Steven P

weird, for all the things out there slating Trump, I rarely see art - the world has changed, video clips, ticktocks and twatterings - the quick fixes, but it takes a special effort to create proper artworks.

Little difference between that and a garden bonfire, and little difference to the heating of the house too.

It is a rehash I think of what was before so anyone with a stove installed won't be required to replace it, just more controls of what you can sell new. It is a Labour thing is week so the Telegraph is very angry this morning. 18 months ago it was a Tory thing so the Guardian was very angry. As for wood - the ready to burn scheme is an attempt to make wood have a maximum moisture content, else it needs to be sold with a note telling you how to dry it and you can only sell limited quantities (? I think)... though of course you can sell it like that and the customer can stash it in the rain by the back porch, there is nothing to require them to keep it dry.

Yup, I'd agree with that.

the last government wanted to do the same thing too, went quiet for a bit, is this just them dusting off those ideas again?

Ahhh, so much truth there from JonsonD, your pants are probably self combusting right now. Ridiculous rightarded poster that you are. Now did you have something constructive to add to the thread or are you just happy to dish out the ever so effective attacks and insults?

Why do you find that incredulous? I have a sky dish of course, it is in the woods as a cheap lightweight firepit, I don't watch football on TV so have no need for sky TV.

It is not his plane, it goes to his library. I wonder if my library card would let me borrow it for 4 weeks?

but then the idea of defence being in the hands of who ever is willing to fork out the train fare to get to where the fight is falls down to that isn't it? Take on a reasonable sized town, say 50,000 people, 25,000 men, 2,500 willing to go and defend it might work, but take on a small coastal village, 500 people, 250 men, 25 defenders is an easy foot hold unless there is some centralised way to persuade people from elsewhere to travel over and defend. Back to 'people are selfish' you see.

Ahh, but it is them paying from their own pocket to defend "a load of Londoners" that the Glaswegians might not like so much.

Sorry Kram - I should have said the box to store the sharpener in the car - that one to be stackable with other tools (handy for in the workshop too).

Just playing devils advocate here... SAMs on top of sky scrapers would only work if the owner of the sky scraper thought the workers in there were doing something irreplaceable and valuable, or if data (in the case of data centres) was worth the protection. I reckon if most saw something aiming at them they would just evacuate the building and make an insurance claim. You forget we are a nation of selfish people, target a neighbouring building, we wouldn't use our defences to protect them... if they didn't pay for any, tough! Likewise a numbers of soldiers, 25 million 'potential' but... if an invasion was in Hastings (history does repeat itself), selfishness, but 2 1/5 millions Scotsmen arn't going to pay their own way to jump on a train using their own ammunition to save some Londoners (likewise for Cornishmen, Yorkshiremen, Lancastrians...). Not going to start on law and order either. So I get your point but somewhere for our society to run there does need some centralised organisation to coordinate and make it all work.

There will be a pay back going the other way, I don't believe he does much unless there is something in it for him (usually $$).

Think you are onto a winner (from me anyway) with the tool box. Just a small modification for other tools as well... and make them all stackable? So perhaps standardised dimensions (could go half width or full width for thinner / thicker tools).

That's a thing AHPP, a good idea to pay as you use it - a good example might be petrol taxes (and now electric vehicle pay per mile) to support the road networks through extra taxes that a pedestrian doesn't use. But... things like the armed forces you can't opt out, image "we're not going to invade apart from number 57 who haven't paid to be defended, we'll invade them" - the things for all of society that you cannot opt out of because it covers us all equally. There is also an efficiency in collecting the cash centrally rather than every service having a cash collection department.

Oooh, 'Leftard', does that make you a Rightard, and your attitude rightarded? Just wondering,

Anecdotal evidence of course but my local supermarket petrol 'does the job' but the one with 'Bigger Prices' is far superior - a few more mpg in the car. Could be something in that. All the base petrol comes from the same refinery of course, but different companies put different additives in to make it their own. Supermarkets are less likely to add so much. Of course small local garage might not sell the quantities as a bigger one - could be something there too.

Yes, I think you are both saying the same thing here, if the BBC (or others) report something then they have to be able to stand by their reports as accurate. A correction should have been made, and it was. but.... shouldn't ever happen. Control of the press has been the tactic of tin pot dictators through history - any countries leader that is honourable and able to defend their actions would never control the press like Trump is trying to do... the BBC will be wary of any critical pieces from now on, which is a bad thing. Noting that the UK - according to the World Press Freedom Index (Wikipedia it) - ranks about 20th in 180 countries, the US is about 60th - British journalists are afforded a lot more freedom to report than their US based peers. Perhaps Trump doesn't like that much either (that last sentence was of course, an opinion). But that goes back to what you are both saying, our national press needs to be trusted. It also needs the freedom to report - accurately - as it sees fit. One last problem is that while the press organisations have standards, more and more people are getting their news reports from social media - linkedin, facebook, bebo and so on - who are not obliged to uphold any standards and what is posted there should be seen as opinion pieces only. Very easy for them to push an agenda by what articles they promote and there is little control of that (see the last elections with Cambridge analytics (?) doing that). At least the BBC is kind of unbiased with their reporting (some reports are biased one way, some the other but as a whole, generally neutral). Back to yesterday though, (opinion here) Trump is milking this presidency for all he can get, far more than any others did before.

Nixon and Clinton did the decent thing though and kept any corruption hidden. Trump is not even trying to hide what he is doing.

Did we mention his Trump phone yet? Taken thousands of $100 deposits for a phone made in the US, no phone in sight yet, but the cash is in his accounts.

So, how is he doing this week? The Gaza ceasefire is holding, with only non aggressive missiles and killings from both sides. Still in the first 24 hours of his presidency, the war in Ukraine is still on going. Latest offering is that the Ukraine give up more ground than the Russians currently occupy, walk away from any thoughts of NATO membership and accept that 'The West' will protect them, Russia will stop invading. Might be cynical but that was the deal after Crimea wasn't it. He did sign to get the Epstein papers released... shortly after persuading the FBI to create 'active investigations' into some of those named in them (Clinton and others) - meaning most will not be released. Most of the papers containing allegations about Trump will be heavily redacted (black marker pens!) or used as a part of these investigations. His dementia is getting worse - classic signs are shown almost every day (aggressive, incoherent and so on), as well as falling asleep in the oval office in front of the press. Almost like he was right when he said an 80 year old Biden was too old... an 80 year old Trump is also too old to be effective. His 'people' have stopped treating him like a make-a-wish kid, so perhaps they have learned how to handle him better. Laying into all reporters he doesn't agree with as 'stupid' or commenting on their appearances... forgetting of course that the press are his mouthpiece to the world at large. Still not a rip roaring success, unless you are his bank manager. So what is the alternative? JD Vance has been slipping in the opinion polls as the heir to the throne. Very quiet that one, though he did pop up this week to ask the military if any of them actually like turkey

Get into power, launch a crypto currency, make policies that the government will support crypto currency more and take a commission for each of yours that you sell. Trumps are now worth more than his property empire (reputed to be billions), from nothing at the start of the year. That one? To continue the thought from above, Trumps fortune has rocketed since he was elected for the 2nd time, much of it profiting from his position. The other biggie is his ballroom, first touted that he would pay the 200 million from his own pocket but now it is 300 millions, and 'others' are paying for it - big corporations who will not be doing that out the goodness of their hearts, they will want their payback, Trump will want his name on the ballroom, a $300million bung to get his name in lights for eternity. Big corporations will need to say the payback on capital invested will be returned double or more. But... a sure he is an honourable man (?), all he does is for the good of the US and the greater world.

Like the shoulder to crayon...

That's true, but... all politicians change their minds yearly, I wouldn't be surprised if they reinstate it next year as a 'isn't the government wonderful to you' gift though. I tend to only count for the coming year because I have no clue what they will change in the next budget. (edit here: With inflation I guess you could say that fuel duty being frozen for the year, not being linked to inflation makes it a drop 'in real terms'... but would be grasping at straws to say that... though I have a vague memory of about 10 years ago a chancellor trying to sell us that line)

Done the sums last night, broadly speaking they'll be taking the same tax from me as before. What did amuse me though is that -even before she had stood up to speak- the Daily Mails calculator was headlined by "How much MORE will YOU pay"... not saying they are biased but... in their actual calculator when I looked they (and the Telegraph) only asked about what will put your tax bill up so any gains from it were not included "Do you drive an electric car" but forgetting fuel (petrol) duty being frozen as an example. Bit of a bland budget to be honest, nothing to get too wound up about, and nothing to get excited about either.