Sunday 25 July: Herd immunity is precisely what widespread vaccination is bringing

Posted on by Geoff Graham

An unofficial place to discuss the Telegraph letters, established when the DT website turned off its comments facility (now reinstated, but not as good as ours),
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Today’s letters (visible only to DT subscribers) are here:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2021/07/24/letters-herd-immunity-precisely-widespread-vaccination-bringing/

463 thoughts on “Sunday 25 July: Herd immunity is precisely what widespread vaccination is bringing”

  1. Good morning all.

    Is anybody else already fed up with the BBC’s saturation coverage of the Olympics?

          1. I had a tranny once.
            A tiny battery radio with truly the worlds worst sound. But it was pocket-sized, and I was eight, so I loved it.

          6. I’ve had a couple of Trannies. 1st was an old Mk.1 diesel with the old Fordson tractor engine in it and the 2nd was a ’68 Caravanette.
            Then a Mk.2 and an early Mk.3.

      2. Neither do I, but a lot of regular programmes have been displaced, e.g. Antiques Roadshow tonight.

    2. Good Morning & Happy Sunday Peter, first up I am not watching the Olympics, second I no longer get the BBC Propaganda Network on my cable TV subscription, thirdly despite the intense coverage that the BBC will be giving the current Tokyo Olympics they are on record for having intensely covered with more staff & resources two other historical events than even the comrade Blair London Olympics – the funeral of their beloved hero the evil mass murdering terrorist Yasser Arafat & the funeral of the other scumbag Black Communist terrorist Nelson Mandela. With the Beeb its a matter of priority & hero worshiping the evil deities of the Left will always get more time, staff & resources allocated to it than sports.

      1. Morning, Elfin.
        18C here in darkest Norway, 27 excepcted, and a max of 16 on Tuesday. About to go building roof extension to Firstborn’s barn (this is what’s called “vacation”), but as far as I can see, the BBC on a channel called “BBC Brit” that we can get, shows endless episodes, back-to-back, of Pointless and QI. So, we call it BBC Pointless. Most appropriate.

        1. Here in Israel the BBC has been unavailable for about 5 years, we used to get the BBC World News channel ( 100% propaganda 24/7 ) & a channel called BBC Prime which was a mixture of endless repeats of all the mostly documentary or unfunny woke multi-racial programmes that the BBC could not sell as complete series

    3. I haven’t watched any of it. Olympic athletes annoy me. I have never understood why we pay people to do something that benefits no-one but themselves.

      1. GM & Happy Sunday Minty, IMO sports like the Olympics are just a form of organized tribal warfare that nations promote to keep the peasants happy for a while & keep their attention off of important matters at home.

    4. Not remotely interested, radio and tv firmly off. YouTube much more entertaining.

  4. Sydney police fine hundreds of anti-lockdown protesters for ‘filthy, risky behaviour’. 25 July 2021.

    Australian prime minister Scott Morrison said on Sunday the previous day’s protests – in which thousands breached the region’s coronavirus measures to protest – were “selfish and self-defeating”, adding: “It achieves no purpose. It won’t end the lockdown sooner.”

    The New South Wales premier, Gladys Berejiklian, said was “utterly disgusted” by the scenes, saying: “It just broke my heart that people had such a disregard for their fellow citizens.”

    In France, police deployed teargas and water cannon against some protesters, after an estimated 160,000 took to the streets in nationwide protests against President Emmanuel Macron’s health pass that will drastically curtail access to restaurants and public spaces for unvaccinated people.

    Western Governments are becoming explicitly hostile to their own people! They no longer see them as citizens but slaves here to obey the dictates of their Political Masters!

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jul/25/covid-sydney-police-punish-anti-lockdown-protesters

    1. The language being used is becoming very strong.
      Can’t believe anyone is so blind they can’t see what’s happening.

  5. ‘Morning All

    Untold Billions for Foreign Aid,untold Billions to support Illegal Gimmegrants……….

    “Pensioners could lose the triple lock next year amid mounting concern in

    Government over the “unfairness” of hiking taxes on young people to pay

    for Boris Johnson’s £10 billion social care reforms….”

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2021/07/24/pensions-triple-lock-could-suspended-amid-concern-fairness-young/

    Good BTL

    The
    State Pension is among the lowest in the West at around £650 pm if you
    have paid in for 35 years. Compare to the US monthly amount at c.
    $2900.

    “Unfairness” is using the retired and
    vulnerable as an easy target until election time when, like May,
    millions will remember who NOT to vote for.”
    Uk pensions are by far the most meagre of any first world country the tax take is about the highest its ever been what the hell are they doing with the money??
    Oh i forgot Public sector gold plated pensions likd Bercow’s 35,000 a year…….

    1. GM & happy Sunday Rik, top priority for the Globalists is paying billions of White taxpayers cash to 3rd world despots so they can create wars & famine thereby causing millions of their low IQ unskilled & violent citizens to flee to the West and take over Western democracies so that the Globalists can get richer & impose dictatorial rule in the West once law & order completely breaks down under the weight of 3rd world immigrants.

    2. Doesn’t work – they don’t care. Brown stole our pensions, Cameron kept them down and didn’t remove the theft. For over a decade taxes kept going up and up and up. Our military veterans are ignored and hounded by tax supported scum. The pension won’t change, welfare keeps increasing, there are more gimmigrants than ever before none of whom deserve a penny.

      Someone who never works a day in their lives gets the same as someone who has worked 50 hours weeks all their life. It’s wrong.

  6. Good morning, all

    The Grimes being as cheerful as always

    Think you melted last week? Prepare for 40C Britain

    1. GM & Happy Sunday Citroen1, prepare for 40’C Britain, IQ level 40 Britain & Britain 40 BC as the invaders of the south coast slowly strangle the UK.

    2. Is that more climate woo woo?
      Remember in 2003 which was a very hot summer, they told us that soon we would be regarding that as a cool summer.

  8. SIR – As a teenager, I watched the Berlin Wall come down amid scenes of jubilation and I wondered about the people in East Berlin who had watched it being built all those years before. Why had they not run for their lives – and freedom – while they could? Now I know why. A mixture of denial, self-delusion and personal responsibilities.

    Is the Covid pass and its sinister implications for freedom Britain’s Berlin Wall? If I fail to leave now, will my child face a future of government monitoring, digital tracking and a Chinese-style social-credit system?

    Alexandra Seear
    Derry Hill, Wiltshire

  10. SIR – The Government needs to start being honest and treat the European Union as a threat, not as a partner.

    The EU’s claims that the Northern Ireland Protocol cannot be adjusted are hogwash. Having put together international deals, I know that adjustments are undertaken all the time when unworkable consequences that were not apparent are discovered.

    The fact is that the EU is still smarting over Brexit and is determined to keep the United Kingdom in its thrall by using the European courts and badly structured trade deals at every juncture.

    Major Mike McKone (rtd)
    Kirkby Stephen, Cumbria

    1. SIR – Of the difficulty being caused by the Northern Ireland Protocol, the EU keeps saying: “It’s in the agreement”.

      So is Article 16. If the Government opts to trigger it, the EU, Labour and the SNP will, I assume, say: “That’s OK, it’s in the agreement.”

      Alastair Muir
      Bearsden, Dunbartonshire

  11. Here comes more control with goodies thrown in if you behave – well, at the start but the inducements wouldn’t last long beyond mass take-up – from our ‘control freak’ PM.
    IMO Claire Fox misses the point re the social and economic problems that require curing: the only way the ‘freak’ will be able to get these dictatorial powers into the mainstream is to break society in the first place. He has no intention of mending society but intends to “Build Back Better” (the most seriously worrying and devious alliteration ever). So, first, he will have to destroy what already exists and the ‘freak has started that with his lockdowns and with threats of more to come. This man is a real menace to this Country and its people, time for real Conservatives (a rare breed) to stand up and depose this very dangerous ‘freak’.

    https://twitter.com/Fox_Claire/status/1418965552673042438

    2. Again, it will beccome a two tier system.

      Those decent, honest and obedient will be penalised with oppressive, abusive controls and the wasters, the ones who litter, steal, assault, smoke, shop lift, burgle, rape and murder living on welfare won’t bother, nor be bothered by this nonsense.

      The sheer stupidity of ‘build back better – nothing needs building, and government never makes anything better – is by radical tax cuts and bulldozing 95% of government into the nearest landfill. We don’t need the state. The state needs us.

      1. I am not a waster – I don’t litter or steal, nor have I ever assaulted anybody (except in defence of my country). I don’t shoplift, burgle, rape nor murder, nor do I live on welfare. However, for my sins, I do smoke.

        So can I take it I belong to one of those fortunate groups who’ll not be bothered by ‘this nonsense’?

        Just wondering ….
        ;¬)

    1. From a well-known expert; Professor of the Chair of Stating the Blindingly Obvious at Bog Standard University.

    2. You have to ask – why? They’ve robbed us of our money, which they gave back to us. There’s not some black hole except where big fat state has spent more than we can raise.

    1. There’s room for at least two more posters on that fence. I do hate to see a job only half done.

    1. BTL Comment;

      Bob of Bonsall, Matlock, United Kingdom, moments ago

      Drip, drip, drip… So our freedoms and liberties are being eroded away bringing Dystopia even closer.

    2. How to sequestrate the public’s money, then their property. “You will own nothing…”

      1. What possible reason could there be to justify it except further social control.

    4. The state wants a point where you don’t have anything and it gives you what it ‘feels is right’. An end to merit, and end to any possible earnings outside of state control – which is will destroy in taxation.

      This is why bitcoin is so important. The state can’t control it, and fears it.

      1. I can’t help thinking that Governments will find a way to stymie these independent crypto currencies and as the article suggests, create their own, which I suspect will eventually become a monopoly.

  15. Silence Anjem Choudary and he grows more dangerous. Even clowns have a right to speak

    Rod Liddle Sunday July 25 2021, 12.01am, The Sunday Times

    The sum total of possible human enjoyment was increased a little last week with the news that the radical Islamic preacher Anjem Choudary has had his speaking ban lifted. We will be able to hear his honeyed words again: “British soldiers burn in hell!” and the like. He may be on a street corner near you very soon. Enjoy.

    Choudary received a very hefty prison sentence in 2016 for inciting people to join Isis. The five-year term seemed to me, at the time, more a reflection of various imagined, or real but unproven, worries about the possible terrorist associations of the organisation of which he was a spokesman, al-Muhajiroun, than about him simply saying, “Come on, you Muslims, let’s join Isis.” The sentence worried me a little. I prefer long sentences to be given to people who do things, such as maim people, rather than say things.

    Which isn’t to say that I have a lot of time for Choudary. He strikes me as a smirking, freeloading, self-publicising, quasi-fascist moron. I remember well him saying that his ambition was to go to Syria to join Isis, because I contacted him at the time to offer to drive him to the airport and buy him a snack for the journey. Better to have the likes of Choudary finding a nice, quiet spot in the desert to blow themselves up than doing it in London or Manchester.

    Choudary responded that he would love to go, but the home secretary wouldn’t let him. Oh, Theresa May, I thought back then — you’ve got it all the wrong way round. Let them go, if they want to. Maybe even charter a plane. But don’t let them back in. God forbid, I thought, that she should ever become prime minister. It won’t end well. Call me prescient.

    Now, though, a furore has been whipped up because Choudary is free to do his cut-price I Can’t Believe It’s Not Jihad rabble-rousing again. “Keep him banned! Silence him!” politicians and columnists are fulminating. You will find, too, plenty of Muslims who accord with this view because, reasonably enough, they are embarrassed to be associated with him by the rest of us.

    Well, fair enough. But it’s still wrong. First, it elevates Choudary and gives him a kind of samizdat mystique as a victim (which that prison sentence only enhances): it increases his power. He is not an evil genius; he is a semi-literate gobshite from Welling.

    But, more importantly, in this forgotten area of the culture war we must cleave to the ideals in which we believe — and none is more important than freedom of speech and freedom of conscience. Let him speak. No good comes from the silencing of opinion, no matter how fantastically deranged it might be. It simply drives that opinion underground, where it festers and might later explode.

    Nor should we suborn the law by clobbering people who say things with which we might fervently disagree. I think that happened with Choudary. I fear it also happened with his predecessor Sheikh Abu Hamza al-Masri, the hook-handed nutjob from Finsbury Park, whom we peremptorily extradited to America, where he will die in prison. And I think it happened with Tommy Robinson: the other side of the coin.

    We should cherish those two totems of a liberal democracy: an independent judiciary separate from the polity; and freedom of speech. And yet both seem to me increasingly to have been winnowed away, or to have become vague and contingent (which is worse). First they silence Choudary and Robinson; next it’s you.

    If you doubt that, look at what happened with Blackpool council last week. It was rightly fined £109,000 for having banned adverts for an appearance by the evangelical preacher Franklin Graham. LGBT activists bombarded the council with objections, and the council — taking the easy route — caved in. Ads banned, even though there was nothing remotely homophobic about them.

    It was a clear suppression of freedom of speech instigated by people who simply did not like what Graham might have to say (hell, they should hear old Anjem on the issue). The court hammered the council, saying it had breached the Human Rights Act and conducted itself in a way antithetical to how a local authority should behave.

    But you can see why Blackpool did it. Freedom of speech is much less important today than the risk of offending someone. That is dangerous. Just as it is more dangerous to silence Choudary than to let him speak — and morally wrong to boot. Je suis Anjem. (Well, kind of, up to a point.)

    •*Dogs know when you are lying, according to a team of researchers who have spent several months lying to dogs and seeing how they react. Probably asking questions like “Did you know cats invented electricity?” and “Were you aware that bees travel faster than the speed of light?” and seeing their doubtful expressions.

    This ability differentiates them from the apes, human infants and Conservative voters, all of whom are supremely gullible.

    But I have my doubts about the study. I lie to my dog all the time and it doesn’t have a Scooby. I say: “Jessie, there’s a load of bacon in the garden.” She tears off, and I find her later standing on the grass in a bewildered state. Done that plenty of times and she never twigs. Why would there be bacon in the garden, you cretin?

    Vaccine passports for clubs

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/imageserver/image/%2Fmethode%2Fsundaytimes%2Fprod%2Fweb%2Fbin%2F370b55c4-ec92-11eb-ba7b-b4d4e5c44898.jpg?crop=1500%2C1000%2C0%2C0&resize=1022

    MP sticks her neck out and is spotted</u.

    For more than a decade the Labour MP Dawn Butler has entertained us with a parade of marvellous idiocies. Who can forget her bold assertion that 90 per cent of giraffes are homosexual? Or that all babies are born with “no sex”?

    Then there was the time she claimed Barack Obama had written her an endorsement — when it was actually something knocked up by her office.

    Now, for possibly the first time, she has spoken with clarity, insight and accuracy in asserting Boris Johnson has lied to the British people. And for this she is frogmarched out of the House of Commons. There’s the lesson, Dawn. Stick to calling giraffes gay and you won’t get into trouble.

    Spain is left with totalitarian recall

    Spain’s Socialist government is making it a crime for people to say nice things about General Franco, the somewhat robust chap who led the perpetually fissiparous country for 40 years. It will also be against the law for Spaniards to opine that they’re glad the Communists lost the civil war.

    These laws are being overseen by Félix Bolaños, the minister for democratic memory. You can have a memory in Spain only if it is democratic, and Félix will decide what is democratic and what is not. I wonder if it will be illegal to suggest — as many have — that the 1936 election that ushered the Commies into power was rigged.

    Totalitarianism comes in many forms. Sometimes it’s a pompous-looking, stiff-necked bloke in a military uniform. And then sometimes it’s a nice bespectacled young former law student, like Félix.

    ***************************************************************

    Fountainhead

    6 HOURS AGO
    Superb on freedom of speech. But there is an irony here. When you say that the problem is freedom of speech being less important than the possibility of offending someone, you do it in a paper that practices just such a myopic mendacious code in its editing of these comment boards. Even this post, agreeing with what you have written as a Sunday Times columnist will be taken down as having offended ‘Community Guidelines’. Frequently on topics regarding hot topics such as race, most of the most recommended comments on these boards have been taken down. This paper has almost become an example of which we used to read about in Randian or Orwellian dystopias and think, “but that could never happen here”. Well, it is happening, Rod, on this paper, right now.

    Michael Patterson

    6 HOURS AGO
    Sentencing Anjem Choudary in 2016 the judge said: “The jury were sure that you knowingly crossed the line between the legitimate expression of your own views and the criminal act of inviting support for an organisation [Isis] which was at the time engaged in appalling acts of terrorism.” He continued that Choudary had “encouraged your audience … to believe that no one who failed to support the caliphate established by Isis could be a true Muslim”.

    It’s not just a question of free speech, Rod. It’s a question of using his right of free speech to exhort others to commit acts of terrorism, and the evidence is that he was successful in so doing. Liberal societies have a duty to defend themselves against those who would exploit the very concept of free speech to incite others to destroy our freedom and democracy.

      1. From the archives:

        Matthew d’Ancona in the DT in February 2006 (after the Danish cartoon ‘controversy’).

        “The allure of Islamism…owes much to its confidence. And that confidence has been bolstered during the past week. On Monday’s Newsnight, Anjem Choudary of al-Ghuraba – the group that organised Friday’s rally – showed in a series of furious outbursts how empowered extremists feel by the impunity they have enjoyed. To make clear what he thinks of the British, he said: ‘If I go to the jungle, I am not going to live like the animals. I’m going to propagate what I believe to be a superior way of life.’ In response to Jeremy Paxman’s point that he might be happier in a country where sharia law was in place, Mr Choudary raged: ‘Who said to you that you own Britain, anyway? Britain belongs to Allah.’ At such moments, the nation needs Paxman, and he did not disappoint. ‘We’re moving on, matey,’ was his verdict on Mr Choudary’s nonsense – and the right one, too. It lifted the spirits…”

        1. They all need a smack. While they might be invading and breeding like rabbits, Islam survives because the state acts as an enforcer for it.

          Get rid of that aegis and the profet Mo will find himself mocked, and any whinging retaliation will see a short visit to the barbers.

    2. Mr Patterson has forgotten that the fundamental principle of freedom is that people will do and say things with which you will disagree. His right to speak should have been allowed.

      You cannot have the monster live beside you, feed it and expect it will not eat you one day. By suppressing freedoms you create the very society so many fought so long to create.

  16. Silence Anjem Choudary and he grows more dangerous. Even clowns have a right to speak

    Rod Liddle Sunday July 25 2021, 12.01am, The Sunday Times

    The sum total of possible human enjoyment was increased a little last week with the news that the radical Islamic preacher Anjem Choudary has had his speaking ban lifted. We will be able to hear his honeyed words again: “British soldiers burn in hell!” and the like. He may be on a street corner near you very soon. Enjoy.

    Choudary received a very hefty prison sentence in 2016 for inciting people to join Isis. The five-year term seemed to me, at the time, more a reflection of various imagined, or real but unproven, worries about the possible terrorist associations of the organisation of which he was a spokesman, al-Muhajiroun, than about him simply saying, “Come on, you Muslims, let’s join Isis.” The sentence worried me a little. I prefer long sentences to be given to people who do things, such as maim people, rather than say things.

    Which isn’t to say that I have a lot of time for Choudary. He strikes me as a smirking, freeloading, self-publicising, quasi-fascist moron. I remember well him saying that his ambition was to go to Syria to join Isis, because I contacted him at the time to offer to drive him to the airport and buy him a snack for the journey. Better to have the likes of Choudary finding a nice, quiet spot in the desert to blow themselves up than doing it in London or Manchester.

    Choudary responded that he would love to go, but the home secretary wouldn’t let him. Oh, Theresa May, I thought back then — you’ve got it all the wrong way round. Let them go, if they want to. Maybe even charter a plane. But don’t let them back in. God forbid, I thought, that she should ever become prime minister. It won’t end well. Call me prescient.

    Now, though, a furore has been whipped up because Choudary is free to do his cut-price I Can’t Believe It’s Not Jihad rabble-rousing again. “Keep him banned! Silence him!” politicians and columnists are fulminating. You will find, too, plenty of Muslims who accord with this view because, reasonably enough, they are embarrassed to be associated with him by the rest of us.

    Well, fair enough. But it’s still wrong. First, it elevates Choudary and gives him a kind of samizdat mystique as a victim (which that prison sentence only enhances): it increases his power. He is not an evil genius; he is a semi-literate gobshite from Welling.

    But, more importantly, in this forgotten area of the culture war we must cleave to the ideals in which we believe — and none is more important than freedom of speech and freedom of conscience. Let him speak. No good comes from the silencing of opinion, no matter how fantastically deranged it might be. It simply drives that opinion underground, where it festers and might later explode.

    Nor should we suborn the law by clobbering people who say things with which we might fervently disagree. I think that happened with Choudary. I fear it also happened with his predecessor Sheikh Abu Hamza al-Masri, the hook-handed nutjob from Finsbury Park, whom we peremptorily extradited to America, where he will die in prison. And I think it happened with Tommy Robinson: the other side of the coin.

    We should cherish those two totems of a liberal democracy: an independent judiciary separate from the polity; and freedom of speech. And yet both seem to me increasingly to have been winnowed away, or to have become vague and contingent (which is worse). First they silence Choudary and Robinson; next it’s you.

    If you doubt that, look at what happened with Blackpool council last week. It was rightly fined £109,000 for having banned adverts for an appearance by the evangelical preacher Franklin Graham. LGBT activists bombarded the council with objections, and the council — taking the easy route — caved in. Ads banned, even though there was nothing remotely homophobic about them.

    It was a clear suppression of freedom of speech instigated by people who simply did not like what Graham might have to say (hell, they should hear old Anjem on the issue). The court hammered the council, saying it had breached the Human Rights Act and conducted itself in a way antithetical to how a local authority should behave.

    But you can see why Blackpool did it. Freedom of speech is much less important today than the risk of offending someone. That is dangerous. Just as it is more dangerous to silence Choudary than to let him speak — and morally wrong to boot. Je suis Anjem. (Well, kind of, up to a point.)

    •*Dogs know when you are lying, according to a team of researchers who have spent several months lying to dogs and seeing how they react. Probably asking questions like “Did you know cats invented electricity?” and “Were you aware that bees travel faster than the speed of light?” and seeing their doubtful expressions.

    This ability differentiates them from the apes, human infants and Conservative voters, all of whom are supremely gullible.

    But I have my doubts about the study. I lie to my dog all the time and it doesn’t have a Scooby. I say: “Jessie, there’s a load of bacon in the garden.” She tears off, and I find her later standing on the grass in a bewildered state. Done that plenty of times and she never twigs. Why would there be bacon in the garden, you cretin?

    Vaccine passports for clubs

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/imageserver/image/%2Fmethode%2Fsundaytimes%2Fprod%2Fweb%2Fbin%2F370b55c4-ec92-11eb-ba7b-b4d4e5c44898.jpg?crop=1500%2C1000%2C0%2C0&resize=1022

    MP sticks her neck out and is spottedSpain is left with totalitarian recall

    Spain’s Socialist government is making it a crime for people to say nice things about General Franco, the somewhat robust chap who led the perpetually fissiparous country for 40 years. It will also be against the law for Spaniards to opine that they’re glad the Communists lost the civil war.

    These laws are being overseen by Félix Bolaños, the minister for democratic memory. You can have a memory in Spain only if it is democratic, and Félix will decide what is democratic and what is not. I wonder if it will be illegal to suggest — as many have — that the 1936 election that ushered the Commies into power was rigged.

    Totalitarianism comes in many forms. Sometimes it’s a pompous-looking, stiff-necked bloke in a military uniform. And then sometimes it’s a nice bespectacled young former law student, like Félix.

    ***************************************************************

    Fountainhead

    6 HOURS AGO
    Superb on freedom of speech. But there is an irony here. When you say that the problem is freedom of speech being less important than the possibility of offending someone, you do it in a paper that practices just such a myopic mendacious code in its editing of these comment boards. Even this post, agreeing with what you have written as a Sunday Times columnist will be taken down as having offended ‘Community Guidelines’. Frequently on topics regarding hot topics such as race, most of the most recommended comments on these boards have been taken down. This paper has almost become an example of which we used to read about in Randian or Orwellian dystopias and think, “but that could never happen here”. Well, it is happening, Rod, on this paper, right now.

    Michael Patterson

    6 HOURS AGO
    Sentencing Anjem Choudary in 2016 the judge said: “The jury were sure that you knowingly crossed the line between the legitimate expression of your own views and the criminal act of inviting support for an organisation [Isis] which was at the time engaged in appalling acts of terrorism.” He continued that Choudary had “encouraged your audience … to believe that no one who failed to support the caliphate established by Isis could be a true Muslim”.

    It’s not just a question of free speech, Rod. It’s a question of using his right of free speech to exhort others to commit acts of terrorism, and the evidence is that he was successful in so doing. Liberal societies have a duty to defend themselves against those who would exploit the very concept of free speech to incite others to destroy our freedom and democracy.

  17. New coronavirus variant under investigation in the UK
    The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control reported that there is evidence for an impact on transmissibility and on immunity.
    By TZVI JOFFRE JULY 25, 2021 https://www.jpost.com/health-science/new-coronavirus-variant-under-investigation-in-the-uk-674817

    Laboratory testing has begun on a new coronavirus variant, named B.1.621, Public Health England (PHE) announced on Friday.

    PHE reported that 16 cases of the variant have been identified in the UK so far, with the majority linked to overseas travel. The variant has been designated a variant under investigation.

    The PHE report added that there is currently no evidence that the variant causes more severe disease or affects the effectivity of the vaccine.

    According to the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC), the variant was first detected in Colombia in January. The variant has so far been detected 1,267 times in at least 27 countries, including the US, Spain, France, Mexico and the Netherlands, according to outbreak.info.
    The ECDC reported that there is evidence for an impact on transmissibility and on immunity.

    A preprint paper by researchers from Colombia which was published in May stated that an increase in frequency and fixation in a relatively short time in some cities near where there theoretically should have been herd immunity suggest an epidemiologic impact.

    The variant has five spike mutations of interest, including the E484K, R346K, N501Y, D614G and P681H mutations, according to the ECDC. The E484K and R346K mutations may help the virus avoid some kinds of antibodies, while the N501Y, P681H and D614G mutations have been associated with increased transmissibility.

    2. Ah, they’re trying to blind us with science. Must be a new booster jab on the way!

  18. 335817+up ticks,
    Morning Each,

    Sunday 25 July: Herd immunity is precisely what widespread vaccination is bringing,

    No one sound of mind will deny that in the likes of yellow fever, cholera etc,etc tested by time not so covid that seemingly to many peoples is coming across as gene manipulation.

    One should ask WHY other forms of medication ( tablet ) that I do believe could be individually controlled, were kicked into touch whilst giving the jab top billing as a “must have”

    To my mind these political overseers odious, devious, double dealing past history certainly does NOT instill confidence to the extent of allowing a jabbed medication to be administered to ones arm especially one of NO time proven history.

    As for their ( the political pro jabbers ) intentions of jabbing children that would be seen by many as being MASS abuse of children and decent peoples have surely had sufficient of that via other forms as in rotherham,rochdale etc,etc, through mass uncontrolled immigration ie lab/lib/con ongoing policies.

    1. I don’t understand why people think my getting vaccinated helps or hinders them. If I’m carrying it but vaccinated, then I can still transmit it.

      If I am not vaccinated I can still transmit it. In either case, my being vaccinated makes absolutely no difference to other people. I don’t magically pass on my antibodies to them, nor they to me.

      It is that level of frightful ignorance that infuriates me.

  21. Good Moaning.
    Hurrah: grey, sunless and rain forecast for today.
    Can life get any better!

    1. I can think of around 600 resignations that would make me feel a wee bit better.

  23. I’m no medical expert but how can vaccination bring herd immunity for a virus that mutates like the flu?
    If it brought herd immunity then one treatment would suffice.

  24. Slightly off topic.
    It was very shocking last night when we attended a medium sized open air event, ~200 people.

    We were asked for vaccine certificates and told to mask up, where it had not been the case in previous weeks. We were also informed that from next week: no certificates, no entry.
    What was particularly disturbing was that an official was later going around scanning the certificates and confirming from his ‘phone that the person in question was recorded, where they lived and apparently could tell their age. I wonder what else was recorded and what gave what appeared to be a random individual from the organisers the right to record that information on what appeared to be his own smart phone. He also spent the evening photographing those attending.
    This looks like a hacker’s and burglar’s dream.
    We are rapidly sliding down a very slippery slope.

    1. And we just know that there are thousands of people out there that would love that officials job.
      Most probably devout remainers and Trump haters as well.

      1. Oh we complained all right, and refused to let the man scan our paper certificates. Our friends had their ‘phone scanned and that’s how I knew about the details being read off.

        1. I would have taken his phone and either stamped on it or, if available, chuck it in the nearest river or pond.

          1. Not a great idea, this guy was a version of Giant Haystacks. I suspect that was why he was chosen.

    3. Nasty. I do hope that you will refuse to attend from now on, and let the organisers know why, in no uncertain terms.

      Certain people seem to love the idea of controlling and monitoring others’ behaviour – nothing to do with health, given that the vaccinated can still catch and transmit the virus.

      No wonder the government thinks it can get away with vaccine passports, when such mindsets exist.

      1. Unfortunately it’s a choice between not going out at all and acceptance. That’s the buggeration of it.

        Yesterday we had arranged to meet friends and they had already passed through.

      1. WE comply because we’re already vaccinated and have the certification.

        If the choice is comply or never to go out and about, we go out and about.

        BUT, if it was only me on my own I’d say stuff it. HG needs to see and be around people, I would make a reasonably good recluse.

  25. Nearly 60pc of women in Armed Forces have faced bullying, harassment or discrimination. 25 July 2021.

    Elsewhere, the report said that women in the military faced numerous challenges that placed them at risk of suffering “life threatening injuries”.

    They include stories of armoured plates restricting movement, oversized helmets restricting vision and servicewomen deliberately dehydrating themselves due to “limited systems” to enable them to go to the toilet.

    Bullying, harassment and discrimination have been a part of service in the British Army for four hundred years. As to “life threatening injuries” what would you expect in a fighting force? It’s not only the enemy that gets killed or wounded! All this of course is a part of the ongoing feminisation of what was once one of the worlds’ great fighting forces. No longer alas. One suspects that if it faced a supposed peer competitor that it could not sustain any prolonged Will to Combat!

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/07/25/nearly-60pc-women-armed-forces-have-faced-bullying-harassment/

    2. I wonder what the line is between “bullying” and “tough behaviour necessary for a fighting person”? Is beasting bullying? Being forceful towards a squaddie? Remember “train hard, fight easy”?
      I know it’s not nice, but then, neither is fighting, and tough training is probably all that stands between the individual soldier and a body bag when the chips are down.
      Also, you have to be able to kill or horribly maim people, often face-to-face, and studies show, that’s really hard to get people to do. Witness the screaming during bayonet training – nothing to do with frightening the enemy, but manning up before you shove a bleedin’ great knife in his guts – close up & personal, you’ll hear him grunt with pain, you’ll likely get his blood on you, you’ll smell his guts as you rip his stomach open, and you’ll leave him screaming as he bleeds to death, guts strewn over the ground.
      No wonder so many ex-squaddies are damaged when the return from operations. It’s got to be terrible.

      1. The maxim of train hard fight easy is accepted, but female soldiers also have the Ginger Rodgers factor* to contend with in having to adapt to using clothing and equipment designed for males.

        Backwards and in high heels

        1. That doesn’t help anything, unsuited clothing. It impairs the ability to move properly, never mind reducing concentration through discomfort. That is totally unreasonable, and also happens all over. IIRC, there was a story some years ago about ballistic vests and women police – the ballistic vest didn’t account for the women being built differently in the chest (forwards) and the waist (sideways), and so were less than useful.
          Some years ago, I employed a tiny Irish lass (made small to stop her taking over the world…) who didn’t fit any of the PPE we could get for her for her site work – infact, the smallest sizes were big enough on her to add to the hazards (by getting caught on things, or adding wind drag when on scaffolding, and the like). Had a real job getting her stuff that fitted, but I saw that as part of being her manager, looking after her safety when she was working. In the end, we found some in Aberdeen, got it sent through.
          I always wonder what it is that makes other managers not give a sh!t about their people.
          And – do so many men have an inferiority complex about working with, or for, women? Are their willies really that tiny? After some thought considering 40 years of paid employment, I can’t think of any women I’ve not been pleased to work with, for, or have work for me.

          1. Doesn’t bother me one bit having a female boss. Yet… if we change a ballistic vest to fit a woman it will leave gaps.

            Bah, I’ve no idea what the answer is, but a 5’4 woman police officer is pointless. As it is, these figures are obscne when we need front line officers.

            https://www.portsmouth.co.uk/news/crime/hampshire-police-chief-constable-olivia-pinkney-takes-salary-cut-pay-package-hits-ps248000-2904346

            Dear, freakin. Fricken. Life.
            https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/01/10/police-service-white-says-hampshires-chief-constable-racism/

            These creatures are idiotic. We want more ethnics – despite the population being overwhelmingly white. We don’t care it’s racist, oh, and our salaries could pay for 10 officers for a decade, including a vehicle!

        2. In my youth, I worked with a lass who had been in the WRACs during the war. Because the quarter masters were men of a certain generation, they had no idea that women’s under things came in different sizes. My friend was a Skinnie Minnie – she could have used the standard issue bras as hammocks. And the knickers would have held an entire farm’s harvest.

        3. Clothing should be scaled back to fit a woman, same as it should fit any frame, but equipment? No.

          If a woman cannot carry a full pack, her weapon and an injured male colleague she has no business being a soldier.

        4. I understand some female RAF personnel sought compensation for being made to march with the men when the women were wearing skirts – too restrictive of the stride, I believe.

    3. The QARNNS and WRNS were regarded with huge affection and warmth by the male officers and sailors they worked with decades ago .

  26. Building Your Strength

    Three mice were sitting in a bar talking about how tough they were.

    The first mouse drank a shot and said, “I play with mousetraps for fun. I’ll run into one on purpose and as it is closing on me, I grab the bar and bench press it twenty or thirty times.” And with that he drank another shot.

    The second mouse drank a shot and said, “That’s nothing. I take those Final Blox. tablets, cut them up and snort them just for the fun of it.” And with that he drank another shot.

    The third mouse drank a shot, got up and walked away. The first two mice looked at each other, turned to the third mouse and asked, “Where the hell are you going?”

    The third mouse stopped and replied, “I’m going home to fuck the cat.”

  28. Good morning my friends

    An interesting article onthe wokery nonsense:

    The elite is not woke out of self-flagellation, but out of self-preservation
    What is now called “wokery” began life on the margins of academia, and has now been embraced by the entire global elite

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/07/24/elite-not-woke-self-flagellation-self-preservation/

    A BTL comment from Pierrot Pierrot

    Very good! An excellent summary of what we are experiencing today.

    We have at the very top of our social order an excellent example in Prince Harry, someone hardly noted for his meritocratic abilities but who is clearly making very large amounts of money from his “Wokery”. He also embodies many of the worst features of our modern society in addition to Wokery and, it would appear, including a willingness to “sell his granny to the highest bidder”.

    When and how will sanity and morality return to our suffering society?

    1. I must read his book; then I’ll know how to create £20 million out of foot stamping petulance.

      1. You wouldn’t.
        You aren’t a nasty, whining little traitorous shit, you are a decent human being, Anne.
        That’s the difference.

    2. The fascist Left are trying to force a war. Soon we will have a White Rosa Parks and then the Left will realise that twitter is not real life and that they’re outnumbered thousands to 1. No doubt there will be violence and conflict but the normal have always defeated the Left. Next time we’ll have to adopt some of their miserable oppressive nature to ensure society stays free and they can never sink their fangs into it.

      The very thing decent, civil society hates. After a few decades we’ll relax the rules and the evil Left will rise up and again… rinse, repeat.

    1. Personal favorite: https:
      The sound system was terrible and we couldn’t hear a word.
      After a while one of a group who looked more like football hooligans (clean cut, well-groomed, drinking beer, and not interested in their surroundings), one of whom was clearly taking orders from a middle-aged swampy woman went up and down with a loud hailer and drew people away to “march” down Whitehall. Several followed and I left – just can’t be caught in any trouble.
      But the atmosphere was good humoured and given the weather forecast which did not produce the promised rain the turnout was on the whole good humoured.

    2. Is there a problem with the second post? – seems to be stuck in moderation.

      1. I saw it there a while ago and apprroved it – there didn’t seem to be any reason for the hold-up other than a Disqus blip.

  30. The coming collapse of the developing world. Spiked.24 July 2021.

    In Europe, North America, Oceania and East Asia, the Covid-19 pandemic has been a tragic, wrenching experience, creating more depressed and divided societies. Yet, as we have been gazing obsessively at our own problems, a spectre infinitely worse is emerging in the most populous, fastest growing and least resilient parts of the world.

    Covid has caused a deep crisis in the already suffering developing world, which contains nearly half of all humanity. And this will have serious implications for the future of the world economy and political order.

    Without in any way wishing to be flippant or indifferent or cruel can I say that the coming collapse of the developed world will be far more serious since it produces most of the world’s economic activity and possesses most of its weapons. This while Europe and the United States are disintegrating politically before our eyes as Freedom itself is erased from the political landscape and Governments become ever more authoritarian, issuing Diktat’s instead of laws.

    All this is largely self- inflicted by the adoption of Cultural Marxist policies and being massively enhanced by the so called pandemic that is undermining the World Economy.

    The UK itself is lost! It cannot even control its own borders, the quintessential requirement of all Nation States. It is a Globalist Glove Puppet. It carries out those tasks that are required by its real masters. Aircraft Carriers to China? No problem. The Defender sailing into Russian controlled waters to create an incident? Who cares what happens to the ship and crew? Certainly not the Government. The manufactured chaos of Covid restrictions? The constant Fearmongering at every level? What are these last but manipulative devices?

    There will be a reckoning soon that will see real chaos unleashed upon the world! During such times the Elites usually turn to war because it offers opportunities for advancement, enhances their authority and excuses their repression of their citizens.

    https://www.spiked-online.com/2021/07/23/the-coming-collapse-of-the-developing-world/

  31. The coming collapse of the developing world. Spiked.24 July 2021.

    In Europe, North America, Oceania and East Asia, the Covid-19 pandemic has been a tragic, wrenching experience, creating more depressed and divided societies. Yet, as we have been gazing obsessively at our own problems, a spectre infinitely worse is emerging in the most populous, fastest growing and least resilient parts of the world.

    Covid has caused a deep crisis in the already suffering developing world, which contains nearly half of all humanity. And this will have serious implications for the future of the world economy and political order.

    Without in any way wishing to be flippant or indifferent or cruel can I say that the coming collapse of the developed world will be far more serious since it produces most of the world’s economic activity and possesses most of its weapons. This while Europe and the United States are disintegrating politically before our eyes as Freedom itself is erased from the political landscape and Governments become ever more authoritarian, issuing Diktat’s instead of laws.

    All this is largely self- inflicted by the adoption of Cultural Marxist policies and being massively enhanced by the so called pandemic that is undermining the World Economy.

    The UK itself is lost! It cannot even control its own borders, the quintessential requirement of all Nation States. It is a Globalist Glove Puppet. It carries out those tasks that are required by its real masters. Aircraft Carriers to China? No problem. The Defender sailing into Russian controlled waters to create an incident? Who cares what happens to the ship and crew? Certainly not the Government. The manufactured chaos of Covid restrictions? The constant Fearmongering at every level? What are these last but manipulative devices?

    There will be a reckoning soon that will see real chaos unleashed upon the world! During such times the Elites usually turn to war because it offers opportunities for advancement, enhances their authority and excuses their repression of their citizens.

    https://www.spiked-online.com/2021/07/23/the-coming-collapse-of-the-developing-world/

  32. This report from Berlin sets the scene in a third wave of COVID, now the Lambda variant, in Peru where it was first discovered and that has now been found in North America and Europe.

    Doctors are demonstrating there as stronger measures are deemed necessary, whilst Peruvians come out of second wave lockdown, to stem the highest rate of COVID casualities per capita in the world.

    There is criticism of WHO who currently rate this variant as only variant of interest:

    https://youtu.be/a30WCWk8C0U

      1. We’ll get there once the Greek alphabet is used up, countries, then capitals. It will never end. If the state were not so desperate for tax revenue this control would never end.

        1. As I have said, they chose the wrong alphabet to track these variations, the Khmer has 72 letters – enough to keep them going until summer 2022.

  33. Of course they’re all children…

    Migrants ALL claim they’re children so they will get better rooms and education after crossing the channel and being put up in a seaside hotel in Kent
    Each of the migrants housed at Stade Court Hotel in Hythe, Kent, claim to be children
    Reports last week revealed all 43 rooms were booked by Home Office until September
    Mail on Sunday told by migrants claiming to be under-18 they were sharing rooms

    https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2021/07/25/00/45852985-9822119-image-a-45_1627168799009.jpg

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9822119/Migrants-hotel-Kent-claim-theyre-children-better-rooms-education.html

    2. It’s odd – Brittany Pettibone and Lauren Southern – reporters, speakers and generally inoffensive people who as difficult questions – are forbidden to enter the UK, but these dross rock up and are given free housing.

      It’s disgusting hypocrisy.

      Get rid of these creatures. Push them into a shipping container and post them back to Africa.

      1. One of my brothers going through (yet another) divorce is having great difficulty finding somewhere to live, the council seem to be handing over available places to newcomers.

  34. Could it be that someone in HMG has got something right…?

    New Zealand lawyer who called Facebook ‘morally bankrupt pathological liars’ is put forward for £180k Information Commissioner role by Oliver Dowden
    New Zealand privacy commissioner John Edwards is tipped to be the UK’s new Information Commissioner who is in charge of upholding privacy and data laws
    Social media critic once called Facebook ‘morally bankrupt pathological liars’
    It comes as UK Government continues to mount pressure on social media giants be accountable for harmful content appearing on platforms such as racist abuse

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9822897/New-Zealander-John-Edwards-forward-Information-Commissioner-role-Oliv

    1. What about “harmful” content of deliberate obfuscation of cheap and effective treatment for covid?

    2. What about “harmful” content of deliberate obfuscation of cheap and effective treatment for covid?

    3. Well, he’s not wrong. Put it this way. The EU bought Clegg to buy favour and influence in the EU – specifically for various exceptions to the GDPR to be quietly added in specifically to aid Farcebook’s mining and selling of user data.

      1. I read that as, “FB bought Clegg to buy favour and influence in the EU”.

        The same EU for which Clegg has ‘earned’ a pension.

    1. Dopey Joe needs to hang on until Jan 20, 2023 if Camelfoot is to server two full terms. Or that is mu understanding of the Constitution.

      1. That’s mine too. It’s at the point that he has served the majority of his first presidency.

        Of course it doesn’t inevitably follow that she would get two nominations as the Democrat contender, although I don’t know of a case where a sitting President has been displaced for another party nominee.

      2. Camelfoot will not get past an election. She is unpopular with her own party let alone anyone else. When she was running independently for president she got about 2% of the vote from Democrats. So next general election in 3 years and she will be out. In fact the entire Democratic Party will be out, out of the Presidency and both Houses.

      3. Camelfoot will not get past an election. She is unpopular with her own party let alone anyone else. When she was running independently for president she got about 2% of the vote from Democrats. So next general election in 3 years and she will be out. In fact the entire Democratic Party will be out, out of the Presidency and both Houses.

      4. If she gets past the date you quote and then takes over as President, she can serve the rest of this term, plus two full terms if elected. If she takes over before then, she can only serve the rest of this term plus one more.

    2. That’ll put Hillary’s nose out of joint. She always wanted to be the first female POTUS.

        1. Could it be that she wasn’t pres because no one likes her! No surely not, sarcasm must be on full flow.

          Best watch out for the Clinton Arkansas curse.

  36. Princess Diana’s niece Lady Kitty Spencer, 30, marries fashion tycoon Michael Lewis, 62, at Italian villa before celebrating with A-list guests at black tie reception complete with flower arches and a firework display
    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-9820745/Princess-Dianas-niece-Lady-Kitty-Spencer-30-weds-80million-fashion-tycoon-Michael-Lewis.html

    I always think it is cynical for people to say that when a woman marries a much older man she is doing it for any possible reasons other than for true love.

    I must add that Caroline agrees with me!

    1. If you truly believe that, do you need a bridge?

      I’ll accept it’s possible where significant wealth isn’t involved, but cases like this with gaps like that smack of sugar daddy.

      Do you honestly think she would have been remotely interested in an “ordinary” man twice her age?

      1. I think you underestimate my cynicism!
        (And Carrie Johnson agrees with me!)

      2. She comes from a privileged enough background not to need a sugar daddy, plus she’s old enough to know what she’s doing.
        Age 20 and 52 would be more questionable.

        1. Men do mature more slowly than women. I myself am close to 50, the wife closer to 40 and I know I’m vastly more immature than she is.

        2. That doesn’t alter my point. Do you really, honestly, believe that she would give a second glance to a 62 year old who wasn’t extremely wealthy?
          I certainly don’t and whilst she is chronologically old enough it doesn’t necessarily mean that she does.

          1. Some women do, every year. You are entitled to your opinion. But it’s deeply unfair to him, as well as to her to draw that conclusion.

          2. You didn’t answer my question.

            Do you really, honestly, believe that she would give a second glance to a 62 year old who wasn’t extremely wealthy?
            I do not wish them ill. The article suggests they will be extremely happy in the public eye.

            Some 30 year old immigrants marry 62 year old women and love them deeply, until they have their papers and move on.

            I wonder what happened to his previous wife.

          3. I answered it. Some women do get together with men old enough to be their fathers who are not particularly rich, every year. Without knowing the couple in question personally, one cannot say, but as she is in no particular financial need, I don’t see a reason to impute a financial motive to her.

          4. You are deliberately avoiding the issue.
            Do you you think she would give a 62 year old man a second glance if he was poor?

          5. In what way is this not answer to your question?
            “Without knowing the couple in question personally, one cannot say, but as she is in no particular financial need, I don’t see a reason to impute a financial motive to her.”

          7. I really don’t understand what you’re getting at. I just said that I don’t know them so I can’t say. I’m not going to impute low motives to someone that I barely know anything about.

          9. I wonder what Lady Kitty saw in the billionaire Michael Lewis………

            And the bride wore Dolce and Gabbana! Princess Diana’s niece Lady
            Kitty Spencer, 30, wows in Victorian-inspired lace gown as she marries
            billionaire fashion tycoon Michael Lewis, 62, in lavish black tie
            ceremony at Italian villa

          10. I wonder what Lady Kitty saw in the billionaire Michael Lewis………

            And the bride wore Dolce and Gabbana! Princess Diana’s niece Lady
            Kitty Spencer, 30, wows in Victorian-inspired lace gown as she marries
            billionaire fashion tycoon Michael Lewis, 62, in lavish black tie
            ceremony at Italian villa

    3. I can understand why a woman would find an older man attractive. To begin with he is an adult compared to men of her own age group.

    5. Mr Merton to Debbie Magee………….What first attracted you to millionaire Paul Daniels (Michael Lewis).

    2. That is absolutely terrible. Unbelievable. Surely his little neck could get broken, brain injuries? Child abuse in the name of religion. Greek or Russian orthodox?

      1. 335817+ up ticks,
        Morning PM,
        Personally I would rate it a tad more preferable than the jab
        as in the main it is external, but both the actions of child abusers, with future very nasty consequences.

      2. Not in the least. Perhaps if all the WOKE youngsters of today had been given that robust start to life then they would not have turned out to be the gormless wimps that they are now.

        1. Babies’ heads NEED to be supported until they are at least 4 months old – they have no control over them and they wobble all over the place. I re-iterate – that is terrible. That is an infant of 6-8 weeks of age.

      3. I’m Orthodox and I would like to assure you that this idiot is way over the top! I think someone will be having a vigorous talk with him. In the background you can see a woman put her hand to her mouth, obviously shocked by his performance.

  38. From the Telegraph . .
    “Ministers have pointed to evidence that Covid could be spread by people breaking wind in confined spaces such as lavatories”
    “No Sh!t” .. Sherlock . .?

    1. The gendarmes know that if it turns nasty that they will have a hard choice to make.

  40. ‘Something’s seriously wrong with Joe’: Ex-White House physician Ronny Jackson says he believes the president, 78, will be forced to resign. 25 July 2021.

    House Rep. Ronny Jackson, who served as the top White House physician under the Obama and Trump administrations, has predicted President Joe Biden won’t finish his term in office because of a lack of fitness for the job.

    ‘Something is SERIOUSLY wrong with Biden – and it’s only going to get WORSE!’ the Republican congressman from Texas tweeted on Thursday.

    ‘It’s past the point of embarrassment. He’s lost. He can barely put a coherent sentence together.’

    Well pretty much everyone knows this except the MSM. If anything illustrates the reality of the Borg and their control of the Media it is this universal lack of comment.

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9821135/Former-White-House-physician-said-believes-Biden-forced-resign-fitness.html

    1. Well, chase my Aunt Fanny round the gasworks. Something that was bl00dy obvious from the moment Sleepy Joe was wheeled out as a frontman.
      This was planned right from the start. Running a country – let alone one that is the most powerful in the free (!?!) world – would be tough for a fit, compos mentis 78 year old.

    2. Knew that when he was required to hide in his basement during the elections while they were busy rigging the elections. Next, Kamala Harris than midterm elections when the Democrats will be destroyed, if they don’t rig that too.

    3. Wow a republican saying that Biden is not fitting be pres. Next there will be recollections of a Democrat saying that Trump is a lowerloser.

      Not questioning the implication, merely the source.

      Edited.

      1. ‘Afternoon, Richard, “…saying that Trump is a lower.”

        Since they are fairly close together on the QWERTY keyboard I can only presume that ‘w’ sneaked in when ‘s’ was supposed to be there.

        Or does ‘lower’ have another meaning in Canada?

        1. Bloody spell checker.
          Or maybe it is our leftiy internet controls censoring social media posts.

    1. If Lammy, Campbell, Yvette Cooper, Blackford et al are up in arms he must be saying something with a grain of truth in it!

    2. …and there’s a world of difference between ‘cower’ and ‘coward’ as one twatter implied that they are one and the same.

  43. Four brothers left home for college, and they became successful doctors and lawyers. One evening, they chatted after having dinner together.

    They discussed the Christmas gifts they were able to give their elderly mother who had moved to Florida.

    The first said, “You know I had a big house built for Mama.”

    The second said, ” And I had a large theater built in the house.”

    The third said, “And I had my Mercedes dealer deliver an SL600 to her.”

    The fourth said, “You know how Mama loved reading the Bible and you know she can’t read anymore because she can’t
    see very well. I met this preacher who told me about a parrot that can recite the entire Bible. It took ten preachers almost
    8 years to teach him. I had to pledge to contribute $50,000 a year for five years to the Church, but it was worth it.

    Mama only has to name the chapter and verse and the parrot will recite it.” The other brothers were impressed.

    After the holidays Mom sent out her Thank You notes. She wrote:

    “Milton, the house you built is so huge that I live in only one room, but I have to clean the whole house. Thanks anyway.”

    “Marvin, I am too old to travel. I stay home, I have my groceries delivered, so I never use the Mercedes. The thought was good. Thanks”

    “Michael, you gave me an expensive theater with Dolby sound and it can hold 50 people, but all of my friends are dead.
    I’ve lost my hearing and I’m nearly blind. I’ll never use it. Thank you for the gesture just the same.”

    “Dearest Melvin, You were the only son to have the good sense to give a little thought to your gift.
    The chicken was delicious.” Thank you so much.”

    Love, Mama

    1. Four brothers left home for college, and they became successful doctors and lawyers.

      Then they crossed Europe to Calais and jumped into a rubber dinghy and headed for the UK

  44. Warning as Putin could trigger Europe-wide gas crisis by strangling key supply –UK at risk. Express. 23 July 2021.

    VLADIMIR Putin is plotting to trigger a European gas supply crisis by restricting pipeline flows in an effort to force Western authorities to rubber-stamp the Nord Stream 2 project between Russia and Germany, experts fear.

    And Richard Branson is plotting to trigger an internet access crisis so that he can force the government to rubber stamp his Virgin IP service throughout the UK!

    Simples. At least it doesn’t mention WW3!

    https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1466958/putin-russia-news-eu-news-david-frost-brexit-news-nord-stream-2-merkel-germany

    1. No sh@t Sherlock. Just wait until the next pipeline is operational to see how tightly he can squeeze.

    2. H’mmm …. choice between Russian gas supply and £10,000 to wreck my house and garden to install an inefficient heat pump.
      Can I get back to you on that?

    4. When the gas is cut off, I’m looking forward to the BBC interviewing Heseltine about his part in it.

    5. Putin isn’t the danger. Our own blasted, cretinous, miserable, spiteful, useless, abusive, totalitarian government are.

    1. I dread to think what they must have in their back garden – or rather yard – so they have to put their pool in the street.

      2. What an utter lack of decorum. It’s not as if they’re from Norway and heat is a surprise.

        1. No surprise here. A week or so ago, 30 or so C, over 25 at night, 27C just now.

    2. Living in a city, probably no back yard, no swimming pool nearby, in that hot weather, that shows a bit of nouse to be honest. I don’t have a problem with that at all. At least there are no slammers around.

  48. So golfer Rahm was forced to withdraw from a tournament a few weeks ago because he tested positive for the blessed covid. He has been back on tour winning wads of money for a few weeks but has now had to withdraw from the Olympics because of a positive lurgy test.

    So what is it? Doesn’t catching covid give you some immunity or are the tests just rollocks?

    1. It’s not him they are worried about, it’s him passing it on to someone who hasn’t had it.

      And therein lies the folly of the whole thing. Whether we like it or not, we’re going to have to learn to live with it.

    2. Evening Richard and Nottlers.

      The PCR tests were never meant to be used as a diagnostic tool, for starters. The lateral flow tests are even more useless. The “tests” are used merely to plump up government “figures” for positive “cases”. They are a terrible terrible waste of our money. As is test and trace. The whole thing is a scamdemic.

      Yes there has been illness and death but, if you compare the ONS figures for the last 5 years, you will see there have been fewer than 70,000 “excess” deaths. This has never been about our health – it’s all about control. And, boy, has it worked. Why do you think “freedom day” has come and gone and there are more restrictions than ever. They will never relinquish their control now they have us where they want us. The public has been too willing to be controlled.

  49. Royal Family has ‘very real fears’ that Harry’s ‘£18m’ four-book deal could destabilize the discount bins in WH Smith.

  51. Ordained Anglican minister in deep doo-doo

    Former Post Office chief executive could be stripped of her CBE under official plans
    The Telegraph has been told the Government could launch a review into the Horizon scandal and ask for names of figures involved

    By Harry Yorke, WHITEHALL EDITOR and James Bickerton
    24 July 2021 • 5:00pm

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/politics/2021/07/24/TELEMMGLPICT000184411211_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BqWD2eDignlj-46IdEzj28y-vaJp5oQI2T7-qRuTysDl0.jpeg?imwidth=680
    Paula Vennells was awarded a CBE for services to the Post Office and to charity in the 2018 New Year Honours list CREDIT: PA Wire/Post Office
    *
    *
    *
    **********************************************************************

    This is one of the tamer BTL comments

    Clifford Webb
    24 Jul 2021 7:13PM
    I’m a little concerned that Vennells is getting all the blame. I’m sure Adam Crozier would have been culpable at some point. The postmasters union also supported the persecution of their own members. It’s almost unbelievable what went on, and the sole journalist who pursued this story had to crowdfund his attendance at the court hearings against the sub postmasters, such was the general acceptance that they were all fiddling the books.

    Why aren’t the post office prosecutors being hauled across the coals? It was these goons who were most responsible, presenting lies before the courts, and probably before Vennels, although I have no wish to reduce her culpability.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2021/07/24/former-post-office-chief-executive-could-stripped-cbe-official/

    1. I doubt very much that she will see the inside of a prison. But if she does she would be safer in a men’s prison.

    2. What do they mean ‘could’? This is the worse case of legal malfeasance for decades. I hope to Goodness they don’t have a Royal Commission or whatever, which gives everyone immunity from prosecution.

    3. I listened to a radio documentary about this issue. They were accused of pocketing cash for sales and not paying it to the PO.
      I would have thought that all postal products e.g. stamps, print out stamp labels Giro payouts etc are accountable and auditable. What products are they supposed to have sold without and pocketed the cash? It just doesn’t make sense.

    1. Yukk!!
      Firstborn has an IR camera in his mobile phone ( a CAT S66) – maybe that’s an excuse for filming women’s bottoms?? Err…

    2. BTL:
      John Bankhead 24 Jul 2021 2:45PM
      @GJ White: “One could not begin to imagine the state, if Corbyn had been in charge.”

      I could, mad green policies, mass immigration, lax borders, big spending, more taxation, less individual freedom et al.

      Hang on, we have all that now…

    3. I honestly don’t now what the solution is, but changing the head boy won’t reform the school. Big state behaves this wa because it cannot be stopped.

      We need referism, recall and direct democracy.

          1. Second day was yesterday in the pub watching the rugby.
            First day was the wedding but i didn’t take any pics.

        2. Oh, I didn’t think of putting them under the whipped cream as well! I must remember that tip.

    3. Sometimes self-sacrifice and resilience are called for.
      Show ’em what you’re made of.

      1. Yes, gor blimey.

        It was Kaz & Gaz the neighbours who got married. (I gave them that nickname).

        They came over with big plates of charcuterie and English cheeses. Lots of fizz and laughs. I have had enough of both food and people for the rest of the week.

        At the wedding which was held in the grounds of Alton House Hotel we all had a merry time. Especially the bit where he said if anyone knows any just impediment…there were several loud coughs and everyone burst out laughing.

        1. Yo, Phil. I know Alton, but not the hotel. I rather resent the trend for marriages to take place other than in church, but the CofE is so far up it’s own fundament, I totally understand. I attended a wedding a few years ago of a 2nd cousin. In the garden of an IoW hotel. Arguably, it wasn’t legal…

          1. Hello Mr Boss man.

            What do you mean it ain’t legal? I thought that if you signed the ‘book’ that was all that mattered in a legal sense.

            BTW the Registrar brought the book and had an ice cream from the wagon provided for all the guests. £350 for the damned thing ! (the wagon not the Registrar)

            I understand your point but it was properly done. Did you know that i can legally perform a wedding ceremony? I am ordained.

          2. Apparently, you no longer get a marriage certificate. My church has produced its own certificate of solemnisation – it’s better than the official CofE one (what a surprise).

  57. Ta Da – all credit to the Yodel employee who made a series of special deliveries today, including my two crates! It wouldn’t have been necessary if they hadn’t messed up Thursday, Friday and Saturday, but it was a very nice gesture and much appreciated!

      1. Superb. The be in a choir singing the Alleluia is one of the most electrifying experiences ever. Better than being in the audience.

        1. I sang it to myself in the car going back home after church; it seemed appropriate somehow as we’d been freed to sing along with the choir this morning.

      1. We only had a bit of drizzle for half an hour or so this afternoon. I had to water the pots as usual this evening.

        1. Beelzebub, etc. For what it’s worth, Roger Taylor lives in Puttenham Priory, next door to one of our churches. He’s not a stranger to The Good Intent (my local), but, apart from allowing car parking on one of his fields for the Puttenham Bonfire, he doesn’t have much to do with the locals.

          1. I think I’ve mentioned before; I used to know a couple of chaps who were his private gardener and tree surgeon.

  59. So we spend Squillions and get HS2 knocking 30 mins off travel time to Birmingham while the Chinese have developed this capable of doing the distance from London to Birmingham in around 30 minutes (including time to accelerate and decelerate).

    https://twitter.com/Reuters/status/1417806560487624710?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1417806560487624710%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.zerohedge.com%2Ftechnology%2Fchina-unveils-worlds-fastest-maglev-bullet-train

    1. Professor Eric Braithwaite springs to mind. “No prophet is accepted in his own country.”

      1. A Balti? And with a fast return journey you’d be sure to make it back in good time…..

        1. I lived for 5 years in both cities. They do say you can never ‘go back’. Good !

    4. Ah but, ‘forward planning’ will mean after the purchase of all the land and destroying wild life habitat ex agricultural land (now all Brown Field) and flattening many homes in the process. There will latterly be allowed many dodgy deals leading to many, many juicy bungs to keep local MPs in pocket and in votes, as thousands of new homes will be built on the adjacent land.

    6. We had an experimental track at Earith in Cambs over twenty years ago.

      As usual, dumbos said, no it’ll never be feasible.

    7. Maglev was developed in the UK and the first system ran between Birmingham Airport and Birmingham international railway station by the NEC – a very short distance of a few hundred metres. It was not developed further in the UK and the current driverless shuttle service is propelled by cables.
      I despair.

    8. Maglev was developed in the UK and the first system ran between Birmingham Airport and Birmingham international railway station by the NEC – a very short distance of a few hundred metres. It was not developed further in the UK and the current driverless shuttle service is propelled by cables.
      I despair.

    1. Plum you and I have something far richer than all the previous Kings and Queens of England – Life.

      1. Carpe diem….eh Stephenroi…..must get the canoe out again
        and paddle up the Avon & Kennet. Happy days….

    2. You have a lovely garden , and live in a gorgeous part of the UK, and a wonderful naughty sense of humour .

      You are attempting to be too deeply philosophical .

      .

  61. The Daily Human Stupidity.

    “Human stupidity: the ultimate global disaster.”

    Marty Rubin.

  63. We haven’t had any rain today .. Weymouth Sainsbury had lots of very empty shelves , we enjoy a papaya for breakfast , nothing and not even a grapefruit .. all the usual stuff gone , so I went to my little local Coop , , well not so local , they had plenty of essentials .

    We had salmon fillets( Norwegian) Cornish new potatoes , home grown runner beans , broccoli and fresh peas .. I podded them whilst I was watching the Olympics and a chunk of lemon with the grilled fish .. and a ready made trifle with fresh strawberries .

    All enjoyed by no 1 son , Moh and myself … and the dogs ate the fish skins

        1. Just attach a balloon for carbon capture. Much more fun when walking the dog….

    2. If anyone in your family is on Statins they should avoid grapefruit.

      Several local co-ops can be supplied from one lorry. Sainsbury’s needs a fleet of them.

      I love to eat peas straight from the pod. :@)

        1. So do I but it is an advisory with Statins. I think it interferes with the uptake of the medication.

    3. We had a just a bit of drizzle….. then roast chicken, etc….. then we went out to watch the swifts circling our house until they dropped into their boxes. Feeding time for the youngsters – they’ll be gone soon.

      We’ve had more flying activity this year than before. A new pair moved in to one of the other boxes a few weeks ago, so there will be another camera fitted when they’ve gone, ready for next year.

      The young ones are getting ready to go – lots of wing-flapping and press-ups to strengthen their wings.

  64. 335817+ up ticks,
    The johnson chap may have a problem there getting the council imams to agree in the choice of flags.

    Take Back Control? Boris Govt Instructs Councils Receiving ‘European’ Covid Funds to Display EU Flag

  65. A follow on from yesterday’s Covid passport tale.

    Tonight the Marché Gourmande was checking people as they arrived. Many didn’t have the phone app or they had a UK version.

    Sorry, you can’t come in.
    But we’ve driven for half an hour.
    Tough, piss orf.

    And the stupid bastards will wonder why the tourists don’t return.

    2. I’d make the feckin’ eejit serve 26 years and then dance all the way back to his original shithole.

  67. Evening, all. We were allowed to sing in church this morning! Alleluia! The stupid thing was, we were allowed to take masks off when seated, but had to put them on to sing! I didn’t have a mask with me anyway, but they know I’m exempt. I was rung up this afternoon (just as I was about to serve my lunch, as it happens) by the psychiatrist who had been assessing MOH. The conclusion, which I had already reached, was that it just wasn’t possible to come home. I expect to hear in the next few days what decisions have been reached as to where and when; ie which EMI unit locally. The person I spoke to seemed sympathetic about a CHC, but she can only recommend; she doesn’t make the decisions. Fingers crossed she can sway the assessment team and we get funding or I’ll be bankrupt and they’ll take a charge on my house.

    1. You must have very mixed feelings about whether she comes home or not. I thought if the person in care had savings in their own name they pay until it reaches the limit for help ie £23,000? but the house stayed with the partner living there. That was the case when my OH’s mother was in care for her last years. There was no charge over the house.

      1. The assessment nurse told me, when I explained the situation about funding (ie MOH’s savings are below the limit, but I took out a certain amount for house repairs, which won’t be completed until October – and until I’ve paid the final bill the money is deemed to be “unaccounted for” and counts towards the total, putting it just over the limit) that there would be a charge on my house – “but not until you die” she added, helpfully. What? Even if my will has tied it up? “They’ll still take it”. Gee, thanks. Why did I bother working, saving, paying into the system?

        1. OH’s parents held their house as tenants in common, and the executor was their solicitor. When his mother’s savings dropped to the limit, the fees were paid. He and his sister received a small share of her estate that was left.

          His father lived two more years, though he had cared for her for so long before she went into nursing care, that he was exhausted. He tried to change his will in favour of a young woman he’d befriended, but his solicitor/executor wouldn’t let him as she thought he was no longer of sound mind. So that was fortunate for OH and his sister, but he had given a lot away to the young woman. She turned up to his funeral, but ran away when I went over to speak to her. His son and daughter did inherit the house.

          1. A relative of mine was befriended by a much younger woman, relative was in his late eighties, younger woman was in her forties. He bought her a car, white goods for her kitchen, bought her stuff when they were out and about and she was ‘window shopping’. He spent a fortune on her. Apart from that towards the end she caused us a lot of grief, every two weeks we would travel 180 miles north (and back) to change the locks on his door – this went on for a year at least.

          2. Elderly people beginning to lose their marbles are such easy meat for predatory “friends”, aren’t they? This woman was about half his age, but she made him feel better so that was something. He drove into the back of someone one day and wouldn’t drive after that so he gave her his car after the repairs were done. He gave her quite a lot of money but there was little we could do about that. We were glad his solicitor looked after his interests.

          3. My mother seems happy for any bugger to have her money, but apparently, by paying her care bills for her, I’m stealing it.

          7. There is nothing you can do and the ‘vulnerable one’ can be very determined, and at the same time he appealed for our help when things went wrong. He had a sympathetic nature and was always on the look-out to assist someone so he was an easy target.

          8. My wife’s great aunt was befriended by her ‘gardener’ whose bank employee wife persuaded her to grant them Lasting Power of Attorney over her affairs.

            The bastard couple soon placed her in a poorly run nursing home where she promptly died leaving her property to them. The bungalow in Cambridge was worth more than 150k in the mid eighties.

          9. That is getting on for 2 million today, surely – in Cambridge.

            I phoned the police for advice (at one stage they phoned me but that is another story!) – their only ‘advice’ was that these people are all over the place infiltrating churches, day classes, walking groups – you name it, where people gather there will be someone on the look-out for the lonely and vulnerable.

            I learned a lot during that episode which lasted five years.

        2. They really don’t care do they? Like the others, I thought that they could not take the house when the one partner still lived there.

          How are you feeling, a home may be best for your other half but it will leave a big hole in your life.

          1. Apparently, my house is mine while I’m alive, but they’ll take it once I’m dead. I still think that’s a cheek. I worked hard and paid the deposit and the mortgage (and a lot of interest!) to buy it. I would have been better off renting! I am currently enjoying the respite, to be honest. I hadn’t realised quite what a toll it was taking on my health until the stress was removed.

    2. You must have very mixed feelings about whether she comes home or not. I thought if the person in care had savings in their own name they pay until it reaches the limit for help ie £23,000? but the house stayed with the partner living there. That was the case when my OH’s mother was in care for her last years. There was no charge over the house.

    2. This is so damaging to the US. People are being forced to accept something as truth, which is clearly a lie (that Biden won, and that he is capable). If you can force people to accept something they know to be a lie, you own them.

    1. Thanks Rastus & Caroline for keeping the birthday list going!
      Many happy returns to Delboy!

  80. The start of the school holidays may have had a bigger impact on COVID case numbers than we previously thought.

    UK case numbers have been falling since the end of the lockdown despite superspreader events.

    This piece from the BBC suggests that the start of the school holidays could be reason for the fall:

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-57962995

    The possibility that school children are in fact potent silent spreaders of the Sars-cov-2 virus seems very plausible considering the findings reported in this article from the Harvard Gazette:

    https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2020/08/looking-at-children-as-the-silent-spreaders-of-sars-cov-2/

    It looks as though children, who are now known to asymptomatically carry considerably higher viral loads than even hospitalised patients, can present a seriously high COVID infection risk to the adult population.

    1. Surely it was all the false positives from the regular testing of school children?

        1. I hope so! What kind of idiot would install a Government app in the first place? They walk among us and look like normal human beings!

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