Friday 14th March 2025

[refitman]

Morning all.

[Frog222]

Morning refit
Having read @Sky on Emma Reynolds I went on to check last night's Polly on the subject ... I was wondering when the WCA monnicker would come up, if at all ...... but she got close with this -

" Even in the time of truly vicious jobcentre persecution of claimants with sanctions, punishment didn’t work. Chivvying may urge some people into work, but research shows it has the contrary effect on those with mental ill-health. "

She also made the point that bloody poverty , plus poor physical health etcetc would drive anyone into 'mental ill-health'.

Points also made -
like Sky with DNS links, expenditure %GNP has NOT exploded .
International comparisons, UK no higher than comparable countries.
UK working conditions have declined considerably compared again to other countries , leading to ""ill-health"" surprise .

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... employment

[Frog222]

Daughter uses short, max 3mins ,youtubes in her English teaching to get the ears used to the language PLUS the youtube 'transcript'

BUT that is a long unpunctuated spiel, so she asks Chat GPT to put it into usable form,
Ten seconds later she has that teaching aid which would have taken her ages just a few years ago.

[refitman]

Nothing to see here, just Scottish Labour being terrible

[Frog222]

Only five minutes --



Nicolle on Mad King Donny --

[refitman]

No, Labour aren't going to cut benefits. It's all just been made up by the media. I mean, just listen to Reeves, she's fully behind making sure disabled people are fully funded & supported...oh

[Frog222]

I do wonder if English judges could act like this in the case of a Government Gone Mad ?

[refitman]

Wouldn't it be lovely if our Chancellor understood how tax & benefits work

[RogerOThornhill]

This goes in the "Well I never!" and "Shocked, shocked!" pile...it was screamingly obvious what was going on with this.

[Frog222]

WHAT a contrast ------------->

Why Apple Co-founder Steve Wozniak Is Not A Billionaire
In an interview with Fortune, the tech entrepreneur shared his investment strategy. "I do not invest. I don't do that stuff," Wozniak said. "I didn't want to be near money because it could corrupt your values."Nov 10, 2023

Not much more than an informed whinge about Tesla's technology, IE shit !

[Frog222]

Two ace Putinologists
Catherine Elizabeth Belton MBE is a British journalist and writer. From 2007 to 2013, she was the Moscow correspondent for the Financial Times. In Putin's People: How the KGB Took Back Russia and Then Took On the West, published in 2020, Belton explored the rise of Russian president Vladimir Putin. Wikipedia

[AnatolyKasparov]

No, Labour aren't going to cut benefits. It's all just been made up by the media. I mean, just listen to Reeves, she's fully behind making sure disabled people are fully funded & supported...oh

Well if you believe the Telegraph (I know, but still) they aren't going to cut PIP at any rate.

(of course, the Barclaygraph framed this as a "u-turn")

[refitman]

No, Labour aren't going to cut benefits. It's all just been made up by the media. I mean, just listen to Reeves, she's fully behind making sure disabled people are fully funded & supported...oh

Well if you believe the Telegraph (I know, but still) they aren't going to cut PIP at any rate.

(of course, the Barclaygraph framed this as a "u-turn")

It would be amazing to have your utter, blind optimism in anything. Can you please, please point me to a single thing that the government have done or said that doesn't give the impression that they consider ALL disabled people are feckless shirkers, who need to get off the bums and 'give themselves the freedom of work'.

[refitman]

I'm sure JRF are just scaremongering and don't actually believe Labour are going to harm people

[Sky'sGoneOut]

To be honest I'm just doing my best to ignore all the benefit stuff now until they make the announcement. One thing's for sure though, regardless of the outcome I'll never forgive or forget the way Starmer, Reeves and their cronies have lied, purposely misrepresented statistics, and generally behaved appallingly in order to justify impoverishing the sick and disabled in a way even the Tories couldn't stomach.

On another note, I'd been mucking about with my new TV changing settings and what not when I noticed some weird flickering thing going on when using it as a desktop monitor. It was really annoying and after over 2 hours of googling I still couldn't figure it out. I tried multiple fixes but nothing worked. So eventually I turned it off and on again and instantly my problem was solved. Dumbass.

[refitman]

Talking about misrepresenting statistics

[AnatolyKasparov]

To be honest I'm just doing my best to ignore all the benefit stuff now until they make the announcement. One thing's for sure though, regardless of the outcome I'll never forgive or forget the way Starmer, Reeves and their cronies have lied, purposely misrepresented statistics, and generally behaved appallingly in order to justify impoverishing the sick and disabled in a way even the Tories couldn't stomach.

On another note, I'd been mucking about with my new TV changing settings and what not when I noticed some weird flickering thing going on when using it as a desktop monitor. It was really annoying and after over 2 hours of googling I still couldn't figure it out. I tried multiple fixes but nothing worked. So eventually I turned it off and on again and instantly my problem was solved. Dumbass.

Well that's just not true is it. You are quite entitled to your displeasure on this but let's not rewrite history.

[Sky'sGoneOut]

Well that's just not true is it. You are quite entitled to your displeasure on this but let's not rewrite history.

What isn't true?

[AnatolyKasparov]

That the Tories "never did this sort of thing". You could barely move for stories in their captive press berating "scroungers" in the coalition years.

And they proposed stuff much harsher than what they ultimately implemented. Whether that has any relevance to now, we shall see in due course - but considering that, let's not forget, the sole significant source for all this angst is an ITV News report that didn't even claim it had anonymous "government sources" but basically amounted to "this is what we have heard, trust us guv" I won't be surprised if it isn't as bad as some think.

[Sky'sGoneOut]

We have FOI documents concerning the Tories proposed benefit reforms which show that when civil servants provided them with breakdowns of how various proposals would effect sick/disabled benefit claimants the Tories quickly backed off from messing with PIP or cutting the UC rate for LCWRA claimants. As I've previously said it's a certainty that Labour will have received the same information and are ploughing on regardless.

The FT amongst other media outlets have had it confirmed to them by ministers that the ITV leak was correct in all its details so you're also wrong on that front.

[AnatolyKasparov]

Well as I said there is now at least one media report that they aren't "ploughing on regardless" at all. Not a reliable source I would be the first to admit, but still. We will have much more certainty a fortnight from now - if you turn out broadly correct I will readily admit as much.

[refitman]

Well as I said there is now at least one media report that they aren't "ploughing on regardless" at all. Not a reliable source I would be the first to admit, but still. We will have much more certainty a fortnight from now - if you turn out broadly correct I will readily admit as much.

For the love of god, provide a link to something - anything - instead of cryptically referring to 'reports'.

[refitman]

Who fancies a bit of light corruption?

[AnatolyKasparov]

Politics UK is a ridiculous clickbait site run by Tories.

But yes, ministers should be careful about all this after what happened in the autumn.

[Frog222]

Who fancies a bit of light corruption?

Thanks for the light relief as i wait patiently for the next call for a transfusion!
The lack of self awareness is so
Huge , almost unbelievable, but there you go....
We are in the Age of Trump