The 2015 Popularity Contest (aka UK General Election )

[daylightrobber]

It was an open secret at the time.

And we wonder why so much emphasis is placed on personality rather than policy.

 

[1966efc]

Which is likelier? Clegg trying to persuade a dubious party that he was right to form a coalition with a party where the next vote could never be guaranteed; whose popular vote & seat total had fallen like a rock? Or Clegg playing yah boo, don't like you?

As I recall, great play was made of the need for "strong" (i.e., can't be beaten in the Commons) government in order to drag the country out of the hopeless mess etc etc.

Noone knows and I see no value in guessing games but maybe arithmetic + party politics is a bit more likely than personal animosity. I'll be the first, however, to say "Well, I never" if I'm wrong.

Hopefully, the results this time will sideline the Lib Dems completely.

 

[piddlywiddly]

An opinion formed on what @piddlywiddly? The fact that he has a level of decency that isn't always associated with people with power? He was more than strong enough to take on his brother in the party leadership campaign. He's a man of conviction who is prepared to lead the country by not allowing us to be ushered towards the exit door in Europe. He has demonstrated very strong leadership on issues such as Murdoch, phone hacking and the press in general as well of course on inequality and disadvantage.

It needs to be noted that the Labour party is pretty damn coherent at the moment and has been since they lost office 5 years ago. When was the last time they lost office and didn't fall to pieces resulting in being frozen out for the next term as well? I think the guy has potential.

This is such an offensive remark. There is no robbing of anyone to give to those who live in poverty. The wealth gap is widening with the levels at opposite ends of the spectrum being equally incomprehensible for the vast majority of us. The rich don't get rich from nothing. The phrase 'self-made millionaires' is a misnomer. Rich people generally get rich on the back of the rest of us in society. Don't get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with being rewarded for hard work and endeavour and when times are good many truly are. Nor though is there anything wrong with asking for something back when society is failing some of its members. The stall has been set out. We have a democratic process. The nation will decide and it may be that a mandate is given by the populous to ask that rich people pay more taxes. There is a choice here. If they don't want to, they can abandon the society and leave. If they do then they will have simply demonstrated that they were willing to take advantage of those that made them rich in ways which extends beyond any business transaction.

"The True Measure of Any Society can be found in how it treats its most vulnerable members” – Ghandi

Gordon Brown was presiding when the world went into financial meltdown. There were complexities in the banking system that virtually no politician of the day understood, or was advised on properly. On all sides. Boom and bust never has and never will be a policy.

There is no best of UKIP. Vile party. Vile policies.

Just my opinion.

An opinion on formed on what i have seen and read about Ed Miliband. I'm stunned he was elected leader of the party and i have no idea why you think he has a level of decency above Cameron or Clegg? Where does this decency come from and how do you know? I don't see any of the things you see in him, all i see is hot air.

Sorry, did you say the Labour part are coherent? You must live on a different planet to me.

Offensive remark? Dear me, you take a turn of phrase and got offended? If you actually think i was being literal that the rich would be robbed to give to the poor then i'm sorry but you've taken that the wrong way. The phrase 'self made millionaire' is a misnomer? Thats a sweeping statement that i completely disagree with. I would suggest there are wealthy individuals who've got rich by being ruthless, having mates in right places and taking advantage of the work force as there are people who've created wealth by creating something out of nothing, created valuable service and products, created jobs which pay well and been a huge benefit to our society.

I completely agree that more money needs to filter down from the very top through the middle classes to the working classes. In fact you could argue it's a false economy for the 1% to not filter more money down. A richer working and middle class tends to make the rich even richer. I believe what governments have allowed the banking industry to get away with is criminal. There should be a lot of high profile people in the FSI sitting behind bars right now for fraud. Bankers bonuses need to be regulated, especially those that have been bailed out by the tax payer. These people are nothing but gamblers and speculators, when it goes wrong we bail them out and when it goes right they get paid handsomely. Nice work if you can get it.

Every single tax loop hole currently being ruthlessly taken advantage of by the likes of Google, Vodafone, Starbucks and Amazon needs closing. If these companies want to trade in the UK and make huge profits in the UK, then they need to pay UK tax, non negotiable. They can make all the threats they want, if a company want to pull out of the UK market then a UK taxpayer will step in and start profiting from established and proven markets.

I want to see tax breaks for people who start their own businesses, especially on business rates which are absolutely criminal. Tax Sainsbury's, Tescos's et al more and give the money to small medium businesses.

Stop sending aid money to a country (India) who have a space programme, centralise all council expenditure so that better deals can be negotiated. Why don't the government pay for British companies manufacturing or providing services in Britain to take their products & service to markets around the world by organising trade shows and conferences? This is how you grow businesses, create jobs and develop British business.

£100 billion on trident over the next 30 years? How about realising that if anyone launches an Nuclear bomb in anger at anyone we are probably all done anyway and spend that money on schools, free education, hospitals, housing? We are so far up the US's arse anyway and they have more Nucs than are needed to wipe everything off the face of the earth.

There are plenty of ways a government can find money to invest in the future of this country and not one of them is brave, progressive or creative enough to try.

There were complexities in the banking system that were allowed to be there by lack of regulation both here and in the US. I think boom and bust is a policy, it's the nature of short termism politics which is, as this threads title suggests, a popularity contest. Allowing people to buy houses on 90-100% borrowed money is scandalous and dangerous, but which Political party relegated this? Credit Card debt, is this regulated properly, no. Governments have allowed companies to offer dangerous financial packages to consumers, who if there was a slight change in the markets, simply wouldn't be able to afford the finance they got. This was not a niche market, it was a mass market product and no one did a singly thing about it. Boom is not government policy?

 

[Clint Planet]

http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/polit...-just-really-hated-gordon-brown-2015041097247

DAVID Cameron is finally realising he only became prime minister because Britain could not stand another second of Gordon Brown.

With three polls showing Labour in the lead, Cameron has accepted he has no political appeal other than coinciding accidentally with the strange, brooding Scotsman.

A Tory source said: “At first he was upset, what with the economy doing marginally better and Ed Miliband being just as weird as Brown, but without the tendency for extreme violence.

“But then he realised he should never have been prime minister in the first place. If Alan Johnson or the slightly less unusual Miliband had forced Brown to resign, David would have been just another arse who led the Tory party for a while.”

The source added: “There’s still a chance we can hang on, particularly as from now on the campaign will just be gigantic images of Ed Balls’ unbearable face.

“And also we have MI5.”

Meanwhile, Ed Miliband has accepted Britain is going to make him prime minister in exchange for not being David Cameron.

 

[daylightrobber]

a level of decency above Cameron or Clegg? Where does this decency come from and how do you know?

The two of them have presided over some of the the worst moral turpitude I've seen during this last parliament. The bedroom tax ffs! Attacks on the (working) poor and the disabled. Turning the working poor against the unemployed. The 'ethnic' cleansing of London by capping housing benefit. Student debt. Ed Miliband is head and shoulders above them in terms of decency.

 

[piddlywiddly]

The two of them have presided over some of the the worst moral turpitude I've seen during this last parliament. The bedroom tax ffs! Attacks on the (working) poor and the disabled. Turning the working poor against the unemployed. The 'ethnic' cleansing of London by capping housing benefit. Student debt. Ed Miliband is head and shoulders above them in terms of decency.

Ed Miliband has never been in power and therefore what he says he will do and what he actually does is yet to be determined. Only a staunch Labour voter with blinkers on could argue he's head and shoulders above anyone. Mansion tax is a disgrace and could drive a large number of pensioners out of their homes they've been in for decades. Go on decent Ed !!!

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/...ular-government-older-peoples-tsar-warns.html

This is also the same man who continually voted against there being an Iraq war enquiry.

"Mr Miliband personally voted against starting an inquiry on four occasions as an MP, first in October 2006, then in June 2007, once more in March 2008 and again in March 2009"

Yeah, moral fibers running right through his soul.

 

[daylightrobber]

Ed Miliband has never been in power and therefore what he says he will do and what he actually does is yet to be determined. Only a staunch Labour voter with blinkers on could argue he's head and shoulders above anyone. Mansion tax is a disgrace and could drive a large number of pensioners out of their homes they've been in for decades. Go on decent Ed !!!

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/...ular-government-older-peoples-tsar-warns.html

This is also the same man who continually voted against there being an Iraq war enquiry.

"Mr Miliband personally voted against starting an inquiry on four occasions as an MP, first in October 2006, then in June 2007, once more in March 2008 and again in March 2009"

Yeah, moral fibers running right through his soul.

I'm not sure what the correlation is.

It certainly doesn't follow that voting against an inquiry into the war in any way proves he supported it. He wasn't an MP when politicians of many persuasions (including Cameron) voted for the war.

You can only judge politicians on what they have actually done and not what we speculate that they would have done/will do.

 

[The Esk]

Mansion tax is a disgrace and could drive a large number of pensioners out of their homes they've been in for decades

Bedroom tax is a disgrace and has driven a large number of poor people out of their homes they've been in for decades.

 

[Blue 1]

Bedroom tax is a disgrace and has driven a large number of poor people out of their homes they've been in for decades.

The bedroom tax is utterly abhorrent, the mansion tax is still a daft policy though.

 

[Seanjd]

Ed Miliband has never been in power and therefore what he says he will do and what he actually does is yet to be determined. Only a staunch Labour voter with blinkers on could argue he's head and shoulders above anyone. Mansion tax is a disgrace and could drive a large number of pensioners out of their homes they've been in for decades. Go on decent Ed !!!

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/...ular-government-older-peoples-tsar-warns.html

This is also the same man who continually voted against there being an Iraq war enquiry.

"Mr Miliband personally voted against starting an inquiry on four occasions as an MP, first in October 2006, then in June 2007, once more in March 2008 and again in March 2009"

Yeah, moral fibers running right through his soul.

I think it's genuinely hilarious watching the rich panic about having to pay an extra £250 a month because they live in a £2m+ house. Their "driving little old grannies out of their homes" line is perhaps the best.

 

[Seanjd]

You know it's desperate time when the right wing gutter-press are running with this stuff

 

[roydo]

Bedroom tax is a disgrace and has driven a large number of poor people out of their homes they've been in for decades.

It is also stupid imo. In purely political terms it has given people a very big stick to whack the Tories with, for not a great deal of actual money raised/saved.

And it is also so unimportant in the context of benefit and welfare reform. Like, so what if a grandmother has a spare room in a house she has lived in 30 years? Never really understood why they bothered.

Some will say spite I guess. Muddled thinking/dogma is probably closer.

 

[roydo]

I think it's genuinely hilarious watching the rich panic about having to pay an extra £250 a month because they live in a £2m+ house. Their "driving little old grannies out of their homes" line is perhaps the best.

Dont think people are panicking mate. It is just a stupid policy.

 

[piddlywiddly]

I'm not sure what the correlation is.

It certainly doesn't follow that voting against an inquiry into the war in any way proves he supported it. He wasn't an MP when politicians of many persuasions (including Cameron) voted for the war.

You can only judge politicians on what they have actually done and not what we speculate that they would have done/will do.

Why would anyone want to block (4 times) an enquiry into the Iraq war?

 

[piddlywiddly]

Bedroom tax is a disgrace and has driven a large number of poor people out of their homes they've been in for decades.

Agreed. Sorry have you mistaken me for someone who will be voting conservative?