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Persepolis Now – looking at the future of Iran – politicalbetting.com

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  • Some of the nudge nudge wink wink stuff has been pretty distasteful.

    As if people can't compute the possibility that someone can just support a cause and want its standard-bearers to be the best and most effective they can be.

    There have been plenty of money scandals where that hasn't been the case, but without any other evidence, it's the place to start.
    Are you saying this lot are the best he could afford?
  • MalmesburyMalmesbury Posts: 53,476
    edited September 2024
    Nigelb said:

    FPT

    There are no 10,000G forces involved.

    ...Multi-injection guns like Longshot’s current prototype spread the acceleration of the projectile out over time, but have a similar top speed to a traditional cannon. The speed is limited by the top speed of the gas, which is determined by the gas composition and temperature. For room temperature nitrogen, this is a maximum of just over Mach 4 - about one sixth the speed needed for space launch.

    By moving the system to the desert, Longshot can use hydrogen as the accelerant gas. By extending the length of the barrel to 500+ meters and adding more boosters, Longshot will be able to accelerate payloads of up to 100 KG to Mach 5+ at acceleration loads that your cell phone can survive, and at prices significantly lower than current rocket-based accelerators systems...


    Note, this is a technology development project.
    If it's possible to scale up, it could be used to launch raw materials into orbit at low cost. That could make near earth space manufacturing an economically interesting idea.
    Mach 5 in 500 metres = 3000g

    That’s still pretty fruity for most payloads. Sure, you can pot electronics to survive that. But it’s limiting.

    Orbital speed is Mach 25. So you need to find 20 Mach (yes, I know, non existent unit) which means most of your projectile will be rocket engine and fuel. Plus you need to circularise.

    So you are really talking about shooting high performance rockets out of a gun. Which provides a bit of starting velocity.

    This has all been looked at before.
  • bondegezoubondegezou Posts: 13,075

    Leaving aside the question of do we really need political parties for democracy to function*, it would clearly be better and cheaper to fund the parties through the state than fulfil the quids for the quos of the elite donations.

    How many years of funding could we have had just from not paying £200m to Michelle Mone?

    * I would say they can help but less party influence than we have now would be beneficial and in the US they have got to the stage that losing them would be a massive improvement.
    For the year ending 2019, political parties reported expenditure of £169,103,000, according to the Electoral Commission. So Mone's £200m would pay for a year and a bit of party spending. Getting rid of parties wouldn't change this: candidates running as independents would still have the same costs.

    I'm not aware of any Western democracy that has come up with a sensible way for the state to fund parties instead of donations, but I'm open to suggestions. (Some state funding occurs in most, of course.) How do you decide what parties (or candidates) get what? Can anyone just set up a party and ask for public funds? If you decide based on past electoral results, you favour established parties and build in a certain psephological conservatism. The Green Party were a significant upstart force at the recent general election and I note all of the elected Green MPs have declared substantial donations to their campaigns. I suspect these facts are related. A free market in donations means the system can track changing views, whereas any public funding will tend to be less responsive.

    People here have been suggesting banning donations to individual candidates and just allowing them to parties. That would give parties more influence. If we want parties to have less influence, we presumably need to allow donations to individual candidates.
  • I'd take that to HR for a second opinion...
    It's an expression you don't hear much now for a certain sort of management ruthlessness, not coined by TSE's chum and not literally connected to pussy cats.
  • eekeek Posts: 29,399

    I will do so.

    As a former boss said of me ‘He’s very good at drowning kittens.’ which I am assured was a compliment.
    I'm equally happy to do so as I did when a group of flat owners in a recently built block decide that the 1600 century pub they were next to was too noisy so has to close.

    For that one I happily stood up at planning committee and explained how too faced their were...
  • CookieCookie Posts: 14,642

    10 years ago is today, in cultural terms.
    I don't think it is. Consider, for example, the example of Dara O'Briain having to apologise for a joke he made ten years ago on Mock the Week which no eyelid was batted about at the time.

    The position of the conservative side of the culture wars isn't an attempt to go back to the 1950s. It's an attempt to go back to the early 2010s.
  • Some of the nudge nudge wink wink stuff has been pretty distasteful.

    As if people can't compute the possibility that someone can just support a cause and want its standard-bearers to be the best and most effective they can be.

    There have been plenty of money scandals where that hasn't been the case, but without any other evidence, it's the place to start.
    Any actual examples of these utterly disinterested benefactors?

    I think he's shopping for something and given his background, history and links with pressure groups I think that something is probably pro trans legislation. It is 2024 FFS, there's nothing nudge nudge or distasteful in stating this as a possibility.
  • stodge said:

    So if I were a Lib Dem party member and wanted to donate £1000 to the Party, I couldn't? No, this is nonsense.

    Political parties in the modern age, just like any other "business", need money to exist. There's only so much volunteers can do and that's more about the on-ground campaigning.

    The parties aren't the problem - if the only people who could run for office were the wealthy who could afford to, we'd have a pretty unrepresentative democracy. We need to make it much easier for people with low amounts of time and money to get involved in the political process.
    £999 is plenty.

    If I am reading the electoral commission correctly there were only 748 donors (of which 330 individuals) donating more than £500 in 2022. So it is fine for more than 99.99% of the population already.

    What proportion of the donors above £1k really don't want any extra influence on policy or decisions in exchange for their donation? Why should the rest of us allow them that influence?
  • LeonLeon Posts: 58,927
    edited September 2024
    RobD said:

    I think there’s also been a bit of climate change in the intervening thousands of years.
    Indeed there has


    When the people that built Gobekli Tepe were building Gobekli Tepe (and the Tas Tepeler) the surrounding country was Edenic. Rolling green hills with woodlands and rivers and abundant fauna, including many delicious creatures of the chase

    Now it is a bleak semi desert

    It has been suggested that mankind himself did this, by chopping down the trees and ploughing the meadows, and that the shame that overcame the first farmers led to them burying those temples, as an act of propitiation, like a Celtic chieftain hurling his sword in the Thames
  • mercator said:

    Any actual examples of these utterly disinterested benefactors?

    I think he's shopping for something and given his background, history and links with pressure groups I think that something is probably pro trans legislation. It is 2024 FFS, there's nothing nudge nudge or distasteful in stating this as a possibility.
    That is, as they say, a testable prediction.

    Let's see what happens.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 75,246
    Cookie said:

    I don't think it is. Consider, for example, the example of Dara O'Briain having to apologise for a joke he made ten years ago on Mock the Week which no eyelid was batted about at the time.

    The position of the conservative side of the culture wars isn't an attempt to go back to the 1950s. It's an attempt to go back to the early 2010s.
    Is it ?
    Roe v Wade was "settled law" back then, for example.

    Admittedly, we've not approached the culture war heights scaled by the US, but I doubt some of the right's culture warriors in this country would be happy with status quo 2010. See Europe, and freedom of movement, for example.
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 33,924
    Does anyone have fond memories of the early 1990s?
  • DecrepiterJohnLDecrepiterJohnL Posts: 29,649
    edited September 2024
    mercator said:

    Any actual examples of these utterly disinterested benefactors?

    I think he's shopping for something and given his background, history and links with pressure groups I think that something is probably pro trans legislation. It is 2024 FFS, there's nothing nudge nudge or distasteful in stating this as a possibility.
    Often suggested but I've seen no evidence of that. My guess is Lord Alli just likes being part of the in-crowd. Remember too that for him, the amounts are trivial.

    ETA: you ask for other examples. I've not checked but off the top of my head, maybe Lady Bamford and Boris.
  • bondegezoubondegezou Posts: 13,075
    algarkirk said:

    I agree this question is difficult. The actual problem I was addressing is that of individual enrichment rather than party coffers. To that second question the first answer I have is the one no-one thinks can be done: The return to individual mass membership of parties.

    Until that day, the second best is absolute transparency about donations to parties and a culture which takes for granted that general political support is morally unrelated to personal enrichment whether it is a business, a union or an individual.
    We have pretty good transparency about donations. The entire kerfuffle around donations we currently have is based on public declarations of those donations. There's not been much journalism that's gone beyond reading through the register of interests!

    I take your point about personal enrichment, but it still seems odd to say you can't accept a gift worth a small amount that personally benefits you (tickets to a football match) but you can accept a gift that is 20 times larger for your campaign. But, sure, we could have different rules here.

    I am also sympathetic to the point that some of the contentious donations really are about campaigning costs. Here's a Hello magazine article about Mrs Starmer's clothes, https://www.hellomagazine.com/fashion/celebrity-style/702212/keir-starmers-wife-victoria-best-outfits/ Or think back to the numerous press pieces about the Starmers going to see Taylor Swift perform. That's all good publicity for the party, makes them seem approachable and competent without anyone asking difficult questions about income tax rises.
  • £999 is plenty.

    If I am reading the electoral commission correctly there were only 748 donors (of which 330 individuals) donating more than £500 in 2022. So it is fine for more than 99.99% of the population already.

    What proportion of the donors above £1k really don't want any extra influence on policy or decisions in exchange for their donation? Why should the rest of us allow them that influence?
    I wasn't reading it correctly....

    2811 donors of which 1210 individuals.

    My point remains.
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 54,031
    edited September 2024
    18-29 year olds going for Harris 2:1 - 64%-32% (Harvard Kennedy School poll)

    In April, it was Biden 56 Trump 37.

    I'm betting the polling models aren't making adequate allowance for the spike in voter registrations within this age group that are happening this year. :
  • bondegezoubondegezou Posts: 13,075
    boulay said:

    Oh come on, I dislike Starmer loads, don’t like Labour at all but we surely aren’t going here with twisted gossip about politicians wives who cannot defend themselves and frankly shouldn’t have this sort of shot thrown around about them.

    Grim stuff.
    It seems rather bizarre to accuse Lord Alli, who is famously gay, of having an affair with a woman.
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 54,031
    Andy_JS said:

    Does anyone have fond memories of the early 1990s?

    I was having lots of sex. Remember that with fondness...

    I don't remember much else about that time. Maybe the two are linked?
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 44,317
    Cookie said:

    Good luck. Keen to hear your report later.
    Positive so far. Watford Gap as good as ever.
  • I was having lots of sex. Remember that with fondness...

    I don't remember much else about that time. Maybe the two are linked?
    Do you remember Global Hyper Colour shirts?

    I certainly do.
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 54,031

    Do you remember Global Hyper Colour shirts?

    I certainly do.
    Were those the one sthat showed when you were hot?
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 44,317
    Taz said:

    The kinder progressive left in action.
    Me? Thank you. I do try to shun the 'bombastic bruiser' approach to surfing the river of debate.
  • Were those the one sthat showed when you were hot?
    Yes.
  • VerulamiusVerulamius Posts: 1,554
    edited September 2024
    I think that there is a difference between a donation to a party, organisation, individual for campaigning purposes and a donation/gift in cash or kind for personal purposes.

    We gift to charities, campaigning organisations that might not be charities, to benefit their activities. That is seen to be ok (although you can debate the worthiness of gifts to certain organisations).

    But a personal gift to an individual could be seen as a bribe or at least compromising. This could be limited.

    As said lots of professionals will have significant restrictions on the latter.

    There is a gray area which could be both activity and personal. You could apply tax law as to what is wholly and exclusively for the purposes of the activity (eg clothing in the main would be personal).
  • viewcodeviewcode Posts: 23,780
    kinabalu said:

    Hmm, ok, noted. But I do think we should wait for a few policies and outcomes before writing the book.

    Anyway, off to the Red Wall now. I might be some time.
    Unsarcastically, you might want to watch this:

    "Shattered Nation: how to save Britain from becoming a failed state" (2023), Danny Dorling. A lecture at the David Hume Institute, see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SCUfqIND8mQ , 92mins.
  • CookieCookie Posts: 14,642
    kinabalu said:

    Positive so far. Watford Gap as good as ever.
    I presume you mean the service station, rather than the pleasant but slightly dull gap itself.

    I love service stations. Even crappy ones. A sense of excitement of the journey, of existing outside the normal rules. Yes kids, we will stop for a KFC! Because we're on a road trip.

    I also love that they are named after such tiny bits of geography. Watford Gap. Leicester Forest East. Trowell. Tibshelf. Woolley Edge. Birch. Charnock Richard.
    It's found poetry.

    We used to do that with airports. Ringway. Speke. Dyce. No longer, sadly, apart from Heathrow and Gatwick. Happy that we are bloody-mindedly sticking with those at any rate, rather than follow the global trend of naming them after politicians or other notables.
  • boulayboulay Posts: 6,001

    Yes.
    And yet wearing one ensured you didn’t look remotely hot.
  • boulay said:

    And yet wearing one ensured you didn’t look remotely hot.
    Look, I was twelve years old, I didn’t sweat, they were cool.
  • LeonLeon Posts: 58,927
    I see that the unfortunate Mr Starmer has a new nickname

    "No Beer Kier"

    Another one that will stick. He really does himself no favours
  • It seems rather bizarre to accuse Lord Alli, who is famously gay, of having an affair with a woman.
    More bizarre that there was not even a tangential link to any of AI, lab leaks, pizza restaurants, aliens or Jewish space lasers. Surely everyone knows that at least one of those is required for a mad conspiracy story?
  • Look, I was twelve years old, I didn’t sweat, they were cool.
    Did you also not know where the bar was at Tramps?
  • PulpstarPulpstar Posts: 79,005
    Leon said:

    I see that the unfortunate Mr Starmer has a new nickname

    "No Beer Kier"

    Another one that will stick. He really does himself no favours

    No fun for thee, freebies for me.
  • For the year ending 2019, political parties reported expenditure of £169,103,000, according to the Electoral Commission. So Mone's £200m would pay for a year and a bit of party spending. Getting rid of parties wouldn't change this: candidates running as independents would still have the same costs.

    I'm not aware of any Western democracy that has come up with a sensible way for the state to fund parties instead of donations, but I'm open to suggestions. (Some state funding occurs in most, of course.) How do you decide what parties (or candidates) get what? Can anyone just set up a party and ask for public funds? If you decide based on past electoral results, you favour established parties and build in a certain psephological conservatism. The Green Party were a significant upstart force at the recent general election and I note all of the elected Green MPs have declared substantial donations to their campaigns. I
    suspect these facts are related. A free
    market in donations means the system can
    track changing views, whereas any public
    funding will tend to be less responsive.

    People here have been suggesting banning donations to individual candidates and just
    allowing them to parties. That would give parties more influence. If we want parties to have less influence, we presumably need to allow donations to individual candidates.
    You should be able to make donations to “the office of the MP” - if you want to help an individual. It’s the gifting of personal items and entertainment that looks D A F.
  • PhilPhil Posts: 2,507
    Cookie said:

    I'm on a Teams call with various public sector types from various organisations. The conversation keeps drifting off topic to mock the Labour Party.

    I'm vaguely astonished. For the last 30 years, in the circles I've moved in, nobody has mocked the Labour Party. I had put it down to an inherent left-wing lean among the types of people I interacted with - young (well, this was true 20 years ago), urban, public sector/public sector adjacent, northern types simply didn't mock the Labour party unless they knew each other very well - it was only one step away from admitting support for the Conservative Party. This was true whether Labour or Conservatives were in power. I do remember one rather good joke from my brother-in-law about Gordon Brown 15 years ago, but that was notable more for its rarity.

    Yet two months into a Labour government they are already the subject of ridicule. Even Boris got more leeway than this at the start.

    I'm not for a moment claiming that people are clamouring for the return of Rishi. But as TSE noted yesterday, I've never known a PM take over to such a lack of enthusiasm. Even Liz Truss got a bit of early credit for the way she handled Lizzydeath (though obviously spaffed away what little political credit she had with the minibudget, and SKS has already outlasted her).

    Ooh, update, a brief joke about Liz Truss. And now more eyerolling about Labour "maybe if we bung them a pair of glasses they might be convinced".

    My father (lifelong social democrat, ex labour councillor & party member) is livid.

    Deeply unimpressed doesn’t even begin to cover it.
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 54,031

    I didn’t sweat...
    You are Prince Andrew and I claim my five young lovelies....
  • kenObikenObi Posts: 245
    mercator said:

    Any actual examples of these utterly disinterested benefactors?

    I think he's shopping for something and given his background, history and links with pressure groups I think that something is probably pro trans legislation. It is 2024 FFS, there's nothing nudge nudge or distasteful in stating this as a possibility.
    Asian / West Indian heritage, Muslim and Gay.

    Like a wet dream for the right.

  • EabhalEabhal Posts: 9,773
    Here we go...
  • CookieCookie Posts: 14,642
    Cookie said:

    I presume you mean the service station, rather than the pleasant but slightly dull gap itself.

    I love service stations. Even crappy ones. A sense of excitement of the journey, of existing outside the normal rules. Yes kids, we will stop for a KFC! Because we're on a road trip.

    I also love that they are named after such tiny bits of geography. Watford Gap. Leicester Forest East. Trowell. Tibshelf. Woolley Edge. Birch. Charnock Richard.
    It's found poetry.

    We used to do that with airports. Ringway. Speke. Dyce. No longer, sadly, apart from Heathrow and Gatwick. Happy that we are bloody-mindedly sticking with those at any rate, rather than follow the global trend of naming them after politicians or other notables.
    Just listing service stations makes me feel like I'm on holiday.

    Knutsford. Sandbach. Keele. *. Hilton Park. Frankley. Strensham. South Gloucester**. Michaelwood. Gordano. Sedgemoor. Bridgwater***. Taunton Deane****. Cullompton.

    * I don't recognise Stafford services.
    ** Always called South Gloucester in our family. I don't know why. Gloucester (which I think is its actual name) would be much less poetic.
    *** Bridgwater is poetic if a) you know nothing about the town, and b) you enjoy the slightly quirky lack of an 'e'.
    ****Taunton Deane is wonderful. "Where is Taunton Deane?" "Taunton" "So why not just call it Taunton?" "Because it's a British service station."

    After Cullompton I consider myself on holiday. Just say it. "Cullompton." It has an air of finality to it - you've arrived. Let's not trouble ourselves with Exeter services, which is lazily named and which, unsatisfyingly, you arrive at through a regular junction on a motorway, and which we really don't need to trouble ourselves with unless someone really needs a wee.

    It's the same coming home, with each successive service station building the anticipation of home, so by the time you see Knutsford you're almost giddy with the joy of your own bed at last and seeing the cats again.

    I defy any red-blooded Brit not to be a tiny bit moved by the names of service stations.
  • kenObikenObi Posts: 245
    Leon said:

    I see that the unfortunate Mr Starmer has a new nickname

    "No Beer Kier"

    Another one that will stick. He really does himself no favours

    It will stick only in you imagination.

    No doubt filed alongside "Big queer Kier", "one year Kier" and "Kier the sneer".

    Sounding like Trump flailing about for Komrade Kambala
  • EabhalEabhal Posts: 9,773
    edited September 2024
    Cookie said:

    Just listing service stations makes me feel like I'm on holiday.

    Knutsford. Sandbach. Keele. *. Hilton Park. Frankley. Strensham. South Gloucester**. Michaelwood. Gordano. Sedgemoor. Bridgwater***. Taunton Deane****. Cullompton.

    * I don't recognise Stafford services.
    ** Always called South Gloucester in our family. I don't know why. Gloucester (which I think is its actual name) would be much less poetic.
    *** Bridgwater is poetic if a) you know nothing about the town, and b) you enjoy the slightly quirky lack of an 'e'.
    ****Taunton Deane is wonderful. "Where is Taunton Deane?" "Taunton" "So why not just call it Taunton?" "Because it's a British service station."

    After Cullompton I consider myself on holiday. Just say it. "Cullompton." It has an air of finality to it - you've arrived. Let's not trouble ourselves with Exeter services, which is lazily named and which, unsatisfyingly, you arrive at through a regular junction on a motorway, and which we really don't need to trouble ourselves with unless someone really needs a wee.

    It's the same coming home, with each successive service station building the anticipation of home, so by the time you see Knutsford you're almost giddy with the joy of your own bed at last and seeing the cats again.

    I defy any red-blooded Brit not to be a tiny bit moved by the names of service stations.
    Does "House of Bruar" count?

    I would guess they must include a fuel stop.
  • Eabhal said:

    Here we go...

    Nice suit...
  • MarqueeMarkMarqueeMark Posts: 54,031
    Leon said:

    I see that the unfortunate Mr Starmer has a new nickname

    "No Beer Kier"

    Another one that will stick. He really does himself no favours

    I have noticed that cartoonists have a real spring in their step since this new Government came in. There was nothing new to do with the Rishi government. Now they can really get the barbs away.
  • Cookie said:

    Just listing service stations makes me feel like I'm on holiday.

    Knutsford. Sandbach. Keele. *. Hilton Park. Frankley. Strensham. South Gloucester**. Michaelwood. Gordano. Sedgemoor. Bridgwater***. Taunton Deane****. Cullompton.

    * I don't recognise Stafford services.
    ** Always called South Gloucester in our family. I don't know why. Gloucester (which I think is its actual name) would be much less poetic.
    *** Bridgwater is poetic if a) you know nothing about the town, and b) you enjoy the slightly quirky lack of an 'e'.
    ****Taunton Deane is wonderful. "Where is Taunton Deane?" "Taunton" "So why not just call it Taunton?" "Because it's a British service station."

    After Cullompton I consider myself on holiday. Just say it. "Cullompton." It has an air of finality to it - you've arrived. Let's not trouble ourselves with Exeter services, which is lazily named and which, unsatisfyingly, you arrive at through a regular junction on a motorway, and which we really don't need to trouble ourselves with unless someone really needs a wee.

    It's the same coming home, with each successive service station building the anticipation of home, so by the time you see Knutsford you're almost giddy with the joy of your own bed at last and seeing the cats again.

    I defy any red-blooded Brit not to be a tiny bit moved by the names of service stations.
    If you don’t know this song I think you will enjoy it!

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=U6OHD2uCpfU
  • Leon said:

    I see that the unfortunate Mr Starmer has a new nickname

    "No Beer Kier"

    Another one that will stick. He really does himself no favours

    The pub hour changes have been ruled out.
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 33,924
    edited September 2024
    Visiting a slightly rubbish service station at the start of a long holiday was always strangely exhilarating. On the way back home, not so much.
  • FossFoss Posts: 1,301
    Eabhal said:

    Does "House of Bruar" count?

    I would guess they must include a fuel stop.
    Bruar makes the farm shop at Gloucester Services look reasonably priced. Nice smoked venison tho'.
  • Anger of a quiet man vibe.
  • numbertwelvenumbertwelve Posts: 7,212
    edited September 2024
    Not sure the tone is right here? If people are criticising me it’s water off a ducks back, is noisy politics/populism and I’m just ignoring it, is a bit of a weird stance.
  • The pub hour changes have been ruled out.
    But what if he comes after 25% off six at Tesco?
  • TazTaz Posts: 16,920
    Leon said:

    I see that the unfortunate Mr Starmer has a new nickname

    "No Beer Kier"

    Another one that will stick. He really does himself no favours

    I thought it was "Free Gear Keir"
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 33,924
    Starmer — irreversible changes. Scary.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 30,585
    He said sausages! He has to go!
  • TazTaz Posts: 16,920
    edited September 2024
    mercator said:

    But what if he comes after 25% off six at Tesco?
    I think there's a good chance they do and implement Minimum Unit Pricing following the lead of Wales and Scotland.

    There's a strong lobby in favour of it.

    https://alcoholchange.org.uk/blog/mup-in-england-myths-and-facts
  • Did he just say sausages by mistake for hostages?
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 39,679
    Leon said:

    I see that the unfortunate Mr Starmer has a new nickname

    "No Beer Kier"

    Another one that will stick. He really does himself no favours

    Yup, for all of the denial from lefties around the nicknames, they are sticking. I can see it on Instagram, "Two Tier Kier" makes an appearance any time there's anything about politics on Instagram and this is among mostly politically unengaged people. Closing the pubs early has also made it to Instagram and I saw "No Beer Kier" as well so all of this is sticking to him.
  • CookieCookie Posts: 14,642

    If you don’t know this song I think you will enjoy it!

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=U6OHD2uCpfU
    Thanks! I was aware of it, but I don't think I've ever listened to it all the way through, and not at all for a good 30 years.
    I was expecting it to be someone had made a song out of service station names in the idiom of Jay Foreman's tube station song ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8jPyg2pK11M ). But of course it wasn't that, it was Flanders and Swann's incomparable 'The Slow Train'.
    It gave me the tingle. And also brought forth unbidden tears. The combined emotional power of music (which is hardwired), comedy (because it lowers your defences) and trains. All mixed with the poetry of British place names.

    Worth adding that happily you can now go from St. Erth to St. Ives, and also that Chorlton cum Hardy is now accessible by tram. I think F&S would take some small happiness from that at least.
  • turbotubbsturbotubbs Posts: 18,330

    10 years ago is today, in cultural terms.
    Is it bollocks.
  • mercator said:

    Did he just say sausages by mistake for hostages?

    Yes.
  • Foss said:

    Bruar makes the farm shop at Gloucester Services look reasonably priced. Nice smoked venison tho'.
    It buys from the local Netherend Farm and therefore offers Netherend butter, which cyclists will find entertaining.
  • There was an organisation that I am only indirectly involved in now, it was a care home run as a charity. The board all used to get turkeys at christmas, the accounting was regularly that a new set of curtains and televisions were of greater numbers than actually ended up in the homes. The board was made of appointed councillors from the local county council.
    That's not great...
  • CookieCookie Posts: 14,642
    edited September 2024
    Eabhal said:

    Does "House of Bruar" count?

    I would guess they must include a fuel stop.
    Sure, why not? Doesn't have fuel but it has a poetic name. Unlike Stafford.
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 33,924
    MaxPB said:

    Yup, for all of the denial from lefties around the nicknames, they are sticking. I can see it on Instagram, "Two Tier Kier" makes an appearance any time there's anything about politics on Instagram and this is among mostly politically unengaged people. Closing the pubs early has also made it to Instagram and I saw "No Beer Kier" as well so all of this is sticking to him.
    Maybe people finally waking up from Covid-era censoriousness.
  • BarnesianBarnesian Posts: 8,965
    This is boring and uninspiring.
    I found Ed Davey's speech much more interesting and entertaining.
  • FossFoss Posts: 1,301
    On topic; if the 'Civil War' or 'Revolution' scenarios play out then the West needs to ensure that a bunch of Iranian Hardliners don't end up being granted asylum and protection by the nations they hate. We need to be ok with Ceaușescu-like outcomes.
  • EabhalEabhal Posts: 9,773
    Cookie said:

    Sure, why not? Doesn't have fuel but it has a poetic name. Unlike Stafford.
    I can provide a comprehensive guide to food stops on the A9 next time someone heads up there. Bruar is good for pies and clean toilets.
  • EabhalEabhal Posts: 9,773
    ABERDEEN, ABERDEEN
  • MaxPB said:

    Yup, for all of the denial from lefties around the nicknames, they are sticking. I can see it on Instagram, "Two Tier Kier" makes an appearance any time there's anything about politics on Instagram and this is among mostly politically unengaged people. Closing the pubs early has also made it to Instagram and I saw "No Beer Kier" as well so all of this is sticking to him.
    Giving Dodgy Dave nicknames worked out well for the left in the 2015 general election.
  • viewcodeviewcode Posts: 23,780
    viewcode said:

    Unsarcastically, you might want to watch this:

    "Shattered Nation: how to save Britain from becoming a failed state" (2023), Danny Dorling. A lecture at the David Hume Institute, see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SCUfqIND8mQ , 92mins.
    Some more Danny Dorling. This is more accessible on the same subject and is shorter at 31 mins: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RAJIJ2-8a8c
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 75,246
    Cookie said:

    Sure, why not? Doesn't have fuel but it has a poetic name. Unlike Stafford.
    Tibshelf
    Trowell
    Leicester Forest East

    Ugh.
  • turbotubbsturbotubbs Posts: 18,330
    Andy_JS said:

    Starmer — irreversible changes. Scary.

    No government can bind its successors.
  • Andy_JS said:

    Does anyone have fond memories of the early 1990s?

    First girlfriend? Does that count?
  • This is a good patch. Attacking the tory populists who have done nothing for 14 years.
  • As I predicted last night. Listen to me in future, rather than following Leon, Francis and the Torygraph down some fantastical rabbit hole.

    https://news.sky.com/story/pubs-are-great-part-of-british-life-and-labour-wont-change-opening-hours-minister-says-13221170

    Cabinet Office minister Pat McFadden vowed to table an emergency resolution at his party's conference to halt any alleged change to venue licensing times "if that's on the agenda".

    Fair enough that McFadden is desperate to intervene and stop this madness, but it does smack of a rearguard action, and what if he's not successful?
  • BarnesianBarnesian Posts: 8,965

    This is a good patch. Attacking the tory populists who have done nothing for 14 years.

    Agreed.
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 30,585

    As I predicted last night. Listen to me in future, rather than following Leon, Francis and the Torygraph down some fantastical rabbit hole.

    https://news.sky.com/story/pubs-are-great-part-of-british-life-and-labour-wont-change-opening-hours-minister-says-13221170

    The Mail story answers it's own question in the final paragraph. The answer in "no".

    You can't deny that all this fake news from the Telegraph and the Mail propagated on here by Leon, Urquhart and many more is damaging Starmer. It is cutting through.
  • One there was a lovely little sausage called Baldrick, and it lived happily ever after.

    Sausage?! SAUSAGE?! Argh, blast your eyes!
  • SelebianSelebian Posts: 9,137
    edited September 2024
    mercator said:

    Did he just say sausages by mistake for hostages?

    Oh, just found that bit. It's glorious.

    "I call, again, for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. The return of the sausages. The hostages."

    I could almost have sworn he also called for a "two steak solution":lol:

    ETA: Never give a speech on an empty stomach?
  • AnneJGPAnneJGP Posts: 3,283
    @GarethoftheVale2 Very late to the thread but thank you for a really interesting and unusual header.

    Good afternoon, everybody.
  • AnabobazinaAnabobazina Posts: 23,792

    The Mail story answers it's own question in the final paragraph. The answer in "no".

    You can't deny that all this fake news from the Telegraph and the Mail propagated on here by Leon, Urquhart and many more is damaging Starmer. It is cutting through.
    Water off a duck's back says Sir Keir. Liked that line.
  • SelebianSelebian Posts: 9,137
    Eabhal said:

    ABERDEEN, ABERDEEN

    Abrdn now, isn't it? :wink:
  • CookieCookie Posts: 14,642

    The Mail story answers it's own question in the final paragraph. The answer in "no".

    You can't deny that all this fake news from the Telegraph and the Mail propagated on here by Leon, Urquhart and many more is damaging Starmer. It is cutting through.
    Well it wasn't really fake news. It was reporting something that Andrew Gwynne actually said.
    I mean it's good news that it's bollocks, but the only reason the story started is because there were elements in government who were keen to hint it might happen.
  • Sgheir Toolmakyrsson looked out
    On the Feast of Stephen
    When the snow lay 'round about
    Deep and crisp and even
    Brightly shone the moon that night
    Though the frost was cruel
    When a poor man came in sight
    Gath'ring winter fuel

    "Hither, page, and stand by me
    If thou know'st it, telling
    Yonder peasant, who is he?
    Where and what his dwelling?"
    "Sire, he is a pensioner
    But just above the breadline"
    "Take his fuel" says good Sir Keir
    "Never mind the headlines."

    ...

    Therefore, Christian men, be sure
    Wealth or rank possessing
    Ye who now dress Lady S
    Shall yourselves find blessing.
  • AnabobazinaAnabobazina Posts: 23,792
    Cookie said:

    Well it wasn't really fake news. It was reporting something that Andrew Gwynne actually said.
    I mean it's good news that it's bollocks, but the only reason the story started is because there were elements in government who were keen to hint it might happen.
    Did you read the actual full quote from Gwynne last night, or just the clips in the Trashygraph?
  • AnabobazinaAnabobazina Posts: 23,792

    Cabinet Office minister Pat McFadden vowed to table an emergency resolution at his party's conference to halt any alleged change to venue licensing times "if that's on the agenda".

    Fair enough that McFadden is desperate to intervene and stop this madness, but it does smack of a rearguard action, and what if he's not successful?
    It ain't a policy, never was, and ain't happening.

    Take it from me.
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 75,246
    Andy_JS said:

    Does anyone have fond memories of the early 1990s?

    First child.

    Though she didn't sleep through the night for two and a half years...
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 39,679
    Cookie said:

    Well it wasn't really fake news. It was reporting something that Andrew Gwynne actually said.
    I mean it's good news that it's bollocks, but the only reason the story started is because there were elements in government who were keen to hint it might happen.
    Not just the government, this idea has been around for ages coming from the Chris Whitty types who see elected politicians as an obstacle to their perfect technocratic utopia. I wouldn't be surprised if he (or one of his cronies) was involved with briefing this out just after the 2/3rds pint stories.
  • Selebian said:

    Abrdn now, isn't it? :wink:
    Th cty s gd thy nmd t twc
  • AnabobazinaAnabobazina Posts: 23,792
    edited September 2024

    Giving Dodgy Dave nicknames worked out well for the left in the 2015 general election.
    David Chameleon was a classic of the genre, even better than the seminal Tony Bliar.

    Some other notable monikers:

    Theresa MayDay

    Bozo Johnson

    'Liz' TRUSS
  • Starmer will give benefit fraud investigators access to bank accounts and ‘search and seizure’ powers

    https://www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/article/keir-starmer-labour-conference-speech-ftc0b6hvx
  • EabhalEabhal Posts: 9,773
    Attacks on NIMBYs. Prisons, pylons, property.

    And goodness, granting of asylum!
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 75,246
    Selebian said:

    Oh, just found that bit. It's glorious.

    "I call, again, for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. The return of the sausages. The hostages."

    I could almost have sworn he also called for a "two steak solution":lol:

    ETA: Never give a speech on an empty stomach?
    A two steak solution ?

    He's pitching for Casino's vote.
  • SelebianSelebian Posts: 9,137
    Cookie said:

    Just listing service stations makes me feel like I'm on holiday.

    Knutsford. Sandbach. Keele. *. Hilton Park. Frankley. Strensham. South Gloucester**. Michaelwood. Gordano. Sedgemoor. Bridgwater***. Taunton Deane****. Cullompton.

    * I don't recognise Stafford services.
    ** Always called South Gloucester in our family. I don't know why. Gloucester (which I think is its actual name) would be much less poetic.
    *** Bridgwater is poetic if a) you know nothing about the town, and b) you enjoy the slightly quirky lack of an 'e'.
    ****Taunton Deane is wonderful. "Where is Taunton Deane?" "Taunton" "So why not just call it Taunton?" "Because it's a British service station."

    After Cullompton I consider myself on holiday. Just say it. "Cullompton." It has an air of finality to it - you've arrived. Let's not trouble ourselves with Exeter services, which is lazily named and which, unsatisfyingly, you arrive at through a regular junction on a motorway, and which we really don't need to trouble ourselves with unless someone really needs a wee.

    It's the same coming home, with each successive service station building the anticipation of home, so by the time you see Knutsford you're almost giddy with the joy of your own bed at last and seeing the cats again.

    I defy any red-blooded Brit not to be a tiny bit moved by the names of service stations.
    South Mimms
    Skelton Lake
    Woolley Edge

    But then you end up at somewhere like Scotch Corner, which sounds like it should be glorious but is an absolute shit hole.
  • MaxPBMaxPB Posts: 39,679

    Starmer will give benefit fraud investigators access to bank accounts and ‘search and seizure’ powers

    https://www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/article/keir-starmer-labour-conference-speech-ftc0b6hvx

    Isn't the issue that people on benefits work cash in hand? How will this make any difference?
  • CookieCookie Posts: 14,642

    First girlfriend? Does that count?
    It was my favourite period musically. My most listened-to musical period is still 1990-1992. The Pixies and the Wedding Present were still extant and baggy was in its heyday.

    Actually, ages 14-17 were a really good period of my life - I was starting to interact with girls and alcoholic drinks and other things I could do with my emerging freedom. It wasn't that the times were better than they are now, objectively; it was that the trajectory with which each year was better than the last was so good. And that, my friends, is the real key to happiness.

  • People who should have known bitter
  • MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 30,585
    MaxPB said:

    Isn't the issue that people on benefits work cash in hand? How will this make any difference?
    Ban cash?
  • SelebianSelebian Posts: 9,137
    MaxPB said:

    Isn't the issue that people on benefits work cash in hand? How will this make any difference?
    The investigators will search the hand and seize the cash? :wink:

    Alternatively, fix the benefits system, so people are less inclined to not declare work.
  • AnabobazinaAnabobazina Posts: 23,792

    Ban cash?
    Well...
  • NigelbNigelb Posts: 75,246
    edited September 2024
    Cookie said:

    It was my favourite period musically. My most listened-to musical period is still 1990-1992. The Pixies and the Wedding Present were still extant and baggy was in its heyday.

    Actually, ages 14-17 were a really good period of my life - I was starting to interact with girls and alcoholic drinks and other things I could do with my emerging freedom. It wasn't that the times were better than they are now, objectively; it was that the trajectory with which each year was better than the last was so good. And that, my friends, is the real key to happiness.

    So you're saying Starmer is establishing a very low baseline on purpose?
This discussion has been closed.