Westminster Politics 2024-2029
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik (@Rood) and Jamie (@Vault Dweller) review both the Everton and Bodø/Glimt victories at Old Trafford. Listen to the guys discuss 2 wins and 7 goals in the last week, analyse of the Amorim formation, focus on Amad and how he is playing, and also take a look at Hojlund, Rashford & Zirkzee – who starts v Arsenal?
The political consensus is wrong.
If NATO means anything as a defensive alliance, then we need to ensure the states bordering Russia are protected. The view from Tallinn is very different from the view from London.
Plenty of economists have been talking about how to raise more taxes on wealth for decades now. Maybe on all those Russians who are state agents and billionaires for a start? This does not need to be a zero sum game. We taxed and spent under Tories and Labour for decades after WW2.
Huge amounts of dirty money flow through British territories every year. Billions of dollars. It is within our power to smash the consensus. It doesn't even need countries to abandon capitalism or neoliberalism. That's the irony.
I wish Labour still had union paymasters. Jenrick is an anti-worker cnut.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/a...lear-drills-after-macron-and-cameron-comments
Would Russia invade the UK? No. Might Russia invade a UK ally while attempting to intimidate us in various ways into not responding? Yep. I think the UK is diplomatically and militarily weak as it is, and if NATO unravelled we could be horribly exposed. Weakness invites aggression.
You deter murderous fascists because you have to, not because you want to, or because it's a choice.
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Yeah, that's kind of been my point.
Starving kids and freezing gran is a choice, a choice made by people who have spent every second since they made it lying about what they did.
Thats who the tories were, and that is who the current regime are.
So why is everyone so willing to give those people more money? Do you honestly think it will go to soldiers, or is it more likely that half will dissapear in profits to defence consultants and end up in tax free accounts in the caymans.
I wouldn't trust this government with a fiver, let alone give them another 20 billion to spend.
We did but welfare and health spending as a % of GDP was lower then than it is now, while defence spending was higher - the reduction in military spending post cold war certainly helped enable the rise in welfare spending. I fear we will have hard choices to make in the next couple of years, and confronting european nations with the reality of that has been half the point of trump's rhetoric.
Standard Tory tactic of divide and conquer when it comes to workers. Whether its related to wages or working conditions, it's always the same strategy.
If the likes of Jenrick always had their way, then the standard working week would still be 12 hour a day, 6 days a week with no paid leave, and just enough pay to survive long enough to be useful to your employer.
Alan Milburn. To rescue the NHS for labour, now officially appointed. Don't worry they said, once starmer is elected they will pivot to more left leaning policies. Alan Milburn, the architect of new Labour outsourcing nhs healthcare to private companies during new Labour years. Alan Milburn, who's made almost 10million for himself advising private healthcare on opportunities in the NHS.
I don't what people want sometimes. He is a just a non Exec, he's not running the thing, he's an adviser. But consider Labour's just put an extra 22bn into the health service, a phenomenal amount of money. It (a) has to be spent effectively and (b) there is a point at which pumping in money without a harder look at how it all works, simply becomes unaffordable.
If heinz told you jeffrey dahmer was advising them on their next soup flavours, would you not be a little concerned?
The people hired as advisors signify the direction of travel they are looking for.
But you know that.
Fecking vile individuals. They can lay a wreath anytime but don’t like not being photographed.
I don't worry about the principle of some private expertise or investment in our health services, provided the NHS remains free at the point of use. Equating a former cabinet health secretary in a successful labour government, with Jeffery Dahmer isn't a serious argument.
The world is developing at the fastest rate ever. Technology will take over a lot of the things in the next 18 months. If Trump implements half of what he has said he will (I don't believe he will to be honest, but he is a lunatic) then he will hold the US back centuries. Just like communism held China and Eastern Europe back while the rest of the world developed. You can argue there was 50 odd years of communism but if you go back to my first sentence those 50 years are like months in today's world.
As for tariffs, I think it is all talk. The US cannot afford to piss off the country that exporter 1/3 of all world electronics. If Trump really does annoy China then they will just invade Taiwan who is the biggest manufacturer of semiconductors chips and then they will control or at least cripple 68% of the manufacturing worldwide.
A lot of people don't know that the whole battle for Taiwan is for chips. This is why the US is vehemently siding with Taiwan autonomy but within China's rule. They "retook" Hong Kong, Trump might be the piece of the puzzle they need to get Taiwan.
I don't agree the battle for Taiwan is for chips - China's desire for reunification far predates TSMC's rise and tensions started rising way before TSMC became the world's leading chipmaker. It's political not economic. And it would be trivial to sabotage the foundries so they would be useless to a Chinese invading force. China reunified with Macau, and Hong Kong, and Taiwan is next on the list.
The US has a long history of imposting tariffs, including ones that arguably helped ruin global trade and increase global tensions in the 1930s.
whats the point of investing extra money into the NHS if its going to be creamed off by private enterprise, in many cases (i do know of what i speak), much of the funding is just duplicating services already found in the NHS but carried out for private profits. so theres a short term gain in terms of waiting lists, but a complete absence of capital expenditure to actually enhance NHS offerings in the long term.
I'm not talking about China's desire, I'm talking about US interest. They will not allow Taiwan to be usurped by China because of TSMC.
I'm not saying China will destroy the foundries, a blockade on exports is enough to cripple so many things. COVID is a testament to that.
The US is building TSMC plants in the USA to de risk that, and I think the sabotage would come from within Taiwan not China. And I am not sure the US, under Trump, would want to defend Taiwan - he seems quite happy to throw allies under a bus when it suits.
Well precisely why I am saying that Trump may be the missing puzzle which will allow China to retake Taiwan.
Controlling 70% of the world chips (+ what they produce themselves) in the technological age is a sure path to domination.
This is why I said that if Trump implements his America first policies the US will be isolated and be held back while the East flourishes and by the end of his reign IMO they will no longer be considered a world leader.
TSMC makes the most advanced chips, not all chips, and the fantastically precise technology that enables it, is from Europe and nowhere else. If China invaded, TSMC foundries in Taiwan would be destroyed and production would eventually relocate. It's not like oil which sits around in the same place for 80 years. Chip production can be anywhere.
Yeah but you can't build a foundry in a day and this being in Taiwan I can assure you China has already got all the information they need and probably has improved on flaws.
Just take a look at a XIAOMI car compared to a Tesla. People may have not heard of it but it blows it out the water for less than half the price. The Ford CEO had one for several months and said in an interview he didn't want to give it up.
Huawei another Chinese company has the only wearable ABP in watch format and developed it before the likes of Apple and Samsung despite both trying and failing for several years (Samsung has got a ring now, but again an Asian company).
The West is greedy they are focused on money, the East is focused on progress and advancement. As an example, Apple's hand has been forced so many times by Samsung to follow suit with new technology.
Nobody knows how to build the photolithography machines used by TSMC (and others). If china did, they'd be making 3nm processors and they aren't.
China currently struggles with very cutting edge tech in other areas. They can't build decent jet engines either, despite trying very hard to.
And they have nothing like starlink or spacex.
They are good at mass produced high tech low priced stuff, not so good at the very high performance cutting edge stuff.
And fyi Samsung phones run on Android, also a US technology.
No one is close to TSMC when it comes to top-tier chips. Not Huawei in China, not Intel in the US, not Samsung in Korea.
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The state of this lot!
"Common sense MUST be at the heart of the revival of the right" - how about you pricks start with the fecking truth!
- Labour's early release of prisoners -> Only because Sunak repeatedly refused requests to do the same after 14yrs of neglecting the prison system
- how convicted sex offenders stay out of jail but people tweeting get banged up?! -> conveniently forgetting that judges put people in prison, not the leader of the Labour party. Also neglecting that 'people tweeting' were suggesting burning a Mosque down with the people still inside.
"Common sense MUST be at the heart of the revival of the right" - how about you pricks start with the fecking truth!
- Labour's early release of prisoners -> Only because Sunak repeatedly refused requests to do the same after 14yrs of neglecting the prison system
- how convicted sex offenders stay out of jail but people tweeting get banged up?! -> conveniently forgetting that judges put people in prison, not the leader of the Labour party. Also neglecting that 'people tweeting' were suggesting burning a Mosque down with the people still inside.
WTF
What has shocked you?
Starmer has done everything he can in the last three months to piss off the right, left and centre.
I don't think it's that surprising, since the election they've been a bit of a train wreck. They're supposed to be riding high on popular changes at this point yet they've come in and apologised for serving a shit sandwich.
It really doesn't matter if the other party caused it or even if they're currently a bigger mess.
It is 3 months. He wasn’t supposed to do much in 3 months, cause you know, it is 3 months.
If Tories were bad (which I think they were) for over a decade, I think Labour deserves a bit more than 3 months before deciding to go back to Tories.
Yeah but the Tories have the entire machine behind them, and a current new manager bounce.
Doesn't mean much right now. I doubt Badenoch will be leader by the time there is a next election.
Anecdotally, because I'm old I know a lot of old people, mostly left-leaning in Lancashire, they took the winter fuel allowance withdrawal very badly, 'never vote labour again' etc.
There's plenty of time to turn that around of course, but Labour need to understand that they did cock up enormously, and if they have planners that still think they didn't then they are the problem, those people need to go.
For the record I believe in higher taxes for all, and wealthier pensioners have more room to pay extra than most, but the targeting as it was done was simply shite.
XIAOMI has already built 3nm chips but they don't advertise it because the US and west will again target them like they did Huawei.
Chinese technology companies prefer to keep quiet about their achievements since then. Look it up.
TSMC is a world leader no doubt but China is edging ever closer, and if they were to take over Taiwan then that's check mate.
My mother of 72 received her winter fuel allowance. It became a means tested allowance which was automatically given for all pensioners that were receiving some form of credit. Have many people actually lost it?
If they have it's using DUV rather than EUV. There's no way China have self developed EUV yet, that would take a decade and they haven't even got any fabs locally to copy. Anybody can make 3mm chips using DUV, but it will have appalling yields and be expensive so no-one tries normally.
I agree with you that we shouldn't underestimate China and they're doing wonders on older technology but they're not really edging closer, just doing as much as they can on what they've got for now.
Edit - Xiaomi aren't embargoed, this will be a TSMC made chip
Hopefully not. I don’t want a chance of that vile piece of work getting in.
Well of course its without EUV because China has been sanctioned so they can't get the technology however they have designed and taped it out and it is likely TSMC will produce it.
Still it was unthinkable that they could do it given the stringent restrictions placed on China and they estimated they were a decade away. It just shows at what fast pace they are moving.
I don't think a non-sanctioned company going 3nm shows much about advancement, they can just take the generic ARM design and get it manufactured by TSMC. They're doing amazing things on 7nm with Huawei, and that's where the restrictions hit due to only having DUV fabs. A non-restricted company using TSMC to produce 3nm isn't anything to do with those estimations about being a decade away.
It's gone from about 11m receiving it to about 1.5m. it's thought about 700k of the ones excluded should be receiving it - even according to the new means tested formula - but haven't put in a claim form for the pension credit that it uses as a filter.
Everyone over £173 a week has lost it, or couples on £265 for both. Also whilst you say automatically you can add many more people with less than that who aren't on pension credit in the first place because they don't understand it.