Westminsterenders: Talent or Colour

[FishesaPlenty]

RTB and BCF are presumably busy with more important things. I'm clearly not qualified to start a Westminsterenders thread - but somebody has to take control and collect the waifs and strays.

The party of no talent want to introduce no colour into our lives.

6 days to the election.

Johnson is still a liar.

Corbyn is still apparently loved by Labour members and hated by everyone else.

Swinson is still a charming PTA chair.

But I don't think they will. Fucking hell I want this over with now.

Oh squid. If we lose doctors like you, what the fuck’s going to happen to us?

Chris Hanretty (Professor of Politics at Royal Holloway I think?) retweeted someone who was debunking that centrist_phone poll error thread. I’ll see if I can find a link. It’s not something I know much about so can’t say whose analysis is correct.

mobile.twitter.com/MattSingh_/status/1202921942451474432

I do NOT specifically recommend "voting Labour" in the UK:

(Like former PMs Major & Blair) I recommend voting for whichever local candidate has the best chance to keep out the Tory candidate
whether that be Labour, LDem, SNP, Plaid

How I can vote CDU in Germany:

As a centrist, I was very torn between CDU and SPD, but eventually plumped for CDU because the policy "Wahlomat" calculator gave me slightly more agreement with their policies and also because I admire Merkel

The CDU is only slightly right of centre and holds to the German "social contract" of workers rights, good public services & taxes to pay for them etc

Sadly, the current UK Tory party has more in common with the far right AfD than the CDU

My hope is that some Independent Conservative candidates win in this GE and that Rory the ex-Tory does well in the London Mayoral elections next year,
I want the moderates to chuck out the far right and reclaim the Tory party for the One Nation Conservatives

squid I dont post that much, but I wanted to say how much I respect those of you in A&E and your paramedic colleagues. DM spent a horrendous 5 months dying last year, involving numerous falls and hosptal admissions, and without exception the frontline staff were exemplary (it just all went wrong on the wards....) and for you and your colleagues - please don't go, we need you.

If many doctors like squid really do quit, the NHS would struggle to function

We HAVE quit. In 2016 with the junior doctor strikes people said they would quit under this government, and the contract was imposed on us, and patient care massively suffered, and working conditions get worse year on year.

And you know what? The tories said we wouldn't, but lots of doctors quit. Quietly, cause we'd done all our shouting by then and no one had listened. Half the people I went to med school with are in australia or nz, and not coming back.

11,000 doctor vacancies.

And you work a night shift - believe me, it shows.

thanks for your support guys

Faisal Islam@faisalislam

Brexit leak to FT:
officials say NI protocol “major” challenge, ponders “not being able to deliver” it by next Dec

Cons claim is that they can negotiate a UK-EU Free Trade deal, ratify across multiple Parliaments and implement too incl complex NI checks/rebates within 11 months

Jim Pickard@PickardJE

Breaking Scoop by @GeorgeWParker

https://amp.ft.com/content/b5be23ba-19d0-11ea-97df-cc63de1d73f4?

Any US FTA will depend on having no goods checks within the island of Ireland, as in the WA

dear god, why do we have a govt of such fucking liars?? I've had an emotionally difficult 24 hours, I really should remove myself from this brexshit - but I cant, because it's so tight and the election so close...

Sam Freedman@Samfr

BMG now in line with all the other pollsters.
Opinium the only outlier with their bigger Tory leads.

Everyone else between 8-11pt lead.

This was not the case last time.
The weekend before the 2017 election poll leads ranged from 1pt to 12pts with pretty much everything in between.

Much more clustered this time.

Half the people I went to med school with are in australia or nz, and not coming back.

And that suits the current generation of Tories just fine - the sooner the NHS breaks, the better, as far as they are concerned.

That DrModerate poll on Twitter is very interesting Squid.

I hope he's right!

Sooooo....what are people planning for election night?
I'm taking the next day off.. except for a xmas do in the evening.
I don't usually stay up beyond about 1am for elections/referenda. But this time I feel like drinking all the booze in the house and breaking open the Xmas/Brexit cupboard. And staying up all night like the politics nerd I have become.

I'm not needed at the count (hurrah) so I'm going to snuggle on the sofa with a blanket and doze.

I’m meeting a friend in the pub earlier in the evening. I doubt I’ll be able to stay up very late, but I (night owl) leave a note for DH about the state of play when I turn in and he (lark) brings me a cup of tea in bed with an update.

I plan to go to bed after the polls close, because I shan't be needed any more after that, and hope that when I wake up the country may have been saved from the worst possible result.

There may be alcohol involved.

(Memo to self: go and put money on a conservative win. That way I'll have some money to spend on booze. What are the odds at the moment, does anyone happen to know?)

I mean I'll have some money if they win and I really need to get sozzled on Friday.

I'm not sure I want to sit up and see the results...

But not sure I'll be able to sleep either.

DH and I are planning on pulling an all-nighter on Thursday. Mind you, given that I’ve only done that twice before - for the EU referendum and the 2016 U.S election - I have a horrible feeling I’m the political equivalent of the person who’s not allowed in the room when the nation football team is playing.

National team.

Always stay up for elections. Love them, except the losing.

I have stayed up for every election since 1970. I was gutted then when the Tories won, but then they lost the next time.

I was gutted in 1992 when the Tories won, but they were slaughtered in 1997.

I sincerely hope I am not gutted this time - but I would expect that they would be slaughtered again the next time, but the question is just what are they going to wreck in the mean time?