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...
A (potentially) interesting sidethought about this.
I was quite surprised by the length of the sentence, so I went on a
explaining it and they offered three examples of what she said:
The 41-year-old childminder called for "mass deportation now" and added: "If that makes me racist, so be it."
The court heard Connolly, who had no previous convictions, also sent another tweet commenting on a sword attack, which read: "I bet my house it was one of these boat invaders."
Another X post sent by Connolly - commenting on a video posted by the far right activist Tommy Robinson - read "Somalian I guess" and was accompanied by a vomiting emoji.
Pretty horrible stuff, but 2.5 years seems quite a lot. No wonder all of the "free speech brigade" are up in arms.
Then, I went to a red top and found the same thing as Jalfrezi:
Clear incitement to violence to a huge audience at a time when, demonstrably, people were acting on it.
I understand why platforms like the BBC and the broadsheets don't want to repeat these narratives verbatim, but given contemporary conversations about free speech, it could end up being really misleading.
The BBC is not the BBC of old. It's no longer interested in freedom of speech or in balanced reporting. It's lead "journalists" (Mason, Kuenssberg etc) are little more than shills for the far right. It would be best if it was disbanded because reform looks too large a task now.
Pretty horrible stuff, but 2.5 years seems quite a lot. No wonder all of the "free speech brigade" are up in arms.
Then, I went to a red top and found the same thing as Jalfrezi:
Clear incitement to violence to a huge audience at a time when, demonstrably, people were acting on it.
I understand why platforms like the BBC and the broadsheets don't want to repeat these narratives verbatim, but given contemporary conversations about free speech, it could end up being really misleading.
Direct incitement of such a homicidal kind, at a dangerous time, is unlikely to be protected speech. The BBC will be aware of the possibility of an appeal against the sentence, but they have paraphrased the crazy tweet in news bulletins today. (Quoting it would breach broadcasting guidelines.)
The CPS isn't in charge of sentencing, the judge is. The available range is laid down and the judge has to explain why he or she has gone high or low.
Well I assume the CPS put together a very solid set of proofs to make the judge get to that decision. Usually they **** it up in cases like this.
NO CHEATING
Who is Kay Burley of Sky News describing here?
Analysis: Striding determinedly towards me, hand outstretched to offer a firm, eye-contact handshake, [redacted] cuts a powerful image as he arrives for our interview.
I first met him as a friendly, fresh-faced MP when he was put forward by the government in the [redacted] election campaign to hold the party line on myriad topics. He was calm, friendly and self-assured.
[redacted] is unquestionably a safe pair of hands in the unpredictable world of politics.
Is it recent or historic?
This century. Burely isn't so old she met Churchill as a new MP lol.
Matt Goodwin caught lying again
Well I assume the CPS put together a very solid set of proofs to make the judge get to that decision. Usually they **** it up in cases like this.
She pleaded guilty, and got a discount for that, and for previous good character. The sentence was in the middle of the range for the offence. She had unfortunately joked on WhatsApp that she would 'play the mental health card' if arrested, and her counsel did indeed do that, but for obvious reasons the judge wasn't terribly impressed. The context was extremely serious violent public disorder caused by ill-informed and prejudiced social-media posts. She's been 'made an example of,' which is hard for her, but she'll only serve 40% of the time, with allowance for time already served on remand, so she'll be out in under a year from now. Some people think it should have been a suspended sentence, but that's perhaps because they've already forgotten how menacing the disorder was at the time.
If we didn't put so many in prison and believe in punishment as somehow being a good thing then I wouldn'tr support jail (or at most a very short stay).
As it is, she doesn't deserve special treatment and it was serious. A year seems fair enough given the stupid system we have.
Yeah, people riot because of what the wife of a Tory politician says on the internet.
Putting someone in prison for a social media post is ridiculous.
Unless the post contains images of children getting raped or something. But Huw Edwards gets a suspended sentence.
Yeah, people riot because of what the wife of a Tory politician says on the internet.
Putting someone in prison for a social media post is ridiculous.
These are the times we live in. Social media as an instrument of social unrest is something we have to get used to.
The judge took the view that as her post had 300k views she was broadcasting to a wide audience. So as an analogy if you had a mic for your speaking gig and had audiences totalling that number where you were telling people to set fire to busy hotels, yes you should expect to be imprisoned.
Hopefully it'll wipe that smirk from her face but I expect it'll return when she learns the full value of far right grifting.
You're saying it's likely that more unrest and disorder took place because of her post, than would otherwise have occurred?
I don't think it's right to say that all the social media posts had a zero combined effect.
There is a difference between ignorance and incitement, and we are all ignorant in some way. To give her 31 months for that first offence is to pretend otherwise.
When I was a little girl in my village in Nigeria going to school was something I could not even dream of because we did not have money. Then my mother sold everything we owned to pay for me to go to school.
I knew this was my only ticket to make something worthwhile out of my life and my family’s life.
My father had abandoned my mother because she gave birth to girls not boys and he said “girls were worth nothing”. That put a lot of pressure on my little self but made me determined to strive. I felt I had something to prove to my father and that education was the way I could do that.
Eventually I was able to study nursing at university and became the best student in some of my exams, graduating with a degree in nursing science.
I worked in two different hospitals in Nigeria and passed the exams I needed to do to work in the UK, including the CBT – computer-based test – which I did at Yunnik. I studied hard for this test.
No concerns were raised about my performance in the CBT by the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) while I was in Nigeria and I travelled to the UK after undergoing a series of interviews, criminal checks, health checks, work and school tests.
I sat and passed the OSCE – objective structured clinical examination – after arriving in the UK. This is another requirement needed to practise as a nurse here. In the autumn of last year, NMC contacted me raising concerns about fraud at Yunnik test centre, which they said they were going to investigate. I was accused of using a proxy to sit the test there because of the quick time I completed the test in. I deny this. I believe that what is happening to us is a witch-hunt.
I sat the test again in the UK and passed it in a similar time but NMC said they are questioning my integrity even though I completed the test in similar times in Nigeria and UK. Nobody from NMC has ever worked with me and I have provided good character references from my line manager and university lecturers in Nigeria.
I have always been a studious person and am very self-motivated. But now I have lost my name, my integrity, my dreams and I feel like I have failed everyone who believed in me and the little girls back in my village who believed in themselves and their dreams because of me.
I don’t sleep at night. My pillows are always wet with crying. This feels like the end of my world because I have had to give up on all my dreams I worked so hard to achieve to get a better life for myself and my family. I am now a miserable person with a broken spirit and I am about to have the word “criminal” added to my name. My dream of being an international nurse able to work anywhere in the world has been shattered.
*****
Well, I'm convinced.
Because you erroneously believe immigrants to be more criminal than the host population.
