UKMT Red October 2015: Basically D&D's Communist Motherbase

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Renaissance Robot: Oct 10, 2010; Bite my furry metal ass

Pilchenstein posted:

It's elitist attitudes like this that stop dipshits like myself from posting in this thread. Can't we talk about something a bit lower-brow occasionally, like "favourite Sooty episode" or whathaveyou?

We talk about lowbrow poo poo all the time! You must have the reading comprehension of a three year old if you can't see that :ironicat:

# ? Oct 28, 2015 13:22

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# ? May 14, 2024 17:17

Tesseraction: Apr 5, 2009

Stephen Phillips, Tory MP, asking Cameron about the Yemen crisis. Crikey, a man with a conscience!

# ? Oct 28, 2015 13:22

serious gaylord: Sep 16, 2007; what.

Cameron got loving roasted on that. Trotted out all the soundbytes but nothing stuck. Calling him a defecit denier and everything, but his inability to answer a simple question will be whats broadcast, especially when Corbyn led with his final question with 'Five times the Prime Minister has been unable to say whether people will be worse off after the tax credit cuts.

This is not a very nice PMQ's for him, he's getting slaughtered.

# ? Oct 28, 2015 13:23

Pilchenstein: May 17, 2012; So your plan is for half of us to die?; Hot Rope Guy

Phoon posted:

Corbyn asking six times if people will be worse off after tax credit cuts

I'd imagine he didn't get six answers?

Renaissance Robot posted:

We talk about lowbrow poo poo all the time! You must have the reading comprehension of a three year old if you can't see that

# ? Oct 28, 2015 13:28

feedmegin: Jul 30, 2008

Renaissance Robot posted:

We talk about lowbrow poo poo all the time! You must have the reading comprehension of a three year old if you can't see that

Which flavour of Monster Munch most purely embodies the post-Hegelian dialectic?

# ? Oct 28, 2015 13:29

serious gaylord: Sep 16, 2007; what.

Cameron is now taking credit for the Lib Dems free school meals for infants policy. That will come back to bite him. And more tax credit grilling, he's not getting this to go away.

# ? Oct 28, 2015 13:29

Blacknose: Jul 28, 2006; Meet frustration face to face
A point of view creates more waves
So lose some sleep and say you tried

I'm sure the remaining 3 lib dems will be furious.

# ? Oct 28, 2015 13:30

XMNN: Apr 26, 2008; I am incredibly stupid

How long until the Guardian article praising Cameron's masterful performance goes up?

# ? Oct 28, 2015 13:30

serious gaylord: Sep 16, 2007; what.

Congrats to George osbourne for managing to unite the opposition to give his boss a giant butt loving on live tv.

# ? Oct 28, 2015 13:32

Rumda: Nov 4, 2009; Moth Lesbian Comrade

Blacknose posted:

I'm sure the remaining 3 lib dems will be furious.

I wonder how racist the other two are.

# ? Oct 28, 2015 13:33

crispix: Mar 28, 2015; Grand-Maman m'a raconté
_{(Les éditions des amitiés franco-québécoises)}

Hello, dear

IDS is putting job centre advisers in foodbanks: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-34658755

Because only shirking jobless scroungers use foodbanks! :v:

# ? Oct 28, 2015 13:37

LemonDrizzle: Mar 28, 2012; neoliberal shithead

The Tories are being pretty amazingly blatant about their desire to effectively nullify the Lords and create a mechanism that allows them to make sweeping tax changes without meaningful scrutiny in either the Commons or the Lords: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/pol...-the-Lords.html

quote:

The formal restrictions on Lords� powers were set out in the Parliament Act of 1911, forced through by the Liberals and amended by Attlee�s Labour government in 1949. The Act makes it clear that the upper house has no power to block or amend a Bill designated as a �Money Bill�.

Now the solution is for the Government, calmly and in the next session of this parliament, to bring forward a Bill to amend the Act once more. Such a Bill could be very short indeed, but would specify either that the same system of designation would be extended to secondary legislation of the type defeated this week, or that the supremacy of the Commons on matters of finance is an overriding principle of law.

Of the scores of democracies I have visited over the last decade, I cannot think of one where an unelected chamber can change or veto the tax proposals of an elected government, however strongly they may feel. That the supposed heirs of Lloyd George have cast the position in Britain into doubt reflects badly on them, but it would reflect badly on this country if we did not now put it right.

He explicitly acknowledges that the Commons can already bypass the Lords on financial matters provided that they put the legislation in a Money Bill. If the government had done that with the tax credit cuts, the Lords would've let it pass untouched. However, Money Bills are subject to lengthy debate in the Commons whereas Statutory Instruments are waved through with minimal scrutiny. Now the Tories want to create a special class of Statutory Instrument that allows them to make sweeping changes to tax and spending without any examination in either of the houses of parliament.

# ? Oct 28, 2015 13:39

StoneOfShame: Jul 28, 2013; This is the best kitchen ever.

crispix posted:

IDS is putting job centre advisers in foodbanks: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-34658755

Because only shirking jobless scroungers use foodbanks!

He also said he supports food banks showing he completely misses the point, we should hate food banks as they shoes we have failed as a society to keep people out of poverty.

# ? Oct 28, 2015 13:41

crispix: Mar 28, 2015; Grand-Maman m'a raconté
_{(Les éditions des amitiés franco-québécoises)}

Hello, dear

StoneOfShame posted:

He also said he supports food banks showing he completely misses the point, we should hate food banks as they shoes we have failed as a society to keep people out of poverty.

It's adding insult to injury. It's almost as if he can't abide the idea of a place that offers genuine help to those hard up rather than his kind of "help".

# ? Oct 28, 2015 13:44

communism bitch: Apr 24, 2009

StoneOfShame posted:

He also said he supports food banks showing he completely misses the point, we should hate food banks as they shoes we have failed as a society to keep people out of poverty.

Privatising welfare is exactly the sort of thing the tories love.

# ? Oct 28, 2015 13:47

StoneOfShame: Jul 28, 2013; This is the best kitchen ever.

Oberleutnant posted:

Privatising welfare is exactly the sort of thing the tories love.

The Big Society

# ? Oct 28, 2015 13:49

NO FUCK YOU DAD: Oct 23, 2008

Superb PMQs, that. Corbyn struck just the right level of righteous anger and made Cameron look like a soundbyte-spewing robot. Cameron really needs to get his back benches to stop jeering Corbyn's questions from the public as it really does make them look like cunts.

Also, Osborne looked like he hadn't slept in days.

# ? Oct 28, 2015 14:01

Jedit: Dec 10, 2011; Proudly supporting vanilla legends 1994-2014

big scary monsters posted:

Michael Fallon, Secretary of State for Defence. Classics and Ancient History (??), St. Andrews (not Oxford!!)

St Andrews is where you study if you're a twat that was educated in Scotland instead of England. It's sometimes referred to as "Jocksford".

# ? Oct 28, 2015 14:02

ookiimarukochan: Apr 4, 2011

More succinctly, St Andrews is, with Edinburgh, the Oxbridge equivalent for people who had very expensive educations but even with all that weren't smart enough to get into the real Oxbridge.

# ? Oct 28, 2015 14:16

Prince John: Jun 20, 2006; Oh, poppycock! Female bandits?

Renaissance Robot posted:

I would also like to know this. Apparently he didn't even want to be here? How the gently caress does immigration detain someone on their way to somewhere else, even if they're not euro/commonwealth?

I've been trying to find out more about this, but with very little success. An article here covers the man's background in more detail and some of the effort to get him out of there.

It looks like he was removed from the plane. The doctors report also describes him as "demented" (in the medical sense of the word) so who knows whether he was acting rationally at the time.

quote:

No-one will tell us why he was taken off the plane. Perhaps he had some sort of episode. Perhaps he didn't have the right paperwork. Either way, for some reason he was put in restraints and brought to Harmondsworth.

The doctor went to some effort to raise his case, including appealing to the Canadian High Commission, with no success:

quote:

It went on to explain that despite being declared unfit for detention he ended up dying, in handcuffs, while still in detention two weeks later.
Channel 4 News has spoken exclusively to the doctor who examined him when he first arrived in the detention centre. She immediately knew this was the wrong man in the wrong place.

"This person was extremely vulnerable, he was frail, he should not have been there in the first place, let alone to be detained for such a long while," she said.
"He was the sort of person you see and immediately identify with as a sort of grandfather figure."

So first the doctor, who wants to remain anonymous to protect her career, spoke to her line manager. She wanted to alert her manager, the person in charge of the health and welfare of detainees, to Alois's condition.

When the doctor asked that official why Alois was here in the first place, she was told: "UK Border Agency (UKBA) are not giving us this information because it's none of our business". According to her notes, she asked: "What do I have to do to get him out of here?"

Eventually she was told to fill in a form and fax it to UKBA, which she did. But she decided to go further. She rang UKBA directly. The official she spoke to there assured her that she would try to get him a place in an appropriate care setting or hospital.

The doctor went further still. She rang the Canadian high commission emergency number around the end of January. She explained to an official that she was really concerned about one of their citizens and gave them all the details.

"At that point, there was not much more that I could do. I definitely think that I tried to act ethically, I always do. I tried extra hard in this case to do the right thing by this patient and I feel as if nothing I said or did made any difference," she said.

But about a fortnight later his heart gave way while still in detention. He'd been in handcuffs for five hours and was still wearing them when he died.

This is what the Canadian Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development told Channel 4 News about Alois's case: "Our thoughts remain with the family of the deceased Canadian in the United Kingdom. Canadian Officials in the United Kingdom have maintained close contact with representatives of the Home Office to press on this tragic case and to receive developments.

That sounds like code for "we did nothing".

It also looks like we initially tried to deport him, but he was declared medically unfit for flight, and therefore ended up back in the centre according to this Canadian report:

quote:

On Jan. 30, 2013, a doctor at the centre diagnosed the man with Alzheimer�s disease and declared him unfit for detention. The doctor�s report stated: "Frail, 84 yrs old, has Alzheimer�s disease � demented. UNFIT for detention or deportation. Requires social care."

A caseworker didn't respond to the doctor�s report until a week later, on Feb. 5, when it was acknowledged that the man was vulnerable and lacked contacts in the country.

The next day, attempts to take the man out of the centre were called off after a doctor declared him unfit to fly, and he was returned to Harmondsworth.

LemonDrizzle posted:

The Tories are being pretty amazingly blatant about their desire to effectively nullify the Lords and create a mechanism that allows them to make sweeping tax changes without meaningful scrutiny in either the Commons or the Lords: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/pol...-the-Lords.html

He explicitly acknowledges that the Commons can already bypass the Lords on financial matters provided that they put the legislation in a Money Bill. If the government had done that with the tax credit cuts, the Lords would've let it pass untouched. However, Money Bills are subject to lengthy debate in the Commons whereas Statutory Instruments are waved through with minimal scrutiny. Now the Tories want to create a special class of Statutory Instrument that allows them to make sweeping changes to tax and spending without any examination in either of the houses of parliament.

Sneaky fuckers, that's exactly what I was afraid of when we were first discussing this.

In other news, I'm off to my first Labour party meeting (my first political meeting of any kind in fact). Any idea what to expect? Is it likely to be a fairly informal affair?

Prince John fucked around with this message at 14:27 on Oct 28, 2015

# ? Oct 28, 2015 14:17

hookerbot 5000: Dec 21, 2009

My brother went to St Andrews, after doing night classes in a community centre to get his A Levels because he left school with no highers when my dad died and our family imploded. He is not at all twattish (except when he was 10 and used to point a remote control in my eyes and shout cancer of the eye!).

This was pre Prince William, maybe it's different now.

# ? Oct 28, 2015 14:20

SurrealityCheck: Sep 15, 2012

Zephro posted:

Does objecting to sucking up to a literal oppressive dictatorship because they have a lot of money to throw around really count as sinophobia though? Or is there something else in the article that does that?

Oh I think China is odious - but I don't think that right wing hatred of China is necessarily motivated by good things.

# ? Oct 28, 2015 14:22

Guavanaut: Nov 27, 2009; Looking At Them Tittys
1969 - 1998; Toilet Rascal

LemonDrizzle posted:

Now the Tories want to create a special class of Statutory Instrument that allows them to make sweeping changes to tax and spending without any examination in either of the houses of parliament.

I hope they do and then Corbyn wins and uses it for full Corbynism.

# ? Oct 28, 2015 14:23

ThomasPaine: Feb 4, 2009; We have no compassion and we ask no compassion from you. When our turn comes, we shall not make excuses for the terror.

As a St Andrews graduate I can confirm that it is full of cunts. On the plus side though the saturation of cunts means that the normal people there (they do exist) tend to get very mad in the face of all the obnoxious gratuitous displays of wealth and lurch to the left as a result. It's a town where you're either a literal imperial apologist /objectivist or a total commie and there's less inbetween than you'd think.

Really pretty town too. On balance glad I went there. Interesting formative experience.

# ? Oct 28, 2015 14:28

Jedit: Dec 10, 2011; Proudly supporting vanilla legends 1994-2014

hookerbot 5000 posted:

My brother went to St Andrews, after doing night classes in a community centre to get his A Levels because he left school with no highers when my dad died and our family imploded. He is not at all twattish (except when he was 10 and used to point a remote control in my eyes and shout cancer of the eye!).

This was pre Prince William, maybe it's different now.

If your brother isn't a twat and got a degree from St Andrews, that would be a first.

# ? Oct 28, 2015 14:29

Gonzo McFee: Jun 19, 2010

I knew a guy who worked as a grounds keeper at St Andrews and he said everyone was snobby as gently caress. He was also massively snobbish so he knew his snobbery.

# ? Oct 28, 2015 14:33

communism bitch: Apr 24, 2009

We had an extremely good looking Italian postgrad researching here for about a year or so and she was fantastic in every way except she was obsessed/besotted with the nobility and always asking me questions about the Duke.
Anyway she went off to be a TA at St Andrews and now it's all fitting into place cause William went there apparently? lol

# ? Oct 28, 2015 14:33

big scary monsters: Sep 2, 2011; -~Ｓｋｕｌｌｗａｖｅ~-

ookiimarukochan posted:

More succinctly, St Andrews is, with Edinburgh, the Oxbridge equivalent for people who had very expensive educations but even with all that weren't smart enough to get into the real Oxbridge.

One of my sisters went to St. Andrews and the other Edinburgh. Am I going to have to enact a purge when I see them next?

# ? Oct 28, 2015 14:38

Gonzo McFee: Jun 19, 2010

It'd be for the best.

# ? Oct 28, 2015 14:40

GEORGE W BUSHI: Jul 1, 2012

The Tories are displaying their maturity by refusing to talk to Heidi Allen, the Tory MP who spoke up against tax credt cuts

# ? Oct 28, 2015 14:40

Party Boat: Nov 1, 2007; where did that other dog come from

who is he

Jedit posted:

If your brother isn't a twat and got a degree from St Andrews, that would be a first.

Do all the twats get 2:1s and below?

# ? Oct 28, 2015 14:40

LemonDrizzle: Mar 28, 2012; neoliberal shithead

Baron Corbyn posted:

The Tories are displaying their maturity by refusing to talk to Heidi Allen, the Tory MP who spoke up against tax credt cuts

Do you have a link to the article this piece comes from?

# ? Oct 28, 2015 14:42

Hong XiuQuan: Feb 19, 2008; "Without justice for the Palestinians there will be no peace in the Middle East."

Party Boat posted:

Do all the twats get 2:1s and below?

At least a third.

# ? Oct 28, 2015 14:43

TheRat: Aug 30, 2006

"The People's Stare"

# ? Oct 28, 2015 14:44

GEORGE W BUSHI: Jul 1, 2012

LemonDrizzle posted:

Do you have a link to the article this piece comes from?

It's from The Times so it's behind a paywall. (I saw it on Twitter, I'm not paying for The Times).

# ? Oct 28, 2015 14:45

Angepain: Jul 13, 2012; what keeps happening to my clothes

ThomasPaine posted:

As a St Andrews graduate I can confirm that it is full of cunts. On the plus side though the saturation of cunts means that the normal people there (they do exist) tend to get very mad in the face of all the obnoxious gratuitous displays of wealth and lurch to the left as a result. It's a town where you're either a literal imperial apologist /objectivist or a total commie and there's less inbetween than you'd think.

Really pretty town too. On balance glad I went there. Interesting formative experience.

I went there for a year, which from what I hear from other (lefty hippie type) St Andrews graduates that went longer is just enough time to enjoy the scenery without having to become fully aware of the extent of the undercurrents of classism/etc going on. I also didn't go to any balls which probably helped.

They have a M&S Food now, because of course they do. Right opposite the food bank.

# ? Oct 28, 2015 14:46

GEORGE W BUSHI: Jul 1, 2012

TheRat posted:

"The People's Stare"

"The People's Eyebrow"

# ? Oct 28, 2015 14:47

LemonDrizzle: Mar 28, 2012; neoliberal shithead

Baron Corbyn posted:

It's from The Times so it's behind a paywall. (I saw it on Twitter, I'm not paying for The Times).

Ta. In the interests of sharing:

quote:

Osborne can�t afford another week like this

As a keen student of China, George Osborne may already be aware of the proverb that �the greatest conqueror is he who overcomes the enemy without a blow�. His foes in Westminster certainly believe this week�s government defeats on tax credit cuts prove the aphorism true: the chancellor has badly wounded himself without anyone needing to plot against him.
Osborne could have chosen to introduce the cuts only for new claimants, thus avoiding the horror of families opening letters just before Christmas that tell them they will lose around �1,300. He could have twigged that a sum this large would mean that the adulation he received for his clever summer budget wouldn�t last forever. He could have listened to worried backbenchers, rather than sending his henchmen to bellow down the phone at them when, exasperated, they voiced concern in the press.
He could have put the cuts into primary legislation, where they belong, rather than in a statutory instrument, a lesser form of legislation that the Hansard Society believes is being increasingly abused by governments keen to avoid proper scrutiny. And he could, at a number of stages in this long row, have shown some humility by saying he wants policies to work for the hardworking people that the Conservatives claim to represent, and that he would tweak his original design. Though he said on Monday that he was listening to those who were worried, he appeared to snarl into the camera as he said it, suggesting a man whose pride had been stung, not someone humbled.

It is difficult even for those who support the chancellor�s ideal of a �lower welfare, higher wage� economy to feel much sympathy for where he has ended up. He thought he was being wise, which is always the sign he is being a fool. This latest row confirms that the �omnishambles� budget of 2012 was not just one dropped stitch, but part of a pattern: a complacent chancellor assumes that everything is fine with a controversial policy until its flaws are so obvious that even Geoffrey Boycott�s mother could have pinpointed them with a stick of rhubarb.
Boris Johnson�s allies think the Lords defeat and backbench Tory dissent on the matter puts the mayor of London �back in business� in the party�s leadership contest. Boris had a lonely start in this parliament, but is enjoying his autumn term far more. �Boris has never been so popular,� says one MP furious about the tax credit changes. �While Osborne is confirmed for the f***wit he really is. He needs to realise that he is not the Tory party.�
Osborne stuck to and defended his tax credit policy long enough for his foes to turn it into a serious question mark over his political judgment. As soon as the Tory leadership race finally begins, it can be brought up again and again. �He can�t escape in his submarine this time,� says one enemy. �The policy is his and it can�t be bounced off to others.�

The submarine chancellor was racing ahead in the contest. Now his pace has been checked. His critics say he went too early: the frontrunner never wins a political contest, and he�s realising the folly of appearing so successful so early.
But this reading of what the tax credit row has done to George Osborne ignores the reality of the Conservative party. It represents what those who already hate Osborne want to believe has happened to the chancellor, not what has actually happened. To understand, you need to tumble down the Westminster rabbit hole into a looking-glass world where conventional wisdom does not apply.
The first piece of conventional wisdom to discard is that Heidi Allen, whose forceful Commons speech about the danger of the cuts made waves far beyond Westminster, is a hero for being so honest. Many colleagues agree with her fears about tax credits but they are furious that she criticised the way parliament works just months after being elected a Tory MP. She excused taking so long to make her maiden speech by saying �sadly most days I feel that members on both sides of the House are firmly married to their positions regardless of the debate, and so, frankly, why prolong the agony?�
To the layman, this assessment may seem spot on. But it has infuriated the many Tory MPs who see the House of Commons as a precious institution. �She dissed it!� cried one parliamentarian. �She can diss policies all she likes, but she�s barely been here and then she turns up and she disses the Commons before voting with the government! I can�t forgive that.� Other MPs who, unlike Allen, occupy marginal seats, are furious that her speech prompted a wave of emails from constituents angry that they hadn�t taken a similar stand on the matter. They worry this careless talk could cost them their majorities. A group of her colleagues who met the day after her speech vowed not to speak to her. Many more are still fuming a week later.
Second, although the Lords rebellion may have flushed out a sour-looking chancellor to face the cameras on Monday night, it may have helped him in the long term. When he addresses the 1922 Committee of Tory MPs tonight, he will find a party that is boiling with rage about the behaviour of peers, rather than anxious about the tax credit cuts. Yet again, MPs believe that peers have dissed the Commons by challenging its will on a financial matter. For the Tory mafia, insulting the Commons is akin to insulting their mother.
All of this means that even Conservative MPs and ministers who cannot stand Osborne believe that the row over tax credit cuts will ultimately make no difference to his leadership bid. And his large fan club in the 2015 intake doesn�t seem to have lost heart. �Even if he disagrees with what we say, he takes the trouble to listen,� says a new MP.

These are the men and women who will, to a large extent, decide whether he succeeds David Cameron. And if the chancellor does manage to mitigate the cuts, and if Labour remains in turmoil in 2020, the electorate at large may conclude that a vote for an Osborne-led Conservative party is a vote for the devil you know. Team Osborne has a lot of hypotheticals to overcome before their man can move next door to No 10. But one thing is for sure: he cannot afford too many more weeks like this one.

It's all rather tasty.

# ? Oct 28, 2015 14:49

Judd Stackington: Oct 27, 2015

Alternately, which UK universities historically have reputations as hotbeds of radical right-on leftist thought? I only ever seem to hear about the universities being discussed at the moment and the kind of ineffectual sludge of most of the metropolitan institutions I've visited.

# ? Oct 28, 2015 14:51

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# ? May 14, 2024 17:17

distortion park: Apr 25, 2011

Judd Stackington posted:

Alternately, which UK universities historically have reputations as hotbeds of radical right-on leftist thought? I only ever seem to hear about the universities being discussed at the moment and the kind of ineffectual sludge of most of the metropolitan institutions I've visited.

Universities are generally full of immature students with excessive confidence in their own correctness.

So it's basically like this thread.

# ? Oct 28, 2015 14:56

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > UKMT Red October 2015: Basically D&D's Communist Motherbase

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