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A little thought experiment for Sunday – politicalbetting.com
A little thought experiment for Sunday – politicalbetting.com
My % chance of this happening though is "small"
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A little thought experiment for Sunday – politicalbetting.com
My % chance of this happening though is "small"
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Another option - no election but an emergency leading to a national coalition government and extension of the Pmt session.
The tweet doesn't actually specify a GE ...
Doesn’t want to pay for it.
Yes, the Tories are a bit like Germany in the 20th century. Losing the Great War in 1918, the way they did - a slightly frustrating armistice, with no actual occupation of German land, and just a few hungry people in Berlin - was not enough. The Germans went away simultaneously humiliated, and with the sense they *could* have won it, and weren't really defeated
So they came back for more in 1939, in an even less pleasant guise, and then they had to be utterly annihilated, no question, and Berlin had to be levelled, millions raped, the country divided, and so forth
The Tories under Theresa May were the Kaiser's Germany - then Boris was a kind of burlesque Weimar interlude, when you thought they might be fun, then Truss was the hyperinflation, and now they are the Nazis, and Sunak is Hitler, who must be entirely vanquished
I hope this helps younger PB-ers
On topic the only way I see this happening is something horrendous by Labour scaring the horses and causing voters to "cling to nurse for fear of worse".
Again, odds are small. Especially with Starmer doing his best to not take a position on anything ever.
If the likes of Khan and his attitude infected Labour nationwide then that'd be a bigger problem, which is why the Tories are trying to link Labour like that and why Starmer is trying not to be linked to that.
Or the sudden adoption of what3words by the entire world leading to renewed faith in British ideas, and a thumping majority for Rishi "Adolf" Sunak
I think the one interesting decision that Rishi Sunak has made is the increase in heat pump grant to £7500, which means that for quite a lot of normal sized houses that would now cover the whole cost.
He has not been clear about the numbers of grants available, however.
I’ll be betting on a low turnout, when the election eventually happens.
It's a real stretch. I think the tweeters are probably right that it would need SKS disappearing from the scene and a much less attractive option being offered by Labour. Sunak's biggest single problem, even above having a cabinet that makes the muppet ensemble look good, is that people are just not scared of SKS. They can avoid being bored to death by simply not listening to him. The majority of the population are ok with that.
From here, he needs an event that somehow transforms the national perception of him.
And the sort of crisis that makes us rally to his flag is not the sort of crisis I want to live through.
(Though if Russia invaded East Anglia, he'd quite possibly consider selling them Norfolk and Suffolk to fund tax cuts.)
Putin is in a similar position now. Russia didn’t quite get the memo about the end of empire in 1991.
This kind of scenario isn't very likely but is far from impossible.
Valuer for money all the way....
I am surprised this issue hasn't had more spotlight shone on it before. I could never quite fathom how two people who made their fortune out of gambling on football and set up companies whose only role seems to be is do data analysts for said individuals betting syndicates was not perhaps a bit of an issue (even if by the letter of the rules they have enough of an arms length to be ok e.g Tony Bloom isn't listed as the owner of Star Lizard, but....I mean...everybody knows what is going on, it isn't a big secret.
Jesus. I think everyone on this site collectively needs a nice cup of tea and a sit down.
So, if Mr Sunak is going to win another term, I suggest he gets Spain to invade Gibraltar or something like that. Without an obvious common enemy, he's toast.
Tho Sunak is quite short, and an anti-smoker, and a vegetarian, who worships the swastika
Leon needing a sit down and a chill pill is nothing new.
At least its not bloody aliens or lab leak or whatever today.
There are no easy answers and they are no more able to escape political and economic reality than anyone else.
The next few years are not going to be fun.
It reduces to one central factor: Either the Labour or Tory leader will be PM in Feb 2025. It isn't complicated. The Labour leader will be PM unless the Tories get approximately 314 seats. (314+8 DUP = 322. 321 is a majority if Speaker + 7 SFs don't count. 650-8=642).
The Tories therefore cannot lose more than 51 seats. 365-51=314.
In normal circumstances this is quite doable. But these times are not normal.
It would take a lot of these:
Iron discipline in the party.
A united Tory front.
No scandals.
Reform to be marginalised.
Some economic luck.
A year of free gift populist policies to the centre right.
Labour to divide between left and right.
A united right wing press/media campaign.
Labour scandals
Sir K to be discredited, and probably replaced.
And, hopefully, it still wouldn't succeed.
So we spent far more than we would have if the limited-scope version had been planned in the first place. And the requirement for HS2 arises partly from the lack of capacity that would have been provided by the full-fat WCML upgrade if it had gone ahead.
So, sure, not a failure as such - more of an open question, pending the decision on HS2 Phase 2.
It's exactly where we're at.
It points to Starmer's Labour dropping back to c.30% polling within 9-12 months of taking office.
So if Sunak made the popular choice in response to that (though eff knows what that would be), while Starmer took the opposite view, then who knows?
The trouble is Sunak seems quite incapable of reading a room.
I’ll start with tossing a coin 10 heads in a row, because that can actually happen.
(There’s a video out there of Derren Brown doing it, took him something like nine hours of tossing a coin!).
May as well ask which leader is better to deal with Suez.
Sunak is an awful PM. He's no Hitler, the UK has never had a Hitler.
There's a significant chance it might be fewer.
7 SF could be more or less, too.
But the fact is the Tories have been in power for 13 largely ineffective, increasingly incompetent years and now the country overwhelmingly wants them gone, either with sorrow or with anger - and PB merely reflects that. Moreover, the Tories seem to be doing everything possible to annoy every single last pocket of support (except for those frigging rich pensioners)
They aren't even tackling Wokeness or defending Britishness, so people like me think "what's the effing point of them". They can't even stop a single boat
Enough. Let them be gone. Let them rebuild after they are chopped down to the ground, like the wonderful plane trees in Euston Square, razed and killed for HS2, which now might never actually get to Euston Square
You are not being persecuted. You are merely in a seriously SMALL minority of people that actively want the Tories to win
If Starmer can plausibly point to things being better in 2028/9, Labour will win again. That's even if the Conservatives have got their act together, which I'm expecting to take longer than that. For a start, it needs someone on the Conservative side to tell the party some hone truths, and I don't see who that is.
Eight years doesn't take long if you say it quickly.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vVKIFfwWRg8
I actually smiled at Rishi “Adolf” Sunak.
CasinoRoyale has the sense of humour one expects from a venison-twitching young fogey with a persecution complex.
Some people think automatically in metaphors and analogies. It’s how some brains sort out and understand patterns. Particularly common in writers.
I thought this was fairly clear when I compared Liz Truss to the Late Weimar hyperinflation
David Cameron was Bismarck, Theresa May was Kaiser Bill, Boris Johnson was the Weimar Republic, Sunak is Hitler, Jacob Rees-Mogg is Goebbels and Suella Braun is Eva Braverman. It all makes perfect sense.
I think there’s also a lack of talent putting themselves forward for office, as the negatives now far outweigh the positives, so all we are seeing is career political animals in all major parties.
At least British politics isn’t yet quite as broken as American politics.
I can see this meme really taking off and becoming common parlance among ordinary, decent working people
There will likely be civilian casualties, but since the civilians in questions will be a bunch of hooray henries with a masturbatory interest in small boats, that’s a price I’m willing to pay.
But he needs access to the XL Bully Lair
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claus_von_Stauffenberg
If you think the DUP would stay neutral, or even side with the centre left rainbow (Lab, LD, SNP, PC, Green, Alliance, SDLP) than of course the Tories margin is slimmer. Assuming 8 for SF + Speaker, they need 321/2 seats to form a government.
The other thing to note is that the area of result which results in something uncertain and chaotic is fairly large. PB will explode with activity if this looks likely, as will the media generally.
In that realm there are only a few certainties: The Tories have no friends except possibly the DUP, the world's most perfidious faction to whom the word 'friend' is a stranger. The government can only be led by Tories or Labour. So almost all NOM result will bring a Labour led government, even if a chaotic and brief one.
But, Labour will remain well ahead, on public services, which, combined with the general exasperation with the government, still gives them a pretty big lead on polling day.
Labour's own poor ratings probably point to quite a drop off in support, after winning the next election.
For the Conservatives to actually win a majority, or near-majority, would require the blackest of black swans.
Bloody ball ache when the direct debit keeps going out every time it happens.
Yes, Australia called the toss wrong four times in a row, only getting it right on the 5th Test. The odds of that are one in 16 for the four losses.
I can see Labour plunging to great depths of polling negativity within 1-2 years of their election, and the Tories might easily be back in power by 2029, so their despair is rather overdone
He even had a bit of a glow-up in terms of his personal appearance: he clearly had media training, started wearing much better suits, and stopped doing whatever-it-was that used to make his hair look unwashed. He actually ended his premiership looking better than he did when he started, which is rare for a PM.
Sunak's the opposite - he gives the impression that he's simply not comfortable in the job. He often shows clear signs of exasperation, and he whines about people "playing politics". It's hard not feel that this may be the first time in his life when things haven't gone his way, and I suspect he hates it.
And, in contrast to Brown, he's beginning to look increasingly tired. He's greying at the temples, and growing his hair longer so that he can comb it over the rapidly-spreading bald patch. He's riding the tail end of a fashion wave with those ankle-grazing trousers - it's beginning to look a little desperate, and it's starting to attract comment. He needs to have a good holiday... but hasn't he just had one?
If there were to be a 2008-style crisis now, would Sunak really be able to deal with it? I'm honestly not sure. I think he might be worse than Brown.
Currently nominal wages are growing faster than inflation, but real take-home wages are still falling due to fiscal drag.
No feel good factor if any wage growth is being taken in fiscal drag and not taken home.
They quote from data supplied, and the EPC. So make sure it is up to date !
https://octopus.energy/get-a-heat-pump/
If that's not a penalty for handball then what is?!
But here we go. 2-2. Exciting!
Then we can line up Stewart's futile attempt of 2019 with von Stauffenberg's of 1944.
I know it's the Norf Lunnun derby but still, it's pretty intense
Say, you're on £30,000. Your wages go up by £2,500 in nominal terms. £500 of that goes in extra tax, at 20%, and £1,200 in terms of extra inflation.
Sunak, I agree, gives the impression he found it a lot easier to make decisions and have them put into effect at Goldman Sachs than he does now. He comes across as exasperated by the messy nonsense of democracy.
This is an exciting game, 2-1.
I am no Starmerite, but there is a seachange in opinion that will see the Tories gone for a decade or longer.
As to the header, it brings this meme to mind:
Yes if inflation falls to 4% then maybe we might have real wage growth, but we don't yet. And miniscule real wage growth in the next year thanks to fiscal drag eating up what should be wage growth won't counteract the real wage decline of the past few years.
The EPL is clearly successful for several reasons, but the fans are obviously a big part of it. Contrast that with the 976 people in the Saudi league who recently watched Jordan Henderson
https://www.dailystar.co.uk/sport/football/jordan-henderson-saudi-league-fans-31004291
The Saudi league is gonna fail for this reason, I predict - or at least not prosper. Not enough fans, zero atmos, no young player will want to go to a graveyard league (for more than a season or two making ££££)
The state pension is £9,627.80
I would argue that they should be the same, for tidiness. But that’s part of my UBI proposal.
The renter can have double the marginal tax rate of the home owner too, even if they earn the same amount.
Current Starting Rate of Tax: £12,500.
That's quite a bit of headroom. But it could be an issue if inflation does not fall to target range within 1-2 years.
I make it average increase of just over 4% would stop it hitting £12500 by 2027-28.