Scrutable

lpm wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 24, 2022 5:07 pm

Bird on a Fire wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 24, 2022 4:38 pm

First billionaire PM as well I expect?

Possibly richest ever PM. Hard to compare across eras.

Robert Walpole was probably the richest. Inherited a vast estate - and then invested a fortune in the South Sea Bubble at the start and sold at the peak. Built a Norfolk palace.

Earl of Derby was also as rich as f.ck. Inherited most of Lancashire and vast lands elsewhere. Oddly enough the family didn't own so much as an acre in Derbyshire.

Derbyshire is of course home to the Devonshires.

Liz Truss is likely to be the poorest PM ever. No family money. John Major might be a contender - but went on to make millions afterwards. That doesn't seem likely for Truss.

lpm wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 24, 2022 5:13 pm

Liz Truss is likely to be the poorest PM ever. No family money. John Major might be a contender - but went on to make millions afterwards. That doesn't seem likely for Truss.

Mmmm. Ramsay MacDonald, Harold Wilson and James Callaghan didn’t inherit wealth and as far as I know didn’t have significant incomes outside their parliamentary salaries.

Though we’ll have to wait and see how long Truss remains an MP.

Woodchopper wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 24, 2022 5:28 pm

lpm wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 24, 2022 5:13 pm

Liz Truss is likely to be the poorest PM ever. No family money. John Major might be a contender - but went on to make millions afterwards. That doesn't seem likely for Truss.

Mmmm. Ramsay MacDonald, Harold Wilson and James Callaghan didn’t inherit wealth and as far as I know didn’t have significant incomes outside their parliamentary salaries.

Though we’ll have to wait and see how long Truss remains an MP.

Presumably they also stopped being PM later in life, so didn't manage to claim nearly as much in the way of post PMship expenses as Truss could.

dyqik wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 24, 2022 5:52 pm

Woodchopper wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 24, 2022 5:28 pm

lpm wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 24, 2022 5:13 pm

Liz Truss is likely to be the poorest PM ever. No family money. John Major might be a contender - but went on to make millions afterwards. That doesn't seem likely for Truss.

Mmmm. Ramsay MacDonald, Harold Wilson and James Callaghan didn’t inherit wealth and as far as I know didn’t have significant incomes outside their parliamentary salaries.

Though we’ll have to wait and see how long Truss remains an MP.

Presumably they also stopped being PM later in life, so didn't manage to claim nearly as much in the way of post PMship expenses as Truss could.

As I posted in the Who's Next? thread https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-63350359

Woodchopper wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 24, 2022 5:28 pm

lpm wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 24, 2022 5:13 pm

Liz Truss is likely to be the poorest PM ever. No family money. John Major might be a contender - but went on to make millions afterwards. That doesn't seem likely for Truss.

Mmmm. Ramsay MacDonald, Harold Wilson and James Callaghan didn’t inherit wealth and as far as I know didn’t have significant incomes outside their parliamentary salaries.

Though we’ll have to wait and see how long Truss remains an MP.

Yeah but back then a middle class salary could buy you a 5 bedroom house, a flat cap and all the whippets you could eat. Liz Truss isn't exactly the intellectual after dinner speaker you'd pick, unless all the z list celebs from Love Iskand were unavailable.

Grumble wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 24, 2022 5:10 pm

lpm wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 24, 2022 5:07 pm

Bird on a Fire wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 24, 2022 4:38 pm

First billionaire PM as well I expect?

Possibly richest ever PM. Hard to compare across eras.

Robert Walpole was probably the richest. Inherited a vast estate - and then invested a fortune in the South Sea Bubble at the start and sold at the peak. Built a Norfolk palace.

Earl of Derby was also as rich as f.ck. Inherited most of Lancashire and vast lands elsewhere. Oddly enough the family didn't own so much as an acre in Derbyshire.

Derbyshire is of course home to the Devonshires.

Well, the Cavendish family, who are the Dukes of Devonshire.

dyqik wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 24, 2022 5:52 pm

Woodchopper wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 24, 2022 5:28 pm

lpm wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 24, 2022 5:13 pm

Liz Truss is likely to be the poorest PM ever. No family money. John Major might be a contender - but went on to make millions afterwards. That doesn't seem likely for Truss.

Mmmm. Ramsay MacDonald, Harold Wilson and James Callaghan didn’t inherit wealth and as far as I know didn’t have significant incomes outside their parliamentary salaries.

Though we’ll have to wait and see how long Truss remains an MP.

Presumably they also stopped being PM later in life, so didn't manage to claim nearly as much in the way of post PMship expenses as Truss could.

MacDonald and Callahagn were older, though Lucky Jim lived into his 90s. I think Wilson and Truss were about the same age when Wilson first became Prime Minister. Though I don't know whether he got the equivalent lifetime benefits.

lpm wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 24, 2022 8:40 am

Sunak is not the first non-Christian. Lloyd George was a non-believer, Chamberlain and Attlee described themselves as agnostics, and Callaghan was an atheist.

Which makes the concern expressed in some circles around Blair’s incipient Catholicism, to the extent he felt he couldn’t formally convert until after he left office, so bizarre. Along with the residual handful of other openly anti-Catholic statutes on the Law Books,

I’ll leave wild speculation over why Blair was so desperate to convert to a religion which offered the prospect of the Absolution of Sins through Confession as an exercise for the reader.

Well ostensibly before that he was protestant, which makes the whole forgiveness of sins thing even f.cking easier, so it was hardly a choice based on that

While we're talking about stupid irrational beliefs held by morons, the bronze age storytellers would have got excited by this morning's events - the sun will be darkened by an eclipse at the moment Sunak is anointed.

It's not an eclipse, it's Boris Johnson jumping to try to get his boxers down from out of a tree

El Pollo Diablo wrote: ↑

Tue Oct 25, 2022 8:02 am

Well ostensibly before that he was protestant, which makes the whole forgiveness of sins thing even f.cking easier, so it was hardly a choice based on that

There is a non-zero percentage chance that last comment may not have been 100% serious.

lpm wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 24, 2022 6:36 pm

Woodchopper wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 24, 2022 5:28 pm

lpm wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 24, 2022 5:13 pm

Liz Truss is likely to be the poorest PM ever. No family money. John Major might be a contender - but went on to make millions afterwards. That doesn't seem likely for Truss.

Mmmm. Ramsay MacDonald, Harold Wilson and James Callaghan didn’t inherit wealth and as far as I know didn’t have significant incomes outside their parliamentary salaries.

Though we’ll have to wait and see how long Truss remains an MP.

Yeah but back then a middle class salary could buy you a 5 bedroom house, a flat cap and all the whippets you could eat. Liz Truss isn't exactly the intellectual after dinner speaker you'd pick, unless all the z list celebs from Love Iskand were unavailable.

Having just heard Truss f.ck up a reference to Seneca in her farewell speech I concur.

Honestly, if I hear one more time that thing where they say THE PRIME MINISTER HAS RESIGNED FOR THE NEXT FIFTEEN MINUTES THE KING* IS IN CHARGE OF THE COUNTRY I'm going to scream



*adjust for monarch gender

lpm wrote: ↑

Tue Oct 25, 2022 8:27 am

While we're talking about stupid irrational beliefs held by morons, the bronze age storytellers would have got excited by this morning's events - the sun will be darkened by an eclipse at the moment Sunak is anointed.

I just had a look. There's a cloud over the sun. Peak eclipse in London is 10.59.

El Pollo Diablo wrote: ↑

Tue Oct 25, 2022 9:17 am

It's not an eclipse, it's Boris Johnson jumping to try to get his boxers down from out of a tree

Only a temporary mooning then.

Am I right in thinking that we now have a PM who thinks that NFTs are a good idea and not total b.llsh.t?

El Pollo Diablo wrote: ↑

Tue Oct 25, 2022 2:27 pm

Am I right in thinking that we now have a PM who thinks that NFTs are a good idea and not total b.llsh.t?

Yes. Which tells you just how incoherent he is on economics.

El Pollo Diablo wrote: ↑

Tue Oct 25, 2022 2:27 pm

Am I right in thinking that we now have a PM who thinks that NFTs are a good idea and not total b.llsh.t?

That depends.

Does NFT stand for No-more f.cking Trussonomics?

Little waster wrote: ↑

Tue Oct 25, 2022 2:49 pm

El Pollo Diablo wrote: ↑

Tue Oct 25, 2022 2:27 pm

Am I right in thinking that we now have a PM who thinks that NFTs are a good idea and not total b.llsh.t?

That depends.

Does NFT stand for No-more f.cking Trussonomics?

No f.cking Thing.

Braverman still Home Sec ffs. Gotta keep the fash wing of the party on side, but perhaps while lightly trolling them by appointing a bigot of colour.

There's a veriable feast of 'talent' being appointed by Captain Sensible innit.
Braverman, Raab, Jenrick, Gavin f.cking Williamson ...

Holy f.ck, this is going to be a hella administration. 'Eye-watering decisions' for sure.
Buckle up.

Opti wrote: ↑

Tue Oct 25, 2022 8:16 pm

There's a veriable feast of 'talent' being appointed by Captain Sensible innit.
Braverman, Raab, Jenrick, Gavin f.cking Williamson ...

Holy f.ck, this is going to be a hella administration. 'Eye-watering decisions' for sure.
Buckle up.

And an Equalities Minister who is openly hostile to a minority.

Bird on a Fire wrote: ↑

Tue Oct 25, 2022 8:01 pm

Braverman still Home Sec ffs. Gotta keep the fash wing of the party on side, but perhaps while lightly trolling them by appointing a bigot of colour.

I used to know a Sikh who was a member of Immigration Watch. Definitely a tendency to immigrate then want to pull up the drawbridge behind you.