Election Year or Fear!

[swaledale]

Au contraire, on the matter of reading what rA wrote I fear you havent. He referred to of the 77,00 that COULD have voted, ie the constituency voting public, not those who actually did. Actually about 36,800 voted. He took comfort in in his conclusion that just 13.8% of the people who could have voted, voted for right leaning candidates.

In order to derive the 13.8% that he he took comfort in, he of course assumed that none of the non voters (over 50% of the total constituency, as the turnout was 45.2%) would have voted Tory or Reform. That is what I mean by abuse of statistics. Thats something of a stretch - and just like his view on the Brexit vote, you cannot assume that the non voters would vote the way you want them to vote in drawing conclusions. More realistic to assume that the non voters' leanings would mirror the balance of those that did vote, but that too os potentially flawed.

Absolutely the left leaning parties received more votes than the right leaning by some way, but my issue isn't that - in this constituency with its demographic and election history, it would be a minor miracle to see any other outcome - but my issue was with his 13.8% and the nonsensical conclusion he drew about total percentage support for right leaning parties.

At the last general election there was an approximate 60% turnout, of which Labour gained 33.7% votes cast. Thus Labour gained 20.1% of the available votes, alongside a landslide FPP victory. Applying his abuse of statistics rA would conclude Labour had no mandate to govern, yet clearly they do have one.....


Anyway this is a rerun of the tiresome Brexit argument that the majority of the people didnt want Brexit. That was fallacious in that context and his conclusion here is just as fallacious. ironically I suspect that today a majority would be against Brexit had the debate been held 10 years on.

Mea Culpa, yes your right, on the electorate figures, I misread, so your point stands.

RA was I think pointing out that if there was such a groundswell of support for Reform, as has been claimed variously across the media, by certain polls and by some on here, it was surprising that more of those that didn't vote hadn't turned out to vote for Reform. But thats my interpretation.

The tiresome as you put it Brexit argument, largely centred on the fact that the buffoon Cameron didn't put a threshhold on the referendun result, typically 60% voting in favour for it to pass and that the narrow margin was insufficient for a plebscite that effected so significant a change.

[ramAnag]

The independent observers did not identify any section of the electorate or ethnicity of voters adopting this coercive behaviour. Nor any party what might have benefitted.

Yet you assume the coercive practice was carried on by voters in the Muslim community. I had not expected such inherent racism from you.

The rest of your post is simple deflection and assigning characteristics to non voters in just the same way as you did with the Brexit poll. The votes of those who bothered to vote are what matters - and note the turnout was almost the same at both by election and general election.

Labour got less than half of the votes of the full electorate at the last election - does that mean they have no mandate to govern?

If you take comfort from abusing statistics to dismiss the threat of the far right, that's up to you, I hope you sleep well at night.

Silly post. Of course the independent observers didn?t identify a particular group however when moaning about family voting RUK identified Muslim and Islamist sectarianism and that is what I was referring to.

I slept a lot better last night than the night before thanks.

[Andy_Faber]

Like him or no, and be it for good or ill, DT has hit the jackpot in Iran, my source from a family member, Iranian via Spain and Germany and ‘wired in’ to the source area claimed (yes Swale and rA, just ‘claimed’) to have known at lunchtime and there’s widespread rejoice in his family area in Germany

[Andy_Faber]

Silly post.

GP ignore the insult, I get that a lot, usually when I’ve made a point. It’s just a tactic - just defecation. or do I mean defection. Or deflection

[ramAnag]

RA was I think pointing out that if there was such a groundswell of support for Reform, as has been claimed variously across the media, by certain polls and by some on here, it was surprising that more of those that didn't vote hadn't turned out to vote for Reform. But thats my interpretation.

The tiresome as you put it Brexit argument, largely centred on the fact that the buffoon Cameron didn't put a threshhold on the referendun result, typically 60% voting in favour for it to pass and that the narrow margin was insufficient for a plebscite that effected so significant a change.

Your interpretation is correct.

I’d add complacency to the reasons for the Brexit referendum defeat Swale. I was trying to avoid comparison because there really isn’t one. There was certainly no such complacency in Gorton and Denton and it was always seen as a massive challenge for Starmer and a litmus test of Farage’s appeal as a potential leader, one he and his abominable candidate singularly failed.

So yes, GP, I am reassured. It was certainly a bad night for Starmer and Labour which no one has denied, but in terms of the political spectrum, it was just as bad, possibly worse, for Farage and he’s the one who’s meant to be ‘on the up’ and with much more to prove.

[Geoff Parkstone]

GP ignore the insult, I get that a lot, usually when I’ve made a point. It’s just a tactic - just defecation. or do I mean defection. Or deflection

Don't worry AF, I find that when people get found out they react in such a way so as to belittle the point. Especially racists, overt or covert.

[ramAnag]

GP ignore the insult, I get that a lot, usually when I??ve made a point. It??s just a tactic - just defecation. or do I mean defection. Or deflection

Some ‘moderator’ you are. You seem to have forgotten that we’d been trying to get along, but seeing as you’ve returned to your usual grumpy and divisive self…the only reason you might receive the ‘silly post’ response is because you write so many of them, not least the one above.

[ramAnag]

Don't worry AF, I find that when people get found out they react in such a way so as to belittle the point. Especially racists, overt or covert.

Lol…which is certainly something you’d know all about these days…on every level!

[swaledale]

Like him or no, and be it for good or ill, DT has hit the jackpot in Iran, my source from a family member, Iranian via Spain and Germany and ‘wired in’ to the source area claimed (yes Swale and rA, just ‘claimed’) to have known at lunchtime and there’s widespread rejoice in his family area in Germany

History would suggest that its perhaps a little early for anyone to "rejoice" over Trump's illegal and obviously dangerous action.

1) Any person who is able understand history, will know that US intervention in other nations and especially the Middle East gnerally does not end well.

If we are looking for examples Afghanistan, Iraq (in partiuclar Bush and Blairs "war on terror" achived nothing but bloodshed, chaos and spawned even more terrosits who ahve since killed numerous innocent civilians in the West. Afghanistan was a **** show and the lives of EU, UK and US forces were needlessly lost for abo****ely nothing.

2) There is no clear strategy here, other than the Israeli PM thinks war is one way of keeping him in power and Trump knows that this distracts from his domestic troubles, viz. ICE killings, his defeat on tariffs, inflation, failing growth. There is no clear indication as to who, if the current Iranian leader is removed, will take over and how that will pan out. In the meantime tens of thousands of civilians have been killed, by both Iran and the US, hey but who cares about them eh?

3) Its a matter of fact that Trump has ignored the US Constitution in launching this attack, the celebration of an authoritarian leader ignoring democractic norms, is frankly only for people who fail to understand that one day that same authoritarian leader may (or in this case already has) be using the same methods to attack their own citizens.

Its truly bizarre that at this stage with no clear indication as to what has happened and what the effects will be on Iran and the wider world economy and overall security, that anyone is rejoicing.

But then the world is full of dumb ****ers!

[swaledale]

GP ignore the insult, I get that a lot, usually when I’ve made a point. It’s just a tactic - just defecation. or do I mean defection. Or deflection

Mm someone's a little sore after failing to provide evidence to back uprecent claims and being shown up for it aren't they?

[swaledale]

Don't worry AF, I find that when people get found out they react in such a way so as to belittle the point. Especially racists, overt or covert.

Rather like you ignoring the part of his post which I pointed out you were wrong about and only focussing on where you were in fact correct on the figures, if not as to the reasoning behind RA's use of them? He wasn't "found out" as you put it, he didn't make himself clear over the use of statistics, but your interpretation was a little wide of the mark.

Just for the record, RA did not claim that family voting was undertaken by Muslims, he was quoting comments made by others about the claims Reform and the Tories had made, as supported by other posters! So he was belittling YOUR misunderstanding of what he'd posted in respect of that.

Given you have recently posted a blatant racist "joke", its hypocritical for you to be implying RA is a racist and hypocritical also that you fail to recognise and admit where you got it wrong. Still I guess that merely makes you the same as AF, who seems to think "lived eperience" without any evidence to back his claims up, consitutes an adult response to a debate.

[swaledale]

Some ‘moderator’ you are. You seem to have forgotten that we’d been trying to get along, but seeing as you’ve returned to your usual grumpy and divisive self…the only reason you might receive the ‘silly post’ response is because you write so many of them, not least the one above.

He is a little sore from losing the last debate he had with me RA, so seeks solace with his racist fellow poster.

[Ram Pant]

American and Israel or Israel and America? There's a lot of people online believing the latter.

[Andy_Faber]

You seem to have forgotten that we’d been trying to get along.

It was all going fine until I disagreed with something, then the personal insults started again, sadly and predictably

[ramAnag]

He is a little sore from losing the last debate he had with me RA, so seeks solace with his racist fellow poster.

Tbh, Swale, I’m a bit bewildered by AF. He seems to think using the word ‘silly’ is ‘insulting’ but cannot see anything wrong with openly racist posts and genuine insults such as one poster calling another ‘anti semitic’. Apparently he doesn’t like the ‘one liner’ thread, some of which I find very funny and some of which I don’t, but that’s just the nature of humour. What is true though is that, throughout the thread’s many posts only two people have posted tasteless/racist jokes. One is GP and the other supports Forest. Neither have ever been chastised by our moderator. Odd that.

As for GP. What can one say? I used to find him, in his previous RR incarnation, good fun. We disagreed about somethings and agreed on others. It was largely good natured banter. What we see now is different. It’s often openly racist, bitter and sometimes slightly sick. Calling me ‘racist’ is simply laughable, but typical of the way he seeks to twist things. He’s turned into Tricky, albeit a slightly more articulate version. Maybe he’ll threaten to leave again - for the umpteenth time. Whether that will be any great loss is for others to decide. It was certainly a more peaceful place without him, imo.

Perhaps the pair of them are just more disappointed by RUK’s result in Manchester than we thought.