Rayvin

I enjoyed the quizzes But then I also think CT is tolerable in the Politics section, so I clearly don't speak for popular opinion.

I thought you plagiarized it actually...

He's a total fuckhead but is entertaining...

I do - they weren't so bad tbf, but there was a lot of criticism too I guess

For a board of our size, that may well be true - although we're active enough I reckon. Something of a niche community, but it's the right size IMO.

Believe it or not, I do think CT adds to the discussion in here. As infuriating as it is to argue with him (as he moves around, changes his mind depending on which way the wind is blowing and refuses to concede any point, ever) he does add a different viewpoint which I think is important in avoiding echo chambers. I would prefer a less infuriating version of CT, but still

Well, we'll have to see I guess. Fingers crossed he does a good job of it.

And while we're at it, McDonnell saying what you guys want an 'effective' opposition to say: This morning, Philip Hammond may have performed a U-turn on investment spending, admitting that the failed ‘long-term economic plan’ never really existed, and he still intends to go ahead with cuts to in-work benefits and local authority funding. Labour is now the only national party with a fiscal framework that supports patient, long-term investment in our economy, and it’s clear that Phillip Hammond is now borrowing from Labour to invest in his own speech. As well as abandoning their own fiscal charter, this was full of the same empty promises George Osborne made, only with worse gags. The chancellor should apologise today for the failed Tory approach that has meant he has had to abandon the failed economic agenda of the last six years, an approach which has seen them dragging their heels on tax avoidance, an increase in child poverty and housebuilding falling to its lowest peacetime rate since the 1920s. The dangerous divide in society the chancellor mentioned has come about as a direct result of the policies he has voted for since 2010.

Senior Tory Robert Halfon: When Jeremy Corbyn got re-elected there were too manyConservatives celebrating on Twitter and implying that it’s a walk in the park, that we can all go to the Bahamas for the next five years, that the 2020 election is already won. Now, the reason why that is wrong is actually we’re not looking at the much deeper meanings of how he won ... Not every one of the 600,000 members who have joined the Labour party is a hard-left Trotskyite ... There are also many hundreds of thousands of people, I suspect, who have joined the Labour party, who support the Labour party, because they believe they have a noble mission which is helping working people and helping people on lower incomes. When we think “oh whoop dee doo, Jeremy Corbyn’s got re-elected” we should actually be thinking why are so many young people joining the Labour party? Why do they still have a powerful message on the doorstep despite the fact that many Conservatives believe they get it wrong? So the first task of the Conservative party is we have to be a party with an ethical, moral mission too. We must not be complacent about the Labour party for one minute.

Surely the damage to the car would be a secondary concern for the manufacturer, given that damage = more spending on parts and replacement vehicles?

I would go for whatever saves the most lives, and we all just accept and live by that basic rationality. Each life weighed equally against the next. Sure there'd be horror stories where some small child is killed in place of 5 terminally ill old people on their way to a euthanasia clinic, but overall, I think the rule would be acceptable.

Unfortunately the old 'effective' opposition supported their policies. Even though they were bollocks - so we'd have a hard time making any political point scoring stick if NL were still in charge wouldn't we? Couldn't the Tories just turn around and say 'Yeah well you had the same sorts of plans?'

I mean, that's effectively the same thing I said. Unless you're stating that them 'playing' in the centre means that they haven't moved back to the left from a position to the right of there.

I think he is. I think they moved right while Miliband was in charge as Labour kept rushing centrewards to meet them. For the sake of distinction, if one moves towards the other, the other has to move away. But Corbyn pulling Labour way off that stance has forced the Tories to gravitate back into the middle, IMO. I genuinely don't think they'll be treating Corbyn as blithely as the papers are making out. Not after Brexit. I hope they are of course! That'd be truly very interesting. But I doubt it.

That's a really interesting question - but would any of us be capable of assessing that moral quandry in the few split seconds we'd have to make a decision. Surely your brain would just pick a direction and go for it. The car would have to be programmed on something along the lines of assessing which object it was farthest from and aiming for that one, I think.

I get what you're saying but I dunno. Motion detectors, sensors for detecting changes in light... if they can pick up the movement they'd have a better reaction time than we would. I recall being surprised that cars can park themselves now. They'll find a way to do it, and far more safely (overall) than people being responsible I reckon.

Do you think the Tories live in a bubble, entirely uninterrupted by the events of the outside world? They will have seen Labour's populist policy pledges, and have incorporated some of it into their own. The abandonment of austerity is case in point. If Labour were still in agreement with them on austerity, would we be seeing the same changes? They've framed it as a response to Brexit, so it's possible, but that smacks of a convenient excuse given that Gideon was going to ramp up the cuts in his post-Brexit plan. I think Corbyn is having an effect personally. I think they'll be sensitive to the fact that he could connect with the voters that the establishment left behind, who ultimately voted us out of Europe. I know plenty of people on here feel Corbyn can't make this connection, but the Tories won't just be sitting there assuming that they don't have to do anything in response to him, and that they can carry on regardless. He is pulling them leftwards - in the same way that they pulled Labour rightwards.

Quite.

Swansea have just jettisoned Guidolin. Can't imagine too many people bet on him to go first...

I see the Tories are promising spending on building affordable housing, and have abandoned any pretense at gaining a budget surplus, claiming instead that they will be looking at pragmatically reducing the deficit instead of making key pledges. This latter point means that they can no longer be judged on the economy any more, as they can just claim that their 'pragmatic' targets are farther into the future. The housing one is a win for Corbyn I would argue. I'd suggest he's focusing their minds on actually having to help people. Hopefully we can pull them further left. As an aside, he (Corbyn) was up in Newcastle over the weekend. The first time I can recall seeing any politician of any relevance on the ground talking to people...

It's like every single news event takes us one step closer to Parky's dystopian future.

He has gone over this a few times CT...

Aye, that makes sense. Goodbye, FDI!