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Post by mercian on May 9, 2022 22:15:29 GMT
@ mark 16.17 pm Thanks for that message. I have had no problems today, but yesterday got told that UKPR2 was infected with a virus by Avast. So I couldn`t reach it - I tried my normal route, and later put the full address into my Google search box. Strange that nobody else has reported this I reported it on the old site, as I couldn't get into this one yesterday. |
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Post by mercian on May 9, 2022 22:18:08 GMT
Student who shot Keir Starmer Beergate video is Breitbart writer’s son Ivo Delingpole, son of James Delingpole, filmed footage from his Durham digs Breitbart where the truth goes to die. Media Bias has this to say about Breitbart QUESTIONABLE SOURCE A questionable source exhibits one or more of the following: extreme bias, consistent promotion of propaganda/conspiracies, poor or no sourcing to credible information, a complete lack of transparency, and/or is fake news. Fake News is the deliberate attempt to publish hoaxes and/or disinformation for profit or influence (Learn More). Sources listed in the Questionable Category may be very untrustworthy and should be fact-checked on a per-article basis. On 9 July 2017, Breitbart News ran a story written by chart enthusiast James Delingpole, which carried a characteristically provocative and demonstrably false headline: ‘Nearly All’ Recent Global Warming Is Fabricated, Study Finds In it, Delingpole alleges that a “peer-reviewed” study (first “exclusively” highlighted by the Daily Caller), written by “two scientists and a veteran statistician” found evidence that “much of global warming has been fabricated by climate scientists”: There was no peer review study . This report, published on a WordPress blog run by co-author Joseph D’Aleo — a meteorologist who did not complete a PhD, but who prominently advertises his honorary doctorate on the document’s cover page — is not published in a scientific journal. In other words it was fabricated bollocks Like father like son. So because the father has views you disagree with, the son must be tarred by the same brush? Is this how it worked when you were in the police - the father's a crim so the son must be too? |
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Post by mercian on May 9, 2022 22:20:32 GMT
<button disabled="" class="c-attachment-insert--linked o-btn--sm">Attachment Deleted</button> More brexity benefits. One Brexity benefit is that we can make our own decisions on what to do about Russian oil and gas imports without being vetoed by Hungary. |
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Post by alec on May 9, 2022 22:20:48 GMT
mercian - "It's quite wrong to put the police in this situation. Let's hope they can try to ignore the political impact and just evaluate the facts on a legal basis. I don't care about the result, but think Starmer should have said he would wait for the verdict before commenting. What he has done is pure political opportunism and is very unfair to the police." Sorry, but that's just spin. Police decide who gets fined all the time, and that can have major consequences for an individual. There's absolutely nothing wrong with a public figure saying that they would resign if found guilty of wrongdoing, and that isn't opportunism or being unfair to the police. It's just childish to pretend otherwise.
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Post by mercian on May 9, 2022 22:23:37 GMT
@ mark 16.17 pm Thanks for that message. I have had no problems today, but yesterday got told that UKPR2 was infected with a virus by Avast. So I couldn`t reach it - I tried my normal route, and later put the full address into my Google search box. Strange that nobody else has reported this Happened to me too. Worked OK on my mobile though. That might be because mobiles are usually (in my experience) less secure than a well-maintained and defended PC or laptop. |
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Post by mercian on May 9, 2022 22:27:39 GMT
pjw1961 What a pity they can't spell. Much as I hate to admit it, on this occasion our American cousins are actually correct (albeit probably by accident). The medical and scientific professions have agreed on "Fetus" as the correct spelling, not to please the US, but because it derives from the Latin word fetus, meaning bringing forth of young. Oxford Dictionary: "foetus noun /ˈfiːtəs/ /ˈfiːtəs/ (British English) (also fetus British and North American English)" So it is an alternative spelling, not the main one. |
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Post by mercian on May 9, 2022 22:38:29 GMT
Incidentally, those posters who said I was over-reacting by suggesting that in the wake of the forthcoming overturning of Roe v Wade the American Taliban (aka the Republican Party) would attack other women's and minority rights may care to note that when the Republican Governor of Mississippi was asked to rule out banning IUDs and the morning after pill, he declined to do so, merely saying “That is not what we’re focused on at this time". Hence even women's access to contraception is on the agenda. Also the plan in Louisiana is to pass legislation so that any woman who obtains an abortion and the medical professionals undertaking it will be charged with homicide. These people are just getting started. There are other methods such as something known as a Dutch cap I believe. I'm way past all that nonsense so not too sure. |
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Post by mercian on May 9, 2022 22:42:01 GMT
I agree and would go further. I don't believe Starmer broke the regs but he has to come out fighting now. He should make a statement to the effect that he is absolutely certain he hasn't broken any laws, but if he is given a FPT he will resign as leader immediately This will take pressure off him and put it back on Johnson. In the unlikely event he's given a FPT it is likely he would have to go anyway as the pressure to do do will be immense, so he's nothing to lose by taking the moral high ground. Looks like Labour Party HQ do read the UK polling report site, although as I posted this yesterday morning they were a bit tardy 😀 I've noticed a few occasions when things discussed on here surface as one party or another's latest position within a day or two, and we do have a lot of lurkers! Could be just the zeitgeist of course. |
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Post by mercian on May 9, 2022 22:49:33 GMT
The Tory client journalists are now fulminating that Starmer is putting unfair pressure on the Durham Police and undermining their investigation. There's some truth in that, but again, it's little different to the pressure put onto the Metropolitan police over 10 Downing Street. Their findings could/should really be a resigning matter for Johnson too, the fact that he has so little integrity and so won't resign is not something that should influence their investigations.
I do agree that Sunak seems to be a bit hard done by. Having said that, I haven't seen laid out the exact rules in place during the Durham event vs the Birthday event. No doubt I could dig and find out, but I can't be bothered. They happened (I assume) at quite different times and in different circumstances, so the rules can be quite different, though no doubt that subtlety will get lost in much of the press coverage.
Yeah, there was stage when the rules seemed to change almost every day, which meant that a point came when I just started applying common sense and ignoring official advice, though the two often coincided. |
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Post by lens on May 9, 2022 22:52:32 GMT
Well now you've gone and made me look up the figures. It was actually much worse than I thought. The figures I recalled which led me to state that there were 500 admissions a week of children with covid were only for England (see here under 'Additional Information' - www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/statistical-work-areas/covid-19-hospital-activity/ ). The numbers were at times also much higher than 500 a week. For example, from March 17 - 23rd 2022 there were 451 admissions for under 5s alone, with another 247 for the 6 - 17 cohort. The next seven days gave 474 and 238 respectively, so England had pretty much hit 500 admissions a week for toddlers alone. Alec, I believe you are completely misunderstanding those figures. It states "A supplementary analysis of reported admissions and diagnoses by age category at England level can be found in the file below." It does *NOT* say "admissions a week of children "BECAUSE OF" covid - it is for children in that age group who test positive when in hospital. Which includes children who are admitted for a variety of reasons, but test positive for Covid when there, even possibly being asymptomatic. It's obviously important for the hospital to know about positive test results (even if totally asymptomatic) to limit spread to other patients, but it's completely incorrect to assume that number remotely represents the number of children hospitalised *BECAUSE* of Covid! I did post about these numbers at the time, because frankly I thought it was shocking that so many tiny tots were being hospitalised and no one seemed to give a shit. I'm not surprised that there are posters on here who can't believe the figures, because I think Omicron has given us a kind of national dementia, where we are blinded to the extent of the impacts on children, long covid etc etc. I looked into your figures because I found them hard to believe. Not because "I don't give a shit", but because my wife works in a school (primary) and they simply didn't seem to make sense with reference to what she reports. A high proportion of the children at that school have had Covid by now - but not a single hospitalisation and (as far as she knows) all the cases have been asymptomatic or very mild. Any problem has been down to requiring them to miss school, possibly transmitting to other pupils or staff, and earlier on whole classes having to be sent home. There have certainly been many children catching Covid, but serious illness amongst them (let alone death) has mercifully been extremely rare. Maybe not zero, but it's because serious illness amongst children is so rare that there was the whole debate about vaccine risk outweighing Covid risk in the very young. |
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Post by mercian on May 9, 2022 22:58:51 GMT
mercian - "It's quite wrong to put the police in this situation. Let's hope they can try to ignore the political impact and just evaluate the facts on a legal basis. I don't care about the result, but think Starmer should have said he would wait for the verdict before commenting. What he has done is pure political opportunism and is very unfair to the police." Sorry, but that's just spin. Police decide who gets fined all the time, and that can have major consequences for an individual. There's absolutely nothing wrong with a public figure saying that they would resign if found guilty of wrongdoing, and that isn't opportunism or being unfair to the police. It's just childish to pretend otherwise. So you think that it's ok for the Durham police to (effectively) decide that the Prime Minister has to be changed? Starmer has put them in that position. BTW apologies to everyone for the multiple posts, but some of us have limited time available and have to catch up. Thank you for asking, I just won two rapid-play chess games. My opponent was not very good, a bit like on here really. 🤣 |
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Post by RAF on May 9, 2022 23:09:32 GMT
mercian - "It's quite wrong to put the police in this situation. Let's hope they can try to ignore the political impact and just evaluate the facts on a legal basis. I don't care about the result, but think Starmer should have said he would wait for the verdict before commenting. What he has done is pure political opportunism and is very unfair to the police." Sorry, but that's just spin. Police decide who gets fined all the time, and that can have major consequences for an individual. There's absolutely nothing wrong with a public figure saying that they would resign if found guilty of wrongdoing, and that isn't opportunism or being unfair to the police. It's just childish to pretend otherwise. So you think that it's ok for the Durham police to (effectively) decide that the Prime Minister has to be changed? Starmer has put them in that position. BTW apologies to everyone for the multiple posts, but some of us have limited time available and have to catch up. Thank you for asking, I just won two rapid-play chess games. My opponent was not very good, a bit like on here really. 🤣 The Durham Police had no intention of pursuing the matter at all until the Daily Mail pretty much demanded it. Also there is zero opportunism in Starmer's stance. So many prople had already determined (not least of all the Press) that if he was found liable for even a minor breach, he wouod have to resign. All Starmer has done is gone onto the front foot to meet the ball rather than hanging back in defence. Some in the Press don't like his position because he has seized control of the narrative. One final observation. The idea that the Police would not issue a FPN simply because it coukd result in a significant political resignation has already been demonstrated to be false. The PM was expected to have to resign if he had to pay a FPN, and even intimated he would, until changing his mind. |
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oldnat
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Extremist - Undermining the UK state and its institutions
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Post by oldnat on May 9, 2022 23:39:47 GMT
A reasonable question might be " Why, during strict covid lockdown, did politicians in England [1] make exceptions to the rules for themselves (and use them), which were not available to those mourning the recently deceased etc etc?" One rule for them ...
[1] There may have been similar exceptions in the separate legislation in Scotland, Wales and NI for all I know - but the actual allegations of communal boozing which might provoke that question are, thus far, limited to English politicians. Not boozing certainly, but Margaret Ferrier is the only MP so far to actually be arrested and charged with "culpable and reckless conduct" in connection with Covid breaches. Then there was John Swinney having to apologise for breaching the regulations while campaigning (https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/politics/john-swinney-apologises-after-deleting-23817647) and Nicola Sturgeon's recent faux pas with not wearing a face mask in a shop. I don't mention these to suggest the SNP has a particular issue here, just that the rules varied a lot, people are human and mistakes were made and this was clearly not confined to England. The culture at No. 10 was something else again, and seriously compounded for me by all the continuous lying inside and outside parliament.
Your points about SNP politicians emphasise the seeming difference. Ferrier was charged under Scots Law for her offence. Sturgeon received the appropriate sanction for her brief periods of non-mask wearing. They were not exempt from the laws that applied to everyone else.
The argument being deployed re "Beergate" is that the meeting was specifically allowed under English rules for political campaigning, and thus no offence was committed. I don't suggest that there were no similar exemptions in polities outwith England - only because I don't know if there were or not - but AFAIK no use of such exemptions (if they existed) have been alleged outwith England.
The question that a reasonable person on the Durham omnibus might ask is the sort that I suggested earlier - "Why, under the laws applying to England, were politicians given exemptions from the rules that applied to everyone else, when taking part in their activities?" The presumption of "one rule for them" might reasonably be made when that defence is used - as it has been by Labour partisans on here.
"Partygate" and "Beergate" contain allegations that the rules applying in England were breached. We know that some were and (properly) appropriate sanctions eventually applied. It may be (I dunno) that the meal enjoyed by Starmer et al also broke the rules, but that the lengthy face to face meeting didn't due to a specific exemption only applicable to political activities in England.
It is that exemption, and the use of it by politicians in that polity, that I am suggesting omnibus users across England might reasonably question. |
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oldnat
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Extremist - Undermining the UK state and its institutions
Posts: 6,131
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Post by oldnat on May 10, 2022 0:05:53 GMT
Today is primidi 21 Floréal in the year of the Republic CCXXX, celebrating thrift.
For the Tories, thrift is a virtue to be exhibited only by the less privileged.
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Post by joeboy on May 10, 2022 0:34:28 GMT
The casual reader of Northern Irish election news, i.e. me, concludes that Sinn Fein had a titanic victory. In fact their share of 1st pref votes increased by 1% n they gained no seats. The real winners attracted little publicity: Alliance increased their vote share by 50% from 9 to 13.5% n gained 9 seats. The SFs historic triumph is a vagary of the currently unworkable power-sharing constitution. It is hardly surprising the population is rejecting hard line Unionism n the Tory gov n is searching for centrist solutions. They voted Remain when the DupedUP campaigned for Leave - God knows why - while Johnson offers them Brexit chaos, criminal lies about borders, n like the DimUP has a unique capacity to shirk responsibility. Robbie SF's 2017 result of 27 seats was seen as a freak caused by the vagaries of STV. This time round they held those 27 with ease and nearly gained two more. So understating the SF performance would be a mistake. Looking at transfers it's extremely doubtful the Alliance could have made the progress they made without the Shinners, Also if you took 2019 as a yardstick the Shinners are up 6% while the Alliance are down 3%. |
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Post by joeboy on May 10, 2022 0:37:12 GMT
mercian - "It's quite wrong to put the police in this situation. Let's hope they can try to ignore the political impact and just evaluate the facts on a legal basis. I don't care about the result, but think Starmer should have said he would wait for the verdict before commenting. What he has done is pure political opportunism and is very unfair to the police." Sorry, but that's just spin. Police decide who gets fined all the time, and that can have major consequences for an individual. There's absolutely nothing wrong with a public figure saying that they would resign if found guilty of wrongdoing, and that isn't opportunism or being unfair to the police. It's just childish to pretend otherwise. So you think that it's ok for the Durham police to (effectively) decide that the Prime Minister has to be changed? Starmer has put them in that position. BTW apologies to everyone for the multiple posts, but some of us have limited time available and have to catch up. Thank you for asking, I just won two rapid-play chess games. My opponent was not very good, a bit like on here really. 🤣 |
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Post by joeboy on May 10, 2022 0:52:20 GMT
I trust the Durham police to do their job without 'fear or favour' as does Keir Starmer. It's the BS boy in Downing Street and the Tory whips who are really worried about KS getting an FPN. As for your accusation that the Durham police decide anything about the PM, where does that come from, oh yeah the right wing Tory press who are now Sh*tting themselves because Starmer made the obvious political response. Tory boys may win elections but they're not that bright really.
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Post by robbiealive on May 10, 2022 1:00:07 GMT
Robbie SF's 2017 result of 27 seats was seen as a freak caused by the vagaries of STV. This time round they held those 27 with ease and nearly gained two more. So understating the SF performance would be a mistake. Looking at transfers it's extremely doubtful the Alliance could have made the progress they made without the Shinners, Also if you took 2019 as a yardstick the Shinners are up 6% while the Alliance are down 3%. Thanks v much. By 2019 you refer to the December 2019 GE. There were also local elections in May 2019 which may act as a better yardstick?? In those the SF 1st preferences were static at 23%, so they gained 6% again, while Alliance doubled their share of the 1st preferences to 11% in 2019 and hence gained 2% this time round. Is it the case that the Alliance vote is much more evenly spread & hence they are likely to do better in local and assembly elections. |
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Post by joeboy on May 10, 2022 1:56:42 GMT
Well I think I took a bit of a liberty with the 2019 result, but if you look at the 2017 assembly election the Alliance 'surge' is around 4% of FPV this time round.
One of the features of this elections was Colum Eastwood's fixation on attacking SF at every turn. While that made sense in that SF was his main opposition in nationalist areas, it may also have determined that many SF transfers went to the Alliance rather than the SDLP, resulting in people like Nicola Mallon losing out in North Belfast for example.
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Post by moby on May 10, 2022 4:09:08 GMT
Well I did say he was a bit edgy these days! (Here’s a recent instalment in the saga… youtu.be/J4XuAlpfcng)Nonetheless, I found his latest album as recommended by Old Southendian an interesting listen, not least because it was produced by Radiohead’s producer and it was interesting to hear what he did with it. My problems with Waters go back to 1985. I've been a Pink Floyd fanatic since the Barrett days but I hated the direction Waters was taking the band in, (The Wall, Final Cut) and the fact he sacked Richard Wright from the band. The other members didn't accept his lead and found him increasingly oppresive; he then left and assumed Pink Floyd was over. After a legal dispute Gilmour, Wright and Mason carried on and Waters has never accepted that and has , " commented" frequently ever since. He wrote some great lyrics but the musical talent was Gilmour and Wright imo. This is disputed of course and the vendetta has continued ever since! |
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Danny
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Post by Danny on May 10, 2022 5:18:43 GMT
The culture at No. 10 was something else again, and seriously compounded for me by all the continuous lying inside and outside parliament. All this showed is that politicians did not believe there was any risk from their behaviour. They were right, of course. The real elephant in the room is why when they didnt believe these rules had any point, did they impose them on everyone else? |
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Danny
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Post by Danny on May 10, 2022 5:29:15 GMT
I suspect Durham Police are not investigating the Starmer event because it is potentially a serious breach of the Regs, but simply because they want to be seen to be fair to all sides. The most obvious way in which it is serious is because its the leader of the opposition who was also one of the 650 who made the law in question. Anyone claiming his threatening to resign is putting undue pressure upon police might stop to consider it is only because it is high profile that it is being investigated at all. If this was some random office I imagine the police would simply say its all historic and no longer worth our time pursuing such a minor offense now. It was actually much worse than I thought. The figures I recalled which led me to state that there were 500 admissions a week of children with covid were only for England You do like to have fun, don't you? We know for certain masses of people have been admitted to hospital with covid rather than because of covid. That has been explained to you. We dont know precisely how many, estimated percentages reaching tens of percents (30%?) at times are minimums not maximums. They could all be incidental during high outbreaks of covid, because the great majority of people would have caught covid so anyone going to hospital will do so. Including as soon as they get there, because it was rife. Anyone staying long enough to incubate it would automatically become a positive admission. Hospitals and care homes have been huge causes of death from covid, because sick and therefore susceptible people catch it there. Our hospitals in the main were not designed to prevent patients infecting each other, because of the open ward system. There were numbers at outset saying 25% of covid deaths were coming from care homes. Not surprising, because they were full of sick people in close quarters. Have you so easily forgotten how much hospitals caused covid deaths? One Brexity benefit is that we can make our own decisions on what to do about Russian oil and gas imports without being vetoed by Hungary. What are you on about? This is like the claims on fast tracking vaccine use. The UK as an EU member could fast track its own vaccines, and could ban Russian oil imports. It could also ban immigrants from anywhere in the world except the EU, which was always most of them, but it did not. It is concerning that leavers dont seem to have understood the rules of the organisation they wanted to leave, and believed it imposed so much upon the Uk which it did not. No wonder they made such a huge mistake. |
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neilj
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Post by neilj on May 10, 2022 5:41:51 GMT
Brilliant, one of the unintentionally funniest tweets I have read 😀
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steve
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Post by steve on May 10, 2022 6:26:42 GMT
War criminal Putin's invasion of Ukraine and attacks on the port of Odessa are on the cusp of causing famine for tens of millions as for the first time since the second world war exports from Ukraine of wheat have ceased.
This isn't simply an act of unprovoked aggression against Ukraine it's an act of war against the world.
Russian naval assets in the black sea should be forcibly prevented from interdicting merchant trade.
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steve
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Post by steve on May 10, 2022 6:37:14 GMT
oldnat Where in your grizzled wee heid do you get the notion that I don't make reference to events that occurred more than two years ago , I simply like to point out when posters imply events have just occurred when this isn't actually the case.
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Post by hireton on May 10, 2022 6:48:18 GMT
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Post by alec on May 10, 2022 6:51:58 GMT
mercian - that's just daft. Durham police have to decide whether Starmer broke the law. Evereything else from that point onwards is the personal responsibility of Starmer's and Johnson's. I think it's bizarre that you are now linking Johnson's fate to a completely different investigation. A bit pathetic really, and you are usually way better than that. lens - the idea that people in hospital with covid are only there incidentally is one of those persistent myths. The majority of those admitted with covid are admitted because of covid, but even where they are admitted and subsequently found to have covid (well below half of all admissions) that doesn't mean covid is not related to their admission. Covid makes most medical conditions worse, so this whole argument is a giant red herring. Only those admitted and subsequently infected in hospital can truly be argued to have no covid impact on admission, but that is rare with the Omicron wave. I think it's also an incredibly weak argument to suggest that because your wife didn't see anyone from her school go to hospital the figures must be wrong. There are 24,314 schools in England (https://www.besa.org.uk/key-uk-education-statistics/) which gives you a statistical flavour of how likely it would be for your wife to experience a serious case in her school.
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Post by jimjam on May 10, 2022 6:56:24 GMT
Joeboy
Re: ''One of the features of this elections was Colum Eastwood's fixation on attacking SF at every turn. While that made sense in that SF was his main opposition in nationalist areas, it may also have determined that many SF transfers went to the Alliance rather than the SDLP, resulting in people like Nicola Mallon losing out in North Belfast for example.''
I have a family member in the SDLP and their view is that there are 2 factors at play in these elections 'explaining' the poor showing.
One is the way the FM and DFM is decided which pushes aligned voters for whom that alignment is their main issue towards the main party in the designation.
(The DUP recovery from the shambles of last year to only losing 2 seats would support this notion).
The second is the equivocation around social policy particularly abortion rights with Nicola Mallon being strongly so called pro-life.
As you say, there were more transfers direct that one would expect from SF to APNI and the other way with the SDLP cut out.
Wonder if the Roe v Wade stuff in the US fed this in some voters minds.
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Post by steamdrivenandy on May 10, 2022 7:18:09 GMT
mercian - that's just daft. Durham police have to decide whether Starmer broke the law. Evereything else from that point onwards is the personal responsibility of Starmer's and Johnson's. I think it's bizarre that you are now linking Johnson's fate to a completely different investigation. A bit pathetic really, and you are usually way better than that. lens - the idea that people in hospital with covid are only there incidentally is one of those persistent myths. The majority of those admitted with covid are admitted because of covid, but even where they are admitted and subsequently found to have covid (well below half of all admissions) that doesn't mean covid is not related to their admission. Covid makes most medical conditions worse, so this whole argument is a giant red herring. Only those admitted and subsequently infected in hospital can truly be argued to have no covid impact on admission, but that is rare with the Omicron wave. I think it's also an incredibly weak argument to suggest that because your wife didn't see anyone from her school go to hospital the figures must be wrong. There are 24,314 schools in England (https://www.besa.org.uk/key-uk-education-statistics/) which gives you a statistical flavour of how likely it would be for your wife to experience a serious case in her school. Alec you surely should know by now that Hastings is the perfect microcosm of the UK and if anything hasn't happened in Hastings, it hasn't happened anywhere. They really should move it a bit north of the hills into the Weald and the real world. |
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Post by alec on May 10, 2022 7:21:22 GMT
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