Where is the Taliban's money? Just follow the trail and at every stage close all permits and licenses. Of course that's a very obvious thing to do, but the question then becomes why it hasn't been done? And the answer will be that it's all a bit opaque in the Arab world. The lovely thing about the Arab world is that the people with money are the worlds worst cowards. Ask the damn question!
I have not posted much recently, partly because I have been busy but also I find the constant brexit, indyref2 , and AI discussions fairly tedious with so many entrenched views
Politically I like Sunak, and he is the only conservative who can mitigate 2024 but frankly I have become very disillusioned with all politicians and while Starmer and labour may well win in 24 I do not expect much to change as no-one seems to have the inspiration, desire and charisma to take the country forward like a Thatcher or Blair
However, it is Christmas eve and I just want to say a happy Christmas to each and every poster on PB, no matter how much we may disagree in politics, as this is the time for ' goodwill to all ' and let us hope that 2023 will see a better outlook for everyone as we do need to overcome the negativity and gloom that seems to invade all our lives every day
Happy Christmas, BigG!
And to all you good PB’ers.
Happy Christmas all.
I’m at peak Christmas around now on the evening of the 24th. Final visit to the outside world (in this case Brockley market then Greenwich by the river), some quiet food prep in the kitchen boiling bones and making stuffing, a many layered biscuity cake courtesy of Yulia our Ukrainian lodger, then Carols from kings with the fire burning in the sitting room.
And this year they did the Vaughan Williams Christmas fantasia the first half of which is the most Christmassy piece of music ever written, evoking as it does a cold night wind blowing over bare hillsides in a sort of chimera of Bethlehem and the Golden Valley (as do many of the best: A spotless rose, Bethlehem down, in the bleak midwinter).
Now time for a bedtime story of the night before Christmas for the youngest so she hopefully falls asleep before the stockings get filled.
I was told the following by someone who works as airline staff.
At Heathrow, there have been repeated problems with border staff sabotaging the automated passport check machines - just enough to make them break down x percent of the time.
I remember at the height of post 9/11 paranoia some friends flying to the US. Border guard dude at the airport was trying to do some sort of facial/iris scan of them - but the USB camera wouldn't connect. After about 40 minutes he gave up and just said "You're clear!" and that was that.
Penny Mordaunt has written quite an interesting piece on Con Home about dystopian Britain we would now be experiencing had the country voted for Ed Miliband in 2015.
It’s actually quite good, although it makes a number of claims which seem suspect (has crime really halved under the Tories?).
That’s actually quite sad, looking around at the desperate state of our country and seeing her trying to argue that, had we not got to enjoy the Tories’ apparently wise and inspirational leadership, things would now be even worse.
Insofar as she’s saying anything, it is that if she were now PM the government might have had rather more drive and purpose than it is demonstrating currently.
This is perhaps the strangest lead-up to Christmas that yours truly can recall, weather-wise anyway.
Especially here in Seattle. Where today's unrelenting cold rain on Christmas Eve, with temperatures in 40sF in the city and most of rest of Western Washington lowlands, is being greeted as a HUGE improvement over yesterday.
Because Friday was the worst ice storm in living memory, caused by freezing rain falling on sub-freezing ground and snow cover. Glazed everything with ice. Sensible folk (such as myself) stayed indoors. Only time I went out, was to spread salt and chip ice from my porch and walkway, which was challenging - and hazardous - enough for a chicken like me.
During the day on Friday the temperature slowly but steadily rose. Consequently the ice started melting, but took it's sweet time about it - actually a GOOD thing with respect to possible stream AND street flooding. Overnight thawing process was aided by steady rain.
Which has kept up through Saturday morning. So much that I've gotten close-to-soaked twice, going out for my morning coffee (which I had to skip yesterday) and just now to the grocery store. Which unsurprisingly was heaving with customers. With zero a cough drop to buy!
You had it easy. I see that the town of Hell, Michigan, has frozen over.
I have not posted much recently, partly because I have been busy but also I find the constant brexit, indyref2 , and AI discussions fairly tedious with so many entrenched views
Politically I like Sunak, and he is the only conservative who can mitigate 2024 but frankly I have become very disillusioned with all politicians and while Starmer and labour may well win in 24 I do not expect much to change as no-one seems to have the inspiration, desire and charisma to take the country forward like a Thatcher or Blair
However, it is Christmas eve and I just want to say a happy Christmas to each and every poster on PB, no matter how much we may disagree in politics, as this is the time for ' goodwill to all ' and let us hope that 2023 will see a better outlook for everyone as we do need to overcome the negativity and gloom that seems to invade all our lives every day
Have a happy christmas! And - at worst - I hope 2023 turns out to be really, really boring!
A nice, quiet Christmas, that's what I want. A nice, quiet Christmas, no unusualincidents or people turning up, that would suit me. A nice, quiet, normal, everyday Christmas.
I have not posted much recently, partly because I have been busy but also I find the constant brexit, indyref2 , and AI discussions fairly tedious with so many entrenched views
Politically I like Sunak, and he is the only conservative who can mitigate 2024 but frankly I have become very disillusioned with all politicians and while Starmer and labour may well win in 24 I do not expect much to change as no-one seems to have the inspiration, desire and charisma to take the country forward like a Thatcher or Blair
However, it is Christmas eve and I just want to say a happy Christmas to each and every poster on PB, no matter how much we may disagree in politics, as this is the time for ' goodwill to all ' and let us hope that 2023 will see a better outlook for everyone as we do need to overcome the negativity and gloom that seems to invade all our lives every day
Have a happy christmas! And - at worst - I hope 2023 turns out to be really, really boring!
A nice, quiet Christmas, that's what I want. A nice, quiet Christmas, no unusualincidents or people turning up, that would suit me. A nice, quiet, normal, everyday Christmas.
Penny Mordaunt has written quite an interesting piece on Con Home about dystopian Britain we would now be experiencing had the country voted for Ed Miliband in 2015.
It’s actually quite good, although it makes a number of claims which seem suspect (has crime really halved under the Tories?).
That’s actually quite sad, looking around at the desperate state of our country and seeing her trying to argue that, had we not got to enjoy the Tories’ apparently wise and inspirational leadership, things would now be even worse.
Insofar as she’s saying anything, it is that if she were now PM the government might have had rather more drive and purpose than it is demonstrating currently.
Penny Mordaunt has written quite an interesting piece on Con Home about dystopian Britain we would now be experiencing had the country voted for Ed Miliband in 2015.
It’s actually quite good, although it makes a number of claims which seem suspect (has crime really halved under the Tories?).
That’s actually quite sad, looking around at the desperate state of our country and seeing her trying to argue that, had we not got to enjoy the Tories’ apparently wise and inspirational leadership, things would now be even worse.
Insofar as she’s saying anything, it is that if she were now PM the government might have had rather more drive and purpose than it is demonstrating currently.
Looking at Mr D’s post. It would suggest something like 1945. In England and Wales anyway.
If only the LibDems could get their act together, and perchance, a new leader!
I’m starting to think that Labour don’t need Scotland, because they’re heading for a 45-/97-style landslide in England and Wales. Keir Starmer has clearly already reached that conclusion, otherwise he wouldn’t be so assiduously sticking the vickies up to the Jocks.
The Lib Dems are a complete mystery to me, both north and south of the border. If Mark Senior was around he’d be expertly sticking the boot in to the Tories, the Labourites and the SNP. Where is the Mark de nos jours?!? C’mon sandal-wearing Dr Who aficionados of the world: show us yer six-packs and testosterone. We could do with a laugh.
Agreed; as an ex Liberal and sometime LibDem activist, I am saddened to see the complete lack of activity locally; this seat might not be hopeful, but Colchester is next door, which was a LibDem seat in 97.
They’ve lost their mojo.
Scottish Liberals and Lib Dems used to have real spunk and natural authority. David Steel, Menzies Campbell, Charlie Kennedy, Malcolm Bruce, Jim Wallace, Jo Grimond. These men were giants astride the Scottish political landscape. Veterans of the long, long fight for Scottish self governance. Respected and feared by opponents (well, maybe not Malcolm Bruce).
Nowadays the standard is absolutely shocking. Let’s not name names: no need to humiliate the timrous beasties.
Johnson going and Starmer looking like the next PM in waiting has taken a lot of the wind out of the 'loud' LD activists. Still plenty of activity going on in the local level where there are existing toeholds but that won't be visible at the national level, and from Sweden you won't hear a thing.
Please enlighten us: where is all this “plenty of activity going on in the local level”? Specifics please, not generalities.
Here in Barnes, delivering LibDem leaflets on the coldest day of the year.
Last May three LibDem councillors replaced the Tories who had been in place here for 20 years. Richmond Council has 48 LibDem councillors and one Tory (who is 92 years old) matching the demographic.
Average house price over £1 million, overwhelmingly graduates and diehard Remainers you mean?
There are a lot of us in Richmond, Twickenham, Kingston, Wimbledon, Esher, Carshalton, Winchester ...
And Bath and North Oxford and West Edinburgh and Chesham and Amersham.
Almost all LD seats or top target seats are very wealthy, very expensive and filled with graduates.
By contrast under Charles Kennedy the LDs won most seats in Cornwall and seats like Burnley and Colchester and the LDs had five times the MPs they do now.
Instead the LDs are now the poshest party not the Tories
And supporting the Conservatives if you are under age 50 is weird.
The Conservatives won 39 to 50 year olds in 2019
You’re big on past performance being an indicator of future performance aren’t you? By 2024 roughly half of those people will be over 50. And your sales pitch is hardly “youth” (by which I mean the under 50s, absurdly) friendly.
No they won't, 5/11 of them only will be. Less than half.
Plus the median voter now is about 50 anyway, so the Conservatives could lose every age up to 50 and still narrowly win at least most seats
5/11 is by anyone's definition 'roughly half '. That is what roughly means, not exact but close to.
Ask him where the 39-50 age sector is reported. Does he actually mean by any chance the 40-49 age group reported by YouGov as breaking for the Tories?
A day off, so I will raise a glass to His Majesty.
Indeed I have reprised the Jubilee trifle for pudding tommorow. Better than Christmas pud.
Enjoy your day off and your trifle. I don’t believe I’ve eaten trifle in well over 3 decades. I don’t miss it. Nor do I miss Christmas pudding, although I did actually eat a wee one yesterday, but only because my wife wanted it out of the way.
A day off, so I will raise a glass to His Majesty.
Indeed I have reprised the Jubilee trifle for pudding tommorow. Better than Christmas pud.
Enjoy your day off and your trifle. I don’t believe I’ve eaten trifle in well over 3 decades. I don’t miss it. Nor do I miss Christmas pudding, although I did actually eat a wee one yesterday, but only because my wife wanted it out of the way.
I meant a day off for the Coronation. Should be fun.
I am off over Christmas so will raise a glass tommorow too. The Jubilee Trifle is rather good, though I did a cheats version. Life is too short to bake your own Amaretti biscuits.
Merry Christmas one and all. Time for the festive truce.
If we all agreed on everything, this site would be a boring place, so thanks for the diversity of opinions and also the expertise on just about any topic you can think of. And a special shout out to those who have written headers over the past year. I do read (nearly!) all of them.
A day off, so I will raise a glass to His Majesty.
Indeed I have reprised the Jubilee trifle for pudding tommorow. Better than Christmas pud.
Enjoy your day off and your trifle. I don’t believe I’ve eaten trifle in well over 3 decades. I don’t miss it. Nor do I miss Christmas pudding, although I did actually eat a wee one yesterday, but only because my wife wanted it out of the way.
I meant a day off for the Coronation. Should be fun.
I am off over Christmas so will raise a glass tommorow too. The Jubilee Trifle is rather good, though I did a cheats version. Life is too short to bake your own Amaretti biscuits.
A cartoonist surprisingly isn't smart enough to know the difference between one-off and recurring costs.
Or indeed costs that don't exist at all. Northern Ireland tunnel? Really?
£900k spent on a study. :really:
It's a cartoon fffs, like Corbyn with his hat, and Steel in Owen's pocket, it's funny.
Political cartoonists also aspire to have messages though. Indeed, being funny is secondary to most of them, which is why they're often so bad. Yes, they can certainly be overanalysed, but if they are 'funny' in a way which does not actually ring true (say one which showed Starmer looking to implement the communist manifesto, since he is such a dangerous radical), the value as a political cartoon is diminished.
This one its a list of expensive things, some more significant or real than others, so it makes its point. People are overanalysing it, but overanalysing the overanalysis but pretending people are not supposed to get a 'true' message from a political cartoon (the 'it's just a cartoon' reaction) is itself an overreaction.
A day off, so I will raise a glass to His Majesty.
Indeed I have reprised the Jubilee trifle for pudding tommorow. Better than Christmas pud.
Enjoy your day off and your trifle. I don’t believe I’ve eaten trifle in well over 3 decades. I don’t miss it. Nor do I miss Christmas pudding, although I did actually eat a wee one yesterday, but only because my wife wanted it out of the way.
I meant a day off for the Coronation. Should be fun.
I am off over Christmas so will raise a glass tommorow too. The Jubilee Trifle is rather good, though I did a cheats version. Life is too short to bake your own Amaretti biscuits.
Have a wonderful Christmas everyone. Best wishes to you and your families. Apologies for any grumpiness on my part as the year has progressed. I am giving 2023 a chance to be great - even the political and economical situation, as a great man once said, 'may surprise on the upside'.
If (and it’s obviously a big if) Iran does finally ditch the Ayatollahs right next door to Afghanistan I wonder what impact that may have. Because of all the countries on the other side that are primed fully to embrace the West after a revolution Iran must be up there at the top along with Belarus.
Everyone’s online these days, even in the Hindu Kush, so surely what’s going on there will have some influence.
Merry Christmas one and all. Time for the festive truce.
If we all agreed on everything, this site would be a boring place, so thanks for the diversity of opinions and also the expertise on just about any topic you can think of. And a special shout out to those who have written headers over the past year. I do read (nearly!) all of them.
The football match starts in No Man's Land at 10.00 am.
Looking at Mr D’s post. It would suggest something like 1945. In England and Wales anyway.
If only the LibDems could get their act together, and perchance, a new leader!
I’m starting to think that Labour don’t need Scotland, because they’re heading for a 45-/97-style landslide in England and Wales. Keir Starmer has clearly already reached that conclusion, otherwise he wouldn’t be so assiduously sticking the vickies up to the Jocks.
The Lib Dems are a complete mystery to me, both north and south of the border. If Mark Senior was around he’d be expertly sticking the boot in to the Tories, the Labourites and the SNP. Where is the Mark de nos jours?!? C’mon sandal-wearing Dr Who aficionados of the world: show us yer six-packs and testosterone. We could do with a laugh.
Agreed; as an ex Liberal and sometime LibDem activist, I am saddened to see the complete lack of activity locally; this seat might not be hopeful, but Colchester is next door, which was a LibDem seat in 97.
They’ve lost their mojo.
Scottish Liberals and Lib Dems used to have real spunk and natural authority. David Steel, Menzies Campbell, Charlie Kennedy, Malcolm Bruce, Jim Wallace, Jo Grimond. These men were giants astride the Scottish political landscape. Veterans of the long, long fight for Scottish self governance. Respected and feared by opponents (well, maybe not Malcolm Bruce).
Nowadays the standard is absolutely shocking. Let’s not name names: no need to humiliate the timrous beasties.
Johnson going and Starmer looking like the next PM in waiting has taken a lot of the wind out of the 'loud' LD activists. Still plenty of activity going on in the local level where there are existing toeholds but that won't be visible at the national level, and from Sweden you won't hear a thing.
Please enlighten us: where is all this “plenty of activity going on in the local level”? Specifics please, not generalities.
Here in Barnes, delivering LibDem leaflets on the coldest day of the year.
Last May three LibDem councillors replaced the Tories who had been in place here for 20 years. Richmond Council has 48 LibDem councillors and one Tory (who is 92 years old) matching the demographic.
Average house price over £1 million, overwhelmingly graduates and diehard Remainers you mean?
There are a lot of us in Richmond, Twickenham, Kingston, Wimbledon, Esher, Carshalton, Winchester ...
And Bath and North Oxford and West Edinburgh and Chesham and Amersham.
Almost all LD seats or top target seats are very wealthy, very expensive and filled with graduates.
By contrast under Charles Kennedy the LDs won most seats in Cornwall and seats like Burnley and Colchester and the LDs had five times the MPs they do now.
Instead the LDs are now the poshest party not the Tories
And supporting the Conservatives if you are under age 50 is weird.
The Conservatives won 39 to 50 year olds in 2019
You’re big on past performance being an indicator of future performance aren’t you? By 2024 roughly half of those people will be over 50. And your sales pitch is hardly “youth” (by which I mean the under 50s, absurdly) friendly.
No they won't, 5/11 of them only will be. Less than half.
Plus the median voter now is about 50 anyway, so the Conservatives could lose every age up to 50 and still narrowly win at least most seats
5/11 is by anyone's definition 'roughly half '. That is what roughly means, not exact but close to.
Ask him where the 39-50 age sector is reported. Does he actually mean by any chance the 40-49 age group reported by YouGov as breaking for the Tories?
We have actually played - 7 of us, from three generations - a board game tonight. I thought this was an unachievable Christmas cliche. But now my youngest is 8, it worked. Joy. The rain cleared to leave a dramatically clear sky in time to leave reindeer food out and look for promising movements in the sky. Daughters all asleep together ij matching pyjamas in middle daughter's room - because that's what they do every year - and a sneaky peak before I go to bed at the hearth reveals that stockings are full and the glass of whisky is empty. Happy Christmas pb.com.
I know there has been a technical glitch in receiving this year’s political crossword so I have just sent again as an email attachment. Please could one of the team confirm safe receipt. Thanks. St John
Comments
I’m at peak Christmas around now on the evening of the 24th. Final visit to the outside world (in this case Brockley market then Greenwich by the river), some quiet food prep in the kitchen boiling bones and making stuffing, a many layered biscuity cake courtesy of Yulia our Ukrainian lodger, then Carols from kings with the fire burning in the sitting room.
And this year they did the Vaughan Williams Christmas fantasia the first half of which is the most Christmassy piece of music ever written, evoking as it does a cold night wind blowing over bare hillsides in a sort of chimera of Bethlehem and the Golden Valley (as do many of the best: A spotless rose, Bethlehem down, in the bleak midwinter).
Now time for a bedtime story of the night before Christmas for the youngest so she hopefully falls asleep before the stockings get filled.
Cheap theatre at it's best.
https://www.instagram.com/p/CmjE5hpL78_/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=
Insofar as she’s saying anything, it is that if she were now PM the government might have had rather more drive and purpose than it is demonstrating currently.
A nice, quiet Christmas, no unusualincidents or people turning up, that would suit me.
A nice, quiet, normal, everyday Christmas.
Time to find Father Ted, methinks.
Have a good one, everyone.
https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politics/articles-reports/2019/12/17/how-britain-voted-2019-general-election
https://twitter.com/welshbollocks/status/1606624842190667776?s=46&t=nfx3wSk-nH05gdM_I1NK_A
Indeed I have reprised the Jubilee trifle for pudding tommorow. Better than Christmas pud.
Dear old Stockholm town
Well what's the matter with Stockholm
For it's goin' 'roon and 'roon…
Have a great plastic patriotic Christmas the noo.
Particular thoughts and wishes for @Jonathan and his father.
I am off over Christmas so will raise a glass tommorow too. The Jubilee Trifle is rather good, though I did a cheats version. Life is too short to bake your own Amaretti biscuits.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/lemon_swiss_roll_and_42467
If we all agreed on everything, this site would be a boring place, so thanks for the diversity of opinions and also the expertise on just about any topic you can think of. And a special shout out to those who have written headers over the past year. I do read (nearly!) all of them.
Imagine if he had said "And you are an unemployed down and out?" The howls of anger on here would have been deafening.
https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/12/behold-worlds-ugliest-presidential-jet.html?m=1
Happy Christmas everybody!
This one its a list of expensive things, some more significant or real than others, so it makes its point. People are overanalysing it, but overanalysing the overanalysis but pretending people are not supposed to get a 'true' message from a political cartoon (the 'it's just a cartoon' reaction) is itself an overreaction.
Never! Forget!
Just drove nearly five hours up to Edinburgh, so going to bed early.
Fearless girls out protesting today in Herat city and chanting — “Education is our human right.”
It’s worth knowing that these girls are putting their lives at risk by even stepping out of their house. But Afghanistan’s women won’t be silenced.
https://twitter.com/NasimiShabnam/status/1606622399524487170
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2022/12/21/hospital-evacuated-80-year-old-man-has-first-world-war-removed/
Happy Christmas everybody!
Many of our esteemed posters work in finance and not all on the shady bond trader part of the spectrum
Everyone’s online these days, even in the Hindu Kush, so surely what’s going on there will have some influence.
All welcome (except pineapple on pizza deniers).
Festive Greetings to all.
Labour in 2019 was 39!!!!
Even the Scottish motto is properly translated as “Whaur dare trifle with me?”
https://twitter.com/tomhfh/status/1606626428258291712?s=20&t=EPyKj_OvSSg-O93WFFgxcw
https://twitter.com/ElectionMapsUK/status/1606624770266734592?t=MS0EzJCyLv7YYOtm6v0V0g&s=19
The rain cleared to leave a dramatically clear sky in time to leave reindeer food out and look for promising movements in the sky.
Daughters all asleep together ij matching pyjamas in middle daughter's room - because that's what they do every year - and a sneaky peak before I go to bed at the hearth reveals that stockings are full and the glass of whisky is empty.
Happy Christmas pb.com.
We've had our share of tears
Oh, my friend
We've had our hopes and fears
Oh, my friends
It's been a long hard year
But now it's Christmas
Yes, it's Christmas
Thank God, it's Christmas
Merry Chistmas everyone!
It Blanche (and others) are around, the Spotify playlist, “You’re Not on the Christmas List”, compiled by Jim Irvin, is v v good.
I know there has been a technical glitch in receiving this year’s political crossword so I have just sent again as an email attachment. Please could one of the team confirm safe receipt. Thanks. St John