For those who are voting for him, what is your main reason for doing it?
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For those who are voting for him, what is your main reason for doing it?
I'm not, but I imagine the reason lots will be voting for him is to get rid of the Tories. In fact I don't think there have been many elections, if any, since Blair in 1997 where most people have voted FOR something, but to stop the others.Quote:
Originally Posted by Wales-Bales
Can he play up front?
Unless we’ve changed our voting system, shirley only those in his constituency can vote for him ?
As an MP yes, but for PM he'll need widespread support.Quote:
Originally Posted by BLUETIT
get rid of tories 100%
The Truth!
Are you saying that Sir Keir is telling the truth?Quote:
Originally Posted by Tuerto
TBF, Sunak is probably going to vote for Starmer too! I'm just trying to gauge the opinion among ordinary people here in South Wales.Quote:
Originally Posted by Blooburd
Because one maybe a closet Tory?Quote:
Originally Posted by Wales-Bales
It's a bit like folk saying they hate porn, then indulge in a descret way when alone.
Closett tossing, could be a thing.
Get rid of the ToriesQuote:
Originally Posted by Wales-Bales
The only thing he has going for him is that he doesn't represent the Tory Party. I'd hesitate to claim he isn't a Tory though.
I'm not voting for Starmer or his circle. He is a right wing, racist, serial liar with the personality of a plank. I will vote Labour.Quote:
Originally Posted by Wales-Bales
Two reasons:
1. My local MP (Olivia Blake) is one of the good ones and if she doesn't get in it will be the Lib Dems (yellow Tories) again;
2. Labour still has a majority of trades unions as affiliates and part funders (the reason the party was founded - to represent organised labour in Parliament) and still just about has the ability to hold one of Labour's feet close to the fire. That organisational, political and financial connection is weakening every year and if it finally breaks Labour will be like every other party (reduced membership, donors and lobbyists dictating policy with no counter balance, few roots and no pretence at internal democracy).
I was a Labour member for over 30 years but no longer. They don't get my time, money or commitment any more; they just about get my vote (for now).
Quote:
Originally Posted by jon1959
Hypocrisy . You hated thier type and Blair .
Do you have a point?Quote:
Originally Posted by life on mars
Who are you voting for then?Quote:
Originally Posted by Eric the Half a Bee
Labour is a vote for Starmer you can't say it's not.Quote:
Originally Posted by jon1959
It is a vote that helps Starmer into No 10, and hopefully keeps my local MP in Parliament. It keeps out the Tories. It ensures my trade union has some small influence with a Labour government (as opposed to no influence with any other possible government). A Labour vote is a vote for and against many things. It will be a reluctant vote for the lesser of the evils on show. The beauty is I can describe it any way that feels right to me - I don't have to adopt a trite or simplistic thought process to get there. One thing is certain - I will be up most of election night (with friends) enjoying every 'Portillo moment' that comes along. One of many silver linings to the Starmer cloud.Quote:
Originally Posted by North Cardiff Blue
I am glad to see the liberals looking like they might get 60 seats
In the likely advance of reform they will be an important buffer
As the campaign goes on I’ve become frustrated with Labour/Starmer’s lack of ambition to really bring change, something I truly believe there is a huge appetite for. I understand why he doesn’t, but it’s about time they tell the Daily Mail to F off. The thought of the Tories crumbling to dust is a fabulous prospect and would be a well deserved conclusion for the most incompetent bunch of bandits that has ever tried to govern this country.
It was never his to win it was the conservatives to lose
If if he doesn’t deliver growth within 6 months he will have to cut services or raise taxes (lots of them)
I find it astonishing that you've had to wait for this election campaign to realise Starmer doesn't intend to make any major changes to the way the country is run.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dave Blue
People who revelled in the markets dictating what happened after Liz Truss's budget now being upset when politicians propose nothing radical...
Thanks for writing that Jon, it's exactly how i feel :thumbup:Quote:
Originally Posted by jon1959
I totally get what you're saying about wanting change. I just can't see where it would come from.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dave Blue
The UK is in decline and a basket case - high tax burden, low investment, stagnant productivity, failing public services, a disintegrating trade position, and a deeply-rooted cloying class system and, amazing hubris around supposed British superiority (eg. Brexit).
There are zero degrees of freedom to change anything in such a scenario. From admittedly afar, the election appears to be a choice among different groups rearranging chairs on the Titanic.
Come off it, Truss' plans being totally back-of-the-fag packet unfunded was the problem not their "radical" nature.Quote:
Originally Posted by JamesWales
Starmer is a watered down version of the idealQuote:
Originally Posted by Tuerto
But as kinnock said you can mess around with student idealistic politics and resolutions all day long but you have to get into power to be able to implement policy
Otherwise we sit at home miserable as sin as the Tories get in yet again
Since I was old enough to remember politics it's been the Tories with one double shift of Blair
And that's it
Surely even the most devoted left winger can see that this country will never elect a socialist type government
It's never going to happen
The best we can hope for is a centrist government with some left leaning social policy
You can still be a left leaning voter without walking around dressed up as Wolfie Smith
All that is absolutely fair enough. Except Blair and his ilk should have started their own party to do it with rather than hijacking the socialist party that Labour had been.Quote:
Originally Posted by SLUDGE FACTORY
Well I think a mix of moderate labour , liberals and independents is the way to goQuote:
Originally Posted by Robin Friday's Ghost
Socialism is just pretend politics these days , kinnock saw through them , more interested in fringe meeting speeches and singing the red flag than dealing with the system we have and making the best of it
Renationalising the former state industries is a great idea but if the cost is crippling then forget it
Same goes for you then. You shouldn't change the whole nature of a party just because it offers the best means of getting into power. I knew Kinnock reasonably well through a close friendship with Llew Smith MP. He was and remains a snake.Quote:
Originally Posted by SLUDGE FACTORY
Well i think kinnock became one of the naughty gang when he cosied up to europe but his criticism of the far left in 1985 at that famous speech was spot onQuote:
Originally Posted by Robin Friday's Ghost
The same problem arose with Corbyn and his crew
Either we have a moderate opposition to the Tories which can get elected or we have a fractured protest party
It's 2024 and for a lot of people the labour party is dead its the ideas and policies and an opposition to the Tories that people want
This country is never going to vote for a left wing Labour party
If we have one we can sing the red flag .....through gritted teeth ...till the cows come home and tell our mates we are left wing but it will all be hot air and we will all sit on our hands
I certainly don't think starmer is the long term answer and I would love to see the labour and liberals form a proper alliance to keep the Tories out but for that to happen you need a moderate , centre ground opposition
The likes of corbyn , Abbott and Raynor could easily be replaced by a moderate candidate and they would easily get elected and appeal more widely
So ironic sludge, chatting to a lot of my mates over the weekend, most of whom are far more clued up than me when it comes to politics, some are Labour Party members etc, they jest now that unfortunately Labour, particularly in Wales, is far more akin to a Tory type rule and I don’t think they are wrong. One lives in south Pembs, the guy running for Labour there isn’t from there, no, a massive stately home in the Cotswolds is his usual abode….they don’t listen to the people and they think they can get away with anything as we’ve seen of late. Champagne socialist bla bla, the new Tories…..your welcome to them��Quote:
Originally Posted by SLUDGE FACTORY
I don't think I am talking to someone who votes labour very often no matter what they areQuote:
Originally Posted by goats
You seem to be a tory boy if anything
Nah, not me I’ve always been a liberal. Your a modern day Tory living in Cowbridge, perfect…..Quote:
Originally Posted by SLUDGE FACTORY
Oh don't be grumpyQuote:
Originally Posted by goats
I vote Labour, I vote Liberal
Anything but tory
Where do you live ?
In a nice liberal area….:hehe::thumbup:Quote:
Originally Posted by SLUDGE FACTORY
Monmouth ?Quote:
Originally Posted by goats
Most modern economics is done based on “fag packet” assumptions. Examples:Quote:
Originally Posted by az city
1. Gordon Brown: We’ll borrow to “invest” (Brown code language for “current spend”) on the assumption of “Growth”. Growth which never matched his predictions post 2005, hence the debt spiral.
2. Starmer’s assumptions is also supposing “growth” at assumed levels. Those levels are untested and impossible to know. So we should base them on a GDP level less than current, to be cautious. Any upside is a gain. This is just basic, prudent, financial planning assumptions
3. The OBR and Treasury equally make such assumptions on growth. 40-50% of the time they are crap, and based on crude linear analysis, which any baboon armed with a spreadsheet and a GCSE could knock up.
4. Liz Truss was all about changing direction and making mostly Laffer Curve assumptions on corporation tax rates, which again are unknowable. Keynesians say Laffer Curve theory is rubbish, because they have a natural envy of tax cuts on high earners. It is political. Laffer Curve proponents (such as Patrick Minford) argue that it will work, because it worked under Reagan and Thatcher. But that was because corporation tax rates were coming down from an egregiously, evil, glutenous, and envious 1970s high level set by Wilson, Heath and Callaghan - it stimulated inward investment and creates a broader tax base.
Truss’s idea would have likely failed, but not because of Keynesians were right, and not because Minford’ is wrong. Empirical analysis (free of doctrine/ideology) shows that The Laffer Curve does work, but only at a certain point in the cycle (recession or post-recession) and only when pulling it down from much higher corporation tax rate bounds. That has been statistically proven, althought the IFS and BBC still preach the same outdated guff. At the time, as it now, it would not work because the tax rates are already low, and Ireland is already a tax competitor. The marginal gains would be questionable
Minford is a cockQuote:
Originally Posted by Keyser Soze
Imagine having that idiot as your first year economics tutor at Cardiff uni
Minford. Interesting choice of topic. Around 1982 or 1983, something like 367 Keynesian economists made shocking predictions of doom off the back of the the Geoffrey Howe budget. Patrick Minford was one of two mainstream economists to get it right, with his knowledge of the Laffer Curve.
It was front page of the FT, and it was mass hysteria from people quoting the “experts”. The 357 Keynesian “experts” were wrong. Minford and the other guy were correct. I only care about merit and track record. In my world the “cocks” are the ones screaming in a state of groupthink hysteria that they are so correct, only to be proven wrong. The good ones get it right. Especially when more modern economists and revised data proves you are wrong.
Professor Patrick Minford and Tim Congdon were leading proponents of the Truss budget. They was guilty of making bad assumptions on the Truss budget, but not out of poor theory. Theoretically they were reasonable enough, but this time his gap was a lack of applied economics and a lack of understanding of who was manipulating the bond and sterling markets. Market structure had changed a lot since 1983, and in my view what happened in the month around the Truss budget was ethically shocking, although Truss was seemingly unaware. Because of where I was consulting at the time, I would like to write a book or a series of articles on the Truss events, and the political and financial market chicanery on the month around it, but I think I need to be near my death bed before I publish it, if I ever do. I suspect I will never scribe about it and remain quiet.
The guy who was better at the time than Patrick Minford and more accurate more often was Sir Alan Walters, who MT sacked in order to back Lawson. Whereas Minford was more theoretical, Alan Walters was from the more respected area of Applied Economics (always testing theory with real data). More importantly, unlike the kooks from Harvard and LSE, Walters was schooled at Johns Hopkins University. They are leading lights on Applied Econ and Systems Thinking / Complexity Theory. Sadly, Walters recently died.
There are probably only two economists I would pay attention to these days who have called the interest rate cycle, debt cycles, inflation cycle and supply shocks almost perfectly for years. One works inside a Western central bank, and I have attended her lectures. The other is based at Johns Hopkins University and was a peer of Alan Walters, who worked on similar economics models. I would also say that there only three central bankers are worth listening to due to their track record on getting things right. The ECB, BoE and Fed are not the ones I have in mind.