PMUK Ponders...

Hey there Commanders,

Thought I’d pass on my own findings from Quince. As of late, I’m kinda, sorta simultaneously working on powerplay (for Aisling Duval, don’t judge me) and engineers. When I made my 750 merits this week for powerplay, I thought I’d head back up to Quince as someone had said it was out of lockdown now. Turns out to be sort of true.

While there are no in-systems passenger missions at Jeffries or Millarport (and if I’m honest, I am more than happy with that “fix”), there are still some scan missions available at Millarport, and for me (one rank off Elite in Explorer), they are all paying pretty good… But… I only find missions at Millarport in Open Play (and rarely sometimes in Solo). I get no missions at all in Private Group. Oh, and for me Millarport is still in lockdown.

So, the Quince money tree has been cut down, but there’s still some money to be made there.

Catch you in the black.

Welp, the weekend saw me finally make it to Rear Admiral in Elite: Dangerous, so I’m the proud owner of all the largest playable ships in E:D now: the Anaconda, the Federal Corvette, and the Imperial Cutter. With the exception of the ‘Conda (currently my “go to” for combat), these are stock ships as they came from the shipyard.

First job after is for me to get no less than a billion credits, that way I can afford to set up the ‘Vette and Cutter (‘Vette will be my new combat ship, and the Cutter will be set up for mining). So, it’s back to Quince and I’m ferrying passengers to the tourist satellite and back, which gets me Explorer rank and cash. Yes, planetary scan missions can get you more cash, but you don’t get any Explorer rank for doing that, and I need to get one of the three major ranks to Elite so I can get access to Shinrata Dezra.

Right, I’m getting pretty sick of the stupidity that appears to have infested UK politics (and let’s not get started on what’s happening in the US right now). Prior notice: I’m a card-carrying member of the Liberal Democrats: I will have things to say about them shortly.

The Tories have lurched so far to the right in the shadow of the EU referendum that UKIP have no place to stand anymore, and I genuinely wonder when the cabinet will don their black shirts. I’m trying very hard to not invoke Godwin’s Law here, but seriously? Nationalistic jingoism aside, the current cabinet is making hay while the referendum sun is shining, and that could oh-so-easily be their downfall; they have such a narrow mandate from the referendum, but they think it’s a license to print law.

The Labour party appears to have imploded over on the left (@SteveReedMP amiright?). Collectively get your shit together, support your leader, and start attacking the Tories head-on (@Kier_Starmer has the right idea). The EU referendum was “won” by the narrowest of margins by the Leave campaign on the back of what can only be described as a mountain of lies (not that the Project Fear peddled by the Remain campaign was any better) – but the Tories seem intent to use that narrowly specified result (lest we forget the referendum question was basically “Should Britain remain in the EU?”) to push through any and all policy they wish to. Grow some balls, FFS!

As for my own party, the Liberal Democrats, Tim Farron has seemingly unified huge support behind the idea that the EU referendum was won by the people who now totally regret the choice they made. So what? David Cameron almost certainly was attempting to use the referendum to bolster his flagging support in the Tory party, but almost certainly many people used it to protest against the Tory party that was then ruling, and the lack of a decent opposition to said ruling party. Well, you folks have gotten the ruling party you deserve; totally unelected and with no manifesto. Whatever laws this bunch of jackals manage to push through in the remaining years of this parliament will have your fingerprints all over them.

It’s disgusting that the LibDems think that ignoring more than 50% of the population is a way to campaign. Please, get off that horse soon. The enemy is the unelected cabinet, focus on them. Their mandate to exist is singular – remove the UK from the EU. Force the Tories into a swift and hard exit, and then you can campaign on the back of the destruction of the British economy that will bring.

Finally, my op. ed. The population has made it’s opinion known, and the Leavers “won”. If we want the population to understand the vast mistake they have made, the exit needs to be swift and hard, and the lessons learned need to be tough ones. I very much hope that a future Labour (or better yet LibDem) government will have the opportunity to have a new referendum asking the British people if we should re-join the EU, and I very much hope that they will resoundingly say “yes!”. As for the humble pie that will then have to be eaten? Bring me a spoon, and plenty of custard…