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In England only in London does Starmer have a “Best PM” lead over Johnson – politicalbetting.com
In England only in London does Starmer have a “Best PM” lead over Johnson – politicalbetting.com
At the weekend Opinium became the second pollster to report that Johnson had retaken the lead over Starmer on the best PM question. This was the first time this had happened since last November.
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What I find interesting in all these surveys is how popular the Tories are / how unpopular Labour is in the Midlands compared to elsewhere and I cannot for the life of me work out why that is the case.
I think that Johnson will ride out the Lebedev issues. He will keep saying that the security services never issued any meaningful warnings about him. I still haven't seen any significant evidence that Lebedev is a malign influence, other than he had a line to Putin - not unexpected for someone in his position. How Lebedev got to be where he is, and where all his money came from, is an interesting question; but Boris Johnson cannot be blamed for that.
If not him then we're back to Brexit goodness - people have decided to take a punt on Brexit and the Tories to deliver it, and the reality of how shit it is in the delivery phase hasn't sunk in yet. It will.
This year's economic prospects are increasingly brutal...
Corbyn's pro-Russia narrative on the back of the Salisbury poisonings ultimately did for him. Maybe Johnson can fall down the same rabbit hole.
If anything, there’s a sense of disappointment setting in.
He’s eminently beatable, next time, if labour sort their shit out.
If the size of the economic hit is 100, 75 of that is war, 24 covid and 1 is Brexit.
I think Johnson's approval ratings in the South should be a lot more worrying for the LDs although still plenty of time for to take a hit again there.
He owned 2 newspapers, so politicians of all parties will have had dealings with him.
Wales still voted Labour even in 2019 and Scotland did not vote Tory either.
However the fact not only does Boris lead him in the Midlands and South but he also leads him as best PM narrowly still even in the North exposes Starmer's major weakness, . He still has little more appeal to Leavers in the redwall than Corbyn did, as the 2021 locals confirmed. Any gains Labour have made there have been over the negative reaction to partygate which is now starting to ebb as Ukraine overshadows it and Boris acts as a national leader again.
If Burnham was Labour leader he would surely be doing better relative to Boris in the North in particular than Starmer is
India, which imports 80% of its oil needs, usually buys about 2% to 3% of its supplies from Russia. But with oil prices up 40% so far this year, the government is looking at increasing this if it can help reduce its rising energy bill.
"Russia is offering oil and other commodities at a heavy discount. We will be happy to take that. We have some issues like tanker, insurance cover and oil blends to be resolved. Once we have that we will take the discount offer," one of the Indian government officials said.
https://www.reuters.com/world/india/india-considers-buying-discounted-russian-oil-commodities-officials-say-2022-03-14/
Then the guy at the top brings in people who have lots of high risk factors associated with them which undermines all the work that is done below.
The guy at the top needs to go, not for turning a blind eye to spies (which is possible, but as you say difficult to prove) but for ignoring long standing and common sense security guidelines and bringing in potential threats that put our national security at risk.
Starmer is more popular than most Labour leaders in the South and London as the Opinium figures show, Boris the reverse (remember the SE voted Leave by less than the UK average and London voted Remain).
However Boris is more popular than most Tory leaders in the Midlands, Starmer the reverse as Opinium also shows.
Brexit is still the reason
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RFt0x2RKpks
So do we take that they have provided drones or that they have said no to providing them?
Ukraine has enabled him to get beyond partygate, keep covid blunders out of the headlines, turn immigration around from a very unpromising place, bury tax rises and find an excuse to finesse energy policy beyond net zero.
And then there's inflation......Food prices? Petrol costs? Vlad's fault guvnor.
Its almost tailor made.
Including a lack of morality.
https://twitter.com/DeItaone/status/1503339131178471424
Have any other European countries done this?
https://twitter.com/richardburgon/status/1503350743306280961?s=21
Election: East Midlands, West Midlands
1983: 4.1pp, 2.0pp
1987: 6.0pp, 3.0pp
1992: 4.4pp, 2.5pp
1997: 4.0pp, 2.9pp
2001: 5.2pp, 3.0pp
2005: 4.4pp, 2.3pp
2010: 5.0pp, 3.3pp
2015: 6.7pp, 5.0pp
2017: 8.6pp, 6.9pp
2019: 11.8pp, 10.5pp
hyufd is an expert in this.
https://twitter.com/LBCNews/status/1503356371210809348?s=20&t=EYSVm_MP1ghYdiINd-Csgg
Here is the reality on the coal face. People have been promised the moon on a stock having been persuaded that what they backed for so long was bad for them. Delivery of their personal moon on a stick had better happen sharpish or they will think they have been conned. The red wall will not suffer excuses from fools.
Well before Ross's abandonment of his temporary discovery of a spine, so I'd guess the SLab would be ahead of SCons now.
Remember that the approach of this government is sneering condescending arrogance. They won't be sympathising with people who can't afford to eat, they will lying that people have more money to spend on food than ever (replete with censures from ONS) and that anyone out there who can't afford to eat is a degenerate. You can even picture the sneer on their faces as they attack the victims of their policies.
Other Tories were smart enough - and frankly cared enough - to know not to treat people for fools. This lot know no other way. So the economic pain will not be deflected away to Putin or to Covid, or to the Last Labour Government, or to not existing at all except as an anti-Boris remoaner whine. It is very real and it will absolutely cripple people.
The Makhnovists’ economic policies verged on the insane. They wanted to drive society back to a primitive pre-capitalist barter economy – a supposed “natural economy” in which products were directly exchanged between workers and peasants.76 But no modern society can conceivably function on that basis. The great bulk of the working class – nurses, shop assistants, truck drivers, teachers, wharfies, construction workers, communications workers, fire fighters, clerical workers – do not produce commodities that can be simply bartered for a chicken or a loaf of bread.
To further compound the problem, the Makhnovists recognised all currencies – Red, White or Ukrainian Nationalist. This led to rampant inflation which hurt workers in the towns most.77 Moreover the Makhnovists’ immediate financial program stated that “all compulsory taxation should be discontinued and replaced by free and voluntary contributions from toilers. In a context of free and independent construction, these contributions will undoubtedly produce the best results.”78 This fairyland policy could only conceivably benefit the better off sections of the peasantry.
https://marxistleftreview.org/articles/nestor-makhno-the-failure-of-anarchism/
I just think Boris and Tories may get ground down by the cost of living crisis. People will want change and Tories have been in for a fair while. But it won't be a landslide. That would come in 2029 if Boris manages to wing it 2024.
Stasis continues in Scotland.
https://twitter.com/nikorepi
Arrests of people in Red Square before they say anything, even if they were intending to support Putin; Zelensky advisor predicting in 2019 Russia's invasion; Russian's opinions of the war; devastatingly sad and depressing aerial imagery of Mariupol
On the one hand the present situation seems tailor-made for a "we're all in this together" sort of message - because it's actually true, isn't it? I'm sure people moaned about rationing during the War, but they all understood why it was done, and that there wasn't an easy alternative.
But on the other hand, we see plenty of demands to try and deny reality and protect one group of consumers, or another, or everyone, from the effects of the current turmoil. So perhaps the electorate won't be so understanding.
In 2015 the Tories won a majority despite Austerity. Why was that? I think there were two reasons. Firstly, the political messaging was spot on, necessary hardship, Labour's fault, collective sacrifice for a better tomorrow.
Secondly, they targeted austerity so that electorally important parts of society were relatively spared, and a mini house price boom was perfectly timed for polling day - and it did them no harm that this contradicted the messaging.
I don't see any reason why, in principle, the current government can't pull off the same strategy. Perhaps they're not as competent as Cameron/Osbourne, and they don't have the Liberal Democrats to act as a scapegoat, but they're likely to retain fiscal space to manoeuvre until after the general election so they might just pull it off.
Decent right-minded people are at their wits end.
one after that, where I think they could be almost wiped off the map, I know a lot of people say no election is a good election to lose, but I think for the survival of the Conservative party, 2024 would be good one to lose
I think there's a distinction there, even if you can still criticise Germany for not acting more quickly.
https://twitter.com/HalibutAngry/status/1503282157204258817
E.g. We had one a while back trying the COVID / pilots antivaxxer narrative, linking to a load of dodgy info.
With Lebedev - I agree it looks bad and shows misjudgement on Johnson's part, but I just think he will ride it out, because there is basically nothing on Lebedev apart from his nationality and unexplained wealth. If, on the other hand, something is cooked up about Lebedev and he becomes persona non grata, then it becomes much more serious for Johnson.
It is bothered about China though with whom it has territory disputes
Looks like hardly any change since last year to me except more SNP constituency voters switching to the Greens on the list and that is still problematic for Labour on the list in places like Edinburgh and Glasgow.
That said SNP is still vulnerable in a bunch of constituencies to unionist tactical voting mainly in South Scotland and NE Scotland in 2026.
The 'new deal' includes a closer relationship with the EU on defence, security and easier trade will be mutually beneficial, how we move to domestic and gas development and more UK green energy, including on shore wind farms and home insulation, together with how we fund the seemingly bottomless financial demands of the NHS and of course defence
Above all else how inflation and the immediate energy crisis are mitigated and of course how war with Russia is resolved, if it is
You may note I have not mentioned Boris or Starmer as notwithstanding the objections to each from their opponents it will be these policies that decide the outcome though if Boris does fight GE24 it would be a brave person to declare he will be shown the door
That could well be an IP from a troll farm, but not conclusive.
She also repeatedly said that the virus isn't over and advocated more pro-active measures
She has been called both a Russian and a Ukrainian propaganda spammer so must be doing something right.
Apparently she has a dodgy IP address which I am told renders all her posts and arguments redundant but I'm not 100% sure why.
Other than that nothing that I can see.
Alternatively it’s one of PB’s regular spasms of self importance.
other pollsters are available for a more peer reviewed picture, rather than swigging just the medicine you like the sound of.
another way to look at it would be, here is the table when news dominated by an extra ordinary crisis, where even Doug Ross has withdrawn his letter to the 1922, what could this table look like in more normal times? So as a fun ending antidote to Mike’s fake tease of a header, I can actually show you the real state of play today, if it wasn’t for War Crisis rally round flag bounce.
so it’s either nuclear war or is this a party 😃
I mean, who would discard a M&S chocolate log?