Tuesday 21st November 2023

[refitman]

Morning all.

[AnatolyKasparov]

Good morefternoon to anybody who is about.

[frog222]

[RogerOThornhill]

Good afternoon.

Gotta love all of the toxic right rubbing their hands with glee over the Argentinian election result and then going...oh...wait...

[notnowsonny]

@sky from the weekend

"On a lighter note I was sitting up having a few drinks with my Dad last night when he began going on about Frenchmen called 'Onion Johnnies' riding around on bikes selling onions when he was a kid. According to him they wore stripey Breton shirts and berets and would ride down the street shouting 'onions'. I couldn't stop laughing and thought he was having me on but he was telling the god's honest truth."

I'm pleased to say that I have a hazy memory from the very early 50s of seeing one of these guys who'd cycled up to my Nan's tied cottage on a farm. Don't think he had a striped jersey, but I feel quite sure that he wore a beret! Whether he had much luck that day I don't know cos my Nan had quite a large garden that was well stocked.

[AnatolyKasparov]

Good afternoon.

Gotta love all of the toxic right rubbing their hands with glee over the Argentinian election result and then going...oh...wait...

Though it is only what every Argentinian leader "has" to say - despite the excited chatter Falklands War 2:0 is about as far away as it has ever been.

[frog222]

[refitman]

Meanwhile, in the USA, Trumps fraud case in NYC doesn't seem to be going so well

[frog222]

[frog222]

[frog222]

[Sky'sGoneOut]

Disabled people must work from home to do ‘their duty’, says UK minister

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/202 ... t-benefits

People with mobility and mental health problems will be asked to work from home or lose benefits as part of what a UK government minister described today as doing “their duty”.

I've never hit a woman in my life but if Laura Trott had said that to my face I'd have punched her. Duty to what? A state which offers the meagerest of mental health services while making sickness benefit claimants jump through endless burning hoops? Has Laura ever been made homeless because a fucking physio working for a private company judged them fit for work despite having zero expertise or experience in diagnosing mental health problems? Because I fucking have and at that time I felt my duty was to vandalise their property. Nearly a year it took to appeal that decision and it was turned over at a tribunal in less than 10 minutes. A year of lies, conveniently lost evidence, missing documents, and various other underhand shenanigans by the DWP. It was a living hell, yet now it looks like those were the good times.

Because now apparently no other mental health conditions besides psychosis will be considered when applying for sickness benefits. Bipolar disorder? Schizophrenia? Nah, you're fine. Get a job.

Cunts.

Whatever Hunt comes out with tomorrow will face legal challenges but as we know from previous victories they're often pyrrhic because the government can retrospectively change the law. Which leaves folks like me in the unenviable position of having to put our fates in the hands of the Labour party. Which is just wonderful.

[Sky'sGoneOut]

As for Whitty, I must agree with a lot of the flak he's taken today. On the surface he has the air of a humble, boring technocrat but under some pretty mild cross examination he betrayed an arrogant tetchiness, a willingness to rewrite history, and a disturbing streak of English exceptionalism which clearly influenced his thinking.

Listening to him today you'd think Covid jumped straight from China to here and what had happened in Italy, Spain and France in the intervening weeks was of absolutely no consequence. All that mattered were UK cases and UK data, so any talk of earlier measures based on what was happening to those hapless foreigners was balderdash. We're British don't you know. And besides even if we had brought in earlier measures they wouldn't have made any difference. Why? Because Chris Whitty said so while politely shitting on the competence of his colleagues who he of course made clear he had the utmost respect for.

The difference between his evidence and that of Vallance was stark, especially his total unwillingness to ascribe any blame to any politician at all. He knows which side his bread is buttered on.

[Sky'sGoneOut]

So two things I learned today, octopuses* are antisemitic and the rain belongs to Israel.



*Octopus is Greek not Latin so 'octopi' is bollocks.

[Sky'sGoneOut]

I'm pleased to say that I have a hazy memory from the very early 50s of seeing one of these guys who'd cycled up to my Nan's tied cottage on a farm. Don't think he had a striped jersey, but I feel quite sure that he wore a beret! Whether he had much luck that day I don't know cos my Nan had quite a large garden that was well stocked.

According to my recently acquired mother in law in Wales they were commonly seen there in the 50's and the pink onions they sold were regarded to be a delicacy but only posh people could afford them.

I'm presuming this was still under post war rationing where even a different type of onion would have been a luxury.

[Sky'sGoneOut]

My pre-reaction to Jeremy's Autumn Statement.

[Sky'sGoneOut]