Barbe bleu

thanks for looking. The top article does tally with my initial thoughts and it does seem, even at this horrific stage, that war has positive effects. What if we could capture those and take out the negative? I'll read lower articles later but I'm not sure they will fully rid me of the belief that men especially (not necessarily all) seek status and tribe and that if these urges are repressed they result in inappropriate or harmful acts and pained feelings

It doesn't really matter why people remember some events more fondly than they were, it's real regardless of the bias I'd imagine that there are lots of people studying the ukraine conflict and its effects on happiness. I'd imagine that the general findings are that being in the east is a throughly miserable experience but that in the west happiness is holding up despite everything. Once it's done and dusted as one day it surely must there will be as much pride as there is deep and horrific trauma. I'm not for a minute suggesting that war is anything other than catastrophic. But daubney is onto something when he says that we could use a 'struggle' that meets our (mainly men's) evolutionary needs to be hunter gatherers without the violence (if that is what he said, clip.was edited for 'comedic' effect). I would think that he is an absolute visionary requiring accolades rather than mockery on a regional football forum, but it's not exactly a new idea...

He's got a point though hasn't he? There are many many studies which suggest that war (the nasty bit no the winning bit) does indeed make many people happy. If we could ever find a "moral equivalent" of war to replace it we'd probably be a much happier place. Maybe stadium expansion and subsidised tickets in the NHS?

I get to retire at 68, if at all. I'm not really in the 50s women category but I knew about these changes. I assume those that didn't were doing essential aid work in far flung parts of the world where external communication was possible only during an eclipse. Oh hang on.... I meant I didn't know that I couldn't retire at 65. No one told me! what can I possibly do now? Can I have some cash please?

From the summary the report concludes that the communications around the change were insufficient and for that reason compensation should be given The weakness for rhe campaign is that they lost the court case on the same grounds, so the government can just turn around and say that it will follow the judgment and not the opinion Court case could have been a massive own goal - as they often are.

I'll look that up, cheers. I'd be interested how much of this rent seeking and development investment svtivity is foreign capital. Property speaks a universal language and the UK is generally a safe bet for money. It will be interesting if the correlation between that is equally as strong as the fall out from pension changes. From what I hear UK national 'landlordism' isn't what it used to be a few years ago and people are not getting into the market as much as they were.

Completely agree. The main reason we have lots of single person households is because that's how a lot of people want to live. What we need in housing policy is to determine what we need in terms of size, tenure and location. Just saying we built x number of houses across the country is an almost irrelevant statement of the type well probably be hearing quite a lot in the coming months.

Logan's run culling of single men over 55 it is then. (NB This is not actually serious)

I don't think there are any easy answers to this. There are things that sound good but in reality won't work, or solve one problem and create another. I don't think Rwanda is the right answer, but I'm increasingly of the opinion that it's the closest we have got to one yet.

Interesting read but some pretty massive holes in the argument. He says that our ratio of homes to people is about average for Europe and therefore we have enough houses. But that tells us nothing about how many houses we will need in the next 5, 10, 50 years as the population changes. It also tells us nothing about where we need housing - The fact that there are empty homes in Stoke on Trent doesn't help someone get the house of their dreams in Norwich, London, or Birmingham. And what if we don't want to live in multi generation homes, is that just tough? Also, if 'landlordism' really was the cause of the housing crisis why has the issue grown and not subsided in recent years as the tax cuts that they used to enjoy have been removed? Its an interesting point of view and its true that affordability is a big issue but there is a reason that this is a consensus issue

I'm a bit confused about the bond thing. Trump is hardly going to do a runner taking skyscrapers with him so I'm not sure what the bond is for. Here we just freeze assets until the matter is done and dusted. If I get time I'd read anything you might have seen that explains it Given the bond is half a billion dollars he was never going to get a comapny to play ball, it's going to be so far out of normal practice they could never get the algorithm to work.

From a UK perspective it should seem odd that we know the names and inclinations of US Supreme Court justices better than those that sit in our own. Its difficult to see that as anything other than because of years of politicisation. I think though that in its decisions the SC has actually depoliticised, taking on a far more 'legal formalist' role than I've seen before. I could be very wrong though, I've not followed US law beyond the headlines.

And that's the heart of it. Tories are losing votes but a great many are not going to Labour but to other parties (or one party really). Whether you want to put the comparison to 2019 or 2022 it's true that overall support for the big 2 is down. Them's the basic facts. Most of that is due to the Tories losing votes, but Labour is struggling a bit to pick them up and there see signs that it is losing support itself, which might be a indicator that a lot of the support it does have is lukewarm, something that starmers aneamic leadership hints at: Does this matter? Well yes it does. This far out from the 1997 election ( the last real equivalent to the upcoming vote) Blair was regularly polling at over 50% even though he had to compete with pre-self-immolation LDs and ended up with 43%. It's not beyond the realms of possibility that Labour's share will drop like it did in 1997, for reform support to trend back to tory and for the LDs to reestablish themselves. If these three things happen Labour could still yet regret its safety first approach and wish it had done more to be positive. Even with toxic corbyn at the helm a lot of people were behind the economic policies put forward by Labour. They really don't need to play it safe, they can be more positive- it might help both them and the country.

It can look like spin if you want to read it that way but it was a straight answer to a straight question. I'm not interested in supporting either team, just in presenting neutral data ans analysis. In 2019 76% of voters supported one of the big two, that number is now 67%. The story is mainly that Conservatives are losing votes, that doesn't need to be said, but Labour are losing their way a bit too. Labour could be on well over 50% against a wildly unpopular government, just as they were in summer 2022, but the above charts seem to suggest that they are losing support rather than tapping into the potential. Come the election you'd expect the reform vote to evaporate and the LD to rally but where will these votes come from or go?

Why did you ask the question then!? Personally I think you are wrong to dismiss it. Increasing support for smaller parties tells the 2 big parties that there is untapped potential that they are not attracting, so it can inform policy creation and marketing. It also tells us more about how our system is failing to reflect modern political thought.

Sanity returns. "Art gallery talks absolute b*llocks is a given and isn't something that needs reporting. Money talks though

I said that the total level of support across the two parties had fallen by 9% from 76% in 2019 polls to 67% now. That much should have been obvious from the charts I posted and the context of the question. If you want it in a manner able to pass through your filter: the Tories are losing a lot of support, but Labour is not picking up a lot of the freed up votes, which are instead going to smaller parties. It is also not clear how loyal labour's new support is and whether it will dissipate before the election. Labour cannot yet take this for granted

Take another look at your question and my answer and then come back with a response

I don't t think the hester thing will change much but if it does then I would expect the 9% to grow not diminish

It might come as a huge shock to some but corbyn was electoral poison. He managed to put a toxic gloss onto what were probably quite popular policies. To go back to your question support for the smaller parties has grown since 2019, meaning that less people overall like either of the two big ones. To a degree this represents return to the 21st century mean but there is an implied question about whether people really want to vote for either. That's why you need to look beyond the standard poll. If Labour is getting 44% in the polls but starmer has a low popularity rating then its the Torys and the system pushing people to Labour despite labour's lack of appeal. I've not looked at the approval rating but I'm sure you can tell me

According to the polls support for either two main parties is down 9% from 2019 (2019 poll average top chart).Doesn't sound huge but that's quite a jump in our system. There is also a question about how firm these opinions are. If support were thin you'd expect to see lowere approval ratings for leaders than in, for instance, 2019 and more variation between polls

That does seem to be a bit of a theme, we hated them at the time but looking back we can appreciate strengths that were not apparent at then. I wonder if it was ever thus and applies to all things and not just politics. Maybe Liz Truss will be remembered as a misunderstood trailblazer whi preempted the changes that made Britain a euro tiger economy, or maybe Boris' entry into the history of UK prime ministers will recall how he galvanised the world to support ukraine, support that led to the toppling of Putin and Russia's renaissance after defeat into a liberal powerhouse?

You're not old enough for heath I doubt so given that you seem to think that every prime minister since 1979 has been awful then (a) it is a wonder how we still function as a society and (b) presumably Callaghan or Wilson is your lifetime favourite?

Take it up with the Smithsonian museum. Fact is Mr Johnson decided he wanted to own another human being and convinced a court to agree with him- I'm not sure he deserves a free pass because of the colour of his skin. Whilst I think it is silly to take pride or shame in events beyond one's own control or influence I also think it is important to acknowledge history rather than hide or change it because it is inconvenient to a certain narrative or challenges certain preconceptions. I've put it into a post above but in the same spirit it does seem fair to provide balance by saying that colonial law in N America soon took on a far more racialised and discriminatory nature after the Castor case so no free passes there either.

Depends how you want to define slave holder Johnson was the first person to formally claim complete ownership over another person, so in some repects your 'if' is superfluous- the first chattel slave owner in N America was indeed black. Before then people held 'slaves' during of their term of indenture (and beyond if they were sentenced to servitude as punishment for a crime) but that's a slightly different thing. Also fair to mention tgat's the above is the legal view and no doubt things happened illegally before then. Also true to say that once the flood gates to chattel slavery were opened after the Casor case it rapidly took on a racialised element that until then was formally absent.