General News Thread

[Trav Le Bleu]

1 hour ago, leicsmac said:

There's plenty of good and altruistic mixed in with the evil, both past and present. 

 

However, while humans have stayed humans, our technological power has not, and therefore the stakes are higher than they have been at any time since the dawn of recorded civilisation. So things do have to change, because if they don't, the next time the wheel is spun and it lands on a zero, the consequences will not be limited as they have been in historical examples, simply because of how far we've come along the tech tree. 

 

The old ideas can't survive the new times. 

Typically though evil uses all sorts of nasty things to subdue altruism.

 

It's much easier to obtain power by nefarious means and an altruistic person wouldn't seek power.

 

As the quote goes (I can't remember who said it and I'm probably paraphrasing it), "those who want power are the last people who should have it."

[Lionator]

19 minutes ago, Heathrow fox said:

This is total nonsense.As much as the British government wants a war with Russia in it’s dreams.It will always have to do as it’s told.

The USA will never sacrifice NewYork Chicago and LA  to save London Paris and Berlin.Never.So it’s a bit of a stretch to expect them to wave goodbye to Houston for the sake of bloody Sunderland.Not aimed at you but it’s astonishing how many mugs still believe this.

A change in leader by any which means would speed things up a bit.

There are people on the left and right who are called Putin sympathisers who oppose confrontation with them, but the centre ground majority are united in the idea that Russia is an enemy and any compromise with them is surrender, the only way is to militarily crush them. If Ukraine run out of men, then we will have to do it. Some days I agree, some days I don’t. We say these things will never happen until they do. In October 2022, Russia was days away from using nuclear weapons against Ukrainian troops, they chickened out thankfully. But this can spiral out of control faster than you think. Even if Trump withdraws which I think may happen soon, France and the UK will go to war with Russia because we have nukes, therefore we think they wouldn’t possibly fight us. 

[leicsmac]

1 hour ago, Trav Le Bleu said:

Typically though evil uses all sorts of nasty things to subdue altruism.

 

It's much easier to obtain power by nefarious means and an altruistic person wouldn't seek power.

 

As the quote goes (I can't remember who said it and I'm probably paraphrasing it), "those who want power are the last people who should have it."

Absolutely right. 

 

Only thing to do is to keep fighting the good fight. 

 

"They cannot conquer forever."

[leicsmac]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c86076qd40xo

 

The heads of the UK's national institute for artificial intelligence (AI) have acknowledged recent months have been "challenging" for staff as the charity undergoes "substantial" change.

It comes after staff raised "serious and escalating concerns" in a whistleblowing complaint this week submitted to the Charity Commission.

They warned that the body - which receives £100m from the government - is at risk of collapse after Technology Secretary Peter Kyle instructed it to prioritise defence, and threatened to pull its funding if it did not.

In a letter seen by the BBC, Chair Dr Doug Gurr said the Turing Institute would "step up at a time of national need".

 

It's one of those sad truths that when tech moves forward, even in a place like the UK, it tends to manifest itself around the cause of killing people. 

 

Oh no, sorry, "defence".

[Free Falling Foxes]

I wonder if they shouted 'Fore' as they came down.

[Trav Le Bleu]

3 hours ago, leicsmac said:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c86076qd40xo

 

The heads of the UK's national institute for artificial intelligence (AI) have acknowledged recent months have been "challenging" for staff as the charity undergoes "substantial" change.

It comes after staff raised "serious and escalating concerns" in a whistleblowing complaint this week submitted to the Charity Commission.

They warned that the body - which receives £100m from the government - is at risk of collapse after Technology Secretary Peter Kyle instructed it to prioritise defence, and threatened to pull its funding if it did not.

In a letter seen by the BBC, Chair Dr Doug Gurr said the Turing Institute would "step up at a time of national need".

 

It's one of those sad truths that when tech moves forward, even in a place like the UK, it tends to manifest itself around the cause of killing people. 

 

Oh no, sorry, "defence".

Like I said earlier...

 

And also, how is this a charity? 

[urban.spaceman]

Rumours abound that the 19 year old Reform Deputy Leader of the Leicestershire County Council has been sacked. 

[Sly]

So it sounds like Putin told Trump in Alaska, in order for the war to end, the following needs to happen:

 

Ukraine not to join NATO

Ukraine aren’t getting land back

 

With today’s meeting, if you’re Zelensky, that’s a tough thing to accept, however knowing it brings an end to the bloodshed do you concede? The major concern will always be that Russia kicks off again, as the no NATO thing is the thing that stops stuff like this happening.

 

I personally, wouldn’t take that deal. 

[st albans fox]

30 minutes ago, Sly said:

So it sounds like Putin told Trump in Alaska, in order for the war to end, the following needs to happen:

 

Ukraine not to join NATO

Ukraine aren’t getting land back

 

With today’s meeting, if you’re Zelensky, that’s a tough thing to accept, however knowing it brings an end to the bloodshed do you concede? The major concern will always be that Russia kicks off again, as the no NATO thing is the thing that stops stuff like this happening.

 

I personally, wouldn’t take that deal. 

If he doesn’t take it then it probably gets worse cos trump will not continue to offer the support needed and we’ve seen that the Europeans aren’t capable of filing the void - both with weapons and intel. 
 

I think the sell to Ukraine will be that it isn’t the entirety all four oblasts and Putin will allow the west to have boots on the ground in Ukraine as part of a ‘nato protection deal’ - think ‘west Germany lite’ with its nato bases. (But way smaller).   So not nato membership with its guaranteed protection but nato forces providing 24/7 assistance and defacto protection.  If Putin can sell as a win with no nato membership then effective nato protection is good enough ???
 

 

[st albans fox]

5 hours ago, urban.spaceman said:

Rumours abound that the 19 year old Reform Deputy Leader of the Leicestershire County Council has been sacked. 

Sacked by whom ??

Is there a fall back mechanism in the event that the person ‘elected’ to the position is incapable of carrying it out. 

[Jon the Hat]

1 minute ago, st albans fox said:

If he doesn’t take it then it probably gets worse cos trump will not continue to offer the support needed and we’ve seen that the Europeans aren’t capable of filing the void - both with weapons and intel. 
 

I think the sell to Ukraine will be that it isn’t the entirety all four oblasts and Putin will allow the west to have boots on the ground in Ukraine as part of a ‘nato protection deal’ - think ‘west Germany lite’ with its nato bases. (But way smaller).   So not nato membership with its guaranteed protection but nato forces providing 24/7 assistance and defacto protection.  If Putin can sell as a win with no nato membership then effective nato protection is good enough ???

Russia's objective is to remove Ukraine as a sovereign power which brings Western forces - both economic and military - to their borders.  Anything Russia agrees now will only be on their route to achieving this.  the only thing that will stop them is force, and it remains unclear if there is even a way to push them back without triggering something much worse.

 

So if Ukraine are forced to agree to giving up some land - which does not achieve Russia's objective - it must be on the condition of a US + Europe backed security guarantee plus the ability to make it much much harder for Russia to break the agreement in future.  The problem being that probably means Russia will not agree.  Its a proper stalemate because of the incompatible demands.

[Jon the Hat]

6 minutes ago, st albans fox said:

Sacked by whom ??

Is there a fall back mechanism in the event that the person ‘elected’ to the position is incapable of carrying it out. 

He is elected as a councillor, his fellow councillors made him deputy leader and can remove him from that position with a vote.

[Sly]

25 minutes ago, st albans fox said:

If he doesn’t take it then it probably gets worse cos trump will not continue to offer the support needed and we’ve seen that the Europeans aren’t capable of filing the void - both with weapons and intel. 
 

I think the sell to Ukraine will be that it isn’t the entirety all four oblasts and Putin will allow the west to have boots on the ground in Ukraine as part of a ‘nato protection deal’ - think ‘west Germany lite’ with its nato bases. (But way smaller).   So not nato membership with its guaranteed protection but nato forces providing 24/7 assistance and defacto protection.  If Putin can sell as a win with no nato membership then effective nato protection is good enough ???
 

 

Yes, valid points actually. 
 

So you got a soft wall of protection. That region will be hostile for years to come though, if it wasn’t already. 

[Sly]

5 hours ago, urban.spaceman said:

Rumours abound that the 19 year old Reform Deputy Leader of the Leicestershire County Council has been sacked. 

 

[st albans fox]

53 minutes ago, Jon the Hat said:

He is elected as a councillor, his fellow councillors made him deputy leader and can remove him from that position with a vote.

Why ?

[leicsmac]

8 hours ago, Trav Le Bleu said:

Like I said earlier...

 

And also, how is this a charity? 

Yep.

 

And I think it's a "charity" from the point of view that it's an organisation that doesn't turn a profit? Its current objectives certainly do not seem particularly charitable. 

 

 

[Lionator]

3 hours ago, Sly said:

So it sounds like Putin told Trump in Alaska, in order for the war to end, the following needs to happen:

 

Ukraine not to join NATO

Ukraine aren’t getting land back

 

With today’s meeting, if you’re Zelensky, that’s a tough thing to accept, however knowing it brings an end to the bloodshed do you concede? The major concern will always be that Russia kicks off again, as the no NATO thing is the thing that stops stuff like this happening.

 

I personally, wouldn’t take that deal. 

It has been known that this would be the end game since the summer of 2023 but people have kept kicking the can down the road. Again the only way to prevent this outcome is for European countries to go to war with Russia. 

[Lionator]

2 hours ago, Jon the Hat said:

Russia's objective is to remove Ukraine as a sovereign power which brings Western forces - both economic and military - to their borders.  Anything Russia agrees now will only be on their route to achieving this.  the only thing that will stop them is force, and it remains unclear if there is even a way to push them back without triggering something much worse.

 

So if Ukraine are forced to agree to giving up some land - which does not achieve Russia's objective - it must be on the condition of a US + Europe backed security guarantee plus the ability to make it much much harder for Russia to break the agreement in future.  The problem being that probably means Russia will not agree.  Its a proper stalemate because of the incompatible demands.

Which is why we’re on the cusp of a nuclear world war 3 and nobody seems to grasp this. 

[leicsmac]

1 minute ago, Lionator said:

Which is why we’re on the cusp of a nuclear world war 3 and nobody seems to grasp this. 

There will be an agreement reached before that happens, simply because as much as both the US and Russian leadership value looking hard, they value their own ego and self-preservation more. 

 

If, gods forbid, it does happen, it will be because of some kind of terrible error or misunderstanding at some point in escalation, not as a deliberate act. 

[Robo61]

1 hour ago, st albans fox said:

Why ?

Because they could

[Lionator]

5 minutes ago, leicsmac said:

There will be an agreement reached before that happens, simply because as much as both the US and Russian leadership value looking hard, they value their own ego and self-preservation more. 

 

If, gods forbid, it does happen, it will be because of some kind of terrible error or misunderstanding at some point in escalation, not as a deliberate act. 

Of course! Nobody wants that although the public could be easily convinced that psycho Putin does, therefore we might as well fight them anyway. And Trump does seem to have a fear of nukes more than any president in modern history which is why he’s throwing Ukraine under the bus. It’s cruel but you either press the accelerator and push even closer to the abyss or eventually you say enough is enough and make concessions. As Rubio said yesterday, this war has zero impact on everyday life in the states and in Western Europe too. It’s not existential to us. It will always mean more to Russia than the USA. Trump is doing now what the American people elected him to do. Now it’s up to us in Britain, Germany and the rest of Europe to either fight Russia and get obliterated or to make concessions. 

[leicsmac]

34 minutes ago, Lionator said:

Of course! Nobody wants that although the public could be easily convinced that psycho Putin does, therefore we might as well fight them anyway. And Trump does seem to have a fear of nukes more than any president in modern history which is why he’s throwing Ukraine under the bus. It’s cruel but you either press the accelerator and push even closer to the abyss or eventually you say enough is enough and make concessions. As Rubio said yesterday, this war has zero impact on everyday life in the states and in Western Europe too. It’s not existential to us. It will always mean more to Russia than the USA. Trump is doing now what the American people elected him to do. Now it’s up to us in Britain, Germany and the rest of Europe to either fight Russia and get obliterated or to make concessions. 

Yes, it's the powers that be reverting to the old "spheres of influence" model best known during the Cold War (but with less actual antagonism between those same powers).

 

Whether people think that's acceptable or even inimical to future progress and survival as a civilisation is clearly up to the beholder. 

 

Personally, I think that an agreement along the lines of "Russia gets what it has taken, but it won't happen again" will be arrived at, and, yet again, the deaths and displacement of millions of people for the sake of some puerile great game is tragic and, more importantly, meaningless. 

[Zear0]

1 hour ago, Lionator said:

Of course! Nobody wants that although the public could be easily convinced that psycho Putin does, therefore we might as well fight them anyway. And Trump does seem to have a fear of nukes more than any president in modern history which is why he’s throwing Ukraine under the bus. It’s cruel but you either press the accelerator and push even closer to the abyss or eventually you say enough is enough and make concessions. As Rubio said yesterday, this war has zero impact on everyday life in the states and in Western Europe too. It’s not existential to us. It will always mean more to Russia than the USA. Trump is doing now what the American people elected him to do. Now it’s up to us in Britain, Germany and the rest of Europe to either fight Russia and get obliterated or to make concessions. 

Get a grip, there's not going to be a nuclear exchange over this.  It's more likely to end that way if we just roll over in Ukraine where a conventional war against a non-nuclear power is taking place.

 

Rubio is engaged in arse covering at the moment as the Trump administration has just been very publicly embarrassed by the outcome of the Alaska summit.  We've gone from Trump saying “very severe consequences on Russia if its President Vladimir Putin doesn’t agree to end his war in Ukraine during the summit" to Rubio last night saying "The problem is this – let’s use our heads here. The problem is this: The minute you levy additional sanctions, strong additional sanctions, the talking stops."  They've honestly not got a clue what to do, and even if they did, either don't have the minerals to do anything or, as suspected, Putin has something on Trump.  If the US are too nervous about putting economic sanctions on Russia, then the Russian's aren't exactly going to be concerned about Ukrainian security guarantees or indeed Article 5 ones.

 

With this not having an impact on western life, this again is Rubio trying to dig themselves out of a hole as that's just rubbish.  A massive contributor to the cost of living crisis was this war which has been a driver in the rise of populism that must make Putin rub his hands as we get more sycophants like Trump, Farage, Le Pen, Fico and Nawrocki.

 

Putin has called the US' bluff.  He has zero to fear from them economically or militarily as the summit prove to him they won't go through with anything.  If they agree to surrender the Donbas, it'll move the frontline past the Ukrainian lines of defence, put them on a highway to Kyiv and this will happen again. 

 

I'm not for a second suggesting the West deploy troops in Ukraine as that is a recipe for serious escalation which is what you're proposal on concessions entails btw.  I'm advocating to put the biggest sanctions on as possible on Russia, as well as secondary tariffs (striking that he did this to India but not China, TACO again) on his allies. China being the main one given they are clearly annoyed that Russia did this.

Edited 18 August 2025 by Zear0

[Trav Le Bleu]

15 minutes ago, leicsmac said:

 

Personally, I think that an agreement along the lines of "Russia gets what it has taken, but it won't happen again" will be arrived at,

And in a couple of years Russia will take more of Ukraine.

 

Putin makes these promises, hands behind his back, fingers crossed.

[leicsmac]

16 minutes ago, Trav Le Bleu said:

And in a couple of years Russia will take more of Ukraine.

 

Putin makes these promises, hands behind his back, fingers crossed.

I emphatically agree. 

 

That's why any agreement has to come with security guarantees, or it's pointless.