Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Have you ever lost your phone or had it run out of battery?
On the budget, it seems that there's a trade off between higher personal living standards and better public services - because we can't afford both given the dire state of public finances. I would happily accept my disposable income being pretty static over the next five years if, at the same time, my life was made better and easier by a significantly improved public realm including, but by no means confined to, the NHS. I think that's what Labour is aiming for.
What happened to the growth agenda....ultimately without growth the problem is never solved, the pain is just delayed.
It is quite impressive they are borrowing masses of money to fund infrastructure, but making growth worse....that is the opposite of what is supposed to happen by such a policy.
It will take more than 5 years for there to be sufficient growth to enable both higher personal living standards and improved public services. That's why Labour's plan is really a 10-year plan rather than a 5-year plan. They'll reap the benefits in the second term, provided they can secure enough progress to win in 2029.
If that is the case, the front loading of all the spending is really stupid. Going famine to feast to famine, in a two year cycle, will lead to negative spending decisions as its leads to use it or lose it mentality, just like if a start-up is given far too much early round funding.
If they are really in for the long term, you spread this money over the 3-4-5 years, carefully plan what needs building and enact reform along side.
I actually have a hospital appointment this morning. What a budget!
I went to hospital yesterday.
There was a poster by the entrance warning about measles, which we thought had been vanquished in the 1960s, before they invented anti-vaxxers.
But beyond that were electronic signs displaying a message that their software licence had expired (presumably unbeknownst to whoever could either renew the licence or turn the system off to save electricity) and direction signs that stopped well short of their destination. The clock had not been put back an hour at the weekend, or so I thought till I noticed that even then it would be 10 minutes wrong.
People say the NHS needs huge investment. They are right. It does. But it also needs people directly running hospitals and clinics to pick the low hanging fruit.
My wife had a miscarriage at about 9 weeks 18 months or so ago. Turning up at my local large hospital to find there was nowhere to park (we would cheerfully have paid, but the site has about 50% of the parking spaces it needs - we ended up ditching the car in a nearby supermarket carpark), followed by having to find the "early pregnancy unit*" we'd been told to attend and then follow the non-existent signage to it with a tired and distressed wife was one of the less enjoyable experiences of my life, which could have been made vastly for virtually no cost by some decent signage.
I think I've posted before about how I nearly missed an expensive MRI slot because I went to the wrong hospital, thanks to the receptionist at a different hospital using without explanation the abbreviation MRI for Manchester Royal Infirmary, without considering this was also the department I was being sent to see. This was after a previous missed MRI because they failed to book an X-ray to check for steel splinters in my eyes first, despite my ringing them and telling them this exactly as instructed on the paperwork they sent out.
Stuff like this isn't hard, or expensive to fix - but because it's a state monolith entirely run by a mixture of incompetence and producer capture it isn't. Pouring loads more money in the top won't help either - this stuff isn't fixed primarily because nobody cares, rather than anything else.
*It turned out that it has been renamed the "Jasmine Suite" presumably to be more sensitive to people our situation, which is lovely and thoughtful, but does require that people are told to go there. And once we found that bit out, the signage was still rubbish to actually get there.
These are exactly the sorts of problems that arise when you keep cutting costs so there's no-one to check on signage and staff don't have the time to check everything has been understood. They have nothing to do with the system being "a state monolith".
Your claim that "nobody cares" is nonsense (and insulting). NHS staff generally do care, but they're worked off their feet. More money does help.
Nobody cares you just have to deal with it. What would the budget line item be for "checking signage".
I appreciate you evidently love the NHS but it is crap. Or rather, it is brilliant on many measures apart from saving lives and health outcomes.
My sister was just invited for a smear test which is available, apparently, to "all women and those people with cervixes". This is not a political correctness gone mad rant but that is where the money is going. Could the budget used for developing and writing that not have been used to "check signage".
The budget line for "checking signage" would probably be a manager. Politicians keep cutting NHS managers, who get described as "pen pushers". Yet NHS managers do important jobs.
The problem in a nutshell. If you walk into work and there is a crisp packet on the floor do you wait for the person responsible for picking up crisp packets to come along. No. You pick it up or ask for the cleaners to go over the area.
The NHS is full of people who walk past the crisp packet because it isn't their job to pick up crisp packets and meanwhile the place is full to brimming with rubbish. And they don't care enough either to pick the damn thing up or to ask the cleaners to do so.
And Cheese & Onion if you're wondering.
You've got a long patient list, you've just been bleeped, you're already behind on your paperwork.... what do you do? You need to give people capacity.
Managers for checking signage?
Counter proposal - NHS Armed Response Unit. Heavily armed, with the right to shoot to kill. They pick up all the empty crisp packets, change lightbulbs and fix the signage. Anyone interferes, they get the Mozambique Drill, then the team takes the body downstairs to recycle as blood, organs and skeleton for the anatomy classes.
Leon (who seems to have disappeared ?) is fond of talking about a "Korean style armistice". Nonsense, of course, for multiple reasons, but this demonstrates the biggest single one.
US Secretary of Defense confirmed that Washington would defend South Korea by using all available weapons, including nuclear weapons, if necessary. Any nuclear attack by the DPRK against the US or its allies and partners would lead to the end of the Kim Jong Un regime. https://x.com/Hromadske/status/1851922058030256371
Unless Ukraine is in NATO, the comparison is simply absurd.
Leon has received the ban hammer a few nights back.
Don't know if it is Temp or not. It was all somewhat tetchy here at the time.
He went the full racist; Britain for the white British.
Good riddance IMO. He's entertaining, but I don't think that excuses his views.
I don't think he was saying that and, even if he was, I don't think such views should lead to a banning unless it was accompanied by incitement to violence or raw hate.
But, I have a higher spectrum of tolerance for speech (admittedly I can respond very aggressively and rudely to them but I only advocate banning where they are consistently personally abusive or nasty)
He literally said that the UK should promote/increase the number of "white babies".
Great Replacement and "14 words" are all that's left from there....
But, that's your extrapolation of what you thought he might subsequently say and mean and not what he actually said.
Just saying we should increase the number of white babies isn't an intrinsically and fundamentally unreasonable thing to say.
The implication is "increase the proportion of white babies", which is.
I have to say I am with @Casino_Royale on this (twice in one day, might have to lie down). See my earlier post.
I was one of the people arguing with @leon. He was putting a point of view that I totally disagreed with and we argued, but it was civilised. There was no abuse. He put an argument. He didn't just come out with racist abuse. His argument to my mind is racist but you have to argue against it not ban it. It is not as if he was chanting racist stuff. He was just putting an argument forward.
Now my only reservation was after the fact when @TheScreamingEagles commented upon the effect it had on him when thinking of his daughter. Something I hadn't considered being white.
Leon's comment is stupid for a whole host of reasons. Stupid, and racist.
As I asked @Andy_JS when he said the comment wasn't racist: my wife is olive-skinned. Is she 'white'? My son is pasty in winter, but tans olive in summer. Is he 'white'? My wife is a joint Turkish/British citizen. Is she 'British'? My son only has a UK passport. Is he 'British'?
People who throw around this sort of stuff are either totally thick, racist, or both.
For many of us, this sort of talk matters, as it means loved ones are not seen as being equal, for dint of skin colour or whatever.
I agree, which is why I argued with him and I wanted the right to argue with him.
What I hadn't appreciated, as you can see from my comment about @TheScreamingEagles, was the difference between me arguing with him, but not being hurt because I am white, and others that are hurt by the comments.
If we can step back from the race element then the question of culture is, to me, more important. Do the inhabitants of a village, town, city, county, country have a right to want to maintain their culture? (If that is a reasonable thing, and of course will mean different things to different people). We see when you have immigration from cultures similar to the 'host' country that there are fewer problems with integration etc. What are the rights of the existing population?
Since moving to Yorkshire I have tried to fit in to the local culture by avoiding buying my round.
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
Just use your phone/watch to pay – there's no limit to contactless that I have ever encountered.
I don't have watch and don't use my phone to pay for anything.
Is there a reason why not? Its incredibly convenient and more secure and means I haven't had to carry my wallet with me for years.
Also helpful if you use loyalty cards (I know some do not) as you can keep them in the same wallet app so I can easily swipe between which cards I have to the one of the shop I'm in, and choose which card I'm paying with at the same time.
It really is crackers how pointlessly old-school some PBers are. I imagine many of them in grey cardigans and driving gloves, with little leather purses in which they keep their 'pound coins'.
I rarely use cash these days, but I do sort of miss it because I have this beautiful "dragons egg" to hold my coins in. If cash had much of a future I'd be keen to scrap the lower denomination notes and replace them with fancy new coins to get more use out of such a wonderful tactile object.
Leon (who seems to have disappeared ?) is fond of talking about a "Korean style armistice". Nonsense, of course, for multiple reasons, but this demonstrates the biggest single one.
US Secretary of Defense confirmed that Washington would defend South Korea by using all available weapons, including nuclear weapons, if necessary. Any nuclear attack by the DPRK against the US or its allies and partners would lead to the end of the Kim Jong Un regime. https://x.com/Hromadske/status/1851922058030256371
Unless Ukraine is in NATO, the comparison is simply absurd.
Leon has received the ban hammer a few nights back.
Don't know if it is Temp or not. It was all somewhat tetchy here at the time.
He went the full racist; Britain for the white British.
Good riddance IMO. He's entertaining, but I don't think that excuses his views.
I don't think he was saying that and, even if he was, I don't think such views should lead to a banning unless it was accompanied by incitement to violence or raw hate.
But, I have a higher spectrum of tolerance for speech (admittedly I can respond very aggressively and rudely to them but I only advocate banning where they are consistently personally abusive or nasty)
He literally said that the UK should promote/increase the number of "white babies".
Great Replacement and "14 words" are all that's left from there....
But, that's your extrapolation of what you thought he might subsequently say and mean and not what he actually said.
Just saying we should increase the number of white babies isn't an intrinsically and fundamentally unreasonable thing to say.
The implication is "increase the proportion of white babies", which is.
I have to say I am with @Casino_Royale on this (twice in one day, might have to lie down). See my earlier post.
I was one of the people arguing with @leon. He was putting a point of view that I totally disagreed with and we argued, but it was civilised. There was no abuse. He put an argument. He didn't just come out with racist abuse. His argument to my mind is racist but you have to argue against it not ban it. It is not as if he was chanting racist stuff. He was just putting an argument forward.
Now my only reservation was after the fact when @TheScreamingEagles commented upon the effect it had on him when thinking of his daughter. Something I hadn't considered being white.
Leon's comment is stupid for a whole host of reasons. Stupid, and racist.
As I asked @Andy_JS when he said the comment wasn't racist: my wife is olive-skinned. Is she 'white'? My son is pasty in winter, but tans olive in summer. Is he 'white'? My wife is a joint Turkish/British citizen. Is she 'British'? My son only has a UK passport. Is he 'British'?
People who throw around this sort of stuff are either totally thick, racist, or both.
For many of us, this sort of talk matters, as it means loved ones are not seen as being equal, for dint of skin colour or whatever.
I agree, which is why I argued with him and I wanted the right to argue with him.
What I hadn't appreciated, as you can see from my comment about @TheScreamingEagles, was the difference between me arguing with him, but not being hurt because I am white, and others that are hurt by the comments.
If we can step back from the race element then the question of culture is, to me, more important. Do the inhabitants of a village, town, city, county, country have a right to want to maintain their culture? (If that is a reasonable thing, and of course will mean different things to different people). We see when you have immigration from cultures similar to the 'host' country that there are fewer problems with integration etc. What are the rights of the existing population?
Since moving to Yorkshire I have tried to fit in to the local culture by avoiding buying my round.
I presume you have also become an expert in ensuring that everybody knows you have had a harder upbringing than anybody else....
Leon (who seems to have disappeared ?) is fond of talking about a "Korean style armistice". Nonsense, of course, for multiple reasons, but this demonstrates the biggest single one.
US Secretary of Defense confirmed that Washington would defend South Korea by using all available weapons, including nuclear weapons, if necessary. Any nuclear attack by the DPRK against the US or its allies and partners would lead to the end of the Kim Jong Un regime. https://x.com/Hromadske/status/1851922058030256371
Unless Ukraine is in NATO, the comparison is simply absurd.
Leon has received the ban hammer a few nights back.
Don't know if it is Temp or not. It was all somewhat tetchy here at the time.
He went the full racist; Britain for the white British.
Good riddance IMO. He's entertaining, but I don't think that excuses his views.
I don't think he was saying that and, even if he was, I don't think such views should lead to a banning unless it was accompanied by incitement to violence or raw hate.
But, I have a higher spectrum of tolerance for speech (admittedly I can respond very aggressively and rudely to them but I only advocate banning where they are consistently personally abusive or nasty)
He literally said that the UK should promote/increase the number of "white babies".
Great Replacement and "14 words" are all that's left from there....
But, that's your extrapolation of what you thought he might subsequently say and mean and not what he actually said.
Just saying we should increase the number of white babies isn't an intrinsically and fundamentally unreasonable thing to say.
The implication is "increase the proportion of white babies", which is.
I have to say I am with @Casino_Royale on this (twice in one day, might have to lie down). See my earlier post.
I was one of the people arguing with @leon. He was putting a point of view that I totally disagreed with and we argued, but it was civilised. There was no abuse. He put an argument. He didn't just come out with racist abuse. His argument to my mind is racist but you have to argue against it not ban it. It is not as if he was chanting racist stuff. He was just putting an argument forward.
Now my only reservation was after the fact when @TheScreamingEagles commented upon the effect it had on him when thinking of his daughter. Something I hadn't considered being white.
Leon's comment is stupid for a whole host of reasons. Stupid, and racist.
As I asked @Andy_JS when he said the comment wasn't racist: my wife is olive-skinned. Is she 'white'? My son is pasty in winter, but tans olive in summer. Is he 'white'? My wife is a joint Turkish/British citizen. Is she 'British'? My son only has a UK passport. Is he 'British'?
People who throw around this sort of stuff are either totally thick, racist, or both.
For many of us, this sort of talk matters, as it means loved ones are not seen as being equal, for dint of skin colour or whatever.
I agree, which is why I argued with him and I wanted the right to argue with him.
What I hadn't appreciated, as you can see from my comment about @TheScreamingEagles, was the difference between me arguing with him, but not being hurt because I am white, and others that are hurt by the comments.
If we can step back from the race element then the question of culture is, to me, more important. Do the inhabitants of a village, town, city, county, country have a right to want to maintain their culture? (If that is a reasonable thing, and of course will mean different things to different people). We see when you have immigration from cultures similar to the 'host' country that there are fewer problems with integration etc. What are the rights of the existing population?
Since moving to Yorkshire I have tried to fit in to the local culture by avoiding buying my round.
Deep pockets. Very hard to reach the coins at the bottom.
Leon (who seems to have disappeared ?) is fond of talking about a "Korean style armistice". Nonsense, of course, for multiple reasons, but this demonstrates the biggest single one.
US Secretary of Defense confirmed that Washington would defend South Korea by using all available weapons, including nuclear weapons, if necessary. Any nuclear attack by the DPRK against the US or its allies and partners would lead to the end of the Kim Jong Un regime. https://x.com/Hromadske/status/1851922058030256371
Unless Ukraine is in NATO, the comparison is simply absurd.
Leon has received the ban hammer a few nights back.
Don't know if it is Temp or not. It was all somewhat tetchy here at the time.
He went the full racist; Britain for the white British.
Good riddance IMO. He's entertaining, but I don't think that excuses his views.
I don't think he was saying that and, even if he was, I don't think such views should lead to a banning unless it was accompanied by incitement to violence or raw hate.
But, I have a higher spectrum of tolerance for speech (admittedly I can respond very aggressively and rudely to them but I only advocate banning where they are consistently personally abusive or nasty)
He literally said that the UK should promote/increase the number of "white babies".
Great Replacement and "14 words" are all that's left from there....
But, that's your extrapolation of what you thought he might subsequently say and mean and not what he actually said.
Just saying we should increase the number of white babies isn't an intrinsically and fundamentally unreasonable thing to say.
The implication is "increase the proportion of white babies", which is.
I have to say I am with @Casino_Royale on this (twice in one day, might have to lie down). See my earlier post.
I was one of the people arguing with @leon. He was putting a point of view that I totally disagreed with and we argued, but it was civilised. There was no abuse. He put an argument. He didn't just come out with racist abuse. His argument to my mind is racist but you have to argue against it not ban it. It is not as if he was chanting racist stuff. He was just putting an argument forward.
Now my only reservation was after the fact when @TheScreamingEagles commented upon the effect it had on him when thinking of his daughter. Something I hadn't considered being white.
Leon's comment is stupid for a whole host of reasons. Stupid, and racist.
As I asked @Andy_JS when he said the comment wasn't racist: my wife is olive-skinned. Is she 'white'? My son is pasty in winter, but tans olive in summer. Is he 'white'? My wife is a joint Turkish/British citizen. Is she 'British'? My son only has a UK passport. Is he 'British'?
People who throw around this sort of stuff are either totally thick, racist, or both.
For many of us, this sort of talk matters, as it means loved ones are not seen as being equal, for dint of skin colour or whatever.
I agree, which is why I argued with him and I wanted the right to argue with him.
What I hadn't appreciated, as you can see from my comment about @TheScreamingEagles, was the difference between me arguing with him, but not being hurt because I am white, and others that are hurt by the comments.
If we can step back from the race element then the question of culture is, to me, more important. Do the inhabitants of a village, town, city, county, country have a right to want to maintain their culture? (If that is a reasonable thing, and of course will mean different things to different people). We see when you have immigration from cultures similar to the 'host' country that there are fewer problems with integration etc. What are the rights of the existing population?
Since moving to Yorkshire I have tried to fit in to the local culture by avoiding buying my round.
Just get a tailor to modify your trousers to have pockets that end at the ankles.
10y yields up by 25bp and the spread to US 10y yields has increased by 15bp, spread to France by 17bp. The UK does now have a slight risk premium on debt that we didn't have under Rishi and Hunt. So far it isn't as bad as Truss where the idiot premium was about 80bp but that didn't peak until the week after the original announcements.
I really think we're going to be facing the spectre of failed bond auctions over the next few years as the BoE continues to unwind QE and the government writes £150bn in additional debt that needs to be digested. Our debt interest bill is going to be unbearably high by the end of 2029 because we've got about £400bn in gilts to rollover from relatively low interest rates from pre-2020 that will be refinanced with at least 2pp more yield. I wouldn't be surprised if we end up paying more than £100bn per year in debt interest by the time of the next election.
It seems like the direct opposite of the Truss budget. She thought tax cuts would generate sufficient economic growth to pay for themselves. Reeves thinks that tax rises and borrowing to pay for additional public expenditure will do the same.
Truss's budget at least had a chance of releasing sufficient economic activity to lead to increased tax receipts. The CT rise that she fought and was eventually compelled to implement has resulted in businesses setting up elsewhere and I doubt it will raise any money.
I also note the negative but still somewhat muted market impact of this dreadful budget compared to Truss, even though Reeves' liabilities seem far worse than Truss's were. This lends further credence to the theory that the market turbulence then was due in no small part to the Bank's bond selloff announced the previous day, which Max furiously denied at the time, but now seems tacitly to acknowledge. Their programme has conveniently slowed under the new Labour Government.
On the budget, it seems that there's a trade off between higher personal living standards and better public services - because we can't afford both given the dire state of public finances. I would happily accept my disposable income being pretty static over the next five years if, at the same time, my life was made better and easier by a significantly improved public realm including, but by no means confined to, the NHS. I think that's what Labour is aiming for.
What happened to the growth agenda....ultimately without growth the problem is never solved, the pain is just delayed.
It is quite impressive they are borrowing masses of money to fund infrastructure, but making growth worse....that is the opposite of what is supposed to happen by such a policy.
It will take more than 5 years for there to be sufficient growth to enable both higher personal living standards and improved public services. That's why Labour's plan is really a 10-year plan rather than a 5-year plan. They'll reap the benefits in the second term, provided they can secure enough progress to win in 2029.
If that is the case, the front loading of all the spending is really stupid. Going famine to feast to famine, in a two year cycle, will lead to negative spending decisions as its leads to use it or lose it mentality, just like is a start-up is given far too much early round funding.
If they are really in for the long term, you spread this money over the 5 years, carefully plan and enact reform along side.
Blowing that much cash (which isn't quite a one off opportunity but something close to it) on stuff which isn't really going to do anything for economic growth, while raising expectations of everyone who depends on government services, is the absolute opposite of long term planning. This was a popular budget with quite a lot of Labour supporters. They are likely to be severely disappointed over the next four or five years.
It's not (yet) a disaster, and I still cling to the hope that they will introduce some genuinely pro-growth policies, but I do not have a good feeling about the UK's prospects at the moment.
Leon (who seems to have disappeared ?) is fond of talking about a "Korean style armistice". Nonsense, of course, for multiple reasons, but this demonstrates the biggest single one.
US Secretary of Defense confirmed that Washington would defend South Korea by using all available weapons, including nuclear weapons, if necessary. Any nuclear attack by the DPRK against the US or its allies and partners would lead to the end of the Kim Jong Un regime. https://x.com/Hromadske/status/1851922058030256371
Unless Ukraine is in NATO, the comparison is simply absurd.
Leon has received the ban hammer a few nights back.
Don't know if it is Temp or not. It was all somewhat tetchy here at the time.
He went the full racist; Britain for the white British.
Good riddance IMO. He's entertaining, but I don't think that excuses his views.
I don't think he was saying that and, even if he was, I don't think such views should lead to a banning unless it was accompanied by incitement to violence or raw hate.
But, I have a higher spectrum of tolerance for speech (admittedly I can respond very aggressively and rudely to them but I only advocate banning where they are consistently personally abusive or nasty)
He literally said that the UK should promote/increase the number of "white babies".
Great Replacement and "14 words" are all that's left from there....
But, that's your extrapolation of what you thought he might subsequently say and mean and not what he actually said.
Just saying we should increase the number of white babies isn't an intrinsically and fundamentally unreasonable thing to say.
The implication is "increase the proportion of white babies", which is.
I have to say I am with @Casino_Royale on this (twice in one day, might have to lie down). See my earlier post.
I was one of the people arguing with @leon. He was putting a point of view that I totally disagreed with and we argued, but it was civilised. There was no abuse. He put an argument. He didn't just come out with racist abuse. His argument to my mind is racist but you have to argue against it not ban it. It is not as if he was chanting racist stuff. He was just putting an argument forward.
Now my only reservation was after the fact when @TheScreamingEagles commented upon the effect it had on him when thinking of his daughter. Something I hadn't considered being white.
Leon's comment is stupid for a whole host of reasons. Stupid, and racist.
As I asked @Andy_JS when he said the comment wasn't racist: my wife is olive-skinned. Is she 'white'? My son is pasty in winter, but tans olive in summer. Is he 'white'? My wife is a joint Turkish/British citizen. Is she 'British'? My son only has a UK passport. Is he 'British'?
People who throw around this sort of stuff are either totally thick, racist, or both.
For many of us, this sort of talk matters, as it means loved ones are not seen as being equal, for dint of skin colour or whatever.
I agree, which is why I argued with him and I wanted the right to argue with him.
What I hadn't appreciated, as you can see from my comment about @TheScreamingEagles, was the difference between me arguing with him, but not being hurt because I am white, and others that are hurt by the comments.
I wasn't 'hurt' by his comment, but it is the sort of comment that needs forcibly arguing against. Because the moment it becomes acceptable, we have lost something important.
Mrs J has been in this country for several decades. In that time, she has had no racist comments made against her. That is something to feel proud about our country. In contrast, in our first night on a trip through Germany, she was racially abused by a group of (white) German men.
Then again, she fits in: her spoken English is better than mine, and she dresses in a western style and has a well=paid job. She is a very non-immigranty immigrant, if you know what I mean.
A Spanish friend, married to Ghanian, thinks that London is the least problematic place for them. In Spain, he hears stuff all the time - very often they assume that he must be a foreigner and say stuff in Spanish.
In my friend"s experience, the UK and Holland are best in Europe for Black people.
Southern Europe is bad , and Eastern Europe the least tolerant.
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
I say yes. Wouldn't everyone?
A friend helps you move. A *real* friend helps you move a body…..
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
Just use your phone/watch to pay – there's no limit to contactless that I have ever encountered.
I don't have watch and don't use my phone to pay for anything.
Is there a reason why not? Its incredibly convenient and more secure and means I haven't had to carry my wallet with me for years.
Also helpful if you use loyalty cards (I know some do not) as you can keep them in the same wallet app so I can easily swipe between which cards I have to the one of the shop I'm in, and choose which card I'm paying with at the same time.
It really is crackers how pointlessly old-school some PBers are. I imagine many of them in grey cardigans and driving gloves, with little leather purses in which they keep their 'pound coins'.
I rarely use cash these days, but I do sort of miss it because I have this beautiful "dragons egg" to hold my coins in. If cash had much of a future I'd be keen to scrap the lower denomination notes and replace them with fancy new coins to get more use out of such a wonderful tactile object.
What exactly is that? I don't mean to be rude if it's genuinely something you treasure!
10y yields up by 25bp and the spread to US 10y yields has increased by 15bp, spread to France by 17bp. The UK does now have a slight risk premium on debt that we didn't have under Rishi and Hunt. So far it isn't as bad as Truss where the idiot premium was about 80bp but that didn't peak until the week after the original announcements.
I really think we're going to be facing the spectre of failed bond auctions over the next few years as the BoE continues to unwind QE and the government writes £150bn in additional debt that needs to be digested. Our debt interest bill is going to be unbearably high by the end of 2029 because we've got about £400bn in gilts to rollover from relatively low interest rates from pre-2020 that will be refinanced with at least 2pp more yield. I wouldn't be surprised if we end up paying more than £100bn per year in debt interest by the time of the next election.
I thought debt interest was already over £100bn pa. Budget documents have it forecast to be 3.6% of GDP throughout or £126bn in 2025-26.
Anyone want to look up how much debt interest Britain was paying in 2009-10?
Leon (who seems to have disappeared ?) is fond of talking about a "Korean style armistice". Nonsense, of course, for multiple reasons, but this demonstrates the biggest single one.
US Secretary of Defense confirmed that Washington would defend South Korea by using all available weapons, including nuclear weapons, if necessary. Any nuclear attack by the DPRK against the US or its allies and partners would lead to the end of the Kim Jong Un regime. https://x.com/Hromadske/status/1851922058030256371
Unless Ukraine is in NATO, the comparison is simply absurd.
Leon has received the ban hammer a few nights back.
Don't know if it is Temp or not. It was all somewhat tetchy here at the time.
He went the full racist; Britain for the white British.
Good riddance IMO. He's entertaining, but I don't think that excuses his views.
I don't think he was saying that and, even if he was, I don't think such views should lead to a banning unless it was accompanied by incitement to violence or raw hate.
But, I have a higher spectrum of tolerance for speech (admittedly I can respond very aggressively and rudely to them but I only advocate banning where they are consistently personally abusive or nasty)
He literally said that the UK should promote/increase the number of "white babies".
Great Replacement and "14 words" are all that's left from there....
But, that's your extrapolation of what you thought he might subsequently say and mean and not what he actually said.
Just saying we should increase the number of white babies isn't an intrinsically and fundamentally unreasonable thing to say.
The implication is "increase the proportion of white babies", which is.
I have to say I am with @Casino_Royale on this (twice in one day, might have to lie down). See my earlier post.
I was one of the people arguing with @leon. He was putting a point of view that I totally disagreed with and we argued, but it was civilised. There was no abuse. He put an argument. He didn't just come out with racist abuse. His argument to my mind is racist but you have to argue against it not ban it. It is not as if he was chanting racist stuff. He was just putting an argument forward.
Now my only reservation was after the fact when @TheScreamingEagles commented upon the effect it had on him when thinking of his daughter. Something I hadn't considered being white.
Leon's comment is stupid for a whole host of reasons. Stupid, and racist.
As I asked @Andy_JS when he said the comment wasn't racist: my wife is olive-skinned. Is she 'white'? My son is pasty in winter, but tans olive in summer. Is he 'white'? My wife is a joint Turkish/British citizen. Is she 'British'? My son only has a UK passport. Is he 'British'?
People who throw around this sort of stuff are either totally thick, racist, or both.
For many of us, this sort of talk matters, as it means loved ones are not seen as being equal, for dint of skin colour or whatever.
I agree, which is why I argued with him and I wanted the right to argue with him.
What I hadn't appreciated, as you can see from my comment about @TheScreamingEagles, was the difference between me arguing with him, but not being hurt because I am white, and others that are hurt by the comments.
If we can step back from the race element then the question of culture is, to me, more important. Do the inhabitants of a village, town, city, county, country have a right to want to maintain their culture? (If that is a reasonable thing, and of course will mean different things to different people). We see when you have immigration from cultures similar to the 'host' country that there are fewer problems with integration etc. What are the rights of the existing population?
That's a good question.
I'd make two points:
*) Culture changes. Someone from a hundred years ago would be astounded and/or shocked by the culture seen in Britain today - and not all of it because of immigration. I'd argue most of these culture changes have been positive. That does not mean changes cannot be regressive, which is why I prefer to think of 'values'. What values do we, as a country, believe in? As an example, sexual equality. Culture changes that embrace those values are welcome. Ones that do not embrace them are less so.
*) Culture means different things to different people. As with the 'Fremen' comment below (who I think mainly seem to be white), British culture is hard to define. For many, it is cricket on a Sunday afternoon on the village green. Not for me though, and someone who has arrived in the country from India or Pakistan in the last decade might fit much more in with that 'culture'.
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
I say yes. Wouldn't everyone?
Depends if you have fifty quid going spare. If not get Lord Alli to buy her some knickers
Leon (who seems to have disappeared ?) is fond of talking about a "Korean style armistice". Nonsense, of course, for multiple reasons, but this demonstrates the biggest single one.
US Secretary of Defense confirmed that Washington would defend South Korea by using all available weapons, including nuclear weapons, if necessary. Any nuclear attack by the DPRK against the US or its allies and partners would lead to the end of the Kim Jong Un regime. https://x.com/Hromadske/status/1851922058030256371
Unless Ukraine is in NATO, the comparison is simply absurd.
Leon has received the ban hammer a few nights back.
Don't know if it is Temp or not. It was all somewhat tetchy here at the time.
He went the full racist; Britain for the white British.
Good riddance IMO. He's entertaining, but I don't think that excuses his views.
I don't think he was saying that and, even if he was, I don't think such views should lead to a banning unless it was accompanied by incitement to violence or raw hate.
But, I have a higher spectrum of tolerance for speech (admittedly I can respond very aggressively and rudely to them but I only advocate banning where they are consistently personally abusive or nasty)
He literally said that the UK should promote/increase the number of "white babies".
Great Replacement and "14 words" are all that's left from there....
But, that's your extrapolation of what you thought he might subsequently say and mean and not what he actually said.
Just saying we should increase the number of white babies isn't an intrinsically and fundamentally unreasonable thing to say.
The implication is "increase the proportion of white babies", which is.
I have to say I am with @Casino_Royale on this (twice in one day, might have to lie down). See my earlier post.
I was one of the people arguing with @leon. He was putting a point of view that I totally disagreed with and we argued, but it was civilised. There was no abuse. He put an argument. He didn't just come out with racist abuse. His argument to my mind is racist but you have to argue against it not ban it. It is not as if he was chanting racist stuff. He was just putting an argument forward.
Now my only reservation was after the fact when @TheScreamingEagles commented upon the effect it had on him when thinking of his daughter. Something I hadn't considered being white.
Leon's comment is stupid for a whole host of reasons. Stupid, and racist.
As I asked @Andy_JS when he said the comment wasn't racist: my wife is olive-skinned. Is she 'white'? My son is pasty in winter, but tans olive in summer. Is he 'white'? My wife is a joint Turkish/British citizen. Is she 'British'? My son only has a UK passport. Is he 'British'?
People who throw around this sort of stuff are either totally thick, racist, or both.
For many of us, this sort of talk matters, as it means loved ones are not seen as being equal, for dint of skin colour or whatever.
I agree, which is why I argued with him and I wanted the right to argue with him.
What I hadn't appreciated, as you can see from my comment about @TheScreamingEagles, was the difference between me arguing with him, but not being hurt because I am white, and others that are hurt by the comments.
If we can step back from the race element then the question of culture is, to me, more important. Do the inhabitants of a village, town, city, county, country have a right to want to maintain their culture? (If that is a reasonable thing, and of course will mean different things to different people). We see when you have immigration from cultures similar to the 'host' country that there are fewer problems with integration etc. What are the rights of the existing population?
Since moving to Yorkshire I have tried to fit in to the local culture by avoiding buying my round.
By that yardstick I have a friend who's an honorary yorkshireman wherever he has lived.
IFS - "I am willing to bet a substantial sum that day-to-day public service spending will in fact increase more quickly than supposedly planned after next year. 1.3% a year overall would almost certainly mean real terms cuts for some departments. It would be odd to increase spending rapidly only to start cutting back again in subsequent years.
I’m afraid this looks like the same silly games playing as we got used to with the last lot. Pencil in implausibly low spending increases for the future in order to make the fiscal arithmetic balance. It sounds like it was hard enough to get agreement from departmental ministers to relatively generous settlements in the short term. When it comes to settling with departments for the period after 2025-26 keeping within that 1.3% envelope will be extremely challenging. To put it mildly ….
[Reeves] is meeting her borrowing target only by repeating the same silly manoeuvres as her predecessors used to make it look as if the books will balance. Let’s pretend we’ll increase fuel duties next time, but not do it this year. Let’s pretend that we’ll really rein in spending in a couple of years after splurging this year. That’s not going to happen. The spending plans will not survive contact with her cabinet colleagues."
Clifnotes - Much more tax rises ahead as we aren't getting it from growth....
Looking like the financial markets have lost their patience with this sort of game-playing. Who becomes Chancellor after the run on Sterling?
Leon (who seems to have disappeared ?) is fond of talking about a "Korean style armistice". Nonsense, of course, for multiple reasons, but this demonstrates the biggest single one.
US Secretary of Defense confirmed that Washington would defend South Korea by using all available weapons, including nuclear weapons, if necessary. Any nuclear attack by the DPRK against the US or its allies and partners would lead to the end of the Kim Jong Un regime. https://x.com/Hromadske/status/1851922058030256371
Unless Ukraine is in NATO, the comparison is simply absurd.
It would require a nuclear guarantee from the UK and France. Not enough nukes to defeat Russia in an all out war, but enough for MAD.
But Europe definitely needs to get its act together, and part of that is by excluding, or threatening to exclude, bad actors like Hungary or Slovakia under Fico from NATO and the security apparatus of the EU as well as taking away their veto over economic sanctions. The US is going to become semi-detached from NATO even if Harris wins, and potentially actively hostile if Trump does - only mutual hostility to China would remain as common cause, and NATO is not the main geographical player in that theatre.
Any thoughts on simple investment strategies for a Trump win that could hedge against global trade wars?
Buy gold is the traditional one.
Though others are already doing so.
Physical gold and Bitcoin. And have a nice watch as you can use it to secure passage in difficult circumstances - need to get through a checkpoint, hand over the nice watch. I believe US special forces dropped behind enemy lines have been kitted out with rolexes for precisely that reason.
I know you're not a fan of bitcoin, but it's a heck of a lot easier to transfer your wealth out of a country fast on a USB stick or even using a brain wallet than it is to walk across a border with a suitcase full of gold bars. Many Ukrainians arriving in the UK couldn't access their banks but brought crypto with them on memory sticks. Worth keeping a few grand that way, just in case.
Gold is of course a better hedge, but less fungible.
Oh wait, OP said *trade* wars.
Well, if history repeats itself, the real wars will be following soon after.
I consider my real wealth to be what I can get out of the country fast, carrying nothing more than a duffel bag. Everything else is just numbers on a page.
History has proven time and time again that in hard times, everything else can and will be confiscated. Anyone investing in gold would do well to remember Executive Order 6102.
10y yields up by 25bp and the spread to US 10y yields has increased by 15bp, spread to France by 17bp. The UK does now have a slight risk premium on debt that we didn't have under Rishi and Hunt. So far it isn't as bad as Truss where the idiot premium was about 80bp but that didn't peak until the week after the original announcements.
I really think we're going to be facing the spectre of failed bond auctions over the next few years as the BoE continues to unwind QE and the government writes £150bn in additional debt that needs to be digested. Our debt interest bill is going to be unbearably high by the end of 2029 because we've got about £400bn in gilts to rollover from relatively low interest rates from pre-2020 that will be refinanced with at least 2pp more yield. I wouldn't be surprised if we end up paying more than £100bn per year in debt interest by the time of the next election.
I thought debt interest was already over £100bn pa. Budget documents have it forecast to be 3.6% of GDP throughout or £126bn in 2025-26.
Anyone want to look up how much debt interest Britain was paying in 2009-10?
All these are international bond movements are a concern.
Concerns over the U.S. election and unpredictable intentional events ?
Or even, international events.
Autocorrect is a menace to respectable, law-abiding people everywhere.
If I was an international bond market, I'd be shitting myself over the possibility of a Trump win and the possible utter economic chaos that would follow. Musk agreed with the contention that "markets will tumble" in response to his/Trump's plans, and said they would cause "temporary hardship".
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Have you ever lost your phone or had it run out of battery?
Never since I have started using it to pay – which is years ago. These days I use my watch anyway, so have two ways of paying. Cards are absolutely pointless clutter. Believe you me.
(By the way I noted your reply to @BartholomewRoberts – you do realise that setting up Apple Pay takes... two minutes?)
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
Just use your phone/watch to pay – there's no limit to contactless that I have ever encountered.
I don't have watch and don't use my phone to pay for anything.
Is there a reason why not? Its incredibly convenient and more secure and means I haven't had to carry my wallet with me for years.
Also helpful if you use loyalty cards (I know some do not) as you can keep them in the same wallet app so I can easily swipe between which cards I have to the one of the shop I'm in, and choose which card I'm paying with at the same time.
It really is crackers how pointlessly old-school some PBers are. I imagine many of them in grey cardigans and driving gloves, with little leather purses in which they keep their 'pound coins'.
I rarely use cash these days, but I do sort of miss it because I have this beautiful "dragons egg" to hold my coins in. If cash had much of a future I'd be keen to scrap the lower denomination notes and replace them with fancy new coins to get more use out of such a wonderful tactile object.
What exactly is that? I don't mean to be rude if it's genuinely something you treasure!
It's a "purse", a prehistoric means of carrying ancient shards of metal, once quite unbelievably used as a medium of exchange
10y yields up by 25bp and the spread to US 10y yields has increased by 15bp, spread to France by 17bp. The UK does now have a slight risk premium on debt that we didn't have under Rishi and Hunt. So far it isn't as bad as Truss where the idiot premium was about 80bp but that didn't peak until the week after the original announcements.
I really think we're going to be facing the spectre of failed bond auctions over the next few years as the BoE continues to unwind QE and the government writes £150bn in additional debt that needs to be digested. Our debt interest bill is going to be unbearably high by the end of 2029 because we've got about £400bn in gilts to rollover from relatively low interest rates from pre-2020 that will be refinanced with at least 2pp more yield. I wouldn't be surprised if we end up paying more than £100bn per year in debt interest by the time of the next election.
It seems like the direct opposite of the Truss budget. She thought tax cuts would generate sufficient economic growth to pay for themselves. Reeves thinks that tax rises and borrowing to pay for additional public expenditure will do the same.
FFS you can't compare yields on an unhedged basis that's just total financial illiteracy - fully hedged to EUR 10y gilts yield 2.75% and into USD 4.34% ....and btw 50y debt yields less than30y due to convexity - nothing to do with liquidity.
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
I say yes. Wouldn't everyone?
Indeed, but everyone else usually has £50 in their wallet when in the pub on payday.
Leon (who seems to have disappeared ?) is fond of talking about a "Korean style armistice". Nonsense, of course, for multiple reasons, but this demonstrates the biggest single one.
US Secretary of Defense confirmed that Washington would defend South Korea by using all available weapons, including nuclear weapons, if necessary. Any nuclear attack by the DPRK against the US or its allies and partners would lead to the end of the Kim Jong Un regime. https://x.com/Hromadske/status/1851922058030256371
Unless Ukraine is in NATO, the comparison is simply absurd.
Leon has received the ban hammer a few nights back.
Don't know if it is Temp or not. It was all somewhat tetchy here at the time.
He went the full racist; Britain for the white British.
Good riddance IMO. He's entertaining, but I don't think that excuses his views.
I don't think he was saying that and, even if he was, I don't think such views should lead to a banning unless it was accompanied by incitement to violence or raw hate.
But, I have a higher spectrum of tolerance for speech (admittedly I can respond very aggressively and rudely to them but I only advocate banning where they are consistently personally abusive or nasty)
He literally said that the UK should promote/increase the number of "white babies".
Great Replacement and "14 words" are all that's left from there....
But, that's your extrapolation of what you thought he might subsequently say and mean and not what he actually said.
Just saying we should increase the number of white babies isn't an intrinsically and fundamentally unreasonable thing to say.
The implication is "increase the proportion of white babies", which is.
I have to say I am with @Casino_Royale on this (twice in one day, might have to lie down). See my earlier post.
I was one of the people arguing with @leon. He was putting a point of view that I totally disagreed with and we argued, but it was civilised. There was no abuse. He put an argument. He didn't just come out with racist abuse. His argument to my mind is racist but you have to argue against it not ban it. It is not as if he was chanting racist stuff. He was just putting an argument forward.
Now my only reservation was after the fact when @TheScreamingEagles commented upon the effect it had on him when thinking of his daughter. Something I hadn't considered being white.
Leon's comment is stupid for a whole host of reasons. Stupid, and racist.
As I asked @Andy_JS when he said the comment wasn't racist: my wife is olive-skinned. Is she 'white'? My son is pasty in winter, but tans olive in summer. Is he 'white'? My wife is a joint Turkish/British citizen. Is she 'British'? My son only has a UK passport. Is he 'British'?
People who throw around this sort of stuff are either totally thick, racist, or both.
For many of us, this sort of talk matters, as it means loved ones are not seen as being equal, for dint of skin colour or whatever.
I agree, which is why I argued with him and I wanted the right to argue with him.
What I hadn't appreciated, as you can see from my comment about @TheScreamingEagles, was the difference between me arguing with him, but not being hurt because I am white, and others that are hurt by the comments.
If we can step back from the race element then the question of culture is, to me, more important. Do the inhabitants of a village, town, city, county, country have a right to want to maintain their culture? (If that is a reasonable thing, and of course will mean different things to different people). We see when you have immigration from cultures similar to the 'host' country that there are fewer problems with integration etc. What are the rights of the existing population?
Since moving to Yorkshire I have tried to fit in to the local culture by avoiding buying my round.
I presume you have also become an expert in ensuring that everybody knows you have had a harder upbringing than anybody else....
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
Just use your phone/watch to pay – there's no limit to contactless that I have ever encountered.
I don't have watch and don't use my phone to pay for anything.
Is there a reason why not? Its incredibly convenient and more secure and means I haven't had to carry my wallet with me for years.
Also helpful if you use loyalty cards (I know some do not) as you can keep them in the same wallet app so I can easily swipe between which cards I have to the one of the shop I'm in, and choose which card I'm paying with at the same time.
It really is crackers how pointlessly old-school some PBers are. I imagine many of them in grey cardigans and driving gloves, with little leather purses in which they keep their 'pound coins'.
I rarely use cash these days, but I do sort of miss it because I have this beautiful "dragons egg" to hold my coins in. If cash had much of a future I'd be keen to scrap the lower denomination notes and replace them with fancy new coins to get more use out of such a wonderful tactile object.
What exactly is that? I don't mean to be rude if it's genuinely something you treasure!
It's a "purse", a prehistoric means of carrying ancient shards of metal, once quite unbelievably used as a medium of exchange
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
I say yes. Wouldn't everyone?
Indeed, but everyone else usually has £50 in their wallet when in the pub on payday.
Nope. I'd guess that people carrying that amount of cash on any day are in the minority now. And it takes about 80 seconds to digitally transfer the £50 to the mate with the birthday-girl wife, so what is the point of lugging around daft pieces of plastic?
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
I say yes. Wouldn't everyone?
Indeed, but everyone else usually has £50 in their wallet when in the pub on payday.
Nope. I'd guess that people carrying that amount of cash on any day are in the minority now. And it takes about 80 seconds to digitally transfer the £50 to the mate with the birthday-girl wife, so what is the point of lugging around daft pieces of plastic?
What’s the method of transfer? Genuinely interested in how this works, as I’m sitting in the pub with a wallet full of c**h.
Leon (who seems to have disappeared ?) is fond of talking about a "Korean style armistice". Nonsense, of course, for multiple reasons, but this demonstrates the biggest single one.
US Secretary of Defense confirmed that Washington would defend South Korea by using all available weapons, including nuclear weapons, if necessary. Any nuclear attack by the DPRK against the US or its allies and partners would lead to the end of the Kim Jong Un regime. https://x.com/Hromadske/status/1851922058030256371
Unless Ukraine is in NATO, the comparison is simply absurd.
Leon has received the ban hammer a few nights back.
Don't know if it is Temp or not. It was all somewhat tetchy here at the time.
He went the full racist; Britain for the white British.
Good riddance IMO. He's entertaining, but I don't think that excuses his views.
I don't think he was saying that and, even if he was, I don't think such views should lead to a banning unless it was accompanied by incitement to violence or raw hate.
But, I have a higher spectrum of tolerance for speech (admittedly I can respond very aggressively and rudely to them but I only advocate banning where they are consistently personally abusive or nasty)
He literally said that the UK should promote/increase the number of "white babies".
Great Replacement and "14 words" are all that's left from there....
But, that's your extrapolation of what you thought he might subsequently say and mean and not what he actually said.
Just saying we should increase the number of white babies isn't an intrinsically and fundamentally unreasonable thing to say.
The implication is "increase the proportion of white babies", which is.
I have to say I am with @Casino_Royale on this (twice in one day, might have to lie down). See my earlier post.
I was one of the people arguing with @leon. He was putting a point of view that I totally disagreed with and we argued, but it was civilised. There was no abuse. He put an argument. He didn't just come out with racist abuse. His argument to my mind is racist but you have to argue against it not ban it. It is not as if he was chanting racist stuff. He was just putting an argument forward.
Now my only reservation was after the fact when @TheScreamingEagles commented upon the effect it had on him when thinking of his daughter. Something I hadn't considered being white.
Leon's comment is stupid for a whole host of reasons. Stupid, and racist.
As I asked @Andy_JS when he said the comment wasn't racist: my wife is olive-skinned. Is she 'white'? My son is pasty in winter, but tans olive in summer. Is he 'white'? My wife is a joint Turkish/British citizen. Is she 'British'? My son only has a UK passport. Is he 'British'?
People who throw around this sort of stuff are either totally thick, racist, or both.
For many of us, this sort of talk matters, as it means loved ones are not seen as being equal, for dint of skin colour or whatever.
I agree, which is why I argued with him and I wanted the right to argue with him.
What I hadn't appreciated, as you can see from my comment about @TheScreamingEagles, was the difference between me arguing with him, but not being hurt because I am white, and others that are hurt by the comments.
If we can step back from the race element then the question of culture is, to me, more important. Do the inhabitants of a village, town, city, county, country have a right to want to maintain their culture? (If that is a reasonable thing, and of course will mean different things to different people). We see when you have immigration from cultures similar to the 'host' country that there are fewer problems with integration etc. What are the rights of the existing population?
Since moving to Yorkshire I have tried to fit in to the local culture by avoiding buying my round.
I presume you have also become an expert in ensuring that everybody knows you have had a harder upbringing than anybody else....
Clearly I was underprivileged by not being brought up in Yorkshire!
IFS - "I am willing to bet a substantial sum that day-to-day public service spending will in fact increase more quickly than supposedly planned after next year. 1.3% a year overall would almost certainly mean real terms cuts for some departments. It would be odd to increase spending rapidly only to start cutting back again in subsequent years.
I’m afraid this looks like the same silly games playing as we got used to with the last lot. Pencil in implausibly low spending increases for the future in order to make the fiscal arithmetic balance. It sounds like it was hard enough to get agreement from departmental ministers to relatively generous settlements in the short term. When it comes to settling with departments for the period after 2025-26 keeping within that 1.3% envelope will be extremely challenging. To put it mildly ….
[Reeves] is meeting her borrowing target only by repeating the same silly manoeuvres as her predecessors used to make it look as if the books will balance. Let’s pretend we’ll increase fuel duties next time, but not do it this year. Let’s pretend that we’ll really rein in spending in a couple of years after splurging this year. That’s not going to happen. The spending plans will not survive contact with her cabinet colleagues."
Clifnotes - Much more tax rises ahead as we aren't getting it from growth....
Looking like the financial markets have lost their patience with this sort of game-playing. Who becomes Chancellor after the run on Sterling?
Are you serious? You seem to lurch wildly from preachy and waspish to hyperbolic and hysterical daily/hourly...
Charlie Kirk is upset that Republican women may “undermine their husbands” and secretly vote for Harris while telling their husbands they voted for Trump, even though the husband “works his tail off to make sure that she can have a nice life.” https://x.com/RonFilipkowski/status/1851815354009342217
Seems to be a GOP thing. Here's the Fox News host who just married the researcher he had an affair with, while married to his first wife.
Jesse: if i found out my wife secretly voted for harris, "that's the same thing as having an affair... that violates the sanctity of our marriage... that would be D Day" https://x.com/cynicalzoomer/status/1851744214071332869
The United States really is just turning into Iran with more guns and worse food, isn't it.
Anyway before I disappear off into the ether again in the next day ir so, my US prediction is for the following states go be won by Trump in an easy EC victory for him
All of 2020 plus
Pennsylvania Michigan (Coin Toss) Wisconsin Georgia Nevada Arizona (Coin toss) Virginia (Perhaps) New Hampshire
Why New Hampshire?
Because he'll run her very close there. I think NJ might ge close enough to raise some eyebrows too
A few months ago I thought of writing an article about how modern-day issues - abortion, trans, immigration, insurrection - produced choropleths which can be used to produce bands of states, which when compared to the existing state rankings could indicate value or a flip. I abandoned it because of time issues, but one of those maps stuck in my mind because it had NH as red. It's too late to revisit but it's beginning to bug me...
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
I say yes. Wouldn't everyone?
Indeed, but everyone else usually has £50 in their wallet when in the pub on payday.
Nope. I'd guess that people carrying that amount of cash on any day are in the minority now. And it takes about 80 seconds to digitally transfer the £50 to the mate with the birthday-girl wife, so what is the point of lugging around daft pieces of plastic?
The lady running the samosa-and-pasty stall in Ilford Shopping Centre only accepts cash or... a bank transfer!!
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
Just use your phone/watch to pay – there's no limit to contactless that I have ever encountered.
I don't have watch and don't use my phone to pay for anything.
Is there a reason why not? Its incredibly convenient and more secure and means I haven't had to carry my wallet with me for years.
Also helpful if you use loyalty cards (I know some do not) as you can keep them in the same wallet app so I can easily swipe between which cards I have to the one of the shop I'm in, and choose which card I'm paying with at the same time.
Have never yet migrated to paying by phone, but probably will at some point. I'm going to cite inertia.
Biggest risk is Single Point of Failure. When my phone was stolen last year it took me about a week to get everything back the way it should have been. As I never use my phone to pay anything and everything on it is also available online via the laptop it was an inconvenience.
If I used it for everything then I would not have been able to pay for my meal, or subsequent drinks, or get home. Card and cash in my wallet meant no problem.
Secondly I'm concerned about the security risk of having everything on my phone. I prefer to have payment methods scattered around and I have one card I never use online and one for online use only as a defence against fraud. I expect modern tech has improved a lot and I should no longer worry, but having said that my bank's security has recently changed and no longer requires 2FA on the phone.
(I did wonder why my phone was taken, it was a cheap Android and not even very new).
Leon (who seems to have disappeared ?) is fond of talking about a "Korean style armistice". Nonsense, of course, for multiple reasons, but this demonstrates the biggest single one.
US Secretary of Defense confirmed that Washington would defend South Korea by using all available weapons, including nuclear weapons, if necessary. Any nuclear attack by the DPRK against the US or its allies and partners would lead to the end of the Kim Jong Un regime. https://x.com/Hromadske/status/1851922058030256371
Unless Ukraine is in NATO, the comparison is simply absurd.
Leon has received the ban hammer a few nights back.
Don't know if it is Temp or not. It was all somewhat tetchy here at the time.
He went the full racist; Britain for the white British.
Good riddance IMO. He's entertaining, but I don't think that excuses his views.
I don't think he was saying that and, even if he was, I don't think such views should lead to a banning unless it was accompanied by incitement to violence or raw hate.
But, I have a higher spectrum of tolerance for speech (admittedly I can respond very aggressively and rudely to them but I only advocate banning where they are consistently personally abusive or nasty)
He literally said that the UK should promote/increase the number of "white babies".
Great Replacement and "14 words" are all that's left from there....
But, that's your extrapolation of what you thought he might subsequently say and mean and not what he actually said.
Just saying we should increase the number of white babies isn't an intrinsically and fundamentally unreasonable thing to say.
The implication is "increase the proportion of white babies", which is.
I have to say I am with @Casino_Royale on this (twice in one day, might have to lie down). See my earlier post.
I was one of the people arguing with @leon. He was putting a point of view that I totally disagreed with and we argued, but it was civilised. There was no abuse. He put an argument. He didn't just come out with racist abuse. His argument to my mind is racist but you have to argue against it not ban it. It is not as if he was chanting racist stuff. He was just putting an argument forward.
Now my only reservation was after the fact when @TheScreamingEagles commented upon the effect it had on him when thinking of his daughter. Something I hadn't considered being white.
Leon's comment is stupid for a whole host of reasons. Stupid, and racist.
As I asked @Andy_JS when he said the comment wasn't racist: my wife is olive-skinned. Is she 'white'? My son is pasty in winter, but tans olive in summer. Is he 'white'? My wife is a joint Turkish/British citizen. Is she 'British'? My son only has a UK passport. Is he 'British'?
People who throw around this sort of stuff are either totally thick, racist, or both.
For many of us, this sort of talk matters, as it means loved ones are not seen as being equal, for dint of skin colour or whatever.
I agree, which is why I argued with him and I wanted the right to argue with him.
What I hadn't appreciated, as you can see from my comment about @TheScreamingEagles, was the difference between me arguing with him, but not being hurt because I am white, and others that are hurt by the comments.
If we can step back from the race element then the question of culture is, to me, more important. Do the inhabitants of a village, town, city, county, country have a right to want to maintain their culture? (If that is a reasonable thing, and of course will mean different things to different people). We see when you have immigration from cultures similar to the 'host' country that there are fewer problems with integration etc. What are the rights of the existing population?
That's a good question.
I'd make two points:
*) Culture changes. Someone from a hundred years ago would be astounded and/or shocked by the culture seen in Britain today - and not all of it because of immigration. I'd argue most of these culture changes have been positive. That does not mean changes cannot be regressive, which is why I prefer to think of 'values'. What values do we, as a country, believe in? As an example, sexual equality. Culture changes that embrace those values are welcome. Ones that do not embrace them are less so.
*) Culture means different things to different people. As with the 'Fremen' comment below (who I think mainly seem to be white), British culture is hard to define. For many, it is cricket on a Sunday afternoon on the village green. Not for me though, and someone who has arrived in the country from India or Pakistan in the last decade might fit much more in with that 'culture'.
In answer to @turbotubbs I have put my reply under @JosiasJessop so as not to repeat what I agree with. I would add issues arise when change is rapid, but gradual change is not a problem. I'm 70 in a few weeks and the UK is very different to when I was young, mostly for the better. I have no problem with cultural changes and with people celebrating their cultures old and new. Both are good. I love traditional British culture, but also enjoy our imported ones.
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
I say yes. Wouldn't everyone?
Indeed, but everyone else usually has £50 in their wallet when in the pub on payday.
Nope. I'd guess that people carrying that amount of cash on any day are in the minority now. And it takes about 80 seconds to digitally transfer the £50 to the mate with the birthday-girl wife, so what is the point of lugging around daft pieces of plastic?
The lady running the samosa-and-pasty stall in Ilford Shopping Centre only accepts cash or... a bank transfer!!
Nothing wrong with BACS. My local tree nursery accepts BACS only. It takes about 80 seconds to do and he doesn't have to bother with cash tills or card machines.
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
I say yes. Wouldn't everyone?
Indeed, but everyone else usually has £50 in their wallet when in the pub on payday.
Nope. I'd guess that people carrying that amount of cash on any day are in the minority now. And it takes about 80 seconds to digitally transfer the £50 to the mate with the birthday-girl wife, so what is the point of lugging around daft pieces of plastic?
The lady running the samosa-and-pasty stall in Ilford Shopping Centre only accepts cash or... a bank transfer!!
A Chinese I use only accepts cash. Definitely everything goes through the books. Definitely.
Anyway before I disappear off into the ether again in the next day ir so, my US prediction is for the following states go be won by Trump in an easy EC victory for him
All of 2020 plus
Pennsylvania Michigan (Coin Toss) Wisconsin Georgia Nevada Arizona (Coin toss) Virginia (Perhaps) New Hampshire
Why New Hampshire?
Because he'll run her very close there. I think NJ might ge close enough to raise some eyebrows too
A few months ago I thought of writing an article about how modern-day issues - abortion, trans, immigration, insurrection - produced choropleths which can be used to produce bands of states, which when compared to the existing state rankings could indicate value or a flip. I abandoned it because of time issues, but one of those maps stuck in my mind because it had NH as red. It's too late to revisit but it's beginning to bug me...
Had to laugh at this:
High-Risk States (AR, IA, IN, MO, NE, NH, OH, SC, WV): All of these states have passed some anti-trans adult laws, but they haven't reached the same level of severity as the worst states. Missouri and West Virginia, for example, prohibit gender-affirming care for incarcerated adults as well as transgender youth…
Imagine going so far as to not fund sex changes for prisoners and children.
Leon (who seems to have disappeared ?) is fond of talking about a "Korean style armistice". Nonsense, of course, for multiple reasons, but this demonstrates the biggest single one.
US Secretary of Defense confirmed that Washington would defend South Korea by using all available weapons, including nuclear weapons, if necessary. Any nuclear attack by the DPRK against the US or its allies and partners would lead to the end of the Kim Jong Un regime. https://x.com/Hromadske/status/1851922058030256371
Unless Ukraine is in NATO, the comparison is simply absurd.
Leon has received the ban hammer a few nights back.
Don't know if it is Temp or not. It was all somewhat tetchy here at the time.
He went the full racist; Britain for the white British.
Good riddance IMO. He's entertaining, but I don't think that excuses his views.
I don't think he was saying that and, even if he was, I don't think such views should lead to a banning unless it was accompanied by incitement to violence or raw hate.
But, I have a higher spectrum of tolerance for speech (admittedly I can respond very aggressively and rudely to them but I only advocate banning where they are consistently personally abusive or nasty)
He literally said that the UK should promote/increase the number of "white babies".
Great Replacement and "14 words" are all that's left from there....
But, that's your extrapolation of what you thought he might subsequently say and mean and not what he actually said.
Just saying we should increase the number of white babies isn't an intrinsically and fundamentally unreasonable thing to say.
The implication is "increase the proportion of white babies", which is.
I have to say I am with @Casino_Royale on this (twice in one day, might have to lie down). See my earlier post.
I was one of the people arguing with @leon. He was putting a point of view that I totally disagreed with and we argued, but it was civilised. There was no abuse. He put an argument. He didn't just come out with racist abuse. His argument to my mind is racist but you have to argue against it not ban it. It is not as if he was chanting racist stuff. He was just putting an argument forward.
Now my only reservation was after the fact when @TheScreamingEagles commented upon the effect it had on him when thinking of his daughter. Something I hadn't considered being white.
Leon's comment is stupid for a whole host of reasons. Stupid, and racist.
As I asked @Andy_JS when he said the comment wasn't racist: my wife is olive-skinned. Is she 'white'? My son is pasty in winter, but tans olive in summer. Is he 'white'? My wife is a joint Turkish/British citizen. Is she 'British'? My son only has a UK passport. Is he 'British'?
People who throw around this sort of stuff are either totally thick, racist, or both.
For many of us, this sort of talk matters, as it means loved ones are not seen as being equal, for dint of skin colour or whatever.
I agree, which is why I argued with him and I wanted the right to argue with him.
What I hadn't appreciated, as you can see from my comment about @TheScreamingEagles, was the difference between me arguing with him, but not being hurt because I am white, and others that are hurt by the comments.
If we can step back from the race element then the question of culture is, to me, more important. Do the inhabitants of a village, town, city, county, country have a right to want to maintain their culture? (If that is a reasonable thing, and of course will mean different things to different people). We see when you have immigration from cultures similar to the 'host' country that there are fewer problems with integration etc. What are the rights of the existing population?
Agreed. It's increasingly hard to pin down exactly where someone is from, too. My mother was Russian-born, grew up in Danzig (Polish corridor), moved to Britain in 1937, she sounded native in all of Russian, Polish, German and English, and her outlook had elements of all four. She encountered a problem with racist German customs officials puzzled by the absence of a "resident" stamp in her passport - "she doesn't look black", said one to a colleague, perplexedly. She said something sharp in German and they retreated in confusion. She was keen to adopt the culture of the country she lived in, though - Britain, from 1937 - and declined to teach me Russian or Polish.
In her time, she was a bit unusual, but nowadays it's common. She wanted to live in Britain because it was unideological and not very nationalist, unlike the countries she'd lived in before. In unimportant ways - taste in food, for instance - she retained her past, but she accepted the British outlook wholesale (and voted Conservative till I stood for Labour), and I think it's reasonable to expect that. Countries like Britain have quite a few "native" cultures to choose from, and in general people aren't bothered how you look and where your parents were from if you broadly go with the flow of one of those cultures, especially if you're open-minded about adopting a few new elements and dropping others which are clearly dated.
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
I say yes. Wouldn't everyone?
Indeed, but everyone else usually has £50 in their wallet when in the pub on payday.
Nope. I'd guess that people carrying that amount of cash on any day are in the minority now. And it takes about 80 seconds to digitally transfer the £50 to the mate with the birthday-girl wife, so what is the point of lugging around daft pieces of plastic?
What’s the method of transfer? Genuinely interested in how this works, as I’m sitting in the pub with a wallet full of c**h.
Er, you are aware that you can make peer-to-peer instant transfers via your banking app and have been able to do so for....... years?
All these are international bond movements are a concern.
Concerns over the U.S. election and unpredictable intentional events ?
Or even, international events.
Autocorrect is a menace to respectable, law-abiding people everywhere.
If I was an international bond market, I'd be shitting myself over the possibility of a Trump win and the possible utter economic chaos that would follow. Musk agreed with the contention that "markets will tumble" in response to his/Trump's plans, and said they would cause "temporary hardship".
He was also quoted the other day as saying that people would have to accept the same "temporary hardship" in response to the "welfare system restructuring."
In his political outlook, he seems to be some sort of loony mixture of ultra-libertarian fanatic, protectionist, and ethnic nationalist. A warning from history of the perils of over-reach, from business and engineering into politics , as Boris Johnson with showbusiness.
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
I say yes. Wouldn't everyone?
A friend helps you move. A *real* friend helps you move a body…..
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
I say yes. Wouldn't everyone?
Indeed, but everyone else usually has £50 in their wallet when in the pub on payday.
Nope. I'd guess that people carrying that amount of cash on any day are in the minority now. And it takes about 80 seconds to digitally transfer the £50 to the mate with the birthday-girl wife, so what is the point of lugging around daft pieces of plastic?
The lady running the samosa-and-pasty stall in Ilford Shopping Centre only accepts cash or... a bank transfer!!
A Chinese I use only accepts cash. Definitely everything goes through the books. Definitely.
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
I say yes. Wouldn't everyone?
Indeed, but everyone else usually has £50 in their wallet when in the pub on payday.
Nope. I'd guess that people carrying that amount of cash on any day are in the minority now. And it takes about 80 seconds to digitally transfer the £50 to the mate with the birthday-girl wife, so what is the point of lugging around daft pieces of plastic?
What’s the method of transfer? Genuinely interested in how this works, as I’m sitting in the pub with a wallet full of c**h.
Er, you are aware that you can make peer-to-peer instant transfers via your banking app and have been able to do so for....... years?
Does your friend’s phone kiss yours, or is my expat brain about to be totally fried?
(As someone who works in IT security, I go to the bank to make transfers, but do use Apple Pay becuase it’s way more secure than using the card especially online).
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
I say yes. Wouldn't everyone?
Indeed, but everyone else usually has £50 in their wallet when in the pub on payday.
Nope. I'd guess that people carrying that amount of cash on any day are in the minority now. And it takes about 80 seconds to digitally transfer the £50 to the mate with the birthday-girl wife, so what is the point of lugging around daft pieces of plastic?
The lady running the samosa-and-pasty stall in Ilford Shopping Centre only accepts cash or... a bank transfer!!
A Chinese I use only accepts cash. Definitely everything goes through the books. Definitely.
One of the things that has been missed with no fuel duty increase this year, motorists are getting hammered elsewhere with doubling of VED on ICE cars.
The main hammering in recent years has been the absurd rise in insurance premiums. I’m now paying £1,600 for a car worth about 15k. Having recently had an insurance claim for theft (it was then found again) and seen the sharp practices of the repair garages that do insurance work, I am starting to understand why.
Yet motoring costs have increased much more slowly than other forms of transport.
I wasn't impressed, now was the time to increase duty on fuel as prices have been falling. A clear mistake and a sign that hard choices will be avoided.
Anyway before I disappear off into the ether again in the next day ir so, my US prediction is for the following states go be won by Trump in an easy EC victory for him
All of 2020 plus
Pennsylvania Michigan (Coin Toss) Wisconsin Georgia Nevada Arizona (Coin toss) Virginia (Perhaps) New Hampshire
Why New Hampshire?
Because he'll run her very close there. I think NJ might ge close enough to raise some eyebrows too
A few months ago I thought of writing an article about how modern-day issues - abortion, trans, immigration, insurrection - produced choropleths which can be used to produce bands of states, which when compared to the existing state rankings could indicate value or a flip. I abandoned it because of time issues, but one of those maps stuck in my mind because it had NH as red. It's too late to revisit but it's beginning to bug me...
Had to laugh at this:
High-Risk States (AR, IA, IN, MO, NE, NH, OH, SC, WV): All of these states have passed some anti-trans adult laws, but they haven't reached the same level of severity as the worst states. Missouri and West Virginia, for example, prohibit gender-affirming care for incarcerated adults as well as transgender youth…
Imagine going so far as to not fund sex changes for prisoners and children.
So you think it good policy to legally prohibit the supply of hormones, for example, to transitioned individuals ?
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
I say yes. Wouldn't everyone?
Indeed, but everyone else usually has £50 in their wallet when in the pub on payday.
Nope. I'd guess that people carrying that amount of cash on any day are in the minority now. And it takes about 80 seconds to digitally transfer the £50 to the mate with the birthday-girl wife, so what is the point of lugging around daft pieces of plastic?
The lady running the samosa-and-pasty stall in Ilford Shopping Centre only accepts cash or... a bank transfer!!
Nothing wrong with BACS. My local tree nursery accepts BACS only. It takes about 80 seconds to do and he doesn't have to bother with cash tills or card machines.
Christ. That's only one step away from the guy in the TV add who only accepts crypto payments for his potatoes.
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
Cash is much better for splitting the bill. The other night we ate out, and instead of faffing around with multiple payments via the machine, we just slapped £40 each on the table and walked out. It took about 2 seconds for all of us to pay.
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
Just use your phone/watch to pay – there's no limit to contactless that I have ever encountered.
I don't have watch and don't use my phone to pay for anything.
Is there a reason why not? Its incredibly convenient and more secure and means I haven't had to carry my wallet with me for years.
Also helpful if you use loyalty cards (I know some do not) as you can keep them in the same wallet app so I can easily swipe between which cards I have to the one of the shop I'm in, and choose which card I'm paying with at the same time.
It really is crackers how pointlessly old-school some PBers are. I imagine many of them in grey cardigans and driving gloves, with little leather purses in which they keep their 'pound coins'.
I rarely use cash these days, but I do sort of miss it because I have this beautiful "dragons egg" to hold my coins in. If cash had much of a future I'd be keen to scrap the lower denomination notes and replace them with fancy new coins to get more use out of such a wonderful tactile object.
What exactly is that? I don't mean to be rude if it's genuinely something you treasure!
It's a crocheted cylinder with an i-cord drawstring to close it at the top, then giving it a roughly ovoid shape. The crochet uses a repeated pattern that is reminiscent of scales, as found on fish, or as one might imagine would be possessed by a dragon.
It currently contains ~€9 in assorted denomination coins.
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
I say yes. Wouldn't everyone?
Indeed, but everyone else usually has £50 in their wallet when in the pub on payday.
Nope. I'd guess that people carrying that amount of cash on any day are in the minority now. And it takes about 80 seconds to digitally transfer the £50 to the mate with the birthday-girl wife, so what is the point of lugging around daft pieces of plastic?
What’s the method of transfer? Genuinely interested in how this works, as I’m sitting in the pub with a wallet full of c**h.
Er, you are aware that you can make peer-to-peer instant transfers via your banking app and have been able to do so for....... years?
Does your friend’s phone kiss yours, or is my expat brain about to be totally fried?
(As someone who works in IT security, I go to the bank to make transfers, but do use Apple Pay becuase it’s way more secure than using the card especially online).
You are winding me up right*? You – this is going to blow your mind – you know, put their bank account number into your app and then press 'transfer'. Hey presto!
IFS - "I am willing to bet a substantial sum that day-to-day public service spending will in fact increase more quickly than supposedly planned after next year. 1.3% a year overall would almost certainly mean real terms cuts for some departments. It would be odd to increase spending rapidly only to start cutting back again in subsequent years.
I’m afraid this looks like the same silly games playing as we got used to with the last lot. Pencil in implausibly low spending increases for the future in order to make the fiscal arithmetic balance. It sounds like it was hard enough to get agreement from departmental ministers to relatively generous settlements in the short term. When it comes to settling with departments for the period after 2025-26 keeping within that 1.3% envelope will be extremely challenging. To put it mildly ….
[Reeves] is meeting her borrowing target only by repeating the same silly manoeuvres as her predecessors used to make it look as if the books will balance. Let’s pretend we’ll increase fuel duties next time, but not do it this year. Let’s pretend that we’ll really rein in spending in a couple of years after splurging this year. That’s not going to happen. The spending plans will not survive contact with her cabinet colleagues."
Clifnotes - Much more tax rises ahead as we aren't getting it from growth....
Looking like the financial markets have lost their patience with this sort of game-playing. Who becomes Chancellor after the run on Sterling?
Are you serious? You seem to lurch wildly from preachy and waspish to hyperbolic and hysterical daily/hourly...
As Ed Conway points out, a day after the budget and the government are halfway to breaking their fiscal rules and having to rethink their budget.
Elon Musk has not shown up to a Philadelphia court, according to the BBC's US news partner CBS, for a hearing over the billionaire's cash giveaways to registered voters.
He had been ordered to attend in person.
Musk's failure to appear could put the Trump-backing SpaceX and Tesla owner at risk of being held in contempt of court.
We'll bring you more updates from inside the courtroom as we get them, so stick with us.
He had earlier said he would appear in court. Musk does seem to think that different rules apply to rich people.
Charlie Kirk is upset that Republican women may “undermine their husbands” and secretly vote for Harris while telling their husbands they voted for Trump, even though the husband “works his tail off to make sure that she can have a nice life.” https://x.com/RonFilipkowski/status/1851815354009342217
Seems to be a GOP thing. Here's the Fox News host who just married the researcher he had an affair with, while married to his first wife.
Jesse: if i found out my wife secretly voted for harris, "that's the same thing as having an affair... that violates the sanctity of our marriage... that would be D Day" https://x.com/cynicalzoomer/status/1851744214071332869
The United States really is just turning into Iran with more guns and worse food, isn't it.
Er, no.
What is it with previously respected posters that have turned to ludicrous hyperbole?
I can only assume that you've spent too much time on Twitter. Like Southam.
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
Cash is much better for splitting the bill. The other night we ate out, and instead of faffing around with multiple payments via the machine, we just slapped £40 each on the table and walked out. It took about 2 seconds for all of us to pay.
Exactly. Cash is the best option. There is also a bill splitting app too. It is not very good.
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
Just use your phone/watch to pay – there's no limit to contactless that I have ever encountered.
I don't have watch and don't use my phone to pay for anything.
Is there a reason why not? Its incredibly convenient and more secure and means I haven't had to carry my wallet with me for years.
Also helpful if you use loyalty cards (I know some do not) as you can keep them in the same wallet app so I can easily swipe between which cards I have to the one of the shop I'm in, and choose which card I'm paying with at the same time.
Have never yet migrated to paying by phone, but probably will at some point. I'm going to cite inertia.
Biggest risk is Single Point of Failure. When my phone was stolen last year it took me about a week to get everything back the way it should have been. As I never use my phone to pay anything and everything on it is also available online via the laptop it was an inconvenience.
If I used it for everything then I would not have been able to pay for my meal, or subsequent drinks, or get home. Card and cash in my wallet meant no problem.
Secondly I'm concerned about the security risk of having everything on my phone. I prefer to have payment methods scattered around and I have one card I never use online and one for online use only as a defence against fraud. I expect modern tech has improved a lot and I should no longer worry, but having said that my bank's security has recently changed and no longer requires 2FA on the phone.
(I did wonder why my phone was taken, it was a cheap Android and not even very new).
Apple backs up its phones by the cloud so if you have it stolen the replacement is a facsimile of the old one. And of course you can still use your watch to pay.
Anyway before I disappear off into the ether again in the next day ir so, my US prediction is for the following states go be won by Trump in an easy EC victory for him
All of 2020 plus
Pennsylvania Michigan (Coin Toss) Wisconsin Georgia Nevada Arizona (Coin toss) Virginia (Perhaps) New Hampshire
Why New Hampshire?
Because he'll run her very close there. I think NJ might ge close enough to raise some eyebrows too
A few months ago I thought of writing an article about how modern-day issues - abortion, trans, immigration, insurrection - produced choropleths which can be used to produce bands of states, which when compared to the existing state rankings could indicate value or a flip. I abandoned it because of time issues, but one of those maps stuck in my mind because it had NH as red. It's too late to revisit but it's beginning to bug me...
Had to laugh at this:
High-Risk States (AR, IA, IN, MO, NE, NH, OH, SC, WV): All of these states have passed some anti-trans adult laws, but they haven't reached the same level of severity as the worst states. Missouri and West Virginia, for example, prohibit gender-affirming care for incarcerated adults as well as transgender youth…
Imagine going so far as to not fund sex changes for prisoners and children.
So you think it good policy to legally prohibit the supply of hormones, for example, to transitioned individuals ?
Fake news. The law prohibits inmates being given gender transition surgery, not medication:
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
Just use your phone/watch to pay – there's no limit to contactless that I have ever encountered.
I don't have watch and don't use my phone to pay for anything.
Is there a reason why not? Its incredibly convenient and more secure and means I haven't had to carry my wallet with me for years.
Also helpful if you use loyalty cards (I know some do not) as you can keep them in the same wallet app so I can easily swipe between which cards I have to the one of the shop I'm in, and choose which card I'm paying with at the same time.
Have never yet migrated to paying by phone, but probably will at some point. I'm going to cite inertia.
Biggest risk is Single Point of Failure. When my phone was stolen last year it took me about a week to get everything back the way it should have been. As I never use my phone to pay anything and everything on it is also available online via the laptop it was an inconvenience.
If I used it for everything then I would not have been able to pay for my meal, or subsequent drinks, or get home. Card and cash in my wallet meant no problem.
Secondly I'm concerned about the security risk of having everything on my phone. I prefer to have payment methods scattered around and I have one card I never use online and one for online use only as a defence against fraud. I expect modern tech has improved a lot and I should no longer worry, but having said that my bank's security has recently changed and no longer requires 2FA on the phone.
(I did wonder why my phone was taken, it was a cheap Android and not even very new).
One of the pains of having a phone is that it goes out of date, sometimes surprisingly quickly in terms of security support updates, and no way will I use email etc on such a phone, never mind banking, once it is not being updated.
I'm getting a new phone and top criterion is how many years the makers will support it - though as batteries last only 2-3 years (?) that may make it academic for things like a Samsung S24 to have c. 6-7 years updates. I'm seriously considering the Fairphone as the battery isn't bloody glued in like too many other phones but is easily replaceable. (Already a key criterion for laptops for me these days agfter bitter experience with Microsoft Surface Book 1.)
How well do you think pollsters are likely to fare ?
That is a surprisingly high proportion! Interesting.
Yes, I was a bit taken aback, but given the current levels of polarisation, not entirely. Children/parents (or grandparents) and wives/husbands are obvious categories.
Are they more honest with (comparatively) anonymous pollsters ?
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
I say yes. Wouldn't everyone?
Indeed, but everyone else usually has £50 in their wallet when in the pub on payday.
Nope. I'd guess that people carrying that amount of cash on any day are in the minority now. And it takes about 80 seconds to digitally transfer the £50 to the mate with the birthday-girl wife, so what is the point of lugging around daft pieces of plastic?
What’s the method of transfer? Genuinely interested in how this works, as I’m sitting in the pub with a wallet full of c**h.
With Revolut, for example, everyone has a "revtag" (the first six digits of their name, followed by four random alphanumeric characters) that you can use to identify other people to transfer money to, though in practice it looks like it has used my contacts and matched people on phone number and/or email address.
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
Cash is much better for splitting the bill. The other night we ate out, and instead of faffing around with multiple payments via the machine, we just slapped £40 each on the table and walked out. It took about 2 seconds for all of us to pay.
Exactly. Cash is the best option. There is also a bill splitting app too. It is not very good.
It really isn't because then everyone has to remember to withdraw cash and bring it with them, which they won't do, and which is a pointless faff. We just have one person pay the whole bill then everyone ping over their share in the coming days. Easy AF.
There really aren't any good reasons to use cash: it is a completely pointless waste of time.
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
I say yes. Wouldn't everyone?
Indeed, but everyone else usually has £50 in their wallet when in the pub on payday.
Nope. I'd guess that people carrying that amount of cash on any day are in the minority now. And it takes about 80 seconds to digitally transfer the £50 to the mate with the birthday-girl wife, so what is the point of lugging around daft pieces of plastic?
What’s the method of transfer? Genuinely interested in how this works, as I’m sitting in the pub with a wallet full of c**h.
Er, you are aware that you can make peer-to-peer instant transfers via your banking app and have been able to do so for....... years?
Does your friend’s phone kiss yours, or is my expat brain about to be totally fried?
(As someone who works in IT security, I go to the bank to make transfers, but do use Apple Pay becuase it’s way more secure than using the card especially online).
You are winding me up right*? You – this is going to blow your mind – you know, put their bank account number into your app and then press 'transfer'. Hey presto!
(*I mean you must be winding me up)
You know your bank account number, when not in possession of the card, with enough certainty to actually run a transfer? Yes I am genuine.
Apologies if this has been covered but I need to raise this concern somewhere and think PB is a proven place to check things! I'm astonished how little focus is on the impact on part time workers / low paid jobs by the employer NI changes - especially the secondary threshold being lowered to £5k from £9.1k pa. I make it that the employer NI cost for someone earning just £12,000pa will increase from the current £400pa to a stonking £1,050pa.
I think that's right and surely that's going to risk lost jobs, the Chancellor previously called Employer NI raises as a tax on jobs, but isn't this actually a tax on low-paying jobs and those who most likely can least afford to risk those jobs?
I know the employment allowance is doubled at least but....
Elon Musk has not shown up to a Philadelphia court, according to the BBC's US news partner CBS, for a hearing over the billionaire's cash giveaways to registered voters.
He had been ordered to attend in person.
Musk's failure to appear could put the Trump-backing SpaceX and Tesla owner at risk of being held in contempt of court.
We'll bring you more updates from inside the courtroom as we get them, so stick with us.
He had earlier said he would appear in court. Musk does seem to think that different rules apply to rich people.
IFS - "I am willing to bet a substantial sum that day-to-day public service spending will in fact increase more quickly than supposedly planned after next year. 1.3% a year overall would almost certainly mean real terms cuts for some departments. It would be odd to increase spending rapidly only to start cutting back again in subsequent years.
I’m afraid this looks like the same silly games playing as we got used to with the last lot. Pencil in implausibly low spending increases for the future in order to make the fiscal arithmetic balance. It sounds like it was hard enough to get agreement from departmental ministers to relatively generous settlements in the short term. When it comes to settling with departments for the period after 2025-26 keeping within that 1.3% envelope will be extremely challenging. To put it mildly ….
[Reeves] is meeting her borrowing target only by repeating the same silly manoeuvres as her predecessors used to make it look as if the books will balance. Let’s pretend we’ll increase fuel duties next time, but not do it this year. Let’s pretend that we’ll really rein in spending in a couple of years after splurging this year. That’s not going to happen. The spending plans will not survive contact with her cabinet colleagues."
Clifnotes - Much more tax rises ahead as we aren't getting it from growth....
Looking like the financial markets have lost their patience with this sort of game-playing. Who becomes Chancellor after the run on Sterling?
Are you serious? You seem to lurch wildly from preachy and waspish to hyperbolic and hysterical daily/hourly...
As Ed Conway points out, a day after the budget and the government are halfway to breaking their fiscal rules and having to rethink their budget.
Who is going to be the equivalent of a young Cameron holding Lamont's hand on Black Wednesday? Who will be Labour's Hunt to Reeves' Kwarteng? It's the return of Annelise Dodds isn't it?!
Anyway before I disappear off into the ether again in the next day ir so, my US prediction is for the following states go be won by Trump in an easy EC victory for him
All of 2020 plus
Pennsylvania Michigan (Coin Toss) Wisconsin Georgia Nevada Arizona (Coin toss) Virginia (Perhaps) New Hampshire
Why New Hampshire?
Because he'll run her very close there. I think NJ might ge close enough to raise some eyebrows too
A few months ago I thought of writing an article about how modern-day issues - abortion, trans, immigration, insurrection - produced choropleths which can be used to produce bands of states, which when compared to the existing state rankings could indicate value or a flip. I abandoned it because of time issues, but one of those maps stuck in my mind because it had NH as red. It's too late to revisit but it's beginning to bug me...
Had to laugh at this:
High-Risk States (AR, IA, IN, MO, NE, NH, OH, SC, WV): All of these states have passed some anti-trans adult laws, but they haven't reached the same level of severity as the worst states. Missouri and West Virginia, for example, prohibit gender-affirming care for incarcerated adults as well as transgender youth…
Imagine going so far as to not fund sex changes for prisoners and children.
So you think it good policy to legally prohibit the supply of hormones, for example, to transitioned individuals ?
Fake news. The law prohibits inmates being given gender transition surgery, not medication:
The United States really is just turning into Iran with more guns and worse food, isn't it.
There's always been an odd puritan streak in US culture, in recent years it's gone from an oddity to something quite sinister. I've had multiple serious enquiries from friends and acquaintances in the US asking if the UK is a good place to emigrate to. At some point the US turned into somewhere to escape from.
All these are international bond movements are a concern.
Concerns over the U.S. election and unpredictable intentional events ?
No, the UK spread to US yields is increasing. This is a reaction to the budget saying the government is going to borrow an additional £150bn over 5 years.
IFS - "I am willing to bet a substantial sum that day-to-day public service spending will in fact increase more quickly than supposedly planned after next year. 1.3% a year overall would almost certainly mean real terms cuts for some departments. It would be odd to increase spending rapidly only to start cutting back again in subsequent years.
I’m afraid this looks like the same silly games playing as we got used to with the last lot. Pencil in implausibly low spending increases for the future in order to make the fiscal arithmetic balance. It sounds like it was hard enough to get agreement from departmental ministers to relatively generous settlements in the short term. When it comes to settling with departments for the period after 2025-26 keeping within that 1.3% envelope will be extremely challenging. To put it mildly ….
[Reeves] is meeting her borrowing target only by repeating the same silly manoeuvres as her predecessors used to make it look as if the books will balance. Let’s pretend we’ll increase fuel duties next time, but not do it this year. Let’s pretend that we’ll really rein in spending in a couple of years after splurging this year. That’s not going to happen. The spending plans will not survive contact with her cabinet colleagues."
Clifnotes - Much more tax rises ahead as we aren't getting it from growth....
Looking like the financial markets have lost their patience with this sort of game-playing. Who becomes Chancellor after the run on Sterling?
Are you serious? You seem to lurch wildly from preachy and waspish to hyperbolic and hysterical daily/hourly...
I think it would be fair to say that I have less mental stability than the average person, yes.
I do think Britain is sailing very close to the edge of what the markets will accept in terms of borrowing. Truss took a step over the line. I'd assumed yesterday that the willingness to raise taxes would have reassured the markets that Reeves was a chancellor who recognised things had to be paid for - but it sounds like traders don't want to be the last people holding onto British government bonds today, if what people are saying about the increase in yield today is accurate.
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
I say yes. Wouldn't everyone?
Indeed, but everyone else usually has £50 in their wallet when in the pub on payday.
Nope. I'd guess that people carrying that amount of cash on any day are in the minority now. And it takes about 80 seconds to digitally transfer the £50 to the mate with the birthday-girl wife, so what is the point of lugging around daft pieces of plastic?
What’s the method of transfer? Genuinely interested in how this works, as I’m sitting in the pub with a wallet full of c**h.
Er, you are aware that you can make peer-to-peer instant transfers via your banking app and have been able to do so for....... years?
Does your friend’s phone kiss yours, or is my expat brain about to be totally fried?
(As someone who works in IT security, I go to the bank to make transfers, but do use Apple Pay becuase it’s way more secure than using the card especially online).
You are winding me up right*? You – this is going to blow your mind – you know, put their bank account number into your app and then press 'transfer'. Hey presto!
(*I mean you must be winding me up)
You know your bank account number, when not in possession of the card, with enough certainty to actually run a transfer? Yes I am genuine.
Yes, I do know my bank account number. And if said person is a mate I will likely have his saved on my app from a previous transfer. I genuinely cannot believe you were unaware this technology existed. If such ignorance is commonplace it rather explains a lot about PBers' weird obsession with cash – one of the most pointless relics in modern life.
Anyway before I disappear off into the ether again in the next day ir so, my US prediction is for the following states go be won by Trump in an easy EC victory for him
All of 2020 plus
Pennsylvania Michigan (Coin Toss) Wisconsin Georgia Nevada Arizona (Coin toss) Virginia (Perhaps) New Hampshire
Why New Hampshire?
Because he'll run her very close there. I think NJ might ge close enough to raise some eyebrows too
A few months ago I thought of writing an article about how modern-day issues - abortion, trans, immigration, insurrection - produced choropleths which can be used to produce bands of states, which when compared to the existing state rankings could indicate value or a flip. I abandoned it because of time issues, but one of those maps stuck in my mind because it had NH as red. It's too late to revisit but it's beginning to bug me...
Had to laugh at this:
High-Risk States (AR, IA, IN, MO, NE, NH, OH, SC, WV): All of these states have passed some anti-trans adult laws, but they haven't reached the same level of severity as the worst states. Missouri and West Virginia, for example, prohibit gender-affirming care for incarcerated adults as well as transgender youth…
Imagine going so far as to not fund sex changes for prisoners and children.
So you think it good policy to legally prohibit the supply of hormones, for example, to transitioned individuals ?
Fake news. The law prohibits inmates being given gender transition surgery, not medication:
Leon (who seems to have disappeared ?) is fond of talking about a "Korean style armistice". Nonsense, of course, for multiple reasons, but this demonstrates the biggest single one.
US Secretary of Defense confirmed that Washington would defend South Korea by using all available weapons, including nuclear weapons, if necessary. Any nuclear attack by the DPRK against the US or its allies and partners would lead to the end of the Kim Jong Un regime. https://x.com/Hromadske/status/1851922058030256371
Unless Ukraine is in NATO, the comparison is simply absurd.
Leon has received the ban hammer a few nights back.
Don't know if it is Temp or not. It was all somewhat tetchy here at the time.
He went the full racist; Britain for the white British.
Good riddance IMO. He's entertaining, but I don't think that excuses his views.
I don't think he was saying that and, even if he was, I don't think such views should lead to a banning unless it was accompanied by incitement to violence or raw hate.
But, I have a higher spectrum of tolerance for speech (admittedly I can respond very aggressively and rudely to them but I only advocate banning where they are consistently personally abusive or nasty)
He literally said that the UK should promote/increase the number of "white babies".
Great Replacement and "14 words" are all that's left from there....
But, that's your extrapolation of what you thought he might subsequently say and mean and not what he actually said.
Just saying we should increase the number of white babies isn't an intrinsically and fundamentally unreasonable thing to say.
The implication is "increase the proportion of white babies", which is.
I have to say I am with @Casino_Royale on this (twice in one day, might have to lie down). See my earlier post.
I was one of the people arguing with @leon. He was putting a point of view that I totally disagreed with and we argued, but it was civilised. There was no abuse. He put an argument. He didn't just come out with racist abuse. His argument to my mind is racist but you have to argue against it not ban it. It is not as if he was chanting racist stuff. He was just putting an argument forward.
Now my only reservation was after the fact when @TheScreamingEagles commented upon the effect it had on him when thinking of his daughter. Something I hadn't considered being white.
Leon's comment is stupid for a whole host of reasons. Stupid, and racist.
As I asked @Andy_JS when he said the comment wasn't racist: my wife is olive-skinned. Is she 'white'? My son is pasty in winter, but tans olive in summer. Is he 'white'? My wife is a joint Turkish/British citizen. Is she 'British'? My son only has a UK passport. Is he 'British'?
People who throw around this sort of stuff are either totally thick, racist, or both.
For many of us, this sort of talk matters, as it means loved ones are not seen as being equal, for dint of skin colour or whatever.
I agree, which is why I argued with him and I wanted the right to argue with him.
What I hadn't appreciated, as you can see from my comment about @TheScreamingEagles, was the difference between me arguing with him, but not being hurt because I am white, and others that are hurt by the comments.
I wasn't 'hurt' by his comment, but it is the sort of comment that needs forcibly arguing against. Because the moment it becomes acceptable, we have lost something important.
Mrs J has been in this country for several decades. In that time, she has had no racist comments made against her. That is something to feel proud about our country. In contrast, in our first night on a trip through Germany, she was racially abused by a group of (white) German men.
Then again, she fits in: her spoken English is better than mine, and she dresses in a western style and has a well=paid job. She is a very non-immigranty immigrant, if you know what I mean.
A Spanish friend, married to Ghanian, thinks that London is the least problematic place for them. In Spain, he hears stuff all the time - very often they assume that he must be a foreigner and say stuff in Spanish.
I once went to a wedding in Romania, and part of the festivities was a coach trip to see a certain famous castle in Transylvania. On the way, we stopped at a rest stop and a load of British people got out. One of the staff was saying something in Romanian, not realising that the bride and a lot of the guests knew the language. It led to a very heated argument between the Romanian guests and the staff, with the British people standing around wondering what the heck was going on.
Apparently the comments had been very derogatory towards Brits. One of whom the bride had just married.
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
I say yes. Wouldn't everyone?
Indeed, but everyone else usually has £50 in their wallet when in the pub on payday.
Nope. I'd guess that people carrying that amount of cash on any day are in the minority now. And it takes about 80 seconds to digitally transfer the £50 to the mate with the birthday-girl wife, so what is the point of lugging around daft pieces of plastic?
The lady running the samosa-and-pasty stall in Ilford Shopping Centre only accepts cash or... a bank transfer!!
Nothing wrong with BACS. My local tree nursery accepts BACS only. It takes about 80 seconds to do and he doesn't have to bother with cash tills or card machines.
Christ. That's only one step away from the guy in the TV add who only accepts crypto payments for his potatoes.
Thanks - had learnt it was a moat on my visits many years ago but never seen that.
I read an article in a local archaeology magazine last year postulating that Avebury circle was built when the water level was such that, due to the natural spring underneath it, the ditch would have been full of water, and that the same was true for Silbury
Thanks - had learnt it was a moat on my visits many years ago but never seen that.
I read an article in a local archaeology magazine last year postulating that Avebury circle was built when the water level was such that, due to the natural spring underneath it, the ditch would have been full of water, and that the same was true for Silbury
Of course, both have silted up over the millennia, which would make it easier to get water in them.
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
Just use your phone/watch to pay – there's no limit to contactless that I have ever encountered.
I don't have watch and don't use my phone to pay for anything.
Is there a reason why not? Its incredibly convenient and more secure and means I haven't had to carry my wallet with me for years.
Also helpful if you use loyalty cards (I know some do not) as you can keep them in the same wallet app so I can easily swipe between which cards I have to the one of the shop I'm in, and choose which card I'm paying with at the same time.
Have never yet migrated to paying by phone, but probably will at some point. I'm going to cite inertia.
Biggest risk is Single Point of Failure. When my phone was stolen last year it took me about a week to get everything back the way it should have been. As I never use my phone to pay anything and everything on it is also available online via the laptop it was an inconvenience.
If I used it for everything then I would not have been able to pay for my meal, or subsequent drinks, or get home. Card and cash in my wallet meant no problem.
Secondly I'm concerned about the security risk of having everything on my phone. I prefer to have payment methods scattered around and I have one card I never use online and one for online use only as a defence against fraud. I expect modern tech has improved a lot and I should no longer worry, but having said that my bank's security has recently changed and no longer requires 2FA on the phone.
(I did wonder why my phone was taken, it was a cheap Android and not even very new).
Revolut - and probably other alt-banks - will create a one-use disposable card that you can use for online transactions. There's then zero risk to you if the website you buy from is hacked and your card details stolen.
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
I say yes. Wouldn't everyone?
Indeed, but everyone else usually has £50 in their wallet when in the pub on payday.
Nope. I'd guess that people carrying that amount of cash on any day are in the minority now. And it takes about 80 seconds to digitally transfer the £50 to the mate with the birthday-girl wife, so what is the point of lugging around daft pieces of plastic?
What’s the method of transfer? Genuinely interested in how this works, as I’m sitting in the pub with a wallet full of c**h.
Er, you are aware that you can make peer-to-peer instant transfers via your banking app and have been able to do so for....... years?
Does your friend’s phone kiss yours, or is my expat brain about to be totally fried?
(As someone who works in IT security, I go to the bank to make transfers, but do use Apple Pay becuase it’s way more secure than using the card especially online).
You are winding me up right*? You – this is going to blow your mind – you know, put their bank account number into your app and then press 'transfer'. Hey presto!
(*I mean you must be winding me up)
You know your bank account number, when not in possession of the card, with enough certainty to actually run a transfer? Yes I am genuine.
Yes, I do know my bank account number. And if said person is a mate I will likely have his saved on my app from a previous transfer. I genuinely cannot believe you were unaware this technology existed. If such ignorance is commonplace it rather explains a lot about PBers' weird obsession with cash – one of the most pointless relics in modern life.
Where does a chap keep his condoms in your wallet free world?
Our vending machines have gone contactless yesterday. Fortunately there is still the cash option as well for people.
Not for much longer, I’d venture. The pool table in my local is now card only. I like to imagine certain PBers discovering this in horror as they furkle in their leather pouches for useless metal!
Our local milk vending machines (supply your own bottle, they supply the milk) are contactless only. A month ago my card got declined (reached its limit for contactless). I could not use it until I went somewhere that allowed me to enter a pin.
Does this happen at the pool table too? I guess you could go to the bar and enter the pin there but I had no way to buy the milk at any of the three milk vending stations I tried.
#Firstworldproblem
I have a card with an alt-bank and one can instantly reset the contactless limit using the app on the phone.
Great, but again this is a solution looking for a problem. Just pay with your phone/watch and leave the obsolete bits of plastic at home. And, while you are at it, the physical wallet. Declutter your life.
Question for you. Genuine question. A mate comes up to you in the pub tonight and says “Can I borrow £50 until next Thursday, I’ve not been paid yet but it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow and I need to buy her something?”, how do you react?
I say yes. Wouldn't everyone?
Indeed, but everyone else usually has £50 in their wallet when in the pub on payday.
Nope. I'd guess that people carrying that amount of cash on any day are in the minority now. And it takes about 80 seconds to digitally transfer the £50 to the mate with the birthday-girl wife, so what is the point of lugging around daft pieces of plastic?
What’s the method of transfer? Genuinely interested in how this works, as I’m sitting in the pub with a wallet full of c**h.
Er, you are aware that you can make peer-to-peer instant transfers via your banking app and have been able to do so for....... years?
Does your friend’s phone kiss yours, or is my expat brain about to be totally fried?
(As someone who works in IT security, I go to the bank to make transfers, but do use Apple Pay becuase it’s way more secure than using the card especially online).
You are winding me up right*? You – this is going to blow your mind – you know, put their bank account number into your app and then press 'transfer'. Hey presto!
(*I mean you must be winding me up)
You know your bank account number, when not in possession of the card, with enough certainty to actually run a transfer? Yes I am genuine.
Yes, I do know my bank account number. And if said person is a mate I will likely have his saved on my app from a previous transfer. I genuinely cannot believe you were unaware this technology existed. If such ignorance is commonplace it rather explains a lot about PBers' weird obsession with cash – one of the most pointless relics in modern life.
Where does a chap keep his condoms in your wallet free world?
Comments
If they are really in for the long term, you spread this money over the 3-4-5 years, carefully plan what needs building and enact reform along side.
Autocorrect is a menace to respectable, law-abiding people everywhere.
Counter proposal - NHS Armed Response Unit. Heavily armed, with the right to shoot to kill. They pick up all the empty crisp packets, change lightbulbs and fix the signage. Anyone interferes, they get the Mozambique Drill, then the team takes the body downstairs to recycle as blood, organs and skeleton for the anatomy classes.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silbury_Hill
Shortening your arms would be over the top.
I also note the negative but still somewhat muted market impact of this dreadful budget compared to Truss, even though Reeves' liabilities seem far worse than Truss's were. This lends further credence to the theory that the market turbulence then was due in no small part to the Bank's bond selloff announced the previous day, which Max furiously denied at the time, but now seems tacitly to acknowledge. Their programme has conveniently slowed under the new Labour Government.
This was a popular budget with quite a lot of Labour supporters. They are likely to be severely disappointed over the next four or five years.
It's not (yet) a disaster, and I still cling to the hope that they will introduce some genuinely pro-growth policies, but I do not have a good feeling about the UK's prospects at the moment.
Southern Europe is bad , and Eastern Europe the least tolerant.
https://ifs.org.uk/data-items/debt-interest-spending-share-national-income
I'd make two points:
*) Culture changes. Someone from a hundred years ago would be astounded and/or shocked by the culture seen in Britain today - and not all of it because of immigration. I'd argue most of these culture changes have been positive. That does not mean changes cannot be regressive, which is why I prefer to think of 'values'. What values do we, as a country, believe in? As an example, sexual equality. Culture changes that embrace those values are welcome. Ones that do not embrace them are less so.
*) Culture means different things to different people. As with the 'Fremen' comment below (who I think mainly seem to be white), British culture is hard to define. For many, it is cricket on a Sunday afternoon on the village green. Not for me though, and someone who has arrived in the country from India or Pakistan in the last decade might fit much more in with that 'culture'.
"The President should be elected through..."
Popular vote: 54%
Electoral College: 28%
Unsure: 18%
YouGov / Oct 29, 2024 / n=1587
https://x.com/USA_Polling/status/1851710636985634872
(By the way I noted your reply to @BartholomewRoberts – you do realise that setting up Apple Pay takes... two minutes?)
https://youtu.be/VKHFZBUTA4k?si=iUZkofwOS56r9w-q
"Many citizens are not smart enough to vote"
Disagree: 48%
Agree: 41%
YouGov / Oct 29, 2024 / n=1587
https://x.com/USA_Polling/status/1851710332735000579
https://x.com/USA_Polling/status/1851684644036477419/photo/1
How well do you think pollsters are likely to fare ?
If I used it for everything then I would not have been able to pay for my meal, or subsequent drinks, or get home. Card and cash in my wallet meant no problem.
Secondly I'm concerned about the security risk of having everything on my phone. I prefer to have payment methods scattered around and I have one card I never use online and one for online use only as a defence against fraud. I expect modern tech has improved a lot and I should no longer worry, but having said that my bank's security has recently changed and no longer requires 2FA on the phone.
(I did wonder why my phone was taken, it was a cheap Android and not even very new).
High-Risk States (AR, IA, IN, MO, NE, NH, OH, SC, WV): All of these states have passed some anti-trans adult laws, but they haven't reached the same level of severity as the worst states. Missouri and West Virginia, for example, prohibit gender-affirming care for incarcerated adults as well as transgender youth…
Imagine going so far as to not fund sex changes for prisoners and children.
In her time, she was a bit unusual, but nowadays it's common. She wanted to live in Britain because it was unideological and not very nationalist, unlike the countries she'd lived in before. In unimportant ways - taste in food, for instance - she retained her past, but she accepted the British outlook wholesale (and voted Conservative till I stood for Labour), and I think it's reasonable to expect that. Countries like Britain have quite a few "native" cultures to choose from, and in general people aren't bothered how you look and where your parents were from if you broadly go with the flow of one of those cultures, especially if you're open-minded about adopting a few new elements and dropping others which are clearly dated.
In his political outlook, he seems to be
some sort of loony mixture of ultra-libertarian fanatic, protectionist, and ethnic nationalist. A warning from history of the perils of over-reach, from business and engineering into politics , as Boris Johnson with showbusiness.
(As someone who works in IT security, I go to the bank to make transfers, but do use Apple Pay becuase it’s way more secure than using the card especially online).
It currently contains ~€9 in assorted denomination coins.
(*I mean you must be winding me up)
https://x.com/EdConwaySky/status/1851987029912846734
Elon Musk has not shown up to a Philadelphia court, according to the BBC's US news partner CBS, for a hearing over the billionaire's cash giveaways to registered voters.
He had been ordered to attend in person.
Musk's failure to appear could put the Trump-backing SpaceX and Tesla owner at risk of being held in contempt of court.
We'll bring you more updates from inside the courtroom as we get them, so stick with us.
He had earlier said he would appear in court. Musk does seem to think that different rules apply to rich people.
What is it with previously respected posters that have turned to ludicrous hyperbole?
I can only assume that you've spent too much time on Twitter. Like Southam.
https://senate.mo.gov/23info/pdf-bill/tat/SB49.pdf
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/10/31/nicola-sturgeon-25k-general-election-night-pundit-snp-scot/
The look on her face as the SNP got routed, priceless.
I'm getting a new phone and top criterion is how many years the makers will support it - though as batteries last only 2-3 years (?) that may make it academic for things like a Samsung S24 to have c. 6-7 years updates. I'm seriously considering the Fairphone as the battery isn't bloody glued in like too many other phones but is easily replaceable. (Already a key criterion for laptops for me these days agfter bitter experience with Microsoft Surface Book 1.)
Children/parents (or grandparents) and wives/husbands are obvious categories.
Are they more honest with (comparatively) anonymous pollsters ?
For everyone else you can use their IBAN.
There really aren't any good reasons to use cash: it is a completely pointless waste of time.
I think that's right and surely that's going to risk lost jobs, the Chancellor previously called Employer NI raises as a tax on jobs, but isn't this actually a tax on low-paying jobs and those who most likely can least afford to risk those jobs?
I know the employment allowance is doubled at least but....
It's the return of Annelise Dodds isn't it?!
I do think Britain is sailing very close to the edge of what the markets will accept in terms of borrowing. Truss took a step over the line. I'd assumed yesterday that the willingness to raise taxes would have reassured the markets that Reeves was a chancellor who recognised things had to be paid for - but it sounds like traders don't want to be the last people holding onto British government bonds today, if what people are saying about the increase in yield today is accurate.
Apparently the comments had been very derogatory towards Brits. One of whom the bride had just married.