Best Of

Not sure if this has been discussed yet so apologgies if repeating earlier posts (I did look back to lunchtime and saw no mention)

So the Police will not invetsgate the claims that Farage overspent to get elected at the GE because of statute of limitations.

Two questions that this raises for me.

1. Why is the statute of limitations so short for this potential crime? We are only 18 months after the election so I would have thought anything this serious should still be prosecutable.

2. If the police can't do anything, is there any other body with legal powers that can investigate? They may not be able to prosecute but could they demand a by-election if he is found to have cheated. Does this fall under the remit of the Electoral Commission or the Commons authorities?

As you all know I was and still am very pro-Brexit. I also recognise we would never have got the referendum without Farage's many years of work for it. But that doesn't mean he should be treated any differently to anyone else who has broken electoral law. If elections are not fair and honest then they count for nothing.

I hope we've all digested this story: https://www.theverge.com/news/847159/trump-media-tae-technologies-merger-nuclear-fusion

Trump Media is merging with a nuclear fusion company. Of course they are.

His other businesses were a mess and, whilst wealthy, not as valuable as he would claim. Trump Media has been a real godsend for him, he really leveraged being President to make money.

In spades. "Ask not what you can do in the White House for the country, ask what being in the White House can do for you."

On the plus side, he'll be dead before he manages to use all his corruptly gotten gains.

On the downside, his children appear to be as awful as him.

It's very amusing to here all the advise for the Tories from non-tories. Anyone would think the panic about Reform was growing. Yet only the other day some were posting that Reform had peaked. Indeed I doubt they can get much beyond 33/5% and probably less. However, it's also quite possibly true tha the Labour bottom is not yet there. All very funny.

Gavin Barwell is a particularly unappealing lib dem adjacent entryist. He may deserve tactical votes from Lib Dem, Labour and Green voters - he sure as heck doesn't deserve any from Tories.

It's funny the journey people go on.

When I met Gavin, he was the President of the Union Society at Cambridge. I ran the Union Ball, and he was President at that time. He also went on to be the President of the Cambridge University Conservative Association. (One of several people to hold both roles!)

He was a hard as nails Thatcherite at that time.

But then he got elected in Croydon, and that pulled him towards the centre.

I think he recognized that his consituency was not calling out for the same things that seemed so important to him when he was 23.

I guess he wasn't a migrant and so it wasn't a priority.

I understand this is the approved response to male offences against women.

Never underestimate the madness that can be created by semi-voluntary organisations.

Years ago, there was a case involving a local sports club. Turned out that a committee member had been hiring private investigators to bug members, steal email, and "phone hack" - aka listen to voice mails by guessing the password. He spent a fortune on doing this. Used the information to harass and manipulate everyone around him.

Barking mad, of course.

What I found interesting was the statement from the PIs involved - that this was a standard package of services offered. This was before the Phone Hacking Scandal hit big.

The smaller the power involved, the more vicious the internal politics.