Just a quick note to say that Craig has been in contact and he is fine but currently in Jacobabad, Pakistan with no reliable internet access.
He knows some people have been wondering if all is okay, so this post is just to confirm all’s well and he’ll be back online when he can.
Site Admin.
The state broadcaster (BBC) doing what it does best, trying to influence politicians, surely this is lobbying and outside, its not worth the paper its written on Charter.
Then again BBC was caught red handed in sheer bias yet again. Scotland’s enemy within.
https://mobile.twitter.com/ScotNational/status/1096112870721536000
The situation is bizarre. The statement from Small regards audience selection can be easily disproved. Small implies (all but states) that Mitchell provided false identification when applying for previous shows. Even if this were true the astronomical improbability of random selection for four shows remains. There is also the photo showing Mitchell chatting with the panel before filming. In short, Mitchell’s account of events is substantiated by evidence and background, Small’s version of events is comically inept.
If senior BBC management are in a hole, why are they still digging? Ruling out shear stupidity, are they obligated to maintain this farcical, blank denial of wrongdoing because full disclosure would be existentially terminal?
I can only image the atmosphere amongst the minions on the floor of the newsroom.
Yet they spout unsubstantiated accusations about Maduro, and condone political prisoners in Spain.
“Theresa May has vowed to press ahead with her Brexit plan, despite it being roundly rejected for a second time.”
“The Prime Minister issued an astonishing statement minutes after being handed another crushing defeat in the House of Commons.
And the statement suggests she intends to ignore the vote entirely and pursue her rejected plan.”
http://archive.is/VEE5C
Glenn Greenwald drew attention to this servant to the paleocons who supported Abrams in her tweet which was subsequently deleted.
Glenn Greenwald
@ggreenwald
Ladies and Gentlemen: the Center for American Progress. This is who and what they are. This is one of the most disgusting comments I’ve seen from them in awhile, Neera included: “I worked for Elliott Abrams as a civil servant. He is a fierce advocate for human rights & democracy”
https://twitter.com/kellymagsamen/status/1095817536669696000 …
Her tweet is on here –
https://twitter.com/schwarz/status/1095839581419778048
Who she is – https://www.fp4america.org/kelly-magsamen/
Note her unconditional support for whatever Abrams has got planned for Venezuela.
Our old friend Suzanne Nossel is in the same set up as Magsamen.
https://www.fp4america.org/suzanne-nossel
Pen, Amnesty, HRW, State Dept under Obomber etc etc
She is married to the historian David Greenberg who is a professor at Rutgers. http://greenberg.rutgers.edu/
https://pen.org/press-release/pen-american-center-names-suzanne-nossel-as-executive-director/
Lets add to that the IMF and the World bank are both US playbooks.
Money is given or withheld, to nations depending on their status with the US. Countries can be denied or cut-off, when the eye of Sauron (US) focuses in on them.
Elliott Abrams is on the ‘Committee on Conscience’ of the US Holocaust Memorial Museum.
https://www.ushmm.org/confront-genocide/about/committee-on-conscience-members
Which is nice..
It suggests that Mr Abrams feels empathy for Jews, but not for anyone else.
(Of course that’s not racism, as Jews – like black people – cannot be racists by definition).
Britain is no longer a priority, its just a little fish in a big pond.
“The EU, the United States and China will get access to new medicines ahead of the UK after Brexit, the CEO of a global pharmacutical company said.”
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/brexit-medicine-shortage-eu-china-us-drug-stockpile-a8779321.html
The end of the world is nigh. We’re all doomed.
Yes, RoS, and I’ve just been told that various deadly viruses have decided to target the UK after Brexit.
Did Bellingcat get something wrong?
https://johnplatinumgoss.wordpress.com/2019/02/15/did-bellingcat-get-something-wrong/
In the absence of Craig I think you might have been favoured by my two blogs in one day. Especially the second one above. What it took Bellingcat 4 months not ot find out I found out in a few hours. Their suspect Sergeyev is working as vice consul of a French embassy.
Great work John. I expect Bellingcat will just ignore your revelation. What else can they do?
Actually Eliot Higgins did start a conversation on Twitter (a platform quite alien to me). His response went something along the lines:
“You do get it there are other people with the same name?”
“If you think otherwise you clearly did not read my blog.”
“And the title asks a question. So you don’t think it is the same person.”
Another person (who seems to work for Bellingcat) chipped in:
“Obviously not. If you do a search in Russian you’ll find tons of people with that name.”
“I was asking Eliot. I found a taxi driver and a film producer, Do you think they are the same person Eliot?”
And that is where the conversation stopped. I realise it’s Friday night. Perhaps he will get his researchers to come up with something tomorrow. We’ll see.
John, I recommend George Bernard Shaw’s wise advice:
“I learned long ago, never to wrestle with a pig. You get dirty, and besides, the pig likes it”.
@John Goss:
“Did Bellingcat get something wrong?”
Is the ocean ever wet?
You made me smile Tom Welsh. 🙂
A minor detail really; if it is the same person.
The wise are using their life jackets to flee, the listing HMS Britain.
“Staff at French oil and gas giant Total have been told it is moving its trading operations from London to Geneva in September in a move affecting 200 jobs, Sky News understands.”
http://archive.is/Hp0uj
Meanwhile, more than 1,000 jobs have been created at Manchester Airport, even though there will be no planes and no flights after Brexit. Strange we don’t see such a fanfare in the media about that.
Not to put the dampers on it, it could be extra seasonal staff by the sounds of it.
“Brad Miller, COO at Manchester Airport, said: “The airport is gearing up for another busy summer and that means there are hundreds of jobs being created.”
Geneva is in Switzerland.
Switzerland is not a member of the European Union.
So relocation can not be because of Brexit.
All dogs have four legs.
Cats have four legs.
Therefore cats are dogs.
Ford did not move transit to Turkey because the U.K. was going to Brexit, there is a World Crash on the way, maybe even this year but certainly by next year.
Ford no longer make cars in the U.K. did they move out because of Fear of Brexit, no they did not, they are always trying to cut costs, bugger all to do with Brexit.
Boeing make plane in China, cheaper than getting them built in America.
Nothing to do with Brexit.
Dyson gets his vacuums made in Malaya, nothing to do with Brexit.
Range rovers to be built in India, nothing to do with Brexit.
But you can see where this is going – World Trade Wars.
Is Geneva some kind of EU outpost?
The British government is busy preparing the ground to blame the EU and the Labour party for No Deal and their media allies will be all too happy to run with it Conservatives establish the narrative for the next decade or more, people fall into line as usual.
A look at who got their palms greased on the shambolic never built Boris Garden Bridge.
https://www.architectsjournal.co.uk/news/who-got-what-how-was-53m-squandered-on-the-doomed-garden-bridge/10039976.article
Coming soon, who made a mint of the non-existant HS2, and here’s me thinking Maduro has deep pockets.
Just want a quick show of hands. Who of you is stockpiling food for Brexit? I see N_ has already joined in with the gullible and the desperately stupid. Who else?
I can’t afford to stockpile food. My bribes from oil companies never arrived.
I know it’s gone down somewhat, but why not sell a bitcoin? That would provide for plenty of stockpiling. Alternatively, part with an ounce or two of gold – that’s doing quite well these days.
Did you know you can buy citizenship of a number of countries now with just bitcoin?
Would you really want to live there? I’m happy enough with NL (and PT in winter, of course).
Vanuatu doesn’t sound too bad.
“I’m happy enough with NL (and PT in winter, of course).”
From where you’re happy enough to swipe away at the UK, of course.
What “swiping away at the UK” are you talking about?
The establishment talking to itsef.
Sorry, RoS, what are you talking about – are you accusing ME of being a “member of the Establishment”?
Glenn
For an investment in a property costing only 250.000 euros you can obtain per;q,e,t residency in Greece. It’s a snip and there are thousands of Chinese who are doing it. Go for it, it’d only cost you a couple of the bitcoins you’re always going on about.
BTW, are you a 30 percenter?
permanent residency
I think “always going on about” is something of an exaggeration, and it would cost more than “a couple” too. Out by a factor of 50 on both counts.
But why get a property in Greece, when you can get a very agreeable motorhome and stay wherever you want for extended periods?
(No, I don’t go for the 30% rule – my arrangement is a bit different to that of an expat living and working a F/T job in NL.)
Glad to hear that, Glenn. Whatever the arrangement is, I’m sure you’ve maximised, it’s human nature after all
Glenn
“But why get a property in Greece, when you can get a very agreeable motorhome and stay wherever you want for extended periods?”
To save on fuel, thereby doing your bit for the environment?
CB/H: “To save on fuel, thereby doing your bit for the environment?”
Come now, not everything is so simple. How much fuel and electricity does one use in a motorhome parked up in Portugal for a couple of months, compared with heating a house over winter in the UK and a reasonably large flat in NL? Weigh that up against a couple of thousand miles at 30 mpg (much of that by ferry) for the entire period, and no daily commuting involved. Bus/bike/walking the entire time.
Not a “slam dunk”, as the Yanks like to say. Add to that commuting by bicycle for the rest of the year (all seasons!), a veggie/vegan diet and recreation which mainly consists of running, gym, reading, walking and cycling… I wouldn’t consider myself without a significant and regrettable ecological footprint of course, but surely not outstandingly bad either.
I suppose they have been unsuccessfully trying to bribe schoolchildren not to go on strike:
https://www.bbc.com/news/amp/uk-47250424
Stockpiling isn’t entirely stupid. If a substantial number of people start to do so, it will cause a run on supermarket stocks, regardless of anything to do with supplies to supermarkets. I made the point a couple of weeks ago that getting a bit extra in now would actually help, because that will allow more for everyone else closer to the time.
It’s not as if you’ll have to throw it out, just buy less later. Makes sense to me.
It could cause scarcity of supply, which will be blamed on Brexit. A self-fulfilling prophecy!
Well that’s what I mean – regardless of anything to do with Brexit, a run on supplies will cause shortages. A rumour started about, say, a bank will bust it for the same reason. So it would be unwise not to prepare for the inevitable attack of jitters which the media is certainly playing up.
When was the last time anyone [UK] had a power cut, that lasted more than a few hours?
Well, we now have all those new Solar Farms and Wind Farms, much more diverse electricity production, once it was nearly all from coal.
Just checked
almost half of electricity production in the United Kingdom is from Methane, wow, I wonder how much comes from Mother Russia, the World’s largest producer of gas?
@ michael, I didn’t know that, thanks. I’ll be taking some tips from “Lofty” Wiseman – you are only as sharp as your knife. 🙂
If things get really desperate there is a rich source of protein to be found in every city centre in the form of pigeons and squirrels, accompanied with a little re-hydrated mashed potato and a drizzle of raspberry jus made from jam makes a rather acceptable meal.
I think the only genuine concern is shortage of fresh goods. Most of the main supermarkets are already stocking up on tinned food (especially fruit) for this reason. People should buy a variety of dried beans and sprout them in water if they have trouble getting fresh food. A sprouted bean has far more nutritional value than simply soaking and boiling.
Lot of meat on a badger.
U.K. Gov want them killed by being gassed or shot or attacked by wild dogs.
Stockpiling is the same principle as a run on the bank. Though a run on a bank is easier to manage if you have a friendly central banker nearby. If you run out of food we don’t have central feeder and so far we have not managed to live off food derivatives.
Like Venezuela – and many, many other countries – the UK long ago ceased to be self-sufficient in food. The utterly insane theory is that countries with natural resources should export them at low prices so that other countries can process them and make immense profits. Meanwhile the resource-rich country can buy all its food and other necessities from abroad.
Until one day it can’t. Either because it runs out of foreign exchange and other valuable considerations, or because an unfriendly foreign government decrees that it is to be blockaded.
The UK could support about 18 million people more or less indefinitely – as far as all resources, including food, are concerned. For the time being, it could probably feed about 50 million people – it did during WW2.
Any government that fails to make sure its people can be fed, regardless of the possible hostile acts of foreign governments, is guilty of treason.
I’m certainly not. I would like to hear from Sharp Ears on this, though, even though it’s not Israel related.
A lot more than 1000 jobs are going to be created at Manchester Airport: Airport City is a huge investment/development.
Stockpiling of food? You mean like the Palestinians in Gaza living under the siege?
Looking around, many of our fellow citizens are carrying excess weight and would benefit from being on diets.
Very few of the Gazans you see at the Israeli border or at funerals (toting automatic rifles, wonder how they got there?) and so on look as if they’re starving. Most look fine and healthy and by God quite a few of the top dogs look as if they could do with a week or so at a slimming farm.
Im not some non dom teacher who can laugh it all off, whilst talking to us here from some furrin country. So, no whats the point apart from dodging higher prices?
Fresh from being taught to question their “gender identity”, a new concept has been implanted in the heads of our indoctrinated schoolchildren by leftist educators – the concept of the “striking schoolchild”.
Call me old fashioned, but at my school “going on strike” would have resulted in three hours detention and a gating. And rightly so.
Oi! Oi! Napoleon I see you have resurfaced.
The child soldier concept showcased at Davos, that leftist hot bed!
Able was u ere u saw Elba.
Lol.
Oi oi Josephine!
Having trouble decyphering yours. What is your point?
BTW Dungroanin
I haven’t seen details of your tertiary education on here yet, despite the fact that you owe us – and especially IrishU – the details.
Further failure to pony up will lead readers to suspect that you have no degree(s) at all and are therefore much less educated than the IrishU whom you accused of being “ill educated” a couple of days ago.
@ Dungroanin
Correction and mea culpa!
I’be just seen your repmy to my qusetion anout your tertiary education. You did in fact reply. But like this:
“As IrishU has written here as well at the previous thread, and he hasn’t the urgent need to know my education as much as you do – I won’t bore readers with your point 1.”
The conclusion I draw from that reply is that you did not attend university. Fair enough, nothing wrong with that, but then you really shouldn’t go around calling other people “ill-educated”, should you? Because you might end up with egg on your face.
Over and out on this one.
Oh Bossie you are as incap-Able as your caped crusader partner in crime – why is it that when I respond to that bot – you pop up like a genie?
Anyway if you go back to my ‘ill-educated’ comment – and pay attention – you will see that my comment was made at the claim that our universities are not profit driven nowdays. As i made clear to IrishU. With whom I have had a percectly reasonable and informative conversation. And Irish U offered the information without asking for reciprocation. Which I would have given.
I have responded to your misclaim about profits as you chase me about the board.
Yet you have failed to address the information I have provided and links to a full understanding of Education having been turned into yet another profit stream for bankers from the masses.
It is you that is proved wrong on your claim.
Yet you completely ignore and fail to engage with the topic. Instead you divert with the canard of my education!
I’ll venture that I have probably forgotten more formal education than you display in your inane botspeak.
I also know a lot more than when I left formal education.
And I learn more everyday.
Do you?
Do you mean the striking schoolchildren are child soldiers? I suppose it’s the same concept.
Yes. The current campaign launched at Davos.
https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.desmog.co.uk/2019/01/17/climate-change-high-agenda-davos-summit-despite-privileged-access-fossil-fuel-industry%3famp
With 15 year old as figurehead. At Davos.
The deepshits are turning directly to our children to get past our demands for social democracy. Turning them into the neo-revolutionary snowflake army!
I don’t mind children going on strike but I wish they’d do it over a real problem, rather than an imaginary one.
I mind children going on strike.
They are children.
I mind using them as an invented ‘populist’ political pawns by ‘grown ups’ a lot more.
How dare they?
It seems kids apparently understand climate science better than you as well Blunderbuss.
Every denial argument you proposed would have been retracted, in a scientific discussion. The fact that none of them have been proves that they are propaganda, not science.
Don’t dismiss the kids as pawns Dungroanin. They learn about global warming in school, so they’ll have been asking why we let CO2 concentrations and emissions continue to rise. It’s a fucking disgrace; there simply is no reasonable answer.
Things are pretty simple to kids, and if enough agree – OK, let’s just walk out and protest. Bravo.
Sorry Clark I think you are wrong to give children such agency. I will try and explain better.
They can’t drink, have sex, gamble, vote, drive… because they are children.
Children are the responsibility of adults.
If the lids said they want to eat only chips and ice cream and play their computer games non stop.., etc, because what’s the point of learning or doing as the world is doomed? etc … we should let them?
Children are children.
It doesn’t take long for childhood to pass.
The current politicisation of kids emotional response is wrong and evil, as i pointed out in my comment on the previous page, there wasn’t much difference between the harmessing and channelling the innocent instincts by the Scouts and Hitler Youth movements, or the Maoists and Child Soldiers in Africa and the Taliban Madrasses.
We can all disagree about many things but I insist we all agree that kids are kids and must be treated with unconditional love no matter how much they annoy with ‘are we there yet’ or ‘S’not fair’ or impress with their advanced understanding – just because a 7 year child may be aufait with technology, smart phones and programs – it does not mean they can be treated as adults.
Fetishising them as such leads to nastiness.
So all together now –
Children are children.
– “Children are the responsibility of adults”
But us adults are abdicating our responsibility; we have no moral high ground to preach from. Destroying their future, we negate our right to confine them in school.
Clark! You are surely being deliberately mischievious.
Adults are responsible for their words and actions. Children are NOT.
You would not let a child drink alcohol or smoke or partake in lewd behaviour or cruelty to animals and others?
Many of us haven’t abdicated our responsibility.
– “Adults are responsible for their words and actions. Children are NOT.”
Which is why adults should encourage responsible behaviour in children.
– “You would not let a child drink alcohol or smoke or partake in lewd behaviour or cruelty to animals and others?”
But those are all irresponsible behaviours, whereas protesting against environmental collapse is highly responsible.
All totalitarian governments take steps to condition children and turn them into secret agents against their parents.
‘When an opponent declares, “I will not come over to your side,” I calmly say, “Your child belongs to us already… What are you? You will pass on. Your descendants, however, now stand in the new camp. In a short time they will know nothing else but this new community”’.
– Adolf Hitler
Reductio ad Hitlerum is a fallacy of irrelevance:
http://www.fallacyfiles.org/adnazium.html
Not so much “old fashioned” able, just ignorant. Should have paid more attention at school and had fewer detentions.
Anon that’s not old fashioned; that’s the sort of lesser school mentality. There was a public school tradition of standing up to teachers.
Not just strikes but insurrection and uprising. Not only in Anderson’s fictional If but it used to happen periodically back before the Public School Act (or whatever that Act was called) especially if a house master got ahead of his station in life and sought to question the pupil’s right to run house discipline.
@fwl: “especially if a house master got ahead of his station in life and sought to question the pupil’s right to run house discipline.”
– I think you should have put an irony alert on that. At first I thought you meant it, then I remembered the plot of ‘If.’
Anon 1 would love to have a.prevent teacher in every primary school? To keep these pesky kids from becoming radicalised by the stupidity and grab all attitudes of the existing status quo merchants, and go and sacrifice their lives for the cause of extinction rebellion.
Climate change might hit us a little harder soon and
Ain’t that right. A 7 year old girl summed it all up today
‘ of we all ate doing nothing we all ate responsible for her bleak future
But some here are more of the staffing kind and would like to take full spectrum control over young minds.
Shame on you.
– “three hours detention and a gating”
Versus mass starvation, the collapse of civilisation with the ecosystem, and potential human extinction.
Not much of a choice, is it?
I presume you have never been on the receiving end of a ‘gating’: potentially or otherwise.
Caitlin Johnston on Ilhan Omar’s demolition job on Elliott Abrams on the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
https://medium.com/@caityjohnstone/ilhan-omar-smacks-down-elliott-abrams-in-front-of-everybody-8cc7d88d6569
Congresswoman Omar – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ilhan_Omar
Very far from a demolition job. She closed by saying “nobody would dispute” Abrams’s fantastical claim that the US objective in Venezuela is to promote democracy. She gave approval for the latest anti-democratic coup in Latin America .. to somebody she knows was an accomplice in the mass rape and murder of children.
There is no coup going on in Venezuela, it is just the justified wrath of a people reduced to penury by the “policies” and incompetence of a group of erstwhile populist leaders whose popularity evaporated a long time ago.
Former President Maduro Moros is not going to commit suicide like President Allende, he will go (and be allowed to go) into exile, perhaps to Cuba, where he will no doubt live out the rest of his life at a level of luxury commensurate with that of the Cuban leqadership….
“There is no coup going on in Venezuela”
Any credibility you had Habb, I mean Charles, just flew right out the window. You’d better refer to the IODP, and re-establish your parameters of reality.
Knowing GCHQ staff are active in the field you should be sent immediately to Venezuela. ?
“There is no coup going on in Venezuela, it is just the justified wrath of a people reduced to penury by the “policies” and incompetence of a group of erstwhile populist leaders whose popularity evaporated a long time ago.”
This.
Charles, most of Venezuela’s poorest continue to support President Maduro enthusiastically. Guaido (who’s 14 day temporary presidency expired a while ago, even if you buy into the false narrative around him) and the rest of the opposition parties (if you lump them all together, which they are unable to do themselves) struggle to get 30% support, most of it from the middle classes, who are not struggling the same as the poorer classes.
Meanwhile, Venezuela’s real friends have just flown in 92 tons of medical aid. I wonder if the US will propose an air blockade in response, to back up their proposed naval blockade?
Amazing to read your interpretation of the facts there. Suggest you actually read the article and watch the video. Then you will be able to get it right with no distortions.
https://youtu.be/4Mutu-P7_NA
I suggest you and Caitlin Johnson watch it and reflect upon the reply to Abrams at 4.40.
I have just seen and listened to the Omar/Abrams exchange in the House. My conclusion is that far from it being a demolition job it merely revealed Ms Omar to be a very silly woman who is probably situated politically on the far left of the Democratic country. The impression I was left with was not that of a humiliated Elliott Abrams but of a young person playing to the anti-US/anti-Trump gallery from a script she was even unable to read from without the several stumbles. If anything, Avrams gets my vote for gaving demonstrated that the young woman still has a lot to learn in terms of technique, focus, relevancy and manners.
Far left of Obama and Hillary gets you about as Left as the ERG. Forging ahead with socialism for the exceedingly rich and increasing workers’ rights by expelling all the available workers.
This ‘It’s all the fault of the far-left’ stuff is such a crock of outmoded BS that it beggars belief. She tore him a new one, simple as that. It appears that ‘The New McCarthyism’ is not just around the corner. It is here already.
She tore him nothing. She read her piece off a script and still managed to stumble. And when Abrams protested she was too slow and too dim to turn his protest against hum (a Galloway could have done it).
Senior citizens and indeed others should have learnt by now not to be over-impressed by politicos just because they’re young. They usually disappoint fairly quickly (Mhairi Black refers).
WATCH Ilhan Omar grill US Venezuela envoy on war crimes of previous US-backed coups, he get furious.
https://www.rt.com/usa/451414-ilhan-omar-elliott-abrams-venezuela/
No reasonable person having watched the video would say Abrams got furious. He simply protested at the young girl’s misuse of her speaking time and then about the idiotic “questions” she wasted the rest of her time pitting. His reply to her last “question” was magisterial! As I said, she has a lot to learn.
Seems to me that Elliott Abrams’ entire attitude could be summed up by “You might very well think that; I couldn’t possibly comment”.
”young girl’s”.
Charles, you sound like you have zero respect for women. Would this be accurate? Would explain your harassment of SE.
I’m reasonable. Abrams lost his cool and started shouting along the lines of I will not answer that question, rocking back and forth. In no way was he in control of himself. He also went on to threaten a journalist outside the building shortly after.
Maybe you are the unreasonable one.
Listen to the video again and then indicate to me (and readers) at which point Abrams starts “shouting”.
You won’t because he didn’t.
Advice : if you must lie, don’t leave the evidence around.
“Charles, you sound like you have zero respect for women. Would this be accurate? ”
It would not.
As for Sharp Ears, I don’t see her as a woman, but as a disembodied electromagnetic impulse which spends far too much time on this blog and others obsessing about Israel, the West Bank and Gaza. So your hypthesis there is also false.
So Trump is attempting to emulate Israel by spending £5 billon dollars on a wall across the USA’s border with Mexico.
In order to achieve his madman’s goal quicker Trump has declared a national emergency to bypass congress, and the democratic process.
He’ll be sued, and it will end in the courts, and eventually the Supreme court, I suppose it all boils down to which party, (The Republicans or Democratics) controls the Supreme court.
Meanwhile Trumps obedient minion Britain, has stated that the (TATA), the TransAtlantic Trade Agreement will be strengthened after Brexit, which basically means Trump tell May, we’re flooding the UK with our products.
If you had this on your doorstep, you’d want a wall too. Read it all.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_San_Fernando_massacre
Anon1.
Irrelevant, trade supercedes any unpleasantness.
Older link but still relevant I think.
“According to the Office of the United States Trade Representative:”
“Mexico is currently our 3rd largest goods trading partner with $531 billion in total (two way) goods trade during 2015. Goods exports totaled $236 billion; Goods imports totaled $295 billion. The U.S. goods trade deficit with Mexico was $58 billion in 2015.”
“The US is Mexico’s largest supplier. Of all Mexico imports, 46% are from the United States. Mexico was the United States’ 2nd largest goods export market in 2016.
“Following are the most important exports from the US to Mexico.”
“Machinery $42 Billion
Electrical Machinery $41 Billion
Vehicles & Vehicle Parts $21 Billion
Mineral Fuels $20 Billion (Gasoline, natural gas).”
https://www.inside-mexico.com/what-does-the-us-export-to-mexico/
Of course the illegal coup about to take place in Venezuela, will negate Mexican oil, maybe that’s the method behind Trump’s madness.
“Meanwhile Trumps obedient minion Britain, has stated that the (TATA), the TransAtlantic Trade Agreement will be strengthened after Brexit, which basically means Trump tell May, we’re flooding the UK with our products.”
It doesn’t mean that at all. All it means is that the US will not put up barriers to doing business with Britain. Compare to Obama’s “Back of the queue” comment.
Why is it that you rejoice at every bit of bad news you can find and then jeer at this piece of good news? Is it because you hate this country?
I was also wondering why RoS got so much amusement out of running down the United Kingdom,
if it is so ghastly here why not move to Germany or France?
Or why not leave the UK? Oh that’s right, they can’t do it.
I think he wants to live in an Independent Scotland. I can’t blame him for that.
|Most voters in Scotland wish to remain in the United Kingdom.
I was in Scotland recently for a family event,
I would guess it was 60/40 for Remain in U.K.
I’m sure that Trump has been advised that the UK is gagging for quality US chicken, beef, grain and cars. You remember, the chlorinated chicken, hormoned beef, GMO grain and oversized cars.
Not sure what else they can export to us that we don’t already buy.
Clean air? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_emissions_scandal
Chlorinated chicken meme…. yawn.
According to Rees Smugg he is in favour of no tariffs for incoming goods into the UK.
The thing for Mogg is that the US and others will not reciprocate the goodwill.
they will have the UK for breakfast dinner and tea.
He followed that with saying British Farmers would do well out of this non tariff arrangement.
It will be like nicking an ice cream off a child.
He then followed up that gem with alarming comparison of deaths in Boer War prison camps in defence of Winston Churchill saying that more people died in Glasgow at the time in question.
Likening Glasgow to a Boer War prison camp.
Had Scotland declared war on the UK or am I missing something?
As far as Churchill goes he was a defender of The British Empire and he didn’t want the Germans to take over the British Empire ( or what was left of it post WW2) and the ‘ Hero ‘ was soundly rewarded in a massive seats defeat in 1945 by a 183 majority Labour government.
His career was revived in 1951 where the Conservatives got less party votes than Labour ( 230000 less ) but won just by 17 seats over other parties.
Rationing had ended in the South and London but wouldn’t end in other areas until 1953.
He saved British Imperialism form German Imperialism.
And here we are in Brexit mode where it looks like Germany won after all but we all still speak English.
Post Brexit we will all still speak English, poorer but still speaking English like Jacob.
If you think Churchill was bad, wait until you hear about the other guy.
But don’t tell me. You’re going to try and equate the death of a striking miner with the murder of 6 million Jews in the death camps.
He could equate it to the gassing of men, women and children Churchitler ordered or to the famine he orchestrated, but I’m sure you have your blood soaked whitewashing sponge at the ready.
BTW Anonable1, why do you dismiss the memories of the non-jewish victims of the death camps in your equation above? 1 miner, 6 million Jews, no room for everyone else. Are some victims of the nazi regime death camps more worthy than other victims?
“BTW Anonable1, why do you dismiss the memories of the non-jewish victims of the death camps in your equation above? 1 miner, 6 million Jews, no room for everyone else. Are some victims of the nazi regime death camps more worthy than other victims?”
That is a line frequently trotted out by holocaust deniers.
In this case its unpleasantness is aggravated by the lie that Anon1 “dismissed the memories of the non-jewish victims of the death camps”. Not mentioning those other victims is not “dismissing” them.
You’re a nasty bit of work, aren’t you.
”That is a line frequently trotted out by holocaust deniers”
Sorry Charles are you accusing me of something with regard the Shoah or are you just throwing out some random thoughts?
”Not mentioning those other victims is not “dismissing” them.”
To not include is to exclude. ”Exclude – remove from consideration” says google.
I merely asked why a rabid racist, your friend Anonable1, left out ALL victims of the Nazi death camps from his query above. His statement above suggests that he is not at all too concerned about all the victims of the Nazi’s, just some. Which is not right you’d agree (?). I still await clarification on this from Anonable1.
And no the the final question. Have a good day.
“Sorry Charles are you accusing me of something with regard the Shoah or are you just throwing out some random thoughts?”
Yes, I’m pointing out that your line of “argument” is one which is often used by holocaust deniers.
As to whether or not you are a paid-up holocaust denier, I would not presume to answer on your behalf. But feel free to tell us if you wish.
”Yes, I’m pointing out that your line of “argument” is one which is often used by holocaust deniers.”
So random thoughts then over an actual accusation that I deny something or other. Cheers for clarity.
I’d also like to point out (using your random logic machine above) that your line of ”writing in English” is often used by Holocaust deniers too. Spooky.
”As to whether or not you are a paid-up holocaust denier, I would not presume to answer on your behalf. But feel free to tell us if you wish”
Thank you. Out of intrigue though who does one pay for this ”paid-up Holocaust denier” stuff you know so much about?
And I thought that Rees Mogg was an intelligent man – whatever you might think of his policies!
Winston Churchill had bugger all to do with instigating Boer concentration camps – the man responsible for that was Alfred – later 1st Viscount Milner. Churchill was never more than a gofer compared to him!
I hate Tories . Time for a cull. As in Steve Bell’s recent version of hieronymous Bosch, May engorging Cameron into a glass bottle.
He and Tusk got the same idea, only Tusk’s was funnier and Bell’s scary.
Are we ever going to be rid of these racists?
Usual right-wing rubbish. Many of us don’t hate this country. It is ours. We were born here. Not to be sold out to US neocons, or anyone else who takes advantage of our considerable tax-burden for their own nefarious purposes.
“Many of us don’t hate this country”.
You couldn’t even bring yourself to say none of you. I think you mean some of you.
Terrorist attacks inside Israel have dropped to almost zero since the construction of the wall. But I understand that people sitting comfortably far away from the action might wish to deny that.
State terrorist attacks in Palestine (or “mowing the lawn”, to which such attacks are affectionately referred in the apartheid homeland) continue apace.
Actually Charles minorities in Israel are still terrorized and attacked on a daily basis across the Holy Land.
Its just you’re not concerned with Christian and Muslim victims of terrorism in Israel. Which is a shame.
Or ‘Black’ jewish apparently.
Or women by the ultra religious bigots.
Keep trying!
More truths?
Thousand of school children demonstrating over climate change, in London I think, loudly chanting F*ck Theresa May. Who am I to disagree.
https://mobile.twitter.com/CallumCant1
Their teachers have been busy at work on them, then. Somewhere between the mosque visits, diversity sessions, gender identity classes and sexuality workshops, there will have been a poisoning of minds against Toreeez.
I’ll bet they understand the science better than you.
I agree Anonable1.
All these misguided kids should be brought down to the local synagogue to learn about tolerance. Could you suggest a few?
Speaking on demonstrations, why do ADULTS not march against war these days.
“Sixteen years ago today, we marched against the Iraq war.”
https://twitter.com/jeremycorbyn/status/1096442021991104513
“F@ck Theresa May”, “Fu@k The Tory’s” good to see their spirit is in the right place. Hopefully they will realise who the real controllers are soon (The Establishment) and the huge task of dismantling it.
They’d do more good refusing to let mummy drive them to and from school.
Kempe
Well said. And with regard to environmental problems generally, school children are some of the worst culprits at dropping litter. In despair a few months ago, I phoned a secondary school near me to point out the irony of their website making a big thing about the school’s doctrine of ‘teaching the pupils to respect their environment and other people’, as their pupils were the worst litterbugs in the area. I was assured that the headmaster would remind them of their responsibility but, if he did, I haven’t witnessed any improvement. Funny how in the 60s and 70s, in the days when ‘green’ was just a colour, we didn’t have to be taught such behaviour by our schoolteachers. So you must excuse me for failing to take seriously children demonstrating about climate change.
Borncynical, don’t die cynical.
Here’s to the kids. Get out and join them. Look at the fucking mess we’re leaving them.
If have them all doing a beach clean seeing as they (rightly) care so much about the environment. Or are they just learning to be good virtue signallers like they’ve seen on social media?
They’re protesting about potential human extinction, and you’re carping about litter?
The oceans are choking with plastics, and that’s not because insufficient schoolkids have been forced to act like wombles. Production of plastics needs to be controlled at source.
@Clark
“just carping about litter”
I raised the litter issue to highlight that IMO environmental concerns are not unique to climate change and if people (children or otherwise) cannot begin to help control the situation at the grassroots level of not wantonly discarding crisp and biscuit packets and sandwich wrappers then you have to question such people’s understanding of the situation beyond shouting profanities at the PM and bunking off school for a day – couldn’t they (or presumably their teachers) have organised their demonstration for next week’s half-term? It might have had more credibility but I wonder how many would have turned up. I think they would all have managed to find something to do of more pressing urgency than climate change (facetious comment, in case in doubt). Children as individuals cannot do anything practical about climate change but they can do something about litter but refuse to do so. There is no denying that the oceans are choked with plastic but that is a different challenge which shouldn’t deflect from the responsibility that even the smallest children can be encouraged to take with immediately tangible results with regard to protecting our environment.
What I am saying in short is that it’s right to have genuine (this being the key word) concerns about climate change but this doesn’t have to be distinct from other equally damaging environmental issues. All of these issues are ultimately interlinked. Just because you wish to defend the attendance of children at such a demonstration shouldn’t present you with an excuse to criticise those who express views on other environmental problems. By doing so you raise questions about your own credibility in debating such issues.
Borncynical, some kids (and adults) drop litter; others don’t. Yet you’re dismissing the sincerity of all the protestors on the basis of litter.
This packaging; it’s marketing material. It could be biodegradable. It could have value attached to it – collect and/or return some and you get paid for it or whatever; remember returnable bottles and the Schweppes protest? But no; “too expensive, not competitive”.
Competitive. These kids grow up surrounded by an ideology of competition – look out for yourself – just yourself – because no one else will, and getting rich is the ultimate virtue – internalise the gain, externalise the damage. It’s everywhere. Let’s change that, instead of dismissing this protest.
NONSENSE, Kempe, utter nonsense.
In a market economy, personal reduction of fossil fuel use merely reduces demand, causing its price to fall. Since the majority of the world’s population is poorer than us, the price drop simply increases consumption elsewhere.
No demand side policy can reduce emissions, and only governments can reduce the supply.
Those kids absolutely put you to shame there Kempe.
So according to you any attempt to reduce fossil fuel consumption is just going to make the problem worse?
We need to educate everyone to reduce demand not just sit back and rely on governments to solve the problem by rationing. That’d go down well with voters!
Kempe, those kids are fighting for their lives. It is well past time to treat this crisis with the seriousness it demands. Rationing was enforced in the Second World War. This is far more serious. You’re a rationalist. You know this is true.
Kempe, a lot of people here think you just automatically support the establishment. This is make or break for you. You can’t deny anthropogenic global warming. You know that CO2 emissions can’t fall unless extraction falls. With all those growing economies out there you know that restricting ourselves in the developed countries can’t reduce extraction. And the establishment won’t enforce extraction restriction. You’ve reached the end of the road. To maintain your rationalist stance, you have to oppose the establishment.
I predict no comment. Please prove me wrong.
” You can’t deny anthropogenic global warming. ”
I’m not; what I am contesting is your view that the individual can’t do anything about it. In the end it’s not the extraction of fossil fuels which is the problem but consumption and in that respect we all bear some responsibility for the mess the planet is in. Sure, it’s a global problem but it’s no good sitting back, doing nothing and waiting for governments to impose rationing. That’s going to work isn’t it?
“No comment”? I thought you knew me better than that.
OK Kempe, so you merely support the establishment. Companies and governments can extract as much as they like, and it’s entirely the plebs fault for using it. Just like we should lock up minor drugs users, but collect tax from the producers, traffickers and pushers and use the police to protect their commercial operations.
Fine. Just so long as you’re clear about it.
– “but it’s no good sitting back, doing nothing and waiting for governments to impose rationing”
Exactly. That’s why civil disobedience is necessary. If the governments won’t act to protect our only home then they aren’t fit for purpose and we have to take matters into our own hands.
Teenagers are a popular target group for extreme ideologies: African child soldiers, Islamism in Madrassas, Hitlerjugend under the Nazism, Komsomol under Stalin.
Easier to convince, lead (astray), bully….
And at what age can you join the British army then there ‘BigMac’? Still 16?
I like digging holes ‘BigMac’, do you like digging holes?
Succinct BM – this may be the litmus test of the day!
It’s hilarious. We’re being told what to do by children. A whole panel of them on C4 News earlier, telling grown-ups how they should act on Brexit and climate change. Is this the fruition of the long march? The complete inversion of accepted norms?
It will be no use to the children if they get a good education and ten years later they are stood up their necks in floods and starving due to climate change.
Sometimes the ‘ educators’ need educating by the children.
Good luck to them they are right to be angry.
Using Police Horses on kids is not a good optic neither.
Ken
It must be annoying for Mrs May to have to let go of throttling the minds of our youngsters and scourging our country of immigrants just to strangle the EU project and drown Russia and China in a butt of Salisbury wine.
She did aim a mustang kick at them while grunting and straining with both hands. Not the passive violence of Fux or Snog. The desperate frustration of a rich bitch to humiliate her husband.
Dunno, I’m not young enough to know anything.
I’ve been first and last
Look at how the time goes past.
But I’m all alone at last.
Rolling home to you.
YOU’ve been spreading conspiracy theories to fuck those kids’ future. You should hang your head in shame.
The above to Blunderbuss. Not you Freddy.
I guessed that.
Just out of interest Clark, what effect do you think has 200+ nuclear bomb tests conducted over decades had on the planets atmosphere?
Have you ever overlaid a time-lapse of the planets spike in temperature over the past 100 years with Nuclear testing conducted by less than 15 countries in the world?
The scientific community from these <15 countries want the hold the whole world responsible for global warming (while also charging them for it). Why can't people discuss the cause of this warming with the label of ''climate change denier'?
And what effect has punching nuclear powered spacecraft through the planets atmosphere and into space had? No, effect in your mind? Its all CO2?
Jeffleb, it was ten times that; 2000+. But the tests stopped decades ago, and the temperature has continued to rise, and polar ice melt has accelerated.
There have been no nuclear powered launch vehicles; there was Project Orion but they never attempted to launch, and the programme was shut down with the Atmospheric Nuclear Test Ban Treaty of 1963.
I’ve looked through every objection to the CO2 theory that has been presented to me and more besides. Not only are they wrong, they have the hallmark of superficial plausibility, and their proponents never retract them, so they have the character of propaganda, not science.
Extra heat retained by CO2 equates to the energy of dozens or hundreds of nuclear bombs every day. Check, but it’s something like one Hiroshima-sized explosion every five minutes. Or maybe even every five seconds, but certainly not five hours.
Clark I was referring to nuclear powered devices carried into space as cargo rather than powering the rockets into orbit. What effect would such cargo have penetrating the layers of the earths atmosphere?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_in_space
Chernobyl is decades old. Radioactive fallout to this day, and for many decades to come, is carried 100’s of miles with the wind.
”because of the long-lived radiation in the region surrounding the former Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant, the area won’t be safe for human habitation for at least 20,000 years”
https://www.livescience.com/39961-chernobyl.html
But you don’t see a connection as to how 2000+ bombs and the radiation/fallout from them could be still melting ice or warming the sea?
Tsar Bomba – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WwlNPhn64TA
looks like it could have melted a bit of ice, no?
And nuclear testing hasn;t stopped. A few countries still let some off.
An archive of Russian nukes on twitter
https://twitter.com/atomicarchive?lang=en
BOOM.
– “nuclear powered devices carried into space as cargo rather than powering the rockets into orbit. What effect would such cargo have penetrating the layers of the earths atmosphere?”
Essentially none. No more than any other payload.
People confuse all things nuclear, so people think nuclear fuel is like high-level radioactive waste, or fallout. They aren’t remotely similar. You can handle pure uranium 235 and it’ll basically do you no harm. If you handle it a lot you should wear gloves. I wouldn’t recommend you eat off plates made from it, but you’d be very unlikely to notice any effect unless you did it for years. Uranium’s natural; it’s in the rocks, it’s in the oceans.
You mustn’t even go near spent fuel straight out of a reactor. Radiation from the melted cores at Fukushima fried the computers of the observation robots they tried to send in.
– ”because of the long-lived radiation in the region surrounding the former Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant, the area won’t be safe for human habitation for at least 20,000 years”
But people do live there. In fact, the area is teeming with wildlife, precisely because nearly all the humans have moved away.
– “But you don’t see a connection as to how 2000+ bombs and the radiation/fallout from them could be still melting ice or warming the sea?”
The fall-out has caused cancers, people were used as test subjects, and populations were deprived of their islands. But the contribution to global warming is negligible. I understated my figures above; global warming is adding heat faster than four Hiroshima-type bombs per second:
https://4hiroshimas.com/
The Tsar Bomba was about 60 megatons, and Little Boy was 15 kilotons, so Tsar Bomba was 60,000,000 / 15,000 = 4000 times greater, ie. equivalent to about 1000 seconds or 17 minutes of global warming.
Really Anon we would not have had a British empire if pupils had been so passive as to listen to teachers and not challenge them. Of course to be fair I assume your your point is with regard to the lower middle classes isn’t it.
The bureaucrats children should sit quietly and be passive so as not to grow up and become overly confident chaterati whereas elite and working class children should learn to stand up, challenge and fight.
The cousins too. Isn’t the best thing that we love about them their maverick tendency to stand up to authority.
It’s shameful that we need to be told what to do by children.
CO2 emissions should have been fixed, three decades ago. Before they were even born.
But no. It’s money money money. Well fuck money, because you can’t eat it and you can’t breathe it.
Adults are meant to protect children. Global warming is universal child abuse.
OUR FAULT.
You could be wrong. Does that possibility ever occur to you?
The Observer, Sunday, 22 Feb 2004
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2004/feb/22/usnews.theobserver
“A secret report, suppressed by US defence chiefs and obtained by The Observer, warns that major European cities will be sunk beneath rising seas as Britain is plunged into a ‘Siberian’ climate by 2020”.
Which European cities have sunk beneath rising seas? Oh well, maybe next year.
Why do you have to be so stupid? So Clark – together with the entire scientific consensus – is just plain wrong, you contend. Everything is just tickety-boo. But if we took action anyway, and have a cleaner, greener planet – that would be just terrible, right?
Perhaps you just take some delight in being a contrarian – it’s a cute little game for you. Because you cannot be bothered to understand or study the subject, it’s OK to sit back and cast doubt, like a good little stooge of the oil industry. A useful idiot for them, to be sure.
That’s all you’ve got, right? Casting doubt. No facts. No reason. No semblance of counter-argument. Just plain lazy nay-saying, coming from a position of total ignorance in which you are smugly content.
I think a hundred year warning on rising sea levels would suffice for even the most dullest brains to get it, but calcification of the last two brain cells left might require a 200 year warning to convince us that it is a task for each and everyone of us to tackle and act up to.
I very much enjoyed the children protests, which followed a protest here at Norfolk County Councils budget meeting, little did it achieve as the dinosaurs voted to build the western bypass completing the doughnut development around Norwich. This bypass will go through the Wensum valley, the main water source for over 150.000 people, no doubt it will be going over budget as almost every NCC planning development, the last northern bypass was 1/3 more expensive than quoted, an abysmal state of contracting work.
I expect the children to grow up into a vociferous opposition to any Government that allows itself to be controlled by the oil/gas and coal lobbies, I for one shall support them, always have done.
dinosaurs have to die out!
@glenn_nl at 10:38
My point is that the climate alarmists got it wrong in 2004 when they predicted “major European cities will be sunk beneath rising seas by 2020” so why should we believe them today when they predict “disaster in 12 years”?
@nevermind at 11:19
I am not controlled by the oil/gas and coal lobbies.
I accept that we will have to phase out fossil fuels eventually, because they will run out, but I see no need to harm the poor by pushing up energy costs prematurely.
I don’t care about “climate alarmists”, a pseudo-group invented to dismiss what we can see.
I care about these:
https://scripps.ucsd.edu/programs/keelingcurve/wp-content/plugins/sio-bluemoon/graphs/co2_800k.png
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2a/Annual_Arctic_Sea_Ice_Minimum_1979-2015_with_Area_Graph.webm
Now Blunderbuss give them a chance – they said “by 2020” – we’ve still got 10 months to go!
@Clark 11:43
You appear to be cherry-picking by showing only the minima. Here is a plot of monthly mean values of the area of the arctic sea ice:
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Plot_arctic_sea_ice_area.svg
Blunderbuss, the graph you linked shows that, averaged over each year, about a quarter of former ice area has been lost in under forty tears. That’s less than the animation I linked, but still highly significant.
The provenance of that graph seems highly obscure. Dominiklenne, a Wikimedia user who has since deleted their account, claims to have compiled it him/herself from one or more of the many rather technical datasets found below, without saying which sets were used nor how the graph was derived from the data, and most of the relevant dates seem inconsistent:
ftp://sidads.colorado.edu/DATASETS/NOAA/
Since you’re picking the personal work of an unheard-of and deleted Wikimedia account, it would seem to be you that’s cherry-picking. As usual. Yet it still shows massive ice loss.
Blunderbuss, two Wikipedia points.
I realised this morning that I made an assumption above, that Dominiklenne deleted his/her own Wikimedia account, when this user was possibly banned. I noticed some questions about licensing of images. Personally, I can’t be bothered to investigate further; I just added this for balance.
More importantly, that image is used on Wikipedia, on the Arctic article. But Dominiklenne claims to have made those graphs him/herself, so they count as Original Research. Under Wikipedia rules, they should be unlinked from Wikipedia. But I hesitate to do so because I feel you may accuse me of bias, effectively “part of the conspiracy”, like you did jytdog and others. What should we do?
@Clark, February 17, 2019 at 11:58
You can do what you like. I’m not disputing that global warming causes ice reduction. What I am disputing is that carbon dioxide is a significant cause of global warming.
Actually, it’s the other way round – global warming (driven by natural cycles) causes an increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide because, as the oceans warm up, they release dissolved carbon dioxide.
You really don’t care what arguments you throw at global warming do you? Chuck sufficiently varied turds some of them must stick, is that the approach? Do you think that’s how science is done? Couldn’t you do the same to, say, powered flight and prove it’s impossible? Those are questions Blunderbuss; please answer them.
@Clark, February 17, 2019 at 21:45
I’m just explaining my views on global warming. I know you don’t agree with them but I don’t see why we can’t just agree to disagree.
Blunderbuss, another question; how did you find that specific graph?
Blunderbuss, are you claiming that your views are scientific?
@Clark, February 17, 2019 at 22:13
“Blunderbuss, are you claiming that your views are scientific?”
Yes.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_dioxide_%28data_page%29#Solubility_in_water_at_various_temperatures
@Clark, February 17, 2019 at 22:12
“Blunderbuss, another question; how did you find that specific graph?”
I suspected that the title of your graph was misleading (it should have read “Minimum Arctic Sea Ice Area” rather than just “Arctic Sea Ice Area”) so I searched for further information and found the graph I posted.
Blunderbuss, do you claim that your rejection of global warming is scientific?
Please post the search term and a link to the search engine’s results page, and tell me which link found that graph.
Yes I know CO2 dissolves in water. What happens to the acidity of the water?
BB: – “I suspected that the title of your graph was misleading”
Not my graph. Are you going to go and edit its title at Wikipedia?
@Clark, February 18, 2019 at 01:10
“Blunderbuss, do you claim that your rejection of global warming is scientific?”
I’m not rejecting global warming, I’m just rejecting the CO2 theory. My theory is scientific, it is based on historical records, not computer predictions.
“Please post the search term and a link to the search engine’s results page, and tell me which link found that graph.”
I went to Wikimedia Commons and entered “Arctic sea ice area” which is the title of your graph.
“Yes I know CO2 dissolves in water. What happens to the acidity of the water?”
The water becomes more acid. I know where we’re going from here.
@Clark, February 18, 2019 at 01:27
“Not my graph. Are you going to go and edit its title at Wikipedia?”
No. When I try to edit anything about climate change on Wikipedia, I get banned from editing. Are you going to edit it?
– “I know where we’re going from here”
Really. How do you know that?
– “When I try to edit anything about climate change on Wikipedia, I get banned from editing”
Why do you think that happens?
– “My theory is scientific, it is based on historical records, not computer predictions”
What, you mean your latest theory? I mean, we’ve been all round the houses, haven’t we? First you posted a link claiming there was no consistent warming over the most recent century, but that article’s own figures showed that there was. When I pointed this out, you said we’d “just have to agree to disagree”, but actually there was nothing to disagree about; the figures you linked showed warming, and the article you recommended is simply wrong. But you didn’t retract, thereby acting unscientifically.
Next you “agreed with Dave” that CO2 concentrations were too low to do anything at all, but that was wrong and yet you didn’t retract.
Then your idea was that the IPCC ignore solar variation, which proved untrue, but you didn’t retract.
And on and on and on. So I feel you’re being dishonest, or at best mistaken, by claiming to be acting scientifically. It seems to me that your approach actually undermines readers’ understanding of what science is. Rather than being a matter of testing theory against evidence, you treat it like an opportunistic guessing game decided by rhetoric.
– “Are you going to edit it?”
Possibly. I’m busy; for instance, trying to get you to act scientifically has been taking considerable amounts of my time.
@Clark, February 18, 2019 at 11:54
OK, since you are so busy, I will wait for your next message.
Blunderbuss, that seems like an excuse to me. You could answer my questions while you’re waiting.
If you are really making a scientific argument, it should be easy for us to discover exactly which parts of the evidence and theory we disagree about. However, I have become convinced that you’re only pretending to discuss scientifically; you throw in some scientific terms or graphs, like quacks and cosmetic companies do, but you don’t genuinely have any scientific structure to your argument. It seems to me that you’re trying to trick other readers. I don’t like that at all because the future of my species is at stake.
@Clark, February 18, 2019 at 17:10
Here you are:
http://joannenova.com.au/2009/12/carbon-rises-800-years-after-temperatures/
ANSWER the damn questions or STOP pretending you’re discussing scientifically. Invoking the authority of Jo Nova is NOT a scientific argument. You have me here, and I will argue scientifically, which means, on the basis of evidence, theory, maths, logic and reason, NOT “I know of someone who says so-and-so”.
I suspect that this is why I got to call you a liar without the mods deleting my comments; if it’s true it’s a description not an insult.
@Clark, February 19, 2019 at 01:26
If Jo Nova isn’t an authority then what makes you an authority?
I have never claimed to be an authority. Are you still beating your wife?
I was very clear:
– ‘I will argue scientifically, which means, on the basis of evidence, theory, maths, logic and reason’
@Clark, February 19, 2019 at 13:28
Jo Nova’s article is based on evidence. She’s even given references.
But Blunderbuss, you haven’t retracted one damn thing yet, despite being proven wrong over and over, AND you have yet to answer my questions above. Your constant pressure to set the agenda is reminiscent of political lobbying. I will not be railroaded.
Correct these matters and then we can look at Nova’s article, though I expect it’ll turn out to be as facile as all the rest. My questions above await.
To answer your question in your parent comment: “You could be wrong. Does that possibility ever occur to you?”, yes of course it does, and my thinking is that the potential dangers of heeding the mainstream science pale into insignificance against the potential dangers of dismissing it. Actively attempting to corrupt it, as you seem to, adds the further danger of undermining public understanding of science itself.
@Clark, February 19, 2019 at 18:00
“But Blunderbuss, you haven’t retracted one damn thing yet, despite being proven wrong over and over”
I haven’t been proved wrong and I keep giving you evidence but you keep ignoring it. For example, I gave you this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_dioxide_%28data_page%29#Solubility_in_water_at_various_temperatures
Are you claiming that carbon dioxide isn’t less soluble in warm water than in cold water?
You are still merely pushing an agenda. My questions remain outstanding.
And you lie, yet again. You have been proven wrong repeatedly. Therefore, you have zero respect for science.
Now, Blunderbuss, I think I saw a comment in which you claimed to be a minor politician. Is that right?
@Clark, February 19, 2019 at 20:00
I’m bored with this. I’m going to do something else.
Well I find science fascinating, maybe you should try it; trying to promote dead ducks is indeed a bit tedious.
– “I am therefore speaking directly to you now, Professor Patrick Holford. If we disagree on a point of scientific evidence, instead of this stuff about the pharmaceutical industry being out to get you, or a complaint, or a legal letter, instead of airily claiming that that queries should be taken up with the scientist whose valid work you are – as I think I have shown – overinterpreting, instead of responding on a different question than the one which was posed, or any other form of theatrics, I would welcome professorial clarification, simply and clearly.
– These are not complicated matters. Either it is acceptable to cherry-pick evidence on, say, vitamin E, or it is not. Either it is reasonable to extrapolate from lab data about cells in a dish to a clinical claim about people with AIDS, or it is not. Either an orange contains vitamin C, or it does not. And so on. Where you have made errors, perhaps you could simply acknowledge that, and correct them. I will happily do so myself, and indeed have done so many times, on many issues, and felt no great loss of face.
– I welcome other people challenging my ideas: it helps me to refine them.”
Ben Goldacre, Bad Science Chapter 9, 2008.
Clark: Why do you bother? I pointed out some time back that BlunderBust was not exactly an honest player.
Recall, if you will, he referenced his “proof” than AGW was false some time back. It was a single study, based on a single observation and some very guarded speculation, that solar events might cause cloud formations which very-maybe-could reflect sunlight and retard any possible problems concerning AGW. But that was about 2003, with zero follow up.
Pointing this out brought the same predictable results, which you are rediscovering now – BB doesn’t acknowledge a thing, moves onto another highly dubious “proof”, and lets you spin away, spluttering about the last pile of BS he piled up.
Look at the sheer number of conversations he’s blustered and walked away from, rather than accept he is wrong or counter the (admittedly) inarguable points against his sham references.
BB is simply not honest. Forget it.
Just for reference, recall this exchange:
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2018/09/soft-focus/comment-page-4/#comment-784620
This was the “proof” BB offered me, in order to waste my time.
—-start
Blunderbuss
September 18, 2018 at 14:56
@glenn_nl
All right. Here’s one:
http://science.sciencemag.org/content/298/5599/1732
—–end
This, I must confess, I comprehensively demolished. Please read it. Was BB brave enough to admit it? Of course not. His childish response was :
—–Start BB
Actually, it’s a religious debate. I have blasphemed by questioning the authority of your god, the IPCC. You will never be satisfied until I confess my sin and ask for forgiveness.
I’m not going to confess my sin so I’m not going to waste any more time on this.
—–End BB
We pointed out the IPCC was never mentioned, but – fah! – what are facts to BB?
So why is he still here? He’s not interested in honesty, or getting to the truth. He’s been feigning this honest doubter line for getting on for a year. Never interested in getting to the bottom even of his own references, even after they’ve been blown out of the water. Just pushing doubt, doubt, doubt. Interesting behaviour.
Glenn_nl, thanks, but I bother because the argument proceeds in public and it’s a very important topic, possibly the most important that humanity has ever faced. It’s shit work, but someone has to do it. More need to do the same because the problem continues:
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2019/02/craig-is-in-jacobabad/comment-page-10/#comment-831894
It is disappointing that he won’t simply retract and instead pulls theatrics, waltzing off in a huff. But it demonstrates that he’s doing propaganda not science, and that’s the important point.
Glenn_nl, our comments crossed. Thanks for those links; that was where this all started, with Blunderbuss linking an article with data showing a century of warming but claiming none. I particularly like BB’s statement:
– “Climate change has been happening ever since the earth was formed. This is why I put my faith in geologists, not climate scientists”
An admission of faith, and we should turn to geologists for advice about the climate – with no mention that geologists have been working with climate scientists for decades and support the AGW consensus.
@glenn_nl, February 20, 2019 at 00:55
If you and Clark are the future of science then heaven help us. I haven’t claimed to “prove” anything. All I’ve said is “other views on climate change are available” but you just want to suppress this.
Rubbish. You keep leaping over my attempts to open discussion, scientific and otherwise, and instead you post a link and expect me to discuss that, thereby setting the agenda. My questions above are still awaiting your answers.
BB: “All I’ve said is “other views on climate change are available” but you just want to suppress this.”
These “other views” either don’t stand the slightest scrutiny, or they don’t say what you claim. Who’s bothered about that, though – it’s “other views” and that’s all that counts. After all, one view is just as valid as any other, right BB, you sneaky old fraud?
Clark, initially quoting –
BB: “ – “Climate change has been happening ever since the earth was formed. This is why I put my faith in geologists, not climate scientists”
Clark: “An admission of faith, and we should turn to geologists for advice about the climate – with no mention that geologists have been working with climate scientists for decades and support the AGW consensus.”
—-
In that case, BB should be bowled over by this guy (who I quoted a while back when making a point that BB chose to ignore).
Josef Werne is a professor of geology and environmental science at the University of Pittsburgh. (So what would _he_ know about it, eh?):
“In all honesty, anthropogenic (human-caused) climate change is _not_ a scientific debate, it is a political/economic debate.” According to Werne, the relevant question is not, “Is there human-induced climate change?” The question that we should be focused on is, if anything, “What should we do about human-induce climate change?”
https://www.livescience.com/37152-global-warming-causes.html
—-
So how about that, BB? A professor of geology, no less, and environmental science. Are you so utterly craven that you won’t even acknowledge what this guy is saying – someone you _claim_ to put faith in?
Nah. Course not. Your intellectual dishonesty is staggering.
Blunderbuss, I would prefer you to continue this conversation, but there are many outstanding points that I think we should clarify before proceeding to introduce any new ones.
“It’s shameful that we need to be told what to do by children”
That’s stretching it a bit, isn’t it? As far as I’m aware no children have pointed out any issues or resolutions that nobody was already aware of. As I have posted above, they are being made out to be saints when in fact the majority of them and the teachers all just wanted yet another excuse for a day off school. Perhaps you can explain precisely what such a demonstration achieved that will be remembered in a year’s time.
The protest seems to have achieved no effect upon you. Their fault or yours?
@Clark, February 16, 2019 at 15:02
What would you do to reduce production of carbon dioxide? Ban cars? Ban aeroplanes? You can do that in a dictatorship but not in a democracy.
Some governments have tried carbon taxes but they don’t work because people just pay the tax and keep on generating carbon dioxide. Or, as in France, they mount massive protests against the carbon taxes.
Do you have a silver bullet?
Stop being such a thickhead, BB.
Government policy shifts people’s behaviour, particularly through the taxation system. Remember when diesels were given the thumbs-up by the government, and diesel fuel was taxed a lot less? Sales went through the roof. Now the reverse is happening, again by dint of government taxation policy.
In NL, we have huge discounts for electric vehicles, and tax incentives for companies who allow charging at their premises. As a result, electric car sales are soaring.
You don’t need a dictatorship to change people’s behaviour, just incentives in the right direction and people will tend quite rapidly in that direction.
@glenn_nl, February 17, 2019 at 20:01
“Stop being such a thickhead, BB”.
You are getting worse than Clark at insulting me. It does you no favours.
It may work in NL but it doesn’t work in Britain. I hardly ever see an electric car. Lots of big car parks have charging points but I’ve never seen one in use.
BB: “It may work in NL but it doesn’t work in Britain. I hardly ever see an electric car. “
Not sure if you’re having a laugh, and avoiding the bleedin’ obvious here.
If government policy encourages a behaviour, it will change. There’s nothing fundamentally different about human nature amoung the Dutch compared with British, for christ’s sake – the Dutch simply have a more enlightened government which encourages behaviour beneficial to the people rather than corporations (in large part).
Do you know the sort of subsidies the fossil fuel industry gets? Here’s something copied from what Phil wrote a short while ago (thanks Phil!) :
————
https://www.independent.co.uk/environment/fossil-fuel-firms-billion-pound-uk-state-subsidies-oil-gas-firms-leak-climate-change-environment-a7690966.html
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2017/aug/07/fossil-fuel-subsidies-are-a-staggering-5-tn-per-year
https://oilprice.com/Latest-Energy-News/World-News/The-G7-Spends-100-Billion-On-Fossil-Fuel-Subsidies.html
————-
Imagine if this behaviour was penalised, rather than given tax incentives, and sustainable policies subsidised to this extent instead!
Are you really saying you simply cannot understand this?
@glenn_nl, February 17, 2019 at 20:52
I think it is misleading to describe these as subsidies. In the first case, it appears that these are loan guarantees so, as long as there is no default, the “subsidy” will not be paid.
In the second case, the “subsidy” relates to “environmental costs like global warming and deaths from air pollution”. These are purely speculative.
In the third case, it is not clear what the “subsidies” relate to.
Not very enlightening.
Governments have to cap extraction.
If it’s extracted, it will be burned in short order. If this were not so, there would need to be massive storage infrastructure. To reduce emissions, reduce extraction.
If we then leave matters to the market, that which is extracted will go according to how people can pay. That’s a political matter. If you want to ask me about my politics, I will give you my political opinions. But to reduce emissions, reduce extraction.
@Clark, February 17, 2019 at 22:33
“If we then leave matters to the market, that which is extracted will go according to how people can pay”.
So are you happy for poor people to be deprived of fuel because they can’t afford it?
No I’m not. Are you happy that global warming could displace a billion people, submerge most agricultural land cause civilisation to collapse, with immense suffering and loss of life?
People are already deprived of fuel because they can’t afford to pay. I’m unhappy about such gross inequality. Are you?
@Clark, February 18, 2019 at 01:29
“I’m unhappy about such gross inequality. Are you?”
Yes – that’s why I don’t want to make it worse by pushing up the price of fuel.
@Clark, February 18, 2019 at 01:23
“Are you happy that global warming could displace a billion people, submerge most agricultural land cause civilisation to collapse, with immense suffering and loss of life?”
No, that’s why I’d rather spend money on sea defences than on futile attempts to control the climate.
Do you think that the price of fuel is the major cause of inequality?
Spending money on sea defences will be futile unless we cut emissions. Try reading the more pessimistic scenarios; the planet is literally unrecognisable.
Please Craig, if you are ABLE, could we have a new post. It is becoming rather tedious on here.
Ah shucks. I’m off for the weekend now. Wont’ tease anyone anymore for a day or two….tho it want you I was teasing.
If anyone thinks “The Left” stands for freedom, witness Exhibit A.
You’re not obliged to read and post here, you know. Haven’t you got anything else to do?
The limits of her practical involvement with the various “causes” she espouses are posting on this and other blogs and attending meetings of like-minded obsessives.
Power To the Children.. Best not to Grow up.. Paint Stones instead.. a wee bit like this yes stone for Independence – on the Clyde coast today –
https://www.flickr.com/photos/132108640@N08/46192849085/in/dateposted-friend/
a wee bit Closer –
https://www.flickr.com/photos/132108640@N08/47106625611/in/dateposted-friend/
<3 Brian.
Agreed but do you think they know they real enemy? Corporations like lockheed, Apple or BP or are they more focused on us all turning vegan and banning gaseous plant food? 🙂
Not convinced that turning vegan will save the planet.
However having less people being born, would be a start.
It is the number of people that is the sticking point.
if there were only 100 million people we could all live like Tony Blair
Good idea Michael, if you, Anon2 and fanfare Habbakuk/ alias Charles Bostitch partake in the real Knaus Ogino method of procriation, you would do your little ends worth of climate change.
get to it drop the viagra.
– “banning gaseous plant food”
Learn some science before you dismiss, or all you can project will be prejudice.
Anna Soubry is on her way out of the Tory party fast, I reckon. She has called it “broken”. But I don’t think she gets on well with many people, so she probably won’t become the next Lord Owen of Bosnia. It boils down to a smash the Labour voteshare operation, as happened the last time (before Jeremy Corbyn) the Labour party had a decent leader, namely Michael Foot nearly 40 years ago. The next general election is likely to be soon, but it will be AFTER Brexit.
As for Theresa May – what leadership qualities, huh? Not even being present in the Commons when the result of the vote on the government motion came in. Did she vote and then scarper? A leader like that is going to have practically no respect in the cabinet. OK the motion wasn’t that meaningful, but the government lost and she ran. (Did they three-line whip it? Or does no-one tell Jacob Rees-Mogg what to do?)
Has anyone in the mainstream media mentioned yet that Andrea Leadsom, former institutional banking director at Barclays and also former director of her brother-in-law’s Jersey-based hedge fund, and who is currently in charge of steering government business through the Commons, is an ERG member?
So many pundits think they are cynical about the ERG but most of their “thoughts” about it come down to how they feel about Rees-Mogg’s “Mr Posh” act (clue: it’s deliberate) and a little bit of noticing of how the group functions as a party within a party if they’re feeling observative.
Thank goodness they have you to correct them, and tell them, and us, what to think.
Charles Bostock
February 15, 2019 at 22:13
“No reasonable person having watched the video would say Abrams got furious.”
……………………………………………….
Well, let us just say Bostock, he got annoyed but managed to bottle his rage. I was expecting his eyeballs to explode.
………………………………………………
“He simply protested at the young girl’s misuse of her speaking time…”
………………………………………………
The young girl? As you will know Bostick she is 37 years old.
The comically slow motion SDP3 attempts to rise from the launchpad to destroy the Labour party pre-eminence, again.
Or as the Graun fan fair grandly anoounces:
‘Intense discussions are taking place at Westminster that could lead to the emergence of a new centrist party consisting of six or more disaffected anti-Brexit Labour MPs along with the involvement of some Conservatives and the backing of the Liberal Democrats.’
Well after so many fuck-ups they are finally charging forward to festoon their petards and bring down the social democratic resurgent fortress…
There can be no logical or honourable self respecting return to the fold when they fail van there?
Hi ho hi ho its off to hell they go!
Rejoice, rejoice.
Dungerees
My penny has finally dropped. I know the pound has dropped and it’s going to be renamed the Farthing. Yes. The bum in the pavement in which Jezza rather quizzically parks his bike in Steve Bell’s recent cartoon belongs to Nobhead Johnson.
Whose shrewd political instincts as London Mayor led him to sell everything to Russia and scarper and led London to choose a Labour mayor before it was all gone.
A much lesser evil socialist threat in the form of Jeremy Corbyn is offered the job of PM if he uses the designated slot. Blair famously parked there and look where that got him. Tempting. Tempting
@Dungroanin at 01:37
Why don’t the anti-Brexit Labour and Conservative MPs just join the Lib Dems?
I don’t know, why don’t the anti … join the Lib Dems?
I am squirming with delight at the the punchline …
Why didnt the third chickencoup cross the road?
Err…
All the useless wittering in these comments, wasted time, only a minority of you have stood up for the kids doing what we should be doing, and pretty limply at that. Some, to your eternal shame, say the kids should be punished.
What a bunch of pathetic, lazy, self-righteous wankers you lot are acting like.
Here’s to the kids.
Clarke calm down. We are beyond beyond irony in Thatcher Britain. Kids are needed for chimney duties in Victorian varlues by the Establishment Nouveau who Thatcher spawned.
It doesn’t mean children are going to be physically sent up physical chimneys.
It is the mental satisfaction of the new criminal elite to ignore the young as our parents were ignored in the past. Having all this money without Victorian ignorance would not give them the proper sense of imperial power.
Tory power is purely virtual. Why would you deprive the arseholes of their virtual self-deception? There’s a limit to how much satisfaction engineering fake terror and loop-playing the national anthem can give to the soul-less . Why deprive them of their pathetic delusions of Tory dogma fantasy. They are coke-head planners without purpose or direction.
Ignoring children empowers their zombie dreams.
Thanks giyane. But on this blog it’s a real disappointment to see young protestors dismissed this way. Of course I expect no better from a couple of familiar names who seem to relish foreigners getting blown to bits, but quite a few others have really shocked me with their attitude towards this protest.
I think we’re being scammed Clark. Something very nasty has already happened to the planet, and instead of trying to find out what it is, and doing something about it, we're training kids to run around bleating about 'global warming' and 'climate change' that is going to kill us all 50 years from now.
There has been a massive die-off of insects that poses an existential threat to life on Earth. This has already happened, and it could not possibly be explained by global warming or climate change. In the UK for example, even if there had been any climate change or warming, it would pale into utter insignificance in comparison to the natural variations in temperature and climate with which our native insects have coped quite comfortably for millions of years. So what is killing them off?
@ Stonky February 16, 2019 at 06:12
‘…So what is killing them off?’
Pesticides, herbicides, chemical fertilisers, GMO’s, microwave communications, Chemtrails, increased UV (including UVC), overuse of land for monocultures (instead of crop rotation), unhealthy and inhumane factory farms, with poisonous run-off, plastics, heavy metals and other poisons in the seas, wars and their detritus – a whole slew of deadly attacks.
Just as most people just accept chemtrails, if they even look up and see them, so they don’t seem to be aware that the ladybirds have virtually gone, as are caterpillars, bees, birds, butterflies, moths, hedgehogs, even flies.
Even the stars have disappeared behind pollution-laden haze.
And Global Warming, which I believe is increasing, but in the face of all the other real threats, I don’t worry too much about.
And then there are all the wars, and the likelihood, I believe the inevitability, of the ‘Big One’.
Which came first the flowering plants “Angiosperms” or the insects?
Only one of these things is happening in the Puerto Rican rainforest, and there has been a catastrophic decline in insect populations there too:
https://www.pnas.org/content/115/44/E10397
What I find rather discouraging is that the authors of this study, having demonstrated an unarguable decline in insect numbers, manage to concoct a ‘temperature rise’ of 2 degrees in the last forty years, and announce without a shred of experimental or scientific evidence that the latter is the cause of the former.
And hey presto! Another ‘scientific paper’ proving climate change / global warming and the catastrophic damage it is doing to the planet…
These people think the answer was bees.
https://www.nytimes.com/1995/05/23/science/which-came-first-bees-or-flowers-find-points-to-bees.html
That’s right Paul Barbara; dilute the science with pseudoscience, and help scramble the public understanding of science. That’ll help.
Stonky, physical law doesn’t care what you think. We sort this, or we follow the dinosaurs.
Spot on, Clark. The kids are fantastic, and are absolutely correct. Here’s to them, they show up the miserable misanthropes for what they are. I expect a slew of articles about how they are being manipulated, the shadowy figures behind them etc. But it is very difficult for anybody to argue that we are not destroying their future and bequeathing them a terrifying planet.
Thanks Ian. Maybe they got too old, their brains started fossilising and they forgot that they could actually think when they were younger.
Clark if we are to listen to kids it is the youngest of them who have the most to teach when they are just all life, full of life, springing about like lambs in the fields just jumping for joy – that is before they / we become more rigid and caked in our shell.
Caked in our shells and ego our enjoyment of life and the love of being alive is a less frequent occurrence. Sorry to sound like a hippy but if we love our life, that is to say if we love the life in us, the life that unites us all and the earth and sea and sky, so that we smile naturally and laugh and can’t help but have fun even when we also have sorrow and argue and tumble and play then things shall be ok.
I entirely agree about children and their love of life.
But it’s up to us alleged adults to look after practicalities, and that takes a lot more than good intentions. Love should prompt us to learn the necessary skills and take the necessary actions. If it doesn’t, then ‘love’ is just another excuse we’re giving to ourselves.
I agree.
I was at a PSC meeting last night where the speaker, who is a psychotherapist in this country, told us about the mental ill health of Palestinian adults and children living under the Occupation. He and his wife have visited the so called West Bank more than 10 times but they have not been allowed to enter Gaza. The statistics he gave were distressing to hear. There is a daily toll of abuse and intimidation of the Palestinians at the checkpoints, arrests, orchards and olive groves wrecked, imprisonments, house demolitions, sewage sent down from the overlooking settlements, night raids where homes are trashed (in one the contents of the kitchen cupboards were spread over the floor – flour was spread around and then covered with olive oil.)
A retiring collection was taken for Medical Aid for Palestinians.
This is one of several articles I have found relating to the subject.
https://www.alaraby.co.uk/english/comment/2018/5/31/mental-health-in-conflict-occupation-therapy-needed-for-palestinians
Harrowing.
What is a or the “PSC” ?
Re PSE
Choose from one of this list:
https://acronyms.thefreedictionary.com/PSC
Long list! She probably went to some Hamas-supporting meeting.
Good old Guardian. Always dutifully at the service of the State when any more Novichok nonsense is needed. I feel sorry for Dawn, but I guess as a ‘jakey’ or ‘junkie’ (even though it now appears she was neither) she was just considered to be a dispensable pawn in the great geopolitical game of “Look! Look everybody! Chemical Vlad is evil!”
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/feb/15/novichok-victim-dawn-sturgess-parents-tell-of-their-anger-and-hurt
I have read in a couple of threads recently that there is some disquiet among Guardian journalists concerning the direction of its editorial policy concerning the Skripal case. It appears there were meetings in a nearby pub earlier this year to voice contrary opinions. Those present included senior editorial staff, but did not include Luke Harding.The story in yesterday’s paper, was a timeless story that, for me, was a nod to this disquiet. The chink in the armour appears in the comments by the parents of Dawn Sturgess; they refused to blame Russia for their daughter’s death, and their ire was directed at the government.
A co-author of the article is Caroline Bannock who has considerable editorial influence over the intelligence-led back bench executives. Maybe falling ad sales, or reduced clicks are having an effect.
That’s interesting Monster. I did note the comments from Dawn’s parents. Frankly, if I was a Guardian journalist with a shred of scruple my concerns would go a good deal deeper that the Skripal story. Since the minute that Katherine Viner took over the paper has gone off a cliff. As long as she can carry on peddling her imaginary racism and made-up misogyny, there seems to be nothing she won’t publish in service of the neo-con narrative.
even more amazing, BBC News Briefing at 05:30z reported Dawn’s angry parents – and quoted them as denanding the real story from the government (ours not Vlado’s) and mentioned that they also wanted answers as to why the UK MOD chose to embed Sergei Skripal in Salisbury.
it did have a ‘whiff’ of rebellion about it, true. Still no mention of Pablo, just how long do DASM notices last?
David, yes I also heard on R4 that the parents of Dawn thought the originating seed,
was Sergei Skripal being settled in Salisbury.
They may have a point, if it transpires Sergei was storing very dangerous chemicals in his loft?
Quote Metropolitan Police Assistant Commissioner Neil Basu
“I’d like to reassure anyone who has bought Nina Ricci perfume from a legitimate source that they should not be concerned. It is safe!”
He goes on to suggest that there are likely multiple bottles of Novichok, in counterfeit Nina Ricci spray bottles.
I guess it was the Russians, up to their dastardly dealings, again and again.
I am not convinced there was ever any Novichok.
Where id Yulia?
Well they had to put him somewhere. Resettling him in Middlesborough might’ve saved Dawn’s life but equally put some other mother’s daughter in peril.
David
The ‘real story ‘ has most definitely been told.
I feel sorry for Dawn’s relatives as they have been told ‘ facts ‘ by authorities which they trusted which are a pack of lies.
Last time I read about Dawn’s Inquest it had been adjourned until January 2019. Any journo worth their salt would be knocking on the door of the Coroners Office demanding to know as to what the conclusion and cause of death was for Dawn?
There is no chance of a retest of as Dawn has been cremated.
Her parents have been misled.
Meanwhile Charlie is struggling so contrast and compare the governments assistance to Mr Skripal – Julia Skripal and the Policeman.
It’s a class matter – not a matter of truth.
I think you’re pretty much on the money there.
Who rakes through charity bins? Jakeys and junkies.
Who doesn’t matter much in the overall scheme of things? Jakeys and junkies.
Who would make an ideal victim if you want to keep the Novichok pot simmering nicely? Jakeys and junkies.
Where would you put your ‘brand-new unopened pack of expensive perfume’ if you wanted to make sure it was found by a jakey or a junkie? In a charity bin.
The Boots in the village near where Charlie and Dawn lived was closed by the police for quite some time in the summer. It was where local drug addicts like this pair went to get their methadone fix. One popular ‘trick’ of such addicts was to shoplift bottles of perfume to sell to support their drug habit. The simplest explanation of the fabled wrapped bottle of perfume that Charlie and Dawn had, was that he had nicked it from Boots, couldn’t find a buyer so gave it to Dawn. What she actually died of was probably contaminated drugs related, not ‘novochok’ or whatever. There are so many ridiculous holes in the official government Charlie and the nina ricci bottle story that beggar belief. Even down to Charlie spraying himself with it, washing it off without any problems. The wrapped and sealed bottle etc., etc. Shoplifting a genuine bottle of perfume from Boots far more credible explanation.
That’s an interesting take on events John A. But it can’t possibly be true as at no point does it involve dastardly Russian assassins hoying perfume bottles full of Novichok into charity bins in Salisbury town centre, secure in the knowledge that they’ll never be seen again…
That’s actually a very strange article . The more they write about it and the more they try , the less credible the government’s narrative gets .
Another large contract for G4S from Mr Gauke in the bag?
Electronic GPS tags to track thousands of criminals in England and Wales
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-47256515
House of Commons Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee After Carillion: Public sector outsourcing and contracting
Seventh Report of Session 2017–19
‘Government outsourcing and contracting has become a very significant part of the delivery of central and local government services throughout the world. The UK Government spends £251.5 billion per year on outsourcing and contracting. The UK spends 13.7% of GDP on public procurement, which is not significantly different from countries such as Denmark (14.16%) or Germany (15.05%). Despite the UK leading innovation in this field for some 30–40 years, there has been a depressing inability of central government to learn from repeated mistakes and to some extent the collapse of Carillion and the state of the sector reflect this.
The failure of Carillion was one of the biggest commercial challenges the Cabinet Office has ever faced. The Government was right not to bail out Carillion. The Government was prepared for the consequences of this decision, and was able to ensure that public services kept operating as far as possible. However, the failure of Carillion reflects long term failures of Government understanding about the design, letting and management of contracts and outsourcing.’
Staggering sums of taxpayers’ money.
Gauke – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Gauke#Expenses
His jobs under Theresa have not lasted long. SoS DWP for 6 months Chief Secretary to the Treasury for 11 months Now Lord Chancellor and SoS for Justice since January 2018.
An MP since 2005 for SW Hertfordshire.
https://www.theyworkforyou.com/regmem/?p=11633
A member of the Conservative Friends of Israel and has made the requisite visit to Israel. Partial to freebies from Lords and Wimbledon, etc etc.
“A member of the Conservative Friends of Israel and has made the requisite visit to Israel. Partial to freebies from Lords and Wimbledon, etc etc.”
Speaking of politicians visiting the Middke East and getting freebies and so on, did Mr Jeremy Corbyn pay for his visit to the Middle East – you know, the one where he paid his respects at the grave of one of the Palestinian Munich terrorists – pit of his own pocket? If not, who paid it for him?
Charles you have become like a sniper with no bullets left.
Clarkson: Villain or Hero?
Suggest that anyone unable to find the link to the Parliamentary Register of Interests use this to find out for themselves.
Changes to the Register of Members’ Interests
Jeremy Corbyn
https://www.theyworkforyou.com/regmem/?p=10133 (From November 2000 to date)
Did he go on a freebie to the Middle East?
LIAR.
Im still waiting for the proof that Pritty Patel paid for her family holiday in Israel – when she found time to secretly meet officials and visit the illegally occupied Golan.
“Did he go on a freebie to the Middle East? 3
Yes, Dungroanin, that was my question. If you have the answer, please share.
Where is that cemetery? Which country Bossie? What answers don’t you have? Just how ignorant are you?
Pritty Patel?
Tunisia.
October 2014.
Graves of two Black September terrorists.
And now over to you : did Jeremy pay his own way or was it a freebie (and if so, who paid)?
LIAR.
Tunisia is not the Middle East – like Palestine and Israel. It is North Africa.
Bossie your lying blood red lips are not seductive to me.
Your ignorance is boundless and you revel in it! Like a pig rolling in shit.
I’m in danger of getting covered in it wrestling you.
Hey ho, it’s a dirty job, guess someones got to do it.
Bring it.
More than one freebie to the Middle East so it seems.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/jeremy-corbyn-referred-to-watchdog-over-2010-hamas-visit-hlm3mlvtw
His wife is a corporate tax lawyer. Keeping it in the family!
https://lexisweb.co.uk/users/rachel-gauke
@Anon1:
“It’s hilarious. We’re being told what to do by children. A whole panel of them on C4 News earlier, telling grown-ups how they should act on Brexit and climate change. Is this the fruition of the long march? The complete inversion of accepted norms?”
I assure you, Anon1, that children often have more sense about things that really matter than the mentally warped, smug, primitive thinking psychopaths that run our societies. Children see things clearly because their minds have not yet been completely corrupted by the greed and insanities of the adult world.
As a 75 year old, I was truly heartened by the response of so many children and I thought the Channel Four interviews they gave were excellent – these children are a credit to our society and I hope they hold on to their principles and also start to fight for more equality throughout societies.
Meanwhile, back at this point;
“Very far from a demolition job. She closed by saying “nobody would dispute” Abrams’s fantastical claim that the US objective in Venezuela is to promote democracy. ”
Do we all agree that this is what she said?
Maybe it’s time Craig left Pakistan, especially with feelings rising between Pakistan and India over the Kashmir bombing.
On another note.
Jacob Rees-Mogg says that “you’ve got to understand the history” before condemning the British concentration camps during the Boer War.”
I wonder if Mr Rees-Mogg feels the same way about Eisenhower’s death camps? Or Hitler’s death camps?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-politics-47247835/jacob-rees-mogg-comments-on-concentration-camps
I found this to be rather disturbing.
“Mounted police now pushing forward to try and push the children back into parliament square.”
https://mobile.twitter.com/sandralaville/status/1096407739331420161
Maybe they were going away from the cameras and the director wanted them back in front of the media?
Did you watch “Nightcrawler” last night?
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/feb/15/mi6-chief-britons-joined-isis-cannot-stopped-returning-shamima-begum
if you are ethnically from Asia, yet you once were considered British, if you run to Turkey to be people smuggled into Islamic State, then you marry a Dutchman in Islamic State, then your baby is born in Rojava,
could this infant in any way be described as British?
@Clark
I’d say the greatest threats to our natural ecosystems and associated biodiversity are overpopulation (from which all else follows), habitat loss, intensive farming practices, plastic contamination of the soil and oceans, desertification, introduction and spread of adventive/invasive species and diseases, overfishing, hunting for bushmeat, illegal trade and Chinese ‘medicine’. Perhaps I have missed something.
It takes a special kind of stupid to think that paying more tax is going to alter the output from the sun.
Mostly agree, pointless becoming vegan/using less diesel/less plastic/turning down thermostats, only one thing will make any noticeable difference, reducing the number of people being born.
Yet that is unmentionable.
Indeed.
We’re in solar minimum, and the temperature is still rising.
All the issues you mention are important, but the kids weren’t campaigning for more tax, and more than leaving something out, you’ve revealed yourself as among the conspiracy theorists.
Hey Anon. Let’s say you were a dastardly Russian assassin who had just carried out a dastardly assassination plot, and you found yourself in possession of some spare Novichok in what appeared to be a brand-new unopened package of expensive perfume. Would you:
1. Carefully dispose of it where it could never be found?
2. Take it back home with you?
3, Wander around Salisbury town centre till you found a charity bin, and then drop it in there, which (short of handing it to some kids and saying “Hey guys – give this to your Mum”) would be the best possible way of ensuring that some member of the public got their hands on it?
Malthusian bollocks.
Supremacist nonsense – who will decide who should have kids. Will there be an election to choose that wise person? Will every human get a say?
All these desperatly shilling the idea of over population should know what their own logical duty is – kindly proceed to removey yourselves from the Earth.
For everybody else – please educate yourselves – start with a few hours watching the late great Proff Hans Rosling’s lectures – rather than swallowing the pontificating emotional ‘common sense’ of eugenecists.
I’m not saying anything about who should have kids. I’m telling you the problem is overpopulation.
Agreed. Strange that overpopulation was (rightly!) considered a problem in the 1970s, but now that the population has doubled to 7.8 billion it’s hardly given much thought anymore. Nevermind that the average consumption of individuals has about doubled in the same period too.
I’m telling you and everyone that you are WRONG.
Human over population is a LIE now as it was when Malthus crapped on about it. It is a WhiteAngloImperralist LIE.
That’s it, get it all out. Nursie will be along in a minute.
Dungroanin, yes dear. Human population can grow without limit. Eight billion? Fine. Eight trillion? No problem. And before you call my trillion unreasonable, that’s only another ten doublings. I’ve seen more than a doubling in under half a lifetime.
@ Dungoanin BA (not), MSc (not), MBA (npt)
Who decides about how many kids?
Well, for a long time the friendly Chinese government did.
Ever heard of the one-child policy?
I’ve given you the information about human population science. By the worlds leading academic, a scientist, if you have not bothered to check it out – you are being wilfully ignorant, LIARS.
Clark – no.
Just. NO. Don’t go anti-science like some here.
Malthus claimed that populations can crash, and they can, and sometimes do – insect populations seem to have crashed. Malthus predicted a specific human population crash and he was wrong, but that doesn’t mean a human population crash can’t or won’t happen.
Hans Rosling in context; “A Confused Statistician”
http://mahb.stanford.edu/blog/a-confused-statistician
Clark – have you actually bothered to watch his lectures?
I haven’t; like everyone else, my time is limited. You could summarise his argument. From your comment it seems our planet could sustain eight trillion humans, no problem, and only a fascist would argue otherwise. That’s going to take a damn compelling theory to support it.
Link on post below.
Basically the Human population is following the normal Bell curve.
The indicative plateau is well below 20 Billion. The historical data, analysis and projection is statistically described. Rosling makes it understable to ANYONE willing to listen.
Dungroanin, thanks for the clarification; this is the sort of curve I’m expecting.
I have no idea what Malthus was like as a person, but Isaac Newton was apparently a very nasty piece of work. Such considerations are irrelevant to the science. Animal populations can and occasionally do crash, and I get fed up with people slagging off Malthus’ work as if the human population could not possibly overshoot sustainability and consequently crash. In one sense it already has overshot; current maintenance of current levels depends upon fossil fuels which are progressively degrading the biosphere, so to avoid a crash we now require technological solutions. Luckily they seem to be available, but that isn’t the result of careful planning.
@ Dungroanin February 16, 2019 at 12:54
‘The Earth provides enough to meet everyone’s needs’:
https://www.thenational.ae/opinion/comment/the-earth-provides-enough-to-meet-everyone-s-needs-1.426562
‘…Gandhi famously said that there is enough on Earth for everybody’s need, but not enough for everybody’s greed….’
When 26 families on the planet own as much wealth as 50% of the poorest, you know the world system is kaput. and Lucifer reigns.
? yes mate and Rosling has science to prove it.
@ Dungroanin February 16, 2019 at 14:18
Did you mean Rosslyn? If so, point of info – that is where Dolly the Sheep was cloned.
No way that was a coincidence.
Hans Rosling was by far Sweden’s most famous professor of international health, and lectured before the entire world.
Hans Rosling’s sphere of influence extended far beyond Sweden. His son Ola Rosling and daughter-in-law Anna Rosling Rönnlund produced a computer programme offering a new model of visual statistics, through which the whole world came to listen to Hans’s lectures.
Equipped with this novel tool, he was able to illustrate multiple variables while exposing changes and trends that debunked tired myths. His expanding, shifting bubble graphics showed that the state of the world is not static but in a constant state of flux – that today’s world is not the world of 25 years ago.
https://ki.se/en/news/hans-rosling-spoke-and-the-world-listened
One of his lectures that exposes the overpopulation myth – scientifically.
DON’T PANIC — Hans Rosling showing the facts about population
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FACK2knC08E
And many more
https://www.gapminder.org/videos/
– “When 26 families on the planet own as much wealth as 50% of the poorest, you know the world system is kaput”
Exactly.
– “and Lucifer reigns”
You mean capitalism reigns.
Prosperity, education and empowerment of women are what halt population growth. That has been seen time and time again. The wealth needs sharing around.