politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » This week’s Ashcroft phone poll sees LAB move to 6%

corporeal said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

Surely the unofficial Muslim world cup final will be when England play another Muslim Country?

Don't be ridiculous. A football world cup final wouldn't have England in it.

TheScreamingEagles said:

corporeal said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

Surely the unofficial Muslim world cup final will be when England play another Muslim Country?

Don't be ridiculous. A football world cup final wouldn't have England in it.

Oh yeah, I'm confusing the Association Football World Cup Final, with the Rugby Football World Cup Final, where England have appeared three times.

TOPPING said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

corporeal said:

TheScreamingEagles said:

Surely the unofficial Muslim world cup final will be when England play another Muslim Country?

Don't be ridiculous. A football world cup final wouldn't have England in it.

Oh yeah, I'm confusing the Association Football World Cup Final, with the Rugby Football World Cup Final, where England have appeared three times.

Do we know whether an unsatisfactory result might have any, um, negative consequences for Team Iran?

Smarmeron said:

@TheScreamingEagles

Britain is far more civilized, here the football teams torture the public.

Socrates said:

AveryLP said:

It has been said the USA is a nation which has moved from barbarism to decadence without encountering civilisation on the way.

Given that the USA has the majority of the world's great universities, has more Nobel laureates than any other country, and its period as superpower has overseen a greater spread of liberal democracy - the finest form of civilisation - than any other time in history, that seems like a foolish statement.

MarqueeMark said:

OK, season finale of Game of Thrones. All politics can stop for 70 minutes....

SeanT said:

It's weird how non-European, non-South American football teams are still, to be blunt, a bit crap (with the modest exception of the USA, who should be brilliant given their resources)

Football is the biggest sport throughout Africa, the Mid East, central America, much of Asia.

Yet all their teams are still bollocks.

Why?

Indeed there have only been eight World Cup winning teams in 19 World Cups: Uruguay, Italy, Germany, Argentina, Brazil, France, England, Spain. And the chances are the winner this time will come from the same limited pool (albeit not England, sadly) - unless Holland pull a blinder.

Curious.

foxinsoxuk said:

Nigeria Iran is like watching paint dry. With no beer and a bag over your head. While listening to Phil Neville.

AveryLP said:

Socrates said:

AveryLP said:

It has been said the USA is a nation which has moved from barbarism to decadence without encountering civilisation on the way.

Given that the USA has the majority of the world's great universities, has more Nobel laureates than any other country, and its period as superpower has overseen a greater spread of liberal democracy - the finest form of civilisation - than any other time in history, that seems like a foolish statement.

I'll make a note of that, Socrates.

Thank you.

Socrates said:

India is just the largest example, which had a system of monopolies and taxation that kept hundreds of millions in poverty.

TheScreamingEagles said:

I'm warming to Phil Neville.

He just said "I loved social media until about 24 hours ago"

No_Offence_Alan said:

I won't see it until Wednesday, so any plot spoilers, and I'll send you to Lord Bolton for a good flaying.

MrJones said:

Merkel does look a bit like Adolf. Makes you wonder if there ever was a "Boys from Brazil" it would have been easier to hide if it was "Girls from Brazil".

ProudToBeLabour said:

Harrier Harman is absolutely right in her assessment of Ed Miliband's photoshoot with the Sun. He was right to do it; this will have eternally endeared him to the White Working Class voters of South-East England. He was right to apologise for it; this will have bolstered his already impressive standing with the White Working Class voters of the North-West. This is the same deft agile campaigning style which we in Labour will wheel out time and time again in the General Election campaign.

The Tory Party has a Woman Problem. We are the party of Angela Eagle. We are the party of Kerry McCarthy. And yes, we are the party of Rosie Winterton. Who in the Tory Party has ever reached such rarefied heights?

TheScreamingEagles said:

ProudToBeLabour said:

Harrier Harman is absolutely right in her assessment of Ed Miliband's photoshoot with the Sun. He was right to do it; this will have eternally endeared him to the White Working Class voters of South-East England. He was right to apologise for it; this will have bolstered his already impressive standing with the White Working Class voters of the North-West. This is the same deft agile campaigning style which we in Labour will wheel out time and time again in the General Election campaign.

The Tory Party has a Woman Problem. We are the party of Angela Eagle. We are the party of Kerry McCarthy. And yes, we are the party of Rosie Winterton. Who in the Tory Party has ever reached such rarefied heights?

Kerry McCarthy, the one with the police caution for electoral fraud?

Whereas we are the party of Margaret Thatcher.

How many times have Labour elected a woman as leader?

SeanT said:

AndyJS said:

The USA has the world's best universities and its worst school system of any rich country.

Quite. The best US universities are world beating. Yet America is mediocre in PISA rankings and is dropping fast.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2013/12/03/248329823/u-s-high-school-students-slide-in-math-reading-science

The most ominous stat is that Shanghai students (supposedly the best in China) are fully two years ahead, educationally, compared to those of Massachusetts (supposedly the best in the USA).

Whatever way you look at it, the weathervanes for America point towards significant relative decline. Gentle, but inexorable.

Smarmeron said:

@Sean_F
Not much has changed since then, has it?

Socrates said:

FalseFlag said:

SeanT said:

AndyJS said:

The USA has the world's best universities and its worst school system of any rich country.

Quite. The best US universities are world beating. Yet America is mediocre in PISA rankings and is dropping fast.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2013/12/03/248329823/u-s-high-school-students-slide-in-math-reading-science

The most ominous stat is that Shanghai students (supposedly the best in China) are fully two years ahead, educationally, compared to those of Massachusetts (supposedly the best in the USA).

Whatever way you look at it, the weathervanes for America point towards significant relative decline. Gentle, but inexorable.

Asian-Americans out perform Asians, European-Americans outperform Europeans and African-Americans outperform Africans on the PISA test. That is if we are comparing apples with apples and pears with pears.

Still I find it funny that America is today the evil empire, aggressively pushing permanent revolution, minoritarianism, political correctness and corrosive social values. A Trotskyite wet dream, whereas the rapidly advancing formerly Communist countries of China and Russia stand up for the values of 50s America. As John O'Sullivan remarked 'for much of the world's left, the U.S.today is utopia'. As such there can be only one loser and that is America, a fate every conservative looks forward to.

Ah, if only we could look back to the days when gays could be lynched and Jews weren't allowed into the country club.

America is undoubtedly a better society today than China and Russia. That's why Chinese and Russian people desperately try to migrate into the United States, but Americans, on the whole, don't do it the other way.

Socrates said:

SeanT said:

Your idolatry of America sometimes teeters on the absurd. You can't simultaneously give America credit for everything good that happened under its watch, and carefully exonerate it of everything bad, while doing the opposite to Britain 1750-1930.

Britain CREATED the world's biggest democracy - India - and the world's mightiest democracy - America. The modern world, post 1700, was shaped by Britain more than any other nation, I'd say, and shaped in a positive way. And that's ignoring the miracle of the English language.

As Paul Johnson says, the two races who have given most to the world are the English and the Jews.

Also, we invented Masterchef.

I don't give credit to America for everything good that happened under its watch, nor do I do the opposite for Britain. Britain has given huge amounts to the world - in literature, in science, in political values - and deserves huge praise for that. But let's not put the blinders on here. In terms of our management of world affairs, we did not push things in a liberal democratic direction the way the US did.

The whole reason Britain gave up India in the first place was because Roosevelt sat Churchill down and told him clearly the US would not accept Britain in the first place. If it wasn't for the Americans, India wouldn't have had that democracy. I actually think Britain did very well in how it managed independence, given the circumstances, but the release does not make up for the centuries of oppression before that. Just look at what happened to literacy rates in the decades after independence compared to the decades before to see what a constraint we were on that country.

I'm not blind to America's faults. I am ever ready to criticise the corporatist take over of their republic. Wars such as Vietnam and Iraq were reckless mistakes, and the depositions of governments during the Cold War at times betrayed their values. But we need to look at the big picture. The USA, as top dog, was responsible for hundreds of millions of people getting to benefit from liberal democracy, which is the greatest thing a society can have. The UK as top dog, instead oversaw the spread of colonial subjugation. There's no getting round that.

Socrates said:

I don't give credit to America for everything good that happened under its watch, nor do I do the opposite for Britain. Britain has given huge amounts to the world - in literature, in science, in political values - and deserves huge praise for that. But let's not put the blinders on here. In terms of our management of world affairs, we did not push things in a liberal democratic direction the way the US did.

The whole reason Britain gave up India in the first place was because Roosevelt sat Churchill down and told him clearly the US would not accept Britain in the first place. If it wasn't for the Americans, India wouldn't have had that democracy. I actually think Britain did very well in how it managed independence, given the circumstances, but the release does not make up for the centuries of oppression before that. Just look at what happened to literacy rates in the decades after independence compared to the decades before to see what a constraint we were on that country.

I'm not blind to America's faults. I am ever ready to criticise the corporatist take over of their republic. Wars such as Vietnam and Iraq were reckless mistakes, and the depositions of governments during the Cold War at times betrayed their values. But we need to look at the big picture. The USA, as top dog, was responsible for hundreds of millions of people getting to benefit from liberal democracy, which is the greatest thing a society can have. The UK as top dog, instead oversaw the spread of colonial subjugation. There's no getting round that.

Socrates said:

SeanT said:

Your idolatry of America sometimes teeters on the absurd. You can't simultaneously give America credit for everything good that happened under its watch, and carefully exonerate it of everything bad, while doing the opposite to Britain 1750-1930.

Britain CREATED the world's biggest democracy - India - and the world's mightiest democracy - America. The modern world, post 1700, was shaped by Britain more than any other nation, I'd say, and shaped in a positive way. And that's ignoring the miracle of the English language.

As Paul Johnson says, the two races who have given most to the world are the English and the Jews.

Also, we invented Masterchef.

I actually think Britain did very well in how it managed independence, given the circumstances, but the release does not make up for the centuries of oppression before that. Just look at what happened to literacy rates in the decades after independence compared to the decades before to see what a constraint we were on that country.

Socrates said:

Sean_F said:

I think that Roosevelt et al were motivated more by a desire to replace the UK as top dog, rather than by a desire to spread liberal democracy per se. The US was somewhat lacking in liberal democratic values in the era of Jim Crow.

I disagree. I think they had a genuine belief in anti-imperialism, due to their own history. I agree that Jim Crow was an ugly stain on America's history, but it was possible at the time to believe in segregation within societies while opposing rule of one country by another.

Socrates said:

SeanT said:

I think this is intellectually mediocre drivel. Sorry. America spread English values, and did it with the virility of an undisputed superpower merely because England gave her all defeating Nazism.

The world never had a more "sweet, just boyish master" than the English, as Santayana said.

Anyway now America is on the wane and China's in charge. Or soon will be, Let's see what they do. I recommend we all master chopsticks, and spitting.

Richard_Nabavi said:

It's too late at night to get into detail on such a big subject, but that is a breathtaking piece of historical revisionism.

Two cases of just blanket disagreement without engagement on the actual arguments.

RodCrosby said:

Sean_F said:

As hegemonies go, America's has been pretty benign.

Sure, if you think 20-30 million deaths since 1945 in their wars or proxy-wars is "benign".

Socrates said:

4) Yes, it was. But the British handled things pretty well given the circumstances that the Hindus and the Muslims were at each other's throats and that Britain herself was bankrupt. What else could Britain have done? You don't believe a united India was possible surely?

RodCrosby said:

AndyJS said:

RodCrosby said:

Sean_F said:

As hegemonies go, America's has been pretty benign.

Sure, if you think 20-30 million deaths since 1945 in their wars or proxy-wars is "benign".

It's better than most hegemonies in history.

We will have to wait and see, I suppose...