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Yesterday saw the Reform Party claim they had overtaken the Conservative Party’s membership total although Kemi Badenoch has accused Reform of manipulating their figures in a lengthy thread on the social media plaform formerly known as Twitter. As the Tweet by Ben Harris points out there’s no automatcity that having more members leads to electoral victory, just ask Jeremy Corbyn in 2017 and 2019, or the SNP earlier on this year when they were reduced to a single digit number…

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“They slipped the surly bonds of earth to touch the face of God.” Those words from the poem, High Flight by John Magee, were said by President Reagan on the afternoon of Tuesday 28 January 1986. They ended his address to the nation after the Challenger Shuttle exploded barely 2 minutes after its launch earlier that day. The seven astronauts on board did not disappear into the sky. As described in Adam Higginbotham’s magisterial, detailed and gripping account of the tragedy and…

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Political Crossword Clues 2024 Across 1.) Former mayor in Germany’s capital rejected by minister (6) 5.   President or Prime Minister represented in slow motion (6) 9.   Tory has upset stomach and the runs (9) 10. Brown reflected over political alliance (4)  11.  Political thinker bonds with opponents around a table (6)  12.  Imperialist suspicious over America being taken in (3,5)  14. Pardon minister’s assistant spinning over a message (8)  16. Red or nearly Blue (4)  18. Dictator for a…

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Happy Christmas everybody. TSE

This chart in the FT shows how badly Labour have started, with business confidence in Labour falling like Hans Gruber from Nakatomi Plaza. The only positive for Labour is that they have a long time to turn things around but a Labour government being bad for the economy as a once in a century pandemic is not the narrative Starmer and Labour wanted. TSE

This should help left leaning parties overall is my expectation but this may the lives of opinion pollsters even harder as younger people are harder to sample. TSE

TSE

For me the single most significant event this millenium is the great financial crisis. I think it led to an expectation for the electorate that bailouts for the banks would become de rigueur for all companies if they ever got into difficulties and when non banks weren’t bailed out that led to resentment, particularly as living standards didn’t improve. I think it explains in part things like Brexit and Trump. TSE