UK Politics Unexpected Election edition

[Stannis Eats No Peaches]

Does anyone know how proxy voting works? I sent the form off well before the deadline but my parents haven't received anything in the post yet. I imagine there's a special polling card that they get but I've never done it before so I don't know.

[polishgenius]

1 hour ago, Stannis Eats No Peaches said:

Does anyone know how proxy voting works? I sent the form off well before the deadline but my parents haven't received anything in the post yet. I imagine there's a special polling card that they get but I've never done it before so I don't know.

My brother got my proxy card last week, so they should hopefully recieve something soon.

[Dolorous Gabe]

2 hours ago, Chaircat Meow said:

No it isn't. You know perfectly well what the difference is here. If you have no issues turning your country over to politicians who supported its enemies then so be it, but for right thinking people Corbyn and co's terrorist sympathies are a total disqualification for high office.

Oh please! The world has never been simple. The current government supplies arms to horrible regimes. Thatcher's government publicly supported General Pinochet and denounced Nelson Mandela.

Corbyn sees injustices in the world on both sides of a divide and wants to bring peace. You can't do that without a dialogue.

[mormont]

3 hours ago, Chaircat Meow said:

No it isn't. You know perfectly well what the difference is here.

Suppose we don't? Humour us for a little. Explain the distinction between having expressed sympathy for the aims of a terrorist organisation (or at least their elected representatives) and having a former terrorist in your party that makes any comparison between these things invalid.

[Rippounet]

Le Monde is quoting a Times poll from thursday of last week that gave 42% for the Tories and 39% for Labour. Yougov gave 42-38 soon afterward.

So let's be sure I'm getting this right. Suppose Labour does get something like 39%... Would Labour thus be able to form a coalition with the SNP with Corbyn as PM? Or would the Tories try to form a coalition with the LibDems first? This is going to be a hung Parliament right?

[mormont]

Not likely, no.

Remember this is a first-past-the-post election, and in most seats Labour start from way back. Plus, the Labour gains are not coming from the Tories, who are also increasing their vote share from 2015. Even if that swing is uniform, and it likely isn't, and even if that poll is correct, and it may not be, Labour probably won't gain enough seats to form a coalition with the SNP, even if that were politically possible, which it isn't.  Neither party can form a coalition with the Lib Dems either, because Labour will have pinched almost all of their seats and the Tories will have pinched most of the rest, so they will be irrelevant.

The most likely outcome, if that polls is right, is a narrow Tory majority.

[Chaircat Meow]

2 hours ago, Dolorous Gabe said:

Oh please! The world has never been simple. The current government supplies arms to horrible regimes. Thatcher's government publicly supported General Pinochet and denounced Nelson Mandela.

Corbyn sees injustices in the world on both sides of a divide and wants to bring peace. You can't do that without a dialogue.

Corbyn and his coterie have a record of support for an organization attacking their own state and people. Consequently it is wildly irresponsible to grant them the highest offices in the land. Perhaps people committed to dialogue in the way Corbyn apparently is have their uses in Parliament or public discourse (big perhaps) but they certainly shouldn't be serving as PM or CotE.

[Fez]

Is it Labour or the Conservatives that usually wind up with a disproportionately large number of seats in England compared to their vote share because of how the constituency lines are drawn? I'm fairly certain I remember hearing once that one of them did, but I can't remember which.

[polishgenius]

Oh for fuck's sake. Corbyn may have met with the IRA, and he is in favour of a united Ireland (though not as much as he is in favour of self-determination), but those two things, even taken together, do not mean he supported the IRA! Unless you're suggesting (1) that nobody who thinks Ireland united might be a better thing can be loyal to Britain and (2) no conflict can ever be resolved except by the bloody death of everyone on one of the sides, branding Corbyn an enemy of the state for whatever role he had back then is fucking bonkers.

 

 

[Chaircat Meow]

12 minutes ago, polishgenius said:

Oh for fuck's sake. Corbyn may have met with the IRA, and he is in favour of a united Ireland (though not as much as he is in favour of self-determination), but those two things, even taken together, do not mean he supported the IRA! Unless you're suggesting (1) that nobody who thinks Ireland united might be a better thing can be loyal to Britain and (2) no conflict can ever be resolved except by the bloody death of everyone on one of the sides, branding Corbyn an enemy of the state for whatever role he had back then is fucking bonkers.

Corbyn was all over Sinn Fein and other Republican organizations in the UK. He even attended protests in favour of IRA terrorists. His colleagues, Abbott and Mcdonnell, are on record as saying they supported the IRA against the British state, because they viewed the war as part of a broader anti-imperialist struggle. Corbyn also supported Sinn Fein's line against early moves towards a settlement. So, yeah, Corbyn supported the IRA. Of course, he wrings his hands at bombings and so on, but he wanted Northern Ireland to be settled on the IRA's terms. He was a supporter.

[ljkeane]

Speaking of Ireland they're going to have their first openly gay Prime Minister.

[Dolorous Gabe]

2 hours ago, Chaircat Meow said:

Corbyn and his coterie have a record of support for an organization attacking their own state and people. Consequently it is wildly irresponsible to grant them the highest offices in the land. Perhaps people committed to dialogue in the way Corbyn apparently is have their uses in Parliament or public discourse (big perhaps) but they certainly shouldn't be serving as PM or CotE.

Let's take this line of thinking a bit further.

Let's say Corbyn was PM at the time in question. What exactly do you think he would have done? Joined in with the violence against the UK? Because it seems to me, a dialogue could in all likelihood have been opened up much sooner, an agreement could have been reached much sooner, and lives could have been spared.

[Chaircat Meow]

3 hours ago, Dolorous Gabe said:

Let's take this line of thinking a bit further.

Let's say Corbyn was PM at the time in question. What exactly do you think he would have done? Joined in with the violence against the UK? Because it seems to me, a dialogue could in all likelihood have been opened up much sooner, an agreement could have been reached much sooner, and lives could have been spared.

But on what terms do you think?

[mormont]

Returning to this millennium, I see 'magic money tree' is the new 'strong and stable government'.

[Dolorous Gabe]

1 hour ago, Chaircat Meow said:

But on what terms do you think?

Terms that would be worth the earlier ending of the troubles and the lives spared. But I guess from the question you feel differently.

[Hereward]

But those terms wouldn't have ended the Troubles and wouldn't have saved lives. Handing over Northern Ireland to the Republic (who didn't even want it and couldn't afford to take it)  would just have swapped a terrorist uprising by a community drawn from 33% of the population to a terrorist uprising drawn from 66% of the population, with a security force attempting to keep order that was 5% of the size.

Edit: And that's ignoring the fact that the IRA at the time were committed to revolution against the Irish government as well.

[Castel]

meh, nvm

[The Marquis de Leech]

14 hours ago, Fez said:

Is it Labour or the Conservatives that usually wind up with a disproportionately large number of seats in England compared to their vote share because of how the constituency lines are drawn? I'm fairly certain I remember hearing once that one of them did, but I can't remember which.

In recent times, the constituency lines benefit Labour, because safe Labour seats have much lower turnout than safe Conservative seats. This was particularly true in 2005, when the Tories got more votes in England, but ended up with fewer than 200 seats. Also, tactical anti-Tory voting between Liberal Democrats, Labour, and the nationalist parties helped screw the Tories out of seats they would otherwise have won.

This time round it's harder to say. If the Labour surge is primarily in safe Labour seats, they won't pick up much, while tactical voting matters much less in such a two-way contest.

[The Marquis de Leech]

15 hours ago, mormont said:

Not likely, no.

Remember this is a first-past-the-post election, and in most seats Labour start from way back. Plus, the Labour gains are not coming from the Tories, who are also increasing their vote share from 2015. Even if that swing is uniform, and it likely isn't, and even if that poll is correct, and it may not be, Labour probably won't gain enough seats to form a coalition with the SNP, even if that were politically possible, which it isn't.  Neither party can form a coalition with the Lib Dems either, because Labour will have pinched almost all of their seats and the Tories will have pinched most of the rest, so they will be irrelevant.

The most likely outcome, if that polls is right, is a narrow Tory majority.

Actually, the current narrow Tory majority is based off a 6.5% margin. If the Tories are less than 5% in front, that's a hung parliament on a uniform swing (never mind that the Tories doing much better in Scotland means the swing is bigger in England and Wales). Pinching Lib Dem seats is a bit moot, given how few of them there are.

If the Tories fall more than 10 short of a majority (i.e. the margin that can be made up with DUP support), a Labour minority government suddenly becomes possible. Not likely (at least not until Labour hits around 270 seats), but possible.