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Pricing of a bet – Part 2 – The bet – politicalbetting.com

SystemSystem Posts: 11,002
edited January 2022 in General
imagePricing of a bet – Part 2 – The bet – politicalbetting.com

This is the second thread on the theory behind the recently established Smarkets market on the prospects of a Conservative lead by end of January (covered here). 

Read the full story here

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Comments

  • First unlike Djokovic
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 27,835
    edited January 2022
    Second....
    ...
    No. Not like anything I can think of just now.
  • turbotubbsturbotubbs Posts: 14,878
    Is it wrong that I really like how new threads get announced? And second.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,080
    Third rate, like you already know who
  • OmniumOmnium Posts: 9,688

    Is it wrong that I really like how new threads get announced? And second.

    I guess it depends on how happy you are to always be second.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,080
    Skip the formulae, just consider that we’re just a few working days into January, and the clown is already embroiled in at least two *new* stories that involve his dishonesty.

    Betting on a Tory lead this month is a fool’s bet.
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 27,835

    Is it wrong that I really like how new threads get announced? And second.

    I love them too. But how do people find out and then think of stuff?
  • turbotubbsturbotubbs Posts: 14,878
    Omnium said:

    Is it wrong that I really like how new threads get announced? And second.

    I guess it depends on how happy you are to always be second.
    I had a first once. Lifetime achievement. Bucket list. Etc.
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,080
    Music for our time. Amid the unremitting gloom, some of the best orchestral solos ever scored

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9jFesZ-jxRw
  • solarflaresolarflare Posts: 3,623
    It's been a while since I had to do any integration.
  • dixiedean said:

    Is it wrong that I really like how new threads get announced? And second.

    I love them too. But how do people find out and then think of stuff?
    I just refreshed the screen and saw that the link to the new thread was on the right side just above the comments.
  • MrEdMrEd Posts: 5,578
    Off topic, re Kazakhstan, it feels like one of two things has happened:

    1. The US / EU have essentially done a backroom deal with Putin that says "fine, you can intervene in Kazakhstan but the quid pro quo is no Ukraine movements (for now)"

    OR

    2. Putin knows Biden / the EU is so spineless that he can send his troops into Kazakhstan without serious implications, in which case he is probably going to be emboldened to do something in the Ukraine.

    I hope it's the first, I fear it's the second.

  • LeonLeon Posts: 46,238
    MrEd said:

    Off topic, re Kazakhstan, it feels like one of two things has happened:

    1. The US / EU have essentially done a backroom deal with Putin that says "fine, you can intervene in Kazakhstan but the quid pro quo is no Ukraine movements (for now)"

    OR

    2. Putin knows Biden / the EU is so spineless that he can send his troops into Kazakhstan without serious implications, in which case he is probably going to be emboldened to do something in the Ukraine.

    I hope it's the first, I fear it's the second.

    An unopposed Putin incursion into Kazakhstan will also embolden Xi re Taiwan

    We are beginning to see what a world Not run by the West will look like. Not pretty; quite sad

    The world will miss its just and boyish master
  • How bad was December for the hospitality sector? Pretty awful.



    https://twitter.com/DuncanWeldon/status/1479041428055597056
  • StuartDicksonStuartDickson Posts: 12,146
    More Scottish Conservative sleaze:

    Tory peer Michelle Mone secretly involved in PPE firm she referred to government
    Exclusive: Leaked files suggest Mone and her husband were involved in business given £200m contracts

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jan/06/tory-peer-michelle-mone-involved-ppe-medpro-government-contracts

    BritNat Mone was “incandescent with rage”. I’ll bet she was.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 53,770
    MrEd said:

    Off topic, re Kazakhstan, it feels like one of two things has happened:

    1. The US / EU have essentially done a backroom deal with Putin that says "fine, you can intervene in Kazakhstan but the quid pro quo is no Ukraine movements (for now)"

    OR

    2. Putin knows Biden / the EU is so spineless that he can send his troops into Kazakhstan without serious implications, in which case he is probably going to be emboldened to do something in the Ukraine.

    I hope it's the first, I fear it's the second.

    Of course it's the second.

    And what would you suggest "the West" does? The government of Kazakhstan asked for help for help from the Russians. And they gave it.

    Now, it's a brutal repressionary regime in Kazakhstan, that you would not wish to be a citizen of. It's also a Russian client state (like most of the other poor countries on Russia's southern border). But ultimately, there's nothing the West can do about it.
  • If the Prime Minister doesn’t remember key details, like the Brownlow WhatsApp exchange, how does he know he always followed the Ministerial Code?

    https://twitter.com/carldinnen/status/1479174644036943874
  • OmniumOmnium Posts: 9,688

    Omnium said:

    Is it wrong that I really like how new threads get announced? And second.

    I guess it depends on how happy you are to always be second.
    I had a first once. Lifetime achievement. Bucket list. Etc.
    It's a first with likes that we all seek though. Not sure even Mike has achieved that despite his strong 'test' sycophantic bait.

  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 58,038
    Washington reflecting on last 6th Jan today.

    "In short, the Republic faces an existential threat from a movement that is openly contemptuous of democracy and has shown that it is willing to use violence to achieve its ends. No self-governing society can survive such a threat by denying that it exists."

    NY Times
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 53,770
    Leon said:

    MrEd said:

    Off topic, re Kazakhstan, it feels like one of two things has happened:

    1. The US / EU have essentially done a backroom deal with Putin that says "fine, you can intervene in Kazakhstan but the quid pro quo is no Ukraine movements (for now)"

    OR

    2. Putin knows Biden / the EU is so spineless that he can send his troops into Kazakhstan without serious implications, in which case he is probably going to be emboldened to do something in the Ukraine.

    I hope it's the first, I fear it's the second.

    An unopposed Putin incursion into Kazakhstan will also embolden Xi re Taiwan

    We are beginning to see what a world Not run by the West will look like. Not pretty; quite sad

    The world will miss its just and boyish master
    It's a little bit different.

    One would be an invasion of a hostile power over 120 miles of Ocean guarded by a well equipped air force and navy.

    The other is a regime inviting Russian troops in.

    What are we supposed to re Kazakhstan? We can say "please don't murder your citizens". But the fact is that the regimes in the Caucuses have pretty much all got (Russian supported) despots who behave pretty poorly. And they can do so, because the Russians come running with tanks and soldiers whenever necessary.

    This is a regime that's brutally repressed its citizens for decades, and what do we do? We invite them to the White House for pictures with the President.
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 58,038
    Former NFL player lawmaker says he thought his days of trying to put people on the floor were over when he retired from football.
  • RazedabodeRazedabode Posts: 2,973

    Washington reflecting on last 6th Jan today.

    "In short, the Republic faces an existential threat from a movement that is openly contemptuous of democracy and has shown that it is willing to use violence to achieve its ends. No self-governing society can survive such a threat by denying that it exists."

    NY Times

    I really do worry about the USA, and linked to the Russian conversation, the west as a whole.

    We’re toothless and fatigued. In decline.
  • NickPalmerNickPalmer Posts: 21,263
    Leon said:

    MrEd said:

    Off topic, re Kazakhstan, it feels like one of two things has happened:

    1. The US / EU have essentially done a backroom deal with Putin that says "fine, you can intervene in Kazakhstan but the quid pro quo is no Ukraine movements (for now)"

    OR

    2. Putin knows Biden / the EU is so spineless that he can send his troops into Kazakhstan without serious implications, in which case he is probably going to be emboldened to do something in the Ukraine.

    I hope it's the first, I fear it's the second.

    An unopposed Putin incursion into Kazakhstan will also embolden Xi re Taiwan

    We are beginning to see what a world Not run by the West will look like. Not pretty; quite sad

    The world will miss its just and boyish master
    I don't think Kazakhstan and Taiwan are remotely comparable. The former is a client state in chaos which has requested aid - an unpleasant, corrupt oligarchy, certainly, but it would be peculiar if it was denied - it's not as though there was a credible opposition. The latter is a fiercely defensive, well-armed country which has absolutely no need or wish for intervention. Xi shows no real sign of remotely contemplating invasion.

    I've also never thought Putin had any real interest in taking over Ukraine, though I agree there's more evidence that he might. He'd like to destabilise and unnerve it and get some Western concessions - could be wrong, but I doubt if it's more than that.
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 58,038
    Gilead news:

    "[Christian] Movement leaders now appear to be working to prime the base for the next attempt to subvert the electoral process."

    https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/06/opinion/jan-6-christian-nationalism.html
  • LeonLeon Posts: 46,238

    Washington reflecting on last 6th Jan today.

    "In short, the Republic faces an existential threat from a movement that is openly contemptuous of democracy and has shown that it is willing to use violence to achieve its ends. No self-governing society can survive such a threat by denying that it exists."

    NY Times

    If it weren’t for the bit about ‘violence’ they could be talking about Remainers 2016-19
  • IanB2IanB2 Posts: 47,080

    Washington reflecting on last 6th Jan today.

    "In short, the Republic faces an existential threat from a movement that is openly contemptuous of democracy and has shown that it is willing to use violence to achieve its ends. No self-governing society can survive such a threat by denying that it exists."

    NY Times

    I really do worry about the USA, and linked to the Russian conversation, the west as a whole.

    We’re toothless and fatigued. In decline.
    A book I am reading at the moment, not far enough in yet to heartily recommend, is Wildland by Osnos. So far, it seems to be very on point.
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 19,072
    Leon said:

    Washington reflecting on last 6th Jan today.

    "In short, the Republic faces an existential threat from a movement that is openly contemptuous of democracy and has shown that it is willing to use violence to achieve its ends. No self-governing society can survive such a threat by denying that it exists."

    NY Times

    If it weren’t for the bit about ‘violence’ they could be talking about Remainers 2016-19
    You must have an IQ of 4
  • AnabobazinaAnabobazina Posts: 19,606

    How bad was December for the hospitality sector? Pretty awful.



    https://twitter.com/DuncanWeldon/status/1479041428055597056

    Deliberately trashed by the government without compensation. An absolute scandal.
  • How bad was December for the hospitality sector? Pretty awful.



    https://twitter.com/DuncanWeldon/status/1479041428055597056

    Deliberately trashed by the government without compensation. An absolute scandal.
    Indeed, another reason to lay Rishi Sunak in the next PM/Con leadership markets.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 46,238

    Leon said:

    MrEd said:

    Off topic, re Kazakhstan, it feels like one of two things has happened:

    1. The US / EU have essentially done a backroom deal with Putin that says "fine, you can intervene in Kazakhstan but the quid pro quo is no Ukraine movements (for now)"

    OR

    2. Putin knows Biden / the EU is so spineless that he can send his troops into Kazakhstan without serious implications, in which case he is probably going to be emboldened to do something in the Ukraine.

    I hope it's the first, I fear it's the second.

    An unopposed Putin incursion into Kazakhstan will also embolden Xi re Taiwan

    We are beginning to see what a world Not run by the West will look like. Not pretty; quite sad

    The world will miss its just and boyish master
    I don't think Kazakhstan and Taiwan are remotely comparable. The former is a client state in chaos which has requested aid - an unpleasant, corrupt oligarchy, certainly, but it would be peculiar if it was denied - it's not as though there was a credible opposition. The latter is a fiercely defensive, well-armed country which has absolutely no need or wish for intervention. Xi shows no real sign of remotely contemplating invasion.

    I've also never thought Putin had any real interest in taking over Ukraine, though I agree there's more evidence that he might. He'd like to destabilise and unnerve it and get some Western concessions - could be wrong, but I doubt if it's more than that.
    They’re not comparable situations, the link is that they both illustrate western weakness and decline

    Would we really go to war with Xi to stop him taking Taiwan? I doubt it. No more than we would go to war with Putin over Ukraine

    As for “Xi shows no real sign of remotely contemplating invasion” that’s remarkably naive. The Taiwanese certainly don’t agree with you

    ‘Taiwan fears Chinese invasion by 2025’

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/china-could-invade-by-2025-taiwan-fears-3wwfb7mv8
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 31,274

    Leon said:

    MrEd said:

    Off topic, re Kazakhstan, it feels like one of two things has happened:

    1. The US / EU have essentially done a backroom deal with Putin that says "fine, you can intervene in Kazakhstan but the quid pro quo is no Ukraine movements (for now)"

    OR

    2. Putin knows Biden / the EU is so spineless that he can send his troops into Kazakhstan without serious implications, in which case he is probably going to be emboldened to do something in the Ukraine.

    I hope it's the first, I fear it's the second.

    An unopposed Putin incursion into Kazakhstan will also embolden Xi re Taiwan

    We are beginning to see what a world Not run by the West will look like. Not pretty; quite sad

    The world will miss its just and boyish master
    I don't think Kazakhstan and Taiwan are remotely comparable. The former is a client state in chaos which has requested aid - an unpleasant, corrupt oligarchy, certainly, but it would be peculiar if it was denied - it's not as though there was a credible opposition. The latter is a fiercely defensive, well-armed country which has absolutely no need or wish for intervention. Xi shows no real sign of remotely contemplating invasion.

    I've also never thought Putin had any real interest in taking over Ukraine, though I agree there's more evidence that he might. He'd like to destabilise and unnerve it and get some Western concessions - could be wrong, but I doubt if it's more than that.
    This was posted on here earlier today (apologies, I can't remember who by). I found it pretty depressing.

    https://www.theneweuropean.co.uk/desk-russie-putin-plan-for-europe-and-ukraine/
  • turbotubbsturbotubbs Posts: 14,878

    How bad was December for the hospitality sector? Pretty awful.



    https://twitter.com/DuncanWeldon/status/1479041428055597056

    Deliberately trashed by the government without compensation. An absolute scandal.
    I think that’s a little unfair. We’ve called on the government to move towards living with Covid. Awful timing for omicron for sure, but was a better option really locking down plus furlough? Some funding has been made available.
    These are tough times, but to call it a deliberate act is too strong.
  • AlistairAlistair Posts: 23,670
    edited January 2022
    People make very weird assumptions about how easy it would be for China to invade Taiwan.

    Never mind thatbdoing so would blow up the world economy (via shattering compiter chip supplies) that China is currently entirely dependent on. If ASML ever sell top end machinery to China then otnos a different matter but everything goes boom if China invades Taiwan.
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 58,038

    If the Prime Minister doesn’t remember key details, like the Brownlow WhatsApp exchange, how does he know he always followed the Ministerial Code?

    https://twitter.com/carldinnen/status/1479174644036943874

    Does he even know there is a Code?

    If he does, he probably thinks it only applies to the little people in junior ranks.

  • LeonLeon Posts: 46,238

    How bad was December for the hospitality sector? Pretty awful.



    https://twitter.com/DuncanWeldon/status/1479041428055597056

    Deliberately trashed by the government without compensation. An absolute scandal.
    I think that’s a little unfair. We’ve called on the government to move towards living with Covid. Awful timing for omicron for sure, but was a better option really locking down plus furlough? Some funding has been made available.
    These are tough times, but to call it a deliberate act is too strong.
    The tragedy is that Plan B probably had littie to zero effect on Omicron. Even hard lockdowns struggle to contain it. As the Dutch are discovering
  • kle4kle4 Posts: 91,392

    If the Prime Minister doesn’t remember key details, like the Brownlow WhatsApp exchange, how does he know he always followed the Ministerial Code?

    https://twitter.com/carldinnen/status/1479174644036943874

    Does he even know there is a Code?

    If he does, he probably thinks it only applies to the little people in junior ranks.

    He's a Paterson.
  • solarflaresolarflare Posts: 3,623

    How bad was December for the hospitality sector? Pretty awful.



    https://twitter.com/DuncanWeldon/status/1479041428055597056

    Would be interesting to see that statistic split out by the different constituent parts of the UK.
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 31,274
    edited January 2022
    How can anyone square this:

    "29 November 2020, 12.59pm
    Hi David
    I am afraid parts of our flat are still a bit of a tip and am keen to allow Lulu Lytle to get on with it. Can I possibly ask her to get in touch with you for approvals ?
    Many thanks and all best
    Boris "


    ...with the idea that Boris claims not to have known that Brownlow was funding renovations to the No 11 residence?
  • If the Prime Minister doesn’t remember key details, like the Brownlow WhatsApp exchange, how does he know he always followed the Ministerial Code?

    https://twitter.com/carldinnen/status/1479174644036943874

    “The code is more what you’d call ‘guidelines’ than actual rules.”
    – Barbossa, Pirates of the Caribbean.
  • AnabobazinaAnabobazina Posts: 19,606

    How bad was December for the hospitality sector? Pretty awful.



    https://twitter.com/DuncanWeldon/status/1479041428055597056

    Deliberately trashed by the government without compensation. An absolute scandal.
    I think that’s a little unfair. We’ve called on the government to move towards living with Covid. Awful timing for omicron for sure, but was a better option really locking down plus furlough? Some funding has been made available.
    These are tough times, but to call it a deliberate act is too strong.
    Jenny Harries saying you shouldn’t go to parties unless you absolutely have to, on the Monday morning of the week of the first tranche of Christmas parties. Various bods from the government actively discouraging works parties. Just wiped out thousands of bookings worth multiple millions in a sector that has already been hit.

    If it wasn’t deliberate, it was an act of gross stupidity - I don’t know which is worse.
  • TimSTimS Posts: 9,153

    Leon said:

    MrEd said:

    Off topic, re Kazakhstan, it feels like one of two things has happened:

    1. The US / EU have essentially done a backroom deal with Putin that says "fine, you can intervene in Kazakhstan but the quid pro quo is no Ukraine movements (for now)"

    OR

    2. Putin knows Biden / the EU is so spineless that he can send his troops into Kazakhstan without serious implications, in which case he is probably going to be emboldened to do something in the Ukraine.

    I hope it's the first, I fear it's the second.

    An unopposed Putin incursion into Kazakhstan will also embolden Xi re Taiwan

    We are beginning to see what a world Not run by the West will look like. Not pretty; quite sad

    The world will miss its just and boyish master
    I don't think Kazakhstan and Taiwan are remotely comparable. The former is a client state in chaos which has requested aid - an unpleasant, corrupt oligarchy, certainly, but it would be peculiar if it was denied - it's not as though there was a credible opposition. The latter is a fiercely defensive, well-armed country which has absolutely no need or wish for intervention. Xi shows no real sign of remotely contemplating invasion.

    I've also never thought Putin had any real interest in taking over Ukraine, though I agree there's more evidence that he might. He'd like to destabilise and unnerve it and get some Western concessions - could be wrong, but I doubt if it's more than that.
    This was posted on here earlier today (apologies, I can't remember who by). I found it pretty depressing.

    https://www.theneweuropean.co.uk/desk-russie-putin-plan-for-europe-and-ukraine/
    It was me. I suspect it’s deliberately catastrophist, like a geopolitical version of an Eric Feigl Ding post, but is certainly good for thought. You have to hope the Russians are doing their usual masterful bluffing.
  • AnabobazinaAnabobazina Posts: 19,606
    Trashing hospitality vs lockdown wasn’t a binary choice. Compensation for lost bookings could have been advanced with a little imagination, plus various tax breaks.
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 31,274
    TimS said:

    Leon said:

    MrEd said:

    Off topic, re Kazakhstan, it feels like one of two things has happened:

    1. The US / EU have essentially done a backroom deal with Putin that says "fine, you can intervene in Kazakhstan but the quid pro quo is no Ukraine movements (for now)"

    OR

    2. Putin knows Biden / the EU is so spineless that he can send his troops into Kazakhstan without serious implications, in which case he is probably going to be emboldened to do something in the Ukraine.

    I hope it's the first, I fear it's the second.

    An unopposed Putin incursion into Kazakhstan will also embolden Xi re Taiwan

    We are beginning to see what a world Not run by the West will look like. Not pretty; quite sad

    The world will miss its just and boyish master
    I don't think Kazakhstan and Taiwan are remotely comparable. The former is a client state in chaos which has requested aid - an unpleasant, corrupt oligarchy, certainly, but it would be peculiar if it was denied - it's not as though there was a credible opposition. The latter is a fiercely defensive, well-armed country which has absolutely no need or wish for intervention. Xi shows no real sign of remotely contemplating invasion.

    I've also never thought Putin had any real interest in taking over Ukraine, though I agree there's more evidence that he might. He'd like to destabilise and unnerve it and get some Western concessions - could be wrong, but I doubt if it's more than that.
    This was posted on here earlier today (apologies, I can't remember who by). I found it pretty depressing.

    https://www.theneweuropean.co.uk/desk-russie-putin-plan-for-europe-and-ukraine/
    It was me. I suspect it’s deliberately catastrophist, like a geopolitical version of an Eric Feigl Ding post, but is certainly good for thought. You have to hope the Russians are doing their usual masterful bluffing.
    Thanks, yes, let's hope so. A quick scan of the other Desk Russie articles shows they seem to have a clear anti-Russian objective. But still...
  • MrEdMrEd Posts: 5,578
    rcs1000 said:

    MrEd said:

    Off topic, re Kazakhstan, it feels like one of two things has happened:

    1. The US / EU have essentially done a backroom deal with Putin that says "fine, you can intervene in Kazakhstan but the quid pro quo is no Ukraine movements (for now)"

    OR

    2. Putin knows Biden / the EU is so spineless that he can send his troops into Kazakhstan without serious implications, in which case he is probably going to be emboldened to do something in the Ukraine.

    I hope it's the first, I fear it's the second.

    Of course it's the second.

    And what would you suggest "the West" does? The government of Kazakhstan asked for help for help from the Russians. And they gave it.

    Now, it's a brutal repressionary regime in Kazakhstan, that you would not wish to be a citizen of. It's also a Russian client state (like most of the other poor countries on Russia's southern border). But ultimately, there's nothing the West can do about it.
    Not much but there are degrees of what you can't do, if that makes sense. Kicking up a fuss plus some sanctions against both gives at least some impression that there are consequences which are likely to be greater if the Ukraine is invaded / messed with. It seems from the reaction today - and part is probably down to Biden trying to maximise the January 6th narrative rather than get distracted - it seems like a shrug of the shoulders.

    And that will embolden Putin.
  • turbotubbsturbotubbs Posts: 14,878

    How bad was December for the hospitality sector? Pretty awful.



    https://twitter.com/DuncanWeldon/status/1479041428055597056

    Deliberately trashed by the government without compensation. An absolute scandal.
    I think that’s a little unfair. We’ve called on the government to move towards living with Covid. Awful timing for omicron for sure, but was a better option really locking down plus furlough? Some funding has been made available.
    These are tough times, but to call it a deliberate act is too strong.
    Jenny Harries saying you shouldn’t go to parties unless you absolutely have to, on the Monday morning of the week of the first tranche of Christmas parties. Various bods from the government actively discouraging works parties. Just wiped out thousands of bookings worth multiple millions in a sector that has already been hit.

    If it wasn’t deliberate, it was an act of gross stupidity - I don’t know which is worse.
    Jenny Harries is NOT the government. She is head of UKHSA. The pb was saying take a test before you go. Very different.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 46,238
    Alistair said:

    People make very weird assumptions about how easy it would be for China to invade Taiwan.

    Never mind thatbdoing so would blow up the world economy (via shattering compiter chip supplies) that China is currently entirely dependent on. If ASML ever sell top end machinery to China then otnos a different matter but everything goes boom if China invades Taiwan.

    Xi is said to see retaking Taiwan as his final goal. Finally erasing China’s century of shame. The achievement which will put him in the pantheon. That’s pretty ominous because he is not young

    I wonder if China might choose to strangle Taiwan into submission. Refuse to trade with countries that feed Taiwan. Try and shut down the internet. Same way the USSR tried to strangle West Berlin

    They took Hong Kong without a bullet being fired…
  • algarkirkalgarkirk Posts: 10,342
    edited January 2022
    Leon said:

    MrEd said:

    Off topic, re Kazakhstan, it feels like one of two things has happened:

    1. The US / EU have essentially done a backroom deal with Putin that says "fine, you can intervene in Kazakhstan but the quid pro quo is no Ukraine movements (for now)"

    OR

    2. Putin knows Biden / the EU is so spineless that he can send his troops into Kazakhstan without serious implications, in which case he is probably going to be emboldened to do something in the Ukraine.

    I hope it's the first, I fear it's the second.

    An unopposed Putin incursion into Kazakhstan will also embolden Xi re Taiwan

    We are beginning to see what a world Not run by the West will look like. Not pretty; quite sad

    The world will miss its just and boyish master
    And the possibility of USA descending into extreme and paranoid isolationism is somewhat above zero.

    And the point so often made about the EU's biggest two mistakes could stop being merely comic. Mistake one: to be in denial about the EU's state like ambitions. Mistake two: to think that in 'ever closer union' having a common currency and central bank, to say nothing about harmonising standards for My Little Pony stickers, was way ahead of all EU members being in the same defence alliance and having proper defence forces.

  • AnabobazinaAnabobazina Posts: 19,606
    Leon said:

    How bad was December for the hospitality sector? Pretty awful.



    https://twitter.com/DuncanWeldon/status/1479041428055597056

    Deliberately trashed by the government without compensation. An absolute scandal.
    I think that’s a little unfair. We’ve called on the government to move towards living with Covid. Awful timing for omicron for sure, but was a better option really locking down plus furlough? Some funding has been made available.
    These are tough times, but to call it a deliberate act is too strong.
    The tragedy is that Plan B probably had littie to zero effect on Omicron. Even hard lockdowns struggle to contain it. As the Dutch are discovering
    Absolutely.

    If only the medical elite of a major G20 nation at the vanguard of the outbreak had told us this at the time.



  • Leon said:

    Alistair said:

    People make very weird assumptions about how easy it would be for China to invade Taiwan.

    Never mind thatbdoing so would blow up the world economy (via shattering compiter chip supplies) that China is currently entirely dependent on. If ASML ever sell top end machinery to China then otnos a different matter but everything goes boom if China invades Taiwan.

    Xi is said to see retaking Taiwan as his final goal. Finally erasing China’s century of shame. The achievement which will put him in the pantheon. That’s pretty ominous because he is not young

    I wonder if China might choose to strangle Taiwan into submission. Refuse to trade with countries that feed Taiwan. Try and shut down the internet. Same way the USSR tried to strangle West Berlin

    They took Hong Kong without a bullet being fired…
    Almost like Hong Kong was on lease to UK and the UK had to give it back to China after 99 years.
  • rottenboroughrottenborough Posts: 58,038

    How bad was December for the hospitality sector? Pretty awful.



    https://twitter.com/DuncanWeldon/status/1479041428055597056

    Deliberately trashed by the government without compensation. An absolute scandal.
    I think that’s a little unfair. We’ve called on the government to move towards living with Covid. Awful timing for omicron for sure, but was a better option really locking down plus furlough? Some funding has been made available.
    These are tough times, but to call it a deliberate act is too strong.
    Jenny Harries saying you shouldn’t go to parties unless you absolutely have to, on the Monday morning of the week of the first tranche of Christmas parties. Various bods from the government actively discouraging works parties. Just wiped out thousands of bookings worth multiple millions in a sector that has already been hit.

    If it wasn’t deliberate, it was an act of gross stupidity - I don’t know which is worse.
    iirc Whitty said prioritise your socializing. So that you get to see Grandma on 25th, but ditch all the works outings and parties and get together with old mates just before xmas.


  • Leon said:

    Washington reflecting on last 6th Jan today.

    "In short, the Republic faces an existential threat from a movement that is openly contemptuous of democracy and has shown that it is willing to use violence to achieve its ends. No self-governing society can survive such a threat by denying that it exists."

    NY Times

    If it weren’t for the bit about ‘violence’ they could be talking about Remainers 2016-19
    When did Remainers invade the HoC?
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 31,274
    Alistair said:

    People make very weird assumptions about how easy it would be for China to invade Taiwan.

    Never mind that doing so would blow up the world economy (via shattering compiter chip supplies) that China is currently entirely dependent on. If ASML ever sell top end machinery to China then otnos a different matter but everything goes boom if China invades Taiwan.

    Good point. I assume they want to get Taiwan the long way, via attrition.

    Similarly an invasion of Ukraine would presumably bring massive sanctions down on Russia (exclusion from Swift has been mentioned), which would not make life very pleasant in the Kremlin.
  • AnabobazinaAnabobazina Posts: 19,606

    How bad was December for the hospitality sector? Pretty awful.



    https://twitter.com/DuncanWeldon/status/1479041428055597056

    Deliberately trashed by the government without compensation. An absolute scandal.
    I think that’s a little unfair. We’ve called on the government to move towards living with Covid. Awful timing for omicron for sure, but was a better option really locking down plus furlough? Some funding has been made available.
    These are tough times, but to call it a deliberate act is too strong.
    Jenny Harries saying you shouldn’t go to parties unless you absolutely have to, on the Monday morning of the week of the first tranche of Christmas parties. Various bods from the government actively discouraging works parties. Just wiped out thousands of bookings worth multiple millions in a sector that has already been hit.

    If it wasn’t deliberate, it was an act of gross stupidity - I don’t know which is worse.
    Jenny Harries is NOT the government. She is head of UKHSA. The pb was saying take a test before you go. Very different.
    She works for the government and is seen as a public face of the health service. Ministers entirely failed in reining her in - meanwhile Whitty etc were saying similarly destructive things. I shudder when I remember that period: it was inexcusably poor messaging.
  • Alistair said:

    People make very weird assumptions about how easy it would be for China to invade Taiwan.

    Never mind that doing so would blow up the world economy (via shattering compiter chip supplies) that China is currently entirely dependent on. If ASML ever sell top end machinery to China then otnos a different matter but everything goes boom if China invades Taiwan.

    Good point. I assume they want to get Taiwan the long way, via attrition.

    Similarly an invasion of Ukraine would presumably bring massive sanctions down on Russia (exclusion from Swift has been mentioned), which would not make life very pleasant in the Kremlin.
    We should also seize all Russian owned UK assets.

    Nobody would weep if the UK government took control of Chelsea FC, sold off all the players and ground and closed Chelsea FC down.
  • MrEdMrEd Posts: 5,578
    Leon said:

    MrEd said:

    Off topic, re Kazakhstan, it feels like one of two things has happened:

    1. The US / EU have essentially done a backroom deal with Putin that says "fine, you can intervene in Kazakhstan but the quid pro quo is no Ukraine movements (for now)"

    OR

    2. Putin knows Biden / the EU is so spineless that he can send his troops into Kazakhstan without serious implications, in which case he is probably going to be emboldened to do something in the Ukraine.

    I hope it's the first, I fear it's the second.

    An unopposed Putin incursion into Kazakhstan will also embolden Xi re Taiwan

    We are beginning to see what a world Not run by the West will look like. Not pretty; quite sad

    The world will miss its just and boyish master
    Others have said the situation between Taiwan and Kazakhstan are different but in two key ways they are not. The first, as you pointed out, is the message of Western inertia bringing parallels with the the 1930s. The second is that both Russia and China see the respective territories as renegades that rightfully belong to their home nation.

    The other way I would look at this is to say, if you are Putin or Xi, why would you NOT invade now? I would argue there might not be a better time - the US is run by a weak President (and, let's be honest, who would bet their mortgage on saying that the Chinese / Russians also don't have something on Hunter Biden - an interesting parallel with Hitler's coming to power in 1933), the EU is weak, America's allies are disheartened by its lack of spine and there are mid-terms coming up where the President's party faces electoral disaster if things continue. If I was Putin or Xi, I would be seriously tempted to call Biden's bluff.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 46,238

    Leon said:

    Alistair said:

    People make very weird assumptions about how easy it would be for China to invade Taiwan.

    Never mind thatbdoing so would blow up the world economy (via shattering compiter chip supplies) that China is currently entirely dependent on. If ASML ever sell top end machinery to China then otnos a different matter but everything goes boom if China invades Taiwan.

    Xi is said to see retaking Taiwan as his final goal. Finally erasing China’s century of shame. The achievement which will put him in the pantheon. That’s pretty ominous because he is not young

    I wonder if China might choose to strangle Taiwan into submission. Refuse to trade with countries that feed Taiwan. Try and shut down the internet. Same way the USSR tried to strangle West Berlin

    They took Hong Kong without a bullet being fired…
    Almost like Hong Kong was on lease to UK and the UK had to give it back to China after 99 years.
    Not true? The New Territories were the leased bit. Think we ‘owned’ Hongers
  • stodgestodge Posts: 12,741
    Evening all :)

    Thanks to @Fishing for making my efforts to try to work out the winner of the 2.30 at Lingfield seem positively amateurish.

    There's a thing about "value" in all this but as any horse racing punter will tell you, that one is in the eye of the beholder. Back when I punted seriously, I would create my own tissue prices for some races and compare with how the bookies priced up a race.

    On other matters, Kazakhstan becomes another thing in the Putin in-tray so we may see the rhetoric on the Ukraine toned down a little. "Helping out" in Almaty, as in Minsk, is a low-risk strategy for Putin in terms of any Russian casualties or any serious destabilisation of the ruling group in each country. If anything, it binds Kazakhstan closer to Russia.

    Ukraine is a very different pot of beluga by comparison - there are too many risks and not enough rewards for anything to really happen. It helps to keep the pot simmering and the West and Kiev on edge but that's all it is.

    Elsewhere, a single Council by-election tonight at Gedling - a Labour seat but with Conservative, Labour, LD, Green and No Description parties running. I've always wondered about voting No Description - I presume they can have whatever policy you want.

    Quick look at the latest Infratest poll from Germany - very little change since last September's election. The SPD-FDP-Green coalition still enjoys majority support at 53% (+1) with the Union still well behind on 23% (-1).
  • pigeonpigeon Posts: 4,087
    Leon said:

    How bad was December for the hospitality sector? Pretty awful.



    https://twitter.com/DuncanWeldon/status/1479041428055597056

    Deliberately trashed by the government without compensation. An absolute scandal.
    I think that’s a little unfair. We’ve called on the government to move towards living with Covid. Awful timing for omicron for sure, but was a better option really locking down plus furlough? Some funding has been made available.
    These are tough times, but to call it a deliberate act is too strong.
    The tragedy is that Plan B probably had littie to zero effect on Omicron. Even hard lockdowns struggle to contain it. As the Dutch are discovering
    Pointless something-must-be-done-ism. OTOH (a) our leaders could've gone an awful lot further (as the Dutch did, and as the Welsh and Scots would have been sorely tempted to do as well, if fiscal devolution had run in parallel to administrative devolution,) and (b) they've hopefully learned that the coronavirus has now grown so infectious that trying to squash it with restrictions is pointless. The government in the Netherlands has relented and agreed to let the schools back next week despite rising case rates, the devolved administrations show no signs of building on their rules, and (aside from the mask pantomime in secondary schools) we've had no gold plating of plan B in England either.

    Beyond that, there are sound reasons to believe that future Covid variants will be more transmissible and less virulent than Omicron - because the former seems to be contingent upon the latter. It looks encouragingly as if the pandemic is almost over, thank goodness.
  • AnabobazinaAnabobazina Posts: 19,606

    Alistair said:

    People make very weird assumptions about how easy it would be for China to invade Taiwan.

    Never mind that doing so would blow up the world economy (via shattering compiter chip supplies) that China is currently entirely dependent on. If ASML ever sell top end machinery to China then otnos a different matter but everything goes boom if China invades Taiwan.

    Good point. I assume they want to get Taiwan the long way, via attrition.

    Similarly an invasion of Ukraine would presumably bring massive sanctions down on Russia (exclusion from Swift has been mentioned), which would not make life very pleasant in the Kremlin.
    We should also seize all Russian owned UK assets.

    Nobody would weep if the UK government took control of Chelsea FC, sold off all the players and ground and closed Chelsea FC down.
    I suspect the odd Chelsea fan might shed a tear.
  • pigeonpigeon Posts: 4,087
    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    Alistair said:

    People make very weird assumptions about how easy it would be for China to invade Taiwan.

    Never mind thatbdoing so would blow up the world economy (via shattering compiter chip supplies) that China is currently entirely dependent on. If ASML ever sell top end machinery to China then otnos a different matter but everything goes boom if China invades Taiwan.

    Xi is said to see retaking Taiwan as his final goal. Finally erasing China’s century of shame. The achievement which will put him in the pantheon. That’s pretty ominous because he is not young

    I wonder if China might choose to strangle Taiwan into submission. Refuse to trade with countries that feed Taiwan. Try and shut down the internet. Same way the USSR tried to strangle West Berlin

    They took Hong Kong without a bullet being fired…
    Almost like Hong Kong was on lease to UK and the UK had to give it back to China after 99 years.
    Not true? The New Territories were the leased bit. Think we ‘owned’ Hongers
    Hong Kong wasn't sustainable without the New Territories, and Maggie had the good sense to recognise both this and the fact that Britain couldn't credibly defend a tiny scrap of land bordering China from the Chinese army.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 46,238
    MrEd said:

    Leon said:

    MrEd said:

    Off topic, re Kazakhstan, it feels like one of two things has happened:

    1. The US / EU have essentially done a backroom deal with Putin that says "fine, you can intervene in Kazakhstan but the quid pro quo is no Ukraine movements (for now)"

    OR

    2. Putin knows Biden / the EU is so spineless that he can send his troops into Kazakhstan without serious implications, in which case he is probably going to be emboldened to do something in the Ukraine.

    I hope it's the first, I fear it's the second.

    An unopposed Putin incursion into Kazakhstan will also embolden Xi re Taiwan

    We are beginning to see what a world Not run by the West will look like. Not pretty; quite sad

    The world will miss its just and boyish master
    Others have said the situation between Taiwan and Kazakhstan are different but in two key ways they are not. The first, as you pointed out, is the message of Western inertia bringing parallels with the the 1930s. The second is that both Russia and China see the respective territories as renegades that rightfully belong to their home nation.

    The other way I would look at this is to say, if you are Putin or Xi, why would you NOT invade now? I would argue there might not be a better time - the US is run by a weak President (and, let's be honest, who would bet their mortgage on saying that the Chinese / Russians also don't have something on Hunter Biden - an interesting parallel with Hitler's coming to power in 1933), the EU is weak, America's allies are disheartened by its lack of spine and there are mid-terms coming up where the President's party faces electoral disaster if things continue. If I was Putin or Xi, I would be seriously tempted to call Biden's bluff.
    Yes, Hitler progressively taking bits of europe that were ‘rightfully German anyway’ is a striking parallel. First the Ruhr. Then Austria and the Sudetenland. Likewise HK and Taiwan to China

  • Daveyboy1961Daveyboy1961 Posts: 3,335
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aH1u1GIPU2A

    OT

    Anyone seen this vid from Dr John Campbell about Omicron from mice?

    Very interesting
  • Gilead news:

    "[Christian] Movement leaders now appear to be working to prime the base for the next attempt to subvert the electoral process."

    https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/06/opinion/jan-6-christian-nationalism.html

    May the Lord open
  • MrEdMrEd Posts: 5,578

    Alistair said:

    People make very weird assumptions about how easy it would be for China to invade Taiwan.

    Never mind that doing so would blow up the world economy (via shattering compiter chip supplies) that China is currently entirely dependent on. If ASML ever sell top end machinery to China then otnos a different matter but everything goes boom if China invades Taiwan.

    Good point. I assume they want to get Taiwan the long way, via attrition.

    Similarly an invasion of Ukraine would presumably bring massive sanctions down on Russia (exclusion from Swift has been mentioned), which would not make life very pleasant in the Kremlin.
    Let's say Russia invades and gets kicked out of SWIFT. It then turns off gas supplies to Europe.

    Who do you reckon blinks first?
  • Leon said:

    Leon said:

    Alistair said:

    People make very weird assumptions about how easy it would be for China to invade Taiwan.

    Never mind thatbdoing so would blow up the world economy (via shattering compiter chip supplies) that China is currently entirely dependent on. If ASML ever sell top end machinery to China then otnos a different matter but everything goes boom if China invades Taiwan.

    Xi is said to see retaking Taiwan as his final goal. Finally erasing China’s century of shame. The achievement which will put him in the pantheon. That’s pretty ominous because he is not young

    I wonder if China might choose to strangle Taiwan into submission. Refuse to trade with countries that feed Taiwan. Try and shut down the internet. Same way the USSR tried to strangle West Berlin

    They took Hong Kong without a bullet being fired…
    Almost like Hong Kong was on lease to UK and the UK had to give it back to China after 99 years.
    Not true? The New Territories were the leased bit. Think we ‘owned’ Hongers
    Hongers without The New Territories wouldn't have been viable.
  • AnabobazinaAnabobazina Posts: 19,606

    How bad was December for the hospitality sector? Pretty awful.



    https://twitter.com/DuncanWeldon/status/1479041428055597056

    Deliberately trashed by the government without compensation. An absolute scandal.
    I think that’s a little unfair. We’ve called on the government to move towards living with Covid. Awful timing for omicron for sure, but was a better option really locking down plus furlough? Some funding has been made available.
    These are tough times, but to call it a deliberate act is too strong.
    Jenny Harries saying you shouldn’t go to parties unless you absolutely have to, on the Monday morning of the week of the first tranche of Christmas parties. Various bods from the government actively discouraging works parties. Just wiped out thousands of bookings worth multiple millions in a sector that has already been hit.

    If it wasn’t deliberate, it was an act of gross stupidity - I don’t know which is worse.
    iirc Whitty said prioritise your socializing. So that you get to see Grandma on 25th, but ditch all the works outings and parties and get together with old mates just before xmas.


    Exactly, thus completely flattening the hospitality sector in one of its few (normally) profitable periods of the year. An act of gross negligence that was executed without any compensation for the thousands of businesses affected.
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 31,274
    edited January 2022
    Leon said:

    Alistair said:

    People make very weird assumptions about how easy it would be for China to invade Taiwan.

    Never mind thatbdoing so would blow up the world economy (via shattering compiter chip supplies) that China is currently entirely dependent on. If ASML ever sell top end machinery to China then otnos a different matter but everything goes boom if China invades Taiwan.

    Xi is said to see retaking Taiwan as his final goal. Finally erasing China’s century of shame. The achievement which will put him in the pantheon. That’s pretty ominous because he is not young

    I wonder if China might choose to strangle Taiwan into submission. Refuse to trade with countries that feed Taiwan. Try and shut down the internet. Same way the USSR tried to strangle West Berlin

    They took Hong Kong without a bullet being fired…
    Same way the USSR tried and failed to strangle West Berlin

    (Edit: I've no idea what's causing that new line.)
  • turbotubbsturbotubbs Posts: 14,878

    How bad was December for the hospitality sector? Pretty awful.



    https://twitter.com/DuncanWeldon/status/1479041428055597056

    Deliberately trashed by the government without compensation. An absolute scandal.
    I think that’s a little unfair. We’ve called on the government to move towards living with Covid. Awful timing for omicron for sure, but was a better option really locking down plus furlough? Some funding has been made available.
    These are tough times, but to call it a deliberate act is too strong.
    Jenny Harries saying you shouldn’t go to parties unless you absolutely have to, on the Monday morning of the week of the first tranche of Christmas parties. Various bods from the government actively discouraging works parties. Just wiped out thousands of bookings worth multiple millions in a sector that has already been hit.

    If it wasn’t deliberate, it was an act of gross stupidity - I don’t know which is worse.
    Jenny Harries is NOT the government. She is head of UKHSA. The pb was saying take a test before you go. Very different.
    She works for the government and is seen as a public face of the health service. Ministers entirely failed in reining her in - meanwhile Whitty etc were saying similarly destructive things. I shudder when I remember that period: it was inexcusably poor messaging.
    What would you have done? Nothing? In the face of the unknown potential of omicron. With people screaming on all sides?
    I think the advice to prioritise was fine. Not great for hospitality but you cannot do everything.
  • MrEdMrEd Posts: 5,578
    pigeon said:

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    Alistair said:

    People make very weird assumptions about how easy it would be for China to invade Taiwan.

    Never mind thatbdoing so would blow up the world economy (via shattering compiter chip supplies) that China is currently entirely dependent on. If ASML ever sell top end machinery to China then otnos a different matter but everything goes boom if China invades Taiwan.

    Xi is said to see retaking Taiwan as his final goal. Finally erasing China’s century of shame. The achievement which will put him in the pantheon. That’s pretty ominous because he is not young

    I wonder if China might choose to strangle Taiwan into submission. Refuse to trade with countries that feed Taiwan. Try and shut down the internet. Same way the USSR tried to strangle West Berlin

    They took Hong Kong without a bullet being fired…
    Almost like Hong Kong was on lease to UK and the UK had to give it back to China after 99 years.
    Not true? The New Territories were the leased bit. Think we ‘owned’ Hongers
    Hong Kong wasn't sustainable without the New Territories, and Maggie had the good sense to recognise both this and the fact that Britain couldn't credibly defend a tiny scrap of land bordering China from the Chinese army.
    That may be true but I think Leon was talking about TSE's claim that HK was leased. Some of it was, but the original part was the UK's.
  • MrEdMrEd Posts: 5,578
    Leon said:

    MrEd said:

    Leon said:

    MrEd said:

    Off topic, re Kazakhstan, it feels like one of two things has happened:

    1. The US / EU have essentially done a backroom deal with Putin that says "fine, you can intervene in Kazakhstan but the quid pro quo is no Ukraine movements (for now)"

    OR

    2. Putin knows Biden / the EU is so spineless that he can send his troops into Kazakhstan without serious implications, in which case he is probably going to be emboldened to do something in the Ukraine.

    I hope it's the first, I fear it's the second.

    An unopposed Putin incursion into Kazakhstan will also embolden Xi re Taiwan

    We are beginning to see what a world Not run by the West will look like. Not pretty; quite sad

    The world will miss its just and boyish master
    Others have said the situation between Taiwan and Kazakhstan are different but in two key ways they are not. The first, as you pointed out, is the message of Western inertia bringing parallels with the the 1930s. The second is that both Russia and China see the respective territories as renegades that rightfully belong to their home nation.

    The other way I would look at this is to say, if you are Putin or Xi, why would you NOT invade now? I would argue there might not be a better time - the US is run by a weak President (and, let's be honest, who would bet their mortgage on saying that the Chinese / Russians also don't have something on Hunter Biden - an interesting parallel with Hitler's coming to power in 1933), the EU is weak, America's allies are disheartened by its lack of spine and there are mid-terms coming up where the President's party faces electoral disaster if things continue. If I was Putin or Xi, I would be seriously tempted to call Biden's bluff.
    Yes, Hitler progressively taking bits of europe that were ‘rightfully German anyway’ is a striking parallel. First the Ruhr. Then Austria and the Sudetenland. Likewise HK and Taiwan to China

    Let's do "would you bet the mortgage on..." question again. How many on here would bet their mortgage that the US would be prepared to inflict severe economic sanctions on Russia if it invaded Ukraine or China intervened in Taiwan?
  • LeonLeon Posts: 46,238

    How bad was December for the hospitality sector? Pretty awful.



    https://twitter.com/DuncanWeldon/status/1479041428055597056

    Deliberately trashed by the government without compensation. An absolute scandal.
    I think that’s a little unfair. We’ve called on the government to move towards living with Covid. Awful timing for omicron for sure, but was a better option really locking down plus furlough? Some funding has been made available.
    These are tough times, but to call it a deliberate act is too strong.
    Jenny Harries saying you shouldn’t go to parties unless you absolutely have to, on the Monday morning of the week of the first tranche of Christmas parties. Various bods from the government actively discouraging works parties. Just wiped out thousands of bookings worth multiple millions in a sector that has already been hit.

    If it wasn’t deliberate, it was an act of gross stupidity - I don’t know which is worse.
    iirc Whitty said prioritise your socializing. So that you get to see Grandma on 25th, but ditch all the works outings and parties and get together with old mates just before xmas.


    Exactly, thus completely flattening the hospitality sector in one of its few (normally) profitable periods of the year. An act of gross negligence that was executed without any compensation for the thousands of businesses affected.
    Yup. Casual vandalism by an unaccountable bureaucrat who doesn’t have to face the voters. Instead he gets a gong

    With power must come responsibility. Labour should have this in their manifesto. A reckoning for ALL when this horror eventually ends
  • kjhkjh Posts: 10,458
    Leon said:

    Washington reflecting on last 6th Jan today.

    "In short, the Republic faces an existential threat from a movement that is openly contemptuous of democracy and has shown that it is willing to use violence to achieve its ends. No self-governing society can survive such a threat by denying that it exists."

    NY Times

    If it weren’t for the bit about ‘violence’ they could be talking about Remainers 2016-19
    Usual bollocks over reaction as normal. Are you not capable of not overreacting, exaggerating, panicking about absolutely everything?
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 31,274
    MrEd said:

    Alistair said:

    People make very weird assumptions about how easy it would be for China to invade Taiwan.

    Never mind that doing so would blow up the world economy (via shattering compiter chip supplies) that China is currently entirely dependent on. If ASML ever sell top end machinery to China then otnos a different matter but everything goes boom if China invades Taiwan.

    Good point. I assume they want to get Taiwan the long way, via attrition.

    Similarly an invasion of Ukraine would presumably bring massive sanctions down on Russia (exclusion from Swift has been mentioned), which would not make life very pleasant in the Kremlin.
    Let's say Russia invades and gets kicked out of SWIFT. It then turns off gas supplies to Europe.

    Who do you reckon blinks first?
    Not the USA

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Society_for_Worldwide_Interbank_Financial_Telecommunication#U.S._government_involvement
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 53,770
    MrEd said:

    pigeon said:

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    Alistair said:

    People make very weird assumptions about how easy it would be for China to invade Taiwan.

    Never mind thatbdoing so would blow up the world economy (via shattering compiter chip supplies) that China is currently entirely dependent on. If ASML ever sell top end machinery to China then otnos a different matter but everything goes boom if China invades Taiwan.

    Xi is said to see retaking Taiwan as his final goal. Finally erasing China’s century of shame. The achievement which will put him in the pantheon. That’s pretty ominous because he is not young

    I wonder if China might choose to strangle Taiwan into submission. Refuse to trade with countries that feed Taiwan. Try and shut down the internet. Same way the USSR tried to strangle West Berlin

    They took Hong Kong without a bullet being fired…
    Almost like Hong Kong was on lease to UK and the UK had to give it back to China after 99 years.
    Not true? The New Territories were the leased bit. Think we ‘owned’ Hongers
    Hong Kong wasn't sustainable without the New Territories, and Maggie had the good sense to recognise both this and the fact that Britain couldn't credibly defend a tiny scrap of land bordering China from the Chinese army.
    That may be true but I think Leon was talking about TSE's claim that HK was leased. Some of it was, but the original part was the UK's.
    The New Territories were leased, but Hong Kong Island was not.

    However... as we captured Hong Kong during the first Opium War, and ceded to the UK at the Treaty of Nanking, the Chinese never really - shall we say... - let it go. They regard it as something of theirs they were forced at gunpoint to give up.

    Unfortunately (for the UK), when it came to the talks, the Chinese government informed Mrs Thatcher that (a) they would not be releasing the New Territories, and (b) that the existing water supply arrangement would not be renewed. So, would the UK like to discuss the peaceful handover of Hong Kong?

    There is no Hong Kong without a supply of fresh water, so the UK didn't have a whole bunch of choice.
  • Daveyboy1961Daveyboy1961 Posts: 3,335
    kjh said:

    Leon said:

    Washington reflecting on last 6th Jan today.

    "In short, the Republic faces an existential threat from a movement that is openly contemptuous of democracy and has shown that it is willing to use violence to achieve its ends. No self-governing society can survive such a threat by denying that it exists."

    NY Times

    If it weren’t for the bit about ‘violence’ they could be talking about Remainers 2016-19
    Usual bollocks over reaction as normal. Are you not capable of not overreacting, exaggerating, panicking about absolutely everything?
    It's obviously the alcohol talking....
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 19,072
    Day 6 LFT still positive ffs
  • LeonLeon Posts: 46,238
    kjh said:

    Leon said:

    Washington reflecting on last 6th Jan today.

    "In short, the Republic faces an existential threat from a movement that is openly contemptuous of democracy and has shown that it is willing to use violence to achieve its ends. No self-governing society can survive such a threat by denying that it exists."

    NY Times

    If it weren’t for the bit about ‘violence’ they could be talking about Remainers 2016-19
    Usual bollocks over reaction as normal. Are you not capable of not overreacting, exaggerating, panicking about absolutely everything?
    No, but I am capable of simply winding people up when I’m bored
  • kjhkjh Posts: 10,458
    Leon said:

    kjh said:

    Leon said:

    Washington reflecting on last 6th Jan today.

    "In short, the Republic faces an existential threat from a movement that is openly contemptuous of democracy and has shown that it is willing to use violence to achieve its ends. No self-governing society can survive such a threat by denying that it exists."

    NY Times

    If it weren’t for the bit about ‘violence’ they could be talking about Remainers 2016-19
    Usual bollocks over reaction as normal. Are you not capable of not overreacting, exaggerating, panicking about absolutely everything?
    No, but I am capable of simply winding people up when I’m bored
    😀 I think you are mistaking who is doing the winding up.
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 39,139

    Day 6 LFT still positive ffs

    Oh dear. Never mind, you will get good karma from not going out and about unlike some PBers want. I know, not much consolation is it??
  • bigjohnowlsbigjohnowls Posts: 21,722

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aH1u1GIPU2A

    OT

    Anyone seen this vid from Dr John Campbell about Omicron from mice?

    Very interesting

    Who needs NICE when it s/b MICE
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 53,770
    Leon said:

    MrEd said:

    Leon said:

    MrEd said:

    Off topic, re Kazakhstan, it feels like one of two things has happened:

    1. The US / EU have essentially done a backroom deal with Putin that says "fine, you can intervene in Kazakhstan but the quid pro quo is no Ukraine movements (for now)"

    OR

    2. Putin knows Biden / the EU is so spineless that he can send his troops into Kazakhstan without serious implications, in which case he is probably going to be emboldened to do something in the Ukraine.

    I hope it's the first, I fear it's the second.

    An unopposed Putin incursion into Kazakhstan will also embolden Xi re Taiwan

    We are beginning to see what a world Not run by the West will look like. Not pretty; quite sad

    The world will miss its just and boyish master
    Others have said the situation between Taiwan and Kazakhstan are different but in two key ways they are not. The first, as you pointed out, is the message of Western inertia bringing parallels with the the 1930s. The second is that both Russia and China see the respective territories as renegades that rightfully belong to their home nation.

    The other way I would look at this is to say, if you are Putin or Xi, why would you NOT invade now? I would argue there might not be a better time - the US is run by a weak President (and, let's be honest, who would bet their mortgage on saying that the Chinese / Russians also don't have something on Hunter Biden - an interesting parallel with Hitler's coming to power in 1933), the EU is weak, America's allies are disheartened by its lack of spine and there are mid-terms coming up where the President's party faces electoral disaster if things continue. If I was Putin or Xi, I would be seriously tempted to call Biden's bluff.
    Yes, Hitler progressively taking bits of europe that were ‘rightfully German anyway’ is a striking parallel. First the Ruhr. Then Austria and the Sudetenland. Likewise HK and Taiwan to China

    The problem the Chinese have always had with Taiwan is their own propaganda. Most Chinese think that the Taiwanese are desperate for reunification and are only held back by their mendacious leaders. (I have heard this from intelligent Chinese business leaders, who really should know better.)

    This makes any kind of bloody conflict a little difficult, because the Taiwanese aren't supposed to be fighting, they're supposed to be throwing flowers.

    Xi would need to strangle Taiwan via a blockade. Which is possible, but far from easy.
  • AnabobazinaAnabobazina Posts: 19,606

    How bad was December for the hospitality sector? Pretty awful.



    https://twitter.com/DuncanWeldon/status/1479041428055597056

    Deliberately trashed by the government without compensation. An absolute scandal.
    I think that’s a little unfair. We’ve called on the government to move towards living with Covid. Awful timing for omicron for sure, but was a better option really locking down plus furlough? Some funding has been made available.
    These are tough times, but to call it a deliberate act is too strong.
    Jenny Harries saying you shouldn’t go to parties unless you absolutely have to, on the Monday morning of the week of the first tranche of Christmas parties. Various bods from the government actively discouraging works parties. Just wiped out thousands of bookings worth multiple millions in a sector that has already been hit.

    If it wasn’t deliberate, it was an act of gross stupidity - I don’t know which is worse.
    Jenny Harries is NOT the government. She is head of UKHSA. The pb was saying take a test before you go. Very different.
    She works for the government and is seen as a public face of the health service. Ministers entirely failed in reining her in - meanwhile Whitty etc were saying similarly destructive things. I shudder when I remember that period: it was inexcusably poor messaging.
    What would you have done? Nothing? In the face of the unknown potential of omicron. With people screaming on all sides?
    I think the advice to prioritise was fine. Not great for hospitality but you cannot do everything.
    I have already told you! I’d have compensated them for the loss of trade. It was not beyond the wit of man. As it is, the words of Whitty et al carpeted the entire sector without any compensation. A disgrace.
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 31,274
    Russia: On the one hand we hear it's about to undertake an East European land grab to resurrect the Soviet Empire and knock the USA off its perch...

    ...On the other hand it's an economic basket case living on borrowed time.

    Which is closest to the truth, I wonder?
  • rpjsrpjs Posts: 3,787
    Alistair said:

    People make very weird assumptions about how easy it would be for China to invade Taiwan.

    Never mind thatbdoing so would blow up the world economy (via shattering compiter chip supplies) that China is currently entirely dependent on. If ASML ever sell top end machinery to China then otnos a different matter but everything goes boom if China invades Taiwan.

    As well as that, my understanding is that the PRC doesn't really have the capability to make an amphibious assault across the Taiwan Strait, certainly not against a very well-armed opponent.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 53,770

    Russia: On the one hand we hear it's about to undertake an East European land grab to resurrect the Soviet Empire and knock the USA off its perch...

    ...On the other hand it's an economic basket case living on borrowed time.

    Which is closest to the truth, I wonder?

    Surely (2) is why they're engaging in (1)?
  • kjhkjh Posts: 10,458
    edited January 2022

    Day 6 LFT still positive ffs

    Don't want to depress you but my daughter was still +ve on day 11 so the early release was useless for her.
  • bigjohnowlsbigjohnowls Posts: 21,722

    MrEd said:

    Alistair said:

    People make very weird assumptions about how easy it would be for China to invade Taiwan.

    Never mind that doing so would blow up the world economy (via shattering compiter chip supplies) that China is currently entirely dependent on. If ASML ever sell top end machinery to China then otnos a different matter but everything goes boom if China invades Taiwan.

    Good point. I assume they want to get Taiwan the long way, via attrition.

    Similarly an invasion of Ukraine would presumably bring massive sanctions down on Russia (exclusion from Swift has been mentioned), which would not make life very pleasant in the Kremlin.
    Let's say Russia invades and gets kicked out of SWIFT. It then turns off gas supplies to Europe.

    Who do you reckon blinks first?
    Not the USA

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Society_for_Worldwide_Interbank_Financial_Telecommunication#U.S._government_involvement
    Can they replace the gas Europe gets from Russia Immediately if not sooner?
  • kyf_100kyf_100 Posts: 3,911

    MrEd said:

    Alistair said:

    People make very weird assumptions about how easy it would be for China to invade Taiwan.

    Never mind that doing so would blow up the world economy (via shattering compiter chip supplies) that China is currently entirely dependent on. If ASML ever sell top end machinery to China then otnos a different matter but everything goes boom if China invades Taiwan.

    Good point. I assume they want to get Taiwan the long way, via attrition.

    Similarly an invasion of Ukraine would presumably bring massive sanctions down on Russia (exclusion from Swift has been mentioned), which would not make life very pleasant in the Kremlin.
    Let's say Russia invades and gets kicked out of SWIFT. It then turns off gas supplies to Europe.

    Who do you reckon blinks first?
    Not the USA

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Society_for_Worldwide_Interbank_Financial_Telecommunication#U.S._government_involvement
    "Why should the Russians annexe the whole of Europe.... no, if they try anything, it will be salami tactics."
    "Salami tactics?"
    "Slice by slice."

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o861Ka9TtT4
  • CookieCookie Posts: 11,183
    Leon said:

    How bad was December for the hospitality sector? Pretty awful.



    https://twitter.com/DuncanWeldon/status/1479041428055597056

    Deliberately trashed by the government without compensation. An absolute scandal.
    I think that’s a little unfair. We’ve called on the government to move towards living with Covid. Awful timing for omicron for sure, but was a better option really locking down plus furlough? Some funding has been made available.
    These are tough times, but to call it a deliberate act is too strong.
    Jenny Harries saying you shouldn’t go to parties unless you absolutely have to, on the Monday morning of the week of the first tranche of Christmas parties. Various bods from the government actively discouraging works parties. Just wiped out thousands of bookings worth multiple millions in a sector that has already been hit.

    If it wasn’t deliberate, it was an act of gross stupidity - I don’t know which is worse.
    iirc Whitty said prioritise your socializing. So that you get to see Grandma on 25th, but ditch all the works outings and parties and get together with old mates just before xmas.


    Exactly, thus completely flattening the hospitality sector in one of its few (normally) profitable periods of the year. An act of gross negligence that was executed without any compensation for the thousands of businesses affected.
    Yup. Casual vandalism by an unaccountable bureaucrat who doesn’t have to face the voters. Instead he gets a gong

    With power must come responsibility. Labour should have this in their manifesto. A reckoning for ALL when this horror eventually ends
    Well ideally yes. But are Labour really going to take on the public sector machine? Labour is the party of the public sector machine.
  • MrEdMrEd Posts: 5,578
    rcs1000 said:

    MrEd said:

    pigeon said:

    Leon said:

    Leon said:

    Alistair said:

    People make very weird assumptions about how easy it would be for China to invade Taiwan.

    Never mind thatbdoing so would blow up the world economy (via shattering compiter chip supplies) that China is currently entirely dependent on. If ASML ever sell top end machinery to China then otnos a different matter but everything goes boom if China invades Taiwan.

    Xi is said to see retaking Taiwan as his final goal. Finally erasing China’s century of shame. The achievement which will put him in the pantheon. That’s pretty ominous because he is not young

    I wonder if China might choose to strangle Taiwan into submission. Refuse to trade with countries that feed Taiwan. Try and shut down the internet. Same way the USSR tried to strangle West Berlin

    They took Hong Kong without a bullet being fired…
    Almost like Hong Kong was on lease to UK and the UK had to give it back to China after 99 years.
    Not true? The New Territories were the leased bit. Think we ‘owned’ Hongers
    Hong Kong wasn't sustainable without the New Territories, and Maggie had the good sense to recognise both this and the fact that Britain couldn't credibly defend a tiny scrap of land bordering China from the Chinese army.
    That may be true but I think Leon was talking about TSE's claim that HK was leased. Some of it was, but the original part was the UK's.
    The New Territories were leased, but Hong Kong Island was not.

    However... as we captured Hong Kong during the first Opium War, and ceded to the UK at the Treaty of Nanking, the Chinese never really - shall we say... - let it go. They regard it as something of theirs they were forced at gunpoint to give up.

    Unfortunately (for the UK), when it came to the talks, the Chinese government informed Mrs Thatcher that (a) they would not be releasing the New Territories, and (b) that the existing water supply arrangement would not be renewed. So, would the UK like to discuss the peaceful handover of Hong Kong?

    There is no Hong Kong without a supply of fresh water, so the UK didn't have a whole bunch of choice.
    Absolutely, there was no way.

    Wonder what the Spaniards would ever be tempted to do the same with Gibraltar?
  • FarooqFarooq Posts: 10,775
    FPT:

    I know he punches well above his weight, but is our Farooq any relation?

    ‘Scottish bantamweight Kash Farooq has announced his shock retirement from professional boxing at age 26 because of "unforeseen circumstances"’

    https://www.bbc.com/sport/boxing/59899037

    Who?
  • AnabobazinaAnabobazina Posts: 19,606

    Day 6 LFT still positive ffs

    Do you have any symptoms?
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 31,274
    rcs1000 said:

    Russia: On the one hand we hear it's about to undertake an East European land grab to resurrect the Soviet Empire and knock the USA off its perch...

    ...On the other hand it's an economic basket case living on borrowed time.

    Which is closest to the truth, I wonder?

    Surely (2) is why they're engaging in (1)?
    Well yes, I can see that. But can an economic basket case really be that much of a threat to the West?
  • AlistairAlistair Posts: 23,670
    edited January 2022
    rcs1000 said:

    Leon said:

    MrEd said:

    Leon said:

    MrEd said:

    Off topic, re Kazakhstan, it feels like one of two things has happened:

    1. The US / EU have essentially done a backroom deal with Putin that says "fine, you can intervene in Kazakhstan but the quid pro quo is no Ukraine movements (for now)"

    OR

    2. Putin knows Biden / the EU is so spineless that he can send his troops into Kazakhstan without serious implications, in which case he is probably going to be emboldened to do something in the Ukraine.

    I hope it's the first, I fear it's the second.

    An unopposed Putin incursion into Kazakhstan will also embolden Xi re Taiwan

    We are beginning to see what a world Not run by the West will look like. Not pretty; quite sad

    The world will miss its just and boyish master
    Others have said the situation between Taiwan and Kazakhstan are different but in two key ways they are not. The first, as you pointed out, is the message of Western inertia bringing parallels with the the 1930s. The second is that both Russia and China see the respective territories as renegades that rightfully belong to their home nation.

    The other way I would look at this is to say, if you are Putin or Xi, why would you NOT invade now? I would argue there might not be a better time - the US is run by a weak President (and, let's be honest, who would bet their mortgage on saying that the Chinese / Russians also don't have something on Hunter Biden - an interesting parallel with Hitler's coming to power in 1933), the EU is weak, America's allies are disheartened by its lack of spine and there are mid-terms coming up where the President's party faces electoral disaster if things continue. If I was Putin or Xi, I would be seriously tempted to call Biden's bluff.
    Yes, Hitler progressively taking bits of europe that were ‘rightfully German anyway’ is a striking parallel. First the Ruhr. Then Austria and the Sudetenland. Likewise HK and Taiwan to China

    The problem the Chinese have always had with Taiwan is their own propaganda. Most Chinese think that the Taiwanese are desperate for reunification and are only held back by their mendacious leaders. (I have heard this from intelligent Chinese business leaders, who really should know better.)

    This makes any kind of bloody conflict a little difficult, because the Taiwanese aren't supposed to be fighting, they're supposed to be throwing flowers.

    Xi would need to strangle Taiwan via a blockade. Which is possible, but far from easy.
    You then need to struggle with thr form thr blockade takes what with TSMC producing something like 50% of thr World's computer chips. The chips which China assembles into finished products.

    Ot would have to be the threat of a blockade rather than am actual blockade as an actual blockade crashes China.
  • MrEdMrEd Posts: 5,578

    MrEd said:

    Alistair said:

    People make very weird assumptions about how easy it would be for China to invade Taiwan.

    Never mind that doing so would blow up the world economy (via shattering compiter chip supplies) that China is currently entirely dependent on. If ASML ever sell top end machinery to China then otnos a different matter but everything goes boom if China invades Taiwan.

    Good point. I assume they want to get Taiwan the long way, via attrition.

    Similarly an invasion of Ukraine would presumably bring massive sanctions down on Russia (exclusion from Swift has been mentioned), which would not make life very pleasant in the Kremlin.
    Let's say Russia invades and gets kicked out of SWIFT. It then turns off gas supplies to Europe.

    Who do you reckon blinks first?
    Not the USA

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Society_for_Worldwide_Interbank_Financial_Telecommunication#U.S._government_involvement
    Definitely not the US, what about the EU?

    And then let's say the US does this, does Putin stick or twist? Withdraw from Ukraine or invade the Baltics (with help from Belarus) and dare the US and its allies to take the ultimate step?

    How many US / EU citizens would be prepared to perish for the Balts?

    (PS there is a reason why Russia kept relatively quiet when Trump was in office and it wasn't because he was a Russian spy, it's because he was considered nuts enough to possibly go OTT)
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 31,274
    Alistair said:

    rcs1000 said:

    Leon said:

    MrEd said:

    Leon said:

    MrEd said:

    Off topic, re Kazakhstan, it feels like one of two things has happened:

    1. The US / EU have essentially done a backroom deal with Putin that says "fine, you can intervene in Kazakhstan but the quid pro quo is no Ukraine movements (for now)"

    OR

    2. Putin knows Biden / the EU is so spineless that he can send his troops into Kazakhstan without serious implications, in which case he is probably going to be emboldened to do something in the Ukraine.

    I hope it's the first, I fear it's the second.

    An unopposed Putin incursion into Kazakhstan will also embolden Xi re Taiwan

    We are beginning to see what a world Not run by the West will look like. Not pretty; quite sad

    The world will miss its just and boyish master
    Others have said the situation between Taiwan and Kazakhstan are different but in two key ways they are not. The first, as you pointed out, is the message of Western inertia bringing parallels with the the 1930s. The second is that both Russia and China see the respective territories as renegades that rightfully belong to their home nation.

    The other way I would look at this is to say, if you are Putin or Xi, why would you NOT invade now? I would argue there might not be a better time - the US is run by a weak President (and, let's be honest, who would bet their mortgage on saying that the Chinese / Russians also don't have something on Hunter Biden - an interesting parallel with Hitler's coming to power in 1933), the EU is weak, America's allies are disheartened by its lack of spine and there are mid-terms coming up where the President's party faces electoral disaster if things continue. If I was Putin or Xi, I would be seriously tempted to call Biden's bluff.
    Yes, Hitler progressively taking bits of europe that were ‘rightfully German anyway’ is a striking parallel. First the Ruhr. Then Austria and the Sudetenland. Likewise HK and Taiwan to China

    The problem the Chinese have always had with Taiwan is their own propaganda. Most Chinese think that the Taiwanese are desperate for reunification and are only held back by their mendacious leaders. (I have heard this from intelligent Chinese business leaders, who really should know better.)

    This makes any kind of bloody conflict a little difficult, because the Taiwanese aren't supposed to be fighting, they're supposed to be throwing flowers.

    Xi would need to strangle Taiwan via a blockade. Which is possible, but far from easy.
    You then need to struggle with thr form thr blockade takes what with TSMC producing something like 50% of thr World's computer chips. The chips which China assembles into finished products.

    Otbwpuld jave to be the threat of a bloclade rather than am actusl blockade as an actual blockade crashes China.
    Time to blow the crumbs from that keyboard, just sayin.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 53,770
    MrEd said:

    Leon said:

    MrEd said:

    Leon said:

    MrEd said:

    Off topic, re Kazakhstan, it feels like one of two things has happened:

    1. The US / EU have essentially done a backroom deal with Putin that says "fine, you can intervene in Kazakhstan but the quid pro quo is no Ukraine movements (for now)"

    OR

    2. Putin knows Biden / the EU is so spineless that he can send his troops into Kazakhstan without serious implications, in which case he is probably going to be emboldened to do something in the Ukraine.

    I hope it's the first, I fear it's the second.

    An unopposed Putin incursion into Kazakhstan will also embolden Xi re Taiwan

    We are beginning to see what a world Not run by the West will look like. Not pretty; quite sad

    The world will miss its just and boyish master
    Others have said the situation between Taiwan and Kazakhstan are different but in two key ways they are not. The first, as you pointed out, is the message of Western inertia bringing parallels with the the 1930s. The second is that both Russia and China see the respective territories as renegades that rightfully belong to their home nation.

    The other way I would look at this is to say, if you are Putin or Xi, why would you NOT invade now? I would argue there might not be a better time - the US is run by a weak President (and, let's be honest, who would bet their mortgage on saying that the Chinese / Russians also don't have something on Hunter Biden - an interesting parallel with Hitler's coming to power in 1933), the EU is weak, America's allies are disheartened by its lack of spine and there are mid-terms coming up where the President's party faces electoral disaster if things continue. If I was Putin or Xi, I would be seriously tempted to call Biden's bluff.
    Yes, Hitler progressively taking bits of europe that were ‘rightfully German anyway’ is a striking parallel. First the Ruhr. Then Austria and the Sudetenland. Likewise HK and Taiwan to China

    Let's do "would you bet the mortgage on..." question again. How many on here would bet their mortgage that the US would be prepared to inflict severe economic sanctions on Russia if it invaded Ukraine or China intervened in Taiwan?
    Well, China can't simply invade Taiwan. It's 120 miles of Ocean from China, and there aren't nice flat beaches on the China side. You would need a flotilla of landing vessels that went all the way around to the far side of the island. Plus, of course, you would need to actually build tens of thousands of barges. In secrecy.

    Now, could they, if they committed, invade Taiwan?

    Yes, absolutely. But it wouldn't be an "out the blue" thing, because this would be an amphibious invasion over a distance much greater than the channel with at least as many troops as the D-Day landings (against a heavily armed enemy with the latest Western fighter jets and French submarines). Sure, they could do it. But not tomorrow.

    So, the question is a very different one. If China was building a force of barges and martialling them in the ports nearest Taiwan, what would the West do? And I suspect the answer is that they'd happily sell the Taiwanese lots more weapons. The French certainly would and I suspect the Americans would too. You might also see some exercises around Taiwan, that would make the Chinese job much more difficult.

    If the Chinese wanted to take Taiwan, the only plausible way is via strangulation. It would be a slow uptick in diplomatic pressure; you'd refuse flights from Taiwan being able to overfly China; combined with - eventually - ships outside Taiwanese ports.
  • GallowgateGallowgate Posts: 19,072

    Day 6 LFT still positive ffs

    Do you have any symptoms?
    A slight runny nose
This discussion has been closed.