Rayvin

I mean the poisoned chalice of delivering Brexit - But yes, I probably should have expanded. There's no way May can deliver Brexit while keeping enough people happy, and while preserving the economy; so whoever carries it out, is fucked. I'd prefer the Tories to 'deliver' it rather than Labour, actually. Corbyn losing would see him off altogether but my views on this have changed since his re-election. In a Trump election landscape we don't have time to wait for the Tories to fuck up and for people to head to Corbyn, we need the left to start building a new framework for winning people back in that doesn't look like what Blair did. I thought we had another four or five years

Corbyn did well at PMQs today (though not amazing, as ever). What worries me though is how utterly out of her depth May seems to be. She had nothing of any substance to say whatsoever when challenged. I genuinely don't think she knows what she's doing. I suspect the reason she hasn't called a GE is because she'd probably win it - and winning it would be political suicide.

It is nice to see that some sectors of the media establishment are starting to confront the message behind Trump now, rather than the man himself. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/nov/16/globalization-trump-inequality-thomas-piketty Rising inequality was always the issue in my view, especially in an austerity ravaged economic landscape. The people needed to send a message, the message is sent and, fortunately, appears to be received. Now we just have to endure 4 years of Trump and hope that this gives the left enough time to put together something coherent as an alternative.

Fully agree, but do we want regulation for this? Shouldn't people have some personal responsibility for their lifestyle choices? I know this debate exists now as we're all paying for it anyway, but I feel like it'd be more pronounced if people were 'actively' paying for health insurance rather than effectively doing it passively through PAYE.

Interesting and sensible. Is it politically achievable over here? Presumably the barrier is that it's just too hard a sell for one of our two relevant parties?

Also true But hey, it's the Guardian.

I'd say no but then those people are probably shelling out a lot more than we are anyway, on NI. Also, if we end up doing this, and people are effectively covering their own premiums, if someone is willfully fat, a smoker, eats poorly, does drugs, enjoys base jumping, etc - all manner of potentially life shortening issues, do they get a higher premium? They probably would do, I expect.

I agree, if the issue is people getting bent out of shape about insurance then yes, that's pointless. Assuming of course that those who can't afford insurance are still covered.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/nov/16/train-bosses-investigate-alleged-racist-announcement-over-tannoy Unfortunate to see this coming from Newcastle. Just one pillock but it's made national news (in the Guardian).

If that happens there'd be hell on. Although it does have a socialist flavour to it which leaves me rather conflicted.

I still can't make up my mind if Trump never expected to win, and therefore never expected to have to live up to his promises (and is therefore scrambling around for anyone at all to help him, abandoning his rhetoric all over the place), or if he is quite as two faced as it seems...

But the state acts as a go between which theoretically protects it from the private interests of a select number of shareholders.

The NHS sorely needs private sector thinking from the albeit limited discussions I've had with friends who work in it. One of my mates heads up a radiology department in his hospital, and the number of inefficiencies he has to deal with day to day are staggering. He was telling me about how consultant radiographers are supposed to audio record their report on each case they look at so that a machine can type it up for them later. Instead though, most of them refuse, and insist on dictating the notes to a typist. While this is latter option is about 25% quicker at the time of processing the report, it requires the consultant to re-read each report at a later date, before it is issued. So in reality it takes up more of the consultant's time (despite looking quicker initially), causes up to two weeks of delay in the report being issued to the patient (versus 1-3 days) and costs more (for the typist). That kind of thinking can only happen because the management structures aren't strong enough to exert control over the consultants in this case and force them into line. This is just one hospital but I can't imagine the experience is unique. You would hope that we could reform it without privatising it through the use of consultants, except that they seem to be more interested in buttering their bread in the long run - and so their solutions are not often the best ones.

Great line. The MSM doesn't have fake narratives, they have very real narratives. They're just not all encompassing and often hypocritical. Agree that nothing is real

Yep just found it. Fair enough.

Fake news? Do they? I've seen a lot of things thrown at them but not that one. Like what?

Dacre is an establishment media force though. Barron isn't. Although I want to be clear here, I don't think he should appoint the guy either. I'm a bit concerned by what exactly he thinks he needs him for, and it's not like the guy has ever been in office. But then again, I'm no more concerned than I would be if he'd hired whichever sad individual heads up the Guardian these days. Ultimately, the media and those with media influence should be nowhere near political positions. Not when they still have an outlet. Presumably Brietbart is going to become a full on propaganda arm of the Trump office.

I had a look at Brietbart last night and while fully confessing I didn't 'dig deep', it had literally nothing offensive posted on there. Some of the comments beneath certain articles were off kilter for sure, but the articles themselves are actually really lacking in any racial/bigotted substance. As in, the Daily Mail is far worse on a cursory glance. I've come across Milo Yannoupoulos before in my diggings around the internet - he seems to be one of the figureheads for the paper. He just carried out some kind of tour around American universities campaigning against feminism. He's a British guy educated at Cambridge (before dropping out) I gather. So yes, anyway. While Brietbart has some inflammatory headlines it seems, I wish to draw attention to some of the headlines we've seen from the Guardian in the past few years: Why I hate Men. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2006/nov/02/whyihatemen Women hitting men is not the same https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/may/18/solange-jay-z-beyonce-fight-assault-domestic-violence-men-women Feminists don't hate men, but it wouldn't matter if we did (presumably she hadn't read Bindel's article) https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/mar/13/feminists-do-not-hate-men So how is the above different to Breitbart, save that some of the terms used aren't as on the nose? I suspect it is a platform for hate speech, but I'm not having the Guardian telling me that after their crusades in the ever divisive gender wars.

it is a very Fish style post. Nice to have fans from other clubs on sometimes though

Libertarian-ism has a lot to answer for as well in this. Entirely unsustainable in practice, there'd be hell on.

How is he going to be undermining democracy?

I guess so, just a bit concerned about the relative loss of creativity. I suspect we'll win but I think it's going to be a harder fought slog now than it would have been. More like the Newcastle of last season in terms of style.

Aye, says something doesn't it? I'm not sure that survey weights income/finance high enough to be honest.

Inevitable.