and expensive, very expensive…with a dash of inept:
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The special relationship is no longer so special
You have to wonder to what extent we’d be better off backing away from this shit-show for a while.
The serious risks are a) that the orange incompetent will get re-elected (for now, at least, he hasn’t managed to sink the economy, and that counts over there) and b) that we’re about to end up with a clown of our own in charge, and no European friends to help us.
VB
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New UK ambassador to the US announcement expected imminently.
This saddens me greatly
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I’m always amazed that senior people write this stuff down! Everything is a potential leak these days, the more controversial the more likely.
In the same vein the terrorists and villains who don’t get caught are the ones who don’t text or email their plans to each other FFS.
He does, however, win today’s No Shit Sherlock award.
I imagine there’s a civil service protocol about this. There may be a requirement for him to record the advice he gives to the politicians so that when a public inquiry comes along five years later they can be held to account for ignoring him. I’m more surprised that people who leak this stuff don’t go to jail for long periods.
VB
I expect that’s right. I’m still amazed it gets out. There’s bound to be loads of stuff that doesn’t see the light of day.
Selfish as I am, I hope so. A government can only achieve the best for me if it can keep quite a lot of its business secret from our competitors. In a perfect world we’d all co-operate and there wouldn’t be any competition between us, only between humanity as a whole and the proverbial slings and arrows … But we’re a long way from that.
VB
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There is a special address they send notes to, it’s to cover anything that is said outside of minuted meetings etc but updates or briefings are sent by diplomatic cables.
The leaking of diplomatic memos or cables is technically a huge breach as they are secured with the highest level of encryption possible. I bet the FCO are going batshit crazy over this leak as diplomats will lose the confidence in the system to express views or opinions now.
Whoever leaked those is likely to end up in a very deep dark hole.
I once worked in the Fire Protection field and went to survey a cypher room in an embassy in London.
I was escorted by a sergeant from their Marines.
One of the issues was getting cables and pipework through an RF shielded room.
On the way out I realised I had left a notebook in the cypher room.
I said “I need to go back to the cypher room as I left a notebook there”
“I don’t know what you mean sir, we don’t have a cypher room”
NB This was the 80s and before the internet.
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These cunts got their cockpunch…
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In Barcelona right now, the Catalans banned this stuff years ago and the 2x rings are now shopping centres, still gruesome I accept 
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Fucking UPS can have one (again) They keep missing deliveries as our address is right on the edge of their area and then claim it’s because “the receiving business was closed”
Oh dear UPS do seem to be coming in for a bit of stick recently !!
https://theartofsound.net/forum/showthread.php?64799-UPS-Warning-Don�t-Bother!!!
I was due a UPS delivery today. By coincidence I have been in all day with the lurgy. They just texted me to say they are delivering tomorrow… Useless Parcel Service.
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I only read the first page (life’s short) but it turned out the way courier threads always seem to: everyone has had grief with couriers but which courier it is varies utterly. I have had mixed, but sometimes appalling, experience with ParcelForce. I have never ever had a problem with UPS and I have used them tens of times. One of the AoS posters has had equally trouble-free large-volume experience with them. I’m convinced that it depends i) on which depots and round drivers are involved (my local UPS depot and the guy who works my round both seem to be very good) and ii) on the packing. It really does have to be bomb-proof. I read a piece somewhere recently from a guy who used to be involved with shipping Leak gear (IIRC). He said that they tested their packaging by dropping it from 6 feet onto concrete. Because that happened, even back in the 1960’s.
VB
We must have the same UPS team. I get my brewing ingredients delivered from my supplier Next Day, on the correct day and in good condition.
UPS are normally OK and I did phone to have a whinge. The depot phoned me back last night and confirmed the driver wasn’t near my office when he closed the ticket so she apologised and said she would make sure it was first out in the morning.
Got a phone call this morning to say it will be with me before 10:00, it was.
Don’t mind them saying they ran out of time to deliver but the bullshit about the office being closed got on my tits.
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This definitely is a thing. I once had be out when I was pretty sure a small UPS delivery was due. I know the driver on my round sufficiently well that when I came across him quite by chance in a nearby village I was able to ask if he had anything for me. He duly rooted the jiffy bag out and I signed for it there at the kerbside. But he asked me to check the goods because if there was going to be any follow-up then he would get grief for the mismatch between the delivery address and the handover location.
VB
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