It's not often I agree with a Tory.......

[Billy the Fish]

Does anyone really care anymore? It's like a choice between treading in dogshiit or cat sick.

I saw Osbournes speech on the news and it beggars belief really, but the other lot are about as trustworthy as the inhabitants of HMP wandsworth. I can't imagine it wqould change my life too much either way. Everyone arguing on this thread must be so entrenched and invested in their Red Team vs Blue Team mentality it's impossible for them to change their view.

I guess the same goes for most of the country, we'd be better off at the next election if everyone burned their ballot en masse, at least we'd have a chance of killing this broken system and getting something less corrupt in place.

 

[Machiavelli]

Long way to go so it might be wise for Labour supporters not to get too smug just yet. After all what was it Ed forgot to mention in his speech ? Ah .... yes .... only the small matter of the economy. I'm sure as the election gets closer people might decide voting for Bungle as PM and for Zippy as Chancellor might be a step too far.

This is a myth. Much of his speech was about the economy, and his plan for the economy for the next ten years. What he forgot to mention -- and admitted as much -- was the deficit.

 

[Machiavelli]

It's not UKIP winning seats that's the issue. If Conservative voters desert them in Tory marginals it will lose the Tories seats to Labour and perhaps the Lib Dems. It won't take much of a swing to have an impact.

Precisely. What Farage wants voters to believe is that they're taking votes off all parties, and they'll take MPs out of both Tories and Labour. Thus far, it's only been Tory MPs -- and (very) right-wing ones at that -- that have defected to UKIP; what they want is for a Labour MP to defect, I still very much doubt this will happen. What UKIP are is a right-wing populist party and rightly it's the Tories that are most concerned about them, precisely for the profound effect that they'll have in marginals in our out-of-date electoral system.

 

[Moshe Gariani]

& you will continue to refuse any inheritance offered?

I am no Mother Theresa but I will happily vote and campaign for a party that has as its guiding principle the interests of the many rather than the few.

The current emphasis on property, and inheritance from one relatively privileged family generation to the next, is a nail in the coffin of future social justice.

 

[father_and_son]

There is money swilling around. Difference between Tories and Labour is that Labour share it with the population, Tories hoard it for them and their business chums.

It is virtually impossible to HOARD money!

You spend it or you save it, but either way it fuels the economy, it creates jobs, it pays wages... not hoarded.

If you buy something, anything... you buy it FROM someone else, moving the money around and creating wealth for other people.
If you save money, then you put in a bank or invest it in a company... moving money around and creating wealth for other people.


Disagree all you like with how much wealth any particular individual (or you) gets, but there is a huge waterfall of money whereby anyone at any level who earns or spends or saves or in any way financially interacts with society, feeds the money back into the system and helps a huge number of people - this is what an economy is.

Money is not hoarded!

 

[spring hall convert]

in our out-of-date electoral system.

And the biggest irony - which party have been most opposed to electorial reform?

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha. Not so keen when it's your vote being split, are you?

 

[Skylar]

All the Muslim illegal immigrants who are massing at the French ports will be pleased and won't bother trying to sneak in now as they know when Labour get into power then Labour will send coaches to pick them up like last time.

 

[Seagull on the wing]

This is a myth. Much of his speech was about the economy, and his plan for the economy for the next ten years. What he forgot to mention -- and admitted as much -- was the deficit.

So Ed is going back to the policies of borrow/spend/borrow...exactly the same policies that worked so well,that when they left they little notes like...'There is no money left.
Labour and their voters want to hit the bosses and bankers and give the working man the money.(So they say...delivering is not so easy) Executive thinking...the very people who make the money and employ workers should be hit so they cannot expand and give out more jobs and increase production.
High taxes for the better off doesn't work...France tried it,put up taxes for the bosses...look at the mess they are in now,all the high earners have left the country, so they lost tax revenues all together......paramount to when Russia shot all her generals...
Somebody has to be in charge,somebody has to earn more than you...A labour vote is a short term memory vote...you cannot remember last time they had the reins..opened up the borders to anyone who wanted to come here,these people have to be housed,=or a hundred and fifty of them can be put up at expensive hotels ...you may moan that your not getting enough money,bet all these interlopers do....why do you think they are queueing up to get into this country.

 

[Deleted member 22389]

So Ed is going back to the policies of borrow/spend/borrow...exactly the same policies that worked so well,that when they left they little notes like...'There is no money left.
Labour and their voters want to hit the bosses and bankers and give the working man the money.(So they say...delivering is not so easy) Executive thinking...the very people who make the money and employ workers should be hit so they cannot expand and give out more jobs and increase production.
High taxes for the better off doesn't work...France tried it,put up taxes for the bosses...look at the mess they are in now,all the high earners have left the country, so they lost tax revenues all together......paramount to when Russia shot all her generals...
Somebody has to be in charge,somebody has to earn more than you...A labour vote is a short term memory vote...you cannot remember last time they had the reins..opened up the borders to anyone who wanted to come here,these people have to be housed,=or a hundred and fifty of them can be put up at expensive hotels ...you may moan that your not getting enough money,bet all these interlopers do....why do you think they are queueing up to get into this country.

Thank god someone is speaking sense here.

 

[Westdene Seagull]

And the biggest irony - which party have been most opposed to electorial reform?

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha. Not so keen when it's your vote being split, are you?

I think you may have guessed wrong at Machiavell's party of choice !

 

[Eeyore]

It's not UKIP winning seats that's the issue. If Conservative voters desert them in Tory marginals it will lose the Tories seats to Labour and perhaps the Lib Dems. It won't take much of a swing to have an impact.

I think that's what I'm trying to say. People are generally quite savvy in these elections. If there is a chance that switching their vote could let Labour in, then a Tory would most likely stay in the fold.

 

[spring hall convert]

I think you may have guessed wrong at Machiavell's party of choice !

I wasn't talking directly at him. More the supporters of the party in question. I can see how that could be misconstrued but I think we know where each other are coming from.

 

[spring hall convert]

I think that's what I'm trying to say. People are generally quite savvy in these elections. If there is a chance that switching their vote could let Labour in, then a Tory would most likely stay in the fold.

Sad really isn't it. If people want to vote for someone they should be allowed to vote for that option safe in the knowledge that

a) That vote will mean something
b) It won't basically be a vote for something that is the complete opposite.

We wonder why people don't vote in this country.

 

[Moshe Gariani]

France tried it,put up taxes for the bosses...look at the mess they are in now,.

France's debt problem is roughly half the extent of ours. French families enjoy a standard of living far higher than their UK counterparts with an emphasis on freedom and equality of opportunity that we can only dream about.

 

[spring hall convert]

All the Muslim illegal immigrants who are massing at the French ports will be pleased and won't bother trying to sneak in now as they know when Labour get into power then Labour will send coaches to pick them up like last time.

Well done for sneaking some Islamophobia into this one. It must have been pretty tough.

I reckon you should go for the music thread or the next match thread. Really up your game.

 

[34064 Fighter Command]

People have given up saying this government is a 'coalition government', due to those spineless Liberal Democrats. Though imagine how terrible a tory majority government would be? I am shuddering.

Pre 2010 Election:

Gordon Brown " I agree with Nick ...... "

David Cameron " I agree with Nick ...... "

Nick Clegg " I don't think that any politician deserves your trust - and you talked
about credibility - deserves any credibility until everybody has come
clean about what has gone wrong. Now, there have been some
changes to the rules and all that, the changes to the expenses rules.
But, you know, there are still people who haven't taken full
responsibility for some of the biggest abuses in the system. There
are MPs who flipped one property to the next, buying property, paid
by you, the taxpayer, and then they would do the properties up, paid
for by you, and pocket the difference in personal profit. They got
away scot-free. There are MPs who avoided paying Capital Gains
Tax. Of course, you remember, what was it, the duck houses and all
the rest of it. But actually, it's the people, the MPs who made these
big abuses, some of them profiting hundreds of thousands of
pounds. I have to stress, not a single Liberal Democrat MP did
either of those things, but they still haven't been dealt with. We can
only turn round the corner on this until we're honest about what
went wrong in the first place. "

" Listen, none of this will make any difference if we allow this rotten
system in Westminster to carry on where MPs have jobs for life,
where they basically only need to get 20, 30% of your votes in their
areas, then no questions asked, they don't even need to bother until
the next time there's an election. There is a direct correlation
between the hundreds of Labour and Conservative MPs who have
got these safe seats, these jobs for life, and the levels of abuse in
expenses. "

" I'm absolutely dismayed by this. This is something I actually put
forward in the House of Commons. We already could have had that
law, people already could have had the right to sack corrupt MPs.
Labour MPs voted against it. Conservative MPs didn't turn up. "

" All I would appeal for is just a bit of honesty in this debate. People
know that money is tight. People know that you can't promise
something for nothing. You can't say you're going to fill the deficit
tomorrow and you're going to give lots and lots of tax breaks to
people, inheritance tax breaks for double millionaires, tax breaks for
one in three hand-picked married couples, and also extra, extra
money to the NHS without explaining how you're going to do it. "

 

[Seagull on the wing]

France's debt problem is roughly half the extent of ours. French families enjoy a standard of living far higher than their UK counterparts with an emphasis on freedom and equality of opportunity that we can only dream about.

Yep,that's why our economy is the fastest growing in Europe and France is now becoming the basket case...part of what keeps the French going is the C.A.P. unfair dole out ...we pay the second biggest dues to the EU and get one of the lowest returns

 

[Eeyore]

Sad really isn't it. If people want to vote for someone they should be allowed to vote for that option safe in the knowledge that

a) That vote will mean something
b) It won't basically be a vote for something that is the complete opposite.

We wonder why people don't vote in this country.

The irony is that, if UKIP defectors do any damage in seats they cannot win, I suspect it will be less in Tory/Labour head to heads and more elsewhere. Where the UKIP vote is lowest, it will be more hardcore. A good example is Brighton Pavilion. Labour may have lost a few voters to UKIP, and they may stay in this case as they are defecting where they cannot win. But the Greens will lose hardly any. That could be telling in the result of less than, say, 1500 votes.

When I studied politics I was quite surprised to discover that the 'split vote' theory is quite toothless for the most part. Yet politicians drum it into us.

 

[Skylar]

Well done for sneaking some Islamophobia into this one. It must have been pretty tough.

I reckon you should go for the music thread or the next match thread. Really up your game.

Don't play the race card, we've had that since 97 and look what has happened.

 

[34064 Fighter Command]

It is virtually impossible to HOARD money!

You spend it or you save it, but either way it fuels the economy, it creates jobs, it pays wages... not hoarded.

If you buy something, anything... you buy it FROM someone else, moving the money around and creating wealth for other people.
If you save money, then you put in a bank or invest it in a company... moving money around and creating wealth for other people.


Disagree all you like with how much wealth any particular individual (or you) gets, but there is a huge waterfall of money whereby anyone at any level who earns or spends or saves or in any way financially interacts with society, feeds the money back into the system and helps a huge number of people - this is what an economy is.

Money is not hoarded!

It's the banks that are currently hoarding money - ask them for a loan and wait for them ( at the slightest hint of any risk ) to show you the door.

That's not to say there isn't money to lend, there's plenty. Just that no-one can get there hands on it as long as the European Bank are insisting on Lenders shoring up their levels of reserves.