Fox NEws puts out a poll that supports their deeply held gut feeling?
I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you.
Carried out by Beacon Research/Shaw & Co. Research who are rated 2.8 stars (out of 3) on 538 pollster ratings, so can't just be dismissed.
It will be dismissed because it's good for "Trump".
Unforgivable on a betting site - particularly one that was founded to discuss the 2004 Kerry v Bush election - but that's where we're at.
My cynicism comes from the fact it's the perfect result for Fox news - it may be 100% accurate but it also 100% matches the result Fox would want to talk about..
The one thing I've picked up from this site is that US polling is awful compared to the UK..
I've also picked up that this site is terrible at discussing the US election dispassionately.
I think we can safely say that most people on here know a lot less about the US than they think they do.
I've lost a post but I was going to reply to @DougSeal that the other thing I've picked up from this site is that I don't know enough to sanely bet on the US elections, so I'm not going to.
The US is an insanely large and diverse country and far more different from the UK than most people realise. I lived there for 5 years but would still not claim any particular insight into it - especially the non-coastal portions.
During my Erasmus year in Germany, a long time ago, the British and American students were initially drawn together by their common language. I noticed, though, that after a little while, the Americans tended to stick with each other, while the Brits increasingly socialised with other Europeans. This brought home to me just how culturally different Americans are to Europeans, and that Brits generally have a more European than American worldview.
100% my experience too. Living in the US convinced me that the UK is just another European country.
Living in Australia convinced me the UK is more than just another European country.
That's because you probably get more TV/media etc. from the UK in Australia than any other European country. Same is true in Latin America vis a vis Spain and Portugal, Quebec in re France etc etc. We are, quite literally, just another European country. There's nowt special about us.
Hunt and Sunak both rather hard done by in terms of the forecasts. The OBR forecast was 0.8% for the entire year as recently as May of this year. Seriously wrong, adversely affecting borrowing and tax take tying the government's hands on both tax cuts and spending.
And Reeves wants to give them even more influence.
Wait until Rishi finds out who it was who called the election early instead of waiting for better economic news when Parliament still had most of a year left to go.
That seems to have been himself. There is going to be a modest blip upwards in inflation as we saw this week but the underlying news, particularly in terms of growth, was much better than was being reported.
Simplest explanation is that Hunt maxxed out the borrowing to engineer a pre-election feelgood boomlet. After all, consumers had 4p off their tax rate. These things generally aren't that sustainable, and it can be viewed as another of the poos that Hunt and Sunak left on the Downing St carpet for their sucessors to clean up.
But it's a good thing for now.
Consumers had what off their what?
Taxes went UP. Not down. A cut in NI rates at the same time as the overall tax take goes up - the effect is that the rate of the tax increase is reduced vs how it would have been without the NI cut.
The reason why the Tories got destroyed is because as they visibly and noticeably put taxes up they kept insisting they were cutting taxes. It wasn't remotely credible because it was an egregious lie.
It was a brief binge halfway through a decade-long diet. Utterly cynical and dishonest, and the distributional effects were horrible.
But perfectly timed to generate a spurt of growth around the election.
The distributional effects were fantastic, boosting the earnings of those working for a living while increasing the taxes on those with unearned incomes - and increasing the incentive to work by meaning people can keep more of their earned income.
You seem to have a real bugbear over this. Do you rely more on unearned incomes than a paycheck for your living? Oh well, you should pay the same tax rate as everyone on PAYE.
That's not my bugbear.
My issue is that the tax increases were done by freezing thresholds. "Dragging more people into the tax net" as old fashioned Conservatives used to put it. Whereas the cuts were done on percentage rates, which benefits higher earners more.
Taking more from the worse off to take less from the better off.
And yes, I do have a problem with that, despite being in the bit of the population (income from work, comfortable without being mega rich) that the 2024 changes was laser-focused on.
Except that's simply not true, those on low earned incomes are better off net from the changes. Those who are worse off are those with unearned incomes.
And lowering the percentage rate means those on earned incomes (or those who can earn more) are less disincentivised to work more and earn more. We need much more reform like that to get people in work to do more than 16 hours a week.
Fox NEws puts out a poll that supports their deeply held gut feeling?
I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you.
Carried out by Beacon Research/Shaw & Co. Research who are rated 2.8 stars (out of 3) on 538 pollster ratings, so can't just be dismissed.
I don't put huge faith in US pollsters compared with ours (for the reasons TSE has frequently outlines), but Fox's poll reporting tends to be a great deal less partisan overall than is their news reporting.
Excellent (paywalled) article on the recent riots. Some snippets:
UK needs no lessons from apologists for rioters
Those behind the rioting are not misguided social justice warriors, they are violent, far-right racists fortified by a general hooligan element that was up for a ruck and expected to face no consequences. Now they know better.
It is easy to mock Sir Keir Starmer for reverting to type as a former prosecutor but nearly 1,000 arrests and some rapid and tough sentences was the right response [to restore confidence in the law]
For all the vacuous “something must be donery” of many commentators there are real underlying issues. But even if you accept that the riots were about anything beyond violence, they have not changed the calculation. The answers are what they have always been: improved economic prospects, investment in skills to secure high-status blue-collar jobs, better housing, good public services. In fact, all the things Labour was elected to deliver.
For Starmer, these grim scenes have marred the start of his government. But the riots told us nothing we didn’t already know about the state of Britain except perhaps the value of a tough response, the true measure of the instigators and the cynicism of their apologists.
All that was needed to quell the riots was the swift response. The lengthy sentences are excessive: a week or two would suffice as deterrent. Contrast this with other crimes that appear to have no consequence because there is a year or more delay before reaching trial.
Yes and No IMO. The exemplary sentences deal with the rioters' assumption that lawlessness has no consequence for them. But it does result in a long hangover once the riot is in the past.
Excellent (paywalled) article on the recent riots. Some snippets:
UK needs no lessons from apologists for rioters
Those behind the rioting are not misguided social justice warriors, they are violent, far-right racists fortified by a general hooligan element that was up for a ruck and expected to face no consequences. Now they know better.
It is easy to mock Sir Keir Starmer for reverting to type as a former prosecutor but nearly 1,000 arrests and some rapid and tough sentences was the right response [to restore confidence in the law]
For all the vacuous “something must be donery” of many commentators there are real underlying issues. But even if you accept that the riots were about anything beyond violence, they have not changed the calculation. The answers are what they have always been: improved economic prospects, investment in skills to secure high-status blue-collar jobs, better housing, good public services. In fact, all the things Labour was elected to deliver.
For Starmer, these grim scenes have marred the start of his government. But the riots told us nothing we didn’t already know about the state of Britain except perhaps the value of a tough response, the true measure of the instigators and the cynicism of their apologists.
All that was needed to quell the riots was the swift response. The lengthy sentences are excessive: a week or two would suffice as deterrent. Contrast this with other crimes that appear to have no consequence because there is a year or more delay before reaching trial.
Yes, it shows what can be done. Let's start to treat other crimes as seriously.
Fox NEws puts out a poll that supports their deeply held gut feeling?
I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you.
Carried out by Beacon Research/Shaw & Co. Research who are rated 2.8 stars (out of 3) on 538 pollster ratings, so can't just be dismissed.
It will be dismissed because it's good for "Trump".
Unforgivable on a betting site - particularly one that was founded to discuss the 2004 Kerry v Bush election - but that's where we're at.
My cynicism comes from the fact it's the perfect result for Fox news - it may be 100% accurate but it also 100% matches the result Fox would want to talk about..
The one thing I've picked up from this site is that US polling is awful compared to the UK..
I've also picked up that this site is terrible at discussing the US election dispassionately.
FWIW I think Harris remains a pretty weak candidate (particularly her speeches, and I don't think there is a guarantee she'll be any good in the debate), and therefore the Democrat campaign is reliant on good vibes and Walz being American Dad. That might be enough but it's a long time till the election.
I wouldn't be surprised if this is peak Harris.
She is largely dependent upon Trump becoming worse or suffering from set backs in his various trials and civil cases. The chances of that happening seem better than evens so I suspect Silver is not far off.
Realistically, the only major obstacle now for Trump trial-wise is the verdict in the NY case as the others are stalled / will be past-the election. Who knows how that will go.
Trump could melt down but it is fair to say we have been here before multiple times where people claim he is losing it, on his way out etc. The polling also has underestimated his support at the last elections.
I suspect @Eabhal is right, it feels like peak Harris. Jim Acosta at CNN had a go at her campaign manager for only offering one interview before the end of the month, and it is starting to be picked up by others. If I was Harris and truly feeling Trump was on the run, I would be interviewing like mad and hammering the points home.
I would have said that Peak Harris will likely be in the immediate aftermath of the DNC next week, but that now looks to be a bit of a nightmare for her with the ‘Palistine’ mob looking to disrupt proceedings. Trying to lock her away from the media only works for so long as well, there’s a limit to how long they’ll shill for someone who won’t even engage with them.
Re comments on Democrats winning the House and Senate.
The former looks entirely possible. It’s on a knife edge anyway.
The Senate likely all comes down to Montana. They are generally polling ahead in the other close races I think, and WV is gone. So Tester winning would produce a 50-50 Senate and VP casting vote. At the moment, I think Tester is polling slightly behind.
I’m not sure they’ll be too upset with a 49-51 Senate though. The filibuster sadly probably remains, but they’ll have Murkowski and Collins on the GOP side who will probably get them where they need to be on nominations etc.
Dems are behind in Montana. But even if they win there, there are a few other very close races they would need to hold to keep it 50-50.
Some say Dems have a 'tough map this year'. Which is kind of true. But the truth is the whole Senate map of 50 states is tough for the Dems. There are simply more red states than blue states. And as the phenomenon of Dem senators in red states slowly disappears, it's going to be very hard for the Dems to get a Senate majority in any election where the national vote is close-ish.
Which is why its ridiculous they've not made DC and Puerto Rico states, both of which deserve to be states.
The latter would be a purple state, but a purple one they could win in a good year.
Please fuck off you lying Hitler-apologist. Thanks.
I clearly didn't get the memo about the New Civility....
Quite. I’ve taken breaks from here after I nearly crossed the line and I suggest others do too. I sometimes forget, and it appears others do to, that there are humans* on the other end of this here internet.
Excellent (paywalled) article on the recent riots. Some snippets:
UK needs no lessons from apologists for rioters
Those behind the rioting are not misguided social justice warriors, they are violent, far-right racists fortified by a general hooligan element that was up for a ruck and expected to face no consequences. Now they know better.
It is easy to mock Sir Keir Starmer for reverting to type as a former prosecutor but nearly 1,000 arrests and some rapid and tough sentences was the right response [to restore confidence in the law]
For all the vacuous “something must be donery” of many commentators there are real underlying issues. But even if you accept that the riots were about anything beyond violence, they have not changed the calculation. The answers are what they have always been: improved economic prospects, investment in skills to secure high-status blue-collar jobs, better housing, good public services. In fact, all the things Labour was elected to deliver.
For Starmer, these grim scenes have marred the start of his government. But the riots told us nothing we didn’t already know about the state of Britain except perhaps the value of a tough response, the true measure of the instigators and the cynicism of their apologists.
All that was needed to quell the riots was the swift response. The lengthy sentences are excessive: a week or two would suffice as deterrent. Contrast this with other crimes that appear to have no consequence because there is a year or more delay before reaching trial.
Yes, it shows what can be done. Let's start to treat other crimes as seriously.
To be fair, when people plead guilty at the first available opportunity, it's easy to sentence them and to send them to jail.
The problems occur when people actually want trials with barristers and witnesses and judges and juries and all.
Fox NEws puts out a poll that supports their deeply held gut feeling?
I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you.
Carried out by Beacon Research/Shaw & Co. Research who are rated 2.8 stars (out of 3) on 538 pollster ratings, so can't just be dismissed.
It will be dismissed because it's good for "Trump".
Unforgivable on a betting site - particularly one that was founded to discuss the 2004 Kerry v Bush election - but that's where we're at.
My cynicism comes from the fact it's the perfect result for Fox news - it may be 100% accurate but it also 100% matches the result Fox would want to talk about..
The one thing I've picked up from this site is that US polling is awful compared to the UK..
I've also picked up that this site is terrible at discussing the US election dispassionately.
FWIW I think Harris remains a pretty weak candidate (particularly her speeches, and I don't think there is a guarantee she'll be any good in the debate), and therefore the Democrat campaign is reliant on good vibes and Walz being American Dad. That might be enough but it's a long time till the election.
I wouldn't be surprised if this is peak Harris.
She is largely dependent upon Trump becoming worse or suffering from set backs in his various trials and civil cases. The chances of that happening seem better than evens so I suspect Silver is not far off.
Realistically, the only major obstacle now for Trump trial-wise is the verdict in the NY case as the others are stalled / will be past-the election. Who knows how that will go.
Trump could melt down but it is fair to say we have been here before multiple times where people claim he is losing it, on his way out etc. The polling also has underestimated his support at the last elections.
I suspect @Eabhal is right, it feels like peak Harris. Jim Acosta at CNN had a go at her campaign manager for only offering one interview before the end of the month, and it is starting to be picked up by others. If I was Harris and truly feeling Trump was on the run, I would be interviewing like mad and hammering the points home.
Nice try, but Harris has the big mo and is setting the agenda without needing to have major interviews - she is setting the agenda in a way that Trump in the past was a master of.
I'm sure Harris will do major interviews but she has little reason to do so right now, while she's dominating the agenda anyway. When the media buzz around her dies off a bit then she has the option of getting major interviews booked then and setting the agenda once more - she has no reason to waste that bolt yet.
I'm sure you would differ from some of my views, but I'd be interested to hear comments.
I spent a bit of time looking at the direction Liz Truss is coming from, and came across a couple of conferences for this movement. Speakers for the UK conference in 2023 included the likes of Kevin Roberts (CEO Heritage Foundation), Mogg, Kruger, Miriam Cates, Braverman, Gove, Lee Anderson, Katherine Birbal-Singh, Toby Young, Theodore Dalrymple, Lord Frost, Melanie Philips, an 'interesting' South-Coast Vicar called Daniel French, Frank Furedi, Matthew Goodwin, Juliet Samuel, Darren Grimes, Louise Perry, David Starkey, Ed West and interestingly, also JD Vance.
Values are mono-culturalism, patriotism, social conservatism, anti-modernism, anti-feminism, nationalism (obviously), anti-immigration, cultural conservatism, Euroscepticism, opposition to modernity, 'family values', preservation of national and cultural identity. And a bit of an obsession with fertility in some quarters, especially Usonian, which may explain JD Vance's posturings about the threat posed by a deep stare under the control of single cat-ladies.
It has been described as an attempt to create an intellectual / philosophical base for Trumpism. That perhaps explains some of the people endorsing him.
Interesting to me is a move away from Thatcher's relative internationalism, free trade and economic liberalism. It seems to me to be quite heavily driven by fear of the other, and goes for withdrawal rather than engagement.
If I had to choose someone to be the "soul" of National Conservatism, I'd go for the Ghost of Roger Scruton.
I'm always a bit annoyed at the co-option of the phrase "National Conservatism" by Anglosphere politicians, since it worked perfectly well for a strand in Central/Eastern European politics for many years prior. They are similar (definitely around Kinder, Küche, Kirche values), although I think the European version is more religious.
Digging a little further, Miriam Cates on the importance of having lots of babies.
Indeed. The NatCon lectures are online, as are its more English cousin PopCon's lectures. Whilst not necessarily pleasant they are rewarding to listen to. On a first approximation the NatCon are more TED talks for the Anglosphere Patriots, but the PopCons are more English. To give an obvious example, Lee Anderson can (and has) spoken at PopCon, but wouldn't have been invited to NatCon, and vice-versa for Darren Grimes.
Not wanting to disagree with your analysis, but here is Lee Anderson's speech at NatCon 2023 . I was a touch surprised to see him there; I think he was Exhibit A Working-Class Conservative.
At the time he was Deputy Chairman of the Conservatives.
I can also pick some holes in his personal narrative - for example he's being a little over-imaginative about his education being a Comprehensive School conditioning him into going down the mines and restricting him to his station, because the loss of prospect of Grammar School and the Eleven Plus took away alternatives.
One of his year mates of my acquaintance when I was last in contact was the Director with overall supervision of the project to build one of the large offshore windfarms in the channel.
Fox NEws puts out a poll that supports their deeply held gut feeling?
I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you.
Carried out by Beacon Research/Shaw & Co. Research who are rated 2.8 stars (out of 3) on 538 pollster ratings, so can't just be dismissed.
It will be dismissed because it's good for "Trump".
Unforgivable on a betting site - particularly one that was founded to discuss the 2004 Kerry v Bush election - but that's where we're at.
My cynicism comes from the fact it's the perfect result for Fox news - it may be 100% accurate but it also 100% matches the result Fox would want to talk about..
The one thing I've picked up from this site is that US polling is awful compared to the UK..
I've also picked up that this site is terrible at discussing the US election dispassionately.
FWIW I think Harris remains a pretty weak candidate (particularly her speeches, and I don't think there is a guarantee she'll be any good in the debate), and therefore the Democrat campaign is reliant on good vibes and Walz being American Dad. That might be enough but it's a long time till the election.
I wouldn't be surprised if this is peak Harris.
Harris will be the third president in a row to be a one-term president who ranks in the bottom quintile of presidents overall, and who is there largely because her opponent is so dreadful. Still, I'd take that from here.
Absurd, IMO, to rank Biden in the bottom quintile of US presidents. Even setting aside Trump (who currently polls around the bottom of the pile), what about Buchanan; Pierce; Andrew Johnson; Harding; Fillmore; Taylor; Tyler; Hoover; Coolidge; Nixon or GW Bush ?
He's governed a country as divided as it's been since the 60s, and managed to get substantial domestic and foreign policy legislation through a divided Congress. And dealt pretty gracefully with being obliged to retire at the end of his first term, while living his party considerably stronger than he found it.
I'd rate him pretty highly myself.
As for Harris, we'll have to wait and see.
I think he's been pretty poor, not least due to his evident mental deterioration. But you do make a good point about some of the other duds the US has had.
Fox NEws puts out a poll that supports their deeply held gut feeling?
I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you.
Carried out by Beacon Research/Shaw & Co. Research who are rated 2.8 stars (out of 3) on 538 pollster ratings, so can't just be dismissed.
It will be dismissed because it's good for "Trump".
Unforgivable on a betting site - particularly one that was founded to discuss the 2004 Kerry v Bush election - but that's where we're at.
My cynicism comes from the fact it's the perfect result for Fox news - it may be 100% accurate but it also 100% matches the result Fox would want to talk about..
The one thing I've picked up from this site is that US polling is awful compared to the UK..
I've also picked up that this site is terrible at discussing the US election dispassionately.
I think we can safely say that most people on here know a lot less about the US than they think they do.
I've lost a post but I was going to reply to @DougSeal that the other thing I've picked up from this site is that I don't know enough to sanely bet on the US elections, so I'm not going to.
The US is an insanely large and diverse country and far more different from the UK than most people realise. I lived there for 5 years but would still not claim any particular insight into it - especially the non-coastal portions.
During my Erasmus year in Germany, a long time ago, the British and American students were initially drawn together by their common language. I noticed, though, that after a little while, the Americans tended to stick with each other, while the Brits increasingly socialised with other Europeans. This brought home to me just how culturally different Americans are to Europeans, and that Brits generally have a more European than American worldview.
100% my experience too. Living in the US convinced me that the UK is just another European country.
Living in Australia convinced me the UK is more than just another European country.
That's because you probably get more TV/media etc. from the UK in Australia than any other European country. Same is true in Latin America vis a vis Spain and Portugal, Quebec in re France etc etc. We are, quite literally, just another European country. There's nowt special about us.
That's a negative, defeatist attitude, there's plenty special about us.
There's also plenty special about France and other nations too.
We don't need to belittle either ourselves or them by pretending we're all the same.
Fox NEws puts out a poll that supports their deeply held gut feeling?
I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you.
Carried out by Beacon Research/Shaw & Co. Research who are rated 2.8 stars (out of 3) on 538 pollster ratings, so can't just be dismissed.
It will be dismissed because it's good for "Trump".
Unforgivable on a betting site - particularly one that was founded to discuss the 2004 Kerry v Bush election - but that's where we're at.
My cynicism comes from the fact it's the perfect result for Fox news - it may be 100% accurate but it also 100% matches the result Fox would want to talk about..
The one thing I've picked up from this site is that US polling is awful compared to the UK..
I've also picked up that this site is terrible at discussing the US election dispassionately.
FWIW I think Harris remains a pretty weak candidate (particularly her speeches, and I don't think there is a guarantee she'll be any good in the debate), and therefore the Democrat campaign is reliant on good vibes and Walz being American Dad. That might be enough but it's a long time till the election.
I wouldn't be surprised if this is peak Harris.
Harris will be the third president in a row to be a one-term president who ranks in the bottom quintile of presidents overall, and who is there largely because her opponent is so dreadful. Still, I'd take that from here.
Those on here who are of a politically conservative disposition do raise an eyebrow when even before the election of a national leader who is not of a conservative disposition are confident that, should the national leader not of a conservative disposition be elected ( e.g. Starmer/ Harris) they will be a one term only leader ( they may be correct of course). Yet back in the distant days of December 2019 these same posters were mulling over, with some confidence, Boris Johnson's second, third and fourth terms, particularly from the following April against Captain Hindsight/ Sir Softie.
There's a Schroedinger uncertainty here. While one term for a liberal incumbent is very possible, the more conservatives assume that to be the case the less likely it is to happen.
Very early days, but the UK Conservative Party don't seem serious about fixing the issues that led to their historically catastrophic defeat in 2024.
Fox NEws puts out a poll that supports their deeply held gut feeling?
I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you.
Carried out by Beacon Research/Shaw & Co. Research who are rated 2.8 stars (out of 3) on 538 pollster ratings, so can't just be dismissed.
It will be dismissed because it's good for "Trump".
Unforgivable on a betting site - particularly one that was founded to discuss the 2004 Kerry v Bush election - but that's where we're at.
My cynicism comes from the fact it's the perfect result for Fox news - it may be 100% accurate but it also 100% matches the result Fox would want to talk about..
The one thing I've picked up from this site is that US polling is awful compared to the UK..
I've also picked up that this site is terrible at discussing the US election dispassionately.
FWIW I think Harris remains a pretty weak candidate (particularly her speeches, and I don't think there is a guarantee she'll be any good in the debate), and therefore the Democrat campaign is reliant on good vibes and Walz being American Dad. That might be enough but it's a long time till the election.
I wouldn't be surprised if this is peak Harris.
She is largely dependent upon Trump becoming worse or suffering from set backs in his various trials and civil cases. The chances of that happening seem better than evens so I suspect Silver is not far off.
Realistically, the only major obstacle now for Trump trial-wise is the verdict in the NY case as the others are stalled / will be past-the election. Who knows how that will go.
Trump could melt down but it is fair to say we have been here before multiple times where people claim he is losing it, on his way out etc. The polling also has underestimated his support at the last elections.
I suspect @Eabhal is right, it feels like peak Harris. Jim Acosta at CNN had a go at her campaign manager for only offering one interview before the end of the month, and it is starting to be picked up by others. If I was Harris and truly feeling Trump was on the run, I would be interviewing like mad and hammering the points home.
I would have said that Peak Harris will likely be in the immediate aftermath of the DNC next week, but that now looks to be a bit of a nightmare for her with the ‘Palistine’ mob looking to disrupt proceedings. Trying to lock her away from the media only works for so long as well, there’s a limit to how long they’ll shill for someone who won’t even engage with them.
But that's precisely the point, the media wants her to engage with them - but she's dominating the agenda now without them - and she will next week because of the DNC too. So why waste her time or effort, or the opportunity, of the media engagement?
After the DNC will be the time to get major interviews in, at which point the media will love the fact they're getting the attention they want.
Waste that opportunity now and it won't be as effective post-DNC to have a second interview.
Managing the media is smart politics. In 2016 Trump was a master of getting free media attention without paying for advertising, now Harris is outclassing him and complaints about it just show what a good job she is doing.
Fox NEws puts out a poll that supports their deeply held gut feeling?
I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you.
Carried out by Beacon Research/Shaw & Co. Research who are rated 2.8 stars (out of 3) on 538 pollster ratings, so can't just be dismissed.
It will be dismissed because it's good for "Trump".
Unforgivable on a betting site - particularly one that was founded to discuss the 2004 Kerry v Bush election - but that's where we're at.
My cynicism comes from the fact it's the perfect result for Fox news - it may be 100% accurate but it also 100% matches the result Fox would want to talk about..
The one thing I've picked up from this site is that US polling is awful compared to the UK..
I've also picked up that this site is terrible at discussing the US election dispassionately.
I think we can safely say that most people on here know a lot less about the US than they think they do.
I've lost a post but I was going to reply to @DougSeal that the other thing I've picked up from this site is that I don't know enough to sanely bet on the US elections, so I'm not going to.
The US is an insanely large and diverse country and far more different from the UK than most people realise. I lived there for 5 years but would still not claim any particular insight into it - especially the non-coastal portions.
During my Erasmus year in Germany, a long time ago, the British and American students were initially drawn together by their common language. I noticed, though, that after a little while, the Americans tended to stick with each other, while the Brits increasingly socialised with other Europeans. This brought home to me just how culturally different Americans are to Europeans, and that Brits generally have a more European than American worldview.
100% my experience too. Living in the US convinced me that the UK is just another European country.
Living in Australia convinced me the UK is more than just another European country.
I think the truth is somewhere between these last three posts. I'd say that the UK is an outlier in Europe, but is more European than American. I'd quibble with the suggestion that the UK is culturally more European, but mainly I think over the interpretation of the word 'culture' - culture is clearly bound up a lot in language, and a visit to the USA offers a lot more cultural familiarity than a visit to Europe, which at first sight can appear plain weird. I'd offer advertising as an example: American adverts seem a lot less discordant to my UK eyes than European ones (and that's not just the language, although dubbed adverts always seem a little odd.) But I'd say that in terms of attitudes and expectations of the world the UK is more European than American, and that because of our lack of a common language we often mentally exaggerate the differences with Europeans and minimise the differences with Americans.
Excellent (paywalled) article on the recent riots. Some snippets:
UK needs no lessons from apologists for rioters
Those behind the rioting are not misguided social justice warriors, they are violent, far-right racists fortified by a general hooligan element that was up for a ruck and expected to face no consequences. Now they know better.
It is easy to mock Sir Keir Starmer for reverting to type as a former prosecutor but nearly 1,000 arrests and some rapid and tough sentences was the right response [to restore confidence in the law]
For all the vacuous “something must be donery” of many commentators there are real underlying issues. But even if you accept that the riots were about anything beyond violence, they have not changed the calculation. The answers are what they have always been: improved economic prospects, investment in skills to secure high-status blue-collar jobs, better housing, good public services. In fact, all the things Labour was elected to deliver.
For Starmer, these grim scenes have marred the start of his government. But the riots told us nothing we didn’t already know about the state of Britain except perhaps the value of a tough response, the true measure of the instigators and the cynicism of their apologists.
All that was needed to quell the riots was the swift response. The lengthy sentences are excessive: a week or two would suffice as deterrent. Contrast this with other crimes that appear to have no consequence because there is a year or more delay before reaching trial.
Yes and No IMO. The exemplary sentences deal with the rioters' assumption that lawlessness has no consequence for them. But it does result in a long hangover once the riot is in the past.
No, it is the speed of sentence that deals with rioters' assumption that lawlessness has no consequences. By contrast, any sentence after the more usual 6-18 months out on bail has little connection to the original crime because offenders, and more importantly their peers, will have seen them continue their normal lives after arrest and release.
Fox NEws puts out a poll that supports their deeply held gut feeling?
I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you.
Carried out by Beacon Research/Shaw & Co. Research who are rated 2.8 stars (out of 3) on 538 pollster ratings, so can't just be dismissed.
It will be dismissed because it's good for "Trump".
Unforgivable on a betting site - particularly one that was founded to discuss the 2004 Kerry v Bush election - but that's where we're at.
My cynicism comes from the fact it's the perfect result for Fox news - it may be 100% accurate but it also 100% matches the result Fox would want to talk about..
The one thing I've picked up from this site is that US polling is awful compared to the UK..
I've also picked up that this site is terrible at discussing the US election dispassionately.
FWIW I think Harris remains a pretty weak candidate (particularly her speeches, and I don't think there is a guarantee she'll be any good in the debate), and therefore the Democrat campaign is reliant on good vibes and Walz being American Dad. That might be enough but it's a long time till the election.
I wouldn't be surprised if this is peak Harris.
She is largely dependent upon Trump becoming worse or suffering from set backs in his various trials and civil cases. The chances of that happening seem better than evens so I suspect Silver is not far off.
Realistically, the only major obstacle now for Trump trial-wise is the verdict in the NY case as the others are stalled / will be past-the election. Who knows how that will go.
Trump could melt down but it is fair to say we have been here before multiple times where people claim he is losing it, on his way out etc. The polling also has underestimated his support at the last elections.
I suspect @Eabhal is right, it feels like peak Harris. Jim Acosta at CNN had a go at her campaign manager for only offering one interview before the end of the month, and it is starting to be picked up by others. If I was Harris and truly feeling Trump was on the run, I would be interviewing like mad and hammering the points home.
If I was betting on Trump, I'd be waiting at least a week / 10 days until after the DNC finishes.
The complaints of not doing interviews in the last 3 weeks are ludicrous. Her campaign has played it perfectly so far. No amount of pressers or TV interviews will convince the 40% who are Trump zeolots / or die hard Republicans.
It will become untenable not to do interviews including the biggies like 60 minutes from September onwards, but she can control the schedule & how many really make a huge difference ?
Easy to forget the campaigns are ridiculously long and still 12 weeks to go.
Fox NEws puts out a poll that supports their deeply held gut feeling?
I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you.
Carried out by Beacon Research/Shaw & Co. Research who are rated 2.8 stars (out of 3) on 538 pollster ratings, so can't just be dismissed.
It will be dismissed because it's good for "Trump".
Unforgivable on a betting site - particularly one that was founded to discuss the 2004 Kerry v Bush election - but that's where we're at.
My cynicism comes from the fact it's the perfect result for Fox news - it may be 100% accurate but it also 100% matches the result Fox would want to talk about..
The one thing I've picked up from this site is that US polling is awful compared to the UK..
I've also picked up that this site is terrible at discussing the US election dispassionately.
I think we can safely say that most people on here know a lot less about the US than they think they do.
I've lost a post but I was going to reply to @DougSeal that the other thing I've picked up from this site is that I don't know enough to sanely bet on the US elections, so I'm not going to.
The US is an insanely large and diverse country and far more different from the UK than most people realise. I lived there for 5 years but would still not claim any particular insight into it - especially the non-coastal portions.
During my Erasmus year in Germany, a long time ago, the British and American students were initially drawn together by their common language. I noticed, though, that after a little while, the Americans tended to stick with each other, while the Brits increasingly socialised with other Europeans. This brought home to me just how culturally different Americans are to Europeans, and that Brits generally have a more European than American worldview.
100% my experience too. Living in the US convinced me that the UK is just another European country.
Living in Australia convinced me the UK is more than just another European country.
That's because you probably get more TV/media etc. from the UK in Australia than any other European country. Same is true in Latin America vis a vis Spain and Portugal, Quebec in re France etc etc. We are, quite literally, just another European country. There's nowt special about us.
There's a bit more to it than that. The UK is a bit of an outlier; there are lots of ways that we are less European than continental countries. It might just be as trivial as having a border mostly fixed by where the land meets the sea.
But most of us are much more European-with-quirks than we are Ameri-Australi-Anglosphere. Not all of us, but most of us.
(There's a conversation somewhere between Stephen Fry and Craig Ferguson... I think it was in the latter's Letterman plus one hour talk show. They discussed the idea that because people became American by choice, that led to some selection bias. People who left Britain for the Anglosphere were different to those who stayed. Sounds pretty plausible to me.)
Fox NEws puts out a poll that supports their deeply held gut feeling?
I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you.
Carried out by Beacon Research/Shaw & Co. Research who are rated 2.8 stars (out of 3) on 538 pollster ratings, so can't just be dismissed.
It will be dismissed because it's good for "Trump".
Unforgivable on a betting site - particularly one that was founded to discuss the 2004 Kerry v Bush election - but that's where we're at.
My cynicism comes from the fact it's the perfect result for Fox news - it may be 100% accurate but it also 100% matches the result Fox would want to talk about..
The one thing I've picked up from this site is that US polling is awful compared to the UK..
I've also picked up that this site is terrible at discussing the US election dispassionately.
FWIW I think Harris remains a pretty weak candidate (particularly her speeches, and I don't think there is a guarantee she'll be any good in the debate), and therefore the Democrat campaign is reliant on good vibes and Walz being American Dad. That might be enough but it's a long time till the election.
I wouldn't be surprised if this is peak Harris.
Harris will be the third president in a row to be a one-term president who ranks in the bottom quintile of presidents overall, and who is there largely because her opponent is so dreadful. Still, I'd take that from here.
Absurd, IMO, to rank Biden in the bottom quintile of US presidents. Even setting aside Trump (who currently polls around the bottom of the pile), what about Buchanan; Pierce; Andrew Johnson; Harding; Fillmore; Taylor; Tyler; Hoover; Coolidge; Nixon or GW Bush ?
He's governed a country as divided as it's been since the 60s, and managed to get substantial domestic and foreign policy legislation through a divided Congress. And dealt pretty gracefully with being obliged to retire at the end of his first term, while living his party considerably stronger than he found it.
I'd rate him pretty highly myself.
As for Harris, we'll have to wait and see.
He's done a great job both domestically (see investment in manufacturing following his reforms) and internationally in helping Ukraine to defeat Putin.
The one failure in his term was Afghanistan but that owes more to his predecessors than him. It was Trump who signed a withdrawal agreement with the Taliban and it was GWB who invaded and him and his successors who failed to win the peace after the invasion.
Biden is right to retire, but he'll retire in the top half of Presidents overall.
Agree. Biden was what Trump claimed to be but isn't, an accomplished deal maker. I would say Biden was the most successful president since Reagan in marshalling the various interest groups towards getting his agenda through.
Here's the thing: the most successful political candidates are blank slates onto whom voters project their own views.
So, why would Kamala allow herself to get bogged down in policy and take on interviews? What's she got to gain? Her job is to keep reemphasizing Project 2025, and abortion, and danger to democracy, and Trump's blocking of a bipartisan border bill. She should stay well away from actual policy, and certainly shouldn't sit down for interviews with journalists. What does she have to gain?
She also benefits - right now - from a Trump campaign that seems completely flat footed. Thinking of Trump in 2016, I am reminded of the Ollivander quote about Voldemort "terrible thing... great but terrible...". And he was. Trump was a mental force to be reckoned with, he belittled and dismantled opponents without difficulty.
This time around, he's had one debate... with someone suffering from the early stages of dementia.
He hasn't gone through any cut and thrust with fellow Republicans, he's just landed in the role. And he's not the man he was eight years ago.
It is astonishing, though, that we're having this discussion. The US should be getting rid of the incumbent party because voters have had a pretty shit four years (as has happened across the developed world). The fact that it looks like Harris is the narrow favourite right now is a testament to just how poor Trump is as a candidate in 2024.
I'm sure you would differ from some of my views, but I'd be interested to hear comments.
I spent a bit of time looking at the direction Liz Truss is coming from, and came across a couple of conferences for this movement. Speakers for the UK conference in 2023 included the likes of Kevin Roberts (CEO Heritage Foundation), Mogg, Kruger, Miriam Cates, Braverman, Gove, Lee Anderson, Katherine Birbal-Singh, Toby Young, Theodore Dalrymple, Lord Frost, Melanie Philips, an 'interesting' South-Coast Vicar called Daniel French, Frank Furedi, Matthew Goodwin, Juliet Samuel, Darren Grimes, Louise Perry, David Starkey, Ed West and interestingly, also JD Vance.
Values are mono-culturalism, patriotism, social conservatism, anti-modernism, anti-feminism, nationalism (obviously), anti-immigration, cultural conservatism, Euroscepticism, opposition to modernity, 'family values', preservation of national and cultural identity. And a bit of an obsession with fertility in some quarters, especially Usonian, which may explain JD Vance's posturings about the threat posed by a deep stare under the control of single cat-ladies.
It has been described as an attempt to create an intellectual / philosophical base for Trumpism. That perhaps explains some of the people endorsing him.
Interesting to me is a move away from Thatcher's relative internationalism, free trade and economic liberalism. It seems to me to be quite heavily driven by fear of the other, and goes for withdrawal rather than engagement.
If I had to choose someone to be the "soul" of National Conservatism, I'd go for the Ghost of Roger Scruton.
I'm always a bit annoyed at the co-option of the phrase "National Conservatism" by Anglosphere politicians, since it worked perfectly well for a strand in Central/Eastern European politics for many years prior. They are similar (definitely around Kinder, Küche, Kirche values), although I think the European version is more religious.
Digging a little further, Miriam Cates on the importance of having lots of babies.
Indeed. The NatCon lectures are online, as are its more English cousin PopCon's lectures. Whilst not necessarily pleasant they are rewarding to listen to. On a first approximation the NatCon are more TED talks for the Anglosphere Patriots, but the PopCons are more English. To give an obvious example, Lee Anderson can (and has) spoken at PopCon, but wouldn't have been invited to NatCon, and vice-versa for Darren Grimes.
Not wanting to disagree with your analysis, but here is Lee Anderson's speech at NatCon 2023 . I was a touch surprised to see him there; I think he was Exhibit A Working-Class Conservative.
At the time he was Deputy Chairman of the Conservatives.
I can also pick some holes in his personal narrative - for example he's being a little over-imaginative about his education being a Comprehensive School conditioning him into going down the mines and restricting him to his station, because the loss of prospect of Grammar School and the Eleven Plus took away alternatives.
One of his year mates of my acquaintance when I was last in contact was the Director with overall supervision of the project to build one of the large offshore windfarms in the channel.
It's an interesting narrative, though.
No, please feel free. If people don't point my mistakes out here where my only risk is embarrassment, then other people will point them out elsewhere where it may be more reputational lossy ☹️
Fox NEws puts out a poll that supports their deeply held gut feeling?
I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you.
Carried out by Beacon Research/Shaw & Co. Research who are rated 2.8 stars (out of 3) on 538 pollster ratings, so can't just be dismissed.
It will be dismissed because it's good for "Trump".
Unforgivable on a betting site - particularly one that was founded to discuss the 2004 Kerry v Bush election - but that's where we're at.
My cynicism comes from the fact it's the perfect result for Fox news - it may be 100% accurate but it also 100% matches the result Fox would want to talk about..
The one thing I've picked up from this site is that US polling is awful compared to the UK..
I've also picked up that this site is terrible at discussing the US election dispassionately.
I think we can safely say that most people on here know a lot less about the US than they think they do.
I've lost a post but I was going to reply to @DougSeal that the other thing I've picked up from this site is that I don't know enough to sanely bet on the US elections, so I'm not going to.
The US is an insanely large and diverse country and far more different from the UK than most people realise. I lived there for 5 years but would still not claim any particular insight into it - especially the non-coastal portions.
During my Erasmus year in Germany, a long time ago, the British and American students were initially drawn together by their common language. I noticed, though, that after a little while, the Americans tended to stick with each other, while the Brits increasingly socialised with other Europeans. This brought home to me just how culturally different Americans are to Europeans, and that Brits generally have a more European than American worldview.
100% my experience too. Living in the US convinced me that the UK is just another European country.
Living in Australia convinced me the UK is more than just another European country.
I think the truth is somewhere between these last three posts. I'd say that the UK is an outlier in Europe, but is more European than American. I'd quibble with the suggestion that the UK is culturally more European, but mainly I think over the interpretation of the word 'culture' - culture is clearly bound up a lot in language, and a visit to the USA offers a lot more cultural familiarity than a visit to Europe, which at first sight can appear plain weird. I'd offer advertising as an example: American adverts seem a lot less discordant to my UK eyes than European ones (and that's not just the language, although dubbed adverts always seem a little odd.) But I'd say that in terms of attitudes and expectations of the world the UK is more European than American, and that because of our lack of a common language we often mentally exaggerate the differences with Europeans and minimise the differences with Americans.
That's fair.
But its not a binary European or American, we're neither, we're us.
We share some stuff in common with Europe. We share some stuff in common with America. We share some stuff in common with Canada, Australia and New Zealand. We share some stuff in common with India and Pakistan. We share some stuff in common with Japan. We share some stuff in common with many other nations too.
We're a bastard hodgepodge of many different cultures and more.
Excellent (paywalled) article on the recent riots. Some snippets:
UK needs no lessons from apologists for rioters
Those behind the rioting are not misguided social justice warriors, they are violent, far-right racists fortified by a general hooligan element that was up for a ruck and expected to face no consequences. Now they know better.
It is easy to mock Sir Keir Starmer for reverting to type as a former prosecutor but nearly 1,000 arrests and some rapid and tough sentences was the right response [to restore confidence in the law]
For all the vacuous “something must be donery” of many commentators there are real underlying issues. But even if you accept that the riots were about anything beyond violence, they have not changed the calculation. The answers are what they have always been: improved economic prospects, investment in skills to secure high-status blue-collar jobs, better housing, good public services. In fact, all the things Labour was elected to deliver.
For Starmer, these grim scenes have marred the start of his government. But the riots told us nothing we didn’t already know about the state of Britain except perhaps the value of a tough response, the true measure of the instigators and the cynicism of their apologists.
All that was needed to quell the riots was the swift response. The lengthy sentences are excessive: a week or two would suffice as deterrent. Contrast this with other crimes that appear to have no consequence because there is a year or more delay before reaching trial.
Yes, it shows what can be done. Let's start to treat other crimes as seriously.
To be fair, when people plead guilty at the first available opportunity, it's easy to sentence them and to send them to jail.
The problems occur when people actually want trials with barristers and witnesses and judges and juries and all.
Juries are immediately available; there is a constant flow of new jurors. Likewise judges. Barristers might need time to prepare their cases for prosecution or defence, but often have only a week, but a week that starts 18 months later. And of course, delays give time for witnesses' memories to fade.
Excellent (paywalled) article on the recent riots. Some snippets:
UK needs no lessons from apologists for rioters
Those behind the rioting are not misguided social justice warriors, they are violent, far-right racists fortified by a general hooligan element that was up for a ruck and expected to face no consequences. Now they know better.
It is easy to mock Sir Keir Starmer for reverting to type as a former prosecutor but nearly 1,000 arrests and some rapid and tough sentences was the right response [to restore confidence in the law]
For all the vacuous “something must be donery” of many commentators there are real underlying issues. But even if you accept that the riots were about anything beyond violence, they have not changed the calculation. The answers are what they have always been: improved economic prospects, investment in skills to secure high-status blue-collar jobs, better housing, good public services. In fact, all the things Labour was elected to deliver.
For Starmer, these grim scenes have marred the start of his government. But the riots told us nothing we didn’t already know about the state of Britain except perhaps the value of a tough response, the true measure of the instigators and the cynicism of their apologists.
All that was needed to quell the riots was the swift response. The lengthy sentences are excessive: a week or two would suffice as deterrent. Contrast this with other crimes that appear to have no consequence because there is a year or more delay before reaching trial.
Yes and No IMO. The exemplary sentences deal with the rioters' assumption that lawlessness has no consequence for them. But it does result in a long hangover once the riot is in the past.
No, it is the speed of sentence that deals with rioters' assumption that lawlessness has no consequences. By contrast, any sentence after the more usual 6-18 months out on bail has little connection to the original crime because offenders, and more importantly their peers, will have seen them continue their normal lives after arrest and release.
I find it really how weird how comfortable Conservatives have been with a broken justice system. They claim to be the party of law and order but would rather save a few quid (short term only as a broken justice system costs us loads in the medium and long run) and push for longer sentences rather than actually fixing it.
Excellent (paywalled) article on the recent riots. Some snippets:
UK needs no lessons from apologists for rioters
Those behind the rioting are not misguided social justice warriors, they are violent, far-right racists fortified by a general hooligan element that was up for a ruck and expected to face no consequences. Now they know better.
It is easy to mock Sir Keir Starmer for reverting to type as a former prosecutor but nearly 1,000 arrests and some rapid and tough sentences was the right response [to restore confidence in the law]
For all the vacuous “something must be donery” of many commentators there are real underlying issues. But even if you accept that the riots were about anything beyond violence, they have not changed the calculation. The answers are what they have always been: improved economic prospects, investment in skills to secure high-status blue-collar jobs, better housing, good public services. In fact, all the things Labour was elected to deliver.
For Starmer, these grim scenes have marred the start of his government. But the riots told us nothing we didn’t already know about the state of Britain except perhaps the value of a tough response, the true measure of the instigators and the cynicism of their apologists.
All that was needed to quell the riots was the swift response. The lengthy sentences are excessive: a week or two would suffice as deterrent. Contrast this with other crimes that appear to have no consequence because there is a year or more delay before reaching trial.
Yes and No IMO. The exemplary sentences deal with the rioters' assumption that lawlessness has no consequence for them. But it does result in a long hangover once the riot is in the past.
No, it is the speed of sentence that deals with rioters' assumption that lawlessness has no consequences. By contrast, any sentence after the more usual 6-18 months out on bail has little connection to the original crime because offenders, and more importantly their peers, will have seen them continue their normal lives after arrest and release.
Not sure where you need to draw the line. These are possibly longer than needed. I am pretty sure 1 to 2 week sentences as you suggest are too short to act as an immediate deterrent
And by the way my only objection to the longer sentences is a practical one. These are not nice people.
I hope all the A level students in people's lives got the grades they were hoping for. Our daughter got the grades she needed to study maths and philosophy at Oxford so we are very proud parents this morning.
Congratulations to your daughter and to everyone on PB who has friends and family getting their A Level results today.
Excellent (paywalled) article on the recent riots. Some snippets:
UK needs no lessons from apologists for rioters
Those behind the rioting are not misguided social justice warriors, they are violent, far-right racists fortified by a general hooligan element that was up for a ruck and expected to face no consequences. Now they know better.
It is easy to mock Sir Keir Starmer for reverting to type as a former prosecutor but nearly 1,000 arrests and some rapid and tough sentences was the right response [to restore confidence in the law]
For all the vacuous “something must be donery” of many commentators there are real underlying issues. But even if you accept that the riots were about anything beyond violence, they have not changed the calculation. The answers are what they have always been: improved economic prospects, investment in skills to secure high-status blue-collar jobs, better housing, good public services. In fact, all the things Labour was elected to deliver.
For Starmer, these grim scenes have marred the start of his government. But the riots told us nothing we didn’t already know about the state of Britain except perhaps the value of a tough response, the true measure of the instigators and the cynicism of their apologists.
All that was needed to quell the riots was the swift response. The lengthy sentences are excessive: a week or two would suffice as deterrent. Contrast this with other crimes that appear to have no consequence because there is a year or more delay before reaching trial.
Yes, it shows what can be done. Let's start to treat other crimes as seriously.
To be fair, when people plead guilty at the first available opportunity, it's easy to sentence them and to send them to jail.
The problems occur when people actually want trials with barristers and witnesses and judges and juries and all.
Juries are immediately available; there is a constant flow of new jurors. Likewise judges. Barristers might need time to prepare their cases for prosecution or defence, but often have only a week, but a week that starts 18 months later. And of course, delays give time for witnesses' memories to fade.
But there schedules and there are trials already in calendars. Judges know that from 2 May to 4 May, they will be trying a case involving a mugging in Soho (or whatever). Now, at Magistrates Courts, where there are many cases per day, it's different, but if you get to serious cases at the High Court, then stuff is scheduled a long time in advance, and there aren't wide open gaps in the calendar where you can put a new trial. Or at least, not without rescheduling an existing one.
Robert F Kennedy Jr, the independent presidential candidate, has revealed he attempted to meet Kamala Harris to broach the prospect of endorsing her in exchange for a cabinet position.
The son of the late former US attorney general launched his third party presidential bid last October and surprised many pundits by securing double-digits in some polls of the 2024 White House race.
His support has fallen dramatically since Joe Biden withdrew from the race and Ms Harris replaced the president at the top of the Democratic ticket.
Mr Kennedy, 70, sought a meeting with Ms Harris, 59, last week to discuss the possibility of backing her campaign in exchange for a high-level position in her administration should she win, his campaign aides told the Washington Post and CNN.
Ms Harris and her advisers did not take up the offer to meet and have shown no interest in the proposal, which Mr Kennedy called a “strategic mistake”.
Technicality? Maybe, though the judges remarks are pretty scathing:
'In New York, Judge Christina Ryba concluded in her 34-page decision that the rented bedroom Kennedy claimed as his residence in New York wasn’t a “bona fide and legitimate residence, but merely a ‘sham’ address that he assumed for the purpose of maintaining his voter registration” and furthering his political candidacy.
“Given the size and appearance of the spare bedroom as shown in the photographs admitted into evidence, the Court finds Kennedy’s testimony that he may return to that bedroom to reside with his wife, family members, multiple pets, and all of his personal belongings to be highly improbable, if not preposterous,” the judge wrote.
Ryba said evidence submitted in trial showed Kennedy had a “long-standing pattern” of borrowing addresses from friends and relatives so he could maintain his voter registration in New York state while actually residing in California, where he has a home with his wife, “Curb Your Enthusiasm” actor Cheryl Hines.'
“Using a friend’s address for political and voting purposes, while barely stepping foot on the premises, does not equate to residency under the Election Law,” the judge wrote. “To hold otherwise would establish a dangerous precedent and open the door to the fraud and political mischief that the Election Law residency rules were designed to prevent.”
Barbara Moss, who rents the room to Kennedy, testified that he pays her $500 a month. But she acknowledged there is no written lease and that Kennedy’s first payment wasn’t made until after the New York Post published a story casting doubt on Kennedy’s claim that he lived at that address.'
I'm not at all convinced it's in the Dems interest to keep RFK off the ballot.
Excellent (paywalled) article on the recent riots. Some snippets:
UK needs no lessons from apologists for rioters
Those behind the rioting are not misguided social justice warriors, they are violent, far-right racists fortified by a general hooligan element that was up for a ruck and expected to face no consequences. Now they know better.
It is easy to mock Sir Keir Starmer for reverting to type as a former prosecutor but nearly 1,000 arrests and some rapid and tough sentences was the right response [to restore confidence in the law]
For all the vacuous “something must be donery” of many commentators there are real underlying issues. But even if you accept that the riots were about anything beyond violence, they have not changed the calculation. The answers are what they have always been: improved economic prospects, investment in skills to secure high-status blue-collar jobs, better housing, good public services. In fact, all the things Labour was elected to deliver.
For Starmer, these grim scenes have marred the start of his government. But the riots told us nothing we didn’t already know about the state of Britain except perhaps the value of a tough response, the true measure of the instigators and the cynicism of their apologists.
All that was needed to quell the riots was the swift response. The lengthy sentences are excessive: a week or two would suffice as deterrent. Contrast this with other crimes that appear to have no consequence because there is a year or more delay before reaching trial.
Yes, it shows what can be done. Let's start to treat other crimes as seriously.
To be fair, when people plead guilty at the first available opportunity, it's easy to sentence them and to send them to jail.
The problems occur when people actually want trials with barristers and witnesses and judges and juries and all.
Juries are immediately available; there is a constant flow of new jurors. Likewise judges. Barristers might need time to prepare their cases for prosecution or defence, but often have only a week, but a week that starts 18 months later. And of course, delays give time for witnesses' memories to fade.
Juries may be available to be pulled into a 5 day court case but Judges, barristers and court rooms will be booked months in advance...
For reference I'm currently aware that first Tax tribunals are now booking for January to March 2026...
Setting aside the violation of the Logan Act (which has always been toothless), what are the chances of one of the tame journalists invited to his next Bedminster press conference asking him what was the purpose of this call - and (for example) whether they discussed delaying any hostage deal in order to improve his election chances ?
https://x.com/BarakRavid/status/1823874825930064241 Former President Donald Trump spoke on the phone with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday and discussed the Gaza hostage and ceasefire deal, according to two U.S. sources who were briefed on the call...
Here's the thing: the most successful political candidates are blank slates onto whom voters project their own views.
So, why would Kamala allow herself to get bogged down in policy and take on interviews? What's she got to gain? Her job is to keep reemphasizing Project 2025, and abortion, and danger to democracy, and Trump's blocking of a bipartisan border bill. She should stay well away from actual policy, and certainly shouldn't sit down for interviews with journalists. What does she have to gain?
She also benefits - right now - from a Trump campaign that seems completely flat footed. Thinking of Trump in 2016, I am reminded of the Ollivander quote about Voldemort "terrible thing... great but terrible...". And he was. Trump was a mental force to be reckoned with, he belittled and dismantled opponents without difficulty.
This time around, he's had one debate... with someone suffering from the early stages of dementia.
He hasn't gone through any cut and thrust with fellow Republicans, he's just landed in the role. And he's not the man he was eight years ago.
It is astonishing, though, that we're having this discussion. The US should be getting rid of the incumbent party because voters have had a pretty shit four years (as has happened across the developed world). The fact that it looks like Harris is the narrow favourite right now is a testament to just how poor Trump is as a candidate in 2024.
A sane Republican would absolutely walk this.
Nikki Haley was correct in that the first party to dump Trump / Biden was going to win.
the Democrats dumped Biden, the Republicans are stuck with Trump whose flaws are now obvious because while he was better than Biden he's worse than anyone else.
Excellent (paywalled) article on the recent riots. Some snippets:
UK needs no lessons from apologists for rioters
Those behind the rioting are not misguided social justice warriors, they are violent, far-right racists fortified by a general hooligan element that was up for a ruck and expected to face no consequences. Now they know better.
It is easy to mock Sir Keir Starmer for reverting to type as a former prosecutor but nearly 1,000 arrests and some rapid and tough sentences was the right response [to restore confidence in the law]
For all the vacuous “something must be donery” of many commentators there are real underlying issues. But even if you accept that the riots were about anything beyond violence, they have not changed the calculation. The answers are what they have always been: improved economic prospects, investment in skills to secure high-status blue-collar jobs, better housing, good public services. In fact, all the things Labour was elected to deliver.
For Starmer, these grim scenes have marred the start of his government. But the riots told us nothing we didn’t already know about the state of Britain except perhaps the value of a tough response, the true measure of the instigators and the cynicism of their apologists.
All that was needed to quell the riots was the swift response. The lengthy sentences are excessive: a week or two would suffice as deterrent. Contrast this with other crimes that appear to have no consequence because there is a year or more delay before reaching trial.
Yes and No IMO. The exemplary sentences deal with the rioters' assumption that lawlessness has no consequence for them. But it does result in a long hangover once the riot is in the past.
No, it is the speed of sentence that deals with rioters' assumption that lawlessness has no consequences. By contrast, any sentence after the more usual 6-18 months out on bail has little connection to the original crime because offenders, and more importantly their peers, will have seen them continue their normal lives after arrest and release.
Not sure where you need to draw the line. These are possibly longer than needed. I am pretty sure 2 to 3 week sentences as you suggest are too short to act as an immediate deterrent
And by the way my only objection to the longer sentences is a practical one. These are not nice people.
As a thought experiment, phone your boss and say you need the next three weeks off, starting tomorrow, because you will be in prison. My guess is you'd be down the JobCentre on your release. Phone a local recruitment agency, and ask how many jobs they've got that do not need a DBS check. How's your emergency fund looking now?
Excellent (paywalled) article on the recent riots. Some snippets:
UK needs no lessons from apologists for rioters
Those behind the rioting are not misguided social justice warriors, they are violent, far-right racists fortified by a general hooligan element that was up for a ruck and expected to face no consequences. Now they know better.
It is easy to mock Sir Keir Starmer for reverting to type as a former prosecutor but nearly 1,000 arrests and some rapid and tough sentences was the right response [to restore confidence in the law]
For all the vacuous “something must be donery” of many commentators there are real underlying issues. But even if you accept that the riots were about anything beyond violence, they have not changed the calculation. The answers are what they have always been: improved economic prospects, investment in skills to secure high-status blue-collar jobs, better housing, good public services. In fact, all the things Labour was elected to deliver.
For Starmer, these grim scenes have marred the start of his government. But the riots told us nothing we didn’t already know about the state of Britain except perhaps the value of a tough response, the true measure of the instigators and the cynicism of their apologists.
All that was needed to quell the riots was the swift response. The lengthy sentences are excessive: a week or two would suffice as deterrent. Contrast this with other crimes that appear to have no consequence because there is a year or more delay before reaching trial.
Yes, it shows what can be done. Let's start to treat other crimes as seriously.
To be fair, when people plead guilty at the first available opportunity, it's easy to sentence them and to send them to jail.
The problems occur when people actually want trials with barristers and witnesses and judges and juries and all.
Juries are immediately available; there is a constant flow of new jurors. Likewise judges. Barristers might need time to prepare their cases for prosecution or defence, but often have only a week, but a week that starts 18 months later. And of course, delays give time for witnesses' memories to fade.
Juries may be available to be pulled into a 5 day court case but Judges, barristers and court rooms will be booked months in advance...
For reference I'm currently aware that first Tax tribunals are now booking for January to March 2026...
Those are capacity issues. The rate of flow is the same.
ETA of course you are right there is no easy fix but a determined government ought to be able to fix the backlog over two or three years.
Fox NEws puts out a poll that supports their deeply held gut feeling?
I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you.
Carried out by Beacon Research/Shaw & Co. Research who are rated 2.8 stars (out of 3) on 538 pollster ratings, so can't just be dismissed.
It will be dismissed because it's good for "Trump".
Unforgivable on a betting site - particularly one that was founded to discuss the 2004 Kerry v Bush election - but that's where we're at.
My cynicism comes from the fact it's the perfect result for Fox news - it may be 100% accurate but it also 100% matches the result Fox would want to talk about..
The one thing I've picked up from this site is that US polling is awful compared to the UK..
I've also picked up that this site is terrible at discussing the US election dispassionately.
FWIW I think Harris remains a pretty weak candidate (particularly her speeches, and I don't think there is a guarantee she'll be any good in the debate), and therefore the Democrat campaign is reliant on good vibes and Walz being American Dad. That might be enough but it's a long time till the election.
I wouldn't be surprised if this is peak Harris.
She is largely dependent upon Trump becoming worse or suffering from set backs in his various trials and civil cases. The chances of that happening seem better than evens so I suspect Silver is not far off.
Realistically, the only major obstacle now for Trump trial-wise is the verdict in the NY case as the others are stalled / will be past-the election. Who knows how that will go.
Trump could melt down but it is fair to say we have been here before multiple times where people claim he is losing it, on his way out etc. The polling also has underestimated his support at the last elections.
I suspect @Eabhal is right, it feels like peak Harris. Jim Acosta at CNN had a go at her campaign manager for only offering one interview before the end of the month, and it is starting to be picked up by others. If I was Harris and truly feeling Trump was on the run, I would be interviewing like mad and hammering the points home.
I would have said that Peak Harris will likely be in the immediate aftermath of the DNC next week, but that now looks to be a bit of a nightmare for her with the ‘Palistine’ mob looking to disrupt proceedings. Trying to lock her away from the media only works for so long as well, there’s a limit to how long they’ll shill for someone who won’t even engage with them.
But that's precisely the point, the media wants her to engage with them - but she's dominating the agenda now without them - and she will next week because of the DNC too. So why waste her time or effort, or the opportunity, of the media engagement?
After the DNC will be the time to get major interviews in, at which point the media will love the fact they're getting the attention they want.
Waste that opportunity now and it won't be as effective post-DNC to have a second interview.
Managing the media is smart politics. In 2016 Trump was a master of getting free media attention without paying for advertising, now Harris is outclassing him and complaints about it just show what a good job she is doing.
While I realise I could be accused of pot calling kettle black, Sandpit does tend to regurgitate the current GOP talking points.
I don't think it's unreasonable for a presidential candidate, who's had to bootstrap an entire campaign from scratch in the space of three weeks, to decide on how best to manage the limited time available.
"Before the end of the month", which is what she's said, pretty well matches your after the convention analysis.
And Sandpit's idea that the press are "shilling" for her seems fairly detached from what they're actually writing. (Setting aside the Time magazine piece which wound up the GOP.)
Fox NEws puts out a poll that supports their deeply held gut feeling?
I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you.
Carried out by Beacon Research/Shaw & Co. Research who are rated 2.8 stars (out of 3) on 538 pollster ratings, so can't just be dismissed.
It will be dismissed because it's good for "Trump".
Unforgivable on a betting site - particularly one that was founded to discuss the 2004 Kerry v Bush election - but that's where we're at.
My cynicism comes from the fact it's the perfect result for Fox news - it may be 100% accurate but it also 100% matches the result Fox would want to talk about..
The one thing I've picked up from this site is that US polling is awful compared to the UK..
I've also picked up that this site is terrible at discussing the US election dispassionately.
I think we can safely say that most people on here know a lot less about the US than they think they do.
I've lost a post but I was going to reply to @DougSeal that the other thing I've picked up from this site is that I don't know enough to sanely bet on the US elections, so I'm not going to.
The US is an insanely large and diverse country and far more different from the UK than most people realise. I lived there for 5 years but would still not claim any particular insight into it - especially the non-coastal portions.
During my Erasmus year in Germany, a long time ago, the British and American students were initially drawn together by their common language. I noticed, though, that after a little while, the Americans tended to stick with each other, while the Brits increasingly socialised with other Europeans. This brought home to me just how culturally different Americans are to Europeans, and that Brits generally have a more European than American worldview.
100% my experience too. Living in the US convinced me that the UK is just another European country.
Living in Australia convinced me the UK is more than just another European country.
That's because you probably get more TV/media etc. from the UK in Australia than any other European country. Same is true in Latin America vis a vis Spain and Portugal, Quebec in re France etc etc. We are, quite literally, just another European country. There's nowt special about us.
There's a bit more to it than that. The UK is a bit of an outlier; there are lots of ways that we are less European than continental countries. It might just be as trivial as having a border mostly fixed by where the land meets the sea.
But most of us are much more European-with-quirks than we are Ameri-Australi-Anglosphere. Not all of us, but most of us.
(There's a conversation somewhere between Stephen Fry and Craig Ferguson... I think it was in the latter's Letterman plus one hour talk show. They discussed the idea that because people became American by choice, that led to some selection bias. People who left Britain for the Anglosphere were different to those who stayed. Sounds pretty plausible to me.)
A lot of American culture comes from the fact that it is a nation of immigrants, self selected for a go getting attitude. Presumably this fades over time, perhaps why we are seeing the well documented collapse in morale and proliferation of addiction issues among parts of the population in the US heartlands, who over time are maybe reverting back to being a settled population. Perhaps for them the American dream, really a story about striving immigrants freed from the social constraints of the old country, has ended. Just like it never really started for groups who weren't self selected immigrants, like Native and African Americans. Australia is presumably a bit different because it started as a prison colony, ie the settlers were selected for poverty and criminality not a go getting attitude. The US also had indentured white prisoners sent over but it's a smaller proportion of the population I think. Also worth bearing in mind that most immigrants to the US were not British. There's a lot of German, Italian, Dutch, Scandi and Jewish human and cultural DNA in there, plus important Hispanic and Black influences. It's just a really big and complicated place and the British cultural influence is only part of the mix, and one that is diminishing all the time.
We've been saying that for weeks - both the school we talked about yesterday and the school Casino's children went to claimed that it's the VAT changes that are the reason when a close look shows serious problems that were exacerbated by the VAT change.
I do suspect the VAT change may be the trigger for schools closing but these initial closures will have significant other issues...
Excellent (paywalled) article on the recent riots. Some snippets:
UK needs no lessons from apologists for rioters
Those behind the rioting are not misguided social justice warriors, they are violent, far-right racists fortified by a general hooligan element that was up for a ruck and expected to face no consequences. Now they know better.
It is easy to mock Sir Keir Starmer for reverting to type as a former prosecutor but nearly 1,000 arrests and some rapid and tough sentences was the right response [to restore confidence in the law]
For all the vacuous “something must be donery” of many commentators there are real underlying issues. But even if you accept that the riots were about anything beyond violence, they have not changed the calculation. The answers are what they have always been: improved economic prospects, investment in skills to secure high-status blue-collar jobs, better housing, good public services. In fact, all the things Labour was elected to deliver.
For Starmer, these grim scenes have marred the start of his government. But the riots told us nothing we didn’t already know about the state of Britain except perhaps the value of a tough response, the true measure of the instigators and the cynicism of their apologists.
All that was needed to quell the riots was the swift response. The lengthy sentences are excessive: a week or two would suffice as deterrent. Contrast this with other crimes that appear to have no consequence because there is a year or more delay before reaching trial.
Yes and No IMO. The exemplary sentences deal with the rioters' assumption that lawlessness has no consequence for them. But it does result in a long hangover once the riot is in the past.
No, it is the speed of sentence that deals with rioters' assumption that lawlessness has no consequences. By contrast, any sentence after the more usual 6-18 months out on bail has little connection to the original crime because offenders, and more importantly their peers, will have seen them continue their normal lives after arrest and release.
Not sure where you need to draw the line. These are possibly longer than needed. I am pretty sure 2 to 3 week sentences as you suggest are too short to act as an immediate deterrent
And by the way my only objection to the longer sentences is a practical one. These are not nice people.
As a thought experiment, phone your boss and say you need the next three weeks off, starting tomorrow, because you will be in prison. My guess is you'd be down the JobCentre on your release. Phone a local recruitment agency, and ask how many jobs they've got that do not need a DBS check. How's your emergency fund looking now?
The thought experiment fails because I wouldn't take part in any of this violence, like most people who have regard for their community.
In any case 1 to 2 week sentences are completely out of line with guidelines for non riot situations - community sentence to 1 year prison or 1 to 3 years prison depending on whether you actually take part or merely incite. This really would be two tier sentencing
Fox NEws puts out a poll that supports their deeply held gut feeling?
I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you.
Carried out by Beacon Research/Shaw & Co. Research who are rated 2.8 stars (out of 3) on 538 pollster ratings, so can't just be dismissed.
It will be dismissed because it's good for "Trump".
Unforgivable on a betting site - particularly one that was founded to discuss the 2004 Kerry v Bush election - but that's where we're at.
My cynicism comes from the fact it's the perfect result for Fox news - it may be 100% accurate but it also 100% matches the result Fox would want to talk about..
The one thing I've picked up from this site is that US polling is awful compared to the UK..
I've also picked up that this site is terrible at discussing the US election dispassionately.
I think we can safely say that most people on here know a lot less about the US than they think they do.
I've lost a post but I was going to reply to @DougSeal that the other thing I've picked up from this site is that I don't know enough to sanely bet on the US elections, so I'm not going to.
The US is an insanely large and diverse country and far more different from the UK than most people realise. I lived there for 5 years but would still not claim any particular insight into it - especially the non-coastal portions.
During my Erasmus year in Germany, a long time ago, the British and American students were initially drawn together by their common language. I noticed, though, that after a little while, the Americans tended to stick with each other, while the Brits increasingly socialised with other Europeans. This brought home to me just how culturally different Americans are to Europeans, and that Brits generally have a more European than American worldview.
100% my experience too. Living in the US convinced me that the UK is just another European country.
Living in Australia convinced me the UK is more than just another European country.
That's because you probably get more TV/media etc. from the UK in Australia than any other European country. Same is true in Latin America vis a vis Spain and Portugal, Quebec in re France etc etc. We are, quite literally, just another European country. There's nowt special about us.
There's a bit more to it than that. The UK is a bit of an outlier; there are lots of ways that we are less European than continental countries. It might just be as trivial as having a border mostly fixed by where the land meets the sea.
But most of us are much more European-with-quirks than we are Ameri-Australi-Anglosphere. Not all of us, but most of us.
(There's a conversation somewhere between Stephen Fry and Craig Ferguson... I think it was in the latter's Letterman plus one hour talk show. They discussed the idea that because people became American by choice, that led to some selection bias. People who left Britain for the Anglosphere were different to those who stayed. Sounds pretty plausible to me.)
A lot of American culture comes from the fact that it is a nation of immigrants, self selected for a go getting attitude. Presumably this fades over time, perhaps why we are seeing the well documented collapse in morale and proliferation of addiction issues among parts of the population in the US heartlands, who over time are maybe reverting back to being a settled population. Perhaps for them the American dream, really a story about striving immigrants freed from the social constraints of the old country, has ended. Just like it never really started for groups who weren't self selected immigrants, like Native and African Americans. Australia is presumably a bit different because it started as a prison colony, ie the settlers were selected for poverty and criminality not a go getting attitude. The US also had indentured white prisoners sent over but it's a smaller proportion of the population I think. Also worth bearing in mind that most immigrants to the US were not British. There's a lot of German, Italian, Dutch, Scandi and Jewish human and cultural DNA in there, plus important Hispanic and Black influences. It's just a really big and complicated place and the British cultural influence is only part of the mix, and one that is diminishing all the time.
The American dream is also a bit of a Con Job. Although there are a few exceptions, the vast majority of the wealth and political power is in the hands of families that have had that wealth and power for a couple of hundred years. They have, somehow, convinced people that if they are not wealthy it is their own fault, and if they just work a bit harder generating more wealth for the wealthy, they might just "break through". They won't.
However, the flip side of that is that the US has been, and still is, a fantastic gateway to *comparative* wealth for new immigrants, largely at the expense of the previous generation of immigrants.
Excellent (paywalled) article on the recent riots. Some snippets:
UK needs no lessons from apologists for rioters
Those behind the rioting are not misguided social justice warriors, they are violent, far-right racists fortified by a general hooligan element that was up for a ruck and expected to face no consequences. Now they know better.
It is easy to mock Sir Keir Starmer for reverting to type as a former prosecutor but nearly 1,000 arrests and some rapid and tough sentences was the right response [to restore confidence in the law]
For all the vacuous “something must be donery” of many commentators there are real underlying issues. But even if you accept that the riots were about anything beyond violence, they have not changed the calculation. The answers are what they have always been: improved economic prospects, investment in skills to secure high-status blue-collar jobs, better housing, good public services. In fact, all the things Labour was elected to deliver.
For Starmer, these grim scenes have marred the start of his government. But the riots told us nothing we didn’t already know about the state of Britain except perhaps the value of a tough response, the true measure of the instigators and the cynicism of their apologists.
All that was needed to quell the riots was the swift response. The lengthy sentences are excessive: a week or two would suffice as deterrent. Contrast this with other crimes that appear to have no consequence because there is a year or more delay before reaching trial.
Yes, it shows what can be done. Let's start to treat other crimes as seriously.
To be fair, when people plead guilty at the first available opportunity, it's easy to sentence them and to send them to jail.
The problems occur when people actually want trials with barristers and witnesses and judges and juries and all.
Juries are immediately available; there is a constant flow of new jurors. Likewise judges. Barristers might need time to prepare their cases for prosecution or defence, but often have only a week, but a week that starts 18 months later. And of course, delays give time for witnesses' memories to fade.
Juries may be available to be pulled into a 5 day court case but Judges, barristers and court rooms will be booked months in advance...
For reference I'm currently aware that first Tax tribunals are now booking for January to March 2026...
Those are capacity issues. The rate of flow is the same.
ETA of course you are right there is no easy fix but a determined government ought to be able to fix the backlog over two or three years.
Only if there is excess capacity in the system to allow more cases to be processed quickly. So given spare judges, court rooms and barristers we may be able to fix the backlog - without all 3 you won't be able to..
Here's the thing: the most successful political candidates are blank slates onto whom voters project their own views.
So, why would Kamala allow herself to get bogged down in policy and take on interviews? What's she got to gain? Her job is to keep reemphasizing Project 2025, and abortion, and danger to democracy, and Trump's blocking of a bipartisan border bill. She should stay well away from actual policy, and certainly shouldn't sit down for interviews with journalists. What does she have to gain?
She also benefits - right now - from a Trump campaign that seems completely flat footed. Thinking of Trump in 2016, I am reminded of the Ollivander quote about Voldemort "terrible thing... great but terrible...". And he was. Trump was a mental force to be reckoned with, he belittled and dismantled opponents without difficulty.
This time around, he's had one debate... with someone suffering from the early stages of dementia.
He hasn't gone through any cut and thrust with fellow Republicans, he's just landed in the role. And he's not the man he was eight years ago.
It is astonishing, though, that we're having this discussion. The US should be getting rid of the incumbent party because voters have had a pretty shit four years (as has happened across the developed world). The fact that it looks like Harris is the narrow favourite right now is a testament to just how poor Trump is as a candidate in 2024.
A sane Republican would absolutely walk this.
Nikki Haley was correct in that the first party to dump Trump / Biden was going to win.
the Democrats dumped Biden, the Republicans are stuck with Trump whose flaws are now obvious because while he was better than Biden he's worse than anyone else.
Re comments on Democrats winning the House and Senate.
The former looks entirely possible. It’s on a knife edge anyway.
The Senate likely all comes down to Montana. They are generally polling ahead in the other close races I think, and WV is gone. So Tester winning would produce a 50-50 Senate and VP casting vote. At the moment, I think Tester is polling slightly behind.
I’m not sure they’ll be too upset with a 49-51 Senate though. The filibuster sadly probably remains, but they’ll have Murkowski and Collins on the GOP side who will probably get them where they need to be on nominations etc.
Dems are behind in Montana. But even if they win there, there are a few other very close races they would need to hold to keep it 50-50.
Some say Dems have a 'tough map this year'. Which is kind of true. But the truth is the whole Senate map of 50 states is tough for the Dems. There are simply more red states than blue states. And as the phenomenon of Dem senators in red states slowly disappears, it's going to be very hard for the Dems to get a Senate majority in any election where the national vote is close-ish.
Which is why its ridiculous they've not made DC and Puerto Rico states, both of which deserve to be states.
The latter would be a purple state, but a purple one they could win in a good year.
It was a deliberate choice by the founders that Washington was not a state
Fox NEws puts out a poll that supports their deeply held gut feeling?
I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you.
Carried out by Beacon Research/Shaw & Co. Research who are rated 2.8 stars (out of 3) on 538 pollster ratings, so can't just be dismissed.
It will be dismissed because it's good for "Trump".
Unforgivable on a betting site - particularly one that was founded to discuss the 2004 Kerry v Bush election - but that's where we're at.
My cynicism comes from the fact it's the perfect result for Fox news - it may be 100% accurate but it also 100% matches the result Fox would want to talk about..
The one thing I've picked up from this site is that US polling is awful compared to the UK..
I've also picked up that this site is terrible at discussing the US election dispassionately.
FWIW I think Harris remains a pretty weak candidate (particularly her speeches, and I don't think there is a guarantee she'll be any good in the debate), and therefore the Democrat campaign is reliant on good vibes and Walz being American Dad. That might be enough but it's a long time till the election.
I wouldn't be surprised if this is peak Harris.
Harris will be the third president in a row to be a one-term president who ranks in the bottom quintile of presidents overall, and who is there largely because her opponent is so dreadful. Still, I'd take that from here.
Those on here who are of a politically conservative disposition do raise an eyebrow when even before the election of a national leader who is not of a conservative disposition are confident that, should the national leader not of a conservative disposition be elected ( e.g. Starmer/ Harris) they will be a one term only leader ( they may be correct of course). Yet back in the distant days of December 2019 these same posters were mulling over, with some confidence, Boris Johnson's second, third and fourth terms, particularly from the following April against Captain Hindsight/ Sir Softie.
Sir Crasherooni Snoozefest!
That was the most ludicrously pathetic slur. I wonder what utter unimaginative clown came up with that.
In all fairness to DJT his troll-names are far more imaginative and effective than the genius Johnson. "Crooked Hillary", " Sleepy Joe", "Pocahontas", "Low Energy Jeb" and "Little Marco".
He's running dry now though. Reduced to recycling. He'd like to do a 'Pocahontas' type one for Harris but he knows he can't. Must be frustrating.
We've been saying that for weeks - both the school we talked about yesterday and the school Casino's children went to claimed that it's the VAT changes that are the reason when a close look shows serious problems that were exacerbated by the VAT change.
I do suspect the VAT change may be the trigger for schools closing but these initial closures will have significant other issues...
"You don’t find out who’s been swimming naked until the tide goes out"
Excellent (paywalled) article on the recent riots. Some snippets:
UK needs no lessons from apologists for rioters
Those behind the rioting are not misguided social justice warriors, they are violent, far-right racists fortified by a general hooligan element that was up for a ruck and expected to face no consequences. Now they know better.
It is easy to mock Sir Keir Starmer for reverting to type as a former prosecutor but nearly 1,000 arrests and some rapid and tough sentences was the right response [to restore confidence in the law]
For all the vacuous “something must be donery” of many commentators there are real underlying issues. But even if you accept that the riots were about anything beyond violence, they have not changed the calculation. The answers are what they have always been: improved economic prospects, investment in skills to secure high-status blue-collar jobs, better housing, good public services. In fact, all the things Labour was elected to deliver.
For Starmer, these grim scenes have marred the start of his government. But the riots told us nothing we didn’t already know about the state of Britain except perhaps the value of a tough response, the true measure of the instigators and the cynicism of their apologists.
All that was needed to quell the riots was the swift response. The lengthy sentences are excessive: a week or two would suffice as deterrent. Contrast this with other crimes that appear to have no consequence because there is a year or more delay before reaching trial.
Yes, it shows what can be done. Let's start to treat other crimes as seriously.
To be fair, when people plead guilty at the first available opportunity, it's easy to sentence them and to send them to jail.
The problems occur when people actually want trials with barristers and witnesses and judges and juries and all.
If they'd pleaded not guilty wouldn't they have been held on remand till a jury trial could have been scheduled - which may have been... a while ?
I think some of the sentences for the keyboard warriors are chilling fwiw.
Re comments on Democrats winning the House and Senate.
The former looks entirely possible. It’s on a knife edge anyway.
The Senate likely all comes down to Montana. They are generally polling ahead in the other close races I think, and WV is gone. So Tester winning would produce a 50-50 Senate and VP casting vote. At the moment, I think Tester is polling slightly behind.
I’m not sure they’ll be too upset with a 49-51 Senate though. The filibuster sadly probably remains, but they’ll have Murkowski and Collins on the GOP side who will probably get them where they need to be on nominations etc.
Dems are behind in Montana. But even if they win there, there are a few other very close races they would need to hold to keep it 50-50.
Some say Dems have a 'tough map this year'. Which is kind of true. But the truth is the whole Senate map of 50 states is tough for the Dems. There are simply more red states than blue states. And as the phenomenon of Dem senators in red states slowly disappears, it's going to be very hard for the Dems to get a Senate majority in any election where the national vote is close-ish.
Which is why its ridiculous they've not made DC and Puerto Rico states, both of which deserve to be states.
The latter would be a purple state, but a purple one they could win in a good year.
Please fuck off you lying Hitler-apologist. Thanks.
I clearly didn't get the memo about the New Civility....
Quite. I’ve taken breaks from here after I nearly crossed the line and I suggest others do too. I sometimes forget, and it appears others do to, that there are humans* on the other end of this here internet.
Excellent (paywalled) article on the recent riots. Some snippets:
UK needs no lessons from apologists for rioters
Those behind the rioting are not misguided social justice warriors, they are violent, far-right racists fortified by a general hooligan element that was up for a ruck and expected to face no consequences. Now they know better.
It is easy to mock Sir Keir Starmer for reverting to type as a former prosecutor but nearly 1,000 arrests and some rapid and tough sentences was the right response [to restore confidence in the law]
For all the vacuous “something must be donery” of many commentators there are real underlying issues. But even if you accept that the riots were about anything beyond violence, they have not changed the calculation. The answers are what they have always been: improved economic prospects, investment in skills to secure high-status blue-collar jobs, better housing, good public services. In fact, all the things Labour was elected to deliver.
For Starmer, these grim scenes have marred the start of his government. But the riots told us nothing we didn’t already know about the state of Britain except perhaps the value of a tough response, the true measure of the instigators and the cynicism of their apologists.
All that was needed to quell the riots was the swift response. The lengthy sentences are excessive: a week or two would suffice as deterrent. Contrast this with other crimes that appear to have no consequence because there is a year or more delay before reaching trial.
Yes and No IMO. The exemplary sentences deal with the rioters' assumption that lawlessness has no consequence for them. But it does result in a long hangover once the riot is in the past.
No, it is the speed of sentence that deals with rioters' assumption that lawlessness has no consequences. By contrast, any sentence after the more usual 6-18 months out on bail has little connection to the original crime because offenders, and more importantly their peers, will have seen them continue their normal lives after arrest and release.
Not sure where you need to draw the line. These are possibly longer than needed. I am pretty sure 2 to 3 week sentences as you suggest are too short to act as an immediate deterrent
And by the way my only objection to the longer sentences is a practical one. These are not nice people.
As a thought experiment, phone your boss and say you need the next three weeks off, starting tomorrow, because you will be in prison. My guess is you'd be down the JobCentre on your release. Phone a local recruitment agency, and ask how many jobs they've got that do not need a DBS check. How's your emergency fund looking now?
The thought experiment fails because I wouldn't take part in any of this violence, like most people who have regard for their community.
In any case 1 to 2 week sentences are completely out of line with guidelines for non riot situations - community sentence to 1 year prison or 1 to 3 years prison depending on whether you actually take part or merely incite. This really would be two tier sentencing
Not all the rioters rioted. Some were keyboard warriors, who might or might not have inflamed the situation on the streets. (On the subject of two tier justice, I do not suppose Jess Phillips MP or Richard Tice MP will be getting their collars felt for their social media contributions.)
We've been saying that for weeks - both the school we talked about yesterday and the school Casino's children went to claimed that it's the VAT changes that are the reason when a close look shows serious problems that were exacerbated by the VAT change.
I do suspect the VAT change may be the trigger for schools closing but these initial closures will have significant other issues...
"You don’t find out who’s been swimming naked until the tide goes out"
Fox NEws puts out a poll that supports their deeply held gut feeling?
I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you.
Carried out by Beacon Research/Shaw & Co. Research who are rated 2.8 stars (out of 3) on 538 pollster ratings, so can't just be dismissed.
It will be dismissed because it's good for "Trump".
Unforgivable on a betting site - particularly one that was founded to discuss the 2004 Kerry v Bush election - but that's where we're at.
My cynicism comes from the fact it's the perfect result for Fox news - it may be 100% accurate but it also 100% matches the result Fox would want to talk about..
The one thing I've picked up from this site is that US polling is awful compared to the UK..
I've also picked up that this site is terrible at discussing the US election dispassionately.
I think we can safely say that most people on here know a lot less about the US than they think they do.
I've lost a post but I was going to reply to @DougSeal that the other thing I've picked up from this site is that I don't know enough to sanely bet on the US elections, so I'm not going to.
The US is an insanely large and diverse country and far more different from the UK than most people realise. I lived there for 5 years but would still not claim any particular insight into it - especially the non-coastal portions.
During my Erasmus year in Germany, a long time ago, the British and American students were initially drawn together by their common language. I noticed, though, that after a little while, the Americans tended to stick with each other, while the Brits increasingly socialised with other Europeans. This brought home to me just how culturally different Americans are to Europeans, and that Brits generally have a more European than American worldview.
100% my experience too. Living in the US convinced me that the UK is just another European country.
Living in Australia convinced me the UK is more than just another European country.
That's because you probably get more TV/media etc. from the UK in Australia than any other European country. Same is true in Latin America vis a vis Spain and Portugal, Quebec in re France etc etc. We are, quite literally, just another European country. There's nowt special about us.
There's a bit more to it than that. The UK is a bit of an outlier; there are lots of ways that we are less European than continental countries. It might just be as trivial as having a border mostly fixed by where the land meets the sea.
But most of us are much more European-with-quirks than we are Ameri-Australi-Anglosphere. Not all of us, but most of us.
(There's a conversation somewhere between Stephen Fry and Craig Ferguson... I think it was in the latter's Letterman plus one hour talk show. They discussed the idea that because people became American by choice, that led to some selection bias. People who left Britain for the Anglosphere were different to those who stayed. Sounds pretty plausible to me.)
A lot of American culture comes from the fact that it is a nation of immigrants, self selected for a go getting attitude. Presumably this fades over time, perhaps why we are seeing the well documented collapse in morale and proliferation of addiction issues among parts of the population in the US heartlands, who over time are maybe reverting back to being a settled population. Perhaps for them the American dream, really a story about striving immigrants freed from the social constraints of the old country, has ended. Just like it never really started for groups who weren't self selected immigrants, like Native and African Americans. Australia is presumably a bit different because it started as a prison colony, ie the settlers were selected for poverty and criminality not a go getting attitude. The US also had indentured white prisoners sent over but it's a smaller proportion of the population I think. Also worth bearing in mind that most immigrants to the US were not British. There's a lot of German, Italian, Dutch, Scandi and Jewish human and cultural DNA in there, plus important Hispanic and Black influences. It's just a really big and complicated place and the British cultural influence is only part of the mix, and one that is diminishing all the time.
The American dream is also a bit of a Con Job. Although there are a few exceptions, the vast majority of the wealth and political power is in the hands of families that have had that wealth and power for a couple of hundred years. They have, somehow, convinced people that if they are not wealthy it is their own fault, and if they just work a bit harder generating more wealth for the wealthy, they might just "break through". They won't.
However, the flip side of that is that the US has been, and still is, a fantastic gateway to *comparative* wealth for new immigrants, largely at the expense of the previous generation of immigrants.
A lot of it is nonsense but yes, there is a kernel of truth to it. There is a feeling of optimism and promise in American culture that is very attractive. I was tempted to stay there. The flip side is an aggression and harshness that is quite ugly and gives rise to the country's may odd pathologies. It is an endlessly fascinating place though.
Excellent (paywalled) article on the recent riots. Some snippets:
UK needs no lessons from apologists for rioters
Those behind the rioting are not misguided social justice warriors, they are violent, far-right racists fortified by a general hooligan element that was up for a ruck and expected to face no consequences. Now they know better.
It is easy to mock Sir Keir Starmer for reverting to type as a former prosecutor but nearly 1,000 arrests and some rapid and tough sentences was the right response [to restore confidence in the law]
For all the vacuous “something must be donery” of many commentators there are real underlying issues. But even if you accept that the riots were about anything beyond violence, they have not changed the calculation. The answers are what they have always been: improved economic prospects, investment in skills to secure high-status blue-collar jobs, better housing, good public services. In fact, all the things Labour was elected to deliver.
For Starmer, these grim scenes have marred the start of his government. But the riots told us nothing we didn’t already know about the state of Britain except perhaps the value of a tough response, the true measure of the instigators and the cynicism of their apologists.
All that was needed to quell the riots was the swift response. The lengthy sentences are excessive: a week or two would suffice as deterrent. Contrast this with other crimes that appear to have no consequence because there is a year or more delay before reaching trial.
Yes and No IMO. The exemplary sentences deal with the rioters' assumption that lawlessness has no consequence for them. But it does result in a long hangover once the riot is in the past.
No, it is the speed of sentence that deals with rioters' assumption that lawlessness has no consequences. By contrast, any sentence after the more usual 6-18 months out on bail has little connection to the original crime because offenders, and more importantly their peers, will have seen them continue their normal lives after arrest and release.
Not sure where you need to draw the line. These are possibly longer than needed. I am pretty sure 2 to 3 week sentences as you suggest are too short to act as an immediate deterrent
And by the way my only objection to the longer sentences is a practical one. These are not nice people.
As a thought experiment, phone your boss and say you need the next three weeks off, starting tomorrow, because you will be in prison. My guess is you'd be down the JobCentre on your release. Phone a local recruitment agency, and ask how many jobs they've got that do not need a DBS check. How's your emergency fund looking now?
The thought experiment fails because I wouldn't take part in any of this violence, like most people who have regard for their community.
In any case 1 to 2 week sentences are completely out of line with guidelines for non riot situations - community sentence to 1 year prison or 1 to 3 years prison depending on whether you actually take part or merely incite. This really would be two tier sentencing
Not all the rioters rioted. Some were keyboard warriors, who might or might not have inflamed the situation on the streets. (On the subject of two tier justice, I do not suppose Jess Phillips MP or Richard Tice MP will be getting their collars felt for their social media contributions.)
And they would be category 3, culpability C in the guidelines I posted. Normal non riot starting point sentence 6 months imprisonment.
We've been saying that for weeks - both the school we talked about yesterday and the school Casino's children went to claimed that it's the VAT changes that are the reason when a close look shows serious problems that were exacerbated by the VAT change.
I do suspect the VAT change may be the trigger for schools closing but these initial closures will have significant other issues...
Nearly nothing happens from a single cause. The real world is almost always more complex than that.
The question is whether the school closures will increase from normal. And/or whether private school formation dips.
As ever, we will know what happened, in hindsight.
Popular with women in the hiking/cycling/climbing/backpacking world. They work really well for hostels and campsites, even dodgy river crossings.
For this reason I've stated to associate them with people I find attractive. Eeeek.
Most terrifying part of my recent abdominal abscess surgery was the doctor who was going to operate on me came to visit me before surgery was wearing Crocs.
Re comments on Democrats winning the House and Senate.
The former looks entirely possible. It’s on a knife edge anyway.
The Senate likely all comes down to Montana. They are generally polling ahead in the other close races I think, and WV is gone. So Tester winning would produce a 50-50 Senate and VP casting vote. At the moment, I think Tester is polling slightly behind.
I’m not sure they’ll be too upset with a 49-51 Senate though. The filibuster sadly probably remains, but they’ll have Murkowski and Collins on the GOP side who will probably get them where they need to be on nominations etc.
Dems are behind in Montana. But even if they win there, there are a few other very close races they would need to hold to keep it 50-50.
Some say Dems have a 'tough map this year'. Which is kind of true. But the truth is the whole Senate map of 50 states is tough for the Dems. There are simply more red states than blue states. And as the phenomenon of Dem senators in red states slowly disappears, it's going to be very hard for the Dems to get a Senate majority in any election where the national vote is close-ish.
Which is why its ridiculous they've not made DC and Puerto Rico states, both of which deserve to be states.
The latter would be a purple state, but a purple one they could win in a good year.
It was a deliberate choice by the founders that Washington was not a state
It was a deliberate choice to maintain the institution of slavery. It doesn't mean it can't be changed.
And the Article IV process for admitting a new state is massively simpler than that for amending the Constitution. New States may be admitted by the Congress into this Union; but no new State shall be formed or erected within the Jurisdiction of any other State; nor any State be formed by the Junction of two or more States, or Parts of States, without the Consent of the Legislatures of the States concerned as well as of the Congress.
So on OGH's last holiday Nicola Sturgeon was arrested and today The Times reports
Nicola Sturgeon still under investigation in SNP finances inquiry
Operation Branchform was triggered in July 2021 after complaints relating to more than £600,000 of donations given to the SNP
Nicola Sturgeon is still under investigation as part of an inquiry into the SNP’s finances, Scotland’s chief constable has confirmed.
Jo Farrell refused to say when Operation Branchform, the police investigation into the funding and finances of the SNP, will end. The inquiry was triggered in July 2021 after complaints were made relating to more than £600,000 of donations given to the SNP to fight a new independence referendum campaign.
I’m sure they can stretch it out till 08/05/26 if they really, really try.
I've just been cited for court for something that happened in 2021. Will be late this year/next year. The police officer who phoned me about it couldn't help laughing about ridiculous the situation is.
In the High Court, where I work, that is about average unless the accused is in custody in which case it would be slightly faster. In the Sheriff court, where less serious matters are dealt with, that seems extraordinarily slow.
SKS really is doing something right, then, down here he's cleared up the backlog so people are getting jailed within bare weeks of their crimes!
Difference between proper crown court trials and magistrates courts.
Mags can only do 12 months, right? And people have been getting multiple years? (I missed a lot of the details, I was away for a couple of weeks).
Excellent (paywalled) article on the recent riots. Some snippets:
UK needs no lessons from apologists for rioters
Those behind the rioting are not misguided social justice warriors, they are violent, far-right racists fortified by a general hooligan element that was up for a ruck and expected to face no consequences. Now they know better.
It is easy to mock Sir Keir Starmer for reverting to type as a former prosecutor but nearly 1,000 arrests and some rapid and tough sentences was the right response [to restore confidence in the law]
For all the vacuous “something must be donery” of many commentators there are real underlying issues. But even if you accept that the riots were about anything beyond violence, they have not changed the calculation. The answers are what they have always been: improved economic prospects, investment in skills to secure high-status blue-collar jobs, better housing, good public services. In fact, all the things Labour was elected to deliver.
For Starmer, these grim scenes have marred the start of his government. But the riots told us nothing we didn’t already know about the state of Britain except perhaps the value of a tough response, the true measure of the instigators and the cynicism of their apologists.
All that was needed to quell the riots was the swift response. The lengthy sentences are excessive: a week or two would suffice as deterrent. Contrast this with other crimes that appear to have no consequence because there is a year or more delay before reaching trial.
Yes, it shows what can be done. Let's start to treat other crimes as seriously.
To be fair, when people plead guilty at the first available opportunity, it's easy to sentence them and to send them to jail.
The problems occur when people actually want trials with barristers and witnesses and judges and juries and all.
Juries are immediately available; there is a constant flow of new jurors. Likewise judges. Barristers might need time to prepare their cases for prosecution or defence, but often have only a week, but a week that starts 18 months later. And of course, delays give time for witnesses' memories to fade.
Juries may be available to be pulled into a 5 day court case but Judges, barristers and court rooms will be booked months in advance...
For reference I'm currently aware that first Tax tribunals are now booking for January to March 2026...
Those are capacity issues. The rate of flow is the same.
ETA of course you are right there is no easy fix but a determined government ought to be able to fix the backlog over two or three years.
Only if there is excess capacity in the system to allow more cases to be processed quickly. So given spare judges, court rooms and barristers we may be able to fix the backlog - without all 3 you won't be able to..
Court rooms can be conjured out of thin air; they are just buildings. Judges and barristers could work slightly longer hours; retired lawyers called in. Bureaucracy smoothed over.
OK, that sounds glib, and I cannot know the details. But something similar was done during the Covid pandemic with both doctors on the one hand, and vaccine production on the other. Schools adapted quickly to remote teaching, and WFH became commonplace at least for white collar workers.
Fox NEws puts out a poll that supports their deeply held gut feeling?
I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you.
Carried out by Beacon Research/Shaw & Co. Research who are rated 2.8 stars (out of 3) on 538 pollster ratings, so can't just be dismissed.
It will be dismissed because it's good for "Trump".
Unforgivable on a betting site - particularly one that was founded to discuss the 2004 Kerry v Bush election - but that's where we're at.
My cynicism comes from the fact it's the perfect result for Fox news - it may be 100% accurate but it also 100% matches the result Fox would want to talk about..
The one thing I've picked up from this site is that US polling is awful compared to the UK..
I'm not sure that's entirely true. I might do a check of US vs UK polling for 2024 vs US 2020 in a bit.
Errors from the last month of polling across all pollsters for the final month of campaign (Oct 2020 US, June 2024 UK)
Con -3.3% Lab +6.08% LD -1.47% Green -0.89% Reform +0.89%
Trump -4.83% Biden -0.03%
AVERAGE of Sum of SQRT (ERROR^2)
Con 3.5% Lab 6.08%
Trump 4.85% Biden 1.71%
So actually the US polling for their last big election was better than ours.
Note Labour is identical on both scores because they were overestimated by every single poll.
Slight point of order
This is not quite a measure of polling error, as 1 month of polls allows polling drift as well as error to creep in.
That averaging serves well for the anticipation of what might occur in a future election, i.e. the discussion at hand, but that is not 'error' as such.
For instance, the 'error' between last polls taken within a few days of GE24 and the actual Labour result was, by my reckoning, 4.08% rather than 6.08%*. Still a miss beyond MoE, but somewhat less.
* 18 pollsters took final, non MRP, polls within a week of GE24 and Lab average was 38.78% GB (Savanta adjusted up by 1% as they were UK), their actual GB vote share was 34.7%.
Re comments on Democrats winning the House and Senate.
The former looks entirely possible. It’s on a knife edge anyway.
The Senate likely all comes down to Montana. They are generally polling ahead in the other close races I think, and WV is gone. So Tester winning would produce a 50-50 Senate and VP casting vote. At the moment, I think Tester is polling slightly behind.
I’m not sure they’ll be too upset with a 49-51 Senate though. The filibuster sadly probably remains, but they’ll have Murkowski and Collins on the GOP side who will probably get them where they need to be on nominations etc.
Dems are behind in Montana. But even if they win there, there are a few other very close races they would need to hold to keep it 50-50.
Some say Dems have a 'tough map this year'. Which is kind of true. But the truth is the whole Senate map of 50 states is tough for the Dems. There are simply more red states than blue states. And as the phenomenon of Dem senators in red states slowly disappears, it's going to be very hard for the Dems to get a Senate majority in any election where the national vote is close-ish.
Which is why its ridiculous they've not made DC and Puerto Rico states, both of which deserve to be states.
The latter would be a purple state, but a purple one they could win in a good year.
It was a deliberate choice by the founders that Washington was not a state
It was also a deliberate choice by the founders to enable new states to be created.
It was not a deliberate choice by the founders to have more population than either Wyoming (which the founders didn't know about) or Vermont disenfranchised outside of statehood.
Redefining the capital territory as the uninhabited land spanning the White House, US Congress etc while admitting the rest of the inhabited territory as a new state would be entirely plausible and reasonable.
I hope all the A level students in people's lives got the grades they were hoping for. Our daughter got the grades she needed to study maths and philosophy at Oxford so we are very proud parents this morning.
Nice! I recommend she doesn’t waste money on joining the Oxford Union however hard she’s persuaded. First mistake I made.
Although when you are in Oxford it’s really convenient if you need a whizz
Fox NEws puts out a poll that supports their deeply held gut feeling?
I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you.
Carried out by Beacon Research/Shaw & Co. Research who are rated 2.8 stars (out of 3) on 538 pollster ratings, so can't just be dismissed.
It will be dismissed because it's good for "Trump".
Unforgivable on a betting site - particularly one that was founded to discuss the 2004 Kerry v Bush election - but that's where we're at.
My cynicism comes from the fact it's the perfect result for Fox news - it may be 100% accurate but it also 100% matches the result Fox would want to talk about..
The one thing I've picked up from this site is that US polling is awful compared to the UK..
I'm not sure that's entirely true. I might do a check of US vs UK polling for 2024 vs US 2020 in a bit.
Errors from the last month of polling across all pollsters for the final month of campaign (Oct 2020 US, June 2024 UK)
Con -3.3% Lab +6.08% LD -1.47% Green -0.89% Reform +0.89%
Trump -4.83% Biden -0.03%
AVERAGE of Sum of SQRT (ERROR^2)
Con 3.5% Lab 6.08%
Trump 4.85% Biden 1.71%
So actually the US polling for their last big election was better than ours.
Note Labour is identical on both scores because they were overestimated by every single poll.
Slight point of order
This is not quite a measure of polling error, as 1 month of polls allows polling drift as well as error to creep in.
That averaging serves well for the anticipation of what might occur in a future election, i.e. the discussion at hand, but that is not 'error' as such.
For instance, the 'error' between last polls taken within a few days of GE24 and the actual Labour result was, by my reckoning, 4.08% rather than 6.08%*. Still a miss beyond MoE, but somewhat less.
* 18 pollsters took final, non MRP, polls within a week of GE24 and Lab average was 38.78% GB (Savanta adjusted up by 1% as they were UK), their actual GB vote share was 34.7%.
Well we're further out than that now to the US election so ?
Fox NEws puts out a poll that supports their deeply held gut feeling?
I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you.
Carried out by Beacon Research/Shaw & Co. Research who are rated 2.8 stars (out of 3) on 538 pollster ratings, so can't just be dismissed.
It will be dismissed because it's good for "Trump".
Unforgivable on a betting site - particularly one that was founded to discuss the 2004 Kerry v Bush election - but that's where we're at.
My cynicism comes from the fact it's the perfect result for Fox news - it may be 100% accurate but it also 100% matches the result Fox would want to talk about..
The one thing I've picked up from this site is that US polling is awful compared to the UK..
I'm not sure that's entirely true. I might do a check of US vs UK polling for 2024 vs US 2020 in a bit.
Errors from the last month of polling across all pollsters for the final month of campaign (Oct 2020 US, June 2024 UK)
Con -3.3% Lab +6.08% LD -1.47% Green -0.89% Reform +0.89%
Trump -4.83% Biden -0.03%
AVERAGE of Sum of SQRT (ERROR^2)
Con 3.5% Lab 6.08%
Trump 4.85% Biden 1.71%
So actually the US polling for their last big election was better than ours.
Note Labour is identical on both scores because they were overestimated by every single poll.
Slight point of order
This is not quite a measure of polling error, as 1 month of polls allows polling drift as well as error to creep in.
That averaging serves well for the anticipation of what might occur in a future election, i.e. the discussion at hand, but that is not 'error' as such.
For instance, the 'error' between last polls taken within a few days of GE24 and the actual Labour result was, by my reckoning, 4.08% rather than 6.08%*. Still a miss beyond MoE, but somewhat less.
* 18 pollsters took final, non MRP, polls within a week of GE24 and Lab average was 38.78% GB (Savanta adjusted up by 1% as they were UK), their actual GB vote share was 34.7%.
Well we're further out than that now to the US election so ?
Re comments on Democrats winning the House and Senate.
The former looks entirely possible. It’s on a knife edge anyway.
The Senate likely all comes down to Montana. They are generally polling ahead in the other close races I think, and WV is gone. So Tester winning would produce a 50-50 Senate and VP casting vote. At the moment, I think Tester is polling slightly behind.
I’m not sure they’ll be too upset with a 49-51 Senate though. The filibuster sadly probably remains, but they’ll have Murkowski and Collins on the GOP side who will probably get them where they need to be on nominations etc.
Dems are behind in Montana. But even if they win there, there are a few other very close races they would need to hold to keep it 50-50.
Some say Dems have a 'tough map this year'. Which is kind of true. But the truth is the whole Senate map of 50 states is tough for the Dems. There are simply more red states than blue states. And as the phenomenon of Dem senators in red states slowly disappears, it's going to be very hard for the Dems to get a Senate majority in any election where the national vote is close-ish.
Which is why its ridiculous they've not made DC and Puerto Rico states, both of which deserve to be states.
The latter would be a purple state, but a purple one they could win in a good year.
It was a deliberate choice by the founders that Washington was not a state
It was also a deliberate choice by the founders to enable new states to be created.
It was not a deliberate choice by the founders to have more population than either Wyoming (which the founders didn't know about) or Vermont disenfranchised outside of statehood.
Redefining the capital territory as the uninhabited land spanning the White House, US Congress etc while admitting the rest of the inhabited territory as a new state would be entirely plausible and reasonable.
We’re all ignoring the elephant in the room. The British Isles should join the union.
We've been saying that for weeks - both the school we talked about yesterday and the school Casino's children went to claimed that it's the VAT changes that are the reason when a close look shows serious problems that were exacerbated by the VAT change.
I do suspect the VAT change may be the trigger for schools closing but these initial closures will have significant other issues...
"You don’t find out who’s been swimming naked until the tide goes out"
Excellent (paywalled) article on the recent riots. Some snippets:
UK needs no lessons from apologists for rioters
Those behind the rioting are not misguided social justice warriors, they are violent, far-right racists fortified by a general hooligan element that was up for a ruck and expected to face no consequences. Now they know better.
It is easy to mock Sir Keir Starmer for reverting to type as a former prosecutor but nearly 1,000 arrests and some rapid and tough sentences was the right response [to restore confidence in the law]
For all the vacuous “something must be donery” of many commentators there are real underlying issues. But even if you accept that the riots were about anything beyond violence, they have not changed the calculation. The answers are what they have always been: improved economic prospects, investment in skills to secure high-status blue-collar jobs, better housing, good public services. In fact, all the things Labour was elected to deliver.
For Starmer, these grim scenes have marred the start of his government. But the riots told us nothing we didn’t already know about the state of Britain except perhaps the value of a tough response, the true measure of the instigators and the cynicism of their apologists.
All that was needed to quell the riots was the swift response. The lengthy sentences are excessive: a week or two would suffice as deterrent. Contrast this with other crimes that appear to have no consequence because there is a year or more delay before reaching trial.
Yes, it shows what can be done. Let's start to treat other crimes as seriously.
To be fair, when people plead guilty at the first available opportunity, it's easy to sentence them and to send them to jail.
The problems occur when people actually want trials with barristers and witnesses and judges and juries and all.
Juries are immediately available; there is a constant flow of new jurors. Likewise judges. Barristers might need time to prepare their cases for prosecution or defence, but often have only a week, but a week that starts 18 months later. And of course, delays give time for witnesses' memories to fade.
Juries may be available to be pulled into a 5 day court case but Judges, barristers and court rooms will be booked months in advance...
For reference I'm currently aware that first Tax tribunals are now booking for January to March 2026...
Those are capacity issues. The rate of flow is the same.
ETA of course you are right there is no easy fix but a determined government ought to be able to fix the backlog over two or three years.
Only if there is excess capacity in the system to allow more cases to be processed quickly. So given spare judges, court rooms and barristers we may be able to fix the backlog - without all 3 you won't be able to..
Court rooms can be conjured out of thin air; they are just buildings. Judges and barristers could work slightly longer hours; retired lawyers called in. Bureaucracy smoothed over.
OK, that sounds glib, and I cannot know the details. But something similar was done during the Covid pandemic with both doctors on the one hand, and vaccine production on the other. Schools adapted quickly to remote teaching, and WFH became commonplace at least for white collar workers.
It just takes imagination and political will.
And money - which is going to be problematic because no-one sane goes into Criminal law, it makes stacking shelves at Tesco look well paid...
Re comments on Democrats winning the House and Senate.
The former looks entirely possible. It’s on a knife edge anyway.
The Senate likely all comes down to Montana. They are generally polling ahead in the other close races I think, and WV is gone. So Tester winning would produce a 50-50 Senate and VP casting vote. At the moment, I think Tester is polling slightly behind.
I’m not sure they’ll be too upset with a 49-51 Senate though. The filibuster sadly probably remains, but they’ll have Murkowski and Collins on the GOP side who will probably get them where they need to be on nominations etc.
Dems are behind in Montana. But even if they win there, there are a few other very close races they would need to hold to keep it 50-50.
Some say Dems have a 'tough map this year'. Which is kind of true. But the truth is the whole Senate map of 50 states is tough for the Dems. There are simply more red states than blue states. And as the phenomenon of Dem senators in red states slowly disappears, it's going to be very hard for the Dems to get a Senate majority in any election where the national vote is close-ish.
Which is why its ridiculous they've not made DC and Puerto Rico states, both of which deserve to be states.
The latter would be a purple state, but a purple one they could win in a good year.
It was a deliberate choice by the founders that Washington was not a state
It was also a deliberate choice by the founders to enable new states to be created.
It was not a deliberate choice by the founders to have more population than either Wyoming (which the founders didn't know about) or Vermont disenfranchised outside of statehood.
Redefining the capital territory as the uninhabited land spanning the White House, US Congress etc while admitting the rest of the inhabited territory as a new state would be entirely plausible and reasonable.
We’re all ignoring the elephant in the room. The British Isles should join the union.
I'm sure you would differ from some of my views, but I'd be interested to hear comments.
I spent a bit of time looking at the direction Liz Truss is coming from, and came across a couple of conferences for this movement. Speakers for the UK conference in 2023 included the likes of Kevin Roberts (CEO Heritage Foundation), Mogg, Kruger, Miriam Cates, Braverman, Gove, Lee Anderson, Katherine Birbal-Singh, Toby Young, Theodore Dalrymple, Lord Frost, Melanie Philips, an 'interesting' South-Coast Vicar called Daniel French, Frank Furedi, Matthew Goodwin, Juliet Samuel, Darren Grimes, Louise Perry, David Starkey, Ed West and interestingly, also JD Vance.
Values are mono-culturalism, patriotism, social conservatism, anti-modernism, anti-feminism, nationalism (obviously), anti-immigration, cultural conservatism, Euroscepticism, opposition to modernity, 'family values', preservation of national and cultural identity. And a bit of an obsession with fertility in some quarters, especially Usonian, which may explain JD Vance's posturings about the threat posed by a deep stare under the control of single cat-ladies.
It has been described as an attempt to create an intellectual / philosophical base for Trumpism. That perhaps explains some of the people endorsing him.
Interesting to me is a move away from Thatcher's relative internationalism, free trade and economic liberalism. It seems to me to be quite heavily driven by fear of the other, and goes for withdrawal rather than engagement.
If I had to choose someone to be the "soul" of National Conservatism, I'd go for the Ghost of Roger Scruton.
I'm always a bit annoyed at the co-option of the phrase "National Conservatism" by Anglosphere politicians, since it worked perfectly well for a strand in Central/Eastern European politics for many years prior. They are similar (definitely around Kinder, Küche, Kirche values), although I think the European version is more religious.
Digging a little further, Miriam Cates on the importance of having lots of babies.
Indeed. The NatCon lectures are online, as are its more English cousin PopCon's lectures. Whilst not necessarily pleasant they are rewarding to listen to. On a first approximation the NatCon are more TED talks for the Anglosphere Patriots, but the PopCons are more English. To give an obvious example, Lee Anderson can (and has) spoken at PopCon, but wouldn't have been invited to NatCon, and vice-versa for Darren Grimes.
Not wanting to disagree with your analysis, but here is Lee Anderson's speech at NatCon 2023 . I was a touch surprised to see him there; I think he was Exhibit A Working-Class Conservative.
At the time he was Deputy Chairman of the Conservatives.
I can also pick some holes in his personal narrative - for example he's being a little over-imaginative about his education being a Comprehensive School conditioning him into going down the mines and restricting him to his station, because the loss of prospect of Grammar School and the Eleven Plus took away alternatives.
One of his year mates of my acquaintance when I was last in contact was the Director with overall supervision of the project to build one of the large offshore windfarms in the channel.
It's an interesting narrative, though.
No, please feel free. If people don't point my mistakes out here where my only risk is embarrassment, then other people will point them out elsewhere where it may be more reputational lossy ☹️
Back onto UK NatCons, I think their analysis and proposals - from what I've heard - are clunky, and and based on categories from two or three decades ago. It's too much like someone trying to oppose Cromwellian values in 1690; I think they are trying to fight cultural battles that no longer exist or are unnecessary.
For example, "anti-modernism" is difficult as a slogan or value when modernism as such hasn't really existed for quite a long time. It is tilting at Windmills of the Mind.
They imagine - I think - that there is necessarily an opposition, and has to be a battle between, same sex marriage and traditional MF marriage. I don't see it.
Cates has some good points - more respect for parents who choose to stay at home and support for longer term stable relationships I see, but to suggest that the way to support it is to defund Universities because higher education prevents people becoming mums on average is a touch peculiar.
Attempting to link to similar movements in the USA, and picking up Trumpism with it, is problematic.
This is an interesting piece of polling out of the US.
https://navigatorresearch.org/younger-americans-side-with-progressive-stances-on-a-number-of-issues/ This Navigator Research report is the fourth release from a survey conducted among 4,000 Americans under the age of 35 across five different modes to understand where they stand on issues facing the nation today. Today’s release focuses on younger Americans’ stances on a range of issues including the economy, democracy, reproductive rights, and a number of other issues, and how their political identity aligns with their issue stances...
It's interesting that the sample skews quite a bit more progressive than their stated party affiliation would suggest. Overall, 46% identified as Dem or lean Dem, and 35% as Rep or lean Rep. For those expressing a preference, that's about 57%-43%. Which is fairly close to voting patterns in the 2022 and 2020 exit polls.
Looks pretty promising for the Democrats, if they can get this cohort to turn out.
Re comments on Democrats winning the House and Senate.
The former looks entirely possible. It’s on a knife edge anyway.
The Senate likely all comes down to Montana. They are generally polling ahead in the other close races I think, and WV is gone. So Tester winning would produce a 50-50 Senate and VP casting vote. At the moment, I think Tester is polling slightly behind.
I’m not sure they’ll be too upset with a 49-51 Senate though. The filibuster sadly probably remains, but they’ll have Murkowski and Collins on the GOP side who will probably get them where they need to be on nominations etc.
Dems are behind in Montana. But even if they win there, there are a few other very close races they would need to hold to keep it 50-50.
Some say Dems have a 'tough map this year'. Which is kind of true. But the truth is the whole Senate map of 50 states is tough for the Dems. There are simply more red states than blue states. And as the phenomenon of Dem senators in red states slowly disappears, it's going to be very hard for the Dems to get a Senate majority in any election where the national vote is close-ish.
Which is why its ridiculous they've not made DC and Puerto Rico states, both of which deserve to be states.
The latter would be a purple state, but a purple one they could win in a good year.
It was a deliberate choice by the founders that Washington was not a state
It was also a deliberate choice by the founders to enable new states to be created.
It was not a deliberate choice by the founders to have more population than either Wyoming (which the founders didn't know about) or Vermont disenfranchised outside of statehood.
Redefining the capital territory as the uninhabited land spanning the White House, US Congress etc while admitting the rest of the inhabited territory as a new state would be entirely plausible and reasonable.
We’re all ignoring the elephant in the room. The British Isles should join the union.
On the contrary. The United States should rejoin the United Kingdom.
Re comments on Democrats winning the House and Senate.
The former looks entirely possible. It’s on a knife edge anyway.
The Senate likely all comes down to Montana. They are generally polling ahead in the other close races I think, and WV is gone. So Tester winning would produce a 50-50 Senate and VP casting vote. At the moment, I think Tester is polling slightly behind.
I’m not sure they’ll be too upset with a 49-51 Senate though. The filibuster sadly probably remains, but they’ll have Murkowski and Collins on the GOP side who will probably get them where they need to be on nominations etc.
Dems are behind in Montana. But even if they win there, there are a few other very close races they would need to hold to keep it 50-50.
Some say Dems have a 'tough map this year'. Which is kind of true. But the truth is the whole Senate map of 50 states is tough for the Dems. There are simply more red states than blue states. And as the phenomenon of Dem senators in red states slowly disappears, it's going to be very hard for the Dems to get a Senate majority in any election where the national vote is close-ish.
Which is why its ridiculous they've not made DC and Puerto Rico states, both of which deserve to be states.
The latter would be a purple state, but a purple one they could win in a good year.
It was a deliberate choice by the founders that Washington was not a state
It was also a deliberate choice by the founders to enable new states to be created.
It was not a deliberate choice by the founders to have more population than either Wyoming (which the founders didn't know about) or Vermont disenfranchised outside of statehood.
Redefining the capital territory as the uninhabited land spanning the White House, US Congress etc while admitting the rest of the inhabited territory as a new state would be entirely plausible and reasonable.
We’re all ignoring the elephant in the room. The British Isles should join the union.
The European Union? I'm in!
No, the United States. We need a North Atlantic superstate for the 21st century.
Excellent (paywalled) article on the recent riots. Some snippets:
UK needs no lessons from apologists for rioters
Those behind the rioting are not misguided social justice warriors, they are violent, far-right racists fortified by a general hooligan element that was up for a ruck and expected to face no consequences. Now they know better.
It is easy to mock Sir Keir Starmer for reverting to type as a former prosecutor but nearly 1,000 arrests and some rapid and tough sentences was the right response [to restore confidence in the law]
For all the vacuous “something must be donery” of many commentators there are real underlying issues. But even if you accept that the riots were about anything beyond violence, they have not changed the calculation. The answers are what they have always been: improved economic prospects, investment in skills to secure high-status blue-collar jobs, better housing, good public services. In fact, all the things Labour was elected to deliver.
For Starmer, these grim scenes have marred the start of his government. But the riots told us nothing we didn’t already know about the state of Britain except perhaps the value of a tough response, the true measure of the instigators and the cynicism of their apologists.
All that was needed to quell the riots was the swift response. The lengthy sentences are excessive: a week or two would suffice as deterrent. Contrast this with other crimes that appear to have no consequence because there is a year or more delay before reaching trial.
Yes, it shows what can be done. Let's start to treat other crimes as seriously.
To be fair, when people plead guilty at the first available opportunity, it's easy to sentence them and to send them to jail.
The problems occur when people actually want trials with barristers and witnesses and judges and juries and all.
If they'd pleaded not guilty wouldn't they have been held on remand till a jury trial could have been scheduled - which may have been... a while ?
I think some of the sentences for the keyboard warriors are chilling fwiw.
I've pointed out for 20 years that people say things on the internet that they would previously only have said in the pub and that people don't understand how big the difference actually is.
These sentences are showing the reality of that fact..
Re comments on Democrats winning the House and Senate.
The former looks entirely possible. It’s on a knife edge anyway.
The Senate likely all comes down to Montana. They are generally polling ahead in the other close races I think, and WV is gone. So Tester winning would produce a 50-50 Senate and VP casting vote. At the moment, I think Tester is polling slightly behind.
I’m not sure they’ll be too upset with a 49-51 Senate though. The filibuster sadly probably remains, but they’ll have Murkowski and Collins on the GOP side who will probably get them where they need to be on nominations etc.
Dems are behind in Montana. But even if they win there, there are a few other very close races they would need to hold to keep it 50-50.
Some say Dems have a 'tough map this year'. Which is kind of true. But the truth is the whole Senate map of 50 states is tough for the Dems. There are simply more red states than blue states. And as the phenomenon of Dem senators in red states slowly disappears, it's going to be very hard for the Dems to get a Senate majority in any election where the national vote is close-ish.
Which is why its ridiculous they've not made DC and Puerto Rico states, both of which deserve to be states.
The latter would be a purple state, but a purple one they could win in a good year.
It was a deliberate choice by the founders that Washington was not a state
It was also a deliberate choice by the founders to enable new states to be created.
It was not a deliberate choice by the founders to have more population than either Wyoming (which the founders didn't know about) or Vermont disenfranchised outside of statehood.
Redefining the capital territory as the uninhabited land spanning the White House, US Congress etc while admitting the rest of the inhabited territory as a new state would be entirely plausible and reasonable.
We’re all ignoring the elephant in the room. The British Isles should join the union.
Excellent (paywalled) article on the recent riots. Some snippets:
UK needs no lessons from apologists for rioters
Those behind the rioting are not misguided social justice warriors, they are violent, far-right racists fortified by a general hooligan element that was up for a ruck and expected to face no consequences. Now they know better.
It is easy to mock Sir Keir Starmer for reverting to type as a former prosecutor but nearly 1,000 arrests and some rapid and tough sentences was the right response [to restore confidence in the law]
For all the vacuous “something must be donery” of many commentators there are real underlying issues. But even if you accept that the riots were about anything beyond violence, they have not changed the calculation. The answers are what they have always been: improved economic prospects, investment in skills to secure high-status blue-collar jobs, better housing, good public services. In fact, all the things Labour was elected to deliver.
For Starmer, these grim scenes have marred the start of his government. But the riots told us nothing we didn’t already know about the state of Britain except perhaps the value of a tough response, the true measure of the instigators and the cynicism of their apologists.
We've been saying that for weeks - both the school we talked about yesterday and the school Casino's children went to claimed that it's the VAT changes that are the reason when a close look shows serious problems that were exacerbated by the VAT change.
I do suspect the VAT change may be the trigger for schools closing but these initial closures will have significant other issues...
"You don’t find out who’s been swimming naked until the tide goes out"
Excellent (paywalled) article on the recent riots. Some snippets:
UK needs no lessons from apologists for rioters
Those behind the rioting are not misguided social justice warriors, they are violent, far-right racists fortified by a general hooligan element that was up for a ruck and expected to face no consequences. Now they know better.
It is easy to mock Sir Keir Starmer for reverting to type as a former prosecutor but nearly 1,000 arrests and some rapid and tough sentences was the right response [to restore confidence in the law]
For all the vacuous “something must be donery” of many commentators there are real underlying issues. But even if you accept that the riots were about anything beyond violence, they have not changed the calculation. The answers are what they have always been: improved economic prospects, investment in skills to secure high-status blue-collar jobs, better housing, good public services. In fact, all the things Labour was elected to deliver.
For Starmer, these grim scenes have marred the start of his government. But the riots told us nothing we didn’t already know about the state of Britain except perhaps the value of a tough response, the true measure of the instigators and the cynicism of their apologists.
All that was needed to quell the riots was the swift response. The lengthy sentences are excessive: a week or two would suffice as deterrent. Contrast this with other crimes that appear to have no consequence because there is a year or more delay before reaching trial.
Yes, it shows what can be done. Let's start to treat other crimes as seriously.
To be fair, when people plead guilty at the first available opportunity, it's easy to sentence them and to send them to jail.
The problems occur when people actually want trials with barristers and witnesses and judges and juries and all.
Juries are immediately available; there is a constant flow of new jurors. Likewise judges. Barristers might need time to prepare their cases for prosecution or defence, but often have only a week, but a week that starts 18 months later. And of course, delays give time for witnesses' memories to fade.
Juries may be available to be pulled into a 5 day court case but Judges, barristers and court rooms will be booked months in advance...
For reference I'm currently aware that first Tax tribunals are now booking for January to March 2026...
Those are capacity issues. The rate of flow is the same.
ETA of course you are right there is no easy fix but a determined government ought to be able to fix the backlog over two or three years.
Only if there is excess capacity in the system to allow more cases to be processed quickly. So given spare judges, court rooms and barristers we may be able to fix the backlog - without all 3 you won't be able to..
Court rooms can be conjured out of thin air; they are just buildings. Judges and barristers could work slightly longer hours; retired lawyers called in. Bureaucracy smoothed over.
OK, that sounds glib, and I cannot know the details. But something similar was done during the Covid pandemic with both doctors on the one hand, and vaccine production on the other. Schools adapted quickly to remote teaching, and WFH became commonplace at least for white collar workers.
It just takes imagination and political will.
And money - which is going to be problematic because no-one sane goes into Criminal law, it makes stacking shelves at Tesco look well paid...
Yes up front money, but what is the cost of delayed trials, re-work on cases as staff have changed or police/lawyers need to refresh their memories, low motivation and retention of staff and justice not delivered?
We need to move on beyond thinking of everything in terms of costs that are visible in treasury spreadsheets and give far more weight to hidden, but real and significant, future costs.
I'm sure you would differ from some of my views, but I'd be interested to hear comments.
I spent a bit of time looking at the direction Liz Truss is coming from, and came across a couple of conferences for this movement. Speakers for the UK conference in 2023 included the likes of Kevin Roberts (CEO Heritage Foundation), Mogg, Kruger, Miriam Cates, Braverman, Gove, Lee Anderson, Katherine Birbal-Singh, Toby Young, Theodore Dalrymple, Lord Frost, Melanie Philips, an 'interesting' South-Coast Vicar called Daniel French, Frank Furedi, Matthew Goodwin, Juliet Samuel, Darren Grimes, Louise Perry, David Starkey, Ed West and interestingly, also JD Vance.
Values are mono-culturalism, patriotism, social conservatism, anti-modernism, anti-feminism, nationalism (obviously), anti-immigration, cultural conservatism, Euroscepticism, opposition to modernity, 'family values', preservation of national and cultural identity. And a bit of an obsession with fertility in some quarters, especially Usonian, which may explain JD Vance's posturings about the threat posed by a deep stare under the control of single cat-ladies.
It has been described as an attempt to create an intellectual / philosophical base for Trumpism. That perhaps explains some of the people endorsing him.
Interesting to me is a move away from Thatcher's relative internationalism, free trade and economic liberalism. It seems to me to be quite heavily driven by fear of the other, and goes for withdrawal rather than engagement.
If I had to choose someone to be the "soul" of National Conservatism, I'd go for the Ghost of Roger Scruton.
I'm always a bit annoyed at the co-option of the phrase "National Conservatism" by Anglosphere politicians, since it worked perfectly well for a strand in Central/Eastern European politics for many years prior. They are similar (definitely around Kinder, Küche, Kirche values), although I think the European version is more religious.
Digging a little further, Miriam Cates on the importance of having lots of babies.
Indeed. The NatCon lectures are online, as are its more English cousin PopCon's lectures. Whilst not necessarily pleasant they are rewarding to listen to. On a first approximation the NatCon are more TED talks for the Anglosphere Patriots, but the PopCons are more English. To give an obvious example, Lee Anderson can (and has) spoken at PopCon, but wouldn't have been invited to NatCon, and vice-versa for Darren Grimes.
Not wanting to disagree with your analysis, but here is Lee Anderson's speech at NatCon 2023 . I was a touch surprised to see him there; I think he was Exhibit A Working-Class Conservative.
At the time he was Deputy Chairman of the Conservatives.
I can also pick some holes in his personal narrative - for example he's being a little over-imaginative about his education being a Comprehensive School conditioning him into going down the mines and restricting him to his station, because the loss of prospect of Grammar School and the Eleven Plus took away alternatives.
One of his year mates of my acquaintance when I was last in contact was the Director with overall supervision of the project to build one of the large offshore windfarms in the channel.
It's an interesting narrative, though.
No, please feel free. If people don't point my mistakes out here where my only risk is embarrassment, then other people will point them out elsewhere where it may be more reputational lossy ☹️
Back onto UK NatCons, I think their analysis and proposals - from what I've heard - are clunky, and and based on categories from two or three decades ago. It's too much like someone trying to oppose Cromwellian values in 1690; I think they are trying to fight cultural battles that no longer exist or are unnecessary.
For example, "anti-modernism" is difficult as a slogan or value when modernism as such hasn't really existed for quite a long time. It is tilting at Windmills of the Mind.
They imagine - I think - that there is necessarily an opposition, and has to be a battle between, same sex marriage and traditional MF marriage. I don't see it.
Cates has some good points - more respect for parents who choose to stay at home and support for longer term stable relationships I see, but to suggest that the way to support it is to defund Universities because higher education prevents people becoming mums on average is a touch peculiar.
Attempting to link to similar movements in the USA, and picking up Trumpism with it, is problematic.
It is worth remembering that one of the biggest predictors of later life success is a working mother.
Excellent (paywalled) article on the recent riots. Some snippets:
UK needs no lessons from apologists for rioters
Those behind the rioting are not misguided social justice warriors, they are violent, far-right racists fortified by a general hooligan element that was up for a ruck and expected to face no consequences. Now they know better.
It is easy to mock Sir Keir Starmer for reverting to type as a former prosecutor but nearly 1,000 arrests and some rapid and tough sentences was the right response [to restore confidence in the law]
For all the vacuous “something must be donery” of many commentators there are real underlying issues. But even if you accept that the riots were about anything beyond violence, they have not changed the calculation. The answers are what they have always been: improved economic prospects, investment in skills to secure high-status blue-collar jobs, better housing, good public services. In fact, all the things Labour was elected to deliver.
For Starmer, these grim scenes have marred the start of his government. But the riots told us nothing we didn’t already know about the state of Britain except perhaps the value of a tough response, the true measure of the instigators and the cynicism of their apologists.
All that was needed to quell the riots was the swift response. The lengthy sentences are excessive: a week or two would suffice as deterrent. Contrast this with other crimes that appear to have no consequence because there is a year or more delay before reaching trial.
Yes, it shows what can be done. Let's start to treat other crimes as seriously.
To be fair, when people plead guilty at the first available opportunity, it's easy to sentence them and to send them to jail.
The problems occur when people actually want trials with barristers and witnesses and judges and juries and all.
Juries are immediately available; there is a constant flow of new jurors. Likewise judges. Barristers might need time to prepare their cases for prosecution or defence, but often have only a week, but a week that starts 18 months later. And of course, delays give time for witnesses' memories to fade.
Juries may be available to be pulled into a 5 day court case but Judges, barristers and court rooms will be booked months in advance...
For reference I'm currently aware that first Tax tribunals are now booking for January to March 2026...
This is exactly what happened to a friend's sister who was on trial in Newcastle, pretty serious offence.
After 8 days the trial collapsed because the Judge, court rooms and barristers were booked onto another case the day after.
She has since had a further trial cancelled with no reschedule date.
There comes a point where the process is the punishment
Josephine Cumbo @JosephineCumbo Son achieved AAA in Physics, Further Maths and Maths and no offer from First Choice or Insurance University. Now doing mad scramble for Clearing places. Stress levels are high.
But, then I remembered that there is now an A* grade. Presumably, for many universities, the A* just replaced the A.
Excellent (paywalled) article on the recent riots. Some snippets:
UK needs no lessons from apologists for rioters
Those behind the rioting are not misguided social justice warriors, they are violent, far-right racists fortified by a general hooligan element that was up for a ruck and expected to face no consequences. Now they know better.
It is easy to mock Sir Keir Starmer for reverting to type as a former prosecutor but nearly 1,000 arrests and some rapid and tough sentences was the right response [to restore confidence in the law]
For all the vacuous “something must be donery” of many commentators there are real underlying issues. But even if you accept that the riots were about anything beyond violence, they have not changed the calculation. The answers are what they have always been: improved economic prospects, investment in skills to secure high-status blue-collar jobs, better housing, good public services. In fact, all the things Labour was elected to deliver.
For Starmer, these grim scenes have marred the start of his government. But the riots told us nothing we didn’t already know about the state of Britain except perhaps the value of a tough response, the true measure of the instigators and the cynicism of their apologists.
Re comments on Democrats winning the House and Senate.
The former looks entirely possible. It’s on a knife edge anyway.
The Senate likely all comes down to Montana. They are generally polling ahead in the other close races I think, and WV is gone. So Tester winning would produce a 50-50 Senate and VP casting vote. At the moment, I think Tester is polling slightly behind.
I’m not sure they’ll be too upset with a 49-51 Senate though. The filibuster sadly probably remains, but they’ll have Murkowski and Collins on the GOP side who will probably get them where they need to be on nominations etc.
Dems are behind in Montana. But even if they win there, there are a few other very close races they would need to hold to keep it 50-50.
Some say Dems have a 'tough map this year'. Which is kind of true. But the truth is the whole Senate map of 50 states is tough for the Dems. There are simply more red states than blue states. And as the phenomenon of Dem senators in red states slowly disappears, it's going to be very hard for the Dems to get a Senate majority in any election where the national vote is close-ish.
Which is why its ridiculous they've not made DC and Puerto Rico states, both of which deserve to be states.
The latter would be a purple state, but a purple one they could win in a good year.
Please fuck off you lying Hitler-apologist. Thanks.
I clearly didn't get the memo about the New Civility....
Quite. I’ve taken breaks from here after I nearly crossed the line and I suggest others do too. I sometimes forget, and it appears others do to, that there are humans* on the other end of this here internet.
Fox NEws puts out a poll that supports their deeply held gut feeling?
I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you.
Carried out by Beacon Research/Shaw & Co. Research who are rated 2.8 stars (out of 3) on 538 pollster ratings, so can't just be dismissed.
It will be dismissed because it's good for "Trump".
Unforgivable on a betting site - particularly one that was founded to discuss the 2004 Kerry v Bush election - but that's where we're at.
My cynicism comes from the fact it's the perfect result for Fox news - it may be 100% accurate but it also 100% matches the result Fox would want to talk about..
The one thing I've picked up from this site is that US polling is awful compared to the UK..
I've also picked up that this site is terrible at discussing the US election dispassionately.
FWIW I think Harris remains a pretty weak candidate (particularly her speeches, and I don't think there is a guarantee she'll be any good in the debate), and therefore the Democrat campaign is reliant on good vibes and Walz being American Dad. That might be enough but it's a long time till the election.
I wouldn't be surprised if this is peak Harris.
She is largely dependent upon Trump becoming worse or suffering from set backs in his various trials and civil cases. The chances of that happening seem better than evens so I suspect Silver is not far off.
Realistically, the only major obstacle now for Trump trial-wise is the verdict in the NY case as the others are stalled / will be past-the election. Who knows how that will go.
Trump could melt down but it is fair to say we have been here before multiple times where people claim he is losing it, on his way out etc. The polling also has underestimated his support at the last elections.
I suspect @Eabhal is right, it feels like peak Harris. Jim Acosta at CNN had a go at her campaign manager for only offering one interview before the end of the month, and it is starting to be picked up by others. If I was Harris and truly feeling Trump was on the run, I would be interviewing like mad and hammering the points home.
She's the VP. She actually has an important job, unlike Trump.
Just called into a branch of ASDA to get a sandwich to be met by a picket line. Of course I didn't blackleg and go inside. But ASDA could well be this Government's biggest business collapse.
Re comments on Democrats winning the House and Senate.
The former looks entirely possible. It’s on a knife edge anyway.
The Senate likely all comes down to Montana. They are generally polling ahead in the other close races I think, and WV is gone. So Tester winning would produce a 50-50 Senate and VP casting vote. At the moment, I think Tester is polling slightly behind.
I’m not sure they’ll be too upset with a 49-51 Senate though. The filibuster sadly probably remains, but they’ll have Murkowski and Collins on the GOP side who will probably get them where they need to be on nominations etc.
Dems are behind in Montana. But even if they win there, there are a few other very close races they would need to hold to keep it 50-50.
Some say Dems have a 'tough map this year'. Which is kind of true. But the truth is the whole Senate map of 50 states is tough for the Dems. There are simply more red states than blue states. And as the phenomenon of Dem senators in red states slowly disappears, it's going to be very hard for the Dems to get a Senate majority in any election where the national vote is close-ish.
Which is why its ridiculous they've not made DC and Puerto Rico states, both of which deserve to be states.
The latter would be a purple state, but a purple one they could win in a good year.
It was a deliberate choice by the founders that Washington was not a state
It was also a deliberate choice by the founders to enable new states to be created.
It was not a deliberate choice by the founders to have more population than either Wyoming (which the founders didn't know about) or Vermont disenfranchised outside of statehood.
Redefining the capital territory as the uninhabited land spanning the White House, US Congress etc while admitting the rest of the inhabited territory as a new state would be entirely plausible and reasonable.
We’re all ignoring the elephant in the room. The British Isles should join the union.
On the contrary. The United States should rejoin the United Kingdom.
Excellent (paywalled) article on the recent riots. Some snippets:
UK needs no lessons from apologists for rioters
Those behind the rioting are not misguided social justice warriors, they are violent, far-right racists fortified by a general hooligan element that was up for a ruck and expected to face no consequences. Now they know better.
It is easy to mock Sir Keir Starmer for reverting to type as a former prosecutor but nearly 1,000 arrests and some rapid and tough sentences was the right response [to restore confidence in the law]
For all the vacuous “something must be donery” of many commentators there are real underlying issues. But even if you accept that the riots were about anything beyond violence, they have not changed the calculation. The answers are what they have always been: improved economic prospects, investment in skills to secure high-status blue-collar jobs, better housing, good public services. In fact, all the things Labour was elected to deliver.
For Starmer, these grim scenes have marred the start of his government. But the riots told us nothing we didn’t already know about the state of Britain except perhaps the value of a tough response, the true measure of the instigators and the cynicism of their apologists.
Josephine Cumbo @JosephineCumbo Son achieved AAA in Physics, Further Maths and Maths and no offer from First Choice or Insurance University. Now doing mad scramble for Clearing places. Stress levels are high.
But, then I remembered that there is now an A* grade. Presumably, for many universities, the A* just replaced the A.
I wonder how poor his personal statement was.
I know that my nephew was rejected from a lot of universities for having nothing to write about for hobbies or achievements outside academia (he's ended up in Birmingham). My niece (next year) shouldn't have a problem given that she has done things outside of school, is the bassist in a reasonably successful band and makes money doing GCSE maths tuition.. Downside is she wants to do medicine so everything rests on the exam in a few weeks.
Josephine Cumbo @JosephineCumbo Son achieved AAA in Physics, Further Maths and Maths and no offer from First Choice or Insurance University. Now doing mad scramble for Clearing places. Stress levels are high.
But, then I remembered that there is now an A* grade. Presumably, for many universities, the A* just replaced the A.
Who the hell has an insurance offer dependent on getting A*s?
I got an offer from Cambridge (AAB), and a slew of other offers (St Andrews, LSE, UCL and Aberdeen). I chose UCL as my insurance because they generously offered me EE, and I reckoned that I was likely to achieve that even on a really bad day. St Andrew's offer (ABB) was discarded almost immediately because it was simply too close to my Cambridge offer. I didn't want a situation where I got ABC and didn't get in anywhere.
Josephine Cumbo @JosephineCumbo Son achieved AAA in Physics, Further Maths and Maths and no offer from First Choice or Insurance University. Now doing mad scramble for Clearing places. Stress levels are high.
But, then I remembered that there is now an A* grade. Presumably, for many universities, the A* just replaced the A.
Hmmm.
He must have aimed very high with his first uni if he got no response to three As in those subjects.
But I'm also surprised his insurance offer wasn't rather lower than three As. That suggests bad planning.
If he's got an A in Further Maths I'd also be surprised if he has any trouble at all getting a place through Clearing, but maybe it would be better to defer?
Anyway, none of that is presumably of any use to her.
Josephine Cumbo @JosephineCumbo Son achieved AAA in Physics, Further Maths and Maths and no offer from First Choice or Insurance University. Now doing mad scramble for Clearing places. Stress levels are high.
But, then I remembered that there is now an A* grade. Presumably, for many universities, the A* just replaced the A.
Who the hell has an insurance offer dependent on getting A*s?
I got an offer from Cambridge (AAB), and a slew of other offers (St Andrews, LSE, UCL and Aberdeen). I chose UCL as my insurance because they generously offered me EE, and I reckoned that I was likely to achieve that even on a really bad day. St Andrew's offer (ABB) was discarded almost immediately because it was simply too close to my Cambridge offer. I didn't want a situation where I got ABC and didn't get in anywhere.
To add at 9am this morning Durham had places for Maths... Newcastle are clearly after every penny they can find as they have a lot of courses with spaces.
Just called into a branch of ASDA to get a sandwich to be met by a picket line. Of course I didn't blackleg and go inside. But ASDA could well be this Government's biggest business collapse.
Let it collapse. Let something emerge from it. Whatever that may be. The equal pay claim goes to the high court. If it collapses what happens to that if they win and now we have judges who decide the value of different jobs in companies and they have said shop floor workers can compare themselves to warehouse worked I expect they will win it.
The people picketing will only help hasten the collapse if it affects sales. From a quick google plenty of other Asda stores are balloting on strike action. Once people stop going and go elsewhere then will they return.
Morrisons is looking to be in less than great shape too.
Josephine Cumbo @JosephineCumbo Son achieved AAA in Physics, Further Maths and Maths and no offer from First Choice or Insurance University. Now doing mad scramble for Clearing places. Stress levels are high.
But, then I remembered that there is now an A* grade. Presumably, for many universities, the A* just replaced the A.
Who the hell has an insurance offer dependent on getting A*s?
I got an offer from Cambridge (AAB), and a slew of other offers (St Andrews, LSE, UCL and Aberdeen). I chose UCL as my insurance because they generously offered me EE, and I reckoned that I was likely to achieve that even on a really bad day. St Andrew's offer (ABB) was discarded almost immediately because it was simply too close to my Cambridge offer. I didn't want a situation where I got ABC and didn't get in anywhere.
My Oxford offer was AAA (including in Geography) and I think I went for Manchester with my insurance (think it was ABB with the A in geography). In hindsight, that was a bit of a risk. I have a feeling Sheffield offered me BBB.
Harry Cole @MrHarryCole · 1h EXC: Senior Tories plotting bringing forward leadership result to allow new boss to respond to budget on October 30.
Exclusive? I could have told them that a month ago. It was widely reported that Rishi wanted to hand over to the new leader before the budget response.
Josephine Cumbo @JosephineCumbo Son achieved AAA in Physics, Further Maths and Maths and no offer from First Choice or Insurance University. Now doing mad scramble for Clearing places. Stress levels are high.
But, then I remembered that there is now an A* grade. Presumably, for many universities, the A* just replaced the A.
I wonder how poor his personal statement was.
I know that my nephew was rejected from a lot of universities for having nothing to write about for hobbies or achievements outside academia (he's ended up in Birmingham). My niece (next year) shouldn't have a problem given that she has done things outside of school, is the bassist in a reasonably successful band and makes money doing GCSE maths tuition.. Downside is she wants to do medicine so everything rests on the exam in a few weeks.
Oh I suspect his personal statement was excellent as he got the offer. Alas, he didn't make the grade.
Fox NEws puts out a poll that supports their deeply held gut feeling?
I'm shocked. Shocked, I tell you.
Carried out by Beacon Research/Shaw & Co. Research who are rated 2.8 stars (out of 3) on 538 pollster ratings, so can't just be dismissed.
It will be dismissed because it's good for "Trump".
Unforgivable on a betting site - particularly one that was founded to discuss the 2004 Kerry v Bush election - but that's where we're at.
My cynicism comes from the fact it's the perfect result for Fox news - it may be 100% accurate but it also 100% matches the result Fox would want to talk about..
The one thing I've picked up from this site is that US polling is awful compared to the UK..
I've also picked up that this site is terrible at discussing the US election dispassionately.
FWIW I think Harris remains a pretty weak candidate (particularly her speeches, and I don't think there is a guarantee she'll be any good in the debate), and therefore the Democrat campaign is reliant on good vibes and Walz being American Dad. That might be enough but it's a long time till the election.
I wouldn't be surprised if this is peak Harris.
She is largely dependent upon Trump becoming worse or suffering from set backs in his various trials and civil cases. The chances of that happening seem better than evens so I suspect Silver is not far off.
Realistically, the only major obstacle now for Trump trial-wise is the verdict in the NY case as the others are stalled / will be past-the election. Who knows how that will go.
Trump could melt down but it is fair to say we have been here before multiple times where people claim he is losing it, on his way out etc. The polling also has underestimated his support at the last elections.
I suspect @Eabhal is right, it feels like peak Harris. Jim Acosta at CNN had a go at her campaign manager for only offering one interview before the end of the month, and it is starting to be picked up by others. If I was Harris and truly feeling Trump was on the run, I would be interviewing like mad and hammering the points home.
She's the VP. She actually has an important job, unlike Trump.
Trump has been campaigning for president for four years, and these are examples of what he has come up with on economic policy.
Harris is part of an administration whose policies of the last three and a half years are there to see. Of course she'll end up articulating differences from the current administration (along with defending much of its record), but it's fairly absurd to expect a detailed sit down with the media on it before the convention. The campaign will have a hundred other priorities.
Comments
And lowering the percentage rate means those on earned incomes (or those who can earn more) are less disincentivised to work more and earn more. We need much more reform like that to get people in work to do more than 16 hours a week.
IIRC the judgment said the lies came from the news and the anchors.
The problems occur when people actually want trials with barristers and witnesses and judges and juries and all.
I'm sure Harris will do major interviews but she has little reason to do so right now, while she's dominating the agenda anyway. When the media buzz around her dies off a bit then she has the option of getting major interviews booked then and setting the agenda once more - she has no reason to waste that bolt yet.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kyxW9QCTzM0
At the time he was Deputy Chairman of the Conservatives.
I can also pick some holes in his personal narrative - for example he's being a little over-imaginative about his education being a Comprehensive School conditioning him into going down the mines and restricting him to his station, because the loss of prospect of Grammar School and the Eleven Plus took away alternatives.
One of his year mates of my acquaintance when I was last in contact was the Director with overall supervision of the project to build one of the large offshore windfarms in the channel.
It's an interesting narrative, though.
There's also plenty special about France and other nations too.
We don't need to belittle either ourselves or them by pretending we're all the same.
https://x.com/darthputinkgb/status/1823629263150383211
Very early days, but the UK Conservative Party don't seem serious about fixing the issues that led to their historically catastrophic defeat in 2024.
After the DNC will be the time to get major interviews in, at which point the media will love the fact they're getting the attention they want.
Waste that opportunity now and it won't be as effective post-DNC to have a second interview.
Managing the media is smart politics. In 2016 Trump was a master of getting free media attention without paying for advertising, now Harris is outclassing him and complaints about it just show what a good job she is doing.
I'd say that the UK is an outlier in Europe, but is more European than American.
I'd quibble with the suggestion that the UK is culturally more European, but mainly I think over the interpretation of the word 'culture' - culture is clearly bound up a lot in language, and a visit to the USA offers a lot more cultural familiarity than a visit to Europe, which at first sight can appear plain weird. I'd offer advertising as an example: American adverts seem a lot less discordant to my UK eyes than European ones (and that's not just the language, although dubbed adverts always seem a little odd.)
But I'd say that in terms of attitudes and expectations of the world the UK is more European than American, and that because of our lack of a common language we often mentally exaggerate the differences with Europeans and minimise the differences with Americans.
The complaints of not doing interviews in the last 3 weeks are ludicrous. Her campaign has played it perfectly so far.
No amount of pressers or TV interviews will convince the 40% who are Trump zeolots / or die hard Republicans.
It will become untenable not to do interviews including the biggies like 60 minutes from September onwards, but she can control the schedule & how many really make a huge difference ?
Easy to forget the campaigns are ridiculously long and still 12 weeks to go.
But most of us are much more European-with-quirks than we are Ameri-Australi-Anglosphere. Not all of us, but most of us.
(There's a conversation somewhere between Stephen Fry and Craig Ferguson... I think it was in the latter's Letterman plus one hour talk show. They discussed the idea that because people became American by choice, that led to some selection bias. People who left Britain for the Anglosphere were different to those who stayed. Sounds pretty plausible to me.)
Could be.
But equally, it might not be.
Here's the thing: the most successful political candidates are blank slates onto whom voters project their own views.
So, why would Kamala allow herself to get bogged down in policy and take on interviews? What's she got to gain? Her job is to keep reemphasizing Project 2025, and abortion, and danger to democracy, and Trump's blocking of a bipartisan border bill. She should stay well away from actual policy, and certainly shouldn't sit down for interviews with journalists. What does she have to gain?
She also benefits - right now - from a Trump campaign that seems completely flat footed. Thinking of Trump in 2016, I am reminded of the Ollivander quote about Voldemort "terrible thing... great but terrible...". And he was. Trump was a mental force to be reckoned with, he belittled and dismantled opponents without difficulty.
This time around, he's had one debate... with someone suffering from the early stages of dementia.
He hasn't gone through any cut and thrust with fellow Republicans, he's just landed in the role. And he's not the man he was eight years ago.
It is astonishing, though, that we're having this discussion. The US should be getting rid of the incumbent party because voters have had a pretty shit four years (as has happened across the developed world). The fact that it looks like Harris is the narrow favourite right now is a testament to just how poor Trump is as a candidate in 2024.
A sane Republican would absolutely walk this.
But its not a binary European or American, we're neither, we're us.
We share some stuff in common with Europe.
We share some stuff in common with America.
We share some stuff in common with Canada, Australia and New Zealand.
We share some stuff in common with India and Pakistan.
We share some stuff in common with Japan.
We share some stuff in common with many other nations too.
We're a bastard hodgepodge of many different cultures and more.
And by the way my only objection to the longer sentences is a practical one. These are not nice people.
'In New York, Judge Christina Ryba concluded in her 34-page decision that the rented bedroom Kennedy claimed as his residence in New York wasn’t a “bona fide and legitimate residence, but merely a ‘sham’ address that he assumed for the purpose of maintaining his voter registration” and furthering his political candidacy.
“Given the size and appearance of the spare bedroom as shown in the photographs admitted into evidence, the Court finds Kennedy’s testimony that he may return to that bedroom to reside with his wife, family members, multiple pets, and all of his personal belongings to be highly improbable, if not preposterous,” the judge wrote.
Ryba said evidence submitted in trial showed Kennedy had a “long-standing pattern” of borrowing addresses from friends and relatives so he could maintain his voter registration in New York state while actually residing in California, where he has a home with his wife, “Curb Your Enthusiasm” actor Cheryl Hines.'
“Using a friend’s address for political and voting purposes, while barely stepping foot on the premises, does not equate to residency under the Election Law,” the judge wrote. “To hold otherwise would establish a dangerous precedent and open the door to the fraud and political mischief that the Election Law residency rules were designed to prevent.”
Barbara Moss, who rents the room to Kennedy, testified that he pays her $500 a month. But she acknowledged there is no written lease and that Kennedy’s first payment wasn’t made until after the New York Post published a story casting doubt on Kennedy’s claim that he lived at that address.'
I'm not at all convinced it's in the Dems interest to keep RFK off the ballot.
For reference I'm currently aware that first Tax tribunals are now booking for January to March 2026...
https://x.com/BarakRavid/status/1823874825930064241
Former President Donald Trump spoke on the phone with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday and discussed the Gaza hostage and ceasefire deal, according to two U.S. sources who were briefed on the call...
the Democrats dumped Biden, the Republicans are stuck with Trump whose flaws are now obvious because while he was better than Biden he's worse than anyone else.
ETA of course you are right there is no easy fix but a determined government ought to be able to fix the backlog over two or three years.
I don't think it's unreasonable for a presidential candidate, who's had to bootstrap an entire campaign from scratch in the space of three weeks, to decide on how best to manage the limited time available.
"Before the end of the month", which is what she's said, pretty well matches your after the convention analysis.
And Sandpit's idea that the press are "shilling" for her seems fairly detached from what they're actually writing. (Setting aside the Time magazine piece which wound up the GOP.)
Education Secretary says fee-paying schools shutting their doors has more to do with business models rather than Government imposing VAT
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/08/15/phillipson-private-schools-closing-vat-not-attractive/
Crocs becomes fastest-growing ‘cool’ brand with British children
Footwear company famed for its foam clogs now ranks above Star Wars, BBC and Converse, polling reveals
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/08/15/crocs-becomes-fastest-growing-cool-brand-with-uk-children/
I do suspect the VAT change may be the trigger for schools closing but these initial closures will have significant other issues...
In any case 1 to 2 week sentences are completely out of line with guidelines for non riot situations - community sentence to 1 year prison or 1 to 3 years prison depending on whether you actually take part or merely incite. This really would be two tier sentencing
https://www.sentencingcouncil.org.uk/offences/magistrates-court/item/violent-disorder-2/
However, the flip side of that is that the US has been, and still is, a fantastic gateway to *comparative* wealth for new immigrants, largely at the expense of the previous generation of immigrants.
"One of the defining attributes of his leadership of the Republican Party is the extent to which he has so thoroughly reshaped Republican identity while leading Republican politicians to a string of election defeats across the nation"
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/world/analysis-grapples-with-gop-fallout-if-trump-loses-badly/ar-AA1oNmfY?ocid=msedgntp&pc=U531&cvid=4db4759f0f1f4b5081af5a2d470f51c3&ei=60
For this reason I've stated to associate them with people I find attractive. Eeeek.
Warren Buffet, 1994 (I don't know if he invented the quote): see https://buffett.cnbc.com/video/1994/04/25/buffett-you-dont-find-out-whos-been-swimming-naked-until-the-tide-goes-out.html
One problem with modern politics is the idea that you cannot admit that your policies can have any downsides.
Which is insane - everything has downsides.
I think some of the sentences for the keyboard warriors are chilling fwiw.
The question is whether the school closures will increase from normal. And/or whether private school formation dips.
As ever, we will know what happened, in hindsight.
It doesn't mean it can't be changed.
And the Article IV process for admitting a new state is massively simpler than that for amending the Constitution.
New States may be admitted by the Congress into this Union; but no new State shall be formed or erected within the Jurisdiction of any other State; nor any State be formed by the Junction of two or more States, or Parts of States, without the Consent of the Legislatures of the States concerned as well as of the Congress.
OK, that sounds glib, and I cannot know the details. But something similar was done during the Covid pandemic with both doctors on the one hand, and vaccine production on the other. Schools adapted quickly to remote teaching, and WFH became commonplace at least for white collar workers.
It just takes imagination and political will.
This is not quite a measure of polling error, as 1 month of polls allows polling drift as well as error to creep in.
That averaging serves well for the anticipation of what might occur in a future
election, i.e. the discussion at hand, but that is not 'error' as such.
For instance, the 'error' between last polls taken within a few days of GE24 and the actual Labour result was, by my reckoning, 4.08% rather than 6.08%*. Still a miss beyond MoE, but somewhat less.
* 18 pollsters took final, non MRP, polls within a week of GE24 and Lab average was 38.78% GB (Savanta adjusted up by 1% as they were UK), their actual GB vote share was 34.7%.
It was not a deliberate choice by the founders to have more population than either Wyoming (which the founders didn't know about) or Vermont disenfranchised outside of statehood.
Redefining the capital territory as the uninhabited land spanning the White House, US Congress etc while admitting the rest of the inhabited territory as a new state would be entirely plausible and reasonable.
Women used as lampstands at ‘tone deaf’ tech event
Silicon Valley company admits marketing stunt was in ‘poor taste’ after sexism backlash
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2024/08/14/company-apologises-using-women-lampstands-sexism-storm/
For example, "anti-modernism" is difficult as a slogan or value when modernism as such hasn't really existed for quite a long time. It is tilting at Windmills of the Mind.
They imagine - I think - that there is necessarily an opposition, and has to be a battle between, same sex marriage and traditional MF marriage. I don't see it.
Cates has some good points - more respect for parents who choose to stay at home and support for longer term stable relationships I see, but to suggest that the way to support it is to defund Universities because higher education prevents people becoming mums on average is a touch peculiar.
Attempting to link to similar movements in the USA, and picking up Trumpism with it, is problematic.
https://navigatorresearch.org/younger-americans-side-with-progressive-stances-on-a-number-of-issues/
This Navigator Research report is the fourth release from a survey conducted among 4,000 Americans under the age of 35 across five different modes to understand where they stand on issues facing the nation today. Today’s release focuses on younger Americans’ stances on a range of issues including the economy, democracy, reproductive rights, and a number of other issues, and how their political identity aligns with their issue stances...
It's interesting that the sample skews quite a bit more progressive than their stated party affiliation would suggest.
Overall, 46% identified as Dem or lean Dem, and 35% as Rep or lean Rep.
For those expressing a preference, that's about 57%-43%.
Which is fairly close to voting patterns in the 2022 and 2020 exit polls.
Looks pretty promising for the Democrats, if they can get this cohort to turn out.
These sentences are showing the reality of that fact..
There’s loads of companies out there that are way overleveraged and/or overvalued, and the ‘adjustment’ will come quickly when it happens.
We need to move on beyond thinking of everything in terms of costs that are visible in treasury spreadsheets and give far more weight to hidden, but real and significant, future costs.
After 8 days the trial collapsed because the Judge, court rooms and barristers were booked onto another case the day after.
She has since had a further trial cancelled with no reschedule date.
There comes a point where the process is the punishment
@MrHarryCole
·
1h
EXC: Senior Tories plotting bringing forward leadership result to allow new boss to respond to budget on October 30.
https://x.com/JosephineCumbo/status/1823989183519543369
Josephine Cumbo
@JosephineCumbo
Son achieved AAA in Physics, Further Maths and Maths and no offer from First Choice or Insurance University. Now doing mad scramble for Clearing places. Stress levels are high.
But, then I remembered that there is now an A* grade. Presumably, for many universities, the A* just replaced the A.
You think these people are nice?
https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/markets/article-13739809/Asda-crisis-deepens-sales-dive-chairman-say-hes-embarrassed-performance.html
I note the Issa brothers (well one for the moment) are bailing out before anything gets too serious.
https://www.proactiveinvestors.co.uk/companies/news/1053871/asda-chair-urges-mohsin-issa-to-step-away-amid-embarrassing-performance-1053871.html
Their rate of prior offending ranges from quite a bit to prolific.
I
I know that my nephew was rejected from a lot of universities for having nothing to write about for hobbies or achievements outside academia (he's ended up in Birmingham). My niece (next year) shouldn't have a problem given that she has done things outside of school, is the bassist in a reasonably successful band and makes money doing GCSE maths tuition.. Downside is she wants to do medicine so everything rests on the exam in a few weeks.
I got an offer from Cambridge (AAB), and a slew of other offers (St Andrews, LSE, UCL and Aberdeen). I chose UCL as my insurance because they generously offered me EE, and I reckoned that I was likely to achieve that even on a really bad day. St Andrew's offer (ABB) was discarded almost immediately because it was simply too close to my Cambridge offer. I didn't want a situation where I got ABC and didn't get in anywhere.
Since when has "anti-establishment rhetoric" been disallowed in this country?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cy9elrjpry0o
He must have aimed very high with his first uni if he got no response to three As in those subjects.
But I'm also surprised his insurance offer wasn't rather lower than three As. That suggests bad planning.
If he's got an A in Further Maths I'd also be surprised if he has any trouble at all getting a place through Clearing, but maybe it would be better to defer?
Anyway, none of that is presumably of any use to her.
The people picketing will only help hasten the collapse if it affects sales. From a quick google plenty of other Asda stores are balloting on strike action. Once people stop going and go elsewhere then will they return.
Morrisons is looking to be in less than great shape too.
Trump at 2.2 doesn't feel terrible right now given how much everything can move about from here.
https://x.com/jimstewartson/status/1823822871153819926
https://x.com/atrupar/status/1823822173670195369
https://x.com/Acyn/status/1823824154728259964
Harris is part of an administration whose policies of the last three and a half years are there to see.
Of course she'll end up articulating differences from the current administration (along with defending much of its record), but it's fairly absurd to expect a detailed sit down with the media on it before the convention.
The campaign will have a hundred other priorities.