UK General Discussion:The Rt. Hon Alex Boris de Pfeffel Johnson, Populist Hero

[Antonio the Sixth]

lol 
https://twitter.com/ladyhaja/status/1305548261126795264

"Dear voters, here is what you could have won".

That's terrible news for Ed Miliband

[CumbrianLefty]

On this note I just realised that the three most well positioned corbynite MPs from the 2015 & 2017 intake are Rayner, Sam Tarry and Dan Carden who were all officials in trade unions. They know how to play the game & do the graft.

Although unlike the other two, Rayner actually won a contested selection. Carden's shortlist was thoroughly stitched up, whilst Tarry's primary local challenger was suspended from the party on the morning of the initial selection. Which does give some clue as to how much better her retail political skills are than the other two.

Though the "stitch up" in Walton was to stop "Big" Joe Anderson (or one of his placepersons, at least) getting it, so its hard to be too exercised about that one.

[EastAnglianLefty]

On this note I just realised that the three most well positioned corbynite MPs from the 2015 & 2017 intake are Rayner, Sam Tarry and Dan Carden who were all officials in trade unions. They know how to play the game & do the graft.

Although unlike the other two, Rayner actually won a contested selection. Carden's shortlist was thoroughly stitched up, whilst Tarry's primary local challenger was suspended from the party on the morning of the initial selection. Which does give some clue as to how much better her retail political skills are than the other two.

Though the "stitch up" in Walton was to stop "Big" Joe Anderson (or one of his placepersons, at least) getting it, so its hard to be too exercised about that one.

I see the argument, but for all Anderson's charm and willingness to be a team-player, he might have struggled to rise as high in the PLP as Graham Stringer has managed.

[Never Made it to Graceland]

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-54228079

Least surprising news of the year.

[CumbrianLefty]

So did he or didn't he?

(our PM taking an impromptu break in Lebedev's hideout in Italy, for the uninitiated)

[DaWN]

"We need to do something, this is something, ergo we shall do this"

[CumbrianLefty]

And six months - seriously?

[Cassius]

Time to get those letters in boys.

[CumbrianLefty]

Time to get those letters in boys.

Sorry, what?

[Cassius]

Time to get those letters in boys.

Sorry, what?

To the 1922 Committee.

[Silent Hunter]

And six months - seriously?

Maybe not this level, but sounds realistic until we get widespread vaccine rollout.

[Statilius the Epicurean]

If this lasts for 6 months I might as well top myself. Not even joking. 

https://twitter.com/GdnScotland/status/1308420731294879744?s=20

[Silent Hunter]

The household visit ban seems questionable if you can meet up with someone at a pub or restaurant. The actual distances involved wouldn't change. You might well be further apart in a house or garden.

[Cassius]

The efforts of the various governments to impose it’s-not-a-national-lockdown-but-to-all-intents-and-purposes-it-really-is are really straining credibility.

If we take the new pub rule, for example, Tim Martin (whatever you may think of him otherwise) made a pretty good point saying that people, particularly young people, will simply load up on booze from supermarkets and drink at home (in groups) once 10pm comes rolling round. If the government believes that transmission in pubs is a problem then it should order them to shut again, simply as that. This kind of half-arsed measure amounts to spitting into a gale and hoping it will turn away from you. It won’t solve the problem of transmission in pubs and may possibly (as Martin said) have unintended consequences that will be very difficult to police.

We need to abandon this fantastical idea that lockdown can somehow be ‘fine tuned’ as the situation develops. Either we have a lockdown, which means shutting workplaces, pubs, restaurants, public transport etc to as great a degree as possible, or we don’t have one. Arsing around with local lockdowns, the ‘rule of six’, 10pm curfews et al won’t be blanket enough to majorly curb the spread of the virus, whilst simultaneously they’ll cause economic and social chaos and immense frustration for the bulk of the population.

[Silent Hunter]

This may be an attempt to force a change in behaviour. No-one can really afford a second lockdown economically.

The first one basically failed because someone decided to release people from hospitals into care homes without doing a Covid test first.

[Cassius]

This may be an attempt to force a change in behaviour. No-one can really afford a second lockdown economically.

Yeah, I guess they’re trying to put the frighteners on. I have strong doubts about the wisdom of this strategy, given the incredibly patronising messaging coming from all the governments about the public’s ‘behaviour’.

Yes, there are certain things that individuals can do to minimise their personal risk of catching and spreading the virus, but, you know, if schools, universities and many workplaces are still open then people are inevitably going to catch the virus. Outbreaks of disease can spiral from one unlucky incident. It reminds me a bit of the old IRA adage ‘you have to be lucky every time, we only have to be lucky once’. Meanwhile, as this is happening, many people, who have made sacrifices and had their freedoms drastically curtailed by this virus, will be understandably pissed off at being spoken to like this by our elected representatives and may not be inclined to fall into line like good little boys and girls. Rather than attempting to turn this issue into one of ‘you, the stupid, feckless British public have brought this lockdown upon yourselves’, the government should have developed a strategy to help us live with COVID-19, which we will have to do now that it is essentially endemic in this country, with no vaccine in sight.

[Silent Hunter]

We are definitely making progress towards a vaccine, but we'll probably only be vaccinating high risk groups come Christmas.

[Hnv1]

The household visit ban seems questionable if you can meet up with someone at a pub or restaurant. The actual distances involved wouldn't change. You might well be further apart in a house or garden.

We have those now. Unenforceable ban

[CumbrianLefty]

The household visit ban seems questionable if you can meet up with someone at a pub or restaurant. The actual distances involved wouldn't change. You might well be further apart in a house or garden.

We have those now. Unenforceable ban

And governments know it is unenforceable, but hope to scare enough into complying anyway.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

The first one basically failed because someone decided to release people from hospitals into care homes without doing a Covid test first.

That happened everywhere and was probably unavoidable (if really regrettable) given the pressures at the time. But the thing that went very wrong in England and Scotland was that people who had tested positive were released back into care homes.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

The household visit ban seems questionable if you can meet up with someone at a pub or restaurant. The actual distances involved wouldn't change. You might well be further apart in a house or garden.

We have those now. Unenforceable ban

Even less enforceable here: small unarmed police force, tiny (for the size of the population) standing army.

[afleitch]

The first one basically failed because someone decided to release people from hospitals into care homes without doing a Covid test first.

That happened everywhere and was probably unavoidable (if really regrettable) given the pressures at the time. But the thing that went very wrong in England and Scotland was that people who had tested positive were released back into care homes.

Very true. But it's in part compounded by the fact there was no where else for them to go. It's either a care home, which for some functions as nothing more than a proxy hospital for many, or a hospital which was a no.

As much as there was outrage that people were sent 'home to die' the alternative would have been what did happen for a short while in other parts of Europe; being left to die somewhere halfway.

Obviously that's now given away to a reactive visitation quarantine that has now led to demands to be able to visit relatives. And that is the real fear going into the winter months.

A close friend of mine works at one such home. The harsh reality is that you get someone in who is sick and every winter they are hospitalised once or twice, kept alive, then shipped back to the care home, then back to hospital and this can happen for years every cold and flu season until death. Nothing seasonal is 'allowed' to kill them (as it may in their own home) if it can be helped because it's a sh!t storm if it does. It's a cruel 'industry'.

We are not prepared, either emotionally or in terms of how we deal with this apolitically without points scoring to deal with the real fact that bodies might have to be piled high if this cuts through the vulnerable this winter because it's not possible to do anything with a modicum of dignity if care homes are ground zero and the NHS is overwhelmed.

[CumbrianLefty]

Dishy Rishi handing out more "virus aid" today, though not as much as earlier this year (and almost certainly not enough given all that is likely coming our way)

[Statilius the Epicurean]

This is not a parody.

https://twitter.com/ShippersUnbound/status/1309903624374546433?s=20

[Alcibiades]

This is not a parody.

https://twitter.com/ShippersUnbound/status/1309903624374546433?s=20

Good lord.