candide

7 minutes ago, MajarTheLion said:

Perhaps the kind of person who observes the credibility of the accusations made against Trump. Would you believe a story that used four anonymous sources or the ten people who step forward by name to say the story is false?

Who are these 10 people? What did they say, exactly?

3 hours ago, riclag said:

  "but he did find time to pilfer"

You might want to read your source(bloomberg) entirely before you make ridiculous claims ! 

 

"But after all the hand-wringing it was decided that the move was legal because the art is government property".

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/09/trump-art-ambassador-home-paris-fakes-replicas.html

 

"Ultimately, because the art is U.S. government property, the move was deemed legal".

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-09-06/trump-ended-2018-france-trip-having-art-loaded-on-air-force-one?sref=C3P1bRLC

On top of it, given Trump's <deleted> taste, the ambassador was probably happy to get rid of the art pieces Trump liked! ????

50 minutes ago, RichardColeman said:

I'd be more happy if the WHO were told by all countries to decide where the virus came from, what country is responsible for it and exactly how much that country should pay in reparations to the world for destroying and killing everyone by hiding the disease.

 

And if they wont commit to anything or anyone, then they are not fit for purpose and should disbanded

The WHO is not a watchdog. It's not part of its status and missions as voted by member-states. If member-states want to change its purpose, they have to vote, and likely increase its budget.

BTW, There's no "they". The WHO is composed of its members.

4 hours ago, Morch said:

 

Bolton said on one occasion that he did not hear it, not that it wasn't said.

On a later interview he said the report was untrue, but did not have a good answer as to whether it could have been said when he wasn't around. He did confirm Trump's habit of degrading and disparaging anyone who isn't Trump.

 

Who are the others?

Good question. This claim that there are "9 sources by name" has been parroted over and over, but no one seems to be able to tell who these people are.

3 hours ago, Bkk Brian said:

I'm not into conspiracy theories but there was more than a little controversy when he was appointed.

 

From reading this it suggests that it may have been more to do with him being the first ever Head of WHO to be appointed from Africa, rather than the best person for the job. 

 

Zero transparency in the funding of his lobbying for the job despite him being the only candidate out of 3 who appointed a high profile Media Firm who deal in high-stakes public strategy and have 18 offices worldwide. "Mecury Public Affairs"

 

Good explanation on how he got the position here and did not disclose how much or where all the money came from while the other two candidates in the running did state where their funds came from.

 

"Tedros Adhanom hires US based firm to win to WHO job." https://www.tesfanews.net/tedros-adhanom-hires-firm-win-who-job/

Interesting article. However, it doesn't particularly support your claim about who financed his campaign. 

5 hours ago, Chomper Higgot said:

Tin foil hats out in force this morning.

Indeed!

1 hour ago, MajarTheLion said:

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/trump-vote-twice-north-carolina/

“They will vote and then they are going to have to check their vote by going to the poll and voting that way because if it tabulates then they won’t be able to do that,” Trump said.

“So let them send it in, and let them go vote. And if the system is as good as they say it is, then they obviously won’t be able to vote.”

Is it not clear enough? That's his own words, not an interpretation. It was on WETC.

https://www.wect.com/2020/09/02/wects-jon-evans-interview-with-president-trump-he-arrives-ilm/

I've just watched Trumps speech! I nearly <deleted> in my pants! ????

4 minutes ago, kingdong said:

   2 million predominantly white economic migrants from the eu resident in britain? and thats simple arithmetic not xenophobia,wondered when you,d play the race card.

That's around 3% of total pop. Not such a big change.

6 hours ago, ezzra said:

The old lion is on his very last leg of his life's journey, once he's gone, the younger lion Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman will have his say and he's no fan of the Palestinians and a very modern thinker...

He's able to make cutting-edge decisions! ????

5 minutes ago, MajarTheLion said:

TSA fails security checks by DHS 95% of the time.

 

In a series of trials, the Department of Homeland Security was able to smuggle fake explosives, weapons and other contraband past airport screeners in major cities across the country, according to ABC News. Officials briefed on the Homeland Security Inspector General’s investigation told the station that the TSA failed 67 out of 70 tests conducted by the department’s Red Teams — undercover passengers tasked with identifying weaknesses in the screening process, NJ.com reports.

 

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/tsa-fails-95-percent-tests-homeland-security_n_7485558

The way Trump described it, they were openly carrying gear, to the point that some passengers got afraid/ disturbed about it. He did not make any claim about thugs succeeding in secretely sneaking arms in despite controls.

29 minutes ago, Nigel Garvie said:

Well that is an encouraging assessment of the possibilities, which I didn't understand as well before, thank you.  Business is howling out for some sort of adult deal in which trade is still possible without horrendous paperwork, extra taxes, market disadvantage, days of delay in Dover etc etc. These guys are not fools - although no deal suits some personally in the media and the financial industry, virtually no actual manufacturers are in favour (Where is Dyson now?). 

 

Unfortunately you would search long and hard in the Tory benches - the front one anyway - to find an adult. 

 

The US/UK  further negotiations are coming soon, but Trump has lost it completely. Boris probably is happy to sell UK plc  down the water for longer in power, but Nov 3rd is not far away. Trade deals just don't get completed in that time scale, although acts of surrender maybe. Anyway a 5 minute study of statistics will tell anyone, that even a huge increase in US  trade, will not remotely replace a modest decrease in EU trade. 

Personally, I wouldn't bet BoJo wants a deal. If he just wants a more interesting job and the opportunity to leave a trace on history, it's not in his interest to strike a deal with the EU. He may fail but "Après moi le déluge". This is a purely subjective opinion.

Then it also depends on the pressure his sponsors exert on him, which may not be in favour of no deal.

2 hours ago, 3NUMBAS said:

To my mind, the core reason we voted to leave the EU was our rejection of the EU as a political organisation. We joined a trading organisation in 1973, and by leaving with a basic trade deal, we would be returning to that acceptable situation. But if we are forced to accept some of the political aspects of the EU, the very aspects that were rejected at the referendum, Brexit becomes meaningless. We can't accept fishing rights, or EU standards, or European Court jurisdiction, and Brussels knows this. They have picked these impossible issues precisely because they know we can't compromise on them, and that makes no-deal inevitable. And it is no-deal that they want. They want Brexit to be as messy and damaging as possible, even to their own members, because they know anything other than a disastrous Brexit will encourage other member states to follow the UK out of the EU, and that will be the end of the project.

There isn't actually much reason for not striking a deal, apart from posturing.

Standards

- most of them derive from international treaties and commitment made above the EU and UK level (I.e. the Basel agreement, etc...). There is not much reason why UK and EU would need to diverge significantly.

- UK firms doing business directly or indirectly with the EU would have to apply them, anyway

ECJ

- a compromise could be found, I.e. ECJ only for common market issues, and not other issues

Fishing rights:

- it's just a money issue, I.e. fixing a price and and reducing UK market access fees accordingly.

Then there US the political play, posturing, etc... which may lead to a failure.

Interesting news

Putin's vaccine meets opposition from frontline workers in Russia

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/09/06/europe/russia-vaccine-putin-opposition-intl/index.html

On 9/5/2020 at 4:59 AM, Kelsall said:

Well, the bottom line is another terrorist is off the streets, gone, kaput, killed, and that's a good thing.  President Trump has a few under his belt: Qasem Soleimani, Hamza bin Laden, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, and this guy to name just a few.  Certainly those who are pro-terrorist are unhappy about these deaths, but the rest of us salute President Trump for his effort.

,

(1) He was not a terrorist. There was a affrontment between him and the other guy. It may well have been a crime, but it doesn't fall under the definition of terrorism.

(2) No one supports terrorism here

(3) The left-wing is a 'small player' as concerns terrorism (see chart)

https://www.csis.org/analysis/escalating-terrorism-problem-united-states

1 minute ago, ukrules said:

Regardless, we are seeing some leaps forward in vaccine technology in real time.

 

I'm sure some will work better than others, but I don't think that matters so much - there's many of them in development, lots of different types, some very different from previous models.

 

 

Which is an additional risk factor, as these new types of vaccines have never been tested before.

3 hours ago, chilli42 said:

I think the Russians at least got the psychology of Covid right.  No vaccine developed anywhere for Covid is going to be 100% effective (the flu vaccine is 40-60% effective).  The safety of the Russian vaccine is unlikely to have any more safety issues than vaccines being developed elsewhere ... these will also not have full safety data complete by next year.  So Russia tells their citizens that they have a vaccine, so time to get back to work/normal.  The vaccine being the catalyst to restore confidence to stop hiding under a rock.  If the Russian vaccine is effective then their gamble pays off and the economy returns to grow quickly.  If the vaccine turns out not effective (or as effective as other vaccines) the story is still positive ... government did its best (more than other governments), it was better than doing nothing, economy on the mend, we now start to use whatever miracle vaccine was developed elsewhere.  The only outstanding question is safety ... but the same can be said about vaccines that people will be lining up for next year.  The Covid virus is heavily politicized.  Public policy/health has to be viewed through that lens first.

The problem is not only that a vaccine, which has not been tested enough, may not be effective. It is also that it may have an unexpected  adverse effect on millions of people who have been inoculated.