1
General Chatter - The Boozer / Re: Workshop Booze Up VII - New Year, Same Plague, Same Booze Up, Deja Vu
« on: Today at 01:13:23 PM »
The Glorious Twenty-Fifth Of May cometh round again, for those who remember.
Show Posts
This section allows you to view all posts made by this member. Note that you can only see posts made in areas you currently have access to.
The Glorious Twenty-Fifth Of May cometh round again, for those who remember.
2
Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: UK Politics 2024
« on: Today at 12:09:10 PM »
Yeah. If I wanted to be fair to Labour (I usually don't, but if I did), I'd say there also feels like a competence difference. I do genuinely think that on basic keeping the wheels turning stuff Starmer is likely to be functional in a way that Sunak has failed to be and Sunak's predecessors very definitely haven't been since at least 2016. Tons of Tory MPs seem to be stepping down to leave the sinking ship, so I think it's fair to say they do know they've lost already.
The assumptions that different models are making do make a huge amount of difference to the outcome. Not in terms of who will win, but in terms of whether Labour will fall just shy of 400 seats or break the 500 (!) mark. Blair's big majority in 1997 was 418, the Conservatives in 1931 got 470 but that's rather unique circumstances. A lot depends on tactical voting: you'd expect very high tactical voting in this election, given that a) kicking the Conservatives out is a priority for a lot of people and b) to be frank if you're willing to vote for one boring man in a suit you're probably willing to vote for another, the gap between the opposition parties is much lower than in 2019. I think some models which look better for the Conservatives, like the UK Polling Report model, underestimate tactical voting in that their seat-by-seat results show too many seats with Labour a hair's breadth from winning and a 16 or 20 percent Lib Dem vote which would be pretty odd IMV. OTOH a friend pointed out to me that some models that are exceptionally bad for the Conservatives will assume too efficient a vote distribution for the Lib Dems, on the grounds that there's fewer places to tactically vote Lib Dem and, if you're assuming people vote tactically and balance out the topline numbers, that means you give the Lib Dems a huge amount of squeeze efficiency to make the numbers balance.
I think at the moment if the polls don't change we're looking at a solid 450-470 Labour MPs, 100-120 Tories, maybe 25 each SNP and Lib Dem, and then the NI/PC/Grn/Miscellany. That said, the polls might well change, The Conservative election campaign has had an awkward start in particular and if Sunak falls further then the Tory numbers might drop off even more of a cliff which would lead to an even more eyewatering result.
The assumptions that different models are making do make a huge amount of difference to the outcome. Not in terms of who will win, but in terms of whether Labour will fall just shy of 400 seats or break the 500 (!) mark. Blair's big majority in 1997 was 418, the Conservatives in 1931 got 470 but that's rather unique circumstances. A lot depends on tactical voting: you'd expect very high tactical voting in this election, given that a) kicking the Conservatives out is a priority for a lot of people and b) to be frank if you're willing to vote for one boring man in a suit you're probably willing to vote for another, the gap between the opposition parties is much lower than in 2019. I think some models which look better for the Conservatives, like the UK Polling Report model, underestimate tactical voting in that their seat-by-seat results show too many seats with Labour a hair's breadth from winning and a 16 or 20 percent Lib Dem vote which would be pretty odd IMV. OTOH a friend pointed out to me that some models that are exceptionally bad for the Conservatives will assume too efficient a vote distribution for the Lib Dems, on the grounds that there's fewer places to tactically vote Lib Dem and, if you're assuming people vote tactically and balance out the topline numbers, that means you give the Lib Dems a huge amount of squeeze efficiency to make the numbers balance.
I think at the moment if the polls don't change we're looking at a solid 450-470 Labour MPs, 100-120 Tories, maybe 25 each SNP and Lib Dem, and then the NI/PC/Grn/Miscellany. That said, the polls might well change, The Conservative election campaign has had an awkward start in particular and if Sunak falls further then the Tory numbers might drop off even more of a cliff which would lead to an even more eyewatering result.
3
History, Science, and Interesting Information - The Great Library / Re: Space yays
« on: Today at 11:51:52 AM »
You'd have thought that Blue Origin would have been developing some more expertise in this given their lean into the space tourism side, but maybe their much shorter tourist flights are just far too different to what's needed for keeping people alive over the time it takes to do a moon mission etc.
4
History, Science, and Interesting Information - The Great Library / Re: Nature yays
« on: Today at 11:33:07 AM »
The extinct-in-the-wild Rosy Saxifrage has been reintroduced to the wild in Wales. It's been placed in a secret location to avoid collectors getting it. Thought it was a nice story, anyway, hopefully it'll establish properly
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cjkkm4re518o
11
Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: UK Politics 2024
« on: May 23, 2024, 12:34:08 PM »
I was surprised too - I was certainly expecting later in the year. I wonder if this is a doctrine on Sunak's part of of "good politicians make surprise moves that outwit their enemies. This is a surprise move, therefore it will outwit my enemies, because I am a good politician." Or possibly he's got a job offer in California and they want him to start in August.
Honestly it feels like the most vapid campaign start I can remember from all sides. I'm by any reasonable standards an enormous politics nerd and I really don't know what the opposition is offering except "change" or what the incumbents are claiming they've achieved. I don't even know what my own party is promising that's meaningful and distinct. The whole thing feels like a weird vacuum where everyone is going "eh, it's the other lot's turn now I guess".
Is that just a me thing watching from abroad and people back in the UK are more fired up for this/have I just become disconnected from what's going on at home? Genuinely interested for thoughts from those back on the ground.
Honestly it feels like the most vapid campaign start I can remember from all sides. I'm by any reasonable standards an enormous politics nerd and I really don't know what the opposition is offering except "change" or what the incumbents are claiming they've achieved. I don't even know what my own party is promising that's meaningful and distinct. The whole thing feels like a weird vacuum where everyone is going "eh, it's the other lot's turn now I guess".
Is that just a me thing watching from abroad and people back in the UK are more fired up for this/have I just become disconnected from what's going on at home? Genuinely interested for thoughts from those back on the ground.
13
Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: World Politics and Elections 2024
« on: May 22, 2024, 09:47:36 PM »
Some European news, as we approach the EU elections (early June):
The Dutch still don't know who's going to be Prime Minister because the obvious candidate has come down in a scandal, also the right-liberal VVD look like being kicked out of the European liberal party for working with the deeply anti-European PVV.
Also, even more darkly amusingly, the Identity and Democracy group in the European parliament, which is to say the most fascist of the formal groups, is blowing itself up on the cusp of the elections because the German fascists are increasingly too obviously Nazi for the French fascists. Being too Nazi for Marine le Pen is not something anyone should ever want to achieve, but turns out it's happened, and it does look like le Pen has actually ruled out sharing a group with the AfD after the election, which in turn will force the other ID parties like Lega, the PVV, the Austrian FPO, etc, to decide which part of the split they go down. Possibly the result is that le Pen goes to the ECR, since she's moved to a much more publicly anti-Russian stance to deflect her own past dealings with them whereas most of the rest of ID is more anti-Ukrainian.
We're also just a week away from South Africa's election: the ANC might just scrape a majority still, they've recovered a tiny bit of ground in the last few polls. The DA look a bit stuck, probably doesn't help that they've got a white leader which may blunt their reaching out to most of the rest of the country. The new MKP have clearly taken a chunk off the ANC based on Jacob Zuma's personal vote, but the radical EFF don't look like they've made much progress either: the ANC aren't being crushed, just losing bits off all sides to different political parties.
The Dutch still don't know who's going to be Prime Minister because the obvious candidate has come down in a scandal, also the right-liberal VVD look like being kicked out of the European liberal party for working with the deeply anti-European PVV.
Also, even more darkly amusingly, the Identity and Democracy group in the European parliament, which is to say the most fascist of the formal groups, is blowing itself up on the cusp of the elections because the German fascists are increasingly too obviously Nazi for the French fascists. Being too Nazi for Marine le Pen is not something anyone should ever want to achieve, but turns out it's happened, and it does look like le Pen has actually ruled out sharing a group with the AfD after the election, which in turn will force the other ID parties like Lega, the PVV, the Austrian FPO, etc, to decide which part of the split they go down. Possibly the result is that le Pen goes to the ECR, since she's moved to a much more publicly anti-Russian stance to deflect her own past dealings with them whereas most of the rest of ID is more anti-Ukrainian.
We're also just a week away from South Africa's election: the ANC might just scrape a majority still, they've recovered a tiny bit of ground in the last few polls. The DA look a bit stuck, probably doesn't help that they've got a white leader which may blunt their reaching out to most of the rest of the country. The new MKP have clearly taken a chunk off the ANC based on Jacob Zuma's personal vote, but the radical EFF don't look like they've made much progress either: the ANC aren't being crushed, just losing bits off all sides to different political parties.