Bardeh posted:

I can still see the group in my Steam list and there are a ton of people in it, but nobody in chat and I don't think I've seen any notifications or activity from it in yonks. I made this, if anyone wants to join and play some games sometime.

https://steamcommunity.com/groups/UKMT

Gort posted:

How does that square with his previous comments to the tune of, "We'll give you extra negotiating time if there's a change in government"?

BBC News posted:

A boy who sent a birthday card to his dad "in heaven" received a touching letter from the Royal Mail to say it had been delivered safely.

Jase Hyndman, seven, from West Lothian, received the letter assuring him his message to his father James had made it through the "difficult" journey.

His mother Teri Copland said: "I actually cannot state how emotional he is knowing his dad got his card.

"Royal Mail you've just restored my faith in humanity."

In response to Jase's envelope requesting to be sent to "heaven", Royal Mail's Sean Milligan said: "I just wanted to take this opportunity to contact you about how we succeeded in the delivery of your letter, to your dad in heaven.

"This was a difficult challenge avoiding stars and other galactic objects on route to heaven," the note added.

It concluded: "I will continue to do all I can to ensure delivery to heaven safely."

Comrade Fakename posted:

My mum died so I probably won’t be receiving or giving presents with anyone and instead will be having Christmas alone. Good times!

mila kunis posted:

can someone explain how the guardian went from exposing the NSA to being a propaganda outlet for intelligence agencies?

https://www.moonofalabama.org/2018/11/this-intentional-guardian-fake-news-story-proves-that-the-media-cant-be-trusted.html

mila kunis posted:

can someone explain how the guardian went from exposing the NSA to being a propaganda outlet for intelligence agencies?

https://www.moonofalabama.org/2018/11/this-intentional-guardian-fake-news-story-proves-that-the-media-cant-be-trusted.html

Trin Tragula posted:

Maybe quit taking your news from a blog run by one weird dude who's still using an AOL email address and is very het up about people who say mean things about Vladimir Putin? Just a thought, la

Trin Tragula posted:

Maybe quit taking your news from a blog run by one weird dude who's still using an AOL email address and is very het up about people who say mean things about Vladimir Putin? Just a thought, la

mila kunis posted:

can someone explain how the guardian went from exposing the NSA to being a propaganda outlet for intelligence agencies?

Skilbs posted:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-tyne-46398021

If only the kids were on mopeds.

quote:

"You had a group of six to 10 boys wanting to show off in front of their friends, and that developed into kicks, karate kicks, punching and people jumping around sparring," he said.

kingturnip posted:

Let's have some nicer news, shall we?


It'll be awkward when the kid tries to arrange for his Dad to visit in a few years, mind you.

Jose posted:

Ian Austin has written an article in the guardian saying labour should vote for mays deal

"Tory-run Northamptonshire county council bailed out by government posted:

The government has in effect bailed out Tory-run Northamptonshire county council after giving it unprecedented permission to spend up to £60m of cash received from the sale of its HQ on funding day-to-day services.

The highly unusual move – accounting rules normally prevent councils using capital receipts in this way – means the crisis-hit authority is likely to escape falling into insolvency for the third time in less than a year.

Ministers gave the go-ahead for the bailout after commissioners sent in to run the council issued a stark warning that without a cash injection, Northamptonshire would be unable to meet its legal duties to run core services such as social care.

Opposition councillors called it a political move to save ministers from having to directly bail out the council. Labour group leader Mick Scrimshaw said: “It is clearly politics. The Conservative government did not want the political embarrassment and for that reason they have been allowed to use these capital receipts.”

Northamptonshire declared itself effectively bankrupt in February after it realised it could not balance its books. It declared insolvency again in July after a review revealed it had understated the extent of its financial problems. It must make good a £70m deficit by the end of March to avoid insolvency for a third time.

Although the council has already set in train a draconian cuts programme for the current financial year to try to overturn the £70m budget shortfall, the commissioners said this alone would not be enough to prevent insolvency.

In a report to the communities secretary, James Brokenshire, the commissioners Brian Roberts and Tony McArdle said the “extraordinary” scale of cuts to services needed in one year to fill the funding gap would breach councils’ legal obligations.

[...]

Rob Whiteman, the chief executive of the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy, said the move was effectively a bailout for Northamptonshire. Although it went against accepted accountancy rules and practice, it could be justified on the grounds that the council was being abolished.

Northamptonshire is to be replaced by two unitary authorities under plans approved by ministers earlier this year after the inspectors’ report concluded that the council’s management and financial problems were so deep-rooted it could not be easily turned around.

Enabling the council to convert some of the £60m it received from the fire sale of its new state-of-the-art HQ earlier this year – just months after it moved in – will allow it to clear an underlying £35m revenue deficit, and removes the need for ministers to pump money into the council directly.

V. Illych L. posted:

blah blah Tory Brexit is shite, if we cannot do better we oughtn't leave at all blah blah wash our hands blah blah disastrous negotiations regrettably we must choose the best of three bad choices blah blah

Pesky Splinter posted:

Comrade Fakename posted:

My mum died so I probably won’t be receiving or giving presents with anyone and instead will be having Christmas alone. Good times!

Tsietisin posted:

I understand how you feel as my mother, the last member of my family, is gravely ill and probably not going to last until Christmas. She has brain tumor and lung cancer.

I'm not sure how I'm managing to hold it together.

mila kunis posted:

can someone explain how the guardian went from exposing the NSA to being a propaganda outlet for intelligence agencies?

https://www.moonofalabama.org/2018/11/this-intentional-guardian-fake-news-story-proves-that-the-media-cant-be-trusted.html

OwlFancier posted:

Can you imagine the poor translator who has to try and make trump sound intelligible.

namesake posted:

I reckon Labour will take this line and fight with all the other parties to stop Brexit. The questions after that though are: will it make any difference and what the gently caress do Labour campaign on in the following general election?

jBrereton posted:

By calling a "free and fair vote" whose only aim is to return a different result, you are starting off from a reactionary premise while retaining the most trivial and least important aspect of democracy (the vote). It's peak neoliberalism.

Hugely in favour of this. Also a great money saver to help contribute to John McDonnell's Fully Costed Budget Programme.

Random Integer posted:

This a total tangent to nowhere but it wasnt until I started learning a new language as an adult, when I actually cared about it compared to learning french at school, that I realised how incredibly difficult and subjective translation is. So much of spoken language is based on idioms and commonly understand references that are impossible to directly translate and a bad translator can make a total hash of things without technically being wrong. That goes triple for diplomatic translators I imagine. What Im saying is Im fairly certain is that at some point a translator has probably either stopped or nearly started a war.

Captain Fargle posted:

The same things Labour has already been campaigning about?

Random Integer posted:

This a total tangent to nowhere but it wasnt until I started learning a new language as an adult, when I actually cared about it compared to learning french at school, that I realised how incredibly difficult and subjective translation is. So much of spoken language is based on idioms and commonly understand references that are impossible to directly translate and a bad translator can make a total hash of things without technically being wrong. That goes triple for diplomatic translators I imagine. What Im saying is Im fairly certain is that at some point a translator has probably either stopped or nearly started a war.

Brony Car posted:

Donald Tusk kind of screwed Corbyn, didn’t he? It definitely ramps up the “May Deal or no Brexit!” framing.

https://mobile.twitter.com/Channel4News/status/1068520777362825216

XMNN posted:

how is voting the least important part of a democracy? can you even have one without it (or some other method of determining consensus)? like the debate and the engagement with politics and all that poo poo is also important but in order for the demos to cratise themselves surely they have to be consulted at some point?

and yeah the aim of the people agitating for it currently is to reverse the decision but if e.g. parliament tries to break a deadlock by seeking the public's approval for the deal instead of just saying "gently caress it, we voted down the PMs deal so no deal it is" then would that be undemocratic? what do you actually do in that situation? crash out even though no one really wants to but at least it could be interpreted as the will of the people? just another general election? presumably we have to hope no one tries to turn it into any kind of referendum on anything

namesake posted:

I reckon Labour will take this line and fight with all the other parties to stop Brexit. The questions after that though are: will it make any difference and what the gently caress do Labour campaign on in the following general election?

Jose posted:

Ian Austin has written an article in the guardian saying labour should vote for mays deal

WhatEvil posted:

Well we live in a representative democracy so technically anything that parliament decides on unless it's in direct contradiction of a manifesto promise (which people have implicitly voted for) is democratic? Ultimately though it's all shite because the elected representatives should in theory be representing the "will of the people" (I hate that phrase now) but the will of the people is wrong often - e.g. if we had a referendum on capital punishment or nuclear power or any number of other things the public would probably vote for The Bad Thing™ and that's why we elect MPs because in theory we are trusting them to decide poo poo like this, even if it doesn't match necessary with the populist viewpoint.

That said, anything which the public disagrees with *AND* cares about enough will generally not get carried out by a representative democracy. Stuff like the death penalty, yeah if you asked the general public you might get back an answer that we should have it, BUT probably the majority of people will not express a preference strongly enough such that when the government bans it, they'll make much noise about it and that's kind of the key. So I guess we need to agitate against No Deal? I'd like to hope that if it looks like No Deal is a realistic prospect that poo poo will kick off in a huge way.

Gort posted:

How does that square with his previous comments to the tune of, "We'll give you extra negotiating time if there's a change in government"?

Junior G-man posted:

Nah. It's extremely typical EU behaviour. You will find that there's always a fudge to be made if people want it and you're important enough. The UK isn't Greece so you'll get one.

Gonzo McFee posted:

https://twitter.com/DailyMirror/status/1068573123367202816

Good news, finally. Shocked to hear that the racist bully has family that live abroad. Never could have seen it coming.