Hi, I'm not on the forum much these days, but thought I'd better check in and see how the ol' Kraken is doing.
Still no sign of it, eh?

I don't find the 'percentage of soul' argument convincing, but I'd agree that people who have similar backgrounds and similar life experiences tend to have more in common, which you'd assume means a more solid basis for building a strong relationship. I mean, any relationship where one person has vastly more power than the other isn't really healthy (and money is a proxy for power).



Numbers (and mathematical operations) help us to understand the world, how stuff relates to other stuff, how stuff works, etc. The modern world and all modern technology is built on understanding derived from numbers and mathematics.

Inflation is high everywhere. Politicians will always try to blame each other, but the underlying cause is Covid+Ukraine, not Biden or Trump.


https://www.ft.com/content/088d3368-bb8b-4ff3-9df7-a7680d4d81b2

That thermometer is broken, so won't give an accurate reading.

It does seem very likely that he had already decided to step down, and that the poll is simply yet more publicity.
The question is, who would want to take over, given that Musk is still, of course, the owner?

St Helena is a British territory, and not far from Ascension Island, which has a joint UK/US military presence... so even tropical islands can be military targets.

New Zealand is a popular location for the billionaire prepper. Climate is reasonable, and it's probably sufficiently out of the way. There's an interesting article here about it (albeit a few years old now).



Having sufficient money (or items of value to others, depending on degree of collapse), is probably more important than location.

No.

We know that the 2020 election wasn't stolen. We can tell from the way it's been nearly two years now, and Trump's idiotic sore-loser ranting has got him precisely nowhere.

Yes. I'm not a fan of the Conservatives (as is perhaps evident ), but Sunak has always seemed quite competent, whereas Truss has always seemed way out of her depth.

The distinction needs to be made between Conservative MPs (who wanted Sunak instead of Truss) and the wider Conservative party membership (who wanted Truss and not Sunak). The politicians aren't being racist, but they are being somewhat foolish in leaving the final decision up to their wider membership. The only reason Sunak won the next time around is because he's the only one who gathered enough backing from MPs, so the membership weren't given a choice. I believe the Conservative MPs deserve some credit here for the way they learned from their mistake and tweaked the rules this time around. Even so, it was a close run thing... if Johnson had managed to get 100 MPs backing him, then the membership would have chosen him to return as PM... leading to perhaps even greater chaos than we've seen already.

I'm not suggesting that a high percentage of the population is innately racist, more that many years of politicians and their friends in the media blaming foreigners for the woes of the country has dramatically increased antipathy towards immigrants across the population, such that a high percentage of people now vote for racist/xenophobic reasons. Perhaps I should have been clearer on this. And perhaps instead of nincompoops it might be kinder to reframe it as people whose opinions are easily manipulated. It would be interesting to see, in some alternative universe, what would have happened with the Brexit vote if the preceding years had been filled not with foreigner-bashing, but with the media lauding the invaluable contribution that immigrants make to the economy, and particularly as doctors and nurses within the beloved NHS. Unfortunately we will never know.

No, that's not what I said. Plenty of Conservative voters voted remain. Equally plenty of Labour voters voted leave. I'm talking here about leave voters (regardless of Con/Lab orientation) being racist and having difficulty grasping simple concepts. I'd argue that were Labour to elect a non-white leader, then many of the Labour voters who voted leave would be outraged (albeit more so if Labour were running the country).

As a separate point (and it is a separate point) I'd certainly argue that the small number of Conservative party members (overwhelmingly old, rich, white and rural) who voted in the leadership election are proportionally more racist than everyone else, but I wouldn't argue that they are stupid, or indeed that they voted leave.

The Conservative party runs the country. If the PM resigns, the Conservatives just pick a new leader from their own ranks, who then becomes the next PM. They don't have to go to the electorate.


It's complicated. He's much more competent, so less likely to make calamitous blunders where he'd have to resign. The big question is whether his party just implodes.



I'm British, so can offer an opinion from that perspective (but of course it's just my opinion, and others would no doubt disagree). Apologies for the wall of text, but hopefully you might find some of it illuminating.

If we want to understand the current situation, then we need some background. 2010 is probably the best place to start...

Politicians are to an extent judged on events that happen around them, regardless of how well or badly they perform. Labour (left of centre) were in office at the time of the global financial crisis, and when the next election came around in 2010, the Conservatives (right of centre) ran an election campaign blaming Labour for the crash. The campaign was effective, and the Conservatives won and took control of the country. They then began a process of austerity, drastically cutting public funding across the board. I'd contend that this approach was largely ideologically driven rather than through necessity. The crash gave them an excuse to cut services and reduce the size of the state, to do what they'd always wanted to do but had previously shied away from due to its unpopularity. Now they could claim that they were simply being economically responsible, financially prudent, and that there was no other option.

The inevitable consequence of Conservative rule is that money gets taken from ordinary people and given to the rich, and inequality increases. The effect was exacerbated this time around due to the unprecedented levels of austerity, and many people, even those in full-time employment, began to struggle to survive. Food banks proliferated. The Conservatives and their friends who control the media then just relied on their tried and tested divide and conquer strategy. If you're poor and struggling, it's not your fault, and it's not the government's fault, it's [insert sub-group of the powerless] who are to blame. They decided to blame European immigrants.... the Poles and Romanians are taking your jobs, they're exploiting EU freedom of movement to use our health service for free and then go back home without paying anything, they're the reason you're poor, the reason that services are suddenly so over-stretched, that it takes you weeks to get a doctor's appointment, that you can't afford to buy a house, that you are suffering. We want to help you, we want to stop them coming here, but we can't because Europe won't let us. It's Europe's fault.

As a consequence of this media offensive, support for the small, obscure, anti-immigration, anti-EU, UKIP (UK Independence) party began to rise dramatically. UKIP threatened to suck up right-wing votes, which would hurt the Conservatives in an election, and potentially let Labour back into power. So the Conservatives needed to appeal to the xenophobic tendencies that they'd helped to promote. And the threat wasn't entirely external, there had always been a section of the Conservative party that were hard-right zealots intent on leaving Europe in order to be able to remove EU-imposed protections on workers' rights, sick and redundancy pay, environmental standards, etc. So the Conservatives, as well as heading off the threat of UKIP, also needed to heal the developing rift within their own ranks.

The eventual result was that the Conservatives promised the public an in/out referendum on the EU question, and due to giving this promise they successfully held off the threat of UKIP, won the next election, and retained power. Next came the EU vote. On one side of the debate, the perfectly clear economic argument of remaining a part of your largest market. On the other side, xenophobic hysteria. The prime minister (David Cameron), knowing that he himself, most of his own party, and almost the entirety of the opposition Labour party, wanted to remain a part of the EU, assumed that the referendum result would be fairly clear-cut in favour of remain. This was a catastrophic miscalculation, as leave won the vote (52% to 48%), and the UK was suddenly committed to leaving the EU. The prime minister duly resigned, abdicating all responsibility for what he'd done, and leaving someone else to sort out the mess.

This is a large part of why we have had so many prime ministers in such a short space of time. The Conservatives have to be seen to support the referendum result. A largely pro-remain party has to become pro-leave, and deal with the aftermath. The supposedly pro-business party has to throw up barriers to trade. They also have to solve unsolveable questions, such as: where should the border between the EU and the UK be? The Republic of Ireland remains part of the EU, but we can't have a hard border between Northern and Southern Ireland for obvious historical reasons, and we can't have a border in the Irish Sea, because that would split Northern Ireland off from the rest of the UK, and would be seen as surrendering the territory to Europe. Basic, simple questions, that the people who voted leave either couldn't comprehend or just disregarded because it wasn't as important as getting rid of the foreigners.

These issues have for the last few years been threatening to tear the Conservative party apart. Many of the Conservatives are pro-EU membership, but must be seen to be pro-leave. Meanwhile the pro-leave faction are steadily gaining control of the party. It's civil war in all but name. And then came Covid, and a new global economic downturn. The world has to fight to recover, but the UK has to recover from both this and Brexit.

Our populist, foreigner-bashin' Trump-lite prime minister, Boris Johnson, was forced to resign after a series of scandals. The Conservatives command a sizeable majority in parliament, and for so long as they can muster enough votes from amongst their own ranks to keep the government functioning, they don't need to call an election until the end of 2024.

After Johnson resigned, there was a Conservative leadership contest, which would give us our new prime minister. This contest had two parts. Firstly, Conservative MPs selected their favourite candidates from their own ranks, and through voting whittled this down to a final two (Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss). Sunak was the overwhelming favourite amongst MPs, but the leadership contest has a second part... once it's down to the final two, then members of the Conservative party (not MPs, rather that small section of the general public who are members of the wider party) vote to determine who wins from the final two. There was absolutely no chance that those racist bigots would vote for the one with brown skin, regardless of the fact that Sunak was by far the more qualified of the two... so they elected Truss, who became the new PM despite the MPs of her own party not wanting her, and her not being elected by the general population. We ended up with an imbecile in charge, with inevitable consequences, a disastrous unfunded mini-budget, market chaos, recrimination and finally resignation and another leadership contest to elect yet another new PM. Similar rules to last time, first the MPs pick their top choices - not the final two this time, just anyone who gets over 100 Conservative MPs supporting them - and then the party membership vote for their favourite. And the result was that Sunak was the only one to get the 100 nominations, which meant the MPs didn't need to go to the membership for the second round (if they had, it would surely once again have been a resounding win for 'anyone but the brown-skinned guy').

The result is that Sunak is our new PM. He has the backing of most of the Conservative MPs, but there is a sizeable minority who blame him for the downfall of Boris Johnson, and who might vote with the opposition and so limit what he can achieve in parliament - they could conceivably make the government entirely powerless if they so wished. And because Sunak has brown skin and is (gasp!) a Hindu, many Conservative voters are outraged (we voted for Brexit! we voted to get these people out!*). The Labour party and other opposition parties are saying we need a general election, because we now have yet another PM who has no mandate. Sunak doesn't want an election, because Truss destroyed support for the Conservatives, and they will undoubtedly lose badly and relinquish power to a resurgent Labour party. It's up to the Conservatives really, if they can hold themselves together, they have no need to call an election until Dec 2024. The issue is whether they can hold themselves together and vote together as a functioning government. Now that Sunak has taken over, we are for the first time starting to see some Conservative voters wanting an election just to get rid of the brown-skinned guy, some Conservative MPs wanting an election to get rid of the guy who helped bring down Boris Johnson, and some Conservative MPs who, more strategically, can see that their party is in a complete mess, and would rather give up power for a few years, let Labour in to take control and make the painful decisions to get the country running again, and then try to get back in at the next election by blaming Labour for the pain of fixing everything.





*The fact that xenophobes and racists are largely the same, and that the xenophobes who wanted us to leave the EU did so in large part to get rid of people from India and Pakistan, despite India and Pakistan not being a part of Europe, says a lot about the intellectual wattage of the electorate and the wisdom of holding a plebiscite on anything important.

Kind of weird then how the biggest recipient of donations from the oil industry is Manchin, the one Dem who was against the climate bill. And that the bill only passed once he'd wrung out a load of concessions for new fossil fuel exploration in Alaska and the Gulf of Mexico. You seriously think he's actually an uncover tree-huggin' eco-warrior whose overriding desire is to promote green energy?



You have a fundamental misconception of what science is, and how it advances.



Why, because Russia has turned off some magical unknown green energy pipeline, that supplies the rest of Europe? Are you sure? So shutting off the gas pipeline is just an elaborate ruse, and really Russia is depriving the continent not of gas, but of renewables? 

If someone spends pretty much their entire time in P&S attacking every example of scientific evidence that is presented, then it seems reasonable to conclude that their arguments are faith-based rather than fact-based. If they then cite as a source of authority an institution that they've previously and routinely disparaged, then that just lends weight to the conclusion that they're simply seeking out anything that anybody says that supports (or, more often, and more superficially, merely appears to support) whatever half-baked notion they have already decided, sans evidence, is the indisputable truth.




No, I don't get it, because this is complete nonsense. You do realise that the oil companies make vast profits, and indeed have announced record-breaking profits during the last few weeks? But you contend that they are actually intent on destroying their own gargantuan money-making machine in order to further a green agenda? Seems somewhat unlikely. 

Weird to see someone with such an aversion to science and facts suddenly regarding NASA as a source of authority. But there we go, even Big Oil shills can surprise us from time to time.

You may be interested in this illustration of climate change from a former NASA employee:

https://xkcd.com/1732

Do you want me to explain to you why this claim is misleading, or are you able to work it out for yourself?

3.5 million people currently infected, 93% of people have had at least one dose of vaccine, latest deaths per week is 412. This tells quite a powerful story.

High cases is a consequence of the removal of all requirements for self-isolation and social distancing, and the guidance that even if you test positive, you should still go in to work or school if you feel able.
This guidance may or may not be considered somewhat controversial, and whilst it is partly a consequence of the latest variant being less deadly than earlier variants, it's also a direct consequence of the high levels of protection conferred by what has been a hugely successful vaccination programme.

If you're interested in the data for the UK, this is a great source that has everything you need: https://ourworldindata.org/coronavirus/country/united-kingdom




King Kong is an ape, not a monkey. He is also, like the disease with which you're trying to smear him*, fictional.


* How would you even do it? Attach a giant turkey baster to a old-style biplane and circle the Empire State Building until he shows up?

The climate is changing over the short term, and this is caused by humans. It certainly affects our ability to inhabit parts of the planet. It continues to amaze and appal me so how many ordinary people of a generally "right-wing" political leaning will happily lap up whatever lies they are fed by the oil industry and their stooges in government* rather than accept incontrovertible fact, simply because they don't want to be seen to identify with what they perceive as a "leftie" cause. The climate crisis is not a cover for some ideological push for a big state, or a geographical analogue of BLM, or anything like that. It should transcend politics, we all share the same planet, FFS, and everyone will be affected, even if they aren't already.

I write this on a Sunday evening. In my country, we're expecting to break our national temperature record tomorrow or Tuesday. Other parts of the world are literally on fire. 400 million people in China inhabit a place that may soon, for parts of the year, have such a high temperature that humans simply cannot survive there.




* ... and cigarettes don't cause cancer, right?  

---

Neither China nor the West is doing anything like enough. It's mainly political greenwashing, and half-hearted commitments to go to net zero by 2050, which will of course be far too late. Hence my sharing that xkcd strip again.

Democracy is a great idea, and elections every few years are also a good idea. But one problem with the way modern western democracies are set up is that it fosters short-termist thinking. Looking at climate change, even if we ignore the might and influence of the oil industry, the fact remains that fixing the climate involves sacrifices now in exchange for a reward in the future. Most governments - and particularly a Tory government - will shy away from implementing any policy that could make themselves look bad and their (unknown) successors look good. I assume at some point the climate issue will become so overwhelming that the spell might be broken and serious action might be taken, but by then a lot of damage will have been done. Governments will respond reactively (when they have to), rather than proactively (when they should). Sadly, it's a situation where this comic is relevant yet again.


https://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/scientific_briefing.png