The Conservatives

[MammaBrussels]

I cannot believe someone, even someone in the Conservative Party, would say this.

How can anyone support them?

high-finance style legal salaries

The elderly are wise and careful with money. They don't spend what they don't have and make provision for the future just like the Conservative. Many people start out life as teenagers in their 20s left wing and as time goes on they realise the error of their ways. They all "come home" eventually into the warm safe bosom of Conservative policies which are for them all best. (I am an FT not Daily Mail reader).

I still think it's a pile of shit mind you

Very intersting article in the Guardian to understand why the left has been in power much less over the last century than teh Tories, and I think this will continue, until the left tap into real public sentiment, stop treating good Labour voters like Mrs Duffy as bigots, stop knee-jerking about the millions of working class Daily Mail readers and understand the people's concerns.

Miliband has made some moves towards the people and that is a good thing - he has admitted that Labour was wrong on many issues and has vowed to listen and change - he has ditched some of the advice of the loaded litterati and professional progressives and opened up a real dialogue with the good people of this country.

Labour should be able to win every election uncder the sun if it really stood for the people and its values. The Bullingdonians should be a marginal force. But it won't happen until Labour respects the public.

'In sum, the left has a tendency to place caring for the weak, sick and vulnerable above all other moral concerns. It is admirable and necessary that some political party stands up for victims of injustice, racism or bad luck. But in focusing so much on the needy, the left often fails to address ? and sometimes violates ? other moral needs, hopes and concerns. When working-class people vote conservative, as most do in the US, they are not voting against their self-interest; they are voting for their moral interest. They are voting for the party that serves to them a more satisfying moral cuisine. The left in the UK and USA should think hard about their recipe for success in the 21st century.

www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/jun/05/why-working-class-people-vote-conservative

'Most elderly vote Tory?'

That's throughoyt the country as a whole. Ask the masses of New Labour pollsters, focus group researchers and spin doctors. They know it. They don't like it, they say they have all been duped, but that is the way it is.

'One of the most robust findings in social psychology is that people find ways to believe whatever they want to believe. And the left really want to believe the duping hypothesis. It absolves them from blame and protects them from the need to look in the mirror or figure out what they stand for in the 21st century.'

'When working-class people vote conservative, as most do in the US, they are not voting against their self-interest; they are voting for their moral interest.'

How on earth can that happen? It means they are doing something wrong and the right is doing something right. Unless they convince the public that they really stand with them in their beliefs and values and that they are in it together with the public, then they will never achieve what should have been so easy to achieve,

People are not as stupid as the political pollsters, PPE pundits and progressive party apparatchiks think.

The people may not be as privileged as the political class, they may not have been to their outstanding schools and have their graduate degress, they may not even be able to read and write, but stupid none of them ain't, they can spot spin and bullshit from a 100 paces and they know what is best for them and that is what they vote for.

44% of over 65s voted Conservative in 2010. Most over 65s vote for other parties. The largest proportion of over 65s vote Conservative. I have a suspicion that may change in 2015 though after the Granny Tax debacle.

Older voters are more likely than younger voters to vote Conservative and more likely to vote than younger voters (75% turnout in 2012).

It won't change, Mamma, because teh elderly don't trust Labour. It's not what they say, it's what they do. They remember the "coffin dodgers" comment of the youngish Labour wannabe who wanted to climb to power on the back of their votes. They should vote against teh Tories, but when they look at the alternative, they know they have no choice.

Let Labour change, let them come up with policies that really help, that don't strip the elderly of their homes and wealth, that increase the police force and protect them in their homes and communities. Let them sort out the antisocial elements that prevent them going to the shops late at night. Let Labour listen to the millions and do what is right.

We can only hope that Labour will change and listen more to the people's real concerns rather than the media moguls at the swank parties where they are wined and dined. They could change things, stop the corruption, stop the reckless bankers, tear up the light-touch regulation, stop the rip off of the public, but will they?

Or will they continue to fine old-age pensioners for not closing their bin lids, tear up civil liberties won over centuries and hand out contracts to cronies?

This is all starting to sound very much like the work I'm on here trying to avoid!

Does that make sense?

the Conservatives are winning the media spin, this is clear from this thread alone where someone states catagorically and in their own mind 100% that the ConDems are not taking money from genuine disabled. That is simply a falsehood.

The fact that the Conservatives can point to the third world and starving people and exclaim ' that's real poverty' is rubbish. Absolute and relative poverty are different and should not be mixed up. The discussion should revolve around why the rich have got richer and the poor - poorer. That is an actual fact.

Debating the meaning and definition of 'poor' as a relative term is besides the point and a deflection from the real argument.

I pay a lot in taxes - i don't want to give my money to scroungers who won't bother to get a job. But i believe that is a media spun lie. The fact that in britain in 2012 we have a whole underclass is disgraceful.

The fact that middle England believes that there are plenty of jobs to be had for the underclass - who are battling against public sector workers and relatively well educated to work at the coop shop has completely passed them by.

The fact that the PAID jobs they expect the underclass to get are actually being taken up by people on workfare - also - just passes them by.

A catch 22 situation - the way that workfare is set up enables real-life-dinner-party-going friends of Conservative party members to get richer in the name of helping the poor?

I believe the Conservatives are better for the poor. If the economy does better there is more money for all. If we do what France is doing people might think wow - pensions at even an earlier age etc etc but it will not help France long term. Another of their proposals I think is £16k minimum wage and £360k maximum wage. That is hardly likely to make people flock to France to run their business or stay here. Anyway English socialists should observe France in the next 18 months and see if that works well over there.

I certainly do not believe there are jobs to be had for anyone who wants them. That is certainly not the case. We need to get the echnoomy moving. We need to make this the best place to do businesss. We need low flat taxes and a much small state, things the Tories have no interest in.

I have no problems with big gaps between rich and poor as long as the poor are fed and housed. I do not see any moral wrong in difference and the fact some have more than others. That is just the sin of envy. Doesn't matter matter if some people have more money. Money doesn't make you happy.

Wow.

So the Tories think 'the Left' means North Korea; and that the n word is just a generational non-problem.

Cameron has even more problems than he thought.

It is not the sin of envy, it is the sin of inequality.

'it is the sin of inequality'

I don't remember the Bible saying that inequality is a sin. Ed Miliband and Harriet Harman and most of New Labour have much more wealth and privilege than any of us, but that is not a sin.

Inequality is probably only a sin in (dare I say it) North Korea, but even there, the Great Leader is more equal than others.

Crikey, are we only allowed to obey the Bible now?

LineRunner, you are free to do what you wish, even if that is to obey the New Labour manifesto.

You don't know what I vote, claig.

But you did define a sin as that which appeared in the Bible. Or North Korea. Cracking argument.

I don't care what the Bible says. I am just pointing out that inequality is not a sin, it is a fact of life, and that is true even in North Korea.

'(I am an FT not Daily Mail reader).'

Xenia, have you never thought of moving upmarket?