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David Herdson dusts off his crystal ball for the year ahead For all that 2011 was a big year for politics domestically – the first nationwide referendum since the 1970s, in which AV was voted down, the formation of a majority SNP government at Holyrood, cracks appearing in both the coalition and Ed Miliband’s leadership – the biggest stories came from abroad. At the start of the year, predicting mounting trouble for the Eurozone, where problems in Greece, Ireland and…

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Could Mitt be over-taken on Tuesday? The big news tonight in the race for the White House is that the much anticipated Des Moines Register poll is just out. The overall figures are in line with other recent surveys – Romney 24% / Paul 22% / Santorum 15% / Gingrich 12% / Perry 11% / Bachmann 7%. But the paper reports that there was a massive difference in responses later in the week which suggest that the momentum is with…

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Will incumbents hold on in London/Washington/Paris? It’s a big year coming up opening with the Iowa caucus on Tuesday to be followed by a White House race primary programme lasting nearly six months – which I think is the longest ever. On this side of the Atlantic there’s the French Presidential election in April/May where Sarkorzy will be fighting for a second term. We haven’t covered that yet – I’ve been waiting for Betfair to open up a market –…

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Were your 2011 picks crystal clear or “through a glass darkly?” Congratulations to Oliver who finished 29 points ahead of Jim Lowe with Dan Tor in third place in PB’s annual prediction competition – the full table with all players is available here, as well as an Excel spreadsheet showing the detailed breakdown of results. These were the questions from a year ago. The first section looked at key posts as at Christmas 2011, and the first three questions were…

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Which of these 5 women will still be in the cabinet at the end of 2012? (Tick all that apply) Baroness Warsi Theresa May Justine Greening Cheryl Gillan Caroline Spelman    pollcode.com free polls 

Will 2012 bring tests for all three party leaders? First up in January David Cameron needs to make a judgement call on a tricky little situation involving Aidan Burley MP. The Conservatives are currently investigating the situation that resulted in the MP for Cannock Chase being present at a Nazi-themed stag party in a French Restaurant, praising the Third Reich and allegedly hiring the costume. To make things worse Burley, now shorn of his PPS role and of future Ministerial…

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Which of these Lib Dems will still be in the cabinet at the end of 2012? (Tick all that apply) Chris Huhne Vince Cable Danny Alexander Nick Clegg Michael Moore     

Is he now in with a shout in Iowa? With just five campaigning days to go before Tuesday’s Iowa caucuses there’s been huge movement in a CNN/Time poll in the state. These are the shares with changes on the last similar poll three weeks ago: Romney 25% (+5) Paul 2% (+3) Santorum 16% (+11) Gingrich 14% (-19) Perry 11% (+2) Bachmann 9% (+2) Huntsman 1% (-3) The survey came out only a few hours after US political analyst, Nate Silver,…

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