Things that make you :)

[franciswilliamwebb]

8 hours ago, melmerby said:

I can just imagine J R-M doing the latin wearing a top hat & tails and carrying a cane

 

I think he's spent most of his life doing Latin, wearing top hat & tails and carrying a cane😉

[Dunsignalling]

12 hours ago, KeithMacdonald said:

 

My vote is them being taken to The Repair Shop.

 

 

 

To be suitably "dealt with" by the Teddy Bear Ladies....

 

[Hroth]

12 hours ago, KeithMacdonald said:

 

My vote is them being taken to The Repair Shop.

 

 

 

28 minutes ago, Dunsignalling said:

 

To be suitably "dealt with" by the Teddy Bear Ladies....

 

 

Sounds reasonable, considering how they "stuffed" the rest of us....

 

If I had to see them on the telly, how about one of those shows where the presenter goes to a tip, selects items from a skip and then has them "upcycled" and sold on for silly prices to arty shops?

 

[melmerby]

1 hour ago, PhilJ W said:

I wonder if any of them would dare appear on HIGNFY.

Jacob Ress-Mogg has, in 2014

[GMKAT7]

Good afternoon folks,

 

Perhaps La Truss, J R-M and Schnapps could feature in a Home Counties version of 'Last of the Summer Wine'.

 

Surrounded by the WI, open garden societies, etc and they could reminisce about their time in power.

Mostly talking b0ll0x, as per their previous life (although J R-M will do it in Latin) and La Truss salivating about home-made cheese.

 

Cheers, Nigel.

[Hroth]

15 minutes ago, GMKAT7 said:

Good afternoon folks,

 

Perhaps La Truss, J R-M and Schnapps could feature in a Home Counties version of 'Last of the Summer Wine'.

 

Surrounded by the WI, open garden societies, etc and they could reminisce about their time in power.

Mostly talking b0ll0x, as per their previous life (although J R-M will do it in Latin) and La Truss salivating about home-made cheese.

 

Cheers, Nigel.

 

"Last of the Summer Whine"? 🤔

 

[franciswilliamwebb]

2 hours ago, melmerby said:

Jacob Ress-Mogg has, in 2014

 

 

 

[KeithMacdonald]

15 hours ago, melmerby said:

I can just imagine J R-M doing the latin wearing a top hat & tails and carrying a cane

 

Putting on the Ritz?

 

 

 

[Sidecar Racer]

 

 

[CameronL]

18 hours ago, Hroth said:

 

I'm not sure I'd want to see any of them on anything!

 

 

17 hours ago, jcm@gwr said:

 

Except a charge sheet!

Or a plane to Rwanda (poetic justice). 

 

Asking for suggestions: if Rishi Sunak decided to release a single, what would he cover? My thoughts include:

 

The Loser - Hot Chocolate

Movin' Out - Billy Joel

It’s My Party and I'll Cry If I Want To - Lesley Gore

 

Any more?

 

[Dunsignalling]

20 minutes ago, CameronL said:

 

Or a plane to Rwanda (poetic justice). 

 

Asking for suggestions: if Rishi Sunak decided to release a single, what would he cover? My thoughts include:

 

The Loser - Hot Chocolate

Movin' Out - Billy Joel

It’s My Party and I'll Cry If I Want To - Lesley Gore

 

Any more?

 

 

Only The Lonely (Know The Way I Feel Tonight) - Roy Orbison

 

[Dunsignalling]

And one for Kier Starmer:  Brand New Key - Melanie

 

(With Boris still lurking, they must have changed the locks...)

 

Edited July 8 by Dunsignalling

[ian]

18 minutes ago, Dunsignalling said:

And one for Kier Starmer:  Brand New Key - Melanie

 

(With Boris still lurking, they must have changed the locks...)

 

/pedant mode

The front door to No.10 doesn't have a keyhole. As the saying goes, "If your name's not on the list, you aren't getting in."

/end pedant mode

[Ramblin Rich]

14 minutes ago, ian said:

/pedant mode

The front door to No.10 doesn't have a keyhole. As the saying goes, "If your name's not on the list, you aren't getting in."

/end pedant mode

I always thought changing my name to Richard Down could be useful.  Then, if told "you're name's not down, you're not coming in" I could reply to the contrary!

[Vistisen]

21 hours ago, RFS said:

 

We had a referendum in 2011 during the Coalition government to change the first-past-the-post system and was to agree an alternative vote system. It was rejected by a two-thirds majority but that was on a 40% turnout ....

Quite, when talking to my parents after they were complaining about the result in 2019. They mentioned PR, and that they never had the chance to get it. I pointed out that there had been a referendum, which they both denied had taken place. But then neither Labour or the torries wanted it. It was about the only thing they agreed on. 

There is however another problem  with PR. it often leads to coalition governments where small and somtimes extreme party's support has to be 'purchased' to get any laws passed. This was the case for years in Denmark where the Danish equivalent  of UKIP held the balance of power and led to really wierd clauses in laws along the lines of "we want to reduce pollution, so we will stop immigrants in diesel cars"

[Reorte]

8 minutes ago, Vistisen said:

Quite, when talking to my parents after they were complaining about the result in 2019. They mentioned PR, and that they never had the chance to get it. I pointed out that there had been a referendum, which they both denied had taken place. But then neither Labour or the torries wanted it. It was about the only thing they agreed on.

The referendum was for AV, not PR. The cynic in me thinks it was deliberately designed to rubbish the whole idea of PR, despite not being about that, and something that they could use to claim false legitimacy for FPTP ("people voting against changing the system, so they're happy with FPTP" - not true, it just means they weren't happy with the idea of AV, but I've heard that excuse given).

[woodenhead]

3 minutes ago, Reorte said:

The referendum was for AV, not PR. The cynic in me thinks it was deliberately designed to rubbish the whole idea of PR, despite not being about that, and something that they could use to claim false legitimacy for FPTP ("people voting against changing the system, so they're happy with FPTP" - not true, it just means they weren't happy with the idea of AV, but I've heard that excuse given).

I guess what happens next in France will either cause PR to shine or shame.

[GMKAT7]

Good evening folks,

 

As a follow-up to Ian's suggestion above, and in a similar vein, Paul Simon's "If you don't have a wrist band, you don't get through the door" may be appropriate.

 

Or, following La Truss' lead "Moving on down and moving on out, nothing can stop us".

 

The only thing I would prefer to see them in is the stocks, but that may be considered too political for RMW and may also be considered an incitement to violence.

 

Cheers, Nigel.

[Reorte]

1 hour ago, woodenhead said:

I guess what happens next in France will either cause PR to shine or shame.

If it represents the overall spread of opinions in France then it shines, no matter the result. If there's any shame it'll be down to what the people have chosen, not a system that respects their choice. That's democracy - it shouldn't pick and choose.

[bimble]

I do wonder how PR would deal with the regional parties, such as the SNP, Plaid, those of N. Ireland, or Independents, all of whom would garner very low numbers overall nationally as they only run in a small number of seats.

 

There are flaws in all the various methods one might chose to use but (and I'm agreeing with something Rees-Mogg said on Radio 4 so please forgive me) at least FPTP gives a single party majority government more often than not even though no-one party ever gets more than 50% of the overall vote.

 

But I suppose when it's something you've always used the thought of having to use another method seems wrong.  We're not used to coalition governments, even though our last one lasted the full term of office, despite people not expecting it to last 12 months.

[bimble]

But for more smiley things, I did read this story on the CBC news page about the Boston Transit System giving their trains (and busses & trams) eyes after some passengers asked them to.

 

A Boston transit rider was frustrated by a late train. She asked the city to give them googly eyes

 

 

[Reorte]

1 hour ago, bimble said:

I do wonder how PR would deal with the regional parties, such as the SNP, Plaid, those of N. Ireland, or Independents, all of whom would garner very low numbers overall nationally as they only run in a small number of seats.

 

There are flaws in all the various methods one might chose to use but (and I'm agreeing with something Rees-Mogg said on Radio 4 so please forgive me) at least FPTP gives a single party majority government more often than not even though no-one party ever gets more than 50% of the overall vote.

 

But I suppose when it's something you've always used the thought of having to use another method seems wrong.  We're not used to coalition governments, even though our last one lasted the full term of office, despite people not expecting it to last 12 months.

Perhaps for the various countries you could have a certain number of seats allocated to each but the total within each are chosen by PR. A slightly hybrid system. I think it would work well enough even if broken down to a regional level (e.g. each largish area elects say 10 MPs, chosen by PR). The part of it I don't like is that it would lose the direct link between fairly small constituency and MP (which in turn breaks the idea that that MP is supposed to directly be the representative in Parliament of the the people living there,), but I think losing that's the lesser evil.

 

Coalition governments aren't something that worries me, having to have a bit of compromise and accept some variation from what the largest party would want to do is a good thing IMO. Producing a single party majority government most of the time is (to me) a downside, not a strength.

[billbedford]

Scotland has proportional representation and that has worked well, no?

[Vistisen]

3 hours ago, bimble said:

I do wonder how PR would deal with the regional parties, such as the SNP, Plaid, those of N. Ireland, or Independents, all of whom would garner very low numbers overall nationally as they only run in a small number of seats.

 

There are flaws in all the various methods one might chose to use but (and I'm agreeing with something Rees-Mogg said on Radio 4 so please forgive me) at least FPTP gives a single party majority government more often than not even though no-one party ever gets more than 50% of the overall vote.

 

But I suppose when it's something you've always used the thought of having to use another method seems wrong.  We're not used to coalition governments, even though our last one lasted the full term of office, despite people not expecting it to last 12 months.

Denmark has traditionally had coalition governments. The normal practice has been for the government to try and create binding agreements on major policy areas (defense, health, education and so on) which include some of the parties in opposition. This means that if/when the opposition becomes the government, they are obliged to get permission from all the parties in the agreement if they want to change it. This allows for long term planning and stops 'pendulum' politics. For example the privatise/renationalise seasaw.

The downside is that these agreements are often "patchwork" where each party has to have their fingerprint. Which leads to over bureaucratic regulations.

Edited July 8 by Vistisen

[chris p bacon]

11 hours ago, billbedford said:

Scotland has proportional representation and that has worked well, no?

 Only if you think it has.  The Greens held the SNP hostage.