British Politics
Been on holiday for a few weeks, surprised to find no general discussion of British politics so though I'd kick one off.
Tory leadership contest is quickly turning into farce. Trump has backed Boris, which should be reason enough for anyone with half a brain to exclude him.
Of the other candidates Rory Stewart looks the best of the outsiders. Surprised to see Cleverly and Javid not further up the betting, but not sure the Tory membership are ready for a brown PM.
https://www.oddschecker.com/politics/bri...
Regarding the LD leadership contest, Jo Swinson is miles ahead of any other candidate (and indeed any of the Tory lot). Should be a shoe in.
Finally, it's Groundhog Day in Labour - the more serious the anti-Semitism claims get, the more Corbyn's cronies write their own obituary by blaming it on outlandish conspiracy theories - this week, it's apparently the Jewish Embassy's fault...
Obviously, but it's still cheap, easy to install on houses and more than takes care of our electricity needs for 6 months in the year.
Right, but there is finite capacity to produce panels, and the world gets more MWh per unit if the panels it can produce are placed in more advantageous locations. Also rooftop solar tends to be deployed at less than optimal angles due to the typical pitches of an average roof. They also aren’t connected to the grid but to the local network.
When, in your opinion, was Labour last centre left or further to the left? When was the last left wing Labour government.
We can exlcude the Corbyn anomaly as a record defeat showed how well that worked out.
Conveniently forgetting the 40% in the previous GE.
But results don't determine whether a party's on the right, centre, centre-left or left. Your terminology is screwed up.
We only have a few days a year when the Sun is near vertically overhead for a spell every day, which is when solar panels work best, only it's often cloudy and we have 'washout summers' like last year and many recent years. And we have a lot of days when the wind just doesn't blow much.
We once generated 69% of the grid's power by wind, for half an hour, one day last November. (Well, it would be November.) The thing is it comes and goes.
Right, but there is finite capacity to produce panels, and the world gets more MWh per unit if the panels it can produce are placed in more advantageous locations. Also rooftop solar tends to be deployed at less than optimal angles due to the typical pitches of an average roof. They also aren’t connected to the grid but to the local network.
Posts like this are why spending a bit of time on an internet forum are worthwhile 😀
The only aspect I'd push back on is there is a constant drive to demonstrate how we (i.e., the UK) can reduce our carbon footprint. I'm not saying this is correct, just how it is. Therefore, fitting as much solar as we can while we can is better than worrying about things like running out of materials.
How realistic is it to build huge solar farms on or near the equator? and then pump the energy to countries like Putin pumps gas?
Why dont we do more tidal?
Posts like this are why spending a bit of time on an internet forum are worthwhile 😀
The only aspect I'd push back on is there is a constant drive to demonstrate how we (i.e., the UK) can reduce our carbon footprint. I'm not saying this is correct, just how it is. Therefore, fitting as much solar as we can while we can is better than worrying about things like running out of materials.
How realistic is it to build huge solar farms on or near the equator? and then pump the energy to countries lik
It isn’t - transmission losses would be high and the cables are now a target for nefarious states. You would need countries with better access to solar to use that and the UK or whoever to use something else. But then when you have countries like Germany shutting down nuclear reactors we really are a bit ****ed.
Basically we can build up wind and solar a bit, but we're going to need more nuclear, and nobody's planning it. (Any more than they're planning how to bump up the grid to recharge all those EVs when they outlaw petrol and diesel.)
It isn’t - transmission losses would be high and the cables are now a target for nefarious states. You would need countries with better access to solar to use that and the UK or whoever to use something else. But then when you have countries like Germany shutting down nuclear reactors we really are a bit ****ed.
Figured as much, but thanks for confirming. Nuclear is and always has been the best and safest option, and it's another flaw in the human psyche that we think it isn't.
I think we've come around (rather late) to the idea that nuclear is actually quite good, but unfortunately it is a minimum of ten years to build one from putting your first spade in the ground.
When the Germans decided to shut down their nukes due to the issues Japan had, I remember the guy that ran our European office (who is German, about as knowledgeable as anyone on this topic and incredibly bright) saying "What the hell are they doing? They need baseload generation. This is madness." And lo, they were squeezed by the Russians.
I think we've come around (rather late) to the idea that nuclear is actually quite good, but unfortunately it is a minimum of ten years to build one from putting your first spade in the ground.
When the Germans decided to shut down their nukes due to the issues Japan had, I remember the guy that ran our European office (who is German, about as knowledgeable as anyone on this topic and incredibly bright) saying "What the hell are they doing? They need baseload generation. This is madness." And lo,
after making Germany (and thus Europe) fully dependant on beggar thy neighbor economic policy, and almost destroying the euro by horribly mismanaging the Greek debt crisis, Merkel goodbye gift was to make Europe fully dependant to Russian gas as well.
truly one of the bad guys of european history
More bad news on climate change in Sabine's latest video.
Models use a range of Climate Sensitivity between 2.3 and 4.5 that's produced the rate of heating predictions we're familiar with. Problem is, not all models agree with this range and there's recent evidence that CS could be significantly higher.
^ Nice
did a bit of fannying around to see whether there are any tipping points for conservative seats vs vote share. i assumed a uniform swing and a redistribution of votes along the lines of: https://i.imgur.com/XfjxYAL.jpeg
ignored scotland as too hard
starting at 25% and dropping one percentage point at a time, each drop equates to roughly 18 seats lost on average. std dev of 5.6 seats for the NERDS
however, there are jumbo drops from 20% -> 19%, and again from 19% -> 18%. at 20% the tories have 134 MPs, at 18% they have 84.
tories who die in the drop between 20% and 18% include gove, coffey, cash, kwasi, jenrick, dowden
cliffs, 18% vote share is the spot where real agony is inflicted on the tories
Senior MP all but confirms Labour has dropped £28bn green investment target
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/202...
Which leaves:
did a bit of fannying around to see whether there are any tipping points for conservative seats vs vote share. i assumed a uniform swing and a redistribution of votes along the lines of: https://i.imgur.com/XfjxYAL.jpeg
ignored scotland as too hard
starting at 25% and dropping one percentage point at a time, each drop equates to roughly 18 seats lost on average. std dev of 5.6 seats for the NERDS
however, there are jumbo drops from 20% -> 19%, and again from 19% -> 18%. at 20% the tories have 134 M
YouGov has the Tories on 23% to Labour's 44% just now, a +3 for the Tories and -3 for Labour since only a week before. We know that voter volatility is higher than in previous eras, and party loyalty is more of a dead letter, but it's quite surprising. Not sure what Labour did to achieve that, given the government's Titanic-post-iceberg status. Starmer announced an aggressive ban on 'conversion therapy', a thing that does not meaningfully exist -- the ban is intended to criminalise and jail parents who don't believe their child is the opposite sex, along with doctors who think the child might have a psychological problem that the claimed opposite-sex identity is masking, and it is a clearly insane and totalitarian measure -- but I'm not sure how many people have registered that particular bit of dangerous doctrinal lunacy. And both party leaders are supporting Israel, and I don't think Starmer has gone 'Yay small boats! Let the organised-crime people-smugglers reign!' lately, that being the most obvious hot-button issue, so I just don't know what that remarkable swing is about.
If labour dropping their green pledges (which were quite weak anyway but better than nothing), I have no reason to vote for anyone except green.
my view is that policies are a small-ish part of the decision. we're picking an executive team who will occasionally be tasked with reacting to unforeseen and unforeseeable events, and i dont think the current tory party, sunak aside, are good enough or serious enough to hold that responsibility.
their pathetic in-house rivalries and never ending power struggles and all the rest of it make them unfit to deal with a surprise volcano in hertfordshire or whatever. i urge you to reconsider. they need a kicking.
The difference in decision making/execution during crises is minute. Only exception is foreign adventures where it could be huge but wouldn't be with starmer. What makes the huge difference is the state we are in when the crises hit. The state of our health system, science, housing stock, social care, emergency plans etc etc.
Outsde crises, execution matters hugely but it's execution of polices. Without good policies it's just about how slickly they piss in the wind.
Starmer is a spineless diasaster. Just when something was really possible.
It's funny from outside to read that the Labour aren't green enough, when from where i sit the problem in the UK is that the right is way too green
Yep close clustered in the technocratic center left though.
Tories betrayed any fiber of conservatism. There is not even any attempt anymore to claim the very normal right-wing position that the government can never be the solution of almost anything rather it's often the main cause if any societal problem.
That collectivism is always inherently the absolute evil and any problem that can supposedly only be fixed with collectivism is best left untouched because it doesn't matter how big the problem is collectivism is always worse than the worst possible problem.
That the whole green transition governed by law, the whole concept of net 0 being a necessary target, goes against every atom of anyone who ever was right-wing and we should oppose all green socialism with every fiber of our being as the worst possible choice for "climate change".
It's incredible to see the party of Thatcher end up as just another variant of ****ing technocratic collectivism
