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Guest MattP

FT General Election Poll 2019

FT General Election 2019  

501 members have voted

  1. 1. Which party will be getting your vote?

    • Conservative
      155
    • Labour
      188
    • Liberal Democrats
      93
    • Brexit Party
      17
    • Green Party
      26
    • Other
      22


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53 minutes ago, Jon the Hat said:

I don't understand why people get upset about income disparity.  The mega rich have **** all influence on the rest of us, and there have always been the mega rich.  As long as they pay a decent chunk of tax, or employ people who do, who cares?  The more important point is that we are all wealthier.  The politics of envy are as stupid and pointless as the listening to those who blame everything on immigration.

I read a statistic the other day that said that 1 million seconds is about a week and half, 1 billion second is around 31 and half years.

 

The idea that food banks, homelessness etc are on the rise whilst simultaneously there are people that could spend a pound a second for three decades and still have money left in the bank, living in the same country/city as each other, seems rather unpleasant and unnecessary, does it not?

 

Now of course it's not the fault of the billionaires that food banks have risen by something like 73% and one in every 200 people are now homeless, there are a myriad of reasons as to why individuals/families fall to such awful lows. However, I really don't see why addressing that disparity, without going 'full communist', is that radical. 

 

Also, one trillion seconds would take you back to the beginnings of human civilization.  

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I'm not the most clued up on politics but show an interest. Which I guess makes me very similar to a lot of people, and I can honestly I say over the past few months and even years I've found it so hard to keep up with whats going on regarding Brexit etc. Which in turn, has made it a rather difficult decision now a general election is upon us. 

 

I know there isn't a better party as such, but what are the pros and cons of each? I've seen some numbers that Labour have put out and not sure how they plan on hitting all of those, apparently the 'super rich' get taxed some more?

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1 hour ago, Jon the Hat said:

I don't understand why people get upset about income disparity.  The mega rich have **** all influence on the rest of us, and there have always been the mega rich.  As long as they pay a decent chunk of tax, or employ people who do, who cares?  The more important point is that we are all wealthier.  The politics of envy are as stupid and pointless as the listening to those who blame everything on immigration.

I have no issue with people getting rich, especially if they have done something exceptional to achieve it. But what is rich? 10m? 50m? 100m? At some point wealth becomes less about financial security or even about providing for your extended family’s security, it becomes about power.

 

At this point the super rich can and do, game the system. This is done in a huge variety of ways, forming monopolies, use of lobbyists, control of the media, control of the financial system, old fashioned corruption and bribery of politicians, to name just a few. This seems to be happening more and more as wealth accrues to an ever smaller percentage of the population.

 

For me this is the real issue, and one that seems pretty much impossible to tackle.

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When I see this sort of thing it makes me think that some people have just got so much money they don't know what to do with it it.

 

Olivia Newton-John's Grease outfit fetches $405,700 at auction

 

Also think the world's gone mad.

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4 minutes ago, davieG said:

When I see this sort of thing it makes me think that some people have just got so much money they don't know what to do with it it.

 

Olivia Newton-John's Grease outfit fetches $405,700 at auction

 

Also think the world's gone mad.

Yet the thing in common we all have, is that we are all willing to pay £55 for a tee shirt with the club crest and the name of a duty free shop from Thailand and the name and logo of a German sportswear manufacturer coupled with that adding a name at £1 a letter and £4 a number and £6 for a premiere league badge. As opposed to £2 for a plain white tee shirt at Primark. An items value is what someone is willing to pay and I would suggest that as it was an auction at least one other individual perceived the value of the item to be greater than £400,000 to them. The are things in our society that have a value that is higher than their usefulness it is not that the world has gone mad it is that the world has always been mad in that respect why is gold more valuable than silver or diamond more valuable than jade.   

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59 minutes ago, WigstonWanderer said:

I have no issue with people getting rich, especially if they have done something exceptional to achieve it. But what is rich? 10m? 50m? 100m? At some point wealth becomes less about financial security or even about providing for your extended family’s security, it becomes about power.

 

At this point the super rich can and do, game the system. This is done in a huge variety of ways, forming monopolies, use of lobbyists, control of the media, control of the financial system, old fashioned corruption and bribery of politicians, to name just a few. This seems to be happening more and more as wealth accrues to an ever smaller percentage of the population.

 

For me this is the real issue, and one that seems pretty much impossible to tackle.

The point is it makes sod all difference to 99% of us what other people's net worth is.  Take the earlier point on food banks - if most people are better off than they have ever been in the history of human kind yet some people are falling off the bottom, then there are issues at play which have sod all to do with whether the rich pay enough tax.

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17 minutes ago, twoleftfeet said:

Yet the thing in common we all have, is that we are all willing to pay £55 for a tee shirt with the club crest and the name of a duty free shop from Thailand and the name and logo of a German sportswear manufacturer coupled with that adding a name at £1 a letter and £4 a number and £6 for a premiere league badge.

Not me, but then I've never been enticed by a designer name on stuff I buy, it may be there on some of it but not because i wanted it, but them I'm of a different generation.

 

But you have to have a lot of money to spare to pay those sort of sums and I wouldn't compare it to precious metals as they have important practical uses.

 

You're right the world has always been mad but seems to be getting madder looking at the stuff people but compared to the past.

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Whilst its easy to blame the rich for the problems of the poor.

It could be that the problems of the poor can be blamed somewhat on ourselves, insofar as the abuses of the powers held in the 70's by unions has set back the cause of the working class. Looking back at the 80's the NUM entered a battle with the then Government which neither side could afford to lose, whilst not nice to admit coal was cheaper to buy from a communist state than produce in the uk but rather than accept that some UK pits were too expensive to run with other options available to the electricity board Scargill said no pits would be allowed to close rather then ensuring that the would be a coal industry he stuck to his guns and lost. Thatcher having won the battle brought in massive changes to the law to make strikes harder to organise. How many of todays worker fell that parting with a couple of quid a week is worth it when it comes to union membership fees. if the poor wont stick together then what do we expect?     

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Whatever the merits of this debate, that thing that has been proven throughout history is that you don't solve the problems of the poor by just attacking the rich.

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8 minutes ago, MattP said:

Whatever the merits of this debate, that thing that has been proven throughout history is that you don't solve the problems of the poor by just attacking the rich.

Allowing the rich to get richer and have more control over politics isn't a great alternative either.

 

Incidentally, I've been watching Andrew Marr's Making of Modern Britain documentary over my last couple of lunchtimes and I'm currently in the 1910s and can't help but notice the overlap with today's politics.

 

Attempts to get rid of the Lords.

Constitutional chaos.

The People's Budget and the arguments against.

Election after election.

MPs switching sides.

 

 

 

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14 minutes ago, MattP said:

Whatever the merits of this debate, that thing that has been proven throughout history is that you don't solve the problems of the poor by just attacking the rich.

True.

 

You do, however, solve the problems of powermongers (who are often moneyed) by stopping them from abusing their power whenever you can.

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2 minutes ago, David Guiza said:

Allowing the rich to get richer and have more control over politics isn't a great alternative either.

 

Incidentally, I've been watching Andrew Marr's Making of Modern Britain documentary over my last couple of lunchtimes and I'm currently in the 1910s and can't help but notice the overlap with today's politics.

 

Attempts to get rid of the Lords.

Constitutional chaos.

The People's Budget and the arguments against.

Election after election.

MPs switching sides.

It is like history repeating itself, pretty sure the Irish border around the partition and just how "socialist" the Labour party should be was also two of the biggest political arguments of the 1910's as well. Let's hope the next fourty years don't mirror that of the last century. 

 

As an aside if you enjoy that Marr documentary watch his other series as well he did about the history of the World - fantastic knowledge packed into eight episodes.

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21 minutes ago, MattP said:

It is like history repeating itself, pretty sure the Irish border around the partition and just how "socialist" the Labour party should be was also two of the biggest political arguments of the 1910's as well. Let's hope the next fourty years don't mirror that of the last century. 

 

As an aside if you enjoy that Marr documentary watch his other series as well he did about the history of the World - fantastic knowledge packed into eight episodes.

You can add world circumstances - tough economic times and a rise in nationalist governments - to that list of parallels too. Like you, I sincerely hope the next few decades don't follow that pathway.

 

I'll have to check out that Marr documentary myself.

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5 hours ago, Jon the Hat said:

Boris is already in number 10, and coming up with some pretty sensible policies in the main.  

I don't trust a word that comes out his mouth personally, his an ego driven baffoon who has shown himself up to a political.clown of the highest order. 

 

I couldn't support him if I tried.

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1 hour ago, Alf Bentley said:

Chris Williamson deselected as Labour candidate for Derby North, according to BBC East Midlands News.

 

No news yet about Keith Vaz, but NEC decision due today....

Hope he has the good grace to put cause before ego and not stand as an independent. As I mentioned, that seat could go as many as five different ways but is most likely to be a straight up Tory-Labour marginal.

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25 minutes ago, Alf Bentley said:

Chris Williamson deselected as Labour candidate for Derby North, according to BBC East Midlands News.

 

No news yet about Keith Vaz, but NEC decision due today....

Bad news - Tories would surely have seen him off.

 

Back in play now.

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6 minutes ago, Voll Blau said:

Hope he has the good grace to put cause before ego and not stand as an independent. As I mentioned, that seat could go as many as five different ways but is most likely to be a straight up Tory-Labour marginal.

 

I second that hope. I assume that it is accurate news? Not appeared in Google News yet, but BBC local news announced it....

 

1 minute ago, MattP said:

Bad news - Tories would surely have seen him off.

 

Back in play now.

 

Tories must be strong favourites, unless the polls prove a long way out.

They won the seat in 2010 and 2015 (though very narrowly). Williamson only won it back in 2017 & has doubtless alienated a few voters with his antics & comments since then.

 

If he stands as an independent, it would be a definite Tory gain, I imagine.

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1 hour ago, Alf Bentley said:

 

I second that hope. I assume that it is accurate news? Not appeared in Google News yet, but BBC local news announced it....

 

 

Tories must be strong favourites, unless the polls prove a long way out.

They won the seat in 2010 and 2015 (though very narrowly). Williamson only won it back in 2017 & has doubtless alienated a few voters with his antics & comments since then.

 

If he stands as an independent, it would be a definite Tory gain, I imagine.

 

 

I think Williamson standing here would be as much of a disaster for Labour as the Brexit Party standing would be for the Tories.

 

Was the tightest marginal at the 2015 election (I think?) and not much in it last time out either. Suspect I'll end up living in a blue constituency again.

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4 minutes ago, Voll Blau said:

 

 

I think Williamson standing here would be as much of a disaster for Labour as the Brexit Party standing would be for the Tories.

 

Was the tightest marginal at the 2015 election (I think?) and not much in it last time out either. Suspect I'll end up living in a blue constituency again.

Did you vote for Williamson last time out?

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1 hour ago, leicsmac said:

You can add world circumstances - tough economic times and a rise in nationalist governments - to that list of parallels too. Like you, I sincerely hope the next few decades don't follow that pathway.

 

I'll have to check out that Marr documentary myself.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03ty0wf/episodes/guide

 

It's a series of eight, very good watch.

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