Which issues would most determine how Britons would vote in a General Election? (14 May)The Economy 60%Healthcare 57%Immigration 27%Education 25%Housing 20%The Environment 19%Policing/Crime 18%Taxation 16%Welfare 16%Pensions 16% pic.twitter.com/XWuHE5F1MY
Comments
Stop being stupid and part of the problem
Economic issues turn out floating voters.
The problem is that the economy is in a hole, nothing Labour has done or thinks can be blamed for that fact. It is Tory through and through.
Therefore anyone trying to pretend penises matter for the electorate at large is crazy.
That is the limitation with these sorts of polls, since am I to believe taxation is not an important issue for people because it is pretty low down on the list? That's why the 'people didn't list the EU as an important issue' argument was always a nonsense, since people did care about it once they were asked specifically about it. Likewise if you asked specifically on taxation people would show they have very strong views on its importance.
Its time to do something else. That is my point here. You accuse me of being a miserable git because I don't think that more of the same is going to change a thing and is just going to be leading us further into decline.
At least I realise we need to do something different when trying the same thing over and over is not working. Which is why I say you are part of the problem. You pretty evidently are a supporter of one of the parties on offer and I don't really care which as a vote for them is a vote for more of the same
One of the reasons I'd like to see PR is because you'd get more nuance. Want an economically liberal pro-Europe party that's socially conservative? Well, you aren't going to get one under FPTP. Under PR you're much more likely to find the right combination of flavours for your policy tastes.
Verstappen face mask - check.
Welsh rugby shirt - check.
Pizza with pineapple on - check.
Route to Sheffield - laid in.
ENGAGE...
Sounds like Gove is trying to have his dog whistles and eat them.
Where we are isn't so bad anyway. Perhaps the end state of wise government looks like this? (I don't believe it does, but I see no opportunities of gain in the policies of anybody).
Just as he was actually right about many of the issues in education.
It was his solutions that were the problem..
That doesn't stop it being alarming how much pleasure some on the right get from those topics.
He had shocking judgment, which is a different problem.
Here's a scenario - if someone doesn't see a great deal of difference between the major parties (correctly or not) on their top 3 priorities, then other issies will come into play for them.
People might not care as much, and so you can be reasonably confident if the issues you are strong on are aligned with the public that you will do well, but that doesn't mean people don't care at all on the other stuff and so shouldn't be assumed to be on board for anything else you decide to do - the sort of thing where parties pretend their whole manifesto has been endorsed.
Unbelievably, there are still civilians, even children trapped in Bakhmut. Some are desperate to escape. Others are what Ukrainians refer to as "zhduny," meaning "the waiting ones," those waiting for Russia. I also know a few people are left in Ivanivske, where I used to teach.
https://twitter.com/ChristopherJM/status/1660290654583283712?cxt=HHwWgICzpbjjxIouAAAA
After all, if you don't want culture wars, why back Badenoch?
(Actually, a 900 word op-ed on why KB is the bee's knees and SB isn't would be an interesting exercise for someone.)
It's more representative as well to have incapable people running things, and that's all the rage now rght?
4 words. Lacking nuance, but it's a solid outline.
A cross party working group that looks at the figures producing a table of non infrastructure things. Then a general poll using av on what people in the country want. People can vote 1,2,3,4 etc until what they have voted for comes to the total of tax revenue
The table would be (with an example figures made up)
This is what the state does === This is how much it costs to fund that properly
Free nursery places === 5billion
Then drop the things that are lowest in votes until Tax revenue balances expenditure
The winning team, half an hour ago, was the Ferrari 296 #30, run by the husband of the late Sabine Schmitz, famous lady ‘Ring driver. They smashed the record for number of laps in the race.
I vote on who I think has the best offer, on who I have most confidence in, and partly on values.
It's lucky for Leeds that their ride or die game is Spurs at home. I might have some of that
Who decides how much each thing costs? (Spoiler: you can't. Policy decisions interact profoundly and affect the costs and revenues of adjacent policy decisions)
How many things would be on the list (I'm imagining hundreds)?
How are decisions that affect the tax revenue accounted for? If a measure is revenue positive is it automatically in?
What happens when circumstances change and the cost of a policy goes up or down? New vote, or someone decides. Who? When?
Totally unworkable.
But: his political instincts are iffy, his strategic nous is off and he struggles with the compromise and diplomacy required to navigate complex policy change (most notably at Education, where his certainty of his own rightness - egged on by Classic, Gibbo et al - led to ultimate defeat by ‘the blob’).
He is also susceptible to the allure of the alt-right and cannot help but scheme and meddle, that and suggestions about his recreational activity make me question his morality too.
It makes not a jot to me who the two out of three are. Leicester are a midlands club, so I would prefer them to stay up. It would be a shame if Everton lost their top flight longevity status and Leeds? Well who cares about Leeds? really?
mad
The Tories would have more chance turning out their wider base by doing as Gove suggests, although it is probably too late now.
We don’t know what things cost. Sure, you can do a basic calculation of the initial implementation or running cost, but we have these policies because we think they benefit the country. The NHS costs £xxx, but having a healthy workforce increases productivity, having a state safety net increase labour mobility and entrepreneurship. These make money. How do we factor those in?
We can make estimates, but generally those estimates reflect political views.
Another challenge is that direct democracy can falter because people aren’t sufficiently knowledgeable about how things work. That’s why we have representative democracy.
Tytler
We either sort things out or we be Nero fiddling while Rome burns because that quote sums up where we are now
Those parties are, between them, delivering what people want.
Whenever people claim that we're coming to a crisis in the coming decades, what they really mean is that their view is so far off to one side they can't connect with anything in the mainstream.
But that's a you problem.
As for debt being unsustainable... the markets have got you covered there. If there was no faith in future governments being able to service debts incurred now, those debts would be prohibitively expensive. And they aren't. So again, it's you versus tens of thousands of people who do this sort of thing as a job and get paid well for it too.
Now, outlier individuals like you can sometimes be right against the prevailing opinions. But does that apply in this case. Are you a pundit of rare vintage? Probably not, since you can't handle the merest challenge to your idea. I offered specific criticisms to your idea, and you decided not to engage with them at all. I suspect you don't have any answers at all. That's because you're not a savant, you're just some dafty.
What it does put me in mind of is Jim Hacker being advised not to angrily or sarcastically rage against the opposition.
"Those are the bits the party likes"
"The party will vote for you anyway".
Bombast and vituperation works far more than we'd prefer to acknowledge however.
@PaulEmbery
The Ukrainian parliament building? No, it’s City Hall, Norwich, England. Forgive me, but I just find it incredibly weird."
https://twitter.com/PaulEmbery/status/1660238823337369600
We may still have a way to go.
I can't seeing it lasting another 100 years if we carry on as we are
Also, never let us down, Twitter
That way it resets to 1660 and we get another 360 or so years to sort things out.
We must be a little wary of mapping the past onto the present thoughtlessly, because the progress of ideas and technology make conditions too different. We like to spot similarities and we easily overlook profound differences.
Is the sarcasm more overt in this post?
This is deeply weird and incoherent stuff from you. Is there a committee telling you what sentences to write, perhaps chosen by an AV vote?
It's largely your fault, though. You jumped into a conversation between a couple of idiots. It's only natural that one of them briefly mistook you for a third.
Certainly though in the UK we have a homeowner/pensioner/hoping for inheritance vote....voting for parties which will support largesse and a class of people who lose out mostly the young because of those policies who resent it, therefore the rise in "hey boomer" type insults.
When democracy stops working for one portion of a nation it is a source of potential trouble.
I have no doubt whichever party wins in 2024 the policies will support those that are already supported more than those currently losing out
The government's economic strategy had been ERM membership with 15% interest rates to maintain it.
"What we eventually run up against are the forces of humourlessness, and let me assure you that the humourless as a bunch don't just not know what's funny, they don't know what's serious. They have no common sense, either, and shouldn't be trusted with anything."
Martin Amis
Politics is serious business. We want people to not treat it as a joke or game at critical moments. But equally no one is po faced or moralising all the time, or just a real downer, and people like Boris at the right time and place have managed to take advantage of that by not being total killjoys. But also some good people have done it too.
I'm deeply hurt at the suggestion anyone could think I'm not an idiot. Just look at my cricket predictions.
But for many millions - oldies, GenXers who have paid off their mortgages, teenagers who want a job things are very nice.
For other groups things aren't so good with the apogee of crap likely being a young, southern graduate.