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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » Tonght’s Local By-Election Preview by Harry Hayfield
politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » Tonght’s Local By-Election Preview by Harry Hayfield
Darlington (the constituency that Labour won in a by-election just prior to the 1983 general election, only to see it go to the Conservatives at that election), is the sort of area that shows what a problem the Conservatives have in the North of England. At the 1983 general election, there were a total of eight seats in the North (four of them in Northumberland).
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/comedy/clips/p006vm6j/the_league_of_gentlemen_a_local_shop_for_local_people/
"THE BBC’s live coverage of Baroness Thatcher’s funeral next week has been slammed for its bias, incompetence and lack of respect.
Critics of the corporation have accused it of exploiting the linear nature of time to disguise yet another disaster.
Daily Mail editor Paul Dacre said: “The BBC has shown spectacular arrogance, thinking it can get away with monumental failings simply because they have yet to occur"
http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/celebrity/bbc-coverage-of-thatchers-funeral-pre-emptively-slammed-2013041165371
"This makes me think that there is an interesting psychological difference between left-wingers and right-wingers. On the whole, right-wingers are prepared to indulge left-wingers on the grounds that they may be wrong and misguided but are still perfectly nice. Lefties, on the other hand, are much more likely to think right-wingers are genuinely evil."
When it comes to Thatcher, the tendency to cry 'evil' does indeed appear more frequently, but many other issues do not provoke such reactions as much. But rightwingers are reasonable and nice, and left wingers are inherently more predisposed towards irrational dislike and hatred of their opponents?
What self-important, self-indulgent drivel.
http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2013/04/staggers-envy-being-rejected-martin-amis-and-why-left-hated-maggie-so-much
As I missed Mike's previous thread, a belated comment:
I don't think that poll's too bad for Cameron. I wouldn't be at all surprised if the wording, comparing Thatcher to Diana or the Queen Mother, had been written by the Mirror with the express intention of producing an unfavourable result for the decision. That's not having a go at the pollster. Their job is to accurately find the result of a particular question, not to ensure there's no loading or bias. It's highly likely that had the reference to the two royals been replaced by references to, say, Gladstone and Churchill, there'd have been a quite marked shift towards a positive response.
As it is, level pegging's not a bad outcome given the actual wording. Fwiw, I'm fairly ambivalent about the idea, and not that keen on ceremonial or state funerals for non-royals for all but the rarest of exceptions - where does one draw the line? Anyway, I doubt there'll be much of a lasting impact either way on current polling so I'm not sure there is a 'wrong' decision from that angle.
A couple of Green party guys were in the square looking for interest, but not getting much I think. My remark that I didn't own a car got, off the bat, only a fishy-eyed blink.
Two guys at a conference making jokes about women reps and dongles were overheard by a third woman, who publicised their private remarks widely. Both men were fired, and the woman herself then got the sack after all the negative publicity.
Only today some chap called Orth (Microsoft executive) resigned (not sure if that's 'resigned' or resigned) after making very ill-received comments about people needing to 'deal with it' if the next Xbox is always-online (for a variety of reasons that's insane).
Or you could just refer to the way that an MP was investigated for calling a man unkempt and seemingly harmless remarks on Twitter (an irate man joking about blowing up Robin Hood airport, for example) have led to police action.
Make it a play between the bathos of animal reality and the idealism of myth creation.
"I think Farage may, if all things go UKIPs way, be more the sort without the skills to take them onwards after an initial breakthrough, even though they would likely not have made it (if they do) without him. Perhaps more a Julius Ceasar than an Augustus, setting the stage which someone else ended up finishing and reaping larger benefits of."
Yes, the leaders who destroyed a republican system of government and replaced it with a personal dictatorship - something to look forward to if UKIP come to power then...
Yes, the leaders who destroyed a republican system of government and replaced it with a personal dictatorship - something to look forward to if UKIP come to power then...
I was thinking more that his leadership might see them gain some MPs, but he will be unable to control them effectively or build on it, and so will be replaced and remembered more as a flawed icon as others turn them into what they will become but deny for now (that is, just another party, like any other), but whatever floats your boat I guess.
hmm. Is the recent case of a certain (male) hors categorie arschloch a special case? No, I guess.
How about following up your advocacy of heroin for the elderly with an ALP type hymn to the wisdom of George. For a contraversalist must be rather tempting.
http://www.providentliving.org/?lang=eng
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/religion/9984600/British-Mormons-take-on-The-Book-of-Mormon.html
Do multiple blog entries on various electoral systems and their merits versus First Past the Post.
To be fair, Augustus also ended a century or so of intermittent civil war and established a stable political system which proved good for another two centuries, despite some of the considerably less-than-adequate individuals to wear the Purple. In addition, he was wise enough to recognise that appearances matter, hence his desire to clothe his autocracy in the garb of the republic, and aversion to any title hinting at kingly aspirations.Yes, the leaders who destroyed a republican system of government and replaced it with a personal dictatorship - something to look forward to if UKIP come to power then...
In any case, the republican system was long dead; the battle Caesar and others were fighting was what and who would replace it.
For eight months last year I blogged for the Telegraph on the US election as well as doing PB. In the end I found it very difficult generating enough ideas. PB generally needs 3 posts a day which, even with the help of you, Henry G and Harry Hayfield, is enormously challenging. Adding on the Telegraph requirement to generate a fixed number of posts per week (and they were paying) proved too much and I stopped.
The running commentary from US & Korean officials on the where Kim the Younger (or KTY to his mates...) missiles are and whether they are horizontal or vertical is deliberate. Its designed to let the North know that everyone knows what they are doing. The assumption is this going to be a missile test of an untried system with the added publicity potential. Thus any launch will be from a fairly fixed set of locations where the full testing rigs are there to measure every aspect of the launch and trip.
This commentary is in one way its an assertive approach, in another way it reflects a reality that this time around the North Koreans are doing a lot of feints and dodges, moving and siting missile systems trying to throw off the scent. The North Koreans also can keep the latest in the line of the Taepodong missile family sitting on a launchpad fully fueled for some time and launch it in a week if they feel like it. Thus Kim the Younger is chain pulling in a big way..or he intends to do something.
This is what is causing the headache, because there are other missiles, both at the site that is publicly having a running commentary being done on it, and at other sites where not much is being said. If the US/Japanese/South gets caught napping and say a single launch is actually several missiles, or they get launched from other sites, that news will get out to the free Western media and young Kim will look almighty clever.
Yet, haven't we been here before many times in the last 10 years?
Yes and no. Theres a lot more going on. The missile launch for a bit of publicity is one thing. The South, however, is very concerned and trying to protect against a provocation of a more lethal kind. The sinking of a South Korean naval vessel by a NK submarine a year or two back is etched in the memory over there. By the time the South finally confirmed the source of the sinking, heat had gone out. The North, militarily at least, walked away with a success and one that initially had deniability all over it.
The US and South Koreans are striking a much more forward posture and certainly the South Korean premier has promised to take no guff. Obama in the last hour suggested the North needs to step off the hill and that the US will protect its territory (maybe its allies as well, who knows). The tone and words of this statement supported by others from Chuck Hagel, the South Koreans and also regional parties such as the Chinese and Russians are relatively unusual because listening to the politicians they are not expecting just a bit of a publicity shoot, the fear, genuinely, that things are not in their regular pattern.
The chain pulling though is fraying nerves amongst the respective security & political communities because they are essentially reactive by default and simply have to wait. If something occurs, what will the reaction be? Nothing may be sensible but nothing may well only encourage the North. Dictatorships tend not to see passivity as a sign to back off. Shooting any launch down might weaken Kim himself, it might just light a bigger fire.
The key to being a longstanding pundit as opposed to your briefer stint must therefore be the ability to not let lack of ideas slow you down. Ideas are for the weak!
As councillor wins the vote to stand to be South Shields MP, we ask ...
Thursday, 11 April 2013
Is Emma Lewell-Buck the right candidate for Labour?
Yes
174 (47%)
No
195 (53%)
http://i.imgur.com/h4VxBN9.png
It's slightly addictive, actually.
Incidentally, thanks to Mr. Hayfield for his regular locals slot.
"Humiliating? Try walking into school the day after Women in Love has just been repeated on BBC2"
Instead, write something on how hard it is for anyone, even highly educated people, to know who to trust when it comes to important decisions such as MMR. Such decisions are so specialist that people who are not intimately involved with that speciality have to follow whoever they trust.
Throw in a media who (with one or two honourable exceptions) do not understand it either, and snake-oil salesmen, and we have a situation where it is all too easy for people to make the wrong decisions with the best of intentions. MMR threw in another couple of factors: fear, and the understandable desire of parents wanting to find *something* to blame for their child's autism.
Also mention that it will happen again. And again.
(AGW is another area which is outside of most people's understanding at a deep level. People just follow their instincts, and read the blogs, and use the data, that backs up those instincts).
However, for a rather off-piste topic, how about a blog on the way that 98.347% of people could not tell an invented statistic if it bit them on the backside?
With a name like that she must be a toff.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/22105955
Although in Malaysia I think Vettel was entirely at fault, it is fair to say that Webber hasn't always obeyed team orders in the past. However, that might be because in Turkey (2010) he was blamed for Vettel's mistake and in 2011 (when Vettel easily won the title) he was ordered not to compete for the win (against Vettel), even though it wouldn't really have harmed Vettel's chances at all.
YouGov/Sun poll tonight: CON 32%, LAB 42%, LD 9%, UKIP 11%. Labour lead 10 points, like last week. No Thatcher bounce then?
I use it a lot now.
Labour 42%
Government 41%
Ta.
Was that the film that starred Chukkuz Umoney? Didn't he play Harrison Fraud...?
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/danhodges/100211777/mum-did-to-maggie-what-shed-done-to-kermit/
It's not the East London, that runs under the District line further west at Whitechapel. Do you mean the DLR at Bow? There's nothing between West Ham and Bromley by Bow except the River Lea!
Look, it was bad for reasons that had nothing to do with it having aliens in it. It could have worked even on the sceptical like yourselves if well done, but it wasn't very well done. Better writing, no Shia Laboef and so on and I bet you'd find it easier to be believable.
I imagine she'd have been disappointed; I'm sure the character would have been able to speak both, and you should too.
I hope is it True, it will be Gold, if they're on
what do you think about the UKIP candidate (who is the likely main challenger at the moment)?
He really is growing in stature as a writer.
Plus, the villain was a bit rubbish (Russian swordswoman sounds good, but she pales in comparison to the chaps from Raiders of the Lost Ark and The Last Crusade), Communists are less interesting than Nazis and Shia LaBoeuf was in it.
http://tyneandwear.sky.com/news/article/63086/south-shields-by-election-meet-the-woman-labour-hopes-will-replace
I would link to the relevant clips, but they're most certainly NSFW. So here's the Telegraph's take on it:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/3179812/South-Park-episode-angers-viewers-with-scenes-of-Hollywood-titans-raping-Indiana-Jones.html
The German language is awesome, as Schadenfreude is the greatest word in the history of mankind.
But Latin is so elegant.
I have to confess, swearing in French is the best, it's like wiping your arse with silk.
OT, I still don't get why independents are so popular in west Wales. How well run are the councils round that way as a result?
Go with gangsta sporran and the loss of random nudity on Play for Today, SeanT.
Largely, that's because Harrison Ford is still a charismatic, likeable fellow, and manages to defy the baggage (yes, LaBoeuf, and the wife-mother) the writers lumbered him with.
Incidentally, if anyone were interested in my thoughts on a fifth film, it would start with the son of Hitler killing the son of Indy. Instant motive for revenge, better villain and no more LaBoeuf.
Oh dear, oh dear.
Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear.
I know we've all been spoiled by TV detectives who work 24 hours a day to solve complex cases in 2 days, maximum (although how many of their cases would fall apart afterwards before trial? Someone should really make a show about the team who has to pick up the ruins of cases TV detectives messed up as they ignored laws and procedures to get the guys who did it), but what's taking them so long. I know it's complex, but there were aspects which were revealed to be clear cut some time ago.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-22117380
French I found a bit more difficult. That said, I recently stumbled across a cool name for a bunch of Felarian mercenaries (not Altmortis, but later): Les Sanguinaires (the bloodthirsty men).
http://hitchensblog.mailonsunday.co.uk/
I think he's a fine actor.
I hate him because he's stirred his spoon in Megan Fox's porridge.
What a fantastic movement in just one day.
Maggie appears to be closing the gap with Labour even faster than George is eliminating the deficit.
Who would have thought it?
http://hitchensblog.mailonsunday.co.uk/
Oh and it leading to a discussion with a friend what the plural of Dominatrix is.
The answer is of course Dominatrices
I do wonder whether an apex should be pluralised to become apices, though.
Lab 426
LD 129
Con 117
turnout 31.8%