Is politics down to the great mortgage divide?
December 29th, 2008
Have the interest rate cuts been behind the Brown bounce?
Starting with the usual caveat about not reading too much into poll subsets there is some quite interesting data from the latest Ipsos-MORI poll linking the tenure of respondents to their voting intention.
From what I can see the firm only started providing this information in November so there is almost nothing we can compare current figures with. But what we see in the panel above is an enormous split between those with mortgages or who pay rent and those who own their own properties outright.
Thus if the voting was just restricted to the owning outright then it would be C53-L33-LD10 enough to give Cameron a massive landslide. Whereas amongst those still paying off their mortgage who have benefited enormously from the interest rate cuts the split C33-L39-LD15 which would produce a three figure majority for Brown.
Clearly the owner outright group has many more older people in it and they generally tend to be more pro-Tory.
One thing that makes the owners without mortgage so much more powerful is that they are disproportionally more likely to vote. Their certainty percentage is 68% compared with 47% for the mortgage payers and just 32% for private renters.
This data will be worth tracking.
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Losers vote Labour?
Isn’t this just another way of presenting data by age cohort?
I think MORI do a similar breakdown for outright owners, mortgage payers, and renters at each election. So, I think it’s possible to compare with the results for the last election.
My suspicion is that there is no particular significance in these figures, other than that outright owners are likely to be older voters, who are more likely than average to be Conservatives.
“re 303 Tim “I’m surprised at Benedicts raw ignorance re Zionism in Nazi Germany”
Raw ignorance? F off tw*t!”
Benedict.
Show me a credible source for your claim about Zionist Flags and Nazi Germany.
(Not from a Holocaust denial site please)
Yes, and it won’t last as ‘mortgage cut’ warm glows are outweighed by collapsing property values plunging millions into negative equity.
Benedict. I accused noone.
FPT [and after this I promise to shut up about Israel, as the argument is getting circular]
NickP at 307. “Maybe I’m a bit ethnoblind”
Oooh get you. “I apologise for being such a non racist”. This is why you are so often a twat. The vanity oozes as you speak, like some purulent discharge. And you don’t even realise.
You bring up my awareness of the Jewishness of a Question Time panel. First, I have already confessed to being both anti-Semitic and philo-Semitic and artistically obsessed with Jewishness, so accusing me of, er, being obsessed with Jewishness is otiose, to put it politely.
Secondly, at the time my point was very apposite. The Question Time programme was in the middle of the Iraq War, as I recall (the illegal one you supported, the one you still refuse an inquiry into), and some of the questions referred to the whole MidEast crisis.
My point at the time was that a Muslim watching this panel discuss Israeli-Arab relations would certainly feel that the panel was inherently biassed (being 4/5 Jewish), even if you, being so miraculously “ethnoblind” and therefore uniquely saintly, wouldn’t.
Now put away the mirror and stop admiring yourself, you silly man.
Re 2. Yes - that is broadly the case.
5. Marcus Wood. Collapsing property prices only matters if you want or need to sell. Anyone who is fortunate enough to have a tracker mortgage is a lot better off as a result of today’s low interest rates. Whether they give the government the credit for this, I don’t know?
My response to Nick from the previous thread, as I had intended it to be written:
307- I would suggest that as long as individuals of whatever group constitute their own identity as a function of that group, then it is valid and perhaps even important for others to recognize that identity when sizing up such individuals in a given context. This could be gender, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, ideological orientation, etc., etc. If the ‘Jewishness’ of the Jewish individuals on the particular panel referenced in your post could reasonably be viewed as influencing their opinions on the matter that was in question, it seems a reasonable thing to comment on their ethnicity/religious affiliation.
Don’t know if it got mentioned in the other thread, but that MORI poll about Tory members that Coldstone - and others - were blabbering on about, was misrepresented by the NotW.
http://conservativehome.blogs.com/goldlist/2008/12/news-of-the-wor.html
Baxter:
Own outright: 488-129-5 (Con maj 326)
Mortgage: 205-380-36(Lab maj 110)
Other: 135-411-75 (Lab maj 172)
re 4, Tim “Show me a credible source for your claim about Zionist Flags and Nazi Germany.”
That is a fair question, and I am looking it up, but by dexcribing my position as one of sheer ignorance is insulting, as indeed was my reply. I do hope you took it that way at the time
That said, we have peace now…
13 - Lets hope you weren’t just repeating a Holocaust Denial myth Benedict.
Otherwise ignorance would be a preferable charge.
Do the sites you’re coming up with set off any alarm bells?
If Israel is going to launch a full scale ground assault it’ll come within 48 hours.
8. Although the age breaks in an interesting fashion -
18-24 Labour ahead by lots
25-34 Tories marginally ahead
35-44 Tories ahead
45-54 Tories ahead
55-64 Labour ahead
65+ Tories ahead by lots
This suggests that it doesnt just break by tenure type, but there are some interesting numbers here.
http://www.ipsos-mori.com/_assets/pdfs/decembertables.pdf
Table 5 for age breakdown.
re 14, Tim “13 - Lets hope you weren’t just repeating a Holocaust Denial myth Benedict.”
Who said anything about that?
“Do the sites you’re coming up with set off any alarm bells?”
Er no, I am picking through books I own.
Looks like Gordy has really upset the Bishops. Another shot across the bows, this time from the Bishop of London:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/4015946/Gordon-Brown-dealt-fresh-blow-as-Bishop-of-London-criticises-false-financial-hopes.html
Labour MP’s making snide comments like this is only going to sour relations further.
Labour MP John McFall, chairman of the Commons Treasury committee, sought to play down the criticism, saying the bishops may have had “too much mulled wine”.
You’d really think the Labour Party had more common sense but there again common sense is not something this iteration of the Labour Party is well known for.
Re 15, Yokel “If Israel is going to launch a full scale ground assault it’ll come within 48 hours.”
Probably though never underestimate Ehud Olmerts ability to cock it up. Also whilst Hamas are no Hezbollah, the streets in parts of Gaza are very narrow and hard to fight in.
13- I have read and heard many times that some of Hitler’s biggest financial backers in the 1920’s were wealthy Jews (although I don’t have a source at hand to reference). I have not read a thorough history of the matter, though, so can’t comment on how far the connections between the Nazis and Jews went or how long they continued.
As Islam prohibits gambling, I presume that very few Muslims would be attracted to a site called PoliticalBetting.com. Curious to know though if any Muslims are regular posters - or lurkers who would like to “delurk” briefly to reveal that they are indeed represented here - and perhaps add another dimension to the current debate…
16, Ken: “Table 5 for age breakdown”
On a more lighthearted note, I recall a comment I overheard in a pub some time ago:
“I feel like an opinion poll”
–”What?!”
“Yeah. Broken down by age and sex …”
St John at 9.
Not so. There is a very direct correlation between most peoples sense of financial wellbeing and the amount of equity they have or believe they have in their home.
The last recession made people feel vey much poorer even though for most people falling equity makes no practical difference at all.
The easy way out option for most people who have over spent is a re-mortgage, and that route is now firmly closed meaning that millions will have to face up to their credit card and other debts. This knowledge makes people feel less secure.
And lastly although some mortgage rates have fallen fixed rates have remained stubbornly high, and credit cards have risen with most topping 20% these days.
19. Last word on the suject, at least for the night: Yes both Ehud’s have cock up written all over them. I’ll be surprised if it all dosn’t end in tears.
The mortgage split is pretty striking, but as Sean Fear says it may be an “intervening variable” - an apparent correlation due to a correlation with something else. Another aspect is that people who own their own houses are presumably pretty strongly represented in the group who say savings interest is an important part of their income - if you’ve paid off the mortgage and are still employed, it’d be surprising if you aren’t piling up savings. It’d be really helpful if someone could dig out the MORI figures.
7 - lol. You might be right. Enough about us.
10 - yes - if one can reasonably argue that their background decisively influences their views. But that’s an assumption IMO too readily made.
19, The Israelis have done it before and they’ve been training for it, alot. Its just a matter of Olmert’s will to take it to the next stage.
On Topic:
In assessing the significance of this information regarding housing status has anyone got any idea what proportion of the electorate are outright owners / mortgagees / renters?
There is no doubt that Labour collared the younger voter in 1997 and after, the recession cum depression will I’m sure change perceptions.
26. The 2001 census has it 29% outright owners and 39% with mortgages. Not sure if there is any more up to date info out there.
Zionism was supported by the German SS and Gestapo.[3] [4] [5] [6] Hitler himself personally supported Zionism.[7] [8] During the 1930’s, in cooperation with the German authorities, Zionist groups organized a network of some 40 camps throughout Germany where prospective settlers were trained for their new lives in Palestine. As late as 1942 Zionists operated at least one of these officially authorized “Kibbutz” training camps[9] over which flew the blue and white banner which would one day be adopted as the national flag of “Israel”.[10]
http://www.jewsagainstzionism.com/antisemitism/nazisupport.cfm
All people have their founding “myths”. My ancestors had “Cromwell”, the “famine” and the “Black and Tans.”
The Holocaust is one of many belonging to the Jews…
21- You never know. Some Muslims are more devout/religious than others. I know some Muslims who gamble, some who eat ham and hot dogs, and a lot who drink alcohol.
28. Thanks for that.
By the way, 6 of the 7 Diplomacy players have now signed up here
http://www.playdiplomacy.com/games.php?subpage=pending&msg=18
- still missing David Roe…
29 Do you really believe that if Germany had won the War, a State of Israel would have been allowed to exist?
“The Holocaust is one of many belonging to the Jews…”
Yeah, I’m sure that Auschwitz was really a bit like Butlins, and the Jews just misunderstood waht was happening to them.
Mike. They provide this information in the July poll that went 47-27 to the Conservatives. Interestingly mortgaged people broke Conservative in this one.
http://www.ipsos-mori.com/_assets/pdfs/ipsos%20mori%20july08%20political%20monitor%20tables.pdf
Also available in May. Mortgagees also Tory in this one.
http://www.ipsos-mori.com/_assets/pdfs/polit2.pdf
But not prior to that.
30 I’ve visited getting on for twenty Muslim countries - and can confirm that offering a well-stocked bar has been one of the few constants. They get rather wrong-footed when I say I am a tee-totaller!
Gambling is another thing though. I have never seen that be made obvious.
33- Hitler apparently had a plan at one time to resettle some European Jews to Madagascar (a plan that obviously never went very far). Perhaps the Nazi affinity for the Zionists, if it actually existed, was related to their desire to ship Jews somewhere other than Europe, a goal which both groups would have shared for their own separate reasons.
33. There’s certainly evidence that points that way. We’ll never know for sure. The Germans seriously considered Madagascar and Uganda as an alternative homeland for the Jews…
Re 23, Weathercock, “19. Last word on the suject, at least for the night: Yes both Ehud’s have cock up written all over them. I’ll be surprised if it all dosn’t end in tears.”
Yes granted, but then Ehud Barak did lead the operation to take out the leaders of Black September, one of whom lived a few floors above me, so at least he does know which end of a gun is the dangerous one, even if he is a little generous on the plastic.
30
Oh dear. As i said if the cap fits.
30. RodCrosby.
Well, at least you’re consistent and unwavering in your reprehensible wrongness.
29 - RodCrosbys source is
“Neturei Karta - (Aramaic Literally, “keepers of the gates.”) (so called - “Jews against Zionism”) A tiny sect of fanatic ultra-orthodox anti-Zionist Jews who do not recognize the state of Israel. They claim that the Jewish state can only be formed when the Messiah comes. “
YouGov poll reported in Daily Telegraph - Anthony King has comment piece saying 7% ahead.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/personal-view/4015413/The-Tories-greatest-asset-is-that-they-are-not-in-power-right-now.html
Trying to find poll itself.
43. Their sources are independent of their beliefs, if you care to look…
39 However, I think Mein Kampf, and the whole of Nazi propaganda, indicates what Hitler wanted for the Jews.
39
By the way Rod, you should be careful about your partial reporting of ‘facts’. A quick look at his biography shows that describing Lenni Brenner as a jew when he wrote his stuff is about as accurate as describing Henry VIII as a Catholic after he had divorced Catherine of Aragon. He apparently became an atheist before he even reached his teens. I know it helps your argument to say oh look heres a jewish writer saying all these things but it is misleading in the extreme.
44 is that not the Dec 22nd poll?
44 Sorry - seems to be an article updated referring to poll reported before Xmas.,
44. I think that’s a reference to this poll.
Ted, a Telegraph one on the 20th gave that figure? Might King simply be refering to that in his article, rather than the article relating to a new poll?
47. The Jews are a race, and no-one can change their race. Catholicism is a religion, adhered to by some people of all races…
Re 26, Yokel, “19, The Israelis have done it before and they’ve been training for it, alot. Its just a matter of Olmert’s will to take it to the next stage.”
You could say the same about Southern Lebanon and hezbollah, that does seem to me to underestimate Olmerts ability to cock it up.
44 - I think that’s the YouGov/Telegraph poll from 18th December (the latest) rather than a new poll. Good spot though!
52 There are black Jews, as well as white Jews.
54 - Four corrections and a retraction in only 5 minutes. We know our polls!
Re 30, Rod Crosby, “The Holocaust is one of many belonging to the Jews…”
The Holocaust is not a myth, but then neither was Cromwell or the black and tans.
Further to my 57, Rod Crosby, being generous, did you mean narrative?
56 The only thing we cannot agree on is which poll is correct………
54 Couldn’t load Polling Report to check (ever since Anthony changed it’s format Safari takes ages to load it).
Article is worth reading though as Anthony King doesn’t damn the Tories by some odd finding. He seems to agree with us optimists (in partisan terms) who think the Brown Bounce II is a passing fad and the fundamentals are with Cameron.
Re 38, Stars and Stripes “33- Hitler apparently had a plan at one time to resettle some European Jews to Madagascar (a plan that obviously never went very far). Perhaps the Nazi affinity for the Zionists, if it actually existed, was related to their desire to ship Jews somewhere other than Europe, a goal which both groups would have shared for their own separate reasons.”
Correct, and neither cared much for those who wanted to stay where they were.
52
Rod, seriously, where do you dig up this garbage?
Jewishness, Judeism or whatever you want to call it is not a race. It is a religion which others not born jews can also join.
http://judaism.about.com/od/abcsofjudaism/a/beingjewish.htm
I am starting to think that in spite of your clever quizes you are a moron. And no, that is not a race either.
62 - No, Jews are classified as races under the Race Discrimination Act, as are Sikhs. Islam and Christianity and Hinduism are, of course, not.
This is in accordance with Jewish teaching. Converts are allowed, but very few, and normally only by marrying in.
re 44. I think that this Anthony King piece is his commentary on the last Telegraph YouGov poll that came out before Xmas. The detailed numbers he refers to are the same as in that poll.
Re 47, Richard Tyndall “I know it helps your argument to say oh look heres a jewish writer saying all these things but it is misleading in the extreme.”
Perhaps but many political Zionists are not particularly religious if at all. It proves nothing either way.
64 Looks like a later end of year commentary but using the figures from pre-Christmas poll which is what confused me. The comments on the piece are from today and I couldn’t find an earlier version.
re 55, Sean Fear “52 There are black Jews, as well as white Jews.”
Yes, but that has never stopped anyone trying to refer to them as a race now has it? Quite a few of them are genetically very close to most Arabs as well.
On a slightly more light-hearted but still Semitically-oriented note, someone mentioned the “Jewish homeland” established by Stalin, pre-thread.
In point of fact, this homeland was set in the malarial pine-swamps of south eastern Siberia, it was called Birobidzhan, AND I’VE BEEN THERE.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birobidzhan
I went through it when I was on the Trans-Siberian railway in the 1990s. I was extremely bleary eyed for somewhat outre reasons, however I still remember the weirdness of this railway station - selling Yiddish newspapers, with Orthodox Jews standing on the platform - looming suddenly out of the endless Russian taiga.
Can anyone else beat that? Has any other pb-er visited a totally remote and utterly fantastical Jewish community?
63
Since when did the race discrimination act have anything sensible to say about anything?
62. From the same doubtful source, a Jewish rabbi himself says “both”, thus supporting my assertion.
http://judaism.about.com/od/orthodoxfaqenkin/f/raceorreligion.htm
65
But Rod’s explicit point was that here was a jew writing these things and we should therefore give them more credence. Otherwise why mention his religion at all? What it proves is that Rod was being misleading in his posting.
Benedict.
If you want a bit of help with your flag theory.
Start here.
Jüdische Volkspartei
70
Race a definition.
“A local geographic or global human population distinguished as a more or less distinct group by genetically transmitted physical characteristics.”
73
Posted too early. If one can become a jew by conversion then under that definition jews cannot be a race - unless of course one believes in some sort of religious Lamarkism.
53. Well actually no, the Israelis didnt properly prepare for the Southern Lebanon move and didnt realise their opponents position or tactics. That they acknowledged. They had their inquest.
History suggests that the state of Israel rarely gets its military strategy wrong twice whatever its politicians may do before or after. This right now is a miltary conflict and Hamas, whether people like it or not, was caught with its pants down and is scrambling to get its act together.
Thirdly, the territory is different this time from the Hizbollah action. It is tight streets and the Israelis have shown themselves perfectly capable down the years of fighting in such environments.
The media and those who are sympathetic to Hamas (or just dont like the Israelis or Jews or whatever badge they wear) will most likely protray any Israeli ground attack in the same way that the halfwits protrayed the invasion of Iraq, in itself one of the most succesful miltary operations in history (the afters was incompetently shite). They will magnifying every Israeli casualty or mistake and every rocket Hamas still fire as somehow indicating failure. Meanwhile the bigger miltary picture is ignored. Who can forget the Iraq invasion when memorably the media blanket covered the downing of one..repeat one Apache helicopter. Meanwhile Iraqi divisons were disintegrating.
No one denies that this action will not finish Hamas, it isnt designed to and the Israelis know this. It is designed to put them on a rack and knock them back some time in planning, capability and leadership and weaken their position in Gaza.
Most of all, just a note for those people who use (and I’ve heard it already on various news outlets) that Hamas just use ‘home made’ rockets need to get a grip. As if that somehow is endearing. Home made bombs took out 50 odd people in London and I dont hear people say they were just home made then. If Hamas had aircraft theyd use them. War isnt fair, it isnt meant to be. Its about using all your advantages and exerting maximum force where it matters.
Those who somehow go on about this being David versus Goliath and if its mean’t to be sport need to get with the real world.
Congratulations all pb winners, which in my book (admittedly not as popular as Shadsy’s) includes all nomineess and indeed all pbers. Most esp. Mike S, Morus & all other active enablers!
Just gave my precious suffrage to the Old Jacobite as my part of the Hiberno-Papist-Fop compact of 1688.
70. RodCrosby: a Jewish rabbi himself says “both”, thus supporting my assertion.
Wrong.
You said, and I quote: The Jews are a race, and no-one can change their race. Catholicism is a religion, adhered to by some people of all races…
The very strong implication there is that you consider “Jewish” to be an ethnic and not a religious term. It’s clearly both (and therefore neither).
On thread, up to a point. The relief for hard-pressed mortgage payers must have been welcome and may give a clue why Labour has recovered in the south east, where property prices were at their most feverish. However, most mortgage payers will be of the generation previously lost to the Tories, so I expect that Labour’s strong showing here also reflects the residual 1997 loyalty.
71. My point was merely to head-off another round of pointless screeching “anti-semite”, “holocast-denier”, “Nazi-lover”, etc.. If a Jew* (*person of Jewish origin) can research these matters and publish his conclusions, a Gentile surely can consider them and give them their due weight.
btw, some Jews don’t even believe in the Holocaust at all. Now there’s a thing…
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=iXKHw0EZrqM
Re 71, Richard Tyndall “But Rod’s explicit point was that here was a jew writing these things and we should therefore give them more credence. Otherwise why mention his religion at all? What it proves is that Rod was being misleading in his posting.”
I can’t see it proves anything either way to be frank. For a start Rod may not have been aware that he was an atheist (though unlikely) and I do take the view that being Jewish is a bit more than a question of religious belief. Others do to. You may legitimatly disagree, and we would have to agree to differ however taking one view or another is hardly deceitful or disengenuous.
68 - Golders Green is pretty fantastic. Does that count?
68. Interesting question, SeanT, and I’m glad you asked.
I have also been to a fantastically surreal Jewish community: the home of the “Mountain Jews” in Azerbaijan: Krasnaya Sloboda.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krasnaya_Sloboda
It’s said to be the oldest continuously inhabited Jewish town in the world outside the Holy Land, and it is truly odd: a very Yiddish town with red haired Jews tucked away in the foothills of the Caucasus mountains, surrounded mainly by Azeri Muslims.
The people speak their own language, called Judaeo-Tat.
82. They also sell Judaeo Tat in the gift shop….
68, 82. Fascinating stuff, SeanT and SeanT, I too have also visited a surreal and remote Jewish town: this time its Belmonte in the high sierras of central Portugal.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belmonte_Jews
These Jews survived the expulsion or forced conversion of Iberia’s Jews after the Reconquista by pretending to convert, but secretly remaining Jewish. They even faked their own pork sausages (really filled with chicken) to convince their suspicious neighbours they had abandoned their Hebrew ways.
You can still buy these crypto-Jewish Lusitanian chicken bangers in the town.
And people say I’m obsessed with the Jews.
78. The relief for hard-pressed mortgage payers must have been welcome and may give a clue why Labour has recovered in the south east
Have they?
Last Comres Poll SE Con 41 Lab 33
Last Yougov Poll London Con 40 Lab 37
Last Yougov Poll Rest of South Con 50 Lab 28
78. The relief for hard-pressed mortgage payers must have been welcome and may give a clue why Labour has recovered in the south east
Have they?
Last Comres Poll SE Con 41 Lab 33
Last Yougov Poll London Con 40 Lab 37
Last Yougov Poll Rest of South Con 50 Lab 28
82. “I have also been to a fantastically surreal Jewish community: the home of the “Mountain Jews” in Azerbaijan: Krasnaya Sloboda.”
I love weird stuff like this.
Are there any Jews here who can clarify the religion/ethnicity question? It’s amazing that this can really be a question at all after thousands of years of Jewish history. Are the two concepts two sides of the same coin or merely largely intersecting circles in a Venn diagram? Was Sammy Davis Jr. an ethnic Jew? Are Jews for Jesus really Jews at all? Anybody? Anybody?
Apologies for the double post!
Re 75, Yokel “History suggests that the state of Israel rarely gets its military strategy wrong twice whatever its politicians may do before or after. This right now is a miltary conflict and Hamas, whether people like it or not, was caught with its pants down and is scrambling to get its act together.”
True, especially re Hamas.
“The media and those who are sympathetic to Hamas (or just dont like the Israelis or Jews or whatever badge they wear) will most likely protray any Israeli ground attack in the same way that the halfwits protrayed the invasion of Iraq, in itself one of the most succesful miltary operations in history (the afters was incompetently shite). They will magnifying every Israeli casualty or mistake and every rocket Hamas still fire as somehow indicating failure. Meanwhile the bigger miltary picture is ignored. Who can forget the Iraq invasion when memorably the media blanket covered the downing of one..repeat one Apache helicopter. Meanwhile Iraqi divisons were disintegrating.”
The problem here is the environment. There will be much colatoral damage, if nothing else in buildings, and that will cause Israel much political damage.
“No one denies that this action will not finish Hamas, it isnt designed to and the Israelis know this. It is designed to put them on a rack and knock them back some time in planning, capability and leadership and weaken their position in Gaza.”
A point I have made before, but they did that to Fatah first, and it dod not seem to help did it? With a bit of luck there will not be anything worse than Hamas waiting and perhaps something better.
On home made bombs, they are less effective and accurate than well made ones, but if your dead, well your dead.
87. It is genuinely one of the oddest places I have ever visited. And I’ve been to a few weird nooks and corners.
In fact the whole of the Caucasus is decidedly surreal.
Will President Obama send [State Secretary] Hillary Clinton [in the Middle East] to restart negotiations from the point they reached in 2000, when her husband, President Bill Clinton, brought a historic peace agreement as close as it’s ever been.?
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2008-12-29/send-in-hillary/
Latest voting for Poster of the Year
Just done a quick calculation and it’s currently:-
SeanT 36%
David Herdson - 27%
JackW - 19%
SallyC 9%
This does not add up to 100% because of rounding.
If you have not voted yet go to
http://politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2008/12/29/the-pb-poster-of-2008-the-final-round/
Voting is open to all site visitors - not just those who post
92. Yeah and Bill left a very bitter man when Arafat took him to the edge of breakthrough then walked away. Rumour has it that Clinton told Colin Powell ‘never to trust that son of a bitch’.
91. Yeah i bet.
93-How many people have already voted?
Prior to the Incarnation, the division between Jews and Non-Jews was coinciding with the division between Circumcised and Not circumcised…
But then Paul blurred this line by saying some were Jews from the prepuce (the flesh) and some from the spirit — for a New Alliance between God and its people is now dividing the division instituted by the Law of Moses…
Re 88, Stars and Stripes “Are there any Jews here who can clarify the religion/ethnicity question?”
No, because it is largely a matter of opinion.
Re 94, Yokel, “92. Yeah and Bill left a very bitter man when Arafat took him to the edge of breakthrough then walked away. Rumour has it that Clinton told Colin Powell ‘never to trust that son of a bitch’.”
Yes, but you have not seen what was actually on offer as a final settlement. For a start it did not include control over the West Banks own water. I would have told them to FO as well.
97 was a response to 88 …
I dared to speak even if I’m not a Jew from the flesh (even if I’m c…).
98- That’s a pretty sad answer. I’m not saying you’re wrong, but just that the answer is bizarre given that Judaism isn’t something that just came in as the latest fad.
Here’s something I found at Wikipedia (yes, I know…): “A study published by the National Academy of Sciences found that “the paternal gene pools of Jewish communities from Europe, North Africa, and the Middle East descended from a common Middle Eastern ancestral population”, and suggested that “most Jewish communities have remained relatively isolated from neighboring non-Jewish communities during and after the Diaspora”. Researchers expressed surprise at the remarkable genetic uniformity they found among modern Jews, no matter where the diaspora has become dispersed around the world.”
So apparently just about everybody who practices Judaism today is also ethnically related. That sounds like a real ethnicity to me, even if there has been some marriage to goys who converted to the faith over the centuries.
“The world gives Israel a free hand”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/dec/29/israelandthepalestinians-middleeast1
If Labour’s recovery is down to mortgage holders, then they must not have an endowment or they have just given up reading their red warning notices.
I wonder what will happen to Labour ‘ahead by lots’ [Ken @16] when they leave further education with a debt and no job.
Thank you for your very generous comments on the last thread Marquee Mark. I was going to say that at least I won’t be Norway [no offence Jan] with ‘nil points’ - but then that position usually falls to the UK nowadays.
Thanks to everyone who voted for me in the last round.
Re 101, Stars and Stripes “98- That’s a pretty sad answer. I’m not saying you’re wrong, but just that the answer is bizarre given that Judaism isn’t something that just came in as the latest fad.”
Well true, they are fundamentally a bunch of Arabs, and what we are seeing now in Gaza is a family tiff!
“So apparently just about everybody who practices Judaism today is also ethnically related. That sounds like a real ethnicity to me, even if there has been some marriage to goys who converted to the faith over the centuries.”
Hence why different people take different views on the subject.
101. I’d say the Ashkenazim Jews have a distinct racial identity. You only have to took at all the tragic photos of victims in, say, Auschwitz to realise this - they look alike. Simple as.
Sephardic Jews are a less obvious ethnic group, and much less distinguishable from southeast Europeans and Levantine Arabs.
Ethiopian Jews (etc etc) are entirely different, of course.
Interestingly the Mountain Jews I met in Azerbaijan could have stepped out of 19th century Krakow.
The enormous confusion arises because Jewishness is a cultural, religious AND racial identity, with various overlaps and complexities.
104- Do the Jews have any special terminology to describe a Jew who abandoned the faith for, say, Islam (and is still therefore just as ethnically Jewish as the day they were born), or has that person ceased to be anything Jewish in any way as far as they’re concerned? Of couse, that person is still an ethnic Jew in an objective sense. This stuff is really crazy. No wonder the Jews just couldn’t imagine Israel being anything other than a one-religion nation.
There is a bunch of Sephardic Jews living near my place, in Outremont. The women are so sexy… even at 50…
One can be a Jew from the prepuce, yet a Gentile from the Spirit…
84. There is an even more surreal Jewish community in Mexico - sort of went to ground in hills to avoid the Inquisition. Think extras from a Sergio Leone movie (half Indian) but Jewish.
Re 106 Stars and Stripes “104- Do the Jews have any special terminology to describe a Jew who abandoned the faith for, say, Islam (and is still therefore just as ethnically Jewish as the day they were born), or has that person ceased to be anything Jewish in any way as far as they’re concerned? Of couse, that person is still an ethnic Jew in an objective sense.”
No idea.
“This stuff is really crazy.”
Is it?
“No wonder the Jews just couldn’t imagine Israel being anything other than a one-religion nation.”
Many can imagine it being just that though. Jews share the same religion the same way that born again Christians, Pentacostalists, Roman Catholics and Orthodox Christians do, only more so. It is no surpise therefore that they have many differing opinions on matters political.
104. Again, the idea of a Jewish race may be a “myth.” Arthur Koestler (an Ashkenazi Jew) posited that most Jews are descended from a Turko-Mongoloid people, the Khazars, who converted en-masse about 1200 years ago.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thirteenth_Tribe
In attempting to disprove Koestler’s theory, geneticists seem to have proved that the Jews are indeed a distinct race…
Another article:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/dec/29/israelandthepalestinians-middleeast
20. There are some strange stories out there. I remember a lecture given by a descendant of Jewish refugees, and apparently one of his Jewish forebears had been awarded a medal by the Nazis and was presented it by one of the top brass.
101. The initial confusion comes from it being a religion and an ethnicity, that are interrelated so that most but not all religious jews are ethnically jewish.
There are those who might be ethnically Jewish/part Jewish/etc but religiously otherwise might not consider themselves Jewish whereas others would and all kinds of other complications.
The fount of all knowledge has a detailed article on it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Who_is_a_Jew
109. Splendid. Never heard of them! Another surreal Jewish community to visit!!
Know any more…?
The author of a recent work on diplomacy in the Middle East, “The Much Too Promised Land”, seemed to agree with our “intrepid” Morus :
Politico: “Obama’s going to inherit a crisis without the capacity to do much about it,” Miller said.
http://dyn.politico.com/printstory.cfm?uuid=839573CA-18FE-70B2-A87AE2F8CA4A8821
106. Can’t think of one - the attitude is that if you are born Jewish, you are jewish (in a non-caps kind of way) even if you are a practising Roman Catholic!!
I think this leads to resentment and anger among some who *want* to leave a faith/culture they don’t feel they fit in with - and they can’t get away.
114. Search for Crypto-Judaism.
Thanks to Ken for his link to the July MORI figures at post 36. Bear in mind the hideous dangers of (a) looking at subsets and (b) comparing across institutes. Also, of course, there has been a shift since July from a Tory lead of 20 to one of 5. However, what we see is that for those who own their homes entirely, there is a shift thus:
Con 53% (no change)
Lab 26% (+8)
LD 10% (-7)
whereas for those with mortgages:
Con 43% (-10)
Lab 39% (+7)
LD 15% (-2)
It does appear, therefore, that mortgages have swung significantly more from Tory to Labour than outright home-owners. The comparison is harder for people renting, since MORI divides these into private rentals (who strikingly are very much more LibDem than any other group - the student vote?) and public sector. But it looks as though the swing there is similar to the mortgagees.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jews_in_apostasy
Since they’ve managed to so successfully maintain their isolation/distinctiveness (in a cultural sense) through the centuries, I guess it’s not so surprising that the ethnicity almost always corresponds to the religion. Still, it would be helpful if an Academie Juive could be created in the spirit of the Academie Francaise to once and for all clarify who and what is Jewish.
Correction: the Tory figure for mortgagees should be 33, not 43 (as in Mike’s article).
114. I just did. Fascinating. The crypto-Jews of Monterrey. Wow.
Get this: Diego Rivera was Jewish. So was Frida Kahlo.
And so was….. Fidel Castro! Duh?!!!
How can anyone not find this stuff deeply intriguing? Now where are my calipers for measuring skull size*.
*joke
120. Eh, I think it’s a can of worms that would be much better off left closed.
118. NPMP: private rentals (who strikingly are very much more LibDem than any other group - the student vote?)
I suspect few over 30s rent privately.
116- This is true of Islam too: born a Muslim, always a Muslim, as far as the faith itself is concerned.
Anybody remember that post of seanT ?:
http://politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2008/08/08/how-much-of-an-issue-is-mccains-eighth-decade/#comment-740794
Extract :
“My daughter Lucy is 2 years old, very cute, excitable, learning new words every day etc etc.
Quite often I take her to Kenwood, near where she lives, and we have a little daddy-and-Lucy picnic with strawberries and stuff. Bless!
Anyway. This Wednesday, to entertain myself during the boring lulls of parenthood, I taught her to point and say “look, Daddy, there’s a Jew!” whenever we saw someone rich-looking in Hampstead. She’s been doing this ever since, with all the enthusiasm of a two year old.
I have to confess this cracks me up every time she does it. “
114. Sorry, no - I will try and find out. Basically they were descended from the Conversos who mass immigrated to the New World. Then came the big crack down from the Inquisition. Some went completely underground - you get completely Catholic families that light 7 candles on a Friday in a locked room in the middle of the house. And don’t know why that is the family tradition….
The really strange bunch headed into the hills - quite a few intermarried with the locals. So you got Mexican cowboys with lots of Indian blood who celebrate Passover….
93.
‘SeanT 36%
David Herdson - 27%
JackW - 19%
SallyC 9%’
Does this mean I am coming up behind Jack’s [in]famous rear?
Yikes.
I think I’ll close my eyes.
125 — Maybe Obama — whose father was Muslim — will have some problem with the Islamists — for, being now a devout Christian, can be considered an apostate from an islamic point of view…
9.”Anyone who is fortunate enough to have a tracker mortgage is a lot better off as a result of today’s low interest rates. Whether they give the government the credit for this, I don’t know?”
At this moment in time, and *if* rates remain low, and they survive this recession unscathed.
To me, a tracker mortgage is a bit of a gamble in the longer term.
103. Sally C. Congratulations on Best Newcomer. I went to the CML site and the following link provides an excel sheet of the types of mortgage for FTB and home movers.
Endowments appear really to have fallen into disuse. Only 9% of mortgages appear to be interest only + specified repayment vehicle (which I guess will be endowments), while I am very surprised by the proportion of interest only with no specified repayment vehicle which is up to 26% of total mortgages in 2007. (Although this includes those where there is a specified repayment vehicle but is not mentioned by the lender.)
http://www.cml.org.uk/cml/filegrab/2ML6.xls?ref=4628
120. S&S: it would be helpful if an Academie Juive could be created in the spirit of the Academie Francaise to once and for all clarify who and what is Jewish.
I had a similar thought a few days ago (though it sprung from thoughts about Islam): how many religions actually have an authority to define what falls within it. Off the top of my head I could only think of (Roman) Catholicism.
126. lol. Shhh.
It’s curel, and really not my style, but I’m forced to post this, which I’m sure will amuse many of you:
http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=3798711
Billionaire developer and San Diego Chargers owner Alex Spanos has announced in a letter that he suffers from dementia[...] Spanos was one of the largest contributors to the 2004 campaign of George W. Bush [...]
114- There’s a Jewish community here in New York too, tucked away on a little island known as “Manhattan.”
Happiness and bodyline for Women:
HAPPIEST DRESS SIZES
1. 14
2. 12
3. 8.
4. 16.
5. 10
LEAST HAPPY DRESS SIZES
1. 24
2. 20
3. 22
4. 6
5. 18
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/4014153/Size-14-women-happiest-with-life-and-looks.html
135. S&S.
Post of the day, by miles!
129- That’s an interesting question. If there have been any rumblings of the sort, I have not encountered them. Of course, I’m no expert on either Sunni scripture or modern Shia interpretations as would concern Obama’s status within the faith.
116 - In fairness, that’s the same for Catholics. Baptism is a life-sentence.
You can lapse, convert, die, whatever. You’re still a Catholic.
Re 126, Philippe “I have to confess this cracks me up every time she does it”
I have to confess I find this distinctly odd of SeanT.
131. I do wonder if the rise of interest only mortgages is symptomatic of money illusion*. Those with interest only repayment mortgages are going to be in trouble. With the capital value falling and with the real value of the debt not being eroded by inflation, this is going to drive people to save, save, save.
http://www.cml.org.uk/cml/filegrab/112006Interest-only-whyalltheinterest.pdf?ref=5138
*http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Money_illusion
75.Excellent post Yokel. I really appreciate your no nonsense style and the way you knock the argument down in this way on these types of topics. You simple tell it how it is, without the flowers and chocolates embellishments that lead to silly arguments on here.
132 - There’s the Dalai Lama in Tibetan Buddhism, and the Aga Khan (latest incarnation of the Imam, as recognised by the Ismailis). They share with the Pope the title of “His Holiness”.
Ayatollah Sistani is about as close as you get amongst the Twelvists (majority Shia sect).
Grand Muftis in Sunni Islamic countries are essentially Chief Justices under Sharia. Orthodox Churches have Patriarchs, and the Anglican Community has HM Elizabeth II.
130 Surely a fixed interest rate is also a gamble - you’re betting that interest rates will rise, with a tracker you’re betting they’ll fall.
140. Here she is, Benedict, my daughter the appalling Nazi. Just about to goose-step down to Golders Green.
http://toffeewomble.blogspot.com/2008/08/my-daughter-yesterday.html
118. I didnt really bother with the rental vote - the samples are small and look very variable to me - the numbers are even worse than you might think from the 70:30 split of home owners vs renters, because renters also have appalling voting intention figs which means the samples become smaller still.
What’s quite interesting with the shift in the voting intention of mortgagees is that according to the CML, 70% of mortgagees in 2007 were fixed. Only 27% were linked to floating rates. Taking the average of the past 7 years the numbers become 46% fixed vs 43% floating. (Don’t ask me what it is relative to outstanding - I dont know, and it isnt really an area of interest to me - I am perfectly happy with the rough guesstimates I’ve given above).
re 145, Seant “140. Here she is, Benedict, my daughter the appalling Nazi. Just about to goose-step down to Golders Green.”
I said nothing about your daughter, just that it was very odd of you.
144. It’s not as much of a gamble because you know exactly what your outgoings will be unlike with a floating rate.
143 - Correction, Aga Khan IV (49th Imam and leader of the Nizari branch of the Ismailis) is addressed as His Highness (awarded by HM in 1957).
It is the leader of the Dawoodi Bohra, the 52nd Da’i al-Mutlaq, Dr. Syedna Mohammed Burhanuddin who uses the title His Holiness, along with the Pope, the Dalai Lama, and the Pope of The Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria, Shenouda III.
Interestingly, the Da’i al-Mutlaq is recognised in the UK as a Corporation Sole, by a Private Act of Parliament (1993)
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/localact1993/ukla_19930010_en_1
Aren’t you glad I cleared that up?
145 - Blonde, I notice…
“130 Surely a fixed interest rate is also a gamble - you’re betting that interest rates will rise, with a tracker you’re betting they’ll fall.”
Over the longer term it brings security, and remember, its only very recently that interest rates have come down. They did in fact decouple from the BoE rate for while.
139. Though the worst that you get in the Judaic thing is being invinted round by your mother to meet the Rabbi - again.
Not quite a death sentence.
The Obama thing doesn’t seem to have got any traction in the Muslim world yet. Until he visits a Muslim country and *then* is involved in a relious event in public, my guess is that it won’t hit critical mass.
Bit like all the artists etc. who make rude noises/picture about the Jewish son of a building contractor. Forgetting that he is a holy man in more than one religion. That doesn’t seem to have hit the nutball radar either. Yet.
68. Apologies for the late reply. Only got as far as Sean’s post down the thread before feeling the need to reply but by a strange coincidence I have been to / through Birobidzhan on the Trans-Sibirian (nearly six days into the journey), and remember it well as one of the Russians who’d been travelling in my compartment since Ekaterinburg got off there to fit some new road barriers at the level crossing. He wasn’t Jewish but the place obviously was.
Isn’t the point about Jewishness that it’s a religion that behaves like and thinks of itself as a race? This definition benefits those who wish to promote Zionism and those who wish to destroy it. In the same way, there’s often a conflation between the interests of Israel and those of Jewishness - so that anything in the interests of Israel must be in the interests of Jews (and the equivalent argument against).
Oh, and upthread it was suggested that Henry VIII wasn’t a Catholic after his divorce. It’s not really an time I’ve read an enormous amount on but I always got the impression that the crucial change that Henry made was to go from being a Roman Catholic to an Anglo- one. The more radical changes may have begun under Henry but weren’t lead by or inspired by him and certainly gained a great deal more pace after his death.
Oh, and on topic, if the thesis is right then negative equity will be one of the key political issues in the next few years - low repayments are great but if your mortgage is worth more than your house, you’re still a prisoner.
145.Seant, she is a little cutie like my own niece, and looks very like her daddy.
URW you need to go and lie down in a dark room and recover your sanity. My boss does exist and will no doubt laugh at being called an anti-semite.
151. Fixed rates are insurance against future high interest rates.
Re 149, Morus “Aren’t you glad I cleared that up?”
Very, its been keeping me up for nights on end!
150. Yes. In my unpublished fatherhood memoir (Never Change A Baby With A Hangover) I do note that my daughter Lucy has a slightly blue-eyed, flaxen-haired Hitler Youth look about her.
153 - Quite right. He remained a Catholic until he died, even taking transubstantiated eucharist on his death bed.
153. Henry was burning Protestants till the end of his life.
His vision was of an English Catholic Church with himself as the No. 1 guy. There are still quite a few traces of this in the Anglican faith.
158 - Soon to be published? I was given your book (’Millions of Women…’) over Christmas, and read it in one. I won’t give a review here - think I’ll email you instead.
I have pre-ordered The Genesis Secret, but am regretting doing so on the co.uk version of Amazon. Maybe by buying it from different Amazon websites, we could hedge your currency exposures?
156 - Insurance is “a gamble” in itself though. If you take out fire insurance, you are effectively placing a small bet on your house burning down.
160 - See http://archbishop-cranmer.blogspot.com !
“The Church of England - worshipping Jesus with a self-satisfied glow of superiority since 1536…”
OK, I must retire. An engaging and vigorous day of debate on pb.com
Soon I must fly off to the desert and my posts will diminish for a while. If I don’t get a chance before… Happy New Year to all pb-ers, Yiddishers and gentiles alike.
re 155, Chris A “URW you need to go and lie down in a dark room and recover your sanity. My boss does exist and will no doubt laugh at being called an anti-semite.”
Where did he call him that?
145 “70% of mortgagees in 2007 were fixed. Only 27% were linked to floating rates. Taking the average of the past 7 years the numbers become 46% fixed vs 43% floating”
So what are the 3% (in 2007) or 11% (last 7 years) that are somehow neither fixed nor floating?
161. No, it was never published and probably never will be. It was an unfortunate combination of elements - gosh-darn-I’ve-dropped-the-nappy Inept New Dad light comedy, interspersed with very hair-raising and sometimes harrowing drug addiction/Hezbollah kidnapping type stuff.
The book was meant to be about a roisterous danger-seeking lad reforming himself through paternity, but the bad stuff was just too weird and alarming, and the light comedy too light to counterweigh it.
One day I will try and totally rework it. For the moment I am concentrating on the thriller and a secret “posh novel” project.
OK that really is it. G’nite!
Re 164, SeanT Happy New Year to you too!
I’m not Jewish.
But sometimes I wish I was.
I also wish I could be a professional jiver, so perhaps I’m just weird like that!
re 165 Benedict 96 on the last thread. URW has seemed a bit overwrought today.
156 etc Yes I can understand that a fixed rate insures you against massive increases in interest rates in the future - it also insures you against decreases
You know what your outgoings are, but they can never decrease… Just as bookmakers make a healthy living, I have always suspected that it is the lender that makes money on fixed rates, not the borrower.
171.It irons out the ups and downs, and gives you the security of set monthly payments. And if you go for the right one at the right time, it will save you money in the longer term.
172 But I suspect you are unlikely to get “the right rate at the right time”, it’s the lender that knows the market & can make the best predictions, not the borrower.
In any case, most fixed term deals are for quite short periods - typically 2 years - so by the time rates have gone up you will probably be looking for a new deal, based on higher rates.
But maybe I’m just a bit more of a risk taker than some; I have never had a fixed rate mortgage.
O.K!! As a 37 year-old member payoin of the Labour Party,I will attempt (and am prepared to be shot down) celebrating my Woolwick/Barcalys tracker mortgage falling,from 3207/month in Aug 08 to £97/month in Jna 09.
O.K,I was three-quarters owner,and therefore,by todays standrads,have a piffling mortgage (£54K,which I have done interest-only for c.15 months.soon to revert)
Many others of my cohort are at leats chuffed:I feel for evry last person who may/may not lose their job in 2009,but lets see how the ship staedies-I’ve heard the rigth-wing ‘extemtr-eamers’ often enough to turn a deaf ear to them.
Well,less than 48 hours till 2009 is born GMT-I wish you all well!
Re 170, Chris A “re 165 Benedict 96 on the last thread. URW has seemed a bit overwrought today.”
Ah I see, I just told him to FOT.
174 Sorry about the typos-my underlying thoguht is that,somewhere,somehow,a ‘window of opportunity’ will arise in the first half of ‘09!
175. Benedict White: I just told him to FOT.
Feast of Tabernacles?
175. I’m overwrought EVERY day but some days I don’t express my overwroughtness.
173.”172 But I suspect you are unlikely to get “the right rate at the right time”, it’s the lender that knows the market & can make the best predictions, not the borrower.”
Wrong, its like when you buy or sell a house, you should do your homework over a period of at least 6 months before making a move. And if you are taking out a new mortgage you should check out the products, a good clue is to monitor the ones that are steadily being removed by lenders when there is movement afoot in the area.
I have done most types of mortgages at some point, and its always a gamble trying to decide what will happen in the future. I don’t want to tempt fate, but I have played it right since becoming more savvy in the early 90’s, that period certainly concentrated the mind.
178 - Let it out, mate! It’s what the interblag is for!!
180-Morus.One thing that makes me overwrought is when people go ‘off topic’ and when I do it myself I get really overwrought.
This is a good topic..which is why I didn’t reply.Wasn’t there a time when only people who owned property were allowed to vote ?
Re 176, Patrick, the best opportunity for Gordon to have gone has er.. gone.
Re 177, LS, “Feast of Tabernacles?”
Er possibly not. it involves intercourse, travel and the last word is another word for a female part of the anatomy.
Re 178, URW, “175. I’m overwrought EVERY day but some days I don’t express my overwroughtness.”
Could I possibly suggest that you don’t question my ability to read or understand history, though you are welcome to cite what ever you like and argue what you like.
It is certainly the case that the Zionist party in Germany was still allowed at least up to 1935 if not 1938, as was their flag which is very similar to that of modern day Israel. They shared in part a common purpose, to wit, ridding Germany of Jews, though the Zionist had a particular destination in mind. That does not mean to say that they shared all aims, though reading some of the diary notes of people like Ben Gurion is frankly as chilling as those of people like Oswold Mosley.
Isn’t it the case that these tracker mortgage deals only last for a short time, such as two years? When the deal ends many borrowers will have to go on to their lender’s standard variable rate because in present conditions many of them won’t be able to negotiate new deals as they haven’t have enough equity in their property.
I don’t believe Labour’s improvement in the polls can be explained by everyone with a tracker mortgage thinking, oh good, everything’s all right now. They must be worried about what happens when their deal ends and they don’t know if they’ll be able to re-mortgage.
182. Benedict White: It is certainly the case that the Zionist party in Germany was still allowed at least up to 1935 if not 1938, as was their flag which is very similar to that of modern day Israel.
Yes, you keep saying that. No progress on finding a citation?
Re 183, LS, “Yes, you keep saying that. No progress on finding a citation?”
As yet, no. Too much time reading and responding here.
Fixed rates are a good idea when you are stretching but once your mortgage is quite small - I am with Phil and would take the gamble in certain circumstances.
I did 6 months ago and have a tracker 0.5% above the base rate which is looking great now.
I am able to substantially overpay to compensate for the kn*cker*d endowments!
184. Benedict White.
OK. Would you mind awfully not keeping repeating what is an unsupported assertion until you can back it up?
Timesonline has a trip down memory lane from 30 years ago.
Looks familiar: how Labour Prime Minister put off election just before real crisis set in
“As Gordon Brown is again urged by some to call a general election in the face of a worsening economy, records released today offer an insight into the mind of a previous Labour prime minister faced with the same decision.
Official papers made public today under the 30-year rule disclose how James Callaghan decided against a poll in the autumn of 1978 because of a “malicious delight” in confounding the Tories and a determination not to dance to the newspapers’ tune.
Speculation about an impending election had reached fever pitch during the summer of 1978, but Callaghan returned from his holiday at the end of August with his mind “90 per cent made up” that he would persevere for another year, according to a memo written by his principal private secretary, Ken Stowe. The Prime Minister optimistically thought the unions would agree to his administration’s attempts to restrict pay rises to try to curb inflation. Rather than a prompt election and another probable hung Parliament, he gambled that a rosier economic outlook should deliver a Labour victory in the spring of 1979.”
1978: Labour opposes ID cards to curb illegal immigration
“The Labour administration in 1978 believed the introduction of ID cards would be “unacceptable” and “objectionable” in the fight against illegal immigration, confidential documents released today show.
The comments were in a draft statement due to be given to the Commons by Merlyn Rees, the Home Secretary, who wrote that the introduction of identity cards “would require major changes in practices and powers reaching far beyond immigration control”.
He added: “In the past such changes have been contemplated only in war: the Government does not believe they could be justified on immigration grounds alone.”
The comments were later edited out of the final speech he delivered to the House, as a struggling Labour Government tried to resist the calls from Opposition leader Margaret Thatcher for more draconian measures to tackle illegal immigration.”
How times change!
174 Don’t know what it is about Labour Party members and Barclays/Woolwich mortgages as I am in exactly the same position as you mortgage wise and mine will be down to about £90 in January.Def makes me feel better as I suspect will many other Barclays/Woolwich borrowers.
(Not sure about their savers mind you, but I guess from previous comments on this thread they will be Tories anyway)
181 - Fair enough! I used to get really irate when people went OT, especially if it was 2 comments after I had spent ages writing a thread. Now, not so much. The sheer randomness has an appeal too, most of the time. Also, it’s motivation to write better and more interesting stuff.
I’m ready to drop, so I’ll see you all tomorrow (metaphorically).
G’night, all. Be nice to one another.
re 186, LS, “OK. Would you mind awfully not keeping repeating what is an unsupported assertion until you can back it up?”
Yes actually I would, i have read it in a number of places, not written by nut jobs either.
Any other questions?
Goodnight,Morus.I should be in for an early night myself the way the cricket is going.
187 The trgeday being that:
(a) A Callgahn victory in October 1978
(b)A more moderate,centerist leader of the Conservative Party subsequently winning power c.1983/4 or 87/8 may well have implemented some (maybe already in cyber-world by Callghna) some of the more moderate,reasonable reforms of the 1980s-which most G& countries to a lesser or greater extent,did push through.
(If I sound like an SDP throwback to the mid/late 1980s then thats what I am!)
190. Benedict White.
That’s your prerogative. It all adds to the way in which people consider your contributions.
186. It was enshrined by the Nuremberg Laws, 1935.
“Section 4
Jews are forbidden to display the Reich and national flag or the national colours.
On the other hand they are permitted to display the Jewish colours. The exercise of this right is protected by the State.“
re 192, Patrick, You can argue its a tragedy, but Wilson ducked the issue altogether, Heath bottled it, Wilson didn’t bother, Calaghan had to get the IMF involved just to get support from his cabinet. After that there was only one way reform was going to come, however tragic you might think it was. The tragedy did not happen when Calaghan did not go to the country in 1978, it started in the late 1960’s and went on util 1979 when no one dealt with the problem.
Re 194, Rod, that is not the same thing, as I think you are talking of the yellow Star of David, rather than the blue and white flag I am talking about.
Re 193, LS,. “That’s your prerogative. It all adds to the way in which people consider your contributions.”
I refere you to an answer I gave URW on the previous thread.
185.SallyC, it wasn’t long ago that people were coming off short term fixed rates only to find their mortgages hiking up 2-300 hundred quid a month.
No, I like to gamble on getting the right mortgage which removes the ups and downs for the right period of time, given the longer economic outlook. We had just bought our first house and started a family when Black Wednesday hit, wrong time to drop down to a one salary income.
Just noticed your comment up-thread Ken. Thanks.
Off to bed. Gnight all
153: For anyone interested in the Henry VIII/Cranmer era, can I recommend C. J. Sansom’s series of novels? The hero is a reformist lawyer, employed by Cranmer, but increasingly disillusioned with the ruthlessness of both sides. The books are essentially thrillers, but written with a keen eye and infused with a gentle humanity which is a delight to read (though for my taste the curren tone is on the gruesome side). He’s also done one of the Spanish Civil War (Winter in Madrid), in my opinion less successfully, but perhaps that’s because I’m more partisan about that period so less receptive to his detached approach.
167: “a secret “posh novel” project” - ha, you have no secrets from us, we know you’ve called it The Osborne Insanity.
196. several (Jewish) sources refer to the “blue and white” zionist flag, with reference to the Nuremberg Law.
http://books.google.com/books?um=1&num=100&q=zionist+flag+nazis
199.Or we could call it the Champagne Socialists charter.
Christina. Snap.
Black Wednesday hit just after the birth of my first.
Will never forget it.
We were trapped with high payments and negative equity. Afterwards [eventually when we could change borrowers]we took the safe course but I took a guess recently that I would be better off with a tracker.
Hope Christmas hasn’t been too hard all in all.
I thought about you.
Must go - have family coming in the morning. Gnight again- and Happy New Year.
Re 200, Rod, cheers, but I am looking on my bookshelves. Perhaps i should have organised them better?
I don’t know much about it, but a bit of quick googling turns up these references which seem to be relevant to Benedict’s thesis:
http://www.ihr.org/jhr/v13/v13n4p29_Weber.html
http://www.marxists.de/middleast/brenner/ch07.htm
- they seem to confirm that the Zionist flag was permitted and the Nazis toyed at times with encouraging Zionism, even though they envisaged ‘catching up’ with Jews in Palestine in due course. The sources don’t confirm that a Zionist party was allowed, and this seems to have been expressly forbidden by the 1993 legislation.
The Jew hate discussion on this site is still boring.
202.Good luck! My mum and sister and her family just left today, but we get to go and visit them for New Year. Very poignant Christmas day for us, first without Dad, but we did get a phone call from Afghanistan.
re 205, Al Fresco “The Jew hate discussion on this site is still boring.”
Who is doing the Jew hate thing?
205- Guess what number I’m thinking of. I’ll give you a hint. It has eight digits.
re 204, Nick Palmer “I don’t know much about it, but a bit of quick googling turns up these references which seem to be relevant to Benedict’s thesis:”
Many thanks for the references, but the IHR are serious er… well, I would not quote them. (You can’t be too careful what with a loony government thinking of making it easier to sue for libel!)
In response to my question (172):
———-
The Watcher (180) wrote:
I don’t know if you’ve ever seen this before but here is an alternative history of 1970’s Britain in which some of the actions you mentioned happened. It’s very long though!
http://www.btinternet.com/~chief.gnome/
Wow! What an interesting (hi)story! I wasn’t expecting it to be that long, but I wasn’t expecting it to be so gripping either. I’ve just finished reading through all of it (about 6 hours, I think)
————
LS (240) wrote:
Lots of good posts today, but many bad ones, perhaps best exemplified by this idiotic offering:
were there substantial groups of public opinion among the swivel-eyed reactionary plebs, or the tabloid media, or the reactionary chattering classes, who couldn’t distinguish between the IRA and the Republic of Ireland
Why is it idiotic? Because neither the IRA nor Sinn Féin was ever the government of Ireland.
Er… of course it would be idiotic to think such a thing; and of course they weren’t; that’s the whole point I was making. Why are you describing my question as “idiotic” when you’re agreeing with me?
202.”We were trapped with high payments and negative equity.”
We were lucky and missed the negative equity that hit, the Scottish housing market was out of sync with down South back then. We had managed to buy our first house at the absolute bottom of the housing market in 1991 up in the North East of Scotland. I had planned to go back to nursing part time to keep my hand in, but a second bundle of joy less than 14 months after the first put paid to that. Everything I do mortgage wise is done through the prism of that period.
We did the big gambles with mortgages and house buying back in the late nineties because I had followed politics and the economy, I knew that interest rates were heading down for a while at that time. But from about 2003/4 I have tended to play it much safer.
93. I thought the whole point of us voting by sending emails (instead of one of those scroll-down menu thingies) was to keep the so-far result of the vote secret, so as not to influence tactical voting or hacking or ballot-rigging? But never mind, because the correct candidate is in the lead.
210. I presume LS was making the point that Hamas are in control of Gaza, so the Irish comparison is a false one. However, that’s a relatively recent development, and the Israelis were happy enough in the past to blur the distinction between the Palestinian authorities and militant groups when it suited them.
212. The real test of SeanT’s popularity is whether there’ll now be a surge in support for David Herdson as the only viable stop-Thomas candidate!
208.
12,345,678?
23,456,789?
98,765,432?
87,654,321?
34,568,537?
0.0000328?
There are quite a lot to choose from. Can we do the higher/lower game?
213. Of course the Irish comparison is a false one. That’s the whole point I was making.
215. I’m totally confused now. Can you explain what you did mean?
“Politico: One thing Caroline Kennedy would bring to Washington: A new, distinctive Kennedy verbal tic. She said “you know” 138 times in her Times interview.”
216. What I wrote was:
A question for those old enough to remember:
In the early 1970s, when the violence in Northern Ireland was at its most intensive, were there substantial groups of public opinion among the swivel-eyed reactionary plebs, or the tabloid media, or the reactionary chattering classes, who couldn’t distinguish between the IRA and the Republic of Ireland, and who wanted the UK to “invade the Republic of Ireland” or “bomb Dublin” or kidnap terrorist suspects in cross-border raids, and so on?
What I actually meant was:
A question for those old enough to remember:
In the early 1970s, when the violence in Northern Ireland was at its most intensive, were there substantial groups of public opinion among the swivel-eyed reactionary plebs, or the tabloid media, or the reactionary chattering classes, who couldn’t distinguish between the IRA and the Republic of Ireland, and who wanted the UK to “invade the Republic of Ireland” or “bomb Dublin” or kidnap terrorist suspects in cross-border raids, and so on?
Those who are capable of reading properly will have noticed that I did not mention the Israel/Gaza conflict in my question at all (although it was what stimulated the thought to arise in my mind). The reason I asked the question is because I am not old enough to remember the state of ill-informed / reactionary public / tabloid opinion as it was in, say, 1972.
If you are still “totally confused”, then address the question as I wrote it, and forget about anything to do with Gaza or Israel.
Vote for SeanT!
The other three are running-dogs of boringism / hysterical and deranged maniacs / dull gits with no sense of humour / agents of anti-treacle-puggingism (delete as applicable)
213.”212. The real test of SeanT’s popularity is whether there’ll now be a surge in support for David Herdson as the only viable stop-Thomas candidate!”
What about the female vote? SallyC has to be in there as a representative of the blue harpies with real b*lls, Seant is more like a teenage girl in this category.
218. Apologies, John. But in the context of that thread, I’m sure many people would have taken your question as meaning ‘did people blur the distinction between the IRA and the Irish state as now happens in Palestine?’
219. Bit harsh on SallyC. And are you seriously implying Mr Thomas is NOT a “hysterical and deranged maniac”?
214- You’re getting warmer…
I’ll give you another hint. It isn’t 19,078,225.
o/t Helmut Schmidt turns 90….
http://www.thelocal.de/politics/20081223-16311.html
Hands up! Who thought he was still alive? (and looking great too!)
221.”219. Bit harsh on SallyC. And are you seriously implying Mr Thomas is NOT a “hysterical and deranged maniac”?”
Absolutely correct Red Meteor! SallyC has got staying power, Seant maybe the most amusing poster on this site, but he always folds at the slightest hint of a downturn in the polls. I have seen teenage girls who hold an opinion longer than he does.
“Pound Falls to 98 Pence Per Euro for 1st Time on Housing Slump”
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=aDeya8Ha_0Vk
If this sort of news keeps up, Labour is sure to rocket past the Tories!
225.Remember, Gordon has left the UK in good shape to weather this economic storm, it therefore allows him to spend more time to lecture the rest of the world and save the universe from economic meltdown.
43.
” fanatic ultra-orthodox anti-Zionist Jews who do not recognize the state of Israel….claim that the Jewish state can only be formed when the Messiah comes. “
I think you will find that this is what the Jewish religion teaches. Their failure to compromise their religion with Zionism makes them ‘fanatics’? Interesting concept. A damn sight more interesting than Holocaust denial which is a lot more scary than any religion!
200.
“The Osborne Insanity.”
Wasn’t there a trash TV programme called ‘Gideon’s Way’?
158.
“Never Change A Baby With A Hangover”
…..because it will sick up all over your head?
110.
“Jews share the same religion the same way that born again Christians, Pentacostalists, Roman Catholics and Orthodox Christians do”
ie a lot of their kids have no more belief in any deity than they do in the tooth fairy.
Hi, I am an Israeli Jew, I read PBC almost daily - a great site, a pity we do not have anything like it on the Israeli politics.
This is a fascinating discussion. “Who is a Jew?” is an intensely political question in Israel, there will never be a general agreement on it among the Jews of different backgrounds. So, most of you are right at least in part when arguing on this point. I am impressed that so many PBC contributors actually know something about us, as opposed to having wildly wrong misconceptions I sadly encounter elsewhere.
228 wage slave - “Neturei Karta” is a small group of people that, for example, meet Ahmadinejad and publicly express hope for destruction of the Zionist entity by force. This kind of view is what makes us think of them as extremists. The fact that their view is caused by an “uncompromising” religious belief and not by, say, racial hatred, is, m-m, irrelevant.
114 SeanT - You are welcome to visit Israel, we have lots of different Jewish communities, including many strange ones, not all of them are integrated to the modern Israeli way of life. Ethnography is not a common reason for tourists here, but it is as good as any.
Gershon - you’re very welcome here. Double Carpet will be doing several pieces on the Israeli elections in the New Year, and the more informed comment ‘from the ground’ the better.
We look forward to your insights to guide us.