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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » The woman in this great ad wins the Senator race in Iowa to
politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » The woman in this great ad wins the Senator race in Iowa to help the GOP take control of the Senate
The big UK political betting news will be the release by Lord Ashcroft later this morning of his latest round of single seat polling. He’s gone for seats with bigger majorities than his earlier polling as well as a look at Scotland.
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That, however, is not to say that she won't be a candidate in 10 or 14 years time.
Cameron:
Sticks to what he believes in: 23 (+1) [50 (-)]
Strong: 16 (+1) [40 (+4)]
Natural Leader: 16 (+3) [41 (+9)]
Miliband:
In touch with concerns of ordinary people: 16 (-9)* [43 (-15)] (* would be -11 vs 1 yag + 2 weeks)
Honest: 14 (-3) [35 (-6)]
Sticks to what he believes in: 13 (-4) [33 (-5)]
http://cdn.yougov.com/cumulus_uploads/document/3jhq20nxn6/YG-Archive-Pol-Sun-results-041114.pdf
http://cdn.yougov.com/cumulus_uploads/document/1sqhc03nrf/YG-Archive-Pol-Sun-results-291013.pdf
What we need is another 3 year Indyref campaign.
The standout value constituency bet for me is Birmingham Northfield at 12/1. It feels like this should be much shorter, perhaps 4/1. See link to my blog below:
http://royaleleseaux.wordpress.com/2014/11/04/could-the-conservatives-win-an-overall-majority-in-the-2015-general-election-next-year-part-2/
Comments welcome!
Just wanted to a shout out for my friend Seth who's just been elected to Congress for the MA 6th.
Hope you all got on him when he was an upstart trying to unseat a 7 term incumbent from his own party...tasty odds when I tipped him...
They've done well to take the Senate. But I can't see them taking the Presidency anytime soon.
Catchy – reminds me of my old science teacher who started each lesson with some explosive prank and the immortal words – “‘now that I have your attention”….!
The one way it goes Tory is if they are heading for an overall majority. But you are right - the likelihood is it will be a comfortable Labour hold as the LD vote collapses. I believe there are slight Labour concerns, though, that the Greens could eat into their vote.
In the meantime Obama is reduced to a lame duck President with little control over the domestic agenda. What a disappointment he has been in office.
Certainly might be more of a race than previously thought in 2016, but that almost always seems to be the case whenever someone is touted as a shoe-in in the US - the country is very divided. However, Mike's demographic chart from NYT shows the GOP problems. That's why I am thinking a Jeb Bush run might make sense: his hispanic credentials may put this demo back in play.
I would not be looking for many Conservative gains in London - quite the reverse, this is one region where Labour will do unusually well, relatively.
"(1) Emerging economies will cripple European manufacturing and service industries.
(2) The compounding effect of technology; computing power increases and its price decreases. The world added 5 exaflops (great word!) of computing capacity in 2008, 20 in 2012 and heading for 40 this year and will change just about everything.
(3) The demographic deficit, ratio of working age population +16 to dependent population +65, is in decline."
From Roy Lilley's wonderful daily e-mail to-day, of course. The implication of course is that either we use (2) to fix (1) and (3) or they don't get fixed. My concern is, frankly, that if the voices of the right on here are typical of anyone but themselves, they don't want them to get fixed. In truth, sooner or later, anyone motivated by greed is going to take a dim view of other folk, a view that will only get dimmer day by day.
A good result for the GOP, but can they build on it for presidential elections in 2016?
Was out working last night so missed the Liverpool team vs Real.
It showed a club wanting to reach the CL for the next season is more important than how they do once actually in it - that was the message of last night.
Feeble.
At least Harry had a right go at it when we were there.
We don't always see eye-to-eye on political matters, but I'm a great admirer of your analysis and betting insight skills. Your kind words mean a lot to me!
What the NYT noticed this time is that the republicans were playing to win with major party support for incumbents and moderate candidates being threatened by the Tea Party:
"With the political climate and the electoral map playing to their decided advantage, Republicans were determined not to relive the elections of 2010 and 2012, when infighting between establishment Republicans and Tea Party insurgents damaged the party’s brand and elevated candidates who could not win.
From the beginning, party officials decided to take sides when fierce primary challenges emerged. The party establishment crushed challengers to Mr. McConnell in Kentucky, and to Senators Lindsey Graham in South Carolina and Lamar Alexander in Tennessee.
The establishment also sent reinforcements to help Senator Thad Cochran eke out a runoff victory against a Tea Party firebrand in Mississippi; cleared the Republican field for Mr. Gardner in Colorado; and backed winning primary candidates in Iowa, North Carolina, New Hampshire and Alaska."
We may have seen the peak of Tea Party destructiveness.
Got to say I was quite angry about the nonsense the idiot Mark Easton (BBC chap, an article of whose on an identical subject I posted here for derision a day or two prior to the TV piece) was spouting on the News at Ten last night.
It was about English devolution. So, he went to Cornwall and asked some Cornish nationalists if they wanted a Cornish assembly. Amazingly, they did. Behold the incredible journalism!
Then he went to a 'neutral' setting, namely a pub. He presented a few pubgoers with various options for devolution.
These were:
A Cornish assembly (met with disapproval because of lack of resources in Cornwall)
A Plymouth-led Devon-Cornwall assembly (met with disapproval because Devon isn't the boss of Cornwall)
A south-west region which looked to include Cornwall, Devon, Somerset and Dorset (met with disapproval because the West Country doesn't understand Cornish things)
There was no English Parliament option. The exact analogy of a Scottish Parliament is an English Parliament, and the state broadcaster refuses to even mention the single most desired option. Asking Cornish nationalists if they want their own elected body is as revealing and fair as asking nymphomaniacs if they'd like a shag.
I think I might ask Mr. Smithson if I could write a piece about the need for an English Parliament. Whilst I very much doubt it will be as widely read as the moronic wibbling of Easton it might have the advantage of being worth reading.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-29850286
Check the top comments - people want an English Parliament. The BBC doesn't want to even whisper it.
Edited extra bit: and asking vague questions to promote a political perspective is unimpressive:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-29880995
"'Support' for English devolution - BBC poll"
"However, Prof John Curtice, from Strathclyde University, said the question asked in the poll needed to be more specific.
He said people might interpret "local area" in different ways and the result could change if people were asked about tax, education and policing separately."
Suggest that @Casino_Royale reposts his blog link later in the day, around PMQs as they'll be more of us PBers online around then.
You are not quite right that the exact analogy of a Scottish Parliament is an English Parliament. The problem is that such an English assembly would represent some 85% of the population of UK. That's why people talk about regional entities like Cornish or North East as these would represent populations more on the scale of Scotland and Wales.
You can get 49/1 on Betfair on him (£19) and 40/1 with other bookies.
Only longer.
Nobody said Wales was too small. Nobody argued Scotland should be cut up in Lowlands, Highlands and Islands. I'm an Englishman, and England should not be dismembered for political convenience or because some right-on idiots dislike England.
I absolutely do not care that 85% of the UK's population would be covered by an English Parliament. If a Parliament is good enough for Scotland, it's good enough for England.
If the Scots get DevoMax (and if they don't, they'll leave sooner rather than later) then justice demands equality for England. Can we have that with shitty little regional assemblies?
Do you think varying income tax, VAT, and so forth could work in Yorkshire and Lancashire, Somerset and Devon? It's utterly unworkable on a regional level. To have the same democratic rights as Scotland we must have an English Parliament.
The vicar of Bath is still ranting, nobody appears to have told him the vote was held in September.
He has some skeletons in his cupboard but the recall was a disaster for his opponents and boosted his standing nationally. I think he is a real contender.
Roundings!
Will we get that level of comedy next time?
Good midterms by the Republicans. Back as a force, notably because they have restrained their loony Tea Party fringe. A lesson for all.
Apparently movements in oil prices aren't important for a petro-economy.
EV4EL is the way to go.
Whatever that is......
http://www.buzzfeed.com/alanwhite/there-is-an-announcement-in-the-times-that-benedict-cumberba
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/ed-miliband/11208812/Worcester-Woman-lives-and-she-could-settle-Ed-Milibands-fate.html
I'm still marvelling at Mr Carnyx who is normally a sensible chap, telling us that the current contest in Scotland is a contest between the SNP and the Tories. This in a week when the Tories were reported on 8%.
He appears to have missed the 40 or so Labour Mps who are representing Scotland.
I fully expect Nats demanding Koala bears for all 3 year olds and the reappearance of Stuart Dickson.
https://www.opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/michael-skey/older-anxious-and-white-why-ukip-are-english-tea-party
Of course our declining education standards will not help matters.
Agree with 3 but you have omitted medical technology advances - on a macro scale more and better spare part surgery, but on a micro scale both disease prevention and gene and cell technology (replacement/change) which will result in more of us living longer as we are more healthy, may limit aging - but we could run out of food or destroy the natural environs that we love.
Thus will children become a rarity or even a luxury allowed to certain privileged classes? We continue to embrace technologial advance without thinking of the social global implications. So more wars that will limit populations or extermination of the less intelligent slaves when they are no longer useful?
You can get 25/1 on him being the Republican Candidate
http://www.oddschecker.com/politics/us-politics/us-presidential-election-2016/republican-candidate
Thanks for the info.
That said, I do not want regional assemblies either!
As a footnote to the US election, this page rounds up the statewide issue polls:
http://edition.cnn.com/election/2014/results/race/ballot
Nothing wildly exciting, but mixed results on legalising pot, lots of support for higher minimum wages, a defeat for an anti-abortion measure (defining all unborn children as people - presumably it would have made abortion at any stage into murder?) and a Washington State vote for tougher gun laws.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/matt/
...believes Obama is a dictator that should be impeached: http://news.yahoo.com/joni-ernst---impeachment--of-obama-should-be-on-the-table-204439051.html
...would take up armed rebellion if the Feds "took away her rights": http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/10/22/joni-ernst-guns_n_6032164.html
...STILL thinks there were WMDs in Iraq: http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2014/05/joni-ernst-iowa-senate-iraq-weapons-mass-destruction
...supports the Confederate view that states can nullify Federal laws: http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/07/28/exclusive-gop-senate-candidate-caught-saying-states-can-nullify-laws.html
...believes the United Nations has a secret plot called Agenda 21 that's out to oppress Americans: http://wonkette.com/551631/iowa-senate-candidate-joni-ernst-will-castrate-uns-evil-agenda-21-plot-to-make-you-ride-a-bicycle
It's an impressive victory for her, but not one that will win in Virginia and Ohio. What's surprising is that she so openly marketed herself as conservative in an Obama state. I've always wondered how Iowa stayed so blue over the years when it's a rural evangelical state very similar to Indiana. It looks like it's now falling into line.
We've got the treason, we've got the plot and if we can stick a rocket up TSE's arse we'll also have the gunpowder
Increasingly I meet people working after conventional retirement age. There are three doctors in my dept over 65 who plan to work for several years longer. They have reasonable pensions so are mostly planning to carry on because they enjoy it.
I have a few patients with similar plans. One 82 year old cattle dealer explained to me the other day "I would rather wear out than rust out", but he only works part time now.
Got any tips for yesterday's horse racing?
It allowed to me seamlessly segue into a few classical history references.
Philby's codename was Homer.
D'oh
There's a lot of economic hot air about immigration at the moment but the arguments seem to be ... well to be totally polarised. A real 'us vs them' debate
EU immigration first off. If you import a lot of young, relatively fit people, you'd expect GDP to grow, the total number of jobs to grow and a positive net benefit to the country as a whole.
That assumes that the new workers take jobs that the current workers can't or won't do. In the case of unskilled jobs (which most are), that's beneficial only if the current workers refuse to do them.
So there's two points. Where does the benefit to the country lie? If people see their services squeezed and the benefit going to other people, should they rejoice? And if the locals see their own job opportunities reduced should they be happy?
Secondly, should the country be happy that foreign workers have a better work ethic, and that some workers would rather live on welfare? Looking back, I spent most of my school holidays from 12 to 17 working on the land, being picked up in gang vans after finishing my paper round. It is hard work, so you can see the attraction to farmer of having a young, keen workforce.
In the case of non-EU immigration, the economics will be different. You can get a squeeze on services without any overall economic benefit. The benefit is social - the satisfaction of helping families stay together and to save genuine asylum seekers from persecution. Or in the case of the Labour party, helping to increase diversity.
The problem we have is the BBC present one side and many of the papers the other. In line with the relatively unskilled vs the relatively affluent split. Or the old-fashioned Labour party vs the new-fashioned Labour party
Similarly the first world will inevitably have to cut back on the benefits and services provided by its governments, the countries just can't afford them.
I'll get my coat....
As to 2. I think you place too much faith in the exaflop as a solution to the problem you perceive in 1 (brown and yellow people getting ideas above their station). More to the point, why not take a map of the world and colour in the bits where you think all these new exaflops are being made? Be afraid, be very afraid of the Yellow Peril.
Douglas Carswell MP ✔ @DouglasCarswell
Remember, Remember, November! Guy Fawkes in #Rochester - come and join the insurgency against SW1 pic.twitter.com/kOkvN71hSC
"I'm a happily married man"
I was going to say
"Douglas, you're turning into the epitome of Cameron's maxim about twitter"
It's like a child declaring they're going to try superhard because the nasty boy next door said they couldn't beat them at football.
People comment on Carswell's intellect but his tweets don't exactly back that up.
1) What action is Home Secretary Theresa May taking against the South Yorkshire Police after the widespread media reports of its collaboration with child rapists.
2) When is Childrens Minister Edward Timpson going to place Rotherham's Childrens Services into special measures.
3) What is Policing Minister Mike Penning doing to ensure that the police's much publicised 'day of reckoning' with its 'wave after wave of arrests' takes place.
4) How much did the locally well connected former Communities Minister Sayeeda Warsi know about what was happening and what did she chose to do about it.
5) Why has Prime Minister David Cameron shown no interest despite his emphasis on 'Broken Britain' whilst Leader of the Opposition.
Good one.
In the case of the Tea Party, ‘nationwide surveys produce a consistent picture of Tea Party supporters… Between 55 and 60 percent of supporters are men; 80–90 percent are white; and 70–75 percent are over 45 years old’ (Williamson, Skocpol & Coggin, 2011: 27). According to YouGov data, 85% of UKIP supporters are over 40 years old and 57% are men. Surprisingly, there is no official data on ethnicity, but it’s generally agreed that most of their supporters are white.
I bet a straw poll of pb.com kippers will find they are predominantly:
Over 40
White
Male
And judging by the times at which they post, I reckon many of you-kippers on here are retired. Happy to be corrected on that one.
The kippers I know fit this bill perfectly. And they have given rise to my view that it's a protest party. In the case of two close friends in Buckinghamshire, it's HS2 which has led to them supporting Farage. In the case of someone else, it's the number of eastern Europeans in her area (although she is switching back Conservative for "the real thing"). For some others it's Heathrow expansion. For others it's the EU. Wherever you look, it's protest: it's a party of what they are against, not what they are for. And that, my friends, does not a General Election victory make.
Just realised my previous piece was far too long. I should have generalised ...
Posh people see the benefits of immigration.
Plebs see the disadvantages.
Neither see the other's viewpoint.
Entirely right that we need answers from this, and the lack of political, and media, follow-up is perplexing and unacceptable.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_Wisconsin_Act_10
The effect on union membership was startling !
"Effect on unions[edit]
Public employee union membership dropped significantly after the law passed, with AFSCME reporting a drop from 62,818 in 2011 to 28,745 in February 2012. In many cases, the union members were removed by the union after they declined to have dues collected by the union.
Since teachers' unions were no longer able to automatically deduct dues from teachers' paychecks because of the new budget repair law, unions are using a variety of methods including using a combination of meetings, emails, phone calls and home visits to get teachers signed up for dues collection. "
The US is sneezing and the winds of change are coming.
http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/2014/results/ballot-measures#Marijuana