UK Election June 08 [Archive] - HungAngels - Guide to TGirls and Transsexuals

Stavros

04-19-2017, 12:53 AM

On the one hand yes, the Tories see an opportunity for a major election victory too good to resist. On the other hand the Electoral Commission is now looking into 30 seats that were contested in the 2015 General Election where there are claims the party did not properly account for its election expenses. If found guilty, the election would have to be run again in all 30 seats. In theory calling a new election annuls the value of the investigation, or not, if the Commission decides to continue its work.

On the one hand, Theresa May has the backing of most of her party and the Labour opposition in the matter of the UK's exit from the EU. On the other hand, hard liners in her own party are snooping around her Brexit team to make sure they don't cave in to EU demands and if necessary they welcome the ultimate 'no deal' over Brexit Mrs May does not want.

But with a lack of clarity on negotiations that have not even begun, how can any observer make a statement on the terms of the exit that is anything but speculation? The idea that a new Parliament gives her a stronger hand in the negotiations does not make sense, and does not even make sense if she has a majority in the Commons of 100, she already has the power she needs, Parliament has already made its commitment clear, with the only possible conundrum being a vote against the precise terms of the negotiation, but that is also speculation. But what is more extraordinary, is the possibility that the election may not produce a Commons much different from what it is today.

The assumption is that the Labour vote will melt away, as it did in the Netherlands and as the Socialists in France are expected to get hammered, but in the Netherlands the Greens filled the gap, and in France leftist Melenchon is drawing support from socialists. Labour has solid support in its northern constituencies, and defeated UKIP in the Stoke by-election last month. If the SNP rule in Scotland, Labour might only lose 10-20 seats in England and Wales, and those may be taken by the Tories and the Liberal Democrats so the Tory majority might only be 20-25, and with Scotland in effect voting for independence, the outcome actually either weakens the Prime Minister, or leaves her in the same position as she is in now. As for Northern Ireland, the power sharing administration has all but ceased to function, and while Direct Rule from Westminster appears the only option right now, the likelihood is that the limbo will continue until after the election. In spite of the sectarian nature of Northern Irish elections, one wonders if the indifference London shows to the province will persuade enough Protestants to consider their prospects in a United Ireland to be better than the so-called 'United Kingdom'.

Finally this: with most of the polls getting the last election wrong, May has based this gamble on -the polls, the one's showing Labour in crisis and her party way ahead...is this shrewd political manipulation, or Hubris?

Jericho

04-19-2017, 05:24 AM

You Brits are lucky this smart cookie fell into your lap.

Haaaaaaar, you New Yorkers and yer wacky sense of humour...Nearly had me there! :screwy

broncofan

04-19-2017, 04:45 PM

Finally this: with most of the polls getting the last election wrong, May has based this gamble on -the polls, the one's showing Labour in crisis and her party way ahead...is this shrewd political manipulation, or Hubris?
It's possible that the polls show disaffection with how Labour is being run more than how people will vote once they hear an election is called. If I'm unhappy with a party's leadership, I might not indicate support in a poll, but when given the choice in an election would still cast my ballot for the party that most reflects my values.

broncofan

04-19-2017, 05:41 PM

For those who are left of center politically, would you prefer a politician who is pragmatic or uncompromising? One dilemma is that we distrust the pragmatic politician bc we fear they might sell out our interests. But then there is the concern that the purist does not have broad enough appeal and will not yield to what is expedient, as all leaders must occasionally do.

It is difficult for me to get a grip on why Labour is seen as so weak right now, except to assume that people think Corbyn does not care what Labour voters want, but is wedded to what he wants for them. For instance, although he campaigned for remain his heart was not in it because he sees the EU as a pro-corporate force. But the alternative is isolationism and nationalism. Is the problem with Corbyn's Labour that he is not responsive to his constituents?

One also has to question his judgment somewhat. He is someone who insisted that he spoke with Holocaust deniers and invited both Hamas or Hezbollah to Parliament because he is willing to share a platform with anyone even when they have disagreements on specific issues. When Netanyahu came to Britain he was unwilling to meet with him. Either of these positions is tenable on its own. Don't meet with Netanyahu bc you think his policies are destructive or meet with Hamas bc you think they are necessary for a peace agreement despite their rancid incitement. The two positions put together don't seem consistent to me. I doubt this is the specific reason he has lost support as those on the left seem very defensive (to the point of willful blindness) about this issue. But it might be a symptom of his tone deafness and general inflexibility.

filghy2

04-20-2017, 03:09 AM

More than 80 per cent of Labour MPs voted against Corbyn last year. Given they're the people who are in a position to know him best that probably tells us something about his leadership. No party leader can succeed in these circumstances.

Corbyn stayed as leader because party members continued to support him, but the problem is that only a tiny minority of the voters join political parties and those that do are not representative of the broader electorate. The fact that he did not recognise his position was untenable is a sign of tone deafness and inflexibility. Even now there are reports that he intends to stay on as leader even if Labour loses badly. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/jeremy-corbyn-stay-on-leader-labour-party-general-election-2017-party-conference-a7691911.html

That seems to suggest that Corbyn and his supporters would rather destroy the party than give up control. This is not just a problem for Labour - good government will not happen unless there is an effective opposition.

Stavros

04-20-2017, 01:13 PM

It is difficult for me to get a grip on why Labour is seen as so weak right now, except to assume that people think Corbyn does not care what Labour voters want, but is wedded to what he wants for them. For instance, although he campaigned for remain his heart was not in it because he sees the EU as a pro-corporate force. But the alternative is isolationism and nationalism. Is the problem with Corbyn's Labour that he is not responsive to his constituents?
One also has to question his judgment somewhat. He is someone who insisted that he spoke with Holocaust deniers and invited both Hamas or Hezbollah to Parliament because he is willing to share a platform with anyone even when they have disagreements on specific issues. When Netanyahu came to Britain he was unwilling to meet with him. Either of these positions is tenable on its own. Don't meet with Netanyahu bc you think his policies are destructive or meet with Hamas bc you think they are necessary for a peace agreement despite their rancid incitement. The two positions put together don't seem consistent to me. I doubt this is the specific reason he has lost support as those on the left seem very defensive (to the point of willful blindness) about this issue. But it might be a symptom of his tone deafness and general inflexibility.

Jeremy Corbyn is not hard to understand. He joined the Labour Party in the 1960s at a time when most young people attracted to left-wing politics regarded Labour as a waste of time, preferring the 'revolutionary' and mostly Trotskyist parties that have dominated the left in Britain since the 1940s, to no known effect on the working class or indeed politics in general. The Communist Party of Great Britain was viewed as a Stalinist project, but for Corbyn (at the same time true of Ken Livingstone) Labour had a national party machine and crucially, was funded by the Unions, and this was the vehicle he chose to work in.

The Labour left in the 1960s was in the process of a change shaped by 1960s 'radical chic', as Tom Wolfe put it, where the struggle of justice against injustice, equality against inequality, freedom against oppression found its campaigns in the struggle against Apartheid in South Africa, opposition to 'American Imperialism' in Vietnam, and an ill-thought through support for 'revolutionary' or 'national liberation' struggles, often armed struggles in Latin America, Africa, and by the end of the decade in Northern Ireland and the Middle East (but few recall the 'revolutionary movement in Oman that was fighting a guerilla war).

The irony here is that a previous generation of Labour left-wingers like Michael Foot (who became leader of the Party and led it to its worst election result in 50 years in 1983), and Ian Mikardo, is that they welcomed the creation of Israel on the same terms, seeing it as a positive climax of the anti-fascist struggle and anti-semitism, and viewing Ben-Gurion's Labour Party as their fraternal comrades in the Socialist International, given that in 1948 Israel was considered to be a Socialist country.
But the Arab-Israeli War of 1967 the War and its aftermath, in particular the occupation of the West Bank and the onset of illegal settlement buildings, changed the perspective of the left for whom justice now lay with the Palestinians. As with Northern Ireland, the hurdle the left had to jump over was 'the armed struggle' where in the case of Northern Ireland it led to savage sectarian violence in the province and bombings and assassinations in the rest of the UK, and in the Middle East a wave of aeroplane hi-jackings organized by Palestinian guerillas, culminating in the Munich Olympic assassinations which for most people robbed the Palestinian cause of any just argument it might have had (and indeed, the armed struggle as a strategy declined from 1972). The problem is that you cannot really support a revolutionary movement and condemn it at the same time because of its violent acts, so the tactic of both Corbyn and at the time, Sinn Fein was to condemn 'all acts of violence'.

An additional problem in the UK at the time was that while, in spite of their denials, Sinn Fein was the political wing of the IRA, it also had support among Catholics, won seats to Parliament (which it never attended) and was in secret negotiations with the British government even as the press and the same government pilloried Corbyn for inviting Sinn Fein's Gerry Adams to talk to MPs in the House of Commons. On a similar level, Hezbollah in Lebanon is represented in the Lebanese Parliament, it is a social movement popular among the Shi'a communities of Souther Beirut and Lebanon, but is regarded a 'terrorist' organization by the USA, mostly due to its connections with Iran, and to support Israel (which according to some rumours is planning another mini-war against Hezbollah on Lebanon this summer).

The Labour left has thus embraced Marxism in a way that the older generation did not, and in Corbyn's case, his involvement with the Labour Party coincided with the emergence of a small group in the London School of Economics in 1968 called the 'Chartist' group. At a time when Marxist and Trotskyists were forming the International Marxist Group or beefing up the Socialist Labour League and the International Socialists (subsequently the Worker's Revolutionary Party, and the Socialist Worker's Party), Chartists identified Labour as the best vehicle for their version of the 'Parliamentary Road to Socialism'. Working from the base, they identified London as the engine room for their long-term aim to capture the Labour Party, and identified Livingstone and Corbyn, both of whom became councillors in London Boroughs, Ken in Camden and Corbyn in Islington, as their champions.

Chartists (most of them teachers but I knew one comrade who was a window cleaner) moved into bed-sits and apartments in Brent, Haringey, Islington, Lewisham, Lambeth and Southwark, joining the local Labour Party, recruiting members, sponsoring radical resolutions, and generally giving local people the idea Labour was 'fighting the cuts' that the (Labour) government introduced to social services after the financial crisis of 1976. They were also active in the Campaign for Labour Party Democracy which aimed to give the memberhsip of the Party the power to select and de-select MPs, and elect the leader of the Party. This became a successful campaign that the left believed placed power in the hands of the rank and file members, and has been the primary objective of the Momentum movement that lay behind Corbyn's successful campaign to become Labour leader.

The election of Mrs Thatcher in 1979 galvanized the left which grew substantially -this is when I joined, for example- and it was clear that getting to the next stage -electing Livingstone and Corbyn to Parliament was a priority, as indeed happened in 1983 for Corbyn, 1987 for Livingstone (his supporters in Brent successfully de-selected sitting MP Reg Freeson [by origin a Jewish orphan from Russia]). In addition, electing radical Labour councils was seen as imperative to raise the tensions with the Thatcher government, which shut down the Greater London Council Livingstone had been leading, and saw the emergence of left-wingers in Brent (the first Black leader of a council in the UK, Merle Amory, then and now a close friend of Livingstone along with her husband Paul Franklyn), Haringey, Lambeth and Southwark. This translated into issue based politics, with a confrontation over council rates and rents the most toxic issue, indeed John McDonnell, the most intellectual of this group (he cites Marx, Lenin and Trotsky as the biggest influences on his life) split -temporarily it seems- with Livingstone over the attempt by the left to force Livingstone in the Greater London Council to defy the government on a matter of law, McDonnell seeing it as part of the long-term strategy known as the 'transitional programme' in which the revolutionary movement attempts the impossible to expose the vicious nature of the state and organize the fight back by the workng class, led of course by people like him.

The left, however, crushed in the 1983 election, limped away to lick its wounds and many left the party (as did I in 1986) disillusioned with the failure to defeat Thatcher. This forced Labour to re-evauate its policy platform and led through Neil Kinnock and the late and much loved John Smith to Tony Blair and the 'New Labour' project. On a key policy issue, Corbyn hated the EU from its inception in 1973 to a few seconds ago, but was persuaded to give lip service to the Social Chapter of the Single Market Act when it was presented to the Labour Conference in 1987 as a guarantee for worker's rights across Europe. Nevertheless Labour has voted with the Conservatives to invoke Article 50 and is committed to the UK being outside of the EU although it claims it will challenge the terms of the Exit when they are brought before Parliament, presumably in 2019.

The summary of this probably over-long story, is that in the aftermath of Blair's New Labour project, the party turned left again, as it did after defeats in the 1930s, 1950s and the 1980s losing election after election, and Corbyn thus represents that secular left which has adopted all the social causes of the day -mostly rights based causes- on the basis that it has wide social and electoral appeal. The older Trotskyists in the Chartist group, new ones and other radicals like Seamus Milne became the foundation of the Momentum movement that sponsored Corbyn's leadership campaign, and a policy portfoliio that could have been written in 1977 -policies to cap wages, policies to regulate prices, the nationalization of the railways, 'defending the NHS', huge tax rises on the super-rich (anyone earning more than £70,000 a year) and so on. It was almost comical to see the old timers energized by the prospect that the 'transitional programme' could be the official policy of Her Majesty's Opposition, even though most of Corbyn's colleagues have deserted him, and this election could be as big a disaster as the 1931 election, although Corbyn claims he will stay on as leader.

The party has lost its way, it has no credibe leadership, no credible policies, no vision of the future, no MPs in Scotland -yet it may hang on in there with 75-100 seats in this election, stranger things have happened. In the end, Corbyn is just a footnote in history, and that is the best one can say for him.

Jericho

04-20-2017, 04:25 PM

In the end, Corbyn is just a footnote in history, and that is the best one can say for him.

We shall see.

But in the mean time, lets take an empty chair and crush the saboteurs!

1005179

peejaye

04-20-2017, 06:02 PM

If Corbyn as a decent campaign, he could win? The biggest problem is the Establishment, far right media that is the BBC and Murdoch who will ignore Corbyn at every opportunity, as they always do, and keep kissing Mr's Mays bottom, as they always do.
The BBC's "Daily Politics" & their "Newsnight" shows are appallingly bias!
I think the sooner we have an "opt-out" of the license fee the better!

broncofan

04-20-2017, 07:31 PM

https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/3344804/jeremy-corbyn-reports-one-of-his-own-mps-for-harassment-after-his-leadership-is-questioned/

One might argue against the logical conclusion of this article by attacking the source. Afterall I have no idea what the reputation of the sun is but it wouldn't surprise me if it were a tabloid.

But this article paints the picture of a man who is unable to accept criticism of his leadership and takes any critique as evidence of disloyalty. Corbyn supporters might say Coyle represents the establishment or some force sent to undermine dearest Jeremy and his sacred agenda. Could it be the guy just doesn't think Jeremy is as effective a leader as he might be?

Edit: maybe a better article here. Would love to see that email to Corbyn. https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/apr/17/jeremy-corbyn-critic-neil-coyle-says-he-is-victim-of-labour-smear-campaign

Stavros

04-20-2017, 08:31 PM

One might argue against the logical conclusion of this article by attacking the source. Afterall I have no idea what the reputation of the sun is but it wouldn't surprise me if it were a tabloid.

But this article paints the picture of a man who is unable to accept criticism of his leadership and takes any critique as evidence of disloyalty. Corbyn supporters might say Coyle represents the establishment or some force sent to undermine dearest Jeremy and his sacred agenda. Could it be the guy just doesn't think Jeremy is as effective a leader as he might be?

The Sun is the tabloid that has been the flagship for the Murdoch empire since the Dirty Digger took it over in 1969 and transformed a dull and lifeless broadsheet into a popular daily written in a language the ordinary man and woman could understand but which, unlike the (pro-Labour) Daily Mirror, its most intense competitor, was right-wing, reflecting Rupert Murdoch's view of the world. The Sun became famous for its 'Page 3 girls' flashing their tits, at one time including a 16 year old which in some states in the US would have landed Murdoch in prison. The Sun plied so relentless an anti-Labour campaign between 1980 and 1987 that when Labour lost the General Election it ran a headline 'It woz the Sun wot won it', and Murdoch has been walking in and out of 10 Downing Street ever since, but lost readers over The Sun's disgraceful smears about Liverpool football fans after the Hillsborough tragedy in 1986. The point being that The Sun does not investigate news stories, but makes them up, and if there has been a major event, instead of querying what the Police or the Government says, it just repeats them.

I think an important point is that the 1960s saw the end of a Christian tradition in the Labour Party, and the growth of a secular, often Marxist/Trotskyist trend. Labour's roots are in the non-established Christian communities of Scotland, Wales and rural England, such as the Devon which produced the Tolpuddle Martyrs, workers who organised a union to protect their craft and wages and in 1834 were arrested, and deported to Australia as criminals. The secular left was always in a minority in the party dominated by Keir Hardie, Ramsay MacDonald and Clement Attlee, but by the 1960s the decline of Empire and the challenges to the UK economy that saw the beginning of the end of coal, steel, shipbuilding and textiles also undermined the solidity of Labour's natural working class constituency. This aspect of Labour is not dissimilar to the decline of the industrial working class as the Democrats natural base in the USA, and both parties have relied on the public servant to fill the gap, while policies that used to be focused on the issues most important to to workers: wages, working conditions, education, housing and health, were sidelined as the party recruited supporters based on rights, as in the rights of minorities, women, LGBT and so on. Blair succeeded because he looked reliable, and because voters were fed up with corruption in the Tory Party, and while Blair overhauled the original socialist ideology of Labour to replace it with a modified version of Thatcherism (much as Clinton was a clone of Reagan), he also scored early successes with the Good Friday Agreement in Northern Ireland, and a major boost to spending on education. But as Mark Antony put it, 'The evil that men do lives after them, the good is oft interred with their bones', thus Blair is now tainted by Iraq and the slavish caving in to the demands of Saudi Arabia. At least Golf can claim to be protecting his brand and financial interests when kow-towing to the unelected dictators of that horrible kingdom.

It is simple really, Labour lost four elections in a row because Labour offered policies the people did not want, and did not trust the leadership. It won elections when the policies were sound and the leadership looked competent. Theresa May exudes confidence even though her actual record in office, as Home Secretary -an almost impossible job in which to be a success anyway- is mixed if not poor. When Tony Benn, a Christian Socialist died, he took that tradition with him into the graveyard of history, though there must be some Labour people with values left in the party. I have rarely known the Labour Party to be led by a group of people so lacking in intellect and culture, so lacking in inspiration, so out of touch with ordinary voters. This is worse than 1983, and it could be even worse on June 9th.

broncofan

04-20-2017, 08:35 PM

they welcomed the creation of Israel on the same terms, seeing it as a positive climax of the anti-fascist struggle and anti-semitism, and viewing Ben-Gurion's Labour Party as their fraternal comrades in the Socialist International, given that in 1948 Israel was considered to be a Socialist country.
But the Arab-Israeli War of 1967 the War and its aftermath, in particular the occupation of the West Bank and the onset of illegal settlement buildings, changed the perspective of the left for whom justice now lay with the Palestinians.With this viewpoint, one could construct a policy that is coherent. An activist might see the benefit of a boycott tactic to bring pressure to bear on Israel, but a politician is probably in a better position to explain to Netanyahu how he intends to shift Britain's policies and which Israeli policies he sees as unacceptable. The veneration of revolutionary movements regardless of their tactics represents a kind of stunted development. Even the most pro-Israeli person would not think a two state solution could be effectuated without including some Palestinian leadership, whether Fatah or Hamas. How exactly does Corbyn plan to help create a Palestinian state if he is unwilling to talk to any Israeli and even engages in strange efforts to avoid saying the name of the state while talking about it?

Every interview I see with the guy, he seems to look shocked that an interviewer would dare ask him a challenging question. Like the person is breaking some unwritten rule by asking him a tough question. I don't know that it's going to go badly for him, but every time I hear one of his daft supporters complain about traitors within the party, I think it might be for the best. He can take his corduroy jacket and his che guevara hat and complain to his cat about how everyone was out to get him. Yeah, I would prefer him over any Conservative (obviously I don't get a say), and I would not want to go back to the warmongering of Blair but dissent within his party and attention to the priorities of the average person is the only way forward.

blackchubby38

04-21-2017, 12:13 AM

For those who are left of center politically, would you prefer a politician who is pragmatic or uncompromising? One dilemma is that we distrust the pragmatic politician bc we fear they might sell out our interests. But then there is the concern that the purist does not have broad enough appeal and will not yield to what is expedient, as all leaders must occasionally do.

One also has to question his judgment somewhat. He is someone who insisted that he spoke with Holocaust deniers and invited both Hamas or Hezbollah to Parliament because he is willing to share a platform with anyone even when they have disagreements on specific issues. When Netanyahu came to Britain he was unwilling to meet with him. Either of these positions is tenable on its own. Don't meet with Netanyahu bc you think his policies are destructive or meet with Hamas bc you think they are necessary for a peace agreement despite their rancid incitement. The two positions put together don't seem consistent to me. I doubt this is the specific reason he has lost support as those on the left seem very defensive (to the point of willful blindness) about this issue. But it might be a symptom of his tone deafness and general inflexibility.

I think if you're far of left center politically, you have to accept a pragmatic politician on the national and state level. You also have to pick your battles. Fight the ones you know you can win and compromise on the other ones where there is some wiggle room.

I consider myself a moderate who leans left and libertarian on social issues. But if you give me the choice between voting for a moderate Republican candidate and a purist Left one, I'm going to vote for the former. I just can't get on board with a lot of what the pure Left stands for. Their stance on Israel is actually one of them.

Stavros

04-21-2017, 05:26 AM

With this viewpoint, one could construct a policy that is coherent. An activist might see the benefit of a boycott tactic to bring pressure to bear on Israel, but a politician is probably in a better position to explain to Netanyahu how he intends to shift Britain's policies and which Israeli policies he sees as unacceptable. The veneration of revolutionary movements regardless of their tactics represents a kind of stunted development. Even the most pro-Israeli person would not think a two state solution could be effectuated without including some Palestinian leadership, whether Fatah or Hamas. How exactly does Corbyn plan to help create a Palestinian state if he is unwilling to talk to any Israeli and even engages in strange efforts to avoid saying the name of the state while talking about it?

Every interview I see with the guy, he seems to look shocked that an interviewer would dare ask him a challenging question. Like the person is breaking some unwritten rule by asking him a tough question. I don't know that it's going to go badly for him, but every time I hear one of his daft supporters complain about traitors within the party, I think it might be for the best. He can take his corduroy jacket and his che guevara hat and complain to his cat about how everyone was out to get him. Yeah, I would prefer him over any Conservative (obviously I don't get a say), and I would not want to go back to the warmongering of Blair but dissent within his party and attention to the priorities of the average person is the only way forward.

You raise interesting issues, one of which is the support the Labour left has given to national liberation movements without thinking though the potential consequences. Corbyn's second wife was from Chile, his current wife is from Mexico, and you could say they backed the right horse with the Sandinistas in Nicaragua, but their support for Hugo Chavez could not reconcile their 'international socialism' with his more nationalist version of it if indeed it was socialism, which is debatable. Venezuela has an abundance of conventional and unconventional oil and gas resources, but is an economic basket case, a testament to failure if ever there was one, yet Chavez remains a 'fallen hero' for reasons not clearly explained.

The problem with Israel is that even with the relatively warm relations between Israel and the UK's Labour Party, most of of whose leaders have been members of Labour Friends of Israel, it was a lukewarm relationship until 1977 when Menachem Begin became Prime Minister, whereupon it deteriorated to the point that Israel gave military support to Argentina during the 1982 Falklands War. It is rooted in the experience of the British Mandate and the 'armed struggle' -to the British, terrorism- that was as violent and destructive as the conflict in Northern Ireland and means there is, particularly with Netanyahu a mild contempt for the British who are simply not important and whose views on the conflict with the Palestinians are mostly ignored. For their part, the left around Corbyn and Livingstone tend to view Israel as an outpost of American Imperialism (and the relationship with the US is now worth a staggering $38 Billion a year), and make a point of forming liaisons with Jews in Israel who not only oppose the occupation of the West Bank, but are also opposed to Zionism, claiming it is possible to be anti-Zionist without being anti-Jewish. The extent to which this means they offer support to Palestinians leaves behind critical thinking in favour of 'situationist' politics, given that while there are acceptable and moderate Palestinians whose voices should be heard, they nevertheless offer support to HAMAS because it is part of the 'resistance struggle' where all good comrades should be, even though in policy terms, the kind of Palestinian state HAMAS wants would be intolerant and undemocratic, and they also never mention the fact that Israel sponsored HAMAS when it was formed because it was opposed to Yasir Arafat and his Fateh movement.

Similarly the Boycott movement is adopted without thinking all of it through, not least whether or not it is effective, the tired argument being that it worked in South Africa, which is debatable. Yes, Israel should not be allowed to market products made on the West Bank and label them 'Made in Israel', but the Boycott is a limp weapon, and in real terms, Israel only does deals in peace when the terms are advantageous to it, and right now the backing Israel's government gives to Settler Fanatics and the repudiation of the Oslo process makes a just peace for both sides difficult if not impossible to produce. The conundrum at the heart of this conflict is that Israel is a democratic state with a vibrant and diverse civil society, but in the West Bank it is little more than a brutal, military dictatorship, which is why those Israelis who recall the original purpose of their state are so appalled at what has happened since 1967, and you don't need to be left, right or centre to agree with that.

Finally, I doubt that if and when the UK leaves the EU it will be able to develop a diplomatic role in the world that leads to it being an honest broker in conflict zones; not only did we lose an Empire, we never did find a role, and I see no demand for the British in the near to medium future least of all in the Middle East where it has a long history of intervention that has created more problems than it solved.

peejaye

04-21-2017, 08:57 AM

peejaye

04-21-2017, 08:59 AM

Excellent precise view of "The Sun" newspaper Stavros. Always remember as a child my dear old grandma saying; I won't have it in the house!

Stavros

04-21-2017, 12:47 PM

I'm interested to know which Labour MP these Corbyn critics would like to lead the party? All these Corbyn critics seem to want a "Red Tory" Blairite style, pro Establishment character in charge? Then you have nothing different from the far right you have now!
The membership put Corbyn where he is right now, it's pro-Establishment people out there & the media who don't like it!
109.000 people were asked who they would prefer as UK PM yesterday, 63% said Corbyn, sorry I don't know source, it will be on-line somewhere.
The two front runners are Yvette Cooper and Keir Starmer, assuming they are re-elected as MPs!

My longer term bet, if he wants the job, would be London Mayor Sadiq Khan. Prepare yourselves for a Muslim Prime Minister, but not in the next 5 years...

Odd are here-(note Tony Blair is 200/1)
https://www.oddschecker.com/politics/british-politics/next-labour-leader

peejaye

04-21-2017, 01:50 PM

broncofan

04-21-2017, 05:05 PM

My longer term bet, if he wants the job, would be London Mayor Sadiq Khan. Prepare yourselves for a Muslim Prime Minister, but not in the next 5 years...

Every time I've seen an interview with Mr. Khan he has come across as intelligent, temperate, and charismatic. I hope those characteristics don't make him suspect, but based on the attacks I've seen him deal with, he seems like someone who is resilient and dignified. There is no doubt that being a Muslim would make him subject to personal attack from every angle by the nationalist right wing, and that his attempts to be diplomatic and promote cohesion might even be challenged.

But just because someone is a lighting rod for the intolerant does not mean he would not make a great candidate. He's described as center left in bios I've read of him; personally center left does not automatically translate to militaristic in my mind. He's probably not as comfortable with Russia's actions in Ukraine as say George Galloway who in 2014 said he believed Russia had a right to act in Ukraine, but some might think there's a moral basis for that.

peejaye

04-21-2017, 05:26 PM

He is NOT centre left, you have been mis-informed! He is actually centre right, just the kind of candidate Labour doesn't need!
Although I'm sure the media and their friends would disagree!

broncofan

04-21-2017, 05:29 PM

All those 3 are Tories in my book Savros!
Even though our views are different, I enjoy your posts. I know that bc I'm not British I don't have my finger on the pulse of these issues like you guys do, and also do not have to live as directly with the consequences of your vote.

I'm just curious what makes Sadiq Khan a Tory? Does he support intervention and active foreign policy? Does he want to cut social programs? I guess I'd also be curious what make George Galloway left wing except him professing that he is.

Stavros

04-21-2017, 06:18 PM

All those 3 are Tories in my book Savros! With undecided voters it would come down to personalities & that's not what Politics is all about!
Some people will laugh but I'd like to see George Galloway(I know he's not even a Labour MP) or Unite Union leader Len McCluskey take the reigns. Jeremy Corbyn struggles to defend himself against his critics & the far right, he's just not aggressive enough.
Realistically though I suppose Corbyns No.2 John McDonald could do a job?

Peejaye I understand your frustration with the political class that has been in power at least since 2010 and probably before, but I don't think anger and resentment are a sound basis for policy making, and the UK has tended not to vote for candidates who appear to be extreme. George Galloway is a three-legged show pony, completely untrustworthy and too much of a maverick to be a team leader. Len McCluskey reminds me of the trade union barons of the 1970s who were, as the saying goes, all mouth and no trousers, campaigning for worker's rights and socialism but yet when offered a seat in the House of Lords tripped over their left feet in the mad rush to don the ermine and claim their daily allowance. The closest we have come to an extremist was Margaret Thatcher, yet in spite of her flamboyant rhetoric, she was in essence a pragmatist, indeed it was only when she became fixated on a policy nobody else believed in, the Poll Tax, that she was challenged in her own party and forced to resign. The appeal of Theresa May is precisely that sense that she is a safe pair of hands, as was also true of Blair, and is also why Nigel Farage has been on the fringe of British politics where he is destined to remain, having decided after 7 failed attempts he won't be making an 8th attempt to become an MP. As for John McDonnell, the Leninist mind-set he has is not suited to government, he is and would probably prefer to be in perpetual opposition, but if he was Prime Minister, my guess is the UK would be bankrupt in six months.

The truth is the Prime Minister, and the leaders of most parties in the UK are likely to be dull, managerial types. You need only look across the Atlantic to see the pitfalls of electing a matinee idol as Prime Minister, or a loud-mouthed fantasist as President. The policy agenda is where we should focus our energies, but without knowing how Brexit is going to look when the negotiations are done, I am not sure how much forward planning can be done in 2017 if the conditions all change in 2019, but I suppose that is the challenge. I think the voters make relatively simple judgements: Am I better off now than I was ten years ago when I voted for X, will I be better off in the next ten years if I vote for Y? Voters want a risk-free option, but even when voting for change I wonder if they know what it can really mean, like the cleaner working two jobs a day I used to know who voted for Mrs Thatcher in 1979 because he wanted lower taxes. His income tax was reduced, but VAT was doubled in a month, and by December that year he had been made redundant from his main day job because his firm went bust. But if any party, be it the Labour or the Tories, or Le Pen in France claims they will represent the 'forgotten people' they need to deliver for them in terms of jobs and economic growth, and those are the two jewels in the crown that have been missing their sparkle for some time. And Our Noble, and Most Gracious Majesty is 91 years old...

peejaye

04-21-2017, 07:08 PM

Thanks for your input Stavros, fascinating as always, you are certainly a man of the world.

It certainly should be all about policies, so why were the Tories voted in? I think it came down to personalities last time; Cameron or Milliband and most people didn't like the way Milliband ate is bacon sandwich! Remember the BBC showing all it's viewers half a dozen times a day during the entire election campagne! Most people are now officially worse off than they were 10 years ago, that's there fault if they voted that way! Unfortunately, so am I now after 33 years on the railway, I have been made redundant because of Tory policy on freight on rail and coal fuelled power stations. I did receive a "pay out" thank goodness.
I can only hope and pray for a change of Government but I am not optimistic.

Brancofan; Sadiq Khan isn't a Tory but neither was Tony Blair! They are both what is now called "New Labour". Almost the opposite to traditional Labour. If Corbyn isn't elected he will no doubt be removed as leader and we will have another right wing Labour leader then will have no choice of policies to choose from, depressing isn't it.

broncofan

04-21-2017, 07:26 PM

Brancofan; Sadiq Khan isn't a Tory but neither was Tony Blair! .I suppose I know he isn't literally a Tory. I guess I just don't really know what policies he advocates that make him seem unacceptably right wing. I have a sense of why Tony Blair is seen that way, but was curious if there are deeper parallels between the two than people placing them in the same category. Anyhow, I'll be watching the election eagerly. Cheers and I hope you get what you're looking for.

peejaye

04-21-2017, 07:55 PM

Thanks Bronco. No-one could ever be fairly placed in the same category as Tony Blair. He is seen by many as the most hated figure in British Politics but not by everyone I should say.

filghy2

04-22-2017, 04:11 AM

Blair deserves condemnation for the Iraq war and for not preventing the behaviour in the financial sector that led to the financial crisis. But his government did expand social programs whereas the Conservatives have cut them. Surely that is a significant difference.

The striking fact at present is that conditions in the UK and other advanced countries - stagnant wages, rising inequality, economic insecurity - should have been tailor-made for left-leaning parties, yet it is the right-wing populists who are prospering. Unfortunately it is much easier to target scapegoats (aided by the tabloid press) but the centre-left will have to do a better job of developing solutions and articulating a narrative that addresses the the practical concerns of ordinary people.

On the positive side, the populist right are unlikely to be able to meet their supporters expectations when they do get into power, as we are already seeing with Trump. In particular, a key issue for the future will be the impact of technology - for instance, driverless vehicles are likely to eliminate most driving jobs over the next decade or so. Obviously there are no easy solutions, but the key challenge will be how to ensure that the benefits of technology can be realised without leaving behind large segments of the population. The populist right seems to have nothing to say on this.

holzz

04-22-2017, 01:09 PM

She's right to call it, and to be fair she has a good chance of winning.

As for broken promises..haha..what? are people dim, politicians lie. its how it works.

Corbyn can say "oh the polls can be wrong!" until he's blue in the face, but then how many general elections in the last thirty years have made wrong polls? 1992 and 2015? that's out of probably 10 in that period. 2015 was an anomaly really, and the Scottish, Welsh elections have been generally accurate. Plus, I don't want Diane Abbott as Home Secretary or something. If I want to hear a shrill voice, I'd listen to a cat.

peejaye

04-22-2017, 01:39 PM

Classic example above of someone possibly not voting for a political party because he doesn't like a particular person from that party!
For the record; I am a member of the Labour Party but I am not a fan of Diane Abbott! It wouldn't make me go out & vote for another party!
I'm not having a go at holzz but this is how a lot of voters think! Hundreds of thousands of working class people, some of them poor, would of voted Conservative in 2015, some of them trade unionists! :banghead

Laphroaig

04-22-2017, 01:43 PM

She's right to call it, and to be fair she has a good chance of winning.

As for broken promises..haha..what? are people dim, politicians lie. its how it works.

First part, probably true.

Second part, ever thought about a career change?

Stavros

04-22-2017, 03:17 PM

The striking fact at present is that conditions in the UK and other advanced countries - stagnant wages, rising inequality, economic insecurity - should have been tailor-made for left-leaning parties, yet it is the right-wing populists who are prospering. Unfortunately it is much easier to target scapegoats (aided by the tabloid press) but the centre-left will have to do a better job of developing solutions and articulating a narrative that addresses the the practical concerns of ordinary people.

I think that one of the trends that helps to explain this was begun in Australia when Bob Hawke transformed the Labour Party into an election winning machine in 1983, following the disarray that crippled the party in the wake of Gough Whitlam's dismissal from power. Blair, Mandelson and Phillip Gould based a lot of their tactics on the Australian experience, in which the key to an election victory was seen as the replacement of the opposition in 'the centre ground' of politics. For New Labour, this meant endorsing most of Thatcher's policies, on housing in particular, but also by not 'threatening' or 'promising' to raise taxes and to maintain a light regulation of the banking and financial sectors in order to persuade the middle class they could trust New Labour not to eat into their prosperity. In previous years it had been claimed the traditional Labour model of 'tax and spend' would damage the City and lead to capital flight, whereas Mandelson made a point of saying he was comfortable with people being filthy rich (which is what he wanted to be himself).

A similar trend enabled Bill Clinton to win the Presidency, the key being to win the support of 'Reagan Democrats' and pursue popular policies like being 'tough on crime'. Blair and Clinton were close at the start of the Blair government, but one wonders if in both cases, the fetish for centre ground policies led to a lapse in their attention to the needs of the poorest members of society. Democrats, today talk about 'the middle class' for obvious reasons, but what about the working class, the poor and the homeless? They used to be on the fringes of society, but in recent years, as the rise in food banks has shown, more and more people are on or just above the poverty line, and many people in work in the UK claim benefits because their wages are not enough to meet the cost of living.

Globalization has been blamed for this alienation between government and the governed, but it is more complex I think. The traditional town centre in France had its baker, butcher and grocery store, along with the cafes and other shops and services. But since the 1970s the growth of out-of-town hypermarkets has shredded town centres and left many looking semi-derelict because it is cheaper to shop in the hypermarket, and town centre businesses find the local council to compensate for falling tax revenues raises them to a level that makes a small business unprofitable. This has happened in the UK. A few years ago I made the mistake of thinking a day out in Nuneaton, birthplace of George Eliot was worth the trip. Within an hour of arriving, I was almost running to the station to leave.

Where globalization has taken effect, the free flow of capital that began in the 1980s, and the transformation of China in particular, has provided people with affordable clothes, affordable cars, affordable long-haul holidays, and affordable computers, smart phones and tablets. In the UK, however, lax rules on home ownership mean that segments of cities like London are stacked with exclusive apartment blocks that nobody appears to live in on a regular basis while local people are bought out and any local character a district has is lost. A major weakness of the New Labour policy was the failure to impose strict limits on borrowing by high street banks, the availability of credit at a time of historic low interest rates meant many people borrowed more than they could repay over time, and it was only a matter of time when the system collapsed. But again, this was not an issue of globalization as much as a domestic political decision not to seek more government control of money and finances, to leave it to the markets, markets which we found out were in any case rigged by the banks. Canada and Australia with stricter rules on borrowing did not suffer as badly as the US and the UK.

In the end, if both the major parties are in effect, offering the same menu of policies or a variation of the same, what is the point of them? The Conservatives have also transformed their party, to some extent at least, with a crop of MPs who are openly gay (two of whom are in the government), Muslim, of African heritage which would have been unthinkable in the 1980s when the only known Conservative MP who was gay was referred to as 'the colourful Norman St John-Stevas' and as recently as 1992 when a black candidate selected by the party to fight Cheltenham Spa -John, later Lord Taylor- was disowned by his local constituency who voted in a Liberal Democrat in the subsequent election for the first time since 1945.

Even now, Labour is trying to offer something different, but not on Brexit, where it has voted with the Conservatives so that anyone opposed to Brexit has limited alternatives, unless you live in Scotland where there is a clear choice. Crucially, I think that while Corbyn is trying to re-position Labour as the party of the 'forgotten people', his lack of credibility and the weakest front bench team in living memory is going to make success very difficult. Dianne Abbott lives in a world of her own, and doesn't even seem to be in touch with the people of Hackney, by contrast Emily Thornberry doesn't appear to be living in this world at all, and is as good a reason for not voting Labour as I can think.

holzz

04-23-2017, 12:30 PM

Ok, so FOUR national holidays?

hahaha...nice gimmick Mr. Corbyn.

Offer a gimmick to make Mr. Wenger better at his job, that would be more transparent. ;)

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/jeremy-corbyn-labour-bank-holidays-general-election-2017-a7697296.html

We're not stupid. We know YOU know you're the underdog, and are doing anything for votes.

peejaye

04-23-2017, 01:44 PM

Laphroaig

04-23-2017, 02:37 PM

Stavros

04-23-2017, 02:45 PM

So people are happy with a pledge tax rises and 0.7% of GDP still going to Foreign aid to places like India(parts of it full of millionaires)
That's 7 pence for every £10 spent in this country! No wonder this place is fucked. I wouldn't of thought Corbyn would have to do or say anything to get in?
You are stupid, because you will probably still vote these evil c**ts in!

Foreign Aid is one of those topics which can never be fully resolved because it generates so much division. Most of the attacks on Foreign Aid come from the Mail, the Murdoch press and an assortment of people who simply don't like the idea of sending a penny to Africa if it can be spent here. But if the Foreign Aid budget was shut down, where would the money go? Not to the projects its critics say it should be spent on in the UK.

The UK's commitment to Foreign Aid comes out of the Overseas Development policy that was created in the 1960s as the Empire was replaced by the Commonwealth. When the UN adopted North-South development issues in the 1970s to get a commitment from governments to spend money to combat poverty and disease, the UK responded by seeking to meet the 0.7% gdp target which in time it did.

Yes, you can find any number of daft-sounding projects in Ethiopia and Pakistan that appear to make a mockery of the concept of foreign aid, and yes you can complain the admin costs alone take too much money and local officials pocket some of it for themselves, but 37% of aid is spent in UN agencies, such as the WHO where money is part of the GAVI alliance that runs vaccination campaigns in rural Africa, for example, and is a crucial part of the fight against diseases such as Meningitis, Polio, Diarrhoeal diseases, pneumonia, TB and malaria.

If you scrap the aid budget because you don't think the UK should be funding the Ethiopian Spice Girls, or running English Language clinics and a physiotherapy unit in North Korea, bear in mind that you will also be scrapping the UK's commitment to the WHO campaign against diseases which make life a misery across the world, and which local government often struggles to deal with. You may also raise questions among the recipients in those countries, such as 'Why did the British leave?', particularly if nothing similar replaces it. Corruption may be a way of life in Nigeria, but does that mean we should not fund campaigns against river blindness? In the end, if nobody does, this disease will just carry on ruining lives. The government of Nigeria has received several trillion dollars in oil revenue since 1979, where did it go? And if Nigeria is that corrupt, ditto Saudi Arabia, why are commercial firms so keen to get their hands on their oil money by doing business with them? Is it not hypocritical to argue we should not send aid to corrupt Nigeria, but yes we can trade with them?
A sensible debate on foreign aid is welcome, but there is more to it than a list of bijoux projects that inflame the retired colonels and their less serviceable friends. Some of it actually works.

Laphroaig

04-23-2017, 02:56 PM

Not necessarily. Already there's an opinion poll (and we all know how reliable those are...:whistle:) showing the Tories lead cut by 11 points in the few days since the election was announced. Can't find the link to it, but basically, who really knows how this election will go?:shrug

Found it, might have known it was from the Daily Mail.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4436044/Tory-lead-slashed-half-tax-U-turn.html

peejaye

04-23-2017, 05:00 PM

Found it, might have known it was from the Daily Mail.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4436044/Tory-lead-slashed-half-tax-U-turn.html

Thanks Phroaig, first place I looked was the Mails website. Cheered me up a little as that, probably short term though?

I hear what you're saying Stavros, re. Foreign Aid, I was not aware however it was the far right mainly criticising it?
I actually believe taxes should rise for the benefit of all our public services, mostly to fund the NHS but what the Tories will do is raise taxes, not for the most wealthy of course, and still carry on with their austerity cuts on public services! A "spin Doctor" will come up with some excuse when the opposition question their motives or May will just say things were much worse under Labour or her favourite; "We are investing record amounts of £££££" but not explain where it will go!
However; declaring you are going to raise taxes in an election campaign is a very brave and dangerous move. I really hope it comes back to haunt them!

Stavros

04-23-2017, 06:00 PM

I hear what you're saying Stavros, re. Foreign Aid, I was not aware however it was the far right mainly criticising it?
I actually believe taxes should rise for the benefit of all our public services, mostly to fund the NHS but what the Tories will do is raise taxes, not for the most wealthy of course, and still carry on with their austerity cuts on public services! A "spin Doctor" will come up with some excuse when the opposition question their motives or May will just say things were much worse under Labour or her favourite; "We are investing record amounts of £££££" but not explain where it will go!
However; declaring you are going to raise taxes in an election campaign is a very brave and dangerous move. I really hope it comes back to haunt them!

Not always the 'far right' who criticise foreign aid, but plenty of people who should know better do attack it.

On tax, I think general election campaigns produce the least convincing arguments. Before she was elected in 1979 Mrs Thatcher said the Tories had no plan to raise VAT, within a month of the election it had doubled. If anything, the issue of tax became so toxic New Labour maintained the generally low levels of income tax with some fiddling at the margins -raising the threshold for tax payments, and lowering the upper limit from 50+ to 45 then 40% over a set figure. We thus have a bizarre situation where some people are not paying income tax at all because they are on low wages, and they and others receive 'in work benefits' because they can't survive on their basic income, yet everyone who drinks or smokes pays increased duties on their delightful sins, and everyone pays VAT. Every government now makes claims about not raising taxes, says there are too many layers and the tax code should be simplified, but in office reform rarely makes radical change, and the argument that low taxes produces a healthier economy is not borne out by the evidence. At some point, however, I think the government will have to increase income tax, probably when the national income declines as a result of the UK leaving the EU if not before then. Interest rates will also rise. I think governments have no touched these two issues for years because they don't win elections. But if May wins this election, Brexit will take place within the lifetime of the new Parliament and there is no hiding place for hard decisions following a 'hard Brexit'.

peejaye

04-23-2017, 07:06 PM

Course; the most obvious thing to do would be all employers to pay a decent living wage, that would also be a good solution for the benefit reforms within the DSS. Also everyone would pay tax. When I say decent I mean £10+ an hour minimum. Probably nearer £12.

broncofan

04-23-2017, 10:46 PM

http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/uk/labour-reiterates-support-for-trident-despite-review-pledge-35645715.html
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/apr/23/jeremy-corbyn-casts-doubt-labour-support-trident-nuclear-deterrent-manifesto

Everyone with a conscience knows that there is no way to use nuclear weapons without it being a war crime. This is true even if it is a second strike in response to a war crime. But I've heard from a lot of lefties about how M.A.D doctrine is effective and helps prevent nuclear war because everyone is rational enough to avoid national suicide. In my view, with the increasing number of rogue states trying to develop them this is probably not true, and the doctrine might not result in stability the more countries there are that possess them.

But it seems to me that in order for a nuclear deterrent to have any effect there needs to at least be a pretense that you might use it. This is why you hear leaders say stuff like "all options are on the table". It doesn't mean they are eager to use first strike but rather that strategically they don't want to rule anything out and they don't want adversaries to believe they would rule anything out. Corbyn also seems to be saying he would not kill Al-Baghdadi if given the chance. Of course nobody tied his hands and demanded that he be willing to strike ISIS no matter what collateral damage there would be. But he has ruled out any engagement in Syria, either against ISIS or against Assad, and also ever using a nuclear weapon. These may be sound policies, but I think strategically one is supposed to leave open the possibility of force.

Stavros

04-24-2017, 08:59 AM

Everyone with a conscience knows that there is no way to use nuclear weapons without it being a war crime. This is true even if it is a second strike in response to a war crime. But I've heard from a lot of lefties about how M.A.D doctrine is effective and helps prevent nuclear war because everyone is rational enough to avoid national suicide. In my view, with the increasing number of rogue states trying to develop them this is probably not true, and the doctrine might not result in stability the more countries there are that possess them.

But it seems to me that in order for a nuclear deterrent to have any effect there needs to at least be a pretense that you might use it. This is why you hear leaders say stuff like "all options are on the table". It doesn't mean they are eager to use first strike but rather that strategically they don't want to rule anything out and they don't want adversaries to believe they would rule anything out. Corbyn also seems to be saying he would not kill Al-Baghdadi if given the chance. Of course nobody tied his hands and demanded that he be willing to strike ISIS no matter what collateral damage there would be. But he has ruled out any engagement in Syria, either against ISIS or against Assad, and also ever using a nuclear weapon. These may be sound policies, but I think strategically one is supposed to leave open the possibility of force.

Corbyn has been opposed to nuclear weapons for most of his adult life, and is not about to change. Defence was considered a major weakness for Labour during the Thatcher years, but with the end of the Cold War and the threat of nuclear war receding it ceased to be a major issue, where 'security' in relation to terrorism at home or abroad has taken a higher profile. Killing al-Baghdadi might be a headline in the news but would not deal with the support Daesh has in Iraq even if a lot of it is based in the mostly Sunni areas of Iraq and among former Ba'ath party/Saddam loyalists and ex-militay who may have used Daesh for their own purposes.

The fear now is not of rogue states using nuclear weapons, it is debatable if even North Korea is a 'rogue state'. The creation of a 'dirty bomb' has been discussed for decades but so far nobody has been able to make or use one, whereas chemical weapons, illegal in international law since 1928 have been used to kill people by Iraq, Israel and Syria. In fact the fear is that the USA is now most likely to use nuclear weapons, depending on who makes the decision. The strikes in Syria were not ordered or even agreed to by the President who has farmed out these decisions to the military, his indifference to military matters and the fact he spends most of his time playing golf at tax-payer's expense while 'doing deals' with foreign governments to extend his private business interests across the world means the military are now free to choose whom to strike without the President looking over their shoulders.

Were North Korea to sink a US vessel as it has threatened to do, there will be retaliation but one wonders of what kind, where, and to what end? On the other hand, the US operation in the Yemen that led to the death of Ryan Owens was ill-prepared, poorly run and produced nothing of importance, other than an opportunity for the golfer-in-chief to gloat over a man's death as if it proved his Presidency was robust and aggressive where Obama's was passive and ineffectual. In fact, given the way things are going maybe we should entertain the thought that if there is a 'rogue state' with nuclear weapons, it is the USA.

broncofan

04-24-2017, 03:35 PM

Corbyn has been opposed to nuclear weapons for most of his adult life, and is not about to change. Defence was considered a major weakness for Labour during the Thatcher years, but with the end of the Cold War and the threat of nuclear war receding it ceased to be a major issue, where 'security' in relation to terrorism at home or abroad has taken a higher profile. Killing al-Baghdadi might be a headline in the news but would not deal with the support Daesh has in Iraq even if a lot of it is based in the mostly Sunni areas of Iraq and among former Ba'ath party/Saddam loyalists and ex-militay who may have used Daesh for their own purposes.

The fear now is not of rogue states using nuclear weapons, it is debatable if even North Korea is a 'rogue state'. The creation of a 'dirty bomb' has been discussed for decades but so far nobody has been able to make or use one, whereas chemical weapons, illegal in international law since 1928 have been used to kill people by Iraq, Israel and Syria. In fact the fear is that the USA is now most likely to use nuclear weapons, depending on who makes the decision. The strikes in Syria were not ordered or even agreed to by the President who has farmed out these decisions to the military, his indifference to military matters and the fact he spends most of his time playing golf at tax-payer's expense while 'doing deals' with foreign governments to extend his private business interests across the world means the military are now free to choose whom to strike without the President looking over their shoulders.

Were North Korea to sink a US vessel as it has threatened to do, there will be retaliation but one wonders of what kind, where, and to what end? On the other hand, the US operation in the Yemen that led to the death of Ryan Owens was ill-prepared, poorly run and produced nothing of importance, other than an opportunity for the golfer-in-chief to gloat over a man's death as if it proved his Presidency was robust and aggressive where Obama's was passive and ineffectual. In fact, given the way things are going maybe we should entertain the thought that if there is a 'rogue state' with nuclear weapons, it is the USA.It has only been 72 years since the first nuclear detonation. Why this gives everyone so much confidence that they could not be used is beyond me. There are two incompatible claims by people on the left; one, that it does not matter who gets nuclear weapons because nobody would use them and two, they pose the greatest threat to world peace and disarmament is advisable. I agree with the second claim. I am sorry if it sounds like first world arrogance that I don't think their development should be democratized to the point of 190+ states having them. I doubt this is maximum stability, whoever is and isn't a rogue.

On the other hand, I also think that if you are relying on a weak doctrine like M.A.D to defend yourselves, you have to at least maintain strategic ambiguity. That does not mean an actual willingness to use them, only a willingness to use phrases like, "we will do what's necessary to defend our interests". I did not think Obama was at all ineffectual or that Trump is remotely effective. I do not think tough talk is helpful, but not revealing your cards probably is.

I'm not sure in what sense North Korea is not a rogue state, since rogue state is used to refer to states that are threats to world peace. North Korea tried to help Syria develop nuclear weapons, has threatened to use nuclear weapons against at least three states I can think of, and uses their nuclear arsenal as a bulwark against international intervention to prevent the appalling human rights violations taking place in their country. You are right that chemical weapons have been used more often than nuclear weapons, but the threat of nuclear warfare is one that poses a more catastrophic outcome.

You would be right to indicate that the phrase rogue state is one that is applied in a highly biased way and would apply to the U.S. as well given our history of intervention. It applies doubly against the U.S. under Trump. And while nuclear disarmament is the eventual goal, I haven't seen anyone offer to do it unilaterally. If Corbyn does, then kudos to him. We will see if voters feel comfortable being the first state to begin a trend that would make everyone safer if other countries follow suit. The essence of a collective action problem is that you rarely have anyone willing to make the first sacrifice.

broncofan

04-24-2017, 04:21 PM

Anyway, I regret using the phrase rogue state, since it is often used in a hypocritical way. I am only suggesting that disarmament might be done in a multi-lateral or gradual way. And that no country wants to be the first one to jump in; which I think is why the Labour party felt the need to clarify Corbyn's statements. For all the Republicans tried to paint Obama as weak, and for all of his talk about disarmament, I don't think he ever promised to go as far as Corbyn has. At least the results of his eight years in office were to leave us with something like 4,500 warheads...

Stavros

04-25-2017, 06:44 AM

Some snippets from the election here:

Polls are suggesting the Conservatives will return to Scotland by taking seats from the SNP, and that they will eat away at Labour seats in Wales producing the worst result in Wales for Labour since the 1920s; and one poll has a Conservative majority of 150 in the House of Commons. But we all know about polls, do we not?

The United Kingdom Independence Party held a farcical news conference in London in which the leader, Paul Nuttall refused to say if he is standing for election, and presented a policy programme which was basically an attack on Muslims, calling for a ban on the full-face Burqa 'for security reasons', and inspections of young women returning from South Asia to assess whether or not they have been subject to Female Genital Mutilation. No similar ban will be imposed on bee-keepers and so far there is no plan to make boys aged 12 and under returning from South Asia drop their trousers to assess whether or not they have been circumcised. Nuttall then avoided press questions by locking himself into a side room, and refusing to answer any more questions as he rushed from the building. On historical evidence, it will not be surprising if Nuttall is replaced as leader of UKIP in the next few weeks though what this party is for, other than being anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim is not clear. Whether or not Nigel Farage will return guide the party is not known, but given he has described his own party as made up of 'low-grade opportunists' this seems unlikely. He does, however, love being in the public arena as it convinces him that he is important.

Aaron Banks, the millionaire (via mining and insurance or so we are told) who funded UKIP and the Leave.eu campaign, arrived in Clacton-on-Sea yesterday to announce he is standing for Parliament. On a miserably cold day he purchased an ice-cream, gave interviews to the press, and three hours later announced he had changed his mind and was not going to stand. Well, I don't mean to be rude, but have you been to Clacton-on-Sea? Some things are best left alone.

Yesterday Jeremy Corby went to Scotland. That is news. The message to the Scottish Trade Union conference appeared to be: the workers, united, will never be defeated.

Laphroaig

04-25-2017, 09:02 AM

Corbyn has been opposed to nuclear weapons for most of his adult life, and is not about to change.

I think that's a key point, Corbyn is now stuck between a rock and a hard place with regards to nuclear weapons. He's being made out to be "weak" for refusing to use them, but he'd probably be portrayed as even weaker and indecisive, if he was to do a U-turn on the issue. I can't say that I'm a fan of Corbyn, but in many ways, his idealism and willingness to stick to his principles in the face of criticism are his biggest selling points.

On the subject of the 4 extra national holidays. Firstly, election "bribes" are part and parcel of electioneering, whether it's promises for extra funding, tax cuts, etc, etc. At least this is novel (though I'm sure Stavros's vast knowledge will come up with a previous example) and in many ways perfectly targets traditional Labour supporters. In any case, just because there are extra public holidays, doesn't mean all employers would stick to them. I'm certain they'd find a way to reduce holiday entitlements for their employees, so overall it would probably have a negligible effect.

Stavros

04-25-2017, 11:26 AM

Corbyn does have some integrity, that is true. He is just not a leader, he cannot bring people together in a combined endeavour, and he is notorious for not listening to people he doesn't agree with.

In the 1983 Election, Labour promised to take the UK out of the European Economic Community, a policy considered madness at the time and one part of the 'longest suicide note in history'. Labour I believe promised to abolish the House of Lords in every manifesto from 1945 until I think the 1990s.

One other items of news: the Communist Party of Great Britain, which is backing Labour, has decided not to field a candidate in the election for the first time since it was founded in 1920. The combined vote for Communist Party candidates in the last election was around 425, quite a fall since 1945 when two MP's were returned to the Commons (Phil Piratin and Willie Gallacher -the latter first elected in 1935).

One of the daftest election promises was made by candidate Newton Gingrich in the USA in his bid to be Republican Party presidential nominee -to establish a colony on the Moon by the end of his second term (ie 2020). Apparently Mars is now the favoured planetary destination where a wall will be built around the American sector.

Jericho

04-25-2017, 04:08 PM

Apparently Mars is now the favoured planetary destination where a wall will be built around the American sector.

And they're getting the Martians to pay for it.
(sorry, couldn't resist)!

peejaye

04-25-2017, 05:59 PM

Abolishing the House of Lords....now that IS a vote winner! :cheers:

peejaye

04-25-2017, 07:43 PM

Nice to see Mr's May in Wales today, what the BBC failed to mention is food bank use in Cardiff as just risen 20% in a year. I hope they made her feel very welcome :loser:

Stavros

04-26-2017, 02:52 PM

Abolishing the House of Lords....now that IS a vote winner! :cheers:

Labour was opposed to the House of Lords because most of the last 100 years it was dominated by Tories. It was not until the 1980s when the Lords was viewed as an alternative opposition to the Thatcher government that Labour began to change its policy but mostly after an influx of Labour peers in the 1990s so that these days Labour no longer places abolition of the Lords as a priority.

Jericho

04-27-2017, 04:15 AM

Today explains why Mays best chance of winning the election stays in staying right the fuck out of the way of any kind of debate!
She was an absolute disaster earlier. Corbyn ripped her a new one!

Jericho

04-30-2017, 05:35 PM

Granted, I'm biased (and in my element), but what a truly dismal performance by the conservatives over the last week.

Clowning glory, Boris Johnson (as usual), #NastyPieceOfWork
Theresa May (finally comes out of hiding) on the Andrew Marr show this morning.
Wow, just fuck, WOW! (Don't take my word for it, look it up yourselves), unbelievable.

Stavros

05-01-2017, 09:30 AM

One has to distinguish between the day-to-day and the underlying factors -the day-to-day stuff is that the 'Tory surge' has been halted, that Labour is not doing so bad, that the SNP is in decline and UKIP in crisis...the outcome at least suggests the Tory majority may be closer to 50 than 150.

On the other hand there is no sign that Corbyn is inspiring people to vote Labour. The best one can say is that if both are Brexit parties one can vote for either of them, but while Labour held on to Stoke in the by-election, they lost Copeland which they had held for decades. This suggests that Labour is going to get hammered, but that it may hang on to seats in loyal areas like London, Manchester and Liverpool while losing seats elsewhere.

As for May and VAT, Mrs Thatcher in the run up to the 1979 election said her party had no plans to increase VAT, and doubled it within a month of taking office. VAT is an EU tax, prior to entering the EU the UK had a 'purchase tax' so maybe someone should ask if VAT will be abolished when/if the UK leaves the EU and the Purchase Tax be restored, and how it will be calculated.

peejaye

05-01-2017, 10:33 AM

I keep on saying it but; The BBC & mainstream media will ensure "The Tories" will govern this country for the foreseeable future.
Just for the record & I've never herd it mentioned on any TV channel but Copeland was a very marginal Labour held seat for many years!

Read on social media last week; The rich vote & the poor don't! Suspect the poor have given up after years of being kicked to death & the rich must go out and vote to make sure their wealth is protected! It does make sense!

holzz

05-01-2017, 08:16 PM

SNP will get a whitewash in Scotland. Ican't see any bigger party getting more seats.

holzz

05-01-2017, 08:21 PM

But the evil one wants to get his hands dirty....

Tory landslide by 200 seats lol.

http://news.sky.com/story/blair-is-back-i-want-to-be-part-of-the-debate-10858988

Jericho

05-01-2017, 09:28 PM

On the other hand there is no sign that Corbyn is inspiring people to vote Labour.

I'm going to disagree with you there.
Over the last week, while May's been hiding in the forests, he's been a fucking RockStar!

Jericho

05-01-2017, 09:31 PM

Though, everything else, i fucking hope you're wrong, but...
Oh, and as Holz mentioned, someone's let Mad Uncle Tony out of the attic again...That's not going to help!

Laphroaig

05-01-2017, 10:01 PM

SNP will get a whitewash in Scotland. Ican't see any bigger party getting more seats.

Look up the meaning of whitewash...:banghead

The SNP will probably end up with the majority of seats in Scotland again, but it's unlikely they will reach the heights of the 2015 election. There's a lot of Scot's unhappy with the way the SNP is running Scotland and even more who will be very unhappy if they (as they almost certainly will) focus their campaign on an "Indy 2" referendum. I fully expect a significant backlash and drop in votes for the SNP in this election. How that will translate into seats remains to be seen though. The Scottish Labour Party is in almost as much disaray up here as their parent party and the leader, Kezia Dugdale, appears to lack direction. labour needs a sizable vote and huge swing in seats in Scotland to stand any chance in this election, but for example, my own parents, lifelong Labour supporters who've never voted any other way, are for the first time ever uncertain of how to vote. Ruth Davidson, the Scottish Conservative leader, is actually gaining a lot of respect as the only credible opposition to the SNP up here at the moment, but again, whether this will translate into Tory gains is yet to be seen. Cliched maybe, but the only predictable thing about this upcoming election is that it will be unpredictable...:shrug

Stavros

05-02-2017, 08:51 AM

Recent posts above beg the question: is this General Election all about Brexit?
It is clear that for some people the primary issues are the state of the economy and public services, rather than the EU, just as people in the EU referendum voted to Leave just to vote against the Tory government and not specifically on the issue of the EU.

On one level, this benefits Labour, even if most of the time this party just keeps repeating its tired old formulas about the NHS, schools and housing without ever telling anyone where the money is going to come from, or reviving failed policies of the past like 'privatising the railways'. Corbyn definitely has a credibility problem, but in places like London, Manchester and Liverpool I doubt the party will lose a lot of seats (and if it does then the condition of the party is even worse than we thought), whereas in the older industrial areas of the north-west I think it will struggle. Scotland, as Laphroaig suggests, appears now to be a lost cause, in part because the SNP stole its clothes, and in part because the party ruled parts of Scotland as if it were the USSR.

The problem I see for May is that even without knowing the detailed terms of the negotiations on Article 50, there appears to be a widening gap between what May thinks is both possible and desirable, and what the EU thinks is essential for its own survival. It has been suggested that the British seem to be ignorant of how the EU actually works, and that the two are so far apart there may be no agreement at all. The two-year transition thus appears to be in question.

peejaye

05-02-2017, 06:33 PM

Seems things aren't going very well for Mr's May & her Brexit talks, even the BBC struggling to find any positives!
How much money would a Labour Government take in revenues when the railways & energy companies are taken back into public ownership?
Coupled together with the £161m per week we wouldn't be sending to that millionaires club in Brussels & a hefty tax increase for the super rich I suspect there could be a bit of spare cash around?

Laphroaig

05-02-2017, 08:18 PM

Recent posts above beg the question: is this General Election all about Brexit?
It is clear that for some people the primary issues are the state of the economy and public services, rather than the EU, just as people in the EU referendum voted to Leave just to vote against the Tory government and not specifically on the issue of the EU.

There's no question that Brexit will dominate this election, although in Scotland, the SNP will push for "Indy referendum 2" to share the centre stage. Across the country though, candidates will continue to focus on whatever local issues are most important to them, whether it's schools, housing, jobs or just potholes.

Seems things aren't going very well for Mr's May & her Brexit talks, even the BBC struggling to find any positives!
How much money would a Labour Government take in revenues when the railways & energy companies are taken back into public ownership?
Coupled together with the £161m per week we wouldn't be sending to that millionaires club in Brussels & a hefty tax increase for the super rich I suspect there could be a bit of spare cash around?

We always knew that the Brexit negotiations were never going to be straightforward and whatever Mrs May says, I don't believe that she's 100% convinced that it's the right thing to do, though I do believe that she'll fight hard for (what she see's as) the best deal possible. She will lose some negotiations though and be forced to compromise on others, which will have a negative affect on both her individual and the Tories overall approval rating. I actually wonder if this early election has been called for precisely those reasons, to secure the Tory government before the innevitable negotiation "failures" happen.

Stavros

05-03-2017, 01:53 AM

How much money would a Labour Government take in revenues when the railways & energy companies are taken back into public ownership?
Coupled together with the £161m per week we wouldn't be sending to that millionaires club in Brussels & a hefty tax increase for the super rich I suspect there could be a bit of spare cash around?

I am not sure. The railway infrastructure has been brought back into public ownership through Network Rail since 2002, but the train operating companies remain in private hands, and most of them are part owned by state owned companies in France, the Netherlands and Germany. Bringing those companies into a re-unified nationalised railway network would cost billions in compensation to the companies concerned, at a time when the exit from the EU would damage trade in terms of UK revenues.

But would a nationalised railway network be able to deal with chronic problems of overcrowding on commuter trains, not just the notorious Southern Rail, but the commuter services into Birmingham and Manchester? Is it a problem of ancient track? Longer trains pulling into stations with longer platforms? What will happen to high speed projects? How soon can we have the inevitable -driverless trains? Will Labour stand by manned trains and stations it cannot afford putting modernization off for how long?

Just as Dianne Abbott made a complete mess of the issue of extra policing there is no coherence in Labour's railway plans, not on costs, not on modernization and crucially, perhaps, not on what the consumers want. Labour must have some sort of death wish, or it could just be incompetence, but an incompetence that is unforgivable for a party that has been in opposition for seven years.

filghy2

05-03-2017, 02:23 AM

Stavros

05-03-2017, 10:49 AM

If that was there motivation wouldn't it have made more sense to express it in the 2015 elections (when there was actually a swing to the Conservatives)?

In a word, no. In 2015 Cameron was still unsure that he would be able to govern alone- it looked like another coalition was inevitable, and because the previous year UKIP had won most of the seats in the EU Parliamentary election and by election time in 2015 two Tory MPs had defected to UKIP, he promised an in/out EU Referendum in order to steal UKIP's thunder. The polls in 2015 did not predict a Tory majority large enough to govern alone, but also did not predict the collapse of the Liberal Democrat vote, and the collapse of Labour in Scotland with an historic vote for the SNP. There was also no surge for UKIP strong enough to elect more than one MP to the Commons, so Cameron was actually in a strong position. He could have used this to decide not to hold a referendum at all, or to delay it for a year, two years -the argument that a Manifesto Pledge is just that is nonsense, parties can put anything they like in an election manifesto, it has no legal value at all.

In other words, Cameron gambled the future of the UK on the toss of a coin, and we lost.

peejaye

05-03-2017, 12:44 PM

Stavros

05-03-2017, 03:54 PM

If this election is about Br-exit, how on Gods green earth can May be elected to take us out of the EU when she was a staunch remain-er? :smh
Your knowledge of the "state" of todays railways Stavros is, yet again, spot on. However, these people who are running the trains were given the franchises at a very low cost, are you aware that some companies are actually paid to run the non-profitable ones? They would have to be, of course!
It wouldn't cost that much to take them back because they didn't pay much in the first place! As for shareholders, they would have to find another way of making easy money!

I think May's position is that as leader of the party and Prime Minister she has no option but to administer the results of the referendum, although only Parliament can vote to repeal the 1972 European Communities Act, and May has shown tendencies to by-pass Parliament on the grounds the referendum decision cannot be reversed. In addition, she has attempted to find a 'pain-free' path through the negotiations on the basis she thinks the EU may be swayed on some issues to give the UK privileges that states like Norway and Switzerland do not have, but on this it appears Jean-Claude Juncker thinks she is 'deluded'.

On the railways -the compensation package would normally be around £250 million per company (roughly 3% of their annual profit) times the number of years left on their contract -most expire in 2020 but some run longer, for example East Coast runs to 2023 and Essex Thameside 2029. An alternative would be to wait for the contracts to expire and then take them back into public ownership, but to do this the law would have to be changed, as currently the Railways Act 1993 prevents the public sector from bidding for rail operating franchises. It would also be against EU competition policy, and we will not be able to act independently of the EU until we have actually left it, so I don't see how even a Labour government can do anything but plan for a public ownership around 2020-2025.

None of this deals with the issues that matter most to consumers -the quality and cost of the service, and what the long term vision for transport by rail could be. That a publicly-owned system would also be subsidized by the tax-payer and that the Unions will resist substantial cuts to staffing puts the whole scheme into an area somewhere between 'Desirable-Difficult-Undesirable-Impossible' on the spectrum of policy making.

A return of the British Rail sandwich is also something that should concern consumers...

http://news.sky.com/story/is-there-a-strong-case-to-renationalise-the-railways-10550346

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-31621300

holzz

05-03-2017, 04:18 PM

Jericho

05-03-2017, 08:46 PM

I think May's position is that as leader of the party and Prime Minister she has no option but to administer the results of the referendum, although only Parliament can vote to repeal the 1972 European Communities Act, and May has shown tendencies to by-pass Parliament on the grounds the referendum decision cannot be reversed. In addition, she has attempted to find a 'pain-free' path through the negotiations on the basis she thinks the EU may be swayed on some issues to give the UK privileges that states like Norway and Switzerland do not have, but on this it appears Jean-Claude Juncker thinks she is 'deluded'.

After her speech today, he won't be the only one to think she's 'deluded'!
Still, she wrapped herself up in the flag nicely...Go Theresa, pity you couldn't start a war!

peejaye

05-04-2017, 11:21 AM

After her speech today, he won't be the only one to think she's 'deluded'!
Still, she wrapped herself up in the flag nicely...Go Theresa, pity you couldn't start a war!
I'd put my balls on it & what hangs between them this dirty lot WILL get involved in some kind of war if or when she's elected! Wars make money & that lot are besotted with money. :hide-1:

peejaye

05-04-2017, 11:29 AM

A return of the British Rail sandwich is also something that should concern consumers...

http://news.sky.com/story/is-there-a-strong-case-to-renationalise-the-railways-10550346

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-31621300

Don't forget those stale tasteless pork pies too! It's often said nowadays "If only the state of buffet car food was the only thing wrong with our trains".
Re. Mr's May taking us out of Europe; I don't think she should of put herself forward, she knew, as did the rest of the Party, she would have to deal with this, I'd of rather seen David Davies as leader, as far as Conservatives go, I can actually tolerate the guy!

Jericho

05-04-2017, 09:54 PM

Re. Mr's May taking us out of Europe; I don't think she should of put herself forward, she knew, as did the rest of the Party, she would have to deal with this, I'd of rather seen David Davies as leader, as far as Conservatives go, I can actually tolerate the guy!

The same David Davies who voted to cut disability benefits by 30 quid a week?
Sorry, i can not tolerate a single fucking one them!

filghy2

05-05-2017, 04:13 AM

Because there was a referendum and we're a democracy.

Actually, you live in a parliamentary democracy in which you elect representatives who then vote on legislation. That's why the courts ruled that a parliamentary vote was required to trigger the Brexit process (the referendum itself was only advisory). Yet the 'democrats' on the Brexit side were vehemently opposed to this.

The referendum asked whether people wanted to leave the EU but it said nothing about what arrangements should take its place. If the Brexiteers were sincere about following the will of the people they should support a second referendum on what these arrangements should be.

I'm not a Brit, but it always strikes me that the UK political system has too few checks and balances. Democracy should not mean the dictatorship of a (possibly temporary) majority. Most effective democracies have a higher hurdle for fundamental changes than a simple majority vote. The fact that the power to make laws across the land is concentrated in a single parliamentary chamber also seems problematic.

Stavros

05-05-2017, 12:45 PM

Actually, you live in a parliamentary democracy in which you elect representatives who then vote on legislation. That's why the courts ruled that a parliamentary vote was required to trigger the Brexit process (the referendum itself was only advisory). Yet the 'democrats' on the Brexit side were vehemently opposed to this.
The referendum asked whether people wanted to leave the EU but it said nothing about what arrangements should take its place. If the Brexiteers were sincere about following the will of the people they should support a second referendum on what these arrangements should be.
I'm not a Brit, but it always strikes me that the UK political system has too few checks and balances. Democracy should not mean the dictatorship of a (possibly temporary) majority. Most effective democracies have a higher hurdle for fundamental changes than a simple majority vote. The fact that the power to make laws across the land is concentrated in a single parliamentary chamber also seems problematic.

A Tory MP once described the UK's Parliamentary Democracy as, in reality, an 'elective dictatorship', the point being that Parliament is sovereign and no other body can amend its decision, although UK law has been amended in order to conform to international agreements be it through agencies of the UN or the EU.

This became a core argument to leave the UK, as leavers claimed that the EU and not the UK was the source of laws and regulations, ignoring the extent of EU laws and regulations that originated in the UK, and the simple fact that every EU law and regulation was approved by the same Parliament. Moreover, the leave slogan 'Take Back Control' was used in a referendum that took decision-making away from Parliament and gave it to the electorate via a referendum even though the Law declares a referendum can only advise on, and not make policy. The most vociferous supporters of the referendum, UKIP, used it to compensate for the fact that they had no representation in Parliament, until two MPs defected, because nobody would vote for them.

Although we do not have checks and balances like they do in the US, it is not the case that an Act of Parliament is automatically rolled out across the UK. The Sexual Offences Act of 1967 which de-criminalised sexual relations between consenting men over the age of 21 did not become law in Scotland until 1980, and 1982 in Northern Ireland. Indeed, homosexuality in Northern Ireland did not become legal until a case was take to the European Court of Human Rights, under a law that Theresa May and the Conservatives are determined to repeal. That may not be a check and balance to prevent laws being imposed across the UK, but it is an example of the peculiarity of a united state in which there are two currencies, three legal systems, three education systems, four football associations and two official languages, although an MP can swear his Oath to the Queen on entering the House of Commons in English, Welsh, Scots Gaelic, and Cornish and for those with religion swear the oath on the Bible, the New Testament, the Old Testament (English or Hebrew), the Quran, the Granth (Sikhism), the Scots Bible, and the Welsh Bible.

Perhaps the most bizarre act of democracy took place last night in Northumberland, as part of a wide range of local council elections taking place in England, Scotland and Wales. Here, in the smallest unit in politics, the Ward, two candidates -Conservative and Liberal Democrat- were tied after numerous re-counts, and the final decision was made when the Returning Officer produced straws, having decided to use straws rather than the flip of a coin. The Liberal Democrat drew the long straw, and was duly elected. (So far in these elections, seen as a dry run for the General Election) the Conservatives are doing well, Labour is doing badly, UKIP has lost all its council seats so far, and all eyes are on Scotland to see if the SNP can take control of Glasgow City Council).

The only comparison I can think of is in the US where, in Manhattan, the one district that voted for Donald Trump last November contained 14 voters. Drawing straws is plain crazy, a re-election should be held. But how can electoral districts in a city like New York contain 14 voters? But I guess that is democracy.

holzz

05-06-2017, 01:32 AM

rodinuk

05-06-2017, 05:07 AM

...I'm not a Brit, but it always strikes me that the UK political system has too few checks and balances......The fact that the power to make laws across the land is concentrated in a single parliamentary chamber also seems problematic.

That's right we abolished the House of Lords..... oh no we didn't.....

rodinuk

05-06-2017, 05:19 AM

Perhaps the most bizarre act of democracy took place last night in Northumberland, as part of a wide range of local council elections taking place in England, Scotland and Wales. Here, in the smallest unit in politics, the Ward, two candidates -Conservative and Liberal Democrat- were tied after numerous re-counts, and the final decision was made when the Returning Officer produced straws, having decided to use straws rather than the flip of a coin. The Liberal Democrat drew the long straw, and was duly elected. (So far in these elections, seen as a dry run for the General Election) the Conservatives are doing well, Labour is doing badly, UKIP has lost all its council seats so far, and all eyes are on Scotland to see if the SNP can take control of Glasgow City Council)

The Electoral Rules were followed - they state the exact number of recounts which is 3 rather than the arbitrary numerous stated above and the action thereafter - the drawing of lots.

I didn't see these polls as a dry run for the General Election because voters are fickle especially in this day and age and have always been prone to lodge protest votes at bye-elections anyway.

Stavros

05-06-2017, 10:22 AM

The Electoral Rules were followed - they state the exact number of recounts which is 3 rather than the arbitrary numerous stated above and the action thereafter - the drawing of lots.

I didn't see these polls as a dry run for the General Election because voters are fickle especially in this day and age and have always been prone to lodge protest votes at bye-elections anyway.

Thank you for the correction, I didn't get that right.
As for the vote, with turn-outs as low as 21% in some wards, the loss of council seats may not be a good guide to the General Election result. John Curtice in the Independent argues today the Conservatives are ahead, but not by enough to guarantee a huge majority.
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/local-election-2017-latest-analysis-john-curtice-tory-landslide-general-election-a7720801.html

filghy2

05-07-2017, 02:43 AM

That's right we abolished the House of Lords..... oh no we didn't.....

The House of Lords still exists, but its power to block legislation was removed in 1911. It's obviously an anachronism, but there are probably better alternatives than simply abolishing it: eg having an upper house elected by proportional representation as many other countries do.

Of course, the little Englanders like holzz won't like that - 'no foreign influences here; we're British!'.

Jericho

05-09-2017, 02:58 PM

Of course, the little Englanders like holzz won't like that - 'no foreign influences here; we're British!'.

We've got far too much foreign influence as it is, thank you kindly!
1008315

Stavros

05-09-2017, 05:15 PM

Hip Hip Hooray! Theresa May is going to support the repeal of the ban on fox-hunting by offering the party a free vote on the issue, the most pressing and urgent policy facing all true English men and women today. Oh I say, isn't she splendid? I do so love a commanding woman with a whip mounted on her trusty steed, and reject utterly the remarks of that scoundrel, Oscar Wilde who described this sport of Kings 'The unspeakable in pursuit of the uneatable!

Meanwhile, Jeremy Corbyn was asked seven times (by BBC journalist and Tory Laura Kuenssberg) if he could confirm that Labour if elected to govern will leave the UK whatever the outcome of the negotiations. He failed, so about 40 minutes later someone in the party's communications clarified it, Kuenssberg tweeting "Aides to Corbyn say 'Brexit is settled' , if JC is PM 'we will leave the EU'" -but this is the really interesting segment in her interview with JC:
I sent a letter to President Elect Macron last night congratulating him on his election and also setting out in broad terms what our aims are in these negotiations: To have good relations with Europe of course, secondly to make sure there is a trade access, a tariff free trade access, to European markets. Thirdly, that we will of course protect the rights of EU nationals living in Britain which we will do straight away and that we will also ensure that the regulations that we got from the European Union such as Working Time Directive and employment conditions will be defended and maintained. It has to be put very clearly.

Hmmm...tariff free access to 'European markets' -presumably including the EU Single Market? That is what we have right now, and what we will not have if/when the UK leaves the EU. Like the man said It has to be put very clearly...

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/live/2017/may/09/general-election-2017-corbyn-leader-labour-loses-may-energy-cap-politics-live

peejaye

05-09-2017, 05:28 PM

I don't know if you're familiar with "Social Media" Stavros but there as been a series ongoing issues between Kuenssberg & the Labour leader for a long time now! Pleased you branded her a "Tory", she most certainly is, often appearing on the BBC's The Politics show as a so called "neutral" :???:

Jericho

05-09-2017, 06:56 PM

The Kuenssberg interview can be found in full here.
Make your own minds up:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2017-39852719 (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2017-39852719)

broncofan

05-09-2017, 07:54 PM

It was inappropriate for her to ask the question so many times. His answer appeared to be that he is unwilling to guarantee anything at the beginning of negotiations. However, his party was willing to promise unequivocally. I understand his apprehension about saying you will leave EU regardless of negotiations but if his party's position is that you're leaving the EU, he should concede it. Does he want to be misunderstood? You can't be a martyr and a leader at the same time.

Stavros

05-09-2017, 08:32 PM

You can't be a martyr and a leader at the same time.

Welcome to our Momentum world....

filghy2

05-10-2017, 02:55 AM

Meanwhile, Jeremy Corbyn was asked seven times (by BBC journalist and Tory Laura Kuenssberg) if he could confirm that Labour if elected to govern will leave the UK whatever the outcome of the negotiations.

So you think that's the only way he can get people to vote for him?

filghy2

05-10-2017, 03:16 AM

We've got far too much foreign influence as it is, thank you kindly!
1008315

You're welcome to them (and Rolf Harris too). After all, you did start off by sending us your undesirables. Murdoch has actually been a US citizen since 1985, when the great patriot relinquished his Australian citizenship to satisfy US media ownership laws.

Stavros

05-10-2017, 06:37 AM

So you think that's the only way he can get people to vote for him?

OOps! So many layers to the Freudian slip I don't know where to begin...or end. And that's before we get to Labour and the EU...!

Jericho

05-10-2017, 07:48 PM

OOps! So many layers to the Freudian slip I don't know where to begin...or end. And that's before we get to Labour and the EU...!

Or, we could talk about the conservatives, and what they have to offer for the common people of this country. #justsayin

Jericho

05-11-2017, 01:20 AM

However, his party was willing to promise unequivocally. I understand his apprehension about saying you will leave EU regardless of negotiations but if his party's position is that you're leaving the EU, he should concede it. Does he want to be misunderstood? You can't be a martyr and a leader at the same time.

He did unequivocally answer that question today.
"Yes, we accept the results of the referendum, Britain is leaving the UK".

Jericho

05-11-2017, 02:28 AM

He did unequivocally answer that question today.
"Yes, we accept the results of the referendum, Britain is leaving the UK".

Bit of a Diane Abbot moment there, i *meant* EU

broncofan

05-11-2017, 02:51 AM

Bit of a Diane Abbot moment there, i *meant* EU
That's okay it's easy enough to do. I think he just didn't like the way the question was worded to be honest. She wanted him to accept the premise that he doesn't get anything he wants and he didn't find a nimble way to say you will leave no matter what but that he has no intention of failing in the negotiations.

Stavros

05-11-2017, 08:05 AM

Or, we could talk about the conservatives, and what they have to offer for the common people of this country. #justsayin

We will have to wait for the manifesto, or just accept that 'more of the same' is on the agenda which means Theresa May's poor record of achievements at the Home Office will continue -she presents a calm and solid profile and is a 'One Nation Tory' compared to the Hard Brexiteers in her party, but she failed to reduce immigration to the levels David Cameron said they would, she promoted the 'Snooper's Charter' to monitor our emails and web browsing activities, has presided over a serious decline of the prison system struggling to recruit and retain staff, and as Prime Minister has done nothing to prevent the sale of arms to unelected dictatorships like Saudi Arabia currently being used to destroy the Yemen.
Government pledges to reduce government borrowing have been undermined by their own forecasts for growth even without the potential for Brexit to make all government spending figures meaningless, while she now may pledge to increase defence spending. As for Brexit, the approach that Juncker and others has said is 'rigid' is rigid because the room for manoeuvre is actually limited. The Tories and their supporters bang on about the trade deficit -the Germans need us more than we need them, is the mantra- making it appear that the UK is so precious a partner the EU will do everything it can to give us freebies denied to others. But clarity is not possible on the terms of Brexit because the negotiations haven't started yet.

The Tory party is split, as it has been since we entered the EU in 1973. The Hard Brexiteers want the UK to go it alone in the world, and want to see the EU dissolved. They share this mission to swap globalization as an integrated network of trade deals and regulations, for a pseudo-Darwinian 'life or death struggle' with the Russians and the Americans, all based on the assumption that if there were free markets, British and American firms would flourish. The fact that most of the world's capital resources and also its raw materials are owned by states not companies and that markets are rigged and manipulated makes the free market fantasy dangerous, but it does mean in the longer term the UK as it declines economically after leaving the EU will not be able to afford the range of public services we currently have, with in-work benefits the first to go, followed in the course of time with publicy funded health and education services.
Theresa May represents that part of the Tory party which understands it must appeal to voters who want some if not all public services protected, she thus represents the last gasp of One Nation Tories, because if she fails, the consequences could be dire for all of us, including the EU which itself will struggle for a time without the political and financial input of the UK.

So it is ironic that the leader who generates the most confidence, Mrs May is running on a portfolio of policies dating from 2010 that have failed, while the leader who generates no confidence at all, Jeremy Corbyn, is running on a portfolio of failed policies from the 1970s even as both of them claim to be protecting what the British people value the most. In sum, it may come down to a judgement of who is going to be the least damaging for Britain, rather than who is offering a positive message for the future.
But that is because I don't see the UK outside the EU as the positive development that others do.

Jericho

05-11-2017, 11:16 PM

But that is because I don't see the UK outside the EU as the positive development that others do.

Voting ourselves out of Europe's probably the stupidest thing we've done in a while.
(I don't know why, but it irritates me when i agree with you)!

Thankfully, the lower orders can make up for it by voting for a Labour government with Jeremy Corbin as its leader.
(I'm officially a believer. It might only last until the 1st week of June, but for the first time in a long time, I've got some hope for this country).

(Well done J, so much for talking about the conservatives...Tho Fair play, you covered that pretty well)!

Stavros

05-12-2017, 01:34 AM

Voting ourselves out of Europe's probably the stupidest thing we've done in a while.
(I don't know why, but it irritates me when i agree with you)!
Thankfully, the lower orders can make up for it by voting for a Labour government with Jeremy Corbin as its leader.
(I'm officially a believer. It might only last until the 1st week of June, but for the first time in a long time, I've got some hope for this country).
(Well done J, so much for talking about the conservatives...Tho Fair play, you covered that pretty well)!

We can agree and disagree on a range of things, it is nothing to worry about. As for this manifesto, it promises everything to everyone and they claim it has all been costed and the figures will be provided. It sounds to me like the kind of programme Hugo Chavez introduced in Venezuela, no prizes for guessing Jeremy Corbyn was a fan. The difference is that, allowing for the money syphoned off in bribes and everyday corruption, what was left of Venezuela's petroleum riches was, in a word, spent rather than invested, with the consequence that one of the richest oil states in the world is now an economic basket case, falling to pieces and becoming ungovernable, not exactly the model one wants imported into the UK. You have to wonder if the costs of Labour's programme has factored in the costs of leaving the EU. I doubt it. In any case, manifesto pledges are not worth the paper they are written on, and the outstanding fact we have learned since Corbyn became leader of the Labour Party is that he is a useless manager, that he is inflexible on policy issues, and for all his sincerely held beliefs he is offering policies from the past that failed.

But bear in mind that I am biased because of my past membership of the party and the disagreements I had with them around the time McDonnell was in a mini-war with Livingstone over the rates issue on the Greater London Council. I did re-join the party briefly a few years later, and was an admirer of the late and much lamented John Smith, but once Blair arrived and in spite of the Good Friday Agreement I lost confidence in them, with Iraq the nail in the coffin. They can promise me the earth and jam tomorrow, I will never vote Labour again.

holzz

05-13-2017, 08:58 PM

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2017-39909126?ocid=socialflow_twitter&ns_mchannel=social&ns_campaign=bbcnews&ns_source=twitter

Stavros

05-16-2017, 03:54 PM

The Labour Party has issued its election manifesto containing a fabulous array of promises with an equally fabulous amount of money to pay for it. The costing has been based on a 're-balancing' of the economy which will see higher rates of income tax imposed on people earning more than £80,000 a year, an increase in Corporation Tax to 26% with an unspecified set of measures designed to collect taxes from businesses and corporations currently lost through evasion or fraud. The cardinal point is whether or not these increases in taxation and receipts from a static VAT will be enough to pay for an ambitious spending programme which includes: (apologies if specific proposals are costed but not noted below, as I am working from Telegraph and Guardian reports not the manifesto itself)

-Creation of a Migrant Impact Fund, money coming from 'visa levies and a contributory element from residence visas for high net worth individuals' (see Telegraph link)
-The completion of the HS2 rail link between London and Birmingham with an extension called the 'Crossrail of the North' -and this following the full re-nationalization of the railways as the state takes over rail operating companies when their franchises expire.
-Abolition of university tuition fees and the restoration of maintenance grants for students (not sure if this has been costed).
-Creation of a National Care Service -not sure if this is costed, with a Carer's Allowance to be increased along with Jobseekers Allowance.
-an £8 billion investment in services over the life of the next Parliament (ie, five years).
-Creation of a Ministry of Labour (not sure if this is costed).
-'triple lock' on pensions guaranteed.
-Borrowing £250 billion over a ten year period for investment on energy, transport and digital infrastructure (Telegraph link).
-Maintain the renewal of the (nuclear) Trident missile programme (estimated cost phased through to the 2060s, £250 million).
-Maintain defence spending @ 2% of GDP.
-Increase police force by 10,000 -costed as a transitional programme at £800 million over the life of the next Parliament.
-Increase spending on the NHS by £6 billion a year, with £1.6 billion on social care.
-Building 100,000 new council homes.

In addition to these spending plans, Labour's aim is to maintain the UK's links to the single market and customs union of the EU but to end the free movement of people/workers in and out of the EU/UK. It has said it will oppose a 'no deal' outcome if negotiations with the EU end without an agreement, though what this means in practice is as mysterious as the policy to retain 'tariff free access' to the single market.

Labour also proposes to re-introduce rent controls, provide unspecified 'homes' for people sleeping rough, estimated at 4,000; and lower the voting age to 16. On communications the aim is to Improve 4G mobile coverage and invest to bring uninterrupted 5G to all urban areas, major roads and railways (see Telegraph link).
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/0/at-a-glance-key-points-leaked-labour-manifesto/
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/may/16/labour-proposes-45p-income-tax-above-80000

For years the left used to tell us that the reason they lost election after election was due to the Party not offering the public a radical manifesto, as radical as the policy programme implemented by Clement Attlee's government in 1945. Tony Benn used this argument repeatedly in the 1980s, but it doesn't stack up because Labour lost four elections in a row and there comes a point when you have to ask -where did we go wrong? And even if you don't like winning three elections in a row under Tony Blair you might ask, what did he get right?

In 1945 the UK was bankrupt, but it paid for its ambitious programme of national renewal and extensive public ownership of transport, health, education and parts of industry through loans it received from the USA and Canada -to be precise, £4.3 billion from the USA (roughly £27 billion in today's money) and in 1946 £1.2 billion from Canada. The loans were offered at an interest rate of 2% payable when the UK could make it, the last payment of £42.4 million was paid to the USA, and £9.9 million paid to Canada by Gordon Brown as Chancellor in 2006.
http://www.politics.co.uk/news/2006/12/29/britain-finally-pays-off-wwii-debt

Labour seems to me have failed to factor in the potential costs of Brexit -it is beyond doubt that, even if only in the short term, ie ten years, the UK will be worse off by leaving the EU, this means our national income will also decline taking tax revenues with it. In addition, even were corporation tax to be reduced, as a tax it will decline if major firms either downsize because of Brexit, or leave altogether, for example JP Morgan is likely to move at least 1,000 staff out of the UK to Ireland -which has a much lower rate of corporation tax- with 4,000 jobs in their Bournemouth offices at risk. If the costs of Brexit are not factored in, energy costs must be a factor as North Sea oil and gas declines as imports rise; the cost of compensating the rail operating companies will fall if they just let the franchises expire, but the cost of re-nationalizing the water industry will surely be burdened by compensations costs which a Labour spokesperson on the radio said would be decided on by Parliament.

Finally, Labour is committed to renewing the Trident nuclear programme, in spite of Corbyn's personal antipathy to nuclear weapons, but the more astonishing fact that it is also opposed by some in the Royal Navy who think it is an expensive, useless and outmoded piece of kit which we can't afford and don't even need.

Here ends the fairy tale, my apologies if it went on far too long.

peejaye

05-16-2017, 04:35 PM

It all sounds very possible to me, still don't see any concrete evidence why we're going to be worse off out of the EU? What about the £350m per week we won't be sending there anymore?
Privatisation and rich Tories have been plundering the public purse for years, I would pay a fortune to see all these policies brought in on June 9th :Bowdown:

Jericho

05-16-2017, 07:45 PM

Here ends the fairy tale, my apologies if it went on far too long.

And like all good fairy tales, everybody lives happily ever after. :shrug

I aint smart like some people, I let my gut decide the right and wrong of things for the most part.
And what I get from the manifesto is hope (something I've waited a long time for).
Not for a better future, but for a future.
All we need is the will to make it happen.

Or there's the alternative.
And i can already see the turkeys lining up getting ready to vote for Christmas!

http://www.labour.org.uk/index.php/manifesto2017

Stavros

05-17-2017, 03:34 AM

If I can reply to Peejaye and Jericho simultaneously, I too like a lot of the policies, there is a lot to like. I like the idea of a tax system that is fair and re-distributes wealth and reduces the gap between rich and poor -but wage caps don't work, and the volume of revenues the party thinks it will get from higher rate tax earners, corporation tax and if successful, revenues previously lost to evasion and fraud just doesn't fill the gap, and that is before we take into consideration the potential for interest rates to rise with inflation. Moreover, taxes at some point will rise across the board, we have been living in a low-tax environment for too long, and in-work benefits are a nonsense that must be scrapped.

I was always opposed to tuition fees and the elimination of maintenance grants, not least because I went to university and did not pay a penny, in fact in those days during the summer vacation I was able to claim housing and unemployment benefit so instead of working I spent the summers in the Robbins library, and I don't see why these benefits should not be extended to everyone else.

I can see the benefits of re-nationalising the water industry, though it could remain in private hands as long as the companies agree to re-invest a higher percentage of their profits in the UK. I think the Royal Mail is facing, like the railways, a difficult future though lack of demand in one, and technological change in the other, but as I can get from Bardland to London for less than £10 with my railcard I see no reason to take the rail operating companies back into public ownership, just because Southern Rail offers a crap service. As for the money needed to overhaul the track, the trains and the timetables, I think Labour has woefully underestimated the cost -
And all of this is based on the assumption that the economy will carry on ticking, as if leaving the EU were not going to have a negative effect.
Lastly, the performance of Labour's front bench team in the last month has been disgraceful, from Emily Thornberry mouthing the word 'bollocks' on a Sunday morning TV programme in which she failed to tackle Defence Secretary Michael Falllon over arms sales to Saudi Arabia, Dianne Abbott's complete mess of the figures on costing the recruitment of 10,000 new policemen, to John McDonnell unable to tell the BBC interviewer yesterday morning what the deficit is, and was either googling it on his phone while waffling, or getting a slip of paper from an aid and then getting it wrong anyway. The fact that Corbyn is not a team player, has no flexibility in his judgement, and is prepared to sacrifice principle for 'realism' on war, ie the renewal of useless Trident, underlines his lack of credibility.

peejaye

05-17-2017, 10:03 AM

Or there's the alternative.
And i can already see the turkeys lining up getting ready to vote for Christmas!

Jericho; You are smarter than what you think!

.....& Stavros; You know the BBC is a Party Political broadcast for the Conservative Party 24/7, there No.1 Political correspondent (Keunssberg) is a member of the party & married to a banker!

Stavros

05-17-2017, 01:03 PM

.....& Stavros; You know the BBC is a Party Political broadcast for the Conservative Party 24/7, there No.1 Political correspondent (Keunssberg) is a member of the party & married to a banker!

Peejaye, yes, and her predecessor in the role, Nick Robinson who interrogated John McDonnell on the radio yesterday, has been a lifelong Tory ever since creating Macclesfield Young Conservatives. I would probably say the BBC is an 'establishment' rather than a specifically Tory outfit, it isn't that simple. But it should be simple as 1-2-3 for anyone on the Labour front bench to know their brief and not fail to answer questions because they arrived in the studio without the facts at their fingertips -in Dianne Abbott's case she was interviewed on LBC by the 'take no prisoners' Nick Ferrari.

peejaye

05-17-2017, 01:53 PM

Jericho

05-17-2017, 06:46 PM

Stavros

05-17-2017, 10:37 PM

It would appear Diane (how do i get out of here?) Abbot isn't the only one having trouble with her figures.
Chancellor Philip Hammond had a bit of nightmare, himself.
He only messed up *his own* costings on HS2 by 20bn (Yeah, 20 Billion)
Wonder how much we'll hear about that in the media?
Maybe that's why Mrs May declined to endorse the long-term future of Philip Hammond as Chancellor of the Exchequer...and then she claimed the EU referendum result had nothing to do with the fall in the value of sterling...!
Two more reasons to vote Green?

Stavros

05-17-2017, 10:45 PM

Dianne Abbott had completed 6 previous interviews "on the bounce" that morning. That was the seventh! For the BBC to make it their "lead story" on their flagship 6pm news programme is totally outrageous!

Come on, Peejaye, if she had managed six interviews before the meltdown how come she didn't know the figures off by heart? I heard she had been up until 2 in the morning before those interviews dealing with some demands from John McDonnell who had already pressured Comrade Jeremy to prevent her from appearing on the BBC's Question Time after Hammond's autumn statement. They can't stand each other, probably because John has (Marxian) intellectual rigour where Dianne has intellectual rigor mortis. She sounds increasingly like someone who wishes she had a villa in Spain she could escape to, as in, right now, and forever.
I wonder what the people of Hackney think? Upset on the cards?

Jericho

05-18-2017, 12:56 AM

Maybe that's why Mrs May declined to endorse the long-term future of Philip Hammond as Chancellor of the Exchequer.

That and his tax arrangements!

Two more reasons to vote Green?

Yes, but no!

peejaye

05-18-2017, 09:51 AM

It would appear Diane (how do i get out of here?) Abbot isn't the only one having trouble with her figures.

Chancellor Philip Hammond had a bit of nightmare, himself.
He only messed up *his own* costings on HS2 by 20bn (Yeah, 20 Billion)
Wonder how much we'll hear about that in the media?
Sssssssssssssssssssh Jericho....you're not supposed to see things like that! Maybe ch.4 let it slip!
I've just seen a "car-crash" interview with that charming & popular character "Jeremy Hunt" talking about the Conservative manifesto!
I bet you won't see that again headlining the popular news bulletins! I'm still non the wiser??

Stavros

05-18-2017, 11:38 AM

The Liberal Democrats published their election manifesto yesterday (Weds 17th 2017). The party hopes to win back seats in Scotland and the South West of England which it lost in 2015 and pick up the odd seat here and there, and presents itself as the only party which is opposed to Brexit and promises a second referendum which, in theory, ought to recommend it to those voters who think it is not too late to reverse the Brexit. It is also pitching policies aimed at young people who are voting for the first time who may not have any party loyalty. The policies include:
-Repealing the Investigative Powers Act, or Snooper's Charter giving the state the right to monitor web browsing and inspect emails.
-Replacing single member, simple plurality voting with proportional representation.
-Reducing the voting age to 16.
-Creating an elected upper chamber in Parliament (presumably replacing the House of Lords).
-Creating a regulated cannabis market and raising £1 billion a year in a 'Pot Tax' (my invention!). That's a lot of spliffs, mate.
-Housing benefit restored for 18-21 year olds.

There are a range of environmental measures designed to phase out diesel powered cars by 2025, reduce emissions in towns, and generate 60% of domestic energy from renewable sources by 2060.

A Telegraph presentation is here-
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/0/liberal-democrat-manifesto-general-election-2017-key-points/

Jericho

05-18-2017, 05:39 PM

-Creating a regulated cannabis market and raising £1 billion a year in a 'Pot Tax'

As much as I like that idea, I could never smoke enough weed to persuade myself to vote for Satans lapdogs!

Stavros

05-18-2017, 10:58 PM

Now the Conservative Party has launched its election manifesto, Forward Together.
Among the proposals, there will be an increase in schools funding, spending on the NHS will continue to increase through the life of the next Parliament, but money will be clawed back from pensioners by means-testing the annual winter fuel allowance so that better off pensioners will no get it. The triple-lock pension guarantee has lost a chink and is now a two-lock proposal, while the policy on social care is proving controversial as people with more than £100,000 in assets would have to pay for their own care out of the value of their homes rather than relying on the council to cover the cost of visits by care workers (see Guardian links).

-The current target figure of 1 million new homes by 2020 has expanded to 1.5 million by 2022.
-The honours system will be reviewed so that donors to the party do not get gongs in exchange for banknotes.
-The fixed-term Parliament act will be repealed so that Prime Ministers can call general elections whenever they like.
-There will be no increase in VAT -this is also Labour policy; Mrs Thatcher made the same commitment in 1979 and doubled VAT within a month of being elected.
-Corporation tax should be reduced to 17% by 2020 and reform the business rates system,
-The Tories are committed to reducing immigration to below 100,000 a year, with tougher rules on student visas.
-On Brexit, 'no deal is better than a bad deal':
The deal May seeks would take the UK out of the single market and out of the customs union but maintain “a deep and special relationship” through a comprehensive free trade and customs agreement. It would introduce controls on EU immigration while securing the rights of EU nationals (https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/feb/18/eu-citizens-right-to-stay-britain-chaos) in UK and Britons in EU. And it would maintain a common travel area with a “frictionless” border with Ireland (https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/apr/23/northern-ireland-brexit-border-old-wounds-troubles).
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/may/18/tory-general-election-manifesto-key-points-analysis
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/may/18/theresa-may-launches-conservative-manifesto-for-community-and-country

Theresa May, it is claimed, has put clear blue water between her vision for Britain and the one proposed by Mrs Thatcher in 1979. Rather than extol the virtues of limited government and free markets, Mrs May, speaking at the launch in Halifax said
“We do not believe in untrammelled free markets. We reject the cult of selfish individualism. We abhor social division, injustice, unfairness and inequality. We see rigid dogma and ideology not just as needless but as dangerous.”

Whether or not her party is fully behind this I doubt, as the 'Hard Brexiteers' in reality would not be bothered if there was no deal at the end of the EU negotiations because they see a 'scorched earth' position as one that would benefit from the dissolution of the EU. However, if May does win the election with a large majority, she will be in a strong position to determine policy, but the ability of the Tory party to tear itself apart on Europe is a constant threat, so the negotiations could produce an outcome they don't like.

So here we are: the two main parties are both Brexit parties, both committed to spending more on health and education, building more houses, but we are no closer to knowing what the Brexit negotiations that begin next month will produce and therefore cannot know what the UK's relationship to the EU and its Single Market will be, yet so much is going to be determined by the new relationship and its economic impact, that policies for the 2017-2022 Parliament may be derailed even as they take effect.

As for the differences between the two main parties, what struck me, a few days after hearing Jeremy Corbyn present a manifesto For the Many not the Few,
was to hear Mrs May climax her speech by presenting her government as one that will work
Not for the privileged few but for everyone...

The choice is yours...

Jericho

05-19-2017, 11:40 AM

As for the differences between the two main parties, what struck me, a few days after hearing Jeremy Corbyn present a manifesto For the Many not the Few,
was to hear Mrs May climax her speech by presenting her government as one that will work
Not for the privileged few but for everyone...

Like they say, the devil is in the details...and it's nice of TM to leave a suicide note.

Jericho

05-19-2017, 11:45 AM

peejaye

05-19-2017, 12:58 PM

Something i have found interesting is the difference between Social media and Mainstream media.
I've always been fairly dismissive of it (facebook/twitter/etc) in the past, but, I think it's something the Tories seriously underestimated.
Spot-on with that! There is a huge anti-establishment following on social media, I only do Twitter, sites like @TheCanarySays have a huge following & were only mentioned last week on Channel 5's "The Wright Stuff" by a panel member, they expose what these public schoolboys & girls are really up to & very often with very concrete evidence which is more than mainstream media are doing right now with all this "fake news" around.

peejaye

05-19-2017, 01:18 PM

Stavros

05-19-2017, 01:46 PM

Something i have found interesting is the difference between Social media and Mainstream media.
I've always been fairly dismissive of it (facebook/twitter/etc) in the past, but, I think it's something the Tories seriously underestimated.

This is a weak area for me, as HA is the closest to social media I get to. A few years ago I was persuaded to create a Facebook page but had no idea what to do with it, so it has my name at the top and a blank page, I don't even know how to access it. It is part of the debate about Robert Mercer and the part-Russian owned Cambridge Analytica and whether or not targeting Facebook users with blatant or sly 'advertising' can swing undecided voters, though in the US case it may be whether or not Facebook data was retrieved/laundered illegally. I can't work out if social media is decisive in winning marginal seats, or whether or not elections are won and lost because of local factors, personality issues, or policies, or a combination of all three. I can see that if someone goes into politics, particularly if they are elected, social media is a good way of communicating with the people who voted for them, or are in their constituency, but it also seems to me to run risks, though those politicians who make infantile or offensive remarks in tweets or on their Facebook page have only themselves to blame.

Stavros

05-19-2017, 02:03 PM

The "BIG" difference Stavros forgot to mention between the two main parties Manifestos is The Tory Manifesto doesn't have any costings unlike the Labour Manifesto! Unbelievable & obscenely arrogant as The Tories, with a little help from their friends at The BBC & ITV have spent all week trying to pull the Labour one to pieces! As the man says..."The choice is yours".

I agree with you on this Peejaye, and on Question Time last night someone asked a question about the deficit, but the weak response seemed to me to suggest the current government doesn't see reducing the deficit as a priority, at the moment policy is all about spending. And Priti Patel did not give much of an answer to the question around the weekly contributions to the EU that were trumpted during the EU referendum campaign as money we could 'bring back from Brussels' and spend on the NHS. On the other hand, the costing of policies in election manifestos rarely matches up when reality sets in, rather like government pledges to reduce immigration to less than 100,000 a year, a pledge broken every year ever since it was made, and by the Home Secretary responsible for the policy who is now Queen Elizabeth's Prime Minister.

I was also either shocked that when challenged on Foreign Aid, none of the panellists, including the woman responsible for it -Priti Patel- could point out that just under half of Foreign Aid (I think it is around 40%) goes to projects that the UK Government co-ordinates with agencies of the UN such as the UNICEF, UNHCR, UNESCO and the WHO.
In particular Foreign Aid helps the WHO with vaccination programmes that target diseases that afflict the poor in countries which are economically undeveloped and have a limited if any health care system. International co-operation on health has been one of the least discussed, but most successful examples of international co-operation since the co-ordination of disease control in the 19th century. It is a pity, bordering on a disgrace, that people opposed to Foreign Aid prefer to expose the idiocy of funding mythical tap-dancing classes for Ugandan lesbians, rather than the very real and effective projects that benefit from Foreign Aid and enhance the reputation of the UK at the same time. Malaria, River Blindness, Polio and TB are serious diseases that we can deal with, Priti Patel should have made a stand on this and it was a poor performance from her throughout the programme.

Jericho

05-19-2017, 03:34 PM

Also nice of them to promise to repeal section 40.
Can't think who that would help!

Theresa May (http://www.holdthefrontpage.co.uk/tag/theresa-may/) has vowed to repeal controversial plans to make newspapers pay both sides’ costs in libel actions if the Tories win the General Election. The Conservative Party’s manifesto published today says it will repeal the infamous Section 40 of the Crime and Courts Act, originally designed to force publishers to sign-up to a ‘recognised’ system of press regulation.
The legislation would have seen media organisations having to pay the legal costs of both sides in libel and privacy cases, regardless of whether they win, unless they signed up to an approved press regulator under the government’s Royal Charter (http://www.holdthefrontpage.co.uk/tag/royal-charter/).
At present, the Max Mosley-funded body Impress (http://www.holdthefrontpage.co.uk/tag/impress/) is the only such organisation to have gained approved regulator status. The Independent (http://www.holdthefrontpage.co.uk/tag/the-independent/) Press Standards Organisation, which most national and regional publishers are signed up to, has refused to seek approved status on the grounds that it would amount to state regulation of the press.
Culture secretary Karen Bradley had already announced a consultation into whether to go ahead with the implementation of Section 40, and with polls showing the Tories on course for a comfortable victory the controversial clause now appears dead in the water.
In today’s manifesto the Tories also pledge to scrap part two of the Leveson Inquiry (http://www.holdthefrontpage.co.uk/tag/leveson-inquiry/), which would have looked into the corporate governance issues which gave rise to the phone hacking scandal.
The manifesto states: “At a time when the internet is changing the way people obtain their news, we need to take steps to protect the reliability and objectivity of information that is essential to our democracy and a free and independent press.
“We will ensure content creators are appropriately rewarded for the content they make available online. We will be consistent in our approach to regulation of online and offline media.
“Given the comprehensive nature of the first stage of the Leveson Inquiry and given the lengthy investigations by the police and Crown Prosecution Service into alleged wrongdoing, we will not proceed with the second stage of the Leveson Inquiry into the culture, practices and ethics of the press.
“We will repeal Section 40 of the Crime and Courts Act 2014, which, if enacted, would force media organisations to become members of a flawed regulatory system or risk having to pay the legal costs of both sides in libel and privacy cases, even if they win.”
The move was warmly welcomed by the Society of Editors (http://www.holdthefrontpage.co.uk/tag/society-of-editors/) which has spearheaded the campaign against Section 40.
A spokesman said: “The role of a free press that is vociferous and investigative in holding power to account is something even its fiercest critics claim is vital in a democratic society and yet too many politicians have been steadfast in lending support to a piece of legislation which, if proposed in any other country, would have our democratic instincts up in arms.
“While the Society does not support any one political point of view, it is regrettable to see that other parties are fighting the election on manifestos which fail to deliver commitments to safeguarding freedom of expression.
“As many editors made clear publicly through their papers during the consultation process, Section 40 costs orders would have a seriously chilling effect on their work and, to put it simply, they would be less inclined to pursue investigations in the public interest when the risk of crippling legal costs would be increased.
“There has been an arduous 300-year battle to achieve press freedom and freedom of expression in the UK and we welcome the Conservative party’s recognition that Section 40 would be a giant step backwards.
“In a year in which the threat of such illogical legislation has seen the UK fall once again in the World Press Freedom Index, the repeal of Section 40 would ensure that other countries continue to look to the UK as a nation that upholds and protects the values it seeks to promote abroad.”
However campaign group Hacked Off (http://www.holdthefrontpage.co.uk/tag/hacked-off/) denounced the move as “a wholesale betrayal both of victims of press abuse and ordinary members of the public.”
A spokesman said: “If this pledge is carried through, there will be no effective, independent regulation of the press in this country and no access to affordable justice for victims of press abuse. We wish to make it clear that those who have suffered at the hands of powerful and unaccountable newspapers will not tolerate this betrayal.
“It appears that the Prime Minister has stitched up a calculated deal to trade the interests of the public for favourable election coverage in powerful newspapers.
“We will fight throughout the next Parliament to ensure that the voices of ordinary people are heard above the megaphones of self-interested newspaper editors and proprietors. We will fight to ensure that the careful regulatory framework proposed by Leveson and agreed by Parliament is not systematically dismantled by a government subservient to newspaper editors.”

http://www.holdthefrontpage.co.uk/2017/news/tories-vow-to-repeal-section-40-in-election-manifesto/

holzz

05-19-2017, 03:35 PM

tories hate the poor, but want caring support and free school meals. and higher pensions. lol.

Jericho

05-20-2017, 08:58 PM

I can't work out if social media is decisive in winning marginal seats, or whether or not elections are won and lost because of local factors, personality issues, or policies, or a combination of all three.

Like i say, it's interesting to watch. Twitter especially.
People have had enough of mainstream media, and they're reporting their own news.

broncofan

05-20-2017, 09:50 PM

Stavros

05-21-2017, 10:04 AM

Like i say, it's interesting to watch. Twitter especially.
People have had enough of mainstream media, and they're reporting their own news.

What is interesting about this point, is that if we accept the media in general is biased against Corbyn in particular, and I think they are, and if a lot of young people -say, under the age of 30- use different sources for their news, will this affect the outcome of the election? According to the Independent, younger voters could be the key to Labour holding on to marginal seats and denying May a huge majority in the Commons. It is too late now for any more to register, so now the issue is, will they turn out to vote?
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/young-voters-tory-marginals-general-election-2017-register-to-vote-a7744296.html

peejaye

05-21-2017, 10:59 AM

Twitter is definitely interesting to follow, but the move away from what's called mainstream media is better for speed than accuracy.

Twitter is great for group think, for confirmation bias, and sources that are unaccountable and cynical in their methods. It is often attractive to people who are disillusioned and want an alternative source to tell them something counter-intuitive or that makes them feel better. Sometimes there's a useful take, or a breaking story, but often times it's cranks who focus in on a very small segment of facts and block out everything else. As a result, it has been a boon for promoters of conspiracy theories. 140 characters per tweet is too short for a caveat and therefore too short for a balanced or thoughtful view but great for zingers.

On the other hand, it can be useful if you follow people who are accountable for their views (they work for a company that has an editorial board and are subject to defamation laws and dismissal if they spout bullshit).
I really don't understand this post? You're clearly are not a follower of Twitter? It's a site for people to express their own views! That's what we are allowed to do in this country! 140 characters per tweet is irrelevant because a lot of tweets have a link to click on to the bigger story. As for disillusioned cranks; you have to ask yourself what they are disillusioned with? You sound like a very influential part of "The Establishment"?

Jericho

05-21-2017, 12:39 PM

What is interesting about this point, is that if we accept the media in general is biased against Corbyn in particular, and I think they are, and if a lot of young people -say, under the age of 30- use different sources for their news, will this affect the outcome of the election? According to the Independent, younger voters could be the key to Labour holding on to marginal seats and denying May a huge majority in the Commons. It is too late now for any more to register, so now the issue is, will they turn out to vote?
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/young-voters-tory-marginals-general-election-2017-register-to-vote-a7744296.html

The mainstream media bias against Corbyn (in particular) and the Labour Party, may have worked in their favour a little. Irking our British sense of fair play (If such a thing exists)?
On Twitter, there's almost a 'cult' of Jeremy Corbyn. Sorta, fuck you then, don't report it. We'll do it..."We Are His Media".
And you've got to give Labour props. They've used it to *really* go after the young voter.

Tho, like you say, can they be arsed to go and vote.
I dunno.

1010003

Stavros

05-21-2017, 01:42 PM

The mainstream media bias against Corbyn (in particular) and the Labour Party, may have worked in their favour a little. Irking our British sense of fair play (If such a thing exists)?
On Twitter, there's almost a 'cult' of Jeremy Corbyn. Sorta, fuck you then, don't report it. We'll do it..."We Are His Media".
And you've got to give Labour props. They've used it to *really* go after the young voter.

Tho, like you say, can they be arsed to go and vote.
I dunno.

I had a debate with Prospero some years ago about the effectiveness of negative media campaigns on leading politicians, mostly the hysterical banner headlines in the Mail, Sun, Express and Mirror, and also the bias of the Telegraph, Times and Guardian, it was a primary feature of the attacks on Labour when Neil Kinnock was leader.

If over a period of more than a year there is a drip-drip of nasty headlines, in Corbyn's case add the words IRA, anti-Semitism, immigration and a negative tone is infiltrated into reports on Corbyn and Labour and it creates suspicion, if only because a lot of people don't instantly think beyond the headline. Where in the past The Times had journalists who reported the news and then investigated the deeper background to it, investigative journalism has been a casualty of the Murdoch machine which either creates news rather than reporting it, or relies on the government, the police, the military, etc for news without bothering to check to see if it is true. The vilification by The Sun of Winston Silcott was one example, Hillsborough a stunning follow up.

Unfortunately for him, Corbyn is not a smooth performer in the media and has trouble explaining his invitation to Gerry Adams to speak in the Commons (even though the Government had its own contacts with Sinn Fein at the time), or struggling to separate Israel from Zionism and Palestinian rights, so he doesn't help his own cause, but those are also two issues on which there is little to be gained in the UK, too many people recall the worst aspects of the armed struggle for a United Ireland, though it may only be people of my age who remember Palestinians hi-jacking aeroplanes and murdering Israeli athletes. Sometimes people get a bad press because they deserve to, though Labour is hardly a special case compared to the other parties.

It would also help if Labour's front bench representatives spoke with one voice rather than Emily Thornberry claiming Labour is still reviewing the renewal of Trident when the shadow Defence Secretary slaps her down by saying it is not and anyway its not her job to comment on it -etc etc. It looks bad, and one can compare that to Phillip Hammond's budget policy to increase National Insurance contributions by the self-employed, which he had to reverse a week later, even though Theresa May sat in the same Cabinet office when Hammond told them what was in the budget. And even in recent weeks when there is speculation about his future as Chancellor, it doesn't generate 'Tories in crisis' headlines. It may that the power of the 'mainstream media' in the UK is not as strong as once it was, but I can't say for sure.

Part of the problem is also the simple fact that a few obscure details aside, on Brexit it is a choice between Blue Labour and the Red Tories. Neither of them have staked out a position that is anything other than a fairy tale from where I am sitting. Just today Jay Rayner has an extensive article on the food industry in the UK, something he knows a lot about, with the simple fact that seasonal migrant labour is crucial to our food production but neither party has a coherent policy on it -as Tim Lang, Professor of Food Policy at the City University put it
Basically, if on March 31, 2019, migrant labour is not sorted the food system is fucked.” And then he says, “I hope those who voted Brexit and who still want to eat British are prepared to go to Lincolnshire in winter to pick vegetables.” Or as Wright [Ian Wright of the Food and Drink Federation] puts it, “Food is at the heart of national security. If you can’t feed a country you haven’t got a country.”
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/may/21/brexit-coming-food-crisis-seasonal-migrant-labour-eu

broncofan

05-21-2017, 10:14 PM

I really don't understand this post? You're clearly are not a follower of Twitter? It's a site for people to express their own views! That's what we are allowed to do in this country! 140 characters per tweet is irrelevant because a lot of tweets have a link to click on to the bigger story. As for disillusioned cranks; you have to ask yourself what they are disillusioned with? You sound like a very influential part of "The Establishment"?
You have a right to express a view, but when you do so, is it news? I think twitter is a great news aggregator and I use it to follow people who publish useful articles. But here (in the U.S.) you will have 200,000 people following some guy who calls himself the maestro or something and makes all sorts of outlandish claims...and the claims never come true and the goalposts keep shifting.

I can't help but notice similarities between what you guys are saying and what a lot of Trump supporters say. So one of the things the media should be reporting is Corbyn's crowds? I guess I'm just not as convinced that Corbyn has been so unfairly treated and when I've encountered pockets of Corbyn supporters on twitter they do seem a bit cultish, but not in a good way.

I can't help it if that's what I think....I'm also just expressing a viewpoint:).

broncofan

05-21-2017, 10:32 PM

You sound like a very influential part of "The Establishment"?
No, I just have been all over that site and find that the information that turns out to be correct is often from a major outlet, or is posted in a niche blog by someone who is knowledgeable about some matter. I didn't mean to post anything too contrary, just that it's easy to use social media to spin.

Maybe your conclusion is that the media is unfair to Corbyn. When we lost, we found that too, but if things don't go well I'm not sure that can be your only take away. There has to something about the message, the messenger, the tactics...anyhow, that's what I've been told when my candidate loses. Often we will say, "well no matter how many flaws he/she has, she's still superior to the right wing jerk." But then you will find when the candidate and the message are perfectly tuned, you will have enough support to win.

Jericho

05-22-2017, 12:38 PM

So one of the things the media should be reporting is Corbyn's crowds? I guess I'm just not as convinced that Corbyn has been so unfairly treated and when I've encountered pockets of Corbyn supporters on twitter they do seem a bit cultish, but not in a good way.

When newspapers/headlines are saying, "Mrs May today met crowds in Scotland, and meanwhile, Jeremy Corbyn met a few labour supporters in Clacton (or wherever)", and the truth is, May met a few party faithful in a barn (that was booked as a child's party), and the 'few' labour supports were a packed out/streets closed, shopping precinct, then damn right the newspapers should be 'reporting' on those crowds.

As Stavros mentioned above, this isn't the first time (I personally believe Neil Kinnock was the best prime minister this country never had....but Welsh and Ginger, they might as well have painted a bullseye on his back)!

This time (maybe for the 1st time), MSM can't get way with that shit, people are calling them out on it.

Re the Corbynistas, I'm not one, but I don't blame them/ They're up against it, they've got an uphill struggle. I do know they've certainly opened up my eyes to Corbyn. (unlike some, in the past, my reasons for disliking him were personal rather than idealogical).
And it rankles to have my opinions changed, but I see a man I can follow, a leader.

But then you will find when the candidate and the message are perfectly tuned, you will have enough support to win.

But what if you've no outlet for that message, or those outlets are trying to fuck you, even when they do give you a voice?

Granted, there are a few biased the other way, the Canary for instance, but i really don't think you could class them as mainstream media.
Interesting little piece from the canary
(https://www.thecanary.co/2017/05/22/sky-news-host-attempts-ambush-jeremy-corbyn-falls-flat-arse-video/)

peejaye

05-22-2017, 12:48 PM

I didn't know you were from the US Bronco?
The media here are bias during the Election, it's very simple. The media is a huge part of "The Establishment" here and Corbyn is anti-Establishment, that's the "Top & bottom" of it. By "The Establishment" I mean The Royal Family, The House of Lords, The Political system, Public schools like Eton(in Royal Windsor) the "Ox-bridge" (Oxford/Cambridge) University elite, & of course the great British Broadcasting Company, known as the BBC, awash with people, many on one day per week contracts earning telephone number salaries! I could go on but will spare you, basically a system for the upper classes born into money, around 5% of the entire UK population but speaking out for all of us!

Stavros

05-22-2017, 02:31 PM

This morning Theresa May 'clarified' the party position on social care, having suffered over the weekend as some people clearly didn't understand it (Jeremy Corbyn was one of them) and others then realised that is was viewed as a hostile act against the very age group assumed to be safe Tory voters, ie anyone over 60 with a house worth more than £100,000. There was no cap, now there is a cap, there was a 'dementia tax' now there isn't.

It is probably too complex to lay out in full (see the first link below), but the point is that both the main parties have been exposed as inept in presenting their policies to the public. Blue Labour with fabulous policies at great expense, the Red Tories with policies without costs at all, unless you believe Boris Johnson who, when asked about the promise his campaign made in the EU Referendum, that leaving the EU would give the UK an extra £350 miilion a week to spend on the NHS, claimed this is in the manifesto, though only he can see it. Labour's defence spokesperson says they will renew Trident, the shadow Foreign Secretary says it is under review. Work and Pensions Secretary Damian Green stated categorically on Sunday there will be no review of the social care policy, on Monday morning, Theresa May said there will be...

Tweedledum and Tweedledee
Agreed to have a battle;
For Tweedledum said Tweedledee
Had spoiled his nice new rattle.

http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/theresa-may-has-blundered-into-scaring-pensioners-over-social-care-a7746516.html

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/boris-johnson-falsely-claims-350m-nhs-brexit-pledge-conservative-manifesto-a7747376.html

Jericho

05-22-2017, 02:45 PM

But Mrs May rejected claims she was making any sort of U-turn, telling reporters that “nothing has changed”.

You can add that one to 'strong and stable' and 'strengthen my hand'!

Jericho

05-22-2017, 02:49 PM

In fairness, it has to be said, haven't seen a lot of tory bias today.
A step too far right?

Stavros

05-22-2017, 03:52 PM

In fairness, it has to be said, haven't seen a lot of tory bias today.
A step too far right?

Exactly, they made a mess of their social care proposals and there is nowhere to hide from it. One hopes that Andrew Neil will, in a manner of speaking, stick it to Mrs May at 7pm on BBC1 tonight. He doesn't usually let politicians get away with lame excuses, or makes them look silly when they do.

In the meantime the Green Party has issued its manifesto with its 'Green Guarantee' that includes a universal basic income, a four-day working week (max 35 hours), tax reform to squeeze more from the rich (a 'Robin Hood' tax). They will abolish tuition fees, and return the railways to public ownership, invest in local rail networks at the expense of HS2, and cancel all airport expansion. They will cancel the Trident missile programme, develop an ethical foreign policy based on conflict resolution rather than war, and halt the sale of arms to 'oppressive regimes'. They will pass an Environmental Protection Act, engage in public works programmes for warmer homes and flood control, and begin phasing out fossil fuels with the wider growth of alternative and renewable energy sources.
This and much more here-
https://www.greenparty.org.uk/
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/may/22/green-party-plan-caring-britain-manifesto-launch

Jericho

05-22-2017, 06:31 PM

I was watching the leader of the Welsh Greens on TV, Sunday morning. He was very matter of fact, "If we retain our deposits, it's a victory", sort of thing. I remain unconverted, but I liked him, spoke a lot of sense.

peejaye

05-22-2017, 07:40 PM

According to Yahoo; this is the latest polling figures in Wales;

LAB 44%+9
CON 34%-7
PC 9%-2
LD 6%-1
UKIP 5%+1

Up the Welsh!

Jericho

05-22-2017, 09:00 PM

According to Yahoo; this is the latest polling figures in Wales;

LAB 44%+9
CON 34%-7
PC 9%-2
LD 6%-1
UKIP 5%+1

Up the Welsh!

I'll give it as much credence as any other poll (betting odds are the ones to watch), but it is nice to know some of the stroppy druids around here are getting their act together!

broncofan

05-23-2017, 11:38 PM

But what if you've no outlet for that message, or those outlets are trying to fuck you, even when they do give you a voice?

Granted, there are a few biased the other way, the Canary for instance, but i really don't think you could class them as mainstream media.
Interesting little piece from the canary
(https://www.thecanary.co/2017/05/22/sky-news-host-attempts-ambush-jeremy-corbyn-falls-flat-arse-video/)
Fair enough. The sentence you quoted is a fiction people tell you to get you to focus on the things you have most control over. As you say it's by no means a certainty that media bias cannot alter an election outcome.

But it's such a complicated issue because often the media are playing off perceptions people already have. So they start with the premise that their readers view Corbyn one way and then do anything to perpetuate the narrative because it already has traction and people like stories. In our elections our unfair narratives have targeted Al Gore, the eye-rolling intellectual who took credit for things he didn't do, John Kerry, the stiff patrician who vainly attempted to appeal to real Americans by talking about how much he loves sashimi. And you have Corbyn, the mealy-mouthed radical who can't give a straight statement, when in fact he's being asked questions that have complicated and multifaceted answers. So I've seen this kind of attack...it has nothing to do with the issues.

Maybe the answer is to have your own outlets, but you risk preaching to the choir, and when you try to convert the centrists they see you as being just as partisan as the other guys. And I think it's a trap if you find yourself pitted against people who you have small political differences with because you can't distinguish the people who criticize someone in good faith and those who are engaged in a smear campaign. Truthfully if you've concluded 70% of the public are acting in bad faith, you can't win anyway.

broncofan

05-24-2017, 01:18 AM

And I think it's a trap if you find yourself pitted against people who you have small political differences with because you can't distinguish the people who criticize someone in good faith and those who are engaged in a smear campaign. Truthfully if you've concluded 70% of the public are acting in bad faith, you can't win anyway.
This is not directed at you, just a general statement.

blackchubby38

05-24-2017, 01:50 AM

I wonder what the impact of the terrorist attack in Manchester will have on the UK election. The last thing the Labor Party wants to do is appear that its weak on radical Islam.

peejaye

05-24-2017, 09:36 AM

I wonder what the impact of the terrorist attack in Manchester will have on the UK election. The last thing the Labor Party wants to do is appear that its weak on radical Islam.
That's a new one? What's that all about? Even the BBC haven't come out with that one yet? Corbyn as denounced this attack as deplorable on social media. He probably wasn't ask to appear on TV to denounce it?

Stavros

05-24-2017, 11:42 AM

I wonder what the impact of the terrorist attack in Manchester will have on the UK election. The last thing the Labor Party wants to do is appear that its weak on radical Islam.

What is 'radical Islam'? I could interpret the phrase to refer to Muslims who wish to go the roots of Islam and revive the original purpose of their faith, which is the definition of the word Radical, and it is possible to do that without killing anyone or anything. Some may not be aware of it, but not all Salafi advocate violence; that many do is but an example of the lack of consensus within Islam in which those who kill in the name of their religion are in a minority, albeit one that can inflict terrible damage.

As for Labour, the Conservatives today have said they see no reason to expand the police, a service they have bee cutting these past years: this is Amber Rudd, Home Secretary this morning:

Amid questions about whether there were enough armed officers to deal with incidents outside London, Rudd said she believed the police and security services had the right legislation and resources to tackle the threat facing the UK.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/may/24/manchester-bomber-unlikely-acting-alone-rudd-salman-ramadan-abedi

In fact it is Labour who have proposed increasing the police service with 10,000 more officers over the life of the next Parliament, even if you set aside queries about their costing of this policy. As for Corbyn, he has stated-
“I am horrified by the horrendous events in Manchester last night. My thoughts are with families and friends of those who have died and been injured."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/05/23/jeremy-corbyn-pays-tribute-victims-manchester-terror-attack/

If anyone is facing criticism, it is the intelligence services in the USA who leaked the identity of the murderer at a time when the police and security services here had decided to keep it secret -Amber Rudd in language seen as an unusually robust and public rebuke of the Americans said

“The British police have been very clear that they want to control the flow of information in order to protect operational integrity, the element of surprise. So it is irritating if it gets released from other sources and I have been very clear with our friends that should not happen again.” [flagged at 10.15am]
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/live/2017/may/24/manchester-arena-bombing-terror-attack-victims-threat-critical-ariana-grande-concert-live-news

peejaye

05-24-2017, 12:41 PM

Stavros

05-24-2017, 02:34 PM

They(The Tories)have also cut Border Security too although I'm not sure what the figures are?
I don't get involved in the "media furore" when something like this happens, just watch the lunchtime and early evening bulletins for an update but I haven't I seen any reports about Arena Security in Manchester & why no one as asked the question how a bomb was allowed in to a venue holding 18,000 people, many of them so young? Surely "Head of Security" should be at least interviewed with such loss of life, or have I missed something? Is something being kept from us?

Strictly speaking, as the FT link argues, the attack took place just outside the Arena itself, while the other link focuses on the lack of security inside it. However, I think most security procedures in venues focus on preventing someone entering it, I am not sure they have factored in someone targeting people as they leave, but I suspect the bomber and his accomplices -I assume he was not acting alone- planned this after visiting the scene of their crime and calculating when and how to cause the most damage they could.

http://metro.co.uk/2017/05/23/people-say-they-raised-security-issues-at-manchester-arena-weeks-ago-6656337/

https://www.ft.com/content/20f2c594-3fa6-11e7-82b6-896b95f30f58

blackchubby38

05-24-2017, 03:52 PM

What is 'radical Islam'? I could interpret the phrase to refer to Muslims who wish to go the roots of Islam and revive the original purpose of their faith, which is the definition of the word Radical, and it is possible to do that without killing anyone or anything. Some may not be aware of it, but not all Salafi advocate violence; that many do is but an example of the lack of consensus within Islam in which those who kill in the name of their religion are in a minority, albeit one that can inflict terrible damage.

As for Labour, the Conservatives today have said they see no reason to expand the police, a service they have bee cutting these past years: this is Amber Rudd, Home Secretary this morning:

Amid questions about whether there were enough armed officers to deal with incidents outside London, Rudd said she believed the police and security services had the right legislation and resources to tackle the threat facing the UK.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/may/24/manchester-bomber-unlikely-acting-alone-rudd-salman-ramadan-abedi

In fact it is Labour who have proposed increasing the police service with 10,000 more officers over the life of the next Parliament, even if you set aside queries about their costing of this policy. As for Corbyn, he has stated-
“I am horrified by the horrendous events in Manchester last night. My thoughts are with families and friends of those who have died and been injured."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/05/23/jeremy-corbyn-pays-tribute-victims-manchester-terror-attack/

If anyone is facing criticism, it is the intelligence services in the USA who leaked the identity of the murderer at a time when the police and security services here had decided to keep it secret -Amber Rudd in language seen as an unusually robust and public rebuke of the Americans said

“The British police have been very clear that they want to control the flow of information in order to protect operational integrity, the element of surprise. So it is irritating if it gets released from other sources and I have been very clear with our friends that should not happen again.” [flagged at 10.15am]
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/live/2017/may/24/manchester-arena-bombing-terror-attack-victims-threat-critical-ariana-grande-concert-live-news

Its how I refer to Muslims who commit terrorist attacks in order to spread their twisted view of their religion. I have also used the term jihadists and savages.

trish

05-24-2017, 05:39 PM

But why would one choose a usage of a term(in this case the term 'radical', and only when one uses it to modify 'Islam') that is contrary to its meaning and its traditional usage, unless one intended to pervert the correct usage in order to amplify one's own prejudice and encourage the prejudices of others?

blackchubby38

05-24-2017, 06:19 PM

Jericho

05-24-2017, 08:47 PM

This is not directed at you, just a general statement.

s'cool, didn't think it was.

Jericho

05-24-2017, 09:02 PM

I wonder what the impact of the terrorist attack in Manchester will have on the UK election.

Well, according to the Daily Scum, Jeremy Corbyn's directly responsible for the bombing...because he cosied up to the iRA (at least, in their first edition (they've made bigger fuck-ups since)). Well done, The Sun. Looks like you won't be selling any copies in Manchester, either!

Meanwhile, the major parties have agreed to halt electioneering, for the time being.
(Except the conservatives, who did another manifesto u-turn this morning).

Oh, and because of budget cuts, the police can't cope...So troops have been deployed!

broncofan

05-24-2017, 09:41 PM

The particular phrase radical Islam is one that some over here claim has a talismanic quality where simply uttering the phrase can prevent violence. It is a shame that one can be seen as weak on terrorism simply by not using the right phrase as any condemnation must be strong enough to condemn the acts and the motivating ideology without tarnishing completely innocent people. It's not an easy task and I'm not sure whether I've used radical Islam or Jihadist or religious extremist, but I guess the important thing is that we're mindful of both the aim of condemning the act and care not to attack those who have done nothing wrong. I can see how the phrase could be either innocent or used to imply that extremism is an inherent feature of Islam so I will also be careful about that.

I think you guys are right that anyone who attempts to exploit this tragedy for political attacks should lose voters. I hope that's the case. That's the kind of thing that should have a political price.

Stavros

05-25-2017, 01:31 AM

Its how I refer to Muslims who commit terrorist attacks in order to spread their twisted view of their religion. I have also used the term jihadists and savages.

I wasn't criticising you personally, so I hope that is clear. I have become tired of the lexicon of blame and explanation that is being raided to find appropriate words, even when I have been using them myself. For example, in its pure form, Jihad is the struggle against the temptation to sin, and while one of its meanings may also be to struggle with non-believers or those attacking Islam, it may not even mean physically fighting, though sometimes it might (religious texts tend to have such ambiguities), and this is where the phrase 'Holy War' came from. And it was also used as a political weapon, for example when the Ottoman Empire sided with the German Empire in the First World War and attempted to rouse Muslims in India against Britain by declaring 'Holy War', to no real effect.

Radical is useful for some, but I think is too loosely used. For example, was the Civil Rights movement more radical than the Black Panther Party, or less? I would argue that it was more radical, because I see the Black Panthers as reactionary and anti-American, and however one explains it, it reduces the status of that party to a fringe movement, one too isolated from the communities it sought to represent to be effective. The Civil Rights movement was genuinely radical, it went to the root of the Constitution and argued that the rights enshrined there could not be denied to Americans because of the colour of their skin. And it was a radicalism that also rejected the violence endemic in, but not essential to being alive in the USA. Elijah Mohammed's Lost-Found Nation of Islam, and the Nation of Islam Louis Farrakhan created when the former was dissolved were also too obscure to be radical, let alone popular. Indeed, Farrakhan's movement is middle class and conservative, and is part-funded by the Federal Government.

I think we can agree that when you peel away the ideology, most of these young men are ex-jailbirds who have been in and out of gangs, doing drugs and alcohol and generally becoming petty criminals. They are murderers, there is no other word for it, and it doesn't add meaning to pin so many extra words to emphasize how bad they are -evil, wicked, savage, mindless, and so on. To the extent that these murders are planned in advance, they are also psychopaths. Unfortunately, these attacks are going to happen, because there is enough resentment to cause them, one only hopes they will fail most of the time. And the words will continue to flow, but most people will not share my irritation with them when I think they are not the rights ones.

fred41

05-25-2017, 01:45 AM

fred41

05-25-2017, 01:49 AM

I think we can agree that when you peel away the ideology, most of these young men are ex-jailbirds who have been in and out of gangs, doing drugs and alcohol and generally becoming petty criminals. They are murderers, there is no other word for it, and it doesn't add meaning to pin so many extra words to emphasize how bad they are -evil, wicked, savage, mindless, and so on. To the extent that these murders are planned in advance, they are also psychopaths. Unfortunately, these attacks are going to happen, because there is enough resentment to cause them, one only hopes they will fail most of the time. And the words will continue to flow, but most people will not share my irritation with them when I think they are not the rights ones.
but of course...however burning anger (leaving out the craziness for a moment) 'sometimes' comes to naught unless it is channeled and abetted.

broncofan

05-25-2017, 03:14 AM

Nothing is more 'radical' then killing massive amounts of people,
http://www.dictionary.com/browse/radicalize

and I agree that black chubby didn't mean anything by it.
http://www.dictionary.com/browse/radical?s=t
I know a lot has been exhausted on this topic, but when you look at M&W's definition of radical, I think one issue is the difference between definitions one and two. I believe Stavros is using the first listed definition (more of a technical definition), which raises the question of what is a root or origin of a belief system. Maybe the term becomes a little looser when definitions one and two are used interchangeably, because they don't always lead to the same conclusion. A reactionary can be radical (def. 2) etc.

Stavros

05-25-2017, 10:16 AM

I suppose the term 'radicalized Muslim' would be apt...or radicalized version of Islam. Nothing is more 'radical' then killing massive amounts of people, so if the defense used in perpetrating the violent act is a form of religion that is commonly practiced and referred to as peaceful, then I guess the two descriptions I gave would suffice.
and I agree that black chubby didn't mean anything by it.
I guess we can just use the word murderer, or scum or terrorist...but we like our labels to differentiate them.
I'm fine with 'terrorist', but I suppose that does become a little confusing when ones own local politicians will go out of their way to grandize them at a parade...like they are at the NYC Puerto Rican Day Parade by giving special status to Oscar Lopez Rivera.

'Terrorist' is a problem word as it has been ever since someone said 'One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter'. To the British in the 1930s and 1940s, there were 'Jewish terrorists' who today are celebrated as 'freedom fighters' by those who inherited the state of Israel, they even hold their ceremony at the King David Hotel that was bombed in 1946 by the Irgun, killing 91 people, including 17 Jews. To the British government in the 1970s and 1980s, there were IRA 'terrorists' described by their comrades (and Sinn Fein) as 'Volunteers'. The USA refers to Hezbollah in Lebanon as a 'terrorist' organization even though it is a social movement with 12 seats in Parliament.

Or you could bring it all back home. In today's parlance, would Robert E. Lee be described as a terrorist?

Stavros

05-25-2017, 10:38 AM

http://www.dictionary.com/browse/radical?s=t
I know a lot has been exhausted on this topic, but when you look at M&W's definition of radical, I think one issue is the difference between definitions one and two. I believe Stavros is using the first listed definition (more of a technical definition), which raises the question of what is a root or origin of a belief system. Maybe the term becomes a little looser when definitions one and two are used interchangeably, because they don't always lead to the same conclusion. A reactionary can be radical (def. 2) etc.

The definitions show why it is a problem when they move away from the original 'technical' meaning as you put it, not least when you claim 'a reactionary can be radical' in which case both words lose their meaning. In fact the 'technical' meaning offers more in this context, because these so-called 'Islamic radicals' are convinced that they are restoring the original purpose and daily practice of Islam as it was in the 7th century, a prospect as daft as any Christian replacing their clothes for a white robe and being dunked in the River Jordan (the one in Palestine not the one in Utah, but hey...) to be baptized in the way it was done by 'John'. We cannot step back into the 7th century or the days of Jesus with any accuracy or authenticity any more than a Druid can wander around Stonehenge with some candles chanting some made-up gibberish and claim any link to that ancient world.

Consider the marginal becoming mainstream -this may be where the real issue assumes greater importance, because as long as a political group isolates itself from most of society because of its violent rhetoric or actual violence, because it appeals to only a narrowly defined segment of society, it can be tolerated in an open democracy but also monitored, much as MI5 always had -and has- informers in the IRA (and its successor groups), a wide assortment of neo-Nazi/fascist groups, the Marxist/Trotskyist left and some anarchist groups.

It is when the marginals come closer to the centre that we should be concerned, and in Europe the creeping influence of Saudi Arabia has offered to some Muslims an explanation for their confusion -not the natural cacophony of social and religious diversity that comes with living in a late modern state, but the simple argument -'they' are all wrong, including most Muslims. But the 'radical' ideas of Wahab that have been globalized by Saudi money were themselves the product of Wahab's ignorance. Denounced by his father, described as 'mad' by his brother, Wahab rejected everything that had happened in Islam since the 7th century, mostly because he didn't understand it. In its time the Saudi family used violence to grab land in the Arabian peninsula, and seized Mecca by force in 1925 destroying ancient monuments and shrines at the time. In fact this old adage, if you want something go out and get it, helps explain the growth of the Saudi state, but so too does the willingness of others to let them get away with it, most recently when the President of the US handed Saudi Arabia a free pass to slaughter as many people as it chooses to, in exchange for money. It is this correct to say that Islam 'in general' does not condone bomb attacks, let alone suicide as a means of expression, but does that mean 'all Muslims'? Evidently not, as Patrick Cockburn puts it in this article in today's Independent:

The real causes of “radicalisation” have long been known, but the government, the BBC and others seldom if ever refer to it because they do not want to offend the Saudis or be accused of anti-Islamic bias. It is much easier to say, piously but quite inaccurately, that Isis and al-Qaeda and their murderous foot soldiers “have nothing to do with Islam”. This has been the track record of US and UK governments since 9/11. They will look in any direction except Saudi Arabia when seeking the causes of terrorism. President Trump has been justly denounced and derided in the US for last Sunday accusing Iran and, in effect, the Shia community of responsibility for the wave of terrorism that has engulfed the region when it ultimately emanates from one small but immensely influential Sunni sect. One of the great cultural changes in the world over the last 50 years is the way in which Wahhabism, once an isolated splinter group, has become an increasingly dominant influence over mainstream Sunni Islam, thanks to Saudi financial support.
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/manchester-attack-salman-abedi-salafi-jihadism-wahhabism-isis-al-qaeda-islam-muslim-suicide-bombing-a7754301.html

Stavros

05-25-2017, 02:55 PM

Interesting though it is to hear views on the ideas in the recent posts above, can I suggest we move back to the General Election?

Most parties will resume the campaign tomorrow, Friday 26th 2017, the one exception being UKIP which unveiled its manifesto this morning while declaring that Theresa May must share the blame for the attack in Manchester. Among their policy proposals are a reduction of net migration to zero in five years using a 'one in, one out' policy; a ban on the flying of the EU flag on public buildings after Brexit, and making June 23rd a public holiday as 'Independence Day'. They propose to 'pump' £11 billion into health and social care funded by cuts in foreign aid, and the abolition of the House of Lords, to be replaced by an English Parliament with the electoral system subject to proportional representation.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/ukip-theresa-may-manchester-attack-paul-nuttall-suicide-bomber-salman-abedi-return-uk-jihadis-a7754996.html

It is hard to say right now if UKIP will benefit from the Manchester attacks, although one member of the public on the BBC's lunchtime news today argued 'something must be done' about Muslims in the UK, and once people are over their grief anger could play a role. However, the leader of UKIP, Paul Nuttall has been described as an 'idiot' by members of his own party -hardly a departure from the norm for this party of 'low grade' people as Farage described them- and net migration has already fallen in one year more than any since 2009 with substantial numbers of EU migrants returning home, and universities recording a decline in the number of students applying for a place in the UK declining by 32,000. If examined closely what proportion of the £11 billion will be spent on health, and what proportion on social care? It doesn't look good for UKIP right now, but the next two weeks will reveal if there is any new support for it, or whether or not we are finally seeing the end of this incoherent mess of a party.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/immigration-figures-down-policies-general-election-2017-a7754796.html

Stavros

05-26-2017, 05:08 PM

The former Labour Prime Minister Harold Wilson is famous for having said 'A week is a long time in politics', and never was that more evident than in the interval that has passed since Monday when Theresa May was desperately trying to present her reversal of policy on social care as anything but a reversal, followed by the horrific attack in Manchester that night, and today, Friday when the Conservatives cancelled their re-launch of their election campaign. A YouGov poll taken before the atrocity in Manchester showed the gap between Labour and the Tories narrowing to five points with the even more astonishing leadership poll-
the Prime Minister’s lead over Jeremy Corbyn in personal approval ratings has shrunk from an astonishing 52 per cent at the start of the election campaign to just 17 per cent
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/conservatives-election-campaign-relaunch-party-lead-polls-cut-labour-theresa-may-jeremy-corbyn-a7756976.html

Signs of panic in the Tory party, while Strong and Stable Theresa is away at the NATO/G7 summits have been evident all day as Defence Secretary Michael Fallon and Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson lay into Jeremy Corbyn for making a speech in which he stated what has been obvious for the last 16 years, namely that the 'war on terror' has not succeeded in making the UK safe from the very kind of attack that took place last Monday night.

It seems almost impossible, but with less than two weeks to go before the election, the Tories look like they have lost the plot, and a lot now rests on how Theresa May and her advisers organize their response, not least because Corbyn, the centre of attention will be interviewed by Andrew Neil at 7pm on the BBC. Yes, the figures do not suggest the Tories are going to lose, not yet, but the assumption that fuelled the election itself, that Labour is hopeless and the SNP past their best, that this would give Mrs May a huge majority to negotiate her version of Brexit -is proving to be less than stable. The final irony might be that the next Parliament may look like the last one, with the Tories barely able to scrape in with a 10-15 seats majority. Or it could be that the Tories have had their mid-campaign crisis, and Labour will have their in the last days of the campaign to set everything back to where it was 10 days ago. But like the man said, a week is a long time in politics. And don't underestimate Labour's ability to screw it up.

flabbybody

05-26-2017, 05:37 PM

On a side note, Defense Secretary Tillerson met up with Bojo today to discuss immigration. Good hair versus Bad hair
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/rex-tillerson-west-must-do-a-better-job-making-immigrants-feel-welcome/article/2624244

peejaye

05-26-2017, 05:43 PM

One thing for sure Stavros; Jeremy Corbyn is certainly "away from home" tonight compared to Mr's Mays "home game" the other night!
I know you will be aware but just for anyone who isn't; Neil was Editor of "The Sunday Times" for a number of years and still shares its Political views! He's also actually worked for The Conservative Party!

Stavros

05-26-2017, 10:13 PM

I watched the interview and although I generally like Andrew Neil for giving his guests a hard time, I thought it was clear that this interview was not going to be about Labour policy, but the Labour leader, and he decided to spend the first half of the session dealing with Northern Ireland.

This is because it is seen as a weakness and the truth is that while Corbyn was sincere in claiming he has always supported peace and condemned 'all bombing', it is also true that he offered comradely support to Provisional Sinn Fein because like others on the left of the party, he saw them as a fraternal Socialist party, while his revolutionary sympathies and knowledge of Anglo-Irish relations were always going to tip the balance toward a United Ireland rather than a defence of 'British Imperialism'. In 1986 when he and Livingstone invited Gerry Adams to various public meetings in London, I tabled a resolution to my local party criticising them and calling for them to be called off, and was asked to withdraw it on the basis that there needed to be a wider discussion in the constituency (one party member never spoke to me again, as if I cared about that). I refused and the resolution fell but I did nevertheless attend a wider meeting at which it was clear that some sort of 'radical chic' had taken over and criticism of Sinn Fein was equivalent to defending British imperialism against Irish freedom, etc etc. Corbyn could just admit that it was part of the 'anti-imperialist struggle' but he doesn't want to frighten away the voters, and tends these days to leave the redundant orthodox Marxism-Leninism to John McDonnell.

In addition, if Corbyn was less than willing to polish his revolutionary credentials in public, he made the mistake today of giving a speech on foreign policy/security/terrorism rather than on social care, where the Tories are weak, or the prospects for economic growth and jobs when the UK leaves the EU -a subject Neil never raised in this evening's interview. Yes, it was feeble of Neil to try and distort the argument that UK foreign intervention has been the cause of terrorism in the UK, as if this were a 'monstrous' argument according to Boris Johnson, yet the ringleader of the 7/7 atrocities in London stated on tape the attacks were in revenge for regime change in Iraq, and Boris Johnson himself said this in 2005:
"The Iraq war did not create the problem of murderous Islamic fundamentalists, though the war has unquestionably sharpened the resentments felt by such people in this country, and given them a new pretext.

"The Iraq war did not introduce the poison into our bloodstream but, yes, the war did help to potentiate that poison."
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/boris-johnson-just-called-jeremy-10506835

Where Corbyn also failed completely, was on the question of Trident. He took the view that as the Party had decided to maintain the nuclear deterrent, that he would support the decision, even though he is opposed to the deterrent, and could have said so but, being a Party Man, simply kept repeating the Party Line, as all good comrades do.

But this was pathetic on a deeper level, because it reveals the Labour Party has not only not given any serious thought to military and security policy, had it done more research it would be aware that there has been a heated debate in the Royal Navy for some years about Trident itself, and the whole future of our 'Senior Service'. Unfortunately it is not online, but the extract from an article in The Naval Review in 2016 by a former Commander of a Polaris submarine not only argues Trident is a waste of money and, in strategic terms, a useless piece of kit, he goes on to argue the future of the Royal Navy may not be able to justify manned submarines when submarine drones can do the same job at a fraction of the cost. There is a whole agenda here that Labour could have opened up to give the British public an entirely new perspective -ad indeed, a choice- on 21st century military strategy and cost, but no, Corbyn like Johnson, May and Defence Secretary Michael Fallon are still locked into the Cold War mentality out of which no sensible position can be carved.
https://www.navybooks.com/blog/2016/06/22/trident-is-it-keeping-us-safe/

The Green Party will scrap Trident, a good enough reason for me.

peejaye

05-27-2017, 10:14 AM

holzz

05-27-2017, 04:51 PM

I'm no Labour person, but Corbyn is right. The media are getting all pissy for nothing. it's been accepted in military, international relations, political science and geopolitical circles for years that Western foreign policy can cause resentment. this is probably before 9/11, and was the narrative in the 7/7 bombings in London. It's common sense really. If a child's parents get killed by UK/US troops, and then they grow up and join ISIS or Al Qaeda out of revenge, what do the media really expect?

That said, Tories to win, but by no more than a 30 seat majority. No 100-plus seat landslide will happen.

Stavros

05-27-2017, 10:57 PM

To be honest Stavros; I thought it was an absolute disgrace & supports everything I & many other people think; The BBC are nothing more than a Party Political broadcast for the Conservatives! I found the interview appallingly repetitive & the almost childish like behaviour by Andrew Neil in trying to get Corbyn to say what Neil wanted him to say on the IRA & NATO totally unprofessional! Everything you say in your piece above re. Corbyn & the IRA is true but most of it was over 30 years ago, absolutely ridiculous! I personally, with many others no doubt, have made an official complaint to the BBC, complete waste of time though no doubt?

I agree, I was disappointed in Neil because by now most people who are interested known Corbyn's background on the left makes him vulnerable to this issue, but yes, the Troubles are over, and the most ironic thing is that there is even talk of a United Ireland as a solution to Northern Ireland's dilemma over Brexit. Moreover, the Labour manifesto is full of promises on a wide range of policy areas, so even if Neil did not want to discuss Brexit, he could have challenged Corbyn on the NHS, Education, Policing, Housing, the Environment, Transport and on and on. This has been a poor show by the BBC, rather like the US elections where there was -to some extent understandably- an intense focus on personality, but almost no serious or extended debate on real issues like education or housing. And it will get worse because it seems to me Theresa May rushed into this election and Tory policies were thrown together without any real depth of thought, and to cover up the social care fiasco, for example, they have decided to divert the campaign believing that Corbyn is weak on terrorism and defence and will -as they did with Kinnock- recruit the Murdoch press and the Mail to produce negative copy rather than offer the public a positive view of their own portfolio. But even there they have not done very well, Michael Fallon made a complete tit of himself on Channel 4 News, helped of course by the madness of King Boris. Question is -will this produce the desired result? If the Tories are returned but not with the huge majority May banked on, does this weaken her position in the party, and how will this affect the Brexit negotiations?

peejaye

05-28-2017, 06:39 PM

Stavros

05-29-2017, 01:17 AM

Seems Mr Fallon's had another bad morning on "Peston on Sunday" earlier today, not sure if it's repeated again this evening. Jeremy Corbyn also made an appearance, fresh from Wembley after watching his team Arsenal win the FA Cup. (He was on Twitter last night!)
He was asked about his IRA connections briefly & answered them well, he was also asked about Labour policies and the costings of it all.
Andrew Neil take note! :loser:

Paxman has a go tonight, Monday. He has described himself as a 'One Nation Tory' so maybe he will be kind to Theresa May, though he might try to get her to admit she changed her mind on social care policy -for some reason changing one's mind on policy is seen as a weakness in this country,even if it makes sense. Although I would like to think he will not press Corbyn on the IRA, HAMAS -for some reason he gets a free pass on Hugo Chavez- I suspect this will be tackled early on before he challenges Corbyn on its manifesto highlights. One thing Paxman and others might like to note is that when Corbyn was in favour of a United Ireland and accused of being a friend of the IRA, the Tories described the ANC as a terrorist organization funded by Moscow and supported the Inkatha Movement, Mandela was either thus also a terrorist or not worthy of their attention -until the Federation of Conservative Students produced 'Hang Mandela' badges and Norman Tebbit shut it down in 1986 (though the precise reason was their defence of Nicolas Tolstoi who made bogus claims about former Tory Ministers and the repatriation of Soviet POWs to the USSR after the war where it is claimed they were executed). And guess what, when Norman Tebbit was challenged on his party's demonization of Mandela and the ANC he replied

"He was the leader of a political movement which had begun to resort to terrorism. You have to act within the constraints of the time and I get very irritated by people who judge the past by the present."
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2013/dec/06/conservative-party-uncomfortable-nelson-mandela

Meanwhile in the Telegraph on Sunday, Simon Heffer trotted out that old canard about British Marxists: that Corbyn hates Britain. This was the argument the Daily Mail used to smear the Miliband brothers a few years ago because their father, a refugee from the Nazis was a Marxist who wrote critically of capitalism (really?, Gosh!) and wanted to see a socialist Britain (even more shocking). It is of course possible to love one's country but not want its citizens to sleep rough on the streets or rely on food banks to eat. As for hate, you find more bile written about the UK in the Daily Mail and in UKIP leaflets than you do in Labour Party publications.

holzz

05-29-2017, 04:41 AM

lol...i don't care really what Lapafrog thinks about me. his only issue is that he mocks me for posting, when i post in the same manner as everybody else. but fine. he needs to suck cock, or fuck or get fucked, it would relax him a lot.

holzz

05-29-2017, 04:42 AM

Stavros

05-29-2017, 10:26 AM

I think this thing on Diane Abbott is a bit stupid. It was thirty years ago, so what? the entire issue of Northern Ireland is highly complex, and if anybody knows the history of Ireland, one would realise that England and later the UK has been the aggressor.

While it is true that over the course of 800 years of Anglo-Irish relations the British made catastrophic mistakes, I don't see how any observer of the Troubles since 1968 can either justify the violence committed on both sides in the Province, or detonating bombs in pubs in Birmingham, and litter bins in Warrington in England, to cite just two examples. In these cases it was not the 'UK' that was the aggressor but the Provisional IRA.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birmingham_pub_bombings
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warrington_bomb_attacks

peejaye

05-29-2017, 01:59 PM

Meanwhile in the Telegraph on Sunday, Simon Heffer trotted out that old canard about British Marxists: that Corbyn hates Britain.
I think Heffers quote on Corbyn should read[ he hates everything about Britain] to be more appropriate. I grew up in 70's Britain, it wasn't exactly happy days but all the Tories go on about is the 3 day week, power-cuts & Trade Unions being in control of everything!
Very few people were living in poverty back then compared to today!

holzz

05-29-2017, 08:49 PM

While it is true that over the course of 800 years of Anglo-Irish relations the British made catastrophic mistakes, I don't see how any observer of the Troubles since 1968 can either justify the violence committed on both sides in the Province, or detonating bombs in pubs in Birmingham, and litter bins in Warrington in England, to cite just two examples. In these cases it was not the 'UK' that was the aggressor but the Provisional IRA.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birmingham_pub_bombings
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warrington_bomb_attacks

The IRA issue is part of the centuries' old domination. Or more accurately a consequence/culmination of it. Irish indepedence started long before the Collins Civil War, or the modern IRA. it's a complex issue, and to the IRA it's about liberation from occupation going back centuries.

broncofan

05-29-2017, 10:21 PM

Stavros

05-30-2017, 12:22 AM

The IRA issue is part of the centuries' old domination. Or more accurately a consequence/culmination of it. Irish indepedence started long before the Collins Civil War, or the modern IRA. it's a complex issue, and to the IRA it's about liberation from occupation going back centuries.

Your post only makes sense if you ally yourselves with the minority who opposed the 1921 Anglo-Irish Treaty who at various stages between 1926 and 1997 attempted to use the armed struggle to create a United Ireland. Such an alliance cannot accept that the 1921 Treaty was a legal arrangement, cannot accept that the majority of Irish citizens accepted it -the refuseniks were defeated in the Civil War-, and denies the right of Protestants in the Northern provinces that remained in the UK to rule the six counties. This places you on the fringe of history, and on its violent fringe if you subscribe to the fiction that the six counties were 'under occupation', a legal nonsense.

The irony of this rejection of Carson and his followers, is that no intelligent Irish citizen would take away from its history the Gaelic Revival through which Lady Gregory (Protestant), William Butler Yeats (Protestant), and JM Synge (Protestant) led a phenomenal explosion of Irish creativity that lasts to this day, and not just in the Abbey Theatre. Whatever role the Revival played in creating a practical and cultural identity for Ireland as a country independent from the British Empire -and it was the first 'colony' to break away and achieve its independence- should be factored in, not deleted from the account.

The problem is that revolutionaries -or romantic revolutionary wannebes- are addicted to violence as the physical means to change the status quo, but the 'armed struggle' created more problems than it solved, and in the end, there was a negotiated solution that could have been agreed upon years before had the parties not been so rigidly attached to their positions, as is the case in most conflict zones today be it Israel-Palestine, Syria, Iraq, and so on.

It comes down to simple questions implied in Broncofan's post above: does violence achieve anything? What did violence achieve in Northern Ireland?

holzz

05-30-2017, 01:17 AM

Your post only makes sense if you ally yourselves with the minority who opposed the 1921 Anglo-Irish Treaty who at various stages between 1926 and 1997 attempted to use the armed struggle to create a United Ireland. Such an alliance cannot accept that the 1921 Treaty was a legal arrangement, cannot accept that the majority of Irish citizens accepted it -the refuseniks were defeated in the Civil War-, and denies the right of Protestants in the Northern provinces that remained in the UK to rule the six counties. This places you on the fringe of history, and on its violent fringe if you subscribe to the fiction that the six counties were 'under occupation', a legal nonsense.

The irony of this rejection of Carson and his followers, is that no intelligent Irish citizen would take away from its history the Gaelic Revival through which Lady Gregory (Protestant), William Butler Yeats (Protestant), and JM Synge (Protestant) led a phenomenal explosion of Irish creativity that lasts to this day, and not just in the Abbey Theatre. Whatever role the Revival played in creating a practical and cultural identity for Ireland as a country independent from the British Empire -and it was the first 'colony' to break away and achieve its independence- should be factored in, not deleted from the account.

The problem is that revolutionaries -or romantic revolutionary wannebes- are addicted to violence as the physical means to change the status quo, but the 'armed struggle' created more problems than it solved, and in the end, there was a negotiated solution that could have been agreed upon years before had the parties not been so rigidly attached to their positions, as is the case in most conflict zones today be it Israel-Palestine, Syria, Iraq, and so on.

It comes down to simple questions implied in Broncofan's post above: does violence achieve anything? What did violence achieve in Northern Ireland?
Violence solves nothing, but even that depends.

I just think whilst terrorism is wrong, ignoring past events is foolish. It's never that black and white. ISIS is doing wrong, but then they were bombed by Bush and Blair for no good reason (that we know of). So it cannot be so black and white really.

Stavros

05-30-2017, 08:58 AM

I am not sure if we learned anything from last night's tv debate. Theresa May does not look comfortable being tested in public by the public, which in a way is odd for someone who has chosen to go into public life and has the top political job in the country. I understand her strength is in one-to-one discussions, but that is no good for tv. Nevertheless, she repeated most of what we know, and as we do not know how the Brexit negotiations will proceed, we still have no really clear idea how it will affect the UK economy over the next five years, which makes both Tory and Labour promises on spending look and sound hollow.

In Corbyn's case, his personal opposition to nuclear weapons has been set aside because the party has made a decision and that is what he must go with. But this suggests that if the party is going to be the source of policy, presumably as expressed at the annual Conference, then the Parliamentary party merely becomes a group of delegates to the House of Commons from that Conference, and that voters are not in fact electing someone to represent their constituency but someone who represents the party. This is a re-run of the attempt that was made in the 1980s to make the Parliamentary party accountable to the membership as a whole, and while this might sound reasonable it is in fact an erosion of parliamentary democracy given that MPs are elected to represent a place, not a party. It has already been demonstrated that Corbyn cannot control his own party in Parliament, so I don't see how this new format can work. Conference will make policy, MPs will refuse to support it -what happens then?
Tony Benn once said he thought the Cabinet should be elected by the party membership, and this is the trend that Corbyn represents, as with many economic policies, a return to the ideas we thought had been buried by electoral failure. But what it also shows is that the party has not adjusted to the 21st century to offer any new thinking on defence or education -the same is true of the Tories- so that we have a debate at a critical moment for the UK that has offered the public a re-hash of failed policies with not a single idea that has any substance because the great unknown, the UK outside the EU, remains what it is.

On balance, May retains her lead in the polls, and though it is remarkable how Corbyn has managed to close the gap, in part because a lot of people like Labour policy, in part because of flaws in the Tory manifesto, the Tories should be returned but with a slightly better majority rather than the landslide the Polls predicted when the election was called. The problem as usual is that many people have already made up their minds, and while the first time voters seem to be pro-Labour, they have to vote on the day, if they have not already cast their postal ballots, so I am not sure if these tv debates achieve anything.

Jericho

05-30-2017, 10:25 AM

On balance, May retains her lead in the polls, and though it is remarkable how Corbyn has managed to close the gap, in part because a lot of people like Labour policy, in part because of flaws in the Tory manifesto, the Tories should be returned but with a slightly better majority rather than the landslide the Polls predicted when the election was called. The problem as usual is that many people have already made up their minds, and while the first time voters seem to be pro-Labour, they have to vote on the day, if they have not already cast their postal ballots, so I am not sure if these tv debates achieve anything.

Obviously, I'm biased...But I think May gave an absolutely dismal performance last night.
As for her lead in the polls, and being retuned with a slightly better majority, we shall see, Brother Stavros! :p

For those who missed it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LiDvn3ZWgN4

The 56:30 mark's a bit of a masterclass in not answering anything!

Though, if I had to choose a highlight, it would be the bloke at the end of the May segment who went to give her a Standing Ovation, saw he was on his own, and sat down again, right sharpish!

Stavros

05-30-2017, 12:56 PM

Obviously, I'm biased...But I think May gave an absolutely dismal performance last night.
As for her lead in the polls, and being retuned with a slightly better majority, we shall see, Brother Stavros!
The 56:30 mark's a bit of a masterclass in not answering anything!
Though, if I had to choose a highlight, it would be the bloke at the end of the May segment who went to give her a Standing Ovation, saw he was on his own, and sat down again, right sharpish!
The nowithtsanding moment was indeed priceless, I would not be surprised if the Mail and Telegraph wonder if the audience was selected to be biased, not least as the veteran journalist David Dimbleby:

The veteran BBC broadcaster David Dimbleby has intervened in the election campaign to say that Jeremy Corbyn has not been treated fairly in the press.

The broadcaster, who is often regarded as the voice of the nation after decades of fronting Question Time, election night specials and state occasions, strayed into unfamiliar territory by backing a longstanding complaint by Corbyn’s supporters.

Speaking before a Question Time special on Thursday when he will interview the Labour (https://www.theguardian.com/politics/labour) leader and Theresa May, Dimbleby pointed out the rightwing bias of most British newspapers and complained of their “lazy pessimism”.

In an interview with the Radio Times (https://www.theguardian.com/media/radio-times), Dimbleby said: “I don’t think anyone could say that Corbyn has had a fair deal at the hands of the press, in a way that the Labour party did when it was more to the centre, but then we generally have a rightwing press.”
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2017/may/30/jeremy-corbyn-david-dimbleby-rightwing-bias-british-newspapers

Dimbleby sold the family newspaper business for around £12 million in 2001 so he should know about a biased press. One wonders how long it will be before the Mail and Telegaph see this as confirmation that DD works for the Bolshevik Broadcasting Committee.
The polls still give May a lead but not as great as it was when the campaign began. But like I said, I think many people have made up their minds.
https://ig.ft.com/elections/uk/2017/polls/

peejaye

05-30-2017, 04:57 PM

Jericho

05-30-2017, 11:13 PM

Are there any Conservatives here.
Come on, stop hiding, don't be embarrassed, it's all friendly fire!

Well, except this.
I always thought Boris was slightly amusing...For a cunt.
But this is disgraceful.
Fuqaduq, I'm almost ashamed for him!

<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tn-BUJJSsoQ" target="_blank">
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tn-BUJJSsoQ (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tn-BUJJSsoQ)

Stavros

05-31-2017, 01:46 AM

That's all a bit odd Stavros as I thought Dimbleby was "The Face of the British Establishment fronting the BBC1". Staggering if he's spoken out about the bias shown by his own media machine!
As for last night, yet again a personal attack on Jeremy Corbyn about things he allegedly said 35 years ago during the Falklands conflict, troubles in Ireland and his dealings with HAMAS! Didn't see the interview with Mr's May as the sound of her voice makes me physically ill, sorry for my own bias there!

It is a simple, if tired point. Do you want a Prime Minister who confronts and defeats terrorists, or one who sympathizes with them?

Inside that question are many more -if it was wrong for Jeremy Corbyn to invite Gerry Adams to the House of Commons, was it wrong for the government to be talking to representatives of the IRA at the same time? Legally, yes, Corby was at fault, because the IRA/Sinn Fein were guilty of crimes against the UK and its citizens. Morally? Difficult, because it may have suggested to the IRA/Sinn Fein that they would get a better deal from a Labour, than a Tory government (as indeed was the case).

If the USA describes HAMAS as a terrorist organization, why was that organization when it started up given so much support by the state of Israel, an ally of the USA?

If Corbyn was soft on a United Ireland, sympathetic to Hugo Chavez in Venezuela, is it not also true that Margaret Thatcher was a supporter of and gave a personal welcome to General Pinochet in 1999 even though his regime tortured a British citizen- Sheila Cassidy (the secret police had trained German Shepherds how to rape a woman when she was place in a prone position) -and did not that same party regard the ANC in South Africa as a 'terrorist' organization'?

Corbyn's position on the Falkland Islands is indeed weak, I recalll at the time how the left ridiculed it as an imperialist adventure. It was in the early stages seen as crucial to ousting Thatcher from power. But if you step back and think, it would have made sense for the British and Argentine governments to agree a joint sovereignty arrangement which gave Argentina and the UK an equal share in the oil and gas resources of the Falkland/Malvinas basin (identified c1971), gave citizens equal access (because 99.99% of Argentinians are no more interested in invading and occupying the Falklands than the English are in living in the Outer Hebrides), and made all war pointless because both states were in agreement that co-operation makes more sense than conflict.

And if it is the case that Corbyn cannot control his own party in Parliament, bear in mind there are ferocious beasts in the Conservative Party who unlike Theresa May have hated the EU even before the UK joined in 1973 and regard her with suspicion. They need her to win the election, they don't need her to carry on the negotiations. Look closely and you will see that there are as many cracks in the Tory party as there are in Labour.

Stavros

05-31-2017, 02:23 AM

A short note on polls -this article in the Independent argues there could be a hung parliament -
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/tory-majority-poll-election-2017-latest-labour-hung-parliament-seats-theresa-may-conservatives-a7764271.html

Martin Baxter of Electoral Calculus made this claim a week ago, but has since revised its forecast to give the Tories a 92 seat majority, with Angus Robertson -leader of the SNP in the Commons, losing his seat to the Tories. The micro-data they use shows that the most left-wing street in Britain is in the constituency of Brighton & Hove- a power base for the Greens, and possibly the 'gayest' (is this a word?) constituency in the UK. The most right-wing is in Knightsbridge, but let's not go there (especially not if you have a ts girlfriend who loves shopping, plastic stretches only so far, darling).

http://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/homepage.html

http://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/Analysis_extreme30_part2.html

peejaye

05-31-2017, 10:45 AM

Are you saying Terrorism would be worse under Corbyn? I don't really see your point? As I've said; Corbyns views from half his lifetime ago(& he's 68!) aren't relevant to most voters today despite the media making out they are!

peejaye

05-31-2017, 10:53 AM

Oh, & how is Mr's May confronting & defeating terrorism? Almost 20,000 Police officers & numerous Border Force officers have been cut by her party & will continue one assumes as she never talks about party policies? Start sleeping with one eye open if these "strong & stable" people hold on to power! :nervous:

Jericho

05-31-2017, 10:37 PM

Bit of Fluff #1

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1S99-3C16SA

Jericho

05-31-2017, 10:37 PM

Bit of Fluff #2

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zgnYCQeRO8

Jericho

05-31-2017, 11:48 PM

Oi, Granddad, your girl did well for herself!
Nice but Tim was, well, what can you say, nice?
Funniest line of the night had to go to Leanne Wood, and her "There's no such thing as a free divorce", in response to Nutsac, er, Nuttalls' stance on paying fuck all in regards to brexit.
(Sorry Jocks) Where the SNP there?
Open derision for Rudderless.
All things being even, and all politicians being aresoles, Jeremy Corbyn *is* Lord Of The Rings.

OMFG, for the first time in my lifetime, we're looking at a possible LABOUR government!

Jericho

06-01-2017, 12:09 AM

I underestimated my age in that last post...Wouldn't want anyone thinking I was forty seven!

peejaye

06-01-2017, 09:37 AM

Just seen a live TV interview on BBC Breakfast with, of all people, Boris Johnson, trying to justify why his leader(Mr's May) was missing from a live TV debate yesterday evening....should of renamed it "Car Crash TV!" This election is getting very interesting. :D

rodinuk

06-01-2017, 10:02 AM

I'm leaning towards the Monster Raving Loony Party, I love their manifesto pledge to introduce a 99p coin and a 30-day cooling-off period for the General Election at last something's making sense :D

peejaye

06-01-2017, 12:50 PM

Looks like even Stavros as become worried?:shrug

Jericho

06-01-2017, 01:37 PM

Slightly less elated this morning.
What do they say about posting and drinking? Oooops!

But I do not care...Even the hangover's worth it!

broncofan

06-02-2017, 07:01 AM

Slightly less elated this morning.
What do they say about posting and drinking? Oooops!

But I do not care...Even the hangover's worth it!
Who can blame you. Things are looking a hell of a lot better than when the election was called. Right? Every article that comes up on my feed says May's lead has narrowed and that she has made a mistake by thinking she can sit on a lead. Still election polling leaves a lot of room for error, and that doesn't cut either way but is a caution not to take any result for granted.

peejaye

06-02-2017, 01:31 PM

Who can blame you. Things are looking a hell of a lot better than when the election was called. Right? Every article that comes up on my feed says May's lead has narrowed and that she has made a mistake by thinking she can sit on a lead. Still election polling leaves a lot of room for error, and that doesn't cut either way but is a caution not to take any result for granted.
She's obscenely arrogant, think she can just talk about "strong stable" leadership, Br-exit(they have no idea on that either) don't have to turn up to live television debates, have virtually no policies, few they have published have no justifications on costings; It's the biggest circus in town since Billy Smarts!.....but they've got the media onside & that's a HUGE advantage!

Stavros

06-02-2017, 02:00 PM

OMFG, for the first time in my lifetime, we're looking at a possible LABOUR government!

Setting aside the gnomic maths in your post, Jericho, I can't see a Labour government emerging from this election unless there is a truly dramatic collapse of the Tory vote in England. On the one hand yes, the election of 2010 resulted in a House of Commons with no overall control and the formation of a Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition, underlining the fact the Tories had failed to win an election since 1992, and even the victory in 2015 only produced a majority of 12. That could be overturned on a modest swing, but 2015 saw the decimation of the Labour vote in Scotland with no sign that the party is going to return to the days when its Scottish MPs were numbered in double figures. It is just about conceivable there could be a Labour-SNP coalition were it not for the SNP rejecting this option. But while Martin Baxter's Election Calculus has revised downwards a prediction with the Tories having a majority of 76, there are no signs that the share of the Labour vote is going to win them seats taken from the Tories.

Put simply, the Tories have conducted their worst election campaign since the 1990s. It was clear from the start that they wanted it to be a personality contest between 'Strong and Stable' May versus 'Loony left' Corbyn. What happened is that the Tories did not plan ahead a manifesto with sound policies, but cobbled some ideas together, and not only were they not costed -rather like going to a restaurant which has a menu but not prices- on a key policy like social care that affects not just many elderly people but also their property, the policy was inserted late and without any consultation across the party with people who might have advised May to amend it or even to just omit it.
The consequence has been that Work and Pensions Secretary Damian Green has disappeared from the campaign, and Mrs May failed to persuade anyone it was part of a 'consultation paper' and not a 'u-turn', and as 'Strong and Stable' became -thanks to Michael Crick at Channel 4 News- 'Weak and Wobbly- May retreated into a temporary hermitage leaving Corbyn to mop up the resentment and in the process come across as a rather likeable chap who has some sincerely held beliefs about poverty, educational opportunity and taxes.

This week has seen the launch of a new brand for Mrs May who is now lauding the 'future' for the UK as we leave the EU, and is the only person who can lead the Brexit negotiations to get the best deal, and if past form is anything to go by the Murdoch press and the Mail will be trying to smear Corbyn and Labour -if not him then Dianne Abbott, John McDonnell or someone else- to tilt the mood away from Corbyn. But senior Tories are invisible, and it will all come down again to the magnetic personality of Theresa May...David Davis has been around a lot, and I have seen a lot of Amber Rudd, even though her father died in the last ten days (having lost her husband, the journalist AA Gill earlier this year), but nothing of Liam Fox, Philip Hammond, Justine Greening, Liz Truss, Sajid Javid, and others.

So yes, there is a swing in Labour's step, and the Tories look, well, laboured, but behind the scenes the two parties are fairly well informed and the only issue for the Tories is the size of the majority, because the smaller it is, the weaker it is for Mrs May.

The latest Election Calculus is here-
http://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/homepage.html

Jericho

06-02-2017, 02:49 PM

Who can blame you. Things are looking a hell of a lot better than when the election was called. Right? Every article that comes up on my feed says May's lead has narrowed and that she has made a mistake by thinking she can sit on a lead. Still election polling leaves a lot of room for error, and that doesn't cut either way but is a caution not to take any result for granted.

Like I say, betting odds are the ones to watch.
When was the last time you told a pollster the truth? I tell them the exact opposite, just for the fuck of it. But when it comes to laying money down...

Jericho

06-02-2017, 03:21 PM

So yes, there is a swing in Labour's step, and the Tories look, well, laboured, but behind the scenes the two parties are fairly well informed and the only issue for the Tories is the size of the majority, because the smaller it is, the weaker it is for Mrs May

Even if they do win, I think May's finished after the election.
They'll have won in spite of her, not because of.

But, Craig Mackinlay getting charged, another attack on the NHS...Call it pie in the sky, wishful thinking, whatever.
I'm feeling that dramatic collapse.

Jericho

06-02-2017, 03:23 PM

Looks like even Stavros as become worried?:shrug

He's had other things on his mind (https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/3703063/stavros-flatley-56k-cannabis-factory-london-flat-investigation-dropped/)! :dead:

peejaye

06-02-2017, 04:36 PM

Stavros

06-02-2017, 07:45 PM

Welcome back Stavros.
Thing is; Tory voters will go out & vote in appalling weather, floods, on crutches, in wheelchairs, in taxis(they can afford it) while Labour voters won't be so committed, a lazy day in nursing a hangover & that's a vote wasted!
Hurts & pains me but I think Stavros is right?
Worth a "wager" though if Corbyn is good odds!
I wasn't gone for long! Whatever -betting on elections is rarely worth the money owing to the fact in the UK you only have two choices, thus to win this election the Tories are between 9and 14 to one on to win, Labour mostly 6-1. However, if you believe Theresa May is not going to last as Tory leader, there are some curious odds on her successor- set aside Nigel Farage who is not even a member of the party, you can get 40/1 for David Davis whereas the favourites are Boris Johnson and Amber Rudd 4,5 or 6 to one -but I am sceptical about Boris as I think he is now seen as a maverick who will not unite the party, if anyone can. The real issue would be who is soft on Brexit and who is hard.
My advice would be to save your money and back the horse in tomorrow's Derby that has already won over the distance.
Here are the odds:

General Election:
https://www.oddschecker.com/politics/british-politics/next-uk-general-election/most-seats

Next Tory leader:
https://www.oddschecker.com/politics/british-politics/next-conservative-leader

Stavros

06-02-2017, 08:06 PM

Even if they do win, I think May's finished after the election.
They'll have won in spite of her, not because of.
But, Craig Mackinlay getting charged, another attack on the NHS...Call it pie in the sky, wishful thinking, whatever.
I'm feeling that dramatic collapse.

Indeed one of the bizarre twists of this election is that it now appears it was a profound mistake for Mrs May to go for it, I don't think it will be as calamitous as Cameron betting the country on staying in the EU, because the Tories will still be the government, but this is twice in a row that the Tories have assumed their public persona of invincibility is tripping them up. The decision to hold an election and her failure to maintain the policy on social care for more than a few days has damaged her reputation for sound management, but it doesn't offer much hope to her opponents as there are no credible alternatives, for while I think David Davis would be the obvious choice, I don't believe he has the support of the party around the country.

This is in a way a continuation of the internal war over Europe the Tories have been fighting since 1972 because we don't really know what the negotiations will bring, although I think there will be an agreement on the rights of residence for EU citizens in the UK, and UK citizens in the EU. The UK I think will have to commit to maintaining its financial contributions to the EU as long as it remains a member, but we don't know when the formal relationship will end, and the longer it takes the more we will pay. But the real stumbling block will be on trade. A 'bad deal' would surely be no preferential access to the Single Market after a relatively short cut off point -say December 2019- a good deal would be a phased withdrawal which gives the UK a few more years to detach itself, with other phased withdrawals from, say, the Fishing and Agricultural sectors. But as the EU is in command of these talks, we cannot know how sympathetic to UK demands they will be. The border with the Irish Republic is a conundrum that could prove to be harder to deal with, as it may come down to various scenarios linked to access/no access to the Single Market.

Confidence is a curious commodity in politics, among the population at large, Mrs May had it in abundance at the start of the election, Corbyn very little; if anything it has been reversed. In the longer term this may suit Jeremy Corby who will want to remain leader of the party while he maintains the process of reforms to 'return' it to the membership as long as it doesn't threaten John McDonnell's Stalinist grip of policy. Right now a close look at the parties suggests decisions are made by a Poliburo in Labour, and a Church Fete Committee in the Tories.

Would you like another fairy cake with your tea, vicar, or a pint?

bluesoul

06-03-2017, 12:20 AM

^^^ miss may. i stopped reading there. really... ?

but seriously [insert serious face]. fuck theresa may.

i had a point and forgot it. there is a seriously fucking sexy dame in this airport and i have designs to fuck her. chances her i will not, but my chances are greater if i don't think about whatever the fuck you guys are on about in this thread.

sorry if you read this

i will report soon if i "score"

Jericho

06-03-2017, 12:34 AM

Worth a "wager" though if Corbyn is good odds!

They were when i put a bet on! :mrgreen:

Stavros

06-03-2017, 09:18 AM

A pathetic response from both party leaders last night to two compelling questions:

-when asked by a nurse why her wages in 2017 are the same as they were in 2009 Mrs May droned on with the established Central Office mantra: there is no magic money tree -so suddenly all that money the UK will save when it leaves the UK has disappeared? Was it not supposed to be spent on the NHS?

-Corbyn was asked if he would press the red button to launch a nuclear weapon if the UK has been attacked and he couldn't give a coherent answer to the precise question, just waffle on about not being in a position to need retaliation -what he could have done is make it clear that ot all nuclear weapons are Hiroshima-type bombs as nuclear warheads have for some time had a lower yield and are sometimes referred to as 'tactical' or 'battlefield' weapons which, if anything, makes them more likely to be used than the Hirosihima style 'strategic' weapons capable of wiping Moscow off the map. This has meant that within NATO first use has been part of the 'deterrence' strategy, and was indeed confirmed by Geoff Hoon in the last Labour government when he said in 2003

"Let me make it clear the long-standing British government policy that if our forces or our people were threatened by weapons of mass destruction we would reserve the right to use appropriate proportionate responses which might ... might in extreme circumstances include the use of nuclear weapons." The follow-up question (from David Dimbleby) "But you would only use Britain's weapon of mass destruction after an attack by Saddam Hussein using weapons of mass destruction?" Hoon replied: "Clearly if there were strong evidence of an imminent attack if we knew that an attack was about to occur and we could use our weapons to protect against it."
https://www.opendemocracy.net/conflict/britain_nuclear_3693.jsp
(A rather long but useful overview of nuclear weapons policy in the UK since the 1940s)

I believe Corbyn was opposed to this policy, but as I have pointed out in posts above, Labour does not seem to have looked in depth at Trident or the future of the Navy and thus the debate on nuclear weapons doesn't seem to me to have made any advance on the position the UK has had since the 1950s. A missed opportunity to re-set this whole debate, not least the more pertinent one that the UK outside the EU may not have enough money to sustain a nuclear strike force which is anyway mostly controlled by the USA without whose permission the UK cannot use nuclear weapons.

Stavros

06-03-2017, 09:27 AM

Meanwhile the Conservative Party campaign stumbles on suggesting there is no central command. Three examples:

1) Yesterday Craig Mackinlay was charged by the police with breaking election law in the General Election of 2015 in which he was elected MP for Thanet South, it relates to the party's election expenses. Mackinlay saw off a challenge from Nigel Farage of UKIP who believes the Tory vote in Thanet South will collapse and this time the fight is between Labour and UKIP, but Farage has been wrong before.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-kent-40129826

2) Yesterday Boris Johnson (Foreign Secretary) and Michael Fallon (Defence Secretary) both said the party will not raise taxes, even though their party manifesto does not say this, thus Michael Fallon:
In an interview with The Daily Telegraph today Sir Michael made it clear that income tax "absolutely" will not rise under a new Conservative government.
While Mr Johnson told BBC's Newsnight: "We will bear down on taxation and we have absolutely no plans to raise income tax."
http://www.itv.com/news/2017-06-03/senior-ministers-say-income-tax-will-not-rise-under-tories/

3) The Tory pledge on Housing has also changed, thus:
The Conservatives have U-turned on a flagship pledge to build “a new generation” of social housing announced in their manifesto just weeks ago.
Theresa May personally promised her policy would deliver “a constant supply of new homes for social rent”, but her housing minister has now admitted (http://www.insidehousing.co.uk/policy/politics/barwell-new-homes-for-social-rent-will-be-let-at-affordable-rent-levels/7020225.article) planned homes would be let at significantly less affordable rents.
...in an interview on Friday with trade magazine (http://www.insidehousing.co.uk/policy/politics/barwell-new-homes-for-social-rent-will-be-let-at-affordable-rent-levels/7020225.article) Inside Housing, minister Gavin Barwell admitted the party was planning to continue to build homes with higher rents and was not in fact reinstating traditional socially rented council housing.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/tories-housing-policy-u-turn-affordable-homes-general-election-2017-manifesto-a7769866.html

So, questions now arise as to who is making policy and what the policy is, because the Manifesto doesn't tell us. But will the media take the bait and ask Mrs May awkward questions about tax and housing?

peejaye

06-03-2017, 12:26 PM

Stavros

06-03-2017, 01:37 PM

You forgot to mention that lovely gentleman "Philip Hammond", he got his figures mixed up over HS2 by a mere £20 billion! Not sure what programme it was? Newsnight possibly? Cause; the BBC haven't mentioned it! :crap

I might have done in an earlier post, but either way Philip Hammond is still alive, though you won't see him on tv or hear him on the radio. A curious absence for one of the most senior politicians in the country who may be considered 'second-in-command' to Mrs May, assuming there is someone in command of the campaign. It is of course possible Hammond boarded a blue bus for Kettering and has never been seen again. Or was it Redditch?

peejaye

06-03-2017, 05:28 PM

He'll be counting his money somewhere!
Up to his neck in all sorts of things is that guy, ask former swimmer Sharon Davies; Some dirty waste company decided to build an incinerator at the bottom of her "Cotswolds" garden a couple of years ago, Hammond was a director!

holzz

06-04-2017, 03:14 PM

that debate on friday was a whole heap of bull. BOTH the PM and Corbyn dodged questions, and looked out of place.

peejaye

06-04-2017, 05:14 PM

I don't watch them because I know my politics & how I will vote but suspect if Corbyn was dodging questions it's probably because they were about his opinions from 30 years ago which doesn't concern him or his supporters over him becoming PM. Elections should be about Policies & making sure they're implemented!
May probably had no idea as usual I suspect.
Today we hear a statement from her re. terrorism; Enough is enough! And........? That's it!
Goodbye & thanks for coming!

Stavros

06-06-2017, 10:57 AM

In the last week the gap between the Tories and Labour has continued to narrow -the last time I posted Martin Baxter's predictions it suggested a 76 seat majority whereas polling up to last Saturday reduces this to 72.

It remains to be seen if the attack in London and the 'debate' about policing and Theresa May's 'urgent' call for a review of security policy will work to the Tories advantage. But while Labour has always been seen as weak on policing, and the reduction of police numbers began under the last Labour government, Labour will be on stronger ground if it focuses on what it is that resources are used for.

Boston, in the USA has shown that better community policing can bring local people and law enforcement into a better and non-confrontational relationship, though there is a clear need for accountability on the part of LE to maintain confidence in communities that they matter, so that in the end the outcome is a reduction of crime- the stark difference being confrontational policing that views 'difficult' inner-city and often poor districts as war zones where might is right.
http://harvardpolitics.com/united-states/does-boston-have-the-best-police-a-case-study-in-police-community-relations/

The reduction of police numbers is relevant if it means that community policing is either non-existent or so stretched as to be ineffective. Whether or not it would prevent fanatics from killing people I don't know, but I would expect a closer engagement of policing with the public to be a good thing, and it would be a human intelligence aspect that the fetish for controlling the internet cannot match. It has been claimed Theresa May wants internet controls as severe as those in China, but I suspect that peer-to-peer and encrypted communications are now standard though it also seems that once decisions have been made, the organizers and perpetrators of massacres go silent.

Whatever the arguments are, an election Theresa May called on leadership and Brexit, has spun out of her control, and it proves that 'events' can rapidly undermine political strategy -but that in this case there does not appear to have been a 'Plan B', which confirms in the comparison with the EU Referendum, that we have a generation of politicians who, if not entirely useless, are unable to think through their own policies to imagine a world without them.
Theresa May's internet policy may be here (doesn't really tell you much)
http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/theresa-may-internet-regulating-regulation-china-general-election-london-attack-bridge-a7774221.html

peejaye

06-06-2017, 11:27 AM

Stavros

06-06-2017, 12:56 PM

There is talk of a cover-up regarding the Manchester bomber & what we aren't being told & you may of seen one of the London Bridge terrorists was very well known to the Police! It's very worrying but I have to say our society as become far too tolerant.
If one ever dares to look at child pornography or attempts to download it; you would expect a knock on the door from the Police the next day however it seems some of these fanatics are looking at extremist & ISIS paraphernalia & little is done about it!
I really can't see an answer to it.

Re. The Election; The BBC have gone into overdrive, Jo Coburn of the Daily Politics made a complete buffoon of herself yesterday basically ignoring everything Corbyn as said recently and focussing only on what he said 30+ years ago & today on BBC Breakfast the presenter allowed Boris Johnson to rant on for 5 minutes branding Corbyn a terrorist without a hint of interruption! I want my license fee refunding!

The point about Butt is not that he was on a tv programme and known by the police and security services for his affiliations, but did he break the law? The laws on pornography are clear, but so too are the laws on terrorism, and one of the things extremists do when organized, is sail as close to the edge of the law as they can, which is how Anjem Choudary managed to stay out of prison for so long. The alternative, as Nigel Farage argued on Fox News the other day, is internment, a policy that was tried and failed in Northern Ireland.

If you think back to the 1960s and 1970s MI5 regularly (still do, in fact) infiltrated the assortment of Marxist, Trotskyist, Maoist and Anarchist groups, mostly aware that for all their talk of revolution the closest they were ever going to come to it was throwing stones at the police on anti-Vietnam demos. But then there was the Angry Brigade who went further and launched small scale bombs at targets like embassies, and when arrested were imprisoned, then went on hunger strike which led to them being 'force-fed', described as a form of torture and eventually a practice that was ended. The point being that we have always had fringe groups who want to overthrow the state, but rarely do anything about it, similarly in West Germany where it didn't matter until Baader-Meinhof crossed the line and killed a policeman.

As for Boris Johnson, I also listened to him this morning and it was clear he had no real answer to the questions other than to depict Jeremy Corbyn as irresponsible. Neither he nor Mishal Hussein (and note how he once made a point of saying her full name) pointed out that Corbyn's opposition to anti-terror legislation has been due to what he believed was the infringement of individual liberty in those Bills, which may also be why both Boris Johnson himself and Theresa May also voted against some of that legislation.

But consider for comparison sake, the difference between Jeremy Corbyn, and Peter King, the Republican Representative of New York's 2nd District on Long Island, here is just a flavour of views that would cause multiple heart attacks in the offices of the Daily Mail:
King began actively supporting the Irish republican movement (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republican_Movement_%28Ireland%29) in the late 1970s. He frequently traveled to Northern Ireland (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_Ireland) to meet with senior members of the paramilitary (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paramilitary) group, the Provisional Irish Republican Army (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Provisional_Irish_Republican_Army) (IRA), many of whom he counted as friends.[13] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_T._King#cite_note-2005-nysun.com-13)[29] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_T._King#cite_note-congressman_behind-29) King compared Gerry Adams (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerry_Adams), the leader of Sinn Féin (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinn_F%C3%A9in), the political wing of the Irish republican movement, to George Washington (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Washington), and asserted that the "British government is a murder machine".[30] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_T._King#cite_note-WaPo_2011-03-05-30) However, he apparently did not meet Adams until 1984.[31] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_T._King#cite_note-king_of_the_hill-31)

King became involved with NORAID (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NORAID), an organization that the British, Irish and U.S. governments had accused of financing IRA activities and providing them with weapons.[13] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_T._King#cite_note-2005-nysun.com-13)[32] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_T._King#cite_note-passing_the_hat-32)[33] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_T._King#cite_note-rich_friends-33)[34] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_T._King#cite_note-decommissioning-34) Regarding the 30 years of violence during which the IRA killed over 1,700 people, King said, "If civilians are killed in an attack on a military installation, it is certainly regrettable, but I will not morally blame the IRA for it."[35] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_T._King#cite_note-nytira-35)

He also called the IRA "the legitimate voice of occupied Ireland (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ireland)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_T._King#Support_for_the_IRA

Jeremy Corbyn appears dull and pathetic when compared to Peter King, and that is before you get started on Muslims and their mosques...

Jericho

06-06-2017, 03:30 PM

I'll just leave this here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUVUC1NHftY

Stavros

06-07-2017, 08:46 AM

I'll just leave this here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUVUC1NHftY
I watched the whole of this yesterday, and I think it is a fair and useful attempt by Corbyn to re-establish the purpose of the Labour Party after Blair and the crash of 2008. At that time it was often stated that there were no new alternatives to the solutions to capitalism and its problems that had been tried before, a reference to the 'post-war Keynesian consensus' on the one hand, and Thatcherism on the other. I do think a debate on how far the State should intervene in the economy is a useful one, not least because for all their commitment to 'free markets', every Conservative government has intervened when it wanted, or needed to.

However, there have always been 'radical' free market apostles in the Conservative Party, and today they see a 'Hard Brexit' as another opportunity to prove markets are better than states, even though it appears they believe governments can and should be involved in these new global trade deals a UK free of the EU will be able to negotiate. It is indeed worthwhile offering an alternative because I think it is clear a lot of people in the UK want the State to do what markets cannot, or will not do, and that most people value the fair re-distribution of wealth over unlimited private profit.

What is fundamentally wrong with Corbyn's speech is its lack of truth -he offers no proper explanation for the decline of coal, for while it is true Mrs Thatcher presided over the decline of operating mines, coal was eclipsed in the 1960s by oil and gas because petroleum is cheaper, more efficient as a fuel, and in abundant supply. Hard though it might be to believe, it is also more environmentally friendly than coal, and kills fewer people working in the industry. Again, the decline of shipbuilding, dockyard labour, thousands of jobs in printing -these all went through lack of competition or technological change. But the real problem is that Corbyn is not thinking through the financial impact of the UK's exit from the EU, because it offers the nightmare scenario of a Labour government committed to spending billions on social programmes it cannot afford, simply because the money will not be there.

It would make sense if all the parties admitted what I think will become true over the next 5-10 years as we leave the EU: interest rates will rise, inflation will rise, VAT will rise, and direct taxation will rise. To offer 'no tax increases' or 'no tax increases for lower earners' is a false promise.

Lastly, Dianne Abbott has pulled out of another public speaking engagement. Although I think she has been a disaster for the campaign, I now wonder if she is genuinely ill. In the past she had a degree of energy, indignation and fluency that she has lacked for over a year now, and although only 63 years old, the wife of a friend of mine began developing Alzheimer's at the age of 60 (she has since died) and those signs, forgetting things, appearing to be lost in the present, apparent indifference, are signs of illness. I hope this is not true, but there could be more to this than campaign fatigue or some internal rows with members of the team.

peejaye

06-07-2017, 12:33 PM

What about the £161m per week(The PRO-remain BBC's own figure)that we won't be sending to the "Millionaires Club" anymore once this whole situation is sorted?

peejaye

06-07-2017, 02:13 PM

Love this;

Stavros

06-07-2017, 05:40 PM

What about the £161m per week(The PRO-remain BBC's own figure)that we won't be sending to the "Millionaires Club" anymore once this whole situation is sorted?

The predictions that have been made of the money the UK will save by not have to pay into the EU have been fiction from the start of the EU Referendum until a moment ago.
The point is that as long as the UK is in some way engaged with the EU, be it on trade, be it on Euro-Policing, be it in the service sector, education, scientific research and so on, there will be costs to pay. The Hard Brexiteers even think that if the UK just 'walks away' at the end of 2019 that's it, but even then the UK will still be linked to the EU if not at the level of government, then through commercial contracts which are protected by international law. My guess is that the full financial 'benefit' of not being part of the EU, in terms of the annual membership fee and other financial costs, will not be known for at least ten years. In between then and now, some costs will not be incurred, but I don't know what that figure is, and neither does anyone else.

Stavros

06-08-2017, 02:12 AM

Well I for one am glad that this election is over but for the voting itself. I can't see the Tories losing this, and I can't see Labour winning, but there will be surprises and some shocks. A lot depends on the turn-out which I think may be low generally, but high among the under-30s which theoretically benefits Labour. Labour's obstacle to power is its lack of support in Scotland although the SNP are forecast to lose 12 seats, but perhaps to the Conservatives rather than Labour. Baxter and Election Calculus retain their prediction of a 72 seat majority so it will be interesting to see if his team got it right. The fate of UKIP is an enigma, most of us think it is finished as a party but the seat to watch may be Hartlepool, though I hope they fail wherever they stand, even if it means the return of their saviour, Nigel Farage to the leadership.

I shall vote Green, which won't make a difference either way as my constituency, apart from voting for a Whig in the 1840s and, in a freak result for Labour in 1997 has been Tory since 1832, although the county was for Cromwell in the Civil War and the Constituency voted Remain in the EU referendum. Some say that after Brexit and the US elections, we should not be so safe in our predictions, and that people want change. But change is coming with Brexit, and isn't that enough for now?

Jericho

06-08-2017, 04:35 AM

I believe that...Enough is enough.

The turn out will be high.
Labour will win.
We all live happily ever after.
Well, OK, maybe the last bit's a stretch! :dead:

peejaye

06-08-2017, 11:54 AM

I agree, thank goodness it's over, the bias shown by the Media as made me sick & very confused as to why?
The Tories will triumph & it makes me wonder what sort of people I'm surrounded by when I go about my normal business!
We are not safe :nervous:

Jericho

06-08-2017, 03:51 PM

I agree, thank goodness it's over, the bias shown by the Media as made me sick & very confused as to why?

That's simple, init.
Cunts like Murdoch, with his mates, Branson and tory barrow boy, Sugar, don't want to part with a fucking penny more than they have to!

The Tories will triumph

Peejaye, I will not countenance this.
Not until unequivocally proven wrong...And even then, I want a recount!
And until then, I have hope that the people of this country will do the right thing.

It's going to be a long day and a longer night!

peejaye

06-08-2017, 04:02 PM

I'll second the recount Jericho!

Stavros

06-08-2017, 04:40 PM

In fact Martin Baxter's final prediction has been made today, based on polls up to yesterday the 7th. This gives the Conservatives a majority of 66 with 37.8% of the vote, a significant reduction in their expectations of 100+ when the election was called. Labour retain opposition status with 218 seats and a 31.2% share but he has the Liberal Democrats with 8 seats, which I think could be wrong, and UKIP with one seat and a 12.9% share of the vote whereas most polls had them barely around 5%; he predicts the SNP will lose 7 seats.

We will find out by this time tomorrow although Northern Ireland doesn't usually conclude its results until Saturday.
http://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/homepage.html

Jericho

06-08-2017, 04:40 PM

I shall vote Green, which won't make a difference either way

I like the idea of the Greens, I hope they retain their deposits (at the expense of the Tories, of course).
Even I need a conscience...Occasionally!

Some say that after Brexit and the US elections, we should not be so safe in our predictions, and that people want change. But change is coming with Brexit, and isn't that enough for now?[/QUOTE]

No.

Without a doubt, Brexit has introduced uncertainty into our lives (Thanks a lot, you fucking idiots - When you dickheads die, I hope you spend eternity sucking on Boris Johnsons rancid cock!!!)

But Brexit's not the be all and end all of this election (no matter how much they'd like us to think otherwise).

Jericho

06-08-2017, 04:42 PM

I'll second the recount Jericho!

Lets hope it's not needed.

flabbybody

06-09-2017, 02:37 AM

After watching 6 hours of FBI Comey testimony Yanks were hoping Brits would give us election sanity with a significant May victory.
I'm watching New York returns and that's not happening.
We're all doomed

Jericho

06-09-2017, 03:47 AM

Nick Clegg, ex deputy prime minister, libdem.
Just lost his seat to Labour.

Early, real early, but FUCK!

Jericho

06-09-2017, 03:58 AM

Stavros

06-09-2017, 06:31 AM

Oh, and Amber Rudd, the Home Secretary...Fuck off, and when you get there, fuck off a bit more!
I am sorry for gloating.
This will be the last time.
But...Fuck (I bet stavros would have a word for what I'm feeling right now)!
(fuck you, fullofshit is not one word)!

Perhaps you feel vindicated?

The word for Theresa May is catastrophe. Just as David Cameron did not need to hold a referendum on the EU in 2016 but did so, convinced the vote was won before the vote- and lost, so Theresa May, elevated by hubris and the polls that gave her a 20 point lead which would translate into a Commons majority of at least 100, swallowed the bait, and is now choked. It is now 5.30am, and the gossip is that later this morning she will announce her intention to resign, but not immediately. Boris Johnson, according to social media, has been planning his leadership bid since 1am, but now Amber Rudd has scraped back in with a majority of I think 400 in her constituency, those two and maybe David Davis could be in the frame.

If there is a key explanation here, on the one hand it has been the worst managed Conservative campaign in living memory with what one pundit on ITV (far superior coverage than the BBC which I stopped watching early on -I have been up all night) also called the worst manifesto of a government in British electoral history....a manifesto given to Cabinet members an hour before its launch that they had no input into and did not agree with, whose social care pledge had to be reversed within three days -simply unforgivable in what used to be a well-oiled (and well-funded) party machine. May refused to take part in a debate which Corbyn turned up to, and she came across as stiff, monotonous and utterly lacking in precisely the enthusiasm that Corbyn's campaign had in buckets.

On the other hand the other key is the role of social media and the extent to which it may have eclipsed mainstream media, with the vitriolic abuse of Corbyn in Murdoch's Sun and also in the Daily Mail having no effect. Labour is plugged into social media and the 'youth vote' with apps, twitter, facebook and all that, but for the Tories this is not a world they know or live in, indeed I have been citing polls that appear to have dismissed the 'youth vote' as unreliable because I too know little about this other world, yet it is clear that youth did turn out in large numbers, not least in my constituency which has dumped the Tory for Labour with a less than 2,000 vote majority -but we were a remain constituency, and there is a large cohort of students from a nearby university which I think has tipped the vote. I am also pleased that we recorded one of the highest votes for the Greens at nearly 2,000, and delighted to see UKIP's useless candidates losing their deposit, but probably not thrown in the dustbin of history as Nigel Farage will probably be leader again soon.

Crucially, this does nothing to give clarity to Brexit negotiations which are supposed to begin in two weeks time, not least because the Labour surge suggests a re-think on what the details might be, and the extent to which an accommodation with the EU may be sought to prevent a 'hard Brexit'. Moreover, if there is no overall control or a narrow majority, we may need another election in October.

More on this later, but congratulations to Labour for its enthusiastic, positive campaign, and for restoring to the agenda a raft of policies that were considered redundant. I still feel they are cowards on defence/Trident, have offered nothing on curriculum development in education, and cannot fund their programme after Brexit and are either lying about taxes or are just deluded, but that is for another day.

flabbybody

06-09-2017, 07:36 AM

On a tranny forum a hung parliament might seem like a desirable state of affairs, but I'm doubting any of you lot are in the mood for humor right now.

rodinuk

06-09-2017, 07:44 AM

Stavros

06-09-2017, 07:55 AM

Laphroaig

06-09-2017, 10:07 AM

This is what you get for being greedy, not learning from history and being so stupid in announcing policies like the 'dementia tax' and thereby jeopardising the UK's negotiating position in the Brexit talks.

I'm not usually vindictive but delighted to see Angus Robertson lose his seat.

Alex Salmond gone as well. That will make a lot of people I know, very happy.

To which one must add a stunning restoration of the Conservative vote in Scotland without which the Tories would be in a deeper mess than they are now. Ten years of SNP rule is beginning to pall, even Labour did better than expected. George Osborne on ITV made the point that Ruth Davidson, the Scottish Conservative leader in the Scottish Parliament, ran exactly the positive and enthusiastic campaign north of the border that Mrs May did not in England and Wales, and that this gives her a lot of authority when they begin choosing a new party leader. One wonders if she could have replaced Theresa May were she to have been an MP.

This is largely what I predicted earlier in the thread (so much for the SNP "whitewash";)). A lot of people, including some lifelong labour supporters, have been very impressed with the way Ruth Davidson has conducted her campaign. Labour themselves have probably done slightly better in Scotland than I expected as well.

peejaye

06-09-2017, 10:30 AM

Well; I've just got up having stayed up till 3.30 am expecting the Torys to scrape through! I am now having a 5.0% craft IPA for breakfast instead of toast and coffee :cheers:

Stavros

06-09-2017, 12:16 PM

Theresa May will be going to Buckingham Palace at lunchtime to tell the Queen she can stay in power and form a government with the help of the Democratic Unionist Party. Proof that this foolish woman is obstinate and determined to carry on, plugging a hole in a sinking ship, but for how long?

There is no obligation to begin the Brexit talks on the 19th June, they could be postponed -but as Article 50 has been invoked with a two year time-table, the talks have to end by the end of 2019. In theory, Theresa May could try to form a 'Brexit consensus' in the Commons which would require her to open talks with Labour, the SNP, the Liberal Democrats and the Democratic Unionist Party in order to secure an agreement with them to vote with the government on Brexit negotiations, but that assumes a) that the other parties will agree to it, and b) that her own party will support a strategy that must require her Brexit agenda to be compromised and be 'too soft' for that half of her party that wants to see the EU fall apart and therefore wants a 'hard Brexit'.

If her managerial reputation has been so damaged by this result, I am not sure how she can create a holding operation in the Commons, but I don't believe there can be an internal challenge to her leadership until the party conference in late September. There is also the spoiling operation that the other parties could try and use to extract commitments to domestic policies they prefer, say on housing and education- as a trade for support for Brexit. And what happens if the 'Brexit consensus' produces precisely the 'backsliding' on Brexit the militants in her party are opposed to and vote against her whenever they can?

So far this morning Mrs May has not brought the Cabinet together in a meeting to tell them what is going on and what the formal position of the party/government is, and we can only wait to see if she calls a Cabinet meeting for this afternoon when she returns from the Palace. If she wants to hold her party together in the Commons, she needs to break out of her shell and even if only for a short term, learn how to be part of a team. I am speculating and events could move fast over the next few days and we don't know where the country will be on Monday morning.

peejaye

06-09-2017, 01:45 PM

Couldn't of put it better myself Stavros. Having sobered up; I am quite shocked she hasn't offered a resignation! Just pure arrogance I suppose?

Stavros

06-09-2017, 02:11 PM

You might be sober, Peejaye, but is Mrs May? This is what she said a few moments ago:

What the country needs now more than ever is certainty. Having secured the largest number of votes and greatest number of seats in the general election, it is clear the Conservatives and Unionist party has the legitimacy to provide that.

Certainty? Legitimacy? Yes, the Tories have the largest number of seats, but the whole point of this election was to secure a 'mandate' for her vision of Brexit with a huge majority and she has failed, and the one thing that is not certain is what is on the agenda for Brexit and what has been taken off, who is in the government and who is not. As for legitimacy, we know her own party is convulsed with rage and that her own position is vulnerable. And where is her own government this morning? Are they still asleep? This could be a long day for all concerned.

Jericho

06-09-2017, 02:31 PM

Perhaps you feel vindicated?

Not really.
At that particular moment, something along the lines of 'elated' would have covered it.
Really thought Rudd had lost her seat, and Labour were in.
I'll go with gutted, atm.

Fuck!

holzz

06-09-2017, 04:29 PM

i voted tory, but then the campaign was badly run.

and it makes us look pretty stupid, since May called the election when the polls were good, and then now she needs the DUP to get a minuscule majority. and it's not a shock result. The Tories were always going to get the most seats/votes, but then with a normally-run campaign, it would have been a 20 seat majority. The care policy fucked up, and if this new DUP/Tory coalition doesn't work, then May really should resign and get in Boris Johnson.

Then again, maybe Corbyn could win next time. He's not as damaged goods as he was six months ago.

holzz

06-09-2017, 04:31 PM

On a tranny forum a hung parliament might seem like a desirable state of affairs, but I'm doubting any of you lot are in the mood for humor right now.

I am. My party "won", but we got the non-victory we deserved, due to our shitty campaign. Though I want a soft-Brexit, as i was a remainer. As for hung parliament, a little sex can lighten any mood.

Jericho

06-09-2017, 05:46 PM

Fuck My Life!

Seriously?
After everything that trout said about Corbyn, *she's* getting into bed with the DUP?

Stavros

06-09-2017, 06:21 PM

On a tranny forum a hung parliament might seem like a desirable state of affairs, but I'm doubting any of you lot are in the mood for humor right now.

She may not be an angel, Flabbybody, but I think we can all agree she is hung...!

1013111

peejaye

06-09-2017, 06:25 PM

i voted tory, but then the campaign was badly run.

The care policy fucked up, and if this new DUP/Tory coalition doesn't work, then May really should resign and get in Boris Johnson.

Then again, maybe Corbyn could win next time. He's not as damaged goods as he was six months ago.
That's all we need, our own version of Donald Trump! Do us all a favour!

Stavros

06-09-2017, 06:47 PM

Some reflections:

1) The polls dismissed the 'youth vote' but it was crucial in some constituencies, like mine, like Sheffield, and like Canterbury which has been Tory since 1918 and is now Labour, but not just because of university students who want to be relieved of debt. Young people between 18-28 who are not students but working, and who are or want to get married cannot afford to buy an apartment let alone a house, they are often in low to medium incomes which do not give them enough to save, and many -the majority?- who grew up as citizens of the EU believe they were robbed of their future when so many older people voted to take the UK out of the EU. They were also fascinated and energized by the Corbyn campaign, and turned off by the dreary monotony of the Tories.

2) So the polls ignored both a key voting bloc, but also the social media they use was not factored in to predictions, so credit to ITV last night as they had a 'Media Hub' which reported on the responses from social media through the night and often from abroad. Crucially, given the hysterical abuse that was levelled at Corbyn by the Daily Mail and the Murdoch press like The Sun- does this mean their power has been eclipsed? Compare them to the problems Murdoch is having at Fox News in the US. And, was this aspect of elections an innovation that elected Barack Obama in 2008 but which few other politicians outside the US have taken notice of?

3) We had comfortable Tory-Labour governments from 1979 to 2010, so the financial crash of 2008 must be seen as a watershed moment that shattered the stability of the two party system -the Tories were unable to govern alone in 2010, and only scraped through with a majority of 12 in 2015 and are now the largest party but with no overall majority; yet small parties do feature as either coalition partners or voting supporters, and in the case of the DUP May would need every Tory MP and every DUP MP to vote to get her legislation through. I suspect we will have another election by October. Pundits are saying we have returned to the Tory-Labour two party system, but formal or loose coalitions have been essential to government since 2010.

4) It has been said Labour cannot be elected with a left-wing programme and it failed last night, but the 2017 Manifesto was not as left-wing as the 1945 manifesto and the intriguing question to which there is no answer is, with the same degree of positive enthusiasm would a different leader have won Labour a majority?

5) What is going on in the Tory party? Twice in two years their leader has gambled the house on a vote convinced the result would leave them secure, and twice they have been humiliated. It is not just the hubris of winning elections, perhaps it is the reliance on focus groups and think tanks rather than real people that has detached such politicians from the real world in which they might find the views they think everyone shares with them does not exist, if they ever bothered to actually walk around town and talk to the people.

6) For all the desire for certainty and stability the Conservatives have always been vulnerable to destructive splits which are caused by arguments about the role of the State and of Free Markets. The party tore itself apart over the Corn Laws in the 1840s, it tore itself apart over Tariff Reform between 1903-1906, and it is has been shredding itself over the EU since 1972 and the negotiations over Brexit could be the cause of a major convulsion in the party, particularly because the hard Brexiteers see their cherished dream of smashing the EU and living in a Free Market world being undermined by their own leader. History repeats itself, the first time as tragedy, the second time as farce. The third time, it may just be nasty, brutish and short (thanks to Hegel, Marx and Hobbes for those quotes).