Have the Tories broken 50%?
September 17th, 2008
Could the “rumour” possibly be true?
Anthony Wells on UK Polling Report is carrying a story that a rumour is going round that the latest Ipsos-MORI poll has C52-L24-LD12. If that is the case then it is pretty sensational.
I’ve been trying to contact senior people at the firm but so far without success.
I have enough respect for Anthony to know that he would have not published a rumour on his site without him having an inkling that there might be something in it.
In one or two recent surveys Ipsos-MORI has been reporting the biggest Tory leads of any of the main pollsters.
UPDATE I have now spoken to MORI who have confirmed that a poll that they did at the weekend will be published at midnight by the Press Association. Fieldwork took place from Friday until Sunday when the domestic news agenda was dominated by Labour’s leadership troubles. MORI were “unable to confirm or deny the figures”.
SECOND UPDATE A journalist who had the embargoed PA story in front of him has confirmed the figures to me. This is for real.
Mike Smithson
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Maybe this is what is needed to finally force a cabinet minister to go public?
28% lead over Labout and 40% ahead of the LibDems
Seems almost impossible
But perhaps the polling has picked up on the way Brown is under attack
and people are very unconvinced by the LD new direction
On those figures I’d sooner be Brown than Clegg!
Downhill all the way for Dave’s rating now. One day he’ll look at this and smile. The good old days.
If true Baxter gives Tory majority of 336
National government, of one party
Lib Dems would have 8 seats
Labour 121
*does not believe the above but liked posting it*
3 - I suspect the Tory leadership will be content with an election result that shows a clear, working majority.
No-one seriously expects this sort of result on the day of the GE
Here’s hoping. Will it finally spur Labour ministers into action?
Jack W: on the previous thread you reported a Zogby poll as O 47 M 45. IMO that is the correct way to report polls. However, in the past you have stated that you always include the minor candidates, Barr and Nader - usually, that depresses McCain’s numbers. In the case of the Zogby poll, when minor candidates are included that 2% lead vanishes and the candidates are tied at 45 each:
“The poll found McCain and Obama were in an absolute dead heat at 45 percent when independent candidate Ralph Nader and Libertarian Party candidate Bob Barr were added to the mix. Nader earned 2 percent and Barr 1 percent of the vote.”
http://www.reuters.com/article/vcCandidateFeed7/idUSN1642854220080917?pageNumber=3&virtualBrandChannel=10112
I trust the Big BUTT cannot lie and will adjust its averages accordingly!
What was the highest figure/lead ever managed by a party? Did Blair hit 54% in 1996?
Did Blair ever get this high before the 1997 election?
Good poll for the Lib Dems.
3 - I completely agree - let’s say September 2022 (when the Tories are down to 41%)
[2] - Yes, recently the Lib Dems have been stable at about 2/3rds of the Labour score, now [possibly] only half..!
I would never have expected that Labour would poll in the low twenties and still be comfortably ahead of the Lib Dems, as has been the case recently.
Must admit that when it was flagged up on the last thread I began to take the possibility a lot more seriously when I realised it was Anthony Wells reporting it rather than someone in the comments thread.
I find it ironic that within hours of Nick Clegg declaring Labour finished and the Lib Dems are the bright new hope and a poll comes out putting them back at Ming levels of support.
52% - can you believe what we were posting on this site after Gordon’s last conference?
Mindblowing.
7. Polling was not so accurate then, remember.
Is it MORI who changed their methodology after London? I’d still be inclined to put the most faith in YouGuv.
Like the sound fo my own witterings so much, have reposted!
159-Why the evident distaste at US “right wing” media? What about US “left wing” media, apaprently with MSNBC at the fore? But also the other mainstream media.
Personally I have no issue with media bias, so long as:
-not tax payer funded, cue BBC and apprently ARD in Germany
-you know what you are getting: I read the Grauniad every morning to get my daily dose of disgust and loathing of the left (plus it’s a genuinely good read!!). Also C4 News which has an agenda, good on them!
And ultimately, of course, (especially in the US) if you don’t like it you can find plenty of other like-minded news outlets on tv, radio and internet. When I hear lefty whingeing about Rush Limbaugh, remember, if people don’t like it they can switch off. Didn’t Gore and other denizens set up a Dem-leaning radio station (Radio America or Radio Free America or something?). Maybe the reason I forget was because it promptly bombed.
13. Good, isn’t it?
10 Cameron’s 1000 year reign…
I think I deserve some points for finding a bright side!
4 my apologies to those on the last thread that had already posted the Baxter figures - I had missed that
Still, jut a bit of fun
I must say the figures seem entirely imaginable to me as a snapshot today, depending on when the fieldwork was done. Voters don’t like divided parties, they don’t like incompetence and they don’t like navel-gazing. Labour has exuded all of these qualities in its wiki-coup. Meanwhile, if fieldwork was done after Nick Clegg’s £30 a week pension gaffe, he might well be being punished by older voters aghast at his ignorance.
I guess we shall see in due course.
Just the sort of confidence booster Brown needs before the Labour Party Conference !!!
6-Does ARSE/BUTT takle account for the fact that minor candidates are not on all state ballots?
Poor MORI. They used to be such a respected pollster
18. Jonathan, surely the bright side - for you - is that this poll (IF TRUE!!!) has come at just the right time to stiffen a few Cabinet sinews, and summon up some ministerial blood, and screw a few ambitions to the sticking place (etc etc).
Surely, surely, surely, this will goad the pathetic neoplasms that constitutes the Labour party into ditching Gordon. No?
According to my calculations (using my own spreadsheet) this gives the Tories a majority of 250 (Tories 450, Labour 152, Lib Dems (wait for it *s*) 17, Others 31).
Note to PtP - how does my approach of selling Lib Dem seats look now?
24 No comment!
As I said, we could be near Cameron’s peak.
When the real Mori poll comes out, it will be a bit of an anti-climax (particularly for Tories).
11% is the lowest Ming ever managed. This is Clegg’s worst poll ever.
How big do the Tories have to be before they split into being both main parties on their own?
Wet Tories: 212 seats
Dry Tories: 258 seats
Labour: 121 seats
Lib Dems: 8 seats
NI: 18 seats
PC: 3 seats
SNP: 20 seats
If it is true a Brown bounce next week could take the tories ‘down’ to 49%
total disaster for Brown.
personally attaching himself to this botched, appalling bank merger, will do him in for sure.
What I’d like to know is how come as many as 24% think this useless shower are still worth voting for. Unbelievable!
Interesting that the seats market hasn’t budged.
33 - Could it be waiting for the Labour leadership situation to be resolved?
OT Has Guido come up with any evidence for his Peston piece?
25 Albion
It was illogical on your own terms, and on your own numbers. That was the point I was trying to make.
And don’t pretend you saw that poll drop coming! We can all look smart with hindsight.
31. As I have pointed out before, some psychometricians claim that an IQ below 80 constitutes “mental subnormality” - therefore, by definition, about 1 in 5 of the population is retarded.
There’s 20% of the 24& Labour vote: the retards. The other 4% is those actually employed by the Labour party, or mad people.
Labour is basically a fair institution, Brown will be given his chance at Manchester.
Trouble is - he has the appearance and manner of IDS just before “The Quite man” rubbish.
I think they’ll get in a froth in the bars of Manchester, and when they get back to the House, the trouble will start. But don’t expect it to come from within the cabinet, it’s not needed or necessary. This is a foot soldiers and officer class rebellion - the Generals will not be involved
22 only Jack W knows that. I always thought including minors was inaccurate as they underperformed in the primaries. But you have to stick to your own methodology. Nobody knows how the Wall Street crisis will pan out but the Kos and Ras trackers stabilised for McCain today meaning yesterday’s polling was better than the day before. The debates will be v. important.
I am increasingly impressed by fivethirtyeight.com which has some awesome articles from the road in the swing states. It’s an unbiased site hosted by Obama supporters and if all his supporters were that nice I might vote for him myself! (metaphorically)
32. Probably people who want to bring out the “I didn’t vote for him card” as soon as Cameron becomes PM.
190 from previous thread: “Perhaps the French think Obama is not really American, hence their support for him. by runnymede”
-Dicey suggestion but probably something to it. I think much of the world, incuding much of France, would agree with the statement that a lot of the problem with America is that it’s run by Americans. The less “American” the leader, the better.
195 from previous thread: “Islamisation of the UK : College bans ‘Christmas’ and ‘Easter’ from calendar for fear of offending ethnic students. by Philippe Magnan”
-One thing I do think the French have gotten right is their opposition to “communautarisme,” which has been embraced with reckless abandon by the U.S. and the UK. I believe the French are correct in their assessment that much harm has come to our countries as a result and they wisely wish to avoid the same fate. Of course, they’ll have their own brand of related problems.
If Cameron gets anything remotely like this at the general election he will have a big enough majority to force through some truly radical measures - on education and welfare if nothing else.
36 would not profess to see it coming, but marginal differences in the Tory poll around 50% affect the Lib Dems proprotionately more than Labour. Feeling semi-smug. Right theory, right strategy (I think).
Now I know this is cruel and it feels a bit naughty but i just can’t help myself.
around this time last year i distinctly remember year Nick Palmer made a comment that he thought if Labour went to the polls then they could get a 1997 type majority. Now if someone could find me that post I would be eternally grateful, just for a fit of giggles.
(Mores seriously, while MORI have commendably reviewed their methodology, I’d still sit back and wait for YouGov and ICM. If indeed this rumour is correct anyway.)
New Scotland Minister Ann McKechin would lose her seat in Glasgow North to the Tory tidal wave
Tories gain Glasgow North?!! Say it ain’t so…
Not gonna happen, not even in my wildest fantasies do the Tories take a Glasgow seat
24 Poor Labour. They used to be such a respected party.
39-I agree, 538 does give the numbers and dissacoiate these from the text, also they update every day! They are of course Obamaites, but that does not affect the numbers. Only occasionally how to interpret the numbers in a way to keep up your good cheer!
(I refer you to my earlier post at 17.)
meanwhile the FTSE is down to the low 4900s…..
46 Dyed, they said that about a lot of safe Tory seats that went Labour in 1997
the next election will be a very interesting one
44 He was right, the next election will be of “1997 style proportions”……….
Height of the bounce to bottom (so far of the trough) a 20.1% swing Labour to Tory
ouch
41. The strange thing is, the French apparently dislike the US for its belligerent foreign policy and yet have been responsible themselves for numerous interventions - often with highly suspect motives - in their former colonies in Africa.
US Dollar and Wall Street falling hard.
Gold continues to rally +6.6%
Looks like a currency meltdown is starting.
What a day to come back from my break from posting!
Sorry about the posting on previous thread - I could not help having ago at Clegg, I try and do LD critism on other sites!
This 52% would be truely great for the Tories but would it be that unexpected given the Labour party internal problems at this time?
It is an extreamly worrying time with the economic backdrop and Labour are not providing suitable policies partly because they helped manufacture the problem.
Why are North Americans so paranoid about the “Islamisation of the UK”?
17- Lefties who can’t stand Rush don’t even have to turn off their radios. Even if Air America isn’t broadcast in their area due to terrible ratings, they can always tune in to taxpayer-subsidized commie-nostalgic National Public Radio, which is available almost everywhere.
44-I remember the quote vaguely. Not sure if it was a recycled quote or straight from Browtowe.
24. Would that be back in the days of 40+ Labour leads?
“33: Interesting that the seats market hasn’t budged.”
Well it is as yet still an unconfirmed rumour. If could cause huge shifts in the betting markets with unconfirmed rumours then I’d be typing this from the UKPollingReport yacht.
17 the left wing bias is only helping McCain at this point. Americans hate being told who to vote for. The debates, including the veep debate, will be vital.
56- Did you ever hear of Richard Reid?
50 I appreciate that and I am as big a Tory trumpeteer as anyone (often to the cost of actually making a valid point!) but they simoly do not have the people on the ground or the base to take seats in Glasgow… besides I expect the SNP to surge in these areas leaving Tory gains in Scotland to the borders and the west coast/Argyll regions and possibly the likes of Perth and North Perthshire
Tory in large poll lead. People flee into gold.
Makes perfect sense
Is there any way I can search all the blogs on here for specific words?
A couple of decades of Tory rule is on it’s people, woo hoo!
64
lol
60 Anthony when will you know for sure?
a poll with the Tories over 50% is important psychologically - doesn’t matter if it’s Mori or whoever. It may spur Labour action, it will set the tone of conference, it will make headlines, it will cement a feeling of inevitable defeat. It may quite well hasten a General Election.
Afternoon folks, here is my last posting from last thread:
Afternoon all, re the HBOS/Lloyds amalgamation etc I think there has to be an Act of Parliament because the Bank of Scotland was incorporated by Act of the Scottish Parliament (the pre 1707 one). Should be interestng what happens.
Frankly as a BoS customer, Iwould prefer Lloyds running it to the disaster which has been the Yorkshire organisation. BoS staff are totally demoralised. Gordon Brown is overriding the Mergers and Monopolies Authority. Wonder whether he has the power to do that without an Act of Parliament. Would be interesting if the Scottish MPs blocked it.
by Easterross September 17th, 2008 at 4:10 pm
I hear the Dow is heading south even after the AIG bale out. Reminds me of the George Soros run on the pound in 1992. This is only just beginning.
46 when I first voted in 1979 we were defending 2 Tory seats in Glasgow. If the Tories are ever to take a Glasgow seat back (which we wont do in 2010) it would be either Glasgow North or South-west.
I am however more interested in all the LibDem seats which become vulnerable and also Labour seats like Carrick etc, Ochil, Edinburgh North which we should have no hope of taking back. As I have said before, in Scotland the story of election night will be the anti-Labour vote and the main beneficiaries will be the SNP an Tories followed by the anti-LibDem vote again benefitting the SNP and Tories.
57-And PBS.
63 I will concede it’s not that likely in Glasgow
but I think the SNP makes big Westminster gains at the next GE, what do you reckon?
54 - Certainly things are looking bleak out there. I think that if we start getting currency crises then things get a lot lot worse. Remember China is going to be an enormous player in this as they have trillions in US$ reserves prinicpally in US Treasuries. If they lose faith in the holdings they have then they have the power to make everything that has happened this week look like a vicarage tea party!
62. Did you hear of Timothy McVeigh?
UPDATE I have now spoken to MORI who have confirmed that a poll that they did at the weekend will be published at midnight by the Press Association. Fieldwork took place from Friday until Sunday when the domestic news agenda was dominated by Labour’s leadership troubles. MORI were “unable to confirm or deny the figures”.
62 — Did you hear that most of the 9/11 terrorists came from Saudi Arabia?
71 yes - 15 seats plus
Tories - 5 Scotland seats, maybe 6
73- And your point is (drumroll please)…?
Possible answer, just to help you out: ‘A country can only focus on one brand of terrorism at a time (for sake of simplicity, perhaps).’
44 Jimbo just for you”
Nick Palmer last autumn: “Having been a bit cautious about YouGov I’m impressed by that one -Populus nowadays has quite a sharp turnout filter. It’s presumably from just after The (ie Brown conference) Speech (remember Matt saying how rubbish it was?) but still. And yes, that is landslide territory, and a market on whether the Conservative Party will be called something else within 12 months might be worth opening. To be precise, Labour’s lead in 1997 was 12.5%, converting into a majority of 179. I don’t think we’d quite achieve that, but 100 looks increasingly possible.”
63 Dont underestimate the Tory grass roots. in Scotland the constituency associations are smaller but they are more dedicated street fighters. Remember the Tory campaign in Glasgow East. The Tories in Glasgow have been running leafleting days in the city for months now and indeed this weekend will be the 2nd Tory action day in Glenrothes and the by-election hasnt even started.
Across Scotland the Tories have been running leafleting and action days for months now, especially in seats like East Renfrewshire which we intend to regain.
75- See 77.
73 — Not forgetting Terry Nichols and Eric Rudolph.
‘A country can only focus on one brand of terrorism at a time (for sake of simplicity, perhaps).’
Well at least that means your countrymen have stopped funding the IRA.
81- Changing the subject is rarely a good way to win an argument.
74 - So some of the rumour is true; there is a poll coming out. If someone is making up a bullsh*t rumour, they have done so with some panache.
The dates of the fieldwork belie my idea behind a Lib Dem drop in support though.
ZOMG! is the only reaction to this and doubtless a ‘OH NOES’ from Broon.
69-Interesting you mention south west. Cathcart, apparently no longer a “Glasgow” seat, was the only one they lost in 1979 (Teddy Taylor), but it was in the south east I thought.
In the heady days of 1983 the Tories did win Renfrew west with about 32% of the vote, and at a time when then SNP were in retreat! Is that where you think a Glasgow SW Tory (very) hypothetical win would come from? {also Strathkelvin & Bearsden, since subsumed into East Dunbartonshire?)
How about one in Liverpool?
Unlike other big cities in England (Leeds-Bradford, Newcastle, Manchester) the Tories can’t claim that commuters in those cities do not have a Tory MP. I think Sheffield will get its bye when High Peak goes Tory again in 2010 (or increasingly 2009).
Guess Southport, Sefton Mid, or ,more likely, the Wirral seats will do the trick.
The pound is, for some reason, up against the Euro. Not much but it is up a tad.
76 The Tory seats I expect after the 2010 election in Soctland are
Dumfries and Galloway
Dumfriesshire etc
Berwickshire, Roxborough and Selkirk
Edinburgh S
Stirling
and then maybe one of Renfrewshire E, Perth and N Perthshire and Argyll and Bute, Edinburgh SW
In case anyone was worried, according to Baxter the Rt Hon Member for Kirkaldy and Cowdenbeath would be safe at the next general election on those figures.
Indeed if Brown does manage to hold on (and I’m getting doubtful now) the choice of MPs for next leader after the next GE might be pretty small.
78 : Re the esteemed Nick Palmer: “a market on whether the Conservative Party will be called something else within 12 months might be worth opening.
Dry Tories
Wet Tories
So far, Labourhome seem to be in blissful ignorance of the poll rumours. Be interesting to see the comments if it’s confirmed.
The excitement is rather damped when you realise this is a MORI poll. They have a lot to prove. Has their methodology review done the job or not? The before was not reliable. Perhaps the after will be better.
Got caught by the thread change so repost, as an attempt at a fair comment on Cleggs’s speech:
Heard most of Clegg’s speech on the radio. It came across OK rhetorically - the odd minor stumble but generally forceful and clear. The main coherent message for the part I heard was ‘freedom’ - trying to define that as the LD USP makes sense, I think,since it appeals both to some Tories (he sounded like David Davis on the hideous menace of CCTV) and some Labour people. Some details were odd - I don’t think the idea of “people-shaped benefits” works as an image (I tried to visualise one and boggled). The example he gave was both odd and patronising - paying Winter Fuel Allowance 4 months later, at the end of winter, as otherwise pensioners are so thick they’ll have spent it on something else. He praised at length the way a disabled mum in Sheffield was getting tailored help - but it sounded as though this was simply the Government’s Direct payments scheme. And they were going to double their seats - wow - but in the next breath ‘and take a first big step towards that at the next election (oh, not double them, then, only in 2018 or so?).
But one can analyse conference speeches to death without really getting the sense, which in this case was simply ‘we are a freedom-loving alternative to the big parties’. So far as it goes, I think that worked.
Martin Coxall last thread: any attempt to build righteous indignation on the assumption that there’s something seanT wouldn’t dare to say is built on sand. Thanks to John O for digging out the quote.
————-
The poll sounds grim but odd - I can well imagine all the stuff about leadership challenges hurting Labour, but why should there be a marked LD->Con swing instead?
90 - See my comment at 29
56. I think it’s just Phillipe Manganan and the fact that he treats the Daily Mail like a serious news source.
84 - Yes, think what LibDem support would be if the fieldwork had been done AFTER Clegg’s £30 pension gaffe.
73-I do remember. I also remember the lack of howls of protest from the usual suspects when he was executed.
I somehow doubt they would be so quite if Bin Laden were captured, tried and executed.
Why? Was it becasue McVeigh was white? Or was it because it was perceived he was on the “right”?
The conservative share of the opinion poll should hit 60% soon after the HBOS shambles,despite the fact that I hope you have made money trading their shares.
City rumours are that it will soon become Northern Rock Mark 2.
I raise my glass to Prime Minister Flint!!!
This is unbelievable. The news item “Clegg in call for fairer Britain” is STILL not one of the most read/emailed/popular news stories on the BBC website.
WTF is going on? Are people mad? As soon as I saw the headline “Clegg in call for fairer Britain” I just clicked on, immediately. I was literally stunned. Nick Clegg has called for a FAIRER Britain??? I asked myself. How can this be??? Like I said, it shook me to the roots of my being.
And yet this incredible, incredible news, that Nick Clegg has called for a fairer Britain, seems to be going unnoticed. This is simply ridiculous.
NICK CLEGG HAS CALLED FOR A FAIRER BRITAIN!!! How much more newsy can it get?? The leader of a minor and declining party has made a meaninglessly trite remark !!!
THIS IS BIG. This is HUGE.
This, my friends, is IT. The BIGGIE.
I think when people come to their senses this revelation will sweep the world.
CLEGG IN CALL FOR FAIRER BRITAIN. One day we will look back and remember what we were doing, the day Nick Clegg called for a fairer Britain.
83. The point is that terrorists can come from anywhere and have any motive. Being paranoid about attacks by British muslims is irrational.
This sounds like a sensational poll.
If true, changes from the last MORI poll see;
Con +4 Lab N/C Lib -5
Wouldn’t it be typical on the day Clegg tells his party to go home a prepare for government, if the Lib-Dems polled 12% in a national poll?
Reasons for this dramatic movement? Well, Labour tearing itself apart has probably seen more floating voter decide to move to the Tories, because if there was an election, they wouldn’t want to risk letting Labour off the hook by voting for a bunch of insignificant nonentities like the Liberal Demorcrats.
Oh, and don’t forget about all those millionare Tories now returning home after jetting away on holiday through July and August.
99 - HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
78. Cheers Witan, had been bugging me for a while.
May I just post to say that I did think that a 50% poll would come and that it might well be the tipping point. Can Cbinet ministers STILL close ranks after this, just before the Labour Conference. I think its just too much….
O/T - There are some completely idiot presenters on the Beeb, they are reporting that the White House and US Fed are concerned about other companies, and the bimbo reporting says “They haven’t named any of those companies they are concerned about though”. Er think about it dimwit!!
65. Albion
you can search a site using google. it is in the advanced options bit - can’t remember the syntax to do it in the main window, but it ain’t hard. often better than the search engine at a site.
‘Or was it because it was perceived he was on the “right”?’
Of course it was.
94. Out of interest, do you work for one of the big consultancies ?
99 Nice Work SeanT! Screw Churchill, Cleggs in town.
Dow tanking - another 3% off and FTSE losses approaching 10% this week
Ugh
O/T Answering Stars and Stripes and Sean Fear regarding French minorities and elections
Actually the French ministers for justice and housing are arab women and my former classmate rama yade , black, muslim, and 32years old, is vice minister of foreign affairs.
Loads of african and north african people are elected at municipal and regional level, some as MEPs. The problem is with mps, the single mp cstituencies seem to play against minority candidates, as we don’t have gerrymandered minority districts as in the USA (and the new boundaries due to be drafted in the coming months will not take that into account as well, for the simple reason that census by race is forbidden by law in France).
However even constituencies with majority non-white populations vote for white mps. This has a lot to do with the allocation of these super safe seats to socialist apparatchiks. Ironically only the right present non white candidates there.
Sarkozy made a very symbolic opposite gesture when he imposed rachida dati as his candidate for mayor of paris poshest district (she won easily).
So there is some progress and this issue has provided Sarkozy with unlikely supporters, coming for the left and fed up with their mistreatment…
SECOND UPDATE A journalist who had the embargoed PA story in front of him has confirmed the figures to me. This is for real.
110 - Yeah, not looking good!
SportingIndex has just notched down 2 seats for Labour: 224-230. LibDems unchanged.
How can this be?
Only yesterday Nick Robinson told us “when times get worse, we cling to nurse”
112 - Thanks Mike
It has been quite a day
100- “Being paranoid about attacks by British muslims is irrational.”
That statement would have been understandable, although wrong, immediately before the Richard Reid incident. Now it’s just wrong.
113 FTSE has closed out of sight of that 5000 comfort blanket. If the Dow continues its slide we could be looking at another far Eastern bloodbath overnight. DOW and S&P futures ugly at the moment.
112 - Woohoo!
IMHO the bigger the Tory majority the better.
I suspect some of the “I never thought I’d win” brigade will be staunchly anti-EU. Hopefully they will also be happy to bring back the rope, and relish the inevitable rumpus with the EU over it.
Even better, hopefully they will ban Trade Unions, disenfrachise (selected; ie those who don’t vote Tory. LD or SNP/PC only after investigation) ethnic minorities, prosecute, sexual “minorities”, make those executed pay for the wear and tear on the rope, etc.
One can only dream…
Oh well, back to the sordid reality of Blue Labour….
Those who think Obama’s chances are improving as some of the latest polls seem to suggest and/or are likely to improve as he starts to throw his much bigger pile of mega bucks at the advertising campaign, should consider taking Paddy Power’s stand out odds of 6-4 on him winning Ohio. It’s difficult to see him winning without this key state, yet he’s very likely to prevail with it. On this basis these odds look very generous compared with backing the man himself to become POTUS at best available odds of 0.7-1, i.e. less than half the price.
Those who are not yet convinced that the Tories will win an overall majority at the next GE - which from a purely detached numbers point of view remains a big ask - should take the 3.3-1 highest ever available odds with Betfair on there being a NOM outcome. This compares with best odds of 2.4-1 available from the conventional bookies, a massive difference and a handy bit of insurance with probably 19 months still to go before the GE.
“I think it’s just Phillipe Manganan and the fact that he treats the Daily Mail like a serious news source.”
Worse, he treats Mark Steyn (”The Iraqi insurgency will peter out by spring 2004.”) like a serious news source.
Peter2′, there’ll be no complaints from me when Bin Laden is tried and executed, any more than I’ll be bothered when the Buddhist-fundamentalist mass-murderer Shoko Asahara comes face to face with the hangman’s noose. I was living in Japan when his lot were letting off nerve gas on subway trains.
Evening Standard are reporting that Eric Joyce will be resigning after conference
Only a PPS - but still…
43 LOL!
As long as it’s the right profit, it doesn’t matter, Albion!
117. What is ridiculous is thinking that Islamic Terrorism directly follows from changing Christmas to Winterval.
What’s even more ridiculous is thinking that “they” have actually changed Christmas to Winterval.
The most ridiculous thing is taking the Daily Mail seriously.
50%!
That may even be enough to quieten David Cameron’s critics over at Conservative Home
Some historical context;
The last time the Tories polled 50% with MORI (or any pollster) was August 22nd 1988.
This is the Tories second largest every lead since 1987. In October 1978 they polled 53% with Gallup.
http://ukpollingreport.co.uk/blog/historical-polls/voting-intention-1987-1992
123 - I read that as Eric Pickles…
117 - And not just the Richard Reid incident. Britain has been quite a fertile source of Islamic terrorists and their sympathisers. On this particular issue, Americans are being quite sensible. (But don’t get me started on US support for IRA terrorism..)
118 - HBOS being taken over and still looks like being down hugely! So far we havent seen a major panic sell off, I think we could be building up for a very very big drop.
111 Thanks.
122 I enjoy a lot of Mark Steyn’s articles.
125. That was the local Tory MP talking about Winterval, which makes it even worse.
108 - I do, but you’ll understand if I’m reluctant to say which one!
G What is really silly is those who believe that changing Christmas to Winterval will actually improve community relations
120. You make a serious point, however, in that those who get elected and never really though they would ( ie not on DC’s A list) will more likely be the headbanging right wing children of Thatcher, ie fiscal conservative, small statist, anti european !!!
Would be a joyous time indeed.
Where is Nick Palmer when you need him???
125 These demands rarely come from Muslims, but rather, some white left wingers assume that our cultural traditions must be offensive to them.
However, if you are inclined to carry out terrorist acts in the name of Islam, you might find such attitudes among people in authority an encouragement.
130 Yep I agree - looks bleak
111- Thanks for that. Although it should be mentioned that people like Dati are not elected members of the National Assembly or Senate. Sarkozy has long advocated for a version of affirmative action (which Chirac opposed) and it’s not surprising to see the support from unexpected quarters he’s received as a result of putting it into action as President.
ITN just rang up to ask the usual stuff and said they were satisfied the poll was correct, and asked what I made of the huge LD-Con swing. Evidently the electorate have decided the authors of the world’s economic problems are the LibDems…
130.
Don’t believe all that you hear and read about the HBOS takeover.
I’ll give a metaphorical cookie to anyone who can correctly guess who Eric Joyce nominated to be Deputy Leader of the Labour Party last year…
131, is it my Steynian duty to breed more white Christian babies before the fuzzy-wuzzies take over?
112. Labour are F*CKED. And the Lib Dems.
If this poll doesn’t bury Gordon, then it proves that he must have some hoodoo over the Cabinet, that prevents them acting rationally. Perhaps the prime minister has demanded one testicle from every Secretary of State, which he keeps in a safe for just such a moment - to threaten those who express disloyalty.
Of course, it’s just one goolie, you might say, you’ve got another. But such is the weak and piffling effeminacy of Labour ministers, taking just one cullion would deny many of them their entire reproductive apparatus.
That’s why they’re scared to act.
Chris (from Paris) - you were in a class with Rama Yade?!
I am mroe than a little jealous…
Morgan Stanley down 41%
Re. 127. That of course should have read October 1987, rather than October 1978.
129. Do you mean all those chaps from Yorkshire and Lancashire who went on thir hols to jolly camps in Afghanistan and Pakistan were actually training to be terrorists? Egad!
133. Quite, I was just interested at the attempt by the one in Mayfair (Rhymes with a city on US East Coast) and the one on Jermyn street to recruit disgruntled bankers, especially given what must now be a surfeit of out of work bankers.
135. And lets have more of them. The A-list is packed to the brim with vacuous bien-pensant plonkers. We saw a clutch of them posing in Tatler last week and suffice to say they are not going to save us from doom.
Ha ha ha
Love it:
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/09/what_states_are_really_in_play.html
“fertile ground for Obama, who does best among… very highly educated secular whites who do not own or use guns”.
Guess that’s me, and guess to it is dangerous to typecast people!
121 Thanks PfP - That’s a really handy tip on Ohio.
As for NOM, there’s a great twin bet to be had. Buy Cons (or sell Lab) on the spreads, and back the NOM option on Betfair. If Labour do contrive a comeback, you’re covered.
140: Nick, who do you blame for your parties polling?
134. Yes I know.
But no one has actually done it. The. Mail. Is. Lying.
137. That’s a bit of a silly argument. You could say that Section 28 encouraged “queer bashing”.
Wow - running at approx 200 comments an hour. This is the busiest we’ve been since David Davies resigned…
I just watched Clegg’s speech in full.
It was quite good, actually…maybe I’ll give him a chance.
142 Morus - I’ll have a wild guessand say…Hazel Blears?
140. No Nick, what it means is that more and more people are deciding not to waste their time and risk letting YOU off the hook by voting Lib-Dem - Lib-Dems will only do well where they are direct challengers to Labour - Otherwise its gonna be a case of Vote Blue, Kick The Reds, Yeah Baby!
153. The pollsters?
146 - Eek, they are pretty big!
I know the Beeb do not routinely report polls but how would they analyse this?
“Brown holds steady in latest poll”
“Almost half of voters hate Tories”
154 Not necessarily.
160 there are them and Goldman left as the biggies in the US - Goldman down 20% too
What really gets me is that if I was a liberal in the US, I’d definitely want to keep a gun at home.
142 - Hazel Blears? Are metaphorical cookies good for the waistline?
OK, few days later than suggested, but still:
“76 A poll in one of Sunday’s showing the Tories nudging 50% - with Labour 27% behind - might provoke a few more names though….
by Marquee Mark September 13th, 2008 at 3:00 pm ”
I still think it might provoke those extra names to revealthemselves.
161.
See RCP has now Obama ahead in Virginia
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2008/president/va/virginia_mccain_vs_obama-551.html
if true, mayeb Virgibia back in play, and it corresponds to some of the latest polls.
Personally, I still think VA will be a (narrow) McCain win come NOvemeber.
162. “However, if you are inclined to carry out violence against homosexuals, you might find such attitudes among people in authority an encouragement.”
I think people who want to carry out acts of violence will find whatever excuse they can.
165 - Not for the metaphorical waistline, no!
149 - Yeah, I don’t know why they’re doing that. We’ve actually done very well in-spite-of/because-of the credit crunch, but we’re still maintaining the policy deliberately losing 8% of UK workforce every 6 months, and hire exceptional people sparingly.
To be honest, apart from some post-M&A integration and some cash release work (like Working Capital release), I can’t imagine Financial Services is going to be the easiest place to sell work at the moment - consultancy is still discretionary spend that robs the client of cash which is expensive to borrow.
Personally, I wouldn’t bother hiring the majority of people who have just lost banking jobs. Their contacts are worth a lot less this week, and they won’t help you as much in the growing markets of work which are Mining/Natural Resources/Energy markets.
Are you a Consultant too?
150. I was very annoyed at the presumptuousness of posing for Tatler, but I would exclude Shaun Bailey from the description of : ” vacuous bien-pensant plonkers”, he hates labour with a passion. Might not have an OXbridge degree, but I thin khe represents a traditional type of conservatism.
140.
Yes - I have been saying it for a while! The LD’s are the problem, looks like you have given up on the local factors Nick! From your point of view there is no vote to squeese! Hope this cheers you a little by looking at the fact that this is dire for Labour it is even worse for the LD’s! 
This must surely be the point at which the Cabinet tell Gordon to get on his Bike and look for alternative work? In 1990 Labour nudged over 50%, the difference then was the Tories were in the Mid 30’s upward. This time Labour are obviously in the low 20’s - there is no way back for Labour now. I think one Labour MP has been on the telly in the last 24 hours saying as much.
156: Clegg’s speech was quite good but its timing with HBOS, this poll, etc is bad.
165 - comment 170 beat me too it! PtP wins the cookie for being first!
So, assuming Labour have a terrible conference, and the Conservatives have an excellent one (not a particularly far-fetched assumption?) what chance that the poll straight after Camerons speech might show the Tories breaking 60%?
168 I read an article a few months back suggesting that the demographics of Virginia have trended strongly Democrat since 2004. It will be tough for McCain.
172 - My thoughts at the time, exactly.
171. No I am not. Have a slightly unorthodox background and currently find myself doing a life sciences PhD somewhere in East Anglia, having previously worked in the public sector.
Applied to the one in Mayfair and was shocked not to be shortlisted, while the one in Jermyn street have encouraged me to apply but I have not as my ego has taken a bit of a hit.
172. Noted and I brim with delight at the idea of a new intake that hasn’t been to Oxbridge. I want to see more Tory MPs who are, shall we say ’salt of the earth’. I h