DEM not gonna CON dis NATION: Rolling UK politics in the short-lived post-Murdoch era

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/oct/03/conservatives-ignore-european-court-human-rights-rulings

Ah, it's the Belarus route after all. Reasonably good chance that this would call the UK's position in the EU into question.

ihttp://i.imgur.com/tTioHv0.jpg

HUMAN RIGHTS MADNESS!

chris grayling is a fuckboy for the ages

CLEAVAGE

Reading through the comments on various newspapers about the ECHR issue is interesting

A lot of people do not particularly care whether they're talking about the Council of Europe, the ECHR, or the EU. It's Europe so it's Bad. They're Meddling. Britain Britain Britain. Lawyers are bad too.

Thing is - as a British citizen your liberties are safer if the ECHR can have some influence on legal process in Britain and why don't people understand this why does this spectral image of BAD EUROPE coming and telling you what to do just overpower people's reasoning

Why don't people understand that Britain is in almost every case, whichever particular euro institution we're talking about, part of this EUROPE thing and have as much say in it as everyone else who's part of it

And how is it more democratic to take us out of the ECHR if we never get to vote on it and they just go ahead and do it

http://www.lrb.co.uk/v36/n19/james-meek/in-farageland rly good article

YouGov’s Peter Kellner has told Newsnight that he expects Douglas Carswell to win in Clacton with a majority of around 10,000.

The UK Independence Party has gained its first elected MP, with Douglas Carswell taking the seat of Clacton by 12,404 votes.

Extent of the swing from Lab to UKIP in the Heywood & Middleton vote is probably more worrying tbh

No swing from Lab to UKIP, Labour actually increased their percentage of the vote - but a collapse in Tory and Lib Dem support.

oh right i misread it then. labour v close to losing a seat to ukip though

It is (or should be) very worrying for Labour - despite getting their vote out they nearly lost a safe seat. I'd like to see the potential number of seats UKIP could win at the 2015 general election in northern constituencies if they take the same proportion of Tory and Lib Dem voters as in Heywood & Middleton.

http://www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2014/10/07/dave-boyle/in-heywood/

Erstwhile Ilxor Dave B is worth reading on Heywood.

Loving how the media is spinning this as a disaster for Labour and a minor anomaly for the Tories.

I suppose it's because Carswell was almost a foregone conclusion. Labour potentially losing seats to Ukip is more newsworthy.

yeah, carswell is p much "mp of ten years' standing retains seat"

Indeed. As we're stuck with Miliband, he should bite the bullet and ditch Balls as Shadow Chancellor, fuck knows who he'd he replace him with though.

OTM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N64jaf1_9Ew

stop saying elite, owen

I mean, he is OTM. but he needs to say elite thirty or so times less.

man got a book out u guys, don't hate the player hate the game

Don't worry Dave, big Sol's here to help

http://www.theguardian.com/football/2014/oct/10/sol-campbell-conservative-party-conversation

Campbell, who retired in 2011 having won 73 caps for his country, said last week that he was thinking about joining the Conservative Party to fight Labour’s proposed introduction of mansion tax should they win the General Election next year.

^^ which is preceded by:

“Politics is very hard work. You have to really commit to things. Some people get into it for the wrong reasons.”

Fight the good fight, Sol (xp)

Ex-England defender believes he can secure ‘the black vote’

couldn't even secure the North London vote amirite?

I know we need to fight the real enemy here and that Jones is on the right side of the debate but every time he uses one of these pleased-with-himself phrases like "earning their poverty" I die a little inside. It's up there with "Israel is acting as Hamas's recruiting sergeant" in the Ladybird Book of Vacuous Leftist Bollocks.

Altho I do get annoyed by Owen Jones' style I don't think "earning their poverty" is vacuous

It depends on your interpretation of "earning" in this context but it's a pretty dumb soundbite to trot out on national TV.

I'm just taking it as another way of referring to the working poor

it sounds a bit glib, but it might make people stop and unpack what it means

yes i think it could be a pretty effective term. it definitely caught me.

I thought "earning their poverty" was brilliant - focusses on the idea that so many people in poverty are working and that they need benefits because their wages are so low. Important point to keep making.

But yes, he says "elite" too often

The phrase is undermined by the fact that it could also mean "they're deserving of their poverty", which obviously isn't what Jones means but it does kind of hang there.

also don't think that "Israel is acting as Hamas's recruiting sergeant" is vacuous either tho am reluctant to derail thread down that road.

representin 4 vacuous leftist bollocks hard core 24-7 andudontstop

Not this wanker again, how is he still in his job... and the same goes for Lord Freud.

lord freud is truly the vilest of them all

Cameron's new tactic to deflect criticism seems to be to interpret it as a personal attack on his family and get TERRIBLY CROSS INDEED

Think the dead child's best off out of it TBH. And I would say so to DC's face.

To the Dead Child's face?

...

Farage's EU parliament group collapses

the best bit of that of course being that ukip will lose some of the eu subsidies they were getting for being group members

True. According to the BBC: "Group status means extra funds, seats on committees and more speaking time."

Farage has just blamed Martin Schulz for the collapse btw. You just don't expect it amirite? (can't find an English source for this btw, while it's all over the Spanish press for example)