In the first of three articles Alanbrooke looks at Irish affairs The fallout from the Brexit vote has led to more interest in the future of Northern Ireland than is usual. In particular the issue of a one state Ireland has bubbled back to the top of the political discussion with, as ever, strong views on either side The modern Irish state is not the Ireland of old; it is a successful, self-confident country which has worked its way to…
This’ll ratchet up the pressure for a “People’s vote” Inevitably there are massively different estimates of how many people have been marching in London today against Brexit but judging by the TV pictures it does seem to be very large. Whether it’s up to the anti Iraq war demonstrations of 2003 I don’t know but it’s still pretty substantial. The organisers are lucky that it is commanding a lot of attention by the media and the pro-Brexiteers who have been…
The balance in the Upper House has silently trended towards the blues Jeremy Corbyn doesn’t like the House of Lords and as with many things he doesn’t like, he’s gone out of his way to avoid engaging with it. When he was first running for the Labour leadership, he promised that he wouldn’t nominate any new Labour peers. That was understandable for someone who has long opposed the nature of the undemocratic upper House, and for someone who’s always believed…
This week’s PB / Polling Matters podcast is split into two parts: In part one, Keiran Pedley is joined by Peter McLeod (Vice President at pollster GQR) to explore what the public think of “Chequers” and what they expect from any Brexit deal May brings back. It turns out that Chequers is more popular than you might think in the right context – but is that the context the Prime Minister’s eventual deal will ultimately be seen in? Keiran and…
Even though the next US presidential election is more than two years away potential contenders, particularly on the Democratic side, are already going through the machinations of preparing for a run – first for the party nomination then for the Presidency itself. The big surprise of the 2016 race was how successful Vermont Senator and socialist, Bernie Sanders, was in the fight for the Democratic nomination giving Hillary Clinton much harder fight than perhaps she had been expecting. The signs…
I have been wary of writing on Brexit. The vast majority of the visitors to this site are clearly informed – and informedly clear – with respect to their opinions on the matter. However, with Mike’s indulgence, I would like to pose some questions for discussion. The weakness of the British position now has little to do with the Parliamentary arithmetic. Indeed, as Alastair Meeks presciently wrote in July 2017, there can actually be negotiating strength in what he termed…
One of the things that the Elizabeth Warren DNA argument has highlighted is how successful Trump is at undermining anybody who is an opponent by the use of well thought out nicknames. These encapsulate the main negative and he uses the attack time and time again. Just remember from the 2016 nomination and election when we had,”Little Marco” , “Low energy” Bush, “Lying Ted” , and, of course, “Crooked Hillary”. Those all in their own way contributed to Trump’s victory….
It’s getting messy. In truth, that was always on the cards after the general election result. The public in their wisdom delivered a Parliament with no overall majority, with two main parties both formally committed to implementing Brexit and neither sharing any kind of consensus over what that meant in practice. Theresa May has spent the last 16 months navigating between competing interest groups, endlessly deferring decisions, endlessly conceding ground whenever short term coalitions formed against her and evading final…