Betting on the SNP getting zero seats is quite tempting.
Sunak may have had a pretty shonky first 24hours of election campaign but I think the “Inauspicious Start Award” really has to go to the SNP. Swinney confirms they need to find money to fund campaign, goes out to bat for Michael Mathieson & Operation Branchform gets an update.
Sunak is making Rwanda central to the campaign apparently. Now if he can find whoever's responsible for tabling the election so early the flights won't take off, there'll be hell to pay"
I'm already shitting myself about the 10pm SJC exit poll.
Anyone else feel the same?
Yep. This is all surreal and horrible. Sunak and his team leading the Conservative campaign. Like it’s for President of Britain.
But it’s the election after this election that really worries me too. in the inevitable leadership election after this defeat, a new leader MUST work to return the Party to the USP that made them own the last 100 years of British Politics, not a leader that will take them further down the road of the MAGA junk priorities imported from America. Further down that road is further away from the UK electorate. After a defeat to below 200 seats, the Conservatives could elect their own version of Michael Foot or Jeremy Corbyn 😔
I'm already shitting myself about the 10pm SJC exit poll.
Anyone else feel the same?
Hey Casino, don't worry. Me and my squad of ultimate Starmer fans will protect you! Check it out! Independently targeting particle beam phalanx. Vwap! Fry half a city with this puppy. We got tactical smart missiles, phased plasma pulse rifles, RPGs, we got sonic electronic ball breakers! We got nukes, we got knives, sharp sticks, leaflets with dodgy bar charts...
Interesting insight and suggests perhaps 180 to 200 Con and 380 to 400 Lab given starting point
At what number does the Labour party start getting fractious?
If you've got 400+ MPs then you can't keep many quiet by giving them ministerial jobs and there's no incentive to avoid splits in order to win votes. That's a lot of back bench fodder getting bored.
Interesting insight and suggests perhaps 180 to 200 Con and 380 to 400 Lab given starting point
At what number does the Labour party start getting fractious?
If you've got 400+ MPs then you can't keep many quiet by giving them ministerial jobs and there's no incentive to avoid splits in order to win votes. That's a lot of back bench fodder getting bored.
Interesting insight and suggests perhaps 180 to 200 Con and 380 to 400 Lab given starting point
At what number does the Labour party start getting fractious?
If you've got 400+ MPs then you can't keep many quiet by giving them ministerial jobs and there's no incentive to avoid splits in order to win votes. That's a lot of back bench fodder getting bored.
Please hold fire! Can we save that kind of talk until IF that outcome occurs which is by no means certain. This is a democracy where the people will decide.
There’s six weeks of an election campaign first and many of us feel like we’ve been waiting an eternity for this one.
Sunak is making Rwanda central to the campaign apparently. Now if he can find whoever's responsible for tabling the election so early the flights won't take off, there'll be hell to pay"
Isn’t Dunt missing the point? Sunak can say, “we’ve tried, against huge opposition from terrible people who want millions of refugees, to get Rwanda started and we are still facing opposition from the blob in the civil service who want to block flights etc etc.
Now it’s time for those who want to help stop small boats and deter illegal immigrants to make your voices heard and vote Tory so we can get those flights moving and people will have to listen.
If you want to stop the boats vote Tory, if you want a million illegal immigrants in your town vote Starmer.”
Now it likely won’t work, it’s cynical, it’s the hailiest of Hail Mary passes but it’s pretty much all they’ve got.
The spreads have Blair landslide as their midpoint. One way you profit (potentially bigtime) if it really is the Tory extinction event with them reduced to a rump. The other way you profit for all results from Blair size landslide downwards.
It's almost a binary big picture decision you need to make. Will it be that way or that way? Then buy or sell Labour seats accordingly. I'm leaning to the sell but I haven't hit the button on it. Something is stopping me.
The funniest moment I’ve seen so far was ITV News asking someone what they thought of Rishi Sunak?
Answer: ‘Who?’
She needed about three prompts, including an explanation that he was the PM, before laughing and explaining that he hadn’t been Prime Minister long enough to know anything about him.
This is what we are dealing with. This is also what the Conservatives are dealing with.
Comments about Farage on this GB News video are pretty brutal
Think the penny might finally have dropped with this grifters fan base.
What reemerges from the wreckage of the right after this elecion will probably be much younger and more right wing.
Yes, mirroring what’s been seen in the US this year.
The very weird trend is that people are no longer trending right as they get older to the same extent as previously (possibly related to home ownership), but that the youngsters are trending right, possibly as a rebellion.
The young are trending right because young white men can see they are at the back of the queue for everything, behind every single minority, and all women; young white women are trending right because the city streets are becoming less safe for them, as we import people from more violent and/or patriarchal cultures, getting hissed at for wearing short skirts, etc
Go look at interviews with young French Le Pen supporters, if you need evidence
There's something about talking too much about identity that reinforces it. And not always in the way that you'd perhaps like.
But, I don't think young women are trending right - for now, they are very liberal/woke and that possibly increases the more men go the other way.
There’s a massive gender imbalance, young men are trending right and young women trending left.
Having a large group of dissatisfied young men, doesn’t generally work out too well for any country.
So... being right-wing a sign of dissatisfaction?
Dissatisfaction with the status quo, which is left-liberal.
But women are trending the other way, so the status quo is also conservative? Confusing.
Support for the status quo isn't a bad working definiton of small-c conservatism.
yeeeeesss, but you said the status quo is "left-liberal". So you seem to be saying that left-liberal-conservative is a single thing, which doesn't track to me.
Let's start again. You say men are turning right because they are dissatisfied with the left-liberal status quo. But if women are turning left, then what's the reason? It can't be because they are dissatisfied with the status quo, unless the status quo is conservative. I don't think it can be conservative AND left-liberal. So I'm not sure I understand at all what your model for political change is.
This needs better definition. Is left and right here social, economic, or something else? Who is moving? Is it a whole sex group moving as a rigid mass or is it smaller subgroups moving very radically? What are the moving relative to? I.e., are they just switching VI to parties and the parties are regarded as fixed points? Or if I supported Labour in 2017 and then again in 2024, have I moved right simply by definition of Labour having moved right?
These questions are vital if we want to interpret what's going on in an honest way. The methodology of the survey? study? should be understood before we jump to explanations.
I agree that there needs to be better data but there's an additional problem with conflating different political axes with each other.
I don't think the term 'conservative' is particularly helpful in the present moment as a synonym for the right because the cultural consensus is so far to the left. Therefore the right is almost compelled to be radical rather than conservative.
Interesting insight and suggests perhaps 180 to 200 Con and 380 to 400 Lab given starting point
At what number does the Labour party start getting fractious?
If you've got 400+ MPs then you can't keep many quiet by giving them ministerial jobs and there's no incentive to avoid splits in order to win votes. That's a lot of back bench fodder getting bored.
One senior politician (maybe Magaret Thatcher) said that the back benchers much prefer a large majority as they don't have to sit around parliament the whole time to vote, they can work on the political issues that they find really important.
Sunak is making Rwanda central to the campaign apparently. Now if he can find whoever's responsible for tabling the election so early the flights won't take off, there'll be hell to pay"
Isn’t Dunt missing the point? Sunak can say, “we’ve tried, against huge opposition from terrible people who want millions of refugees, to get Rwanda started and we are still facing opposition from the blob in the civil service who want to block flights etc etc.
Now it’s time for those who want to help stop small boats and deter illegal immigrants to make your voices heard and vote Tory so we can get those flights moving and people will have to listen.
If you want to stop the boats vote Tory, if you want a million illegal immigrants in your town vote Starmer.”
Now it likely won’t work, it’s cynical, it’s the hailiest of Hail Mary passes but it’s pretty much all they’ve got.
(Brillo Neil voice) So why call the election now? You've got the law in place, you're telling us that you confident you can have a flight a few days after winning an election. Why not show your policy works, then ask the public to vote on it?
(Normal voice) It's not 2019. He can't use the 2019 playbook with Brexit replaced by Rwanda. If Rishi thinks he can, he's a bigger chump than I think he is.
I’m quite relaxed with a Blair level Labour majority. I just can only hope they do some good with it. We’ve had a large government majority wasted this time.
Anything more and it gets a little silly, but I fully appreciate you cannot vote for that outcome.
As there is apparently one of those election things shortly to happen and the site servers may consequently come under some additional strain (and to be honest they are still recovering from Leon's Italian saga): is it time for a bit of a round of donations?
I'm sure some of us would be happy to chip in if costs are needed to be met.
@RussInCheshire Tory whips have had to ask their MPs not to announce they've decided not to stand all at the same time, so it doesn't look like the entire party has given up.
This is not a joke. I know, everything they say sounds like it's intended to be satire. But this has really happened.
Sunak is making Rwanda central to the campaign apparently. Now if he can find whoever's responsible for tabling the election so early the flights won't take off, there'll be hell to pay"
Isn’t Dunt missing the point? Sunak can say, “we’ve tried, against huge opposition from terrible people who want millions of refugees, to get Rwanda started and we are still facing opposition from the blob in the civil service who want to block flights etc etc.
Now it’s time for those who want to help stop small boats and deter illegal immigrants to make your voices heard and vote Tory so we can get those flights moving and people will have to listen.
If you want to stop the boats vote Tory, if you want a million illegal immigrants in your town vote Starmer.”
Now it likely won’t work, it’s cynical, it’s the hailiest of Hail Mary passes but it’s pretty much all they’ve got.
(Brillo Neil voice) So why call the election now? You've got the law in place, you're telling us that you confident you can have a flight a few days after winning an election. Why not show your policy works, then ask the public to vote on it?
(Normal voice) It's not 2019. He can't use the 2019 playbook with Brexit replaced by Rwanda. If Rishi thinks he can, he's a bigger chump than I think he is.
He can use it, and he’s probably right to do so given the situation he’s in. It’s all he’s got at the moment, unless Labour manage to give him something to attack (which they have very studiously avoided doing).
Won’t win him an election or get him anywhere near close, but he needs to squeeze Reform, and sow some doubt about Starmer making immigration ‘worse’.
The funniest moment I’ve seen so far was ITV News asking someone what they thought of Rishi Sunak?
Answer: ‘Who?’
She needed about three prompts, including an explanation that he was the PM, before laughing and explaining that he hadn’t been Prime Minister long enough to know anything about him.
This is what we are dealing with. This is also what the Conservatives are dealing with.
I would think Starmer would draw a similar response.
I don’t feel people are overly engaged with politicians or politics. They certainly have to contend with that.
@RussInCheshire Tory whips have had to ask their MPs not to announce they've decided not to stand all at the same time, so it doesn't look like the entire party has given up.
This is not a joke. I know, everything they say sounds like it's intended to be satire. But this has really happened.
They want to spread the stories out to keep them in the news for longer?
Sunak is making Rwanda central to the campaign apparently. Now if he can find whoever's responsible for tabling the election so early the flights won't take off, there'll be hell to pay"
Isn’t Dunt missing the point? Sunak can say, “we’ve tried, against huge opposition from terrible people who want millions of refugees, to get Rwanda started and we are still facing opposition from the blob in the civil service who want to block flights etc etc.
Now it’s time for those who want to help stop small boats and deter illegal immigrants to make your voices heard and vote Tory so we can get those flights moving and people will have to listen.
If you want to stop the boats vote Tory, if you want a million illegal immigrants in your town vote Starmer.”
Now it likely won’t work, it’s cynical, it’s the hailiest of Hail Mary passes but it’s pretty much all they’ve got.
(Brillo Neil voice) So why call the election now? You've got the law in place, you're telling us that you confident you can have a flight a few days after winning an election. Why not show your policy works, then ask the public to vote on it?
(Normal voice) It's not 2019. He can't use the 2019 playbook with Brexit replaced by Rwanda. If Rishi thinks he can, he's a bigger chump than I think he is.
He can use it, and he’s probably right to do so given the situation he’s in. It’s all he’s got at the moment, unless Labour manage to give him something to attack (which they have very studiously avoided doing).
Won’t win him an election or get him anywhere near close, but he needs to squeeze Reform.
Most Reform voters never believed in the Rwanda policy. This new imaginary version is unlikely to impress
Sunak is making Rwanda central to the campaign apparently. Now if he can find whoever's responsible for tabling the election so early the flights won't take off, there'll be hell to pay"
Isn’t Dunt missing the point? Sunak can say, “we’ve tried, against huge opposition from terrible people who want millions of refugees, to get Rwanda started and we are still facing opposition from the blob in the civil service who want to block flights etc etc.
Now it’s time for those who want to help stop small boats and deter illegal immigrants to make your voices heard and vote Tory so we can get those flights moving and people will have to listen.
If you want to stop the boats vote Tory, if you want a million illegal immigrants in your town vote Starmer.”
Now it likely won’t work, it’s cynical, it’s the hailiest of Hail Mary passes but it’s pretty much all they’ve got.
(Brillo Neil voice) So why call the election now? You've got the law in place, you're telling us that you confident you can have a flight a few days after winning an election. Why not show your policy works, then ask the public to vote on it?
(Normal voice) It's not 2019. He can't use the 2019 playbook with Brexit replaced by Rwanda. If Rishi thinks he can, he's a bigger chump than I think he is.
He can use it, and he’s probably right to do so given the situation he’s in. It’s all he’s got at the moment, unless Labour manage to give him something to attack (which they have very studiously avoided doing).
Won’t win him an election or get him anywhere near close, but he needs to squeeze Reform.
Most Reform voters never believed in the Rwanda policy. This new imaginary version is unlikely to impress
But he is not trying to impress, he is just trying to draw a dividing line so that people fear Starmer will make it worse.
I have my doubts it will succeed, but again, it’s the only real thing they can go with right now. Certainly until the manifestos, or some Labour foot-in-mouth moment which seems unlikely now, but we can’t rule out.
I’m quite relaxed with a Blair level Labour majority. I just can only hope they do some good with it. We’ve had a large government majority wasted this time.
Anything more and it gets a little silly, but I fully appreciate you cannot vote for that outcome.
I'm not too much of an optimist for the future but I do know that a party that has p-d about with our country to the extent that this Govt has needs to get a serious beating at the polls. A record-low popular vote percentage and under 200 seats would be perhaps the minimum deserved
Sunak is making Rwanda central to the campaign apparently. Now if he can find whoever's responsible for tabling the election so early the flights won't take off, there'll be hell to pay"
Isn’t Dunt missing the point? Sunak can say, “we’ve tried, against huge opposition from terrible people who want millions of refugees, to get Rwanda started and we are still facing opposition from the blob in the civil service who want to block flights etc etc.
Now it’s time for those who want to help stop small boats and deter illegal immigrants to make your voices heard and vote Tory so we can get those flights moving and people will have to listen.
If you want to stop the boats vote Tory, if you want a million illegal immigrants in your town vote Starmer.”
Now it likely won’t work, it’s cynical, it’s the hailiest of Hail Mary passes but it’s pretty much all they’ve got.
(Brillo Neil voice) So why call the election now? You've got the law in place, you're telling us that you confident you can have a flight a few days after winning an election. Why not show your policy works, then ask the public to vote on it?
(Normal voice) It's not 2019. He can't use the 2019 playbook with Brexit replaced by Rwanda. If Rishi thinks he can, he's a bigger chump than I think he is.
He can use it, and he’s probably right to do so given the situation he’s in. It’s all he’s got at the moment, unless Labour manage to give him something to attack (which they have very studiously avoided doing).
Won’t win him an election or get him anywhere near close, but he needs to squeeze Reform.
It highlights Rishi's mistake of not calling a May election - if he'd done so at a time when the Rwanda bill was still stuck in parliament, he could plausibly have pointed at Labour and/or the HoL and blamed them for it not yet being law.
But now, it's successfully passed into law and the most recent set-back lies with the the High Court in Belfast finding that it conflicts with Rishi's own Windsor Framework. Any attempt to try blaming others will likely backfire.
Sunak is making Rwanda central to the campaign apparently. Now if he can find whoever's responsible for tabling the election so early the flights won't take off, there'll be hell to pay"
Isn’t Dunt missing the point? Sunak can say, “we’ve tried, against huge opposition from terrible people who want millions of refugees, to get Rwanda started and we are still facing opposition from the blob in the civil service who want to block flights etc etc.
Now it’s time for those who want to help stop small boats and deter illegal immigrants to make your voices heard and vote Tory so we can get those flights moving and people will have to listen.
If you want to stop the boats vote Tory, if you want a million illegal immigrants in your town vote Starmer.”
Now it likely won’t work, it’s cynical, it’s the hailiest of Hail Mary passes but it’s pretty much all they’ve got.
(Brillo Neil voice) So why call the election now? You've got the law in place, you're telling us that you confident you can have a flight a few days after winning an election. Why not show your policy works, then ask the public to vote on it?
(Normal voice) It's not 2019. He can't use the 2019 playbook with Brexit replaced by Rwanda. If Rishi thinks he can, he's a bigger chump than I think he is.
He can use it, and he’s probably right to do so given the situation he’s in. It’s all he’s got at the moment, unless Labour manage to give him something to attack (which they have very studiously avoided doing).
Won’t win him an election or get him anywhere near close, but he needs to squeeze Reform, and sow some doubt about Starmer making immigration ‘worse’.
But it rapidly falls apart, even on those terms.
Johnson had some justifying saying that he needed a new House of Commons to Get Brexit Done, hence an election.
Sunak's calling an election is the thing stopping him doing Rwanda- unless the whole thing is a blag, which I'm pretty sure it is. All it takes is one interviewer to ask the right question.
There are times when Sunak reminds me of a junior school chess player who seems surprised that their opponent a) gets to make moves and b) can choose to make moves that help them win.
Sunak is making Rwanda central to the campaign apparently. Now if he can find whoever's responsible for tabling the election so early the flights won't take off, there'll be hell to pay"
Isn’t Dunt missing the point? Sunak can say, “we’ve tried, against huge opposition from terrible people who want millions of refugees, to get Rwanda started and we are still facing opposition from the blob in the civil service who want to block flights etc etc.
Now it’s time for those who want to help stop small boats and deter illegal immigrants to make your voices heard and vote Tory so we can get those flights moving and people will have to listen.
If you want to stop the boats vote Tory, if you want a million illegal immigrants in your town vote Starmer.”
Now it likely won’t work, it’s cynical, it’s the hailiest of Hail Mary passes but it’s pretty much all they’ve got.
(Brillo Neil voice) So why call the election now? You've got the law in place, you're telling us that you confident you can have a flight a few days after winning an election. Why not show your policy works, then ask the public to vote on it?
(Normal voice) It's not 2019. He can't use the 2019 playbook with Brexit replaced by Rwanda. If Rishi thinks he can, he's a bigger chump than I think he is.
He can use it, and he’s probably right to do so given the situation he’s in. It’s all he’s got at the moment, unless Labour manage to give him something to attack (which they have very studiously avoided doing).
Won’t win him an election or get him anywhere near close, but he needs to squeeze Reform.
It highlights Rishi's mistake of not calling a May election - if he'd done so at a time when the Rwanda bill was still stuck in parliament, he could plausibly have pointed at Labour and/or the HoL and blamed them for it not yet being law.
But now, it's successfully passed into law and the most recent set-back lies with the the High Court in Belfast finding that it conflicts with Rishi's own Windsor Framework. Any attempt to try blaming others will likely backfire.
If he wanted a "Get Rwanda Done" election, he should have called it straight after signing a deal with Rwanda and asking for a majority to push it through the Lords using the Parliament Act.
Sunak: Vote for me to Get Rwanda Done. Or Labour will stop it and They Have No Plan Everyone: But Rwanda is law and you would have got flights away had you not called an election Sunak: I blame Starmer. He doesn't know which teams have qualified for the Euros.
Sunak is making Rwanda central to the campaign apparently. Now if he can find whoever's responsible for tabling the election so early the flights won't take off, there'll be hell to pay"
Isn’t Dunt missing the point? Sunak can say, “we’ve tried, against huge opposition from terrible people who want millions of refugees, to get Rwanda started and we are still facing opposition from the blob in the civil service who want to block flights etc etc.
Now it’s time for those who want to help stop small boats and deter illegal immigrants to make your voices heard and vote Tory so we can get those flights moving and people will have to listen.
If you want to stop the boats vote Tory, if you want a million illegal immigrants in your town vote Starmer.”
Now it likely won’t work, it’s cynical, it’s the hailiest of Hail Mary passes but it’s pretty much all they’ve got.
(Brillo Neil voice) So why call the election now? You've got the law in place, you're telling us that you confident you can have a flight a few days after winning an election. Why not show your policy works, then ask the public to vote on it?
(Normal voice) It's not 2019. He can't use the 2019 playbook with Brexit replaced by Rwanda. If Rishi thinks he can, he's a bigger chump than I think he is.
He can use it, and he’s probably right to do so given the situation he’s in. It’s all he’s got at the moment, unless Labour manage to give him something to attack (which they have very studiously avoided doing).
Won’t win him an election or get him anywhere near close, but he needs to squeeze Reform.
It highlights Rishi's mistake of not calling a May election - if he'd done so at a time when the Rwanda bill was still stuck in parliament, he could plausibly have pointed at Labour and/or the HoL and blamed them for it not yet being law.
But now, it's successfully passed into law and the most recent set-back lies with the the High Court in Belfast finding that it conflicts with Rishi's own Windsor Framework. Any attempt to try blaming others will likely backfire.
From a purely tactical perspective, he should probably have called a “who controls immigration?” election when the courts struck the policy down in November. I’m glad he didn’t - because the campaign would have been tedious and nasty in the extreme, and we can do without those horrid single issue elections like we had in 2019 (and look how that ended). But for trying to save some more seats? It probably would have been the best call he could have made in the last 12 months.
As usual with Rishi, when confronted with a series of options he chooses the least optimal.
The funniest moment I’ve seen so far was ITV News asking someone what they thought of Rishi Sunak?
Answer: ‘Who?’
She needed about three prompts, including an explanation that he was the PM, before laughing and explaining that he hadn’t been Prime Minister long enough to know anything about him.
This is what we are dealing with. This is also what the Conservatives are dealing with.
Interesting insight and suggests perhaps 180 to 200 Con and 380 to 400 Lab given starting point
At what number does the Labour party start getting fractious?
If you've got 400+ MPs then you can't keep many quiet by giving them ministerial jobs and there's no incentive to avoid splits in order to win votes. That's a lot of back bench fodder getting bored.
One senior politician (maybe Magaret Thatcher) said that the back benchers much prefer a large majority as they don't have to sit around parliament the whole time to vote, they can work on the political issues that they find really important.
Blair had 418 and there wasn't a vast amount of fallout so I guess that may be right.
Still, I can't imagine 550 would be that healthy, unlikely though it is.
Sunak: Vote for me to Get Rwanda Done. Or Labour will stop it and They Have No Plan Everyone: But Rwanda is law and you would have got flights away had you not called an election Sunak: I blame Starmer. He doesn't know which teams have qualified for the Euros.
The trouble is a hell of a lot of voters vaguely on the right/swing will just think 'yeh, stop the bloody boats, at least Sunak is going to get that done'.
They know nothing of any detail.
It is a squeeze Reform vote - at least for the first week of campaign.
There’s not a lot for me to get into there so I may switch to some constituency markets but you need to know your onions.
Don't have many onions to sell, but for what it is worth I can tell you that the LDs are nailed on for Cheltenham, and have a small squeak in neighbouring Tewkesbury.
The spreads have Blair landslide as their midpoint. One way you profit (potentially bigtime) if it really is the Tory extinction event with them reduced to a rump. The other way you profit for all results from Blair size landslide downwards.
It's almost a binary big picture decision you need to make. Will it be that way or that way? Then buy or sell Labour seats accordingly. I'm leaning to the sell but I haven't hit the button on it. Something is stopping me.
Electoral Calculus with no tactical voting and the lead narrowed to 41-30 still gives Labour 402 seats. You only win 4x your stake, but the Tories have made up a lot of ground to get that result, and if there's a lot of tactical voting you still lose.
It can be tough to cut a colleague and friend loose, and defending your allies is expected up to a point if you are going to earn some loyalty from your people. But there are limits.
Comments
We have implemented a new set up regarding embedded photos.
PBers are now only permitted to embed one photo per calendar day. This does not mean multiple photos in one post.
The issue was too many photos were being embedded and it was causing rendering issues.
If PBers stick to this we will consider increasing the limit.
Wa-hey! That sounds INCREDIBLY rude!
Just follow my tips precisely.
First, you must...
Interesting insight and suggests perhaps 180 to 200 Con and 380 to 400 Lab given starting point
If she is charged, when do you predict that?
Anyone else feel the same?
https://x.com/Cat_Headley/status/1793681941423702309
(Sorry, does it have to be on topic? How onerous.)
Edit: quotum?
I'd say the 29th of Nevertember, but if plumping for an actual date I'll day 23rd July. People will want their holidays uninterrupted
@IanDunt
Sunak is making Rwanda central to the campaign apparently. Now if he can find whoever's responsible for tabling the election so early the flights won't take off, there'll be hell to pay"
https://x.com/IanDunt/status/1793635571778429137
So long as it isn't offensive or thinks it is sexual (Vanilla will automatically remove those.)
Oh and no photos of pizzas with pineapples on them, that's a six month ban to ConHome.
But it’s the election after this election that really worries me too. in the inevitable leadership election after this defeat, a new leader MUST work to return the Party to the USP that made them own the last 100 years of British Politics, not a leader that will take them further down the road of the MAGA junk priorities imported from America. Further down that road is further away from the UK electorate. After a defeat to below 200 seats, the Conservatives could elect their own version of Michael Foot or Jeremy Corbyn 😔
😂😂😂😂
If this is such a big issue, and I don’t think it is, friendly pro asylum seeker pieces like this could work against labour.
Usual inarticulate talking heads too.
The previous 3 days saw, inter alia,
Donald Trump get charged with a federal crime.
Boris Johnson resign as an MP.
Three Tory MPs resigned as MPs because they were blackballed for peerages.
Volunteering for a Spread of the Day, daily post?
If you've got 400+ MPs then you can't keep many quiet by giving them ministerial jobs and there's no incentive to avoid splits in order to win votes. That's a lot of back bench fodder getting bored.
Disappointed.
There’s not a lot for me to get into there so I may switch to some constituency markets but you need to know your onions.
There’s six weeks of an election campaign first and many of us feel like we’ve been waiting an eternity for this one.
Now it’s time for those who want to help stop small boats and deter illegal immigrants to make your voices heard and vote Tory so we can get those flights moving and people will have to listen.
If you want to stop the boats vote Tory, if you want a million illegal immigrants in your town vote Starmer.”
Now it likely won’t work, it’s cynical, it’s the hailiest of Hail Mary passes but it’s pretty much all they’ve got.
The spreads have Blair landslide as their midpoint. One way you profit (potentially bigtime) if it really is the Tory extinction event with them reduced to a rump. The other way you profit for all results from Blair size landslide downwards.
It's almost a binary big picture decision you need to make. Will it be that way or that way? Then buy or sell Labour seats accordingly. I'm leaning to the sell but I haven't hit the button on it. Something is stopping me.
Answer: ‘Who?’
She needed about three prompts, including an explanation that he was the PM, before laughing and explaining that he hadn’t been Prime Minister long enough to know anything about him.
This is what we are dealing with. This is also what the Conservatives are dealing with.
I don't think the term 'conservative' is particularly helpful in the present moment as a synonym for the right because the cultural consensus is so far to the left. Therefore the right is almost compelled to be radical rather than conservative.
I thought Peter Capaldi was a bit disappointing though
John Swinney: “Challenge accepted.”
https://x.com/euanmccolm/status/1793700787430031695
You have a class 2 rating on that acronym.
So why call the election now? You've got the law in place, you're telling us that you confident you can have a flight a few days after winning an election. Why not show your policy works, then ask the public to vote on it?
(Normal voice)
It's not 2019. He can't use the 2019 playbook with Brexit replaced by Rwanda. If Rishi thinks he can, he's a bigger chump than I think he is.
Anything more and it gets a little silly, but I fully appreciate you cannot vote for that outcome.
2) How do you know I'm a virgin?
I'm sure some of us would be happy to chip in if costs are needed to be met.
@TSE @rcs1000 ???
Tory whips have had to ask their MPs not to announce they've decided not to stand all at the same time, so it doesn't look like the entire party has given up.
This is not a joke. I know, everything they say sounds like it's intended to be satire. But this has really happened.
Won’t win him an election or get him anywhere near close, but he needs to squeeze Reform, and sow some doubt about Starmer making immigration ‘worse’.
I don’t feel people are overly engaged with politicians or politics. They certainly have to contend with that.
Public service link for the "Grizzlies are lovable balls of fur" theorists
I have my doubts it will succeed, but again, it’s the only real thing they can go with right now. Certainly until the manifestos, or some Labour foot-in-mouth moment which seems unlikely now, but we can’t rule out.
But now, it's successfully passed into law and the most recent set-back lies with the the High Court in Belfast finding that it conflicts with Rishi's own Windsor Framework. Any attempt to try blaming others will likely backfire.
Johnson had some justifying saying that he needed a new House of Commons to Get Brexit Done, hence an election.
Sunak's calling an election is the thing stopping him doing Rwanda- unless the whole thing is a blag, which I'm pretty sure it is. All it takes is one interviewer to ask the right question.
There are times when Sunak reminds me of a junior school chess player who seems surprised that their opponent a) gets to make moves and b) can choose to make moves that help them win.
Everyone: But Rwanda is law and you would have got flights away had you not called an election
Sunak: I blame Starmer. He doesn't know which teams have qualified for the Euros.
As usual with Rishi, when confronted with a series of options he chooses the least optimal.
But I wouldn't buy Tory seats, that's for sure.
Still, I can't imagine 550 would be that healthy, unlikely though it is.
They know nothing of any detail.
It is a squeeze Reform vote - at least for the first week of campaign.
Neither are priced up on Betfair yet.
Rishi 2024: Get Rwanda Done. I have an oven-ready deal.
It won't work.
Just ask Boris Johnson and one Owen Paterson.