Are these the scariest figures of all for Labour?
September 9th, 2008
Even without the “adjustments” things look awful
One of the nagging doubts at the back of my mind about the current Tory poll leads is that much of it could be down to modern polling techniques. Could it be, I’ve been asking myself as I work out how much to risk on the spread markets, that part of Labour’s deficits are down to the adjustments that pollsters make and not fundamental shifts of opinion?
The new polling techniques have not been tested in a situation like that we are seeing at the moment where there’s been such a swing away from Labour.
Take for instance the certainty to vote responses which have a huge impact on the final numbers - could they be hiding a mass of Labour support that would come back during the intensity of an election campaign? This is certainly the view and hope of Nick Palmer - the site’s most long-standing MP contributor.
Well there is one set of polling numbers that come out every month which tend not to get much attention. These are the “all naming a party” shares from Ipsos-MORI. Here, unlike all the other main pollsters there’s no weighting for past voting or party ID and the “certainty to vote” responses are not factored into the figures. The firm, of course, uses only the “100% certains” for its headline figures.
Over the years this MORI figure has almost always shown Labour in much better position than other pollsters. Only last February when Tory leads of upto 11% were being recorded the MORI “all naming a party” figure was showing an 8% Labour lead.
How things have changed dramatically in the past seven months. That 8% Labour lead has become a general election winning Tory lead of 14%. With an outcome like this on it is hard to find any comfort element for Brown and his team.
I believe that there was a step change just after Darling’s budget and since then all has looked gloomy. It’s becoming hard to argue that there will not be a significant Tory majority if not a landslide.
Mike Smithson
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No.
(standard response to any MS Question)
Another comforting factor (from my point of view) is that the the Conservative poll lead has been validated in the local elections and by-elections.
It’s real.
Personally I am surprised that the govt’s rating is as high as it is. In the current economic situation, who is going to go out of their way to sing the govt’s praises. If things stay as they are, on election day Labour has a problem. If they change, then there might be a chance.
The scariest figure is that of our Prime Minister
He is looming over our political landscape surrounded by black clouds and the stench of decay
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/nickrobinson/2008/09/shock_news.html
Even his relaunch article needs to be clarified.
The figures in this article must add to the air of panic. I wish I could see some sort of resolution coming. June 2010 is a long way off
They will no doubt get worse.
Hands up all those who think the economy is getting better?
As we endure at least another 6 months minimum of redundancies, Labour’s financial mismanagement is going to become increasingly more painful.
If the slowdown lasts 12 months, ditto
Some of the economic forecasts I read suggest 5 years plus of low world economic growth. (or 10)
If so it’s all going to be very painful…
3 - People stick with Governments in hard times if they think that they are better-equipped than their rivals to deal with those hard times. Why else did John Major win in 1992? Labour certainly has problems with the economy, but its true problems lie in an aura of incompetence, a lack of charm and a sense that its political seam has been exhausted.
On topic, these figures are pretty bad for Labour. What is scarier for Labour is that they represent part of a well-established trend rather than one month’s bad figures.
Actually, no. The scariest stat is the level of Labour support, not the Conservative’s mid-40s. Scotland’s proven that people are actively anti-Labour… in Labour heartlands. A pro-Tory electorate means Labour loses an election. Vehemently anti-Labour feeling could be much worse.
Here’s a nice summary of how the Palin pick has paid unexpected dividends for the McCain campaign as a result of the bungled reaction by Obama and his surrogates and supporters:
http://www.nypost.com/seven/09092008/postopinion/opedcolumnists/how_obama_blew_it_128132.htm
Given Obama’s comments at a Michigan campaign stop, it appears that he still hasn’t figured out quite what to do about her. The best thing he could do is to just stop talking about her, the way the GOP isn’t talking about Biden anymore.
From last thread
Ed
Let me add some insight. I volunteer at a needby secondary. They, like most schools, apply for any funding they can get. The money is always ring fenced.
They won a grant. Its got a nice new dance studio [it looks just like a hall]. The builders banged and hammered it up two years ago - during exam time.
This is in addition to the gym, the sports hall, the main hall and the dining hall.
The school had six dance pupils the first year. Three this.
They are making teachers redundant.
I re-read a one line history of 1974-79..
http://www.bized.co.uk/dataserv/chron/kf5579.htm#1974
I recall living through it.
Some things are very different.. others like the attempts to kickstart housing sound familiar…
8 SaS. Obama may not have to do too much if stories like this gain traction :
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/09/08/AR2008090803088.html?hpid=topnews
11. A bit thin really Jack…
To Dan. From the last thread.
Give the money to the schools and let them decide their own priories rather than using the money to fit with Ballsian spin.
Sorry. Back on thread. Bearing in mind how many more people are now in ‘natural’ Labour territory as they are either public sector employees or dependent on some sort of benefit/credit, the figures are horrendous.
9. are you objecting to underfunding of teachers, the way that dance as a subject is promoted, or this particular school’s mismanagement? or all three?
OT: Fraser Nelson accused of racism by Johann Hari.
In other news, Johann Hari accused by Morris Dancer being a pillock.
er, Morris Dancer of being a pillock*. Whoops
12. A bit thin?
If a Labour politician did this, you’d call it fraud. Which it more or less is, though it looks like the legal niceties may put Palin in the clear.
13
being a public sector worker is Ok until your pay rises 2% when inflation rises 5%.
Happens every time at the end of Labour administrations… see 1977 - 79 as above.
When labour have to raise taxes and cut public employment is when the problems start.
If it is an 18-36 month recession, then late 2009 by my estimates…
Inflation is of course falling but sterling is falling hard as well..£1 =$1.766 today .
11- This sounds like a potential scandal until you read the article and discover that what she did is within the bounds of state reimbursement rules, and in fact she could have claimed even more reimbursements if she had wanted to. One wonders why this article was even written…
14 Ed. We all know to whom Sally C is objecting. She is a RoboTory in extremis. All problems in the known universe gets attributed to her political foe.
9 SallyC - You’ve put your finger on the problem. It’s not only that Labour throw our money around; it’s also the fact that they try to micro-manage, from the centre, what it is spent on. The result? Massive misallocation of resources, and an education system which is actually worse than when they came to power, despite the huge increase in spending. The same is true (though perhaps to a lesser extent) in the NHS. I’ve also seen the same kind of thing in Local Government, and I’m sure it’s the same in all areas of government spending.
The conclusion must be that there are big savings to be made in public expenditure. However, Cameron and Osborne are quite correct to be very, very cautious on this, because it will take a long time to sort out the mess and restore a culture of sensible scrutiny of spending.
15 - Is this the Johann Hari who seems to have gone straight from school to being a comment writer without gaining any experience in the interim on which to base his commentary?
There are lots of things bandied about on partisan themes
One of my favourites was why the governor of Arkansas had more “foreign policy experience” than the governor of Texas/Alaska.
Being some sort of ganj-addled stoo-dent in the UK in the late 60s doesn’t really give anyone foreign policy “experience”.
Jacky Boy:
Gov. Palin has spent far less on her personal travel than her predecessor: $93,000 on airfare in 2007, compared with $463,000 spent the year before by her predecessor, Frank Murkowski. He traveled often in an executive jet that Palin called an extravagance during her campaign. She sold it after she was sworn into office.
12 TGoHF. I see the add …. Gloomy mood music
“When you’re paying four bucks for gas and struggling with the cost of food and utilities ….”
“When you’re finding it tough to pay the mortgage or send the kids to college ….”
“When you’re wondering how to pay for health insurance or the hospital bills ….”
“Sarah Palin isn’t …. she can stay at home and charge the taxpayer hundreds of thousands of dollars for the privilege.”
I am Jack W and I approve this message.
11 Don’t think that will hurt her. The expenses are not unusal.
“Gov. Palin has spent far less on her personal travel than her predecessor: $93,000 on airfare in 2007, compared with $463,000 spent the year before by her predecessor.”
22-Being a sexual minoprity gives him the right to bypass having had any kind of “experience”.
23 - Well, at least he’d spent time outside the US, unlike (until very recently) Gov. Palin
But I agree that the article quoted at 11 doesn’t amount to a hill of beans, as I think the phrase goes.
25. Should be tens of thousands of dollars !!
22, unless the champagne socialists are breeding, and there’s another one.
18. Back in 1979 even the luvvies voted against Labour, as did many, many trade unionists. I can see the same thing happening now. Disaffected Tories are coming out of the woodwork after years of refusing to vote, while Labour’s bedrock supporters are completely demoralised or alienated. Even the chippy yobs of genus Campbell-Whelan-Draper.
All the ingredients are in place for a landslide that will put the 1979 swing in the shade, given the social changes we have seen since then.
Yes - our own speaker has hosed far more up against the wall and yet his party was re-elected in 2005.
Non-illegal expenses stories are pretty thin.
18
Gordo is hoppoiung against hope inflation will fall. but that doesnt solve any problems as the costs of the weekly shop wont go down from where it is now, it will just increase less quickly. People will still be suffereng.
I have been meaning to ask someone clever on PB about the term recession. If inflation is 5% and the economy grew by 0% doesnt that mean we are in recession anyway and have been for some while….
Stevens now ahead of Begich 46-44 in the Alaska senate race. Palin has strange coattails indeed.
And Reverend Wright is involved in another scandal. Unlikely to hurt Obama much now, but cannot be good.
http://www.nypost.com/seven/09092008/news/nationalnews/o_pastor_in_sex_scandal_128142.htm
21, You accuse Labour of micromanaging from the centre, but in the example that Sally cites, it’s her school who’s chosen to bid for a facility that isn’t being used, not the government forcing one down their throat. If you empower schools to make their own decisions, inevitably not all of them will be good ones.
What about all the schools who’ve had new facilities that *are* being used? Sorry, good news is no news…
I remember a few things about teacher redundancies as well…
33-Normally growth is couched round “real” growth which is nominal growth less the GDP deflator (similar to inflation). So if GDP last year was, £1000, zero growth would mean this year it is £1050 assuming a GDP deflator of 5%. Or, indeed, £1000 in last year’s money.
Clear as mud.
Compare and contrast - Darling has to get up on stage and face the TUC live on tv.
Brown addressess Union bosses the next night at a “private dinner”
His courage knows no bounds..
35. Yes - there weren’t nearly enough. All the NUT members should have got the boot for a start - that alone would have done wonders for standards.
Darling just falling back on the “tories were sh1t in the 1980’s” pathetic
34-This was supposed to be (per Demmiecrat blogs) an almost certain pick up. Wonder if Palin will help Young (preusmably) in the congressional seat too?
O/T-At least this time round though the Demmiecrats will carry both thier home states. Last done in 1996 I believe. Hope it isn’t an indication they will win!
34- When you’re from an oft-ignored state such as Alaska (many polling firms don’t even call Alaskans and Hawaiians for national polls, arguing that their opposite political slants basically cancel each other out!), it’s a pretty intoxicating experience to have one of your own running for national office and bringing much attention to the state. It won’t surprise me if the wave of excitement swells GOP numbers enough to save Stevens. Indeed, this is probably the only sort of thing that could save him.
38, here’s that difference between Cameron and his party again… the nasty party is alive and well!
Darling “we have lowered debt to the lowest levels of any industrial countries” what planet does he live on. a total lie. we are as bust as we have ever been. PFI, unfunded pensions and 60bn+ a year PSBR…….. still i dont suppose the union muppets understand economics
35 - No, that’t not correct. Any organisation (or any company department for that matter) will always accept ‘free’ money. So if the school is told it can bid for a dance hall, why wouldn’t it? It might prefer to spend the money on something else, but it isn’t given the option. You seem to be suggesting that they should turn down the money, but no-one behaves like that. Nor should they, from their point of view.
I’ve seen this in Local Government. The first question which gets asked when any proposal is made is ‘Can we get a grant for it?’ If the answer is yes, they’ll try for it. The merits of the proposal hardly matter. And this is quite rational, given the fact that they have so little discretion.
42 The Nasty Party’s in government.
In fairness, any successful political party has to be at least a bit nasty.
Former Scottish First Minister Henry McLeish supports the establishment of a devolved English Parliament:
The Liberal Democrats received a boost when former Labour first minister Henry McLeish also came out in favour of a federal system for the UK.
He wants Scotland to have more tax raising powers and said that there should be an equivalent English parliament to Holyrood.
http://news.scotsman.com/politics/Lib-Dems-want-Holyrood-to.4467192.jp
Despite what The Scotsman says, McLeish is not supporting the Lib Dem proposals for breaking up England into regions. He wants to see a proper parliament for the whole of England.
43, PSBR?
You missed off the Rock.
33, “hoppoiung”?
42. Actually the Tories aren’t nearly nasty enough for me - I was thinking of joining New Labour.
Darling receives a 4-second sitting ovation!!
44/35 - I should add that you say “If you empower schools to make their own decisions, inevitably not all of them will be good ones.” But the problem is precisely the opposite. Because the money is ring-fenced, they have NOT been empowered to make their own decisions.
25. TGoHF – please explain what this initialism stands for!
33. Growth figures take inflation into account. Otherwise we’d have been in recession for erm… many years.
46. The Lib Dems have said this? Surely that just about wraps it up for the Union
33. To be fair, 12 months from now, things will probably be less uncomfortable economically than they are now. Inflation will have fallen (due to falling commodity prices), house prices will be 10-15% lower than now, but probably no longer falling, interest rates will be lower, and the economy will probably have stopped contracting. But, it’s unlikely people will feel any better disposed to the government.
49, indeed. What could be nastier than proposing to fine the recently bereaved for forgetting to post their deceased’s ID card to the Home Office?
52. My moniker.
44 Richard - You should know that it’s much easier to get money o one-off capital projects (school hall) than for recurring revenue costs (salaries). The reasons are pretty obvious.
44, Schools do not just get told to ‘bid for a dance hall’. Schools are certainly encouraged to develop a specialism, but it’s up to them to decide what it is. Many schools have done this very successfully.
57 money for….
I really must get a new keyboard.
36. yes, and if you believe all the “inflation figures underestimate inflation” stuff, then in fact growth is then negative.
but going beyond the pure technicalities, “real” recessions aren’t really judged on growth anyway - if you suddenly feel like you have less money, prices are going up, your job is less secure, your house is worth less, local shops are going out of business, everyone is talking about recessions - you’re in recession.
‘Battle lines drawn over plans to shake up the political map’
Changes proposed by the Boundary Commission would see a drastic reshuffling of [Edinburgh]’s seats for the next Scottish Parliament elections in 2011. But Labour and the Tories – the two parties most likely to lose out in the shake-up – are objecting to some of the key proposals.
The changes would make it almost impossible for Labour’s Sarah Boyack to hold on to Edinburgh Central, while Tory David McLetchie would struggle to keep South-West.
http://news.scotsman.com/politics/Battle-lines-drawn-over-plans.4471321.jp
O/T Snowflake fans (see link right) will enjoy the latest hymn from the bunker
” No future Tory will be able to match the Labour government’s record on reducing tax for ordinary people. Tories won’t be able to match Labour’s record on eleven consecutive years of growth either. Nor on improving public services.”
42. it isn’t hard to find examples on these threads - although i question whether any ‘representative’ Cons comment on here
57 - True, but that isn’t the point I was making. I was referring to the ring-fencing of classes of capital expenditure. For example, local schools where I live (and I expect elsewhere) were given grants to buy electonic whiteboards, and only electronic whiteboards. Barmy.
51. yes i preferred the days when schools were empowered to sell off their playing fields to make ends meet.
62, Eleven years? Snowflake is too modest. It’s more like 13 and a half, of which the first 10 quarters were under a Conservative government, and the next few years under Conservative spending plans (copied by Labour in 1997).
Indeed, it’s only since Brown tried thinking for himself that he buggered everything up.
38-”A future Conservative administration will introduce into law the right of any employer to terminate the employment of any trade union member.”
If only! Sensibel policies for a better Britain!
66 In fact, it’s about 16 years of growth. The Conservatives are right not to boast that they’ll achieve 11 successive years of growth, because they’ll inherit an economy in worse shape than the one they passed onto Labour in 1997.
64 Yeah, but if it’s not ring-fenced it winds up being spent on a Statue of Nelson Mandela. You know the problem. It’s easier stated than solved.
54. And remember once house prices turn and start rising, they’ll rise sharply, particularly in London and the SE. Not that will prevent a monumental election defeat for Labour however, but at least might make the job a little easier for your lot when they come in. I’m not one of those that wishes hardship on Tory Governments, as I fail to see how that does me any good as a UK citizen!
Darling has just announced that “our last quarter of growth was flat”. We also have hysterically low inflation (I think that’s what he said, I was still laughing at the time).
69. That’s surely a much bigger risk if the government controls the money, isn’t it? Especially this one.
65 I preferred the days when despite selling off playing fields to make ends meet pupils ended up literate after their education
70 If the past is any guide, house prices will go nowhere for about 4 years after touching bottom, (which is a good thing, as they gradually become more affordable, and the volume of transactions picks up) before starting to rise again.
“Political Wire” has advance notice of two Strategic Vision polls due for release tomorrow :
Wisconsin
McCain 43% .. Obama 46%
Michigan
McCain 44% .. Obama 45%
Note - No details of sampling dates.
http://politicalwire.com/archives/2008/09/09/strategic_vision_michigan_wisconsin_very_close.html
65 ed “i preferred the days when schools were empowered to sell off their playing fields to make ends meet.”
Like Labour-controlled Councils:
http://www.hucknalldispatch.co.uk/hucknall/Fight-to-save-Wigwam-is.4013993.jp
Benedict Brogan on Ed eats while David flannels
Must admit that thanks to Benedict drawing attention to David’s brother Ed tucking into the buffet I never really paid any attention to Dave’s facial expressions. Wonder what Ed and the bobby were talking about?
Sam Coates at the Red Box reports that Union leader calls Brown “crackpot”
“We are now facing a winter of fear for ordinary families. Fear of the cold. Fear of the fuel bills. Fear for their jobs and even their homes. This can’t be addressed by ‘lagging the loft’ as some crackpot has suggested.”
71 - I preferred him when he was doing his Private Fraser. At least it was more plausible.
73, do you have any actual evidence that kids these days are less literate and educated than their forebears? Or is it something you think that if you repeat often enough, people will believe you? I know more people of my parents’ generation who are functionally illiterate than I do younger people.
69 “Yeah, but if it’s not ring-fenced it winds up being spent on a Statue of Nelson Mandela.”
Not if parents have any choice about where their children go to school, bringing the funding with them. So, by an inexorable logic, we’re back to the excellent Conservative proposals on education. (I think we’ve already covered this on a previous thread…)
80 LOL! Maybe, Richard…
75 - When’s today’s Gallup tracker due? Usually out by now, isn’t it? I need my fix…..
73. The literacy of most kids has always been poor. Something the Tories conveniently forget. Whereas a generation ago many lef school told they were ‘uneducatable’ now everyone is expected to read and write adequately.
Something the grammar/public school educated Tories don’t realise/conveniently forget.
81 - Anyway, PtP, I thought you were the arch-capitalist, making money by using your superior expertise to exploit less privileged mugs in the political betting markets? [I'd do a Martin-Day style smiley if I knew how]
59. Me too.
73. No he doesn’t because there isn’t any evidence. In fact, literacy and numeracy rates have risen steadily over time. Some people like to believe in a Golden Age that never existed. In that age there were no paedophiles, no crimes, and everyone was happy.
74. Chronic undersupply, now being exacerbated because builders have downed tools, should cause a sharp spike this time Sean.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/2008/sep/06/houseprices.housingmarket
79.”73, do you have any actual evidence that kids these days are less literate and educated than their forebears?”
How about listening to the Universities and Companies who have pointed out the noticeable decline in literacy, with exam results for them becoming more meaningless. For gods sake, they have a whole new language for texting and chatting online!
82. Don’t know. Does anyone remember what Ramussen Tracker numbers were yesterday? I can’t find them anywhere.
79 Nothing beyond anecdote I’m afraid, such as all the reports of universities having to teach remedial lessons to freshers that they didn’t use to. I’m fairly sure functional illiteracy is increasing (though I don’t know how old your parents are, and it may well be possible that literacy was even worse back whenever)
Presumably you subscribe to the view that because GCSE passrates are 103% everything must be getting better, children are more intelligent and teachers are better than ever before?
83.”Something the Tories conveniently forget. Whereas a generation ago many lef school told they were ‘uneducatable’ now everyone is expected to read and write adequately.”
Are you really trying to say that education standards have improved rather than declined in the last 10 years? What do you believe, government statistics which do not recognise if the exams are easier or harder than previous generations, or Universities and the companies expected to employ this generation?
Nice line in Hillary’s speech (post 300 on the last thread): “Anybody who believes that the Republicans, whoever they are, can fix the mess they created probably believes that the iceberg could have saved the Titanic.”
weathercock was saying the other day that he thought Obama’s campaign would quietly dump her now the convention is over - not so. Whatever her motives (and I expect they’re mixed - do any of us know absolutely what motivates us?) she’s proving a real asset to the campaign.
To respond to antifrank’s suggestion on Labour’s approach - I think it depends on whether Cameron is widely considered to have come out with concrete plans at their convention. If yes, then we attack the plans. If no, then we attack the vapidity. I wouldn’t go too hard in either direction before then, just point out that they’re at present floating one trial balloon after another.
Channel 4’s Factcheck has tried to assess whether the Tory plans are unfunded, but is stumped as it can’t find out either any firm commitments or whether they’ll be funded: http://tinyurl.com/5vfapb
Good news Jack! My man has the better strategy.
Seriously, I believe this election will prove to be as close as 2000. At this stage either candidate can win. But I’m willing to bet that the Palin factor, will prove a winning master stroke by McCain:
http://www.gallup.com/poll/110137/McCain-Now-Winning-Majority-Independents.aspx
Literacy — working with very bright, technical people who can certainly read suggests that during the 80s and 90s schools decided that teaching writing, spelling and even speaking standard English was racist (or classist or something).
Still, it keeps the good jobs safe for the middle class kids.
91 I’d have thought after the Crewe by-election bribe and the more recent stamp duty changes Labour would want to avoid talking about unfunded commitments!
91. “Convention”? Less of the Americanisms please!
86 - According to Michael Gove’s briefings, in the most recent PISA surveys – the international league tables of school performance – Britain fell from 4th to 14th in science, 7th to 17th in literacy, 8th to 24th in maths.
94 Indeed. Add Northern Rock Nationalisation to the list…
91 Well we know that Labour’s spending is unfunded Nick, Whats the actual debt if you include the off balance sheet items PFI etc etc. Gordon’s addiction to spending is why we are in the mess we are now. Dont try spin Nick, its seen through faster than you can type it.
91 NickP “Channel 4’s Factcheck has tried to assess whether the Tory plans are unfunded, but is stumped as it can’t find out either any firm commitments or whether they’ll be funded”
Can you point us to the equivalent firm commitments by Labour, for the period 2010 onwards?
84 Nothing particularly capitalistic about separating mugs from their money, Richard. Greed is universal, mon vieux!
Smileys are easy - colon, dash, closed bracket.
If you make the colon a semi-colon, it becomes a wink.
88. McCain 48 Obama 47
Full series back to June here:
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/election_20082/2008_presidential_election/general_election_match_up_history
97
Yup, I ommited the 2.7 billion bribe to get Gordo out of a hole when he denied anyone would be worse off after the 10p tax debacle.
96. Relative to other countries. As the UK has a literacy rate of 99 per cent (CIA), one of the highest in the Western World, I doubt it had a higher rate, say, in 1950. And we have the highest level of book readership in the EU as I recall. The grass always looks greener, over space or time. But actually, it’s not.
91, “If yes, then we attack the plans.” Presumably code for “Steal and alter veeery slightly.”
As for Tory plans being unfunded, I refer you to the £2.7bn failed bribe for C&N and angry backbenchers over the 10p tax fiasco.
91. Nick. Obama is due to meet with Bill on Thursday; can it be that Obama is trying to get Hillary off his back?
Seriously, I did think that the Obama team would let Hillary go quietly after the convention. The reason I was wrong is because of the Sarah Palin Success, and they have had to throw Hillary into the breach, having no other top flight female Dem, except perhaps Pelosi. And who would use a a crude spaker like her to counter the Palin effect?
‘Local income tax: ‘The issue will dominate the by-election”
“Should Calman, like the Steel Commission, come out on favour of greater, or even total fiscal autonomy for Scotland, the potential for the SNP to drive more wedges between Holyrood and Westminster will increase greatly.
Were Holyrood ever to win full tax-raising powers, in reality it would put the country a hair’s breadth away from virtual independence. And a YouGov poll published yesterday, which showed that many more Scots would vote for independence if the Tories win power in Westminster, illustrates just how close this is to becoming to reality.”
http://news.scotsman.com/opinion/Local-income-tax-39The-issue.4471306.jp
11. Again, Jack, I feel that this must be re-iterated: it is where a lot of Democratic members, supporters, bloggers and activists are going wrong:
.. John McCain is the GOP candidate for POTUS. Not Sarah Palin.
101. Thanks. So Day 3 (the latest) of the tracker must have Barry ahead I guess.
103 benbobjim - In which case, why has so much money been spent? You can’t have it both ways. The priorities in 1997 were said to be ‘Education, Education, Education’. To be fair to Labour, they did indeed try to follow up on this by pouring in money. Huge amounts of money. And the results are, what exactly? Other countries, which haven’t increased spending so dramatically, have done better.
The most damning fact is that, despite all the money spent and all the pressure put on universities to tilt admissions policy in favour of state-school children, the proportion of pupils from state schools getting into the top universities has actually fallen since 1997.
It hasn’t worked, either for the academically able or the less able. Labour has failed, on its own top priority.
45.
“The Nasty Party’s in government.”
The cheap plastic imitation nasty party is in government. What we need is David Cameron’s real thing to teach the people of England how to be true masochists once more!
OT: Betfair have settled my Hamilton back (4/1) and apparently I lost. Bloody outrage. I’d managed to get all green for both Raikonnen and Hamilton, one crashes (bad luck, but that’s how it goes) and then the bloody stewards steal Hamilton’s win.
Brown is hopeless as PM - How can Labour MP’s support such a cretin as leader?
Anybody who believes that that Gordon Brown and Labour, can fix the mess they created probably believes that the iceberg could have saved the Titanic.
Maybe Nick Palmer MP believes the iceberg saved the titanic?
Brown is hopeless as PM - How can Labour MP’s support such a cretin as leader?
Anybody who believes that Gordon Brown and Labour, can fix the mess they created probably believes that the iceberg could have saved the Titanic.
Maybe Nick Palmer MP believes the iceberg saved the titanic?
NP 4 PM! Has a kind of ring about it! Nick might save Labour yet!
105- You’re right, Hillary is no fool and she doesn’t do a favor for nothing in return. I’d guess that Obama knows he needs Hillary right now more than she needs him, so she’s probably been promised whatever it is that Obama can promise her, perhaps even a promise that he’ll support her next time around if he doesn’t make it this time. Since nobody else could do what Hillary is doing now (including, as you mentioned, Pelosi), the price must be steep.
103. Better buildings, better wages for teachers more books, better play equipment. I went into a school the other day and I was astounded. And all my teacher friends say the whole environment has got better. I had a wooden desk with graffiti all over it and books that were falling apart. I don’t know, I just think it’s better to have a decent environment for pupils and teachers. As for the unis, why don’t you ask them why they favour private school kids?
On results, the Government can’t win. If GCSE A-Level rates rise, everyone accuses them of getting easier. Yet there’s no robust evidence at all that they have done.
What price Nick Palmer retires and doesn’t answer the questions put to him, as has so often happened in the past.
92. We’re certainly not in 40+ state blowout territory (as some thought possible earlier this year).
Thoughts on some of the state polls - the GOP must be absolutely delighted that the latest Rasmussen puts McCain ahead by 7% in Ohio; of course, it’s just one poll in a fairly good few days for McCain, but if he’s winning the ‘Bellweather’ state so handily according to this data, this will energise the campaign.
My guess is they’ll be pretty pleased with the Michigan figures up thread, and the PA figures which show Obama only leading by a couple of points, too (though I strongly doubt the latter will switch, and the former will only come into real contention if McCain really keeps up the momentum IMHO).
Team McCain must be worried about Colorado (Obama +3), and Florida (dead even). I think at present they’ll take the McCain +2 in Virginia. McCain *should* win Florida, but as others have said on this thread, Biden may be helping Obama there. It’s clear McCain has to dig in and hold on there, though like PA I doubt it will switch on election day. Would love to see some more polls from Nevada, New Hampshire and New Mexico, in particular.
At present - Obama still sitting fairly nicely in the electoral college (if he can win Colorado, New Mexico, Iowa and the Kerry states he’s in the White House), but cause for concern with the Ohio figures and evidence that McCain may be inching in on Wisconsin and Michigan - if he goes ahead in either of those states, I’d give him the advantage.
An Assignation? No, Dinner!
I am enjoying sky’s Jon Craig blogging from the TUC conference, he got an invite to dinner from Tom Watson…
“And so I was escorted by Tom and a clutch of MPs, union officials and “the usual suspects” to a windowless private dining room in the basement of the Hotel Du Vin. The group included Dick Caborn, the former Sports Minister, Brian Wilson, the ex-MP and former Government Minister, Charlie Whelan, a few special advisers to Cabinet ministers and Tom’s father-in-law, Paul Corby, an extrovert with a handlebar moustache and immaculate suits and silk handkerchiefs that make him the best dressed man at the TUC.”
117. Nick would probably blaim on Tory sabotage and the ballest of the ice berg helped keep the titanic afloat saving hundreds of lives for a few hours longer!
I do find Nick Pamler’s fondness for the Clintons baffling. To me they come across as self-obsessed, self-interested and particularly in Hilary’s case, wholly insincere (rather like the Blairs - no wonder they are such good friends). It’s not even as if Bill was a very progressive President.
I have just been wathching a CNN report on Sarah Palin - if she was in UK she would be locked up - she is BARKING!!!!
I dont understand Americans. I just dont.
117. Nick would probably put the blame on Tory sabotage and the ballest of the ice berg helped keep the titanic afloat saving hundreds of lives for a few hours longer!
121. That should be Palmer. I don’t know who Nick Pamler is.
116 They favour private school pupils because they put in better applications, and get better results. THe gap is increasing, because state schools are getting worse relative to private schools.
A decent environment is nice as a secondary priority.
They are getting easier by any measurement. Any time current pupils are given old exams they get nowhere.
Do you really think that todays children are actually significantly more intelligent than they were 10, 20 or 30 years ago? Does evolution work that quickly? The exam results go up every year without fail. (I’ll admit that some small part of the increase may be due to teaching to the tests, though that doesn’t really improve education as a whole)
Apart from anything else, there is absolutely no point in an exam that everyone passes - they are only useful as discriminators between the more and less able.
121. I think the Clintons remind Third Way ‘centre-left’ parties of the heady days of the 1990s when they were widely praised and fairly popular.
The Independent’s Open House blog has this story from Jane Merrick on Unite divided.
“There is not much sign of unity inside Unite’s TUC bunker at the Grand Hotel, Brighton.
My source in the corridor reports hearing shouts and screams coming from the suite occupied by Britain’s super-union.
Since the weekend, the main topic of conversation in the bars has been Unite joint leader Derek Simpson’s four-letter tirade against David Miliband. The Foreign Secretary, Simpson reportedly claimed, was an “arrogant s***”. The finger of blame was pointed at Charlie Whelan, Unite’s political secretary and five-star Brownite, so there are no prizes for guessing that the shouting on Sunday night was directed at him.
The message before the TUC conference was supposed to be one of unity in the Labour Party - part of an attempt to extract more from Gordon Brown. So many officials are cross that the outburst has had the opposite effect. Whelan, said to be unpopular among Unite officials, who question whether he is working for the Prime Minister or the union, was noticeably in a foul mood all day on Monday.”
121. Clinton and uptil this year his wife were and are seen as winners! I have no doubt that if Nick has a picture of him meeting Clinton, it will be in pride of place in a gold frame - might even by signed. Nick probably has one of Tony too! The one of Brown is only ever displayed when one of Brown’s fixes visits him!
Today’s Gallup unchanged - McCain still leads 49-44.
http://www.gallup.com/poll/110143/Gallup-Daily-McCain-Maintains-5Point-Lead.aspx
91- Hillary has really grown over the years into a sort of formidable politician I wouldn’t have thought her capable of back in 2000 when she started her solo political career. She is able to be funny and even endearing while delivering a blow, which is far removed from the Hillary of 1992 who was angry that people might see her as Tammy Wynette standing by her man and baking cookies. Somehow, I just can’t see Obama delivering that same line and actually evoking laughter. He just isn’t a funny guy, which is unfortunate for someone who is in need of something to take the edge off of his aloof seriousness.
119 “private dining room in the basement of the Hotel Du Vin”
The Hotel du Vin in Brighton was described by one newspaper as ‘the ideal place to take your mistress for the weekend’. I haven’t had occasion to put this advice to the test, but it is a nice place.
Fox:
Gallup Poll:
Obama 44
McCain 49
130. Obama is terrible at anything other than speeches. This is the point I have been making for a while - He can do the big occasions but cannot do “human with the folks”. Ironically Obaam needs to do human with the folks to do the big occasions as POTUS.
Obama reminds me of this pompus tw*t I used to see around London in Camden, hampstead or Finchley road IIRC - He was a charity collector and had this big Black folder like this is your life! When i said i was a student he was really very off - handed with me - This bloke looked like obama as well. It was about ten years ago.
I told him to F*ck off the next time he tried collaring me as I found him that patronising!
122- I hope Palin doesn’t have any UK travel plans coming up in the next week or so. With the 42 days’ detention at his disposal, Brown could keep her locked up in the Tower of London without bringing charges almost until election day!
12 - There is a wealth of information coming out about how much Palin has lied about her record, earmarks, bridge to nowhere, pork barrel projects etc. All lies. The line on this is an excellent one from the campaign ‘these people think you’re stupid’, that resonates with people who feel they have been left behind throughout the Bush presidency.
On polling we now have two trackers showing exactly the opposite, Obama will have been ahead yesterday by 3/5% for Rasmussen (likely voter) and McCain ahead by the same in Gallup (registered voters).
It could be that the likely voters numbers are not including people enthused by McCain/Palin enough to definitely vote as yet.
@129/132:
It’s good to see McCain sustaining poll leads finally.
Obama deserves some punishment for his lacklustre campaign.
MUST TRY HARDER.
@135:
And yet, even though she’s demon spawn reincarnate, she’s beating your man hands down.
That’s gotta sting, eh?
135. It seems to me that McCain has out - bounced obama! How do you feel about that?
As it happens, it’s Democrats who *think* the electorate are stupid. Republicans *believe* it.
There’s an important difference of emphasis there.
130. Forgive the fairly long and rambly post, but here’s my take on why Obama (at present) isn’t doing as well as he *should* be.
I think the US likes its Presidents to have a certain down-to-earth, folksy charm; the guy you trust is the guy you’d have a beer with or invite to your barbecue. There is a mistrust of the more aloof intellectuals who, despite being very capable politicians and political thinkers, are seen as being unable to get into the heads of the populace and talk to them on their level.
Let’s take the Presidential elections since 1976 (largely because they’re the ones I’m acquainted with the most). In nearly each and every one of those I’d argue that the seemingly less intellectual and more down-to-earth man has won. Perhaps with the exception of Carter, although being a peanut farmer from Georgia could be considered to be pretty humble and down-to-earth, if unspectacular; plus this was in the wake of the Nixon pardon.
Reagan walked all over Carter and Mondale in the ability to empathise with the voter; and Bush, despite not having much of this quality, had it much more than Dukakis. Clinton had it in shedloads and beat Bush in 1992, and Dole in 1996; Bush II (despite being a pretty dire politician), appeared more down-to-earth and your average guy than either Gore or Kerry.
So I honestly do believe there’s something in it; the more personable and down to earth you are the more I think a lot of average Americans will consider voting for you. Obama is a very talented politician; immistakeably academic and intelligent; and has a soaring rhetoric; but in a year where the Democrats *should* be looking for that 40+ state blowout he just isn’t cutting it. I’d argue that this is partially because McCain is more reminiscent of the kind old grandfather - he seems more ‘down to earth.’ (though nothing like on the level Clinton managed).
I think the Americans like their President to be a pretty average sort of guy. Obama clearly isn’t, and that’s why he’s being tested.
137. Martin, You might be putting yourself at risk to Labour’s minor abuse laws displaying images of children on your link. Just thought i better say as they might ferret you off to jail!
141. It is a painted picture not an image!
“John McCain is the GOP candidate for POTUS. Not Sarah Palin.”
And, equally, this is where the GOP campaign is going wrong.
137- The more the Left nurtures and grows its glowing ember of hatred for Palin, the bigger the price they will pay when their attacks backfire on them. If Obama, a man who has done his best to craft the image of a non-partisan uniter, listener, etc., now slips into the mode of attack dog targeting, of all people, the popular VP of his adversary, he risks that people will come to the conclusion that they really don’t know him well enough to be comfortable voting for him on election day. This is not the time for Obama to be changing his persona, lofty and fragile as it is, just as people were beginning to think they knew him.
@143:
Yeah, it’s going SO WRONG, that they’ve opened up a five-point lead.
That’s WRONG YOU CAN BELIEVE IN, my friend.
137
Looooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooool
122. It’s interesting to compare Palin to Putin. Palin enjoys gunning down animals for he fun of it, fuelled by sheer naked aggression. Mr Putin on the other hand (we are lead to believe) merely shot a Siberian Tiger with a tranquiliser gun as an act of self-defence. He then helped attach a tracking device to the cat and touchingly kissed the animal on the forehead before it had come round. I’m sure it was stage-managed nonsense but it does suggest how differently Russians view wildlife issues to their Alaskan neighbours.
143. The Dems seem to be focusing on Palin.
Mind you if you had Biden as your VP candidate who can blame them!
The Dems have screwed this election up big time HRC would definatly have won where as Obama will lose. Obama just does not seem to be able to connect with the folks.
143. I’m not sure having a nice little polling surge in recent days counts as ‘going wrong’ ukpaul.
No, the problem is that the voters don’t really seem to be giving a stuff about the Palin scandals; she neutralised the issue with that one line; “I’m not going to Washington to seek their good opinion…”, whatever the merits.
So at present Palin is being seen as this mildly-positive factor in the GOP ticket; so the GOP are running with it a little. However, the negativity surrounding her by the Democrats has been neutralised and so if it keeps coming up it’s just going to rebound.
[21] - The NHS is a lot better now then it was 10 years ago. There has been a lot of waste - PFI, private treatment centres, endless reorganisations, bungled GP contract - but Labour did expand capacity, bringing down waiting lists, and we now no longer have the yearly staple in the media of hospitals filling up and having to put people in corridors. Such a story used to be as predictable as the one about whether there would be a white Christmas, or that this year was seeing people wait until later to do their xmas shopping. It doesn’t happen anymore.
135 - you need to be very careful about trying to interpret daily figures from tracking polls. They will almost certainly not be aiming for representative daily samples but 3 day ones so on any given day the sample could be heavily biased one way or the other. Thinking back to the last UK GE the Times did a daily rolling tracker which people tried to interpret as a daily sample and at one point had the Tories in third - this was clearly wrong and the headline 3 day figure correct.
All you can really say from these polls is that gallup has a 5 point McCain lead and Rasmussen a 1 point lead.
137 - You know that Palin would likely have you shot don’t you?
It’s just after the GOP convention, that’s the territory. If this was October then you’d say it was 50/50. It isn’t October.
135 - Martin, different polls saying different things suggests that things are volatile but, given that a number of polls are now also starting to show Obama leads again, then it’s clear that there is no definitive sustained bounce.
91 - I’m flattered that you commented on my suggestion and your take on it was pretty much what I intended to say in the first place. My point was that at present there isn’t enough to attack the Tories on policy, so to do that won’t do Labour any good (yet).
114 - 500-1 with Ladbrokes!
150. The NHS is a lot better now then it was 10 years ago - Sorry I disagree: I had to go to hospital for minor surgery in 1997 and again in 2007. The 2007 experience was alot worse in terms of hygiene and waiting than in the summer of 1997.
150. But 10 years ago we had NHS dentists, more than a few midwives, GPs that allowed you to book an appointment more than an hour in advance, ambulances that were not used as waiting rooms because of targets and we were all treated alike in England, Scotland and Wales. Most people I know now think the NHS is worse than 10 years ago.
152. True enough they have wobbled both ways. I still think Obama needs to be well clear to win as his race will play a huge part in this election. Tips’s of icebergs and all that about current prejudice.
[22] - He was an odious twit at Uni too.
37 the Ghost of Harry Flashman is sadly ignorant of matters TUC when accusing the PM of cowardice for addressing a private dinner not the conference. Since time imemorial the TUC has invited Labour leaders and chancellors/shadow chancellors to speak in alternate years. The one whose turn it isn’t to address conference gets to speak at the. General Council dinner instead.
147- Members of my family back in Wisconsin, including a few uncles and my grandfather, blast Bambis every autumn, and we feast off of the tasty carcasses in the form of steaks, sausages, etc., for the rest of the year. Worse than Putin, we are, indeed…
This is actually part of responsible wildlife management, since the alternative would be to allow deer populations to explode, leading to both more deadly car accidents and deer starvation. Not to mention that the activity provides a free alternative food source. If you want to compare that to Russia vs. Georgia, give it your best shot!
154 Working in the NHS, I’d say that it has got better in many ways, though worse in some others. The problem is that the changes in service provided have been tiny compared to the money that has been spent (NOT invested!)
What was a cheap OK service is now an expensive OK service.
On topic - YES. This was the poll that used to give Labour 30% leads in the mid-90s.
155. Completly agree - one of the reasons for decline in the NHS under Labour is Immigrants, Waste and capital spending that provides no increase in utility - especially as infection rates continue to soar. No use moving from a victorian hospital to a new one if the patients are more likely to die!
159. We have Prince Philip over here - I believe he has despatched 40,000 creatures over the years!
[155] - NHS Dentists had mostly disappeared before Labour took over. Midwifery policy is in tatters, but it was before. I booked an appointment with my GP a couple of weeks in advance recently - perhaps the problem is your GP and not the government? You are perfectly right that targets have created problems.
It’s possible to argue that, because of the structural decisions that have caused waste, we have lower value for money now. Personally I think it is quite clear that the NHS is a lot better though, even if I think it could have been a lot better for the money that has been spent - or both better and cheaper.
It’s ridiculous to suggest that the NHS has got worse. What one can question is the extent that any improvements are down to Labour policy as opposed to technological advance. One can also question whether the improvements could have been achieved at vastly lower cost.
144 - You say attacking someone for their mistakes, inconsistencies and poor decision making is poor politics?
Really?
145 - It’s fun seeing you fixate on a poll that is going your way though.
149 - By going wrong, I mean that the GOP love Palin and many want *her* to be the candidate. McCain is becoming marginalised in the light of this, if he’s your presidential candidate that cannot be a good vote winning strategy. Things have moved on from last week’s opening gambits, a look at what is in the press show that things are now being dug up and reported in the MSM. The GOP are going to try and keep her ‘pure’, the Democrats job is to make sure that this doesn’t happen.
151 - Nate Silver at 538, stats guru has been crunching the figures. The opposite direction in tracker poll daily leads is a clear one, a two point range or so for today, but nevertheless clear.
165. It has got worse- I went to the same hospital as well! The NHS is F*cking dreadful - Go private if you can!
I doubt very much that NHS Dentistry was much different 10 years ago, and was inexorably set on a path of decline anyway.
167 - don’t worry i will! But then i would have 10 years ago! People just have higher expectations today because of all the money that has been spent.
158
You mean Just like Gordo is ignorant, refusing to wear Black tie at the Mansion House speech..
135/137/138.. If you want to read a first class biography of Palin, read this, by a person I am not personally fond of:
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/dominic-lawson/dominic-lawson-this-babe-has-floored-the-left-923494.html
168 I doubt NHS dentistry has ever been brilliant, but I don’t think there was the near impossibility of getting a dentist back then that there is today. It may have been declining, but it wasn’t inexorable until Labour’s great new contract a year or 2 back that seems to be killing off the remnants.
Very scary figures for Labour - you know things are dire when they are behind on the party naming measure.
O/T - had to laugh at Jim Cramer on CNBC yesterday over the Freddie Mae / Fannie Mac bailout, he was like a crack addict being given his next fix with excitement. But now we’re into Lehman Brothers and Washington Mutual death spiralling, both their stocks have dropped ominously today on the NYSE, just a couple days after the biggest bailout in history. I think the market is smelling another bailout coming very soon - oh what a mess they’ve created for themselves. Preservation of capital is the name of the game in this market.
173. I wonder if Bush will reap any benifit from pumping Fannie with Cash for McCain?
171 - That falls down within the first paragraph, she isn’t seen as stupid but, like Bush and Cheney, as dangerous.
169. People’s expectations are also higher because they’ve listened to years of Labour telling them how much better things are under Labour. It’s just the same with education and crime. One of Labour’s problems now is that finally the public has woken up to all the bullshit it’s been fed, and it does not like the taste at all.
175 - 352,000 hits on “sarah palin” “stupid” on google and a further 231,000 hits on “sarah palin” “dumb” would seem to prove you wrong.
The NHS has improved massively. I’m sorry but who wants to go back to the waiting lists years.
178. You gotta be kidding? Unless someone is up the duff you have to wait for treatment anyway. It may not be a waiting list as you remember it but it could be waiting to see the consultant before you go for treatment. As one of the poor f*ckers who goes through the NHS with my folks i should know!
177
Intersting word “prove”, of course it does nothing of the kind, because if someone writes “Sarah Palin is seen as stupid by some peopl”, Google will link it. I wouldnt rely on Google to prove any point…..
177. Ugh, i hate it when people use Google searches as an argument. That includes any combination of ’sarah’ and ‘palin’, ’sarah’ and ’stupid’ and ‘palin’ and ’stupid’ etc…
For instance ‘antifrank stupid’ yields 500+ results and ‘antifrank clever’ yields under 350…
what should we draw from this?
On education there are 2 areas that lead me to believe that the standards have dropped: 1. GCSE pass rates are always quoted for A-C and always show an increase. Unfortunately, the fact that English and Maths are omitted from these figures is never highlighted. 2. How can any exam system be trusted when you are allowed to take the exams in segments and keep retaking the bits you have failed until you pass them?
I wonder if any celebs will leave the UK if Labour won the next election. I always remember Paul Daniels saying that if Labour won in 1997 - he would go! The Sun said that was another good reason to vote Labour!
‘Scots media network ‘will finish jigsaw”
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/scotland/article4718096.ece
177 - “Tony Blair” and “honest” gets over a million google hits…
178
OH there aren’t any waiting lists now…., I didnt know that. tell me more. Of course the waiting list stuff is nonsense too. people who would have been seen earlier are now made to wait, so now everyone waits six months. It doesn’t mean that waiting lists have disappeared by any means.
179. My experience in the last two years has been very good. Obviously with such a big organisation the service is variable, but, I like many others I speak to, know from experience that overall things have improved.
Martin, do you spend all day on here?
‘charlie the best’
59,000,000 hits
181 - I suggest that it means:
1) antifrank is a pretty obscure person
2) he is associated more with stupidity than cleverness (and who am I to argue?)
3) charlie didn’t notice that I put inverted commas around “sarah palin”
182. I was not aware they could retake segments - that is terrible, When i was younger you just got one chance at everything! I still have dreams about doing GCSE / A-level courses now!
171.
“a first class biography of Palin”
er… that is not even a biography, let alone a ‘first class’ biography. It ia a quick assembley of grossly-partisan tittle tattle which could be assembled in a few minutes of Googling, which it is a disgrace if he was paid for.
Well look at the hits for my adopted online name!
Results 1 - 10 of about 222,000,000 for Martin Day.
182, the exams for A-level are flawed. I was pretty good at religious studies. First exam, grade A. Next two a D and an E apparently. Resat, no better prepared and got B and a C.
Unfortunately, my last two exams were similarly undergraded, and to resit I would’ve had to spend another year at school just for that, so I only got a C overall.
Maths can be either very hard or much easier, and most of us were advised to avoid it because of the difficulty.
Cameron wins has 3,070,000 hits
Gordon Moron has 631,000 hits
186. Total nonsense. I saw a consultant within 21 days under choose and book. After several consultations, my consultant got his diary out and agreed to operate 14 days’ later.
187. Sorry, but I like many others I speak to know from experience that overall things have not improved.
[172] - As far as I can recall there was a marked deterioration in the Major years. I accuse Labour of doing nothing to improve the situation, despite ten years and billions of pounds, but the situation they inherited was dreadful.
McNulty on C4 News now being interviewed on a balcony in Brighton in the pouring rain. His jacket is SOAKED. He’s keeping a cheerful veneer while on camera, but I’d hazard a guess this will fade when the lights go off!
189 yes but if you had put “Sarah Palin stupid” in inverted commas, you would only have 386 hits which rather destroys your argument.
[185] - That’ll include all the pages where someone says “Tony Blair is as far from being an honest man as I am from windsurfing on the surface of the Sun”
Quadratic equations amd linear equations! Argh! I cannot do it!
194.
“Cameron wins has 3,070,000 hits”
A lot of caber-tossing victories?
199 - Hardly. The number of sentences where those three words follow consecutively grammatically are small.
Here’s a question for any of you: Is there any form of campaign finance restriction in the UK, other than having to be a citizen to contribute? Can you contribute whatever you wish to parties, specific candidates, etc.? Can one plutocrat self-finance an entire major party if he wishes?
203. ‘It’s Sarah Palin, stupid!’
Oh dear after all the huff and bluster of yesterday, the Dow is down 133 pts. I knew it would not last…
203
Which again destroys your agument.
argument
‘Unions members at the TUC annual conference in Brighton give their opinion on Gordon Brown as prime minister.’
Alan Carr, University and College Union:
“Brown hasn’t done terribly well…. I think the door is close to being completely closed for Brown… Brown should implement some radical policies like the SNP have in Scotland.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7606040.stm
I don’t know if the NHS is better or worse; what I do know is it has significant failings at the moment;
1. The postcode lottery is absolutely ridiculous. I fail to see why one person should get a cancer-treating drug in Leeds but not in Liverpool, for example. At the end of the day, if the NHS can afford the drug, it should be available to all who need it nationwide. If they can’t, nobody should get it, or those with the most severe conditions should only be able to receive a limited amount. I distrust centralisation generally but for such things it surely makes sense.
2. In connection with the first point, if you pay for one type of treatment (ie drug) outside of the NHS you automatically opt out of having NHS cover for your condition. This is absurd; if people pay their taxes they should be able to take advantage of the relative benefits of both NHS and private healthcare.
3. An emphasis on targets has meant decreases in waiting times but a much more rushed and less patient-targetted culture. I’d argue this leads to more slipups, rushed procedures and things like infections spreading.
4. A hideous amount has been spent for very little return, though there has been some.
5. We have hundreds of young British students qualifying as Doctors but they are finding it impossible to get NHS jobs while we import hundreds of doctors and nurses from abroad. This to me is crazy.
204 - Constituency (non-national) campaigns have spending limits.
‘Alan Carr’
‘Oooh, hasn’t it been aawful for Gord?! I tell you, he’s an attractive man isn’t he? If I was of that persuasion…oh wait!! *cackles* I do love the older type!’
207 - It would help if you would elaborate why you think that. My original point is very simple: many thousands of internet pages are out there with the words “sarah palin” and “stupid” in the same sentence. I’m not suggesting that all of those pages discuss her intelligence, but for a woman who has come to prominence very recently, it is a strikingly high number. By way of contrast, “Margaret Thatcher” and “stupid” produces 312,000 hits.
little tip, the word ‘g-a-y’ is censored on pb.com…
‘Jonah’ Brown is going to Ulster:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/northern_ireland/7607082.stm
1 - the postcode lottery is simply the logical extension of devolving local decision making. At the moment it may actually have more to do with local financial mismanagement, but that’s not the point. Every one wants more local decision making until the logical consequences are spelled out to them.
213 - edit: not “same sentence”, “same page”.
165.”It’s ridiculous to suggest that the NHS has got worse.”
Its not ridiculous to suggest that its got worse if your experience has been anything but an improvement in recent years.
Could the multiple Alex’s on here add an initial or something to your names, it gets a bit confusing for the rest of us.
190 - something we have in common, Martin. For some reason exam anxiety dreams never seem to go away.
Sorry for being so rude to you a couple of threads ago old chap - I’d thought better of it but accidently pressed return and submitted the comment.
I suspect that the polling methodology is slightly overstating Tories. many people will remember that things got a lot worse once the Tories were in in 1979. Just seen the reports that the tories plan to cut public spending given that they also plan to help out the children of millionairres with huge tax cuts its clear they are getting over excited and reverting to their old ways.
169.”People just have higher expectations today because of all the money that has been spent.”
What rubbish, most complaints are about simple basic nursing care and hygiene!!
214 - I think it depends on the context:
The bright sunshine made John and Kate gay and full of the joys of spring
167 - you say the NHS is dreadful - and there are lots of reasons to say that - but my flatmate’s date who is very seriously ill is currently receiving the most amazing treatment. Everyone’s experience is different. I suppose inconsistency is a fault in itself, though.
215. That’s the Executive as good as dead, then…
my flatmate’s DAD, not date.
“Brown backs Obama”
http://waugh.standard.co.uk/2008/09/brown-backs-oba.html
F*ck.
Okay, that’s it. Sell, sell, sell!!!
221 - that misses the point. People are more likely to complain now because of their expectations.
210
I can see why there is a lottery.
Some Local Trusts happily spend money on such vital areas as non essential plastic surgery and other lifestyle operations.. plus associated drugs etc.
I assume every £ spent on such things means a £ not spent elsewhere.
It looks to me from the outside that some Trusts prioritise spending on health issues: others just do not.
Of course if they were elected and accountable.. but none are…
213
You cannot possibly know… if the sentence starts….. “To write off Sarah Palin as stupid is…..” or “Sarah Palin is stupid……” induces more hits. To use google as a basis for proving anything is foolhardly.
Gordon’s latest character relaunch is focussing on him apparently overcoming difficult things in his life like being blinded in one eye and we are supposed to conclude he is a principled resourceful fighter. The problem with this theory is that it can be interpreted another more realistic way. He lost his eye and has since been bitter and twisted and lived in a paranoid world where his raisin detre is to beat the other guy whoever that may be and at whatever cost. As Alister Campbell said in one of his rare honest moments Brown is psychologically flawed. This is the main reason he is such a poor Prime Minister and his sole focus is himself hence stupid policy like the 10p tax or the stamp duty holiday.
Now I feel it unfortunate that Brown has told us what a wonderful guy he is for overcoming the death of his daughter. Any kind of decent principled resourceful fighter would not have used that for spin.
171. I wouldn’t say Palin is stupid, but her academic credentials are far less even than Bush. She is an anti-Science ‘believer’ who enjoys nothing more than gunning down wild animals.
I trust Frank Luntz and his Palin focus group was NOT positive.
229 - But either of those sentences assumes that the intelligence of Sarah Palin is in question, whether the proposition is being proposed or opposed. ukpaul’s “Tony Blair”-honest combination illustrates the same point.
223 If you are really really ill(life threatening sudden illness), the NHS is fantastic, but if you have a debilitating illness that is not life threatening, the NHS is dreadfiul.
219. No problem! Thoses dreams are wiered though! I sat my A-levels nearly 15 years ago! Still I dream about them but never qualifications/ exams nearer to me in time!
226.
err no it doesnt. The first questions those who are stupid enough to write her off, the second does not.
216. OK. So NHS head honcho in my area decides someone can’t get a cancer drug; but elsewhere another NHS head honcho has decided they can.
What can I do to change this, other than put pressure on the local NHS, who have spent their budget and hence can do nothing.
As Madasafish says at 228, there’s no democratic accountability; there’s nothing that can be done if you disagree.
44. I see you live in the real world. Schools will not always make good decisions but to systematically remove power from them in these and others matters takes the responsibility out of the positions of those in power.The head is alwyas complaining he would rather take his own decisions and answer for them.
57. The problem is that projects and initiatives, some funded and some not [so they have to come out of the existing budgets] come through all the time].
Meanwhile ancillary staff who are already low paid have pay cuts.
58. Schools do not always get much choice in what they specialise in. If the neighbour specialises in the sciences they might have to head in a different direction. In the end the specialisms are sometimes a fiction, but money is channelled in anyway.
65 Selling off the playing fields was wrong, but it wasn’t a decision taken by the schools but by the local authorities who may well have done it because they were underfunded.
It has of course continued under Labour].
New PPP poll for Florida :
McCain 50% .. Obama 45%
Note - All sampling Saturday and Sunday.
http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/PPP_Release_Florida_909.pdf
I’m not sure that Putin the wildlife-lover is a very plausible image. Very few Russians are sentimental about wild animals, unfortunately. Cherie’s autobiography has an entertaining scene where she and Tony are dragged along in the freezing darknes to watch Putin hoping to shoot a wild boar.
Frank: the Clintons are intelligent, articulate, widely-read, cosmoplitan liberals with a good instinct for how to win general elections - it’s a rare American combination, as serious liberals tend not to have a killer instinct when it comes to winning (like serious left-wingers in Britain). I don’t think she’s a great speaker or has an especially winning personality, and Bill’s sex history is a bad thing, but I don’t care about that stuff: I just want a US president who relates to left of centre people around the world. If Obama wins, that’s absolutely fine - my worry has always been that he won’t.
117: MTF, this is pb.com, where we comment when we feel like it, not ask_nick.com. Sometimes I have the time and energy to respond to stuff, sometimes not. But if you want a contrast on firm commitments, what about the BSF programme, to rebuild and replace every state secondary school by 2017 in three waves, starting now? Would the Tories maintain it, speed it up, slow it down, stop it? Who knows? Have they even given it any thought? Dunno.
New IBD/TIPP national poll :
McCain 40% .. Obama 45%
Note - All sampling 2-7 Sep.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/RCP_PDF/IBD_TIPP_PollSep2008.pdf
230. You’re right it does work both ways.
Was it his experience of adversity that made him choose to bottle the election?
Was it his experience of adversity that causes him to hide in the bunker everytime he says or does something that gets a bad press?
Was it his experience of adversity that has made him u-turn like a whirling Dervish time and time again
Was it his experience of adversity that made him deny the blatant mistakes he has made again and again.
Was it his experience of adversity to deceive the British electorate over the EU Referendum, the 10p Tax Cut, the Car tax increases etc. etc?
It seems to me his reaction to his experience of adversity turned him into the man he is and he is being judged by the electorate on the basis of that and not on the basis of what he didn’t learn from that adversity.
Hotline tracking today 45 McCain 44 Obama, was 44-44 yday.
http://www.diageohotlinepoll.com/
230.”As Alister Campbell said in one of his rare honest moments Brown is psychologically flawed.”
IIRC Andrew Rawnsley never named the person behind that quote, most assumed it was down to Alistair Campbell. But Lance Price(former Blair spin doctor) told Iain Dale in an interview a while back that he thought it was actually Tony Blair who said it.
230. The BBC conducted interviews about his past - most people said they were sorry to hear about it etc. Somewere more dismissive.
It won’t do him anygood - If I went to a job interview and said I got tw*ted, wrong place - wrong time when I was a student would i get the job - no!
Whilst it is the only thing that comends Brown to me, the fact he battled on despite Blindness in one eye - not to mention how this would affect him in terms of confidence (Women until recently said he was good looking)- to have that at 16-17 and the fact you might go blind is a major struggle. Likewise the tragic case of his kids lends some sympathy but in terms of how he conducts his job - I am afraid he is on a hiding to nothing!
I can be a bit of a cnut about Brown but it is more my sick sense of humour that is not shared by many! On Brown himself, I just don’t think being PM is the right job for him - too sensitive & unable to deal with the fast pace. That is not to demean the man but to say he is in the wrong job.
226- Sounds like Brown is abandoning precedent, and good diplomacy, in a desperate hope of associating and identifying himself with the vastly more popular Obama. The tone of ‘progressive politicians like me and Obama…’ certainly gives that impression, anyway.
242. When Brown brings up his personal life it always goes tragically wrong; the number of times ‘Moral Compass’ has been used against him is testament to that…
I actually find Brown an awfully tragic figure and I don’t like my thoughts to dwell too much on his personal life; because it must be blackly depressing, really.
240. That’s a shame. i thought I read that Russia had a growing environmntal movement. And who did Putin have in mind when he decided to kiss the Tiger on the head?
To be fair I would have preferred Clinton to Obama if I thought she could win. My instinct was that she was too divisive and whatever Obama’s current difficulties, I’m not convinced SHE could have won it for them.
Latest Diageo/Hotline Tracker :
McCain 45% .. Obama 44%
Numbers via Pollster.com.
245. He is in the wrong job yet has been dreaming all of his adult life (maybe longer) to hold it…
… it’s just a complicated mess of horrible-ness.
250. Should say “of holding it” not “to hold it”.
Link to Diageo/Hotline tracker :
http://hotlineblog.nationaljournal.com/archives/2008/09/diageohotline_t.html
“Would the Tories maintain it, speed it up, slow it down, stop it? Who knows? Have they even given it any thought? Dunno.”
How about asking if an incoming Conservative government could afford to fund it after 12 years of this government Nick? Your government supposedly had 10 years of growth, had the Treasury been managed better we might be in a stronger position to weather this downturn in the economy, and pay for the debt that Gordon Brown has already racked up during that period.
240. Good post about the Clintons! The bit about Putin was interesting as well! I didn’t think Tony and his wife would watch the slaughter of animals but you find out something new everyday! I do hope you got a signed copy as it will be rearer than the rare non-signed!
Yes, I was being a bit naughty on the titanic quote! Of course you post when it is something of interest to you as you have a real job! unlike me! What about NP 4 PM! Better than the current alternative in my opinion! Mind you “NP Huddersfield MP” would be better than the present situation!
190 Yes you can Martin.
One of my kids has just got 100% in Physics, 100% in Chemistry and 98% in Biology for their module [exam not assessment] at the end of this year.
The kids is very bright but not a genuis and not especially great at science! When I questioned my kid they said, ‘you don’t have to get them all right to get 100%!’?????
247. I agree, if he were not the leader of the country, I’d probably feel sorry for him but he is the leader of the country and turning the tragedies in his life into a political ploy when he blatantly displays the opposite of what those tragedies should instil in someone suggests one of three things - either he is a cynical political manipulator, he learnt nothing from his tragedies or those tragedies have sadly distorted who he is.
I have no idea which of those is true but none of it changes the fact that he is damaging this country and clearly he needs to step down. If he needs help the country can look after him once he has left office.
245. Martin, are you the arch-Tory buying into the ‘Brown sensitive’ myth? I could hardly believe I saw those 2 words together in the Telegraph. He appears unable to express empathy for anyone but himself. Fragile self-esteem, perhaps?
240- I’m not sure why there seems to be this consistent impression here that the Clintons are fairly mediocre speakers but Obama is out of this world. Certainly the British taste for public speakers is different from American tastes, which must account for the impression. Can I ask you, or anyone: what is so marvelous about Obama’s speaking? Why is it superior to the Clintons (and I include both Bill and Hillary here, both of whom I find to be superior speakers to Obama, with Bill in 1st place)?
I’m coming at this from the perspective of who’s speaking style is the most politically effective, not who is most eloquent or sophisticated.
250. Yes, but on the brutal side - why should he be safe in it as nobody else who is employed and does not meet the challange is given the boot.
253 The lack of shame at the ruinous debt is truely breathtaking.
257. Yes, I was putting it gently! Actually some of the most sensitive people are completly insensive! Brown is likely to fall into this group!
Brown is not my cup of tea and is not the right man for the job….
240 I haven’t followed the Obamamania closely on this site but I wonder if its the same people who were impressed/taken in by Blair.
JM drifts out to 2.44
OB in to 1.69 today
nearing the £4M matched
Betfair punters dont believe the polls… ?
258 - Bill Clinton is a mediocre speaker????
Sets the bar a bit high!
With NP’s question on re-building schools.
Is it necessary? Surely it is what the kids learn not the environment they are in that is the main driver - My school was horrible - Ghastly legacy of the 1970’s but i still learn’t the building blocks of life! Better to have more teachers than new painted walls?
263. they are believing the polls, mccain’s bounce is beginning to subside and obamas base for the race is still there !
117 - BSF gets mixed reviews…
262- It’s obvious why blacks are moved by Obama’s oratory (Oprah Winfrey even cried her eyelashes off) and I can see how his professorial style appeals to upper-class white liberals, but beyond that, his oratorical talents don’t seem to encompass the skills needed to speak particularly movingly to those beyond his core constituency. He may not need to do so to win (since his adversary isn’t a great speaker either), but I’m puzzled by the superlative adjectives attached to his speaking style.
262 - You must be joking!
“I suspect that the polling methodology is slightly overstating Tories. many people will remember that things got a lot worse once the Tories were in in 1979″
And there are those of us who will remember that much got a good deal better.
It’s a bit typical of all New labour’s projects. Something sounds nice, so it’s done, regardless of whether the money is best spent there or how effective the business case that has been made.
SAS - Obama speaks with the most passion, Mr Clinton speaks with a certain folksy charm and Mrs Clinton sounds pretty tough. I think Brits most like the former and are suspicious of the latter two.
Looking at it from an angle. My theatrical hero is Stephen Sondheim, he writes some of the most searingly emotional, moving and poignant music and lyrics that I know.
People who don’t like his stuff say that it lacks emotion.
Calm down folks - we have yet to see Labour’s post conference bounce yet..
274- Send in the clowns… They’re already here!
“as serious liberals tend not to have a killer instinct when it comes to winning (like serious left-wingers in Britain)”
I would put that down to a tendency to underrate their opponents, who they see as less moral people than they are.
WRT Obama and his speeches - realistically he’s somewhere in between the perception of the Obamamaniacs (the Messiah is come) and the cynics (he’s overrated). He IS a very good speaker, he knows how to keep a crowd hooked and he invests a lot of energy and charisma. But he is not the best orator in the world; indeed, he doesn’t come close. For an *American politician* he is very good; many top British politicians could easily match him if they tried, though.
277. Well liberals have to be sensible. It’s easy to characterise Cameron as a classic Eton/Brasenose/Bullingdon/White’s toff radicalised under Thatcher, but if the swing voters don’t really agree, there’s not very far you can run with it
275. Will we need the Hubble Telescope to see it?
;o)
276 - His most successful song commercially and yet one that people rarely quote correctly (”don’t bother, they’re here), a touching hymn to self-knowledge.
Personally I’d go with anything from ‘Sunday in the Park With George’ as his best work.
Well, if the Large Hadron Collider works as its critics fear, Brown may finally have found his path to avoiding both resignation and electoral defeat…
278. Should point out, that definitely *excludes* Gordon Brown…
282. Then none of us will have to worry! Hows the song go?
It’s the end of the world as we know it
140 Matt1 “There is a mistrust of the more aloof intellectuals who, despite being very capable politicians and political thinkers, are seen as being unable to get into the heads of the populace and talk to them on their level. ”
Unfortunately for the Democrats, most of their senior figures for the past 30 years or more have been lawyers (generally from the top law schools in the land) - Obama, Biden, both Clintons, Kerry, Edwards, Dukakis, Mondale etc.
Some voters (especially intellectuals I suppose) like a lawyer’s style of argument and bearing but many don’t.
On the subject of Obama’s dip in polling form, could it simple be that he has done nothing to grab back the agenda in this campaign since the conventions? All we have talked about this last week on PB.com is McCain and Palin, a lot of it negative, but we have been focussed on them rather than the Democrats who have gone very quiet since those initial negative attacks on Sarah Palin backfired.
Both Obama and Biden have been a little footnote in the discussions.
O/T:
Apparently, the Washington Post has a scoop exposing that Sarah Palin has claimed around £9k in expenses over 19 months including claiming expenses for nights at home in Wasilla which is around 600 miles from Juneau. Apparently she earns about the same as an MP (65k) and all the expenses are above board.
Given our own MP’s, none of which (?) live as far away from their centre of Government as Palin, exist on 12 to 15 times these expenses (ministers even more) on average and she has probably paid for these expenses many times over by selling the Governor’s Jet and giving up the Governor’s chef it seems to me that Alaska got a really good deal out of it.
The left-wing media in the US is getting really desperate.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/deadlineusa/2008/sep/09/whatsthisanotherpalininspir
220: You are just repeating NuLab scare stories and are incorrect in equating cuts in public spending to cuts in services. The public sector has huge volumes of fat in the managerial, advisor and consultancy sectors. NuLab’s solution to any problem is to throw money at it - this is something the UK cannot afford.
Cost efficiencies can be made easily whilst not only keeping but improving services at the sharp ends of health, education etc. Indeed there will be surplus to invest in new enrgy sources and improved infrastructure.
However, to improve standards for all and to compete in a global economy The UK has to become more efficient, more self-sufficient and more streamlined in its functions. Only then can there be improved lifestyles for all.
O/T but I was interested in Rachel Sylvester’s article, in the Times, that if Labour face a landslide defeat at the next election, the party will lurch a long way to the Left in opposition. I agree, but disagree with her view that that would be disastrous for Labour. To my mind, if Labour finish up with 26-28% of the vote, holding onto, and reclaiming, their core vote will be an absolute necessity. If you suffer a landslide defeat, you can forget about regaining power in one term, so you do need to worry more about people on your side of the political spectrum, rather than floating voters.
A longtime American Lurker here. I think what is missed in a lot of analysis of the American election, is what a brilliant pick Palin is. Not because she is great in and of herself, but because she is a reflection of Obama. All of his strengths(rhetoric, loving family, change) are her strengths, while all of his weakness are also his weakness(lack of experience, interest in foreign affairs, questionable municipal government. Therefore in order to attack her, the Democrats have make the issue about experience, or how she’s all rhetoric, or what she did in Wasila. The result is that if Obama wins, all he has done is proven that he is marginally more qualified to be President than the inexperienced Republican VP candidate. If he ties, its a major loss. And if he loses its a disaster.
All the while McCain is skidding through home free. The implications of a strategy involved in arguing that Palin is unfit to be President is that McCain is more fit than either Obama or Palin.
Obama has to stop fighting with Palin. Unless he does, he will lose the daily debate simply because expectations for her are so low she can’t possibly fail to meet them. On the other hand he can lose but not win.
286. The Republicans have held the Presidency for 36 of the past 56 years, despite being the minority party for most of that period, in Congress. My impression is that the Republicans are more pragmatic than the Democrats, in choosing Presidential candidates, and usually choose the candidate who is most likely to win, whether he’s from the right or left of the party. The Democrats usually choose someone from the centre left of the party, which is to the left of the typical American voter. A right wing Democrat would give them a far better chance, but is rarely chosen.
Oil
I mentioned a number of weeks ago that anyone who was into a bit of trading should bet on oil going down by whatever method they fancied, eg spreads.
I perosnally did quiet well out of it before bailing when teh Georgian conflict broke out. Anyone who took the hint and kept going however hopefully got very well rewarded. From a near peak of over $145 Brent Crude slipped under $100 today.
I quite like this game, Gold first and now oil. If I could get a good run on the nags and the football I’d be ok….
263. Fundamentals. The Democrats are going to have go some to lose it.
What has happened however is that people now see that they could lose.
Leader exit dates on Betfair:
Brown’s 7 for July-September 2010, and 4.6 for April-June 2010. That’s 6/1 and 7/2, roughly.
What date is the next election? Mayish 2010?
282 Hence why Brown put £500m into hadron.
On Nick Palmer’s love affair with the Clinton’s. Labour have copied the Clinton’s and their focus on the “economy stupid” and indeed their focus on spin, cooking the books and fiddling the figures. In his heart of heart’s nick knows people no longer believe all that rubbish, but his only chance and his party’s only chance is if suddenly people start believing again. so no wonder they are heroes to him.
290. Interesting point - who was the last right-wing Democratic candidate, would you say?
? - But it is “the economy stupid”. That’s Labour’s whole problem!
290. I agree. And at the end of the day, what we’re seeing here is that, in terms of the Presidency at least, the GOP are to US politics what the Tories used to be in UK politics; a formidable force that will take a *heck* of a lot of effort to keep out of power.
It is testament to the political skill of Blair (who I think is a pretty horrible person, all in all) that he and his first government managed to scare the Tories so much that they became introspective and obsessed with their core 30% of the vote. Not many politicians have ever managed that before; even in the early 1900s the Tories bounced back tremendously from their 1906 rout; it was the Irish Nats who kept Lloyd George and co in power in subsequent elections…
The Tories always used to have a reputation for choosing the right person at the right time and being the ‘natural party of government.’ In many ways I think we see that applied to the GOP right now; but they seem even more skilled at it than the UK Tories, in that this year - after a hated GOP President - they’re running the Democratic candidate close (or even edging ahead) in the popular vote and/or the electoral college. If McCain pulls it off it is testament to the sheer political skill of the GOP.
295 Clinton, I think, would have been seen as running on the right of his party, in 1992 and 1996. It’s curious that at House, and Senate level, the Democrats pick quite a few right wing people, but rarely do so at Presidential level.
240 Would the Tories keep “building schools for the future going”?
I’d suspect that the mess that they’ll inherit the economy in would preclude that. I would hope that they’ll think better of more ridiculous PFI contracts as well. I suspect that a lot of the money spent on these shiny new schools doesn’t appear in the accounts quite as it should do.
Are they the most frigthening numbers for Labour? Perhaps - a 14 point deficit on named party from Mori is meltdown in electoral terms. However the more worrying figure for the average Joe in the UK are the 28% of people that still identify with this disgraced and disgraceful government. As Sally says above at 260, the lack of shame over the financial mess is breathtaking.
A Labour chancellor gets polite applause from the TUC - applause merely for the sake of not being rude, applause because that is what you do when someone shows up. The Unions have deserted them, the coalition has deserted them, the voters are deserting them day by day in droves, in torrents.
And yet we find ourselves under the temporary dictatorship of the damned, forced to wait out this disgrace, time out the agony and hope that our decision to come is the right one, that we find the right level of massacre to sate and placate.
As for Brown, all that remains is for a statue to be cast so that in years to come when it is toppled and broken and future children ask of their parents ‘who were Labour?’ they can point them to the base stone and the legend which reads
I am Gordon Brownius, PM of PMs, look upon my works ye mighty and despair.
290- What’s more, Republicans have almost always had fewer people identifying themselves as members of their party as opposed to Democrat self-identifiers.
If you look at Democratic presidential losers vs. winners (post-Truman, let’s say), it’s remarkable to note how successful the moderate candidates were vs. the liberals. The liberals nearly always lost (Stevenson, Humphrey, McGovern, Mondale, Dukakis, Kerry), while the moderates often won (Kennedy, Carter, Clinton). Yes, Kennedy was center-left in his day, even if his various relations are not. And Carter ran as a Democrat of the deep south at a time when southern Democrats were often more conservative than northern Republicans. Clinton, too, ran as a moderate Democrat, which was believable as he came from a conservative southern Democratic tradition. I don’t believe the Democrats have ever nominated a real conservative or center-right candidate from their ranks, unless we want to go back and troll the pre-Roosevelt waters.
240 No Mr Palmer that’s nonsense I am not prepared to willingly accept such spin,, you fly a kite from your perspective, it gets shot down and then you claim you dont always have the time to respond. That may be the case, but if you dont have the time to respond it seems a touch churlish to post in the first place.
You know and I know that Labours plans were(since 2001),are and are likely in the future to be uncosted, to suggest that the Tories plans are uncosted is laughable, unless its in the context of scorched earth, whereby Labour claim the Tories plans are uncosted because Labour have spent this and the next generations income.
299, I thought most PFIs were longterm and virtually non-negotiable?
301 But Kennedy’s anti-communist credentials were very strong.
The question is why do the Democrats never nominate a conservative?
301. Genuine question; is it the fact that the Democrats have failed to reconnect with their “conservative Southern tradition” that the GOP now dominates the South? Or is it clear demographic change?
302. Mr.Palmer will no doubt still be parroting his prepared spin lines about ‘uncosted’ pledges a year from now when public borrowing reaches £100bn per annum. Ignore.
305- I think the stems and leaves of the southern conservative Democratic tradition are pretty much dead, but some of the roots remain alive. This means that southern voters will still readily vote for old-fashioned Democrats at the state level even though they vote Republican at the national level. The Democrats at the national level have drifted so far to the left of that old tradition that they really can’t appeal to that old southern voting coalition anymore, except perhaps briefly at a time of high GOP unpopularity (like now). I expect non-minority southern voters to stay solidly Republican for a long time.
Demographic changes could start pushing some of the South back into the Democratic column, though, as Hispanic populations explode and largely side with the Democrats. When this happens, the GOP will have to discover some way of credibly appealing to those minority-group voters or they’ll be relegated to virtual permanent minority status and we’ll be left with a one-party system.
305
Because post-1968 the nomination is in the hands of primary voters rather than the elected officials, and they care less about winning the general than winning the primary. Plus they generally believe that most people are secretly liberal and would vote for them if the Republicans stopped spreading lies.
The departure of the South has had a huge effect. Half the southern primary electorate is African American, hence Kerry carried Georgia in 2004 while winning only about 14% of the white vote.
The last real conservative to run was probably Fritz Hollings of South Carolina in 1984. Didn’t work out so well. He would have been a great President too. Lloyd Bentsen as VP in 1988 was probably the last Conservative on a national ticket for the Democrats.
302. A kite is all it is! Maybe he is going to be the staulking horse! If he does not get a minesterial Job, then why not! I reckon stalking Brown is woth 5% in Broxtowe - He has nothing to lose!
296 but that is the point, the economy through Clinton’s reign (and Bush’s come to that) and Throughout New Labour has been built on sand whilst trying to convince people endlessly that it is rock solid. What Clinton and new labour are all about is spinning that the economy is in great shape. Obviously no one now believes that and Brown therefore is in deep doo doo.
306. As an uber loyalist, thats a given, but the more he posts such nonsense, the more I hope the voters of Broxtowe will give their verdict, irrespective of his insights to the workings of Govt. I do not believe he is here for the benefit of PB punters, far from it.
S&S is interesting about what sort of speeches Brits like. Probably even Brits who don’t like Tony Blair would mostly admit he’s what we think of as a good speaker - passionate, coherent and lightened with witty asides (very important in Britain, perhaps less so in the US, though I think Congress enjoyed the “last time we were in Washington we burned it down…sorry about that…’ line). William Hague goes down well with nearly everyone too for similar reasons. As Frank says at 273, Brits are resistant to folksiness and macho attitudes. I’m not saying we’re right or that British speaking standards are higher - they’re just different.
253: well, you’re arguing they may not be affordable, but that wan’t the issue. I was giving it as an example in response to the challenge upthread to point to firm Labour commitments that the Tories are vague about. ‘We are going to cancel the new schools as we don’t think we can afford them’ would be a clear statement - we could then argue about whether they were right. ‘We don’t think they are needed at all’, as argued by Martin Day, would also be clear, as would ‘We think it’s important and will do it as planned’. Lots of Tories here - does anyone claim to know?
306.”302. Mr.Palmer will no doubt still be parroting his prepared spin lines about ‘uncosted’ pledges a year from now when public borrowing reaches £100bn per annum. Ignore.”
To be fair, poor Nick would be up in the dock in the Whips office if he drifted to far off the official line or criticised his government.
He would probable feature quite prominently in a few political columns and blogs too.
One question for him though, who is more scary in full whips mode, Geoff Hoon or Nick Browne?
310. Indeed - you’d have to be staggeringly naive to believe that. But don’t worry, he has zero chance of holding his seat and I suspect he may not even contest it.
311.You could have quoted from the article George Osborne gave yesterday to the Guardian. I believe that he thought an incoming Conservative government was going to be placed in a financial straight jacket thanks to the combined mismanagement of the long term Treasury finances by Brown and Darling.
307. Very interesting, Stars and Stripes. I do love seeing how the states have twisted and turned and changed allegiance as regards the Presidency, it’s very interesting. For instance, I find it interesting that California was once a pretty strong GOP President state (or at least they could win it in a strong year), whilst Texas and the South used to be reliably Democratic. Just goes to show how things change, eh?
240
‘to rebuild and replace every state secondary school by 2017′
Sounds like an incredibly wasteful pledge as I can’t believe every state secondary school needs to be rebuilt or replaced.
On the subject of education & election pledges made by New Labour;
would you care to comment on to-days Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development report, that UK primary school class sizes are among the biggest in the developed world.Out of 30 countries covered by the report only Turkey,Japan & Korea had more children in a class than in the UK.
Where did all the billions go?
Mudflats’ new article on how to get promoted in “Palinworld”:
http://mudflats.wordpress.com/
310: Genuinely puzzled - why do you think I post here? To win votes? There must be easier ways. To have long, detailed debates? Too much like the day job. To increase punters’ profits? No - I wish you all well, but it’s a side-effect if it’s helpful. I contribute when I feel like it because I enjoy some light discussion as an occasional mental coffee-break, and you’re free to argue, ignore or whatever you like.
311 Why would one want to rebuild/replace every State secondary school between now and 2017?
307 This is a very good paper on Hispanic voting trends. Looking at the run to 2006 on the second page, the Republicans can pull Hispanics away from the Democrats. McCain just needs to hope that 2007 was an anomaly.
http://pewhispanic.org/files/reports/83.pdf
Incidentally, does anyone know of a similar paper on white/total vote percentage for Democrats and Republicans over the last few years? 2007 was a vintage year for Democrats and it would be interesting to see how big a jump they received among all voters.
311- I always thought Blair was a great speaker, too, and perhaps his style is the best “universal” one that I’ve seen (i.e., would go down well in the U.K. or here in the US). He seemed to be energetic, passionate, articulate, and alternatively forceful or lighthearted according to the occasion. I found him to be very likeable and engaging (on a superficial level as a listener), and would definitely classify him as a great orator. If Obama could assimilate more of the Blair charm, energy and charisma into his style, he would be much more effective in my opinion.
318
You mean as long as your spin message gets though you mean. As to genuiniely puzzled, thats equally risible.
311. You have an interesting point Nick on school spending. Personally is acapital spending on new school buildings essential - you could from your point of view say it is important from a economic stand point i.e. House buikding has collapsed so at least the government is building/upgrading schools. My view point is in austere times, it is a case of make do and mend - even share facilities for a few years if necessary. By far the most important thing is quality of education. Will the quality of education improve if new school buildings are provided? I think not, when teachers can remain in place or recruited to continue class sizes. Indeed at a time of human hardship, surely capital spending being suspended and diverted into salry rises to meet inflation is the best route? Teaching etc is a very important part of Labour’s “New Labour” coalition?
311. A good speech by a British politician is charismatically (or, failing that, powerfully) delivered; a good mix of soundbites and statistics (even at the height of the Blair reign you still got the doctor and nurse numbers, unemployment figures etc) to be persuasive, a little bit of personal conviction (but not *too* much), some well timed jokes, and a line or two in there you seriously *hope* is going to go down in political history in a good way (a “Lady’s not for turning..” or … “Education, education, education”…)
In other words, a good balance; but I agree that UK politicians should stay away from the “folksy charm” that many US politicians go in for. I just don’t think it would work here.
312: nah - I can truthfully say that I have never heard of the whips taking an interest in what anyone says on a blog. Life’s too short for them to go trawling the web for 450 people’s thoughts. Unless you endorse satanism or something, the whips of all parties are interested in how you vote in Commons business - end of.
Anyway, back to my next leaflet. Night all!
319, you must’ve watched Yes, Minister. The public sector measures achievement not by profit but by activity. And constantly building new hospitals and schools and endlessly reforming health, education and criminal law is very active indeed.
319. Sean Fear: “Why would one want to rebuild/replace every State secondary school between now and 2017?”
… indeed, it’s a puzzling one. OK, so kids *do* need a good environment in which to learn, but a few walls knocked down, a couple of new displays and a fresh lick of paint now and again is surely less wasteful than razing the whole lot and starting again?
323 - To be fair part of the point of a lot of these new schools is to improve education by removing the inflexibility in the current system eg. whereby good schools can’t expand and bad schools keep going simply because they’re there. “Make do and mend” is all very well, but the danger with that attitude is that you end up like we were in 1997 with chronic underinvestment in infrastructure.
The point about BSF is that a proper business case needs to be put forward on a case by case basis. A blanket pledge to just rebuild EVERY school is just silly.
Furthermore, BSF is supposed to bear fruit over decades - it really is the sort of thing (if a proper case is made) that shouldn’t really have decisions made on the basis of the prevailing economic conditions.
325.”312: nah - I can truthfully say that I have never heard of the whips taking an interest in what anyone says on a blog.”
Nick, come on, if someone in the PLP posted something critical about the leadership that went on and made a big splash in the media they would take an interest.
Didn’t someone email Mike Smithson not long ago and inform him that Gordon Brown reads PB.com occasionally?
New Fairleigh Dickinson Uni poll for New Jersey :
McCain 41% .. Obama 47%
Note - Sampling 4-7 Sep.
http://publicmind.fdu.edu/bounce/
317- California was a Republican bastion until the late 1980’s, and turned largely as a result of the exploding the Hispanic population there (but also due to the continuing influx of like-minded folks to places like Los Angeles and San Francisco). Texas has been voting GOP at the national level for a bit longer, but may also start to swing back to the Democrats within a few voting cycles because of the Hispanic population.
By the way, did you know that pre-Roosevelt, American blacks always favored Republicans, while they’ve always favored Democrats since then? It was Roosevelt who turned them, and they’ve never looked back.
318. Nick, of course you may have a mildly Labour lilt to you contribution - even a tad of spin! But i can tell you post on here because the dialogue interests you, not just on UK politics but also the US side of things!
Indeed don’t you meet with some of the more sympathetic contributors on non-PB occasions. I like your posts even though I don’t share your views! Indeed you could write newspapers columns and and appear on regional news programs but I think your contributions on here are of a more cut and thrust nature and provide an insight into Labour thinking. The NP is here spinning cuts no ice with me, maybe i am wrong but it just would not seem worthwhile politically for you to do so.
331. Really? Poor Gordon. I’ll bet there’s a good old evening of phone-chucking after checking PB.
Capital spending is the one thing that shouldn’t just be suspended in harsh economic times. Otherwise nothing would ever get built! No capital project last over a couple of years could ever be considered!
329,330 Plenty of schools are solidly constructed, and a decent building, if kept in proper repair, should last for hundreds of years, so I can’t see the point of this pledge.
331. I hope not for Gordon’s sake!
333 How did Roosevelt do that? After all, in his time, the Democrats had Senators like Theodore Bilbo, who wrote “Segregation, or Mongrelisation”, and Governor Talmadge.
324 Keep up the good work- his “wot me guv” comments are risible. Just one further point on education, no one has yet mentioned the social engineering aspect yet. Most of the capital money has been spent in Labour constituencies, just as most of the central government grant to councils is weighted to these areas.
Obviously, according to socialist logic, this is fair as if you vote Conservative you must be a millionaire and don’t need any of your taxes benefitting you.
337 - Really? Why were so many people being educated in portacabins then? You need a bit more than a “decent building” unless you are in favour of Victorian style teaching.
334. I, too, value Nick’s contributions and I think he does offer genuine insight. It is to his credit that he actually posts on a site like this; it *invites* vitriol being that he is a government MP, and a loyal one at that. He does have guts; and at times you can have a good debate with him, (though sometimes he’s a little too constrained by the government spin! But that’s a whipping system for you!)
340 - Barely ANY of the capital money has been spent yet!
Guardian has this on Oh, Darling, you weren’t wonderful
“One delegate enthused about the benefits of nationalisation; another claimed that “New Labour has reached the end of the line as far as privatisation and markets are concerned”; yet another reckoned that “capitalism can seriously damage your welfare.” In support of an amendment – passed, as it happens – advocating the state ownership of “utilities and services including water, gas, electricity, oil and the transport sector”, a fella from the dependably militant RMT at least had the good sense to cut to the quick: “We want to go back to how it was before 1979,” he said, to enthusiastic claps.
Two hours later, Alistair Darling took his seat on the platform, and the realisation once again hit home. No matter that as business transfers its munificence to the Conservative party, 92% of the “people’s party’s” funding currently comes from the unions – when it comes to the big stuff, they are from Mars, while the government hails from Venus (or, as possibly evidenced by Darling’s impossibly measured, joke-free schtick, Vulcan).”
333 Do Hispanics vote en bloc, like black voters, though?
My impression of Western democracies is that demographic changes tend to cancel each other out. For example, a growing non-white population, voting leftwards, stimulates a greater proportion of white voters to vote rightwards. Look at the way white working class wards in London voted for the Mayoralty, for example.
McCain ahead by 20 in North Carolina - Survey USA. This was supposed to be one of Obama’s target states.
http://abclocal.go.com/wtvd/story?section=news/politics&id=6380065
341 I’m really not convinced you do need more than a “decent building”. I was taught effectively in buildings that were very old. A pledge to rebuild/replace every secondary school is just silly.
341. Yes but there’s a big difference between building *extensions*, if possible, to existing school buildings to remove the portacabin element then knock the whole thing down and start again!
Yes, children need a good atmosphere in which to learn but it doesn’t *need* to be some immensely expensive new building. Some schools do need replacing, but definitely not a majority. You can do plenty of things to a building to spruce it up without starting again from scratch and incurring all the extra costs that go with that.
New thread - Will this be another boost for McCain?
342. Indeed, No point making Nick the “whipping boy” for the government, when i first came on here I did that and it was out of order. His electorate will decide on him, sure i will occasionally be a bit of a devil and quote HRC back at him but it is done in fun not malice!
Nick’s a good man - shame he is Labour but onr has to take him as he is, not what you want him to be.
348 - Like i said, it depends on the individual business case that has been made. The blanket pledge to rebuild EVERY one is obviously silly, but where a case has been made then it should go ahead. And should not, within reason, be delayed by concerns about the economy.
Of all the criticisms about the last Conservative Govt, the chronic underinvestment in infrastructure, for whatever reason, was the most damning.
341
Certainly where I live the standard of the state school buildings is good,including the two state schools that my kids went to.
This policy pledge sounds similar to the Prescott vandalism of Merseyside housing .
348 Quite. If you were living in a 100 year old house, or working in a hundred year old office, you might well refurbish it, but why knock it down and replace it for the hell of it?
339, 345- Sean, I’m not an expert in the reasons for the tipping of the black population from right to left, but I believe it had much to do with a sense that they were quite vulnerable to the effects of the Great Depression, particularly since they were quite underrepresented among landowners, and saw Roosevelt’s promised socialism as a greatly appreciated lifeboat in the storm. It is very interesting to me that, somehow, the southern blacks and traditional southern white Democrats coexisted, and still coexist, in the same party.
The Democrats haven’t sewn up the Hispanic vote yet the way they own the black vote, but there are growing indications that the Hispanics are increasingly becoming Democratic voters. If that trend solidifies, it will be big trouble for the GOP. Your last point is a very interesting one, and I believe you’re right that white voters tend to shift to the right to compensate for growing minority populations on the left. However, there reaches a point where this doesn’t work anymore to create balance because there simply isn’t enough water left in the well. When that happens, the GOP will have to start drawing Hispanic voters, or some other minority voters, or become a permanent minority party.
347 monuments, plain and simple. i.e here is something concrete (possibly literally) that they can point to, regardless of whether children can spell anymore, and whats more they have managed to keep their beloved building industry in government subsidised jobs. I pray that the tories will resist testing, building and tractor figures and will instead try to introduce a real improvement in quality teaching.
There is the other possibility of the new schools becoming income generators in their own right. Modern buildings can be built to be dual purpose - available for example for conference hire perhaps. I return to the point that if the business case is made and is robust, then it should have considered the alternatives of refurbishment etc, and ruled against it. Rejecting new buildings on a matter of principle is no more sensible than proposing to rebuild them all.
346 Jan. Best outlier poll of the race so far !!!!!!!!!!!!!
354 That is so, but the London experience suggests that the more upwardly mobile minorities start identifying with the right wing party. Jews, and increasingly, Hindus, are clear examples of this.
267 - You forget the base for the race starts from a base position of only being 2 points behind nationally Bush won 51/49.
re 18 but Madasafish, inflation’s only 2% you know. And yes I am Madasafish about my pay award.
re 150 really Timothy? If you let me have your email address I’ll keep you informed the next and every time we have a bed crisis. This is because we have far fewer beds than we used to. And surprise, surprise our brand spanking new PFI hospital (which I and you will be paying for until long after we retire) will have many fewer beds still. When you get an email perhaps you could come round and help chuck out all those who perhaps aren’t quite well yet, but their bed is needed.
re 210 you can’t with one hand blame failings on the NHS on it being led from the centre and then moan about autonomy given to PCTs leading to different outcomes. The rates of cancer, and types will be very different in Leeds and Liverpool, and their PCTs may well have different priorities on how it spends its money. We already have NICE which decides whether treatments are cost effective - and is a world leader in its methodology.
re 214 no gay most certainly isn’t but lesb1an is.
re 228 every foundation Trust has elected lay members of its board.
re 327 why have whips do it, it’s probably been fobbed off on GCHQ. I’d bet that they keep tabs on several of us on here.
When you say “the more upwardly mobile minorities start identifying with the right wing party. Jews, and increasingly, Hindus, are clear examples of this”, Sean Fear,
what you really mean is “as they become increasingly selfish…
366 Not really. Unless you assume that poorer people who vote leftwards do so purely for altruistic reasons.