[Closed] Is May about to call an election?

The elephant in the room is that 80% of the UK press is owned by 5 billionaires none of whom are uk taxpayers, all of whom want out of the EU for their own selfish reasons and thus who move the centre of political discussion in the press to the right. Then the BBC takes its "neutrality" form the centre of the press position ie well to the right of the political centre in the UK

This results in an unfair advantage to the tories

I was 85% Plaid and Labour. But I won't vote Plaid since my constituency used to be Labour and only lost to Tories by 2,000 odd votes last time.

ulysse - Member

Innit, as a left libertarian, it's weird how them questionnaires tell me I'm closest aligned to The Greens...

that would be because they are the most left libertarian party

Oh, the irony.

Tory majority in 2015
Leave vote in 2016
Tory landslide (imo) in 2017

Posters here don't want to take the issue seriously and the above has been the result. I have lost interest posting the same explanations again and again. Please carry on with the racists/xenophobe/they are all idiots line of responce as thats working absolutely perfectly for me - see above timeline

I know, and it's also why I'm a paid up member..

And we were certainly more to the left than Millibands Labour in 2015

83% snp
80% labour
76% lib dem
32% tory
31% UKIP

No mention of greens which is a bit odd

Edit - found the "add more parties" button which says green 85% but that they are not standing in my area - a bit daft 'cos they are and I didn't tell them my location!

Posters here don't want to take the issue seriously

What issue?

Posters here don't want to take the issue seriously and the above has been the result. I have lost interest posting the same explanations again and again. Please carry on with the racists/xenophobe/they are all idiots line of responce as thats working absolutely perfectly for me - see above timeline

Stop it Jamba - everyone [i]knows[/i] that if you resort to an endless tirade of abuse, name calling and labelling people as ...ist , then sooner or later they are bound to change their mind and vote in favour of you.

Its worked so well in the past after all.

a bit daft 'cos they are and I didn't tell them my location!

Websites can tell where you are from your IP address. Except that relies on databases that aren't very accurate, so it makes mistakes.

Odd results there, TJ, as I'd put SNP slightly right of Labour

86% lab
83% LD
72% Green
40% Con
35% [s]Racist[/s]* UKIP

* sorry jambs

well thats pretty clear cut, looks like im in for a dissapointing june the 9th and beyond!

Please carry on with the racists/xenophobe/they are all idiots line of responce as thats working absolutely perfectly for me - see above timeline

Odd results there, TJ, as I'd put SNP slightly right of Labour

Everything that isn't a communist party is right of JC's Labour

Don't be ridiculous.

SNP are still a heavily [s]left[/s] authoritarian leaning party imo

Seriously? That's an actual belief and not some flippant statement thrown off the cuff?

Labour are only *just* to the left of us Greens in the real world, and Greens ain't a million miles from being centrist and I'd put SNP slightly to the right of Green

snp are left of centre but authoritarian not libertarian. Labour are to the right of the snp, greens to the left but not much in it.

This was the state of play in 2015
Interesting to note Millibands Labour stance was around about Hitler and the ground normally covered by true, one nation conservatism

[img] [/img]

Who set those centre lines ?

Here you go Mol, but like everything else on the internet...

www.politicalcompass.org/uk2015

Who set those centre lines ?

Slide the left/right centre to between Lab/LD and that would give a fairly accurate reflection of 2015 imo

nope - labour were right of centre in 2015. Now left of centre

No mate, the graph is an indication of how far to the right politics has shifted since 1979
The graph portrayed the traditional values

Gove making up his numbers again 😳

https://twitter.com/LabourEoin/status/865246455417774080

the entire Tory manifesto is just a huge uncosted gamble !

double post- im as befuddled as a tory in a maths class !

If only the interviewer involved had a history of humiliating people who didn't know their brief, then he would have known to prepare properly. 🙂

If only the interviewer involved had a history of humiliating people who didn't know their brief, then he would have known to prepare properly.

You'd think wouldn't you.....
And somehow these fools actually get voted in to run the country

Just for fun..

https://ge2017.gritdigital.co.uk/#2017-opinion-poll

ulysse - Member

Odd results there, TJ, as I'd put SNP slightly right of Labour

Not really much between them. I'd have SNP to the left of labour

86% lab
83% LD
72% Green
40% [s]Racist[/s] Con
35% [s]Also racist[/s]* UKIP

FTFY Kimbers

*Sorry again Jamba 😉

Seriously though Jamba, you express support for Trump, Farage, LePen - it would be easy to assume you're racist. I mean I've never met you, the only evidence I've got are your posts on here on one hand and a few folk who've met you on the other saying you're ok. It's hard to judge.

Ninfan of course doesn't have anyone saying he's ok - but I'm sure he is normal really.

Just for fun..

https://ge2017.gritdigital.co.uk/#2017-opinion-poll

Had potential until it tried to force me to sell my soul to facebook

87% Plaid Cymru
86% Green
82% Lab
76% LD
30% UKIP
27% Con

Seems I value UKIP policies even more than the Tories 😯

[quote=jambalaya ]Posters here don't want to take the issue seriously and the above has been the result. I have lost interest posting the same explanations again and again. Please carry on with the racists/xenophobe/they are all idiots line of responce as thats working absolutely perfectly for me - see above timeline

We've done this one before (of course). Us lot on here calling a spade a spade makes no difference at all to national election results, which are mainly influenced by the lies told by billionaires to the credulous - many of whom are racists or xenophobes and the majority of whom may not be stupid, but voting for something which is going to make your life worse isn't the action of the highly intelligent. You can deny it all you like, or make spurious claims like the above with the implication that us "calling people names" made all the difference, but we all know that the secret to electoral success in modern times is telling different (and often contradictory) carefully focused lies to each particular target group.

FWIW if by "who might vote Conservative" you include people who have in the past, then that's me, I'll happily admit it. I was one of those taken in by the lies.

Just for fun..

https://ge2017.gritdigital.co.uk/#2017-opinion-poll

That's brilliant. 14 Tory seats?!

Can we hold all our elections on Facebook now?

Unfortunately I think that's why I said just for fun

I meant brilliant as in comedy..

77% LibDem
72% Green
69% Labour
47% UKIP
44% Conmen

That's alright then - pretty much bang on though there's a worrying anomaly that UKIP feature above the Conmen. 😳

matt_outandabout - Member
Have you any idea just how much tax we've contributed in our lives?

Have you an idea how much it costs to run NHS, schools, police, defence, transport, social care, housing, garden bridges etc?
Judging by the fact we have torn through all our gas and oil, sold off every utility and resource we could, borrowed way more than we could comfortably afford and *still* need to cut back hard, we spent a shed load more than your taxes.

I regurgitate this for all who would make this a generation 'war against pensioners' and in a way I understand those who have never experienced politicians other than Thatcher,Blair,Brown, Cameron etc would think, but the fact is we generated the money, it was your generation that squandered it. Our generation don't squander money, we don't waste it the way it is these days.

It wasn't us that decided to pay nearly 2500 council officials over £150,000, it wasn't us that decided to privatise the NHS with private finance initiatives that would cost it a fortune for ever after, it wasn't us that decided to introduce student debt to University Graduates rather than have them do the jobs in the summer fruit picking that all these immigrants you moan about do, the point is, you all have so much more that needs paying for and it is your turn to step up to the plate and get taxed at the level we were in the sixties, no, I don't suppose you even remember at what level that was, all our poor pop stars had to leave the country, google the Beatles 'Taxman' recording of the Heath Wilson years, three day weeks, rubbish piled high, shitty cars, shitty industrial relations, it's in your history books now, but we had to live with it all, so lets have less of the soak the boomers, you lot haven't even begun to experience the sort of 'austerity' that we endured.

no. it was you who didn't put enough money away to pay for your pensions....

It wasn't us that decided to ...

Wasn't it?

Older people are far more likely to vote Tory aren't they? If no-one over 50 voted Blair wouldn't have happened and we'd be Labour all the way.

It sure as hell wasn't us.

I'm not trying to make it a war on pensioners or anyone else. I'm just calling bullshit on this blame game.

My shop tends to cater for well off ladies.
The word on da street is that they are not happy at all.
Enola May is upsetting some of her core supporters.
Let's hope the libs can field some attractive young men .

No more porn via Google in the Tory manifesto!

. "We will put a responsibility on industry not to direct users – even unintentionally – to hate speech, pornography, or other sources of harm,"

If they ban hate speech doesn't that mean the Daily Mail will be affected ?

No-one comes out of this well. We're all victims of a political system where [i]the future[/i] is never any more than 4 years away and the constantly selfish are often promoted to positions of power

I fully appreciate Graemecsl's view that his [i]generation[/i] (whatever that means) have already paid their dues but I'm not sure you can point the finger of spendthriftism at any particular generation or party or cohort. From so many angles we've never had it so good but there are caveats:

Stuff - we've never had so much - we're living in a society where we are sold at constantly and this obliviously makes people want to buy more stuff which leads to people making more stuff which just leads to more stuff which leads to more waste which leads to more polution that makes us feel guilty so we buy more stuff.

We're living longer than ever and I expect life expectancy for most of the baby boomers will far outstip that projected by their original pension funds so those in work are constantly topping them up. Aren't pension funds constantly trotted out as the excuse for "growth"? See above about stuff.

The future hasn't quite become the labour saving endless freetime utopia anyone was promised in the 50s/60s/70s has it?

I blame stuff . . . and pensioners. 😉

It wasn't us that decided to pay nearly 2500 council officials over £150,000, it wasn't us that decided to privatise the NHS with private finance initiatives that would cost it a fortune for ever after, it wasn't us that decided to introduce student debt to University Graduates rather than have them do the jobs in the summer fruit picking that all these immigrants you moan about do, the point is, you all have so much more that needs paying for and it is your turn to step up to the plate and get taxed at the level we were in the sixties, no, I don't suppose you even remember at what level that was, all our poor pop stars had to leave the country, google the Beatles 'Taxman' recording of the Heath Wilson years, three day weeks, rubbish piled high, shitty cars, shitty industrial relations, it's in your history books now, but we had to live with it all, so lets have less of the soak the boomers, you lot haven't even begun to experience the sort of 'austerity' that we endured.

You do know that this started with Fatcha who was born in 1925 don't you? Not in the 80's - her policies were then carried on by Major...oh I'm sorry....wasn't he a boomer?

And your anecdotes belay the macroeconomic reality that is the ratio of people working and paying taxes - to those retired is becoming unsustainable. It happened in Japan, it's happening here.

Also, in terms of not paying enough Tax, we've always hovered around the same value in terms of % of GDP.

[img] [/img]

Although income tax was higher in the 60's, especially for high earners - but boomers would never vote for a Tory party who brought back similar tax rates.

Interesting to note Millibands Labour stance was around about Hitler and the ground normally covered by true, one nation conservatism

I call Godwin. Close this thread of hate.

We are still ricocheting from the results of the war, really.

jamba> I have lost interest posting the same explanations again and again

You say that, but here you are. Still. As it says in the country song - "How can I miss you, when you won't go away?".

If I am totally honest I am bored to tears with this. I told @tmh if he stays away I will too, I need to be more disciplined. As you can see I am here much less as its just repeating the same stuff.

I told @tmh if he stays away I will too,

Promises, promises.

Jamba - leave then. It's what you do isn't it? 😉

Jamba is a worthwhile contributor on here. We need balanced opinions and he is always polite. Unlike THM.

Guys - I disagree with Jamba on virtually everything but you are verging on bullying him.

respect for those who show it as he does.

he wants to stay away but not half as much as he wants the thread to be about him 😉
As for polite yes he is but his views are not. THM, who i rarely agreed with him was a great example of how one could be right wing and reject nationalism and oppose racism.
I cannot say the same thing about jamby who views on Islam would leave him apoplectic with rage if I repeated them but about Jews.
Essentially jamby is more Trump in his use of facts than any other poster on here and that is why he gets the attention he does and for no other reason

I bet the trump points out he is always right as well 😉

If I am totally honest I am bored to tears with this

Maybe you should try listening for once.

ps did you ever find a reputable source to back up your French fascist accusations? or did you just decide to brush it under the carpet like every other time you are wrong.

http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/and-we-accuse-our-police-of-corruption/page/2

#jambaheroinhisownlunchtime

TJ - the last comment was me joking about a leaver (a Brexy) threatening to leave. Surely that's not bullying.

My earlier comment was simply pointing out that for all the protestations about people throwing the word racist out there, Jamba himself has made some comments that might be very easy to interpret as racism. I pointed them out at the time(s) and others who know him personally vouched for him not being a a racist. I'll accept that and just ask that he chooses his words wisely. Friendly advice isn't bullying. And if he is in any way feeling intimidated by my words, I trust he isn't, then one PM and I give my word I'll tone it down.

Now that said I do detest what the Brexies have done to a country that I care about in the name of (at best) nationalism. They have created problems that will last for generations and I hope they will go to their graves regretting it - but I doubt they will because I suspect they ain't that sort of people. Hope I'm wrong.

The "Hitler" aside was used to point out that his regime of pure evil is often trotted out as an example of ultra right wing authoratism, it was said to point out their place on the political spectrum. It was not meant to parallel Nazism to New Labour or One Nation Conservatism.

If one wants to draw parallel with how trades unions, unemployed and the disabled are currently treated, however...

igm - it was not aimed at anyone specifically - just at the "ganging up" appearance from multiple people attacking the man not the words.

My point is that as he shows respect by not being intemperate nor attacking people then surely he is worthy of the same respect - unlike THM who used personal attacks all the time

TJ 's reet ya knaaaa

Something is happening- Jamba flouncing! Labour/Corbyn must be doing well!

I disagree, I think THM and Jamba play from the same "debating club" rulebook, winning is more important than being right, and they are very successful at undermining their opposing viewpoints by attacking the man, while claiming to be the victims. I think they also know very well what people care about, so quite deliberately choose to ignore which points are being made against them.

That being said it was quite interesting to see them go head to head in the brexit debate.

as he shows respect by not being intemperate nor attacking people then surely he is worthy of the same respect

Yes he is not rude whilst doing all this but that misses the point.

I also think you should stop bashing THM at this point i would not have tolerated him doing this to you when you were banned and I wont this way round either. STOP its not fair.
defend jamby if you must [ its one the daftest things i have seen you do] but leave THM out of this he is not here to defend himself and we all know what you think of him

Indeed teej, enough of us defended you when you weren't around. You'd do well to keep your counsel on this one as JY advises.

Point taken chaps.

Something is happening- Jamba flouncing! Labour/Corbyn must be doing well!

🙂

As I posted a few weeks ago politics isn't that interesting at the moment. The election is going to be an easy Tory win, its's a case of by how much - 50, 100 or 150 seats ? Nothing is going to happen on Brexit till after the German elections in October.

Au contraire, politics is very interesting at present. Yes the Tories look like getting a landslide, but something else is happening.

The landscape is shifting somehow. This might well be the last Tory government for s long time. In simple terms the will win, they will fail, and they will be consigned to history for sometime.

But if by boring you mean, who's going to win in June. Fair enough.
And that many Brexies are that old they probably don't care about the next election.

Au contraire, politics is very interesting at present. Yes the Tories look like getting a landslide, but something else is happening.

tjagain - Member
igm - it was not aimed at anyone specifically - just at the "ganging up" appearance from multiple people attacking the man not the words.

Look, I'm all for playing the ball and not the man. However, Jamby uses lies and mistruths to deliberately derail and undermine debate. He openly supports public figures who continually espouse racist, or at the very least, xenophobic viewpoints. There eventually becomes a point when the ball and the man become one and the same. I really struggle to see how someone who so openly understands and supports the socially destructive and harmful policies of the Tories / UKIP can be a pleasant person to be around. For me, his apparent lack of empathy for the less fortunate is unconscionable.

As far as I, and it appears many others are concerned, he's shot his bolt when it comes to political threads. The reason it appears that we're ganging up on him is that he's one person exhibiting behaviours that an awful lot of us are frankly more than a little tired of. I accept that without opposing viewpoints then any debate becomes a bit of an echo chamber, but there are ways of putting those viewpoints across, and also ways of accepting criticism when it's due for holding said points of view.

I'm OK with Jamba's comments. He can say what he likes, I don't have to believe it if I don't want to. I'm not sure what the problem is tbh.

Yes. I'd love there to be proper constructive political debate from both sides.

@molgrips - that would be nice, but i found a quote online which summarises political threads on here quite well.

“Supporters of Labour and other left wing parties are convinced they have the moral high ground and that any disagreement is inhumane, as a result any confession of Tory support is shouted down and abused.”

Just because someone shares some beliefs with UKIP or the Tories doesn't make them inherently evil, it probably just means some life experience has shaped their views that way.

I'm OK with Jamba's comments. He can say what he likes, I don't have to believe it if I don't want to. I'm not sure what the problem is tbh.

The problem, as zokes said, is not that jamba has differing opinions or philosophies. It is that he presents fibs and half-truths as facts and then runs away. Whether that matters on an MTB website is debatable, but we can see the results of the same process on politics on a large scale and it is quite worrying.

It is that he presents fibs and half-truths as facts and then runs away

I agree that is kind of disappointing.

And his bizarre opinion that just because he predicted the results of recent elections and votes, this somehow makes him right all the time about everything

“Supporters of Labour and other left wing parties are convinced they have the moral high ground and that any disagreement is inhumane, as a result any confession of Tory support is shouted down and abused.”

It really does sum things up very well, doesn't it!

You only need to look how so many of them get upset about being disparagingly referred to as 'lefties' to see the hypocrisy in action.

Just because someone shares some beliefs with UKIP or the Tories doesn't make them inherently evil,

I'd give them the benefit of the doubt and just leave it as ignorance.

[img] [/img]
They are picking on me again

It really does sum things up very well, doesn't it!

It certainly sums something up. What that something is - that's another matter.

It really does sum things up very well, doesn't it!

You're right, it does some it up well: It sums up the arrogance and prejudice of Tories and UKIPers very well indeed. I suppose you had to be right about something at some point.

Just because someone shares some beliefs with UKIP or the Tories doesn't make them inherently evil,

Not evil, just prejudiced and lacking in any empathy. I suppose as more empathetic people we should feel for them due to their genetic issues or bad life experiences.