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Author: David Herdson

The dangers of reverse-reasoning: a Christmas parable

The dangers of reverse-reasoning: a Christmas parable

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Beware starting from a conclusion and working backwards “This time next year, we’ll be running the country”, as Jeremy Corbyn didn’t quite say a few days ago in his interview with Grazia. It’s a near-repetition of his prediction at Glastonbury this June – except that there he was talking about Christmas 2017 rather than 2018 – and for those not favourably inclined towards him, might bear a passing resemblance to the unsubstantiated optimism of another Christmas staple. Admittedly, Del Boy…

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As we edge towards to the year end three seasonal political betting tips

As we edge towards to the year end three seasonal political betting tips

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At the end of a tumultuous year, some early thoughts for 2018 and beyond Date of the Next UK election: 2022, 5/2 SkyBet In one sense, this is a great bet. Yes, there’s a lot that could happen over the next four and a bit years but the FTPA makes it hard for an early election to be forced unless the government wants to, and after the experience of this last year, why would it? If this last week has…

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Why are the Eurosceptics not kicking up more of a fuss?

Why are the Eurosceptics not kicking up more of a fuss?

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May looks set for an easier ride The Conservative whips are doing their job well. Evening after evening, the government records consistent majorities in the teens or twenties as it protects its Brexit Bill unamended through the Commons. More innovatively, we saw this morning a flurry of tweets and statements from Tory MPs and ministers lauding Theresa May for her tough diplomacy in delivering a good interim Brexit deal. That helped set the news agenda. To some extent, there was…

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Damian Green’s computer is none of our business

Damian Green’s computer is none of our business

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This has unhealthy echoes of the Plebgate affair Why would former policemen leak details of an investigation that didn’t result in a prosecution (never mind a conviction), which took place nine years ago and where the details were incidental to the alleged act being investigated? The answer to that is, of course, entirely speculative. It is also to a large degree irrelevant. If there was evidence of criminal wrongdoing, they should have acted at the time. If there wasn’t, they…

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The sun is rising in the East

The sun is rising in the East

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Never mind the crocodile: the dragon is now the power in Zimbabwe Robert Mugabe is probably not a man much amused by historical irony. That’s a shame because if he was he might appreciate the various mirror images between his enforced retirement and the downfall of the Nawab Siraj-ud-daulah of Bengal in 1757. The Nawab – at 24, nearly seven decades younger than Mugabe – was deposed by the East India Company after it bribed his commander with the offer…

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The Electoral Commission’s investigation into Leave’s funding could halt Brexit

The Electoral Commission’s investigation into Leave’s funding could halt Brexit

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The door to an exit from Brexit might just have opened Butterflies are beloved of writers of alternate history and counterfactuals. The notion that but for the eddies created by the meanderings of an individual butterfly, a hurricane would (or would not) have developed is as old as it is misleading; there are many butterflies, there are few hurricanes and there is precious little connection from the one to the other. It’s a curious example of an argument reduced to…

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Sir Robert Peel and the Corn Laws – the ghost that haunts Theresa May

Sir Robert Peel and the Corn Laws – the ghost that haunts Theresa May

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There is a way to avoid a Crash Brexit – but it’ll destroy May, her party and trust All parties of any age have ghosts that haunt them: spectres from disasters of the past so great that they dare not be forgotten yet dare not be truly remembered either. Indeed, they may not really be remembered in detail at all; their legacy today lying not in memory or even mythology but in the culture and behaviour that evolved to ward…

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Back to the 1990s? Maybe

Back to the 1990s? Maybe

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https://twitter.com/BobJWilliams/status/926587275105984513 Friday might have been the day the Tories became ungovernable again Remakes are rarely as good as the originals. For all the attempts to update the story, they’re generally hamstrung by the essential unoriginality of it. Not that that stops the recycling: the public might not take them to their hearts but they’ll pay their money all the same. We might seem to be living through a remake now. A Tory prime minister with no majority, reliant on the…

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