On May 07 2010 02:55 kakaman wrote: Wait so Gordon Brown seems in place to win? What happened to the white Obama's momentum? What happened to change???
Ha, I'm sure Obama would not appreciate being insulted in such a way.
Obama is a man of such character he tells the truth and fights for what's right even when it makes him unpopular. Clegg will just tell you exactly what you want to hear then deny it when examined later.
Thinking American politics is any less bullshit than UK politics is a foolish thought indeed.
I'm not actually a UK citizen, so I have a kind of outsider's inside view, and one of the funniest things about elections in the UK is, that every time everyone talks about LibDem and then nobody actually votes for them. Seems like it has happened again. By nobody I don't mean that they didn't get a decent number of seats, but the pre-election hype about LibDems and people proclaiming their intentions ("vote to make a difference" - "change" - etc) and the final result are always vastly different. This has happened every time I remember and that goes back some 10 years by now ...
At least now things seem to move away from a 2-party system, which I think is good. Sadly this seems to be the case due to increasing support for lunatics like the BNP ...
On May 07 2010 02:55 kakaman wrote: Wait so Gordon Brown seems in place to win? What happened to the white Obama's momentum? What happened to change???
Ha, I'm sure Obama would not appreciate being insulted in such a way.
Obama is a man of such character he tells the truth and fights for what's right even when it makes him unpopular. Clegg will just tell you exactly what you want to hear then deny it when examined later.
Thinking American politics is any less bullshit than UK politics is a foolish thought indeed.
Lucky I didn't say that then.
This result or lack of result is pretty intriguing. Especially the vast difference in voting in Scotland and Wales. Nick Robinson writes that the only potential stable majority is a Conservative and Liberal combination. I really hope that they can put aside political point scoring and create a Government that works.
It must be pretty infuriating for the Lib Dems, Labour get 29.1% of the vote and get 255 seats so far and the lib dems get just 6.2% less (22.9%) of the vote but get only 54 seats.
Yes indeed, it's been worse I believe but it's pretty harsh for them. Ours is a two party system. I wonder what would happen in a referendum vote on voting reform.
It is pretty amazing the lib dems didn't shift one bit. I've always had a feeling that personal conviction and hereditary voting and sheer ignorance rules about 80% of the country's voting anyway...tend to find it a bit ridiculous how the press exaggerates every tiny thing and go around saying 'oh its definitely a win for so and so now' when most people just vote vs con because of thatcher or vs lab cos they went to war etc.
Pleased that we won green :D:D:D with 14k > 13k > 12k being the voting spread. Well done miss Lucas.
Cameron wants a alliance with the liberals. Even if Clegg and Cameron agree, there's no way the more right wing tories and more left wing liberals are going to let it last.
On May 08 2010 00:19 noddyz wrote: Interesting night, now a interesting day.
Cameron wants a alliance with the liberals. Even if Clegg and Cameron agree, there's no way the more right wing tories and more left wing liberals are going to let it last.
This is what I'd like to see for my progenitor nation. I think it can work.
This is a sad day for british polictics now we get 2 weeks of the lib debs holding the country to ransom for the best deal really do they have no souls at all .
As with all things, i blame the 3rd anti-christ Thatcher, wheres the IRA when you need them they could get all the torys in 1 go now.
Incase you dont understand im joking in very english way.
this is a really education thread. the debate was incredible, and the results of the poll shift is even more so. haha, I didn't even know about the liberals until this thread. good stuff!
On May 08 2010 03:08 kakaman wrote: So I'm guessing the British equivalent to George W Bush will lead the country in the next few years?
edit: don't take this too seriously:
No not quite. There is a possible analogy between our politics but you've got it slightly skewed.
Obama = Tony Blair (Old Labour leader) Biden = Brown (Our current/failed Labour PM) Democrats = Labour Republicans = Tories
13 years ago when we elected the Labour party and Tony Blair... that was like when you elected Obama. Blair swooped to power on a wave of popular support after driving out a quite unpopular right wing Government (but unlike Bush the Tories left the economy in a strong position).
Imagine 12 years from now Obama has screwed up the economy and failed miserably in the eyes of the people. He leaves and is replaced by Joe Biden who stays in power having not been elected.
Now this time the Republicans have a more sensible ticket with a younger, more progressive leader who tries to copy Obama. He's a bit of a rich twat though and you still have doubts about the Republicans after the Bush era.
Basically we've given the biggest mandate to the rich twat but he doesn't have a majority to Govern alone so the guy has to agree with a Liberal party to form a Government. Oh and Biden has to resign.
On May 08 2010 03:08 kakaman wrote: So I'm guessing the British equivalent to George W Bush will lead the country in the next few years?
Well it depends what you are comparing by, if it's political alignment and popularity from the left then yes, but in terms of public speaking, intelligence and ignorance, no. In the UK we have a different system were the working class vote left wing, and then middle class right wing as appose to America where you have the deep south working class voting republican, while the north middle class votes democrat/left. Also I'd say that the whole communism so i wont vote democrat style of thinking comes more from the left here in the UK, we have a "right is only for rich snobs and racists" dogma here despite our right wing party being more left wing than your democrats on most issues. I mean the fact that Tony Blair, the leader of our left wing aligned himself with George Bush shows how it's the other way round here in the UK. While Obama is not so keen, despite being considered the left in his country like our current government unlike Bush, and i don't see David Cameron, who will most likely be our new right wing leader, jumping to bend over backwards to the USA like Blair.
A quick update for anyone who cares. Elections in Britain are for MPs, regional representatives who sit in the lower house of our legislative. Government's in Britain are semi unofficial. What happens is the queen will invite the leader of the biggest party of MPs to become Prime Minister and form a government. He'll continue to be Prime Minister until such a time as he cannot govern effectively. To govern effectively you need the support of enough MPs to put legislation through. When it is clear a Prime Minsister can no longer govern effectively he will officially ask the Queen to invite the leader of the opposition party to form a Government. For this reason despite losing the election Gordon Brown is still Prime Minister for now and Labour are still the Government. He no longer has the loyalty of sufficient MPs to pass any legislation but nobody else does either.
The Conservative Party got 306 with one delayed seat they will get which will bring them to 307. The total number of seats is 650 which means they are short of an absolute majority needed to govern effectively. If they had 326 MPs then they could unseat Brown immediately with a vote of no confidence where the House of Commons votes on whether the Government still has their confidence (it's what it sounds like). A simple majority forces the resignation of the PM (again not through any constitution but a tradition evolved out of the fact that a Government requires the support of the House of Commons to push through legislation).
Labour and Lib Dems came second and third respectively with 258 and 57 MPs, not enough to have a majority if they formed a coalition. With just 315 MPs they would have to utilise the party whip (every MP in the party is told to vote the same way or face deselection) and rely on minor parties to pass every single piece of legislation. That's not viable so they know they cannot form a Government.
There are a few regional parties which defy the national three party trend. The DUP in Northern Ireland are allied with the Conservatives but if every other independent and regional MP in the country all threw their lot in with Labour and the Lib Dems that'd bring them to 330.
The most likely outcome is that the Conservatives form a minority Government with firm support from the DUP (bringing them to 315) and loose support from the Lib Dems, in exchange for concessions. The one concession that the Lib Dems want more than anything else is electoral reform to proportional representation so they don't get fucked over every election but I don't see the Conservatives giving them that because they benefit too much from it. But given how close to a majority Cameron was I'm sure they can find some common ground. Even if Conservatives don't get support from either party Labour is divided enough to be able to poach a few stray votes from their backbench MPs if needed although that would create the possibility of the Labour whip defeating the Conservatives on a big vote which acts as a vote of no confidence.