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Today’s must read – politicalbetting.com
Today’s must read – politicalbetting.com
Is a Labour victory a done-deal? No, says @PeterKellner1 A) It's not 1997—Tories are hated more than Labour is loved.B) Different polling questions get different results—it's likely a closer race.C) Electoral geography is against Labour.https://t.co/s7sHDCMikO
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But of course lots of people in 1997 didn't think it would be like 1997.
Kellner notwithstanding.
RFK Jr. cites Hou et al. (/doi.org/10.1186/s12916-020-01673-z) to justify his intimating that someone, somehow, tried to engineer SARS-CoV2 to target ACE2 in Black & non-Jewish White folks, while sparing Chinese & Ashkenazi folks.
https://twitter.com/GenomeNathan/status/1680492167331020800
And possibly where some of Leon's political ideas originate.
https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2023/07/16/bronze-age-pervert-masculinity-00105427
But I see it’s a Twitter account.
https://twitter.com/RALee85/status/1680805295524573185
No idea if this is true, if it's just the road bridge and not the rail bridge, etc, etc.
The final GB score in 1997 was L43 C31. So my starting point is that if that's the final score next time, we're looking at a big Conservative defeat. The rise of the SNP will take quite a bit of the Labour majority, but there's a lot to spare from a 179 seat majority.
The current wikiworm average is L46 C26. By comparison, ICM through 1996 (and that's the only polling with a comparable mechanism) was about L47 C31. The swingback (such as it was) was @MoonRabbit's observation that some voters realise that an anti-Conservative vote in their seat was Lib Dem.
It doesn't have to be 1997, and the key determinant is how efficient the anti-Conservative vote can become in one go. It was already pretty efficient in 1992, but was crazy inefficient in 2019.
But 1997 increasingly looks like the base map to use- probably as in "not as good as 1997 for Labour, but roughly as bad for the Conservatives."
Last night's attack is reported as having been done by a sea drone or cruise missiles.
Now it's carrying heavier loads than anticipated, and has been bombed at least once probably twice, and the repairs have clearly been rushed.
I'm not bloody surprised it's got nasty cracks in the piers.
1) Labour will gain a large majority of over 100 seats.
2) Within a year, there will be a scandal that will cause at least one Labour MP to resign. Probably one of the newer MPs.
Peter K being ultra cautious. A double digit Labour lead won't be a hung parliament, especially as there's plenty of evidence of tactical anti-tory voting, on which people are FAR more savvy now than in 1997.
The 'hated' point is a good one. It is in fact a much stronger voting motivation than 'loved'. Online reviews e.g. on trustpilot are a good example. Very few people are motivated to write positive reviews compared with those who type critical ones. The anger around the current Gov't far exceeds that of 1992-7 when, despite Black Wednesday and sleaze, the economy was in fact in good shape.
The main point though is that Starmer's Labour are not currently experiencing the kind of love-in that Tony Blair did. TB was young and telegenic, able to schmoooze his way into people's hearts. He was the song and dance man who stepped forward to trip the light fantastic. Personally I thought he was vacuous.
Starmer is plodding but I suspect in the GE campaign people will warm more to him. Well, in comparison with Sunak anyway. And Starmer has more substance than Blair, but that's not saying a lot.
It's the anger though. The anger. That's the thing. The thing those living inside psephological bubbles haven't quite grasped.
LAB big favourites but unlikely to get more than 340. Could be fewer!
The second one is inevitable from the first. There will be a lot of MPs from seats they didn’t expect to win, with token candidates who were not properly vetted.
https://twitter.com/EuromaidanPress/status/1680815014167420929
That is a lot.
The record in the postwar era* is 1997, when Blair gained 148 seats (not including boundary changes).
Next best are David Cameron in 2010 (109 seats) and Edward Heath in 1970 (77 seats).
If we consider Starmer to be a character similar in many ways to Heath, the urbane civil servant that people spend their lives underestimating, and remember Sunak is no Harold Wilson, a gain of around 100-110 seats seems plausible.
But that still leaves him well short of a majority and reliant on a 'kick the fuckers out' mentality among other opposition parties to form a government.
Is it possible he could do better? Yes.
Is it likely? I would say not.
*which does not include 1945.
O'Mara may have been a paper candidate but there was no excuse for Ian Lavery in 2010.
Utterly bonkers, but part of the new Republican discourse.
https://liveuamap.com/en/2023/17-july-images-of-the-damage-at-kerch-bridge-after-explosions
Elon Musk says Twitter cashflow still negative amid 50% drop in ad revenue
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2023/jul/16/elon-musk-says-twitter-cash-flow-negative
If he'd payed cash for the company, of course, it would be quite profitable by now.
And it's fairly clear that the previous management could have run a more lean operation - without his draconian cuts.
In some ways the political campaign to win over the press was far more successful than that to win over the voters.
43% of the vote is very good for a U.K. election win. But not a hymm sung to the universal heros.
Musky Baby wants to expand what Twitter does into some form of massive all-Internet behemoth, doesn't give a damn about moderation, and thinks he can do it on zero staff.
He cannot.
But the main problem is that he simply does not understand the advertising world; a world he has often lambasted and ridiculed in the past.
One could argue that the current Conservative total is uniquely inflated by the circumstances of the 2019 election.
And I don't think those kind of shots come in very often.
At least, it's not as though anyone ever talks about them on here these days although I think one of them did come up once and may have been mentioned just a couple of times.
I guess there isn’t enough shame, in the eyes of either the electorate or the party machines, when a Jared O’Mara gets through and totally embarrasses himself, to justify the cost of half a dozen staffers doing the work.
Something totally unrelated - in 2024, many 35-year-olds will have had an iPhone since they were 18.
On the other side of the equation we have Serkeir, who currently seems to be doing everything possible to reduce the size of the majority he can win.
Yes we know the economy is broken and services are in pieces and spivs have carried off all the cash. There isn't a simple solution. But you have to offer some hope - "we're not bastards like they are" isn't enough.
Even when you have little money you can offer vision. Shagger was great at this - visions of an airport or a garden bridge or 40 new hospitals. All lies, but pretty ones. Labour need to talk more about the kind of country they want to build, pin the mess and lack of cash on the Tories now and then endlessly repeat it. A "there's no money left" play for the 20s. And then do the social and societal reform stuff that costs little cash.
There is an assumption that red wall voters expressing frustration with the Tories will automatically revert to mean and vote Labour. I think this a reckless assumption. They had been drifting away for years for a variety of reasons and Starmer isn't a horny handed son of toil to win them back. Brexit was as much a symptom as a cause of their disillusionment.
Similarly, Blue Wall voters flirting with the Oranges may change their minds when actually voting.
Put it this way, what I'm seeing for Labour is an uphill struggle to get even a bare majority. Remember, a 1997 level swing gives them a majority of one. And that presupposes a UNS which hasn't worked in fifty years, if it ever did.
It should be noted that Starmer is clearly fully alive to the scale of his challenge. He is showing no sign of complacency or willingness to compromise with the nutters in his party in the way May did.
In 1997 there was real enthusiasm for Blair and New Labour. That is certainly not the case for Starmerism, which is a dish of pretty thin gruel. On the other hand Sunak does not have either the appeal of Major nor a functioning economy and public services.
It looks a pretty low turnout GE to me.
I think a Heath-sized swing Con>Lab is plausible, plus whatever happens in Scotland.
NOM is probably the value bet at this stage, with likely more than a year to go.
Agree with @Foxy above, that turnout is likely to be low, and that each side needs to get their votes out on the day - which is why it won’t be in winter and definitely not in January.
Trussk is still the face of the company and its increasingly annoying actions.
Having killed all the 3rd party apps they have now killed Tweetdeck. Good news for those who don't like Tweets posted here...
The Metropolitan Police has agreed an unprecedented £2 million settlement after admitting that the case of an unsolved murder 35 years ago was mired in corruption and incompetence.
The family of Daniel Morgan, a private investigator who was found with an axe embedded in his head in a southeast London pub car park in 1987, will receive one of the biggest payouts in British policing history.
Sir Mark Rowley, the Met commissioner who has promised to clean up the force after a series of scandals, is expected to make a public apology this week for “corruption, incompetence and defensiveness” in its response to the murder.
An independent panel concluded in 2021 that the Met was institutionally corrupt and had repeatedly covered up its failings in the Morgan case to protect its reputation. The panel, led by Baroness O’Loan, said this meant it was unlikely anyone would be brought to justice.
The murder is the most investigated case in British history, with five police inquiries costing £50 million. The Met has admitted that corrupt officers shielded suspects and that later investigations did not adequately chase down leads or examine corruption claims.
The financial settlement brings to an end a long struggle by Morgan’s family. Five remaining relatives, including his brother, Alastair, started a civil claim that alleged misfeasance in public office and breaches of the Human Rights Act.
An official source confirmed to The Times the size of the payout, which also covers the family’s legal fees. It means the force has avoided lengthy civil proceedings.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/met-chief-to-admit-corruption-in-handling-of-daniel-morgan-murder-0mtqt036f
BTW, Labour is making a couple of errors at the moment; including keeping the 2 child cap and opposing Tory limits on sub-optimal degrees.
I guess in my mind is how obvious a Tory loss looks. If Tory destruction seems clear, I wonder what effect that will have on squeeze messaging. If you live in a seat that could potentially go LD or Green, for example, and you're a left of centre voter who looks at SKS and sighs, I can see a few weird outcomes where overperformance happens.
I also don't really get how SKS makes the base / left leaning voter excited. Like, Sunak just offered a higher wage increase that Labour said they would allow. If Labour keep that kind of line then a large number of voters / unions could just decide to publicly tell him to fuck off. It's a conversation I've often had with people who want the Tories out, but don't see any respite from the Labour party - what is the point of voting out Tories if you'll get similar or even potentially worse outcomes with Labour anyway?
Because they are so toxic if you fired them into the Sun they would trigger a supernova and take out the rest of us as well.
https://www.opensecrets.org/elections-overview/incumbent-advantage
Here, if the tide is strong enough, incumbent MPs will be swept away.
Malaysia stands to gain from free palm oil exports but few other benefits seen
https://asia.nikkei.com/Economy/Trade/U.K.-formally-joins-CPTPP-to-little-fanfare-and-low-expectations
..."The impact appears mainly cosmetic, for the U.K. to show it made a trade deal after Brexit," said Chris Devonshire-Ellis, chairman of Dezan Shira & Associates, an advisory firm that works with investors across Asia. "No one in Asia is taking the pact very seriously."..
..."We are using our status as an independent trading nation to join an exciting, growing, forward-looking trade bloc, which will help grow the U.K. economy and build on the hundreds of thousands of jobs CPTPP-owned businesses already support up and down the country," according to a statement released by the U.K. Department for Business and Trade, citing Trade Secretary Kemi Badenoch, who backed the U.K. to leave the EU.
We don't want him going back to his idea of a header on cash.
The Labour lead was 47/25, in the local elections of May 1995, 43/28 in 1996, 43/31 on polling day. As Stodge said, the Conservatives recovery in local government, began on that day, when they regained several county councils.
The same was true of Brown's government.
The Conservative lead was 44/24 in May 2008, 39/21, in May 2009, 36/29 on polling day.
You see the same thing with Wilson's, and Callaghan's governments.
In the end, there are always people who decide to stick with the devil they know.
The Sun is reserved for the enmasse landing of the DfE
The House of Parliament are going to Pluto
Hmmm
The Met… the Met…. Surface of Neptune is available?
They’ve never made a profit, and were losing $128m a quarter before the takeover. There wasn’t a sustainable business there. https://investor.twitterinc.com/files/doc_financials/2022/q1/Final-Q1’22-earnings-release.pdf
Yes, Musk and friends way overpaid, and are probably going to have to put a load more cash in at some point.
First is that there's quite a lot of low-hanging fruit (some of them pro-hanging fruitcakes). Just not having Lib and Lab shooting at each other moves quite a few seats, maybe enough to get back to about 2015. (Boris didn't put on that many more votes or share compared to his predecessors.)
Also, political campaigning has changed in a way that makes spectacular shifts in seat numbers easier. Go back to the days of Heath and parties were constrained by the number of activists and how many letterboxes they could rattle. Door to door combat was only possible in a finite number of seats and that limited the number of seat gains that was possible.
Thatcher and the Saatchis broke that limit a bit by revolutionising national political advertising in the 1980s. Cummings and Vote Leave smashed it in 2016-9 by using social media. That allows you to run an entire election campaign with one computer connection, a moderate amount of money and one psychopath.
It does seem absurd that Boring Old Starmer might be on course for a spectacular win (and even to get a majority of 1 will be pretty spectacular; it's not that long ago that a minority government that could ignore the SNP seemed like a stretch target). It will be really galling for Conservatives, and will have to make us all wonder if Blair was really all that.
But the Conservatives are really unpopular and seem to be lacking ideas to turn that round. If they lose big, what's the alternative to a big Labour win?
And here you hit an important point. YouTube are not being 'censorious' because they want to be; they are being censorious because they are afraid of regulators and regulations.
Musky Baby thinks he can avoid all that; he cannot. Old Twitter realised that as well; and Musk's constant crying about "free speech" will not help him.
In fact, if anything I would say social media tends to ossify political attitudes as much as change them by offering a bigger echo chamber.
...For Britain, the CPTPP will allow tariff-free whisky exports to Malaysia, whose population is majority Muslim, within 10 years from the current 80%. Within seven years, the 30% export tariff for British cars will be eliminated...
Does that count?
https://twitter.com/Barnes_Joe/status/1680494816746958850
...Ukrainians have been forced to dismount from their Western-supplied vehicles and wade through dense Russian anti-tank minefields on foot, Wallace said, because Kyiv's lack of 'combat engineering capabilities', often under heavy fire from Russian drones and artillery. /3
Having adapted, Moscow's forces now lay mixed minefields, combining anti-personnel and anti-tank mines to further slow any Ukrainian advance. Russia is also learning, and adapting its forces, to deal with new, long-range weapons introduced onto the battlefield, Wallace added. /4
Ukraine is attacking on three main axes (Bakhmut, Orikhiv-Tokmak, Velyka Novosilka), Wallace said. 'The main line of defence at some parts, the Ukrainians are only 300 metres away,' he added, 'Instead of there being lots of Russians behind those lines, there aren’t.' /5
Wallace said Ukraine hadn't yet committed reserves from its 12 offensive brigades, the majority of which were trained and armed by Nato allies. He said Kyiv hadn't yet made a choice on what potential axes of attack to 'really pile it on' in an attempt to breach the lines. /6
On UK-donated Storm Shadow missiles, Wallace said in one recent hit on a Russian ammunition dump, shown by 'open source', Ukraine had destroyed 2,500 tonnes of ammo. He didn't confirm where but video from Makiivka, seven miles east of Donetsk, showed a vast explosion. /7
...Interestingly, Wallace confirmed Kyiv had asked Britain to manufacture 'some capabilities' in the UK, without confirming what they are for security reasons. 'Ukraine has asked us to make them but you know, after this conflict, we would inevitably move them back into Ukraine.' /9
At the site of the blast, RSJ's bent almost double by blast and heat. A large storage vessel lifted up off its foundations and went up one storey, through the floor above. Yet nearby, a roll of cleaning towel was still on its trolley, in the correct place.
(*) They should have, which was the first sussy part of it ...
Please save this prediction for GE 2024
Lab 40%
Con 35%
Hung Parliament
We are in the hands of homoerotic loons like Bronze Age Pervert now, and the equally nutty #ItsAScam mob.
I don't pay anything directly for Google and Facebook. Obviously I pay indirectly, through advertising costs, but they're free to me as an end-user. They are both profitable because they understand their customers.
The 'customers' are not you and me, but the advertisers. Now, ask yourself how Twitter can attract advertisers to a platform that in the name of 'free speech' allows anyone to say virtually anything. Where their ads might be served alongside (say) neo-Nazi comments.
Which is another reason YouTube et al get 'overly censorious'.
As I've said passim, Musk simply does not understand advertising.
I'm not clear how this will help the finances.
a) Sunak's latest form of Tory Statism isn't popular
b) CCHQ still don't realise this
I'm personally looking forward to the left of the party getting smashed, so we can return to proper right of centre pro-growth Conservatism at the subsequent election.
I realise Starmer is trying to cause a little fuss as possible, but I was horrified today… and I mean, horrified ….. that he proposed to continue the two child policy.
I can only guess he's terrified of the right wing media and their bleating about pampering the poor. Ditto immigrants?
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/criminals-have-a-licence-to-shoplift-says-john-lewis-boss-sharon-white-69sbkn93g
Lab 44%
Con 29%
Musk has pissed off the former while drastically reducing the latter.
Genius...
I know Musk doesn’t understand advertising, which is why he hired an advertising exec and is getting revenue directly from users.
https://twitter.com/Shmuli/status/1680669938468499458
No bet from me.
Edit: Lady S definitely not one of that kind of customer, I hasten to add. But the juxtaposition was so bizarre.
Let's say the subscription costs $8 a month, or ~$100 a year.
Let's also say advertising revenue has halved to $2.3 billion.
To make up that 'lost' $2.3 billion, you would need 23 million subscribers, as you make Twitter less appealing to non-subscribers. And have to service a humongous debt. And now pay put to 'large' tweeters.
That's a big ask, for something that was free before.
(1): https://www.oberlo.com/statistics/twitter-ad-revenue
https://www.vice.com/en/article/wjwebw/yelp-is-sneakily-replacing-restaurants-phone-numbers-so-grubhub-can-take-a-cut
Plan to crack down on 'rip-off' university degrees
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-66216005
I hope that includes a commitment to phase out PPE at Oxford and the MA in Public Policy at Birkbeck. Given the vast amounts their graduates cost the nation they're definitely a rip off.
The low value of the actual product stolen, per theft, is often pointed out.
In parts of the US, prosecution has been stopped. Leaving to organised theft rings. And stores quitting the areas in question.