egg

That paves the way for Tom Hardy playing Winnie Mandela in a future biopic. Anything is possible these days LD. Embrace the opportunism for us all.

A big part of this, I'm convinced, is to divide the BRICS nations giving the power back to the US and the Dollar. I think Trump believes that China can be isolated, but if he cuts off Europe, buddies up with Russia, India and perhaps Brazil, it'll leave the remainder to either align with each other or do their own thing. I've said before that I forsee some interesting alignments, but China into Ukraine is a non starter for me.

I knew you'd duck the question. Indulge me please. Of those 2 choices, what's your priority?

Two choices SOG: 1. Defence spending 2. Foreign aid In a binary choice, it's number 1. We've underspent for years, and given the various threats, we need to sort our shit out. We face harsh realities I'm afraid.

I think it's much more than that. He wasn't being shouted down on fox, he wasn't outgunned, he had his translator in the background giving time to talk to him where needed, thus extra thinking time. Basically, fox didn't stitch him up with a stage managed show trial like the white house did.

I agree entirely on the last part. I've always said that the war will end by negotiation involving Ukraine ceding land, and that's still inevitable. What I never foresaw was the US seeing it's aid as an investment, then expecting a return on that, and then expecting Ukraine to agree to all of that before any deal on the land carve up, and before peace and a sustained ceasefire. On the first part, I'm not so sure. Russia will be empowered by this fiasco.

You seen to overlook that Zelensky wasn't offered a ceasefire yesterday. He had no proposal for sustained peace beyond that. He doesn't even know how Trump and Putin propose carving up Ukraine. It was a moronic proposal from a moron. Even the worst Mafia protection rackets promise and give protection. Any deal must be a package. It must include for fighting to stop and to stay stopped, an agreement over any border adjustments, and the US giving peace amd protection guarantees for any monies that they get over and what they've given and will give. This suggestion that Ukraine should sign whatever in the hope of sustained peace is nonsense.

Got the link to where some idiot had an unnecessary pop at Starmer please? Thank you.

I've watched that twice now and still have no idea what he was going on about. It was like a drunken rant from the local soak down the pub at the end of the night. Nuts.

Absolutely. If it was ever intended to be a respectful two day dialogue it would have been Trump and Zelensky, or those two plus their respective chiefs of staff or similar to give balance in the room. Not the shouty puppet. There was also no need for that huge entourage, including that idiot who pretty much got told his suit was shit which was Zelensky dealing with a heckler well imo. It should also not be lost that the Russians had the courtesy of a meeting behind closed doors. Absolutely disgraceful that Zelensky got this staged theatre/kangaroo court instead. Tim Marshall in the Times News video above called this right yesterday. He's brilliant on geopolitics and I'll be keeping an eye on what he's got to say in the coming days. Currently his view is as per mine - feck knows where we go from here. For me, Trump has shown himself to be as Machiavellian as any leader of a civilised country as I can remember, and I'm not sure we've seen anything yet.

Agreed. It seems pretty clear that Trump wants to divide the BRICS nations and leave China against the rest. The US public will never support any US/Russia double act though, and as you say, we may well see China become more aligned with others. I said way up there that we could see very interesting alignments. Interesting times.

I think there's a real risk of that. Starkink support is also vital, ditto US intelligence. The US have really done a number on Ukraine. Feck knows where we go from here, but credit to Zelensky for not signing a shit deal which gave no guarantee of peace or support.

The only negative from that press conference was dippy questions from out media. Starmer played him like a fiddle, and Peston than pipes up asking about an apology for Zelensky. Lovely sentiment, but read the room and ditch your script.

No signs of injury apparently, but deemed the deaths "suspicious enough" to investigate and have not ruled out foul play. Interesting.

He's not wrong. Ukraine repaying aid monies following Russia's invasion is simply wrong. To be paying significantly more than that, and ongoing in perpetuity, is beyond scandalous. I'm not even sure what they're buying if the US aren't giving them security guarantees. It ts a shameful carry on.

Ditto. We nicked them, but need Diego Garcia. Giving back what we don't need and being able to use what we do seems entirely sensible.

All this labelling people as narcissistic (it's not just you) is properly pathetic. It's a forum FFS. People agree with each other, and disagree. Some views of people are strong, but labelling people as narcissistic has become a really unpleasant feature and imo has no place here.

I deem suspicious to mean nobody else involved

It's just fecking pointless. I don't think anyone gives a monkeys.

Jeez SoG, this is not your finest hour mate.

Probably, yep. I hadn't appreciated he was that old either. Seems to have been a bloody sad ending though - not many explanations if nobody else involved.

Can one stand behind the other and catch the bullet on the way through?

Him, his wife and dog all found dead at home. His wife was only 63. Very sad, whatever the cause. Great actor. RIP.

That video was appalling. Alas I think it will happen. If there's a bonus, hopefully the Russians will flock there and leave other tourist areas for civilised people and Germans.

Gotcha. Any suggestion of that sort is unnecessary. I was referring to the smoke in connection with lifting the travel ban.