this post was submitted on 17 Jan 2024
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UK Politics

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General Discussion for politics in the UK.
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[–] Bassman27 29 points 6 months ago

Former investment banker and businessman. Really says it all about the structure of the current government. Why would you put someone who can’t even grasp the very basics of our solar system in charge of this?

[–] [email protected] 24 points 6 months ago

I love how he says he's learning on the job and isn't an encyclopedia because it obviously requires a phd level education to know the difference between a planet and a fucking star.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 children)

"We now have plans to colonize the sun!"

Crowd begins murmuring

"How do you expect to land on the sun?"

"Simple. We'll go at night!"

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago

Have you been listening to The Goons again? 😀

[–] [email protected] 16 points 6 months ago (2 children)

Worse still:

Andrew Griffith, who has been in charge of the space sector since November, also mistook Jupiter for Saturn.

You know, Saturn, famous for its massive rings.

[–] FMT99 15 points 6 months ago (1 children)

To be fair that's an easier mistake to make than confusing Mars and the frickin Sun

[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 months ago (1 children)

The Sun doesn't have rings!

Sheesh.

[–] FMT99 4 points 6 months ago

Haha ok touche

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 months ago (1 children)

In fairness it seems like it was displayed without rings, but if you're into space then you should be able to see the difference as saturn is far more featureless (at least from the pictures we have), but if the projection on the sphere is lower resolution and the red spot is on the other side I could see them being confused I guess

Equally though you could not make a fool of yourself but pointing out things which should be fairly obvious as the minor popularity gains of "knows common knowledge facts about topics they should be an expert in" are far outweighed by any chance of "looks like a buffoon for not even knowing common knowledge facts about things they should be an expert in"

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 months ago

Jupiter has a MOOOOLE

[–] carl_dungeon 14 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I’m guessing education is important to him and he always votes to fund it extensively.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago

For those that want to see... https://www.theyworkforyou.com/mp/25927/andrew_griffith/arundel_and_south_downs/divisions?policy=1074

He doesn't seem to have voted on enough items for they work for you to form an opinion.

It's not clear whether he just hasn't voted or there haven't been any votes and I haven't done enough research to say anything on that topic myself

[–] breadsmasher 13 points 6 months ago

average conservative. spouting about stuff they are clueless about

[–] [email protected] 13 points 6 months ago

One's a chocolate bar, the other's a newspaper?? What a moron!

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

Well they're both roughly the same colour. I can see his confusion.

One is big, and red, and hot.
The other is small, and red, and cold

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 months ago

What a small, inactive, rocky body orbiting the sun, this man is.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 months ago

Easy mistake to make 😂

[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 months ago

Didn't realize we had a space minister

[–] [email protected] -2 points 6 months ago (1 children)

This is the best summary I could come up with:


On a walk around the Science Museum in London, Mr Griffith pointed to an exhibit showing the surfaces of different planets, the House magazine reported.

A year on from the failure of Britain’s first rocket launch, Mr Griffith insisted that the UK “is a great spacefaring nation”.

The former investment banker and businessman said that in order for humans to colonise Mars, “you’re going to need a lot of the British research and innovation that we’re funding right now”.

Peregrine Mission One, which was the first American attempt to land on the Moon in 50 years, was carrying an instrument built by UK scientists before its journey was brought to an end by a run of technical problems.

The device was supposed to analyse the thin lunar atmosphere as well as find out more about how water might be moving around the moon.

“I think having things like a space strategy, which the UK didn’t have until recently, gives people a long-term roadmap so they understand what we’re doing as a government.”


The original article contains 456 words, the summary contains 172 words. Saved 62%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!

[–] [email protected] 8 points 6 months ago

This bot should potentially find paragraphs that include words from the headline. It seems to have missed anything about the mistake that the headline is referring to.