GroveHillWanderer

The new passports are dark blue (I got mine earlier this year) not black. There has been this persistent "urban myth" that back in pre-EU days UK passports were once black but that's also not the case. There was a time when the passports were a dark navy blue that actually darkened further with age to where they looked almost black but as the Passport Office themselved stated in response to enquiries, the UK did not issue black passports. Here's a photo of my passport taken outdoors in natural light. I'll admit that in dim indoor light it looks darker but even so, it's clearly dark blue rather than black.

Not sure if you're being deliberately disingenuous there but I'm sure you know fine well that charging for 21 hours is not the alternative to stopping 10 mins in a gasoline station. About the only time it would ever take 21 hours to charge an EV would be if doing an overnight trickle charge on a 110V power supply. Even on a normal household 220/240V supply it will only take around 6-12 hours (depending on battery size). With a dedicated EV wall charger (which a large proportion, if not a majority of EV owners have) the recharge time is normally 4-8 hours. But once again, even that's not the equivalent of gasoline station refuelling. The equivalent to that would be a service area charging station, where the charging time with current batteries and CS charging speeds is more like 20 minutes to an hour depending on the various charging parameters (battery size, CS power output, starting percentage, desired ending percentage etc). And, as mentioned in another post, we are already at the stage where within a year, batteries may well be available that can charge to 100% in only 6 minutes. You're also ignoring the fact that rather than being some kind of impediment, the overnight charging scenario actually provides a benefit to EV's that ICE vehicle owners just don't have - the possibility of arriving home (or at some other destination) with your vehicle almost out of juice and leaving the next morning with it 100% refueled, without needing to go anywhere in the meantime.

Well that's the thing - based on the reporting, it seems the only reason anyone found out about this was that when she got pregnant, she told her aunt. Had she not got pregnant, the abuse may have continued to go unnoticed.

1MW chargers will be available (as they already are in several European countries) in regular EV charging stations. And yes, they will be available for any vehicles capable of using them. At the moment they're used primarily for heavy goods EV's but that's because not many smaller vehicles can use them yet. As more and more private vehicles like the Lotus Elise become capable of using them, their availability and use will obviously increase.

The stupidest thing about this whole affair (to me at least) is the fact that this is a problem entirely of Trump's own making. If he had just returned the documents when asked, like so many of his advisors were telling him to (or like Biden and Pence did) he would not be having any of these current problems. As pointed out in the article below: Trump rejected lawyers’ efforts to avoid classified documents indictment

You really should stop flogging this dead horse - it's not going to get up again. Virtually every single Republican politician being interviewed on this issue on the last couple of days has now admitted that there is no evidence these tapes exist. No-one knows where they might be or even where the person who said he had them, might be (he may not even be alive). How can you say there is "credible witness testimony" when even those who were touting this originally, now all concede to a man, that there is not a single shred of evidence to support it.

I haven't seen anyone except Comer calling this person a "trusted" informant. Most of the reports I've seen described them as a "confidential" informant. Just because something is told in confidence, doesn't make it automatically reliable. Anyway, even if the informant is reliable, the source may not be. If you follow that Twitter conversation, it contains the following direct quote from Republican Senator Ron Johnson:

Just to update this, even Chuck Grassley, the person who made the announcement about the tapes in the first place, has now admitted in an interview that the tapes may not even exist (as has James Comer, also in an on-air interview). Senator Admits Biden Bribery Tapes Might Not Exist After All

There is already a prototype of a new battery being trialled in a Lotus Elise S1 concept car, that can fully charge to 100% in just 6 minutes. Lotus Elise reimagined as a sporty EV that can fully charge in 6 minutes According to the manufacturer, these ultra-fast charging batteries should start commercial production next year. Apparently the 6 minute charging requires a 350kW (or better) fast charger of which admittedly there are not very many around yet but they are becoming more common and as another poster alluded to, 1MW chargers are already being introduced. In Europe their roll out started around a year ago - the announcement below is from June 2022. CharIN Officially Launches The Megawatt Charging System (MCS)

According to the full article that is linked to, the abuse only came to light after the girl missed her period and told her aunt about it (and how it had been going on for four years). The mother was apparently unaware of what had been going on until after the girl told her aunt.

The issue isn't whether to get treatment for anxiety, it's about whether, having experienced anxiety (and not having been treated for it yet) it needs to be declared as a pre-existing condition when applying for health insurance.

Thaksin didn't raise the amount from 200,000 to 800,000. In 2003, while he was in power, it was raised from 600,000 to 800,000. It was raised from 200,000 (to 400,000) in 1998. See post below from the late, great UbonJoe.

Did you miss the part where it's been established that nobody involved in these claims actually knows whether there are any tapes? All we have so far, is Chuck Grassley talking about an unverified, uncorroborated tip from an unidentified "confidential human source" who claimed that there was somebody who had some tapes. There is as yet, no evidence that these tapes actually exist, as both Jim Jordan and Ron Johnson have acknowledged.

The problem with this story of tapes "proving" the whole Joe Biden-Burisma bribery scheme is that there's no evidence the tapes actually exist. As that article also points out:

They should, but no other politician is accused of: holding on to government documents for a year and a half after being asked to return them, lying to investigators about them, obstructing an investigation into their whereabouts, inducing his own lawyers to make false declarations about them or showing national defence documents to unauthorised persons.

It depends within which jurisdiction the offence takes place. For example, in the US it is, in the UK it is not (unless the 'anything else' is a penis).

Yes, that's exactly what I did, three years ago. No need to leave the country, no need to go through the multi-step process outlined above. Just be aware that the paperwork required for a marriage extension is appreciably more voluminous than for a retirement extension. It's not quite as burdensome (IMHO) as some would have you believe, though. I don't find it particularly troublesome at all. The only part that I find a little bit of a hassle is having to sign every single sheet of paper (and there's a lot of them). Still, that probably takes less than 5 minutes all in all so it's not really that big of a deal - to me at least. I did this in Hua Hin and it was an extremely straightforward process. I was half expecting them to ask me some questions about why I was changing and/or possibly give me a little bit of a hard time about it but not at all. They didn't ask me a single question or make any kind of fuss, they just took the paperwork and processed it without demur.

I'm not sure about how the technicalities of it work, but the articles I've read (unless they're somehow mistaken) all say that it can charge to 100% in six minutes. Here's another quote from the same AutoCar article, talking about the 35 kWh battery. I see that the fastest chargers around at the moment are 350 kW so if I understand how the figures you give work, that apparently means they've found a way to charge a battery without any losses?

I'm not quite sure what you're referring to. According to all the articles about it (and there are a bunch of them) this new fast-charging battery does not require a new breed of chargers, nor to charge at a higher Kw rate. The articles all make a point of saying it will fully charge in 6 minutes using existing chargers. As the article below from AutoCar states: Lotus Elise S1 reborn as rapid-charging EV sports They also all say that it will be available next year. That is still a prediction but I'd be surprised if they're off by a whole 9 years.

Looking at the Khaosod article linked to earlier with photos of her with her parents and based on the implication in it that those who, like her, have benefitted from fast promotions, came from "influential and wealthy families with prestigious backgrounds," it appears quite possible that her family are rather well-off.

Battery technology seems to be making advances almost every day now. This looks like a really promising development - a battery using existing recharging infrastructure that: According to the article below, it should be available next year in a Lotus Elise model. Electrified Lotus Elise Charges To 100% In 6 Minutes It doesn't have a particularly spectacular driving range at 250 km but it's also smaller and lighter than current batteries and since this is only the first iteration of it, they will no doubt be working on increasing the range in future (probably by making bigger and heavier versions).

It depends which country's definition you're using. It would be rape in the US, where this is defined as: However in the UK, where rape requires penetration by a penis, this would be classed as, "Assault by penetration."

If there is "very strong and credible evidence that joe biden was taking money from the Ukraine" then it certainly isn't contained in what Chuck Grassley is saying. All we've got from Grassley is an allegation that a Ukrainian businessman, who allegedly made payments to the Bidens, claims to have recordings of him talking to Hunter and Joe Biden. Furthermore, the only basis for this is an FBI FD-1023 document which as several people have pointed out, is a document used for unverified reports from confidential sources. If and when the recordings have been produced, verified, and we know what's on them, then there might be something substantive here. However there is as yet, no evidence that these recordings actually exist, or of what is on them.

Did you even read that article? It provides no evidence whatsoever of John Brennan admitting that it "was political." It does reference a Fox News article that the Daily Mail says was reporting Brennan had said something to that effect. However if you follow the link and read the Fox News article, it also does not provide any evidence of John Brennan admitting to it being political. All it says is that Jim Jordan claimed John Brennan's remarks in a closed door hearing confirmed to him (Jordan) that this was political. It also indicates that a democratic member of the committee who was in the hearing interpreted Brennan's remarks completely differently to how Jordan did. Neither the Daily Mail article nor the Fox News article contain any information about what John Brennan's actual words were. All we have are Jim Jordan's claims about what his words amounted to.

Comer is the Chairman of the House Oversight Committee, the body that is being used to propagate all the (as yet unfounded) allegations about a Biden influence peddling scheme. So you're basically responding to a post about the allegations against Joe Biden and admitting to being clueless about the entire basis of the subject.