(((Dan Hodges))) @DPJHodges · 3h If the atrocities being reported are verified, and there's evidence they're still being perpetrated, then we need to intervene directly and militarily in Ukraine. Whether a country is part of NATO is irrelevant. We don't stand back and allow the perpetration of genocide.
How long before national newspapers and broadcasters are demanding something is done.
He seems to have forgotten Rwanda, Syria, much of Bosnia, Cambodia etc where we did very little when genocide was committed.
If a NATO nation is invaded then yes we have to take military action but in terms of Ukraine we just keep sending supplies, we don't go to WW3
The problem with the argument about "not going to WW3" is that it sets an arbitrary threshold that hands escalation dominance to Putin. Are you going to let him decide what level of support is acceptable?
No. The red line remains if he invades a NATO nation
Only an invasion? And the red line for what specifically?
NATO military response
Then you're still in a discussion of what kind of response, by whom, what retaliation risks to avoid, etc.
There are already NATO troops and jets based in Estonia and Latvia as NATO states bordering Russia.
So if Putin invaded those states then at that point we would be at war
What if Putin struck an airfield as a warning against NATO weapons shipments?
If he struck an airfield and destroyed NATO planes then obviously NATO would respond in kind with airstrikes on a Russian base
So just tit for tat? Which NATO member would carry out the retaliation?
Planes from all of them, as NATO is based on collective defence
You'd send in bombers from every NATO member in response to a single missile strike? What if not every NATO member agrees with that plan? Which Russian targets would you need that many planes for and how would you defend them?
Unless every NATO state agrees and is ready to participate in NATO action then NATO is redundant to defend its member states and their armed forces. If Russia bombed NATO jets it should prepare for NATO jets to bomb an airfield with Russian jets.
Otherwise NATO would then collapse and Russia could invade every individual NATO nation in turn. China would also take note of the inability and unwillingness of western nations to defend themselves when looking at Taiwan and the broader Far East
If you read NATO Article 5, that's not what collective defence is based on.
It is based on an attack on one NATO ally being an attack on all of them.
So if Russia can bomb NATO jets without response from the collective NATO nations then Putin could invade Estonia and Latvia etc without fear of collective NATO response either. The Baltic states on their own are far easier pickings than Ukraine, much smaller with far less strong militaries
Invasion of Estonia and Latvia is WW111
BigG - I hope your 50k post is going to be a good one! Reveal how you have secretly been a Corbynite all along. Or how you're secretly another SeanT clone. Or how you're really into skydiving bondage with anyone you meet in the air...
Trying to be an optimist am I being silly in hoping that China has seen how bad invading Ukraine is that they think invading Taiwan will be a hundred times harder and abandon all plans to do so?
I think if you're the Chinese military establishment you can probably find plenty of supporting material for an argument that this was largely down to Russian military incompetence and lousy equipment and therefore not applicable for any military adventures you'd like to embark on yourself...
Bugger.
I’m very much hoping that the US or others have a very very effective anti-ship missile they can give the Ukrainians which starts taking out Black Sea fleet ships very publicly as that is the sort of thing that really will make the Chinese have to consider invading Taiwan very carefully.
If Star Streak and their like have major success against AirPower and ships are very vulnerable (and we know that tanks are looking near obsolete thanks to NLAW and co now) then it potentially changes all war in favour of defenders for a while at least.
Reuters - Ukrainian prosecutors investigating possible war crimes by Russia have found 410 bodies in towns near Kyiv and 140 of them had been examined. Russia denied allegations that its forces killed civilians in the town of Bucha near Kyiv.
Disgusting behaviour from Putin. There really needs to be a way to find a ceasefire now by any means possible and end this war
Hmm, not completely sure about that. I want a lot more of these murderers going home in wooden boxes and as much equipment stripped off the Russian army as possible so they can't come back. Allowing the Russians to regroup and rearm might be a major mistake.
Edit, but welcome by the way. New voices always welcome.
You don’t want them going back in wooden boxes - you want them going back missing limbs as they will be a clear and indisputable “truth” to the Russian people of the cost of the war they support.
If there are 20,000 young men who are visibly ruined by the war it cannot be hidden and also they will be able to tell their families and friends about what they saw and how bad the Russian military really is.
Also injured soldiers use up more resources than dead soldiers along the line….
yes but these may be ordinary russian conscipts....we have to maintain our sense of morality here
But there armed any conscripts in Ukraine Putin has told us that. (as if we could believe a word that lying pies of Sh*t says)
I think most if not all people would rather go back missing a leg that in a body bag, so wishing that the enemy is wended instead of killed is hardly a show if pore Morality.
Please don't take this the wrong way, but we have had a few Putin trolls on here, so do you mind me asking in your own words can you describe Putin?
Reuters - Ukrainian prosecutors investigating possible war crimes by Russia have found 410 bodies in towns near Kyiv and 140 of them had been examined. Russia denied allegations that its forces killed civilians in the town of Bucha near Kyiv.
Disgusting behaviour from Putin. There really needs to be a way to find a ceasefire now by any means possible and end this war
Hmm, not completely sure about that. I want a lot more of these murderers going home in wooden boxes and as much equipment stripped off the Russian army as possible so they can't come back. Allowing the Russians to regroup and rearm might be a major mistake.
Edit, but welcome by the way. New voices always welcome.
You don’t want them going back in wooden boxes - you want them going back missing limbs as they will be a clear and indisputable “truth” to the Russian people of the cost of the war they support.
If there are 20,000 young men who are visibly ruined by the war it cannot be hidden and also they will be able to tell their families and friends about what they saw and how bad the Russian military really is.
Also injured soldiers use up more resources than dead soldiers along the line….
That’s why the Azov battalion shot those Russian POWs in the legs. Much more militarily effective than murder
I seem to remember from the Ken Burns Vietnam doc that whilst the American public were shocked by deaths the effect of seeing the wounded and traumatised soldiers around them every day brought the war home much more viscerally than stats of dead soldiers.
If you are a Russian mother and you see young men come home missing limbs and traumatised in your town and then you look at your son who might get called up then you might start questioning the propaganda.
There were earlier reports that many of the Russian soldiers had suffered frostbite. That is a lifelong reminder - and if on the hands, a visible reminder - to those around you that you went to Ukraine. And given the atrocities committed there, a stark warning of perhaps what you are capable of.
Anyway, I am back up North tomorrow am. I have been a city girl most of my life - Naples, London, Bristol, Paris - with childhood holidays in very rural Ireland. I love cities.
And, yet, I feel trapped in London in a way I have never done before. I look out of the window and see buildings. Even though on the top floor I can see across London to the Surrey hills the view is still of buildings. And my soul dies a little. Everywhere I look out of my home up North I see sea and sky and mountains and valleys so sumptuous in their colours it makes my heart fit to burst. And the bird song. Plus the moon at night and stars, lots of them. I really miss it. I cannot wait to get back.
I never thought I would feel this way. Can people change quite so much? Or maybe I have secretly always been a solitary misanthrope?
There is something about the natural world which my mind, my soul needs, I think, to feel whole. No other way to explain it.
Plus - mad as it is - I love driving by myself. Nothing better than to have the music on very loud - and have some really strong music on to get the blood racing. Just f***ing awesome.
Still in May I shall be speaking at a big conference in London. If you're very good I may tell you about it and you can come and enthusiastically applaud. 😀
What about the Heath and Regents Park? Doesn't that work for you when you're here in NL?
The Heath does - for a walk. But it's the sense of enclosure which is what is different. I have horizons there. I have always loved being near the sea. In Naples - which is urban to the nth degree - it was a 5 minute walk down to the sea. If I had to end my life I would go into the sea, not bloody Dignitas.
And you can stare at the sea for hours. It is never ever boring.
I've done *alot* of walking around this country. And whilst I know what you mean, scenery becomes a little boring after a while. The great thing about London is the sheer variety, both in views and the people. This can be seen in (say) a seven-mile walk along the Regents Canal from Mile End to Paddington, seven miles along the Thames Path, or seven miles south from Greenwich.
If you want boring, try walking around Loch Long. Three days just to end up a couple of kilometres from where you began ...
I agree re London walks. They are interesting. But I never find scenery boring because there is so much to notice - the plants, the trees, the light, the shadows on rocks, the animals etc.
One of the things I was told by an old gardening hand was to walk round your garden every single day and simply look closely. You'd think that there would be no change from day to day but you'd be wrong. And learning how to really see has been a blessing. And once you start doing it there is so much to observe. Partly because of my asthma I rarely walks for long periods without stopping. But also because I am always seeing all sorts of things up close - even the beauty of a gorse bush - or moss or lichen on a stone- or the pattern of a dry stone wall or ferns growing out the ground or a wall.
Honestly I could bore you all for hours about it. Don't worry. I won't.
london walks are great but the air pollution means you benefit a lot more from country walks
Today I saw this
The oldest life size statue in the world. His obsidian eyes are truly haunting. 12,000 years old. Those eyes looked at me as if to say, You again
I’m surprised he has the time to do his human statue act when he’s busy with Wagner Group in Ukraine…..[image deleted]
A most unfair comparison.
One is something creepy, inhuman and pure stone that haunts all our nightmares.
Looking at the latest appalling images from Ukraine and the verified equipment losses if arms shipments from the West are upped so that Russian air cover is reduced further and the Ukrainians can move men and equipment around reasonably freely then Russia could be heading for cataclysmic battlefield defeat.
Not if Germany has its way.....
Western unity is overrated. We shouldn't limit our foreign policy based on the lowest common denominator.
Tweet apparently from leaked Russian casualty report:
Inside 📍 - excerpt from the internal report in the Russian Federation on the morning of April 2: "Irretrievable ☠️ military-operational losses of manpower of personnel Armed Forces of the Russian Federation - 17,549 people. PMC - 5,366 people. The total loss of manpower of the personnel of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation and Russian PMCs is 22,915 people"
Anyway, I am back up North tomorrow am. I have been a city girl most of my life - Naples, London, Bristol, Paris - with childhood holidays in very rural Ireland. I love cities.
And, yet, I feel trapped in London in a way I have never done before. I look out of the window and see buildings. Even though on the top floor I can see across London to the Surrey hills the view is still of buildings. And my soul dies a little. Everywhere I look out of my home up North I see sea and sky and mountains and valleys so sumptuous in their colours it makes my heart fit to burst. And the bird song. Plus the moon at night and stars, lots of them. I really miss it. I cannot wait to get back.
I never thought I would feel this way. Can people change quite so much? Or maybe I have secretly always been a solitary misanthrope?
There is something about the natural world which my mind, my soul needs, I think, to feel whole. No other way to explain it.
Plus - mad as it is - I love driving by myself. Nothing better than to have the music on very loud - and have some really strong music on to get the blood racing. Just f***ing awesome.
Still in May I shall be speaking at a big conference in London. If you're very good I may tell you about it and you can come and enthusiastically applaud. 😀
What about the Heath and Regents Park? Doesn't that work for you when you're here in NL?
The Heath does - for a walk. But it's the sense of enclosure which is what is different. I have horizons there. I have always loved being near the sea. In Naples - which is urban to the nth degree - it was a 5 minute walk down to the sea. If I had to end my life I would go into the sea, not bloody Dignitas.
And you can stare at the sea for hours. It is never ever boring.
I've done *alot* of walking around this country. And whilst I know what you mean, scenery becomes a little boring after a while. The great thing about London is the sheer variety, both in views and the people. This can be seen in (say) a seven-mile walk along the Regents Canal from Mile End to Paddington, seven miles along the Thames Path, or seven miles south from Greenwich.
If you want boring, try walking around Loch Long. Three days just to end up a couple of kilometres from where you began ...
I agree re London walks. They are interesting. But I never find scenery boring because there is so much to notice - the plants, the trees, the light, the shadows on rocks, the animals etc.
One of the things I was told by an old gardening hand was to walk round your garden every single day and simply look closely. You'd think that there would be no change from day to day but you'd be wrong. And learning how to really see has been a blessing. And once you start doing it there is so much to observe. Partly because of my asthma I rarely walks for long periods without stopping. But also because I am always seeing all sorts of things up close - even the beauty of a gorse bush - or moss or lichen on a stone- or the pattern of a dry stone wall or ferns growing out the ground or a wall.
Honestly I could bore you all for hours about it. Don't worry. I won't.
london walks are great but the air pollution means you benefit a lot more from country walks
Today I saw this
The oldest life size statue in the world. His obsidian eyes are truly haunting. 12,000 years old. Those eyes looked at me as if to say, You again
I’m surprised he has the time to do his human statue act when he’s busy with Wagner Group in Ukraine…..[image deleted]
A most unfair comparison.
One is something creepy, inhuman and pure stone that haunts all our nightmares.
The other is a very interesting antique statue.
oh come on he would be a good neighbour...he would scare any criminals away
Perhaps Rishi should book a summer holiday in a b and b in Skegness, Southend, Scarborough, Margate or Blackpool. Then he can try and restore his man of the people image as the cost of living rises after the damage of his Easter break in his multi million dollar California apartment
But the real question that raises is why are Blackpool and Skegness the punchline of a joke on PB rather than thriving coastal resorts?
Last few years I've spent one long weekend per year in Blackpool.
Staying at The Imperial is great for political geeks, last time my suite was the same suite that President Clinton had stayed in.
Took the other half up the Blackpool tower, there's a Sealife, and you cannot beat walking down the promenade whilst eating candy floss and phallic and breast shaped sweets.
I heartily recommend a break in Blackpool, had a great meal in the White Tower.
On a clear day I can see Blackpool Tower from my window.
This story will make you chuckle, where do Barclays find these people?
CS Venkatakrishnan is not a typical, cocksure chief executive of a major international bank. Popular with staff, he sports sober, dark suits, likes consensus – and is said to be genial and more low-key than his predecessor, Jes Staley.
The Indian native, known internally as Venkat, was thrust into the top job at Barclays following Staley’s sudden resignation in November over his ties to the late convicted paedophile and Wall Street financier Jeffrey Epstein.
Venkat was regarded as a safe pair of hands. He was promoted from chief risk officer, a role held since 2016 at the British lender, which he joined after more than two decades as a risk specialist at JP Morgan in New York.
But after a quiet first five months in the job, Barclays was once again propelled into the spotlight for all of the wrong reasons last week, causing shares to slump and shareholders to raise concerns.
On Monday, the bank revealed it was facing a £450m hit and a regulatory investigation after it mishandled the sale of basic trading products in the US. And to make matters worse, the error occurred while Venkat was managing the bank’s risk.
BBC bosses have readvertised the job of political editor after being unhappy with the choice of candidates to replace Laura Kuenssberg in one of the most influential roles in British journalism.
Following weeks of interviews and an extensive recruitment process, the corporation had produced an all-female shortlist for the role, with ITV News’s Anushka Asthana and Sky News’s Sophy Ridge believed to be the final two candidates. An announcement on which of them would get the job had been expected to coincide with Kuenssberg stepping down last week.
Instead, the BBC political correspondent Chris Mason is now the favourite to land the role after bosses quietly began inviting fresh applications for the job. The recruitment page for the role of political editor has been reopened until Tuesday, although there has been no acknowledgement of this from senior staff or formal announcement from the BBC encouraging fresh applications.
Mason is widely liked across the BBC but one media industry executive pointed out the BBC could be about to reject “an all-female shortlist of brilliant women” in favour of a man.
Reopening applications will allow Mason to send in his CV – but will also make it possible for anyone else to apply and is a public sign that executives are not content with the existing range of candidates. In recent days, there had been speculation that BBC executives were unhappy with the process and were seeking other candidates for the role.
"Mason is widely liked across the BBC but one media industry executive pointed out the BBC could be about to reject “an all-female shortlist of brilliant women” in favour of a man."
Why should that be an issue if he is a "brilliant man"?
Laura K has just had the job. Is it to become a female fiefdom?
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/rebuild-our-cities Interesting article by a fella called Sean Thomas in the Speccie on urbanism. Strangely redolent of what we were talking about on here a week or two back. FWIW (/self-aggrandisment mode on/) I know a but about this sort of thing and agree with pretty much all of it. Apart from the bit about Newcastle being rainy. It's actually a comparatively dry city. In a rain shadow.
Precisely because Britain stood firm against Hitler, Britain took the full force of Hitler’s bombers. Contrast with France, which briskly surrendered, and thus escaped with many of its cities unscathed (this is one reason French urbanism seems so enviably gracious today).
I bet he got the Speccie readership standing up and saluting with that bit.
I was in Normandy recently where every major city and town was flattened by by bombs - American and British bombs - with huge loss of life. The official narrative is that these unfortunate but heroic people made the sacrifice for France. But that explanation seems very glib.
On the architectural point, the rebuilding of Le Havre is inspiring . There was nothing left of the city after the War. The government decided to use France's allocation of Marshall Aid to rebuild in a modernist style - concrete blocks and walkways as got such a bad reputation here after the 1960's. But because the architect Auguste Perret focused on making the dwellings light, spacious, comfortable and habitable, these are very desirable flats. The authorities also took the decision to make them a consistent size and quality, replacing what previously a mixture of large villas and cramped slums.
They still look horrible, even with a blue sky and sunshine. In the rain, I suspect they look even worse.
I agree the photos don't do it justice - that's one of the better ones. Le Havre is actually quite nice when you're there, and different from other cities. Perhaps we are conditioned by too much bad brutalist architecture, but this is a lot more human.
We landed in Bremerhaven on a cruise a few years ago. It wasn’t as bad as Cumbernauld, but we found the hauptbahnhof and jumped on the first train to Bremen. Le Havre reminded me of Bremerhaven.
Anyway, I am back up North tomorrow am. I have been a city girl most of my life - Naples, London, Bristol, Paris - with childhood holidays in very rural Ireland. I love cities.
And, yet, I feel trapped in London in a way I have never done before. I look out of the window and see buildings. Even though on the top floor I can see across London to the Surrey hills the view is still of buildings. And my soul dies a little. Everywhere I look out of my home up North I see sea and sky and mountains and valleys so sumptuous in their colours it makes my heart fit to burst. And the bird song. Plus the moon at night and stars, lots of them. I really miss it. I cannot wait to get back.
I never thought I would feel this way. Can people change quite so much? Or maybe I have secretly always been a solitary misanthrope?
There is something about the natural world which my mind, my soul needs, I think, to feel whole. No other way to explain it.
Plus - mad as it is - I love driving by myself. Nothing better than to have the music on very loud - and have some really strong music on to get the blood racing. Just f***ing awesome.
Still in May I shall be speaking at a big conference in London. If you're very good I may tell you about it and you can come and enthusiastically applaud. 😀
What about the Heath and Regents Park? Doesn't that work for you when you're here in NL?
The Heath does - for a walk. But it's the sense of enclosure which is what is different. I have horizons there. I have always loved being near the sea. In Naples - which is urban to the nth degree - it was a 5 minute walk down to the sea. If I had to end my life I would go into the sea, not bloody Dignitas.
And you can stare at the sea for hours. It is never ever boring.
I've done *alot* of walking around this country. And whilst I know what you mean, scenery becomes a little boring after a while. The great thing about London is the sheer variety, both in views and the people. This can be seen in (say) a seven-mile walk along the Regents Canal from Mile End to Paddington, seven miles along the Thames Path, or seven miles south from Greenwich.
If you want boring, try walking around Loch Long. Three days just to end up a couple of kilometres from where you began ...
I agree re London walks. They are interesting. But I never find scenery boring because there is so much to notice - the plants, the trees, the light, the shadows on rocks, the animals etc.
One of the things I was told by an old gardening hand was to walk round your garden every single day and simply look closely. You'd think that there would be no change from day to day but you'd be wrong. And learning how to really see has been a blessing. And once you start doing it there is so much to observe. Partly because of my asthma I rarely walks for long periods without stopping. But also because I am always seeing all sorts of things up close - even the beauty of a gorse bush - or moss or lichen on a stone- or the pattern of a dry stone wall or ferns growing out the ground or a wall.
Honestly I could bore you all for hours about it. Don't worry. I won't.
london walks are great but the air pollution means you benefit a lot more from country walks
Today I saw this
The oldest life size statue in the world. His obsidian eyes are truly haunting. 12,000 years old. Those eyes looked at me as if to say, You again
I’m surprised he has the time to do his human statue act when he’s busy with Wagner Group in Ukraine…..[image deleted]
A most unfair comparison.
One is something creepy, inhuman and pure stone that haunts all our nightmares.
The other is a very interesting antique statue.
oh come on he would be a good neighbour...he would scare any criminals away
probably best solution in war now is some sort of ceasefire and negotiated settlement which gives Putin a win he can sell to the Russians. We then keep sanctions in place and try to slowly strangle his regime
Tweet apparently from leaked Russian casualty report:
Inside 📍 - excerpt from the internal report in the Russian Federation on the morning of April 2: "Irretrievable ☠️ military-operational losses of manpower of personnel Armed Forces of the Russian Federation - 17,549 people. PMC - 5,366 people. The total loss of manpower of the personnel of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation and Russian PMCs is 22,915 people"
BBC bosses have readvertised the job of political editor after being unhappy with the choice of candidates to replace Laura Kuenssberg in one of the most influential roles in British journalism.
Following weeks of interviews and an extensive recruitment process, the corporation had produced an all-female shortlist for the role, with ITV News’s Anushka Asthana and Sky News’s Sophy Ridge believed to be the final two candidates. An announcement on which of them would get the job had been expected to coincide with Kuenssberg stepping down last week.
Instead, the BBC political correspondent Chris Mason is now the favourite to land the role after bosses quietly began inviting fresh applications for the job. The recruitment page for the role of political editor has been reopened until Tuesday, although there has been no acknowledgement of this from senior staff or formal announcement from the BBC encouraging fresh applications.
Mason is widely liked across the BBC but one media industry executive pointed out the BBC could be about to reject “an all-female shortlist of brilliant women” in favour of a man.
Reopening applications will allow Mason to send in his CV – but will also make it possible for anyone else to apply and is a public sign that executives are not content with the existing range of candidates. In recent days, there had been speculation that BBC executives were unhappy with the process and were seeking other candidates for the role.
I wonder if Isabel Hardman would be considered an option? Or whether she would fancy it. She comes across as completely non-ideological. Someone who just tells you what is going on.
The fact such a plum role is short of applicants rather sadly tells its own story. Did the BBC initially insist on an all woman shortlist?
probably best solution in war now is some sort of ceasefire and negotiated settlement which gives Putin a win he can sell to the Russians. We then keep sanctions in place and try to slowly strangle his regime
That's tempting, but the problem is a 'win' he can sell would just mean round three or four (depending how you count Donbass/Crimea) in a few years.
It's the sort of appeasement that we've done with his regime time after time, from Georgia through Syria and Crimea to Salisbury. And each time he gets harder to deal with.
Tweet apparently from leaked Russian casualty report:
Inside 📍 - excerpt from the internal report in the Russian Federation on the morning of April 2: "Irretrievable ☠️ military-operational losses of manpower of personnel Armed Forces of the Russian Federation - 17,549 people. PMC - 5,366 people. The total loss of manpower of the personnel of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation and Russian PMCs is 22,915 people"
Of course, it is hard to tell what is real and what is propaganda.
It sounds in like with Ukrainian estimates, and I am incline to believe it.
worth noting that apart form the PMC there are also 2 allied army's of the 2 breakaway regens in the Donbass, who hade 14,000 and 20,000 personnel as the start, and seem to have lost a lot, as they have now increased to conscription age to 60. possible that they are incorporated in to the PMC total, but I expect not.
BBC bosses have readvertised the job of political editor after being unhappy with the choice of candidates to replace Laura Kuenssberg in one of the most influential roles in British journalism.
Following weeks of interviews and an extensive recruitment process, the corporation had produced an all-female shortlist for the role, with ITV News’s Anushka Asthana and Sky News’s Sophy Ridge believed to be the final two candidates. An announcement on which of them would get the job had been expected to coincide with Kuenssberg stepping down last week.
Instead, the BBC political correspondent Chris Mason is now the favourite to land the role after bosses quietly began inviting fresh applications for the job. The recruitment page for the role of political editor has been reopened until Tuesday, although there has been no acknowledgement of this from senior staff or formal announcement from the BBC encouraging fresh applications.
Mason is widely liked across the BBC but one media industry executive pointed out the BBC could be about to reject “an all-female shortlist of brilliant women” in favour of a man.
Reopening applications will allow Mason to send in his CV – but will also make it possible for anyone else to apply and is a public sign that executives are not content with the existing range of candidates. In recent days, there had been speculation that BBC executives were unhappy with the process and were seeking other candidates for the role.
I wonder if Isabel Hardman would be considered an option? Or whether she would fancy it. She comes across as completely non-ideological. Someone who just tells you what is going on.
The fact such a plum role is short of applicants rather sadly tells its own story. Did the BBC initially insist on an all woman shortlist?
One scandalous theory is that choosing attractive women for the role exploits the ego of male politicians and gets them to talk to said women.
probably best solution in war now is some sort of ceasefire and negotiated settlement which gives Putin a win he can sell to the Russians. We then keep sanctions in place and try to slowly strangle his regime
That's tempting, but the problem is a 'win' he can sell would just mean round three or four (depending how you count Donbass/Crimea) in a few years.
It's the sort of appeasement that we've done with his regime time after time, from Georgia through Syria and Crimea to Salisbury. And each time he gets harder to deal with.
ok waht do you suggest Putin is maddog crazy and whilst russians arent doing well they could still dig in and do massive damage to ukraine and indiscriminately slaughter the male population of ukraine. What would you do
(((Dan Hodges))) @DPJHodges · 3h If the atrocities being reported are verified, and there's evidence they're still being perpetrated, then we need to intervene directly and militarily in Ukraine. Whether a country is part of NATO is irrelevant. We don't stand back and allow the perpetration of genocide.
How long before national newspapers and broadcasters are demanding something is done.
He seems to have forgotten Rwanda, Syria, much of Bosnia, Cambodia etc where we did very little when genocide was committed.
If a NATO nation is invaded then yes we have to take military action but in terms of Ukraine we just keep sending supplies, we don't go to WW3
The problem with the argument about "not going to WW3" is that it sets an arbitrary threshold that hands escalation dominance to Putin. Are you going to let him decide what level of support is acceptable?
No. The red line remains if he invades a NATO nation
Only an invasion? And the red line for what specifically?
NATO military response
Then you're still in a discussion of what kind of response, by whom, what retaliation risks to avoid, etc.
There are already NATO troops and jets based in Estonia and Latvia as NATO states bordering Russia.
So if Putin invaded those states then at that point we would be at war
What if Putin struck an airfield as a warning against NATO weapons shipments?
If he struck an airfield and destroyed NATO planes then obviously NATO would respond in kind with airstrikes on a Russian base
So just tit for tat? Which NATO member would carry out the retaliation?
Planes from all of them, as NATO is based on collective defence
You'd send in bombers from every NATO member in response to a single missile strike? What if not every NATO member agrees with that plan? Which Russian targets would you need that many planes for and how would you defend them?
Unless every NATO state agrees and is ready to participate in NATO action then NATO is redundant to defend its member states and their armed forces. If Russia bombed NATO jets it should prepare for NATO jets to bomb an airfield with Russian jets.
Otherwise NATO would then collapse and Russia could invade every individual NATO nation in turn. China would also take note of the inability and unwillingness of western nations to defend themselves when looking at Taiwan and the broader Far East
If you read NATO Article 5, that's not what collective defence is based on.
It is based on an attack on one NATO ally being an attack on all of them.
So if Russia can bomb NATO jets without response from the collective NATO nations then Putin could invade Estonia and Latvia etc without fear of collective NATO response either. The Baltic states on their own are far easier pickings than Ukraine, much smaller with far less strong militaries
Invasion of Estonia and Latvia is WW111
BigG - I hope your 50k post is going to be a good one! Reveal how you have secretly been a Corbynite all along. Or how you're secretly another SeanT clone. Or how you're really into skydiving bondage with anyone you meet in the air...
It was 2014 when I nervously wrote my initial posts and since then I decided to try to contribute as honestly as possible, and of course got involved in lots of controversial discussions, but I would just say that this site is a credit to those who administer it and give so much time to it
My wife is enormously grateful as it provides her with so much peace as I am otherwise engaged, and she said the other day it was a shame I had not discovered it before 2014
And to all posters across the political divide I am grateful for the interaction even if sometimes it is a bit feisty but there is a common theme of how kind we are to each other when one of us encounters difficult or serious issues..
Anyway, I am back up North tomorrow am. I have been a city girl most of my life - Naples, London, Bristol, Paris - with childhood holidays in very rural Ireland. I love cities.
And, yet, I feel trapped in London in a way I have never done before. I look out of the window and see buildings. Even though on the top floor I can see across London to the Surrey hills the view is still of buildings. And my soul dies a little. Everywhere I look out of my home up North I see sea and sky and mountains and valleys so sumptuous in their colours it makes my heart fit to burst. And the bird song. Plus the moon at night and stars, lots of them. I really miss it. I cannot wait to get back.
I never thought I would feel this way. Can people change quite so much? Or maybe I have secretly always been a solitary misanthrope?
There is something about the natural world which my mind, my soul needs, I think, to feel whole. No other way to explain it.
Plus - mad as it is - I love driving by myself. Nothing better than to have the music on very loud - and have some really strong music on to get the blood racing. Just f***ing awesome.
Still in May I shall be speaking at a big conference in London. If you're very good I may tell you about it and you can come and enthusiastically applaud. 😀
What about the Heath and Regents Park? Doesn't that work for you when you're here in NL?
The Heath does - for a walk. But it's the sense of enclosure which is what is different. I have horizons there. I have always loved being near the sea. In Naples - which is urban to the nth degree - it was a 5 minute walk down to the sea. If I had to end my life I would go into the sea, not bloody Dignitas.
And you can stare at the sea for hours. It is never ever boring.
I've done *alot* of walking around this country. And whilst I know what you mean, scenery becomes a little boring after a while. The great thing about London is the sheer variety, both in views and the people. This can be seen in (say) a seven-mile walk along the Regents Canal from Mile End to Paddington, seven miles along the Thames Path, or seven miles south from Greenwich.
If you want boring, try walking around Loch Long. Three days just to end up a couple of kilometres from where you began ...
I agree re London walks. They are interesting. But I never find scenery boring because there is so much to notice - the plants, the trees, the light, the shadows on rocks, the animals etc.
One of the things I was told by an old gardening hand was to walk round your garden every single day and simply look closely. You'd think that there would be no change from day to day but you'd be wrong. And learning how to really see has been a blessing. And once you start doing it there is so much to observe. Partly because of my asthma I rarely walks for long periods without stopping. But also because I am always seeing all sorts of things up close - even the beauty of a gorse bush - or moss or lichen on a stone- or the pattern of a dry stone wall or ferns growing out the ground or a wall.
Honestly I could bore you all for hours about it. Don't worry. I won't.
That looks beautiful. However my garden is one of a new-build. A walk around it takes a minute, tops, if I don't get strangled by the washing line in the process. I can see well over twenty other rooftops from an upper window.
As it happens, I converse with lots of coastal walkers. I tell the ones who do it sectionally over a number of years that they get more out of it than those of us who do it in one go. They get to choose the season and the weather. And they get to see scenery with fresh eyes. On my walk, after six months it became: "Oh, another nice view. Oh well." I had scenery fatigue. And I was always rushing, rarely stopping.
There's your mistake, right there. "Rushing, rarely stopping."
Anyway, I am willing to come and design and plant a child and washing-line friendly garden for you, which will provide plenty for you to look at, as you sit there. And your young man.
You're near Cambridge, no - so you can have a Beth Chatto style garden - ones with plenty of ground cover plants, that don't mind being trampled on, and that don't need watering. I love the style and I've adapted it for the green roof on top of my bin and wood store.
Ok so doesn't look like any exit polls, turnout appears to be 63% nationwide and 67% in Budapest (which presumably will be strong for the opposition).
Thanks, and yes higher tern out in capital should be good for opposition, but do we know what it was last time? i.e. if the capital had 80% tern out last time and has dropped to 67% then maybe its not such a good omen for the oppression.
BBC bosses have readvertised the job of political editor after being unhappy with the choice of candidates to replace Laura Kuenssberg in one of the most influential roles in British journalism.
Following weeks of interviews and an extensive recruitment process, the corporation had produced an all-female shortlist for the role, with ITV News’s Anushka Asthana and Sky News’s Sophy Ridge believed to be the final two candidates. An announcement on which of them would get the job had been expected to coincide with Kuenssberg stepping down last week.
Instead, the BBC political correspondent Chris Mason is now the favourite to land the role after bosses quietly began inviting fresh applications for the job. The recruitment page for the role of political editor has been reopened until Tuesday, although there has been no acknowledgement of this from senior staff or formal announcement from the BBC encouraging fresh applications.
Mason is widely liked across the BBC but one media industry executive pointed out the BBC could be about to reject “an all-female shortlist of brilliant women” in favour of a man.
Reopening applications will allow Mason to send in his CV – but will also make it possible for anyone else to apply and is a public sign that executives are not content with the existing range of candidates. In recent days, there had been speculation that BBC executives were unhappy with the process and were seeking other candidates for the role.
I wonder if Isabel Hardman would be considered an option? Or whether she would fancy it. She comes across as completely non-ideological. Someone who just tells you what is going on.
The fact such a plum role is short of applicants rather sadly tells its own story. Did the BBC initially insist on an all woman shortlist?
IIRC she has some mental health issues and the fact she's married to an ex Labour MP who left the party because of Corbyn might lead to more abuse which isn't good for her.
The idea that someone could look at Russia right now and say "hmm, maybe what's needed is a dictator" boggles me. It's the stupidest thing I've read on here (and I was here for when HYUFD claimed that you couldn't get from London to Cambridge without entering Essex).
The M11, the main road route from London to Cambridge, goes through Essex
The A10 does not.
So you can choose to go into Essex or not. Literally nobody thinks you can't possibly go through Essex, and only one person, you, thinks you HAVE to.
When Samuel Pepys went from London to Cambridge, a favorite journey for him, he almost always went one of the Hertfordshire routes, which had a number of alternatives. Curiously he never chose the M11, though on one occasions he diverted to Audley End, near Saffron Walden in Essex. And IIRC once via Epping Forest.
Anyway, I am back up North tomorrow am. I have been a city girl most of my life - Naples, London, Bristol, Paris - with childhood holidays in very rural Ireland. I love cities.
And, yet, I feel trapped in London in a way I have never done before. I look out of the window and see buildings. Even though on the top floor I can see across London to the Surrey hills the view is still of buildings. And my soul dies a little. Everywhere I look out of my home up North I see sea and sky and mountains and valleys so sumptuous in their colours it makes my heart fit to burst. And the bird song. Plus the moon at night and stars, lots of them. I really miss it. I cannot wait to get back.
I never thought I would feel this way. Can people change quite so much? Or maybe I have secretly always been a solitary misanthrope?
There is something about the natural world which my mind, my soul needs, I think, to feel whole. No other way to explain it.
Plus - mad as it is - I love driving by myself. Nothing better than to have the music on very loud - and have some really strong music on to get the blood racing. Just f***ing awesome.
Still in May I shall be speaking at a big conference in London. If you're very good I may tell you about it and you can come and enthusiastically applaud. 😀
What about the Heath and Regents Park? Doesn't that work for you when you're here in NL?
The Heath does - for a walk. But it's the sense of enclosure which is what is different. I have horizons there. I have always loved being near the sea. In Naples - which is urban to the nth degree - it was a 5 minute walk down to the sea. If I had to end my life I would go into the sea, not bloody Dignitas.
And you can stare at the sea for hours. It is never ever boring.
I've done *alot* of walking around this country. And whilst I know what you mean, scenery becomes a little boring after a while. The great thing about London is the sheer variety, both in views and the people. This can be seen in (say) a seven-mile walk along the Regents Canal from Mile End to Paddington, seven miles along the Thames Path, or seven miles south from Greenwich.
If you want boring, try walking around Loch Long. Three days just to end up a couple of kilometres from where you began ...
I agree re London walks. They are interesting. But I never find scenery boring because there is so much to notice - the plants, the trees, the light, the shadows on rocks, the animals etc.
One of the things I was told by an old gardening hand was to walk round your garden every single day and simply look closely. You'd think that there would be no change from day to day but you'd be wrong. And learning how to really see has been a blessing. And once you start doing it there is so much to observe. Partly because of my asthma I rarely walks for long periods without stopping. But also because I am always seeing all sorts of things up close - even the beauty of a gorse bush - or moss or lichen on a stone- or the pattern of a dry stone wall or ferns growing out the ground or a wall.
Honestly I could bore you all for hours about it. Don't worry. I won't.
That looks beautiful. However my garden is one of a new-build. A walk around it takes a minute, tops, if I don't get strangled by the washing line in the process. I can see well over twenty other rooftops from an upper window.
As it happens, I converse with lots of coastal walkers. I tell the ones who do it sectionally over a number of years that they get more out of it than those of us who do it in one go. They get to choose the season and the weather. And they get to see scenery with fresh eyes. On my walk, after six months it became: "Oh, another nice view. Oh well." I had scenery fatigue. And I was always rushing, rarely stopping.
There's your mistake, right there. "Rushing, rarely stopping."
Anyway, I am willing to come and design and plant a child and washing-line friendly garden for you, which will provide plenty for you to look at, as you sit there. And your young man.
You're near Cambridge, no - so you can have a Beth Chatto style garden - ones with plenty of ground cover plants, that don't mind being trampled on, and that don't need watering. I love the style and I've adapted it for the green roof on top of my bin and wood store.
i would hate living in cambridge...surrounded by the most boring countryside in the entire UK
(((Dan Hodges))) @DPJHodges · 3h If the atrocities being reported are verified, and there's evidence they're still being perpetrated, then we need to intervene directly and militarily in Ukraine. Whether a country is part of NATO is irrelevant. We don't stand back and allow the perpetration of genocide.
How long before national newspapers and broadcasters are demanding something is done.
He seems to have forgotten Rwanda, Syria, much of Bosnia, Cambodia etc where we did very little when genocide was committed.
If a NATO nation is invaded then yes we have to take military action but in terms of Ukraine we just keep sending supplies, we don't go to WW3
The problem with the argument about "not going to WW3" is that it sets an arbitrary threshold that hands escalation dominance to Putin. Are you going to let him decide what level of support is acceptable?
No. The red line remains if he invades a NATO nation
Only an invasion? And the red line for what specifically?
NATO military response
Then you're still in a discussion of what kind of response, by whom, what retaliation risks to avoid, etc.
There are already NATO troops and jets based in Estonia and Latvia as NATO states bordering Russia.
So if Putin invaded those states then at that point we would be at war
What if Putin struck an airfield as a warning against NATO weapons shipments?
If he struck an airfield and destroyed NATO planes then obviously NATO would respond in kind with airstrikes on a Russian base
So just tit for tat? Which NATO member would carry out the retaliation?
Planes from all of them, as NATO is based on collective defence
You'd send in bombers from every NATO member in response to a single missile strike? What if not every NATO member agrees with that plan? Which Russian targets would you need that many planes for and how would you defend them?
Unless every NATO state agrees and is ready to participate in NATO action then NATO is redundant to defend its member states and their armed forces. If Russia bombed NATO jets it should prepare for NATO jets to bomb an airfield with Russian jets.
Otherwise NATO would then collapse and Russia could invade every individual NATO nation in turn. China would also take note of the inability and unwillingness of western nations to defend themselves when looking at Taiwan and the broader Far East
If you read NATO Article 5, that's not what collective defence is based on.
It is based on an attack on one NATO ally being an attack on all of them.
So if Russia can bomb NATO jets without response from the collective NATO nations then Putin could invade Estonia and Latvia etc without fear of collective NATO response either. The Baltic states on their own are far easier pickings than Ukraine, much smaller with far less strong militaries
Invasion of Estonia and Latvia is WW111
BigG - I hope your 50k post is going to be a good one! Reveal how you have secretly been a Corbynite all along. Or how you're secretly another SeanT clone. Or how you're really into skydiving bondage with anyone you meet in the air...
It was 2014 when I nervously wrote my initial posts and since then I decided to try to contribute as honestly as possible, and of course got involved in lots of controversial discussions, but I would just say that this site is a credit to those who administer it and give so much time to it
My wife is enormously grateful as it provides her with so much peace as I am otherwise engaged, and she said the other day it was a shame I had not discovered it before 2014
And to all posters across the political divide I am grateful for the interaction even if sometimes it is a bit feisty but there is a common theme of how kind we are to each other when one of us encounters difficult or serious issues..
Here's to 100,000
That's a wonderful sentiment for you 50,000 posts.
From a commenter who is not even at 10% of your total, can I say I do like reading your thoughts/posts
Looking at the latest appalling images from Ukraine and the verified equipment losses if arms shipments from the West are upped so that Russian air cover is reduced further and the Ukrainians can move men and equipment around reasonably freely then Russia could be heading for cataclysmic battlefield defeat.
Not if Germany has its way.....
This from Illia Ponomarenko, The Kyiv Independent:
"I am now facing an interview no sane human being would easily wish to have. And I am horrified by the fact I will have to write it down. Word by word."
Can't imagine who he is interviewing, but I can imagine about what. Some of these journalists are going to need serious counseling once this is over.
Anyway, I am back up North tomorrow am. I have been a city girl most of my life - Naples, London, Bristol, Paris - with childhood holidays in very rural Ireland. I love cities.
And, yet, I feel trapped in London in a way I have never done before. I look out of the window and see buildings. Even though on the top floor I can see across London to the Surrey hills the view is still of buildings. And my soul dies a little. Everywhere I look out of my home up North I see sea and sky and mountains and valleys so sumptuous in their colours it makes my heart fit to burst. And the bird song. Plus the moon at night and stars, lots of them. I really miss it. I cannot wait to get back.
I never thought I would feel this way. Can people change quite so much? Or maybe I have secretly always been a solitary misanthrope?
There is something about the natural world which my mind, my soul needs, I think, to feel whole. No other way to explain it.
Plus - mad as it is - I love driving by myself. Nothing better than to have the music on very loud - and have some really strong music on to get the blood racing. Just f***ing awesome.
Still in May I shall be speaking at a big conference in London. If you're very good I may tell you about it and you can come and enthusiastically applaud. 😀
What about the Heath and Regents Park? Doesn't that work for you when you're here in NL?
The Heath does - for a walk. But it's the sense of enclosure which is what is different. I have horizons there. I have always loved being near the sea. In Naples - which is urban to the nth degree - it was a 5 minute walk down to the sea. If I had to end my life I would go into the sea, not bloody Dignitas.
And you can stare at the sea for hours. It is never ever boring.
I've done *alot* of walking around this country. And whilst I know what you mean, scenery becomes a little boring after a while. The great thing about London is the sheer variety, both in views and the people. This can be seen in (say) a seven-mile walk along the Regents Canal from Mile End to Paddington, seven miles along the Thames Path, or seven miles south from Greenwich.
If you want boring, try walking around Loch Long. Three days just to end up a couple of kilometres from where you began ...
I agree re London walks. They are interesting. But I never find scenery boring because there is so much to notice - the plants, the trees, the light, the shadows on rocks, the animals etc.
One of the things I was told by an old gardening hand was to walk round your garden every single day and simply look closely. You'd think that there would be no change from day to day but you'd be wrong. And learning how to really see has been a blessing. And once you start doing it there is so much to observe. Partly because of my asthma I rarely walks for long periods without stopping. But also because I am always seeing all sorts of things up close - even the beauty of a gorse bush - or moss or lichen on a stone- or the pattern of a dry stone wall or ferns growing out the ground or a wall.
Honestly I could bore you all for hours about it. Don't worry. I won't.
That looks beautiful. However my garden is one of a new-build. A walk around it takes a minute, tops, if I don't get strangled by the washing line in the process. I can see well over twenty other rooftops from an upper window.
As it happens, I converse with lots of coastal walkers. I tell the ones who do it sectionally over a number of years that they get more out of it than those of us who do it in one go. They get to choose the season and the weather. And they get to see scenery with fresh eyes. On my walk, after six months it became: "Oh, another nice view. Oh well." I had scenery fatigue. And I was always rushing, rarely stopping.
There's your mistake, right there. "Rushing, rarely stopping."
Anyway, I am willing to come and design and plant a child and washing-line friendly garden for you, which will provide plenty for you to look at, as you sit there. And your young man.
You're near Cambridge, no - so you can have a Beth Chatto style garden - ones with plenty of ground cover plants, that don't mind being trampled on, and that don't need watering. I love the style and I've adapted it for the green roof on top of my bin and wood store.
Thanks, sounds interesting. A couple of years ago I asked for a quote for a new patio, beds and turf to be laid. Three grand.
f that for a load of soldiers. I'd do it myself, but there are two manholes on the patio, and they'd be a job to cut out with an angle grinder.
As for 'rushing, rarely stopping'; that's what I mean. I walked 6,200 miles around the coast in a little under a year. You just don't get to see as much as those who so it in sections, or don't average 18 miles a day. Someone like Ruth Livingstone has a much better idea:
Telegraph At least two Russian soldiers died and nearly three dozen were taken to intensive care after eating poisoned pastries offered by Ukrainian villagers, Ukraine’s intelligence said on Sunday.
Residents of a village near the town of Izyum reportedly "treated" the troops of Russia's 3rd Motor Rifle infantry division to the traditional "pirozhki", which resemble a Cornish pastry, laced with an unknown poison.
There are no formal links, the Russian Orthodox Church is not in the Anglican communion is it. It is not formally linked to the main Orthodox Church either after Kyrill cut links with the Patriarch of Constantinople.
In any case Welby told Kyrill of his ‘grave concerns’ over the Russian action only last month. Compare that to the leaders of China, South Africa, Syria, Pakistan, India etc none of whom have expressed any concern or criticism over Putin’s action
Anyway, I am back up North tomorrow am. I have been a city girl most of my life - Naples, London, Bristol, Paris - with childhood holidays in very rural Ireland. I love cities.
And, yet, I feel trapped in London in a way I have never done before. I look out of the window and see buildings. Even though on the top floor I can see across London to the Surrey hills the view is still of buildings. And my soul dies a little. Everywhere I look out of my home up North I see sea and sky and mountains and valleys so sumptuous in their colours it makes my heart fit to burst. And the bird song. Plus the moon at night and stars, lots of them. I really miss it. I cannot wait to get back.
I never thought I would feel this way. Can people change quite so much? Or maybe I have secretly always been a solitary misanthrope?
There is something about the natural world which my mind, my soul needs, I think, to feel whole. No other way to explain it.
Plus - mad as it is - I love driving by myself. Nothing better than to have the music on very loud - and have some really strong music on to get the blood racing. Just f***ing awesome.
Still in May I shall be speaking at a big conference in London. If you're very good I may tell you about it and you can come and enthusiastically applaud. 😀
What about the Heath and Regents Park? Doesn't that work for you when you're here in NL?
The Heath does - for a walk. But it's the sense of enclosure which is what is different. I have horizons there. I have always loved being near the sea. In Naples - which is urban to the nth degree - it was a 5 minute walk down to the sea. If I had to end my life I would go into the sea, not bloody Dignitas.
And you can stare at the sea for hours. It is never ever boring.
I've done *alot* of walking around this country. And whilst I know what you mean, scenery becomes a little boring after a while. The great thing about London is the sheer variety, both in views and the people. This can be seen in (say) a seven-mile walk along the Regents Canal from Mile End to Paddington, seven miles along the Thames Path, or seven miles south from Greenwich.
If you want boring, try walking around Loch Long. Three days just to end up a couple of kilometres from where you began ...
I agree re London walks. They are interesting. But I never find scenery boring because there is so much to notice - the plants, the trees, the light, the shadows on rocks, the animals etc.
One of the things I was told by an old gardening hand was to walk round your garden every single day and simply look closely. You'd think that there would be no change from day to day but you'd be wrong. And learning how to really see has been a blessing. And once you start doing it there is so much to observe. Partly because of my asthma I rarely walks for long periods without stopping. But also because I am always seeing all sorts of things up close - even the beauty of a gorse bush - or moss or lichen on a stone- or the pattern of a dry stone wall or ferns growing out the ground or a wall.
Honestly I could bore you all for hours about it. Don't worry. I won't.
That looks beautiful. However my garden is one of a new-build. A walk around it takes a minute, tops, if I don't get strangled by the washing line in the process. I can see well over twenty other rooftops from an upper window.
As it happens, I converse with lots of coastal walkers. I tell the ones who do it sectionally over a number of years that they get more out of it than those of us who do it in one go. They get to choose the season and the weather. And they get to see scenery with fresh eyes. On my walk, after six months it became: "Oh, another nice view. Oh well." I had scenery fatigue. And I was always rushing, rarely stopping.
There's your mistake, right there. "Rushing, rarely stopping."
Anyway, I am willing to come and design and plant a child and washing-line friendly garden for you, which will provide plenty for you to look at, as you sit there. And your young man.
You're near Cambridge, no - so you can have a Beth Chatto style garden - ones with plenty of ground cover plants, that don't mind being trampled on, and that don't need watering. I love the style and I've adapted it for the green roof on top of my bin and wood store.
i would hate living in cambridge...surrounded by the most boring countryside in the entire UK
I love the Fens. Beautiful scenery, and surprisingly bleak in places. Then again, I love bog-trotting through the Dark Peak, and I know other walkers who hate the moors.
Incidentally, my parents live near Derby. My house, just eight miles from Cambridge, is at a higher altitude than the centre of Derby (203 foot cf 187 foot). People are surprised by that.
Anyway, I am back up North tomorrow am. I have been a city girl most of my life - Naples, London, Bristol, Paris - with childhood holidays in very rural Ireland. I love cities.
And, yet, I feel trapped in London in a way I have never done before. I look out of the window and see buildings. Even though on the top floor I can see across London to the Surrey hills the view is still of buildings. And my soul dies a little. Everywhere I look out of my home up North I see sea and sky and mountains and valleys so sumptuous in their colours it makes my heart fit to burst. And the bird song. Plus the moon at night and stars, lots of them. I really miss it. I cannot wait to get back.
I never thought I would feel this way. Can people change quite so much? Or maybe I have secretly always been a solitary misanthrope?
There is something about the natural world which my mind, my soul needs, I think, to feel whole. No other way to explain it.
Plus - mad as it is - I love driving by myself. Nothing better than to have the music on very loud - and have some really strong music on to get the blood racing. Just f***ing awesome.
Still in May I shall be speaking at a big conference in London. If you're very good I may tell you about it and you can come and enthusiastically applaud. 😀
What about the Heath and Regents Park? Doesn't that work for you when you're here in NL?
The Heath does - for a walk. But it's the sense of enclosure which is what is different. I have horizons there. I have always loved being near the sea. In Naples - which is urban to the nth degree - it was a 5 minute walk down to the sea. If I had to end my life I would go into the sea, not bloody Dignitas.
And you can stare at the sea for hours. It is never ever boring.
I've done *alot* of walking around this country. And whilst I know what you mean, scenery becomes a little boring after a while. The great thing about London is the sheer variety, both in views and the people. This can be seen in (say) a seven-mile walk along the Regents Canal from Mile End to Paddington, seven miles along the Thames Path, or seven miles south from Greenwich.
If you want boring, try walking around Loch Long. Three days just to end up a couple of kilometres from where you began ...
I agree re London walks. They are interesting. But I never find scenery boring because there is so much to notice - the plants, the trees, the light, the shadows on rocks, the animals etc.
One of the things I was told by an old gardening hand was to walk round your garden every single day and simply look closely. You'd think that there would be no change from day to day but you'd be wrong. And learning how to really see has been a blessing. And once you start doing it there is so much to observe. Partly because of my asthma I rarely walks for long periods without stopping. But also because I am always seeing all sorts of things up close - even the beauty of a gorse bush - or moss or lichen on a stone- or the pattern of a dry stone wall or ferns growing out the ground or a wall.
Honestly I could bore you all for hours about it. Don't worry. I won't.
london walks are great but the air pollution means you benefit a lot more from country walks
Today I saw this
The oldest life size statue in the world. His obsidian eyes are truly haunting. 12,000 years old. Those eyes looked at me as if to say, You again
I'm willing to bet there are even older artefacts awaiting discovery on the sunken Sunda Shelf (Sundaland) in SE Asia.
Telegraph At least two Russian soldiers died and nearly three dozen were taken to intensive care after eating poisoned pastries offered by Ukrainian villagers, Ukraine’s intelligence said on Sunday.
Residents of a village near the town of Izyum reportedly "treated" the troops of Russia's 3rd Motor Rifle infantry division to the traditional "pirozhki", which resemble a Cornish pastry, laced with an unknown poison.
Reuters - Ukrainian prosecutors investigating possible war crimes by Russia have found 410 bodies in towns near Kyiv and 140 of them had been examined. Russia denied allegations that its forces killed civilians in the town of Bucha near Kyiv.
Disgusting behaviour from Putin. There really needs to be a way to find a ceasefire now by any means possible and end this war
Hmm, not completely sure about that. I want a lot more of these murderers going home in wooden boxes and as much equipment stripped off the Russian army as possible so they can't come back. Allowing the Russians to regroup and rearm might be a major mistake.
Edit, but welcome by the way. New voices always welcome.
You don’t want them going back in wooden boxes - you want them going back missing limbs as they will be a clear and indisputable “truth” to the Russian people of the cost of the war they support.
If there are 20,000 young men who are visibly ruined by the war it cannot be hidden and also they will be able to tell their families and friends about what they saw and how bad the Russian military really is.
Also injured soldiers use up more resources than dead soldiers along the line….
That’s why the Azov battalion shot those Russian POWs in the legs. Much more militarily effective than murder
I seem to remember from the Ken Burns Vietnam doc that whilst the American public were shocked by deaths the effect of seeing the wounded and traumatised soldiers around them every day brought the war home much more viscerally than stats of dead soldiers.
If you are a Russian mother and you see young men come home missing limbs and traumatised in your town and then you look at your son who might get called up then you might start questioning the propaganda.
And The Band Played Waltzing Matilda. Great anti war song.
Rubbish. I have zero problems with people talking: especially if it means it might divert people away from an evil course.
IIRC alongside Iran and The Vatican we're the only nations to have unelected clergy in our parliament.
I find that very scary and undemocratic.
I don’t know, I thought we were supposed to be in favour of more men in dresses in public life? I don’t know what Transubstantiation means but it sounds like something JK Rowling wouldn’t like and they’re all for it so I say “more”.
Telegraph At least two Russian soldiers died and nearly three dozen were taken to intensive care after eating poisoned pastries offered by Ukrainian villagers, Ukraine’s intelligence said on Sunday.
Residents of a village near the town of Izyum reportedly "treated" the troops of Russia's 3rd Motor Rifle infantry division to the traditional "pirozhki", which resemble a Cornish pastry, laced with an unknown poison.
The idea that someone could look at Russia right now and say "hmm, maybe what's needed is a dictator" boggles me. It's the stupidest thing I've read on here (and I was here for when HYUFD claimed that you couldn't get from London to Cambridge without entering Essex).
The M11, the main road route from London to Cambridge, goes through Essex
The A10 does not.
So you can choose to go into Essex or not. Literally nobody thinks you can't possibly go through Essex, and only one person, you, thinks you HAVE to.
When Samuel Pepys went from London to Cambridge, a favorite journey for him, he almost always went one of the Hertfordshire routes, which had a number of alternatives. Curiously he never chose the M11, though on one occasions he diverted to Audley End, near Saffron Walden in Essex. And IIRC once via Epping Forest.
He actually stayed in Epping on one such journey, as he notes in his diaries
Anyway, I am back up North tomorrow am. I have been a city girl most of my life - Naples, London, Bristol, Paris - with childhood holidays in very rural Ireland. I love cities.
And, yet, I feel trapped in London in a way I have never done before. I look out of the window and see buildings. Even though on the top floor I can see across London to the Surrey hills the view is still of buildings. And my soul dies a little. Everywhere I look out of my home up North I see sea and sky and mountains and valleys so sumptuous in their colours it makes my heart fit to burst. And the bird song. Plus the moon at night and stars, lots of them. I really miss it. I cannot wait to get back.
I never thought I would feel this way. Can people change quite so much? Or maybe I have secretly always been a solitary misanthrope?
There is something about the natural world which my mind, my soul needs, I think, to feel whole. No other way to explain it.
Plus - mad as it is - I love driving by myself. Nothing better than to have the music on very loud - and have some really strong music on to get the blood racing. Just f***ing awesome.
Still in May I shall be speaking at a big conference in London. If you're very good I may tell you about it and you can come and enthusiastically applaud. 😀
What about the Heath and Regents Park? Doesn't that work for you when you're here in NL?
The Heath does - for a walk. But it's the sense of enclosure which is what is different. I have horizons there. I have always loved being near the sea. In Naples - which is urban to the nth degree - it was a 5 minute walk down to the sea. If I had to end my life I would go into the sea, not bloody Dignitas.
And you can stare at the sea for hours. It is never ever boring.
I've done *alot* of walking around this country. And whilst I know what you mean, scenery becomes a little boring after a while. The great thing about London is the sheer variety, both in views and the people. This can be seen in (say) a seven-mile walk along the Regents Canal from Mile End to Paddington, seven miles along the Thames Path, or seven miles south from Greenwich.
If you want boring, try walking around Loch Long. Three days just to end up a couple of kilometres from where you began ...
I agree re London walks. They are interesting. But I never find scenery boring because there is so much to notice - the plants, the trees, the light, the shadows on rocks, the animals etc.
One of the things I was told by an old gardening hand was to walk round your garden every single day and simply look closely. You'd think that there would be no change from day to day but you'd be wrong. And learning how to really see has been a blessing. And once you start doing it there is so much to observe. Partly because of my asthma I rarely walks for long periods without stopping. But also because I am always seeing all sorts of things up close - even the beauty of a gorse bush - or moss or lichen on a stone- or the pattern of a dry stone wall or ferns growing out the ground or a wall.
Honestly I could bore you all for hours about it. Don't worry. I won't.
That looks beautiful. However my garden is one of a new-build. A walk around it takes a minute, tops, if I don't get strangled by the washing line in the process. I can see well over twenty other rooftops from an upper window.
As it happens, I converse with lots of coastal walkers. I tell the ones who do it sectionally over a number of years that they get more out of it than those of us who do it in one go. They get to choose the season and the weather. And they get to see scenery with fresh eyes. On my walk, after six months it became: "Oh, another nice view. Oh well." I had scenery fatigue. And I was always rushing, rarely stopping.
There's your mistake, right there. "Rushing, rarely stopping."
Anyway, I am willing to come and design and plant a child and washing-line friendly garden for you, which will provide plenty for you to look at, as you sit there. And your young man.
You're near Cambridge, no - so you can have a Beth Chatto style garden - ones with plenty of ground cover plants, that don't mind being trampled on, and that don't need watering. I love the style and I've adapted it for the green roof on top of my bin and wood store.
i would hate living in cambridge...surrounded by the most boring countryside in the entire UK
Oh, I don't know. The fens are lovely, and hillwalkers can manage the traverse of the Gog Magog range in a day.
Telegraph At least two Russian soldiers died and nearly three dozen were taken to intensive care after eating poisoned pastries offered by Ukrainian villagers, Ukraine’s intelligence said on Sunday.
Residents of a village near the town of Izyum reportedly "treated" the troops of Russia's 3rd Motor Rifle infantry division to the traditional "pirozhki", which resemble a Cornish pastry, laced with an unknown poison.
In WW2, the Poles got into an SS supply bakery and poisoned the bread, reportedly killing 1,000.
Anyway, I am back up North tomorrow am. I have been a city girl most of my life - Naples, London, Bristol, Paris - with childhood holidays in very rural Ireland. I love cities.
And, yet, I feel trapped in London in a way I have never done before. I look out of the window and see buildings. Even though on the top floor I can see across London to the Surrey hills the view is still of buildings. And my soul dies a little. Everywhere I look out of my home up North I see sea and sky and mountains and valleys so sumptuous in their colours it makes my heart fit to burst. And the bird song. Plus the moon at night and stars, lots of them. I really miss it. I cannot wait to get back.
I never thought I would feel this way. Can people change quite so much? Or maybe I have secretly always been a solitary misanthrope?
There is something about the natural world which my mind, my soul needs, I think, to feel whole. No other way to explain it.
Plus - mad as it is - I love driving by myself. Nothing better than to have the music on very loud - and have some really strong music on to get the blood racing. Just f***ing awesome.
Still in May I shall be speaking at a big conference in London. If you're very good I may tell you about it and you can come and enthusiastically applaud. 😀
What about the Heath and Regents Park? Doesn't that work for you when you're here in NL?
The Heath does - for a walk. But it's the sense of enclosure which is what is different. I have horizons there. I have always loved being near the sea. In Naples - which is urban to the nth degree - it was a 5 minute walk down to the sea. If I had to end my life I would go into the sea, not bloody Dignitas.
And you can stare at the sea for hours. It is never ever boring.
I've done *alot* of walking around this country. And whilst I know what you mean, scenery becomes a little boring after a while. The great thing about London is the sheer variety, both in views and the people. This can be seen in (say) a seven-mile walk along the Regents Canal from Mile End to Paddington, seven miles along the Thames Path, or seven miles south from Greenwich.
If you want boring, try walking around Loch Long. Three days just to end up a couple of kilometres from where you began ...
I agree re London walks. They are interesting. But I never find scenery boring because there is so much to notice - the plants, the trees, the light, the shadows on rocks, the animals etc.
One of the things I was told by an old gardening hand was to walk round your garden every single day and simply look closely. You'd think that there would be no change from day to day but you'd be wrong. And learning how to really see has been a blessing. And once you start doing it there is so much to observe. Partly because of my asthma I rarely walks for long periods without stopping. But also because I am always seeing all sorts of things up close - even the beauty of a gorse bush - or moss or lichen on a stone- or the pattern of a dry stone wall or ferns growing out the ground or a wall.
Honestly I could bore you all for hours about it. Don't worry. I won't.
london walks are great but the air pollution means you benefit a lot more from country walks
Today I saw this
The oldest life size statue in the world. His obsidian eyes are truly haunting. 12,000 years old. Those eyes looked at me as if to say, You again
That looks like some children's art project I saw back in 2019.
He is quite obviously umpiring a cricket match. The roots of English sport are deep
Telegraph At least two Russian soldiers died and nearly three dozen were taken to intensive care after eating poisoned pastries offered by Ukrainian villagers, Ukraine’s intelligence said on Sunday.
Residents of a village near the town of Izyum reportedly "treated" the troops of Russia's 3rd Motor Rifle infantry division to the traditional "pirozhki", which resemble a Cornish pastry, laced with an unknown poison.
In WW2, the Poles got into an SS supply bakery and poisoned the bread, reportedly killing 1,000.
Looking at the latest appalling images from Ukraine and the verified equipment losses if arms shipments from the West are upped so that Russian air cover is reduced further and the Ukrainians can move men and equipment around reasonably freely then Russia could be heading for cataclysmic battlefield defeat.
Not if Germany has its way.....
This from Illia Ponomarenko, The Kyiv Independent:
"I am now facing an interview no sane human being would easily wish to have. And I am horrified by the fact I will have to write it down. Word by word."
Can't imagine who he is interviewing, but I can imagine about what. Some of these journalists are going to need serious counseling once this is over.
Is this an army out of control, or have they been guided to atrocities so as to provoke the west? Ditto the rape-murders reported yesterday
This is not the Red Army wreaking understandable (if terrible) revenge on Hitler’s Germany
I am haunted by this passage in a CNN article yesterday
"I have been trying to make sense of this for a month, because as terrible as Putin is, you could never say he was illogical," says Peter T. DeSimone, an associate professor of Russian and Eastern European history at Utica University in New York.
"All of this is illogical, and that's the scary thing," he says. "This is not normal for what he's done in the past. This is something that makes no sense on many levels, and not just in regard to World War II."
Telegraph At least two Russian soldiers died and nearly three dozen were taken to intensive care after eating poisoned pastries offered by Ukrainian villagers, Ukraine’s intelligence said on Sunday.
Residents of a village near the town of Izyum reportedly "treated" the troops of Russia's 3rd Motor Rifle infantry division to the traditional "pirozhki", which resemble a Cornish pastry, laced with an unknown poison.
In WW2, the Poles got into an SS supply bakery and poisoned the bread, reportedly killing 1,000.
Anyway, I am back up North tomorrow am. I have been a city girl most of my life - Naples, London, Bristol, Paris - with childhood holidays in very rural Ireland. I love cities.
And, yet, I feel trapped in London in a way I have never done before. I look out of the window and see buildings. Even though on the top floor I can see across London to the Surrey hills the view is still of buildings. And my soul dies a little. Everywhere I look out of my home up North I see sea and sky and mountains and valleys so sumptuous in their colours it makes my heart fit to burst. And the bird song. Plus the moon at night and stars, lots of them. I really miss it. I cannot wait to get back.
I never thought I would feel this way. Can people change quite so much? Or maybe I have secretly always been a solitary misanthrope?
There is something about the natural world which my mind, my soul needs, I think, to feel whole. No other way to explain it.
Plus - mad as it is - I love driving by myself. Nothing better than to have the music on very loud - and have some really strong music on to get the blood racing. Just f***ing awesome.
Still in May I shall be speaking at a big conference in London. If you're very good I may tell you about it and you can come and enthusiastically applaud. 😀
What about the Heath and Regents Park? Doesn't that work for you when you're here in NL?
The Heath does - for a walk. But it's the sense of enclosure which is what is different. I have horizons there. I have always loved being near the sea. In Naples - which is urban to the nth degree - it was a 5 minute walk down to the sea. If I had to end my life I would go into the sea, not bloody Dignitas.
And you can stare at the sea for hours. It is never ever boring.
I've done *alot* of walking around this country. And whilst I know what you mean, scenery becomes a little boring after a while. The great thing about London is the sheer variety, both in views and the people. This can be seen in (say) a seven-mile walk along the Regents Canal from Mile End to Paddington, seven miles along the Thames Path, or seven miles south from Greenwich.
If you want boring, try walking around Loch Long. Three days just to end up a couple of kilometres from where you began ...
I agree re London walks. They are interesting. But I never find scenery boring because there is so much to notice - the plants, the trees, the light, the shadows on rocks, the animals etc.
One of the things I was told by an old gardening hand was to walk round your garden every single day and simply look closely. You'd think that there would be no change from day to day but you'd be wrong. And learning how to really see has been a blessing. And once you start doing it there is so much to observe. Partly because of my asthma I rarely walks for long periods without stopping. But also because I am always seeing all sorts of things up close - even the beauty of a gorse bush - or moss or lichen on a stone- or the pattern of a dry stone wall or ferns growing out the ground or a wall.
Honestly I could bore you all for hours about it. Don't worry. I won't.
That looks beautiful. However my garden is one of a new-build. A walk around it takes a minute, tops, if I don't get strangled by the washing line in the process. I can see well over twenty other rooftops from an upper window.
As it happens, I converse with lots of coastal walkers. I tell the ones who do it sectionally over a number of years that they get more out of it than those of us who do it in one go. They get to choose the season and the weather. And they get to see scenery with fresh eyes. On my walk, after six months it became: "Oh, another nice view. Oh well." I had scenery fatigue. And I was always rushing, rarely stopping.
There's your mistake, right there. "Rushing, rarely stopping."
Anyway, I am willing to come and design and plant a child and washing-line friendly garden for you, which will provide plenty for you to look at, as you sit there. And your young man.
You're near Cambridge, no - so you can have a Beth Chatto style garden - ones with plenty of ground cover plants, that don't mind being trampled on, and that don't need watering. I love the style and I've adapted it for the green roof on top of my bin and wood store.
i would hate living in cambridge...surrounded by the most boring countryside in the entire UK
Oh, I don't know. The fens are lovely, and hillwalkers can manage the traverse of the Gog Magog range in a day.
I once walked the Roman Road from Cambridge to Haverhill in deep snow, passing the Gog Magogs.
The Gog Magogs are also where I introduced Mrs J to the undoubted joys of trig pillars...
Rubbish. I have zero problems with people talking: especially if it means it might divert people away from an evil course.
IIRC alongside Iran and The Vatican we're the only nations to have unelected clergy in our parliament.
I find that very scary and undemocratic.
The bishops are less than 5% of the Lords and they also have a higher percentage of Oxbridge degrees than other peers and MPs do.
Most of them have done parish ministry at some time as well, rooted in the problems of local communities. They are educated and experienced and the type of people we need in the Lords, certainly not more ex politicians and wealthy party donors who increasingly make up the rest of the Lords now
BBC bosses have readvertised the job of political editor after being unhappy with the choice of candidates to replace Laura Kuenssberg in one of the most influential roles in British journalism.
Following weeks of interviews and an extensive recruitment process, the corporation had produced an all-female shortlist for the role, with ITV News’s Anushka Asthana and Sky News’s Sophy Ridge believed to be the final two candidates. An announcement on which of them would get the job had been expected to coincide with Kuenssberg stepping down last week.
Instead, the BBC political correspondent Chris Mason is now the favourite to land the role after bosses quietly began inviting fresh applications for the job. The recruitment page for the role of political editor has been reopened until Tuesday, although there has been no acknowledgement of this from senior staff or formal announcement from the BBC encouraging fresh applications.
Mason is widely liked across the BBC but one media industry executive pointed out the BBC could be about to reject “an all-female shortlist of brilliant women” in favour of a man.
Reopening applications will allow Mason to send in his CV – but will also make it possible for anyone else to apply and is a public sign that executives are not content with the existing range of candidates. In recent days, there had been speculation that BBC executives were unhappy with the process and were seeking other candidates for the role.
"Mason is widely liked across the BBC but one media industry executive pointed out the BBC could be about to reject “an all-female shortlist of brilliant women” in favour of a man."
Why should that be an issue if he is a "brilliant man"?
Laura K has just had the job. Is it to become a female fiefdom?
Do they want a woman who knows how to ask questions?
Reuters - Ukrainian prosecutors investigating possible war crimes by Russia have found 410 bodies in towns near Kyiv and 140 of them had been examined. Russia denied allegations that its forces killed civilians in the town of Bucha near Kyiv.
Disgusting behaviour from Putin. There really needs to be a way to find a ceasefire now by any means possible and end this war
Hmm, not completely sure about that. I want a lot more of these murderers going home in wooden boxes and as much equipment stripped off the Russian army as possible so they can't come back. Allowing the Russians to regroup and rearm might be a major mistake.
Edit, but welcome by the way. New voices always welcome.
You don’t want them going back in wooden boxes - you want them going back missing limbs as they will be a clear and indisputable “truth” to the Russian people of the cost of the war they support.
If there are 20,000 young men who are visibly ruined by the war it cannot be hidden and also they will be able to tell their families and friends about what they saw and how bad the Russian military really is.
Also injured soldiers use up more resources than dead soldiers along the line….
That’s why the Azov battalion shot those Russian POWs in the legs. Much more militarily effective than murder
I seem to remember from the Ken Burns Vietnam doc that whilst the American public were shocked by deaths the effect of seeing the wounded and traumatised soldiers around them every day brought the war home much more viscerally than stats of dead soldiers.
If you are a Russian mother and you see young men come home missing limbs and traumatised in your town and then you look at your son who might get called up then you might start questioning the propaganda.
And The Band Played Waltzing Matilda. Great anti war song.
So they collected the cripples, the wounded and maimed And they shipped us back home to Australia The legless, the armless, the blind and insane Those proud wounded heroes of Suvla And as our ship pulled into Circular Quay I looked at the place where me legs used to be And thank Christ there was no-one there waiting for me To grieve and to mourn and to pity And the band played Waltzing Matilda As they carried us down the gangway But nobody cheered, they just stood and stared And they turned all their faces away
Trying to be an optimist am I being silly in hoping that China has seen how bad invading Ukraine is that they think invading Taiwan will be a hundred times harder and abandon all plans to do so?
I think if you're the Chinese military establishment you can probably find plenty of supporting material for an argument that this was largely down to Russian military incompetence and lousy equipment and therefore not applicable for any military adventures you'd like to embark on yourself...
Bugger.
Don’t worry. No one sane would contemplate invading Taiwan without taking out the US carriers first. And no one sane would attempt that.
Telegraph At least two Russian soldiers died and nearly three dozen were taken to intensive care after eating poisoned pastries offered by Ukrainian villagers, Ukraine’s intelligence said on Sunday.
Residents of a village near the town of Izyum reportedly "treated" the troops of Russia's 3rd Motor Rifle infantry division to the traditional "pirozhki", which resemble a Cornish pastry, laced with an unknown poison.
Who knows what they Putin?
Sounds as dangerous as the cooking of my ex mother-NLAW.
Rubbish. I have zero problems with people talking: especially if it means it might divert people away from an evil course.
IIRC alongside Iran and The Vatican we're the only nations to have unelected clergy in our parliament.
I find that very scary and undemocratic.
The bishops are less than 5% of the Lords and they also have a higher percentage of Oxbridge degrees than other peers and MPs do.
Most of them have done parish ministry at some time as well, rooted in the problems of local communities. They are educated and experienced and the type of people we need in the Lords, certainly not more ex politicians and wealthy party donors who increasingly make up the rest of the Lords now
Even so, it is, erm, eccentric by 21st century standards to have members of only one privileged sect of one religion given automatic seats.
Bleating about what C of E priests have or have not done doesn't negate the point that other priests, and ministers, Quaker meeting secretaries, imams, etc., also deal with such matters. So the C of E is not specially privileged in that sense.
Edit: And we need fewer, not more, Oxbridge graduates in Parliament, in both houses.
Rubbish. I have zero problems with people talking: especially if it means it might divert people away from an evil course.
IIRC alongside Iran and The Vatican we're the only nations to have unelected clergy in our parliament.
I find that very scary and undemocratic.
The bishops are less than 5% of the Lords and they also have a higher percentage of Oxbridge degrees than other peers and MPs do.
Most of them have done parish ministry at some time as well, rooted in the problems of local communities. They are educated and experienced and the type of people we need in the Lords, certainly not more ex politicians and wealthy party donors who increasingly make up the rest of the Lords now
Nearly 2.5 million Russian-Germans returned to Germany after the fall of the USSR in 1991.
Today, they gathered in Berlin to wave Russian, Soviet Union and “Z symbol”- flags.
Interesting, and sad, do we know weather its the same people?
I did know about the large number of ethnic Russians that had lived in the USSR who came back to Germany, some are the descendants of Amish and Mennonite to came to Russia in the time of 'Catherin the Great' who wished to bring what where at the time 'modern farming methods to Russia, and was willing to offer them exemption form military conscription, which as passivists the Mennonites wanted.
but are the pro-Russia protesters just neo-communist and alt-Right pro Putin idiots? or the same people that ones lived in Russia?
Rubbish. I have zero problems with people talking: especially if it means it might divert people away from an evil course.
That was John Sentamu's position when asked about the possible expulsion of the Russian Orthodox church from the World Council of Churches today. As an atheist I have little time for these things but I do have a huge amount of time for John Sentamu. I think he might be wrong on this particular point but I hope it is I who am wrong.
Rubbish. I have zero problems with people talking: especially if it means it might divert people away from an evil course.
IIRC alongside Iran and The Vatican we're the only nations to have unelected clergy in our parliament.
I find that very scary and undemocratic.
The bishops are less than 5% of the Lords and they also have a higher percentage of Oxbridge degrees than other peers and MPs do.
Most of them have done parish ministry at some time as well, rooted in the problems of local communities. They are educated and experienced and the type of people we need in the Lords, certainly not more ex politicians and wealthy party donors who increasingly make up the rest of the Lords now
House of Lords = House of Unelected Has-Beens!
They are only there because of who their Fava was.
BBC bosses have readvertised the job of political editor after being unhappy with the choice of candidates to replace Laura Kuenssberg in one of the most influential roles in British journalism.
Following weeks of interviews and an extensive recruitment process, the corporation had produced an all-female shortlist for the role, with ITV News’s Anushka Asthana and Sky News’s Sophy Ridge believed to be the final two candidates. An announcement on which of them would get the job had been expected to coincide with Kuenssberg stepping down last week.
Instead, the BBC political correspondent Chris Mason is now the favourite to land the role after bosses quietly began inviting fresh applications for the job. The recruitment page for the role of political editor has been reopened until Tuesday, although there has been no acknowledgement of this from senior staff or formal announcement from the BBC encouraging fresh applications.
Mason is widely liked across the BBC but one media industry executive pointed out the BBC could be about to reject “an all-female shortlist of brilliant women” in favour of a man.
Reopening applications will allow Mason to send in his CV – but will also make it possible for anyone else to apply and is a public sign that executives are not content with the existing range of candidates. In recent days, there had been speculation that BBC executives were unhappy with the process and were seeking other candidates for the role.
I wonder if Isabel Hardman would be considered an option? Or whether she would fancy it. She comes across as completely non-ideological. Someone who just tells you what is going on.
The fact such a plum role is short of applicants rather sadly tells its own story. Did the BBC initially insist on an all woman shortlist?
They have been trying to find someone of the same quality as Laura Kuenssberg, but sadly, no other journalists are as bad.
BBC bosses have readvertised the job of political editor after being unhappy with the choice of candidates to replace Laura Kuenssberg in one of the most influential roles in British journalism.
Following weeks of interviews and an extensive recruitment process, the corporation had produced an all-female shortlist for the role, with ITV News’s Anushka Asthana and Sky News’s Sophy Ridge believed to be the final two candidates. An announcement on which of them would get the job had been expected to coincide with Kuenssberg stepping down last week.
Instead, the BBC political correspondent Chris Mason is now the favourite to land the role after bosses quietly began inviting fresh applications for the job. The recruitment page for the role of political editor has been reopened until Tuesday, although there has been no acknowledgement of this from senior staff or formal announcement from the BBC encouraging fresh applications.
Mason is widely liked across the BBC but one media industry executive pointed out the BBC could be about to reject “an all-female shortlist of brilliant women” in favour of a man.
Reopening applications will allow Mason to send in his CV – but will also make it possible for anyone else to apply and is a public sign that executives are not content with the existing range of candidates. In recent days, there had been speculation that BBC executives were unhappy with the process and were seeking other candidates for the role.
"Mason is widely liked across the BBC but one media industry executive pointed out the BBC could be about to reject “an all-female shortlist of brilliant women” in favour of a man."
Why should that be an issue if he is a "brilliant man"?
Laura K has just had the job. Is it to become a female fiefdom?
Do they want a woman who knows how to ask questions?
Rubbish. I have zero problems with people talking: especially if it means it might divert people away from an evil course.
IIRC alongside Iran and The Vatican we're the only nations to have unelected clergy in our parliament.
I find that very scary and undemocratic.
The bishops are less than 5% of the Lords and they also have a higher percentage of Oxbridge degrees than other peers and MPs do.
Most of them have done parish ministry at some time as well, rooted in the problems of local communities. They are educated and experienced and the type of people we need in the Lords, certainly not more ex politicians and wealthy party donors who increasingly make up the rest of the Lords now
Even so, it is, erm, eccentric by 21st century standards to have members of only one privileged sect of one religion given automatic seats.
Bleating about what C of E priests have or have not done doesn't negate the point that other priests, and ministers, Quaker meeting secretaries, imams, etc., also deal with such matters. So the C of E is not specially privileged in that sense.
Edit: And we need fewer, not more, Oxbridge graduates in Parliament, in both houses.
No it isn’t. The Bishops have been in the Lords since the Middle Ages. They represent the established church. The moment they are removed the main established church in the UK would revert to the Vatican and the Pope.
Quakers and Protestant evangelicals are not part of an established church like the Church of England and Roman Catholic Church are. In Iran where Muslims are a majority clerics are also represented in the legislature. No reason we cannot have a few other religious leaders in the Lords as we have Rabbis already but the Bishops must remain there
Anyway, I am back up North tomorrow am. I have been a city girl most of my life - Naples, London, Bristol, Paris - with childhood holidays in very rural Ireland. I love cities.
And, yet, I feel trapped in London in a way I have never done before. I look out of the window and see buildings. Even though on the top floor I can see across London to the Surrey hills the view is still of buildings. And my soul dies a little. Everywhere I look out of my home up North I see sea and sky and mountains and valleys so sumptuous in their colours it makes my heart fit to burst. And the bird song. Plus the moon at night and stars, lots of them. I really miss it. I cannot wait to get back.
I never thought I would feel this way. Can people change quite so much? Or maybe I have secretly always been a solitary misanthrope?
There is something about the natural world which my mind, my soul needs, I think, to feel whole. No other way to explain it.
Plus - mad as it is - I love driving by myself. Nothing better than to have the music on very loud - and have some really strong music on to get the blood racing. Just f***ing awesome.
Still in May I shall be speaking at a big conference in London. If you're very good I may tell you about it and you can come and enthusiastically applaud. 😀
What about the Heath and Regents Park? Doesn't that work for you when you're here in NL?
The Heath does - for a walk. But it's the sense of enclosure which is what is different. I have horizons there. I have always loved being near the sea. In Naples - which is urban to the nth degree - it was a 5 minute walk down to the sea. If I had to end my life I would go into the sea, not bloody Dignitas.
And you can stare at the sea for hours. It is never ever boring.
I've done *alot* of walking around this country. And whilst I know what you mean, scenery becomes a little boring after a while. The great thing about London is the sheer variety, both in views and the people. This can be seen in (say) a seven-mile walk along the Regents Canal from Mile End to Paddington, seven miles along the Thames Path, or seven miles south from Greenwich.
If you want boring, try walking around Loch Long. Three days just to end up a couple of kilometres from where you began ...
I agree re London walks. They are interesting. But I never find scenery boring because there is so much to notice - the plants, the trees, the light, the shadows on rocks, the animals etc.
One of the things I was told by an old gardening hand was to walk round your garden every single day and simply look closely. You'd think that there would be no change from day to day but you'd be wrong. And learning how to really see has been a blessing. And once you start doing it there is so much to observe. Partly because of my asthma I rarely walks for long periods without stopping. But also because I am always seeing all sorts of things up close - even the beauty of a gorse bush - or moss or lichen on a stone- or the pattern of a dry stone wall or ferns growing out the ground or a wall.
Honestly I could bore you all for hours about it. Don't worry. I won't.
london walks are great but the air pollution means you benefit a lot more from country walks
Today I saw this
The oldest life size statue in the world. His obsidian eyes are truly haunting. 12,000 years old. Those eyes looked at me as if to say, You again
That looks like some children's art project I saw back in 2019.
He is quite obviously umpiring a cricket match. The roots of English sport are deep
Quite clearly indicating that one was outside off at point of contact wherever it was spinning.
Reuters - Ukrainian prosecutors investigating possible war crimes by Russia have found 410 bodies in towns near Kyiv and 140 of them had been examined. Russia denied allegations that its forces killed civilians in the town of Bucha near Kyiv.
Disgusting behaviour from Putin. There really needs to be a way to find a ceasefire now by any means possible and end this war
Hmm, not completely sure about that. I want a lot more of these murderers going home in wooden boxes and as much equipment stripped off the Russian army as possible so they can't come back. Allowing the Russians to regroup and rearm might be a major mistake.
Edit, but welcome by the way. New voices always welcome.
You don’t want them going back in wooden boxes - you want them going back missing limbs as they will be a clear and indisputable “truth” to the Russian people of the cost of the war they support.
If there are 20,000 young men who are visibly ruined by the war it cannot be hidden and also they will be able to tell their families and friends about what they saw and how bad the Russian military really is.
Also injured soldiers use up more resources than dead soldiers along the line….
That’s why the Azov battalion shot those Russian POWs in the legs. Much more militarily effective than murder
I seem to remember from the Ken Burns Vietnam doc that whilst the American public were shocked by deaths the effect of seeing the wounded and traumatised soldiers around them every day brought the war home much more viscerally than stats of dead soldiers.
If you are a Russian mother and you see young men come home missing limbs and traumatised in your town and then you look at your son who might get called up then you might start questioning the propaganda.
And The Band Played Waltzing Matilda. Great anti war song.
So they collected the cripples, the wounded and maimed And they shipped us back home to Australia The legless, the armless, the blind and insane Those proud wounded heroes of Suvla And as our ship pulled into Circular Quay I looked at the place where me legs used to be And thank Christ there was no-one there waiting for me To grieve and to mourn and to pity And the band played Waltzing Matilda As they carried us down the gangway But nobody cheered, they just stood and stared And they turned all their faces away
One of the best anti-war songs ever written. And actually one of the best songs ever written as well.
BBC bosses have readvertised the job of political editor after being unhappy with the choice of candidates to replace Laura Kuenssberg in one of the most influential roles in British journalism.
Following weeks of interviews and an extensive recruitment process, the corporation had produced an all-female shortlist for the role, with ITV News’s Anushka Asthana and Sky News’s Sophy Ridge believed to be the final two candidates. An announcement on which of them would get the job had been expected to coincide with Kuenssberg stepping down last week.
Instead, the BBC political correspondent Chris Mason is now the favourite to land the role after bosses quietly began inviting fresh applications for the job. The recruitment page for the role of political editor has been reopened until Tuesday, although there has been no acknowledgement of this from senior staff or formal announcement from the BBC encouraging fresh applications.
Mason is widely liked across the BBC but one media industry executive pointed out the BBC could be about to reject “an all-female shortlist of brilliant women” in favour of a man.
Reopening applications will allow Mason to send in his CV – but will also make it possible for anyone else to apply and is a public sign that executives are not content with the existing range of candidates. In recent days, there had been speculation that BBC executives were unhappy with the process and were seeking other candidates for the role.
I wonder if Isabel Hardman would be considered an option? Or whether she would fancy it. She comes across as completely non-ideological. Someone who just tells you what is going on.
The fact such a plum role is short of applicants rather sadly tells its own story. Did the BBC initially insist on an all woman shortlist?
Hardman is not quoted in the betting. Here are Star Sports' prices:-
Chris Mason 9/4 Anushka Asthana 5/2 Sophy Ridge 11/4 Alex Forsyth 7/2 Sam Coates 9/2 Paul Brand 11/2 Faisal Islam 8/1 Adam Fleming 9/1 Lewis Goodall 10/1 James Landale 12/1 Pippa Crerar 12/1 Ros Atkins 16/1 Beth Rigby 20/1 Emma Vardy 20/1 Nick Watt 20/1 Nick Eardley 33/1 Jonathan Blake 40/1 Ione Wells 50/1 Gary Gibbon 66/1 Others Upon Request
Looking at the latest appalling images from Ukraine and the verified equipment losses if arms shipments from the West are upped so that Russian air cover is reduced further and the Ukrainians can move men and equipment around reasonably freely then Russia could be heading for cataclysmic battlefield defeat.
Not if Germany has its way.....
This from Illia Ponomarenko, The Kyiv Independent:
"I am now facing an interview no sane human being would easily wish to have. And I am horrified by the fact I will have to write it down. Word by word."
Can't imagine who he is interviewing, but I can imagine about what. Some of these journalists are going to need serious counseling once this is over.
Is this an army out of control, or have they been guided to atrocities so as to provoke the west? Ditto the rape-murders reported yesterday
This is not the Red Army wreaking understandable (if terrible) revenge on Hitler’s Germany
I am haunted by this passage in a CNN article yesterday
"I have been trying to make sense of this for a month, because as terrible as Putin is, you could never say he was illogical," says Peter T. DeSimone, an associate professor of Russian and Eastern European history at Utica University in New York.
"All of this is illogical, and that's the scary thing," he says. "This is not normal for what he's done in the past. This is something that makes no sense on many levels, and not just in regard to World War II."
It feels like Russia, under its leader, has entered some kind of psychosis. Akin to Hitlerism
As I understand it in WW2 many SS commanders and some German army commanders worked out that there men where less likely to surrender if they had committed terrible crimes on civilians first. possibly because if men have committed theses sorts of crimes, they know not to expect to much mercy if they surrender so fight to the death.
Very very sad, but we might be at that point again.
The idea that someone could look at Russia right now and say "hmm, maybe what's needed is a dictator" boggles me. It's the stupidest thing I've read on here (and I was here for when HYUFD claimed that you couldn't get from London to Cambridge without entering Essex).
The M11, the main road route from London to Cambridge, goes through Essex
The A10 does not.
So you can choose to go into Essex or not. Literally nobody thinks you can't possibly go through Essex, and only one person, you, thinks you HAVE to.
When Samuel Pepys went from London to Cambridge, a favorite journey for him, he almost always went one of the Hertfordshire routes, which had a number of alternatives. Curiously he never chose the M11, though on one occasions he diverted to Audley End, near Saffron Walden in Essex. And IIRC once via Epping Forest.
He actually stayed in Epping on one such journey, as he notes in his diaries
Reuters - Ukrainian prosecutors investigating possible war crimes by Russia have found 410 bodies in towns near Kyiv and 140 of them had been examined. Russia denied allegations that its forces killed civilians in the town of Bucha near Kyiv.
Disgusting behaviour from Putin. There really needs to be a way to find a ceasefire now by any means possible and end this war
Hmm, not completely sure about that. I want a lot more of these murderers going home in wooden boxes and as much equipment stripped off the Russian army as possible so they can't come back. Allowing the Russians to regroup and rearm might be a major mistake.
Edit, but welcome by the way. New voices always welcome.
You don’t want them going back in wooden boxes - you want them going back missing limbs as they will be a clear and indisputable “truth” to the Russian people of the cost of the war they support.
If there are 20,000 young men who are visibly ruined by the war it cannot be hidden and also they will be able to tell their families and friends about what they saw and how bad the Russian military really is.
Also injured soldiers use up more resources than dead soldiers along the line….
That’s why the Azov battalion shot those Russian POWs in the legs. Much more militarily effective than murder
I seem to remember from the Ken Burns Vietnam doc that whilst the American public were shocked by deaths the effect of seeing the wounded and traumatised soldiers around them every day brought the war home much more viscerally than stats of dead soldiers.
If you are a Russian mother and you see young men come home missing limbs and traumatised in your town and then you look at your son who might get called up then you might start questioning the propaganda.
And The Band Played Waltzing Matilda. Great anti war song.
So they collected the cripples, the wounded and maimed And they shipped us back home to Australia The legless, the armless, the blind and insane Those proud wounded heroes of Suvla And as our ship pulled into Circular Quay I looked at the place where me legs used to be And thank Christ there was no-one there waiting for me To grieve and to mourn and to pity And the band played Waltzing Matilda As they carried us down the gangway But nobody cheered, they just stood and stared And they turned all their faces away
That’s good
I always liked Country Joe and the Fish’s Feel Like I’m Fixing To Die
Well, come on all of you, big strong men Uncle Sam needs your help again He's got himself in a terrible jam Way down yonder in Vietnam So put down your books and pick up a gun We're gonna have a whole lotta fun
And it's one, two, three What are we fighting for? Don't ask me, I don't give a damn Next stop is Vietnam; And it's five, six, seven Open up the pearly gates Well there ain't no time to wonder why Whoopee! we're all gonna die
Well, come on generals, let's move fast; Your big chance has come at last Now you can go out and get those reds 'Cause the only good commie is the one that's dead And you know that peace can only be won When we've blown 'em all to kingdom come
Come on Wall Street, don't be slow Why man, this is war au-go-go There's plenty good money to be made By supplying the Army with the tools of its trade But just hope and pray that if they drop the bomb They drop it on the Viet Cong
Come on mothers throughout the land Pack your boys off to Vietnam Come on fathers, and don't hesitate To send your sons off before it's too late And you can be the first ones in your block To have your boy come home in a box
A good anti-war popular song is a deeply powerful thing
There are no formal links, the Russian Orthodox Church is not in the Anglican communion is it. It is not formally linked to the main Orthodox Church either after Kyrill cut links with the Patriarch of Constantinople.
In any case Welby told Kyrill of his ‘grave concerns’ over the Russian action only last month. Compare that to the leaders of China, South Africa, Syria, Pakistan, India etc none of whom have expressed any concern or criticism over Putin’s action
There is a formal link through the World Council of Churches.
But as I already said. There is perhaps a valid argument for the persuasion argument even if I personally think it is pointless.
Trying to be an optimist am I being silly in hoping that China has seen how bad invading Ukraine is that they think invading Taiwan will be a hundred times harder and abandon all plans to do so?
I think if you're the Chinese military establishment you can probably find plenty of supporting material for an argument that this was largely down to Russian military incompetence and lousy equipment and therefore not applicable for any military adventures you'd like to embark on yourself...
Bugger.
Don’t worry. No one sane would contemplate invading Taiwan without taking out the US carriers first. And no one sane would attempt that.
Can we just be sure that Xi doesn't have whatever Putin has?
Nearly 2.5 million Russian-Germans returned to Germany after the fall of the USSR in 1991.
Today, they gathered in Berlin to wave Russian, Soviet Union and “Z symbol”- flags.
Apparently similar demos in Cyprus and Slovenia. Trouble brews….
I can't see support for Putin being a thing. The mad may, clearly. The Russian narrative is obviously completely untrue. The West's narrative, admittedly, might have issues too, but there is a pretty strong pressure as to truth.
Support for Putin's incarceration - now that's a thing.
Reuters - Ukrainian prosecutors investigating possible war crimes by Russia have found 410 bodies in towns near Kyiv and 140 of them had been examined. Russia denied allegations that its forces killed civilians in the town of Bucha near Kyiv.
Disgusting behaviour from Putin. There really needs to be a way to find a ceasefire now by any means possible and end this war
Hmm, not completely sure about that. I want a lot more of these murderers going home in wooden boxes and as much equipment stripped off the Russian army as possible so they can't come back. Allowing the Russians to regroup and rearm might be a major mistake.
Edit, but welcome by the way. New voices always welcome.
You don’t want them going back in wooden boxes - you want them going back missing limbs as they will be a clear and indisputable “truth” to the Russian people of the cost of the war they support.
If there are 20,000 young men who are visibly ruined by the war it cannot be hidden and also they will be able to tell their families and friends about what they saw and how bad the Russian military really is.
Also injured soldiers use up more resources than dead soldiers along the line….
That’s why the Azov battalion shot those Russian POWs in the legs. Much more militarily effective than murder
I seem to remember from the Ken Burns Vietnam doc that whilst the American public were shocked by deaths the effect of seeing the wounded and traumatised soldiers around them every day brought the war home much more viscerally than stats of dead soldiers.
If you are a Russian mother and you see young men come home missing limbs and traumatised in your town and then you look at your son who might get called up then you might start questioning the propaganda.
And The Band Played Waltzing Matilda. Great anti war song.
So they collected the cripples, the wounded and maimed And they shipped us back home to Australia The legless, the armless, the blind and insane Those proud wounded heroes of Suvla And as our ship pulled into Circular Quay I looked at the place where me legs used to be And thank Christ there was no-one there waiting for me To grieve and to mourn and to pity And the band played Waltzing Matilda As they carried us down the gangway But nobody cheered, they just stood and stared And they turned all their faces away
When Shane McGowan sang it for The Pogues, you could quite believe he was legless....
BBC bosses have readvertised the job of political editor after being unhappy with the choice of candidates to replace Laura Kuenssberg in one of the most influential roles in British journalism.
Following weeks of interviews and an extensive recruitment process, the corporation had produced an all-female shortlist for the role, with ITV News’s Anushka Asthana and Sky News’s Sophy Ridge believed to be the final two candidates. An announcement on which of them would get the job had been expected to coincide with Kuenssberg stepping down last week.
Instead, the BBC political correspondent Chris Mason is now the favourite to land the role after bosses quietly began inviting fresh applications for the job. The recruitment page for the role of political editor has been reopened until Tuesday, although there has been no acknowledgement of this from senior staff or formal announcement from the BBC encouraging fresh applications.
Mason is widely liked across the BBC but one media industry executive pointed out the BBC could be about to reject “an all-female shortlist of brilliant women” in favour of a man.
Reopening applications will allow Mason to send in his CV – but will also make it possible for anyone else to apply and is a public sign that executives are not content with the existing range of candidates. In recent days, there had been speculation that BBC executives were unhappy with the process and were seeking other candidates for the role.
I wonder if Isabel Hardman would be considered an option? Or whether she would fancy it. She comes across as completely non-ideological. Someone who just tells you what is going on.
The fact such a plum role is short of applicants rather sadly tells its own story. Did the BBC initially insist on an all woman shortlist?
Hardman is not quoted in the betting. Here are Star Sports' prices:-
Chris Mason 9/4 Anushka Asthana 5/2 Sophy Ridge 11/4 Alex Forsyth 7/2 Sam Coates 9/2 Paul Brand 11/2 Faisal Islam 8/1 Adam Fleming 9/1 Lewis Goodall 10/1 James Landale 12/1 Pippa Crerar 12/1 Ros Atkins 16/1 Beth Rigby 20/1 Emma Vardy 20/1 Nick Watt 20/1 Nick Eardley 33/1 Jonathan Blake 40/1 Ione Wells 50/1 Gary Gibbon 66/1 Others Upon Request
Nearly 2.5 million Russian-Germans returned to Germany after the fall of the USSR in 1991.
Today, they gathered in Berlin to wave Russian, Soviet Union and “Z symbol”- flags.
Apparently similar demos in Cyprus and Slovenia. Trouble brews….
Surely we could just designate Russia as a terrorist state. Same thing as we did with ISIS. Any support for Russia is terrorism - so 10 years in jail and a ruined life.
Greetings from Tallinn. The weather continues cold, hovering just below freezing and with wet snow forecast. Its warmer in Kyiv, but much wetter. Spring is slowly coming, but it is still bitter out and gloves and hat are a must.
The atmosphere in the Baltic has changed.
The local defence league militia is still accepting volunteers and cyber war continues to be waged as Russian hackers battle to inflict as much damage as they can. However, the counter attacks by people like Anon have ripped open targets across Russian cyberspace and whatever defences the Russians once had now seem to be fully compromised. Petabytes of Russian data are being released.
The Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian armed forces are now able to put tens of thousands of troops into the field and the steady arrival of troops and equipment from other NATO states now means that the Baltic would be a pretty tough nut for the Russians to crack, particularly if the latest news from Kyiv is anything like accurate.
A friend of mine who was involved in the fighting north west of Kyiv tells me that the battle was more devastating than any he had ever been involved with, and he has seen his fair share of war. He described the battle as hellish and almost pitied the Russians. This is not a withdrawal, it is a devastating defeat. It is a very moot point as to whether the Russian forces will be able to regroup to press a further attack on the Donbas. Even if they do, the morale and equipment losses amongst the Russian forces will make any recovery a slow and difficult one, We expect the war to continue for some time.
Meanwhile, although the Baltic now feels reasonably secure, there is cold fury as to the conduct of the Russian army in the field. It has redoubled support for Ukraine, with craftswomen, for example, today making camouflage nets outside the Russian embassy to send to the Ukrainian army. As much kit as can be spared is being sent to Ukraine. Russian speakers have cancelled the May 9th event in Tallinn, and there is shock and horror at the news of the atrocities in Mariupol and Bucha. There are fears that Putinists could create trouble with arriving Ukrainians, especially as the flow is now coming from Russia itself where refugees who escaped to Russia are now crossing into Estonia to try to return to the Ukrainian government side of the lines.
Obviously there is considerable satisfaction about this defeat, but no sense that the crisis is easing in any way. Of course the Russian regime has now arrested senior figures in the army, FSB and Rasgvardia as Putin seeks to blame everyone but himself. Here in Tallinn the hatred and contempt for Putin is universal. there is deep gratitiude to Ukraine and a painful awarness that had the plan been different that it could have been Tallinn or Riga rather than Mariupol or Kyiv facing this barbarity. There is total determination to defy the tyrant and defend the freedom and independence of Estonia and Europe.
The idea that someone could look at Russia right now and say "hmm, maybe what's needed is a dictator" boggles me. It's the stupidest thing I've read on here (and I was here for when HYUFD claimed that you couldn't get from London to Cambridge without entering Essex).
The M11, the main road route from London to Cambridge, goes through Essex
The A10 does not.
So you can choose to go into Essex or not. Literally nobody thinks you can't possibly go through Essex, and only one person, you, thinks you HAVE to.
When Samuel Pepys went from London to Cambridge, a favorite journey for him, he almost always went one of the Hertfordshire routes, which had a number of alternatives. Curiously he never chose the M11, though on one occasions he diverted to Audley End, near Saffron Walden in Essex. And IIRC once via Epping Forest.
He actually stayed in Epping on one such journey, as he notes in his diaries
That must have been a full page!
It was there that he was famously castigated for not being a Tory which sunk him into depression leading to him burying his Parmesan to protect it having been given warnings of war with Scotland.
Trying to be an optimist am I being silly in hoping that China has seen how bad invading Ukraine is that they think invading Taiwan will be a hundred times harder and abandon all plans to do so?
I think if you're the Chinese military establishment you can probably find plenty of supporting material for an argument that this was largely down to Russian military incompetence and lousy equipment and therefore not applicable for any military adventures you'd like to embark on yourself...
Bugger.
Don’t worry. No one sane would contemplate invading Taiwan without taking out the US carriers first. And no one sane would attempt that.
Can we just be sure that Xi doesn't have whatever Putin has?
I think the last two months have taught us that Xi is not necessarily a more careful calculator than Putin.
Thanks again, I'm struggling to understand why some 'party's' seem to have more candidates that there are seats available? e.g. the main opposition seem to have 279 candidates and there are only 199 seats?
is this because each of the party's who make up the main opposition are standing against each other in the constituency's? but a common list in the national PR section?
Nearly 2.5 million Russian-Germans returned to Germany after the fall of the USSR in 1991.
Today, they gathered in Berlin to wave Russian, Soviet Union and “Z symbol”- flags.
Interesting, and sad, do we know weather its the same people?
I did know about the large number of ethnic Russians that had lived in the USSR who came back to Germany, some are the descendants of Amish and Mennonite to came to Russia in the time of 'Catherin the Great' who wished to bring what where at the time 'modern farming methods to Russia, and was willing to offer them exemption form military conscription, which as passivists the Mennonites wanted.
but are the pro-Russia protesters just neo-communist and alt-Right pro Putin idiots? or the same people that ones lived in Russia?
There was once a Soviet Republic for the Volga Germans -it was abolished soon after the Nazis invaded in 1941, and the ethnic Germans exiled to Kazakhstan and Siberia.
I remember SamCam looking pretty bloody miserable when DC dragged her away for some holiday bash on Easyjet pretending to be "normal" whilst Osborne had no problem at all going to an exclusive skiing resort with his then missus.
Personally, I have no problem with politicians being who they are and not apologising for it. Rishi is a very rich man married to an extremely rich woman and can go wherever the hell he likes on holiday so far as I am concerned.
I am more concerned about a budget that did not do anything to help those facing serious real terms cuts in their already poor living standards as the increase in benefits is dwarfed by the current rise in inflation, who reduced VAT on home improvements for privately owned properties but didn't on heating costs. Who still thinks, despite the increase in the reliefs on NI, that earned income should still bear a higher tax rate than unearned income. Whose idea of help for those unable to heat their homes was a ridiculous loan available in several months time.
And no Labour, the answer to all of this is not some ridiculous windfall tax.
Perhaps, though, Sunak's great wealth and privileged lifestyle has a bearing, in that he doesn't really understand what it is like to scrape through life under a constant financial struggle? Same with Osborne and his 'austerity' (for the poor) programme. Certainly Sunak seems to lack genuine empathy with, for example, those who have no choice but to subsist on benefits.
I can see the argument. But someone that clever really should have a bit more imagination.
He’s a spreadsheet jockey. Doesn’t need imagination to work at Goldmans
Rubbish. I have zero problems with people talking: especially if it means it might divert people away from an evil course.
IIRC alongside Iran and The Vatican we're the only nations to have unelected clergy in our parliament.
I find that very scary and undemocratic.
The bishops are less than 5% of the Lords and they also have a higher percentage of Oxbridge degrees than other peers and MPs do.
Most of them have done parish ministry at some time as well, rooted in the problems of local communities. They are educated and experienced and the type of people we need in the Lords, certainly not more ex politicians and wealthy party donors who increasingly make up the rest of the Lords now
Even so, it is, erm, eccentric by 21st century standards to have members of only one privileged sect of one religion given automatic seats.
Bleating about what C of E priests have or have not done doesn't negate the point that other priests, and ministers, Quaker meeting secretaries, imams, etc., also deal with such matters. So the C of E is not specially privileged in that sense.
Edit: And we need fewer, not more, Oxbridge graduates in Parliament, in both houses.
No it isn’t. The Bishops have been in the Lords since the Middle Ages. They represent the established church. The moment they are removed the main established church in the UK would revert to the Vatican and the Pope.
Quakers and Protestant evangelicals are not part of an established church like the Church of England and Roman Catholic Church are. In Iran where Muslims are a majority clerics are also represented in the legislature. No reason we cannot have a few other religious leaders in the Lords as we have Rabbis already but the Bishops must remain there
Oh, why don't we beign back the humoral theory of illness and villeinage and so on, if doing something in mediaeval times is a reason to do it now? But I forgot, you want to bring back the squire and yokel model of society. Any recommendations about chicken soup for the Black Death?
As for the 21st century: just delete the establishment of one sect. No established sect, no worry about the Pope muscling in. Actually, the Pope taking over the 'main established church', that's the craziest justification I have ever seen for bishops' bums in the HoL. One would need to be living in the 16th or 17th century to take it seriously.
PS You were always totally unwilling to accept that the C of E is a Catholic church. But now you do?!
Greetings from Tallinn. The weather continues cold, hovering just below freezing and with wet snow forecast. Its warmer in Kyiv, but much wetter. Spring is slowly coming, but it is still bitter out and gloves and hat are a must.
The atmosphere in the Baltic has changed.
The local defence league militia is still accepting volunteers and cyber war continues to be waged as Russian hackers battle to inflict as much damage as they can. However, the counter attacks by people like Anon have ripped open targets across Russian cyberspace and whatever defences the Russians once had now seem to be fully compromised. Petabytes of Russian data are being released.
The Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian armed forces are now able to put tens of thousands of troops into the field and the steady arrival of troops and equipment from other NATO states now means that the Baltic would be a pretty tough nut for the Russians to crack, particularly if the latest news from Kyiv is anything like accurate.
A friend of mine who was involved in the fighting north west of Kyiv tells me that the battle was more devastating than any he had ever been involved with, and he has seen his fair share of war. He described the battle as hellish and almost pitied the Russians. This is not a withdrawal, it is a devastating defeat. It is a very moot point as to whether the Russian forces will be able to regroup to press a further attack on the Donbas. Even if they do, the morale and equipment losses amongst the Russian forces will make any recovery a slow and difficult one, We expect the war to continue for some time.
Meanwhile, although the Baltic now feels reasonably secure, there is cold fury as to the conduct of the Russian army in the field. It has redoubled support for Ukraine, with craftswomen, for example, today making camouflage nets outside the Russian embassy to send to the Ukrainian army. As much kit as can be spared is being sent to Ukraine. Russian speakers have cancelled the May 9th event in Tallinn, and there is shock and horror at the news of the atrocities in Mariupol and Bucha. There are fears that Putinists could create trouble with arriving Ukrainians, especially as the flow is now coming from Russia itself where refugees who escaped to Russia are now crossing into Estonia to try to return to the Ukrainian government side of the lines.
Obviously there is considerable satisfaction about this defeat, but no sense that the crisis is easing in any way. Of course the Russian regime has now arrested senior figures in the army, FSB and Rasgvardia as Putin seeks to blame everyone but himself. Here in Tallinn the hatred and contempt for Putin is universal. there is deep gratitiude to Ukraine and a painful awarness that had the plan been different that it could have been Tallinn or Riga rather than Mariupol or Kyiv facing this barbarity. There is total determination to defy the tyrant and defend the freedom and independence of Estonia and Europe.
There were many who last week criticised Biden for calling Putin a war criminal. I wonder how many of them would still hold to that criticism now they have seen what the Russians have been doing in Ukraine?
The idea that someone could look at Russia right now and say "hmm, maybe what's needed is a dictator" boggles me. It's the stupidest thing I've read on here (and I was here for when HYUFD claimed that you couldn't get from London to Cambridge without entering Essex).
The M11, the main road route from London to Cambridge, goes through Essex
The A10 does not.
So you can choose to go into Essex or not. Literally nobody thinks you can't possibly go through Essex, and only one person, you, thinks you HAVE to.
When Samuel Pepys went from London to Cambridge, a favorite journey for him, he almost always went one of the Hertfordshire routes, which had a number of alternatives. Curiously he never chose the M11, though on one occasions he diverted to Audley End, near Saffron Walden in Essex. And IIRC once via Epping Forest.
He actually stayed in Epping on one such journey, as he notes in his diaries
That must have been a full page!
It was there that he was famously castigated for not being a Tory which sunk him into depression leading to him burying his Parmesan to protect it having been given warnings of war with Scotland.
The idea that someone could look at Russia right now and say "hmm, maybe what's needed is a dictator" boggles me. It's the stupidest thing I've read on here (and I was here for when HYUFD claimed that you couldn't get from London to Cambridge without entering Essex).
The M11, the main road route from London to Cambridge, goes through Essex
The A10 does not.
So you can choose to go into Essex or not. Literally nobody thinks you can't possibly go through Essex, and only one person, you, thinks you HAVE to.
When Samuel Pepys went from London to Cambridge, a favorite journey for him, he almost always went one of the Hertfordshire routes, which had a number of alternatives. Curiously he never chose the M11, though on one occasions he diverted to Audley End, near Saffron Walden in Essex. And IIRC once via Epping Forest.
He actually stayed in Epping on one such journey, as he notes in his diaries
That must have been a full page!
It was there that he was famously castigated for not being a Tory which sunk him into depression leading to him burying his Parmesan to protect it having been given warnings of war with Scotland.
Comments
If Star Streak and their like have major success against AirPower and ships are very vulnerable (and we know that tanks are looking near obsolete thanks to NLAW and co now) then it potentially changes all war in favour of defenders for a while at least.
I think most if not all people would rather go back missing a leg that in a body bag, so wishing that the enemy is wended instead of killed is hardly a show if pore Morality.
Please don't take this the wrong way, but we have had a few Putin trolls on here, so do you mind me asking in your own words can you describe Putin?
Best left well alone....
One is something creepy, inhuman and pure stone that haunts all our nightmares.
The other is a very interesting antique statue.
Inside 📍
- excerpt from the internal report in the Russian Federation on the morning of April 2:
"Irretrievable ☠️ military-operational losses of manpower of personnel
Armed Forces of the Russian Federation - 17,549 people.
PMC - 5,366 people.
The total loss of manpower of the personnel of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation and Russian PMCs is 22,915 people"
https://twitter.com/avakovarsen/status/1510185195756007425?s=21&t=lTNLXSqEvJ2lbnr0wHFkfQ
Of course, it is hard to tell what is real and what is propaganda.
Why should that be an issue if he is a "brilliant man"?
Laura K has just had the job. Is it to become a female fiefdom?
The fact such a plum role is short of applicants rather sadly tells its own story. Did the BBC initially insist on an all woman shortlist?
It's the sort of appeasement that we've done with his regime time after time, from Georgia through Syria and Crimea to Salisbury. And each time he gets harder to deal with.
worth noting that apart form the PMC there are also 2 allied army's of the 2 breakaway regens in the Donbass, who hade 14,000 and 20,000 personnel as the start, and seem to have lost a lot, as they have now increased to conscription age to 60. possible that they are incorporated in to the PMC total, but I expect not.
My wife is enormously grateful as it provides her with so much peace as I am otherwise engaged, and she said the other day it was a shame I had not discovered it before 2014
And to all posters across the political divide I am grateful for the interaction even if sometimes it is a bit feisty but there is a common theme of how kind we are to each other when one of us encounters difficult or serious issues..
Here's to 100,000
Anyway, I am willing to come and design and plant a child and washing-line friendly garden for you, which will provide plenty for you to look at, as you sit there. And your young man.
You're near Cambridge, no - so you can have a Beth Chatto style garden - ones with plenty of ground cover plants, that don't mind being trampled on, and that don't need watering. I love the style and I've adapted it for the green roof on top of my bin and wood store.
I find that very scary and undemocratic.
Visegrád 24
@visegrad24
Europe has a big problem.
There is a fifth column among us in Germany.
Nearly 2.5 million Russian-Germans returned to Germany after the fall of the USSR in 1991.
Today, they gathered in Berlin to wave Russian, Soviet Union and “Z symbol”- flags.
From a commenter who is not even at 10% of your total, can I say I do like reading your thoughts/posts
f that for a load of soldiers. I'd do it myself, but there are two manholes on the patio, and they'd be a job to cut out with an angle grinder.
As for 'rushing, rarely stopping'; that's what I mean. I walked 6,200 miles around the coast in a little under a year. You just don't get to see as much as those who so it in sections, or don't average 18 miles a day. Someone like Ruth Livingstone has a much better idea:
https://coastalwalker.co.uk/author/ruthl/
Before the little 'un came along I'd go back and do sections, savouring it more. A much better way of doing it, but less challenging.
At least two Russian soldiers died and nearly three dozen were taken to intensive care after eating poisoned pastries offered by Ukrainian villagers, Ukraine’s intelligence said on Sunday.
Residents of a village near the town of Izyum reportedly "treated" the troops of Russia's 3rd Motor Rifle infantry division to the traditional "pirozhki", which resemble a Cornish pastry, laced with an unknown poison.
In any case Welby told Kyrill of his ‘grave concerns’ over the Russian action only last month. Compare that to the leaders of China, South Africa, Syria, Pakistan, India etc none of whom have expressed any concern or criticism over Putin’s action
🌳CON: 38% (-8)🌹LAB: 36% (+7)
Areas surveyed: Cornwall, Cumbria, North Yorkshire, Norfolk and Gwynedd.
via,@Survation• changes w/GE.2019
This is very promising.
RIP Tories
Incidentally, my parents live near Derby. My house, just eight miles from Cambridge, is at a higher altitude than the centre of Derby (203 foot cf 187 foot). People are surprised by that.
What goes around comes around.
The mutilations are way too disturbing.
Is this an army out of control, or have they been guided to atrocities so as to provoke the west? Ditto the rape-murders reported yesterday
This is not the Red Army wreaking understandable (if terrible) revenge on Hitler’s Germany
I am haunted by this passage in a CNN article yesterday
"I have been trying to make sense of this for a month, because as terrible as Putin is, you could never say he was illogical," says Peter T. DeSimone, an associate professor of Russian and Eastern European history at Utica University in New York.
"All of this is illogical, and that's the scary thing," he says. "This is not normal for what he's done in the past. This is something that makes no sense on many levels, and not just in regard to World War II."
https://www.cnn.com/2022/04/02/world/putin-invasion-mistakes-hitler-blake-cec/index.html
It feels like Russia, under its leader, has entered some kind of psychosis. Akin to Hitlerism
The Gog Magogs are also where I introduced Mrs J to the undoubted joys of trig pillars...
Most of them have done parish ministry at some time as well, rooted in the problems of local communities. They are educated and experienced and the type of people we need in the Lords, certainly not more ex politicians and wealthy party donors who increasingly make up the rest of the Lords now
😉
And they shipped us back home to Australia
The legless, the armless, the blind and insane
Those proud wounded heroes of Suvla
And as our ship pulled into Circular Quay
I looked at the place where me legs used to be
And thank Christ there was no-one there waiting for me
To grieve and to mourn and to pity
And the band played Waltzing Matilda
As they carried us down the gangway
But nobody cheered, they just stood and stared
And they turned all their faces away
Bleating about what C of E priests have or have not done doesn't negate the point that other priests, and ministers, Quaker meeting secretaries, imams, etc., also deal with such matters. So the C of E is not specially privileged in that sense.
Edit: And we need fewer, not more, Oxbridge graduates in Parliament, in both houses.
I did know about the large number of ethnic Russians that had lived in the USSR who came back to Germany, some are the descendants of Amish and Mennonite to came to Russia in the time of 'Catherin the Great' who wished to bring what where at the time 'modern farming methods to Russia, and was willing to offer them exemption form military conscription, which as passivists the Mennonites wanted.
but are the pro-Russia protesters just neo-communist and alt-Right pro Putin idiots? or the same people that ones lived in Russia?
https://vtr.valasztas.hu/ogy2022/orszagos-listak?tab=parties
Quakers and Protestant evangelicals are not part of an established church like the Church of England and Roman Catholic Church are. In Iran where Muslims are a majority clerics are also represented in the legislature. No reason we cannot have a few other religious leaders in the Lords as we have Rabbis already but the Bishops must remain there
Chris Mason 9/4
Anushka Asthana 5/2
Sophy Ridge 11/4
Alex Forsyth 7/2
Sam Coates 9/2
Paul Brand 11/2
Faisal Islam 8/1
Adam Fleming 9/1
Lewis Goodall 10/1
James Landale 12/1
Pippa Crerar 12/1
Ros Atkins 16/1
Beth Rigby 20/1
Emma Vardy 20/1
Nick Watt 20/1
Nick Eardley 33/1
Jonathan Blake 40/1
Ione Wells 50/1
Gary Gibbon 66/1
Others Upon Request
Very very sad, but we might be at that point again.
I always liked Country Joe and the Fish’s Feel Like I’m Fixing To Die
Well, come on all of you, big strong men
Uncle Sam needs your help again
He's got himself in a terrible jam
Way down yonder in Vietnam
So put down your books and pick up a gun
We're gonna have a whole lotta fun
And it's one, two, three
What are we fighting for?
Don't ask me, I don't give a damn
Next stop is Vietnam;
And it's five, six, seven
Open up the pearly gates
Well there ain't no time to wonder why
Whoopee! we're all gonna die
Well, come on generals, let's move fast;
Your big chance has come at last
Now you can go out and get those reds
'Cause the only good commie is the one that's dead
And you know that peace can only be won
When we've blown 'em all to kingdom come
Come on Wall Street, don't be slow
Why man, this is war au-go-go
There's plenty good money to be made
By supplying the Army with the tools of its trade
But just hope and pray that if they drop the bomb
They drop it on the Viet Cong
Come on mothers throughout the land
Pack your boys off to Vietnam
Come on fathers, and don't hesitate
To send your sons off before it's too late
And you can be the first ones in your block
To have your boy come home in a box
A good anti-war popular song is a deeply powerful thing
But as I already said. There is perhaps a valid argument for the persuasion argument even if I personally think it is pointless.
Support for Putin's incarceration - now that's a thing.
The atmosphere in the Baltic has changed.
The local defence league militia is still accepting volunteers and cyber war continues to be waged as Russian hackers battle to inflict as much damage as they can. However, the counter attacks by people like Anon have ripped open targets across Russian cyberspace and whatever defences the Russians once had now seem to be fully compromised. Petabytes of Russian data are being released.
The Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian armed forces are now able to put tens of thousands of troops into the field and the steady arrival of troops and equipment from other NATO states now means that the Baltic would be a pretty tough nut for the Russians to crack, particularly if the latest news from Kyiv is anything like accurate.
A friend of mine who was involved in the fighting north west of Kyiv tells me that the battle was more devastating than any he had ever been involved with, and he has seen his fair share of war. He described the battle as hellish and almost pitied the Russians. This is not a withdrawal, it is a devastating defeat. It is a very moot point as to whether the Russian forces will be able to regroup to press a further attack on the Donbas. Even if they do, the morale and equipment losses amongst the Russian forces will make any recovery a slow and difficult one, We expect the war to continue for some time.
Meanwhile, although the Baltic now feels reasonably secure, there is cold fury as to the conduct of the Russian army in the field. It has redoubled support for Ukraine, with craftswomen, for example, today making camouflage nets outside the Russian embassy to send to the Ukrainian army. As much kit as can be spared is being sent to Ukraine. Russian speakers have cancelled the May 9th event in Tallinn, and there is shock and horror at the news of the atrocities in Mariupol and Bucha. There are fears that Putinists could create trouble with arriving Ukrainians, especially as the flow is now coming from Russia itself where refugees who escaped to Russia are now crossing into Estonia to try to return to the Ukrainian government side of the lines.
Obviously there is considerable satisfaction about this defeat, but no sense that the crisis is easing in any way. Of course the Russian regime has now arrested senior figures in the army, FSB and Rasgvardia as Putin seeks to blame everyone but himself. Here in Tallinn the hatred and contempt for Putin is universal. there is deep gratitiude to Ukraine and a painful awarness that had the plan been different that it could have been Tallinn or Riga rather than Mariupol or Kyiv facing this barbarity. There is total determination to defy the tyrant and defend the freedom and independence of Estonia and Europe.
is this because each of the party's who make up the main opposition are standing against each other in the constituency's? but a common list in the national PR section?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volga_German_Autonomous_Soviet_Socialist_Republic
As for the 21st century: just delete the establishment of one sect. No established sect, no worry about the Pope muscling in. Actually, the Pope taking over the 'main established church', that's the craziest justification I have ever seen for bishops' bums in the HoL. One would need to be living in the 16th or 17th century to take it seriously.
PS You were always totally unwilling to accept that the C of E is a Catholic church. But now you do?!