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PB Predictions Competition 2025 – The (first) results are in! – politicalbetting.com
PB Predictions Competition 2025 – The (first) results are in! – politicalbetting.com
The international chaos of the that past week has naturally dominated both the world news and politicalbetting.com, but let us not forget that there are other important matters to discuss…
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He was writing about children's cardiac surgery in Bristol before then, indeed made his name with that exposure.
Commiserations to Ben in December as he discovers how much work he has left to the very end of the year.
Hammond himself asserts that he said MMR was safe in PE in this 2010 blogpost: https://www.drphilhammond.com/blog/2010/02/18/private-eye/dr-phil’s-private-eye-column-issue-1256-february-17-2010/
But that was written long after the MMR controversy was settled & PE found to be obviously on the wrong side of history of course.
"The United States has informed its NATO allies of its decision to cease participation in the planning of future military exercises in Europe.
It is expected to affect exercises that are still in the planning stages or in the conceptual phase.
US will shift focus to the Indo-Pacific region."
Once again, the speed with which this is moving is shocking. Trump at least learned 1 thing from his first administration.
NATO needs replaced now. Only when we know what the alternative is can we work out properly what we need to do.
It makes me pessimistic about my predictions already. This year is going to be far more unstable than I had realised.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Q1K4nRq3evMdn518k123eppQP0VQWa9s/edit?gid=1771788203#gid=1771788203
Given my complete hatred and usual experience in CDG this did come as a very nice and massive surprise.
My prediction was only the third least accurate.
Pathetic. Must do better.
The biggest takeaway for me from the four juries I sat on was that they varied enormously in quality. In fact I came away with the distinct view that if you were a guilty defendant, the stupider the jury, the better your chances of getting away with it.
One juror was so illiterate he couldn't read the oath. In the jury room he just nodded along with the prevailing sentiment which was that most of the jurors just wanted to get home and as a not guilty verdict was the quickest and easiest way of achieving this, he got off. The judge made it clear that he thought this was the wrong verdict, and i am sure he was right.
By contrast, in a much more serious case, it was clear that the entire court thought the defendant would get off, but it was his misfortune to have some very smart people on the jury, some of whom had picked up on things missed by the court. The discussion was detailed, rational and highly responsible. To this day I am certin the guilty verdict was correct, and the defendant was simply unlucky to have so many smart people ruling on his case.
The one serious contentious case with which I am deeply familiar is the A6 murder for which James Hanratty was hanged. There is little doubt that a material contributory factor in the guilty verdict was that the case, unusually, was held at Bedford rather than the Old Bailey. Bedford was close to the scene of the crime and feelings were running high at the time.
I am not saying these examples makes the jury system bad, and I certainly don't have any magic formula for improving it, but the nature of the jury and the way it is selected seems to me a neglected area of study. If we understood more about it, some of the miscarriages we hear of might be avoided.
But I always support the independent coffee shops - I find (from the few times I've had a coffee there) that Gail's coffee is bland..
If you are thinking of the DNA evidence, it was deeply flawed but I suspect it will be the last word on the subject.
Paul Foot had me convinced.
Indeed @kinabalu is in the lead on this one, predicting 4 MPs.
As far as the mark scheme is concerned, glad its not a spread bet!
The BT brand has been saved from the consumer scrap heap as its chief executive plots a bold strategy overhaul.
The former telecoms monopoly announced in 2022 that it was ditching BT as its “flagship” brand for millions of customers to focus on selling broadband and mobile services under the EE name.
However, these plans have now been shelved by Allison Kirkby, its chief executive, amid concerns that dropping the historic brand risked alienating older customers.
As a result, both the BT and EE brands will continue to be used side by side.
The change comes amid pressure from Sunil Bharti Mittal, the Indian tycoon who became BT’s largest shareholder last summer after taking a stake of almost 25pc.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2025/03/08/bt-brand-saved-amid-pressure-billionaire-indian-investor/
There’s no good reason to openly call him an enemy (whether or not some of us might think that), but rather simply treat the US as a country for now acting only in what it (wrongly) sees as its own interests, which on several rather important matters are completely at odds with our interests.
Trump has no better nature to appeal to - but he does respect strength. Grovelling means you still get told to do what he wants.
His column in 2010 is a pretty mealy mouthed apology for getting it wrong, and with far wider consequences than an individual miscarriage of justice.
I have subscribed on and off to Private Eye since the Eighties. It's an entertaining read, but should never be regarded as reliable.
He's just toying with us here!
Meanwhile, the US is being sabotaged.
Something you learn very quickly when covering biotech startups -- including successful ones that now treat cancers and diabetes and heart disease -- is how many are based on govt-funded academic research.
There is no private funding mechanism to replace that work.
https://x.com/danprimack/status/1898078351686091225
In general, I have found juries very attentive and focused in the High Court, much more so than they tend to be for less serious trials in the Sheriff court. I have had the odd jury who have come back quickly with a not proven verdict that smacked of a reluctance to engage with the evidence but it has been rare, maybe 2 in 40 or so trials that come to mind.
Even when I have disagreed with the jury's verdict I have seen how they got there. More often, I have had very discerning judgments where parts of the charge have been removed showing that they have gone through the evidence carefully.
It is not a perfect system and there is a random element to it but in my view decisions by judges alone, whether on their own or in a panel of 3, would be worse.
At which time I will be a potential juror where I simply don’t understand one of the verdicts I can give - Not Proven.
No wonder the criminal justice professionals get puzzled by jury verdicts when you have clueless idiots like me on them.
A lot of the early questions on the competition lend themselves to early elimination of competitors even if the right answers are not obvious till the end.
Said the highest Labour vote share is 29%. That 30% just did wink murder.
Said no defectors to Reform. Suella just hexxed you.
Said one by-election? Etc.
So, we can track early eliminees at some point during the year.
Btw, how many cabinet exits are we on in 2025? Not sure either Siddiq or Dodds were full cabinet, so I'm thinking 0 at the moment.
Is Donald Trump the KGB agent known as Krasnov?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TYI4EoAPq4U
(Spoiler: probably not...)
They came back Not guilty and not proven, the latter being for the girl they completely believed but could not convict on. I don't know if it gave her any comfort but it is a good example of when the alternative verdict of acquittal allowed them to make a point.
We are basing our decision on here
https://members.parliament.uk/government/cabinet
One thing that is almost universally acknowledged now is that Hanratty should have been acquitted on the evidence as it was presented to the jury. That is not to say he was definitely innocent (that was and remains unproveable) but the reasonable doubt principle should have been sufficient to get him off. This is where I think the location of the trial and the tabloid witchhunt played a part.
It was packed. I like it, but chacun a son gout....
It is true that disclosure rules have changed since so the procedures followed then would not be up to modern standards.
But the evidence presented was:
1) That he had been identified by the survivor;
2) That he'd stayed in the hotel room where two spent cartridges from the murder weapon were found;
3) That the gun was hidden in a place he had previously used as a hiding place;
4) That he had repeatedly lied about his whereabouts.
I'm not altogether seeing why it is 'universally acknowledged' that he should have been acquitted? That's a pretty damning chain of evidence.
That's before we get on to the vexed question of how, if he wasn't the murderer, his mucus was found on the handkerchief the gun was wrapped in. I know contamination theories have abounded and they could be plausible with the other DNA strands but that's a definite stumbling block.
The point at which f***ing stupid intersects f***ing dangerous.
Hanratty I suspect was guilty – the coincidence of the gun being found where he had previously advocated hiding guns tipped me over – but I'm surprised Hanratty's sentence was not commuted after the on/off identification.
"A New Foreign Policy for Europe: Give Russia a free hand on the Continent", Curtis Yarvin.
The influence of a far-right ideologue on the Trump administration.
1/25
https://x.com/vic_010100/status/1898028601431175608
As I’ve noted before, Yarvin is an utter loon, but one who apparently has considerable influence in the administration (and, as the above thread notes, even more on Vance).
https://graymirror.substack.com/p/a-new-foreign-policy-for-europe
… But screw Putin. Forget these Slav-squatting, tracksuited snow-apes. What’s in it for us? What about America? (We’re all good Americans here, right?)
Obviously, Gray Mirror can have no influence on the Biden administration. But, unless one of these saurians keels over, we are headed straight for a Biden-Trump 2024. A savage 2024—a real plate-throwing showdown in America’s broken marriage. Even now we all can feel the tension winding up.
We need not mention the real Trump—obviously I don’t know the real Trump—but what would the ideal Trump do?
If Trump triumphant returns to office in 2024, his first goal must not be to use power, but to take power—to relentlessly grow the scope of his office by bold, decisive action. And the proper arena for this action is foreign policy.
Trump’s goal is to expand his power rather than getting results, because results are revenue and power is capital. Rather than fish with his hands, he makes a fishing rod. Action creates power because action makes precedent.
If Trump can act on a scale on which no President in living memory has dared to act, his enemies will be daunted and afraid; his fans will be exhilarated and emboldened; and he will find it easier not just to get results, but to take even more power. Victory creates more victory, and there is no such thing as too much power.
Of course, if these actions are bizarre, imprudent and detrimental to America’s goals, they become counterproductive rather than productive. What Trump needs is not just enormous actions, but enormous wins—as soon as possible, as big as possible.
And those wins must ride roughshod over the most heartfelt beliefs and assumptions of his foes in the administrative state—then prove themselves by palpable success.
It is much easier for a new President to assert his Constitutional right to control the executive branch by controlling foreign policy—since foreign policy, by definition, has no entirely domestic axe to grind. The President’s right, as chief executive of the executive branch, to dictate the budget, policy and personnel of that branch, is at its clearest in diplomacy and defense abroad.
Therefore, Trump needs a dramatic foreign policy win that will be palpably good for America, and for the world in general, but can only be achieved by annihilating some network of power within the so-called “executive branch.” Ideally, the policy win is so complete that no organization can plausibly remain—the problem is simply gone…
3) the hiding place makes me believe he was guilty but I'd not want to hang a man on that.
4) the questionable alibi that Hanratty was on the rob somewhere else was not put before the jury iirc.
… The goal of US foreign policy in Europe
Under a Trump administration, the goal of US foreign policy in Europe is to impact domestic politics in America.
There are no realistic American foreign-policy goals, in the usual sense, for Europe. Realistic foreign-policy goals are either military or economic. Europe is not a military threat to the United States in any way. Europe has a trade surplus with the US, which means that cutting off trade with Europe would by definition grow the US economy.
Rather, under a Trump administration, the goal of US foreign policy in Europe is to impact domestic power in America. For example, the fall of Afghanistan liquidated the organizational structures within State and DoD that supported this shambolic puppet state. These structures are tough, but they cannot survive the end of their purpose.
The liquidation of “Ukraine,” comedian-Presidents, petrochemical magnates and all—will be an enormous blow to both State and Defense. It will suggest to all State’s other client states that Washington can no longer guarantee their “sovereignty,” whether by diplomacy or by force.
Give Russia a free hand on the Continent
But thinking only in terms of “the Texas of Russia” is thinking way too small. Rather, Trump should give Russia a free hand not just in Russian-speaking territories—but all the way to the English Channel.
The goal of a Trumpist foreign policy in Europe is to withdraw American influence from Europe. This will guarantee the defeat of liberalism on the Continent. Here in America, this will show liberals and conservatives alike that liberalism is mortal—with gargantuan effects on the morale of both. And as Clausewitz said, all conflicts are mainly about morale...
Although we weren't at 1970s levels of coppers fitting up villains we were heading towards the peak. Did you know Wally Virgo lived in Horse Lane Orchard, Ledbury? We were a rum lot North of the Leadon.
Lucy Letby's defence counsel - https://www.exchangechambers.co.uk/people/benjamin-myers-kc/
What his instructions were we don't know. But to suggest that he was just going through the motions is nonsense. The defence applied to have all the charges struck out on the basis that there was no case to answer. That is relatively unusual. It is not "going through the motions" in any sense. Myers himself is an experienced advocate. Note that he got an acquittal in the case of Inspector Duckenfield over Hillsborough.
Why the defence did not call as witnesses the medical experts they had is the big unanswered question. Another one is why Letby herself accepted that one of the babies had been poisoned by insulin.
4) Hanratty said initially he was in Liverpool, but had no witnesses to prove it. He then said he had been in Rhyl, producing one person to confirm it who subsequently admitted she hadn't seen him.
If Trump is merely transactional, what is (personally) in this for Trump?
Reform have been exposed and the Tories look irrelevant. The question will be "the Putin Party or Labour?"
If only the ICC had had the gumption to tell India 'play in Pakistan or don't play at all.'
As an example, that seems a pretty good explanation for the Trump/Vance dynamic during the Zelenskyy meeting.
Yarvin isn’t a Russia shill; he more of a Mein Kampf style theorist. As I said, a complete nutter.
Was this the guy being quoted on here as some guru?
As to why Letby accepted that the babies had been poisoned by insulin - she was effectively trapped by the prosecution barrister into accepting his claim that the evidence meant that someone had been doing so. A better briefed defendant might have refused to make a claim either way on the basis that they didn’t have the expertise to make such a judgement.
For the jury, once the idea that /someone/ was poisoning babies became the accepted truth, their conviction of Letby was probably inevitable.
These are difficult tactical decisions that have to be made in the course of trials and there has been too much hindsight applied to them without the relevant information. What the Letby case actually needs is for people to engage with the strongest parts of the Crown case, not the more marginal decisions. If the stronger cases can be undermined then it is worth taking a look at again. So far, I have not really seen that.
I note that only 3 people predicted the number of Reform MPs going DOWN.
That was @kinabalu 4, @MarqueeMark 3, and @ydoethur 3.
Since I said 7 I'm probably toast unless the Leeanderthal Man develops multiple personalities, and returns to both the Conservative and Labour parties wearing different coloured suits, which he probably still has in his wardrobe just in case, standing in multiple constituencies.
If it were so obviously outrageous call me naiive but I don't think the defence would be working a public campsign as much as a legal one, that suggests to me if there are indeed flaws they are not as slam dunk as suggested.
We must rearm.
We should have started the minute Putin invaded eastern Ukraine.
It is late now. But still time.
Tactically, it seems that Letby’s defence thought that they had fatally undermined the prosecution expert witness & that this would be their client’s best hope of obtaining a Not Guilt verdict. Events have proved otherwise of course.
The strongest case against Letby is the insulin poisonings it seems to me. If those are genuinely unsafe, as the Unherd article alleges, & the prosecution also withheld that information from the defence then her convictions must be reversed as the jury was instructed that they could use the fact that she had been found guilty of attempted murder in the insulin cases as evidence in the other cases where no hard evidence of direct harm could be found, only circumstantial evidence (which many have argued is also unsafe, but that’s another topic entirely).
https://x.com/Partisan_12/status/1898645076991229964
Yarvin and the rest can't think outside the Cold War superpower mindset.
This is because the criticisms of the case are about evidence which was available to the defence at the time of the original case & therefore cannot be used to appeal her convictions. Her application to appeal her convictions was (correctly, according to the law) thrown out by the appeal judges: No new evidence? No appeal.
Currently I’d be happy just with confirmation that the world will last long enough to play the series.
In every other job, people get better at it by doing it repeatedly.
Why should this most important function be any different?
He's been around for years. I came across his blog over a decade ago, and he just seemed a nut back then, albeit one quite a few US conservatives read.
With Trump back in power - and more particularly with the new crew around him, including Vance - he's a nut with mainstream influence.
See, for example:
Curtis Yarvin’s Ideas Were Fringe. Now They’re Coursing Through Trump’s Washington.
https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2025/01/30/curtis-yarvins-ideas-00201552
His ideas aren't coherent in any logical terms, but you have now to take them seriously. As much more powerful people than us are doing so.
If Trump puts his hand in the other side of the scales, then its a different world.
https://x.com/front_ukrainian/status/1898627955850359036
Estonia had a Resistance movement active against the Soviets until, IIRC, almost the 60's and earlier the Finns had pretty well fought the Soviets to a standstill in 1940-1.
I'm not a historian, so my recollections may be hazy and bear correction.
Ill report my suspicion i guess but i doubt the police will welcome it, they tend to know the prolific individuals already.