UK Conservative Party Leadership Election

[ChopleyIOM]

That was a decent enough speech by Sunak, and he was clearly the choice the party should have gone with first time around. If the Tories had skipped the two months of the Truss disaster and gone straight for Sunak, they'd be in a much better place right now.

Labour might have a fight on its hands at least (which is a good thing, there should always be more than one team on the pitch), but whichever way you slice it there's a massive hole in the budget thanks to the Truss/Kwarteng self-immolation, and if he goes down the austerity route (which all signs point to), that becomes a very hard sell after twelve years of Tory rule, they can't blame Labour, and it'll be a bit much coming from a bloke worth nearly a billion quid.

Also no acknowledgement of the elephant in the room (remaining outside the Single Market and Customs Union).

For my money he's the best the Tories have at the moment, so they (eventually) got to the correct leader.

 

[goatwack]

One of the most challenging times is indeed upon us, but a large part of our restoring trust and partnerships will be that of our special relationship with the U.S.

Clearly, Sunak's appointment has been impactful, and it will be interesting to see Biden's rapport with 'Rashee Sanook'

 

[ChopleyIOM]

Well that's JRM off to the back benches at least, which is a win.

I hear rumours that Cruella is due to make a return though, which is not a win.

 

[TheAddict]

One of the most challenging times is indeed upon us, but a large part of our restoring trust and partnerships will be that of our special relationship with the U.S.

Clearly, Sunak's appointment has been impactful, and it will be interesting to see Biden's rapport with 'Rashee Sanook'

 

[slot_zombie]

Suella is back, and can't wait to get stuck in to the dinghy merchants. Good choice!

 

[megadam]

That was a decent enough speech by Sunak, and he was clearly the choice the party should have gone with first time around. If the Tories had skipped the two months of the Truss disaster and gone straight for Sunak, they'd be in a much better place right now.

Labour might have a fight on its hands at least (which is a good thing, there should always be more than one team on the pitch), but whichever way you slice it there's a massive hole in the budget thanks to the Truss/Kwarteng self-immolation, and if he goes down the austerity route (which all signs point to), that becomes a very hard sell after twelve years of Tory rule, they can't blame Labour, and it'll be a bit much coming from a bloke worth nearly a billion quid.

Also no acknowledgement of the elephant in the room (remaining outside the Single Market and Customs Union).

For my money he's the best the Tories have at the moment, so they (eventually) got to the correct leader.

Counted for complete fuck all when he talks about Integrity and then hires her inner Third Reichness despite her breaching the rules.

 

[goatwack]

Gove back in for his third stint as Levelling Up Minister. The man's like mildew!

 

[ChopleyIOM]

Counted for complete fuck all when he talks about Integrity and then hires her inner Third Reichness despite her breaching the rules.

Indeed, seeing Braverman back, a week after resigning for breaking the ministerial code, and also as someone who is pretty close to a manifestation of pure evil, as Home Secretary, doesn't fill me with hope.

This is a woman who said she 'dreamed' of newspaper front pages reporting on refugees being flown to Rwanda, literally saying her dream is someone else's nightmare.

I mean, Christ, if you support the policy then at least say something like, 'It's not pleasant but it's a difficult problem and hopefully by taking this tough action now we'll deter the traffickers and those who fall victim to them', but to say it's your 'dream and obsession' is, frankly, pretty fucking disturbing.

 

[dunover]

Indeed, seeing Braverman back, a week after resigning for breaking the ministerial code, and also as someone who is pretty close to a manifestation of pure evil, as Home Secretary, doesn't fill me with hope.

This is a woman who said she 'dreamed' of newspaper front pages reporting on refugees being flown to Rwanda, literally saying her dream is someone else's nightmare.

I mean, Christ, if you support the policy then at least say something like, 'It's not pleasant but it's a difficult problem and hopefully by taking this tough action now we'll deter the traffickers and those who fall victim to them', but to say it's your 'dream and obsession' is, frankly, pretty fucking disturbing.

I love having immigrants run the immigration system as their weird mindset is invariably to pull the ladder up behind themselves.

 

[goatwack]

It's pretty obvious she was drawing up a mock scenario of newspaper headlines, even citing a particular one, of having done her job brilliantly, with those not meant to be here being flown away?

It's amazing how context is skewed when loathing a particular politician, when any other time it'd be taken with a large grain of salt (Tory-hate and nuance don't really go hand-in-hand!)

If one were to take Labour for example, Knight of the Bath Keir's idea of subtle and respectful wit is sneering disdain and open hostility, with his congratulatory remarks about Sunak!

And lest we forget 26 year-old Labour MP Nadia Whittome's stating Sunak's appointment not being "A win for the Asian community".....

So whilst the UK and the world acknowledge a historic milestone that should at least garner some positive recognition, Labour lambast the ethnicities they claim to represent. Seems to me the only disturbing and racist utterings always end up coming from the idealists. Food for thought, at least?

 

[ChopleyIOM]

Zahawi looks absolutely delighted with his demotion.

Overall it's not a great cabinet, same old bloody faces again, almost all of whom were deeply uninspiring first/second/third/fiftieth time around, and Braverman is a stunningly awful appointment.

Part of the problem of the Johnson years was he surrounded himself with sycophants, actually being good at the job came long down the list of requirements - hence the dearth of talent now.

 

[ChopleyIOM]

It's pretty obvious she was drawing up a mock scenario of newspaper headlines, even citing a particular one, of having done her job brilliantly, with those not meant to be here being flown away?

It's amazing how context is skewed when loathing a particular politician, when any other time it'd be taken with a large grain of salt (Tory-hate and nuance don't really go hand-in-hand!)

If one were to take Labour for example, Knight of the Bath Keir's idea of subtle and respectful wit is sneering disdain and open hostility, with his congratulatory remarks about Sunak!

And lest we forget 26 year-old Labour MP Nadia Whittome's stating Sunak's appointment not being "A win for the Asian community".....

So whilst the UK and the world acknowledge a historic milestone that should at least garner some positive recognition, Labour lambast the ethnicities they claim to represent. Seems to me the only disturbing and racist utterings always end up coming from the idealists. Food for thought, at least?

Ooohhh yes check out that 'Tory-hate'

Braverman has come out with horrible shite like that time and time again, it's clearly what she thinks.

 

[Mr_Slot5]

It's pretty obvious she was drawing up a mock scenario of newspaper headlines, even citing a particular one, of having done her job brilliantly, with those not meant to be here being flown away?

It's amazing how context is skewed when loathing a particular politician, when any other time it'd be taken with a large grain of salt (Tory-hate and nuance don't really go hand-in-hand!)

If one were to take Labour for example, Knight of the Bath Keir's idea of subtle and respectful wit is sneering disdain and open hostility, with his congratulatory remarks about Sunak!

And lest we forget 26 year-old Labour MP Nadia Whittome's stating Sunak's appointment not being "A win for the Asian community".....

So whilst the UK and the world acknowledge a historic milestone that should at least garner some positive recognition, Labour lambast the ethnicities they claim to represent. Seems to me the only disturbing and racist utterings always end up coming from the idealists. Food for thought, at least?

Good points.

But I doubt you’ll make much headway with someone who has Sir Keir Starmer as their profile picture

 

[goatwack]

I dream of a day where it'll be in the newspapers. Say, a Daily Mail headline of how Chopley's become a fully-fledged Conservative and has Margaret Thatcher as his profile pic

 

[ChopleyIOM]

Good points.

But I doubt you’ll make much headway with someone who has Sir Keir Starmer as their profile picture

I've had Corbyn, Kinnock, Tony Benn and Clement Attlee amongst others. And also the Kobold Geomancer from Hearthstone.

Starmer is just the current resident of the profile pic slot but I thought it was important he should last longer than a Tory Prime Minister, so about 53 minutes at the last count.

 

[goatwack]

Geomancer at 4-1 to become next PM by December

 

[mack341]

I think many in the Labour party and left circles, if they get into power, will argue the calais asylum seekers should be brought here safely on train via the euro tunnel.

However I agree with Chop on Boris' tendency towards promoting sycophants and suck-up merchants, then they become the publicly known 'faces' and forever in the revolving door of getting the top jobs.

Edit: Chop dare I say you also respect Ken Clarke because he's an EU fanatic?

 

[ChopleyIOM]

Geomancer at 4-1 to become next PM by December

With that Spell Damage +2 he'd bring more to the table than a lot of the actual possible candidates.

 

[Kroffe]

I've had Corbyn, Kinnock, Tony Benn and Clement Attlee amongst others. And also the Kobold Geomancer from Hearthstone.

Starmer is just the current resident of the profile pic slot but I thought it was important he should last longer than a Tory Prime Minister, so about 53 minutes at the last count.

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You still play Heartstone?
I was really into it at first but now its been quite a while (probably 2 years) since i last played it.

I didnt feel like spending a ton of money on it, and keeping up with new pack releases and new sets with the gold you got from just playing the daily quests and grinding duels was starting to take waaaay too much time.
And at least back then if you didnt keep up with the new stuff that was released you just didnt stand any chance, not always but most of the time the new cards released felt owerpowered (probably not by accident).

 

[Kroffe]

People were Ready4Rishi, but were they ready for Rashi Sanook?

 

[ChopleyIOM]

You still play Heartstone?
I was really into it at first but now its been quite a while (probably 2 years) since i last played it.

I didnt feel like spending a ton of money on it, and keeping up with new pack releases and new sets with the gold you got from just playing the daily quests and grinding duels was starting to take waaaay too much time.
And at least back then if you didnt keep up with the new stuff that was released you just didnt stand any chance, not always but most of the time the new cards released felt owerpowered (probably not by accident).

I played it for years but dropped it nearly two years ago (so about the same time as you!). I wasn't F2P and had spent about £500 on the game in total, but I'd been playing it since beta in 2014 and had thousands of hours out of it so didn't feel short changed.

I finally gave up when they brought in the new 'rewards track' system which on paper gave as much gold and stuff as the old quest system, but demanded far more time from the player, and I was also fed up with them cranking out new cards on a far more regular basis and making so many of them 'must haves' for competitive decks. I much preferred the old cadence of 'cards expansion - story expansion - cards expansion - story expansion'.

As someone who'd been playing the game for years, spent hundreds of pounds and never missed a daily quest (I would generally go into a new expansion being able to buy 100+ packs with gold I'd saved up), I'd really started to resent the fact I couldn't just craft any cards I wanted to try a fun new deck, because it might turn out to be shit in the meta and then I'd wasted all the dust to get the cards. Plus Blizzard were absolute fuckers for padding out the legendary and epic card pools with horseshit cards that were no use at all.

Then you had decks that were just awful to play against, like fucking Resurrect Priest (god I hated that), all the RNG that they'd added into the game, the lack of them giving a fuck about Wild mode in terms of card balance, it just seemed to be a long way away from the board-based unit tussles that I loved so much about the game early on.

One day I just thought, 'Nah, I've had enough of this now', walked away and never played it again.

 

[ChopleyIOM]

A rather downbeat assessment of where the UK is at the moment, and the challenges it faces. Also acknowledges that the political philosophies of both the left and the right have big gaps in them in terms of fixing it (a viewpoint I agree with).

As Sunak lays out his policies over the coming weeks, we will start to see if he's got any of the answers. I suspect, unfortunately, that he won't.

It's a good read, if rather sobering,

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[Webzcas]

Indeed, seeing Braverman back, a week after resigning for breaking the ministerial code, and also as someone who is pretty close to a manifestation of pure evil, as Home Secretary, doesn't fill me with hope.

This is a woman who said she 'dreamed' of newspaper front pages reporting on refugees being flown to Rwanda, literally saying her dream is someone else's nightmare.

I mean, Christ, if you support the policy then at least say something like, 'It's not pleasant but it's a difficult problem and hopefully by taking this tough action now we'll deter the traffickers and those who fall victim to them', but to say it's your 'dream and obsession' is, frankly, pretty fucking disturbing.

I'd stay hidden here in the Attic, Chopley. You are the type of person she eats for breakfast! We will keep you hidden

 

[ChopleyIOM]

I'd stay hidden here in the Attic, Chopley. You are the type of person she eats for breakfast! We will keep you hidden

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Well so far they've managed to transport a grand total of.... checks notes.... zero refugees to Rwanda over six months after announcing the policy so I'll take my chances as a lefty wokerati for now I guess it helps that we've got stuff like, y'know, the actual law on our side. Not that we could possibly expect a former Attorney General and current Home Secretary to be familiar with such things, I suppose.

 

[ChopleyIOM]

As previously detailed I'm not a big fan of PMQs but that was a solid performance from Starmer and poor from Sunak, I don't know how much mileage the Tories really think there is in 'BUT CORBYN' and 'soft on law and order' these days, especially since Starmer was the actual Director Of Public Prosecutions and removed the whip from Corbyn.

Sunak came across as Johnson's nerdy young brother and he just doesn't have Johnson's ability as a speaker, plus he dodged all the questions although I admit that's par for the course in what is essentially a dose of performative art.

The other problem the Tories have as a whole, and especially Sunak as their leader, is every time they complain about the mess the country is in and how it's their job to fix it, everyone just immediately thinks you've been in charge for twelve years, so whose fault is that?

And remember, the next dose of cuts and austerity (and possible tax rises) hasn't even started yet.