Westminstenders: PreGrades (Minority Report comes to the UK)

[RedToothBrush]

In Aug 2020, London, DC's prototype 'PreGrades' launched from the education department stops plebs before they go to university, reducing the social mobility rate to zero percent. Social mobility is predicted using specialized mutated humans, called "Teachers", who "predict" grades by marking shit lots of course work and exams over a period of years. Would-be social climbers are knocked down in a computer algorithm which distorts reality and hits the disadvantaged hardest. Central government is on the verge of adopting the controversial program nationwide by applying it in all departments from the DWP, the Home Office, the Department of Health and the Department of Justice to predict benefit fraud, getting sick asylum seeking and crime before it occurs.

DC's vision of the future is based on excellence being genetically ingrained into the elite but he must sell this vision to the unsuspecting public in a series of public votes which rely on the idea of the 'undeserving'. Little do they know that they too will be the victims of this plan until a mysterious bug appears and only the wealthy and well connected are able to get hold of adequate PPE and they are no longer able to buy bog roll nor retire to Spain as they had previously and endless queues for pizza form near Kent.

@Jason118

Meanwhile in the world where grown ups live, things keep moving on trade.ec.europa.eu/doclib/press/index.cfm?id=2178 Damn good these negotiators aren't they. Didn't we used to have some?

Another MFN clause. Not that there is a hope in hell the UK can get a better deal.

@Tanith , I voted. I spoiled my ballot. So I do get a say. There was no decent party to vote for. Labour minus Corbynistas is tolerable now. I'd vote for them.
However, I repeat "fuck 'em". Fuck everyone who wanted this.

I agree with the Good Law Projects aims, but I suspect it will backfire - it will just be an excuse for Johnson and cronies to abolish judicial reviews because it doesn't suit them.

What annoys me now is why the average sort of Tory isn't up in arms about this - although I was pleased to see that at least one Tory voter expressed anger and expected better.

Hong Kong Reports First Confirmed Coronavirus Re-Infection

www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-08-24/hong-kong-reports-first-coronavirus-re-infection-in-it-worker

I voted. I spoiled my ballot

Unless you vote to oppose you may as well vote in support, own it

Yep, those that sat on their hands In December helped enable this. Difficult to imagine Corbyn’s Labour taking the same line on migrants as Priti Patel. But here we are counting down the days to 2024....

I think a Corbyn Government would have found Covid difficult, but I doubt very much whether they would have been putting out contracts left right and centre to their chums, to firms who have no experience in what they are supposed to be providing. And any infraction would have been leapt upon by the Press screaming their heads off about their incompetence.

Cannot believe we are still getting "but Corbyn!....."

Ffs

Well, we are all living the reality of not getting a Labour government in December. World beating isn’t?

Maybe a Labour government would have cooperated with the EU to buy reasonably priced and effective ventilators, rather than pretending that they didn't get the email? And ignoring vast numbers of offers by PPE manufaturers before contracting to buy it with a sweet manufacturer owned by chums?
Let's face it, it would have been impossible to have done a worse job. It's been much, much worse than sheer incompetence.

I had to get a But Corbyn in. It will be time expired soon enough.

I think May would have done a better job too. Dare I say it, it might have been the sort of challenge she could have risen too?

I can think of crude comments about Boris and rising, but I will leave that to your imaginations.

We get the leaders we deserve. I think I need to go out and commit some truly neferious sin to deserve Williamson and Co.

Hate to say it but if I could choose between May, Corbyn and Johnson to be PM in March, I think May would be my choice.

Just to recap ...

(reading comments on internet) Seems US lobster is included ? Not a great deal for UK fishermen then ?

Oops.

May was hugely indecisive. And a bully. I think she'd have continued to make a mess of things. But would obviously have been much better than Johnson.

I don't know - it's all academic anyway, but I think that for defined tasks like sourcing ventilators or PPE, May would have been OK.

What would have happened if Corbyn were PM ?

Corbyn - or any other Labour leader except maybe Blair - might not have managed to get sufficient public assent for lockdown

• the rightwing media and many Tories might only have accepted such draconian measures from a Tory government, at least until deaths rocketed out of control

In a densely populated country, with the NHS already stretched, the consequences woiuld have been horrendous

Even if lockdown had been accepted, Rishi's furlough and huge expenditure would only be acceptable from a Tory chancellor
and any Labour government would be absolutely crucified by the economic downturn and unemployment this winter.

The Tories may be forgiven, but I doubt if Labour would have been, even after avoiding the chumocracy contracts

Also, Brexit is basically a Tory catfight that a few Lexiters - and former "Revolutionary Communist Party activists turned Tory - latched onto

Any Brexit outcome from Labour would be rejected by most Brexiters

It is maybe better that the Tories are responsible for sorting out the problems of Brexit and COVID

• with public services & the civil service savaged by a decade of their cuts

I don't think many epidemiologists or futurologists predicted a virus that while it wasn't as lethal as, say, Ebola, was so highly infectious both asymptomatically and/or prior to developing symptoms, thus requiring a world wide lockdown

We covered the possibility of a “SARS-2” back when I did my Epidemiology MSc in 2012 (my area is epidemiology of non-infectious diseases, so I haven’t really kept up with the resp virus discourse since then). The modelling we did was even bleaker - SARS mainly affected young fit economically active people - a lot of healthcare workers died, crippling the initial response. So we assumed a lot of death amongst schoolchildren, and a lot of key workers refusing to work to protect their families.

I also used to work in Toronto, and yes having been through SARS they fully expected further outbreaks (and their healthcare systems were in a much better position than we were to manage it, because they had already done it once)

But yep, everyone has been warning about this for years. Obviously nobody could predict exactly when a virus would emerge, but everyone has known that one probably would eventually.

Re; The academic discussion about May. I don't think for all her failings she would have ordered the DNR's in care homes. It was rumoured and discussed at the time, but was officially acknowledged yesterday..... why isn't there more outrage over this. Why aren't people more concerned about the eugenics leaning of the government?

May was PM during Exercise Cygnus.

I think BCFs post about what would have happened if Corbyn was PM is spot on. Labour are held to much higher standards, whether it’s because of media bias or other things. Look at the state of the country & our current PM/cabinet yet many still support them.

I don't think many epidemiologists or futurologists predicted a virus that while it wasn't as lethal as, say, Ebola, was so highly infectious both asymptomatically and/or prior to developing symptoms, thus requiring a world wide lockdown

Been discussed since the 90s. All permutations.

When James Burke was asked in the late 90s in a "20 years on from 'Connections'" US interview if he could think of a single event which could derail progress his reply without missing a beat was: "pandemic".

Which is why, I previously posted that it's a little bit tiresome now hearing the whinging from some quarters about how "nobody could have foreseen this ..." because not only did people foresee this - they were pretty damn accurate in their thoughts about how it would affect us.

Of course, if we had grown ups in charge then rather that swallowing the line "nobody could have foreseen", the public should have responded with "What the fuck have you been doing with all our fucking money these years ? We pay you to protect us, and thinking the unthinkable is part of that."

I speak as someone who made "Alien invasion" a line on my disaster recovery plans for my employer 3 years running.

So i posted on mn at the start if the month that i was expecting a u turn on masks in high schools in the third or fourth week in august?

What do you think my chances are?