Friday 8 November: America chose a very different future to that awaiting Starmer’s Britain

Posted on by Geoff Graham

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592 thoughts on “Friday 8 November: America chose a very different future to that awaiting Starmer’s Britain”

  2. Morning Geoff and all Nottlers
    Today's Tales – Irish again
    An Irishman goes on ‘Sale of the Century’ and chooses Irish history as his category.
    “In what year was the Easter rising?”
    “Pass,” he replies.
    “What’s the famous stone in Ireland that you can kiss?” “Pass,” he replies.
    “What’s the difference between the Orange and the Green?” “Pass,” he replies.
    “Good man Patrick!” says a voice from the audience. “Tell ’em nothing!”

    The time keeper was checking the bus driver’s running sheet. “What time did you pull out this morning, Paddy?” “I didn’t,” said Paddy, “and I’ve been worrying about it all day.”

  4. Good morning. Two tier justice?

    ”The son of Oscar-winning actress Tilda Swinton has avoided a driving ban after telling magistrates it would ruin his film career.

    Xavier Swinton Byrne was caught driving his Ford Mustang on the A23 near Slaugham, West Sussex, at 100mph in July.
    For speeds in excess of 100mph, or more than 30 miles above the relevant limit, drivers are normally handed an instant disqualification rather than penalty points. But the decision is at the discretion of the court, and it is possible to avoid a disqualification if magistrates are persuaded a ban would lead to exceptional hardship….”

    I won’t repeat my comment on PressReader but it references people in prison – or dead – for hurty words. But they didn’t have “elite” mothers.

    1. The political assassination was obvious. The Left hate dissent. They cannot tolerate people thinking differently to them. As a result they crush it using whatever force they have available.

      Stabbings, bombings, mass murder, rape of children – irrelevant to the Left. In fact it's good for them as they can demand more money to pretend to solve the problems they've caused.

      But they will set about destroying anyone who resists them. This is where the root of fascism comes from.

  6. Good morning, chums. Thanks Geoff for today's new site. And thanks, too, to corimmobile, possiesmum and Sue Edison for your answers to my query last night asking how "Sleepy Joe" Biden transformed himself into a sharp, intelligent speaker when he congratulated Trump on winning the election. I can understand this if he was acting as an incapable idiot in order to torpedo Kamala Harris's Presidential campaign; but why would he act as "Sleepy Joe" non-stop for four long years? I am still baffled.

    Wordle 1,238 3/6

    🟨⬜🟨⬜⬜
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    🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

        1. Good morning Paul! I read that first as possum! ….. It could have been worse, it could have been pussiesmum…..!

  7. Good morning, chums. Thanks Geoff for today's new site. And thanks, too, to corimmobile, possiesmum and Sue Edison for your answers to my query last night asking how "Sleepy Joe" Biden transformed himself into a sharp, intelligent speaker when he congratulated Trump on winning the election. I can understand this if he was acting as an incapable idiot in order to torpedo Kamala Harris's Presidential campaign; but why would he act as "Sleepy Joe" non-stop for four long years? I am still baffled.

    Wordle 1,238 3/6

    🟨⬜🟨⬜⬜
    ⬜🟨🟩🟩🟨
    🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

  9. Much obliged Geoff.

    The more I read about what the useless fools in Labour say, the more i despair. They simply haven't got a clue. They refuse to learn the lessons of history and are just utterly clueless as to how dumb they are.

  10. 396079+ up ticks,

    Morning Each,

    We as a collective indigenous mass must have a collective amount of brain matter as there is rocking horse shit in this Country.

    We could, in reality have the elderly / pensioners dying under viaducts whilst illegal invaders and BATS roost in comfort.

    Surely the sane that are left within these Isles must start a
    building program for containment of the criminally insane.

    https://x.com/SandraWeeden/status/1854757667576619457

      1. 396079+ up ticks,

        Morning W,

        Agreed,
        The political top rankers are taking advantage of the very
        weak minded, wholesale.

          1. As many have already stated, our political idiots don't have the brain cells to make such important decisions.

  11. Biden administration confirms surge of military aid to Kyiv will continue. 8 November 2024.

    The Biden administration has confirmed that the US will keep surging aid to Ukraine before Donald Trump becomes president in January. “That’s not going to change. We’re going to surge and get that out there to Ukraine. We understand how important it is to make sure they have what they need,” said Karine Jean-Pierre, White House spokesperson. A Guardian editorial on US aid to Ukraine says: “The Biden administration is reportedly attempting to expedite as much as $9bn worth of military aid, agreed but not yet transferred. This is far from straightforward, not least because weaponry and ammunition are still being produced and because the next president could stop agreed shipments. But it is essential.”

    This is only to be expected. It's poisoning the well. Permission for the Ukies to fire missiles directly into Russia should also soon be given. Vlad is almost certainly smart enough to see through this and will probably use it as a bargaining chip with the Donald.

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/nov/08/ukraine-war-briefing-biden-administration-confirms-surge-of-military-aid-to-kyiv-will-continue

  12. 'Morning All
    Medley
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/33883b2821bca7f9efd5dd73cdae7e8029a4c712b25ed0188d676dc50c1eb9ce.jpg
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/00ce382c758d76123fda8c64015f275dd6062826aa1a795e0ac5fa1b3c967be9.jpg
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/2143b741dd68ecd48c4626c26e3ad505628b8d8dae14799b1cd742fe2ba79b9a.png
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/de453561f9972627ca7f1d346b7bfe2643bc8c5cd688139b467ccf9548cb30ee.png
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/18c536fb91e9902eecceb77f9a977d645bfe4e071cbcd98d2ce58215f4d7d9bc.png
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/f1f817e41c594af0ce876e39403ef6b85a64e92fbc77bb699d8f5bb0a2edb7d7.jpg
    https://media.gab.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=568,quality=100,fit=scale-down/system/media_attachments/files/168/340/714/original/e50bbc127fdb7a23.png
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/fa67233543a943ed539eebde9304cafc4c0a64a827ea65e82a7d64966953c5b6.jpg
    C'mon Bono
    https://x.com/GiveUsAQuid/status/1854415548773183768

  15. Phoebe is asking what's all the cheering outside.. is it because you've finally put an end to fossil-fuel?

    1. Illegals get everything free, do they? Can I rock up and say I'm illegal – and have no documentation, as "I threw it all away"?

      1. 396079+ up ticks,

        Morning O,
        I see no reason why not, advice,
        join the guests at the Dover end
        and don’t forget the prayer mat prop.

      1. 396079+ up ticks

        Morning MIR,

        Head down arse up the whole criminal political enterprise worldwide is counting on you.

        Never in the history of this planet
        has anything appertaining to sanity been so true as the lunatics chanting ” Come inside you silly
        sods ,come inside”.

      1. 396079+ up ticks,

        BB2,

        I see it as the word & meaning
        prevention has been overlaid by
        ” lets wait & see” resulting in premature deaths, and maybe action.

      2. Hungry and poor………..and ripe for a "Socialist Revolution"

        Some people think that this has been the intention of Starmer all along.

      3. ………..and ripe for a "Socialist Revolution"

        Some people think that this has been the intention of Starmer all along.

      4. ………..and ripe for a "Socialist Revolution"

        Some people think that this has been the intention of Starmer all along.

    1. The woke Left have infiltrated government, the state machine and are busy undoing everything good and decent. They haven't lost. They're getting stronger. Look at the damage their ideology is doing. Look at the chaos they are causing, the poverty, the unhappiness. They're fighting the 2nd world war and will not stop until they have total control or, as is more likely, they're defeated yet again as people reject their crazed insanity.

      1. 396079+ up ticks,

        W,
        I do post in an anti WOKE manner, only dedicated idiots cannot recognise that the governing political overseeing infrastructure is highly odiously contaminated.

      2. It feels a bit like Brexit – the people have spoken, but the power structure remains in place.

    2. They may have lost a battle, but I don't think they've lost the war yet. Still, this may not be the beginning of the end, but it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.

  21. Minor note – we are the 6th largest economy in the world by GDP, but by GDP per capita – the only value that matters, we're 14th.

    14th.

    We should be in the top ten, but no, the Left wanted ten million welfare sated criminal savages here.

    1. I've said for a long time that GDP may have increased, but GDP per capita has fallen and that's what's crucial.

  22. Guten Tag Kameraden,

    Groundhog Day 4 weather-wise at the McPhee's but a chance of the sun peeping through this afternoon despite being locked into an Easterly drift. 8 to11℃.

    While the euphoria over the US election results continues it's a good time to listen to a realistic assessment. We may not be out of the woods yet. Catherine Austin Fitts explains to Dutch independents Blackbox TV.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YTArsszj5gk
    In January Trump will be POTUS, The Supreme Court 6-3 Republican, the Senate 52-44 Republican but the House could still go either way with over 20 results still to come in (currently 211-200 Republican). Nevertheless things would seem to be looking good. It all depends on who gets the 1,000 government jobs.

    While she is cautious there is a note of optimism in her second segment.

    1. I thought it was interesting that she homed in on technocratic control by the central banks (digital id, leading to central bank-controlled digital currency) as the main agenda.
      Elon Musk has reinvented himself as a champion of free speech, people forget that he's Mr Technocracy – and he's right in the heart of government. He will beat RFK Jr in a power struggle, I fear. They'll offer RFK some big wins, like taking fluoride out of the water supply, maybe even going back on vaccines, as long as he stands by while they introduce the digital id.

  23. Guten Tag Kameraden,

    Groundhog Day 4 weather-wise at the McPhee's but a chance of the sun peeping through this afternoon despite being locked into an Easterly drift. 8 to11℃.

    While the euphoria over the US election results continues it's a good time to listen to a realistic assessment. We may not be out of the woods yet. Catherine Austin Fitts explains to Dutch independents Blackbox TV.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YTArsszj5gk
    In January Trump will be POTUS, The Supreme Court 6-3 Republican, the Senate 52-44 Republican but the House could still go either way with over 20 results still to come in (currently 211-200 Republican). Nevertheless things would seem to be looking good. It all depends on who gets the 1,000 government jobs.

    While she is cautious there is a note of optimism in her second segment.

  24. Letters to the Editor
    America chose a very different future to that awaiting Starmer’s Britain

    Letters to the Editor 08 November 2024 12:01am GMT

    SIR – Could there be a bigger contrast between the Labour Government’s policies and Donald Trump’s proposals (“Trump has just handed smug global elites their worst defeat since Brexit”, Comment, November 7)?

    Sir Keir Starmer’s plan is to achieve net zero at a ridiculous cost, resulting in overpriced electricity. Mr Trump’s is to open up oil and gas exploration to drive down prices.

    Mr Trump’s main focus will be on wealth creation and growing the economy, and finally tackling illegal migration. Labour, on the other hand, is increasing taxes and failing to stop the boats.

    How can Sir Keir believe we have anything in common with America when our policies are diametrically opposed?

    I know which approach I prefer.

    Neil Thomson
    Horncastle, Lincolnshire

    1. Only in the Left wing mind could higher taxes and massive subsidy mean lower prices. It's truly staggering. Unreliables are expensive, inefficient, unworkable, dangerous, ecologically harmful, colossally expensive and ultimately pointless.

      1. Wibbling- this came out a couple of years ago and explains a lot:-

        According to Klaus Schwab of the World Economic Forum, Communist China will likely serve as a “role model” for many countries as the global community embarks on a “systemic transformation of the world.”

        Klaus Schwab, chairman and founder of the World Economic Forum (WEF), praised the communist government in Beijing in an interview with the Chinese state-run television network CGTN for being a leading figure in his vision of a Great Reset of capitalism to usher in the “world of tomorrow.”

        “I respect China’s achievements, which are tremendous over the last over 40 years, I think it’s a role model for many countries,” the Davos chief said.

    2. Only in the Left wing mind could higher taxes and massive subsidy mean lower prices. It's truly staggering. Unreliables are expensive, inefficient, unworkable, dangerous, ecologically harmful, colossally expensive and ultimately pointless.

  25. Good morning all.
    Another grey and overcast day, slightly cooler at 4½°C but with less mist on the valley sides than yesterday.

    Will be clearing another bit of the hillside today, I wonder if there is still sufficient heat in the fire embers to re-ignite?

    1. They had choices over the decisions they made. They've deliberately made absolutely the wrong ones at every turn.

      Why? (thinking positively) Because they don't have a clue what they're doing or, thinking rationally, they're spiteful, mendacious, vicious, arrogant fools.

        1. Every member of the Labour cabinet needs to be slapped, repeatedly, so hard they're spun around. Once down, they need the kicking of their lives.

  27. The Trump restoration is an unmitigated disaster for Germany
    Tariffs and Ukraine’s surrender would be ruinous for Europe’s former economic powerhouse

    Ambrose Evans-Pritchard 08 November 2024 7:00am GMT

    The splash across Germany’s venerable newspaper Die Zeit was a single word in English, distilled to sum up what has just happened to Europe, Nato, the world trading system, and above all Germany: “F–k”.

    “Looking away doesn’t help, fear doesn’t help, and in the end all that’s left is feeble self-soothing,” it said, with a nod to Heinz Kohut’s Self Psychology for a Fractured World.

    1. Trump warned Germany. Their Left wing politicians laughed. Now Germany is facing massive companies moving away, a collapse of GDP and zero growth – almost depression.

      This is what happens when fools get into government – however, sadly it seems that government is populated entirely by fools.

  28. Morning all 🙂😊
    Grey but dry grey today.
    Starmer's Britain, please it's not his Britain it's the people's Britain. A poll held Monday would see him gone and never heard of again.
    His and his vindictive operatives opinions and actions do not fit in with the expectations of British people. They have even hidden extra hate in the small print. If the people had known that before the election he would have been out of a job by now. Get rid.

    1. I cannot believe people did not understand what we would get if this lot were let in. This isn't Blair era politics (even then Brown destroyed the pensions industry) this is Soviet communism. True East German 'tractor production is up, Comrades!' drivel.

  29. The Oval Office – The White House

    While Biden is safely locked away in his padded room

    Obama – ( concerned face ) well Kamala you did your best , at least we control the Senate.

    Kamala – but but Barack, Sir, we just lost the senate.

    Obama – ( angry face) well the House is going our way.

    Kamala- ( looking down and muttering ) well Sir, we are losing that too.

    Obama – ( stands up bashing the desk ) Michelle, leave the room now! ( then rants for ten minutes before calming down rubbing his head) well Kamala at least be have the popular vote

    Kamala – ( breaks down sobbing)

  30. One of Mr. Launert's best letters:-

    Once gone, farming know-how will never return

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/eb40676dd926722de3614fad26db5b2e17ade9e4e83e5414958fa5c189ef5644.png
    SIR – Farming knowledge isn’t gained by sitting a GCSE (Letters, November 6). This is a gruelling job, learnt from cradle to grave, and as far from being a nine-to-five occupation as any in the world.

    Lambs are born at their mother’s convenience, not the farmer’s; crops ripen when the weather allows, not when the diary says they must; broad-backed Texel sheep must be checked and righted if necessary before any human can put their feet up; and someone must run the family kitchen so that the farmer can eat at 4am when they get up, again at 8am for a proper feed, at 5pm to keep the batteries charged, and once more just before they fall into an exhausted sleep whenever circumstances allow.

    Small networks of farms arrange to tup their ewes at two-week intervals so that each can send a son or daughter to help with the other’s overnight lambing watch, and combine harvesters are shared because few can afford the £1 million price tag. Alarm clocks and train timetables don’t manage farms; nature does, with all its blessings and curses.

    When the family farmers have all been driven out of business, our schools and universities will not be providing their replacements; the generation these institutions are producing would never put up with the pay, conditions, danger and inconvenience. To be a farmer you must either love it, or be mad.

    Once this Government has broken the ancient generational link with the land, no other will be able to bring it back.

    Victor Launert
    Matlock, Derbyshire

    2. The 'government' couldn't even run a bath between them.
      They are simply not fit for purpose.
      Perhaps we need 'a parade' with pitch forks to remind all of our collective political idiots they are nothing better than a permanently used wrecking bar.

    3. Another splendid letter from Victor Launert. He had one published recently and copied on here. If only I could remember what it was about…

  31. Good morning, all. Weather? Not much change i.e. overcast, calm with a forecast of being a bit cooler than recent days.

    This week's The Highwire is very different as presenter Del Bigtree reveals that he has been one of the people driving Bobby Kennedy's presidential campaign. Rules and regulations re non–profit organisations, in this case ICAN, prohibited Bigtree from making political statements and so his involvement with Kennedy had to be kept quiet. Now that the election is over Bigtree feels that he is able to talk about his personal involvement albeit with disclaimers having to be displayed.

    Revelations re Kennedy's treatment by the Democrat's organisation clearly show that that organisation is very far from what his uncle, JFK, and his father Robert supported. Little wonder that Kennedy has found more in common with Trump than within the party he had supported since childhood. Bigtree, too, has found that Trump is not quite the ogre that the MSM has portrayed him as. In addition, Bigtree has a real pop at the MSM and he thinks that their day is over.

    Worth a listen.

    The Highwire

  32. 396079+ up ticks,

    We the sanely stable indigenous have no need of any further political enemy enemas, this chap is a battalion of SS in his own right.

    Live Lammy warns Trump against ‘hurting’ allies with tariffs plan

      1. 396079+ up ticks,

        Morning RE,

        He is a selected political better
        serving the peoples of this nation
        rejoice in favour of tactical voting,
        ungrateful wretches.

        1. If Lammy is a 'selected better' could there be anything worse?

          He has been put in office simply to infuriate us; Starmer hopes he will draw our total contempt away from himself and lay it all on Lammy.

          1. 'Morning Rastus. I find it very difficult to decide which of these cretins I loathe the most…

  33. SIR – Bryan Sykes, the late professor of human genetics at Oxford, was one of the first scientists to investigate DNA from ancient bones in Britain. In the 1980s he tested the mitochondrial DNA of farming families and found they had been in their farmsteads for more than 6,000 years. Some families can now be traced back more than 10,000 years, to when the early hunter-gatherers settled the land.

    The Chancellor appears to be initiating the destruction of 10,000 years of British history.

    Dr Frances Howard
    Bere Alston, Devon (Letters 8 November)

    1. How on earth did we end up with such a thick pile of political idiots who don't know or investigate anything ?
      What are they trying to prove ?

      1. Worked for Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Kim…now it’s our turn to return to the Stone Age.

        We are going to have to get organised and start marching. And support all the brave people who are in prison standing up for our liberties.

      2. Living here , deep in the countryside, we understand the rhythm of the seasons and the farming year.

        We are in touch with the finer routine of the agricultural calendar , and the sounds and sight , and yes the smell that food production entails.

        Haven't those political idiots ever sung the wonderful hymn .. "We plough the fields and scatter"

        1. Same as here TB we are right next to a huge field and although we can’t see it because of woodland we hear the sound of farming and the smell.
          But it’s not a problem. Yesterday a lot of shooting was taking place not far away.
          Politicians only read or take advice and repeat it all they know nothing.

      3. Power. Reeves has said 'the state cannot afford to not tax farm inheritance.' What she means of course, is that she wants to hurt those with property and land and didn't give a stuff that farmers were hurt in the way.

        Now she's done the damage she won't backtrack as that unravels the rest of her stupid, mendacious budget.

        It was an act of spite against people she ideologically hates. There was no reason for it. She could have cut spending. She could have simply said 'we're scrapping windmill subsidy to make energy cheaper and instead of all the woke tripe waste announced building power stations. Instead she's spaffed 22 thousand million quid on utter nonsense that will never work. Money that could have built 20 power stations around the country.

        It is simple, brutal Left wing malignancy. Labour are a cancer.

      4. They are not trying to prove anything, they are trying to destroy us. In their view of life one lot of people is interchangeable with another, without regard for culture, religion, or anything else. But, we, the English, are a nuisance because we are not compliant enough, therefore need to be removed. And one of the reasons we need to be removed is that we claim to have, as natives, a special claim to the land.

      5. They imported an electorate that has no connection with the country and its history and embedded a client state.

    3. Sent in my DNA sample to see my ancestry. It should be ready on the 15th or thereabouts. I think I'm English through and through. Hope so!

  34. Good morning all

    Another dank overcast day, still no breeze , leaves are hanging on , colours are glorious 13c.

    SIR – Farming knowledge isn’t gained by sitting a GCSE (Letters, November 6). This is a gruelling job, learnt from cradle to grave, and as far from being a nine-to-five occupation as any in the world.

    Lambs are born at their mother’s convenience, not the farmer’s; crops ripen when the weather allows, not when the diary says they must; broad-backed Texel sheep must be checked and righted if necessary before any human can put their feet up; and someone must run the family kitchen so that the farmer can eat at 4am when they get up, again at 8am for a proper feed, at 5pm to keep the batteries charged, and once more just before they fall into an exhausted sleep whenever circumstances allow.

    Small networks of farms arrange to tup their ewes at two-week intervals so that each can send a son or daughter to help with the other’s overnight lambing watch, and combine harvesters are shared because few can afford the £1 million price tag. Alarm clocks and train timetables don’t manage farms; nature does, with all its blessings and curses.

    When the family farmers have all been driven out of business, our schools and universities will not be providing their replacements; the generation these institutions are producing would never put up with the pay, conditions, danger and inconvenience. To be a farmer you must either love it, or be mad.

    Once this Government has broken the ancient generational link with the land, no other will be able to bring it back.

    Victor Launert
    Matlock, Derbyshire

    SIR – Bryan Sykes, the late professor of human genetics at Oxford, was one of the first scientists to investigate DNA from ancient bones in Britain. In the 1980s he tested the mitochondrial DNA of farming families and found they had been in their farmsteads for more than 6,000 years. Some families can now be traced back more than 10,000 years, to when the early hunter-gatherers settled the land.

    The Chancellor appears to be initiating the destruction of 10,000 years of British history.

    Dr Frances Howard
    Bere Alston, Devon

    1. This government is evil. It wants to destroy the whole fabric of Britain completely and establish a communist state.

      The government thinks it owns the land, those who own the title deeds think they own the land – but the land is really owned by those who farm it and whose antecedents have farmed it throughout the generations.

      I remember my father reading this poem of Kipling's to me:

      The Land

      When Julius Fabricius, Sub-Prefect of the Weald,
      In the days of Diocletian owned our Lower River-field,
      He called to him Hobdenius—a Briton of the Clay,
      Saying: "What about that River-piece for layin' in to hay?"

      And the aged Hobden answered: "I remember as a lad
      My father told your father that she wanted dreenin' bad.
      An' the more that you neeglect her the less you'll get her clean.
      Have it jest as you've a mind to, but, if I was you, I'd dreen."

      So they drained it long and crossways in the lavish Roman style —
      Still we find among the river-drift their flakes of ancient tile,
      And in drouthy middle August, when the bones of meadows show,
      We can trace the lines they followed sixteen hundred years ago.

      Then Julius Fabricius died as even Prefects do,
      And after certain centuries, Imperial Rome died too.
      Then did robbers enter Britain from across the Northern main
      And our Lower River-field was won by Ogier the Dane.

      Well could Ogier work his war-boat—well could Ogier wield his brand—
      Much he knew of foaming waters—not so much of farming land.
      So he called to him a Hobden of the old unaltered blood,
      Saying: "What about that River-piece; she doesn't look no good ?"

      And that aged Hobden answered "'Tain't for me to interfere.
      But I've known that bit o' meadow now for five and fifty year.
      Have it jest as you've a mind to, but I've proved it time on ' time,
      If you want to change her nature you have got to give her lime!"

      Ogier sent his wains to Lewes, twenty hours' solemn walk,
      And drew back great abundance of the cool, grey, healing chalk.
      And old Hobden spread it broadcast, never heeding what was in't—
      Which is why in cleaning ditches, now and then we find a flint.

      Ogier died. His sons grew English—Anglo-Saxon was their name—
      Till out of blossomed Normandy another pirate came;
      For Duke William conquered England and divided with his men,
      And our Lower River-field he gave to William of Warenne.

      But the Brook (you know her habit) rose one rainy autumn night
      And tore down sodden flitches of the bank to left and right.
      So, said William to his Bailiff as they rode their dripping rounds:
      "Hob, what about that River-bit—the Brook's got up no bounds ?"

      And that aged Hobden answered: "'Tain't my business to advise,
      But ye might ha' known 'twould happen from the way the valley lies.
      Where ye can't hold back the water you must try and save the sile.
      Hev it jest as you've a mind to, but, if I was you, I'd spile!"

      They spiled along the water-course with trunks of willow-trees,
      And planks of elms behind 'em and immortal oaken knees.
      And when the spates of Autumn whirl the gravel-beds away
      You can see their faithful fragments, iron-hard in iron clay.

      Georgii Quinti Anno Sexto, I, who own the River-field,
      Am fortified with title-deeds, attested, signed and sealed,
      Guaranteeing me, my assigns, my executors and heirs
      All sorts of powers and profits which—are neither mine nor theirs,

      I have rights of chase and warren, as my dignity requires.
      I can fish—but Hobden tickles—I can shoot—but Hobden wires.
      I repair, but he reopens, certain gaps which, men allege,
      Have been used by every Hobden since a Hobden swapped a hedge.

      Shall I dog his morning progress o'er the track-betraying dew ?
      Demand his dinner-basket into which my pheasant flew ?
      Confiscate his evening faggot under which my conies ran,
      And summons him to judgment ? I would sooner summons Pan.

      His dead are in the churchyard—thirty generations laid.
      Their names were old in history when Domesday Book was made;
      And the passion and the piety and prowess of his line
      Have seeded, rooted, fruited in some land the Law calls mine.

      Not for any beast that burrows, not for any bird that flies,
      Would I lose his large sound counsel, miss his keen amending eyes.
      He is bailiff, woodman, wheelwright, field-surveyor, engineer,
      And if flagrantly a poacher—'tain't for me to interfere.

      "Hob, what about that River-bit ?" I turn to him again,
      With Fabricius and Ogier and William of Warenne.
      "Hev it jest as you've a mind to, but"—and here he takes command.
      For whoever pays the taxes old Mus' Hobden owns the land.

      2. Brilliant , thank you Richard .

        To an ignorant public .. Mr Kipling makes perfectly delicious(horrible cakes )

        To me Rudyard wrote brilliant stories and verse.. I suspect the Woke litterartery have cancelled him and students no longer read his words.

        1. Remember your Orwell – every book re-written every painting repainted to suit The Party, there was nothing but the perpetual now.

          … a boot stamping on a human face, forever. …

        2. Good morning, Maggiebelle

          It is a prophetic poem. This is so very relevant to what happened in the Somerset Levels when the EU insisted that dredging – which had worked well enough for centuries – was stopped.

    2. I worked on a friends farm as a vacation student mid 80s. The farmer behaved as described in Victor Launerts letter, and he was late 60s, retired Navy Commander with WW2 service. It was endless work, and he and the Foreman were of retirement age, yet thrived on it. Both as hard as nails, they could work hard all day without being tired. Us teens were nothing but a paper hanky in comparison.

      1. As the young bull said to the old stager, "let's run down and service a few of those cows". The old man said, "no, lets stroll down and have ALL of them".

    1. Some people, regardless of rationality, regardless of evidence will always vote Labour. They do so unthinking, unaware. They just don't care. They just vote red.

      1. As Elvis Presley might have said to the Labour Party:

        Honey you lied when you said you loved me,
        And I had no reason to doubt you
        But I'd rather go on hearing your lies
        Than to go on living without you

  36. Looking at the headline, I feel the Telegraph is being a little obtuse, deliberately or not makes no odds. A mere 20% of the electorate voted for Starmer and Labour simply because he wasn't Sunak and the Tories.

    Why did people vote for President Trump?
    Because they want:
    Jobs.
    Security.
    Economic security.
    To be able to walk through their neighbourhoods without fear.
    Schools where their children don't have their minds poisoned with Woke sickness.
    Classrooms free of paedophiles and other degenerates.
    A free society where everyone is equal in the eyes of the law and black drug dealers are not venerated.
    A reasonable cost of living.

    The Woke left will never understand this and no amount of MSM propaganda and stomach churning promotion of debased perversity will alter the basic decency of ordinary people.

  38. 'Morning Peeps.

    With reference to posts about the PSA test, this letter caught my eye:

    SIR – Dr John Doherty (Letters, November 7) suggests “there is no reason to change the NHS guidelines” on prostate screening. He would be right, if the guidelines worked.

    Aged 62, I had a check-up with my GP. I had no symptoms of prostate cancer, and my physical check was fine. I asked about the PSA test and was advised that it was unreliable and not necessary. I took the doctor’s advice.

    Three years on I had another check with a new GP. Still no symptoms, bar a few more regular visits to the loo at night. She advised taking a PSA test, which showed a significantly raised level. After further tests and scans, prostate cancer was diagnosed.

    After surgery, radiotherapy (since the cancer had spread) and three years of hormone treatment, my PSA is, at present, undetectable. I can’t help thinking that an earlier PSA test might have rung the alarm bells. I will just never know.

    I agree with Sir Chris Hoy (Letters, November 7) that those at any risk should insist on a simple blood test.

    Simon Marriage
    Good Easter, Essex

    As I said to Lola late last night, while the PSA has its limitations (a few false positives) the next stages – MRI and then biopsies – should mean that no one is operated on – or otherwise treated – until the positive PSA result has been verified, or alternatively shown to be wrong. Simon Marriage has survived (so far) despite the absence of early intervention. I remain eternally grateful that my GP got stuck in and trusted the positive test. However, the sooner the new PHI test is widely adopted, the better.

  40. Morning all,

    As Azerbaijan prepares for cop29 by using the conference to do some gas deals, Trump commits to making America great again by drilling for more fossil fuels and Justin Rowlatt has the wind taken out his sails as renewable uk power output plummets in this dull windless period with gas turbines making up for demand. Meanwhile Mount Fuji has its first snowfall in 150 years and the residents can go back home in Bedford as the 100m hole made for a heat pump is plugged with concrete to stop the gas escaping.

    1. A neighbour pointed out that if they could get gas, why would they not want it. She's an elderly lady who has had the same grant we got. She's terrified of turning on her heating because of the cost.

      Imagine that. Having had all that money spent and being frightened of the cost of electricity.

      Clucking tankers.

    2. In the convoluted way that the eco freaks think " Mount Fuji has its first snowfall in 150 years", must be proof of global warming.

      1. Part of Saudi Arabia which has never had snow before was recently blanketed with it.

        Even the BBC showed photos of it on their website.

        1. Yet the bbc recently claimed it had been the hottest summer on record, using clips of fire our breaks to to 'prove' it.
          Also a lot of snow in the Cape SA.

          2. Well sure, a shot to the back of the head when you don’t know it’s coming. That qualifies as a mild execution. Being a quivering mass whilst being Allahu Akbared at by a sword is seriously executed.

          4. A couple of years ago. Snow in Libya is not unusual. In fact one crop in Libya does not exactly depend on it, but is grown with the hopes that it will snow. That is blood oranges, the flesh becomes more red with a cold snap. Away from the coast, in the Fezzan, you are in desert and it can get very cold there, to 0 Centigrade in winter but usually 6 centigrade. I remember that in the winter we would use paraffin heaters, like this, that was on the coast.

            https://c8.alamy.com/comp/F7PPDB/world-war-two-paraffin-heater-from-an-air-raid-shelter-in-london-england-F7PPDB.jpg. Actually my mother also cooked on a paraffin stove.

          5. We had one – not that model but very similar. My mother used to put it on in the bathroom – nearly used up all the oxygen while one had a bath……..

          6. Yes, they were not exactly safe. My late sister had a large scar on one of her legs from falling into one of the things.

          7. Ours was quite stable but of course it got very hot. My ex husband managed to burn his bottom on the one at his mother’s house.

  41. Good morning everyone. Still cloudy out there, murky
    From Julian Assange's channel on Telegram:

    "Trump’s Victory Triggers Elite Panic: Clinton Foundation’s CEO and Moderna’s Top Executive Resign—Hollywood’s Biggest Names Running Scared!

    Trump’s recent election win has sent shockwaves through elite circles that thought they were untouchable. With Trump back in power, the walls of secrecy protecting these powerful figures are collapsing.

    This isn’t just a network of celebrities; it’s a web of power brokers tied to dark interests. High-profile figures like Beyoncé, Oprah Winfrey, Barack and Michelle Obama, Bill and Hillary Clinton, and many Hollywood A-listers have hidden behind public personas while being part of an entrenched system of corruption.

    These elites, once thought untouchable, have had disturbing connections to the Epstein/Diddy network, which many believe was used to traffic and exploit the vulnerable for the powerful. Under a mask of charity and celebrity, they maintained ties with those accused of unspeakable crimes.

    Kamala Harris’s backers aren’t just entertainers; they include tech moguls, media icons, and billionaires who’ve gained wealth and power through these connections. Oprah Winfrey, known as the “Queen of Media,” is now questioned over her longstanding relationships with figures in Epstein’s circle. Bill and Hillary Clinton’s ties to Epstein’s operations, including visits to his island and the Clinton Foundation’s shadowy dealings, have fueled suspicions for years.

    Hollywood and Big Tech aren’t innocent either. Figures like Tom Hanks, Ellen DeGeneres, and Bill Gates are deeply embedded in this elite machinery. Their recurring presence on client lists isn’t accidental; it’s part of a dark alliance that spans entertainment, tech, and politics, all working to control, distract, and manipulate the public.

    From music icons like Eminem and Taylor Swift to movie stars like Robert De Niro and Meryl Streep, these aren’t just celebrities—they’re symbols used to push hidden agendas. Lady Gaga openly plays with symbolism that hints at elite secrets, while tech giants like Bill Gates use global health as a front for population control and tracking. Mark Cuban and other billionaires have aligned with policies that support these agendas, reinforcing a power structure that serves only the elite.

    Now, with Clinton Foundation’s Thurm and Moderna’s Stephane Bancel resigning, the panic is real. These resignations aren’t just career changes; they’re desperate moves to escape the impending revelations that Trump’s administration promises to unveil. The ties between the Clintons, Gates, and the Hollywood elite are cracking under the weight of truth.

    Trump’s return signals a seismic shift. For years, these elites used their wealth and influence to shield themselves, but Trump’s victory is breaking that shield. The American people are awakening to the reality that these so-called icons—once glorified and trusted—have been part of a dark network benefiting from secrecy and manipulation.

    The days of hidden power and secret alliances are ending. The unraveling has begun, and each resignation, each exposure, brings us closer to the truth. This is the end of an era for the elites, as a new dawn of accountability finally arrives."

  42. Morning all, after whatever feels like a lifetime of grey damp miserable weather, Mrs VVOF and I took a day trip down to Bude where better weather was promised.
    We weren’t disappointed with warm sunshine thanks to a cloud free blue sky.
    Looking up I could see a procession of passenger jets crossing the coastline from the Atlantic. They could well be full of tearful woke celebrity lefties making good on their promise to leave the US if Donald Trump was elected.
    Fine I thought, just keep flying eastward, we don’t want you and your petulant hissy fits.
    Some photos just in case anyone has forgotten what sunny days look like!
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/74d6d34f29fe6e8171bc05b4c0493ed39a422f21b1ef037597fc2c9a42ac4c6c.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/d882c0c97c273369b09b74b590b8efe4bce6bcc77d1018646f709315086d1496.jpg https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/415c0aa52d6a1feafc6ee1d49d54f8b3c244765aa52a2b54ec0592b4c988415a.jpg

    1. The like of the woke Left will never leave america. They are pretty useless and want somewhere safe and nice, so they'll try Canada only to find it's vastly higher taxes put them off. They won't come here as our taxes are even higher than Canada's.

      No, they'll stay put, whinging and complaining about how horrible Trump is while paying 20% tax on their many millions (rather than the 85% they'd pay here).

    2. 'Morning Oldie, love the photos. A reminder of several childhood holidays to Bude and Newquay. Yes, if the weather was bad on the south coast of Cornwall it was off to the north – and vice versa! Newquay was relatively quiet in those days. I used to walk along the coast and watch the Shackletons coming and going at RAF St Mawgan. What happy, carefree days they were.

          2. And is apparently fabulously noisy! At least, a former Shackleton pilot told me, way back in 1990, when he retired from Lossiemouth.

      2. Morning Hugh, in my younger days I spent many holidays and short stays on that coast, Treyarnon Bay just south of Padstow to be precise.
        Our local weatherman did hint at the possibility of the grey cloud breaking up over north Devon in his forecast Wednesday evening. As the trip from home is easier to Bude rather than North Devon we thought we would have a day out, and it was glorious down there.
        Some local ale and a pasty sat outside the pub, what could be better?

    3. Beautiful! I love fine days in November. Just been out to catch some sun myself – we had to travel quite a long way, but it was worth it!

  43. SIR – Many years ago I flew with British Airways (Letters, November 7) when it still operated the Aberdeen to Sumburgh (Shetland) route.

    It was only a short flight, but upon arrival over Sumburgh we were unable to land due to fog, so circled for a long time.

    I shall always remember the very posh, very jolly, very BA captain assuring us not to worry as “we have loads of fuel, and loads of booze”.

    Chris Ash
    Cunningsburgh, Shetland

    I had the misfortune to fly back from Jersey to Southampton during the evening, just before the Great Storm broke in the early hours of the 16th October 1967. Within minutes of leaving the ground at St Helier the ride resembled that of a fairground ride. We knew trouble was coming when the Captain ordered the cabin crew to secure the trolley and everything else, then themselves. We lurched our way back to S'ton – only to be held because an earlier flight had a technical problem and was burning off fuel prior to landing. Our 35-ish minute flight became 1.5 hours, with some of the passengers, including me, turning as green as grass due to the turbulence. It was as close as I have ever been to the 'technicolour yawn'! And certainly no booze, not even a cuppa to fortify us. When we eventually wobbled our way down the steps an elderly passenger ahead of me 'did a Pope' and kissed the tarmac! In the chaos that became clear in the morning news, the ferry that I saw leaving St Helier as we took off was beached on the south coast…

    1. 1987….. what a nightmare of a journey you had! I slept through all that, I had had a cold the previous night which had kept me awake so I was really tired and slept heavily the night of the storm. I woke at 7.00-ish am and said, "it's a bit windy, isn't it?" I could hear the noise of the wind and the rain splattering in the force of the south-westerlies against the window. I pulled back the curtains to see trees felled in the wake of what I realised was not "a bit windy" but a stampeding monster.

      1. Morning, 'mum. Yes, I probably wasn't alone in not sleeping well that night. In those days we lived in Romsey, which turned out to be on the western edge of the storm. But it still felt as though the windows would be blown in. We knew it was bad when it was announced on the radio at about 3am that all train services in the south had stopped. In the morning I couldn't drive very far to work in Southampton, so abandoned the car and walked the rest of it. Most of the trees were down on Southampton Common and I had to climb over much of the debris. Why the urgency to get to work? In those days I was in insurance claims. That morning our usual 40-50 morning phone calls came in thick and fast, and we stopped counting at 1,200…

      2. Living just off Lodge Road in Southampton I was woken by a yowling down the chimney.
        Still went to St.Denys Station for the train and was surprised when it actually arrived and I got to work!

      3. I was taking a party of students on an exchange. The coach had to inch its way through fallen trees across the roads and I could scarcely believe the sight of roofs ripped off and a swathe of fallen trees in one of the parks.

    2. In many years of flying I rarely had any issues with flights.
      The oddest incident had to be our flight into Singapore that had to abort the landing because a ship was crossing the end of the runway (well that's what the driver announced after the 747 showed that it could climb very quickly).

    3. I flew Aberdeen to Sumburgh when working in the Shetland Project about 10 years ago. I was seated by the left hand window and the weather was rough. The plane was going all over the place as we were about half a mile out. It lurched to the right and I swear I was looking straight down the runway at an almost right angle.

  46. Jeremy Clarkson furious as farmers’ mass IHT protest blocked while pro-Palestinian marches continue
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/11/08/jeremy-clarkson-fury-protest-farmers-inheritance-blocked/

    This is one of the clearest examples of the government's total contempt of British people and their wish for them to have fewer rights to express their views and demonstrate than violent potential terrorists.

    Look at the way the 'far right thugs' – who turned out to be neither thugs nor far right – were summarily put in prison while violent criminals were set free and anti-Semitic demonstrators were not stopped from vomiting their filthy bile.

    Will the Farmers meekly observe the government's dictates or will they do what the French and Dutch farmers have done?

    How supine have the British become? Or will they finally manage to throw off the oppressors – and if they do – how will they do it?

    2. It is about controlling people. If the state approves of your actions, you get a free pass. If it doesn't, it will destroy you.

    3. If they don't get permission to demonstrate they should threaten to block all access to London with manure, as the French did.

    4. The NFU wrote to members on Wednesday, saying only the 1,800 who had registered to attend its event at the Church House conference centre in Westminster should attend.

      "There are legal issues which mean we can’t simply turn up in numbers in Westminster on the streets or the open spaces. We cannot risk either member or public safety, or the loss of public support that could come from what could be an illegal demonstration," it said.

      Meanwhile, Kill The Jews demos go ahead week after week without question.

  47. Before I dash off to do my bit here at home whilst Moh plays golf for over five hours .. I want to report what the outstanding success the replacement CPAP Sleep Apnoea machine courtesy of the NHS is .

    Yesterday morning , Moh had an appointment with the sleep people . His old machine was huge , noisy and blew up during covid .

    I mean huge , it was the size of an ancient desk top pc.. talking Sirius or larger .. and the machine was noisy, uncomfortable and clumsy, it was probably one of the originals 30 + years ago.

    The new machine Moh brought home is neat , small and efficient , and the mask much better than the Hannibal Lector mask of old!

    He used the new one last night .. neat size probably similar or smaller than a Roberts radio .. He wore the mask all night , yes he needed to get up once or twice to visit the bathroom , but it was virtually soundless .. no whirring or hiss or clonking like an air conditioning unit , I mean it , it was silent .. clever and Moh was delighted .

    https://www.cpap.co.uk/cpap-products/cpap-machines/?gad_source=1&gclid=Cj0KCQiAire5BhCNARIsAM53K1i6TRmnG3btuhZBUDkhXuLnzzQXKRYJ_tlzLgrqjg75bJ97b-LDVBoaAqAfEALw_wcB

    The one Moh was given / lent ,is the first black one in the second row of the link .

    A huge plus for the NHS.

    1. I don’t sleep well at all so I was grateful for your link to CPAP machines. However, I was shocked that prices of such machines were in excess of £500. Unless I can get the NHS to lend me one, I shall have to do without. That price would keep me awake all night!

    2. For years I used a Philips CPAP machine which by means of an app on my phone I could monitor my nightly readings. Then in their wisdom they changed it for a "new" model which although it was a bit quieter there was no way to monitor how effective it was. I stopped using it.

    3. The Fisher? Mine is the Res Med. Hate it. Doers he have to deal with a dozen bloody straps around his head? As I said yesterday. It really isn't sensible if you have to go to the loo all the time. For me its at least 6 times a night and often more.

    4. I have any oxygen concentrator as I need oxygen 24/7. Provided by NHS and they even pay the electricity bill for it so a huge plus from me too

    2. Get rid of them ………..
      Whoops wrong comment should have been the one on the illegal migrants.

    3. Get rid of them ………..
      Whoops wrong comment should have been the one on the illegal migrants.

  49. Good Moaning.
    I've decided Spartie is a cheap date.
    It only takes one piece of chicken to buy his undying loyalty.
    Lammy is too expensive for me.

    2. Wave a sausage roll at Mongo and he'll never leave your side. Seriously, you'll wonder if he's glued there.

  51. Has the SAD threat ever been so bad as this year?

    Since landing back in Birmingham on Monday 28 October, a grey blanket of cloud has covered the city. Now, 11 days later, I cannot recall a single minute of sunshine.

    1. The Warqueen is still abed. Put the hot water on boost so she'd have some for a wash at goodness knows when.

    2. It's a message from above to Ed Miliband telling him that wind and solar energy are useless and unreliable when the wind doesn't blow and the sun doesn't shine.

      But, to borrow from Paul Simon's song, 'a man man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest' the Lunatic Miliband is too mad, and too demonically deaf to listen to any reason which might contradict his dogma.

      1. I'm staggered that Milioaf has A levels in maths and physics. Truth that ideology completely erodes higher brain functions.

        1. It's rote learning. And he's from a very indoctrinated background, so that will have helped.

    3. Many years ago I was working back in the UK for a month. I am sure that the sun disappeared as the plane started it's descent into Heathrow and the next time I saw the sun was as the plane rose above the clouds when I was on my way home.

      Not easy to survive a month in Bracknell at the best of times but that was beyond depressing.

  52. All they need to do as an alternative to spending and taxing is Stop the boats. And as should have done, the other idiots before them

  54. "We will reduce the govt headcount. We'll give very long severance pay like two years.
    Look go do something else. You'll get paid for two years so you've gotta a lot of time to figure out something else to do."

    Elon Musk.

    Now that is taxpayers money well spent.

    2. What do you mean two years severance pay? Do what was done to us when we were taken over- your position will be terminated in three months . That wasx it – no redundancy, no severance pay, it was up to you to find an alternate position in the new organisation.

  55. "We will reduce the govt headcount. We'll give very long severance pay like two years.
    Look go do something else. You'll get paid for two years so you've gotta a lot of time to figure out something else to do."

    Elon Musk.

    Now that is taxpayers money well spent.

  56. "We will reduce the govt headcount. We'll give very long severance pay like two years.
    Look go do something else. You'll get paid for two years so you've gotta a lot of time to figure out something else to do."

    Elon Musk.

    Now that is taxpayers money well spent.

  57. My contact in The States tells me that the whole mood of the nation has already changed so much for the better.
    He thinks it is the begining of the end for these evil people who are trying to destuy our way of life.

    Wish i could say the same for here.

    1. There's a cabal who all think the same, all say the same, all want the same. The same phrases, '15 minute cities', build back better' all come from this same dank place of useless, Left wing effluent.

      They hate Trump because he doesn't bow to it.

      1. Fortunately they are all very stupid people. I could see their ideas gaining strength in the 80's. Misfits and stupids. These kinds love trends. The trend is on its way out. The stupids and misfits will always be with us but they won't rise again for a long time. Until we become complacent again.

    2. Hopefully Farage will say something to Trump about Der Starmerfuhrer and Trump will say plenty to Der Starmerfuhrer. It was Trump who promised us a trade deal, if you recall, interrupted by the odious anti British Biden. So if Trump threatens to scupper that deal, for example, I suspect Der Starmerfuhrer will come to heel pretty quick. Oh, and he should demand Lammykins head.
      Come to think of it, a State visit too, with a demand for plenty of groveling from the blubberment, with a stiff lecture from Trump in Westminster Hall.

        1. Yes, thus hopes of a stern lecture in which, one hopes, Trump will weave around for a minimum of four hours torturing the idiots of Westminster.

    3. Hopefully Farage will say something to Trump about Der Starmerfuhrer and Trump will say plenty to Der Starmerfuhrer. It was Trump who promised us a trade deal, if you recall, interrupted by the odious anti British Biden. So if Trump threatens to scupper that deal, for example, I suspect Der Starmerfuhrer will come to heel pretty quick. Oh, and he should demand Lammykins head.
      Come to think of it, a State visit too, with a demand for plenty of groveling with a stiff lecture from Trump in Westminster Hall.

    4. Unfortunately, once a cancer is established in the institutions it is very difficult to get rid of it. If DT can do the groundwork and Vance carry on the good work for another term, the US has a chance if reform. We are doomed as not even a Conservative government could turn around the woke wave. Apparently, a quarter of those out of work are disabled and claims for child mental elf disabilities have rocketed. Labour are swelling their voter base and making irreversible changes. In Wales, 16 year olds have the vote alongside those who are not even citizens of UK, therefore socialism is baked in. Starlin is said to admire the Labour ways down here in the valleys. Is the sun over the yardarm yet, hard to tell, but it will be somewhere.

    5. I just hope Trump keeps his head down (literally) for the next 4 years. He's got to stay alive.

    6. There are many bitter, angry lefties decrying the election result, cries of not my president are out there again.
      It is still a very divided country, we will have to see what happens after the euphoria / despair settles..

  58. Did it again – forgot to use a letter I already had. Going senile:
    Wordle 1,238 5/6

    ⬜⬜⬜⬜🟨
    ⬜⬜🟨⬜⬜
    🟨🟩⬜⬜⬜
    ⬜🟩🟩🟨🟩
    🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    1. I got off to a good start.

      Wordle 1,238 3/6

      🟨🟨⬜⬜🟨
      ⬜🟩🟩🟨🟨
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    2. But you got there

      I wasn't much better. After g8etting the middle letter right, I replaced it with another one!

      Wordle 1,238 4/6

      ⬜⬜⬜🟨🟨
      ⬜⬜🟩⬜⬜
      🟨🟨🟨🟨⬜
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

  59. Not a bad option, really.

    Heck, if someone said to me 'Sod off. Here's 100k' I'd leap at it. Take a month off, finish the book I'm pretending to write and get a really junior, no responsibility, no duty, no hassle admin job.

  60. Morning all, dull day and cold. But I am still basking in the glorious sunshine of a Trump win!

    I had this in my feed this morning. It's Joe Rogan with Elon Musk. I missed that long interview but this is short, it's an extract. But it is instructive in that it illustrates what we have just missed in a Democrat defeat and the victory of Trump. We have missed the bullet aimed squarely at our freedom.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xl4VMD6lADg

    1. Musk makes very good point – go back to the source. The Left don't like that. The BBC is a case in point. It lies by omission because that suits them.

      I remember when Blair was asked if he had prayed on the war in Iraq (and I despise Blair and marched against the war) and even I was disgusted by the headlines 'God made me do it!'.

      It's a dumbing down of the populace and hiding the deceit.

  62. I have just been shat on by Farcebook for posting something about Global Warming. They don't like it up 'em, do they?

    1. Post it on Twitter (X). Anything goes. As long as you don't use words such as 'worm' or 'idiot' or 'monkey'. I have been banned for several days pre-Elon for 'the worm turned' and 'monkey see, monkey do'. I have seen others go to Twitter jail for 'idiot'. You 'll be fine with anything to do with Global Warming, as long as it's not a study of the effects of climate change on the habitat of the earthworm.

      1. I got it from X . The controllers on Farcebuk are a bunch of turds. It's like 1984 as prophesised.

      1. Yet you shouldn't have to. For example, the Valencia flooding. It's down to the removal of dams and water management, not climate change but the Left want the narrative, so they ban any factual discussion.

        1. You should read ths Guardian. Tthe dam removal is all a right wing conspiracy – naturally!

        2. I never use Facebook for discussion. I post some of my photos or events I’ve been to or been involved with. Political discussion I keep for discussion sites like this.

    1. "We don't eat pork.. so you shouldn't either.."

      In fact we don't like; museums, democracy, Christians, Jews, women, gays, common law, pork, music, bacon, alcohol.. so you shouldn't either.."

  64. A man has been left outraged over the price of a cup of coffee at a London cafe.

    Sam Williams, 27, recently documented his visit to Kiss the Hippo, a coffee shop in Covent Garden, to try their Colombian 'Wush Wush' blend that retails for £16 a cup.

    'Is this one of the most expensive coffees in London?' Williams, who is Dame Judi Dench's grandson, began his TikTok.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-14055013/most-expensive-coffee-london-kiss-hippo.html

  66. Is Lammy still in situ because Starmer is insecure re the racial makeup of his overwhelming majority ?

    Is Starmer scared of losing votes if the Lammy twerp is removed from FO post ?

    2. Probably yes, Belle, although both are so daft as to be unfit to run a household, let alone a country.

  67. 396079+ up ticks,

    Agreed,
    The number of United Kingdom indigenous working slaves MUST keep ahead of the illegal invading troop numbers, otherwise our choice of governing overseers will be a complete failure.

    Vietnamese Channel migrants fuelling record number of UK modern slavery claims
    Number of suspected victims referred to Home Office rises to record levels with 11 per cent of claimants from Vietnam

      1. Why? It's all one country now. It's saving grace, if any, is they are rabidly anti Chinese, they have been for centuries but the modern Chinese they hate even more.

        1. 396079+ up ticks

          Afternoon JR,

          Apologies, I was thinking Korea
          and suffering a plague of funny haircuts.

    2. Vietnam is now a lovely, peaceful and liveable in land so the UK would be justified in repatriating all those claimants. We have enough nail bars and cannabis farms here now

    1. I stopped going to Boots nearly a year ago. I used to get my prescriptions from there, but they stopped me taking Kadi with me to collect them. I moved to a dog-friendly independent chemist. Two fingers to Boots!

  70. Dame Mary Archer: ‘Climate change deniers are scientifically illiterate’
    The scientist, currently creating an innovative children’s hospital, says her outlook helped her through her marriage’s public challenges
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/11/08/dame-mary-archer-interview-jeffrey-cambridge-climate-change/

    BTL

    As soon as they said: "The Science is Settled" we knew they were lying!

    I managed to pass Physics and Chemistry at "O" level but I am no scientist – in fact I happily admit that am scientifically illiterate.

    However many well-qualified geologists and climatologists – whom they try to silence and discredit – are convinced that man-made climate change is a myth and that Net Zero is a scam based on fiction.

    Mrs Archer is, by all accounts, a competent scientist but competent scientists often disagree with other competent scientists. She should, perhaps, leave fiction to her husband.

    1. The fragrant Dame is 180 degrees out – it’s the climate crisis morons who are scientifically illiterate! Some 500 other scientists wrote to the UN several times saying there is no climate emergency – they were ignored!

    2. The science is not settled. If it were it'd be religion, not science.

      Are we affecting our environment? Yes, because we manage it. Every time Milioaf pours 500 tons of concrete and steel into the ground he damages the environment.

      Are we a detrimental force on our world's ecology? Probably, as we cut down trees and concrete over them. We are not good custodians of our planet.

      However, does that mean we should unilaterally deindustrialise our entire way of life and pay high taxes? No. We should re-use, recycle almost everything we produce. We should replant trees and better manage our ecology.

      Reaching net zero is an idiotic conceit. We can't. If we did we would be far worse off to protect ourselves and support our ecology in future. We should be pushing for micro reactors and really investing in fusion and yes, it's 10 years away, but why are we not in space finding the next minerals and chemicals to accelerate our progress? Why are we not looking at thorium reactors and helium3?

      Being held back by the hard Left is going to do real damage to our world. The scam of 'man made climate change' must end. We should, however, be better custodians – and that means, Lefties, getting rid of foreign welfare wasters.

      1. Surely all life on earth is carbon based. If you decarbonise the planet it will be a dead planet. Environmentalism by all means. Plastic is a wonderful material. Plastic waste needs to be controlled.

        The romantic notion that if we all lived like the American Indians, we'd be in harmony with nature is nonsense. They were stone age cannibals who struggled for survival in filth and abject poverty.

        https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/ef82ea657a42250b3006541185b2e77b4ae0bee93f64b8593fd7eb33d2978d11.png

        1. The way we're importing savages we'll be a country of stone age cannibals struggling for survival in filth and abject poverty!

      2. I'm all in favour of cutting down waste and recycling. Crippling the economy to achieve some chimera is against my principles.

    3. Most scientists think there is climate change but many do not think it is caused by man, although man contributes to it. Her words obfuscate that. It is a great thing that she is setting up a children's hospital though. But no, those words were unnecessarily misleading, although maybe the journalist quoted out of context.

    4. The climate change argument depends upon whether you believe that a trend over a hundred years or so is actually the climate changing or just a fluctuation. In my view, we will only be able to see a real climatic change when those around in a thousand years or so look back at the temperatures and draw their conclusions.

      1. I think we are on the verge of a man-made mass global extinction and that the trend is not a hundred years or so, but closer to fifty. I have noticed the huge decline in a large number of species and habitats since 1974, and a lot of the peril lies in the fact that the global human population has doubled since then, and moved into places once taken for granted.

        Part of this apocalypse is the breakdown of civilisation, which is already under way, although they said that of the 1930s too.

        Nature will adapt eventually, but at its own speed, which is longer than a human lifetime.

        1. The ultimate way of restoring the planet, really. Wipe out the human population and the world will reestablish the eco balance. Similar to the evolutionary process, you can keep an unviable species such as the Panda Bear going so long but if the creature is not too keen on reproducing and eats only one food, it’s not going to be there at the end of time.

          1. There was this poem written just after WW1, but just as relevant today that local composer Tom Wells set to music during Lockdown. It was ‘There Will Be Soft Rains’ by Sara Teasdale.

            There will come soft rains and the smell of the ground,
            And swallows circling with their shimmering sound;

            And frogs in the pools singing at night,
            And wild plum-trees in tremulous white;

            Robins will wear their feathery fire
            Whistling their whims on a low fence-wire;

            And not one will know of the war, not one
            Will care at last when it is done.

            Not one would mind, neither bird nor tree
            If mankind perished utterly;

            And Spring herself, when she woke at dawn,
            Would scarcely know that we were gone.

        1. Yes, complete with dramatic deaths, affairs, unlikely inhabitants etc – I gave up listening to it about twenty years ago!

    8. Scientists are by their very nature sceptics, and there is nothing they enjoy more than overturning theories once thought irrefutable.

      The level of proof is determined by a thing scientists call significance. After getting a result, an error analysis is done, and as much error (such as the limitations of apparatus, and all sorts of external variables) eliminated as possible. The holy grail is significance, which taking a result arrived at randomly, there is a 95% (the most common level of significance) probability of the result being the consequence of what is being examined. It is rare indeed to get to 100%, since there always has to be a margin for error, and if ignored, this is not science; it is religion. Even Newton's apple may not fall in the expected direction under certain circumstances.

      Nor is bluster and political assertion science, and I am afraid to say that more deniers fall for this than their consensus opponents. They seem afraid to state the significance of observed manifestations of climate change being natural event, rather than due to industrial scale global warming caused by the material aspirations of twice as many people as lived in 1974.

    9. At the time of her husband's incarceration for perjury, wasn't there a report that she shared some of his carnal proclivities?

          2. Allegedly, Lucy Lastic.
            Not a big deal was made of the story, but it did rather stick in my mind as it went a long way to explaining why she did not leave him when he'd been shagging prostitutes.

      1. I am quite interested in perfumery. There is an element called "Indol" – very noticeable in heavily scented jasmine, particularly Stephanotis and Indian jasmine, which have rather "rude" overtones. And Oud. The same scent is to be found in human emissions such as shit (as part of the general complexity of the overall bouquet, varying from stool to stool), and I've no doubt that it would make an appearance in Paltrow's quimsically named candles.

        Obviously, this balance is rather delicate. You do not want a fragrance to identifiably smell of shit. Dear Mary treads a tightrope.

    11. I am no scientist, but I did study Physics and Chemistry and have an O Level in Biology. CO2 is plant food. Humans breathe out CO2. Them facts ain't changed. One thing I did learn in my science lessons is to challenge accepted views. The earth is no longer the centre of the Universe and the existence of phlogiston is no longer a settled theory.

  73. Much as I share the sentiment, this video is, by the admission of the person who filmed it, a set-up scene.

    Apparently this was filmed in 2023 in the Netherlands, not in France The "joker" author of the post filmed his friend pretending to urinate on pre-packaged pork, and added the sound effect after the event. Apparently he filmed four such films which were initially put on YouTube. https://factuel.afp.com/doc.afp.com.3492987

    Horrid, bad taste, but nothing else.

    1. Gotta earn a living on social media.. either that or county lines n stuff.
      If The West were expecting them to innovate.. forget it.. haven't done any since 622 AD.

  74. National conservatism has won its first great victory

    There's a lesson the Tories must take from Trump's landslide: there's nothing wrong with patriotism

    David Frost – 7th November 2024 – 5:58pm GMT

    President Trump's decisive victory this week will change many things (though the disdain of the liberal establishment towards the views of ordinary voters doesn't appear to be one of them). It will take time to sink in. Presumptions about the way the world works are going to have to adjust.

    This is going to be particularly difficult for Labour: their worldview is already so disconnected from the way the world actually works that reality can only with difficulty impinge upon it. Happily, their ideas are being overtaken fast by the new conservative movement emerging across the West – one that will be galvanised by Trump's victory.

    It's undeniable that across Western countries a different kind of conservatism is emerging. The direction of policy in the post-Cold War period – towards globalisation, international institutions, and free movement of goods, services, and people – has largely exhausted itself.

    Like it or not, the most vibrant, growing, and intellectually active movements on the Right derive their strength from a different form of conservatism, "national conservatism" if you will: one based on promoting nationhood, national identity, culture, borders, history, a degree of social conservatism, the prosperity of people who actually live in the country, and a realist not messianic view of foreign policy and defence commitments.

    The form varies across the West. In Hungary, in Poland, to a large extent in Italy, and now in the United States this movement has simply taken over the main Right-wing parties. Elsewhere, in France, Germany, Austria, Spain, or Sweden, there are challenger parties on the Right, of varying degrees of acceptability, still competing with a weakening mainstream.

    Britain sits between the two. The Brexit vote and the temporary realignment under Boris Johnson were driven by similar forces, but it turned out that the 2019-24 Conservative Party couldn't wholly bring itself to represent them. It is now resurfacing amidst ever-stronger concerns about immigration and social cohesion, both in the Conservatives and in Reform.

    So far, national conservatism has been fragmented, in some places tainted by the origins of the parties that represent it, and often fragile electorally. In Europe, the EU is deliberately constructed to keep such forces at the margin. But President Trump's victory is now going to change things. This form of conservatism has won a decisive mandate in the leading country of the West. And if Trump delivers in the way he has promised, we will have a visible example of what it can achieve.

    Trump has big advantages over others. He won't have Ursula von der Leyen and the European Courts fussing every time he tries to change immigration rules. His mandate is strong enough to weaken opposition in domestic courts and the US deep state. He has now-repentant Democrats like Elon Musk and Tulsi Gabbard, visible symbols of the political realignment, as leading members of his team. As long as Trump sticks to his strategy, explains his ideas (and JD Vance will be vital here), and moves quickly, then he should be able to get things done.

    Conservatives across the West have got to start accommodating themselves to this reality and stop being sniffy about it. After all, it's not new. National identity, history, and culture were core components of conservative parties' policies until the 1990s and the so-called "end of history". They were also core elements of the Reagan and Thatcher appeal, forgotten though they may be now. Such ideas are what conservatism is about at its heart.

    British conservatives in particular need to get real about this. In many ways we in Britain drove this trend with Brexit. It's frankly ridiculous for some supposed Tories – I saw one such MP on the BBC on Wednesday – to oppose Trump and talk up Kamala Harris, seemingly because she seems somewhat closer to the pre-2016 version of conservative politics. That version of conservatism is dying. What British conservatives must now do is tap into this new movement while stopping it drifting too far into protectionism and social democrat style welfare economics. The politics of "Right on culture, Left on economics" is not sensible, because Left on economics always leads to wealth destruction and decline.

    It's an open question whether Trump 47 will avoid this, but the signs are cautiously positive. I don't like his tariff policy in general, but before we get too precious about it let's remember that we and the EU have average external tariffs of 5 per cent now, and around twice that on agriculture. Let's also remember the Musk plan for huge reductions in federal bureaucracy, likely reduced regulation, and the very welcome attack on Net Zero policies which will make US energy even cheaper and its industry even more productive.

    British conservatism has to keep its eye on this big picture or it risks being squeezed. The voter base for the policies of the last 30 years is disappearing. The choice is between Leftist, statist, post-modernist madness; or the nation, borders, growth, and a return to the traditions and strengths of Western civilisation. Let's get properly on the right side of that argument. It's from there that we can win.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/11/07/national-conservatism-great-victory-trump-win

    The principles are sound, Lord F. The problem is finding enough conservatives to enact them. There aren't many in the Conservative Party.

    1. There's nothing wrong with nationalism and it works best when everyone comes from the same tribe. That's just the reality of human nature and the Bible teaches that God created the nations. He destroyed the Tower of Babel. Wars aren't driven by nationalism. Wars come from empire building of the malign variety.

    2. Frost omits the thrall in which the UK's political "elite" are held by Davos Man/EU/WEF/WHO et al. Until that control is exposed to the majority of the electorate, nothing will change.

  75. "This popularism won't catch on.. winning over & appeasing readers of The Guardian is the way forward."
    Wet Tories.

  76. Rare Earth

    While eating my lunch I turned on the radio for the mid-day news and stayed to listen to "Rare Earth". This is a BBC (spit) programme which was supposed to debate the pros and cons of running hundreds of miles of pylons, 200-metre-high wind turbines and other "infrastructure necessities" across the landscape. NIMBYism figured quite prominently.

    During the closing minutes one of the presenters said something like "because we need to de-carbonise the world.." and there was not a single voice during the whole programme to disagree that this was proven FACT.

    The Beeb is totally wedded to Net Zero. I hope they have lots of backup generators (running on what?) or very big batteries (made in China) for the many times that the mains power will be cut off "to save the planet".

      1. Thanks, Herr Oberst,
        I am just preparing a Nottl post that shows in graphs my own Solar generation during September and the beginning of November. According to some sources, we have not had an hour of sunshine in the Southeast since 28th October. I can believe it.
        Watch this space. RC.

        1. Solar Power
          Sorry this is a long post. Hope it's not too technical.

          On 4th November I received my first quarterly electricity bill from Octopus. They had paid me £261.71 for the electricity I had exported, so far from my bill being historically in the hundreds of pounds, it looks like being around £70 a month, maybe £100 in January/February. That's mostly for Gas Central Heating.

          I have just interrogated my Solar Inverter's computer database to see how the sunny September days compare with the last week or so, when it has been continuously overcast here in Kent. I tried to publish the graphs just now, but the print was too tiny unless you use a 26 inch Screen, not an iPad and definitely not a Smartphone.

          In September (not known for very long, sunny days) I typically generated 25-30 kWh (=units) from Solar per day, of which I exported 20-25 kWh. I use about 2-4 kWh (Units) per day myself and export the rest. Result: £261.71 knocked off my quarterly bill. Nice.

          The second graph I hoped to post was for 6 days at the end of October/beginning of November. .

          On most days the electrical load (amount I used) has been 5-6 kWh (Units) per day (it's been colder), but the Solar power generated has only once reached 6 kWh on 4th November.

          I was expecting this when I paid for the installation, but it just shows the fragility and stupidity of the Nation's future reliance on huge Solar Installations in the winter, when demand is higher.

          No matter if the Solar 'Farm' has 100,000 panels at a peak 430 watts each (so a purported peak total output of 43 Megawatts), it may be generating only zero to a few percent of its rated output, and only during daylight.

          CONCLUSION: Somebody had better tell Milibrain about this.

        2. Solar Power
          Sorry this is a long post. Hope it's not too technical.

          On 4th November I received my first quarterly electricity bill from Octopus. They had paid me £261.71 for the electricity I had exported, so far from my bill being historically in the hundreds of pounds, it looks like being around £70 a month, maybe £100 in January/February. That's mostly for Gas Central Heating.

          I have just interrogated my Solar Inverter's computer database to see how the sunny September days compare with the last week or so, when it has been continuously overcast here in Kent. I tried to publish the graphs just now, but the print was too tiny unless you use a 26 inch Screen, not an iPad and definitely not a Smartphone.

          In September (not known for very long, sunny days) I typically generated 25-30 kWh (=units) from Solar per day, of which I exported 20-25 kWh. I use about 2-4 kWh (Units) per day myself and export the rest. Result: £261.71 knocked off my quarterly bill. Nice.

          The second graph I hoped to post was for 6 days at the end of October/beginning of November. .

          On most days the electrical load (amount I used) has been 5-6 kWh (Units) per day (it's been colder), but the Solar power generated has only once reached 6 kWh on 4th November.

          I was expecting this when I paid for the installation, but it just shows the fragility and stupidity of the Nation's future reliance on huge Solar Installations in the winter, when demand is higher.

          No matter if the Solar 'Farm' has 100,000 panels at a peak 430 watts each (so a purported peak total output of 43 Megawatts), it may be generating only zero to a few percent of its rated output, and only during daylight.

          CONCLUSION: Somebody had better tell Milibrain about this.

      2. We are, despite living on a hill, now in our third day of mist/cloud and no wind – this isn't unusual, and makes a complete nonsense of any policy that relies on solar/wind power to the exclusion of any reliable backup. Sadly the Milioaf seems totally immune to reality in his pursuit of the unattainable!

    2. It isn't only the beeb. I've just had a whole blurb of "Net Zero Carbon" proposals from the Synod. From the beginning it asserts there is a climate catastrophe and it never wavers. I can't attend the meeting or I might ask if they have ever considered that CO2 is plant food and we all breathe out CO2. They mention high electricity prices but don't make the connection with green subsidies. I don't think I'm going to fit in well when they do eventually hold a meeting on a day I am free.

    1. I was going to introduce my parents to my husband.. and my boyfriend. Now I can't. Lol.

    2. One Facebook poster declared that the outlook is so bad that he will be leaving the US and moving to Hawaii.

      Education really is wasted on some of them.

      1. They are not well educated. Many of them don't know that we speak English in England! Was even told once that England was off the coast of Kansas, I was in Kansas city at the time. Thought the woman was joking but it turned out she was serious. Kansas, by the way, is landlocked.

        1. Some years back, one of our friends was crossing the US via Greyhound buses.
          One of her fellow passengers asked her what language we speak in England.

    4. Well this goes back to what I was saying yesterday. How come that all the polls gave the impression it was touch and go who was going to win. Obviously a great deal of dishonesty was at play in order to manipulate people, rendering polls worthless. I did see Sebastian Gorka commenting on that and he said that the only polls worth paying attention to are from "The Trafalgar Group". I had forgotten about them but they have been right about every election but one.

      1. I followed People’s Pundit viz. Rich Baris for polling and Robert Barnes for the betting markets. Rich Baris is far and away the best pollster.

    1. They would probably not realise that they had made a foot in mouth faux pas and ask why them.

      1. They would simply say that it shows that Trump is 1) a racist (criticise ANYTHING Lammy says about absolutely anything, and it's racism) and 2) a bigot (criticism ANYTHING Starer says about absolutely anything and it's because you are a far-right bigot). It's very simple for them.But then they are very simple people.

      2. They would simply say that it shows that Trump is 1) a racist (criticise ANYTHING Lammy says about absolutely anything, and it's racism) and 2) a bigot (criticism ANYTHING Starer says about absolutely anything and it's because you are a far-right bigot). It's very simple for them.But then they are very simple people.

    3. Unfortunately those two simply never do humble pie. IMO so many politicians suffer from a kind of narcissism – it simply doesn't occur to them that they can be wrong. That's why they often are bordering on being compulsive liars – whatever they say is right, even if they said the opposite 10 minutes ago. I don't even think they think they are hoodwinking people – they are just extremely flexible in their concept of "their truth".

    4. Unfortunately those two simply never do humble pie. IMO so many politicians suffer from a kind of narcissism – it simply doesn't occur to them that they can be wrong. That's why they often are bordering on being compulsive liars – whatever they say is right, even if they said the opposite 10 minutes ago. I don't even think they think they are hoodwinking people – they are just extremely flexible in their concept of "their truth".

  79. I just saw that Elon Musk has brought Fox News for $25 billion and You Tube for $50 billion. Thought I should check and it turns out that both stories are fake. What the motivation is, who knows. But these two reports are apparently spreading. So don't get excited if you see that. But it would be fascinating if he did buy them. Would change the face of communications drastically and for the good. The censorship, especially on you tube, is out of control and often absurd.

      1. Yes, that is one of the reasons I double checked the story. I can't see Google selling anything. But. you know, they, the famous 'they', say that Elon is well on his way to becoming the first trillionaire. Pretty impressive if he manages that. If he does, perhaps he could put in a bid for the UK?

    2. It would be better if they bought the Disney conglomerate. No I am not looking for a woke free Snow White but media forced to be middle of the road would be helpful.

    3. Bummer. Just read the first bit of your post and got overexcited. Then i read the second bit. I guess we've had our miracle for the time being. No complaining about that :-)))))

  80. I just saw that Elon Musk has brought Fox News for $25 billion and You Tube for $50 billion. Thought I should check and it turns out that both stories are fake. What the motivation is, who knows. But these two reports are apparently spreading. So don't get excited if you see that. But it would be fascinating if he did buy them. Would change the face of communications drastically and for the good. The censorship, especially on you tube, is out of control and often absurd.

  81. I just saw that Elon Musk has brought Fox News for $25 billion and You Tube for $50 billion. Thought I should check and it turns out that both stories are fake. What the motivation is, who knows. But these two reports are apparently spreading. So don't get excited if you see that. But it would be fascinating if he did buy them. Would change the face of communications drastically and for the good. The censorship, especially on you tube, is out of control and often absurd.

  82. Trudeau is trying to shut down oil and gas in Canada and make us dependent on green stuff. We will soon be back in the Indian stone age.

  83. Twenty million votes go missing.
    And there were all those really annoying posters on The Spectator name calling the middle of the night conspiracy theorists.

  84. A big shout out to the Amish communities in all the swing states voting for Trump.. over the raw milk ishoo.

    clip-clop clip-clop clip-clop bang bang clip-clop clip-clop clip-clop..
    (another Amish drive-by shootin..)

      1. "Hitch up the buckboard, Gideon, and call Rebecca, Elizabeth and Esther. We're going a-votin'!"

        1. The Amish were already fed up with the Dem government. The unpasteurised issue was the last straw.
          They had been taken to court over the use of child slave labour.
          What they were actually doing was teaching them their way of life. Children would work the fields alongside their parents.
          There were other issues too with them being told they needed electric lights on their wagons.

  85. Just testing, to see if some graphics will be legible.
    If they are, I will post them with text, if not I will apologise and turn tail.

    EDIT: Sorry folks, I will need to edit the graphics before re-posting.
    RC

  86. 396079+ up ticks,

    Very greedy gits, automate the network.

    Dt,

    Tube drivers offered four-day week by Sadiq Khan’s TfL to call off strikes
    Letter to Aslef trade union pledges to ‘set out a proposal for delivering an average four-day working week’

    1. For the same money? Brings them into line with all the snivel serpents working from home I suppose?

      1. The idea of public sector workers being paid the same for a 4 day week implies they are at least 20% overmanned.

    3. Same as the main rail workers isn't it? A four day work week for a seven day a week operation takes sense.

    1. Yes. I saw that. Didn't bother reading the article. I know Tom Kerridge ended their business relationship quite a while ago because Tom can do sums.

      Michael Ohare is innovative and quite cutting edge but possibly made the wrong decision to join with an ex-footballer looking for a tax write off.

      Michael probably had it in his contract that he would be paid first before all other considerations.

      I know that's what i would do.

      And yes it was pretentious.

      Unlike our future date at the Lanesborough where we will stuffed full of cake and ginger beer at a fraction of the price.

      (you are aware afternoon tea is £85 per head and you're paying?)

        1. At Smithfield no less. That should be good.

          My steak was inedible at Rules which was disappointing.

          The accompanying creamed savoy cabbage was rubbish too. I like a bit of dark green with savoy cabbage.

          Have fun.

      3. I stood outside O'Hare's restaurant on my visit to Leeds back in 2018. It looked rather garish and pretentious so I'm glad I didn't waste my money by venturing inside.

    1. Yes. We have supporters of Hamas all over europe now. Of course once the threat of home grown terrorists had subsided 'they' had to import new ones.

      1. They'll go on importing them until we are overrun overwhelmed and it will be too late to do anything about it. It's what Schwab at the WEF, Gates and Soros want and I rather fear it is was our PM and the Idiot King want too.

        1. I seriously hope as DT will already realise that the damage being caused to our once civilised countries has been and is still being carried out by the above mentioned in your comment RC. And gets stuck in.

    2. It's the lead DT article:

      We failed Jews during football attacks like we did under Nazis, says Dutch king

      Scenes dubbed 'Jew hunt' by Dutch media

      Netanyahu sends planes and medical teams to Netherlands

      1. The BBC are being even handed:

        The Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has condemned "anti-Arab chants" and an "attack on the Palestinian Flag" in Amsterdam.

        In a statement on X, the ministry says it has called on the Dutch government to investigate the incident and to "protect Palestinians and Arabs" living in the Netherlands.

        As we've reported, Amsterdam police earlier said supporters of Israeli football club Maccabi Tel Aviv attacked a taxi and set a Palestinian flag on fire on Wednesday.

        Videos posted to social media, verified by the BBC, show Maccabi Tel Aviv fans chanting racist slogans about Arabs and Palestinians. Other videos online show a Palestinian flag being torn from a building.

        Police say violence continued into the early hours of Thursday, with Maccabi supporters becoming the target of "hit-and-run" attacks overnight in the capital. Five people were taken to hospital but were discharged this morning.

    3. It Looks like our useless political classes really need to 'get their ducks in a row' before it's too late. They've been handing over the lead to the wrong people for too long.
      Things are starting to get serious, if they haven't realised yet there's not much hope for a sensible and safe future.

  92. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zBoWmIYN4vw&list=WL&index=66 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MZ6wBfkLaMM&list=WL&index=67 This SHIT is not just the stuff people fry their food in … it is also present in every item of processed food you buy.

    Not only is it killing you and adversely affecting your physical health, it is also directly responsible for the escalating rate of human stupidity and imbecility. It is this exponentially-rising stupidity that prevents people from accepting the facts about how their food is killing them.

    Stupidity begets stupidity … begets annihilation. Most people will never learn. They are much too fucking stupid!

      1. It is notable that there is a natural hierarchy for living organisms that is fully dependent upon their eating patterns.

        Apex predators will eat both carnivorous and herbivorous animals.
        Carnivorous animals eat herbivorous animals to acquire their nutritional requirements.
        Herbivorous animals eat, and gain their all nutrition from, vegetation.

        There are vastly more herbivorous animals on the planet since there is a massive amount of vegetation to be consumed and, in the main, those herbivores need to eat more-or-less constantly in order to acquire their required levels of nutrition. Herbivores are, by nature, stupid with low levels of brain power since their food is all around and they do not need to work out any strategy to find it.

        Carnivores, by necessity, are far fewer in number since they become sated after eating their herbivorous prey. This allows them to remain fully nourished for some considerable time, thereafter, before they need to go out and kill for their next meal. Carnivores are, naturally, highly intelligent. They work out strategies for out-thinking their prey and devise cunning ways to hunt, capture and kill it. This gives them a massive advantage over stupid herbivores. They are also intelligent enough to keep their numbers in check and not overbreed.

        Since their first appearance on this planet, humans have been apex predators, killing other animals for their sustenance and nutrition. This accounts for the first 99·6% of human evolution.

        Unfortunately, since the advent of the so-called ‘agricultural revolution’ (accounting for only the last 0·4% of the existence of humans as a species) when humans commenced the eating of plant material and grains, they have lost their status as an apex predator and have disavowed their ranking as a carnivore. The concomitant reduction in brain size and enfeeblement of skeleton and musculature, as a direct consequence of this unnatural fad, has transformed an erstwhile carnivore, progressively, from an omnivore to a herbivore.

        This ongoing deterioration in human status — their ability to think rationally and to retain the physical strength, speed, agility and stamina that they evolved as an apex predator — has taken us from being the most formidably intelligent organism in the existence of the planet to becoming an enfeebled, and scatterbrained, imbecilic also-ran in biological terms. Since modern life ensures they are not exposed to routinely becoming the prey of other carnivores, their now-ingrained stupidity is causing them to breed out of all proportion over their optimum population.

        The deterioration of Homo sapiens as a viable species will only accelerate as a direct consequence of this catastrophic change in diet and status.

        1. The slight problem with your on-going thesis is that mankind only really made huge strides in development, life expectancy, intellectual achievement and settlements AFTER they moved to an omnivorous diet.

          If they had stuck only to meat they would still be hunters and the world as we know it would not exist.

          Whether that would have been a good or a bad thing is a different issue.

          1. Show me the empirical proof for that theory of yours. I certainly refute your opinions on this topic. Humans brains continued to grow when they were carnivorous, they started to atrophy when they commenced eating vegetation. There is clear evidence of this in stable-isotope testing on the collagen in the bones of our ancient ancestors.

      2. Zero in the 50s, now 1 in 3 children are diabetic.
        1 in 24 autistic in Cal.
        50% obese children. 74% overall. 3% is the norm.
        1 in 4 food allergy.
        1 in 8 black children has asthma.
        From $0 to $4.3 Trn in 5 decades spent on chronic deceases.

        But wot about Gaza, says Owen Jones.

      3. Zero in the 50s, now 1 in 3 children are diabetic.
        1 in 24 autistic in Cal.
        50% obese children. 74% overall. 3% is the norm.
        1 in 4 food allergy.
        1 in 8 black children has asthma.
        From $0 to $4.3 Trn in 5 decades spent on chronic deceases.

        But wot about Gaza, says Owen Jones.

  93. Shit, shite and buggeration!!!
    Just took the camera and took some pictures and, when I downloaded them to the computer, they were all out of focus!!!
    Turns out the switch on the lens, which I never touch, had been switched to manual focus, not auto!

    A bit dark to reshoot so I might take some more tomorrow.

    1. Easily done, Bob.

      I'm no great photographer, but over the years I've has a Pentax MV1, a Nikon D40, and – since last year – a Nikon D3400 , second hand on eBay. Pentax is long gone. Still have the D40, plus lenses, etc. but they're long in the tooth, and one of the lenses has AF issues, but otherwise still working.

      Anyone wanting a very cheap, entry-level DSLR, feel free to message me..

      1. I've written into my will that I want a picture taken of my dying minutes. I'm determined to have a photo finish.

        I'll get me lens cap…………

        1. Better carry it around with you. The camerawill – might have to make do with a selfie…

      2. I still have a Pentax Spotmatic and a small Leica Minox. I used the latter when working on the scaffold of Norwich Cathedral formulating stone repairs to the Tower. Minox was the smallest 35mm camera and fitted into my jacket pocket.

      3. I still have a Pentax Spotmatic and a small Leica Minox. I used the latter when working on the scaffold of Norwich Cathedral formulating stone repairs to the Tower. Minox was the smallest 35mm camera and fitted into my jacket pocket.

      4. My all time favourite camera was a Kodak Instamatic 126. I’d have it still if the cartridges hadn’t become obsolete. It did long exposure and holding a camera that small steady was a challenge.

    2. I recall the Architect Pat Landucci was charged with taking photos on a visit to the US. Unfortunately he forgot to take off the lens cap so on his return to the UK his developed photos were just black.

  95. One swift way to clear out the Augean Stables would shurely be to release and prosecute the Epstein client list.

      1. I am confident Gates is on the list. Whether there will be prosecutions is a different matter.

        1. If It is he will have paid for his name to be erased. After all you cannot be the great philanthropist if you have doom and gloom hanging over you.

        2. Along with Gates I suspect there will be a lot of prominent "Swamp Republicans" on the list. One of the reasons why so many were anti-Trump during his 1st time round.

  96. A fledgling Birdie Three!

    Wordle 1,238 3/6
    🟨⬜⬜⬜🟨
    ⬜⬜⬜⬜🟨
    🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    1. Me too. Don't know how you do it with so few clues though.

      Wordle 1,238 3/6

      🟨🟨⬜🟨⬜
      ⬜⬜🟩🟩🟨
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    2. Well done, I had a good first word.

      Wordle 1,238 3/6

      🟨🟨⬜⬜🟨
      ⬜🟩🟩🟨🟨
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

          1. What's your hit rate on that 795, mola? I've got about 250 since I started logging them and I've missed on 4 – all of them either – O-ER or -I-ER (most recently the massively irritating FIBER!!).
            The another annoying thing is that if you dont do it that day – it counts as a fail! Another 2 there……

          2. Statistics
            Number of games played, 795
            795
            Played
            Win percentage, 98
            98
            Win %
            Current Streak count, 24
            24
            Current Streak
            Max Streak count, 203
            203
            Max Streak
            Guess Distribution
            1 1
            2 41
            3 243
            4 295
            5 161
            6 39

          3. Mines not dissimilar but I have a pretty much perfect sinusoidal distribution, so more 4s and 5s and less 3s than you – I see you got an Ace!! What was your word?

          4. It would have been Raise. Now I normally use arise, but might swap to pouty or some such on a whim.

          5. I used to use STARE but I changed to TASER to set me up better for the dreaded -O-ER. Follow that with OPIUM and, if still thin on the ground LYNCH…..

          6. Ah, I didn't know that. I went on a week's fishing trip a couple of years ago without my laptop so no Wordle.

      1. Par four
        Wordle 1,238 4/6

        🟨⬜⬜⬜🟨
        ⬜🟩⬜🟨🟨
        🟨🟩🟩🟨⬜
        🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    5. #MeToo – Finally got bloody lucky with a multiple choice!!…..

      Wordle 1,238 3/6

      ⬜🟨⬜🟨🟨
      🟩🟩🟩⬜⬜
      🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

  97. Had a GP appointment today. I spend half the evenings in pubs in Carlisle and the other half in pubs in Gretna.
    The doctor said I'm a borderline alcoholic.

  99. I see the 'woman hater' Trump has appointed the first ever female Chief of Staff (Susie Wiles).

    1. Almost everything derogatory said about Trump usually turns out to be inaccurate or grossly (ho ho) inaccurate

    2. Had a visit from daughter number 2 who came out with the normal anti woman bollocks the lefty liberals has been sprouting.
      I had words, telling her she is old enough to be able to cut through the crap the MSM keeps coming out with, and to take the time to find out what the truth is.
      Horses and water springs to mind. ☹️

    3. If Kemi Badenoch can be called white privilege surely zTrump can be accused of misogynistic behaviour.

    1. Pally Wally check points to verify passport status..
      Made to chant.. "From the liver to the kidney Palestine will be free.."
      Absolutely zero police presence.
      Total anarchy.
      Actually just like yer average Muslim hellhole.

  103. My second line was wasted but I was seeking to eliminate certain letters. Then on my fourth line I had a choice of two words and picked the wrong one.

      1. Dont mean to be pedantic (yes you do… Ed.) but it has to be cor (not cori). Cor immobile, a heraldic term, translates as a 'steadfast heart'……

      2. Dont mean to be pedantic (yes you do… Ed.) but it has to be cor (not cori). Cor immobile, a heraldic term, translates as a 'steadfast heart'……

    1. Pro-Palestine activists are plotting to throw Armistice Day events into chaos across the UK with a series of "highly coordinated" protests ..

      Great, crank it up.. then UK might get a Trump sooner rather than later.

      1. I reported this last night. Some of the demos might be small student-led events on Monday and of little consequence. This one is planned for Sunday and could be dangerous.

        I wish the media would be more careful in their use of 'Remembrance' and 'Armistice'.

        1. I would not wish for a backlash, but if every one of those protestors was individually surrounded by people doing a proper act of remembrance and just silently intimidated with the threat of appalling violence if they disturbed the silence; it might just let them know they are not welcome.

        2. They probably don't know the difference. I'm going to a Remembrance Day service on Sunday, but I'll be laying a wreath on Armistice Day on the 11th.

          1. Here, in France, it is always held on the 11th.
            After commune amalgamations one can have four or more remembrances on the day.
            The last, at 11, is always followed by a "vin d'honneur" at whichever of the old communes' salle de fetes celebrates it.
            Ours will be at 9.30 this year.
            They read out all the names of the dead from every war since the Franco Prussian at ours, I suspect because there was a prominent local citizen who died, because I've not seen similar going back before WW1 elsewhere.

          2. I know. I was there for 11th November one year. We marched in parade from the war memorial in the town square to every place that had a commemorative plaque, ending up in the cemetery at the war graves where there were quite a few English and Canadians.

          3. I suspect your experience must have been in the North of France.
            Being that much further South, there are relatively few WW1 graves with English or other non-French locally.
            WW2 more, but still far, far fewer than the North.

            What is shocking around here is the relatively large numbers killed in WW1, I usually expect 8+:1 further North, here 12 or more isn't unusual.

            Reading several names from the same family hammers home how ghastly it must have been.

          4. Yes, I spend a lot of time in Normandy. In Rouen the bullet holes are still visible on some of the buildings. What struck me was the number of disparus on the memorial.

          5. I took my M-i-L on a tour of WW1 battlefields and memorials. She was in her late 80's.
            Her husband had waded ashore on D-day, but she appeared to have no real idea of the WW1 death tolls.
            Her father went ashore at Gallipoli, but I'm not convinced she really appreciated what that meant.
            Hard years, difficult childhood because of it.

            She was moved to tears when I took her to the Menin Gate and she spotted distant relatives named as "no known grave" and sites like Tyne Cot just shattered her.

          6. Do you get many with the inscription “mort pour la patrie”? Shot by the Germans for resisting.

      2. I've always thought it would end in violence one way or another. People will eventually snap.

      1. After the ensuing riot, Max will say: "It was most regrettable that the, er, the, um, er, parade in Birmingham on Sunday was disrupted by a minor counter-demonstration. That's the price of freedom of speech and conscience.

        "What followed, however, was utterly disgraceful. The violent retaliation by marchers and spectators showed that they have no respect for those freedoms, however many of them were attacked. Whatever their age, they will be punished severely."

    5. From the Office for National Statistics;

      In 2023:

      31.8% of all live births were to non-UK-born mothers in England and Wales (an increase from 30.3% in 2022); this continues a general increase in the percentage of live births to non-UK-born mothers.

      37.3% of live births were to parents where either one or both were born outside the UK, increasing from 35.8% in 2022.

      We're doomed arent we?

    7. "Honouring our strong martyrs". But what about the weak martyrs, don't they deserve a prayer?

      2. "Martyrs", eh? Yet another word whose meaning has been repurposed. In our culture, a "martyr" is someone prepared to defend their faith even unto death, in peaceful and heroic self sacrifice. A life-affirming saint.

        In the alien culture thrust upon us, a "martyr" is now a murderous thug who dies whilst slaughtering innocents in pursuit of the vainglory of a death cult.

        Do not let these people hijack our language. We need another word for their satanic death worshippers.

          1. I am (increasingly less) loathe to tar them all with the same brush. A little more condemnation of the murderous fanatics from within the "communities" would make a big difference.

          2. They all subscribe to the same beliefs. If they don't actively support those who act on them, they don't oppose them. Silence implies consent, after all.

          3. Some time ago, I wrote on one of Tom Armstrong’s blogs something to the effect that:
            Those nice, middle class, wine drinking, bacon eating, Muslims that you mix with, will change instantly once Islam is in control, and don’t believe otherwise.
            Condemnation?
            Forget it!

          4. It's the way they work. While they are in a minority they pretend to fit in. As their numbers increase, they become emboldened and then when they're a majority, they crack the whip.

    9. What has this country become .. a liberal minded woke weak ungrateful pile of nothing ness who applaud the culture that belongs to goat shaggers child molesters , Allah wailers , wife murderers, FGM cutters ,bum scrapers , and idle sallow skinned hairy shifty sly incomers.

      This weekend is significant to all of us whose grandparents and parents fought in two world wars .

      I am now 77 years old , my father and mother's photo of them both in uniform sit close by, they were serving in the RN during the war , my husband and myself served our time , Moh longer than me , in the RN ..

      I have nursing friends who served on board Canberra and QE2 during the Falklands campaign ..

      I feel so nauseated by the way Britain has sunk so far in maybe thirty years or more .

      What has happened to our backbone?

  105. It'll come out one-day. More cloud seeding more man made and huge destructive floods in Spain.

    1. The Valencians were angry with the Spanish authorities because they didn't seed it coming.

  106. Evening, all. Have made arrangements to change my car, hopefully, at the end of this month (so I don't lose out on the tax situation). Another ICE with a low VED (for the moment). I vilified the government (re the tax situation) to the chap who runs the dealership and he said he thought a lot of people agreed with me. He asked if I thought the veterans would turn their backs on Starmer at the Cenotaph. I said probably not; they were brought up to respect authority and the young lad said it shouldn't be made about Starmer anyway; it was to commemorate the fallen. I tend to agree with him.

    America chose life, prosperity and growth. We chose Starmer- harmer. I didn't vote for them.

    1. Impressive, yes.

      But if I'm honest, I don't think it really should be a light show.
      It looks far too much like a celebration of what happened.

      Celebrate their sacrifice, yes, but for me the two minutes silence is sufficient.

  109. So they have built a £ 100 million tunnel for old bats.
    I thought that old female Labour cabinet ministers would prefer something more luxurious

    1. I imagine Emily Thornberry hanging upside down from the beams would impose a bit of a strain on the structure.

  110. From Coffee House, the Spectator

    Football fans are known to get a little rowdy after a game, but the horror that broke out after the Maccabi Tel Aviv and Ajax game on Thursday night was an entirely different matter. As Jonathan Sacerdoti wrote for the Spectator today, hundreds of Jews were hunted and beaten by mobs after the game while videos of the violence quickly spread across social media, leaving users horrified at the Amsterdam attacks. Yet for some rather peculiar reason, mainstream broadcasters were not quite as fast to report on the matter as one might have expected – with the Beeb in particular notably slow to the news, with readers taking to Twitter to blast both the delay to the public service broadcaster’s reporting and the language used to describe the attacks. Good heavens…

    Last night, social media users slammed the Beeb for what seemed like ‘complete radio silence’ on the matter, while the broadcaster was criticised over its reporting of ‘rude, anti-Palestinian slogans’ in Amsterdam. When the news outlet finally decided to report on the attacks taking place on Jewish people, Twitter users raged at its description of ‘clashes in Amsterdam’. One person tweeted that the BBC ‘couldn’t refer to what had happened as “antisemitic riots” without the disclaimer that this was Israel’s description of events’.

    Then this morning, a blog post appeared on the broadcaster’s website which looked to some Twitter users as though the Beeb was trying to lay some of the blame for the attacks on Israeli football fans. In the post entitled ‘Some Maccabi fans “looking for a fight”, witness tells BBC’, the author writes, on interviewing one individual, that:

    I’ve spoken to a fan who went to the match last night, who reports seeing Maccabi Tel Aviv supporters on the Amsterdam metro ‘going up and down the carriages three or four times looking for a fight’. Conor Dalton tells me: ‘I felt worried. Everyone was going into the city so everyone knew what was going to happen.’ He adds that he is ‘shocked by the portrayal’ of the incident in the media, adding that the attacks were ‘completely provoked’ and Palestinian flags were ‘torn down the night before’.

    ‘Nothing to see here,’ one Twitter poster fumed. ‘Just BBC News trying to victim blame the Israeli fans who were attacked last night in Amsterdam.’ Another raged: ‘Jews are attacked on the streets of Amsterdam. So who does the BBC blame? Jews!’ One writer took to the social media app to lament:

    I very rarely pick up on BBC News criticism but I do not understand why it was necessary to append the words ‘officials say’ to the headline about the Amsterdam football attacks. Why suggest doubt about the attacks? This is beneath you, BBC.

    The BBC’s live blog has received criticism for noting: ‘Before the match, there was trouble between Maccabi fans and pro-Palestinian protestors.’ It also highlighted as a main bullet point that: ‘Maccabi supporters attacked a taxi and set a Palestinian flag on fire. There are also reports of supporters chanting racist slogans about Arabs.’ However none of the other main bullets actively condemned the attacks on Israeli fans. How very curious…

    For its part, a BBC spokesperson told Mr S:

    A single short post on a live page which has been running for several hours cannot and does not represent the entirety of BBC coverage on the subject. The live page, which has been headlining throughout on Israeli fans being attacked, includes detailed reports of these incidents, with some posts based on single-source testimony, for example one from a Maccabi fan who describes being attacked. The BBC’s job is to report this story impartially, taking in all the context and testimony – this includes looking at user-generated content to build a full picture of how the events unfolded.

    Meanwhile another reader simply took to the platform to write about the BBC: ‘I have truly lost all faith in your veracity as an unbiased news outlet.’ Oh dear. The Beeb lost half a million licence fee payers over the last year – how many more will desert it now?

    Steerpike
    WRITTEN BY
    Steerpike
    Steerpike is The Spectator's gossip columnist, serving up the latest tittle tattle from Westminster and beyond. Email tips to steerpike@spectator.co.uk or message @MrSteerpike

  111. From Coffee House, the Spectator

    Poor old Bruce Springsteen. The legendary rocker bet the farm on an endorsement of Kamala Harris and may well have alienated about half his audience as a result. The ‘Boss’ who had built his career on empathising with the hard-grafting, blue-collar, Bud-swilling ‘deplorables’ with his anthems of white working-class alienation, recorded a folksy recommendation from the counter of a (real or staged – who knows?) diner. ‘Freedom, social justice, equal opportunity, the right to love who you want’ are on the ballot, pleaded Springsteen, adding that Trump’s ‘disdain for the constitution’ should disqualify him from office.

    Harrison Ford followed suit in two ads run just before polling day. The Star Wars actor summoned the force to warn us of ‘the other guy’ (Trump’s name doesn’t sully his speech) ‘…embracing dictators and tyrants around the world’. ‘For goodness sake, don’t do this again’, pleaded Ford, advice that he might have been better taking himself when he was mulling over whether to make that fifth Indiana Jones film.

    At best such endorsements seem to have had a negligible effect and at worst may even have hurt Kamala’s chances

    A tearful Jennifer Lopez outraged at a comedian’s (not Trump’s) joke about her beloved Puerto Rico (she was born in New York) emoted about how ‘we should be emotional. We should be upset. We should be scared and outraged. We should – our pain matters. We matter. You matter. Your voice and your vote matters’. Lady Gaga who implored us to ‘vote like your life depends on it, or your children’s lives depend on it, because they do’ in 2020 was prominent again this time performing in swing state rallies for the Democrat candidate.

    Then, of course, there was Oprah Winfrey, who seems to exists on her own super-terrestrial plane of celebrity these days, a sort of deity who appears now and again in outfits not of this world, to make vital interventions and save us all from our human follies. Oprah swooped to Kamala’s aid a couple of times, most recently to warn Americans that if Trump wins ‘it is entirely possible that we will not have the opportunity to ever cast a ballot again’. (How so? – not explained)

    The list goes on and on and is glittering and impressively multi-generational: Di Caprio, Clooney, Billie Eilish, Lizzo, Eminem, Beyonce, Usher, Pink, Olivia Rodrigo, and Madonna all weighed in for Kamala. And most importantly of all perhaps, the holy grail of celebrity imprimatur was secured last month with the ‘perfect and powerful…exquisite…flawless’ (according to MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnel) written endorsement of stadium galactico and ‘childless cat lady’ (her words) Taylor Swift.

    Kamala had so much celebrity glitter thrown over her that she seemed to exist inside a kind of just shuffled glittery snow globe. A whole posse of top billing female actresses (Roberts, Witherspoon, Cher) moved by her defence of ‘female reproductive freedom’ (also known as abortion) flanked their heroine like outriders on her righteous progress to the White House. Meanwhile, Trump had Kid Rock and Hulk Hogan.

    It was extreme, but it is in the tradition of US politics. Celebrity endorsements have been a part of political campaigning in the US at least as far back as the 1920s when the singer Al Jolson endorsed Warren Harding but became much more important in the age of television. Frank Sinatra’s serenading of JFK with the Democrat theme song ‘High Hopes’ was a famous example. Since then, there have been some weird match ups, like Elvis appearing to back Nixon, Muhammad Ali supporting Ronald Reagan or Chuck Norris endorsing George W Bush.

    But has there ever been any evidence that this hobnobbing has worked? Maybe, a little, but the calculations are difficult. Oprah Winfrey is credited with boosting Barack Obama’s chances in the Democratic primary of 2007/8 against Hilary Clinton, helping him win over 1 million votes (the so-called ‘Oprah effect’). And Taylor Swift’s endorsement of Kamala Harris is believed to have led to 400,000 engagements with the US government voter registration website.

    But it is difficult to gauge how many of those Swiftie clicks led to actual registrations or votes, and impossible to know how many voters were influenced the other way – perhaps irritated enough by a smug celebrity’s arrogant or hectoring appeal to push them to vote for his or her opponent (what you might call the Eddie Izzard effect). A recent UK example of a failed celeb intervention is David Tennant’s trashing of Kemi Badenoch, which doesn’t seem to have done the new Tory leader any harm at all.

    The US election suggests it may be time to call time on celebrity endorsements. At best they seem to have had a negligible effect and at worst may even have hurt Kamala’s chances. The assumption that people are dumb enough to be swayed by the recommendations of the super-rich and famous, whose everyday concerns (the colour of their new Lamborghini perhaps, or choice of suite at the Four Seasons) are beyond the most fantastical imaginings of the vast majority of their fans, seems increasingly implausible. For many it may be just a case of ‘who cares?’

    This may come as highly unpleasant news to those celebs, who have to face to up to, not just a Trump presidency, but the awful realisation that they are neither as important, or as loved, as they think they are. Poor things.

    To paraphrase JK Rowling’s perfect riposte to David Tennant: our thoughts and prayers are with the showbiz elite at this difficult time.

    Philip Patrick
    WRITTEN BY
    Philip Patrick
    Philip Patrick is an exiled Scot, who lectures at a Tokyo university and contributes to the Japan Time

    1. Lopez is funny because she goes on about Puerto Rico but wouldn't live there. These rich celebrities live in safe, secure areas where accountants manage their taxes to keep them as rich as possible, safe from the drugs, violence and struggles of others.

      Of course they don't want to change that.

        1. In California, and even in LA, the elites live in safe compounds/neighbourhoods.

          President Trump wouldn't, but I would:
          Place thousands of gimmegrants in those wealthy enclaves.

          Put camps where the Left live, and fill them with young males, no families, nobody over 40, just those most likely to mug and assault the locals, particularly the women

          Make their menfolk defend them

          1. Rather gloomy picture. My son and his family live in LA, I spend time there and in general the neighbourhoods seem safe. There are lots of people from different countries, very multilingual. Spanish of course is spoken as much as English. It’s a great place but don’t bother going downtown where you simply rub shoulders with the homeless. ( My impression mainly maimed service veterans abandoned by the state and living as best they can. Despised by Californians as people who refuse to work but very often people maimed in wars).

          2. But, do you and they venture out much; outside the hours 9-5?

            It's many years since I was there, but even then one had to be very careful later in the evening.

    2. The daft bint Kamala Harris and her advisors blew a billion dollars on payments to celebrity endorsements. Most of the fuckers never performed but were used as bait to attract a large science to an otherwise paltry attendance at her fake rallies.

      Meanwhile Trump’s rallies attracted millions of patriotic Americans. Trump had no need to employ celebrities to encourage supporting crowds. Trump’s supporters were genuine patriots sick of the Disneyfication of American political influence.

  113. President Trump could do a lot worse than get his team to look at all cases of lawfare against Democrat people and give Presidential pardons to end them. Then his team should announce that America is moving forward together to MAGA.

    The leftwaffe warfare Democrats would have the ground swept from under them.

      1. Phase two.
        Phase one is reuniting Americans on common ground, so that he has the mandate so to do..

  114. From Coffee House, the Spectator

    Everybody’s lost but me,’ mutters a teenage Indiana Jones emerging from a cave in the middle of the desert to find that the boy scouts with whom he arrived have now disappeared without trace. Spain’s left-wing prime minister might be excused for thinking much the same. Relentlessly upbeat about the benefits of immigration, Pedro Sánchez now finds himself more or less alone in the European Union. And just when he was hoping that fellow progressive Kamala Harris would win the US election, he finds instead that he’s going to have to contend with Donald Trump.

    ‘We will work on our strategic bilateral relations and a strong transatlantic partnership,’ Sánchez said, presumably between gritted teeth, in his message of congratulation. It was left to his deputy prime minister Yolanda Díaz to say what he couldn’t: ‘Trump’s victory is bad news for everyone who understands politics as the means to improve lives rather than poison them with hate and misinformation.’

    For some, Trump’s victory shows how ineffective the fight against fascism has been

    And it’s not just the politicians. I haven’t seen the centre-left El País, one of Spain’s leading national dailies and the progressive newspaper of record, in such paroxysms of fury since Britain had the temerity to vote for Brexit. Trump is going to hand power to a cohort of ‘paranoid racists’ thundered the editorial. ‘Trump has won by promoting vengeance, rancour, lies, hatred, insult and confrontation,’ railed one columnist. ‘The most powerful country in the world has just voted in the most capricious, false, unpredictable and amoral character ever to appear on the political stage of an advanced democracy,’ wailed another. For others, the victory of this ‘racist buffoon’ was a victory ‘for the beast that lies inside us all’.

    It seems that for Spain’s self-styled progressives Trump’s latest victory is all part of ‘the rapid advance of extremism in the Western world… The first major warning was Brexit in 2016, followed by Trump’s victory the same year, and then …. Meloni in Italy, Wilders in the Netherlands … Bolsonaro in Brazil and Milei in Argentina.’ Trump’s victory confirms ‘the exultation of xenophobia and the erosion of democracy’.

    But explaining Trump’s victory is much trickier than denouncing it. Trump won, ventured one El País columnist, because he appealed to the ignorant and the poorly educated who believed his talk of ‘a swarm of uncontrolled immigrants made up of criminals, rapists, and murderers who eat decent citizens’ pets’. Or perhaps Harris lost for the same reason that Hillary Clinton did: because the country is not yet ready to elect a woman. La Sexta, a left-leaning free-to-air television channel, announced that it all goes to show that ‘lies win elections’. (It doesn’t seem to have occurred to anyone that rational voters might simply have compared Trump’s previous administration with these last four years of Democrat presidency and decided that on balance they preferred the former.)

    For Spain’s left-wingers, the ‘nightmare’ into which the world will now be plunged does however have some upsides. One member of Sánchez’s government is reported to have suggested that another Trump administration will finally bring home to people the real and powerful dangers of a far-right government. Another insisted that Trump’s victory will ‘be a spur to the progressive world to do better’. Above all, government sources declared, ‘It’s time for Europe to move towards full political union. Europe needs to be strengthened, and Trump’s victory will spur us on to that end’.

    But some politicians didn’t need to hunt for silver linings. Reacting with undisguised joy, Santiago Abascal, the leader of Vox, Spain’s most right-wing party, highlighted ‘the importance of the Hispanic vote in this victory for the free world’ and announced that ‘now is the hour of patriots. Now is the hour of freedom’.

    But at the opposite end of the political spectrum, for Podemos, the party which is currently making its continued support for Sánchez conditional on the severance of ‘commercial and diplomatic relations with the genocidal state of Israel’, Trump’s victory shows how ineffective the fight against fascism has been. On that theme, the day before the election, under a photograph of Trump with his arm aloft, apparently in Nazi salute, El País ran an article comparing Trump’s views to those of the Nazis.

    ‘Nazis,’ says the grown-up Indiana Jones, peering into a room full of Hitler’s henchmen, ‘I hate these guys.’

    WRITTEN BY
    Jim Lawley
    Jim Lawley is a former university lecturer who has lived and worked in Spain for 40 years.

  115. I spoke too soon when I told Elsie that the bangs and fireworks had stopped. El Alamein is now being recreated and the house is rocking as explosions break overhead! Even I am flinching at times, despite having music on. Kadi, wearing his huggie, has taken himself to bed. Hopefully he'll be calmer there. He's been sprayed with Pet Remedy to calm him down. Roll on the end of Bonfire Night Week.

    1. Similar here. Be the same Saturday, Sunday. Me. I remember: one night, Roman Candles, Katherine Wheel, a few bangers, the bonfire (potatoes and different bangers), and the guy. And my dad skulking around in full kit including red beret, people saying 'who is that?'

      1. We were reminiscing about bonfire nights gone by on Wednesday. Catherine wheels that came off the pin and whirled around, penny bangers being thrown around, Jumping Jacks that seemed to follow you everywhere …

        2. I thought they were pretty good…we spent quite a bit of time collecting wood for it, but weren’t allowed to build it and certainly not light it. Knew everyone there, when communities were small, I liked it. Remember the bangers/jumping jacks, and especially jokes about Katherine wheels……:-D

    2. It has been very quiet here this bonfire season. Two distant muffled bangs about 15 minutes apart the week before the 5th, nothing on the Saturday 'party' night and only a little volley of bangs about 9.30 pm that were a little distance away on the 5 November itself. I went out into the garden with Rico about 8.00 pm and it was so quiet, it was like Christmas Eve. No sound, only my tinnitus to disturb the peace. Our son in Biggleswade also said it had been very quiet this year. What is going on, I wonder?!

      1. They’ve all decided to come up to Shropshire! There were more bangs – not quite so loud or sustained, thankfully – again tonight. Kadi is now quaking in his paws, despite the lull. He isn’t panting quite as hard now (he sounded like a steam train before) but still sounds distressed. I shall be putting some music on in a minute. I do wonder if he associates my listening to music with distress – I rarely listen otherwise.

        1. Yes, we heard some tonight, only 20 seconds or so in the distance just before coming in from the garden. Rico gave it a good yapping. Poor Kadi, it is so distressing to see your dog upset. I suppose it is with the 5th Nov being almost mid-week, parties at either weekend. Hopefully this will be the last.

          1. He’s settled down and is asleep next to me now. I hope that tomorrow will be the very last (until New Year).

  117. Some of the news reports about drug criminals are beyond bizarre.
    In the port of Algeciras, Spain, a record THIRTEEN TONNES of white powder was recently discovered in a shipping container that had arrived from Ecuador. Subsequently, a Spanish police officer and his wife were arrested and in a search of their home at Alcala de Henares, near Madrid, around 20 million euros was discovered hidden in cavity walls etc. Wads of banknotes sealed in green plastic.
    The accused was head of the economic crimes unit. Senor Oscar Sanchez hedged his bets by keeping another million euros in his office at the Police station.
    (all on Youtube)

  118. A thought has occurred to me. The Reiver might quite like a trade deal with the USA. That would mean cheap-as-chips hormone-laden beef and chlorinated chicken for the poor plebs – and bankruptcy for UK farmers. "Sieze the moment! Sieze their land!" might be the cry in 11 Downing Street this weekend.

    On the other hand, I should perhaps have avoided Any Questions on Radio 4 and then I wouldn't have heard Kim Darroch reminding us of that threat from the past. Yes, that Darroch, hung out to dry by Bonjo in 2019 just before he became PM.

    1. That he has a Trump/Vance sign in the garden supports the hypothesis he's a Trump supporter who was expecting to have to demonstrate about the result, I would have thought.

      1. Or, that Matt thinks the core of Republican voters are NRA rednecks. That is a baseball bat he’s tapping.

  120. OK.
    My proof is that the societies of the far east, the middle east, Egypt, the South Americas, Europe moved beyond hand to mouth existence.
    They all grew, prospered, developed and produced innovation.

    EVERY single hunter gatherer society that stayed that way didn’t progress beyond tribalism.

    AND, you show me a single country/society that didn’t eat vegetables/pulse that developed beyond hunters.

    I accept that many modern foods are not good for us, but please don’t try to tell us that without that mixed diet, that humans would have achieved a fraction of what they have.

  121. I think I'll buzz off to bed now I'm almost over my upper respiratory infection. 12 days now.
    We've recorded and been watching a film called Tamara Drewe 2010 based on Far from the Maddening Crowd.
    I can't recommend it enough Nottlers. Very rude language, but very amusing.

      2. Oh yes just taking my meds,…..typo I've only got one lense in my specs since my cataract op in late June.

        1. No criticism RE just an obvious correction.

          I was going to add that the Bathsheba Everdene surname was appropriated by the makers of the films featuring Jennifer Lawrence. I forget the names for the moment Hunger Games I think.

          I loved the books of Thomas Hardy. My favourite is The Trumpet Major. I also loved Hardy’s Ale. It came in small bottles like Red Shield and was a very strong ale.

          1. No I realised Corim, no problems.
            I also have an inventive type and spell checker. That sort of thing happens often. And I’m waiting rather a long time for my second cataract removal.
            When I belonged to a share club a few years ago we use to pop off and stay over for a weekend now and again to towns with decent Brewery’s.
            The one in Dorset had a cheque for payment in its memorabilia display.
            From Thomas Hardy.

          2. The Brewery was Eldridge Pope. I surveyed part of it a decade ago for a Carluccio’s unit. Fabulous polychromatic brickwork. Such a shame to lose the Brewery.

          5. I remember one ale being poured gently but can’t remember that it was.

            Geoff was from the west country and surveyed Pubs and other licenced premises.

  123. My daughter is back for the evening, and our tradition is to watch trash TV together. Death in Paradise, Hustle, Shakespeare and Hathaway etc. We started on Ludwig (I know). Well 10 minutes in, I said: that’s the house on Ham Farm Road. And now, a house on Dickens Close. I could literally throw a stone there from where I sitting. When Jasper was alive, it was his afternoon hobble. They do a lot of filming round here, but never tell you which programmes.

      1. Yes. You never tire of it. We had four cows in the meadow this year, from http://tomstrust.co.uk/tomsFarm.html

        Don’t get me started on the National Trust and Petersham Meadow!

        Edit: “Tom ap Rhys Pryce was robbed and killed on 12 January 2006 as he walked home from Kensal Green underground station. He was a 31 year old qualified lawyer who worked for Linklaters LLP. He was engaged to be married in September of that year. Tom's parents, his fiancée and Linklaters LLP established a registered charity (in the form of a trust) in memory of Tom. Tom was a beneficiary of educational funding for which he was always grateful.”

        (ap Rhys Pryce is a tautology, Shirley?)

        1. Spent an awful lot of time lure fishing that part of the Thames as well as drinking in the pubs on the hill, Duke's Head, The Marlborough and Roebuck. The Roebuck is the one with this view, but not the best pub.

    2. I kid you not. They are using the house our Jasper very occasionally went to when we had to use a dog walker.

      1. It could have been really good but it was spoiled for me by the lighting – very dark – and the sound – quite muffled.

        Yes, I know it's fashionable, but not for me.

        1. Hmmm… I do know what you mean but I didnt find it that bad – plus I have a secret crush on Anna Maxwell-Martin…..

      2. I like doing sudokus.

        Here is a site which gives you a limitless number of free puzzles at 4 different levels: Easy, Medium, Hard and Diabolical. You can either do them on your computer or print them.

        I don't bother with the Easy and the Medium so I stick with the Hard ones which are doable – however the Diabolical ones require too much hypothesis and notes.

        http://www.websudoku.com/

        1. Thanks for that Rastus, I like Sudokus as well – I do all the Times puzzles but it’s the crosswords that are my favourites, my wife prefers the sudokus so I’ll pass on the link!

  127. Goodnight, all. Kadi is back downstairs and asleep – I'll have to wake him up to go to bed! The bangs, thankfully, have stopped.

  130. Pogroms have returned to Europe, and the 'anti-racist' Left are silent

    Chilling scenes in Amsterdam remind us of an ancient evil

    Brendan O'Neill • 8th November 2024 • 2:11pm GMT

    "Globalise the intifada!", radicals cried on the streets of Europe this past year. And last night it happened: the intifada was globalised. Jews in Europe were hunted down, humiliated and beaten.

    The scenes from Amsterdam are horrendous. The echoes of past catastrophes are hard to ignore. Israeli fans of the Maccabi Tel Aviv football team were chased through the streets and assaulted. Some reportedly leapt into canals or took refuge in hotels to escape the blows of their persecutors.

    "Free Palestine!", the mob thundered. "Now you know how it feels", some screamed as they put the boot into the visiting Jews. They had clearly anointed themselves as Gaza's vengeance with a duty to visit violent "justice" on these Israeli citizens.

    It started as football clashes often do – with offensive chanting and scuffles here and there. The Maccabi Tel Aviv fans had come from Israel to watch their team play a Europa League match against the Dutch side Ajax.

    Tensions ran high. Footage on social media seems to show Maccabi fans gathering in Dam Square and elsewhere in the city where they chanted "F**k Palestine" and tore down some of the Palestine flags that are now omnipresent in Europe's capitals.

    But after the game, things took a very dark turn. What had been a pretty typical skirmish between fans morphed into something more like a mini-pogrom. There were "completely unacceptable anti-Semitic attacks on Israelis", said the Dutch Prime Minister Dick Schoof. The Israeli media is referring to it as a "Jew hunt".

    The mob filmed their abuse and shared it online. They demanded to see their victims' passports to check if they were Israelis and thus deserving of a vicious kicking. There are chilling clips of Israelis seemingly knocked unconscious. Some can be heard pleading for the mob's mercy.

    "This is nothing like Amsterdam", said the city's mayor Femke Halsema. "I'm very ashamed of the behaviour that was shown last night."

    We should all be. This bloody taunting of Israelis, this collective punishment of visiting Jews, shames all of Europe. It makes a mockery of our postwar promise to protect Jews from the hellish hatreds of the mob.

    It is reported that some of the assailants were of Arab origin and perhaps were recent immigrants. That remains to be seen. But if it is true, then this horrific event also raises questions about Europe's immigration policies and our crisis of integration.

    Do we really want to throw open the doors to migrants who, in Kemi Badenoch's words a few weeks ago, "hate Israel"? "That sentiment has no place here", said Badenoch. I suspect many Dutch politicians will be thinking similarly this morning.

    Some will try to write off the Amsterdam horror as a one-off. A regrettable anomaly. Nothing to do with the anti-Israel protests that have taken place across Europe every weekend since Hamas attacked Israel on 7 October last year.

    I'm not buying it. I think the violence in Amsterdam is grim confirmation that a continent on which it becomes fashionable to view the Jewish nation as the most evil nation is a continent on which it will become acceptable to attack Jews. The Israelophobia we've seen in our cities this past year has been unhinged.

    It has crossed the line, time and again, from criticism of Israel into frothing bigotry against Israelis. From peacenik opposition to Israel's war on Hamas to an ugly, wild-eyed view of Israel as a uniquely barbarous nation, more wicked and deceitful than all the others.

    Serious commentators have described Israel as a nation in the grip of "genocidal mania".

    Posters of the Israelis kidnapped on 7 October have been clawed down in virtually every city, because apparently even the innocent citizens of Israel are suspect, "problematic", undeserving of our sympathy.

    Israeli culture and wares are feverishly boycotted by the pseudo-virtuous of our chattering classes. They meticulously forcefield their entire lives from the output of this most unholy nation like medieval mystics praying to keep the devil at bay.

    The impression given by this army of "pro-Palestine" influencers is that Israel is a fallen nation. And its people are under the spell of "savagery". And everything it produces is morally compromised, if not morally poisonous, and thus you must boycott, avoid, destroy.

    That some in Europe have taken this polite-society bigotry one step further and physically attacked the citizens of this supposedly diseased nation is shocking, but not surprising.

    Israel-hate is a la mode in intellectual circles across Europe. That mob in Amsterdam was its armed wing.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/11/08/pogrom-amsterdam-football-fans-violence-jews

    1. I don't like the term Israelophobia. Let's call it what it is – it is hatred of Jews. It is the canary in the coalmine, to coin a cliche, and it is an urgent warning of the hell towards which we are allowing our new, uninvited masters to pull us down to in a designer handcart.

      “Facilis descensus Averno:
      Noctes atque dies patet atri ianua Ditis;
      Sed revocare gradium superasque evadere ad auras,
      Hoc opus, hic labor est.
      (The gates of Hell are open night and day;
      Smooth the descent, and easy is the way:
      But to return, and view the cheerful skies,
      In this task and mighty labor lies.)”
      ― Virgil, The Aeneid

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