UK Politics: Spaffed up the wall while chuntering from a sedentary position

[Spockydog]

So, for the past two years, the Tories have been categorically denying that the NHS will be part of any post-Brexit trade deal with the US.

Oh dear.

 

[Spockydog]

 

 

[The Anti-Targ]

2 hours ago, Which Tyler said:

Entirely seperate from the previous points - this article is a couple of years old; but I've only just come across it - analysing the myth that conservatives are the fiscally responsible, whilst labour are fiscally untrustworthy (analysing stats for public borrowing, and payment of national debt since WWII):
http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2016/03/13/the-conservatives-have-been-the-biggest-borrowers-over-the-last-70-years/

So the lesson is therefore: talking about spending and then being financially responsible and not spending as much as people thought you would gets you fewer votes over the long term than talking about financial responsibility and then spending a lot more than people expected (though not necessarily on the things people want) while carrying on talking about how financially responsible you are.

[mormont]

Did this really come as a surprise to anyone?

'We made an extra effort and found the money for this after all' is a popular line. 'We underspent our budget' is not. 

[Heartofice]

3 hours ago, Spockydog said:

So, for the past two years, the Tories have been categorically denying that the NHS will be part of any post-Brexit trade deal with the US.

Oh dear.

 

Seems Corbyn is telling porkies here. Good deflection tactic from his disastrous interview 

[A Horse Named Stranger]

Not really.

Labour is overselling it as bombshell. It is clearly not the smoking gun Corbyn wishes it to be. However the content itself is hardly a surprise for anybody, who's paid some attention to it.

If the UK wants a FTA with the US, they will have to move towards the US (check lower food standards (aka chlorinated chicken), enviromental standards and social standards), and the NHS will very likely be part of the deal. Anybody who denies that is either disingenious, or willfully ignorant towards reality. So this comes down to who has more credibility. Johnson and his fellow leavers are obvious serial liars.

Part of me is looking forward to something, if the Tories were to win a majority and things go ahead and the great British sell off is going ahead, I am 100% convinced you will happily claim that all of that was public knowledge well before Brexit. But then again, it's not like you have ever been bothered with trivial stuff like honesty or logical consistency.

[williamjm]

9 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

They either know they've lost or won handily. So why go to any effort? They're not likely to be wrong about concluding they've already lost handily, but they might not have seen the way the wind if blowing within the electorate (looking instead at the national poll and just assuming that safe seat will fall into line) and might get surprised by imaging they already have a handy win.

There's also a third possibility that they realise nothing is going to scare aware potential voters more than a visit from Dominic Raab.

[A Horse Named Stranger]

15 minutes ago, williamjm said:

There's also a third possibility that they realise nothing is going to scare aware potential voters more than a visit from Dominic Raab.

Well, a visit from Rees-Twat might be scarier. Altho, that might be scarier for poor Jacob, seeing all those horseless carriages moving on the streets. Witchcraft.

[Jen'ari]

10 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

They either know they've lost or won handily. So why go to any effort? They're not likely to be wrong about concluding they've already lost handily, but they might not have seen the way the wind if blowing within the electorate (looking instead at the national poll and just assuming that safe seat will fall into line) and might get surprised by imaging they already have a handy win.

Sadly I think the latter is likely and he will win comfortably despite this area being very pro remain. I’ve made my mind up not to vote for him.

46 minutes ago, williamjm said:

There's also a third possibility that they realise nothing is going to scare aware potential voters more than a visit from Dominic Raab.

The image of Raab trying to interact with my toddler is slightly amusing, going by her recent antics I expect she would throw one of her soft toys at him .

[Chaircat Meow]

More tightening. Tory lead just in the danger zone, a 7 point lead could produce a hung Parliament. 

New @SavantaComRes poll for The Telegraph 

Con 41 (-1)

Lab 34 (+2)

LD 13 (-2)

BXP 5 (-)

Grn 2 (-) O 5 (-)

[Chaircat Meow]

Labour now up across 4 recent polls, so they are closing in. If ICM and ComRes are right a little extra push should be enough to finish off Johnson but other polls, such as Kantar, despite showing tightening still have the Tory lead large enough for them to withstand Corbyn squeezing Swinson and mobilising some undecideds (which is what seems to be happening). 

[mormont]

Seems like Labour are going to chase the Leave vote.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-2019-50580699

 

[Werthead]

On 11/26/2019 at 3:11 PM, mormont said:

As someone who does deal with the benefit system, the problem in the benefit system lies with a, the private companies given contracts (for example who assess claimants' disabilities) and b, the target-driven ethos imported from private enterprise in the mistaken belief that private enterprise knows best. It's these aspects of the benefits system, not the public service element, that cause the heartache you're talking about.

Put it another way - if you think bureaucracy apathetic to human suffering is a characteristic of the public sector, not private enterprise, you're sorely mistaken. 

One of the many reasons Universal Credit is a total shitshow is target culture (as with police and education as well). Each job centre has targets to get people off the system, because if someone is not claiming benefits they are assumed to be in work (which jacks up the government's figures). If they are behind on these targets, they will kick people off benefits for completely spurious reasons, knowing their benefits will be restored on appeal, because usually they can drag things out across the dividing point for the month, and the applicant's benefits getting restored the next month won't affect the previous month's figures, which will still benefit from showing that person is not claiming benefits.

It's turning human suffering into a game of numbers and stats. It is the purest example of Conservative politics in action.

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as opposed to Raab who hasn't made an effort whatsoever 

Few people are as great an example as Raab - except maybe Grayling - at how you can fail upwards, be completely useless at every job you were ever given, be terrible in public speaking, and still end up getting promoted.

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Entirely seperate from the previous points - this article is a couple of years old; but I've only just come across it - analysing the myth that conservatives are the fiscally responsible, whilst labour are fiscally untrustworthy (analysing stats for public borrowing, and payment of national debt since WWII):

The article is accurate, but it also fails to account for the fact that Conservative standards of financial success are based on them making tons of money for the already extremely wealthy elite, at the expense of the rest of society, and then blaming other people (immigrants, single mothers, benefits fraudsters, drug addicts etc). From that standpoint, they have been extraordinarily successful.

 

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Seems Corbyn is telling porkies here. Good deflection tactic from his disastrous interview 

 

Incorrect. US trade officials and Trump have confirmed that the NHS is on the table (as Trump even said, "Why wouldn't it be?" before backtracking). The only exaggeration in the story is that it is new information, when Dispatches turned it up in an investigation a couple of months ago.

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Part of me is looking forward to something, if the Tories were to win a majority and things go ahead and the great British sell off is going ahead, I am 100% convinced you will happily claim that all of that was public knowledge well before Brexit. But then again, it's not like you have ever been bothered with trivial stuff like honesty or logical consistency.

 

The fact that people are still prepared to vote Conservative after ten years of disastrous policies in rapid succession, economic stagnation, productivity decline and the titanic number of deaths caused by austerity policies and NHS budget tightening suggests a possible epidemic of cognitive dissonance.

One interesting point made recently is that a lot of governments chasing a third term in office would be crowing over their achievements (this was one of Labour's paths to success in 2001 and - much less convincingly - in 2005, but they could not replicate in 2010) as an electoral boon, but the Conservatives have pretty much been unable to do this.

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Labour now up across 4 recent polls, so they are closing in. If ICM and ComRes are right a little extra push should be enough to finish off Johnson but other polls, such as Kantar, despite showing tightening still have the Tory lead large enough for them to withstand Corbyn squeezing Swinson and mobilising some undecideds (which is what seems to be happening). 

 

The youth vote still seems to be being disregarded in polls, so it's unclear how that is going to affect things. The LibDem boost collapsing also seems to have taken both the Tories and Labour by surprise, forcing them to readjust their strategy. The LibDem "revoke" pledge seems to have backfired, whilst if they had stuck to their guns for a third referendum that may have been more successful. The LibDems also don't seem to have any headline non-Brexit pledges, which is the same mistake they made last time.

[Chaircat Meow]

4 hours ago, Werthead said:

The youth vote still seems to be being disregarded in polls, so it's unclear how that is going to affect things. The LibDem boost collapsing also seems to have taken both the Tories and Labour by surprise, forcing them to readjust their strategy. The LibDem "revoke" pledge seems to have backfired, whilst if they had stuck to their guns for a third referendum that may have been more successful. The LibDems also don't seem to have any headline non-Brexit pledges, which is the same mistake they made last time.

Is that right though? Not saying you're wrong but would appreciate any links to pollsters/academics arguing this. In 2017 people attributed Labour's surprising performance to a 'youth quake' but I think the jury is out as to whether that really explained that much. If by Da Yoof you mean students, or those of student-age, there are not that many as a proportion of the electorate; it is only the first three years in a voting career that can span 60 or more years. 

[A Horse Named Stranger]

5 hours ago, Werthead said:

Few people are as great an example as Raab - except maybe Grayling - at how you can fail upwards, be completely useless at every job you were ever given, be terrible in public speaking, and still end up getting promoted.

Still minor flaws. I mean their awfulness pales when compared to the saint of perverts. Christopher Chope, I am sorry, Sir Christopher Chope.

[The Anti-Targ]

I am still amazed at the notion that if the Conservative party have pretty much failed as a government since the 2017 election when they failed to get a majority that they will get more seats than they did in 2017 and possibly even a majority. That possibility must surely be the fault of the opposition parties failing to present themselves as a viable alternative government, and of course Labour in particular which is the only other party that can realistically present an image of the potential to gain an outright majority. If you add the assumption that a majority of the electorate wants remain, and a big majority are anti no-deal / hard Brexit, with a competent opposition the Conservatives should be facing a landslide loss.

[The Marquis de Leech]

29 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

I am still amazed at the notion that if the Conservative party have pretty much failed as a government since the 2017 election when they failed to get a majority that they will get more seats than they did in 2017 and possibly even a majority. That possibility must surely be the fault of the opposition parties failing to present themselves as a viable alternative government, and of course Labour in particular which is the only other party that can realistically present an image of the potential to gain an outright majority. If you add the assumption that a majority of the electorate wants remain, and a big majority are anti no-deal / hard Brexit, with a competent opposition the Conservatives should be facing a landslide loss.

Post-referendum polarisation, First Past the Post, and a unified Right (Farage has collapsed) versus a fragmented Left rather screws things.

Basically, Britain's degenerated into American-style Culture War at this point.

[Werthead]

44 minutes ago, The Marquis de Leech said:

Post-referendum polarisation, First Past the Post, and a unified Right (Farage has collapsed) versus a fragmented Left rather screws things.

This is reasonably accurate.

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Basically, Britain's degenerated into American-style Culture War at this point.

This isn't, though. There's been very long-running political-economic arguments in the UK over things like health and the economy which Brexit has thrown into sharper relief, but most of the American culture war issues (gay rights, abortion, guns, climate change scepticism) are totally non-existent as issues here, outside of very small lunatic fringes.

[BigFatCoward]

1 hour ago, The Anti-Targ said:

I am still amazed at the notion that if the Conservative party have pretty much failed as a government since the 2017 election when they failed to get a majority that they will get more seats than they did in 2017 and possibly even a majority. That possibility must surely be the fault of the opposition parties failing to present themselves as a viable alternative government, and of course Labour in particular which is the only other party that can realistically present an image of the potential to gain an outright majority. If you add the assumption that a majority of the electorate wants remain, and a big majority are anti no-deal / hard Brexit, with a competent opposition the Conservatives should be facing a landslide loss.

People hate Corbyn more than any politician in my lifetime. The stubborn fucker needs to fall on his sword for the good of the country. 

[The Anti-Targ]

52 minutes ago, The Marquis de Leech said:

Post-referendum polarisation, First Past the Post, and a unified Right (Farage has collapsed) versus a fragmented Left rather screws things.

 

I think these factors have some influence on what we're seeing. But there is simply no way the Cons should still be looking comfortable to be the biggest party in parliament by a decent margin based on their actual performance in govt over the last 2 years. And the reason they are likely to be the biggest party is down to the weakness of the alternatives.