Thursday 30th November 2023

[refitman]

Morning all.

[refitman]

Good news everyone

[AnatolyKasparov]

Jimmy Carter outlives him, maybe there is a god after all.

[gilsey]

[AnatolyKasparov]

RIP Shane Macgowan, genuinely thought he was immortal a la Keith Richards.

[PorFavor]

Good morfternoon.

Alistair Darling has died.

[refitman]

[AnatolyKasparov]

Good morfternoon.

Alistair Darling has died.

Even 70 isn't much of an age these days. Had his faults but was a grown up politician in a grown up government,

[frog222]

Good morfternoon.

Alistair Darling has died.

Even 70 isn't much of an age these days. Had his faults but was a grown up politician in a grown up government,

I remember him being the first UK politician to come clean in August 2008 and say we were in the worst situation for sixty years . But as AK says he definitely was a grown-up !

Just a reminder , article from 2010 basically about his plans for Austerity --

The IFS said that the slight improvement in the state of the public finances in recent months had reduced the size of the structural budget deficit – borrowing that will not be eliminated by faster growth – from £73bn before the budget to £67bn.

Chote said: "Presented with this good news, the chancellor had a choice: to give away his good luck in pre-election bribes, or to bank it and bring government borrowing down more quickly as the recovery takes hold. Perhaps in the face of pressure to do otherwise by the "forces of hell", he has sensibly chosen to do the latter."

Whoops , doing the 'right thing' ....

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/20 ... t-thatcher

[frog222]

Far too kind from Chris --

[AnatolyKasparov]

CM has always had a soft spot for Mr Tony.

And tbh despite his known leanings I certainly did not expect his Institute's tribute to be so uncritically gushing.

[frog222]

CM has always had a soft spot for Mr Tony.
And tbh despite his known leanings I certainly did not expect his Institute's tribute to be so uncritically gushing.

I confess I've only dipped in to the 600 or so pages of this
"" www.amazon.co.uk/View-Foothills-Diaries-Chris-""

which i bought for €1 in town . Each page has brought forth at least a smile

Will try to devote some time for a proper read .

[refitman]

Just in case anyone was wondering, Twitter is looking to lose somewhere in the region of $75M *this month* and Elon's taking it like a champ

[AnatolyKasparov]

Good morfternoon.

Alistair Darling has died.

Even 70 isn't much of an age these days. Had his faults but was a grown up politician in a grown up government,

I remember him being the first UK politician to come clean in August 2008 and say we were in the worst situation for sixty years . But as AK says he definitely was a grown-up !

A lot of people at the time dismissed that as alarmism, but we subsequently came to know how narrowly total disaster was averted that year.

That at least is definitely a point in his favour.

[Sky'sGoneOut]

Question Time came tonight from Doncaster, which my brother and I drove through earlier this year and he was joking about locking the car windows like on National Lampoon's Vacation.

For the Tories we had the 'common sense' minister Esther McVey. I know we're not supposed to mock the afflicted but even Fiona Bruce was getting in on the act, repeatedly bringing up Esther's job title to whoops of laughter, and what made it all the more hilarious was McVey's total refusal to find any of it funny at all, she kept shouting and wildly gesticulating like an angry mad woman which only made it worse. At one point nobody on the panel could even look at her out of embarrassment. All she had to do was go along with the joke, have a self effacing chuckle at it herself, and she'd have been fine. But no, Esther doesn't do humility (or a sense of humour) so she came out swinging instead and ended up looking completely deranged. At one point she even said she agreed with Andrew Neil who'd just spent 5 minutes slagging off her government which brought even more laughter. It was gloriously Bravermanesque.

For Labour we had Steve Reed. Steve didn't have to do much tonight, appearing reasonably sane was enough in response to Esther's antics, which he managed. However he was hardly inspiring. Which I suppose is fair enough given the party he represents. He was so tediously middle of the road he might as well have had a line of cat's eyes stuck on his face. So centrist it should be possible for cartographers to create maps showing how all roads lead to Steve. He managed to get a few feeble smatterings of applause on a night when a Labour MP should have been taking full advantage of the meltdown his Tory opponent was having. But not Steve, he just plodded along, nice and safe, the kind of guy you might trust to check on your house when you're away on holiday but then accidentality on purpose forget to invite to the pub when you get back.

For the Lib Dems we had Layla Moran. As I'm sure you all know Layla has had a family member (a UN engineer) die in Northern Gaza due to the lack of availability of medical treatment. Tonight she went further and explained how another member of her family was gravely ill as a result of drinking contaminated water. As Palestinian Christians they have no dog in this fight, they're 'collateral damage' caught between Hamas and Israel and she was understandably emotional when discussing the situation yet also the most clear headed and hopeful about what needed to be done to resolve it. When confronted by the Conservatives and Labour singing from the same blood soaked hymn sheet and the repulsive partisan nihilism of Andrew Neil she stood her ground and I, and the audience, admired her for it.

For bloated right wing hacks we had Andrew Neil. I say bloated because Andrew seems to have doubled his girth since last time I saw him and his face now looks like it's been crudely carved out of a massive, diseased potato. And despite his best efforts to appear balanced tonight (any fool can slag off the Tories these days) the mask began to slip when he started going on about getting the sick and disabled back to work as if we're all scrounging malingerers, then it completely fell off revealing his true hideous countenance when he offered his opinion on the Israel/Gaza conflict. You see according to Andrew there is no solution so we should simply leave the situation to work out as it will and Israel are entirely blameless. He claimed to have once been a supporter of a two state solution but blamed its failure on the Palestinians and after his entirely one sided and horrific opinion was met with silence from the audience you could still hear him chuntering on about Hamas being worse than the Nazis while Layla Moran was talking. I cannot stress how disgusting I found him.

For comedy we had Zoe Lyons. Zoe said very little and what she did say I've forgotten.

[Sky'sGoneOut]

Refitman

No worries fella.

I hear you're Australian now Father.

[AnatolyKasparov]

Looks like another example of the "fifth guest" on QT being basically an irrelevance - they should stick with four (or even think about going down to three)

[Sky'sGoneOut]

While watching Andrew Neil's take on the Israel/Gaza conflict I couldn't help but think of another person who keeps saying Britain's view would be peripheral and as such calling for a ceasefire would be a waste of time.

Despite the fact the only thing that has eventually stopped the Israelis slaughtering people in Gaza in the past has been international pressure.

Steve Reed tried to claim that by not calling for a ceasefire we (the US and UK) had somehow made the current truce more likely, whereas it looks to me like every prisoner exchange we've ever seen before.

Ritualistic almost.

[Sky'sGoneOut]