Welcome to the next stage of COVID – The Government versus the Scientists – politicalbetting.com

Endillion said:

FF43 said:

Gardenwalker said:

MaxPB said:

Stuartinromford said:

Leon said:

Philip_Thompson said:

Gardenwalker said:

Philip_Thompson said:

FF43 said:

DavidL said:

MikeSmithson said:

Stark_Dawning said:

DavidL said:

NickPalmer said:

alex_ said:

CD13 said:

At the risk of sounding a bit Sheldon Cooperish, Professor Reicher is a psychologist. Why is he sounding off about long Covid? Mission-creep seems an occupational hazard for some experts in other fields.

I can see the scene now ... "Let me through, I've a degree in Expressive Dance.

Yes, we are well used to the media using rent-a-gob backbenchers as a way of apparently giving an insight into Govt policy. It is a very bad development of this pandemic that the media make no attempt to consider an individual’s area of expertise in their rent-a-hobby-scientist approach throughout the pandemic. Simply having an association with an “expert” committee (whether official or unofficial” is deemed sufficient.

It's a general fact of life that a backbencher only gets serious airtime if they're arguing with their party leadership. I took on Mandelson's Millennium Dome in the early days and the media were absolutely all over me - a dozen calls a day. At some point the Government compromised on how it would be funded (I forget the details) and I said that seemed more reasonable. Media enquiries stopped immediately.

LOL. If only our current MPs had such self awareness. Instead there is a group who seem deluded into thinking that what they think actually matters and become addicted to the TV interviews as a way of feeding their massive egos. They become a permanent awkward squad to make sure that they get the attention that they so obviously deserve, apparently oblivious to the fact that they are simply being used to cause controversy and problems for the government they purport to support.

Mrs May is showing alarming tendencies in this direction and she really should know better.

I doubt she loses much sleep over showing insufficient loyalty to friend Boris, what with all the 'controversy and problems' he caused her government, which he purported to support.

If TMay had still been PM far fewer would have died.

You think? Would she have been bold enough to give a blank cheque to the Covid vaccine group under Kate Bingham? Would she even have had the balls to appoint Bingham in the first place? I seriously doubt it.

I also think that the current mess in Scotland demonstrates once again that more lockdowns both in time and extent simply aren't the answer. They may defer some deaths, they don't prevent them.

The vaccine rollout in the UK is a relative success, compared with peer countries, which nevertheless have had mostly a much lower death rate from Covid. The reason for the very high death rate in England in particular isn't hard to find: the unwillingness of the Johnson government to lock down quickly or effectively enough. Would May have dithered in the same catastrophic way? Don't know obviously, but suspect not.

Except its not true. If you look at excess death figures which are the only honest figures, the UK has a lower death rate than even the USA for instance despite the UK being a much more densely packed nation than the naturally socially distanced America - and population density is strongly correlated with death rates.

The USA is a poor comparison, for many of the reasons you actually cite.

What about comparing U.K. with its near, and similarly dense, neighbours?

European countries as per the Economist chart excess deaths per 100k people: https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/coronavirus-excess-deaths-tracker
Note that many of these countries only have figures up to date for months ago, so some miss the second or third waves.

Bulgaria 433
Russia 338
Serbia 320
Lithuania 319
North Macedonia 319
Czech Republic 300
Slovakia 270
Poland 264
Bosnia and Herzegovnia 245
Romania 236
Moldova 231
Hungary 228
Albania 206
Portugal 203
Kosovo 200
Italy 197
Slovenia 185
Britain 180
Croatia 176
Spain 170
Belgium 165
Montenegro 154
Latvia 134
Ukraine 133
Georgia 129
Kyrgyzstan 128
France 126
Estonia 124
Netherlands 117
Switzerland 108
Austria 105
Sweden 102
Germany 63
Malta 51
Luxembourg 50
Greece 38
Finland 18
Denmark -1

So the UK is about middle of the pack, despite being on of the densest nations on the planet. Which means in my opinion the UK has done better than you'd expect all else being equal. Certainly without cherry picking exceptions like Germany, it seems the UK has not done worse or led to a "very high" death rate.

Certainly there's no reason we couldn't have been towards the top of that list with a death rate roughly twice what we have got if we really had done "catastrophically" and without vaccines I imagine that would have been very plausible.

But we had more warning, and we are an island. We had advantages we did not exploit. We should be nearer the bottom of that table

We fucked up on the borders, on that we can all agree

Not just that. Look at the countries that have done worse than the UK. It's a long list, sure, but "better than Bulgaria and Bosnia" isn't saying much. If you take Western European countries as your comparator, the UK has done about 10% better than Italy and Portugal, slightly worse than Spain. And, with great affection for Spain, Spain is not well run.

The countries that we like to compare ourselves with- that we really ought to compare ourselves with- the likes of France, Germany, Benelux, Austria are all doing an awful lot better at keeping people alive.

The UK is not well run either, I think the last year and a half has made that extremely obvious. Anyone trying to say otherwise should have their head examined.

That’s the bloody point.

The comparison is with Benelux, France, and Germany.

Most countries have fucked this up somehow.

We seem to have fucked up more than we ought, and the blame rests with the government.

My takeaway from Philip's figures is that East Europe has had a nightmare. They also have poor vaccination rates. The UK has had one of the worst death rates of the rest.

About a year ago, everyone was talking about how great the Eastern European countries were doing and bemoaning how much worse run the UK was than them. Then they got hit badly by the second wave and suddenly everyone shut up about them. Moral: stop making up narratives purely to fit the facts if you don't really understand the mechanics of why some countries have done better than others. It's complicated, and lots of the factors (% diabetics, age profile, % immunocompromised etc) were out of politician's control.

Foxy said:

HYUFD said:

MaxPB said:

Trigger warning for Labour supporters!

Surely not a problem for new diehard England fan Keir? Has to be seen to get down with the Red Wall don't you know!

https://twitter.com/Keir_Starmer/status/1411415156014395405?s=20
https://twitter.com/Keir_Starmer/status/1411429411535134727?s=20

To be fair on Keir (and I rarely am!) he has a long and well documented history of being a football fan and player, including attending England games, well before being an MP.

Philip_Thompson said:

LostPassword said:

Philip_Thompson said:

LostPassword said:

Philip_Thompson said:

Cyclefree said:

Nigelb said:

Cyclefree said:

Foxy said:

Cyclefree said:

Gardenwalker said:

FPT

My issue with China, apart from the way it treats its own people, is that it advances the authoritarian, anti-democratic surveillance state as a model of development.

Ultimately, that’s a threat to our way of life, or perhaps our children’s way of life.

One of the best things Britain can do, in my opinion, is better uphold democracy, liberty and the rule of law in *this* country, thereby acting as an example to others.

We did this quite well for a hundred years or so.

Fun fact, I was taught by someone later outed as a Chinese spy at University.

Fat chance when we've got Sunak wanting a more "nuanced" relationship with China, "nuanced" meaning "we promise we won't ever criticise you".

The tables have turned since the 19th century. We now allow China to buy up and modernise our infrastructure, and are reliant on Chinese capital and investment.

Gardenwalker said:

Cyclefree said:

Gardenwalker said:

FPT

My issue with China, apart from the way it treats its own people, is that it advances the authoritarian, anti-democratic surveillance state as a model of development.

Ultimately, that’s a threat to our way of life, or perhaps our children’s way of life.

One of the best things Britain can do, in my opinion, is better uphold democracy, liberty and the rule of law in *this* country, thereby acting as an example to others.

We did this quite well for a hundred years or so.

Fun fact, I was taught by someone later outed as a Chinese spy at University.

Fat chance when we've got Sunak wanting a more "nuanced" relationship with China, "nuanced" meaning "we promise we won't ever criticise you".

We do have to live with China somehow. We can’t wish it away. Therefore, I’m reserving judgment on Sunak’s comments.

I don’t even especially think it necessary for the govt to “criticise” China, but I do want it to promote our values, and protect our strategic industries and technologies.

There is a difference between living with a country and bending over and holding our ankles.

Making pacts with the devil is never a good idea. And yes I do believe China under the current regime is a devil. It is a threat to freedom and liberty and democracy. The more we depend on it, the more that will threaten our freedom, liberty and democracy.

Except that the move is now (albeit slight so far) away from dependence. The recent sharp spike in transport costs, and the massive delays in getting some types of goods out of China, have opened quite a few peoples eyes, irrespective of any human rights objections.
Sunak and the government will be judged by their deeds rather than his words; I don't have any great confidence in them either, but we'll see.

I hope so.

Not content with persecuting Uighurs in China, it is now going after Uighurs who have managed to escape abroad.

China is IMO an evil regime and we should sup with them with a very long spoon indeed, if we have to sup with them at all.

Not wanting to do a Godwin but there are alarming parallels between the modern Chinese regime and the Nazi fascists. It doesn't seem beyond the realms of possibility that China will seek a 'final solution' for the Uighur and other 'trouble makers'.

Though there's little new there, communism has always been as bad as fascism though we tend to pay less attention to the worst excesses of Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot. It wouldn't surprise me if years from now Xi is added to that list too.

How people in this day and age can self-identify as communists and not immediately be treated with the same contempt as fascists is beyond me. Two sides of the same authoritarian coin.

If, say, Jeremy Corbyn were to state that he was not anti-Semitic, do you simply accept his words? Quite rightly you do not. You look at his actions and you compare them to your definition of anti-Semitism and you make your judgement.

When I look at the regimes of Stalin, Mao, Castro, etc, and I look at the definition of Communism, do I accept their claims to be leaders of Communist countries? No I do not. There is no meaningful way in which China can be described as Communist, except self-ID. But then you'd also have to accept North Korea as democratic.

Well that's just ridiculous. These are communist countries. Xi maybe not, but the rest were.

Communism requires central control and central control leads to abuses like this. It is most definitely cause and effect.

There is no "good" form of communism.

Communism is about having local democratic control of the economy, as opposed to the economic dictatorship of capitalist owners. It is more democracy.

The self-ID Communist countries all had much less democracy. Not more. Cannot then be Communist by any definition of Communism that I recognise.

Communism is about "the dictatorship of the proletariat" not democracy and that is what the Communist countries have all had, by defining themselves as the proletariat.

Because the reality is that democracy and communism are mutually incompatible because when people have the right to vote and choose for themselves they don't choose communism so the only way for communism to actually work is to do what Marx and Engels called for which is to take and keep power by force.

FF43 said:

Gardenwalker said:

MaxPB said:

Stuartinromford said:

Leon said:

Philip_Thompson said:

Gardenwalker said:

Philip_Thompson said:

FF43 said:

DavidL said:

MikeSmithson said:

Stark_Dawning said:

DavidL said:

NickPalmer said:

alex_ said:

CD13 said:

At the risk of sounding a bit Sheldon Cooperish, Professor Reicher is a psychologist. Why is he sounding off about long Covid? Mission-creep seems an occupational hazard for some experts in other fields.

I can see the scene now ... "Let me through, I've a degree in Expressive Dance.

Yes, we are well used to the media using rent-a-gob backbenchers as a way of apparently giving an insight into Govt policy. It is a very bad development of this pandemic that the media make no attempt to consider an individual’s area of expertise in their rent-a-hobby-scientist approach throughout the pandemic. Simply having an association with an “expert” committee (whether official or unofficial” is deemed sufficient.

It's a general fact of life that a backbencher only gets serious airtime if they're arguing with their party leadership. I took on Mandelson's Millennium Dome in the early days and the media were absolutely all over me - a dozen calls a day. At some point the Government compromised on how it would be funded (I forget the details) and I said that seemed more reasonable. Media enquiries stopped immediately.

LOL. If only our current MPs had such self awareness. Instead there is a group who seem deluded into thinking that what they think actually matters and become addicted to the TV interviews as a way of feeding their massive egos. They become a permanent awkward squad to make sure that they get the attention that they so obviously deserve, apparently oblivious to the fact that they are simply being used to cause controversy and problems for the government they purport to support.

Mrs May is showing alarming tendencies in this direction and she really should know better.

I doubt she loses much sleep over showing insufficient loyalty to friend Boris, what with all the 'controversy and problems' he caused her government, which he purported to support.

If TMay had still been PM far fewer would have died.

You think? Would she have been bold enough to give a blank cheque to the Covid vaccine group under Kate Bingham? Would she even have had the balls to appoint Bingham in the first place? I seriously doubt it.

I also think that the current mess in Scotland demonstrates once again that more lockdowns both in time and extent simply aren't the answer. They may defer some deaths, they don't prevent them.

The vaccine rollout in the UK is a relative success, compared with peer countries, which nevertheless have had mostly a much lower death rate from Covid. The reason for the very high death rate in England in particular isn't hard to find: the unwillingness of the Johnson government to lock down quickly or effectively enough. Would May have dithered in the same catastrophic way? Don't know obviously, but suspect not.

Except its not true. If you look at excess death figures which are the only honest figures, the UK has a lower death rate than even the USA for instance despite the UK being a much more densely packed nation than the naturally socially distanced America - and population density is strongly correlated with death rates.

The USA is a poor comparison, for many of the reasons you actually cite.

What about comparing U.K. with its near, and similarly dense, neighbours?

European countries as per the Economist chart excess deaths per 100k people: https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/coronavirus-excess-deaths-tracker
Note that many of these countries only have figures up to date for months ago, so some miss the second or third waves.

Bulgaria 433
Russia 338
Serbia 320
Lithuania 319
North Macedonia 319
Czech Republic 300
Slovakia 270
Poland 264
Bosnia and Herzegovnia 245
Romania 236
Moldova 231
Hungary 228
Albania 206
Portugal 203
Kosovo 200
Italy 197
Slovenia 185
Britain 180
Croatia 176
Spain 170
Belgium 165
Montenegro 154
Latvia 134
Ukraine 133
Georgia 129
Kyrgyzstan 128
France 126
Estonia 124
Netherlands 117
Switzerland 108
Austria 105
Sweden 102
Germany 63
Malta 51
Luxembourg 50
Greece 38
Finland 18
Denmark -1

So the UK is about middle of the pack, despite being on of the densest nations on the planet. Which means in my opinion the UK has done better than you'd expect all else being equal. Certainly without cherry picking exceptions like Germany, it seems the UK has not done worse or led to a "very high" death rate.

Certainly there's no reason we couldn't have been towards the top of that list with a death rate roughly twice what we have got if we really had done "catastrophically" and without vaccines I imagine that would have been very plausible.

But we had more warning, and we are an island. We had advantages we did not exploit. We should be nearer the bottom of that table

We fucked up on the borders, on that we can all agree

Not just that. Look at the countries that have done worse than the UK. It's a long list, sure, but "better than Bulgaria and Bosnia" isn't saying much. If you take Western European countries as your comparator, the UK has done about 10% better than Italy and Portugal, slightly worse than Spain. And, with great affection for Spain, Spain is not well run.

The countries that we like to compare ourselves with- that we really ought to compare ourselves with- the likes of France, Germany, Benelux, Austria are all doing an awful lot better at keeping people alive.

The UK is not well run either, I think the last year and a half has made that extremely obvious. Anyone trying to say otherwise should have their head examined.

That’s the bloody point.

The comparison is with Benelux, France, and Germany.

Most countries have fucked this up somehow.

We seem to have fucked up more than we ought, and the blame rests with the government.

My takeaway from Philip's figures is that East Europe has had a nightmare. They also have poor vaccination rates. The UK has had one of the worst death rates of the rest.

JosiasJessop said:

Foxy said:

HYUFD said:

MaxPB said:

Trigger warning for Labour supporters!

Surely not a problem for new diehard England fan Keir? Has to be seen to get down with the Red Wall don't you know!

https://twitter.com/Keir_Starmer/status/1411415156014395405?s=20
https://twitter.com/Keir_Starmer/status/1411429411535134727?s=20

To be fair on Keir (and I rarely am!) he has a long and well documented history of being a football fan and player, including attending England games, well before being an MP.

A good reason not to vote for him, then.

Stark_Dawning said:

Philip_Thompson said:

LostPassword said:

Philip_Thompson said:

LostPassword said:

Philip_Thompson said:

Cyclefree said:

Nigelb said:

Cyclefree said:

Foxy said:

Cyclefree said:

Gardenwalker said:

FPT

My issue with China, apart from the way it treats its own people, is that it advances the authoritarian, anti-democratic surveillance state as a model of development.

Ultimately, that’s a threat to our way of life, or perhaps our children’s way of life.

One of the best things Britain can do, in my opinion, is better uphold democracy, liberty and the rule of law in *this* country, thereby acting as an example to others.

We did this quite well for a hundred years or so.

Fun fact, I was taught by someone later outed as a Chinese spy at University.

Fat chance when we've got Sunak wanting a more "nuanced" relationship with China, "nuanced" meaning "we promise we won't ever criticise you".

The tables have turned since the 19th century. We now allow China to buy up and modernise our infrastructure, and are reliant on Chinese capital and investment.

Gardenwalker said:

Cyclefree said:

Gardenwalker said:

FPT

My issue with China, apart from the way it treats its own people, is that it advances the authoritarian, anti-democratic surveillance state as a model of development.

Ultimately, that’s a threat to our way of life, or perhaps our children’s way of life.

One of the best things Britain can do, in my opinion, is better uphold democracy, liberty and the rule of law in *this* country, thereby acting as an example to others.

We did this quite well for a hundred years or so.

Fun fact, I was taught by someone later outed as a Chinese spy at University.

Fat chance when we've got Sunak wanting a more "nuanced" relationship with China, "nuanced" meaning "we promise we won't ever criticise you".

We do have to live with China somehow. We can’t wish it away. Therefore, I’m reserving judgment on Sunak’s comments.

I don’t even especially think it necessary for the govt to “criticise” China, but I do want it to promote our values, and protect our strategic industries and technologies.

There is a difference between living with a country and bending over and holding our ankles.

Making pacts with the devil is never a good idea. And yes I do believe China under the current regime is a devil. It is a threat to freedom and liberty and democracy. The more we depend on it, the more that will threaten our freedom, liberty and democracy.

Except that the move is now (albeit slight so far) away from dependence. The recent sharp spike in transport costs, and the massive delays in getting some types of goods out of China, have opened quite a few peoples eyes, irrespective of any human rights objections.
Sunak and the government will be judged by their deeds rather than his words; I don't have any great confidence in them either, but we'll see.

I hope so.

Not content with persecuting Uighurs in China, it is now going after Uighurs who have managed to escape abroad.

China is IMO an evil regime and we should sup with them with a very long spoon indeed, if we have to sup with them at all.

Not wanting to do a Godwin but there are alarming parallels between the modern Chinese regime and the Nazi fascists. It doesn't seem beyond the realms of possibility that China will seek a 'final solution' for the Uighur and other 'trouble makers'.

Though there's little new there, communism has always been as bad as fascism though we tend to pay less attention to the worst excesses of Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot. It wouldn't surprise me if years from now Xi is added to that list too.

How people in this day and age can self-identify as communists and not immediately be treated with the same contempt as fascists is beyond me. Two sides of the same authoritarian coin.

If, say, Jeremy Corbyn were to state that he was not anti-Semitic, do you simply accept his words? Quite rightly you do not. You look at his actions and you compare them to your definition of anti-Semitism and you make your judgement.

When I look at the regimes of Stalin, Mao, Castro, etc, and I look at the definition of Communism, do I accept their claims to be leaders of Communist countries? No I do not. There is no meaningful way in which China can be described as Communist, except self-ID. But then you'd also have to accept North Korea as democratic.

Well that's just ridiculous. These are communist countries. Xi maybe not, but the rest were.

Communism requires central control and central control leads to abuses like this. It is most definitely cause and effect.

There is no "good" form of communism.

Communism is about having local democratic control of the economy, as opposed to the economic dictatorship of capitalist owners. It is more democracy.

The self-ID Communist countries all had much less democracy. Not more. Cannot then be Communist by any definition of Communism that I recognise.

Communism is about "the dictatorship of the proletariat" not democracy and that is what the Communist countries have all had, by defining themselves as the proletariat.

Because the reality is that democracy and communism are mutually incompatible because when people have the right to vote and choose for themselves they don't choose communism so the only way for communism to actually work is to do what Marx and Engels called for which is to take and keep power by force.

Marx thought that some societies, Britain in particular, could bring about communism by wholly democratic and parliamentary means.

OldKingCole said:

Malmesbury said:

OldKingCole said:

Malmesbury said:

OldKingCole said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Carnyx said:

OldKingCole said:

Cyclefree said:

Nigelb said:

Cyclefree said:

Foxy said:

Cyclefree said:

Gardenwalker said:

FPT

My issue with China, apart from the way it treats its own people, is that it advances the authoritarian, anti-democratic surveillance state as a model of development.

Ultimately, that’s a threat to our way of life, or perhaps our children’s way of life.

One of the best things Britain can do, in my opinion, is better uphold democracy, liberty and the rule of law in *this* country, thereby acting as an example to others.

We did this quite well for a hundred years or so.

Fun fact, I was taught by someone later outed as a Chinese spy at University.

Fat chance when we've got Sunak wanting a more "nuanced" relationship with China, "nuanced" meaning "we promise we won't ever criticise you".

The tables have turned since the 19th century. We now allow China to buy up and modernise our infrastructure, and are reliant on Chinese capital and investment.

Gardenwalker said:

Cyclefree said:

Gardenwalker said:

FPT

My issue with China, apart from the way it treats its own people, is that it advances the authoritarian, anti-democratic surveillance state as a model of development.

Ultimately, that’s a threat to our way of life, or perhaps our children’s way of life.

One of the best things Britain can do, in my opinion, is better uphold democracy, liberty and the rule of law in *this* country, thereby acting as an example to others.

We did this quite well for a hundred years or so.

Fun fact, I was taught by someone later outed as a Chinese spy at University.

Fat chance when we've got Sunak wanting a more "nuanced" relationship with China, "nuanced" meaning "we promise we won't ever criticise you".

We do have to live with China somehow. We can’t wish it away. Therefore, I’m reserving judgment on Sunak’s comments.

I don’t even especially think it necessary for the govt to “criticise” China, but I do want it to promote our values, and protect our strategic industries and technologies.

There is a difference between living with a country and bending over and holding our ankles.

Making pacts with the devil is never a good idea. And yes I do believe China under the current regime is a devil. It is a threat to freedom and liberty and democracy. The more we depend on it, the more that will threaten our freedom, liberty and democracy.

Except that the move is now (albeit slight so far) away from dependence. The recent sharp spike in transport costs, and the massive delays in getting some types of goods out of China, have opened quite a few peoples eyes, irrespective of any human rights objections.
Sunak and the government will be judged by their deeds rather than his words; I don't have any great confidence in them either, but we'll see.

I hope so.

Not content with persecuting Uighurs in China, it is now going after Uighurs who have managed to escape abroad.

China is IMO an evil regime and we should sup with them with a very long spoon indeed, if we have to sup with them at all.

I forget where I read it, but I found somewhere a suggestion ..... from someone who thought about these things ..... that today's Chinese leaders may describe themselves as Communists, but they are in fact in the long tradition of Emperors, and that they, perhaps subconsciously, believe that the Han are the superior group in humanity, and that everyone else should try to become Han, or to be made Han.

For their own good!

That's not saying that I disagree with Ms Cyclefree, that we should be very, very cautious in our dealing with the Chinese Government. I'm say that we ought to be very careful in our dealing with any Chinese Government, and that caution should take into account the fact that while the current Government may be Communist, it's still Chinese, and remembers the indignities heaped upon the country by 19th & early 20th Century Westerners.

And a somewhat belated Good Morning everyone!

Morning! Just reading a history of the siege of the German base in Tsingtao (as it was called then) by the Japanese in WW1. The Germans just rocked up in the 1890s and said 'we'll have our base here, thank you very much' - in the ensuing disputes, they paid serious attention only to the other Western (incl Russia) governments.

Which reminds me, the Japanese also were honorary Westerners. Which puts an interesting light, from the Chine3se point of view, on the current discussions in Japan over whether to deal with the Taiwan issue by allying with the USA.

Most people do forget - or never knew - that the Japanese were our allies in WW1. I have a fascinating account by a soldier of the machine gun corps crossing the Mediterranean from Marseille to Egypt in 1918 and their ship being protected by a couple of Japanese destroyers hunting for Austro-Hungarian submarines.

Why the Japanese changed sides is also fascinating. According to an Australian expert (at least, that was how he was introduced) at the River Kwai in Thailand post WWI the USA didn't want the British 'interfering' in North Pacific affairs.

No, that's not what happened.

In the aftermath of WWI, the idea was to remove all the things that had caused WWI. Or rather, the things that people thought had caused WWI

So treaties on the limitation of armaments, and the ending of various military pacts.

The idea was that the UK/Japanese alliance could conceivably threaten the US in the Pacific. Without the alliance, no one power could really threaten the other, providing the naval treaties were held to.

The Japanese government was taken over, starting in the 20s, by ever more extreme and Fascist elements, who regarded anything other than more battleships than everyone else on the planet, plus conquering China plus plus as evil and weak.

The idea that the British and Americans had done the dirty on them was their version of the "stab in the back" myth. The reality was that japan thing to conquer China was a farcical idea. But reality wasn't their strong suit.

In fact, the naval treaties and arms limitation worked in Japans favour. They never had even a fraction of the industrial capability required to build the insane fleet the militarists wanted.

Once the treaties were ditched and the Americans started building ships at economic capacity (not even max'd out!) this was spelled out.

Thanks for that. One of these days I'm going to have a read round the subject. I was on a train trip from Bangkok to Singapore and one of the 'attractions' was a stop at Kanchanaburi, a trip on the river, and a lecture, as I said, from someone whom we were told was an Australian academic working with the Museum.

The thing to understand is that, even by the standards of fascism, the Japanese militarists were demented fuckwits.

Read the Hagakure - a homage to the joy joy of The Samurai, written by a fanatic, long after the real Samurai age had ended. The Japanese fascists loved it.....

Beautiful failure is better than the wrong kind of success is the message. Oh, and long live death!

Read it and you can really understand Banzai charges......

Much obliged.
The fact that some of them seriously thought about fighting on after Nagasaki says something about them.

FrancisUrquhart said:

NEW: Indonesia reports 34,379 new coronavirus cases, the biggest one-day increase so far, and a record 1,040 new deaths

kamski said:

DavidL said:

Roger said:

I've not been following the pandemic in any sort of detail. Just listening to the news and government spokespeople. While our vaccine program was purring like a Ferrari Europe's were limping along like a Lada Riva with a puncture. Tory poster's on here have been crowing about our ingenuity and delighting in our good fortune at being-dare I say it-BRITISH!

1. FIRST in Europe for total number of cases.
2. FIRST in Europe for total number of deaths.
3. FIRST in Europe for total of NEW cases.
4. FIRST in Europe for total number of NEW deaths.

Roger, this is just total nonsense.
1. France and Russia have both had more cases
2. Russia has more deaths, on a per million analysis there are a host of countries ahead of us.
3. Russia has more new cases. And we do massively more testing than anyone else.
4. Total rubbish. In the last 7 days Italy, Germany and France (as well as Russia) have all had more deaths than us.

Why do you write this stuff?

Does the UK do *massively* more testing than *anyone* else?

Anabobazina said:

JosiasJessop said:

Foxy said:

HYUFD said:

MaxPB said:

Trigger warning for Labour supporters!

Surely not a problem for new diehard England fan Keir? Has to be seen to get down with the Red Wall don't you know!

https://twitter.com/Keir_Starmer/status/1411415156014395405?s=20
https://twitter.com/Keir_Starmer/status/1411429411535134727?s=20

To be fair on Keir (and I rarely am!) he has a long and well documented history of being a football fan and player, including attending England games, well before being an MP.

A good reason not to vote for him, then.

Why?

Malmesbury said:

OldKingCole said:

Malmesbury said:

OldKingCole said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Carnyx said:

OldKingCole said:

Cyclefree said:

Nigelb said:

Cyclefree said:

Foxy said:

Cyclefree said:

Gardenwalker said:

FPT

My issue with China, apart from the way it treats its own people, is that it advances the authoritarian, anti-democratic surveillance state as a model of development.

Ultimately, that’s a threat to our way of life, or perhaps our children’s way of life.

One of the best things Britain can do, in my opinion, is better uphold democracy, liberty and the rule of law in *this* country, thereby acting as an example to others.

We did this quite well for a hundred years or so.

Fun fact, I was taught by someone later outed as a Chinese spy at University.

Fat chance when we've got Sunak wanting a more "nuanced" relationship with China, "nuanced" meaning "we promise we won't ever criticise you".

The tables have turned since the 19th century. We now allow China to buy up and modernise our infrastructure, and are reliant on Chinese capital and investment.

Gardenwalker said:

Cyclefree said:

Gardenwalker said:

FPT

My issue with China, apart from the way it treats its own people, is that it advances the authoritarian, anti-democratic surveillance state as a model of development.

Ultimately, that’s a threat to our way of life, or perhaps our children’s way of life.

One of the best things Britain can do, in my opinion, is better uphold democracy, liberty and the rule of law in *this* country, thereby acting as an example to others.

We did this quite well for a hundred years or so.

Fun fact, I was taught by someone later outed as a Chinese spy at University.

Fat chance when we've got Sunak wanting a more "nuanced" relationship with China, "nuanced" meaning "we promise we won't ever criticise you".

We do have to live with China somehow. We can’t wish it away. Therefore, I’m reserving judgment on Sunak’s comments.

I don’t even especially think it necessary for the govt to “criticise” China, but I do want it to promote our values, and protect our strategic industries and technologies.

There is a difference between living with a country and bending over and holding our ankles.

Making pacts with the devil is never a good idea. And yes I do believe China under the current regime is a devil. It is a threat to freedom and liberty and democracy. The more we depend on it, the more that will threaten our freedom, liberty and democracy.

Except that the move is now (albeit slight so far) away from dependence. The recent sharp spike in transport costs, and the massive delays in getting some types of goods out of China, have opened quite a few peoples eyes, irrespective of any human rights objections.
Sunak and the government will be judged by their deeds rather than his words; I don't have any great confidence in them either, but we'll see.

I hope so.

Not content with persecuting Uighurs in China, it is now going after Uighurs who have managed to escape abroad.

China is IMO an evil regime and we should sup with them with a very long spoon indeed, if we have to sup with them at all.

I forget where I read it, but I found somewhere a suggestion ..... from someone who thought about these things ..... that today's Chinese leaders may describe themselves as Communists, but they are in fact in the long tradition of Emperors, and that they, perhaps subconsciously, believe that the Han are the superior group in humanity, and that everyone else should try to become Han, or to be made Han.

For their own good!

That's not saying that I disagree with Ms Cyclefree, that we should be very, very cautious in our dealing with the Chinese Government. I'm say that we ought to be very careful in our dealing with any Chinese Government, and that caution should take into account the fact that while the current Government may be Communist, it's still Chinese, and remembers the indignities heaped upon the country by 19th & early 20th Century Westerners.

And a somewhat belated Good Morning everyone!

Morning! Just reading a history of the siege of the German base in Tsingtao (as it was called then) by the Japanese in WW1. The Germans just rocked up in the 1890s and said 'we'll have our base here, thank you very much' - in the ensuing disputes, they paid serious attention only to the other Western (incl Russia) governments.

Which reminds me, the Japanese also were honorary Westerners. Which puts an interesting light, from the Chine3se point of view, on the current discussions in Japan over whether to deal with the Taiwan issue by allying with the USA.

Most people do forget - or never knew - that the Japanese were our allies in WW1. I have a fascinating account by a soldier of the machine gun corps crossing the Mediterranean from Marseille to Egypt in 1918 and their ship being protected by a couple of Japanese destroyers hunting for Austro-Hungarian submarines.

Why the Japanese changed sides is also fascinating. According to an Australian expert (at least, that was how he was introduced) at the River Kwai in Thailand post WWI the USA didn't want the British 'interfering' in North Pacific affairs.

No, that's not what happened.

In the aftermath of WWI, the idea was to remove all the things that had caused WWI. Or rather, the things that people thought had caused WWI

So treaties on the limitation of armaments, and the ending of various military pacts.

The idea was that the UK/Japanese alliance could conceivably threaten the US in the Pacific. Without the alliance, no one power could really threaten the other, providing the naval treaties were held to.

The Japanese government was taken over, starting in the 20s, by ever more extreme and Fascist elements, who regarded anything other than more battleships than everyone else on the planet, plus conquering China plus plus as evil and weak.

The idea that the British and Americans had done the dirty on them was their version of the "stab in the back" myth. The reality was that japan thing to conquer China was a farcical idea. But reality wasn't their strong suit.

In fact, the naval treaties and arms limitation worked in Japans favour. They never had even a fraction of the industrial capability required to build the insane fleet the militarists wanted.

Once the treaties were ditched and the Americans started building ships at economic capacity (not even max'd out!) this was spelled out.

Thanks for that. One of these days I'm going to have a read round the subject. I was on a train trip from Bangkok to Singapore and one of the 'attractions' was a stop at Kanchanaburi, a trip on the river, and a lecture, as I said, from someone whom we were told was an Australian academic working with the Museum.

The thing to understand is that, even by the standards of fascism, the Japanese militarists were demented fuckwits.

Read the Hagakure - a homage to the joy joy of The Samurai, written by a fanatic, long after the real Samurai age had ended. The Japanese fascists loved it.....

Beautiful failure is better than the wrong kind of success is the message. Oh, and long live death!

Read it and you can really understand Banzai charges......

Theuniondivvie said:

Carnyx said:

OldKingCole said:

Cyclefree said:

Nigelb said:

Cyclefree said:

Foxy said:

Cyclefree said:

Gardenwalker said:

FPT

My issue with China, apart from the way it treats its own people, is that it advances the authoritarian, anti-democratic surveillance state as a model of development.

Ultimately, that’s a threat to our way of life, or perhaps our children’s way of life.

One of the best things Britain can do, in my opinion, is better uphold democracy, liberty and the rule of law in *this* country, thereby acting as an example to others.

We did this quite well for a hundred years or so.

Fun fact, I was taught by someone later outed as a Chinese spy at University.

Fat chance when we've got Sunak wanting a more "nuanced" relationship with China, "nuanced" meaning "we promise we won't ever criticise you".

The tables have turned since the 19th century. We now allow China to buy up and modernise our infrastructure, and are reliant on Chinese capital and investment.

Gardenwalker said:

Cyclefree said:

Gardenwalker said:

FPT

My issue with China, apart from the way it treats its own people, is that it advances the authoritarian, anti-democratic surveillance state as a model of development.

Ultimately, that’s a threat to our way of life, or perhaps our children’s way of life.

One of the best things Britain can do, in my opinion, is better uphold democracy, liberty and the rule of law in *this* country, thereby acting as an example to others.

We did this quite well for a hundred years or so.

Fun fact, I was taught by someone later outed as a Chinese spy at University.

Fat chance when we've got Sunak wanting a more "nuanced" relationship with China, "nuanced" meaning "we promise we won't ever criticise you".

We do have to live with China somehow. We can’t wish it away. Therefore, I’m reserving judgment on Sunak’s comments.

I don’t even especially think it necessary for the govt to “criticise” China, but I do want it to promote our values, and protect our strategic industries and technologies.

There is a difference between living with a country and bending over and holding our ankles.

Making pacts with the devil is never a good idea. And yes I do believe China under the current regime is a devil. It is a threat to freedom and liberty and democracy. The more we depend on it, the more that will threaten our freedom, liberty and democracy.

Except that the move is now (albeit slight so far) away from dependence. The recent sharp spike in transport costs, and the massive delays in getting some types of goods out of China, have opened quite a few peoples eyes, irrespective of any human rights objections.
Sunak and the government will be judged by their deeds rather than his words; I don't have any great confidence in them either, but we'll see.

I hope so.

Not content with persecuting Uighurs in China, it is now going after Uighurs who have managed to escape abroad.

China is IMO an evil regime and we should sup with them with a very long spoon indeed, if we have to sup with them at all.

I forget where I read it, but I found somewhere a suggestion ..... from someone who thought about these things ..... that today's Chinese leaders may describe themselves as Communists, but they are in fact in the long tradition of Emperors, and that they, perhaps subconsciously, believe that the Han are the superior group in humanity, and that everyone else should try to become Han, or to be made Han.

For their own good!

That's not saying that I disagree with Ms Cyclefree, that we should be very, very cautious in our dealing with the Chinese Government. I'm say that we ought to be very careful in our dealing with any Chinese Government, and that caution should take into account the fact that while the current Government may be Communist, it's still Chinese, and remembers the indignities heaped upon the country by 19th & early 20th Century Westerners.

And a somewhat belated Good Morning everyone!

Morning! Just reading a history of the siege of the German base in Tsingtao (as it was called then) by the Japanese in WW1. The Germans just rocked up in the 1890s and said 'we'll have our base here, thank you very much' - in the ensuing disputes, they paid serious attention only to the other Western (incl Russia) governments.

Which reminds me, the Japanese also were honorary Westerners. Which puts an interesting light, from the Chine3se point of view, on the current discussions in Japan over whether to deal with the Taiwan issue by allying with the USA.

And the beer (Tsingtao) remains, founded by German brewers. I think there’s an argument to be made that brewing was Germany’s great gift to the world, though sadly many of the brands like Tsingtao have abandoned the Reinheitsgebot brewing purity laws.

Carnyx said:

Theuniondivvie said:

RochdalePioneers said:

*sits back and opens a huge bag of popcorn at south of the wall antics*

Meanwhile north of the wall, the Tory nob cheese Transport spokesman Graham Simpson whines "The SNP have taken their eye off the ball and the virus is threatening to spiral out of control in Scotland" - this apparently being a threat to Scottish summer holidays abroad which if he hadn't noticed started the week before last.

‘north of the wall, the Tory nob cheese Transport spokesman Graham Simpson whines’

You seem to have settled in well 🙂

I quite liked Mr Simpson's colleague who complained about the fall in testing at Scottish schools over the period in question ...

Anabobazina said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

NEW: Indonesia reports 34,379 new coronavirus cases, the biggest one-day increase so far, and a record 1,040 new deaths

Do you do a daily trawl for the worst figures globally Francis? It seems so...

JosiasJessop said:

Having said that, I hope England win, if only because it matters to so many people in this country.

CarlottaVance said:

Classic:

Reporter: 'What would it mean to you guys to stop it from coming home?'

#Den's Kasper Schmeichel: 'Has it ever been home?'

https://twitter.com/guardian_sport/status/1412705035184713730?s=20

TheWhiteRabbit said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

DavidL said:

I think that England will win tonight. Beating the Italian side we saw last night, certainly in the first 90 minutes, is an entirely different proposition.

Apparently Southgate is concerned about Denmark, such that he might go more defensive again, possibly 3 holding midfielders. My fear is England don't create and we end up with penalties or that they finally concede and then switching from deliberately slow defensive approach to having to up the tempo / attacking footballer is hard.

Four at the back, 2 and a half holding midfielders is certainly one option, with Mount prepared to drop deep.

Surely even Mr Southgate won't play five at the back and do that. (It could still be Mount, in a more usual supporting-the-flanks role)

kamski said:

DavidL said:

kamski said:

DavidL said:

Roger said:

I've not been following the pandemic in any sort of detail. Just listening to the news and government spokespeople. While our vaccine program was purring like a Ferrari Europe's were limping along like a Lada Riva with a puncture. Tory poster's on here have been crowing about our ingenuity and delighting in our good fortune at being-dare I say it-BRITISH!

1. FIRST in Europe for total number of cases.
2. FIRST in Europe for total number of deaths.
3. FIRST in Europe for total of NEW cases.
4. FIRST in Europe for total number of NEW deaths.

Roger, this is just total nonsense.
1. France and Russia have both had more cases
2. Russia has more deaths, on a per million analysis there are a host of countries ahead of us.
3. Russia has more new cases. And we do massively more testing than anyone else.
4. Total rubbish. In the last 7 days Italy, Germany and France (as well as Russia) have all had more deaths than us.

Why do you write this stuff?

Does the UK do *massively* more testing than *anyone* else?

In quantity yes. If you go on to worldometer and highlight the tests per million there are a number of European countries who do more tests per million but they are all small. Denmark and Austria are the arguable exceptions, the others being Cyprus, Gibraltar, Luxembourg. We have done 219m tests. France has done 95m, Italy 72m, Germany 63m. Its hardly surprising that we have more positive results than they do.

Once again, you are comparing UK pcr plus antigen with just pcr (at least as far as Germany is concerned).

JosiasJessop said:

Scott_xP said:

JosiasJessop said:

Having said that, I hope England win, if only because it matters to so many people in this country.

Which country? That's the problem...

Johnson is making a mistake aligning himself so closely with England. He's PM of the UK and while his words might be transferable to other Home Nations, his gestures are not. He should therefore stick to words.
https://twitter.com/DavidHerdson/status/1412701865872089095

https://twitter.com/BorisJohnson/status/1412684618143342595

Oh, hush. Johnson could cure cancer and you'd argue that the fiend hadn't found a cure for HIV, measles or BDS yet.

IshmaelZ said:

Nigelb said:

Leon said:

Northern_Al said:

I think I've spotted the fatal flaw in the government's approach: the idea that it's best to have this wave in summer, when transmission is reduced by people being outside.

Down here on the south coast the weather is awful. My wife has just got out her winter clothes. Few people are venturing out, and the beer gardens are empty. It's been like this for most of the "summer". Miserable: the opposite of last year.

*typing in my Majorcan garden*

Actually, last summer was pretty mediocre. Your memories are probably coloured by the extraordinarily dry, warm and sunny spell in spring, which continued into June. But then stopped.

This does look like quite a traditional shit British summer, however. I doubt if we will hit 30C again now

Except that June, despite the rain, was the fourth warmest on record.

good point if you think warm rain = good weather.

Philip_Thompson said:

Slackbladder said:

Philip_Thompson said:

LostPassword said:

Philip_Thompson said:

LostPassword said:

Philip_Thompson said:

Cyclefree said:

Nigelb said:

Cyclefree said:

Foxy said:

Cyclefree said:

Gardenwalker said:

FPT

My issue with China, apart from the way it treats its own people, is that it advances the authoritarian, anti-democratic surveillance state as a model of development.

Ultimately, that’s a threat to our way of life, or perhaps our children’s way of life.

One of the best things Britain can do, in my opinion, is better uphold democracy, liberty and the rule of law in *this* country, thereby acting as an example to others.

We did this quite well for a hundred years or so.

Fun fact, I was taught by someone later outed as a Chinese spy at University.

Fat chance when we've got Sunak wanting a more "nuanced" relationship with China, "nuanced" meaning "we promise we won't ever criticise you".

The tables have turned since the 19th century. We now allow China to buy up and modernise our infrastructure, and are reliant on Chinese capital and investment.

Gardenwalker said:

Cyclefree said:

Gardenwalker said:

FPT

My issue with China, apart from the way it treats its own people, is that it advances the authoritarian, anti-democratic surveillance state as a model of development.

Ultimately, that’s a threat to our way of life, or perhaps our children’s way of life.

One of the best things Britain can do, in my opinion, is better uphold democracy, liberty and the rule of law in *this* country, thereby acting as an example to others.

We did this quite well for a hundred years or so.

Fun fact, I was taught by someone later outed as a Chinese spy at University.

Fat chance when we've got Sunak wanting a more "nuanced" relationship with China, "nuanced" meaning "we promise we won't ever criticise you".

We do have to live with China somehow. We can’t wish it away. Therefore, I’m reserving judgment on Sunak’s comments.

I don’t even especially think it necessary for the govt to “criticise” China, but I do want it to promote our values, and protect our strategic industries and technologies.

There is a difference between living with a country and bending over and holding our ankles.

Making pacts with the devil is never a good idea. And yes I do believe China under the current regime is a devil. It is a threat to freedom and liberty and democracy. The more we depend on it, the more that will threaten our freedom, liberty and democracy.

Except that the move is now (albeit slight so far) away from dependence. The recent sharp spike in transport costs, and the massive delays in getting some types of goods out of China, have opened quite a few peoples eyes, irrespective of any human rights objections.
Sunak and the government will be judged by their deeds rather than his words; I don't have any great confidence in them either, but we'll see.

I hope so.

Not content with persecuting Uighurs in China, it is now going after Uighurs who have managed to escape abroad.

China is IMO an evil regime and we should sup with them with a very long spoon indeed, if we have to sup with them at all.

Not wanting to do a Godwin but there are alarming parallels between the modern Chinese regime and the Nazi fascists. It doesn't seem beyond the realms of possibility that China will seek a 'final solution' for the Uighur and other 'trouble makers'.

Though there's little new there, communism has always been as bad as fascism though we tend to pay less attention to the worst excesses of Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot. It wouldn't surprise me if years from now Xi is added to that list too.

How people in this day and age can self-identify as communists and not immediately be treated with the same contempt as fascists is beyond me. Two sides of the same authoritarian coin.

If, say, Jeremy Corbyn were to state that he was not anti-Semitic, do you simply accept his words? Quite rightly you do not. You look at his actions and you compare them to your definition of anti-Semitism and you make your judgement.

When I look at the regimes of Stalin, Mao, Castro, etc, and I look at the definition of Communism, do I accept their claims to be leaders of Communist countries? No I do not. There is no meaningful way in which China can be described as Communist, except self-ID. But then you'd also have to accept North Korea as democratic.

Well that's just ridiculous. These are communist countries. Xi maybe not, but the rest were.

Communism requires central control and central control leads to abuses like this. It is most definitely cause and effect.

There is no "good" form of communism.

Communism is about having local democratic control of the economy, as opposed to the economic dictatorship of capitalist owners. It is more democracy.

The self-ID Communist countries all had much less democracy. Not more. Cannot then be Communist by any definition of Communism that I recognise.

Communism is about "the dictatorship of the proletariat" not democracy and that is what the Communist countries have all had, by defining themselves as the proletariat.

Because the reality is that democracy and communism are mutually incompatible because when people have the right to vote and choose for themselves they don't choose communism so the only way for communism to actually work is to do what Marx and Engels called for which is to take and keep power by force.

It is true that a mixed economy can easily exist in a capitalist structure, but cannot in a communist structure.

Communism is very much an all or nothing it seems, and the moment cracks appear, it breaks down. Hence the need for authoritarian control.

And LostPassword is very wrong that Marx and Engels literally called for authoritarian control.

Quite simply communism is evil and authoritarian and it doesn't work. Its not that communist countries weren't communist enough.

NerysHughes said:

The thing to always remember is that the UK is world leading when it comes to counting.

Anyone who believes France's figures is deluded. Many more cases, currently 4 times as many people in hospital with Covid, was sometimes 10 times more, yet less deaths. Do they have a secret new treatment for Covid or are they not counting deaths properly?

Carnyx said:

Malmesbury said:

OldKingCole said:

Malmesbury said:

OldKingCole said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Carnyx said:

OldKingCole said:

Cyclefree said:

Nigelb said:

Cyclefree said:

Foxy said:

Cyclefree said:

Gardenwalker said:

FPT

My issue with China, apart from the way it treats its own people, is that it advances the authoritarian, anti-democratic surveillance state as a model of development.

Ultimately, that’s a threat to our way of life, or perhaps our children’s way of life.

One of the best things Britain can do, in my opinion, is better uphold democracy, liberty and the rule of law in *this* country, thereby acting as an example to others.

We did this quite well for a hundred years or so.

Fun fact, I was taught by someone later outed as a Chinese spy at University.

Fat chance when we've got Sunak wanting a more "nuanced" relationship with China, "nuanced" meaning "we promise we won't ever criticise you".

The tables have turned since the 19th century. We now allow China to buy up and modernise our infrastructure, and are reliant on Chinese capital and investment.

Gardenwalker said:

Cyclefree said:

Gardenwalker said:

FPT

My issue with China, apart from the way it treats its own people, is that it advances the authoritarian, anti-democratic surveillance state as a model of development.

Ultimately, that’s a threat to our way of life, or perhaps our children’s way of life.

One of the best things Britain can do, in my opinion, is better uphold democracy, liberty and the rule of law in *this* country, thereby acting as an example to others.

We did this quite well for a hundred years or so.

Fun fact, I was taught by someone later outed as a Chinese spy at University.

Fat chance when we've got Sunak wanting a more "nuanced" relationship with China, "nuanced" meaning "we promise we won't ever criticise you".

We do have to live with China somehow. We can’t wish it away. Therefore, I’m reserving judgment on Sunak’s comments.

I don’t even especially think it necessary for the govt to “criticise” China, but I do want it to promote our values, and protect our strategic industries and technologies.

There is a difference between living with a country and bending over and holding our ankles.

Making pacts with the devil is never a good idea. And yes I do believe China under the current regime is a devil. It is a threat to freedom and liberty and democracy. The more we depend on it, the more that will threaten our freedom, liberty and democracy.

Except that the move is now (albeit slight so far) away from dependence. The recent sharp spike in transport costs, and the massive delays in getting some types of goods out of China, have opened quite a few peoples eyes, irrespective of any human rights objections.
Sunak and the government will be judged by their deeds rather than his words; I don't have any great confidence in them either, but we'll see.

I hope so.

Not content with persecuting Uighurs in China, it is now going after Uighurs who have managed to escape abroad.

China is IMO an evil regime and we should sup with them with a very long spoon indeed, if we have to sup with them at all.

I forget where I read it, but I found somewhere a suggestion ..... from someone who thought about these things ..... that today's Chinese leaders may describe themselves as Communists, but they are in fact in the long tradition of Emperors, and that they, perhaps subconsciously, believe that the Han are the superior group in humanity, and that everyone else should try to become Han, or to be made Han.

For their own good!

That's not saying that I disagree with Ms Cyclefree, that we should be very, very cautious in our dealing with the Chinese Government. I'm say that we ought to be very careful in our dealing with any Chinese Government, and that caution should take into account the fact that while the current Government may be Communist, it's still Chinese, and remembers the indignities heaped upon the country by 19th & early 20th Century Westerners.

And a somewhat belated Good Morning everyone!

Morning! Just reading a history of the siege of the German base in Tsingtao (as it was called then) by the Japanese in WW1. The Germans just rocked up in the 1890s and said 'we'll have our base here, thank you very much' - in the ensuing disputes, they paid serious attention only to the other Western (incl Russia) governments.

Which reminds me, the Japanese also were honorary Westerners. Which puts an interesting light, from the Chine3se point of view, on the current discussions in Japan over whether to deal with the Taiwan issue by allying with the USA.

Most people do forget - or never knew - that the Japanese were our allies in WW1. I have a fascinating account by a soldier of the machine gun corps crossing the Mediterranean from Marseille to Egypt in 1918 and their ship being protected by a couple of Japanese destroyers hunting for Austro-Hungarian submarines.

Why the Japanese changed sides is also fascinating. According to an Australian expert (at least, that was how he was introduced) at the River Kwai in Thailand post WWI the USA didn't want the British 'interfering' in North Pacific affairs.

No, that's not what happened.

In the aftermath of WWI, the idea was to remove all the things that had caused WWI. Or rather, the things that people thought had caused WWI

So treaties on the limitation of armaments, and the ending of various military pacts.

The idea was that the UK/Japanese alliance could conceivably threaten the US in the Pacific. Without the alliance, no one power could really threaten the other, providing the naval treaties were held to.

The Japanese government was taken over, starting in the 20s, by ever more extreme and Fascist elements, who regarded anything other than more battleships than everyone else on the planet, plus conquering China plus plus as evil and weak.

The idea that the British and Americans had done the dirty on them was their version of the "stab in the back" myth. The reality was that japan thing to conquer China was a farcical idea. But reality wasn't their strong suit.

In fact, the naval treaties and arms limitation worked in Japans favour. They never had even a fraction of the industrial capability required to build the insane fleet the militarists wanted.

Once the treaties were ditched and the Americans started building ships at economic capacity (not even max'd out!) this was spelled out.

Thanks for that. One of these days I'm going to have a read round the subject. I was on a train trip from Bangkok to Singapore and one of the 'attractions' was a stop at Kanchanaburi, a trip on the river, and a lecture, as I said, from someone whom we were told was an Australian academic working with the Museum.

The thing to understand is that, even by the standards of fascism, the Japanese militarists were demented fuckwits.

Read the Hagakure - a homage to the joy joy of The Samurai, written by a fanatic, long after the real Samurai age had ended. The Japanese fascists loved it.....

Beautiful failure is better than the wrong kind of success is the message. Oh, and long live death!

Read it and you can really understand Banzai charges......

Indeed.

The fall of the cherry blossom is one of the great elegiac symbols of Japanese culture.

This is what they gave the name of 'Cherry Blossom':a purpose-designed kamikaze rocket (or jet) missile:

https://airandspace.si.edu/collection-objects/kugisho-mxy7-ohka-cherry-blossom-22/nasm_A19480180000

Anabobazina said:

IshmaelZ said:

Nigelb said:

Leon said:

Northern_Al said:

I think I've spotted the fatal flaw in the government's approach: the idea that it's best to have this wave in summer, when transmission is reduced by people being outside.

Down here on the south coast the weather is awful. My wife has just got out her winter clothes. Few people are venturing out, and the beer gardens are empty. It's been like this for most of the "summer". Miserable: the opposite of last year.

*typing in my Majorcan garden*

Actually, last summer was pretty mediocre. Your memories are probably coloured by the extraordinarily dry, warm and sunny spell in spring, which continued into June. But then stopped.

This does look like quite a traditional shit British summer, however. I doubt if we will hit 30C again now

Except that June, despite the rain, was the fourth warmest on record.

good point if you think warm rain = good weather.

WRONG

June was also drier than average.

PB Weather Experts strike back.

IshmaelZ said:

Nigelb said:

Leon said:

Northern_Al said:

I think I've spotted the fatal flaw in the government's approach: the idea that it's best to have this wave in summer, when transmission is reduced by people being outside.

Down here on the south coast the weather is awful. My wife has just got out her winter clothes. Few people are venturing out, and the beer gardens are empty. It's been like this for most of the "summer". Miserable: the opposite of last year.

*typing in my Majorcan garden*

Actually, last summer was pretty mediocre. Your memories are probably coloured by the extraordinarily dry, warm and sunny spell in spring, which continued into June. But then stopped.

This does look like quite a traditional shit British summer, however. I doubt if we will hit 30C again now

Except that June, despite the rain, was the fourth warmest on record.

good point if you think warm rain = good weather.

Anabobazina said:

IshmaelZ said:

Nigelb said:

Leon said:

Northern_Al said:

I think I've spotted the fatal flaw in the government's approach: the idea that it's best to have this wave in summer, when transmission is reduced by people being outside.

Down here on the south coast the weather is awful. My wife has just got out her winter clothes. Few people are venturing out, and the beer gardens are empty. It's been like this for most of the "summer". Miserable: the opposite of last year.

*typing in my Majorcan garden*

Actually, last summer was pretty mediocre. Your memories are probably coloured by the extraordinarily dry, warm and sunny spell in spring, which continued into June. But then stopped.

This does look like quite a traditional shit British summer, however. I doubt if we will hit 30C again now

Except that June, despite the rain, was the fourth warmest on record.

good point if you think warm rain = good weather.

WRONG

June was also drier than average.

PB Weather Experts strike back.

Philip_Thompson said:

Jonathan said:

Attacks on Roger upthread are somewhat pathetic. Challenging him on the basis that the whole of Russia is in Europe is a little silly.

Sillier still is to ignore his substantial point. Some of the UK Covid numbers are poor and almost certainly poorer than they needed to be.

We need to face up to that reality as well as the celebrating what went well. Who knows, we might learn something useful.

All of his numbers were total bullshit though, transparent lies. Apart from one meaningless one he misunderstood.

If you're going to spread outright lies and untruths, expect to be called out on it.

Philip_Thompson said:

FF43 said:

Philip_Thompson said:

FF43 said:

Gardenwalker said:

MaxPB said:

Stuartinromford said:

Leon said:

Philip_Thompson said:

European countries as per the Economist chart excess deaths per 100k people: https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/coronavirus-excess-deaths-tracker
Note that many of these countries only have figures up to date for months ago, so some miss the second or third waves.

Bulgaria 433
Russia 338
Serbia 320
Lithuania 319
North Macedonia 319
Czech Republic 300
Slovakia 270
Poland 264
Bosnia and Herzegovnia 245
Romania 236
Moldova 231
Hungary 228
Albania 206
Portugal 203
Kosovo 200
Italy 197
Slovenia 185
Britain 180
Croatia 176
Spain 170
Belgium 165
Montenegro 154
Latvia 134
Ukraine 133
Georgia 129
Kyrgyzstan 128
France 126
Estonia 124
Netherlands 117
Switzerland 108
Austria 105
Sweden 102
Germany 63
Malta 51
Luxembourg 50
Greece 38
Finland 18
Denmark -1

So the UK is about middle of the pack, despite being on of the densest nations on the planet. Which means in my opinion the UK has done better than you'd expect all else being equal. Certainly without cherry picking exceptions like Germany, it seems the UK has not done worse or led to a "very high" death rate.

Certainly there's no reason we couldn't have been towards the top of that list with a death rate roughly twice what we have got if we really had done "catastrophically" and without vaccines I imagine that would have been very plausible.

But we had more warning, and we are an island. We had advantages we did not exploit. We should be nearer the bottom of that table

We fucked up on the borders, on that we can all agree

Not just that. Look at the countries that have done worse than the UK. It's a long list, sure, but "better than Bulgaria and Bosnia" isn't saying much. If you take Western European countries as your comparator, the UK has done about 10% better than Italy and Portugal, slightly worse than Spain. And, with great affection for Spain, Spain is not well run.

The countries that we like to compare ourselves with- that we really ought to compare ourselves with- the likes of France, Germany, Benelux, Austria are all doing an awful lot better at keeping people alive.

The UK is not well run either, I think the last year and a half has made that extremely obvious. Anyone trying to say otherwise should have their head examined.

That’s the bloody point.

The comparison is with Benelux, France, and Germany.

Most countries have fucked this up somehow.

We seem to have fucked up more than we ought, and the blame rests with the government.

My takeaway from Philip's figures is that East Europe has had a nightmare. They also have poor vaccination rates. The UK has had one of the worst death rates of the rest.

Of the densely populated nations we've done better than Italy and Portugal, and comparable to Belgium and Spain who will finish at or around our figures.

Germany are the exception not the norm.

There is little correlation in those figures between population density and excess deaths. Denmark is the most egregious example. Netherlands also. You are cherry picking your figures.

Bullshit, there is an absolutely massive correlation between population density and excess deaths.

Even look at the UK's own data. The biggest single issue that explains Coronavirus excess deaths once you take into account age profile etc is population density.

Locations in the UK with lower levels of population density have had considerably lower death rates.

FF43 said:

Philip_Thompson said:

FF43 said:

Philip_Thompson said:

FF43 said:

Gardenwalker said:

MaxPB said:

Stuartinromford said:

Leon said:

Philip_Thompson said:

European countries as per the Economist chart excess deaths per 100k people: https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/coronavirus-excess-deaths-tracker
Note that many of these countries only have figures up to date for months ago, so some miss the second or third waves.

Bulgaria 433
Russia 338
Serbia 320
Lithuania 319
North Macedonia 319
Czech Republic 300
Slovakia 270
Poland 264
Bosnia and Herzegovnia 245
Romania 236
Moldova 231
Hungary 228
Albania 206
Portugal 203
Kosovo 200
Italy 197
Slovenia 185
Britain 180
Croatia 176
Spain 170
Belgium 165
Montenegro 154
Latvia 134
Ukraine 133
Georgia 129
Kyrgyzstan 128
France 126
Estonia 124
Netherlands 117
Switzerland 108
Austria 105
Sweden 102
Germany 63
Malta 51
Luxembourg 50
Greece 38
Finland 18
Denmark -1

So the UK is about middle of the pack, despite being on of the densest nations on the planet. Which means in my opinion the UK has done better than you'd expect all else being equal. Certainly without cherry picking exceptions like Germany, it seems the UK has not done worse or led to a "very high" death rate.

Certainly there's no reason we couldn't have been towards the top of that list with a death rate roughly twice what we have got if we really had done "catastrophically" and without vaccines I imagine that would have been very plausible.

But we had more warning, and we are an island. We had advantages we did not exploit. We should be nearer the bottom of that table

We fucked up on the borders, on that we can all agree

Not just that. Look at the countries that have done worse than the UK. It's a long list, sure, but "better than Bulgaria and Bosnia" isn't saying much. If you take Western European countries as your comparator, the UK has done about 10% better than Italy and Portugal, slightly worse than Spain. And, with great affection for Spain, Spain is not well run.

The countries that we like to compare ourselves with- that we really ought to compare ourselves with- the likes of France, Germany, Benelux, Austria are all doing an awful lot better at keeping people alive.

The UK is not well run either, I think the last year and a half has made that extremely obvious. Anyone trying to say otherwise should have their head examined.

That’s the bloody point.

The comparison is with Benelux, France, and Germany.

Most countries have fucked this up somehow.

We seem to have fucked up more than we ought, and the blame rests with the government.

My takeaway from Philip's figures is that East Europe has had a nightmare. They also have poor vaccination rates. The UK has had one of the worst death rates of the rest.

Of the densely populated nations we've done better than Italy and Portugal, and comparable to Belgium and Spain who will finish at or around our figures.

Germany are the exception not the norm.

There is little correlation in those figures between population density and excess deaths. Denmark is the most egregious example. Netherlands also. You are cherry picking your figures.

Bullshit, there is an absolutely massive correlation between population density and excess deaths.

Even look at the UK's own data. The biggest single issue that explains Coronavirus excess deaths once you take into account age profile etc is population density.

Locations in the UK with lower levels of population density have had considerably lower death rates.

There is little correlation in the table that you supplied between population density and Covid deaths, which allow you to discount "low density" countries such as the Netherlands and Denmark from consideration. In fact every country in Western Europe is discounted from your consideration on grounds of population density, except the five ones with the worst death rates.

That's what I mean by cherry-picking your figures.

Carnyx said:

JosiasJessop said:

Scott_xP said:

JosiasJessop said:

Having said that, I hope England win, if only because it matters to so many people in this country.

Which country? That's the problem...

Johnson is making a mistake aligning himself so closely with England. He's PM of the UK and while his words might be transferable to other Home Nations, his gestures are not. He should therefore stick to words.
https://twitter.com/DavidHerdson/status/1412701865872089095

https://twitter.com/BorisJohnson/status/1412684618143342595

Oh, hush. Johnson could cure cancer and you'd argue that the fiend hadn't found a cure for HIV, measles or BDS yet.

Dentists? What's wrong with them?

Chris said:

If people are being ruthlessly political about this - as I suppose is only to be expected - then what they need to worry about is not death rates or long COVID, but hospitalisation rates.

The current rate of hospitalisation per positive test 2-3 weeks before is about 3%. The new health secretary says cases may top 100,000 a day. Neil Ferguson says twice that number. Given that - if all mitigation measures are abandoned - the only thing that will stop numbers increasing is herd immunity, both those numbers actually seem optimistic to me, because I don't think we'll get herd imunity without another 20%+ of the population being infected.

20% of the population is 10 million+.

So Javid's number would see us remaining (just) under the January peak in hospital admissions of around 4000 a day. Ferguson's number wouldn't.

On the current rate of increase we get to that peak in about a month from now. If that happens, what does the government do? Bearing in mind that it needs to do something 2-3 weels before that point, otherwise it's too late.

IshmaelZ said:

RochdalePioneers said:

Carnyx said:

Theuniondivvie said:

RochdalePioneers said:

*sits back and opens a huge bag of popcorn at south of the wall antics*

Meanwhile north of the wall, the Tory nob cheese Transport spokesman Graham Simpson whines "The SNP have taken their eye off the ball and the virus is threatening to spiral out of control in Scotland" - this apparently being a threat to Scottish summer holidays abroad which if he hadn't noticed started the week before last.

‘north of the wall, the Tory nob cheese Transport spokesman Graham Simpson whines’

You seem to have settled in well 🙂

I quite liked Mr Simpson's colleague who complained about the fall in testing at Scottish schools over the period in question ...

As patriotic unionists they think that the English calendar is the only calendar. Hence why the Flag Twattery Day song event was after Scottish schools had broken up. "Why have testing numbers fallen in schools?" they ask. Because its the summer holiday and they're closed you prannock.

Bit too much zeal of the converted going on here? Your initial point is pants because it assumes that the Scots only go abroad in the first two weeks in which they can do so.

Aslan said:

Scott_xP said:

JosiasJessop said:

Having said that, I hope England win, if only because it matters to so many people in this country.

Which country? That's the problem...

Johnson is making a mistake aligning himself so closely with England. He's PM of the UK and while his words might be transferable to other Home Nations, his gestures are not. He should therefore stick to words.
https://twitter.com/DavidHerdson/status/1412701865872089095

https://twitter.com/BorisJohnson/status/1412684618143342595

If Scotland had done better he would be backing them too. It isn't the fault of Boris that Scotland are shite, finished last in their group and went out in the first round.

Aslan said:

It isn't the fault of Boris that Scotland are shite

Aslan said:

that was England's worse result in the tournament

Scott_xP said:

JosiasJessop said:

Having said that, I hope England win, if only because it matters to so many people in this country.

Which country? That's the problem...

Johnson is making a mistake aligning himself so closely with England. He's PM of the UK and while his words might be transferable to other Home Nations, his gestures are not. He should therefore stick to words.
https://twitter.com/DavidHerdson/status/1412701865872089095

https://twitter.com/BorisJohnson/status/1412684618143342595

Philip_Thompson said:

FF43 said:

Philip_Thompson said:

FF43 said:

Philip_Thompson said:

FF43 said:

Gardenwalker said:

MaxPB said:

Stuartinromford said:

Leon said:

Philip_Thompson said:

European countries as per the Economist chart excess deaths per 100k people: https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/coronavirus-excess-deaths-tracker
Note that many of these countries only have figures up to date for months ago, so some miss the second or third waves.

Bulgaria 433
Russia 338
Serbia 320
Lithuania 319
North Macedonia 319
Czech Republic 300
Slovakia 270
Poland 264
Bosnia and Herzegovnia 245
Romania 236
Moldova 231
Hungary 228
Albania 206
Portugal 203
Kosovo 200
Italy 197
Slovenia 185
Britain 180
Croatia 176
Spain 170
Belgium 165
Montenegro 154
Latvia 134
Ukraine 133
Georgia 129
Kyrgyzstan 128
France 126
Estonia 124
Netherlands 117
Switzerland 108
Austria 105
Sweden 102
Germany 63
Malta 51
Luxembourg 50
Greece 38
Finland 18
Denmark -1

So the UK is about middle of the pack, despite being on of the densest nations on the planet. Which means in my opinion the UK has done better than you'd expect all else being equal. Certainly without cherry picking exceptions like Germany, it seems the UK has not done worse or led to a "very high" death rate.

Certainly there's no reason we couldn't have been towards the top of that list with a death rate roughly twice what we have got if we really had done "catastrophically" and without vaccines I imagine that would have been very plausible.

But we had more warning, and we are an island. We had advantages we did not exploit. We should be nearer the bottom of that table

We fucked up on the borders, on that we can all agree

Not just that. Look at the countries that have done worse than the UK. It's a long list, sure, but "better than Bulgaria and Bosnia" isn't saying much. If you take Western European countries as your comparator, the UK has done about 10% better than Italy and Portugal, slightly worse than Spain. And, with great affection for Spain, Spain is not well run.

The countries that we like to compare ourselves with- that we really ought to compare ourselves with- the likes of France, Germany, Benelux, Austria are all doing an awful lot better at keeping people alive.

The UK is not well run either, I think the last year and a half has made that extremely obvious. Anyone trying to say otherwise should have their head examined.

That’s the bloody point.

The comparison is with Benelux, France, and Germany.

Most countries have fucked this up somehow.

We seem to have fucked up more than we ought, and the blame rests with the government.

My takeaway from Philip's figures is that East Europe has had a nightmare. They also have poor vaccination rates. The UK has had one of the worst death rates of the rest.

Of the densely populated nations we've done better than Italy and Portugal, and comparable to Belgium and Spain who will finish at or around our figures.

Germany are the exception not the norm.

There is little correlation in those figures between population density and excess deaths. Denmark is the most egregious example. Netherlands also. You are cherry picking your figures.

Bullshit, there is an absolutely massive correlation between population density and excess deaths.

Even look at the UK's own data. The biggest single issue that explains Coronavirus excess deaths once you take into account age profile etc is population density.

Locations in the UK with lower levels of population density have had considerably lower death rates.

There is little correlation in the table that you supplied between population density and Covid deaths, which allow you to discount "low density" countries such as the Netherlands and Denmark from consideration. In fact every country in Western Europe is discounted from your consideration on grounds of population density, except the five ones with the worst death rates.

That's what I mean by cherry-picking your figures.

Of course low density nations like Denmark should not be contrasted with incredibly high density England.

The Netherlands are a high density but small country which is an interesting comparator, though Belgium next door while equally small have death rates comparable to the UKs.

IshmaelZ said:

RochdalePioneers said:

Carnyx said:

Theuniondivvie said:

RochdalePioneers said:

*sits back and opens a huge bag of popcorn at south of the wall antics*

Meanwhile north of the wall, the Tory nob cheese Transport spokesman Graham Simpson whines "The SNP have taken their eye off the ball and the virus is threatening to spiral out of control in Scotland" - this apparently being a threat to Scottish summer holidays abroad which if he hadn't noticed started the week before last.

‘north of the wall, the Tory nob cheese Transport spokesman Graham Simpson whines’

You seem to have settled in well 🙂

I quite liked Mr Simpson's colleague who complained about the fall in testing at Scottish schools over the period in question ...

As patriotic unionists they think that the English calendar is the only calendar. Hence why the Flag Twattery Day song event was after Scottish schools had broken up. "Why have testing numbers fallen in schools?" they ask. Because its the summer holiday and they're closed you prannock.

Bit too much zeal of the converted going on here? Your initial point is pants because it assumes that the Scots only go abroad in the first two weeks in which they can do so.

TOPPING said:

What a total knob Starmer is.

Reckless to open up but what about all the people who have to isolate?

WTAF? Utter dick.

MarqueeMark said:

tlg86 said:

I'm confused. Starmer started by saying we were being reckless. Now he seems to share the concerns of businesses who don't want people to have to self-isolate.

Labour are all over the shop in trying too find a political "line". Painfully transparent.