BARTIROMO: How do you justify taking over a country when Denmark & Greenland have said they're not interested?
BESSENT: Maria, the president has a very strong view on Western Hemisphere security & believes US should not outsource our natl security, He believes Greenland is essential for Golden Dome
He's had so much enough that he's said something and done nothing.
A good time then to revisit this issue.
Is this the same Belgium PM that, partly at the behest of the United States, deliberately sabotaged European efforts to finance Ukraine - and therefore help secure a vital European strategic interest - with frozen Russian funds? https://x.com/JimmySecUK/status/2013598177341980847
De Wever is many things but he is not a fucking idiot (he once won a TV show called De slimste mens ter wereld and he would have to be a fucking idiot to do that. The rest of the EU and the UK would be nowhere to been seen if the Russians took it to court leaving Belgique holding the baby that was a product of Cossak rape.
BARTIROMO: How do you justify taking over a country when Denmark & Greenland have said they're not interested?
BESSENT: Maria, the president has a very strong view on Western Hemisphere security & believes US should not outsource our natl security, He believes Greenland is essential for Golden Dome
...and I believe Putin has weaponised "golden showers"...
'Wage growth in the UK eased to 4.5% between September and November, official figures suggest, following a sharp slowdown in private sector pay increases.
The pace of pay growth for those employed by private businesses slowed to the lowest rate in five years, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
In contrast, public sector workers saw their wages jump but, the ONS said, this was likely due to pay rises being awarded earlier than in the previous year.
Meanwhile, the number of people on company payrolls continued to fall - down 135,000 in the three months to November - with a particular decline in shops and hospitality....The ONS data showed a stark contrast between public and private pay growth in the three months to November.
Annual average public sector pay growth was 7.9% compared to 3.6% for the private sector.'
As ever the people who produce are stiffed by those who suck at the public teat. Unlimited cash to give them rises at twice the private sector and of course more of them on higher salaries whilst the private companies don't have a magic money tree and have to balance the books.
Don’t forget the near 30% employer pension contribution too, and the increments and the extra holidays.
But very little in the way of other benefits. No company cars, no health insurance, no salary sacrifice, no (or risible}) bonuses.
It would be nice if someone actually did a proper package analysis, rather than just spouting shit.
DJT likes telegenic people. I am pretty confident the small amount of favour he dispensed toward SKS was because of the hair. KB's fizzog would stop a clock. She wouldn't get a job serving shrimp at Mar-a-Lago.
He has his model from the 1930s, which he is pursuing, when aiui the US economy was in the doldrums (toilet?) years longer than other advanced economies.
'Wage growth in the UK eased to 4.5% between September and November, official figures suggest, following a sharp slowdown in private sector pay increases.
The pace of pay growth for those employed by private businesses slowed to the lowest rate in five years, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
In contrast, public sector workers saw their wages jump but, the ONS said, this was likely due to pay rises being awarded earlier than in the previous year.
Meanwhile, the number of people on company payrolls continued to fall - down 135,000 in the three months to November - with a particular decline in shops and hospitality....The ONS data showed a stark contrast between public and private pay growth in the three months to November.
Annual average public sector pay growth was 7.9% compared to 3.6% for the private sector.'
As ever the people who produce are stiffed by those who suck at the public teat. Unlimited cash to give them rises at twice the private sector and of course more of them on higher salaries whilst the private companies don't have a magic money tree and have to balance the books.
Don’t forget the near 30% employer pension contribution too, and the increments and the extra holidays.
Yes it is incredible and never any productivity improvements for all the wonga flung at them.
DJT likes telegenic people. I am pretty confident the small amount of favour he dispensed toward SKS was because of the hair. KB's fizzog would stop a clock. She wouldn't get a job serving shrimp at Mar-a-Lago.
A friend of mine had a fetish for women, like Kemi, with gaps in their front teeth. 😳
'Wage growth in the UK eased to 4.5% between September and November, official figures suggest, following a sharp slowdown in private sector pay increases.
The pace of pay growth for those employed by private businesses slowed to the lowest rate in five years, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
In contrast, public sector workers saw their wages jump but, the ONS said, this was likely due to pay rises being awarded earlier than in the previous year.
Meanwhile, the number of people on company payrolls continued to fall - down 135,000 in the three months to November - with a particular decline in shops and hospitality....The ONS data showed a stark contrast between public and private pay growth in the three months to November.
Annual average public sector pay growth was 7.9% compared to 3.6% for the private sector.'
As ever the people who produce are stiffed by those who suck at the public teat. Unlimited cash to give them rises at twice the private sector and of course more of them on higher salaries whilst the private companies don't have a magic money tree and have to balance the books.
Don’t forget the near 30% employer pension contribution too, and the increments and the extra holidays.
Yes it is incredible and never any productivity improvements for all the wonga flung at them.
Indeed and when people look at it and just compare to private sector it is always salary to salary. They never consider the other benefits as part of the package.
'Wage growth in the UK eased to 4.5% between September and November, official figures suggest, following a sharp slowdown in private sector pay increases.
The pace of pay growth for those employed by private businesses slowed to the lowest rate in five years, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
In contrast, public sector workers saw their wages jump but, the ONS said, this was likely due to pay rises being awarded earlier than in the previous year.
Meanwhile, the number of people on company payrolls continued to fall - down 135,000 in the three months to November - with a particular decline in shops and hospitality....The ONS data showed a stark contrast between public and private pay growth in the three months to November.
Annual average public sector pay growth was 7.9% compared to 3.6% for the private sector.'
As ever the people who produce are stiffed by those who suck at the public teat. Unlimited cash to give them rises at twice the private sector and of course more of them on higher salaries whilst the private companies don't have a magic money tree and have to balance the books.
Public sector salaries always lag the private sector - this is just a function of the inflation and wage growth of the last few years catching up. See chart 4 here:
You can make a general point about people in the public sector getting paid too much, conditions etc, but the pay increases at the moment aren't a fair reflection of the underlying trend.
Incredible in a country that is skint and borrowing 150 billion, can fling the cash at them and not tie it to productivity/less people as private companies have to do.
'Wage growth in the UK eased to 4.5% between September and November, official figures suggest, following a sharp slowdown in private sector pay increases.
The pace of pay growth for those employed by private businesses slowed to the lowest rate in five years, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
In contrast, public sector workers saw their wages jump but, the ONS said, this was likely due to pay rises being awarded earlier than in the previous year.
Meanwhile, the number of people on company payrolls continued to fall - down 135,000 in the three months to November - with a particular decline in shops and hospitality....The ONS data showed a stark contrast between public and private pay growth in the three months to November.
Annual average public sector pay growth was 7.9% compared to 3.6% for the private sector.'
As ever the people who produce are stiffed by those who suck at the public teat. Unlimited cash to give them rises at twice the private sector and of course more of them on higher salaries whilst the private companies don't have a magic money tree and have to balance the books.
Don’t forget the near 30% employer pension contribution too, and the increments and the extra holidays.
Yes it is incredible and never any productivity improvements for all the wonga flung at them.
So I presume you never received any benefits in kind other than salary.
DJT likes telegenic people. I am pretty confident the small amount of favour he dispensed toward SKS was because of the hair. KB's fizzog would stop a clock. She wouldn't get a job serving shrimp at Mar-a-Lago.
I sense where Kemi resides on the Trump colour chart rather than her beauteousness would be the deciding factor (I have a Terrry Thomas sized gap between my front teeth so may be biased).
He's had so much enough that he's said something and done nothing.
A good time then to revisit this issue.
Is this the same Belgium PM that, partly at the behest of the United States, deliberately sabotaged European efforts to finance Ukraine - and therefore help secure a vital European strategic interest - with frozen Russian funds? https://x.com/JimmySecUK/status/2013598177341980847
Hopefully, an example of the repentant sinner.
There will not be a better time for making the case. It is entirely in Europe's interest to support Ukraine sufficiently to end the war - which is within its capability. And doing so using Russia's money to help finance the effort would be entirely just.
DJT likes telegenic people. I am pretty confident the small amount of favour he dispensed toward SKS was because of the hair. KB's fizzog would stop a clock. She wouldn't get a job serving shrimp at Mar-a-Lago.
A friend of mine had a fetish for women, like Kemi, with gaps in their front teeth. 😳
I think he’d have tolerated her looks for it.
It has long been thought the sign of a "willing woman".
As the world is batshit crazy I was tempted not to bother. But lets do an outlier:
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? -80 (elections suspended in zones under Martial Law) Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? -6 (elections suspended in states where seditious traitors were in charge of trying to rig the election) Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 60 Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 31 UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). 14% Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 17% Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 17 The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Wes Streeting Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? Yes UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £145bn UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.2% Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. - no winner. Tournament collapses into chaos when ICE arrests players from Senegal and shoots the manager on live TV
Interesting but of course Trump cannot suspend elections without state governor and legislature consent and nor can he send in the National Guard without Congressional approval on the grounds of war or emergency
Trump can do anything he wants. State governors will be getting arrested as well. Traitors!
State governors can also call out the State National Guards, as I said Trump cannot call out the Federal National Guard without Congressional approval. State governors also control the state police, so they certainly won't be telling them to arrest themselves, it would need the FBI
At times you do seem to be naive
The evidence is that Trump will do whatever Trump wants
Well he can't, most US police are controlled by state governors, mayors and local sheriffs in the US NOT the President. States also have their own National Guards controlled by state governors and Congress has to approve the President deploying the Federal National Guard.
The FBI is also run by its own director accountable to Congress not just POTUS
Well he can't
Well, yes he can until such time he ceases to be POTUS
Go away and read some facts about the US law enforcement system before posting again please BigG.
The President does NOT control the US police, state governors and mayors and sheriffs do. The President does not even have full control of the FBI and Federal National Guard, Congress also has oversight as does the FBI Director.
The President does control the army but by that point if he sent in the army against half his nation the US would be headed for a second civil war anyway if Congress had not impeached and convicted him and removed him from office first (and Congress could cut off funds for the army too)
Read up on what he is doing in Minnesota. The reality is that unless Congress exercises its oversight powers, which it is not now doing, then there isn't all that much that any but the biggest states can do to prevent, or even control the paramilitary organisation that is ICE.
You talk about the FBI not being under his control - and yet that organisation actively took control of the investigation of a homicide by an ICE agent, prevented state law enforcement from investigating (or even having access to evidence), and has now declared the investigation closed.
And there appears to be no way in federal law to bring a civil action against either the FBI or ICE o compel investigation.
What they have done is a clear civil rights breach (and therefore criminal under existing federal legislation), but there appears to be no avenue by which a case can be brought, without the cooperation of the Dept of Justice.
There is a slight difference between ICE actions taken against a woman they say was trying to run over one of their officials and Trump cancelling midterm elections without the say so of state governors who control their State national guards and state police.
Management of elections is also not an FBI issue
There is no difference. SA squads are marauding not only at will, they have been granted absolute immunity.
The states no longer have control of what goes on inside their borders. Trump is using Minnesota as the testbed, but the principle is very simple - the government has absolute control.
The government has declared various Dem officials to be seditious traitors and maintains that elections are fraudulent. It is perfectly rational to extend this reality to a place where the state officials are arrested and / or prevented by force from holding elections.
I don't predict these elections will be cancelled. They will say "suspended". Hold them in GOP areas, suspend them in areas full of traitors and insurrectionists. You then get a fully pliant congress where all of the dem seats have expired without an election to replace them. Congress then votes Trump to have extraordinary powers in this time of national emergency (the insurgency) and that is that.
What stops this? Trump is ill. But I doubt the regime would be willing to pack up and go to jail if he dies...
Which is rubbish, state governors can still deploy state guards and state police.
Those Democratic governors and state officials of blue states and purple states will certainly go ahead with elections in November, the President has no power to stop them.
It only needs a handful of GOP representatives to also vote with the Democrats to impeach Trump again.
If not then of course Democratic states would start seceding from the Union and you end up with US civil war 2
You're in a desperate state of denial.
Deploy state guards and police. Against the SA. Who have blanket immunity to shoot people dead. Trump invokes the Insurrection Act. Which federalises the MN national guard and removes them from state control.
You can't hold elections in states where federal troops have taken control and arrested the officials who organise elections as terrorists. As he has already declared many of them terrorists why would he allow them to rig the elections against him?
GOP are not going to vote to impeach Trump out of fear as to what will happen to their career and in some cases in fear of what would happen to them and their families. Last time they impeached him nothing happened. We won't even get that far this time.
Hard for states to secede when they are under Martial law.
I know you don't want to accept the evidence of your eyes and ears but it is there.
DJT likes telegenic people. I am pretty confident the small amount of favour he dispensed toward SKS was because of the hair. KB's fizzog would stop a clock. She wouldn't get a job serving shrimp at Mar-a-Lago.
I sense where Kemi resides on the Trump colour chart rather than her beauteousness would be the deciding factor (I have a Terrry Thomas sized gap between my front teeth so may be biased).
'Wage growth in the UK eased to 4.5% between September and November, official figures suggest, following a sharp slowdown in private sector pay increases.
The pace of pay growth for those employed by private businesses slowed to the lowest rate in five years, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
In contrast, public sector workers saw their wages jump but, the ONS said, this was likely due to pay rises being awarded earlier than in the previous year.
Meanwhile, the number of people on company payrolls continued to fall - down 135,000 in the three months to November - with a particular decline in shops and hospitality....The ONS data showed a stark contrast between public and private pay growth in the three months to November.
Annual average public sector pay growth was 7.9% compared to 3.6% for the private sector.'
As ever the people who produce are stiffed by those who suck at the public teat. Unlimited cash to give them rises at twice the private sector and of course more of them on higher salaries whilst the private companies don't have a magic money tree and have to balance the books.
Don’t forget the near 30% employer pension contribution too, and the increments and the extra holidays.
Yes it is incredible and never any productivity improvements for all the wonga flung at them.
So I presume you never received any benefits in kind other than salary.
Well I get shedloads, but the company has had regular culls in the bad times over my 49 years to balance the books and those left have to take up the slack.
As the world is batshit crazy I was tempted not to bother. But lets do an outlier:
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? -80 (elections suspended in zones under Martial Law) Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? -6 (elections suspended in states where seditious traitors were in charge of trying to rig the election) Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 60 Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 31 UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). 14% Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 17% Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 17 The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Wes Streeting Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? Yes UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £145bn UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.2% Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. - no winner. Tournament collapses into chaos when ICE arrests players from Senegal and shoots the manager on live TV
Interesting but of course Trump cannot suspend elections without state governor and legislature consent and nor can he send in the National Guard without Congressional approval on the grounds of war or emergency
Trump can do anything he wants. State governors will be getting arrested as well. Traitors!
State governors can also call out the State National Guards, as I said Trump cannot call out the Federal National Guard without Congressional approval. State governors also control the state police, so they certainly won't be telling them to arrest themselves, it would need the FBI
At times you do seem to be naive
The evidence is that Trump will do whatever Trump wants
Well he can't, most US police are controlled by state governors, mayors and local sheriffs in the US NOT the President. States also have their own National Guards controlled by state governors and Congress has to approve the President deploying the Federal National Guard.
The FBI is also run by its own director accountable to Congress not just POTUS
Well he can't
Well, yes he can until such time he ceases to be POTUS
Go away and read some facts about the US law enforcement system before posting again please BigG.
The President does NOT control the US police, state governors and mayors and sheriffs do. The President does not even have full control of the FBI and Federal National Guard, Congress also has oversight as does the FBI Director.
The President does control the army but by that point if he sent in the army against half his nation the US would be headed for a second civil war anyway if Congress had not impeached and convicted him and removed him from office first (and Congress could cut off funds for the army too)
Read up on what he is doing in Minnesota. The reality is that unless Congress exercises its oversight powers, which it is not now doing, then there isn't all that much that any but the biggest states can do to prevent, or even control the paramilitary organisation that is ICE.
You talk about the FBI not being under his control - and yet that organisation actively took control of the investigation of a homicide by an ICE agent, prevented state law enforcement from investigating (or even having access to evidence), and has now declared the investigation closed.
And there appears to be no way in federal law to bring a civil action against either the FBI or ICE o compel investigation.
What they have done is a clear civil rights breach (and therefore criminal under existing federal legislation), but there appears to be no avenue by which a case can be brought, without the cooperation of the Dept of Justice.
There is a slight difference between ICE actions taken against a woman they say was trying to run over one of their officials and Trump cancelling midterm elections without the say so of state governors who control their State national guards and state police.
Management of elections is also not an FBI issue
There is no difference. SA squads are marauding not only at will, they have been granted absolute immunity.
The states no longer have control of what goes on inside their borders. Trump is using Minnesota as the testbed, but the principle is very simple - the government has absolute control.
The government has declared various Dem officials to be seditious traitors and maintains that elections are fraudulent. It is perfectly rational to extend this reality to a place where the state officials are arrested and / or prevented by force from holding elections.
I don't predict these elections will be cancelled. They will say "suspended". Hold them in GOP areas, suspend them in areas full of traitors and insurrectionists. You then get a fully pliant congress where all of the dem seats have expired without an election to replace them. Congress then votes Trump to have extraordinary powers in this time of national emergency (the insurgency) and that is that.
What stops this? Trump is ill. But I doubt the regime would be willing to pack up and go to jail if he dies...
Which is rubbish, state governors can still deploy state guards and state police.
Those Democratic governors and state officials of blue states and purple states will certainly go ahead with elections in November, the President has no power to stop them.
It only needs a handful of GOP representatives to also vote with the Democrats to impeach Trump again.
If not then of course Democratic states would start seceding from the Union and you end up with US civil war 2
Get your nose out of those US constitutional law books, and go read this:
No direct parallels, but an illustration of how the entire fabric of a democratic state can be captured or cast aside in less than a year, starting from a position without actual majority power. People like you who tried to say “you can’t do that” either got beaten up in their own home, or found themselves in Dachau.
Germany in the 1930s did not give the states as much power as the US does and of course a plurality of Germans did vote for Hitler's Nazis and Hitler was more popular in Germany in the mid 1930s than Trump is in the US now
To make Canada a leader in electric vehicle manufacturing, we’re working to attract significant new joint-venture Chinese investments.
And as our domestic sector builds up, we’ll allow a limited number of EVs from China into the Canadian market — less than 50,000 next year — providing more affordable, energy-efficient options for Canadians. https://x.com/MarkJCarney/status/2013378535486800334
On the World Cup, are we talking about the official World Cup, or the breakaway one?
If the official one, then Argentina defeats the US 3-1 in the final, but as there were only about a dozen countries competing compared to the breakaway one with more than 20 competitors, including almost all of the European teams, Brazil and others.
As the world is batshit crazy I was tempted not to bother. But lets do an outlier:
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? -80 (elections suspended in zones under Martial Law) Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? -6 (elections suspended in states where seditious traitors were in charge of trying to rig the election) Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 60 Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 31 UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). 14% Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 17% Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 17 The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Wes Streeting Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? Yes UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £145bn UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.2% Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. - no winner. Tournament collapses into chaos when ICE arrests players from Senegal and shoots the manager on live TV
Interesting but of course Trump cannot suspend elections without state governor and legislature consent and nor can he send in the National Guard without Congressional approval on the grounds of war or emergency
Trump can do anything he wants. State governors will be getting arrested as well. Traitors!
State governors can also call out the State National Guards, as I said Trump cannot call out the Federal National Guard without Congressional approval. State governors also control the state police, so they certainly won't be telling them to arrest themselves, it would need the FBI
At times you do seem to be naive
The evidence is that Trump will do whatever Trump wants
Well he can't, most US police are controlled by state governors, mayors and local sheriffs in the US NOT the President. States also have their own National Guards controlled by state governors and Congress has to approve the President deploying the Federal National Guard.
The FBI is also run by its own director accountable to Congress not just POTUS
Well he can't
Well, yes he can until such time he ceases to be POTUS
Go away and read some facts about the US law enforcement system before posting again please BigG.
The President does NOT control the US police, state governors and mayors and sheriffs do. The President does not even have full control of the FBI and Federal National Guard, Congress also has oversight as does the FBI Director.
The President does control the army but by that point if he sent in the army against half his nation the US would be headed for a second civil war anyway if Congress had not impeached and convicted him and removed him from office first (and Congress could cut off funds for the army too)
Read up on what he is doing in Minnesota. The reality is that unless Congress exercises its oversight powers, which it is not now doing, then there isn't all that much that any but the biggest states can do to prevent, or even control the paramilitary organisation that is ICE.
You talk about the FBI not being under his control - and yet that organisation actively took control of the investigation of a homicide by an ICE agent, prevented state law enforcement from investigating (or even having access to evidence), and has now declared the investigation closed.
And there appears to be no way in federal law to bring a civil action against either the FBI or ICE o compel investigation.
What they have done is a clear civil rights breach (and therefore criminal under existing federal legislation), but there appears to be no avenue by which a case can be brought, without the cooperation of the Dept of Justice.
There is a slight difference between ICE actions taken against a woman they say was trying to run over one of their officials and Trump cancelling midterm elections without the say so of state governors who control their State national guards and state police.
Management of elections is also not an FBI issue
There is no difference. SA squads are marauding not only at will, they have been granted absolute immunity.
The states no longer have control of what goes on inside their borders. Trump is using Minnesota as the testbed, but the principle is very simple - the government has absolute control.
The government has declared various Dem officials to be seditious traitors and maintains that elections are fraudulent. It is perfectly rational to extend this reality to a place where the state officials are arrested and / or prevented by force from holding elections.
I don't predict these elections will be cancelled. They will say "suspended". Hold them in GOP areas, suspend them in areas full of traitors and insurrectionists. You then get a fully pliant congress where all of the dem seats have expired without an election to replace them. Congress then votes Trump to have extraordinary powers in this time of national emergency (the insurgency) and that is that.
What stops this? Trump is ill. But I doubt the regime would be willing to pack up and go to jail if he dies...
Which is rubbish, state governors can still deploy state guards and state police.
Those Democratic governors and state officials of blue states and purple states will certainly go ahead with elections in November, the President has no power to stop them.
It only needs a handful of GOP representatives to also vote with the Democrats to impeach Trump again.
If not then of course Democratic states would start seceding from the Union and you end up with US civil war 2
You're in a desperate state of denial.
Deploy state guards and police. Against the SA. Who have blanket immunity to shoot people dead. Trump invokes the Insurrection Act. Which federalises the MN national guard and removes them from state control.
You can't hold elections in states where federal troops have taken control and arrested the officials who organise elections as terrorists. As he has already declared many of them terrorists why would he allow them to rig the elections against him?
GOP are not going to vote to impeach Trump out of fear as to what will happen to their career and in some cases in fear of what would happen to them and their families. Last time they impeached him nothing happened. We won't even get that far this time.
Hard for states to secede when they are under Martial law.
I know you don't want to accept the evidence of your eyes and ears but it is there.
You can't stop secession if the overwhelming majority of the state population and the state government wants it short of going to civil war.
State governors can also order state guards and police to shoot SA dead and if necessary to shoot federal troops interfering in elections too. There is no authority under the Insurrection Act for POTUS to take over the State National Guard either and state governors would ignore any attempts by him to do so.
It only takes 5% of GOP representatives to join the Dems in the House and Trump is impeached again
As the world is batshit crazy I was tempted not to bother. But lets do an outlier:
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? -80 (elections suspended in zones under Martial Law) Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? -6 (elections suspended in states where seditious traitors were in charge of trying to rig the election) Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 60 Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 31 UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). 14% Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 17% Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 17 The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Wes Streeting Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? Yes UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £145bn UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.2% Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. - no winner. Tournament collapses into chaos when ICE arrests players from Senegal and shoots the manager on live TV
Interesting but of course Trump cannot suspend elections without state governor and legislature consent and nor can he send in the National Guard without Congressional approval on the grounds of war or emergency
Trump can do anything he wants. State governors will be getting arrested as well. Traitors!
State governors can also call out the State National Guards, as I said Trump cannot call out the Federal National Guard without Congressional approval. State governors also control the state police, so they certainly won't be telling them to arrest themselves, it would need the FBI
At times you do seem to be naive
The evidence is that Trump will do whatever Trump wants
Well he can't, most US police are controlled by state governors, mayors and local sheriffs in the US NOT the President. States also have their own National Guards controlled by state governors and Congress has to approve the President deploying the Federal National Guard.
The FBI is also run by its own director accountable to Congress not just POTUS
Well he can't
Well, yes he can until such time he ceases to be POTUS
Go away and read some facts about the US law enforcement system before posting again please BigG.
The President does NOT control the US police, state governors and mayors and sheriffs do. The President does not even have full control of the FBI and Federal National Guard, Congress also has oversight as does the FBI Director.
The President does control the army but by that point if he sent in the army against half his nation the US would be headed for a second civil war anyway if Congress had not impeached and convicted him and removed him from office first (and Congress could cut off funds for the army too)
Read up on what he is doing in Minnesota. The reality is that unless Congress exercises its oversight powers, which it is not now doing, then there isn't all that much that any but the biggest states can do to prevent, or even control the paramilitary organisation that is ICE.
You talk about the FBI not being under his control - and yet that organisation actively took control of the investigation of a homicide by an ICE agent, prevented state law enforcement from investigating (or even having access to evidence), and has now declared the investigation closed.
And there appears to be no way in federal law to bring a civil action against either the FBI or ICE o compel investigation.
What they have done is a clear civil rights breach (and therefore criminal under existing federal legislation), but there appears to be no avenue by which a case can be brought, without the cooperation of the Dept of Justice.
There is a slight difference between ICE actions taken against a woman they say was trying to run over one of their officials and Trump cancelling midterm elections without the say so of state governors who control their State national guards and state police.
Management of elections is also not an FBI issue
There is no difference. SA squads are marauding not only at will, they have been granted absolute immunity.
The states no longer have control of what goes on inside their borders. Trump is using Minnesota as the testbed, but the principle is very simple - the government has absolute control.
The government has declared various Dem officials to be seditious traitors and maintains that elections are fraudulent. It is perfectly rational to extend this reality to a place where the state officials are arrested and / or prevented by force from holding elections.
I don't predict these elections will be cancelled. They will say "suspended". Hold them in GOP areas, suspend them in areas full of traitors and insurrectionists. You then get a fully pliant congress where all of the dem seats have expired without an election to replace them. Congress then votes Trump to have extraordinary powers in this time of national emergency (the insurgency) and that is that.
What stops this? Trump is ill. But I doubt the regime would be willing to pack up and go to jail if he dies...
Which is rubbish, state governors can still deploy state guards and state police.
Those Democratic governors and state officials of blue states and purple states will certainly go ahead with elections in November, the President has no power to stop them.
It only needs a handful of GOP representatives to also vote with the Democrats to impeach Trump again.
If not then of course Democratic states would start seceding from the Union and you end up with US civil war 2
Get your nose out of those US constitutional law books, and go read this:
No direct parallels, but an illustration of how the entire fabric of a democratic state can be captured or cast aside in less than a year, starting from a position without actual majority power. People like you who tried to say “you can’t do that” either got beaten up in their own home, or found themselves in Dachau.
Germany in the 1930s did not give the states as much power as the US does and of course a plurality of Germans did vote for Hitler's Nazis and Hitler was more popular in Germany in the mid 1930s than Trump is in the US now
None of which points have any bearing on the current situation. The US constitution is filled with far more checks and balances than the Weimar Constitution (which allowed the President to rule by decree), but a supine Congress and SCOTUS have rendered them meaningless.
As the world is batshit crazy I was tempted not to bother. But lets do an outlier:
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? -80 (elections suspended in zones under Martial Law) Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? -6 (elections suspended in states where seditious traitors were in charge of trying to rig the election) Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 60 Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 31 UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). 14% Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 17% Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 17 The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Wes Streeting Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? Yes UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £145bn UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.2% Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. - no winner. Tournament collapses into chaos when ICE arrests players from Senegal and shoots the manager on live TV
Interesting but of course Trump cannot suspend elections without state governor and legislature consent and nor can he send in the National Guard without Congressional approval on the grounds of war or emergency
Trump can do anything he wants. State governors will be getting arrested as well. Traitors!
State governors can also call out the State National Guards, as I said Trump cannot call out the Federal National Guard without Congressional approval. State governors also control the state police, so they certainly won't be telling them to arrest themselves, it would need the FBI
At times you do seem to be naive
The evidence is that Trump will do whatever Trump wants
Well he can't, most US police are controlled by state governors, mayors and local sheriffs in the US NOT the President. States also have their own National Guards controlled by state governors and Congress has to approve the President deploying the Federal National Guard.
The FBI is also run by its own director accountable to Congress not just POTUS
Well he can't
Well, yes he can until such time he ceases to be POTUS
Go away and read some facts about the US law enforcement system before posting again please BigG.
The President does NOT control the US police, state governors and mayors and sheriffs do. The President does not even have full control of the FBI and Federal National Guard, Congress also has oversight as does the FBI Director.
The President does control the army but by that point if he sent in the army against half his nation the US would be headed for a second civil war anyway if Congress had not impeached and convicted him and removed him from office first (and Congress could cut off funds for the army too)
Read up on what he is doing in Minnesota. The reality is that unless Congress exercises its oversight powers, which it is not now doing, then there isn't all that much that any but the biggest states can do to prevent, or even control the paramilitary organisation that is ICE.
You talk about the FBI not being under his control - and yet that organisation actively took control of the investigation of a homicide by an ICE agent, prevented state law enforcement from investigating (or even having access to evidence), and has now declared the investigation closed.
And there appears to be no way in federal law to bring a civil action against either the FBI or ICE o compel investigation.
What they have done is a clear civil rights breach (and therefore criminal under existing federal legislation), but there appears to be no avenue by which a case can be brought, without the cooperation of the Dept of Justice.
There is a slight difference between ICE actions taken against a woman they say was trying to run over one of their officials and Trump cancelling midterm elections without the say so of state governors who control their State national guards and state police.
Management of elections is also not an FBI issue
There is no difference. SA squads are marauding not only at will, they have been granted absolute immunity.
The states no longer have control of what goes on inside their borders. Trump is using Minnesota as the testbed, but the principle is very simple - the government has absolute control.
The government has declared various Dem officials to be seditious traitors and maintains that elections are fraudulent. It is perfectly rational to extend this reality to a place where the state officials are arrested and / or prevented by force from holding elections.
I don't predict these elections will be cancelled. They will say "suspended". Hold them in GOP areas, suspend them in areas full of traitors and insurrectionists. You then get a fully pliant congress where all of the dem seats have expired without an election to replace them. Congress then votes Trump to have extraordinary powers in this time of national emergency (the insurgency) and that is that.
What stops this? Trump is ill. But I doubt the regime would be willing to pack up and go to jail if he dies...
Which is rubbish, state governors can still deploy state guards and state police.
Those Democratic governors and state officials of blue states and purple states will certainly go ahead with elections in November, the President has no power to stop them.
It only needs a handful of GOP representatives to also vote with the Democrats to impeach Trump again.
If not then of course Democratic states would start seceding from the Union and you end up with US civil war 2
Get your nose out of those US constitutional law books, and go read this:
No direct parallels, but an illustration of how the entire fabric of a democratic state can be captured or cast aside in less than a year, starting from a position without actual majority power. People like you who tried to say “you can’t do that” either got beaten up in their own home, or found themselves in Dachau.
Germany in the 1930s did not give the states as much power as the US does and of course a plurality of Germans did vote for Hitler's Nazis and Hitler was more popular in Germany in the mid 1930s than Trump is in the US now
German States had quite a lot of power. One small one (Brunswick) was responsible for awarding Hitler German citizenship, a power that is firmly Federal in the US system. And a large part of Hitler taking power was gaining the levers of the Prussian police, Goering was made Prussian interior minister and the Gestapo was originally a Prussian police agency.
As the world is batshit crazy I was tempted not to bother. But lets do an outlier:
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? -80 (elections suspended in zones under Martial Law) Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? -6 (elections suspended in states where seditious traitors were in charge of trying to rig the election) Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 60 Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 31 UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). 14% Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 17% Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 17 The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Wes Streeting Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? Yes UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £145bn UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.2% Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. - no winner. Tournament collapses into chaos when ICE arrests players from Senegal and shoots the manager on live TV
Interesting but of course Trump cannot suspend elections without state governor and legislature consent and nor can he send in the National Guard without Congressional approval on the grounds of war or emergency
Trump can do anything he wants. State governors will be getting arrested as well. Traitors!
State governors can also call out the State National Guards, as I said Trump cannot call out the Federal National Guard without Congressional approval. State governors also control the state police, so they certainly won't be telling them to arrest themselves, it would need the FBI
At times you do seem to be naive
The evidence is that Trump will do whatever Trump wants
Well he can't, most US police are controlled by state governors, mayors and local sheriffs in the US NOT the President. States also have their own National Guards controlled by state governors and Congress has to approve the President deploying the Federal National Guard.
The FBI is also run by its own director accountable to Congress not just POTUS
Well he can't
Well, yes he can until such time he ceases to be POTUS
Go away and read some facts about the US law enforcement system before posting again please BigG.
The President does NOT control the US police, state governors and mayors and sheriffs do. The President does not even have full control of the FBI and Federal National Guard, Congress also has oversight as does the FBI Director.
The President does control the army but by that point if he sent in the army against half his nation the US would be headed for a second civil war anyway if Congress had not impeached and convicted him and removed him from office first (and Congress could cut off funds for the army too)
Read up on what he is doing in Minnesota. The reality is that unless Congress exercises its oversight powers, which it is not now doing, then there isn't all that much that any but the biggest states can do to prevent, or even control the paramilitary organisation that is ICE.
You talk about the FBI not being under his control - and yet that organisation actively took control of the investigation of a homicide by an ICE agent, prevented state law enforcement from investigating (or even having access to evidence), and has now declared the investigation closed.
And there appears to be no way in federal law to bring a civil action against either the FBI or ICE o compel investigation.
What they have done is a clear civil rights breach (and therefore criminal under existing federal legislation), but there appears to be no avenue by which a case can be brought, without the cooperation of the Dept of Justice.
There is a slight difference between ICE actions taken against a woman they say was trying to run over one of their officials and Trump cancelling midterm elections without the say so of state governors who control their State national guards and state police.
Management of elections is also not an FBI issue
There is no difference. SA squads are marauding not only at will, they have been granted absolute immunity.
The states no longer have control of what goes on inside their borders. Trump is using Minnesota as the testbed, but the principle is very simple - the government has absolute control.
The government has declared various Dem officials to be seditious traitors and maintains that elections are fraudulent. It is perfectly rational to extend this reality to a place where the state officials are arrested and / or prevented by force from holding elections.
I don't predict these elections will be cancelled. They will say "suspended". Hold them in GOP areas, suspend them in areas full of traitors and insurrectionists. You then get a fully pliant congress where all of the dem seats have expired without an election to replace them. Congress then votes Trump to have extraordinary powers in this time of national emergency (the insurgency) and that is that.
What stops this? Trump is ill. But I doubt the regime would be willing to pack up and go to jail if he dies...
Which is rubbish, state governors can still deploy state guards and state police.
Those Democratic governors and state officials of blue states and purple states will certainly go ahead with elections in November, the President has no power to stop them.
It only needs a handful of GOP representatives to also vote with the Democrats to impeach Trump again.
If not then of course Democratic states would start seceding from the Union and you end up with US civil war 2
You're in a desperate state of denial.
Deploy state guards and police. Against the SA. Who have blanket immunity to shoot people dead. Trump invokes the Insurrection Act. Which federalises the MN national guard and removes them from state control.
You can't hold elections in states where federal troops have taken control and arrested the officials who organise elections as terrorists. As he has already declared many of them terrorists why would he allow them to rig the elections against him?
GOP are not going to vote to impeach Trump out of fear as to what will happen to their career and in some cases in fear of what would happen to them and their families. Last time they impeached him nothing happened. We won't even get that far this time.
Hard for states to secede when they are under Martial law.
I know you don't want to accept the evidence of your eyes and ears but it is there.
While that's true: it's usually at the point that the military are ordered to fire on unarmed protestors that you see refusal to follow orders.
On the World Cup, are we talking about the official World Cup, or the breakaway one?
If the official one, then Argentina defeats the US 3-1 in the final, but as there were only about a dozen countries competing compared to the breakaway one with more than 20 competitors, including almost all of the European teams, Brazil and others.
The question specifies the "FIFA" World Cup, so that would be the Trump-Infantino one.
'Wage growth in the UK eased to 4.5% between September and November, official figures suggest, following a sharp slowdown in private sector pay increases.
The pace of pay growth for those employed by private businesses slowed to the lowest rate in five years, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
In contrast, public sector workers saw their wages jump but, the ONS said, this was likely due to pay rises being awarded earlier than in the previous year.
Meanwhile, the number of people on company payrolls continued to fall - down 135,000 in the three months to November - with a particular decline in shops and hospitality....The ONS data showed a stark contrast between public and private pay growth in the three months to November. until Annual average public sector pay growth was 7.9% compared to 3.6% for the private sector.'
As ever the people who produce are stiffed by those who suck at the public teat. Unlimited cash to give them rises at twice the private sector and of course more of them on higher salaries whilst the private companies don't have a magic money tree and have to balance the books.
Public sector salaries always lag the private sector - this is just a function of the inflation and wage growth of the last few years catching up. See chart 4 here:
You can make a general point about people in the public sector getting paid too much, conditions etc, but the pay increases at the moment aren't a fair reflection of the underlying trend.
Not really, on that chart public sector salary rises were ahead of or tied with private sector rises from 2005 to 2010 when Labour were in power, Private sector rises then tied public sector rises under the Coalition, then after the Tories won a majority in 2015 private sector salaries increased by more than public sector rises. Then since 2024 public sector payrises have started to increase by more than private sector rises now Labour are back in power
On the World Cup, are we talking about the official World Cup, or the breakaway one?
If the official one, then Argentina defeats the US 3-1 in the final, but as there were only about a dozen countries competing compared to the breakaway one with more than 20 competitors, including almost all of the European teams, Brazil and others.
The question specifies the "FIFA" World Cup, so that would be the Trump-Infantino one.
Does ending up with the trophy count as winning it......
As the world is batshit crazy I was tempted not to bother. But lets do an outlier:
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? -80 (elections suspended in zones under Martial Law) Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? -6 (elections suspended in states where seditious traitors were in charge of trying to rig the election) Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 60 Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 31 UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). 14% Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 17% Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 17 The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Wes Streeting Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? Yes UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £145bn UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.2% Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. - no winner. Tournament collapses into chaos when ICE arrests players from Senegal and shoots the manager on live TV
Interesting but of course Trump cannot suspend elections without state governor and legislature consent and nor can he send in the National Guard without Congressional approval on the grounds of war or emergency
Trump can do anything he wants. State governors will be getting arrested as well. Traitors!
State governors can also call out the State National Guards, as I said Trump cannot call out the Federal National Guard without Congressional approval. State governors also control the state police, so they certainly won't be telling them to arrest themselves, it would need the FBI
At times you do seem to be naive
The evidence is that Trump will do whatever Trump wants
Well he can't, most US police are controlled by state governors, mayors and local sheriffs in the US NOT the President. States also have their own National Guards controlled by state governors and Congress has to approve the President deploying the Federal National Guard.
The FBI is also run by its own director accountable to Congress not just POTUS
Well he can't
Well, yes he can until such time he ceases to be POTUS
Go away and read some facts about the US law enforcement system before posting again please BigG.
The President does NOT control the US police, state governors and mayors and sheriffs do. The President does not even have full control of the FBI and Federal National Guard, Congress also has oversight as does the FBI Director.
The President does control the army but by that point if he sent in the army against half his nation the US would be headed for a second civil war anyway if Congress had not impeached and convicted him and removed him from office first (and Congress could cut off funds for the army too)
Read up on what he is doing in Minnesota. The reality is that unless Congress exercises its oversight powers, which it is not now doing, then there isn't all that much that any but the biggest states can do to prevent, or even control the paramilitary organisation that is ICE.
You talk about the FBI not being under his control - and yet that organisation actively took control of the investigation of a homicide by an ICE agent, prevented state law enforcement from investigating (or even having access to evidence), and has now declared the investigation closed.
And there appears to be no way in federal law to bring a civil action against either the FBI or ICE o compel investigation.
What they have done is a clear civil rights breach (and therefore criminal under existing federal legislation), but there appears to be no avenue by which a case can be brought, without the cooperation of the Dept of Justice.
There is a slight difference between ICE actions taken against a woman they say was trying to run over one of their officials and Trump cancelling midterm elections without the say so of state governors who control their State national guards and state police.
Management of elections is also not an FBI issue
There is no difference. SA squads are marauding not only at will, they have been granted absolute immunity.
The states no longer have control of what goes on inside their borders. Trump is using Minnesota as the testbed, but the principle is very simple - the government has absolute control.
The government has declared various Dem officials to be seditious traitors and maintains that elections are fraudulent. It is perfectly rational to extend this reality to a place where the state officials are arrested and / or prevented by force from holding elections.
I don't predict these elections will be cancelled. They will say "suspended". Hold them in GOP areas, suspend them in areas full of traitors and insurrectionists. You then get a fully pliant congress where all of the dem seats have expired without an election to replace them. Congress then votes Trump to have extraordinary powers in this time of national emergency (the insurgency) and that is that.
What stops this? Trump is ill. But I doubt the regime would be willing to pack up and go to jail if he dies...
Which is rubbish, state governors can still deploy state guards and state police.
Those Democratic governors and state officials of blue states and purple states will certainly go ahead with elections in November, the President has no power to stop them.
It only needs a handful of GOP representatives to also vote with the Democrats to impeach Trump again.
If not then of course Democratic states would start seceding from the Union and you end up with US civil war 2
Get your nose out of those US constitutional law books, and go read this:
No direct parallels, but an illustration of how the entire fabric of a democratic state can be captured or cast aside in less than a year, starting from a position without actual majority power. People like you who tried to say “you can’t do that” either got beaten up in their own home, or found themselves in Dachau.
Germany in the 1930s did not give the states as much power as the US does and of course a plurality of Germans did vote for Hitler's Nazis and Hitler was more popular in Germany in the mid 1930s than Trump is in the US now
German States had quite a lot of power. One small one (Brunswick) was responsible for awarding Hitler German citizenship, a power that is firmly Federal in the US system. And a large part of Hitler taking power was gaining the levers of the Prussian police, Goering was made Prussian interior minister and the Gestapo was originally a Prussian police agency.
Prussia was also firmly behind Hitler in the 1930s, California, New York etc are not firmly behind Trump
On the World Cup, are we talking about the official World Cup, or the breakaway one?
If the official one, then Argentina defeats the US 3-1 in the final, but as there were only about a dozen countries competing compared to the breakaway one with more than 20 competitors, including almost all of the European teams, Brazil and others.
The question specifies the "FIFA" World Cup, so that would be the Trump-Infantino one.
Does ending up with the trophy count as winning it......
You think FIFA will award Trump a special World Cup participation trophy ?
@JakeSherman House Republican leaders have for months turned off the ability for members of the chamber to bring legislation to the floor to oppose Trump's tariffs. That ban expires next week. GOP leaders have to decide whether to tuck that language into a rule today.
He's had so much enough that he's said something and done nothing.
A good time then to revisit this issue.
Is this the same Belgium PM that, partly at the behest of the United States, deliberately sabotaged European efforts to finance Ukraine - and therefore help secure a vital European strategic interest - with frozen Russian funds? https://x.com/JimmySecUK/status/2013598177341980847
De Wever is many things but he is not a fucking idiot (he once won a TV show called De slimste mens ter wereld and he would have to be a fucking idiot to do that. The rest of the EU and the UK would be nowhere to been seen if the Russians took it to court leaving Belgique holding the baby that was a product of Cossak rape.
And which court would this be, and how would it have jurisdiction over assets held in Belgium?
It is certainly true that court cases in the US (or wherever) could make Euroclear's business untenable in the future. But none of that would get Russia's money back.
On the World Cup, are we talking about the official World Cup, or the breakaway one?
If the official one, then Argentina defeats the US 3-1 in the final, but as there were only about a dozen countries competing compared to the breakaway one with more than 20 competitors, including almost all of the European teams, Brazil and others.
The World Cup being held in America this year is utterly absurd. Fans aren't safe, the teams aren't safe. "But it's the World Cup, it must go ahead" I hear some people say.
Yeah. I remember watching the build up to the 2020 Australian Grand Prix. Must go ahead, everyone is here, its a sell-out. Gone in a few hours...
He's had so much enough that he's said something and done nothing.
A good time then to revisit this issue.
Is this the same Belgium PM that, partly at the behest of the United States, deliberately sabotaged European efforts to finance Ukraine - and therefore help secure a vital European strategic interest - with frozen Russian funds? https://x.com/JimmySecUK/status/2013598177341980847
De Wever is many things but he is not a fucking idiot (he once won a TV show called De slimste mens ter wereld and he would have to be a fucking idiot to do that. The rest of the EU and the UK would be nowhere to been seen if the Russians took it to court leaving Belgique holding the baby that was a product of Cossak rape.
And which court would this be, and how would it have jurisdiction over assets held in Belgium?
It is certainly true that court cases in the US (or wherever) could make Euroclear's business untenable in the future. But none of that would get Russia's money back.
I think the thing that finally killed the idea of seizing Russia's assets was the fear that it would set a precedent for European assets to be seized elsewhere around the world on all manner of pretexts - colonial reparations, perhaps, or trade disputes. It wasn't just Belgium in the end who killed the idea - France and Italy also pulled their support.
Would this be the same Ray Dalio who donated $75m to fund Trump Accounts?
It's a little late, Mr Dalio.
To be fair, who could possibly have seen it coming that giving the most important job in the world to a vengeful, dim witted, over grown toddler might not be optimal for the stock market. It is just one of those unavoidable black swans.
He's had so much enough that he's said something and done nothing.
A good time then to revisit this issue.
Is this the same Belgium PM that, partly at the behest of the United States, deliberately sabotaged European efforts to finance Ukraine - and therefore help secure a vital European strategic interest - with frozen Russian funds? https://x.com/JimmySecUK/status/2013598177341980847
De Wever is many things but he is not a fucking idiot (he once won a TV show called De slimste mens ter wereld and he would have to be a fucking idiot to do that. The rest of the EU and the UK would be nowhere to been seen if the Russians took it to court leaving Belgique holding the baby that was a product of Cossak rape.
That's why it needs revisiting. A European deal can be worked out, with sufficient motivation; Trump just provided that.
As the world is batshit crazy I was tempted not to bother. But lets do an outlier:
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? -80 (elections suspended in zones under Martial Law) Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? -6 (elections suspended in states where seditious traitors were in charge of trying to rig the election) Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 60 Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 31 UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). 14% Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 17% Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 17 The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Wes Streeting Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? Yes UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £145bn UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.2% Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. - no winner. Tournament collapses into chaos when ICE arrests players from Senegal and shoots the manager on live TV
Interesting but of course Trump cannot suspend elections without state governor and legislature consent and nor can he send in the National Guard without Congressional approval on the grounds of war or emergency
Trump can do anything he wants. State governors will be getting arrested as well. Traitors!
State governors can also call out the State National Guards, as I said Trump cannot call out the Federal National Guard without Congressional approval. State governors also control the state police, so they certainly won't be telling them to arrest themselves, it would need the FBI
At times you do seem to be naive
The evidence is that Trump will do whatever Trump wants
Well he can't, most US police are controlled by state governors, mayors and local sheriffs in the US NOT the President. States also have their own National Guards controlled by state governors and Congress has to approve the President deploying the Federal National Guard.
The FBI is also run by its own director accountable to Congress not just POTUS
Well he can't
Well, yes he can until such time he ceases to be POTUS
Go away and read some facts about the US law enforcement system before posting again please BigG.
The President does NOT control the US police, state governors and mayors and sheriffs do. The President does not even have full control of the FBI and Federal National Guard, Congress also has oversight as does the FBI Director.
The President does control the army but by that point if he sent in the army against half his nation the US would be headed for a second civil war anyway if Congress had not impeached and convicted him and removed him from office first (and Congress could cut off funds for the army too)
Read up on what he is doing in Minnesota. The reality is that unless Congress exercises its oversight powers, which it is not now doing, then there isn't all that much that any but the biggest states can do to prevent, or even control the paramilitary organisation that is ICE.
You talk about the FBI not being under his control - and yet that organisation actively took control of the investigation of a homicide by an ICE agent, prevented state law enforcement from investigating (or even having access to evidence), and has now declared the investigation closed.
And there appears to be no way in federal law to bring a civil action against either the FBI or ICE o compel investigation.
What they have done is a clear civil rights breach (and therefore criminal under existing federal legislation), but there appears to be no avenue by which a case can be brought, without the cooperation of the Dept of Justice.
There is a slight difference between ICE actions taken against a woman they say was trying to run over one of their officials and Trump cancelling midterm elections without the say so of state governors who control their State national guards and state police.
Management of elections is also not an FBI issue
There is no difference. SA squads are marauding not only at will, they have been granted absolute immunity.
The states no longer have control of what goes on inside their borders. Trump is using Minnesota as the testbed, but the principle is very simple - the government has absolute control.
The government has declared various Dem officials to be seditious traitors and maintains that elections are fraudulent. It is perfectly rational to extend this reality to a place where the state officials are arrested and / or prevented by force from holding elections.
I don't predict these elections will be cancelled. They will say "suspended". Hold them in GOP areas, suspend them in areas full of traitors and insurrectionists. You then get a fully pliant congress where all of the dem seats have expired without an election to replace them. Congress then votes Trump to have extraordinary powers in this time of national emergency (the insurgency) and that is that.
What stops this? Trump is ill. But I doubt the regime would be willing to pack up and go to jail if he dies...
Which is rubbish, state governors can still deploy state guards and state police.
Those Democratic governors and state officials of blue states and purple states will certainly go ahead with elections in November, the President has no power to stop them.
It only needs a handful of GOP representatives to also vote with the Democrats to impeach Trump again.
If not then of course Democratic states would start seceding from the Union and you end up with US civil war 2
Get your nose out of those US constitutional law books, and go read this:
No direct parallels, but an illustration of how the entire fabric of a democratic state can be captured or cast aside in less than a year, starting from a position without actual majority power. People like you who tried to say “you can’t do that” either got beaten up in their own home, or found themselves in Dachau.
Germany in the 1930s did not give the states as much power as the US does and of course a plurality of Germans did vote for Hitler's Nazis and Hitler was more popular in Germany in the mid 1930s than Trump is in the US now
Do yourself a favour, go read the book, then come back, and try again
He's had so much enough that he's said something and done nothing.
A good time then to revisit this issue.
Is this the same Belgium PM that, partly at the behest of the United States, deliberately sabotaged European efforts to finance Ukraine - and therefore help secure a vital European strategic interest - with frozen Russian funds? https://x.com/JimmySecUK/status/2013598177341980847
De Wever is many things but he is not a fucking idiot (he once won a TV show called De slimste mens ter wereld and he would have to be a fucking idiot to do that. The rest of the EU and the UK would be nowhere to been seen if the Russians took it to court leaving Belgique holding the baby that was a product of Cossak rape.
And which court would this be, and how would it have jurisdiction over assets held in Belgium?
It is certainly true that court cases in the US (or wherever) could make Euroclear's business untenable in the future. But none of that would get Russia's money back.
I think the thing that finally killed the idea of seizing Russia's assets was the fear that it would set a precedent for European assets to be seized elsewhere around the world on all manner of pretexts - colonial reparations, perhaps, or trade disputes. It wasn't just Belgium in the end who killed the idea - France and Italy also pulled their support.
Today’s going well for Labours foreign policy - Trump and Chagos, Greenland and now the Chinese super embassy.
Somehow managed to be pissing off everyone at the moment.
He could turn triumph into disaster and unite left and right in Britain if he cancels the Chagos deal and then terminates the US military lease and kicks them out.
Then invite back the Chagossians, all expenses paid, and turn the area into a UK-owned luxury tourist destination.
As the world is batshit crazy I was tempted not to bother. But lets do an outlier:
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? -80 (elections suspended in zones under Martial Law) Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? -6 (elections suspended in states where seditious traitors were in charge of trying to rig the election) Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 60 Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 31 UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). 14% Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 17% Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 17 The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Wes Streeting Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? Yes UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £145bn UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.2% Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. - no winner. Tournament collapses into chaos when ICE arrests players from Senegal and shoots the manager on live TV
Interesting but of course Trump cannot suspend elections without state governor and legislature consent and nor can he send in the National Guard without Congressional approval on the grounds of war or emergency
Trump can do anything he wants. State governors will be getting arrested as well. Traitors!
State governors can also call out the State National Guards, as I said Trump cannot call out the Federal National Guard without Congressional approval. State governors also control the state police, so they certainly won't be telling them to arrest themselves, it would need the FBI
At times you do seem to be naive
The evidence is that Trump will do whatever Trump wants
Well he can't, most US police are controlled by state governors, mayors and local sheriffs in the US NOT the President. States also have their own National Guards controlled by state governors and Congress has to approve the President deploying the Federal National Guard.
The FBI is also run by its own director accountable to Congress not just POTUS
Well he can't
Well, yes he can until such time he ceases to be POTUS
Go away and read some facts about the US law enforcement system before posting again please BigG.
The President does NOT control the US police, state governors and mayors and sheriffs do. The President does not even have full control of the FBI and Federal National Guard, Congress also has oversight as does the FBI Director.
The President does control the army but by that point if he sent in the army against half his nation the US would be headed for a second civil war anyway if Congress had not impeached and convicted him and removed him from office first (and Congress could cut off funds for the army too)
Read up on what he is doing in Minnesota. The reality is that unless Congress exercises its oversight powers, which it is not now doing, then there isn't all that much that any but the biggest states can do to prevent, or even control the paramilitary organisation that is ICE.
You talk about the FBI not being under his control - and yet that organisation actively took control of the investigation of a homicide by an ICE agent, prevented state law enforcement from investigating (or even having access to evidence), and has now declared the investigation closed.
And there appears to be no way in federal law to bring a civil action against either the FBI or ICE o compel investigation.
What they have done is a clear civil rights breach (and therefore criminal under existing federal legislation), but there appears to be no avenue by which a case can be brought, without the cooperation of the Dept of Justice.
There is a slight difference between ICE actions taken against a woman they say was trying to run over one of their officials and Trump cancelling midterm elections without the say so of state governors who control their State national guards and state police.
Management of elections is also not an FBI issue
There is no difference. SA squads are marauding not only at will, they have been granted absolute immunity.
The states no longer have control of what goes on inside their borders. Trump is using Minnesota as the testbed, but the principle is very simple - the government has absolute control.
The government has declared various Dem officials to be seditious traitors and maintains that elections are fraudulent. It is perfectly rational to extend this reality to a place where the state officials are arrested and / or prevented by force from holding elections.
I don't predict these elections will be cancelled. They will say "suspended". Hold them in GOP areas, suspend them in areas full of traitors and insurrectionists. You then get a fully pliant congress where all of the dem seats have expired without an election to replace them. Congress then votes Trump to have extraordinary powers in this time of national emergency (the insurgency) and that is that.
What stops this? Trump is ill. But I doubt the regime would be willing to pack up and go to jail if he dies...
Which is rubbish, state governors can still deploy state guards and state police.
Those Democratic governors and state officials of blue states and purple states will certainly go ahead with elections in November, the President has no power to stop them.
It only needs a handful of GOP representatives to also vote with the Democrats to impeach Trump again.
If not then of course Democratic states would start seceding from the Union and you end up with US civil war 2
Get your nose out of those US constitutional law books, and go read this:
No direct parallels, but an illustration of how the entire fabric of a democratic state can be captured or cast aside in less than a year, starting from a position without actual majority power. People like you who tried to say “you can’t do that” either got beaten up in their own home, or found themselves in Dachau.
Germany in the 1930s did not give the states as much power as the US does and of course a plurality of Germans did vote for Hitler's Nazis and Hitler was more popular in Germany in the mid 1930s than Trump is in the US now
German States had quite a lot of power. One small one (Brunswick) was responsible for awarding Hitler German citizenship, a power that is firmly Federal in the US system. And a large part of Hitler taking power was gaining the levers of the Prussian police, Goering was made Prussian interior minister and the Gestapo was originally a Prussian police agency.
Prussia was also firmly behind Hitler in the 1930s, California, New York etc are not firmly behind Trump
Prussia was about 2/3 of Germany and not particularly pro-Hitler, it ran from the the Rhineland to Silesia, and Schleswig to Hohenzollern
Some of the smaller states were quite Nazi though, and Bavaria was always a bit nationalist
Closely watched over there as US mortgages are linked to that tenor point, rather than short-dated rates as is the case here.
The best outcome would be if that turns into a more sustained sell-off that forces Trump to reconsider alienating the entire world outside of Argentina.
As the world is batshit crazy I was tempted not to bother. But lets do an outlier:
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? -80 (elections suspended in zones under Martial Law) Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? -6 (elections suspended in states where seditious traitors were in charge of trying to rig the election) Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 60 Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 31 UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). 14% Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 17% Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 17 The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Wes Streeting Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? Yes UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £145bn UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.2% Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. - no winner. Tournament collapses into chaos when ICE arrests players from Senegal and shoots the manager on live TV
Interesting but of course Trump cannot suspend elections without state governor and legislature consent and nor can he send in the National Guard without Congressional approval on the grounds of war or emergency
Trump can do anything he wants. State governors will be getting arrested as well. Traitors!
State governors can also call out the State National Guards, as I said Trump cannot call out the Federal National Guard without Congressional approval. State governors also control the state police, so they certainly won't be telling them to arrest themselves, it would need the FBI
At times you do seem to be naive
The evidence is that Trump will do whatever Trump wants
Well he can't, most US police are controlled by state governors, mayors and local sheriffs in the US NOT the President. States also have their own National Guards controlled by state governors and Congress has to approve the President deploying the Federal National Guard.
The FBI is also run by its own director accountable to Congress not just POTUS
Well he can't
Well, yes he can until such time he ceases to be POTUS
Go away and read some facts about the US law enforcement system before posting again please BigG.
The President does NOT control the US police, state governors and mayors and sheriffs do. The President does not even have full control of the FBI and Federal National Guard, Congress also has oversight as does the FBI Director.
The President does control the army but by that point if he sent in the army against half his nation the US would be headed for a second civil war anyway if Congress had not impeached and convicted him and removed him from office first (and Congress could cut off funds for the army too)
Read up on what he is doing in Minnesota. The reality is that unless Congress exercises its oversight powers, which it is not now doing, then there isn't all that much that any but the biggest states can do to prevent, or even control the paramilitary organisation that is ICE.
You talk about the FBI not being under his control - and yet that organisation actively took control of the investigation of a homicide by an ICE agent, prevented state law enforcement from investigating (or even having access to evidence), and has now declared the investigation closed.
And there appears to be no way in federal law to bring a civil action against either the FBI or ICE o compel investigation.
What they have done is a clear civil rights breach (and therefore criminal under existing federal legislation), but there appears to be no avenue by which a case can be brought, without the cooperation of the Dept of Justice.
There is a slight difference between ICE actions taken against a woman they say was trying to run over one of their officials and Trump cancelling midterm elections without the say so of state governors who control their State national guards and state police.
Management of elections is also not an FBI issue
There is no difference. SA squads are marauding not only at will, they have been granted absolute immunity.
The states no longer have control of what goes on inside their borders. Trump is using Minnesota as the testbed, but the principle is very simple - the government has absolute control.
The government has declared various Dem officials to be seditious traitors and maintains that elections are fraudulent. It is perfectly rational to extend this reality to a place where the state officials are arrested and / or prevented by force from holding elections.
I don't predict these elections will be cancelled. They will say "suspended". Hold them in GOP areas, suspend them in areas full of traitors and insurrectionists. You then get a fully pliant congress where all of the dem seats have expired without an election to replace them. Congress then votes Trump to have extraordinary powers in this time of national emergency (the insurgency) and that is that.
What stops this? Trump is ill. But I doubt the regime would be willing to pack up and go to jail if he dies...
Which is rubbish, state governors can still deploy state guards and state police.
Those Democratic governors and state officials of blue states and purple states will certainly go ahead with elections in November, the President has no power to stop them.
It only needs a handful of GOP representatives to also vote with the Democrats to impeach Trump again.
If not then of course Democratic states would start seceding from the Union and you end up with US civil war 2
Get your nose out of those US constitutional law books, and go read this:
No direct parallels, but an illustration of how the entire fabric of a democratic state can be captured or cast aside in less than a year, starting from a position without actual majority power. People like you who tried to say “you can’t do that” either got beaten up in their own home, or found themselves in Dachau.
Germany in the 1930s did not give the states as much power as the US does and of course a plurality of Germans did vote for Hitler's Nazis and Hitler was more popular in Germany in the mid 1930s than Trump is in the US now
German States had quite a lot of power. One small one (Brunswick) was responsible for awarding Hitler German citizenship, a power that is firmly Federal in the US system. And a large part of Hitler taking power was gaining the levers of the Prussian police, Goering was made Prussian interior minister and the Gestapo was originally a Prussian police agency.
Prussia was also firmly behind Hitler in the 1930s, California, New York etc are not firmly behind Trump
Trump had a SPD-Zentrum coaliton, from 1919-33. And, that government was overturned by Goering, within months.
@JakeSherman House Republican leaders have for months turned off the ability for members of the chamber to bring legislation to the floor to oppose Trump's tariffs. That ban expires next week. GOP leaders have to decide whether to tuck that language into a rule today.
While Speaker Johnson is the other side of the Atlantic? Hmmm....
As the world is batshit crazy I was tempted not to bother. But lets do an outlier:
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? -80 (elections suspended in zones under Martial Law) Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? -6 (elections suspended in states where seditious traitors were in charge of trying to rig the election) Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 60 Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 31 UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). 14% Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 17% Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 17 The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Wes Streeting Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? Yes UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £145bn UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.2% Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. - no winner. Tournament collapses into chaos when ICE arrests players from Senegal and shoots the manager on live TV
Interesting but of course Trump cannot suspend elections without state governor and legislature consent and nor can he send in the National Guard without Congressional approval on the grounds of war or emergency
Trump can do anything he wants. State governors will be getting arrested as well. Traitors!
State governors can also call out the State National Guards, as I said Trump cannot call out the Federal National Guard without Congressional approval. State governors also control the state police, so they certainly won't be telling them to arrest themselves, it would need the FBI
At times you do seem to be naive
The evidence is that Trump will do whatever Trump wants
Well he can't, most US police are controlled by state governors, mayors and local sheriffs in the US NOT the President. States also have their own National Guards controlled by state governors and Congress has to approve the President deploying the Federal National Guard.
The FBI is also run by its own director accountable to Congress not just POTUS
Well he can't
Well, yes he can until such time he ceases to be POTUS
Go away and read some facts about the US law enforcement system before posting again please BigG.
The President does NOT control the US police, state governors and mayors and sheriffs do. The President does not even have full control of the FBI and Federal National Guard, Congress also has oversight as does the FBI Director.
The President does control the army but by that point if he sent in the army against half his nation the US would be headed for a second civil war anyway if Congress had not impeached and convicted him and removed him from office first (and Congress could cut off funds for the army too)
Read up on what he is doing in Minnesota. The reality is that unless Congress exercises its oversight powers, which it is not now doing, then there isn't all that much that any but the biggest states can do to prevent, or even control the paramilitary organisation that is ICE.
You talk about the FBI not being under his control - and yet that organisation actively took control of the investigation of a homicide by an ICE agent, prevented state law enforcement from investigating (or even having access to evidence), and has now declared the investigation closed.
And there appears to be no way in federal law to bring a civil action against either the FBI or ICE o compel investigation.
What they have done is a clear civil rights breach (and therefore criminal under existing federal legislation), but there appears to be no avenue by which a case can be brought, without the cooperation of the Dept of Justice.
There is a slight difference between ICE actions taken against a woman they say was trying to run over one of their officials and Trump cancelling midterm elections without the say so of state governors who control their State national guards and state police.
Management of elections is also not an FBI issue
There is no difference. SA squads are marauding not only at will, they have been granted absolute immunity.
The states no longer have control of what goes on inside their borders. Trump is using Minnesota as the testbed, but the principle is very simple - the government has absolute control.
The government has declared various Dem officials to be seditious traitors and maintains that elections are fraudulent. It is perfectly rational to extend this reality to a place where the state officials are arrested and / or prevented by force from holding elections.
I don't predict these elections will be cancelled. They will say "suspended". Hold them in GOP areas, suspend them in areas full of traitors and insurrectionists. You then get a fully pliant congress where all of the dem seats have expired without an election to replace them. Congress then votes Trump to have extraordinary powers in this time of national emergency (the insurgency) and that is that.
What stops this? Trump is ill. But I doubt the regime would be willing to pack up and go to jail if he dies...
Which is rubbish, state governors can still deploy state guards and state police.
Those Democratic governors and state officials of blue states and purple states will certainly go ahead with elections in November, the President has no power to stop them.
It only needs a handful of GOP representatives to also vote with the Democrats to impeach Trump again.
If not then of course Democratic states would start seceding from the Union and you end up with US civil war 2
Get your nose out of those US constitutional law books, and go read this:
No direct parallels, but an illustration of how the entire fabric of a democratic state can be captured or cast aside in less than a year, starting from a position without actual majority power. People like you who tried to say “you can’t do that” either got beaten up in their own home, or found themselves in Dachau.
Germany in the 1930s did not give the states as much power as the US does and of course a plurality of Germans did vote for Hitler's Nazis and Hitler was more popular in Germany in the mid 1930s than Trump is in the US now
German States had quite a lot of power. One small one (Brunswick) was responsible for awarding Hitler German citizenship, a power that is firmly Federal in the US system. And a large part of Hitler taking power was gaining the levers of the Prussian police, Goering was made Prussian interior minister and the Gestapo was originally a Prussian police agency.
Prussia was also firmly behind Hitler in the 1930s, California, New York etc are not firmly behind Trump
Prussia was about 2/3 of Germany and not particularly pro-Hitler, it ran from the the Rhineland to Silesia, and Schleswig to Hohenzollern
As the world is batshit crazy I was tempted not to bother. But lets do an outlier:
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? -80 (elections suspended in zones under Martial Law) Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? -6 (elections suspended in states where seditious traitors were in charge of trying to rig the election) Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 60 Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 31 UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). 14% Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 17% Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 17 The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Wes Streeting Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? Yes UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £145bn UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.2% Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. - no winner. Tournament collapses into chaos when ICE arrests players from Senegal and shoots the manager on live TV
Interesting but of course Trump cannot suspend elections without state governor and legislature consent and nor can he send in the National Guard without Congressional approval on the grounds of war or emergency
Trump can do anything he wants. State governors will be getting arrested as well. Traitors!
State governors can also call out the State National Guards, as I said Trump cannot call out the Federal National Guard without Congressional approval. State governors also control the state police, so they certainly won't be telling them to arrest themselves, it would need the FBI
At times you do seem to be naive
The evidence is that Trump will do whatever Trump wants
Well he can't, most US police are controlled by state governors, mayors and local sheriffs in the US NOT the President. States also have their own National Guards controlled by state governors and Congress has to approve the President deploying the Federal National Guard.
The FBI is also run by its own director accountable to Congress not just POTUS
Well he can't
Well, yes he can until such time he ceases to be POTUS
Go away and read some facts about the US law enforcement system before posting again please BigG.
The President does NOT control the US police, state governors and mayors and sheriffs do. The President does not even have full control of the FBI and Federal National Guard, Congress also has oversight as does the FBI Director.
The President does control the army but by that point if he sent in the army against half his nation the US would be headed for a second civil war anyway if Congress had not impeached and convicted him and removed him from office first (and Congress could cut off funds for the army too)
Read up on what he is doing in Minnesota. The reality is that unless Congress exercises its oversight powers, which it is not now doing, then there isn't all that much that any but the biggest states can do to prevent, or even control the paramilitary organisation that is ICE.
You talk about the FBI not being under his control - and yet that organisation actively took control of the investigation of a homicide by an ICE agent, prevented state law enforcement from investigating (or even having access to evidence), and has now declared the investigation closed.
And there appears to be no way in federal law to bring a civil action against either the FBI or ICE o compel investigation.
What they have done is a clear civil rights breach (and therefore criminal under existing federal legislation), but there appears to be no avenue by which a case can be brought, without the cooperation of the Dept of Justice.
There is a slight difference between ICE actions taken against a woman they say was trying to run over one of their officials and Trump cancelling midterm elections without the say so of state governors who control their State national guards and state police.
Management of elections is also not an FBI issue
There is no difference. SA squads are marauding not only at will, they have been granted absolute immunity.
The states no longer have control of what goes on inside their borders. Trump is using Minnesota as the testbed, but the principle is very simple - the government has absolute control.
The government has declared various Dem officials to be seditious traitors and maintains that elections are fraudulent. It is perfectly rational to extend this reality to a place where the state officials are arrested and / or prevented by force from holding elections.
I don't predict these elections will be cancelled. They will say "suspended". Hold them in GOP areas, suspend them in areas full of traitors and insurrectionists. You then get a fully pliant congress where all of the dem seats have expired without an election to replace them. Congress then votes Trump to have extraordinary powers in this time of national emergency (the insurgency) and that is that.
What stops this? Trump is ill. But I doubt the regime would be willing to pack up and go to jail if he dies...
Which is rubbish, state governors can still deploy state guards and state police.
Those Democratic governors and state officials of blue states and purple states will certainly go ahead with elections in November, the President has no power to stop them.
It only needs a handful of GOP representatives to also vote with the Democrats to impeach Trump again.
If not then of course Democratic states would start seceding from the Union and you end up with US civil war 2
Get your nose out of those US constitutional law books, and go read this:
No direct parallels, but an illustration of how the entire fabric of a democratic state can be captured or cast aside in less than a year, starting from a position without actual majority power. People like you who tried to say “you can’t do that” either got beaten up in their own home, or found themselves in Dachau.
Germany in the 1930s did not give the states as much power as the US does and of course a plurality of Germans did vote for Hitler's Nazis and Hitler was more popular in Germany in the mid 1930s than Trump is in the US now
Do yourself a favour, go read the book, then come back, and try again
The book says 'Third Reich destroyed democracy'.
Yet in 1932 and 1933 the Nazis won most seats and votes in almost all German states in Reichstag elections from Pomerania and East Prussia to Hesse and East Hanover. From Wurttemberg to Thurungia and Berlin.
Even in 2024 Trump failed to win big US states like California, Illinois and New York by contrast
The partnership proposal is the latest effort by the Korean shipbuilder in its ongoing competition with Germany’s TKMS to secure Canada’s order for 12 submarines worth 60 billion Canadian dollars ($43 billion).
The deal would mark the largest single contract in Korea’s defense export history if successful. Hanwha Ocean and the Korean government have been mobilizing all possible means and seeking support from other major companies, such as Hyundai Motor and Korean Air, to meet Canadian expectations in various sectors.
Officials at Hanwha Ocean said it made the proposal together with Babcock following last week’s meeting on the sidelines of annual bilateral talks between senior defense officials from Korea and the U.K. in London.
"The Canadian Patrol Submarine Project (CPSP) is not just about delivering a submarine platform. It is about building long-term industrial capability and skilled jobs in Canada," said Eoh Sung-chul, president of Hanwha Ocean's naval ship business.
"Through our partnership with Babcock, and with Babcock Canada at the center of localization, we are committed to supporting sovereign sustainment and lasting workforce development for Canada."
According to the Defense Acquisition Program Administration, Korean and U.K. defense officials held in-depth discussions on Jan. 13 on the strategic partnership between Hanwha Ocean and Babcock.
Last September, the two companies signed an exclusive teaming agreement under which the Korean firm would bring a proven, in-service KSS-III submarine platform and extensive shipbuilding expertise, while the British firm would provide sustainment, maintenance and lifecycle support as well as critical subsystems, including the weapon launching and handling system and key torpedo tube components...
As the world is batshit crazy I was tempted not to bother. But lets do an outlier:
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? -80 (elections suspended in zones under Martial Law) Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? -6 (elections suspended in states where seditious traitors were in charge of trying to rig the election) Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 60 Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 31 UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). 14% Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 17% Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 17 The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Wes Streeting Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? Yes UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £145bn UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.2% Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. - no winner. Tournament collapses into chaos when ICE arrests players from Senegal and shoots the manager on live TV
Interesting but of course Trump cannot suspend elections without state governor and legislature consent and nor can he send in the National Guard without Congressional approval on the grounds of war or emergency
Trump can do anything he wants. State governors will be getting arrested as well. Traitors!
State governors can also call out the State National Guards, as I said Trump cannot call out the Federal National Guard without Congressional approval. State governors also control the state police, so they certainly won't be telling them to arrest themselves, it would need the FBI
At times you do seem to be naive
The evidence is that Trump will do whatever Trump wants
Well he can't, most US police are controlled by state governors, mayors and local sheriffs in the US NOT the President. States also have their own National Guards controlled by state governors and Congress has to approve the President deploying the Federal National Guard.
The FBI is also run by its own director accountable to Congress not just POTUS
Well he can't
Well, yes he can until such time he ceases to be POTUS
Go away and read some facts about the US law enforcement system before posting again please BigG.
The President does NOT control the US police, state governors and mayors and sheriffs do. The President does not even have full control of the FBI and Federal National Guard, Congress also has oversight as does the FBI Director.
The President does control the army but by that point if he sent in the army against half his nation the US would be headed for a second civil war anyway if Congress had not impeached and convicted him and removed him from office first (and Congress could cut off funds for the army too)
Read up on what he is doing in Minnesota. The reality is that unless Congress exercises its oversight powers, which it is not now doing, then there isn't all that much that any but the biggest states can do to prevent, or even control the paramilitary organisation that is ICE.
You talk about the FBI not being under his control - and yet that organisation actively took control of the investigation of a homicide by an ICE agent, prevented state law enforcement from investigating (or even having access to evidence), and has now declared the investigation closed.
And there appears to be no way in federal law to bring a civil action against either the FBI or ICE o compel investigation.
What they have done is a clear civil rights breach (and therefore criminal under existing federal legislation), but there appears to be no avenue by which a case can be brought, without the cooperation of the Dept of Justice.
There is a slight difference between ICE actions taken against a woman they say was trying to run over one of their officials and Trump cancelling midterm elections without the say so of state governors who control their State national guards and state police.
Management of elections is also not an FBI issue
There is no difference. SA squads are marauding not only at will, they have been granted absolute immunity.
The states no longer have control of what goes on inside their borders. Trump is using Minnesota as the testbed, but the principle is very simple - the government has absolute control.
The government has declared various Dem officials to be seditious traitors and maintains that elections are fraudulent. It is perfectly rational to extend this reality to a place where the state officials are arrested and / or prevented by force from holding elections.
I don't predict these elections will be cancelled. They will say "suspended". Hold them in GOP areas, suspend them in areas full of traitors and insurrectionists. You then get a fully pliant congress where all of the dem seats have expired without an election to replace them. Congress then votes Trump to have extraordinary powers in this time of national emergency (the insurgency) and that is that.
What stops this? Trump is ill. But I doubt the regime would be willing to pack up and go to jail if he dies...
Which is rubbish, state governors can still deploy state guards and state police.
Those Democratic governors and state officials of blue states and purple states will certainly go ahead with elections in November, the President has no power to stop them.
It only needs a handful of GOP representatives to also vote with the Democrats to impeach Trump again.
If not then of course Democratic states would start seceding from the Union and you end up with US civil war 2
Get your nose out of those US constitutional law books, and go read this:
No direct parallels, but an illustration of how the entire fabric of a democratic state can be captured or cast aside in less than a year, starting from a position without actual majority power. People like you who tried to say “you can’t do that” either got beaten up in their own home, or found themselves in Dachau.
Germany in the 1930s did not give the states as much power as the US does and of course a plurality of Germans did vote for Hitler's Nazis and Hitler was more popular in Germany in the mid 1930s than Trump is in the US now
German States had quite a lot of power. One small one (Brunswick) was responsible for awarding Hitler German citizenship, a power that is firmly Federal in the US system. And a large part of Hitler taking power was gaining the levers of the Prussian police, Goering was made Prussian interior minister and the Gestapo was originally a Prussian police agency.
Prussia was also firmly behind Hitler in the 1930s, California, New York etc are not firmly behind Trump
Trump had a SPD-Zentrum coaliton, from 1919-33. And, that government was overturned by Goering, within months.
By late 1932 hardline conservative von Papen was German Chancellor and he persuaded Hindenberg to make Hitler Chancellor by 1933, a move also ultimately accepted by his brief conservative successor von Schleicher
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? 30
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? 4
Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 62
Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 24
UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). Reform 16%
Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 20%
Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 9
The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Starmer
Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? No
UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £153billion
UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.1%
Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. Argentina
You have the Senate being retaken? That's a strong bet.
I think the Dems win North Carolina and Maine.
Then it gets much harder. You are basically betting on two of:
Iowa, Ohio, Alaska and Texas.
That's a really tough ask. Not impossible, but tough.
Sherrod could win in Ohio (and he did in 2018). Ken Paxton could be the Democratic dream opponent in Texas. And Pelota could win in Alaska (and came within a whisker last time in the House). And Iowa is winnable on a *really* good day for the Dems.
My guess is that Ohio stays Republican, although Sherrod Brown will get within 5 or 6 points.
I think Texas will be a closer race, but that the Republicans will hold it by the slimmest of margins.
Iowa - the Dems will pickup at least one Congressional District - but not the Senate seat.
Of the four tough ones, Alaska is probably the best bet. Dan Sullivan, the incumbent Republican only has favorables of 38% - that's pretty poor. There's also ranked choice voting. And Mary Pelota only just lost the (sole) House District in a year when Trump won Alaska by 13%. Given it's the midterms and differential turnout will not favour the Republicans, that's probably a decent bet for a Democratic pickup.
As the world is batshit crazy I was tempted not to bother. But lets do an outlier:
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? -80 (elections suspended in zones under Martial Law) Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? -6 (elections suspended in states where seditious traitors were in charge of trying to rig the election) Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 60 Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 31 UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). 14% Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 17% Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 17 The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Wes Streeting Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? Yes UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £145bn UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.2% Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. - no winner. Tournament collapses into chaos when ICE arrests players from Senegal and shoots the manager on live TV
Interesting but of course Trump cannot suspend elections without state governor and legislature consent and nor can he send in the National Guard without Congressional approval on the grounds of war or emergency
Trump can do anything he wants. State governors will be getting arrested as well. Traitors!
State governors can also call out the State National Guards, as I said Trump cannot call out the Federal National Guard without Congressional approval. State governors also control the state police, so they certainly won't be telling them to arrest themselves, it would need the FBI
At times you do seem to be naive
The evidence is that Trump will do whatever Trump wants
Well he can't, most US police are controlled by state governors, mayors and local sheriffs in the US NOT the President. States also have their own National Guards controlled by state governors and Congress has to approve the President deploying the Federal National Guard.
The FBI is also run by its own director accountable to Congress not just POTUS
Well he can't
Well, yes he can until such time he ceases to be POTUS
Go away and read some facts about the US law enforcement system before posting again please BigG.
The President does NOT control the US police, state governors and mayors and sheriffs do. The President does not even have full control of the FBI and Federal National Guard, Congress also has oversight as does the FBI Director.
The President does control the army but by that point if he sent in the army against half his nation the US would be headed for a second civil war anyway if Congress had not impeached and convicted him and removed him from office first (and Congress could cut off funds for the army too)
Read up on what he is doing in Minnesota. The reality is that unless Congress exercises its oversight powers, which it is not now doing, then there isn't all that much that any but the biggest states can do to prevent, or even control the paramilitary organisation that is ICE.
You talk about the FBI not being under his control - and yet that organisation actively took control of the investigation of a homicide by an ICE agent, prevented state law enforcement from investigating (or even having access to evidence), and has now declared the investigation closed.
And there appears to be no way in federal law to bring a civil action against either the FBI or ICE o compel investigation.
What they have done is a clear civil rights breach (and therefore criminal under existing federal legislation), but there appears to be no avenue by which a case can be brought, without the cooperation of the Dept of Justice.
There is a slight difference between ICE actions taken against a woman they say was trying to run over one of their officials and Trump cancelling midterm elections without the say so of state governors who control their State national guards and state police.
Management of elections is also not an FBI issue
There is no difference. SA squads are marauding not only at will, they have been granted absolute immunity.
The states no longer have control of what goes on inside their borders. Trump is using Minnesota as the testbed, but the principle is very simple - the government has absolute control.
The government has declared various Dem officials to be seditious traitors and maintains that elections are fraudulent. It is perfectly rational to extend this reality to a place where the state officials are arrested and / or prevented by force from holding elections.
I don't predict these elections will be cancelled. They will say "suspended". Hold them in GOP areas, suspend them in areas full of traitors and insurrectionists. You then get a fully pliant congress where all of the dem seats have expired without an election to replace them. Congress then votes Trump to have extraordinary powers in this time of national emergency (the insurgency) and that is that.
What stops this? Trump is ill. But I doubt the regime would be willing to pack up and go to jail if he dies...
Which is rubbish, state governors can still deploy state guards and state police.
Those Democratic governors and state officials of blue states and purple states will certainly go ahead with elections in November, the President has no power to stop them.
It only needs a handful of GOP representatives to also vote with the Democrats to impeach Trump again.
If not then of course Democratic states would start seceding from the Union and you end up with US civil war 2
Get your nose out of those US constitutional law books, and go read this:
No direct parallels, but an illustration of how the entire fabric of a democratic state can be captured or cast aside in less than a year, starting from a position without actual majority power. People like you who tried to say “you can’t do that” either got beaten up in their own home, or found themselves in Dachau.
Germany in the 1930s did not give the states as much power as the US does and of course a plurality of Germans did vote for Hitler's Nazis and Hitler was more popular in Germany in the mid 1930s than Trump is in the US now
Do yourself a favour, go read the book, then come back, and try again
The book says 'Third Reich destroyed democracy'.
Yet in 1932 and 1933 the Nazis won most seats and votes in almost all German states in Reichstag elections from Pomerania and East Prussia to Hesse and East Hanover. From Wurttemberg to Thurungia and Berlin.
Even in 2024 Trump failed to win big US states like California, Illinois and New York by contrast
Most of those weren't states. Pomerania and East Prussia were just a couple of districts of the *huge* Prussia. East Hannover is clearly part of Hannover. Thuringia was a selection of microstates. What you've cherry-picked there barely amounts to a hill of beans.
As the world is batshit crazy I was tempted not to bother. But lets do an outlier:
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? -80 (elections suspended in zones under Martial Law) Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? -6 (elections suspended in states where seditious traitors were in charge of trying to rig the election) Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 60 Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 31 UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). 14% Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 17% Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 17 The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Wes Streeting Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? Yes UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £145bn UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.2% Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. - no winner. Tournament collapses into chaos when ICE arrests players from Senegal and shoots the manager on live TV
Interesting but of course Trump cannot suspend elections without state governor and legislature consent and nor can he send in the National Guard without Congressional approval on the grounds of war or emergency
Trump can do anything he wants. State governors will be getting arrested as well. Traitors!
State governors can also call out the State National Guards, as I said Trump cannot call out the Federal National Guard without Congressional approval. State governors also control the state police, so they certainly won't be telling them to arrest themselves, it would need the FBI
At times you do seem to be naive
The evidence is that Trump will do whatever Trump wants
Well he can't, most US police are controlled by state governors, mayors and local sheriffs in the US NOT the President. States also have their own National Guards controlled by state governors and Congress has to approve the President deploying the Federal National Guard.
The FBI is also run by its own director accountable to Congress not just POTUS
Well he can't
Well, yes he can until such time he ceases to be POTUS
Go away and read some facts about the US law enforcement system before posting again please BigG.
The President does NOT control the US police, state governors and mayors and sheriffs do. The President does not even have full control of the FBI and Federal National Guard, Congress also has oversight as does the FBI Director.
The President does control the army but by that point if he sent in the army against half his nation the US would be headed for a second civil war anyway if Congress had not impeached and convicted him and removed him from office first (and Congress could cut off funds for the army too)
Read up on what he is doing in Minnesota. The reality is that unless Congress exercises its oversight powers, which it is not now doing, then there isn't all that much that any but the biggest states can do to prevent, or even control the paramilitary organisation that is ICE.
You talk about the FBI not being under his control - and yet that organisation actively took control of the investigation of a homicide by an ICE agent, prevented state law enforcement from investigating (or even having access to evidence), and has now declared the investigation closed.
And there appears to be no way in federal law to bring a civil action against either the FBI or ICE o compel investigation.
What they have done is a clear civil rights breach (and therefore criminal under existing federal legislation), but there appears to be no avenue by which a case can be brought, without the cooperation of the Dept of Justice.
There is a slight difference between ICE actions taken against a woman they say was trying to run over one of their officials and Trump cancelling midterm elections without the say so of state governors who control their State national guards and state police.
Management of elections is also not an FBI issue
There is no difference. SA squads are marauding not only at will, they have been granted absolute immunity.
The states no longer have control of what goes on inside their borders. Trump is using Minnesota as the testbed, but the principle is very simple - the government has absolute control.
The government has declared various Dem officials to be seditious traitors and maintains that elections are fraudulent. It is perfectly rational to extend this reality to a place where the state officials are arrested and / or prevented by force from holding elections.
I don't predict these elections will be cancelled. They will say "suspended". Hold them in GOP areas, suspend them in areas full of traitors and insurrectionists. You then get a fully pliant congress where all of the dem seats have expired without an election to replace them. Congress then votes Trump to have extraordinary powers in this time of national emergency (the insurgency) and that is that.
What stops this? Trump is ill. But I doubt the regime would be willing to pack up and go to jail if he dies...
Which is rubbish, state governors can still deploy state guards and state police.
Those Democratic governors and state officials of blue states and purple states will certainly go ahead with elections in November, the President has no power to stop them.
It only needs a handful of GOP representatives to also vote with the Democrats to impeach Trump again.
If not then of course Democratic states would start seceding from the Union and you end up with US civil war 2
Get your nose out of those US constitutional law books, and go read this:
No direct parallels, but an illustration of how the entire fabric of a democratic state can be captured or cast aside in less than a year, starting from a position without actual majority power. People like you who tried to say “you can’t do that” either got beaten up in their own home, or found themselves in Dachau.
Germany in the 1930s did not give the states as much power as the US does and of course a plurality of Germans did vote for Hitler's Nazis and Hitler was more popular in Germany in the mid 1930s than Trump is in the US now
German States had quite a lot of power. One small one (Brunswick) was responsible for awarding Hitler German citizenship, a power that is firmly Federal in the US system. And a large part of Hitler taking power was gaining the levers of the Prussian police, Goering was made Prussian interior minister and the Gestapo was originally a Prussian police agency.
Prussia was also firmly behind Hitler in the 1930s, California, New York etc are not firmly behind Trump
Prussia was about 2/3 of Germany and not particularly pro-Hitler, it ran from the the Rhineland to Silesia, and Schleswig to Hohenzollern
Don't forget East Prussia!
I was going to include it, but thought it was a bit repetitive. Anyway full of Junkers who were all Freikorps members and hardly representative
This notion of Trump declaring that he is pulling US armed forces out of Europe. That is the withdrawal of the US from NATO - I have little doubt that the regime will try and declare NATO to be over, but we will meet and formulate a new resolute declaration that the mission continues.
What does that mean practically? The US would have to be excluded from intelligence, from air defence, from military co-operation. As a minimum. Can that even be done overnight?
Playing out the scenario it would seem likely that this would force the US to seize key installations. On paper the US needs the BMEWS network including Thule and Fylingdales, as well as the Canadian installations in places such as North Bay. In practice as they are allied with Russia why would they need warning systems?
But let's assume the Joint Chiefs demand it and Trumpler wants a display of strength. That means seizing Greenland. And you saw that map put out overnight with Canada as American? Yeah.
We're making Greenland a line in the sand and rightly so. But if Trump pushes over it then are we in shooting war territory to defend Canada from the US?
As @DavidL points out, the competition is an optimistic ray of light in an otherwise gloomy world.
The current agreement allowing unlimited deployment of US forces in Greenland is predicated on NATO existing. No NATO, that agreements no longer applies.
JUST IN: NO tariffs opinion from #SCOTUS today. We got 3 opinions in much-lower-profile cases. Court was unanimous in all rulings but not all opinions. No opinions are expected tomw, when Lisa Cook firing is to be argued. Next scheduled sitting after that in Feb. 20.
As the world is batshit crazy I was tempted not to bother. But lets do an outlier:
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? -80 (elections suspended in zones under Martial Law) Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? -6 (elections suspended in states where seditious traitors were in charge of trying to rig the election) Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 60 Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 31 UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). 14% Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 17% Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 17 The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Wes Streeting Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? Yes UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £145bn UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.2% Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. - no winner. Tournament collapses into chaos when ICE arrests players from Senegal and shoots the manager on live TV
Interesting but of course Trump cannot suspend elections without state governor and legislature consent and nor can he send in the National Guard without Congressional approval on the grounds of war or emergency
Trump can do anything he wants. State governors will be getting arrested as well. Traitors!
State governors can also call out the State National Guards, as I said Trump cannot call out the Federal National Guard without Congressional approval. State governors also control the state police, so they certainly won't be telling them to arrest themselves, it would need the FBI
At times you do seem to be naive
The evidence is that Trump will do whatever Trump wants
Well he can't, most US police are controlled by state governors, mayors and local sheriffs in the US NOT the President. States also have their own National Guards controlled by state governors and Congress has to approve the President deploying the Federal National Guard.
The FBI is also run by its own director accountable to Congress not just POTUS
Well he can't
Well, yes he can until such time he ceases to be POTUS
Go away and read some facts about the US law enforcement system before posting again please BigG.
The President does NOT control the US police, state governors and mayors and sheriffs do. The President does not even have full control of the FBI and Federal National Guard, Congress also has oversight as does the FBI Director.
The President does control the army but by that point if he sent in the army against half his nation the US would be headed for a second civil war anyway if Congress had not impeached and convicted him and removed him from office first (and Congress could cut off funds for the army too)
Read up on what he is doing in Minnesota. The reality is that unless Congress exercises its oversight powers, which it is not now doing, then there isn't all that much that any but the biggest states can do to prevent, or even control the paramilitary organisation that is ICE.
You talk about the FBI not being under his control - and yet that organisation actively took control of the investigation of a homicide by an ICE agent, prevented state law enforcement from investigating (or even having access to evidence), and has now declared the investigation closed.
And there appears to be no way in federal law to bring a civil action against either the FBI or ICE o compel investigation.
What they have done is a clear civil rights breach (and therefore criminal under existing federal legislation), but there appears to be no avenue by which a case can be brought, without the cooperation of the Dept of Justice.
There is a slight difference between ICE actions taken against a woman they say was trying to run over one of their officials and Trump cancelling midterm elections without the say so of state governors who control their State national guards and state police.
Management of elections is also not an FBI issue
There is no difference. SA squads are marauding not only at will, they have been granted absolute immunity.
The states no longer have control of what goes on inside their borders. Trump is using Minnesota as the testbed, but the principle is very simple - the government has absolute control.
The government has declared various Dem officials to be seditious traitors and maintains that elections are fraudulent. It is perfectly rational to extend this reality to a place where the state officials are arrested and / or prevented by force from holding elections.
I don't predict these elections will be cancelled. They will say "suspended". Hold them in GOP areas, suspend them in areas full of traitors and insurrectionists. You then get a fully pliant congress where all of the dem seats have expired without an election to replace them. Congress then votes Trump to have extraordinary powers in this time of national emergency (the insurgency) and that is that.
What stops this? Trump is ill. But I doubt the regime would be willing to pack up and go to jail if he dies...
Which is rubbish, state governors can still deploy state guards and state police.
Those Democratic governors and state officials of blue states and purple states will certainly go ahead with elections in November, the President has no power to stop them.
It only needs a handful of GOP representatives to also vote with the Democrats to impeach Trump again.
If not then of course Democratic states would start seceding from the Union and you end up with US civil war 2
Get your nose out of those US constitutional law books, and go read this:
No direct parallels, but an illustration of how the entire fabric of a democratic state can be captured or cast aside in less than a year, starting from a position without actual majority power. People like you who tried to say “you can’t do that” either got beaten up in their own home, or found themselves in Dachau.
Germany in the 1930s did not give the states as much power as the US does and of course a plurality of Germans did vote for Hitler's Nazis and Hitler was more popular in Germany in the mid 1930s than Trump is in the US now
German States had quite a lot of power. One small one (Brunswick) was responsible for awarding Hitler German citizenship, a power that is firmly Federal in the US system. And a large part of Hitler taking power was gaining the levers of the Prussian police, Goering was made Prussian interior minister and the Gestapo was originally a Prussian police agency.
Prussia was also firmly behind Hitler in the 1930s, California, New York etc are not firmly behind Trump
Trump had a SPD-Zentrum coaliton, from 1919-33. And, that government was overturned by Goering, within months.
By late 1932 hardline conservative von Papen was German Chancellor and he persuaded Hindenberg to make Hitler Chancellor by 1933, a move also ultimately accepted by his brief conservative successor von Schleicher
What was really popular was the new Reich highway code (Bahngebot) of 1934 which brought in various reforms, including banning u-turns on country roads.
As the world is batshit crazy I was tempted not to bother. But lets do an outlier:
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? -80 (elections suspended in zones under Martial Law) Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? -6 (elections suspended in states where seditious traitors were in charge of trying to rig the election) Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 60 Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 31 UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). 14% Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 17% Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 17 The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Wes Streeting Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? Yes UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £145bn UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.2% Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. - no winner. Tournament collapses into chaos when ICE arrests players from Senegal and shoots the manager on live TV
Interesting but of course Trump cannot suspend elections without state governor and legislature consent and nor can he send in the National Guard without Congressional approval on the grounds of war or emergency
Trump can do anything he wants. State governors will be getting arrested as well. Traitors!
State governors can also call out the State National Guards, as I said Trump cannot call out the Federal National Guard without Congressional approval. State governors also control the state police, so they certainly won't be telling them to arrest themselves, it would need the FBI
At times you do seem to be naive
The evidence is that Trump will do whatever Trump wants
Well he can't, most US police are controlled by state governors, mayors and local sheriffs in the US NOT the President. States also have their own National Guards controlled by state governors and Congress has to approve the President deploying the Federal National Guard.
The FBI is also run by its own director accountable to Congress not just POTUS
Well he can't
Well, yes he can until such time he ceases to be POTUS
Go away and read some facts about the US law enforcement system before posting again please BigG.
The President does NOT control the US police, state governors and mayors and sheriffs do. The President does not even have full control of the FBI and Federal National Guard, Congress also has oversight as does the FBI Director.
The President does control the army but by that point if he sent in the army against half his nation the US would be headed for a second civil war anyway if Congress had not impeached and convicted him and removed him from office first (and Congress could cut off funds for the army too)
Read up on what he is doing in Minnesota. The reality is that unless Congress exercises its oversight powers, which it is not now doing, then there isn't all that much that any but the biggest states can do to prevent, or even control the paramilitary organisation that is ICE.
You talk about the FBI not being under his control - and yet that organisation actively took control of the investigation of a homicide by an ICE agent, prevented state law enforcement from investigating (or even having access to evidence), and has now declared the investigation closed.
And there appears to be no way in federal law to bring a civil action against either the FBI or ICE o compel investigation.
What they have done is a clear civil rights breach (and therefore criminal under existing federal legislation), but there appears to be no avenue by which a case can be brought, without the cooperation of the Dept of Justice.
There is a slight difference between ICE actions taken against a woman they say was trying to run over one of their officials and Trump cancelling midterm elections without the say so of state governors who control their State national guards and state police.
Management of elections is also not an FBI issue
There is no difference. SA squads are marauding not only at will, they have been granted absolute immunity.
The states no longer have control of what goes on inside their borders. Trump is using Minnesota as the testbed, but the principle is very simple - the government has absolute control.
The government has declared various Dem officials to be seditious traitors and maintains that elections are fraudulent. It is perfectly rational to extend this reality to a place where the state officials are arrested and / or prevented by force from holding elections.
I don't predict these elections will be cancelled. They will say "suspended". Hold them in GOP areas, suspend them in areas full of traitors and insurrectionists. You then get a fully pliant congress where all of the dem seats have expired without an election to replace them. Congress then votes Trump to have extraordinary powers in this time of national emergency (the insurgency) and that is that.
What stops this? Trump is ill. But I doubt the regime would be willing to pack up and go to jail if he dies...
Which is rubbish, state governors can still deploy state guards and state police.
Those Democratic governors and state officials of blue states and purple states will certainly go ahead with elections in November, the President has no power to stop them.
It only needs a handful of GOP representatives to also vote with the Democrats to impeach Trump again.
If not then of course Democratic states would start seceding from the Union and you end up with US civil war 2
Get your nose out of those US constitutional law books, and go read this:
No direct parallels, but an illustration of how the entire fabric of a democratic state can be captured or cast aside in less than a year, starting from a position without actual majority power. People like you who tried to say “you can’t do that” either got beaten up in their own home, or found themselves in Dachau.
Germany in the 1930s did not give the states as much power as the US does and of course a plurality of Germans did vote for Hitler's Nazis and Hitler was more popular in Germany in the mid 1930s than Trump is in the US now
German States had quite a lot of power. One small one (Brunswick) was responsible for awarding Hitler German citizenship, a power that is firmly Federal in the US system. And a large part of Hitler taking power was gaining the levers of the Prussian police, Goering was made Prussian interior minister and the Gestapo was originally a Prussian police agency.
Prussia was also firmly behind Hitler in the 1930s, California, New York etc are not firmly behind Trump
Trump had a SPD-Zentrum coaliton, from 1919-33. And, that government was overturned by Goering, within months.
By late 1932 hardline conservative von Papen was German Chancellor and he persuaded Hindenberg to make Hitler Chancellor by 1933, a move also ultimately accepted by his brief conservative successor von Schleicher
What was really popular was the new Reich highway code (Bahngebot) of 1934 which brought in various reforms, including banning u-turns on country roads.
U-turns not useful when invading Poland, presumably.
As the world is batshit crazy I was tempted not to bother. But lets do an outlier:
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? -80 (elections suspended in zones under Martial Law) Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? -6 (elections suspended in states where seditious traitors were in charge of trying to rig the election) Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 60 Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 31 UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). 14% Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 17% Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 17 The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Wes Streeting Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? Yes UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £145bn UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.2% Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. - no winner. Tournament collapses into chaos when ICE arrests players from Senegal and shoots the manager on live TV
Interesting but of course Trump cannot suspend elections without state governor and legislature consent and nor can he send in the National Guard without Congressional approval on the grounds of war or emergency
Trump can do anything he wants. State governors will be getting arrested as well. Traitors!
State governors can also call out the State National Guards, as I said Trump cannot call out the Federal National Guard without Congressional approval. State governors also control the state police, so they certainly won't be telling them to arrest themselves, it would need the FBI
At times you do seem to be naive
The evidence is that Trump will do whatever Trump wants
Well he can't, most US police are controlled by state governors, mayors and local sheriffs in the US NOT the President. States also have their own National Guards controlled by state governors and Congress has to approve the President deploying the Federal National Guard.
The FBI is also run by its own director accountable to Congress not just POTUS
Well he can't
Well, yes he can until such time he ceases to be POTUS
Go away and read some facts about the US law enforcement system before posting again please BigG.
The President does NOT control the US police, state governors and mayors and sheriffs do. The President does not even have full control of the FBI and Federal National Guard, Congress also has oversight as does the FBI Director.
The President does control the army but by that point if he sent in the army against half his nation the US would be headed for a second civil war anyway if Congress had not impeached and convicted him and removed him from office first (and Congress could cut off funds for the army too)
Read up on what he is doing in Minnesota. The reality is that unless Congress exercises its oversight powers, which it is not now doing, then there isn't all that much that any but the biggest states can do to prevent, or even control the paramilitary organisation that is ICE.
You talk about the FBI not being under his control - and yet that organisation actively took control of the investigation of a homicide by an ICE agent, prevented state law enforcement from investigating (or even having access to evidence), and has now declared the investigation closed.
And there appears to be no way in federal law to bring a civil action against either the FBI or ICE o compel investigation.
What they have done is a clear civil rights breach (and therefore criminal under existing federal legislation), but there appears to be no avenue by which a case can be brought, without the cooperation of the Dept of Justice.
There is a slight difference between ICE actions taken against a woman they say was trying to run over one of their officials and Trump cancelling midterm elections without the say so of state governors who control their State national guards and state police.
Management of elections is also not an FBI issue
There is no difference. SA squads are marauding not only at will, they have been granted absolute immunity.
The states no longer have control of what goes on inside their borders. Trump is using Minnesota as the testbed, but the principle is very simple - the government has absolute control.
The government has declared various Dem officials to be seditious traitors and maintains that elections are fraudulent. It is perfectly rational to extend this reality to a place where the state officials are arrested and / or prevented by force from holding elections.
I don't predict these elections will be cancelled. They will say "suspended". Hold them in GOP areas, suspend them in areas full of traitors and insurrectionists. You then get a fully pliant congress where all of the dem seats have expired without an election to replace them. Congress then votes Trump to have extraordinary powers in this time of national emergency (the insurgency) and that is that.
What stops this? Trump is ill. But I doubt the regime would be willing to pack up and go to jail if he dies...
Which is rubbish, state governors can still deploy state guards and state police.
Those Democratic governors and state officials of blue states and purple states will certainly go ahead with elections in November, the President has no power to stop them.
It only needs a handful of GOP representatives to also vote with the Democrats to impeach Trump again.
If not then of course Democratic states would start seceding from the Union and you end up with US civil war 2
Get your nose out of those US constitutional law books, and go read this:
No direct parallels, but an illustration of how the entire fabric of a democratic state can be captured or cast aside in less than a year, starting from a position without actual majority power. People like you who tried to say “you can’t do that” either got beaten up in their own home, or found themselves in Dachau.
Germany in the 1930s did not give the states as much power as the US does and of course a plurality of Germans did vote for Hitler's Nazis and Hitler was more popular in Germany in the mid 1930s than Trump is in the US now
Do yourself a favour, go read the book, then come back, and try again
The book says 'Third Reich destroyed democracy'.
Yet in 1932 and 1933 the Nazis won most seats and votes in almost all German states in Reichstag elections from Pomerania and East Prussia to Hesse and East Hanover. From Wurttemberg to Thurungia and Berlin.
Even in 2024 Trump failed to win big US states like California, Illinois and New York by contrast
Most of those weren't states. Pomerania and East Prussia were just a couple of districts of the *huge* Prussia. East Hannover is clearly part of Hannover. Thuringia was a selection of microstates. What you've cherry-picked there barely amounts to a hill of beans.
'Wage growth in the UK eased to 4.5% between September and November, official figures suggest, following a sharp slowdown in private sector pay increases.
The pace of pay growth for those employed by private businesses slowed to the lowest rate in five years, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
In contrast, public sector workers saw their wages jump but, the ONS said, this was likely due to pay rises being awarded earlier than in the previous year.
Meanwhile, the number of people on company payrolls continued to fall - down 135,000 in the three months to November - with a particular decline in shops and hospitality....The ONS data showed a stark contrast between public and private pay growth in the three months to November.
Annual average public sector pay growth was 7.9% compared to 3.6% for the private sector.'
As ever the people who produce are stiffed by those who suck at the public teat. Unlimited cash to give them rises at twice the private sector and of course more of them on higher salaries whilst the private companies don't have a magic money tree and have to balance the books.
Don’t forget the near 30% employer pension contribution too, and the increments and the extra holidays.
Yes it is incredible and never any productivity improvements for all the wonga flung at them.
So I presume you never received any benefits in kind other than salary.
Well I get shedloads, but the company has had regular culls in the bad times over my 49 years to balance the books and those left have to take up the slack.
NHS England is currently cutting 50% of its staff.
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? 30
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? 4
Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 62
Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 24
UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). Reform 16%
Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 20%
Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 9
The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Starmer
Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? No
UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £153billion
UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.1%
Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. Argentina
You have the Senate being retaken? That's a strong bet.
I think the Dems win North Carolina and Maine.
Then it gets much harder. You are basically betting on two of:
Iowa, Ohio, Alaska and Texas.
That's a really tough ask. Not impossible, but tough.
Sherrod could win in Ohio (and he did in 2018). Ken Paxton could be the Democratic dream opponent in Texas. And Pelota could win in Alaska (and came within a whisker last time in the House). And Iowa is winnable on a *really* good day for the Dems.
My guess is that Ohio stays Republican, although Sherrod Brown will get within 5 or 6 points.
I think Texas will be a closer race, but that the Republicans will hold it by the slimmest of margins.
Iowa - the Dems will pickup at least one Congressional District - but not the Senate seat.
Of the four tough ones, Alaska is probably the best bet. Dan Sullivan, the incumbent Republican only has favorables of 38% - that's pretty poor. There's also ranked choice voting. And Mary Pelota only just lost the (sole) House District in a year when Trump won Alaska by 13%. Given it's the midterms and differential turnout will not favour the Republicans, that's probably a decent bet for a Democratic pickup.
So... I'm going with +3.
If Paxton is GOP nominee for Texas not incumbent Cornyn, yes polls show the Democrats could win the Senate seat
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? 30
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? 4
Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 62
Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 24
UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). Reform 16%
Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 20%
Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 9
The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Starmer
Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? No
UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £153billion
UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.1%
Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. Argentina
You have the Senate being retaken? That's a strong bet.
I think the Dems win North Carolina and Maine.
Then it gets much harder. You are basically betting on two of:
Iowa, Ohio, Alaska and Texas.
That's a really tough ask. Not impossible, but tough.
Sherrod could win in Ohio (and he did in 2018). Ken Paxton could be the Democratic dream opponent in Texas. And Pelota could win in Alaska (and came within a whisker last time in the House). And Iowa is winnable on a *really* good day for the Dems.
My guess is that Ohio stays Republican, although Sherrod Brown will get within 5 or 6 points.
I think Texas will be a closer race, but that the Republicans will hold it by the slimmest of margins.
Iowa - the Dems will pickup at least one Congressional District - but not the Senate seat.
Of the four tough ones, Alaska is probably the best bet. Dan Sullivan, the incumbent Republican only has favorables of 38% - that's pretty poor. There's also ranked choice voting. And Mary Pelota only just lost the (sole) House District in a year when Trump won Alaska by 13%. Given it's the midterms and differential turnout will not favour the Republicans, that's probably a decent bet for a Democratic pickup.
So... I'm going with +3.
I went with +1 for the Dems in the Senate on the basis that they've looked good to win NC in previous years, and somehow it keeps eluding them, while Collins seems to have a special relationship with Maine voters. I also don't think it's impossible that the Dems really feck up and lose MI. So there are lots of ways to +1 - hold MI and win one of ME or NC, or lose MI and win both NC and ME are the more obvious ones.
As the world is batshit crazy I was tempted not to bother. But lets do an outlier:
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? -80 (elections suspended in zones under Martial Law) Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? -6 (elections suspended in states where seditious traitors were in charge of trying to rig the election) Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 60 Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 31 UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). 14% Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 17% Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 17 The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Wes Streeting Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? Yes UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £145bn UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.2% Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. - no winner. Tournament collapses into chaos when ICE arrests players from Senegal and shoots the manager on live TV
Interesting but of course Trump cannot suspend elections without state governor and legislature consent and nor can he send in the National Guard without Congressional approval on the grounds of war or emergency
Trump can do anything he wants. State governors will be getting arrested as well. Traitors!
State governors can also call out the State National Guards, as I said Trump cannot call out the Federal National Guard without Congressional approval. State governors also control the state police, so they certainly won't be telling them to arrest themselves, it would need the FBI
At times you do seem to be naive
The evidence is that Trump will do whatever Trump wants
Well he can't, most US police are controlled by state governors, mayors and local sheriffs in the US NOT the President. States also have their own National Guards controlled by state governors and Congress has to approve the President deploying the Federal National Guard.
The FBI is also run by its own director accountable to Congress not just POTUS
Well he can't
Well, yes he can until such time he ceases to be POTUS
Go away and read some facts about the US law enforcement system before posting again please BigG.
The President does NOT control the US police, state governors and mayors and sheriffs do. The President does not even have full control of the FBI and Federal National Guard, Congress also has oversight as does the FBI Director.
The President does control the army but by that point if he sent in the army against half his nation the US would be headed for a second civil war anyway if Congress had not impeached and convicted him and removed him from office first (and Congress could cut off funds for the army too)
Read up on what he is doing in Minnesota. The reality is that unless Congress exercises its oversight powers, which it is not now doing, then there isn't all that much that any but the biggest states can do to prevent, or even control the paramilitary organisation that is ICE.
You talk about the FBI not being under his control - and yet that organisation actively took control of the investigation of a homicide by an ICE agent, prevented state law enforcement from investigating (or even having access to evidence), and has now declared the investigation closed.
And there appears to be no way in federal law to bring a civil action against either the FBI or ICE o compel investigation.
What they have done is a clear civil rights breach (and therefore criminal under existing federal legislation), but there appears to be no avenue by which a case can be brought, without the cooperation of the Dept of Justice.
There is a slight difference between ICE actions taken against a woman they say was trying to run over one of their officials and Trump cancelling midterm elections without the say so of state governors who control their State national guards and state police.
Management of elections is also not an FBI issue
There is no difference. SA squads are marauding not only at will, they have been granted absolute immunity.
The states no longer have control of what goes on inside their borders. Trump is using Minnesota as the testbed, but the principle is very simple - the government has absolute control.
The government has declared various Dem officials to be seditious traitors and maintains that elections are fraudulent. It is perfectly rational to extend this reality to a place where the state officials are arrested and / or prevented by force from holding elections.
I don't predict these elections will be cancelled. They will say "suspended". Hold them in GOP areas, suspend them in areas full of traitors and insurrectionists. You then get a fully pliant congress where all of the dem seats have expired without an election to replace them. Congress then votes Trump to have extraordinary powers in this time of national emergency (the insurgency) and that is that.
What stops this? Trump is ill. But I doubt the regime would be willing to pack up and go to jail if he dies...
Which is rubbish, state governors can still deploy state guards and state police.
Those Democratic governors and state officials of blue states and purple states will certainly go ahead with elections in November, the President has no power to stop them.
It only needs a handful of GOP representatives to also vote with the Democrats to impeach Trump again.
If not then of course Democratic states would start seceding from the Union and you end up with US civil war 2
Get your nose out of those US constitutional law books, and go read this:
No direct parallels, but an illustration of how the entire fabric of a democratic state can be captured or cast aside in less than a year, starting from a position without actual majority power. People like you who tried to say “you can’t do that” either got beaten up in their own home, or found themselves in Dachau.
Germany in the 1930s did not give the states as much power as the US does and of course a plurality of Germans did vote for Hitler's Nazis and Hitler was more popular in Germany in the mid 1930s than Trump is in the US now
German States had quite a lot of power. One small one (Brunswick) was responsible for awarding Hitler German citizenship, a power that is firmly Federal in the US system. And a large part of Hitler taking power was gaining the levers of the Prussian police, Goering was made Prussian interior minister and the Gestapo was originally a Prussian police agency.
Prussia was also firmly behind Hitler in the 1930s, California, New York etc are not firmly behind Trump
Trump had a SPD-Zentrum coaliton, from 1919-33. And, that government was overturned by Goering, within months.
By late 1932 hardline conservative von Papen was German Chancellor and he persuaded Hindenberg to make Hitler Chancellor by 1933, a move also ultimately accepted by his brief conservative successor von Schleicher
What was really popular was the new Reich highway code (Bahngebot) of 1934 which brought in various reforms, including banning u-turns on country roads.
'Wage growth in the UK eased to 4.5% between September and November, official figures suggest, following a sharp slowdown in private sector pay increases.
The pace of pay growth for those employed by private businesses slowed to the lowest rate in five years, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
In contrast, public sector workers saw their wages jump but, the ONS said, this was likely due to pay rises being awarded earlier than in the previous year.
Meanwhile, the number of people on company payrolls continued to fall - down 135,000 in the three months to November - with a particular decline in shops and hospitality....The ONS data showed a stark contrast between public and private pay growth in the three months to November.
Annual average public sector pay growth was 7.9% compared to 3.6% for the private sector.'
As ever the people who produce are stiffed by those who suck at the public teat. Unlimited cash to give them rises at twice the private sector and of course more of them on higher salaries whilst the private companies don't have a magic money tree and have to balance the books.
Don’t forget the near 30% employer pension contribution too, and the increments and the extra holidays.
Yes it is incredible and never any productivity improvements for all the wonga flung at them.
So I presume you never received any benefits in kind other than salary.
Well I get shedloads, but the company has had regular culls in the bad times over my 49 years to balance the books and those left have to take up the slack.
NHS England is currently cutting 50% of its staff.
so they have been totally overstaffed for ages then. WTF do they actually do if you can get rid of 50% of them. No doubt there will be a new organisation where they will all get jobs on even better salaries.
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? 30
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? 4
Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 62
Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 24
UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). Reform 16%
Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 20%
Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 9
The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Starmer
Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? No
UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £153billion
UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.1%
Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. Argentina
You have the Senate being retaken? That's a strong bet.
I think the Dems win North Carolina and Maine.
Then it gets much harder. You are basically betting on two of:
Iowa, Ohio, Alaska and Texas.
That's a really tough ask. Not impossible, but tough.
Sherrod could win in Ohio (and he did in 2018). Ken Paxton could be the Democratic dream opponent in Texas. And Pelota could win in Alaska (and came within a whisker last time in the House). And Iowa is winnable on a *really* good day for the Dems.
My guess is that Ohio stays Republican, although Sherrod Brown will get within 5 or 6 points.
I think Texas will be a closer race, but that the Republicans will hold it by the slimmest of margins.
Iowa - the Dems will pickup at least one Congressional District - but not the Senate seat.
Of the four tough ones, Alaska is probably the best bet. Dan Sullivan, the incumbent Republican only has favorables of 38% - that's pretty poor. There's also ranked choice voting. And Mary Pelota only just lost the (sole) House District in a year when Trump won Alaska by 13%. Given it's the midterms and differential turnout will not favour the Republicans, that's probably a decent bet for a Democratic pickup.
So... I'm going with +3.
+4 is not such a long way off of +3 !!
But you've done more thinking than me.
I basically looked at Cook report latest prediction and picked the grey toss-ups and the leans R i.e Maine, NC, Alaska, Ohio.
I am a great believer in Sherrod.
Alaska - the Dem lady who is Peltola not Pelota seems to be running on fish and that has to be a winner in that state!
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? 30
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? 4
Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 62
Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 24
UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). Reform 16%
Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 20%
Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 9
The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Starmer
Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? No
UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £153billion
UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.1%
Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. Argentina
You have the Senate being retaken? That's a strong bet.
I think the Dems win North Carolina and Maine.
Then it gets much harder. You are basically betting on two of:
Iowa, Ohio, Alaska and Texas.
That's a really tough ask. Not impossible, but tough.
Sherrod could win in Ohio (and he did in 2018). Ken Paxton could be the Democratic dream opponent in Texas. And Pelota could win in Alaska (and came within a whisker last time in the House). And Iowa is winnable on a *really* good day for the Dems.
My guess is that Ohio stays Republican, although Sherrod Brown will get within 5 or 6 points.
I think Texas will be a closer race, but that the Republicans will hold it by the slimmest of margins.
Iowa - the Dems will pickup at least one Congressional District - but not the Senate seat.
Of the four tough ones, Alaska is probably the best bet. Dan Sullivan, the incumbent Republican only has favorables of 38% - that's pretty poor. There's also ranked choice voting. And Mary Pelota only just lost the (sole) House District in a year when Trump won Alaska by 13%. Given it's the midterms and differential turnout will not favour the Republicans, that's probably a decent bet for a Democratic pickup.
So... I'm going with +3.
I went with +1 for the Dems in the Senate on the basis that they've looked good to win NC in previous years, and somehow it keeps eluding them, while Collins seems to have a special relationship with Maine voters. I also don't think it's impossible that the Dems really feck up and lose MI. So there are lots of ways to +1 - hold MI and win one of ME or NC, or lose MI and win both NC and ME are the more obvious ones.
I'm surprised people are so bullish on Georgia.
That would be an easy Dem hold, except for the trifling detail that its senior officials (Republicans) are among the world's leading expert at voter suppression even if they baulk at outright falsification.
Comments
BARTIROMO: How do you justify taking over a country when Denmark & Greenland have said they're not interested?
BESSENT: Maria, the president has a very strong view on Western Hemisphere security & believes US should not outsource our natl security, He believes Greenland is essential for Golden Dome
It would be nice if someone actually did a proper package analysis, rather than just spouting shit.
He has his model from the 1930s, which he is pursuing, when aiui the US economy was in the doldrums (toilet?) years longer than other advanced economies.
I think he’d have tolerated her looks for it.
The current one seems to be setting one up.
Did she also say if she had been Prime Minister Ukraine would never have been invaded?
Kemi Badenoch fans please explain.
https://x.com/mohammedakunjee/status/2013204256111706314?s=20
It is entirely in Europe's interest to support Ukraine sufficiently to end the war - which is within its capability. And doing so using Russia's money to help finance the effort would be entirely just.
Chaucer's Wife of Bath had such a gap.
Congress can of course impeach and convict the President and remove them from office.
States can also ultimately secede from the Union if the above fails, the POTUS does not have unchecked power
The Dow was down 728 points, or 1.47%. The broader S&P 500 fell 1.4%. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite slid 1.7%.
To make Canada a leader in electric vehicle manufacturing, we’re working to attract significant new joint-venture Chinese investments.
And as our domestic sector builds up, we’ll allow a limited number of EVs from China into the Canadian market — less than 50,000 next year — providing more affordable, energy-efficient options for Canadians.
https://x.com/MarkJCarney/status/2013378535486800334
If the official one, then Argentina defeats the US 3-1 in the final, but as there were only about a dozen countries competing compared to the breakaway one with more than 20 competitors, including almost all of the European teams, Brazil and others.
State governors can also order state guards and police to shoot SA dead and if necessary to shoot federal troops interfering in elections too. There is no authority under the Insurrection Act for POTUS to take over the State National Guard either and state governors would ignore any attempts by him to do so.
It only takes 5% of GOP representatives to join the Dems in the House and Trump is impeached again
Somehow managed to be pissing off everyone at the moment.
Regrettably whatever you think of Trump he's right.
it's probably better value in terms of our defence relevance. Just.
If we wanted it just to be about finances we'd be safer selling BIOT to the USA.
$ 1 trillion off the national debt.
House Republican leaders have for months turned off the ability for members of the chamber to bring legislation to the floor to oppose Trump's tariffs. That ban expires next week. GOP leaders have to decide whether to tuck that language into a rule today.
It is certainly true that court cases in the US (or wherever) could make Euroclear's business untenable in the future. But none of that would get Russia's money back.
It's a little late, Mr Dalio.
Yeah. I remember watching the build up to the 2020 Australian Grand Prix. Must go ahead, everyone is here, its a sell-out. Gone in a few hours...
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the House? 30
Number of net gains (or losses -ve) for the Dems in the Senate? 4
Number of MSPs won by the SNP at the Holyrood election? 62
Number of AMs won by Plaid Cymru at the Senedd election? 24
UK Party recording the largest poll lead during 2026 and by what percentage? (British Polling Council registered pollsters only). Reform 16%
Labour’s Projected National Share of the vote based on the 2026 local elections according to the BBC? 20%
Number of Reform MPs on the 31st December 2026? 9
The name of the UK Prime Minister on 31st December 2026? Starmer
Will Andy Burnham will be an MP on 31st December 2026? No
UK borrowing in the financial year to November 2026 (£132.3bn to November 2025). £153billion
UK GDP growth in the 12 months to October 2026 (1.1% to October 2025). 0.1%
Winners of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup. Argentina
But I can see the idea got you sightly rattled.
Then invite back the Chagossians, all expenses paid, and turn the area into a UK-owned luxury tourist destination.
Some of the smaller states were quite Nazi though, and Bavaria was always a bit nationalist
Closely watched over there as US mortgages are linked to that tenor point, rather than short-dated rates as is the case here.
The best outcome would be if that turns into a more sustained sell-off that forces Trump to reconsider alienating the entire world outside of Argentina.
Yet in 1932 and 1933 the Nazis won most seats and votes in almost all German states in Reichstag elections from Pomerania and East Prussia to Hesse and East Hanover. From Wurttemberg to Thurungia and Berlin.
Even in 2024 Trump failed to win big US states like California, Illinois and New York by contrast
https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/business/companies/20260120/hanwha-babcock-pitch-korea-uk-canada-partnership-for-43-bil-submarine-deal
Hanwha Ocean and British defense firm Babcock have proposed a trilateral cooperative agreement between Korea, the United Kingdom and Canada to supply patrol submarines for the Royal Canadian Navy.
The partnership proposal is the latest effort by the Korean shipbuilder in its ongoing competition with Germany’s TKMS to secure Canada’s order for 12 submarines worth 60 billion Canadian dollars ($43 billion).
The deal would mark the largest single contract in Korea’s defense export history if successful. Hanwha Ocean and the Korean government have been mobilizing all possible means and seeking support from other major companies, such as Hyundai Motor and Korean Air, to meet Canadian expectations in various sectors.
Officials at Hanwha Ocean said it made the proposal together with Babcock following last week’s meeting on the sidelines of annual bilateral talks between senior defense officials from Korea and the U.K. in London.
"The Canadian Patrol Submarine Project (CPSP) is not just about delivering a submarine platform. It is about building long-term industrial capability and skilled jobs in Canada," said Eoh Sung-chul, president of Hanwha Ocean's naval ship business.
"Through our partnership with Babcock, and with Babcock Canada at the center of localization, we are committed to supporting sovereign sustainment and lasting workforce development for Canada."
According to the Defense Acquisition Program Administration, Korean and U.K. defense officials held in-depth discussions on Jan. 13 on the strategic partnership between Hanwha Ocean and Babcock.
Last September, the two companies signed an exclusive teaming agreement under which the Korean firm would bring a proven, in-service KSS-III submarine platform and extensive shipbuilding expertise, while the British firm would provide sustainment, maintenance and lifecycle support as well as critical subsystems, including the weapon launching and handling system and key torpedo tube components...
I think the Dems win North Carolina and Maine.
Then it gets much harder. You are basically betting on two of:
Iowa, Ohio, Alaska and Texas.
That's a really tough ask. Not impossible, but tough.
Sherrod could win in Ohio (and he did in 2018). Ken Paxton could be the Democratic dream opponent in Texas. And Pelota could win in Alaska (and came within a whisker last time in the House). And Iowa is winnable on a *really* good day for the Dems.
My guess is that Ohio stays Republican, although Sherrod Brown will get within 5 or 6 points.
I think Texas will be a closer race, but that the Republicans will hold it by the slimmest of margins.
Iowa - the Dems will pickup at least one Congressional District - but not the Senate seat.
Of the four tough ones, Alaska is probably the best bet. Dan Sullivan, the incumbent Republican only has favorables of 38% - that's pretty poor. There's also ranked choice voting. And Mary Pelota only just lost the (sole) House District in a year when Trump won Alaska by 13%. Given it's the midterms and differential turnout will not favour the Republicans, that's probably a decent bet for a Democratic pickup.
So... I'm going with +3.
How the coackroaches will laugh at them, as they crawl out of the irradiated wreckage of civilization...
Biden Has a Peloton Bike. That Raises Issues at the White House
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/19/us/politics/biden-peloton.html
Oh dear
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/July_1932_German_federal_election#/media/File:July_1932_German_federal_election_-_Charts.svg
But you've done more thinking than me.
I basically looked at Cook report latest prediction and picked the grey toss-ups and the leans R i.e Maine, NC, Alaska, Ohio.
I am a great believer in Sherrod.
Alaska - the Dem lady who is Peltola not Pelota seems to be running on fish and that has to be a winner in that state!
That would be an easy Dem hold, except for the trifling detail that its senior officials (Republicans) are among the world's leading expert at voter suppression even if they baulk at outright falsification.
I think Ossoff has a tough fight on his hands.