Is Gordon now staring defeat in the face?
January 13th, 2008
Two more polls show increases in the Labour deficit
A week ago Gord returned from his holiday and went on the publicity offensive with a series of set-piece interviews and high profile announcements. For days there was hardly a TV bulletin without him featuring. This wasn’t a re-launch, we were assured, but it had all the makings of one. Brown was trying to get the initiative back and to build on the improvements in Labour polling fortunes that we had seen in the run-up to Christmas and beyond.
That all seems to have fallen flat on its face with two more bad polls for the government. For following yesterday’s Ipsos-MORI survey in the Sun showing a double digit Labour deficit we now have surveys from ICM and YouGov in the Sunday Telegraph and Sunday Times which report the same trend. Gord’s big week has led to big Labour setbacks.
These are the numbers that won’t make welcome reading in Downing Street:-
A factor that we have to consider is that the recent Labour recovery might have been a mirage - caused by the well-known problems of polling during periods when a lot of people are away from home. For some reason these tend to produce poorer Tory shares than surveys during normal times.
There’s also been the Peter Hain donation affair which cannot have been helpful and provided a reminder of one of the big problems Labour experienced last year.
But could Gordon’s massive media exposure during the week have contributed? Could it be that the controversial “named leader” question polls that we saw from January 2006 - May 2007 were right and that Gordon is a vote-loser? These, it will be recalled, almost always showed that Labour did worse when Brown and Cameron’s names were mentioned.
For me the polling has prompted a total turnaround in my spreadbetting on the number of seats the parties will get at the general election. I had been a £50 a seat Labour buyer at 273 seats. I’m now a £100 a seat Conservative buyer at an average of 300 seats - so if the general election produces the 345 Tory seats that the Anthony Wells seat predictor suggests that the YouGov shares would lead to then I make 45 times my stake level = £4500.
You cannot ignore three polls taken at about the same time all moving in the same direction.
With this form of betting the number of seats are traded like stocks and shares and if your prediction is right and the seat levels increase/decrease to more than cover the difference between the buy and sell prices then you can cash in and take your profits immediately. You can also close down positions, as I did yesterday with my Labour trade, and cut your losses.
Mike Smithson
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A factor that we have to consider is that the recent Labour recovery might have been a mirage - caused by the well-known problems of polling during period when a lot of people are away from home. For some reason these tend to produce poorer Labour shares than surveys during normal times.
Another factor is that posts in the small hours of the morning can state the opposite of what is intented.
(Surely poorer should read better.)
re 1. Thank you.
I enjoy early morning posts, although it does nothing for my insomnia.
I predict that Labour will pull all the stops out this year to attempt to get a boost, however I think it will all backfire and they’ll end up with a poll 15-20 points behind the tories at some point.
Mike: I know you had for a while buys at the Tories which you have chopped and changed a couple of times over the past month or so into being Labour buys then seemingly bouncing straight back.
Could I please ask if you have gained via your trading, or if you would have been better off just sticking with your original Conservative bet you had in the first place and/or increasing it?
We all know that governments can recover from this sort of mid term deficit. In fact by pre 1997 standards its not actually that big. I suppose the question is how many do it in a third term. In fact in the 20th C how many four term governments were there?
With interest rates peaked and a 2p tax cut comming in in April I would give up on Labour yet but I accept that it does look grim. Still no worse really than under blair. The labour core vote is still there in the low thirties. Its the lib dem decline that is inlating the tories.
3: I agree although 20 points is a very big ask. As a bit of fun if there is any interest I would like to propose a charity bet for Peter’s new part of the site. I propose that there will be a headline voting intention poll in 2008 (by a proper, recognised pollster) with a Con lead of 20+. If there is then £10 for the charity of my choice, if anyone accepts the bet and there isn’t by the end of the year then I’ll donate £10 for the charity of their choice.
If there are any potential takers who are put off because I’m not a very regular poster here, I do write occasionally and am a regular poster on Anthony’s blog. I’m fully prepared to give the required details to Peter.
re 4. I look for short-term movements and if that doesn’t happen I get out quickly. My aim is to make £1000 a month which I have been doing easily since March. A fortnight ago, as I recorded at the time, I lost £600 when I clicked the wrong button when I was doing a trade. I’ve now just about recovered from that but I do not expect to make my £1000 in January.
The highest the Tory spread reached was about 306 seats in early December so I probably would not have done better keeping my money in.
The main reasons for trading as I do are to reduce risk and to get the income out.
6 I’ll take that for a tenner, Philip. It’s a very sporting bet.
Drop me an email to the usual address: arklebar@talktalk.net
Cheers
Er yes. Maybe it’s easier to see from afar (I’m in Canada now) but Labour are doomed. There is very little Gordon can do. It is down to whether Cameron and the tories mess it up. Of course Kinnock did manage to mess it up but he was ginger and had much narrower appeal than Cameron. I think Cameron is too experienced now for a major gaffe so maybe its some of the fringe in his party that pose a greater risk. But don’t really think so. I’m betting on a tory overall majority right now….
10 In principle, I agree Axel. The bar is set very high for an overall majority though, as you will know if you read Rod Crosby’s posts, or even if you don’t.
My money is still on N.O.M., still available at decent odds.
If Labour’s poll position doesn’t improve, is there any chance enough Labour MPs will rebel to prevent the EU Constitution getting through parliament?
8. Done. My first ever political bet
Is Gordon on telly bad for Labour? Perhaps but there are simpler reasons for Labour’s poor showing.
First, people are skint after Christmas (aggravated by having been paid early in December).
Second, and more worryingly, most of the policies in the not-a-relaunch have been seen as thinly-veiled attacks on Labour’s own supporters.
Third, Hain has been all over the news reminding us there’s one law for the rich and another for the poor.
The Times write-up of their YouGov poll, seems to be trying to spin it as circumstances beyond Gordon/Labour’s control.
“VOTERS’ gloom about the economy and a series of “rip-off” price rises has turned them against Gordon Brown’s government again.”
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article3177630.ece
They also try to find good news for Mr Brown in the poll,
“One of Brown’s policies is also favoured by voters. The decision to push ahead with new nuclear power stations is backed by more than two to one; 59% to 27%, a sharp shift compared with two years ago, when nuclear was opposed by a similar margin”
12 A betting virgin! Not the first one I’ve led astray though.
13
In Lord Ashcroft’s ‘Smell the Coffee’ report he places particular weight on January polls:
“Early January has long been regarded as the best moment to take a reading ofthe levels ofsupport
for each party.With little political news or activity over the Christmas break people tend to tune
out ofpolitics and current affairs,providing an ideal opportunity to gauge voters’views with min-
imal adulteration from passing news events. ”
http://www.lordashcroft.com/publications/smellthecoffee.html
5 - Yellow Submarine - the “2p tax cut” was exposed as a scam within minutes of Brown’s announcement in last year’s Budget.
In fact, because of the DOUBLING of tax from 10p to 20p on the first tranche of taxable income, everyone whose income is less than 375 quid a week (the poor) will be paying MORE tax. No cut there!
Interest rates ‘peaked’? With retail price inflation at its highest for 16 years, don’t bank on it. Rates - particularly mortgage rates - are on their way up again.
17 - I accept that about the tax cut but lots of people will gain. More than will loose. I think we will see another 0.25% cut in interest rates soon. Given that people were confidentally predicting 6.5% not very long agao I think this will spare a bit of pain.
Fundamentally the Blair/Brown transfer was like a Dr Who regeneration. A once in a generation oppertunity to reinvent the franchise. It worked for a while then he blew it on the hubris of a bottled election.
It will be one of the great counterfactuals of recent British history.
However I suspect John L is right. The only card left to play is to relaunch in a direction core labour voters will rally to. Nuclear as an example may be popular over all but it sends those soft lib dem switchers back.
OT. Congratulations to Morus on successfully identifying and translating my extremely funny Volapük joke (at the end of Sean’s Friday thread).
I predict that there will be 2 parliamentary by-elections in 2008.
19. do tell!
It will only get worse the longer Hain hangs about. Hopefully common sense will prevail and he’ll be forced to resign this week.
18 - Yellow Submarine - ‘lots of people (the richer) will gain. More than (the poor, who) will lose.’
Is that the measure of socialism these days, that if a few poor people are ground into the dust it doesn’t matter so long as lots of rich people make a few bob?
Let me give you just one small example from direct personal experience.
A minor Civil Servant accepted early retirement on an annual pension worth, from April 2008, £8515.
The tax free allowance for 2008/9 is £5435 - leaving £3080 as raxable income.
Under the previous regime, £2320 of this would have been taxed at 10% (£232) and the remainder, £760, at 22% (£167) - a total tax bill of £399.
Under the new improved Gordon Brown engineered tax cut, ALL of the £3080 will be taxed at 20% - a total of £616. That’s £216 - over four quid a week - more! Four quid taken from the mouth of a poor pensioner!
Gee, thanks, Gordon - of course I’ll vote for you.
USA: libertarian, fringe GOP candidate Ron Paul is picking up Black votes.
He also offers a pardon for non-violent drug crimes.
http://www.usadaily.com/article.cfm?articleID=224961
22. I’m not disputing the in justice or say its good policy. In fact its a fiddle and regressive. However as more people win than loose I think it might get him a few votes thats all.
24 Abolishing the 10p rate was a tricksy, poorly thought-out political stunt from Brown as Chancellor that would play badly with the voters.
But, oh, how different things would be when he became PM…. Iraq visit during the Tory Conference, anyone?
Looks like Osbourne could be suffering from Hain’s disease!
http://tinyurl.com/33l4pb
But apparently it was someone elses fault, so thats all right then.
20. (repeated by popular request)
Morus:
This is almost as much fun as the Christmas Crossword & Quiz! Somebody post a news report in another obscure language!
JohnLoony:
My second favourite joke is
Q. Kin binon nim okiälikün da vol lölik?
A. Ziporüt, bi ai sagon “Ob… ob… ob… ob…”.
Ha ha ha ha ha !!!
Morus:
I got it! I don’t speak Volapuk, but:
Q. Kin [which] binon [is] nim [creature] okiälikün [’okial’ is ’selfish or egotistical’, ‘-ikun’ makes superlative’] do vol lölik [in the whole world]?
A. Ziporüt [Goldfish], bi [because] ai sagon [it says] “Ob… ob… ob… ob…”. [”I” “I” “I” “I”]
Q Which is the most egotistical creature in the whole world?
A The Goldfish, because it says ” I … I … I … I”
It’s a classic!
Peter the Punter:
Does lose a tad in the translation though.
JohnLoony:
Wow! I am impressed by the fact that you (a) were sad enough even to bother trying a translation (b) knew enough to know that it was Volapük (c) bothered to work out a translation.
The only word you missed was “ai” which means “always”.
For the curious, (a) I have been dablling in Esperanto since I was 10, (b) I have always been interested in languages generally (c) There was a programme on Channel 4 about invented languages in 1995 at about 3am, which led me to do a 10-lesson correspondence course on Volapük. The programme said that at the time there were about 30 people worldwide who used or knew Volapük to any substantial degree, although that was probably an underestimate at the time and has since been made redundant by the availability of V. on the internet.
25 does anyone really care about the poor any more? Do they matter electorally. Most of them live in safe labour seats where there low turnout won’t matter. I accept that there is income poverty in many rural areas but Labour don’t compete there. Its a tax cut aimed at marginals.
26 Pah! Rothschild!!
Harrumph!! Sloane!!!
A story that presses all the good old class-warrior buttons…shame there is no dishonesty element to it though. Still, I expect that regardless, they will get to unpack their “Tory sleaze!” outrage from its box in the attic and give it a good airing.
Actually, given how good a year Osborne had, these toffs were quite right to insist on the money being spent on his office, rather than it being squandered by the useless heir-spares that populate Central Office.
I think Hain resign! he should have know what was going on, he should know the rules, he should abide by them.
I also think the same of Osborne, ignorance is no excuse, and passing the buck! pass the sick bag.
30 in my experience peoples opinion of politicans is so low that this stuff just brushes past. They hate us all and think we are all as bad as each other which broadly we are. The lot in power at any given moment tend to be worse because power corupts etc. But all parties show flawed humanity. I can see no killer blow in the Sundays for hain and osborne may provide distraction.
On the Hain and Osborne thing - just so I’m clear:
Hain raised a large chunk of money for his personal bid for the deputy leadership and DIDN’T tell the Electoral Commission as legally required;
Osborne raised a large chunk of money for his Shadow Office and DID tell the Electoral Commission as required.
Is that it?
The substance of the latter story appears to be that the Commons Registrar, when appropached by Osborne to declare the donation in the Declarations of Interest told him that it wasn’t necessary (speculating: presumably on the grounds it was to run his Shadow Office); this has been seized upon as a demonstration that Osborne is either incompetent or corrupt.
Am I getting hold of the wrong end of the stick or is this actually all there is to it?
Too early to say Mike - these polls seem to reinforce where we were at the end of last year rather than say where we are going in this. Announcements this week won’t have filtered through yet, and unless Hain runs and runs (e.g. his statement yesrerday kept him in the headlines without answering any of the questions.) it’ll take time.
Same with Nick Clegg - given the history there’s not going to be any more of a bounce than what we have seen, but over time he will build up his profile and his portfolio of key issues, which should make a real impact. Starting off with fuel poverty was an excellent sign that he grasps this.
Yellow Submarine (28) asks whether anybody cares about the poor any more.
He seems to have missed that fact that Nick Clegg devoted his first PMQ session to precisely one of the problems that the poor face, namely very expensive winter heating.
Inevitably, Gordon Brown claims that there is no problem and brushes the issue aside, but that was only to be expected from this Labour Government.
What is the question of the day? Ah yes! Why is Labour doing so badly?
30 The biggest boon for Labour is that Osborne’s position - “I was badly advised” - could also become Gordon’s catch-phrase!
“I was badly advised on Northern Rock/Iraq/the Euro-Constitution/party funding/[fill in ad nauseum] - but these so called “advisors” - who I truly trusted, but now know to be little more than shysters and flim-flam merchants - are as we speak helping create record production levels of sodium chloride in Siberia…”
32. Thats it. But as everyone wants to belive the worst of politicans it’ll get a bit of coverage for a news cycle then die. Its chaff put out to deflect things from hain.
For those who only take a passing interest in politics between elections I can see that there wouldn’t be much enthusiasm for the government at the moment or even much loyalty from their usual supporters. Look at how thin they are on this site. Where’s Red Flump etc?
But to suggest this even gives a hint of what’s likely to happen in two years is just delusional. We’ve seen the polls swing wildly 10% in just a couple of months. People aren’t engaged. If Gordon gets his act together and the government start to look competent there’s no reason why they wont get their majority in 2009.
I still believe that there are too many city dwellers who won’t vote for Cameron/Osborne when the time comes. I thought the same of Michael Howard and despite the Iraq debacle just before voting I was right.
34. NO the LD’s don;t CARE about the poor. They are concerned about them in the same way the LD’s are concerned about deforestation or dolphins. The LD’s are an irredeemably middle class party. How many people are in the commons that have actually suffered fuel poverty any time recently?
The most obvious gap in the political market is a for a party that would genuinely fight for the urban poor. ONe with organic links and members in the crime ridden, poverty ridden hell holes that is much of our urban landscape.
35 “these so called “advisors” - who I truly trusted, but now know to be little more than shysters and flim-flam merchants - are as we speak helping create record production levels of sodium chloride in Siberia…”
He added “in some of the harshest underground conditions endured by man.”
Cue Brown’s inappropriate smile….
37 “there are too many city dwellers who won’t vote for Cameron/Osborne when the time comes”
So, Roger - city dwellers think Gordon Brown is “one of use”, do they? Or will they just sit on their arses on the day?
38 Actually, I think that the LibDems do care about the poor. Unlike dolphins and rainforests though, they haven’t got a clue what to do about them…
“I still believe that there are too many city dwellers who won’t vote for Cameron/Osborne when the time comes. I thought the same of Michael Howard and despite the Iraq debacle just before voting I was right”
There seem to be plenty of city dwellers, where it counts, who are willing to vote Conservative.
Don’t forget the Conservatives can win comfortably without gaining seats in Liverpool, Newcastle, Sheffield, Leicester, and Manchester.
re 37 The polls have not fluctuated wildly for Gordon. Apart from the period of July-September 2007 we have had more than two years of consistent poll numbers showing the public’s view of Brown - thyey don’t like him. I can’t predict yet the outcome of the general election but one thing is pretty certain - Labour is going to lose power with Brown there.
Now with a leader like John Denham - who comes over exceptionally well and resigned his ministerial post over Iraq - the world would look a lot different.
Brown = Labour is toast.
Any leader other than Brown = Labour could win a fourth term.
32
Isn’t it amazing, the benefit of the doubt is always given to members of the party which some of our posters support.
There should be zero tolerance for MP’s, any infringement of the rules, (ignorance no excuse) and out you would go! and I mean parliament. Mp’s are there to serve us, not help themselves.
I see one of Osborne’s, ‘donors’ is a Cypriot, haven’t we been here before? ‘Beware of Greeks bearing gifts’
Re the Osborne donation. It sounds like a genuine mistake where no normal person could have done more but for those listening to the news with only one ear it didn’t sound like that. Half a million from city financiers to George Osborne personally hasn’t got an attractive ring to it. I’m sure it’ll amount to nothing and if it just shuts up Chris Grayling it might even have done the Tories a favour
37 - Roger - ‘If Gordon gets his act together and the government start to look competent …. ‘
One really does have to admire your blind faith, but precisely when are you expecting this miracle?
37 wouldn’t a Thatcher style defenstration do so much damage though? They did elect him unopposed?
28 I think we are in an era where people again - as often in the Victorian age - are enabled safely to declare “If you’re poor it’s your own fault”. That, of course, isn’t always, or even very often the case. But this problem of perception is IMO, one of the big downsides of a “meritocratic” society. This enables people to ignore some of the big brakes (not breaks!) on progress, whether they be those people grew up with, or those where some accident of circumstance occurs and hobbles people permanently or for a long time. The fact that social mobility has now declined, must give us as a nation pause for thought that not all is right.
Your second point - do the poor matter electorally? I think here, we are weakened by the fact that many people who are poor find voting less accessible for psychological and practical reasons, and so they have declined in importance. Actually, the poor are well distributed throughout Britain, but again, overall, are outnumbered by those who feel the system serves (or might serve!) them well.
On “What do we do about it?” As politicos, we need to develop a language which can tell the aspirational the facts in ways that can be accepted by them. Difficult, but I have to hope, not impossible.
44,
I was genuinely curious as it seems to be nothing more than a flim-flam attempt.
Personally, I think that MPs from any party, if they clearly attempt to follow all the rules and seek advice from appropriate authorities when in doubt and then follow that advice, should not be in trouble if the appropriate authority has pronounced incorrectly. And throwing them out of Parliament if they followed that line (as you propose) does seem a bit harsh to me. But then maybe I’m biased.
If,as widely expected,an announcement is made this Tuesday regarding the nationalisation of Northern Rock, Gord may as well throw in the towel.
NR, the first among many to be nationalised. Who is next? Paragon, A&L or B&B?
Old Labour in all its glory is about to unfold. Guess what Darling’s budget is going to look like?
Anyone thinking about emigrating? Watch out for exchange controls to come in under the Emergency Measures (Great Crash 2) Act 2008.
48. Sorry but I know to many inner city areas which are just shocking. Its just that theres no one left to be shocked. Once middle class / white flight has taken place then they are f***ed. They will never have the social capital to fight back and all that is left is a neo colonial set of interventions from middle class proffesionals who live no where near. All these areas historic allegience to the “Labour” party is a bit of ameilarative redistribution. More of an anelgesic than a cure. And the money is often wasted.
We tolerate a level of social failure in our cities and urban areas that would have the army put on the streets if transported for just one day to the suburbs. And these areas have NOONE to speak for them in the system, at least authentically. Its interesting that the three great areas where the political class is badly adrift of popular opinion; immigration, euroskeptism and the enviroment have all developed there own parties, albeit unsucessful so far. And yet not one for the Poor?
As we are reminded with polls, what matters is the direction of travel.
Labour are continuing to decline.
Conservatives have a small rise.
Lib Dems have had a “dead bird” bounce. Clegg has gained fewer headlines than Huhne was achieving.
Have Labour hit rock bottom? Clearly not, they are bumping along just above “worst since 87″ levels. The question is will they fall into the 20s.
44. Hilarious stuff today, pls keep it up.
49
Biased! gosh you Andy, perish the thought.
All MP’s of what ever party, should realise that their privileged position brings enormous responsibility.
If an MP gets it wrong, don’t blame anyone else, its your responsibility to get it right, no excuses.
If you get it wrong, then you are not fit for public office, ejection for Parliament immediately. Because getting it wrong will mean one thing, the ‘Hollow Square’
51 That’s true enough of places like Glasgow, or Liverpool, I should think. But many big urban centres do have large resident professional populations - and in East London, a lot of them do live next door to the poor. You could hardly be unaware of poverty if you lived in somewhere like Dalston for example. But they would still leave completely separate lives.
Hain taking a pasting on the Andrew Marr show. When you become a figure of fun its over really. I hadn’t thought he would go but I do now.
54 Fair enough for genuinesly sleazy MPs like Michael Trend, but hardly reasonable for genuinely honest mistakes.
38. There is a party which is exactly filling the gap you describe and we had a thread on them the other day. Unless one or several of the other parties is/are seen to start treating the poor as serious electors with aspirations and opinions again, rather than as recipients of benefits to be bribed, they will continue to do quite well (by their own terms).
Fortunately, it’s unlikely for the forseeable future that they’ll improve much on their current position as they’ve got an invisible leader - partly it seems through his own choice and partly through (understandable) media bias - and also there are structural reasons as to why their activist base is unlikely to expand further quickly: to gain significantly more members, they’ll need to expand beyond their traditional recruiting ground, but doing so will bring them into contact with existing members whose views are extreme enough to put them off participating. Similarly, were such a recruitment strategy tried, some traditionalist members are likely to object to what they see as a dilution of the message. Indeed, if the thread on the Vote2007 site is accuratem, something like that happened recently.
Nonetheless, there is undoubtedly the potential for them to do better if the main parties continue to chase the key swing voters most likely to turn out.
51. Thinking more about it, I should think ethnicity must be one factor to consider here. Quite a lot of research suggests that people are far more concerned about the well-being of members of their own ethnic group than about those who they see as strangers.
[48] Tim13 muses do the poor matter electorally? I think here, we are weakened by the fact that many people who are poor find voting less accessible for psychological and practical reasons, and so they have declined in importance
I agree with the psychological aspect: to vote is, among other things, to believe that you have some say over the way your life is, which “the poor” by and large don’t, but I’m unclear why Tim thinks they are practically disadvantaged - they may choose not even to register their names on the electoral roll, but that surely is also a psychological factor.
58. Actually, I don’t think the BNP get many votes from the poor. I think it’s more from people who are on average to below average incomes, but who wouldn’t be classed as poor.
I’m interested to see that our host seems mainly to trade in tory seats. I don’t make anything like his £1000/month from political betting (0 is nearer the mark, and minus when I’m swept along by the Obama bubble on here), so he’s probably right.
I mostly trade in Labour seats. Currently I’m short, as I can see no upside in them—they must lose some to the LDs, SNP and the tories? But surely its harder to predict how many gains the tories will make from Clegg’s LDs? My guessing—and betting—is very few.
An all out onslaught by the Libdems (Vince Cable) on the mismanagement of the UK economy by NuLabour should reap rewards given the latest allegations of undeclared donations by certain other individuals.
I am prepared to wager that the next opinion poll will show an increase in support for the Libdems.
UK slips behind France on economy
The size of the British economy has slipped below that of France for the first time since 1999 thanks to the slide in the value of the pound.
Sterling’s rapid fall to 11-year lows against European currencies has also pushed Britain into sixth place in the world.
The US, Japan, Germany, China and France all had larger economies than the UK in the third quarter of 2007 – and in 2006.
The figures represented a “political economic cataclysm” for Britain, said Martin Weale, the director of the National Institute of Economic and Social Research, who noted that the UK government often boasted of Britain’s being the fourth largest economy, and then the fifth largest when China overtook the UK in 2005.
The UK’s demotion to sixth place will put pressure on the government’s reputation for economic competence, particularly as it is Britain’s ancient rival, France, that is moving ahead.
This will sure to send Brown into a purple faced rage when he tries to find who is behind the embarassing decline and fall of his miracle economy. Perhaps Darling will take the blame?
57
What is an honest mistake, how do we recognize one?
How do we know, that a smoke screen hasn’t been created, so that the miscreant can then say, ‘Sorry it was an honest mistake’ Yeah I’m sure!
Why do all these rich people give money to political parties, what are they getting in return?
Some of those people on Osborne’s list look suss to me.
With MP’s, don’t ever give them the benefit of the doubt, its Paxo’s rule everytime, ‘Why is this bastard lying to me’
The full Yougov data is here http://extras.timesonline.co.uk/pollresults.pdf
Note the usual bias in the sample responses to over 55’s and the raw unweighted figures as %’s Con 36% Lab 26% LibDems 10% Others 7% indicating turnout of 79% . This is 10-12% higher than all other pollsters find and these extra would be voters are all COnservatives .
54 When I first heard the report I thought stupid boy about Osborne but there was no attempt to hide donation, nor was it “overlooked” because he was busy. His office asked the authorities, they said it shouldn’t be registered. If that advice was wrong the authorities should admit blame.
I think though that politicians should err on the side of transparency - better to register unnecessarily than be seen as dishonest.
63. OK, ten pounds says the next ICM poll will not have a Lib Dem share in excess of the one listed at the head of this thread?
On your other points, it is not the pound that is weak, it is the euro that is very strong. After all, £1=$1.90? Down on recent months but still high by any sensible standard. The refusal of the Chinese to allow a floating exchange rate and so revalue their currency to a sensible level, and the size of the US trade deficit is causing various exchange rates to be well out of kilter with fundamentals.
Well, the Osborne revelation will help Labour blunt any attack on Hain, which is most unfortunate.
I think that it is likely he (Osborne) is telling the truth about receiving poor advice, simply because it makes little sense to declare the donations to the Electoral Commission and not as a Memebrs’ Interest.
It is much less serious than Hain’s apparent ignorance of over half his campaign budget, but I suspect it’ll get lumped in the same bracket.
Hain won’t go, and Gordon won’t push him. Losing Hain could open the floodgates for Alexander and Harman.
In any case, the impending nationalisation (or perhaps sale) of Northern Rock will probably knock some of the media stuffing out of the stories in the near future.
Must be close between Hain & Darling as to who quits first !
A sorry, unbelievable tale of greed, corruption and hypocrisy.
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/busi…icle3177668.ece
January 13, 2008
Key Northern Rock staff receive secret bonuses
Grant Ringshaw and David Smith
SENIOR staff at Northern Rock are receiving secret bonuses of up to £100,000 a year as part of an incentive scheme.
The bank’s board approved the bonuses for 173 staff who are seen as essential for the running of the bank. The payouts, of up to £25,000 per quarter, could double the salaries of some of the recipients.
In a letter to senior staff on December 20, the chief executive, Andy Kuipers, said the “enhanced remuneration package” was for employees deemed “essential to our continuing excellent operational performance”.
He emphasised that the arrangement “will not be offered to the generality of staff and, as such, must remain absolutely confidential to yourself and not be discussed with others. If you do discuss the existence of this bonus to any third party then you will forfeit your entitlement”.
The revelation will cause anger among customers, the bank’s remaining 6,000 staff, and taxpayers, whose exposure to Northern Rock is about £55 billion, including £25 billion in loans from the Bank of England. Alistair Darling, the chancellor, will also face embarrassment as the Treasury, Bank of England, and Financial Services Authority (FSA) were informed of the bonus plans.
Last night the Treasury tried to distance itself from the fallout, claiming the government was powerless to intervene. A source said: “ Yes, we were appraised of these bonuses, but it was not for us to say yes or no to it. They have their own independence to run things.”
Either both or neither should resign.
[69] Well, I suppose a burglar who gets clean away and leaves no prints or DNA behind puts in an “excellent operational performance”, too
68
think that it is likely he (Osborne) is telling the truth about receiving poor advice, simply because it makes little sense to declare the donations to the Electoral Commission and not as a Memebrs’ Interest.
When you set out too deceive, you create a, ‘It makes no sense’ scenario, so if you are tumbled, you can claim, ‘Well if I’d meant to do that, I wouldn’t have done that, now would I?’
I get the feeling some of you lot have led very sheltered lives!
67 I will take you up on that £ 10 wager David . I think the next ICM poll will have the LibDems on at least 19% .
72 Osbourne sought advice from the registrar BEFORE the papers found the story and it was the advice of the Registrar that was unclear. all donations were registered with electoral commission. if Hain had done any of these things he would be fine.
61. Sorry Sean, in my experience, the BNP do best in genuinely poor areas, though I accept that this may vary from place to place.
re 65. Mark I don’t understand your “bias to over 55s” point. My calculation is that YouGov is weighting it so that this group represents 35.4% of the voting population which seems about right. Many more than that from this group responded to the poll so the impact of the over 55s was reduced by 14%.
74
Has the registrar confirmed this?
60 IA Quick reaction - things like transient addresses - “officialdom” and other sources of help can’t always keep up. If you are very poor, things tend to break, go wrong for you a lot more, and the resources you have to devote to getting things right take away from your looking at “the world beyond”.
Can I say, this is a fascinating debate - not sure whether pb is the absolute best place for it, but it’s good enough for the mo. Thankyou Yellow Submarine for raising it. Your point about the lack of “authentic” representation strikes a real chord with me. When you see the likes of Peter Hain interviewed (presumably) in the grounds of his constituency home, and compare it with the majority of people’s circumstances, I think “dear me!” (or equivalent) Many of Dave Nellist, the former Militant MP’s ideas were pretty off the wall. But his insistence that he be an authentic representative of “his” people, drawing an average wage, experiencing similar circumstances has to have merit. Readers ofthe Guardian will have seen the letters of Bob Holman, an academic who has worked with and studied poverty issues in Glasgow for many years. Simon Hughes also to my knowledge “lives among his people”. Enough rant!
58. Indeed
I’m watching Cameron on TV. he’s beinging to look like a Prime Minister. Jesus.
77 a meeting was held, emails are in hand etc. lets not do GBs work for him by muddying the water.
77,
coldstone - does it matter? Under your philosophy he should be out anyway, surely?
Ted. I also thought the same about Osborne but afterv the slippery performance of his leader on Marr’s programme now I’m not so sure! (Methinks the lady doth protest too much!)
PS. Does anyone think Cameron is impressive?
78 My favourite was a documentary about Robert Maxwell in which he claimed “I’ve always considered myself a member of the working classes” while being served tea by a servant.
80
I’m not interest in doing anyone’s work.
Whats wrong is wrong and what’s right is right, If A Labour politician had done this its wrong, no excuses.
As far as the registrar is concerned its.
Ms Barry declined to comment last night.
I think she should give her view of events, rather than accept Mr Osborne’s without question.
82 compared to GB he is very impressive.
70 If Osborne has, as stated in the Mail on Sunday, emails from the registrar Alda Barry saying they shouldn’t be declared in the Register of Members Interests then no he shouldn’t resign, he should publish those and a timeline. Was the story obtained by a Mail reporter comparing Electoral Commission results v members interests or “provided” to the Mail I wonder? Certainly the use of Excel spreadsheets adds an aura of investigatitive journalism but the spreadsheets aren’t claimed as source documents so one presumes they were either created by the Mail or put together by the “source”.
The Mail remains in an interesting position as regards who it supports - strong article from Piers Morgan on how wonderful Gordon Brown is, this article ( its editorial is very anti-Hain but opening is all good for Gordon “Prime Minister proud of his reputation for rock-ribbed integrity” “Gordon Brown genuinely wants to restore trust in British politics”.
Must admit I always look for a second source for Mail stories ever since it splashed across its centre pages in the 80’s the revelation that my sister and her friends were founding members of a female version of the Bullingdon Club which was a) untrue b) made up c) completely incorrect D) had no foundation in fact other than four or five broke girl students met once a month for a meal. Since then I’ve known of other instances where friends have been quoted in Mail stories again with very little relation to the facts.
“For some reason these tend to produce poorer Tory shares than surveys during normal times”
It’s bloody obvious.
It’s all those rich tories goung away on holiday.
86. The Mail is a terrible newspaper with a well-earned reputation for disgraceful ‘journalism’. The idea that such an unholy organ as this should have any influence on the next general election is quite depressing.
85. He’s not easy to compare with Gordon because they’re so different. He’s much more easy to compare with Blair. Do you think he compares well with Blair?
84. It just keeps getting better - not even Roger can compete with this stuff!
The idea that we should worry about the French overtaking us because of a currency move is richly entertaining - Sarkozy is the only leader in euroland who calls constantly for a weaker currency and urges action to make it happen.
89, why not compare him to Major, Thatcher, Wilson or Heath? His opponent is Brown, so with the Brown the comparison should be made.
Cameron did reasonably well, particularly with the funding of political parties. He spoke more or less like a human, rather than a human calculator spewing forth such commonplace phrases as “fiscal arithmetic” or occasionally grinning like a serial killer.
Brown’s biggest flaw, in PR terms, is simply that he’s hard to like and easy to loathe.
Roger
Clearly Yellow Submarine thinks Cameron impressive. Actually, YS, I am very surprised, after your warranted tirade about politicians and the “poor” earlier, that you can think dave a particularly authentic rep of anything but a (previously thought to be) bygone age of Old Etonian, silver spoon Toryism, trying to give a PR spin on why he sees eye to eye with the majority.
Obviously bad polls for Labour, but reading through the detials I don’t see anything that differs from our collective general impression of recent months. People aren’t happy with the government, they think the economy is in difficulty, they slightly prefer Cameron to Brown on most measures (see the figures on ‘X is doing a good job’), but they aren’t sure about the Tories. They think Brown’s a bear and Cameron’s a snake.
They’re fairly typical midterm polls, and, as we’ve discussed, governments sometimes recover and sometimes don’t. Whether we will in this case is a matter of opinion and I don’t think we have any hard indicators to tell us. As you’d expect from me, I expect us to recover as the economic cycle moves on and people have a closer look at the alternative.
The common feature about Hain and Osbourne seems to me that in both cases there is no suggestion that anything really sinister has occurred - there is no suggestion that anyone has obtained improper influence, they both unwisely relied upon someone else instead of making sure, and the sources for the revelations are respectively Hain and Osbourne, who cleared up the matter when it came to light. Both stories feed into the ‘what a shambles they are’ view of politicians, but I don’t think many people out there are especially concerned. “MPs threatening to break the 2% pay limit” has *much* more resonance - if we do that people will be very, very cheesed off.
‘They think Brown’s a bear and Cameron’s a snake’
Risible spin.
Camo put up a spirited show on Marr’s show. We need those emails in the public domain. It may again be, just as with Ashcroft’s money and the Midlands Whatever Funding Secret Fund Thingy, the Tories are just within the law. But the law is murky and being exploited - although not broken. Much more transparency is needed.
Osborne is slightly damaged. For heaven’s sake, he is the Tories’ man to run the economy. It must be a worry for Cameron.
54 Coldstone You seem a little frantic today, and a little ruthless, too, as your recipe would remove much of the cabinet at a stroke if we really adopted your policy for MPs: “If you get it wrong, then you are not fit for public office, ejection for Parliament immediately.”
Fortunately Osborne did not get it wrong. If anyone did - and that is not clear as the rules are not clear - the parliamentary registrar did.
Sadly though, Hain, Harperson, Watt and even Brown (as leader and in regard his own leadership finance) certainly did break the law and/or party rules. After all, we know this is true as Brown himself admitted that the law had been broken.
94 Nick Palmer MP “They’re fairly typical midterm polls, and, as we’ve discussed, governments sometimes recover and sometimes don’t.”
Sorry Nick my recollection is that you are completely wrong. We had an article on this which showed that the evidence is that Govts do not recover.
Can someone find the article?
97 - but if Willetts did delcare money he got why did Osborne not? Do Shadow Cabinet members actually talk to each other?
To me the Osborne seems like a classic muddy the waters/diversion tactic. It appears designed to generate a ‘tarred with the same brush’ thing. I think the problem with intricate laws is that the more hoops you create to jump through the more likely it is that means round them will be sought/found. THat is not to say that we shouldn’t have laws on party funding but the problem is that due to the fact that the public implicitly do not trust politicians then the laws are designed to remove the trust element, this makes them in my opinon not particularly good laws and when parties act up to the line that has been drawn then it reinforces the lack of trust.
94 About the only “common feature” between the two stories is that both Osborne (sic) and Hain are MP’s
The differences are:
The Osborne donations were registered in full and in good time with the Electoral Commission. Coldstone thinks some of the donors “look dodgy”, but you could have decided this at any time since the quarter in which the donations were published. You didn’t have to wait for the Mail on Sunday to reprint the list. Hain has taken more than 6 months to tell us about his donations, because he has been busy. We only got the names on Thursday night.
Osborne’s office sought clearance from the Commons registrar, Alda Barry about how the donations should be treated in the Register of Members interests. There’s no question of him unwisely relying on “someone else”. Hain didn’t ask anyone about how he should register. He just didn’t do it.
The “source” of the Hain story was Jon Mendelsohn on 29 November. It wasn’t Hain. It looks like the Osborne story came from the Mail on Sunday.
More the half of Hain’s undeclared donations were laundered through a body whose only activity seems to have been to launder donations to his deputy leadership bid. You don’t think this is sinister. I’ve yet to hear anyone explain the justification for it. It certainly seems designed to get round the rules. I call that sinister. If there has been “laundering” by Osborne it has been through the Conservative Party which has been around rather longer and does rather more than the PPF.
Do we have the Voter retention figures for ICM and YouGov. I’m thinking comparison for the LDs v Populus. Once again YouGov have them at Ming Campbell levels, why? I mean 18% sounds right to me. Clegg is not making huge waves but OTOH he’s not Ming. This will matter hugely in seat numbers for both Cons and Lab. If only the Tories against LDs advance then its tough for them but Ok, but if the Tory advance is coming solely from Labour then Labour could start shipping more seats to the Lds as well as the Tories
On the ‘Daily Mail’ I hate to admit this,(seeing as I’ve spent all my life denigrating that paper) they did a full page spread on the wife of a collegue. The woman in question, (who I think, is actually mentally ill) had been passing her self off as the relative of a famous person, (amazingly she took in some very prominent people) The Mail’s piece was accurate in every detail.
On the earlier discussion, Hain/Osborne, wouldn’t it be really refreshing if Labour people started calling for the resignation of politicians who had let their party down, wouldn’t it be really refreshing if Tory people started calling for the resignation of people who let their party down, all other parties too.
While politicians know they will get the unquestioning support from the ususal gaggle of arse licking sycophants who seem to make up the majority of party members, they’ll go on letting their parties down.
95 I have learnt to put dark glasses on before I read anything Nick writes, it makes me go dizzy otherwise. If it gives you comfort to think its just mid-term blues, you just go on thinking that Nick, to me it looks more like a terminal and painful decline. The economy over the next 2 yrs will just make things worse.
43 Anyone other than Brown? Steady I agree they’d have a better chance but even Denham would be no sure thing
guys. labour broke the law, hain broke the law, harman broke the law, abrahams broke the law, watt broke the law. GB himself described the donations as “illegal”. The Tories and Osbourne havent broken the law. get over it.
I would like to put something else into the mix here which i have believed could happen for quite some time.
It is the Euro and the possible entry of the UK into the system.
I have long thought that we would enter the Euro on the back of a declining currency and a rise in inflation as it would be a way of getting the government out of worsening eceonomic times.
We have euro interest rates way below that of the UK and we have the Euro strengthening considerably against the pound.
Buying into the Euro at a stroke would reduce mortgage payments and lower inflation.
The political fallout would be huge but at the heart of the decision would be how well off people would feel.
This happened with Ireland and Italy in the late Nineties and their economies boomed whilst their own central banks were powerless to raise rates against the spectre of higher domestic inflation.
It could be Gordons final throw of the dice.
Remember he has always stuck to the line that we would only enter the Euro when eceonomic conditions meant it was right.
He never said that conditions had to be perfect.
106
Like I say, the usual gaggle of arsehole licking sycophants.
Sorry Coldstone - you’re going to have to give up your Sunday morning straw-clutching. Osborne is in the clear on this one.
107-no way!
107 The Tories not to mention Murdoch would eat him alive. He’s spent ten years taking the credit for keeping us out
The real significance of the Osborne story is that the Mail presented with a reasonable explanation still choose to run an anti-Conservative story.
It is called the Dacre effect and this will act as a limiting factor on the size of Conservative polling.
103 My experience of Mail journalism is different but this Osborne story looks to me like something a party researcher found out after the Abrahams story broke - there would have been detailed searches of Conservative registered donations by Labour (& vice versa) to see if there were non-permitted donors to the Tories that could be exposed to take the heat off. Nearest seems to have been donations in Bournemouth which unfortunately for Labour were through a British company, though that was owned by Channel Island resident but didn’t stop the astro-turfers from posting across political sites.
Now on a weekend where editorials are calling for Hain to go, surprise, surprise a story appears in a friendly newspaper that muddies the water - no law breaking, almost certainly no rule breaking, unlike Hain’s case, but enough perhaps to take the heat off Labour.
In view of the three polls over last couple of days showing Tories doing better than over Christmas I did like the comment in the Guardian “One Labour Party source said: ‘The last thing the government needs is for someone to walk. It would take all the shine off our good start to the new year.” Sorry the was no good start, no shine.
However you interpret the events around Osborne this morning (and it does look increasingly like his office played everything by the book) Roger is right to say that for the man on the street the damage may already be done. Your ordinary voter glances at the BBC News website, sees “Osborne under fire over donations row” and thinks “bloody typical”. Only the anoraks amongst us seek the detail to differentiate between the various differing party funding issues. To that end, it is a point scored for Labour, but a pretty hollow one, and I think it has possibly eroded their credibility amongst thinking observers still further.
I am disappointed Nick P is trying to equate Hain and Osborne’s stories as both being cases of innocent but unwise reliance. There is a world of difference between declaring your interest to the person who maintains the register and being told by them it does not need to be made public (if that is the case - looks likely), and hiring someone to run your office and assuming they are counting the pennies correctly. That said, I think it is likely that Hain was acting “innocently” in the sense that he wasn’t trying to hide the money he raised, and for that reason I don’t think there is a compelling case for his resignation, although it remains a mark against him as a politician and yet again calls into question the ability of Labour MPs to deliver value for money - £200k for that awful campaign?
111-I agree.However it is the economy that would dictate.
If the average bod in the street was to be an extra £300 a month better off do you think they would care if it was the pound or Euro.
It may seem an extremely far fetched idea but dont rule it out.
I was canvassing yesterday and things don’t look brilliant for Labour. A key Brown policy, which is also different from the Blair era, is the ambitious plans to build more homes. As far as I can see this has totally failed to get over to the electorate, so the government needs to get a grip on this.
On the other hand I didn’t meet any declared Conservatives either, or anyone mentioning Cameron. It was just aparty, apathy, apathy.
43. You say Brown = Labour is toast but it needn’t be so. It would help if good communicators like Johnson and Benn were able to explain their own policies rather than having it done for them. Better organisation at no 10 and indeed a new general secretary could help matters.
BTW, as usual no one on the doorstep mentioned Europe, or the amending treaties.
107. A very good spoof post
101 George Osborne. I think this allegation is only an issue regarding the rules of the HoC and the declaration of interests there.
As you say, the public bit, and the declaration to the Electoral Commission under PPERA has been done. I am not entirely sure whether there is any provision for such public declaration to be registered by the Commission IF, say, a donor makes it clear that (s)he wishes the money to be used to finance GO’s office / Shadow Chancellor’s office at Westminster. If it were his constituency office, we would expect the donation to go through the Constituency Tories, and it would be declared as such (there are somewhat different rules for donations at local level). But, AFAIK, the only time donations to an individual come into this are when that person stands for election, when you have to declare what your political party gives you, as well as any other personal donations for the campaign.
So both GO and Peter Hain are in the frame at the HoC, and clearly, the authorities have not been sure of themselves in GO’s case. Yes, Osborne, like any other MP or public figure, should stay whiter than white on these issues, but I fail to see why he should be forced out on what is clearly a grey area and had asked and been given advice. Hain, OTOH…..
BTW, I am very disturbed that many people, on here, and Peter Hain himself and others accused of this sort of thing where breaches of PPERA have taken place, try to play it down - “small admin error” etc. The whole raison d’etre of PPERA was to tighten things to the point where sleaze was difficult. Now for members of the political establishment to play it down is very cynical. No wonder people take OTT and cynical views of them!
Also meant to say that Hain not resigning is a boon for the Tories because it drags this out longer and means Brown will have to make one of his much vanunted “tough decisions”.
What happens if Gord calls a referendum on the Euro and when the arguments are put Mr and Mrs Uk see they will be financially better off under the system.
The UK votes for it and lets Gordon off the hooki.
The Murdoch press then become an irrelevance.
I think it’s as simple as Mike and others have decribed. Cameron on TV leads to Tories UP, Labour DOWN. Brown on TV leads to Tories UP and Labour DOWN.
The Labour “rally” over the holiday period was because we saw less of these two Tory vote winners.
It’s ironic that the more Brown tries to turn things around the worse things become for Labour.
Oh Gawd! what a prospect, two years of the present government, lurching from disaster to disaster, then a GE. Then we’ll have those two PR spivs, Cameron and Osborne, (Camborne) in charge.
Still Sunday mornings on this site will be interesting, the papers full of the ususal, Tory MP caught with his hand down some tarts knickers or up a choirboys Y fronts, the ‘Blue Harpies’ lining up to explain it all away, ‘A misunderstanding’ life will have its compensations.
Cynics of the world unite you have nothing to lose but your….. well nothing to lose really.
107 timmo One major problem with that theory is that the other Euro users are most unlikely to accept a low value of the pound as that gives the UK a built in trade advantage and the UK takes a immense chunk of EU exports, greater even than the US.
In the years after the ERM mess as the Euro launch approached various European sources put a level of 1.4 or slightly above for the pound if it ever joined.
As a regular Euro user I would think that is still a little low as much of the Euro zone has inflation well above the CPI 3.1% reported. Like us that measure does not match what people really suffer. Spain, even under CPI, has a rate above 4% and a ‘real rate’ of much more than that.
The strength of the Euro is cushioning the rise in energy prices but even so the business picture is not particularly good made less rosy by the ECB being determined to kill inflation before reducing rates - the German solution, and very sound too.
We on the other hand keep talking about following the repeatedly failed British solution of easing rates while inflation rages on the delusion that will encourage exports and get us out of a mess. It never has before, it has simply made the pain last longer and get worse before effective action is taken.
There is no easy way out of a trade imbalance which has multiplied four times in the last ten years.
Here are the numbers in black and white.
Spreadfair(I only use this company because despite the 5% comm. you can trade your positions without paying the premium of the actual spread)
LAB 272.6-276.9
CON 295.1-304.5 ! That must be the result of Mike’s handiwork.
LD 47-52.4
Betfair.I do bet with online bookies but only when they are way out of line.For example I took 10-1 a CON MAJ of 1-25 but almost all my betting/trading is done with BF.
MOST SEATS
LAB 2.20-2.24
CON 1.86-1.89
‘OVERALL MAJORITY’ No Overall 2.56-2.66
LAB 3.45-3.65
CON 2.86-2.96
Liquidity is very poor all round but there are one or two tempters in that list.My general aim is to exploit illogicalities existing between the Spread Price and the Odds Price.The weakest link on that list is the LAB OVERALL to LAY at 3.65.
I have consistently awarded 570 seats to the two major Parties.Is this wrong and if so in which direction ? I did make a tactical blunder in closing my CON Buy for a LAB Sell BUT NO GREAT HARM DONE.
The key to it all is the performance or non-performance of the Lib Dems.I perhaps rashly awarded them 50 Seats.Is this majorly wrong ?
MOST SEATS
121 “Camborne” Oh, I see, coldstone, this is the “below the radar’ way the Tories will reassert a foothold in Cornwall?!
122-Witan
Your argument is sound but does nottake into account the political imperative.
Remember reunification in Germany when the Bundesbank fought tooth and nail against parity for the changing of Ostmarks to Deutchemarks.They lost and 1-1 prevailed.That ultimatley led to German problems for the next 10 years.
If the EU see the UK joining as the final piece in the Euro jigsaw they will take the economic disadvantages caused by a low entry rate.
I know this all looks fairy tale stuff but if Gordon is cornered we dont know what he will do….
Any more attacks on Osborne in the Mail and it’s readers on this site will stop having it delivered. Just think of all the ‘cut and pastes’ from Witan/Blue2Win that we’d miss!
106. What did Harman do that was illegal?
92. “….spewing forth such commonplace phrases as “fiscal arithmetic” or occasionally grinning like a serial killer”
Though I LOLed at this description of Brown’s interview techniques I did wonder where you got your information on serial killers?
121 On the subjects of tarts (coldstone raised it) … my prediction is that Labour’s plans to criminalize paying for sex will be their equivalent to Major’s “Back to Basics”.
The tabloids will be full of MPs caught in massage parlours & brothels, and kerb crawling (cf. the sad case of Joe Ashton former MP for Bassetlaw).
No doubt MPs will be found “carrying out research” into poor housing conditions at 1.00 am in the morning in red light districts.
And no doubt, if they are Labour MPs, we will have Nick Palmer urging us to applaud their efforts to research and combat urban poverty.
126 didnt harman get money from abrahams via 3rd party? oh no sorry thats not illegal-just an admin error- even though it breaks the law. nothing to see, move along
O/T After a week of consistantly good news for McCain polls in Michigan are narrowing again, as Romneys seems to have some luck in focusing all his efforts there. The last four polls are basically even.
VChandler offers 9/1 on Romney for the nomination, and I’ve taken some as insurance.
127 Bit reminiscent of Gladstone! Second time today there’s been a comparison with Victorian times - is this a trend?