What Do You Think Today?

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Post by wayfriend »

I don't think this "digital wallets" thing works the way you think it does. Unless you understand that it's crypto-currency you're talking about, with all the volatility and theft-ability that comes with it.

The recent bank problems have been caused by (a) the people running the bank were stupid, and (b) the people who were watching the stupidity (e.g. regulators) gave it a pass. It's probably not going to be a problem in the UK unless UK also relaxed it's bank regulations, as the US did in 2018.
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Post by Diamondraughtaholic »

world moving to cashless.. that's the endgame.
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Post by SoulBiter »

A couple of problems with FRC. One was the stupidity of offering almost zero interest loans to their wealthy clients, an overexposure to bonds (bond prices are inversely proportional to interest rates), and an over reliance on almost free money from the Fed or years. Then as the Fed raised interest rates over and over, it cause them to get upside down because they couldn't borrow themselves out of trouble. A couple of years ago this would not have been an issue because of the almost free money the Fed was "Lending" to banks.

People in the know, the wealthy, started pulling all their money out all at once causing a run on the bank, a free fall of their stock price, and now a take over by the FDIC and a pennies for dollars sale to JP Morgan.
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Post by peter »

Thanks for the responses guys!

You think so Wayfriend? Varafoukis seems pretty sure about the security side and didn't talk in terms of its being a cryptocurrency.

I'm not entirely happy myself about the fact idea of a cashless society - too much scope for state control for my liking, but as I say, I simply don't believe that people will give up the facility of private person to person transaction. Perhaps, as in fallout, the e currency will be in bottle tops. ;) Doubt it, but it will be in something.

It would be surprising if the UK had avoided doing anything stupid given our record in the past few years and our banking systems seem inextricably linked. There is nervousness here to be sure. Principally evidenced by every commentator saying there is nothing to worry about - never a good sign.

On Mrs P's phone and she's bleating so I have to go.

Thanks again for posting boys.
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Post by wayfriend »

peter wrote: You think so Wayfriend?
A digital wallet is just a safe place to store data. Money isn't data, unless it's crypto. "Real" money is more than just data, although it seems like it is when you can transfer money with an app. Whenever you move money around from a computer, the banks involved eventually move real money.

https://wise.com/gb/blog/how-do-banks-move-your-money

And this is why you can't just keep real money in a digital wallet.
peter wrote: I'm not entirely happy myself about the fact idea of a cashless society
BTW, this doesn't mean that there is no "real money". It only means that there is no currency.

I am sure that people love this idea. Every single transaction can be traced, but of course only certain people have access to that trace. Authorities can take you money at any time, whenever they feel justified. What could go wrong?
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Post by peter »

Fair play Wayfriend - I'll take your word for it. You have clearly done the reading enough for both of us on this. But the digital wallet non-viability notwithstanding (and assuming that there is indeed some pretty serious structural problems about to manifest, ala 2008, in the banking system) do you agree that it will not be a viable option to dump the inevitable cost of sorting it out onto the shoulders of a population that has never really recovered from the demands that were placed on it (via failure of wages to be maintained, public service degradation etc) following the financial crash of fifteen years ago?

Seems a hard ask for people who are already strained to the limits to me. And funny how the magic money tree is always found when the interests of the top percentiles are threatened, but suddenly is found to be missing, or even nonexistent, when it comes to paying for essential services and the wages of the workers employed therein.
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Post by peter »

Don't get me wrong, but it seems to me that King Charles is doing pretty well enough without the need for me to be swearing allegiance to him during the forthcoming coronation service this Saturday.

Much has been made in the media about how this coronation service is going to be a far more modern and inclusive affair than that of the old Queen, with contributions from people of many different faiths (as opposed to only the Church of England, who after all King Charles is the head of), and a general request to the people of the country to swear allegiance instead of just the peers of the realm.

The multi faith inclusions have caused a bit of controversy, within even the Church of England itself, as many people see the coronation as fundamentally a religious service and the most important one at that. There is no place in it, they say, for visitors of other and no faith, and to include them out of some misguided perception of the need to demonstrate inclusivity is, in their eyes, a mistake.

And actually, I think I agree - but probably not for the reasons they think I should.

I think that perhaps the people would just prefer to see the traditional version. They wouldn't think less of the King for seeing a bit of history unfold before their eyes in the way it has always been done. It's just more fun, more entertaining in a way, if the old pageantry is stuck to, the old protocols adhered to. Let me put it like this. When you go to the Tower of London, you don't want to see the Beefeater guards dressed in swat team regalia - carrying sub-machine guns and walkie talkies. You want to see them in their flat feathered caps and tights. You want them carrying their pikestaffs. Similarly, when visiting the Vatican, you don't want to see the pope in a double breastfed suit with a mobile in his hand. You want the tradition. You want the theatre.

Similarly, I think that the public don't want to witness an exercise in inclusivity on Saturday. They want to see continuity and tradition, and the theatre thereof. They know Charles is inclusive. They understand that their new King is a reformer. But this is not Charles's day only. It is the people's as well. And they deserve what they want.

Besides which, I think the idea that a demonstration of inclusivity made via changing the established traditions is a mistake. It won't work and could well be actually counterproductive.

Think on it like this. Once something is demanding of change, it is but a step to questioning whether you want it at all. Say you have an old French dresser. It's been in the house a million years, standing unchanged. Suddenly, in the heat of a new fad or fashion, you decide it needs a revamp. A new coating of brilliant mixtures of colours, making it modern and trendy, fitting it into the glossy world of the interior decor magazines you buy. How long will it be, I ask, before you take the next step, and decide that you no longer need it at all? And what makes Charles and whoever has decided upon this revamping of the service think that the monarchy is any different?

Still, it won't make any difference what I think - the planners within the royal household will do what they believe to be right, but in this, I think I have a better handle on what people want than they do.
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Post by peter »

It's taken a while, but at last our government seems to be getting a handle on the cold-calling racket that has dogged the lives of anyone with a phone - mobile or otherwise - for the last few decades.

Under the guise of cracking down on fraudsters, new legislation is being introduced that limits cold-calling and bans it in certain areas altogether.

This is seen as an extension to earlier restrictive legislation brought in a few years ago and will bring the area of insurance sales into the ban alongside the pension sales bans already in place.

As I say, the reason given by government for this legislation is to crack down on the problem of criminal fraud in which people, particularly the aged, are duped out of their savings by callers who are not anything like who they claim to be. The blanket bans might seem a bit extreme in this context and one cannot but think that there is an element of thinking that most people regard these calls as falling into the 'nuisance' category and that the world would be a better place without them.

I'd very much go along with this not least because I was once (albeit briefly) employed in a cold-calling centre and believe me, you did not want to find me on the other end of your telephone line. Persistent is not the word for it! In my defence I was doing what I have always attempted to do in employment - earn the money I was paid by doing the job I was paid to do........but I can't pretend I was happy about it. We were expected to sell, and sell I did. And there were people who could knock me into a cocked hat at it. One girl had a voice like pouring honey and men would buy anything from her just to listen to the sound of her voice. Another guy, an ex door-knocker (one of those guys who gets you to change your electricity provider - a job legendary for its reputation as difficult and in which only the best of the best individuals in terms of their persuasiveness can survive) could literally talk people into anything. He had this weird technique of intermingling statements with questions, all delivered in an uninterrupted flow, only pausing at certain places for answers and thoroughly bamboozling the recipient into agreement. It was masterful in a beastly way.

And given the current advances in generative AI, I think that this legislation comes not a moment to soon.

We have spoken elsewhere about the newly introduced ChatGPT chatbot (or whatever it is called) and if what we are being told is to be believed, this early model is being improved upon by its developers (not to mention the competing versions being developed by Google, Microsoft and the like) by the day. Pretty soon these bots will be able to mimic human speech and responses to a point where they will be indistinguishable from real human counterparts on the other end of the phone. Imagine the persuasive power of an AI that had access to virtually every response that would elicit agreement from virtually every recipient of calls that it was to make. It could assess your personality, game its responses and tailor them to your individual psyche faster than you could think. It would know you and your weaknesses better than you know yourself. How dangerous could this technology be even in legally used hands, never mind those with criminal intent.

No. Given these developments it becomes ever more important to limit certain areas of retail or commercial activity to face to face scenarios. This must surely be something that the government is bearing in mind with the introduction of this legislation.

------0-------

On a more positive note, and in relation to the generative AI aspect of the above, and the improvements coming down the line, just let me talk briefly on a YouTube video I recently saw.

The guy presenting was commenting on a single short quest in Skyrim that he was playing, in which a computer geek had upgraded the npc's to be responsive via the generated responses of the ChatGTP program.

It was like, every single character in the field of view could be spoken to, interacted with, as though you were talking to a real person. The responses were detailed and inquisitive, searching out information upon which to base further responses, to the point where the guy said you wouldn't need a quest to follow at all. You could simply just wander around in say Whiterun market, talking to the npc's as if they were ordinary people you might meet in the street. All of that following scripted dialogue and choosing answers from a list of responses was gone.

The guy observed that the serious limitations of the model in terms of actual gaming were that it would be almost impossible to keep the quests on track (as it were) without the interactions you were following derailing them altogether. Such a wide variety of responses does not lend itself to scripted outcomes in the same way, which makes sense. Human interactions are simply too unpredictable and varied to be corralled into the linear thread of a quest-line. Another thing that occurs to me, is that it would soon become repetitive if everyone you met had exactly the same personality - that of the interested and always calmly accommodating character of ChatGPT. People are not like this. They are nice, nasty, stupid and clever, each according to his way. Any game that could not reflect this in its generated dialogue would not for long satisfy one's need for variety in the maintenance of interest.

But nevertheless, the exercise was an interesting one. The particular bit of dialogue the presenter engaged in was pertaining to a specific quest, and how they should proceed. The npc being questioned (about how a particular Yarl should be approached in order to get their agreement on something iirc) gave thoughtful and convincing responses, and tailored their advice according to the responses you gave to certain questions that they in turn posed. It was very clever indeed. The presenter observed that if such tech was being trialled and tweaked for use in the long awaited Elder Scrolls 6, then the game produced could be a thing of wonder indeed. Almost infinite in its playability in fact, with scripted quest-lines forming only a very small part of the whole.

Oh gosh I hope I am around to see this developed. Now this would be gaming worthy of the name!
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Post by Avatar »

Well, hopefully your enforcement is better than here...despite improved laws against that sort of thing, requiring informed consent to receive calls etc. it's still pretty rife. And there's a technical loophole which allows calls to still be made in person, but it's routinely ignored and robo-calls are still happening regularly. Just reporting it is a mission, and the chances of anything being done by under-funded government departments are slim. Despite fairly severe penalties, I have yet to hear of one company actually brought to book for doing it.

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Post by peter »

I wouldn't bank on it Av.

Things have been better in respect of our land-line perhaps, but my wife's mobile phone seems to have gotten even worse of late. It's forever going off, just for her to find it to be an unsolicited sales call. With the amount of revenue that the phone operating companies and the government take (the latter via taxes) I have significant doubts that any legislation designed to curb the practice will be anything more than a pr exercise to mollify the public. :roll:
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Post by peter »

Much is being made of the security operation surrounding the forthcoming coronation, particularly in the wake of a seeming breach whereby an apparently unhinged man was able (for some reason best known to himself) throw a handful of shotgun shells over the wall into the Buckingham Palace gardens.

There are fears that the event might become a focus for republican activities, particularly along the route that the King will take, to and from Westminster Abbey.

Republican groups have been sent warning letters by the authorities reminding them of recently introduced legislation that forbids the use of such tactics as 'locking-on' and even carrying the materials whereby this could be done. Also forbidden is any activities that could block carriage ways or otherwise stop the flow of traffic. Essentially, anything other than standing with a placard or banner is not allowed. I'm not sure if chanting "Not my King!" is allowed, or anything disrespectful of the monarch, but at least the police have given assurance that they will not act to remove banners and placards used within the letter of the law. (I should think not, as well! The clue is in the 'used within the law' bit.)

The general reportage in the television news coverage is certainly much more open to airing the republican viewpoint than it would have been in the old Queen's day, and one gets the feeling that somewhere behind the scenes Charles is not the most popular of figures. (I mean within the inner circle of power in this country - whatever that shadowy entity might be. Most probably a loose establishment network of power and monied interests, not formally operating as such, but generally of a mind when it comes to looking after its own set.) One prominent journalist was saying on the BBC yesterday that she doubted that George (Prince William's son) would ever be King. She cited the youth of the country as just not being interested in retention of a monarchy, and whilst I have sympathy with this, I'm just not sure of what you might replace it with that would be any better. At least with the monarchy you have a tourist attraction element, and to be honest, it's just more fun than a presidential system might be. Can you imagine - President Blair or President (David) Attenborough? Ugh!

But I do understand that the monarchy is the keystone which props up the whole system of privilege and patronage around which our society is based. There is very little chance of there ever being a more egalitarian system introduced whilst it persists. Here's a very interesting fact that serves to illustrate just how pernicious and serving of the status quo the system is. A recent survey carried out into the association of wealth with the surname held, found that wealth in this country is still, one thousand years after the event of the Norman conquest, skewed toward those with surnames derived from French forebears. This is how conservative our system is. Those with money and power tend to keep it, generation after generation after generation. Nothing changes and the ruling elite retain their hold on the levers of power. And this will certainly never change while the keystone which supports the entire system holds. And nothing represents that keystone more than the King.

But would that it were that simple. Because it might be that it is the very same conservatism that has led to this retention of power and influence in a limited number of hands, that has also provided the stability that has given a thousand years of continuity without any of the upheavals of say, a French Revolution or an American War of Independence or, God forbid, a civil war.

Except that it hasn't really has it? Because we had a revolution of our own, it's just that everyone has forgotten about it. In fact ours was the first revolution of the lot of them, right back in the time of Charles the First, when Cromwell and his New Model Army took the fight to the royalists and finished up chopping the head off a King. But then for some little understood reason, a few years later we brought back another one and set him up in the same role of perpetual monarchy that we had just got rid of. And in the process, ensured that the truly radical ideas of levelling the playing field in favour of the people of this country (that's where the name 'The Levellers' comes from) as put together by those early socially minded thinkers, would never be realised. But that's us all over.

And there is another thing.

I made the observation back at the time of the Queen's death about how, in the light of what I was seeing, suddenly a lot of the sense of what was being done came out in a visible form (re the seamless transfer of symbolic power and the comparison with the chaos of Trump's leaving office when Biden took over). Suddenly the sense of separation of executive powe and symbolic power became clear, together with the relegation of the latter to a lower, more workaday level: how this makes for a very stable system because people don't then tend to get worked up at the points of transfer of power. Well I just wonder if there isn't yet more to come out when we see the coronation. These are things, after all, which are important. Certainly giving power to people to determine their own lives is important. Making sure we run society in a fair and equitable way. But it isn't the only thing. Stability and continuity is important as well. It's what allows us to plan for the future, not just of ourselves, but of our children as well. It provides a grounded backdrop to the practice of everyday life. A permanent state of semi-revolution and uncertainty is not good for a nation, as the years since the Brexit referendum have shown. Continuity is also important.

So I find myself in a quandary. Royalist or republican? I'll hold off for a while, see what happens, what comes out of the coronation.

But in the meantime I have to say I don't like the look of Charles's hands. Those swollen fingers don't look right to me, and must surely be indicative of some circulatory problems or something. The press are making merry around the subject, but I doubt it's much of a laughing matter at all. Not to wish it on him by any means (I've always rather liked the guy and felt a bit sorry for him), but I think he's got problems brewing there which all the money in the world ain't gonna fix.
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Post by wayfriend »

Peter I'm surprised you're not throwing a wobbler at the idea of Charles asking for an "oath of fealty" from every resident of the Commonwealth during the big C.
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Post by peter »

:lol: Reason I'm not throwing a wobbler about it Wayfriend is that I haven't got the slightest intention of doing it.

I spoke about it a few posts back and nothing has changed my mind about it in the last couple of days since posting.

To be honest, I don't think that very many people will be standing up to swear the oath in front of their televisions. People, if I'm honest, don't seem all that invested in the coronation fervour that the media is indulging in. It's far less of a national topic than the death of the Queen, which I suppose because it was such a huge change, really got under people's skin. I was born into an era where the national anthem was played at the end of every day's television programming and even in cinemas at the cessation of the days screenings. And some people would even stand in their own homes for it! All of that is gone now and certainly in the case of the coronation, it's seen as somewhat of a secondary thing to the actual change of monarchy that happened at the time of the Queen's death.

Not to say that there will not be a big turnout for the event.

Already people are camping out in the streets that line the route, many having travelled from different countries to witness the proceedings. In fact I'd go so far as to say it is these travellers from afar that make up the bulk of those already gathering. Local people are more casual about the whole affair. They'll be out on the day, but are not sufficiently motivated to do much more than turn up just to be there (as it were) for something historic. It's not really true loyalty to the Crown as much as indulging the opportunity to witness something a bit different (though they will doubtless get caught up in the patriotic thing when the event actually starts).

For my part, I am finding it rather tiresome at the moment. Today's newspapers are full of pictures of Kate and William visiting a London pub (very originally called the Dog andDuck) and travelling on a tube-train. It's all so novel, such fun, this playing for a moment at being one of the proles. They are laughing, the sycophants around them are laughing. It's all such a laugh. Try doing it on a Saturday night with pissed up assholes abusing you for taking too long to serve them if they are not simply satisfied with ogling your tits.Try travelling on those tubes, crammed in with thousands of others like cattle going to the kill, for forty minutes every morning before you even start working. Suddenly it ain't so funny.

There is a reason why France is so much more dedicated to the standards of living of the people, why they retire earlier on better pensions, why any attempt to encroach upon their standards and liberties is rebuffed with such vigour in comparison with what you'd see in this country. It's because they abolished their monarchy and aristocratic class. Because the people, and the conditions of their lives, are the central concern of their governments. They don't have this parasitic class, sucking the lifeblood out of the country, making sure that whatever is done, whatever legislation is passed, is always done with an eye to their interest.

Never should it be forgotten, amongst the pomp and the pageantry, that these people are where they are because they killed better, tortured better, put the fear of god into people better, than anyone else around them. Because it happened a thousand years plus ago - that's how long the system they instituted has supported them - doesn't change it. Certainly, they've been there so long now that we don't even think of it in these terms, it's all dressed up in this fancy covering of faux 'service' and loyalty to 'the people', but the fact remains, in a thousand years time, if they survived and retained their position, the mafia families of any cheap organised crime outfit would look no different. Their position was taken by brute force and bloodshed. What they wanted, they took. And any who stood in their way they killed. As Neil Oliver said recently, it is now so much of a given that even Hollywood makes films about it. Two in particular he cited. The Godfather. From this we learned that whatever outrage has to be committed to retain power and position, it's not personal. It's simply business. And from The Usual Suspects we learned a second thing. That getting to the top, grabbing the ultimate prize, is simply a matter of being prepared to do what no other is prepared to. No matter what it is. That's it. That's the key to ultimate power, and this is what the forebears of King Charles recognised.

And here they are, a thousand years later, and tomorrow we will all get up and cheer them for doing so. It was a damn good trick!
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Post by Avatar »

peter wrote: Reason I'm not throwing a wobbler about it Wayfriend is that I haven't got the slightest intention of doing it.

I spoke about it a few posts back and nothing has changed my mind about it in the last couple of days since posting.

To be honest, I don't think that very many people will be standing up to swear the oath in front of their televisions.
LOL, yeah, I agree, but it definitely paints him as an out of touch idiot if he thought that would be at all well received. :D Let alone acted on. The fact that it was even mooted in public just shows an utter disregard for the reality of modern Britain. :D (Just watched Frankie Boyle's Farewell to the Monarchy...it was quite amusing. :D

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Post by wayfriend »

Yes. I know no one will do it. But the gall in the asking is rather ... Feudal, shall we say.

Some are more appalled than they otherwise would be due to the inclusion of the "and my heirs and successors" bit, upon consideration of said heirs and successors.
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Sinomë maruvan ar Hildinyar tenn' Ambar-metta.
All lies and jest
Still a man hears what he wants to hear
And disregards the rest
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Post by peter »

Ehhh.......Yeah - right Fist! ( ;) )

Agreed Wayfriend, it was a bit cheeky. I've read a snippet that it might be changed in some way following a bit of a backlash and as Av says, nothing could more demonstrate the out of touch nature of the whole institution that it would even consider such nonsense.

But today's coronation is doing nothing but distracting attention from the really important story of the day (well - politically if not constitutionally), which was the Tories slamming in yesterday's local elections, where the results of their bungling of just about everything came home to roost in the form of a crushing loss of seats on local councils across the country.

Now they're not generally a topic of great interest or comment, but coming as they do on this occasion not so far in front of the next general election, they do at least give an indication of the direction of travel in terms of voter intention in that larger event.

Without going into specific details, the Tories lost some eight hundred plus council seats, and overall control of a significant number of councils up and down the country. This makes it harder for them to effectively point the country in the direction they would choose to, because at the end of the day, it is local councils that get to decide how the money dished out by central government is spent. (Not universally true, but at least in the main.) The loss of control of councils therefore means the spending priorities of the local areas might less reflect the priorities of the government and the party interests they represent.

But going back to the results as a predictive tool in respect of next year's general election (because it will be next year, barring some calamity for the government that forces it to be held earlier), the bad result for the Tories does not immediately translate into a good result for Labour. Most analysts seem to agree that while Labour has done pretty well, it is not sufficiently well to guarantee them a majority result in the forthcoming big one. This will be disconcerting to them. They should have nailed it. Given the basket case that the country is, following thirteen years of Tory rule, the vote should have been a slam-dunk for a clear Labour majority at the polls in 2024. The effects of the disastrous Brexit agreement on the economy, the virtual failure of the NHS, the small boats crisis, the looming food shortages - all of this should have added to the usual mid-term blues effect, to produce a result that showed Labour as a clear winner and Kier Stamer as our next PM. But rather than this, we see an okay result for them, but with significant progress for the Lib-dems and Greens as well. So the losses that the Tories sustained are spread out as gains amongst their competitors, which I suppose, might come as something of a relief. They do after all, have a stonking lead in the House in terms of seats (many of those grantedly being pretty tenuously held) to loose.

But these results, while in essence damning Kier Stamer with faint praise, will be no walk in the park for Sunak either. He's going to have his backbenchers snapping at his heels over this, and the inevitable commentary that "This never would have happened under Boris" is bound to come out. I saw him commenting earlier in the day yesterday and he was saying, "What these results tell us is that people want us to concentrate on their priorities the economy, the NHS, the small boats...". In other words, he was saying exactly what he's been saying for the past three months since he came out with his list of priorities (the same ones incidentally, he now attributes to the people) and which has provided this dish of excrement for his party to tuck into as they prepare for the big contest to come. If it were possible for them, the Tories would pull Sunak down tomorrow and yes - probably stick Johnson back in his place. Sunak is going to get slayed in a general election on this turnout. Put the core vote for Labour together with the screw up the Tories have made of everything, sprinkle in the dash of racism that will inevitably drive a proportion of the older Tories away, and bingo, the Conservatives are out. Question is, what kind of slubbered up coalition do we get to replace them with? Nothing with any capability of turning this stalling vessel around that's for sure. We're heading in one direction only - down. At what level we will finally settle is a question for the future to answer, because a Stamer-Ed Davies coalition will have nothing to say on the matter.

(Edit: Do you see that. The Lib-Dem leader is so insignificant that I didn't even get his name right. It's Ed Davey not Davies. Bet you didn't notice either. To think that this old Cameron coalition puppet is the best the Lib-Dems can do. They should have elected Layla Moran when they had the chance.)

(2nd Edit; Just done the translation Fist. Like it! Now that's an oath I might have taken :lol:)
Last edited by peter on Sun May 07, 2023 4:50 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by Damelon »

Since the coronation is on in place of what I normally might watch on a Saturday morning, I have to wonder how people there feel about the Coronation Concert.
LONDON -- Some of music's biggest stars are slated to perform at King Charles III's coronation on Saturday.

Katy Perry, Lionel Richie and Andrea Bocelli will take the stage at the coronation concert, which will be held on the grounds of Windsor Castle and televised across the BBC and on iPlayer.
I would think that they'd have stayed away from Americans and Europeans as performers and go with those who are from the UK, or Commonwealth. But what do I know?. :)
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I have no doubt that there'll be a smattering of home-grown talent there as well Damelon, but I take your point. Truth is, UK spawned talent of the 'right stamp' is pretty thin on the ground. We could put up opera diva Katherine Jenkins I suppose, but she is probably too busy not having an affair with the current football hunk of the day. (Jenkins, an undeniably pretty woman in her day, once announced in the media that she wasn't having an affair with David Beckham. Thing was nobody had even suggested that she was! :lol: ) Brian May could climb up onto the battlements of Windsor Castle I suppose and do his guitar thing, but at seventy five years old it might be difficult to get his zimmer frame up there.

No - it's a problem. Probably best stick with the imported talent. Less chance of any embarrassing faux pas' as well I'm thinking.

;)

-----------0----------

Well, I watched it all, more out of idle interest and because Mrs P was doing so, than any deep seated patriotism or royalist supportive sentiments, but I have to say that I'm glad I did.

The thing was well done, the balance of traditional elements (which to an extent are laid down in law as having to be performed in exactly that way) with the modern was smoothly executed, and there was no jarring of the newly introduced multi-faith and cultural elements with the historical format of the whole.

The high spot was undoubtedly the placement of the none too balanced crown on the (some would say none too balanced) royal napper, and then watching the King's almost circis-trick execution of his walk to the alter wearing the thing. One almost expected that drum roll and cymbal thing when he made it, such was the precarious nature of the thing, but luckily he was able to subsequently swap it for another jewel encrusted thing, the creation of another later King of yore, which, I noted, after the ceremony when he was more visibly relaxed, he was able to actually sport at a slightly jaunty angle, such was the equilibrium of the fit.

The gold coach was another highlight, notoriously uncomfortable by accounts, but by this point Charles and Camilla were so glad that the service was all over that they looked positively buoyant in it. The military, Needless to say, performed impeccably and the logistics of getting a twelve person wide marching column through a six person wide archway was pulled off in seamlessly expert fashion. The sheer scale of the amassed column of forces, a mile in length, was breathtaking, particularly as it advanced down the Mall - simply the most perfect carriageway in the world for such a presentation. This level of amassing of troops in ceremonial formation has not been done for decades - probably since the last coronation - but you'd think that they did it every day.

So yes, to even a borderline republican like myself, I could see what this service and public display meant, and could not fail to be moved by it. It visibly said, "We (as a nation, as represented by our figurehead) have been here a thousand years and we are not going anywhere!"

And yet, and yet.....

52 arrests of protesters against the monarchy were made. The chairman of the anti-monarchy group Republic was arrested for unloading banners from his car. The charges of 'conspiracy to cause a public nuisance' and 'suspicion of carrying equipment designed to incite an affray' (or some such), seemed almost plucked out of the air, made up on the spot, just to give an excuse to haul these people in. King Charles, if he has a grain of sense, should immediately request that the charges be dropped - but I suppose that that might be seen to be interference with that which above even his exalted position....the Law. But like it or not, these arrests speak of a system that is moving into places that are uncharted in our modern era, and places we may well regret in future days to have seen it come to.

But okay, it's done now. The new King and Queen are established in their Palace, and the inflexion point is passed. Navigated most would say with a modicum of success. I've heard some commentators say that while they expect William to make it to the top position, they think that he'll probably be the last. I'm not so sure. Okay - it's all pageantry and excess, totally anachronistic and unfitted for the modern world, not to say unfair and hierarchical to a degree that would have anyone with any bent towards seeing the establishment of a society based on equity and fairness spitting in their teeth.....

But those arrests make me think.

The monarchy have (in their own odd way) always been closer to the people than the polity. Of old it was their association with the people that enabled them to a degree, to stand against the aristocracy and out of which our chambered political system has developed. It seems to me that in a time where our politicians are contemplating ever more draconian ways of limiting our rights of protest and expression of our will, that alternative centre of our constitution might be needed more than it has been in the past. I can think of a number of politicians who would be more than happy not to have to answer to a monarch, not to have that symbolic representation of the people en masse, the King, to have to stand before and justify what they are doing. It seems to me that they, the politicians, would be perfectly happy to occupy that position at the pinnacle of our state, without that fly in the ointment of their omnipotent power to have to consider - and perhaps this is as good a reason as any of thinking very carefully before we away with an institution that has served us, if not well, then at least not malignly, for a thousand years.

But to finish on a lighter note, I thought that the Star, of all the papers yesterday, ran the best headline of all. In respect (obviously, but not stated as such) of the King's swollen fingers, and given the inclusion of a particular armed forces mascot dog in the (then) forthcoming parade, they had one word to say. "SAUSAGES!"

;)

(I hope at least some of you have good enough memories to get the connections in that headline. For any who missed it, feel free to ask and I'll explain.)
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Post by peter »

Now that the official shindig of the Coronation is over, it will be a short matter of time before the media returns from the sublime to the ridiculous, by which I refer of course to the governance (or lack of it) of the country.

I say lack of it, but given what the Conservative led governments of the last 12 years have managed to achieve perhaps it would have been better had they actually not done anything, and just left the country to go where it would under the administration of the civil service. Because beyond question, the country is a poorer, less free, more bitter and divided place to live than at any point in my life to date. The towns and cities are dilapidated and crumbling with signs of the rising poverty of the people everywhere. Not exclusively down to Brexit- - even that debacle could not exert its influence that fast - every time you see or visit other European countries you can visibly see the higher levels of affluence in the people, the cars, the buildings, as they increasingly pull further and further away from us.

This is the Conservative Party legacy to the country as we approach the next election, yet one wonders how much the people actually understand this, actually get that it didn't have to be this way. That with equitable governance that did not starve the national infrastructure in favour of allowing a small section of the population to garner and hold onto an ever greater share of the collective national wealth, we could ourselves be enjoying a better outlook on life, the world, simply by stepping out of our front doors and seeing it visibly expressed before our eyes. Certainly small government is good - but only down to a minimal point. Taxation similarly, is the better for being lower, but only up to a certain point whereby income is maximised in terms of what it takes to live. Beyond that point a progressive system to correct the excesses that an unrestrained free-market capitalist system will by its nature engender, is necessary for government to provide the infrastructure and services which make all of our lives, rich and poor alike, the better. How hard is this to grasp.?

But in the wake of their disastrous showing in the local council elections last week, the Tories will be doing everything in their power to work out how to cling in there, to bamboozle the public into believing that things under the Labour Party would actually be worse - because that is the only option left to them. So absolutely devoid of any fresh ideas as to what to do to improve matters are they, so impossible is it to point to even a single thing they have handled well, that the only thing they can say is that under the other lot it would be no better.

And the tragedy of it is that it's true. The Labour Party are as devoid of ideas as the Tories. They have aped their blue opponents to the point where they are now indistinguishable. There is literally no gap through which you could slide a sheet of toilet paper (the only kind I would waste even trying) between them. In fact, you could spend an aimless ten minutes composing a front bench 'fantasy team' (although it would be more of a nightmare team) made up from current front bench members from either side. It would not look or feel incongruent if you did so, cut from so similar a cloth are the two sides we have to choose from. There is nothing, literally nothing, between them, and certainly the right wing (in Labour terms) front bench team that Stamer has put together contains members far more closely aligned to Sunak's cabinet than to even the centre of their own party.

Such is the choice we have, and already as I said above, there are voices within the Conservative backbenchers calling for Johnson to be recalled to lend support to the failing Sunak performance, if not to actually take up the reins of leadership again. Stamer is doing his best to try to talk up his party's performance in the elections, but while they did indeed gain some seats and take control of a good number of councils, it was only a fraction of what the tories actually lost and in terms of vote score rather than seats, the party remains exactly where it was the last time elections of this type were held. The truth is that winning a clear majority in the next election looks ever more a pipe dream, and the chances of a hung parliament are rising by the day as the Labour polling slips inexorably away under Stamer's dreary leadership.

And the Lib-dem's Ed Davey knows it,and is laying the groundwork for it as I post. Refusing yesterday to rule out a collaboration with Stamer, he clearly signalled his preparedness to step into his own previous role as poodle-in-support of whatever political master will lead him into a role in government. Last time it was the Tories, this time it will be Labour. Last time the Lib-dems abandoned their commitment to free university tuition, thereby saddling the youth of the country with a debt burden for lives for the temerity of wanting to educate themselves - what will the thirty pieces of silver legislation be this time......(I was going to come up with a pithy Labour policy that would be equivalent to "Voting for planes to Rwanda" were it the Tories - but then I realised that I didn't know any.....Labour policies at all that is, not just beastly ones that the Lib-Dems might ordinarily be expected to rail against). But hey - politics has ever made for strange bedfellows and I suppose the idea of Ed Davey frolicking with Kier Stamer under the Cabinet sheets is no stranger than any other slubbered up arrangement that he (Stamer) might make to attain power.

So as I post, there is nothing exciting in British politics to get enthused about. There has been talk of a loose coalition of independent Labour candidates standing at the next general election - even the formation of a new left wing party - but it's pretty late in the day for it. It's not impossible if someone with the profile of Jeremy Corbyn were to step up to front it. But I don't think that that's going to happen. It would take some high profile figures from the left, together with the collective support of the unions to do it, and to date, although some unions have disafiliated themselves from the Labour Party, some remain committed to the party they gave birth to, like a mother who remains loyal to a child that has gone to the bad, despite everything.

There is no fresh ideas in our collective political class - at least not amongst the ones that matter. Braverman and Co are ready to pull the country into yet greater levels of authoritarianism, and are preparing to stoke the flames of nationalism in support of this. Do you know that in last week's new public order legislation, any police officer was given the full power to stop and search any member of the public at any time, with or without suspicion that they may be carrying illicit goods or be up to some misdemeanor. This is the ruling of a police state, and we are not simply headed there - we are effectively there already.

Think on that.
The truth is a Lion and does not need protection. Once free it will look after itself.

....and the glory of the world becomes less than it was....
'Have we not served you well'
'Of course - you know you have.'
'Then let it end.'

We are the Bloodguard
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