The Hung Like a Donkey General Election December 2019 Thread

[Awol]

2 hours ago, snowychap said:

Thanks, Donald.

Ha, I didn't even know postal voting fraud was actually a thing in the US?

From memory I think it was '04 or '05 when six(6!) Labour Councillors in our very own Aston were nabbed for harvesting postal votes from constituents and filling them in? As I remember they set up in a warehouse to do it, not exactly a kitchen table type effort!  I definitely recall that after the shambles of voter fraud and intimidation at polling stations in Tower Hamlets 2015, the government commissioned a review into tackling electoral fraud, because the idea about voter identification at polling stations was one of the recommendations, in addition to clamping down on postal vote harvesting by activists (one wonders why the Labour government didn't address it after the situation in Aston was exposed, but I'm sure they had their reasons.)

Point is Labour's people (politicians, activists, supporters) have form for it, and over an extended period.  Not a nice thing to admit if that's the team you (not you specifically, of course) support, but there it is. 

[Sam-AVFC]

2 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

In another column which has come to light, Johnson blamed single mothers for “producing a generation of ill-raised, ignorant, aggressive and illegitimate children”, saying that social housing was an enticement for them to become pregnant.

I wonder how many single mother households he'd created when he wrote that.

[Awol]

4 hours ago, Davkaus said:

Are the CPS discredited every time someone gets off? Someone being found not guilty doesn't mean there wasn't a case to answer.

Oh they were guilty, alright. Guilty of winning a referendum against the establishment. Both sides were fined for breaching spending limits (though Grimes was later cleared in court) and as Snowy said, the Old Bill hoofed out allegations against Banks before getting to court because there was no case to answer.   

Edit: I forgot that after the referendum Priti Patel presented a dossier of the Remain campaign's overspending activities to the Electoral Commission and they refused to even look at it, but you know, they're fair, impartial and all that...

Edited November 28, 2019 by Awol

[snowychap]

28 minutes ago, Awol said:

Ha, I didn't even know postal voting fraud was actually a thing in the US?

That's not the point I was making.

The point was about a recognised issue (i.e. voting fraud) being called 'massive' (i.e. appearing to be rather overblown in significance).

None of that is to say that any voting fraud, electoral fraud, overspending, offences against the Representation of the People Act, data misuse or fraud, &c. should be ignored, not dealt with or downplayed. These things should be dealt with accordingly and proportionately.

Edited November 28, 2019 by snowychap

[snowychap]

8 minutes ago, Awol said:

Both sides were fined for breaching spending limits (though Grimes was later cleared in court) and as Snowy said, the Old Bill hoofed out allegations against Banks before getting to court because there was no case to answer. 

That's really quite poor.

You seem to be suggesting that my post supports the line you were running when it clearly doesn't.

Have Banks and Leave.EU been 'cleared in court of false allegations made by the commission'?

Edited November 28, 2019 by snowychap

[Awol]

Just now, snowychap said:

That's really quite poor.

You seem to be suggesting that I agree with the line you were running earlier when my post clearly doesn't.

Darren, I don't presume that you agree with anything, ever. I was acknowledging your previous reply - which confirmed the NCA told the Electoral Commission to do-one, in so many words. 

[snowychap]

Here's a thread from Faisal Islam on the IFS verdicts on the Tory & Labour manifestos:

 

[snowychap]

10 minutes ago, Awol said:

Darren, I don't presume that you agree with anything, ever. I was acknowledging your previous reply - which confirmed the NCA told the Electoral Commission to do-one, in so many words. 

Edit:

Not worth it.

 

Edited November 28, 2019 by snowychap

[Awol]

7 minutes ago, snowychap said:

Edit:

Nope, still piss poor. But if that's the way you want to pllay it then I'll gladly ignore what else you have to say on the matter.

 

I genuinely have no idea what the beef is, but whatever floats your boat mate.

[StefanAVFC]

22 minutes ago, Awol said:

 winning a referendum against the establishment

We're still trotting this line out are we? 

[Awol]

1 minute ago, StefanAVFC said:

We're still trotting this line out are we? 

Yes, the establishment were vehemently pro-Leave, weren't they?  Also, I thought we'd all agreed about 10 years ago that the rolling-eyes thing was a bit sh*t? 

[peterms]

Also see Simon Wren-Lewis here on the IFS work, making similar points to others: they don't do macro, and this is a weakness.

Quote

...A more credible generic criticism of the IFS is that they do not do macroeconomics. I have in the past made this point. If you listened to the 2017 presentation I linked to above, you will see some discussion (13.02 minutes in) of the supply side of each party’s policies. Labour have a plus (more infrastructure spending) and according to the IFS negatives (higher minimum wage, higher corporation tax, more bank holidays), and the Conservatives have a negative (less immigration), so they assume both parties will have no long run impact on output! Now it is just possible the plus and minuses for Labour cancel out, but just one negative for the Conservatives cannot equate to zero. They also assumed the multiplier from a balanced budget fiscal expansion is zero. They clearly don’t want to do macro.

 

Does this matter? Yes for two reasons. First sometimes macro has a critical influence on their overall assessment of plans, and as my illustration in the previous paragraph suggests it is not good enough to wish them away. Another example is in their analysis of Labour’s 2019 manifesto, where higher public investment under Labour will almost certainly outweigh any impact of higher corporation tax on investment. It is better to be humble about ignorance than pretend to take it into account and then do nothing, and better still to do something more rigorous on macro. Second, as the media takes the IFS as definitive, it means macroeconomic aspects tend to be ignored, which - as with 2019 - is very unfortunate.

 

The IFS have a real problem here. Their basic funding is for microeconomic analysis of tax and spending changes, and not for macro. For the Green Budget this year they teamed up with Citi who did the macro analysis. In an ideal world they would team up with a respected think tank that is known for its macro analysis, like the National Institute (NIESR). In the meantime we need to look to the Resolution Foundation, that clearly has macro expertise.

 

In 2019, many of the key issues are macro, or are not addressed by the IFS analysis. To see that, read the letter in the Financial Times yesterday from scores of economists. Issues of stagnant productivity, lack of real wage growth, regional inequalities, the state of public services and the need for a green transformation of the economy are all key issues influencing peoples’ welfare, are addressed by Labour’s manifesto but are not part of the IFS’s analysis. That does not mean what the IFS does should be ignored - as I suggested at the start it is vital work they do - but just that what they do is not everything that matters to peoples’ wellbeing.

 

[snowychap]

1 minute ago, Awol said:

I genuinely have no idea what the beef is, but whatever floats your boat mate.

Really? I don't believe that at all.

[StefanAVFC]

There were members of the 'establishment' (wtf does it mean anyway?) on both sides.

The framing of Brexit as the working man fighting back against the establishment is just lazy and dishonest tbqh.

[Chindie]

It isn't enough to have barely swung a referendum on lies, it has to be revolutionary, heroic, sticking it to the man. They'll put a bronze statue of Farage's gurning pug face on the spare plinth in Trafalgar Square. True Englishmen can salute it, tears in their eyes, for years to come, the Union Jack warming their heart.

[Chindie]

Farage, Banks, Cummings as working class heroes is hilarious.

[StefanAVFC]

Wtf does this shite even mean?

14 days until the election fought on multiple issues, other than Brexit.

Then January 31st as the next cutoff, which still doesn't get Brexit done.

Him and his party are dishonest dickheads.

[snowychap]

4 minutes ago, peterms said:

Also see Simon Wren-Lewis here on the IFS work, making similar points to others: they don't do macro, and this is a weakness.

I'm not so sure that I'd have only selected the paragraphs you did there given that Wren-Lewis's post is entitled: 'In defence of the IFS, and why it cannot tell the whole story'.

Indeed the last sentence of the paras quoted says:

Quote

That does not mean what the IFS does should be ignored - as I suggested at the start it is vital work they do - but just that what they do is not everything that matters to peoples’ wellbeing.

The point that he is making, I think, is that their analysis should be taken alongside the analysis of others and in the context that they don't do 'macro' and that others do, &c.

[bickster]

1 hour ago, snowychap said:

Leave.EU and Banks's insurance company were also fined by the ICO in Feb of this year and though he 'announced' that they'd be appealing, I can't find any information as to whether they have or how that is progressing.

He'd be spunking money up a wall if he appealed. He's actually lucky the offence took place before the GDPR was implemented so was on the old fine structure

Vote Leave contacted many customers solely on his Insurance database and the Insurance Company tried to sell insurance to many people solely on the vote leave database. It's hard to conjure up a credible defence for that

.

[Awol]

5 minutes ago, StefanAVFC said:

There were members of the 'establishment' (wtf does it mean anyway?) on both sides.

The framing of Brexit as the working man fighting back against the establishment is just lazy and dishonest tbqh.

The banks, the big business lobby groups, all of the political parties, the vast majority of MP's and the Lords and the broadcast media were all pro-Remain. That's the establishment.

Not sure how that's controversial at all, but it's certainly not dishonest. 

If that poll from YouGov yesterday is remotely accurate (and I'd be surprised if it is) then many solidly Labour seats in the Midlands and the North are going to the Conservatives and their pro-Brexit campaign. You mentioned "the working man", but those are stereotypical "working man" seats, and they voted Leave. Is that also a dishonest thing to say?