renton

Thank f**k.

Well, he was absent from the dugout against Ayr so makes some sense. Murray can't be thinking of doing it all himself...

No, unattributed sources have spoken.

Any rule where the only people holding you it is yourselves is not a rule, it's simply will power. In practice, if the Tories want her gone, she'll be gone.

I disagree in so much as the general public won't deign to make the distinction between what the MPs wanted and the ordinary membership wanted, and that decapitating their party after a month in charge just creates an image of god awful decision making and crisis that will cling to them all. They are fucked if they get rid of them, fucked if they stay and nothing miraculously get's better. They are properly hanging onto a tiger by it's tail here.

I think the strategy is to tough it out. Not sure what else they can do? Sacking Kwarteng for implementing a plan you've been advocating for through a leadership election and doing a screeching U-turn will kill Truss' premiership stone dead. Likewise, the rank and file deciding to get rid of the two most senior office holders after a month in charge probably destroys what slim credibility the Party still has, particularly if there isn't a unity candidate they can rally around. Their only shot, by the looks of it - is to hope that they can point to a quarter or two of improved growth to cover their blushes while dismantling their strategy quietly and hoping another crisis comes along to occlude memories of this one.

Reunite the Dumbo dream team and get Jack Ross in. Would he pretty much all he could get just now

John McGlynn school of spending money.

Fair fucks.

I focus, on the Raith The only thing, that's real

I'd have it as a sitting two of Spencer and Brown, Ross at 10 and McBride a straight swap for Connolly with Coulson on the other side.

As far as possible, send out the B team without being seen to throw the kids to the wolves. A refreshing change.

Finally replacing the Council Tax with something progressive would be my favoured option

She's always been a small state fanatic. Plenty of those in certain areas of the Lib Dems. She helped write Britannia Unchained alongside others including Kwarteng back in 2011 - which is basically this "fiscal event" made manifest so its not like this is something they've cooked up on the hoof. If it was only self interest motivating her then it'd be easy enough to keep Johnson-ite populist positions on most things, try and be quietly dignified and wait for the Labour poll lead to collapse. This isn't intended as a defence, she is setting fire to thr UK economy on a hunch that even most economic liberals would blanche at. All I'm saying is this is likely to get even worse than many think, because she believes this shit. She'll dig in even when it's all going to shit around her.

Your wrong. She's a true believer. That's what makes it worse. In two years she thinks she'll win a 100 seat majority on the back of her bold plan to get work shy Brits busting a gut and growing the economy.

They've got you covered with new anti strike legislation.

Truss and Kwarteng are ideologues. British politics is predicated on the notion that most politicians don't actually mean what they say, and that ultimately Civil Service orthodoxy runs like a thread through each government. Occasionally you get a proper batshit mental one who actually believes their own convictions. This is basically the right wing Corbyn moment.

Well, won't this be fun.

Today is certainly a day.

I never understood this distance argument for missiles. Flight time has only a very weak effect on the liklihood of a missile hitting a target. Detection time is far more important and that is only a subset of the overall engagement time. What does it matter if a ballistic missile is launched from half the world away or from 5 minutes away if the radar horizon of the former only gives a 5 minute warning anyway? What does any of that matter when there is no anti ballistic system with a reasonable chance of stopping any given warhead? In actual fact, having a strategic, ballistic nuclear missile system close by is better for the defender: easier to detect and track for a start, not to mention that launching one of these on a basically flat trajectory massively increases the circular error probability anyway. The notion that Ukraine was invaded because the Russians got squeamish about being subject to a short window of being hit by nuclear weapons is ultimately laughable when they've been under the same pressure for more than 50 years since the deployment of the first ICBMs.

Isolated incidents of booing drowned out by the majority, apparently.

What nuclear weapons were going to be stationed on Russia's borders, again?

Do you mean low radiation or just low yield?

I dont doubt that a disastrous escalation would be unavoidable. I don't think Putin is willing though, even now, to risk a nuclear confrontation with the West.

The point is whether other countries agree. Particularly, other nuclear powers. Unless the other nuclear/NATO powers can be persuaded that indeed, Ukraine is invading sovereign Russian territory then they risk a showdown with the West. That would start at a convention level. NATO direct intervention would utterly destroy all Russian forces in Ukraine in a couple of weeks and Putin would be right back where he started but with no Army and his nuclear trump card no longer usable since any nuclear attack on NATO forces would likely see (at first) proportionate tactical strikes on Russian oil and gas refineries before escalating further.