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BS: The Great Train Snobbery
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Subject: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Richard Bridge Date: 19 Oct 12 - 06:32 PM http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/great-train-snobbery-osborne-embarrassment-after-sitting-in-first-class-with-stand Even worse for the conservatives - his aide tells ticket collector "he cannot possibly move and sit with the likes of us in standard class and requests he is allowed to remain in First Class." (ITV reporter) In 2010, Tory MP Nicholas Winterton said the people in standard class were a "totally different type of people". http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/8521510.stm Yet worse, on Newsnight tonight Jacob Rees-Mogg (one of the plummiest toff conservatives, an old Etonian, an archetype of an upper crust snob, once described for his image as Conservative leader "David Cameron's worst nightmare") tried to argue that the train tickets are so confusing the chancellor could easily have made a mistake. This man is supposed to control our economy and he can't tell one train ticket from another? One rule for the rich and another for the poor. Omnishambles |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Leadfingers Date: 19 Oct 12 - 07:17 PM Makes you wonder about our Government !! |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: The Sandman Date: 19 Oct 12 - 08:21 PM Page last updated at 18:04 GMT, Thursday, 18 February 2010 E-mail this to a friend Printable version MP's anger at expenses 'ban' on first-class travel Sir Nicholas Winterton MP Sir Nicholas said there had been a "grotesque injustice" Sir Nicholas Winterton has angrily denounced plans to reduce first-class travel by MPs - telling the BBC he needs "quiet" and privacy to work. The veteran Tory MP said there was a "totally different type of people" in standard-class train carriages. He also said it was a "grotesque injustice" that the expenses system had been "misrepresented" by the media. A Tory spokesman said Sir Nicholas's remarks were "the out-of-touch views of a soon-to-retire backbench MP". "They do not in any way represent the views of David Cameron or that of the Conservative Party and should be treated as such," the spokesman added. Macclesfield MP Sir Nicholas, who is standing down at the general election, spoke to the BBC following an interview with Total Politics magazine, in which he said restricting first-class travel left MPs "below local councillors". 'Need a seat' Sir Nicholas, an MP since 1971, told BBC Radio 5 live that MPs worked "extremely hard" and used the time travelling between London and their constituencies to work. But he said to do that they had to have a seat - something you could not always get in standard class. FROM BBC RADIO 5 LIVE More from BBC Radio 5 live Read your comments And he said: "If I was in standard class I would not do work because people would be looking over your shoulder the entire time, there would be noise, there would be distraction." He added: "They are a totally different type of people. "There's lots of children, there's noise, there's activity. I like to have peace and quiet when I'm travelling." Sir Nicholas said he was not saying people who used standard class were inferior but that, in general, they were not working while travelling. sir nicholas, was one of the better conservative mps, he was unpredictable and certainly not a person who toed the party line, i think he makes a reasonable point, I do not begrudge mps first class travel, I think it more important that they should have substantial pay cuts one of Wintertons good points was his support for the campaign for real ale. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: SPB-Cooperator Date: 20 Oct 12 - 03:13 AM I actual agree with him - when I travel (standard class) the last thing I every want is a tory mp lowering the tone of the carraige - keep them in their dedicated livestock truck (1st class carraige) |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: GUEST,Shimrod Date: 20 Oct 12 - 05:06 AM Yes, deplorable attitudes and behaviour on the part of our elected representatives ... sorry, not our representatives (even though we elect them) but the representatives of Big Business (which is what they've appointed themselves as these days). But, I ask, would members of the Blairite/Brownite Labour Governments have acted any better? I strongly suspect not. They, with their 'Daddy knows best authoritarian' attitudes, would probably have legislated against railway staff reporting on the ministers' travelling habits on health and safety grounds - or something equally daft. In my opinion we've just replaced one neo-liberal, pro-Big Business bunch of hypocritical shits with a different set of neo-liberal, pro-Big Business upper class shits. At least you know where you stand with the latter! |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Dead Horse Date: 20 Oct 12 - 05:47 AM There used to be a class of carriage called 'Parliamentarian' so called because it was brought in by act of parliament. This act stipulated that there be "carriages protected from the weather and provided with seats; for all which luxuries not more than a penny a mile might be charged" |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: GUEST,Big Al Whittle Date: 20 Oct 12 - 05:59 AM I've spent a lifetime wondering if he was related to one of the Gunpowder Plotters. Three seconds on wikipedia have told me it was Thomas Winter in the plot - not Winterton. I went to school with a boy called Winterton. And another called Nicholas. I wonder if either of them were related. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Howard Jones Date: 20 Oct 12 - 06:28 AM The papers and political opponents are predictably having some fun with this. However the reality is that every day, and probably on nearly every train, people are upgrading their tickets on board, either because they have been caught out by the byzantine ticketing structure or, as in this case, want to sit somewhere they can be quiet and relax, or do some work. Both are usually next to impossible in standard class. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Raedwulf Date: 20 Oct 12 - 06:31 AM (ITV reporter) And you'd take the word of a journalist would you? Is that because you think politicians are less prone to truth-telling than journalists, or just because this happens to cast someone on the right wing in a poor light? Your link has already gone 404, so I can't read it. I did read the BBC report last night, though. And an Fb friend has just posted a link to the journalist's feed. He says that, the journalist claims, according to people on the train as well as herself, Osborne refused initially to move or pay the upgrade According to the people on the train? Or according to a journalist? Now it may be the that Georgie-porgie did try to blag. I have no political affiliation; I am cynical about the whole kit & caboodle. Labour will blag when they can, just as much as Tory; celeb's will; frankly many of the ordinary "disgusted" men-in-the-street, if they thought they could get away with it, would (& do, I'm sure) blag anything they could. What irritates me about this is not the tendency of self-important wankers to try to get something for less than its value. I am cynical enough to assume they will try. But Dugher's quotes are so out of step with the BBC report. The salient points are: he missed the train he was supposed to catch because of constituency work; his escorting plod warned the TM he had the wrong ticket; his aide found the TM and paid for the upgrade. Is it just me, or does schoolground yah-yah politics get up your nose? This, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-20008342, is the Beeb report. It is such a non-story. But read, carefully, despite all the contrary reportage, the comments at the end. I couldn't give a damn about George Osborne; he's just another politician. Michael Dugher, on that showing, is not fit to be representing ANYONE in our parliament. And he's a shadow minister! If I Twitted, I would almost certainly have Twitted @MichaelDugher (I'm sure he must have a Twit account) to express my disgust. That kind of politics does nothing to create a better society. Far more than any complaints about a bit of alleged blagging. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Bonzo3legs Date: 20 Oct 12 - 06:49 AM I would always upgrade to First Class when travelling by train in the UK at the weekend - infinitely more civilised away from the noisy hoardes with hideous picnics, screaming children and incessant mobile phone conversations. Used to cost a flat rate of £6 but there seems to be a range of charges now. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Dave Hanson Date: 20 Oct 12 - 07:39 AM Yes Raedwulf it is just you, and Howard Jones it was the fucking Tory's who created this ' byzantine ticketing structure ' by privating the railways in the first place. Dave H |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Raedwulf Date: 20 Oct 12 - 08:30 AM DaveH, you're having a laugh. The ticketing structure has not been simple Single, Return, Cheap Day Return for far longer than the current government has been in power. So which fucking Tories are you criticising? The previous lot? Whose transport policies the Blair (Brown) lengthy government didn't revoke? I used to be a passenger guard on the London - Tilbury - Shoeburyness line (routes out of Fenchurch Street, essentially). That was more than 25 years ago. The ticketing structure, then, wasn't what you might call simple. So whose fault? Privatisation might have made it worse, but it didn't make it 'Byzantine'. That's a creeping disease that several governments, of more than one political stripe, are responsible for. All of which, Dave, misses my point which, I admit, was not necessarily what the original thrust of the thread was about. I was talking about shameless, pointless, political point-scoring, rather than a sudden fit of snobbery. Don't complain at me Richard! You used the word first. Snobbery is about the other side of the fence; not about whether there's genuinely something wrong. It's the label you used; I really do think that's also what you meant. I've seen too many of your posts to think otherwise. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Howard Jones Date: 20 Oct 12 - 10:27 AM It's not like he was caught hiding in the bogs trying to avoid the train manager. All that happened is that he sat in a First Class seat and paid the upgrade. That's what you do if you decide to upgrade. It happens every day. It's a non-story which is being stirred up by journalists to sell papers and by politicians trying to score points. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: theleveller Date: 20 Oct 12 - 11:26 AM So this twat is supposed to be running the finances of the country and he can't even buy the right train ticket. Summs up this government! |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: GUEST,sturgeon Date: 20 Oct 12 - 11:42 AM Ha, Bonzo wants to travel with 'civilised people away from the noisy hoardes'. Said people would almost certainly snub his illiteracy. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 20 Oct 12 - 11:44 AM "So which fucking Tories are you criticising?" Presumably the ones who sold off the railways, which is what Dave said... True enough Blair's crypto-Tory "New Labour" governments failed to do anyhing to reverse the process, but that's tribal politics for you. We've got the priciest train fares in Europe, ande the most shambolically confusing fares system, and the people who gave us that, and kept it that way, should have been lynched. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Howard Jones Date: 20 Oct 12 - 12:02 PM He caught a different train from the one intended. He upgraded his ticket on the train. What's the big deal? There's plenty to criticise George Osborne, and the government, for but this isn't one of them. It's a media brouhaha, nothing more. Don't fall for it. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Richard Bridge Date: 20 Oct 12 - 12:37 PM Howard - have you READ the reports? If (and that's a pretty big if) the omni-incompetent one wan't bilking, the reason his aide gave is just plebgate all over again, and Rees-Mogg's excuse for him on the Tonight programme simply impugned his competence and intelligence. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Bonzo3legs Date: 20 Oct 12 - 12:39 PM And as for the fucking tuc march.... |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Dave Hanson Date: 20 Oct 12 - 01:17 PM Good old bonzo I know you are a socialist at heart, the outrageous snobbery you use is just a ploy to highlight what the Tory party is really all about. Well done mate. Dave H |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Raedwulf Date: 20 Oct 12 - 03:59 PM Kevin, DaveH's comment was entirely throwaway. Just who created a byzantine ticketing structure? I'm no Tory, I'm not Labour either. Are you really trying to tell me that, if the railways had not been privatised, their ticketing would not have grown ever more geared toward profit? Like Richard, I know you start from the left wing, but that doesn't make everything the fault of the right wing when something later doesn't seem to have worked out. Especially when you consider that, as you have noted, tribal politics interferes. Maybe the people who gave us... whatever... should have been lynched (except, I am certain you're against mob rule AND capital punishment). The people that kept it that way? Wow! There's an awful lot of them, isn't there? Many of them on your side of the political divide. As for Richard, have you READ the reports? Or have you only bothered to read the ones that suit your point of view? I don't think I've ever crossed words with you before, but I have seen enough of your posts to know where your biases lie, and you are, often, a poor debater. You seem to choose your opinions first. I don't know, exactly, what Georgie-porgy did, but I know what Dugher said in response. What do you think of the latter's remarks? You've been hot to express your views on the former; stony silence on the latter. Is he beyond criticism because George the Blagger MUST be gospel truth? |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Richard Bridge Date: 20 Oct 12 - 04:38 PM Perhaps, Raedwulf, you would care to clarify what you are talking about. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Raedwulf Date: 20 Oct 12 - 05:42 PM I need to clarify? Oh, dear... I made a direct response to your OP. Your second post ignored everything I said in favour of trying to score a cheap point off of Howard. Go back and re-read your own thread. Properly. Without skimping or cherry-picking. I won't need to clarify anything then. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Richard Bridge Date: 20 Oct 12 - 06:43 PM Open quote - Michael Dugher MP, Labour's shadow Cabinet Office minister, said the train episode was yet another indication of how out of touch Tory ministers were. "Just like Andrew Mitchell, George Osborne obviously thinks it's one rule for him and another for the plebs he's so keen to sit apart from," Mr Dugher said. "So much for 'we're all in it together'." Close quote. A perfectly fair comment. As I said elsewhere about the "failure to pay the full price" aspect "TBH, I'm not sure that that is the real harm - the toffs are now spinning that it was a reasoned choice and that an aide was sent to seek the conductor in order to upgrade. The real harm is in two things - the aide who argued that the chancellor could not be expected to sit amongst the plebs, and Jacob Rees-Mogg (the toff's toff) who argued that you could not expect the chancellor to know one ticket from another. Remarkable for a man supposed to run the economy, doncherknow?" The real harm of the event is that Osborne (or his aides) think that he cannot possibly be expected to sit with the rest of us. It is a replay of plebgate. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: MGM·Lion Date: 21 Oct 12 - 01:36 AM What's with this "us"? Old Pons-Asini is a member of the most upper-middle-class of professions, The Law. Such often hold & express trendy-lefty views, sympathetic to the cause of the poor & downtrodden & exploited. Nowt wrong with that; opinion is free, and it was always a bourgeois movement, quite as much Sir Stafford Cripps as John Burns: but isn't there something a bit distastefully patronising in this romantic identification with the lumpenproletariat and trying to come on as an actual member of their number? "The rest of us", forsooth! ~M~ |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Richard Bridge Date: 21 Oct 12 - 01:49 AM Osborne is, and plainly thinks of himself as, a member of the upper class or ruling class. While I may be upper middle class I am not, never have been, and have never had any wish to be, a member of the ruling class. Also, while there is a respectable volume of socialist barristers (and barristers may count as upper class) socialist solicitors are much rarer. There is a well known story about the evolution of the Society of Conservative lawyers. Do try to think more clearly, Myer. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: MGM·Lion Date: 21 Oct 12 - 02:12 AM I am of course "Mr Myer" to the like of old Mr Pons-Asini. But he is a well-known mannerless pig. I should like to know what makes him think himself entitled to patronise me. I see nothing unclear in my thinking on the inappropriateness of identification, as distinct from sympathy, of members of the Upper Middle Class with the proletariat. The presence or number of socialists in any particular profession is of no relevance whatsoever. It is Ponsy who needs to 'think more clearly'. ~M~ |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: GUEST,Big Al Whittle Date: 21 Oct 12 - 03:34 AM Osborne is, and plainly thinks of himself as, a member of the upper class or ruling class. ... so what's the problem. he's a toff, he behaves like one.why disguise what you are? better than being a tory leading the labour party. if they stop acting like arrogant twats - they will be harder to recognise. Its like as if you want tigers dressed up as zebras. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Richard Bridge Date: 21 Oct 12 - 04:53 AM Al - you may have overlooked Scameron's attempts to de-toxify teh brand "Tory". Plebgate and this replay of it make it transparent that this is a government by the toffs, for the toffs. The rest of us (those who are not toffs, do try to keep up Myer) should vote elsewhere. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Owen Woodson Date: 21 Oct 12 - 07:06 AM Ok., Who rattled Bonzo3legs' cage? "And as for the fucking tuc march." It just so happens, me ould mucker, that I was on that extremely well organised and almost entirely trouble free march. Travelled all the way down from Liverpool we did. Me and several thousand other Scouse comrades, in one of several trains which had been chartered for the occasion by Merseyside TUC. The one I was booked on was an hour late arriving. "Typical. Bloody privatisation. Couldn't even organise a sweep of leaves on the line." When the train eventually arrived, it consisted entirely of first class carriages!!! So, for the first time in my life, I travelled all the way to London and back first class, and for the princely sum of just twenty quid (£10-00 unwaged). And you know what? We didn't see hide now hair of the right honourable member for Tatton, also known as George Gideon Oliver Osborne,also known as Baronet Osborne of Ballentaylor and Ballylemon. Perhaps he decided we were two posh for him. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: GUEST,Big Al Whittle Date: 21 Oct 12 - 07:46 AM for about two thirdsof the English population - the tory brand has never been toxic. The patrician airs of tories are seen as lovable grandosity - see Boris's popularity. Its only when it really in your face that you know howmuch it stinks - like that poor sod of a policemen who had to protect his job, by reporting the pleb incient. or myself. my church (the Quakers) got me into a public school aged 15 when my parents found the army cadet corps and other stuff not their taste at my grammar school. Biggest mistake of my life going there. My inherited lancashire accent and cheap clothes made me an object of ridicule and pity. I was told to get back in the gutter - after 15 months I did. That was my O level year. still I did learn folk guitar there. If Scotland gets independence, I think I'll go and live there. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Richard Bridge Date: 21 Oct 12 - 08:01 AM It now transpires that Osborne is a serial fare bilker http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/georgeosborne/9623740/George-Osborne-caught-in-first-class-with-a-standard-ticket-five- |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Dave Hanson Date: 21 Oct 12 - 08:19 AM Page not found message Richard. Dave H |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Penny S. Date: 21 Oct 12 - 08:27 AM It's too long for the blicky maker. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/georgeosborne/9623740/George-Osborne-caught-in-first-class-with-a-standard-ticket-five-months-ago.html Penny |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Richard Bridge Date: 21 Oct 12 - 09:06 AM Is this my first manual blicky? http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/georgeosborne/9623740/George-Osborne-caught-in-first-class-with-a-standard-ticket-five-months-ago.html |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: GUEST,Fred McCormick Date: 21 Oct 12 - 11:35 AM Sounds like we're all in this (first class compartment) together. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Edthefolkie Date: 21 Oct 12 - 01:19 PM I hold no brief for Georgy-Porgie, but I think this incident isn't so much an demonstration of his snobbishness as an indicator of his poor judgment when choosing his servants. His aide first didn't know how to buy a first class ticket at short notice (surely there's a human selling tickets in WILMSLOW of all places?) then managed to leave the impression that Osborne didn't want to sit in Cattle Class. Mind you, that sneering "I got the cream and you lot are the dirt beneath my brogues" attitude of George's doesn't help when a situation like this occurs. The gripper must have thought "My lucky day, I'll 'ave 'im!" |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: MGM·Lion Date: 21 Oct 12 - 01:45 PM The rest of us (those who are not toffs, do try to keep up Myer) .,,. Keep up with Ponsyface? Why, I left him behind yonx ago, the poor little pontyfaced-cake. Does he, I wonder, know Shaw's early play, You Never Can Tell? There's a lawyer character called Bohun, who has a good way with the persistently but erringly argumentative ~~ like Ponsy's ungood self. So to respond to his above aspostrophe: Richard Bridge is a toff. He thinks he isn't but he is. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: MGM·Lion Date: 21 Oct 12 - 01:50 PM But he is a leftie one, of course. Do you know Kingsley Amis's fine piece on Lefties? Well worth a look ~~ it's in his collected essays; I think it's called Why Lucky Jim Turned Right. One of the definitions that sticks in my mind is "One of a chorus of a hundred million voices crying in the wilderness". Doesn't that just describes the tone of a lot of the voices you find crying on threads like this one?! ~M~ |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Richard Bridge Date: 21 Oct 12 - 02:18 PM Yes, I know most of my Shaw. No, the upper middle class are not toffs. The upper class are. No such word as aspostrophe in Complete OED. Why you want to ally yourself or justify yourself by reference to a serial adulterer, a drunk, and an antisemite baffles me, Myer. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: MGM·Lion Date: 21 Oct 12 - 02:43 PM A man drinks, commits adultery, and makes occasional facetious remarks about Jews {examples? ah!]; so his opinions on all subjects can safely be ignored. What a priceless piece of logic. That Bridgie, now; what a pricelessly pathetically comic little specimen he is too, to be sure... LoL. Likewise Tee-Hee... |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: theleveller Date: 21 Oct 12 - 02:48 PM Just been reading the thread about slugs eating everything and it reminded me of Osborne, Cameron and the rest of the slimy bunch. Personally, I've nothing against First Class - used to travel it between York and London a couple of times a week when my company was paying - it's second class we need to abolish. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Richard Bridge Date: 21 Oct 12 - 02:52 PM Amis was by his own admission and as revealed by his biographers a serial adulterer for much of his life. A famous photograph of a sleeping Amis on a Yugoslav beach shows the slogan (written by wife Hilly) on his back "I Fat Englishman – I fuck anything". In one of his memoirs, Amis wrote: "Now and then I become conscious of having the reputation of being one of the great drinkers, if not one of the great drunks, of our time". The fact was that he enjoyed drink, and spent a good deal of his time in pubs. Hilary Rubinstein, who accepted Lucky Jim for publication at Victor Gollancz, commented: "I doubted whether Jim Dixon would have gone to the pub and drunk ten pints of beer ... I didn't know Kingsley very well, you see." Clive James comments: "All on his own, he had the weekly drinks bill of a whole table at the Garrick Club even before he was elected. After he was, he would get so tight there that he could barely make it to the taxi." According to Clive James, Amis reached a turning point when his drinking ceased to be social. "Amis had turned against himself deliberately ... it seems fair to guess that the troubled grandee came to disapprove of his own conduct." His friend Christopher Hitchens said: "The booze got to him in the end, and robbed him of his wit and charm as well as of his health." Amis was drawn to speculations on the historically received, and commonly accepted stereotypes attributed to be intrinsic to Jewish character. He echoed this unexamined prejudice with a provocative vitality all his own in conversations and letters written to friends and associates: "The great Jewish vice is glibness, fluency … also possibly just bullshit, as in Marx, Freud, Marcuse." Or, "Chaplin is a horse's arse. He's a Jeeeew you see, like the Marx Brothers, like Danny Kaye." As for the cultural complexion of America, Amis had this to say: "I've finally worked out why I don't like Americans … Because everyone there is either a Jew or a hick." Amis himself defined his anti-Semitism as being "Very mild." Strange friends you keep, Myers |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: MGM·Lion Date: 21 Oct 12 - 03:08 PM Someone tell that fool Bridge the difference between 'keeping a friend', and agreeing with one particular opinion expressed in the public prints by one person, entirely outside one's personal acquaintance, which may appear accurate, no matter what other, less persuasive, ones he may choose to express on other topics. The relevance of his weight and his alcohol intake entirely eludes me. FWIW, I entirely agree {listening, Godwin?} with the late Führer on the subject of smoking; but not, oddly enough. with his opinion as to how I should prematurely have met my demise in a lethal chamber. I see no incompatibility here. Can anyone make out what the Pons-Asini is on about? Buggered if I can make a single head or a single tail of his fatuous maunderings. And he has the gall to enjoin me to "keep up"! ~M~ |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Backwoodsman Date: 21 Oct 12 - 03:55 PM And now, normal service is resumed - back to the topic of the thread. Am I the only one who thinks that MPs - all MPs - should always travel 1st class on the railways? Would you lot be happy for an MP to travel 2nd class and have Wayne & Waynetta and their umpteen snotty-nosed sprogs looking over his shoulder at his laptop screen, reading possibly-confidential documents and listening to his phone conversations? When I was working I used to go 1st class on rail when travelling on business. Nothing to do with snobbery, everything to do with it being considerably more conducive to working in peace. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Bonzo3legs Date: 21 Oct 12 - 04:05 PM I agree Backwoodsman. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: theleveller Date: 21 Oct 12 - 05:14 PM "Wayne & Waynetta and their umpteen snotty-nosed sprogs" Er... do you mean the general travelling public? Steady on - you're adopting Bozo-speak there. As to the "discussion" about Kingsley Amis - I knwe two people who had him as their tutor at Cambridge and both credited him with developing their left-wing sensibilities. I did have the privilege of enjoying his company once. One of the aforementiond, my friend, Roger Deakin, once invited me to join him and Kingsley for lunch at the Garrick. He was a superbly witty, erudite and charming host and, I'm afraid to say, it was I who was poured into a taxi afterwards. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Backwoodsman Date: 21 Oct 12 - 05:22 PM I was trying to inject a little humour to lighten the green-eyed tone of this thread, Pete! :-) |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: MGM·Lion Date: 22 Oct 12 - 01:53 AM Oh BTW ~~ Ponsy is, too a toff ~ ~he thinks he isn't but he is. ~M~ |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Richard Bridge Date: 22 Oct 12 - 02:19 AM Myers, have you forgotten everything you might once have known about the meaning of words? Backwoodsman - everyone who defends a conservative enables their oppression of others. Doubtless when you travelled first class you paid for your ticket in advance, rather than try to blag a free upgrade to escape hoi polloi. It is not necessary in most cases to travel first class. I did it once and once only when I was an expensive central London lawyer - on the Manchester Pullman to the completion of the sale of a business. The only time my clients ever paid for me to fly business class was for the finalisation and signature in New York of a deal for a £20million TV series - and that was because Channel 4's legal affairs person insisted we all did, much to the annoyance of the producer since it didn't half dent his budget. I relatively often used to get the HST to Cardiff to review TV programmes and never once needed anything other than an ordinary ticket. Mostly first class is simply a conceit. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Richard Bridge Date: 22 Oct 12 - 02:21 AM Meaning of "toff" for the ignorant Myers |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: theleveller Date: 22 Oct 12 - 03:20 AM "Mostly first class is simply a conceit." Well, possibly, but at the times I used to travel you got a deal that included car parking at the station, breakfast and - most important - a seat! It wasn't just us directors who went first class; the Chairman, who had also founded the company, insisted that as he went first class, everyone travelling on business should do so as well. We were usually dressed in jeans and t-shirts and it was amusing to see the looks we got from the stuffed shirts. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Backwoodsman Date: 22 Oct 12 - 03:23 AM Correct Richard, I booked in advance most of the time but, on occasions (and I'm talking a good few years ago now, not in recent times) I paid a supplemental fare on the train (voluntarily - no attempt to 'blag' anything, if you knew me you'd know how ridiculous that suggestion is). Anyone who doubts the benefits of 1st class accommodation on rail should experience, as I have, a journey in 2nd class, KX - Retford, with a horde of (apparently) drunken Doncaster Rovers supporters. I'm a man who has never been afraid to defend himself, verbally or physically but, on that journey, I was very scared indeed, and my wife was terrified. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: MGM·Lion Date: 22 Oct 12 - 03:44 AM Meaning of "toff" for the ignorant Myers===== .,.,. Who is this Myers, Brige? |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Howard Jones Date: 22 Oct 12 - 03:48 AM I used to enjoy the benefit of 1st class travel on business but I'm now required to travel standard class. The difference is that on a busy service (as most are) it is very difficult to do any real work on the train, other than reading documents. Quite apart from the noise from loud conversations and music leaking from headphones (and the occasional rowdy football crowd), only a few standard-class seats come with a table, and despite its name using a laptop on your lap in a fairly confined space is next to impossible, especially if you have papers to refer to. Of course people cope, but it is far from an ideal environment. Even the quiet coaches lack adequate table provision. In 1st class you get a table and usually some peace and quiet (although this cannot be guaranteed), but at an exorbitant price. I have wondered whether there would be a demand for an intermediate "business class", in a quiet coach without the frills of first but with tables throughout. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Backwoodsman Date: 22 Oct 12 - 04:18 AM Couldn't agree more with all of that, Howard. I sometimes think that some of the regulars in the BS section live their lives in a parallel universe to the one the rest of us live in, where it's 'the same but different'. Either that, or their socio-political dogmas blind them to reality.i |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Big Al Whittle Date: 22 Oct 12 - 05:34 AM I think the stuff about Kingsley Amis is intereting . All this stuff about Nicholas Winterton and his inability to buy the right train ticket is dead boring. Why don't webuy all MP s a new English car every year and employ a driver. It would do a little something to get the economy moving. then we wouldn't have any more of this bollocks. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Richard Bridge Date: 22 Oct 12 - 05:52 AM Well, I don't suppose it's this one (which I did NOT create, I just stumbled on it) http://www.bebo.com/Profile.jsp?MemberId=7770531964 |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Big Al Whittle Date: 22 Oct 12 - 06:04 AM Strange! |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Backwoodsman Date: 22 Oct 12 - 06:46 AM Richard - where did I defend a Conservative? Read my post again please - I said ALL politicians. No specific reference to Conservatives. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Richard Bridge Date: 22 Oct 12 - 08:11 AM You defend Osborne by saying that all politicians should be entitled to do as he. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Backwoodsman Date: 22 Oct 12 - 08:22 AM You really do have a perverse, nay perverted, view of the world Richard. Your dogmas and obsessions turn an intelligent, articulate man into a buffoon. Thankfully, everyone else whose mental processes work properly can see the giant flaw in your argument, and that I did no such thing. Not only do i not suffer fools gladly, i don't suffer them at all, especially fools who wilfully distort the meaning of what i say. Best we end the current exchange now - when you're prepared to discuss like a rational person, I may be prepared to respond. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Raedwulf Date: 26 Oct 12 - 08:04 PM You really do have a perverse, nay perverted, view of the world Richard. No, he just talks utter drivel, as with one or two others on this board and, as with one or two others on this board, is desperately afraid of either admitting to it, or to sticking his hand up and saying "I wuz wrong, guv!" Of course, he wouldn't talk like that, him being posh an' all... Oh dear, now he's got me doing it. I do apologise. Dear Richard, Go and look up ad hominem. Then stop doing it. You really are the worst debater I've seen on Mudcat since Monomaniacal Roger, of Blessed Memory. Indulging in sneering & ad hominem just makes you look an utter berk and does not get your point across in the slightest. You might think you're being clever, but you're not. Note to MtheGM - same to you, Mister! Regards, Raedwulf P.S. Before you respond, please note that the opening para is deliberately intended as a satirical set up for the main point. Whilst you may think you do not, you DO spend far too many words attacking the poster & not the post. I've seen (& mostly ignored) your posts here for several years for that very reason. Ad hominem is the worst debating tactic in the world. If you want to get your point across, try posting without the AH. If you're going to tell me "I don't care", then the only logical conclusions are that you are either a troll, or you're only interested in the sound of your own voice. If you think you have a point to make, in many of your posts, you do it badly. If you don't care you do it badly, you're not worth listening to. A rethink might be in order? |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Richard Bridge Date: 26 Oct 12 - 10:31 PM You did, BW, exactly as I said you did. R: curious that you should set out an ad hominem attack against me in such general terms. Not only that, but do so in such illogical terms. Perhaps you don't get it. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: MGM·Lion Date: 27 Oct 12 - 01:12 AM For the record: I have several times got bebo to take down that post linking me to the BNP, charmingly linked by RB above [22 0ct 5.52 am - can even he imagine it to be genuine!?] ~~ which from internal evidence if you look it seems to have been put up by someone who knows me thru Mudcat, and I don't think I'm the only one. It keeps reappearing and I have long since given up bothering about it. ~M~ |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: MGM·Lion Date: 27 Oct 12 - 01:18 AM What I gather from its appearance here is that RB must have been googling me to find something to my disadvantage, or how else would he have come across it? Wonder why he has been doing that? ~M~ |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Backwoodsman Date: 27 Oct 12 - 03:03 AM Sorry Richard, I'm far too intelligent to involve myself in your schoolboy games of "oh yes you did", "oh no I didn't". The evidence is there in black and white, everyone but you can read and understand it. Your apparent lack of skill in English Comprehension strongly suggests that your parents wasted a lot of money sending you to that Toffs' school. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Richard Bridge Date: 27 Oct 12 - 03:52 AM Ah - Woodie - "ad hominem"? |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Richard Bridge Date: 27 Oct 12 - 03:57 AM Myer. Paranoid or what? Don't you remember saying "Who is this Myers"? You will note that I did not refer to anything else I might have found if I had been looking for stuff that might have been about you. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: GUEST,Big Al Whittle Date: 27 Oct 12 - 05:26 AM I've got one or two of those sites linking me to the BNP. Do you think if we all got together and made a complaint to the police, they might track down who is doing it and stop them? |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: MGM·Lion Date: 27 Oct 12 - 07:19 AM Would it be worth while, Al? Can't imagine anyone who knows one taking it in the least seriously ~~ apart, apparently, from RB. At least, I can think of no motive for his having linked to it here, other than fatuous credulity, or vindictive malevolence and spite; neither of which motivations is likely to do the silly fellow much credit. Not, to go by posts above addressing or referring to him, that he possesses much of that around these parts. I do not really wish to descend to his level of disputation; but he really is rather a contemptible little specimen, isn't he? ~M~ |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: GUEST,Big Al Whittle Date: 27 Oct 12 - 08:33 AM perhaps not worthwhile for you - your reputation precedes you. I'm not famous like you... Someone from lewes folk club called me a racist on facebook theother week - and he must have got it from somewhere. Not to mention generations to come, who might find these sites and think I was Joseph Mengele in hiding. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Raedwulf Date: 27 Oct 12 - 05:30 PM Dear gods, Richard, did they they beat all of the brains out of you at public school? I thought you'd been left with a few functioning neurons. Obviously not. I did say "satirical set-up". Did you miss it? Or did you think it would be more convenient to ignore it & hope no-one would that you'd done so? Or that no-one noticed the phrase? It doesn't matter either way to me. You've shown yourself up for what you are. Maybe you should form a club with Keith A, who has as desperate a need to be right as you seem to. I just hope you never disagree. Bye bye, Dick. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: GUEST,Musket sans cookie Date: 28 Oct 12 - 06:01 AM Just seen this thread so excuse me for dragging it back to the subject. When I do work for the government regulator I travel on their behalf. I used to get reimbursed up to the value of a standard open return regardless of how I travelled. I only got what I spent but that value set the limit. Now, thanks to the MP scandals, everybody tightened up and rightly so. However, I cannot use first class saver tickets which are cheaper than standard open because the rule is on first class itself rather than cost. I'm all for keeping costs down but now I travel standard class, it costs tax payers more. Mind you at least these tickets are more flexible. Just over £100 more for a return to London that's all. Is that good? A standard saver is cheapest but the rules don't require it and be blessed to using them just to keep chippy buggers happy. The Chancellor deserves all the flak he is getting but the rules are based on envy not cost. And that is pathetic. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: GUEST Date: 28 Oct 12 - 09:13 AM I'm more concerned with highly-paid public servants (and that includes all MPs of whatever stamp) giving value for money, and being able to work on the train, in conditions conducive to privacy and productivity, contributes to that. 1st Class is more likely than Standard Class to permit it. Only someone with a chip the size of an oak tree on his shoulder and shit for brains could fail to understand that. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: GUEST,Big Al whittle Date: 28 Oct 12 - 03:17 PM And I get very fed up with the right wing faction always coming up wi this 'chip on the shoulder/politics of envy routine. Every time a tory gets nabbed for nicking lead off the roof and pissing in the water supply - they get the chips, the giant battered cod, the mushy peas and the jumbo sausage on their bloody shoulders at the slightest criticism. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: MGM·Lion Date: 28 Oct 12 - 03:59 PM Surely better to demolish an arguable 'routine' by rational counter-argument, Al, than by denouncing it as merely making you 'get very fed up'. You won't carry much conviction that way. Why are such accusations inaccurate? In what way are your objections to the 'right wing factions' modes of thought such as to convince an objective bystander of their validity, other than by announcing that you personally find them tedious? ~M~ |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: The Sandman Date: 28 Oct 12 - 04:41 PM this thread reminds me of prime ministers question time |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Backwoodsman Date: 29 Oct 12 - 12:45 AM Amazing - never voted Tory in my life and, at the age of 65, I'm suddenly described as a member of the 'Right-Wing faction'! Al, I know you don't have shit for brains, so why do you and Dickie Cranium have such difficulty understanding the phrase "all MPs of whatever stamp" - no reference whatsoever to political preference, certainly no reference specifically to Tories. So why does that make me a member of the 'Right Wing faction', or a defender of Osborne as Cranium claims. It's a ludicrous suggestion. Or do you hold a notion that anyone who believes in getting value for money from public servants is automatically a Right Winger - an equally ludicrous idea? I'm curious. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Musket Date: 29 Oct 12 - 04:15 AM I'm a socialist and I have the greyhound and flat cap to prove it. (Now look Al, you've got me feeling conscious when I am out walking the mutt.) Ok, not a socialist in the Stalin mode, more of a social democrat, in a the wide sense. Or to put it another way, you need aspiration to keep the economy going in order to fund a social programme. Somebody said a few weeks ago that to appreciate social aspiration, you need to understand the market for conservatories. Quite. This just in; In today's Indescribablyboring, three people in that carriage have challenged the person's recollection. Osborn's hoppo has also denied the "train" of events. I wonder if, like Mitchell, this is a case of damned by what is expected of you by the contents of Grimsby's trawler fleet and Lincolnshire's spud farmers? |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: GUEST,Big Al Whittle Date: 29 Oct 12 - 04:17 AM Put it this wayy. My nephew is a really talented graphic designer. Took him three years at Exeter Uno get a good degree. Cost his parents a fortune to pay his feees rent and expenses. He works for P and O cruises for a small salary. With himand his wife working every hour God sends, plus extra duties on the side - showing people round the ships - he just makes enough to pay his mortgage on two bedroom semi, plus his very expensive season ticket for Brtish rail. Work begins before eight o clock every morning when he takes his laptop out on the train. Finishes eight o'clock at night when he gets off the train. If him and millions like him can buy the correct ticket - why can't your man? If his work is that important that he can't be bothered, let parliament BUY for its members a go anyhwere , ist class, rail season ticket. So he can get on his fucking train without resorting to bluster and/or low dishonesty. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Backwoodsman Date: 29 Oct 12 - 05:58 AM "If him and millions like him can buy the correct ticket - why can't your man?" Now there I totally agree, Al, but the tone of your posts, and those of R. Cranium Esq., suggests that you believe it's wrong that anyone at all should travel 1st class, and especially anyone who holds Conservative allegiances. So.....are we agreed that 1st is fine for any and all MPs, regardless of party, provided they hold the correct ticket? |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Musket Date: 29 Oct 12 - 06:48 AM When, wearing a previous hat (not necessarily a flat cap) I started going to London on the train on government business, there seemed to be a belief, whether true or not I don't know, that the amount of first class public sector travel was an implied promise to the operators as back door subsidisation. If true, then hopefully this is a thing of the past and the cost of subsidy can be of public record. if it were balls, then the operators have lost a hell of a lot of income with which to improve services. Me? I happily buy standard and because I can, I generally upgrade at my own expense for long journey one on the train. Tell you what though, whilst East Coast are generally fine whichever class you are in, the cost just ensures roads remain clogged at rush hour. Which defeats the idea of encouraging trains in the first place. As much as I have no time for Osborn and feel he has proved to be incompetent in many areas, it remains one person saying he tried to evade paying and three saying he didn't. Is the one believed through being more credible? Or because hate and mistrust has reached levels everybody should be ashamed of? |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: GUEST,Big Al Whittle Date: 29 Oct 12 - 06:50 AM 'So.....are we agreed that 1st is fine for any and all MPs, regardless of party, provided they hold the correct ticket? ' Yes and tickets of the correct denomination are currently available to all classes, for those who go the trouble of buying one. This government information has not been witheld from ministers. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Backwoodsman Date: 29 Oct 12 - 06:59 AM I agree. :-) |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Howard Jones Date: 29 Oct 12 - 04:07 PM "tickets of the correct denomination are currently available to all classes, for those who go the trouble of buying one." Yes, and upgrades on the train are available to anyone, whether they have decided to catch a different train or want to move to first class, or didn't have time to get one at the station. Do none of you travel by train? I see new tickets being issued on the train three or four times a week, and that's just in my immediate vicinity. It's not unusual. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: GUEST,Musket sans cookie Date: 30 Oct 12 - 03:30 AM Like I said, I upgrade on the train. Hence I have a degree of scepticism about the claim. Might be that he fancies himself enough to demand privilege. But 3/1 claim he has been misrepresented. My concern is that too many people are willing to see such things as fact if it fits in with their huge King Ted at the side of their collar. Rich people aren't going to fuck off abroad because they are tarred with a brush many others have avoided in the austerity reckoning. They are as much a part of society as those who have less and aspire to less. Many don't get it. But there again neither do many of the tap room barriers who decry them. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Richard Bridge Date: 30 Oct 12 - 04:53 AM Amazing bunch of people imagining what I said in stead of what I actually said. Facts: 1. Gideon reported travelling without upgrade. 2. Allegedly, an aide sent to try to get upgrade. 3. Aide reported trying to get free upgrade. 4. Aide reported saying that Gideon could not possibly sit with ordinary people. 5. Rees-Mogg actually defended Gideon on the basis that the ticket structure was too confusing for Gideon to understand. Woodie says "MPs - all MPs - should always travel 1st class on the railways". This is wholly clearly a purported defence to the "plebgate" aspect of the Great Train Snobbery. For some reason Woodie does not wish to be seen in that light and denies it. Raedwulf, who has persistently defended Gideon on this thread, decides taht the best way to achieve that is to call me the worst debater ever on Mudcat (or words to similar burden) - and simultaneously to accuse me of ad hominem arguments. Not very consistent. Myer says "who is this Myers" - and I say "presumably NOT this one" - and Myer for some reason infers that I am saying that he IS that one. Meanwhile another conservative reveals his true colours, sliding from government to manager of government liaison - no possible conflict of interest is there? Much. http://news.sky.com/story/1004407/exclusive-cameron-aide-quits-for-wonga |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: MGM·Lion Date: 30 Oct 12 - 05:15 AM Mr Myer to you, pig. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: GUEST,SPB Cooperator (on a different pc) Date: 30 Oct 12 - 05:16 AM The class of travel is a matter of choice - or business policy - in my coop if I want to travel 1st class, I pay the difference. It could be justified that if an mp is using the journey to catch up with work, and the work is, for example, reading constituency letters and drafting replies, then that would be fine with me. If it is 'Political Party' business, then the party should pay the difference. If the MP is not working during the journey, again he or she should pay the difference' On the original thread title, if for any reason he or she considers herself more important than the public who pays his/her wages, that IS snobbery. MPs are elected to serve, not to rule. - but who they serve is another issue that has been widely discussed before and will do so again. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Backwoodsman Date: 30 Oct 12 - 06:00 AM FFS, Richard Cranium, you boorish, bullying buffoon, I explained my reasoning which is based on long experience of travelling on business and privately on the East Coast main line. Do NOT make accusations against me which are not borne out by what I actually said. I don't lie, if I make a statement it's fact. Your persistent, wilful misrepresentations of what I said make you look very, very stupid indeed. I said in an earlier post that I don't suffer fools at all, and you are giving us plenty of evidence that you are a fool. Neither do I submit to a bully. From this moment, if you address me, you'll be talking to the hand. Now do one. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Richard Bridge Date: 30 Oct 12 - 06:11 AM Ah, ad hominem again. And not in any way that relates to the argument. Meanwhile, two thirds of the electorate share my view that "Dave" and Gideon are "out of touch" and even 40% of conservatives agree! http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/9642442/Now-Tory-voters-say-David-Cameron-and-George-Osborne-are-out-of-touch.html |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Musket Date: 30 Oct 12 - 08:07 AM If there were allegations about someone called Gideon, then who is this? The chancellor, George Osborn used to have that name but decided his parents weren't helping his chances so changed it to George. By keeping the ridicule of his name rather than the allegations, Bridge is showing his true colours yet again. I share the popular view that the PM and Chancellor appear out of touch. Whether I share any view with Bridge is, as ever, another matter entirely.... There s a difference between being disturbed that the leadership of this country being out of touch and being pleased about it because it somehow fits in with your view that democracy is only to be applauded if we all think like you do. Luckily, we don't... |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: GUEST,SPB Cooperator (on a different pc) Date: 30 Oct 12 - 09:09 AM If you genuinely believe a policy, or action, or inaction is wrong, even if the perpetrator has been elected democratically - and those who elected the perpetrators may have done so for totally unconnected reasons, then it is right to try to charge the hearts and minds of the populace. If in doing so, by common consensus the actions, inactions, and policies are seen as morally repugnant, then the perpetrators no longer have a moral mandate to carry on. This is a justification for public protest, non-compliance, and direct action (as long as 'bystanders' are not hurt or damaged). Changing the hearts and minds includes highlighting the impact of policies and actions, highlighting hypocracies, injustices and inconsistencies is how policies are instigated (one rule for etc......) As an individual I stand for my right to try to win over public opinion, and my right to do so should always be respected. Similarly, I respect the right of other people to have an opposing point of view, and if I feel strongly enough I would argue the case until I am blue in the face. What I will not due is abuse the person who I disagree with, as this only serves to weaken my position. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: GUEST Date: 30 Oct 12 - 09:48 AM Bridge, please stop misrepresenting what I have said, and why I said it. I have given my explanations, that should be good enough. SPB - we're not dealing with opposing points of view here. I fully agree that Osborne should have paid the correct fare, and have said so further up the thread. What we have is a bully with a particularly perverted political agenda, who also has an agenda against me (witness his posts in other threads) and is determined to provoke rather than discuss, so he wilfully and repeatedly distorts my words and misrepresents my position on the topic. On a further point, he has repeatedly abused me in other threads. So if your last line was aimed at me, it was misdirected - he started it! And now I really am out of this thread for good. I've got a dog to walk, a decent car to drive, and nice guitars to play. And I've actually got a life. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Jim Dixon Date: 30 Oct 12 - 10:04 AM The original link doesn't work for me. I hope this one will take you to the same article: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/great-train-snobbery-george-osborne-embarrassment-after-sitting-in-first-class-with-standardclass-ticket-8218841.html |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Q (Frank Staplin) Date: 30 Oct 12 - 12:53 PM The only way to avoid unwanted associations on a train is to travel in a private compartment. The alternative is a ticket in a parlor car with the bar at hand (or do they still have these on the RR?) Here in Alberta, most people travel by car, which keeps one in proper isolation. The Greyhound buses here have a few extra-cost seats near the front, which offers a little help in keeping the unwashed and babies carrying cold viruses at slight remove, if one does not drive and must use ground transportation. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: SPB-Cooperator Date: 30 Oct 12 - 05:18 PM My post was directed across a myriad of threads in respect of: (1) Those who hold the view that people should blindly accept the will of government, as long as it was democratically elected. (2) Those who mud-sling rather than debate the issue. It is not aimed at anyone in particular, but to coin an old expression If the cap fits.............. |
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Subject: RE: BS: The Great Train Snobbery From: Raedwulf Date: 31 Oct 12 - 05:14 PM "Reported, alleged, reported, reported..." Don't let facts get in the way of your axe-grinding, will you, Dick? And you can't / won't read either. Which several people pointed out to you. Go read my remarks again. I haven't defended Osborne at all (Gideon... yep, more sneering ad hominem). I've merely pointed out that I'm not willing to trust the word of a jounalist over that of a policitian. The bit that exercised me was the cheap childish political point scoring that The Other Side tried to indulge in. Note to Dick: The Other Side does NOT mean Labour. It means the other side. Tories do it, Labour does it, if the Lib-Dem's could work out who the other side was, I don't doubt they'd do it too. Just like the blagging. Go back to my first post. Read it properly. Defending George Osborne indeed! |
