But that would have meant I'd have lost my bet with StJohn, occasionally of this parish!
As it was I won - it seemed to me that any party leader would have to be certifiably insane to bring DD back into the Cabinet/Shadow Cabinet, following his bizarre tantrum or flounce or arrogant display or whatever it was. It's one thing to resign on principle because you don't agree with your own leadership's position, but barking mad to resign on principle because you don't agree with the other side's. If he really did care about civil liberties, what in heaven's name was he up to? He'd have been Home Secretary, and thus in the best position of anyone in the world to protect British civil liberties. Utterly barking.
I was DD's most trenchant supporter on PB.com when he made his 'stand for our ancient rights'. Alas, his subsequent antics - boorish homophobic rants in London bars, snipes at his leadership to Michael Crick by canteen service hatches etc. - made me feel I'd been duped. Poor old DD - a political show pony lacking judgement.
"a political show pony lacking judgement."???
And David Cameron, by contrast, is.... what, exactly?
You need to consider my remarks as a response to Richard Nabavi's. Whatever you think of Cameron, he never resigned as Leader of the Opposition in protest against the policies of New Labour.
But that would have meant I'd have lost my bet with StJohn, occasionally of this parish!
As it was I won - it seemed to me that any party leader would have to be certifiably insane to bring DD back into the Cabinet/Shadow Cabinet, following his bizarre tantrum or flounce or arrogant display or whatever it was. It's one thing to resign on principle because you don't agree with your own leadership's position, but barking mad to resign on principle because you don't agree with the other side's. If he really did care about civil liberties, what in heaven's name was he up to? He'd have been Home Secretary, and thus in the best position of anyone in the world to protect British civil liberties. Utterly barking.
I was DD's most trenchant supporter on PB.com when he made his 'stand for our ancient rights'. Alas, his subsequent antics - boorish homophobic rants in London bars, snipes at his leadership to Michael Crick by canteen service hatches etc. - made me feel I'd been duped. Poor old DD - a political show pony lacking judgement.
"a political show pony lacking judgement."???
And David Cameron, by contrast, is.... what, exactly?
You need to consider my remarks as a response to Richard Nabavi's. Whatever you think of Cameron, he never resigned as Leader of the Opposition in protest against the policies of New Labour.
Whatever you think of David Davis, I can't help feeling he would have won an overall majority over Gordon Brown.
Can't see it. Brown was dead in the the water until the Financial Armageddon, upon which he managed an extraordinary revival. After that it was 'Dour bloke who might have saved the nation' v. 'Cheerful bloke and breath of fresh air'. 'Dour bloke who might have saved the nation' v. 'Dour bloke who didn't save the nation' wouldn't have been a contest.
A couple of golf notes - this week the PGA Tour is at The Players Championship, which the PGA Tour would like to see as the 5th major, but this has not yet come to pass.
The tournament is played at TPC Sawgrass, a Pete Dye designed course whose signature hole is the island green (actually an isthmus) par 3 17th hole.
Dye's best course is generally assumed to be Harbor Town Links at Hilton Head. Dye courses are known for their use of wood and railroad ties, leading to the line that Pete Dye builds the only golf courses which can be burned down.
Each year a number of balls well into 6 figures are retrieved from the water around the 17th green at Sawgrass.
Virtually every amateur playing the stadium course at the 17th keeps hitting balls until he or she gets one on the green. In some cases that can be a prodigious number.
UKIP are not doing well because of Europe. As Mike Smithson keeps explaining on here, slowly and patiently, very few voters are interested in the EU.
So the tories who think that a promise to hold an in/out referendum---and then to campaign to stay in-- will make much difference to the support for UKIP, haven't been paying attention.
Certainly, there are some issues that membership of the EU makes much worse, notably net immigration. But that is a connection few voters make.
UKIP's support comes from those who feel ignored. They'll only give the govt the benefit of the doubt if they think the govt looks competent, especially on the economy. Issues such as being unable to deport thoroughly undesirable immigrants, or people who appear to be immigrant, fosters a feeling of a lack of competence.
Miliband offers no answers. UKIP's vote will continue to grow, especially if we limit exposure of our less capable supporters.
The key word here is "promise". As Davis pointed out on QT all the main parties have broken promises on the EU. As the old saying goes "you fool me once". The politicians talk about listening but the problem they have is a question of credibility and trust. It fundamentally doesn't matter what new policies they talk about if no-one believes a word they say.
To win back it is not enough to say "I've changed". You have to demonstrate you have changed and then keep up the change over a period.
Tony Blair understood this. His rebranding of Labour showed they had changed but it wasn't just marketing. He backed this up by practical changes such as Clause 4, promising to maintain Con spending plans and promising not to put up tax.
Too many of our current political class think you can just spin to the punlic without having the substance to back it up.
On the missing Barking BNP voters - maybe they got fed up and moved away.
It's looking pretty certain now that at least 20% of the over 60s will vote UKIP in 2015 which would mean at least 6-8% overall. Difficult for the Tories to win a majority with even 6% voting UKIP.
I had some good tips on things to do in Boston from pbcers when I went without doing any research about things to do there - my favourite was definitely the Mapparium
Whatever you think of David Davis, I can't help feeling he would have won an overall majority over Gordon Brown.
David Davis would not have had Osborne as his electoral master strategist, nor would he have footled around with all that Big Society crap.
In retrospect, working class Davis was the much better choice, despite his flakiness. Tories cannot win with posh boys in charge: a public school Tory boy hasn't won a majority since 1959.
Davis would have beaten Brown.
Rubbish. Hague / Howard mark 3 could never win. It's amazing that even you still haven't learnt the most basic of lessons.
The right does not have enough votes to win. The Conservatives can only win with centre ground voters.
Oh, and the public do not care how posh someone is. The only people who care about that are people with chips on their shoulder.
But that would have meant I'd have lost my bet with StJohn, occasionally of this parish!
As it was I won - it seemed to me that any party leader would have to be certifiably insane to bring DD back into the Cabinet/Shadow Cabinet, following his bizarre tantrum or flounce or arrogant display or whatever it was. It's one thing to resign on principle because you don't agree with your own leadership's position, but barking mad to resign on principle because you don't agree with the other side's. If he really did care about civil liberties, what in heaven's name was he up to? He'd have been Home Secretary, and thus in the best position of anyone in the world to protect British civil liberties. Utterly barking.
I was DD's most trenchant supporter on PB.com when he made his 'stand for our ancient rights'. Alas, his subsequent antics - boorish homophobic rants in London bars, snipes at his leadership to Michael Crick by canteen service hatches etc. - made me feel I'd been duped. Poor old DD - a political show pony lacking judgement.
"a political show pony lacking judgement."???
And David Cameron, by contrast, is.... what, exactly?
You need to consider my remarks as a response to Richard Nabavi's. Whatever you think of Cameron, he never resigned as Leader of the Opposition in protest against the policies of New Labour.
Whatever you think of David Davis, I can't help feeling he would have won an overall majority over Gordon Brown.
Can't see it. Brown was dead in the the water until the Financial Armageddon, upon which he managed an extraordinary revival. After that it was 'Dour bloke who might have saved the nation' v. 'Cheerful bloke and breath of fresh air'. 'Dour bloke who might have saved the nation' v. 'Dour bloke who didn't save the nation' wouldn't have been a contest.
Brown polled 29% of the vote. The second lowest vote total in Labour post universal suffrage history. It was also the lowest vote total of any incumbent peacetime government since the Great Depression and the lowest % vote share of any incumbent government since 1918. Indeed some extraordinary revival.that was.....
It's looking pretty certain now that at least 20% of the over 60s will vote UKIP in 2015 which would mean at least 6-8% overall. Difficult for the Tories to win a majority with even 6% voting UKIP.
The above isn't at all certain.
How many votes did the Lib Dems lose in the last 5 days before the last GE?
Remember - UKIP won't get a lot of TV coverage in the campaign - everyone will know it's PM Cameron or Miliband. Even if UKIP is at 10% in national polls at the start of the campaign they could easily still get under 5% on the day.
UKIP are not doing well because of Europe. As Mike Smithson keeps explaining on here, slowly and patiently, very few voters are interested in the EU.
So the tories who think that a promise to hold an in/out referendum---and then to campaign to stay in-- will make much difference to the support for UKIP, haven't been paying attention.
Certainly, there are some issues that membership of the EU makes much worse, notably net immigration. But that is a connection few voters make.
UKIP's support comes from those who feel ignored. They'll only give the govt the benefit of the doubt if they think the govt looks competent, especially on the economy. Issues such as being unable to deport thoroughly undesirable immigrants, or people who appear to be immigrant, fosters a feeling of a lack of competence.
Miliband offers no answers. UKIP's vote will continue to grow, especially if we limit exposure of our less capable supporters.
The key word here is "promise". As Davis pointed out on QT all the main parties have broken promises on the EU. As the old saying goes "you fool me once". The politicians talk about listening but the problem they have is a question of credibility and trust. It fundamentally doesn't matter what new policies they talk about if no-one believes a word they say.
To win back it is not enough to say "I've changed". You have to demonstrate you have changed and then keep up the change over a period.
Tony Blair understood this. His rebranding of Labour showed they had changed but it wasn't just marketing. He backed this up by practical changes such as Clause 4, promising to maintain Con spending plans and promising not to put up tax.
Too many of our current political class think you can just spin to the punlic without having the substance to back it up.
On the missing Barking BNP voters - maybe they got fed up and moved away.
.
Given his record I don't think so. The only thing that Tony Blair understood is that if you are going to undertake a branding exercise you do it quickly, declare victory and move on, The Clause IV moment which detoxified the Labour party was just such a branding exercise and a pretty damaging one long term at that as it was that act which symbolised Labour's desertion of the working classes whom now in part are leaving Labour for UKIP and others. That said, without it I doubt Blair would have had such a stunning success in 1997 but once in power that trust all began to unravel fairly quickly.
If he hadn't have had such a big majority (or benefitted from the imbalances within the voting system) and if the Tory Party weren't suffering from the political equivalant of severe PTSD for the next 10 years (and perhaps even now) Blair's leadership of Labour would have ended much earlier.
Blair lost 4 million votes between 1997 and 2005. He polled no more votes in 2005 than John Major in 1997. Trust began unravelling with the Ecclestone Affair. After Iraq (the WMD Dossier) and the referendum that never was (not to mention the procession of other incidents and scandals) there was little trust left in his Government.
In fact this government probably has to provide a much higher level of proof to acheive credibility purely because of the widespread mistrust in politicians that the Blair and Brown government's (who became renouned for their dishonesty and spin) had embedded in the electorate's collective psyche.
It's looking pretty certain now that at least 20% of the over 60s will vote UKIP in 2015 which would mean at least 6-8% overall. Difficult for the Tories to win a majority with even 6% voting UKIP.
The above isn't at all certain.
How many votes did the Lib Dems lose in the last 5 days before the last GE?
Remember - UKIP won't get a lot of TV coverage in the campaign - everyone will know it's PM Cameron or Miliband. Even if UKIP is at 10% in national polls at the start of the campaign they could easily still get under 5% on the day.
It didn't stop Clegg polling more votes than any Libdem leader since David Steele in 1987 (almost 1 million more than Charles Kennedy in 2005) and arguably stopping Cameron from getting a majority. Given that we could be seeing the evolution of three party politics into four party we really are in unknown territory.
WIll there be debates? If not how will that be intepreted? If there are and UKIP are excluded how will that be interpreted? If UKIP are included how well will Farage do? Furthermore, what is clear now and clearly acknowledged by Farage is UKIP are going going to have to do a full detailed manifesto this time around.
ANother consideration is that the thought of either PM Cameron or PM Miliband or worse another coalition (with DPM Clegg) could drive large groups of voters to distraction. Under such circumstances I'd suggest we have no idea how the voters will react. UKIP could get 5%. They could get somewhere near 20%. I think at this point its that uncertain.
I had some good tips on things to do in Boston from pbcers when I went without doing any research about things to do there - my favourite was definitely the Mapparium
The photo at the top of the thread was taken by me on general election day 2010 at the polling station which I voted at in Bedford. It was about 7am in the morning as the presiding officer was trying to get his polling station notices up in pretty windy weather conditions.
What I like about it is that it has life rather than just a dull polling station sign. I think that it's a great picture and have used it dozens of times on the site.
Off topic. I have seen Star Trek Into Darkness four times today.
Just saying.
(I like the Star Trek TV series, but ) I have never watched any of the Star Trek films. In the 1970s/1980s there was a children's TV programme called "Screen Test" which was a quiz based on observing film clips. When they showed a clip of the Star Trek film, I was confused because the film set was different from the set used on the TV series. As a pedantic autistic 10-year-old, I therefore didn't "recognise" the validity of the Star Trek films, and I have boycotted them ever since.
I have, however, watched some films several times. When the eighth and final Harry Potter film came out, I saw it 8 times. For the last few times I went to sit in the front row so that I could get as close as possible to Daniel Radcliffe's gorgeous face and stubble. When the third Narnia film came out, I saw it 13 times because it had Skandar Keynes in it.
Whatever you think of David Davis, I can't help feeling he would have won an overall majority over Gordon Brown.
David Davis would not have had Osborne as his electoral master strategist, nor would he have footled around with all that Big Society crap.
In retrospect, working class Davis was the much better choice, despite his flakiness. Tories cannot win with posh boys in charge: a public school Tory boy hasn't won a majority since 1959.
Davis would have beaten Brown.
Rubbish. Hague / Howard mark 3 could never win. It's amazing that even you still haven't learnt the most basic of lessons.
The right does not have enough votes to win. The Conservatives can only win with centre ground voters.
Oh, and the public do not care how posh someone is. The only people who care about that are people with chips on their shoulder.
You're being a bit slippery there. SeanT's post specifically stated 'against Gordon Brown'. Hague and Howard weren't fighting Gordon Brown. They were both up against Tony Blair, a formidably successful politician regardless.
Apart from the Blair factor, William Hague suffered two other problems. First he was fighting the 'aftermath' election. No Conservative leader in history would have won in 2001. Second he was bald.
Michael Howard suffered one other big problem. No one liked him (unfairly in my view but that's irrelevant).
SeanT's post was about winning against Gordon Brown, with a backdrop of the worst economic mismanagement since, well, since Labour last screwed it up in 1974-9 and after 13 years of Labour. There was no goalkeeper in sight. The ball was placed, not on the spot, but about 12 inches from the line. All the other players had been sent to the tunnel. All Cameron had to do was run up and tap the ball into the net. He tripped up, landed on his face and the ball trickled to a halt short of the line. It's the worst miss in British political history.
"Let your rapidity be that of the wind, your compactness that of the forest. In raiding and plundering be like fire, is immovability like a mountain. Let your plans be dark and impenetrable as night, and when you move, fall like a thunderbolt."
Comments
You need to consider my remarks as a response to Richard Nabavi's. Whatever you think of Cameron, he never resigned as Leader of the Opposition in protest against the policies of New Labour.
The tournament is played at TPC Sawgrass, a Pete Dye designed course whose signature hole is the island green (actually an isthmus) par 3 17th hole.
Dye's best course is generally assumed to be Harbor Town Links at Hilton Head. Dye courses are known for their use of wood and railroad ties, leading to the line that Pete Dye builds the only golf courses which can be burned down.
Each year a number of balls well into 6 figures are retrieved from the water around the 17th green at Sawgrass.
Virtually every amateur playing the stadium course at the 17th keeps hitting balls until he or she gets one on the green. In some cases that can be a prodigious number.
To win back it is not enough to say "I've changed". You have to demonstrate you have changed and then keep up the change over a period.
Tony Blair understood this. His rebranding of Labour showed they had changed but it wasn't just marketing. He backed this up by practical changes such as Clause 4, promising to maintain Con spending plans and promising not to put up tax.
Too many of our current political class think you can just spin to the punlic without having the substance to back it up.
On the missing Barking BNP voters - maybe they got fed up and moved away.
Well I said so at the time but no-one listened.
I had some good tips on things to do in Boston from pbcers when I went without doing any research about things to do there - my favourite was definitely the Mapparium
http://www.marybakereddylibrary.org/exhibits/mapparium
The right does not have enough votes to win. The Conservatives can only win with centre ground voters.
Oh, and the public do not care how posh someone is. The only people who care about that are people with chips on their shoulder.
How many votes did the Lib Dems lose in the last 5 days before the last GE?
Remember - UKIP won't get a lot of TV coverage in the campaign - everyone will know it's PM Cameron or Miliband. Even if UKIP is at 10% in national polls at the start of the campaign they could easily still get under 5% on the day.
Given his record I don't think so. The only thing that Tony Blair understood is that if you are going to undertake a branding exercise you do it quickly, declare victory and move on, The Clause IV moment which detoxified the Labour party was just such a branding exercise and a pretty damaging one long term at that as it was that act which symbolised Labour's desertion of the working classes whom now in part are leaving Labour for UKIP and others. That said, without it I doubt Blair would have had such a stunning success in 1997 but once in power that trust all began to unravel fairly quickly.
If he hadn't have had such a big majority (or benefitted from the imbalances within the voting system) and if the Tory Party weren't suffering from the political equivalant of severe PTSD for the next 10 years (and perhaps even now) Blair's leadership of Labour would have ended much earlier.
Blair lost 4 million votes between 1997 and 2005. He polled no more votes in 2005 than John Major in 1997. Trust began unravelling with the Ecclestone Affair. After Iraq (the WMD Dossier) and the referendum that never was (not to mention the procession of other incidents and scandals) there was little trust left in his Government.
In fact this government probably has to provide a much higher level of proof to acheive credibility purely because of the widespread mistrust in politicians that the Blair and Brown government's (who became renouned for their dishonesty and spin) had embedded in the electorate's collective psyche.
WIll there be debates? If not how will that be intepreted? If there are and UKIP are excluded how will that be interpreted? If UKIP are included how well will Farage do? Furthermore, what is clear now and clearly acknowledged by Farage is UKIP are going going to have to do a full detailed manifesto this time around.
ANother consideration is that the thought of either PM Cameron or PM Miliband or worse another coalition (with DPM Clegg) could drive large groups of voters to distraction. Under such circumstances I'd suggest we have no idea how the voters will react. UKIP could get 5%. They could get somewhere near 20%. I think at this point its that uncertain.
What I like about it is that it has life rather than just a dull polling station sign. I think that it's a great picture and have used it dozens of times on the site.
I have, however, watched some films several times. When the eighth and final Harry Potter film came out, I saw it 8 times. For the last few times I went to sit in the front row so that I could get as close as possible to Daniel Radcliffe's gorgeous face and stubble. When the third Narnia film came out, I saw it 13 times because it had Skandar Keynes in it.
Apart from the Blair factor, William Hague suffered two other problems. First he was fighting the 'aftermath' election. No Conservative leader in history would have won in 2001. Second he was bald.
Michael Howard suffered one other big problem. No one liked him (unfairly in my view but that's irrelevant).
SeanT's post was about winning against Gordon Brown, with a backdrop of the worst economic mismanagement since, well, since Labour last screwed it up in 1974-9 and after 13 years of Labour. There was no goalkeeper in sight. The ball was placed, not on the spot, but about 12 inches from the line. All the other players had been sent to the tunnel. All Cameron had to do was run up and tap the ball into the net. He tripped up, landed on his face and the ball trickled to a halt short of the line. It's the worst miss in British political history.
London support for UKIP back to normal levels.
Cons support wrt Labour:
MEN -10; WOMEN -7