Proboscis

Will this mean that Thailand will be bringing in tourists from countries with relatively high levels of covid such as the UK while keeping the borders closed to neighbours such as Laos which have had zero community cases in over three months?

15 hours ago, Justgrazing said:

adds evermore to the compelling case for abolishing the quite archaic license fee that keeps this bloated entity of self righteousness and hand wringing on behalf of whoever is next on the feeling aggrieved list afloat .. and is so bloody typical of the spineless jellybacks like Hall who pervade the Org' and are so desperate to do backflips to please the aggrieved .. Top gear used to be a programme the Beeb sold around the world enhancing their reputation and swelling the coffers .. but Hall forsook that in his desperation to please the outraged brigade in getting rid of Clarkson for one of his faux pas .. May and Hammond also left as a result and the Beebs feeble attempts to reignite it's popularity since have failed to achieve the view figures the previous cast had .. and all in the name of political correctness .. 

 

And yet all over the World, whenever there is war or civil unrest and a cacophany of voices preaching lies from one side or another, everyone goes to the one trusted source, the BBC, for the unbiased news.

I am not British. I have lived in a number of countries in Africa and Asia, including at times when both government, opposition and other pretender entities are spewing lies over the airways. Everyone, including government officials, opposition members and others tune in to the BBC in whatever way they can.

I have always wondered how Brexit supporters seem to decry the BBC when it is truly the one single asset that the UK has that is internationally admired and respected (and has absolutely nothing to do with the EU).

5 hours ago, Tippaporn said:

No big deal.  How "prominent" can they be if they are all "former" lawmakers?  It's been well known that numbers of Republicans never endorsed Trump.  So what?  Former Democratic New Jersey Rep. Jeff Van Drew changed parties on Jan. 7th this year over Trump's impeachment.  Me thinks this article is attempting to take a nothing burger and create a something burger out of it.

The fact that they are former lawmakers is an indicator in itself. Current Republican lawmakers know that if they do say anything other than fulsome support for the President they risk the wrath of the party. Besides, Republicans, as a party, are known for sticking by the party line in public anyway. But the fact that so many former lawmakers are showing their hands at this stage, something they would seldom do in public, is an indication of how many in party feel.

Like many of these political waves, thanks to the system set up by the founding fathers, Trumpism will soon make way for something else. Remember McCarthyism? Again, no one in the Republican party would say a word against it for fear of being labeled a communist. McCarthyism had the whole country in its grip and it even attacked leading lights in the armed forces. And while McCartyism had some use in its early stages in that it raised the issue of communist sleepers in the USA during the beginnings of the Cold War, it ended up destroying the careers of a lot of good people and frightened off a lot of others from serving in either the civil service, the armed forces or higher education. In the same way that Trump probably did a little good in not letting Hiliary Clinton be president, some tax reform (although not in an economically efficient way but at least it unleashed some economic growth at the time) and facing up to China (again, not handled right but at least a marker was put down). But after that, it is clear that many of his policies won't work (coal mining, for instance, will not employ huge number of miners because of technological development) and many of his policy approaches are uninformed (his early approach to Covid-19). Soon he too will go the way of McCarthyism. It is the American way.

On 8/21/2020 at 10:18 AM, cmarshall said:

Yes, but it is all but certain that the indictment came down because the previous US Attorney for the Southern District, Geoffrey Berman, resisted Barr's attempt to push him out a month or so ago.  The reason he gave was to protect certain ongoing investigations.  In the end Berman and Barr agreed to a compromise in which Berman would resign, but his duties would be taken over by his own assistant US Attorney, Audrey Strauss, in whom he had confidence.  So, Berman resigned and Strauss took over, not the stooge that Barr had picked presumably to sabotage the Bannon investigation and probably others like it.

 

Geoffrey Berman's integrity was a surprise to me, since prior to his appoint to the Southern District he was the law partner of Rudy Giuliani.  I expected him to be a hack, but he's not.  

 

Bannon, another sociopath like Trump, is now in a bind.  He was cast out of the WH, because he was quoted in Michael Wolf's book criticizing the Trump family.  So, he is still persona non grata to Trump.  In that situation, Bannon would be taking a big risk to refuse to cooperate with prosecutors in the expectation of an eventual pardon.  The better bet would be to sing his guts out, which is what I think he will do.

Thank you for this excellent analysis of the situation. If Bannon sings, I would guess that he might be able to produce a few arias concerning Trump himself.

On 8/21/2020 at 3:40 PM, Bluespunk said:

Why’s that trump?

 

Other presidents have done this without suffering. 
 

Or do you have something to hide...

Not true. Other recent presidents of the USA just handed over their tax returns. No quibbles. No ifs. No buts. Democrats, Republicans. Trump is the exception.

16 hours ago, Iron Tongue said:

Are you serious?  Political murder attempt on a Putin critic, and by use of poison?

 

And you're inclined to look elsewhere?

I don't think that Putin has the time or inclination to go after all and every critic and poison them. There are other ways of getting back at critics. And the way things are in that part of the world, a poisoning like this would not benefit Putin. Therefore I am much more inclined to look at what the victim was working on when he was poisoned. In that will be the clue.

As I mentioned in my original posting, I don't say that Putin is not capable of such a murder. But Russia is a more complex place and not all such murders are the work of Putin or the Kremlin.

3 hours ago, pedro01 said:

They should check to see if he glows in the dark. 

 

What a bunch of dinosaurs the Russian Govt are... 

I wonder about the involvement of the Kremlin in this. Sure, he is a critic but one that is so contained that he never gets into the mainstream. Probably his poisoning is the most publicity he has got inside Russia.

Don't get me wrong, I firmly believe that the Novichok and the other poisoning in the UK were done by the Russian government and the orders came from the top. But this is overkill with too much blockback.

For what it is worth, my take is that Navalny has <deleted> off someone other than the central government. He went after so many people for corruption and malfeasance. He may have been working on something when he was attacked. I would be looking in that direction.

On 4/25/2020 at 9:54 AM, Kenny202 said:

I got a macbook pro now which I have had and loved for many years and still going strong. Just a little bit bulkier than a Macbook air I used to have which these days not needing too much grunt would probably be perfect for me. I don't know why but I did tend to use my Macbook air more portably than my pro which I tend to leave in one place all the time. The Mac Air so easy to pick up and move around will be my next computer choice for sure, when my poor old Macbook finally dies lol....2009 and still going strong lol

Some years ago on the recommendation of a friend I was looking for an iPad for travel purposes. I did not want to have to drag around a Macbook pro all the time. In the electronics section of John Lewis (famous store in the UK), the knowledgeable salesman suggested that instead of buying a 12 inch iPad plus keyboard stand (which would not support the iPad in bed - had to be a hard smooth surface), I should get a 12 inch macbook air. I eventually did - it was on sale. The only issue at the time was that the Macbook air did not take a Sim card but a version of the iPad did.

Some 5 or 6 years later, I still have the macbook air which worked perfectly until recently when I was asked if I wanted to upgrade the operating system "free of charge." Of course, having much more interesting things to do than to keep up with the multitude of issues with computers, I upgraded only to find that my versions of MS Word and all the other stuff in MS Office don't work now. Will buy MS Word.

Many of my friends have smaller tablets - there may be a case for getting a smaller tablet that is easily handheld and that can fit into a jacket pocket. But most of my friends/colleagues have had issues with their larger tablets - scratched screens, problems with keyboards etc. But the greatest problems have to do with usability in places such as buses or trains or hotels beds where there is no surface for you to set up a stand (if such a stand/keyboard is available, of course!). Don't get me wrong - I think that tablets have functionality but many people find the larger ones a pain in the neck or the wrists etc.

I love the way Trump talks about this being the worst witch-hunt ever. Apart from the actual witch-hunts back several hundred years ago, just looking for a person's tax returns was the least of it when it came to the McCarthy era when the FBI and other agencies teamed up with congressional committees to hunt down everyone who was even friends with someone who might have signed a petition or a membership card back when they were a student. Destroyed the lives and careers of many people. And one of the people who was leading the charge was a lawyer called Roy Cohn who was later to legally represent someone called Donald Trump. Hmmmmm.

4 hours ago, anterian said:

I am puzzled, how does a doctor confirm a failed attempt at rape. 

Think for a moment the injuries and bruising that an attempted rape might give rise to. The fact that the alleged perpetrator was not able to gain full penetration does not mean that he did not leave significant marks or injuries consistent with a sexual assault.

To add a little science to the discussion, I had thought that the HIV scare was somewhat over, given the ready availability of retrovirals that lack side-effects and also drive down the level of infection so that it is no longer discernible in the blood in tests and the individual is no longer infectious.

So presumably what is being discussed here are the rather small number of individuals who are HIV positive, who have been tested and know that they are positive and have not started or been on retrovirals long enough for them to have effect.

18 hours ago, sammieuk1 said:

What a surprise what exoctic poison this time polonium novichok or bleach ????  

Novichok and Polonium are invariably only used abroad as it is all to easy to contaminate others. No problem if others are killed abroad but perhaps a bigger problem in Russia if some Russians killed.

19 hours ago, pnustedt said:

TB is a very infectious disease which kills more people in Thailand than Covid ever has. I know because I have survived it.

At least one quarter of the World's population currently have TB but mostly in a "latent" form - the healthy immune system suppresses it. If something happens to the immune system, then out it comes. Sometimes this is happes in old age as the immune system deteriorates. There is medication for TB - taking isoniazid for a year, in my case. Not a pleasant medication due to side-effects. But at least it is available.

Most of those who die of TB either have a version that cannot be treated, have complications or do not want to take the medication either for financial or other reasons. The meds are not expensive but you do have to keep at it otherwise it will come back and maybe in an untreatable form.

But as regards TB killing more people than Covid - just give Covid time. It is early days. TB has infected more than a quarter of the population of humans - Covid is only just starting.

4 hours ago, Andrew65 said:

My sister worked for a time in the UK fostering children for the social services, the children had come from situations where one was being sexually abused, She says it was common (over-represented) that the  mother of the children was cohabiting with a man who wasn't the father of the kids.

(Before there are comments, many adoptive fathers are better fathers than the real ones, in every way).

The dynamic in families as regards violence against children can be very very complex. It does not have to be a broken family. It does not have to be a male who instigates the violence, as is often incorrectly believed by social workers and others.

My own experience with parents who never took drugs, did not drink and never strayed from the bonds of marriage was that my father beat me but always at the instigation of my mother. There were never any visible marks in public areas, such as the face or arms. Father did not always beat us - even when mother left a note that said "flog them hard." But if she provoked him properly or the red mist descended, he deliberately delivered a beating with a stick on the bare behind with deliberation, on occasion drawing blood.

It took me some time as a young adult to recover from their system of forced labour, deprivation and pain but the best "revenge" is to become the author of your own life despite them. I was not special in this regard. Nor is this poor kid - this kind of child abuse is everywhere. The only thing he has going for him is that the mother's boyfriend was stupid enough to leave marks and visible injuries on the kid's face. There are many who torture and exploit children but leave no visible marks. But this way this kid gets out of a young life full of pain, hopefully to be raised by his father or grandparents or guardians who will treat him right.

14 hours ago, Amdesign said:

Haha we already have 'democratic Ukraine', where Nazi groups are used to suppress the opposition, and the country became the slave of IMF. Yes, and the country is de-industrialized, with millions working now as cheap agricultural labor in EU. Indeed 'democracy' is very bright perspective for Belarus!

I knew that it was only a matter of time before the Russian troll factory would make its presence known. Hi Ivan (or whatever your name is). Don't you think that your post is just a little obvious? Nazis? Really?