UK universities should never have become reliant on fees from foreign students. I can't think of anything more stupid than to arrive at that situation.
Why? It is an excellent export of services with lots and lots of spin offs. Clearly most Universities should have been more careful in their projections instead of assuming never ending growth but having foreign students here has been very, very good for UK plc.
The problem comes from the secondary effects. The dark side of the boom. Which ends in visa fraud.
When people see “students” working 3 jobs to pay for the university course they are too tired to actually attend, this hurts not just the student. It’s fuel to the fire of Reform. Which hurts us all.
A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don't want that to happen, but it probably will. However, now that we have Complete and Total Regime Change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen, WHO KNOWS? We will find out tonight, one of the most important moments in the long and complex history of the World. 47 years of extortion, corruption, and death, will finally end. God Bless the Great People of Iran!
This doesn't sound like someone about to TACO, sadly...
Maybe Iran can say something nice about his hair and buy him a golden toilet to help calm him down?
Hang on, you may be onto something.
The dafter MAGA types have portrayed him as The Emperor from 40k. Who sits in living death upon The Golden Throne for 10,000 years.
Several of the petol stations on the A1 have been out of deisel since last Thursday but I suspect that is buying combined with the Easter weekend.
Most of the petrol stations in Dundee have been out of petrol over the weekend. Diesel a little more available. At the moment I think this is mainly panic buying but real shortages are not far away.
Gorgeous down here on the Wight today, and pleased to be here in our EV. Glad that I am not planning to fly anywhere until October. It is a good year for a domestic holiday.
Unfortunately, from our point of view, its about the third or fourth "good" year for a domestic holiday in a row and we really wanted a change. I think its fair to say that the election of Trump by the US has proven to be somewhat suboptimal.
We really should have had through routes to Scotland and the North on Eurostar by now, but our politicians have no vision.
HS2 doesn't even go to Leeds. Pretty sure Scotland has 'Here there be dragons' on the mental map of Westminster.
From where I'm sitting (on a Shinkansen travelling at 262kmh) our failure to build HS2 beyond Birmingham looks frankly ridiculous.
True. Though it's taken Japan 60 years and they're still not finished. And there have been plenty of problems. For example:
AIUI, the Shinkansen works because it's entirely separate to the regular rail network, a choice that had to be made because the gauge for the regular rail network was unsuitable for faster trains? Lots of money was spent on the infrastructure, but it was spent decades ago and Japan has been reaping the benefits since. There has been some tendency for local politicians to call for a Shinkansen line to their local area and not all of these have been commercially viable.
Still, whatever the reason, the Shinkansen is quicker, cheaper, more reliable, pleasanter, and more frequent than our trains. It is a delight. It's outcompeted short haul flights.
Some of the busiest flight routes in the world are Japanese domestic:
Can we note anything about these routes? Yes. They are all between different islands. Naha is in Okinawa. You can't build a train line there. Sapporo is on Hokkaido. The Shinkansen does now reach the bottom of Hokkaido, but there's no line to Sapporo (although one is being built). Fukuoka is the only one of those that is on the Shinkansen and that is one of the longest journeys.
So, Fukouka isn't outcompeted? At 4h45. And Sapporo won't be when it's reached. Ok.
(Slightly) more people go by train from Tokyo to Fukuoka/Hakata than fly. (You could note that more people also go by train from London to Edinburgh than fly, although that's only half the distance.)
The Japanese fly domestically a lot less than the US or Canada, although they do fly more than us in the UK.
The issue isn't distance, of course, but time and price. 4.15- 5 hours by train LKX to Edinburgh Waverley, 1 hour 20 minutes LHR-Edinburgh Airport. City centre to city centre its about an hour quicker by plane, but the planes leave earlier and come back later. As for price... planes are often cheaper, especially if booked well in advance.
I would never fly London-Edinburgh, unless I was connecting from another flight into London. Taking into account security and arriving early at the airport I don't really see how it's quicker, and the train in so much more pleasant. Since trips to Scotland are normally going home to Fife not Auld Reekie the train is a no brainer.
At this point my loathing for all those Americans who voted for Trump is off the scale .
It's a shame because I lived in the US for five years but in recent years I've really come to loathe the place. Trump seems like the logical end point of their civilisation in a lot of ways.
A whole civilisation will die tonight sounds very much like a threat to commit genocide, right?
Sorry but this is really serious now. If there is even a 1% chance he uses UK bases to conduct a genocide via nuclear weapons, that’s should be enough for us to close access to the bases. Give them 6 hours to get their planes out then send the RAF regiment in.
I think it’s very, very unlikely, but if we’re doing risk assessments then the extreme impact pushes it into the red zone anyway.
At this point my loathing for all those Americans who voted for Trump is off the scale .
It's a shame because I lived in the US for five years but in recent years I've really come to loathe the place. Trump seems like the logical end point of their civilisation in a lot of ways.
I loathe anyone who supports him . But a lot of people in the USA are equally horrified by what’s unfolding . If I ever go to the USA again it would only be to a deep blue state .
A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don't want that to happen, but it probably will. However, now that we have Complete and Total Regime Change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen, WHO KNOWS? We will find out tonight, one of the most important moments in the long and complex history of the World. 47 years of extortion, corruption, and death, will finally end. God Bless the Great People of Iran!
This doesn't sound like someone about to TACO, sadly...
Maybe Iran can say something nice about his hair and buy him a golden toilet to help calm him down?
I dunno. Sometimes the loudest bluster comes before the most humiliating climbdown.
At this point my loathing for all those Americans who voted for Trump is off the scale .
It's a shame because I lived in the US for five years but in recent years I've really come to loathe the place. Trump seems like the logical end point of their civilisation in a lot of ways.
I loathe anyone who supports him . But a lot of people in the USA are equally horrified by what’s unfolding . If I ever go to the USA again it would only be to a deep blue state .
There’s plenty of non MAGA types in even the red states. Usually a rural /big city divide
UK universities should never have become reliant on fees from foreign students. I can't think of anything more stupid than to arrive at that situation.
Why? It is an excellent export of services with lots and lots of spin offs. Clearly most Universities should have been more careful in their projections instead of assuming never ending growth but having foreign students here has been very, very good for UK plc.
The problem comes from the secondary effects. The dark side of the boom. Which ends in visa fraud.
When people see “students” working 3 jobs to pay for the university course they are too tired to actually attend, this hurts not just the student. It’s fuel to the fire of Reform. Which hurts us all.
There is certainly a place for high quality courses offered to high quality foreign students. But the original article is bang on the money IMHO in referring to what's happening as a form of trafficking. It all comes down to political cowardice, with politicians unwilling to fund universities properly or put up domestic fees and instead forcing universities to rely on scamming vulnerable people in developing countries to balance the books. It's a familiar tale of difficult decisions being shirked, and far worse outcomes resulting.
At this point my loathing for all those Americans who voted for Trump is off the scale .
It's a shame because I lived in the US for five years but in recent years I've really come to loathe the place. Trump seems like the logical end point of their civilisation in a lot of ways.
I loathe anyone who supports him . But a lot of people in the USA are equally horrified by what’s unfolding . If I ever go to the USA again it would only be to a deep blue state .
The problem I’ve found is most people aren’t really paying much attention, and their focus is almost always on the domestic impacts, not on the people affected in the region.
A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don't want that to happen, but it probably will. However, now that we have Complete and Total Regime Change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen, WHO KNOWS? We will find out tonight, one of the most important moments in the long and complex history of the World. 47 years of extortion, corruption, and death, will finally end. God Bless the Great People of Iran!
This doesn't sound like someone about to TACO, sadly...
Maybe Iran can say something nice about his hair and buy him a golden toilet to help calm him down?
There really isn't any point in trying to parse his deranged ramblings.
Except he has all the power to make his deranged ramblings reality. 😭
Do you remember when hot politics was about Cones hotlines, Pasty taxes and duck islands?
That was better than this.
Feels like we've been in perma-crisis since the Covid pandemic. Something about that made old guys worry about their mortality, and they've been in a hurry to get things done ever since.
At this point my loathing for all those Americans who voted for Trump is off the scale .
It's a shame because I lived in the US for five years but in recent years I've really come to loathe the place. Trump seems like the logical end point of their civilisation in a lot of ways.
I loathe anyone who supports him . But a lot of people in the USA are equally horrified by what’s unfolding . If I ever go to the USA again it would only be to a deep blue state .
For sure, almost every American I know hates his guts. But Trump is just a symptom of a wider sickness in American culture, IMHO. I can't really stomach them any longer.
Several of the petol stations on the A1 have been out of deisel since last Thursday but I suspect that is buying combined with the Easter weekend.
Most of the petrol stations in Dundee have been out of petrol over the weekend. Diesel a little more available. At the moment I think this is mainly panic buying but real shortages are not far away.
Gorgeous down here on the Wight today, and pleased to be here in our EV. Glad that I am not planning to fly anywhere until October. It is a good year for a domestic holiday.
Unfortunately, from our point of view, its about the third or fourth "good" year for a domestic holiday in a row and we really wanted a change. I think its fair to say that the election of Trump by the US has proven to be somewhat suboptimal.
We really should have had through routes to Scotland and the North on Eurostar by now, but our politicians have no vision.
HS2 doesn't even go to Leeds. Pretty sure Scotland has 'Here there be dragons' on the mental map of Westminster.
From where I'm sitting (on a Shinkansen travelling at 262kmh) our failure to build HS2 beyond Birmingham looks frankly ridiculous.
True. Though it's taken Japan 60 years and they're still not finished. And there have been plenty of problems. For example:
AIUI, the Shinkansen works because it's entirely separate to the regular rail network, a choice that had to be made because the gauge for the regular rail network was unsuitable for faster trains? Lots of money was spent on the infrastructure, but it was spent decades ago and Japan has been reaping the benefits since. There has been some tendency for local politicians to call for a Shinkansen line to their local area and not all of these have been commercially viable.
Still, whatever the reason, the Shinkansen is quicker, cheaper, more reliable, pleasanter, and more frequent than our trains. It is a delight. It's outcompeted short haul flights.
Some of the busiest flight routes in the world are Japanese domestic:
Can we note anything about these routes? Yes. They are all between different islands. Naha is in Okinawa. You can't build a train line there. Sapporo is on Hokkaido. The Shinkansen does now reach the bottom of Hokkaido, but there's no line to Sapporo (although one is being built). Fukuoka is the only one of those that is on the Shinkansen and that is one of the longest journeys.
So, Fukouka isn't outcompeted? At 4h45. And Sapporo won't be when it's reached. Ok.
(Slightly) more people go by train from Tokyo to Fukuoka/Hakata than fly. (You could note that more people also go by train from London to Edinburgh than fly, although that's only half the distance.)
The Japanese fly domestically a lot less than the US or Canada, although they do fly more than us in the UK.
The issue isn't distance, of course, but time and price. 4.15- 5 hours by train LKX to Edinburgh Waverley, 1 hour 20 minutes LHR-Edinburgh Airport. City centre to city centre its about an hour quicker by plane, but the planes leave earlier and come back later. As for price... planes are often cheaper, especially if booked well in advance.
I would never fly London-Edinburgh, unless I was connecting from another flight into London. Taking into account security and arriving early at the airport I don't really see how it's quicker, and the train in so much more pleasant. Since trips to Scotland are normally going home to Fife not Auld Reekie the train is a no brainer.
I've done London to Edinburgh by plane because the earliest arrival into London was earlier and the latest departure from London was later.
I've taken the train many more times, but the timetabling doesn't really help the train option at times.
At this point my loathing for all those Americans who voted for Trump is off the scale .
It's a shame because I lived in the US for five years but in recent years I've really come to loathe the place. Trump seems like the logical end point of their civilisation in a lot of ways.
I loathe anyone who supports him . But a lot of people in the USA are equally horrified by what’s unfolding . If I ever go to the USA again it would only be to a deep blue state .
For sure, almost every American I know hates his guts. But Trump is just a symptom of a wider sickness in American culture, IMHO. I can't really stomach them any longer.
That just sounds like the people who hate on all Russians, to be honest.
At this point my loathing for all those Americans who voted for Trump is off the scale .
It's a shame because I lived in the US for five years but in recent years I've really come to loathe the place. Trump seems like the logical end point of their civilisation in a lot of ways.
I loathe anyone who supports him . But a lot of people in the USA are equally horrified by what’s unfolding . If I ever go to the USA again it would only be to a deep blue state .
There’s plenty of non MAGA types in even the red states. Usually a rural /big city divide
See Texas
Labeling a whole people as evil is the sort of thing that bad people like Trump do.
My wife lived in Missouri for more than a year and has loads of friends there who are all horrified by what Trump has done.
The American side of her family has the ancestral family home on Staten Island, which is the deep red borough of New York City, and they're also appalled.
UK universities should never have become reliant on fees from foreign students. I can't think of anything more stupid than to arrive at that situation.
Why? It is an excellent export of services with lots and lots of spin offs. Clearly most Universities should have been more careful in their projections instead of assuming never ending growth but having foreign students here has been very, very good for UK plc.
The problem comes from the secondary effects. The dark side of the boom. Which ends in visa fraud.
When people see “students” working 3 jobs to pay for the university course they are too tired to actually attend, this hurts not just the student. It’s fuel to the fire of Reform. Which hurts us all.
So you think a good source of cheap labour is a part of the downside? Not sure many cafes and restaurants in Edinburgh would agree with you.
Do you remember when hot politics was about Cones hotlines, Pasty taxes and duck islands?
That was better than this.
Feels like we've been in perma-crisis since the Covid pandemic. Something about that made old guys worry about their mortality, and they've been in a hurry to get things done ever since.
Politically in the UK we had the Brexit psychodrama followed by Covid followed by Truss followed by this (whatever this may be). Exhausted frankly.
Looks like the UK won't be too affected then, has lower imports of oil from the Gulf region than the US as well as Asia
Tankers are turning round. Now.
Which means that deliveries from other sources will start failing to come here.
Who has the most money, out of the U.K. and China?
Who has the most “pull”?
We should drill more in the North Sea again though
That isn't going to help much in the next few months and in the longer term irrelevant in terms of supply.
I am supportive of continued exploration and extraction in the North Sea as a form of import substitution, but the real need is renewables.
I would doubt you could get from lease to an exploration rig onsite in six months.
The North Sea from this point is about not throwing away tax yield in the medium/long term.
It's not even about tax yield, which is predicted to diminish to almost nothing in the next five years. Further exploration at tax-rebated rates won't change that significantly.
From what I can see five moderately useful reasons to open new oil fields:
1. Maintains an asset that would otherwise permanently disappear 2. Provides the UK with an exportable product 3. Continues employment 4. A degree of energy security 5. North Sea oil is extracted to higher environmental standards than elsewhere.
But if renewables and electrification weren't the absolute focus before, they should be now.
Why would failing to open new oil fields make them permanently disappear?
I get that it would be more difficult and expensive to open them in the future due to the need to rebuild expertise and retool, but they'll still be there. The oil's not going to evaporate or seep away. On the contrary, exploiting them is what will make them permanently disappear, and then we'll be completely dependent on foreign sources.
I'd have thought the best approach would be to carefully eke out our remaining resources, maintaining the minimum flow needed for technical reasons and to maintain expertise. That way we'll still have some left when we really need it in the future for applications that are difficult to replace with alternatives.
That requires planning - rather than rabid exploitation for maximum profit NOW, or closure.
Try Norway !
It seems absolutely crazy to me that in the face of accelerating global warming due to burning hydrocarbons and increasing scarcity of said hydrocarbons - which are essential inputs to a variety of industrial processes - the first reaction of so many to increasing prices is, "let's burn our remaining hydrocarbons as quickly as possible." Utter insanity.
The insanity is to be buying in hydrocarbons at an increased cost and with increased pollution and then claiming we are doing anything to help the environment rather than the reality which is that we are making it worse.
Deal with demand. Supply will then deal with itself. But don't pretend you are doing something good when actually you are polluting more and paying more for the privilege.
The notion that we can wean ourselves away from fossil fuels solely by dealing with demand seems naive to me. Demand is of course a function, though price, of supply, and it is extremely difficult to reduce demand without also reducing supply. As soon as the price of energy falls, more uses of energy become economical, energy use increases, and you're back to square one. It is notable, for example, that the recent large expansion in renewable energy supplies has had a negligible effect on the price and consumption of oil and gas.
Fossil fuels will not be priced out of the market anytime soon, and certainly not soon enough to avert environmental disaster. Those claiming otherwise are simply making excuses to continue with business as usual and damn the consequences.
Several of the petol stations on the A1 have been out of deisel since last Thursday but I suspect that is buying combined with the Easter weekend.
Most of the petrol stations in Dundee have been out of petrol over the weekend. Diesel a little more available. At the moment I think this is mainly panic buying but real shortages are not far away.
Gorgeous down here on the Wight today, and pleased to be here in our EV. Glad that I am not planning to fly anywhere until October. It is a good year for a domestic holiday.
Unfortunately, from our point of view, its about the third or fourth "good" year for a domestic holiday in a row and we really wanted a change. I think its fair to say that the election of Trump by the US has proven to be somewhat suboptimal.
We really should have had through routes to Scotland and the North on Eurostar by now, but our politicians have no vision.
HS2 doesn't even go to Leeds. Pretty sure Scotland has 'Here there be dragons' on the mental map of Westminster.
From where I'm sitting (on a Shinkansen travelling at 262kmh) our failure to build HS2 beyond Birmingham looks frankly ridiculous.
True. Though it's taken Japan 60 years and they're still not finished. And there have been plenty of problems. For example:
AIUI, the Shinkansen works because it's entirely separate to the regular rail network, a choice that had to be made because the gauge for the regular rail network was unsuitable for faster trains? Lots of money was spent on the infrastructure, but it was spent decades ago and Japan has been reaping the benefits since. There has been some tendency for local politicians to call for a Shinkansen line to their local area and not all of these have been commercially viable.
Still, whatever the reason, the Shinkansen is quicker, cheaper, more reliable, pleasanter, and more frequent than our trains. It is a delight. It's outcompeted short haul flights.
Some of the busiest flight routes in the world are Japanese domestic:
Can we note anything about these routes? Yes. They are all between different islands. Naha is in Okinawa. You can't build a train line there. Sapporo is on Hokkaido. The Shinkansen does now reach the bottom of Hokkaido, but there's no line to Sapporo (although one is being built). Fukuoka is the only one of those that is on the Shinkansen and that is one of the longest journeys.
So, Fukouka isn't outcompeted? At 4h45. And Sapporo won't be when it's reached. Ok.
(Slightly) more people go by train from Tokyo to Fukuoka/Hakata than fly. (You could note that more people also go by train from London to Edinburgh than fly, although that's only half the distance.)
The Japanese fly domestically a lot less than the US or Canada, although they do fly more than us in the UK.
The issue isn't distance, of course, but time and price. 4.15- 5 hours by train LKX to Edinburgh Waverley, 1 hour 20 minutes LHR-Edinburgh Airport. City centre to city centre its about an hour quicker by plane, but the planes leave earlier and come back later. As for price... planes are often cheaper, especially if booked well in advance.
I would never fly London-Edinburgh, unless I was connecting from another flight into London. Taking into account security and arriving early at the airport I don't really see how it's quicker, and the train in so much more pleasant. Since trips to Scotland are normally going home to Fife not Auld Reekie the train is a no brainer.
I've done London to Edinburgh by plane because the earliest arrival into London was earlier and the latest departure from London was later.
I've taken the train many more times, but the timetabling doesn't really help the train option at times.
If you want an early arrival into London, catch the sleeper the night before. Then the travel time is essentially zero, as you multitask travel with sleeping. And you get a Class 92 in the book for haulage.
At this point my loathing for all those Americans who voted for Trump is off the scale .
It's a shame because I lived in the US for five years but in recent years I've really come to loathe the place. Trump seems like the logical end point of their civilisation in a lot of ways.
I loathe anyone who supports him . But a lot of people in the USA are equally horrified by what’s unfolding . If I ever go to the USA again it would only be to a deep blue state .
For sure, almost every American I know hates his guts. But Trump is just a symptom of a wider sickness in American culture, IMHO. I can't really stomach them any longer.
That just sounds like the people who hate on all Russians, to be honest.
UK universities should never have become reliant on fees from foreign students. I can't think of anything more stupid than to arrive at that situation.
Why? It is an excellent export of services with lots and lots of spin offs. Clearly most Universities should have been more careful in their projections instead of assuming never ending growth but having foreign students here has been very, very good for UK plc.
The problem comes from the secondary effects. The dark side of the boom. Which ends in visa fraud.
When people see “students” working 3 jobs to pay for the university course they are too tired to actually attend, this hurts not just the student. It’s fuel to the fire of Reform. Which hurts us all.
There is certainly a place for high quality courses offered to high quality foreign students. But the original article is bang on the money IMHO in referring to what's happening as a form of trafficking. It all comes down to political cowardice, with politicians unwilling to fund universities properly or put up domestic fees and instead forcing universities to rely on scamming vulnerable people in developing countries to balance the books. It's a familiar tale of difficult decisions being shirked, and far worse outcomes resulting.
And when all those trafficked students go home they remember Britain as the country that scammed them. Great for British soft power.
At this point my loathing for all those Americans who voted for Trump is off the scale .
It's a shame because I lived in the US for five years but in recent years I've really come to loathe the place. Trump seems like the logical end point of their civilisation in a lot of ways.
I loathe anyone who supports him . But a lot of people in the USA are equally horrified by what’s unfolding . If I ever go to the USA again it would only be to a deep blue state .
There’s plenty of non MAGA types in even the red states. Usually a rural /big city divide
See Texas
Labeling a whole people as evil is the sort of thing that bad people like Trump do.
My wife lived in Missouri for more than a year and has loads of friends there who are all horrified by what Trump has done.
The American side of her family has the ancestral family home on Staten Island, which is the deep red borough of New York City, and they're also appalled.
Do you remember when hot politics was about Cones hotlines, Pasty taxes and duck islands?
That was better than this.
Feels like we've been in perma-crisis since the Covid pandemic. Something about that made old guys worry about their mortality, and they've been in a hurry to get things done ever since.
Politically in the UK we had the Brexit psychodrama followed by Covid followed by Truss followed by this (whatever this may be). Exhausted frankly.
And before that the financial crisis and the Eurozone crisis, the Arab Spring, ISIS, and the Russian annexation of Crimea too.
Several of the petol stations on the A1 have been out of deisel since last Thursday but I suspect that is buying combined with the Easter weekend.
Most of the petrol stations in Dundee have been out of petrol over the weekend. Diesel a little more available. At the moment I think this is mainly panic buying but real shortages are not far away.
Gorgeous down here on the Wight today, and pleased to be here in our EV. Glad that I am not planning to fly anywhere until October. It is a good year for a domestic holiday.
Unfortunately, from our point of view, its about the third or fourth "good" year for a domestic holiday in a row and we really wanted a change. I think its fair to say that the election of Trump by the US has proven to be somewhat suboptimal.
We really should have had through routes to Scotland and the North on Eurostar by now, but our politicians have no vision.
HS2 doesn't even go to Leeds. Pretty sure Scotland has 'Here there be dragons' on the mental map of Westminster.
From where I'm sitting (on a Shinkansen travelling at 262kmh) our failure to build HS2 beyond Birmingham looks frankly ridiculous.
True. Though it's taken Japan 60 years and they're still not finished. And there have been plenty of problems. For example:
AIUI, the Shinkansen works because it's entirely separate to the regular rail network, a choice that had to be made because the gauge for the regular rail network was unsuitable for faster trains? Lots of money was spent on the infrastructure, but it was spent decades ago and Japan has been reaping the benefits since. There has been some tendency for local politicians to call for a Shinkansen line to their local area and not all of these have been commercially viable.
Still, whatever the reason, the Shinkansen is quicker, cheaper, more reliable, pleasanter, and more frequent than our trains. It is a delight. It's outcompeted short haul flights.
Some of the busiest flight routes in the world are Japanese domestic:
Can we note anything about these routes? Yes. They are all between different islands. Naha is in Okinawa. You can't build a train line there. Sapporo is on Hokkaido. The Shinkansen does now reach the bottom of Hokkaido, but there's no line to Sapporo (although one is being built). Fukuoka is the only one of those that is on the Shinkansen and that is one of the longest journeys.
So, Fukouka isn't outcompeted? At 4h45. And Sapporo won't be when it's reached. Ok.
(Slightly) more people go by train from Tokyo to Fukuoka/Hakata than fly. (You could note that more people also go by train from London to Edinburgh than fly, although that's only half the distance.)
The Japanese fly domestically a lot less than the US or Canada, although they do fly more than us in the UK.
The issue isn't distance, of course, but time and price. 4.15- 5 hours by train LKX to Edinburgh Waverley, 1 hour 20 minutes LHR-Edinburgh Airport. City centre to city centre its about an hour quicker by plane, but the planes leave earlier and come back later. As for price... planes are often cheaper, especially if booked well in advance.
I would never fly London-Edinburgh, unless I was connecting from another flight into London. Taking into account security and arriving early at the airport I don't really see how it's quicker, and the train in so much more pleasant. Since trips to Scotland are normally going home to Fife not Auld Reekie the train is a no brainer.
I've done London to Edinburgh by plane because the earliest arrival into London was earlier and the latest departure from London was later.
I've taken the train many more times, but the timetabling doesn't really help the train option at times.
If you want an early arrival into London, catch the sleeper the night before. Then the travel time is essentially zero, as you multitask travel with sleeping. And you get a Class 92 in the book for haulage.
I've often gone down the day before and slept overnight in a hotel, but I've never managed to sleep on the sleeper train. My daughter loved it, but I was awake all night. I slept better in the car when we tried driving overnight.
Several of the petol stations on the A1 have been out of deisel since last Thursday but I suspect that is buying combined with the Easter weekend.
Most of the petrol stations in Dundee have been out of petrol over the weekend. Diesel a little more available. At the moment I think this is mainly panic buying but real shortages are not far away.
Gorgeous down here on the Wight today, and pleased to be here in our EV. Glad that I am not planning to fly anywhere until October. It is a good year for a domestic holiday.
Unfortunately, from our point of view, its about the third or fourth "good" year for a domestic holiday in a row and we really wanted a change. I think its fair to say that the election of Trump by the US has proven to be somewhat suboptimal.
We really should have had through routes to Scotland and the North on Eurostar by now, but our politicians have no vision.
HS2 doesn't even go to Leeds. Pretty sure Scotland has 'Here there be dragons' on the mental map of Westminster.
From where I'm sitting (on a Shinkansen travelling at 262kmh) our failure to build HS2 beyond Birmingham looks frankly ridiculous.
True. Though it's taken Japan 60 years and they're still not finished. And there have been plenty of problems. For example:
AIUI, the Shinkansen works because it's entirely separate to the regular rail network, a choice that had to be made because the gauge for the regular rail network was unsuitable for faster trains? Lots of money was spent on the infrastructure, but it was spent decades ago and Japan has been reaping the benefits since. There has been some tendency for local politicians to call for a Shinkansen line to their local area and not all of these have been commercially viable.
Still, whatever the reason, the Shinkansen is quicker, cheaper, more reliable, pleasanter, and more frequent than our trains. It is a delight. It's outcompeted short haul flights.
Some of the busiest flight routes in the world are Japanese domestic:
Can we note anything about these routes? Yes. They are all between different islands. Naha is in Okinawa. You can't build a train line there. Sapporo is on Hokkaido. The Shinkansen does now reach the bottom of Hokkaido, but there's no line to Sapporo (although one is being built). Fukuoka is the only one of those that is on the Shinkansen and that is one of the longest journeys.
So, Fukouka isn't outcompeted? At 4h45. And Sapporo won't be when it's reached. Ok.
(Slightly) more people go by train from Tokyo to Fukuoka/Hakata than fly. (You could note that more people also go by train from London to Edinburgh than fly, although that's only half the distance.)
The Japanese fly domestically a lot less than the US or Canada, although they do fly more than us in the UK.
The issue isn't distance, of course, but time and price. 4.15- 5 hours by train LKX to Edinburgh Waverley, 1 hour 20 minutes LHR-Edinburgh Airport. City centre to city centre its about an hour quicker by plane, but the planes leave earlier and come back later. As for price... planes are often cheaper, especially if booked well in advance.
I would never fly London-Edinburgh, unless I was connecting from another flight into London. Taking into account security and arriving early at the airport I don't really see how it's quicker, and the train in so much more pleasant. Since trips to Scotland are normally going home to Fife not Auld Reekie the train is a no brainer.
I've done London to Edinburgh by plane because the earliest arrival into London was earlier and the latest departure from London was later.
I've taken the train many more times, but the timetabling doesn't really help the train option at times.
If you want an early arrival into London, catch the sleeper the night before. Then the travel time is essentially zero, as you multitask travel with sleeping. And you get a Class 92 in the book for haulage.
I've often gone down the day before and slept overnight in a hotel, but I've never managed to sleep on the sleeper train. My daughter loved it, but I was awake all night. I slept better in the car when we tried driving overnight.
A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don't want that to happen, but it probably will. However, now that we have Complete and Total Regime Change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen, WHO KNOWS? We will find out tonight, one of the most important moments in the long and complex history of the World. 47 years of extortion, corruption, and death, will finally end. God Bless the Great People of Iran!
This doesn't sound like someone about to TACO, sadly...
Maybe Iran can say something nice about his hair and buy him a golden toilet to help calm him down?
Much of that sounds as though he's talking about himself. ..one of the most important moments in the long and complex history...of extortion, corruption, and death..
At this point my loathing for all those Americans who voted for Trump is off the scale .
It's a shame because I lived in the US for five years but in recent years I've really come to loathe the place. Trump seems like the logical end point of their civilisation in a lot of ways.
I loathe anyone who supports him . But a lot of people in the USA are equally horrified by what’s unfolding . If I ever go to the USA again it would only be to a deep blue state .
For sure, almost every American I know hates his guts. But Trump is just a symptom of a wider sickness in American culture, IMHO. I can't really stomach them any longer.
That just sounds like the people who hate on all Russians, to be honest.
Or all Israelis or all Palestinians or….
Like I say, I lived there five years, I Iiked livng there, I have lots of American friends. But I've always found aspects of their culture deeply troubling and the truth is those aspects are very much in the ascendancy right now, and I am doubtful that process is going into reverse. We only have one planet and I'm getting sick of sharing it with people whose ignorance of the rest of the world is matched only by their belligerence towards it.
The Spectator Index @spectatorindex · 42m BREAKING: Iran's Revolutionary Guards announces all restraint in targeting will be ending and it will strike infrastructure in a way that could deprive US and regional countries of oil and gas resources for years.
People who were sceptical of the war at the start might have to conclude that it was right to stop Iran in its tracks before it became invulnerable.
Er no. We all know that Iran had the capability to do this. Indeed it was one of the reasons so many people thought Trump was a lunatic for kicking the wasps nest.
You deserve no sympathy if you kick a slumbering wasps nest and then complain when you get stung.
The Banque de France has announced that it has effectively repatriated their gold reserves. Poland has already done this. New York and London are losing their warehousing role in the global gold market. Every day, the power of the US markets is being eroded. The devaluation of both currency and markets is slow, but it is inevitable. The US scored highly when they respected rule of law and predictable commercial regulation. Now, that is no longer true and the Dollar is looking ever more unsettled. In the back of my mind I keep reminding myself that the US economy is about 25% of global GDP, but US markets about 60% of market capitalisation... that is going to change and with it the Dollar as the only reserve currency.
Last night I met an American who a few months ago made no bones about having voted for Trump. When the subject came up yesterday he had tears in his eyes. The unfolding disaster is obvious to all. Now, no matter what, the US is going to get its ass severely kicked. Its the kind of fuck up that we have seen before- Rome, Yuan China, the British and French Empires...
At this point my loathing for all those Americans who voted for Trump is off the scale .
It's a shame because I lived in the US for five years but in recent years I've really come to loathe the place. Trump seems like the logical end point of their civilisation in a lot of ways.
I loathe anyone who supports him . But a lot of people in the USA are equally horrified by what’s unfolding . If I ever go to the USA again it would only be to a deep blue state .
There’s plenty of non MAGA types in even the red states. Usually a rural /big city divide
See Texas
Labeling a whole people as evil is the sort of thing that bad people like Trump do.
My wife lived in Missouri for more than a year and has loads of friends there who are all horrified by what Trump has done.
The American side of her family has the ancestral family home on Staten Island, which is the deep red borough of New York City, and they're also appalled.
A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don't want that to happen, but it probably will. However, now that we have Complete and Total Regime Change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen, WHO KNOWS? We will find out tonight, one of the most important moments in the long and complex history of the World. 47 years of extortion, corruption, and death, will finally end. God Bless the Great People of Iran!
So Trump, aided and abetted by Israel, is bragging they’re planning to commit Genocide. I’m not sure even the most bloodthirsty on here could defend that.
Israeli airstrikes have targeted 10 crucial railway networks running into Tehran isolating it from rail reinforcement, Israeli sources propose this is to prevent reinforcement by IRGC units in case of mass civil unrest.
A whole civilisation will die tonight sounds very much like a threat to commit genocide, right?
Sorry but this is really serious now. If there is even a 1% chance he uses UK bases to conduct a genocide via nuclear weapons, that’s should be enough for us to close access to the bases. Give them 6 hours to get their planes out then send the RAF regiment in.
I think it’s very, very unlikely, but if we’re doing risk assessments then the extreme impact pushes it into the red zone anyway.
"I hope they make the right response," says @VP on Iran.
"They've got to know, we've got tools in our toolkit that we so far haven't decided to use. @POTUS can decide to use them, and he will decide to use them if the Iranians don't change their course of conduct."
At this point my loathing for all those Americans who voted for Trump is off the scale .
It's a shame because I lived in the US for five years but in recent years I've really come to loathe the place. Trump seems like the logical end point of their civilisation in a lot of ways.
I loathe anyone who supports him . But a lot of people in the USA are equally horrified by what’s unfolding . If I ever go to the USA again it would only be to a deep blue state .
There’s plenty of non MAGA types in even the red states. Usually a rural /big city divide
Do you remember when hot politics was about Cones hotlines, Pasty taxes and duck islands?
That was better than this.
Feels like we've been in perma-crisis since the Covid pandemic. Something about that made old guys worry about their mortality, and they've been in a hurry to get things done ever since.
Politically in the UK we had the Brexit psychodrama followed by Covid followed by Truss followed by this (whatever this may be). Exhausted frankly.
And before that the financial crisis and the Eurozone crisis, the Arab Spring, ISIS, and the Russian annexation of Crimea too.
Thank god history ended. Don't know how we would have coped otherwise.
A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don't want that to happen, but it probably will. However, now that we have Complete and Total Regime Change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen, WHO KNOWS? We will find out tonight, one of the most important moments in the long and complex history of the World. 47 years of extortion, corruption, and death, will finally end. God Bless the Great People of Iran!
This doesn't sound like someone about to TACO, sadly...
Maybe Iran can say something nice about his hair and buy him a golden toilet to help calm him down?
Hang on, you may be onto something.
The dafter MAGA types have portrayed him as The Emperor from 40k. Who sits in living death upon The Golden Throne for 10,000 years.
There's a number of Ukrainian drone groups who use Warhammer imagery and iconography. I've known about the Khorne group for a while, and I just saw another UAV unit using the symbol for the Inquisition. I wonder if they'd seen the Monty Python sketch?
At this point my loathing for all those Americans who voted for Trump is off the scale .
Your focus is wrong imo. It ought to be on the awfulness of the Iranian regime.
They're not the ones threatening to end a whole Civilisation!
Purely in a fit of pique when they won’t accede to his demands after he, and Bart’s lot, attacked them during a negotiation which was, according to the Omanis, going well.
Why wouldn’t the Iranians not want a Nuke after this ?
If they had one and the means to deliver this wouldn’t even be an issue.
At this point my loathing for all those Americans who voted for Trump is off the scale .
Your focus is wrong imo. It ought to be on the awfulness of the Iranian regime.
What focus? It's possible, indeed the only moral outcome, to hate both. The Manicheanism of the right, on full and pitiful display in your post, is why we're in this mess.
At this point my loathing for all those Americans who voted for Trump is off the scale .
Your focus is wrong imo. It ought to be on the awfulness of the Iranian regime.
They're not the ones threatening to end a whole Civilisation!
Purely in a fit of pique when they won’t accede to his demands after he, and Bart’s lot, attacked them during a negotiation which was, according to the Omanis, going well.
Why wouldn’t the Iranians not want a Nuke after this ?
If they had one and the means to deliver this wouldn’t even be an issue.
The only way to guarantee not being attacked is to get a nuke .
A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don't want that to happen, but it probably will. However, now that we have Complete and Total Regime Change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen, WHO KNOWS? We will find out tonight, one of the most important moments in the long and complex history of the World. 47 years of extortion, corruption, and death, will finally end. God Bless the Great People of Iran!
So Trump, aided and abetted by Israel, is bragging they’re planning to commit Genocide. I’m not sure even the most bloodthirsty on here could defend that.
Israeli airstrikes have targeted 10 crucial railway networks running into Tehran isolating it from rail reinforcement, Israeli sources propose this is to prevent reinforcement by IRGC units in case of mass civil unrest.
Insane. After all the maiming and death and destruction they've inflicted on Iranian people, they still expect the Iranian people to support them over the regime. They have completely lost it. "We'll keep bombing them until they support us".
If Trump commits genocide tonight, should the King still visit?
I’m sure SKS will allow it as long as due process is followed.
the King visits because cancelling it will result in the UK being the next country Trump targets - remember even though we aren’t drilling for North Sea oil we have some
A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don't want that to happen, but it probably will. However, now that we have Complete and Total Regime Change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen, WHO KNOWS? We will find out tonight, one of the most important moments in the long and complex history of the World. 47 years of extortion, corruption, and death, will finally end. God Bless the Great People of Iran!
So Trump, aided and abetted by Israel, is bragging they’re planning to commit Genocide. I’m not sure even the most bloodthirsty on here could defend that.
At this point my loathing for all those Americans who voted for Trump is off the scale .
It's a shame because I lived in the US for five years but in recent years I've really come to loathe the place. Trump seems like the logical end point of their civilisation in a lot of ways.
I loathe anyone who supports him . But a lot of people in the USA are equally horrified by what’s unfolding . If I ever go to the USA again it would only be to a deep blue state .
For sure, almost every American I know hates his guts. But Trump is just a symptom of a wider sickness in American culture, IMHO. I can't really stomach them any longer.
That just sounds like the people who hate on all Russians, to be honest.
Or all Israelis or all Palestinians or….
Like I say, I lived there five years, I Iiked livng there, I have lots of American friends. But I've always found aspects of their culture deeply troubling and the truth is those aspects are very much in the ascendancy right now, and I am doubtful that process is going into reverse. We only have one planet and I'm getting sick of sharing it with people whose ignorance of the rest of the world is matched only by their belligerence towards it.
But aren't we slowly going the same way?
Look at what is happening right now in the world then remind yourself that 30% of our fellow citizens would vote for a party that supports Trump and Putin. It could well be our undoing as well.
At this point my loathing for all those Americans who voted for Trump is off the scale .
Your focus is wrong imo. It ought to be on the awfulness of the Iranian regime.
They're not the ones threatening to end a whole Civilisation!
Purely in a fit of pique when they won’t accede to his demands after he, and Bart’s lot, attacked them during a negotiation which was, according to the Omanis, going well.
Why wouldn’t the Iranians not want a Nuke after this ?
If they had one and the means to deliver this wouldn’t even be an issue.
How many nuclear powers are there already?
The five with vetos on the security council - US, Russia, Britain, France, China. The four we know, or think we know, about - North Korea, India, Pakistan, Israel. So that's nine in total.
Assuming the US/Israel fail to topple the Iranian regime and/or secure their enriched uranium, we can assume that Iran will then do so, followed by Saudi Arabia (+2).
Widely assumed that Taiwan, South Korea and Japan are on the brink and would go nuclear if the US stops being seen as a reliable ally (+3).
Israeli airstrikes have targeted 10 crucial railway networks running into Tehran isolating it from rail reinforcement, Israeli sources propose this is to prevent reinforcement by IRGC units in case of mass civil unrest.
Insane. After all the maiming and death and destruction they've inflicted on Iranian people, they still expect the Iranian people to support them over the regime. They have completely lost it. "We'll keep bombing them until they support us".
You can target anything civilian and it not be a war crime, as long as you label it ‘terrorist’ or claim the IrGC could use it, it seems.
Israeli airstrikes have targeted 10 crucial railway networks running into Tehran isolating it from rail reinforcement, Israeli sources propose this is to prevent reinforcement by IRGC units in case of mass civil unrest.
Insane. After all the maiming and death and destruction they've inflicted on Iranian people, they still expect the Iranian people to support them over the regime. They have completely lost it. "We'll keep bombing them until they support us".
Doubt it was ever expected. The purpose is to degrade Iran so it can no longer contest the region and maintain this state with air power. Like Israel’s actions in Syria, Lebanon and Gaza. And similar to the two American led wars in Iraq.
If Trump commits genocide tonight, should the King still visit?
"Please, I like America! Fancy schmancy! What a cinch! Go fly a kite! Cat got your tongue! Hill of beans! Karoline Leavitt, what a dish! Kristi Noem, nice gams!"
That feeling of defeat when you read the news at lunch and find it impossible to concentrate on work afterwards. I don’t like handing away my attention for free, especially to people who operate with no wisdom, respect or dignity.
A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don't want that to happen, but it probably will. However, now that we have Complete and Total Regime Change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen, WHO KNOWS? We will find out tonight, one of the most important moments in the long and complex history of the World. 47 years of extortion, corruption, and death, will finally end. God Bless the Great People of Iran!
So Trump, aided and abetted by Israel, is bragging they’re planning to commit Genocide. I’m not sure even the most bloodthirsty on here could defend that.
A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don't want that to happen, but it probably will. However, now that we have Complete and Total Regime Change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen, WHO KNOWS? We will find out tonight, one of the most important moments in the long and complex history of the World. 47 years of extortion, corruption, and death, will finally end. God Bless the Great People of Iran!
This doesn't sound like someone about to TACO, sadly...
Maybe Iran can say something nice about his hair and buy him a golden toilet to help calm him down?
Doing it would be TACO. Dropping wanton death and destruction on a defenceless population from the skies is as cowardly as it's evil. The route that takes some gumption is either a ground operation or (better) a ceasefire and negotiation.
That feeling of defeat when you read the news at lunch and find it impossible to concentrate on work afterwards. I don’t like handing away my attention for free, especially to people who operate with no wisdom, respect or dignity.
A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don't want that to happen, but it probably will. However, now that we have Complete and Total Regime Change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen, WHO KNOWS? We will find out tonight, one of the most important moments in the long and complex history of the World. 47 years of extortion, corruption, and death, will finally end. God Bless the Great People of Iran!
This doesn't sound like someone about to TACO, sadly...
Maybe Iran can say something nice about his hair and buy him a golden toilet to help calm him down?
There really isn't any point in trying to parse his deranged ramblings.
Except he has all the power to make his deranged ramblings reality. 😭
That feeling of defeat when you read the news at lunch and find it impossible to concentrate on work afterwards. I don’t like handing away my attention for free, especially to people who operate with no wisdom, respect or dignity.
And yet you’re a PB regular?
Was a regular. I think this is my fourth post of the year. Politics is far too mad these days to healthily engage with. Was seduced in a moment of weakness by today’s events. It’s difficult.
"Trump Denial Syndrome is an affliction where the poor, misguided victim denies that Donald J. Trump is the worst U.S. President in history. In particular, the victim denies that Trump is completely unfit to hold the Office of POTUS by his temperament, actions, and language, denies that the Trump is a racist and misogynist, and denies that he is self-confessed "pussy-grabber". The victim will also deny that Trump is steadily going senile and is increasingly unhinged to put it politely. Moreover, the victim will deny that Trump's opponent Joe Biden won the 2020 Presidential Election fair and square."
Israeli airstrikes have targeted 10 crucial railway networks running into Tehran isolating it from rail reinforcement, Israeli sources propose this is to prevent reinforcement by IRGC units in case of mass civil unrest.
Insane. After all the maiming and death and destruction they've inflicted on Iranian people, they still expect the Iranian people to support them over the regime. They have completely lost it. "We'll keep bombing them until they support us".
'Cause when push comes to shove I will kill your friends and family to remind you of my love Da-da-da, dat-da, dat, da-da-da, da-ya-da
A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don't want that to happen, but it probably will. However, now that we have Complete and Total Regime Change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen, WHO KNOWS? We will find out tonight, one of the most important moments in the long and complex history of the World. 47 years of extortion, corruption, and death, will finally end. God Bless the Great People of Iran!
This doesn't sound like someone about to TACO, sadly...
Maybe Iran can say something nice about his hair and buy him a golden toilet to help calm him down?
Hang on, you may be onto something.
The dafter MAGA types have portrayed him as The Emperor from 40k. Who sits in living death upon The Golden Throne for 10,000 years.
There's a number of Ukrainian drone groups who use Warhammer imagery and iconography. I've known about the Khorne group for a while, and I just saw another UAV unit using the symbol for the Inquisition. I wonder if they'd seen the Monty Python sketch?
Quite likely - the Russians and Ukranians I know seem to appreciate the anarchic humour of Monty Python
At this point my loathing for all those Americans who voted for Trump is off the scale .
Your focus is wrong imo. It ought to be on the awfulness of the Iranian regime.
They're not the ones threatening to end a whole Civilisation!
Purely in a fit of pique when they won’t accede to his demands after he, and Bart’s lot, attacked them during a negotiation which was, according to the Omanis, going well.
Why wouldn’t the Iranians not want a Nuke after this ?
If they had one and the means to deliver this wouldn’t even be an issue.
How many nuclear powers are there already?
The five with vetos on the security council - US, Russia, Britain, France, China. The four we know, or think we know, about - North Korea, India, Pakistan, Israel. So that's nine in total.
Assuming the US/Israel fail to topple the Iranian regime and/or secure their enriched uranium, we can assume that Iran will then do so, followed by Saudi Arabia (+2).
Widely assumed that Taiwan, South Korea and Japan are on the brink and would go nuclear if the US stops being seen as a reliable ally (+3).
Any others?
Ukraine needs to be given back the one they gave up.
That feeling of defeat when you read the news at lunch and find it impossible to concentrate on work afterwards. I don’t like handing away my attention for free, especially to people who operate with no wisdom, respect or dignity.
And yet you’re a PB regular?
Was a regular. I think this is my fourth post of the year. Politics is far too mad these days to healthily engage with. Was seduced in a moment of weakness by today’s events. It’s difficult.
A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don't want that to happen, but it probably will. However, now that we have Complete and Total Regime Change, where different, smarter, and less radicalized minds prevail, maybe something revolutionarily wonderful can happen, WHO KNOWS? We will find out tonight, one of the most important moments in the long and complex history of the World. 47 years of extortion, corruption, and death, will finally end. God Bless the Great People of Iran!
Within the definition of genocide. No question at all.
Comments
When people see “students” working 3 jobs to pay for the university course they are too tired to actually attend, this hurts not just the student. It’s fuel to the fire of Reform. Which hurts us all.
That was better than this.
The dafter MAGA types have portrayed him as The Emperor from 40k. Who sits in living death upon The Golden Throne for 10,000 years.
I think it’s very, very unlikely, but if we’re doing risk assessments then the extreme impact pushes it into the red zone anyway.
See Texas
I've taken the train many more times, but the timetabling doesn't really help the train option at times.
Or all Israelis or all Palestinians or….
My wife lived in Missouri for more than a year and has loads of friends there who are all horrified by what Trump has done.
The American side of her family has the ancestral family home on Staten Island, which is the deep red borough of New York City, and they're also appalled.
Fossil fuels will not be priced out of the market anytime soon, and certainly not soon enough to avert environmental disaster. Those claiming otherwise are simply making excuses to continue with business as usual and damn the consequences.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLQbPCvV8W8
https://www.itv.com/news/2026-04-07/kanye-west-blocked-from-entering-uk-ahead-of-wireless-performance
..one of the most important moments in the long and complex history...of extortion, corruption, and death..
Last night I met an American who a few months ago made no bones about having voted for Trump. When the subject came up yesterday he had tears in his eyes. The unfolding disaster is obvious to all. Now, no matter what, the US is going to get its ass severely kicked. Its the kind of fuck up that we have seen before- Rome, Yuan China, the British and French Empires...
Israeli airstrikes have targeted 10 crucial railway networks running into Tehran isolating it from rail reinforcement, Israeli sources propose this is to prevent reinforcement by IRGC units in case of mass civil unrest.
When asked, SKS - “all due process was followed.”
"I hope they make the right response," says @VP on Iran.
"They've got to know, we've got tools in our toolkit that we so far haven't decided to use. @POTUS can decide to use them, and he will decide to use them if the Iranians don't change their course of conduct."
https://x.com/rapidresponse47/status/2041496262663426182?s=46&t=CW4pL-mMpTqsJXCdjW0Z6Q
Why wouldn’t the Iranians not want a Nuke after this ?
If they had one and the means to deliver this wouldn’t even be an issue.
Wireless festival cancelled following Kanye West's banning from the UK, say organisers
Ukraine learnt this the hard way .
Look at what is happening right now in the world then remind yourself that 30% of our fellow citizens would vote for a party that supports Trump and Putin. It could well be our undoing as well.
“The Iranians are animals. That’s why blowing up their bridges and power stations isn’t a war crime.”
The five with vetos on the security council - US, Russia, Britain, France, China.
The four we know, or think we know, about - North Korea, India, Pakistan, Israel.
So that's nine in total.
Assuming the US/Israel fail to topple the Iranian regime and/or secure their enriched uranium, we can assume that Iran will then do so, followed by Saudi Arabia (+2).
Widely assumed that Taiwan, South Korea and Japan are on the brink and would go nuclear if the US stops being seen as a reliable ally (+3).
Any others?
They hit the Sabic plant this morning. That’s a major escalation.
Is this additional.
‘ Members of the Iranian Jewish community inspect what is left of their synagogue in Tehran after Israel bombed it. On Passover...’
https://x.com/tparsi/status/2041489784615416316?s=61
God, I hope not. I used to deal with ITW there. Good people.
There’s one by Barton Under Needwood too, or was.
This one was ‘frying tonight’
https://x.com/currentreport1/status/2041318554822463967?s=61
https://www.iranintl.com/en/202604074692
Trump Denial Syndrome (TDS) - n.
"Trump Denial Syndrome is an affliction where the poor, misguided victim denies that Donald J. Trump is the worst U.S. President in history. In particular, the victim denies that Trump is completely unfit to hold the Office of POTUS by his temperament, actions, and language, denies that the Trump is a racist and misogynist, and denies that he is self-confessed "pussy-grabber". The victim will also deny that Trump is steadily going senile and is increasingly unhinged to put it politely. Moreover, the victim will deny that Trump's opponent Joe Biden won the 2020 Presidential Election fair and square."
I will kill your friends and family to remind you of my love
Da-da-da, dat-da, dat, da-da-da, da-ya-da