Chat about Novel Coronavirus - 2019-nCoV - COVID-19

What we need is Susie Dent

Yes

Right. Turns out the point was to make it so Johnson can now just stonewall any questions about Cummings. I guess if the press continue to ask questions for days on end without getting anything new then the 'media obsession' and 'time to move on' narrative that's been seeded will build.

I think it will pass, I'm a bit over it all already and I'm rabidly anti Tory.

Cute. It comes from Kabbalah. It became fashionable in Europe in the 17th century apparently.

Perversely both of you are right. The term does come from Kabbalah but also the term was popularised by the privy councillors @Dammit mentioned

I guess if the press continue to ask questions for days on end without getting anything new then the 'media obsession' and 'time to move on' narrative that's been seeded will build.

It will, but I think this one will bite the Tories in the next election if they haven't ditched Cummings by then.

Cummings is basically saying "well you didn't have to, it's not my fault you followed the government guidelines, I guess your relatives are less important to you than my family is to me".

People have stuck by the rules even though it caused hardship and pain to their own loved ones. Sick parents HAVE looked after their children. People have said goodbyes to dying relatives via iPad rather than visit in person. Bereaved people have been left living alone with families unable to visit and comfort them. That's not a memory that diminishes with time even if the media move on.

Kabbala קבלה comes from the Hebrew word לקבל - to receive ie the received tradition handed down alongside the other books of Jewish law, the Talmud from לומד = learning and torah תורה from להורות to instruct

The Kabbala was handed down secretly, not for general consumption, esoteric text for people who'd studied the Talmud for the 40 the years needed to comprehend it. (unless you're Madonna) (I may be wrong)

Perhaps being in the elite group allowed to study the kabbala led to cabbal?

Back to Cummings, from the Hebrew לקום, lakum, meaning to rise up...

"well you didn't have to, it's not my fault you followed the government guidelines, I guess your relatives are less important to you than my family is to me".

I think it Was more, “well, you weren’t clever enough to find the loophole, suckers”

https://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Attraction_Review-g190814-d2048791-Reviews-or5-Barnard_Castle-Barnard_Castle_County_Durham_England.html#REVIEWS

The regulation that Cummings kept referring to at the presser today was put in to enable a parent to take their child and leave if in fear of domestic abuse during lockdown, it was absolutely not put in there to address an unwillingness to obtain childcare locally.

Exactly.

Huh, I thought Dammit was making an original funny.

Dislike that the Johnson briefing was held via video link to journalists after we had just seen them all in person, in the Downing Street back garden. The mute button was liberally applied and there was a lack of follow up questions. The questions from the public are equally a pointless addition because they only serve to trigger scripted softball responses.

Questions from the public are filibustering.

i think part of what has happened is there has been a shying away of people to return to work - i dont mean without cause as i still think theres high risk factors, but just over what the govt would have liked to have seen over the last fortnight. Suns out for one, if we stay holed up taking the money it never really kicks in to gear. The foot up the back side the public needs is exactly whats happened here, call out a non MP but still significant person attached to govt for wrongdoing which flick a switch in the minds of millions 'well if he can..i can!' resentment of lockdown and it goes along that whole plan of how do you enact a herd immunity but without it being the govts request?, very much along the lines reported of 'control the virus' in terms of ownership, spin a rather unsophisticated reverse psychology, open up the emotional channels in a few when the press get brutal and again youve kind of captured the majority of the demographic in acting exactly as you want them to and accepting the worst govt thats ever existed. Or is that just my take?

I always struggle with the idea these guys are geniuses playing three dimensional chess, when the simplest explanation is that they are blundering idiots.

This.

Listened on radio. Some good questions at end... They missed an open goal though, as mentioned a few posts back: "How many loo stops did your son need on way up to & back from Durham?"

I've done a 5 hour car journey with no loo stops for a 4 year old. I've also done a 5 hour car journey where we stopped 5 times (including several times in a portapotty shittin in a bus stop within 10 minutes of setting off).

On the way back they'd done their 14 days in self-quarantine and so they could stop as many times as they liked (including to fill the car up).

Much as a I dislike him and all he stands for there's a lot of it that is explained away after the initial transgression (and laughable BC trip), but it does sound like:
a) a lawyer has checked everything and helped him write it
b) it everything he explained covers every time he was seen, and no other times
c) the "let me see if I can drive for 30 minutes" excuse is laughable
d) as others have said, liars go in to a lot of detail to cover their tracks, see (b)
e) he claims to have proof he was in London on the days he was alleged to be back up North
f) it's quite plausible he didn't feel safe at his London home, the various videos online seem to be good evidence of this

If anyone uncovers evidence that disproves anything he's said so far he is toast, but I doubt he's stupid enough to fall foul of that.

Lastly, if anyone uses his behaviour to suddenly ignore some/all of the lockdown rules they're just as stupid. Two wrongs don't make a right. The NHS are pleading with people to keep to the lockdown rules in spite of what Cummings has done.

Agree. These are the guys who, while attempting to fight Coronavirus, managed to spread it between themselves and drive it half way around the country.

BJ saying the public will make up their own minds about Cummings’ trips and whether he broke any law or guidance. Ok, I’ve made up my mind so how do I vote him out? Oh I can’t you say? I have to wait until 2024 and vote for a new government? Well that’s a bit crap then.

Lastly, if anyone uses his behaviour to suddenly ignore some/all of the lockdown rules they're just as stupid. Two wrongs don't make a right. The NHS are pleading with people to keep to the lockdown rules in spite of what Cummings has done.

And i totally agree with you but i dont underestimate the level of conniving - we know theres history of malice behind the blundering idiot facade. I think they set their pedestal at United Russia party levels but fall well short in actual execution.

I'm just going to bang my head on a wall for a bit.

Yep. Hanlon's Razor.

Yep

All bots innit?

https://twitter.com/marcowenjones/status/1264990612627034112?s=19

A very interesting read

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1265043973158121472.html