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UK Politics: General Election Triviality


DJDonegal

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Incidentally, well done to Nick Clegg for this line:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2015-32311736

The only slight problem, as Brian Taylor pointed out last night, is that if this is the Wizard of Oz, Nick has just implicitly cast his own party as the Cowardly Lion... just a bit too on point?

Taking the idea further, perhaps someone should throw a bucket of water over Nigel Farage and see if he melts.

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Perhaps the reason he hasn't bothered doing so. The Bet 2015 map has updated substantially to reflect recent polls. Scotland is a sea of yellow. Labour down to 6 in Scotland, Cons actually rise to two and Lib Dems reduced to smallest in Scotland with just the one (Orkney and Shetland).


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You know, I feel after watching this video that, regardless of who wins this election, the United Kingdom will be in safe hands.

Anyone who can get that leathered and not drop a grown man being repeatedly thrown into the air gets my vote.

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The Vote Now Show of BBC R4 were joking about Milband's challenge to Cameron, seeing sexy depths in it specifically the promise of man on man greased up naked wrestling action live on UK TV. **Sigh** I just can't write slash monster political porn fast enough it seems :(




& once I've typed that, I read this



Next, Milband strips for votes at Hen Parties, sparking intense competition amongst the Party leaders all prepared to strip or not to strip in order to gain votes until inevitably a wedding party promise to vote UKIP and to get all their friends and family to vote UKIP so long as Farage keeps all his clothes on.


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I thought of you when I heard that Lummel! (On a side note, dead ringers is pretty disappointing).

To interject some irish news, the Equal Marriage referendum has started to take off. The no campaign are coming out with the usual canards, "gay people have equal marriage, gay people can marry those of the opposite sex" (mothers and fathers matter, "if this is passed I could marry my same sex horse or dog" (letter in the Sunday times two weeks ago), "what can teachers tell the children" ( national radio phone in show, I believe a member of mandate for marriage. One of the most prominent in favour of aaa note vote was featured in a national paper http://www.independent.ie/irish-news/gays-should-abstain-from-sex-like-all-unmarried-couples-31153701.html saying gay people should abstain. It all sounds like a parody until you realise a sizeable number of people think this.

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Next, Milband strips for votes at Hen Parties, sparking intense competition amongst the Party leaders all prepared to strip or not to strip in order to gain votes until inevitably a wedding party promise to vote UKIP and to get all their friends and family to vote UKIP so long as Farage keeps all his clothes on.

http://i100.independent.co.uk/image/19289-m41514.jpg

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All those cakes in the US Politics thread titles has reminded me of that Tory Manifesto item to give "right to buy" another go. And how it's basically a "let them eat cake" scenario? For starters, the demographics in social housing these days are very different from the ones in the 80s - it's no longer the mix of classes that it used to be, and it really is now for people who literally cannot afford to live elsewhere. And on top of this, a 1/3 discount on a house is not gonna help anyone much, especially not people on minimum wage or benefits. Who, exactly, is this policy aimed at? It can't even be the Mail-reading mainstream, who are more likely to get pissy about those scroungers getting discounts that they don't deserve; is it a desperate plea for the support of the completely financially illiterate?

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All those cakes in the US Politics thread titles has reminded me of that Tory Manifesto item to give "right to buy" another go. And how it's basically a "let them eat cake" scenario? For starters, the demographics in social housing these days are very different from the ones in the 80s - it's no longer the mix of classes that it used to be, and it really is now for people who literally cannot afford to live elsewhere. And on top of this, a 1/3 discount on a house is not gonna help anyone much, especially not people on minimum wage or benefits. Who, exactly, is this policy aimed at? It can't even be the Mail-reading mainstream, who are more likely to get pissy about those scroungers getting discounts that they don't deserve; is it a desperate plea for the support of the completely financially illiterate?

I suspect it's an attempt at luring back Ukip voters with a little extra Thatcherism.

In other Ukip news, the local candidate has sent me the same leaflet twice.

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Interesting 538 analysis (yes, they are jumping into UK elections now as well. Side note: I think their political analysis is pretty bad these days, but when they have actual numbers they still seem to know what they're talking about). Using Ashcroft polls of constituencies, they've found that, compared to Labour and Conservatives, Lib Dem candidates are by far the most likely to see changes in their support due to local factors rather than national ones. This seems to fit with what I understand to be the anecdotal wisdom, that Lib Dem incumbents often have larger personal votes than other party candidates.



With these adjustments for national trends, we find that a bit less than half (44 percent) of the reported changes in the poll pairs is associated with change in support at the constituency level, relative to what is happening nationally. The fraction of variation due to constituency-level change is 27 percent for the Conservatives, 36 percent for Labour, 51 percent for the Liberal Democrats, 48 percent for the Greens, and 52 percent for UKIP. Voting intention for Labour and the Conservatives has been following a more uniform swing across constituencies; voting intention for the other parties has been much more in flux over time and across constituencies.


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I thought of you when I heard that Lummel! (On a side note, dead ringers is pretty disappointing).

To interject some irish news, the Equal Marriage referendum has started to take off. The no campaign are coming out with the usual canards, "gay people have equal marriage, gay people can marry those of the opposite sex" (mothers and fathers matter, "if this is passed I could marry my same sex horse or dog" (letter in the Sunday times two weeks ago), "what can teachers tell the children" ( national radio phone in show, I believe a member of mandate for marriage. One of the most prominent in favour of aaa note vote was featured in a national paper http://www.independent.ie/irish-news/gays-should-abstain-from-sex-like-all-unmarried-couples-31153701.html saying gay people should abstain. It all sounds like a parody until you realise a sizeable number of people think this.

Thank you :laugh: the idea that Irish people are chaste before marriage did make me smile. The fears of all those people eager to marry their same sex horse must be based on their having watched too much Father Ted "My Favourite Horse" song.

All those cakes in the US Politics thread titles has reminded me of that Tory Manifesto item to give "right to buy" another go. And how it's basically a "let them eat cake" scenario? For starters, the demographics in social housing these days are very different from the ones in the 80s - it's no longer the mix of classes that it used to be, and it really is now for people who literally cannot afford to live elsewhere. And on top of this, a 1/3 discount on a house is not gonna help anyone much, especially not people on minimum wage or benefits. Who, exactly, is this policy aimed at? It can't even be the Mail-reading mainstream, who are more likely to get pissy about those scroungers getting discounts that they don't deserve; is it a desperate plea for the support of the completely financially illiterate?

I agree with Malteran, it is an attempt to wear the mantle of Thatcher. Earlier some Tories were talking about harsher anti-union policies, that hasn't got them any traction in the polls, so now they try Right to Buy, if that doesn't get them any momentum in the polls no doubt privatisation will be wheeled out, or a pre-emptive defence of the Falkland Islands. I'd say it is an appeal to core voters. In theory the policy promises Londoners in social housing the opportunity to make a good profit, so maybe the strategists were dreaming of trying to blunt Labour's advantage in London but in practise I doubt many people in London Social housing would be able to afford the mortgages even with the traditional steep discounts - one of the lasting effects of the original round of Right to Buy.

Interesting 538 analysis (yes, they are jumping into UK elections now as well. Side note: I think their political analysis is pretty bad these days, but when they have actual numbers they still seem to know what they're talking about). Using Ashcroft polls of constituencies, they've found that, compared to Labour and Conservatives, Lib Dem candidates are by far the most likely to see changes in their support due to local factors rather than national ones. This seems to fit with what I understand to be the anecdotal wisdom, that Lib Dem incumbents often have larger personal votes than other party candidates.

The proof of the polling will be in the voting. I'm a bit dubious about the 538 method in UK elections currently because fewer constituencies are a two party contest between Conservatives and Labour. There's a growing number of Conservative vs Lib Dem, Lib Dem vs Labour, and now Labour vs SNP seats plus a few seats with three or more way splits such as allowed the Greens to win Brighton Pavilion last time round. So potentially Ashcroft might be heading in a useful direction :dunno:

Got a letter today from Bilbo Baggins asking me to vote Labour.

Surely Hobbits are mostly natural Tories, perhaps with the occasional Liberal here and there - not forgetting of course the Buckland National Party.

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