Monday 26th February 2024

[refitman]

Morning all.

[RogerOThornhill]

Good morning.

Badenoch being economical with the truth? I'm shocked...

[frog222]

AK -- good luck with the tooth !
( UA refugees in UK " Getting hold of a dentist here is like seeking a meeting with the King" . No wonder one visited back home for treatment in Kyiv !)

Pitiful stuff all round in the HoC last week --

[frog222]

" It's all a game really, but WTH I've got a nice job ! "

[frog222]

" The full force of the Law should be invoked against UK Jews who are anti-Zionist and criticise the actions of the state of Israel ! " (OK I made that up ...)



Equal stupidity over here, dunno what happened to this --

Senators have proposed a law punishing "Insults against the Sate of Israel "

France-projet de loi: de la prison et une forte d'amende pour toute injure contre Israël!

https://www.espacemanager.com/france-pr ... srael.html

[refitman]

Only the best MPs for us

[AnatolyKasparov]

AK -- good luck with the tooth !

Thanks, have got an appointment this evening.

[frog222]

AK -- good luck with the tooth !

Thanks, have got an appointment this evening.

Luckier than some , it appears !!!

[Sky'sGoneOut]

A faultline has opened in Keir Starmer’s pragmatic politics – and this time none of the usual fixes will work - Nesrine Malik

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... aza-labour

Whatever motion Labour ended up ramming through, it came too late. The party’s first position on Gaza, refusing to condemn breaches of international law (or even call them that), and refusing to call for a ceasefire, has made too strong an impression for it to be erased by any new modifications. It was a position that fed into something bigger: into pre-existing reservations and dwindling faith in the party.

For those the party was trying to bring round, the manner in which it prevailed will only act to reinforce its most suspect qualities – calculating, pedantic, authoritarian. Ready to drag parliament into the mire so it could pursue its manic drive to keep control of a party narrative that now exists only in the leadership’s heads.

What they think people saw was a party seeing off its adversaries and passing a motion on a ceasefire that would placate voters. What others saw was an ugly process that frittered away any goodwill that could have come from whatever meaningful change there has been in the party’s position on Gaza. Emails from MPs to angry constituents read flatly – robotic lists of the virtues of Labour’s new position that sound like a legal exercise in argument pre-emption rather than a genuinely humbled and considered change of approach.

The party is not capable of reflection or sensitivity to the public on a matter that doesn’t sit squarely in its matrix of “electability”. Which is why it will never be out of the woods as long as the war continues.

Indeed.

[refitman]

I haven't had a chance to watch this yet, but I've heard it's very good - if very sad

[refitman]

So...Parliament is doing fine, why do you ask?

[frog222]

I was waiting to see how much Haley had got , because i reckoned that anything over 30% was good , but the early bbc was gushing over Trump's 'huge lead' ...

In fact she got 39.5, showing in a GOP stronghold how many are pissed off with the Orange One !

[AnatolyKasparov]

The deed is done - I am feeling a bit sore (obviously) but hopefully nothing more than that.

[frog222]

The deed is done - I am feeling a bit sore (obviously) but hopefully nothing more than that.

Should be OK ... !

[frog222]

I saw a figure of 6% for the most Far Right Putin -supporting Polish party .

But can't remember if it was for seats or votes !

As with the truck drivers' blockades there is much underhand Russki stuff at work ...

[gilsey]

A faultline has opened in Keir Starmer’s pragmatic politics – and this time none of the usual fixes will work - Nesrine Malik

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... aza-labour

From later in the piece

It’s bad luck though, for both the people and the party, that Gaza is happening at this precise moment in Labour’s history. Because the party has decided that its route to power is through demonstrating, as often and loudly as possible, that it is driven by bloodless pragmatism. Channelling and representing positions that may not have immediate practical impact, but which make people feel as though they exist in a moral universe under a righteous steward, is treated like heresy, like something that will break the spell of Labour’s rise to government............
But even if the party manages to weather the entire Gaza storm, there will be others that it is congenitally unsuited to deal with.

This is more or less what I've been thinking. The Starmer project will struggle with 'events, dear boy, events'.