Harris was from the far left. She adopted extreme positions e.g. no conscience provision on abortion and at the same time sneered at Christians telling two of them who said Christ is King they were at the wrong rally.
What happens to the UK economy if Trump introduces his proposed huge tariffs?
We're buggered.
I keep reading posts denying that he has said the things he has repeatedly said. He has said over and over and over that he is going to smash tariffs of up to 100%.
Why are parts of the PB in denial? Saying "and you believe this?". Yes. we believe it. And it is what America has voted for.
The thing is one of the things that Trump is, is a blowhard. He said he was going to lock Clinton up. It was almost half his election campaign in 2016. It didn't happen.
Maybe the tariffs will happen. Maybe they won't. I think it would be foolish to assume that they won't, but, equally, Trump isn't exactly a man of his word is he?
I think the tariff on China probably will happen, because the President can invoke national security and get it done easily. But frankly the Chinese deserve it.
The one on the rest of the world I'm not nearly so sure about. He might well have to get that one through the Senate, which I don't think would happen.
CNY has lost less to the Dollar than any western currency overnight. They already face tariffs from the US so this partially levels the playing field.
What happens to the UK economy if Trump introduces his proposed huge tariffs?
Nothing. 70% of our exports to the US are services.
"Nothing"
Do you understand anything?
If the pound rose 10% against the dollar, would you think the UK economy was screwed? I thought we were supposed to regard the fall in the pound as a disaster.
With GBP down 1.33% against the dollar, the EUR down 1.69%, JPY down 1.49% and even CHF losing 1.12%, the question is whether there are any currency safe havens on this glad, confident dawn.
Reader, yes. Yes there is. Down a mere 0.22% to USD and up a solid 1.5% against the Euro. Any guesses which currency that might be?
Spare a thought for David Lammy’s career prospects this morning….
Yes, Lammy's the last person who should be dealing with a Trump presidency. I don't dislike the guy as much as many on here do, but he just isn't up to it character-wise. He will try selling an agenda that Trump hates, and will do so unsubtly.
What happens to the UK economy if Trump introduces his proposed huge tariffs?
We're buggered.
I keep reading posts denying that he has said the things he has repeatedly said. He has said over and over and over that he is going to smash tariffs of up to 100%.
Why are parts of the PB in denial? Saying "and you believe this?". Yes. we believe it. And it is what America has voted for.
The thing is one of the things that Trump is, is a blowhard. He said he was going to lock Clinton up. It was almost half his election campaign in 2016. It didn't happen.
Maybe the tariffs will happen. Maybe they won't. I think it would be foolish to assume that they won't, but, equally, Trump isn't exactly a man of his word is he?
We can only hope they won't. I suspect there will be some tariffs but it won't be the ones he outlined. The ones he implemented in his previous reign were not rescinded by the Democrats.
He has said what he needed to in order to win and focussed on people's priorities.
So America has decided to give power to a guy who fomented a coup. I wonder how that worked out in 1930s Germany.
We need to understand the root causes of why people are supporting him. The Democrats have spent 10 years refusing to do that.
The polls told us that - the economy, and immigration were way ahead of any other issues which favoured him.
Teasing out which way the culture war issues broke - and how they will in the future - is going to be much more complicated. They certainly helped drive record turnout, though.
So America has decided to give power to a guy who fomented a coup. I wonder how that worked out in 1930s Germany.
We need to understand the root causes of why people are supporting him. The Democrats have spent 10 years refusing to do that.
Because he offers simple 'solutions' to complex questions. He will get peace in Ukraine by getting them defeated. He will improve the economy by imposing tariffs on foreigners. He will protect women by reducing their rights.
Complex questions nearly always have complex answers, and those answers are often not easy ones for the electorate to swallow. Easy answers are much easier to swallow, and hence to sell.
The only problem is that simple answers to complex questions rarely work. And when they fail, it is easy for a snake-oil salesmen just to give a crass excuse for the failure, define it as another problem, and come up with another simple solution to it.
The simple solution is to say that we've just got to work together and everything will be ok. The difficult solution is to say that we've got to fight for our interests because nobody else will.
Everyone, and I mean everyone, needs a massive dose of humble pie and to revist all their assumptions.
All of them.
Trump won a majority of the vote. He got massive swings amongst constituencies that are meant to hate him and it was nearly a landslide in the EC.
There's some serious introspection needed and difficult questions to be asked.
Why is a dose of humble pie needed? I thought the result would be close, the result looks to be close. Most people here thought the result would be close. We were all right.
A question for pro-Trump posters on here: most of you decry the Democrats for a perceived slide leftwards into wokeness, and diagnose this victory as a backlash against this.
Isn't Trump's rhetoric on illegal immigrants and the SC anti-abortion stuff just the mirror image of this? It is surely going to prompt a similar backlash four years down the line, no?
I don’t want to sound bitter but I just cannot understand how after four years of utter chaos you’d decide to vote for this chap again.
It seems to me to escape all logic and understanding.
I will hold my hands up and say I got this completely wrong but I just cannot understand what’s happened. I clearly don’t understand the US at all. I don’t think I even understand young people in the US either.
And Trump winning the popular vote! Never thought I would see that.
I guess Kamala must have been a really, really crap candidate.
And that's before we get on to what the Dems have been up to, covering up for Bidens senility for years...
I think Kamala ran a good campaign with only a few hiccups. But she can't hide being a woman.
I think you are jumping on the wrong conclusion. Paley (or any female Rep) would have beaten Biden (or any male Dem). This was a change election.
So America has decided to give power to a guy who fomented a coup. I wonder how that worked out in 1930s Germany.
We need to understand the root causes of why people are supporting him. The Democrats have spent 10 years refusing to do that.
It's that old chestnut, the "she was asking for it wearing that short skirt" line of political analysis.
Or people are fucking bored of mass immigration and woke and being told if they are white they are evil and women are men and America (and britain) are uniquely evil and all that endless endless lefty bollocks?
It looks like they largely voted on the economy - despite the fact it's done better than just about every other Western economy during Biden's tenure.
Harris was from the far left. She adopted extreme positions e.g. no conscience provision on abortion and at the same time sneered at Christians telling two of them who said Christ is King they were at the wrong rally.
Trump is the more moderate - really.
In what world is Harris on the far left?
From a European perspective she's barely on the left at all.
If it’s the USA and Russia v Europe, I’m on the side of Europe.
Starmer should follow Churchill's lead, it is a policy I would endorse given the circumstances.
The final "Declaration of Union" approved by the British War Cabinet stated that;
France and Great Britain shall no longer be two nations, but one Franco-British Union. The constitution of the Union will provide for joint organs of defence, foreign, financial and economic policies. Every citizen of France will enjoy immediately citizenship of Great Britain, every British subject will become a citizen of France.
You have to say that the polls look pretty good in the end. Georgia and NC likely to end up around the state polling averages. Trump also likely to end up with a small lead in the popular vote, which is close to several of the national polls.
That’s the one thing that Harris never really shifted perceptions on. Maybe she couldn’t so didn’t try.
So for GE2029, if SKS can’t be winning on that, he’s out.
I find the w word argument interesting but I’m still not convinced. Maybe it makes a difference at the margin but Biden won in 2020.
Well given the recent budget, record tax hikes and sluggish growth forecast, he has his work cut out. I wish him well and hope he succeeds but so far his track record has been mediocre.
It was already too long a header, but one interesting fact that I cut is that Hispanic Americans are often Evangelicals too, particularly those from Central America. Evangelical Latinos are 3 times as likely to be Republican than Democrat.
I haven't totted up the final damage on Betfair but my main hedge against a Trump victory failed as it seems Kamala won't win the popular vote or make 240 EV. It must be down by £600 or more.The swing states did indeed swing together.
I don’t want to sound bitter but I just cannot understand how after four years of utter chaos you’d decide to vote for this chap again.
It seems to me to escape all logic and understanding.
I will hold my hands up and say I got this completely wrong but I just cannot understand what’s happened. I clearly don’t understand the US at all. I don’t think I even understand young people in the US either.
And Trump winning the popular vote! Never thought I would see that.
Do you think you don’t understand it is because you think erroneously that Americans are just like us? Maybe because our news and media blurs the lines between the two countries and culture we see the liberal cultural side of the US but not the huge equivalent of normal “red wall” (in British terms) people.
It would probably help people who think we are the same if the US spoke a different language as it would stop this misconception of sameness.
The same people who don’t understand Trump didn’t understand Brexit, Boris, the Red Wall.
Spare a thought for David Lammy’s career prospects this morning….
Yes, Lammy's the last person who should be dealing with a Trump presidency. I don't dislike the guy as much as many on here do, but he just isn't up to it character-wise. He will try selling an agenda that Trump hates, and will do so unsubtly.
Good! Trump is our enemy, and needs to be treated as such. We must stop licking Trump’s arse.
What happens to the UK economy if Trump introduces his proposed huge tariffs?
Nothing. 70% of our exports to the US are services.
"Nothing"
Do you understand anything?
If the pound rose 10% against the dollar, would you think the UK economy was screwed? I thought we were supposed to regard the fall in the pound as a disaster.
With GBP down 1.33% against the dollar, the EUR down 1.69%, JPY down 1.49% and even CHF losing 1.12%, the question is whether there are any currency safe havens on this glad, confident dawn.
Reader, yes. Yes there is. Down a mere 0.22% to USD and up a solid 1.5% against the Euro. Any guesses which currency that might be?
I don’t want to sound bitter but I just cannot understand how after four years of utter chaos you’d decide to vote for this chap again.
It seems to me to escape all logic and understanding.
I will hold my hands up and say I got this completely wrong but I just cannot understand what’s happened. I clearly don’t understand the US at all. I don’t think I even understand young people in the US either.
And Trump winning the popular vote! Never thought I would see that.
I guess Kamala must have been a really, really crap candidate.
And that's before we get on to what the Dems have been up to, covering up for Bidens senility for years...
I think Kamala ran a good campaign with only a few hiccups. But she can't hide being a woman.
It seems to me very important that an historic first like woman POTUS really needs to be someone truly suitable. Just imagine how much damage to the principle of equality it would do if someone unsuitable was elected 'just because' - a DEI hire effectively.
We were lucky Teresa May wasn't our first woman PM. IMHO.
Harris was from the far left. She adopted extreme positions e.g. no conscience provision on abortion and at the same time sneered at Christians telling two of them who said Christ is King they were at the wrong rally.
Trump is the more moderate - really.
The ‘far left’. Just listen to yourself. She’s a mainstream social democrat.
If I was Kemi, I would use PMQs to go after Lab for sending volunteers for the Democrats. Also question whether Lammy's position is tenable (he previously called Trump a Neo-Nazi)
I don’t want to sound bitter but I just cannot understand how after four years of utter chaos you’d decide to vote for this chap again.
It seems to me to escape all logic and understanding.
I will hold my hands up and say I got this completely wrong but I just cannot understand what’s happened. I clearly don’t understand the US at all. I don’t think I even understand young people in the US either.
And Trump winning the popular vote! Never thought I would see that.
Do you think you don’t understand it is because you think erroneously that Americans are just like us? Maybe because our news and media blurs the lines between the two countries and culture we see the liberal cultural side of the US but not the huge equivalent of normal “red wall” (in British terms) people.
It would probably help people who think we are the same if the US spoke a different language as it would stop this misconception of sameness.
The same people who don’t understand Trump didn’t understand Brexit, Boris, the Red Wall.
I think you’re right on the money yes. I don’t understand Americans fundamentally.
I think Brexit, Jonson and the Red Wall are different. But I accept the similarities you point out - but I have acknowledged previously about my issues understanding those too.
I don’t want to sound bitter but I just cannot understand how after four years of utter chaos you’d decide to vote for this chap again.
It seems to me to escape all logic and understanding.
I will hold my hands up and say I got this completely wrong but I just cannot understand what’s happened. I clearly don’t understand the US at all. I don’t think I even understand young people in the US either.
And Trump winning the popular vote! Never thought I would see that.
I guess Kamala must have been a really, really crap candidate.
And that's before we get on to what the Dems have been up to, covering up for Bidens senility for years...
Yes, that's it exactly. Fear of a Harris presidency outweighed fear of a Trump presidency. We were shielded in the UK from just how negatively she was seen and how extremist she was perceived to be.
I think Jonathan is at least partly right. What positive vision did Harris offer?
The best that you could say for Trump, that people did say for him in the vox pops, was that he didn't start any wars and groceries were cheaper when he was President. Harris's pitch was, "I'm not Trump."
I think it's why Starmer's victory here was weirdly lacklustre. No positive vision for the future.
Spare a thought for David Lammy’s career prospects this morning….
Yes, Lammy's the last person who should be dealing with a Trump presidency. I don't dislike the guy as much as many on here do, but he just isn't up to it character-wise. He will try selling an agenda that Trump hates, and will do so unsubtly.
Good! Trump is our enemy, and needs to be treated as such. We must stop licking Trump’s arse.
The idea Starmer should replace Lammy with some simpering Trump arse licker is classic British "special relationship" cringe. Trump is a bully. Bullies walk all over weakness but are cowards in the face of strength.
Hence why the Rouble is up significantly against the Euro this morning.
So America has decided to give power to a guy who fomented a coup. I wonder how that worked out in 1930s Germany.
We need to understand the root causes of why people are supporting him. The Democrats have spent 10 years refusing to do that.
It's that old chestnut, the "she was asking for it wearing that short skirt" line of political analysis.
Or people are fucking bored of mass immigration and woke and being told if they are white they are evil and women are men and America (and britain) are uniquely evil and all that endless endless lefty bollocks?
It looks like they largely voted on the economy - despite the fact it's done better than just about every other Western economy during Biden's tenure.
Yes they got a soft landing but it didn’t matter in the end . The strange thing was the initial exit poll which didn’t show the economy as the top issue but democracy . So at that point I suspect the Harris campaign was hopeful . It could be strangely that a section of that democracy number was some GOP supporters bizarrely thinking Trump was there to save democracy .
Saved most of my cash by getting on Trump at EVs 300-329. I still think Harris was value during the night as people got overly excited by the early results; shame they were genuinely indicative.
I don’t want to sound bitter but I just cannot understand how after four years of utter chaos you’d decide to vote for this chap again.
It seems to me to escape all logic and understanding.
I will hold my hands up and say I got this completely wrong but I just cannot understand what’s happened. I clearly don’t understand the US at all. I don’t think I even understand young people in the US either.
And Trump winning the popular vote! Never thought I would see that.
I guess Kamala must have been a really, really crap candidate.
And that's before we get on to what the Dems have been up to, covering up for Bidens senility for years...
I think Kamala ran a good campaign with only a few hiccups. But she can't hide being a woman.
I think you are jumping on the wrong conclusion. Paley (or any female Rep) would have beaten Biden (or any male Dem). This was a change election.
There was an inevitability about it against two very poor consecutive opponents.
I am unhappy as to what it means for Ukraine but I doubt Putin will be celebrating particularly either.
People are right to be exercised about 6 January 2021 BUT the US Constitution assumes anyone who wants power is a dangerous fool and goes to great lengths to protect the people from them. And it worked, it did not buckle under the threat, it stood firm.
That is very different from most democracies of which Russia is only the most egrigious example.
The Royal Family so far has stood against wicked politicians here in the UK, in effect it is the bedrock of our constitution. I think we will survive four years of Starmer in 10 Downing Street, and then we will see him on his way. Will we want him back in 2032, I don't think so.
So America has decided to give power to a guy who fomented a coup. I wonder how that worked out in 1930s Germany.
We need to understand the root causes of why people are supporting him. The Democrats have spent 10 years refusing to do that.
It's that old chestnut, the "she was asking for it wearing that short skirt" line of political analysis.
Or people are fucking bored of mass immigration and woke and being told if they are white they are evil and women are men and America (and britain) are uniquely evil and all that endless endless lefty bollocks?
It looks like they largely voted on the economy - despite the fact it's done better than just about every other Western economy during Biden's tenure.
They are all operating on credit, so the undecideds voted on interest rates. It could be in danger of becoming cyclical, GOP win, tax cuts for the rich, increase the deficit, Dems win and get punished 4 years later for trying to fix it.
I'm slightly in shock that opponents of Trump have conducted themselves so poorly as to allow him to win again. A really extraordinary failure.
It’s doubly odd that they found a way to win in 2020 and didn’t manage to do it again.
But as I said above, I do wonder if this election was genuinely unwinnable for them whatever happened.
They didn't really, they got lucky that the election happened to coincide with a pandemic that Trump handled disastrously. Even then he barely lost.
But that’s the point isn’t it? Covid was handled here disastrously if you take Partygate. But fundamentally the Tories got thrown out because of the economy.
Starmer needs to do something on the economy or he’s out.
Harris was from the far left. She adopted extreme positions e.g. no conscience provision on abortion and at the same time sneered at Christians telling two of them who said Christ is King they were at the wrong rally.
Trump is the more moderate - really.
In what world is Harris on the far left?
From a European perspective she's barely on the left at all.
If I was Kemi, I would use PMQs to go after Lab for sending volunteers for the Democrats. Also question whether Lammy's position is tenable (he previously called Trump a Neo-Nazi)
I don't think that will work.
Even most Tory voters would have preferred Harris to have won, to most Brits Donald Trump is about as appealing as a prostate exam from Edward Scissorhands.
Credit to Elon Musk. He went All In on Trump. And will now make a gazillion dollars.
Yes. He made a huge call. And yet again it’s paid off
Elon has tremendous power now. Maybe he will use it to save us from Starmer. We can only hope
How does he do that in the short term i.e. within almost five years? Get Trump to point the nukes at Blighty and demand Nigel is installed as Governor General or he will shoot.
I'm slightly in shock that opponents of Trump have conducted themselves so poorly as to allow him to win again. A really extraordinary failure.
I think, if we’re writing an obituary for Kamala’s campaign, the issue is the feels vs the reality.
Democrats are very good at doing the hopey, changey, all hold hands and sway messaging when it comes to campaign time. Perhaps 2020 and 2022 made me overconfident that this was a formula that resonated. But they have not, particularly in this round, been good at confronting some of the fundamentals.
Biden presided over high inflation and high immigration. It was incumbent on Harris to speak to how she was going to resolve that, but she wasn’t really able to set out much by way of solutions.
Of course, the fact I’m saying this now when I was sitting on a prediction that she’d win 300+ EC votes is a huge jump on board the hindsight train.
Everyone, and I mean everyone, needs a massive dose of humble pie and to revist all their assumptions.
All of them.
Trump won a majority of the vote. He got massive swings amongst constituencies that are meant to hate him and it was nearly a landslide in the EC.
There's some serious introspection needed and difficult questions to be asked.
Why is a dose of humble pie needed? I thought the result would be close, the result looks to be close. Most people here thought the result would be close. We were all right.
No, Casino is at least partially right. While I'll come out slightly ahead overall, thanks to hedging, it would have been a very profitable night indeed had Harris won.
I'm happy to acknowledge I called that wrong. We talked at length about the polls being wrong in either direction, and I put money on the wrong way (the hedges, thankfully, acknowledged the possibility of the other eventuality).
The implications of the Trump win are going to take a lot more time to disentangle, though.
If he goes ahead with his pledges on tariffs and deportation, there are going to be a lot of very angry and disappointed Trump voters in four years time, for example.
That depends on whether the playing field remains reasonably level. We’ve just seen how difficult it is to defend as an incumbent, and VP to P through the electoral route is an exceptionally rare journey to make.
The scenario where that becomes more credible is if he’s already President by the time 2028 comes around. Which is certainly quite possible.
Very possible. If there’s a next President market, Vance has to be the favourite: he’ll either succeed Trump or he’s the most likely Republican candidate in 2028.
Harris was from the far left. She adopted extreme positions e.g. no conscience provision on abortion and at the same time sneered at Christians telling two of them who said Christ is King they were at the wrong rally.
Trump is the more moderate - really.
In what world is Harris on the far left?
From a European perspective she's barely on the left at all.
Precisely - we are different cultures.
But even from an American perspective, in which Overton window is she far left? Had the DNC selected Sanders then perhaps. But her? Give over.
For all of you bewildered as to why Trump won again and so comprehensively, perhaps I can crave your indulgence and repost the link to the article I wrote for PB on the Trump phenomena back in early 2021.
Nothing really has changed since Trump's first win in 2016. Indeed in no small part because of Trump and of course because of Biden as his successor, for millions of Amernican who see themselves as MIddle Class, things have only got worse.
And the sad fact is that, just as in 2016 and 2020, there is no real prospect of a Trump presidency making it any better.
As an aside, interstimg to see what has changed since then - Trump's relationship with Twitter being the most obvious.
That anecdote “he didn’t start any wars” is one of these interesting things that I thought meant nothing at the time but I wonder if it reflects more what people were voting for as opposed to against.
Is this a polling failure? Guess it depends how close the PV ends up. Did they miss the shy Trumpers?
Not really. Plenty of polls showed the PV neck and neck.
Indeed the polling was pretty accurate, and the betting markets were too, with Trump on 1.6 and Harris on 2.6 when the first results came in. It was the PB consensus that was wrong including me, thinking that 2.6 was value in a toss up.
Everyone, and I mean everyone, needs a massive dose of humble pie and to revist all their assumptions.
All of them.
Trump won a majority of the vote. He got massive swings amongst constituencies that are meant to hate him and it was nearly a landslide in the EC.
There's some serious introspection needed and difficult questions to be asked.
Why is a dose of humble pie needed? I thought the result would be close, the result looks to be close. Most people here thought the result would be close. We were all right.
No, Casino is at least partially right. While I'll come out slightly ahead overall, thanks to hedging, it would have been a very profitable night indeed had Harris won.
I'm happy to acknowledge I called that wrong. We talked at length about the polls being wrong in either direction, and I put money on the wrong way (the hedges, thankfully, acknowledged the possibility of the other eventuality).
The implications of the Trump win are going to take a lot more time to disentangle, though.
If he goes ahead with his pledges on tariffs and deportation, there are going to be a lot of very angry and disappointed Trump voters in four years time, for example.
This reminds me of Brexit. The shock. The motivation for it, the subsequent regret.
It's less shocking than 2016, because it has happened before. I suppose the hope is he was all mouth and trousers then and he might be again.
There are however more sinister people waiting in the wings and eating three BigMacs a day is a distinct health negative.
Its MORE shocking. In 2016 people didn't know what he represented.
In 2024 they know exactly what he represents. And voted for it.
Not really, in 2020 he was up against a WASP male. I was offended earlier when Adam Boulton said Harris would struggle to overcome the handicaps of not being male and white. Seems he was at least in part correct.
If I was Kemi, I would use PMQs to go after Lab for sending volunteers for the Democrats. Also question whether Lammy's position is tenable (he previously called Trump a Neo-Nazi)
When tariffs hit and Ukraine suffers setbacks because of Trump’s policies, I’m not convinced Badenoch cosying up to Trump will be good for her own electoral performance.
So America has decided to give power to a guy who fomented a coup. I wonder how that worked out in 1930s Germany.
We need to understand the root causes of why people are supporting him. The Democrats have spent 10 years refusing to do that.
It's that old chestnut, the "she was asking for it wearing that short skirt" line of political analysis.
Or people are fucking bored of mass immigration and woke and being told if they are white they are evil and women are men and America (and britain) are uniquely evil and all that endless endless lefty bollocks?
All the woke , " we love millions of illegal immigrants" are getting a pasting. Going to be crazy four years given the nutters he has alongside him.
Well I can console myself with more pleasing news nearer to home. Every few years I crash diet to lose 5kg to get myself down to a more healthy weight. On return from my last holiday at the end of September I was the heaviest I have ever been at 97.7 kg. Enough was enough and I have vowed to get down to my weight in my 20s and 30s which was 50 to 40 years ago when I played competitive squash. That is 80 kg. Today I weighed in at 86 kg so 2/3 of the way there. As a consequence my resting blood pressure has dropped from around 125/80 to around 105/65 and my heart rate from about 60 to 50.
Everyone, and I mean everyone, needs a massive dose of humble pie and to revist all their assumptions.
All of them.
Trump won a majority of the vote. He got massive swings amongst constituencies that are meant to hate him and it was nearly a landslide in the EC.
There's some serious introspection needed and difficult questions to be asked.
Why is a dose of humble pie needed? I thought the result would be close, the result looks to be close. Most people here thought the result would be close. We were all right.
And it was mostly a failure of hope, not a failure of analysis.
Harris was from the far left. She adopted extreme positions e.g. no conscience provision on abortion and at the same time sneered at Christians telling two of them who said Christ is King they were at the wrong rally.
Trump is the more moderate - really.
In what world is Harris on the far left?
From a European perspective she's barely on the left at all.
To us, sure.
But it does seem to be part of why Trump won, probably ? A significant number of US voters apparently see her that way.
It's an example of why I said working out the implications of Trump's win will take some time.
I'm slightly in shock that opponents of Trump have conducted themselves so poorly as to allow him to win again. A really extraordinary failure.
It’s doubly odd that they found a way to win in 2020 and didn’t manage to do it again.
But as I said above, I do wonder if this election was genuinely unwinnable for them whatever happened.
They didn't really, they got lucky that the election happened to coincide with a pandemic that Trump handled disastrously. Even then he barely lost.
But that’s the point isn’t it? Covid was handled here disastrously if you take Partygate. But fundamentally the Tories got thrown out because of the economy.
Starmer needs to do something on the economy or he’s out.
Not really the same comparison as there was no GE here in the immediate post-COVID aftermath. And Partygate was a very different "failure" than what happened in the US where Trump promoted quack treatments and denied the seriousness of the disease
If I was Kemi, I would use PMQs to go after Lab for sending volunteers for the Democrats. Also question whether Lammy's position is tenable (he previously called Trump a Neo-Nazi)
Just as did his own VP. The statement is not that too far off.
I don't have enough on Lammy as Foreign Secretary yet to judge whether he is good at it.
I'd say that Trump will try and run it like a City Mayor, much of it personally. He will be corrupt, random and manipulable, and take big decisions from a base of ignorance on a whim. He will lie, including to himself, and bully, because he's a liar and a bully. And he will abuse his position because that is his standard operating procedure.
I wonder if he will sexually abuse his female staff; that is also a habit.
If I was Kemi, I would use PMQs to go after Lab for sending volunteers for the Democrats. Also question whether Lammy's position is tenable (he previously called Trump a Neo-Nazi)
When tariffs hit and Ukraine suffers setbacks because of Trump’s policies, I’m not convinced Badenoch cosying up to Trump will be good for her own electoral performance.
It's not about cosying up to anyone its about respecting the office of US President whoever the American electorate has chosen.
If I was Kemi, I would use PMQs to go after Lab for sending volunteers for the Democrats. Also question whether Lammy's position is tenable (he previously called Trump a Neo-Nazi)
I don't think that will work.
Even most Tory voters would have preferred Harris to have won, to most Brits Donald Trump is about as appealing as a prostate exam from Edward Scissorhands.
It's possible that this makes things more difficult for KB, not less.
She can't get closer to Trump than Farage, because that's anatomically impossible. But if she says anything positive about the new Chief at all, she cuts herself off from a lot of British voters.
Besides. There's the whole question of whether the next President actually succeeds or not. The Trump agenda isn't anything new. Has it ever ended well?
I don’t want to sound bitter but I just cannot understand how after four years of utter chaos you’d decide to vote for this chap again.
It seems to me to escape all logic and understanding.
I will hold my hands up and say I got this completely wrong but I just cannot understand what’s happened. I clearly don’t understand the US at all. I don’t think I even understand young people in the US either.
And Trump winning the popular vote! Never thought I would see that.
I guess Kamala must have been a really, really crap candidate.
And that's before we get on to what the Dems have been up to, covering up for Bidens senility for years...
Yes, that's it exactly. Fear of a Harris presidency outweighed fear of a Trump presidency. We were shielded in the UK from just how negatively she was seen and how extremist she was perceived to be.
I think Jonathan is at least partly right. What positive vision did Harris offer?
The best that you could say for Trump, that people did say for him in the vox pops, was that he didn't start any wars and groceries were cheaper when he was President. Harris's pitch was, "I'm not Trump."
I think it's why Starmer's victory here was weirdly lacklustre. No positive vision for the future.
I did say that the Trump is a Nazi message was terrible.
The Telegraph had an interesting snippet from the exit poll suggesting Trump didn't actually do any better amongst Black voters but that he won Hispanic men
Trump increased his vote in low income areas and decreased it in middle income, per the Times.
This to me points to the economy. Harris was unable to articulate a message on this. But to be fair what on earth could she have said? What could somebody else have said?
That anecdote “he didn’t start any wars” is one of these interesting things that I thought meant nothing at the time but I wonder if it reflects more what people were voting for as opposed to against.
Morning all.
Yes, I noticed this online a lot. There was a large online constituency who thought Trump represented an antu-war vote.
For all of you bewildered as to why Trump won again and so comprehensively, perhaps I can crave your indulgence and repost the link to the article I wrote for PB on the Trump phenomena back in early 2021.
Nothing really has changed since Trump's first win in 2016. Indeed in no small part because of Trump and of course because of Biden as his successor, for millions of Amernican who see themselves as MIddle Class, things have only got worse.
And the sad fact is that, just as in 2016 and 2020, there is no real prospect of a Trump presidency making it any better.
As an aside, interstimg to see what has changed since then - Trump's relationship with Twitter being the most obvious.
As I say they have abandoned democracy because of the price of eggs.
On Jan 6th, Harris is going to have to count the electoral votes in Congress and then announce her own defeat.
She could refuse to certify, sending the reps back to the states to think again. Trump could hardly argue that wasn't kosher. It would be his mantra Harris was following!
That depends on whether the playing field remains reasonably level. We’ve just seen how difficult it is to defend as an incumbent, and VP to P through the electoral route is an exceptionally rare journey to make.
The scenario where that becomes more credible is if he’s already President by the time 2028 comes around. Which is certainly quite possible.
Very possible. If there’s a next President market, Vance has to be the favourite: he’ll either succeed Trump or he’s the most likely Republican candidate in 2028.
Don't you think Donald will have fallen out with him by then? My money would be on one of the Trump offspring.
I'm slightly in shock that opponents of Trump have conducted themselves so poorly as to allow him to win again. A really extraordinary failure.
It’s doubly odd that they found a way to win in 2020 and didn’t manage to do it again.
But as I said above, I do wonder if this election was genuinely unwinnable for them whatever happened.
They didn't really, they got lucky that the election happened to coincide with a pandemic that Trump handled disastrously. Even then he barely lost.
But that’s the point isn’t it? Covid was handled here disastrously if you take Partygate. But fundamentally the Tories got thrown out because of the economy.
Starmer needs to do something on the economy or he’s out.
Not really the same comparison as there was no GE here in the immediate post-COVID aftermath. And Partygate was a very different "failure" than what happened in the US where Trump promoted quack treatments and denied the seriousness of the disease
But the Tories lost? The main reason they lost here IMHO is that after many years people felt the country had not improved for them, I.e. the economy was not working.
To me that’s why people have rolled the dice with Trump again?
Comments
Trump is the more moderate - really.
The motivation for it, the subsequent regret.
He has said what he needed to in order to win and focussed on people's priorities.
Now that colonials have gotten their election out of the way the next big election for PB to focus on is the 2026 Holyrood election.
So PB will be wall to wall coverage about North Britain between now and then.
That’s the one thing that Harris never really shifted perceptions on. Maybe she couldn’t so didn’t try.
So for GE2029, if SKS can’t be winning on that, he’s out.
I find the w word argument interesting but I’m still not convinced. Maybe it makes a difference at the margin but Biden won in 2020.
Teasing out which way the culture war issues broke - and how they will in the future - is going to be much more complicated.
They certainly helped drive record turnout, though.
Isn't Trump's rhetoric on illegal immigrants and the SC anti-abortion stuff just the mirror image of this? It is surely going to prompt a similar backlash four years down the line, no?
Democrats won't pick another female candidate
First female US President will be a Republican
Someone needs to do the stats on turnout % increment for engaged, disengaged and uninformed
Elon has tremendous power now. Maybe he will use it to save us from Starmer. We can only hope
There are however more sinister people waiting in the wings and eating three BigMacs a day is a distinct health negative.
From a European perspective she's barely on the left at all.
The final "Declaration of Union" approved by the British War Cabinet stated that;
France and Great Britain shall no longer be two nations, but one Franco-British Union. The constitution of the Union will provide for joint organs of defence, foreign, financial and economic policies. Every citizen of France will enjoy immediately citizenship of Great Britain, every British subject will become a citizen of France.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franco-British_Union#World_War_II_(1940)
https://www1.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2024/09/22/they-shall-take-up-serpents-god-guns-abortion-and-trump/
It was already too long a header, but one interesting fact that I cut is that Hispanic Americans are often Evangelicals too, particularly those from Central America. Evangelical Latinos are 3 times as likely to be Republican than Democrat.
I haven't totted up the final damage on Betfair but my main hedge against a Trump victory failed as it seems Kamala won't win the popular vote or make 240 EV. It must be down by £600 or more.The swing states did indeed swing together.
It would probably help people who think we are the same if the US spoke a different language as it would stop this misconception of sameness.
The same people who don’t understand Trump didn’t understand Brexit, Boris, the Red Wall.
In 2024 they know exactly what he represents. And voted for it.
But as I said above, I do wonder if this election was genuinely unwinnable for them whatever happened.
We were lucky Teresa May wasn't our first woman PM. IMHO.
I think Brexit, Jonson and the Red Wall are different. But I accept the similarities you point out - but I have acknowledged previously about my issues understanding those too.
The best that you could say for Trump, that people did say for him in the vox pops, was that he didn't start any wars and groceries were cheaper when he was President. Harris's pitch was, "I'm not Trump."
I think it's why Starmer's victory here was weirdly lacklustre. No positive vision for the future.
Hence why the Rouble is up significantly against the Euro this morning.
*I got the result right. If you exclude the fact that Trump won and not Harris.
However I would advise caution. Rolling back the Woke and destroying the left is going to take time and patience
I am unhappy as to what it means for Ukraine but I doubt Putin will be celebrating particularly either.
People are right to be exercised about 6 January 2021 BUT the US Constitution assumes anyone who wants power is a dangerous fool and goes to great lengths to protect the people from them. And it worked, it did not buckle under the threat, it stood firm.
That is very different from most democracies of which Russia is only the most egrigious example.
The Royal Family so far has stood against wicked politicians here in the UK, in effect it is the bedrock of our constitution. I think we will survive four years of Starmer in 10 Downing Street, and then we will see him on his way. Will we want him back in 2032, I don't think so.
50% of CA already counted - the other 50% will only close the gap by 2m.
He's won the popular vote by about 2%.
Starmer needs to do something on the economy or he’s out.
Even most Tory voters would have preferred Harris to have won, to most Brits Donald Trump is about as appealing as a prostate exam from Edward Scissorhands.
You've come back more bonkers than when you left.
Democrats are very good at doing the hopey, changey, all hold hands and sway messaging when it comes to campaign time. Perhaps 2020 and 2022 made me overconfident that this was a formula that resonated. But they have not, particularly in this round, been good at confronting some of the fundamentals.
Biden presided over high inflation and high immigration. It was incumbent on Harris to speak to how she was going to resolve that, but she wasn’t really able to set out much by way of solutions.
Of course, the fact I’m saying this now when I was sitting on a prediction that she’d win 300+ EC votes is a huge jump on board the hindsight train.
While I'll come out slightly ahead overall, thanks to hedging, it would have been a very profitable night indeed had Harris won.
I'm happy to acknowledge I called that wrong.
We talked at length about the polls being wrong in either direction, and I put money on the wrong way (the hedges, thankfully, acknowledged the possibility of the other eventuality).
The implications of the Trump win are going to take a lot more time to disentangle, though.
If he goes ahead with his pledges on tariffs and deportation, there are going to be a lot of very angry and disappointed Trump voters in four years time, for example.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/money/other/crippling-boeing-strike-finally-ends-after-seven-weeks-as-workers-approve-new-pay-deal/ar-AA1tzz7t?ocid=entnewsntp&pc=U531&cvid=e0210f9253e14dd58f465f8b2234e60a&ei=9
https://www1.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2021/01/09/this-is-not-about-trump-except-of-course-it-is/
Nothing really has changed since Trump's first win in 2016. Indeed in no small part because of Trump and of course because of Biden as his successor, for millions of Amernican who see themselves as MIddle Class, things have only got worse.
And the sad fact is that, just as in 2016 and 2020, there is no real prospect of a Trump presidency making it any better.
As an aside, interstimg to see what has changed since then - Trump's relationship with Twitter being the most obvious.
*pauses for breath as he eats a red bean cake in Seoul*
AHAHAHAHAHAHAH
And the good news is I am still enjoying my food.
But it does seem to be part of why Trump won, probably ?
A significant number of US voters apparently see her that way.
It's an example of why I said working out the implications of Trump's win will take some time.
I don't have enough on Lammy as Foreign Secretary yet to judge whether he is good at it.
I'd say that Trump will try and run it like a City Mayor, much of it personally. He will be corrupt, random and manipulable, and take big decisions from a base of ignorance on a whim. He will lie, including to himself, and bully, because he's a liar and a bully. And he will abuse his position because that is his standard operating procedure.
I wonder if he will sexually abuse his female staff; that is also a habit.
She can't get closer to Trump than Farage, because that's anatomically impossible. But if she says anything positive about the new Chief at all, she cuts herself off from a lot of British voters.
Besides. There's the whole question of whether the next President actually succeeds or not. The Trump agenda isn't anything new. Has it ever ended well?
The Telegraph had an interesting snippet from the exit poll suggesting Trump didn't actually do any better amongst Black voters but that he won Hispanic men
Liverpool have just gone favourites to win the Premier League.
Liverpool 2.8
Man City 2.84
Arsenal 4.9
This to me points to the economy. Harris was unable to articulate a message on this. But to be fair what on earth could she have said? What could somebody else have said?
This feels just like the issue Sunak had.
Yes, I noticed this online a lot. There was a large online constituency who thought Trump represented an antu-war vote.
To me that’s why people have rolled the dice with Trump again?