The same model that picked an Al Gore landslide in 2000 and a Hillary Clinton landslide in 2016?
No. You clearly didn't read the article.
The model is said to have correctly predicted the popular vote in every election since 1948, other than 1968 and 1976.
Though xkcd applies to any predictions like this anyone decent will I think hope that the model is right.
The Electoral College wins the presidency not the popular vote as 2000 and 2016 showed
If it had been the Republican Party that won the popular vote but lost the ECV twice in as many decades, there might be more of a clamour to do something about it.
@HYUFD I thought you said there would be no tax increases? I’m confused.
National Insurance is not a tax or should not be
I mean, it is a tax. The revenue goes into general taxation. Are you trying to suggest it’s not an income tax? Different thing.
It was set up to fund state pensions and healthcare and welfare as an insurance only, not as a tax to fund general governmemt spending like income tax.
That is how I would fund social care, however the BBC article makes clear the Government were considering free personal care entirely, given currently you have to pay for care costs down to your last £25 000 excluding your house for at home care rather than tax rises ruled out by the Tory manifesto
Anecdotally on virus stuff, I think London is now down to a very low level. We should be allowed to open up the shops and outdoor businesses fully.
Complete and dangerous nonsense.
The UK went from a handful of cases to an epidemic killing 35k+ people in reasonably short order.
There should be an easing but gradual, managed, backed by reasonably effective track and trace, and with a close eye at all stages on infection rates so we can go into reverse if required.
Except they've done exactly that in Germany and new case numbers have continued to drop.
Releasing the lockdown will probably be slow and go on for a long time. In London specifically there is an issue over social distancing on public transport. Until this is relaxed the tube cannot operate at full capacity meaning that the London economy cannot fully reopen.
There is a massive unknown as to whether relaxing the lockdown will lead to a large second wave of the infection. Therefore the government will watch to see what happens in other European countries and continue to slowly relax the lockdown. The short term options open to the government are clear and restricted. In the long term all options are possible.
The same model that picked an Al Gore landslide in 2000 and a Hillary Clinton landslide in 2016?
No. You clearly didn't read the article.
The model is said to have correctly predicted the popular vote in every election since 1948, other than 1968 and 1976.
Though xkcd applies to any predictions like this anyone decent will I think hope that the model is right.
The Electoral College wins the presidency not the popular vote as 2000 and 2016 showed
If it had been the Republican Party that won the popular vote but lost the ECV twice in as many decades, there might be more of a clamour to do something about it.
To be honest, there would have been exactly the same amount of clamour but from a different set of people.
@HYUFD I thought you said there would be no tax increases? I’m confused.
National Insurance is not a tax or should not be
I mean, it is a tax. The revenue goes into general taxation. Are you trying to suggest it’s not an income tax? Different thing.
It was set up to fund state pensions and healthcare and welfare as an insurance only, not as a tax to fund general governmemt spending like income tax.
That is how I would fund social care, however the BBC article makes clear the Government were considering free personal care entirely, given currently you have to pay for care costs down to your last £25 000 excluding your house for at home care rather than tax rises ruled out by the Tory manifesto
It doesn’t matter what it was set up to do, that’s not what it is used for. It funds general government spending just like income tax does.
Davey's positioning the party to the right of the Conservatives on economics is brave. He might look very clever this time next year, or he risks reminding voters that when push comes to shove, the LibDems back the Tories.
I think the key point is that when push comes to shove, the Tories will back other parties (including the Lib Dems) and work with them for the duration of the agreement, while Labour simply don't play well with others.
I had a look at the history of hung Parliaments and times when the ruling party had a very weak majority - the Tories are far more likely to talk with others and agree compromise, while Labour have a tendency to insist on going it alone.
It rather surprised me; I'd have thought it was the other way around.
Callaghan was propped up by the Liberals as was Macdonald
As an ex-LD (and Lib) I'm very saddened by what a campaigning party has become. I fear that Clegg will be regarded in history as a someone who did more damage to the Lib/LD brand than Lloyd-George did; at least the latter started out well. The more that come out out about the long term-effect of the Coalition's social policies, the worse it seems. Initially I supported the Coalition if only because a) the country needed a Government, b) the arithmetic meant a Conservative or Conservative-led one was the only option and c) I hoped the LDs would have some ameliorating effect on what seemed a Rightward drift by the Conservative back-benchers. However, IMHO Clegg made two disastrous mistakes. He didn't insist on one of the Great Offices, which almost certainly meant Theresa May was promoted above her ability, instead taking the non-job of Deputy PM and secondly he kept the Coalition going right up until the last minute. Three years would have been plenty, after which the LD's could have reverted to C&S and could have stressed their differences.
Now the Party needs a Grimond or an Ashdown, and, TBH, I don't see one anywhere,
Good post. Interesting that CHB was lamenting a couple days ago that on PB.com conservatism is over-represented. I don`t see that at all. A lot of posters seem to be liberals though.
Yes, the last survey of how PBers voted after the 2015 general election showed more PBers voted LD than the general population but fewer PBers voted UKIP.
PBers voted Tory and Labour in about the same percentage as the general public
On what voodoo poll do you base that final statement? With all due respect anecdotally that sounds like nonsense.
It is not voodoo, it was a poll organised by OGH himself of posters.
We are due another though
It doesn't matter who organised it, its still voodoo.
Received my Covid S/E Grant yesterday. I couldn`t be more impressed with the implementation of this. Credit where credit`s due.
There is so much criticism of the Government but the Furlough/Self Employed schemes are an awesome achievement.
I don't think many have criticised the Treasury response - so far its been the only clearly competent part of the government.
However, its big test is still to come. So far they have incentivised inactivity (while staving off economic meltdown).
Can Sunak work out how to incentivise productive employment, as the current schemes cannot work for much longer ?
Giving away vast amounts of other people's money to willing recipients is one of the less complex aspects of government. I don't want to under rate the achievement, but the test will be the later stages: getting going again, unemployment figures, taxation, servicing the interest and paying back the debt, avoiding inflation, avoiding pension funds going bust etc.
As an ex-LD (and Lib) I'm very saddened by what a campaigning party has become. I fear that Clegg will be regarded in history as a someone who did more damage to the Lib/LD brand than Lloyd-George did; at least the latter started out well. The more that come out out about the long term-effect of the Coalition's social policies, the worse it seems. Initially I supported the Coalition if only because a) the country needed a Government, b) the arithmetic meant a Conservative or Conservative-led one was the only option and c) I hoped the LDs would have some ameliorating effect on what seemed a Rightward drift by the Conservative back-benchers. However, IMHO Clegg made two disastrous mistakes. He didn't insist on one of the Great Offices, which almost certainly meant Theresa May was promoted above her ability, instead taking the non-job of Deputy PM and secondly he kept the Coalition going right up until the last minute. Three years would have been plenty, after which the LD's could have reverted to C&S and could have stressed their differences.
Now the Party needs a Grimond or an Ashdown, and, TBH, I don't see one anywhere,
Good post. Interesting that CHB was lamenting a couple days ago that on PB.com conservatism is over-represented. I don`t see that at all. A lot of posters seem to be liberals though.
Yes, the last survey of how PBers voted after the 2015 general election showed more PBers voted LD than the general population but fewer PBers voted UKIP.
PBers voted Tory and Labour in about the same percentage as the general public
On what voodoo poll do you base that final statement? With all due respect anecdotally that sounds like nonsense.
Its actually quite plausible.
Whenever people have tried to draw up lists of how they think people voted PB is remarkably similar to the general public across parties and Leave/Remain.
I think the only reason some leftwing posters tend to feel like they're not represented properly is they fail to recognise each other as left wing.
I think that is an interesting observation. There are definitely quite a few 'Liberals' as opposed to 'Social Democrats' on this site and as a demographic that doesn't surprise me that they are drawn to the site. I suspect that Tories will consider them 'leftwing' whereas they may not consider themselves so. I have been accused for being a leftie on several occasions by Tories whom I consider to be left of me when it comes to both business and freedoms.
So I think your observation is correct, although I dispute lots of us are actually leftwing (Catch 22). I'm definitely not.
Well indeed, there's definitely a strong liberal contingent here.
The funny thing with left v liberal is that the left tends to view liberals as "not left" when it suits them (eg complaining the site is biased) but then on election day deems it as read that the liberals must want a Labour government.
I was more thinking there's a distinction between what you might term the Blair-style centre-left Labour (eg SouthamObserver etc) and the Corbyn-style far-left (eg BigJohnOwls etc)
Haven’t seen the COVID-19 Symptom Survey from Kings College mention here for a while. As of yesterday, they estimate c. 275,000 to be “with COVID” compared to less than 250,000 this time last week. An increase of over 10%.
As an ex-LD (and Lib) I'm very saddened by what a campaigning party has become. I fear that Clegg will be regarded in history as a someone who did more damage to the Lib/LD brand than Lloyd-George did; at least the latter started out well. The more that come out out about the long term-effect of the Coalition's social policies, the worse it seems. Initially I supported the Coalition if only because a) the country needed a Government, b) the arithmetic meant a Conservative or Conservative-led one was the only option and c) I hoped the LDs would have some ameliorating effect on what seemed a Rightward drift by the Conservative back-benchers. However, IMHO Clegg made two disastrous mistakes. He didn't insist on one of the Great Offices, which almost certainly meant Theresa May was promoted above her ability, instead taking the non-job of Deputy PM and secondly he kept the Coalition going right up until the last minute. Three years would have been plenty, after which the LD's could have reverted to C&S and could have stressed their differences.
Now the Party needs a Grimond or an Ashdown, and, TBH, I don't see one anywhere,
Good post. Interesting that CHB was lamenting a couple days ago that on PB.com conservatism is over-represented. I don`t see that at all. A lot of posters seem to be liberals though.
Yes, the last survey of how PBers voted after the 2015 general election showed more PBers voted LD than the general population but fewer PBers voted UKIP.
PBers voted Tory and Labour in about the same percentage as the general public
On what voodoo poll do you base that final statement? With all due respect anecdotally that sounds like nonsense.
It is not voodoo, it was a poll organised by OGH himself of posters.
We are due another though
It doesn't matter who organised it, its still voodoo.
The same model that picked an Al Gore landslide in 2000 and a Hillary Clinton landslide in 2016?
No. You clearly didn't read the article.
The model is said to have correctly predicted the popular vote in every election since 1948, other than 1968 and 1976.
Though xkcd applies to any predictions like this anyone decent will I think hope that the model is right.
The Electoral College wins the presidency not the popular vote as 2000 and 2016 showed
If it had been the Republican Party that won the popular vote but lost the ECV twice in as many decades, there might be more of a clamour to do something about it.
To be honest, there would have been exactly the same amount of clamour but from a different set of people.
For instance, the Democrats appear to have discovered virtue in States Rights.
Received my Covid S/E Grant yesterday. I couldn`t be more impressed with the implementation of this. Credit where credit`s due.
There is so much criticism of the Government but the Furlough/Self Employed schemes are an awesome achievement.
I don't think many have criticised the Treasury response - so far its been the only clearly competent part of the government.
However, its big test is still to come. So far they have incentivised inactivity (while staving off economic meltdown).
Can Sunak work out how to incentivise productive employment, as the current schemes cannot work for much longer ?
I was talking more from the technical side of having the software in place so quickly to faciliatate these schemes. The websites are quick, easy to use and the back up from the staff is very efficient. The other Government websites that have been good are the advice sites on how to make your workplace as Covid Safe as possible.These were around from the day after lockdown.
Obviously the Furlough scheme has prevented mass unemployment but I think it is now it is being overused by companies who remain closed when there is no need to such a Car Servicing Garages. I think that the next annoucement from Boris should instruct such places to return to work and restrict their Furlough payments.
The same model that picked an Al Gore landslide in 2000 and a Hillary Clinton landslide in 2016?
No. You clearly didn't read the article.
The model is said to have correctly predicted the popular vote in every election since 1948, other than 1968 and 1976.
Though xkcd applies to any predictions like this anyone decent will I think hope that the model is right.
The Electoral College wins the presidency not the popular vote as 2000 and 2016 showed
If it had been the Republican Party that won the popular vote but lost the ECV twice in as many decades, there might be more of a clamour to do something about it.
To be honest, there would have been exactly the same amount of clamour but from a different set of people.
No, for a start there is not much clamour now because the Democrats have just swallowed it. And even if they were making a fuss, there would still be a lot more GOP clamour because they are the ones with the right-wing radio stations and the billionaire-funded think tanks.
@HYUFD I thought you said there would be no tax increases? I’m confused.
National Insurance is not a tax or should not be
I mean, it is a tax. The revenue goes into general taxation. Are you trying to suggest it’s not an income tax? Different thing.
It was set up to fund state pensions and healthcare and welfare as an insurance only, not as a tax to fund general governmemt spending like income tax.
That is how I would fund social care, however the BBC article makes clear the Government were considering free personal care entirely, given currently you have to pay for care costs down to your last £25 000 excluding your house for at home care rather than tax rises ruled out by the Tory manifesto
It doesn’t matter what it was set up to do, that’s not what it is used for. It funds general government spending just like income tax does.
It should not do, that was not what Lloyd George created it for that is my point
As an ex-LD (and Lib) I'm very saddened by what a campaigning party has become. I fear that Clegg will be regarded in history as a someone who did more damage to the Lib/LD brand than Lloyd-George did; at least the latter started out well. The more that come out out about the long term-effect of the Coalition's social policies, the worse it seems. Initially I supported the Coalition if only because a) the country needed a Government, b) the arithmetic meant a Conservative or Conservative-led one was the only option and c) I hoped the LDs would have some ameliorating effect on what seemed a Rightward drift by the Conservative back-benchers. However, IMHO Clegg made two disastrous mistakes. He didn't insist on one of the Great Offices, which almost certainly meant Theresa May was promoted above her ability, instead taking the non-job of Deputy PM and secondly he kept the Coalition going right up until the last minute. Three years would have been plenty, after which the LD's could have reverted to C&S and could have stressed their differences.
Now the Party needs a Grimond or an Ashdown, and, TBH, I don't see one anywhere,
Good post. Interesting that CHB was lamenting a couple days ago that on PB.com conservatism is over-represented. I don`t see that at all. A lot of posters seem to be liberals though.
Yes, the last survey of how PBers voted after the 2015 general election showed more PBers voted LD than the general population but fewer PBers voted UKIP.
PBers voted Tory and Labour in about the same percentage as the general public
On what voodoo poll do you base that final statement? With all due respect anecdotally that sounds like nonsense.
Its actually quite plausible.
Whenever people have tried to draw up lists of how they think people voted PB is remarkably similar to the general public across parties and Leave/Remain.
I think the only reason some leftwing posters tend to feel like they're not represented properly is they fail to recognise each other as left wing.
I think that is an interesting observation. There are definitely quite a few 'Liberals' as opposed to 'Social Democrats' on this site and as a demographic that doesn't surprise me that they are drawn to the site. I suspect that Tories will consider them 'leftwing' whereas they may not consider themselves so. I have been accused for being a leftie on several occasions by Tories whom I consider to be left of me when it comes to both business and freedoms.
So I think your observation is correct, although I dispute lots of us are actually leftwing (Catch 22). I'm definitely not.
Well indeed, there's definitely a strong liberal contingent here.
The funny thing with left v liberal is that the left tends to view liberals as "not left" when it suits them (eg complaining the site is biased) but then on election day deems it as read that the liberals must want a Labour government.
I was more thinking there's a distinction between what you might term the Blair-style centre-left Labour (eg SouthamObserver etc) and the Corbyn-style far-left (eg BigJohnOwls etc)
You are basically a right wing Liberal not a Conservative for example, apart from Brexit you could easily be an Orange Book LD
I like Davey, and voted for him over Swinson last year. I may well do so again.
I don't know enough of Daisy, but will have a look. I do like Layla, and she comes over fresh and bright on all media, but not convinced on leadership skills. She is a bit erratic.
I thought Davey was by far the better choice last time out, and I said so. With the benefit of hindsight, I was right.
There is no dignity in kicking a dead corpse, but Swinson’s flaws were legion, and glaringly obvious to uninvolved observers. We need not list them now.
I have not yet come to any conclusion for this new contest. All three of them look miles better than the last few leaders.
Moran comes over very well on radio, but seeing her for the first time is a bit of a shock. This may sound superficial and misogynistic, but it is a serious point. When was the last time a truly odd-looking individual led a political party? (Margaret Beckett doesn’t really count.)
Definitely gendered. Superficially, did (for example) Gordon Brown look particularly normal ? Or William Hague ?
(And then again, what about Theresa May ?)
I can’t deny the point, though. Some time with a stylist might help - a sensible thing for any new leader to consider, however superficial it might seem.
Gordon Brown looked very Scottish. He’s a dead-ringer for my brother-in-law. And vice versa: he once won a local newspaper competition for a Brown look-a-like.
Hague never shook off the image of himself as a precocious, annoying schoolchild. The accent was odder than the look (ask radio 4’s Dead Ringers).
Theresa May had an unfortunate look, but not really “odd”. Rather commonplace.
Brown's look was buttoned up, solid, and looking tired and a bit unshampooed like he'd spent the whole night looking through red boxes and fixing Britain's economy. It worked for him. Sadly he may have been up but it wasn't fixing the economy.
Theresa May isn't unattractive for a mature woman. And she did have a sense of style (or else she had an assistant who had), but unfortunately, she never found a hairdo that she then kept. If you think about Margaret Thatcher, she never stepped out of the door without being immaculately dressed with that helmet of red hair. By the same token, Angela Merkel has never wavered from her rather unfortunate barnet. It reassures people. They know what to expect. Theresa May's dithering over her hairstyle (and often choosing bad ones, more and more toward the end) was a visual representation of her dithering over everything else.
As an ex-LD (and Lib) I'm very saddened by what a campaigning party has become. I fear that Clegg will be regarded in history as a someone who did more damage to the Lib/LD brand than Lloyd-George did; at least the latter started out well. The more that come out out about the long term-effect of the Coalition's social policies, the worse it seems. Initially I supported the Coalition if only because a) the country needed a Government, b) the arithmetic meant a Conservative or Conservative-led one was the only option and c) I hoped the LDs would have some ameliorating effect on what seemed a Rightward drift by the Conservative back-benchers. However, IMHO Clegg made two disastrous mistakes. He didn't insist on one of the Great Offices, which almost certainly meant Theresa May was promoted above her ability, instead taking the non-job of Deputy PM and secondly he kept the Coalition going right up until the last minute. Three years would have been plenty, after which the LD's could have reverted to C&S and could have stressed their differences.
Now the Party needs a Grimond or an Ashdown, and, TBH, I don't see one anywhere,
Good post. Interesting that CHB was lamenting a couple days ago that on PB.com conservatism is over-represented. I don`t see that at all. A lot of posters seem to be liberals though.
Yes, the last survey of how PBers voted after the 2015 general election showed more PBers voted LD than the general population but fewer PBers voted UKIP.
PBers voted Tory and Labour in about the same percentage as the general public
On what voodoo poll do you base that final statement? With all due respect anecdotally that sounds like nonsense.
It is not voodoo, it was a poll organised by OGH himself of posters.
We are due another though
It doesn't matter who organised it, its still voodoo.
So you are calling an OGH survey voodoo?
Yes.
The great thing about Philip is that he's always so on-message. Twas if he actually was part of Team Boris which maybe he is
As an ex-LD (and Lib) I'm very saddened by what a campaigning party has become. I fear that Clegg will be regarded in history as a someone who did more damage to the Lib/LD brand than Lloyd-George did; at least the latter started out well. The more that come out out about the long term-effect of the Coalition's social policies, the worse it seems. Initially I supported the Coalition if only because a) the country needed a Government, b) the arithmetic meant a Conservative or Conservative-led one was the only option and c) I hoped the LDs would have some ameliorating effect on what seemed a Rightward drift by the Conservative back-benchers. However, IMHO Clegg made two disastrous mistakes. He didn't insist on one of the Great Offices, which almost certainly meant Theresa May was promoted above her ability, instead taking the non-job of Deputy PM and secondly he kept the Coalition going right up until the last minute. Three years would have been plenty, after which the LD's could have reverted to C&S and could have stressed their differences.
Now the Party needs a Grimond or an Ashdown, and, TBH, I don't see one anywhere,
Good post. Interesting that CHB was lamenting a couple days ago that on PB.com conservatism is over-represented. I don`t see that at all. A lot of posters seem to be liberals though.
Yes, the last survey of how PBers voted after the 2015 general election showed more PBers voted LD than the general population but fewer PBers voted UKIP.
PBers voted Tory and Labour in about the same percentage as the general public
On what voodoo poll do you base that final statement? With all due respect anecdotally that sounds like nonsense.
Its actually quite plausible.
Whenever people have tried to draw up lists of how they think people voted PB is remarkably similar to the general public across parties and Leave/Remain.
I think the only reason some leftwing posters tend to feel like they're not represented properly is they fail to recognise each other as left wing.
I think that is an interesting observation. There are definitely quite a few 'Liberals' as opposed to 'Social Democrats' on this site and as a demographic that doesn't surprise me that they are drawn to the site. I suspect that Tories will consider them 'leftwing' whereas they may not consider themselves so. I have been accused for being a leftie on several occasions by Tories whom I consider to be left of me when it comes to both business and freedoms.
So I think your observation is correct, although I dispute lots of us are actually leftwing (Catch 22). I'm definitely not.
Well indeed, there's definitely a strong liberal contingent here.
The funny thing with left v liberal is that the left tends to view liberals as "not left" when it suits them (eg complaining the site is biased) but then on election day deems it as read that the liberals must want a Labour government.
I was more thinking there's a distinction between what you might term the Blair-style centre-left Labour (eg SouthamObserver etc) and the Corbyn-style far-left (eg BigJohnOwls etc)
You are basically a right wing Liberal not a Conservative for example, apart from Brexit you could easily be an Orange Book LD
Absolutely not!
@Philip_Thompson is a Corbyn-ite Troops Out Revolutionary Communist Party type of liberal.
As an ex-LD (and Lib) I'm very saddened by what a campaigning party has become. I fear that Clegg will be regarded in history as a someone who did more damage to the Lib/LD brand than Lloyd-George did; at least the latter started out well. The more that come out out about the long term-effect of the Coalition's social policies, the worse it seems. Initially I supported the Coalition if only because a) the country needed a Government, b) the arithmetic meant a Conservative or Conservative-led one was the only option and c) I hoped the LDs would have some ameliorating effect on what seemed a Rightward drift by the Conservative back-benchers. However, IMHO Clegg made two disastrous mistakes. He didn't insist on one of the Great Offices, which almost certainly meant Theresa May was promoted above her ability, instead taking the non-job of Deputy PM and secondly he kept the Coalition going right up until the last minute. Three years would have been plenty, after which the LD's could have reverted to C&S and could have stressed their differences.
Now the Party needs a Grimond or an Ashdown, and, TBH, I don't see one anywhere,
Good post. Interesting that CHB was lamenting a couple days ago that on PB.com conservatism is over-represented. I don`t see that at all. A lot of posters seem to be liberals though.
Yes, the last survey of how PBers voted after the 2015 general election showed more PBers voted LD than the general population but fewer PBers voted UKIP.
PBers voted Tory and Labour in about the same percentage as the general public
On what voodoo poll do you base that final statement? With all due respect anecdotally that sounds like nonsense.
Its actually quite plausible.
Whenever people have tried to draw up lists of how they think people voted PB is remarkably similar to the general public across parties and Leave/Remain.
I think the only reason some leftwing posters tend to feel like they're not represented properly is they fail to recognise each other as left wing.
I think that is an interesting observation. There are definitely quite a few 'Liberals' as opposed to 'Social Democrats' on this site and as a demographic that doesn't surprise me that they are drawn to the site. I suspect that Tories will consider them 'leftwing' whereas they may not consider themselves so. I have been accused for being a leftie on several occasions by Tories whom I consider to be left of me when it comes to both business and freedoms.
So I think your observation is correct, although I dispute lots of us are actually leftwing (Catch 22). I'm definitely not.
Well indeed, there's definitely a strong liberal contingent here.
The funny thing with left v liberal is that the left tends to view liberals as "not left" when it suits them (eg complaining the site is biased) but then on election day deems it as read that the liberals must want a Labour government.
I was more thinking there's a distinction between what you might term the Blair-style centre-left Labour (eg SouthamObserver etc) and the Corbyn-style far-left (eg BigJohnOwls etc)
You are basically a right wing Liberal not a Conservative for example, apart from Brexit you could easily be an Orange Book LD
Do the LibDems not have any other colouring books?
If the LibDems were brave, they'd go for Daisy. From what I have seen of her, she'd be an infinitely better leader than their previously-chosen Swinton.
I remember seeing Robin Cook walking down a train carriage once.
John Smith in the bar car of the Edinburgh Sleeper, holding court to adoring acolytes, "thirsty".
Charles Clarke on the opposite escalator at Victoria, red in the face
Michael Heseltine behind me in the queue for a payphone at King Cross - it wasn't working.
Betty Boothroyd on the number 82 bus.
Mrs T in the Holiday Inn Cramlington (power had been cut the day before as Special Branch searched for bombs)
The Queen at Newcastle Races.
Harold Macmillan buying Chewits at a newsagents in Worthing.
Didier Drogba at the Jorvik Viking Centre.
Ted Moult returning slug pellets at the Wyevale Garden Centre in Chester.
Pope John Paul II at the greyhound racing in Romford.
Kim Jong Un at a roller-disco in Arbroath.
Beat that.
That is superb, bravo! Gave me a laugh anyway. Roller-disco is inspired. *applause*
I have to admit the "roller-disco in Arbroath" is nicked from Bob Servant (written by Neil Forsyth, portrayed by Brian Cox - but not that one), whose TV shows, books, and Twitter feed are well worth checking out.
The same model that picked an Al Gore landslide in 2000 and a Hillary Clinton landslide in 2016?
No. You clearly didn't read the article.
The model is said to have correctly predicted the popular vote in every election since 1948, other than 1968 and 1976.
Though xkcd applies to any predictions like this anyone decent will I think hope that the model is right.
The Electoral College wins the presidency not the popular vote as 2000 and 2016 showed
Of course and this prediction is 328 (D) to 210 (R), although Florida stays (R).
Surprised they reckon the Dems will flip Missouri, which Trump won by 18 points last time. Unless the Independent have coloured in the map incorrectly.
As an ex-LD (and Lib) I'm very saddened by what a campaigning party has become. I fear that Clegg will be regarded in history as a someone who did more damage to the Lib/LD brand than Lloyd-George did; at least the latter started out well. The more that come out out about the long term-effect of the Coalition's social policies, the worse it seems. Initially I supported the Coalition if only because a) the country needed a Government, b) the arithmetic meant a Conservative or Conservative-led one was the only option and c) I hoped the LDs would have some ameliorating effect on what seemed a Rightward drift by the Conservative back-benchers. However, IMHO Clegg made two disastrous mistakes. He didn't insist on one of the Great Offices, which almost certainly meant Theresa May was promoted above her ability, instead taking the non-job of Deputy PM and secondly he kept the Coalition going right up until the last minute. Three years would have been plenty, after which the LD's could have reverted to C&S and could have stressed their differences.
Now the Party needs a Grimond or an Ashdown, and, TBH, I don't see one anywhere,
Good post. Interesting that CHB was lamenting a couple days ago that on PB.com conservatism is over-represented. I don`t see that at all. A lot of posters seem to be liberals though.
Yes, the last survey of how PBers voted after the 2015 general election showed more PBers voted LD than the general population but fewer PBers voted UKIP.
PBers voted Tory and Labour in about the same percentage as the general public
On what voodoo poll do you base that final statement? With all due respect anecdotally that sounds like nonsense.
It is not voodoo, it was a poll organised by OGH himself of posters.
We are due another though
It doesn't matter who organised it, its still voodoo.
So you are calling an OGH survey voodoo?
Yes.
The great thing about Philip is that he's always so on-message. Twas if he actually was part of Team Boris which maybe he is
I was part of Team Boris, god help me, for his mayoral elections. I thought Crosby spoke a lot of sense.
Then again the obvious analogy is that he was facing rabid trots then also. He has not won an election against someone not a rabid trot so we shall see in 2024.
@HYUFD I thought you said there would be no tax increases? I’m confused.
National Insurance is not a tax or should not be
I mean, it is a tax. The revenue goes into general taxation. Are you trying to suggest it’s not an income tax? Different thing.
It was set up to fund state pensions and healthcare and welfare as an insurance only, not as a tax to fund general governmemt spending like income tax.
That is how I would fund social care, however the BBC article makes clear the Government were considering free personal care entirely, given currently you have to pay for care costs down to your last £25 000 excluding your house for at home care rather than tax rises ruled out by the Tory manifesto
It doesn't matter how it was set up, it is a tax. Its not remotely hypothecated and expenditure on pensions, healthcare and welfare has nothing to do with NI. The two are not related.
I've never thought that looks and appearances matter all that much. The only person in a senior position who I think looks out of place is the UEFA president Aleksander Čeferin. Maybe it's because he's quite skinny and the short hair is perhaps unusual.
Received my Covid S/E Grant yesterday. I couldn`t be more impressed with the implementation of this. Credit where credit`s due.
There is so much criticism of the Government but the Furlough/Self Employed schemes are an awesome achievement.
I don't think many have criticised the Treasury response - so far its been the only clearly competent part of the government.
However, its big test is still to come. So far they have incentivised inactivity (while staving off economic meltdown).
Can Sunak work out how to incentivise productive employment, as the current schemes cannot work for much longer ?
I was talking more from the technical side of having the software in place so quickly to faciliatate these schemes. The websites are quick, easy to use and the back up from the staff is very efficient. The other Government websites that have been good are the advice sites on how to make your workplace as Covid Safe as possible.These were around from the day after lockdown.
Obviously the Furlough scheme has prevented mass unemployment but I think it is now it is being overused by companies who remain closed when there is no need to such a Car Servicing Garages. I think that the next annoucement from Boris should instruct such places to return to work and restrict their Furlough payments.
The websites are good but you cant even get in the queue for the phone helpline - it goes straight to not been possible to connect your call.
Received my Covid S/E Grant yesterday. I couldn`t be more impressed with the implementation of this. Credit where credit`s due.
There is so much criticism of the Government but the Furlough/Self Employed schemes are an awesome achievement.
I don't think many have criticised the Treasury response - so far its been the only clearly competent part of the government.
However, its big test is still to come. So far they have incentivised inactivity (while staving off economic meltdown).
Can Sunak work out how to incentivise productive employment, as the current schemes cannot work for much longer ?
I was talking more from the technical side of having the software in place so quickly to faciliatate these schemes. The websites are quick, easy to use and the back up from the staff is very efficient. The other Government websites that have been good are the advice sites on how to make your workplace as Covid Safe as possible.These were around from the day after lockdown.
Obviously the Furlough scheme has prevented mass unemployment but I think it is now it is being overused by companies who remain closed when there is no need to such a Car Servicing Garages. I think that the next annoucement from Boris should instruct such places to return to work and restrict their Furlough payments.
That is part of what I meant when I said 'clearly competent'. The proactive introduction of the furlough scheme was also unusual for a government which has been slow to respond elsewhere.
They now need to come up with a great deal more than restricting furlough and 'instructing' a return to work. The economy has fallen off a cliff; it will require extraordinary measures to restart it - and getting that anywhere near right is the Treasury's big test.
As for Johnson, other than as a figurehead - irrelevant.
As an ex-LD (and Lib) I'm very saddened by what a campaigning party has become. I fear that Clegg will be regarded in history as a someone who did more damage to the Lib/LD brand than Lloyd-George did; at least the latter started out well. The more that come out out about the long term-effect of the Coalition's social policies, the worse it seems. Initially I supported the Coalition if only because a) the country needed a Government, b) the arithmetic meant a Conservative or Conservative-led one was the only option and c) I hoped the LDs would have some ameliorating effect on what seemed a Rightward drift by the Conservative back-benchers. However, IMHO Clegg made two disastrous mistakes. He didn't insist on one of the Great Offices, which almost certainly meant Theresa May was promoted above her ability, instead taking the non-job of Deputy PM and secondly he kept the Coalition going right up until the last minute. Three years would have been plenty, after which the LD's could have reverted to C&S and could have stressed their differences.
Now the Party needs a Grimond or an Ashdown, and, TBH, I don't see one anywhere,
Good post. Interesting that CHB was lamenting a couple days ago that on PB.com conservatism is over-represented. I don`t see that at all. A lot of posters seem to be liberals though.
Yes, the last survey of how PBers voted after the 2015 general election showed more PBers voted LD than the general population but fewer PBers voted UKIP.
PBers voted Tory and Labour in about the same percentage as the general public
On what voodoo poll do you base that final statement? With all due respect anecdotally that sounds like nonsense.
Its actually quite plausible.
Whenever people have tried to draw up lists of how they think people voted PB is remarkably similar to the general public across parties and Leave/Remain.
I think the only reason some leftwing posters tend to feel like they're not represented properly is they fail to recognise each other as left wing.
I think that is an interesting observation. There are definitely quite a few 'Liberals' as opposed to 'Social Democrats' on this site and as a demographic that doesn't surprise me that they are drawn to the site. I suspect that Tories will consider them 'leftwing' whereas they may not consider themselves so. I have been accused for being a leftie on several occasions by Tories whom I consider to be left of me when it comes to both business and freedoms.
So I think your observation is correct, although I dispute lots of us are actually leftwing (Catch 22). I'm definitely not.
Well indeed, there's definitely a strong liberal contingent here.
The funny thing with left v liberal is that the left tends to view liberals as "not left" when it suits them (eg complaining the site is biased) but then on election day deems it as read that the liberals must want a Labour government.
I was more thinking there's a distinction between what you might term the Blair-style centre-left Labour (eg SouthamObserver etc) and the Corbyn-style far-left (eg BigJohnOwls etc)
You are basically a right wing Liberal not a Conservative for example, apart from Brexit you could easily be an Orange Book LD
Does HYUFD have a point Philip? I'm scratching my head over that one. I feel I disagree with you too much for it to be true but......
Anecdotally on virus stuff, I think London is now down to a very low level. We should be allowed to open up the shops and outdoor businesses fully.
That does seem to be the case from what data there is. Quite how London went from worst to best remains unexplained.
Herd immunity?
Given the serological survey results this is unlikely, though it might be possible if there is immunity from another Coronavirus that we didn't notice because it wasn't deadly.
Received my Covid S/E Grant yesterday. I couldn`t be more impressed with the implementation of this. Credit where credit`s due.
There is so much criticism of the Government but the Furlough/Self Employed schemes are an awesome achievement.
I don't think many have criticised the Treasury response - so far its been the only clearly competent part of the government.
However, its big test is still to come. So far they have incentivised inactivity (while staving off economic meltdown).
Can Sunak work out how to incentivise productive employment, as the current schemes cannot work for much longer ?
I was talking more from the technical side of having the software in place so quickly to faciliatate these schemes. The websites are quick, easy to use and the back up from the staff is very efficient. The other Government websites that have been good are the advice sites on how to make your workplace as Covid Safe as possible.These were around from the day after lockdown.
Obviously the Furlough scheme has prevented mass unemployment but I think it is now it is being overused by companies who remain closed when there is no need to such a Car Servicing Garages. I think that the next annoucement from Boris should instruct such places to return to work and restrict their Furlough payments.
From talking with some actual business owners...
The furlough payment, loans etc are not a Pimms-In-The-Garden holiday - if you are owning/running a business. It is a pump that reduces the rate at which your boat is sinking to a small(isn) number.
Unless businesses restart, the furlough will simply be a long, well paid, redundancy notice.
The incentive to restart businesses is two-fold - saving the business and trying to make some of that profit stuff.
One thing the government has got right is to start the return to work while the financial measures are in place.
This gives more time (but still limited) to restart. The restart can therefore be phased.
Which means not throwing everyone back in on the same day.
Which in turn helps getting the HSE implications of COVID19 right and also avoids a cost "cliff" where you are suddenly back to paying the full staff, without income to pay them.
The same model that picked an Al Gore landslide in 2000 and a Hillary Clinton landslide in 2016?
No. You clearly didn't read the article.
The model is said to have correctly predicted the popular vote in every election since 1948, other than 1968 and 1976.
Though xkcd applies to any predictions like this anyone decent will I think hope that the model is right.
The Electoral College wins the presidency not the popular vote as 2000 and 2016 showed
If it had been the Republican Party that won the popular vote but lost the ECV twice in as many decades, there might be more of a clamour to do something about it.
To be honest, there would have been exactly the same amount of clamour but from a different set of people.
No, for a start there is not much clamour now because the Democrats have just swallowed it. And even if they were making a fuss, there would still be a lot more GOP clamour because they are the ones with the right-wing radio stations and the billionaire-funded think tanks.
Democrats going on about Trump being a popular vote LOSER is absolutely commonplace.
They haven't kept quiet on it, and haven't "swallowed it" in that many states have passed the "national popular vote" legislation which is probably the most realistic route to changing the system.
Is it front and centre of national campaigning? Of course not - just as proportional representation isn't in the UK. And it wouldn't be if Republicans had been on the losing end of it - they'd be talking about immigration, crime, and tax because that rather than electoral reform is what presses people's buttons.
Anecdotally on virus stuff, I think London is now down to a very low level. We should be allowed to open up the shops and outdoor businesses fully.
That does seem to be the case from what data there is. Quite how London went from worst to best remains unexplained.
Of the people who are outdoors there's probably a high prevalence of immunity. The initial outbreak here was bad. I know quite a few people who have had symptoms including myself. Multiply that by 9 for those who don't get symptoms and it would be surprising of 20-25% of the population of London has already had it, and that will be more concentrated among people who venture out.
That's my point. The way cases are falling away fast in areas of greater recorded infection suggests that there is already significant immunity - either natural, or acquired. A number of expert studies recently have come to this conclusion.
Yet the few random antibody testing exercises there have been so far have concluded that total infection rates (past + current) remain very low.
If the latter is the case in London, then its new infection rate shouldn't be falling away so quickly, given the anecdotal evidence that the lockdown there isn't tighter than for the rest of the country - if anything the reverse, with crowded tubes and crowded parks etc.
I think the drop in London is easy to explain - complete collapse in public transport usage. Re pictures of "crowded" tubes - first, they're not crowded (a crowded tube is one where you have to literally force your way on); second, they look busy because the number of trains is sharply down. If you look at ridership in the tube and London buses, and national rail, it's generally down 90% or more. Plus, the infection has moved into care homes, and surely London must have fewer of those than other parts of the country? Parks I am sure are not a major source of transmission as you are outside and usually more than 2m from people outside your group.
Davey's positioning the party to the right of the Conservatives on economics is brave. He might look very clever this time next year, or he risks reminding voters that when push comes to shove, the LibDems back the Tories.
I think the key point is that when push comes to shove, the Tories will back other parties (including the Lib Dems) and work with them for the duration of the agreement, while Labour simply don't play well with others.
I had a look at the history of hung Parliaments and times when the ruling party had a very weak majority - the Tories are far more likely to talk with others and agree compromise, while Labour have a tendency to insist on going it alone.
It rather surprised me; I'd have thought it was the other way around.
The tories are only interested in power, not stupid things like principles.
Indeed. Labour: "We're right, so we'll work with you on the proviso that we get all our policies and you get to vote for them" Tories: "Whatever it takes to get a hand on the steering wheel."
It's one reason that I think, against the prevailing consensus, that the Tories would adapt best to PR. They are instinctively set up for consensus politics. (They might even deliberately fissure into their component groups (ERG-types, Wets/Cameroons, Middle-of-the-road Tories) and have a decent chance of getting overall majorities on their own).
As an ex-LD (and Lib) I'm very saddened by what a campaigning party has become. I fear that Clegg will be regarded in history as a someone who did more damage to the Lib/LD brand than Lloyd-George did; at least the latter started out well. The more that come out out about the long term-effect of the Coalition's social policies, the worse it seems. Initially I supported the Coalition if only because a) the country needed a Government, b) the arithmetic meant a Conservative or Conservative-led one was the only option and c) I hoped the LDs would have some ameliorating effect on what seemed a Rightward drift by the Conservative back-benchers. However, IMHO Clegg made two disastrous mistakes. He didn't insist on one of the Great Offices, which almost certainly meant Theresa May was promoted above her ability, instead taking the non-job of Deputy PM and secondly he kept the Coalition going right up until the last minute. Three years would have been plenty, after which the LD's could have reverted to C&S and could have stressed their differences.
Now the Party needs a Grimond or an Ashdown, and, TBH, I don't see one anywhere,
Good post. Interesting that CHB was lamenting a couple days ago that on PB.com conservatism is over-represented. I don`t see that at all. A lot of posters seem to be liberals though.
Yes, the last survey of how PBers voted after the 2015 general election showed more PBers voted LD than the general population but fewer PBers voted UKIP.
PBers voted Tory and Labour in about the same percentage as the general public
On what voodoo poll do you base that final statement? With all due respect anecdotally that sounds like nonsense.
Its actually quite plausible.
Whenever people have tried to draw up lists of how they think people voted PB is remarkably similar to the general public across parties and Leave/Remain.
I think the only reason some leftwing posters tend to feel like they're not represented properly is they fail to recognise each other as left wing.
I think that is an interesting observation. There are definitely quite a few 'Liberals' as opposed to 'Social Democrats' on this site and as a demographic that doesn't surprise me that they are drawn to the site. I suspect that Tories will consider them 'leftwing' whereas they may not consider themselves so. I have been accused for being a leftie on several occasions by Tories whom I consider to be left of me when it comes to both business and freedoms.
So I think your observation is correct, although I dispute lots of us are actually leftwing (Catch 22). I'm definitely not.
Well indeed, there's definitely a strong liberal contingent here.
The funny thing with left v liberal is that the left tends to view liberals as "not left" when it suits them (eg complaining the site is biased) but then on election day deems it as read that the liberals must want a Labour government.
I was more thinking there's a distinction between what you might term the Blair-style centre-left Labour (eg SouthamObserver etc) and the Corbyn-style far-left (eg BigJohnOwls etc)
You are basically a right wing Liberal not a Conservative for example, apart from Brexit you could easily be an Orange Book LD
Does HYUFD have a point Philip? I'm scratching my head over that one. I feel I disagree with you too much for it to be true but......
Yes. I am socially liberal, economically dry. When PoliticalCompass first came out I was placed in the extreme bottom-right hand side corner (very right wing on economics, very liberal on social matters).
I view Nick Clegg as closer to my beliefs than Theresa May.
I don't like the name of my party. I am not a conservative with a small c. In Australia the name of the right wing party, the sister party to the UK's Conservatives, is the Liberal Party. That suits me better.
Fighting 2024 in a worst depression than other countries because of reasons know one can remember will still be very hard. Still, Johnson will be planning to retire by then anyway as he needs more cash.
Interesting views on the LD leadership. I've voted LD more often than other parties and was briefly a member, just long enough to vote for Huhne twice as leader, so my judgement is obviously not very good! I've also voted Labour, Green (EU only) and Conservative in my couple of decades of voting.
Davey would have been an excellent leader when Corbyn was still Labour leader. Would have been a safe home for Tories appalled by Brexit/Johnson and those more on the right of Labour appalled by Corbyn. I'd have voted LD at the last election under Davey. I'm very unlikely to vote Conservative under Johnson and would not vote Labour under Corbyn, but (policies pending) I've no problem voting Labour under Starmer. Davey, so far, doesn't convince me otherwise (although come election I'd look at both manifestos and might end up LD). Moran is a massive turn off, from what I've seen (and, for me, she should be a non-starter after the police incident - a man with that history would be, and rightly so). So if I was a LD member I'd be taking a close look at Cooper to see whether she might be worth a punt. Under Davey, I'd expect modest gains at the next election, maybe quite good gains if Johnson puts enough natural conservatives off and Starmer's manifesto is too far left for those people, but I don't think he really answers what the point of the LDs is, other than as an option for the moderate voters of both Labour and Conservatives when they're put off by their leaders.
Starmer will almost certainly need LD support to become PM, so Davey could end up Deputy PM to Starmer in 2024 as Clegg was to Cameron in 2010
Senior Cabinet post though needed; not the Non-Job Clegg was conned into.
Anecdotally on virus stuff, I think London is now down to a very low level. We should be allowed to open up the shops and outdoor businesses fully.
Complete and dangerous nonsense.
The UK went from a handful of cases to an epidemic killing 35k+ people in reasonably short order.
There should be an easing but gradual, managed, backed by reasonably effective track and trace, and with a close eye at all stages on infection rates so we can go into reverse if required.
It's wonderful, isn't it?
Even after everything that's happened, and is still happening in countries like Brazil, we have bright sparks popping up and saying "on anecdotal (i.e. scientifically worthless) evidence I think it's low (undefined) therefore we should be allowed to do X (reasoning unexplained)".
Or more likely you're an irrational lockdown fascist who ignores the evidence coming out of other countries who have done exactly this and not seen a rise in new cases. Schools, outdoor spaces and businesses and shops. All of them should be open now. You can continue to be scared of your own shadow but it doesn't change the evidence that there isn't a huge amount of outdoor transmission and that there isn't a huge amount of transmission in supermarkets or that the chances of child to adult transmission is extremely low.
These are all new things we didn't previously know and our policy needs to be updated to reflect them.
Yes. The posts of Chris and Sandy and other PB Lockdownists are utterly tiresome, and nauseating. They seem to be driven more by a weird brand of moralising rather than evidence. Sandy pops up on here nightly to dismiss various groups of people as 'dickheads' for leaving their house, then disappears. It really is an odd credo. Clearly the way forward is to explore policies that reconcile safety with economic and social needs. Yet these extremists hate the very mention of such ideas – see the ugly attacks on Cyclefree last night.
As an ex-LD (and Lib) I'm very saddened by what a campaigning party has become. I fear that Clegg will be regarded in history as a someone who did more damage to the Lib/LD brand than Lloyd-George did; at least the latter started out well. The more that come out out about the long term-effect of the Coalition's social policies, the worse it seems. Initially I supported the Coalition if only because a) the country needed a Government, b) the arithmetic meant a Conservative or Conservative-led one was the only option and c) I hoped the LDs would have some ameliorating effect on what seemed a Rightward drift by the Conservative back-benchers. However, IMHO Clegg made two disastrous mistakes. He didn't insist on one of the Great Offices, which almost certainly meant Theresa May was promoted above her ability, instead taking the non-job of Deputy PM and secondly he kept the Coalition going right up until the last minute. Three years would have been plenty, after which the LD's could have reverted to C&S and could have stressed their differences.
Now the Party needs a Grimond or an Ashdown, and, TBH, I don't see one anywhere,
Good post. Interesting that CHB was lamenting a couple days ago that on PB.com conservatism is over-represented. I don`t see that at all. A lot of posters seem to be liberals though.
Yes, the last survey of how PBers voted after the 2015 general election showed more PBers voted LD than the general population but fewer PBers voted UKIP.
PBers voted Tory and Labour in about the same percentage as the general public
On what voodoo poll do you base that final statement? With all due respect anecdotally that sounds like nonsense.
Its actually quite plausible.
Whenever people have tried to draw up lists of how they think people voted PB is remarkably similar to the general public across parties and Leave/Remain.
I think the only reason some leftwing posters tend to feel like they're not represented properly is they fail to recognise each other as left wing.
I think that is an interesting observation. There are definitely quite a few 'Liberals' as opposed to 'Social Democrats' on this site and as a demographic that doesn't surprise me that they are drawn to the site. I suspect that Tories will consider them 'leftwing' whereas they may not consider themselves so. I have been accused for being a leftie on several occasions by Tories whom I consider to be left of me when it comes to both business and freedoms.
So I think your observation is correct, although I dispute lots of us are actually leftwing (Catch 22). I'm definitely not.
Well indeed, there's definitely a strong liberal contingent here.
The funny thing with left v liberal is that the left tends to view liberals as "not left" when it suits them (eg complaining the site is biased) but then on election day deems it as read that the liberals must want a Labour government.
I was more thinking there's a distinction between what you might term the Blair-style centre-left Labour (eg SouthamObserver etc) and the Corbyn-style far-left (eg BigJohnOwls etc)
You are basically a right wing Liberal not a Conservative for example, apart from Brexit you could easily be an Orange Book LD
Does HYUFD have a point Philip? I'm scratching my head over that one. I feel I disagree with you too much for it to be true but......
Yes. I am socially liberal, economically dry. When PoliticalCompass first came out I was placed in the extreme bottom-right hand side corner (very right wing on economics, very liberal on social matters).
I view Nick Clegg as closer to my beliefs than Theresa May.
I don't like the name of my party. I am not a conservative with a small c. In Australia the name of the right wing party, the sister party to the UK's Conservatives, is the Liberal Party. That suits me better.
The conservative party in Australia is the National Party, it is just in coalition with the Liberal Party
Anecdotally on virus stuff, I think London is now down to a very low level. We should be allowed to open up the shops and outdoor businesses fully.
Complete and dangerous nonsense.
The UK went from a handful of cases to an epidemic killing 35k+ people in reasonably short order.
There should be an easing but gradual, managed, backed by reasonably effective track and trace, and with a close eye at all stages on infection rates so we can go into reverse if required.
It's wonderful, isn't it?
Even after everything that's happened, and is still happening in countries like Brazil, we have bright sparks popping up and saying "on anecdotal (i.e. scientifically worthless) evidence I think it's low (undefined) therefore we should be allowed to do X (reasoning unexplained)".
Or more likely you're an irrational lockdown fascist who ignores the evidence coming out of other countries who have done exactly this and not seen a rise in new cases. Schools, outdoor spaces and businesses and shops. All of them should be open now. You can continue to be scared of your own shadow but it doesn't change the evidence that there isn't a huge amount of outdoor transmission and that there isn't a huge amount of transmission in supermarkets or that the chances of child to adult transmission is extremely low.
These are all new things we didn't previously know and our policy needs to be updated to reflect them.
Yes. The posts of Chris and Sandy and other PB Lockdownists are utterly tiresome, and nauseating. They seem to be driven more by a weird brand of moralising rather than evidence. Sandy pops up on here nightly to dismiss various groups of people as 'dickheads' for leaving their house, then disappears. It really is an odd credo. Clearly the way forward is to explore policies that reconcile safety with economic and social needs. Yet these extremists hate the very mention of such ideas – see the ugly attacks on Cyclefree last night.
Seconded.
It's obviously the case that people going out with the awareness that they need to be careful around other people is a totally different situation to the one in which we saw cases rise exponentially.
There is much more political danger to Boris in going soft than going hard. This merely reinforces the Govts approach to the EU negotiations. Fishing will be an interesting one to watch. SNP are gagging for a cave-in.
As an ex-LD (and Lib) I'm very saddened by what a campaigning party has become. I fear that Clegg will be regarded in history as a someone who did more damage to the Lib/LD brand than Lloyd-George did; at least the latter started out well. The more that come out out about the long term-effect of the Coalition's social policies, the worse it seems. Initially I supported the Coalition if only because a) the country needed a Government, b) the arithmetic meant a Conservative or Conservative-led one was the only option and c) I hoped the LDs would have some ameliorating effect on what seemed a Rightward drift by the Conservative back-benchers. However, IMHO Clegg made two disastrous mistakes. He didn't insist on one of the Great Offices, which almost certainly meant Theresa May was promoted above her ability, instead taking the non-job of Deputy PM and secondly he kept the Coalition going right up until the last minute. Three years would have been plenty, after which the LD's could have reverted to C&S and could have stressed their differences.
Now the Party needs a Grimond or an Ashdown, and, TBH, I don't see one anywhere,
Good post. Interesting that CHB was lamenting a couple days ago that on PB.com conservatism is over-represented. I don`t see that at all. A lot of posters seem to be liberals though.
Yes, the last survey of how PBers voted after the 2015 general election showed more PBers voted LD than the general population but fewer PBers voted UKIP.
PBers voted Tory and Labour in about the same percentage as the general public
On what voodoo poll do you base that final statement? With all due respect anecdotally that sounds like nonsense.
Its actually quite plausible.
Whenever people have tried to draw up lists of how they think people voted PB is remarkably similar to the general public across parties and Leave/Remain.
I think the only reason some leftwing posters tend to feel like they're not represented properly is they fail to recognise each other as left wing.
I think that is an interesting observation. There are definitely quite a few 'Liberals' as opposed to 'Social Democrats' on this site and as a demographic that doesn't surprise me that they are drawn to the site. I suspect that Tories will consider them 'leftwing' whereas they may not consider themselves so. I have been accused for being a leftie on several occasions by Tories whom I consider to be left of me when it comes to both business and freedoms.
So I think your observation is correct, although I dispute lots of us are actually leftwing (Catch 22). I'm definitely not.
Well indeed, there's definitely a strong liberal contingent here.
The funny thing with left v liberal is that the left tends to view liberals as "not left" when it suits them (eg complaining the site is biased) but then on election day deems it as read that the liberals must want a Labour government.
I was more thinking there's a distinction between what you might term the Blair-style centre-left Labour (eg SouthamObserver etc) and the Corbyn-style far-left (eg BigJohnOwls etc)
You are basically a right wing Liberal not a Conservative for example, apart from Brexit you could easily be an Orange Book LD
Does HYUFD have a point Philip? I'm scratching my head over that one. I feel I disagree with you too much for it to be true but......
Yes. I am socially liberal, economically dry. When PoliticalCompass first came out I was placed in the extreme bottom-right hand side corner (very right wing on economics, very liberal on social matters).
I view Nick Clegg as closer to my beliefs than Theresa May.
I don't like the name of my party. I am not a conservative with a small c. In Australia the name of the right wing party, the sister party to the UK's Conservatives, is the Liberal Party. That suits me better.
The conservative party in Australia is the National Party, it is just in coalition with the Liberal Party
I never said the conservative party in Australia, I said the Conservative Party in Australia.
The conservative party in Australia is the National Party. I wouldn't support them, but would give them my second preference under their AV voting system because of the coalition. The Conservative Party in Australia is the Liberal Party.
Anecdotally on virus stuff, I think London is now down to a very low level. We should be allowed to open up the shops and outdoor businesses fully.
That does seem to be the case from what data there is. Quite how London went from worst to best remains unexplained.
Of the people who are outdoors there's probably a high prevalence of immunity. The initial outbreak here was bad. I know quite a few people who have had symptoms including myself. Multiply that by 9 for those who don't get symptoms and it would be surprising of 20-25% of the population of London has already had it, and that will be more concentrated among people who venture out.
That's my point. The way cases are falling away fast in areas of greater recorded infection suggests that there is already significant immunity - either natural, or acquired. A number of expert studies recently have come to this conclusion.
Yet the few random antibody testing exercises there have been so far have concluded that total infection rates (past + current) remain very low.
If the latter is the case in London, then its new infection rate shouldn't be falling away so quickly, given the anecdotal evidence that the lockdown there isn't tighter than for the rest of the country - if anything the reverse, with crowded tubes and crowded parks etc.
I think the drop in London is easy to explain - complete collapse in public transport usage. Re pictures of "crowded" tubes - first, they're not crowded (a crowded tube is one where you have to literally force your way on); second, they look busy because the number of trains is sharply down. If you look at ridership in the tube and London buses, and national rail, it's generally down 90% or more. Plus, the infection has moved into care homes, and surely London must have fewer of those than other parts of the country? Parks I am sure are not a major source of transmission as you are outside and usually more than 2m from people outside your group.
Tube usage is at 7% - according to the data from yesterdays briefing
It has been bouncing around at 5-6% for a while now. 7% might be a genuine uptick starting - but there is only one data point.
Many of the "crowds on platforms" pictures are using force perspective - long lens zoomed in - to give the impression that mobs of people are standing on top of each other.
Davey's positioning the party to the right of the Conservatives on economics is brave. He might look very clever this time next year, or he risks reminding voters that when push comes to shove, the LibDems back the Tories.
I think the key point is that when push comes to shove, the Tories will back other parties (including the Lib Dems) and work with them for the duration of the agreement, while Labour simply don't play well with others.
I had a look at the history of hung Parliaments and times when the ruling party had a very weak majority - the Tories are far more likely to talk with others and agree compromise, while Labour have a tendency to insist on going it alone.
It rather surprised me; I'd have thought it was the other way around.
Callaghan was propped up by the Liberals as was Macdonald
"Far more likely"
In the 1890s, the Tories dealt in depth with the Liberal Unionists until they absorbed them.
In 1918, the Tories went with the Liberals even though they could go it alone. They stuck to their agreement for years, even though they could go it alone and the end of that agreement was such a significant moment for the Tories it cost them their leader and their backbench Committee is named after it to this day.
In 1923, the Liberals expected Labour to want to work with them and MacDonald ignored them - basically daring them to try to bring him down. Asquith decided to unilaterally support them anyway, but got nothing for it. Labour also switched to anti-PR at that point.
In 1929, the same as 1923.
In the Thirties, Labour were the only party to refuse a National Coalition. The Liberals split under the pressure. The Tories kept offering a place to the Liberals (even standing down in some constituencies).
In 1964, Grimond expected Wilson to offer a deal to prop him up, but instead Labour doubled down on attacking the Liberals to try to pick up a majority.
In 1974, Heath had full-on talks with the Liberals but couldn't bring the rest of his party along. Wilson didn't even open up talks.
The Lib-Lab deal in 1977 was the only time Labour have properly offered the Liberal Party anything, and that really wasn't much in practice.
In 2010, Labour (despite Brown's intent) offered sod-all to the Lib Dems, while Cameron gave them half their manifesto in a single chunk.
The danger with the Tories is they'll actually hug you close longer than necessary and work towards absorption (Clegg and co probably didn't need the FTPA). Labour work towards exclusion.
I like Davey, and voted for him over Swinson last year. I may well do so again.
I don't know enough of Daisy, but will have a look. I do like Layla, and she comes over fresh and bright on all media, but not convinced on leadership skills. She is a bit erratic.
I thought Davey was by far the better choice last time out, and I said so. With the benefit of hindsight, I was right.
There is no dignity in kicking a dead corpse, but Swinson’s flaws were legion, and glaringly obvious to uninvolved observers. We need not list them now.
I have not yet come to any conclusion for this new contest. All three of them look miles better than the last few leaders.
Moran comes over very well on radio, but seeing her for the first time is a bit of a shock. This may sound superficial and misogynistic, but it is a serious point. When was the last time a truly odd-looking individual led a political party? (Margaret Beckett doesn’t really count.)
Isn’t there a saying that politics is show business for ugly people? I’m not sure any party leader in my lifetime, with the exceptions of Blair and Cameron, have been particular handsome.
As an ex-LD (and Lib) I'm very saddened by what a campaigning party has become. I fear that Clegg will be regarded in history as a someone who did more damage to the Lib/LD brand than Lloyd-George did; at least the latter started out well. The more that come out out about the long term-effect of the Coalition's social policies, the worse it seems. Initially I supported the Coalition if only because a) the country needed a Government, b) the arithmetic meant a Conservative or Conservative-led one was the only option and c) I hoped the LDs would have some ameliorating effect on what seemed a Rightward drift by the Conservative back-benchers. However, IMHO Clegg made two disastrous mistakes. He didn't insist on one of the Great Offices, which almost certainly meant Theresa May was promoted above her ability, instead taking the non-job of Deputy PM and secondly he kept the Coalition going right up until the last minute. Three years would have been plenty, after which the LD's could have reverted to C&S and could have stressed their differences.
Now the Party needs a Grimond or an Ashdown, and, TBH, I don't see one anywhere,
Good post. Interesting that CHB was lamenting a couple days ago that on PB.com conservatism is over-represented. I don`t see that at all. A lot of posters seem to be liberals though.
Yes, the last survey of how PBers voted after the 2015 general election showed more PBers voted LD than the general population but fewer PBers voted UKIP.
PBers voted Tory and Labour in about the same percentage as the general public
On what voodoo poll do you base that final statement? With all due respect anecdotally that sounds like nonsense.
Its actually quite plausible.
Whenever people have tried to draw up lists of how they think people voted PB is remarkably similar to the general public across parties and Leave/Remain.
I think the only reason some leftwing posters tend to feel like they're not represented properly is they fail to recognise each other as left wing.
I think that is an interesting observation. There are definitely quite a few 'Liberals' as opposed to 'Social Democrats' on this site and as a demographic that doesn't surprise me that they are drawn to the site. I suspect that Tories will consider them 'leftwing' whereas they may not consider themselves so. I have been accused for being a leftie on several occasions by Tories whom I consider to be left of me when it comes to both business and freedoms.
So I think your observation is correct, although I dispute lots of us are actually leftwing (Catch 22). I'm definitely not.
Well indeed, there's definitely a strong liberal contingent here.
The funny thing with left v liberal is that the left tends to view liberals as "not left" when it suits them (eg complaining the site is biased) but then on election day deems it as read that the liberals must want a Labour government.
I was more thinking there's a distinction between what you might term the Blair-style centre-left Labour (eg SouthamObserver etc) and the Corbyn-style far-left (eg BigJohnOwls etc)
You are basically a right wing Liberal not a Conservative for example, apart from Brexit you could easily be an Orange Book LD
Does HYUFD have a point Philip? I'm scratching my head over that one. I feel I disagree with you too much for it to be true but......
Yes. I am socially liberal, economically dry. When PoliticalCompass first came out I was placed in the extreme bottom-right hand side corner (very right wing on economics, very liberal on social matters).
I view Nick Clegg as closer to my beliefs than Theresa May.
I don't like the name of my party. I am not a conservative with a small c. In Australia the name of the right wing party, the sister party to the UK's Conservatives, is the Liberal Party. That suits me better.
The conservative party in Australia is the National Party, it is just in coalition with the Liberal Party
I never said the conservative party in Australia, I said the Conservative Party in Australia.
The conservative party in Australia is the National Party. I wouldn't support them, but would give them my second preference under their AV voting system because of the coalition. The Conservative Party in Australia is the Liberal Party.
And as I said I would support the Liberal Party.
The largest centre right party you mean, not the conservative party.
In New Zealand the Nationals are the main centre right party, in Canada the Conservative Party of Canada is.
Australia like Japan and the Netherlands just has a liberal party as the main centre right party
Fighting 2024 in a worst depression than other countries because of reasons know one can remember will still be very hard. Still, Johnson will be planning to retire by then anyway as he needs more cash.
I am very confident the UK will be growing by 2024 and faster than the EU is.
Anecdotally on virus stuff, I think London is now down to a very low level. We should be allowed to open up the shops and outdoor businesses fully.
Complete and dangerous nonsense.
The UK went from a handful of cases to an epidemic killing 35k+ people in reasonably short order.
There should be an easing but gradual, managed, backed by reasonably effective track and trace, and with a close eye at all stages on infection rates so we can go into reverse if required.
It's wonderful, isn't it?
Even after everything that's happened, and is still happening in countries like Brazil, we have bright sparks popping up and saying "on anecdotal (i.e. scientifically worthless) evidence I think it's low (undefined) therefore we should be allowed to do X (reasoning unexplained)".
Or more likely you're an irrational lockdown fascist who ignores the evidence coming out of other countries who have done exactly this and not seen a rise in new cases. Schools, outdoor spaces and businesses and shops. All of them should be open now. You can continue to be scared of your own shadow but it doesn't change the evidence that there isn't a huge amount of outdoor transmission and that there isn't a huge amount of transmission in supermarkets or that the chances of child to adult transmission is extremely low.
These are all new things we didn't previously know and our policy needs to be updated to reflect them.
Yes. The posts of Chris and Sandy and other PB Lockdownists are utterly tiresome, and nauseating. They seem to be driven more by a weird brand of moralising rather than evidence. Sandy pops up on here nightly to dismiss various groups of people as 'dickheads' for leaving their house, then disappears. It really is an odd credo. Clearly the way forward is to explore policies that reconcile safety with economic and social needs. Yet these extremists hate the very mention of such ideas – see the ugly attacks on Cyclefree last night.
Seconded.
It's obviously the case that people going out with the awareness that they need to be careful around other people is a totally different situation to the one in which we saw cases rise exponentially.
Quite right. People are being very careful in my experience. Yet nothing is good enough for some. Also, the new cases data should have shown huge spikes by now were the attacks of the PB Lockdownists valid. There were several posts on here a few weeks ago attacking humans for doing human things, predicting massive spikes in London (particularly) when people who live in small flats without any outdoor space dared to sit in the park in 26c heat. Yet the London numbers are now among the best in the country. Go figure.
Davey's positioning the party to the right of the Conservatives on economics is brave. He might look very clever this time next year, or he risks reminding voters that when push comes to shove, the LibDems back the Tories.
I think the key point is that when push comes to shove, the Tories will back other parties (including the Lib Dems) and work with them for the duration of the agreement, while Labour simply don't play well with others.
I had a look at the history of hung Parliaments and times when the ruling party had a very weak majority - the Tories are far more likely to talk with others and agree compromise, while Labour have a tendency to insist on going it alone.
It rather surprised me; I'd have thought it was the other way around.
Callaghan was propped up by the Liberals as was Macdonald
"Far more likely"
In the 1890s, the Tories dealt in depth with the Liberal Unionists until they absorbed them.
In 1918, the Tories went with the Liberals even though they could go it alone. They stuck to their agreement for years, even though they could go it alone and the end of that agreement was such a significant moment for the Tories it cost them their leader and their backbench Committee is named after it to this day.
In 1923, the Liberals expected Labour to want to work with them and MacDonald ignored them - basically daring them to try to bring him down. Asquith decided to unilaterally support them anyway, but got nothing for it. Labour also switched to anti-PR at that point.
In 1929, the same as 1923.
In the Thirties, Labour were the only party to refuse a National Coalition. The Liberals split under the pressure. The Tories kept offering a place to the Liberals (even standing down in some constituencies).
In 1964, Grimond expected Wilson to offer a deal to prop him up, but instead Labour doubled down on attacking the Liberals to try to pick up a majority.
In 1974, Heath had full-on talks with the Liberals but couldn't bring the rest of his party along. Wilson didn't even open up talks.
The Lib-Lab deal in 1977 was the only time Labour have properly offered the Liberal Party anything, and that really wasn't much in practice.
In 2010, Labour (despite Brown's intent) offered sod-all to the Lib Dems, while Cameron gave them half their manifesto in a single chunk.
The danger with the Tories is they'll actually hug you close longer than necessary and work towards absorption (Clegg and co probably didn't need the FTPA). Labour work towards exclusion.
Without LD support hard to see Starmer becoming PM
Davey's positioning the party to the right of the Conservatives on economics is brave. He might look very clever this time next year, or he risks reminding voters that when push comes to shove, the LibDems back the Tories.
Scottish voters need no reminders. The SLD brand is fatally contaminated by the Cameron coalition years. I strongly recommend that they return to the proud old Scottish Liberals name: the dominant force in Victorian politics north of the border. The federal party in name should become the federal party in fact.
Stuart, they are dead in the water , talentless with a supposed leader like useless Rennie it is ever downward spiral.
Anecdotally on virus stuff, I think London is now down to a very low level. We should be allowed to open up the shops and outdoor businesses fully.
That does seem to be the case from what data there is. Quite how London went from worst to best remains unexplained.
Of the people who are outdoors there's probably a high prevalence of immunity. The initial outbreak here was bad. I know quite a few people who have had symptoms including myself. Multiply that by 9 for those who don't get symptoms and it would be surprising of 20-25% of the population of London has already had it, and that will be more concentrated among people who venture out.
That's my point. The way cases are falling away fast in areas of greater recorded infection suggests that there is already significant immunity - either natural, or acquired. A number of expert studies recently have come to this conclusion.
Yet the few random antibody testing exercises there have been so far have concluded that total infection rates (past + current) remain very low.
If the latter is the case in London, then its new infection rate shouldn't be falling away so quickly, given the anecdotal evidence that the lockdown there isn't tighter than for the rest of the country - if anything the reverse, with crowded tubes and crowded parks etc.
I think the drop in London is easy to explain - complete collapse in public transport usage. Re pictures of "crowded" tubes - first, they're not crowded (a crowded tube is one where you have to literally force your way on); second, they look busy because the number of trains is sharply down. If you look at ridership in the tube and London buses, and national rail, it's generally down 90% or more. Plus, the infection has moved into care homes, and surely London must have fewer of those than other parts of the country? Parks I am sure are not a major source of transmission as you are outside and usually more than 2m from people outside your group.
Tube usage is at 7% - according to the data from yesterdays briefing
It has been bouncing around at 5-6% for a while now. 7% might be a genuine uptick starting - but there is only one data point.
Many of the "crowds on platforms" pictures are using force perspective - long lens zoomed in - to give the impression that mobs of people are standing on top of each other.
Exactly. When I was commuting into central London every day, squeezing into a seat between two morbidly obese Kentish mouth breathers in a packed and overheated Southeastern train that hadn't been cleaned since the late 1990s, I reckon I had a significantly higher of catching Covid than I do now, when I leave the house once a fortnight to go shopping.
As an ex-LD (and Lib) I'm very saddened by what a campaigning party has become. I fear that Clegg will be regarded in history as a someone who did more damage to the Lib/LD brand than Lloyd-George did; at least the latter started out well. The more that come out out about the long term-effect of the Coalition's social policies, the worse it seems. Initially I supported the Coalition if only because a) the country needed a Government, b) the arithmetic meant a Conservative or Conservative-led one was the only option and c) I hoped the LDs would have some ameliorating effect on what seemed a Rightward drift by the Conservative back-benchers. However, IMHO Clegg made two disastrous mistakes. He didn't insist on one of the Great Offices, which almost certainly meant Theresa May was promoted above her ability, instead taking the non-job of Deputy PM and secondly he kept the Coalition going right up until the last minute. Three years would have been plenty, after which the LD's could have reverted to C&S and could have stressed their differences.
Now the Party needs a Grimond or an Ashdown, and, TBH, I don't see one anywhere,
Good post. Interesting that CHB was lamenting a couple days ago that on PB.com conservatism is over-represented. I don`t see that at all. A lot of posters seem to be liberals though.
Yes, the last survey of how PBers voted after the 2015 general election showed more PBers voted LD than the general population but fewer PBers voted UKIP.
PBers voted Tory and Labour in about the same percentage as the general public
On what voodoo poll do you base that final statement? With all due respect anecdotally that sounds like nonsense.
Its actually quite plausible.
Whenever people have tried to draw up lists of how they think people voted PB is remarkably similar to the general public across parties and Leave/Remain.
I think the only reason some leftwing posters tend to feel like they're not represented properly is they fail to recognise each other as left wing.
I think that is an interesting observation. There are definitely quite a few 'Liberals' as opposed to 'Social Democrats' on this site and as a demographic that doesn't surprise me that they are drawn to the site. I suspect that Tories will consider them 'leftwing' whereas they may not consider themselves so. I have been accused for being a leftie on several occasions by Tories whom I consider to be left of me when it comes to both business and freedoms.
So I think your observation is correct, although I dispute lots of us are actually leftwing (Catch 22). I'm definitely not.
Well indeed, there's definitely a strong liberal contingent here.
The funny thing with left v liberal is that the left tends to view liberals as "not left" when it suits them (eg complaining the site is biased) but then on election day deems it as read that the liberals must want a Labour government.
I was more thinking there's a distinction between what you might term the Blair-style centre-left Labour (eg SouthamObserver etc) and the Corbyn-style far-left (eg BigJohnOwls etc)
You are basically a right wing Liberal not a Conservative for example, apart from Brexit you could easily be an Orange Book LD
Does HYUFD have a point Philip? I'm scratching my head over that one. I feel I disagree with you too much for it to be true but......
Yes. I am socially liberal, economically dry. When PoliticalCompass first came out I was placed in the extreme bottom-right hand side corner (very right wing on economics, very liberal on social matters).
I view Nick Clegg as closer to my beliefs than Theresa May.
I don't like the name of my party. I am not a conservative with a small c. In Australia the name of the right wing party, the sister party to the UK's Conservatives, is the Liberal Party. That suits me better.
The conservative party in Australia is the National Party, it is just in coalition with the Liberal Party
I never said the conservative party in Australia, I said the Conservative Party in Australia.
The conservative party in Australia is the National Party. I wouldn't support them, but would give them my second preference under their AV voting system because of the coalition. The Conservative Party in Australia is the Liberal Party.
And as I said I would support the Liberal Party.
The largest centre right party you mean, not the conservative party.
In New Zealand the Nationals are the main centre right party, in Canada the Conservative Party of Canada is.
Australia like Japan and the Netherlands just has a liberal party as the main centre right party
No, I know Australian politics much better than you do. I grew up Down Under.
The sister party to the Conservative Party in Australia is the Liberal Party. The Liberal Party and the Conservative Party are both founding members of the International Democrat Union (IDU) and the Liberal Party is even associated with the ECR European Parliament grouping that David Cameron helped set up too.
One thing Australian newspapers are very good at it using capital letters correctly when referring to conservative or Conservative or liberal or Liberal etc
Anecdotally on virus stuff, I think London is now down to a very low level. We should be allowed to open up the shops and outdoor businesses fully.
Complete and dangerous nonsense.
The UK went from a handful of cases to an epidemic killing 35k+ people in reasonably short order.
There should be an easing but gradual, managed, backed by reasonably effective track and trace, and with a close eye at all stages on infection rates so we can go into reverse if required.
It's wonderful, isn't it?
Even after everything that's happened, and is still happening in countries like Brazil, we have bright sparks popping up and saying "on anecdotal (i.e. scientifically worthless) evidence I think it's low (undefined) therefore we should be allowed to do X (reasoning unexplained)".
Or more likely you're an irrational lockdown fascist who ignores the evidence coming out of other countries who have done exactly this and not seen a rise in new cases. Schools, outdoor spaces and businesses and shops. All of them should be open now. You can continue to be scared of your own shadow but it doesn't change the evidence that there isn't a huge amount of outdoor transmission and that there isn't a huge amount of transmission in supermarkets or that the chances of child to adult transmission is extremely low.
These are all new things we didn't previously know and our policy needs to be updated to reflect them.
Yes. The posts of Chris and Sandy and other PB Lockdownists are utterly tiresome, and nauseating. They seem to be driven more by a weird brand of moralising rather than evidence. Sandy pops up on here nightly to dismiss various groups of people as 'dickheads' for leaving their house, then disappears. It really is an odd credo. Clearly the way forward is to explore policies that reconcile safety with economic and social needs. Yet these extremists hate the very mention of such ideas – see the ugly attacks on Cyclefree last night.
Seconded.
It's obviously the case that people going out with the awareness that they need to be careful around other people is a totally different situation to the one in which we saw cases rise exponentially.
Anecdotally on virus stuff, I think London is now down to a very low level. We should be allowed to open up the shops and outdoor businesses fully.
Complete and dangerous nonsense.
The UK went from a handful of cases to an epidemic killing 35k+ people in reasonably short order.
There should be an easing but gradual, managed, backed by reasonably effective track and trace, and with a close eye at all stages on infection rates so we can go into reverse if required.
It's wonderful, isn't it?
Even after everything that's happened, and is still happening in countries like Brazil, we have bright sparks popping up and saying "on anecdotal (i.e. scientifically worthless) evidence I think it's low (undefined) therefore we should be allowed to do X (reasoning unexplained)".
Or more likely you're an irrational lockdown fascist who ignores the evidence coming out of other countries who have done exactly this and not seen a rise in new cases. Schools, outdoor spaces and businesses and shops. All of them should be open now. You can continue to be scared of your own shadow but it doesn't change the evidence that there isn't a huge amount of outdoor transmission and that there isn't a huge amount of transmission in supermarkets or that the chances of child to adult transmission is extremely low.
These are all new things we didn't previously know and our policy needs to be updated to reflect them.
Yes. The posts of Chris and Sandy and other PB Lockdownists are utterly tiresome, and nauseating. They seem to be driven more by a weird brand of moralising rather than evidence. Sandy pops up on here nightly to dismiss various groups of people as 'dickheads' for leaving their house, then disappears. It really is an odd credo. Clearly the way forward is to explore policies that reconcile safety with economic and social needs. Yet these extremists hate the very mention of such ideas – see the ugly attacks on Cyclefree last night.
Seconded.
It's obviously the case that people going out with the awareness that they need to be careful around other people is a totally different situation to the one in which we saw cases rise exponentially.
What all the governments (that are actively trying to do something vaguely sensible) around the world are doing, is to try and work out a balance -
What are the *least* set of restrictions (combined with testing/tracing) that will reduce the effective R to the point that the disease dies out/falls to a very low level?
Anecdotally on virus stuff, I think London is now down to a very low level. We should be allowed to open up the shops and outdoor businesses fully.
Complete and dangerous nonsense.
The UK went from a handful of cases to an epidemic killing 35k+ people in reasonably short order.
There should be an easing but gradual, managed, backed by reasonably effective track and trace, and with a close eye at all stages on infection rates so we can go into reverse if required.
It's wonderful, isn't it?
Even after everything that's happened, and is still happening in countries like Brazil, we have bright sparks popping up and saying "on anecdotal (i.e. scientifically worthless) evidence I think it's low (undefined) therefore we should be allowed to do X (reasoning unexplained)".
Or more likely you're an irrational lockdown fascist who ignores the evidence coming out of other countries who have done exactly this and not seen a rise in new cases. Schools, outdoor spaces and businesses and shops. All of them should be open now. You can continue to be scared of your own shadow but it doesn't change the evidence that there isn't a huge amount of outdoor transmission and that there isn't a huge amount of transmission in supermarkets or that the chances of child to adult transmission is extremely low.
These are all new things we didn't previously know and our policy needs to be updated to reflect them.
Yes. The posts of Chris and Sandy and other PB Lockdownists are utterly tiresome, and nauseating. They seem to be driven more by a weird brand of moralising rather than evidence. Sandy pops up on here nightly to dismiss various groups of people as 'dickheads' for leaving their house, then disappears. It really is an odd credo. Clearly the way forward is to explore policies that reconcile safety with economic and social needs. Yet these extremists hate the very mention of such ideas – see the ugly attacks on Cyclefree last night.
It's a new form of puritanism. I'm not even suggesting that we go back to normal overnight, just open up the areas where there is evidence of low or no transmission. It's not like I'm saying we should open up Fabric or Printworks, just beer gardens, outdoor seating areas in cafés and restaurants, and schools.
I think Swinson's loss was very much the Lib Dems loss as well. She made some bad mistakes. She won't have the opportunity to learn from those mistakes, which I think she would have done. The Lib Dems big problem now is the tiny MP gene pool. They are all pavement politicians (literally going on about pavements), which helps them win seats in difficult circumstances. It doesn't give them any insight into the broader picture. The Lib Dems are also unfortunate that none of the Change UK candidates won their seats. It would have given them some genetic diversity.
I think Swinson's loss was very much the Lib Dems loss as well. She made some bad mistakes. She won't have the opportunity to learn from those mistakes, which I think she would have done. The Lib Dems big problem now is the tiny MP gene pool. They are all pavement politicians (literally going on about pavements), which helps them win seats in difficult circumstances. It doesn't give them any insight into the broader picture. The Lib Dems are also unfortunate that none of the Change UK candidates won their seats. It would have given them some genetic diversity.
She was utter crap
She was like a woke Ruth Davidson. Completely the wrong person at the wrong time.
Davey's positioning the party to the right of the Conservatives on economics is brave. He might look very clever this time next year, or he risks reminding voters that when push comes to shove, the LibDems back the Tories.
I think the key point is that when push comes to shove, the Tories will back other parties (including the Lib Dems) and work with them for the duration of the agreement, while Labour simply don't play well with others.
I had a look at the history of hung Parliaments and times when the ruling party had a very weak majority - the Tories are far more likely to talk with others and agree compromise, while Labour have a tendency to insist on going it alone.
It rather surprised me; I'd have thought it was the other way around.
Callaghan was propped up by the Liberals as was Macdonald
"Far more likely"
In the 1890s, the Tories dealt in depth with the Liberal Unionists until they absorbed them.
In 1918, the Tories went with the Liberals even though they could go it alone. They stuck to their agreement for years, even though they could go it alone and the end of that agreement was such a significant moment for the Tories it cost them their leader and their backbench Committee is named after it to this day.
In 1923, the Liberals expected Labour to want to work with them and MacDonald ignored them - basically daring them to try to bring him down. Asquith decided to unilaterally support them anyway, but got nothing for it. Labour also switched to anti-PR at that point.
In 1929, the same as 1923.
In the Thirties, Labour were the only party to refuse a National Coalition. The Liberals split under the pressure. The Tories kept offering a place to the Liberals (even standing down in some constituencies).
In 1964, Grimond expected Wilson to offer a deal to prop him up, but instead Labour doubled down on attacking the Liberals to try to pick up a majority.
In 1974, Heath had full-on talks with the Liberals but couldn't bring the rest of his party along. Wilson didn't even open up talks.
The Lib-Lab deal in 1977 was the only time Labour have properly offered the Liberal Party anything, and that really wasn't much in practice.
In 2010, Labour (despite Brown's intent) offered sod-all to the Lib Dems, while Cameron gave them half their manifesto in a single chunk.
The danger with the Tories is they'll actually hug you close longer than necessary and work towards absorption (Clegg and co probably didn't need the FTPA). Labour work towards exclusion.
While I LIKE the post, in Feb 1974 there was a significant Lib opinion that, whoever had 'won' the election, Heath had 'lost' it, and consequently shouldn't be supported. Thorpe wasn't very interested in anything (politically) without PR, either.
I think the preliminary question is what are the Lib Dems for? In the last Parliament they were for overturning the referendum result either outright or by a second referendum. Despite acquiring a reasonable number of fellow travellers from across the political spectrum this proved to be very much a minority interest preventing the breakthrough required by FPTP and resulted in the loss of their newly acquired MPs.
We now have a situation where the UK has left the EU, albeit we remain in a transition phase. By the next election we will certainly have left completely even if the transition is extended. We also have a massive issue of the virus and its economic sequelae. Surely it is the latter that the Lib Dems must concentrate on?
This is personal bias but I always had a real weakness for the Orange Bookers, small state, economically conservative with a small "c", keen to promote equality within those limitations and socially liberal. Cameron and Osborne were both Orange Bookers at heart which is why the quad in the Coalition worked so well. Davey to me epitomises this position and if I had a vote in this I would vote for him in a heart beat. The Conservatives seem, in the current crisis, to have forgotten economic conservatism and it is a voice that needs to be heard. At least I think so, but I fully accept that this is very much a minority position.
Income tax was set up to support the Napoleonic Wars, I wonder if @HYUFD thinks that means its not a tax too?
Income tax reasons of the first few taxes, hence it is called a tax not an insurance like National Insurance
A Jaffa cake is a biscuit.
And the World Series is not open to teams from the whole planet.
A Jaffa cake is not a biscuit according to the court ruling of 1991.
Where is it found in supermarkets? Eh? Not the cake section. Where do you find the Penguin bars? At the pet shop?
It's a biscuit.
You might think so, and HM Customs and Excise thought so before 1991. But in 2020 its place in the VAT schedule is "cake", not "biscuit". But we've gone off on a tangy tangent. NI is a tax.
Davey's positioning the party to the right of the Conservatives on economics is brave. He might look very clever this time next year, or he risks reminding voters that when push comes to shove, the LibDems back the Tories.
I think the key point is that when push comes to shove, the Tories will back other parties (including the Lib Dems) and work with them for the duration of the agreement, while Labour simply don't play well with others.
I had a look at the history of hung Parliaments and times when the ruling party had a very weak majority - the Tories are far more likely to talk with others and agree compromise, while Labour have a tendency to insist on going it alone.
It rather surprised me; I'd have thought it was the other way around.
Callaghan was propped up by the Liberals as was Macdonald
"Far more likely"
In the 1890s, the Tories dealt in depth with the Liberal Unionists until they absorbed them.
In 1918, the Tories went with the Liberals even though they could go it alone. They stuck to their agreement for years, even though they could go it alone and the end of that agreement was such a significant moment for the Tories it cost them their leader and their backbench Committee is named after it to this day.
In 1923, the Liberals expected Labour to want to work with them and MacDonald ignored them - basically daring them to try to bring him down. Asquith decided to unilaterally support them anyway, but got nothing for it. Labour also switched to anti-PR at that point.
In 1929, the same as 1923.
In the Thirties, Labour were the only party to refuse a National Coalition. The Liberals split under the pressure. The Tories kept offering a place to the Liberals (even standing down in some constituencies).
In 1964, Grimond expected Wilson to offer a deal to prop him up, but instead Labour doubled down on attacking the Liberals to try to pick up a majority.
In 1974, Heath had full-on talks with the Liberals but couldn't bring the rest of his party along. Wilson didn't even open up talks.
The Lib-Lab deal in 1977 was the only time Labour have properly offered the Liberal Party anything, and that really wasn't much in practice.
In 2010, Labour (despite Brown's intent) offered sod-all to the Lib Dems, while Cameron gave them half their manifesto in a single chunk.
The danger with the Tories is they'll actually hug you close longer than necessary and work towards absorption (Clegg and co probably didn't need the FTPA). Labour work towards exclusion.
Without LD support hard to see Starmer becoming PM
True. In Opposition, Labour often make conciliatory overtures. In the run-up to 1997 we saw this. When they realised they needed no help after all, they dropped the Lib Dems instantly (well, they gave Roy Jenkins a Commission to investigate voting reform which they promptly gave a stiff ignoring to).
It's possible that if they do need support after 2024, they might follow up. It would be unusual, but possible. The posts of Labour supporters on here show how they'd feel about that prospect, though (eg the one I initially replied to)
I remember seeing Robin Cook walking down a train carriage once.
John Smith in the bar car of the Edinburgh Sleeper, holding court to adoring acolytes, "thirsty".
Charles Clarke on the opposite escalator at Victoria, red in the face
Michael Heseltine behind me in the queue for a payphone at King Cross - it wasn't working.
Betty Boothroyd on the number 82 bus.
Mrs T in the Holiday Inn Cramlington (power had been cut the day before as Special Branch searched for bombs)
The Queen at Newcastle Races.
Harold Macmillan buying Chewits at a newsagents in Worthing.
Didier Drogba at the Jorvik Viking Centre.
Ted Moult returning slug pellets at the Wyevale Garden Centre in Chester.
Pope John Paul II at the greyhound racing in Romford.
Kim Jong Un at a roller-disco in Arbroath.
Beat that.
That is superb, bravo! Gave me a laugh anyway. Roller-disco is inspired. *applause*
I have to admit the "roller-disco in Arbroath" is nicked from Bob Servant (written by Neil Forsyth, portrayed by Brian Cox - but not that one), whose TV shows, books, and Twitter feed are well worth checking out.
Bob Servant was brilliant , Cox played the Burger King superbly, very funny.
Anecdotally on virus stuff, I think London is now down to a very low level. We should be allowed to open up the shops and outdoor businesses fully.
Complete and dangerous nonsense.
The UK went from a handful of cases to an epidemic killing 35k+ people in reasonably short order.
There should be an easing but gradual, managed, backed by reasonably effective track and trace, and with a close eye at all stages on infection rates so we can go into reverse if required.
It's wonderful, isn't it?
Even after everything that's happened, and is still happening in countries like Brazil, we have bright sparks popping up and saying "on anecdotal (i.e. scientifically worthless) evidence I think it's low (undefined) therefore we should be allowed to do X (reasoning unexplained)".
Or more likely you're an irrational lockdown fascist who ignores the evidence coming out of other countries who have done exactly this and not seen a rise in new cases. Schools, outdoor spaces and businesses and shops. All of them should be open now. You can continue to be scared of your own shadow but it doesn't change the evidence that there isn't a huge amount of outdoor transmission and that there isn't a huge amount of transmission in supermarkets or that the chances of child to adult transmission is extremely low.
These are all new things we didn't previously know and our policy needs to be updated to reflect them.
Yes. The posts of Chris and Sandy and other PB Lockdownists are utterly tiresome, and nauseating. They seem to be driven more by a weird brand of moralising rather than evidence. Sandy pops up on here nightly to dismiss various groups of people as 'dickheads' for leaving their house, then disappears. It really is an odd credo. Clearly the way forward is to explore policies that reconcile safety with economic and social needs. Yet these extremists hate the very mention of such ideas – see the ugly attacks on Cyclefree last night.
Seconded.
It's obviously the case that people going out with the awareness that they need to be careful around other people is a totally different situation to the one in which we saw cases rise exponentially.
Quite right. People are being very careful in my experience. Yet nothing is good enough for some. Also, the new cases data should have shown huge spikes by now were the attacks of the PB Lockdownists valid. There were several posts on here a few weeks ago attacking humans for doing human things, predicting massive spikes in London (particularly) when people who live in small flats without any outdoor space dared to sit in the park in 26c heat. Yet the London numbers are now among the best in the country. Go figure.
We are learning every day - yes, it's going to be agggges before we're back to normal, but that shouldn't stop us trying to find ways to return to normality. In my industry, for example, I don't think we'll be having big exhibitions for at least 9 months - maybe 12 or 18. But it is really encouraging that we're seeing places open up to a limited degree and keep a lid on things. It has to start happening here.
In my opinion many of those who want to stay more socially distanced will largely be able to do so. WFH is going to be far more prevalent. I got the train to work this morning as I have no alternative - fewer than 10 people in a 5 carriage train.
The same model that picked an Al Gore landslide in 2000 and a Hillary Clinton landslide in 2016?
No. You clearly didn't read the article.
The model is said to have correctly predicted the popular vote in every election since 1948, other than 1968 and 1976.
Though xkcd applies to any predictions like this anyone decent will I think hope that the model is right.
The Electoral College wins the presidency not the popular vote as 2000 and 2016 showed
If it had been the Republican Party that won the popular vote but lost the ECV twice in as many decades, there might be more of a clamour to do something about it.
To be honest, there would have been exactly the same amount of clamour but from a different set of people.
For instance, the Democrats appear to have discovered virtue in States Rights.
That is hardly new, as anyone with a passing knowledge of the American Civil War would know.
I think Swinson's loss was very much the Lib Dems loss as well. She made some bad mistakes. She won't have the opportunity to learn from those mistakes, which I think she would have done. The Lib Dems big problem now is the tiny MP gene pool. They are all pavement politicians (literally going on about pavements), which helps them win seats in difficult circumstances. It doesn't give them any insight into the broader picture. The Lib Dems are also unfortunate that none of the Change UK candidates won their seats. It would have given them some genetic diversity.
She was utter crap
She was like a woke Ruth Davidson. Completely the wrong person at the wrong time.
The same model that picked an Al Gore landslide in 2000 and a Hillary Clinton landslide in 2016?
No. You clearly didn't read the article.
The model is said to have correctly predicted the popular vote in every election since 1948, other than 1968 and 1976.
Though xkcd applies to any predictions like this anyone decent will I think hope that the model is right.
The Electoral College wins the presidency not the popular vote as 2000 and 2016 showed
If it had been the Republican Party that won the popular vote but lost the ECV twice in as many decades, there might be more of a clamour to do something about it.
To be honest, there would have been exactly the same amount of clamour but from a different set of people.
For instance, the Democrats appear to have discovered virtue in States Rights.
That is hardly new, as anyone with a passing knowledge of the American Civil War would know.
LOL - returning to their.... roots?
Not sure that that the Stainless Banner* will be waving at the next Dem convention, though.
And 3 or 4 seconds after President Biden is sworn in, States Rights will be evil again.
*Yes, a bullshit name for a stupid rag, flown by bigots.
I like Davey, and voted for him over Swinson last year. I may well do so again.
I don't know enough of Daisy, but will have a look. I do like Layla, and she comes over fresh and bright on all media, but not convinced on leadership skills. She is a bit erratic.
I thought Davey was by far the better choice last time out, and I said so. With the benefit of hindsight, I was right.
There is no dignity in kicking a dead corpse, but Swinson’s flaws were legion, and glaringly obvious to uninvolved observers. We need not list them now.
I have not yet come to any conclusion for this new contest. All three of them look miles better than the last few leaders.
Moran comes over very well on radio, but seeing her for the first time is a bit of a shock. This may sound superficial and misogynistic, but it is a serious point. When was the last time a truly odd-looking individual led a political party? (Margaret Beckett doesn’t really count.)
Isn’t there a saying that politics is show business for ugly people? I’m not sure any party leader in my lifetime, with the exceptions of Blair and Cameron, have been particular handsome.
Please note that I did not say that Moran was ugly. Odd-looking is not the same thing.
For example, Margaret Thatcher was most definitely odd-looking, but she was definitely not ugly. In fact, it seems to be universally accepted that the lady had a certain je ne sais quoi.
It could even be argued that odd-looking leaders do unusually well: Churchill, Thatcher, Charlie Kennedy, Ian Paisley snr, Alex Salmond.
She is actually very attractive; her Palestinian heritage gives her an unusual look. Her dress sense however is hideous and I would hope the party will do what it didn’t with Swinson (but Labour did with Corbyn) and force her to take some appropriate advice.
Up close she has the most beautiful translucent skin.
Davey's positioning the party to the right of the Conservatives on economics is brave. He might look very clever this time next year, or he risks reminding voters that when push comes to shove, the LibDems back the Tories.
I think the key point is that when push comes to shove, the Tories will back other parties (including the Lib Dems) and work with them for the duration of the agreement, while Labour simply don't play well with others.
I had a look at the history of hung Parliaments and times when the ruling party had a very weak majority - the Tories are far more likely to talk with others and agree compromise, while Labour have a tendency to insist on going it alone.
It rather surprised me; I'd have thought it was the other way around.
Callaghan was propped up by the Liberals as was Macdonald
"Far more likely"
In the 1890s, the Tories dealt in depth with the Liberal Unionists until they absorbed them.
In 1918, the Tories went with the Liberals even though they could go it alone. They stuck to their agreement for years, even though they could go it alone and the end of that agreement was such a significant moment for the Tories it cost them their leader and their backbench Committee is named after it to this day.
In 1923, the Liberals expected Labour to want to work with them and MacDonald ignored them - basically daring them to try to bring him down. Asquith decided to unilaterally support them anyway, but got nothing for it. Labour also switched to anti-PR at that point.
In 1929, the same as 1923.
In the Thirties, Labour were the only party to refuse a National Coalition. The Liberals split under the pressure. The Tories kept offering a place to the Liberals (even standing down in some constituencies).
In 1964, Grimond expected Wilson to offer a deal to prop him up, but instead Labour doubled down on attacking the Liberals to try to pick up a majority.
In 1974, Heath had full-on talks with the Liberals but couldn't bring the rest of his party along. Wilson didn't even open up talks.
The Lib-Lab deal in 1977 was the only time Labour have properly offered the Liberal Party anything, and that really wasn't much in practice.
In 2010, Labour (despite Brown's intent) offered sod-all to the Lib Dems, while Cameron gave them half their manifesto in a single chunk.
The danger with the Tories is they'll actually hug you close longer than necessary and work towards absorption (Clegg and co probably didn't need the FTPA). Labour work towards exclusion.
Very well said. Two further points.
Some here like Scott call the current government the Brexit Party government (or others say the Vote Leave government) and are phrasing it like that as an insult. But nothing could be more traditionally Conservative than recognising that there are votes for Brexit and pivoting to support tht as a result.
Secondly I think there is a philosophical reason why this happens and it goes back to the People's Front of Judea vs Judean People's Front splits that we often refer to on the left.
Conservatives philosophically believe we are right (as in correct) but we also believe in what works. If compromising with your political opponents works then that's easier for us to do. The left tend to philosophically believe they are right (as in correct) too they also believe far more that their view and only theirs is the one true morally right opinion too. Which makes it much harder for them to make compromises, because its not just compromising your politics but compromising your moral core too.
Comments
That is how I would fund social care, however the BBC article makes clear the Government were considering free personal care entirely, given currently you have to pay for care costs down to your last £25 000 excluding your house for at home care rather than tax rises ruled out by the Tory manifesto
There is a massive unknown as to whether relaxing the lockdown will lead to a large second wave of the infection. Therefore the government will watch to see what happens in other European countries and continue to slowly relax the lockdown. The short term options open to the government are clear and restricted. In the long term all options are possible.
It is now.
That looks controversial
The funny thing with left v liberal is that the left tends to view liberals as "not left" when it suits them (eg complaining the site is biased) but then on election day deems it as read that the liberals must want a Labour government.
I was more thinking there's a distinction between what you might term the Blair-style centre-left Labour (eg SouthamObserver etc) and the Corbyn-style far-left (eg BigJohnOwls etc)
https://covid.joinzoe.com/
Obviously the Furlough scheme has prevented mass unemployment but I think it is now it is being overused by companies who remain closed when there is no need to such a Car Servicing Garages. I think that the next annoucement from Boris should instruct such places to return to work and restrict their Furlough payments.
Theresa May isn't unattractive for a mature woman. And she did have a sense of style (or else she had an assistant who had), but unfortunately, she never found a hairdo that she then kept. If you think about Margaret Thatcher, she never stepped out of the door without being immaculately dressed with that helmet of red hair. By the same token, Angela Merkel has never wavered from her rather unfortunate barnet. It reassures people. They know what to expect. Theresa May's dithering over her hairstyle (and often choosing bad ones, more and more toward the end) was a visual representation of her dithering over everything else.
@Philip_Thompson is a Corbyn-ite Troops Out Revolutionary Communist Party type of liberal.
If the LibDems were brave, they'd go for Daisy. From what I have seen of her, she'd be an infinitely better leader than their previously-chosen Swinton.
Then again the obvious analogy is that he was facing rabid trots then also. He has not won an election against someone not a rabid trot so we shall see in 2024.
EDIT: I think voice matters much more.
They now need to come up with a great deal more than restricting furlough and 'instructing' a return to work. The economy has fallen off a cliff; it will require extraordinary measures to restart it - and getting that anywhere near right is the Treasury's big test.
As for Johnson, other than as a figurehead - irrelevant.
The furlough payment, loans etc are not a Pimms-In-The-Garden holiday - if you are owning/running a business. It is a pump that reduces the rate at which your boat is sinking to a small(isn) number.
Unless businesses restart, the furlough will simply be a long, well paid, redundancy notice.
The incentive to restart businesses is two-fold - saving the business and trying to make some of that profit stuff.
One thing the government has got right is to start the return to work while the financial measures are in place.
This gives more time (but still limited) to restart. The restart can therefore be phased.
Which means not throwing everyone back in on the same day.
Which in turn helps getting the HSE implications of COVID19 right and also avoids a cost "cliff" where you are suddenly back to paying the full staff, without income to pay them.
They haven't kept quiet on it, and haven't "swallowed it" in that many states have passed the "national popular vote" legislation which is probably the most realistic route to changing the system.
Is it front and centre of national campaigning? Of course not - just as proportional representation isn't in the UK. And it wouldn't be if Republicans had been on the losing end of it - they'd be talking about immigration, crime, and tax because that rather than electoral reform is what presses people's buttons.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-edinburgh-east-fife-52748722
Hubris at its most, well, hubristic.
Perhaps they can find a home for it in Malc's back garden.
As it happens I don't think Eck will take it well in his current frame of mind. No doubt, Nicola's fault.
The reckoning is still to come.
Labour: "We're right, so we'll work with you on the proviso that we get all our policies and you get to vote for them"
Tories: "Whatever it takes to get a hand on the steering wheel."
It's one reason that I think, against the prevailing consensus, that the Tories would adapt best to PR. They are instinctively set up for consensus politics.
(They might even deliberately fissure into their component groups (ERG-types, Wets/Cameroons, Middle-of-the-road Tories) and have a decent chance of getting overall majorities on their own).
I view Nick Clegg as closer to my beliefs than Theresa May.
I don't like the name of my party. I am not a conservative with a small c. In Australia the name of the right wing party, the sister party to the UK's Conservatives, is the Liberal Party. That suits me better.
Fighting 2024 in a worst depression than other countries because of reasons know one can remember will still be very hard. Still, Johnson will be planning to retire by then anyway as he needs more cash.
It's obviously the case that people going out with the awareness that they need to be careful around other people is a totally different situation to the one in which we saw cases rise exponentially.
Sozza.
The conservative party in Australia is the National Party. I wouldn't support them, but would give them my second preference under their AV voting system because of the coalition.
The Conservative Party in Australia is the Liberal Party.
And as I said I would support the Liberal Party.
The Tory Party is still not the Brexit Party
And the World Series is not open to teams from the whole planet.
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/slides-and-datasets-to-accompany-coronavirus-press-conference-20-may-2020
It has been bouncing around at 5-6% for a while now. 7% might be a genuine uptick starting - but there is only one data point.
Many of the "crowds on platforms" pictures are using force perspective - long lens zoomed in - to give the impression that mobs of people are standing on top of each other.
In the 1890s, the Tories dealt in depth with the Liberal Unionists until they absorbed them.
In 1918, the Tories went with the Liberals even though they could go it alone. They stuck to their agreement for years, even though they could go it alone and the end of that agreement was such a significant moment for the Tories it cost them their leader and their backbench Committee is named after it to this day.
In 1923, the Liberals expected Labour to want to work with them and MacDonald ignored them - basically daring them to try to bring him down. Asquith decided to unilaterally support them anyway, but got nothing for it. Labour also switched to anti-PR at that point.
In 1929, the same as 1923.
In the Thirties, Labour were the only party to refuse a National Coalition. The Liberals split under the pressure.
The Tories kept offering a place to the Liberals (even standing down in some constituencies).
In 1964, Grimond expected Wilson to offer a deal to prop him up, but instead Labour doubled down on attacking the Liberals to try to pick up a majority.
In 1974, Heath had full-on talks with the Liberals but couldn't bring the rest of his party along. Wilson didn't even open up talks.
The Lib-Lab deal in 1977 was the only time Labour have properly offered the Liberal Party anything, and that really wasn't much in practice.
In 2010, Labour (despite Brown's intent) offered sod-all to the Lib Dems, while Cameron gave them half their manifesto in a single chunk.
The danger with the Tories is they'll actually hug you close longer than necessary and work towards absorption (Clegg and co probably didn't need the FTPA). Labour work towards exclusion.
In New Zealand the Nationals are the main centre right party, in Canada the Conservative Party of Canada is.
Australia like Japan and the Netherlands just has a liberal party as the main centre right party
They're both taxes.
The sister party to the Conservative Party in Australia is the Liberal Party. The Liberal Party and the Conservative Party are both founding members of the International Democrat Union (IDU) and the Liberal Party is even associated with the ECR European Parliament grouping that David Cameron helped set up too.
One thing Australian newspapers are very good at it using capital letters correctly when referring to conservative or Conservative or liberal or Liberal etc
What are the *least* set of restrictions (combined with testing/tracing) that will reduce the effective R to the point that the disease dies out/falls to a very low level?
It's a biscuit.
https://twitter.com/SirSocks/status/1263382896284499968
I notice Barnier didn't defend their daft fishing stance in his letter back to Frost.
Surely an admission their stance is ridiculous ?
https://twitter.com/MichelBarnier/status/1263118957944483842?s=20
We now have a situation where the UK has left the EU, albeit we remain in a transition phase. By the next election we will certainly have left completely even if the transition is extended. We also have a massive issue of the virus and its economic sequelae. Surely it is the latter that the Lib Dems must concentrate on?
This is personal bias but I always had a real weakness for the Orange Bookers, small state, economically conservative with a small "c", keen to promote equality within those limitations and socially liberal. Cameron and Osborne were both Orange Bookers at heart which is why the quad in the Coalition worked so well. Davey to me epitomises this position and if I had a vote in this I would vote for him in a heart beat. The Conservatives seem, in the current crisis, to have forgotten economic conservatism and it is a voice that needs to be heard. At least I think so, but I fully accept that this is very much a minority position.
But we've gone off on a tangy tangent. NI is a tax.
In Opposition, Labour often make conciliatory overtures. In the run-up to 1997 we saw this. When they realised they needed no help after all, they dropped the Lib Dems instantly (well, they gave Roy Jenkins a Commission to investigate voting reform which they promptly gave a stiff ignoring to).
It's possible that if they do need support after 2024, they might follow up. It would be unusual, but possible. The posts of Labour supporters on here show how they'd feel about that prospect, though (eg the one I initially replied to)
In my opinion many of those who want to stay more socially distanced will largely be able to do so. WFH is going to be far more prevalent. I got the train to work this morning as I have no alternative - fewer than 10 people in a 5 carriage train.
Not sure that that the Stainless Banner* will be waving at the next Dem convention, though.
And 3 or 4 seconds after President Biden is sworn in, States Rights will be evil again.
*Yes, a bullshit name for a stupid rag, flown by bigots.
Some here like Scott call the current government the Brexit Party government (or others say the Vote Leave government) and are phrasing it like that as an insult. But nothing could be more traditionally Conservative than recognising that there are votes for Brexit and pivoting to support tht as a result.
Secondly I think there is a philosophical reason why this happens and it goes back to the People's Front of Judea vs Judean People's Front splits that we often refer to on the left.
Conservatives philosophically believe we are right (as in correct) but we also believe in what works. If compromising with your political opponents works then that's easier for us to do.
The left tend to philosophically believe they are right (as in correct) too they also believe far more that their view and only theirs is the one true morally right opinion too. Which makes it much harder for them to make compromises, because its not just compromising your politics but compromising your moral core too.