Rayvin

I could have seen the argument for Ashley some years back when it was being touted as a possible sensible option following the 'Arsenal' model, but the way he operates as it stands makes no sense whatsoever. He could spend £20-30m now, with resale value i might add, or risk losing £100m next year. And this is the second time he's gambled like this, and the first time the gamble failed. It's just fucking stupid. Plenty of other teams are making an effort to compete, what possible argument can there be in favour of a football club that doesnt even try.

Just going to add that while it is still a fucking stupid outcome for the country versus remain, i would have happily taken soft Brexit.

Really we should have never triggered A50. If we were serious about doing this properly we should have sat down, looked at what we wanted, held preliminary talks with the EU and then triggered it once we understood what we were doing. If we wanted a "good deal" this was what it involved. Was it May who triggered it or did Cameron do it as he was running away? I guess May. Am aware Corbyn demanded immediate trigger as well. Our political class were totally consumed with domestic approval ratings and entirely ignored what was best for the country. No matter which way anyone voted in the referendum, the Tories have been a disgrace. And now it seems there is a chance May will close parliament to get her deal through? Is that really possible?

Aye, honestly i think we had Rafa at the wrong moment in time. Maybe if we'd gone down and stayed down, Ashley would have fucked off by now. The club is never going anywhere while he's here, and tbh I'm hardly paying attention to football at all now. That's his legacy.

It isnt the xenophobia angle? I can see some people being unwilling to articulate that. More generally, i swear this is now just an ego issue for leavers. It sure as fuck is for CT. It's just so stupid now.

Wasn't the chant something like 'he fucks who he wants'? I think we can criticise them for that. Although I guess it's doubtful that too many of them really believed that the club would take on the number of abhorrent actions that it did, surrounding that situation. Based on their stadium alone, I agree. Based on their 10-15 previous seasons, I think lower championship is about right. They don't seem to share your confidence on their promotion anymore, but I expected them to go up too. Although I expected them to be cruising first, so who knows. It's irrelevant what we do under Ashley, it's a blip in our existence rather than a reflection of the club.

Only if they get back to the PL in 5 years, wasn't it? Safe bet from the owner that, they've more chance of being in L1 in 5 years than the PL.

The baby boomers as a generation, if not individually, ruined the world.

What are your thoughts on SAFC, the widespread chanting in support of a player charged with touching a minor, and the pervading chip they have on their shoulder about generally performing to a level far beneath ours in terms of club stature? Let's see if we can find some common ground.

Edit - nvm, idk why I'm being pedantic about this.

The joke is that they stole it from Mitchell rather than the content? weird fucking joke...?

Stolen from David Mitchell though.

IMO this proves democracy is barely worth proceeding with in general. What's the point if no one cares, everyone is uninformed, and just vote the way the papers and wider social trends tell them to? It's a total farce.

I am actually getting close to putting CT on ignore because he isn't even trying to make coherent points anymore, it's just shameless attempts at winding everyone up (I know that some people feel it was ever thus, but it's more blatant now than at any point I can recall). The main reason I haven't is because everyone else keeps responding to him and it'll disrupt my reading of the thread. Think Alex is right though - this is CT admitting he's wrong. Depressingly.

Indeed. Even if you consider that this is yet another jumped up media outrage, which I of course do, Trump wedging himself into the middle of it clearly shows his love of division.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2019/01/22/rafa-benitez-will-leave-newcastle-summer-unless-club-sign-new/ To leave unless we sign two players this window, apparently.

I really don't feel I've changed overly

Can you imagine if the lad holding the shotgun actually fired it? He'd go flying

I've seen the exchange between gloom and trooper play out on RTG almost every time i check the place, spanning multiple threads, offering people out, tribalism emerging, etc. How pleasing it is to see a clear example of how much better people on here are than that lot, that it's done and dusted in 3 posts, mutual respect preserved. Both positions deserve respect.

Your first point suggests we need a second vote. Ultimately though, based on what you're saying, she's putting party above country. Cool, just so we're all in agreement on that. The traitorous bitch.

Yeah but given that there was almost certainly no majority for either of those across the country, unless you believe that every single leaver wanted to end FOM, why is she pursuing it? It's undemocratic.

Why is she so fucking determined to have this version of brexit? Why?

The longer we leave it, the more leavers die off. Maybe we should go for an extension and just fuck around for another 2 years like the Tories have been doing anyway.

Gonna add as well that the leave vote in areas lik Sunderland was heavily buoyed by non voters. Also, the GE preceding the referendum, UKIP had 4 million votes. And it was the Tories who were so concerned about this that they had a referendum, not Labour. There are some working class right wingers who voted Leave such as yourself CT, but those people by and large werent voting Labour. I know some working class left wingers who did voted out, but they're generally at what you would consider to be the 'far' end of left wing politics.

This is CT's "yeah but i was right, its just that Labour fucked it up" narrative.