lockdown

Why doesn’t SAGE model positive scenarios?

It’s a week before Christmas, and the veil has been lifted once more on the decision making at the highest levels of government in the UK.

In a rare moment on twitter, the head of modelling for the government’s SAGE committee admitted that it would be essentially pointless to model positive outcomes of covid this winter, and that actually it’s policy makers that decide what to model.

We discuss that decision making process and how it’s only designed to go in one direction.

Nic thinks this is one of many examples where the tide is starting to turn, but will a good old fashioned lockdown be enough to dissuade people again?

From Facebook fact checks to Libertarian Party politics, we wrap up 2021 with the most positive message we can give – don’t comply, and have a very merry Christmas.

Photo by Isaac Smith on Unsplash


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The Covid Christmas Cancellation

The government found just the excuse it needed – a new strain of the coronavirus – to lockdown in all but name and cancel Christmas for a huge swathe of rhe country.

We talk about the rules of Tier 4 and how it was announced, and whether there needs to be a new scientific discipline for analysing and predicting what government will do next.

Does there need to be a new term for those that have always opposed these government restrictions, and what about those that have woken up from the brainwashing?

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The Covid Casedemic

As England heads toward a return to the Lockdown tiering system and out of the 4 week November national Lockdown, we discuss how meaningless the numbers are that have driven us this far.

How exactly to do you count false positives with the now ubiquitous PCR test for SARS-CoV-2?

Does the recent Chinese study really show that asymptomatic people don’t spread the disease, or is this yet more bad science?

We talk about whether or not it’s likely that someone infected can spread it at all if they don’t know it and Andrew explains that a mask won’t prevent you from breathing in particles from Julius Caesar’s last breath, never mind the germs from someone six feet away.

Finally, after sharing stories of real people who have suffered and died due to the government’s handling of public health in 2020, Nic leaves us with one vital pearl of wisdom that might just help us get through it with some sanity.

Photo by National Cancer Institute on Unsplash

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Circuit Breaker Or Will Breaker?

This week, Nic notices that there has been a noticeable change in the political landscape, with the two main parties finally diverging over lockdown policy. But is this a good thing or not?

Certainly when all political parties agree then alarm bells should ring, but if one goes even further, even more authoritarian, will that encourage the other to become more libertarian? Or will it encourage more authoritarianism all round, with every party trying to out-government each other?

We then talk about what could come next. More national lockdowns? Or ever increasing local lockdowns? What about the different tiers? Will they invent any more?

We discuss Sweden, how it’s anti-lockdown policies are being ignored and move on to Neoliberals, who have recently repositioned themselves to align with big statists.

Moving back to more traditional topics, we talk a little about how the left is continuing to redefine language and how that can be catastrophic, before retelling a fantastic covid/whisky anecdote given to us by one of our listeners.

Photo by Michael Dziedzic on Unsplash



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Exam Grades, the Rule of Six and Our Growing Police State

Nic is back from Cornwall after cancelling his trip to Corfu, but how much of a holiday was it, being herded through one way systems, with mask nazis everywhere?

He also shares his recent experiences with masks and how its stopped him attending medical appointments. We cover the exam grading debacle, where yet another computer model mucks up people’s lives – this time students. But will there be long term consequences of not ever having sat your exams? Who will hire the class of 2020?

This leads us onto talking for the first time in depth about working from home and managing a remote team – something Andrew has a great deal of experience with. Can you really recruit and motivate staff in a lockdown?

Then we discuss the latest rule changes about to come into force. The so called “Rule of 6”. As well as its sinister name, how on earth is it fair for families of 6 who can no longer meet anyone, or of more than 6 who can’t freely associate as a family? There’s talk of curfews, which means curfews here we come. And Covid enforcement marshalls. Surely now is the time to call this a police state? Or did that apply a lot, lot earlier?

All this and more, plus a special interruption by the mother of all house spiders. Is it the libertarian thing to do to kill a spider?

Photo by John Cameron on Unsplash


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Agent Based Behaviour Modelling

When did locking down a population, or closing schools become the agreed way of dealing with an epidemic?

Andrew explains where the lockdown model was pioneered (you won’t believe it if you don’t already know), and we discuss why it became popular as a methodology despite being so flawed.

Why were policy makers so ready to curtail our basic freedoms?  Will behaviour modelling be turned towards other policy areas to “prove” that something needs to be done?


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Photo by Martin Sanchez on Unsplash

The Great Derangement

After more than a week of Black Lives Matter protests, and statues being torn down, we discuss whether destruction of public property is as bad as private property, and how the Autonomous Zone in Seattle has already formed at least one government since ditching the last one.  The Minneapolis Police force is being officially dismantled, but what will be created in its place, and is this a good experiment?

J K Rowling has put the cat amongst the pigeons again with her thoroughly reasonable and logic tweets on biological sex and the existence of women, but yet the woke are in full backlash.  Are the general public starting to see the inherent contradictions in woke ideology?

Maybe we are under no more danger any more from Coronavirus (hint, we kind of never where), and that’s why all this woke nonsense has surfaced again.  It’s amazing what you can do while you are on government paid furlough. 

And what of Boris?  Does he resemble another former Tory Prime Minister?

Photo by Clay Banks on Unsplash

House Arrest Ends, More Liberties Infringed

As the 3rd amendment to the Coronavirus Restrictions regulations are dumped unceremoniously on the statute books with no scrutiny whatsoever, we look at just how absurd they are, and whether they are an easing of the lockdown or not.

With regulations now moving from public to private spaces, and definitions emerging of just what “a gathering” is, we pick apart this poorly crafted document, to show that everything has a loophole, and that our freedoms are actually being eroded more, not less.

And as the protests in the US spill over to the UK, where are the Covid Cops to arrest them or take them home?

Photo by Sarah Kilian on Unsplash


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Why don’t the left get memes?

In another Sounding Board Short, we talk about Andrew’s meme on teaching unions that went started some hilarious twitter encounters, and the latest nonsense from local authorities advising schools not to open.

Why don’t those on the left actually get memes?

Did this one in particular hit a nerve with teachers?

When will schools actually open, and will they be an environment parents will want to send their children back to?

Photo by Mladen Borisov on Unsplash

Please visit our website to download or stream all our previous episodes and to read our articles.Web: https://soundingboard.com

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Are Teaching Unions Keeping Schools Closed?

In our first Sounding Board Short, we travel to a nearby park and chat about Nic’s article on hectordrummond.com about the difficult decisions ahead in deciding when it’s time to send the children back to school.

We learn about the over zealous teaching unions and the local authority taking crazy steps to essentially stop schools from opening in any practical sense.

And won’t somebody think of the children? We talk about mental well-being and whether the guidance brought in will have a damaging effect on young minds.

Photo by Ivan Aleksic on Unsplash

Please visit our website to download or stream all our previous episodes and to read our articles.Web: https://soundingboard.com

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