2015 UK General Election campaign & aftermath discussion thread.

I reckon so yes

I am not even remotely confident that Britain will vote to stay in the EU, especially once the propaganda machine really gets going.

― Matt DC, Friday, 8 May 2015 16:43 (16 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

It'll be an interesting test - business interest (it's the economy stupid) v press propaganda (tho without perhaps the blanket attacks - presuming The Times and The Independent will be pro europe.

Murdoch surely won't allow the Times to take a pro-European slant. It'll just be more subtly anti while paying lipservice towards balance.

The main movers and shakers in the new government are all in favour of staying in EU aren't they? Gove and IDS are the only ones I can think of that definitely aren't and not sure either of them will even be in the cabinet in 2 years time.

Also for 30-something years the Right has assumed it had essentially won the battle of ideas, now it's becoming apparent that isn't the case, they are fighting tooth and nail to hang on.

― Matt DC, Tuesday, 28 April 2015 12:48 (31 minutes ago)

this isn't remotely true, the coalition parties and ukip combined have 57% in the latest icm poll

― LMAO. GOLD Chrisso. regards, REB (nakhchivan), Tuesday, 28 April 2015 13:28 (1 week ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this held within a percent or so, just the internal arrangement of it shifted, pandemic quite correct about the feasibility of selling social democracy (ish) in england even with a salesperson of rather better acumen

though i was wrong about the conservative majority dream, which lives another day

paradoxically it was achieved more via chaotic failure than determinism; they would never have got near it had they not miscalculated the balance in scotland prior to and during the referendum campaign, resulting in snp surge and the golden opportunity to cull all three rivals in england with black propaganda

lord hutton's analysis
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G04yBNTnmug&feature=youtu.be

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/generalelection/hours-after-the-election-the-dwp-says-it-is-looking-to-cut-a-disabled-access-to-work-scheme-10237191.html

start as you mean to go on

How did that 'vote for the Coalition parties and hopefully they will be much less conservative and much less liberal' thing work out, Independent hacks?

ha, much more liberal

can someone please map BBC/channel 4 pundits to their political allegiances for me: david dimbleby, laura kuennsberg, jon snow, paul mason, evan davis, emily maitliss, duncan weldon, allegra stratton...

kirsty wark?

?Mason and Snow are on the left. Wark possibly too? Maitlis and Stratton right. Don't know about the others. All guesswork tbh.

Dimbleby's a Tory isn't he?

has anyone here read Paul Mason's novel?

ive drunk his wine

never been sure about wark. She went to an all girls public school in Ayr

So has Orson Welles.

http://youtu.be/Nvxwf1jxdaM

Xpost

can someone please map BBC/channel 4 pundits to their political allegiances for me

david dimbleby(?), laura kuennsberg, jon snow, paul mason all left. Wark is left - big mates with jack McConnell etc

Allegra Stratton right and I don't know about the others

damn, I had hoped he had gone to Wellington School for Girls.

cant believe dimbleby is is left

Erk sorry that was meant to be an uncertain right. Though I'm pretty sure but don't know for certain.

Really need to go to bed now

possible clue

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/culturenews/10083081/I-was-proud-to-wear-uniform-of-Bullingdon-Club-admits-David-Dimbleby.html

Wake up to find they're bringing back fox hunting. Motherfuckers.

Need to find the weakest seven and start lobbying them

i know this is a symptom of what happened, but it is so bizarre to meet total despair, disgust, anger and rage with every friend, stranger, and anyone around you, towards last night's result. it just seems so crazy that the people who voted for this are so absent. that's not to say london should dictate, more to say how divided this country is. the entire system is fucked.

it just seems so crazy that the people who voted for this are so absent

this is so devastating i think
it's like sontag talking about not knowing anyone who knew anyone who voted for bush

Absolutely agree. I don't have work at the moment (freelancer) and only went out briefly to get some essentials. Head down, didn't want to speak to anyone I might meet in the supermarket (quite a tight community around here so I generally do). Utterly devastated and confused. I guess up here in Scotland there's a little more potential for positive change but equally a potential for punishment, who can say how it will go. It's so brutal. I feel hopeless.

If 3 of the main party leaders have resigned what shape will parliamentary bills, debates etc even take?

Given that the forecast was for a hung parliament or coalition in which Labour/UKIP/LD would have had more influence, it might be that the three new leaders of those parties feel that they have to compensate by being more oppositional to the Tory government. I'd expect this government to get even less done compared to the outgoing coalition as a result. They're never going to agree enough on anything to present a united front against the government, but they're still going to provide plenty of opposition. Although one area where the three parties might 'agree' is the issue of PR, because they would have all won more seats under that system than they have now.

The Tories will now be able to go ahead with redrawing constituency boundaries, if anything they'll choose to shore up their position under FTPT, although given the size of their majority they will need to be careful not to shaft any of their own MPs in the process. A lot of Labour MPs are highly sceptical about PR as well.

this held within a percent or so, just the internal arrangement of it shifted, pandemic quite correct about the feasibility of selling social democracy (ish) in england even with a salesperson of rather better acumen

though i was wrong about the conservative majority dream, which lives another day

The swagger of these cunts (slightly reigned in until now) is going to be unbearable, especially by party conference season. I wonder if Cameron is as surprised as the rest of us, although it says a lot for the way expectations have shifted that a very slender and fragile majority feels like a landslide. This government could be weaker than the last, the otherwise assured destruction of the LibDems ensured a reasonable amount of security in big votes. Cameron's decision to call an EU referendum and stand down at the end of the Parliament should partly insulate him from the sort of regicide attempts of the Major era, but he will probably lurch even further to the right to keep them in line. It could also start to look like a government marking time just a couple of years in, now that these things are seen increasingly presidentially.

The debate was more open than in previous elections, and in Scotland has decisively shifted, but I was naive about the effectiveness of the backlash. I guess Miliband was just not trusted/thought capable of delivering his more popular policies.

Deep down though I now suspect that the only thing capable of ejecting a post-Thatcher British government is a housing crash, and this will continue to be the case for as long as owner-occupiers are in the majority. Expect a flood of additional policies aimed at ramping up demand (perversely making the next crash more likely in the process).

They also seem to be under the impression that the Tories won't offer them any further powers thus enraging the Scottish people further - and leading them to do what exactly? Throw a tantrum? Of course the Tories will offer them powers while binning the Barnett Formula and slashing funding.

What are the constraints like on Scottish government borrowing at the moment? The consequences of Westminster seeming to give more powers away while also enforcing tighter fiscal policy could be horrific.

I wonder if Cameron is as surprised as the rest of us

aiui, a hell of a lot of Tory MPs had already started making plans for life after office and will be as surprised as anyone they are in for another five years.

Clegg seemed understandably less than thrilled to not be chucked out of his seat, visibly facing up in his speech to having to fall on his sword and then spend 5 years reporting to the 12-year-old who's running the LibDems next.

The new UKIP leader may or may not be more oppositional to the Tories - they are a ragbag coalition of various lunatics and arseholes formerly with a charismatic leader, so they may tear themselves apart a bit. But their voters (or the non-protest voters anyway) will be well catered for by a Lib Dem-less Tory party with a narrow majority, several of whom have UKIP breathing down their necks.

The anti-immigrant/anti-EU stance is probably going to keep UKIP from fragmenting, also because they're constrained by trying to appeal to voters by being more right wing on those issues than the Tories, but not so much that they're being called out as racist/disastrous for UK business every five minutes. There's not a lot of room for different policy approaches in that area, particularly with the Tories wanting to appear more right wing to grab on the fence UKIP voters.

I'm actually dreading the EU referendum, because it looks like the politicians are mostly going to be anti-EU, and that the voice of sanity in the debate is going to have to come from the CBI and other representatives of UK big business.

Booked yesterday eve in advance to see a play by Doris Lessing (my timing on these things...) w/friend yesterday. Really good all round but there was virtually one topic of conversation..

More politics at the (perhaps soon to be closed) Rich Mix:

http://www.richmix.org.uk/whats-on/event/ww2-end-anniversary-days-of-hope-1945-2015/

xp That was Kael and Nixon, not Sontag and Bush, but the analogy stands.

I'm actually dreading the EU referendum, because it looks like the politicians are mostly going to be anti-EU, and that the voice of sanity in the debate is going to have to come from the CBI and other representatives of UK big business.

On the contrary, bring it on, Cameron and Osborne (and majority of the Tory cabinet) will have to be start being honest about how they want to stay in the EU.

Idk, the stigma of voting Tory is definitely still there in much of London but it seems to be evaporating. Johnson has probably helped, the shift away from aggressive homophobia has helped, the virtually indistinguishable positions between the main parties on immigration too. A lot of the people younger than me I speak to aren't from wealthy backgrounds but are from communities that place a heavy emphasis on personal responsibility and entrepreneurship. They like some of the messages on tax, law and order, etc, but would have been put off by the hardline social conservatism and transparent racism in the past. It may still be a small proportion voting Tory but it's a much more vocal group than before.xp

On the contrary, bring it on, Cameron and Osborne (and majority of the Tory cabinet) will have to be start being honest about how they want to stay in the EU.

― Cram Session in Goniometry (Tom D.), Saturday, 9 May 2015 14:10 (1 minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Absolutely!

http://www.lrb.co.uk/v37/n10/david-runciman/notes-on-the-election

Isn't the narrative as follows: Cameron goes to Brussels to get concessions -> does not get enough of them -> sets a referendum in which he has to campaign against the EU as he didn't get enough concessions to stay in it.

Anyway yes looking forward to it.

I can't see Cameron campaigning to leave the EU so the narrative will probably be: Cameron goes to Brussels to get concessions -> gets hardly any of them -> paints this as a great triumph against tremendous odds -> asks the British people to allow him to finish the job of reforming the EU. Something like that, but with more of a pro-EU spin on it.

How can he do that when he has already said he'd leave after five years? Doubt he'd be able to go back on that as Teresa May has to take over.

Allow us to finish the job then. And Osborne will take over, if Cameron has anything to do with it.

honestly if we're inevitably going to have an eu referendum i'd rather it be under a tory government led by a pm that isn't from the eurosceptic wing of his party. if labour were forced into this with the opposition and media out for blood i think there'd be far more chance of an exit.

Who know, Cameron might not last till 2017!

Lab was never going to be forced into it.

They won't do it, but EU could concede to every one of Cameron's demands and there would still be thundering demand for a referendum - I can't see any way in which he can get out of holding one while remaining Prime Minister.