But we can apparently, The economy can. Children can. Jobs can. Lives can. Mental health can. Cancer and heart patients etc. can. Civil liberties can. All will be victims as the country faces a further 6 months of socially and economically catastrophic restrictions and Christmas is cancelled – but climate action must go right ahead, according to Chairman Johnson. Are we seeing this now? #ZeroCovid (a madcap, fanatical, destructive policy which the government has now formally adopted, dispelling any notion whatsoever that lockdowns are to ‘save the NHS’ or ‘flatten the curve’) is entry-level #Netzero. #NetZero is lockdown forever.
Lest I’m accused of being a ‘Covid denier’ or conspiracy theorist, let me make it clear: SARS-CoV-2 is a real virus and Covid-19 has killed many thousands of people but, it is nowhere near as serious a threat to public health as the government has made it out to be in the last 6 months, thus justifying unprecedented and extremely damaging measures to supposedly control its spread and ‘save lives’. Don’t believe me? That’s your choice, but it is irrefutable that Whitty and Vallance lied to the public when explaining the so called threat still posed by this disease. One of many, many lies, ommissions and distortions by government and government scientific advisers over the last 6 months, I might add.
I seriously recommend you read the entire thread. It is damning. Anyone who believes in evidence-based science should be horrified by the current turn of events. But we all know of course that the stock-in-trade of climate change ‘science’ is not so much evidence-based science but science-based construction of evidence to fit a prevailing consensus narrative. So the Two Ronnies of Covid Armageddon are not so very different from the Manns and the Hayhoes of Climate Armageddon. All willing to lie in order to promote a doom-laden narrative poorly evidenced in actual science and empirical data.
The tactics employed by the critics of those scientists and sceptics who oppose the official narrative are very similar also. Professor Francois Balloux signed a letter penned by Sunetra Gupta, Carl Heneghan and Karol Sikora, urging the government to reconsider its Covid strategy. He was then promptly accused of being duped into signing what amounts to a supposed ‘right wing conspiracy’ which is lobbying for a supposedly “fringe pseudoscience” ‘herd immunity’ strategy. Heneghan, Gupta and Sikora are artificially classed as a “fringe group of scientists” allied to right wing lobbyists who are in opposition to consensus scientific opinion. Nothing could be further from the truth but the tactic will be nauseatingly familiar to followers of the debate on man-made climate change.
But to return to the subject of lockdowns and how they might be opportunistically being used to prepare the ground for more stringent climate action, there is a wealth of evidence to support that view now, with much talk of a ‘green recovery’, ‘great reset’ etc. plus real action on the ground with government proposing to bring forward the ban on petrol and diesel cars to 2030 and councils busily prioritising cycling at the expense of road traffic, following government ‘social distancing’ and ‘Covid-friendly’ Road Traffic Act amendments.
In point of fact, some people are positively salivating at the prospect of extending the concept of Covid lockdowns to ‘climate lockdowns’:
LONDON (Project Syndicate)—As COVID-19 spread earlier this year, governments introduced lockdowns in order to prevent a public-health emergency from spinning out of control. In the near future, the world may need to resort to lockdowns again—this time to tackle a climate emergency.
Shifting Arctic ice, raging wildfires in western U.S. states and elsewhere, and methane leaks in the North Sea are all warning signs that we are approaching a tipping point on climate change, when protecting the future of civilization will require dramatic interventions.
Now Boris the Red has come right out and said that climate action is basically at the top of the government’s agenda, following its deliberate destruction of the economy and the trashing of civil liberties. Getting ‘back to normal’ is definitely not on the agenda.
The prime minister will tell a meeting hosted by UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres that climate action “cannot be another victim of coronavirus”.
He will urge leaders to “look ahead to how we will rebuild” after the pandemic and how to “build back better”.
Mr Johnson is expected to speak to leaders via video link.
His speech at Thursday’s UN Climate Action Roundtable is part of the preparations for a global climate conference the UK is hosting in partnership with Italy in Glasgow in November next year.
“Look ahead to how we will rebuild, and how we can seize the opportunity to build back better,” the prime minister will say.
“Let us be the leaders who secure the very health of the planet for our children, grandchildren and generations to come.”
He says he hopes the UK will serve as “a launch pad for a global green industrial revolution.”
He’s what Delingpole calls a melon: Green on the outside and Red on the inside. He’s definitely not true blue Conservative. I warned of this back in early February, even before he decided to nuke the economy to ‘Save the NHS’. I also pointed out that May – the architect of the regressive, socialist inspired net zero 2050 legislation – wasn’t either.
There’s no hope for the Tories. They have gone mad or they have collectively sold their souls to the Green Globalist Devil and no longer even pretend to govern in the national interest. They need to be consigned to history – fast.
But nobody listened. They voted Tory in their droves six months later and here we are today, with a Communist PM presiding over a broken country telling us that he’s now making climate change the top priority for any ‘recovery’ from the damage his government has inflicted.
climatecontrarian 
There is no hope other than that this government falls or it loses in court over its illegal lockdowns. They intend to crush the UK, its people and its economy beneath the heal of authoritarianism to achieve the ‘eradication’ of a virus which is no danger to 99.9% of the population. They mean us great harm and not enough people realise it or oppose it. Not enough people are willing to stand up against them.
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/joint-statement-on-covid-19/joint-statement-on-coronavirus-covid-19
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18 year old students imprisoned at University, told they can’t visit home, or the pub, or go home for Christmas. An app to track your every movement. Barcodes at entrance to pubs. Asda ‘marshalls’ barking at customers to ‘wear a mask’. What have we become? This is not Britain, it is dictatorial Communist China, distilled, condensed, purified to full strength in blue pill form for the lazy Western masses to swallow each ever darker morning. By winter’s end, there will be nothing left.
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As so often, I agree with the thrust of your argument, but would row back from some of the more forcible language. So far as mask-wearing in shops is concerned, I have seen several people either not wearing masks at all, or wearing them so as to cover only their mouths but not their noses, and nobody has even batted an eyelid, never mind barked at them to wear a mask. Indeed, just the other day I went into a supermarket unmasked (purely out of absent-mindedness, not out of any desire to flout the rules) and the supermarket doorkeeper simply waved me in. Nobody said anything to me, nobody swerved out of my way. It was only when I was half-way round the store that I realised what I’d done, and put my face covering on.
There is little doubt, I think, that cases are rising, hospitalisations are rising, and deaths are rising. That is a cause for concern, but whether it justifies the latest measures depends on a far more detailed analysis of the statistical evidence than is being made available to the public. For instance, it would be useful (if ghoulish) to have detailed information regarding the people whose deaths are being recorded. What age are they, did they have serious underlying health conditions, what did they actually die of? (even after the correction to the statistics following Carl Heneghan’s analysis and expose – sorry, don’t know how to add an acute accent to the final “e” – many people who have died having tested positive in the last 28 days could still have died of something else. Of those testing positive (and leaving aside the issue of false positives) how many even fall ill, for instance, and of those who fall ill, how many display only mild symptoms? Information such as that (and much, much more) seems to me to be vital when deciding how to respond to the rising numbers. Yet none of these things even seem to be discussed.
Then of course there is the question of the collateral damage caused by the Government’s measures. This isn’t simply a good -v- evil or money -v- lives equation. Lives are being wrecked, lives are being lost to other causes, because of the Government measures. The damage caused to the economy will no doubt cost lives in the future too. What if the vast majority of those who die of Covid-19 this year would have died this year anyway, just a few weeks or months later? What, then, if the excess deaths by the end of the year represent a very small number, or if the excess deaths are mostly non-Covid deaths, caused by the lockdowns and related measures? So, it’s the lack of intelligent assessment of all the factors that bothers me.
And, of course, it’s that same failure intelligently to assess the factors and carry out a real-world cost-benefit analysis that lies behind the Government’s “green” agenda. They simply genuinely don’t seem to understand that we could close down and wreck our economy for years, reduce our GHG emissions to net zero (not that we can, of course) and it would make no difference to the climate at all, given the behaviour of the rest of the world, most of which is happily and massively increasing its GHG emissions. China is a case in point. Paul Homewood’s take on Xi’s latest announcement absolutely mirrors my view that Xi said what he did so as to influence the US election, and in the full knowledge that the useful idiots at the BBC, Guardian, EU, UK Parliament, UK CCC etc etc will seize on his meaningless words to praise him to the skies and to say that the climate push must go on now that China is on board (which, of course, it isn’t).
Robin Guenier’s comment is worth reading. As usual, he hits the nail on the head – articulating the inconvenient truth that the climate concerned don’t want to understand.
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Roger Pielke Jr. on ‘climate lockdowns’:
Mark, I was not suggesting that this happened to everybody without a mask in Asda, but please note:
“But as soon as we went through the doors a member of staff shouted over: ‘Why aren’t you wearing a mask?’
“I was so surprised I thought they were talking to someone else.
“Once I realised it was us I said we had a hidden disability card but they said that wasn’t accepted and I needed a letter from the GP.
“And all this was shouted over us, not discussed with a bit of basic courtesy”.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-nottinghamshire-54283453
Please also note:
“Asda to crack down on shoppers without face masks.”
https://www.bbc.com/news/business-54261861
You say:
“There is little doubt, I think, that cases are rising, hospitalisations are rising, and deaths are rising”.
I again refer you to the graphs of cases per 100,000, hospitalisations and deaths. They show no cause for alarm at present. Government measures are not evidence-based and there have now been several mission creeps regarding their imposition, the latest of which is complete suppression of the virus – which is nuts.
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Jaime, we are largely on the same page here. Please note I agree that rising cases, hospitalisations and deaths are not a cause for alarm. My comment – which I stand by – is that they are a cause for concern, which is rather different.
I have something of a love-hate relationship with the Lockdown Sceptics website, which occasionally I find ridiculously right-wing and borderline crackers. On other occasions (such as today) I find I agree with pretty much everything it says. Worth a look, IMO, at today’s update there, if you haven’t already done so.
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Thanks Mark, I will take a look.
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“…They voted Tory in their droves six months later and here we are today, with a Communist PM presiding over a broken country telling us that he’s now making climate change the top priority for any ‘recovery’…”
On climate, every other party were and are even more gung-ho for anti-emission policy. The exception of the Brexit party, were and are essentially a single issue party with very little else being formally pursued including climate policy. They also had no chance of winning anyway, and if they’d attempted to do so this would have split the Brexit vote, resulting in what they least wanted, i.e. no Brexit, which is also something you wanted. While covid occurred way after the election anyhow, there is no evidence that any other party would have had lesser lockdowns, and indeed there have been occasional calls from them that the government isn’t doing enough. Your above implies that *not* voting conservative would have fixed a multiplicity of the things you object to, especially climate policy. But who on Earth would you recommend, in hindsight, that people should have voted for? How could any other option possibly have led to less climate policy, still a Brexit, and also less heavy covid restrictions? Or indeed any two of these, or likely even any one?
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Andy, I’ve consistently pointed out that every single one of the MPs in Parliament voted for May’s #netzero SI amendment to the Climate Change Act, so obviously I would not expect any other government to have acted differently on climate change. But the point I was trying to make is that one might have harboured a reasonable expectation that Johnson would not have embraced such madness so wholeheartedly on the assumption that he was a traditional Conservative. Alas, he has turned out much worse than even I expected; he is neither ‘traditional’ nor Conservative. To all intents and purposes, the government he now leads is indistinguishable from what we might have expected in our worse nightmares from a Corbyn-led extreme left wing Labour government – rampant socialism, economically illiterate and extremely destructive policies, globalism, and now extreme authoritarianism. People voted for Johnson because they expected a true blue Conservative government. I argue that they should not have been lulled into that expectation. I ask myself: what would have happened if all those millions who voted Conservative had simply spoilt their ballot papers by putting ‘none of the above’? It’s what I did. I doubt the outcome could have been any worse than what we have now. The final straw and the ultimate confirmation that voting Tory was a complete waste of time will be if he fails to deliver a meaningful Brexit and the signs look rather ominous on that.
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“…obviously I would not expect any other government to have acted differently on climate change. But the point I was trying to make is that one might have harboured a reasonable expectation that Johnson would not have embraced such madness so wholeheartedly on the assumption that he was a traditional Conservative”
Why do you have an expectation of a link between traditional conservatism and anti-climate change? Climate culture is neither left nor right originally, and can link up with either side or both as an ally. In the US, clearly it linked very strongly with the left, so earning the enmity of the right. In Germany, the main thrust for climate policy was from *right* of centre, and indeed Merkel was known as ‘the climate chancellor’. In the UK, it is not particularly right or left, having only a slight lean left, but essentially has allied with *all* the mainstream parties. Being a ‘new’ culture (just decades old) and not originating anyhow from the old left-right spectrum, it can land anywhere in terms of local alliances, and in practice it has.
“I ask myself: what would have happened if all those millions who voted Conservative had simply spoilt their ballot papers by putting ‘none of the above’? It’s what I did. I doubt the outcome could have been any worse than what we have now.”
Whether it would be worse or not depends on what you want. But considering your oft-stated wants, it couldn’t possibly be better, and would very likely be worse. a) there would *for definite* be no Brexit, and likely we’d already be back within the EU. b) at best lock-downs would be the same, possibly somewhat worse. c) climate policy would be worse, albeit only somewhat worse, as per above climate culture leans only slightly left in the UK. But somewhat worse, is still worse.
If you really want to create an influence regarding particular policies, you have to start with those mainstream people who are most aligned to what you yourself want, and win them around. In the UK, that would be the conservatives for you. Implying that they should all have ditched their party is not a way to get them onside. Especially when that couldn’t possibly have produced a better result. Pointing out the flaws in existing policy is fine, indeed essential; but then advising the best way forward is a whole lot better than denigrating their vote and their loyalty. Appeals to a *change* in loyalty can work, if there’s a viable alternative. If not, said alternative has to be created from scratch, to accrue loyalty. Effie Deans makes a great job of this approach, albeit it is a harder challenge against climate culture (in the UK) than against Scottish Nationalism.
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Mark, re. Lockdown Sceptics, I still haven’t quite got my head around this false positive issue. It seemed quite simple at first and I was willing to accept that, when prevalence in the community was very low (0.1% according to ONS), random testing of people would result in a huge number of false positives if the false positive rate was much higher than the prevalence. I think that argument still stands. Spiegelhalter is arguing that the testing is not random, but it’s of people who are showing symptoms. Seeing the queues of apparently healthy individuals at testing centers and noting the pressure on people in employment to get tested at the slightest sign of a cough or snuffle in the workplace, I’m inclined to believe that the Pillar 2 testing is random and largely of asymptomatic individuals.
What has me confused and what I have not seen adequately explained anywhere is whether the detection of non-infectious viral RNA (which the PCR test can do, and probably does do, frequently, on account of the unjustifiably high number of cycles it’s allowed to go through) counts as a false positive. But however you look at it, using the PCR test for mass testing of the populace to diagnose the supposed spread of infections and then using that data to impose harsh lockdowns is not evidence-based policy making, it is pure politics, very destructive politics at that.
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But the philosopher kings don’t want the politicians to consider critical reviews, cost-benefit, opportunity costs, red team, falsified hypothesis…..all are so “old fashioned”…
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It will be interesting to find out, hopefully in a future that is as committed to data as this age is committed to hype, what the actual costs of the Covid response has been:financial, opportunity, psychiatric, etc.
How many suicides, how many killings, the obvious link between the lockdown and the increasingly violent protests/riots, disrupted trade, wrecked industries, educational disruption, socialization losses, etc. And since something like 90% of the tragic deaths are in the seriously infirm elderly, how many have actually been saved? And at what price?
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Hunterson, on the subject of those “increasingly violent protests”, thank heavens the Metroppolitan Police are keeping us all safe and preventing the spread of Coronavirus by flooring peaceful, middle aged female anti-lockdown protestors with a swift punch to the stomach. I really don’t know what we would do without the boys and girls who make up the ranks of the Thin Blue Muzzle.
https://twitter.com/frencovfefe/status/1309929633308123144
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Andy.
“Why do you have an expectation of a link between traditional conservatism and anti-climate change? Climate culture is neither left nor right originally, and can link up with either side or both as an ally”
I think you are confusing the general acceptance of man-made climate change as a real and imminent threat to society and the planet with specific climate action designed to supposedly address that threat. I think it entirely reasonable that, even if traditional conservatives do believe uncritically in The Science of dangerous anthropogenic climate change, there should be an expectation that their proposed solutions do not bring about the wholesale destruction of free market capitalism, plus extremely radical and permanent changes to society and the way we live. One might, for example, expect them to embrace wholeheartedly a switch to low carbon gas power generation and ultimately to zero carbon nuclear generation. But what do we get from Johnson? The huge expansion of offshore wind, talk of 100% renewables, a ban on fracking, bans on petrol and diesel vehicles (when there is no viable alternative), bans on domestic gas boilers and idiotic waffle about ‘build back better’ and of Britain leading the world with a green technological revolution. I will remind you that the UK is the only major western economy which has adopted a legally binding net zero carbon target, thus essentially forcing the British economy to adapt to ill thought out and very costly and ineffective carbon reduction measures which will have a profound, lasting and damaging effect upon the country and its people. A sensible Conservative administration convinced of the need to act on climate change would not unilaterally adopt such extreme (and pointless) policies more reminiscent of loony left socialism and Green fanaticism than economically literate pragmatism. Johnson is neither sensible, nor a Conservative.
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By the way Andy, would you be so kind as to provide a list of my “oft stated wants”. I seem to have stated them so often that I’ve clean forgotten what they are! Thanks.
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Why? You have expressed these many times on Cli-Scep; less lockdown, less anti-emission climate-change policies, and also favouring Brexit. My a), b), c) above match these wants. I don’t understand what is in the slightest bit controversial about referencing these – most of your posts encapsulate one or the other. Nor are the wants themselves controversial, except to the few that contest them rather too vigorously, they are all mainstream if minority in the case of covid and climate-change. That many disagree, does not make them controversial.
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I think the problem with this is that cultural belief does not follow logic, in fact cannot follow logic. This leads to massive contradiction wherever it blossoms, and the contradiction you state above is only one of many. Johnson is far from alone in the conservative party regarding his beliefs about climate-change. In essence, there is virtually no resistance in that party, or any other viable party in the UK, to the armies of institutions and ever more strident calls that pressure for more and more. The absolute best one could say, is that there is a tiny bit more resistance inside the conservatives, than in the other parties. Nor is this about Johnson, as the advance of the great majority of it pre-dates his leadership or even his prominence, which were both built on an essentially unrelated issue. To attack Johnson on climate is to attack the wrong thing, and likely alienate those who may sympathise with you (to some extent) in the conservative party, into the bargain. The fight is against a thing not a person, and who needs to be convinced is a party, not an individual whoever that is, and the party is ultimately made of its grass roots.
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…the ‘unrelated issue’ being Brexit…
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Andy,
Oh, those ‘wants’. Pretty standard fare I would imagine for a slightly right of centre sceptic. But really, criticising me for attacking Johnson is off-target. I am on target. He is leader of the Conservative party at the moment and he is (allegedly) leader of the country, so he deserves every bit of criticism he gets, from me and others. Of course the rest of the cabinet are a shower too, but the buck stops with him. I’m sorry if Conservative voters/Boris supporters might be put off by my attacks on the Glorious Leader but he is the person ultimately responsible for the current attack on civil liberties, the health of the nation and the economy. Yes, I know, deep state and all that and poor Boris is but a pawn in the game, but he is a willing pawn.
P.S. If we can give Churchill probably the well deserved credit for getting us through the war years and Thatcher the credit for getting the country back on its feet after the disaster of the 70s under Labour, then Boris deserves to get it in the neck for his Communist response to a relatively mild ‘flu like pandemic virus and his absurd enthusiasm for locking down the economy and people’s lives further on the basis of the climate crisis scam.
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Jaime: “Pretty standard fare I would imagine…”
Indeed. I don’t know where you were going with this. It doesn’t change anything of my above.
“I am on target. He is leader of the Conservative party at the moment…”
Criticising his policies is absolutely on target. I don’t think you’ve seen what I’m trying to get across at all. Saying that he has betrayed his conservative values because of his climate change policy, is to hugely miss the point. Almost his whole party with or without him would do the same thing. That’s why he faces virtually no objection from them; whatever his flaws he’s always been good at knowing what will fly and what won’t. So if he was run over by a bus tomorrow and the next true blue stepped up, nothing of substance would change. Hence making this a personal thing about him is a big distraction, a complete waste of ammunition. It’s a much bigger problem than that.
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And it remains the case that if millions had spoiled their ballots per your suggestion, a), b), c) above would be our situation. Such is not the way to win hearts and minds.
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Andy, I’m well aware that the Conservative Party would have followed along similar lines whoever happened to be at the helm. Gove is just as bad, if not worse. This is why I wrote (as quoted above), back in June 2019:
“There’s no hope for the Tories. They have gone mad or they have collectively sold their souls to the Green Globalist Devil and no longer even pretend to govern in the national interest. They need to be consigned to history – fast.”
Now, I happen to know that quite a few people who are intensely sceptical of climate change policy voted for Johnson in the belief that he was actually a true blue Conservative who was only paying lip service to the climate lobby and would start to wind back the ‘Green crap’ when he got into office. He fooled those people very comprehensively. In fact he has accelerated the Green agenda since becoming PM. I guessed correctly that he actually meant what he said in his tweet of 5th June, that he would indeed embrace the net zero 2050 target brought into law by his predecessor. Many thought he would ditch such nonsense.
So, what to do? Vote for him knowing that he’ll sign the WA which isn’t Brexit, knowing that he’ll accelerate the climate agenda, or make a protest vote (NOTA) which is counted. I chose the latter and if millions had done likewise, it may have meant that the election would have to have been recalled and Johnson forced to offer something better to Tory voters than a rehashed WA, I don’t know for sure. Had Farage not stood his troops down and had he opposed the Tories on the WA, I feel certain that the Tory majority would have been greatly reduced and Johnson would not have been able to do the damage he has. I certainly would have voted for a Brexit Party candidate. But alas, it seems that Farage himself turned out to be a paper tiger in the end and he gifted the Tories with their huge majority as much as the voters did. Anyway, I’ll be off-loading on the next wet Tory PM soon by the looks. Johnson can’t go on much longer, surely.
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Jaime,
“…I happen to know that quite a few people who are intensely sceptical of climate change policy voted for Johnson in the belief that he was actually a true blue Conservative who was only paying lip service to the climate lobby…”
No doubt. But climate was almost not an issue in that election, and the overwhelming majority voted for him to ‘get Brexit done’ with little reference to much else (except a dislike of Corbyn, most probably) and certainly not climate.
“So, what to do?”
Exactly. But building support and positive routes is generally better than throwing millions under the bus for voting conservative back then, long before covid had even reared its head, in an election where climate barely registered (even if it should have), and when so far this *has* got them Brexit, albeit ‘what kind’ is still not determined. If those millions had spoiled their ballot papers, ‘no kind’ would have been the almost certain outcome. Nor would they be any better off regarding covid / lockdowns, and likely somewhat worse off regarding climate policy.
“Johnson can’t go on much longer, surely.”
Either in the party or the populace, there is no real support for any formal mechanism of any kind to remove him, other than in the normal fashion by means of the next election. And likely, things will be radically different by then. Labour and Conservative are about equal in the polls at the moment, depending on which ones you read. Even if Labour were drastically ahead, this would almost certainly not trigger an early election. Boris’ net popularity is about -7.5% on average over September, and leaders have been hugely worse off than this and still stayed on. Plus, it may well recover as covid fades and if the final Brexit outcome is seen as +ve. Large numbers of MPs, especially new ones, are grateful for their seats. And serious leadership challengers are nowhere to be seen. I’m no Westminster insider, but no places such as Guido Fawkes or anywhere I’ve seen have the slightest rumour of real challenge (to policies, yes, but not leadership, or even overall control). Whatever one thinks of his policies, there is not a glint of a hint that he will go. While things can change fast in politics, changes of that nature do not come out of the blue, and there isn’t even the wisp of a cloud in the formal sky regarding leadership, however much whining about this that or the other there is. It rather boggles me, but public surveys still show much more support for *stricter* lock-down rules, than they do for relaxation / removal. And even the opposition are pretty much running with the government, so no way is there going to arise any leadership challenge on the covid issue, unless some radically new factor occurs or polls seriously reverse course in a few months (in which case, so will Boris most likely, anyhow).
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“…it may have meant that the election would have to have been recalled…”
No! It’d simply mean that Labour would have won. Probably outright majority needing no coalition for support, but an outside chance of the latter. The largest number of seats tip straight between Labour and Conservative. And millions of conservative voters doing this on the basis of climate objection is unrealistic in the extreme anyhow; the public is not climate literate. They haven’t got a clue what the issues are and what Net Zero means. This doesn’t mean there isn’t some bulk skepticism, but it is driven by instinct not knowledge (as likewise is support for climate culture), and no way would this feature in an election primarily about an issue such as Brexit, and so was proved in practice.
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Andy, I do not believe I was suggesting that the bulk of voters who voted Conservative at the last election (many for the first time) would (should) have not cast their vote on the basis of Johnson’ plans for climate action, only that sceptics should have seen it coming and that the many traditional Conservative voters convinced that he was a true blue Conservative should perhaps have been a bit more sceptical given his Green virtue signalling prior to the election. However, Brexit was of course the main issue and I am afraid Tory voters have even less excuse for casting their vote in Johnson’s direction given his clearly stated intention to sign up to the (slightly) amended WA after the election. It was plain as day at the time that the WA was NOT Brexit in any shape or form and only now is that fact being acknowledged. So, why did they vote Tory? Why not vote BXP (in seats where they stood) or independent? Because they convinced themselves that somehow Boris would magically deliver a real Brexit and that if they did not vote Tory, then they would automatically get a Labour government. Contrary to your assertions, I do not think that was a certainty. A hung Parliament was a likely outcome and the Tories may have been forced into a coalition with BXP. This would have been much more likely if Farage had stuck to his guns, stood a full team of candidates and continued to oppose the Tories on the basis of the fact that the WA was Brexit in name only.
But we could argue about what might have been until the cows come home. What IS is now far more important. We have a globalist socialist PM in charge who has inflicted severe damage upon the nation and its economy (as Corbyn would have done) and I do not believe he is as safe as you suggest, but we shall see over the coming months.
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Jaime: “So, why did they vote Tory? Why not vote BXP (in seats where they stood) or independent? Because they convinced themselves that somehow Boris would magically deliver a real Brexit and that if they did not vote Tory, then they would automatically get a Labour government. Contrary to your assertions, I do not think that was a certainty. A hung Parliament was a likely outcome and the Tories may have been forced into a coalition with BXP.”
The election system is way too unsubtle to try and steer at a tipping point solution such as that. Nor would many voters have understood the aim. A Labour government may not have been a certainty in such conditions, but it would be very much more likely indeed. And given their major fear of Corbyn in charge plus the desire to preserve Brexit in whatever form they could, which in the end even the Brexit party went with, conservative voters were just never going to allow such a high risk of a ‘horror’ scenario. I do not think you could possibly have said at the time that this would be low risk.
“What IS is now far more important. We have a globalist socialist PM in charge who has inflicted severe damage upon the nation and its economy (as Corbyn would have done) and I do not believe he is as safe as you suggest, but we shall see over the coming months.”
Well, Corbyn would likely have done much of this to the economy even without covid, though it would have taken longer. And so post covid, he would remain far worse for business, and still more gung-ho on greenness too. Not to mention the serious Labour plan to make the whole UK a 3 day working week country, and much else of that ilk. I don’t know whether Johnson is safe or not, I merely point out that there appears to be a complete and utter absence of all the normal signs for serious challenge. If you know of any such, I’ll stand corrected. I think it likely that in a year’s time, covid will be fading in the rear view mirror, but the climate-change agenda will not only be still standing like a giant after the storm, it may possible be resurgent / stronger, with the newly acquired skill of leveraging covid exceptions as a response to ‘disaster’.
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Andy, everyone. THIS is the true face of our PM. He’s a dangerous fanatic. It may be the true face of the ‘Conservative’ Party, of all politicians elected to ‘serve’ the people. We are in a very perilous situation, I’m afraid.
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Boris the Red is a globalist puppet, in bed with the UN and with Bill Gates. You don’t have to be a tin foil hat wearing ‘conspiracy theorist’ to see this now. What you have to ask yourself is how do we get rid of this dangerous Communist dictator before he completely destroys the UK and will getting rid of him ultimately make any difference? I believe it may buy us some time. At the moment, he is rushing through his agenda at breakneck speed, thereby not allowing any time for reflection from the public and tomorrow, they will just wake up and find that the UK has transitioned to a new and very frightening place to be. It already is: you can’t have a meal or go for a drink without having an app now, employees are being forced to wear masks at work in their millions, soon you probably won’t be even able to buy food at the supermarket without an app and a mask.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-54320030?at_custom3=BBC+News&
The Speaker should, by all rights, allow the Brady Amendment, but he’s revealed his globalist leanings too. What if he actually denies it? What happens then? Chairman Boris and his psychotic side-kick Hancock get to keep ruling by decree.
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Jaime,
Well perhaps he is a dangerous fanatic, but certainly not on the basis of sharing disease data and research between nations, creating more monitoring of zoonotic diseases, and funding vaccines for poorer people, with or without the aid of the Bill Gates foundation. If there had been much more of this in prior years (instead of all the attention going to climate change!) then maybe we wouldn’t be in such a bad situation now. Pandemic prevention measures have been woefully inadequate for many years, a situation made still worse when the big US PREDICT programme ran out of funding in Sept 2019 and wasn’t continued (although it had an emergency minor and temporary resuscitation in March, due to Covid). The issue was that the US felt it was alone in having to foot the cost of doing this program (ran for 10 years at 200M a year I think) in dozens of countries, and everyone else should chip in. Hence Boris’ announcement is exactly what the US wanted in order to spin up such programmes again on a co-operative basis. Per above a big reason this hasn’t happened before is that the WHO and other bodies identified climate change as the overwhelming main health threat, which is crazy-squared even by IPCC science, let alone anything skeptic.
I think the restrictions are massively OTT and inappropriate. But it is very hard to say that this is due to individual psychosis in particular leadership folks, given that very many countries are also OTT to a lesser or greater degree, and that recent surveys in the UK still show that more of the public want greater restrictions, including full national lockdown, than want less. The government cannot therefore be accused of thwarting the will of the people on this, and neither have the opposition parties meaningfully opposed. Labour should be leading the charge on the Brady amendment, but it is very cool at best. Apparently, the government are highly likely to come to an agreement with the Brady rebels (about 80 of them I think) before tomorrow, meaning a vote won’t be required. I don’t know what the wording will be though, how much the government will concede in giving MPs a voice on the plethora of covid legislation.
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Andy, I am well aware that other countries are applying similar or even more stringent measures and I don’t know if all those in charge are psychopaths but that would would seem rather far-fetched. I am of the opinion that Dan Andrews in Victoria is however. Nothing much else explains his behaviour. But to concentrate on what’s going on here, at home, if the definition of a psychopath is somebody who knowingly causes the deaths of many thousands of people (democide) on the pretence of trying to completely eradicate a disease currently killing much less people than ‘flu/pneumonia and far, far less people than other preventable illnesses, then Hancock is it, and so is Boris:
“Per above a big reason this hasn’t happened before is that the WHO and other bodies identified climate change as the overwhelming main health threat, which is crazy-squared even by IPCC science, let alone anything skeptic.”
They still do. Only recently Tedros was prattling on about climate change and how we can never go back to the way we were before if we are going to fight this existential threat to humanity. Guess what? Johnson just announced a 30% increase in UK funding to the WHO.
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Jaime, I don’t disagree with the concerns per Sikora and many others about lockdown-deaths and damage. I find this every bit as frustrating as you. Nor indeed that notwithstanding laudable efforts to spin-up global pandemic preparedness to something like what it should have been in the first place, among these continuing the corrupt WHO in its current form is a bad thing. It is indeed far-fetched to say all the many leaders world-wide are psychopathic, very far-fetched. That’s my point, this is a communal effect, and in such phenomena information itself is both conflicted and emotionally over-ridden. Hence what one person thinks they honestly know is very different to what another one thinks they honestly know; the sources and validity of all information is challenged, and in some cases (this being one) there are more than two ‘sides’. So, if we’re concentrating on what’s happening here, among the various voices far more people both public and politicians, are still supporting the conservative leadership’s position, than are not. This is why there is so little opposition, from those who are formally named the opposition but seem to be failing in their duties, right down to very many ordinary people. And likewise across many levels of expertise from the top scientists / science advisors, down to armchair pundits at home. It’s like a fever, but it’s a group fever, not an individual one, a madness of crowds. This doesn’t mean policies should not be vigorously opposed, of course they should. But harping on about Boris being a psychopath not only misses the point, it will turn off most of those whose support is needed, which because his party is the one in power, are grass-roots conservatives, to apply pressure.
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Andy, whilst I share your appreciation of the reality of mass hysteria and cultural group think, I do not share your reluctance to point the finger of blame at individual leaders. I believe passionately in individual responsibility. We each of us, if we are sound in mind and body, ultimately are responsible for our actions. Group-think, fear and hysteria are powerful motivators of human behaviour, but, in the final analysis, what you do, what you say, and what you think, are in the power of you, and you alone. When it comes to those who have the responsibility for the well-being of an entire nation, it is no defence to claim that ‘other nations did the same’ or that ‘this is what the scientists advised’. Johnson and Hancock are both fully cognisant of the dire economic and social consequences of their policies and they are both fully aware of the data and the science which conflicts with their insistence that Covid-19 is a uniquely dangerous disease which must be effectively suppressed by lockdown measures until a vaccine comes along. Given this knowledge, given their option to change course, their single-minded persistence with lockdowns and absurd social distancing and other ‘rules’ marks them either as clinically insane or as politicians consciously willing to commit crimes against humanity to achieve some unknown objective. I’m not at all certain that they are insane.
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Democracy is dead in the UK. We now live under a tyranny. Your life is not yours anymore. It belongs to the government. You will be forced to live a miserable half-life until you are forced to submit to vaccination and even then you will not be free.
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Jaime, “I do not share your reluctance to point the finger of blame at individual leaders. I believe passionately in individual responsibility.”
I’m perfectly happy with individual responsibility and the finger of blame. Just not with focussing upon what is a diagnosable medical condition (psychopathy) for which we don’t have any direct evidence, he’d probably fail the test for it anyway, plus which focus diverts hugely from the fact that many others in his party, many others in all the other parties, and indeed vast swathes of the public, would do exactly the same or worse.
You can shoot someone down largely for their policies, or you can shoot them down largely for their personality. Quite apart from the fact that the latter turns off many people who you need for support, if you nevertheless win, the next party person filling the shoes could essentially do the same stuff, because the apparent failure was psychopathy and not policy. If the former is the focus, it’s still sufficient for a leadership swap, yet the next person filling the shoes is forced to comprehensively change the policies.
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P.S. As leader he must take responsibility for all the major things his party is doing, despite the fact that many more would likewise do them. That’s part of being leader. Putting it all down to personal pyschopathy essentially absolves him, or indeed anyone who may replace him, of the responsibility to recognise the madness of his crowd, and deal with it appropriately.
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The Speaker did NOT select the Brady amendment. That says it all. He’s as bad as the last Speaker, maybe even worse. Parliament is rubber-stamping Communist rule in the UK.
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But on technical grounds, and he did excoriate the government first (as much as a Speaker is able) and also opened the door for as many urgent questions or emergency debates on the topic as MPs felt they wished to put forward. I thought this left some hope…
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Plus I think the Brady rebels had already agreed a course with the gov behind closed doors. I was rather hoping someone would leak what it was soon.
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Hancock’s speech saying there will be votes, has too many holes. Not if local (rather than England or all UK), not if needed at emergency speed, and ‘where possible’. That’s rather like a lace curtain. What lattitude did the Brady rebels allow in negotiation, and does that speech faithfully reflect them or not?
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All sounds rather like theatre doesn’t it Andy. We’re in basically the same place we were before the ‘rebels’ announced their plan to contest the government’s rule by decree. Brady, Baker and the rest of the ‘rebels’ voted to renew the Coronavirus Act with just this pretty worthless ‘concession’ from the government that it would not impose national measures without a vote ‘where possible’. Only SEVEN Conservative MPs voted against renewal. I have great respect for them. My MP voted for it, much to my disgust, after having written to him personally imploring him not to, for the good of the country. Useless, self-serving bunch they are. Only the courts or the people themselves can stand in the way of this government now – I don’t have an awful lot of faith in either.
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Unfortunately, yes, very like theatre ):
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A good sign. Middlesbrough’s Mayor defies government instruction for local lockdown…
“I have to tell you that I think this measure has been introduced based on factual inaccuracies and a monstrous and frightening lack of communication and ignorance… As things stand, we defy the government and we do not accept these measures. We need to get Covid under control and we need to work with people to find a way of preserving jobs and mental health.”
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/is-this-the-start-of-the-lockdown-rebellions-
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Andy, even Andrew Neil has become a lockdown sceptic now, questioning outright the government and the government scientists’ motivation for selling us a “false prospectus”. The rebellion is indeed growing, which is encouraging, because the word is that the governmet is going to try to impose another full national lockdown during half term, regardless of what the stats are doing.
https://twitter.com/JamesMelville/status/1311949051638804480
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Andy, I bow to Lord Sumption’s far better informed assessment of the Speaker’s actions in disallowing the Brady Amendment, whlst still reserving judgement about Hoyle’s appallingly ill informed comments re. ‘climate lockdowns’:
“Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle was probably right to disallow the Brady amendment on Wednesday. It was a device designed to force the Government to consult Parliament about orders under the Public Health Act, by making it a condition of extending another Act which is irrelevant to the issue, namely the Coronavirus Act. None of the government’s measures of social control has been made under the Coronavirus Act.
The Speaker was also right to accuse the Government of showing contempt for Parliament. But it will take more than schoolmasterly lectures to put this right. The real problem is the procedures of the House of Commons. MPs have to resort to devices like the Brady amendment, because the House does not have control of its own agenda.”
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/10/02/boris-johnsons-strongman-government-destroying-democracy/
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Yeah, technically Hoyle’s right. And he did blast the government for essentially ignoring the house on Coronavirus legislation. But that’s unlikely to force formal change. As to being ill-informed, the great majority of MPs appear to be very ill-informed, in all parties. On Corona virus as well as climate. Although in the latter case, after decades of aggressive cultural advance, it’s hard to see why they wouldn’t be ill-informed. Because the emotive narratives have pretty much conquered all the elite and much of the public too. The latter may think that XR are OTT, but they still don’t grasp that even by IPCC science let alone anything skeptical, there isn’t an issue that warrants anything like near-net-zero.
For Covid at least, I agree about responsibility; in the sense that it’s Boris’ responsibility to address that knowledge gap and the emotive fear that has gripped his own party, which given they are ruling also means the government. If he doesn’t, that’s entirely down to him. But the failure that he needs to address is indeed one of the party and the elites who advise them, and not primarily a gross character failure of himself or select ministers. Starmer needs to do no less for Labour, who have not formed any meaningful opposition on this issue. Out of the last place you’d expect it, the LibDems were on fire yesterday about resisting / refuting these inappropriate restrictions.
On climate, it’s a global monster. And in the UK, there is essentially no skeptical voice in power or with any route to power. Why wouldn’t Boris believe what everyone’s telling him, including all elite and other leaders (bar Trump) and the UN and all formal science bodies. There is plenty of skepticism in the public, but this is driven by instinct (they sense it’s a religion) not knowledge, so it is never expressed in a manner that elites can’t simply ‘answer with science and reason’. Note that’s in quotes! I don’t know the answer to this, but it is way, way bigger than Boris or Hoyle or whoever. And for sure climate culture is learning to exploit the exceptions caused be Covid.
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