JonnyF

Not really - when you consider Covid19 and the War in Ukraine. What were you expecting after over 2 years of economic devastation? Free Candy for everyone?

Conservatives generally favour low taxation. Truss more than Sunak in this case. A free market economy with low tax and minimal government interference. Marvellous. Labour on the other hand would tax everyone more. They always do. Then spend it on frivolous projects that make their politicians feel all warm inside. They try to justify it by telling everyone how much they taxed those bad rich people and corporations, thus ensuring investment into the country goes down and the economy tanks. Except Blair of course, he ditched the virtue signalling and simply spent it on the illegal war with Bush ????.

Who is taxed most? You need specific names? Professions? Let's take a simple tradesman from Northumberland (since you're talking about counties now), a good honest chap named Albert. Let's say he earns 100 pounds. He has 75 pounds left after income tax. He spends 20 pounds on 2 packs of cigarettes (another 16 pounds in tax) and 55 pounds on half a tank of petrol for his car petrol (about 17 pounds of tax). How much of that 100 pounds went to the taxman? 58 for the taxman and 42 for the tradesman. 58 pounds is 'most' of 100 pounds. Under Labour it would probably be more like 65/35 with their crazy tax/spend other people's money policies. So you see, it is not only those evil rich people (evil Tories no doubt) that pay a lot of tax. It is the man in the street as well. So yes, I support lower tax for honest hard working people and if that's means less money to benefit scroungers and illegal immigrants then excuse me if I don't shed too many tears.

The point is that all parties have different opinions within that party. Claiming it is a conservative thing is inaccurate. Sunak and Truss have different approaches to certain issues, yes. If they all thought the same on every issue it would be like one of your lefty Twitter echo chambers which wouldn't be a great form of Democracy.

In most countries that would be the government, I'm surprised you didn't know... The extent to which salaries are taxed varies greatly between governments, but broadly speaking left wingers support high taxation and big government whereas right winger tend to support low taxation and smaller state interference. Any other basic questions?

Different countries, different culture, different demographics, different everything pretty much. We're talking about UK politics here. The clue is in the title.

Of course the opposition is perfectly aligned on every issue. Starmer is currently out shopping for 2 left shoes to align with Dianne's 'get dressed blind' policy ????. It's normal to have differences of opinion within a party. Healthy even.

If you lower taxes and provide incentives to work hard, people wouldn't be so reliant on government pensions and 'other benefits' in retirement. What's the incentive to work hard when you're taxed most of your salary and the tax is given to the spongers living next door and the illegal immigrants fresh off the boat? Stupid policies to make lefties feel good about themselves while the country goes down the toilet.

For me it was more about spending a great deal of time at Uni (and beyond) in the presence of left wing, sneering, social justice warriors, and realizing fairly quickly that most of them were hypocritical characters masking their vindictiveness and spitefulness with the pretense of caring about others. In my early 20's I also saw a lot of the same characters abusing the welfare state. People perfectly capable of working but instead sitting around all day smoking weed and pontificating about the evil Tories while counting the days to their next dole cheque. A few years watching this while working my <deleted> off to pay off my student debt and forge a career for myself, then the penny starts to drop about the realities of the welfare state. Hopefully whoever wins this contest goes back to true Conservative values and helps those genuinely in need while offering strong incentives for the abusers of the system to get back to work (and by incentives, I mean cutting off their benefits pronto). Sunak's tax and spend policies, plus his abused furlough scheme lead me to believe Truss is more in line with my beliefs.

I never knew you paid so much attention to the opinion of Dominic Cummings. Don't worry about the opposition, they still have Starmer.

So, Truss and Sunak remaining. Truss was always my second choice behind Kemi so obviously I'm hoping she wins ahead of Sunak. Politically I like Truss' views on things like her economic libertarian views, anti woke stance, smaller state, less regulations etc. She also did a good job securing trade deals post Brexit. Her ability to do so despite being a Remainer shows a mature stance and a willingness to accept the will of the people, a lesson that many on this forum could learn from. Like me, she also flirted with Labour and the Lib dems in her youth before waking up to smell the coffee and moving to the Conservatives. This shows a level of intelligence and a willingness to change and admit your mistakes. Sunak's tax and spend stance on the other hand is not what I'm looking for. I don't think he'd be a great election winner either so we'd have to rely on Starmer staying at the top of Labour to secure yet another victory. If Starmer left and they got someone likeable, someone with a personality who knew what a woman is, we could have a battle on our hands at the next General Election. Unfortunately, I predict Sunak will win. If he does, I can only hope he makes Truss or Kemi his deputy PM and that Starmer retains his position (and keeps Abbott, Rayner, Nandy, Lammy et.al alongside him to complete the image of incompetence).

I think it will end up like alcohol. There will be shops selling cheap weed just like you can buy Lao Khao. For people who want something a bit more refined there will be shops selling high quality stuff for people who are prepared to pay, same as you can get decent Whisky if you want to stump up the cash. For me, it's worth buying the decent stuff. I paid about 1600 for 3.5 grammes a couple of weeks ago and I still have more than half left (I'm not a heavy/daily smoker). So let's say 300 Baht a week. For that price, it's not really worth me buying low grade stuff. Sure I will try some out of curiosity, but if it's noticably lower quality then I think it's worth it to buy the decent stuff (same as I don't drink Lao Khao to save a few Baht).

Depends how many licences you have. I have two, one for motorcycles and one for cars ????.

Shame to see Kemi out of the race. Would have liked to see her win. Looks more and more like Rishi. I'm hoping for Truss now. But all 3 are infinitely better than Starmer.

Wow, so you have to get caught drunk driving 4 times (assuming you can't pay off the cop that caught you, otherwise more than 4) before you lose your licence. Sounds like these 12 points are going to be pretty hard to lose but I'm sure drivers will be doing their best up and down the country ????.

Well I for one am shocked that Big Joke was involved. He seems like such a nice, honest, upstanding fellow.

I love the way they always say stopping foreigners owning land is about keeping land prices low for the poor Thai people. In reality it's about keeping prices low and ensuring there is no competition for the Thai Elites to buy vast swathes of cheap land from the very same poor Thai people, often via the banks repossessing said land that has been put down as collateral on high interest loans when the borrower defaults. All the while, the same Thai Elites are free to buy land in Europe with their ill gotten gains. It's ironic that while Thaksin wants to stop foreigners buying tiny amounts of land in Thailand, he cannot even set foot on Thai soil without facing arrest. He's still vastly better than Prayut though.

Heaven forbid that westerners believe in freedom and not being told what to do by authoritative regimes ????. Have you ever considered that's why most of the West is a liberal democracy while much of Asia is still run by illegal, authoritarian, borderline fascist Juntas? Gone native much? ????. Back to masks, I've noticed the waitresses in my local Sukhumvit pubs/restaurants have stopped wearing masks. A couple of Thais in my office have stopped wearing them during office hours (and I assume outside office hours). Other than that, most still wear them. I wouldn't criticize someone for wearing one or not wearing one. Freedom of choice and all that. I still wear them mostly due to habit and smog but if it starts annoying me it comes off.

I have a fat tyre e-mountainbike. Looks a lot like this one. I use it for short journeys around BKK, mainly to and from the MRT station. It's OK, does about 35kph without pedalling but the range is only about 25 kms which is fine for me, but limiting if you wanted to use it for anything more than the short trips I use it for. I'm not sure it's 100% legal but it looks enough like a normal mountain bike to never get stopped, and there are no cops on the route I use to the MRT station anyway. If I saw a checkpoint I'd whip out the key and pedal past them. As for electric motorbikes, I'm not convinced by them yet. Range is not great and neither is performance unless you want to spend serious money. Charging is a bit of a pain (the battery detatches on mine but it's still a lot of work remembering to do it, carrying it up to my condo etc. compared to filling up my Ninja 250 with petrol every 300 kms). Registering them is possible now on some models, but I am not convinced by the benefits over something like a Honda Super Cub for about 40k that will last decades and costs so little to run, easy to resell etc.

What's with all these 'good taxi driver' stories. Has there been more gold chain snatching ladyboys that I haven't heard about?

Very sad. Probably never know what happened. Could have leaned over the rail for a quick rest and had a heart attack. Could have been hit by a truck and tossed over the side. I had a schoolfriend in the UK. At age 21 he sat on the wall of a small bridge on the way back from a country pub, lost his balance, fell backwards about 10 feet down and broke his neck and drowned in 2 feet of water. I suspect a similar thing happened here. RIP fella.

Unfortunately, a few fancy hotels and imported European luxury sedans crawling around Bangkok's streets does not make a first world country. These things are the lipstick on the pig. A quick look at the illegal Junta in charge (having stolen power down the barrel of a gun), the corrupt police force, the corrupt judiciary and the massive, increasingly wide wealth gap tells you everything you need to know about Thailand's development. And those are just the things we are allowed to mention... Having spent 16 years here implementing new systems, it's very clear why we still have antiquated reams of paperwork. Thais are loathe to change any system they understand, no matter how inefficient it is. They cling to old systems using various stalling techniques and invent fake issues with the replacement. They hate change, and they certainly aren't going to inconvenience themselves learning a new system to make a farang's visa renewal easier.

Down to 4 now. I'm delighted to see Tom Tugendhadt out of the race. An ardent Remainer who plays the 'military card' way too often for comfort. Kemi has really impressed me during this race. Well spoken, positive, sensible political views, a Leaver. I really hope she survives the next round but I suspect she might not. Unfortunately I think Rishi is nailed on.

If Labour haven’t got the balls to remove that embarrassment from their party how can you expect them to take the tough decisions required to run a country? It’s symbolic. If you can’t fix a small issue you can’t fix a big issue. I support leaving her there. She embodies the party perfectly and ensures they won’t return to power.

"Youse are all skum". What's not to like about our dear, snarling Angela? The deputy leader makes Dianne Abbott's privately educated, nurse attacking son look cultured, intelligent and mild mannered. She embodies the mean, vitriolic nature of the left. Team "be kind" ???? They are exactly what they accuse you of being. And they wonder why the voters reject them time after time.