As long as MPs rate VI ahead of Approval ratings the PM is safe – politicalbetting.com
As long as MPs rate VI ahead of Approval ratings the PM is safe – politicalbetting.com
I am sure that just about all PBers are aware of my position that leader approval numbers are a better guide to the public mood than voting intention.
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Although I repeat the warning I offered the other day: if anyone's expecting a Conservative implosion in 2024, even under Johnson, then I fear they're in for a terrible disappointment. Turfing the Tories out is eminently achievable, but they're not going to take a 1997-style hammering. Labour will have to perform brilliantly to win any kind of majority.
Lol, definitely not a scotch expert.
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5fd36667e90e07662ed92c85/Scotch_Whisky_Technical_File_-_June_2019.pdf
If polled I would absolutely say that I disapprove of Boris, no doubt about that. But my disapproval of Boris doesn't come close to my disapproval of Corbyn.
I expect that's true for a very, very large proportion of people too.
Johnson unlike Corbyn has already proved he can win a general election majority in 2019 so why would Tory MPs replace him when the voting intention figures have the Tories closer to Starmer Labour now than Corbyn Labour was to the Tories in 2019? Unless Labour clearly expands its poll lead again and the Tories suffer heavy losses in May then Boris stays whatever his approval rating.
I also believe OGH is overrating the impact of a new Tory leader. The hypothetical voting intention and best PM polls suggest even Sunak as PM would still fail to win a majority against Starmer anyway
Which was, always in general (if they made it that far) but never in primary and/or precinct caucus.
As I said the other night, it may be advantageous for the SNP and LDs to sit on the opposition bench rather than provide the Conservatives with the monopoly of opposition so Starmer may well lead a minority Government on paper which has more strength than appears from the parliamentary numbers.
https://twitter.com/kromark/status/1494743813830717454
Would we want to join if we'd been outside who knows but I believe it was a fervent aim before we did join and of course after the Treaty of Rome specifically articulated the desire to achieve an ever closer union between its nations.
Only Major and Boris sustained their bounces as new midterm PMs through to the next general election as they had major policy differences with their predecessors on the poll tax and Brexit. There are no such major policy differences between Boris and Sunak
What @stodge has said is also, of course, correct: the primary aim of the collective Opposition must be to deprive the Conservatives of the votes needed to govern. But I suspect that a lot of people are looking forward to Boris Johnson and his party being rewarded for their numerous misdemeanours and incompetent governance with an epochal defeat. My point is, simply, that this isn't going to happen - especially given that the elderly demographic continues to grow as a proportion of the entire electorate, and still breaks heavily in favour of the Conservatives. There's simply only so far the Government's vote is going to sink, regardless of how poor its overall reputation with the electorate becomes.
I'm pretty sure the west (in various forms) is playing some side games here.
Putin though is the chief villain in this. If he goes to war (and nobody believes for a moment it'll be anybody other than him precipitating this) he'll be despised. Not just by me, not just by the authors of the many, many likes my posts normally attain, but by billions.
He can follow a different path though, a path that will perhaps, in time, glean many likes on PB. He can pull himself together and stop being an arse.
I'm reluctant to predict how the Tories will do so far out, but unless something changes dramatically for the LDs I don't see them achieving a transformational result. As things stand they'll be doing very well indeed to make twenty gains; ten seems more realistic.
Over 40 years, we never came close to accepting the EEC or the EU and in the end the illogicality of our membership became too much for all sides. We protested over the finances even though we were and are one of the world's most powerful economies. We were happy to take European money to improve the infrastructure of our poorer peripheries but when the even poorer nations of first southern and then eastern Europe joined, it seemed we (and the Germans) were always left to pay the bill.
We had two choices - either embrace the European ideal fully - Euro, Schengen etc or leave. Our "neither owt nor nowt" membership frustrated everyone and I suspect it's beneficial for all we go our separate ways for now.
Plenty of Russians listening to their media will believe the Russian spin. China probably won't report it accurately either which is a quarter of the world. Outside Europe and some of the US most of the rest world won't be following it in the same detail, and many will be open to anti western conspiracy theories.
On a global basis, I would guess somewhere between 20-40% of those who have a view which side is telling the truth will go for Russia.
Data Shows Odd Clusters Of Florida Voters Switching To Republican Party
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nNFMhEEGqEQ
We were shocked when our PM was caught out lying. Russians are shocked when their President tells the truth.
It's for domestic consumption, plus useful idiots like Jeremy Corbyn.
Spectator has a piece this weekend saying that basically Labour strategists, although there are some internal debates, are on the whole pleased that Johnson has survived. The longer the lying cad stays the more he pollutes the brand.
The LibDems around 15% of their votes (from 6.0m to 5.2m), yet almost trebled their number of seats. (Or to put it differently - they had half the share of 1983, but had 2.5x the seats that was a 5x increase in their vote efficiency.)
Anyway the point of a false flag operation is not to convince many people in the West, it is to convince people back home and give cover to other anti Western governments such as China to at least stay neutral and say the situation is complex and needs to be resolved locally.
I can see a road to 30-35 LD MPs but it's a tall order and will need some tactical voting from Labour and other party supporters. If Labour can win 40-50 seats off the Conservatives then the question is whether the Labour, LD and SNP blocs will be numerically greater than the Conservative and DUP blocks.
You're probably looking at the Conservatives losing 70-80 seats with Labour winning 55 and other parties scooping up the other 25. That makes the Conservatives the largest party but Labour, SNP, LDs and others close to if not past a majority (assuming the elected SF MPs don't sit).
Sensible next Tory leader = small Tory majority to hung parliament
Another bad Tory leader = hung parliament or Labour majority
Yes Johnson gives Labour far more upside than someone like Sunak would, but he also keeps some upside for the Tories. He is not just a clown, but a ruthless, ambitious and politically astute one.
Worth remembering that 1997 was new boundaries too.
The Russian authorities are not genius masterminds - these are the same people who mass 150k troops on the border and insist something that happened 25 years ago is the aggressive action.
Easy to scoff at, but as much as I'd like to I couldn't deny there are instances I've done the same.
https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/1568415/nigel-farage-storm-eunice-picture-fallen-tree-van-crushed-weather-latest-news
Tomorrow's headline?
In a first hearing of his action against the home secretary, lawyers told the High Court [Prince Harryt]e didn't feel safe visiting under current arrangements.
He wants to pay for police security for himself and his family while in the UK.
Government lawyers said his offer was "irrelevant" to how officials took decisions over Royal Family security...
In his claim, Prince Harry says that Ravec reached this decision unlawfully and unreasonably - including because he has offered to pay for the police time needed and was still in the immediate line of succession to the throne.
He further argues that his private protection team do not have all the powers they would need to act in the UK, including access to police intelligence about threats to him and his family.
But in written submissions to the court, lawyers for the Home Secretary said that Prince Harry's claim was completely without merit - and it should be thrown out because it wasn't for the court to second-guess complex decisions about personal security .
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-60438739
I shall do a feasibility study for no more than £1m and report in 3 years. I'll partner up with a Tory doner to reassure the government this is all above board.
Is Apple run by a europhile? Has Clegg extended his tentacles from Facebook?
Brexiter < Brexiteer < Brexitard (a rare one)
Remainer < Remoaner < Remainiac
It's also that Starmer's doing 14% better than Johnson was on the eve of winning GE2019 (Johnson net -14% then, Starmer 0% now, again with Opinium.)
So the leadership ratings are currently more stacked in Labour's benefit than a simple comparison of Corbyn and Johnson alone would suggest.
I hope all have survived unscathed and I hope @IanB2 gets his roof repaired soon.
I managed to slip and fall on the terrace while pushing a down pipe back into position. I thought I'd just grazed my arm and it was only when I found blood dripping over the sofa and floor that I realised I'd got a nasty gash down my lower arm. Silly me. Anyway all bandaged now.
A couple of interesting R4 radio programmes on iPlayer.
1. File on 4 - A First Class Scandal - about one of the many impacts of the Post Office scandal is well worth hearing. The human consequences are awful.
2. Nazanin - about her and the tank contract and the debt Britain owes Iraq. Really gives the background to this horrible affair.
I would say Remoaner is more insulting (and accurately descriptive) than Remainiac
And don't forget "Brexshitter" which has actually been used by supposedly serious commentators like Yasmin Alibhai Brown
"How many Brexshitters went or are going skiing in Europe? How many own second homes there? What EU wines do they drink? We must be told."
https://twitter.com/y_alibhai/status/947441565953388544?s=20&t=qlsd-1hB8xHSd1C5ZgrJvg
https://order-order.com/2021/10/27/mask-hypocrisy-kebab-awards-edition/
"On 14 June, a short email popped up in the inboxes of all Financial Times editorial staff. It came from the paper’s style guru and announced tersely: ‘The out campaigners should be Brexiters, not Brexiteers.’ As usual for the FT’s style pronouncements, the memo did not lay out the reasoning behind the decision, but it followed a discussion among editors over whether the word ‘Brexiteer’ had connotations of swashbuckling adventure.
"Much has been said and written about the power of the Leave campaign’s simple and disciplined messaging. Both sides agree that the Remain camp never found a slogan with the clarity and muscular appeal of ‘Take Back Control’ — a potent and proven phrase adapted by Vote Leave campaign director Dominic Cummings from the successful campaign against Britain joining the euro. (A 2001 contribution by Cummings to the BBC website ended: ‘Keep your job, keep control, keep the pound.’)
"But the FT style note was evidence of a little remarked on and perhaps quietly significant victory in another corner of the linguistic battlefield. Long before June’s seismic result, the Out camp had comprehensively won the battle of collective nouns.
"‘Brexiteer brings to mind buccaneer, pioneer, musketeer,’ says Michael Gove. ‘It lends a sense of panache and romance to the argument.’ For fellow Leave campaigner Daniel Hannan it had connotations of ‘dashing condottieri’. On the other side of the trenches Remain strategist Lord Cooper feared the word crystallised a feeling about the Out campaign. ‘It helped draw it out. It was exciting, invigorating, boundary-pushing, taking on the world… a positive frame that was taking on our negative frame.’"
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/victory-of-the-swashbucklers
The supposedly smarter Remainers named their campaign with a word that reminded people of death, decay and human corpses. Genius