130 thoughts on “ALL OUR YESTERDAYS”

  1. Thought you all might like this, since it’s now out in the open for all to see, that want to look.

    There are three videos to watch, the speaker is Carwyn Jones ex Counsel General and ex First Minister of Wales, so knows his stuff.
    https://mobile.twitter.com/mimosacymru/status/1217399676309209090

    What prompted this statement was that S38 of the EU Withdrawal Bill states that the UK Parliament is Sovereign, which CJ describes as “Constitutional Graffiti” he then makes the following points
    a) UK Parliament is Sovereign by convention, NOT by law,
    b) the 1688 Bill of Rights conferred Sovereignty on the English Parliament,
    c) the English Parliament was dissolved in 1707, ipso facto cannot be Sovereign,
    d) Scottish Sovereignty rests with the people,
    e) Scottish judges have a history of striking down Acts which violate Scottish rights, or words to that effect.

    So the “legal position” is that the Monarch is still legally Sovereign in England and the people legally Sovereign in Scotland but by “convention” we recognise the UK Parliament as Sovereign. Remember what happened to the “Sewel Convention” in the Supreme Court.
    Won’t be long now – “Keep the Heid”. Bojo’s S30 denial was a suicide note, haha.

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    1. Thanks, Kangaroo.

      This is good stuff. An elected dictatorship, which is what we have at the moment, is trying to sneak this past us in as the current Welsh FM says, the rushed passage of a Bill, at a time when everyone is concentrating more on what will happen between London and Brussels.

      Mr Jones has often been able to see past partisan politics to the truth.

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    1. Kangaroo how are things?

      I recognised an older Betty Bothroyd and wonder if the picture below is a younger Betty? Is that Harry Belafonte who is looking rather dishy? And a young Eartha Kitt – not sure.

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      2. Your younger Betty was, in fact, Edith Piaf. Not so different because Betty was in showbiz before she was in politics.

        And, not Eartha Kitt, but Dinah Washington. Funnily I was thinking about putting Eartha Kitt up!

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      3. I’m well PP, thanks for asking. We got rain so helping quell the fires in NSW and Vic. The fires stopped afew kms from me, thankfully. We had evacuated just before the wind changed direction and stayed away overnight. All good now in my local area, it’s still horrific for others who were caught up in the maelstrom. I’m off to a fundraiser today for us firies, as a big thankyou from the community. Should be fun.

        Meanwhile take care MI5 is watching.

        https://www.sott.net/article/286355-Special-Report-Scottish-Referendum-Rigged-The-How-and-the-Why

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        1. LOL…. oh damn.

          That’s Munguin’s fault. I was trying to prepare his petit déjeuner with one hand, type this with the other and I won;t tell you how i was doing the vacuuming.

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    2. Marcia, it’s actually Victoria Street / Road and Cotton Road, opposite Kitchen and Bathroom World. Click on this and you’ll see how Google Maps shows it today: truncated and demolished… https://is.gd/sMXYiM. If you look closely, the remains of the low wall with the curved top and the iron railings – there’s a name for that fishhook shape but I can’t remember what it is – are clues, and the windows of the tenements on the left are the same. Not much else, though. We can safely assume that Victoria Road / Street would have had trams, I think, because it’s still a major thoroughfare and bus route today.

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  5. Riley Elf – I remember it well – bought one out of mistaken sense of badge loyalty after having Pathfinder and 2.6. Originally with 848cc engine, later 998cc. Original models struggled to propel the weight added to the basic Mini design, 998 reputedly better. Wolseley also did a version, the Hornet.

    May reply on the other pics but too traumatised by the memory of the Riley Elf. « Elf and Safety » indeed !

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  6. That’s Pete Murray with Janice (Oi’ll give it foive) Nicholls on Thank Your Lucky Stars.

    A couple of continental ones there to puzzle over. I’ll guess Pic 2 is Paris (Rue de Rivoli?) and somewhere in Switzerland.

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    3. Picture 12 is the Paradeplatz in Zurich. We used to eat at the Zeughaus Keller nearby. Probably the most famous restaurant in Zurich. The sausage came by the metre!

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      1. I don’t know Switzerland well, but I’ve been to Zurich and more often, Geneve. It always seems so ordered and neat as if nothing would dare to be blowing about in the wind.

        That sausage sounds good! 🙂

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  7. Is the picture with buses and trees one of the Grandes Boulevardes of Paris ?
    The trams- possibly Munich, an early adopter of light rail type transit systems ? Looks like the type of tram but can’t identify the location if it is Munich.

    The maroon car is a Lanchester, which sat somewhere between the mass market and the luxury end.

    The 2i’s, legendary rock and roll joint whence came Tommy Steele, Wee Willie Harris and other denizens of mediocre 50’s Britpop.

    Btw, was not rich – hence the clapped out Elf after time served Pathfinders etc.

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    1. Yep. Capucines is one of the 4 grands boulevards de Paris. The trans are in Zurich, so right corner of the world.

      I’d never heard of the 2is, but I have heard of Tommy Steele, so I learned something.

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  8. A bit late getting here, so most of the pics have been identified, but I’d have got lots of them – honest 🙂 Anyway pic 17 – obviously a Home & Colonial Stores shop. Home & Colonial were a big name up to the 60s, I think. They became part of Allied Suppliers which in turn became part of Safeway – now it’s gone too. It looks like it might be a Sunday or early closing day with the blinds down and papers covering goods in the windows. Not much to go on time-wise but the bloke’s long raincoat and hairstyle and the few items in the clothes shop window suggest late 1950s? Location is Pride Hill, Shrewsbury, Shropshire.

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      1. Safeway was bought over by Morrison’s in 2004. Morrison’s still produce a range of products branded Safeway but don’t sell them in their supermarkets. I think you can buy them in branches of McColl’s.

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  11. Is the Home and Colonial Store pick from Shrewsbury???
    It does indeed look like either a Half Day (us older watchers will remember them well usually a Wednesday and also sometimes Saturday afternoon!!!!!!.) or after shop hours.
    In Dundee in the 50′ and 60’s there was a flourishing Amateur Wednesday Football league of Butchers, Bakers, Police, Fire Brigade and assorted tradesmen.

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    1. Independent, do you know if there are any silversmiths working in Dundee today? I’ve seen some old silver which was made in Dundee according to the hallmarks, but nothing recent. I don’t think there are any, and I’ve looked on line, but I would love to be surprised.

      What’s not a surprise is that Scottish silver is generally called “Scottish provincial silver” – and I have not yet worked out whether that includes Edinburgh silver or not. I rather think it does, with “provincial” meaning anything not London and the Home Counties.

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              1. Yeah, I’m not getting much sleep because of it, so I’m further out of my box than usual thanks to a combination of sleeplessness and controlled drugs. Gawd knows what it would be like if I didn’t have said painkillers.

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                1. Really sorry to hear that Ed. I had to wait quite some time for an appointment with an oral surgeon. Pain killers and antibiotics helped (it had become infected.)

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                  1. Yeah – I’m now on two antibiotics as well, which would probably make me feel rotten all be themselves even if there were nothing wrong with me. Serves me right, I should have looked after them better.

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  12. Total change of subject and a descent into American politics, so be warned, fellow Munguinites!

    The parliamentary language in this article tickled my fancy. Background for those as don’t follow the Murkan noos: Representative Ted Lieu is a Democrat and a former prosecutor; Devin Nunes is a right-wing, famously litigious, Trump-supporting donkeyhole. Some wit, wag and gadfly set up a fake Twitter account in the name of Devin Nunes’ cow (he claims to be a farmer of some description), in which the cow tweets out less-than-flattering comments about Nunes’ performance, attitudes and misdeeds. E.g, he is involved up to his ears in the Trump-Ukraine scandal, and that is in fact the meat of the matter here: https://archive.is/qHpOR.

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    2. It is indeed heating up. Like a pustulating plook, ready tae burst? Sorry, hope everybody is long past their supper.
      They (the US) have a much more dangerous distraction technique, Iran, than Westminster. We are being subjected to Harry and Megan and bung a bob for a Big Ben bong, ffs, to halt questions over a huge number of issues, the Russian report, lying over EU alignment, back tracking on tax etc.
      Anyone heard anything from Dominic Grieve, is he bound and gagged somewhere?
      Ach, I’m not in best humours, bloody boats, bloody storms and bloody brexit.
      I’m now away to read Kangaroo’s comment again, to cheer me up.

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      1. Alan……Harry and Meghan are on both the Times and the Post websites.
        Apparently they are giving up their Royal Highness titles and will live in Canada most of the time. No more public income, but daddy is going to help out.

        NY Times: “The agreement represents one of the most dramatic ruptures within the British royal family since King Edward VIII abdicated the throne in 1936 to marry an American woman, Wallis Simpson.”

        The second time that the family has been disrupted by an American woman, but the royals never learn. 😉

        https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/britains-prince-harry-and-meghan-to-surrender-their-royal-highness-titles/2020/01/18/3bc68470-3a24-11ea-a1ff-c48c1d59a4a1_story.html

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        1. they’ve not actually lost the titles, they just aren’t going to use them. Until it Suits (ah see what I did there!). Cake and Eat it or is it let them eat cake.

          Still that will help when they move to LA after Trump goes since you guys sensibly don’t allow titles.

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          1. PP…..Well said! I noticed that the announcement was carefully worded to say that they would not “USE” the HRH titles.

            Yes, there is already speculation that when they tire of the endless expanse of snow and ice that is Canada, they can move to southern California. What BETTER place to escape the press of media and the celebrity lifestyle than a nice beach house in Malibu with the movie stars?

            As for their meaningless HRH titles in California, Meghan and Archie are already American citizens by birth. Of course if Harry wants to be elevated to “Citizen” of the Republic, he’ll have to take a test and be sworn. But he seems bright. I think he can do it. 😉

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          2. You could have guessed.

            A perfect example though, of letting one woman decide what will happen about titles.

            The BBC, this morning, consistently talked about them losing their tites of HRH. The HRH things aren’t titles; they’re styles. the titles are “prince”, “duke”, “earl” and “baron”, all of which he has got…the first as a matter of birth, the rest for getting married.

            What a bloody idiotic country.

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        2. Well, there’s efficiency Danny, one drama and distraction on both sides of the pond!
          And Trump still has Iran on the back burner, plus a possible fanfare from the Berlin summit. What impeachment?

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                    1. Oh yes Tris, the “Fox and Friends” morning show trio! Maybe Fox News will assign them to anchor ALL the impeachment trial coverage….LOL. Starts next Tuesday BTW!

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                  2. Oh no, you don’t think that their viewing figures will rocket as more people tune in to watch them squirm and Fox are thinking, “wow this blatent lying our arses off really works. Way to go people”
                    Naw, that’s just naive sillyness.

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                    1. LOL Alan! Sometimes I tune in to FOX just to see what things are like in the right wing alternate reality bubble. Really weird! 🙂

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                  1. … and in return, we will expect not to be charged for the privilege of putting electricity into the English National Grid for the power-hungry south. Currently (see what I did there), the cost to generators (i.e., companies generating electricity) for using the grid varies with distance from London, more or less – to the point where power plants nearest London actually get paid for putting power into the grid; in other words, the extra charges consumers pay in the North of Scotland make electricity abnormally expensive there, and it’s down to accounting methods rather than reality. Dundee, naturally, is right on the edge of the expensive area, blast it, I demand compensation!

                    I think public sentiment in Scotland is that the electricity industry should be in public hands, like our water industry, and the cost of maintaining our grid should be shared equally per kWh by everyone buying electricity in Scotland. But we can’t do anything about it at the moment because – you’ll never guess in a million years – energy policy is a reserved matter. Wouldn’t do to have those poor, wee, stupid Scottish blighters in charge of their own resources, eh, what? They’d waste it on setting up an oil fund instead of spending it properly by turning the money over to the deserving rich through tax cuts, and so that hard-working young people in the financial and foreign exchange markets can gamble with even huger sums of other people’s money… Greed is good!

                    Oh, here’s a for example about electricity prices – but remember that the additional charges have approximately nothing to do with the relative cost of maintaining and expanding the infrastructure: https://is.gd/eJZqsJ. It’s from our dear not nationalist at all friends in the BBC, in an article entitled “Scotland’s north-south divide in energy costs” from 6 June last year.

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                    1. Sometime in the near future, people will look back with utter astonishment at how London treated us, in the way that we now do with the empire/commonwealth.

                      They take pleasure in walking all over us…although, if Munguinites were not such a refined and educated bunch of people, I might well have used another word.

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                2. Although @macnessie confessed he did the trailer out of boredom, it maybe near to truth.
                  I was recently searching for some figures on Scotland’s energy production balance, current (sorry Ed) and renewable potential and hydrogen fuel. This was just before the subsea grid connector investors pulled out, this grid connect was between the Western Isles and the mainland. Basically due to what I found out, it didn’t surprise me when the investors pulled out. I would say they were economically coerced into pulling out.
                  I won’t bore you with the impressive figures, “cut to the chase” I hear. Right then, England imports 26 to 28% of it’s electricity from Scotland.
                  As an insult to Scotland, as Ed has already pointed out generators of electricity pay more to connect to the grid the further you are from London. This tax, an energy tax (reserved) goes to the treasury and then the treasury gives 8,6% back, to the country that produced the bloody energy. Yet another subsidy! Better together? Aye for some.
                  P.S. It is worth looking into the energy potential off Scotland’s west coast and the new method of hydrogen production.

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                    1. Indeed, Tris. In relation to your remarks elsewhere about practising a degree of restraint in our language to avoid frightening the horses and other Munguinites, please don’t let Mr. Munguin force me to wash out my mouth with soap and water again!

                      The electricity surcharge is just one of the many ways in which Scotland is soaked by the Powers That Be down south. We can add to it, for example, the disparity between revenue from the TV tax in Scotland and the amount the BBC actually spends here. Instead, the cash currently goes down to London, and not all that much of it ever comes back again.

                      This is not a phenomenon peculiar to the UK: all countries have a problem with this “capital city” effect. We can see it here in Scotland with Edinburgh now that we have our own Government again. Sensible countries, however, know that their government must be careful not to behave like Roman Emperors grabbing all the loot from their Empire to spend on decadent entertainments in Rome, and must be careful to give back to the “Provinces” if they are not to create huge imbalances and disparities between them and the capital, and between the Provinces themselves.

                      Another issue: HMRC procedures, insofar as I understand them, which isn’t very far at all, companies with a presence throughout the UK very often have their company headquarters in London, and use them as their address for service of legal documents; consequently, they deal with HMRC in London, and their profits nationwide get chalked up to the English capital for accounting purposes. I don’t believe they are ever properly disaggregated again to show how much value is added in the other parts of the State – if you’re in London and consider it the centre of the Universe, why would you bother? This particular effect, in my opinion, helps inflate London’s contribution to the UK economy even further, and contributes also to the high prices and cost of living there: London is a great place to have lots of money in, but miserable if you’re poor. I said that that was my opinion, and the reason I said so was because I don’t have the hard facts to prove it – if they don’t collect the statistics or provide the data, no one can prove it, can they?

                      This is what it means to live in those parts of the UK – including most of England – which people in London and the Home Counties are pleased to call the Provinces. For example, when London overheats economically, the Government may slam on the economic brakes – without reference to economic conditions anywhere else in the UK.

                      Another question arose at one point when the Scottish Government was permitted – was allowed – was loftily granted the authority to vary certain tax rates – was it Mundell who gloated about laying a “fiscal trap” for us vile cybernats, divisive nationalists and fanatical separatists? As I recall, the SG would have liked to bump up tax on one form or another of unearned income, in a way that would have affected only the already very wealthy. (It might have been dividend income from stocks and shares. Something like that, anyway.) However, it was soon realised that they couldn’t: such people have the choice of having their business with the Revenue handled by a special office for the exceptionally well heeled rather than their local one. There have been complaints from various quarters – Private Eye for one – that this special tax office for the rich in fact acts as a source of financial and tax advice for them on how to minimise their tax liability, not to determine what their liabilities should be if they didn’t weasel their way out of them somehow.

                      If you guessed that that tax office is in Scotland (not that I imagine any Munguinite would), you’d be wrong – and as such people have the choice of doing their tax business there rather than in Scotland – what was it that happened to the HMRC office in Cumbernauld – the one that was supposed to be saved if we voted No in 2014 – and why? What it boils down to is that the people who would have been affected by the increase in tax could avoid paying it by the simple expedient of declaring the income to a tax office that would not apply the higher rate of tax – so any significant increase in that tax levied in Scotland would likely result in a loss of income to the Scottish Government rather than an increase.

                      The Usual Suspects would of course accuse me of doing that “typical” Jockanese grievance-mongering thing. To which what can anyone say but “If you stop giving us grievances, we’ll stop mongering them”?

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                    2. I read a report a few months ago… don’t know where, about the disparity of wealth in capital regions compared with the rest of the country.

                      Of course it happens everywhere. People in Paris are better off than their counterparts in Orléans; in Bonn as compared to Munich, and so on around the world.

                      But guess where the biggest disparity by miles and miles was?

                      I’ve thought about that tacx thing for big companies.

                      People buy most of their groceries from supermarkets, becasue of the price and range. All that money, our money, disappears to Tesco or Morrisons head office and is taxed there.

                      That’s Scottish money disappearing from the country.

                      Mr Munguin says, no need to use soap! He finds champagne very effective as a mouthwash!

                      Talking of which, how’s your tooth?

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                  2. Alan, please tell us more about the new method of producing hydrogen that you mentioned. It sounds very interesting, and could be pretty consequential.

                    The Icelanders, if I have my facts right, want to lay a very long HVDC undersea cable all the way to Scotland, I think via the Faroes. They have done for years. If that were to go ahead, a subsea connection between the Western Isles and the mainland could be part of the project, I suppose.

                    The reaction to the project in Scotland and in the UK has been rather disappointing, I think – and it shows just how much our will and our ambitions have been quashed by decades of propaganda telling us we’re too wee, too poor and too stupid. We lack self-confidence. A country whose total population is only about 70% of Edinburgh’s is not by the expectations of another country that we’re incapable of undertaking a project of such magnitude.

                    The UK Government is not doing its job here: there is a great need for additional generating capacity as many of the currently operating power plants have to be shut down because of old age. There was more than one reason Westminster made energy policy a reserved matter: it wasn’t just gas and oil. So electricity could be an important factor in the Westminster regime doing its damnedest to stop us taking back our independence.

                    We need an interconnector on the other side of the country too, actually, between Peterhead and near Bergen in Norway, and for the same reason: to help compensate for fluctuations in the supply of renewable energy, as the hydroelectric and geothermal electricity from Iceland and the hydroelectric from Norway as less variable sources, and because of the differences in longitude, the times of peak demand in the three countries are offset from one another.

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                    1. Sheesh. “…not held back / weighed down by the low expectations…”

                      This is what comes of writing reams of claptrap when out of one’s box from insomnia, toothache and painkillers.

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      2. Yes, the Saxe Coburg Gotha problems are a superb distraction from the fact that before they even get to leaving day, the lies are starting to be shown and the fantastic optimism is unravelling. It works for the hard of thinking.

        Some businesses will find things hard, says Javid… even though there was supposed to be no downside to Brexit.

        And of course Trump has made it clear that we have to leave EU standards on GM behind if we want a trade deal.

        I wonder too, how much money Johnson is going to have to give Forster to stop her kicking off about the separation on NI from GB.

        I’m sure though, that if the Iran thing intended to distract the public’s attention does escalate, that the UK will be ordered to take part (if they want a trade deal).

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        1. I got YouGov survey thing a couple of days ago which included a question about how would I feel about the Lords sitting in York while Westminster is reconstructed, rejigged and restored into the early 18th Century but with better toilets. There followed another one about how did I feel about Harry & Meghan. None of the available answers fit properly, of course, and I realise I felt the same way as WGD about the royals, i.e., boredom and anger; and as for the Lords… so in the space for comments at the end of the survey I said that the royals are a matter of supreme indifference to me, but it makes me angry the way they get to sponge off the public; and that the House of Lords should have been abolished decades ago. Oh well. I wonder if they’ll use my answers to the questionnaire, or chuck the whole thing out because I’m obviously of questionable sanity.

          No laughing at the back, there! I can see you through your computer screen, you know!

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          1. It’s absolutely amazing how much tv time and space a non story is getting. For pity’s sake, he’s 6th in line to the throne.

            There is as much chance to the Lords moving to York or Manchester or Birmingham as there is of me being king.

            Johnson’s threatening them so that they will vote for his brexit bill. Either get Brexit done or you’re going to Scunthorpe.

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        2. Tris, on the subject of Fragrant Arlene kicking off, Boris no longer cares. She can kick off all she likes. The Unionist / Loyalists / British Nationalist parties are no longer in the majority in Northern Ireland, and he has the votes to get anything through with his large majority and his successful purge of the Tory Remainers at Westminster.

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    3. Ed…..Nunes is not right in the head and is also a Congressman (from California of course) who hates it when people make fun of him. I followed Nunes’ battle with the “@DevinCow” Twitter account before his dust-up with Congressman Lieu.

      He is probably the only member of Congress who ever sued an internet cow.

      https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20190319/10212841825/rep-devin-nunes-sues-internet-cow-saying-mean-things-about-him-online.shtml

      https://abovethelaw.com/2019/11/devin-nunes-demands-satirical-internet-cow-stop-making-fun-of-him-or-else/

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      2. Yes, Danny, Nunes is bonkers, and stupid with it. There was a whole thing – was it him? I think so – where he hid in some bushes in the White House grounds for a bit and came out to announce that he was bringing some megaimportant document to the White House that would take down some major Democratic plot to overthrow the President of the United States – and it turned out that the document he was clutching in his hot, sticky paw was one he’d received from the White House just before he’d gone to hide in the bushes.

        Have I got that right, Danny? Anyway, it’s the sort of stunt he gets up to. If he doesn’t want to be mocked for acting stupid and crazy, the answer lies in his own hands: stop doing it!

        I used to think he had some redeeming entertainment value, but now we find out that he is up to his neck in the Trump / Ukraine affair – and who knows what else. So he’s yet another danger to American and Western security and other interests to add to the great big orange one in the White House.

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        1. Ed….It’s a little convoluted, but back in 2017, while the Republicans still controlled the House of Representatives and Nunes was Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee (which was starting an investigation of Trump,) Nunes was slipped Trump-friendly information by White House officials, which Nunes then announced as fresh revelations from an unnamed source. Nunes then made a big show of going to the White House to brief President Trump on the so-called “revelations” that the White House had secretly slipped him in the first place. Trump then used that White House information to claim that it was vindication from an independent source that President Obama surveilled then-candidate Trump.

          As I recall, the original contact with Nunes at the White House (when he was slipped the papers) was in the dark of night, to keep the passing of the papers secret.

          The only bushes I remember was when press secretary Sean Spicer was found lurking in some bushes on the walk to the West Wing, to hide from reporters he didn’t want to talk to. 🙂

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          2. Right! I was conflating Nunes with that other clown Sean Spicer -also another lying toad, and also bonkers with it – how on Earth can a person continually debase himself by trying to justify the unjustifiable, defend the indefensible, and generally claiming that black is white? To the point of reinventing the meaning of the word “fact” – oh, that was Kelly-Anne Conway – another bonkers clown and lying toad. On the subject of lying toads – Sarah Huckabee Sanders… how could she look her children in the face when trying to teach them not to tell fibs? “Don’t do as I do, do as I say”. So many of them claimed to be devout Christians too, and then proceeded to lie through their teeth. Oops – shouldn’t have mentioned teeth – I’ve got myself all triggered now.

            No wonder the White House doesn’t do press briefings any more: the only things that matter, thinks the Dear Leader, are the pearls of wisdom he lets fall from his lying lips to the accompaniment of an idling helicopter obbligato… Trump has turned the presidency in to a cult of personality, l’état, c’est moi, the monarchy of the New House of Orange. If the Republicans in the Senate do not convict him – on the evidence so far made public alone – they deserve to be kept out of power for a generation, at least as presently constituted.

            That’s what the Tories in the UK deserve too, but the best thing we can expect here is for our own country to get out from under.

            Digression: I was going to say “our own wee country”, but we’re not all that wee: Scotland is about the same size as the Czech Republic, larger than the Irish Republic but smaller than the whole island of Ireland. Danny, Scotland is nearest in size to South Carolina. We are not, however, counting Scotland’s maritime territory, which is huge – even if some of our territory in the North Sea was nicked by the Wilson government in 1968, and in 1999 yet more of it of was annexed by the Blair regime (I call it the Blair regime because Scots thought they were voting Labour but got Thatcher’s Children instead). If ceding some maritime territory to England were the price to pay for an amicable divorce, however…

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            1. Ed…..You’ve summed up the clown show at the White House very well.
              What was finally called the “midnight ride” of Devon Nunes to the White House to secretly receive the documents…..to advance the phony story about an independent source supporting Trump’s conspiracy theory about Obama……became part of the larger story of the investigation of Trump’s ethical and criminal misconduct that has just now culminated in his impeachment. At the time, the House was in control of the Republicans, Devon Nunes was the Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee (who had been forced to begin a Congressional investigation,) Adam Schiff was the ranking minority member, and Nancy Pelosi was the Majority leader of the House. When it became clear from the midnight ride that Nunes intended to work with Trump to sabotage his Committee’s own investigation for the benefit of Trump and the Republican Party, he agreed to recuse himself from actively participating in the investigation. There was a really big flap about it as you recall.

              Then came the midterm elections, control of the House flipped to the Democrats, Adam Schiff became Chairman of the Intelligence Committee, Nunes was reduced to ranking minority member, Nancy Pelosi became Speaker of the House, the Trump investigation expanded in both houses of Congress, the Mueller probe continued, and the various Trump scandals expanded. (It’s now become even more complicated to keep track of all the threads of the scandal and all the people involved, as it is in trying to understand the history of Nixon and Watergate.)

              Anyway, by the time of the Ukraine phone call and Trump’s apparent order to hold the congressionally authorized Ukrainian funding until they helped him screw his political adversary Joe Biden…….along with whatever it was that Rudy Giuliani and the State Department were doing there……Nancy decided that impeachment shxould proceed. At that point, in the House Intelligence Committee, Adam Schiff , as Chairman, was the star of the show in the war on Trump, while Nunes was out in the cold as ranking minority member and could only bluff and bluster and file nuisance lawsuits about how people are making fun of him.

              The bizarre clown show just gets better and better, as Adam Schiff (with Jerry Nadler of the Judiciary Committee) will lead the House Managers in prosecuting the impeachment trial of President Donald John Trump over on the Senate side of the Capitol.

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                1. Tris…….you can appreciate how much trouble I have sorting out all the players in the Westminster and Holyrood parliaments, particularly as the Brexit debacle advanced and the general election played out. 😉

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            2. Ed…and Tris…..you may have heard that Lev Parnas (one of Rudy Giuliani’s two henchmen who are under indictment) is now talking! He’s finally (on the eve of the impeachment trial) telling all he knows……in an obvious attempt to get better treatment from federal prosecutors.

              As you know, Devon Nunes had to backtrack on his claim that he never met or talked to Parnas, and Parnas had two extended interviews with Rachel Maddow on MSNBC last week. It’s AMAZING how many people (including Trumpy) are still saying they don’t know Parnas.

              Chris Hayes on Friday night…..on his MSNBC show that leads into Rachel’s show……had a rundown on the Parnas charges. The first video begins with a funny bit about all the people who still claim not to know him.

              These are MSNBC videos which usually open OK in Scotland, but I don’t think I’ve previously posted clips from the Hayes show. So no promises. 🙂

              https://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/chris-hayes-trump-definitely-knows-lev-parnas-and-lev-has-receipts-76990533807

              https://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/gop-senators-struggle-to-defend-trump-as-he-continues-to-be-implicated-76925509786

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              1. Worked fine, Danny.

                That Arizona senator is a snipply old bat, isn’t she. Little hack? Wow, I suspect she didn’t get to that finishing school in Switzerland then.

                And the good looking dude (hic) who’s spilling the beans… Ouch.

                I know that Trump does meet a lot of people and get photos taken with them, but these pics weren’t at one of his showbiz type rallies. They look like there were at official functions… and then given that just about everyone in the administration has been photographed with them, it seems unlikely he doesn’t know them.

                Still, we are talking Trump. Who knows what stick is that amazing brain of his.

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                1. Yes Tris, I’d say that Trump and his people had a much closer relationship with Parnas than simply random political photo ops, (as Trumpy would have us believe.)

                  The McSally incident with the CNN reporter caused a big controversy. She not only refused to apologize to the CNN reporter (who asked a simple, polite question and is regarded as being a fair unbiased reporter,) she immediately posted the video and used it in a fundraising ad. On the surface, it seemed really odd, since McSally……who was a combat Air Force fighter pilot before entering politics…….was a two term member of the House before entering the Senate, and was well regarded as a GOP moderate and conscientious legislator.

                  But she has had trouble getting support from right wing Arizona Republicans who haven’t liked the fact that she occasionally criticized Trump. So there’s an Arizona politics back story here.

                  McSally left the House and ran for an empty Arizona Senate seat in 2018. The seat had been occupied by another Republican who got into so much trouble with the right wing of the Arizona GOP that he decided to retire from the Senate. As it turns out, McSally lost the seat to a Democrat by a razor thin margin. A Senate seat flipping parties is a big deal, but her concession speech was considered extraordinarily gracious and generous.

                  Then, the Republican governor of Arizona appointed her to fill John McCain’s seat after he died. So as it stands now, she’s the junior senator from Arizona who is running to retain her seat, but she has never actually won a state-wide Senate race in Arizona.

                  And she’s in trouble. The right wing people of the Trump cult don’t really like her much, she has had trouble raising campaign funds, and her Democratic opponent back in Arizona is currently polling about 4 percentage points ahead of her.

                  Therefore, it probably looked like picking a fight with a reporter….who she called a LIBERAL hack….was a way to gin up support among the right wing Trumpies of the Arizona GOP. As I said, the first thing she did after she manufactured the public fight with the reporter was to use it in a fund raising ad.

                  McSally was once a well regarded moderate who has never actually won a Senate race in Arizona. So she has had to turn nasty to appeal to the right wing crazies to retain the Senate seat she was only appointed to.

                  Just politics!!!! 😉

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                  1. That’s a proud boast for the Trump campaign, Danny.

                    If you want to be elected by Trump supporters you have to turn yourself from a reasonably decent person into an ignorant harpie.

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                    1. Yep Tris……mean and nasty……..that’s the royal road to electoral success in right wing Republican politics these days. 😦

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    1. I’d never seen that Vanity Fair article. Interesting, thank you.

      Being from Europe, where although there was racism it was nothing as strong as in the USA, Clark and Wolff really didn’t understand what it was about. It wouldn’t have occurred to PC that she should keep a distance from Harry for the sake of the sensibilities of the Southern States.

      I suppose that it wasn’t in their culture that companies sponsored entire shows. They’d be aware of it obviously, but probably hadn’t given it much consideration.

      From my understanding of it there wasn’t a huge “human rights” motivations to Petula’s actions, it was more likely to be artistic. The song was better that way.

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      1. Tris……Really a fascinating story! Back in the day that an individual company sponsored TV shows, those sponsors exerted great influence on the content. In this case, a racist advertising manager seems to have exerted influence that may not actually have been fully shared by the Plymouth Division of Chrysler Corporation more broadly.

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  14. He was a bit of alright, was Harry Belafonte! And good on Petula even if she didn’t think of how rednecks in Dixie who would be wearing MAGA hats today thought about her because no sensible person should care what they think except to stop them doing it in public. Before the Race Relations Act, though: before it, it was not unknown to see notices up advertising rooms to let that said “No Gypsies, No Irish, No Blacks, No Dogs”. If nothing else, Pet Clark touching Harry Belafonte’s are showed the sh*itheads what normal human interactions should look like.

    One of my particular heros is Josephine Baker, who lived in exile in France, basically, so she could have artistic freedom and be free of the constant limitations of racism in the States. When she was there, she refused to perform for segregated audiences, for example. She worked with the Resistance in France during WWII – and the civil rights movement in the States in the ’60s. I find her life inspiring. Here’s a short article about her in the Encyclopædia Britannica – https://is.gd/Tw3v5q – and here’s what Wikipedia has to say about her: https://is.gd/vsbMhc.

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    1. Sorry, I meant before the Race Relations Act of 1965 in the UK. I lost concentration for a bit thinking of Enoch Powell’s “Rivers of Blood” speech of 20 April 1968: I was in second year of secondary school at the time, and remember it. It was pretty nasty… Here it is in full as reported in the Telegraph: https://is.gd/cc8Jc3.

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      2. Ed……When I first knew of Josephine Baker, I was surprised to learn that she was from Missouri. I read the Wiki article a while back and found out a lot that I didn’t know.

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    3. From her time in New York, people sometimes imagine that she was from the East. I knew she was from St.Louis, but didn’t know any of the details until I read the Wiki article some time back.

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