Is Brown’s plight much worse than John Major’s?
July 21st, 2008
Do these 95-97 ICM polls undermine the swing-back theorists?
Anybody trying to predict whether Brown’s Labour has any chance at all of turning things round should look at the above table very carefully. For it shows all the Guardian’s ICM surveys for the period from 21 months before the May 1 1997 general election which, of course, brought Blair’s Labour to power in a landslide.
Just compare the polling figures from the August of 1995 with what happened at the election itself - CON 31.4%: LAB 44.4%: LD 17.2%. The Tory 31% share is what they were polling at this precise point in the electoral cycle and what they averaged from the firm in all the Guardian’s surveys in the period until polling day.
The latest YouGov, ComRes and ICM polls are all showing a Labour deficit of 20% or more which, as can be seen, is worse than Major’s Tory party was experiencing at the same point in the electoral cycle
Major, unlike Gordon, was a proven election fighter after his successful battle for the party leadership after Maggie Thatcher resigned in 1990 and his victory against all the odds in April 1992. He also, at this stage in 1995, had better personal ratings than Brown is seeing.
I reproduce the chart to refute the much repeated claims of the swing-back theorists - that polling history shows that a government’s position gets better the closer we get to an election
Ah - I can hear many saying - wasn’t Major polling much worse than this? Well he was but only in polls that used methodologies that have long since been discredited and are no longer used
With the exception of ICM the pollsters from the period have been ditched by the papers that commissioned them or in the case of MORI, made radical changes in the way they collect, compute and present their findings.
The only pollster that you can make any historical comparison with is ICM - the firm that pioneered the changes in polling methodology that were required to deal with the systemic problem from the period magnified in the polling debacle of the 1992 general election.
This all, of course, affects the climate in which betting takes place. Almost all the current polls suggest that David Cameron is heading for a three figure majority - yet the balance of money being invested on the spread markets on the number of commons seats is pointing to one of thirty to forty. That’s why I’m now a buyer of Tory seats and feel quite at ease about the risk I am taking.
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The downfall of the Major government came in one swell foop in the autumn of 1992 when the interest rates went to 15% and the pound crashed out of the ERM. People made up their minds there and then that the Conservative Party had lost its competence for doing the economy.
The downfall of Gordon Brown is not connected to one big single event but is a long drawn-out dribble of decadent dithering and a festering froth of fiscally incompetent incontinence. Depending on what happens to the economy and David Cameron, there may even be a swing-back. I, for one, do not rule out the possibilty of another Labour majority.
Lots of people are speculating about a close result in Glasgow East, and a majority of XYZ or 1,XYZ. But what are the prospects of John Mason getting a landslide by-election victory like David Alton and Simon Hughes did? What were the opinion polls like in their by-elections five days before polling?
JohnLoony’s swing back to Labour @ 2 will not be helped by the votes of the unemployed given the workfare measures due to be announced shortly.
John Major suffered from having a Charismatic waiting in the wings, in the shape of Tony Blair. Labour went from offering the country Kinnock, to offering it a media-savvy “Tory-lite” with a social conscience, one who pledged not to raise taxes or do much to risk Ken Clarke’s growing economy. Major was always going to find it impossible to get much of a swing-back in those circumstances, even if he was essentially a decent chap who delivered a decent economy. However Major played his hand, Blair was going to make his Grand Slam.
I wouldn’t say Cameron was a Charismatic, but for a great many voters he does now embody the notion that “he has to be be better than this shower”. If Labour sticks with Gordon, why should there rationally be any swing-back? Imagine if in the middle of the night, someone has towed your car away and replaced it. You had no say in the replacement car you got. And after you have driven the replacement for just a few miles, you know you have got a lemon. You will never get comfortable with it because it is just bloody uncomfortable. People in the street gawp at its horribleness. But you have got it for three years, without any prospect of changing it. The maintenance costs start to soar. It kangaroo lurches around. Then it won’t start, spending its days refusing to come out of its garage.
And imagine that you live opposite an Alfa Romeo showroom. Pretty shiny cars - with a previously wretched reputation for build quality and reliability. But after three years of having your imposed car, you are faced with a stark choice: sign up for five more years of the crap car, or go for a shiny sporty Alfa Romeo, which the nice man in the showroom swears has addressed the quality issues. No contest.
But what you really wanted was not a shiny - but risky - Alfa coupe. You wanted a car that was going to be economical to run, maybe green, maybe a hybrid. Something thawas going to get you around without any fuss or bother - something that would just let you get on with your life
5 Oops, posted early by mistake. But you get the gist - Brown is a lemon, Cameron is an Alfa Romeo, whilst most folks want a hybrid people carrier. If Labour can make a hybrid people carrier and get it in the showroom by 2010, there will be some swing-back. Assuming anybody can still afford to buy a car.
5 — but John Smith had also enjoyed big leads since 1992 so we should not overstate the impact of Blair’s undoubted charisma.
What did for Major was the economy combined with attacks on Conservative supporters. What will do for Brown is the economy aggravated by attacks on Labour supporters.
2. There may indeed be another Labour majority government. Probably some time around 2030. I really can’t see how they can do it next time though. Things have gone so far that even if there were some disasterous blunder by David Cameron (and he hasn’t looked too much like making one yet - even the policy review difficulties last Summer came about due to other Conservatives all putting conflicting ideas forward concurrently, though that was Cameron’s timetable), the Conservatives are now probably so far ahead that they could change leader and still retain a comfortable lead.
Brown’s plight is worse than Majors for at least three reasons. Firstly, he does not have the personal likeability that Major had - and consequently the personal ratings; secondly, the economy is going to hit the buffers in the two years before the election, whereas the Conservatives went into the election with steady growth; thirdly, Major had other big hitters in the cabinet (Clarke, Heseltine, Rifkind, Portillo, Howard), and while some were better liked by the public than others, all stand up well against the rest of the cabinet that Brown has appointed.
JohnLoony is right about the sudden end of Major’s chances, versus the slow death of Brown. Events could lead to a reversal.
However, it could work the opposite way. Sudden reversals, can be ….. suddenly reversed. But the drip drip of dithering incompetence is far more difficult to change. Gordon is just being himself. What would it take for the public to give him the benefit of the doubt again?
Lets be honest, if he were to heal the sick, the nurses would go on strike.
‘Benefit reforms ‘to be piloted in Glasgow’’
“Sources at the Public and Commercial Services union told The Herald that they had been told by the Department of Work and Pensions that pilot areas for trying out the new policies had been identified, but an announcement of this had been shelved because of the by-election.
“We understand the changes will be pushed through as part of the City Strategy scheme of which Glasgow is already a part, but that this cannot be announced this week,” said one official.”
http://www.theherald.co.uk/politics/news/display.var.2403921.0.Benefit_reforms_to_be_piloted_in_Glasgow.php
From the Guardian:-
The enormous presence of the SNP in the constituency is testament to party members’ belief that it may just be theirs for the grabbing. The party has the biggest of the campaign headquarters, renting out three large portable building on the grounds of Sherwood garage, which sells performance cars.
‘Performance Cars!’ If things are so bad there, makes you wonder who buys ‘em!
It was thinking along Mr Smithson’s lines that persuaded me to open a Sporting Index account and buy Conservative. Labour appears to have lost the permission to be heard. Even if Gordon Brown is replaced (and I think that more likely than some others do), I can’t see much chance of a big Labour recovery - when you drop anything, second bounces are never as high as the first.
I read Marquee Mark’s posts 5 and 6 with interest. I can see the logic, though I don’t agree, and I suspect that thinking like that was behind the “New Labour, New Danger” poster in 1996. That didn’t do the Tories any good though.
10 It seems to be treated as a universal truth that these benefit reform proposals will hurt Labour. I’m not so sure. The places where I’ve heard people rail loudest against “scroungers” are usually urban areas. The people who really get incensed are not so much the middle-class as the low-paid working class who are slogging their guts out for little more than (and they often believe it is for less) than those on benefits. Perhaps these folks are now more likely to vote to support “something being done”?
Betfair:
‘Glasgow East - SNP Percentage Vote’
30.0 Percent or Fewer 1.05
30.01 - 40.0 Percent 1.07
40.01 Percent or Greater 1.1
Best prices - Glasgow East turnout
Ladbrokes:
35-39.99% 3.5
40-44.99% 4.0
30-34.99% 4.5
45-49.99% 6.0
25-29.99% 8.0
50-54.99% 17.0
20-24.99% 21.0
55% + 21.0
0-19.99% 51.0
Betfair:
30.01 - 40.0 Percent 1.44
30.0 Percent or Fewer 2.02
40.01 - 50.0 Percent 2.32
50.01 Percent Or Greater 6.2
12 “I suspect that thinking like that was behind the “New Labour, New Danger” poster in 1996. That didn’t do the Tories any good though.”
The trouble was, people weren’t listening to an anti-Labour message. For one thing, it was in total contrast to the media narrative at the time, which was entirely focussed on Tory sleaze. People had invested their hopes for a better quality of government in that nice Mr. Blair. Similarly, people today aren’t listening to the “Tories still eat babies!!” message which seems to be all that Labour has in its playbook. It doesn’t fit with the voters’ mindset. They think things can’t be any worse than they are under the current Clown Collective.
Best prices - Glasgow East winner
Bookies:
Lab 4/11 (Ladbrokes and Sporting Bet)
SNP 15/8 (Ladbrokes and Sporting Bet)
LD 100/1 (Ladbrokes)
Con 500/1 (Sporting Bet)
(No sign of Paddy Power or William Hill prices yet today.)
Betfair:
Lab 1.31
SNP 3.15
LD 400
Con 420
Any Other 750
13 re workfare. Regardless of who cares, probably the only people who will change their votes will be the unemployed (the vast majority of whom are not scroungers) who will be harrassed. And I suspect most of them normally support Labour.
The government is shooting itself in the foot.
Off topic, I note an account of the Glasgow East by-election in the Times today which accords with some of Easterross’s comments, particularly about there being two separate battles:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/scotland/article4368951.ece
History is written by the victors, or more truthfully, written for the victors by the sycophants who want to prove their own undying loyalty. Certainly John Major lost the 1997 GE when he ignored those who warned him about the ERM in the summer of 1992. He was still on a high and so were his team. Labour was in disarray. Unlike Martin Day I don’t believe Kinnock was crap, certainly not as crap as Nick Clegg.
John Smith was a brilliant leader for Labour, quite the best they have ever had. But, he died. Surprisingly his interim Ms Beckett also led an astonishingly good Euro election campaign in 1994. So, the truth is that Labour DID NOT need Anthony Blair to win. In fact, he contributed little to the 1997 victory. The one service Blair did for Labour was prevent Gordon becoming leader in 1994. But the service he failed to provide was dumping Gordon in 2001.
On Glasgow East, from this distance it is difficult to see anything other than an SNP victory by a country mile. To compare this by-election with previous GEs is pointless. None of the parties did anything in the past, hence the low turnout. My own party is doing a bit of under the radar work to try to ensure a comfortable third but consciously doing nothing to stop non-voters and weak Lab swinging to SNP. My friend in Cowley Street says they are doing the same.
Effects on the party leaderships. Alex enhanced, obviously. If the Tories are fourth then the Beeb will be calling for Dave’s head on Friday morning, again obviously. Gordon and Nick, as Stanislav the Polish Plumber would say elsewhere, “Shrugs”.
20 “the truth is that Labour DID NOT need Anthony Blair to win. In fact, he contributed little to the 1997 victory.”
Contentious words there! The issue is - if not Blair, then who? Blair won over swathes of middle England who might otherwise have sat it out and not voted for a Beckett or a Brown. Blair was a reassuring presence, brought up in a Tory household, who instinctively knew their concerns more than someone brought up in the Valleys or the Scottish coalfields. I think Blair personally won Labour fifty plus seats in 1997.
Labour MPs need to pay more attention to the table at the top of this thread than anything else. Even Glasgow East.
The polls are worse than the Tories faced back in 1995. If they stick with Gordon then they will lose. The smart move is to ditch Gordon, just as it was to have had an early election last year. Labour MPs will not do the smart thing. But I have a bet at 10 to 1 just in case sanity prevails.
“Yesterday, Sir Sean Connery, a long-standing SNP supporter, lent his backing to the party’s candidate, local councillor John Mason. Sir Sean said: “Labour have taken the people of Glasgow for granted for too long. The last year has shown the difference when people have a strong Government that is standing up for them in Scotland, in London and Europe. More than ever, we need that kind of strong SNP voice in Westminster and that is why I hope the people of Glasgow East send John Mason as their new representative.””
http://www.scottishdailyexpress.co.uk/posts/view/53343/Labour-hopes-of-by-election-win-are-on-the-slide-
I thought Rod’s analysis had shown there was a swing-back at the 1997 general election?
In any case the analysis is based on the by-election swings and not the swings implied by the opinion polls. I assume, therefore, that the by-elections were worse for the Tories in 1992-1997 than the opinion polls.
Arguably there’s a case for calculating the swingback based on by-election swings since the non-election debacle, because that’s the direction the average by-election swing is heading, not the results previously.
I don’t think Rod has shown that the average swing in by-elections two years from a general election is a useful predictor, only over the whole of a Parliament.
re 24. Rod was wrong if he was saying that there was a swing-back in the polls as the above chart shows.
The main problem with the by-election analysis is that there is no way that that these can be said to be representative. They happen where they happen. Thus Glasgow East will tell us nothing about the electoral prospects of the Conservatives in relation to Labour.
In most by elections the turnouts are much lower than at general elections and there is scope for a lot of distortion to take place if you just look at percentages. It’s the same reason why local council by elections don’t really help us in assessing the big picture.
#23
The man from Bermuda, he say’ yes…! Surely this sad old man should get over the fact that Roger Moore and Daniel Craig are better Bonds then he ever was…?
“It doesn’t fit with the voters’ mindset.”
I assume you mean it doesn’t fit with the media mindset, MM? In fact I have heard this discussion both on TV, and in the press. Notably one occasion when Matthew Parris acknowledged that stories which did not match this paradigm had been downplayed. Incidentally, I liked antifrank’s concept of “Labour losing the permission to be heard”.
21 In 1997 Blair might have won the Morecambe and Lunedales and the Lancasters but Labour didn’t need them. Also Labour won more seats in 1997 than they would have done under Gordon … a lot more, certainly more than 50. But, did they win more than they would have done under John Smith. I doubt it. Smith would have been Major’s equal in gravitas. Brown’s tragedy is not that he is crap but that no-one had the guts to tell him he is crap. A greater man would have seen for himself that he was not a leader.
I don’t think Labour will do as badly in terms of seats in 2010 as the Conservatives did in 1997 but I would be surprised if they did as well in terms of votes cast. A change of leader probably won’t happen because there is no perceived benefit. With the LDs on both the last occasions there was a perceived benefit … wrong as it turned out. Although in both cases there might have been an element of personal malice as well of course.
26
Sir Sean Connery, a man who’ll do anything for Scotland except actually live there.
It is also tribute to Tories on here and other blogs, who went on endlessly about such issues as “Gordon’s Great Pension Robbery” etc, who have finally got their message - and analysis - out there in the mainstream media, where the likes of MM here are even able to claim that any possible positive view of GB “doesn’t fit with the voters’ mindset”.
29, he’s a true patriot, isn’t he?:p
Here is a bit of trivia for you: the character Connery played in The Rock was a former SAS captain called… John Mason!
28 Is n’t it the case that there are more seats that will never be anything other than Labour, even if they do very badly in an election (as in 1983),than there are the Tory equivalent?
The Major polling data set against a backdrop of an improving economic situation 1995 -1997. Gordon Browns figures may plunge further as the economic situation falls further as we approach 2010, the current economic woes are also falling harshly on the hard working families that Mr Brown has tried to cultivate.
27 - I like it too and while I’d love to claim it was original, I’m afraid it’s just something I borrowed:
http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&safe=off&q=%22permission+to+be+heard%22+%22david+cameron%22&meta=
26
Oooo no!!!
Whatever I might think of Connery’s politics (and it is not favourable) he a million times better as Bond than Moore. Craig is better I agree but prior to him Connery was the only Bond worth watching.
Chris Stephens’ blog (SNP PPC for Glasgow South West):
“A ruthless voter id strategy appears to be paying dividends, not just for this campaign but for the future. Today I was out for the second time this week in Craigend and on the evidence of knocking in supporters letters, the canvassing has been remarkably consistent.”
http://thegiantstepforward.blogspot.com/2008/07/tale-of-two-campaigns.html
33. Like Blaunau Gwent? (I know that is effectively Independent Labour, but still …)
The mood here (mostly from people who haven’t been there) seems to be that Glasgow East is close but that the SNP are running the better campaign and “deserve” to win. However the Betfair odds are relentlessly moving in Labours favour, now:
Labour 1.37 —1.46
SNP 3.2—–3.4
And Ladbrokes say it is the highest turnover for a byelection they can remember (Labour 4/11, SNP 15/8)
Is the money right?
Are any more genuine opinion polls expected?
Every since I watched my father being slated by an SNP candidate because my mother was English I have always had extra sensitivity regarding some of the little Scotlanders who support the SNP. In my mind Sean Connery is not Scottish as he does not live or pay taxes here. However many SNP people seem to think he has more rights than the hard working East Europeans who support our economy.
On a different point I wonder whether the Labour posters which have Curran bold type, East End medium type and Labour small type are a sign of the times. Curran against the SNP. Each party trying to portray themselves as the underdog. Is this the way that Labour will fight the next general election I wonder.
Anyone seen Ave it since the Tory candidate for Watford resigned over the police investigation into dirty tricks? Are they by any chance related?
CRIME REPORT:
TO GABBLE who trumpted falling crime the other day, some scum bags have just broken into my car overnight and stolen a well concealed satelight navigation device. So much for your crime falling!
I have on average a crime commited upon me either directly or indirectly every year or two. I do not believe the bullshit crime statistics. What makes this even more annoying is i am out of work and only held onto a car i cannot really afford for the *next job*. I have a high excess so this crime will cost me directly - I have to have the passanger window replaced.
On a lighter note; a crime within a crime they stole the Sat Nav but left my music CD’s! Obviously someone with a sense of humour!
On thread - yes Gordon Brown is in a worse position than Major - the economy was declining before Major was re-elected and recovery started more than two years before the election. Brown is heading now into his final full parliamentary session with economy heading downwards and as yet no coherent recovery plan. Major at least had Clarke come in with a no nonsense sort it out approach.
Cameron made a good point yesterday that the Government hadn’t yet finalised this years budget. Another u-turn in the Telegraph.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2008/07/21/bcntax121.xml
40. Labour as ‘underdog’ - doesn’t quite resonate, somehow.
Brown is worse off than Major as the economy is going down the pan bigstyle and he was the man at the helm for last 10yrs.
Tory landslide in 2010.
You wouldn’t want to be accused of anything under a Conservative administration would you. It seems that David Davis resigned in vain!
This comment by “Jude” on Con Home re the Watford PCC:
“Let’s drop all this innocent until proven guilty stuff. In a case like this, a resignation is as good as an admission.
I’m starting to think that there is something seriously wrong with our [Conservative] screening procedures. Anybody can make a mistake, but these sleazebags are now being flushed out at the rate of one a week.
It’s only a matter of time before that pattern starts to take its toll.”
41 I was wondering that! Has Sean Fear given his view on the case? He reported that he was a great friend of Ian Oakley back in November 2006
http://politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2006/11/17/sean-fears-friday-slot/
42 - Probably Nick Clegg in cahoots with Neil Kinnock with Mark Senior as look-out. Serves you right.
42 they must be very stupid to steal a sat nav with the price of these under £100, the pub cash price is probably under £20.
One of the benefits of low prices from China is that burglary is less rewarding.
John Major’s government were clearly not up to the job, but Labour have destroyed our very faith in politics as well as destroying this country. The damage that Blair and Brown have done massively outweighs anything that Major managed to do in charge.
http://lettersfromatory.wordpress.com
48.
By the way the Police lady who came round said with regard to the Sat Nav that the brand I have attaches to the windscreen and leaves a ring: this is what gave away the fact i had Sat Nav! Just in case anybody else has this type be on your guard!
46 - I wouldn’t make the assumption that everything that posts on ConHome is a Conservative.
11, 18: FWIW, my opinion is that people who are regularly fiddling the system are exactly the sort of people who very rarely vote, or even go on the electoral register. People who aren’t fiddling the system are very annoyed when they meet people who are, and delighted to hear something is being done about them. What would upset them is if people who aren’t fiddling are made to jump through numerous hoops to prove it, and that’s the rub, of course - either you check everyone in detail or you don’t. I think there’s something to be said for a flexible approach on this - be tougher on people who’ve been caught making dodgy claims before than people with a good record.
But whatever the details, it’s wild stereotyping to say that Glasgow is full of scroungers who will now vote SNP to object to more scrutiny.
Why are SatNavs not fitted with a pin or password so that they are useless if stolen?
49 Perhaps they were lost.
51. Yep - common knowledge - you need to wipe down your windscreen - or leave a note saying sat nav removed - and leave the glovebox visibly open.
49. Yes your right there! I only used mine about 3 times -I doubt i will buy another one (Wouldn’t need it at the moment).
46 probably a Labour troll, never believe half the stuff you read in comments.
That said the Waford situartion is bad, but no screening process would have uncovered such likely behavoiur
54. And now the SatNav has been invented, what’s the point of orienteering?
52 Sorry James for repetition, I was trying out a response and the pnone rang…
55. Nevermind hopefully the police will find them!
58 - I would be wary of inferring guilt by accusation. Has the guy been charged with anything?
“Scotland has “won the natural lottery for a second time”, First Minister Alex Salmond will tell the 10th World Renewable Energy Congress in Glasgow today.
He will tell the conference: “Scotland has vast potential in renewable energy, unrivalled in Europe. We have around a quarter of both Europe’s tidal and offshore wind capacity, and 10% of its potential in wave power. We have the potential to generate more than 60 Gigawatts from renewables… “”
http://www.theherald.co.uk/politics/news/display.var.2403925.0.Salmond_Scots_have_won_natural_lottery_for_power.php
Morning All,
1. the post of the year on this site was Casino Royales about the core Labour vote. many people including me assumed that the absolute bdrock was Michael Foots 201 seats and 28% of the vote. In fact given Labours move onto the centre ground it would probably be a bit higher. However there has never been a 3rd term Labour government before let alone an attempt at a 4th. The bedrock has never been tested in these conditions. I had always bought into the swing back argument. Not that Labour would win again but that some recovery was invitable.
But why ? when did a PM last have these negatives? the economy is going to get much much worse. House prices have only started falling as have the job losses.
It seems to me that no one realy knows what the core labour vote is because its never been put under this sort of strain before. Its why I have slowly swung towards the apocalyptic.
64. I wonder what one might have thought the Liberal ‘core vote’ was in the 1920s?
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58 “no screening process would have uncovered such likely behavoiur”
Or unlikely behaviour, even. Whoever was behind it, these events in Watford do rather smack of somebody having some sort of breakdown. Perhaps it was from shock of suffering male pattern baldness?
64 Yellow Sub Good point. What is the bottom for Labour’s polling? 19%, 18%?
We just do not know because there is more bad news to come over the next 12+ months. Why do we think that 23% or 24% is the bottom of the range for Labour? Is it just because it is worse than Michael Foot’s time?
53. Nick, I’ve just seen those elected to the NEC in the MP/MEPs section. I wondered how many stood for those 3 places…has Janet Anderson stood again? there was someone else too?
68. Labour’s bedrock working class vote must surely have shrunk somewhat in the 25 years since Michael Foot’s ’suicide note’. And it’s doubtful whether the massive recent immigration will make up for that, except perhaps in a few particular areas.
What will turnout be like in the middle of the Glasgow Fair?
“A stroll around Easterhouse was decidely quiet… The streets were empty…
One large stretch of park boasted a total of three people; four if count the gentleman parked in his car next to a fly-tipping hotspot; six if you count the two young girls who suddenly appeared quietly on a park bench. They were the sum total of all the teenage youths witnessed in two hours of walking around the area.”
http://news.scotsman.com/politics/Glasgow-East-blog-Sunday-in.4306908.jp
Remember, Labour chose to rush it and hold this by election in the middle of the main Glasgow holiday. Why?
68. TC
Labour’s core vote in Scotland must be about 25%. I base that upon their performance at the last Euros. Mind you, records are there to be broken…
Roll on Euros 2009!
On thread. I agree with Mike that the spread markets are underplaying the Brown ooze disaster. However, I’ll repeat what I’ve said a few times before, that it is better value to sell Labour at the moment than to buy Tories.
My reasoning: There will be around 80 others (48 LD, 11 SNP, 3 other Others and 18 from NIreland). That leaves 570 to be split between Labour and Tories, giving a midpoint of 285.
Current SpreadFair prices are: Buy Cons @ 350, sell Labs @ 232.
So that suggests Con is 65 points above the midline, Lab is only 53 points below… ergo Lab is a better buy.
Of course, all this depends on where you set the midline!
65 - ISTR Sean Fear posting some interesting stats about the 1920s elections here a few years back. The difficulty for the Liberals back then was, of course, the split, which meant that there was a decline in funds and candidates. This meant that not all seats were contested at all elections and voters “got used” to choosing Tories or Labour, so in some cases when a Liberal candidate stood after none at a previous election,the damage had already been done.
I can’t see this happening to Labour - at present.
“Whatever I might think of Connery’s politics (and it is not favourable) he’s a million times better as Bond than Moore.”
If anything you underestimate Connery’s advantage. Saying Moore was a better Bond than Connery is like saying Colin Baker was a better Doctor than Tom.
67 Being a bit careful as to what to say as charges have not yet been brought , but posts on vote-2007 site at the time of the Nascot deferred byelection in June 2006 gave plenty of hints as to who was the likely culprit of the offences against the LibDems especially as some of them had previously occurred in Hillingdon .
74 - I think this is the thread: http://politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2005/12/22/george-osborne-now-favourite-to-be-next-chancellor/
The Tories have a history of embarassment with their candidates in Watford.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article2199227.ece
I see that he was a Hillingdon man too.
72 if it is 25% in Scotland then it is probably under 20% in England.
73. ‘ There will be around 80 others (48 LD, 11 SNP, 3 other Others and 18 from NIreland). That leaves 570 to be split between Labour and Tories, giving a midpoint of 285.’
You are missing 5 from Plaid, and SNP will probably be nearer 16 - but I think that LDs will be down to around 36 - so overall your midpoint is about right
LONDON (Thomson Financial) - The average asking price of a UK home fell at a record rate for the month of July, as new sellers cut prices to lure buyers put off by rising mortgage costs and tight lending conditions, according to property website Rightmove.
House prices fell by 4,345 pounds or 1.8 percent in July from June, the largest fall in July since the survey began. The previous record for July was set three years ago when asking prices dropped 1 percent.
This has brought annual house prices down by 2.0 percent, the first time there has been a year-on-year fall since records began in Aug. 2002.
80. Yes, it was a breakdown for illustration only. Personally, I’ve got LDs on 38, SNP on 15, Plaid on 5 and odds and sods on 4. You pays your money and you makes your choice. However, I think we agree that 80 is a pretty solid number for Others.
“… apart from the SNP, political opponents were privately conceding that Labour will probably win the crucial by-election.
A Conservative campaign insider said: “It’s a classic damage limitation exercise by Labour. Alex Salmond has played into their hands by raising expectations of an SNP victory.
But the biggest move in the odds has been towards the Conservatives, who came fourth in 2005 and had just 7 per cent support in the most recent opinion poll. Their odds have been slashed from 100/1 to 33/1.”
Err… not on Sporting Bet! There the Tories are 500/1
http://news.scotsman.com/politics/Glasgow-East-byelection-Labour-plays.4306814.jp
Remember the Government’s £35 billion ‘Building Schools for the Future’ scheme (BSF), which Brown says will result in UK schools being the “best equipped in the world for 21st-century learning”? Well, according to the Government’s architecture watchdog, some eight-out-of-every-ten new school designs are “mediocre” or “not yet good enough”. Best in the world? Certainly doesn’t sound like it.
I never believed the idea of swingback, just a theory designed to fit a partisan viewpoint.
66 - Jack, are you following the US closely at the moment? McCain is making some appalling errors, his ideas on the economy are a basket case, as exemplified by Gramm and by giving conflicting views on the *same* day. I used to think he was amiable and better than Bush but god help the US if he gets in power. Add to that the usual GOP suspects on the right, the neo-cons, the christian right and so on and you worry that he’s too weak to hold them back and a Bush 3rd term really is what we’d get.
This is why the right wing press are trying to say the election is ‘about Obama’, because they are worried about the spotlight falling on their own candidate.
McCain’s getting too much of an easy ride at the moment, maybe the Dems are holding their fire. The slavering Obama haters have been out in force for a while though, so they need to push back sooner or later. They must be getting desperate that everything they’ve tried, from the ridiculous idea that he’s being treated as a messiah to painting him as ultra-liberal (I wish) has failed to give McCain a lead.
The clincher is Iraq, Maliki clearly agrees with Obama, Centcom release a statement saying that he doesn’t (note - not Maliki, no specifics and from US command!) because that shoots McCain’s supposed usp out of the water. Without him being able to say that he knows what’s best for Iraq his foreign policy platform crumbles.
‘Sarkozy on EU mission to Dublin’
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7516254.stm
81. Yeah, but asking prices are £10,000 more than they were in December according to their chart. This is a tricky market to bet on.
@79:
So, it’s looking quite possible that Labour could soon be the third party in England, at a national as well as local level?
85. re centcom That’s not quite true. The cbs article is a good guess at what’s going on.
‘With Obama due to visit Iraq soon, al-Maliki’s spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh was quick to discredit the report, saying the prime minister’s remarks were “not conveyed accurately.”‘
http://www.qurl.com/tld38
Telegraph cartoon hits the nail:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/graphics/2008/07/21/ixd21.jpg
86 - Sarkozy would best serve the EU by staying the hell away from Ireland, if any one man could single-handedly derail hopes of Ireland ever ratifying Lisbon it is him. Sorry Chris but your man is painfully bad at being President. He is a great advertisement for the Lisbon solution of a permanent president though!
89 - The New York Times have the audio and have made a direct Arabic translation.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/21/us/politics/21obama.html?_r=1&hp=&adxnnl=1&oref=slogin&adxnnlx=1216635271-X+heCs+aXGhayOel4ojThg
“But the interpreter for the interview works for Mr. Maliki’s office, not the magazine. And in an audio recording of Mr. Maliki’s interview that Der Spiegel provided to The New York Times, Mr. Maliki seemed to state a clear affinity for Mr. Obama’s position, bringing it up on his own in an answer to a general question on troop presence.
The following is a direct translation from the Arabic of Mr. Maliki’s comments by The Times: “Obama’s remarks that — if he takes office — in 16 months he would withdraw the forces, we think that this period could increase or decrease a little, but that it could be suitable to end the presence of the forces in Iraq.”
He continued: “Who wants to exit in a quicker way has a better assessment of the situation in Iraq.””
Now McCain and supporters are desperate for that not to be so but it is clear that Maliki pretty much backs Obama’s position. The CBS article says as much too, when you compare Maliki’s wish with McCain’s ‘hundred years’ or whatever policy he has this week, then it’s clear that he would find Obama’s proposals much more to their liking.
Rather sarcastic but perceptive article from Freedland in the Grauniad -
“If Europeans really want to help Barack Obama next week they should repress their enthusiasm for him – and stay home. Ensure those crowds are thin and lethargic; maybe even offer the odd heckle, perhaps while brandishing a hostile placard. Let the travelling US press report that Obama is not so popular with foreigners after all: nothing will endear him more to the American public.”
To show enthusiasm for a visiting *American* politician? It’s rather sad that it invites sneering rather than pleasure that the world’s greatest power may take the rest of the world with it rather than order it around.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/jul/20/barackobama.eu
I read with interest yellow submarine’s post about Labour’s bedrock.I live in one of those areas where they could stick a rosette on a donkey for Labour and expect to win.The ward parties have collapsed.The activists are not there.I still do not see a massive shift in allegiance (it is tribal)but they are not going to vote at all next time and it could,indeed, be worse than 1983 for them.
re 2 again this myth is being peddled.
The Tories had a poll lead on several occasions after September 1992 up until the Lamont budget in 1993. It was the raising of taxes to cope with the after effects of Black Wednesday which did for the Major government’s economic credibility.
93. The Guardian still seems to be smarting from the results of its ill-fated attempts to influence the 2004 election.
re 59 or the skill of being able to read a map.
95. Glad you picked that up. I think the Tories still recorded poll numbers in the upper 30’s for most of 1993. The crisis after crisis began to eat into the tory vote but the Tories still remained in the 30’s.
It was only 1994 and the death of John Smith combined with the election of Tony Blair that really sealed it for the Tories. This is when Labour started getting polling numbers equal or slightly better to the Tories now.
What is worse for Labour is the Tories have not changed their leader in 2008, which has created the catalyst for change. It is the government that has been seen to fail. In this sense it could well be worse for Labour than the Tories in the Mid - 1990’s as some of the lead Blair and Labour had was not in reality an accurate measure of public opinion. I am talking of the 60%! figures.
97 - Satnav? waste of money!
The Sun has a devastating attack on Browns record as chancellor.
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/columnists/kavanagh/article1447377.ece
His record as chancellor was his only plus point - now that crutch is being kicked away he’s DOA.
99. It was for me! Only got it for my job - then two weeks later they let me go
I had a job where you had to goto 5-7 different addresses everyday in an area i was unfamiliar. I am unlickly to do that sort of business again so will not bother with another one(It was CIS - low value business for poor customers!).
I liked the female Police officer though! She had a nice B*tt and gave me a really nice wave goodbye after she had finished with my car!
re 99 - even at the price that the guy who nicked one from Martin will be flogging it at the pub this lunchtime
69: You’re ahead of me (as usual), Andrea - who won? I can’t remember who stood or even whom I voted for - it was a pretty low-key affair.
63: Stuart - you’ll find a post from me at the end of last night’s thread which might mildly surprise you.
96 - Probably the most hamfisted piece of activism from a UK paper in recent memory.
As a comparison to Jack’s figures here’s my updated EV prediction, I tend to the more positive end of GOP possibilities, hence the difference in our outcomes; for example recent polls in Florida have been mostly leads for Obama but demographics are not as favourable and that may change in the long run. Same with states such as Montana where Obama has been shown to be in the lead.
Updated EV prediction
Definite Obama - Massachusetts (12), Connecticut (7), Maine (4), Rhode Island (4), Vermont (3), New Hampshire (4), New York (31), New Jersey (15), Maryland (10), DC (3), Delaware (3), Pennsylvania (21), Illinois (21), Minnesota (10), Wisconsin (10), Iowa (7), California (55), Washington (11), Oregon (7), Hawaii (4) RUNNING TOTAL 242 Delegates
Probable Obama - Michigan (17)
RUNNING TOTAL 259 Delegates
Leaning Obama - New Mexico (5), Colorado (9), Ohio (20) RUNNING TOTAL 293 Delegates
Definite McCain - Georgia (15), South Carolina (8), Texas (34), Alabama (9), Louisiana (9), Mississippi (6), Tennessee (11), Kentucky (8), Arkansas (6), West Virginia (5), Oklahoma (7), Kansas (6), Nebraska (5), South Dakota (3), Arizona (10), Utah (5), Idaho (4), Wyoming (3) RUNNING TOTAL 154 Delegates
Probable McCain - Indiana (11) RUNNING TOTAL 165 Delegates
Leaning McCain - Florida (27), Missouri (11), North Carolina (15), Alaska (3), Montana (3), North Dakota (3) RUNNING TOTAL 227 Delegates
Too close to call - Virginia (13), Nevada (5)
MOVEMENT SINCE PREVIOUS STATE OF PLAY
TOWARDS MCCAIN
Ohio - Leaning Obama from probable Obama
Indiana – Probable McCain from too close to call
TOWARDS OBAMA
North Dakota – Leaning McCain from probable McCain
Obama – 293 EV (no change), McCain 227 EV (+11), Toss Up 18 EV (-11)
98. This also shows that the political worst for a governing party from an economic downturn can often lag the actual economic low-point. The economy was in theory well into ‘recovery mode’ by 1995 but the Tories’ ratings showed no sign of this. People didn’t feel better off, and in many cases were still nursing serious financial wounds.
The current downturn is just starting to bite. The low point could be a year away. This means there is almost no chance of Labour regaining any support from the economic situation before the next GE - indeed the danger is that they may well have considerably more support to lose. Mike’s call is right - the pricing of the spread markets looks too favourable to Labour.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7517101.stm
This article is being given somewhat undue prominence on the BBC news site. It is interesting to observe the witch hunt that there has been against this documentary whilst the ever more ludicrous claims we hear on a daily basis about the extent of climate changes go virtually unchallenged.
102 - exactly. Just leads to “deskilling”. I travelled in convoy with a colleague recently, who used Satnav, and I arrived a good 45 minutes beforehand (on a 3 hour journey).
107. Is there any betting on climate change e.g. ice cover? Given the number of AGW religious devotees still about, there ought to be some money to be taken from them for a while yet.
@102:
Presumably if it is Neil Kinnock that’s going around nicking Martin Day’s consumer electronics, it fits in with Labour’s repeated pattern of hawking knock-off goods to keep the Labour party semi-solvent. Ps, Ks, and now GPS.
110 - the Order of St George and St Patrick (Supporter)?
109: I can see one of those long-term William Hill markets on the subject - put down your money now, collect in 10,000 years if your forecast proves right…
108. I think your idea of a “convoy” might be a bit different to mine!
107, just saw that on Sky News, and then the BBC coverage.
Sky pointed out that it was found guilty of misleading a few chaps, but cleared of misleading the public.
The BBC banged on about a ‘fine line’ on the latter, with it being heavily implied that it was only because neither harm nor offence had been caused that they, in effect, got away with it.
106 I always had the feeling that Nulab were de facto Govt from the latter half of 1996 on, ie the Tories were de facto opposition, and so made a dead cat sort of political recovery (I believe the electorate generally did give full throated approval to Labour on 1.5.97) from mid 96 - mid 97. I must admit despite Ken Clarke’s perpetual ranting about how well his economy was going, I never gave that much credence for the apparent “dead cat bounce”.
1113 - I should have put it in “commas”. It was supposed to be a convoy, but at a key junction m’colleague followed her Satnav, whereas I used No 1 roadmap and intuition!
112, I thought the point about global warming was that it was an imminent threat to life, the universe and everything?
@107:
Are you surprised? The documentary failed to follow the GMW-Auntie official line on everyone’s favourite bit of pseudoscience-du-jour, AGW.
Of course they’re going to give it undue prominence.
108. The bloody thing i had made noise everytime the speed limit changed - even if you were well below it.
Maybe after the government announcement on benifits today this sort of economic crime will become rife? Drug addicts may just soley turn to crime, rather than seek help. Some will become reformed characters and seek help so i suppose it is swings and roundabouts.
The government seem to be doing a very strange set of measures at the moment. Some that appeal to core Labour voters such as giving £30M to a failing middle-eastern state yesterday and then butchering the status-quo here! Strange times we live in politically.
118, what does the A in AGW stand for?
103. Nick, Dennis Skinner, Michael Cashman and Dawn Butler got elected.
I read it on NEC member Peter Wheeler’s blog.
120. Alledged ?
119 - perhaps they should get it on prescription?
110.
120 - anthropogenic.
Holocaust Denial
HIV-causes-AIDS Denial
Manmade Global Warming Denial
I call ‘em the unholy 3.
@126:
Twat.
126. Who says global warming is all bad anyway ? Pass me another bottle of Vin de Pays du Orkney
If you were on the M1 Tabbers were you racing the signs -”Junction 21 13 miles 12 minutes” I think you can claim a prize if you do it in 10 minutes but, it is very bad for your fuel consumption!
126, you seem confused.
The Holocaust is a recorded historical event.
It has been scientifically proven that HIV leads to AIDS.
MM global warming theory has not been proven. Indeed, (even if true) it may be unprovable. How do you account for the warm period of the Middle Ages and Roman era? All those senators driving around in their 4×4s?
Climate always has and always will change. Man may influence it, but to liken those who disagree with what is becoming an orthodox theory sometimes aggressively defended to people who deny the Holocaust demeans your own position rather than mine.
85 ukpaul. Yes, I’ve been following developments closely between frequent forays to the great white telephone !!
I regard Obama’s foreign trip as a necessary hurdle, that so far he has managed well. Many “events dear boy, events” to flow under the bridge yet but Obama is clearly in the box seat at the moment.
123. Yes that is an option but if they are taking benifits away, surly that will include drug withdrawl theoropies. Problem with drug addicts is the fact they consume drug’s leads to a possibility that they are mentally ill and act in an irrational way. People with mental illness quite often do not except they are ill and think there behaviour normal.
There is much that needs reforming in society in relation to mental illness and it does impact upon the dispersment of Benifits.
You could be even more in denial: you could be a young-Earth Creationist.
Tony Wright (Cannock Chase MP) to stand down at next GE because of health fears. He is battling chronic leukaemia and kidney disease.
134. Sounds like he should stand down now. Obviously wouldn’t be allowed to tho.
“The Holocaust is a recorded historical event.”
There are people on this very board who don’t think so.
“It has been scientifically proven that HIV leads to AIDS.”
Tell that to Thabo Mbeki and his apologists.
“Climate always has and always will change.”
As was the case with the Iraq war, it’s like throwing petrol on a fire. Just because the fire was already burning doesn’t mean you can deny the petrol made it worse.
134. That’s a shame i thought he had recovered and it was in remission. I think he chaired a commitee did he not?
130 - They had sports cars, haven’t you seen Ben-Hur?
@133:
I’m sorry, BannedHorse, but you just equated questioning the pseudoscientific nature of AGW with being a Nazi sympathizer.
You lose any credibility you may have had with a grotesque and cheap shot. I know the left now do it frequently as a pattern of behaviour (using the word ‘denial’ is in and of itself meant to taint with implications of Nazihood). Just because others do it, doesn’t make it right, Mr Horse.
We’re not stupid, and unlikely to be cowed by such cheap tactics. AGW is unfalsifiable, and is therefore pseudoscience. You, as an AGW fanboy, are worthy as much of my consideration as Intelligent Design enthusiasts. Mind you, at least pastafarians have a sense of humour.
All of which leads me to wonder why the left seem so eager to use such foul, underhanded rhetorical means to shut down discussion of the non-scientific nature of their weapon of choice. Presumably, you don’t want your new Socialism-by-the-backdoor to exposed to the electorate for being as much of an idiotic scam as your last failed attempt to destroy capitalism, socialism-by-the-front-door.
107. This is the documentary made by the guy whose other films include one about how breast implants have medical benefits.
Yes, criticism of that is clearly a “witch hunt”.
131 further …. Obama in Iraq and has headed to Basra.
134. That’s sad. Seems one of the better Labour MP’s
Jack - what about your thoughts on Glasgow East? are your SNP links any good - sounds as if Lib Dems and Conservatives wont have much of a clue about what is happening.
127. It is this sort of post that is ruining this website.
139. So not one scientific academy or organisation in this field has realised this theory contradicts science?
136, you appear confused, again. I’m not disputing HIV-AIDS, becaise I’m not Thabo Mbeki. I’m also not a Holocaust denier.
All you’re attempting to do is to pretend that global warming (and man’s influence or lack thereof upon it) is somehow as concrete and established as the two things mentioned above.
It isn’t. And your claim that making more CO2 is somehow adding petrol to a fire contains no compelling reasoning or evidence whatsoever.
Explain to me why the present warming trend (although global temperatures fell last year) is different to any previous warming trend?
HuffPo reporting a “NY Times” piece that Hillary is being vetted for Obama’s Veep :
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/07/20/nytimes-clinton-is-being_n_113889.html
139: You’re suggesting that BannedHorse is left-wing? lol! But I agree that Holocaust denial is far stupider and more dangerous than having an unconventional view on global warming.
117: Yes, but if you want to bet that life on earth will end due to global warming, if you bet no, then when do they need to pay out, and if you bet yes then how do you collect?
89. It was a standard stock denial after being leaned on by the Bush administration. Even in the “retraction” they still supported the timetable.
145 - Indeed, the hysteria and paranoia of the global warming industry would be amusing if it wasn’t dangerous.
135/37/42
The Tony Wright announcement
http://www.expressandstar.com/2008/07/21/mp-will-quit-due-to-poor-health/
Regarding Labour upcoming selections…NEC sub committee agreed AWS for Sunderland Central and Finchley. And open shortlist for NW Leicestershire. Wolverhampton North East will also be open.
(not that Labour has many chances in holding some of those seats)
Mr (or Ms) Horse, it is indeed shameful that you associate holocaust denial with scepticism about the scientific evidence on man’s influence on global climate. No sugar lumps for you today.
145. “Explain to me why the present warming trend (although global temperatures fell last year) is different to any previous warming trend?”
Because its unrelated to Milankovitch cycles.
Explain to me why if AGW is the horsesh*t die-hard right-wingers like to think it is, that hundreds of scientific organisations worldwide, including all the important ones, go out on a limb and make official declarations saying its extremely likely.
146 Well of course they are vetting Hillary. There would be a monster sulk if they didn’t even go through the motions. Doesn’t mean they are seriously thinking of appointing her.
Suggest the vetting may find a few suspect things, such as “Whitewater”. Oh, and a husband who is a loose cannon….
133. Even former enthusiasts are having second thoughts
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24036736-7583,00.html
153 - Are they vetting Bill?
143 Icarus. The ARSE will issue the Glasgow East result on Wednesday evening !!
Frankly both the Scottish Lib Dems and Conservatives are about as much use in Glasgow East as Andrea would be as a judge in the Miss World Contest !!
I’m on friendly terms with some SNP wallers but my views are somewhat coloured by my take on them as willing idiots of the Scottish Numpty Party - All tartan piss and wind …. and I know all about wind to spot a fellow traveller !!
150. It says he is standing down in the next two years. That’s a shame as I thought he was a good parliamentarian.
134. That’s very sad.
He often appears, in the midst of the latest hysteria, as the voice of reason. One of the few people you can rely on to tell you what’s actually going on without all the spin and hype.
156 - Jack, I am led to believe that our “otherly” oriented co-genderists are often quite good on matters aesthetic.
154. Who is this guy? He sounds like a government bureaucrat rather than a climatologist.
And you can always find the odd individual in a field that disagrees with the consensus. Find me an actual organisation that’s retracted a statement on it and you might be convincing.
I’m glad that the complaints were upheld against the programme. If you want to put a case against some of the selective choices of data used by MMGW being even more selective is a bad idea. Even I could see watching the programme that the ice core data had been tampered with and I only studied some of the data for three weeks at university a few weeks ago.
@152:
I’m sorry, Socrates. “Extremely likely”, “Scientific consensus”… None of these things make AGW science.
Quite likely means “probable”. Ask one of these people to estimate the probability that GW is caused by humans. If they give you an answer, ask how they derived this probability. See that they have pulled it out of their arse.
It doesn’t matter how much whining and hand-wringing you do. It doesn’t matter how much “consensus” and “likelihood” you wave around in some desperate attempt to appear right.
AGW is UNFALSIFIABLE. It is therefore pseudoscience, and worthy of contempt. If you want to help your fellow AGW fanboys out, devote your time to devising an experiment that can be used to falsify AGW.
Then you’ll have Actual Science on your hands, and I’ll be prepared to treat your views with less contempt than those of Intelligent Design fanboys.
^ weeks should read years.
147. Of course those who bet that we will all burn to death in some apocalyptic manner cannot win such a bet - but many such people predict extreme scenarios to occur within X years.
For example, a blogger recently stated that within 10 years “global temperatures will soar; hurricanes, flooding, heat waves and drought will become common place; and millions of climate change refugees will overwhelm northern Europe”.
It’s feasible to make a bet that such occurences will not happen by 2018, assuming levels of CO2 emissions are not reduced by the amounts he states are necessary (which are usually huge reductions).
However, as shown on the thread below, most people in the political blogosphere, certainly away from pb.com, enjoy slagging off other people’s predictions, but when offered a chance to put their money where their mouth is, strangely disappear:
http://mattdaviesharingey.blogspot.com/2008/07/you-cant-trust-tories-with-your-local.html
160.
Dr David Evans was a consultant to the Australian Greenhouse Office from 1999 to 2005.
135 “Sounds like he should stand down now. Obviously wouldn’t be allowed to tho.”
Which says something, when Cannock Chase is number 196 on the Tories target list…but I guess on a C&N swing it is highly vulnerable. And with a tidy UKIP and LibDem vote to squeeze, I can sort of understand the Labour’s reluctance to just let him retire and battle his illness. Still seems rather callous, though.
107. But I suppose since this documentary has been pulled up for not being ‘balanced’, then Al Gore’s film is now effectively banned from terrestrial TV?
159 Tabman. Have no fear, Andrea is a star of all political horse flesh.
However he had a strange draw to the former member for Peterborough !!
… and some might question his predeliction for miniature male Conservatives of the roaming Rutland variety. 
Clearly a case of Milanese prickly heat.
@167:
Don’t dignify Gore’s tedious slideshow with the title ‘film’. At best, it was a Powerpoint presentation, and a badly researched and poorly delivered one at that.
168. Oh, Jack, I won’t mock the Peterborough one anymore after seeing her recent condition on youtube.
And the miniature is getting married this week IIRC
135, 166 - It might actually be in his interests to remain in office, if he wants his family to benefit from the death in service benefits payable under the Parliamentary Pension Scheme. It is not that unusual for terminally ill people to stay in work for this reason.
171 - I sincerely hope, of course, that this is not a relevant consideration.
152, because governments and green groups endorse global warming. The greens get to cut back industry, the government gets seemingly bulletproof punitive taxes “for the planet”.
Scientists follow the funding. Even now there are some psychs in America doing research into race psychology, sponsored by white supremacists.
161, could you elaborate? Not trying to be picky, the correlation graph was one of the things I recall from the prog.
162@ AGW is UNFALSIFIABLE.
In that case, and in the spirit of the site and the recent work by Keenlyside et al published in Nature RealClimate is prepared to wager that the average temperature HadCRUT3 global mean surface temperature (as they use) will be higher for 1/11/2000-31/10/2010 then 1/11/1994/-31/10/2004 contrary to there model.
See
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2008/05/global-cooling-wanna-bet/
and
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2008/05/the-global-cooling-bet-part-2/
170 Andrea. Have “Hello” snapped up the miniatures nuptuals ?
re 170 Well Andrea he would be getting married if the spineless new Labour government had not backed away from allowing him to. He’ll just be getting a second class civil partnership instead.
150. Certainly not NW Leics
176 Chris A. I dare say the “liberal” Conservative Cammy will change all that. Probably make homosexuality compulsory …. much like Eton and Harrow !!
I agree with Mike. Ther games up for Labour. There will be no swing back. No recovery. Infact, as the economy gets worse over the next year, so will Labour’s polling position. I really believe Labour are heading for disaster at the next election and the Tories are heading for a huge landslide. The public are quite clear what they want and thats a Conservative government with a big majority. Labour have been warned!
173. Yes, and such race psychologists are shown up for the pseudoscientists they are by the rest of the profession. There’s plenty of funding out there from companies with windfall profits like ExxonMobil to deny global warming. And anyone that denies gets huge abouts of money from the right-wing media to publicise it.
Scientific academies have standards to stop research being distorted in such a way. And scientists were warning about this issue long before governments came round. It’s a completely ridiculous belief. If it were true there would be dozens of theories that scientific academies were coming round to on the same basis: hydrogen emissions cause liver disease, milk causes soil contamination, etc etc. It would be happening all the time.
Besides, there are countries whose authoritarian governments don’t want to put in these taxes, so why do the academies of Russia and China sign up to this huge conspiracy?
The truth is that hardline right-wingers don’t want AGW to exist because it implies that externalities can happen on a large scale, which would need regulation/tax to solve and threatens the purist version of their ideology. It’s the same mindset as fundamentalist Christians not wanting evolution to exist because it threatens their purist version of religion.
Another tory lie debunked:
“John Major says inflation is at least double the official figure. Is it really?”
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/economics/article4363016.ece
174 - Without meaning to be pedantic, if the theory of AGW were ‘unfalsifiable’ then the explanation would have to be of a non-scientific nature.
It is falsifiable, but has not yet been conclusively falsified, thus the bet.
162. It’s over 90% likely, because scientists always admit the doubt in their theories while its still being precisely refined. Again, if you can spot this incredibly obvious flaw in the theory, how come its not recognised by a single national academy?
174. It’s the surface temperature readings that are one of the problems - along with post-facto ‘adjustments’. And they never seem to get round to explaining why readings from radio-sonde balloons and satellites show none of the warming that their little wooden hutches do.
173. The climate data on “World Temp - 120 years” ended in the early 1980’s. They extended the x-axis of it to 2000 as the more recent data contradicted the claim that most GW of the 20th century took place in 1900-1940. They just ignored the available data that didn’t agree with them. The data wasn’t actually from NASA either, it was from a Medical Sentinel piece from 1998 whose authors where funded by The Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine and the George C Marshall Institute.
There were numerous other errors such as the claim that volcanic activity produces a larger quantity of CO2 then burning of fossil fuels etc each year when in reality volcanic activity barely makes an impact on ice core records after large eruptions. They also produced historical data for temperature over the past 1000 years from 1991 again, the newer data contradicted their arguments so they didn’t use it.
As far as AGW goes, I’m open-minded, but I do think this attempt to shut down all debate on the matter is kind of creepy and Orwellian. If a TV channel wants to spend money making a programme saying AGW theory of a load of sh*t, then thats up to them. I don’t understand the outrage that The Great Global Warming Swindle created. It’s just one side of a debate and the hysterical reaction of some of the AGW promoters does make one wonder whether this programme touched a raw nerve.
182 - Let me re-phrase.
AGW as a theory is not unfalsifiable - it could be falsified, therefore is falsifiable.
If it were unfalsifiable, there would be no point saying it hadn’t been scientifically proven, because it couldn’t be.
As it is falsifiable, science is the correct medium to assess its validity, and work out whether it is correct or not.
This will take some time, and some very tight definition of terms, but should be possible, and thus should be able to be bet upon.
I like Tony Wright, one of the better Parliamentarians. I wish him well. Doubtless the vultures will be circling though. OT the Guardian ICM is usualy published on the twenty something of the month. Any idea when it will be this month?
Re. 186. And just to add, I’ve never actually seen it explained and proven why a fairly modest warming of say 1-2c over the next Century (which is the most likely amount of warming expected, I think?) is a bad thing? Certainly a 1-2c temperature rise shouldn’t be as destructive as a 1-2c cooling. I mean, who can deny that our warmer summers and winters are worse than the shocking summers and cold/snowey winters we experianced 25-30 years ago?
188 - I’d also like to echo the concern for Tony Wright MP and wish him the very best with his recovery. A great mind and an independent thinker on each and every issue.
@182:
No, not at all. Falsifiable means, explicit, than an experiment can be carried out that would demonstrate AGW to be false. In the absence of such an experiment, AGW remains unfalsifiable and thus pseudoscience.
Now, I don’t necessarily believe that AGW need remain unfalsifiable, but none of the current envirotrot lobby wishes to change the situation because (a) they don’t want their pet pseudoscience to actually be falsified lest it (b) put their dreams of hiding from the predicted eschaton in the welcoming luddite folds of Mother Gaia’s bosom, wherein socialism may be imposed on the people of Earth against their will.
184. If you are referring to the urban heat affect then it’s effect is considered to be small and NASA only use rural readings as a direct counter to this. If you have a link to some balloon and satellite readings that don’t show a period of warming over the last 30 years or so I’m happy to read it.
http://www.remss.com/data/msu/support/Mears_and_Wentz_TMT_TTS_TLS_submitted.pdf
That one certainly does show an increase.
184. Except they do:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8917093/
As with many of these claims, something against AGW pops up and gets huge media coverage from the right-wing media, but the peer review rebuttal barely gets a mention.
afternoon all, I have missed everything since Thursday afternoon when my Broadband went down.
Glasgow East appears to be “hotting up” nicely and my prediction of an SNP majority of less than 1,000 with 1 or possibly 2 recounts likely.
As I said 4 weeks ago, a slugout between Labour and SNP and then a separate one between the Tories and Libdems.
I doubt today’s Parnell announcement will make much difference to Thursday’s result unless it encourages even more Labour voters to stay at home.
I had forgotten that this year the Glasgow Fair was a week later so it has just started, perhaps explaining Stuart’s comment about almost no-one in Easterhouse. Given I understand Glasgow is enjoying a warm and sunny Fair Monday, if the streets are quiet today then as I said, most people are away on holiday and we are looking at a sub 25% turnout.
Apart from Jack’s ARSE do we know if we are expecting any polls this week?
Clearly BBC Scotland think the result is going to be interesting as they are having a by-election programme on thursday night.
At the weekend I think Alex Salmond was playing down an SNP victory in case it acts as encouragement for more waivering Labour voters to vote Labour.
The fact that recent Labour leaflets are pointing out that there are 2 Curran candidates suggests to me that Labour are worried they are perilously close to losing! I still think the Libdem lad has been easily the best candidate (on TV) which is why I expect him to be 3rd.
@187:
If AGW *is* falsifiable, it falls to somebody to demonstrate the experiment we could carry out to falsify it.
Absent that, as AGW currently is, it remains pseudoscience.
I get what you’re saying though, Morus. That whereas Intelligent Design is unfalsifiable by necessity, it may be that AGW’s falsifiability criteria simply haven’t been gotten around to yet.
But from the point of view of treating AGW like pseudoscience, it’s an unimportant semantic distinction.
185, thanks:)
Hmm. I’m still not entirely convinced. I am, however, open to changing my mind.
I also think that 186 makes a very valid point. Global warming is becoming some sort of religious orthodoxy, where the unbelievers are castigated and would be urnt at the stake, were it not for the environmental impact such ana ct would entail.
182, 187 - Isn’t this akin to Pascal’s Wager?
189. Two degrees warmer would mean large amounts of species extinction, places like Tuvalu will be lost to the ocean, we’d lost most of the world’s coral reef, increased flooding in places like Bangladesh and Mozambique, more extreme heat waves across the tropical belt each summer. There is a world beyond these islands.
191 - I know exactly what it means, whihc is why I said it.
If the AGW hypothesis could not be proven false by an experiment, then I would accept it would be unfalsifiable, but that contradicts the second part of that post that says that sceptics are offering a bet based on a certain experiment/temperature measure.
If AGW is unfalsifiable, then this experiment is invalid. If the experiment leads to the disproving of AGW, then AGW is falsifiable.
These experiments might be very difficult to conduct, but if it is ‘possible’ to show that AGW is false by empirical means, then it is falsifiable, even by the virtue of being false.
Of course, if you are arguing that AGW is a non-scientific theory, for which no experiment could ever be constructed, that is another matter - however, I suspect most AGW advocates would claim it is falsifiable, and would happily help design measures to prove the matter one way or another.
Are we assuming there won’t be a Yougov poll? Given that they’re an on-line pollster it is possible that their Glasgow East sub-sample is rather low, given how the constituency has been described
“139: You’re suggesting that BannedHorse is left-wing?”
Reading some of your comments here, Mr Palmer, never have I been more grateful that my liberalism doesn’t encompass your brand of CCCP-yearning Statism.
And I’m *still* not going to register on your f***ing NIR!
197 - In the sense of ‘it is rational to believe in it, because if true it would be dreadful to have thought it false, whereas if false it would not cause anything other than mild embarrassment to have believed it true’?
Yes and no - err on the side of caution says we should take sensible steps to be sustainable and not be mindless about pollution. However, taxes and constraints on human behaviour would be more of a burden than mild embarrassment, so should perhaps not be chosen just ‘to be safe’. You need good reason to do so.
Sorry, not 139 but 147.
@197:
I’ve had this discussion with several people in the past, and there are certainly similarities in the same flawed thinking leading to Pascal’s Wager also leading to AGW paranoia.
The shared flaw in Pascal’s Wager and Warmism is the shared, entirely unfounded, belief that their own vision of punishment that will be meted out by $DEITY/$MOTHER_GAIA due to failing to show due regard to the chosen anthropomorphic personification’s whims is the *only* possible negative outcome.
Of course, Pascal’s wager also assumes that $DEITY only rewards blind faith, rather than reasoning. Something that trots have loads of and little of respectively.
So there are definite similarities.
It seems to me sensible to maintain a level of scepticism regarding Global climate change and the effect of mankind upon it. Simultaneously it would behove those who are proponents of it to be a little less apocalyptic in their pronouncements. Personally a lot of the things that we can do have intrinsic merit regardless of their impact or not on global temperatures.
Finally has anyone ever looked at the population effect on global warming? Because frankly in the pre-industrial world the world population was probably several orders of magnitude lower than at present.
202 - I can’t argue with that. A propos of nothing in particular, here’s a front cover of a novel from the 1970s:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/customer-images/0722123086/ref=cm_ciu_pdp_images_all#gallery
107
I am amused to see that the BBC are illustrating the AGW piece with the discredited Hockey Stick graph. Clutching at straws I think.
Of course I am only someone who spoent years studying paleao-climatology so what do I know.
I don’t like the rampant politicisation of the discussion in the past decade and bodies like the IPCC don’t help with some of the sneaky things they get up to with oppression of dissenters. I certainly wouldn’t equate disagreeing with it as being equal of Holocaust denial and so on. That said I’ve seen very little in the way of evidence against MMGW that isn’t even easier to find holes in then anything the pro side have come up with.
196. I know it can seem that way if you disagree, but I’ve heard similar things said in the US about the “evolution orthodoxy”. I’m not a scientist myself, but many good friends are. They get incredibly frustrated with people with an ideological agenda trying to give the appearance that there’s more dispute than there actually is in the scientific community.
Besides, there’s no reason why free marketeers need to oppose this stuff anyway. Everyone reasonable accepts there’s going to be some level of tax needed to provide for defence, policing, healthcare etc so why does it matter from what sources it comes from? You can continue to argue against total tax increases, without targeting specific ones. Over time, the free market will do its job and find alternative industrial procedures which won’t emit carbon anyway, so the temporary tax revenue from such sources will decline. There no need to worry that accepting this theory will lead to a socialist supremacy!
‘palaeo-’ even.
Apologies for the misspelling.
201. BannedHorse
You are already on a National Identity database. It’s called the UK Passport Service - I believe it’s rather popular.
No, the flaw with Pascal’s Wager is the same flaw that most religions have — the concept that a benevolent God who created us with free will, while at the same time deliberately erasing all indisputable evidence of His existence, would torture us for all eternity simply for not believing in Him.
211. Does it include fingerprints, DNA and an audit trail of every time we need to prove our ID?
209
Sorry Socrates but that simply isn’t the case. It is inevitable that within the scientific community there are cliques and communities and often it may seem like their concensus extends to the community at large but in many cases this is a false impression.
The main frustration is by those proper scientists who are not directly involved in climatology but who know enough about the scientific method to see when it is being abused or completely ignored. Simply calling oneself a scientist is not enough. If one does not follow the scientific method then no matter what you want to believe, what you are doing is simply not science.
Nonsense! We always need to worry about what the left are up to. Let’s not forget that socialism killed 100 million people last century. It doesn’t become any less dangerous because it paints its face green. Quite the opposite.
Gabble, for what must be the *BILLIONTH* time –
Passport database *does not equal* Labour’s National Identity Database.
They are fundamentally different in scope, ambition and legality.
212. Likewise that you would be rewarded by (a) God who would clearly know you believed in him only as result of fear of one of the outcomes of Pascal’s Wager.
211
Its not a National identity database. Less than half the electorate have passports so I am led to believe.
211 - If that is the case why the need for a second NID? It seems our freedom is to be killed by a surfeit of databases. Secondly the problem with a specific database of identity is that initially you supply the details to it, but susbsequently it would supply the details to you.
@216:
Um, did you just try to reason with Gabble? Good luck with that.
220: Yeah, I know. Thanks.
Just because something cannot be proved, it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.
Take, for example, an afterlife. To many it seems tangible and to others it seems impossible. The fact remains that it cannot be proven either way until it happens - and by then it’s too late. The Popperian position about something being true until it’s not true isn’t exactly useful in a world where the discovery of truth would too late to make a difference when acted upon earlier.
If this piece from “First Post” is to be believed then will Tony Blair be back in contention to re-enter UK politics??
Will Blair quit his hopeless Mideast task?
Blair looks set to step down as peace envoy amid intransigence on both sides, says Philip Jacobson
The Middle East grapevine is buzzing with rumours that Tony Blair is ready to step down from his post as envoy of the so-called Quartet - the US, UN, European Union and Russia - engaged in the search for peace between Israel and the Palestinians.
Appointed with great fanfare last summer, Blair is said to have become increasingly frustrated by the unwillingness of either side to make the concessions required for any breakthrough. Although the official line remains that there is still a chance of a deal being struck before President Bush leaves office at the end of the year, it is widely accepted in diplomatic circles that the US ‘road map’ intended to guide the parties towards a lasting settlement is effectively dead and buried.
208
The problem Mitchell is that the scientific burden of proof has been reversed. Your posting illustrates this very clearly.
As with innocent until proven guilty, in science it is not necessary for the dissenters to come up with a water tight alternative to disprove AGW. All they have to do is show that the theory has not fulifilled the criteria of the scientific method. If any alternative hypothosis can be produced to account for the warming we are seeing until such times as it can be eliminated as a possible causal effect then it is not possible to say that AGW is an accepted Scientific principle.
As I mentioned in a posting on here the other day, 2 weeks ago I gave a lecture on the environment of early man in the Palaeolithic. During the time that modern man has been in the British isles the sea level has been both 150′ higher than today and 350′ lower. Palaeoclimatologists cannot even yet agree on whether we are in a full interglacial or just an interstadial (it is one of those things you can only really decide after the event). As long as everyone goes round saying this is man made and therefore man-curable, we continue to ignore the facat that no matter what we do most of our cities WILL flood in the future as a result of natural climate changes.
We are fiddling while Rome burns and pretending we are saving the planet when we should be more concerned with saving ourselves.
214. I’m sure, but when the criticism of this theory is so circulated in the media, I simply don’t believe that every academy would be taken in by the small clique.
215. Now you’re just sounding like a zealot. Why do we need to see this in left-right terms? I agree people like Sean Berry and the greens are extremely hectoring and irritating, but to equate them to Stalin is just silly. There is nothing more conservative than conservation. The way to defeat the loony left on this is to act like a proper conservative: you listen to the expert advice, you take responsiblity for your actions, you come up with a good solution based on neoclassical economics and you solve the problem. Remember that opposition to the Iraq war started with the loony left, but by acknowledging the small part of their argument where they were right we took the wind right out of their sails.
224 - “We are fiddling while Rome burns and pretending we are saving the planet when we should be more concerned with saving ourselves.”
Indeed, although certainly we should be ensuring that our activity on this planet is as clean as we can make it. We should also realise that the planet is 4.7bn years old and man has been around for a little over 2 million. The dinosaurs roamed around for 75 times the length of time that mankind has been, it is the height of conceit to suppose that in any terms over than our own we are anything more than an insignificant species that has happened to evolve to dominance in the present period. Sooner or later something will get humanity on this planet, it may be climate change or a large scale impactor event or some as yet unforeseen calamity.
225
Ignoring the socialist baiting going on, the problem with your reply to 215 is that we already have a perfect example in history of a supposedly accepted scientific paradyme leading to misery and death for hundreds of thousands of people. In fact two examples. The first is theory of Eugenics, accepted by all but a few scientists world wide in the first few decades of the 20th century and acted upon by democratic, conservative (small c) governments around the world which led ultimately to the death camps in Germany. Secondly was the use of IQ tests by the US in the 1920s and 30s which led to tens of thousands of people being turned away from Ellis Island on the grounds that they were below the required intelligence. Again this was a position wiodely supported by the orthodox scientific community.
The reason both these theories were accepted is partly because they played on the fears and hopes of the public and politicians and partly because they were advocated by people who called themselves scientists but who failed to follow basic scientific principles.
My view is that to some extent at least, the same proiblems apply to the AGW theorists today.
24/25.
Where to begin?
“Rod was wrong if he was saying that there was a swing-back in the polls as the above chart shows.”
You know that’s not what I said, Mike. I deliberately ignored polls and restricted my analysis to by-elections, while you, it appears, have selected one pollster in one parliament that happens to suit your premise. I did a rigorous analysis of all 417 by-elections 1945-2005, and a very clear pattern emerged (to my genuine surprise.) My approach was scientific; yours inherently not so. You cannot undermine my analysis with such obvious selectivity.
FWIW, you omit to mention that even using your “preferred” pollster ,ICM, the gap narrowed from about 17-20% in 1995 to 13% on polling day in 1997.
You assert that by-elections are not representative. Quite what you mean by that I’m not sure. One way of ensuring “representativeness” is to choose at random. If by-elections aren’t essentially random events, what are they?
You assert that Glasgow East will tell us nothing about the Con Labour battle. I disagree. There will probably be a “swing” to the Tories of about 10%, although an artefact of a large Labour drop and the Tories remaining broadly static or perhaps a small increase. [That is my expectation for the next election in Scotland, as it happens, although a lot less than a 10% swing due to swingback "theory"].
But the net swing (within broad limits) is all that matters under FPTP. Between 1970-74 and 1979-83 both Labour and Con votes dropped in by-elections, yet the net by-election swing was an excellent predictor of the outcome of the election, as was the actual net swing exhibited on election day itself, despite drops for both major parties..
The bottom line is the Tories are doing very well in the polls, but not so well in by-elections, even at C&N and Henley, to draw the firm conclusion that they are on course for any majority, never mind a three-figure one.
226
I agree about not polluting by the way. Recycling and renewables seems a very fine aspiration to me. I just don’t like to see the abuse of science by those who should know better.
I see Gordon is just as populpar in Israel…
http://tinyurl.com/5j3tpp
@222:
Poppler didn’t take a view on what is *true*, he took a view on what is *science*.
Poppler was essentially rebelling against the logical positivist view, i.e. that which cannot be verified is meaningless.
The problem with that, of course, is that it cannot be verified. Making it meaningless by its own definition. Hence Poppler’s realisation that nothing can be verified, only falsified.
206 - great cover! Nice pic of Telecom Tower. John Christoper wrote a triolgy of books called “The Tripods” which the BBC filmed in the 1980s, only they only did 2 series and not the full three leaving it hanging inexplicably.
The problem Poppler has is that Science is defined by its own terms - hence the scientific theory. It is no good railing against this when it is thye very basis upon which all science is conducted. It does not preclude other types of study being undertaken, nor does it necessarily invalidate the results. It simply says that such study cannot be classiied as ’scientific’.
226 - is the problem addressing climate change, or population growth?
233 who’s this Poppler character?
Guido opens up a new front on Gordo
http://www.order-order.com/2008/07/gordons-undeclared-donations-during.html
Popper not Poppler. Possible confusion with Doppler.
181, Gabble.
Thanks for the link - it illustrates well the weightings used. I personally disagree with them from my own (anecdotal, admittedly) experience.
They state that the “average family” spends only 9.5% of its (presumably take-home) income on food and 3.8% on car fuel. With the average family take-home income being £533 per week, that gives a hair over £50/week on food and £20/week on petrol/diesel. In my experience, budgeting for a family on those figures would be very unwise.
To put it another way, if your family income is at the average and you spend more than £50/week on food for your family and £20/week on fuelling the family car(s), the experienced inflation rate for your family will be noticeably above that quoted by the Government.
“Poppler didn’t take a view on what is *true*, ”
231/233 - Poppler?!?
In any case, that is the problem. Saying ‘now we can prove it’s true’ when it’s too late may be good science but it’s terrible politics.
To bring it back to gambling, you may get a thrill from gambling with other people’s money but there should be a duty to those whose money you are playing with.
230 On the left of those two photos, is Gordon morphing into Gollum?
Popper, not Poppler. Karl Popper.
I was rushing and cut and pasted the previous entry name. Apologies
Latest Rasmussen Tracker :
McCain 45% .. Obama 46%
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/election_20082/2008_presidential_election/daily_presidential_tracking_poll
239
But saying, we can’t prove this but trust us anyway when the consepquences of taking action are likely to be as bad as not is also unacceptable.
“Prudence, my preciousssss!”
One NIR to rule us all!
238. £20 a week on petrol? Musn’t use it much then.
“The climate is always changing..”
This certainly appears to be the case, but there are three things to bear in mind. Over what timescale is this change occurring, how large is this change and what is causing it.
Climate science has identified many factors that determine climate, and consequently change it when they themselves change.
The sun is one such cause, as is CO2 and other atmospheric gases. The position of the continents also has an impact, although their position is changing so slowly that they are only important when comparing the climate of today with that of hundreds of millions of years ago.
When analysing recent warming you have to look for what has changed that could cause this warming. The sun has not changed in brightness, so can not be the cause, though it is thought to be the cause of some of the warming in the early 20th century. Likewise the volcanic activity there has been is thought to have been enough to cause a slight cooling, in the absence of other factors.
The result is that CO2, and other greenhouse gases are almost certain to have caused recent warming, although this has been moderated by the cooling of man-made aerosols. All measurements, however, have error bars, which is why the IPCC don’t claim this as 100%. We can only proceed on the best available evidence, and that’s what it says.
It should be obvious that CO2 produced by 4×4s does not need to have caused every past change in climate for it to be responsible for causing a present change in climate. I don’t consider pointing this out to be part of a witch hunt, but you should have the decency to acknowledge that it is a logical fallacy.
232 - That book isn’t bad either (though it had an odd ending). It is actually more topical than it looks, because it is most concerned with the problems caused by catastrophe-induced migration and tensions with the home population. It would make a good basis for a television series today.
243 - We come down to the fundamental question then; ‘will the future be best us served by us doing something or doing nothing?’ It will be no use pointing to science, tea leaves or whatever as a justification to our future selves for a decision which turns out to be wrong.
People may use science as a crutch to support either view but, quite frankly, a leap of faith is the only possible reason for following either path.
The future is unknowable, as we cannot know the result of choices made. Life’s a gamble and, as Damon Runyon said, the odds are ‘6/5 against’. Red or black, place your bets.
246. You’re right regarding the fallacy you point out, but you’re wrong in assuming that all the variables that cause climate change are understood and therefore can be eliminated one by one to leave anthropogenic causes as the only option.
Recently it has been admitted that gloal temperatures have decreased since 1998. To respond to this by saying that AGW has been tempered by some as yet unknown factor - unknown it must be as it didn’t figure in any of the models that failed to predict this dip - is to commit the ad hoc fallacy.
http://www.iep.utm.edu/f/fallacy.htm#Ad%20Hoc%20Rescue
247 - apropos of this book’s thesis, isn’t there a theory that nelting ice-caps could make things cooler because of disrupting the gulf stream?
240 “On the left of those two photos, is Gordon morphing into Gollum?”
That is a slur on Gollum. At least he wasn’t ALL bad.
250 - There is such a theory, but I understood that is widely thought to be bunkum even by those that accept manmade global warming.
248, well, there are a great many things we should do regardless of the truth of man’s impact on global warming that (if the theory is correct) would prove useful.
Using less energy through more efficient technologies, and exploiting renewables where feasible, for a start.
But the recent biofuels saga, including the devastation of primary forest in Indonesia to plant aloe vera, should be a warning that slapping a green sticker on an activity shouldn’t guarantee it approval.
Also, how is it that AGW is being declared not falsifiable?
This is frankly bizarre. Scientific theories are rarely tested in a “grand” way, they are normally used to either make a specific prediction (as with Rutherford’s test of Relativity), or else specific components of the theory are tested.
As an example of the former, Hansen was able to predict the effect of the Pinatubo eruption on the climate (the magnitude of the temporary cooling caused).
As examples of the latter there are lab experiments looking at CO2, verifying that it is a greenhouse gas. There was Parker’s analysis of surface temperature which demonstrated that the urban heat island effect had been corrected for completely (he compared windy and non-windy days, since the urban heat island effect would be stronger on non-windy days). Natural experiments have been used to falsify the Svensmark hyothesis. And much more I’ve not heard of, I’m sure..
AGW is falsifiable, and it would have been already, were it not for the fact that the evidence does not conform to the “we have done nothing wrong” world view. Don’t worry, I don’t blame you, we didn’t know in advance. It’s not your fault.. but we had better do something about it now.
253. The biofuels disaster is an EU policy which we can’t change. Just saying.
[250] - If the “gulf stream” was disrupted by ice melt then it would make north-west Europe (relatively) colder. If it were very easily disrupted this would be enough to make NW Europe colder rather than warmer, particularly in winter, but global temperatures as a whole wouldn’t be affected.
It’s now generally thought that the warming needed to produce enough freshwater to disrupt the “gulf stream” would be so much that NW Europe would still warm overall, albeit at a slower pace than the globe as a whole.
[249] - It’s not true to say that global temperatures have fallen over the last 10 years. The last ten years have been much warmer than the ten years that went before. Even the second five years of the last ten years have been warmer than the first five years of the last ten years..
Your statement is thus false and requires no further explanation.
Just out of interest Mike, in what sort of size are you a buyer of Tory seats, and where exactly? I have found the 2 spread firms betting on this unwilling to lay a decent bet.
@253:
Yes! This is my view. It is worthwhile in and of itself to reduce man’s dependency on non-renewable energy, recycle as much as possible, and generally be as clean and parsimonious with scant resources as possible.
I don’t need to dress it up in screeching paranoia, hyperbole, pseudoscience and trostkyite predictions of doom and megadeath in order for these things to make simple, rational sense.
Which is why the luddite envirotrot posse make me so angry.
As the subject is now AGW, I’ll jump in as well.
1) I spoke to the head of IPCC and he said that the newspapers largely exaggerate the impact of global warming. An equivalent of $25 a barrel carbon tax is what is needed on all fossil fuels. Note, no predictions of wailing and knashing of teeth.
2) Bjorn Lomborg showed how statistics had been distorted by the Greens to help their political ends. Since his book, the science has obviously developed, but he certainly shows why we should treat the end of the world brigade with scepticism. (He is not a “denier” rather he thinks that their are other more urgent problems)
3)Most government led action is creating, at best, as many problems as it solves. Fill your Tank with Ethanol, get one dead African free is just the latest.
4) The price of oil is going to solve this problem for us. Just wait a few years and technology will have taken a massive leap forward.
[259,4] - One result of the high price of oil is the exploitation of the Canadian oil deposits which is actually making the problem worse.. The oil lobbies would much rather their profits kept on flowing by us using that oil, than by investing in renewables, so we still have important choices to make.
My fear is that carbon capture and storage will turn out to be the next biofuels - “What do you mean you can’t prove the CO2 is still underground!”
The coal lobby is certainly pushing CCS very hard in the US as a panacea.
@254:
Timothy, I fear you may not understand the notion of falsifiability. It’s not necessarily necessary to carry out a falsification experiment, because it’s often simply not practical to do so. But one has to be able to demonstrate, in theory, how one would falsify it.
I see little evidence that the AGW lobby have any understanding of this, or plans to address it.
They’re not the only one. String theorists are just as bad. And adherents of natural selection.
We radical sceptics can apply remarkably, bloody-mindedly double standards when it suits us.
O/T. We’re told that DNA evidence is both wonderful and certain.
Oh, yes?
Seems the Forensic Science Service can’t get it right when there’s only 4 people to choose from, so would you trust them with a national database of millions?
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23518522-details/%27DNA+blunder+turned+Kate+McCann+into+suspect/article.do
257.
“For many years now, human-caused climate change has been viewed as a large and urgent problem. In truth, however, the biggest part of the problem is neither environmental nor scientific, but a self-created political fiasco. Consider the simple fact, drawn from the official temperature records of the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia, that for the years 1998-2005 global average temperature did not increase (there was actually a slight decrease, though not at a rate that differs significantly from zero).”
http://www.qurl.com/7nkh1
There’s no need to be rude. And you wouldn’t be ‘explaining’ my statement anyway.
“Duffy asked Marohasy: “Is the Earth stillwarming?”
She replied: “No, actually, there has been cooling, if you take 1998 as your point of reference. If you take 2002 as your point of reference, then temperatures have plateaued. This is certainly not what you’d expect if carbon dioxide is driving temperature because carbon dioxide levels have been increasing but temperatures have actually been coming down over the last 10 years.”
Duffy: “Is this a matter of any controversy?”
Marohasy: “Actually, no. The head of the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) has actually acknowledged it. He talks about the apparent plateau in temperatures so far this century. So he recognises that in this century, over the past eight years, temperatures have plateaued … This is not what you’d expect, as I said, because if carbon dioxide is driving temperature then you’d expect that, given carbon dioxide levels have been continuing to increase, temperatures should be going up … So (it’s) very unexpected, not something that’s being discussed. It should be being discussed, though, because it’s very significant.” ”
http://www.qurl.com/my9jl
208 I agree entirely it can just be incredibly frustrating, as someone in their twenties, to be told by baby boomers that global warming isn’t man made because it isn’t or programmes such as this which distort their counter arguments, or references to new ice age articles from the seventies which were debunked at the time.
So far the creditability is with the side that has been most correct in the past fifty odd years, as it should be. As we go on I think we will see mounting evidence for AGW (if separate data is supporting an overriding theory the theory is likely to be correct as Newton wrote) , the question is at what point do we decide that there is enough and do something about it. I rather fear that by the time people are demanding action it would be too late.
The oil lobbies would much rather their profits kept on flowing by us using that oil, than by investing in renewables, so we still have important choices to make.
As renewables become cheaper than oil, what the oil lobbies want becomes irrelevant. Carbon tax (on a revenue neutral basis) would simply make that happen faster.
Timothy likes Zebras
on the question of speed of change the evidence from the ice cores is that the end of the last 2 interstadials saw the northern hemisphere move from temperate to glacial conditions in as littole as 20 years. Not withstanding the idiocy of ‘The Day After Tomorrow’ natural climate change can be extremely rapid.
1998 is not the best year to pick due to that year’s El Niño it represented a peak in temperatures and they overall trend is upwards from 1980 still. A year like 1992 had the eruption of Pinatubo to reduce temperatures.
You’d also do well to consider the effect of Global Dimming increasing in the last 20 years as well.
Does anyone think this decade is going to end up with a lower average temperature than the last if there isn’t a huge volcanic eruption or similar to dramatically alter the data?
[263] - The key word, thomas, is “apparent”. Humans are very good, sometimes too good, at pattern matching. We can see patterns that aren’t there. Thus, when looking at a temperature graph our eye is drawn to the peaks and troughs more than they deserve.
It’s not appropriate to use 1998 as a “point of reference” since the temperature that year was amplified by the strong El-Nino. This variation from year-to-year means that you have to examine averages of several years together, so that the signal of the underlying trend is not obscured by the noise.
The more years you average together, the clearer the signal. Whilst ten years would be better than five, looking at five years is certainly better than just one.
Come back to me when you have calculated the five year averages for 2003-2007 and 1998-2002 (inclusive). You will find that the second five years are warmer than the first. Thus the “plateau” is something of an optical illusion, caused by the extremely hot El-Nino of 1997-98.
It is to be regretted that some environmental activists did not understand this, and made too much fuss about an individual year at the time. However, when we next have an El-Nino of the magnitude of 1997/98 then it will be much warmer, just as 1998 was a lot warmer than the previous very strong El-Nino in 1983.
Member of the MPC thinks we are probably already in recession:
“David Blanchflower, who sits on the Monetary Policy Committee, warned recent job losses could be “the tip of the iceberg” and UK house prices could fall by 30%.
In an interview in The Guardian newspaper, he said: “I think we are going into recession and we are probably in one right now.””
http://tinyurl.com/6rz4e5
re 181 but it is more than double what Labour inherited when they took over the “basket case” economy in 1997. We now much which of the parties is likely to bequeath its successor a basket case economy when it leaves office, and Gabble, it’s not the Tories.
and Blanchflower has been consistently voting for reductions in interest rates. The only sane chap on the committee.
260
“What do you mean you can’t prove the CO2 is still underground!”
You prove it in the same way that you control how you get the oil and gas out. Pressure. If you pump something into the ground and it comes out somewhere else then the pressure in the well drops. If the pressure in the well goes up as you pump the stuff in and then stays the same once you stop pumping then it has not gone anywhere else.
This is already used very successfully on the Sleipner field in Norway. Of course Sleipner is supposed to have had 8 legs so I am not sure how much you can trust those Norwegians
re 270 don’t know how that “much” got in there, it should read “We now know which”
[266] - Well, I think the ice core data is a bit more complicated than that.
Firstly, the time resolution of the core can be a bit problematic, because of the way that the air bubbles form as pits in the ice surface. This degrades the temporal resolution, so that long ice cores often have to be reset by using volcanic eruption signals to match them up.
Secondly, they only cover a point in space. It’s perfectly possible for temperatures to drop several degrees in one area, whilst declining more slowly over a wider region.
So, the data can support such a transition, which is the most interesting conclusion to draw, but I think the error bars currently also support slower transitions.
Finally, and most importantly, the result actually demonstrates that the climate is even more sensitive to change then you might naively imagine. Given that we are perturbing the climate by releasing greenhouse gases, this should make us more, not less, concerned.
[272] - Well, after the mud volcano shenanigans in Indonesia, I’m not sure I trust geologists with fancy schemes.
@268:
Is “El Nino” spanish for Ad Hoc Fallacy?
[276] - No, El-Nino is the term used to describe a well known and studied phenomenon that affects the world climate. One of the effects is to (temporarily) raise the global temperature.
The NOAA website has some good information if you want to find something out.
Sorry, but this is just far too common within Tory ranks. Not a week seemingly goes by without some gaffe. Cameron may have personally changed, and he may have fooled the population that his party has changed, but the evidence is still there
Oakley – Oh dear.
Ray Lewis – Dodgy
James McGrath – Racist remark
Mercer – Black Bastards
Conways – On the fiddle
Hastilow – Racist Remarks
Cllr Ellenor Bland – Racist Peom
Ann Winterton – Banana Repudlic
Alun Cairns – Inappropriate comments
Giles Chichester – Nice little earner
I haven’t even mentioned Bozzer yet !!!!!
I could go on and on, still NASTY, and , still SLEAZY
[275] - I’m probably being too harsh on the geologists, but it does strike me as a complicated solution, and simpler solutions are generally safer and more robust.
275
Hardly “fancy schemes” since they have been doing what they do now for over 40 years. How do you think enhanced recovery works? You pump in gas or water at one end to drive out the oil at the other. the principle is the same. And of course the fact that the oil and gas which has been down the hole for around 100 million years hasn’t been able to seep out in that time sort of reinforces the idea that we are unlikely to see the C02 back on the surface any time soon.
279
Not complicated at all. It is done all the time as part of production. The only difference is that in this case you use C02 instead of methane or water.
274
Not geographically limited as you suggest because the results are backed up by other geological data such as Oxygen isotope concentrations from rocks and varve deposits around the world.
Off topic, the FT has an article explaining why the author thinks that Obama is going to win at a canter:
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/3bf5c59a-5666-11dd-8686-000077b07658.html
278
Since your MErcer comment is taken entirely out of context I will have to regard the rest of your list with similar suspecion.
Though without looking in detail I wilgive you Conway for free.
[278] - I’m no Tory, but even I can see that you’ve only got ten names on your list, when Cameron has been in post for about 120 weeks. Seems to me that several weeks would need to have gone by..
I’m confident in my own mind that Cameron is going to do a lot of things that I won’t agree with, to say the very least, but to try and torpedo him in such a way, given that Labour are not much [if at all] better, is dishonest. It looks like you are scared to actually argue your case. Perhaps Brown doesn’t have one?
@277:
Frankly, it sounds to me like an empty exercise in question-begging.
But, you say the world is warming, but the evidence shows that it’s actually cooling!
Oh, that’s because it was just an “El Pollo Diablo” year!
#254 [TLZ] - How’s the 2008 paper: Oceanic influences on recent continental warming (Compo,G.P., and P.D. Sardeshmukh) being seen?
Evidence will be presented that the recent worldwide warming of the continents has occurred largely in response to a worldwide warming of the oceans rather than as a direct response to increases of greenhouse gases (GHGs) over the continents. Atmospheric model simulations of the last half-century with prescribed observed ocean temperature changes, but without prescribed GHG changes, account for most of the continental warming. The oceanic influence has occurred through hydrodynamic-radiative teleconnections, primarily by moistening the air over the continents and increasing the downward longwave radiation at the surface. The oceans may themselves have warmed from a combination of natural and anthropogenic influences, as suggested by substantial differences between the observed recent warming trend and the ensemble-mean warming trend simulated by the IPCC models with all the radiative forcings included.
An evil chicken? I knew it!! Its those bloody sneezing birds again trying to warm the world up so they can stop getting flu.
String em up!!
Martin Coxall, your comment is bizarre. AGW could have been falsified, if it were shown that CO2 (or CH4, etc) did not act as greenhouse gases. In practice it is now no longer falsifiable through those means because those experiments have been repeated many times. In theory, that would act as a way to falsify it.
Likewise, AGW would be falsified if it could be shown that the CO2 came from the oceans, or volcanoes, or interstellar bat-aliens. In practice, changes in carbon isotope ratios prove that it is the release of fossil carbon by burning of fossil fuels that is increasing CO2 levels. So, in practice, you can not falsify AGW via these means, because this has already been established, but in theory one could do so.
You are about thirty years behind the science.
@290:
No. Nobody of note is denying that greenhouse effect is a real phenomenon, just that its rather tangential to falsifying AGW.
291. So you accept greenhouse gases in the atmosphere raise the temperature of the earth above what it would otherwise be. Do you also accept that there has been a man-induced increase in the greenhouse gases in the atmosphere?
[287] - No, the world is warming, if you look at the long-term means and not individual years.
[288] - There’s been some recent work looking at the land-sea contrast in warming, which says some similar things, although that used more indirect dynamical relationships (lapse-rates), rather than more direct radiative impacts.
I’d be very interested to see whether the land warmed more than the ocean in these experiments (even if less than observed), because the implication from previous work I’ve heard of is that it would have done.
A lot of the warming from CO2 comes about due to the water vapour feedback, so it’s not surprising.
290
Unfortunately that is not quite accurate. Whilst it is true that it has been proved that C02 concentrations act as greenhouse gases, the extent of the effect on a planetary scale is not proven by experimentation. It is based entirely on computer modelling and statistics and those computer models have often failed to take into account many of the natural feedback processes which limit the effects of C02 on atmospheric warming.
There is ahuge - and currently unprovable - leap of faith between the proof that C02 is a greenhouse gas in the laboratory and the assertion that it casues warming on a global scale. Again, going back to that infamous hockey stick, so poor was the scientific grasp of statistics that it turned out that no matter what numbers you put into that model, you would still have got the same pattern.
The guiding principle when dealing with these computer models is one of garbage in:garbage out.
292
No that is not what he said. There is a world of difference between a limited experiment in the laboratory and the application of that to the atmosphere.
Like I said, bad science, propogated by those who don’t undersand the principles.
291 - Surely if we did exactly as the Green Party wanted (every measure under the Sun) to reduce Mankind’s total emissions to effectively zero, and it had no impact, that would imply AGW was false.
The problem is, of course, that the test for the disease is almost as bad as the cure.
@296:
No, not at all. Even if the Earth started to cool, it could simply be due to perfectly ordinary climactic fluctuations.
And if nothing happens… well, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
297.
Thats a very good archaaeological principle you are using there
295. But presumably everyone accepts the Earth has a greenhouse effect? Otherwise we would have a climate like Mars.
@299:
To which the single largest contributor is… anybody?
Is it CO2?
I’m sorry Timmy, no. Anybody else who’s not a retard?
If solar activity is responsible for 20th century warming (as a few “fringe” scientists claim) we will very quickly find out whether theres any truth to their theory. We are currently seeing the most prolonged solar minimum since 1913 - If the solar theory is correct we should see a marked cooling taking place (there HAS been a marked cooling so far this year, but that could be down to La Nina - Now La Nina has decayed, ENSO neutral conditions should see temperatures quickly returning to their post 1998 norm) over the next year. If, as some solar scientist’s suggest we then go on to have a very weak solar max during the next cycle 24, then we would expect ALL of the 20th century warming to have been wiped out by 2020 and the global clime should cool to where it was in Victorian times. So, within a few years we should know which is more important in keeping the Earth warm;
The Sun or C02.
The question is not whether or not we have an atmosphere which retains solar radiation but whether the changes in C02 and other gas concentrations and their effect on the atmosphere have been correctly modeled.
Since those models failed to take into account the changes generated by a well known climatological event and have at times been shown to be based on deeply flawed understanding of statistics, there is a general lack of confidence amongst many people as to the veracity of the results. This is increased by the fact that previous non AGW - natural - climatic changes have been of a magnitude considerably larger than that wew have so far experienced and that we only have a limited understanding of their causes, it seems veryy dangerous to leap to conclusions and develop far reaching, costly and potentially harmful solutions when we don’t even really understand the problem.
If this was a situation where the precautionary principle could be invoked without killing hundreds of thousands of people and wrcking the lives of much of the first world then I might let you get away with the ‘just in case’ position. But it is not. The solutions so far have seen the starvation of people around the world and the destruction of vast tracts of rain forest. They have also threatened the jobs and livelihoods of millions of peple and, most importantly, have provided a distraction which has allowed givernments to ignore the fact thaht most of their population lives in places where they will - without any doubt at all - get flooded out as natural warming occurs.
We saw that all too clearly with the New orleans situation where commentators were quick to blame global warming for the hurricanes - in spite of the fact that the IPCC’s own expert on hurricanes resigned because he was being forced to say there was a link when there wasn’t.
And of course the real problem with New Orleans is that it is sinking because of isostatic readjustment and the fact they have canalised the rivers which carries the sediment further out to see and exacerbates the effect.
194. If Easteross is right about sub 25% turnout in Glasgow East, isn’t the 20/1 Ladbrokes offer for 20-24.99% very good value, with small saver bets side in one or two ranges directly above?
OT. Time to sell Romney as VP?
“While Mitt Romney’s set of paid PR minions are busy pushing out Mitt for Vice President spin, McCain campaign insiders say that while it’s true they have polled Romney on the bottom of the ticket, the data confirms that such a move would be a political disaster for the party.”
http://www.spectator.org/util/print.asp?art_id=13563
New thread on YouGov and the BBC
300 - I’m not an expert but the largest volume greenhouse gas would probably be vaporous water. The most effective greenhouse gas is methane. Infact the largescale release of methane cathrates is presumed to be partially responsible for the Permian-Triassic mass extinction, this cathrate release was possibly a secondry warming event triggered by the flood-basalt eruption in Siberia which would have been warming due to large amounts of CO2 released.
i believe that both the UN and EU are prme contributors to the global warming debate. is that a reason to join in or stay out? i know where my money is going. neither organisation could run a piss up in a brewery. it is not just New Labour that isn’t working!
#300, 305 Water vapour ~80% of all greenhouse gases by mass (~90% by volume).
300. Timmy?
As for your question, no, it’s the second largest. It is however the greenhouse gas with the biggest increase in the atmosphere in the last one hundred years.
Ye gods! You can tell the summer silly season at PB.com is well underway from today’s contributions. Roll on September - UK conference season and US campaign proper.