Sam Freedman @Samfr · 1h I cannot emphasise enough that you cannot tell what's going on from early voting figures in the US. Historic attempts to use them to predict results have been hopeless inaccurate. It's not a representative sample.
Sam Freedman @Samfr · 1h The only minor exception is Nevada where nearly everyone votes early. And even then it can be misleading and v hard to intepret.
Yesterday, CNN published a poll showing Nevada in a virtual tie — Donald Trump led Kamala Harris by 1 point. However, Trump led Harris by a wider margin in the early vote, 6 points, closely matching the GOP partisan turnout edge in the state so far, which has worried Democrats. Harris made up the difference because she was ahead among people whom CNN considers likely voters who have yet to vote.
In other "Britain is a mess" news, one part of the Home Office doesn't accept documents issued by another part of the Home Office, fucking up the lives of people caught in the middle.
fpt Serious question here, not trying to provoke just soliciting opinions
I think most of us agree the country is in a mess, don't think that is in dispute
So given that how many believe a government can actually get elected with policies that could fix the mess.
Personally my view is however you fix it either to the left or right......you wont get elected being honest about it
We all seem to agree that the country is a mess and we all seem to agree that fixing it won't be pleasant, but my sense is that most of the country only agree with the first part. They believe that there is a painless way to fix things by taxing the rich, or cracking down on layabouts, or some manner of deus ex machina.
The reason people believe this is partly denial and partly because the politicians don't tell them any different.
Perhaps I'm a naive idealist, but I think that if a major party leader was relentlessly honest about the financial mess the country is in, and the long-term failures that have put it there, that there's a chance they could convince enough voters that fixing it was going to involve unpleasantness (i.e. spending cuts on things people want spending on and/or tax rises that they pay), and any politician saying otherwise was lying to them.
I don't think the country is a 'mess'; at least, not in a historical sense.
Perhaps, but we don't judge ourselves by our worst historical moments, even modern historial moments. We judge by our neighbours, what we feel we deserve, and how things generally feel in our guts.
I'm an optimist in global terms, life for the majority is better than most other points of history, but for the UK everything just seems kind of low grade crappy. Does anything work properly, or get done swiftly anymore? Surely yes, but a lot does not.
The thing is, my impression of our neighbours is that they feel the same way. Everything's shit if you listen to the French and the Germans.
The vast majority of stuff works. We turn on a tap; we get water. Our 'leccy and gas works. Our Internet works Even the NHS 'works' the majority of the time.
We do not think of the times when things just work. But we complain and remember when things fail: and because of modern communications, we hear about when they fail for other people.
There are objective metrics though that we can look at and see that the country is struggling in many ways. Hospital waiting lists for example are not simply a bad vibe, they're an objective measure of the health service not meeting demand. We see the same with the court system. Or with people unable to buy their own home.
There are vastly worse fates than ours. 150 years ago, at the summit of the British Empire, most people lived like the inhabitants of Eritrea, today.
And most people today would give everything to inhabit a rich world democracy line ours.
Yes, there's little seriously wrong with this country that more enterprise and less socialism wouldn't solve.
Trump following Rishi and targeting the Hindu vote and lauding Modi too (something even Tommy Robinson has done on the basis that Modi is nearly as anti Muslim as he is)
'@realDonaldTrump I strongly condemn the barbaric violence against Hindus, Christians, and other minorities who are getting attacked and looted by mobs in Bangladesh, which remains in a total state of chaos.
It would have never happened on my watch. Kamala and Joe have ignored Hindus across the world and in America. They have been a disaster from Israel to Ukraine to our own Southern Border, but we will Make America Strong Again and bring back Peace through Strength!
We will also protect Hindu Americans against the anti-religion agenda of the radical left. We will fight for your freedom. Under my administration, we will also strengthen our great partnership with India and my good friend, Prime Minister Modi.
Kamala Harris will destroy your small businesses with more regulations and higher taxes. By contrast, I cut taxes, cut regulations, unleashed American energy, and built the greatest economy in history. We will do it again, bigger and better than ever before—and we will Make America Great Again.
Kamala Harris with a Hindu name, and Hindu mother, is ignoring Hindus according to Donald Trump.
Well, one day she just happened to turn black, as he put it.
He was calling her a cracker tonight. (Someone who cracks under pressure.)
You poor naive idiot.
That is not what cracker means in America. It’s a term of contempt in the Deep South for poor white sharecroppers. They were classified and referred to alongside slaves/former slaves “crackers and n*****s”
My mother innocently thought about calling her new dog cracker… until she mentioned it to an American friend who reacted in horror…
It takes 4 years for some people to face any consequences, and most still haven't. But I guess other lawyers will need to commit crimes and ethical violations for Trump this time around.
Kenneth Chesebro, an attorney for Donald Trump, has been suspended from practicing law in New York and could be disbarred just days after pleading guilty in what prosecutors claim was an effort to overturn Georgia’s 2020 election results.
If, like me, you get confused about where the winning post actually is across the Atlantic, you may find this helpful. BNP has very good notes on the US elections and how to trade them. They are mostly focused on timing and the info you should focus on.
fpt Serious question here, not trying to provoke just soliciting opinions
I think most of us agree the country is in a mess, don't think that is in dispute
So given that how many believe a government can actually get elected with policies that could fix the mess.
Personally my view is however you fix it either to the left or right......you wont get elected being honest about it
We all seem to agree that the country is a mess and we all seem to agree that fixing it won't be pleasant, but my sense is that most of the country only agree with the first part. They believe that there is a painless way to fix things by taxing the rich, or cracking down on layabouts, or some manner of deus ex machina.
The reason people believe this is partly denial and partly because the politicians don't tell them any different.
Perhaps I'm a naive idealist, but I think that if a major party leader was relentlessly honest about the financial mess the country is in, and the long-term failures that have put it there, that there's a chance they could convince enough voters that fixing it was going to involve unpleasantness (i.e. spending cuts on things people want spending on and/or tax rises that they pay), and any politician saying otherwise was lying to them.
I don't think the country is a 'mess'; at least, not in a historical sense.
Perhaps, but we don't judge ourselves by our worst historical moments, even modern historial moments. We judge by our neighbours, what we feel we deserve, and how things generally feel in our guts.
I'm an optimist in global terms, life for the majority is better than most other points of history, but for the UK everything just seems kind of low grade crappy. Does anything work properly, or get done swiftly anymore? Surely yes, but a lot does not.
The thing is, my impression of our neighbours is that they feel the same way. Everything's shit if you listen to the French and the Germans.
The vast majority of stuff works. We turn on a tap; we get water. Our 'leccy and gas works. Our Internet works Even the NHS 'works' the majority of the time.
We do not think of the times when things just work. But we complain and remember when things fail: and because of modern communications, we hear about when they fail for other people.
I think we are seeing the long term effects of both Social Media induced envy, and of Russian trolls all over the Internet and Social Media.
It's these trolls mission to trash talk and run down every comment board in every country, from both left and right. They know that their own country is shit, and want their people to believe every other country is shit too. That's the basic message of Russia Today. The pretence is that everywhere is shit, but at least Russia is honest about it.
I think that gives too much power to social media trolling and divests people of agency. People's eyes and ears won't get fooled forever if it contradicts what they read.
It's why governments may not get punished by things like a brief technical recession, if the general person doesn't feel it to be very bad.
I've been vaguely watching the (I assume) Russian trolls over the past few years. It's been interesting watching their MO. Often appear as a regular person in a small-but-influential group. Contribute, chat, seem normal-ish. Then a little bit of fret about how their country is on the wrong track. Eventually posting outright Kremlin TV and things like "I just want my country back!". The groups are usually adjacent culturally. A primarily US-focussed group will get an English troll who can throw in some vaguely plausible local colour, etc.
Bit of sympathy, leading eventually to outrage as their 'friend' talks about how gay/muslims/leftists/whatever mean they are now locked in their home, terrorised, unable to speak their mind for fear of being arrested. (Yes, the irony).
Over and over, across different social platforms. Especially common on Discord (see also 'Disclose TV') and Reddit.
Trump following Rishi and targeting the Hindu vote and lauding Modi too (something even Tommy Robinson has done on the basis that Modi is nearly as anti Muslim as he is)
'@realDonaldTrump I strongly condemn the barbaric violence against Hindus, Christians, and other minorities who are getting attacked and looted by mobs in Bangladesh, which remains in a total state of chaos.
It would have never happened on my watch. Kamala and Joe have ignored Hindus across the world and in America. They have been a disaster from Israel to Ukraine to our own Southern Border, but we will Make America Strong Again and bring back Peace through Strength!
We will also protect Hindu Americans against the anti-religion agenda of the radical left. We will fight for your freedom. Under my administration, we will also strengthen our great partnership with India and my good friend, Prime Minister Modi.
Kamala Harris will destroy your small businesses with more regulations and higher taxes. By contrast, I cut taxes, cut regulations, unleashed American energy, and built the greatest economy in history. We will do it again, bigger and better than ever before—and we will Make America Great Again.
Kamala Harris with a Hindu name, and Hindu mother, is ignoring Hindus according to Donald Trump.
Well, one day she just happened to turn black, as he put it.
He was calling her a cracker tonight. (Someone who cracks under pressure.)
You poor naive idiot.
That is not what cracker means in America. It’s a term of contempt in the Deep South for poor white sharecroppers. They were classified and referred to alongside slaves/former slaves “crackers and n*****s”
My mother innocently thought about calling her new dog cracker… until she mentioned it to an American friend who reacted in horror…
If I didn't know what it meant, I wouldn't have posted it in response to @kle4 talking about his past observations on her racial classification.
Judging by the Yougov members poll I expect it to be close, indeed the closest Tory leadership result since members got the vote. That would also match by conversations with other members.
Badenoch should win though but will have to include other leadership contenders in her Shadow Cabinet
Rishi’s parting gift to his successors is his demonstration yesterday of what a passionate, effective speech as LOTO looks like. I’m not convinced either of them will clear the bar he has now set?
Yes, if Rishi had a political brain not just an economic one he would not have tried to remove Boris but let him lead the party to defeat in July. However it would have been a narrower defeat and Reform would have got nowhere near 14% of the vote and the Tories would have got over 200 seats.
Rishi would now be odds on to be Leader of the Opposition to an already unpopular Labour government instead of his political career being cut short after he led the party to landslide defeat and trying to get on the board of some Silicon Valley Tech Company. Remember David Miliband did not challenge Brown in 2009 but let him lead Labour to defeat in 2010 and actually won the Labour members' and MPs vote that year, only the support of trades unions scraped Ed Miliband over the line and they don't count in Tory leadership elections
Point of order
Johnson removed himself by his behaviour
Not for redwall and Reform voters who turned a narrow Tory defeat into a landslide Tory defeat after Boris was removed
Hispanics not Latinos. Pelosi insider trading. Clinton lied but Kamala lies more.
Colorado, California, New Mexico. This is worrying. Why is he campaigning in states that should be beyond him? What does he know that I don't?
Nothing.
He knows nothing that you don't.
Trump I think now believes the EC is in the bag and wants to win the popular vote too, so he is appearing in California, Virginia, New York, Colorado, New Mexico etc rather than swing states alone.
However that risks him doing a Hillary given Harris and Walz and Obama are in swing state after swing state (albeit with 1 stop for Harris in Texas with Beyonce and her DC anti abortion speech)
Quite:
I am sure Trump thinks he's winning. And he thinks he's winning because (a) the polls understated him last time, and (b) if you don't tell Trump he's winning, then will rapidly find yourself out of a job.
For that reason, I think the likelihood that he knows something that you don't is close to zero.
In other "Britain is a mess" news, one part of the Home Office doesn't accept documents issued by another part of the Home Office, fucking up the lives of people caught in the middle.
I think that's more succinctly put as "border force are unreasonable c****", a characteristic common to many people working at border checks worldwide.
"Delinquent elites are in an open crusade against democracy"
Discuss
The way the Lisbon Treaty was handled would be a good example...
I was thinking more of things like Peter Thiel writing "I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible"
Perhaps he should go and live in North Korea and see what the alternative is like?
Funnily enough though he still lives in America, a country which, with all its faults, is still mostly free AND reasonably democratic.
Is universal suffrage essential for freedom and democracy? Do we look back on the time of Gladstone and Disraeli as an era of tyranny because the vote was restricted?
fpt Serious question here, not trying to provoke just soliciting opinions
I think most of us agree the country is in a mess, don't think that is in dispute
So given that how many believe a government can actually get elected with policies that could fix the mess.
Personally my view is however you fix it either to the left or right......you wont get elected being honest about it
We all seem to agree that the country is a mess and we all seem to agree that fixing it won't be pleasant, but my sense is that most of the country only agree with the first part. They believe that there is a painless way to fix things by taxing the rich, or cracking down on layabouts, or some manner of deus ex machina.
The reason people believe this is partly denial and partly because the politicians don't tell them any different.
Perhaps I'm a naive idealist, but I think that if a major party leader was relentlessly honest about the financial mess the country is in, and the long-term failures that have put it there, that there's a chance they could convince enough voters that fixing it was going to involve unpleasantness (i.e. spending cuts on things people want spending on and/or tax rises that they pay), and any politician saying otherwise was lying to them.
I don't think the country is a 'mess'; at least, not in a historical sense.
Perhaps, but we don't judge ourselves by our worst historical moments, even modern historial moments. We judge by our neighbours, what we feel we deserve, and how things generally feel in our guts.
I'm an optimist in global terms, life for the majority is better than most other points of history, but for the UK everything just seems kind of low grade crappy. Does anything work properly, or get done swiftly anymore? Surely yes, but a lot does not.
The thing is, my impression of our neighbours is that they feel the same way. Everything's shit if you listen to the French and the Germans.
The vast majority of stuff works. We turn on a tap; we get water. Our 'leccy and gas works. Our Internet works Even the NHS 'works' the majority of the time.
We do not think of the times when things just work. But we complain and remember when things fail: and because of modern communications, we hear about when they fail for other people.
There are objective metrics though that we can look at and see that the country is struggling in many ways. Hospital waiting lists for example are not simply a bad vibe, they're an objective measure of the health service not meeting demand. We see the same with the court system. Or with people unable to buy their own home.
There are vastly worse fates than ours. 150 years ago, at the summit of the British Empire, most people lived like the inhabitants of Eritrea, today.
And most people today would give everything to inhabit a rich world democracy line ours.
I'm not sure life in the UK got materially comfortable until the 1960s/1970s, notwithstanding the atrocious politics.
Those very high tax rates, so hated of the Thatcherites, paid for an increasingly contented and resourced society, and also one of improving economic performance.
The real disaster was the ooll crisis of 1973, and the shared responsibility in the aftermath between a feudalistic management attitude, and obstreperous Unions, which allowed both a partial rewriting of history in the 1980's, and then for us to diverge significantly from the Norh European mainstream.
fpt Serious question here, not trying to provoke just soliciting opinions
I think most of us agree the country is in a mess, don't think that is in dispute
So given that how many believe a government can actually get elected with policies that could fix the mess.
Personally my view is however you fix it either to the left or right......you wont get elected being honest about it
We all seem to agree that the country is a mess and we all seem to agree that fixing it won't be pleasant, but my sense is that most of the country only agree with the first part. They believe that there is a painless way to fix things by taxing the rich, or cracking down on layabouts, or some manner of deus ex machina.
The reason people believe this is partly denial and partly because the politicians don't tell them any different.
Perhaps I'm a naive idealist, but I think that if a major party leader was relentlessly honest about the financial mess the country is in, and the long-term failures that have put it there, that there's a chance they could convince enough voters that fixing it was going to involve unpleasantness (i.e. spending cuts on things people want spending on and/or tax rises that they pay), and any politician saying otherwise was lying to them.
The simplest way forward is also the least palatable.
Income tax up by 2p in the pound, coupled with swingeing cuts to the welfare state.
Pay down debt, offer tax breaks to entrepreneurs and encourage the knowledge economy, offer tax breaks to billionaires and non dom types to move here rather than move away. Better to get a small amount of something than a lot of nothing, as Reeves seems to have chosen.
Grasp the nettle of the housing crisis with policies that screw over nimbies and build, build, build. Social care reform. End the triple lock, means tested support for pensioners who need it, the rest need to accept being a bit poorer, like the rest of us, as the economy resets.
Everything I have mentioned is electorally toxic, of course. But it's the only way forward.
No, there are plenty of other ways forward.
For example, install *inside the various government department* units tasked with IT renewal, process reduction, data science etc. Give them massive political support and set them to work.
It can be done - see the private sector.
The problem is the public sector exhibits a largely self-selecting bias towards slowness and inefficiency. The type of person who wants to increase efficiency in the ways you describe rarely gravitates towards the public sector. So how to encourage them, because they generally meet with the immovable monolith of existing culture within the public sector which becomes a force field of resistance to change.
Privatising vast swathes of the public sector is an option, but, again, electorally toxic...
Offer the right pay and motivation. If you like reforming organisations, large chunks of the public sector are pristine territory….
Honestly - I love work like that. Shades of Dom Cummings putting out that APB to attract weirdoes and assorted non-conformists to work with him back in 2019. My kind of gig.
The trouble is, as I've experienced working for very large corporations, is that corporate culture is set in stone. Changing it is less of a herculean task and more of a sisyphean one. You will be met with resistance at every level, as you say massive political support is the only way forward, but even that is likely to meet huge resistance. He who says organisation says oligarchy, and all that.
Trump following Rishi and targeting the Hindu vote and lauding Modi too (something even Tommy Robinson has done on the basis that Modi is nearly as anti Muslim as he is)
'@realDonaldTrump I strongly condemn the barbaric violence against Hindus, Christians, and other minorities who are getting attacked and looted by mobs in Bangladesh, which remains in a total state of chaos.
It would have never happened on my watch. Kamala and Joe have ignored Hindus across the world and in America. They have been a disaster from Israel to Ukraine to our own Southern Border, but we will Make America Strong Again and bring back Peace through Strength!
We will also protect Hindu Americans against the anti-religion agenda of the radical left. We will fight for your freedom. Under my administration, we will also strengthen our great partnership with India and my good friend, Prime Minister Modi.
Kamala Harris will destroy your small businesses with more regulations and higher taxes. By contrast, I cut taxes, cut regulations, unleashed American energy, and built the greatest economy in history. We will do it again, bigger and better than ever before—and we will Make America Great Again.
"Delinquent elites are in an open crusade against democracy"
Discuss
The way the Lisbon Treaty was handled would be a good example...
I was thinking more of things like Peter Thiel writing "I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible"
Perhaps he should go and live in North Korea and see what the alternative is like?
Funnily enough though he still lives in America, a country which, with all its faults, is still mostly free AND reasonably democratic.
Is universal suffrage essential for freedom and democracy? Do we look back on the time of Gladstone and Disraeli as an era of tyranny because the vote was restricted?
It wasn't as free or fair as it would have been had it not been. Whether other decisions would be better or worse is a different question.
Trump following Rishi and targeting the Hindu vote and lauding Modi too (something even Tommy Robinson has done on the basis that Modi is nearly as anti Muslim as he is)
'@realDonaldTrump I strongly condemn the barbaric violence against Hindus, Christians, and other minorities who are getting attacked and looted by mobs in Bangladesh, which remains in a total state of chaos.
It would have never happened on my watch. Kamala and Joe have ignored Hindus across the world and in America. They have been a disaster from Israel to Ukraine to our own Southern Border, but we will Make America Strong Again and bring back Peace through Strength!
We will also protect Hindu Americans against the anti-religion agenda of the radical left. We will fight for your freedom. Under my administration, we will also strengthen our great partnership with India and my good friend, Prime Minister Modi.
Kamala Harris will destroy your small businesses with more regulations and higher taxes. By contrast, I cut taxes, cut regulations, unleashed American energy, and built the greatest economy in history. We will do it again, bigger and better than ever before—and we will Make America Great Again.
In other "Britain is a mess" news, one part of the Home Office doesn't accept documents issued by another part of the Home Office, fucking up the lives of people caught in the middle.
I think that's more succinctly put as "border force are unreasonable c****", a characteristic common to many people working at border checks worldwide.
Never make a joke to a border official, I have heard. Especially if you are of a minority racial background.
fpt Serious question here, not trying to provoke just soliciting opinions
I think most of us agree the country is in a mess, don't think that is in dispute
So given that how many believe a government can actually get elected with policies that could fix the mess.
Personally my view is however you fix it either to the left or right......you wont get elected being honest about it
We all seem to agree that the country is a mess and we all seem to agree that fixing it won't be pleasant, but my sense is that most of the country only agree with the first part. They believe that there is a painless way to fix things by taxing the rich, or cracking down on layabouts, or some manner of deus ex machina.
The reason people believe this is partly denial and partly because the politicians don't tell them any different.
Perhaps I'm a naive idealist, but I think that if a major party leader was relentlessly honest about the financial mess the country is in, and the long-term failures that have put it there, that there's a chance they could convince enough voters that fixing it was going to involve unpleasantness (i.e. spending cuts on things people want spending on and/or tax rises that they pay), and any politician saying otherwise was lying to them.
I don't think the country is a 'mess'; at least, not in a historical sense.
Perhaps, but we don't judge ourselves by our worst historical moments, even modern historial moments. We judge by our neighbours, what we feel we deserve, and how things generally feel in our guts.
I'm an optimist in global terms, life for the majority is better than most other points of history, but for the UK everything just seems kind of low grade crappy. Does anything work properly, or get done swiftly anymore? Surely yes, but a lot does not.
The thing is, my impression of our neighbours is that they feel the same way. Everything's shit if you listen to the French and the Germans.
The vast majority of stuff works. We turn on a tap; we get water. Our 'leccy and gas works. Our Internet works Even the NHS 'works' the majority of the time.
We do not think of the times when things just work. But we complain and remember when things fail: and because of modern communications, we hear about when they fail for other people.
I think we are seeing the long term effects of both Social Media induced envy, and of Russian trolls all over the Internet and Social Media.
It's these trolls mission to trash talk and run down every comment board in every country, from both left and right. They know that their own country is shit, and want their people to believe every other country is shit too. That's the basic message of Russia Today. The pretence is that everywhere is shit, but at least Russia is honest about it.
The great irony is that shit doesn't work in Russia. Outside of Moscow and St Peterburg it is an utter shit hole without jobs and hope.
"Delinquent elites are in an open crusade against democracy"
Discuss
The way the Lisbon Treaty was handled would be a good example...
I was thinking more of things like Peter Thiel writing "I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible"
Perhaps he should go and live in North Korea and see what the alternative is like?
Funnily enough though he still lives in America, a country which, with all its faults, is still mostly free AND reasonably democratic.
Is universal suffrage essential for freedom and democracy? Do we look back on the time of Gladstone and Disraeli as an era of tyranny because the vote was restricted?
fpt Serious question here, not trying to provoke just soliciting opinions
I think most of us agree the country is in a mess, don't think that is in dispute
So given that how many believe a government can actually get elected with policies that could fix the mess.
Personally my view is however you fix it either to the left or right......you wont get elected being honest about it
We all seem to agree that the country is a mess and we all seem to agree that fixing it won't be pleasant, but my sense is that most of the country only agree with the first part. They believe that there is a painless way to fix things by taxing the rich, or cracking down on layabouts, or some manner of deus ex machina.
The reason people believe this is partly denial and partly because the politicians don't tell them any different.
Perhaps I'm a naive idealist, but I think that if a major party leader was relentlessly honest about the financial mess the country is in, and the long-term failures that have put it there, that there's a chance they could convince enough voters that fixing it was going to involve unpleasantness (i.e. spending cuts on things people want spending on and/or tax rises that they pay), and any politician saying otherwise was lying to them.
I don't think the country is a 'mess'; at least, not in a historical sense.
Perhaps, but we don't judge ourselves by our worst historical moments, even modern historial moments. We judge by our neighbours, what we feel we deserve, and how things generally feel in our guts.
I'm an optimist in global terms, life for the majority is better than most other points of history, but for the UK everything just seems kind of low grade crappy. Does anything work properly, or get done swiftly anymore? Surely yes, but a lot does not.
The thing is, my impression of our neighbours is that they feel the same way. Everything's shit if you listen to the French and the Germans.
The vast majority of stuff works. We turn on a tap; we get water. Our 'leccy and gas works. Our Internet works Even the NHS 'works' the majority of the time.
We do not think of the times when things just work. But we complain and remember when things fail: and because of modern communications, we hear about when they fail for other people.
I think we are seeing the long term effects of both Social Media induced envy, and of Russian trolls all over the Internet and Social Media.
It's these trolls mission to trash talk and run down every comment board in every country, from both left and right. They know that their own country is shit, and want their people to believe every other country is shit too. That's the basic message of Russia Today. The pretence is that everywhere is shit, but at least Russia is honest about it.
I think that gives too much power to social media trolling and divests people of agency. People's eyes and ears won't get fooled forever if it contradicts what they read.
It's why governments may not get punished by things like a brief technical recession, if the general person doesn't feel it to be very bad.
I've been vaguely watching the (I assume) Russian trolls over the past few years. It's been interesting watching their MO. Often appear as a regular person in a small-but-influential group. Contribute, chat, seem normal-ish. Then a little bit of fret about how their country is on the wrong track. Eventually posting outright Kremlin TV and things like "I just want my country back!". The groups are usually adjacent culturally. A primarily US-focussed group will get an English troll who can throw in some vaguely plausible local colour, etc.
Bit of sympathy, leading eventually to outrage as their 'friend' talks about how gay/muslims/leftists/whatever mean they are now locked in their home, terrorised, unable to speak their mind for fear of being arrested. (Yes, the irony).
Over and over, across different social platforms. Especially common on Discord (see also 'Disclose TV') and Reddit.
Our Saturday trolls are a poor imitation.
I just want large chunks of other people’s countries back. Mostly in France.
fpt Serious question here, not trying to provoke just soliciting opinions
I think most of us agree the country is in a mess, don't think that is in dispute
So given that how many believe a government can actually get elected with policies that could fix the mess.
Personally my view is however you fix it either to the left or right......you wont get elected being honest about it
We all seem to agree that the country is a mess and we all seem to agree that fixing it won't be pleasant, but my sense is that most of the country only agree with the first part. They believe that there is a painless way to fix things by taxing the rich, or cracking down on layabouts, or some manner of deus ex machina.
The reason people believe this is partly denial and partly because the politicians don't tell them any different.
Perhaps I'm a naive idealist, but I think that if a major party leader was relentlessly honest about the financial mess the country is in, and the long-term failures that have put it there, that there's a chance they could convince enough voters that fixing it was going to involve unpleasantness (i.e. spending cuts on things people want spending on and/or tax rises that they pay), and any politician saying otherwise was lying to them.
I don't think the country is a 'mess'; at least, not in a historical sense.
Perhaps, but we don't judge ourselves by our worst historical moments, even modern historial moments. We judge by our neighbours, what we feel we deserve, and how things generally feel in our guts.
I'm an optimist in global terms, life for the majority is better than most other points of history, but for the UK everything just seems kind of low grade crappy. Does anything work properly, or get done swiftly anymore? Surely yes, but a lot does not.
The thing is, my impression of our neighbours is that they feel the same way. Everything's shit if you listen to the French and the Germans.
The vast majority of stuff works. We turn on a tap; we get water. Our 'leccy and gas works. Our Internet works Even the NHS 'works' the majority of the time.
We do not think of the times when things just work. But we complain and remember when things fail: and because of modern communications, we hear about when they fail for other people.
I think we are seeing the long term effects of both Social Media induced envy, and of Russian trolls all over the Internet and Social Media.
It's these trolls mission to trash talk and run down every comment board in every country, from both left and right. They know that their own country is shit, and want their people to believe every other country is shit too. That's the basic message of Russia Today. The pretence is that everywhere is shit, but at least Russia is honest about it.
The great irony is that shit doesn't work in Russia. Outside of Moscow and St Peterburg it is an utter shit hole without jobs and hope.
I don't know how Putin keeps getting re-election so handily, it's a mystery.
(Some might say he could well win a fair election, or might have done in the past, but since they won't allow one just in case who can say?)
fpt Serious question here, not trying to provoke just soliciting opinions
I think most of us agree the country is in a mess, don't think that is in dispute
So given that how many believe a government can actually get elected with policies that could fix the mess.
Personally my view is however you fix it either to the left or right......you wont get elected being honest about it
We all seem to agree that the country is a mess and we all seem to agree that fixing it won't be pleasant, but my sense is that most of the country only agree with the first part. They believe that there is a painless way to fix things by taxing the rich, or cracking down on layabouts, or some manner of deus ex machina.
The reason people believe this is partly denial and partly because the politicians don't tell them any different.
Perhaps I'm a naive idealist, but I think that if a major party leader was relentlessly honest about the financial mess the country is in, and the long-term failures that have put it there, that there's a chance they could convince enough voters that fixing it was going to involve unpleasantness (i.e. spending cuts on things people want spending on and/or tax rises that they pay), and any politician saying otherwise was lying to them.
I don't think the country is a 'mess'; at least, not in a historical sense.
Perhaps, but we don't judge ourselves by our worst historical moments, even modern historial moments. We judge by our neighbours, what we feel we deserve, and how things generally feel in our guts.
I'm an optimist in global terms, life for the majority is better than most other points of history, but for the UK everything just seems kind of low grade crappy. Does anything work properly, or get done swiftly anymore? Surely yes, but a lot does not.
The thing is, my impression of our neighbours is that they feel the same way. Everything's shit if you listen to the French and the Germans.
The vast majority of stuff works. We turn on a tap; we get water. Our 'leccy and gas works. Our Internet works Even the NHS 'works' the majority of the time.
We do not think of the times when things just work. But we complain and remember when things fail: and because of modern communications, we hear about when they fail for other people.
There are objective metrics though that we can look at and see that the country is struggling in many ways. Hospital waiting lists for example are not simply a bad vibe, they're an objective measure of the health service not meeting demand. We see the same with the court system. Or with people unable to buy their own home.
There are vastly worse fates than ours. 150 years ago, at the summit of the British Empire, most people lived like the inhabitants of Eritrea, today.
And most people today would give everything to inhabit a rich world democracy line ours.
Well quite.
We expect extraordinary things, while at the same time suffering from the impact of an ageing population, and from competition for resources from people prepared to work harder than us for less money.
fpt Serious question here, not trying to provoke just soliciting opinions
I think most of us agree the country is in a mess, don't think that is in dispute
So given that how many believe a government can actually get elected with policies that could fix the mess.
Personally my view is however you fix it either to the left or right......you wont get elected being honest about it
We all seem to agree that the country is a mess and we all seem to agree that fixing it won't be pleasant, but my sense is that most of the country only agree with the first part. They believe that there is a painless way to fix things by taxing the rich, or cracking down on layabouts, or some manner of deus ex machina.
The reason people believe this is partly denial and partly because the politicians don't tell them any different.
Perhaps I'm a naive idealist, but I think that if a major party leader was relentlessly honest about the financial mess the country is in, and the long-term failures that have put it there, that there's a chance they could convince enough voters that fixing it was going to involve unpleasantness (i.e. spending cuts on things people want spending on and/or tax rises that they pay), and any politician saying otherwise was lying to them.
The simplest way forward is also the least palatable.
Income tax up by 2p in the pound, coupled with swingeing cuts to the welfare state.
Pay down debt, offer tax breaks to entrepreneurs and encourage the knowledge economy, offer tax breaks to billionaires and non dom types to move here rather than move away. Better to get a small amount of something than a lot of nothing, as Reeves seems to have chosen.
Grasp the nettle of the housing crisis with policies that screw over nimbies and build, build, build. Social care reform. End the triple lock, means tested support for pensioners who need it, the rest need to accept being a bit poorer, like the rest of us, as the economy resets.
Everything I have mentioned is electorally toxic, of course. But it's the only way forward.
No, there are plenty of other ways forward.
For example, install *inside the various government department* units tasked with IT renewal, process reduction, data science etc. Give them massive political support and set them to work.
It can be done - see the private sector.
The problem is the public sector exhibits a largely self-selecting bias towards slowness and inefficiency. The type of person who wants to increase efficiency in the ways you describe rarely gravitates towards the public sector. So how to encourage them, because they generally meet with the immovable monolith of existing culture within the public sector which becomes a force field of resistance to change.
Privatising vast swathes of the public sector is an option, but, again, electorally toxic...
My little bit of the public sector has brought in professional management and consultants from the private sector. Our once (I flatter myself) fairly cutting-edge outfit now spends it's time in meetings, updating planners in MS Teams, and attending 'enterprise' agile stand-up's where people explain they've not done anything because they've been in meetings and updating planners.
Spreading the good practice from within seems a lot cheaper and more effective. But that would involve the centre (in various senses) trusting in the local expertise. And as is clear - the centre knows best. I think that is really where the problem stems from.
I've also worked for multi-national banks, international courier firms, blah. The same problem everywhere that the centre knows best.
fpt Serious question here, not trying to provoke just soliciting opinions
I think most of us agree the country is in a mess, don't think that is in dispute
So given that how many believe a government can actually get elected with policies that could fix the mess.
Personally my view is however you fix it either to the left or right......you wont get elected being honest about it
We all seem to agree that the country is a mess and we all seem to agree that fixing it won't be pleasant, but my sense is that most of the country only agree with the first part. They believe that there is a painless way to fix things by taxing the rich, or cracking down on layabouts, or some manner of deus ex machina.
The reason people believe this is partly denial and partly because the politicians don't tell them any different.
Perhaps I'm a naive idealist, but I think that if a major party leader was relentlessly honest about the financial mess the country is in, and the long-term failures that have put it there, that there's a chance they could convince enough voters that fixing it was going to involve unpleasantness (i.e. spending cuts on things people want spending on and/or tax rises that they pay), and any politician saying otherwise was lying to them.
I don't think the country is a 'mess'; at least, not in a historical sense.
Perhaps, but we don't judge ourselves by our worst historical moments, even modern historial moments. We judge by our neighbours, what we feel we deserve, and how things generally feel in our guts.
I'm an optimist in global terms, life for the majority is better than most other points of history, but for the UK everything just seems kind of low grade crappy. Does anything work properly, or get done swiftly anymore? Surely yes, but a lot does not.
The thing is, my impression of our neighbours is that they feel the same way. Everything's shit if you listen to the French and the Germans.
The vast majority of stuff works. We turn on a tap; we get water. Our 'leccy and gas works. Our Internet works Even the NHS 'works' the majority of the time.
We do not think of the times when things just work. But we complain and remember when things fail: and because of modern communications, we hear about when they fail for other people.
I think we are seeing the long term effects of both Social Media induced envy, and of Russian trolls all over the Internet and Social Media.
It's these trolls mission to trash talk and run down every comment board in every country, from both left and right. They know that their own country is shit, and want their people to believe every other country is shit too. That's the basic message of Russia Today. The pretence is that everywhere is shit, but at least Russia is honest about it.
The great irony is that shit doesn't work in Russia. Outside of Moscow and St Peterburg it is an utter shit hole without jobs and hope.
I don't know how Putin keeps getting re-election so handily, it's a mystery.
(Some might say he could well win a fair election, or might have done in the past, but since they won't allow one just in case who can say?)
It helps that his opponents keep being unable to compete in elections, due to them having been locked up in a prison camp or having fallen out of a window.
Judging by the Yougov members poll I expect it to be close, indeed the closest Tory leadership result since members got the vote. That would also match by conversations with other members.
Badenoch should win though but will have to include other leadership contenders in her Shadow Cabinet
Rishi’s parting gift to his successors is his demonstration yesterday of what a passionate, effective speech as LOTO looks like. I’m not convinced either of them will clear the bar he has now set?
Yes, if Rishi had a political brain not just an economic one he would not have tried to remove Boris but let him lead the party to defeat in July. However it would have been a narrower defeat and Reform would have got nowhere near 14% of the vote and the Tories would have got over 200 seats.
Rishi would now be odds on to be Leader of the Opposition to an already unpopular Labour government instead of his political career being cut short after he led the party to landslide defeat and trying to get on the board of some Silicon Valley Tech Company. Remember David Miliband did not challenge Brown in 2009 but let him lead Labour to defeat in 2010 and actually won the Labour members' and MPs vote that year, only the support of trades unions scraped Ed Miliband over the line and they don't count in Tory leadership elections
Point of order
Johnson removed himself by his behaviour
Not for redwall and Reform voters who turned a narrow Tory defeat into a landslide Tory defeat after Boris was removed
At what point does a wrongun become more trouble than they are worth, even if they do part of the job very well?
The Republicans failed with respect to Trump years ago. Whatever happens next week, I suspect that what follows will be horrible for them as a result.
The Conservatives took a hit from some voters by dumping Boris in summer 2022. But had they not done so, the consequences with other voters would have been grisly as well. But more importantly, his behaviour meant that the had to go, whatever the electoral hit. Because he was a wrongun.
Trump following Rishi and targeting the Hindu vote and lauding Modi too (something even Tommy Robinson has done on the basis that Modi is nearly as anti Muslim as he is)
'@realDonaldTrump I strongly condemn the barbaric violence against Hindus, Christians, and other minorities who are getting attacked and looted by mobs in Bangladesh, which remains in a total state of chaos.
It would have never happened on my watch. Kamala and Joe have ignored Hindus across the world and in America. They have been a disaster from Israel to Ukraine to our own Southern Border, but we will Make America Strong Again and bring back Peace through Strength!
We will also protect Hindu Americans against the anti-religion agenda of the radical left. We will fight for your freedom. Under my administration, we will also strengthen our great partnership with India and my good friend, Prime Minister Modi.
Kamala Harris will destroy your small businesses with more regulations and higher taxes. By contrast, I cut taxes, cut regulations, unleashed American energy, and built the greatest economy in history. We will do it again, bigger and better than ever before—and we will Make America Great Again.
Trump following Rishi and targeting the Hindu vote and lauding Modi too (something even Tommy Robinson has done on the basis that Modi is nearly as anti Muslim as he is)
'@realDonaldTrump I strongly condemn the barbaric violence against Hindus, Christians, and other minorities who are getting attacked and looted by mobs in Bangladesh, which remains in a total state of chaos.
It would have never happened on my watch. Kamala and Joe have ignored Hindus across the world and in America. They have been a disaster from Israel to Ukraine to our own Southern Border, but we will Make America Strong Again and bring back Peace through Strength!
We will also protect Hindu Americans against the anti-religion agenda of the radical left. We will fight for your freedom. Under my administration, we will also strengthen our great partnership with India and my good friend, Prime Minister Modi.
Kamala Harris will destroy your small businesses with more regulations and higher taxes. By contrast, I cut taxes, cut regulations, unleashed American energy, and built the greatest economy in history. We will do it again, bigger and better than ever before—and we will Make America Great Again.
Kamala Harris with a Hindu name, and Hindu mother, is ignoring Hindus according to Donald Trump.
Well, one day she just happened to turn black, as he put it.
He was calling her a cracker tonight. (Someone who cracks under pressure.)
You poor naive idiot.
That is not what cracker means in America. It’s a term of contempt in the Deep South for poor white sharecroppers. They were classified and referred to alongside slaves/former slaves “crackers and n*****s”
My mother innocently thought about calling her new dog cracker… until she mentioned it to an American friend who reacted in horror…
If I didn't know what it meant, I wouldn't have posted it in response to @kle4 talking about his past observations on her racial classification.
So your inclusion of the incorrect definition “one who cracks” was for what purpose, exactly?
This performance by England in the Windies is making their performance in Pakistan look good. I was lamenting at 5pm that I was stuck doing a never ending rather dull trial instead of drinking Rum in the Caribbean. Not quite so sure now. This is pathetic.
"Delinquent elites are in an open crusade against democracy"
Discuss
The way the Lisbon Treaty was handled would be a good example...
I was thinking more of things like Peter Thiel writing "I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible"
Perhaps he should go and live in North Korea and see what the alternative is like?
Funnily enough though he still lives in America, a country which, with all its faults, is still mostly free AND reasonably democratic.
Is universal suffrage essential for freedom and democracy? Do we look back on the time of Gladstone and Disraeli as an era of tyranny because the vote was restricted?
How about South Africa?
A restricted franchise is a long way from Apartheid.
Trump following Rishi and targeting the Hindu vote and lauding Modi too (something even Tommy Robinson has done on the basis that Modi is nearly as anti Muslim as he is)
'@realDonaldTrump I strongly condemn the barbaric violence against Hindus, Christians, and other minorities who are getting attacked and looted by mobs in Bangladesh, which remains in a total state of chaos.
It would have never happened on my watch. Kamala and Joe have ignored Hindus across the world and in America. They have been a disaster from Israel to Ukraine to our own Southern Border, but we will Make America Strong Again and bring back Peace through Strength!
We will also protect Hindu Americans against the anti-religion agenda of the radical left. We will fight for your freedom. Under my administration, we will also strengthen our great partnership with India and my good friend, Prime Minister Modi.
Kamala Harris will destroy your small businesses with more regulations and higher taxes. By contrast, I cut taxes, cut regulations, unleashed American energy, and built the greatest economy in history. We will do it again, bigger and better than ever before—and we will Make America Great Again.
Kamala Harris with a Hindu name, and Hindu mother, is ignoring Hindus according to Donald Trump.
Well, one day she just happened to turn black, as he put it.
He was calling her a cracker tonight. (Someone who cracks under pressure.)
You poor naive idiot.
That is not what cracker means in America. It’s a term of contempt in the Deep South for poor white sharecroppers. They were classified and referred to alongside slaves/former slaves “crackers and n*****s”
My mother innocently thought about calling her new dog cracker… until she mentioned it to an American friend who reacted in horror…
If I didn't know what it meant, I wouldn't have posted it in response to @kle4 talking about his past observations on her racial classification.
So your inclusion of the incorrect definition “one who cracks” was for what purpose, exactly?
That was what Trump said. He presumably knew what he was doing.
"Delinquent elites are in an open crusade against democracy"
Discuss
The way the Lisbon Treaty was handled would be a good example...
I was thinking more of things like Peter Thiel writing "I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible"
Perhaps he should go and live in North Korea and see what the alternative is like?
Funnily enough though he still lives in America, a country which, with all its faults, is still mostly free AND reasonably democratic.
Is universal suffrage essential for freedom and democracy? Do we look back on the time of Gladstone and Disraeli as an era of tyranny because the vote was restricted?
How about South Africa?
A restricted franchise is a long way from Apartheid.
So you would be OK restricting the franchise on racial lines?
Trump following Rishi and targeting the Hindu vote and lauding Modi too (something even Tommy Robinson has done on the basis that Modi is nearly as anti Muslim as he is)
'@realDonaldTrump I strongly condemn the barbaric violence against Hindus, Christians, and other minorities who are getting attacked and looted by mobs in Bangladesh, which remains in a total state of chaos.
It would have never happened on my watch. Kamala and Joe have ignored Hindus across the world and in America. They have been a disaster from Israel to Ukraine to our own Southern Border, but we will Make America Strong Again and bring back Peace through Strength!
We will also protect Hindu Americans against the anti-religion agenda of the radical left. We will fight for your freedom. Under my administration, we will also strengthen our great partnership with India and my good friend, Prime Minister Modi.
Kamala Harris will destroy your small businesses with more regulations and higher taxes. By contrast, I cut taxes, cut regulations, unleashed American energy, and built the greatest economy in history. We will do it again, bigger and better than ever before—and we will Make America Great Again.
Judging by the Yougov members poll I expect it to be close, indeed the closest Tory leadership result since members got the vote. That would also match by conversations with other members.
Badenoch should win though but will have to include other leadership contenders in her Shadow Cabinet
Rishi’s parting gift to his successors is his demonstration yesterday of what a passionate, effective speech as LOTO looks like. I’m not convinced either of them will clear the bar he has now set?
Yes, if Rishi had a political brain not just an economic one he would not have tried to remove Boris but let him lead the party to defeat in July. However it would have been a narrower defeat and Reform would have got nowhere near 14% of the vote and the Tories would have got over 200 seats.
Rishi would now be odds on to be Leader of the Opposition to an already unpopular Labour government instead of his political career being cut short after he led the party to landslide defeat and trying to get on the board of some Silicon Valley Tech Company. Remember David Miliband did not challenge Brown in 2009 but let him lead Labour to defeat in 2010 and actually won the Labour members' and MPs vote that year, only the support of trades unions scraped Ed Miliband over the line and they don't count in Tory leadership elections
Point of order
Johnson removed himself by his behaviour
Not for redwall and Reform voters who turned a narrow Tory defeat into a landslide Tory defeat after Boris was removed
At what point does a wrongun become more trouble than they are worth, even if they do part of the job very well?
The Republicans failed with respect to Trump years ago. Whatever happens next week, I suspect that what follows will be horrible for them as a result.
The Conservatives took a hit from some voters by dumping Boris in summer 2022. But had they not done so, the consequences with other voters would have been grisly as well. But more importantly, his behaviour meant that the had to go, whatever the electoral hit. Because he was a wrongun.
!00 Tory MPs probably lost their seats in July as a direct result of removing Boris and the Truss budget and Tory move to Reform after Sunak became PM.
Trump has a good chance of winning next week, even if he doesn't the GOP should hold Congress and the party survived the 2016-2020 Trump presidency intact
fpt Serious question here, not trying to provoke just soliciting opinions
I think most of us agree the country is in a mess, don't think that is in dispute
So given that how many believe a government can actually get elected with policies that could fix the mess.
Personally my view is however you fix it either to the left or right......you wont get elected being honest about it
We all seem to agree that the country is a mess and we all seem to agree that fixing it won't be pleasant, but my sense is that most of the country only agree with the first part. They believe that there is a painless way to fix things by taxing the rich, or cracking down on layabouts, or some manner of deus ex machina.
The reason people believe this is partly denial and partly because the politicians don't tell them any different.
Perhaps I'm a naive idealist, but I think that if a major party leader was relentlessly honest about the financial mess the country is in, and the long-term failures that have put it there, that there's a chance they could convince enough voters that fixing it was going to involve unpleasantness (i.e. spending cuts on things people want spending on and/or tax rises that they pay), and any politician saying otherwise was lying to them.
The simplest way forward is also the least palatable.
Income tax up by 2p in the pound, coupled with swingeing cuts to the welfare state.
Pay down debt, offer tax breaks to entrepreneurs and encourage the knowledge economy, offer tax breaks to billionaires and non dom types to move here rather than move away. Better to get a small amount of something than a lot of nothing, as Reeves seems to have chosen.
Grasp the nettle of the housing crisis with policies that screw over nimbies and build, build, build. Social care reform. End the triple lock, means tested support for pensioners who need it, the rest need to accept being a bit poorer, like the rest of us, as the economy resets.
Everything I have mentioned is electorally toxic, of course. But it's the only way forward.
No, there are plenty of other ways forward.
For example, install *inside the various government department* units tasked with IT renewal, process reduction, data science etc. Give them massive political support and set them to work.
It can be done - see the private sector.
The problem is the public sector exhibits a largely self-selecting bias towards slowness and inefficiency. The type of person who wants to increase efficiency in the ways you describe rarely gravitates towards the public sector. So how to encourage them, because they generally meet with the immovable monolith of existing culture within the public sector which becomes a force field of resistance to change.
Privatising vast swathes of the public sector is an option, but, again, electorally toxic...
Offer the right pay and motivation. If you like reforming organisations, large chunks of the public sector are pristine territory….
Honestly - I love work like that. Shades of Dom Cummings putting out that APB to attract weirdoes and assorted non-conformists to work with him back in 2019. My kind of gig.
The trouble is, as I've experienced working for very large corporations, is that corporate culture is set in stone. Changing it is less of a herculean task and more of a sisyphean one. You will be met with resistance at every level, as you say massive political support is the only way forward, but even that is likely to meet huge resistance. He who says organisation says oligarchy, and all that.
"Delinquent elites are in an open crusade against democracy"
Discuss
The way the Lisbon Treaty was handled would be a good example...
I was thinking more of things like Peter Thiel writing "I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible"
Perhaps he should go and live in North Korea and see what the alternative is like?
Funnily enough though he still lives in America, a country which, with all its faults, is still mostly free AND reasonably democratic.
Is universal suffrage essential for freedom and democracy? Do we look back on the time of Gladstone and Disraeli as an era of tyranny because the vote was restricted?
It wasn't as free or fair as it would have been had it not been. Whether other decisions would be better or worse is a different question.
Starting from where we are, following 100 years of universal franchise, it's clear that politics has a problem. But I don't think resiling from democracy can possibly be the answer. All such efforts meet with the unaswerable difficulty of : How do you know what people want unless you ask them? How do you ensure thaty governments can be removed?
The main duty rests not with the electorate, who are likely to be a bit dim on the whole, being just average by definition, but with the responsibilities of politicians. I may be idealising but I think (and I keep an open mind) that politicians once upon a time felt a greater collective duty both to a degree of truth, and to a degree of non-populism of expression that they have lost, and need to recover.
fpt Serious question here, not trying to provoke just soliciting opinions
I think most of us agree the country is in a mess, don't think that is in dispute
So given that how many believe a government can actually get elected with policies that could fix the mess.
Personally my view is however you fix it either to the left or right......you wont get elected being honest about it
We all seem to agree that the country is a mess and we all seem to agree that fixing it won't be pleasant, but my sense is that most of the country only agree with the first part. They believe that there is a painless way to fix things by taxing the rich, or cracking down on layabouts, or some manner of deus ex machina.
The reason people believe this is partly denial and partly because the politicians don't tell them any different.
Perhaps I'm a naive idealist, but I think that if a major party leader was relentlessly honest about the financial mess the country is in, and the long-term failures that have put it there, that there's a chance they could convince enough voters that fixing it was going to involve unpleasantness (i.e. spending cuts on things people want spending on and/or tax rises that they pay), and any politician saying otherwise was lying to them.
The simplest way forward is also the least palatable.
Income tax up by 2p in the pound, coupled with swingeing cuts to the welfare state.
Pay down debt, offer tax breaks to entrepreneurs and encourage the knowledge economy, offer tax breaks to billionaires and non dom types to move here rather than move away. Better to get a small amount of something than a lot of nothing, as Reeves seems to have chosen.
Grasp the nettle of the housing crisis with policies that screw over nimbies and build, build, build. Social care reform. End the triple lock, means tested support for pensioners who need it, the rest need to accept being a bit poorer, like the rest of us, as the economy resets.
Everything I have mentioned is electorally toxic, of course. But it's the only way forward.
No, there are plenty of other ways forward.
For example, install *inside the various government department* units tasked with IT renewal, process reduction, data science etc. Give them massive political support and set them to work.
It can be done - see the private sector.
The problem is the public sector exhibits a largely self-selecting bias towards slowness and inefficiency. The type of person who wants to increase efficiency in the ways you describe rarely gravitates towards the public sector. So how to encourage them, because they generally meet with the immovable monolith of existing culture within the public sector which becomes a force field of resistance to change.
Privatising vast swathes of the public sector is an option, but, again, electorally toxic...
My little bit of the public sector has brought in professional management and consultants from the private sector. Our once (I flatter myself) fairly cutting-edge outfit now spends it's time in meetings, updating planners in MS Teams, and attending 'enterprise' agile stand-up's where people explain they've not done anything because they've been in meetings and updating planners.
Spreading the good practice from within seems a lot cheaper and more effective. But that would involve the centre (in various senses) trusting in the local expertise. And as is clear - the centre knows best. I think that is really where the problem stems from.
I've also worked for multi-national banks, international courier firms, blah. The same problem everywhere that the centre knows best.
Hire good people, trust them to get on with the job.
Frameworks over process, informal catch ups over endless scheduled stand ups.
Sadly many consultants seem to be paid by the number and complexity of processes they introduce...
Trump following Rishi and targeting the Hindu vote and lauding Modi too (something even Tommy Robinson has done on the basis that Modi is nearly as anti Muslim as he is)
'@realDonaldTrump I strongly condemn the barbaric violence against Hindus, Christians, and other minorities who are getting attacked and looted by mobs in Bangladesh, which remains in a total state of chaos.
It would have never happened on my watch. Kamala and Joe have ignored Hindus across the world and in America. They have been a disaster from Israel to Ukraine to our own Southern Border, but we will Make America Strong Again and bring back Peace through Strength!
We will also protect Hindu Americans against the anti-religion agenda of the radical left. We will fight for your freedom. Under my administration, we will also strengthen our great partnership with India and my good friend, Prime Minister Modi.
Kamala Harris will destroy your small businesses with more regulations and higher taxes. By contrast, I cut taxes, cut regulations, unleashed American energy, and built the greatest economy in history. We will do it again, bigger and better than ever before—and we will Make America Great Again.
Jap 0.94 Ger 2.40 Fra 3.12 Can 3.24 Ita 3.64 USA 4.29 UK 4.43
Britain is still sleepwalking in the belief that everything is, or should be normal. It's not long ago that the UK had borrowing costs in the middle- to top end of G7 rates and a AAA rating (for what those are worth). Both parties of government have an interest in not discussing the debt burden though, and no-one else (or no-one credible) seems bothered about talking about it either. Too difficult; leave it for another day. Which is fine other than that strategy means the 'other day' will end up being at someone else's choosing.
"Delinquent elites are in an open crusade against democracy"
Discuss
The way the Lisbon Treaty was handled would be a good example...
I was thinking more of things like Peter Thiel writing "I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible"
Perhaps he should go and live in North Korea and see what the alternative is like?
Funnily enough though he still lives in America, a country which, with all its faults, is still mostly free AND reasonably democratic.
Is universal suffrage essential for freedom and democracy? Do we look back on the time of Gladstone and Disraeli as an era of tyranny because the vote was restricted?
How about South Africa?
A restricted franchise is a long way from Apartheid.
So you would be OK restricting the franchise on racial lines?
Why are you talking about race? We restrict the franchise based on age today. Maybe if you also had an educational requirement, for example, it would provide an additional incentive for people to pass their exams, and it would also raise the standard of political discouse because politicians would know they had to appeal to the more discerning section of the population.
"Delinquent elites are in an open crusade against democracy"
Discuss
The way the Lisbon Treaty was handled would be a good example...
I was thinking more of things like Peter Thiel writing "I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible"
Perhaps he should go and live in North Korea and see what the alternative is like?
Funnily enough though he still lives in America, a country which, with all its faults, is still mostly free AND reasonably democratic.
Indeed.
Thiel's behaviour generally has been fairly ... odd (to put it generously).
He clearly isn't a fan of the free press, after it outed him. So clearly "freedom" merely means "free to do the kind of things that Peter Thiel approves of".
Minister for Women and Equalities 20/10/22 - 5/7/24
President of the Board of Trade 6/9/22 - 5/7//24
Secretary of State for International Trade 6/9/22 - 7/2/23
Secretary of State for Business and Trade 7/2/23 - 5/7/24
So she lazily did three jobs while in the Cabinet
She also lazily didn't interfere in a live legal enquiry that she was banned from interfering in
Lazy bitch, eh?
Can you give us a couple of examples of her achievements in government ?
Not just achievements. Signs of activity of any sort. Badenoch does appear to be quite lazy, which is a problem for her I think. You can't get away with that at the top level of politics. Not even Boris Johnson in the end.
fpt Serious question here, not trying to provoke just soliciting opinions
I think most of us agree the country is in a mess, don't think that is in dispute
So given that how many believe a government can actually get elected with policies that could fix the mess.
Personally my view is however you fix it either to the left or right......you wont get elected being honest about it
We all seem to agree that the country is a mess and we all seem to agree that fixing it won't be pleasant, but my sense is that most of the country only agree with the first part. They believe that there is a painless way to fix things by taxing the rich, or cracking down on layabouts, or some manner of deus ex machina.
The reason people believe this is partly denial and partly because the politicians don't tell them any different.
Perhaps I'm a naive idealist, but I think that if a major party leader was relentlessly honest about the financial mess the country is in, and the long-term failures that have put it there, that there's a chance they could convince enough voters that fixing it was going to involve unpleasantness (i.e. spending cuts on things people want spending on and/or tax rises that they pay), and any politician saying otherwise was lying to them.
The simplest way forward is also the least palatable.
Income tax up by 2p in the pound, coupled with swingeing cuts to the welfare state.
Pay down debt, offer tax breaks to entrepreneurs and encourage the knowledge economy, offer tax breaks to billionaires and non dom types to move here rather than move away. Better to get a small amount of something than a lot of nothing, as Reeves seems to have chosen.
Grasp the nettle of the housing crisis with policies that screw over nimbies and build, build, build. Social care reform. End the triple lock, means tested support for pensioners who need it, the rest need to accept being a bit poorer, like the rest of us, as the economy resets.
Everything I have mentioned is electorally toxic, of course. But it's the only way forward.
No, there are plenty of other ways forward.
For example, install *inside the various government department* units tasked with IT renewal, process reduction, data science etc. Give them massive political support and set them to work.
It can be done - see the private sector.
The problem is the public sector exhibits a largely self-selecting bias towards slowness and inefficiency. The type of person who wants to increase efficiency in the ways you describe rarely gravitates towards the public sector. So how to encourage them, because they generally meet with the immovable monolith of existing culture within the public sector which becomes a force field of resistance to change.
Privatising vast swathes of the public sector is an option, but, again, electorally toxic...
My little bit of the public sector has brought in professional management and consultants from the private sector. Our once (I flatter myself) fairly cutting-edge outfit now spends it's time in meetings, updating planners in MS Teams, and attending 'enterprise' agile stand-up's where people explain they've not done anything because they've been in meetings and updating planners.
Spreading the good practice from within seems a lot cheaper and more effective. But that would involve the centre (in various senses) trusting in the local expertise. And as is clear - the centre knows best. I think that is really where the problem stems from.
I've also worked for multi-national banks, international courier firms, blah. The same problem everywhere that the centre knows best.
Hire good people, trust them to get on with the job.
Frameworks over process, informal catch ups over endless scheduled stand ups.
Sadly many consultants seem to be paid by the number and complexity of processes they introduce...
Just wait until the class-actions start for DVT attributed to all those stand-up meetings ..
Trump following Rishi and targeting the Hindu vote and lauding Modi too (something even Tommy Robinson has done on the basis that Modi is nearly as anti Muslim as he is)
'@realDonaldTrump I strongly condemn the barbaric violence against Hindus, Christians, and other minorities who are getting attacked and looted by mobs in Bangladesh, which remains in a total state of chaos.
It would have never happened on my watch. Kamala and Joe have ignored Hindus across the world and in America. They have been a disaster from Israel to Ukraine to our own Southern Border, but we will Make America Strong Again and bring back Peace through Strength!
We will also protect Hindu Americans against the anti-religion agenda of the radical left. We will fight for your freedom. Under my administration, we will also strengthen our great partnership with India and my good friend, Prime Minister Modi.
Kamala Harris will destroy your small businesses with more regulations and higher taxes. By contrast, I cut taxes, cut regulations, unleashed American energy, and built the greatest economy in history. We will do it again, bigger and better than ever before—and we will Make America Great Again.
I rate this William Windsor chap on ITV. Would be a much better PM than Starmer or either Tory I suspect.
Why would he want the job? Being a Tory or Labour PM automatically would lose him the support of about half the country and he would never get the job as an independent
He was also chief operating officer at the Ministry of Defence between 2017 and 2020. The Commons public accounts committee said the following year that the MoD had been guilty of “repeatedly wasting taxpayers’ money”, while a Labour report identified £4bn of waste.
More recently, he was criticised by the public accounts committee after taking a £168,000 bonus on top of a £311,000 salary for overseeing non-existent renovation work on the Palace of Westminster.
Mr Goldstone led the Houses of Parliament Restoration & Renewal Delivery Authority for four years before standing down in August, during which time no renovations took place and decisions on the scope of the project were delayed until 2025 at least.
fpt Serious question here, not trying to provoke just soliciting opinions
I think most of us agree the country is in a mess, don't think that is in dispute
So given that how many believe a government can actually get elected with policies that could fix the mess.
Personally my view is however you fix it either to the left or right......you wont get elected being honest about it
We all seem to agree that the country is a mess and we all seem to agree that fixing it won't be pleasant, but my sense is that most of the country only agree with the first part. They believe that there is a painless way to fix things by taxing the rich, or cracking down on layabouts, or some manner of deus ex machina.
The reason people believe this is partly denial and partly because the politicians don't tell them any different.
Perhaps I'm a naive idealist, but I think that if a major party leader was relentlessly honest about the financial mess the country is in, and the long-term failures that have put it there, that there's a chance they could convince enough voters that fixing it was going to involve unpleasantness (i.e. spending cuts on things people want spending on and/or tax rises that they pay), and any politician saying otherwise was lying to them.
The simplest way forward is also the least palatable.
Income tax up by 2p in the pound, coupled with swingeing cuts to the welfare state.
Pay down debt, offer tax breaks to entrepreneurs and encourage the knowledge economy, offer tax breaks to billionaires and non dom types to move here rather than move away. Better to get a small amount of something than a lot of nothing, as Reeves seems to have chosen.
Grasp the nettle of the housing crisis with policies that screw over nimbies and build, build, build. Social care reform. End the triple lock, means tested support for pensioners who need it, the rest need to accept being a bit poorer, like the rest of us, as the economy resets.
Everything I have mentioned is electorally toxic, of course. But it's the only way forward.
No, there are plenty of other ways forward.
For example, install *inside the various government department* units tasked with IT renewal, process reduction, data science etc. Give them massive political support and set them to work.
It can be done - see the private sector.
The problem is the public sector exhibits a largely self-selecting bias towards slowness and inefficiency. The type of person who wants to increase efficiency in the ways you describe rarely gravitates towards the public sector. So how to encourage them, because they generally meet with the immovable monolith of existing culture within the public sector which becomes a force field of resistance to change.
Privatising vast swathes of the public sector is an option, but, again, electorally toxic...
My little bit of the public sector has brought in professional management and consultants from the private sector. Our once (I flatter myself) fairly cutting-edge outfit now spends it's time in meetings, updating planners in MS Teams, and attending 'enterprise' agile stand-up's where people explain they've not done anything because they've been in meetings and updating planners.
Spreading the good practice from within seems a lot cheaper and more effective. But that would involve the centre (in various senses) trusting in the local expertise. And as is clear - the centre knows best. I think that is really where the problem stems from.
I've also worked for multi-national banks, international courier firms, blah. The same problem everywhere that the centre knows best.
Many management consultants are not unadjacent to con artists.
Trump following Rishi and targeting the Hindu vote and lauding Modi too (something even Tommy Robinson has done on the basis that Modi is nearly as anti Muslim as he is)
'@realDonaldTrump I strongly condemn the barbaric violence against Hindus, Christians, and other minorities who are getting attacked and looted by mobs in Bangladesh, which remains in a total state of chaos.
It would have never happened on my watch. Kamala and Joe have ignored Hindus across the world and in America. They have been a disaster from Israel to Ukraine to our own Southern Border, but we will Make America Strong Again and bring back Peace through Strength!
We will also protect Hindu Americans against the anti-religion agenda of the radical left. We will fight for your freedom. Under my administration, we will also strengthen our great partnership with India and my good friend, Prime Minister Modi.
Kamala Harris will destroy your small businesses with more regulations and higher taxes. By contrast, I cut taxes, cut regulations, unleashed American energy, and built the greatest economy in history. We will do it again, bigger and better than ever before—and we will Make America Great Again.
Trump following Rishi and targeting the Hindu vote and lauding Modi too (something even Tommy Robinson has done on the basis that Modi is nearly as anti Muslim as he is)
'@realDonaldTrump I strongly condemn the barbaric violence against Hindus, Christians, and other minorities who are getting attacked and looted by mobs in Bangladesh, which remains in a total state of chaos.
It would have never happened on my watch. Kamala and Joe have ignored Hindus across the world and in America. They have been a disaster from Israel to Ukraine to our own Southern Border, but we will Make America Strong Again and bring back Peace through Strength!
We will also protect Hindu Americans against the anti-religion agenda of the radical left. We will fight for your freedom. Under my administration, we will also strengthen our great partnership with India and my good friend, Prime Minister Modi.
Kamala Harris will destroy your small businesses with more regulations and higher taxes. By contrast, I cut taxes, cut regulations, unleashed American energy, and built the greatest economy in history. We will do it again, bigger and better than ever before—and we will Make America Great Again.
fpt Serious question here, not trying to provoke just soliciting opinions
I think most of us agree the country is in a mess, don't think that is in dispute
So given that how many believe a government can actually get elected with policies that could fix the mess.
Personally my view is however you fix it either to the left or right......you wont get elected being honest about it
We all seem to agree that the country is a mess and we all seem to agree that fixing it won't be pleasant, but my sense is that most of the country only agree with the first part. They believe that there is a painless way to fix things by taxing the rich, or cracking down on layabouts, or some manner of deus ex machina.
The reason people believe this is partly denial and partly because the politicians don't tell them any different.
Perhaps I'm a naive idealist, but I think that if a major party leader was relentlessly honest about the financial mess the country is in, and the long-term failures that have put it there, that there's a chance they could convince enough voters that fixing it was going to involve unpleasantness (i.e. spending cuts on things people want spending on and/or tax rises that they pay), and any politician saying otherwise was lying to them.
The simplest way forward is also the least palatable.
Income tax up by 2p in the pound, coupled with swingeing cuts to the welfare state.
Pay down debt, offer tax breaks to entrepreneurs and encourage the knowledge economy, offer tax breaks to billionaires and non dom types to move here rather than move away. Better to get a small amount of something than a lot of nothing, as Reeves seems to have chosen.
Grasp the nettle of the housing crisis with policies that screw over nimbies and build, build, build. Social care reform. End the triple lock, means tested support for pensioners who need it, the rest need to accept being a bit poorer, like the rest of us, as the economy resets.
Everything I have mentioned is electorally toxic, of course. But it's the only way forward.
No, there are plenty of other ways forward.
For example, install *inside the various government department* units tasked with IT renewal, process reduction, data science etc. Give them massive political support and set them to work.
It can be done - see the private sector.
The problem is the public sector exhibits a largely self-selecting bias towards slowness and inefficiency. The type of person who wants to increase efficiency in the ways you describe rarely gravitates towards the public sector. So how to encourage them, because they generally meet with the immovable monolith of existing culture within the public sector which becomes a force field of resistance to change.
Privatising vast swathes of the public sector is an option, but, again, electorally toxic...
My little bit of the public sector has brought in professional management and consultants from the private sector. Our once (I flatter myself) fairly cutting-edge outfit now spends it's time in meetings, updating planners in MS Teams, and attending 'enterprise' agile stand-up's where people explain they've not done anything because they've been in meetings and updating planners.
Spreading the good practice from within seems a lot cheaper and more effective. But that would involve the centre (in various senses) trusting in the local expertise. And as is clear - the centre knows best. I think that is really where the problem stems from.
I've also worked for multi-national banks, international courier firms, blah. The same problem everywhere that the centre knows best.
Hire good people, trust them to get on with the job.
Frameworks over process, informal catch ups over endless scheduled stand ups.
Sadly many consultants seem to be paid by the number and complexity of processes they introduce...
Of course - it is easier to see an immediate increase in process and demonstrate your 'consultancy' has had an effect, even if long term that is not a helpful one.
Trump following Rishi and targeting the Hindu vote and lauding Modi too (something even Tommy Robinson has done on the basis that Modi is nearly as anti Muslim as he is)
'@realDonaldTrump I strongly condemn the barbaric violence against Hindus, Christians, and other minorities who are getting attacked and looted by mobs in Bangladesh, which remains in a total state of chaos.
It would have never happened on my watch. Kamala and Joe have ignored Hindus across the world and in America. They have been a disaster from Israel to Ukraine to our own Southern Border, but we will Make America Strong Again and bring back Peace through Strength!
We will also protect Hindu Americans against the anti-religion agenda of the radical left. We will fight for your freedom. Under my administration, we will also strengthen our great partnership with India and my good friend, Prime Minister Modi.
Kamala Harris will destroy your small businesses with more regulations and higher taxes. By contrast, I cut taxes, cut regulations, unleashed American energy, and built the greatest economy in history. We will do it again, bigger and better than ever before—and we will Make America Great Again.
"Delinquent elites are in an open crusade against democracy"
Discuss
The way the Lisbon Treaty was handled would be a good example...
I was thinking more of things like Peter Thiel writing "I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible"
Perhaps he should go and live in North Korea and see what the alternative is like?
Funnily enough though he still lives in America, a country which, with all its faults, is still mostly free AND reasonably democratic.
Is universal suffrage essential for freedom and democracy? Do we look back on the time of Gladstone and Disraeli as an era of tyranny because the vote was restricted?
So you want to dump universal suffrage now?
Hey, people, williamglenn has said another ridiculous thing!
Oh, you stopped paying attention after the last dozen ridiculous things he’s said?
Trump following Rishi and targeting the Hindu vote and lauding Modi too (something even Tommy Robinson has done on the basis that Modi is nearly as anti Muslim as he is)
'@realDonaldTrump I strongly condemn the barbaric violence against Hindus, Christians, and other minorities who are getting attacked and looted by mobs in Bangladesh, which remains in a total state of chaos.
It would have never happened on my watch. Kamala and Joe have ignored Hindus across the world and in America. They have been a disaster from Israel to Ukraine to our own Southern Border, but we will Make America Strong Again and bring back Peace through Strength!
We will also protect Hindu Americans against the anti-religion agenda of the radical left. We will fight for your freedom. Under my administration, we will also strengthen our great partnership with India and my good friend, Prime Minister Modi.
Kamala Harris will destroy your small businesses with more regulations and higher taxes. By contrast, I cut taxes, cut regulations, unleashed American energy, and built the greatest economy in history. We will do it again, bigger and better than ever before—and we will Make America Great Again.
"Delinquent elites are in an open crusade against democracy"
Discuss
The way the Lisbon Treaty was handled would be a good example...
I was thinking more of things like Peter Thiel writing "I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible"
Perhaps he should go and live in North Korea and see what the alternative is like?
Funnily enough though he still lives in America, a country which, with all its faults, is still mostly free AND reasonably democratic.
Is universal suffrage essential for freedom and democracy? Do we look back on the time of Gladstone and Disraeli as an era of tyranny because the vote was restricted?
How about South Africa?
A restricted franchise is a long way from Apartheid.
So you would be OK restricting the franchise on racial lines?
Why are you talking about race? We restrict the franchise based on age today. Maybe if you also had an educational requirement, for example, it would provide an additional incentive for people to pass their exams, and it would also raise the standard of political discouse because politicians would know they had to appeal to the more discerning section of the population.
We have universal adult sufferage of citizens.
You asked whether it was necessary for good government.
Presumably you are planning on restricting based on some factor: sex, education, wealth, race, etc?
Personally, my view is that yes it is needed for good government. Because otherwise you are literally creating second class citizens of one group or another.
Jap 0.94 Ger 2.40 Fra 3.12 Can 3.24 Ita 3.64 USA 4.29 UK 4.43
Britain is still sleepwalking in the belief that everything is, or should be normal. It's not long ago that the UK had borrowing costs in the middle- to top end of G7 rates and a AAA rating (for what those are worth). Both parties of government have an interest in not discussing the debt burden though, and no-one else (or no-one credible) seems bothered about talking about it either. Too difficult; leave it for another day. Which is fine other than that strategy means the 'other day' will end up being at someone else's choosing.
Do bear in mind that borrowing rates also reflect likely economic growth.
Japan has low rates not because it has sound public finances, but because banks are required to hold JGBs, and there are no better places to invest the money.
"Delinquent elites are in an open crusade against democracy"
Discuss
The way the Lisbon Treaty was handled would be a good example...
I was thinking more of things like Peter Thiel writing "I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible"
Perhaps he should go and live in North Korea and see what the alternative is like?
Funnily enough though he still lives in America, a country which, with all its faults, is still mostly free AND reasonably democratic.
Is universal suffrage essential for freedom and democracy? Do we look back on the time of Gladstone and Disraeli as an era of tyranny because the vote was restricted?
How about South Africa?
A restricted franchise is a long way from Apartheid.
So you would be OK restricting the franchise on racial lines?
Why are you talking about race? We restrict the franchise based on age today. Maybe if you also had an educational requirement, for example, it would provide an additional incentive for people to pass their exams, and it would also raise the standard of political discouse because politicians would know they had to appeal to the more discerning section of the population.
We have universal adult sufferage of citizens.
You asked whether it was necessary for good government.
Presumably you are planning on restricting based on some factor: sex, education, wealth, race, etc?
Personally, my view is that yes it is needed for good government. Because otherwise you are literally creating second class citizens of one group or another.
Do you agree with denying the vote to long-term residents?
"Delinquent elites are in an open crusade against democracy"
Discuss
The way the Lisbon Treaty was handled would be a good example...
I was thinking more of things like Peter Thiel writing "I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible"
Perhaps he should go and live in North Korea and see what the alternative is like?
Funnily enough though he still lives in America, a country which, with all its faults, is still mostly free AND reasonably democratic.
Is universal suffrage essential for freedom and democracy? Do we look back on the time of Gladstone and Disraeli as an era of tyranny because the vote was restricted?
How about South Africa?
A restricted franchise is a long way from Apartheid.
So you would be OK restricting the franchise on racial lines?
Why are you talking about race? We restrict the franchise based on age today. Maybe if you also had an educational requirement, for example, it would provide an additional incentive for people to pass their exams, and it would also raise the standard of political discouse because politicians would know they had to appeal to the more discerning section of the population.
We have universal adult sufferage of citizens.
You asked whether it was necessary for good government.
Presumably you are planning on restricting based on some factor: sex, education, wealth, race, etc?
Personally, my view is that yes it is needed for good government. Because otherwise you are literally creating second class citizens of one group or another.
Do you agree with denying the vote to long-term residents?
I agree with the universal adult suffrage of citizens.
I don't think that's a particularly controversial point of view. (Especially as - if you are a long-term resident of the UK - then there are plenty of paths to citizenship.)
"Delinquent elites are in an open crusade against democracy"
Discuss
The way the Lisbon Treaty was handled would be a good example...
I was thinking more of things like Peter Thiel writing "I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible"
Perhaps he should go and live in North Korea and see what the alternative is like?
Funnily enough though he still lives in America, a country which, with all its faults, is still mostly free AND reasonably democratic.
Is universal suffrage essential for freedom and democracy? Do we look back on the time of Gladstone and Disraeli as an era of tyranny because the vote was restricted?
How about South Africa?
A restricted franchise is a long way from Apartheid.
So you would be OK restricting the franchise on racial lines?
Why are you talking about race? We restrict the franchise based on age today. Maybe if you also had an educational requirement, for example, it would provide an additional incentive for people to pass their exams, and it would also raise the standard of political discouse because politicians would know they had to appeal to the more discerning section of the population.
We have universal adult sufferage of citizens.
You asked whether it was necessary for good government.
Presumably you are planning on restricting based on some factor: sex, education, wealth, race, etc?
Personally, my view is that yes it is needed for good government. Because otherwise you are literally creating second class citizens of one group or another.
Do you agree with denying the vote to long-term residents?
I agree with the universal adult suffrage of citizens.
I don't think that's a particularly controversial point of view. (Especially as - if you are a long-term resident of the UK - then there are plenty of paths to citizenship.)
It’s not universal because we famously deny it to prisoners.
If there were an education requirement then there would also be plenty of paths to qualifying. It could be something as simple as a civics exam, analogous to the test people have to pass to become citizens.
Trump following Rishi and targeting the Hindu vote and lauding Modi too (something even Tommy Robinson has done on the basis that Modi is nearly as anti Muslim as he is)
'@realDonaldTrump I strongly condemn the barbaric violence against Hindus, Christians, and other minorities who are getting attacked and looted by mobs in Bangladesh, which remains in a total state of chaos.
It would have never happened on my watch. Kamala and Joe have ignored Hindus across the world and in America. They have been a disaster from Israel to Ukraine to our own Southern Border, but we will Make America Strong Again and bring back Peace through Strength!
We will also protect Hindu Americans against the anti-religion agenda of the radical left. We will fight for your freedom. Under my administration, we will also strengthen our great partnership with India and my good friend, Prime Minister Modi.
Kamala Harris will destroy your small businesses with more regulations and higher taxes. By contrast, I cut taxes, cut regulations, unleashed American energy, and built the greatest economy in history. We will do it again, bigger and better than ever before—and we will Make America Great Again.
Ganesha idols of different colors can have different meanings, pink Ganesha symbolizes the love, affection, compassion, and care that Ganesha has for people.
Trump following Rishi and targeting the Hindu vote and lauding Modi too (something even Tommy Robinson has done on the basis that Modi is nearly as anti Muslim as he is)
'@realDonaldTrump I strongly condemn the barbaric violence against Hindus, Christians, and other minorities who are getting attacked and looted by mobs in Bangladesh, which remains in a total state of chaos.
It would have never happened on my watch. Kamala and Joe have ignored Hindus across the world and in America. They have been a disaster from Israel to Ukraine to our own Southern Border, but we will Make America Strong Again and bring back Peace through Strength!
We will also protect Hindu Americans against the anti-religion agenda of the radical left. We will fight for your freedom. Under my administration, we will also strengthen our great partnership with India and my good friend, Prime Minister Modi.
Kamala Harris will destroy your small businesses with more regulations and higher taxes. By contrast, I cut taxes, cut regulations, unleashed American energy, and built the greatest economy in history. We will do it again, bigger and better than ever before—and we will Make America Great Again.
Kamala Harris with a Hindu name, and Hindu mother, is ignoring Hindus according to Donald Trump.
Well, one day she just happened to turn black, as he put it.
He was calling her a cracker tonight. (Someone who cracks under pressure.)
You poor naive idiot.
That is not what cracker means in America. It’s a term of contempt in the Deep South for poor white sharecroppers. They were classified and referred to alongside slaves/former slaves “crackers and n*****s”
My mother innocently thought about calling her new dog cracker… until she mentioned it to an American friend who reacted in horror…
If I didn't know what it meant, I wouldn't have posted it in response to @kle4 talking about his past observations on her racial classification.
So your inclusion of the incorrect definition “one who cracks” was for what purpose, exactly?
That was what Trump said. He presumably knew what he was doing.
So why are you regurgitating his vile dog whistles?
More black holes than there are pot holes in the roads....
The numbers always looked shifty. I did a detailed calculation on here earlier this year that put VAT on private schools as revenue neutral _at best_ based on assumptions on elasticity of demand derived from the 2008 era financial crisis. The 1.7bn a year she expects to raise raised eyebrows. And made me assume all her other projections were vastly over-optimistic as behaviour changes and growth falls.
This is genuinely a disastrous, back to the 1970s tax and spend budget that hammers the private sector while giving to the public sector with no real expectation of improvements in efficiency.
Labour don't know how to grow the economy. Or even make tough choices. All they know is tax 'n' spend, tax 'n' spend.
I was personally planning to dump over £1m of capital gains next year, expecting to pay circa £300k in tax. I now plan to hold the vast majority of my existing assets for the next five years and sell only a small amount for comfort, it's that or move abroad. Either way I will be paying less tax next year than I planned to six months ago.
Tax rises change behaviour. Basing predicted income on optimistic assessments of limited behavioural change will end in tears.
As you say, Rachel will be back with more, higher tax demands next year.
"Delinquent elites are in an open crusade against democracy"
Discuss
The way the Lisbon Treaty was handled would be a good example...
I was thinking more of things like Peter Thiel writing "I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible"
Perhaps he should go and live in North Korea and see what the alternative is like?
Funnily enough though he still lives in America, a country which, with all its faults, is still mostly free AND reasonably democratic.
Is universal suffrage essential for freedom and democracy? Do we look back on the time of Gladstone and Disraeli as an era of tyranny because the vote was restricted?
How about South Africa?
A restricted franchise is a long way from Apartheid.
So you would be OK restricting the franchise on racial lines?
Why are you talking about race? We restrict the franchise based on age today. Maybe if you also had an educational requirement, for example, it would provide an additional incentive for people to pass their exams, and it would also raise the standard of political discouse because politicians would know they had to appeal to the more discerning section of the population.
We have universal adult sufferage of citizens.
You asked whether it was necessary for good government.
Presumably you are planning on restricting based on some factor: sex, education, wealth, race, etc?
Personally, my view is that yes it is needed for good government. Because otherwise you are literally creating second class citizens of one group or another.
Do you agree with denying the vote to long-term residents?
I agree with the universal adult suffrage of citizens.
I don't think that's a particularly controversial point of view. (Especially as - if you are a long-term resident of the UK - then there are plenty of paths to citizenship.)
It’s not universal because we famously deny it to prisoners.
If there were an education requirement then there would also be plenty of paths to qualifying. It could be something as simple as a civics exam, analogous to the test people have to pass to become citizens.
We also famously deny prisoners other rights normal citizens have, like the right to leave the prison.
More black holes than there are pot holes in the roads....
The numbers always looked shifty. I did a detailed calculation on here earlier this year that put VAT on private schools as revenue neutral _at best_ based on assumptions on elasticity of demand derived from the 2008 era financial crisis. The 1.7bn a year she expects to raise raised eyebrows. And made me assume all her other projections were vastly over-optimistic as behaviour changes and growth falls.
This is genuinely a disastrous, back to the 1970s tax and spend budget that hammers the private sector while giving to the public sector with no real expectation of improvements in efficiency.
Labour don't know how to grow the economy. Or even make tough choices. All they know is tax 'n' spend, tax 'n' spend.
I was personally planning to dump over £1m of capital gains next year, expecting to pay circa £300k in tax. I now plan to hold the vast majority of my existing assets for the next five years and sell only a small amount for comfort, it's that or move abroad. Either way I will be paying less tax next year than I planned to six months ago.
Tax rises change behaviour. Basing predicted income on optimistic assessments of limited behavioural change will end in tears.
As you say, Rachel will be back with more, higher tax demands next year.
The school VAT revenue is absolute nonsense. Its even higher than the totally not biased report done by the best mate of a Labour minister that had highly dubious assumptions.
And the new blackhole is before what the IFS believe will actually happen which is more public spending, because otherwise there will be austerity in a couple of years on the current figures and the government have ruled that out. It just a matter of how big they will go.
"Delinquent elites are in an open crusade against democracy"
Discuss
The way the Lisbon Treaty was handled would be a good example...
I was thinking more of things like Peter Thiel writing "I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible"
Perhaps he should go and live in North Korea and see what the alternative is like?
Funnily enough though he still lives in America, a country which, with all its faults, is still mostly free AND reasonably democratic.
Is universal suffrage essential for freedom and democracy? Do we look back on the time of Gladstone and Disraeli as an era of tyranny because the vote was restricted?
How about South Africa?
A restricted franchise is a long way from Apartheid.
So you would be OK restricting the franchise on racial lines?
Why are you talking about race? We restrict the franchise based on age today. Maybe if you also had an educational requirement, for example, it would provide an additional incentive for people to pass their exams, and it would also raise the standard of political discouse because politicians would know they had to appeal to the more discerning section of the population.
We have universal adult sufferage of citizens.
You asked whether it was necessary for good government.
Presumably you are planning on restricting based on some factor: sex, education, wealth, race, etc?
Personally, my view is that yes it is needed for good government. Because otherwise you are literally creating second class citizens of one group or another.
In reality, it's neither necessary nor sufficient. Political theorists pay too much attention to systems and not enough attention to political culture (of both participants and of voters / the public). Both matter but culture probably matters more.
A democracy which is founded in identity politics will almost never work, likewise ones where the essence is buying off groups with benefits (even though this will inevitably be an element in any democracy), rather than delivering good governance for the whole. By contrast, there are examples of actual- or near-one-party states that have proven effective, providing that there is a sense, shared by governed and governing alike, of national purpose which isn't abused and which is broadly delivered on.
All else being equal, democracies (with their essential underpinnings of the rule of law, freedom of speech and so on), should out-perform authoritarian states because they're generally more innovative and less prone to corruption. And should out-perform partial democracies which must inevitably have some form of divisiveness between the haves and have-nots (although the starkness of that division will depend to a large degree on how porous it is). But all else is not equal.
"Delinquent elites are in an open crusade against democracy"
Discuss
The way the Lisbon Treaty was handled would be a good example...
I was thinking more of things like Peter Thiel writing "I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible"
Perhaps he should go and live in North Korea and see what the alternative is like?
Funnily enough though he still lives in America, a country which, with all its faults, is still mostly free AND reasonably democratic.
Is universal suffrage essential for freedom and democracy? Do we look back on the time of Gladstone and Disraeli as an era of tyranny because the vote was restricted?
Yes universal suffrage for adult citizens absolutely is essential for freedom and democracy and for many people yes the age of Gladstone and Disraeli was not free.
It was free for some, but not others. We've rightly moved on from those times.
"Delinquent elites are in an open crusade against democracy"
Discuss
The way the Lisbon Treaty was handled would be a good example...
I was thinking more of things like Peter Thiel writing "I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible"
Perhaps he should go and live in North Korea and see what the alternative is like?
Funnily enough though he still lives in America, a country which, with all its faults, is still mostly free AND reasonably democratic.
Is universal suffrage essential for freedom and democracy? Do we look back on the time of Gladstone and Disraeli as an era of tyranny because the vote was restricted?
How about South Africa?
A restricted franchise is a long way from Apartheid.
So you would be OK restricting the franchise on racial lines?
Why are you talking about race? We restrict the franchise based on age today. Maybe if you also had an educational requirement, for example, it would provide an additional incentive for people to pass their exams, and it would also raise the standard of political discouse because politicians would know they had to appeal to the more discerning section of the population.
We have universal adult sufferage of citizens.
You asked whether it was necessary for good government.
Presumably you are planning on restricting based on some factor: sex, education, wealth, race, etc?
Personally, my view is that yes it is needed for good government. Because otherwise you are literally creating second class citizens of one group or another.
Do you agree with denying the vote to long-term residents?
I agree with the universal adult suffrage of citizens.
I don't think that's a particularly controversial point of view. (Especially as - if you are a long-term resident of the UK - then there are plenty of paths to citizenship.)
It’s not universal because we famously deny it to prisoners.
If there were an education requirement then there would also be plenty of paths to qualifying. It could be something as simple as a civics exam, analogous to the test people have to pass to become citizens.
We also famously deny prisoners other rights normal citizens have, like the right to leave the prison.
So what’s the argument against having to pass a simple civics test to get on the electoral roll. We don’t let people drive cars without passing a test. Isn’t it madness to take less care over who can decide the fate of the nation?
Comments
Funnily enough though he still lives in America, a country which, with all its faults, is still mostly free AND reasonably democratic.
Yesterday, CNN published a poll showing Nevada in a virtual tie — Donald Trump led Kamala Harris by 1 point. However, Trump led Harris by a wider margin in the early vote, 6 points, closely matching the GOP partisan turnout edge in the state so far, which has worried Democrats. Harris made up the difference because she was ahead among people whom CNN considers likely voters who have yet to vote.
That is not what cracker means in America. It’s a term of contempt in the Deep South for poor white sharecroppers. They were classified and referred to alongside slaves/former slaves “crackers and n*****s”
My mother innocently thought about calling her new dog cracker… until she mentioned it to an American friend who reacted in horror…
Kenneth Chesebro, an attorney for Donald Trump, has been suspended from practicing law in New York and could be disbarred just days after pleading guilty in what prosecutors claim was an effort to overturn Georgia’s 2020 election results.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/oct/31/trump-lawyer-kenneth-chesebro-suspended
BNP has very good notes on the US elections and how to trade them. They are mostly focused on timing and the info you should focus on.
Here's my summary...
https://bsky.app/profile/jeuasommenulle.bsky.social/post/3l7o2oueliq25
There's a certain type of person who would like to keep nice things whilst also undermining democratic norms.
Bit of sympathy, leading eventually to outrage as their 'friend' talks about how gay/muslims/leftists/whatever mean they are now locked in their home, terrorised, unable to speak their mind for fear of being arrested. (Yes, the irony).
Over and over, across different social platforms. Especially common on Discord (see also 'Disclose TV') and Reddit.
Our Saturday trolls are a poor imitation.
I am sure Trump thinks he's winning. And he thinks he's winning because (a) the polls understated him last time, and (b) if you don't tell Trump he's winning, then will rapidly find yourself out of a job.
For that reason, I think the likelihood that he knows something that you don't is close to zero.
I would like to wish our great Bitcoiners a Happy 16th Anniversary of Satoshi’s White Paper. We will end Kamala’s war on crypto, & Bitcoin will be MADE IN THE USA! VOTE TRUMP! #Bitcoin #FreeRossDayOne
https://x.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1852033244729860397
The real disaster was the ooll crisis of 1973, and the shared responsibility in the aftermath between a feudalistic management attitude, and obstreperous Unions, which allowed both a partial rewriting of history in the 1980's, and then for us to diverge significantly from the Norh European mainstream.
The trouble is, as I've experienced working for very large corporations, is that corporate culture is set in stone. Changing it is less of a herculean task and more of a sisyphean one. You will be met with resistance at every level, as you say massive political support is the only way forward, but even that is likely to meet huge resistance. He who says organisation says oligarchy, and all that.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ganesha
Or just happens to be pink for no reason, like George from Rainbow.
#TreatyOfTroyes
(Some might say he could well win a fair election, or might have done in the past, but since they won't allow one just in case who can say?)
We expect extraordinary things, while at the same time suffering from the impact of an ageing population, and from competition for resources from people prepared to work harder than us for less money.
Spreading the good practice from within seems a lot cheaper and more effective. But that would involve the centre (in various senses) trusting in the local expertise. And as is clear - the centre knows best. I think that is really where the problem stems from.
I've also worked for multi-national banks, international courier firms, blah. The same problem everywhere that the centre knows best.
The Republicans failed with respect to Trump years ago. Whatever happens next week, I suspect that what follows will be horrible for them as a result.
The Conservatives took a hit from some voters by dumping Boris in summer 2022. But had they not done so, the consequences with other voters would have been grisly as well. But more importantly, his behaviour meant that the had to go, whatever the electoral hit. Because he was a wrongun.
Michigan
Harris 47% Trump 47%
Wisconsin
Harris 48% Trump 48%
Pennsylvania
Trump 51% Harris 46%
https://echeloninsights.com/in-the-news/oct2024-mi-poll/
https://echeloninsights.com/in-the-news/oct2024-pa-poll/
https://echeloninsights.com/in-the-news/oct2024-wi-poll/
TIPP National
Harris 48% Trump 48% West 1% Stein 1%
https://tippinsights.com/tipp-tracking-day-18-trump-and-harris-locked-in-a-dead-heat-at-48/
One of the great offices of state, but shut out of economic policy.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ganesha#/media/File:Ganapati1.jpg
with all those hands. I like him.
See also their various comments about crypto viz the international Dollar system.
Trump has a good chance of winning next week, even if he doesn't the GOP should hold Congress and the party survived the 2016-2020 Trump presidency intact
The main duty rests not with the electorate, who are likely to be a bit dim on the whole, being just average by definition, but with the responsibilities of politicians. I may be idealising but I think (and I keep an open mind) that politicians once upon a time felt a greater collective duty both to a degree of truth, and to a degree of non-populism of expression that they have lost, and need to recover.
Frameworks over process, informal catch ups over endless scheduled stand ups.
Sadly many consultants seem to be paid by the number and complexity of processes they introduce...
You found out that that was she wasn't allowed to comment
So you stfu'd about the PO, but continued with your lazy schtick
You're fucking terrified of her
She'll eat your pathetic specimen Starmer alive
Jap 0.94
Ger 2.40
Fra 3.12
Can 3.24
Ita 3.64
USA 4.29
UK 4.43
Britain is still sleepwalking in the belief that everything is, or should be normal. It's not long ago that the UK had borrowing costs in the middle- to top end of G7 rates and a AAA rating (for what those are worth). Both parties of government have an interest in not discussing the debt burden though, and no-one else (or no-one credible) seems bothered about talking about it either. Too difficult; leave it for another day. Which is fine other than that strategy means the 'other day' will end up being at someone else's choosing.
Thiel's behaviour generally has been fairly ... odd (to put it generously).
He clearly isn't a fan of the free press, after it outed him. So clearly "freedom" merely means "free to do the kind of things that Peter Thiel approves of".
Her score is the best since Obama.
North Carolina
Trump 49% Harris 47% Others 4%
https://www.foxnews.com/official-polls/fox-news-poll-trump-still-narrowly-ahead-harris-north-carolina
Pennsylvania
Trump 48% Harris 48% Others 3%
https://www.foxnews.com/official-polls/fox-news-poll-its-neck-and-neck-pennsylvania-presidential-race
Michigan
Harris 48% Trump 46% Others 2% Kennedy Jr 3%
https://www.foxnews.com/official-polls/fox-news-poll-harris-erases-trumps-lead-economy-michigan
More recently, he was criticised by the public accounts committee after taking a £168,000 bonus on top of a £311,000 salary for overseeing non-existent renovation work on the Palace of Westminster.
Mr Goldstone led the Houses of Parliament Restoration & Renewal Delivery Authority for four years before standing down in August, during which time no renovations took place and decisions on the scope of the project were delayed until 2025 at least.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2024/10/31/labours-value-money-tsar-equivalent-250k-annual-salary/
1.44 on Harris winning popular vote looks decent to me.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2024/oct/31/ifs-says-extra-9bn-of-tax-rises-may-be-needed-to-avoid-uk-public-service-cuts
Same time next year for another bashing.
I like Diwali, it's such a positive festival. All the Hindus and Sikhs bring in lots of leftovers to the office. You can catch diabetes overnight.
Hey, people, williamglenn has said another ridiculous thing!
Oh, you stopped paying attention after the last dozen ridiculous things he’s said?
Fair enough.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ganesha#/media/File:Ganesh_mimarjanam_EDITED.jpg
You asked whether it was necessary for good government.
Presumably you are planning on restricting based on some factor: sex, education, wealth, race, etc?
Personally, my view is that yes it is needed for good government. Because otherwise you are literally creating second class citizens of one group or another.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simeon_Saxe-Coburg-Gotha
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norodom_Sihanouk
Japan has low rates not because it has sound public finances, but because banks are required to hold JGBs, and there are no better places to invest the money.
I don't think that's a particularly controversial point of view. (Especially as - if you are a long-term resident of the UK - then there are plenty of paths to citizenship.)
If there were an education requirement then there would also be plenty of paths to qualifying. It could be something as simple as a civics exam, analogous to the test people have to pass to become citizens.
I googled it.
So why are you regurgitating his vile dog whistles?
Can you give me a quick list of her achievements as a minister (probably better tomorrow afternoon when you have sobered up)?
This is genuinely a disastrous, back to the 1970s tax and spend budget that hammers the private sector while giving to the public sector with no real expectation of improvements in efficiency.
Labour don't know how to grow the economy. Or even make tough choices. All they know is tax 'n' spend, tax 'n' spend.
I was personally planning to dump over £1m of capital gains next year, expecting to pay circa £300k in tax. I now plan to hold the vast majority of my existing assets for the next five years and sell only a small amount for comfort, it's that or move abroad. Either way I will be paying less tax next year than I planned to six months ago.
Tax rises change behaviour. Basing predicted income on optimistic assessments of limited behavioural change will end in tears.
As you say, Rachel will be back with more, higher tax demands next year.
And the new blackhole is before what the IFS believe will actually happen which is more public spending, because otherwise there will be austerity in a couple of years on the current figures and the government have ruled that out. It just a matter of how big they will go.
A democracy which is founded in identity politics will almost never work, likewise ones where the essence is buying off groups with benefits (even though this will inevitably be an element in any democracy), rather than delivering good governance for the whole. By contrast, there are examples of actual- or near-one-party states that have proven effective, providing that there is a sense, shared by governed and governing alike, of national purpose which isn't abused and which is broadly delivered on.
All else being equal, democracies (with their essential underpinnings of the rule of law, freedom of speech and so on), should out-perform authoritarian states because they're generally more innovative and less prone to corruption. And should out-perform partial democracies which must inevitably have some form of divisiveness between the haves and have-nots (although the starkness of that division will depend to a large degree on how porous it is). But all else is not equal.
It was free for some, but not others. We've rightly moved on from those times.
And give him a one-way ticket...