My puny efforts to get passenger trains and stations reinstated on 38 miles of existing, double track rail lines in Birmingham and the Black Country. Some, such as the Stourbridge, Dudley, Walsall rail line has its middle section reserved for trams that forever prevent passenger trains returning.
As for Trump, no, I don’t believe he is a conservative. His essential message is “Trump first”. The only thing I like about him is his refusal to be cowed by the self-righteousness of his opponents.
On climate change, I resist what I see as a political viewpoint masquerading as “the science”. The aim of the large numbers of alarmists is unprecedented government control and the relative impoverishment of western societies. (SELF: Charles' impoverishment will come once all the very finite fossil fuels are in short supply and becoming too expensive to pump out of the ground.)
CHARLES:
Cheap energy is one of the greatest emancipations produced by our civilisation. (SELF: a pretty short-sighted, foolish, grab what you can while the going is good, sort of society. In fact, a one-off geological inheritance we are blowing in 300 years. And, in the process, with the downside of turning earth into uninhabitable venus with its runaway greenhouse effect!)
ROWAN MOORE:
Yes, I do take the Leave vote seriously. But it was a narrow vote after a flawed campaign (SELF: "sharp practice" - Cameron on prorogation; Cameron should have initially announced the best of three if no one side got 55% or, advisory for MPs to make the final decision) that has been taken as a licence for whatever Brexiter politicians want it to mean. The missed opportunity was to unite the country around a way of leaving the EU that most people would be happy with. I believe Boris Johnson argued for such a thing at the time.
Re climate: if conservatives like yourself don’t want the issue used against you, perhaps you should try harder to show how capitalism can be reconciled with protecting the environment. Thirty years after Mrs Thatcher raised the issue the noises from the right seem to be saying “it’s not really happening” or “it’s not that bad” or “we’ll muddle through”.
What I find really striking is how strongly you feel that the world is against you and likeminded people, and unfairly so. What I see is 40 years in which the Conservatives have mostly been in power (without ever winning a majority of the vote, thanks to our electoral system), in which Thatcherism has been hugely influential, and in which the Daily Telegraph has, with an amazing blurring of editorial and news, helped to put your fellow columnist into Downing Street.
Of course, if you think you are wrongly oppressed anything is allowable – Cummings’s rulebreaking, Johnson’s lies and betrayals – but I would ask you, too, to check your privilege.
However, you have given me a clearer idea of how liberal assumptions can sound from the outside. I intend to watch myself when I fall into the lazy habits that can go with my worldview. I hope you – or anyone else who feels like it – will point them out to me.
"On the 7th day of her illness Mary Wakefield accompanied her son to hospital in the ambulance. I understand her feelings about her child, but would it not have been appropriate for one of her nieces to take the child to hospital rather than risk the lives of NHS staff and patients. We are told that the reason for Cummings making the trip to Durham was so that his neices could take care of the child if required. Surely this would have been such a situation."
"The government have updated their Covid19 slogan:Stay EliteControl your storySave your career"
"66 mile roundtrip to a place of beauty with his wife and toddler in the car to check his eyesight, which btw happens to be his wife's birthday - all classed as legal and reasonable. Does this govt really think the British public is that thick??"
"The public had a choice, elect a caring, thoughtful and righteous man or elect an adulterous, lying(proven) racist; you reap what you sow."
"So let me get this right. A man and his wife who live in London a highly infectious area of the UK, who both think they have COVID decide to drive 200 miles taking the virus with them ?"
"The letter from Eton College must have been released by a Johnson family member, who else could it have been? Nobody knows Johnson better than his family and they know as PM he's way out of his depth."
LETTER TO BORIS JOHNSON. You have managed to turn the Nation from a laughing stock into one that other Nations view with pity and disbelief. You and your hand-picked government of yes men (and women) have presided over and directly caused the deaths of many thousands of British people. You are a man of straw who opportunistically changed your politics to suit the mood of the majority that you yourself, unintentionally or otherwise created and influenced to become anti-EU, with your relentless, fabricated ridicule of the EU for years. You and your policies are directly responsible for the deaths of hundreds of precious NHS workers, each one of whom is worth more than you will ever be, what of them? Another empty round of applause, even a memorial or a minutes silence? That should take care of things, huh? Or is it "dulce et decorum est pro-patria Mori" eh Boris? After all, they are just minions, the ones who have to obey the rules. I was a life long conservative, I just hope I live long enough to see Keir Starmer take back control, and start to make Britain live up to its title of "Great" Britain, instead of trailing even the Third World with the "greatest" death toll.
"Cummings is on the SAGE committee and is chief advisor to the government.Their handling of the Covid-19 crisis has been consistently catastrophic..That alone should be reason enough for him to be replaced but no, apparently he is too important."
"Thank you, James. Cumming's was responsible for the herd immunity policy at the start of this crisis and the UK lost 5 precious weeks. I still believe the hidden agenda is herd immunity, so long as the health service isn't overwhelmed. No one knows the true numbers of infected or recovered and we'll never know. All we can do is monitor the excess death rate. Cummings should be in court."
"This man lied during the EU Referendum and never even acknowledged his lies. He supported Theresa May by stabbing her in the back. He has consistently avoided taking responsibility for anything that he was responsible for. He says that he didn't see the email from the EU inviting us to join together to obtain the necessary tests and PPE. He has appointed so many incompetent people to senior positions because those who are competent do not agree with him. He quite literally talks Greek and/or blusters when asked to respond to questions. The latest action in defending a self-centered fool for doing something that he expects everyone else in the country to do makes me feel sick to understand how he has managed to fool so many people for so long. I feel gutted that I do not believe that he will suffer for his misdeeds, incompetence, and selfishness other than to go down as the worse PM in the history of the UK. It is tragic indeed that he still has sufficient support within the conservative party to remain PM."
One happy old man climbing 1,000 major hills in the UK and planting 1,000 trees - both since 1980 and now achieved but continuing!
Full-time cycle commuter since October 2003. My family of six bikes; four humans with four full driving licences; three vacuum cleaners; one pet rat; and, ONE 12.5 year old car.
