Campaigners have threatened the government with legal action unless it reconsiders the decision to refuse compensation to millions of women affected by an increase in the state pension age.
The Women Against State Pension Inequality (Waspi) group is demanding payouts for 3.6 million women born in the 1950s who were not properly informed of changes first introduced in the 1990s.
If there were method to it I could see the utility. A well choreographed good cop bad cop act with Macron might work. But I strongly doubt this is a well choreographed good cop bad cop act. It’s just traditional British specialrelationshipitis.
There must be a German compound noun for that. I’ll give one of those online word generators a try.
EDIT - the one I usually use seems to he crashing. I suppose today it’s probably at peak usage.
Some good economic news for once - clean energy sector grew by 10% last year (12x faster than the rest of the economy), average salary of £43,000, NE of England keeping up with the rest of the country for once, 1,000,000 people employed.
CDU/CSU 28.6% AFD 20.8% SPD 16.4% Green 11.6% Linke 8.8%
Total of above = 86.2%
CDU/CSU + SPD has 45% - well over half of the 86.2%.
They're held up by older voters.
We are at very high risk of getting a radical right or radical left government in several European countries in the next 10-20 years.
Neither will be pleasant.
It looks as if a Grand Coalition (CDU/CSU + SPD) will be possible now that the final results of this German federal election are in; it will have just 45% of the vote share and have 328/630 seats in the Bundestag. By contrast, the first post-WW2 German Grand Coalition in 1966-9 represented over 80% of voters and had 447/496 seats, with the FDP forming the sole opposition.
The opposition parties in the new Bundestag all appear to be from the radical left or right (apart from the sole seat for the Danish regional party), unless the German Green party is more moderate than its British equivalent, which seems now to be a home for some of the Corbynite left wing. Comparisons with the UK are not always appropriate; with a similar GE result in the UK, the most likely coalition would be between the Tories and Reform.
The Greens are center-left if anything. The AfD are more Britain First/EDL than Reform
I can't imagine Britain First/EDL being led by a Goldman Sachs alumna.
I can.
Steve Bannon was also Goldman Sachs many years ago
Bullying this country, Canada, and Europe into spending more on the military, and not freeloading off the USA, is perfectly fair and reasonable (Ireland should be bullied, as well).
Turning allies into enemies, through tariffs; accusing them of “stealing” from the US, by selling consumers goods and services that they want; threatening to invade allied States, and seize territory off them; cutting deals with their enemies to gain mineral rights.
Those things are worse than unethical. They are massive blunders.
President Reagan decided Friday to impose punitive 100% tariffs on a wide variety of goods produced by Japanese electronic giants in retaliation for Tokyo’s failure to abide by the semiconductor trade agreement between the two nations.
In approving a recommendation Thursday by the Administration’s top economic officials, the White House decided to put the tariffs into effect about April 17, less than two weeks before Japanese Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone is scheduled to begin a visit to the United States aimed at easing trade frictions.
The tariffs will be targeted to bring in as much as $300 million and designed to punish such firms as NEC Corp., Hitachi Ltd., Fujitsu Ltd., Toshiba Corp. and Oki Corp. by either pricing some of their goods out of the American market or by forcing them to accept substantial losses on U.S. sales.
The tariffs were on specific categories of imports of electronics, from one country, and covered only $300 million of import value. Are you seriously trying to claim equivalence with the incoherent policies they are proposing, then cancelling, then proposing again this time?
I'm just questioning the idea that conducting a muscular trade policy with an ally should be regarded as such a catastrophic breach of norms.
Since when has Vat been a tariff? Trump is not trying to sort out someone breaching an agreement. He is trying to blackmail friends into giving America preferential treatment by removing Vat that internal suppliers have to apply.
And the worse case of this blackmail is his treatment of Ukraine. It is one thing taking Putin's side (despicable as that is), but offering your support in exchange for a deal on your assets is plainly just mercenary.
Trump is just a bully using his might to threaten all and sundry, friend or foe and even willing to support a foe against a friend for a pot of gold. Despicable.
Bullying this country, Canada, and Europe into spending more on the military, and not freeloading off the USA, is perfectly fair and reasonable (Ireland should be bullied, as well).
Turning allies into enemies, through tariffs; accusing them of “stealing” from the US, by selling consumers goods and services that they want; threatening to invade allied States, and seize territory off them; cutting deals with their enemies to gain mineral rights.
Those things are worse than unethical. They are massive blunders.
President Reagan decided Friday to impose punitive 100% tariffs on a wide variety of goods produced by Japanese electronic giants in retaliation for Tokyo’s failure to abide by the semiconductor trade agreement between the two nations.
In approving a recommendation Thursday by the Administration’s top economic officials, the White House decided to put the tariffs into effect about April 17, less than two weeks before Japanese Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone is scheduled to begin a visit to the United States aimed at easing trade frictions.
The tariffs will be targeted to bring in as much as $300 million and designed to punish such firms as NEC Corp., Hitachi Ltd., Fujitsu Ltd., Toshiba Corp. and Oki Corp. by either pricing some of their goods out of the American market or by forcing them to accept substantial losses on U.S. sales.
The tariffs were on specific categories of imports of electronics, from one country, and covered only $300 million of import value. Are you seriously trying to claim equivalence with the incoherent policies they are proposing, then cancelling, then proposing again this time?
I'm just questioning the idea that conducting a muscular trade policy with an ally should be regarded as such a catastrophic breach of norms.
Calling VAT a tariff, and expecting uniquely to be exempt from it is not a "muscular trade policy", it's just idiocy. Unless you mean that outright extortion of putative allies isn't a "catastrophic breach of norms" ?
You're not questioning, as much as conducting an exercise in casuistry on behalf of the Trump administration.
We lost an empire and found a role playing second fiddle in the American orchestra, and now we're upset because we don't like the conductor's taste in music.
At the end of the day, the US is a foreign state. If we're too dependent on it for our sense of our place in the world, that's our problem.
is this a good idea? I don't know. Is it best to flatter him like this (and he certainly enjoys it) to influence him or does it just reinforce his view that being a bully works and it just get worse?
He’s the recognised head of state of the US
The late Queen had to serve tea for far worse on occasion.
America - like the Conservative Party - seems to believe its own propaganda and thus is detached from reality. America is the Greatest Country On Earth. With the Strongest Military. Of course people want to buy their stuff! No, they Do.
Its a brilliant plan. Demand that Ukraine hands over all its mineral wealth. Use it to build new products especially for defence, then force Ukraine's neighbours to buy them to protect themselves from Russia.
Well, I say brilliant. Europe and the middle east are two huge markets for defence equipment. I'm sure Bibi will keep buying American, but will Saudi? Qatar? After what Trump has done to destabilise the region? Europe?
This is gift week for Europe - if its political leaders and the big manufacturers can get the new narrative going quickly. Don't buy American, buy European. With support from our ally Ukraine.
What Trump does as the new pork markets global markets don't flood Murica with orders is the question. How do you extort the world when the world says "no thanks"? Threaten then with Putin? He can't threaten "America will cut you off". Great, go right ahead. We don't need you any more.
Not quite what Project 2025 think. They're of the opinion that after years of DEI, their forces are weak and need 'full spectrum' defence.
The U.S. Army’s mission is “[t]o deploy, fight and win our nation’s wars by providing ready, prompt and sustained land dominance by Army forces across the full spectrum of conflict as part of the joint force.”24 Today, however, the Army cannot execute its land dominance mission.25 The U.S. Army is at an inflection point that is marked by more than a decade of steadily eroding budgets and diluted buying power, an appreciable degradation in readiness and training capacity, a near crisis in the recruiting and retention of critical personnel, and a bevy of aging weapons systems that no longer provide a qualitative edge over peer and near-peer competitors but will not be replaced in the near term.
If that belief has been adopted by the present administration, then it would explain their apparent deference to Russia and the need for more defence spending ($150bn) which they are trying to get through both houses.
And yet, Hegseth is proposing 8% cuts in US defence spending each year.
If there were method to it I could see the utility. A well choreographed good cop bad cop act with Macron might work. But I strongly doubt this is a well choreographed good cop bad cop act. It’s just traditional British specialrelationshipitis.
There must be a German compound noun for that. I’ll give one of those online word generators a try.
EDIT - the one I usually use seems to he crashing. I suppose today it’s probably at peak usage.
It also means that Starmer can say "hey, at least we tried" if it all goes wrong. People dislike Trump/Musk but would not tolerate a slash and burn approach either.
Yes. The result appears to be a straightforward CDU-SPD majority, with immigration the only major problem - Merz's CDU stands for much tougher rules, the SPD is against any toughening. The CDU has wind in its sails and the SPD is much weakened, but the law is possibly a barrier to CDU plans, and changing the law with AFD support would probably sink the coalition.
Starmer is right to meet Trump. If anything we need to buy some time to allow us and European partners to work out the way forwards.
Long term, I am not convinced that the UK will be able to keep up the balancing act and at some point is likely to gravitate back to Europe, because our defence and economic interests primarily lie there.
Once Merz takes office there is likely a narrow window of opportunity to agree a plan of action for Europe. Personally I think defence reform will have to go hand-in-hand with EU reform but the latter is the trickier proposition.
Agree. It is early days and UK/Germany/France/Poland/EU needs to keep options open, buy some time, hope that USA walks back a bit once Congress and people realise what is being done in their name by the gangster oligarchy. But they need to be prepared for a new style European defence (and nuclear) shield, hope that Russia is not ready yet for new wars and so on.
The UK is right to stick with restraint and politeness for now while USA has time to come to a degree of sense.
is this a good idea? I don't know. Is it best to flatter him like this (and he certainly enjoys it) to influence him or does it just reinforce his view that being a bully works and it just get worse?
He’s the recognised head of state of the US
The late Queen had to serve tea for far worse on occasion.
The other question is how big will the Europeans' aid package be for Ukraine today? Will it be enough to see them through another 6 months? If so, Trump will have lost such control as he has and Russia will start to panic as their economic crisis intensifies.
Ideally, we are looking for something close to $20bn with roughly 10% of that from us.
The traitorous scum Orbán is going to block that . They refuse to approve any more arms sales .
Its interesting how effective Hungary, a small recipient country, is in causing disruption in the EU.
Compared to how ineffective the UK, a large contributor country, was in EU negotiations.
Perhaps if the UK leaders had done a little more vetoing and a little less posturing and surrendering then the UK would still be in the EU.
Some good economic news for once - clean energy sector grew by 10% last year (12x faster than the rest of the economy), average salary of £43,000, NE of England keeping up with the rest of the country for once, 1,000,000 people employed.
We've got to defeat the anti-growth agenda and embrace green energy - it's the one thing we are really good at.
It’s also something where we can be much more self sufficient. Having weaned ourselves off Russian gas (ourselves being Europe - the UK was always less dependent on Russia) we now have a growing dependency on US LNG. But with the USA now no longer being a reliable trading partner and potentially a future geopolitical foe, and the other big source being the not exactly unproblematic Qatar, we need other options.
Yes the UK has some gas reserves and yes Miliband is blocking exploitation, but even on the most wildly optimistic estimates those are minuscule and dwindling fast even with new investment. Whereas wind and sun (and tides) are all around us, and battery lithium is far less problematically concentrated in dodgy countries.
The other question is how big will the Europeans' aid package be for Ukraine today? Will it be enough to see them through another 6 months? If so, Trump will have lost such control as he has and Russia will start to panic as their economic crisis intensifies.
Ideally, we are looking for something close to $20bn with roughly 10% of that from us.
The traitorous scum Orbán is going to block that . They refuse to approve any more arms sales .
I think attempting to block this could be the last straw for Orbán.
So far, his blackmail-for-concessions has worked. In the new Trumpian climate, European leaders are more fearful of what is happening on their eastern borders. And he can't hide behind German reluctance with the new government there.
In the short term, although it will cause delays (and therefore Ukrainian lives), I think individual governments will work round it.
Bullying this country, Canada, and Europe into spending more on the military, and not freeloading off the USA, is perfectly fair and reasonable (Ireland should be bullied, as well).
Turning allies into enemies, through tariffs; accusing them of “stealing” from the US, by selling consumers goods and services that they want; threatening to invade allied States, and seize territory off them; cutting deals with their enemies to gain mineral rights.
Those things are worse than unethical. They are massive blunders.
China and Russia must love this: the West being divided and fighting amongst themselves, whilst they extend their sphere of influence in their own backyards.
Russia will have loved Trump's election though will be a bit annoyed the pro Zelensky Merz beat the pro Putin AfD last night.
China will have mixed feelings, for starters it is already the first target of Trump's new tariffs which Russia will avoid as Trump does not see Moscow as an economic threat unlike Beijing.
Secondly, while Trump is cutting back on support for Ukraine he is increasing support for Taiwan, by suggesting the US will support their independence, which has infuriated Beijing
America - like the Conservative Party - seems to believe its own propaganda and thus is detached from reality. America is the Greatest Country On Earth. With the Strongest Military. Of course people want to buy their stuff! No, they Do.
Its a brilliant plan. Demand that Ukraine hands over all its mineral wealth. Use it to build new products especially for defence, then force Ukraine's neighbours to buy them to protect themselves from Russia.
Well, I say brilliant. Europe and the middle east are two huge markets for defence equipment. I'm sure Bibi will keep buying American, but will Saudi? Qatar? After what Trump has done to destabilise the region? Europe?
This is gift week for Europe - if its political leaders and the big manufacturers can get the new narrative going quickly. Don't buy American, buy European. With support from our ally Ukraine.
What Trump does as the new pork markets global markets don't flood Murica with orders is the question. How do you extort the world when the world says "no thanks"? Threaten then with Putin? He can't threaten "America will cut you off". Great, go right ahead. We don't need you any more.
Not quite what Project 2025 think. They're of the opinion that after years of DEI, their forces are weak and need 'full spectrum' defence.
The U.S. Army’s mission is “[t]o deploy, fight and win our nation’s wars by providing ready, prompt and sustained land dominance by Army forces across the full spectrum of conflict as part of the joint force.”24 Today, however, the Army cannot execute its land dominance mission.25 The U.S. Army is at an inflection point that is marked by more than a decade of steadily eroding budgets and diluted buying power, an appreciable degradation in readiness and training capacity, a near crisis in the recruiting and retention of critical personnel, and a bevy of aging weapons systems that no longer provide a qualitative edge over peer and near-peer competitors but will not be replaced in the near term.
If that belief has been adopted by the present administration, then it would explain their apparent deference to Russia and the need for more defence spending ($150bn) which they are trying to get through both houses.
And yet, Hegseth is proposing 8% cuts in US defence spending each year.
Makes sense given Trump is more interested than economic wars than foreign wars.
However the normally Republican voting US military would be furious with big defence cuts
It seems that what Hegseth is proposing is an 8% cut in existing budgets in order to free up resources for schemes like Donald's "Iron Dome". In practice this is most likely to be cuts in Vetrans Administration programmes etc.
The other question is how big will the Europeans' aid package be for Ukraine today? Will it be enough to see them through another 6 months? If so, Trump will have lost such control as he has and Russia will start to panic as their economic crisis intensifies.
Ideally, we are looking for something close to $20bn with roughly 10% of that from us.
The traitorous scum Orbán is going to block that . They refuse to approve any more arms sales .
I think attempting to block this could be the last straw for Orbán.
So far, his blackmail-for-concessions has worked. In the new Trumpian climate, European leaders are more fearful of what is happening on their eastern borders. And he can't hide behind German reluctance with the new government there.
In the short term, although it will cause delays (and therefore Ukrainian lives), I think individual governments will work round it.
It was very unfortunate that Fico came to power in Slovakia. Without him the EU could effectively suspend Hungary voting rights in the EP.
The only thing he can. The British state is highly optimised toward subservience to the USA. That's not going to change overnight. Canada being butthurt, that Ukraine thing if it's even still going, etc. are minor issues compared to that governing principle.
A state visit legitimizes Trump . And what if he becomes even more of a Putin arselicker before that .
What if he does? What the fuck is Starmer going to do it about? Tell Trump to stick his special relationship up his loose old arsehole and get the fuck out of Mildenhall and Lakenheath? No... It's business as usual.
Some good economic news for once - clean energy sector grew by 10% last year (12x faster than the rest of the economy), average salary of £43,000, NE of England keeping up with the rest of the country for once, 1,000,000 people employed.
We've got to defeat the anti-growth agenda and embrace green energy - it's the one thing we are really good at.
It’s also something where we can be much more self sufficient. Having weaned ourselves off Russian gas (ourselves being Europe - the UK was always less dependent on Russia) we now have a growing dependency on US LNG. But with the USA now no longer being a reliable trading partner and potentially a future geopolitical foe, and the other big source being the not exactly unproblematic Qatar, we need other options.
Yes the UK has some gas reserves and yes Miliband is blocking exploitation, but even on the most wildly optimistic estimates those are minuscule and dwindling fast even with new investment. Whereas wind and sun (and tides) are all around us, and battery lithium is far less problematically concentrated in dodgy countries.
Good news.
But the free market should be allowed (And tax receipts follow) for North sea oil and gas till it is uneconomical to do so. It is like being in the EU, it never excluded doing business with the rest of the world, and a similar divide seems to have sprung up between people who want to ban every wind farm; and others who want to ban every oil field. We clearly should allow every form of energy to stand and fall on it's own economic merits and not have gov't put it's thumb on the scales whichever way it's plonking it down.
Bullying this country, Canada, and Europe into spending more on the military, and not freeloading off the USA, is perfectly fair and reasonable (Ireland should be bullied, as well).
Turning allies into enemies, through tariffs; accusing them of “stealing” from the US, by selling consumers goods and services that they want; threatening to invade allied States, and seize territory off them; cutting deals with their enemies to gain mineral rights.
Those things are worse than unethical. They are massive blunders.
President Reagan decided Friday to impose punitive 100% tariffs on a wide variety of goods produced by Japanese electronic giants in retaliation for Tokyo’s failure to abide by the semiconductor trade agreement between the two nations.
In approving a recommendation Thursday by the Administration’s top economic officials, the White House decided to put the tariffs into effect about April 17, less than two weeks before Japanese Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone is scheduled to begin a visit to the United States aimed at easing trade frictions.
The tariffs will be targeted to bring in as much as $300 million and designed to punish such firms as NEC Corp., Hitachi Ltd., Fujitsu Ltd., Toshiba Corp. and Oki Corp. by either pricing some of their goods out of the American market or by forcing them to accept substantial losses on U.S. sales.
Under Reagan, we knew that if the USSR threatened to nuke European targets, the USA would threaten swift and terrible retribution.
Under Trump, we know that if Russia threatened to nuke European targets, the USA would say “nice cities you’ve got there, be a shame if something happened to them.”
Hence Merz wants to bring all NATO European nations under the French and UK nuclear weapons umbrella
The other question is how big will the Europeans' aid package be for Ukraine today? Will it be enough to see them through another 6 months? If so, Trump will have lost such control as he has and Russia will start to panic as their economic crisis intensifies.
Ideally, we are looking for something close to $20bn with roughly 10% of that from us.
The traitorous scum Orbán is going to block that . They refuse to approve any more arms sales .
I think attempting to block this could be the last straw for Orbán.
So far, his blackmail-for-concessions has worked. In the new Trumpian climate, European leaders are more fearful of what is happening on their eastern borders. And he can't hide behind German reluctance with the new government there.
In the short term, although it will cause delays (and therefore Ukrainian lives), I think individual governments will work round it.
Orban has been playing a game of brinkmanship for years now. He calculates that he can sit in the tent and cause trouble, while enjoying the benefits he gets from doing so. This is because those in the tent with him have been historically inept at actually doing anything about his behaviour.
The EU needs to call his bluff now. He doesn’t actually want to be outside the tent, after all.
The only thing he can. The British state is highly optimised toward subservience to the USA. That's not going to change overnight. Canada being butthurt, that Ukraine thing if it's even still going, etc. are minor issues compared to that governing principle.
A state visit legitimizes Trump . And what if he becomes even more of a Putin arselicker before that .
What if he does? What the fuck is Starmer going to do it about? Tell Trump to stick his special relationship up his loose old arsehole and get the fuck out of Mildenhall and Lakenheath? No... It's business as usual.
The only thing he can. The British state is highly optimised toward subservience to the USA. That's not going to change overnight. Canada being butthurt, that Ukraine thing if it's even still going, etc. are minor issues compared to that governing principle.
Yes, there's not much to be lost by trying to get what he can out of Trump. Then coming back and preparing for independence.
Some good economic news for once - clean energy sector grew by 10% last year (12x faster than the rest of the economy), average salary of £43,000, NE of England keeping up with the rest of the country for once, 1,000,000 people employed.
We've got to defeat the anti-growth agenda and embrace green energy - it's the one thing we are really good at.
It’s also something where we can be much more self sufficient. Having weaned ourselves off Russian gas (ourselves being Europe - the UK was always less dependent on Russia) we now have a growing dependency on US LNG. But with the USA now no longer being a reliable trading partner and potentially a future geopolitical foe, and the other big source being the not exactly unproblematic Qatar, we need other options.
Yes the UK has some gas reserves and yes Miliband is blocking exploitation, but even on the most wildly optimistic estimates those are minuscule and dwindling fast even with new investment. Whereas wind and sun (and tides) are all around us, and battery lithium is far less problematically concentrated in dodgy countries.
Good news.
But the free market should be allowed (And tax receipts follow) for North sea oil and gas till it is uneconomical to do so. It is like being in the EU, it never excluded doing business with the rest of the world, and a similar divide seems to have sprung up between people who want to ban every wind farm; and others who want to ban every oil field. We clearly should allow every form of energy to stand and fall on it's own economic merits and not have gov't put it's thumb on the scales whichever way it's plonking it down.
Yes, let's burn our remaining oil and gas reserves as quickly as we can so that we become even more dependent on other countries for hydrocarbons for our chemical industry in the future. Cracking idea.
Some good economic news for once - clean energy sector grew by 10% last year (12x faster than the rest of the economy), average salary of £43,000, NE of England keeping up with the rest of the country for once, 1,000,000 people employed.
We've got to defeat the anti-growth agenda and embrace green energy - it's the one thing we are really good at.
It’s also something where we can be much more self sufficient. Having weaned ourselves off Russian gas (ourselves being Europe - the UK was always less dependent on Russia) we now have a growing dependency on US LNG. But with the USA now no longer being a reliable trading partner and potentially a future geopolitical foe, and the other big source being the not exactly unproblematic Qatar, we need other options.
Yes the UK has some gas reserves and yes Miliband is blocking exploitation, but even on the most wildly optimistic estimates those are minuscule and dwindling fast even with new investment. Whereas wind and sun (and tides) are all around us, and battery lithium is far less problematically concentrated in dodgy countries.
Good news.
But the free market should be allowed (And tax receipts follow) for North sea oil and gas till it is uneconomical to do so. It is like being in the EU, it never excluded doing business with the rest of the world, and a similar divide seems to have sprung up between people who want to ban every wind farm; and others who want to ban every oil field. We clearly should allow every form of energy to stand and fall on it's own economic merits and not have gov't put it's thumb on the scales whichever way it's plonking it down.
That said, there's the "total cost" argument in play. If there are substantial long-term costs associated with "energy source A" then the market is already skewed if the producers are not liable for those costs, and they are instead picked up by future public spending. The hidden thumb on the scales.
The other question is how big will the Europeans' aid package be for Ukraine today? Will it be enough to see them through another 6 months? If so, Trump will have lost such control as he has and Russia will start to panic as their economic crisis intensifies.
Ideally, we are looking for something close to $20bn with roughly 10% of that from us.
The traitorous scum Orbán is going to block that . They refuse to approve any more arms sales .
Its interesting how effective Hungary, a small recipient country, is in causing disruption in the EU.
Compared to how ineffective the UK, a large contributor country, was in EU negotiations.
Perhaps if the UK leaders had done a little more vetoing and a little less posturing and surrendering then the UK would still be in the EU.
EU needs to get its act together and kick out Hungary. Time for countries to pick a side.
If there were method to it I could see the utility. A well choreographed good cop bad cop act with Macron might work. But I strongly doubt this is a well choreographed good cop bad cop act. It’s just traditional British specialrelationshipitis.
There must be a German compound noun for that. I’ll give one of those online word generators a try.
EDIT - the one I usually use seems to he crashing. I suppose today it’s probably at peak usage.
It also means that Starmer can say "hey, at least we tried" if it all goes wrong. People dislike Trump/Musk but would not tolerate a slash and burn approach either.
I doubt if the general public and media of the (non USA) western nations are going to have much patience with the narcissism of small differences among NATO (non USA) big hitters when faced with their greatest challenge since 1945 + the opportunity to be among the biggest cheeses in the world and the greatest by far big cheese committed to democracy and our way of life. The of combination France, Germany, UK, Poland, Canada, etc + non NATOs Australia and others has massive potential as a power bloc in an isolationist USA world.
Quandary: in an Inverness hotel and they’re piping in GB News with the porridge. Should I ask the owner to switch that shite off, or at least wait till my full Scottish has been served? Staying tonight as well so discretion may be the best part of valour.
Some good economic news for once - clean energy sector grew by 10% last year (12x faster than the rest of the economy), average salary of £43,000, NE of England keeping up with the rest of the country for once, 1,000,000 people employed.
We've got to defeat the anti-growth agenda and embrace green energy - it's the one thing we are really good at.
It’s also something where we can be much more self sufficient. Having weaned ourselves off Russian gas (ourselves being Europe - the UK was always less dependent on Russia) we now have a growing dependency on US LNG. But with the USA now no longer being a reliable trading partner and potentially a future geopolitical foe, and the other big source being the not exactly unproblematic Qatar, we need other options.
Yes the UK has some gas reserves and yes Miliband is blocking exploitation, but even on the most wildly optimistic estimates those are minuscule and dwindling fast even with new investment. Whereas wind and sun (and tides) are all around us, and battery lithium is far less problematically concentrated in dodgy countries.
Plus lithium is not actually consumed in batteries. When your car goes to the scrapyard after 20 years, it will have the same amount of lithium in it as when it rolled off the production line.
Some good economic news for once - clean energy sector grew by 10% last year (12x faster than the rest of the economy), average salary of £43,000, NE of England keeping up with the rest of the country for once, 1,000,000 people employed.
We've got to defeat the anti-growth agenda and embrace green energy - it's the one thing we are really good at.
It’s also something where we can be much more self sufficient. Having weaned ourselves off Russian gas (ourselves being Europe - the UK was always less dependent on Russia) we now have a growing dependency on US LNG. But with the USA now no longer being a reliable trading partner and potentially a future geopolitical foe, and the other big source being the not exactly unproblematic Qatar, we need other options.
Yes the UK has some gas reserves and yes Miliband is blocking exploitation, but even on the most wildly optimistic estimates those are minuscule and dwindling fast even with new investment. Whereas wind and sun (and tides) are all around us, and battery lithium is far less problematically concentrated in dodgy countries.
Good news.
But the free market should be allowed (And tax receipts follow) for North sea oil and gas till it is uneconomical to do so. It is like being in the EU, it never excluded doing business with the rest of the world, and a similar divide seems to have sprung up between people who want to ban every wind farm; and others who want to ban every oil field. We clearly should allow every form of energy to stand and fall on it's own economic merits and not have gov't put it's thumb on the scales whichever way it's plonking it down.
Do you oppose the 84% tax relief for oil/gas field development? It's hardly a level playing field given that subsidy.
Quandary: in an Inverness hotel and they’re piping in GB News with the porridge. Should I ask the owner to switch that shite off, or at least wait till my full Scottish has been served? Staying tonight as well so discretion may be the best part of valour.
What would Starmer do?!
When you say shite are you referring to gbnews or porridge
Some good economic news for once - clean energy sector grew by 10% last year (12x faster than the rest of the economy), average salary of £43,000, NE of England keeping up with the rest of the country for once, 1,000,000 people employed.
We've got to defeat the anti-growth agenda and embrace green energy - it's the one thing we are really good at.
It’s also something where we can be much more self sufficient. Having weaned ourselves off Russian gas (ourselves being Europe - the UK was always less dependent on Russia) we now have a growing dependency on US LNG. But with the USA now no longer being a reliable trading partner and potentially a future geopolitical foe, and the other big source being the not exactly unproblematic Qatar, we need other options.
Yes the UK has some gas reserves and yes Miliband is blocking exploitation, but even on the most wildly optimistic estimates those are minuscule and dwindling fast even with new investment. Whereas wind and sun (and tides) are all around us, and battery lithium is far less problematically concentrated in dodgy countries.
Good news.
But the free market should be allowed (And tax receipts follow) for North sea oil and gas till it is uneconomical to do so. It is like being in the EU, it never excluded doing business with the rest of the world, and a similar divide seems to have sprung up between people who want to ban every wind farm; and others who want to ban every oil field. We clearly should allow every form of energy to stand and fall on it's own economic merits and not have gov't put it's thumb on the scales whichever way it's plonking it down.
That said, there's the "total cost" argument in play. If there are substantial long-term costs associated with "energy source A" then the market is already skewed if the producers are not liable for those costs, and they are instead picked up by future public spending. The hidden thumb on the scales.
The Total Cost argument does not apply as long as you are only attacking supply without dealing with demand. That is why Miliband is such a fucking idiot. His actions in destroying the UK North Sea industry will not reduce hydrocarbon consumption by a single barrel.
Meanwhile Norway will be drilling in excess of 170 new wells this year including almost 50 new exploration wells.
They produce the oil and gas. Get the tax money, sell it to us and we burn it. No reduction in CO2 emissions, just vast sums of lost UK revenue.
Quandary: in an Inverness hotel and they’re piping in GB News with the porridge. Should I ask the owner to switch that shite off, or at least wait till my full Scottish has been served? Staying tonight as well so discretion may be the best part of valour.
What would Starmer do?!
When you say shite are you referring to gbnews or porridge
The other question is how big will the Europeans' aid package be for Ukraine today? Will it be enough to see them through another 6 months? If so, Trump will have lost such control as he has and Russia will start to panic as their economic crisis intensifies.
Ideally, we are looking for something close to $20bn with roughly 10% of that from us.
The traitorous scum Orbán is going to block that . They refuse to approve any more arms sales .
Its interesting how effective Hungary, a small recipient country, is in causing disruption in the EU.
Compared to how ineffective the UK, a large contributor country, was in EU negotiations.
Perhaps if the UK leaders had done a little more vetoing and a little less posturing and surrendering then the UK would still be in the EU.
EU needs to get its act together and kick out Hungary. Time for countries to pick a side.
They can’t . There’s no actual mechanism to kick them out . You can suspend their voting rights in the EP and put in other measures but need unanimous agreement from the remaining members and Fico another Putin puppet will block those .
America - like the Conservative Party - seems to believe its own propaganda and thus is detached from reality. America is the Greatest Country On Earth. With the Strongest Military. Of course people want to buy their stuff! No, they Do.
Its a brilliant plan. Demand that Ukraine hands over all its mineral wealth. Use it to build new products especially for defence, then force Ukraine's neighbours to buy them to protect themselves from Russia.
Well, I say brilliant. Europe and the middle east are two huge markets for defence equipment. I'm sure Bibi will keep buying American, but will Saudi? Qatar? After what Trump has done to destabilise the region? Europe?
This is gift week for Europe - if its political leaders and the big manufacturers can get the new narrative going quickly. Don't buy American, buy European. With support from our ally Ukraine.
What Trump does as the new pork markets global markets don't flood Murica with orders is the question. How do you extort the world when the world says "no thanks"? Threaten then with Putin? He can't threaten "America will cut you off". Great, go right ahead. We don't need you any more.
Not quite what Project 2025 think. They're of the opinion that after years of DEI, their forces are weak and need 'full spectrum' defence.
The U.S. Army’s mission is “[t]o deploy, fight and win our nation’s wars by providing ready, prompt and sustained land dominance by Army forces across the full spectrum of conflict as part of the joint force.”24 Today, however, the Army cannot execute its land dominance mission.25 The U.S. Army is at an inflection point that is marked by more than a decade of steadily eroding budgets and diluted buying power, an appreciable degradation in readiness and training capacity, a near crisis in the recruiting and retention of critical personnel, and a bevy of aging weapons systems that no longer provide a qualitative edge over peer and near-peer competitors but will not be replaced in the near term.
If that belief has been adopted by the present administration, then it would explain their apparent deference to Russia and the need for more defence spending ($150bn) which they are trying to get through both houses.
And yet, Hegseth is proposing 8% cuts in US defence spending each year.
Makes sense given Trump is more interested than economic wars than foreign wars.
However the normally Republican voting US military would be furious with big defence cuts
It seems that what Hegseth is proposing is an 8% cut in existing budgets in order to free up resources for schemes like Donald's "Iron Dome". In practice this is most likely to be cuts in Vetrans Administration programmes etc.
Along with the cost of stationing US forces in Europe. And quite possibly the F35 program.
Trump is floating the idea of cutting the defence budget in half, but that's only if China agrees to so the same (so it's not happening).
I'm not convinced there's much in the way of deep thinking behind either policy, or even that they have much of a clue about what they're going to do, but VA healthcare and EUCOM are definitely targets for substantial cuts.
Quandary: in an Inverness hotel and they’re piping in GB News with the porridge. Should I ask the owner to switch that shite off, or at least wait till my full Scottish has been served? Staying tonight as well so discretion may be the best part of valour.
What would Starmer do?!
When you say shite are you referring to gbnews or porridge
Quandary: in an Inverness hotel and they’re piping in GB News with the porridge. Should I ask the owner to switch that shite off, or at least wait till my full Scottish has been served? Staying tonight as well so discretion may be the best part of valour.
What would Starmer do?!
He would say, that while GB News raises some very real concerns that are important to some sections of the community, that they don't speak for the country as a whole in the tone and content of their broadcasts. The right of the British people to be informed, with accuracy and clarity, about current events is at the forefront of his thinking and he has therefore instructed the relevant departments to start a study into establishing a commission which will monitor and regulate reactionary shite that it is consumed by aged morons in ex-council houses. Furthermore, the Gooners have completely fucked it.
The other question is how big will the Europeans' aid package be for Ukraine today? Will it be enough to see them through another 6 months? If so, Trump will have lost such control as he has and Russia will start to panic as their economic crisis intensifies.
Ideally, we are looking for something close to $20bn with roughly 10% of that from us.
The traitorous scum Orbán is going to block that . They refuse to approve any more arms sales .
Its interesting how effective Hungary, a small recipient country, is in causing disruption in the EU.
Compared to how ineffective the UK, a large contributor country, was in EU negotiations.
Perhaps if the UK leaders had done a little more vetoing and a little less posturing and surrendering then the UK would still be in the EU.
EU needs to get its act together and kick out Hungary. Time for countries to pick a side.
They can’t . There’s no actual mechanism to kick them out . You can suspend their voting rights in the EP and put in other measures but need unanimous agreement from the remaining members and Fico another Putin puppet will block those .
Europe needs to start replacing the carrots with sticks. If some countries want to cause difficulties that are contrary to the security of the whole group, then a way can be found to politely remind them that if they’d like to be outside the club at the mercy of Russia and without access to the benefits, the door is over there.
Europe really has to start remaking itself as a security-first collective. I think Merz, and perhaps increasingly Macron, are starting to get this.
Quandary: in an Inverness hotel and they’re piping in GB News with the porridge. Should I ask the owner to switch that shite off, or at least wait till my full Scottish has been served? Staying tonight as well so discretion may be the best part of valour.
What would Starmer do?!
When you say shite are you referring to gbnews or porridge
Porridge 5 out of 5, headlines about harmless granny jailed for FB posts zero out of 5.
Bullying this country, Canada, and Europe into spending more on the military, and not freeloading off the USA, is perfectly fair and reasonable (Ireland should be bullied, as well).
Turning allies into enemies, through tariffs; accusing them of “stealing” from the US, by selling consumers goods and services that they want; threatening to invade allied States, and seize territory off them; cutting deals with their enemies to gain mineral rights.
Those things are worse than unethical. They are massive blunders.
President Reagan decided Friday to impose punitive 100% tariffs on a wide variety of goods produced by Japanese electronic giants in retaliation for Tokyo’s failure to abide by the semiconductor trade agreement between the two nations.
In approving a recommendation Thursday by the Administration’s top economic officials, the White House decided to put the tariffs into effect about April 17, less than two weeks before Japanese Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone is scheduled to begin a visit to the United States aimed at easing trade frictions.
The tariffs will be targeted to bring in as much as $300 million and designed to punish such firms as NEC Corp., Hitachi Ltd., Fujitsu Ltd., Toshiba Corp. and Oki Corp. by either pricing some of their goods out of the American market or by forcing them to accept substantial losses on U.S. sales.
The tariffs were on specific categories of imports of electronics, from one country, and covered only $300 million of import value. Are you seriously trying to claim equivalence with the incoherent policies they are proposing, then cancelling, then proposing again this time?
I'm just questioning the idea that conducting a muscular trade policy with an ally should be regarded as such a catastrophic breach of norms.
Calling VAT a tariff, and expecting uniquely to be exempt from it is not a "muscular trade policy", it's just idiocy. Unless you mean that outright extortion of putative allies isn't a "catastrophic breach of norms" ?
You're not questioning, as much as conducting an exercise in casuistry on behalf of the Trump administration.
We lost an empire and found a role playing second fiddle in the American orchestra, and now we're upset because we don't like the conductor's taste in music.
At the end of the day, the US is a foreign state. If we're too dependent on it for our sense of our place in the world, that's our problem.
Except you're not upset, are you? Because you're a propagandist for fascism. You've become worse than the average Saturday morning Putinbot, with less plausible "arguments"
You need to up your game as you've become a laughing-stock with the transparent bollocks you come out with.
America - like the Conservative Party - seems to believe its own propaganda and thus is detached from reality. America is the Greatest Country On Earth. With the Strongest Military. Of course people want to buy their stuff! No, they Do.
Its a brilliant plan. Demand that Ukraine hands over all its mineral wealth. Use it to build new products especially for defence, then force Ukraine's neighbours to buy them to protect themselves from Russia.
Well, I say brilliant. Europe and the middle east are two huge markets for defence equipment. I'm sure Bibi will keep buying American, but will Saudi? Qatar? After what Trump has done to destabilise the region? Europe?
This is gift week for Europe - if its political leaders and the big manufacturers can get the new narrative going quickly. Don't buy American, buy European. With support from our ally Ukraine.
What Trump does as the new pork markets global markets don't flood Murica with orders is the question. How do you extort the world when the world says "no thanks"? Threaten then with Putin? He can't threaten "America will cut you off". Great, go right ahead. We don't need you any more.
Not quite what Project 2025 think. They're of the opinion that after years of DEI, their forces are weak and need 'full spectrum' defence.
The U.S. Army’s mission is “[t]o deploy, fight and win our nation’s wars by providing ready, prompt and sustained land dominance by Army forces across the full spectrum of conflict as part of the joint force.”24 Today, however, the Army cannot execute its land dominance mission.25 The U.S. Army is at an inflection point that is marked by more than a decade of steadily eroding budgets and diluted buying power, an appreciable degradation in readiness and training capacity, a near crisis in the recruiting and retention of critical personnel, and a bevy of aging weapons systems that no longer provide a qualitative edge over peer and near-peer competitors but will not be replaced in the near term.
If that belief has been adopted by the present administration, then it would explain their apparent deference to Russia and the need for more defence spending ($150bn) which they are trying to get through both houses.
And yet, Hegseth is proposing 8% cuts in US defence spending each year.
Makes sense given Trump is more interested than economic wars than foreign wars.
However the normally Republican voting US military would be furious with big defence cuts
It seems that what Hegseth is proposing is an 8% cut in existing budgets in order to free up resources for schemes like Donald's "Iron Dome". In practice this is most likely to be cuts in Vetrans Administration programmes etc.
"Iron Dome" AFAIK is actually an Iron Colander. Someone areas are going to be annoyed if they suddenly find themselves lower priority than others. But they could pay with mineral rights I suppose.
The other question is how big will the Europeans' aid package be for Ukraine today? Will it be enough to see them through another 6 months? If so, Trump will have lost such control as he has and Russia will start to panic as their economic crisis intensifies.
Ideally, we are looking for something close to $20bn with roughly 10% of that from us.
The traitorous scum Orbán is going to block that . They refuse to approve any more arms sales .
Its interesting how effective Hungary, a small recipient country, is in causing disruption in the EU.
Compared to how ineffective the UK, a large contributor country, was in EU negotiations.
Perhaps if the UK leaders had done a little more vetoing and a little less posturing and surrendering then the UK would still be in the EU.
EU needs to get its act together and kick out Hungary. Time for countries to pick a side.
They can’t . There’s no actual mechanism to kick them out . You can suspend their voting rights in the EP and put in other measures but need unanimous agreement from the remaining members and Fico another Putin puppet will block those .
Europe needs to start replacing the carrots with sticks. If some countries want to cause difficulties that are contrary to the security of the whole group, then a way can be found to politely remind them that if they’d like to be outside the club at the mercy of Russia and without access to the benefits, the door is over there.
Europe really has to start remaking itself as a security-first collective. I think Merz, and perhaps increasingly Macron, are starting to get this.
It's also not impossible that such a security collective overlaps but is distinct from the EU. And indeed NATO. That would get around the vetos of the semi-detached (or worse) members, and allow the participation of non EU members (ie the UK and Norway).
There would be costs in setting up a completely new structure, but far fewer political hurdles to putting it together.
America - like the Conservative Party - seems to believe its own propaganda and thus is detached from reality. America is the Greatest Country On Earth. With the Strongest Military. Of course people want to buy their stuff! No, they Do.
Its a brilliant plan. Demand that Ukraine hands over all its mineral wealth. Use it to build new products especially for defence, then force Ukraine's neighbours to buy them to protect themselves from Russia.
Well, I say brilliant. Europe and the middle east are two huge markets for defence equipment. I'm sure Bibi will keep buying American, but will Saudi? Qatar? After what Trump has done to destabilise the region? Europe?
This is gift week for Europe - if its political leaders and the big manufacturers can get the new narrative going quickly. Don't buy American, buy European. With support from our ally Ukraine.
What Trump does as the new pork markets global markets don't flood Murica with orders is the question. How do you extort the world when the world says "no thanks"? Threaten then with Putin? He can't threaten "America will cut you off". Great, go right ahead. We don't need you any more.
Not quite what Project 2025 think. They're of the opinion that after years of DEI, their forces are weak and need 'full spectrum' defence.
The U.S. Army’s mission is “[t]o deploy, fight and win our nation’s wars by providing ready, prompt and sustained land dominance by Army forces across the full spectrum of conflict as part of the joint force.”24 Today, however, the Army cannot execute its land dominance mission.25 The U.S. Army is at an inflection point that is marked by more than a decade of steadily eroding budgets and diluted buying power, an appreciable degradation in readiness and training capacity, a near crisis in the recruiting and retention of critical personnel, and a bevy of aging weapons systems that no longer provide a qualitative edge over peer and near-peer competitors but will not be replaced in the near term.
If that belief has been adopted by the present administration, then it would explain their apparent deference to Russia and the need for more defence spending ($150bn) which they are trying to get through both houses.
And yet, Hegseth is proposing 8% cuts in US defence spending each year.
Makes sense given Trump is more interested than economic wars than foreign wars.
However the normally Republican voting US military would be furious with big defence cuts
It seems that what Hegseth is proposing is an 8% cut in existing budgets in order to free up resources for schemes like Donald's "Iron Dome". In practice this is most likely to be cuts in Vetrans Administration programmes etc.
On my understanding it's supposed to be an 8% cut in the defence budget in each of the next five years leading ultimately to a budget that's one third smaller. It does look like Hegseth is hoping to divert those savings into other programmes and if so he's at odds with Musk.
America - like the Conservative Party - seems to believe its own propaganda and thus is detached from reality. America is the Greatest Country On Earth. With the Strongest Military. Of course people want to buy their stuff! No, they Do.
Its a brilliant plan. Demand that Ukraine hands over all its mineral wealth. Use it to build new products especially for defence, then force Ukraine's neighbours to buy them to protect themselves from Russia.
Well, I say brilliant. Europe and the middle east are two huge markets for defence equipment. I'm sure Bibi will keep buying American, but will Saudi? Qatar? After what Trump has done to destabilise the region? Europe?
This is gift week for Europe - if its political leaders and the big manufacturers can get the new narrative going quickly. Don't buy American, buy European. With support from our ally Ukraine.
What Trump does as the new pork markets global markets don't flood Murica with orders is the question. How do you extort the world when the world says "no thanks"? Threaten then with Putin? He can't threaten "America will cut you off". Great, go right ahead. We don't need you any more.
Not quite what Project 2025 think. They're of the opinion that after years of DEI, their forces are weak and need 'full spectrum' defence.
The U.S. Army’s mission is “[t]o deploy, fight and win our nation’s wars by providing ready, prompt and sustained land dominance by Army forces across the full spectrum of conflict as part of the joint force.”24 Today, however, the Army cannot execute its land dominance mission.25 The U.S. Army is at an inflection point that is marked by more than a decade of steadily eroding budgets and diluted buying power, an appreciable degradation in readiness and training capacity, a near crisis in the recruiting and retention of critical personnel, and a bevy of aging weapons systems that no longer provide a qualitative edge over peer and near-peer competitors but will not be replaced in the near term.
If that belief has been adopted by the present administration, then it would explain their apparent deference to Russia and the need for more defence spending ($150bn) which they are trying to get through both houses.
And yet, Hegseth is proposing 8% cuts in US defence spending each year.
Makes sense given Trump is more interested than economic wars than foreign wars.
However the normally Republican voting US military would be furious with big defence cuts
It seems that what Hegseth is proposing is an 8% cut in existing budgets in order to free up resources for schemes like Donald's "Iron Dome". In practice this is most likely to be cuts in Vetrans Administration programmes etc.
"Iron Dome" AFAIK is actually an Iron Colander. Someone areas are going to be annoyed if they suddenly find themselves lower priority than others. But they could pay with mineral rights I suppose.
It's a slogan, not a plan. But the intention to pursue large scale ABM (and probably anti-drone) development and deployment is quite clear. Even if Hegseth and Trump have little to zero idea of what's involved technically.
Campaigners have threatened the government with legal action unless it reconsiders the decision to refuse compensation to millions of women affected by an increase in the state pension age.
The Women Against State Pension Inequality (Waspi) group is demanding payouts for 3.6 million women born in the 1950s who were not properly informed of changes first introduced in the 1990s.
Campaigners have threatened the government with legal action unless it reconsiders the decision to refuse compensation to millions of women affected by an increase in the state pension age.
The Women Against State Pension Inequality (Waspi) group is demanding payouts for 3.6 million women born in the 1950s who were not properly informed of changes first introduced in the 1990s.
I still maintain we were properly informed. If they didn't pay attention to any of the advertising about it that's a different issue. I was very close to being one of the people affected and I paid attention to the advertising, even when I found I was one year outside the affected age.
Campaigners have threatened the government with legal action unless it reconsiders the decision to refuse compensation to millions of women affected by an increase in the state pension age.
The Women Against State Pension Inequality (Waspi) group is demanding payouts for 3.6 million women born in the 1950s who were not properly informed of changes first introduced in the 1990s.
It appears to me that WASPI are very much for state pension inequality!
Surely it can't go through as it has an indirect discriminatory effect on gay men (No gay male couple will benefit) which is a protected characteristic ?
America - like the Conservative Party - seems to believe its own propaganda and thus is detached from reality. America is the Greatest Country On Earth. With the Strongest Military. Of course people want to buy their stuff! No, they Do.
Its a brilliant plan. Demand that Ukraine hands over all its mineral wealth. Use it to build new products especially for defence, then force Ukraine's neighbours to buy them to protect themselves from Russia.
Well, I say brilliant. Europe and the middle east are two huge markets for defence equipment. I'm sure Bibi will keep buying American, but will Saudi? Qatar? After what Trump has done to destabilise the region? Europe?
This is gift week for Europe - if its political leaders and the big manufacturers can get the new narrative going quickly. Don't buy American, buy European. With support from our ally Ukraine.
What Trump does as the new pork markets global markets don't flood Murica with orders is the question. How do you extort the world when the world says "no thanks"? Threaten then with Putin? He can't threaten "America will cut you off". Great, go right ahead. We don't need you any more.
Not quite what Project 2025 think. They're of the opinion that after years of DEI, their forces are weak and need 'full spectrum' defence.
The U.S. Army’s mission is “[t]o deploy, fight and win our nation’s wars by providing ready, prompt and sustained land dominance by Army forces across the full spectrum of conflict as part of the joint force.”24 Today, however, the Army cannot execute its land dominance mission.25 The U.S. Army is at an inflection point that is marked by more than a decade of steadily eroding budgets and diluted buying power, an appreciable degradation in readiness and training capacity, a near crisis in the recruiting and retention of critical personnel, and a bevy of aging weapons systems that no longer provide a qualitative edge over peer and near-peer competitors but will not be replaced in the near term.
If that belief has been adopted by the present administration, then it would explain their apparent deference to Russia and the need for more defence spending ($150bn) which they are trying to get through both houses.
And yet, Hegseth is proposing 8% cuts in US defence spending each year.
Makes sense given Trump is more interested than economic wars than foreign wars.
However the normally Republican voting US military would be furious with big defence cuts
It seems that what Hegseth is proposing is an 8% cut in existing budgets in order to free up resources for schemes like Donald's "Iron Dome". In practice this is most likely to be cuts in Vetrans Administration programmes etc.
On my understanding it's supposed to be an 8% cut in the defence budget in each of the next five years leading ultimately to a budget that's one third smaller. It does look like Hegseth is hoping to divert those savings into other programmes and if so he's at odds with Musk.
On my understanding, no one has a clue of what's actually going to be decided. The only thing which is clear at all is the intention to cut specific programs. Beyond that, it's all conjecture for now.
The other question is how big will the Europeans' aid package be for Ukraine today? Will it be enough to see them through another 6 months? If so, Trump will have lost such control as he has and Russia will start to panic as their economic crisis intensifies.
Ideally, we are looking for something close to $20bn with roughly 10% of that from us.
The traitorous scum Orbán is going to block that . They refuse to approve any more arms sales .
Its interesting how effective Hungary, a small recipient country, is in causing disruption in the EU.
Compared to how ineffective the UK, a large contributor country, was in EU negotiations.
Perhaps if the UK leaders had done a little more vetoing and a little less posturing and surrendering then the UK would still be in the EU.
EU needs to get its act together and kick out Hungary. Time for countries to pick a side.
They can’t . There’s no actual mechanism to kick them out . You can suspend their voting rights in the EP and put in other measures but need unanimous agreement from the remaining members and Fico another Putin puppet will block those .
Europe needs to start replacing the carrots with sticks. If some countries want to cause difficulties that are contrary to the security of the whole group, then a way can be found to politely remind them that if they’d like to be outside the club at the mercy of Russia and without access to the benefits, the door is over there.
Europe really has to start remaking itself as a security-first collective. I think Merz, and perhaps increasingly Macron, are starting to get this.
It's also not impossible that such a security collective overlaps but is distinct from the EU. And indeed NATO. That would get around the vetos of the semi-detached (or worse) members, and allow the participation of non EU members (ie the UK and Norway).
There would be costs in setting up a completely new structure, but far fewer political hurdles to putting it together.
This is true, and perhaps starts the ball rolling on the multi-speed Europe that has been hinted at previously.
There is, I think, another factor in this - which is the situation on border security. If Europe can build itself a tighter, united, integrated regime on border policy, that goes some way to allaying voters concerns on immigration. If Merz is also able to get through some changes on FOM policy at the EU level too, then there really is the potential for this to be a game changer, IMHO.
Of course, Europe has not traditionally been very good at getting this sort of stuff right. But necessity (and fear of the consequences of failure) might force its politicians to.
Yes. The result appears to be a straightforward CDU-SPD majority, with immigration the only major problem - Merz's CDU stands for much tougher rules, the SPD is against any toughening. The CDU has wind in its sails and the SPD is much weakened, but the law is possibly a barrier to CDU plans, and changing the law with AFD support would probably sink the coalition.
Given that the SPD anyway has an effective veto in the Bundesrat on such a law the only option was always a compromise with the SPD on this.
Which is another reason why Merz's stupid political stunt introducing rushed unworkable probably unconstitutional and internationally illegal legislation that had zero chance of becoming law into the Bundestag in the middle of an election campaign shows what a rubbish political operator he is.
Witkoff: "The war didn't need to happen. It was provoked. It doesn't necessarily mean it was provoked by the Russians. There were all kinds of conversations back then about Ukraine joining NATO. That didn't need to happen. It basically became a threat to the Russians." https://x.com/atrupar/status/1893666694028992601
The other question is how big will the Europeans' aid package be for Ukraine today? Will it be enough to see them through another 6 months? If so, Trump will have lost such control as he has and Russia will start to panic as their economic crisis intensifies.
Ideally, we are looking for something close to $20bn with roughly 10% of that from us.
The traitorous scum Orbán is going to block that . They refuse to approve any more arms sales .
Its interesting how effective Hungary, a small recipient country, is in causing disruption in the EU.
Compared to how ineffective the UK, a large contributor country, was in EU negotiations.
Perhaps if the UK leaders had done a little more vetoing and a little less posturing and surrendering then the UK would still be in the EU.
EU needs to get its act together and kick out Hungary. Time for countries to pick a side.
They can’t . There’s no actual mechanism to kick them out . You can suspend their voting rights in the EP and put in other measures but need unanimous agreement from the remaining members and Fico another Putin puppet will block those .
Europe needs to start replacing the carrots with sticks. If some countries want to cause difficulties that are contrary to the security of the whole group, then a way can be found to politely remind them that if they’d like to be outside the club at the mercy of Russia and without access to the benefits, the door is over there.
Europe really has to start remaking itself as a security-first collective. I think Merz, and perhaps increasingly Macron, are starting to get this.
It's also not impossible that such a security collective overlaps but is distinct from the EU. And indeed NATO. That would get around the vetos of the semi-detached (or worse) members, and allow the participation of non EU members (ie the UK and Norway).
QMV is possible in the Council of the EU on Common Foreign and Security Policy - Article 31 of Lisbon. So there is no veto on such matters (unless somebody important like France objects). Orban didn't vote in favour of EU association for Ukraine but it still passed.
America - like the Conservative Party - seems to believe its own propaganda and thus is detached from reality. America is the Greatest Country On Earth. With the Strongest Military. Of course people want to buy their stuff! No, they Do.
Its a brilliant plan. Demand that Ukraine hands over all its mineral wealth. Use it to build new products especially for defence, then force Ukraine's neighbours to buy them to protect themselves from Russia.
Well, I say brilliant. Europe and the middle east are two huge markets for defence equipment. I'm sure Bibi will keep buying American, but will Saudi? Qatar? After what Trump has done to destabilise the region? Europe?
This is gift week for Europe - if its political leaders and the big manufacturers can get the new narrative going quickly. Don't buy American, buy European. With support from our ally Ukraine.
What Trump does as the new pork markets global markets don't flood Murica with orders is the question. How do you extort the world when the world says "no thanks"? Threaten then with Putin? He can't threaten "America will cut you off". Great, go right ahead. We don't need you any more.
Not quite what Project 2025 think. They're of the opinion that after years of DEI, their forces are weak and need 'full spectrum' defence.
The U.S. Army’s mission is “[t]o deploy, fight and win our nation’s wars by providing ready, prompt and sustained land dominance by Army forces across the full spectrum of conflict as part of the joint force.”24 Today, however, the Army cannot execute its land dominance mission.25 The U.S. Army is at an inflection point that is marked by more than a decade of steadily eroding budgets and diluted buying power, an appreciable degradation in readiness and training capacity, a near crisis in the recruiting and retention of critical personnel, and a bevy of aging weapons systems that no longer provide a qualitative edge over peer and near-peer competitors but will not be replaced in the near term.
If that belief has been adopted by the present administration, then it would explain their apparent deference to Russia and the need for more defence spending ($150bn) which they are trying to get through both houses.
And yet, Hegseth is proposing 8% cuts in US defence spending each year.
Makes sense given Trump is more interested than economic wars than foreign wars.
However the normally Republican voting US military would be furious with big defence cuts
It seems that what Hegseth is proposing is an 8% cut in existing budgets in order to free up resources for schemes like Donald's "Iron Dome". In practice this is most likely to be cuts in Vetrans Administration programmes etc.
On my understanding it's supposed to be an 8% cut in the defence budget in each of the next five years leading ultimately to a budget that's one third smaller. It does look like Hegseth is hoping to divert those savings into other programmes and if so he's at odds with Musk.
It seems the Trump administration wants to cut overseas military spending and increase spending on border controls on the US border to stop and deport immigrants
America - like the Conservative Party - seems to believe its own propaganda and thus is detached from reality. America is the Greatest Country On Earth. With the Strongest Military. Of course people want to buy their stuff! No, they Do.
Its a brilliant plan. Demand that Ukraine hands over all its mineral wealth. Use it to build new products especially for defence, then force Ukraine's neighbours to buy them to protect themselves from Russia.
Well, I say brilliant. Europe and the middle east are two huge markets for defence equipment. I'm sure Bibi will keep buying American, but will Saudi? Qatar? After what Trump has done to destabilise the region? Europe?
This is gift week for Europe - if its political leaders and the big manufacturers can get the new narrative going quickly. Don't buy American, buy European. With support from our ally Ukraine.
What Trump does as the new pork markets global markets don't flood Murica with orders is the question. How do you extort the world when the world says "no thanks"? Threaten then with Putin? He can't threaten "America will cut you off". Great, go right ahead. We don't need you any more.
Not quite what Project 2025 think. They're of the opinion that after years of DEI, their forces are weak and need 'full spectrum' defence.
The U.S. Army’s mission is “[t]o deploy, fight and win our nation’s wars by providing ready, prompt and sustained land dominance by Army forces across the full spectrum of conflict as part of the joint force.”24 Today, however, the Army cannot execute its land dominance mission.25 The U.S. Army is at an inflection point that is marked by more than a decade of steadily eroding budgets and diluted buying power, an appreciable degradation in readiness and training capacity, a near crisis in the recruiting and retention of critical personnel, and a bevy of aging weapons systems that no longer provide a qualitative edge over peer and near-peer competitors but will not be replaced in the near term.
If that belief has been adopted by the present administration, then it would explain their apparent deference to Russia and the need for more defence spending ($150bn) which they are trying to get through both houses.
And yet, Hegseth is proposing 8% cuts in US defence spending each year.
Makes sense given Trump is more interested than economic wars than foreign wars.
However the normally Republican voting US military would be furious with big defence cuts
It seems that what Hegseth is proposing is an 8% cut in existing budgets in order to free up resources for schemes like Donald's "Iron Dome". In practice this is most likely to be cuts in Vetrans Administration programmes etc.
On my understanding it's supposed to be an 8% cut in the defence budget in each of the next five years leading ultimately to a budget that's one third smaller. It does look like Hegseth is hoping to divert those savings into other programmes and if so he's at odds with Musk.
On my understanding, no one has a clue of what's actually going to be decided. The only thing which is clear at all is the intention to cut specific programs. Beyond that, it's all conjecture for now.
The other question is how big will the Europeans' aid package be for Ukraine today? Will it be enough to see them through another 6 months? If so, Trump will have lost such control as he has and Russia will start to panic as their economic crisis intensifies.
Ideally, we are looking for something close to $20bn with roughly 10% of that from us.
The traitorous scum Orbán is going to block that . They refuse to approve any more arms sales .
I think attempting to block this could be the last straw for Orbán.
So far, his blackmail-for-concessions has worked. In the new Trumpian climate, European leaders are more fearful of what is happening on their eastern borders. And he can't hide behind German reluctance with the new government there.
In the short term, although it will cause delays (and therefore Ukrainian lives), I think individual governments will work round it.
Orban has been playing a game of brinkmanship for years now. He calculates that he can sit in the tent and cause trouble, while enjoying the benefits he gets from doing so. This is because those in the tent with him have been historically inept at actually doing anything about his behaviour.
The EU needs to call his bluff now. He doesn’t actually want to be outside the tent, after all.
Another reason why Merz saying bollocks to European law was such a moronic move.
Campaigners have threatened the government with legal action unless it reconsiders the decision to refuse compensation to millions of women affected by an increase in the state pension age.
The Women Against State Pension Inequality (Waspi) group is demanding payouts for 3.6 million women born in the 1950s who were not properly informed of changes first introduced in the 1990s.
It appears to me that WASPI are very much for state pension inequality!
Except the decision was made in the 90s and there was plenty of time to discover what was happening
It’s a bunch of chances trying to get I don’t know what, as if they were working they are going to have earnt more money and you can’t rollback and give them more time (in poverty)
Campaigners have threatened the government with legal action unless it reconsiders the decision to refuse compensation to millions of women affected by an increase in the state pension age.
The Women Against State Pension Inequality (Waspi) group is demanding payouts for 3.6 million women born in the 1950s who were not properly informed of changes first introduced in the 1990s.
Another crowdfunder. Dig deep morons. How many women have chucked money into this and continue to do so. Throwing good money after bad.
Of course the Lib Dems support the WASPI women. They, like other gormless politicians who support these entitled boomers, never say where the money is coming from.
America - like the Conservative Party - seems to believe its own propaganda and thus is detached from reality. America is the Greatest Country On Earth. With the Strongest Military. Of course people want to buy their stuff! No, they Do.
Its a brilliant plan. Demand that Ukraine hands over all its mineral wealth. Use it to build new products especially for defence, then force Ukraine's neighbours to buy them to protect themselves from Russia.
Well, I say brilliant. Europe and the middle east are two huge markets for defence equipment. I'm sure Bibi will keep buying American, but will Saudi? Qatar? After what Trump has done to destabilise the region? Europe?
This is gift week for Europe - if its political leaders and the big manufacturers can get the new narrative going quickly. Don't buy American, buy European. With support from our ally Ukraine.
What Trump does as the new pork markets global markets don't flood Murica with orders is the question. How do you extort the world when the world says "no thanks"? Threaten then with Putin? He can't threaten "America will cut you off". Great, go right ahead. We don't need you any more.
Not quite what Project 2025 think. They're of the opinion that after years of DEI, their forces are weak and need 'full spectrum' defence.
The U.S. Army’s mission is “[t]o deploy, fight and win our nation’s wars by providing ready, prompt and sustained land dominance by Army forces across the full spectrum of conflict as part of the joint force.”24 Today, however, the Army cannot execute its land dominance mission.25 The U.S. Army is at an inflection point that is marked by more than a decade of steadily eroding budgets and diluted buying power, an appreciable degradation in readiness and training capacity, a near crisis in the recruiting and retention of critical personnel, and a bevy of aging weapons systems that no longer provide a qualitative edge over peer and near-peer competitors but will not be replaced in the near term.
If that belief has been adopted by the present administration, then it would explain their apparent deference to Russia and the need for more defence spending ($150bn) which they are trying to get through both houses.
And yet, Hegseth is proposing 8% cuts in US defence spending each year.
Makes sense given Trump is more interested than economic wars than foreign wars.
However the normally Republican voting US military would be furious with big defence cuts
It seems that what Hegseth is proposing is an 8% cut in existing budgets in order to free up resources for schemes like Donald's "Iron Dome". In practice this is most likely to be cuts in Vetrans Administration programmes etc.
On my understanding it's supposed to be an 8% cut in the defence budget in each of the next five years leading ultimately to a budget that's one third smaller. It does look like Hegseth is hoping to divert those savings into other programmes and if so he's at odds with Musk.
It seems the Trump administration wants to cut overseas military spending and increase spending on border controls on the US border to stop and deport immigrants
Yeah, they want us to pay more into our defence so they can cut/re-assign the cash.
The other question is how big will the Europeans' aid package be for Ukraine today? Will it be enough to see them through another 6 months? If so, Trump will have lost such control as he has and Russia will start to panic as their economic crisis intensifies.
Ideally, we are looking for something close to $20bn with roughly 10% of that from us.
The traitorous scum Orbán is going to block that . They refuse to approve any more arms sales .
Its interesting how effective Hungary, a small recipient country, is in causing disruption in the EU.
Compared to how ineffective the UK, a large contributor country, was in EU negotiations.
Perhaps if the UK leaders had done a little more vetoing and a little less posturing and surrendering then the UK would still be in the EU.
EU needs to get its act together and kick out Hungary. Time for countries to pick a side.
They can’t . There’s no actual mechanism to kick them out . You can suspend their voting rights in the EP and put in other measures but need unanimous agreement from the remaining members and Fico another Putin puppet will block those .
Europe needs to start replacing the carrots with sticks. If some countries want to cause difficulties that are contrary to the security of the whole group, then a way can be found to politely remind them that if they’d like to be outside the club at the mercy of Russia and without access to the benefits, the door is over there.
Europe really has to start remaking itself as a security-first collective. I think Merz, and perhaps increasingly Macron, are starting to get this.
It's also not impossible that such a security collective overlaps but is distinct from the EU. And indeed NATO. That would get around the vetos of the semi-detached (or worse) members, and allow the participation of non EU members (ie the UK and Norway).
There would be costs in setting up a completely new structure, but far fewer political hurdles to putting it together.
This is true, and perhaps starts the ball rolling on the multi-speed Europe that has been hinted at previously.
There is, I think, another factor in this - which is the situation on border security. If Europe can build itself a tighter, united, integrated regime on border policy, that goes some way to allaying voters concerns on immigration. If Merz is also able to get through some changes on FOM policy at the EU level too, then there really is the potential for this to be a game changer, IMHO.
Of course, Europe has not traditionally been very good at getting this sort of stuff right. But necessity (and fear of the consequences of failure) might force its politicians to.
The other issue is the variable attitudes within core Europe.
The Poles I know make a big deal of things like the U.K. army shipments to Ukraine having to fly around various counties, early on. The use of contract provisions to prevent weapons being sent to Ukraine also got a lot of attention.
They want alliances with those prepared to actually do something, not argue against it.
I think the logical outcome would be series of interlocking agreements - think the U.K. agreement and exercises in Northern Europe.
🚨 NEW: Donald Trump’s demand for Ukraine minerals is ‘reasonable’, says Boris Johnson
“America has a history of demanding a price for its support, and from where I stand today, I think that price is reasonable”, the former PM told ITV
If anyone needed any evidence that Johnson is a man who contorts himself into whatever position he calculates is the most expedient for him, there you are.
I actually thought his support for Ukraine one of the very few genuine and heartfelt convictions he held, but it seems not.
America - like the Conservative Party - seems to believe its own propaganda and thus is detached from reality. America is the Greatest Country On Earth. With the Strongest Military. Of course people want to buy their stuff! No, they Do.
Its a brilliant plan. Demand that Ukraine hands over all its mineral wealth. Use it to build new products especially for defence, then force Ukraine's neighbours to buy them to protect themselves from Russia.
Well, I say brilliant. Europe and the middle east are two huge markets for defence equipment. I'm sure Bibi will keep buying American, but will Saudi? Qatar? After what Trump has done to destabilise the region? Europe?
This is gift week for Europe - if its political leaders and the big manufacturers can get the new narrative going quickly. Don't buy American, buy European. With support from our ally Ukraine.
What Trump does as the new pork markets global markets don't flood Murica with orders is the question. How do you extort the world when the world says "no thanks"? Threaten then with Putin? He can't threaten "America will cut you off". Great, go right ahead. We don't need you any more.
Not quite what Project 2025 think. They're of the opinion that after years of DEI, their forces are weak and need 'full spectrum' defence.
The U.S. Army’s mission is “[t]o deploy, fight and win our nation’s wars by providing ready, prompt and sustained land dominance by Army forces across the full spectrum of conflict as part of the joint force.”24 Today, however, the Army cannot execute its land dominance mission.25 The U.S. Army is at an inflection point that is marked by more than a decade of steadily eroding budgets and diluted buying power, an appreciable degradation in readiness and training capacity, a near crisis in the recruiting and retention of critical personnel, and a bevy of aging weapons systems that no longer provide a qualitative edge over peer and near-peer competitors but will not be replaced in the near term.
If that belief has been adopted by the present administration, then it would explain their apparent deference to Russia and the need for more defence spending ($150bn) which they are trying to get through both houses.
And yet, Hegseth is proposing 8% cuts in US defence spending each year.
Makes sense given Trump is more interested than economic wars than foreign wars.
However the normally Republican voting US military would be furious with big defence cuts
It seems that what Hegseth is proposing is an 8% cut in existing budgets in order to free up resources for schemes like Donald's "Iron Dome". In practice this is most likely to be cuts in Vetrans Administration programmes etc.
On my understanding it's supposed to be an 8% cut in the defence budget in each of the next five years leading ultimately to a budget that's one third smaller. It does look like Hegseth is hoping to divert those savings into other programmes and if so he's at odds with Musk.
It seems the Trump administration wants to cut overseas military spending and increase spending on border controls on the US border to stop and deport immigrants
Yeah, they want us to pay more into our defence so they can cut/re-assign the cash.
The billions they give to prop up Israel seem particularly bad value from an America First point view.
Campaigners have threatened the government with legal action unless it reconsiders the decision to refuse compensation to millions of women affected by an increase in the state pension age.
The Women Against State Pension Inequality (Waspi) group is demanding payouts for 3.6 million women born in the 1950s who were not properly informed of changes first introduced in the 1990s.
It appears to me that WASPI are very much for state pension inequality!
Surely it can't go through as it has an indirect discriminatory effect on gay men (No gay male couple will benefit) which is a protected characteristic ?
They have lost every legal challenge they have made. This is about the timelimit for a judicial review of the decision not to pay these freeloaders "compensation" for their ignorance.
America - like the Conservative Party - seems to believe its own propaganda and thus is detached from reality. America is the Greatest Country On Earth. With the Strongest Military. Of course people want to buy their stuff! No, they Do.
Its a brilliant plan. Demand that Ukraine hands over all its mineral wealth. Use it to build new products especially for defence, then force Ukraine's neighbours to buy them to protect themselves from Russia.
Well, I say brilliant. Europe and the middle east are two huge markets for defence equipment. I'm sure Bibi will keep buying American, but will Saudi? Qatar? After what Trump has done to destabilise the region? Europe?
This is gift week for Europe - if its political leaders and the big manufacturers can get the new narrative going quickly. Don't buy American, buy European. With support from our ally Ukraine.
What Trump does as the new pork markets global markets don't flood Murica with orders is the question. How do you extort the world when the world says "no thanks"? Threaten then with Putin? He can't threaten "America will cut you off". Great, go right ahead. We don't need you any more.
Not quite what Project 2025 think. They're of the opinion that after years of DEI, their forces are weak and need 'full spectrum' defence.
The U.S. Army’s mission is “[t]o deploy, fight and win our nation’s wars by providing ready, prompt and sustained land dominance by Army forces across the full spectrum of conflict as part of the joint force.”24 Today, however, the Army cannot execute its land dominance mission.25 The U.S. Army is at an inflection point that is marked by more than a decade of steadily eroding budgets and diluted buying power, an appreciable degradation in readiness and training capacity, a near crisis in the recruiting and retention of critical personnel, and a bevy of aging weapons systems that no longer provide a qualitative edge over peer and near-peer competitors but will not be replaced in the near term.
If that belief has been adopted by the present administration, then it would explain their apparent deference to Russia and the need for more defence spending ($150bn) which they are trying to get through both houses.
And yet, Hegseth is proposing 8% cuts in US defence spending each year.
Makes sense given Trump is more interested than economic wars than foreign wars.
However the normally Republican voting US military would be furious with big defence cuts
It seems that what Hegseth is proposing is an 8% cut in existing budgets in order to free up resources for schemes like Donald's "Iron Dome". In practice this is most likely to be cuts in Vetrans Administration programmes etc.
On my understanding it's supposed to be an 8% cut in the defence budget in each of the next five years leading ultimately to a budget that's one third smaller. It does look like Hegseth is hoping to divert those savings into other programmes and if so he's at odds with Musk.
It seems the Trump administration wants to cut overseas military spending and increase spending on border controls on the US border to stop and deport immigrants
Yeah, they want us to pay more into our defence so they can cut/re-assign the cash.
The billions they give to prop up Israel seem particularly bad value from an America First point view.
Hence why the Trumpdozer wants to annexe Gaza and turn it to Trump Sur La med.
Witkoff: "The war didn't need to happen. It was provoked. It doesn't necessarily mean it was provoked by the Russians. There were all kinds of conversations back then about Ukraine joining NATO. That didn't need to happen. It basically became a threat to the Russians." https://x.com/atrupar/status/1893666694028992601
Negotiating on behalf of Russia and the US.
The Germans must be immensely pissed off with the US over Ukraine. After being effectively browbeaten by the US into providing more and more support for Ukraine (despite their reluctance to engage the old enemy, Russia), they now see the US pulling a volte face and basically leaving it all to them. Many of them must be feeling that they've been tricked into a proxy war with Russia. It's no wonder that former Americanophiles like Merz are now advocating for European autonomy.
America - like the Conservative Party - seems to believe its own propaganda and thus is detached from reality. America is the Greatest Country On Earth. With the Strongest Military. Of course people want to buy their stuff! No, they Do.
Its a brilliant plan. Demand that Ukraine hands over all its mineral wealth. Use it to build new products especially for defence, then force Ukraine's neighbours to buy them to protect themselves from Russia.
Well, I say brilliant. Europe and the middle east are two huge markets for defence equipment. I'm sure Bibi will keep buying American, but will Saudi? Qatar? After what Trump has done to destabilise the region? Europe?
This is gift week for Europe - if its political leaders and the big manufacturers can get the new narrative going quickly. Don't buy American, buy European. With support from our ally Ukraine.
What Trump does as the new pork markets global markets don't flood Murica with orders is the question. How do you extort the world when the world says "no thanks"? Threaten then with Putin? He can't threaten "America will cut you off". Great, go right ahead. We don't need you any more.
Not quite what Project 2025 think. They're of the opinion that after years of DEI, their forces are weak and need 'full spectrum' defence.
The U.S. Army’s mission is “[t]o deploy, fight and win our nation’s wars by providing ready, prompt and sustained land dominance by Army forces across the full spectrum of conflict as part of the joint force.”24 Today, however, the Army cannot execute its land dominance mission.25 The U.S. Army is at an inflection point that is marked by more than a decade of steadily eroding budgets and diluted buying power, an appreciable degradation in readiness and training capacity, a near crisis in the recruiting and retention of critical personnel, and a bevy of aging weapons systems that no longer provide a qualitative edge over peer and near-peer competitors but will not be replaced in the near term.
If that belief has been adopted by the present administration, then it would explain their apparent deference to Russia and the need for more defence spending ($150bn) which they are trying to get through both houses.
And yet, Hegseth is proposing 8% cuts in US defence spending each year.
Makes sense given Trump is more interested than economic wars than foreign wars.
However the normally Republican voting US military would be furious with big defence cuts
It seems that what Hegseth is proposing is an 8% cut in existing budgets in order to free up resources for schemes like Donald's "Iron Dome". In practice this is most likely to be cuts in Vetrans Administration programmes etc.
On my understanding it's supposed to be an 8% cut in the defence budget in each of the next five years leading ultimately to a budget that's one third smaller. It does look like Hegseth is hoping to divert those savings into other programmes and if so he's at odds with Musk.
It seems the Trump administration wants to cut overseas military spending and increase spending on border controls on the US border to stop and deport immigrants
Yeah, they want us to pay more into our defence so they can cut/re-assign the cash.
The billions they give to prop up Israel seem particularly bad value from an America First point view.
Hence why the Trumpdozer wants to annexe Gaza and turn it to Trump Sur La med.
True, though it does sound like a kind of expensive plan
Campaigners have threatened the government with legal action unless it reconsiders the decision to refuse compensation to millions of women affected by an increase in the state pension age.
The Women Against State Pension Inequality (Waspi) group is demanding payouts for 3.6 million women born in the 1950s who were not properly informed of changes first introduced in the 1990s.
It appears to me that WASPI are very much for state pension inequality!
Surely it can't go through as it has an indirect discriminatory effect on gay men (No gay male couple will benefit) which is a protected characteristic ?
They have lost every legal challenge they have made. This is about the timelimit for a judicial review of the decision not to pay these freeloaders "compensation" for their ignorance.
A £75K crowdfunder has been launched.
It’s a bit like fracking in the U.K.
Winning isn’t required. Owning a company that gets paid to drill is all that is needed.
America - like the Conservative Party - seems to believe its own propaganda and thus is detached from reality. America is the Greatest Country On Earth. With the Strongest Military. Of course people want to buy their stuff! No, they Do.
Its a brilliant plan. Demand that Ukraine hands over all its mineral wealth. Use it to build new products especially for defence, then force Ukraine's neighbours to buy them to protect themselves from Russia.
Well, I say brilliant. Europe and the middle east are two huge markets for defence equipment. I'm sure Bibi will keep buying American, but will Saudi? Qatar? After what Trump has done to destabilise the region? Europe?
This is gift week for Europe - if its political leaders and the big manufacturers can get the new narrative going quickly. Don't buy American, buy European. With support from our ally Ukraine.
What Trump does as the new pork markets global markets don't flood Murica with orders is the question. How do you extort the world when the world says "no thanks"? Threaten then with Putin? He can't threaten "America will cut you off". Great, go right ahead. We don't need you any more.
Not quite what Project 2025 think. They're of the opinion that after years of DEI, their forces are weak and need 'full spectrum' defence.
The U.S. Army’s mission is “[t]o deploy, fight and win our nation’s wars by providing ready, prompt and sustained land dominance by Army forces across the full spectrum of conflict as part of the joint force.”24 Today, however, the Army cannot execute its land dominance mission.25 The U.S. Army is at an inflection point that is marked by more than a decade of steadily eroding budgets and diluted buying power, an appreciable degradation in readiness and training capacity, a near crisis in the recruiting and retention of critical personnel, and a bevy of aging weapons systems that no longer provide a qualitative edge over peer and near-peer competitors but will not be replaced in the near term.
If that belief has been adopted by the present administration, then it would explain their apparent deference to Russia and the need for more defence spending ($150bn) which they are trying to get through both houses.
And yet, Hegseth is proposing 8% cuts in US defence spending each year.
Makes sense given Trump is more interested than economic wars than foreign wars.
However the normally Republican voting US military would be furious with big defence cuts
It seems that what Hegseth is proposing is an 8% cut in existing budgets in order to free up resources for schemes like Donald's "Iron Dome". In practice this is most likely to be cuts in Vetrans Administration programmes etc.
On my understanding it's supposed to be an 8% cut in the defence budget in each of the next five years leading ultimately to a budget that's one third smaller. It does look like Hegseth is hoping to divert those savings into other programmes and if so he's at odds with Musk.
It seems the Trump administration wants to cut overseas military spending and increase spending on border controls on the US border to stop and deport immigrants
Yeah, they want us to pay more into our defence so they can cut/re-assign the cash.
The billions they give to prop up Israel seem particularly bad value from an America First point view.
AIPAC, winning either way in the US election won even more bigly than a Harris victory would have entailed when Trump got in.
🚨 NEW: Donald Trump’s demand for Ukraine minerals is ‘reasonable’, says Boris Johnson
“America has a history of demanding a price for its support, and from where I stand today, I think that price is reasonable”, the former PM told ITV
If anyone needed any evidence that Johnson is a man who contorts himself into whatever position he calculates is the most expedient for him, there you are.
I actually thought his support for Ukraine one of the very few genuine and heartfelt convictions he held, but it seems not.
That was in his cosplay Churchill phase. Now he's a very ex-PM, he's into grifting off the US right to make the child support pavements. Nice chap.
America - like the Conservative Party - seems to believe its own propaganda and thus is detached from reality. America is the Greatest Country On Earth. With the Strongest Military. Of course people want to buy their stuff! No, they Do.
Its a brilliant plan. Demand that Ukraine hands over all its mineral wealth. Use it to build new products especially for defence, then force Ukraine's neighbours to buy them to protect themselves from Russia.
Well, I say brilliant. Europe and the middle east are two huge markets for defence equipment. I'm sure Bibi will keep buying American, but will Saudi? Qatar? After what Trump has done to destabilise the region? Europe?
This is gift week for Europe - if its political leaders and the big manufacturers can get the new narrative going quickly. Don't buy American, buy European. With support from our ally Ukraine.
What Trump does as the new pork markets global markets don't flood Murica with orders is the question. How do you extort the world when the world says "no thanks"? Threaten then with Putin? He can't threaten "America will cut you off". Great, go right ahead. We don't need you any more.
Not quite what Project 2025 think. They're of the opinion that after years of DEI, their forces are weak and need 'full spectrum' defence.
The U.S. Army’s mission is “[t]o deploy, fight and win our nation’s wars by providing ready, prompt and sustained land dominance by Army forces across the full spectrum of conflict as part of the joint force.”24 Today, however, the Army cannot execute its land dominance mission.25 The U.S. Army is at an inflection point that is marked by more than a decade of steadily eroding budgets and diluted buying power, an appreciable degradation in readiness and training capacity, a near crisis in the recruiting and retention of critical personnel, and a bevy of aging weapons systems that no longer provide a qualitative edge over peer and near-peer competitors but will not be replaced in the near term.
If that belief has been adopted by the present administration, then it would explain their apparent deference to Russia and the need for more defence spending ($150bn) which they are trying to get through both houses.
And yet, Hegseth is proposing 8% cuts in US defence spending each year.
Makes sense given Trump is more interested than economic wars than foreign wars.
However the normally Republican voting US military would be furious with big defence cuts
It seems that what Hegseth is proposing is an 8% cut in existing budgets in order to free up resources for schemes like Donald's "Iron Dome". In practice this is most likely to be cuts in Vetrans Administration programmes etc.
On my understanding it's supposed to be an 8% cut in the defence budget in each of the next five years leading ultimately to a budget that's one third smaller. It does look like Hegseth is hoping to divert those savings into other programmes and if so he's at odds with Musk.
It seems the Trump administration wants to cut overseas military spending and increase spending on border controls on the US border to stop and deport immigrants
Yeah, they want us to pay more into our defence so they can cut/re-assign the cash.
The billions they give to prop up Israel seem particularly bad value from an America First point view.
AIPAC, winning either way in the US election won even more bigly than a Harris victory would have entailed when Trump got in.
Pardon! Are you sure you meant what you typed, because, to me at any rate, it's incoherent.
America - like the Conservative Party - seems to believe its own propaganda and thus is detached from reality. America is the Greatest Country On Earth. With the Strongest Military. Of course people want to buy their stuff! No, they Do.
Its a brilliant plan. Demand that Ukraine hands over all its mineral wealth. Use it to build new products especially for defence, then force Ukraine's neighbours to buy them to protect themselves from Russia.
Well, I say brilliant. Europe and the middle east are two huge markets for defence equipment. I'm sure Bibi will keep buying American, but will Saudi? Qatar? After what Trump has done to destabilise the region? Europe?
This is gift week for Europe - if its political leaders and the big manufacturers can get the new narrative going quickly. Don't buy American, buy European. With support from our ally Ukraine.
What Trump does as the new pork markets global markets don't flood Murica with orders is the question. How do you extort the world when the world says "no thanks"? Threaten then with Putin? He can't threaten "America will cut you off". Great, go right ahead. We don't need you any more.
Not quite what Project 2025 think. They're of the opinion that after years of DEI, their forces are weak and need 'full spectrum' defence.
The U.S. Army’s mission is “[t]o deploy, fight and win our nation’s wars by providing ready, prompt and sustained land dominance by Army forces across the full spectrum of conflict as part of the joint force.”24 Today, however, the Army cannot execute its land dominance mission.25 The U.S. Army is at an inflection point that is marked by more than a decade of steadily eroding budgets and diluted buying power, an appreciable degradation in readiness and training capacity, a near crisis in the recruiting and retention of critical personnel, and a bevy of aging weapons systems that no longer provide a qualitative edge over peer and near-peer competitors but will not be replaced in the near term.
If that belief has been adopted by the present administration, then it would explain their apparent deference to Russia and the need for more defence spending ($150bn) which they are trying to get through both houses.
And yet, Hegseth is proposing 8% cuts in US defence spending each year.
Makes sense given Trump is more interested than economic wars than foreign wars.
However the normally Republican voting US military would be furious with big defence cuts
It seems that what Hegseth is proposing is an 8% cut in existing budgets in order to free up resources for schemes like Donald's "Iron Dome". In practice this is most likely to be cuts in Vetrans Administration programmes etc.
On my understanding it's supposed to be an 8% cut in the defence budget in each of the next five years leading ultimately to a budget that's one third smaller. It does look like Hegseth is hoping to divert those savings into other programmes and if so he's at odds with Musk.
It seems the Trump administration wants to cut overseas military spending and increase spending on border controls on the US border to stop and deport immigrants
Yeah, they want us to pay more into our defence so they can cut/re-assign the cash.
The billions they give to prop up Israel seem particularly bad value from an America First point view.
AIPAC, winning either way in the US election won even more bigly than a Harris victory would have entailed when Trump got in.
Pardon! Are you sure you meant what you typed, because, to me at any rate, it's incoherent.
🚨 NEW: Donald Trump’s demand for Ukraine minerals is ‘reasonable’, says Boris Johnson
“America has a history of demanding a price for its support, and from where I stand today, I think that price is reasonable”, the former PM told ITV
If anyone needed any evidence that Johnson is a man who contorts himself into whatever position he calculates is the most expedient for him, there you are.
I actually thought his support for Ukraine one of the very few genuine and heartfelt convictions he held, but it seems not.
That was in his cosplay Churchill phase. Now he's a very ex-PM, he's into grifting off the US right to make the child support pavements. Nice chap.
Demonstrates, yet again, what a charlatan he is. Mayor of London should have been the highest he could possibly go in British politics.
Johnson clearly never believed in supporting Ukraine. What is baffling is that anyone ever thought his support was sincere.
It is Labour and SKS that are the legitimate support now. SKS is having a “good” war and this is why I do believe he will now rebound in popularity as other things like waiting lists come down.
Also, no dead pensioners? Was the whole WFA change a bit overblown?
Bullying this country, Canada, and Europe into spending more on the military, and not freeloading off the USA, is perfectly fair and reasonable (Ireland should be bullied, as well).
Turning allies into enemies, through tariffs; accusing them of “stealing” from the US, by selling consumers goods and services that they want; threatening to invade allied States, and seize territory off them; cutting deals with their enemies to gain mineral rights.
Those things are worse than unethical. They are massive blunders.
President Reagan decided Friday to impose punitive 100% tariffs on a wide variety of goods produced by Japanese electronic giants in retaliation for Tokyo’s failure to abide by the semiconductor trade agreement between the two nations.
In approving a recommendation Thursday by the Administration’s top economic officials, the White House decided to put the tariffs into effect about April 17, less than two weeks before Japanese Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone is scheduled to begin a visit to the United States aimed at easing trade frictions.
The tariffs will be targeted to bring in as much as $300 million and designed to punish such firms as NEC Corp., Hitachi Ltd., Fujitsu Ltd., Toshiba Corp. and Oki Corp. by either pricing some of their goods out of the American market or by forcing them to accept substantial losses on U.S. sales.
The tariffs were on specific categories of imports of electronics, from one country, and covered only $300 million of import value. Are you seriously trying to claim equivalence with the incoherent policies they are proposing, then cancelling, then proposing again this time?
I'm just questioning the idea that conducting a muscular trade policy with an ally should be regarded as such a catastrophic breach of norms.
Calling VAT a tariff, and expecting uniquely to be exempt from it is not a "muscular trade policy", it's just idiocy. Unless you mean that outright extortion of putative allies isn't a "catastrophic breach of norms" ?
You're not questioning, as much as conducting an exercise in casuistry on behalf of the Trump administration.
We lost an empire and found a role playing second fiddle in the American orchestra, and now we're upset because we don't like the conductor's taste in music.
At the end of the day, the US is a foreign state. If we're too dependent on it for our sense of our place in the world, that's our problem.
If a friend goes off on a bender, you are allowed to feel bad about it and try to steer them back on to a more healthy path.
America's dominance isn't going away and UK dependence on it isn't going away in the short term at least. If Starmer can do the flattery thing to avoid some concessions that do actual harm, it's worth a try. Big IF.
The only thing he can. The British state is highly optimised toward subservience to the USA. That's not going to change overnight. Canada being butthurt, that Ukraine thing if it's even still going, etc. are minor issues compared to that governing principle.
I wouldn't put it exactly that way but basically yes. UK dependence on the US is a big negative now.
Bullying this country, Canada, and Europe into spending more on the military, and not freeloading off the USA, is perfectly fair and reasonable (Ireland should be bullied, as well).
Turning allies into enemies, through tariffs; accusing them of “stealing” from the US, by selling consumers goods and services that they want; threatening to invade allied States, and seize territory off them; cutting deals with their enemies to gain mineral rights.
Those things are worse than unethical. They are massive blunders.
President Reagan decided Friday to impose punitive 100% tariffs on a wide variety of goods produced by Japanese electronic giants in retaliation for Tokyo’s failure to abide by the semiconductor trade agreement between the two nations.
In approving a recommendation Thursday by the Administration’s top economic officials, the White House decided to put the tariffs into effect about April 17, less than two weeks before Japanese Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone is scheduled to begin a visit to the United States aimed at easing trade frictions.
The tariffs will be targeted to bring in as much as $300 million and designed to punish such firms as NEC Corp., Hitachi Ltd., Fujitsu Ltd., Toshiba Corp. and Oki Corp. by either pricing some of their goods out of the American market or by forcing them to accept substantial losses on U.S. sales.
The tariffs were on specific categories of imports of electronics, from one country, and covered only $300 million of import value. Are you seriously trying to claim equivalence with the incoherent policies they are proposing, then cancelling, then proposing again this time?
I'm just questioning the idea that conducting a muscular trade policy with an ally should be regarded as such a catastrophic breach of norms.
Calling VAT a tariff, and expecting uniquely to be exempt from it is not a "muscular trade policy", it's just idiocy. Unless you mean that outright extortion of putative allies isn't a "catastrophic breach of norms" ?
You're not questioning, as much as conducting an exercise in casuistry on behalf of the Trump administration.
We lost an empire and found a role playing second fiddle in the American orchestra, and now we're upset because we don't like the conductor's taste in music.
At the end of the day, the US is a foreign state. If we're too dependent on it for our sense of our place in the world, that's our problem.
If a friend goes off on a bender, you are allowed to feel bad about it and try to steer them back on to a more healthy path.
You're also entitled to resist their request that you hand over your wallet.
And despite EVERYTHING Labour STILL leads in some polls.
They go up a few points in an election cycle and they’ll be back up to the 33% they enjoyed in 2024.
I do believe the likelihood of their re-election is underpriced. Especially if Streeting takes over.
Current Electoral Calculus seats forecast on the poll average gives Labour 209 MPs, Conservatives 156, Reform 151, LDs 62 and SNP 43.
So at the moment Starmer would scrape home with a Labour minority government reliant on LD and SNP support but with the Conservatives and Reform combined over 300 MPs and not far off a majority with the DUP and TUV either
Campaigners have threatened the government with legal action unless it reconsiders the decision to refuse compensation to millions of women affected by an increase in the state pension age.
The Women Against State Pension Inequality (Waspi) group is demanding payouts for 3.6 million women born in the 1950s who were not properly informed of changes first introduced in the 1990s.
I still maintain we were properly informed. If they didn't pay attention to any of the advertising about it that's a different issue. I was very close to being one of the people affected and I paid attention to the advertising, even when I found I was one year outside the affected age.
Good morning, everybody.
Where the government are giving out money (now or in the future) there are many memory lapses. If you are in receipt of benefits and where there is a Change of Circumstances (CoC), you'll find that beneficial changes are not reported to the DWP while adverse changes are. Then people complain when they have to pay it back.
It's no more than human nature to expect the best outcome and seek exemptions when the issue comes back and bites them. So best the government accepts the legal challenges and gets the matter sorted rather than let it fester - and providing ammunition for those on the left and right.
And despite EVERYTHING Labour STILL leads in some polls.
They go up a few points in an election cycle and they’ll be back up to the 33% they enjoyed in 2024.
I do believe the likelihood of their re-election is underpriced. Especially if Streeting takes over.
I think there’s opportunity for Labour to improve their position, particularly as the global situation continues to shift. But risk, also.
In the medium term I think the biggest domestic challenge facing Starmer is Rachel Reeves. I think it is becoming quite apparent that she is a drag on the party’s fortunes.
Campaigners have threatened the government with legal action unless it reconsiders the decision to refuse compensation to millions of women affected by an increase in the state pension age.
The Women Against State Pension Inequality (Waspi) group is demanding payouts for 3.6 million women born in the 1950s who were not properly informed of changes first introduced in the 1990s.
I still maintain we were properly informed. If they didn't pay attention to any of the advertising about it that's a different issue. I was very close to being one of the people affected and I paid attention to the advertising, even when I found I was one year outside the affected age.
Good morning, everybody.
Where the government are giving out money (now or in the future) there are many memory lapses. If you are in receipt of benefits and where there is a Change of Circumstances (CoC), you'll find that beneficial changes are not reported to the DWP while adverse changes are. Then people complain when they have to pay it back.
It's no more than human nature to expect the best outcome and seek exemptions when the issue comes back and bites them. So best the government accepts the legal challenges and gets the matter sorted rather than let it fester - and providing ammunition for those on the left and right.
Sorry but no - everyone has looked at the issue and said sorry the fact you didn't pay attention is your problem not ours.
If the Government gives the Waspi chancers a penny they won't be getting my vote down the line...
🚨 NEW: Donald Trump’s demand for Ukraine minerals is ‘reasonable’, says Boris Johnson
“America has a history of demanding a price for its support, and from where I stand today, I think that price is reasonable”, the former PM told ITV
If anyone needed any evidence that Johnson is a man who contorts himself into whatever position he calculates is the most expedient for him, there you are.
I actually thought his support for Ukraine one of the very few genuine and heartfelt convictions he held, but it seems not.
That was in his cosplay Churchill phase. Now he's a very ex-PM, he's into grifting off the US right to make the child support pavements. Nice chap.
Demonstrates, yet again, what a charlatan he is. Mayor of London should have been the highest he could possibly go in British politics.
I’ve just been meeting the Mayor of London. But the Lord Mayor, at the Mansion House. Not Sadiq.
And despite EVERYTHING Labour STILL leads in some polls.
They go up a few points in an election cycle and they’ll be back up to the 33% they enjoyed in 2024.
I do believe the likelihood of their re-election is underpriced. Especially if Streeting takes over.
I think there’s opportunity for Labour to improve their position, particularly as the global situation continues to shift. But risk, also.
In the medium term I think the biggest domestic challenge facing Starmer is Rachel Reeves. I think it is becoming quite apparent that she is a drag on the party’s fortunes.
Good morning
Nobody has any way of knowing how all this pans out other than wish casting
It is an opportunity for Starmer but could equally turn out a poisoned chalice and the big question which Starmer has to answer is where and when all the billions is coming for for defence ?
Comments
Campaigners have threatened the government with legal action unless it reconsiders the decision to refuse compensation to millions of women affected by an increase in the state pension age.
The Women Against State Pension Inequality (Waspi) group is demanding payouts for 3.6 million women born in the 1950s who were not properly informed of changes first introduced in the 1990s.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cwyjx9dn38wo
There must be a German compound noun for that. I’ll give one of those online word generators a try.
EDIT - the one I usually use seems to he crashing. I suppose today it’s probably at peak usage.
https://www.energylivenews.com/2025/02/24/net-zero-sector-is-booming/
We've got to defeat the anti-growth agenda and embrace green energy - it's the one thing we are really good at.
And the worse case of this blackmail is his treatment of Ukraine. It is one thing taking Putin's side (despicable as that is), but offering your support in exchange for a deal on your assets is plainly just mercenary.
Trump is just a bully using his might to threaten all and sundry, friend or foe and even willing to support a foe against a friend for a pot of gold. Despicable.
At the end of the day, the US is a foreign state. If we're too dependent on it for our sense of our place in the world, that's our problem.
The late Queen had to serve tea for far worse on occasion.
However the normally Republican voting US military would be furious with big defence cuts
The UK is right to stick with restraint and politeness for now while USA has time to come to a degree of sense.
Compared to how ineffective the UK, a large contributor country, was in EU negotiations.
Perhaps if the UK leaders had done a little more vetoing and a little less posturing and surrendering then the UK would still be in the EU.
Yes the UK has some gas reserves and yes Miliband is blocking exploitation, but even on the most wildly optimistic estimates those are minuscule and dwindling fast even with new investment. Whereas wind and sun (and tides) are all around us, and battery lithium is far less problematically concentrated in dodgy countries.
So far, his blackmail-for-concessions has worked. In the new Trumpian climate, European leaders are more fearful of what is happening on their eastern borders. And he can't hide behind German reluctance with the new government there.
In the short term, although it will cause delays (and therefore Ukrainian lives), I think individual governments will work round it.
China will have mixed feelings, for starters it is already the first target of Trump's new tariffs which Russia will avoid as Trump does not see Moscow as an economic threat unlike Beijing.
Secondly, while Trump is cutting back on support for Ukraine he is increasing support for Taiwan, by suggesting the US will support their independence, which has infuriated Beijing
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/trumps-support-for-taiwan-has-infuriated-beijing/
But the free market should be allowed (And tax receipts follow) for North sea oil and gas till it is uneconomical to do so.
It is like being in the EU, it never excluded doing business with the rest of the world, and a similar divide seems to have sprung up between people who want to ban every wind farm; and others who want to ban every oil field. We clearly should allow every form of energy to stand and fall on it's own economic merits and not have gov't put it's thumb on the scales whichever way it's plonking it down.
The EU needs to call his bluff now. He doesn’t actually want to be outside the tent, after all.
[warning: NSFW]
http://i.imgur.com/qgveV.jpg
Then coming back and preparing for independence.
Time to see it as opportunity for better things.
What would Starmer do?!
And it will be recycled..
*Was 91% before the budget.
Meanwhile Norway will be drilling in excess of 170 new wells this year including almost 50 new exploration wells.
They produce the oil and gas. Get the tax money, sell it to us and we burn it. No reduction in CO2 emissions, just vast sums of lost UK revenue.
And quite possibly the F35 program.
Trump is floating the idea of cutting the defence budget in half, but that's only if China agrees to so the same (so it's not happening).
I'm not convinced there's much in the way of deep thinking behind either policy, or even that they have much of a clue about what they're going to do, but VA healthcare and EUCOM are definitely targets for substantial cuts.
But the main Putinist party got 21%
Europe really has to start remaking itself as a security-first collective. I think Merz, and perhaps increasingly Macron, are starting to get this.
You need to up your game as you've become a laughing-stock with the transparent bollocks you come out with.
That would get around the vetos of the semi-detached (or worse) members, and allow the participation of non EU members (ie the UK and Norway).
There would be costs in setting up a completely new structure, but far fewer political hurdles to putting it together.
But the intention to pursue large scale ABM (and probably anti-drone) development and deployment is quite clear.
Even if Hegseth and Trump have little to zero idea of what's involved technically.
Good morning, everybody.
The only thing which is clear at all is the intention to cut specific programs. Beyond that, it's all conjecture for now.
There is, I think, another factor in this - which is the situation on border security. If Europe can build itself a tighter, united, integrated regime on border policy, that goes some way to allaying voters concerns on immigration. If Merz is also able to get through some changes on FOM policy at the EU level too, then there really is the potential for this to be a game changer, IMHO.
Of course, Europe has not traditionally been very good at getting this sort of stuff right. But necessity (and fear of the consequences of failure) might force its politicians to.
Which is another reason why Merz's stupid political stunt introducing rushed unworkable probably unconstitutional and internationally illegal legislation that had zero chance of becoming law into the Bundestag in the middle of an election campaign shows what a rubbish political operator he is.
Witkoff: "The war didn't need to happen. It was provoked. It doesn't necessarily mean it was provoked by the Russians. There were all kinds of conversations back then about Ukraine joining NATO. That didn't need to happen. It basically became a threat to the Russians."
https://x.com/atrupar/status/1893666694028992601
Negotiating on behalf of Russia and the US.
It’s a bunch of chances trying to get I don’t know what, as if they were working they are going to have earnt more money and you can’t rollback and give them more time (in poverty)
@politics-co-uk.bsky.social
🚨 NEW: Donald Trump’s demand for Ukraine minerals is ‘reasonable’, says Boris Johnson
“America has a history of demanding a price for its support, and from where I stand today, I think that price is reasonable”, the former PM told ITV
Of course the Lib Dems support the WASPI women. They, like other gormless politicians who support these entitled boomers, never say where the money is coming from.
The Poles I know make a big deal of things like the U.K. army shipments to Ukraine having to fly around various counties, early on. The use of contract provisions to prevent weapons being sent to Ukraine also got a lot of attention.
They want alliances with those prepared to actually do something, not argue against it.
I think the logical outcome would be series of interlocking agreements - think the U.K. agreement and exercises in Northern Europe.
I actually thought his support for Ukraine one of the very few genuine and heartfelt convictions he held, but it seems not.
A £75K crowdfunder has been launched.
Winning isn’t required. Owning a company that gets paid to drill is all that is needed.
Very clever.
It is Labour and SKS that are the legitimate support now. SKS is having a “good” war and this is why I do believe he will now rebound in popularity as other things like waiting lists come down.
Also, no dead pensioners? Was the whole WFA change a bit overblown?
They go up a few points in an election cycle and they’ll be back up to the 33% they enjoyed in 2024.
I do believe the likelihood of their re-election is underpriced. Especially if Streeting takes over.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/cx2rnp29p7xt
So at the moment Starmer would scrape home with a Labour minority government reliant on LD and SNP support but with the Conservatives and Reform combined over 300 MPs and not far off a majority with the DUP and TUV either
https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/homepage.html
It's no more than human nature to expect the best outcome and seek exemptions when the issue comes back and bites them. So best the government accepts the legal challenges and gets the matter sorted rather than let it fester - and providing ammunition for those on the left and right.
In the medium term I think the biggest domestic challenge facing Starmer is Rachel Reeves. I think it is becoming quite apparent that she is a drag on the party’s fortunes.
If the Government gives the Waspi chancers a penny they won't be getting my vote down the line...
Nice room for the meeting:
Nobody has any way of knowing how all this pans out other than wish casting
It is an opportunity for Starmer but could equally turn out a poisoned chalice and the big question which Starmer has to answer is where and when all the billions is coming for for defence ?