• noodlehelp_outline
    23 days ago

    And I will be delighted if that works.

    On the other hand, I feel there is common agreement that people keep voting against their own interests and I am not super optimistic that quietly serving those interests* is a winner.

    Stable and competent, but unambitious, governance is a holding tactic. Biden did that for four years but the US dems never tackled the PR of it all and, well, generations of steady progress has been set on fire over a few months.

    * but only for those people that the fascists aren’t explicitly going after. Their interests must be set aside so as not to cause a fuss.

  • trickylens
    23 days ago

    If you've got a plan of how to counteract a well funded global conspiracy that has all the sources of information under it's control, I'm all ears.

    Perhaps a bit more fighting fascism ourselves, and not being a bleeding heart liberal demanding other people fight our battles, is in order here?

    Which is roughly what I've been saying for a decade. We can't focus on the little fires, and the people we are invited to wrestle in a sack with. We've got to lift our gaze and go after the forces with the petrol and the matches. Because I sure as shit can absolutely guarantee you that they have a whole string of no win scenarios to batter us with from every angle.

    Because that's the method. Worked in south america in the fifties/sixties, in russia at the start of the century, still working now on steroids with modern line speed distributed communication.

  • noodlehelp_outline
    23 days ago

    No you’re not. Because whenever anyone speaks up about alternatives you spend 1000 words calling them an idiot.

  • trickylens
    22 days ago

    No. I've had the grown up conversation with you about reality and the long term thinking that needs to be in place to overcome entrenched single issue propaganda led divisive issues. Which are being constantly set as traps. Explaining to you why he has to dodge many of the pot holes, without being able to stop and fill them all in. He has to get somewhere, and your issue isn't it unfortunately.

    Which was why this hole was dug in front of him. For you to step up and take your turn being cross. If it wasn't you, it would have been very many more cross people who had already been teed up to be outraged by the position that he didn't take.

    You are not going to get the comforting warm words of truth and light that you want, because it they are there the noise will drown out any possible good that can be done.

    We had a conversation on here about how they are all the same. It was literally on the same news cycle when they had allocated multi billions of budget to areas defunded by the fascist project, and on an actual budget day.

    The reporting that most people get to see is totally bent. That's the problem. It's bent for a purpose. There really is no alternative to getting your head up, holding your nose, and clambering through the broken and bloody bodies of your comrades, to get at the enemy. It's ugly, it's dirty, it's war baby.

  • JRs_Cigarettepanorama_fish_eye
    22 days ago

    sW Trains now been government owned for a few months I'd say things have got worse.

    I realise it's not been V long to change anything, but can anyone point me to what improvements I should be expecting over the medium to long term.

    My view: nothing will change because the problems are so deep rooted it's an impossible task. Would love to be convinced otherwise

  • Jeff_Albertsonhelp_outline
    22 days ago

    SWT is a bit of a stupid case tbh - they have dozens of multi-million-pound brand-new trains, designed to improve the passenger experience, sitting idle in various places across the country because they were bought hastily (partly to save jobs in Derby).
    The first one was delivered more than five years ago and they are still not fully accepted into service.
    Various problems with the trains themselves, as well as conditions for drivers - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Rail_Class_701

    But yes, the biggest problem with the railways is 20 years of no investment. Albeit that was a long time ago, but we are still playing catch-up to everything which didn't happen in that period, but should have (infrastructure renewal/improvements), because the money just hasn't been there to remedy it all.
    It was another of Thatcher's "success stories" - run British Rail into the ground and then "privatisation is the only answer".

  • Ingopanorama_fish_eye
    22 days ago

    Donny is dead. Long live the new Donny.

  • JimShadypanorama_fish_eye
    22 days ago

    We're looking at this taking years aren't we, not months? Once most/all of the services are back in Government ownership they can start to do some more joined-up investment and reforms of timetables etc?

  • JRs_Cigarettepanorama_fish_eye
    22 days ago

    I am happy for you to tell me what is going to get better? Don't even limit it to SWT, I'll take EMT, Aviva, LNER, Southern,

    To Jeff's point I think there are now 2 or 3 of the Arterios in service (They even announce them as the 822 Arterio service to London Waterloo), but the other (80 or so I think) aren't as they need to train the drivers to use them but they have no time to train the drivers to use them, because they need them to drive the older trains.

  • Simonhelp_outline
    22 days ago

    That's a more realistic hope. But it still seems pretty unlikely.

  • JRs_Cigarettepanorama_fish_eye
    22 days ago

    What does this actually mean? The timetable is theoretically fine. But it's theory not practice.

    And full ownership of all operators, is that even in the period of this government? Because I don't see Reform making things better.

    So maybe I'm Donny, but I'd say I'm realistic not pessimistic.

  • JimShadypanorama_fish_eye
    22 days ago

    Well I would hope long-term that fares will get cheaper. I am not very au-fait with the inner-workings of the UK train system, but national infrastructure being owned by private overseas companies and our fares paying the dividends of shareholders rather than being re-invested doesn't feel like the solution.

  • Simonhelp_outline
    22 days ago

    Aren't they (stupidly) linked to an inflation plus annual increase. Don't see much chance of that changing in the near future, because they'll say they need the money for investment.

    (Linking price increases in one industry to a measure of the average rate by which all prices across all industries have increased in the past makes no sense whatsover and it's crazy that so many regulated prices follow that approach.)

  • JimShadypanorama_fish_eye
    22 days ago

    Yeah maybe, but at least those increases will go into investment rather than profit?

    As said, I don't have in-depth knowledge of all this - I'm more of the belief that it hasn't been working for the last 30 years so let's at least try something different for a while. I guess I'm the Reform vote of the train network.

  • Psychobelpanorama_fish_eye
    22 days ago

    Which is what's referred to as politics and handling it is part of the job. Note how the left of Labour is politely agreeing with everything Starmer says and does. I often took the piss out of the left for it being a cult. Sadly, it was and still seems to be. Corbyn is a nice guy but totally unsuited to the rigours of the job and yet still hasn't been replaced as the figurehead of the hopes of the left.

  • Ingopanorama_fish_eye
    22 days ago

    The money either goes to a private firm and the shareholders trouser half of it

    or

    the unions constantly demand more for less, everyone get's feckless and lazy and impunity so fuck all gets done.

    Either way we lose. There are only 2 options though so you need to pick one.

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