UK Election 2010

[Хahar 🤔]

wtf

[Filuwaúrdjan]

lolexpress

[JohnnyLongtorso]

I especially like the "ZOMG FREE STUFF!!!" above the fold. Are all British papers this tacky?

[Filuwaúrdjan]

I especially like the "ZOMG FREE STUFF!!!" above the fold. Are all British papers this tacky?

All British tabloids are extremely tacky, but lolexpress is probably in a league of its own these days... unless you think pornography beats all when it comes to being tacky.

[Хahar 🤔]

How many tabloids feature pornography?

[Platypus]

How many tabloids feature pornography?

The Sun is infamous for it, but pretty much all the British papers would by now I'm guessing.

Except maybe the Guardian. Female exploitation etc.

[k-onmmunist]

The Di Express.

And only the Sun, Daily Star and Daily Sport do

[minionofmidas]

The Di Express.

And only the Sun, Daily Star and Daily Sport do

IIRC the "Daily Sport" doesn't really feature anything except small print ads for all and sundry, and softcore porn. And is about 8 or 12 pages or something.

[minionofmidas]

There were so many closed shops?

Quite a few (concentrated in certain industries) though I don't have anything in front of me at the moment. The collapse of the economies of most of the old industrial areas probably accounted for most of the fall, though. The jobs that replaced the old unionised ones were in the low-pay service sector rubbish.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

I can't entirely remember how things worked wrt that sort of thing in the coal industry (it's especially confusing as different unions overed different aspects of the industry; overhead workers were in NACODS and not the NUM, for example. Amazingly, NACODS is still going) though union membership was pretty much total in most places even if there wasn't a closed shop. The scabs were mostly ex-NUM members who formed their own union (UDM), fwiw.

Just came across this on Wiki...

"Equity (formerly known as the British Actors' Equity Association) is the trade union for actors, stage managers and models in the United Kingdom. It was formed in 1930 by a group of West End performers.

Equity was the last of the closed shop unions in the UK. This was made illegal in 1981;[1] it is now no longer a requirement that a professional actor be a member of Equity."

Although the "formed in 1930" line is contradicted by this, from the article that linked me to the other one:
"On 18 February 1906, he and Kitty became founder members at the creation of the Variety Artistes Federation (a forerunner of the Equity performers' trade union) at the Vaudeville Club in London", the he being John Major's father.

I always thought it a shame that John Major was a Tory.

[k-onmmunist]

The Di Express.

And only the Sun, Daily Star and Daily Sport do

IIRC the "Daily Sport" doesn't really feature anything except small print ads for all and sundry, and softcore porn. And is about 8 or 12 pages or something.

It does have those, except its harder now, and there are tons of topless girls. There is a brief section where they discuss sport too

[You kip if you want to...]

I'm liking these LibDem attack posters from ConHome.

http://conservativehome.blogs.com/leftwatch/liberal-democrats/

[Phony Moderate]

The Lib Dems now have a big lead in the Facebook Mock General Election.

http://apps.facebook.com/dionedbaccdc/9/result.aspx?typeahead=skip

[You kip if you want to...]

The Lib Dems now have a big lead in the Facebook Mock General Election.

http://apps.facebook.com/dionedbaccdc/9/result.aspx?typeahead=skip

I think teens and twenty-somethings across the nation collectively developed ADD on Thursday night, saw Clegg and went "OOOOO. Shiny."

[afleitch]

The Lib Dems now have a big lead in the Facebook Mock General Election.

http://apps.facebook.com/dionedbaccdc/9/result.aspx?typeahead=skip

I think teens and twenty-somethings across the nation collectively developed ADD on Thursday night, saw Clegg and went "OOOOO. Shiny."

That's what happens when a nation is fed on a diet of reality shows and 'have your say' voting combined with cheering on the underdog. Clegg now has the highest approval ratings of any politician since Churchill. What the recent polls have done is identified where the Labour/Tory core vote actually lies; I am confident that things will return to normal somewhat but the downside is the next two debates will be everything when it had assumed that attention would diminish.

[You kip if you want to...]

The Lib Dems now have a big lead in the Facebook Mock General Election.

http://apps.facebook.com/dionedbaccdc/9/result.aspx?typeahead=skip

I think teens and twenty-somethings across the nation collectively developed ADD on Thursday night, saw Clegg and went "OOOOO. Shiny."

That's what happens when a nation is fed on a diet of reality shows and 'have your say' voting combined with cheering on the underdog. Clegg now has the highest approval ratings of any politician since Churchill. What the recent polls have done is identified where the Labour/Tory core vote actually lies; I am confident that things will return to normal somewhat but the downside is the next two debates will be everything when it had assumed that attention would diminish.

To carry on the reality show analogy, maybe Nick Clegg is a political Susan Boyle: low expectations, high performance, then media fanfare and they they'll untimately disappoint when it comes to the final result. Our fellow Britons are fickle folk. (Plus, I don't think enough of "us yoofs" will be registered by Tuesday.)

[afleitch]

The Lib Dems now have a big lead in the Facebook Mock General Election.

http://apps.facebook.com/dionedbaccdc/9/result.aspx?typeahead=skip

I think teens and twenty-somethings across the nation collectively developed ADD on Thursday night, saw Clegg and went "OOOOO. Shiny."

That's what happens when a nation is fed on a diet of reality shows and 'have your say' voting combined with cheering on the underdog. Clegg now has the highest approval ratings of any politician since Churchill. What the recent polls have done is identified where the Labour/Tory core vote actually lies; I am confident that things will return to normal somewhat but the downside is the next two debates will be everything when it had assumed that attention would diminish.

To carry on the reality show analogy, maybe Nick Clegg is a political Susan Boyle: low expectations, high performance, then media fanfare and they they'll untimately disappoint when it comes to the final result. Our fellow Britons are fickle folk. (Plus, I don't think enough of "us yoofs" will be registered by Tuesday.)

That's why Clegg needs a 'bad performance'; if he's challenged well enough next week and while he may still win on the...uh...'public vote' gets scrutinised enough by the media then he could start to take a hit.

For the moment the prospect of a Tory majority is out of the window (though may be revived later) What the need to focus on is being largest party by a significant amount; ie in the manner by which a Lab/LD/SDLP grouping could not gain a majority. That forces the LibDems to join a Tory government giving the Lib Dems the posts where they are to the right of the Tories to absord the public flak.

If the Lib Dems refused to sit with either party then we go the country again in a few months and the 'Yellow Peril' of a hung parliament, shaky markets etc is fought back giving the Tories a better shot at a majority.

[You kip if you want to...]

The Lib Dems now have a big lead in the Facebook Mock General Election.

http://apps.facebook.com/dionedbaccdc/9/result.aspx?typeahead=skip

I think teens and twenty-somethings across the nation collectively developed ADD on Thursday night, saw Clegg and went "OOOOO. Shiny."

That's what happens when a nation is fed on a diet of reality shows and 'have your say' voting combined with cheering on the underdog. Clegg now has the highest approval ratings of any politician since Churchill. What the recent polls have done is identified where the Labour/Tory core vote actually lies; I am confident that things will return to normal somewhat but the downside is the next two debates will be everything when it had assumed that attention would diminish.

To carry on the reality show analogy, maybe Nick Clegg is a political Susan Boyle: low expectations, high performance, then media fanfare and they they'll untimately disappoint when it comes to the final result. Our fellow Britons are fickle folk. (Plus, I don't think enough of "us yoofs" will be registered by Tuesday.)

That's why Clegg needs a 'bad performance'; if he's challenged well enough next week and while he may still win on the...uh...'public vote' gets scrutinised enough by the media then he could start to take a hit.

For the moment the prospect of a Tory majority is out of the window (though may be revived later) What the need to focus on is being largest party by a significant amount; ie in the manner by which a Lab/LD/SDLP grouping could not gain a majority. That forces the LibDems to join a Tory government giving the Lib Dems the posts where they are to the right of the Tories to absord the public flak.

If the Lib Dems refused to sit with either party then we go the country again in a few months and the 'Yellow Peril' of a hung parliament, shaky markets etc is fought back giving the Tories a better shot at a majority.

I just hope Cameron comes out swinging on Thursday. It defies any glimmer of hope I have for my generation that we can be so easily influenced by 90-minutes of "debate" and then put someone up there with Churchhill. I must be the only person in the country who sees Clegg and thinks "Oh, Dave isn't that bad actually."

Isn't a Grand coalition being discussed by anyone? It'd be the best scenario for stability's sake.

[Хahar 🤔]

Isn't a Grand coalition being discussed by anyone? It'd be the best scenario for stability's sake.

Hardly. It would fall apart within weeks.

[You kip if you want to...]

Isn't a Grand coalition being discussed by anyone? It'd be the best scenario for stability's sake.

Hardly. It would fall apart within weeks.

Why would it though? I don't know much of German politics, but did their grand coalition stick together because it basically had to or something?

[afleitch]

The Lib Dems now have a big lead in the Facebook Mock General Election.

http://apps.facebook.com/dionedbaccdc/9/result.aspx?typeahead=skip

I think teens and twenty-somethings across the nation collectively developed ADD on Thursday night, saw Clegg and went "OOOOO. Shiny."

That's what happens when a nation is fed on a diet of reality shows and 'have your say' voting combined with cheering on the underdog. Clegg now has the highest approval ratings of any politician since Churchill. What the recent polls have done is identified where the Labour/Tory core vote actually lies; I am confident that things will return to normal somewhat but the downside is the next two debates will be everything when it had assumed that attention would diminish.

To carry on the reality show analogy, maybe Nick Clegg is a political Susan Boyle: low expectations, high performance, then media fanfare and they they'll untimately disappoint when it comes to the final result. Our fellow Britons are fickle folk. (Plus, I don't think enough of "us yoofs" will be registered by Tuesday.)

That's why Clegg needs a 'bad performance'; if he's challenged well enough next week and while he may still win on the...uh...'public vote' gets scrutinised enough by the media then he could start to take a hit.

For the moment the prospect of a Tory majority is out of the window (though may be revived later) What the need to focus on is being largest party by a significant amount; ie in the manner by which a Lab/LD/SDLP grouping could not gain a majority. That forces the LibDems to join a Tory government giving the Lib Dems the posts where they are to the right of the Tories to absord the public flak.

If the Lib Dems refused to sit with either party then we go the country again in a few months and the 'Yellow Peril' of a hung parliament, shaky markets etc is fought back giving the Tories a better shot at a majority.

I just hope Cameron comes out swinging on Thursday. It defies any glimmer of hope I have for my generation that we can be so easily influenced by 90-minutes of "debate" and then put someone up there with Churchhill. I must be the only person in the country who sees Clegg and thinks "Oh, Dave isn't that bad actually."

Isn't a Grand coalition being discussed by anyone? It'd be the best scenario for stability's sake.

The Lib Dems are the only main party that I haven't voted for in the past and for good reason; they are still a two headed horse. I see honest old fashioned classical Liberal policies sitting awkwardly next to the stuff produced by the heirs to the SDP.

As for the prospect of a 'Grand Coalition' I don't believe that either party has the ability to come together unless there was a genuine national crisis. In Scotland and Wales I think (moreso Scotland) Labour and Tories are more likely to group together formally.

The most intersting block to any coalition would perhaps unsuprisingly be Gordon Brown. I think his head would be the price for a deal with the Lib Dems. His style of governance and leadership could simply not keep together a coalition. I believe that Labour would be willing to chuck him under a bus if they have to...but I'm not sure he would go without making a great deal of noise.

[Хahar 🤔]

Isn't a Grand coalition being discussed by anyone? It'd be the best scenario for stability's sake.

Hardly. It would fall apart within weeks.

Why would it though? I don't know much of German politics, but did their grand coalition stick together because it basically had to or something?

Yes, in part. Moreover, Germany has a history of grand coalitions. Britain does not. It would be death to any party that participated.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

The history of the Labour Party makes a Grand Coalition essentially impossible. No one wants to be compared to Ramsay MacDonald.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

In Scotland and Wales I think (moreso Scotland) Labour and Tories are more likely to group together formally.

Not in Wales; it's even less likely to happen here than it is in England. Doesn't even happen at council level, as far as I know. Party members here are very traditional, for the most part; it's only recently that some have come over to the idea of dealing with anyone... opposition was once seen as preferable to coalition.

[Silent Hunter]

The history of the Labour Party makes a Grand Coalition essentially impossible. No one wants to be compared to Ramsay MacDonald.

Exactly. We Tory-bash for a practical living.

Also remember what happened to the SPD.

[You kip if you want to...]

BTW, GDP figures are due on Friday and growth is expected to be +0.4.
A good news cycle to follow the debate for Labour?

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSLDE63F1EE20100416?type=marketsNews