Mr Meeks is a fine writer, but this is one of the worst sentences - in so many ways - that I have ever seen on PB
"The number of undocumented migrants crossing the English Channel does not begin to fill the gaps left by all those people who needlessly died with Covid-19 owing to the government’s negligence"
Tasteless, toneless, valueless, pointless.
He's right though, isn't he?
You completely miss the point. Completely. It isn;t about numbers.
Why do you think there is so much concern about migrant boats, and yet when we offer 3m HK chinese pathways to passports nobody bats an eyelid?
Here's why.
Brexiteers see Britain as the Real Madrid and Manchester United of immigration rolled into one.
They think we have our pick. We can choose exactly who we want to play for our team, when we want them to play and the size of the squad we want from overseas players. The demand is enormous. Patently.
Brexitters are tired of what they see as third division players with no skills who are also not team players and cost a fortune to maintain.
And I'll tell you what. Labour will never form a government again until they grasp this simple truth
If 3mn HK Chinese turn up I am certain they will face plenty of hostility, including from the tabloid press. The fact is, neither you nor I know anything about the people crossing the channel right now. Some of them might have been doctors or engineers in their own country. To simply assert that they have no skills and nothing to contribute is ridiculous. And even if some of them are a burden, we have obligations to host refugees. It's not as if we don't already have plenty of useless people here already - indeed many of them are running the country.
Who cares? they are not coming on our terms. They are coming on their terms. They are coming on the people traffickers terms.
Jurgen Klopp does not take 20 random footballers who want to play for Liverpool on the off chance there might be a Messi in there.
They are watched. They are scouted. They are tapped up. They are selected. They sign contracts that demand levels of commitment and conduct.
THAT is what many of the voters of England want for their immigration system. Crucially Farage understands that. Very few others do.
In a world where refugees exist you can't simply take in who you want, unless you think refugees are someone else's problem (many people in this country thought that in the 1930s, I think they were wrong then and now). This is where your football team analogy falls down.
These people are not refugees. Its as if Paris St Germain took on a huge contingent of random footballers and we decided to pay a fortune for a contingent of them. Untested. Untrialled. Unsifted. With no strings.
Its not good enough and it won;t be accepted as good enough in the future, I don;t think.
I think that's a little harsh. If you look at the nationalities of the myriad flow of asylum seekers, they likely mostly come from places with civil wars or other insurrection.
That's why (apart from Ms Merkel's foolish invitation) there was the massive flood of them seven or eight years ago: the revolutions, and civil wars, and subsequent repression in North Africa and the Middle East created a flood of people leaving.
Go back a decade before, and there were a lot of Afghanis.
Many are (and it's pretty obvious when you see the news reports) economic migrants from sub-saharan Africa. They smile and take selfies on their mobiles as soon as Border Force pick them up, for obvious reasons.
Many claim to be Iranian (suffering neither civil war nor oppression) but able to afford flights into Serbia and then to pay traffickers to get them into the UK.
Of course there are a significant number of sub-Saharan economic migrants. And of course they shouldn't be allowed to break the rules and benefit from it. We, as a country, need to quickly process and return those who are not genuine. (And it is of no credit to us that we make it a drawn out process that benefits no-one.)
But at the same time, there is a massive correlation between numbers of asylum seekers arriving in the UK and the level of "trouble" in the world. In the last 20 years, the number arriving has varied from perhaps 5,000 to as many as 100,000
There's also a correlation with the huge population growth and lack of opportunities in Africa. I expect this will get worse too due to increasing geopolitical tension and climate change.
So, I don't think the current framework is fit for purpose. The bigger problem of stabilising, fixing and developing those countries is an even harder one.
I also think this is displacement activity.
In the last year for which numbers were available (2018), the UK accepted 5,833 asylum seekers, and another 600 or so were granted relief to stay for other reasons.
Yes, we need to do a better job of deporting economic migrants, rather than have people hanging around for years (and potentially disappearing into the black market) at the taxpayers expense.
But 5,833 accepted asylum seekers a year is a trivially small number.
by the end of 2018 there were 126,720 refugees, 45,244 pending asylum cases
It suggests there is somewhat of a tale not told somewhere here
No, that matches. As each case including appeals often takes a few years, one would expect that sort of number to be in the pipeline at any one time.
If you quote a figure of circa 6k then its realised for every accepted refugee there are 30 more waiting to find out I think most people would regard your 6k figure as deliberately downplaying the issue was the point I meant especially when I believe it was you pointing out we end up accepting 90% in any case
55% are accepted according to government figures, so maybe 11 000 applications per year, 4 years typical duration makes for 45 000 cases at any one time.
As so many are successful on appeal, one has to doubt the quality of the initial judgements.
Well see you figures dont match, the government is saying half your figure of 11k accepted in 2018
The source I quoted said 126k refugees and 45k asylum cases. I have no idea where you get your 11k from as you don't quote a source whereas robert did for the 5833 and I did for the 45k pending. Leaves me wondering what the 126k are doing are they pending to be pending?
Regardless there seems a lot of manipulation of figures somewhere in here
I don't think there's much manipulation - I think there's an overly complex system that has been starved of funds, plus an ongoing issue with people who "disappear" into the black market.
Better triaging - plus following the Swiss and Norwegian examples for illegal immigrants more generally - would help solve the problem fairly easily.
Maybe manipulation is the wrong word,
Shall we say instead that the people who think its not an issue use the 5833 figure to make it seem a trivial problem and why are you bothering about it when the numbers are small.
Those more concerned about it use the 126+45k pending figure to make the problem appear potentially huger that it is.
It doesn't alter the fact that actual figures are being used in a manipulative way for political ends depending on what someone wants you to think and it would be so much better if we could have a discussion about proper figures where both sides use the same count method
My point is that fixating on the boats is like fixating on the wall, it's displacement activity.
You don't solve the problem by making it a little bit harder to cross the Channel or the Rio Grande, because that adds the square root of bugger all to the cost of any kind of migrant.
You solve it by quickly processing the people who arrive so there isn't a backlog of 100,000 people (or whatever the number is), and there isn't ample opportunity for people to disappear into the black market.
I would agree that boats are the least of the issues, however being tough in the way you suggest would not be popular in some segments of society and they would write strongly worded comments on twitter
Yet the Government are basically proposing to do that, do you honestly think the Government gives a toss what people like me think? Of course not.
You're always blaming somebody else, when the Government is just utterly incompetent, that's the truth.
With you the problem is always somewhere else.
The government aren't forcing people into boats or to come on planes and destroy their documents. How they deal with them afterwards yes is down to the government and sadly they have paid far too much attention to the left rather than doing what they should and instant deporting them and for everyone they do taking a refugee from the camp in return. Wouldn't change the number of refugees it would however advantage those that played fair and square by the rules rather than queue jumped.
As all sides accepted at the time that IndyRef1 was a once in a generation issue it would seem to me that before even thinking about Ref2 the opinions of the rest of the UK should be considered. I don't see why one side in this four nations issue should be permitted to trump all the other considerations now that the Scots have decisively voted to stay with the UK.
The question of whether we in England (or Wales or NI) want to be independent of Scotland is a relevant consideration too. One unilateral chance for the Scots to require the rest of us to go independent of Scotland is enough for now.
Your arse, no-one said any rule about once in a genetration , it was never in any document or signed by any party. A few rhetorical mentions that it was a once in a generation chance does not maake it Law. Go stuff yourself, it has F all to do with rest of UK.
As all sides accepted at the time that IndyRef1 was a once in a generation issue it would seem to me that before even thinking about Ref2 the opinions of the rest of the UK should be considered. I don't see why one side in this four nations issue should be permitted to trump all the other considerations now that the Scots have decisively voted to stay with the UK.
The question of whether we in England (or Wales or NI) want to be independent of Scotland is a relevant consideration too. One unilateral chance for the Scots to require the rest of us to go independent of Scotland is enough for now.
Your arse, no-one said any rule about once in a genetration , it was never in any document or signed by any party. A few rhetorical mentions that it was a once in a generation chance does not maake it Law. Go stuff yourself, it has F all to do with rest of UK.
Mr Meeks is a fine writer, but this is one of the worst sentences - in so many ways - that I have ever seen on PB
"The number of undocumented migrants crossing the English Channel does not begin to fill the gaps left by all those people who needlessly died with Covid-19 owing to the government’s negligence"
Tasteless, toneless, valueless, pointless.
He's right though, isn't he?
You completely miss the point. Completely. It isn;t about numbers.
Why do you think there is so much concern about migrant boats, and yet when we offer 3m HK chinese pathways to passports nobody bats an eyelid?
Here's why.
Brexiteers see Britain as the Real Madrid and Manchester United of immigration rolled into one.
They think we have our pick. We can choose exactly who we want to play for our team, when we want them to play and the size of the squad we want from overseas players. The demand is enormous. Patently.
Brexitters are tired of what they see as third division players with no skills who are also not team players and cost a fortune to maintain.
And I'll tell you what. Labour will never form a government again until they grasp this simple truth
If 3mn HK Chinese turn up I am certain they will face plenty of hostility, including from the tabloid press. The fact is, neither you nor I know anything about the people crossing the channel right now. Some of them might have been doctors or engineers in their own country. To simply assert that they have no skills and nothing to contribute is ridiculous. And even if some of them are a burden, we have obligations to host refugees. It's not as if we don't already have plenty of useless people here already - indeed many of them are running the country.
Who cares? they are not coming on our terms. They are coming on their terms. They are coming on the people traffickers terms.
Jurgen Klopp does not take 20 random footballers who want to play for Liverpool on the off chance there might be a Messi in there.
They are watched. They are scouted. They are tapped up. They are selected. They sign contracts that demand levels of commitment and conduct.
THAT is what many of the voters of England want for their immigration system. Crucially Farage understands that. Very few others do.
In a world where refugees exist you can't simply take in who you want, unless you think refugees are someone else's problem (many people in this country thought that in the 1930s, I think they were wrong then and now). This is where your football team analogy falls down.
These people are not refugees. Its as if Paris St Germain took on a huge contingent of random footballers and we decided to pay a fortune for a contingent of them. Untested. Untrialled. Unsifted. With no strings.
Its not good enough and it won;t be accepted as good enough in the future, I don;t think.
I think that's a little harsh. If you look at the nationalities of the myriad flow of asylum seekers, they likely mostly come from places with civil wars or other insurrection.
That's why (apart from Ms Merkel's foolish invitation) there was the massive flood of them seven or eight years ago: the revolutions, and civil wars, and subsequent repression in North Africa and the Middle East created a flood of people leaving.
Go back a decade before, and there were a lot of Afghanis.
Many are (and it's pretty obvious when you see the news reports) economic migrants from sub-saharan Africa. They smile and take selfies on their mobiles as soon as Border Force pick them up, for obvious reasons.
Many claim to be Iranian (suffering neither civil war nor oppression) but able to afford flights into Serbia and then to pay traffickers to get them into the UK.
Of course there are a significant number of sub-Saharan economic migrants. And of course they shouldn't be allowed to break the rules and benefit from it. We, as a country, need to quickly process and return those who are not genuine. (And it is of no credit to us that we make it a drawn out process that benefits no-one.)
But at the same time, there is a massive correlation between numbers of asylum seekers arriving in the UK and the level of "trouble" in the world. In the last 20 years, the number arriving has varied from perhaps 5,000 to as many as 100,000
There's also a correlation with the huge population growth and lack of opportunities in Africa. I expect this will get worse too due to increasing geopolitical tension and climate change.
So, I don't think the current framework is fit for purpose. The bigger problem of stabilising, fixing and developing those countries is an even harder one.
I also think this is displacement activity.
In the last year for which numbers were available (2018), the UK accepted 5,833 asylum seekers, and another 600 or so were granted relief to stay for other reasons.
Yes, we need to do a better job of deporting economic migrants, rather than have people hanging around for years (and potentially disappearing into the black market) at the taxpayers expense.
But 5,833 accepted asylum seekers a year is a trivially small number.
by the end of 2018 there were 126,720 refugees, 45,244 pending asylum cases
It suggests there is somewhat of a tale not told somewhere here
No, that matches. As each case including appeals often takes a few years, one would expect that sort of number to be in the pipeline at any one time.
If you quote a figure of circa 6k then its realised for every accepted refugee there are 30 more waiting to find out I think most people would regard your 6k figure as deliberately downplaying the issue was the point I meant especially when I believe it was you pointing out we end up accepting 90% in any case
55% are accepted according to government figures, so maybe 11 000 applications per year, 4 years typical duration makes for 45 000 cases at any one time.
As so many are successful on appeal, one has to doubt the quality of the initial judgements.
Well see you figures dont match, the government is saying half your figure of 11k accepted in 2018
The source I quoted said 126k refugees and 45k asylum cases. I have no idea where you get your 11k from as you don't quote a source whereas robert did for the 5833 and I did for the 45k pending. Leaves me wondering what the 126k are doing are they pending to be pending?
Regardless there seems a lot of manipulation of figures somewhere in here
I don't think there's much manipulation - I think there's an overly complex system that has been starved of funds, plus an ongoing issue with people who "disappear" into the black market.
Better triaging - plus following the Swiss and Norwegian examples for illegal immigrants more generally - would help solve the problem fairly easily.
Maybe manipulation is the wrong word,
Shall we say instead that the people who think its not an issue use the 5833 figure to make it seem a trivial problem and why are you bothering about it when the numbers are small.
Those more concerned about it use the 126+45k pending figure to make the problem appear potentially huger that it is.
It doesn't alter the fact that actual figures are being used in a manipulative way for political ends depending on what someone wants you to think and it would be so much better if we could have a discussion about proper figures where both sides use the same count method
My point is that fixating on the boats is like fixating on the wall, it's displacement activity.
You don't solve the problem by making it a little bit harder to cross the Channel or the Rio Grande, because that adds the square root of bugger all to the cost of any kind of migrant.
You solve it by quickly processing the people who arrive so there isn't a backlog of 100,000 people (or whatever the number is), and there isn't ample opportunity for people to disappear into the black market.
I would agree that boats are the least of the issues, however being tough in the way you suggest would not be popular in some segments of society and they would write strongly worded comments on twitter
When I did a video on solving illegal immigration, I got an equal amount of hatred from both Left and Right. I get the feeling that most people don't want a system that actually works.
Had not to be impressed by Michelle Obama's speech to the virtual DNC. Very strong words - to what extent they would impress or change any Trump voter is debatable but that isn't the point of the DNC or indeed any party conference.
Gatherings like that speak to the faithful or the supportive - the Democrats probably know IF they get their vote out they will win and it was their failure to do so last time which cost them so dearly.
Last time, 37% of the voters were registered Democrats (they broke 89-9 for Clinton) and 33% were registered Republican (90-7 for Trump) but 31% were Independent and crucially they broke 47-42 for Trump.
Interestingly, the ABC News/Washington Post poll last night which put Biden ahead 54-44 sampled 31% Democrats, 26% Republicans and 37% Independents.
The Economist/YouGov sample is 42% Democrat, 33% Independent and 25% Republican. As I don't have access to the Rasmussen or Trafalgar crosstabs, I don't know how their sampling methodology operates.
As all sides accepted at the time that IndyRef1 was a once in a generation issue it would seem to me that before even thinking about Ref2 the opinions of the rest of the UK should be considered. I don't see why one side in this four nations issue should be permitted to trump all the other considerations now that the Scots have decisively voted to stay with the UK.
The question of whether we in England (or Wales or NI) want to be independent of Scotland is a relevant consideration too. One unilateral chance for the Scots to require the rest of us to go independent of Scotland is enough for now.
Your arse, no-one said any rule about once in a genetration , it was never in any document or signed by any party. A few rhetorical mentions that it was a once in a generation chance does not maake it Law. Go stuff yourself, it has F all to do with rest of UK.
So Alastair Meeks has a problem with the public having a problem with people crossing the channel to enter Britain illegally? People who are not coming straight from a warzone or death camps but France.
As for them being desperate - some way well be. Many others only seem to be desperate enough to travel over when the weather is relatively good. I'm not sure that the public are on the whole appalled by this. I suspect most people are WORRIED about our borders not being secure and a feeling that if we can't control this Britain will fall apart. And they are right.
Why is this so hard to accept? It just feels like another case of sour grapes because the public refuse to focus on the things you want them to.
Mr Meeks is a fine writer, but this is one of the worst sentences - in so many ways - that I have ever seen on PB
"The number of undocumented migrants crossing the English Channel does not begin to fill the gaps left by all those people who needlessly died with Covid-19 owing to the government’s negligence"
Tasteless, toneless, valueless, pointless.
He's right though, isn't he?
You completely miss the point. Completely. It isn;t about numbers.
Why do you think there is so much concern about migrant boats, and yet when we offer 3m HK chinese pathways to passports nobody bats an eyelid?
Here's why.
Brexiteers see Britain as the Real Madrid and Manchester United of immigration rolled into one.
They think we have our pick. We can choose exactly who we want to play for our team, when we want them to play and the size of the squad we want from overseas players. The demand is enormous. Patently.
Brexitters are tired of what they see as third division players with no skills who are also not team players and cost a fortune to maintain.
And I'll tell you what. Labour will never form a government again until they grasp this simple truth
If 3mn HK Chinese turn up I am certain they will face plenty of hostility, including from the tabloid press. The fact is, neither you nor I know anything about the people crossing the channel right now. Some of them might have been doctors or engineers in their own country. To simply assert that they have no skills and nothing to contribute is ridiculous. And even if some of them are a burden, we have obligations to host refugees. It's not as if we don't already have plenty of useless people here already - indeed many of them are running the country.
Who cares? they are not coming on our terms. They are coming on their terms. They are coming on the people traffickers terms.
Jurgen Klopp does not take 20 random footballers who want to play for Liverpool on the off chance there might be a Messi in there.
They are watched. They are scouted. They are tapped up. They are selected. They sign contracts that demand levels of commitment and conduct.
THAT is what many of the voters of England want for their immigration system. Crucially Farage understands that. Very few others do.
In a world where refugees exist you can't simply take in who you want, unless you think refugees are someone else's problem (many people in this country thought that in the 1930s, I think they were wrong then and now). This is where your football team analogy falls down.
These people are not refugees. Its as if Paris St Germain took on a huge contingent of random footballers and we decided to pay a fortune for a contingent of them. Untested. Untrialled. Unsifted. With no strings.
Its not good enough and it won;t be accepted as good enough in the future, I don;t think.
I think that's a little harsh. If you look at the nationalities of the myriad flow of asylum seekers, they likely mostly come from places with civil wars or other insurrection.
That's why (apart from Ms Merkel's foolish invitation) there was the massive flood of them seven or eight years ago: the revolutions, and civil wars, and subsequent repression in North Africa and the Middle East created a flood of people leaving.
Go back a decade before, and there were a lot of Afghanis.
Many are (and it's pretty obvious when you see the news reports) economic migrants from sub-saharan Africa. They smile and take selfies on their mobiles as soon as Border Force pick them up, for obvious reasons.
Many claim to be Iranian (suffering neither civil war nor oppression) but able to afford flights into Serbia and then to pay traffickers to get them into the UK.
Of course there are a significant number of sub-Saharan economic migrants. And of course they shouldn't be allowed to break the rules and benefit from it. We, as a country, need to quickly process and return those who are not genuine. (And it is of no credit to us that we make it a drawn out process that benefits no-one.)
But at the same time, there is a massive correlation between numbers of asylum seekers arriving in the UK and the level of "trouble" in the world. In the last 20 years, the number arriving has varied from perhaps 5,000 to as many as 100,000
There's also a correlation with the huge population growth and lack of opportunities in Africa. I expect this will get worse too due to increasing geopolitical tension and climate change.
So, I don't think the current framework is fit for purpose. The bigger problem of stabilising, fixing and developing those countries is an even harder one.
I also think this is displacement activity.
In the last year for which numbers were available (2018), the UK accepted 5,833 asylum seekers, and another 600 or so were granted relief to stay for other reasons.
Yes, we need to do a better job of deporting economic migrants, rather than have people hanging around for years (and potentially disappearing into the black market) at the taxpayers expense.
But 5,833 accepted asylum seekers a year is a trivially small number.
by the end of 2018 there were 126,720 refugees, 45,244 pending asylum cases
It suggests there is somewhat of a tale not told somewhere here
No, that matches. As each case including appeals often takes a few years, one would expect that sort of number to be in the pipeline at any one time.
If you quote a figure of circa 6k then its realised for every accepted refugee there are 30 more waiting to find out I think most people would regard your 6k figure as deliberately downplaying the issue was the point I meant especially when I believe it was you pointing out we end up accepting 90% in any case
55% are accepted according to government figures, so maybe 11 000 applications per year, 4 years typical duration makes for 45 000 cases at any one time.
As so many are successful on appeal, one has to doubt the quality of the initial judgements.
Well see you figures dont match, the government is saying half your figure of 11k accepted in 2018
The source I quoted said 126k refugees and 45k asylum cases. I have no idea where you get your 11k from as you don't quote a source whereas robert did for the 5833 and I did for the 45k pending. Leaves me wondering what the 126k are doing are they pending to be pending?
Regardless there seems a lot of manipulation of figures somewhere in here
I don't think there's much manipulation - I think there's an overly complex system that has been starved of funds, plus an ongoing issue with people who "disappear" into the black market.
Better triaging - plus following the Swiss and Norwegian examples for illegal immigrants more generally - would help solve the problem fairly easily.
Maybe manipulation is the wrong word,
Shall we say instead that the people who think its not an issue use the 5833 figure to make it seem a trivial problem and why are you bothering about it when the numbers are small.
Those more concerned about it use the 126+45k pending figure to make the problem appear potentially huger that it is.
It doesn't alter the fact that actual figures are being used in a manipulative way for political ends depending on what someone wants you to think and it would be so much better if we could have a discussion about proper figures where both sides use the same count method
My point is that fixating on the boats is like fixating on the wall, it's displacement activity.
You don't solve the problem by making it a little bit harder to cross the Channel or the Rio Grande, because that adds the square root of bugger all to the cost of any kind of migrant.
You solve it by quickly processing the people who arrive so there isn't a backlog of 100,000 people (or whatever the number is), and there isn't ample opportunity for people to disappear into the black market.
I would agree that boats are the least of the issues, however being tough in the way you suggest would not be popular in some segments of society and they would write strongly worded comments on twitter
When I did a video on solving illegal immigration, I got an equal amount of hatred from both Left and Right. I get the feeling that most people don't want a system that actually works.
(Read the comments below if you want to appreciate just how intelligent and well balanced political betting commenters are)
I think you are probably right and now things have got so tribal that mostly activists are more interested in pointing at the supposed wrong doing of the other side than they are actually finding a solution.
This is why I never bought into the whole its the oppositions duty to oppose line of thought. It is the oppositions duty to oppose where they genuinely think the other party is going down the wrong path. It is the oppositions duty to make suggestions where they think its on the whole a good idea but they can see flaws.
This is why we get tory party suggest a labour oppose. Labour get in basically suggest a with minor changes tory party opposes. It's why we never get shit fixed like social care.
The Whisky industry accuses UK Govt of being “asleep at the wheel” over Trump’s crippling tariffs and Hard Brexit’s still to hit. That’s what happens when you let Tory clowns like Liz Truss run your international trade.
Had not to be impressed by Michelle Obama's speech to the virtual DNC. Very strong words - to what extent they would impress or change any Trump voter is debatable but that isn't the point of the DNC or indeed any party conference.
Gatherings like that speak to the faithful or the supportive - the Democrats probably know IF they get their vote out they will win and it was their failure to do so last time which cost them so dearly.
Last time, 37% of the voters were registered Democrats (they broke 89-9 for Clinton) and 33% were registered Republican (90-7 for Trump) but 31% were Independent and crucially they broke 47-42 for Trump.
Interestingly, the ABC News/Washington Post poll last night which put Biden ahead 54-44 sampled 31% Democrats, 26% Republicans and 37% Independents.
The Economist/YouGov sample is 42% Democrat, 33% Independent and 25% Republican. As I don't have access to the Rasmussen or Trafalgar crosstabs, I don't know how their sampling methodology operates.
Make of that what you will.
Michelle Obama spoke well but wasn't much detail there all mainly generalities about taking the moral high ground and going to vote
Perhaps more than anything else currently I hope we can have a peaceful transition of power in Belarus (followed by the USA in November) without the incumbent resorting to trickery or violence to perpetuate his hold on power.
IF Moscow signals it will accept a transition (and those protesting can't be seen to be too pro-western or anti-Russian) Lukashenko will begin to run out of options.
I'm hoping the Opposition keeps its lines of communication open with Putin and can convince him they can provide a friendly, stable and peaceful Belarus with whom he can continue to do business and work.
Had not to be impressed by Michelle Obama's speech to the virtual DNC. Very strong words - to what extent they would impress or change any Trump voter is debatable but that isn't the point of the DNC or indeed any party conference.
Gatherings like that speak to the faithful or the supportive - the Democrats probably know IF they get their vote out they will win and it was their failure to do so last time which cost them so dearly.
Last time, 37% of the voters were registered Democrats (they broke 89-9 for Clinton) and 33% were registered Republican (90-7 for Trump) but 31% were Independent and crucially they broke 47-42 for Trump.
Interestingly, the ABC News/Washington Post poll last night which put Biden ahead 54-44 sampled 31% Democrats, 26% Republicans and 37% Independents.
The Economist/YouGov sample is 42% Democrat, 33% Independent and 25% Republican. As I don't have access to the Rasmussen or Trafalgar crosstabs, I don't know how their sampling methodology operates.
Make of that what you will.
I posted the numbers a while back, but the number of Registered Republicans has gone from 41-42% under Reagan and Bush Sr to 28% now, while the Democrats have dropped from 45% to 40%. Independents now outnumber Republicans for the first time.
Do not assume a Nationalist majority is inevitable.
I think it increasingly likely all Unionist parties will combine under 1 Unionist Alliance ticket led by Ruth Davidson, just standing one Unionist candidate at constituency level at Holyrood against the SNP, with the Unionist parties only standing separately against each other as Tories, Labour and LD on the Holyrood list.
Thus maximising the number of Unionist MSPs to stop a Nationalist SNP or SNP and Green majority
Lol. Weren't you promoting the idea of Swinson running for Holyrood and leading the Unionist fight back a few months ago? That's not quite as loonball as an alliance led by Baroness Line in The Sand spending most of her time in London in an effort to bring 'democracy' to the HoL (and incidentally pocket the £300 a day expenses).
Good to see it has got the Nats rattled, the one thing the SNP fear is a united Unionist Alliance at constituency level so they no longer get elected on less than 50% of the vote in most SNP seats. Ruth Davidson is also the one leader Sturgeon is still terrified of.
Swinson could be Scottish LD leader on the list, Davidson would lead the Unionist Alliance at constituency level
The Whisky industry accuses UK Govt of being “asleep at the wheel” over Trump’s crippling tariffs and Hard Brexit’s still to hit. That’s what happens when you let Tory clowns like Liz Truss run your international trade.
I thought we were going to be required to change the name to Whiskey as part of the upcoming US trade deal?
Perhaps more than anything else currently I hope we can have a peaceful transition of power in Belarus (followed by the USA in November) without the incumbent resorting to trickery or violence to perpetuate his hold on power.
IF Moscow signals it will accept a transition (and those protesting can't be seen to be too pro-western or anti-Russian) Lukashenko will begin to run out of options.
I'm hoping the Opposition keeps its lines of communication open with Putin and can convince him they can provide a friendly, stable and peaceful Belarus with whom he can continue to do business and work.
Yep. I get the impression that Putin is waiting to see which way the wind blows on this one. But too much EU or NATO involvement will be counter productive at this stage.
Do not assume a Nationalist majority is inevitable.
I think it increasingly likely all Unionist parties will combine under 1 Unionist Alliance ticket led by Ruth Davidson, just standing one Unionist candidate at constituency level at Holyrood against the SNP, with the Unionist parties only standing separately against each other as Tories, Labour and LD on the Holyrood list.
Thus maximising the number of Unionist MSPs to stop a Nationalist SNP or SNP and Green majority
Lol. Weren't you promoting the idea of Swinson running for Holyrood and leading the Unionist fight back a few months ago? That's not quite as loonball as an alliance led by Baroness Line in The Sand spending most of her time in London in an effort to bring 'democracy' to the HoL (and incidentally pocket the £300 a day expenses).
Those PB’ers who backed their life savings on HY’s firm assurances that Chuka will be our next PM after Boris might be starting to wonder precisely how this will come about?
If Boris won a majority again in 2024 and Labour elected say Long Bailey to replace Starmer and Umunna then became LD leader anything could happen.
Even if Starmer becomes PM he is unlikely to win a majority so you could end up with a Labour and LD coalition government and Umunna as Foreign Secretary and heir apparent
Michelle Obama spoke well but wasn't much detail there all mainly generalities about taking the moral high ground and going to vote
Michelle Obama isn't going to be part of the administration so it's not for her to provide the detail of what a Biden/Harris administration would do or look like.
Her task was to galvanise the Democratic faithful into getting out and working for and ultimately voting for Biden/Harris and not stay at home which did for Clinton/Kaine four years ago.
I think she did that very well and if it provokes another bitter and vitriolic tweet from Trump, so much the better.
The Democrat road to victory is through maximising their own support, getting more registered Republicans to switch and matching Trump among the Independents.
Let's not forget in the popular vote Clinton won 48-46 last time - Biden has to do better but not much better. Turning that 2-point,lead into a 5-7 point national advantage should flip enough states to take Biden/Harris past 270 EC votes.
The Whisky industry accuses UK Govt of being “asleep at the wheel” over Trump’s crippling tariffs and Hard Brexit’s still to hit. That’s what happens when you let Tory clowns like Liz Truss run your international trade.
I thought we were going to be required to change the name to Whiskey as part of the upcoming US trade deal?
To whatever the Japanese is. They're leading the new wave of Whisky in my view.
Also, when did the IFS become a defender of "equality"? I've noticed it more and more that they are pushing the "poor people matter the most" agenda in everything they do. It's a worthwhile goal but their remit isn't to bang on about equality, it's to try and see how the UK is performing economically and what the fiscal outlook is and what kind of multipliers government policy will have. The eat out scheme must have an absolutely massive economic multiplier, it's an extremely cheap scheme at £500m but it will generate huge economic benefits for the hospitality industry and save far more than that within the furlough scheme.
Honestly, it actually doesn't matter if poor people can't afford to eat out, they didn't before the virus and they probably won't afterwards. The sector depends on the middle classes going out and spending money on food, booze and tips. It's quite annoying that their insight was "yeah but poor people" and not what kind of multiplier it would have and how good or bad the scheme would be at getting the sector back on its feet. It's not a big deal for me because I have a team of analysts to do that for me, but our research will never see the light of day, where is the public going to learn this stuff from if the IFS is derelicting it's duty to report on the fiscal outlook.
The Whisky industry accuses UK Govt of being “asleep at the wheel” over Trump’s crippling tariffs and Hard Brexit’s still to hit. That’s what happens when you let Tory clowns like Liz Truss run your international trade.
At least it’s not as incompetent as the clown show currently on display at Holyrood.
Do not assume a Nationalist majority is inevitable.
I think it increasingly likely all Unionist parties will combine under 1 Unionist Alliance ticket led by Ruth Davidson, just standing one Unionist candidate at constituency level at Holyrood against the SNP, with the Unionist parties only standing separately against each other as Tories, Labour and LD on the Holyrood list.
Thus maximising the number of Unionist MSPs to stop a Nationalist SNP or SNP and Green majority
Lol. Weren't you promoting the idea of Swinson running for Holyrood and leading the Unionist fight back a few months ago? That's not quite as loonball as an alliance led by Baroness Line in The Sand spending most of her time in London in an effort to bring 'democracy' to the HoL (and incidentally pocket the £300 a day expenses).
Those PB’ers who backed their life savings on HY’s firm assurances that Chuka will be our next PM after Boris might be starting to wonder precisely how this will come about?
If Boris won a majority again in 2024 and Labour elected say Long Bailey to replace Starmer and Umunna then became LD leader anything could happen.
Even if Starmer becomes PM he is unlikely to win a majority so you could end up with a Labour and LD coalition government and Umunna as Foreign Secretary and heir apparent
You do go on fantasy trips losing credibility on the way
Many congratulations on your engagement by the way
The Whisky industry accuses UK Govt of being “asleep at the wheel” over Trump’s crippling tariffs and Hard Brexit’s still to hit. That’s what happens when you let Tory clowns like Liz Truss run your international trade.
I thought we were going to be required to change the name to Whiskey as part of the upcoming US trade deal?
To whatever the Japanese is. They're leading the new wave of Whisky in my view.
Some of the best available are Japanese. Top drawer.
Do not assume a Nationalist majority is inevitable.
I think it increasingly likely all Unionist parties will combine under 1 Unionist Alliance ticket led by Ruth Davidson, just standing one Unionist candidate at constituency level at Holyrood against the SNP, with the Unionist parties only standing separately against each other as Tories, Labour and LD on the Holyrood list.
Thus maximising the number of Unionist MSPs to stop a Nationalist SNP or SNP and Green majority
Lol. Weren't you promoting the idea of Swinson running for Holyrood and leading the Unionist fight back a few months ago? That's not quite as loonball as an alliance led by Baroness Line in The Sand spending most of her time in London in an effort to bring 'democracy' to the HoL (and incidentally pocket the £300 a day expenses).
Those PB’ers who backed their life savings on HY’s firm assurances that Chuka will be our next PM after Boris might be starting to wonder precisely how this will come about?
If Boris won a majority again in 2024 and Labour elected say Long Bailey to replace Starmer and Umunna then became LD leader anything could happen.
Even if Starmer becomes PM he is unlikely to win a majority so you could end up with a Labour and LD coalition government and Umunna as Foreign Secretary and heir apparent
Is Chuka even interested in a political career now ? Thought that ship had sailed.
Do not assume a Nationalist majority is inevitable.
I think it increasingly likely all Unionist parties will combine under 1 Unionist Alliance ticket led by Ruth Davidson, just standing one Unionist candidate at constituency level at Holyrood against the SNP, with the Unionist parties only standing separately against each other as Tories, Labour and LD on the Holyrood list.
Thus maximising the number of Unionist MSPs to stop a Nationalist SNP or SNP and Green majority
Lol. Weren't you promoting the idea of Swinson running for Holyrood and leading the Unionist fight back a few months ago? That's not quite as loonball as an alliance led by Baroness Line in The Sand spending most of her time in London in an effort to bring 'democracy' to the HoL (and incidentally pocket the £300 a day expenses).
Those PB’ers who backed their life savings on HY’s firm assurances that Chuka will be our next PM after Boris might be starting to wonder precisely how this will come about?
If Boris won a majority again in 2024 and Labour elected say Long Bailey to replace Starmer and Umunna then became LD leader anything could happen.
Even if Starmer becomes PM he is unlikely to win a majority so you could end up with a Labour and LD coalition government and Umunna as Foreign Secretary and heir apparent
You do go on fantasy trips losing credibility on the way
Many congratulations on your engagement by the way
We can only hope that his impending marriage will be built on firmer foundations than his wildly imaginative political predications.
Do not assume a Nationalist majority is inevitable.
I think it increasingly likely all Unionist parties will combine under 1 Unionist Alliance ticket led by Ruth Davidson, just standing one Unionist candidate at constituency level at Holyrood against the SNP, with the Unionist parties only standing separately against each other as Tories, Labour and LD on the Holyrood list.
Thus maximising the number of Unionist MSPs to stop a Nationalist SNP or SNP and Green majority
Lol. Weren't you promoting the idea of Swinson running for Holyrood and leading the Unionist fight back a few months ago? That's not quite as loonball as an alliance led by Baroness Line in The Sand spending most of her time in London in an effort to bring 'democracy' to the HoL (and incidentally pocket the £300 a day expenses).
Those PB’ers who backed their life savings on HY’s firm assurances that Chuka will be our next PM after Boris might be starting to wonder precisely how this will come about?
If Boris won a majority again in 2024 and Labour elected say Long Bailey to replace Starmer and Umunna then became LD leader anything could happen.
Even if Starmer becomes PM he is unlikely to win a majority so you could end up with a Labour and LD coalition government and Umunna as Foreign Secretary and heir apparent
You do go on fantasy trips losing credibility on the way
Many congratulations on your engagement by the way
Perhaps more than anything else currently I hope we can have a peaceful transition of power in Belarus (followed by the USA in November) without the incumbent resorting to trickery or violence to perpetuate his hold on power.
IF Moscow signals it will accept a transition (and those protesting can't be seen to be too pro-western or anti-Russian) Lukashenko will begin to run out of options.
I'm hoping the Opposition keeps its lines of communication open with Putin and can convince him they can provide a friendly, stable and peaceful Belarus with whom he can continue to do business and work.
We see a,lot on the news about what is happening in Minsk, what about the rest of the country. Is there an upsurge there too ?
Do not assume a Nationalist majority is inevitable.
I think it increasingly likely all Unionist parties will combine under 1 Unionist Alliance ticket led by Ruth Davidson, just standing one Unionist candidate at constituency level at Holyrood against the SNP, with the Unionist parties only standing separately against each other as Tories, Labour and LD on the Holyrood list.
Thus maximising the number of Unionist MSPs to stop a Nationalist SNP or SNP and Green majority
Lol. Weren't you promoting the idea of Swinson running for Holyrood and leading the Unionist fight back a few months ago? That's not quite as loonball as an alliance led by Baroness Line in The Sand spending most of her time in London in an effort to bring 'democracy' to the HoL (and incidentally pocket the £300 a day expenses).
Those PB’ers who backed their life savings on HY’s firm assurances that Chuka will be our next PM after Boris might be starting to wonder precisely how this will come about?
If Boris won a majority again in 2024 and Labour elected say Long Bailey to replace Starmer and Umunna then became LD leader anything could happen.
Even if Starmer becomes PM he is unlikely to win a majority so you could end up with a Labour and LD coalition government and Umunna as Foreign Secretary and heir apparent
Is Chuka even interested in a political career now ? Thought that ship had sailed.
Cities of London and Westminster is now only 14th on the Liberal Democrats target list, so certainly winnable in 2024
Do not assume a Nationalist majority is inevitable.
I think it increasingly likely all Unionist parties will combine under 1 Unionist Alliance ticket led by Ruth Davidson, just standing one Unionist candidate at constituency level at Holyrood against the SNP, with the Unionist parties only standing separately against each other as Tories, Labour and LD on the Holyrood list.
Thus maximising the number of Unionist MSPs to stop a Nationalist SNP or SNP and Green majority
Lol. Weren't you promoting the idea of Swinson running for Holyrood and leading the Unionist fight back a few months ago? That's not quite as loonball as an alliance led by Baroness Line in The Sand spending most of her time in London in an effort to bring 'democracy' to the HoL (and incidentally pocket the £300 a day expenses).
Those PB’ers who backed their life savings on HY’s firm assurances that Chuka will be our next PM after Boris might be starting to wonder precisely how this will come about?
If Boris won a majority again in 2024 and Labour elected say Long Bailey to replace Starmer and Umunna then became LD leader anything could happen.
Even if Starmer becomes PM he is unlikely to win a majority so you could end up with a Labour and LD coalition government and Umunna as Foreign Secretary and heir apparent
You do go on fantasy trips losing credibility on the way
Many congratulations on your engagement by the way
Thanks
Yes, good for you. Hope you’ll both be very happy.
Had not to be impressed by Michelle Obama's speech to the virtual DNC. Very strong words - to what extent they would impress or change any Trump voter is debatable but that isn't the point of the DNC or indeed any party conference.
Gatherings like that speak to the faithful or the supportive - the Democrats probably know IF they get their vote out they will win and it was their failure to do so last time which cost them so dearly.
Last time, 37% of the voters were registered Democrats (they broke 89-9 for Clinton) and 33% were registered Republican (90-7 for Trump) but 31% were Independent and crucially they broke 47-42 for Trump.
Interestingly, the ABC News/Washington Post poll last night which put Biden ahead 54-44 sampled 31% Democrats, 26% Republicans and 37% Independents.
The Economist/YouGov sample is 42% Democrat, 33% Independent and 25% Republican. As I don't have access to the Rasmussen or Trafalgar crosstabs, I don't know how their sampling methodology operates.
Make of that what you will.
When looking at the Titania Mcgrath Twitter ban, I noticed right wing Twitter is up in arms that she mentioned child cages, but apparently Obama created the child cages. Not sure if it'll have any cut through, these 'zingers' normally don't.
Oldham in Greater Manchester is 48 hours away from potentially being ordered into a “catastrophic” and “premature” local lockdown, its council leader has warned.
Michelle Obama spoke well but wasn't much detail there all mainly generalities about taking the moral high ground and going to vote
Michelle Obama isn't going to be part of the administration so it's not for her to provide the detail of what a Biden/Harris administration would do or look like.
Her task was to galvanise the Democratic faithful into getting out and working for and ultimately voting for Biden/Harris and not stay at home which did for Clinton/Kaine four years ago.
I think she did that very well and if it provokes another bitter and vitriolic tweet from Trump, so much the better.
The Democrat road to victory is through maximising their own support, getting more registered Republicans to switch and matching Trump among the Independents.
Let's not forget in the popular vote Clinton won 48-46 last time - Biden has to do better but not much better. Turning that 2-point,lead into a 5-7 point national advantage should flip enough states to take Biden/Harris past 270 EC votes.
Personally I thought she was pretty awful. I'm not a US citizen, but I'd imagine if I were that my allegiances would be on the right of the Democratic party, or on the very non-religious fringe of the Republicans. An obvious floating voter if I was there.
Joe Biden - directed by 'faith' - I know it works in the US, but total turn-off for me.
Trump is awful, but in my view he's miles ahead of this Democratic shambles.
Do not assume a Nationalist majority is inevitable.
I think it increasingly likely all Unionist parties will combine under 1 Unionist Alliance ticket led by Ruth Davidson, just standing one Unionist candidate at constituency level at Holyrood against the SNP, with the Unionist parties only standing separately against each other as Tories, Labour and LD on the Holyrood list.
Thus maximising the number of Unionist MSPs to stop a Nationalist SNP or SNP and Green majority
Lol. Weren't you promoting the idea of Swinson running for Holyrood and leading the Unionist fight back a few months ago? That's not quite as loonball as an alliance led by Baroness Line in The Sand spending most of her time in London in an effort to bring 'democracy' to the HoL (and incidentally pocket the £300 a day expenses).
Those PB’ers who backed their life savings on HY’s firm assurances that Chuka will be our next PM after Boris might be starting to wonder precisely how this will come about?
If Boris won a majority again in 2024 and Labour elected say Long Bailey to replace Starmer and Umunna then became LD leader anything could happen.
Even if Starmer becomes PM he is unlikely to win a majority so you could end up with a Labour and LD coalition government and Umunna as Foreign Secretary and heir apparent
You do go on fantasy trips losing credibility on the way
Many congratulations on your engagement by the way
Thanks
Yes, good for you. Hope you’ll both be very happy.
Had not to be impressed by Michelle Obama's speech to the virtual DNC. Very strong words - to what extent they would impress or change any Trump voter is debatable but that isn't the point of the DNC or indeed any party conference.
Gatherings like that speak to the faithful or the supportive - the Democrats probably know IF they get their vote out they will win and it was their failure to do so last time which cost them so dearly.
Last time, 37% of the voters were registered Democrats (they broke 89-9 for Clinton) and 33% were registered Republican (90-7 for Trump) but 31% were Independent and crucially they broke 47-42 for Trump.
Interestingly, the ABC News/Washington Post poll last night which put Biden ahead 54-44 sampled 31% Democrats, 26% Republicans and 37% Independents.
The Economist/YouGov sample is 42% Democrat, 33% Independent and 25% Republican. As I don't have access to the Rasmussen or Trafalgar crosstabs, I don't know how their sampling methodology operates.
Make of that what you will.
When looking at the Titania Mcgrath Twitter ban, I noticed right wing Twitter is up in arms that she mentioned cild cages, but apparently Obama created the child cages. Not sure if it'll have any cut through, these 'zingers' normally don't.
Is that true though ? It’s hard to know what to believe on social media.
Mr Meeks is a fine writer, but this is one of the worst sentences - in so many ways - that I have ever seen on PB
"The number of undocumented migrants crossing the English Channel does not begin to fill the gaps left by all those people who needlessly died with Covid-19 owing to the government’s negligence"
Tasteless, toneless, valueless, pointless.
He's right though, isn't he?
You completely miss the point. Completely. It isn;t about numbers.
Why do you think there is so much concern about migrant boats, and yet when we offer 3m HK chinese pathways to passports nobody bats an eyelid?
Here's why.
Brexiteers see Britain as the Real Madrid and Manchester United of immigration rolled into one.
They think we have our pick. We can choose exactly who we want to play for our team, when we want them to play and the size of the squad we want from overseas players. The demand is enormous. Patently.
Brexitters are tired of what they see as third division players with no skills who are also not team players and cost a fortune to maintain.
And I'll tell you what. Labour will never form a government again until they grasp this simple truth
If 3mn HK Chinese turn up I am certain they will face plenty of hostility, including from the tabloid press. The fact is, neither you nor I know anything about the people crossing the channel right now. Some of them might have been doctors or engineers in their own country. To simply assert that they have no skills and nothing to contribute is ridiculous. And even if some of them are a burden, we have obligations to host refugees. It's not as if we don't already have plenty of useless people here already - indeed many of them are running the country.
Who cares? they are not coming on our terms. They are coming on their terms. They are coming on the people traffickers terms.
Jurgen Klopp does not take 20 random footballers who want to play for Liverpool on the off chance there might be a Messi in there.
They are watched. They are scouted. They are tapped up. They are selected. They sign contracts that demand levels of commitment and conduct.
THAT is what many of the voters of England want for their immigration system. Crucially Farage understands that. Very few others do.
In a world where refugees exist you can't simply take in who you want, unless you think refugees are someone else's problem (many people in this country thought that in the 1930s, I think they were wrong then and now). This is where your football team analogy falls down.
These people are not refugees. Its as if Paris St Germain took on a huge contingent of random footballers and we decided to pay a fortune for a contingent of them. Untested. Untrialled. Unsifted. With no strings.
Its not good enough and it won;t be accepted as good enough in the future, I don;t think.
I think that's a little harsh. If you look at the nationalities of the myriad flow of asylum seekers, they likely mostly come from places with civil wars or other insurrection.
That's why (apart from Ms Merkel's foolish invitation) there was the massive flood of them seven or eight years ago: the revolutions, and civil wars, and subsequent repression in North Africa and the Middle East created a flood of people leaving.
Go back a decade before, and there were a lot of Afghanis.
Many are (and it's pretty obvious when you see the news reports) economic migrants from sub-saharan Africa. They smile and take selfies on their mobiles as soon as Border Force pick them up, for obvious reasons.
Many claim to be Iranian (suffering neither civil war nor oppression) but able to afford flights into Serbia and then to pay traffickers to get them into the UK.
Of course there are a significant number of sub-Saharan economic migrants. And of course they shouldn't be allowed to break the rules and benefit from it. We, as a country, need to quickly process and return those who are not genuine. (And it is of no credit to us that we make it a drawn out process that benefits no-one.)
But at the same time, there is a massive correlation between numbers of asylum seekers arriving in the UK and the level of "trouble" in the world. In the last 20 years, the number arriving has varied from perhaps 5,000 to as many as 100,000
There's also a correlation with the huge population growth and lack of opportunities in Africa. I expect this will get worse too due to increasing geopolitical tension and climate change.
So, I don't think the current framework is fit for purpose. The bigger problem of stabilising, fixing and developing those countries is an even harder one.
I also think this is displacement activity.
In the last year for which numbers were available (2018), the UK accepted 5,833 asylum seekers, and another 600 or so were granted relief to stay for other reasons.
Yes, we need to do a better job of deporting economic migrants, rather than have people hanging around for years (and potentially disappearing into the black market) at the taxpayers expense.
But 5,833 accepted asylum seekers a year is a trivially small number.
by the end of 2018 there were 126,720 refugees, 45,244 pending asylum cases
It suggests there is somewhat of a tale not told somewhere here
No, that matches. As each case including appeals often takes a few years, one would expect that sort of number to be in the pipeline at any one time.
If you quote a figure of circa 6k then its realised for every accepted refugee there are 30 more waiting to find out I think most people would regard your 6k figure as deliberately downplaying the issue was the point I meant especially when I believe it was you pointing out we end up accepting 90% in any case
55% are accepted according to government figures, so maybe 11 000 applications per year, 4 years typical duration makes for 45 000 cases at any one time.
As so many are successful on appeal, one has to doubt the quality of the initial judgements.
Well see you figures dont match, the government is saying half your figure of 11k accepted in 2018
The source I quoted said 126k refugees and 45k asylum cases. I have no idea where you get your 11k from as you don't quote a source whereas robert did for the 5833 and I did for the 45k pending. Leaves me wondering what the 126k are doing are they pending to be pending?
Regardless there seems a lot of manipulation of figures somewhere in here
The 126K are those approved in previous years, perhaps going back a decade or longer, the 45 000 are the current cases under consideration surely?
Oldham in Greater Manchester is 48 hours away from potentially being ordered into a “catastrophic” and “premature” local lockdown, its council leader has warned.
Oldham in Greater Manchester is 48 hours away from potentially being ordered into a “catastrophic” and “premature” local lockdown, its council leader has warned.
Catastrophic? I assume Oldham is going to be destroyed from orbit or something, or is this needless sensationalism?
Had not to be impressed by Michelle Obama's speech to the virtual DNC. Very strong words - to what extent they would impress or change any Trump voter is debatable but that isn't the point of the DNC or indeed any party conference.
Gatherings like that speak to the faithful or the supportive - the Democrats probably know IF they get their vote out they will win and it was their failure to do so last time which cost them so dearly.
Last time, 37% of the voters were registered Democrats (they broke 89-9 for Clinton) and 33% were registered Republican (90-7 for Trump) but 31% were Independent and crucially they broke 47-42 for Trump.
Interestingly, the ABC News/Washington Post poll last night which put Biden ahead 54-44 sampled 31% Democrats, 26% Republicans and 37% Independents.
The Economist/YouGov sample is 42% Democrat, 33% Independent and 25% Republican. As I don't have access to the Rasmussen or Trafalgar crosstabs, I don't know how their sampling methodology operates.
Make of that what you will.
When looking at the Titania Mcgrath Twitter ban, I noticed right wing Twitter is up in arms that she mentioned cild cages, but apparently Obama created the child cages. Not sure if it'll have any cut through, these 'zingers' normally don't.
Is that true though ? It’s hard to know what to believe on social media.
Pretty easy to prove/disprove with contemporary images and media reports I'd say
Do not assume a Nationalist majority is inevitable.
I think it increasingly likely all Unionist parties will combine under 1 Unionist Alliance ticket led by Ruth Davidson, just standing one Unionist candidate at constituency level at Holyrood against the SNP, with the Unionist parties only standing separately against each other as Tories, Labour and LD on the Holyrood list.
Thus maximising the number of Unionist MSPs to stop a Nationalist SNP or SNP and Green majority
Lol. Weren't you promoting the idea of Swinson running for Holyrood and leading the Unionist fight back a few months ago? That's not quite as loonball as an alliance led by Baroness Line in The Sand spending most of her time in London in an effort to bring 'democracy' to the HoL (and incidentally pocket the £300 a day expenses).
Those PB’ers who backed their life savings on HY’s firm assurances that Chuka will be our next PM after Boris might be starting to wonder precisely how this will come about?
If Boris won a majority again in 2024 and Labour elected say Long Bailey to replace Starmer and Umunna then became LD leader anything could happen.
Even if Starmer becomes PM he is unlikely to win a majority so you could end up with a Labour and LD coalition government and Umunna as Foreign Secretary and heir apparent
Is Chuka even interested in a political career now ? Thought that ship had sailed.
Must be a short price for Strictly sooner or later?
Mr Meeks is a fine writer, but this is one of the worst sentences - in so many ways - that I have ever seen on PB
"The number of undocumented migrants crossing the English Channel does not begin to fill the gaps left by all those people who needlessly died with Covid-19 owing to the government’s negligence"
Tasteless, toneless, valueless, pointless.
He's right though, isn't he?
You completely miss the point. Completely. It isn;t about numbers.
Why do you think there is so much concern about migrant boats, and yet when we offer 3m HK chinese pathways to passports nobody bats an eyelid?
Here's why.
Brexiteers see Britain as the Real Madrid and Manchester United of immigration rolled into one.
They think we have our pick. We can choose exactly who we want to play for our team, when we want them to play and the size of the squad we want from overseas players. The demand is enormous. Patently.
Brexitters are tired of what they see as third division players with no skills who are also not team players and cost a fortune to maintain.
And I'll tell you what. Labour will never form a government again until they grasp this simple truth
If 3mn HK Chinese turn up I am certain they will face plenty of hostility, including from the tabloid press. The fact is, neither you nor I know anything about the people crossing the channel right now. Some of them might have been doctors or engineers in their own country. To simply assert that they have no skills and nothing to contribute is ridiculous. And even if some of them are a burden, we have obligations to host refugees. It's not as if we don't already have plenty of useless people here already - indeed many of them are running the country.
Who cares? they are not coming on our terms. They are coming on their terms. They are coming on the people traffickers terms.
Jurgen Klopp does not take 20 random footballers who want to play for Liverpool on the off chance there might be a Messi in there.
They are watched. They are scouted. They are tapped up. They are selected. They sign contracts that demand levels of commitment and conduct.
THAT is what many of the voters of England want for their immigration system. Crucially Farage understands that. Very few others do.
In a world where refugees exist you can't simply take in who you want, unless you think refugees are someone else's problem (many people in this country thought that in the 1930s, I think they were wrong then and now). This is where your football team analogy falls down.
These people are not refugees. Its as if Paris St Germain took on a huge contingent of random footballers and we decided to pay a fortune for a contingent of them. Untested. Untrialled. Unsifted. With no strings.
Its not good enough and it won;t be accepted as good enough in the future, I don;t think.
I think that's a little harsh. If you look at the nationalities of the myriad flow of asylum seekers, they likely mostly come from places with civil wars or other insurrection.
That's why (apart from Ms Merkel's foolish invitation) there was the massive flood of them seven or eight years ago: the revolutions, and civil wars, and subsequent repression in North Africa and the Middle East created a flood of people leaving.
Go back a decade before, and there were a lot of Afghanis.
Many are (and it's pretty obvious when you see the news reports) economic migrants from sub-saharan Africa. They smile and take selfies on their mobiles as soon as Border Force pick them up, for obvious reasons.
Many claim to be Iranian (suffering neither civil war nor oppression) but able to afford flights into Serbia and then to pay traffickers to get them into the UK.
Of course there are a significant number of sub-Saharan economic migrants. And of course they shouldn't be allowed to break the rules and benefit from it. We, as a country, need to quickly process and return those who are not genuine. (And it is of no credit to us that we make it a drawn out process that benefits no-one.)
But at the same time, there is a massive correlation between numbers of asylum seekers arriving in the UK and the level of "trouble" in the world. In the last 20 years, the number arriving has varied from perhaps 5,000 to as many as 100,000
There's also a correlation with the huge population growth and lack of opportunities in Africa. I expect this will get worse too due to increasing geopolitical tension and climate change.
So, I don't think the current framework is fit for purpose. The bigger problem of stabilising, fixing and developing those countries is an even harder one.
I also think this is displacement activity.
In the last year for which numbers were available (2018), the UK accepted 5,833 asylum seekers, and another 600 or so were granted relief to stay for other reasons.
Yes, we need to do a better job of deporting economic migrants, rather than have people hanging around for years (and potentially disappearing into the black market) at the taxpayers expense.
But 5,833 accepted asylum seekers a year is a trivially small number.
by the end of 2018 there were 126,720 refugees, 45,244 pending asylum cases
It suggests there is somewhat of a tale not told somewhere here
No, that matches. As each case including appeals often takes a few years, one would expect that sort of number to be in the pipeline at any one time.
If you quote a figure of circa 6k then its realised for every accepted refugee there are 30 more waiting to find out I think most people would regard your 6k figure as deliberately downplaying the issue was the point I meant especially when I believe it was you pointing out we end up accepting 90% in any case
55% are accepted according to government figures, so maybe 11 000 applications per year, 4 years typical duration makes for 45 000 cases at any one time.
As so many are successful on appeal, one has to doubt the quality of the initial judgements.
Well see you figures dont match, the government is saying half your figure of 11k accepted in 2018
The source I quoted said 126k refugees and 45k asylum cases. I have no idea where you get your 11k from as you don't quote a source whereas robert did for the 5833 and I did for the 45k pending. Leaves me wondering what the 126k are doing are they pending to be pending?
Regardless there seems a lot of manipulation of figures somewhere in here
The 126K are those approved in previous years, perhaps going back a decade or longer, the 45 000 are the current cases under consideration surely?
I can't say I honestly know as they dont explain the figure. I do note however another discrepancy
Asylum applications to the UK are relatively low – 35,566 in the year to December 2019. This is significantly lower than the peak of 84,000 applications back in 2002.
That implies for a single year. I think you cited a 55% approval rate. that would mean about 18k to 19 k approved against rcs's quoted value of 5833 for the previous year.
It also implies 45 K isnt a backlog from only approving 6k a year and taking multiple years/
I don't honestly know where the truth lies but you can understand why I turn around and say none of these figures seem to fit with each other so.....
Do not assume a Nationalist majority is inevitable.
I think it increasingly likely all Unionist parties will combine under 1 Unionist Alliance ticket led by Ruth Davidson, just standing one Unionist candidate at constituency level at Holyrood against the SNP, with the Unionist parties only standing separately against each other as Tories, Labour and LD on the Holyrood list.
Thus maximising the number of Unionist MSPs to stop a Nationalist SNP or SNP and Green majority
Lol. Weren't you promoting the idea of Swinson running for Holyrood and leading the Unionist fight back a few months ago? That's not quite as loonball as an alliance led by Baroness Line in The Sand spending most of her time in London in an effort to bring 'democracy' to the HoL (and incidentally pocket the £300 a day expenses).
Good to see it has got the Nats rattled, the one thing the SNP fear is a united Unionist Alliance at constituency level so they no longer get elected on less than 50% of the vote in most SNP seats. Ruth Davidson is also the one leader Sturgeon is still terrified of.
Swinson could be Scottish LD leader on the list, Davidson would lead the Unionist Alliance at constituency level
Is 'Got the Nats rattled' or 'X terrifies Sturgeon' the biggest indicator of a total porridge brained approach to Scotpol?
How well I remember your breathless excitement at the accession of Jim Murphy as SLab leader, and the subsequent 1.5% increase for SLab in a Scottish subsample.
Mr Meeks is a fine writer, but this is one of the worst sentences - in so many ways - that I have ever seen on PB
"The number of undocumented migrants crossing the English Channel does not begin to fill the gaps left by all those people who needlessly died with Covid-19 owing to the government’s negligence"
Tasteless, toneless, valueless, pointless.
He's right though, isn't he?
You completely miss the point. Completely. It isn;t about numbers.
Why do you think there is so much concern about migrant boats, and yet when we offer 3m HK chinese pathways to passports nobody bats an eyelid?
Here's why.
Brexiteers see Britain as the Real Madrid and Manchester United of immigration rolled into one.
They think we have our pick. We can choose exactly who we want to play for our team, when we want them to play and the size of the squad we want from overseas players. The demand is enormous. Patently.
Brexitters are tired of what they see as third division players with no skills who are also not team players and cost a fortune to maintain.
And I'll tell you what. Labour will never form a government again until they grasp this simple truth
If 3mn HK Chinese turn up I am certain they will face plenty of hostility, including from the tabloid press. The fact is, neither you nor I know anything about the people crossing the channel right now. Some of them might have been doctors or engineers in their own country. To simply assert that they have no skills and nothing to contribute is ridiculous. And even if some of them are a burden, we have obligations to host refugees. It's not as if we don't already have plenty of useless people here already - indeed many of them are running the country.
Who cares? they are not coming on our terms. They are coming on their terms. They are coming on the people traffickers terms.
Jurgen Klopp does not take 20 random footballers who want to play for Liverpool on the off chance there might be a Messi in there.
They are watched. They are scouted. They are tapped up. They are selected. They sign contracts that demand levels of commitment and conduct.
THAT is what many of the voters of England want for their immigration system. Crucially Farage understands that. Very few others do.
In a world where refugees exist you can't simply take in who you want, unless you think refugees are someone else's problem (many people in this country thought that in the 1930s, I think they were wrong then and now). This is where your football team analogy falls down.
These people are not refugees. Its as if Paris St Germain took on a huge contingent of random footballers and we decided to pay a fortune for a contingent of them. Untested. Untrialled. Unsifted. With no strings.
Its not good enough and it won;t be accepted as good enough in the future, I don;t think.
I think that's a little harsh. If you look at the nationalities of the myriad flow of asylum seekers, they likely mostly come from places with civil wars or other insurrection.
That's why (apart from Ms Merkel's foolish invitation) there was the massive flood of them seven or eight years ago: the revolutions, and civil wars, and subsequent repression in North Africa and the Middle East created a flood of people leaving.
Go back a decade before, and there were a lot of Afghanis.
Many are (and it's pretty obvious when you see the news reports) economic migrants from sub-saharan Africa. They smile and take selfies on their mobiles as soon as Border Force pick them up, for obvious reasons.
Many claim to be Iranian (suffering neither civil war nor oppression) but able to afford flights into Serbia and then to pay traffickers to get them into the UK.
Of course there are a significant number of sub-Saharan economic migrants. And of course they shouldn't be allowed to break the rules and benefit from it. We, as a country, need to quickly process and return those who are not genuine. (And it is of no credit to us that we make it a drawn out process that benefits no-one.)
But at the same time, there is a massive correlation between numbers of asylum seekers arriving in the UK and the level of "trouble" in the world. In the last 20 years, the number arriving has varied from perhaps 5,000 to as many as 100,000
There's also a correlation with the huge population growth and lack of opportunities in Africa. I expect this will get worse too due to increasing geopolitical tension and climate change.
So, I don't think the current framework is fit for purpose. The bigger problem of stabilising, fixing and developing those countries is an even harder one.
I also think this is displacement activity.
In the last year for which numbers were available (2018), the UK accepted 5,833 asylum seekers, and another 600 or so were granted relief to stay for other reasons.
Yes, we need to do a better job of deporting economic migrants, rather than have people hanging around for years (and potentially disappearing into the black market) at the taxpayers expense.
But 5,833 accepted asylum seekers a year is a trivially small number.
by the end of 2018 there were 126,720 refugees, 45,244 pending asylum cases
It suggests there is somewhat of a tale not told somewhere here
No, that matches. As each case including appeals often takes a few years, one would expect that sort of number to be in the pipeline at any one time.
If you quote a figure of circa 6k then its realised for every accepted refugee there are 30 more waiting to find out I think most people would regard your 6k figure as deliberately downplaying the issue was the point I meant especially when I believe it was you pointing out we end up accepting 90% in any case
55% are accepted according to government figures, so maybe 11 000 applications per year, 4 years typical duration makes for 45 000 cases at any one time.
As so many are successful on appeal, one has to doubt the quality of the initial judgements.
Well see you figures dont match, the government is saying half your figure of 11k accepted in 2018
The source I quoted said 126k refugees and 45k asylum cases. I have no idea where you get your 11k from as you don't quote a source whereas robert did for the 5833 and I did for the 45k pending. Leaves me wondering what the 126k are doing are they pending to be pending?
Regardless there seems a lot of manipulation of figures somewhere in here
The 126K are those approved in previous years, perhaps going back a decade or longer, the 45 000 are the current cases under consideration surely?
I can't say I honestly know as they dont explain the figure. I do note however another discrepancy
Asylum applications to the UK are relatively low – 35,566 in the year to December 2019. This is significantly lower than the peak of 84,000 applications back in 2002.
That implies for a single year. I think you cited a 55% approval rate. that would mean about 18k to 19 k approved against rcs's quoted value of 5833 for the previous year.
It also implies 45 K isnt a backlog from only approving 6k a year and taking multiple years/
I don't honestly know where the truth lies but you can understand why I turn around and say none of these figures seem to fit with each other so.....
The success rate of applications used to be lower, but you are correct that numbers of asylum seekers have dropped a lot over the years. Spikes when places like Kosova or Zimbabwe erupt, and dies down between.
The @rcs1000 approach to employment of illegals is a better way, but I think currently carries a £10K fine.
Oldham in Greater Manchester is 48 hours away from potentially being ordered into a “catastrophic” and “premature” local lockdown, its council leader has warned.
Ireland looks as if it has problems
And meanwhile, the UK seven day average for cases confirmed by test appears to be levelling off, and the total number of Covid patients left in hospital is now just under 900 and has resumed its trend downwards.
We can't be that different to Ireland - can we? Goodness knows what's going on.
Do not assume a Nationalist majority is inevitable.
I think it increasingly likely all Unionist parties will combine under 1 Unionist Alliance ticket led by Ruth Davidson, just standing one Unionist candidate at constituency level at Holyrood against the SNP, with the Unionist parties only standing separately against each other as Tories, Labour and LD on the Holyrood list.
Thus maximising the number of Unionist MSPs to stop a Nationalist SNP or SNP and Green majority
Lol. Weren't you promoting the idea of Swinson running for Holyrood and leading the Unionist fight back a few months ago? That's not quite as loonball as an alliance led by Baroness Line in The Sand spending most of her time in London in an effort to bring 'democracy' to the HoL (and incidentally pocket the £300 a day expenses).
Good to see it has got the Nats rattled, the one thing the SNP fear is a united Unionist Alliance at constituency level so they no longer get elected on less than 50% of the vote in most SNP seats. Ruth Davidson is also the one leader Sturgeon is still terrified of.
Swinson could be Scottish LD leader on the list, Davidson would lead the Unionist Alliance at constituency level
In which case, how do you have a credible Ruth Davidson against Indyref Party* when the good Lady-to-be isn't even standing for election?
*with 'Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party" in the most microscopioc small print tucked away vertically in a back corner of the election literature
Michelle Obama spoke well but wasn't much detail there all mainly generalities about taking the moral high ground and going to vote
Michelle Obama isn't going to be part of the administration so it's not for her to provide the detail of what a Biden/Harris administration would do or look like.
Her task was to galvanise the Democratic faithful into getting out and working for and ultimately voting for Biden/Harris and not stay at home which did for Clinton/Kaine four years ago.
I think she did that very well and if it provokes another bitter and vitriolic tweet from Trump, so much the better.
The Democrat road to victory is through maximising their own support, getting more registered Republicans to switch and matching Trump among the Independents.
Let's not forget in the popular vote Clinton won 48-46 last time - Biden has to do better but not much better. Turning that 2-point,lead into a 5-7 point national advantage should flip enough states to take Biden/Harris past 270 EC votes.
Personally I thought she was pretty awful. I'm not a US citizen, but I'd imagine if I were that my allegiances would be on the right of the Democratic party, or on the very non-religious fringe of the Republicans. An obvious floating voter if I was there.
Joe Biden - directed by 'faith' - I know it works in the US, but total turn-off for me.
Trump is awful, but in my view he's miles ahead of this Democratic shambles.
On the plus side for the Democrats Biden has charisma and a folksy manner, on the plus side for Trump Biden also probably has the lowest IQ of any Democratic presidential nominee since WW2
Oldham in Greater Manchester is 48 hours away from potentially being ordered into a “catastrophic” and “premature” local lockdown, its council leader has warned.
Ireland looks as if it has problems
And meanwhile, the UK seven day average for cases confirmed by test appears to be levelling off, and the total number of Covid patients left in hospital is now just under 900 and has resumed its trend downwards.
We can't be that different to Ireland - can we? Goodness knows what's going on.
I think it is young people who may be an issue with covid compliance in most of the recent problems
Let's not forget in the popular vote Clinton won 48-46 last time - Biden has to do better but not much better. Turning that 2-point,lead into a 5-7 point national advantage should flip enough states to take Biden/Harris past 270 EC votes.
He doesn't necessarily need to do better than Clinton on national lead, although it would plainly be much better for his chances if he did.
It is true that, on average, the electoral college works to the Republicans' advantage, and there are two clear cases (2016 and 2000) where it turned a minority of votes into a win.
But, if you look at the detail of Obama v Romney in 2012, Obama distributed his vote more efficiently. That is, the won the national vote share by just shy of 4% BUT Romney would've needed significantly more than a 2% uniform national swing to have got the win the tipping point state (that year) of Colorado.
So it's less likely, but not outlandish by any means, for a Democrat to win on a minority of the popular vote. Clinton distributed her vote exceptionally inefficiently, barely campaigning in places like Wisconsin which was actually a crucial state. It's not a given that all Democrats would do that - Obama didn't.
Do not assume a Nationalist majority is inevitable.
I think it increasingly likely all Unionist parties will combine under 1 Unionist Alliance ticket led by Ruth Davidson, just standing one Unionist candidate at constituency level at Holyrood against the SNP, with the Unionist parties only standing separately against each other as Tories, Labour and LD on the Holyrood list.
Thus maximising the number of Unionist MSPs to stop a Nationalist SNP or SNP and Green majority
Lol. Weren't you promoting the idea of Swinson running for Holyrood and leading the Unionist fight back a few months ago? That's not quite as loonball as an alliance led by Baroness Line in The Sand spending most of her time in London in an effort to bring 'democracy' to the HoL (and incidentally pocket the £300 a day expenses).
Good to see it has got the Nats rattled, the one thing the SNP fear is a united Unionist Alliance at constituency level so they no longer get elected on less than 50% of the vote in most SNP seats. Ruth Davidson is also the one leader Sturgeon is still terrified of.
Swinson could be Scottish LD leader on the list, Davidson would lead the Unionist Alliance at constituency level
Is 'Got the Nats rattled' or 'X terrifies Sturgeon' the biggest indicator of a total porridge brained approach to Scotpol?
How well I remember your breathless excitement at the accession of Jim Murphy as SLab leader, and the subsequent 1.5% increase for SLab in a Scottish subsample.
Unlike Murphy however Davidson has already made gains off Sturgeon and the SNP in 2016 and 2017
Do not assume a Nationalist majority is inevitable.
I think it increasingly likely all Unionist parties will combine under 1 Unionist Alliance ticket led by Ruth Davidson, just standing one Unionist candidate at constituency level at Holyrood against the SNP, with the Unionist parties only standing separately against each other as Tories, Labour and LD on the Holyrood list.
Thus maximising the number of Unionist MSPs to stop a Nationalist SNP or SNP and Green majority
Lol. Weren't you promoting the idea of Swinson running for Holyrood and leading the Unionist fight back a few months ago? That's not quite as loonball as an alliance led by Baroness Line in The Sand spending most of her time in London in an effort to bring 'democracy' to the HoL (and incidentally pocket the £300 a day expenses).
Good to see it has got the Nats rattled, the one thing the SNP fear is a united Unionist Alliance at constituency level so they no longer get elected on less than 50% of the vote in most SNP seats. Ruth Davidson is also the one leader Sturgeon is still terrified of.
Swinson could be Scottish LD leader on the list, Davidson would lead the Unionist Alliance at constituency level
In which case, how do you have a credible Ruth Davidson against Indyref Party* when the good Lady-to-be isn't even standing for election?
*with 'Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party" in the most microscopioc small print tucked away vertically in a back corner of the election literature
At the moment, she might fancy her chances holding her seat against Angus Robertson in Edinburgh Central with the SNP there split between him and Cherry
The Whisky industry accuses UK Govt of being “asleep at the wheel” over Trump’s crippling tariffs and Hard Brexit’s still to hit. That’s what happens when you let Tory clowns like Liz Truss run your international trade.
I thought we were going to be required to change the name to Whiskey as part of the upcoming US trade deal?
To whatever the Japanese is. They're leading the new wave of Whisky in my view.
Yes, I've just discovered Japanese whisky. Really good stuff.
Oldham in Greater Manchester is 48 hours away from potentially being ordered into a “catastrophic” and “premature” local lockdown, its council leader has warned.
Ireland looks as if it has problems
And meanwhile, the UK seven day average for cases confirmed by test appears to be levelling off, and the total number of Covid patients left in hospital is now just under 900 and has resumed its trend downwards.
We can't be that different to Ireland - can we? Goodness knows what's going on.
I think it is young people who may be an issue with covid compliance in most of the recent problems
They are out here but so are family and friends gatherings.
Do not assume a Nationalist majority is inevitable.
I think it increasingly likely all Unionist parties will combine under 1 Unionist Alliance ticket led by Ruth Davidson, just standing one Unionist candidate at constituency level at Holyrood against the SNP, with the Unionist parties only standing separately against each other as Tories, Labour and LD on the Holyrood list.
Thus maximising the number of Unionist MSPs to stop a Nationalist SNP or SNP and Green majority
Lol. Weren't you promoting the idea of Swinson running for Holyrood and leading the Unionist fight back a few months ago? That's not quite as loonball as an alliance led by Baroness Line in The Sand spending most of her time in London in an effort to bring 'democracy' to the HoL (and incidentally pocket the £300 a day expenses).
Good to see it has got the Nats rattled, the one thing the SNP fear is a united Unionist Alliance at constituency level so they no longer get elected on less than 50% of the vote in most SNP seats. Ruth Davidson is also the one leader Sturgeon is still terrified of.
Swinson could be Scottish LD leader on the list, Davidson would lead the Unionist Alliance at constituency level
In which case, how do you have a credible Ruth Davidson against Indyref Party* when the good Lady-to-be isn't even standing for election?
*with 'Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party" in the most microscopioc small print tucked away vertically in a back corner of the election literature
At the moment, she might fancy her chances holding her seat against Angus Robertson in Edinburgh Central with the SNP there split between him and Cherry
I think that's rather assuming too much, not least that there are two SNP candidates. Have you been on the electric [edit] soup again?
Michelle Obama spoke well but wasn't much detail there all mainly generalities about taking the moral high ground and going to vote
Michelle Obama isn't going to be part of the administration so it's not for her to provide the detail of what a Biden/Harris administration would do or look like.
Her task was to galvanise the Democratic faithful into getting out and working for and ultimately voting for Biden/Harris and not stay at home which did for Clinton/Kaine four years ago.
I think she did that very well and if it provokes another bitter and vitriolic tweet from Trump, so much the better.
The Democrat road to victory is through maximising their own support, getting more registered Republicans to switch and matching Trump among the Independents.
Let's not forget in the popular vote Clinton won 48-46 last time - Biden has to do better but not much better. Turning that 2-point,lead into a 5-7 point national advantage should flip enough states to take Biden/Harris past 270 EC votes.
Personally I thought she was pretty awful. I'm not a US citizen, but I'd imagine if I were that my allegiances would be on the right of the Democratic party, or on the very non-religious fringe of the Republicans. An obvious floating voter if I was there.
Joe Biden - directed by 'faith' - I know it works in the US, but total turn-off for me.
Trump is awful, but in my view he's miles ahead of this Democratic shambles.
On the plus side for the Democrats Biden has charisma and a folksy manner, on the plus side for Trump Biden also probably has the lowest IQ of any Democratic presidential nominee since WW2
You're making quite a courageous assumption about how predictive IQ is of electoral success.
Had not to be impressed by Michelle Obama's speech to the virtual DNC. Very strong words - to what extent they would impress or change any Trump voter is debatable but that isn't the point of the DNC or indeed any party conference.
Gatherings like that speak to the faithful or the supportive - the Democrats probably know IF they get their vote out they will win and it was their failure to do so last time which cost them so dearly.
Last time, 37% of the voters were registered Democrats (they broke 89-9 for Clinton) and 33% were registered Republican (90-7 for Trump) but 31% were Independent and crucially they broke 47-42 for Trump.
Interestingly, the ABC News/Washington Post poll last night which put Biden ahead 54-44 sampled 31% Democrats, 26% Republicans and 37% Independents.
The Economist/YouGov sample is 42% Democrat, 33% Independent and 25% Republican. As I don't have access to the Rasmussen or Trafalgar crosstabs, I don't know how their sampling methodology operates.
Make of that what you will.
When looking at the Titania Mcgrath Twitter ban, I noticed right wing Twitter is up in arms that she mentioned child cages, but apparently Obama created the child cages. Not sure if it'll have any cut through, these 'zingers' normally don't.
Oh has that stultifyingly tedious and unintelligent account for stultifyingly tedious and unintelligent people been cancelled? Rocking good news if so. But why? It was just routine woke bashing as far as I was aware.
Also, when did the IFS become a defender of "equality"? I've noticed it more and more that they are pushing the "poor people matter the most" agenda in everything they do. It's a worthwhile goal but their remit isn't to bang on about equality, it's to try and see how the UK is performing economically and what the fiscal outlook is and what kind of multipliers government policy will have. The eat out scheme must have an absolutely massive economic multiplier, it's an extremely cheap scheme at £500m but it will generate huge economic benefits for the hospitality industry and save far more than that within the furlough scheme.
Honestly, it actually doesn't matter if poor people can't afford to eat out, they didn't before the virus and they probably won't afterwards. The sector depends on the middle classes going out and spending money on food, booze and tips. It's quite annoying that their insight was "yeah but poor people" and not what kind of multiplier it would have and how good or bad the scheme would be at getting the sector back on its feet. It's not a big deal for me because I have a team of analysts to do that for me, but our research will never see the light of day, where is the public going to learn this stuff from if the IFS is derelicting it's duty to report on the fiscal outlook.
From a practical viewpoint its not really a bad scheme for people who are struggling financially either. Having a £20 meal for 2 drop to £10 feels far better than a £100 meal drop to £80.
Mike Pence has gone out from 1.04 to 1.05 today in the GOP VP nominee betting. Is there any obvious reason for this? Trump is 1.01 for comparison.
That's barely a movement worth mentioning and I suspect the reason is someone who thinks there is a fractionally better than 5% chance of Trump ditching him has made a small sum (about £200 so fairly trivial) available at 1.05.
It's totally understandable people would reason there is negligible chance (1%) of Trump pulling out given he seems up for it, but a marginally less neglible chance (5%) he'd ditch Pence to grab a headline.
Michelle Obama spoke well but wasn't much detail there all mainly generalities about taking the moral high ground and going to vote
Michelle Obama isn't going to be part of the administration so it's not for her to provide the detail of what a Biden/Harris administration would do or look like.
Her task was to galvanise the Democratic faithful into getting out and working for and ultimately voting for Biden/Harris and not stay at home which did for Clinton/Kaine four years ago.
I think she did that very well and if it provokes another bitter and vitriolic tweet from Trump, so much the better.
The Democrat road to victory is through maximising their own support, getting more registered Republicans to switch and matching Trump among the Independents.
Let's not forget in the popular vote Clinton won 48-46 last time - Biden has to do better but not much better. Turning that 2-point,lead into a 5-7 point national advantage should flip enough states to take Biden/Harris past 270 EC votes.
Personally I thought she was pretty awful. I'm not a US citizen, but I'd imagine if I were that my allegiances would be on the right of the Democratic party, or on the very non-religious fringe of the Republicans. An obvious floating voter if I was there.
Joe Biden - directed by 'faith' - I know it works in the US, but total turn-off for me.
Trump is awful, but in my view he's miles ahead of this Democratic shambles.
On the plus side for the Democrats Biden has charisma and a folksy manner, on the plus side for Trump Biden also probably has the lowest IQ of any Democratic presidential nominee since WW2
You're making quite a courageous assumption about how predictive IQ is of electoral success.
Charisma is generally the key predictor of electoral success in the USA (and often elsewhere too) but high IQ v charisma elections are often very close e.g. 1960, 2000 and 2016
Do not assume a Nationalist majority is inevitable.
I think it increasingly likely all Unionist parties will combine under 1 Unionist Alliance ticket led by Ruth Davidson, just standing one Unionist candidate at constituency level at Holyrood against the SNP, with the Unionist parties only standing separately against each other as Tories, Labour and LD on the Holyrood list.
Thus maximising the number of Unionist MSPs to stop a Nationalist SNP or SNP and Green majority
Lol. Weren't you promoting the idea of Swinson running for Holyrood and leading the Unionist fight back a few months ago? That's not quite as loonball as an alliance led by Baroness Line in The Sand spending most of her time in London in an effort to bring 'democracy' to the HoL (and incidentally pocket the £300 a day expenses).
Good to see it has got the Nats rattled, the one thing the SNP fear is a united Unionist Alliance at constituency level so they no longer get elected on less than 50% of the vote in most SNP seats. Ruth Davidson is also the one leader Sturgeon is still terrified of.
Swinson could be Scottish LD leader on the list, Davidson would lead the Unionist Alliance at constituency level
Is 'Got the Nats rattled' or 'X terrifies Sturgeon' the biggest indicator of a total porridge brained approach to Scotpol?
How well I remember your breathless excitement at the accession of Jim Murphy as SLab leader, and the subsequent 1.5% increase for SLab in a Scottish subsample.
Unlike Murphy however Davidson has already made gains off Sturgeon and the SNP in 2016 and 2017
And then tanked in the Euros and scuttled off before the Ruth Davidson against Indy Ref II party tanked even more in the GE.
Do not assume a Nationalist majority is inevitable.
I think it increasingly likely all Unionist parties will combine under 1 Unionist Alliance ticket led by Ruth Davidson, just standing one Unionist candidate at constituency level at Holyrood against the SNP, with the Unionist parties only standing separately against each other as Tories, Labour and LD on the Holyrood list.
Thus maximising the number of Unionist MSPs to stop a Nationalist SNP or SNP and Green majority
Lol. Weren't you promoting the idea of Swinson running for Holyrood and leading the Unionist fight back a few months ago? That's not quite as loonball as an alliance led by Baroness Line in The Sand spending most of her time in London in an effort to bring 'democracy' to the HoL (and incidentally pocket the £300 a day expenses).
Good to see it has got the Nats rattled, the one thing the SNP fear is a united Unionist Alliance at constituency level so they no longer get elected on less than 50% of the vote in most SNP seats. Ruth Davidson is also the one leader Sturgeon is still terrified of.
Swinson could be Scottish LD leader on the list, Davidson would lead the Unionist Alliance at constituency level
In which case, how do you have a credible Ruth Davidson against Indyref Party* when the good Lady-to-be isn't even standing for election?
*with 'Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party" in the most microscopioc small print tucked away vertically in a back corner of the election literature
At the moment, she might fancy her chances holding her seat against Angus Robertson in Edinburgh Central with the SNP there split between him and Cherry
I think that's rather assuming too much, not least that there are two SNP candidates. Have you been on the electric [edit] soup again?
HYUFD's got a bit confused between folk putting themselves forward as candidate and *the* candidate. Don't tell him that there are in fact four currently on the SNP shortlist (there were five until today), he might explode.
Mike Pence has gone out from 1.04 to 1.05 today in the GOP VP nominee betting. Is there any obvious reason for this? Trump is 1.01 for comparison.
That's barely a movement worth mentioning and I suspect the reason is someone who thinks there is a fractionally better than 5% chance of Trump ditching him has made a small sum (about £200 so fairly trivial) available at 1.05.
It's totally understandable people would reason there is negligible chance (1%) of Trump pulling out given he seems up for it, but a marginally less neglible chance (5%) he'd ditch Pence to grab a headline.
Pence was 1.06 last week and 1.04 this week. A move back to 1.05 is significant when the race is over next week. You'd expect 1.01 or 1.02 at this stage so there is clearly market sentiment that Pence may be replaced, though Pence seems to be active on the campaign trail for Trump right now. I cannot see any news to make Pence less likely to run but I am thousands of miles away; maybe there has been a development.
Oldham in Greater Manchester is 48 hours away from potentially being ordered into a “catastrophic” and “premature” local lockdown, its council leader has warned.
Ireland looks as if it has problems
And meanwhile, the UK seven day average for cases confirmed by test appears to be levelling off, and the total number of Covid patients left in hospital is now just under 900 and has resumed its trend downwards.
We can't be that different to Ireland - can we? Goodness knows what's going on.
I think it is young people who may be an issue with covid compliance in most of the recent problems
They are out here but so are family and friends gatherings.
Considering COVID barely touches the young, and considering the privations we have subjected them to, we can only marvel at the level of their obedience this far in the UK.
Personally I thought she was pretty awful. I'm not a US citizen, but I'd imagine if I were that my allegiances would be on the right of the Democratic party, or on the very non-religious fringe of the Republicans. An obvious floating voter if I was there.
Joe Biden - directed by 'faith' - I know it works in the US, but total turn-off for me.
Trump is awful, but in my view he's miles ahead of this Democratic shambles.
So you're not put off by Trump's wooing of the evangelicals and his claims that Biden "will hurt God". Pence is an active evangelical so it's crass to think only one side does "faith".
Again, Michelle Obama's speech wasn't directed at Republican voters but at galvanising Democrats into activism as well as voting for Biden/Harris.
I don't argue the choice is uninspiring in historic terms but how can you call the Democrat ticket a "shambles" set against Trump/Pence?
Also, when did the IFS become a defender of "equality"? I've noticed it more and more that they are pushing the "poor people matter the most" agenda in everything they do. It's a worthwhile goal but their remit isn't to bang on about equality, it's to try and see how the UK is performing economically and what the fiscal outlook is and what kind of multipliers government policy will have. The eat out scheme must have an absolutely massive economic multiplier, it's an extremely cheap scheme at £500m but it will generate huge economic benefits for the hospitality industry and save far more than that within the furlough scheme.
Honestly, it actually doesn't matter if poor people can't afford to eat out, they didn't before the virus and they probably won't afterwards. The sector depends on the middle classes going out and spending money on food, booze and tips. It's quite annoying that their insight was "yeah but poor people" and not what kind of multiplier it would have and how good or bad the scheme would be at getting the sector back on its feet. It's not a big deal for me because I have a team of analysts to do that for me, but our research will never see the light of day, where is the public going to learn this stuff from if the IFS is derelicting it's duty to report on the fiscal outlook.
It’s a brilliant scheme.
It has also had the effect of getting even the most irrationally fearful out of their homes. Even @SandyRentool has used it - and he wears radiation equipment just to fill up his car.
Michelle Obama spoke well but wasn't much detail there all mainly generalities about taking the moral high ground and going to vote
Michelle Obama isn't going to be part of the administration so it's not for her to provide the detail of what a Biden/Harris administration would do or look like.
Her task was to galvanise the Democratic faithful into getting out and working for and ultimately voting for Biden/Harris and not stay at home which did for Clinton/Kaine four years ago.
I think she did that very well and if it provokes another bitter and vitriolic tweet from Trump, so much the better.
The Democrat road to victory is through maximising their own support, getting more registered Republicans to switch and matching Trump among the Independents.
Let's not forget in the popular vote Clinton won 48-46 last time - Biden has to do better but not much better. Turning that 2-point,lead into a 5-7 point national advantage should flip enough states to take Biden/Harris past 270 EC votes.
Personally I thought she was pretty awful. I'm not a US citizen, but I'd imagine if I were that my allegiances would be on the right of the Democratic party, or on the very non-religious fringe of the Republicans. An obvious floating voter if I was there.
Joe Biden - directed by 'faith' - I know it works in the US, but total turn-off for me.
Trump is awful, but in my view he's miles ahead of this Democratic shambles.
On the plus side for the Democrats Biden has charisma and a folksy manner, on the plus side for Trump Biden also probably has the lowest IQ of any Democratic presidential nominee since WW2
You're making quite a courageous assumption about how predictive IQ is of electoral success.
Charisma is generally the key predictor of electoral success in the USA (and often elsewhere too) but high IQ v charisma elections are often very close e.g. 1960, 2000 and 2016
Kennedy was as bright as Nixon wasn't he? Or was he all tousled hair and touch football?
Oldham in Greater Manchester is 48 hours away from potentially being ordered into a “catastrophic” and “premature” local lockdown, its council leader has warned.
Ireland looks as if it has problems
And meanwhile, the UK seven day average for cases confirmed by test appears to be levelling off, and the total number of Covid patients left in hospital is now just under 900 and has resumed its trend downwards.
We can't be that different to Ireland - can we? Goodness knows what's going on.
I think it is young people who may be an issue with covid compliance in most of the recent problems
They are out here but so are family and friends gatherings.
Considering COVID barely touches the young, and considering the privations we have subjected them to, we can only marvel at the level of their obedience this far in the UK.
I'm flying out to Greece on Friday. Looks like there's a chance the rising case rate in Greece might make the govt put Greece on the quarantine list (maybe not this week, but more probably next week).
If HMG pulls down the shutters next week when I am sunning myself by the Aegean what is to stop me, when I want to return, simply crossing a border - to Bulgaria or Turkey, and flying back from there, where there is, as yet, no need to self isolate on return?
I'm flying out to Greece on Friday. Looks like there's a chance the rising case rate in Greece might make the govt put Greece on the quarantine list (maybe not this week, but more probably next week).
If HMG pulls down the shutters next week when I am sunning myself by the Aegean what is to stop me, when I want to return, simply crossing a border - to Bulgaria or Turkey, and flying back from there, where there is, as yet, no need to self isolate on return?
I'm flying out to Greece on Friday. Looks like there's a chance the rising case rate in Greece might make the govt put Greece on the quarantine list (maybe not this week, but more probably next week).
If HMG pulls down the shutters next week when I am sunning myself by the Aegean what is to stop me, when I want to return, simply crossing a border - to Bulgaria or Turkey, and flying back from there, where there is, as yet, no need to self isolate on return?
Michelle Obama spoke well but wasn't much detail there all mainly generalities about taking the moral high ground and going to vote
Michelle Obama isn't going to be part of the administration so it's not for her to provide the detail of what a Biden/Harris administration would do or look like.
Her task was to galvanise the Democratic faithful into getting out and working for and ultimately voting for Biden/Harris and not stay at home which did for Clinton/Kaine four years ago.
I think she did that very well and if it provokes another bitter and vitriolic tweet from Trump, so much the better.
The Democrat road to victory is through maximising their own support, getting more registered Republicans to switch and matching Trump among the Independents.
Let's not forget in the popular vote Clinton won 48-46 last time - Biden has to do better but not much better. Turning that 2-point,lead into a 5-7 point national advantage should flip enough states to take Biden/Harris past 270 EC votes.
Personally I thought she was pretty awful. I'm not a US citizen, but I'd imagine if I were that my allegiances would be on the right of the Democratic party, or on the very non-religious fringe of the Republicans. An obvious floating voter if I was there.
Joe Biden - directed by 'faith' - I know it works in the US, but total turn-off for me.
Trump is awful, but in my view he's miles ahead of this Democratic shambles.
On the plus side for the Democrats Biden has charisma and a folksy manner, on the plus side for Trump Biden also probably has the lowest IQ of any Democratic presidential nominee since WW2
You're making quite a courageous assumption about how predictive IQ is of electoral success.
Charisma is generally the key predictor of electoral success in the USA (and often elsewhere too) but high IQ v charisma elections are often very close e.g. 1960, 2000 and 2016
I doubt Nixon had a higher IQ than Kennedy, or at least not materially so. Indeed, it was one of the many things about which he had a bit of a chip on his shoulder. He wasn't thick, and got a good degree, but wasn't an intellectual by any means.
And it's also the case that "high IQ v charisma" elections often aren't that close at all. Reagan twice stomped fairly heavily on much more traditionally smart candidates.
Also, I think you would yourself say this isn't a "high IQ v charisma" election. It's a folksy charm charisma v bombastic charisma election - neither man is an intellectual.
I'm flying out to Greece on Friday. Looks like there's a chance the rising case rate in Greece might make the govt put Greece on the quarantine list (maybe not this week, but more probably next week).
If HMG pulls down the shutters next week when I am sunning myself by the Aegean what is to stop me, when I want to return, simply crossing a border - to Bulgaria or Turkey, and flying back from there, where there is, as yet, no need to self isolate on return?
There is a need to self isolate on your return.
If you’re travelling from an exempt country you will not need to self-isolate. You should check the list of exempt countries before you travel. If you travel from an exempt country but have been in a country that is not exempt within the last 14 days, you will need to self-isolate for the remainder of the 14 days since you were last in a non-exempt country.
Also, when did the IFS become a defender of "equality"? I've noticed it more and more that they are pushing the "poor people matter the most" agenda in everything they do. It's a worthwhile goal but their remit isn't to bang on about equality, it's to try and see how the UK is performing economically and what the fiscal outlook is and what kind of multipliers government policy will have. The eat out scheme must have an absolutely massive economic multiplier, it's an extremely cheap scheme at £500m but it will generate huge economic benefits for the hospitality industry and save far more than that within the furlough scheme.
Honestly, it actually doesn't matter if poor people can't afford to eat out, they didn't before the virus and they probably won't afterwards. The sector depends on the middle classes going out and spending money on food, booze and tips. It's quite annoying that their insight was "yeah but poor people" and not what kind of multiplier it would have and how good or bad the scheme would be at getting the sector back on its feet. It's not a big deal for me because I have a team of analysts to do that for me, but our research will never see the light of day, where is the public going to learn this stuff from if the IFS is derelicting it's duty to report on the fiscal outlook.
I give the Eat Out to Help Out two cheers rather than three. There have been some quite unpleasant stories of abuse directed against staff for not having table space for diners and one or two places in coastal towns have opted out of the scheme.
There's also the question of how much the early week business is affecting the later week and weekend business. My experience of a roast lunch on a Saturday was the venue was exceptionally quiet and the staff confirmed the place was rammed Monday-Wednesday and dead the rest of the week.
If the total volume of business is simply being redistributed and isn't increasing, I can't quite see the benefit except to the consumer early in the week obviously. If the total volume of business is up 10% on what would normally happen because of the scheme, that's excellent and to be welcome.
I wonder if the scheme will be prolonged into September but at £500m a month such largesse isn't going to be on the menu forever (pun intended).
Oldham in Greater Manchester is 48 hours away from potentially being ordered into a “catastrophic” and “premature” local lockdown, its council leader has warned.
Ireland looks as if it has problems
And meanwhile, the UK seven day average for cases confirmed by test appears to be levelling off, and the total number of Covid patients left in hospital is now just under 900 and has resumed its trend downwards.
We can't be that different to Ireland - can we? Goodness knows what's going on.
I think it is young people who may be an issue with covid compliance in most of the recent problems
They are out here but so are family and friends gatherings.
Considering COVID barely touches the young, and considering the privations we have subjected them to, we can only marvel at the level of their obedience this far in the UK.
It might not go on for ever.
Just did a walk around leafy north London: Hampstead, Belsize, Primrose Hill.
A pleasant soft summer evening, and all the restaurants are absolutely RAMMED with people, young and old, enjoying the Eat Out to Help Out. Several places had long queues.
I did my bit last night with my new girlfriend. Ate her out. Everyone has to help.
Oldham in Greater Manchester is 48 hours away from potentially being ordered into a “catastrophic” and “premature” local lockdown, its council leader has warned.
Ireland looks as if it has problems
And meanwhile, the UK seven day average for cases confirmed by test appears to be levelling off, and the total number of Covid patients left in hospital is now just under 900 and has resumed its trend downwards.
We can't be that different to Ireland - can we? Goodness knows what's going on.
I think it is young people who may be an issue with covid compliance in most of the recent problems
They are out here but so are family and friends gatherings.
Considering COVID barely touches the young, and considering the privations we have subjected them to, we can only marvel at the level of their obedience this far in the UK.
Also, when did the IFS become a defender of "equality"? I've noticed it more and more that they are pushing the "poor people matter the most" agenda in everything they do. It's a worthwhile goal but their remit isn't to bang on about equality, it's to try and see how the UK is performing economically and what the fiscal outlook is and what kind of multipliers government policy will have. The eat out scheme must have an absolutely massive economic multiplier, it's an extremely cheap scheme at £500m but it will generate huge economic benefits for the hospitality industry and save far more than that within the furlough scheme.
Honestly, it actually doesn't matter if poor people can't afford to eat out, they didn't before the virus and they probably won't afterwards. The sector depends on the middle classes going out and spending money on food, booze and tips. It's quite annoying that their insight was "yeah but poor people" and not what kind of multiplier it would have and how good or bad the scheme would be at getting the sector back on its feet. It's not a big deal for me because I have a team of analysts to do that for me, but our research will never see the light of day, where is the public going to learn this stuff from if the IFS is derelicting it's duty to report on the fiscal outlook.
It’s a brilliant scheme.
It has also had the effect of getting even the most irrationally fearful out of their homes. Even @SandyRentool has used it - and he wears radiation equipment just to fill up his car.
I'm not sure that disposable gloves count as radiation equipment!
And I only remembered that we would get the Rishi discount after we'd sat down and ordered. At an outdoor table. But it was nice to save over a fiver.
Personally I thought she was pretty awful. I'm not a US citizen, but I'd imagine if I were that my allegiances would be on the right of the Democratic party, or on the very non-religious fringe of the Republicans. An obvious floating voter if I was there.
Joe Biden - directed by 'faith' - I know it works in the US, but total turn-off for me.
Trump is awful, but in my view he's miles ahead of this Democratic shambles.
So you're not put off by Trump's wooing of the evangelicals and his claims that Biden "will hurt God". Pence is an active evangelical so it's crass to think only one side does "faith".
Again, Michelle Obama's speech wasn't directed at Republican voters but at galvanising Democrats into activism as well as voting for Biden/Harris.
I don't argue the choice is uninspiring in historic terms but how can you call the Democrat ticket a "shambles" set against Trump/Pence?
I'm flying out to Greece on Friday. Looks like there's a chance the rising case rate in Greece might make the govt put Greece on the quarantine list (maybe not this week, but more probably next week).
If HMG pulls down the shutters next week when I am sunning myself by the Aegean what is to stop me, when I want to return, simply crossing a border - to Bulgaria or Turkey, and flying back from there, where there is, as yet, no need to self isolate on return?
There is a need to self isolate on your return.
If you’re travelling from an exempt country you will not need to self-isolate. You should check the list of exempt countries before you travel. If you travel from an exempt country but have been in a country that is not exempt within the last 14 days, you will need to self-isolate for the remainder of the 14 days since you were last in a non-exempt country.
I'm still going even if they do put it on the Index Prohibitorum. I'll either wait out the crisis in the Greece, or when I get back, move to some country cottage for a bloody fortnight. Might be nice in t'Autumn
I'm flying out to Greece on Friday. Looks like there's a chance the rising case rate in Greece might make the govt put Greece on the quarantine list (maybe not this week, but more probably next week).
If HMG pulls down the shutters next week when I am sunning myself by the Aegean what is to stop me, when I want to return, simply crossing a border - to Bulgaria or Turkey, and flying back from there, where there is, as yet, no need to self isolate on return?
I'm flying out to Greece on Friday. Looks like there's a chance the rising case rate in Greece might make the govt put Greece on the quarantine list (maybe not this week, but more probably next week).
If HMG pulls down the shutters next week when I am sunning myself by the Aegean what is to stop me, when I want to return, simply crossing a border - to Bulgaria or Turkey, and flying back from there, where there is, as yet, no need to self isolate on return?
Nothing to stop you being a dick. Except your moral duty to your fellow citizens.
Michelle Obama spoke well but wasn't much detail there all mainly generalities about taking the moral high ground and going to vote
Michelle Obama isn't going to be part of the administration so it's not for her to provide the detail of what a Biden/Harris administration would do or look like.
Her task was to galvanise the Democratic faithful into getting out and working for and ultimately voting for Biden/Harris and not stay at home which did for Clinton/Kaine four years ago.
I think she did that very well and if it provokes another bitter and vitriolic tweet from Trump, so much the better.
The Democrat road to victory is through maximising their own support, getting more registered Republicans to switch and matching Trump among the Independents.
Let's not forget in the popular vote Clinton won 48-46 last time - Biden has to do better but not much better. Turning that 2-point,lead into a 5-7 point national advantage should flip enough states to take Biden/Harris past 270 EC votes.
Personally I thought she was pretty awful. I'm not a US citizen, but I'd imagine if I were that my allegiances would be on the right of the Democratic party, or on the very non-religious fringe of the Republicans. An obvious floating voter if I was there.
Joe Biden - directed by 'faith' - I know it works in the US, but total turn-off for me.
Trump is awful, but in my view he's miles ahead of this Democratic shambles.
On the plus side for the Democrats Biden has charisma and a folksy manner, on the plus side for Trump Biden also probably has the lowest IQ of any Democratic presidential nominee since WW2
You're making quite a courageous assumption about how predictive IQ is of electoral success.
Charisma is generally the key predictor of electoral success in the USA (and often elsewhere too) but high IQ v charisma elections are often very close e.g. 1960, 2000 and 2016
I doubt Nixon had a higher IQ than Kennedy, or at least not materially so. Indeed, it was one of the many things about which he had a bit of a chip on his shoulder. He wasn't thick, and got a good degree, but wasn't an intellectual by any means.
And it's also the case that "high IQ v charisma" elections often aren't that close at all. Reagan twice stomped fairly heavily on much more traditionally smart candidates.
Also, I think you would yourself say this isn't a "high IQ v charisma" election. It's a folksy charm charisma v bombastic charisma election - neither man is an intellectual.
J F Kennedy was, I believe, extremely clever. As well as a war hero, charismatic, highly sexed, with a beautiful wife, handsome and young. No wonder Nixon hated him.
I'm flying out to Greece on Friday. Looks like there's a chance the rising case rate in Greece might make the govt put Greece on the quarantine list (maybe not this week, but more probably next week).
If HMG pulls down the shutters next week when I am sunning myself by the Aegean what is to stop me, when I want to return, simply crossing a border - to Bulgaria or Turkey, and flying back from there, where there is, as yet, no need to self isolate on return?
Bulgaria will be easier to enter than Turkey I dare say, but yes, not a lot. Good point.
Comments
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NG4NCHuvCC4
(Read the comments below if you want to appreciate just how intelligent and well balanced political betting commenters are)
https://twitter.com/darshnasoni/status/1295789946113077254
Gatherings like that speak to the faithful or the supportive - the Democrats probably know IF they get their vote out they will win and it was their failure to do so last time which cost them so dearly.
Last time, 37% of the voters were registered Democrats (they broke 89-9 for Clinton) and 33% were registered Republican (90-7 for Trump) but 31% were Independent and crucially they broke 47-42 for Trump.
Interestingly, the ABC News/Washington Post poll last night which put Biden ahead 54-44 sampled 31% Democrats, 26% Republicans and 37% Independents.
The Economist/YouGov sample is 42% Democrat, 33% Independent and 25% Republican. As I don't have access to the Rasmussen or Trafalgar crosstabs, I don't know how their sampling methodology operates.
Make of that what you will.
As for them being desperate - some way well be. Many others only seem to be desperate enough to travel over when the weather is relatively good. I'm not sure that the public are on the whole appalled by this. I suspect most people are WORRIED about our borders not being secure and a feeling that if we can't control this Britain will fall apart. And they are right.
Why is this so hard to accept? It just feels like another case of sour grapes because the public refuse to focus on the things you want them to.
This is why I never bought into the whole its the oppositions duty to oppose line of thought. It is the oppositions duty to oppose where they genuinely think the other party is going down the wrong path. It is the oppositions duty to make suggestions where they think its on the whole a good idea but they can see flaws.
This is why we get tory party suggest a labour oppose. Labour get in basically suggest a with minor changes tory party opposes. It's why we never get shit fixed like social care.
IF Moscow signals it will accept a transition (and those protesting can't be seen to be too pro-western or anti-Russian) Lukashenko will begin to run out of options.
I'm hoping the Opposition keeps its lines of communication open with Putin and can convince him they can provide a friendly, stable and peaceful Belarus with whom he can continue to do business and work.
Swinson could be Scottish LD leader on the list, Davidson would lead the Unionist Alliance at constituency level
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-53825673
Even if Starmer becomes PM he is unlikely to win a majority so you could end up with a Labour and LD coalition government and Umunna as Foreign Secretary and heir apparent
Her task was to galvanise the Democratic faithful into getting out and working for and ultimately voting for Biden/Harris and not stay at home which did for Clinton/Kaine four years ago.
I think she did that very well and if it provokes another bitter and vitriolic tweet from Trump, so much the better.
The Democrat road to victory is through maximising their own support, getting more registered Republicans to switch and matching Trump among the Independents.
Let's not forget in the popular vote Clinton won 48-46 last time - Biden has to do better but not much better. Turning that 2-point,lead into a 5-7 point national advantage should flip enough states to take Biden/Harris past 270 EC votes.
More good news from Rishi's scheme.
Also, when did the IFS become a defender of "equality"? I've noticed it more and more that they are pushing the "poor people matter the most" agenda in everything they do. It's a worthwhile goal but their remit isn't to bang on about equality, it's to try and see how the UK is performing economically and what the fiscal outlook is and what kind of multipliers government policy will have. The eat out scheme must have an absolutely massive economic multiplier, it's an extremely cheap scheme at £500m but it will generate huge economic benefits for the hospitality industry and save far more than that within the furlough scheme.
Honestly, it actually doesn't matter if poor people can't afford to eat out, they didn't before the virus and they probably won't afterwards. The sector depends on the middle classes going out and spending money on food, booze and tips. It's quite annoying that their insight was "yeah but poor people" and not what kind of multiplier it would have and how good or bad the scheme would be at getting the sector back on its feet. It's not a big deal for me because I have a team of analysts to do that for me, but our research will never see the light of day, where is the public going to learn this stuff from if the IFS is derelicting it's duty to report on the fiscal outlook.
Many congratulations on your engagement by the way
We see a,lot on the news about what is happening in Minsk, what about the rest of the country. Is there an upsurge there too ?
I fear it's a bit like Brexit. Two different roads and nothing in between.
Joe Biden - directed by 'faith' - I know it works in the US, but total turn-off for me.
Trump is awful, but in my view he's miles ahead of this Democratic shambles.
Asylum applications to the UK are relatively low – 35,566 in the year to December 2019. This is significantly lower than the peak of 84,000 applications back in 2002.
That implies for a single year. I think you cited a 55% approval rate. that would mean about 18k to 19 k approved against rcs's quoted value of 5833 for the previous year.
It also implies 45 K isnt a backlog from only approving 6k a year and taking multiple years/
I don't honestly know where the truth lies but you can understand why I turn around and say none of these figures seem to fit with each other so.....
How well I remember your breathless excitement at the accession of Jim Murphy as SLab leader, and the subsequent 1.5% increase for SLab in a Scottish subsample.
The @rcs1000 approach to employment of illegals is a better way, but I think currently carries a £10K fine.
We can't be that different to Ireland - can we? Goodness knows what's going on.
*with 'Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party" in the most microscopioc small print tucked away vertically in a back corner of the election literature
It is true that, on average, the electoral college works to the Republicans' advantage, and there are two clear cases (2016 and 2000) where it turned a minority of votes into a win.
But, if you look at the detail of Obama v Romney in 2012, Obama distributed his vote more efficiently. That is, the won the national vote share by just shy of 4% BUT Romney would've needed significantly more than a 2% uniform national swing to have got the win the tipping point state (that year) of Colorado.
So it's less likely, but not outlandish by any means, for a Democrat to win on a minority of the popular vote. Clinton distributed her vote exceptionally inefficiently, barely campaigning in places like Wisconsin which was actually a crucial state. It's not a given that all Democrats would do that - Obama didn't.
'SNP honeymoon over'
'has got the Nats rattled'
'Ruth Davidson is also the one leader Sturgeon is still terrified of'
Do you agree with all three points, Scotty?
It's totally understandable people would reason there is negligible chance (1%) of Trump pulling out given he seems up for it, but a marginally less neglible chance (5%) he'd ditch Pence to grab a headline.
Because you know he never meets a woman without his wife present.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8639501/Bill-Clinton-smiles-receiving-neck-massage-Jeffrey-Epstein-victim.html
It might not go on for ever.
Again, Michelle Obama's speech wasn't directed at Republican voters but at galvanising Democrats into activism as well as voting for Biden/Harris.
I don't argue the choice is uninspiring in historic terms but how can you call the Democrat ticket a "shambles" set against Trump/Pence?
It has also had the effect of getting even the most irrationally fearful out of their homes. Even @SandyRentool has used it - and he wears radiation equipment just to fill up his car.
I'm flying out to Greece on Friday. Looks like there's a chance the rising case rate in Greece might make the govt put Greece on the quarantine list (maybe not this week, but more probably next week).
If HMG pulls down the shutters next week when I am sunning myself by the Aegean what is to stop me, when I want to return, simply crossing a border - to Bulgaria or Turkey, and flying back from there, where there is, as yet, no need to self isolate on return?
And it's also the case that "high IQ v charisma" elections often aren't that close at all. Reagan twice stomped fairly heavily on much more traditionally smart candidates.
Also, I think you would yourself say this isn't a "high IQ v charisma" election. It's a folksy charm charisma v bombastic charisma election - neither man is an intellectual.
If you’re travelling from an exempt country you will not need to self-isolate. You should check the list of exempt countries before you travel. If you travel from an exempt country but have been in a country that is not exempt within the last 14 days, you will need to self-isolate for the remainder of the 14 days since you were last in a non-exempt country.
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-how-to-self-isolate-when-you-travel-to-the-uk/coronavirus-covid-19-how-to-self-isolate-when-you-travel-to-the-uk
There's also the question of how much the early week business is affecting the later week and weekend business. My experience of a roast lunch on a Saturday was the venue was exceptionally quiet and the staff confirmed the place was rammed Monday-Wednesday and dead the rest of the week.
If the total volume of business is simply being redistributed and isn't increasing, I can't quite see the benefit except to the consumer early in the week obviously. If the total volume of business is up 10% on what would normally happen because of the scheme, that's excellent and to be welcome.
I wonder if the scheme will be prolonged into September but at £500m a month such largesse isn't going to be on the menu forever (pun intended).
A pleasant soft summer evening, and all the restaurants are absolutely RAMMED with people, young and old, enjoying the Eat Out to Help Out. Several places had long queues.
I did my bit last night with my new girlfriend. Ate her out. Everyone has to help.
And I only remembered that we would get the Rishi discount after we'd sat down and ordered. At an outdoor table. But it was nice to save over a fiver.
I'm still going even if they do put it on the Index Prohibitorum. I'll either wait out the crisis in the Greece, or when I get back, move to some country cottage for a bloody fortnight. Might be nice in t'Autumn