[Politics] The General Election Thread

[BensGrandad]

Blair and Brown were the best leaders this country has had in a long time. And for a long time to come I fear.

You really are deluded.

 

[The Clamp]

You really are deluded.

Your life improved under their leadership.

 

[WATFORD zero]

Plus lost work time , oh hold on most of them don't have job ?
Regards
DF

 

[Kinky Gerbil]

I disagree

If they lose, surely he'll be gone by next weekend.

You can't fight two elections against an incapable May, and Boris Johnson, lose, and expect to stay on.

If Labour has a decent leader/shadow cabinet they would be 10-15 points ahead a weeks from this election.

He won’t resign and it’s unlikely they will vote him out.

 

[Chicken Run]

Blair and Brown were the best leaders this country has had in a long time. And for a long time to come I fear.

Any notion anyone had that you had a credible understanding of politics has just evaporated, even your honourable left of centre chums who reluctantly support you when your under pressure are cringing at this statement [emoji23][emoji23][emoji23]

 

[Bold Seagull]

Fair play, but surely if you really care you will adjust your lifestyle to help the planet, you can do it without the protesting and costing our police force.

It's easier to change yourself than beat your head against the wall.

How's your protest against the club going?

 

[Hamilton]

It’s all very fair what he says until you realise that he is a staunch socialist and self confessed anarchist.

And Jewish.

 

[Chicken Run]

And Jewish.

His parents were, is he practicing?

 

[Mellor 3 Ward 4]

He won’t resign and it’s unlikely they will vote him out.

We're perhaps being premature here - after all it's all to play for at the moment - but IF he loses, then how could he stay on?

He is toxic to too many voters and has too much baggage.

With Johnson in charge, it's time for labour to reclaim the middle ground.

 

[BensGrandad]

Your life improved under their leadership.

I can assure you that it didnt and didnt under Wilson or Callaghan either like most I suffered, as always, under a Labour PM for the debt the country was left in and I dread to think what that would be under Corbyn and his cronies.

 

[melias shoes]

I can assure you that it didnt and didnt under Wilson or Callaghan either like most I suffered, as always, under a Labour PM for the debt the country was left in and I dread to think what that would be under Corbyn and his cronies.

Well said sir.

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

I agree. He is a poor leader. And it is a shame, because it masks many good policy ideas in the Labour manifesto. However, he is no leader. As a result, he's failed to grasp and deal with the anti-semitism issue and the Brexit issue. Consensus politics does not work when you are the leader.

As for New Labour, I refuse to slag it off. It produce many fantastic leaps forward. Blair's big mistake was the Iraq war. Putting that aside - which is hard - the investment in schools and health; the introduction of the minimum wage and an introduction to a tax credit system aimed at getting people into work was excellent.

I think that the trouble with the left is that they like to attack the centre left making it so much easier for those on the right to do the same. You'll never hear a Tory slag off their previous leaders as much as you'll hear Labour bang on about how bad Blair was, when on domestic policy he wasn't bad.

I don't even blaim Mr Tony for Iraq. The reasons for going in were defensible (refusal of Saddam to comply with weapons inspections for 10 years - and everyone supported this apart from Corbyn). Sky news, Murdoch, The Sun, the Times not to mention the Mail would have killed Blair if he hadn't backed Bush over Saddam. The problem was the aftertime lying about WMD. Needless, reputation-shredding lying.

Still, by comparison, Boris makes Blair look like a cross between Mother Theresa and Abraham Lincoln.

Your comment about 'the trouble with the left' is so true. One reason I have Ernest on ignore is because he called me a red tory (or somesuch). I still think he just pretends to be a lefty, though, which is even more distasteful, but anyway....

It looks like Boris will win a majority so, on the plus side, this may hasten the demise of momentum (remember, to get on a leadership ballot the labour MP must first have the signatures of 50 MPs and I can't see even the wallies on the back benches putting a token lefty like McConnell or Abbott on the ballot). We shall see.

I'm still voting tactically for whomsoever will minimise Boris' candidate winning, which means that here it is team Corbyn. How ironic.

 

[Hamilton]

Any notion anyone had that you had a credible understanding of politics has just evaporated, even your honourable left of centre chums who reluctantly support you when your under pressure are cringing at this statement [emoji23][emoji23][emoji23]

I'm not cringing at it, but in equal measure I'm never going to say that leaders were/are brilliant. By their very nature they make faults, it's just some make many more faults and have ideologies that are repugnant.

John Major was not a bad PM, even though I disagreed with what he was trying to do. Callaghan was wet. Thatcher was hideous. Cameron was misguided. May was stubborn etc.

Try not to display the worst that our politics is bringing out in us - lurching from pole to pole.

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

I can assure you that it didnt and didnt under Wilson or Callaghan either like most I suffered, as always, under a Labour PM for the debt the country was left in and I dread to think what that would be under Corbyn and his cronies.

Isn't that funny. My experience was the exact opposite. Always squeezed under the tories, and in an unpleasant society. Blair was transformative to me, personally, and to the country. I dread to think what the country will be like under Boris and his cronies.

 

[Hamilton]

I can assure you that it didnt and didnt under Wilson or Callaghan either like most I suffered, as always, under a Labour PM for the debt the country was left in and I dread to think what that would be under Corbyn and his cronies.

UK debt in 2010 after the financial crash was still lower than the other G8 countries. Debt is a myth.

Did lives improve for all under Tory PMs (note, for all)?

If your life did not improve under the Blair years, then I suggest you were doing something wrong as for most, it got a lot better - not perfect, but better.

 

[BensGrandad]

Isn't that funny. My experience was the exact opposite. Always squeezed under the tories, and in an unpleasant society. Blair was transformative to me, personally, and to the country. I dread to think what the country will be like under Boris and his cronies.

They were always left to try to balance the books.

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

They were always left to try to balance the books.

So when the nation's finances are squeezed under labour it is labour's fault, but when they are squeezed under the tories it is labour's fault?

Let me make myself horizontal and ponder this for a while.....

 

[Insel affe]

Your life improved under their leadership.

Not sure the people of Iraq would agree with you, or the veterans who were lucky enough to come back unscathed and not disfigured or suffering from mental health issues that now burden the NHS and homeless numbers.

New Labour rode on the back of Tory policy and success, people are now only just working that out.

Blair was a fraud, he was as far removed from what labour means to the working man than can be possible.

 

[Kinky Gerbil]

We're perhaps being premature here - after all it's all to play for at the moment - but IF he loses, then how could he stay on?

He is toxic to too many voters and has too much baggage.

With Johnson in charge, it's time for labour to reclaim the middle ground.

Of course.... if if.

He’s also arrogant - could you see him standing down?

Labour has become a cult so they won’t vote him out and if they do it will be a clone of him

 

[Bold Seagull]

I can assure you that it didnt and didnt under Wilson or Callaghan either like most I suffered, as always, under a Labour PM for the debt the country was left in and I dread to think what that would be under Corbyn and his cronies.

You really should read a bit more about those times really. The oil crisis, where Heath had linked wage increases to the cost of living right on the eve of the crisis starting basically created the infaltionary spiral. Heath can't be criticised for best intentions, but it was one of the worst economic policy moves of the post 1945 era. Callaghan came in, dithered, and we unavoidably entered the IMF crisis. You simply cannot attribute blame solely to Labour for the 70's without Heath's 4 years in context. Wilson's devaluing of Stirling in '67 started as a policy idea but ended in necessity.

It would then be ridiculous not to account for Thatcher's first term where rather than promising to reduce inflation, it rose from 10% to 20% in a year, and by 1986 3 million were unemployed. The Thatcher era (yes that framed picture of the women on your wall) is defined by uncontrolled inflation for over a decade ending with Black Wednesday, with the Bank of England pretty much spending all its currency reserves propping up the pound - which didn't work anyway. Thousands lost their homes with crippling interest rates.

A period of relative stability then ensued from John Major's moderate policies through to relative stability '97 to '08. The end of this period was marked by a GLOBAL BANKING CRISIS. Not domestic policy. Nicholas MacPherson, Treasury permanent secretary to both the Tories and Labour said "A banking crisis pure and simple. Blaming Labour is for those who celebrate ignorance of what really happened.