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On the face of this should be a safe CON by-election hold – politicalbetting.com
On the face of this should be a safe CON by-election hold – politicalbetting.com
Following the very sad demise at such a young age of James Brokenshire we now have another Conservative Westminster by-election defence in the offing. The GE2019 outcome from Old Bexley and Sidcup makes it look a very safe seat indeed and it would be a sensation if the Tories do not hold on.
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If followed, this will militate against Labour holding back in Blue Wall seats - it simply can't be reasonable to make it one-way traffic. TimS, a London LibDem member, on the last thread said that he hadn't seen any sign of LD mobilisation for an effort here. Let's hope he's right.
The state "fighting evil" could have in the past in this country (or the present in other countries) led to myself and other individuals on this site being executed in the name of "fighting evil". The state fighting evil has led to atheists, or gays, or women who want to control their own bodies or a plethora of other individuals being executed or persecuted.
The state fighting evil was the notion being Section 28.
It is not the state's job to determine good and evil. But it is all of ours.
In the words of John Stuart Mill:
Let not any one pacify his conscience by the delusion that he can do no harm if he takes no part, and forms no opinion. Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends, than that good men should look on and do nothing. He is not a good man who, without a protest, allows wrong to be committed in his name, and with the means which he helps to supply, because he will not trouble himself to use his mind on the subject.
If you've got lots of assets and not debt, its a different beast.
People speak about how under 40s have no problems with inflation as they've not experienced it - but luckily all those elderly people who did but have accumulated wealth and assets have ensured their children and grandchildren had the same opportunities for wealth. And didn't load them down with debt.
Oh. Oops.
If the LibDems simply made no effort, it wouldn't help Labour much at all.
Anyone who in a discussion about misogyny says "but what about the Jews" . . . there's a rancid antisemitism that sweeps through the left. Until today I thought Northern_Al was better than that, but he's the one who brought Jews into the conversation in unashamed whatabouterism.
‘PM Viktor Orbán has signed a government resolution which supports the decision of the Polish constitutional court about the primacy of national law above EU law.
The resolution also calls on EU institutions to respect national sovereignty.’
https://twitter.com/visegrad24/status/1446784290205966338?s=21
Very important, but it'll not matter for a while.
One irony is that the UK far more than any other nation treated the supremacy of EU law as unchallengeable. In part because we embedded the EU into our own unwritten constitution but the Poles haven't to the same extent.
Certainly in America if there's a conflict between their own Constitution and an international 'law' or agreement then their Constitution remains supreme. There's no real reason why it shouldn't be the same for the Germans and Poles and anyone else.
If that cuts the EU back down to size and makes the principle of subsidiarity actually mean something, then the EU might be better in the long-run for it.
From an LD perspective, this is a poor area. The party has never finished second in the seat - got to within five points of Labour in 2010. Decent improvement to save the deposit in 2019.
Rather like neighbouring Bromley, the LDs enjoyed a brief period of electoral strength locally in the 1990s but lost their last councillor in 2006. In 2018, the party put up a handful of candidates and won 6% of the vote.
I wouldn't describe it as a strong prospect. Labour are, by most measures, the obvious second-placed party but they have an enormous task.
"Remember the Maine" was the cry to encourage an invasion of Cuba, remember Sutton and Cheam 1972, very similat situation. Liberal landslide.
Edit - Oh dear.
12,000 miles away, a dreadful poll for Judith Collins and National showing them a country mile behind Jacinda Ardern's Labour and also losing ground to ACT under David Seymour. Could the unthinkable happen and National drop to third ? Seems inconceivable but the current numbers:
Changes on 2020 election:
Labour: 45.5% (-4.5)
National: 23% (-2.6)
ACT: 16% (+8.4)
Green 9.5% (+1.6)
Māori: 2.0% (+0.8)
New Zealand First: 1.5% (-1.1)
The Opportunities Party: 1.5% (nc)
CON will be down about 50% (62% last time)? LAB and LD fighting for the rest maybe 30% LAB 20% LD?
"Suffice to say that you could make similarly offensive comparisons about the garb of Hasidic Jews in north London. "
This is what was brought up in a conversation about the burqa, a grossly misogynistic outfit purely design for the oppression of women.
Is Hasidic Jews clothing designed to oppress people? Or was this just rancid whataboutery reaching for Jews as an "other"?
You can quote me on that.
Each nation preserves its own sovereignty but (as we now know) only in that it can unilaterally leave the union. It has no other way of overriding the EU or the ECJ. This was thought to be a theoretical sovereignty only, until it wasn't.
If it had been set up only on a basis of a customs union and single market in goods and services, but not people (leaving that to states) we would still be in it by acclamation. No flag, no Euro, no 'parliament'. The ECJ similar to any other international tribunal. In trying to do too much it may still end up destroying itself.
Brexit does rather let the cat out of the bag.
So they REALLY do want to quit, theoretically, but in practice how on earth can they, when they are so reliant on EU trade, subsidies, free movement.
And yet now we see this double-down from Hungary. Where on earth does the compromise come from? I can't see Warsaw simply folding, but then Brussels cannot yield an inch, either
The burqa is dehumanising. It does make people look like letterboxes and bank robbers. If someone can say that but still says it shouldn't be banned, that carries more weight that those in denial who pretend there's nothing wrong with the burqa and its all sunshine and roses.
And this was my response:
Ye gods, for a libertarian that's a bit rich. You say that the burqa "does make people look like letterboxes and bank robbers". It really, really doesn't, does it? Letter box? Bank robber? Look again at a red letter box. It's a bit of poetic licence by Boris, but I don't think he meant it to be taken as literally as you do.
To me, the burqa makes people who wear it look like conservative/traditional Muslim women.
Suffice to say that you could make similarly offensive comparisons about the garb of Hasidic Jews in north London. But even Boris wouldn't really go there, would he?
You really can't accuse me of either a) misogyny, or b) antisemitism.
I took no view on wearing the burqa. I was merely pointing out that while Boris is quite comfortable mocking (yes, mocking) Muslim women, he would not dream of doing the same the same with, for example, Hasidic Jews. Why not? Because he would be accused of anti-Semitism, which is of course a much greater crime than Islamophobia. Of course, he should not mock either.
I didn't want to pursue this, but your slurs are not on.
ANO 72 seats (-6)
SPOLU 71 (+29)
Pirates & Mayors 37 (+9)
Freedom & Direct Democracy 20 (-2)
Communists 0 (-15)
Social Democrats 0 (-15)
SPOLU have outpolled ANO by 0.5% or roughly 27,000 votes.
Even then about 1/3 of the UK thinks we are incapable if being independent and soon we will be eating gravel
No other EU nation matches our profile. To feel the need, and have the ability, to escape the EU you need to be rich, confident, culturally different, and - surely - not already in the euro, which makes departure near impossible.
Denmark? Too small. Sweden? Ditto, but just possibly
If and when the Eastern European countries get richer, as Ireland did, then I reckon they WILL leave. Poland is too proud, as we see
Is it viewing the burqa as a grossly misogynistic outfit purely designed for the oppression of women that you object to?
Or objecting to then talking about Hasidic Jews as equivalent that you object to?
PS its worth remembering that the burqa is not a traditional Muslim outfit. It is a garment that has been promoted by Saudi Arabian Wahhabism. And what was the Saudi Arabian views of women? Oh yes . . . illegal for women to be out without men, illegal for women to drive, illegal for women to [etc]
Hartlepool - Con Gain
Airdrie and Shotts - SNP Hold
Chesham and Mersham - LD Gain
Batley and Spen - Lab Hold
An interesting mix of results.
With Old Bexley and Sidcup (which is a great name just with the simple addition of Old) it means someone at least, probably Con, will get their second win.
According to wiki number of by-elections looks on the face of it to be relatively steady, though 2001 was low (cause being death in brackets):
2019-: 5 (2)
2017-19: 5 (1)
2015-17: 10 (3)
2010-15: 21 (6)
2005-10: 14 (8)
2001-05: 6 (4)
1997-2001: 17 (10)
1992-97: 18 (15)
1987-92: 24 (20)
"TESTOSTERONE FREEFALL: AVERAGE 21YO TODAY HAS SAME LEVELS AS AVG 67YO IN 2001"
https://twitter.com/AndySwan/status/1446531899560767489?s=20
To equate that to Hasidic Judaism is entirely antisemitic.
If we're all honest, it's going to be a Tory hold, so tactical voting arguments should be ignored from whichever side they come.
I despise the burqa and the niqab, and I agree with Philip that they are tools of misogynistic oppression. It is ludicrous to deny this. They are cages to keep women shrouded, to hide away their sexuality. I'm sure some of the wearers get used to them and even like them, but some slaves enjoyed their pampered conditions inside the Big Plantation House. They were still slaves
Would I ban them - like France, Holland, Austria, Switzerland, and others?
Probably not, but I can certainly see the argument. A better focus would be banning places that promote this evil crap, stopping Saudis funding wahhabi mosques and imams, and so on
A failure to do this is one of the reasons the Greens have consistently struggled. They need to have hundreds of volunteers, and their job has to be get past the LibDems. Because if they can't start chalking up some victories, then they won't be supplanting the LibDems.
That is wholly different from criticising the Labour Party as anti-Semitic because of Corbyn's foolish conflation of Israeli foreign/domestic policy with Jewish Labour MPs.
Unless you make a personal apology you are way out of order.
https://tfl.gov.uk/modes/driving/ultra-low-emission-zone/ulez-expansion
It doesn’t reach this seat, but might annoy some people who travel into it.
But that’s the Mayor’s doing.
Some want France to ally with Russia, Zemmour is a big fan of Brexit (ironically) and wants France to forge its own path like the UK
Major turbulence is approaching, in Paris
Some of your posts are valuable. But on this, and several other issues, you're like the pub bore who just keeps on and on and on repeating the same thing in the hope that you will persuade others to your point of view. It's tedious in the extreme.
Eventually, those subjected to the pub bore have had enough and go and drink somewhere else.
"We're not European, how can we be? Europe is miles away over the sea!"
It gets better and better, this one. At first you think "doggerel" then you realize it is actually summing up in a simple but not simplistic way what lies at the very heart of why we've left the EU.
In fact I googled it to see where it came from. It's in loads of anthologies of generally terrible popular doggerel, but it is hard to find the actual author
With the UK we were very near the position where it was impossible to leave (and would have been if we were in the Euro); with most of the rest they are already in that position.
The sane thing would be to renegotiate the stuff now, getting rid of all the things that look like sovereignty before something explodes.
One day soon the US will ask the question: What's the EU's plan for Finland if Russian troops venture in? And all of a sudden the emperor will have no clothes.
Ashley, wahhabi doin arl that teym wi' the Toon, leyk?
On the other hand the state needs to have compelling reasons to ban such things, especially given their religious connotations. I am ambivalent but on balance I think we have such reasons and I would ban the wearing of such garbs in any public spaces. I would also insist that their children attend mainstream schools and are inculcated with our values, including female autonomy and equality. That way lies a better future for all of us.
But this was the case with his writing about the burqa. He presumably thought he had to show his audience that he was on their side with the "jokes", so that he could persuade them that banning it was a lousy idea.
She says Poland 100% has to be in the EU - as a defence against Russia. That is literally a million times more important to the Polish people than anything else.
Yeah that's perfectly normal language to use. And I'm the deranged one. 🤦♂️
BBC Headline.
Zahawi: Pupil absence is a key priority.
If you don't like them, then you either negotiate to change the treaties, or you leave.
There is nothing in the treaties to say that the EU gets a say in national courts and the ECJ ruling was extremely biased to give the EU such a say. In which case I see nothing unreasonable in national courts interpreting the treaties in their own way and saying "no, that's not in the treaty, its not your jurisdiction".
Somebody remarked that the Lib Dems and Labour were fishing in the same pool. This is probably true. But the Lib Dems are also fishing in the same pool as the decent, moderate Conservatives - the ones who are turned off by Johnson and his gang of incompetents. They could be persuaded to vote Lib Dem, but they are most unlikely to go Socialist.
And somebody else again said that the Lib Dems had not started to mobilise the troops. This is hardly surprising. Mr Brokenshire has only just died.
A Czech military-political boffin here:
"Jakub Janda
@_JakubJanda
·
Oct 7
Central and Eastern Europe will never support the French attempt to go sideways and create new defense structures next to NATO in Europe.
We only trust the U.S. military via NATO that they will defend us against a Russian aggression, that is why.
Trust to Paris is low."
https://twitter.com/_JakubJanda/status/1446021574318977028?s=20
Meanwhile, a German europundit writes
"Fact is that only Balts and Poles openly voice their concerns about Macron's push for "independence", but many, many other EU countries are equally concerned and not on board, they just don't want to have that dispute in public."
https://twitter.com/ulrichspeck/status/1446022230564130819?s=20
What a nightmare Nippy and Eck have created.