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8 June 2017 - the UK elects, generally...again


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A few questions for you UK folks:

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UK #GE2017 exit poll projects:

Conservative 314
Labour 266
SNP 34
Lib Dem 14
Plaid 3 
Green 1
UKIP 0

1. What the heck is the Plaid party?

2. Why does anyone take UKIP seriously?

3. Does the shift from SNP to Labour mean anything?

4. Even if the Tories gain a majority, shouldn't May step down?

5. Why is there only one "r" in Tories?

 

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50 minutes ago, Alexjc said:

Could be a hung Parliament... Conservatives unable to govern alone. Will need the Lib Dems as Cameron had to when they got back into power.

UDP had a great result in Northern Ireland. The Tories will need them especially with the new Lib Dem opposed for a new coallition.

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2 hours ago, zekekelso said:

A few questions for you UK folks:

1. What the heck is the Plaid party?

2. Why does anyone take UKIP seriously?

3. Does the shift from SNP to Labour mean anything?

4. Even if the Tories gain a majority, shouldn't May step down?

5. Why is there only one "r" in Tories?

 

1. A Welsh national party like the SNP.

2. Not anymore after Nutell's crashing defeat :D

3. Actually the shift to Tories is bigger and more relatable to consider. The Scots Tories did a great job keeping the opposition.

4. Theresa May is done. Corbyn and others will plead for her head as the recent speeches mentioned.

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3 hours ago, Alexjc said:

Could be a hung Parliament... Conservatives unable to govern alone. Will need the Lib Dems as Cameron had to when they got back into power.

Libs won't touch Tories with a bargepole this time. Diametrically opposed on Brexit.

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According to SkyNews, she won't resign. However, Theresa May will be in the history for one of the most disastrous political campaigns in UK. The level of destruction of a full advantage of 25 points while having the majority of the media in her side is remarkable in an accidental way. Even Michael Foote has the excuse of being too "radical".

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Oh hell, this is too good.

Though it really does show how biased the electoral map is towards the Conservatives in the UK. Only about 2% separates Cons from Lab and there is a dramatic difference in seats.

The only way the Cons govern with some stability is with the support of DUP. Lord help y'all.

Btw why does Northern Ireland have to be so difficult. Can't they vote for regular parties?

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1 hour ago, Faster said:

why does Northern Ireland have to be so difficult. Can't they vote for regular parties?

Don't forget that Northern Ireland, Wales and Scotland have their own government systems, with their own priorities, in addition to being represented at Westminster.

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5 hours ago, StefanMUC said:

So, the Tories are now in the hands of Ian Paisley's climate-change denying, homophobic (etc etc) heirs, right?

Thankfully Corbyn with his IRA love from the 70s was stopped by the will of the people.

 

 

Hey, May has experience dealing with this kind of guy.

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4 hours ago, Rob. said:

This tweet gets better and better with age...

This sums it up perfectly, Rob.

However, I'll add my two pennies worth as well: As a Social Democrat, I was of course elated at first last night, when seeing the exit poll results. I won't deny that Jeremy Corbyn as a person was never the kind of Labour leader I wished for, even if he made an interesting political point. And I'm glad that such a social justice manifesto can produce huge gains in elections. This is particularly important (or even poignant) when I look towards our national election in Germany on September 24, where the SPD and its candidate for the chancellery, Martin Schulz, are currently fighting an uphill struggle with a comparable social justice manifesto against "I have no other ideas than promising you more of the same-old, same-old" Angela Merkel.

But this morning, my feelings rather turned to sadness and bitterness. As you guys know, I have a soft spot for Britain and her people. I love your humour, your resilience and the many great things you gave to the world. Britain simply does not deserve to be governed to pieces by greedy, irresponsible, clueless and/or oblivious politicians. And this includes, to some extent, even the two Labour administrations of the 1990s/2000s who failed to recognise that their enthusiasm for the European idea was not shared by considerable parts of even its own electorate. And what the Tories have delivered in the past seven and especially the past two years is utterly ridiculous. They keep shooting the country - that they allegedly are so proud of - into the foot and risk that after its relationship to the European Union, also its own internal union will break up. Where David Cameron was a shortsighted nitwit, Theresa May is even more of a political disaster on legs. And isn't it ironical that she wants to punish Britain even further by clinging to 10 Downing Street with the help of the egoistic and unfit DUP and of her own "strong and stable" parliamentary colleagues who obviously can't wait to get an opportunity to finally topple her and replace her with Boris "If you like this mess, you just have to thank me" Johnson or another Tory dud?

Just like the presidency of the insane orange man across the ocean, the British government is presenting a real-life satire of previously unknown proportions. And therefore I ask, even louder than after the Brexit referendum: Where has the "Great" in "Great Britain" gone? And no, I don't direct this at you, all the good-humoured and well-intending people of Britain. I direct it at the political class that risks your country's great reputation for cheap policial "victories". So, in the final analysis, I couldn't be sadder and angrier today.

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2 hours ago, Olympian2004 said:

This sums it up perfectly, Rob.

However, I'll add my two pennies worth as well: As a Social Democrat, I was of course elated at first last night, when seeing the exit poll results. I won't deny that Jeremy Corbyn as a person was never the kind of Labour leader I wished for, even if he made an interesting political point. And I'm glad that such a social justice manifesto can produce huge gains in elections. This is particularly important (or even poignant) when I look towards our national election in Germany on September 24, where the SPD and its candidate for the chancellery, Martin Schulz, are currently fighting an uphill struggle with a comparable social justice manifesto against "I have no other ideas than promising you more of the same-old, same-old" Angela Merkel.

But this morning, my feelings rather turned to sadness and bitterness. As you guys know, I have a soft spot for Britain and her people. I love your humour, your resilience and the many great things you gave to the world. Britain simply does not deserve to be governed to pieces by greedy, irresponsible, clueless and/or oblivious politicians. And this includes, to some extent, even the two Labour administrations of the 1990s/2000s who failed to recognise that their enthusiasm for the European idea was not shared by considerable parts of even its own electorate. And what the Tories have delivered in the past seven and especially the past two years is utterly ridiculous. They keep shooting the country - that they allegedly are so proud of - into the foot and risk that after its relationship to the European Union, also its own internal union will break up. Where David Cameron was a shortsighted nitwit, Theresa May is even more of a political disaster on legs. And isn't it ironical that she wants to punish Britain even further by clinging to 10 Downing Street with the help of the egoistic and unfit DUP and of her own "strong and stable" parliamentary colleagues who obviously can't wait to get an opportunity to finally topple her and replace her with Boris "If you like this mess, you just have to thank me" Johnson or another Tory dud?

Just like the presidency of the insane orange man across the ocean, the British government is presenting a real-life satire of previously unknown proportions. And therefore I ask, even louder than after the Brexit referendum: Where has the "Great" in "Great Britain" gone? And no, I don't direct this at you, all the good-humoured and well-intending people of Britain. I direct it at the political class that risks your country's great reputation for cheap policial "victories". So, in the final analysis, I couldn't be sadder and angrier today.

Well said, compatriot!

 

However, some share for the British mess must go to the media tycoons who masterfully manipulated the masses into Brexit, and at least tried their best again this time around again (and probably still secured sone crucial seats for Dismay), as well as those parts of the British electorate who happily fall for the Daily Crap they're being served. Oh, and to those people in NI who think it smart to vote for either parties that won't take their seats in Westminster anyway, or take the bible more literal than Khomeini did with the Quran.

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When the story of this election comes to be written by the academics and historians, it will take them a very long time to sift through all the mixed messages of what is a quite extraordinary result. Our government as a whole is now clearly weaker as a result of the failure of all the parties to convince enough of the electorate and that will have implications for the Brexit negotiations going forward. Yet, with the losses incurred by the Scottish National Party, it seems to me that the future of our own union of nations appears to be safer now than it was.

I voted Conservative both in 2010 and 2015, and was confident that Theresa May would be a good prime minister when she took office last summer. But, the more I saw of her in this campaign, the less impressed I was. There are too many reasons why I felt I couldn't vote for her party this time round but the main one was a fundamental lack of confidence in her as a leader of my country that goes far beyond the Brexit negotiations to come.

What has made me even more angry, however, is the way in which she has sought to carry on regardless. I understand that, as leader of the largest party, she gets first crack at forming a government. But, having endured such a substantial reverse, she ought to be reaching out and modifying her course. Instead, she appears oblivious to the fact her political credibility is shot to pieces and someone in the Tory party is going to have to put the country first and get her out. Just as long as it isn't Boris.

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4 hours ago, arwebb said:

When the story of this election comes to be written by the academics and historians, it will take them a very long time to sift through all the mixed messages of what is a quite extraordinary result. Our government as a whole is now clearly weaker as a result of the failure of all the parties to convince enough of the electorate and that will have implications for the Brexit negotiations going forward. Yet, with the losses incurred by the Scottish National Party, it seems to me that the future of our own union of nations appears to be safer now than it was.

I voted Conservative both in 2010 and 2015, and was confident that Theresa May would be a good prime minister when she took office last summer. But, the more I saw of her in this campaign, the less impressed I was. There are too many reasons why I felt I couldn't vote for her party this time round but the main one was a fundamental lack of confidence in her as a leader of my country that goes far beyond the Brexit negotiations to come.

What has made me even more angry, however, is the way in which she has sought to carry on regardless. I understand that, as leader of the largest party, she gets first crack at forming a government. But, having endured such a substantial reverse, she ought to be reaching out and modifying her course. Instead, she appears oblivious to the fact her political credibility is shot to pieces and someone in the Tory party is going to have to put the country first and get her out. Just as long as it isn't Boris.

Prophetic words... It's hard to believe that in 2012, UK was, happily, on top of the world...and wasn't even contemplating this scenario. 

Anyways, if it gets really bad...it probably will...then you and Rob are welcome to move to New Zealand. Our politics are so boringly Centre and the nation economically booming, you can live a decent life.

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5 hours ago, Roger87 said:

Speaking of that, what happened with Schulz effect? He was looking as the new bright option with opportunity to sustain a semaphore coallition. Now, he's losing steam.

*sigh* This is a long story. To cut it relatively short:

This spring, the SPD lost three regional elections (Saarland, Schleswig-Holstein and North Rhine-Westphalia), mainly due to regional factors. In Schleswig-Holstein and North Rhine-Westphalia (Germany's most populous state and therefore particularly important) the SPD even lost the regional premierships, while in Saarland, the very popular CDU premier got re-elected. Despite the regional factors that decided those elections, it hurt Martin Schulz' image massively and also killed the momentum for the SPD in the opinion polls. Adding to that, Schulz and the federal SPD also committed mistakes of their own: They waited too long with intruducing their manifesto for the federal election, or least parts thereof. The SPD premier of North Rhine-Westphalia, Hannelore Kraft, even asked Schulz not to interfere with her regional election campaign by making major political announcements for the federal election. This was of course a huge strategic mistake, as Schulz suddenly became practically invisble on the federal stage while Kraft did not manage to win her election due to her own political mistakes in her state.

You can imagine that all this led to very negative reporting here in Germany (our press can be equally as ruthless and sensationalist as the British one) and now Schulz and the SPD suddenly have a "loser image" again, although they are trying to fight against it by rolling out their manifesto which shall be presented and adopted on a party conference by the end of this month. Meanwhile, Angela Merkel is rejoicing about the stupid mistakes her Social Democrat rivals made - and does what she does best: nothing. This week, while the SPD presented its concept for a pension reform, the CDU even said that it doesn't see the need for any pension reform concept of its own. In Germany, this is called "assymetrical demobilisation": By promising almost nothing that can be deemed controversial and by adopting Social Democratic positions, Angela Merkel's keeps distracting traditionally left-leaning supporters from voting SPD while mobilising its own traditional supporters and thus winning federal election after federal election.

It's highly frustrating since, unlike Britain, the political scene here in Germany repeatedly seems to be covered with three thick layers of gratin cheese. Angela Merkel has sucked almost all life out of the political process by her very presidential and rather non-controversial style of governing. Only since the advent of the right-wing populist AfD, the refugee crisis and then the Brexit referendum and Trump's victory in the US, people here seem to get more political again. And that was a momentum Schulz at first was able to use to his and his party's benefit. Now they have lost this momentum entirely. But at least the UK election showed: In these highly turbulent and volatile political times, you just can't predict the outcome of an election months or even weeks in advance. This might be the final straw for Schulz and the SPD, even if I don't expect Merkel and the CDU to make any major mistakes. Especially not mistakes of Theresa May's proportions.

I'm certain that Angela Merkel has watched very closely what her British colleague did and how she acted in her election campaign. The only things that could damage her chances are the CSU or the right wing of the CDU (the CSU controversially fought against Merkel's course during the refugee crisis), any now unforeseen political scandal and the fact that Merkel, after 12 years in office, is simply worn out, even if she is still able to cover that up thanks to the mistakes of her rivals and the "assymetrical demobilisation" strategy of her own party.

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Oh, and I have to add one more thing: While Germany has blatant social injustices of its own, most Germans are more or less well-off. Employment numbers are high, the economy is still developing well, you name it. And while those suffering from the aforementioned social injustices are suffering, the big well-fed and fairly satisfied majority prevents any major political change in this country. It's the old phenomenon: If you feel comfortable, you tend to stick to the same-old, same-old. And Angela Merkel is a genius of presenting a "Don't you worry, let mother do that for you" image to the voters. As I said, this is paralysing the political climate in Germany massively and hurts the chances of the SPD to make major inroads.

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I do wonder what could have happened with a longer campaign like the one Canada had a few years ago. Another 2 weeks of good Labour campaigning could have done a lot of interesting things. Honestly I do not think this election result is the doom and gloom that people are making it. I actually think that the weakened position of May and the destruction of UKIP will lead to a non-Brexit Brexit. It will also likely lead to another election in 18ish months. But c'est la vie. 

I think there is a lot of positives out of this election:

- emboldened labour

- high youth engagement

- took the piss right out of Scottish independence

- weakened the hard Brexit position

 

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And the ugly farce that are the Tories of the years 2015-2017 continues:

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Prime Minister Theresa May's two closest advisers have quit after the Conservatives failed to win a majority of MPs in the general election. The BBC understands the PM was warned she faced a leadership challenge unless she sacked Nick Timothy and Fiona Hill.

(Source: http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-40231107)

So Theresa May has now been officially taken hostage by her own party. Why doesn't she simply quit? Cringeworthy!

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