ARubbishBot

His resignation is small beer - a good quality Act of Attainder would remove his peerage, his pension from his ministerial jobs, and all his accrued assets from when he first started *working on the side* (2003?) tainted as they are by his Treason...

John Morton is your star to aim for.

#CambridgeFive....

Or, they want this stuff to go into the long, tangled grass of Lords reform, making it 'not our fault, guv'.

A junior minister on radio this morning dismissed the idea of a short bill that was only about Mandelson - 'of course it can't be...' type thing.

BTW, what happened to Acts of Attainder...?

Espionage?

I mean, that's what it is.

Why is this stuff only being investigated in terms of Misconduct in Public Office?

At the time of the alleged offences, it would have been covered by the Official Secrets Act, and now the National Security Act: it's the passing of Government information to an outside party, or - you know - spying..

I'm at a loss as to why this stuff isn't being treated as what it is - spying?

Senior official removing govt documents, giving them to overseas orgs & being paid for it.

This isn't a local councillor giving a building contract to his mate, this is espionage.

Would a civil servant get MiPO?

Official Secrets Act - as then was?

I know it's not really Treason, but it looks like Treason, and it tastes like Treason....

Shades of Blair - him driven mad by the catastrophe of Iraq - Truss driven mad by always being a bit mad, and then being dumped so quickly and is such a humiliating fashion.

Err... opportunities for the odd *extended duration* exercise in Greenland?

You know, just thinking out loud...

An amusing thought experiment:

This takes place in 1938, as a large, expansionist, hyper-nationalist state in Europe starts taking lumps out of other states and war is likely.

Cambridge boycott Supermarine and Avro...

There's a word for that isn't there? Tr? Tre? Treas-something?

Any ideas?

It's a re-run of Brexit - ditch your biggest, and immediate, market for the promise of a different market, further away, that might - or might not - take up the slack..

I'm a rejoiner, but a Scotland in-England out situation is going to make Brexit look well planned, coherent, & smooth.

'a non-aligned, neutral country that is a member of an economic, diplomatic, and *military* bloc, that funds and arms one side of a war, and conducts economic warfare against the other' is an... opinion..?

There is no definition of neutrality, anywhere, that Ireland meets.

Embarrassing stuff.

What were the tests the T45's did at the USN range in the Pacific in the 2010(?) era?

They were linked to ABM, and there was chat about an 'ASTER 45' missile for the ABM task...

The heartwarming story of a Slovenian sex-worker who fucks for handbags and a Green Card and becomes the First Lady of the United States of America.

I mean, there's some dystopian stuff in there about a dead-eyed ghoul and a quasi-fascist wannabe dictatorship, but I think the central message holds.

The Rose and Crown in Ludlow is very similar to the New Inn...

Anyone who is now screaming that we should latch onto the French in the way we latched on the US hasn't learnt the lesson of this - that having your most vital capabilities dependant on the cooperation of *other people* is a disaster waiting to happen.

It's not France that's the answer, its *us*...

Thing is, the French *had not* been right all along - for 70 years they've been as unreliable as the Americans, and there's a solid chance that in 18 months France will have a quasi-fascist, friendly to Russia President and Foreign and Defence Policy.

1/?

I have long taken the view that he knew it was disaster by the summer of 2003, & the biggest regret of his life, and the messianic, 'government of the world', 'Iraq was worth it' stuff is his mind trying to protect itself from dwelling on the knowledge that if he'd known, he'd never have touched it.

I find it remarkable that Europe watched a speech with 300 lies in it, openly laughed at those 300 lies, and then decided to take him at his word over Greenland.

Bizarre.

Sorry, does anyone actually believe that if the Joint Chiefs of Staff had told Trump/Hesgeth 'no', Trump would have meekly accepted their judgement and not fired them on the spot?

You know, because he's so great with challenge..?

a man in a suit and white shirt is sitting in front of a purple curtain and holding a glass of water . ALT: a man in a suit and white shirt is sitting in front of a purple curtain and holding a glass of water .

Cool.

Did you wear ear defenders and rubber shoes.? 😬

a man in a suit and tie is standing in front of a framed picture ALT: a man in a suit and tie is standing in front of a framed picture

*novel*, possibly even *courageous*...

Personally, I think we should be at panic stations - putting Sidewinder on Nimrod type thing.

I wonder how much of this is keeping up with the US/Gold standard stuff, and how much is 'it'll almost certainly work'..?

Bigger thing is F-35 and carriers. Neither can work without US relationship....

Obvious Q?

Do we *need* a replacement warhead?

If we ditch Counterstrike as doctrine, and revert to city busting, will the Holbrook warheads be credible for as long UK/European industry can keep the missiles in service?

French missiles are shorter and wider - new missile compt into new subs?

We build missiles every day, Trident just happens to be bigger than the ones we currently build.

We also don't need to build them, we simply need to refurbish them every 3-5 years - good thing France does exactly the same thing, good job Europe has a space program that, err.. builds space rockets.

You think they're going to have meaningful elections any time soon?

Aw, that's so sweet...

Svalbard is demilitarised, there are Russians on Svalbard - Svalbard is like the Falklands in March 1982, just without NP8901....

No, we need our *aerospace* industry to sort this out - possibly with French help.

It's only the missile bodies that are problematic, and the body is no different, technically, from an Arriane rocket or a French M51 SLBM.

This stuff is much *less* difficult than keeping F-35 in the air...

Which is odd, because he looks like he died some years ago, and got buried in a suit....