United Kingdom VII: Taking Pride in Your Success

[QualityChimp]

At first I was a bit annoyed with Chris Whitty standing on a podium alongside Johnson, nodding along with his dangerous rhetoric, but on reflection, I feel bad for him. All he can do is advise and it's been clear for a long time that his advice has been mainly ignored in favour of pleasing voters/donors.

After Johnson said we're ditching social distancing and masks, Whitty took the opportunity to explain why he's going to continue wearing one and in what situations.

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I'm disappointed that mask wearing is about to be abandoned, but I'm pleased there are a few like-minded people in this thread, at least.

[QualityChimp]

Wow! This guy should pass this warning on to the Health Secretary to try and do something about it!

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[Neon Ignition]

Masks are particularly crucial indoors... erm, so don't remove the requirement then?

Scotland and Wales will be building quarantine walls on their borders by Xmas

[QualityChimp]

Well, it looks like another variant has reached the UK. This time it's the Lambda Variant from Peru and is believed to be even more deadly and resistant to vaccines than the Delta one.

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NOTE: Every Lambada joke has already been covered by Twitter. Also gamma, Half-Life, sheep and everything else already.

[MartyG]

At first I was a bit annoyed with Chris Whitty standing on a podium alongside Johnson, nodding along with his dangerous rhetoric, but on reflection, I feel bad for him.

He has the option to step down and rebuke Johnson's rhetoric, rather than stand next to him nodding in agreement.

[QualityChimp]

If he steps down, would that make way for a complete yes man?
Does he feel he can make more of a difference restricted in a prominent position or unrestricted in what he can say, but deplatformed?

[Neon Ignition]

I mean, it's been a week and Javid has already demonstrated himself to be entirely unfit for the role. Not a single word or action has reflected the entire point of the role he holds.




Honestly, the road ahead is paved with horrors. I'd say that the very, very first thing that needs to happen is... and I can't believe I'm headed in this direction... Labour needs to remove Starmer. I don't think he's a bad choice as such but he's the wrong man for the times we're in, he's careful and calculating but that means the party is still sitting on the fence worried about what voters do and don't want which means no-one will vote for them as they continue to stand for nothing.

The leadership contest needs to come out with the outcome of *grimaces* Burnham. Putting aside my distaste the cold reality is he's proven himself to have a position and not to be afraid to argue for it. The Corbyn harder left side of Labour needs the reality check of being told to shut the **** up once and for all, they'll never get Labour into power - this is ultimately a right leaning nation. For years already Labour needs to have been screaming from the rafters about everything that's wrong. From disasters to corruption the party just remains silently shaking its head whilst the Tories control the narrative. Labour should be shaking voters into caring about how they're getting screwed over for upper class profiteering and what they can actually do for them. Labour should be committing to a stance that no matter when they ever hold power again they will immediately dismantle any voting reforms, NHS privatisation like changes etc so that it highlights it to voters and also shakes the confidence of predatory bodies and companies thinking the Tories will serve these things up for them uncontested. Labour hasn't held the Tories to account in close to a decade and they need someone with the will to do so and not so late that they walk into a General Election with their fate pre-decided.

[Neon Ignition]

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jul/05/priti-patel-to-reveal-proposals-for-offshore-centres-for-asylum-seekers

Priti Patel is tabling plans to effectively criminalise Asylum Seekers and to detain them in off shore prison-like facilities. Reports that she came up with the plans whilst sat in a swivel chair, stroking a white cat whilst laughing maniacally are unconfirmed.

[MartyG]

If he steps down, would that make way for a complete yes man?
Does he feel he can make more of a difference restricted in a prominent position or unrestricted in what he can say, but deplatformed?

He'd have the entirety of the media at his feet asking for interviews, he'd hardly be deplatformed - and he's clearly not making any difference, standing next to Johnson in agreement.

So no, I don't buy that at all, any more than Fauci made a difference with Trump, especially when we have people from independent SAGE posting this: https://twitter.com/globalhlthtwit/s...48342923845633 (link for full thread).

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And this: https://twitter.com/chrischirp/statu...34741777534977

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I haven't tired of listening to experts, just trite politicians and their stooges.

[Asura]

No offence, but apples and oranges. I flat-out don't trust any numerical statistic that the Chinese government pushes out, so saying their value is lower than ours is a bit pointless. If you ask them how many people were injured or killed at Tianemen they'd probably say "zero, because nothing happened".

[MartyG]

No offence, but apples and oranges. I flat-out don't trust any numerical statistic that the Chinese government pushes out, so saying their value is lower than ours is a bit pointless. ".

Sure, dismiss China, but Thailand, New Zealand, South Korea, Vietnam - you want to dismiss those too and accept Johnson's version.

I think I'd rather listen to Ant and Chris.

[Asura]

Sure, dismiss China, but Thailand, New Zealand, South Korea, Vietnam - you want to dismiss those too?

Not at all. But if I'd been making that graph, I would've dropped China. It doesn't help their argument.

[Dogg Thang]

Also, had China handled things much worse and that was well documented, that would hardly make the mess in the UK look good.

[MartyG]

And we know that China did lockdown far far harder than the UK ever has - and we know lockdowns DO reduce case numbers and spread.

[QualityChimp]

You can change the settings on that chart here:

https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths

You're going to be hard pushed to find many countries with a worse peak death rate-per-million than the UK.
Andorra, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Paraguay and a few others had higher peaks.

Obviously no data is 100% exact, but better that than Trump's notion of no tests = no infections.