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Starmer’s flawed strategy? – politicalbetting.com

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  • LeonLeon Posts: 54,557
    viewcode said:

    Leon said:

    If you’re looking for a good budget holiday in the sun I think I’ve found it


    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/destinations/africa/egypt/adrere-amellal-hotel-egyptian-desert-mud-hut/

    Just £7,150 per person excluding flights. Go now before they raise prices

    "budget"

    Coral Compostela Golf, Playa de las Americas, Tenerife
    7 nights, Self Catering, £689 total price for two adults

    https://www.thomascook.com/holidays/canary-islands/tenerife/playa-de-las-americas/coral-compostela-golf-5308/
    OK budget-ish


    Still you have to admire the way the journalist snuck Hunter S Thomson into his opening line

    I wonder if ANY of his readers noticed. Probably not



  • Sunil_PrasannanSunil_Prasannan Posts: 51,531
    Leon said:

    Phil said:

    I’m kind of surprised Leon hasn’t jumped on the room temperature superconductor hype train yet. Did I miss it?

    My twitter feed is abuzz with analysis & speculation: It may yet turn out to be a damp squib, but hope springs eternal & this time around they’ve actually published the synthesis, so it will be replicated one way or another within the next week or two. Can’t wait!

    Bit busy with aliens, AI, the cricket and BEING IN UKRAINE

    TBH
    Lviv and let die.
  • StillWatersStillWaters Posts: 8,030

    Leon said:

    Just rejoice that something like this exists. Rejoice



    That spike thing on the breast plate looks like an accident waiting to happen.
    Why would you want to risk a dead enemy being stuck and encumbering you?

  • PeckPeck Posts: 517
    Leon said:

    If you’re looking for a good budget holiday in the sun I think I’ve found it

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/destinations/africa/egypt/adrere-amellal-hotel-egyptian-desert-mud-hut/

    Just £7,150 per person excluding flights. Go now before they raise prices

    That was the place where Alexander announced he was the reincarnation of Akhenaton.
    As well you know.
    An "elite" of nutters spread across many countries are very interested in that place. Some of them even work for the Knapper's.
  • Northern_AlNorthern_Al Posts: 8,302
    kinabalu said:

    At Northampton M1 services, which is every bit as good as I remember it. Nothing flashy but it absolutely does the job.

    You should have gone wherever you're going by train (or rail replacement bus, given it's a Sunday).
    Letting the side down.
  • Dura_AceDura_Ace Posts: 13,677
    edited July 2023
    Sandpit said:

    Dura_Ace said:

    Sandpit said:

    Scott_xP said:

    Meanwhile, in Conservatives only talking to themselves news, here's the Prime Minister's special happy face.

    Talking about freedom, sat in Margaret Thatcher’s old Rover.

    Earlier I spoke to @Telegraph about how important cars are for families to live their lives. It’s something anti-motorist Labour just don’t seem to get.

    And it’s why I’m reviewing anti-car schemes across the country.


    A campaign to appeal to car drivers fronted by a man who would rather take a helicopter.

    And doesn't know how petrol pumps work.

    Genius...
    The 'helicopter' jibes seem ridiculous to me. When Starmer's PM, he'll be taking helicopters as well. It makes sense for someone who has to run the country, and often has to be in different places quickly.

    And when Starmer does take helicopters, the Conservatives will throw jibes at him about it. It's all ridiculous.

    Being PM is not an ordinary job. And if going by helicopter allows them to do it quicker and better, then so be it.
    The row about the Chancellor of the Exchequer travelling First on a train, with his red box, was one of the funnier ones.

    He’s a bloody Cabinet minister, of course he’s not showing his work to random people who might sit next to him.

    That said, if I were Rishi Rich’s diary secretary, I’d be doing my best to avoid taking the helicopter. It reinforces negative stereotypes around him being too weathly to understand regular people.
    There is nothing to "avoid". There is nowhere that the little shit needs to go that is only accessible by helicopter.
    Some idiot booked him meetings 100 miles apart with an hour between them, and they didn’t have the option of using you as his driver.
    This has never happened and it is not the reason that the cashew dicked house elf's preferred mode of transport is a tax payer funded Bell 429.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,028
    Fishing said:

    Fishing said:

    HYUFD said:

    Leon said:

    Douglas Carswell has written about the superior economy of Mississippi over the UK




    I just checked the life expectancy stats. UK life expectancy is 81.8

    Mississippi life expectancy is - wait for it - no, wait - a rather eye-opening 71.9

    It is lower than Colombia, Bangladesh and SYRIA

    Average house price in Mississippi is only $162,000 but in the UK is £286,000

    https://www.fool.com/the-ascent/research/average-house-price-state/

    https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/inflationandpriceindices/bulletins/housepriceindex/april2023#:~:text=Average UK house prices increased,recent peak in September 2022.
    Also the houses are doubtless twice the size, so you get far more for your money.

    Our housing is the definition of masochistic self-help.
    ... self-harm - damn autocorrect...
    You need to whip it into shape.
  • PeckPeck Posts: 517
    edited July 2023
    Fishing said:

    HYUFD said:

    Leon said:

    Douglas Carswell has written about the superior economy of Mississippi over the UK




    I just checked the life expectancy stats. UK life expectancy is 81.8

    Mississippi life expectancy is - wait for it - no, wait - a rather eye-opening 71.9

    It is lower than Colombia, Bangladesh and SYRIA

    Average house price in Mississippi is only $162,000 but in the UK is £286,000

    https://www.fool.com/the-ascent/research/average-house-price-state/

    https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/inflationandpriceindices/bulletins/housepriceindex/april2023#:~:text=Average UK house prices increased,recent peak in September 2022.
    Also the houses are doubtless twice the size, so you get far more for your money.

    Our housing is the definition of masochistic self-help.
    It's to do with debt. It's mostly borrowed money that pushes property prices up, except at the very top of the market. First, banks here are given a lot of freedom to ply their dirty usurious trade. Second, they've softened minds so that it's a common "wisdom" in much of the population that it's sensible to get as big a loan as you can possibly get and let the moneylenders secure it against the house they allow you to live in. Somewhere like Sweden, your average youngsters borrowing money to buy a house only borrow about half of what they could. In Britain, the language is about banks "giving" mortgages. Anyone who displays a "WTF?!" attitude to that kind of language is very much a misfit in Britain.

    Of course it will all end in tears. How the fault lines will crack is unclear. Probably not unclear to about 10 people though.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 121,974
    '🟤 KENSINGTON: the constituency's former Labour MP Emma Dent-Coad - blocked by Labour last autumn from running again as their candidate - says she's thinking instead of standing in her old seat as an Independent. She's backed this crowd-funding appeal'
    https://twitter.com/tomorrowsmps/status/1685432915864301568?s=20
  • SandpitSandpit Posts: 54,169
    edited July 2023
    Peck said:

    Fishing said:

    HYUFD said:

    Leon said:

    Douglas Carswell has written about the superior economy of Mississippi over the UK




    I just checked the life expectancy stats. UK life expectancy is 81.8

    Mississippi life expectancy is - wait for it - no, wait - a rather eye-opening 71.9

    It is lower than Colombia, Bangladesh and SYRIA

    Average house price in Mississippi is only $162,000 but in the UK is £286,000

    https://www.fool.com/the-ascent/research/average-house-price-state/

    https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/inflationandpriceindices/bulletins/housepriceindex/april2023#:~:text=Average UK house prices increased,recent peak in September 2022.
    Also the houses are doubtless twice the size, so you get far more for your money.

    Our housing is the definition of masochistic self-help.
    It's to do with debt. It's mostly borrowed money that pushes property prices up, except at the very top of the market. First, banks here are given a lot of freedom to ply their dirty usurious trade. Second, they've softened minds so that it's a common "wisdom" in much of the population that it's sensible to get as big a loan as you can possibly can and let the moneylenders secure it against the house they allow you to live in.
    And a government that has grown addicted to stamp duty income, loses out substantially from prices falling.
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 42,598
    Dura_Ace said:

    Sandpit said:

    Scott_xP said:

    Meanwhile, in Conservatives only talking to themselves news, here's the Prime Minister's special happy face.

    Talking about freedom, sat in Margaret Thatcher’s old Rover.

    Earlier I spoke to @Telegraph about how important cars are for families to live their lives. It’s something anti-motorist Labour just don’t seem to get.

    And it’s why I’m reviewing anti-car schemes across the country.


    A campaign to appeal to car drivers fronted by a man who would rather take a helicopter.

    And doesn't know how petrol pumps work.

    Genius...
    The 'helicopter' jibes seem ridiculous to me. When Starmer's PM, he'll be taking helicopters as well. It makes sense for someone who has to run the country, and often has to be in different places quickly.

    And when Starmer does take helicopters, the Conservatives will throw jibes at him about it. It's all ridiculous.

    Being PM is not an ordinary job. And if going by helicopter allows them to do it quicker and better, then so be it.
    The row about the Chancellor of the Exchequer travelling First on a train, with his red box, was one of the funnier ones.

    He’s a bloody Cabinet minister, of course he’s not showing his work to random people who might sit next to him.

    That said, if I were Rishi Rich’s diary secretary, I’d be doing my best to avoid taking the helicopter. It reinforces negative stereotypes around him being too weathly to understand regular people.
    There is nothing to "avoid". There is nowhere that the little shit needs to go that is only accessible by helicopter.
    Rockall? Not many voters there, though.
  • TheuniondivvieTheuniondivvie Posts: 41,751
    Leon said:

    Tres said:

    Leon said:

    Douglas Carswell has written about the superior economy of Mississippi over the UK




    I just checked the life expectancy stats. UK life expectancy is 81.8

    Mississippi life expectancy is - wait for it - no, wait - a rather eye-opening 71.9

    It is lower than Colombia, Bangladesh and SYRIA

    Part of my wife's family are from Mississippi, a cousin of hers on that side just suffered a stillbirth - https://www.wlbt.com/2022/08/06/mississippi-moms-suffer-another-grim-statistic-nations-highest-rate-stillbirths/
    Mississippi is fucked in multiple ways. The problems in Jackson alone are astounding for any Brit. Horrendous murder rate. Basic utilities failing
    Still, Carswell and Brillo pimping for Mississippi must count as an absolute positive.



    https://twitter.com/afneil/status/1684980735264862222?s=61&t=LYVEHh2mqFy1oUJAdCfe-Q
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 27,993
    edited July 2023

    Anecdote alert.

    On Friday I went to the Game Fair at Ragley Hall. So on Thursday we stayed at Avoncote near Henley in Arden. My wife wanted an early evening visit to John Lewis, so we ventured into Solihull. A tail of two towns really. On the Touchwood shopping centre, where John Lewis is sited you could buy yourself high end Miele consumer electronics or a Polestar electric car from their own exclusive retail spaces. Old Solihull was a little bit tired. Not helped by House of Fraser closing, nonetheless one could smell the money. On the way back to the Hotel we stopped at the Boot in Lapworth, the car park was like the Geneva Motor show and the place was buzzing. All the little towns and villages around Henley looked like they were doing very, very well. I thought to myself, there is no way the Conservatives are going to lose the next GE.

    The game fair also oozed conspicuous consumption. If this is England, what's not to like? I had a table booked in Ross-on-Wye for the evening, so had a few hours to kill. We decided to stop at Evesham, which during my childhood was a day out by the river and an idyllic place. Not any more. There was real and obvious poverty, obesity and in broad daylight low level drug dealing from the passenger seat of an old Seat Leon. It wasn't much better in Upton upon Severn and Great Malvern. All solid Tory areas where decay is prevalent. If the Conservatives win this election which to my mind seems likely, with more of the same, they will surely lose the next.

    Obesity now being a sign of real and obvious poverty ?

    Some areas/demographics are improving and some areas/demographics are declining.

    One group which have been struggling for decades are the rural working class.

    Not only in this country either.
    Living here in Greggs fuelled Wales I would say yes obesity is a symbol of poverty. Not only financial hardship but knowledge poverty, which more than likely feeds the consumer's financial problems as well as their silhouettes.

  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 81,347
    Australia are going to walk this....series finishes 3-1....record books show a comfortable victory.
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 42,598
    Sandpit said:

    Peck said:

    Fishing said:

    HYUFD said:

    Leon said:

    Douglas Carswell has written about the superior economy of Mississippi over the UK




    I just checked the life expectancy stats. UK life expectancy is 81.8

    Mississippi life expectancy is - wait for it - no, wait - a rather eye-opening 71.9

    It is lower than Colombia, Bangladesh and SYRIA

    Average house price in Mississippi is only $162,000 but in the UK is £286,000

    https://www.fool.com/the-ascent/research/average-house-price-state/

    https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/inflationandpriceindices/bulletins/housepriceindex/april2023#:~:text=Average UK house prices increased,recent peak in September 2022.
    Also the houses are doubtless twice the size, so you get far more for your money.

    Our housing is the definition of masochistic self-help.
    It's to do with debt. It's mostly borrowed money that pushes property prices up, except at the very top of the market. First, banks here are given a lot of freedom to ply their dirty usurious trade. Second, they've softened minds so that it's a common "wisdom" in much of the population that it's sensible to get as big a loan as you can possibly can and let the moneylenders secure it against the house they allow you to live in.
    And a government that has grown addicted to stamp duty income, loses out substantially from prices falling.
    Also CGT from second homes/rentals.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,028

    Australia are going to walk this....series finishes 3-1....record books show a comfortable victory.

    10 wickets the way these two are batting.

    It's Lord's 1984 on acid.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 53,654
    Not for the first time the Cricwiz odds look out of synch. This is Australia's game to lose at the moment.
  • Dura_AceDura_Ace Posts: 13,677

    Leon said:

    Phil said:

    I’m kind of surprised Leon hasn’t jumped on the room temperature superconductor hype train yet. Did I miss it?

    My twitter feed is abuzz with analysis & speculation: It may yet turn out to be a damp squib, but hope springs eternal & this time around they’ve actually published the synthesis, so it will be replicated one way or another within the next week or two. Can’t wait!

    Bit busy with aliens, AI, the cricket and BEING IN UKRAINE

    TBH
    Lviv and let die.
    Octopissed.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,028
    HYUFD said:

    '🟤 KENSINGTON: the constituency's former Labour MP Emma Dent-Coad - blocked by Labour last autumn from running again as their candidate - says she's thinking instead of standing in her old seat as an Independent. She's backed this crowd-funding appeal'
    https://twitter.com/tomorrowsmps/status/1685432915864301568?s=20

    I would say the Tories should be celebrating, but given (a) she doesn't seem to have been very popular and (b) they will probably lose anyway I suppose it makes few odds.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 81,347
    edited July 2023

    Anecdote alert.

    On Friday I went to the Game Fair at Ragley Hall. So on Thursday we stayed at Avoncote near Henley in Arden. My wife wanted an early evening visit to John Lewis, so we ventured into Solihull. A tail of two towns really. On the Touchwood shopping centre, where John Lewis is sited you could buy yourself high end Miele consumer electronics or a Polestar electric car from their own exclusive retail spaces. Old Solihull was a little bit tired. Not helped by House of Fraser closing, nonetheless one could smell the money. On the way back to the Hotel we stopped at the Boot in Lapworth, the car park was like the Geneva Motor show and the place was buzzing. All the little towns and villages around Henley looked like they were doing very, very well. I thought to myself, there is no way the Conservatives are going to lose the next GE.

    The game fair also oozed conspicuous consumption. If this is England, what's not to like? I had a table booked in Ross-on-Wye for the evening, so had a few hours to kill. We decided to stop at Evesham, which during my childhood was a day out by the river and an idyllic place. Not any more. There was real and obvious poverty, obesity and in broad daylight low level drug dealing from the passenger seat of an old Seat Leon. It wasn't much better in Upton upon Severn and Great Malvern. All solid Tory areas where decay is prevalent. If the Conservatives win this election which to my mind seems likely, with more of the same, they will surely lose the next.

    Obesity now being a sign of real and obvious poverty ?

    Some areas/demographics are improving and some areas/demographics are declining.

    One group which have been struggling for decades are the rural working class.

    Not only in this country either.
    Living here in Greggs fuelled Wales I would say yes obesity is a symbol of poverty. Not only financial hardship but knowledge poverty, which more than likely feeds the financial problems as well as their silhouette.

    It is something that really strikes me (and definitely worse than 20-30 years ago) that when I go back to visit Stoke area, people aren't just a bit chubby, there is widespread obesity. And many of those that aren't, is because they are addicted to monkey dust, the ultimate weight loss drug (but with more side effects than semaglutide).
  • viewcodeviewcode Posts: 21,646
    Leon said:

    viewcode said:

    Leon said:

    If you’re looking for a good budget holiday in the sun I think I’ve found it


    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/destinations/africa/egypt/adrere-amellal-hotel-egyptian-desert-mud-hut/

    Just £7,150 per person excluding flights. Go now before they raise prices

    "budget"

    Coral Compostela Golf, Playa de las Americas, Tenerife
    7 nights, Self Catering, £689 total price for two adults

    https://www.thomascook.com/holidays/canary-islands/tenerife/playa-de-las-americas/coral-compostela-golf-5308/
    OK budget-ish


    Still you have to admire the way the journalist snuck Hunter S Thomson into his opening line

    I wonder if ANY of his readers noticed. Probably not



    "We were somewhere around Barstow on the edge of the desert when the drugs began to kick in" - Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

    I never read FaLILV nor "Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72": I doubt I would enjoy the former, but I think I've reached the age to enjoy the latter, as I've had a copy of "Generation of Swine" for more years that I care to remember. I dread to pick it up now, as it's so thumbed the pages are beginning to fall out.
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,028
    Dura_Ace said:

    Leon said:

    Phil said:

    I’m kind of surprised Leon hasn’t jumped on the room temperature superconductor hype train yet. Did I miss it?

    My twitter feed is abuzz with analysis & speculation: It may yet turn out to be a damp squib, but hope springs eternal & this time around they’ve actually published the synthesis, so it will be replicated one way or another within the next week or two. Can’t wait!

    Bit busy with aliens, AI, the cricket and BEING IN UKRAINE

    TBH
    Lviv and let die.
    Octopissed.
    Leon is more an International Man of Mystery.
  • PeckPeck Posts: 517
    edited July 2023
    Sandpit said:

    Scott_xP said:

    Meanwhile, in Conservatives only talking to themselves news, here's the Prime Minister's special happy face.

    Talking about freedom, sat in Margaret Thatcher’s old Rover.

    Earlier I spoke to @Telegraph about how important cars are for families to live their lives. It’s something anti-motorist Labour just don’t seem to get.

    And it’s why I’m reviewing anti-car schemes across the country.


    A campaign to appeal to car drivers fronted by a man who would rather take a helicopter.

    And doesn't know how petrol pumps work.

    Genius...
    The 'helicopter' jibes seem ridiculous to me. When Starmer's PM, he'll be taking helicopters as well. It makes sense for someone who has to run the country, and often has to be in different places quickly.

    And when Starmer does take helicopters, the Conservatives will throw jibes at him about it. It's all ridiculous.

    Being PM is not an ordinary job. And if going by helicopter allows them to do it quicker and better, then so be it.
    The row about the Chancellor of the Exchequer travelling First on a train, with his red box, was one of the funnier ones.

    He’s a bloody Cabinet minister, of course he’s not showing his work to random people who might sit next to him.

    That said, if I were Rishi Rich’s diary secretary, I’d be doing my best to avoid taking the helicopter. It reinforces negative stereotypes around him being too weathly to understand regular people.
    Is there something positive or neutral about being too rich to understand the people you're supposed to be representing?

    BTW "wealthy" is such a lower middle class word. You'll be calling him "affluent" next. What he is, is rich. What people who are rich call themselves is rich.

    What's funny is your response to the story which seems to boil down to of course he'd only let proper people have a chance at looking at his work, not those smelly plebs who travel second class.





  • TheuniondivvieTheuniondivvie Posts: 41,751

    Australia are going to walk this....series finishes 3-1....record books show a comfortable victory.

    You mean in that event England fans/commentators/players won’t be bleating to all & sundry about moral victories and ‘if only’ for eternity? First time for everything I suppose.
  • stodgestodge Posts: 13,779
    Afternoon all :)

    If Sunak wants to be the motorists' friend (rather than using them for his own political ends), he can first of all look to reduce car insurance. Mine has gone up 20% despite a year free of claims or anything else and it's something I'm hearing from colleagues. As the banks and utility companies have made obscene profits in recent times, I expectr we'll hear some heartening returns from the insurance companies.

    Gouging consumers (and pleading on about energy prices and Ukraine and so forth) while making huge profits isn't a good look for capitalism in the 21st century.

    There's much more to car ownership than LTNs and ULEZ - what about cutting fuel excise duty and road fund tax as well if you want to be seen as a true champion of the motorist?
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 27,993
    edited July 2023

    Meanwhile, in Conservatives only talking to themselves news, here's the Prime Minister's special happy face.

    Talking about freedom, sat in Margaret Thatcher’s old Rover.

    Earlier I spoke to @Telegraph about how important cars are for families to live their lives. It’s something anti-motorist Labour just don’t seem to get.

    And it’s why I’m reviewing anti-car schemes across the country.


    Anti- car schemes? He should try driving somewhere, anywhere.

    I thought Rishi was an all round good guy and administrative genius. This has the makings of a fiasco. Save the Pound campaign on steroids. It might work politically, but practically it is hopeless.
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 42,598
    edited July 2023

    Australia are going to walk this....series finishes 3-1....record books show a comfortable victory.

    You mean in that event England fans/commentators/players won’t be bleating to all & sundry about moral victories and ‘if only’ for eternity? First time for everything I suppose.
    They're still complainijng about the match 90 years ago. never mind last month.

    Edit: no, they aren't. Checked; they won.
  • FrancisUrquhartFrancisUrquhart Posts: 81,347
    edited July 2023
    The ultimate total non-story about rich rich cabinet ministers was George Osborne getting widespread grief for eating a Byron Burger rather than a McDonalds late at night before the budget.....because it cost £7. Those were the days when a "posh" burger was just £7. You are lucky to get change from £15 if you go to Five Guys these days.
  • Sunil_PrasannanSunil_Prasannan Posts: 51,531
    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    viewcode said:

    Tres said:

    Nigelb said:

    Tres said:

    Nigelb said:

    Turns out Oppenheimer's most famous quote probably wasn't.

    1: It took me a while to hunt down my copy (buried three stacks deep) of Arthur Ryder’s 1929 version of the Bhagavad Gita which Oppenheimer presumably quoted from. “I am become death, destroyer of worlds” isn’t in there. “Death I am, and my present task Destruction” is.
    https://twitter.com/curiouswavefn/status/1685311747245436929


    I prefer Nolan's take on that quotation!
    Haven't seen it.
    I prefer Bainbridge.
    Favourite physicists? Has to be Marie Curie was polish born but french bread.
    A dough-ty woman. :)
    I was going to try for that, but you decided to baguette.
    I'm going to leaven this one alone.
    Rather a rye comment.
    Wheat the hell!
  • LeonLeon Posts: 54,557
    edited July 2023

    Australia are going to walk this....series finishes 3-1....record books show a comfortable victory.

    You mean in that event England fans/commentators/players won’t be bleating to all & sundry about moral victories and ‘if only’ for eternity? First time for everything I suppose.
    Why on earth do you care - either way - about the English reaction to an English sport being played in England for English people?

    The Scottish inferiority complex is quite something
  • viewcodeviewcode Posts: 21,646
    It's Sunday, and that can only mean... Perun day! (claps like a seal)

    Now calm down children. What has our antipodean War Santa bought in his sack this week?

    Perun 20230730: "The Black Sea & The Naval War in Ukraine - Drones, Grain, Blockades & the Bridge to Crimea": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H8D7ioiW0JA (1hr 1min 49sec)
  • StillWatersStillWaters Posts: 8,030
    Phil said:

    I’m kind of surprised Leon hasn’t jumped on the room temperature superconductor hype train yet. Did I miss it?

    My twitter feed is abuzz with analysis & speculation: It may yet turn out to be a damp squib, but hope springs eternal & this time around they’ve actually published the synthesis, so it will be replicated one way or another within the next week or two. Can’t wait!

    Surely a damp squib wouldn’t conduct well at all?
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 42,139

    Eabhal said:

    Tres said:

    Andy_JS said:

    "Lib Dem councillor suggests he’d gas anti-Ulez campaigners
    Michael Tarling says he would ‘happily fill the room with carbon monoxide’ in response to post about meeting against new zone"

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2023/07/29/lib-dem-suggests-he-would-gas-anti-ulez-campaigners/

    Bromley mum’s window smashed after making ULEZ post online
    https://www.newsshopper.co.uk/news/23615444.bromley-mums-window-smashed-making-ulez-post-online/
    Yep, you have to be a bit cautious with the anti-ULEZ folk. There is someone in Edinburgh going around with an angle-grinder and cutting down cameras, and some of the cycle campaigners have had physical/death threats.
    I ran along the Notts tram route from Clifton into the city centre yesterday. Near the river, three people were walking along the path; two side-by-side, one in front, in the same direction as me. A pepperami in lycra came zooming from ahead, and had to slow down to pass the two people. He stopped and argued with them.

    I reckon he had been doing over 20 MPH as he approached (this is a WAG, but it was fast). There was plenty of space to pass if he had been going at a slower speed.

    Yes, there are a problem with cars and car drivers. But there is a serious attitude problem amongst parts of the cycling lobby as well.
    How do you know the guy in lycra was "part of the cycling lobby"?
    I don't, for sure. But the way he was dressed - as though he was part of a TdF team - and the way he argued with the people, highly indicates it. ;)
    Ok. That's... a bit of a misunderstanding.

    The "cycling lobby" are generally people who think the world would be better if people cycled more and drove less. It includes charities and campaigning organisations (Sustrans, Cycling UK, London Cycling Campaign etc.). It includes a bunch of urbanists and their followers (things like the Not Just Bikes channel on YouTube). It includes lots of people riding Bromptons and cargo bikes and things like that.

    What it generally doesn't include is people who wear Tour de France team kit. If the cycling lobby wears any lycra it's basically only because padded shorts are easier on your nads (not Dorries).

    Conversely, your average lycra wearer does not give a toss about LTNs or cycling for utility/transport or any form of lobbying. They want to go out on their bike and ride either fast or a long way. They very possibly put the bike on the roof of their Discovery to get to the start of their ride. They read Cycling Plus magazine which has lots about sportives and basically nothing about utility cycling.

    There is very occasional crossover (Chris Boardman being the best known) but it's notable how every time a Tour de France rider, Bradley Wiggins and Geraint Thomas among them, pronounces on utility cycling they get it fantastically wrong and you can hear the sound of a thousand everyday cyclists lowering their head into their hands.

    I'm sorry you encountered an unpleasant full kit wanker on your daily run - we get as annoyed with them as you do - but he has about as much to do with the cycling lobby as (returning to more familiar ground for PB) Max Verstappen has to do with the motoring lobby.
    Actually, I think there's much more of an overlap than that. In fact, it's a massive overlap. Look at the reaction from cyclists on here over the tragic incident in Huntingdon, where people were claiming that the pavement was a cycle path, when it clearly was not.
  • TheScreamingEaglesTheScreamingEagles Posts: 119,188

    NEW THREAD

  • DougSealDougSeal Posts: 12,527
    Leon said:

    Australia are going to walk this....series finishes 3-1....record books show a comfortable victory.

    You mean in that event England fans/commentators/players won’t be bleating to all & sundry about moral victories and ‘if only’ for eternity? First time for everything I suppose.
    Why on earth do you care - either way - about the English reaction to an English sport being played in England for English people?

    The Scottish inferiority complex is quite something
    Apparently they are all forced to watch Ingerlish sports reporting, unwillingly, with their eyes prised open Clockwork Orange style. We only let them have one TV channel. Or something.
  • TheuniondivvieTheuniondivvie Posts: 41,751
    Leon said:

    Australia are going to walk this....series finishes 3-1....record books show a comfortable victory.

    You mean in that event England fans/commentators/players won’t be bleating to all & sundry about moral victories and ‘if only’ for eternity? First time for everything I suppose.
    Why on earth do you care - either way - about the English reaction to an English sport being played in England for English people?

    The Scottish inferiority complex is quite something
    Why do you care that I care?
    I guess you’ll have be telling DavidL to shut his pus about the cricket next.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 27,993

    Eabhal said:

    Tres said:

    Andy_JS said:

    "Lib Dem councillor suggests he’d gas anti-Ulez campaigners
    Michael Tarling says he would ‘happily fill the room with carbon monoxide’ in response to post about meeting against new zone"

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2023/07/29/lib-dem-suggests-he-would-gas-anti-ulez-campaigners/

    Bromley mum’s window smashed after making ULEZ post online
    https://www.newsshopper.co.uk/news/23615444.bromley-mums-window-smashed-making-ulez-post-online/
    Yep, you have to be a bit cautious with the anti-ULEZ folk. There is someone in Edinburgh going around with an angle-grinder and cutting down cameras, and some of the cycle campaigners have had physical/death threats.
    I ran along the Notts tram route from Clifton into the city centre yesterday. Near the river, three people were walking along the path; two side-by-side, one in front, in the same direction as me. A pepperami in lycra came zooming from ahead, and had to slow down to pass the two people. He stopped and argued with them.

    I reckon he had been doing over 20 MPH as he approached (this is a WAG, but it was fast). There was plenty of space to pass if he had been going at a slower speed.

    Yes, there are a problem with cars and car drivers. But there is a serious attitude problem amongst parts of the cycling lobby as well.
    How do you know the guy in lycra was "part of the cycling lobby"?
    I don't, for sure. But the way he was dressed - as though he was part of a TdF team - and the way he argued with the people, highly indicates it. ;)
    Ok. That's... a bit of a misunderstanding.

    The "cycling lobby" are generally people who think the world would be better if people cycled more and drove less. It includes charities and campaigning organisations (Sustrans, Cycling UK, London Cycling Campaign etc.). It includes a bunch of urbanists and their followers (things like the Not Just Bikes channel on YouTube). It includes lots of people riding Bromptons and cargo bikes and things like that.

    What it generally doesn't include is people who wear Tour de France team kit. If the cycling lobby wears any lycra it's basically only because padded shorts are easier on your nads (not Dorries).

    Conversely, your average lycra wearer does not give a toss about LTNs or cycling for utility/transport or any form of lobbying. They want to go out on their bike and ride either fast or a long way. They very possibly put the bike on the roof of their Discovery to get to the start of their ride. They read Cycling Plus magazine which has lots about sportives and basically nothing about utility cycling.

    There is very occasional crossover (Chris Boardman being the best known) but it's notable how every time a Tour de France rider, Bradley Wiggins and Geraint Thomas among them, pronounces on utility cycling they get it fantastically wrong and you can hear the sound of a thousand everyday cyclists lowering their head into their hands.

    I'm sorry you encountered an unpleasant full kit wanker on your daily run - we get as annoyed with them as you do - but he has about as much to do with the cycling lobby as (returning to more familiar ground for PB) Max Verstappen has to do with the motoring lobby.
    Actually, I think there's much more of an overlap than that. In fact, it's a massive overlap. Look at the reaction from cyclists on here over the tragic incident in Huntingdon, where people were claiming that the pavement was a cycle path, when it clearly was not.
    A cyclist using the cyclepath? Where is this land of which you speak- Holland?
  • JosiasJessopJosiasJessop Posts: 42,139
    Off-topic:

    An interesting article on how heat affects the human body. I must admit that I hadn't realised it significantly reduced blood flow to the brain.

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-66249805
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 27,993

    Anecdote alert.

    On Friday I went to the Game Fair at Ragley Hall. So on Thursday we stayed at Avoncote near Henley in Arden. My wife wanted an early evening visit to John Lewis, so we ventured into Solihull. A tail of two towns really. On the Touchwood shopping centre, where John Lewis is sited you could buy yourself high end Miele consumer electronics or a Polestar electric car from their own exclusive retail spaces. Old Solihull was a little bit tired. Not helped by House of Fraser closing, nonetheless one could smell the money. On the way back to the Hotel we stopped at the Boot in Lapworth, the car park was like the Geneva Motor show and the place was buzzing. All the little towns and villages around Henley looked like they were doing very, very well. I thought to myself, there is no way the Conservatives are going to lose the next GE.

    The game fair also oozed conspicuous consumption. If this is England, what's not to like? I had a table booked in Ross-on-Wye for the evening, so had a few hours to kill. We decided to stop at Evesham, which during my childhood was a day out by the river and an idyllic place. Not any more. There was real and obvious poverty, obesity and in broad daylight low level drug dealing from the passenger seat of an old Seat Leon. It wasn't much better in Upton upon Severn and Great Malvern. All solid Tory areas where decay is prevalent. If the Conservatives win this election which to my mind seems likely, with more of the same, they will surely lose the next.

    "Tale"
  • RandallFlaggRandallFlagg Posts: 1,279

    Leon said:

    Tres said:

    Leon said:

    Douglas Carswell has written about the superior economy of Mississippi over the UK




    I just checked the life expectancy stats. UK life expectancy is 81.8

    Mississippi life expectancy is - wait for it - no, wait - a rather eye-opening 71.9

    It is lower than Colombia, Bangladesh and SYRIA

    Part of my wife's family are from Mississippi, a cousin of hers on that side just suffered a stillbirth - https://www.wlbt.com/2022/08/06/mississippi-moms-suffer-another-grim-statistic-nations-highest-rate-stillbirths/
    Mississippi is fucked in multiple ways. The problems in Jackson alone are astounding for any Brit. Horrendous murder rate. Basic utilities failing
    Still, Carswell and Brillo pimping for Mississippi must count as an absolute positive.



    https://twitter.com/afneil/status/1684980735264862222?s=61&t=LYVEHh2mqFy1oUJAdCfe-Q
    Nick Tyrone
    @NicholasTyrone
    I find the Brexiter argument that goes “America is so much more prosperous than the EU” so bizarre. Are they proposing that the UK becomes the 51st state of the US? If not, how do they propose the UK gets close to American GDP outside of both the USA and the EU single market?
  • ydoethurydoethur Posts: 71,028

    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    viewcode said:

    Tres said:

    Nigelb said:

    Tres said:

    Nigelb said:

    Turns out Oppenheimer's most famous quote probably wasn't.

    1: It took me a while to hunt down my copy (buried three stacks deep) of Arthur Ryder’s 1929 version of the Bhagavad Gita which Oppenheimer presumably quoted from. “I am become death, destroyer of worlds” isn’t in there. “Death I am, and my present task Destruction” is.
    https://twitter.com/curiouswavefn/status/1685311747245436929


    I prefer Nolan's take on that quotation!
    Haven't seen it.
    I prefer Bainbridge.
    Favourite physicists? Has to be Marie Curie was polish born but french bread.
    A dough-ty woman. :)
    I was going to try for that, but you decided to baguette.
    I'm going to leaven this one alone.
    Rather a rye comment.
    Wheat the hell!
    Hmmm. Barley acceptable.
  • Luckyguy1983Luckyguy1983 Posts: 28,163

    Sunak believes in net zero.

    Yet wants to do everything to encourage motorists into their cars, i.e. using the most polluting form of transport available.

    He's not serious about net zero or the environment. Get rid.

    Our contribution to the preservation of the environment should not consist of us destroying what is left of our own industry, only to import things made on countries that burn coal like it's going out of fashion. Nor should we destroy our own oil industry so that we can have the Saudis or the Americans use energy intensive processes to liquify their gas, and transport it half way across the world to us, releasing more net carbon into the atmosphere and undermining our own economy. Nor should we force poorer people out of their cars, or force anyone to install crappier boilers than they have at the moment - what kind of progress is that? Nor should we carpet the country in wind farms which are actually subsidy farms for foreign investment funds.

    What we should be doing is finding creative ways to reduce our greenhouse gas output, including (as Casino Royale mentioned the other day) changing cow feed to reduce methane emissions, dressing fields with rock dust that that they sequester more carbon, use tidal energy, a cheap, dependable source of zero carbon energy, get behind small modular reactors properly and ensure that all current nuclear stations are recommissioned as small modular reactor stations.

    We should also put tariffs on highly pollution-causing imports to encourage exporters to improve their standards.
  • DavidLDavidL Posts: 53,654
    edited July 2023
    Last throw of the dice. If this doesn't work they are stuffed.
  • El_CapitanoEl_Capitano Posts: 4,238

    What we should be doing is finding creative ways to reduce our greenhouse gas output, including (as Casino Royale mentioned the other day) changing cow feed to reduce methane emissions, dressing fields with rock dust that that they sequester more carbon, use tidal energy, a cheap, dependable source of zero carbon energy, get behind small modular reactors properly and ensure that all current nuclear stations are recommissioned as small modular reactor stations.

    Don't forget bionic duckweed.
  • alednamalednam Posts: 186
    Voters who focus on Labour’s lead in the polls may be in for a bit of a shock. Pollsters have learnt from experience that people who vote in one election are very likely to vote in the next, and that Conservative supporters are especially determined to use their vote (not least because so many of them are elderly), and that this doesn't register in the results of ongoing polling. If such experience is borne out, then the difference between the number of non-Tory seats and Tory seats following the election is likely to be much smaller than would be predicted by those who take only the results of polls into account.
  • malcolmgmalcolmg Posts: 43,197
    Leon said:

    Australia are going to walk this....series finishes 3-1....record books show a comfortable victory.

    You mean in that event England fans/commentators/players won’t be bleating to all & sundry about moral victories and ‘if only’ for eternity? First time for everything I suppose.
    Why on earth do you care - either way - about the English reaction to an English sport being played in England for English people?

    The Scottish inferiority complex is quite something
    He got under your thin skin there.
This discussion has been closed.