big\_dave wrote:Richard Seymour weighs in for the Jacobin.I think you mean this, unless this is an especially oblique joke. In which case, carry on.

POLIDICKS.

Just had a look at the upward shift in share prices for estate agents like Foxtons and Savills over the last few hours. Grim.

Just devastating. Feeling crushed. 5 more years of this. Further Education has taken a 40% cut since 2010. There will be more. My job is becoming untenable, these kids' futures are fucked. Looking at houses in Glasgow on RightMove

I am besides myself with despair. I have to play a gig tonight and I really don't know how I'm going to do it.

What a fucking disaster. Goodbye Miliband.Am looking forward to Ashdown eating his hat though. John Turbo wrote:Basic point is the SNP vote has helped Tory vote in the UK.You have no idea what you're talking about. As has been said, Labour, by being a vague purposeless pandering heap of dung, has helped the Tory vote. ---Anyway, as Goatlord has said. Deepest condolences to all back in the U.K.

Dudley wrote:sleepkid wrote: As has been said, Labour, by being a vague purposeless pandering heap of dung, has helped the Tory vote. Hmmm. I know what you mean, but I think this is looking too much at the parties and not enough at the electorate. Tories win an absolute majority, UKIP get 12% of the vote nationwide - are you saying that, Labour-SNP shift aside, the Labour party made those people that right-leaning? I'm a Labour supporter, just to be clear, but I think the main problem with the Labour party in this election was their attempts to reach a right-leaning electorate, with their immigration policy (I use the term loosely) and so on. I would desperately love the Labour party to have moved to the left, to have fought harder against austerity, to have pushed a much more positive message on immigration and so on, but I think the party thought (rightly or wrongly) this would marginalise them, pushing them into the kind of territory the Green Party finds itself in, more ethical, more ideologically sound, but unelectable. So they went after those centre/right-leaning people. And still lost. I'm not saying that was the right thing to do, but I don't know whose votes, other than some that went to the Greens, they would have gained by placing themselves more to the left at the start of the campaign. My guess is that Scotland was already lost to Labour after the referendum campaign, and that even a severe move to the left would have done little to remedy that situation, whilst losing people from the centre.Our elections are effectively decided by middle-class people worrying they might be worse off financially. The thing I will never understand is the people in the middle. The undecideds. The last minute mind-changers. I can understand people being torn between Labour and Green, or (pre-referendum) Labour and SNP, or between Tory and UKIP, but who the fuck would be torn between Tory and Labour? For all the short comings of the campaign and the policies, I thought the ideological lines ended up being quite clearly drawn. Who isn't sure how important the NHS or the welfare state is to them?As I said pandering, and you talk about Labour trying to gain some foothold with people who might be centre-right, that pretty much says a lot of it. The rest of it I think is as you said - the undecided. Labour didn't make a clear enough case, they were vague, and lost people who were undecided as to leave things unchanged or take things in a new direction (and I do believe people can swing Tory to Labour on something as simple as that, without any thought to policies or anything else political - just it's time for a change) Also, the people who couldn't be arsed to vote - also people who thought, according to the pre-elections polls that Labour would do well, so they didn't need help and who wants to vote for Milliband anyway? Reading friends Facebook feeds, while most of the people I know (including forum members) were motivated, I saw a lot of people in the comments who didn't seem to care, or thought it was all a laugh. The Labour to SNP shift is the most clear cut and obvious, but Labour has been hemmorhaging support for years - probably by their insipid moves towards the centre and right.

Last Man goes voting. But at least Markets are happy, it's good when Markets are happy. Will be nice holiday in Spain (or Thailand), and binge will taste better, and Romanians won't look so menacing for few days.

big\_dave wrote:Those campaigns were entirely reflective of the Tories' Scottish presence and would have been meaningless without it. They were played simultaneously with support of the SNP in Scotland. Lynton Crosby, the Tory campaign strategist, is now quoted as saying that nationalism in Scotland was the wedge that the Conservatives intended to drive against Labour.What Tory presence in Scotland?We can't be blamed if Lynton Crosby dupes the gullible with a false representation of nationalism. It's not really a question of blaming the SNP or the Scottish voter.Not according to Mr Turbo.

murderedman wrote:I'm still learning about UK politics. Is the Torie party the one with all the paedophiles?You learn fast!