The Marf Wednesday View
Marf’s own site is LondonSketchbook.com Rod Crosby’s guest slot looking at 38 seats where the uniform national swing might not apply will be published before 6pm.
Israel 2009 – election night special
Jerusalem Post Have Kadima and Livni edged out Netanyahu’s Likud? Channel 1 exit poll: Kadima 30 Likud 28 Yisrael Beiteinu 14 Labor 13 Double Carpet
Should Gord be more than “very angry” about bonuses?
Has he let Cameron in with an opening? One of the features of depression-hit recession-hit Britain is that anybody who is thought to be getting away with it financially, particularly if it’s with taxpayer’s money, is vulnerable to attack. Jacqui Smith and her housing allowance was in the firing line yesterday and that story continues to rumble today. Now the focus is on the bank bosses – especially the bonuses at RBS where billions of pounds of taxpayers money has…
Is the Home Secretary toast?
Or does she have nothing to lose by staying on? The newspapers have broken a story that Jacqui Smith, the Home Secretary, has been claiming £500 allowances for living at a house belonging to her sister. The Mail on Sunday claims that she has received £116,000 in allowances whilst lodging at her sister’s house. This is in addition to the taxpayer-funded security, which the paper estimates as costing around £200,000 per annum. The Home Secretary’s Special Advisor claims that this…
LDs soar to 22% in new ICM poll
CONSERVATIVES 40% (-4) LABOUR 28% (-4) LIB DEMS 22% (+6) …and Labour is back in the 20s again There’s a new ICM poll in the Sunday Telegraph tomorrow with quite dramatic changes on the last surrvey from the pollster nearly a fortnight ago. The big boost is to the Lib Dem total – up 6% at 22% which is only a fraction off what the party, then led by Charles Kennedy, got at the 2005 general election. Generally ICM, which…
Would a Shadow Cabinet have helped?
How bold can you be in your first 100 days? For those of us who admired how tight and disciplined the Obama campaign was for its duration, it is mystifying how lax the vetting appears to have been around Cabinet nominations. First Bill Richardson was forced to withdraw, allowing Republican Senator Judd Gregg (NH) to take the position at Commerce. They survived the tremors around new Treasury Secretary Geithner’s tax returns, but the same problem of suddenly-discovered tax liabilities has…
What’s Sarkozy done to Gord’s core argument?
Guardian.co.uk Can he go on boasting that the world’s following Britain? For the past five months a key element in the government’s economic crisis rhetoric has been that its approach has been followed or matched by the rest of the world. This line has been used, with some effect, time and time again to batter the Tories in general and isolate David Cameron in particular. It’s become a feature of almost every PMQs. So its not surprising that the Number…
MEMO to MSM: Pre-2001 polls cannot be compared
UKPollingReport Remember the days of the Labour over-staters? Yet again in discussing the latest YouGov poll we have seen a pile of rubbish from supposedly “expert” pundits who should know better. Just look at the polls above just as the 1997 general election was being declared. Look at the crazy Labour leads that were being forecasted. Compare them with the actual result. The issue, of course, is that all but ICM in 1997 were polling in the old-fashioned Labour over-stating…