General Election is ON - Thursday 12 December!
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Original post by Fullofsurprises
Is that the same Nick the Hypocrite who was a buddy of Dave the Born to Rule?
I think so. I read that Clegg was a young Tory.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/politics/blog/2008/apr/15/nickcleggdidnotseem
Original post by DSilva
You don't need to convince me.
Its a bit strange really. The Tories are riding high in the polls at levels similar to Blair's new Labour. But there doesn't really seem to be any real enthusiasm for them.
They just seem to win by default.
Its a bit strange really. The Tories are riding high in the polls at levels similar to Blair's new Labour. But there doesn't really seem to be any real enthusiasm for them.
They just seem to win by default.
partly it is by default - the anyone-but-corbyn types..
But its also largely due to brexit. Yes there are other issues, but brexit is number 1, and as much as labour voters try and defend it, their brexit policy makes no sense to the majority of the population. It doesn't win over remainers or leavers. They could crush the lib-dem vote, if they just came out for remain.. and honestly by this point I don't see how the numbers add up for not doing it. I imagine for every leave labour voter they would loose extra (they have already lost most of them it seems), they would gain more remain liberals who have turned on mass to the lib dems.
Just ditch the whole re-negotiation, and come out and say 'we are for a second refernedum, and in that referendum we will back remain'. Job done, watch the lib dems fall in the polls. Any Labour member they would loose doing that, they likely have already lost to boris/farage anyway.
Their brexit policy will loose them this election.
Original post by Wired_1800
I think so. I read that Clegg was a young Tory.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/politics/blog/2008/apr/15/nickcleggdidnotseem
https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/politics/blog/2008/apr/15/nickcleggdidnotseem
Blair was a marxist.. Peter Hitchens was a marxist.. I don't suppose either of them get your support these days.
What we were as young doesn't matter. People changing their mind with age is normal and natural.
---
Labour are going about their attacks on the lib dems wrongly. Trying to paint them as tory-lite won't work. People aren't that gullible, and except the far left (for whome anyone left of corbyn is bassically the same), it just doesn't seem to resonate. If you want to be the Lib dems, then undermine the two things that are making them popular: 1 they are the party of remain, 2, they give the middle class the feel good feeling of not being a tory, without the fear of voting for corbyn.
As far as people chaing their mind though - I read somewhere, in fact I read thousands of 'wheres' that you were once a brexit supporter who constantly attacked what the labour party has done to furstrait the will of the people for 3 years... People chang their minds and possitions...
Original post by Wired_1800
I think so. I read that Clegg was a young Tory.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/politics/blog/2008/apr/15/nickcleggdidnotseem
https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/politics/blog/2008/apr/15/nickcleggdidnotseem
Lol, I hadn't read that before. So many pieces of the puzzle are coming together in my mind.
Original post by fallen_acorns
Blair was a marxist.. Peter Hitchens was a marxist.. I don't suppose either of them get your support these days.
Not sure that Blair ever was - he was kind of apolitical at college. Hitchens dabbled, but only briefly and one suspects rather insincerely.
Original post by Rakas21
In our system swing is more important than share. Because there was enthusiasm in 2017 and the Liberals/Kippers collapsed they gained vote share. They are holding it because the left don't understand that while they are unloved, they are not disliked outside of the London bubble.
I think they are disliked outside London's bubble. Just less so than Labour. There is no love for the Tories in the same way there was for Blair's Labour in 1997. Just look at the reaction Boris got in Yorkshire. The main diffenece between the parties is that Tory inclined voters always turn out to vote and Labour inclined ones don't.
A poll last week showed that 80% of voters over 80 will definitely vote, whereas only 10% of voters between 18-24 will.
Original post by fallen_acorns
partly it is by default - the anyone-but-corbyn types..
But its also largely due to brexit. Yes there are other issues, but brexit is number 1, and as much as labour voters try and defend it, their brexit policy makes no sense to the majority of the population. It doesn't win over remainers or leavers. They could crush the lib-dem vote, if they just came out for remain.. and honestly by this point I don't see how the numbers add up for not doing it. I imagine for every leave labour voter they would loose extra (they have already lost most of them it seems), they would gain more remain liberals who have turned on mass to the lib dems.
Just ditch the whole re-negotiation, and come out and say 'we are for a second refernedum, and in that referendum we will back remain'. Job done, watch the lib dems fall in the polls. Any Labour member they would loose doing that, they likely have already lost to boris/farage anyway.
Their brexit policy will loose them this election.
But its also largely due to brexit. Yes there are other issues, but brexit is number 1, and as much as labour voters try and defend it, their brexit policy makes no sense to the majority of the population. It doesn't win over remainers or leavers. They could crush the lib-dem vote, if they just came out for remain.. and honestly by this point I don't see how the numbers add up for not doing it. I imagine for every leave labour voter they would loose extra (they have already lost most of them it seems), they would gain more remain liberals who have turned on mass to the lib dems.
Just ditch the whole re-negotiation, and come out and say 'we are for a second refernedum, and in that referendum we will back remain'. Job done, watch the lib dems fall in the polls. Any Labour member they would loose doing that, they likely have already lost to boris/farage anyway.
Their brexit policy will loose them this election.
If it was all about Brexit though then the Lib Dems would be riding on about 45% in the polls. Even if you are an avid remainer, the only way to get a second referendum and stop Brexit is with a Labour led government. It surely shouldn't matter what position Labour take on the referendum because it's up to the public to decide.
Plus there's probably a chunk of Lib Dem voters who are very Liberal economically and would never support a Labour government left of Blair, such as Sam Gyimah.
I agree Brexit is an issue, a big one, but it's not the only one. The core reason why the Tories do so well is in my opinion largely down to the following:
1.) There are a lot of elderly voters
2.) They nearly all vote.
3.) They nearly all vote Tory.
A poll this week showed that only 10% of people aged 18-24 are certain to vote.
It’s so bloody difficult for Labour to get a hearing, let alone a fair hearing when 90% of the press actively campaign for the government. Which is frustrating because Labour policies are often very popular when polled.
(edited 4 years ago)
Original post by fallen_acorns
Blair was a marxist.. Peter Hitchens was a marxist.. I don't suppose either of them get your support these days.
What we were as young doesn't matter. People changing their mind with age is normal and natural.
---
Labour are going about their attacks on the lib dems wrongly. Trying to paint them as tory-lite won't work. People aren't that gullible, and except the far left (for whome anyone left of corbyn is bassically the same), it just doesn't seem to resonate. If you want to be the Lib dems, then undermine the two things that are making them popular: 1 they are the party of remain, 2, they give the middle class the feel good feeling of not being a tory, without the fear of voting for corbyn.
As far as people chaing their mind though - I read somewhere, in fact I read thousands of 'wheres' that you were once a brexit supporter who constantly attacked what the labour party has done to furstrait the will of the people for 3 years... People chang their minds and possitions...
What we were as young doesn't matter. People changing their mind with age is normal and natural.
---
Labour are going about their attacks on the lib dems wrongly. Trying to paint them as tory-lite won't work. People aren't that gullible, and except the far left (for whome anyone left of corbyn is bassically the same), it just doesn't seem to resonate. If you want to be the Lib dems, then undermine the two things that are making them popular: 1 they are the party of remain, 2, they give the middle class the feel good feeling of not being a tory, without the fear of voting for corbyn.
As far as people chaing their mind though - I read somewhere, in fact I read thousands of 'wheres' that you were once a brexit supporter who constantly attacked what the labour party has done to furstrait the will of the people for 3 years... People chang their minds and possitions...
I am not a fan of Blair or Hitchens.
I agree that people change their minds and grow, which is totally understandable. My annoyance is when people try to hide their identity and their past. Clegg has tried to hide his tory past and apparently even tried to portray his aligning with Cameron as a “difficult” situation.
I think the Lib Dems are tory-lite and seem to be doing things that are diabolical. They want to cancel a democratic vote because they did not like the result. Labour and Tories are within their rights to condemn such vicious acts against democracy.
To your final paragraph, what do you mean by ‘wheres’? Also was the ‘you’ directed at me?
Original post by Fullofsurprises
Lol, I hadn't read that before. So many pieces of the puzzle are coming together in my mind.
Yes, lots of skeletons in Mr Clegg’s cupboard.
More fantasy and lies today from Mr Johnson and more undeliverable ideas from Mr Corbyn and Mr McDonnell.
It makes it more difficult for me to persuade people to vote.
It makes it more difficult for me to persuade people to vote.
Original post by barnetlad
More fantasy and lies today from Mr Johnson and more undeliverable ideas from Mr Corbyn and Mr McDonnell.
It makes it more difficult for me to persuade people to vote.
It makes it more difficult for me to persuade people to vote.
I wonder how much cash has now been offered by all parties combined? It must be in the trillions already, or possibly has surpassed the global planetary domestic product.
Original post by Ecdysiastt
You're one of the few that don't. When labour rejects the IHRA definition of antisemitism and provides the most dismissive sounding response to Jews who claimed labour were antisemites, it definitely looks dodgy
They're dismissive because its obviously not true. Labour's whole modus operandi is equality. They're all about it. Why on earth would they exclude Jews from that?
This whole idea of Corbyn being an anti-semite came about because he had passover with a group of left wing Jews called Jewdas. Apparently they were too left wing and were anti-zionists. The Mail took that to mean they were anti-Semitic.Which is is utterly absurd.
Original post by AJ126y
This whole idea of Corbyn being an anti-semite came about because he had passover with a group of left wing Jews called Jewdas. Apparently they were too left wing and were anti-zionists. The Mail took that to mean they were anti-Semitic.Which is is utterly absurd.
There's more to it than that. His anti-Zionist positions are interpreted by some Jews as being anti-Semitic. The World Jewish Congress has sought to define anti-Zionism as anti-Semitism. That's not a view shared by all Jews and it's not shared by most of the Left. So when the 'leading' Jewish organisations (such as the UK Jewish Board of Deputies, through its Jewish Chronicle mouthpiece) condemns him as anti-Jewish, they are mainly reflecting the right wing Israeli (Likud) position that Israel = the Jews, again, a view not shared by everyone.
Then there's Hamas and other Middle Eastern anti-Israeli factions. They have clearly been infected by anti-Semitism and it's become a feature of anti-Israeli belief, conspiracy theory and rhetoric to adopt the norms and memes of anti-Semitism. For Corbyn to, as he does, strongly align with Hamas and Hezbollah and the rest of them, is at the very least naive and at the worst, utterly blind and unprincipled, given how clear it is that they are not just anti-Zionist but anti-Semitic. The same blindness, lack of principle and buy-in to anti-Semitism as a reflexive part of anti-Zionism can be seen across the Left in the UK, aided and abetted by the views of many Islamists who have entered the Left.
Then there's Israel, which has in the past routinely destroyed more moderate forces in the Occupied Territories, including those in Hamas who were in favour of negotiation. The RIght have seized the narrative and power in Israel and hidden behind their wall and content to lob high explosives periodically at Gaza (and shoot, arrest, torture and intimidate other Palestinians), globally spread falsehoods about Israel's right to their captured territories, their history, the nature of Israel and so on. They falsely equate anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism, distort the history of Palestine and their right to it, attack the global Left and marginalise legitimate Palestinian grievances and claims.
It's a complicated picture and Corbyn has chosen sides in a way that isn't very nuanced, but it's not clear cut that he's anti-Semitic, nor are the claims of Likud and the Jewish Right in the UK and globally to be taken at face value.
Original post by Wired_1800
Vote Jo Swinson, get Nick Clegg
Vote Boris Johnson, get Nigel Farage
Vote Corby, get free broadband, good schools, better welfare and social services and a country for the many and not the few.
Vote Boris Johnson, get Nigel Farage
Vote Corby, get free broadband, good schools, better welfare and social services and a country for the many and not the few.
Or vote Corbyn get, sturgeon and a damaged democracy and two referendums!
Original post by Burton Bridge
Or vote Corbyn get, sturgeon and a damaged democracy and two referendums!
If you all vote Corbyn, we wont
Original post by Fullofsurprises
I wonder how much cash has now been offered by all parties combined? It must be in the trillions already, or possibly has surpassed the global planetary domestic product.
They could all just cut the bull**** and offer each and every one of us £10000, oh wait a minute https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/liberal-democrats-general-election-education-training-jo-swinson-a9198646.html
If only we could trust any of these lying ****ers.
Original post by Wired_1800
If you all vote Corbyn, we wont
But most of us do not either like or trust him, so why would we vote for him?
Original post by ColinDent
They could all just cut the bull**** and offer each and every one of us £10000, oh wait a minute https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/liberal-democrats-general-election-education-training-jo-swinson-a9198646.html
If only we could trust any of these lying ****ers.
If only we could trust any of these lying ****ers.
I demand $1m for my vote, or gtfo.
I don't understand Labours timing of the broadband anouncement...
The day before all the focus was on the Tories and how bad the NHS was.. all Labour needed to do was keep it on the NHS for a few days and there is no way the tories could spin their way out of it. All they could say was either deflection (but it would be worse under Labour) or the truth (that the NHS has to be worse then we want, because we haven't been able to afford it in the way we really want without raising taxes).. they won't say the truth, and everyone except diehard tories can see through the deflection.
So why did Labour then decide instead of letting it stay on their comfort zone for a while, to suddenly shift the conversation to braodband and announce a policy that isn't exactly an election winner.
Seems like an awful move to me.
Although it was good on question time.. Plaid actually helped on the tories a fair bit by pointing out that the NHS under Labour in wales is hardly doing great... regardless of the truth in that, it saved the tories somewhat on the night.
The day before all the focus was on the Tories and how bad the NHS was.. all Labour needed to do was keep it on the NHS for a few days and there is no way the tories could spin their way out of it. All they could say was either deflection (but it would be worse under Labour) or the truth (that the NHS has to be worse then we want, because we haven't been able to afford it in the way we really want without raising taxes).. they won't say the truth, and everyone except diehard tories can see through the deflection.
So why did Labour then decide instead of letting it stay on their comfort zone for a while, to suddenly shift the conversation to braodband and announce a policy that isn't exactly an election winner.
Seems like an awful move to me.
Although it was good on question time.. Plaid actually helped on the tories a fair bit by pointing out that the NHS under Labour in wales is hardly doing great... regardless of the truth in that, it saved the tories somewhat on the night.
Original post by fallen_acorns
I don't understand Labours timing of the broadband anouncement...
The day before all the focus was on the Tories and how bad the NHS was.. all Labour needed to do was keep it on the NHS for a few days and there is no way the tories could spin their way out of it. All they could say was either deflection (but it would be worse under Labour) or the truth (that the NHS has to be worse then we want, because we haven't been able to afford it in the way we really want without raising taxes).. they won't say the truth, and everyone except diehard tories can see through the deflection.
So why did Labour then decide instead of letting it stay on their comfort zone for a while, to suddenly shift the conversation to braodband and announce a policy that isn't exactly an election winner.
Seems like an awful move to me.
Although it was good on question time.. Plaid actually helped on the tories a fair bit by pointing out that the NHS under Labour in wales is hardly doing great... regardless of the truth in that, it saved the tories somewhat on the night.
The day before all the focus was on the Tories and how bad the NHS was.. all Labour needed to do was keep it on the NHS for a few days and there is no way the tories could spin their way out of it. All they could say was either deflection (but it would be worse under Labour) or the truth (that the NHS has to be worse then we want, because we haven't been able to afford it in the way we really want without raising taxes).. they won't say the truth, and everyone except diehard tories can see through the deflection.
So why did Labour then decide instead of letting it stay on their comfort zone for a while, to suddenly shift the conversation to braodband and announce a policy that isn't exactly an election winner.
Seems like an awful move to me.
Although it was good on question time.. Plaid actually helped on the tories a fair bit by pointing out that the NHS under Labour in wales is hardly doing great... regardless of the truth in that, it saved the tories somewhat on the night.
It was obviously a pre-planned and timed announcement on the war plan chart, but any big party fighting an election also needs to be flexible and quick on their feet during the campaign and to adjust to what is working. From what we've seen so far, both parties are not doing too well at that, but I suspect Cummings is doing a little better, because he has the authority and the nous. Labour appear not to have some individual in charge my guess is they are having rows and organisation problems behind the scenes. That's similar to the last time the hard left were in charge, in the Michael Foot years. Alastair Campbell would have been shrewd enough to keep on slugging on the NHS until the Tories were down and out on the mat.
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