US Election results

The problem with "taking immigration issues seriously" is that it is legitimately a hard problem to solve (not impossible, but very hard). There are wars and severe economic hardships in lots of areas with geographic proximity to Europe and you will always get people trying to travel from where it is dangerous or life is miserable to where it is safe, life is better. That's just human nature. Once in Europe then, yes, they could stay there but realistically it isn't in e.g. Italy's interests to just absorb the vast wave of people and not encourage them to move on. Inevitably some of those people are going to end up on the coast of France trying to reach the UK. And we have a very large coastline that's hard to monitor, plus the only method of stopping them would be literally shoot the boats and drown people and most would think that that was unnaceptable (and would trigger its own backlash which would maybe make it harder to talk about immigration in the future).
There are things governments can do, and I hope the Labour party does them, but most of those measures are kind of boring and it takes a while to see the effects. The easy way to "take immigration issues seriously" is to reflect public anger back on the public and stoke it up further by leaning into slogans or quite unpleasant rhetoric (Sunak said to "stop the boats" but he didn't, the Rwanda plan was a stupid idea that would never have fixed the problem but seemed sufficiently "tough").
I think politicians should listen more to the public and take people's needs seriously. That's hard though, and its easier instead to vibrate with the emotional state of the public. Which isn't helpful but the right are actually better at at the moment.

Canada is the acid test. It will be interesting.

I don't think Labour will get in again after this term.

There is going to be a push to the right because no one will take immigration issues seriously and they're only going to get worse. That's without even mentioning the gender madness/identity politics that they're obsessed with.

Canada is the next one that's going to go to the right.

If Labour and Tories aren't careful I can see a larger rise of Reform on the horizon.
They need to start listening urgently.

Labour will not survive more than eight years.

I am currently on the fence about the next election. It's too close to call. The trends don't necessarily favour Labour. They are the only significant socialist leaning government in western Europe now. And their margins are exceptionally tight. The British public are traditionally slightly left of centre (despite our newspapers) but there are more left wing parties and the incumbent effect at a point of economic hardship won't wash well.

Brexit was immediately overtaken by Covid. It was inevitable that corruption would occur in Covid when rules in place to prevent it were set aside to deal with the immediate crisis. It is then also inevitable that this would help push them out of office. I think that would have been the case whichever government was in power.

In terms of Brexit - immigration was a huge driving force for it and the Tories failed completely to manage it. Hence Reform’s success. I suspect Labour will be worse.

Hmm yes. People stopped LISTENING a long time ago.

The trend is to talk at people not to listen to different opinions.

Mainly because they block everyone.

I find it interesting that Musk removed the block feature... People hate this but...

I know - they got less votes than last time. Much of their huge majority could be attributed to Reform.

You knew when they ran out of steam - it was the point when they stopped pushing the benefits of Brexit and started the blame game against whoever they could pin it on with immigrants being top of the list.

Labour didn't get a huge majority based on popular vote. The size of their victory does not convey just how waifer thin it is.

Farage will organise again with Trump in power as he sees a huge opportunity.

Don't say I didn't warn you.

I take the point that any government in power during the covid lockdowns was going to suffer in the next election.

But let's not pretend that Brexit, austerity and corruption didn't happen. And Boris. And Truss. Honestly...

That's another of the serious concerns against Trump - potential long term damage to institutions and changes to the American constitution.

There is a lot of visceral contempt emerging from the right as well. Communication has broken down and its being exacerbated by the fact that Twitter encourages people to write the very worst things, and other people are encouraged to find those things and be outraged by them.

The Tories ran out of steam a few years ago, though it is worrying that they did so whilst Labour are in such a bad place and that Labour got such a huge majority. But I am not sure when the ‘good times’ were when they should have spent money. Labour left them with the tale end of a long recession that was the deepest recession since the 1920s. And despite Labour’s ‘good times’ they had spent the gold reserve when gold was at its cheapest, and left the NHS with billions of debt to pay for by using future money.

I suspect there is an element in all governments plans of ‘we will leave that to the next government to sort out’. And this becomes ever more of a problem when you win successive elections and become ‘the next government’.

The Tories had been in power for a very long time though. Too long really. They had got very complacent and in addition to the issues with the economy there was Party Gate, giving of government contracts to mates especially during Covid. (Also, you could argue that part of the reason that the economic decline was hitting people so heavily was because so many things were on a knife edge thanks to austerity/failure of the government to spend responsibly during the better times). I agree that the economy was probably the motivating factor. But actually I think also people felt they had just been in power far too long. Of course that also creates a related problem that we have a Labour government that has spent so long out of power it has forgotten how to be a government not an opposition.

Apart from that I feel Americans are a bit in denial about the economy. There has a been a pandemic and a war is ongoing that is affecting the whole world. Their economy is doing okay in the circumstances (I mean look at the uk FGS). The Democrats failed to explain that.

The same happened during the election here though.
Everything wrong with the economy in this country was solely blamed on the Tories, without a second of thought that it was mostly related to COVID and the wars. Everyone seems to forget that Labour wanted longer and harder lockdowns, leading to more debt now.

Whoever was in power while all that was going on was going to be punished by the electorate.

But it's not just about abortion, is it? There were a couple of cases during the campaign where women died due to being denied healthcare during miscarriages. Doctors wouldn't intervene until a certain number of tests showed no heartbeat, even when baby was 100% unviable and mum's life was in danger. So what to some seems a theoretical, divisive issue that only affects others, and where there is always choice, in reality has the potential to affect all women of reproductive age. To the extent that some, who ironically didn't choose abortions, paid with their lives. It's about female health care and whether a country sees women as equal or second-class citizens.

Add to that the issue of medical staff terrified of being prosecuted and leaving women to die horrific, painful, avoidable deaths through sepsis. They have to live with that on their conscience - because of politics.

Apart from that I feel Americans are a bit in denial about the economy. There has a been a pandemic and a war is ongoing that is affecting the whole world. Their economy is doing okay in the circumstances (I mean look at the uk FGS). The Democrats failed to explain that.

If he does withdraw from Ukraine, I think other countries will too, and blame it on him. But they'd have done the same thing in the end anyway.

Yes. And it allows men to walk away from their responsibilities. “She made a choice to have the kid, not me. So it’s her problem, not mine”.

Mocking and undervaluing motherhood is a massive failure of some feminist theories.

I think this is very much a thing.
Mostly it's kind of unconscious. But any thread about social supports for kids, you will have lots of people saying - it's a choice to be a parent, don't have children if you can't afford to give them. And IME these are not usually particularly conservative people, a lot think of themselves as being on the left, they are typical middle class professionals.

There are always plenty of people in discussions like that who can't wrap their heads around the idea that a woman in a bad spot with a pregnancy just wouldn't have an abortion.

I think this is a really thoughtful post, thank you.

Being gay does not mean you are signed up to a particular ideology or political belief.

I think this has been one thing that woke me up to issues; why did everyone gay automatically have to be left wing and have to support the concept of changing sex? I am not talking about the US where this is much more complex due to the degree of influence of religion, but within the UK. The idea of a Conservative gay man or woman is one which is really overlooked and yet we have a considerable number of them, including some fairly prominant examples. Why? Do your political views have to match your legally recognised protected traits?!

So yes of course we have an LGBT+ ideology going on which is making this assumption that everyone who falls into a certain group should believe the same thing. This is different from being simply actually being gay. One is a political movement and one is the state of being gay which is by default neutral in political terms as its just a state of being.

I think it would be wise to draw distinction between the two for many reasons.

I do think we need to start acknowledging and accepting there is a militancy at the edges of this which is out of control and is having a negative effect on parts of society which have nothing to do with merely being a clash with religious conservative views.

The idea that if you are part of the community you MUST adhere to its tenants and all its belief structure without questioning them, is one of those concerns because its coercive, undemocratic and unaccountable. And yes dangerous. That goes for ANY community.

This is what others are seeing within the pushing of LGBT+ as a political force. And yes the opposite response has elements which are equally batshit and militant but its not happened within a bubble and without gradual esculation due to the polarisation that has occured.

Step it down a notch everywhere and expose the nutters as nutters all round, rather than enabling either extreme to take it to the next level.

Absolutely agree re the social contagion. They've been drawn to each other and appear to be the most dogmatic community with absolute black and white thinking. It's too difficult for us to have a discussion with her on many topics as it ends with us being told we are causing severe pain and distress. I really don't believe there will be mass suicides as such but vulnerable people could be coerced or given misleading information that makes them feel there is no hope.

Although of course there is no such thing as "LGBT+ ideology".

I disagree. There is LGB sexuality, and there is TQ+…(better not say or I might be deleted), but there is also an ideology that defines itself as “LGBTQ+” sometimes with a few more letters thrown in. Yes it could (and often does) shorten this to ‘Queer’ but it is this ideology that is pushed where ever you see “LGBTQ+”.

I believe in democracy as our best option for governance, ironically given who won the election. Millions of Americans have cast their vote and made their choice. They believe Donald Trump will be the best leader of their country. They think the economy, immigration and their lives were better under Trump - who am I to argue?

I have heard security experts say that even though Trump's foreign policy was crazed, it was effective because other leaders genuinely feared what he might do and stayed in line. I do think he will not support Ukraine but he may take a tougher stance with Israel and the world may be more peaceful with China and Russia cowed.

Glimmers of light and hope...

I AM extremely concerned about what Trump will do especially with human rights of migrants. I am concerned that Trump will do a live experiment into the effectiveness of vaccines with appalling consequences for children. I am concerned about what he will do with regards to law and order and justice and democratic processes.

HOWEVER, threatening mass suicides REALLY is not going to help your cause here.

And they say there is no such thing as social contagion and there's no hyperbole from certain quarters...

Do we think there will be mass pact suicides?

And yes, lets go there and give them the benefit of the doubt and say we believe what they say and will go through with it.

If there are mass suicides from a small community, what might this tell us about this community and how healthy it is?

Does that reinforce the concerns about individuals who join this community might be well be very fair?

Mass suicides are the perserve of the indoctrinated.