Political discussions...

OUT OF HOURS BULLY'S TRUCKSTOP BAR (INTERACTIVE)
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If you look hard enough and chop it into small enough pieces you will always find a bit of good news.

And you are looking very very hard to find those gobbets of good news, but are determined to ignore the overall picture.

Atkins was talking on the Breakfast shows. It is not clear whether or not the DHSS released the notes about the data changes in time for reporters to see them.

Are you saying that it is OK for Ministers to lie, cheat, and use weasel words, and there is no need for honesty and straight talking because we should rely on the press to find out the lies?
What a depressing point of view.
Although the press does that, it is more than a bit off to try to blame the press for a Minister’s cheating words!

The document is one click away on the link I gave to FullFact. https://www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2024/04/Feb24-RTT-SPN-Publication-PDF-only-445KB-08666.pdf#page=2

Johnson is still in the Tory party.
He stepped down from his constituency. He wasn’t sacked. He resigned.
He could have stood for election again, but didn’t even try.

As discussed he did increase the police force. It is now about where it was under the last Labour Gov. After years os cuts it is nearer where it should have been all the time.

Getting Brexit done? Which Brexit? Not the one promised by Leave.
Even the Brexiteers say “This isn’t the Brexit I voted for”.
He had a stonking majority, and had culled the non-believers.
The dream of Brexit hasn’t been delivered. Something called Brexit has.
To revisit David Davis’s statement “we have all the downsides and no upsides”.

The pandemic was handled badly.
His Gov’s flailing about was responsible for the UK having a poor outcome.

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I am going out for a bit of a wander and fresh air. :wink:
Not Captain Oates style though!

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where did i say that it was ok for them to do that in fact my complaint above about labour was they did it more than the conservatives. However yes it is the press’s job to investigate and get the truth hence where why or otherwise investigative journalism. Or are you saying that the press are there just as a megaphone for which ever politician gets on the air or talks to the reporter and that no one ever lies.

i dont have to look hard just 10 seconds on google and i come up with this

fact remains the only time the national debt fell between 2000/2001 and 2023/2024 is under the conservatives how ever if you want a longer period of time upto 2023/2024 total increase was 732.5 billion and the average is 61.04 billion or if you dont want to include the covid years the total increase was 315.6 billion an average of 35.07 billion.

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the formula for calculating gdp from my link

What Is the Formula for GDP?

The formula for GDP is: GDP = C + I + G + (X-M). C is consumer spending, I is business investment, G is government spending, and (X-M) is net exports.

so I as a consumer buy a widget from you for 100 pounds then what do you go and bury the 100 quid under the sundial in the back garden or do you go and buy a widget for 100 pounds from me. ie the same 100 quid is counted twice. which is why the gdp fell when the hospitality industry was closed.

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here we go again do we have to have another 20 posts where eventually you admit he didnt lie

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I’ve left out that link to the Guardian article because I don’t understand how it is supposed to support your, frankly bizarre, view that Bojo is not a born liar. Even his own people don’t shy away from stating in the clearest terms possible that Bojo’s pants are permanently on fire!
His non-existant veracity is deemed to be newsworthy even across the pond, despite them having their own deceitful blond-blackguard dominating their media.

I’ve cut and pasted the text from a New York Times article so you don’t have the inconvenience of “continuing with Google” to be able to read the full piece

Johnson’s Lies Worked for Years, Until They Didn’t

The British prime minister thought he could swagger and dissemble his way through any scandal, but found the rules of gravity applied after all.

After a lifetime of swaggering and dissembling his way through one scandal after another on the strength of his prodigious political skills — a potent mix of charm, guile, ruthlessness, hubris, oratorical dexterity and rumpled Wodehousian bluster — Boris Johnson has finally reached the end. It seems that the laws of gravity apply to him after all.

It’s not that he ever fooled anyone about who he really was. Over the years, he has routinely been described as mendacious, irresponsible, reckless and lacking any coherent philosophy other than wanting to seize and hold on to power.

“People have known that Boris Johnson lies for 30 years,” the writer and academic Rory Stewart, a former Conservative member of Parliament, said recently. “He’s probably the best liar we’ve ever had as a prime minister. He knows a hundred different ways to lie.”

In contrast to former President Donald J. Trump, another politician with an improvisational and often distant relationship to the truth, Mr. Johnson’s approach has rarely been to double down on his lies or to delude himself for consistency’s sake into acting as if they were true. Rather, he recasts them to fit new information that comes to light, as if the truth were a fungible concept, no more solid than quicksand.

Mislead, omit, obfuscate, bluster, deny, deflect, attack, apologize while implying that he has done nothing wrong — the British prime minister’s blueprint for dealing with a crisis, his critics say, almost never begins, and rarely ends, with simply telling the truth. That approach worked for him for years — until finally it didn’t.

His government weathered scandal after scandal, much of it centered on Mr. Johnson’s own behavior. He was rebuked by the government’s own ethics adviser after a wealthy Conservative donor contributed tens of thousands of pounds to help him refurbish his apartment. (Mr. Johnson repaid the money.) There were the private text messages he exchanged with a wealthy British businessman over his plan to manufacture ventilators in the early days of the coronavirus pandemic, which raised questions of impropriety.

There was an almost farcical accrual of embarrassing disclosures about how often Mr. Johnson’s aides (and sometimes Mr. Johnson) attended boozy parties during the worst days of the Covid lockdown, flagrantly violating rules the country had set for itself.

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which country started to administer their covid vaccinations before 8 december then im betting that you wont find a single country that did it before that therefore franglais accusation is false britain was the first.

if you want to see a man that is a born liar look at starmer 2 seconds on google shows you the type of man he is yet you dont feel the need to complain about him

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heres one from a few days ago wes streeting the Shadow Secretary of State for Health and Social Care doesnt want to fund the nhs and pass the cost onto the private sector

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Actually, I’m quite neutral on Starmer - unlike you with your Boris Bromance :grin:

What sticks in my mind about Starmer is that when he was in the firing line over Beergate, he said he would stand down if found guilty (which he was not) which was a complete contrast to Boris’s attitude to his confirmed-by-police breach of the rules with Partygate

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here we go again. boris paid the fine for his bday party all the others like beergate were not illegal yet people that excuse starmer on the grounds work functions were allowed at the time refuse to do so for boris. Incidentally starmer spoke out against party gate saying there should be an investigation then went and had a booze up which is a far more telling example of the mans hypocrisy than saying if i have done wrong ill quit when he knew he had done nothing wrong

We will have to see what happens with rayner given the funding for labour’s plans entirely rests on “cracking down on tax dodgers” i wonder if it will be the usual drivel of i havent done anything then oh well she did do it but it doesnt matter like over starmer “not knowing” the value of his land

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All the while many of us feel like you do there - there’s no chance of getting anything but the incumbent keeping their seats in all those areas they deserve to LOSE them in.

Surely by this point, we’re NOT afraid of Starmer, and as a consequence it is WORTH taking the chance that “one’s vote might end up wasted”, and Starmer wins…
It would be better during this election if the Tories lose 126 seats like some pundits are saying, but half of them don’t end up flipping Red.
If less than 10% of seats change hands though?
That is a total DISASTER for Democracy, as the likely result will be all three mainstream parties pumping up taxes, interest rates, and unemployment all the higher, whilst blaming each other for “letting that happen”.

Every pound sent overseas for ANY purpose - is a pound less in the UK economy.
Take enough cash away on the home front, and we’ll end up with such a shock recession, that many of us will end up losing our jobs on top - simply because the public has no cash left to steal…
Rents, Interest Payments, Food prices, Energy prices, Fares, and Insurances - All SKY HIGH already.
What’s left?

The people most likely to succumb to stress - are those worried about losing their job…
Watch firms “not replace people” who snuff it…
Cheaper than redundancy, cheaper than recruiting new staff that need training to take up the slack.
“Natural Wastage” that used to be called…
“Natrual Causes” will likey be the cause of death as well…

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Well, if you will keep trying to defend the indefensible… :man_shrugging:
Boris is done, probably time to let it go

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i agree boris’ has left the building however it doesnt stop people still blaming him for things that have happened after he left office and comparing him to the current runners.

even on labours page they are binging on about boris did this boris did that. In fact on another webpage i read someone said that it was his fault the war in ukraine started

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Why do you care if he was being blamed for something that was not actually his fault? He’s as bent as a nine-bob-note, so even if he was being blamed “unfairly”, most of us would be ok with that, because it’s fairly certain theres a shed load of things he managed to keep hidden.

He’s fond of his latinized quotes, so he ought to know that historically people who ride a wave of populism into a political office tend to get the sharp end of pointy things when they displease the people who put them there, rather than just being “dethroned”, Julius Ceasar being the most famous example.

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so what your saying is its ok to bash him but not defend him even though he was the most honest and straight talking pm we have had in living memory

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Dude… Don’t bogart the spliff, pass it on man, you’re like, totally wasted…

C&C
C&C1916×810 204 KB

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please tell me 1 pm that has achieved all they said they would and didnt spend the entire time lining their own pickets and selling the country short

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No one, whether PM or truck driver, does everything they say they will do, the best anyone can do is give things their best shot

Do successive PMs spend their time lining their pockets? If you have evidence, the guys at The Guardian or Private Eye or any other good quality investigative journalism outfit, would be very glad to receive it. High profile jobs like PM or Chancellor do tend to lead to lucrative post-political career jobs, simply because of the beneficial impact having these guys on board has for the company.

Selling the country short? That would be quite subjective, anyone who does “sell the country short” would probably face a rebellion and be ousted from their role.

I have no idea why you like Boris so much, for me he was the epitome of everything a PM should not be; he promised all those people who voted him in (purely to avoid the potential for Corbyn getting elected) that “I will not let you down.” Then proceeded to do so in a way that even Thatcher would have raised an eyebrow to.

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thats just it he didnt let anyone down/ his words were twisted and he was falsely accused evey step of the way.

he has a dang sight more patients than i do… if i had to put up with the absolute stupidity of the general public and the media that hounded him constantly twisting every word he spoke whilst ignoring everything else everyone (labour and liberal mp’s) were doing.

dont believe me… go ask 1000 people if they have heard of beer gate who they think it was about and if they have both got the first 2 questions if they think the out come was correct . Ill bet you a 1000 pounds that the latter will be very much in the minority but those that do think beergate was allowed will be against partygate when they were in the local area and proper work functions.

what will be interesting in the coming days if rayner actually resigns and or starmer sacks her without the excuse of last time that he cant do it because it is a party vote.

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more on labour being open and honest (not)