Psychoactive Substances: Rolling UK Politics in The Neo-Con Era

Labour should stop asking this nobody questions until Gideon turns up. Complete waste of time.

I know it's not the burning issue of the moment, but if I can go back to that Toby Young piece:

cognitive ability and other characteristics that lead to success, such as conscientiousness, impulse control and a willingness to defer gratification, are between 40 per cent and 80 per cent heritable.[5]

That footnote leads not to a citation of a scientific paper, but this helpful little explanation:

[5] This means that between 40% and 80% of the variation in these characteristics in any given population can be accounted for by genetic differences in that population.

Sadly, no. Accent, for example, is highly heritable (also, like IQ, correlated with race, class, education, and largely fixed after adolescence). Does it have a genetic component? Nope.

(and that is really the crux of his argument)

Hey Gauke dude. what the fuck is wrong with you?

PM defends the work of the Chancellor "we can only improve life chances if our economy is secure and strong"

The government will continue to give the "highest priority to improving life chances", David Cameron says.

The government will "take more people out of tax, rebuild sink estates, improve life chances, and reform prisons".

"Without sound public finances, you end up having to cut spending and put up taxes. You don’t get more life chances that way; you get fewer."

cut spending and put up taxes, huh that sounds familiar

rebuild sink estates,

Stay classy, Dave.

Rebuild Cinque Estates

That was some good parliament games from the Tories there; Gauke rallies the troops, then Cameron praises IDS and dodges what were not Corbyn's best jabs

https://twitter.com/montie/status/711890797772345345

i must admit i am v impressed by the logical contortions involved here

Cooper and Kendall would have abstained the hell of them.

*out of them

From the commentary Corbyn has been p/lame apparently, but its The Guardian saying it and I hate parliament.

Not mentioning IDS at all is p. weird and has all his haters out in force. But it did focus all the discussion on Osborne for a while at least

Does feel like a wasted opportunity though

Not really, a lot of ppl complaining re: Corbyn hate him. He doesn't have some 'killer instinct' or isn't Paxo. We know that.

Yeah, he is never going to "perform" but at this point in the parliament I don't think that matters very much at all

Accoring to the commentariat (and the Lab right, natch) all the useless ppl "performed".

Insulting someone's clothes counts as 'performing' in that shithouse.

Press keeping hammering the Osborne line so poss even savvier than I give him credit for

What is the Osborne line?

That Cameron had to defend him, that he didn't show up, that he is running scared etc.

xp
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/multimedia/archive/00870/a1e9338c-c8e2-11e4-_870403c.jpg

Right, you mean Corbyn's Osborne line not, er, Osborne's Osborne line.(xp) lol

Well, that "no further welfare cuts planned" line isn't going to backfire spectacularly at all is it?

The very fact that a member of the government has had to say that at all indicates a very sharp change in the political weather in the space of one week. It's a pretty desperate move but Cameron's entire edifice is in danger of collapsing here.

Cameron should ditch the hapless ringers and just hold up a big picture of a kitten with NO MORE CUTS written on it.

are they going to pass the budget? we only need around 10 rebels to vote against.

Given that would probably bring down the government and trigger an immediate general election I'd imagine most Tory MPs would be a little squeamish about the prospect.

Don't fully understand how the new legislation works but aren't they basically locked in unless no confidenced by a big majority?

Treasury has already rolled back the "no welfare cuts" line, so he is alive in there somewhere

Xp legislation probably works as well as the welfare cap does. Was that ever passed btw?

Failing to get a budget passed would be expected to trigger resignations under most circumstances.

xps

As I say, I've got no idea

Can't find the last unbalanced budget that passed either tho

are they going to pass the budget? we only need around 10 rebels to vote against.

What, Nick Clegg is going to vote the Budget down?

Good title for a spiritual

lol

Nick Clegg goin to vote the budget down, my saviour
Nick Clegg goin vote the budget down

We'll all be there and we won't have a care
When Nick Clegg gone votethebudget down, down, down, down...

A view from the 18th century

The view from the 21st century left isn't doing it either

"hard choices" is a flag.

The experience of Syriza - all those lawyers -- did 'em good when the might of the Eurozone came marchign down

If only the Labour right started tweeting against the real enemy.

when the might of the Eurozone came marchign down

another spiritual!

Oh they scattered and they ran, lord, the whole of Pharaoh's myriad
When the might of the Eurozone came marching down from Gilead

The Miliband team made a complete arse of the actual process of campaign strategy and planning, and they had the best part of five years to prepare and probably a more experienced operation in place. I don't think you need to be some kind of pissy New Statesman twat to suspect that Corbyn's team is perhaps not adequately prepared for a general election that could arrive this year.

if it goes to a general election this year - no way, imo - then the Tories will have done half their job for them

The Tories are in utter disarray if there is ever a gen election this year. Don't think we'll get to that.

On burying bad news then - I guess the Brussels attacks will have an effect on today's proceedings?

I suppose the issue for any incoming Tory leader will be avoiding the Gordon Brown trap, which might mean an election sooner rather than later, but obviously everything hinges on Brexit. If Britain votes to stay in then it's 50:50 whether Cameron will appear to be triumphantly vindicated or stagger on through four years of increasingly frequent attacks from both sides.

Given the polling it's easy to see a narrow win for In that leaves Cameron with a furious Tory version of the 45ers

They'd take 55/45 now.

http://thebaffler.com/salvos/despair-fatigue-david-graeber

I've been living with this piece for a few days now. Bits of it seem off, sometimes way off. But as a whole I think this is a very insightful examination of where we are now.