The Politics Thread

[BWFC_Insane]

Thing is TD what you're asking for is honesty. Which is actually quite hard to define.

Say you start a new job and announce you're going to do X, Y and Z within a year. You might really mean that but over the course of the year X becomes unimportant, Y is no longer possible and Z changes into something entirely different.

Are you being dishonest?

No BWFCI, that's forecasting. Honesty is simply telling the truth as it stands. Anything else is just fortune telling.

Indeed. But nobody would get elected by saying "I'm going to do my best to make things better and I'll work hard, honest, and I won't be like all them other ones".

Clegg tried that this time. Didn't do him much good in terms of winning seats.

[thebish]

This AV debate might be interesting...

Cameron is in the NO camp. The NO camp thinks that its most powerful argument is that AV will bring perpetual coalition (which they see as a bad thing) and - more pointedly - perpetual Clegg.

they are currently debating how hard to go on the "perpetual Clegg - how awful would that be?" argument... if they go big on it - then Dave might look slightly awkward!! Also - how clever does Dave look if the NO campaign's chief argument is that COALITION leads to weak and poor government - when all the time he tells us it leads to grown-up sensible government?

I think there will be many subtle nuances and much awkwardness to come...

[superjohnmcginlay]

an amusing little piece from Simon Hoggart...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011 ... ig-society

We were gathered in Somerset House, London, to hear from David Cameron what the "big society" really means. It was very exciting, as if we had been invited to learn the true mystery of the Da Vinci Code, or the ingredients in the Colonel's secret KFC sauce.

In the end, it was a little vaguer. I felt as if we'd been invited to the end of an Agatha Christie novel, and Hercule Poirot had gathered us together to tell us he hadn't the faintest idea who the murderer was, but was jolly keen to find out.

Dave was passionate about the big society. He kept telling us how passionate he was. It was a very Valentine's Day mood. "Roses are red / Violets are blue / I'm passionate about the big society / But most people haven't a clue," as he didn't actually say.

There are certainly some fine phrases. "We need social recovery to mend the broken society, and that to me is what the big society is all about!"

There were hints about what we might do to help bring it about. Maybe we can band together to start a school, or save our local public house from closing. Or we could set up a "co-op inside the health service". You or I could volunteer as brain surgeons – I assume that's what he meant. Or you might be like him and run a creche "very badly" at Sunday School. Fair enough: the Good Samaritan was one of the earliest members of the big society. And the parable of the talents was entirely about the first banker's bonus.

Businesses could be brought in. Marks & Spencer were doing a marvellous job training people who might not otherwise have jobs. Possibly they call it the Size 18 Society, or in menswear the XXL Society.

There's a great "Let's roll up our sleeves and get to it" air to everything the prime minister says. He was surrounded by people who were mostly big society adherents – heads of voluntary organisations, charities and so forth. Some were enthusiastic; some less so. One man said the problem was medium-term – the cuts meant there was "a sense of devastation and loss".

"Let's deal with that devastation!" Cameron cried. We instinctively shrank back, afraid that a prime ministerial finger might point our way: "You! Get out there and kill that devastation!"

Nothing would damp him down. We have the most enthusiastic prime minister ever. He makes Tigger look like Rip Van Winkle. "This is my absolute passion! It is about a different way of governing, and it is going to get every bit of my passion!"

He wants us to set up "people's supermarkets" where you can volunteer to stack shelves and get cheap groceries. Perhaps the Chancellor of the Exchequer could set up a People's Osborne & Little where you can buy wallpaper for less than £100 a roll!

One TV journalist ventured that many of his party didn't know what he was talking about. "The reason I talk about it is because I am passionate about it!" he said, before dashing passionately away. The rest of us left, vaguely wondering what he meant, sensing the odd glimpse through the fog of all that passion.

Where's the amusing bit?

[Lord Kangana]

You read it all.

[thebish]

Where's the amusing bit?

I quite liked the "ingredients in the Colonel's secret KFC sauce quip", for one thing...

[Bruce Rioja]

economics probably isn't your forte.

If it was I'd keep stum about it in much the same way I would if I had a Stephen Milligan-esque wanking habit. The embarrassment would just be too much.

[Lord Kangana]

I had to google that.

Now I remember.

[thebish]

I had to google that.

Now I remember.

shhh.... Bruce is keeping stum about it...

[a1]

sounds like it was written by someone who had only ever seen a labour goverment til recently.

and had forgotten the first half of that.

[thebish]

sounds like it was written by someone who only ever seen a labour goverment til recently.

and had forgotten the first half of that.

[Bruce Rioja]

I had to google that.

Now I remember.

shhh.... Bruce is keeping stum about it...

[Worthy4England]

economics probably isn't your forte.

If it was I'd keep stum about it in much the same way I would if I had a Stephen Milligan-esque wanking habit. The embarrassment would just be too much.

Well you have been "missing" a few days - maybe you were a little tied up?

[Bruce Rioja]

economics probably isn't your forte.

If it was I'd keep stum about it in much the same way I would if I had a Stephen Milligan-esque wanking habit. The embarrassment would just be too much.

Well you have been "missing" a few days - maybe you were a little tied up?

But I've been busy musing over a Kolmogorov extension to an autocorrelation.

[Worthy4England]

economics probably isn't your forte.

If it was I'd keep stum about it in much the same way I would if I had a Stephen Milligan-esque wanking habit. The embarrassment would just be too much.

Well you have been "missing" a few days - maybe you were a little tied up?

But I've been busy musing over a Kolmogorov extension to an autocorrelation.

Kondratiev waves and says hello.

[thebish]

But I've been busy musing over a Kolmogorov extension to an autocorrelation.

is that what they're calling it nowadays? Things have obviously moved on since the extend-your-wang-omatic...

[Wandering Willy]

But I've been busy musing over a Kolmogorov extension to an autocorrelation.

is that what they're calling it nowadays? Things have obviously moved on since the extend-your-wang-omatic...

Did you get it to work?

[thebish]

But I've been busy musing over a Kolmogorov extension to an autocorrelation.

is that what they're calling it nowadays? Things have obviously moved on since the extend-your-wang-omatic...

Did you get it to work?

I.... errr... (cough)... bought it for... errrr... a friend...

[Wandering Willy]

You don't want it back do you?

[Gooner Girl]

But I've been busy musing over a Kolmogorov extension to an autocorrelation.

is that what they're calling it nowadays? Things have obviously moved on since the extend-your-wang-omatic...

Did you get it to work?

I.... errr... (cough)... bought it for... errrr... a friend...

[a1]

sounds like it was written by someone who only ever seen a labour goverment til recently.

and had forgotten the first half of that.

i'm saying mr blair used to come out with that kinda talk early in their term. touchy feely hippie nothing that the writers ripping on. tony blair used to do it. now mr camerons doing it and being mocked by a libdem supporting newspaper. thats ironic. no wonder its losing 1million pounds a week. surprised they didnt get five ipod mentions in too.