politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » NEW PB / Polling Matters podcast. So Boris Johnson is PM. What

ydoethur said:

malcolmg said:

Gallowgate said:

Swinsurge continues...

https://twitter.com/britainelects/status/1154536468192382976?s=21

Fantasy

I assure you Gloucester isn't a fantasy Malcolm, I lived there for several years.

Yes but a poncy council seat does not a government make. It is the usual frenzy of fantasy on here. They are just as crap as they were last week, nothing has changed other than a different donkey is pulling the cart. If they are the answer then the country really is well and truly F****d, they are rank rotten, lying toerags without principles.
PS: I am sure Gloucester is a very nice place.

SirNorfolkPassmore said:

malcolmg said:

AndyJS said:

"Meet Carrie Symonds, The Most-Watched Woman In Westminster"

https://www.vogue.co.uk/article/who-is-carrie-symonds

Usual Horses arses faced Tory. Far too much inbreeding down there.

You really are an unpleasant individual. What a nasty, unnecessary comment.

LOL

The Sun’s coverage confirms that Johnson’s proposition is unalloyed, populist, right-wing English nationalism.

https://twitter.com/greenslader/status/1154304486195830784?s=21

malcolmg said:

ydoethur said:

malcolmg said:

Gallowgate said:

Swinsurge continues...

https://twitter.com/britainelects/status/1154536468192382976?s=21

Fantasy

I assure you Gloucester isn't a fantasy Malcolm, I lived there for several years.

Yes but a poncy council seat does not a government make. It is the usual frenzy of fantasy on here. They are just as crap as they were last week, nothing has changed other than a different donkey is pulling the cart. If they are the answer then the country really is well and truly F****d, they are rank rotten, lying toerags without principles.
PS: I am sure Gloucester is a very nice place.

It isn't actually. The Cathedral close is charming and there are some fine buildings - the New Inn, St Mary de Crypt, and the Guildhall spring to mind. But most of it is a concrete jungle due to the tender mercies of a bunch of drunken paederasts, sorry, urban planners in the 1960s who made the architects of Euston look competent. The people also tend to be quite abrupt (cue jokes at my expense) and parochial.

That is why, although I would agree with you about not taking parish (sic) council by-elections too seriously, I would say this is yet another indication of something rather strange going on. The Liberal Democrats should not be winning in Gloucester, especially not this bit, if it is business as usual.

Casino_Royale said:

I’m a regular subscriber to the Spectator.

One of the most irritating things about the election of Boris is how the magazine has gone completely doolally for him. It’s like it’s an in-house journalistic mouthpiece devoted to his advocacy and has lost all objectivity.

This is disappointing as I usually rely on it as a useful and sober perspective on conservative politics.

I may now have to look elsewhere for that.

I'm not unsympathetic - there's no reason why there can't be a critique of the Johnson Government from the centre-right as well. Indeed, the most trenchant criticism of Osborne's economic policies in my view came not from the centre-left but from people like Allister Heath on the monetarist side.

This is the problem generally and it's a big problem on here at the moment.

The tit-for-tat knockabout where a pro-Labour poster has a go at the Conservatives and vice versa and everyone piles in on the LDs is tedious, time wasting pointless piffle. Too many on here do that - big up their own side, attack the other sides and walk away thinking they've contributed.

No, a million times no and it's the same for those who criticise everyone. Relentless negativity about everyone is as tedious as relentless negativity about one side and relentless positivity about another side.

The truly interesting posts and posters are those who dare to critique their own side and praise the opposition side. Genuine insight comes from recognising what your side is doing wrong and what the other side is doing right. Taking that insight and saying it out loud in a forum like this is a step.

To fail to see the mote in one's own eye is as bad as claiming there's only a beam. Shutting down by bluster genuine scrutiny and criticism of your own side by your own side is authoritarian and ultimately counter-productive.

Democracy works when people realise one side doesn't have all the answers or that one minority, or even a majority, are the only group that matters when it comes to policy setting. Parties in Government have a duty to the whole country not just those who voted for them or for a particular policy.

edmundintokyo said:

edmundintokyo said:

I've got something similar here, not working in Chrome, although Firefox is OK. Been this way for a week or two.

I can still see the embedded tweets in Firefox, though.

These are the errors I'm getting - apparently Chrome is applying a content security policy and thinks it's not allowed to load the iframe from vanilla, but I can't see anything in the headers or the source code that sets that, so I guess it's just a setting that Chrome made up.

https://pastebin.com/zxAf0p1h

Looking at those headers and doing some digging, the policy is not being made up by Chrome. The response from Vanilla that contains the comments has a header which includes the directive "Content-Security-Policy: frame-ancestors 'self' www2.politicalbetting.com *politicalbetting.com". That tells the browser that it should only embed the comments in a page from the same source as the comments (i.e. politicalbetting.vanillacommunity.com) or from any domain ending politicalbetting.com. The www2.politicalbetting.com bit of the directive is actually redundant because that will also match *politicalbetting.com. So it appears that Chrome thinks the main page is not from politicalbetting.com but from some other domain. Strange.

New Scientist has a look at what Boris said about science and technology in his opening statement.
https://www.newscientist.com/article/2211206-awkward-truths-about-boris-johnsons-praise-for-uk-science-and-tech/

Though NS does not say it, one can't help wondering if Boris's praise for GMO crops is preparing us to roll over for American demands as part of an FTA.

The Spectator started going downhill when Boris took over. It used to be witty and acute. Boris made it more lifestyle, tribal and boring.

Mexicanpete said:

SouthamObserver said:

Casino_Royale said:

Morris_Dancer said:

Good morning, everyone.

Mr. P, interesting tweet, if accurate (loss of Grayling, very pro-leave and pro-Boris, indicates it might be). If Boris can't even get the hardliners behind him, he's got half a faction.

Difficult to oust a PM. Not so hard to undermine one.

We know he doesn’t have the votes to get the (or his) WA through the HoC. So it looks like he’ll either play Russian roulette with Parliament, or go for a GE if forced.

There’s talk of these magical 40 Labour MPs who might somehow vote it through. They won’t materialise.

Any Labour MPs voting with Johnson would almost certainly be voting to end their political careers. A few are standing down at the next GE, though, so he could get those. Hoey is a given.

Is everyone left in the PLP so browbeaten, resigned or unambitious that they can't muster another challenge to Corbyn?

Johnson has banked on an immediate bounce and that any significant electoral surge for the LDs will damage Labour MP numbers. Under FPTP this will enhance seat numbers for the Tories. The LDs excitement at knocking Labour into third in terms of vote share still leaves us with Johnson.

Johnson can only be pegged back from his 35% voteshare landslide in two ways. A stronger-Corbyn-free Labour leading the charge or mass defections to the LDs by Corbyn-fearng Labour MPs. They need to get off their sorry rumps and do one or tge other.

It speaks volumes too that good people on the Tory side like Grieve are so tribal they too feel they have to stay with the Party and hold their noses. I suspect many, many Tory voters opposed to Johnson will do the same.

At present Johnson looks invincible, all the stars have aligned for a small window at least.

The small window may already be shut.

Let us assume that both of the ideal scenarios for Boris come to pass - Firstly he delivers BREXIT and Farage and co drift toward single figures or secondly having failed to deliver BREXIT in October he goes for a general election on a No Deal prospectus.

The small window might be firmly locked by the reality of economic difficulties as aspects of "Project Fear" begin to take shape and the optics become sub-optimal. Relying on the competence of this administration to steer a steady course might be considered a tad optimistic although in fairness the curse of Grayling has been lifted - a sliver of hope emerges .....

YBarddCwsc said:

The ex Tory MP for Brecon is a "crook" for minor troughing

To be exact, for falsifying a document to support an expenses claim.

Which should bar him from Parliament for terminal stupidity, frankly.

JackW said:

Mexicanpete said:

SouthamObserver said:

Casino_Royale said:

Morris_Dancer said:

Good morning, everyone.

Mr. P, interesting tweet, if accurate (loss of Grayling, very pro-leave and pro-Boris, indicates it might be). If Boris can't even get the hardliners behind him, he's got half a faction.

Difficult to oust a PM. Not so hard to undermine one.

We know he doesn’t have the votes to get the (or his) WA through the HoC. So it looks like he’ll either play Russian roulette with Parliament, or go for a GE if forced.

There’s talk of these magical 40 Labour MPs who might somehow vote it through. They won’t materialise.

Any Labour MPs voting with Johnson would almost certainly be voting to end their political careers. A few are standing down at the next GE, though, so he could get those. Hoey is a given.

Is everyone left in the PLP so browbeaten, resigned or unambitious that they can't muster another challenge to Corbyn?

Johnson has banked on an immediate bounce and that any significant electoral surge for the LDs will damage Labour MP numbers. Under FPTP this will enhance seat numbers for the Tories. The LDs excitement at knocking Labour into third in terms of vote share still leaves us with Johnson.

Johnson can only be pegged back from his 35% voteshare landslide in two ways. A stronger-Corbyn-free Labour leading the charge or mass defections to the LDs by Corbyn-fearng Labour MPs. They need to get off their sorry rumps and do one or tge other.

It speaks volumes too that good people on the Tory side like Grieve are so tribal they too feel they have to stay with the Party and hold their noses. I suspect many, many Tory voters opposed to Johnson will do the same.

At present Johnson looks invincible, all the stars have aligned for a small window at least.

The small window may already be shut.

Let us assume that both of the ideal scenarios for Boris come to pass - Firstly he delivers BREXIT and Farage and co drift toward single figures or secondly having failed to deliver BREXIT in October he goes for a general election on a No Deal prospectus.

The small window might be firmly locked by the reality of economic difficulties as aspects of "Project Fear" begin to take shape and the optics become sub-optimal. Relying on the competence of this administration to steer a steady course might be considered a tad optimistic although in fairness the curse of Grayling has been lifted - a sliver of hope emerges .....

What is remarkable about Johnson’s Cabinet is that Grayling is not in it, but it is still of lower calibre than May’s dire efforts. Williamson at Education is perhaps the worst Cabinet appointment of all time, although Raab at FCO and Patel at the Home Office run it close.

Just been listening to Radio 5. Nikki Campbell has just given Kit Malthouse both barrels because his chum Mark Francois referred to 'Junker in the bunker' on Newsnight last night. "Do you think that's acceptable language?" "Does your friend and colleague have the slightest idea what happened to Luxembourg when the Germans invaded in 1940?"

Lot's of spluttering by the hapless Malthouse. A small sliver of Achilles Heel showing. Like UKIP it's easy to forget the Tories now have their own nutters. Not least Johnson himself.

Clearly the transport system cannot cope without the masterful oversight of Chris Grayling.

F1: current forecast is 67% of thundery showers during qualifying and 50% or so for every hour of the race.

Edited extra bit: still think the 10 each way (fifth the odds top three) on Verstappen in qualifying is worth considering.

Endillion said:

Streeter said:

Endillion said:

TheJezziah said:

https://twitter.com/Otto_English/status/1154438815395864578

https://www.britainfirst.org/best_politically_incorrect_boris_quotes

I figure it would be easier just to list the far right groups that don't like Boris... Just have to find one first.

If I was accustomed to giving credence to such arguments, I'd point out that Putin will presumably be unutterably furious at Johnson's elevation, but would be delighted should he be replaced by your friend from Islington.

On what is your presumption based?

Salisbury.

1) Boris Johnson doesn't care about Salisbury. He cares so little that he ducked out of a Cobra briefing on the subject to be photographed resigning.

2) In the grand scheme of things, Salisbury doesn't matter much to Vladimir Putin anyway. His main strategic aim in Europe is to foment chaos and disorder, so he can divide and rule. Boris Johnson is an ideal choice from that perspective.

YBarddCwsc said:

As usual, a very pious posting from a LibDem ... who actually are some of the worst offenders on here.

When I said I had once voted LibDem, and would never again, I particularly remember a poster who suggested (fallaciously) that I had made up this electoral story.

That poster's name .. err, stodge.

But, this is a typical LibDem act. The bad boys & girls are the Tories and Labour and the SNP who behave like little children, while the "grown up" LibDem party is above such childishness.

The ex Tory MP for Brecon is a "crook" for minor troughing, but the LibDems caught troughing (like David Laws who makes Chris Davies look like a small time apprentice) escape all censure.

Who in the LibDems ever called David Laws a crook? Or censured him at the time?

Pious, eh, I've been called worse.

I regularly criticise my own party on its policies and what it has done and, yes, I critique some of the other parties but I lack the tunnel vision of those who think only one party is ever in the wrong and only one party never criticises its own.

You'd better believe a lot of LDs weren't happy with Laws but in truth many were happy to see him go as he was seen as the extreme end of the Orange Bookers who were ideologically perceived to be too close to Cameron's so-called "liberal conservatism".

You don't like the LDs and think we're all a bunch of hypocrites, then? Fair enough, I'll put you down as a "maybe".

If, however, I impugned you by accusing you of making up a story about having once voted Liberal Democrat, I'm happy to apologise and retract my comment. Clearly, you did once vote LD and have decided you can do so no longer. Fair enough.

El_Capitano said:

prh47bridge said:

edmundintokyo said:

edmundintokyo said:

I've got something similar here, not working in Chrome, although Firefox is OK. Been this way for a week or two.

I can still see the embedded tweets in Firefox, though.

These are the errors I'm getting - apparently Chrome is applying a content security policy and thinks it's not allowed to load the iframe from vanilla, but I can't see anything in the headers or the source code that sets that, so I guess it's just a setting that Chrome made up.

https://pastebin.com/zxAf0p1h

Looking at those headers and doing some digging, the policy is not being made up by Chrome. The response from Vanilla that contains the comments has a header which includes the directive "Content-Security-Policy: frame-ancestors 'self' www2.politicalbetting.com *politicalbetting.com". That tells the browser that it should only embed the comments in a page from the same source as the comments (i.e. politicalbetting.vanillacommunity.com) or from any domain ending politicalbetting.com. The www2.politicalbetting.com bit of the directive is actually redundant because that will also match *politicalbetting.com. So it appears that Chrome thinks the main page is not from politicalbetting.com but from some other domain. Strange.

Off the top of my head (am on mobile, on holiday) I doubt *politicalbetting.com is valid. It should presumably be *.politicalbetting.com, i.e. with a dot to denote subdomain.

Very interesting Gloucestershire comments. I’m keeping a particular eye on Cotswold as it borders my area (West Oxfordshire) and is similar politically - indeed the two are outsourcing partners. It’s possible, even likely, WODC will fall to NOC next time.

South Oxfordshire and Vale of White Horse already are LD.

Remain voting West Oxfordshire could go too but Leave voting Cherwell (the only Leave area in Oxfordshire) is still pretty solid Tory

SouthamObserver said:

JackW said:

Mexicanpete said:

SouthamObserver said:

Casino_Royale said:

Morris_Dancer said:

Good morning, everyone.

Mr. P, interesting tweet, if accurate (loss of Grayling, very pro-leave and pro-Boris, indicates it might be). If Boris can't even get the hardliners behind him, he's got half a faction.

Difficult to oust a PM. Not so hard to undermine one.

We know he doesn’t have the votes to get the (or his) WA through the HoC. So it looks like he’ll either play Russian roulette with Parliament, or go for a GE if forced.

There’s talk of these magical 40 Labour MPs who might somehow vote it through. They won’t materialise.

Any Labour MPs voting with Johnson would almost certainly be voting to end their political careers. A few are standing down at the next GE, though, so he could get those. Hoey is a given.

Is everyone left in the PLP so browbeaten, resigned or unambitious that they can't muster another challenge to Corbyn?

Johnson has banked on an immediate bounce and the Tory side like Grieve are so tribal they too feel they have to stay with the Party and hold their noses. I suspect many, many Tory voters opposed to Johnson will do the same.

At present Johnson looks invincible, all the stars have aligned for a small window at least.

The small window may already be shut.

Let us assume that both of the ideal scenarios for Boris come to pass - Firstly he delivers BREXIT and Farage and co drift toward single figures or secondly having failed to deliver BREXIT in October he goes for a general election on a No Deal prospectus.

The small window might be firmly locked by the reality of economic difficulties as aspects of "Project Fear" begin to take shape and the optics become sub-optimal. Relying on the competence of this administration to steer a steady course might be considered a tad optimistic although in fairness the curse of Grayling has been lifted - a sliver of hope emerges .....

What is remarkable about Johnson’s Cabinet is that Grayling is not in it, but it is still of lower calibre than May’s dire efforts. Williamson at Education is perhaps the worst Cabinet appointment of all time, although Raab at FCO and Patel at the Home Office run it close.

Panel's tough on crime message will go down well with working class voters

Scott_P said:

Boris Johnson’s attempts to lock in the support of hardline Tory Eurosceptics suffered a serious blow last night after one of the most senior Brexiteer MPs angrily turned down a ministerial role.

In the first rift between the new prime minister and the faction that backed him for the leadership, Steve Baker told Mr Johnson that a job in the Brexit department would have left him “powerless”.

Tory Eurosceptics accused Mr Johnson of “binning off” the European Research Group of Brexiteers now that he was in power. They blamed Dominic Cummings, the former head of Vote Leave, who has been appointed the most senior adviser in Downing Street.

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/tory-right-s-anger-over-dominic-cummings-job-as-senior-aide-to-johnson-75k5m69n9

Unsatisfiable. Boris has a lot of unreasonable people to grapple with, let's see how long his optimistic attitude lasts.

SquareRoot said:

Gardenwalker said:

The Spectator started going downhill when Boris took over. It used to be witty and acute. Boris made it more lifestyle, tribal and boring.

You mean he tried to make it accessible to a wider audience.....

Yep. Like Love Island.

TheJezziah said:

AlastairMeeks said:

Endillion said:

Streeter said:

Endillion said:

TheJezziah said:

https://twitter.com/Otto_English/status/1154438815395864578

https://www.britainfirst.org/best_politically_incorrect_boris_quotes

I figure it would be easier just to list the far right groups that don't like Boris... Just have to find one first.

If I was accustomed to giving credence to such arguments, I'd point out that Putin will presumably be unutterably furious at Johnson's elevation, but would be delighted should he be replaced by your friend from Islington.

On what is your presumption based?

Salisbury.

1) Boris Johnson doesn't care about Salisbury. He cares so little that he ducked out of a Cobra briefing on the subject to be photographed resigning.

2) In the grand scheme of things, Salisbury doesn't matter much to Vladimir Putin anyway. His main strategic aim in Europe is to foment chaos and disorder, so he can divide and rule. Boris Johnson is an ideal choice from that perspective.

It is almost a struggle to come up with two better picks than Boris and Trump, Farage maybe, but from a Putin perspective those 2 and their policies are almost perfect.

It isn't for nothing that Putin seems to go for populist right wing Eurosceptic parties, the pattern repeats over a few countries.

Jeremy Corbyn would be a top pick for Vladimir Putin too. The destruction of NATO is a strategic objective and he'd effectively achieve it then without a shot being fired.

TheJezziah said:

ydoethur said:

TheJezziah said:

ydoethur said:

TheJezziah said:

ydoethur said:

It would be amusing to see Casino Royale defending racism among Boris' acolytes and The Jezziah attacking it - in an exact about turn of the discussions over THAT mural - if it wasn't just deeply depressing that this is what we have come to.

I'm not sure people who voted for the woman who sent go home vans around the place have too much to feel high and mighty about.

You cheerfully vote for Corbyn and I note you have actually given up trying to defend his track record on antisemitism. That said, so has he.

The problem is less who we are voting for than the awfulness of the choice facing us. May at least had redeeming features - determination, intelligence and an ability to construct a vaguely coherent sentence. That's why I felt able to vote for her despite misgivings over some of her policies, especially as Labour had put forward a fantasy that would, if they even tried to implement it, have caused economic and social meltdown.

But Corbyn and Johnson have none.

Hmm that is strange... you made a comment about my lack of defence but I have searched your comment and can't find your defence of the racism and xenophobia you voted for?

Being a little hypocritical are we?

Also I can understand why the no deal rhetoric would sound like intelligence and economic competence to a certain kind of person, just not an intelligent or economically competent one.

I have never supported no deal rhetoric. If you have nothing to say, at least don't make things up.

And I note you still haven't addressed the main point. Don't you find it depressing that at the moment we have simple tribal mudslinging over racism, when it's eating its way into both main parties (and it's not as though the Liberal Democrats, the Greens and SNP are immune, and as for UKIP and the Faragistas...)

I'm more concerned that instead of its being addressed as a general problem that needs sorting out, it's being used in an attempt to score political points - as you are doing.

I don't think you are deeply concerned at all, you have been consistent in using it as a political weapon against Corbyn who you oppose for other reasons and now when I call you out on your own voting all of a sudden you are concerned about it being used for political point scoring?!

Not buying it.

It was May's rhetoric and you who said she was intelligent, you didn't mention economic competence though (I seemed to imagine that part...)

Are you saying I should not criticise Corbyn for his awkward issues around racism just because I also think he's a liar, a fool and a bully peddling discredited shibboleths of nineteenth century philosophers?

Am I seeing things or did the Yellow Peril win both Glouceter by-elections yesterday?

Is so, when will HYUFD be along to explain how this demonstrates the Boris bounce?

El_Capitano said:

prh47bridge said:

edmundintokyo said:

edmundintokyo said:

I've got something similar here, not working in Chrome, although Firefox is OK. Been this way for a week or two.

I can still see the embedded tweets in Firefox, though.

These are the errors I'm getting - apparently Chrome is applying a content security policy and thinks it's not allowed to load the iframe from vanilla, but I can't see anything in the headers or the source code that sets that, so I guess it's just a setting that Chrome made up.

https://pastebin.com/zxAf0p1h

Looking at those headers and doing some digging, the policy is not being made up by Chrome. The response from Vanilla that contains the comments has a header which includes the directive "Content-Security-Policy: frame-ancestors 'self' www2.politicalbetting.com *politicalbetting.com". That tells the browser that it should only embed the comments in a page from the same source as the comments (i.e. politicalbetting.vanillacommunity.com) or from any domain ending politicalbetting.com. The www2.politicalbetting.com bit of the directive is actually redundant because that will also match *politicalbetting.com. So it appears that Chrome thinks the main page is not from politicalbetting.com but from some other domain. Strange.

Off the top of my head (am on mobile, on holiday) I doubt *politicalbetting.com is valid. It should presumably be *.politicalbetting.com, i.e. with a dot to denote subdomain.

That's certainly what I would do although the information on Mozilla is unclear. However, having done some further digging and looked at the w3c standard I believe you are correct. So this is another Vanilla issue.

Recidivist said:

Gallowgate said:

Swinsurge continues...

https://twitter.com/britainelects/status/1154536468192382976?s=21

HYUFD might want to note that even if the Tories had been able to get all the Brexit Party votes behind them they'd have still lost to the Lib Dems. It might well be that delivering Brexit might be just as harmful to the Conservatives as it would be to business.

I note in Gloucester Podsmead the LDs beat the Tories by just 3 votes with the Brexit Party gaining 16% so your conclusion does not hold up there.

Last time Labour beat the Tories there by 30 votes, this time Labour's vote collapsed by over 30%

DecrepitJohnL said:

New Scientist has a look at what Boris said about science and technology in his opening statement.
https://www.newscientist.com/article/2211206-awkward-truths-about-boris-johnsons-praise-for-uk-science-and-tech/

Mainly bluster.
The idea that we 'lead the world' in battery technology is utterly risible.

Casino_Royale said:

Morris_Dancer said:

Good morning, everyone.

Mr. P, interesting tweet, if accurate (loss of Grayling, very pro-leave and pro-Boris, indicates it might be). If Boris can't even get the hardliners behind him, he's got half a faction.

Difficult to oust a PM. Not so hard to undermine one.

We know he doesn’t have the votes to get the (or his) WA through the HoC. So it looks like he’ll either play Russian roulette with Parliament, or go for a GE if forced.

There’s talk of these magical 40 Labour MPs who might somehow vote it through. They won’t materialise.

If they didn't under May they wont under Boris.

This issue should be on merits and not on how nasty the PM is but we have seen previously they use that as an excuse not to vote to leave while claiming they want to.

Peter_the_Punter said:

Am I seeing things or did the Yellow Peril win both Glouceter by-elections yesterday?

Is so, when will HYUFD be along to explain how this demonstrates the Boris bounce?

Tories lost Podsmead by 30 votes last time to Labour, Tories lost Podsmead by just 3 votes last night to the LDs

tpfkar said:

Peter_the_Punter said:

Am I seeing things or did the Yellow Peril win both Glouceter by-elections yesterday?

Is so, when will HYUFD be along to explain how this demonstrates the Boris bounce?

It was also the first time the Brexit party stood, and in one seat scored over 100 votes with the Lib Dem’s winning by 3. So I’m sure that HYUFD will also explain how Boris unites the leave side and splits the remain side! Some call it the Boris effect....

Though the BXP got a lower share than UKIP did previously. Like the Euros it was just pretending not a surge.

SquareRoot said:

TOPPING said:

SquareRoot said:

Gardenwalker said:

The Spectator started going downhill when Boris took over. It used to be witty and acute. Boris made it more lifestyle, tribal and boring.

You mean he tried to make it accessible to a wider audience.....

Yep. Like Love Island.

NO Love Island is the reverse. I think trying to make even the C2 D's and E's lose interest. The mere mention of it gets people sighing with disgust.

I thought the viewing figures said otherwise.

tpfkar said:

Peter_the_Punter said:

Am I seeing things or did the Yellow Peril win both Glouceter by-elections yesterday?

Is so, when will HYUFD be along to explain how this demonstrates the Boris bounce?

It was also the first time the Brexit party stood, and in one seat scored over 100 votes with the Lib Dem’s winning by 3. So I’m sure that HYUFD will also explain how Boris unites the leave side and splits the remain side! Some call it the Boris effect....

Brexit Party well below the 20% or so last night they were polling pre Boris.

Boris will pick up Labour Leave seats even if he loses a few to the LDs it will still be a net gain as there are more marginal Labour Leave seats than marginal Tory Remain seats.

LDs won council by elections even before the 2017 general election when they got 7%

HYUFD said:

El_Capitano said:

prh47bridge said:

edmundintokyo said:

edmundintokyo said:

I've got something similar here, not working in Chrome, although Firefox is OK. Been this way for a week or two.

I can still see the embedded tweets in Firefox, though.

These are the errors I'm getting - apparently Chrome is applying a content security policy and thinks it's not allowed to load the iframe from vanilla, but I can't see anything in the headers or the source code that sets that, so I guess it's just a setting that Chrome made up.

https://pastebin.com/zxAf0p1h

Looking at those headers and doing some digging, the policy is not being made up by Chrome. The response from Vanilla that contains the comments has a header which includes the directive "Content-Security-Policy: frame-ancestors 'self' www2.politicalbetting.com *politicalbetting.com". That tells the browser that it should only embed the comments in a page from the same source as the comments (i.e. politicalbetting.vanillacommunity.com) or from any domain ending politicalbetting.com. The www2.politicalbetting.com bit of the directive is actually redundant because that will also match *politicalbetting.com. So it appears that Chrome thinks the main page is not from politicalbetting.com but from some other domain. Strange.

Off the top of my head (am on mobile, on holiday) I doubt *politicalbetting.com is valid. It should presumably be *.politicalbetting.com, i.e. with a dot to denote subdomain.

Very interesting Gloucestershire comments. I’m keeping a particular eye on Cotswold as it borders my area (West Oxfordshire) and is similar politically - indeed the two are outsourcing partners. It’s possible, even likely, WODC will fall to NOC next time.

South Oxfordshire and Vale of White Horse already are LD.

Remain voting West Oxfordshire could go too but Leave voting Cherwell (the only Leave area in Oxfordshire) is still pretty solid Tory

Cotswolds was one of the few non-metropolitan areas in the country to vote Remain.

SquareRoot said:

Gardenwalker said:

The Spectator started going downhill when Boris took over. It used to be witty and acute. Boris made it more lifestyle, tribal and boring.

You mean he tried to make it accessible to a wider audience.....

Potentially. Certainly readership went up, but it has been going up consistently since the 90s and this has continued under Fraser.

I see Carole Codswallop was spreading fake news again last night:

https://order-order.com/2019/07/26/caroles-cadwalladrs-latest-miscarriage-justice/

YBarddCwsc said:

And in turn, I happily agree that you are much more independent LibDem than most, and if you were on my ballot paper, the pen might hover over your name.

I'll take that, my friend. Have a good day and I'll rely on you to hold me to the mark.

I am expecting a fabulous summer of positioning and posturing. The Tories will be in Panto season - we're going to do no deal! Oh no you're not! Oh yes we are! Plenty of choices pf panto villain with all the people sacked now sitting on the back benches.

Labour will continue life in The Matrix - in the mistaken belief that Corbyn is Prime Minister in waiting and that they can truly understand the world around them. Not seeing that in reality they are a withered husk plugged into a machine that the Jeremy cannpt comprehend.

The LibDems will be wanting to build on their stupendous 3 vote win landslide in Gloucester yesterday - poaching sane MPs from the Panto and The Matrix being their focus.

ydoethur said:

tpfkar said:

Peter_the_Punter said:

Am I seeing things or did the Yellow Peril win both Glouceter by-elections yesterday?

Is so, when will HYUFD be along to explain how this demonstrates the Boris bounce?

It was also the first time the Brexit party stood, and in one seat scored over 100 votes with the Lib Dem’s winning by 3. So I’m sure that HYUFD will also explain how Boris unites the leave side and splits the remain side! Some call it the Boris effect....

I think it is fair to say Boris blew his first test in the job.

I'll get my coat...

Have a good morning.

Even Tony Blair lost council by elections before his 2001 general election re election landslide and the Tories did better last night than Labour.

I expect the next poll to show bounces for both the Boris led Tory Party and Swinson's LDs with Corbyn Labour third, maybe even 4th behind the Brexit Party in a poll in the next few weeks

Peter_the_Punter said:

HYUFD said:

El_Capitano said:

prh47bridge said:

edmundintokyo said:

edmundintokyo said:

I've got something similar here, not working in Chrome, although Firefox is OK. Been this way for a week or two.

I can still see the embedded tweets in Firefox, though.

These are the errors I'm getting - apparently Chrome is applying a content security policy and thinks it's not allowed to load the iframe from vanilla, but I can't see anything in the headers or the source code that sets that, so I guess it's just a setting that Chrome made up.

https://pastebin.com/zxAf0p1h

Looking at those headers and doing some digging, the policy is not being made up by Chrome. The response from Vanilla that contains the comments has a header which includes the directive "Content-Security-Policy: frame-ancestors 'self' www2.politicalbetting.com *politicalbetting.com". That tells the browser that it should only embed the comments in a page from the same source as the comments (i.e. politicalbetting.vanillacommunity.com) or from any domain ending politicalbetting.com. The www2.politicalbetting.com bit of the directive is actually redundant because that will also match *politicalbetting.com. So it appears that Chrome thinks the main page is not from politicalbetting.com but from some other domain. Strange.

Off the top of my head (am on mobile, on holiday) I doubt *politicalbetting.com is valid. It should presumably be *.politicalbetting.com, i.e. with a dot to denote subdomain.

Very interesting Gloucestershire comments. I’m keeping a particular eye on Cotswold as it borders my area (West Oxfordshire) and is similar politically - indeed the two are outsourcing partners. It’s possible, even likely, WODC will fall to NOC next time.

South Oxfordshire and Vale of White Horse already are LD.

Remain voting West Oxfordshire could go too but Leave voting Cherwell (the only Leave area in Oxfordshire) is still pretty solid Tory

Cotswolds was one of the few non-metropolitan areas in the country to vote Remain.

Cotswold is full of second homes for wealthy Londoners

@SouthamObserver

While I share your low opinion of most of the cabinet, particularly Williamson and Patel, Raab at the FCO is a different kettle of fish. He has years of experience working at the FCO in the New Labour era, indeed a CV which suits a SJW, including human rights activism, working for the ICC, Liberty and even Palestinian government. From Wikipedia:


"After leaving Cambridge, Raab worked at Linklaters in London, completing his two-year training contract at the firm and then leaving shortly after qualifying as a solicitor in 2000. Whilst at Linklaters he worked on project finance, international litigation and competition law. This included time on secondments at Liberty (the human rights NGO) and in Brussels advising on EU and WTO law.[15][third-party source needed] He spent the summer of 1998 at Birzeit University near Ramallah, Palestine's de facto capital on the West Bank, where he worked for one of the principal Palestinian negotiators of the Oslo peace accords, assessing World Bank projects on the West Bank.

Raab joined the Foreign Office in 2000, covering a range of briefs including leading a team at the British Embassy in The Hague, dedicated to bringing war criminals to justice. After returning to London, he advised on the Arab–Israeli conflict, the European Union, and Gibraltar. "

tlg86 said:

I see Carole Codswallop was spreading fake news again last night:

https://order-order.com/2019/07/26/caroles-cadwalladrs-latest-miscarriage-justice/

You're turning to Paul Staines for reputable journalism?

TheJezziah said:

AlastairMeeks said:

TheJezziah said:

AlastairMeeks said:

Endillion said:

Streeter said:

Endillion said:

TheJezziah said:

https://twitter.com/Otto_English/status/1154438815395864578

https://www.britainfirst.org/best_politically_incorrect_boris_quotes

I figure it would be easier just to list the far right groups that don't like Boris... Just have to find one first.

If I was accustomed to giving credence to such arguments, I'd point out that Putin will presumably be unutterably furious at Johnson's elevation, but would be delighted should he be replaced by your friend from Islington.

On what is your presumption based?

Salisbury.

1) Boris Johnson doesn't care about Salisbury. He cares so little that he ducked out of a Cobra briefing on the subject to be photographed resigning.

2) In the grand scheme of things, Salisbury doesn't matter much to Vladimir Putin anyway. His main strategic aim in Europe is to foment chaos and disorder, so he can divide and rule. Boris Johnson is an ideal choice from that perspective.

It is almost a struggle to come up with two better picks than Boris and Trump, Farage maybe, but from a Putin perspective those 2 and their policies are almost perfect.

It isn't for nothing that Putin seems to go for populist right wing Eurosceptic parties, the pattern repeats over a few countries.

Jeremy Corbyn would be a top pick for Vladimir Putin too. The destruction of NATO is a strategic objective and he'd effectively achieve it then without a shot being fired.

TBH Corbyn will probably have little effect, even if he won a big majority I couldn't see him leaving NATO, I'm not sure it is a huge priority of his.

Whereas no deal clearly is on the Boris agenda.

Given the choice in an upcoming election Putin would almost undoubtedly favour Boris and his no deal platform winning.

If, say, Estonia is invaded by Russia at a time when Britain's Prime Minister is Jeremy Corbyn, do you think Britain would send troops to honour its NATO Article 5 obligations?

FrancisUrquhart said:

Mysticrose said:

tlg86 said:

I see Carole Codswallop was spreading fake news again last night:

https://order-order.com/2019/07/26/caroles-cadwalladrs-latest-miscarriage-justice/

You're turning to Paul Staines for reputable journalism?

Well codswallop has had to apologize yet again, so in this case it appears he is correct.

I don't know. Staines has been completely wrong about her so many times I no longer read him. And I don't take any note of what he says. He's descended into a nasty rabid right-wing thug who pedals half-baked stories.

Mr. Jessop, I watched most of a race (think I stumbled across it when I had time to kill).

It was interesting but very little overtaking (hard to say if that was due to the circuit) and, of course, much slower than F1. I still think it's going to do more harm than good, though.

AlastairMeeks said:

TheJezziah said:

AlastairMeeks said:

TheJezziah said:

AlastairMeeks said:

Endillion said:

Streeter said:

Endillion said:

TheJezziah said:

https://twitter.com/Otto_English/status/1154438815395864578

https://www.britainfirst.org/best_politically_incorrect_boris_quotes

I figure it would be easier just to list the far right groups that don't like Boris... Just have to find one first.

If I was accustomed to giving credence to such arguments, I'd point out that Putin will presumably be unutterably furious at Johnson's elevation, but would be delighted should he be replaced by your friend from Islington.

On what is your presumption based?

Salisbury.

1) Boris Johnson doesn't care about Salisbury. He cares so little that he ducked out of a Cobra briefing on the subject to be photographed resigning.

2) In the grand scheme of things, Salisbury doesn't matter much to Vladimir Putin anyway. His main strategic aim in Europe is to foment chaos and disorder, so he can divide and rule. Boris Johnson is an ideal choice from that perspective.

It is almost a struggle to come up with two better picks than Boris and Trump, Farage maybe, but from a Putin perspective those 2 and their policies are almost perfect.

It isn't for nothing that Putin seems to go for populist right wing Eurosceptic parties, the pattern repeats over a few countries.

Jeremy Corbyn would be a top pick for Vladimir Putin too. The destruction of NATO is a strategic objective and he'd effectively achieve it then without a shot being fired.

TBH Corbyn will probably have little effect, even if he won a big majority I couldn't see him leaving NATO, I'm not sure it is a huge priority of his.

Whereas no deal clearly is on the Boris agenda.

Given the choice in an upcoming election Putin would almost undoubtedly favour Boris and his no deal platform winning.

If, say, Estonia is invaded by Russia at a time when Britain's Prime Minister is Jeremy Corbyn, do you think Britain would send troops

It's possible Corbyn could send troops but I think Putin will be able to manage on his own.

Mysticrose said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

Mysticrose said:

tlg86 said:

I see Carole Codswallop was spreading fake news again last night:

https://order-order.com/2019/07/26/caroles-cadwalladrs-latest-miscarriage-justice/

You're turning to Paul Staines for reputable journalism?

Well codswallop has had to apologize yet again, so in this case it appears he is correct.

I don't know. Staines has been completely wrong about her so many times I no longer read him. And I don't take any note of what he says. He's descended into a nasty rabid right-wing thug who pedals half-baked stories.

But she apologised. Whatever one thinks of Staines, who obviously is no objective source, her apology shows she was wrong. Ignoring her own apology because of Staines seems a peculiar thing to do. You aren't ignoring what he says, you're ignoring what she said.

Even people we dislike or who are awful can occasionally be right.