diable rouge

Busted, you're not really a cat are you?...

If you think it's bad now, just wait until 10 o'clock comes...

Rockets Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Failing to address the rampant anti-Semitism > within the party. This has been an ongoing problem, and although important to address as a whole, it's not relevant to the specific point you were making about the campaigning of the last few weeks. > The divisive anyone with wealth is evil rhetoric. Have you got any actual specifics where this has been said during the campaign? > The spin over the NHS and Trump. In the summer Trump said himself that the NHS was on the table re. a post Brexit deal with the US, so why shouldn't Labour bring it up? > The lies (even over something as straight-forward > as whether Jeremy watches the Queen's speech) He got caught out, but then again who's to say he didn't watch the speech on catch-up TV, there's so much on TV over Christmas it's hard to watch everything you want to at the time it's transmitted. I'm more concerned that by not watching the speech he's somehow painted as being a traitor, when 9 out of 10 people in the country do the same. > The origins of the leaked documents. I assume that you're referring to the NHS docs some people have said emanate from Russian sources? Has this been verified? If not then it's just heresay. Regardless of the source, what the docs highlighted is that drug patents are a US negotiating objective in trade talks, something that has been stated by the US previously. Johnson denied the NHS was on the table, so Labour had every right to bring it up. > The costed yet un-costed manifesto. 'Creative accountancy' is hardly new when it comes to election manifestos, this is hardly a new low. Besides, all The manifesto are there to be costed by independent sources and called out, which they often are. > The doctoring of videos to misrepresent the views > of others (yes, Labour did it too) I haven't seen any apart from the one the Tories did on Keir Starmer at the beginning of the campaign which the MSM picked up on. This is something that concerns me though and I feel it needs to be nipped in the bud as it won't be long before the technology is there to doctor live feeds. Very scary. > The use of a 4 year old boy as a political > football Hardly new, does 'Jennifer's ear' ring a bell? > The blatant attempts to try and bribe elements of > the electorate with "free stuff". Again, hardly new, I don't see any difference between doing this and, say, a tax cut. I think most people know there is a large cake which is cut up and 'given away', who gets what depends on who they're trying to attract, and equally they know any Gov will claim it back somehow. > The constant attacks on any media that they don't > think is toeing the line or dares to question what > or how they are trying to do it. Have you read the Daily Mail, Express, telegraph, Times lately? I think under such a constant onslaught from a hostile right wing press they have every right to defend themselves. > The holier than tho attitude when their own house > is not in order > The endless virtue-signalling I think the use of 'virtue-signalling' has itself become a form of virtue-signalling. > Need I go on? No, I've already missed Eastenders. A lot of what you say reads as opinion dressed up as fact and isn't relevant to your original point. Also I don't think you can say one side has been as bad as the other, i.e. of equivalence, but that's just my opinion. Time to watch catch-up myself...

Rockets Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Both parties have been scraping the > bottom of the barrel over the last few weeks and > can't say either of them ran a campaign they > should be proud of. In what way has Labour been scraping the bottom of the barrel?...

This is his favourite tune...

Laura's latest click-bait scoop...https://twitter.com/JaneyGodley/status/1205075149252440064

The best thing about a General Election, and Dulwich Village makes it to the top (at the time of writing)...https://twitter.com/hashtag/dogsatpollingstations?src=tren

This is a brilliant write-up of the whole Leeds General saga, a long read but well worth it... https://theovertake.com/~beta/chain-reaction-how-one-local-story-became-the-defining-event-of-the-election/ The Yorkshire Post and in particular it's editor have come out really well over all this, local newspapers actually doing the job of journalism, telling truth to power, unlike a lot of the nationals who are now nothing more than propagandists. Then you have the TV hacks, willing conduits for 'sources' to spread disinformation, ignoring factual checks and critical thinking as long as it gives them click-bait scoops...

400...

Rockets Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > - and despite what you may hear both > sides are a guilty as the other for fully > embracing these underhand tactics. Well, when it comes to dishonesty in paid-for Facebook ads, there's one clear winner. From the Beeb... It looked just at every paid-for Facebook ad from the three main UK-wide parties run over the first four days of December: For the Conservatives, it said that 88% (5,952) of the party's most widely promoted ads either featured claims which had been flagged by independent fact-checking organisations (including BBC Reality Check) as not correct or not entirely correct. The figure includes instances of the same claims being made across multiple posts. One example was that Labour would spend ?1.2 trillion at a cost of ?2,400 to every household, which was contained within 4,028 ads. Those sums are significantly higher than others' analysis of Labour's plans For the Lib Dems, it said hundreds of potentially misleading ads had featured identical unlabelled graphs, with no indication of the source data, to claim it was the only party that could beat either Labour, the Conservatives or the SNP "in seats like yours" For Labour, it said that it could not find any misleading claims in ads run over the period

I used to be a werewolf but I'm alright now-ooooooooooowwwwwwwwww!...

You do realise that makes you look even worse (than normal)?...

Captain Marvel Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > So it?s a tricky one really I'm no fan of Corbyn but posts like yours make it easier to put the cross in the Labour box. Thanks...

uncleglen, an obvious c*nt....

No, you have to put your cross in the box next to Johnson, there isn't one for Get Brexit Done. Don't worry, we'll take you back to the care home straight after...

Essential read from David Allen Green's blog. As some of you have an aversion to links, I've coped and pasted the article... The L word, the F word, and contemporary UK politics 9th December 2019 In a few days there will be a general election in the United Kingdom. This post is not about the possible election result ? that is still uncertain and it may even come down to voting intentions which are as yet not settled. This post is instead about two words that should have had more impact on the campaign, and current politics generally, but have not. One word begins with L, the other with F. * The L word The first word is ?lie?. Some commentators in the United Kingdom aver that more should be done to confront politicians with their lies. Peter Oborne, a journalist of immense integrity, has even sought to document and expose each lie of the current prime minister (the estimable website is here). This is essential work: nothing in this post should be taken to mean that recording each lie is not important. But it is not enough. This is because many politicians now do not care about being called a liar, or even be shown to be one. Such a reaction is a cost of political business for them ? and some even relish that they ?trigger? such a response as some perverse form of validation. The ultimate problem is not that many politicians lie. The ultimate problem is far more worrying and far more difficult to resolve. The ultimate problem is that many voters want to be lied to. These voters may pretend otherwise, claiming that they want ?honest politicians?. In reality, such voters just want politicians to say what the voters want to hear. There is therefore an incentive for politicians to lie. Until and unless many voters can be made to care about being lied to, every fine and worthy effort in exposing the lies is (at least in the short-term) futile ? a public good but not enough to effect immediate change. There are many political lies: small lies, forgettable lies, lies that take longer to expose than any mortal attention span. But the biggest lie in the current general election ? a lie that may determine the outcome ? is ?Get Brexit Done?. Brexit cannot be ?done? without years of intense effort and attention. Entire international relationships have to be rebuilt from scratch; entire areas of law and policy have to be reconstructed; entire social and economic patterns of behaviour have to be re-worked. And all this in addition to the making of actual decisions about what we want those relationships, laws, policies, and social and economic patterns of behaviour to be. And all that in turn against the intractable problem of fitting in a Brexit policy within the framework of the relationship between the United Kingdom and Ireland. Brexit cannot be ?got done? by mere exhortation. It is a lie but a lie many want to believe and cannot be dissuaded from believing by mere arguments, logic or evidence. And by the time many voters will come to care that they were lied to, Brexit will be too long gone for any voter choice to make much difference. * The F word The second word ? the F word ? I will not type. It is a word which has lost its traction when it needed to still have traction. The word describes the 1920s and 1930s manifestation of populist nationalist authoritarianism, a political phenomenon that despite the heady optimism of democratic campaigners has never been too far away. Complacently, some believed that the thing had gone away with the end of the second world war, or with the transitions to democracy of Spain and Portugal. The thing, however, is always there. What happened in the 1920s and 1930s in Germany and Italy and elsewhere was always just one set of manifestations of the thing. Populist nationalist authoritarianism has more purchase on voters than many conservatives, liberals and socialists realise. It is the politics of easy answers. In the United Kingdom there are those in favour of Brexit who routinely trash the (independent) courts, the (independent) civil service and diplomatic service, the universities, the broadcasters, even the supremacy of parliament. This populist disdain for independent institutions is unhealthy. The threat of the ?will of the people? is used as intimidation. Coupled with nationalistic rhetoric (on immigration and Brexit generally) and authoritarian hostility to legal checks on government (contempt for human rights), you have all the ingredients of the thing described by the F word. But if you call this thing by its name, it now has little or no effect. People will yawn and shrug and pay no real attention. And because what we have before us is not visually the same as the 1920s and 1930s manifestation of the thing ? no uniforms, no goosesteps, and so on ? many of those hearing the F word will regard what is now happening as not being an example of the F word at all. Of course, using the F word is not as important as stopping the thing it describes from taking hold. * Calling politicians ? and pundits ? liars, and describing the vile populist nationalist authoritarianism that they promote as the F word, is not going to stop them lying or the thing the F word describes. The words are not enough, and it may be that new words are needed to make old warnings. And unless voters can be made to care about being lied to by politicians, or about the implications of the populist nationalist authoritarianism (again) being promoted, then there will be little to stop either the politicians or the F word thing. Making voters care about any of this is the challenge for liberal and progressive politicians (and pundits) in the United Kingdom and elsewhere. And the biggest challenge is to make enough voters care in time.

He could go on tour with that article, so many great takes/lines...

300...

Didn't watch the Corbyn/Johnson debate last night but had to laugh (or else you'll cry) that the immediate poll afterwards as to who 'won' the debate was 52:48 in favour of Johnson. What is more interesting is the response to further detailed questions... Hard not to conclude that the great British public thinks it's more prime ministerial to be untrustworthy and out of touch with ordinary people...

*Faints...*

Springtime, I think a lot of people will wake up next Friday with that opening line...:) Personally, whatever happens I'm going to hit...

Week 15 fixtures... Saturday 7th December Everton v Chelsea AFC Bournemouth v Liverpool Tottenham Hotspur v Burnley Watford v Crystal Palace Manchester City v Manchester United Sunday 8th December Aston Villa v Leicester City Newcastle United v Southampton Norwich City v Sheffield United Brighton & Hove Albion v Wolverhampton Wanderers Monday 9th December West Ham United v Arsenal

Week 14 points... Week 14 table...

Perhaps. I'm all for exposing politicians of all hues for their lies, they should never become normailsed like they have. Johnson and his henchmen are fibbing on an unprecedented industrial scale yet the right wing press ignores them. This 'dossier' by old school right wing Tory journalist Peter Oborne bucks the propaganda trend... https://boris-johnson-lies.com/

It used to be a big thing getting massive audiences, but last year only around 6.5 million watched it, or 1 in 10 of the population. So the right wing press trying to paint Corbyn as somehow being disloyal and out of sync with the UK public simply isn't true... ETA: Heaven forbid had Corbyn decided to lie to Her Maj in order to unlawfully shut down parliament