How the present Government miss the intelligence of Hague, Willetts and even Mark Hoban plus the plethora of Lib Dem ministers in the last Government! No more golf playing for you FLT. Fox wants you to create trade opportunities as he sees Papua New Guinea and the Cape Verde Islands being the UK's biggest trading partners post Brexit!!
It is funny how different people read the political situation as I feel that the exact opposite is happening!! I think that the success of UKIP and the appeal of Jeremy Corbyn are both indicative that the meaningless middle ground is no longer desirable and people want to see their politicians actually stand for something. It is noticeable that the most centralist of al the political parties still hasn't managed to get going 15 months after the last election. the liberals are not even on the political radar and even the Greens seem to have a better media profile! I thought that Corbyn performed the best that I had seen him on BBc Question Time this week but I suppose it is quite easy to look good when the audience was filled with your supporters. It will be fascinating to see how politics will pan out in October / November as Corbyn will have a clearer mandate to pursue his agenda. If Labour manage to purge the vesitges of the New Labour MPs expect a more partisan parliamentary party to take of the Tories and hold them to account. This would be much better that having the principle parties scrabbling over the same policies and not really standing for anything - more a fault with New Labour who forgot what they were supposed to be representing under Blair.
Yep, Bringing back grammar schools is definitely evolving with the times, next thing you know we will have an insurance based health service. So it's not only the Labour Party stepping back. I do agree however that to be electable Labour does have to evolve. How it evolves is surely down to the membership. Labour may well be 11 points behind and a hostile media will do it's best to keep it there, but a coherent argument that exposes not only the schisms in the Tory Party but lays open the inequalities inherent in it's austerity policies will close the gap as the next general election and Brexit approach. If I were Mrs May, god forbid, I'd be going to the nation sooner rather than later. The longer she waits the more vulnerable she will become.
Personally, I can't believe she hasn't already organised going to the country. As you infer, issues brought about by Brexit, and continued austerity, could easily erode the lead to a point where a re-United Labour Party (should that ever be possible) might put up a bit of a fight.
God I hope not. I can't believe that the US are considering appointing a president who is older than Reagan (both of them - in case you didn't know). I feel that the Republicans will now be pointing to Hillary and saying she's unfit to govern because of her health, when Trump is unfit to govern because of his brain ................
Sounds acute so only 2 weeks off. I have had pneumonia twice. Once was when I had bronchitis which turned to pneumonia, that lasted 6 months! And I was off work for nearly 5 months.
I'm not surprised really. It must be difficult to keep quiet after being in charge so long. It will help Theresa May I would think.
I expect he's got a lot of after dinner speeches/part time consultancy/directorships lined up. He is full value for all the above and they will be fully merited and none, absolutely none, of them will be in return for favourable decisions made during his time at number 10.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-37342828T No chance he'd have to leave parliament but they're really just taking the piss now!
You need to spread your dispersions the full width of any leading politician EVER! They're all greedy, self fulfilling bastards.
Not sure about that. Some of them certainly are, & unfortunately the good honest ones - of whom there are plenty - get tarred with the same brush. That leads to the sort of cynicism which allows genuine maniacs like Trump & Farage to look (if you don't look too hard) like a viable alternative.
You would think that would be a plus for supposed independents and "mainstream" conservatives, considering how much they claim to despise Clinton. After all, if she were to die, Tim Kaine would take over. Except it doesn't really work that way. Trump supporters hate Kaine as much as Clinton and the health thing is just another bogus grievance. It's not that they care whether Clinton is healthy, it's that it's another conspiracy theory for them to latch on to. They want her to be sick, and for her to be sick and lying about it is just too delicious for them to pass up.
I don't think I've ever been seen anything to allow those two to look like bible alternatives to anything, in my mind. No matter how hard I looked! I can't think of a "leading" politician who hasn't gone on to milk their satus afterwards.
More likely to be seen at the Oval than aboard the gravy train. Harold Wilson, Ted Heath, Tony Benn, Jim Callaghan, David Steele, Shirley Williams. Don't think any of them really milked it. Different generation I suppose.
I suppose there's also the age factor. Many of them were at "proper" retirement age or older when their political career ended while Cameron isn't 50 yet. Of course the likes of Heath and Benn also stayed in parliament long after their serious careers had ended.
The americans (Was going to say the yanks but not sure if you are allowed to say that these days!) seem to be making a right mess of this round of elections. Of the two that are battling it out to become president neither are being seen as world leaders. Both are not doing the Americans any favours by their rhetoric in fact they are making the Americans the laughing stock of the world. From a personal point of view I think I'll emigrate to Mars if Trump gets in...................
