By invoking a national economic emergency under IEEPA, Trump can now:
- deploy the military domestically - suspend labor laws - freeze finances - expand warantless searches - control domestic radio, social media and broadcast networks
Pay attention. It’s not just about tariffs. 2:07 PM · Apr 6, 2025 · 529.4K Views
I'm on a short break in Dubrovnik. It's possibly the most visually appealing city I have ever been to. Venice comes close, but Venice has no altitude. It's astonishing. Every view is satisfying, ancient, well-composed. It is impossible to take a bad photograph. But with great diligence, if you try, you can find an uninteresting one:
By invoking a national economic emergency under IEEPA, Trump can now:
- deploy the military domestically - suspend labor laws - freeze finances - expand warantless searches - control domestic radio, social media and broadcast networks
Pay attention. It’s not just about tariffs. 2:07 PM · Apr 6, 2025 · 529.4K Views
Trump would veto the legislation introduced by Sens. Maria Cantwell and Sen. Chuck Grassley that would limit the president's authority to unilaterally impose tariffs, according to a White House statement seen by Axios https://x.com/axios/status/1909277136692650128
I'm on a short break in Dubrovnik. It's possibly the most visually appealing city I have ever been to. Venice comes close, but Venice has no altitude. It's astonishing. Every view is satisfying, ancient, well-composed. It is impossible to take a bad photograph. But with great diligence, if you try, you can find an uninteresting one:
It turns out I have been running 2 car insurance policies for a couple of months by mistake (my error).
I don't think that I will have much luck asking for a refund from the one I should have cancelled !
Good luck with that. Two policies, one car is also technically illegal.
Are you sure? Checking, Admiral disagree. There are complications around claims, of course. Since they are all on a single database, the second could have noticed that the other had not been cancelled and refused to cover. I am certainly doubled up on free breakdown cover, as it is complimentary on two other products.
Admiral: Can I have two insurance policies on one car? Yes, you can actually have two insurance policies on a car at the same time. ... Is it illegal? It’s not illegal to have two policies on one car.
But it is illegal to make a claim from multiple insurers and get the same payout twice, as that’s fraud.
How can you have two insurance policies? It’s actually more common than you might think.
There are a few ways it could happen:
You could take out a new policy on your car expecting the original policy to expire automatically. But many insurance policies renew automatically, so you could end up paying twice if you don’t actively cancel the original policy. You could have separate policies covering the same thing. For instance, some drivers pay for specific roadside breakdown insurance, not knowing that breakdown cover is already included in their comprehensive car insurance. You have insurance through your credit card or bank account. Some of these financial services come with breakdown cover, travel or contents insurance which you may not be aware of. https://www.admiral.com/magazine/guides/car-insurance/why-you-shouldnt-double-insurance-cover
I'm on a short break in Dubrovnik. It's possibly the most visually appealing city I have ever been to. Venice comes close, but Venice has no altitude. It's astonishing. Every view is satisfying, ancient, well-composed. It is impossible to take a bad photograph. But with great diligence, if you try, you can find an uninteresting one:
It turns out I have been running 2 car insurance policies for a couple of months by mistake (my error).
I don't think that I will have much luck asking for a refund from the one I should have cancelled !
Good luck with that. Two policies, one car is also technically illegal.
Are you sure? Checking, Admiral disagree. There are complications around claims, of course. Since they are all on a single database, the second could have noticed that the other had not been cancelled and refused to cover. I am certainly doubled up on free breakdown cover, as it is complimentary on two other products.
Admiral: Can I have two insurance policies on one car? Yes, you can actually have two insurance policies on a car at the same time. ... Is it illegal? It’s not illegal to have two policies on one car.
But it is illegal to make a claim from multiple insurers and get the same payout twice, as that’s fraud.
How can you have two insurance policies? It’s actually more common than you might think.
There are a few ways it could happen:
You could take out a new policy on your car expecting the original policy to expire automatically. But many insurance policies renew automatically, so you could end up paying twice if you don’t actively cancel the original policy. You could have separate policies covering the same thing. For instance, some drivers pay for specific roadside breakdown insurance, not knowing that breakdown cover is already included in their comprehensive car insurance. You have insurance through your credit card or bank account. Some of these financial services come with breakdown cover, travel or contents insurance which you may not be aware of. https://www.admiral.com/magazine/guides/car-insurance/why-you-shouldnt-double-insurance-cover
Fair enough. So it only becomes a problem when claims are made.
As I pant and wheeze around Almaty I can inform curious PBers that the site of Trotsky’s house, where he was internally exiled from 1928-1929 has been entirely swept away, replaced by the “Lucky Yu” Chinese restaurant, the Caspian University branch of Starbucks, and a trendy new “European-style cheeseria”
There is no plaque, no nothing. Poignant
Trotsky wanted the revolution to be international, So Poignant in someways. 😆
Likely one of the few things I agree with Musk about. Though I'd have gone with rocks.
It's always interesting when you see an idiomatic expression used by someone who grew up in a different country, even if the language is nominally English
Likely one of the few things I agree with Musk about. Though I'd have gone with rocks.
I’m not sure it’s ending in tears quite yet, but the conscious uncoupling does seem to have started. It all ending in tears between them has been one of the most widely predicted events, the question was always just when.
Likely one of the few things I agree with Musk about. Though I'd have gone with rocks.
I’m not sure it’s ending in tears quite yet, but the conscious uncoupling does seem to have started. It all ending in tears between them has been one of the most widely predicted events, the question was always just when.
Somebody on TwiX reported that Musk had been heard crying at the Whitehouse
here's CNN's Harry Enten gushing this morning that Trump is a "soaring eagle" and saying, "you can't say that he's come in and not tried to deliver on what he at least believes was his promises on the campaign trail and he's doing so in historic fashion" 🤡
Likely one of the few things I agree with Musk about. Though I'd have gone with rocks.
I’m not sure it’s ending in tears quite yet, but the conscious uncoupling does seem to have started. It all ending in tears between them has been one of the most widely predicted events, the question was always just when.
Somebody on TwiX reported that Musk had been heard crying at the Whitehouse
Man with so much money he can do whatever he wants crying. He should try working a minimum wage job then he would be crying.
Likely one of the few things I agree with Musk about. Though I'd have gone with rocks.
I’m not sure it’s ending in tears quite yet, but the conscious uncoupling does seem to have started. It all ending in tears between them has been one of the most widely predicted events, the question was always just when.
Somebody on TwiX reported that Musk had been heard crying at the Whitehouse
Diamonds are Forever becomes increasingly relevant, especially the Whyte House and the vanishing gaffer, replaced by you-know-who.
Except that the ejectee survived the defenestration.
Do we have any inside knowledge as to which characters have cats in the Trump regime?
On a vaguely related topic a pretty horrible thing happened at the vineyard yesterday. One of the sheep that had been grazing there was found dead, clearly attacked and almost entirely eaten.
It’s the second time it’s happened the same flock, though last time in a different part of the valley. It was a fully grown ewe so can only have been a large dog (or wolf, or panther, or crazed murderer). Too much damage for a badger or fox. How a large dog got into the fenced off field - with no footpaths or rights of way - in the first place, where it came from, what its owner was doing, are all deeply mysterious. I think the police have been called by the farmer.
Really unpleasant news. I felt oddly guilty as it was my land they were grazing.
- having a large bunch of MPs is beneficial, after all, despite the many people who haven’t noticed
- Trump has made being pro-European both sensible and fashionable
- the old axiom that dissatisfied Labour votes jump back to the Tories no longer holds given the shortage of sufficiently long barge poles
- Labour tacking to the wimpy right has left a huge political space for the LibDems and Greens to frolic in
- being robustly anti-Trump, when neither Labour nor Tories can
- people eagerly await Ed’s next jumping into the lake stunt
.... or, they have benefitted from the LACK of media coverage.
That’s never done them that much good before!
Even Ashdown’s affair saw their poll ratings rise
It's the forthcoming local elections I think. Lots of Focus leaflets going out these last few weeks. Lib Dems usually do well at Locals.
There was a comment upthread (from @MoonRabbit ?) that the LDs always get a local election bounce, and I thought that too - but looking at the Yougov data as I happened to have it open doesn't bear this out. There was a slight lift last year, but not in 21 or 22. So not proven after all.
I'm on a short break in Dubrovnik. It's possibly the most visually appealing city I have ever been to. Venice comes close, but Venice has no altitude. It's astonishing. Every view is satisfying, ancient, well-composed. It is impossible to take a bad photograph. But with great diligence, if you try, you can find an uninteresting one:
Wife and I have been there on a TUI Marella cruise, appreciate that is a little below the level of most here, and it is an amazing city.
The port was being developed and will be splendid when completed.
We also enjoyed Ljubljana too, on the same cruise.
here's CNN's Harry Enten gushing this morning that Trump is a "soaring eagle" and saying, "you can't say that he's come in and not tried to deliver on what he at least believes was his promises on the campaign trail and he's doing so in historic fashion" 🤡
On a vaguely related topic a pretty horrible thing happened at the vineyard yesterday. One of the sheep that had been grazing there was found dead, clearly attacked and almost entirely eaten.
It’s the second time it’s happened the same flock, though last time in a different part of the valley. It was a fully grown ewe so can only have been a large dog (or wolf, or panther, or crazed murderer). Too much damage for a badger or fox. How a large dog got into the fenced off field - with no footpaths or rights of way - in the first place, where it came from, what its owner was doing, are all deeply mysterious. I think the police have been called by the farmer.
Really unpleasant news. I felt oddly guilty as it was my land they were grazing.
Puma? Or other ABC? Otherwise hard to imagine what would do that kind of damage.
Likely one of the few things I agree with Musk about. Though I'd have gone with rocks.
I’m not sure it’s ending in tears quite yet, but the conscious uncoupling does seem to have started. It all ending in tears between them has been one of the most widely predicted events, the question was always just when.
Somebody on TwiX reported that Musk had been heard crying at the Whitehouse
Man with so much money he can do whatever he wants crying. He should try working a minimum wage job then he would be crying.
He'd have been considerably better off working a minimum wage job rather than hitching his wagon to Trump.
Do you think there should be some kind of basic intelligence test before people can spam pb.com with questions that even a very slow toddler could answer?
Italian premier Giorgia Meloni will head to the US to negotiate tariff relief directly with US President Donald Trump, in a move coordinated with the European Union. Meloni will seek to extract tariff concessions from Trump when she travels to Washington as early as next week, @donatopmancini reports
On a vaguely related topic a pretty horrible thing happened at the vineyard yesterday. One of the sheep that had been grazing there was found dead, clearly attacked and almost entirely eaten.
It’s the second time it’s happened the same flock, though last time in a different part of the valley. It was a fully grown ewe so can only have been a large dog (or wolf, or panther, or crazed murderer). Too much damage for a badger or fox. How a large dog got into the fenced off field - with no footpaths or rights of way - in the first place, where it came from, what its owner was doing, are all deeply mysterious. I think the police have been called by the farmer.
Really unpleasant news. I felt oddly guilty as it was my land they were grazing.
Have you thought about dropping a few trail cams in the area?
Musk is correct: Navarro is among the dumbest and most dangerous of Trump's advisors.
Niall Ferguson called this one right: the voters went for Trump because of cost of living and (illegal) immigration. If Trump makes the cost of living significantly worse, then it will not end well for him. (Doubly so, if he deports a lot of fruit and vegetable pickers.)
However: this is the path Trump has gone down. He cannot back down now without being seen as a loser (which has always been his greatest fear).
The path of least resistance is that he'll clutch at almost anything offered to declare victory, just as with the US Mexico Canada Trade Agreement. But it is equally possible that the rest of the world is - as the header suggests - sick of being Trump's whipping boy, and refuses to play his game. In which case, the world is in for a rough few years. With the US having the roughest time of all.
Great header, thanks Sean, I really enjoyed it. Off topic, been away from politics for a while focusing on things closer to home, so just catching up on Badenoch's outrageous comments about the Labour MPs detained by the Israelis. I'm gobsmacked. She's a disgrace to the office of LOTO.
Latest YouGov poll for The Times: Lab 24, Ref 23, Con 22, Lib Dem 17, Green 9
Lib Dems on highest poll rating with YouGov since before 2019 election. OGH used to focus on momentum, seems like the Lib Dems have some- and its concentrated in the south. The Tories seem set to have a very nasty local result indeed on May 1st.
Every year there is an election in May, and every year the LibDems climb during the campaign to have a good locals result, and then slip back during the rest of the year. Conversely, even in a parliament that led to Labours best ever election result, they would bit by bit slip backwards during the spring campaign to some of their lowest polling of the year.
Visibility and "winning here". Vote share is vanity, seats are sanity.
Getting the largest number of candidates nominated is an impressive logistical feat by Reform. No question about that. But there is a risk that they are going to fall into the same trap as the SDP did in the 1980s; quite a lot of votes everywhere, but not lumpy enough to win in many places.
My suspicion is that the LibLab 41 will be a lot more efficiently arranged than the RefCon 45.
Moonrabbit puts her psephological hat on - she’s really good at this.
What the last election explicitly shows us is three voting blocks.
At the next election my prediction is this will be much the same, or completely different. 😌
We cannot presume blocks 2 and 3 are blurring right now, to helping each other better than they did last July; nor that Labour retains the willing support of LibDem and Green voters from the last election, which helped block 1 game the electoral system so effectively.
But rather than picking over opinion polls, we are so much smarter on PB we should be thinking only in terms of these blocks? Why? Just look at it, being in a block of your own and friendless, 14.3% is just 5 seats, being in a block with friends 33.7% is 412 seats.
I’ll go deeper into this voting block psephology. Where I just used the word “friends” - that’s the wrong way of looking at it. What actually brings people in and out of voting blocks is not choosing what they like, but having first chosen what they don’t want in power.
For example, one Reform voter could agree with the Conservatives 90% of the time, but remaining 10% is hating the Tory record on immigration so much, it makes him a Reform voter. At this stage anyway.
Italian premier Giorgia Meloni will head to the US to negotiate tariff relief directly with US President Donald Trump, in a move coordinated with the European Union. Meloni will seek to extract tariff concessions from Trump when she travels to Washington as early as next week, @donatopmancini reports
- having a large bunch of MPs is beneficial, after all, despite the many people who haven’t noticed
- Trump has made being pro-European both sensible and fashionable
- the old axiom that dissatisfied Labour votes jump back to the Tories no longer holds given the shortage of sufficiently long barge poles
- Labour tacking to the wimpy right has left a huge political space for the LibDems and Greens to frolic in
- being robustly anti-Trump, when neither Labour nor Tories can
- people eagerly await Ed’s next jumping into the lake stunt
.... or, they have benefitted from the LACK of media coverage.
They have fewer skeletons in the closet, and in their social media history, than the other parties?
The LD thing is interesting and unpredictable. Take the four top polling parties. Of these two suffer from unpopularity on account of the way they have exercised or currently exercise power. Two don't - Reform and LD.
Reform have a big plus and big minus: The plus is that unlike the LDs their natural territory is where traditionally Lab and Con have always come first or second. The minus is that there is most voters hate them.
The LDs have a plus and a minus too. The plus is that few hate them - hating Davey is like hating Harry Worth, who he so closely resembles. The minus is that they are only in contention is a finite number of seats (100 max?) where LD or Tory come top.
So the LDs and Reform are not in serious contention with each other.
I live in normal seat - one where in normal times Tory/Lab come in the top two. If a pollster asked me how I would vote I would say Labour.
So the pollster figure for the LDs is constrained by the fact they are only relevant to a small minority of seats.
But that could shift slowly if Tory/Lab unpopularity continues. Te more hated Lab/Con are, the more the LD answer is the alternative to Reform. But it won't be quick.
On a vaguely related topic a pretty horrible thing happened at the vineyard yesterday. One of the sheep that had been grazing there was found dead, clearly attacked and almost entirely eaten.
It’s the second time it’s happened the same flock, though last time in a different part of the valley. It was a fully grown ewe so can only have been a large dog (or wolf, or panther, or crazed murderer). Too much damage for a badger or fox. How a large dog got into the fenced off field - with no footpaths or rights of way - in the first place, where it came from, what its owner was doing, are all deeply mysterious. I think the police have been called by the farmer.
Really unpleasant news. I felt oddly guilty as it was my land they were grazing.
A little happier; we had a young rabbit in our garden today. Not sure how it got in as the garden has a fence at the back, and the other side of the fence is a car park. Each side has walls and the only access is by a path past the front door where there's another fence and a gate. However the sight of it nibbling something unwanted pleased Mrs C.
Bloomberg has some nice charts on the tariffs’ impacts.
The first one argues that tariffs on China are coming globally: too many countries will see a spike of imports from China & that's not sustainable.
Europe needs to consume more, and (other than cars) there is very little overlap between what Europe produces, and what China produces. I think it is just as likely that China selling more (at lower prices) to Europe stimulates domestic demand as is very good for the otherwise moribund Eurozone economy.
On a vaguely related topic a pretty horrible thing happened at the vineyard yesterday. One of the sheep that had been grazing there was found dead, clearly attacked and almost entirely eaten.
It’s the second time it’s happened the same flock, though last time in a different part of the valley. It was a fully grown ewe so can only have been a large dog (or wolf, or panther, or crazed murderer). Too much damage for a badger or fox. How a large dog got into the fenced off field - with no footpaths or rights of way - in the first place, where it came from, what its owner was doing, are all deeply mysterious. I think the police have been called by the farmer.
Really unpleasant news. I felt oddly guilty as it was my land they were grazing.
A little happier; we had a young rabbit in our garden today. Not sure how it got in as the garden has a fence at the back, and the other side of the fence is a car park. Each side has walls and the only access is by a path past the front door where there's another fence and a gate. However the sight of it nibbling something unwanted pleased Mrs C.
Another rabbit who, like Peter, failed to heed the admonitions of Old Mrs Rabbit and squeezed under the gate?
On a vaguely related topic a pretty horrible thing happened at the vineyard yesterday. One of the sheep that had been grazing there was found dead, clearly attacked and almost entirely eaten.
It’s the second time it’s happened the same flock, though last time in a different part of the valley. It was a fully grown ewe so can only have been a large dog (or wolf, or panther, or crazed murderer). Too much damage for a badger or fox. How a large dog got into the fenced off field - with no footpaths or rights of way - in the first place, where it came from, what its owner was doing, are all deeply mysterious. I think the police have been called by the farmer.
Really unpleasant news. I felt oddly guilty as it was my land they were grazing.
Have you thought about dropping a few trail cams in the area?
I think we or the farmer may do that now. Not sure if he might take the sheep off the vineyard now though, and put them somewhere “safer”.
I still think it was most likely a dog, and therefore someone somewhere knows what happened.
As I pant and wheeze around Almaty I can inform curious PBers that the site of Trotsky’s house, where he was internally exiled from 1928-1929 has been entirely swept away, replaced by the “Lucky Yu” Chinese restaurant, the Caspian University branch of Starbucks, and a trendy new “European-style cheeseria”
There is no plaque, no nothing. Poignant
Trotsky wanted the revolution to be international, So Poignant in someways. 😆
Jewish Ukrainian and anti Stalinist. I’m surprised they hadn’t renamed the surrounding streets.
On a vaguely related topic a pretty horrible thing happened at the vineyard yesterday. One of the sheep that had been grazing there was found dead, clearly attacked and almost entirely eaten.
It’s the second time it’s happened the same flock, though last time in a different part of the valley. It was a fully grown ewe so can only have been a large dog (or wolf, or panther, or crazed murderer). Too much damage for a badger or fox. How a large dog got into the fenced off field - with no footpaths or rights of way - in the first place, where it came from, what its owner was doing, are all deeply mysterious. I think the police have been called by the farmer.
Really unpleasant news. I felt oddly guilty as it was my land they were grazing.
Have you thought about dropping a few trail cams in the area?
I think we or the farmer may do that now. Not sure if he might take the sheep off the vineyard now though, and put them somewhere “safer”.
I still think it was most likely a dog, and therefore someone somewhere knows what happened.
If it does turn out to be a big cat then the media licensing rights will certainly help towards the pension fund!
Italian premier Giorgia Meloni will head to the US to negotiate tariff relief directly with US President Donald Trump, in a move coordinated with the European Union. Meloni will seek to extract tariff concessions from Trump when she travels to Washington as early as next week, @donatopmancini reports
Meloni and the EU needs to ignore the US, and to stimulate domestic demand. Continuing to rely on the US's deficit spending is ultimately dumb. (Plus, of course, can you really trust the Trump administration to stick to any deal they sign?)
I would refuse to engage with the US on trade at all, until tariffs are removed.
Musk is correct: Navarro is among the dumbest and most dangerous of Trump's advisors.
Niall Ferguson called this one right: the voters went for Trump because of cost of living and (illegal) immigration. If Trump makes the cost of living significantly worse, then it will not end well for him. (Doubly so, if he deports a lot of fruit and vegetable pickers.)
However: this is the path Trump has gone down. He cannot back down now without being seen as a loser (which has always been his greatest fear).
The path of least resistance is that he'll clutch at almost anything offered to declare victory, just as with the US Mexico Canada Trade Agreement. But it is equally possible that the rest of the world is - as the header suggests - sick of being Trump's whipping boy, and refuses to play his game. In which case, the world is in for a rough few years. With the US having the roughest time of all.
Yes. It won't be good for anyone, but if one country has gratuitously picked a fight with the rest of the world, it will be particularly bad for that country.
Not the worst place in the world to wait for a bus..
Are you trolling MattW? No cycle path and all those poles blocking wheelchairs.
I was wondering about trying to GeoGuess that, but it's low on information.
UK due to driving on the left, but the white lines are a little long, and I don't recognise the bus company. it's quite like the area where Notts shades into Lincs, but could equally be a number of other regions including a hilly bit of East Anglia, near the Northern end of the Pennine Way, or areas around Brum.
The lack of small trees amongst the bits of left over hedge speaks of an area with limited grant farming for a long time.
Maybe aslo a flattish bit of Scotland, though it's short on rain.
Italian premier Giorgia Meloni will head to the US to negotiate tariff relief directly with US President Donald Trump, in a move coordinated with the European Union. Meloni will seek to extract tariff concessions from Trump when she travels to Washington as early as next week, @donatopmancini reports
Meloni and the EU needs to ignore the US, and to stimulate domestic demand. Continuing to rely on the US's deficit spending is ultimately dumb. (Plus, of course, can you really trust the Trump administration to stick to any deal they sign?)
I would refuse to engage with the US on trade at all, until tariffs are removed.
Trump is a malignant narcissist. The only way to deal with them is go "gray rock" and not get sucked into their drama.
Italian premier Giorgia Meloni will head to the US to negotiate tariff relief directly with US President Donald Trump, in a move coordinated with the European Union. Meloni will seek to extract tariff concessions from Trump when she travels to Washington as early as next week, @donatopmancini reports
On Peter Navarro, there was a theory on Rachel Maddow the other day that Trump found him via browsing book covers on Amazon, and that the citation in his books for his theories is just a faked up anagram of his name.
Given that Navarro is another Election manipulator jailbirds that Trump has brought in with him, anything is possible.
"China’s top think tank has shut down its public policy research centre amid a new round of ideological reinforcement, with any activities carried out in its name declared 'illegal', with immediate effect." https://x.com/thomasdggeddes/status/1909621470457721162
On a vaguely related topic a pretty horrible thing happened at the vineyard yesterday. One of the sheep that had been grazing there was found dead, clearly attacked and almost entirely eaten.
It’s the second time it’s happened the same flock, though last time in a different part of the valley. It was a fully grown ewe so can only have been a large dog (or wolf, or panther, or crazed murderer). Too much damage for a badger or fox. How a large dog got into the fenced off field - with no footpaths or rights of way - in the first place, where it came from, what its owner was doing, are all deeply mysterious. I think the police have been called by the farmer.
Really unpleasant news. I felt oddly guilty as it was my land they were grazing.
A little happier; we had a young rabbit in our garden today. Not sure how it got in as the garden has a fence at the back, and the other side of the fence is a car park. Each side has walls and the only access is by a path past the front door where there's another fence and a gate. However the sight of it nibbling something unwanted pleased Mrs C.
Another rabbit who, like Peter, failed to heed the admonitions of Old Mrs Rabbit and squeezed under the gate?
Think it more likely it squeezed under the fence, but in doing so it would have crossed a carpark.
Italian premier Giorgia Meloni will head to the US to negotiate tariff relief directly with US President Donald Trump, in a move coordinated with the European Union. Meloni will seek to extract tariff concessions from Trump when she travels to Washington as early as next week, @donatopmancini reports
Musk is correct: Navarro is among the dumbest and most dangerous of Trump's advisors.
Niall Ferguson called this one right: the voters went for Trump because of cost of living and (illegal) immigration. If Trump makes the cost of living significantly worse, then it will not end well for him. (Doubly so, if he deports a lot of fruit and vegetable pickers.)
However: this is the path Trump has gone down. He cannot back down now without being seen as a loser (which has always been his greatest fear).
The path of least resistance is that he'll clutch at almost anything offered to declare victory, just as with the US Mexico Canada Trade Agreement. But it is equally possible that the rest of the world is - as the header suggests - sick of being Trump's whipping boy, and refuses to play his game. In which case, the world is in for a rough few years. With the US having the roughest time of all.
I have two theories. The first builds on what you have been saying - which I don’t disagree with, only I am switching it around the other way. If they concentrated on the illegal and non illegal immigration and the cost of living - inflation, interest rates and rebuilding incomes - Trump could have got a third term, MAGA ideology could have taken hold in America. Instead, he’s trashing it. He’s built the sandcastle, with the flags and its own theme tune, and now flattened it himself. We were fearing MAGA remaining electable, we should be rejoicing at this MAGA suicide pact.
However. What if Tarrif War isn’t what it seems? What if they don’t remain long enough to create the Great Trump Slump - just a distant memory in a years time? What if the real aim is bullying each country into a US beneficial trade deal, the bullied country would never have agreed to if not bullied? The administration will then turn attention to restoring incomes - with such a huge tax cut, growth rather than slump seems on the cards, either way.
I have been commissioned to eat the finest horse in Kazakhstan
Are they slaughtering it specially for you ? Seems excessive.
Its weird what large mammals we eat and don't eat in the UK. If you can look a cow, a sheep and a pig in the eye and then eat beef/lamb/bacon, why don't we do the same with horse?
I'm on a short break in Dubrovnik. It's possibly the most visually appealing city I have ever been to. Venice comes close, but Venice has no altitude. It's astonishing. Every view is satisfying, ancient, well-composed. It is impossible to take a bad photograph. But with great diligence, if you try, you can find an uninteresting one:
Musk is correct: Navarro is among the dumbest and most dangerous of Trump's advisors.
Niall Ferguson called this one right: the voters went for Trump because of cost of living and (illegal) immigration. If Trump makes the cost of living significantly worse, then it will not end well for him. (Doubly so, if he deports a lot of fruit and vegetable pickers.)
However: this is the path Trump has gone down. He cannot back down now without being seen as a loser (which has always been his greatest fear).
The path of least resistance is that he'll clutch at almost anything offered to declare victory, just as with the US Mexico Canada Trade Agreement. But it is equally possible that the rest of the world is - as the header suggests - sick of being Trump's whipping boy, and refuses to play his game. In which case, the world is in for a rough few years. With the US having the roughest time of all.
I have two theories. The first builds on what you have been saying - which I don’t disagree with, only I am switching it around the other way. If they concentrated on the illegal and non illegal immigration and the cost of living - inflation, interest rates and rebuilding incomes - Trump could have got a third term, MAGA ideology could have taken hold in America. Instead, he’s trashing it. He’s built the sandcastle, with the flags and its own theme tune, and now flattened it himself. We were fearing MAGA remaining electable, we should be rejoicing at this MAGA suicide pact.
However. What if Tarrif War isn’t what it seems? What if they don’t remain long enough to create the Great Trump Slump - just a distant memory in a years time? What if the real aim is bullying each country into a US beneficial trade deal, the bullied country would never have agreed to if not bullied? The administration will then turn attention to restoring incomes - with such a huge tax cut, growth rather than slump seems on the cards, either way.
Problem there is Trump has spent the past 70 days showing how untrustworthy so few people are really talking to him because it doesn’t seem to matter.
Oh and the issue is you cannot have cheap prices and little immigration - it’s the immigration that keeps prices lower than they otherwise would be
Latest poll just now on Trump approval rating. Navigator 3 Apr - 7th April so just beginning to cover the tariff and stock market crash. Approve 44% Disapprove 53% Net -9% Previous poll three weeks ago Approve 47% Disapprove 49% Net -2%
Great header, thanks Sean, I really enjoyed it. Off topic, been away from politics for a while focusing on things closer to home, so just catching up on Badenoch's outrageous comments about the Labour MPs detained by the Israelis. I'm gobsmacked. She's a disgrace to the office of LOTO.
Latest YouGov poll for The Times: Lab 24, Ref 23, Con 22, Lib Dem 17, Green 9
Lib Dems on highest poll rating with YouGov since before 2019 election. OGH used to focus on momentum, seems like the Lib Dems have some- and its concentrated in the south. The Tories seem set to have a very nasty local result indeed on May 1st.
Every year there is an election in May, and every year the LibDems climb during the campaign to have a good locals result, and then slip back during the rest of the year. Conversely, even in a parliament that led to Labours best ever election result, they would bit by bit slip backwards during the spring campaign to some of their lowest polling of the year.
Visibility and "winning here". Vote share is vanity, seats are sanity.
Getting the largest number of candidates nominated is an impressive logistical feat by Reform. No question about that. But there is a risk that they are going to fall into the same trap as the SDP did in the 1980s; quite a lot of votes everywhere, but not lumpy enough to win in many places.
My suspicion is that the LibLab 41 will be a lot more efficiently arranged than the RefCon 45.
Moonrabbit puts her psephological hat on - she’s really good at this.
What the last election explicitly shows us is three voting blocks.
At the next election my prediction is this will be much the same, or completely different. 😌
We cannot presume blocks 2 and 3 are blurring right now, to helping each other better than they did last July; nor that Labour retains the willing support of LibDem and Green voters from the last election, which helped block 1 game the electoral system so effectively.
But rather than picking over opinion polls, we are so much smarter on PB we should be thinking only in terms of these blocks? Why? Just look at it, being in a block of your own and friendless, 14.3% is just 5 seats, being in a block with friends 33.7% is 412 seats.
I’ll go deeper into this voting block psephology. Where I just used the word “friends” - that’s the wrong way of looking at it. What actually brings people in and out of voting blocks is not choosing what they like, but having first chosen what they don’t want in power.
For example, one Reform voter could agree with the Conservatives 90% of the time, but remaining 10% is hating the Tory record on immigration so much, it makes him a Reform voter. At this stage anyway.
You know what they say about people who refer to themselves in the third person....?
I have been commissioned to eat the finest horse in Kazakhstan
Are they slaughtering it specially for you ? Seems excessive.
Its weird what large mammals we eat and don't eat in the UK. If you can look a cow, a sheep and a pig in the eye and then eat beef/lamb/bacon, why don't we do the same with horse?
When did the British..... English, Scots and Welsh...... stop eating horse? If any of them ever did.
Italian premier Giorgia Meloni will head to the US to negotiate tariff relief directly with US President Donald Trump, in a move coordinated with the European Union. Meloni will seek to extract tariff concessions from Trump when she travels to Washington as early as next week, @donatopmancini reports
Meloni and the EU needs to ignore the US, and to stimulate domestic demand. Continuing to rely on the US's deficit spending is ultimately dumb. (Plus, of course, can you really trust the Trump administration to stick to any deal they sign?)
I would refuse to engage with the US on trade at all, until tariffs are removed.
Trump is using Tarrifs, and fear of Tarrifs, the damage they will cause, to get panicked, bullied, US favourable trade deals off everybody.
I have been commissioned to eat the finest horse in Kazakhstan
Are they slaughtering it specially for you ? Seems excessive.
Its weird what large mammals we eat and don't eat in the UK. If you can look a cow, a sheep and a pig in the eye and then eat beef/lamb/bacon, why don't we do the same with horse?
When did the British..... English, Scots and Welsh...... stop eating horse? If any of them ever did.
I think my old grandad said that eating horse during WW2 was a thing.
Italian premier Giorgia Meloni will head to the US to negotiate tariff relief directly with US President Donald Trump, in a move coordinated with the European Union. Meloni will seek to extract tariff concessions from Trump when she travels to Washington as early as next week, @donatopmancini reports
Meloni and the EU needs to ignore the US, and to stimulate domestic demand. Continuing to rely on the US's deficit spending is ultimately dumb. (Plus, of course, can you really trust the Trump administration to stick to any deal they sign?)
I would refuse to engage with the US on trade at all, until tariffs are removed.
Trump is using Tarrifs, and fear of Tarrifs, the damage they will cause, to get panicked, bullied, US favourable trade deals off everybody.
And it’s working.
Is it though? Have any meaningful deals been signed or concessions extracted?
Italian premier Giorgia Meloni will head to the US to negotiate tariff relief directly with US President Donald Trump, in a move coordinated with the European Union. Meloni will seek to extract tariff concessions from Trump when she travels to Washington as early as next week, @donatopmancini reports
Meloni and the EU needs to ignore the US, and to stimulate domestic demand. Continuing to rely on the US's deficit spending is ultimately dumb. (Plus, of course, can you really trust the Trump administration to stick to any deal they sign?)
I would refuse to engage with the US on trade at all, until tariffs are removed.
This sounds like a prescription for more of the same that we've had for decades. Since the advent of modern globalisation, there has been a surfeit of cheap goods, and to avoid this making things get cheaper, which is deemed to be disastrous, demand has been boosted to artificially induce inflation.
Now that the consumer of last resort wants to opt out of the system, it seems like a bad idea for the rest of the West to double down on the policies that have failed.
I have been commissioned to eat the finest horse in Kazakhstan
Are they slaughtering it specially for you ? Seems excessive.
Its weird what large mammals we eat and don't eat in the UK. If you can look a cow, a sheep and a pig in the eye and then eat beef/lamb/bacon, why don't we do the same with horse?
Exactly how I became a vegetarian 50-odd years ago! Sitting on some steps outside a church whilst the cows came down the lane. One of them put its face close to mine, I looked it in the eyes and realised I couldn't eat it any longer.
Italian premier Giorgia Meloni will head to the US to negotiate tariff relief directly with US President Donald Trump, in a move coordinated with the European Union. Meloni will seek to extract tariff concessions from Trump when she travels to Washington as early as next week, @donatopmancini reports
Meloni and the EU needs to ignore the US, and to stimulate domestic demand. Continuing to rely on the US's deficit spending is ultimately dumb. (Plus, of course, can you really trust the Trump administration to stick to any deal they sign?)
I would refuse to engage with the US on trade at all, until tariffs are removed.
This sounds like a prescription for more of the same that we've had for decades. Since the advent of modern globalisation, there has been a surfeit of cheap goods, and to avoid this making things get cheaper, which is deemed to be disastrous, demand has been boosted to artificially induce inflation.
Now that the consumer of last resort wants to opt out of the system, it seems like a bad idea for the rest of the West to double down on the policies that have failed.
Has it failed? I would suggest that it is the policies of Germany and Italy, that suppress domestic demand to run trade surpluses that have failed.
Go look at the developed world countries that run trade surpluses, by and large, their economies are a hell of a lot more moribund than those who run deficits.
Because that's the great irony: the US has been the West's great economic success story.
Italian premier Giorgia Meloni will head to the US to negotiate tariff relief directly with US President Donald Trump, in a move coordinated with the European Union. Meloni will seek to extract tariff concessions from Trump when she travels to Washington as early as next week, @donatopmancini reports
Meloni and the EU needs to ignore the US, and to stimulate domestic demand. Continuing to rely on the US's deficit spending is ultimately dumb. (Plus, of course, can you really trust the Trump administration to stick to any deal they sign?)
I would refuse to engage with the US on trade at all, until tariffs are removed.
This sounds like a prescription for more of the same that we've had for decades. Since the advent of modern globalisation, there has been a surfeit of cheap goods, and to avoid this making things get cheaper, which is deemed to be disastrous, demand has been boosted to artificially induce inflation.
Now that the consumer of last resort wants to opt out of the system, it seems like a bad idea for the rest of the West to double down on the policies that have failed.
It's absolutely hilarious that MAGA supporters are now suddenly against "cheap goods".
Harris lost the election because of high prices under Biden.
Trump won because he promised low prices from "Day 1".
Now, suddenly, it is "cheap goods" meaning low prices that is a problem that needs to be eliminated.
Musk is correct: Navarro is among the dumbest and most dangerous of Trump's advisors.
Niall Ferguson called this one right: the voters went for Trump because of cost of living and (illegal) immigration. If Trump makes the cost of living significantly worse, then it will not end well for him. (Doubly so, if he deports a lot of fruit and vegetable pickers.)
However: this is the path Trump has gone down. He cannot back down now without being seen as a loser (which has always been his greatest fear).
The path of least resistance is that he'll clutch at almost anything offered to declare victory, just as with the US Mexico Canada Trade Agreement. But it is equally possible that the rest of the world is - as the header suggests - sick of being Trump's whipping boy, and refuses to play his game. In which case, the world is in for a rough few years. With the US having the roughest time of all.
I have two theories. The first builds on what you have been saying - which I don’t disagree with, only I am switching it around the other way. If they concentrated on the illegal and non illegal immigration and the cost of living - inflation, interest rates and rebuilding incomes - Trump could have got a third term, MAGA ideology could have taken hold in America. Instead, he’s trashing it. He’s built the sandcastle, with the flags and its own theme tune, and now flattened it himself. We were fearing MAGA remaining electable, we should be rejoicing at this MAGA suicide pact.
However. What if Tarrif War isn’t what it seems? What if they don’t remain long enough to create the Great Trump Slump - just a distant memory in a years time? What if the real aim is bullying each country into a US beneficial trade deal, the bullied country would never have agreed to if not bullied? The administration will then turn attention to restoring incomes - with such a huge tax cut, growth rather than slump seems on the cards, either way.
Problem there is Trump has spent the past 70 days showing how untrustworthy so few people are really talking to him because it doesn’t seem to matter.
Oh and the issue is you cannot have cheap prices and little immigration - it’s the immigration that keeps prices lower than they otherwise would be
I think it's a little bit more complicated than that: immigration (and particularly illegal immigraytion) keeps food prices down in the US, but it also puts pressure on housing and other public services.
I have been commissioned to eat the finest horse in Kazakhstan
Are they slaughtering it specially for you ? Seems excessive.
Its weird what large mammals we eat and don't eat in the UK. If you can look a cow, a sheep and a pig in the eye and then eat beef/lamb/bacon, why don't we do the same with horse?
When did the British..... English, Scots and Welsh...... stop eating horse? If any of them ever did.
Not eating them is part of the bargain for allowing us to sit on them.
I'm on a short break in Dubrovnik. It's possibly the most visually appealing city I have ever been to. Venice comes close, but Venice has no altitude. It's astonishing. Every view is satisfying, ancient, well-composed. It is impossible to take a bad photograph. But with great diligence, if you try, you can find an uninteresting one:
Wife and I have been there on a TUI Marella cruise, appreciate that is a little below the level of most here, and it is an amazing city.
The port was being developed and will be splendid when completed.
We also enjoyed Ljubljana too, on the same cruise.
A cruise ship is a very inefficient way of going to Ljubljana
Off to the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich today hoping to become an exhibit. Old wooden commentary like mine belongs in a museum, I'm told, and the new Centrist wing looks the ideal place.
Looking into today's YouGov poll, the England sub sample of over 2000 people has Labour and Reform level on 24%, the Conservatives on 23% and the LDs on 18% with the Greens on 9%.
Since last July, Labour are down 10.5, Conservatives down 3, the LDs up 5, Reform up 9 and the Greens up 2 so a swing from Labour to Conservative of 6.75%, a swing from Conservatives to LDs of 4% and a swing from Labour to Reform of 9.75%.
A right kerfuffle as someone once opined...
In the south of England outside London, the Conservatives have 26%, the LDs 25%, Reform 24%, Labour 17% and the Greens 7%.
What does this presage for May 1st?
Thoughtfully we can find the equivalent YouGov poll for 7-8 April 2021 and on that occasion, the south of England outside London returned 48% Conservative, 27% Labour, 10% Green and 7% LD.
For those who enjoy these things, that's a 20% swing from Conservative to LD but only a 6% swing Conservative to Labour.
Huge caveats of course - three in particular, first Reform who are polling strongly everywhere outside London and especially in the Midlands. Second, local elections are NOT general elections and people don't vote the same way. Some Conservative councillors will survive (and will no doubt deserve too given a record of hard work for their locality). Third, you have often strong Independent candidates in local contests who often win despite (or because of) party political candidates standing against them.
The Conservatives are defending majority control of 14 out of 16 County Councils and 7 out of 8 Unitary authorities. There will likely be reductions if for no other reason than Buckinghamshire will reduce from 147 to 97 Councillors - given the Tories already hold 110 seats, even if they won every single seat under the new boundaries (which they won't), there would still be 13 fewer Conservative councillors.
Italian premier Giorgia Meloni will head to the US to negotiate tariff relief directly with US President Donald Trump, in a move coordinated with the European Union. Meloni will seek to extract tariff concessions from Trump when she travels to Washington as early as next week, @donatopmancini reports
Meloni and the EU needs to ignore the US, and to stimulate domestic demand. Continuing to rely on the US's deficit spending is ultimately dumb. (Plus, of course, can you really trust the Trump administration to stick to any deal they sign?)
I would refuse to engage with the US on trade at all, until tariffs are removed.
This sounds like a prescription for more of the same that we've had for decades. Since the advent of modern globalisation, there has been a surfeit of cheap goods, and to avoid this making things get cheaper, which is deemed to be disastrous, demand has been boosted to artificially induce inflation.
Now that the consumer of last resort wants to opt out of the system, it seems like a bad idea for the rest of the West to double down on the policies that have failed.
How does increased demand due to cheap goods cause inflation? Cheap goods are deflationary!
Italian premier Giorgia Meloni will head to the US to negotiate tariff relief directly with US President Donald Trump, in a move coordinated with the European Union. Meloni will seek to extract tariff concessions from Trump when she travels to Washington as early as next week, @donatopmancini reports
Meloni and the EU needs to ignore the US, and to stimulate domestic demand. Continuing to rely on the US's deficit spending is ultimately dumb. (Plus, of course, can you really trust the Trump administration to stick to any deal they sign?)
I would refuse to engage with the US on trade at all, until tariffs are removed.
This sounds like a prescription for more of the same that we've had for decades. Since the advent of modern globalisation, there has been a surfeit of cheap goods, and to avoid this making things get cheaper, which is deemed to be disastrous, demand has been boosted to artificially induce inflation.
Now that the consumer of last resort wants to opt out of the system, it seems like a bad idea for the rest of the West to double down on the policies that have failed.
How does increased demand due to cheap goods cause inflation? Cheap goods are deflationary!
That's not what I said. Cheap goods are deflationary, and policy has been geared towards avoiding deflation instead of allowing it to happen.
Comments
- deploy the military domestically
- suspend labor laws
- freeze finances
- expand warantless searches
- control domestic radio, social media and broadcast networks
Pay attention.
It’s not just about tariffs.
2:07 PM · Apr 6, 2025
·
529.4K
Views
https://x.com/DarrigoMelanie/status/1908869295477579928
https://x.com/axios/status/1909277136692650128
The rift is growing. Musk has called Trump advisor Peter Navarro “a moron” and “dumber than a sack of bricks”.
https://bsky.app/profile/chadbourn.bsky.social/post/3lmcpazjdu22d
https://www.sugimotohiroshi.com/seascapes-1
Admiral:
Can I have two insurance policies on one car?
Yes, you can actually have two insurance policies on a car at the same time.
...
Is it illegal?
It’s not illegal to have two policies on one car.
But it is illegal to make a claim from multiple insurers and get the same payout twice, as that’s fraud.
How can you have two insurance policies?
It’s actually more common than you might think.
There are a few ways it could happen:
You could take out a new policy on your car expecting the original policy to expire automatically. But many insurance policies renew automatically, so you could end up paying twice if you don’t actively cancel the original policy.
You could have separate policies covering the same thing. For instance, some drivers pay for specific roadside breakdown insurance, not knowing that breakdown cover is already included in their comprehensive car insurance.
You have insurance through your credit card or bank account. Some of these financial services come with breakdown cover, travel or contents insurance which you may not be aware of.
https://www.admiral.com/magazine/guides/car-insurance/why-you-shouldnt-double-insurance-cover
Though I'd have gone with rocks.
https://youtu.be/MZzDoK5NN4k?si=2cmBVdGEcI2-ExpA
https://bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4g9ejy3gdvo
here's CNN's Harry Enten gushing this morning that Trump is a "soaring eagle" and saying, "you can't say that he's come in and not tried to deliver on what he at least believes was his promises on the campaign trail and he's doing so in historic fashion" 🤡
https://bsky.app/profile/atrupar.com/post/3lmcr2uyyab26
Except that the ejectee survived the defenestration.
Do we have any inside knowledge as to which characters have cats in the Trump regime?
It’s the second time it’s happened the same flock, though last time in a different part of the valley. It was a fully grown ewe so can only have been a large dog (or wolf, or panther, or crazed murderer). Too much damage for a badger or fox. How a large dog got into the fenced off field - with no footpaths or rights of way - in the first place, where it came from, what its owner was doing, are all deeply mysterious. I think the police have been called by the farmer.
Really unpleasant news. I felt oddly guilty as it was my land they were grazing.
The port was being developed and will be splendid when completed.
We also enjoyed Ljubljana too, on the same cruise.
Italian premier Giorgia Meloni will head to the US to negotiate tariff relief directly with US President Donald Trump, in a move coordinated with the European Union. Meloni will seek to extract tariff concessions from Trump when she travels to Washington as early as next week, @donatopmancini reports
https://x.com/JenniferJJacobs/status/1909626756438380698
Niall Ferguson called this one right: the voters went for Trump because of cost of living and (illegal) immigration. If Trump makes the cost of living significantly worse, then it will not end well for him. (Doubly so, if he deports a lot of fruit and vegetable pickers.)
However: this is the path Trump has gone down. He cannot back down now without being seen as a loser (which has always been his greatest fear).
The path of least resistance is that he'll clutch at almost anything offered to declare victory, just as with the US Mexico Canada Trade Agreement. But it is equally possible that the rest of the world is - as the header suggests - sick of being Trump's whipping boy, and refuses to play his game. In which case, the world is in for a rough few years. With the US having the roughest time of all.
What the last election explicitly shows us is three voting blocks.
Block 1 Lab 33.7% - 412 seats; LibDem 12.2% - 72 seats; Green 6.7% - 4 seats.
Block 2 Conservatives 23.7% - 121 seats.
Block 3 Reform 14.3% - 5 seats.
At the next election my prediction is this will be much the same, or completely different. 😌
We cannot presume blocks 2 and 3 are blurring right now, to helping each other better than they did last July; nor that Labour retains the willing support of LibDem and Green voters from the last election, which helped block 1 game the electoral system so effectively.
But rather than picking over opinion polls, we are so much smarter on PB we should be thinking only in terms of these blocks? Why? Just look at it, being in a block of your own and friendless, 14.3% is just 5 seats, being in a block with friends 33.7% is 412 seats.
I’ll go deeper into this voting block psephology. Where I just used the word “friends” - that’s the wrong way of looking at it. What actually brings people in and out of voting blocks is not choosing what they like, but having first chosen what they don’t want in power.
For example, one Reform voter could agree with the Conservatives 90% of the time, but remaining 10% is hating the Tory record on immigration so much, it makes him a Reform voter. At this stage anyway.
Reform have a big plus and big minus: The plus is that unlike the LDs their natural territory is where traditionally Lab and Con have always come first or second. The minus is that there is most voters hate them.
The LDs have a plus and a minus too. The plus is that few hate them - hating Davey is like hating Harry Worth, who he so closely resembles. The minus is that they are only in contention is a finite number of seats (100 max?) where LD or Tory come top.
So the LDs and Reform are not in serious contention with each other.
I live in normal seat - one where in normal times Tory/Lab come in the top two. If a pollster asked me how I would vote I would say Labour.
So the pollster figure for the LDs is constrained by the fact they are only relevant to a small minority of seats.
But that could shift slowly if Tory/Lab unpopularity continues. Te more hated Lab/Con are, the more the LD answer is the alternative to Reform. But it won't be quick.
However the sight of it nibbling something unwanted pleased Mrs C.
I still think it was most likely a dog, and therefore someone somewhere knows what happened.
I’m surprised they hadn’t renamed the surrounding streets.
Meloni and the EU needs to ignore the US, and to stimulate domestic demand. Continuing to rely on the US's deficit spending is ultimately dumb. (Plus, of course, can you really trust the Trump administration to stick to any deal they sign?)
I would refuse to engage with the US on trade at all, until tariffs are removed.
UK due to driving on the left, but the white lines are a little long, and I don't recognise the bus company. it's quite like the area where Notts shades into Lincs, but could equally be a number of other regions including a hilly bit of East Anglia, near the Northern end of the Pennine Way, or areas around Brum.
The lack of small trees amongst the bits of left over hedge speaks of an area with limited grant farming for a long time.
Maybe aslo a flattish bit of Scotland, though it's short on rain.
Given that Navarro is another Election manipulator jailbirds that Trump has brought in with him, anything is possible.
"China’s top think tank has shut down its public policy research centre amid a new round of ideological reinforcement, with any activities carried out in its name declared 'illegal', with immediate effect."
https://x.com/thomasdggeddes/status/1909621470457721162
However. What if Tarrif War isn’t what it seems? What if they don’t remain long enough to create the Great Trump Slump - just a distant memory in a years time? What if the real aim is bullying each country into a US beneficial trade deal, the bullied country would never have agreed to if not bullied? The administration will then turn attention to restoring incomes - with such a huge tax cut, growth rather than slump seems on the cards, either way.
No pictures of spit roasted horses! 😠
Seems excessive.
Oh and the issue is you cannot have cheap prices and little immigration - it’s the immigration that keeps prices lower than they otherwise would be
Navigator 3 Apr - 7th April so just beginning to cover the tariff and stock market crash.
Approve 44% Disapprove 53% Net -9%
Previous poll three weeks ago
Approve 47% Disapprove 49% Net -2%
He's sinking. It begins.
And it’s working.
Now that the consumer of last resort wants to opt out of the system, it seems like a bad idea for the rest of the West to double down on the policies that have failed.
https://bsky.app/profile/krissychula.bsky.social/post/3lm6fq5ydbk2n
The Con/UKIP score hit 52% in a couple of polls in 2014, and 51% in the 2015 general election.
Go look at the developed world countries that run trade surpluses, by and large, their economies are a hell of a lot more moribund than those who run deficits.
Because that's the great irony: the US has been the West's great economic success story.
Harris lost the election because of high prices under Biden.
Trump won because he promised low prices from "Day 1".
Now, suddenly, it is "cheap goods" meaning low prices that is a problem that needs to be eliminated.
New Thread!
"I want wear Nike, I don't want to make 'em"
Off to the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich today hoping to become an exhibit. Old wooden commentary like mine belongs in a museum, I'm told, and the new Centrist wing looks the ideal place.
Looking into today's YouGov poll, the England sub sample of over 2000 people has Labour and Reform level on 24%, the Conservatives on 23% and the LDs on 18% with the Greens on 9%.
Since last July, Labour are down 10.5, Conservatives down 3, the LDs up 5, Reform up 9 and the Greens up 2 so a swing from Labour to Conservative of 6.75%, a swing from Conservatives to LDs of 4% and a swing from Labour to Reform of 9.75%.
A right kerfuffle as someone once opined...
In the south of England outside London, the Conservatives have 26%, the LDs 25%, Reform 24%, Labour 17% and the Greens 7%.
What does this presage for May 1st?
Thoughtfully we can find the equivalent YouGov poll for 7-8 April 2021 and on that occasion, the south of England outside London returned 48% Conservative, 27% Labour, 10% Green and 7% LD.
For those who enjoy these things, that's a 20% swing from Conservative to LD but only a 6% swing Conservative to Labour.
Huge caveats of course - three in particular, first Reform who are polling strongly everywhere outside London and especially in the Midlands. Second, local elections are NOT general elections and people don't vote the same way. Some Conservative councillors will survive (and will no doubt deserve too given a record of hard work for their locality). Third, you have often strong Independent candidates in local contests who often win despite (or because of) party political candidates standing against them.
The Conservatives are defending majority control of 14 out of 16 County Councils and 7 out of 8 Unitary authorities. There will likely be reductions if for no other reason than Buckinghamshire will reduce from 147 to 97 Councillors - given the Tories already hold 110 seats, even if they won every single seat under the new boundaries (which they won't), there would still be 13 fewer Conservative councillors.