Loads warmer today!! This morning I was up in Teeside with my daughter, walking in the park. We ate in a restaurant. It was an early Christmas visit!! Who know3s what the next month holds??
Meanwhile, out in Coronaland at last the teflon is wearing thin and our clown is covered in manure and it’s not sliding off.
I think there has been one too many gates!! We’ve had Brexitgate, Irishbordergate, Fishinggate, Farmergate, Bordergate, Afghanistangate, Wallpapergate, Cronygate, Covidgate, Powergate, Petrolgate, HGVgate, Lyinggate, Torydonorgate, Secondjobgate, Revolvingdoorgate, Peeragegate, Socialcaregate, Lawbreakinggate, Taxgate and Partygate. I’ve probably missed quite a few!!
Brexit – a bunch of nationalists lied about how great it was all going to be!! It is becoming apparent that it was a complete disaster.
He lied about the Irish border.
He lied about the fishing and farming. Fishermen are going out of business. The loss of labour has meant crops rotting in fields and soaring prices.
He lied about keeping our borders secure and taking back control.
Covid mismanagement with one of the worst death-rates and hardest hit economy.
He made a complete ballsup of getting our Afghan helpers out.
He lied about the massive rises in power.
He lied about the huge increases in petrol. Brexit was going to make it cheaper!
He lied about the Tory donors paying for his refurbishment.
He lied about tariffs and HGV drivers – putting costs up and shortages on shelves.
He lied about cash for questions, lobbying and peerages for donors.
He lied about the revolving door and massive salaries for lobbying and disclosing secrets.
He lied about plans for Social Care and then taxed the poor.
He broke international law, law of the land and parliamentary rules.
He lied about not putting up taxes.
We’re meant to be basking in the sunny uplands with free tariff-free trade and no red-tape, secure borders and £350 million aq week for the NHS!!
What we’ve got is tariffs, queues, extra costs, slow delivery, rising prices, shortages, delays and massive job losses. Not quite what were promised. Where are all these wonderful lucrative trade deals?? Nowhere to be seen.
Now we have parties taking place during lockdown in his own house that he doesn’t know about.
Hasn’t this clown and his ‘gathering’ of extremists caused enough damage? They’ve certainly put billions into the pockets of their chums – and themselves. How much has Rees-Mogg made out of Covid and Brexit (to the nearest million)??
The saga of incompetence continues as our clown addresses the nation to tell us that the ‘irreversible’ is to be reversed! What a plonker!!
So yesterday there were another 54,073 new cases with 132 deaths!! Not looking good!!
Omicron is starting to go mad with another 1239 new cases.
Our Track and Trace is performing as usual. Obviously needs another £37 billion!!
As if the virus isn’t bad enough we have the prospect of our clown addressing us. No doubt he will tell us not to party!! To wear facemasks!! To socially distance!!
We will be regaled with a belated Plan B. Should have been in a week or two back.
We’re heading for Plan C. Now as I remember it:
Plan A – ignore it
Plan B – pretend it isn’t happening and only affects foreigners
Plan C – Panic, flap around and hand out billions to Tories to make things that don’t work.
Plan D – find scapegoats for the deaths, job losses and disasters
As we can see – they actually practice what lies to tell to the public. ‘What do we say about parties, nibbles, party games, alcohol etc. ??” ” Legal gatherings, work-related, no covid rules were broken.”
“But will they swallow that?????”
“They’ll swallow anything!!!”
So as we head towards Christmas Is see that we are moving to Level 4. They will be more hospitalisations than with any previous wave. The hospitals are full of the unvaccinated and they are predicting another 75,000 deaths.
The one good thing is that the Omicron variant may be less lethal. It looks like we’ll all catch it, as it is extremely transmissible, but the vaccines will work. It may kill off a lot but it might create herd immunity in those who remain.
As a triple vaccinated person I’m very confident.
Stay safe!! He’s on his way out!!
Well Opher, I’ve updated my magic spreadsheets with the latest virus data for South Africa and the UK. I’ll e-mail them to you as you may find them of some interest.
It does look as if the South Africans are telling the truth when they say that omicron is much less lethal than delta. In the last three weeks, their daily new cases (weekly averaged) have gone up by a factor of 20 (almost all omicron, so they say). But their daily deaths, after an initial rise in the middle of November, have settled back to roughly what they were at the beginning of November, before omicron became a big factor. It’s a great pity that they aren’t providing hospitalization data to the OWID feed, though; that would give a clear idea of how much less serious omicron is than delta.
UK new cases are less affected by omicron, because those are still a small fraction of the whole. But UK daily deaths are now roughly constant, at a similar level to the second week of September. Hospital occupancy per case has been dropping off gradually since mid November, which if it continues will corroborate the South Africans’ story. And ICU occupancy per case has been gradually dropping since mid August. I’m not yet quite ready to make the call, “The South Africans are right, omicron will not be a problem in comparison with delta,” but I don’t think that moment is too far away – I expect the data will be in before Christmas.
Meanwhile, I think Johnson may have a few more “gates” coming. If it becomes apparent that he has unnecessarily over-reacted on omicron, that will be unpopular to say the least. Moreover, the dreaded Neil Ferguson is claiming that COP26 may have been the “seed” for omicron in Scotland: https://www.thenational.scot/news/19773263.professor-neil-ferguson-omicron-may-seeded-scotland-cop26/. It has not gone unremarked that they waived some of the COVID rules for COP26 delegates! Oops. But Ferguson actually appears, in places, to be talking some sense this time; particularly when he says “At the moment we don’t really have a good handle on the severity of this virus.” If Johnson cancels Christmas again, but omicron fizzles in terms of hospitalizations and deaths, that will be the final end of him. If not, and cases and hospitalizations rise out of control in the New Year, that will have the same effect. Christmasgate and COP26gate, anyone?
On an unrelated subject, I am still getting “new post” e-mails from you in addition to the “like” e-mails. The “like” e-mails, which you have been sending for some months, are very useful to me, since they tell me when (and where) you have responded. But the “new post” e-mails – at least 12 to 15 a day – are cluttering up my in-box. I visit your blog most mornings, and will pick up any new posts you have made then. Can you please switch your site back to how it was until a week or so ago – I get the “like” e-mails, but not the “new post” ones? Thanks.
It will be interesting to monitor how this Omicron develops. It seems to be setting off at an alarming pace. If it does turn out to be less lethal that would be brilliant. We could reach herd immunity despite the antivaxxers. It also has to provide immunity against the other strains though.
As for the posts – I haven’t changed anything at this end. It’s probably WordPress messing about updating stuff. I don’t have any control over them. They are a pain. Every update they do makes things worse.
Any suggestions on what I can do to try to rectify the situation??
The Internet community seems unsure, but I’ve switched off “following” your blog, and we’ll see what happens. “Like” this comment, and I’ll come back with the results tomorrow.
That’s probably the only way to do it Neil.
Yup, it seems to have worked.
I haven’t posted anything yet!!