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Punters think Lab’s chances of winning most seats at the GE have improved – politicalbetting.com
Punters think Lab’s chances of winning most seats at the GE have improved – politicalbetting.com
I think is down to in part events in the former thirteen colonies, whether it will last is another matter, as ultimately elections are generally won by issues like the economy and the NHS.
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AI has recommended a ban of 66 days.
And happy Oscars night tonight.
https://eu.usatoday.com/story/entertainment/tv/2025/02/27/elon-musk-daily-show-jon-stewart-doge/80669525007/
Musk says he will go on Jon Stewart's Daily Show - should be fun, though I bet he chickens out.
1. What concrete outcomes emerge from Starmer's meeting of the Europeans, Canadians etc today?
2. Does the American public retain enough sense and integrity to rise up and reject the destruction of their democracy and rule of law?
On the former, I accept the realism point that filling the US gap will take time, but I think NATO has always been about signalling strength to Russia and the non-US NATO need to find a way to signal similar strength, today.
On the latter, videos of town halls are enjoyable but meaningless. As are protests in Vermont or wherever. Americans have a small window to decisively reject their descent into authoritarianism; how do they do this if they so wish? (If they don't wish to reject this, then the devil take them).
eg
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/feb/27/republicans-trump-threats
https://www.vanityfair.com/news/story/trump-congress-political-violence?srsltid=AfmBOor7zKM0TOWhlUENK0X_bzDfzpKWrl7KfZWHZy7aAXITdICB0Vs6
Romney already reported Republican Senators voting not to convict Trump 4 years ago out of this kind of fear.
https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/maddowblog/romney-gop-members-feared-far-right-violence-ahead-key-votes-rcna105272
The amount of Russian kit destroyed is remarkable. These are the claimed "kills" by the Ukrainians (yesterday's claims in brackets):
Tanks — 10,241 (+8)
Armored fighting vehicle — 21,274 (+25)
Artillery systems — 23,959 (+51)
MLRS — 1306 (+2)
Anti-aircraft warfare — 1091 (+3)
Even if you halve them, that is still untold billions. The anti-aircraft systems alone are often cited as being $10m plus a pop. The Soviet stockpiles are gone. The troops are now often old men on crutches, forced to go back and finish the job of getting killed for Mother Russia.
Russia has battled on the assumpton that Trump will deliver a ceasefire. They've gone all in, with men and materal from stockpiles plus those they can get from abroad. It’s weird how much Russia has misjudged this. It’s almost as if they were getting their information from Trump...
https://x.com/nhazony/status/1895954842662883767
Israeli forces are preparing to advance toward Damascus, Syria, to defend the Druze suburb of Jaramana, currently under attack by the Syrian regime (HTS).
Get yourself a camel, TSE. That will be quite the commute...
(Let the reader understand)
https://riversidestudios.co.uk/see-and-do/10-nights-137618/
I also think the election of Trump has been the first real stroke of good fortune for the Conservatives since 2019. They can now carve out a distinct position vis a vis Reform as being pro-Ukraine which should sit well with public opinion.
It's a disaster for Reform who find themselves a populist party on the unpopular side of public opinion.
As for Labour, they will also benefit from Reform's implosion and it's been a decent few days for Starmer.
All this with the caveat the next GE is a long way off unless Labour builds a substantial lead by 2027 on the back of an improving economy and decides to go for a snap election (the memory of May in 2017 may on the other hand offer a defree of caution).
One day out of 200 comments about 80 of them were Leon posting about AI/photos generated by AI, at his monomaniacal that was a typical day.
He gets even more abusive when it is pointed out he doesn't understand parts of AI and that AI frequents churns out rubbish.
Anyhoo that's enough about moderation.
I am off to enjoy the good weather by going clothes and footwear shopping.
A lot of people here say they want a wide range of views yet say nothing when people who don’t share their views leave but throw their arms up when one poster who isn’t even a real person gets removed.
My Dad did some family tree tracing, and got back to some Mancunian bigwig with an unusual name, from where there was a link back to some Welsh aristocrat - and once you have an aristocrat everything is quite well documented. So from there it was possible to get back to the Plantagenet kings. I was momentarily quite excited by this, until I did some maths and worked out the the chances of having vaguely British antecedents and NOT being descended from the early Plantagenet kings were about 44 billion to one. Everyone is descended from everyone (or at least, from everyone who managed to pass on their genes).
I will admit that as somebody who actually works with AI, reading his utter nonsense about it does grate.
Defy Trump, risk the primary. At least you will have a decent record to defend in that primary.
But the rules is the rules.
No doubt @bondegezou will be along before long to repeat his spin that Israel is attacking peaceful Syria unprovoked (despite them being legally at war), that the new regime are peaceful and have done nothing wrong (despite them being proscribed terrorists in this country before they took over) and that the Druze don't need protection.
Anything to blame Israel, plus ça change.
It is also true though, that Labour face a very difficult task ahead. There will be big decisions on defence - perhaps even going beyond the measures announced last week - and those will require navigating very sensitively. Away from all this new global order stuff, there is a March statement that won’t look fantastic and will probably include a few nasties. Reeves remains a weak link.
I think Starmer has proved himself on the international circuit this week, and that’s important for all of us, but what comes next has the potential to be very disruptive, and he and Labour need to be able to bring the country with them on that journey. The bad news for them is it’s a tricky journey to sell. The good news is that at least after 9 months in power they finally have some kind of journey narrative and a frontman who looks capable on the topic.
(ETA. Not a personal dig! Donne's insight was universal.)
Therefore what are we playing at? It seems like the options are simple:
- Let Russia defeat Ukraine.
- Help Ukraine push Russia out of their borders.
- Tell Russia that if they don't accept a negotiated settlement (probably less than the whole Donbas with western bases in Ukraine) then Europe/UK will use all their military might to achieve the above.
What else is there, realistically?Here's his latest show on the subject (25th Feb):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=utl2uLh1wVI
The Daily Show's description:
"Jon Stewart dives into Trump's new Department of Government Efficiency, a.k.a. DOGE, and how the Elon Musk-led project masks its allegiance to corporate overlords and negligence to the American people under the guise of slashing the government's budget".
Sartorial choices, food, wine, horse racing, cars......feck it, let's just ban everyone.
"You're very welcome to Number 10."
Was it followed by "I've had enough of it. Enjoy being PM...."?
He is looking like a real PM, unlike any of the alternatives.
Help Ukraine absorb Russia's attacks until Russia is tired and exhausted and collapses. Which looks like coming soon, which is why Russia's shills are getting increasingly shrill about the need for "peace".
Next time, it is a ban of 66 days according to AI.
One man's boring crap is another man's elixir of life, as I often reflect when scanning some particularly riveting financial data or economic models on a fine Sunday morning ...
What about the rest of his (domestic) shitshow?
Personally I think he has it right on changes to the WFA but he should have scrapped the triple lock at the same time.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cevxd8dgmkjo
(I'm interested to know why he wasn't tasered, which seems appropriate. This is Police Scotland, and I do not know their practice.)
Kidding.
As others have said, however, he has a long way to go and a difficult furrow to plough. Its far too far to the next election to be making any judgments yet.
He will need to be on his game. Lots of pushback coming for the billions for Ukraine already along the lines of we cannot help pensioners heat their home but we can waste billions etc etc….. already seeing it on social media. He needs to stay the course and be a bridge between Washington and Zelenskyy.
We don’t have to like Zelenskyy to know that Russia is the aggressor, Russia has stolen another nations territory, Russia has abducted Ukrainian citizens and Ukrainian children.
It is not unreasonable for Zelenskyy to want security guarantees.
Rewarding Russia is not an option.
Still wishing the world did what you wanted it to do while ignoring facts on the ground.
According to Russian relatives, there is zero sign of war weariness expressed as even vaguely anti-war sentiment. Even anti-Putinists still think the war must carry on until Russia “wins”.
There’s no sign of the morale collapse that would be required for defeat.
If Putin can keep supplying the troops from outside the Greater Russian population, and give them some kind of equipment, it will continue.
Mind you, not mentioning it doesn't make you intelligent.
I am not saying he’ll win, just that the idea it’s all over is patently absurd.
Hence the Hemingway reference that seems to have gone over your head.
Why is dealing with that impossible question so reprehensible.
We see it in aid all the time (enable/support the tyrants to get food to the citizens..)
Let the mods decide on what is acceptable.
By all means, drawing attention to a dodgy post should be done, but anything else is nowt to do with us below the liners.
While 2025 is shaping up nicely, the regulations overhaul for 2026 could be a fantastic opportunity for Williams.
I agree and Starmer has done well
However, the local council confirmed our council tax is to rise 8.95% and having received details of increases in mobile, broadband and tv charges, together with energy and other rises these easily cancel out our triple lock rise of 4.1% and will bear down heavily on family budgets in 2025
We are fortunate as we can afford them, but many cannot and I doubt a feel good factor is about to return and that is before Reeves March statement
On Reform, those predicting it's early demise are wish casting and as much as I attack Farage and Reform I fear they will continue to be the NOA candidate and may not go away as much as many would hope
Politics is impossible to predict and I am not going to predict 2028 election, but for now I do compliment Starmer for his dealings with Trump, warm welcome to Zelenskyy yesterday, and for arranging the meeting with the King
It isn't based on morale that I'm making my judgment. Russia is running out of men, materials and money. Those three determine the outcome of a long-term war far more than morale ever does.
You have been calling for the imminent collapse of Russia for three years and, then as now, I just don't see it.
If Europe wants to do this alone, then I can't see any alternative to the above.
Can't we let the site operators deal with how they run it, rather than us demand bans on other posters?
https://www.scotland.police.uk/about-us/how-we-do-it/taser/
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10610-023-09569-3
A bit of banter is fine, and can be fun. But the site's owners have to trust people to follow the rules, otherwise it becomes impossible.
In that case, I withdraw my pompous rebuttal to Ian!