Thought for the Day

Jericho, I think you know that I don't object to Labour's policies as much as I do the man, and I am not going to reverse the decision I made when Blair became leader to abandon support for the party. On the one hand your appeal for a different set of policies that benefits the people of the UK is laudable, on the other hand the IFS report today points out that Labour's spending plans do not include the reversal of around half of the welfare cuts that have been made since 2010. As most of the spending plans, Labour and Tory do not factor in the possible, and negative consequences of Brexit, if it happens, the manifesto contents of both parties are just aspirations, not promises.

Then vote for the policies, you mooseknuckle, we're not voting for a president! (I'm sorry, I heard the term recently, and It amuses me). Corbyn's a politician, not a saint, he irritates the piss out of me too, sometimes. And like you, I left the party under Blairs tenure, it's just I'm not too stiff necked to U-Turn. But, during the leadership elections, who else would have brought the party back to the left? He was the joke candidate that turned round and bit the centrists in the arse.

Warning, virtue signalling ahead. I don't see my beliefs as 'laudable'. I do some work for a couple for local charities, mainly driving, health, a foodbank, and see the absolute desperation and shame on people's faces. How much further are they going to be pushed, how much further can they be pushed, before they start pushing back? I might have a social conscience, but I'm also quite practical. I've been on the front line, I don't want to be there again, thank you kindly.

Grrr, fucking Brexit. Cunting bastard Tories. Of all the divide and conquer con-tricks they've pulled on us, that was the worst. And again, Labour offer the only way out of it. Another vote and the softest of brexits or an end to it.

Not enough there for me, and a confusing position on Brexit. Corbyn's and most of Labour's response to the 2016 Referendum was unequivocal: 'we will honour the result of the Referendum' -in other words, Labour must be a Leave party, and as the majority of Labour MPs voted for both Acts of Parliament that enable the UK to leave the EU, it is rank hypocrisy to suggest Remain is an option.
In some fantasy world, Corbyn claims a Labour government will re-negotiate the terms of withdrawal, offering the EU what, and getting what in return that has not already been done, twice? Then to put it to the 'people' in a Second Referendum is lunacy -a) it was a referendum that got us into this mess; and b) they only offer a referendum because they think Remain will win -what if it does not?
Throw in the economic downturn already happening and getting worse if the UK leaves, and how will a Labour government maintain the public services they are determined to improve?
I understand your position, but there is more to this than social justice, and if as I suspect Brexit is a mess, I don't see how the Conservatives can be re-elected if they win this election, and don't have a big enough majority to survive five years. In the interim Labour must re-organize itself, but you have to wonder if the party wants power or just wants to campaign. Sorry to sound so cynical, but I just can't believe Labour is failing to expose Johnson for the lies and sleaze that are his ID. Though I think the result may be closer than expected, I have this 1983 feeling all over again.

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Originally Posted by Stavros

Sorry to sound so cynical, but I just can't believe Labour is failing to expose Johnson for the lies and sleaze that are his ID. Though I think the result may be closer than expected, I have this 1983 feeling all over again.

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BBC Trust: Laura Kuenssberg report on Jeremy Corbyn inaccurate, says BBC Trust
BBC Website: Still showing the 'edited' video

BBC: Johnson, You're not going on the Marr show until you do the Neil show.
Also BBC: Johnson, You can do the Marr show.


It's not 1983 I fear, it's 1990.

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Originally Posted by filghy2

I notice that he changed his profile recently. He's no longer in a pub in 'god's own country'; he's now with a bunch of young latino/as in 'hot latina land'. Maybe he's emigrated. Columbian webcam models seem to have been his sole interest here, apart from grudge-bearing.

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Originally Posted by broncofan

If he is traveling the world, more power to him, though of course it sounds a bit bourgeois. What the hell, I figure he can only downvote every single post I've made one time.

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Looks like I was on the money. http://www.hungangels.com/vboard/sho...Colombia/page4

I seems that despite his class envy posturing, peejaye is definitely not a struggling member of the proletariat.

Proletariat? Hahahha..

The proletariat died in 2008 and became the precarious..

You can now call them the prolecarious.. :geek:

I might have asked this before, but are Mitchell McConnell and Lindsay Graham by openly taking sides with the President rather than judging him on the facts available in an objective manner, failing to defend the Constitution of the US, and in doing so, can they be impeached -indeed, can all the members of the Senate who reject the rule of law be impeached?

Only holders of public office can be impeached, but members of Congress can be expelled by a two-thirds vote of the chamber they sit in. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expuls...tates_Congress

I'm not sure what happens to their seat - does their party get to replace them? In any case, it's a moot point unless the composition of the Senate changes significantly.

I think the three pieces of shit that robbed and killed Tessa Majors should be charged as adults. Its obvious that they're not going to become productive members of society anytime soon, so its best just to keep them locked up as long as possible.

If the President has been impeached by the House of Representatives, why would they then invite the same disgraced, impeached President to give them a 'State of the Union' speech? Would it not be better for the President to be told he cannot give a speech he has no moral authority to give, and also isolate him in his bedroom? Or would this be seen as spite, and backfire on the Democrats?

The Dems are looking at the fact that Mitch has openly stated publicly that he will not be impartial (as have a few other republican senators) to see if there is a legal way to remove him from the process as he cannot swear to the oath required.. :geek:

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Originally Posted by Stavros

If the President has been impeached by the House of Representatives, why would they then invite the same disgraced, impeached President to give them a 'State of the Union' speech? Would it not be better for the President to be told he cannot give a speech he has no moral authority to give, and also isolate him in his bedroom? Or would this be seen as spite, and backfire on the Democrats?

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Considering the fact it remains to be seen what kind of impact impeachment is going to have on the Democrats, I don't think they should do anything that can perceived as spiking the ball. Not allowing him to give the State of the Union would fall under that category.

https://www.nbcnews.com/feature/nbc-...ahoma-n1110571

Articles in The Guardian that reveal Evangelical Christians take the view their President is flawed and that they accept these flaws for his policies, not only begs the question about those policies, but more pertinently, what, as Christians are they doing to remedy his flaws? What would be the purpose of a Presidential Pastor if she is not challenging him to stop using filthy language -describing Americans as 'Human Scum' for example; to stop making outrageous claims about The Speaker of the House of Representatives, telling lies, threatening to kill people with bombs, and so on.
What is a committed, Evangelical Christian for if not to change people? So after three years, where is the change?

My thought of the day is that I read about a new epidemic or potential pandemic and don't really know what kind of threat it is. Has anyone read anything about Coronavirus? I've read it's an airborne virus that has killed more than a dozen people in China, that the Chinese have quarantined many large cities and are building hospitals just to deal with it. There is speculation that it may have originated in a "wet market", where exotic animals are slaughtered in conditions that are unsanitary and promote the spread of disease. Beyond that, we'll see in the coming weeks whether the hospitals in China are able to treat it, whether the antivirals we have are effective against it, or if supportive measures can keep people alive.

WHO has some useful Q&A here-
https://www.who.int/news-room/q-a-de...-coronaviruses

Ps if you are ever in Geneva, the WHO has an excellent library- open to the public-, and the view from the 6th floor is stupendous. Also recommended is the International Red Cross Museum near the old League of Nations building.

First case in Australia has just been confirmed (Chinese man who had visited Wuhan). https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-01-...rises/11900428

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Originally Posted by Stavros

Ps if you are ever in Geneva, the WHO has an excellent library- open to the public-, and the view from the 6th floor is stupendous. Also recommended is the International Red Cross Museum near the old League of Nations building.

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I'll make sure I do that one day. Thanks.

Stavros had a good idea, which is that we can use an amendment fleshing out what is impeachable, and whether the President can be held accountable for crimes. I apologize if I misrepresented the post, but I didn't want to take credit for the idea, and I don't recall all of the details of it.

I think there should be an amendment codifying what is impeachable, with guidance about what is a high crime and misdemeanor. I think there should be an amendment specifying what the procedures are for impeachment, and I think the amendment should state that all statutes of limitations for crimes that would prevent the President from facing criminal prosecution should be tolled while he or she is President. If there are Constitutional concerns about a President facing jeopardy while in office, don't allow that to preclude prosecution after the fact because the statutes of limitations ran even though he or she did not actually face jeopardy.

As an alternative, I think impeachment and removal should be decided by the Supreme Court. The framers rejected this idea because the President appoints Justices but the appointments are for a lifetime, which means they are no longer beholden to anyone and in any given Presidential term most have been appointed by previous Presidents. Impeachment is not meant to look like a vote of no confidence, or a review of the job the President has done generally. It's a decision about whether the President engaged in misconduct, using standards that are constitutionally based, though not fully articulated. That's not something legislators are especially qualified for, and what's more, the requirement that Justices write opinions stating the reasons for their decisions provides accountability, to posterity and history, that a single vote by hundreds of members in a chamber never could.

Actually, the place for my last post should have been the impeachment puzzle thread, where many of these ideas have already been discussed. I still feel this is a reasonable synthesis and it's becoming more apparent that the entire process suffers both from a lack of honesty on one side, but also a lack of rigor in spelling out what to look for.

Another reason it would be better if impeachment were judicial is that opinions don't just provide accountability, but future consistency. Once a decision is made based on a fact set, standards are laid out that can provide a useful comparison that might cut through partisanship. Imagine if Justices wrote full sets of opinions on the Clinton impeachment trial. There would be a record, with reasons, that could be compared to the present set of facts...

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Originally Posted by broncofan

Stavros had a good idea, which is that we can use an amendment fleshing out what is impeachable, and whether the President can be held accountable for crimes. I apologize if I misrepresented the post, but I didn't want to take credit for the idea, and I don't recall all of the details of it.

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I found the post. I think Stavros said there should be clear rules governing executive privilege and financial conflicts of interest, as well as allowing the President to be indicted. The above then is an alternative, setting clear rules for impeachability, and preserving the ability of the President to be prosecuted out of office for any crimes he committed while in office.

Briefly, as this really belongs in the Impeachment thread, the clear point I take from last week's blistering presentation in the Senate, is that the law has been broken, while the President boasts 'I can do anything I want'. You have to decide, as Americans, whether or not you want to amend your Constitution to make explicit what the President can and cannot do, or trust in the generalist language that makes the assumption that the kind of person elected to the Presidency will respect the Office, adhere to the Oath of Office, and not stretch the boundaries of acceptability for personal gain, daring Congress to act. Perhaps the 45th President will mark a boundary line in behaviour, tone and outcome that no other dares, or wants to reach. But he could be there for another 4 years, and the potential damage to the US is, to me, even at this distance, scary. There seems to be no future for the EPA or its increasingly weak protection of the American environment in general, its Wilderness and water resources in particular. I won't go into the Foreign Policy options, even more scary. But here we are, and the tamed, cowered Republicans, it seems to me don't want to hear the evience from Bolton, Mulvaney, least of all Giuliani or the President himself, and will vote for more of the same, as if the clear breaches of the law just didn't matter.

https://twitter.com/atrupar/status/1...992248322?s=20

Less my thought of the day than my laugh of the day. Love the laugh in the background from a fox person.

Scary not funny.
And two days ago when presenting the Palestine: Surrender to Israel Plan, the President managed to re-name the third most important Shrine in Islam as 'al-Aqua Mosque', proving thorugh his pathetic ignorance that his son-in-law's plan is not worth the paper it is written on.

It always amuses me that Trump refers to his opponents as "Radical Left, Do Nothing Democrats". What sort of radicals are they if they want to do nothing?

From the State of the Union last night-

"“Socialism destroys nations,” said Trump after welcoming Venezuela’s opposition leader, Juan Guaido"….leader of the Popular Will party, a member of the Socialist International since 2014...

I dont know much about Tucker Carlson other than what I read in the UK press, but what struck me about his 'outing' of a Juror in the Roger Stone trial, publishing her personal details as well, is that I thought Jurors were supposed to be anonymous. It seems to me that if each Juror has sworn to be impartial at the start of a trial, then that must be it and that they should remain anonymous to each other as well as the General Public. I can only assume the law has changed to enable the identification of jurors, but as no juror will be impartial once the trial has produced evidence for or against a conviction, surely anonymity must be protected?
As for Tucker Carlson, does he have the right to identify a Juror and make claims about their political bias which he claims has influenced the outcome of the trial? The rule of law is under a lot of pressure right now, this cannot help reduce that tension.

I don't have an issue with most of the policies of Bernie Sanders but I don't understand the way they're marketed. Last night Bloomberg brought up the fact that Sanders has three homes and is worth about 3 million dollars. There is a world of difference between having a net worth of 3 million dollars and billions. But when I hear Sanders' rhetoric I often hear buzz words and invective. How wealthy does someone have to be before they are suspected of being corrupt and is wealth the best metric?

The best argument for taxing the rich is that they can afford to pay and what they pay funds extremely useful programs. The best justification for casting aspersions on someone's business activities is that they were unethical, broke the law, or were involved in an activity that was by its nature predatory. The best argument for regulating business is that there are collective action problems or some significant public good can be achieved through the regulation at an acceptable cost.

So while I think it's a bit braindead to compare Sanders to the extremely wealthy people he vilifies I do blame him for relying on slogans and clichés about a rigged system without saying what's rigged and what's not. What are the rules we play by? When does he think regulation is useful and when would he think it's too much of an encroachment on commerce?

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Originally Posted by broncofan

So while I think it's a bit braindead to compare Sanders to the extremely wealthy people he vilifies I do blame him for relying on slogans and clichés about a rigged system without saying what's rigged and what's not. What are the rules we play by? When does he think regulation is useful and when would he think it's too much of an encroachment on commerce?

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Sanders is a populist and the essence of populism is to target some 'other' as being at the root of problems. For populists of the right the targets are usually immigrants, minorities and globalist elites: for populists of the left it is the rich. Of course there may be an element of truth in their complaints, but populists are not really interested in analysing the best way to deal with problems. It's all about using rhetoric to appeal to peoples' emotions and build a feeling that you are the only one who understands their concerns.

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Originally Posted by filghy2

It's all about using rhetoric to appeal to peoples' emotions and build a feeling that you are the only one who understands their concerns.

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In his case it seems he really believes it as well. To hear some of his supporters talk, their support sounds almost messianic. "He's been fighting for you his whole life." "He's taken on yada yada". But if you look at his accomplishments they're quite modest. There's definitely a problem with massive income inequality, the growth in the number of super wealthy, and a minimum wage that hasn't changed here for more than ten years. As you say, he's identified a real problem but his explanation of its causes is not complex enough, nor are the solutions.

The main reason that Trump is still generally favoured to win the election is that the US economy is doing well. Nor has there been any crisis that has affected undecided voters in ways that could change their perceptions of his Presidency. A corona-virus epidemic is the most likely risk that could test those propositions between now and November. Could this be Trump's Hurricane Katrina - the event that finally exposes the implications of his Administration's incompetence?
https://www.vox.com/2020/2/25/211505...virus-cdc-cuts
https://www.politico.com/news/2020/0...request-117329

One thing that seems likely is that the Administration will continue to downplay the risks. This is exactly the sort of situation in which people need to be able to trust what officials tell them, yet Trump and his acolytes have completely trashed that credibility.

You're right about this. I want Trump to be right because the idea of a pandemic is terrifying. Yet how is novel coronavirus going to be contained given how easily it's spread (including the possibility of asymptomatic transmission) and tests for it aren't great right now? Look at how quickly it's spread in South Korea and Italy.

There are a couple of treatments for it that doctors in China have reported are effective. At least two anti-virals. One is called Remdesivir, which apparently is also effective against other coronaviruses, SARS and MERS. The other is an anti-malarial drug called Chloroquine. The testing for the former's anti-viral activity is in vitro and so it's not clear how effective it is clinically. The latter seems to be effective once the novel coronavirus has caused pneumonia, but the evidence is anecdotal and the recommendations are from clinicians not based on trials.

Early on it was reported the disease caused death in about 2% of people but that the number is probably lower because minor cases were underreported. As it is, it hasn't seemed to be a lot less lethal than that when you look at the overall numbers. The CDC in the U.S. has said been quoted as saying that it's not a matter of if but when novel coronavirus spreads throughout the U.S.

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/02/25/us-p...emdesivir.html

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32075365

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32075365

The corona virus frightens me. I hope a vaccine is coming soon.

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Originally Posted by tovosan

The corona virus frightens me. I hope a vaccine is coming soon.

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Anthony Fauci from NIH was on msnbc just now. He said a vaccine will be ready at earliest in a year. I think he said the timeline was to get a vaccine ready for testing within 3 months, to do an initial trial looking at safety first and then a 6 month trial for efficacy and safety in a larger cohort. Hopefully the containment strategy is effective at keeping the number of people infected fairly low until the vaccine is ready to be used. But the CDC head sounded confident the virus will not be contained in the long run.

In the meantime, Fauci also said they are doing clinical trials for remdesivir right now. If it's effective, Gilead, the company that makes it, is going to have to produce lots of it.

It is scary. People keep pointing out that influenza kills many more thousands every year but that's because it is already everywhere. The mortality rate per infection for Covid-9 (the latest name for this coronavirus) is anywhere from 20 to 40 times higher per infection than the flu. And it seems highly transmissible.

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Originally Posted by broncofan

Early on it was reported the disease caused death in about 2% of people but that the number is probably lower because minor cases were underreported. As it is, it hasn't seemed to be a lot less lethal than that when you look at the overall numbers. The CDC in the U.S. has said been quoted as saying that it's not a matter of if but when novel coronavirus spreads throughout the U.S.

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It is looking increasingly likely that it won't be contained. The problem seems to be the long delay between infection and symptoms showing up, as well as the fact that many carriers have only moderate symptoms to they don't go to hospital. The Spanish flu after WWI is estimated to have affected around a quarter of the world's population, so if you do the numbers it's potentially very scary.

This is an example of the sort of nonsense we will have to deal with. https://www.politico.com/news/2020/0...spiracy-117781

It looks like socialism is being brought to the USA, and not by Bernie Sanders but by Donald Trump. In recent days we've had announcements about government mailing out checks, bailing out businesses and directing companies to produce essential supplies, as well as restrictions on what people can do. Just as they say there are no atheists in foxholes, there don't seem to be many small government believers in a crisis.
https://www.politico.com/news/2020/0...mocrats-136462

It's the right thing to do, but I can't help noting the contrast between what Republicans are wiling to do now and what they were willing to do under Obama.

And two of the sectors worst hit by Covid 19, certainly in the UK, are the Hotel and Sport sectors. I assume people are no longer boooking themselves into Turnberry for a weekend of Golf and Beef Wellington, and assume this will also mean in the US that 'prestigious' Golfi Clubs and Hotels will suffer from a lack of business, and may even need a handout from the Government/Tax Payer...

Two thoughts connect here:

a) the remarkable claim by President 45 with regard to proposals in the rescue package that never made it to the final text:
“The things they had in there were crazy. They had things, levels of voting that if you’d ever agreed to it, you’d never have a Republican elected in this country again,” Trump said during an appearance on Fox and Friends.

b) a campaign to end gerrymandering in Michigan, now in a documentary called Slay the Dragon.

If the Republican Party is so worried about losing votes, maybe it should make a better effort to appeal to a wider variety of American people? Just as in the UK the Labour Party has lost votes because it does not appeal to enough voters, so there is a good argument for ditching ideology for pragmatism, and seeking election on the basis of practical poltical proposals. Or is that too much to ask of any party?

Slay the Dragon article here-
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/...gerrymandering

President worried more people may vote (and not for him)
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/...rm-coronavirus

Has the USA now reached a point where it must decide if it wants to replace a private health business with a public health service, one that guarantees health care to every American from the moment they are born, to the moment that they die?

It has been one of the longest lasing and supposedly impossible policies to agree upon, but can the US now carry on disagreeing when it is clear there needs to be change?

Trump refused to reopen Obamacare enrolment in response to the coronavirus and they're still backing a lawsuit to abolish it, so no sign of any change of heart there. On past form they are more likely to use the budgetary impact of the virus as an argument for cutting health spending once the crisis has passed.
https://www.politico.com/news/2020/0...navirus-157788