UK General Election, June 8th 2017

[Phony Moderate]

May announcing it as I type.

[Phony Moderate]

Many will be aware that the mechanisms are a bit complicated with the Fixed Terms Parliament Act. May seems to be going for the two-thirds route rather than the amusing spectacle of a government putting a VONC in itself.

[Phony Moderate]

Less than two months in advance?  Christ.

This is actually going to be one of the longest campaigns ever. Usually they are only four weeks. 1997 was about the only other six-week campaign in the past century or so.

[Phony Moderate]

This will of course be held under current (2007-) boundaries rather the new ones.

[Phony Moderate]

With the old leftist Corbyn, Labor is headed for a landslide loss. But that would result in his resignation and hopefully a new leader from the pragmatic New Labor faction.

There is no 'New Labour faction'. Almost the entirety of the Labour Party has moved on from New Labour, including most of those commonly thought of as 'Blairites'.

[Phony Moderate]

This is the first truly snap election since 1974.

[Phony Moderate]

The ancient and noble principle of 'well look some polls have us with twenty point leads'. 'pon such things the British Constitution is founded.

Anyway looked at rationally - which isn't very easy - a landslide isn't actually guaranteed, though the return of the government pretty obviously is. Corbyn should step aside, but I suspect that won't happen.

Will this force another Labour leadership election? Is it mandatory to have leadership elections after a lost GE? Also applies for the deputy position, I suppose corbyn will want to squeeze big Tom out

Not at all, but a major party leader hasn't stayed on for a significant length of time after a lost GE since Kinnock in 1987.

[Phony Moderate]

An argument for a GE following May's ascent to the Premiership existed, but this moment is gone as she's already done things in Parliament. There's no case for an election now other than a purely partisan one; this is a decision taken largely out of opportunism and arrogance. Of course this is how politics works, but this is the line that other parties should take whether they vote for dissolution or not.

Sturgeon has said something more or less to that effect.

[Phony Moderate]

Why is Labour supporting this?

I know whenever we have these over-confident snap elections in Canada, the governing party gets turfed. See Ontario 1990 and Alberta 2015.

Because the official opposition cannot say no to a GE, it's like admitting they're pointless

Snap elections are incredibly unpopular. The Tories can spin that any way they like, but I can't see it overcoming the population's disgust with having to go to the polls again. Now Labour can't use this issue as leverage.

What about the 2000 federal? Chretien called the Alliance's bluff and won an even bigger majority.

Regrettably, I think that might be the most salient precedent for this election. Hopelessly divided opposition with an unpopular leader vs ageing but still competent government held together by ruthless leader.

Tbh I only regard any government as 'aging' once it's reached the 10-year mark.

[Phony Moderate]

Vince Cable will stand again in Twickenham.  I'm going to go ahead and say that seat Leans (or even Likely) Lib Dem.

A lot of the Lib Dem 'big names' have announced that they're standing again - Hughes, Davey plus loads of lesser known names who lost their seats in 2015.

[Phony Moderate]

Rumors that Zac Goldsmith will recontest Richmond as a Tory.

And there's a reasonable chance that he'll win while several other seats in London turn yellow. The by-election in December of last year may have been tipped by voters who were pissed off at having to vote at that time of the year.

[Phony Moderate]

It was a tradition in the pre-Coalition days that the Lib Dems would rise during GE campaigns.

[Phony Moderate]

YouGov:

Con 48 (+4)
Lab 24 (+1)
Lib Dems 12
UKIP 7 (-3)
Others 9 (-1)

Would be the highest vote share for any party in about half a century.

[Phony Moderate]

I love how the left is blaming Blair for their problems despite the fact that he is the only Labour prime minster to serve for two full terms and is the only labour leader to win an election since 1974

Indeed, if Labour had stuck with Blairite ideology, they likely would have won in 2015.

No, they would have voted for the Blairite who was already in power at that time. Blairism is more of an image based thing as opposed to a real ideology anyway.

Anyway, Farron's dubious social views are, as I predicted, being given attention.

[Phony Moderate]

Are coal miners in the UK labour conservative or liberal democrats

It's a well-known fact that 55% of them are David Laws-style Lib Dems, 21% are Greens, 16% are Cornish Nationalists and 8% are swing voters between the Scottish Pensioner's Party and Rainbow Dream Ticket.

[Phony Moderate]

Tories now trumpeting the 'Coalition of Chaos' line again. Either their private polling is showing a closer election than the public polling or they are worried about being hurt by low turnout.

Ftr, there was a report a few weeks ago of Tory private polling showing that about 25 seats could be lost to the Lib Dems.

[Phony Moderate]

All voters in all GB constituencies should have the opportunity to vote for a Labour candidate.

[Phony Moderate]

However by being Home Secretary for 6 years, along with a robotic bore on Brexit she's managed to appear 'competent'. The big problem for the tories is that there is no PM in waiting 

If/when May finally becomes unpopular Ruth Davidson may become to her premiership what Boris Johnson was to much of Cameron's.

I'm just looking at a list of the current cabinet members and I'd forgotten how atrocious it is. Has-beens, fruitcakes, nonentities, incompetents. Just awful.

[Phony Moderate]

Who exactly is still voting Labour in Scotland?

The kind of people who vote Labour in rural SE England, presumably.

[Phony Moderate]

Oh FFS, can we just ban all non-British nationalities from this thread? If you're going to post about a week's old news about a defection involving a years-long retired MP that no one cares about, at least get his name right.

[Phony Moderate]

YouGov poll of Scotland, 24-27 April.

SNP: 41% (-6)
CON: 28% (+1)
LAB: 18% (+3)
LDEM: 7% (+3)

Source: https://twitter.com/britainelects/status/857733753292107777

They also have independence at:
Yes: 45% (+1)
No: 55% (-1)

At least according to this poll, it's notable that the SNP is starting to fall below the Yes % rather than being a bit above it (they ran 5.3 points ahead of Yes in their 2015 landslide).

Leaders' ratings:

May - 37/51
Corbyn - 18/70
Sturgeon - 47/45
Dugdale - 22/51
Davidson - 43/36

[Phony Moderate]

Ed Balls

[Phony Moderate]

I think a fair few voters (especially elderly) have detected to the Tories via UKIP as a sort of stepping stone like so:

2010: Labour
2015: UKIP
2017: Tory

I haven't done data analysis or anything though so take this with a pinch of salt

I actually think a fair few such voters crossed the Tory box for the first time as far back as 2010, then went off to UKIP during the course of the Coalition.  

[Phony Moderate]

Who hear saw Diane Abbott's car crash of an interview with Nick Ferrari this morning?

Luckily for us, not most people.

[Phony Moderate]

As someone who doesn't really understand UK politics, could someone explain to me why Corbyn has been floundering so badly since he got elected?

Because he's a nutter.

We'd be doing better if he did project that image. He's unpopular because he just doesn't come off as a leader.