ironically this would be higher resolution if cloudflare were letting google handle redirects

I think this speaks volumes about how cynical some people have become across the board. Believe nothing, question everything, read Pravda.

And those making the financial decisions can't write or understand code anyway.

I think the best explainer is Private Eye's perennial "person decides against buying a copy of the daily telegraph" joke. Kind of sums up why a media owner wouldn't want to either.

Hallmark really have scraped the bottom of the barrel for this year's Xmas films haven't they

Huh, there I was (a Brit) thinking the US protected free speech in one of the many amendments to its constitution, I forget which one it was though...

When The Cranes Fly South. Also picked up a slightly foxed copy of Moby Dick in homesense for a fiver, which I'm promising myself I will definitely get around to reading at some point

I agree totally, I'd love to live in a country with working hospitals, schools, high quality high speed trains, utilities that didn't pump shit into the waterways etc. But I think our system is geared to short term election cycles rather than big-vision long-term stuff.

No, but it's easy to say that in the knowledge that they did win. No election is in the bag - remember the "ming vase" everyone couldn't stop talking about

I think the right wing press would've had a field day though. "STARMER: I WILL MAKE YOU POORER" isn't beyond the bounds of possibility for a DM headline

Sure, but how does that work in practice? It costs actual money to run public services, which has to be either made or borrowed somehow. It doesn't have to come from PFI-style arrangements, but it does have to come from somewhere. So, higher taxes, in the absence of lower borrowing costs

What's the alternative? They wouldn't have got elected had they campaigned on a platform of increasing taxes for all. Yet either tax rises are inevitable, or they search for further cuts in a system that's already been cut to the bone. If reform got in what would they be able to do differently?

The news moves so fast these days I honestly feel this kind of post could apply at any hour of any day

But how would it have gone down with the electorate if they'd said "things are a mess, we'll have to put your taxes up"?

I'm frustrated with their lack of vision. But I feel they boxed themselves in bc they felt they had no choice, in the absence of a Blair-like inspirational figure at the helm