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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » As the Lib Dem leadership race starts a timely reminder fro
politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » As the Lib Dem leadership race starts a timely reminder from Ladbrokes of the devastation the party suffered at GE15
Next Lib Dem leader betting, 5 years ago:
4 Laws
5 Alexander
8 Teather
8 Huhne
10 Farron
10 Cable
10 Davey
16 Swinson
20 Hughes
25 Lamb
0
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Shadsy will be a happy man the way that market played out!
http://www.theguardian.com/news/video/2015/jun/02/cassetteboy-remix-the-news-hatton-garden-video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7c3s4pLsN9M
On the topic of grandees, while Williams is backing Lamb, I note Steel is backing Farron.
Haven't the Lib Dems had lots of new members sign up since the defenestration a few weeks ago? I wonder how the newcomers will affect things.
Scottish students are losing out on places at some of the country’s most eminent universities to youngsters from the Continent attracted by the SNP’s promise of a ‘free’ degree, new figures have suggested.
Official statistics obtained under the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act found the number of Scots accepted at Glasgow, Edinburgh, Aberdeen and Dundee universities has fallen over the past two years.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/universityeducation/11428014/Scots-losing-out-on-university-places-to-EU-students.html
She would be a better candidate for leader than any of the current crop
The issue with having rules is that people lose the habit of using their judgment, of thinking about whether they are doing the right thing rather than doing what is in compliance with or at least not a breach of the rules.
Everyone in banking needs to have a moral compass, a professional conscience, if you will, and value that. And they need to remember that the question they should be asking themselves every single day is not just "Can I do this?". But "Should I do this?"
The difference between "can" and "should" is judgment. And judgment has been sorely lacking all too often.
But, frankly, the first thing to do is to get the right people into the industry in the first place. If you bring people in who are dishonest or who do not value their integrity, then no amount of rules will help. Employers need to remember that character (moral character, if you will) trumps skills every time, especially in an industry like banking where trustworthiness is the most important single factor which counts in developing the right culture.
There are literally thousands and thousands of rules in banking and policies and procedures and guidance and what have you.
Nothing wrong with general principles: See the 10 Commandments for instance.
If bankers had followed the injunctions to not steal, not lie and not be greedy the banking industry wouldn't be in the mess it's in.
The SNP membership surge was very dramatic, but I don't think it can be compared to the Lib Dems because the circumstances are very different.
Perhaps while you and the rest of the Loyalist brigade are slugging back the Buckfast in George Square on Saturday you can reflect on how badly this line of attack is doing and how Scotland as a whole still has faith in the SNP and are very supportive of the SNP on Education matters (at all levels).
Hint - the lies you keep spewing are not working.
"Farrons religiosity and social conservatism may well go down well with the non-metropolitan membership, particularly the left wing kipper inclined."
You're playing my tune. And you're right.
It doesn't much matter whether the fourth party makes a mistake over this or not.
"Rules are for the obedience of fools and the guidance of wise men."
Douglas Bader
That said, a huge number of people of all political colours may have remarked upon the crapness of Miliband, but Labour ploughed straight ahead.
No bets on this one. Mike is losing his money on this one: talk about shearing sheep.
I have spent 30 years catching crooks of one type or another. In virtually every single case matters went wrong because people did the wrong thing or failed to do the right thing. So the quality of the people you hire, their default instincts/default judgment, what they will do when no-one is looking, when there are no rules or the rules are not clear is key. You need people whose instinct is to do the right thing, even if the right thing is to admit that they don't know and ask for help. And as I'm sure you know, admitting that and asking for help/advice is rarer than it should be.
It is a delusion that politicians, regulators, lawyers and managers are prone to - the delusion that if you can only tweak this rule or that process or those procedures you can get to a situation where bad things won't happen or will be caught.
Where there is money there will be greed, stupidity, hubris, complacency and cowardice. Hiring people who don't display those characteristics is a start, not sufficient, but an essential start.
I mean do they even exist in this era of high speed internet ? Oh wait this is a family website
I nearly did a thread on Danny Alexander when he was 25/1 headlined "Alexander the Great"
Personally, I think both were crap and the rout would have been much the same. David M was basically a spineless damp rag who failed - twice - to take on Brown. He wouldn't have had the gumption to take an unpopular position on any conceivable issue, so would have ended up standing for nothing in the same way as his brother; just via a different route. Ed was incoherent because he was a vacuous nerd, David because he was a wet lettuce.
Politics is well off without the pair of them.
Don't get me wrong, Miliband the Elder isn't great. But he isn't as rubbish as his brother [although he does have some Iraq baggage].
Nobody bought them either. They always seemed to be handed furtively round as having been pinched from someone's older brother's porn stash. IIRC - and I'm going back to the 70s - the tone of them was worship of the women pictured, who had usually been groomed, glammed and taken to some interesting location. The subtext being, I presume, "keep buying the magazine, boys - you'll never have a woman like this one". That has sure changed.... Actually the Tory party's characterisations have always been right. Always. When they critique the Labour leader it pays to listen because they are spot on.
Callaghan: bumbling old fool in thrall to commie union bosses
Foot: unreconstructed old commie fool
Kinnock: verbose, immature, irresponsible, not cut out for the job
Smith: sanctimonious tax and spend economy vandal
Blair: demon eyes
Brown: lunatic
Miliband: lightweight
would anyone now seriously question any of those judgements?
I can claim to have spotted Ed as a dud immediately. The resemblance to Wallace was obvious. And yes, I am shallow.
ANY Labour/wet leader would have been played for fun by the unions.
Centre Right? Centre Left? Left? Right?
WHAT DO THEY WANT???
Ahem...just that along with (population of UK - [60,000]) I can't see what the point of the LDs is.
http://times.newsprints.co.uk/view/30166761/nintchdbpict000157208891_jpg
I don't see how the Scotch situation isn't toxic for Labour in perpetuity. Any vote that doesn't produce a Tory or Labour majority results in England being farmed for taxes to subsidise Scotland. The Tories are much closer to - indeed, actually have - a majority based on English votes and therefore the safest vote an English elector can cast is for the Tories.
No?
As a great sage once said, the 2015 election "ought to herald another decade of strong, confident, consensual government".
I hope you followed me in when I backed/tipped Liz Kendall at 50/1 and 20/1?
The warning lights should have come on ages ago and at least, as a last chance, when it was clear that "Long Term Economic Plan" was going to become the Tories' mantra.
;-) Lib Dems are historically strong in the Highlands, Borders, Wales, the West Country and Northern Mill towns, all bastions of Chapel going or Presbyterianism. More Methodism than Marx is more true of the Liberals than the Labour party. The SDP wing tends to be more secular, such as Cable, or Catholic such as Kennedy.
Not everyone like religiosity in public life; but I suspect that traditional Liberals are more open to it than most.
terrrrrrrrrriiiiiiiiiiiibbbbbbbblllllllllleeeeeee
night for the Lib-Dems! :^O
As someone who has voted LD in the past, Farron is really not someone I could ever vote for. Lamb would give them a chance to regroup and rebuild. Farron would use the job to push his own agenda rather than leading a reassessment of where the LDs should be going. And his agenda does not sit well with all past LD supporters.
Farron represents a very particular line of thought and that is not as widely liked as you appear to think.
The LDs have to stick to the middle ground - moving to the left under Farron will not bring them the dividends they need to become a major national party again. Protest group - yes, future party of government - no.
It's almost as if many in the party don't want to be a Social Democratic Party, even though it was an election winning formula, because Blair was associated with that kind of politics.
And I'm not sure anyone in sales and trading has managed to avoid breaking the third on a daily basis.
I'm not saying that general principles are not good: they are. It's just that I can't see how they can be relied upon, especially in large organisations.
As you say in your post below, it's important to get the right people who can follow general principles. I think that's where I feel it may fall down.
- Bringing about equality, social and economic;
- Making the economy better, for its own sake and better for everyone;
- Ensuring a bold vision for the UK by international participation.
http://aboutus.ft.com/files/2010/09/Ferguson-Adjudication-with-PS.pdf
The tweets between the two men at the centre of all this are as wearying as any pb tussle.
Most voters have little knowledge of politics and what the parties stand for. They know that
Conservatives are for businesmen and the better off
Labour is for the workers
UKIP are against being in the EU
Greens are against damaging the environment
But what do they think the Liberals stand for?
See Obama 2008.
"Romania has topped a league table of EU fraud investigations, it emerged last night.
One in four investigations completed by the European Union’s fraud watchdog related to the Eastern European country.
The top four countries on the list were all from Eastern Europe. Behind Romania came Hungary, Bulgaria and the Czech Republic, followed by Italy. The UK was bottom of the list.
OLAF, the fraud watchdog, called on the EU to try and recover more than 900million euros (£650million) of taxpayers’ money lost from its budget to suspected fraud last year. That is more than double the previous year’s amount."
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3109215/
This cannot occur without collusion by the relevant country and also massive failures by EU staff - or even bribery.
- Individual freedom (free from government interference)
- Free markets (free from government intervention)
- Free trade (between all countries not just within the EU) and against protectionism
- Free education (up to age 18)
- Free health treatment (at the point of delivery)
- Welfare for those unable to look after themselves
- Health and welfare paid for by a contributory system which qualifies you (a la Beveridge)
- A small state so as to let people run their own lives