The url explains the context. The key passage is as follows:
"from the end of the decade, union members – now rebadged as affiliated supporters – could hold huge clout in leadership elections.
But there is a big delay. For the next five years only new union members will be asked to sign up to Labour – with the switchover of everyone else only in 2019.
What that means is that if Ed Miliband loses the next election, or steps down for any other reason, the subsequent leadership contest would be an unprecedented one for Labour: because the unions would temporarily have almost no skin in the game.
Labour’s MPs, meanwhile, would no longer wield the equivalent of 600 votes each – and instead would be no more important than a single activist. Their only role would be in deciding the shortlist: any candidate would need at least 15 per cent of their signatures to proceed.
That suggests any contest within the next five years would be decided almost entirely by grassroots members.
They were the people who in 2010, you may remember, backed David Miliband far ahead of his younger brother.
With the unions neutralised there would be less support for certain candidates, for example Yvette Cooper or Rachel Reeves, that you might expect them to back.
Others, such as Chuka Umunna, Tristram Hunt or Gloria del Piero, who are not so popular with the general secretaries – but might have a wider popular appeal – could do rather better."
Blairism is about as popular among the Labour grassroots as measles these days.
The real implications of these reforms on any future leadership contest is that MPs' power has been diluted. That tilts the odds towards grassroots darling Andy Burnham, away from Westminster bubble favourite Yvette Cooper.
Burnham ? jeez even I wouldn't wish that on Labour.
I note that there will be a by-election for a new crossbencher hereditary peer following the death last week of Lord Moran. No date set as yet for the vote.
Electing a hereditary peer? Are you sure about that?
Yes, it has to be the strangest election in Britain:
It's a crap poster. Take out the "Son of a Marxist" line and it could apply to any of our political elite.
Off topic, I've just had a nice letter from Mr Cameron, urging me to register for a postal vote for the Euros and beyond. I'm a bit miffed, do I look like a Tory pensioner?
Join the club. A prominent local Labour couple have had one (as well as an Xmas card from Cameron to the lady of the two, thanking her for her continuing support), and have eagerly used the replied-paid envelope to write off for PVs (how come they didn't do it before is what I want to know). Broxtowe Labour's party chair had a survey from the MP asking if she approved of her work. Broxtowe Labour's head of fund-raising had a 4-page spiel from the Tories praising her as a "hard-working family" and asking for donations.
The basic problem is that the Tories have run out of people to do the groundwork, so they rely on Experian and the like to spot likely Tories, plus some desultory phone canvassing. Nemesis will arrive when they try to do GOTV with their data.
Even better if they manage to do a GOTV. I always politely ask them in for a cup of tea so that they may rest their tired feet ! As they rumble on , nod occasionally.
So, what sort of personal attacks should the Tories be making against Ed?
I'd suggest binning the 'son of a Maxist' and the 'millionaire' bits (with or without a capital M), but the message that Ed is out of touch is a good one. The message should be that he's out with the fairies, not that he's privileged (a battleground which, as our Labour friends have already pointed out with glee, is one the Tories won't win). Ed's Achilles' heel is his love of wonkish and impractical abstractions, his tendency to view everything as an exercise in political theory completely unrelated to reality. The Tories should find a pithy way of going for that.
Highest level of concern about environment/pollution in 6 years as concern about race/immigration drops after last month's joint top spot
The February Economist/Ipsos MORI issues index shows that, after January’s dead heat between the economy and race/immigration concern about the latter has fallen by 7 percentage points to 34%, meaning that the economy is once again uncontested as the most important issue facing Britain today.
The reason the Conservatives are using this attack is that they think Miliband is a charlatan, although in private they prefer a different c-word. He is certainly a shameless opportunist. He's also dangerous. We shouldn't forget that he shafted his own brother, and when the Conservatives went against Blair's character (remember the Devil's Eyes?) it didn't do them any favours. As it happens they were probably right about Blair too, but that doesn't mean they can get people to see it, and plenty of charlatans have been successful politicians. Negative advertising has also never successfully crossed this side of the pond.
There is something especially odious about Miliband, though, so maybe this time it will work.
I note that there will be a by-election for a new crossbencher hereditary peer following the death last week of Lord Moran. No date set as yet for the vote.
Electing a hereditary peer? Are you sure about that?
Yes, it has to be the strangest election in Britain:
The reason the Conservatives are using this attack is that they think Miliband is a charlatan, although in private they prefer a different c-word. He is certainly a shameless opportunist. He's also dangerous. We shouldn't forget that he shafted his own brother, and when the Conservatives went against Blair's character (remember the Devil's Eyes?) it didn't do them any favours. As it happens they were probably right about Blair too, but that doesn't mean they can get people to see it, and plenty of charlatans have been successful politicians. Negative advertising has also never successfully crossed this side of the pond.
There is something especially odious about Miliband, though, so maybe this time it will work.
Have you ever met this man you claim to be "especially odious"?
'David Cameron would "absolutely" support an independent Scotland's application to join the European Union, he told STV Political Editor Bernard Ponsonby.'
'David Cameron would "absolutely" support an independent Scotland's application to join the European Union, he told STV Political Editor Bernard Ponsonby.'
Personally I think he is preparing for the inevitable Yes vote. It is 1998 all over again. Blame Tony Blair not David Cameron if Scotland votes Yes. Blair pressed the "start button".
Wasn't it Tony Benn who got things going when he turned on the tap of North Sea Oil wealth into the Treasury coffers?
The reason the Conservatives are using this attack is that they think Miliband is a charlatan, although in private they prefer a different c-word. He is certainly a shameless opportunist. He's also dangerous. We shouldn't forget that he shafted his own brother, and when the Conservatives went against Blair's character (remember the Devil's Eyes?) it didn't do them any favours. As it happens they were probably right about Blair too, but that doesn't mean they can get people to see it, and plenty of charlatans have been successful politicians. Negative advertising has also never successfully crossed this side of the pond.
There is something especially odious about Miliband, though, so maybe this time it will work.
Have you ever met this man you claim to be "especially odious"?
Unless Audrey Anne was brought up in the rarefied confines of a North London Marxist enclave, why would she have met him?
Millionaires tend to install metaphorical security gates on their mansions.
You have to peer through the net curtains to see how odious they are.
The reason the Conservatives are using this attack is that they think Miliband is a charlatan, although in private they prefer a different c-word. He is certainly a shameless opportunist. He's also dangerous. We shouldn't forget that he shafted his own brother, and when the Conservatives went against Blair's character (remember the Devil's Eyes?) it didn't do them any favours. As it happens they were probably right about Blair too, but that doesn't mean they can get people to see it, and plenty of charlatans have been successful politicians. Negative advertising has also never successfully crossed this side of the pond.
There is something especially odious about Miliband, though, so maybe this time it will work.
Have you ever met this man you claim to be "especially odious"?
Unless Audrey Anne was brought up in the rarefied confines of a North London Marxist enclave, why would she have met him?
Millionaires tend to install metaphorical security gates on their mansions.
You have to peer through the net curtains to see how odious they are.
Indeed. I think far, far too many people conflate the political with the personal.
Looks like the Mail has got another bloody nose on this story.They don`t seem to get that the Labour party under Miliband is pretty aggressive and ready to take on smear campaigns.
Looks like the Mail has got another bloody nose on this story.They don`t seem to get that the Labour party under Miliband is pretty aggressive and ready to take on smear campaigns.
Not sure they have - they've had a bite on the line - the game is afoot - do they have more bait in their bag or even a stick of dynamite...
If Scotland does vote for independence, where does that leave them WRT UKUSA and other intelligence sharing agreements? The five eyes community each have significant inputs into the sigint machine, Scotland doesn't and is unlikely to do so in the medium to long term. Also where does it leave the foreign nationals as they will become in the security services, will they be sacked?
The reason the Conservatives are using this attack is that they think Miliband is a charlatan, although in private they prefer a different c-word. He is certainly a shameless opportunist. He's also dangerous. We shouldn't forget that he shafted his own brother, and when the Conservatives went against Blair's character (remember the Devil's Eyes?) it didn't do them any favours. As it happens they were probably right about Blair too, but that doesn't mean they can get people to see it, and plenty of charlatans have been successful politicians. Negative advertising has also never successfully crossed this side of the pond.
There is something especially odious about Miliband, though, so maybe this time it will work.
Have you ever met this man you claim to be "especially odious"?
Unless Audrey Anne was brought up in the rarefied confines of a North London Marxist enclave, why would she have met him?
Millionaires tend to install metaphorical security gates on their mansions.
You have to peer through the net curtains to see how odious they are.
Indeed. I think far, far too many people conflate the political with the personal.
I find venom of this nature very sad.
LOL...now whatever happened to that Tim bloke, on here 20hrs a day doing just that.
Looks like the Mail has got another bloody nose on this story.They don`t seem to get that the Labour party under Miliband is pretty aggressive and ready to take on smear campaigns.
If Scotland does vote for independence, where does that leave them WRT UKUSA and other intelligence sharing agreements? The five eyes community each have significant inputs into the sigint machine, Scotland doesn't and is unlikely to do so in the medium to long term. Also where does it leave the foreign nationals as they will become in the security services, will they be sacked?
They can apply for EWNI citizenship and vie versa, surely?
Looks like the Mail has got another bloody nose on this story.They don`t seem to get that the Labour party under Miliband is pretty aggressive and ready to take on smear campaigns.
If Scotland does vote for independence, where does that leave them WRT UKUSA and other intelligence sharing agreements? The five eyes community each have significant inputs into the sigint machine, Scotland doesn't and is unlikely to do so in the medium to long term. Also where does it leave the foreign nationals as they will become in the security services, will they be sacked?
Maybe the USA will make Donald Trump their ambassador to Scotland.
'David Cameron would "absolutely" support an independent Scotland's application to join the European Union, he told STV Political Editor Bernard Ponsonby.'
'David Cameron would "absolutely" support an independent Scotland's application to join the European Union, he told STV Political Editor Bernard Ponsonby.'
Personally I think he is preparing for the inevitable Yes vote. It is 1998 all over again. Blame Tony Blair not David Cameron if Scotland votes Yes. Blair pressed the "start button".
Wasn't it Tony Benn who got things going when he turned on the tap of North Sea Oil wealth into the Treasury coffers?
The heyday of Labour control over the North Sea saw newly licenced fields named Blair, Gordon and Petronella (a little present from Tony B to his friend Woodrow W).
It will come as no suprise to any PB reader that these fields were among the least productive of all on the continental shelf, although Petronella continued to be drilled until as late as 2012.
Looks like the Mail has got another bloody nose on this story.They don`t seem to get that the Labour party under Miliband is pretty aggressive and ready to take on smear campaigns.
Whether it’s overall a good idea or not, however, independence would have to rest on a sound monetary foundation. And the independence movement has me worried, because what it has said on that that crucial subject seems deeply muddle-headed.
What the independence movement says is that there’s no problem — Scotland will simply stay on the pound. That is, however, much more problematic than they seem to realize.
It’s true, as pointed out here, that England, I mean the rump UK, I mean continuing Britain, whatever, can’t prevent the Scots from using the pound, just as the United States can’t stop Ecuador from using dollars. But the lesson of the euro crisis, surely, is that sharing a common currency without having a shared federal government is very dangerous.
In fact, Scotland-on-the-pound would be in even worse shape than the euro countries, because the Bank of England would be under no obligation to act as lender of last resort to Scottish banks — that is, it would arguably take even less responsibility for local financial stability than the pre-Draghi ECB. And it would fall very far short of the post-Draghi ECB, which has in effect taken on the role of lender of last resort to eurozone governments, too.
Looks like the Mail has got another bloody nose on this story.They don`t seem to get that the Labour party under Miliband is pretty aggressive and ready to take on smear campaigns.
Not sure they have - they've had a bite on the line - the game is afoot - do they have more bait in their bag or even a stick of dynamite...
Well the rebuttal was fact-filled and robust.Let`s see whether the Mail runs another `no facts all smear` headline tonight!
If Scotland does vote for independence, where does that leave them WRT UKUSA and other intelligence sharing agreements? The five eyes community each have significant inputs into the sigint machine, Scotland doesn't and is unlikely to do so in the medium to long term. Also where does it leave the foreign nationals as they will become in the security services, will they be sacked?
They can apply for EWNI citizenship and vie versa, surely?
is that a guess? Or has Mr Salmond, even considered it? It is just one of the hundreds of issues that will come to haunt a yes vote.
Hello Lynton Audrey Anne, Stop being silly and do something worthwhile.Ed Miliband is not odious, unless you are a Daily Mail clone, perhaps you are but in fact you are Australian and male not Mail.
Hello Lynton Audrey Anne, Stop being silly and do something worthwhile.Ed Miliband is not odious, unless you are a Daily Mail clone, perhaps you are but in fact you are Australian and male not Mail.
Rose, dear, you seem to have inadvertently attached a Shadow Cabinet policy document to the base of your post.
The poster might damage Ed Miliband's image but I can see it doing more damage to the Tories. I'm not sure it's wise to derogatorively refer to your political opponent as a millionaire when your own party is run by millionaires of probably far more substantial means than Ed Miliband. Bringing his father into it also seems crass. As for the career, what have Cameron and Osborne spent most their lives doing?
What could be really dangerous for the Tory leadership though is that their grassroots might look at this and think hmmmm...... should people in glass houses throw stones? Or possibly they might think, if this is Ed Miliband's weakness, might we have a better chance against him with a different leader? Someone perhaps who has spent a life outside of politics and isn't a man of privilege who would be a proper antidote to the monied metropolitan marxist?
It was always that , just Westminster and media are too stupid to read or listen to what was said.
Indeed. You have it to the posh idiots and bubble thinkers on PB. Next thing they'll be trying to claim millionaire son of a marxist was theirs in their drunken stupidity.
Alex Salmond himself didn't know this last Monday.
Funny, PB's favourite Somerset-based Cybernat seemed to know it 10 days ago.
'(*Nicola Sturgeon all but screamed the Scottish Government’s “Plan B” on currency into Andrew Neil’s ear on the Daily Politics yesterday. Once again, Neil and the rest of the nation’s media either just weren’t listening, or didn’t understand basic Politician. Anyone still telling you we don’t know what “Plan B” is is a slack-jawed halfwit.)'
If Scotland does vote for independence, where does that leave them WRT UKUSA and other intelligence sharing agreements? The five eyes community each have significant inputs into the sigint machine, Scotland doesn't and is unlikely to do so in the medium to long term. Also where does it leave the foreign nationals as they will become in the security services, will they be sacked?
They can apply for EWNI citizenship and vie versa, surely?
is that a guess? Or has Mr Salmond, even considered it? It is just one of the hundreds of issues that will come to haunt a yes vote.
Your email was - seemingly clearly - about foreign nationals in the security services and in the context of your email it seemed to mean the EWNI and US services, and therefore Scots emigres - they can apply to work there or they can come home.
Re Mr Salmond, it's not him but the SNP or the Scottish Government, and you might want to have a look in the White Paper (though as governments never talk willingly about such things ...).
The poster might damage Ed Miliband's image but I can see it doing more damage to the Tories. I'm not sure it's wise to derogatorively refer to your political opponent as a millionaire when your own party is run by millionaires of probably far more substantial means than Ed Miliband. Bringing his father into it also seems crass. As for the career, what have Cameron and Osborne spent most their lives doing?
What could be really dangerous for the Tory leadership though is that their grassroots might look at this and think hmmmm...... should people in glass houses throw stones? Or possibly they might think, if this is Ed Miliband's weakness, might we have a better chance against him with a different leader? Someone perhaps who has spent a life outside of politics and isn't a man of privilege who would be a proper antidote to the monied metropolitan marxist?
Or perhaps people may think. That Milliband bloke, I think his name is David, he's a right hypocrite, slags of the Tories for being posh, but he's minted.
OT, why when I type slags, does my kindle auto correct it to Allah's? Wierd.
Mr. Pork, could be worse. He could be trying to negotiate entry.
Or the fop chicken could be so incompetent he doesn't even know whether he will support IN or OUT for his own Cast Iron Referendum. Because that isn't hilarious in the slightest.
The poster might damage Ed Miliband's image but I can see it doing more damage to the Tories. I'm not sure it's wise to derogatorively refer to your political opponent as a millionaire when your own party is run by millionaires of probably far more substantial means than Ed Miliband. Bringing his father into it also seems crass. As for the career, what have Cameron and Osborne spent most their lives doing?
What could be really dangerous for the Tory leadership though is that their grassroots might look at this and think hmmmm...... should people in glass houses throw stones? Or possibly they might think, if this is Ed Miliband's weakness, might we have a better chance against him with a different leader? Someone perhaps who has spent a life outside of politics and isn't a man of privilege who would be a proper antidote to the monied metropolitan marxist?
Or perhaps people may think. That Milliband bloke, I think his name is David, he's a right hypocrite, slags of the Tories for being posh, but he's minted.
OT, why when I type slags, does my kindle auto correct it to Allah's? Wierd.
Only he's not slagged off the Tories for being rich, he merely pointed out that a cabinet of millionaires had prioritised a tax cut for themselves.
The Plan B stuff is an absolute catastrophe for the Nationalist cause. What the hell was Salmond thinking of? I was ridiculed on here recently when I said that Scotland would be utterly demeaned if it was reduced to using a pirate Sterling. But then I was warning of the unforeseen circumstances of SNP folly; I didn't for one second think they'd make it an election pledge.
'David Cameron would "absolutely" support an independent Scotland's application to join the European Union, he told STV Political Editor Bernard Ponsonby.'
'David Cameron would "absolutely" support an independent Scotland's application to join the European Union, he told STV Political Editor Bernard Ponsonby.'
Personally I think he is preparing for the inevitable Yes vote. It is 1998 all over again. Blame Tony Blair not David Cameron if Scotland votes Yes. Blair pressed the "start button".
Wasn't it Tony Benn who got things going when he turned on the tap of North Sea Oil wealth into the Treasury coffers?
It was Tony Benn who got Ed Miliband's career going, with six weeks' work experience in 1986.
Mr. Pork, could be worse. He could be trying to negotiate entry.
Or the fop chicken could be so incompetent he doesn't even know whether he will support IN or OUT for his own Cast Iron Referendum. Because that isn't hilarious in the slightest.
How extraordinary that he's waiting to see the detail before deciding. It's almost like he's a normal person rather than a zealot.
The Plan B stuff is an absolute catastrophe for the Nationalist cause.
Of course it is petal. Not having a Plan B was a catastrophe according to the out of touch right wingers on PB and now they are claiming the exact opposite because the torygraph says so.
Looks like the Mail has got another bloody nose on this story.They don`t seem to get that the Labour party under Miliband is pretty aggressive and ready to take on smear campaigns.
Not sure they have - they've had a bite on the line - the game is afoot - do they have more bait in their bag or even a stick of dynamite...
Well the rebuttal was fact-filled and robust.Let`s see whether the Mail runs another `no facts all smear` headline tonight!
Quite - this is where it gets interesting - too early for you to call it game set and match.
The Plan B stuff is an absolute catastrophe for the Nationalist cause. What the hell was Salmond thinking of? I was ridiculed on here recently when I said that Scotland would be utterly demeaned if it was reduced to using a pirate Sterling. But then I was warning of the unforeseen circumstances of SNP folly; I didn't for one second think they'd make it an election pledge.
It was going so well for NAW until Krugman joined the fray - unfortunately on their side...
Mr. Pork, could be worse. He could be trying to negotiate entry.
Or the fop chicken could be so incompetent he doesn't even know whether he will support IN or OUT for his own Cast Iron Referendum. Because that isn't hilarious in the slightest.
How extraordinary that he's waiting to see the detail before deciding. It's almost like he's a normal person rather than a zealot.
How extraordinary the obsequious and out of touch Cameroons think anyone would believe that load of old twaddle. Then again tory eurosceptics have proved themselves to be staggeringly gullible many times before. The fact is the fop chicken has to maintain the illusory pretence that he might decide to support OUT lest his own backbench MPs humiliate him yet again and on a scale not even see up to now.
We'll see just how firm Cammie's 'red lines' are after the EU elections, won't we?
'Pot, kettle, desperate, they're all the same, meh.' I imagine that will be the reaction of the unsures, pretty much.
Which is the purpose of the exercise. From YouGov's most recent figures (Feb 17/18):
In touch with ordinary people: Cameron: 7% (the worst rating for him of any of the eight characteristics) Miliband: 24% (the best rating out of the eight characteristics)
Of the others, Miliband leads on 'honest', 16-12; while Cameron leads on 'strong' by 15-7, 'sticks to what he believes in', by 22-18, 'good in a crisis' by 16-5, decisive by 18-8, 'a natural leader' by 17-4, and 'charismatic by 18-5.
It's clear that by and large, Miliband's ratings are very poor but are propped up by that one big lead on 'in touch'. Kill that perception and Labour really do have a leadership problem. (For the record, Cameron's are pretty poor too but politics is a relative game).
The Plan B stuff is an absolute catastrophe for the Nationalist cause.
Of course it is petal. Not having a Plan B was a catastrophe according to the out of touch right wingers on PB and now they are claiming the exact opposite because the torygraph says so.
Unspoofable indeed.
Not having a Plan B would always have been ridiculous. Having a ridiculous Plan B is also ridiculous. What's wrong with a national currency of Scotland's own, the same as most other countries round the world?
'Pot, kettle, desperate, they're all the same, meh.' I imagine that will be the reaction of the unsures, pretty much.
Which is the purpose of the exercise. From YouGov's most recent figures (Feb 17/18):
In touch with ordinary people: Cameron: 7% (the worst rating for him of any of the eight characteristics) Miliband: 24% (the best rating out of the eight characteristics)
Of the others, Miliband leads on 'honest', 16-12; while Cameron leads on 'strong' by 15-7, 'sticks to what he believes in', by 22-18, 'good in a crisis' by 16-5, decisive by 18-8, 'a natural leader' by 17-4, and 'charismatic by 18-5.
It's clear that by and large, Miliband's ratings are very poor but are propped up by that one big lead on 'in touch'. Kill that perception and Labour really do have a leadership problem. (For the record, Cameron's are pretty poor too but politics is a relative game).
Well yes, but there's relative and there's relative. Once you're in the 'relatively crap' zone I don't think it does make that much of a difference. Certainly when you balance that against the public distaste for negative campaigning.
'Pot, kettle, desperate, they're all the same, meh.' I imagine that will be the reaction of the unsures, pretty much.
This 'glass houses' master strategy from the chumocracy cannot possibly fail. It's not as if any tory MPs would ever label Cammie and Osbrowne as "arrogant posh boys" who are out of touch with ordinary voters.
'Pot, kettle, desperate, they're all the same, meh.' I imagine that will be the reaction of the unsures, pretty much.
Which is the purpose of the exercise. From YouGov's most recent figures (Feb 17/18):
In touch with ordinary people: Cameron: 7% (the worst rating for him of any of the eight characteristics) Miliband: 24% (the best rating out of the eight characteristics)
Of the others, Miliband leads on 'honest', 16-12; while Cameron leads on 'strong' by 15-7, 'sticks to what he believes in', by 22-18, 'good in a crisis' by 16-5, decisive by 18-8, 'a natural leader' by 17-4, and 'charismatic by 18-5.
It's clear that by and large, Miliband's ratings are very poor but are propped up by that one big lead on 'in touch'. Kill that perception and Labour really do have a leadership problem. (For the record, Cameron's are pretty poor too but politics is a relative game).
Certainly when you balance that against the public distaste for negative campaigning.
Nah. The Cameroons and labour are utterly convinced that negative campaigning is bound to work (like it did in 2011) and who better than the chumocracy to hammer that home on Independence to the scottish public? (aside from out of touch right-wingers on PB obviously)
The Scottish Independence referendum is starting to become eerily reminiscent of Australia's vote to become a republic in 1999. In both cases the status quo triumphed - not because there was any great love for it, but because the masses recoiled from the fudging, half truths, sleight of hand and general incriminating vagueness of the Yes campaign. The SNP have only themselves to blame. No one is in any doubt about what they hate; their problem is that they never settled on anything positive or worthwhile with which to replace it.
'Pot, kettle, desperate, they're all the same, meh.' I imagine that will be the reaction of the unsures, pretty much.
Which is the purpose of the exercise. From YouGov's most recent figures (Feb 17/18):
In touch with ordinary people: Cameron: 7% (the worst rating for him of any of the eight characteristics) Miliband: 24% (the best rating out of the eight characteristics)
Of the others, Miliband leads on 'honest', 16-12; while Cameron leads on 'strong' by 15-7, 'sticks to what he believes in', by 22-18, 'good in a crisis' by 16-5, decisive by 18-8, 'a natural leader' by 17-4, and 'charismatic by 18-5.
It's clear that by and large, Miliband's ratings are very poor but are propped up by that one big lead on 'in touch'. Kill that perception and Labour really do have a leadership problem. (For the record, Cameron's are pretty poor too but politics is a relative game).
Well yes, but there's relative and there's relative. Once you're in the 'relatively crap' zone I don't think it does make that much of a difference. Certainly when you balance that against the public distaste for negative campaigning.
Carola
There is a difference between a "public distaste for negative campaigning" and a "public taste for criticising negative campaigning".
No one is in any doubt about what they hate; their problem is that they never settled on anything positive or worthwhile with which to replace it.
LABOUR should abandon the cross-party Better Together campaign, former first minister Henry McLeish has said as he accused the unionist group of using “fear and scare tactics” to defeat the SNP.
Mr McLeish said the anti-independence campaign was “treating Scots like idiots” as he claimed Better Together was working alongside Westminster in attempting to frighten voters about independence.
The comments from the former Scottish Labour leader came after the UK government made a series of claims about the consequences of independence such as the end of Scottish banknotes and more expensive mobile phone calls for Scots visiting the rest of the UK.
Mr McLeish said there was “too much venom and hatred aimed at the SNP” in Better Together, which is an alliance of Labour, Tories and the Lib Dems.
Labour's former Scottish First Minister Henry McLeish has criticised the intervention of Osborne, (as well as Ed Balls and Danny Alexander), and said Scots "shouldn't be fooled" by the suggestion that a currency union could not be worked out. He told BBC Scotland:
"This is entirely political and of course consistent with the unionist campaign. This is negative, it is about spreading fears and scare stories.
"What we require from the unionist parties is a bit of statesmanship and quite frankly their behaviour so far falls well short of that."
McLeish is a No supporter as well as a former first minister in the very likely event that the PB right-wingers don't know who he is.
'Pot, kettle, desperate, they're all the same, meh.' I imagine that will be the reaction of the unsures, pretty much.
Which is the purpose of the exercise. From YouGov's most recent figures (Feb 17/18):
In touch with ordinary people: Cameron: 7% (the worst rating for him of any of the eight characteristics) Miliband: 24% (the best rating out of the eight characteristics)
Of the others, Miliband leads on 'honest', 16-12; while Cameron leads on 'strong' by 15-7, 'sticks to what he believes in', by 22-18, 'good in a crisis' by 16-5, decisive by 18-8, 'a natural leader' by 17-4, and 'charismatic by 18-5.
It's clear that by and large, Miliband's ratings are very poor but are propped up by that one big lead on 'in touch'. Kill that perception and Labour really do have a leadership problem. (For the record, Cameron's are pretty poor too but politics is a relative game).
Certainly when you balance that against the public distaste for negative campaigning.
Nah. The Cameroons and labour are utterly convinced that negative campaigning is bound to work (like it did in 2011) and who better than the chumocracy to hammer that home on Independence to the scottish public? (aside from out of touch right-wingers on PB obviously)
Can't see negative campaigning winning over the voters that need to be won. Anyway, what's the point of being negative about the opposition when the public thinks there's no clear water between sides?
What's needed is a similar campaign to what's going on in Ukraine. Go to the residencies of top Labour oicks and also publish a list of assets. Why not? If they're not embarrassed then tell everyone!
Larry Elliott spelled out why the SNP leadership has rejected the idea of a separate Scottish currency very well yesterday:
as Salmond knows, there are not enough purists to win a referendum, so his pitch has been that Scotland can have the best of all worlds. It can be independent while using the pound. It can have most of the North Sea oil money while the rest of the UK picks up the tab for decommissioning fields as they run dry. It can have Scandinavian levels of public spending while the Bank of England provides Royal Bank of Scotland with a lender of last resort guarantee. But this is fantasy politics. The idea that after a yes vote, Scotland could quickly negotiate a currency union with the rest of the UK, and be accepted for EU membership without lengthy debate about such issues as whether Edinburgh would be eligible for a slice of the UK's budget rebate, seems improbable. The misgivings of the Bank of England and the Treasury about a currency union are valid: the experience of the eurozone is that a currency union without fiscal and banking union is inherently unstable. In the case of an independent Scotland, the tensions would quickly become apparent because the country that formed the smaller part of the currency union would have a social-democratic bent while the bigger part would, by virtue of having lost Scotland, have a more conservative economic approach. At the very least, there would be strict rules on Scotland's fiscal autonomy, with curbs on the size of its budget deficit. These sort of arrangements have proved burdensome for the smaller members of the eurozone and a post-referendum Scotland would find them difficult to accept. Perhaps that is the point: Salmond may be playing a long game in which Scots find a halfway house arrangement so unpalatable that they go for the real thing next time. For, make no mistake, this is a halfway house. There is a case for an independent Scotland, but it is not being made in the current campaign. It would be a strange sort of freedom in which all the decisions that matter are made in London. It is an independence of
For obvious reasons, the SNP's leadership does not trust the Scottish people with the truth. Their strategy is to talk vaguely and to play the man when someone points out the very obvious holes in what they are claiming will happen after a Yes. It may work, but the good thing is that at least the real issues are now out in the open and being discussed so that if Scotland does vote for independence it will do so with its eyes open. We should all welcome that.
What's needed is a similar campaign to what's going on in Ukraine. Go to the residencies of top Labour oicks and also publish a list of assets. Why not? If they're not embarrassed then tell everyone!
Blue Rog
Is this a suggestion that the great unwashed be permitted to tour the Miliband family home?
It is not the gold taps and personalised bottles of vodka which are of concern.
I fear the visiting Shadow Cabinet might be mistaken for the Menagerie.
'Pot, kettle, desperate, they're all the same, meh.' I imagine that will be the reaction of the unsures, pretty much.
Which is the purpose of the exercise. From YouGov's most recent figures (Feb 17/18):
In touch with ordinary people: Cameron: 7% (the worst rating for him of any of the eight characteristics) Miliband: 24% (the best rating out of the eight characteristics)
Of the others, Miliband leads on 'honest', 16-12; while Cameron leads on 'strong' by 15-7, 'sticks to what he believes in', by 22-18, 'good in a crisis' by 16-5, decisive by 18-8, 'a natural leader' by 17-4, and 'charismatic by 18-5.
It's clear that by and large, Miliband's ratings are very poor but are propped up by that one big lead on 'in touch'. Kill that perception and Labour really do have a leadership problem. (For the record, Cameron's are pretty poor too but politics is a relative game).
Certainly when you balance that against the public distaste for negative campaigning.
Nah. The Cameroons and labour are utterly convinced that negative campaigning is bound to work (like it did in 2011) and who better than the chumocracy to hammer that home on Independence to the scottish public? (aside from out of touch right-wingers on PB obviously)
Can't see negative campaigning winning over the voters that need to be won.
What it will do is drive down turnout particularly for the side doing it. Something those with a less than impressive ground game can scarcely afford to do, to say the least.
Anyway, what's the point of being negative about the opposition when the public thinks there's no clear water between sides?
The desperate search for clear blue or red water on small differences. 'The wrong lizards' as it is sometimes humourously referred to. (a Douglas Adams reference) You are correct as it makes little to no sense in a fight that will be focused like a laser on marginals and triangulation as it assuredly will be in 2015. The bluster and posturing is usually to keep the unhappy core voters on board now that the kippers are sucking up voters. However, it's all the more dangerous to assume that posturing like this by itself will be enough to cut it. This just fuels discontent and if the tories are deranged enough to think they can afford to throw stones from within their enormous glass house they shall soon be corrected on that matter by either labour or more likely Farage.
For obvious reasons, the SNP's leadership does not trust the Scottish people with the truth.
That why you supported such trustworthy figures as Romney and Clegg?
The day yellow tories know how the scottish public thinks will be an amusing one indeed considering they now have enough MSPs to fit in a taxi and are an irrelevance to scottish politics.
Comments
I can't see why the hereditaries bother with this AV election nonsense.
Surely the proper way to fill an arising vacancy would be to appoint automatically the highest ranking and senior non-serving peer.
It might even give some credibility, effectiveness and public trust back to the much devalued House of Lords..
Some even stay half an hour !
The February Economist/Ipsos MORI issues index shows that, after January’s dead heat between the economy and race/immigration concern about the latter has fallen by 7 percentage points to 34%, meaning that the economy is once again uncontested as the most important issue facing Britain today.
http://ipsos-mori.co.uk/researchpublications/researcharchive/3346/EconomistIpsos-MORI-February-2014-Issues-Index.aspx
There is something especially odious about Miliband, though, so maybe this time it will work.
Provides more information, including full details of past by-elections and vote transfers. The last election had 16 rounds of vote transfers....
Millionaires tend to install metaphorical security gates on their mansions.
You have to peer through the net curtains to see how odious they are.
I find venom of this nature very sad.
"You have to peer through the net curtains to see how odious they are. "
Peering through certain blogs can give an even better glimpse of "odiousness".
Miliband-2 Mail-0
It will come as no suprise to any PB reader that these fields were among the least productive of all on the continental shelf, although Petronella continued to be drilled until as late as 2012.
Stop being silly and do something worthwhile.Ed Miliband is not odious, unless you are a Daily Mail clone, perhaps you are but in fact you are Australian and male not Mail.
LOL
What could be really dangerous for the Tory leadership though is that their grassroots might look at this and think hmmmm...... should people in glass houses throw stones? Or possibly they might think, if this is Ed Miliband's weakness, might we have a better chance against him with a different leader? Someone perhaps who has spent a life outside of politics and isn't a man of privilege who would be a proper antidote to the monied metropolitan marxist?
Re Mr Salmond, it's not him but the SNP or the Scottish Government, and you might want to have a look in the White Paper (though as governments never talk willingly about such things ...).
OT, why when I type slags, does my kindle auto correct it to Allah's? Wierd.
Or the fop chicken could be so incompetent he doesn't even know whether he will support IN or OUT for his own Cast Iron Referendum. Because that isn't hilarious in the slightest.
Oh, off topic too, here's a petition that about a quarter of a million have signed.
http://tinyurl.com/nhjbv6y
Unspoofable indeed.
We'll see just how firm Cammie's 'red lines' are after the EU elections, won't we?
In touch with ordinary people:
Cameron: 7% (the worst rating for him of any of the eight characteristics)
Miliband: 24% (the best rating out of the eight characteristics)
Of the others, Miliband leads on 'honest', 16-12; while Cameron leads on 'strong' by 15-7, 'sticks to what he believes in', by 22-18, 'good in a crisis' by 16-5, decisive by 18-8, 'a natural leader' by 17-4, and 'charismatic by 18-5.
It's clear that by and large, Miliband's ratings are very poor but are propped up by that one big lead on 'in touch'. Kill that perception and Labour really do have a leadership problem. (For the record, Cameron's are pretty poor too but politics is a relative game).
There is a difference between a "public distaste for negative campaigning" and a "public taste for criticising negative campaigning".
I fear the latter applies.
as Salmond knows, there are not enough purists to win a referendum, so his pitch has been that Scotland can have the best of all worlds. It can be independent while using the pound. It can have most of the North Sea oil money while the rest of the UK picks up the tab for decommissioning fields as they run dry. It can have Scandinavian levels of public spending while the Bank of England provides Royal Bank of Scotland with a lender of last resort guarantee.
But this is fantasy politics. The idea that after a yes vote, Scotland could quickly negotiate a currency union with the rest of the UK, and be accepted for EU membership without lengthy debate about such issues as whether Edinburgh would be eligible for a slice of the UK's budget rebate, seems improbable. The misgivings of the Bank of England and the Treasury about a currency union are valid: the experience of the eurozone is that a currency union without fiscal and banking union is inherently unstable. In the case of an independent Scotland, the tensions would quickly become apparent because the country that formed the smaller part of the currency union would have a social-democratic bent while the bigger part would, by virtue of having lost Scotland, have a more conservative economic approach.
At the very least, there would be strict rules on Scotland's fiscal autonomy, with curbs on the size of its budget deficit. These sort of arrangements have proved burdensome for the smaller members of the eurozone and a post-referendum Scotland would find them difficult to accept. Perhaps that is the point: Salmond may be playing a long game in which Scots find a halfway house arrangement so unpalatable that they go for the real thing next time.
For, make no mistake, this is a halfway house. There is a case for an independent Scotland, but it is not being made in the current campaign. It would be a strange sort of freedom in which all the decisions that matter are made in London. It is an independence of
http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/feb/23/scottish-referendum-salmond-independence-oil?CMP=twt_gu
For obvious reasons, the SNP's leadership does not trust the Scottish people with the truth. Their strategy is to talk vaguely and to play the man when someone points out the very obvious holes in what they are claiming will happen after a Yes. It may work, but the good thing is that at least the real issues are now out in the open and being discussed so that if Scotland does vote for independence it will do so with its eyes open. We should all welcome that.
Is this a suggestion that the great unwashed be permitted to tour the Miliband family home?
It is not the gold taps and personalised bottles of vodka which are of concern.
I fear the visiting Shadow Cabinet might be mistaken for the Menagerie.
The desperate search for clear blue or red water on small differences. 'The wrong lizards' as it is sometimes humourously referred to. (a Douglas Adams reference) You are correct as it makes little to no sense in a fight that will be focused like a laser on marginals and triangulation as it assuredly will be in 2015. The bluster and posturing is usually to keep the unhappy core voters on board now that the kippers are sucking up voters. However, it's all the more dangerous to assume that posturing like this by itself will be enough to cut it. This just fuels discontent and if the tories are deranged enough to think they can afford to throw stones from within their enormous glass house they shall soon be corrected on that matter by either labour or more likely Farage.
The day yellow tories know how the scottish public thinks will be an amusing one indeed considering they now have enough MSPs to fit in a taxi and are an irrelevance to scottish politics.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mCovGqMiZyA