In fairness, no one could have predicted removing yourself from the worlds biggest trading bloc, would cause economic decline.
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The international political morons club clearly has a new member.
I wonder if sheâs friends with MTG and Lauren Bobert. 
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And now reports he has changed his mind, and turned on Farage because of opinion on Tommy Robinson.
Starmer is a creep, doesnât seem like a Labor person to me, weird decisions.
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Are you saying he should be like Tiny Blur ?
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As @Bessie said Starmer is not like a Labor person, so that would exclude him being like that war criminal.
Hmm. Starmer comes from a Labour family: his father was a toolmaker and his mother was a nurse. Both of them were Labour supporters and named their son after Keir Hardy. This doesnât mean thereâs anything socialistic or even left-wing about his politics, but Iâll wait till he founds âNew New Labourâ before I condemn him outright. Overall Starmer has more right to be considered a Labour person than the crypto-Tory war criminal ever had.
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I think we are somehow caught up in a triple or even quadruple negative ambiguity
Bessie just has a âfeelingâ. Itâs part of why Shorten lost. Lots of people just had âfeelingsâ.
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That is the best I have heard him speak for some times. The decisions re winter heating for pensioners, and medical scripts decisions to come really harsh, just doesnât seem like a labour leader re the treatment /grooming of young girls etc by certain sections and inaction to certain things by police as instructed are worrying. No good saying would I like former labour leaders to return, not talking about them.
I just hope he becomes assertive in opposite directions mostly.
Nigel Farage seems to be a bit of a facade and worries me.
Musk is odd. and all over the shop decision wise re all this.
I read about it from all angles and I feel very SANE.
Re here, Need strong vocal leaders.
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The stuff about his role as Crown Prosecutor in the so-called Paki grooming gang are fake news ( fabrications without a shred of fact) , similar to like the cat eating Haitian lies in the USA.
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What truth is there about all this grooming stuffâŚhorrifying descriptions. If it is as bad as read then who is to blame, if not what are they on about.
It just appears as an outsider far away. Starmer is inactive on things , Farage Is scary/ strange grinning grinning, and Musk should stay out of things. So Big A 
, I am confused , not wise , and wondering.
Lived in London for all the sixties loved the place, the labour win was not predicted by so many âŚhence the interest.
You have to choose Davos (WEF) or Westminster?
Starmer: Davos
so heâd rather be at world economic forum meetings than in the UK parliament.
That seemed a bit damning to me.
Just another bit of rage bait
PMs and Ministers often attend international meetings while Parliament is sitting.
It goes back to Boris banning a quarter of his Cabinet from a Davos meeting when Brexit negotiations were at a sensitive stage. Subsequently Starmer criticised Sunak for non-attendance at Davos.
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You will find parallels here and in other countries of failure to prosecute systemic child abuse and rape. In part the law has changed in regard to treatment of witnesses, also societal attitudes.
But there is zero evidence of Karmer stepping in to prevent prosecutions or of protecting groomers. And they werenât all Pakis and the victims werenât all white girls.
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Shows some of the flooding affects.
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Is the UK is one big flood plain?
Britons brace themselves for more floods
A warming planet is making a soggy island soggier
Photograph: Alamy
Dec 27th 2024
THE BRITISH are fond of talking about the weather. What they really enjoy, though, is grumbling about the rain. Luckily, they have ample opportunity and a rich vocabulary, according to Alan Connor, author of a new book about rain in Britain. A heavy downpour can be ââ â â â â â â , tipping, chucking or bucketing it downâ. In the Midlands you might call it a âplotheringâ. In the West Country you still hear âmizzleâ (between mist and drizzle) and âlettyâ (just enough to make outdoor work trying).
Map: The Economist
The grumbling wonât be letting up. Britain is getting wetter and, as a result, its inhabitants are being subjected to more frequent and devastating floods. After recent deluges, public agencies have warned Britons to get prepared and published data showing who is most at risk (see map).
On islands between an ocean and a continent, the weather is unusually hard to predict (one reason why it is so worthy of discussion). Nevertheless, the pattern is clear. The 18 months to February 2024 were the wettest since rainfall was first continuously measured in 1836. The past two summers have been pretty wet. Last winter was very wet. In September, which is usually wet, England got twice as much rain as normal. Ten counties had their wettest September on record. Gloucestershire took a dumping of 212mm, about what youâd expect in a monsoon month in India.
All that rain made for saturated ground when the next plothering arrived. The floods in November and December were not especially bad by recent standards. Still, several people died and hundreds of homes were ruined. Further bad weather caused the cancellation of New Year events in many places.
Britain is not alone. In many countries storms are becoming more frequent and intense, partly because the air can hold more water as the planet warms. Not all are being hit with more floods, though. To see why you need to view the landscape through the eyes of a raindrop.
Each makes a journey. Some run quickly into streams, others seep slowly into aquifers. Rivers draw their water from a network of tributaries, like veins on a leaf. And it is in this that Britain suffers for its beauty. It is marked out by âunusually short and steep river catchmentsâ, says Olivia Shears of the Climate Change Committee, a watchdog. That makes its rivers rise terrifyingly fast. On December 7th the Northumbrian Aln surged fiercely in the wee hours and swept away Tom Voyce, a former England rugby player, as he tried to escape from his car.
Not everything can be blamed on God. Many low-lying areas near rivers have been given over to housebuilding or intensive farming. That has not only put people at risk but severed the link between rivers and their natural flood plains, explains Trevor Hoey of Brunel University. Public agencies have sometimes been slow to issue warnings (although catastrophes in Spain and Germany show this is hardly a British problem alone). During a storm in December the Met Office, a weather and climate agency, showed off a new early-warning system: in near-unison some 3m phones across Wales and south-west England emitted a sustained siren-like burst.
Such innovations are hugely welcome. What is more striking, though, is the sense of what little politicians can do as the effects of climate change wash up on doorsteps. Britain spends ÂŁ1bn ($1.3bn) a year on flood defences. That is nowhere near enough to prevent more drastic floods, and it is unlikely to increase. Few experts think it is in any case worth persevering with ever-costlier engineering. Instead, the focus is shifting to natural techniques, like nurturing woodland or peatland alongside rivers to slow the flow of water.
And to softening the blow for the unlucky ones. Even those who have bought a house in the middle of a flood plain can get reasonably priced insurance thanks to a state-backed scheme. Yet many still donât, says Catherine Butler of Exeter University, probably because they havenât heard of it or donât grasp the risks. As the rain gets heavier one thing is certain: Britons are going to need their full lexicon.â
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Haha. Congrats to whoever came up with the change in thread title.
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