Britain is going to be Tory for at least 10 years.

[Rum]

Well I'm afraid the facts don't provide evidence for this. Railway financing is complex and involves subsidies, franchise payments, repayment of surpluses and so on but if you dig deep you can get a summary- here for example: https://fullfact.org/news/do-train-oper ... e-profits/

(won't paste as a table of course so you'll need your specs - or use the link!)


Operating profit (£million)
2009 2010 2011

Arriva Trains Wales 3.4 -27.8 20.5
C2C Rail 3.8 0.8 14.7
Chiltern Railways 67.5 49.4 -57.1
Cross Country 3 -30
East Coast 19.9 19.3 4.6
East Midlands Trains 16 6.6 -34
First Capital Connect 30.3 37.9 2.5
First Great Western 15.3 24.1 -52.3
First ScotRail -12.8 9.4 15.6
London Midland 22.5 30.3 -2.7
London Overground 12.5 13.3 7.5
Merseyrail -0.3 -4.7 14.9
National Express East Anglia -8.4 -12.9 29.6
Northern Rail 3.8 9.7 35.2
South West Trains 13.8 15.3 47.5
Southeastern 1.3 21.8
Southern 5.4 -2 18.5
Virgin Trains -4.3 -16.4 34.3

[Scot Dutchy]

Found this in the Indie comments:

When Britain will be a full new star in the US flag we too will do the same. Oh it's so fulfilling to having ranted against the EU to regain our sovereignty and throw ourselves in the arms of our beloved cousins.

So many others have been listening to their inner Galaxian.

[mistermack]

It's never going to happen.
If we don't want Merkel's muslims coming to live here, we certainly won't want a load of Americans coming over for free operations on the NHS.

I could just about tolerate the muslims, but Americans, no way.

[Brian Peacock]

[Svartalf]

It's never going to happen.
If we don't want Merkel's muslims coming to live here, we certainly won't want a load of Americans coming over for free operations on the NHS.

I could just about tolerate the muslims, but Americans, no way.

shows that you don't have that many muslamic thugs around in Britain... Merkin thugs at least saved our bacon 70 years ago, muslims have never been anything but trouble.

[mistermack]

And we saved the Americans bacon too.

If Hitler had won the war, and controlled Russia as well, the US wouldn't have stood a chance.
As well as dwarfing the US, the new Reich would have had the H bomb long before the US got one. And the means to deliver it.

We would all be lost in admiration of Hitler's legacy today, if it hadn't been for the UK.

[Brian Peacock]

And if it wasn't for Wellington and Nelson we'd all be speaking French. So what?

[Rum]

And we saved the Americans bacon too.

If Hitler had won the war, and controlled Russia as well, the US wouldn't have stood a chance.
As well as dwarfing the US, the new Reich would have had the H bomb long before the US got one. And the means to deliver it.

We would all be lost in admiration of Hitler's legacy today, if it hadn't been for the UK.

'What if' is a fun game to play but no winners.

The USA would have had an atomic bomb first though. They were miles ahead.

Russia was out of reach in any case - to much of a stretch - and of course Japan was taking huge chunks of China and the Eastern USSR. War between the Reich and Japan would also have been very likely.

But who really knows except the Lizard overlords who control our parallel universes.

[JimC]

When I hear my inner Galaxian I reach for my Luger...

[Hermit]

And if it wasn't for Wellington and Nelson Blücher we'd all be speaking French. So what?

[mistermack]

The USA would have had an atomic bomb first though. They were miles ahead.

Only four years ahead of Stalin. Not really miles ahead. And the Germans were ahead of the Russians. If Hitler had not been fighting a war with Britain, the nuclear project wouldn't have been put on the back burner.

Russia was out of reach in any case - to much of a stretch - and of course Japan was taking huge chunks of China and the Eastern USSR. War between the Reich and Japan would also have been very likely.

If Hitler had not been fighting a war on two fronts, he would easily have beaten Russia.
They got to within sight of Moscow as it was. And I thought that Japan was his ally, and was fighting the US?
Japan was fucked really, without oil. They had to fight the US and Britain to get anywhere.

What Hitler had that the US didn't have was rockets.
I think if the UK hadn't fought the Nazis, there would in the end have been a nuclear war between the Reich and the US.

What fun there would have been for all.

[L'Emmerdeur]

The USA would have had an atomic bomb first though. They were miles ahead.

Only four years ahead of Stalin. Not really miles ahead.

Yes, miles ahead. The USSR built its weapon based entirely on plans stolen from the US. The Soviet scientists had all but given up on building a bomb with uranium, and turned to plutonium based on information stolen from the British. Shortly after this the US used a uranium weapon. If not for the knowledge gained through spying, the Soviets would have taken many more years to develop their own bomb.

And the Germans were ahead of the Russians. If Hitler had not been fighting a war with Britain, the nuclear project wouldn't have been put on the back burner.

The German project was put on the back burner because Hitler believed that the V-2 was much more important. The development of an atomic weapon by Germany was effectively dead by the middle of 1942.

[Rum]

Mistermack never let facts get in the way of his opinions.

[mistermack]

If not for the knowledge gained through spying, the Soviets would have taken many more years to develop their own bomb.

So what?

The development of an atomic weapon by Germany was effectively dead by the middle of 1942.

Like I said, it was dumped because he was fighting a war with the Brits. And by the middle of 1942 he had been fighting the Russians for a year.
Nice collection of pointless points though.

[Strontium Dog]

Yeah the Labour party is really not "hard" or "far" left. They're left wing, sure, as they should be. But there's nothing coming out of there that is in any way radical.

Corbyn has somehow managed to present himself as a left-wing radical despite giving us a fairly bland manifesto that was actually less progressive than the one served up by the Lib Dems, and not actually opposing the Tory policy that will cause the most damage to the working poor (Brexit).

The little expressed truth is that Corbyn isn't much of an ideologue at all. Sure, he's left-wing, largely because he has an instinctive desire to side with the underdog against their "oppressors". It's a simple and sincere worldview of good guys and bad guys, which is why he's lauded for his principles, but also why he's found himself rubbing shoulders with people like Hamas and the IRA in the past.

However Corbyn is no intellectual. He only got E grades at A-level despite the middle class, prep school background. When he was asked if he was a Marxist, he said he hadn't really thought about it for a long time. He was telling the truth - of course he hasn't, because he isn't much of a thinker!

His unremarkable intelligence raises serious questions over his ability to run the country, especially because some of the people has has behind him - the likes of McDonnell - are dyed-in-the-wool far left ideologues with real smarts. Corbyn isn't dangerous per se, but he's bolstered by people who are. Lenin would have Corbyn pegged as a useful idiot, and he'd be right.