Forumite Members › General Topics › Other Stuff › Poor Judgement, Wobbly Leadership
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D-Dan.
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June 9, 2017 at 7:20 am #8808
Looks like ‘The Submarine – Theresa May’ has been depth-charged, and is limping back to harbour. She has been justifiably punished for her attempt at political opportunism.
The country has swept back into uncertainty with a DUP/Conservative coalition just hanging on to power. In a way everyone won except UKIP and the Scottish Witch.
The big change is that more young people exercised their vote, just not quite enough of them. Maybe the next election (in six months time?) will see them come out in greater force.
June 9, 2017 at 7:32 am #8809Predictable comments all round. Tories defending TM for this morning at least.
John Redmond is still in fantasy land. There is still a mandate for his Brexit because lots of people voted Con or Lab and not Lib Dem.
But again vote share vs seats shows that first past the post is broken.
June 9, 2017 at 7:46 am #8810But again vote share vs seats shows that first past the post is broken.
I wonder how many people vote tactically for precisely that reason – I know I’m one of them and I’m not a fan of voting for a party that I don’t really like (even though in this instance, their policies I thought were reasonable).
"Everything looks interesting until you do it. Then you find it’s just another job" - Terry Pratchett
June 9, 2017 at 8:30 am #8811The biggest shock of all for me is the Kensington and Chelsea result – well situation really as the result is up in the air at the moment.
I worked in Kensington for the best part of twenty years, and actually knew ( as customers ) quite a few people in the local political circle. It was blue to the core, it bled blue.
For the count to be deferred because it was too close to call is unbelievable and to send the counters home because they’re too tired, is unprecedented – at least in recent electoral process.
June 9, 2017 at 9:21 am #8814My son has done the counting in quite a few elections now and from what he tells me I can well believe they are knackered. Tired people make mistakes.
There have been some really close ones, Amber Reed only just held on. Even in my safe seat the majority was cut from 10,000 to 4,000. Bristol (I live outside) is now all labour. Bristol West was the Greens best hope but they got a kicking, as did the Lib Dems, and all of that and more went red.
June 9, 2017 at 9:53 am #8817As a long time Tory voter I was dismayed at the very least to see the campaign led by TM, she did not face the public apart from selected Tory gatherings, unfortunately her demeanour throughout was that of a ‘middle aged school ma’am who knew better than everybody else’, with an apparent 20 point lead in the pole on a Labour Leader who appeared to be totally unelectable – she blew it. Her policies appeared to be the ones for the rich, looking after what is traditionally the Tory vote, to me she typified what I dislike about many Tories – we look after our own first! Corbyn promised the earth, he will tax the rich to give to the poor – a modern Robin Hood. He might now have to deliver on those promises. He will apparently squeeze industry on corporation tax to raise £26B, re-nationalise rail, water and God knows what else – however in times of austerity, especially if you are at the sharp end of that austerity, he sounded good. Personally I would like to see a gov that will make all the companies we currently have in the UK pay their due corp tax. Based on personal experience, I was with a very small company, out turnover was £35K and we paid £3,500 corp tax on that sum, the same year Costa paid sod all!!!! Should we have imported our paper clips via Belgium and Luxembourg!
This time, for the first time ever, I voted tactically on Anglesey – I voted Labour – I can’t stand Corbyn though I do suspect he may be the most sincere MP in Westminster – I did this to keep Plaid Cymru, Ieuan Wyn Jones out – he was a spent force (force – more force in a wet jelly!) either as our MP, AM or Deputy First Minister – Soooooooo glad to see he came third after the Conservatives on the Island – if the results are close I might regret my tactical vote – we’ll see!!
Just a few political jokes to lighten the morning!
What’s the difference between a politician and a flying pig?
The letter F
I don’t approve of political jokes…
I’ve seen too many of them get elected.
A little girl asked her dad, “do all fairy tales begin with “Once upon a time?”
Her dad replied, ‘No, some begin with – If I am elected’
It’s so cold and windy outside I’ve just seen a politician with his hands in his own pockets.
The more you meet people the more you understand why Noah took animals instead of humans
June 9, 2017 at 9:54 am #8820We can only wait for the political commentators to pull this apart but from my perspective this was a badly run Conservative election trying to bring its own house in order and take opportunistic advantage of what appeared to be a divided and leaderless opposition.
I think there were a number of elements to the failure of May’s poor judgement.
a) It was portrayed by the Conservatives as being an election about needing her boring ‘strong and stable’ leadership to carry us through Brexit. There was however an undertone that this meant a hard Brexit in the very likely event she would not get what she wanted from the other 27 countries. This probably lost her core Conservative votes from those who feared a hard Brexit. I don’t find Chelsea a surprise as a result. Then her ‘strong and stable’ pose soon melted under a badly misjudged Altzheimer Tax which caused her to so publicly and quickly U-Turn and get the disastrous ‘weak & Wobbly’ epithet levelled against her. It looks like the nearly 50% of the population who did not want Brexit have ‘won’ by pretty much won by now taking a hard Brexit off the table.
b) The public were not so easily gulled into thinking this was all about Brexit. They listened to her all too vague promises about social issues with no firm commitment other than to throw things into Committee who would be ‘listened to’ (huh!) etc, Instead the public decided to judge her on her record in Government. Unfortunately the Terrorist murders brought her judgement and record into sharp relief and was found wanting.
c) The young are tired of ten years of austerity that has fallen mainly on their shoulders. This brought out a significant young vote who generally voted Labour.
In my view we are back pretty much where we started except that the Conservative government is weakened and Labour strengthened – a total lose-lose for May. The only positive element being any Brexit negotiations have had the nuclear option disarmed.
June 9, 2017 at 10:07 am #8822+1
And Alex Salmond has been booted out, but I doubt he’ll shut up.
June 9, 2017 at 10:15 am #8823On the money Ed I think – I’d throw in arrogance as well as misjudgement – thought she just had to turn up and would walk away with a massive majority. In fact she didn’t even turn up all the time. Just an opinion but if she had been more likeable she might have got away with it, but she has the old school tory stuck-up air…..contempt for the little people.
Total humiliation for her.
June 9, 2017 at 11:29 am #8825Interesting for brexit indeed. Sad for the country.
June 9, 2017 at 11:48 am #8828Interesting for brexit indeed. Sad for the country.
I guess we will see. There are pluses and minuses to a ‘weak’ Government.
On the plus side it pretty much eliminates any and all extremist views whether left or right.
On the minus side it does become very much a ‘management by committee’ which tends to kick any hard decisions into the long grass for ‘future resolution’. Any bets on High Speed Rail, or the Third London Airport suddenly finding issues that need more study and review?
However that cannot apply to Brexit the two year clock has already lost an eighth of its time due to May’s misjudgement.
[edit] I see there was one election result which shows that there is some justice in fate:
Minister for the Cabinet Office Ben Gummer, architect of the Conservative Party’s manifesto and the man responsible for “digital transformation”, has lost his seat in the general election
June 9, 2017 at 4:07 pm #8836I think the prize for the best summation of the Election goes to the Beeb:
“Almost everybody lost
This is a result that brought disappointment to all parties.The Conservatives lost their majority.
Labour suffered its third defeat in a row.
The Liberal Democrats found themselves treading water.
The SNP’s independence bandwagon came to a juddering halt.
And UKIP imploded.
It is not only Conservatives who will be asking why Mrs May changed her mind about holding a snap election.
The only winners are perhaps the DUP – to whom she seems to have awarded the role of kingmakers.”
June 9, 2017 at 4:24 pm #8838I’d never even heard of the DUP before today. But given their name one would assume a deal with the tories would be a no no? But I have zero idea of what they stand for. If anything.
I have little intrest in finding out tbh.
June 9, 2017 at 4:43 pm #8839The U is the important bit – Unionist, i.e. they want to preserve the status quo of Ulster being part of the UK. They have had a historical alliance with the Tory party. Other than that – lots of Ulster infrastructure investment and an open border with the EU will be high on their agenda. Pork Barrel time!
June 9, 2017 at 5:05 pm #8840This is going to put the kibosh on power sharing in NI. How can the Govt maintain the role of independent adjudicator when they are in bed with one side? Not exactly in the national interest is it?
June 9, 2017 at 5:08 pm #8841This Beeb link more or less says the same thing about the DUP, but points out the enormous difficulty of doing a viable Brexit deal.
Life gets interesting. Life could be even more interesting in 21 months time if no deal looks capable of being struck with the EU, as a hard Brexit then becomes automatic.
At that point I can see panicked steps towards yet another referendum (with hard facts and less lies). If we get near to that point a sneaky EU could offer face savers such as permanent imposition of some of the restrictions to free movement that all EU countries are already allowed to impose but only on a temporary basis. I think we can abrogate the Human Misrights bit as I do not think that is intrinsic to EU law. All the EU need to do is give our slimy politicians ways of wriggling out of responsibility and still claim success..
June 9, 2017 at 6:55 pm #8844The bit I chuckled at was when TM was outside No 10 after seeing the Queen, they became “…the Conservative and Unionist Party…………….” a title they haven’t used since it was dropped in 1965!!
June 9, 2017 at 7:17 pm #8847One thing we’ve learned in the last few years is that anything can happen as the establishment keeps misreading reality. Even now TM really doesn’t seem to have got it. Perhaps she just cannot change. Even the SNP and Scottish Conservatives whilst upbeat with their outcomes have acknowledged they have been sent a message from the public.
One thing I’m really pleased about is the nations “youth” have become engaged. My kids are 18 – 25 and believe me that age bracket is totally engaged now. It’s all they’re talking about and in their own way via memes and video clips. They seem very switched on to spotting fake news too. I think we can put it all down to the referendum and Trump opening their eyes to what happens when you leave it to the old gits. TM’s strategy of personal attacks on the opposition totally back fired, they have a natural sense of justice that time hasn’t beaten out of them yet. Her inability to engage vs Corbyn’s obvious relish in engaging went down well.
I can’t see this hook up with the DUP lasting long and the Tories will continue infighting. TM will be gone by the Autumn at the latest. How ironic that one outcome of this mess is that Labour won’t be ripping themselves apart any more.
interesting times.
June 9, 2017 at 7:28 pm #8848A face for the political future is Ruth Davidson. She came out well from the EU referendum, has called Sturgeon out on several occasions, over several topics, deserves credit for the showing of the Scottish Conservatives this time around and generally is the sensible voice in any debate she joins, and unlike TM, she relishes the debates. I think that’s someone we’ll be seeing a great deal of on the Political landscape to come.
June 9, 2017 at 11:21 pm #8857This is a shock to a lad who grew up 4 miles from Mansfield:
Father of The House and Nottingham MP Ken Clarke has it summed up – He said it has been the “most remarkable” general election and confident predictions in politics “can no longer be made“. He just scraped through himself and has no love whatsoever for TM.
The other side of the coin, is that before 1997 and B.Liar, my old constituency of Newark & Sherwood had returned a Tory for years. He was a wealthy Newark farmer and never visited the West of his manor: after all, we were all coalfield plebs. He was annihilated by Paddy Tipping, who served two terms then, due to his hard working service, had a heart attack. Recovered and is now Nottinghamshire Police Commissioner.
It’s an uncertain political world now. What price another election next year, after expectations encouraging new political allies, are not met?
When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
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