General Election 2024

[BFTD]

34 minutes ago, Hauzen said:

Is there any reason we're under 2 weeks to the election and we've not got lampposts & road signs festooned with all sorts of gaudy political party signs? These used to spring up all over the place during election campaigns but I've not seen a single one so far. 

Was there not enough time to get these printed? A ban on the materials to be ecologically friendly? Nae enough foreigny types allowed in to manufacture them?

They were banned quite a while ago now (10+ years?), because they were all very quick to put them up but reticent to bring them back down again. Had been pissing people off for years. Not sure if it was an agreement they all came to, or if there was some actual legislation passed.

I do kind of miss it, as it was part of the excitement when I was a kid. Not a great reason to bring it back, admittedly.

[Bob in Denny]

 One solitary Scottish Conservative one in Fort William spotted earlier, no name on it.....

[Highlandmagar]

A massive big Andrew Bowie  (Tory), sign  at roadside in Garlogie.

Edited June 21 by Highlandmagar

[Salvo Montalbano]

I saw a "Scottish Liberal Democrats - Winning Here" sign in a field up by Cupar. They've got a good chance in North East Fife but the sign looked like it had been first put out in 1997 

The local Labour candidate has a few posters etc up in bus shelters (as in the paid ones under plastic via Clear Channel or whoever sells the space) and I'm getting a lot of videos on Facebook and Keir Starmer has appeared on my Twitter feed. Not seen much from the SNP here so I take it they are resigned to defeat even though it'll take a 10.2% swing to go red and I think the SNP have a reasonable enough chance of making it very competitive, let alone winning. 

[BFTD]

Should add that big notices on private land are still something that happens.

You can spot the land owned by Mike Mulraney around here, as there'll suddenly be those portable billboards or vinyl signs on fences in support of whatever the Tories want to inflict on us this time.

[scottsdad]

1 hour ago, Hauzen said:

Is there any reason we're under 2 weeks to the election and we've not got lampposts & road signs festooned with all sorts of gaudy political party signs? These used to spring up all over the place during election campaigns but I've not seen a single one so far. 

Was there not enough time to get these printed? A ban on the materials to be ecologically friendly? Nae enough foreigny types allowed in to manufacture them?

Went to St Andrews today (a fucking dump, btw). Wall to wall Lib Dem Winning Here signs.

[BFTD]

Some of you are making me think I've Mandela Effect'd this election placard ban, so I looked it up and it seems to be down to a bit of a council movement about a decade ago. Each area in Scotland makes its own decisions about them, and they're banned in quite a few.

Old article, so some councils may have changed their position since then, but it's been a long time since I saw any in Clacks: https://theferret.scot/councils-election-poster-ban-scotland/

[funky_nomad]

3 hours ago, Salvo Montalbano said:

I saw a "Scottish Liberal Democrats - Winning Here" sign in a field up by Cupar. They've got a good chance in North East Fife but the sign looked like it had been first put out in 1997 

Driving through 'Muchty is an assault on the senses with all the oversized orange signs in people's front gardens/drives.

[Granny Danger]

It will be interesting to see if Reform poll anywhere near the figures being suggested in the polls.  From a Scottish perspective it will be even more interesting to compare support for them north of the border compared to England.

 

[Freedom Farter]

12 hours ago, BFTD said:

He's chasing the national mood, and that appears to be authoritarianism. People seem to want to hear that other people that they don't like are going to be punished for existing (the young, in this case).

Fully agree, it was definitely that. Although I think there's context also worth considering:

The ongoing Russian invasion and occupation of Ukraine has been used as a pretext for reorienting European economies around militarism, to varying extents. This is likely an attempt to replicate the "military keynesianism" which has been a successful part of Bidenomics - around 90% of what gets called Ukraine Aid is spent on domestic US arms manufacturing. 

This graph shows the share price increase of European arms manufacturers from Jan '22 to Feb '24:

https://www.ft.com/content/e9939f2b-6454-4be8-b99d-05023f635e87

Noticing how well Saab has done for itself we can now see why the Swedish government was so desperate to join Nato. There's Rheinmetall topping the table. They've got so cocky from their success they've even come out the shadows to become Borussia Dortmund's shirt sponsor. We can also notice that our very own BAE Systems, Rolls Royce and Melrose have been doing well. Most of the foreign-owned companies listed there have a footprint in the UK, especially Leonardo. Then from the article:

Quote

The fortunes of smaller manufacturers have also been boosted. William Cook, a family-owned British manufacturer, has seen revenues in its defence business jump 20 per cent from 2022 to 2023 thanks to a UK government contract to supply replacement tracks to Ukraine for its Soviet-era armour. One of only two European producers of tank tracks, it expects a further 40 per cent increase this year.

 

This is providing a much needed boost to a currently very shite UK economy and therefore is considered crucial to the national interest. Keeping the populace on board is an important aspect to the project. The point made here is key:

https://newleftreview.org/sidecar/posts/strategies-of-denial

What's being said there is that the green aspects to Bidenomics aren't actually due to a sincere embrace of green politics. Its driven by the need to compete with China on renewable energy production. Then the military keynesianism isn't due to an ideological commitment to public spending, it was done so workers would serve the empire, so they'd produce what the elite needed for their geopolitical aims. Remember there was no public healthcare in USA during Cold War military keynesianism and nor is there now while Biden repeats the trick. In UK terms, public spending on militarism is money diverted from other avenues - healthcare, education, housing, etc. It's not that great a deal for folk. It does provide jobs but there's other, better ways to create jobs. To achieve buy-in you really need to convince folk this is in their interests. One way is to convince them that they themselves are threatened by Russia, by China, or by...err...Hamas. (It should be framed as on behalf of the Ukrainian resistance but then folk get confused as to how Israel fits in. So establishment messaging tends to just focus on the baddies instead).

BBC is ultimately an arm of the UK state, at times very obviously so. The news site has been covering the increasing militarism in Europe in a favourable light, eg. "Russia's neighbours urge Nato allies to bring back military service" - https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-68728096 (maybe Sunak read this). The main story right now on the BBC News site is Farage again. Yet its not that BBC have finally deemed his demonisation of migrants to be worthy of opprobium. No. It's that he's criticised Nato.

Sunak has been swimming in this soup as well as going to all his big boy meetings with state security and whatever else. He has got the message. Which is why he thought he was being very clever with his speech about Scottish nationalists, trans activists and Putin threatening UK security. It's why his party recently came out with their line that Starmer can't stand up to Putin because something something Diane Abbott.  Given all this, the national service thing wasn't so surprising. It was Sunak's cack-handed attempt at extracting political gain from the current zeitgeist.

Edited June 22 by Freedom Farter

[Fullerene]

14 hours ago, Soapy FFC said:

They must be yearning for the heady days of Theresa May, who up until then was the worst PM we'd seen. 

I find it incredible that John Majors could do his "back to basics" crap, literally jump into bed with Edwina Currie AND get totally pumped in the 1997 elections and yet still come across as one of the least worst PMs in modern times.

[DeeTillEhDeh]

7 hours ago, Granny Danger said:

It will be interesting to see if Reform poll anywhere near the figures being suggested in the polls.  From a Scottish perspective it will be even more interesting to compare support for them north of the border compared to England.

 

From the polling it seems it will be a lot less - around 7% share of the vote

It's still enough to damage the Tories and also look like they are also taking votes from Labour - you'd assume would be some of the staunch voters.

[BFTD]

9 hours ago, Freedom Farter said:

Fully agree, it was definitely that. Although I think there's context also worth considering:

The ongoing Russian invasion and occupation of Ukraine has been used as a pretext for reorienting European economies around militarism, to varying extents. This is likely an attempt to replicate the "military keynesianism" which has been a successful part of Bidenomics - around 90% of what gets called Ukraine Aid is spent on domestic US arms manufacturing. 

This graph shows the share price increase of European arms manufacturers from Jan '22 to Feb '24:

https://www.ft.com/content/e9939f2b-6454-4be8-b99d-05023f635e87

Noticing how well Saab has done for itself we can now see why the Swedish government was so desperate to join Nato. There's Rheinmetall topping the table. They've got so cocky from their success they've even come out the shadows to become Borussia Dortmund's shirt sponsor. We can also notice that our very own BAE Systems, Rolls Royce and Melrose have been doing well. Most of the foreign-owned companies listed there have a footprint in the UK, especially Leonardo. Then from the article:

 

This is providing a much needed boost to a currently very shite UK economy and therefore is considered crucial to the national interest. Keeping the populace on board is an important aspect to the project. The point made here is key:

https://newleftreview.org/sidecar/posts/strategies-of-denial

What's being said there is that the green aspects to Bidenomics aren't actually due to a sincere embrace of green politics. Its driven by the need to compete with China on renewable energy production. Then the military keynesianism isn't due to an ideological commitment to public spending, it was done so workers would serve the empire, so they'd produce what the elite needed for their geopolitical aims. Remember there was no public healthcare in USA during Cold War military keynesianism and nor is there now while Biden repeats the trick. In UK terms, public spending on militarism is money diverted from other avenues - healthcare, education, housing, etc. It's not that great a deal for folk. It does provide jobs but there's other, better ways to create jobs. To achieve buy-in you really need to convince folk this is in their interests. One way is to convince them that they themselves are threatened by Russia, by China, or by...err...Hamas. (It should be framed as on behalf of the Ukrainian resistance but then folk get confused as to how Israel fits in. So establishment messaging tends to just focus on the baddies instead).

BBC is ultimately an arm of the UK state, at times very obviously so. The news site has been covering the increasing militarism in Europe in a favourable light, eg. "Russia's neighbours urge Nato allies to bring back military service" - https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-68728096 (maybe Sunak read this). The main story right now on the BBC News site is Farage again. Yet its not that BBC have finally deemed his demonisation of migrants to be worthy of opprobium. No. It's that he's criticised Nato.

Sunak has been swimming in this soup as well as going to all his big boy meetings with state security and whatever else. He has got the message. Which is why he thought he was being very clever with his speech about Scottish nationalists, trans activists and Putin threatening UK security. It's why his party recently came out with their line that Starmer can't stand up to Putin because something something Diane Abbott.  Given all this, the national service thing wasn't so surprising. It was Sunak's cack-handed attempt at extracting political gain from the current zeitgeist.

I definitely don't want to dismiss any of this, but I'm sure Rheinmetall headlined the Download Festival in the 2000s.

[Granny Danger]

2 hours ago, DeeTillEhDeh said:

From the polling it seems it will be a lot less - around 7% share of the vote

It's still enough to damage the Tories and also look like they are also taking votes from Labour - you'd assume would be some of the staunch voters.

At the risk of stating the obvious voting patterns in Scotland have always differed from those in England with support for left, or at least perceived left, parties being far higher.  Yet another reason why we should have the right to choose self determination.

[tamthebam]

You always see big Tory posters in fermer's fields (or maybe more accurately Tory landowners' fields, perhaps the tenants vote differently). 

When I was young you'd see posters in most windows when it was election time. Mostly Labour red round my place, Tory blue and the occasional Lib Dem yellow in the posher parts of Edinburgh. I've seen one SNP window poster when I was through in Glasgow yesterday and one Green poster in South Edinburgh and that's it. 

[BFTD]

7 hours ago, tamthebam said:

You always see big Tory posters in fermer's fields (or maybe more accurately Tory landowners' fields, perhaps the tenants vote differently). 

When I was young you'd see posters in most windows when it was election time. Mostly Labour red round my place, Tory blue and the occasional Lib Dem yellow in the posher parts of Edinburgh. I've seen one SNP window poster when I was through in Glasgow yesterday and one Green poster in South Edinburgh and that's it. 

When my uncle died, I had to clear out the old family home and discovered a stack of hand-printed VOTE LABOUR posters on hot pink paper. Going by the age of everything else in the cupboard they were in, they were likely from the mid-Sixties.

Kept one and I'll be getting it framed at some point.

[PossilYM]

On 21/06/2024 at 22:58, BFTD said:

Some of you are making me think I've Mandela Effect'd this election placard ban, so I looked it up and it seems to be down to a bit of a council movement about a decade ago. Each area in Scotland makes its own decisions about them, and they're banned in quite a few.

Old article, so some councils may have changed their position since then, but it's been a long time since I saw any in Clacks: https://theferret.scot/councils-election-poster-ban-scotland/

Tory curtain twitchers were big into banning outdoor election placards on lampposts especially during the days when Labour had a stranglehold in Scotland. They were forever writing letters into local papers decrying it.

[Fullerene]

8 hours ago, BFTD said:

When my uncle died, I had to clear out the old family home and discovered a stack of hand-printed VOTE LABOUR posters on hot pink paper. Going by the age of everything else in the cupboard they were in, they were likely from the mid-Sixties.

Kept one and I'll be getting it framed at some point.

If they said "Vote for your Socialist candidate" you could post them up in the neighbourhood and cause a bit of mischief.

[coprolite]

On 22/06/2024 at 00:33, Freedom Farter said:

Fully agree, it was definitely that. Although I think there's context also worth considering:

The ongoing Russian invasion and occupation of Ukraine has been used as a pretext for reorienting European economies around militarism, to varying extents. This is likely an attempt to replicate the "military keynesianism" which has been a successful part of Bidenomics - around 90% of what gets called Ukraine Aid is spent on domestic US arms manufacturing. 

This graph shows the share price increase of European arms manufacturers from Jan '22 to Feb '24:

https://www.ft.com/content/e9939f2b-6454-4be8-b99d-05023f635e87

Noticing how well Saab has done for itself we can now see why the Swedish government was so desperate to join Nato. There's Rheinmetall topping the table. They've got so cocky from their success they've even come out the shadows to become Borussia Dortmund's shirt sponsor. We can also notice that our very own BAE Systems, Rolls Royce and Melrose have been doing well. Most of the foreign-owned companies listed there have a footprint in the UK, especially Leonardo. Then from the article:

 

This is providing a much needed boost to a currently very shite UK economy and therefore is considered crucial to the national interest. Keeping the populace on board is an important aspect to the project. The point made here is key:

https://newleftreview.org/sidecar/posts/strategies-of-denial

What's being said there is that the green aspects to Bidenomics aren't actually due to a sincere embrace of green politics. Its driven by the need to compete with China on renewable energy production. Then the military keynesianism isn't due to an ideological commitment to public spending, it was done so workers would serve the empire, so they'd produce what the elite needed for their geopolitical aims. Remember there was no public healthcare in USA during Cold War military keynesianism and nor is there now while Biden repeats the trick. In UK terms, public spending on militarism is money diverted from other avenues - healthcare, education, housing, etc. It's not that great a deal for folk. It does provide jobs but there's other, better ways to create jobs. To achieve buy-in you really need to convince folk this is in their interests. One way is to convince them that they themselves are threatened by Russia, by China, or by...err...Hamas. (It should be framed as on behalf of the Ukrainian resistance but then folk get confused as to how Israel fits in. So establishment messaging tends to just focus on the baddies instead).

BBC is ultimately an arm of the UK state, at times very obviously so. The news site has been covering the increasing militarism in Europe in a favourable light, eg. "Russia's neighbours urge Nato allies to bring back military service" - https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-68728096 (maybe Sunak read this). The main story right now on the BBC News site is Farage again. Yet its not that BBC have finally deemed his demonisation of migrants to be worthy of opprobium. No. It's that he's criticised Nato.

Sunak has been swimming in this soup as well as going to all his big boy meetings with state security and whatever else. He has got the message. Which is why he thought he was being very clever with his speech about Scottish nationalists, trans activists and Putin threatening UK security. It's why his party recently came out with their line that Starmer can't stand up to Putin because something something Diane Abbott.  Given all this, the national service thing wasn't so surprising. It was Sunak's cack-handed attempt at extracting political gain from the current zeitgeist.

You can't have a military industrial complex without a military. 

[Peil]

On 21/06/2024 at 19:29, Hauzen said:

Is there any reason we're under 2 weeks to the election and we've not got lampposts & road signs festooned with all sorts of gaudy political party signs? These used to spring up all over the place during election campaigns but I've not seen a single one so far. 

Was there not enough time to get these printed? A ban on the materials to be ecologically friendly? Nae enough foreigny types allowed in to manufacture them?

I did notice when I went over to Clydebank the lampposts had competing SNP and Labour signs, but none over here in Lenzie/Kirky.  Maybe they decided to focus efforts on where they can actually swing things?