James105

I've been down this road before and it is pointless. When someone has been indoctrinated with the propaganda then even cold, hard numbers do little here. It's a bit like being Winston trying to persuade someone that 2+2 really does equal 4.

Again, since covid deaths had an average age (in the UK at least) of 82 years old, I find this very, very hard to believe. How old were these parents? Over 80? How did they even have kids when they are so old. I'd suggest that if covid had not taken them then there would still be 10m kids without these alleged "parents" since humans are not immortal and have to die of something anyway.

I would change my mind if the stats supported it, but they don't, so I cannot.

What does that even mean? Due to the decreased life expectancy caused by poverty these same kids will end up sacrificing more years of their own lives to give (maybe) a little bit extra life for people who already had lived their lives. Covid only rarely took the lives of healthy, young individuals. This is why the answer to the "trolley problem" shouldn't be to pull the lever as the unknown or unintended consequences of intervening could cause far more devastation than pulling the lever.

So you don't know then or made it up? It was a genuine question as from what I can see people are losing their minds over a £2bn tax cut for the wealthy, whilst ignoring the tax cuts and giveaways that benefit everyone such as the 1p tax cut on basic rate and the £200bn giveaway for energy bills.

Poor kids, and not just here, but in virtually every country they have paid by far the biggest price for the overreaction of the adults to covid. Not only did they lose face to face education at the most important part of their lives, but they will be spending the rest of their lives (and probably their kids lives) paying the cost of the 2.5 years of utter madness of weak leadership and profiteering pharma companies. They will become very resentful adults when they come to realise the true cost of what the adults of today have done to their lives, even though covid was basically harmless to them. If there was another Titanic disaster I have no doubt that 70%-80% of adults of today would sacrifice the children so they could get themselves a seat on the lifeboat.

Which are what exactly?

Except that is not true is it? It's a mere £2bn for the tax cuts that brings it back the higher tax rate back into line to what the highest rate of tax was during the majority of the last Labour government. The rest of the £48bn borrowing is to fund the basic rate cut that benefits everyone who pays income tax. The poorest are going to benefit from the £200bn from help with the energy crisis.

It's quite fascinating how much time and effort has been spent finding solutions to covid that people can take all year round to "prevent" covid, and how much little time and effort has been spent finding solutions to deal with covid once someone has it. A cynical person (unlike myself who of course firmly believes big pharma puts peoples health before profits) may even suspect profiteering motives for these kind of pursuits and I personally cannot wait until we have Netflix style subscriptions to big pharma so they can keep us healthy with their preventative medications for whatever comes next. Fingers crossed they come up with a climate change nasal spray soon!

So you disagree that health is not related to a countries wealth and the lower life expectancy in poorer countries is what... coincidental? What part of what I said is revisionism?

Health is directly related to a countries economy, hence the reason that the poorer a country is the lower the life expectancy so the IMF should of course be involved. The economic problems that are being faced today are a direct consequence of just focusing on just the health aspects of covid without considering the economic impact of these policies. There was no balance. Sensible folks predicted that an increase in poverty around the world would send a lot more people into an early grave than covid could ever hope to achieve.

Shame the IMF didn't get involved a bit earlier really when countries were destroying their economies via unnecessary and wholly ineffective lockdowns. Getting involved now that one of these countries is doing something to try and fix this huge mistake is a bit like locking the stable door after the horse bolted about 2.5 years ago.

Weird how people on here think that the £50bn tax cuts are the sole cause of this (even though the idea of tax cuts is to promote growth and it is too early to tell if that will actually happen), and not the additional £200bn of borrowing that is required to help people with their skyrocketing energy bills. The £200bn borrowing is not investing to grow the economy and it's just the kind of borrowing that causes markets to react just like they have done here. I can presume those on the left would prefer the alternative option of letting people freeze to death as they cannot afford their bills so the pound remains a little bit stronger against the $, unlike those nasty tories who only look after the rich folks.

Someone should tell the Pfizer CEO about this as he has become infected for the second time in 6 weeks. Based on your logic this suggests that the people he works with are unvaccinated as otherwise how could this have happened? https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/pfizer-ceo-tests-positive-covid-2022-09-24/

As with any medication, people should not just be told about the benefits, but also the risks associated with a vaccine so they can make an informed decision. Hiding this information or censoring it on social media does not inspire confidence.

You mean their estates make that money... right? The individual people that make up the royal family, as far as I am aware, do not produce or make anything to generate that level of income. That income would probably be higher if we did not have the royal family and the estates were opened up to tourism. I'm sure tours of the inside of Buckingham palace would be a great money spinner for the UK.

And if Charles turns out to be equivalent or worse than any of those you mentioned and brings embarrassment on the UK which then in turn affects tourism? What system or law is there in place to remove him from office?

I have a bugbear about the British monarchy. Normally I don't care about them but since the media has seen fit to ignore every single other important issue going on right now in favour of devoting almost 100% of coverage on a story about a 96 year old dying of natural causes I am struggling not to be irritated by them. In a presidential system if a 96 year old ex-president dies, the country doesn't need to grind to a halt, the football can still go ahead and there isn't 24 hour coverage of the event for 2 weeks straight. Also, if the law of the land states that inheritance tax needs to be paid over a certain amount then the presidents kids would have to pay it, just like everyone else. I just don't get how people can idolise these people. What talent do they even have that earns this idolisation? It's all a bit of a mystery to me. History doesn't go anywhere, it will still be there. Tourists will still come to see the palaces and castles, just as they do in France. I cannot think of a single good reason why the monarchy system should continue.

Indeed, and where did he even find the money to pay for this settlement? He didn't have the money himself so it must have come via the Queen via the grant she receives from the UK treasury, which in turn comes from the taxpayer, which is a particularly nauseating aspect of this whole thing.

How on earth you can imagine that the Royal family is the only thing standing in the way of the UK turning into Russia is quite beyond comprehension for rational thinking people. This must be the power of propaganda in action to be able to think that way, and as I saw from Covid time, some people are highly susceptible to propaganda. You are correct, we do have peoples (elected) representatives which begs the question or why there needs to be an extra (unelected) layer on top of that. If you feel the need to have someone (that you don't know) to idolise and bow your head to there are plenty of options nowadays, from the equally untalented Love island contestants all the way up highly skilled footballers, scientists, musicians or tech moguls.

Sure, we may well have ended up with "President Blair", but he would not have been able to occupy the presidency for 70 years without challenge, nor would his kids automatically inherit the presidency upon his death. Just because the Queen happened to be a good egg is not a reason to continue with a system that should be confined to the medieval period.

In a monarchy you don't get to select the best or the right person for the job. If Andrew was the first born he would now be King and there would be nothing that could be done to prevent that, such is the ridiculous system of a monarchy.

There is a solution to this problem of not wanting cameras shoved in their faces.... abolish the monarchy. This way the only people who get cameras shoved in their faces are those who seek it. Living a life of unearned wealth, status and an adoring public is most definitely a privilege and if I was eligible to apply for a job of a Prince without needing to have any discernible talent (which other than being born into it is the requirement for the current crop of Royals) then I would most certainly do so.

It distracts from more important issues. Since the royal family are just ceremonial figures and are not allowed to do anything of real significance (such as changing laws etc), in order to keep them in the public eye they are reported on incessantly for carrying out the most mundane of tasks that literally any able-bodied human in the UK is capable of doing. Do the French have to put up with news about the Presidents kids, grandkids, wife's cousin half removed from his sisters fiance etc? Probably not as they are as irrelevant to the vast majority of peoples lives much in the same way as most members of the royal family are in the UK. Yet we see our head of states family in the news everywhere in the UK as soon as they are born and throughout their lives, even though the chances of them accomplishing anything significant is no greater than the other 70 million people in the UK.

How many tourists actually got to even see the Queen, even from miles away? They come to see the palaces and castles which do not require a monarchy to be present. One of the most popular tourist destinations in France is still the Palace of Versailles and they haven't had a monarchy since 1792 so the tourist argument for retaining a monarchy is a non-starter. I've always been indifferent to the Royal family, and it grates when they occupy so much of the news agenda - I have no idea (for example) why I am supposed to be interested when someone does something as normal as saying hello to someone or waves out of a window or car which, quite frankly, any human is capable of doing. At least a "president" is selected by the people, which gives them significantly more credibility than an accident of birth. If the monarchy was disbanded there would be nothing stopping King Charles III putting his name forward to be president and if that is what the people wanted then he could become head of state on merit, rather than based on who his mum was.