Sorry, Killarney, I'm a bit thick - what's the difference between a 'Swing' and a 'vote reduction' ?

And surely not a loss of four million votes ? Did the Lib Dems get 6.6 million votes at the 2010 election ?

Thanks,

Joe

Aidan

I agree with you that some on the left are not enamoured of the Blair years. As you say, “not because of what he's done since leaving, but because of what he did in government”.

And as to your comments on privatisations in the United Kingdom only benefitting the 1%. I agree, in many, many cases yes. But benefitting the 1% isn’t just limited to socialists in government. It was the Tories who underpriced Royal Mail in Oct 2013. Underpriced by some 38%, see

http://onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=16733

And not putting the taxpayer first is not limited to the United Kingdom.

But there is no way Corbyn can un-privatise an asset without digging deep into the Exchequer.

BJelly

I agree that Corbyn “walks the walk”. He is the anti-politician. A straight shooting kind of guy. It’s what he’s loaded in his rife that scares many. And if what you say is true about expenses, then that is admirable.

Let’s not forget that Blair was very popular. He topped the popularity charts with a whopping 93% approval after the death of Diana, Princess of Wales.

As to your link of Michael T. Flynn, the retired United States Army lieutenant general, I caught the interview a couple of weeks go thank you, and he does make a lot of sense. But he does have the benefit of hindsight when he opines, doesn't he?

Yes, Loudmouth.
6.8 million votes actually.

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Jonathan J. Ariel
Why do you consider that a problem? Governments have nationalized and renationalized things before.

The worst that could happen is a slight devaluation of the pound. Which will probably also be one of the results of the Cameron government's economic mismanagement.

Loudmouth

‘Sorry, Killarney, I'm a bit thick’

Oh, that’s nice to know, considering you called me an ‘idiot’ in your last 3 posts on a separate thread.

‘… what's the difference between a 'Swing' and a 'vote reduction' ?

Damned if I know … but as I understand it, a ‘swing percentage’ is based on a formula that measures a party’s changing vote pattern against the changing vote patterns of the other parties in an election. They add it all up and divide it by something or other and then arrive at some kind of average percentage. So the swing percentage often deviates significantly from the actual increase or reduction in votes. For example, the SNP increased its number of seats from 6 to 56 in the last election, but the calculated swing percentage was only 3.1%.

Wiki explains it a bit more here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swing_(politics)

‘Did the Lib Dems get 6.6 million votes at the 2010 election?’

The actual 2010 vote count was 6,836,248. In 2015, it was 2,415,862. Ouch!

Jonathon

Corbyn’s economic policies are backed by several leading economists, including Nobel prizewinner Joseph Stiglitz. Also, a recent open statement was made by 41 leading UK economists, which backed Corbyn’s policies. So he is by no means an isolated voice.

Corbyn has been in politics for at least 30 years – a career that has encompassed the worst of the Thatcher/Blair years. By now, he would know the prevailing mantra backwards, i.e. that Labour are absolutely hopeless economic managers. He’s an intelligent, astute man and he would know that proving his economic acumen has to be a major priority of his leadership.

Contrary to all the negative framing by the media and the Blairites, in all his interviews Corbyn never proposes an increase in expenditure without providing a corresponding decrease. He also shows that he is aware of how speculative investment – at the expense of productive investment – has ruined the British economy, with a devastating impact on its society (except for the top 1%).

Whatever eventuates, Western socio-economic policies have moved so far to the right that they have become dysfunctional and downright dangerous. The sheer force of gravity is pulling us back to the centre. If Corbyn's bid for the leadership is destroyed or if he is overthrown after becoming leader, there will be others to replace him - maybe not in Britain, but elsewhere. Sooner or later, Blair-Thatcherite-Reagan neoliberalism will implode on its own corruption.

Aidan

You suggest the UK nationalise industries.
But why? To what end?
What does the taxpayer gain by say “unprivatising” those assets be they million pound or multimillion pound assets that were sold too cheaply?
And I grant you some were.

Such an exercise will cost a packet. How much is a good question.

Estimates for the Budget 2015-16 are as follows:

Income £673B Expenses £742B

By how much will the deficit balloon with nationalisation?

If the point of your argument is to “stick it” to those who bought public assets “cheaply”, is it not better to legislate for price controls, thereby simultaneously giving the working man and woman say cheaper train tickets, water prices etc and in the process depriving asset owners of outrageous returns on investment?

Killarney

I read what the Columbia University professor wrote about Corbyn. I don’t think he is a cheerleader for Corbyn per se. He does however indicate that while promising to advance the middle class, both President Bill Clinton and PM Tony Blair executed policies that saw the rich swell in wealth while the poor swell in number.