TV- debatten Gordon Brown, David Cameron en Nick Clegg

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Op donderdag 15 april 2010 19:37 schreef tong80 het volgende:
Jammer dat we het hier niet kunnen zien.

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ITV.com will be the only place online hosting a live stream of ITV1's First Election Debate. Follow the event here with ITV News correspondents both during and after the programme. Interact with political experts with your own comments. And track the latest reactions with some really cool tools.

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Op donderdag 15 april 2010 21:15 schreef Thelonious het volgende:

http://nl.justin.tv/garthytv2#r=yQNEweM~

Hier kunnen we het kijken.

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Op vrijdag 16 april 2010 13:47 schreef Libereco het volgende:
Leuk om te lezen: Dutch courage

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Op vrijdag 16 april 2010 15:43 schreef du_ke het volgende:
Die kans is niet zo groot denk ik

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Op vrijdag 16 april 2010 19:18 schreef SeLang het volgende:
Btw: ik heb hier geen stemrecht, maar tot m'n verbazing kreeg ik een oproep in de bus voor zowel lokale verkiezingen (waar ik wel stemrecht heb) en een aparte kaart voor de parlementsverkiezingen (waar ik geen stemrecht voor heb)

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Op maandag 19 april 2010 12:13 schreef Monopoly_Man het volgende:
Polls zetten Nick Clegg nu zelfs voor de Conservatieven! Nooit gedacht dat zo'n debat zoveel invloed kon hebben.

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Op maandag 19 april 2010 14:43 schreef Viajero het volgende:

[..]

Heb je het debat gezien? Waar twee honden vechten om een been, gaat de derde ermee heen..

Brown en Cameron waren elkaar aan het aanvallen, en Clegg bleef daar heel slim buiten.

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Op maandag 19 april 2010 14:59 schreef Monopoly_Man het volgende:

[..]

Heb het gezien en inderdaad! Eerlijkgezegd, ik ben altijd al Lib Dem supporter geweest (woon/werk in Engeland, stem lokaal/Europees ook LD) en ik vond hem niet zo heel bijzonder in heb debat. Maar het is mooi om te zien dat, als zij eindelijk net zoveel tv-aandacht krijgen als Labour/Con, ze meteen de grootste partij worden!

Omwille van het stemsysteem/FPTP betekent dat nog niet dat hij premier zou worden, maar toch.

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Op maandag 19 april 2010 15:06 schreef freako het volgende:

[..]

Zelfs als ze de grootste partij worden, is het nog maar zeer de vraag of ze de meeste zetels halen. De aanhang van de partij is zo uniform over het land verdeeld, dat ze dan waarschijnlijk in bijna elk district tweede worden.

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Op maandag 19 april 2010 15:12 schreef Monopoly_Man het volgende:

[..]

Daar ziet het er inderdaad naar uit... ieder hung parliament is goed voor ze, en hoe meer stemmen ze krijgen hoe meer invloed ze zullen hebben daarin.

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Op maandag 19 april 2010 15:19 schreef Monopoly_Man het volgende:
[ afbeelding ]

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Op maandag 19 april 2010 15:21 schreef freako het volgende:
De verdeling LibDem 37 / Con 30 / Lab 24 / Overig 9 levert helemaal een sneue verdeling op

LibDem 37% / 206 zetels
Conservatieven 30% / 204 zetels
Labour 24% / 207 zetels
Noord-Ierland 18 zetels
Overig 15 zetels

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Op woensdag 21 april 2010 17:45 schreef freako het volgende:
Door de Nederlandse media wordt altijd benadrukt dat Nick Clegg half-Nederlands is, en vloeiend Nederlands spreekt. Hier een link naar een radio-interview uit 2009 met Nick Clegg over de bonnetjesaffaire, in het Nederlands:

http://nos.nl/audio/14911(...)onnetjesaffaire.html

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Op woensdag 21 april 2010 17:49 schreef Morendo het volgende:

[..]

Zijn Nederlands is echt goed. Meestal als mensen claimen 6-7 talen vloeiend te spreken, geloof ik het wel, maar hij maakt het waar ook.

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i'm voting for the icelandic volcano party, it's done more to stop immigration in 5 days than Labour has done in 13 years.

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Op vrijdag 16 april 2010 19:18 schreef SeLang het volgende:
Btw: ik heb hier geen stemrecht, maar tot m'n verbazing kreeg ik een oproep in de bus voor zowel lokale verkiezingen (waar ik wel stemrecht heb) en een aparte kaart voor de parlementsverkiezingen (waar ik geen stemrecht voor heb) . Ik ga op 6 mei gewoon naar naar het stemlokaal en dan zie ik wel of ik inderdaad een vakje rood mag kleuren

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Op donderdag 22 april 2010 11:24 schreef freako het volgende:

[..]

Wil je zeggen voor welk kiesdistrict je kunt stemmen?

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Op donderdag 22 april 2010 14:49 schreef SeLang het volgende:

[..]

Nee, dat is te specifiek .

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Maar het is een klein kiesdistrict in het zuiden. Sinds 1950 is het 7x heen en weer geflipt tussen Labour en Conservatives. De laatste 2 verkiezingen gingen overtuigend naar Labour.

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Op donderdag 22 april 2010 15:09 schreef freako het volgende:
Dan kon het nog wel eens spannend gaan worden deze keer. . Des te meer reden om te gaan stemmen.

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Op donderdag 22 april 2010 18:12 schreef Thelonious het volgende:

[..]

Je bedoelt Wilders of Nick Clegg als geblondeerde idioot?

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Op donderdag 22 april 2010 18:15 schreef Thelonious het volgende:
[ afbeelding ]

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Op donderdag 22 april 2010 18:19 schreef Thelonious het volgende:

[..]

Ik denk dat Gordon Brown er niet zit om zijn rijke vriendjes geld toe te schuiven. En dat is wel wat ik verwacht van Cameron.
Je kunt zeggen van Brown wat je wil maar het is geen elitaire zakkenvuller.

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Op donderdag 22 april 2010 18:12 schreef Thelonious het volgende:

[..]

Je bedoelt Wilders of Nick Clegg als geblondeerde idioot?

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Op donderdag 22 april 2010 22:36 schreef huhggh het volgende:

[..]

weinig mis met Farage hoor, om hem niet tot zo'n debat toe te laten.
Maar door hem bij zoiets uit te sluiten weet je zeker dat hij geen kans krijgt.

Bij BBC Radio 4-debat, een paar weken geleden, vond ik hem niet zo slechts al vaak wordt voorgesteld.

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Op donderdag 22 april 2010 23:26 schreef tim. het volgende:
Peilingen wijzen zowel Clegg als Cameron als winnaar aan. Ik vond Brown opvallend (tegen mijn verwachtingen in) sterk, en Cameron juist de verliezer.

Over een paar minuten bespreekt Alexander Pechtold bij Pauw & Witteman het debat.

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Op donderdag 22 april 2010 23:34 schreef El_Matador het volgende:

[..]

Kereltje Pechtold probeert er weer 2 zetels bij te lullen?

D66 is net zo hol als de PVV. Hoop geschreeuw, geen oplossingen. Jammer, want in principe hebben ze best een aardig idee.

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Op vrijdag 23 april 2010 00:20 schreef tjoptjop het volgende:
Bummer, ik bleek het toch niet op satelliet te kunnen ontvangen

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Five Reasons Why American Conservatives Should be Worried about Nick Clegg [Nile Gardiner]
Thursday night will see the second of three U.S.-style televised debates between the leading candidates in the upcoming British general election: Gordon Brown, David Cameron, and Nick Clegg. The focus this time will be on foreign policy, making the debate of direct relevance to U.S. viewers, who will be able to watch live on C-Span.

As Tim Montgomerie noted in an excellent earlier post, Nick Clegg, the leader of the Liberal Democrats, was widely judged to have won the last debate, on domestic-policy issues (though he failed to offer any real policy solutions), and his party has leapfrogged the ruling Labour Party into second place in the polls behind the Conservatives. Clegg is largely unknown outside of the U.K., but if his party does well on Election Day, he could hold the balance of power in Westminster, and the Liberals could form part of a coalition government if no single party has a ruling majority. This would potentially give Clegg an important say in British foreign policy.

I’ve already described Clegg as the anti-Churchill of British politics, and he is without a doubt the most left-wing major party leader in Britain in a generation. There is some common ground between Clegg’s views and those of the Obama administration, but I think even the current liberal White House would balk at some of Clegg’s extreme positions. Here are five key reasons why U.S. conservatives should be concerned by Clegg’s foreign policy if his party does form part of the next British government:

1. Clegg’s outlook is anti-American.

Clegg, a major opponent of the Iraq War, has made a number of statements calling for a completely new relationship with the United States and an end to what he mockingly calls London’s “subservience” to Washington. He rejects the idea of a “special relationship” with America, and believes that the top priority for Britain is to strengthen ties with a federal Europe.

2. Clegg is not an Atlanticist.

Clegg has called for an end to “default Atlanticism,” and has shown barely any interest in the transatlantic alliance. His party manifesto does not even mention NATO. As Clegg put it in a flagship speech in March: “Our strategic interests will not be served unless we release ourselves from that spell of default Atlanticism which has prevailed so strongly since Suez.”

3. Clegg does not believe in a nuclear deterrent.

Clegg has called for the scrapping of Britain’s trident nuclear deterrent and is firmly opposed to the use of force against Iran’s nuclear facilities as a last resort if sanctions fail. His national-security outlook is extremely weak in the face of mounting threats from rogue regimes, and he has been a fierce critic of key aspects of the U.S.-led War on Terror.

4. Clegg is a fervent supranationalist.

A former European Commission bureaucrat and a strong supporter of the Lisbon Treaty, Clegg firmly believes that Britain must give up key aspects of national sovereignty in Europe, including the pound, and supports the EU having a unified foreign policy and defense identity. He is a big believer in the power of supranational institutions such as the United Nations and summed up his views on sovereignty in a speech at Chatham House: “Globalization requires us to formulate a system of supranational governance capable of controlling forces which escape the limitations of the nation state.”

5. Clegg harbors strong anti-Israeli views.

To describe Clegg as a vociferous opponent of Israel would be an understatement — I’ve written in greater detail on this issue here. Clegg has penned a number of articles condemning Israel’s handling of Gaza, and has been the most prominent British critic of Israel’s response to Hamas attacks. He has alleged that the Israeli government “continues to imprison 1.5 million Palestinians and prevent the rebuilding of its shattered infrastructure,” and supports the U.N.’s use of the highly offensive term “collective punishment.” Clegg has drawn parallels between Israel’s defensive actions and the terrorist campaigns of groups such as Hamas, and has urged the European Union in the past to isolate and even sanction Israel.

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Op donderdag 22 april 2010 23:40 schreef tim. het volgende:

[..]

Nah, dat zal wel zijn eerste motief zijn geweest, maar nu gaat het over het plan van D66/GroenLinks voor een politiemissie in Afghanistan. Hij is wel de juiste persoon om daarover te praten.

En na een paar minuten over het Britse debat te hebben gesproken eindigde het weer met een paar campagneminuten voor D66 . Deed 'ie wel goed, maar ik had meer over het debat willen horen.

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Op vrijdag 23 april 2010 00:27 schreef Illiberal het volgende:
Die clegg is niet een al te beste kerel:
[..]

Achja, weer een land verloren aan de progressieven. Kan ook niet anders. Ik neem aan dat Netwerk, NOVA en de Nederlandse kranten al lopen te juichen?

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Op vrijdag 23 april 2010 00:27 schreef Illiberal het volgende:
Die clegg is niet een al te beste kerel:
[..]

Achja, weer een land verloren aan de progressieven. Kan ook niet anders. Ik neem aan dat Netwerk, NOVA en de Nederlandse kranten al lopen te juichen?

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Op vrijdag 23 april 2010 00:27 schreef Illiberal het volgende:
Die clegg is niet een al te beste kerel:
[..]

Achja, weer een land verloren aan de progressieven. Kan ook niet anders. Ik neem aan dat Netwerk, NOVA en de Nederlandse kranten al lopen te juichen?

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Op vrijdag 23 april 2010 12:09 schreef Vader_Aardbei het volgende:

[..]

''Verloren aan de progressieven?'' Sneu figuur. Je moet eens wat minder de Kool-Aid van Glen Beck drinken en meer zelf nadenken. Tijden veranderen, en je angstig vastklampen aan tradities leidt op de langere duur alleen maar tot verloedering.

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Op woensdag 21 april 2010 17:45 schreef freako het volgende:
Door de Nederlandse media wordt altijd benadrukt dat Nick Clegg half-Nederlands is, en vloeiend Nederlands spreekt. Hier een link naar een radio-interview uit 2009 met Nick Clegg over de bonnetjesaffaire, in het Nederlands:

http://nos.nl/audio/14911(...)onnetjesaffaire.html

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Gordon goes back to grovel in person to life-long Labour grandmother he called a 'bigot' for complaining about immigration

* Huge gaffe as PM insults voter, not realising Sky microphone was on
* Pensioner is life-long Labour supporter about to send postal vote
* World sees him hold his head in his hands as comments are replayed
* First he apologises by phone, then goes to Gillian Duffy's home
* Mandelson: He's deeply upset, this is not his public or private view

A humiliated Gordon Brown was forced to drive to a voter's house today to apologise, hours after he was caught out calling her a 'bigoted woman'.
The Prime Minister had to tear up his schedule to visit Gillian Duffy, 65, after his gaffe threatened to totally undermine Labour's election campaign.

Mr Brown had already apologised to the life-long Labour voter, who had quizzed him about immigration levels, by phone after realising his comment was recorded on tape.
But in farcical scenes, he later went to her terraced home in Rochdale, Lancashire, to speak to her in person to try and mitigate the damage.

He emerged looking chastened after an agonising 40 minutes to face the hordes of media massed on the drive.

'I am mortified by what has happened. I have given her my sincere apologies. I misunderstood what she said. She has accepted that there was a misunderstanding and she has accepted my apology,' he said.
'If you like, I am a penitent sinner. Sometimes you say things that you don't mean to say, sometimes you say things by mistake and sometimes when you say things you want to correct it very quickly.

The slip-up came on one of the few occasions he has not been accompanied on the campaign trail by his wife and public relations expert, Sarah.

Despite the frantic damage-limitation exercise, it risks delivering a potential mortal blow to Mr Brown's hopes of staying in Number Ten.
It could not have come at a worse time for the Prime Minister, just a day ahead of the final leaders' debate tomorrow night.

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Op woensdag 28 april 2010 22:50 schreef huhggh het volgende:
Hopelijk gaat Labour veel zetels verliezen.
Brown is nog erger dan Labour's grootste vijand, wat een lopende anti-reclame.

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Op woensdag 28 april 2010 23:00 schreef Monidique het volgende:

[..]

Labours grootste vijand is de conservatieve partij, dus erger dan dat kan hij niet zijn. Het is omdat ze meer dan een decennium uit beeld zijn, maar de Tories zijn echt, echt, echt heel erg waardeloos.

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She’s not bigot... he’s not clever

SHAMED Gordon Brown's election hopes seemed to be toast last night after he was heard calling a caring gran a "bigot".
The PM smeared LABOUR supporter Gillian Duffy, 66, without realising his slur was being picked up on a TV microphone on his lapel.

She tackled him about immigration after popping out for a loaf of brown bread in Rochdale, Lancs.
Last night Gillian's friends and family said Mr Brown could not have been more wrong.

Retired dinner lady Irene White, a neighbour who has known lifelong Labour supporter Gillian for years, said: "He made a mistake criticising her.
"She's a nice person and has worked hard all her life. She's not a bigot." Irene, 66, added: "If you can't speak your mind to the Prime Minister, what can you do?"

She spoke just hours after Mr Brown met Gillian on a walkabout.
His attack on the pensioner moments later was heard around the world because he didn't realise he was still "wired up" with a TV microphone.

Gillian was approached soon after to be told the PM had said something about her. At first she smiled - but was then near tears when told he had branded her a bigot.Clearly shaken she gasped: "You're joking. Where was I bigoted?" Family friend Nick Woodruff, 37, called Gillian a "lovely woman". And her nephew Andrew Duffy said: "She tells the truth."

He said Mr Brown had "made a massive fool of himself". And he added: "It's a massive gaffe, isn't it?"
The PM knew it - and was forced to make a special trip to Gillian's house later to offer her a humiliating personal apology. But the damage had been done. And a YouGov poll for The Sun last night indicated he may be toast at the election - with 46 per cent of voters quizzed reckoning he had been exposed as a hypocrite.Only one in four believed his apology was genuine.

Before the PM arrived at her home widow Gillian, who spent her life working with vulnerable kids for her local council, told The Sun: "It's awful the Prime Minister is going around talking to the electorate and then saying I'm a bigot when I'm not. It's shocking what happened.

"I'm not voting for him after what he called me. I'm very disappointed, it's very upsetting."

Gillian had popped out for a loaf of brown bread when she bumped into the PM. In public, Mr Brown laughed with her and said it was good to meet her. But a couple of her comments got under his skin.
FIRST, after telling the PM her family had always voted Labour - and her dad went to the local Free Trade Hall to sing The Red Flag - she added: "Now I'm ashamed of saying 'I'm Labour'."
THEN she asked about immigration, a thorny issue in a town hit by six per cent unemployment and genuine concern about the number of foreign workers in the area.

Feisty Gillian, whose husband died of cancer four years ago, told Mr Brown: "You can't say anything about the immigrants. All these Eastern Europeans what are coming in, where are they flocking from?"

The pair appeared to part on good terms, with Gillian calling the PM "very nice". But as soon as he climbed into his waiting Jag, Mr Brown revealed his true feelings.

He told close aide Justin Forsyth the encounter had been a "disaster".

When Forsyth asked him what Gillian said, he snapped: "Ach, everything. She's just a sort of bigoted woman who said she used to vote Labour."

The TV microphone, attached to the PM's lapel to record his walkabout exchanges, picked up the lot.

And he soon realised he was deep in the brown stuff. During a following interview on Radio 2's Jeremy Vine show in Manchester, the PM, unaware he was also being filmed, slumped forward and thrust his head in his hands as his swipe at Gillian was played back.
He said: "I do apologise if I have said anything hurtful and I will apologise to her personally."

But he also called her question about immigration "annoying" and hit out at the broadcasting of the "private conversation" with his aide.

The PM spent 39 minutes with Gillian after hasty arrangements were made to take him to her home. He said as he emerged: "I am mortified by what has happened. I have given her my sincere apologies."

Mr Brown claimed he "misunderstood" Gillian and she had accepted his apology.
He added: "If you like, I am a penitent sinner."

But Gillian's niece, who shares the pensioner's first name, said: "He has shown his true colours. He's always trying to pretend to be so nice and in touch with people. But he's not."
Business Secretary Lord Mandelson admitted there was "no justification" for the PM's comment.
Mr Brown sent a message to Labour Party members admitting his "mistake" would affect their campaigning. And he went on an unplanned walkabout in Manchester's Piccadilly railway station in a bid to repair the damage.

But he bungled again when he met a teenager in Army fatigues.
He told the lad: "Thank you for all you are doing for us. What regiment are you serving in?" The shocked teenager replied: "I'm not. I'm a cadet."
Mr Brown's anger at the question and the resulting "bigot" slur was strange given he insists it is NOT racist to talk about immigration. In November last year, he said: "I have never agreed with the lazy elitism that dismisses immigration as an issue, or portrays anyone who has concerns about immigration, as a racist."

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Op woensdag 28 april 2010 23:00 schreef Monidique het volgende:
en zonder Brown, vermoed ik, had Labour zelfs nog kunnen winnen.

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Op donderdag 29 april 2010 00:46 schreef Morendo het volgende:

[..]

Ik vind de Tories wel een prima partij hebben. En zoveel verschil is er niet tussen 'New Labour' en het 'Compassionate Conservatism' van Cameron.

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Op donderdag 29 april 2010 10:27 schreef Monopoly_Man het volgende:

[..]

De Tories stellen tax cuts voor voor de top 3% van de inkomens en willen geld besparen op andere vlakken. Ook willen ze van de Human Rights Act af en geven ze nou niet al te veel om bvb. homorechten. Hun "familiewaarden" en tax cuts voor mensen die trouwens zijn ook gewoon belachelijk.

In Europa hebben ze ook de centraal-rechtse partij verlaten om samen te werken met enkele erg rechtse partijen die niet geloven in klimaatveranderingen of mensenrechten...

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Op donderdag 29 april 2010 10:44 schreef El_Matador het volgende:

[..]

Dat de Tories conservatieven zijn, dat lijkt me duidelijk. Niks voor mij dus.

Maar dat ze die debiele klimaatveranderingsbullshit verwerpen, spreekt alleen maar voor ze.

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Op donderdag 29 april 2010 10:50 schreef Monopoly_Man het volgende:

[..]

Ehm... nouja, je mag het bullshit noemen.

Zij verwerpen het trouwens helemaal niet, ze werken wel samen met partijen die dat doen...
http://en.wikipedia.org/w(...)tives_and_Reformists
ChristenUnie zit blijkbaar ook in de groep!

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Op donderdag 29 april 2010 10:55 schreef El_Matador het volgende:

[..]

Zeker. Er is geen enkele natuurwetenschappelijke basis voor de onzin die er gespuid wordt. Het is een grote schande voor de natuurwetenschap die op deze manier verkracht wordt.

Ja, dat is logisch; ze zitten in een Europese fractie, maar dat zegt niks natuurlijk. De GristenUnie loopt als een laffe hond achter die klimaatonzin aan, dus het standpunt van een Europese fractie waar toevallig dezelfde partij inzit, is geen teken dat de Tories het klimaatgelul verwerpen.

Dan beter UKIP.

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Op donderdag 29 april 2010 10:50 schreef Monopoly_Man het volgende:

ChristenUnie zit blijkbaar ook in de groep!

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Op donderdag 29 april 2010 11:02 schreef Monopoly_Man het volgende:

[..]

Het kwam vorige week aan bod in het debat... ik weet niet of het vanuit Nederland te zien was. Maar de Tories zeiden dat ze op het gebied van climate change bijvoorbeeld wel in Europa willen samenwerken... waarop de vraag kwam waarom ze dan in een fractie zitten met partijen die niet eens in climate change geloven. Daarop hadden ze geen antwoord.

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Op donderdag 29 april 2010 11:07 schreef freako het volgende:

[..]

De SGP had er eigenlijk ook bij willen zitten, maar die mochten niet van de Conservatieven. De soms controversiële standpunten van de SGP waren een te groot risico.

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Op donderdag 29 april 2010 11:18 schreef El_Matador het volgende:

[..]

"soms controversieel"
De nuance van het jaar!

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Op donderdag 29 april 2010 11:21 schreef freako het volgende:

[..]

Ja, ik heb CU/SGP gestemd bij de Europese verkiezingen vorig jaar. Beginnen over gristenfundamentalistische waanideeën klinkt dan een beetje vreemd uit mijn mond.

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Op donderdag 29 april 2010 19:30 schreef Arcee het volgende:
Clegg zometeen in het RTL Nieuws in het Nederlands.

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Op donderdag 29 april 2010 21:28 schreef Thelonious het volgende:
Zit er klaar voor.
Verwacht wel het een en ander van Brown.


[ afbeelding ]

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Op donderdag 29 april 2010 21:44 schreef Thelonious het volgende:

[..]

Nee, door dat oude vrouwtje het antwoord te geven dat ze verdient a la Obama's "speech on race".

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Op donderdag 29 april 2010 21:44 schreef Thelonious het volgende:

[..]

Nee, door dat oude vrouwtje het antwoord te geven dat ze verdient a la Obama's "speech on race".

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Op donderdag 29 april 2010 21:47 schreef Pietverdriet het volgende:

[..]

dan had ie moeten staan voor zijn Bigot uitspraak en moeten zeggen dat ze racistische onzin sprak en dat ie daar niet voor staat en dat niet accepteerd.

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Op donderdag 29 april 2010 19:30 schreef Arcee het volgende:
Clegg zometeen in het RTL Nieuws in het Nederlands.

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Op donderdag 29 april 2010 21:52 schreef Morendo het volgende:

[..]

Mooie stropdas draagt 'ie. Zou hij dat expres gedaan hebben?

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Op vrijdag 23 april 2010 00:27 schreef Illiberal het volgende:
Die clegg is niet een al te beste kerel:
[..]

Achja, weer een land verloren aan de progressieven. Kan ook niet anders. Ik neem aan dat Netwerk, NOVA en de Nederlandse kranten al lopen te juichen?

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Op donderdag 29 april 2010 22:06 schreef Morendo het volgende:
Ik vind het niveau van debatteren hoger liggen dan in Nederland. Ze weten exact waar ze elkaar op moeten pakken, maar verdedigen zich vervolgens ook weer sterk.

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Op donderdag 29 april 2010 04:51 schreef Morendo het volgende:
Wat ik fantastisch vind aan het Britse medialandschap is dat sommige kranten (tabloids) zo overduidelijk partijpolitiek bedrijven. The Sun bijvoorbeeld steunde sinds '97 Labour maar sinds het einde van vorig jaar staan ze weer achter de Conservatieven. En nu, met de verkiezingen aanstaande, worden de Tories echt elke dag opgehemeld en Labour, met Brown voorop, volledig afgefikt. Check dan hoe tendentieus dit artikel is. Ik kan er wel doorheen prikken, maar veel Britten niet.
[..]

http://www.thesun.co.uk/s(...)ds-gran-a-bigot.html

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General election 2010: The liberal moment has come

If the Guardian had a vote it would be cast enthusiastically for the Liberal Democrats. But under our discredited electoral system some people may – hopefully for the last time – be forced to vote tactically

Editorial
guardian.co.uk, Friday 30 April 2010 18.43 BST

Citizens have votes. Newspapers do not. However, if the Guardian had a vote in the 2010 general election it would be cast enthusiastically for the Liberal Democrats. It would be cast in the knowledge that not all the consequences are predictable, and that some in particular should be avoided. The vote would be cast with some important reservations and frustrations. Yet it would be cast for one great reason of principle above all.

After the campaign that the Liberal Democrats have waged over this past month, for which considerable personal credit goes to Nick Clegg, the election presents the British people with a huge opportunity: the reform of the electoral system itself. Though Labour has enjoyed a deathbed conversion to aspects of the cause of reform, it is the Liberal Democrats who have most consistently argued that cause in the round and who, after the exhaustion of the old politics, reflect and lead an overwhelming national mood for real change.

Proportional representation – while not a panacea – would at last give this country what it has lacked for so long: a parliament that is a true mirror of this pluralist nation, not an increasingly unrepresentative two-party distortion of it. The Guardian has supported proportional representation for more than a century. In all that time there has never been a better opportunity than now to put this subject firmly among the nation's priorities. Only the Liberal Democrats grasp this fully, and only they can be trusted to keep up the pressure to deliver, though others in all parties, large and small, do and should support the cause. That has been true in past elections too, of course. But this time is different. The conjuncture in 2010 of a Labour party that has lost so much public confidence and a Conservative party that has not yet won it has enabled Mr Clegg to take his party close to the threshold of real influence for the first time in nearly 90 years.

This time – with the important caveat set out below – the more people who vote Liberal Democrat on 6 May, the greater the chance that this will be Britain's last general election under a first-past-the-post electoral system which is wholly unsuited to the political needs of a grown-up 21st-century democracy.

Tactical option

The pragmatic caveat concerns the danger that, under the existing electoral system, switching to the Liberal Democrats in Labour-Conservative marginal constituencies might let in an anti-reform Tory party. So, voters who share this principled enthusiasm for securing the largest possible number of Liberal Democrat MPs next Thursday must, in many constituencies, weigh the tactical option of supporting Labour to prevent a Conservative win.

Hopefully, if this really is the last election under the old system, such dilemmas between head and heart will apply less in future. For now, however, the cause of reform is overwhelmingly more likely to be achieved by a Lib Dem partnership of principle with Labour than by a Lib Dem marriage of convenience with a Tory party which is explicitly hostile to the cause and which currently plans to redraw the political map for its own advantage. The momentum for change would be fatally undermined should the Conservatives win an overall majority. The Liberal Democrats and Labour should, of course, have explored much earlier and more explicitly how they might co-operate to reform the electoral system. During the campaign, and especially since the final leaders' debate, the appetite for co-operation has clearly increased and is increasing still. Mr Clegg's Guardian interview today underscores the potential for more productive engagement with Labour and is matched by fresh, untribal thinking from his potential partners.

This election is about serious choices between three main parties which all have something to offer. David Cameron has done what none of his immediate predecessors has understood or tried to do: he has confronted the Conservative party with the fact that it was out of step with the country. He has forced the party to become more diverse and to engage with centre-ground opinion. He has explicitly aligned himself with the liberal Conservative tradition which the Thatcherites so despised during their long domination of the party. He has promoted modern thinking on civil liberty, the environment and aspects of social policy.

Mr Cameron offers a new and welcome Toryism, quite different from what Michael Howard offered five years ago. His difficulty is not that he is the "same old Tory". He isn't. The problem is that his revolution has not translated adequately into detailed policies, and remains highly contradictory. He embraces liberal Britain yet protests that Britain is broken because of liberal values. He is eloquent about the overmighty state but proposes to rip up the Human Rights Act which is the surest weapon against it. He talks about a Britain that will play a constructive role in Europe while aligning the Tories in the European parliament with some of the continent's wackier xenophobes. Behind the party leader's own engagement with green issues there stands a significant section of his party that still regards global warming as a liberal conspiracy.

The Tories have zigzagged through the financial crisis to an alarming degree, austerity here, spending pledges there. At times they have argued, against all reason, that Britain's economic malaise is down to overblown government, as opposed to the ravages of the market. Though the Conservatives are not uniquely evasive on the deficit, a large inheritance-tax cut for the very wealthy is the reverse of a serious "united and equal" approach to taxation. Small wonder that the Cameronisation of the Conservative party sometimes seems more palace coup than cultural revolution. A Cameron government might not be as destructive to Britain as the worst Tory regimes of the past. But it is not the right course for Britain.

If this election were a straight fight between Labour and the Conservatives – which it absolutely is not – the country would be safer in the hands of Labour than of the Tories. Faced in 2008 with a financial crisis unprecedented in modern times, whose destructive potential can hardly be exaggerated, the Labour government made some absolutely vital calls at a time which exposed the Conservatives as neoliberals, not novices. Whether Labour has truly learned the right lessons itself is doubtful. Labour is, after all, the party that nurtured the deregulatory systems which contributed to the implosion of the financial sector, on which the entire economy was too reliant. How, and even whether, British capitalism can be directed towards a better balance between industry and finance is a question which remains work in progress for Labour, as for us all. At the highest levels of the party, timidity and audacity remain in conflict. Nevertheless, Labour, and notably Alistair Darling, a palpably honest chancellor who has had to play the most difficult hand of any holder of his office in modern times, deserves respect for proving equal to the hour. Only the most churlish would deny the prime minister some credit for his role in the handling of the crisis.

Labour's failings

But this election is more than a verdict on the response to a single trauma, immense though it was. It is also a verdict on the lengthening years of Labour government and the three years of Gordon Brown's premiership. More than that, any election is also a judgment about the future as well as a verdict on the past. A year ago, the Guardian argued that Labour should persuade its leader to step down. Shortly afterwards, in spite of polling an abject 15.7% in the European elections, and with four cabinet ministers departing, Labour chose to hug Mr Brown close. It was the wrong decision then, and it is clear, not least after his humiliation in Rochdale this week, that it is the wrong decision now. The Guardian said a year ago that Mr Brown had failed to articulate a vision, a plan, or an argument for the future. We said that he had become incapable of leading the necessary revolution against the political system that the expenses scandal had triggered. Labour thought differently. It failed to act. It thereby lost the opportunity to renew itself, and is now facing the consequences.

Invited to embrace five more years of a Labour government, and of Gordon Brown as prime minister, it is hard to feel enthusiasm. Labour's kneejerk critics can sometimes sound like the People's Front of Judea asking what the Romans have ever done for us. The salvation of the health service, major renovation of schools, the minimum wage, civil partnerships and the extension of protection for minority groups are heroic, not small achievements.

Yet, even among those who wish Labour well, the reservations constantly press in. Massive, necessary and in some cases transformational investment in public services insufficiently matched by calm and principled reform, sometimes needlessly entangled with the private sector. Recognition of gathering generational storms on pensions, public debt, housing and – until very recently – climate change not addressed by clear strategies and openness with the public about the consequences. The inadequately planned pursuit of two wars. A supposedly strong and morally focused foreign policy which remains trapped in the great-power, nuclear-weapon mentality, blindly uncritical of the United States, mealy-mouthed about Europe and tarnished by the shame of Iraq – still not apologised for. Allegations of British embroilment in torture answered with little more than a world-weary sigh. Large talk about constitutional change matched by an addiction to centralisation. Easy talk about liberty and "British values" while Britain repeatedly ratchets up the criminal justice system, repeatedly encroaches on civil liberties, undermines legal aid and spends like there is no tomorrow on police and prisons. Apparent outrage against the old politics subverted by delay, caution and timid compromise.

There are reservations too, though of a different order and on different subjects, about the Liberal Democrats. The Liberal Democrats are a very large party now, with support across the spectrum. But they remain in some respects a party of the middle and lower middle classes. Labour's record on poverty remains unmatched, and its link to the poor remains umbilical. Vince Cable, so admirable and exemplary on the banks, nevertheless remains a deficit hawk, committed to tax cuts which could imply an even deeper slashing of public services. Though the party has good policies on equality, it has not prioritised the promotion and selection of women and ethnic minority candidates.

Matched priorities

Surveying the wider agenda and the experience of the past decade, however, there is little doubt that in many areas of policy and tone, the Liberal Democrats have for some time most closely matched our own priorities and instincts. On political and constitutional change, they articulate and represent the change which is now so widely wanted. On civil liberty and criminal justice, they have remained true to liberal values and human rights in ways that the other parties, Labour more than the Tories in some respects, have not. They are less tied to reactionary and sectional class interests than either of the other parties.

The Liberal Democrats were green before the other parties and remain so. Their commitment to education is bred in the bone. So is their comfort with a European project which, for all its flaws, remains central to this country's destiny. They are willing to contemplate a British defence policy without Trident renewal. They were right about Iraq, the biggest foreign policy judgment call of the past half-century, when Labour and the Tories were both catastrophically and stupidly wrong. They have resisted the rush to the overmighty centralised state when others have not. At key moments, when tough issues of press freedom have been at stake, they have been the first to rally in support. Above all, they believe in and stand for full, not semi-skimmed, electoral reform. And they have had a revelatory campaign. Trapped in the arid, name-calling two-party politics of the House of Commons, Nick Clegg has seldom had the chance to shine. Released into the daylight of equal debate, he has given the other two parties the fright of their lives.

A newspaper that is proudly rooted in the liberal as well as the labour tradition – and whose advocacy of constitutional reform stretches back to the debates of 1831-32 – cannot ignore such a record. If not now, when? The answer is clear and proud. Now.

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Vote of Confidence

The Conservatives offer an optimistic vision for the renewal of Britain. The electorate has made a call for change and they deserve the chance to answer it

The Times has not endorsed the Conservative Party at a general election for 18 years. For far too much of that time, the Conservative Party turned inward and vacated the ground on which British electoral victory is won — a commitment to the prosperity and liberty fostered in a free-market economy and a sense of justice in an open and tolerant society. Tony Blair’s Labour Party took up the promise of modernity, through its commitment to enterprise and the courage to stand tall in the world. Sadly, over the past 13 years that promise has faded. We all know that Britain can do better: it is surely time to regain our optimism.

This election offers a fundamental choice about the future of this country. It offers a moment to put old-fashioned tribal loyalties, class prejudices and social habits aside. We must choose. Either we are to be a country that has lost confidence in the ingenuity and potential of its people, and concludes that the State must continue to grow to protect us from ourselves. Or we can be a country that cares for the needy but reins in the ever-growing appetite of government and frees up people to grow their businesses, nurture their families and pursue their own hopes and happiness.

At an acutely difficult moment in our history, The Times puts its faith in the people rather than the government. It chooses a strong society, more enterprise and a smaller State. It chooses real, radical change. It chooses renewal.

Perhaps the best advertisement of the Labour years can be glimpsed in a scene outside Belfast City Hall on a clear day in December 2005. There, to the backdrop of cheers and pleasure rather than the sound of guns, in a city whose industrial decline had been replaced by the prosperity that has come with modern technology, the first civil partnership was signed. Not everything that was promised and hoped in the roseate glow of 1997 came to pass but one would have to be hard of heart to say that Belfast — like Manchester, Liverpool, Newcastle, Leeds — is not a better place today than it was 13 years ago. Under Tony Blair, Britain also had a formidable presence on the world stage under a Prime Minister who backed the EU’s embrace of countries from the former Soviet bloc while also recognising the importance of the transatlantic alliance. In Kosovo, in Sierra Leone and in Afghanistan, Britain’s military capacity was mobilised in defence of a noble principle. The same applies to the Government’s decision to go to war in Iraq in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks. And the Government also merits praise for its handling of the banking crisis, which, for an alarming moment in 2007, looked like it might threaten capitalism itself. Those who supported Labour — including this newspaper — can look back with some satisfaction.

But the costs have been too high. A Chancellor who had proclaimed an end to boom and bust embarked on a spending spree of remarkable improvidence. Public sector staff now earn £2,000 a year more on average than their private sector counterparts. Spending rose, over the Labour years, by an extraordinary 54 per cent. Productivity lagged behind. Gordon Brown savaged the private pensions industry and sold off the bulk of Britain’s gold reserves much too cheaply. In short, Labour squandered the boom. Even excluding the cost of the bank bailout, which was necessitated by the global credit crunch, Britain is now borrowing £163 billion a year. Mr Brown’s pitch at this election is that voters should not risk the recovery by backing the Conservatives. He does not seem to realise that the greatest threat is more of the same. Yes, the economy is in peril. Mr Brown is the danger.

Britain has also paid a high price in terms of trust in politics. What began as a professional spin operation in Downing Street became a machinery of deceit. Anonymous briefings by figures such as Damian McBride and Tom Watson, part of the cabal around Gordon Brown, dripped poison about opponents both inside the Labour Party and outside. The public stopped believing in official statistics as the Budget became plagued with double-counting, and the real cost of new schools and hospitals was kept off balance sheet. The 10p starting rate of tax was abolished purely to score a political point. The nadir of this style of politics was Mr Brown’s refusal to fund the mission in Afghanistan properly and his repeated denials that he had done so, culminating in a false claim before the Chilcot inquiry that defence spending had risen every year. After ten years in which he was found wanting in the top job, for the past three he has just been found wanting.

This campaign has been electrified by the rise of Nick Clegg. He seized the first television debate and became the overnight sensation of British politics. It was always likely that the electorate’s anger over greedy MPs and their sense of expenses entitlement would affect this election. But what a gloriously British revolution it turned out to be. Anger and dismay go on the march, and the Liberal Democrats do a bit better.

But the Liberal Democrat prospectus for power still reads like that of a party that has no expectation of victory. There is still something soft-headed about its pitch. Mr Clegg’s approach to the euro has in the past been misguided, but these days it is just muddled: he was for entering; now he is against entry; and he wants to leave open the possibility of entry in the future. He is prone to bouts of rank anti-business populism. Was it really necessary to weigh into the Kraft-Cadbury bid — to play the Whole Nut card — in the TV debate on the economy? Surely he cannot think all bankers are greedy? Worse, Mr Clegg’s approach to the biggest economic problem of the day, the deficit, is to duck it: he wants to hold a meeting. Abandoning the Trident nuclear missile system would be a mistake, parading fanciful figures for the cost savings is an error. Breaking up the banks would be counter-productive: the investment banks would become far more dangerous. If Mr Clegg understands this he is not admitting it. Mr Clegg has built a platform that might allow him to go back to his constituency and prepare to be the Opposition. He has yet, however, to build a serious platform to prepare for government.

That is something that David Cameron has been able to do. Today’s Conservative Party is a very different party to that which went to the country in 2005. Mr Cameron has led that change. It is now clear that the modern Conservative Party believes in the importance of reducing the burden on enterprise and entrepreneurship. Its priorities on education, social policy and the environment are those of a modern, innovative force in politics. Its young leadership has the energy, intelligence and integrity to govern.

More modernisation still would be welcome. The party’s desire to maintain the aid budget is a victory for political branding over good sense. Its policies on the National Health Service put a tactical desire to neutralise Labour attacks before the need for radical reform. The Conservatives also retain a worrying streak of pessimism about foreign policy. Mr Cameron’s decision to remove Conservative MEPs from an alliance with mainstream centre-right parties in the EU may have seemed principled to him, but it was also short-sighted. Britain must not shelter behind foreign policy realism to retreat to a Little Englander role in the world.

In 2005 the Conservatives put an illiberal approach to immigration at the centre of their campaign. In 2010 the voters have demanded that immigration be central and the Conservative response has been measured and intelligent. Mr Cameron has made his party think again about the condition of the nation. His bold vision of a “Big Society” — that there is such a thing as society, but it is not necessarily the State — is powerful. The idea that competition will raise standards in public services, using the State as a catalyst, is the right idea for the 21st century. It is the point where new Labour left off. Mr Cameron’s social liberalism has brought a more diverse set of candidates into his party. He has acted ruthlessly against racism and against MPs who abused their expenses.

None of this has been easy. It has been bought at the cost of some unpopularity with his backbenchers. All the more reason that Mr Cameron, and his chief lieutenants George Osborne, William Hague and Michael Gove, should be commended for their decisiveness and determination. These are qualities that this country now needs.

The central question of this general election is the economic future of the nation. The Conservative Party has shown the most consistent willingness to deal with the atrocious State of the public finances that this Government will bequeath. Under fire from Mr Brown, they have held to this unpopular line. Amid the sound and fury, a fundamental philosophical difference has emerged: the Conservatives want to reduce excessive public expenditure, the Labour Party wants to keep on ratcheting up benefits, tax credits and other forms of state spending. One party recognises the benefits of individual independence. The other keeps fostering a state of benefit dependency. In the race for growth with India, China and other rising countries, the Conservatives know that Britain’s entrepreneurial spirit needs to be unleashed.

The economy is broken and so is politics. It is time for a change, in both the philosophy and the style of government. It is time for us to believe in the power of the individual, the strength of society and the unique promise of this country. Labour is tired, defensive and ruinously reliant on higher government spending. David Cameron has shown the fortitude, judgment and character to lead this country back to a healthier, stronger future. It is time, once again, to vote Conservative.

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Who should govern Britain?

Forget the hypotheticals and look at the policies. On that basis, the Conservatives deserve to win

IT IS a long time since quite so much seemed to hang on a British election. With a week to go, the polls suggest that the old duopoly, with either Labour or the Conservatives commanding comfortable majorities under Britain’s first-past-the-post system, has been replaced by a three-way split, with Nick Clegg’s Liberal Democrats on course to pick up around 30% of the votes, just behind David Cameron’s Tories and a whisker ahead of Gordon Brown’s Labour. The way Britain’s voting system works, tiny changes in the popular vote could make huge differences to how many seats each party gets. Horse-trading has already begun in expectation of a hung parliament. And so has conjecture of dramatic realignments—to the centre-left, to the centre-right, to the very United Kingdom.

The exciting possibility that the country’s electoral geometry could be redrawn has overshadowed what should be the centre of an election campaign. Britons must judge the parties on the basis of their policies and their current leaders. As polling day, May 6th, approaches, it is to be hoped that debate will increasingly focus on these substantial issues.

The Economist has no ancestral fealty to any party, but an enduring prejudice in favour of liberalism. Our bias towards greater political and economic freedom has often been tempered by other considerations: we plumped for Barack Obama over John McCain, Tony Blair over Michael Howard and a succession of Italian socialists over Silvio Berlusconi because we thought they were more inspiring, competent or honest than their opponents, even though the latter favoured a smaller state. But in this British election the overwhelming necessity of reforming the public sector stands out. It is not just that the budget deficit is a terrifying 11.6% of GDP, a figure that makes tax rises and spending cuts inevitable. Government now accounts for over half the economy, rising to 70% in Northern Ireland. For Britain to thrive, this liberty-destroying Leviathan has to be tackled. The Conservatives, for all their shortcomings, are keenest to do that; and that is the main reason why we would cast our vote for them.

In the Brown stuff
What of the current lot? In some ways, Gordon Brown is underappreciated. He has stood firm in Afghanistan. He kept Britain out of the euro, which Mr Blair wanted to join. No matter what he did, Britain was always likely to get mauled in the credit crunch: with its reliance on banks and property, it was bound to be hard hit. And, since the economic crisis began, he has mostly made the right decisions. He saved the banks, pumped money into the economy and did as much as any leader to help avert a global depression.

But a prime minister should not get too much credit for climbing out of a hole he himself dug as chancellor. Chancellor Brown poured money into public services. As a result, Britain’s budget deficit is almost as big as Greece’s in proportion to its economy; its public sector is larger. This is a time-bomb of a legacy, and one that Mr Brown is ill equipped to defuse. The prime minister has tended to take the side of producers—especially the public-sector unions—rather than consumers. He frustrated some of Mr Blair’s efforts to reform the health service and education and slowed down others once he became prime minister. There are mutterings about choice in Labour’s manifesto, but Mr Brown too often reverts to old-fashioned statism. He has run a grim campaign (see Bagehot), scarcely bothering to defend his record and concentrating instead on scaring people about the Tories’ plans.

Above all, the government is tired. Mired in infighting and scandal, just as the Tories were in 1997, New Labour has run its course (see article). Some hope that a hung parliament would usher in a refashioning of the centre-left: a Mandelsoned and Milibanded party would arise. But it is better for the country that Labour has its looming nervous breakdown in opposition. A change of government is essential.

The agony and the Cleggstacy
So why not change to the Liberal Democrats? Mr Clegg’s surge has been thrilling, all the more so since the viler attempts to smear him by a panicking Tory press seem to have backfired. This newspaper has been looking for a credible liberal party in Britain for nigh on a century. Mr Clegg is clever and charming. We share his enthusiasm for civil liberties and his willingness to stand up for immigrants. And he is right that the current voting system, which could mean that he ends up with the same number of votes as Mr Brown but a third of his seats, is unfair.

But look at the policies, rather than the man, and the Lib Dems seem less appealing. In the event of another European treaty, they would hold a referendum not on that treaty but on whether to stay in or leave the EU; odd, given that they also (wrongly) want to take Britain into the euro. They are flirting with giving up Britain’s nuclear deterrent. They would abolish tuition fees for universities, which would mean either letting the quality of British higher education slide still further or raising the subsidy to mostly well-off students by increasing state funding. They are worried about climate change but oppose the expansion of nuclear power, which is the most plausible way of cutting emissions. Their policies towards business are arguably to the left of Labour’s. A 50% capital-gains tax, getting rid of higher-rate relief on pensions and a toff-bashing mansion tax are not going to induce the entrepreneurial vim Britain needs. Vince Cable, the Lib Dems’ chancellor-in-waiting, recently dismissed the bosses who argued against the government’s planned National Insurance increase as “nauseating”; that feeling might well be reciprocated by the nation’s wealth creators if the Lib Dems came into power.

An international comparison is helpful. Germany’s Free Democrats have adopted both parts of liberalism: they believe in both civil liberties and the free market. The Liberal Democrats, a coalition between the distant heirs of a once-great governing party and more European-style social democrats, have not yet made the same jump to the radical middle. Optimists cling to the hope that a hung parliament and a realignment on the centre-right would bring that leap about, but for the moment the Lib Dems seem unsure whether they are to the left or the right of Labour. To the extent that elections are holidays from normal politics, Mr Clegg has been a delightful holiday romance for many Britons; but this newspaper does not fancy moving in with him for the next five years.

That leaves the Tories. They plainly have faults. They have run a lacklustre campaign. We dislike their Europhobic fringe and their exaggerations about Britain’s broken society. We thought they were wrong to oppose the economic stimulus after the banking crash. Mr Cameron is prone to bouts of complacency—amply illustrated by his refusal last year to use the expenses scandal as a pretext finally to get rid of Lord Ashcroft, a controversial offshore donor whose money the Tories plainly no longer needed. He has not done enough to convince voters that he is the man to bring change—and thus created an opening into which Mr Clegg has ably stepped.

But just as the kaleidoscope of this weird election has painted Mr Clegg’s relatively small advances in brighter colours, it has dulled Mr Cameron’s much bigger ones. Judged over the past four years, not the past four weeks, he has done a great deal to modernise his party, stamping out social illiberalism, reducing the Europe-bashing and adding environmentalism. During the boom years, his much-maligned chancellor, George Osborne, did not give in to demands from the right for tax cuts, pointing to the deepening hole in the government finances; at the Tory conference last year, when Mr Brown was still unable to mention “cuts”, Mr Osborne was also the first politician to commit his party to an austerity programme.

Since then, like the other parties, the Tories have gone quiet on the question of cuts. But, more than their rivals, they are intent on redesigning the state. They would reform the NHS by bringing in more outside providers; their plans to give parents and teachers the right to set up schools are the most radical idea in this election. Centralisers under Margaret Thatcher, they now want to devolve power to locally elected officials, including mayors and police chiefs. Some of this is clouded in waffle about a Big Society. Other bits do not go far enough: it is foolish to rule out letting for-profit companies run schools and wrong to exempt the NHS from cuts. But Mr Cameron is much closer to answering the main question facing Britain than either of his rivals is. In this complicated, perhaps inevitably imperfect election, he would get our vote.

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Op zaterdag 1 mei 2010 10:08 schreef Monidique het volgende:
Daarentegen is toegegeven dat de media, de gedrukte althans, moedwillig de Liberal Democrats negeren. Kwade zaak. Maar een kwade zaak die voortkomt uit een kwaad systeem.

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Op zaterdag 1 mei 2010 11:14 schreef SeLang het volgende:
Het wordt nooit meer zoals het was in de Britse politiek.

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Op zaterdag 1 mei 2010 11:14 schreef SeLang het volgende:

Voorheen werden ze inderdaad wel redelijk genegeerd, wat eigenlijk logisch was omdat ze toch geen rol zouden spelen in de uitslag.

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Op zaterdag 1 mei 2010 12:01 schreef Monidique het volgende:

[..]

Omdat ze werden genegeerd.

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Op zaterdag 1 mei 2010 12:05 schreef SeLang het volgende:

[..]

Maar je zei "negeren", wat ik lees als tegenwoordige tijd.

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Op zaterdag 1 mei 2010 11:41 schreef Reya het volgende:

[..]

Mwah, je moet je dan vooral afvragen wat de LibDems nou eigenlijk zijn, en waar ze voor staan. Hervorming van het kiesstelsel, daar onderscheiden ze zich duidelijk mee, en een wat liberaler beleid op het gebied van immigratie en buitenlandse zaken, maar daarin verschillen ze al niet meer enorm van Labour. Voor de rest is het een mengelmoes van linkse en centristische standpunten die amper te onderscheiden valt van het beleid van Labour, in het bijzonder waar het de unieke aspecten van New Labour betreft. De LibDems zijn dan vooral Labour zonder Gordon Brown. Vooral dat laatste verklaart waarschijnlijk hun relatieve populariteit op het moment. Als Labour weer een aantrekkelijke, populaire leider krijgt, kan het best zijn dat de LibDems met hetzelfde gemak de vergetelheid ingaan.

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"The longest suicide note in history" is an epithet originally used by Gerald Kaufman[1] to describe the United Kingdom Labour Party's left-wing 1983 election manifesto,[2] which called for unilateral nuclear disarmament, withdrawal from the European Economic Community, abolition of the House of Lords and the re-nationalisation of recently de-nationalised industries like British Telecom, British Aerospace and the British Shipbuilding Corporation. Its far-left policies, along with the popularity gained by the current PM Margaret Thatcher over the Falklands War, contributed to a victory with a substantial majority in Parliament for the incumbent Conservative party. This led to a turning point in the history of the party, which thereafter adopted more free market principles. The epithet referred not only to the orientation of the policies, but also to its marketing aspect. Michael Foot, the Labour leader, had decided, as a statement on internal democracy, that the manifesto would consist of all resolutions arrived at conference, making the manifesto over 700 pages long.

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unilateral nuclear disarmament, withdrawal from the European Economic Community, abolition of the House of Lords and the re-nationalisation of recently de-nationalised industries like British Telecom, British Aerospace and the British Shipbuilding Corporation.

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Op zaterdag 1 mei 2010 12:36 schreef Monidique het volgende:

[..]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_longest_suicide_note_in_history
[..]

Grappig, dingen die je nu niet echt far-left zou noemen.

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Op zaterdag 1 mei 2010 12:36 schreef Monidique het volgende:


Grappig, dingen die je nu niet echt far-left zou noemen.

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Op zaterdag 1 mei 2010 19:19 schreef freako het volgende:
[ afbeelding ]

Ik schrok van deze foto van Tony Blair.

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Op zaterdag 1 mei 2010 19:27 schreef du_ke het volgende:

[..]

Nou inderdaad. Die ziet er niet lekker uit.

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Evidence based voting

What can science and evidence bring to an election? First there are the micro-issues: we can assess the validity of claims made by politicians by seeking out the evidence. David Cameron, for example, claimed that UK cancer services were bad because fewer people die of cancer in Bulgaria than in the UK, which many have already debunked: he used death data from a country with inferior monitoring standards, and a far lower life expectancy, but more than that, he used death data, which is driven not just by treatment success, but also by the number of new cases to start with, which can vary widely for all kinds of reasons.

Still on cancer, but in a neglected example, Cameron also said: “I have a man in my constituency [with] kidney cancer who came to see me with seven others. Tragically, two of them have died because they couldn’t get the drug Sutent that they wanted.” This was odd, because Sutent is actually available on the NHS for kidney cancer, having been approved by NICE in February 2009 (despite costing £54,366 per “quality adjusted life year”, while NICE generally draws the line at £30,000).

Where did Cameron get the idea it was rejected? I don’t know. On the 9th of April the Daily Mail published a bizarre article claiming that 15 cancer drugs (including Sutent) had been rejected by NICE. They provided a list. Bizarrely, 10 of the 15 drugs on that list which the Mail say NICE rejected have actually been approved by NICE. The head of NICE wrote to all three parties on the 9th of April explaining that this article was bizarrely wrong. His letter is posted in full on the NICE website. (NICE did reject Sutent for people with a poor prognosis who are unsuitable for immunotherapy, but only there because they weren’t given any evidence on its use in that group).

As a side issue, of course, it’s always unwise to claim that someone would be alive today if they had a specific treatment, in any situation. The mighty statistician Prof David Spiegelhalter has run through the maths on his Understanding Uncertainty website, and even if you are in the better prognosis group, for whom we do have evidence, you only have a 58% chance of surviving longer after receiving Sutent, and the median survival is 37 months with the drug and 27 months without it. Worth it, of course. I’m just saying.

Alongside the science of individual claims, it’s also worth looking at what the parties say about science itself. Here, only the Liberal Democrats’ manifesto stands out, promising funding like the others, but also making pledges on the use of independent scientific advice in policy (in contrast to the David Nutt affair), and even coming out in favour of open-access academic publication.

But more than anything, this election offers a new opportunity: beyond expecting our politicians to follow the evidence, we can be evidence based ourselves, in our voting decisions, and hold ourselves to the same high standards. VoteMatch can match your views against the party manifestoes. SkepticalVoter knows if your MP believes in the homeopaths’ magic beans. Using TheyWorkForYou I can see that my last MP (Andrew Smith, Labour, Oxford East) voted very strongly in favour of the Iraq war, very strongly against an inquiry into it, very strongly in favour of ID cards, and so on. It’s grim reading. PoliticsPosters will print that on a poster, so you can make sure your neighbours know too.

Websites like these recognise that disseminating data in a meaningful form is as important as gathering it in the first place. Your MPs voting record, and their attendance in parliament, have always been publicly available, but until recently it was an effort to find, so only journalists and lobbyists knew the ugly details. That has changed. In the past we relied on hunches and reputation, but now – uniquely – we have the option to leave tribalism behind, and deploy our vote using data.

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Op zaterdag 1 mei 2010 12:09 schreef SeLang het volgende:

[..]

Wat ik bedoel is niet de Lib Dems maar het feit dat er nu voor het eerst in de geschiedenis live TV-debatten zijn. Dat heeft de hele dynamiek veranderd en die TV-debatten gaan nu nooit meer weg. Het duopolie Tories-Labour is daarmee doorbroken.

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Op donderdag 6 mei 2010 10:11 schreef SeLang het volgende:
Ik heb op de linksen gestemd (Labour)

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Op donderdag 6 mei 2010 10:12 schreef Reya het volgende:

[..]

Wat bezielt je?

quote:

Nigel Farage injured in plane crash on election day

The former UK Independence Party (UKIP) leader Nigel Farage has been injured in a plane crash in Northamptonshire.

The plane carrying two people crashed at Hinton in the Hedges Airfield at Steane, near Brackley, at 0759 BST.
Mr Farage was taken to hospital in Banbury with non-life threatening injuries, and the pilot was transferred to University Hospital in Coventry.

The plane came down an hour after polling stations opened for voting in the general election. The pilot, who was trapped in the wreckage and had to be airlifted to hospital, is believed to be more seriously injured of the two.

General election voting under way

Chris Adams, UKIP parliamentary candidate for Aylesbury, said: "Nigel was unconscious but he can talk.
"He's been coming in and out of consciousness and is now being X-rayed."

The aircraft was due to circle over Buckingham, where Mr Farage is standing as a candidate, trailing a banner, a UKIP spokesman said.

Mike Jose, Mr Farage's assistant, said they had previously flown the plane and banner over the constituency without any problems.

A UKIP spokesman said the aircraft had flown into the airfield from Winchester area and was taking off again when the accident happened

He added: "We've had unconfirmed reports that either the banner got snagged up, or there were cross-winds and it was unfamiliar airfield to the pilot."

But Mr Adams said he had spoken to an aviation expert who said the banner could not have got caught up in the tail fin, as some reports had suggested.

The airfield has now been closed and the crash is due to be investigated by the Air Accident Investigation Branch, Northamptonshire Police said.

East Midlands Ambulance Service and fire crews remain at the scene.

Mr Farage is a Member of the European Parliament, representing South East England.

quote:

Britse verkiezingen: Conservatieven voorop in de peilingen

AMSTERDAM - Vanochtend om 07.00 uur lokale tijd openden de Britse stembureaus hun deuren. In de peilingen loopt oppositieleider David Cameron van de Conservatieven voorop, terwijl de Labourpartij van Gordon Brown en de Liberaal-Democraten onder leiding van Nick Clegg om de tweede plaats vechten.

In 650 districten kunnen de bijna 44 miljoen geregistreerde kiesgerechtigden op bijna 4.150 kandidaten stemmen. Om 22.00 uur lokale tijd sluiten de stembureaus, een uur later worden de eerste uitslagen verwacht.

Geen meerderheid

Volgens de laatste peilingen gaat het grootste deel van de stemmen naar de Conservatieven. BBC vergeleek alle peilingen en stelde vast dat het aandeel van de stemmen dat nu naar de Conservatieven zou gaan op 36 procent ligt, terwijl Labour en de 'LibDems' respectievelijk 28 en 27 procent van de stemmen zullen behalen.

De partij van huidig premier Gordon Brown heeft tijdens de roerige campagnetijd meerdere tegenslagen te verduren gekregen. Zo beging Brown een blunder tijdens zijn campagne en verloor hij de steun van toonaangevende dagbladen The Guardian en The Times.

Volgens alle peilingen zal echter geen enkele partij een absolute meerderheid in het Lagerhuis halen, omdat dit jaar drie partijen in plaats van twee kunnen rekenen op veel stemmen.
Liberaal-Democraten

De voorheen relatief onbekende Nick Clegg steeg in populariteit sinds hij op 15 april als winnaar van het eerste live uitgezonden lijsttrekkersdebat uit de bus kwam.

De partijleider van de Liberaal-Democraten presenteert zich als het alternatief voor de traditionele partijen. Het geloof daarin bij de Britse burger is sterk afgenomen sinds het bonnetjesschandaal dat zich in 2009 afspeelde.

Het zou voor het eerst sinds 1974 in Groot-Brittannië voorkomen dat er geen meerderheid in het Lagerhuis wordt behaald door één partij, wat mede door het Britse kiesstelsel (zie kader) zeer ongebruikelijk is. Dit zou kunnen leiden tot een coalitie van partijen, bijvoorbeeld tussen Labour en de LibDems. Eerder gaf oppositieleider Cameron al aan te overwegen met kleine partijen samen te gaan werken om de benodigde meerderheid te halen.

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Op donderdag 6 mei 2010 23:29 schreef jakkop het volgende:
De wet schijnt te zijn dat je na 10 uur mag stemmen als je al in de rij staat.

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Op donderdag 6 mei 2010 23:39 schreef Dichtpiet. het volgende:
kunnen de tories nog een coalitie maken met die noord-ierse partijtjes? daar was toch ook misschien sprake van?

quote:

Op donderdag 6 mei 2010 23:41 schreef jakkop het volgende:

[..]
Maar Brown heeft eerste recht op het vormen van een overheid.

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Op donderdag 6 mei 2010 23:41 schreef Dichtpiet. het volgende:

[..]

quote:

Op donderdag 6 mei 2010 23:39 schreef Dichtpiet. het volgende:
kunnen de tories nog een coalitie maken met die noord-ierse partijtjes? daar was toch ook misschien sprake van?

quote:

Op donderdag 6 mei 2010 23:44 schreef jakkop het volgende:

[..]

Is de regel, zonder absolute meerderheid mag de zittende leading party het eerst proberen.

quote:

Op donderdag 6 mei 2010 23:54 schreef Dichtpiet. het volgende:
Is dat Sunderland een beetje wat bij ons Schiermonnikoog is?

Ik bedoel: Hebben die (bijna) altijd de eerste uitslagen?

quote:

Sunderland hopes to be first to declare

Sunderland council has reported the first result for four elections in a row

When it comes to election results night there's one city whose name we hear first: Sunderland.

Sunderland City Council takes a lot of pride in having been the first to declare a constituency result in all the last four general elections.

Ballot papers from the three Sunderland constituencies will be counted at Sunderland Tennis Centre on Thursday.

Boundary changes mean votes are being cast this year in Houghton and Sunderland South, Washington and Sunderland West, and Sunderland Central.

The 2005 election was the council's proudest moment. It made history by declaring the first three results on the night - Sunderland South at 2245, Sunderland North at 2325 and Houghton and Washington East at 2332.

That was some achievement when you think that polling stations don't shut until 2200, and then the boxes have to be taken to the central counting point.

Efficiency over speed

Sunderland's election officer, Bill Crawford, says the aim is to continue that record this time around, and nothing is being left to chance.

To make sure the ballot boxes get quickly into Sunderland Tennis Centre a group of local school children are being employed to swiftly pass them down a line.

The council's election team has learnt from past counts too. One year they found they had finished a little slower than anticipated, so changed the weight of their voting papers from 100 grams to 80 grams, making them easier to handle.

And voters are under strict instructions to fold their papers only once, from north to south.

Mr Crawford says plans are also being made for the unexpected: they have spare counters in the wings should it be a particularly high turn out, an emergency generator is available in case there's a power cut, and a spare room has been set aside should there be any problems in the main counting room.

The counters take their job very seriously and stress that they pride themselves on efficiency over speed.

Many of them work in banks where they regularly count paper at speed. All have their own tried and tested methods, often preferring rubber thumbs to moist finger sponges which can cost valuable seconds.

We may all be watching the results of election night to see if there's a hung parliament, but Sunderland assure us that all eyes will be on them at the start of the night as they aim to make declaration history again.

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Op donderdag 6 mei 2010 23:55 schreef Hexagon het volgende:
Dat gaan ingewikkelde pnderhandelingen worden

Volgend jaar weer verkiezingen denk ik

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Op donderdag 6 mei 2010 23:58 schreef Q.E.D. het volgende:

[..]

Die Cameron is trouwens niet goed bij z'n hoofd. Ik hoop op een Labour coalitie.

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 00:00 schreef freako het volgende:
Resultaten komen o.a. hier binnen:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/election2010/results/

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 00:00 schreef jakkop het volgende:

[..]

Gordon Brown is veel beter zeker?

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 00:01 schreef jakkop het volgende:

[..]

Is die feed ook in Nederland beschikbaar?

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Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 00:18 schreef MilaNL het volgende:
Da's weer eens wat anders dan het touchscreen-beamertje van Ferry.

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Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 00:18 schreef Hephaistos. het volgende:
Is het nou echt zo dat de Liberal Democrats ongeveer evenveel stemmen hebben gekregen, maar Labour toch heel veel meer zetels haalt door dat idiote stelsel? Of klopten de peilingen niet?

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Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 00:18 schreef MilaNL het volgende:
Da's weer eens wat anders dan het touchscreen-beamertje van Ferry.

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 00:18 schreef Hephaistos. het volgende:
Is het nou echt zo dat de Liberal Democrats ongeveer evenveel stemmen hebben gekregen, maar Labour toch heel veel meer zetels haalt door dat idiote stelsel? Of klopten de peilingen niet?

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Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 00:20 schreef jakkop het volgende:

[..]

Klopt. Lijkt idioot, maar het heeft ook veel voordelen.

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Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 00:22 schreef Hephaistos. het volgende:

[..]

Dat moeten dan wel hele grote voordelen zijn, wil het opwegen tegen het compleet negeren van de stemmen van grote groepen kiezers.

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 00:30 schreef MilaNL het volgende:
Felix zei bij DWDD dat we het om 1 uur wel zouden weten.. Of denkt die inmiddels in UK tijd? :/

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 00:32 schreef jakkop het volgende:

[..]

Zelfs UK tijd lijkt me sterk.

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Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 00:36 schreef tim. het volgende:
Felix had het volgens mij over de marginal seats, de zetels waar het om zal spannen, de uitslagen daarvan zouden om 1 uur bekend zijn. Jort Kelder weersprak dit direct. Ik denk dat 1 uur Nederlandse tijd inderdaad niet gehaald gaat worden.

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 00:40 schreef Ayca het volgende:
Tvp heb hier geen tv, dus volg het zo maar even

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 00:26 schreef jakkop het volgende:

[..]

-betere band tussen kiezer en politiek, door lokale politici
-grotere kans op absolute meerderheid, dus meer politieke stabiliteit

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 00:46 schreef jakkop het volgende:
Vriend in Sheffield heeft 2 uur in de rij gestaan, in de regen: voor niets, werd naar huis gestuurd.

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 00:46 schreef jakkop het volgende:
Vriend in Sheffield heeft 2 uur in de rij gestaan, in de regen: voor niets, werd naar huis gestuurd.

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Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 00:49 schreef Roel_Jewel het volgende:

[..]

Omdat ie te laat was?

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 00:55 schreef freako het volgende:
Bizar trouwens die rijen. In Nederland zie je tussen 20.30 en 21.00 misschien 5 stemmers in het stembureau, waarvan er eentje om 20.59 binnen komt rennen.

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 00:59 schreef tim. het volgende:
NOVA-correspondent Lia van Bekhoven tweet dat de resultaten van die marginal seats over een uurtje binnen zullen komen.

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 01:02 schreef freako het volgende:

[..]

"de eerste marginals"

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 01:08 schreef SeLang het volgende:
Dat gaat nog een rel worden met die weggestuurde mensen. Ergens in Sheffield houden weggestuurde stemmers de de ballots tegen zodat ze niet geteld kunnen worden hoorde ik net.

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Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 00:51 schreef jakkop het volgende:

[..]

Jep, 200 man naar huis gestuurd daar.

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 00:55 schreef freako het volgende:
Bizar trouwens die rijen. In Nederland zie je tussen 20.30 en 21.00 misschien 5 stemmers in het stembureau, waarvan er eentje om 20.59 binnen komt rennen.

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 01:52 schreef Roel_Jewel het volgende:
@LiavanBekhoven 1ste grote verrassing v d avond. 1ste minister Noord-Ierland verslagen. Kan gevolgen hebben voor vredesproces.
1 minute ago

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 02:00 schreef Appelblauwzeegroen het volgende:
Knevel wannabees Don't knevel paxman!

(BTW: die paarse outfit van die zwangere vrouw van David Cameron is echt niet charmant.... wat ontzettend lelijk zeg!)

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 02:03 schreef zeebeschuit het volgende:

[..]

Kijk voornamelijk ITV en Sky. BBC val ik van in slaap

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 02:05 schreef Appelblauwzeegroen het volgende:
BBC touchscreem alert

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Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 02:07 schreef zeebeschuit het volgende:

[..]

Lijkt wel alsof ze daar gesponsord worden door Apple. Krijg bij dat scherm ipad associaties.

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 02:12 schreef Appelblauwzeegroen het volgende:
Ik vind het hele kiesdistrictsysteem echt ruk.... zouden ze dat ooit gaan veranderen?

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 02:13 schreef jakkop het volgende:
Die green party-gast in Torbay ziet er wel uit als een stereotype linkse lifter zeg.

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 02:07 schreef zeebeschuit het volgende:

[..]

Lijkt wel alsof ze daar gesponsord worden door Apple. Krijg bij dat scherm ipad associaties.

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 02:35 schreef Roel_Jewel het volgende:

[..]

8 miljoen heeft 't gekost .

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 02:36 schreef zeebeschuit het volgende:

[..]

TV License tax

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Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 07:28 schreef Dichtpiet. het volgende:
is de popular vote ook bekend? is libdem daar wel wat mee opgeschoten?

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Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 07:47 schreef Nielsch het volgende:
Ik begrijp het concept van een popular vote en uiteindelijke zetels enzo wel, maar in de UK is het toch wel heel erg scheef!

Labour: 28,5% van de stemmen en 213 zetels
Lib Dem: 22,8% van de stemmen en 42 zetels

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 07:56 schreef Dichtpiet. het volgende:
wat is het plan van LibDem eigenlijk om het kiesstelsel te veranderen? weten ze dat al? of is dat net als D66 en bestuurlijke vernieuwing bij ons: alleen maar vage plannen maar nog niks concreet.

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 09:12 schreef Hexagon het volgende:

[..]

Ik vernam iets van de mogelijkheid tot het uitbrengen van twee stemmen zodat de tweede partijen per district ook meeprofiteren.

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 07:56 schreef Dichtpiet. het volgende:
wat is het plan van LibDem eigenlijk om het kiesstelsel te veranderen? weten ze dat al? of is dat net als D66 en bestuurlijke vernieuwing bij ons: alleen maar vage plannen maar nog niks concreet.

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 09:13 schreef Hexagon het volgende:
Btw deze verkiezing heeft enkel verliezers

Libdem omdat ze geen zetelwinst hebben
Labour omdat ze flink zijn afgedroogd
De Tories omdat ze geen meerderheid hebben

quote:

Op vrijdag 7 mei 2010 09:08 schreef SeLang het volgende:
[ afbeelding ]

[ afbeelding ]

De pound stort compleet in, zowel tov de euro als tegen de US$