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Does this 1992 Scottish constituency result presage the next UK general election?
Does this 1992 Scottish constituency result presage the next UK general election?
One of my all time favourite general election constituency results is the one above which shows the absurdity of the first past the post system. Despite being elected as Labour leader under the alternative vote system Starmer has no plans to change the voting system for the UK general election so FPTP is here to stay in all its glory.
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First.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cn7r7pjy8j1o
It contained the district of Badenoch and Strathspey, but I’m not going to make a song and dance about it.
Support Among Republicans A Constitutional Amendment Allowing Trump To Run For A 3rd Term
🔴 Support 53% (+25)
🔵 Oppose 28%
@J_L_Partners | 1,006 RV
https://x.com/OpenSourceZone/status/1876682047617671291
Obama will still be in his 60s by then..
That leaves a vacuum and all kinds of things will get sucked in. Reform don't need to offer very much substantial to do very well - just show that they understand.
This is a poll in January 2025 showing mega-splittage and Reform doing very well. A map with an awful lot of purple on it. Now extend the trend forward and think what could be the same poll in 12 months time. Or 24 months...
pigeon said:
» show previous quotes
pigeon said: *Time once again to remind ourselves that, after allowing for housing costs, the average pensioner has more disposable income than the average worker. The crossover point was reached some years ago, and the net movement of wealth from workers to the retired can only possibly run in one direction so long as the Triple Lock exists and housing remains chronically overvalued*
Trigger alert for the retired amongst us:
An extension to this is to discourage retirement. The retirement industry is pernicious. It encourages people to believe that being idle when still fully able is something to aspire to. People should be encouraged to continue in productive paid employment (possibly part time) for as long as they are able. It would reduce labour shortages and give people meaning to their lives while adding, rather than detracting from the economy. Discuss.
Did you leave a word out?
#MarshallWadeWasRight
Very briefly as I have a call...
The more trouble and instability there is in the world, the more money flies into US dollars as that is the safe haven currency. This in turn means that the US finds it even harder to achieve a trade balance, which means Trump throws more instability into the world.
Etc.
Rince and repeat.
Long may Truss keep annoying them.
At work we were about to deploy Project Dynamo which is only to be used when the shit hits the fan.
The biggest difficulty, as always, is finding the money. And the answer has to be housing because there's no more to be squeezed from incomes: more than 40% of the population are kids, students, pensioners and those too sick or disabled to work, and much of the working age population are in minimum wage crap jobs and have nothing left to give.
Our lopsided economy funnels immense wealth into overvalued homes. Whether it's through wealth taxes, land value taxes, IHT or CGT on legacies, or some combination of these things, we're never going to cope with the immense burden of an ageing population without syphoning a decent chunk of that wealth off, and at some point someone is going to be forced to do it. It can be presented as a necessary evil to deal with impossibly high health and care costs, and as a mutualisation of risk - so all homeowners and heirs get whacked in a proportionate manner, rather than having a lot of people pay nothing and some lose virtually everything depending on the lottery of ill health - but regardless it has to happen. And I understand why politicians endlessly put the problem off (and when push comes to shove the right wing parties will be even more inclined to keep burying their heads in the sand, because this is going to involve stinging the well off elderly more than anyone else and the grey vote is their core constituency.) They know how very unpopular this is going to be, and I have some sympathy for their predicament. But it is, nonetheless, very cowardly.
Green dissects Truss letter
This is because we simply do not know what Truss’s instructions were to the law firm nor what advice they gave her about sending this letter.
It may well be that that the letter was sent against legal advice.
It may even be that the letter was sent against emphatic legal advice.
We just do not know.
One should not visit the sins (or otherwise) of the client upon their lawyers."
When most countries go tonto, their currency falls, but when the US goes tonto, their currency... rises?
Good trick if you can do it, I suppose.
"There seem many other problems with the letter (subject to the missing second page).
"It sets no deadline.
"It sets out no ultimatum.
"It asks for no undertakings.
"It does not set out what relief or remedies will be sought if Starmer does not comply."
I mentioned this in the GE campaign . If there were to be a sustained period of Reform outpolling the Tories, such as the VI shown here, and particularly if say this is reinforced by Reform beating the Tories in Wales and Scotland in 2026, there could be a huge and significant shift in the Tory vote over to Reform, as the stop Labour, new party of the right.
I’m not saying it will definitely happen but it has to be plausible that we go into the next GE with a lot of voters who would have voted Tory reconciled to a Reform vote.
I wouldn't want to try to enter the HoC through a by-election atm, as a Labour MP.
I fully expect Trump to run a massive governmeny deficit, as per his last term, to fund tax cuts and pork-barrelling. In the short term it will produce good GDP figures, but it's really just giving an alcoholic the keys to the liquor store.
That's a problem for the long term of course, but he doesn't care that Social Security will be bankrupt by the end of his term, because that's someone else's problem.
Here's the 2024 result and here's a poll 4.5 years earlier:
Con poll 49% result 24% - 25pp fall
Lab poll 30% result 35% - 5pp rise
LD poll 8% result 13% - 5pp rise
Green poll 5% result 7% - 2pp rise
Brexit/Reform UK poll 2% result 15% - 13pp rise
Here's the 2010 result and here's a poll 4.5 years earlier:
Con poll 36% result 38% - 2pp rise
Lab poll 38% result 31% - 7pp fall
LD poll 14% result 8% - 6pp fall
Green poll 2% result 4% - 2pp rise
UKIP poll 3% result 13% - 10pp rise
Hans Blix: Mr. Il, I was supposed to be allowed to inspect your palace today, but your guards won't let me enter certain areas.
Kim Jong Il: Hans, Hans, Hans! We've been frew this a dozen times. I don't have any weapons of mass destwuction, OK Hans?
Hans Blix: Then let me look around, so I can ease the UN's collective mind.
Kim Jong Il: Hans, you're breakin' my barrs here, Hans, you're breakin' my barrs!
Hans Blix: I'm sorry, but the UN must be firm with you. Let me in, or else.
Kim Jong Il: Or else what?
Hans Blix: Or else we will be very angry with you... and we will write you a letter, telling you how angry we are.
I concede there are a chunk of politically homeless, typically centre-right-leaning voters who can’t really envisage a vote for Reform. I’m one of them. Goodness knows who I’ll vote for at the next GE at the moment.
But for every one of those voters I think there’s a voter who wouldn’t have Farage as their first choice but if it’s seen as the right wing choice, they will hold their nose and vote Reform.
I may be wrong.
So 20 glasses, even if containing almost no beer at all, would be equivalent to 600ml of whiskey...
Musk has called for military force to overthrow the democratically-elected government and the immediate release of a violent repeat offender who led the English Defence League. There are also the tweets where Musk endorsed a Holocaust denier and where he said Jews were conspiring to flood the US with immigrants. If that's not far right, what is?
Trump has said he will deport US citizens, which would be in contravention of the US Constitution. He has spread conspiracy theories about immigrants. He is threatening to invade several countries because he wants their land. He encouraged a violent riot to try to overturn a democratic election 4 years ago. Again, seems pretty far right to me.
I don't think they are far right but not radical either. Just populist grifters for hire to the elite.
With PR it would also be a hung parliament with Labour and Reform well short of a majority, the only difference is the Greens would join the Tories and LDs in holding the balance of power not the SNP
🤡🤡🤡🤡
https://x.com/v_j_freeman/status/1877352083898126725?s=61
🔴 Labour: 31%
🟦 Reform UK: 37%
🔵 Conservatives: 0%
🟢 Greens: 13%
🟠 Lib Dems: 16%
Then we put that into Electoral Calculus, which will of course work perfectly, and ta da...
Reform UK 296
Labour 243
LibDem 69
Green 4
SNP 8
PC 3
Northern Ireland 18
others 9
Clearly a Lab/LD minority govt. Lab + LD + SDLP + APNI would be 315. Presuming SF 7, you need about 321 for a majority. Presume SNP, Greens and others won't vote down the government.
RefUK are more incoherent than radical. It's the nature of Populism.
Win > fight > laugh....