Wednesday 3 January: Restrictions for inexperienced drivers would make British roads safer

Posted on by Geoff Graham

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455 thoughts on “Wednesday 3 January: Restrictions for inexperienced drivers would make British roads safer”

  1. Good morrow, Gentlefolk. today’s story

    A PASTORAL DONKEY
    A pastor entered his donkey in a race and it won. The pastor was so pleased with the donkey that he entered it in the next race, and it won again.
    The local newspaper read: PASTOR’S ASS OUT FRONT.
    The Bishop was so upset with this kind of publicity that he ordered the pastor not to enter the donkey in another race.
    The next day, the local newspaper headline read: BISHOP SCRATCHES PASTOR’S ASS.
    This was too much for the Bishop, so he ordered the pastor to get rid of the donkey. The pastor decided to give it to a nun in a nearby convent.
    The local paper, hearing of the news, posted the following headline the next day: NUN HAS BEST ASS IN TOWN.
    The Bishop fainted. He informed the nun that she would have to get rid of the donkey, so she sold it to a farmer for $10.
    The next day the paper read: NUN SELLS ASS FOR $10.
    This was too much for the Bishop, so he ordered the nun to buy back the donkey and lead it to the plains where it could run wild.
    The next day the headlines read: NUN ANNOUNCES HER ASS IS WILD AND FREE.
    The Bishop was buried the next day.
    The moral of the story is:
    Being concerned about public opinion can bring you much grief and misery and even shorten your life. So be yourself and enjoy life. You’ll be a lot happier and live longer!

    3. Good moral. I regret that it took me until I was about 50 to stop caring what others thought of me.

      2. I wish I had stopped caring at the age of about 50, Fiscal. (Good morning, btw.)

  3. Morning, all Y’all.
    Wind has dropped a bit. Enough snow to block the railway to Stavanger, block the mountain passes to the West Coast, even stop many of the buses into Oslo. It’s all a bit chaotic, this snow. And they forecast warmer than before for the weekend, only -20C.

  4. “I rang up British Telecom and said: ‘I want to report a nuisance caller.’ He said: ‘Not you again.’”

    1. Another very funny joke this morning, Johnny. I think it’s going to be a really enjoyable one for me.

  6. Good morning, chums. Another day for reading, de-cluttering and (possibly) shredding for me. I hope you all enjoy your day.

  8. Restrictions for inexperienced drivers would make British roads safer

    The hostile environment war on the motorist continues unabated.

    2. Repairing the vast array of holes, trenches and deep pits in the crumbling surfaces of our roads would make driving safer for everyone.

    3. Those Zil lanes have to be created. What with all those cycle lanes, there’s only so much road left for the unimpeded progress of our rulers.

  9. Good morning all,

    Light streaks across the Easten sky at McPhee Towers, a showery day forecast with sunny periods, wind South-West, temperature flat-lining at 8℃.

    Oops!

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/213dcc6ab2e2ba9acb4ff3f0afc519d67bb88e33f32b5595b9232ff533977f91.png

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/01/02/army-apache-helicopter-blown-over-wind/

    Left outside in Storm Henk, not pointing into wind, not tied down. Someone is going to get a bit of a bollocking.

      1. I know. I remember watching a Vulcan bomber at an air display in my youth and the commentator actually said something like “for all you jolly taxpayers out there those four thick smoke trails you can see coming from the Bristol Olympus engines powering the Vucan are unburned fuel”. Later on in my own RAF career I spent many a happy hour “punching holes in the sky” in appalling weather to no good purpose other than making sure we used up the years allocation of fuel before the end of the accounting year so that we wouldn’t have a reduced allocation the following year. It was only taxpayers’ money.

        2. Good morning Fiscal, and everyone.
          You could have filled some bowsers and given some fuel to local farmers, or other good causes.

        3. Same with ‘our’ NHS in 1970s.
          That’s why carpets were laid in geriatric wards before March and binned when temperatures rose – roughly late Spring.

        4. Similar in education; you had to spend what was left of the current year’s capitation on ANYthing or your following year’s allocation would have been reduced.

  10. Apparently doctors have millions of ghost patients on their books, costing £ billions in waste.

    Labour have made plans to sort this all out when they get in power later this year and will supply every doctors surgery with Ouija boards and training in clairvoyance.

    1. Doctors spiriting the money away? Whatever next, an increase in phantom pregnancies to fill their coffers?

      Labour would have trouble sorting a pack of cards into suits and numerical/picture order.

    2. Quelle surprise! And it’s taken the government donkeys years to work out what we’ve known for donkeys years.

  11. Good morning, all. Too dark to see the weather. But the tornado seems to have passed us by.

    3. Apparenty, on an annual basis, we have more tornadoes in the British Isles than in the whole of North America. It’s just that theirs are so much more spectacular.

  14. Israel assassinates senior Hamas leader in Beirut. 3 January 2o24

    Israel has assassinated a senior Hamas leader in a Beirut drone strike that threatens a major escalation in the war.

    Saleh al-Arouri, the deputy leader of Hamas’s political wing and the founder of its militant operations in the occupied West Bank, was among seven killed in the blast in Beirut’s southern suburb of Dahiyeh.

    The 57-year-old is the most senior member of the terror group to have been eliminated since the Oct 7 attack on southern Israel.

    Yes it looks like we are on the Highway to Hell. Once the escalator starts it’s almost impossible to stop.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2024/01/02/israel-assassinate-senior-hamas-saleh-al-arouri-beirut/

    1. Well, Minty, as far as I am concerned the sooner all Hamas leaders are removed from this world so much the better.

      1. I’m sure that a great many people had the same view about the Arch Duke Ferdinand and his relatives Elsie!

  15. And a good day to one and all.
    A 3rd Quarter waning moon peering through the light overcast this morning with a light drizzle falling. 3°C on the Yard Thermometer.

  16. Camila Batmanghelidjh late CEO of Kids Company, gave hope to so many minority ethnic kids.

    That one day they too, could race bait drippy white MPs into funding their 5k per month mansion with a pool.

      1. That’s a reality show i would like to watch. Just need to nail their feet to a plank and give them Deliveroo on speed dial.

  17. Japan’s crashed airline pilots names have been revealed on Sky News

    Sum Ting Wong
    Wi Tu Lo
    Ho Lee Fuk
    Bang Ding Ow

    2. It looks like somebody in their ATC made a colossal bloomer, echos of the Tenerife crash years ago.

      2. Have you seen the pictures of the burned-out Airbus? It’s just a pile of ashes, as you might find in your grate in the morning. Wings & engines are there, fuselage almost completely reduced to dust.

        1. Tokyo Plane Crash
          I have not posted here for many months but could not hold my feelings this morning.

          I just read Phizzee’s tasteless posts, the worst I’ve ever encountered from him. Volunteers dying in flames is not the least bit funny.

          I am keen on aviation, having won my Private Pilot’s Licence 65 years ago and most recently piloted a Cessna 172 in Brisbane in September 2023.

          After visiting my Japanese in-laws, on 7th April 2023 I was on that same journey from Chitose to Haneda airport, this time in a Boeing 787. It is a busy regular hourly service and was almost entirely full (and I do mean full) of Japanese. Both the Boeing 787 and the Airbus 350 are made substantially of composites – fibre reinforced plastics – which are half the weight of metal and almost twice as strong. But when they burn, they burn to ashes.

          It is perhaps less than astonishing that all of the JAL Airbus passengers and crew escaped the aircraft. Apart from Sumo wrestlers, most native Japanese are slight and nimble, often preferring to walk rather than drive. They are also very obedient, so would have been able to exit the aircraft quickly by following the flight crew’s instructions. Unhappily, the crew and passengers of the smaller Embraer aircraft were not so fortunate and all died. But absolutely no cause for mirth.

          Late Edit: The smaller aircraft was a Bombardier Dash-8 maritime patrol plane, not the larger Embraer. And five, rather than all, of the people on board the Dash-8 died.

          2. Hi RC. Good to see from you, it’s been a while.
            It’s awful that the Coastguard crew didn’t make it, but nothing short of a miracle that there’s not even a report of serious injury from the Airbus. Slimmer passengers used to taking orders – about leaving their effing bage behind, and behaving in an orderly manner seemed to be key. I can’t find it again, but the morning radio news reported that the cabin crew had the passengers leaving thir seats by row numbers, making a continuous line to the slides. Whatever the case, respect! Proper job.
            I’ve been interested in aviation all my life, and at one point hoped to join the AAIB. Problem is, they wanted a pilots licence, preferably CPL/ATPL, and sonce I have visual problems including no stereo vision, I couldn’t get that. Bugger. The concept of piloting a 172 in Oz can only be as close to perfction as you can get, apart from piloting an Antonov 2 in the same location… an aeroplane so ugly that even it’s mother couldn’t love it!

        2. Tokyo Plane Crash
          I have not posted here for many months but could not hold my feelings this morning.

          I just read Phizzee’s tasteless posts, the worst I’ve ever encountered from him. Volunteers dying in flames is not the least bit funny.

          I am keen on aviation, having won my Private Pilot’s Licence 65 years ago and most recently piloted a Cessna 172 in Brisbane in September 2023.

          After visiting my Japanese in-laws, on 7th April 2023 I was on that same journey from Chitose to Haneda airport, this time in a Boeing 787. It is a busy regular hourly service and was almost entirely full (and I do mean full) of Japanese. Both the Boeing 787 and the Airbus 350 are made substantially of composites – fibre reinforced plastics – which are half the weight of metal and almost twice as strong. But when they burn, they burn to ashes.

          It is perhaps less than astonishing that all of the JAL Airbus passengers and crew escaped the aircraft. Apart from Sumo wrestlers, most native Japanese are slight and nimble, often preferring to walk rather than drive. They are also very obedient, so would have been able to exit the aircraft quickly by following the flight crew’s instructions. Unhappily, the crew and passengers of the smaller Embraer aircraft were not so fortunate and all died. But absolutely no cause for mirth.

  18. 381275+ up ticks,

    Morning Each,

    Dt,
    Starmer to distance himself from Corbyn in major speech
    Labour leader to vow premiership would not be ‘vanity dressed up as virtue’ and pledge to restore standards in public life

    One of the major leaders of the political telestial kingdom
    on earth ( The toilet attendant ex PM being leader)

    More fodder for fools on the menu

    🎵
    … You think that I don’t even mean
    A single word I say
    It’s only words and words are all I have
    To take your voting hearts away

    A health warning,

    For a longer & more beneficial life steer well clear politically, of the lab/lib/con/current ukip WEF/NWO infested coalition party.

  19. Despite all the dire forecasts yesterday the hurricane also seems to have passed unnoticed here. Looking at Sandhurst Weather it seems the biggest gust was 43mph with mean speed not getting above 25mph. Just 5mm of rain – but it was a pretty miserable day with light showers most of the day. Yet there are reports all around of destruction, photos of trees blocking roads. They closed our railway line mid afternoon after a tree fell and it remained closed until close of service. What the heck is going on? I remember the big storm of 1987 and others around that time with howling wind and fence panels being blown around as if they were sheets of paper. Not seen anything like that in the past year or two. Yet they keep saying extreme weather is getting worse and more often. Really?
    Anyway nice clear blue sky this morning and all still.

    1. Project Fear: the ongoing saga. In a similar vein, the weather app on my phone always mentions rain coming soon, when it is currently dry. Yet I haven’t noticed mention clear skies ahead as the latest wintery weather descends.

    3. We had heavy rain with the stream partially running down the road from a blocked grill above the old colour works.

  20. Wordle 928 4/6

    A splendid result today, chums:

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

    1. Not to outdo

      Wordle 928 4/6

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

  21. Good morning.
    No, restrictions for inexperienced drivers are not needed. What is needed is fewer restrictions for law-abiding, taxpaying people and more restrictions for criminals, including those who break immigration laws.

  22. Steve Bannon on the War Room has mentioned that Biden is considering seizing Russia’s frozen bank holdings in the USA, worth anything from $300 Billion to $500 Billion, and giving the money to Ukraine. The fear being that such a move, not done to German or Japanese assets in WWII, would create financial turmoil and crash the dollar.
    No amount of money is going to help Ukraine defeat the Russian Bear so why even think about such a dangerous move? Is the plan to salt the earth and make recovery very difficult if not impossible?

      1. I remember one of the peasants in Far From The Madding Crowd was Christened Cain rather than Abel because his mother had misremembered the Bible story.

    3. WTF is a ‘happiness expert’ and where do you study for such a qualification?

      I’d rather listen to Jordan Peterson’s opinion: “If you’re not married with a family by the time you’re forty you’re one lost soul.”

    1. A fine tune by a fine band. I only had their second album but they were always worth a listen.

      1. It reached No 1 in the charts … on February 1, 1975.

        Fact, that. It knocked Ms Grace by The Tymes off the top spot.

      2. It reached No 1 in the charts … on February 1, 1975.

        Fact, that. It knocked Ms Grace by The Tymes off the top spot.

    1. A country in which the Post Office, Aviva and NatWest can thrive is not a beacon of freedom.
      But, as the past four years have shown, all too many Britons would have felt thoroughly at home in the old GDR.

      1. 381275+ up ticks,

        Morning Anne,
        To have a british title now is open to the world via Dover, I’m English first & foremost, but willingly tolerate, Welsh,Irish & Jocks as we have done for a long.long,time.

  27. DT Headline: Politics latest news: Farage fires immigration warning shot at Tories ahead of election
    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/01/03/rishi-sunak-latest-news-farage-small-boats-uk-doctor-strike/

    We are fast approaching a situation where the Islamic ethical and legal philosophy and mode de vie will win or the Judeo-Christian philosophy will win. The two cannot continue to coexist peacefully.

    Is the West prepared to defend itself or not? And if it is then how?

    BTL

    Islam cannot co-exist with other faiths and sharia law is not compatible with most law in the west.

    Racial apartheid has been condemned as abhorrent but surely a case can be made for Faith apartheid for a country to protect itself if one religious group wishes to overwhelm, dominate and suppress the existing order of a society based on other religious and social philosophies?

  28. ‘Tis an ill-will that blows no good:

    After their return to work today, I’ve just spoken to a sales rep at the firm which manufactured the windows for the narrowboat. (Fortunately they are still in business).
    As I was en route to Cheshire, the manager of the marina telephone me last Thursday morning to tell me that a kayak had blown off the roof of an adjoining boat and had smashed a window and damaged the frame. Fortunately the window is was double glazed and only the exterior pane has been smashed. The manufacturers don’t have a record of the original order so I hope my measurements are accurate enough for them to make a replacement without me having to fettle 5mm mild steel!!

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/3ad996b24d4b269199c5e386ce790c35ca05a8718f1e8b6719394c5728d24abf.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/e96d3b9c707fe9ff324f5d6a8b19c5007f09fe1429278db75cd097a4aae4ed6b.jpg

      1. Indeed along with the entire frame as the force of the impact smashed the two lock keeps on the inside of the frame.

          3. I would like to think so. They may choose to process the claim via their insurance or if they have a large voluntary excess may wish to settle direct.

          4. Hmmm. It is a condition that all motor vehicles are inured – but many are not… Just saying!

          5. I know: I’ve just come across the price list and it appears that the replacement is going to cost at least £550 (excluding delivery and VAT)!

          7. Providing I can get someone to hold the frame on the outside it is a relatively simple job to screw the clip on fixings to the inside of the hull. Fortunately the entire glass panes can be lifted out and slotted back in once the frame is secure.

          8. Would that be from a boat supplier? Are there alternative sources like caravan manufacturers?

          10. Can you just find a DG manufacturer who can make the insert for the existing frame (if it’s not damaged)?

      2. Kayaks tend to be very cold – you must have heard the expression “You can’t have your kayak and heat it”
        I’ll get my coat

      3. Kayaks tend to be very cold – you must have heard the expression “You can’t have your kayak and heat it”
        I’ll get my coat

  29. David Edwards letter regarding bumping into his neighbour whilst on holiday in Iran reminds me of when I was on detachment to Malaya, I was walking around Singapore when I bumped into an old schoolmate who had also joined the RAF at the same time as me. He was stationed at Tengah and I was up country at Kuantan. Needless to say we downed a few Tiger beers.

    1. I flew to Spain. Searched out a cocktail bar and there were a dozen women in a group from my home town. That was an expensive round of drinks !

    2. 381275+ up ticks,

      Morning FA,
      I was in a university in the centre of the Sahara the only white chap with pakistani labour and a long set of buzz bars, no support
      legs, had to be inventive.

      Buzz bars erected, I walked in to student packed canteen, one white head in view, the electrician, I said “I know you” to which he replied ” I know you too” understandable I suppose under the circumstances, we once shared a caravan on the Isle of Grain refinery back in the dark age.

      Another time I was on the balcony with king charlie and could hear the herd muttering who’s that with john.

    3. One of my niece’s was on a years working holiday in Oz.
      She was in a pub in the wayout town of Alice Springs.
      She got chatting to some English people on the next table and when she told them where she actually came from. One of the guys asked if she knew Reddy Eddy (not his real name) she replied yes he’s my uncle.
      It was Martin who had been One of my Aprentices.
      A few years earlier her father had bumped into one of his old Highgate school chums going through the rotating Hotel door in Hong-Kong.

      1. In the late 70s, I was on a four month exchange with the Kiwi Army. On day two after arrival, some of us decided to check out the local town, Papakura. We got a taxi which had just dropped someone off at the guardroom. I got in the passenger seat and asked the driver to take us down town.
        Driver: Where are you from?
        Me: We’re from the Pom army on exchange.
        Driver: Yes, I know that – whereabouts?
        Me: I’m from Birmingham.
        Driver: Yes I know – whereabouts in Birmingham?
        Me: Small Heath – XXXXXXXXXX Road
        Driver: So am I, number XXX.

        The first civvie I met in NZ was from the same road.. He’d been there since the 50s. He took us to the Returned Services Assn (Bit like the Legion) where we were admirably hosted.

        1. Amazing and also wonderful.
          My father in law was walking from our house towards the beach when we lived in Hunter Road Christie beach near Adelaide, he passed the time of day with a chap in his front garden.
          Found out that the guy use to own and run a shop in Burnt Oak Broadway near Edgware. My mother use to visit the shop quite often.

    4. In 1985 I sailed my boat Raua from Bermuda to the Azores. As all sailors who arrive in Horta do we went to Peter Azevido’s Café Sport.

      One of my crew was called Jeremy and in the crowded bar I had just bought a round of drinks and I called out “Jeremy, please give me a hand carrying these?” To my astonishment another Jeremy, Jeremy Taylor – the satirical song writer* and performer – turned round and said: “Hello, Richard.” We had not met since he had come to stay with me in Devon when I was teaching in Bideford and he was playing a gig at Exeter University in 1977.

      Jeremy’s third wife, Sandra Prinsloo, was a South African film star who had a very grand 60′ sailing boat. She and Jeremy had arrived in
      Horta that morning having sailed non-stop from Capetown. Jeremy was flying to Lisbon the following day. A tiny island in the middle of the Atlantic – and they say Thomas Hardy’s novels contain too may coincidences!

      (* Red Velvet Steering Wheel Cover Driver, Jobsworth, Ag Pleez Deddy, The Belle of Barnstaple, etc)

        1. One of the worst driving hazards know n to man – they should be illegal (the dangly things not the dogs)

  30. David Noble 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿
    @DavidPNoble63

    70% of the earth is water and virtually none of it is carbonated.
    So the earth is, in fact, flat.

    1. Well it soon will be with all the rain we’ve been having (and the resulting erosion!).

  31. Interesting post from Twitt, from a conservative ex muslim. I like his definition of good times (point nr 20), have not come across that before.

    Momus Najmi
    @theworldofmomus
    Some truths as I hold them to be:

    1. Islam is not a religion of peace, neither a friend of the West. It needs to be regulated and monitored. And it is the responsibility of the moderate Muslims to reform the religion to maximise co-existence and minimize conflict.☪️

    2. Communism and all its further derivations are anti-West. The subcategories are just a distraction while the end goal largely remains the same.❌

    3. Slavery was not invented by white people, but it sure as hell was ended by white British people. 🇬🇧

    4. There are only two genders, men and women. Anything else is a mental disorder that should be treated with maximum kindness but not affirmed as normal. ♂️♀️

    5. Everything after LGB is not a sexual preference, but varying forms of mental disorders that again need to be treated and not affirmed. 🏳️‍🌈

    6. Stable family units are vital for building and sustaining strong everlasting societies. 👨‍👩‍👧

    7. You cannot be equally loyal to 2 different Kings/Nations at the same time. 👑

    8. Immigration is not a right, but a privilege, that a community/society/nation affords unto worthy applicants.🧳

    9. Death penalties, capital punishments, are imperative to maintaining a civilised society. For extreme cases only, proven without any doubt. The highest of crimes deserve the highest of deterrence. It used to be, almost certain death, by exile but in today’s world that would be just an opportunity to commit similar crimes in another society. 👨‍⚖️

    10. Deportation of citizens or immigrants for whatever reason is the right of a collective society and nation. Those reasons in a civilised society should be reasoned and justified well – but the right must remain with the nation to be exercised. 🛄

    11. A nation without full sovereignty over all its affairs is not a nation but a vassal state of another. 🗽

    12. Science is the process of constant doubt and discovery. Any deviation from this core principle makes it invalid as a discipline. 🧑‍🔬

    13. Incentives without effort makes people weak. 💰

    14. Knowledge is meaningless without application. 🧠

    15. Marriage is hard but Love is easy. That union between two, has no place for overriding egos. The more you let love guide you through the hard parts, the easier marriage becomes. 💕

    16. God is neither alive nor dead. God is the unknown. For now. Leaning either way without definitive proof beyond circumstantial reasoning, is a folly. This relationship with the unknown is a personal journey for each to travel and it is best kept at personal. ⛪️

    17. Change in inevitable, more of a constant than death. The highest quality for survival is adaptation. Accepting change as an inevitable occurrence makes you forecast with purpose and build an adaptive mindset. 🏃‍♂️

    18. You do not negotiate with terrorists. Chaos does not listen to reason, it only wishes to maximise mayhem. You deal with it in the language it speaks. Violence is not a vice when used with reason and without prejudice.🔫

    19. The more there is technology in warfare, the more easy it becomes to devalue life and detachment from consequences. This is a mistake that will only keep on maximising human suffering till there is none left.🪖

    20. Good times are not the absence of adversity, that only results in bringing back hard times. Good times should be better defined as times when the majority of populace have the means and ability to deal with adversity. And that is the good times that we should aim for on a societal level. 💪

    I am not looking for debate but rather stating some of the truths that I have concluded thus far in my head, after years of pondering. Hope you find them useful.

    3. “16. God is neither alive nor dead. God is the unknown. For now. Leaning either way without definitive proof beyond circumstantial reasoning, is a folly. This relationship with the unknown is a personal journey for each to travel and it is best kept at personal.
      That’s why it’s called faith.

    4. The problem with #1 is that Islam has had its reformation and it is Wahhabism and ISIS.

  32. Morning all 🙂😊
    Brightness at last.
    Of course inexperienced drivers with a P Plate on display front and back should be more easily identifiable.
    As should those who have obviously never read the Highway Code, hold a UK licence nor passed a driving test in the UK. Oh hang on…….delivery pending.

  33. “I always take Mrs N morning tea in my pyjamas. But is she grateful? No, she says she’d rather have it in a cup.”

    2. He is balding, bearded and corpulent and does not look at all like a 16 year old.

      Is he not by chance an illegal immigrant who is really a 36 year old pretending to be a 16 year old?

  35. Is this type of financial arrangement one reason why writing to your MP on issues supported by bodies outside of Parliament is sometimes a waste of time?

    Almost half the Conservative Party’s backbench MPs in the British Parliament belong to a Caucus promoting extreme Net Zero ideas that is funded by a small group of green billionaire foundations. The Conservative Environment Network (CEN), which acts mostly as a lobby group,…

    The following reads like bullshit for bullshit’s sake:

    It is noted by CEN that when Russia invaded Ukraine “we helped promote the narrative that reducing dependency on fossil fuels through renewable energy and insulation would help defeat Putin”.

    The author of the article wasn’t impressed:

    Quite how fossil fuel dependency is reduced by intermittent renewables that rely on back-up hydrocarbons is not immediately clear. It’s unlikely that Putin quaked in his boots at the thought of the widespread mobilisation of loft insulators in the U.K.

    The Daily Sceptics’ article is here

    1. “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.”

    2. “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.”

  37. Some good one-liners here today! Johnny Norfolk and BB2 showing hitherto unknown talents!
    😀
    Maybe we can collect them and publish a NoTTL joke book?

    2. Glad you appreciate the jokes, but I didn’t think them up! The two lines at the top are the nickname and twitter handle of the original posters on Twitter.

    3. The same UN that elected Saudi Arabia to a Women’s Rights Commission has appointed a man as a UN Women UK champion. Are we surprised?

  40. For the benefit of the RAF Benevolent Fund here’s a heart-warming story of how things used to be in the RAF.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/826e8808c62e5734882ce93e75c014361fe96ac787f75a182d159256b0ce495a.png

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/christmas/2024/01/02/colin-mcfarlane-racism-raf-benevolent-fund-charity-appeal/

    I’ll leave aside the bit about Colin’s father “helping Britain get back on its feet after WW2”. In essence what he says was true in my years in the RAF. I knew several non-white brother officers/pilots who were successful but the reason they succeeded was because they were well integrated and assimilated into British life. They had also proved themselves in that most taxing and unforgiving of trades, that of the fighter pilot. They joined in the banter caring nothing for jests about their skin tones and giving as good as they got, especially at Happy Hour/TGIF in the Officers’ Mess at the end of the week. One went by the nickname ‘Roots’ another was known as the “swarthy little Indian git”. It was in the same vein as the joshing between, ‘Jocks’, ‘Taffs’, ‘Paddies’ and English b*st*rds. All taken in good spirit. Of course, this was in the years when Britain’s population was still 95% white if not exactly entirely white British.

    I had also played rugby with several non-white fellows in my teens and twenties. Further back in my childhood we had spent 3 years in Ceylon when my RAF officer/pilot father was posted there. We lived in a colonial style bungalow with an Indian cook who was a Hindu, a Tamil house boy who was a buddhist and a nanny who was a mixed-race Sinhalese Catholic (Portuguese roots?).

    Thus most of my life I have had an attitude towards race that I would sum as not caring a stuff about someone’s colour, width of nose or cast of eye. Beliefs, attitudes and behaviour were another matter, however.

    It is unfortunate that the RAF Benevolent Fund has chosen to highlight a story focussing on a family of Jamaican origin thus showing that it too has succumbed to wokery

    “The RAF, which prides itself on inclusion and diversity today, was in many ways a refuge for Sidney”.

    It’s a pity ithe same RAF couldn’t find the space today for over a hundred young white British men who were overlooked in the 2022 racist recruitment scandal under the DIE drive of the then CAS, ACM Sir ‘Mike’ Wigston. I doubt that I, a former Harrier and Tornado pilot, would find a place in it today. My father, a WW2 bomber pilot who continued to serve for another 15 years after the war, certainly wouldn’t. Wrong attitudes, you see.

    Today all is changed, changed utterly.

      1. Some of us natives would like to be protected from racism today, irrespective of armed forces service.

    2. One of my mates when I was stationed in Germany in the early 60’s was the son of a Jamaican immigrant and although his first name was Calum (he was actually born in Glasgow) he insisted he was called Sambo. He used to talk like a West Indian at times but with a Glaswegian accent – a great guy

    3. I have a personal list of heroes. One is/was a physicist & mathematician called Freeman Dyson. As a youngster in WWII he worked in Operational Research. He calculated that a Lancaster bomber’s chances of safe return could be improved by removing two gun turrets and two airgunners and by carrying a smaller bomb load. Result: 50mph (or knots, I suppose) faster, and possibly a greater range. The design change could have saved thousands of aircrew, but he couldn’t get the idea past his superior. Edited.

      1. I once read a paper on line which said that if more resources had been put into building Mosquitos instead of Lancasters, the bombing would have been more accurate with fewer losses.

  41. Folks thanks for your help and advice regarding the pending parking fine I managed to get a response from their Head office. It seems my appeal is pending and I have a feeling is will be accepted. But if not as TVs Mr Money Martin Lewis suggest on his website, the parking charge notice is merely and invoice. Or of course the three ladies on Rip Off Britain. We will see what happens.
    Thanks again for your help. Cuppa coffee time now 🙂☕

    1. Lewis is right – they are a speculative invoice, not a fine, which can only be issued by a court.

    2. I often walked through Bournville park when at Bourneville College on the green, for some lessons at South Brum Poly on Bristol Road.

  43. On Saturday we had a mail delivery. Included was one for me. It contained my new bus pass – till 24 Dec 2028. I did not have to apply or phone and wait while my “important” call was in a queue. It just came, automatically.

    Why cannot other organisations be as efficient? No – don’t answer….

    2. I have one, but until recently didn’t realise I could use it in London. There was me, funding Khan for three years.

  44. A new year – it’s 2024. Can anyone else remember the common problem of writing cheques early in the new year and writing in the year just passed? Cheque books seem to be almost gone now.

      1. I’ve just looked at the counterfoils in my cheque book and every one is for Alzheimers Scotland – I may as well do bank transfers which will save me the stamp

    2. My brother would still prefer to give me cheques when he is paying back any money he owes, but I am gradually changing that habit to cash. He refuses to use internet banking of any description – probably entirely wise, given his extreme lack of tech ability and aptitude.

      1. The French still use cheques, particularly at supermarket checkouts. France runs on bits of paper.
        Does anyone remember when cheques carried ‘stamp duty’?

        1. Don’t remind me. The hours one spent behind little old ladies searching for their chequebooks….

    3. I still use cheques. Just haven’t written one this year yet (I’m waiting for one written last year to be cashed).

  45. How to solve the Doverista problem

    Cut out the middle-persons.

    Recruit French men/women/its’, who live in the Calais area, into the Border Farce.

    Working from home, which appears to be now the compulsory norm for our Snivel serpents, they can issue Visas, on
    block, to those organising and running the Channel crossings.

    The boats can then run ashore at Dover,

    passengers unloaded,

    Visas Shown

    Passengers then directed to coaches:

    which will take them directly to the 4* Hotel:

    selected by them, before they boarded the boat in France.

    When all hotels full, elderly Brits living alone will be evicted from their home and the visitors housed.

    Cost of gas, electricity, water, Council Tax, mortgage, house maintenance etc will still be the by the evicted resident.

    Fixed

  46. 381275+ up ticks,

    The brexit party post referendum = tory (ino) party, the reform party, post brexit party, post referendum = the tory (ino) party
    It is only too clear to see but, any odious political group that carries the party name or any actions that show them to be of the same ilk, no matter the policy content as witnessed ,will suffice.

    Politics latest news: Farage ‘assessing’ return to front-line politics

    1. No surprise – it’s in his ‘culture’ to be such a vile savage. Cut off his tackle and relevant innards, neuter his urges. Then place him on a regular prison wing where fellow inmates can carry out proper punishments. He’ll be out in 7 years to carry on where he left off. Such dangerous sub-humans, whatever their effnic background, are not capable of reform.
      Why on earth was he released just because he wouldn’t say anything? Useless plod had the evidence.

    1. He is a lying toad. Does anyone believe this rubbish?

      We are all living longer. How can meat and dairy be so wicked to consume? This fills me with rage. TPTB are utterly determined to st.arve or freeze us to death asap.

    2. On 18 October 2017, Tedros announced that he had chosen President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe to serve as a WHO Goodwill Ambassador to help tackle non-communicable diseases for Africa. He said Zimbabwe was “a country that places universal health coverage and health promotion at the centre of its policies to provide health care to all.” WIKIPEDIA.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tedros_Adhanom_Ghebreyesus

      2. Mugabe was a murdering POS, he killed thousand’s because he knew they would never vote for him.

        1. POS is far, far too mild, Eddy.
          I admire your brevity and ability to moderate yourself.

          1. I was only being polite Obs.
            You should hear me and Bruce on the phone. The air is blue.
            We just hope people are eaves dropping.

  49. Afternoon All

    “Who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.”

    Junk history is miring a generation in ignorance

    Children are being taught nonsense masquerading as facts as part of a push for more ‘inclusive’ schooling

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/01/03/junk-history-miring-generation-in-ignorance/

    Medley

    http://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/b12fe6b26f975ce4faf746fa2a5e51095d2047f986520fc64fe758b42ba5793f.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/8369d47964ba3b68fc5379708dffd5442bd4659a8280b2cd1c247f3edfd756b6.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/0813650249fb362512cdd724616c481f29b1b28356c61a3e2ca3fe5000ee3620.png

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/3883bc4701570bf93fcf28311a413644fc979434f768e637ae5b0f3179249b1c.jpg

    1. “Such claims aren’t just false but reductive; if the word ‘black’ is used to refer to anything ‘non-white’, it erases a host of histories and experiences in the process. Talk about cultural appropriation.”

      It wasn’t so long ago that ‘black’ was used here to describe anyone who wasn’t a white ancestral Briton and was considered offensive by all of them – black people who ‘owned’ blackness and immigrants who weren’t black.

    3. That post office shite was featured in many Private Eye editions, back in the days they were interesting. It’s been going on for years. I hope the wrongly convicted take out prosecutions againt the PO and the CEO personally for lost earnings, damage to repuattion and anything else they can think of.
      What bastards. Burn the HQ down.

  50. BTL Observation…..

    “We are becoming a high-population-density Cuba with rain”………

  51. ‘At least 70 killed’ in explosions near tomb of Iranian Guards commander Qassem Soleimani during ceremony. 3 January 2024.

    Local officials say more than 70 people have been killed at a cemetery in Iran where a ceremony was being held to mark the 2020 assassination of Iran’s top commander Qassem Soleimani, the Reuters news agency has reported.

    This is all cooking up nicely.

    https://news.sky.com/story/at-least-20-killed-in-explosions-near-tomb-of-iranian-guards-commander-qassem-soleimani-during-ceremony-13041479

    2. It will be interesting to hear if anyone important to Israel as a target was amongst the victims.

      1. Afternoon Sos. One would assume that someone would be there. Soleimani was an establishment figure. There is a domestic anti-clerical terrorist agency financed by the US and Israel. It could be a provocation to encourage Iran to attack Israel thus justifying a war. The truth is not really important. It is how it is percieved. I think that Israel wants a war. Whether they are responsible is a moot point.

        1. If Biden goes ahead with his confiscations and actually passes the cash to Ukraine they might well get a bigger one than they hoped for.
          It will be a horrible irony if it does kick off, West’s supplies have been swallowed by Ukraine and Iranian Islam triumphs across the ME.

          2. It’s more instinct than reasoning but it looks to me as if we are creeping toward Armageddon.

          3. When it happens, it’ll go quickly.
            Bought Iodine pills last week. Can’t be too careful.

          5. It is a good idea to have iodine pills in stock. I bought some a few years ago. Don’t trust the ones that the govt will issue if they tell us that a nuclear cloud is heading our way.

          7. I don’t know, I just went to the chemist and asked for iodine pills for radiation! If they express unwanted opinions, you can always say that you want them in your emergency travel kit for going to eastern Europe.
            You have to look up how many to take for body weight, write it down and keep it with the pills. Also, I read that you have to take them at the right moment.

            A couple of years ago I suddenly woke up to another possible mass medication event, and don’t want to take part in it, should it happen!!

          8. Yes, you are right – never trust any government bearing gifts! It had crossed my mind, too, from time to time, that it would be an opportunity for mass medication – and if this ‘happened’ in the middle east, how would we know whether it was a true event or not?

            I have ordered some potassium iodine tablets from Amazon (600 packs in people’s baskets! And 300 at some more I looked at!). A good idea to write down the dosage and keep it with the tabs, under the circumstances we envisage there will most likely be no internet. I have also ordered some water purification tablets.

            Thank you!

  53. That’s getting a bit bloody frustrating!
    Went out to recommence firewood sawing etc. operations because the rain had paused or slackened off to very light and each time it’s restarted or intensified within minutes.
    I have got a bit done, but my overalls are now wet. At least there’s a decent amount waiting to be split and stacked.

    We had a stream running down the Via Gellia last night. Immediately before the stream is culverted to go under the old colour works up the road, there is a grid to stop washed down detritus from being washed into the culver and blocking it.
    This was choked and diverting a large amount of the water out onto the road. By the time I’d walked up to see what was happening the flow had eased off but there was still a lot of water bypassing the culvert and flooding the road.

    Looking onto the blocked grid:-
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/5d859f8a8f0ef26bd5d6a7ee3206287c3eb954239e98bde18bb372961c63c37d.jpg

    The water bypassing the culvert coming onto the road:-
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/18fc04b973c834e4da7e79674ad85d86563ce5a51a2c1fcd2732d904566e5705.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/1e2d68e1f92a78a9cb85c26a08916bca252813105c3b0dfa15d792ae9310148d.jpg

    Tarmac surface of the pavement ripped up by the flood:-
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/f71159835be20f75cbdee0fe00313f8b754581d2c642836a4e94d0fcdd7c89ac.jpg

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/6beb8d869c634b20bc49b0bb4e34b9543630962851a38db768aff0f6d1f1df22.jpg

    Not the worst muppet I saw going through the flooded section:- https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/986acccef2b4c02449168c338cf72448997949af4d2c5aa55b6b68102c35203a.jpg

      1. It’s paid £298.00 monthly council tax. Tried to cross the Stour by bridge at Stoke by Clare, flooded, reversed trying to avoid masses of old ivy and branches felled by winds. Managed to get to Tesco in Haverhill avoiding great potholes and crushed verges by alternative route.

        Verges have been destroyed by heavy straw lorries and tankers containing digestate slurry delivering to a farm slurry lake in adjacent village of Ovington.

        This country is a mess, ditches not cleared or maintained, rivers not maintained, neglect everywhere. This after a 7 hour power outage last night and early morning.

        1. Was told this morning that one of the arches of the bridge over the Dee at Bangor is blocked by debris, meaning the others are doing all the work and reducing the flow.

    2. Do you split logs with an axe or a hydraulic splitter, Bob?
      Or, better still, do you have a tractor-mounted PTO driven circular saw and splitter machine, as does Firstborn’s neighbour? What a machine!

        1. A flattish blade, or a wedge-shaped one with the back suited for hammering?
          I love Fiskars gear, me.

        2. Years ago we would visit the East of England Show. One of the displays was a competition between New Zealand Axe Team and a team using chainsaws.

          The Axe Team always won. I studied their shiny axes. The head was in two pieces with the sharpened blade screwed to the head proper. Handles were obligatory Hickory.

          1. Mine isn’t a felling axe, it’s a splitting one.
            Still sharp, but a much wider angle behind the edge.

      1. I’ve just had a friend ring me up to suggest going out on Friday. We went through the roads and flooding and concluded that there is nowhere we can go that doesn’t involve driving through flood waters!

  54. I suppose sending undesirables to Australia is a bit out of date now….
    Not sure I agree with the last two lines; I doubt any African country will want people with a proven record of producing Hamas. Just to be blunt.
    It is a mess with more than a whiff of Suez about it.

    Arnaud Bertrand
    @RnaudBertrand
    This is absolutely crazy: Times of Israel reports that “Israeli officials have held clandestine talks with the African nation of Congo and several others for the potential acceptance of Gaza emigrants”
    https://timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/israeli-officials-said-in-talks-with-congo-others-on-taking-in-gaza-emigrants/

    They justify it by quoting Intelligence Minister Gila Gamliel saying at the Knesset yesterday: “At the end of the war Hamas rule will collapse, there are no municipal authorities, the civilian population will be entirely dependent on humanitarian aid. There will be no work, and 60% of Gaza’s agricultural land will become security buffer zones.”

    In other words as is becoming extremely clear Israel is trying to establish a fait-accompli where Gaza is absolutely unlivable and thereby needs to be ethnically cleansed… And because no Arab country wants to be an accomplice of this crime, they’re now trying to send the Palestinians to some of the poorest countries in Africa, hoping I imagine to be able to pay them off for this. I however suspect it won’t be this easy: any African country that accepts this deal will become a pariah in the global South (and the country’s ruler will also likely be hated by their own population)…

    3. 1 Release the hostages.

      2 Surrender unconditionally.
      Not too difficult to understand, even for baby-burning gang rapists who kill dogs and pets.

  55. Dark humour
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/0f9cc88555b3d1b51d4263d3665deef2b46305b6146cb229970030fa6140ab11.jpg

    Dark-skinned humour, following the resignation of the president of harvard in the US after she was found to have plaigerised darnred squigglescopied academic work that she claimed was her own.
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/1fb0a59f736ff375debb6fd5ee02fb66b55a1753e029bf1492ed9a0e8d9a89e2.jpg

    Better put a spoiler on this one for Grizzly…
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/75bc5319f0433624057aa643a1e875ee3204379a4c93bb909e8270c6acdb9766.jpg

      1. Too many enemies.
        And I suspect that she’s not quite as whiter than white as she’s painted

      1. It would at the very least suggest that there is something so repellent about Benedict to Francis that he can’t bear to have any evidence of him in his sight. (the Vatican is a very spiritual place)
        I believe that Benedict was a good man, so what that says about Francis…

        Alternatively, it could be the start of an attempt to expunge Benedict completely from Vatican history – which would also expunge the dirty tricks that they used to get him to stand down. Is that possible? over a long time, and in a small, claustrophobic community like the Vatican, I’d say yes

  59. Shoplifting couple who terrorised market town jailed. 3 January 2024.

    Scott McSpadden and Tanya Momot, who are already banned from entering shops together, stole hundreds of pounds worth of alcohol and hair straighteners from two major stores.

    The couple have a combined total of 120 criminal offences against their names, including 60 thefts, and were already subject to Criminal Behaviour Orders (CBOs), but they had, until now, escaped jail.

    TOP COMMENT BELOW THE LINE.

    Colm McQuarrie.

    This pair of parasites deserve to be sent down for ten years, if only to give the rest of us a break. In the end, the fault lies with the wasters in Westminster who make the laws and, the activists on the bench, who think they’re there to signal their enlightened, elite munificence. The soft soap approach has failed, badly. Time for a reset.

    I just give a wry smile at this. It’s not left to me or this pair would never dream of stealing anything ever again. We live in a society that has completely lost its way. It no longer knows right from wrong or good from bad. It is necessary just to endure and try to prevent yourself from becoming a victim of it.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/01/02/shoplifting-couple-who-terrorised-market-town-jailed/?li_source=LI&li_medium=for_you

    1. Now, if we had Sharia law, it has a simple solution to prevent shoplifting.

      Theft (stealing in secret) is punished by the amputation of the *offender’s right hand, and armed or highway robbery may be punished by execution, crucifixion, or amputation of hands and feet from opposite sides of the body,depending on the severity of the offense.

      * Which means, they eat using the hand that they use to wipe their ass with

    2. Now, if we had Sharia law, it has a simple solution to prevent shoplifting.

      Theft (stealing in secret) is punished by the amputation of the *offender’s right hand, and armed or highway robbery may be punished by execution, crucifixion, or amputation of hands and feet from opposite sides of the body,depending on the severity of the offense.

      * Which means, they eat using the hand that they use to wipe their ass with

    3. I’d slightly disagree there. It’s not that society no longer knows right from wrong; the majority of us do. It’s that those running society no longer care and have screwed up our systems of justice and accountability. And we ourselves are prevented from enforcing the law, on punishment by said law. We legally have the right to self-defence. Try using that now if you get into bother. The police would rather prosecute you than the perpetrator(s).

      1. A lot of brainwashed youth seem to have no concept of right or wrong any more. It’s been replaced with things like “All white people are evil.”

        1. Perhaps. The problem is counting them, as a percentage. It’s easy to find the most egregious examples of wokery and post them all over the Web, as though they represent the majority. But do they? Even polls I do not trust. What 16-year-old has confidence and presence these days, and is prepared to say what he really thinks? Not many! Even grown adults are averse to telling the truth in public now. I’m not so sure that things are quite as bad as portrayed.

          1. The mere fact that people are now so cowed that they dare not speak about what they really believe, rather suggests that the woke are winning.

          4. I’m getting away with it at the pub, and I’m really not alone. My good friend and neighbour and lifelong (left wing) teacher has admitted to me he thinks that vaccinations, generally, have screwed up generations of children. Have we ever had so many youngsters on anti-depressants and who are on the so-called autistic spectrum?

          6. Call it what it is – mental illness and stop saying they are suffering from mental ‘health’ and they might not attach themselves to the label quite so readily.

          7. They are not attaching the label to themselves, they are being labelled. How many on this forum had 3 or 4 kids in their classroom who would throw wobbly fits, scream and swear at their teacher? I appreciate that discipline has gone by the board as well.

          8. I think a large % of non white people have swallowed the anti-white stuff, which is worrying. It’s a classic preparation for a genocide.

          9. I’m sure a large percentage of the ones we’ve allowed to settle here already hated us. I don’t think they watch the MSM.

          10. I think a lot of ‘white people’ have swallowed the anti-white stuff, which is even more worrying.

          12. I agree that we are being brainwashed into believing we are the minority and that it ain’t so, yet.

  60. A slow Par Four!

    Wordle 928 4/6
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      1. I think I’m getting slower since Christmas…another five.
        Wordle 928 5/6

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        1. Even I managed a par
          Wordle 928 4/6

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    2. I’m happy with a par four!

      Wordle 928 4/6

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    3. Metoo.

      Wordle 928 4/6

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          3. Skål! is Swedish; Slàinte is Irish Gaelic; Slàinte Mhath is Scots Gaelic? Or summat!

    2. Certainly, Rattus norvegicus, becomes less cautious when the temperature drops and food is hard to come by.

  62. I remember a time when Britain was concerned about ‘paying its way in the World’. Success or otherwise was measured monthly in terms of the National Balance of Payments accounts (both visibles and invisibles). For the past couple of decades this concern seems to have dropped out of the National Psyche as, whenever scant attention is given to the BoP results, if I remember correctly the value of imports has far exceeded the value of our exports. As a result the countries we have been importing goods from have accumulated squillions of £sterling. You may wonder what have they bought with all those £££££… Here’s a Sample:

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/3d122a357ce95935dba08e0f31f0de3822b00e041b8336fff9431bead5a0c10a.png

    S. BSc (Econ)

    1. I remember when budgets used to refer to M0 and M1 (the supply of money in circulation). That has dropped off the radar in favour of “press the print button”.

        1. The whole thing is very odd.
          I think it’s merely supposed to show how loved he was.

          RIP.

          1. Well, it doesn’t quite send that message. Perhaps it’s me…
            (There you go, sos! Another open goal!)

        2. Perhaps the media are trying to suggest he was gay. And that resulted in the attack.

          2. It supose it all depends on who is now running our media.
            All the MSM seems to dislike the long established basic British culture.

          3. …… so not ‘racially motivated’ then, if he was gay. Actually, if that is the case, then it was.

    2. It’s just another well practiced form of hiding the truth and lying to avoid and cover up their responsibilities.

    1. Well done to those farmers, truckers and whoever else joins in, though I won’t hold my breath waiting for reports of this to appear in the msm.

    2. All eyes on the next German election, whenever that is? I can foresee a result similar to the Netherlands.

  65. That’s me gone. The MR is off to her Keep Fit class – so I shall relax by the stove. Cats slumber.

    Market tomorrow – first this year. It’ll be good to catch up with the regular stall-holders.

    Have a spiffing evening.

    A demain.

    1. I wish my PCs were aslumber. They’re zooming all around the house and it’s a pretty small house so they whiz past every five seconds.

      1. Are they wearing their tacketty boots? Ours galumph about in theirs during the night!

  66. 381275+ up ticks,

    What’s this, listen here, you cannot have a party split before they openly adhere

    Politics latest news: Reform UK rules out election pact with Tories

  67. Birdie three today

    Wordle 928 3/6

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  68. ‘Night all

    Silence is golden………..for the convid criminals

    https://twitter.com/KTHopkins/status/1742493981026419163

    https://twitter.com/goodfoodgal/status/1742490576447254759

    https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGISbTSWdVVhD3BcvyAK542YvBjO66uCekmn2GFJrs_wv_aF90Mu7jZyevY6RbbH6DdP_oR9LTvzX2qKZAIuqgDXsR_AW2HjcthgaGir5UJpXegAYUX2WoDilguMXSpuBTTphTL6JKhltdR_bGl4mHa7OVKdz5-QVvKwIzpl4A4w9iEVMjghbVQ7FA/s960/OneMonth.jpg

    http://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/c7edb533d45a561780dd6b1916ce1dbfb87392bff08084e343e60e1c56d1edc6.jpg

    1. 381275+ up ticks,

      O2O,

      anthony charlie lynton
      AKA, the creature that crept out of the park public crapper.

  70. Steak and Kidney on the first
    Mushroom and Chicken on the second
    Cheese and Onion today

    This pie January malarkey is going to be a cinch, I can’t think why people make so much fuss about it every year

    1. I can’t see it myself, the Arabs have been fighting among themselves for longer than us and the French

      1. As long as it exists there will always be war between it and that which is not subjugated.

    2. Islam isn’t at peace with itself – in the same way Christianity was always fighting itself in the recent past.

    3. One could argue the problem is religion. But religion is, itself just an excuse to avoid confronting more frightening issues.

      However we live in a society where the Church is trying to talk about social issues in an attempt to be modern and ‘relevant’ while forgetting that the point of faith is to be unchanging and consistent.

      Conversely, governments are desperate to replace rational thought and critical thinking with blind faith and proscriptive ideology. The attitude is the same: keep the masses ignorant, keep them frightened (constant rhetoric of conflict and media deceit, viruses, scare about health), then there’s the slogans – diversity strength! climate change, the science is settled all to reinforce the lies. Heck they even have ‘fact checkers’, a role that didn’t exist until big government decided to lie continually.

      The problem isn’t really muslims, government or religion. Its the desperation of a minority desperate for power over others for money, status (which is really just money) or just power.

      Remember O’Brien’s speech about power in 1984? It is solely about controlling others for no other reason than to be able to.

      Only when that power is refused, when it can no longer ever be applied will conflict stop because the people desperate for it can no longer set A against B for their own ego.

      1. I would suggest that the problem is an ideology which tells its adherents they are superior to non-believers and advocates that said unbelievers be killed. An ideology which is intolerant and inflexible in that it cannot be interpreted.

        1. Islam is merely one example of a deep-seated human relish for forcing others to do what they do not want. Green ideology works along similar lines. The ostensible reason is to save the planet and its various life forms. What its adherents will not admit to is the thrill of forcing and depriving others.

  72. Evening, all. Restrictions for those who hadn’t taken a British driving test would make the roads safer, too.

    1. There is, up to a point. They can drive on their home licence for up to a year. If they have done nothing else, they then apply for a PROVISIONAL UK licence and have to take the theory and practical tests. Not perfect, but something.

      1. I was thinking more of those who have had someone else take their test for them 🙂 Not to mention the Polish lorry drivers who can’t read our road signs.

      2. Surely, as long as you display L Plates, you can continue to drive on a provisional licence.

        1. You can, but you should also have a supervising holder of a full licence with you. I’m not sure if a holder of a foreign licence counts.

      2. Sometimes in France it also lists the “disparus” (disappeared) who presumably were shipped off to Germany and never heard of again.

          1. I don’t think we did, either; it was just a propaganda campaign to get people to give up their pots and pans and feel they were doing something for the war effort (although those who clubbed together to buy a Spitfire did rather better).

  74. I’m watching Digging for Britain. What is it about archaeologists and digging up graves? Why can’t they leave a body in its it’s resting place?

    Is there a law on how old a burial must be before they’re allowed to do this?

    2. I think if they are digging and they find human remains they have to call in specialists and notify the coroner.

    3. Well over here they cannot exhumed a supposed grave until the first nations mob have received several years worth of reconciliation (money) from whitey.

    4. Did you know women make the best archaeologists because they are so good at digging up the past 😂

  77. Well, that’s another day ended, chums. Good night to you all, sleep well and I hope to see you all tomorrow. Bonne Nuit (French for Toodle Pip).

  78. Oh goodie, Trudeau is offering to take up to one thousand refugees from Gaza.

    That’ll help calm tempers at the weekly pro hamas demonstrations / riots.

  80. Britain is forgetting what it means to be a successful, dynamic country

    The costs of the collapse in economic growth are clear, but we’re becoming scarily used to decline and decay

    DAVID FROST • 3 January 2024 • 7:00pm

    Not many things are certain about 2024, but one thing is: we will be living beyond our means as a country.

    Most of us will have travelled around more than usual over Christmas. We’ll have grappled with the trains, inched your way over potholes, seen our shabby public spaces. NHS queues keep growing. Councils continue to go bust. We need to spend more on defence. The strains are clear, the demands are constantly expanding, we are overspending by more than £100 billion every year, yet the country seems to feel worse not better.

    Of course, Labour and the unions say the brutal Conservative Government is to blame. This absurdity need not detain us: taxation is the highest it has been since the war, and (to take just one example) only five countries spend more than we do on health as a share of GDP.

    Indeed, the successive shocks of the banking crash in 2008 and the pandemic in 2020 have jolted public spending to unprecedentedly high levels. In the 30 years before the financial crisis, governments spent on average around 37-38 per cent of GDP. It’s now settling at 44-45 per cent, a mere £1.1 trillion in 2021.

    So, given that we are spending so much, why do things constantly feel under such strain? The first reason is that a large proportion of the money goes on a small number of things. A third of it goes on benefits of one kind or another, and over half of that on the state pension. Another third goes on health and education. The remaining third has to pay for everything else we want.

    Still, you might think, £300 billion-plus ought to be enough to buy a lot of stuff. But because so much else is protected in real terms, this part of the national budget gets squeezed over time, because we can’t raise taxes any further and the deficit can’t be allowed to grow even more.

    The only solution to this problem is economic growth – and that’s the real difficulty. We have got used to thinking of ourselves as a successful, growing economy and to wanting to spend on ourselves accordingly. The demands for more spending continually increase, even it seems among some esteemed Telegraph readers, to judge by the recent suggestions on the letters page that we need an entirely new driving test system for the nearly 10 million people aged over 70.

    The problem is that we aren’t a successful economy. In the 1980s and 1990s we grew at 2.3 per cent per year per person, according to the ONS. Not amazing, but not bad: incomes doubled in 30 years, and for every £100 we earned in 1980, we earned £157, two thirds more, by 2000. But since 2000, we have grown at under half that, by 1.1 per cent per head. Then, £100 in 2000 grows to only £124 by 2020, and it takes more than 60 years to double our income.

    We aren’t unusual in Europe in this regard. Per capita we have outgrown France, and indeed the Eurozone countries as a whole, in every decade since the 1980s. Only in the 2010s did even Germany grow faster than us, a reminder of just how good the euro has been for Germans, and how bad for everyone else forced to suffer its yoke.

    There’s a new fashionable idea in Lefto-green circles – “degrowth”, shrinking the economy, minimising our “burden” on the planet, disdaining consumerism, and living with less “stuff”. Well, we are getting a sense of what that might feel like.

    It means a shabby country, poor public services, and lots of social conflict and strikes. It means transport that doesn’t work and health systems under strain with increased excess deaths every year. It means never really feeling better off, and preferring to put our feet up rather than work because, after all, we can’t improve ourselves by our own efforts anyway.

    I prefer growth. Even just an extra 1 per cent growth last year would have brought in about £10 billion in additional tax revenue. Meeting the junior doctors’ pay claim in full would cost about £2 billion. You can see why getting growth up is so powerful a tool.

    But of course it is not only, or even primarily, about public spending. It is about giving each of us more power over our own lives. If the economy is growing, there are more jobs. If markets work better, prices fall over time and output expands. We all get better off.

    Yes, we can be consumerists and spend it on a gadget from Amazon, but we can also spend it on travel, the latest healthcare, improving our skills, or on our own family. Our growing wealth means we spend less on benefits and pensions. The country gets into a virtuous circle of gradually falling taxation and spending that boosts growth still further.

    The problem is that getting on to this virtuous circle is disruptive. Far too much policy – take just housing, energy and net zero, or transport – is currently anti-market and, whoever wins the general election this year, there is not much sign of it getting any better.

    That has to change, and to do that we must get markets to work. That means reducing regulation, planning, environmental paperwork, and yes, dare I say it, employment rights. It means building houses and encouraging investment. It means further opening our markets to the rest of the world, whether we have trade deals or not. And it means allowing unproductive businesses to close so that their resources can be used more effectively elsewhere. That way we become a dynamic, growing, society once again.

    Many things worry me about Britain, but among the most troubling is that we may have forgotten what it is like to live in that kind of dynamic society. Most societies in world history have not been dynamic. To a large extent, people died as they were born and did not see much change in their lives. That changed in the 19th century and this country led the way.

    Prince Tancredi, in Tomasi’s classic Italian novel The Leopard, famously says that “If we want everything to stay as it is, everything has to change.” If we, too, want to stay a modern, dynamic country, we must be ready to embrace that disruption and change.

    Otherwise it is stasis, and more of the decline we are starting to see around us. We can do better than that.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/01/03/britain-forgetting-what-it-means-successful-dynamic-country/

    1. The State Pension is not a benefit; it has been paid for over years of working (apart from those for whom the “all shall have prizes” government decreed they shall have the same without having been obliged to make the requisite number of contributions). It is not pensioners’ fault if successive governments have pi$$ed it up the wall and rely on a Ponzi scheme.

      1. When I enquired about my own State Pension I was told that the meagre amount I was to receive, after many years of contributions, was in fact an “award”.

    2. ‘Most of us will have travelled around more than usual over Christmas’

      Really? I would have thought the opposite.

      1. I haven’t travelled more than usual compared with other Christmases of the past decade or so but it was more than usual compared with most extended weekends.

    3. How about not continuing to grow the population – who will, at some time, retire and want pensions, healthcare…

      1. Good morning Paul.
        “We” are not growing the population “they” are importing unproductive wasters.

    4. Would be better if we had a Conservative government but that seems unlikely in the foreseeable future. This government is proof that socialism doesn’t work.

  81. An eleventh hour par
    Wordle 928 4/6

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

    1. Ready to post your morning joke and then go back to bed for some more Zeds, Sir Jasper?

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