Meanwhile, across the Pond

[ddstory.livejournal.com]

Some of you might've heard already that there's an election ongoing in the UK (and some might've even pretended that they care, hehe). This appears to be a rarely interesting election actually, which in Britain's case says a lot. Curiously, at the very end of the race, Cameron appeared to have made a Freudian slip, admitting to some workers at a supermarket in Leeds, "This is a vote that will be crucial for me". He soon realized the slip, so he hastened to correct himself, "...that will be crucial for our country". In reality, many Britons hate him in their guts exactly for being a career politician. As if he's scoring for achievement points.

So let's look back at his career history. After he graduated at the university, David Cameron started working at an advertisement agency, but he didn't stay there for too long, because he soon moved into politics. He was an aide to the conservatives at first, and this opened his way to a quick career in politics. Undoubtedly being a good orator with refined manners, about a decade ago he managed to take the reins at the then fragmented party, and then to unite it. During Tony Blair's tenure, the Tories had been pushed into the political periphery; they looked outdated, archaic, backward. Back then, David Cameron promised to change this, and in 2010 he did manage to defeat Labour PM Gordon Brown.

Cameron brought a lot of personal friends to 10 Downing Street, and made them members of his cabinet and close advisors. Later though, this became one of the major problems of his government, which ended up being run by a clique of graduates from the elite high schools and universities like Eton, Oxford and Cambridge - all of them sharing a privileged background, emerging from the high class. There was also a notable shortage of women among them, a problem that the Tories have been unable to overcome even to this day. So far, the conservative party remains an almost exclusively male club.

"Mommy's boys who don't know how much a litre of milk costs", a female member of their own party once derided them. The above description also fits the PM. His wife also comes from the high class, and has the life of the rich aristocrats from the fancy magazines. This image has kept haunting the entire government. It seems utterly detached from the real troubles and pains of the ordinary Britons, which only reinforces the old chicle about the "egoistical party" that only looks after the interests of its own clientele.

And to think that the prime-minister initially had very different intentions - moreover, he headed a coalition government that included the Liberal Democrats, because the Tories didn't have a majority of their own back in 2010. That's quite a rarity in British politics, because the election system is designed to maintain stable majorities mostly dominated by a single ruling party. But this time it's very possible that whoever wins today's extremely tight election, they'll have to babysit a smaller coalition partner, because this is shaping up to be yet another "hung parliament" - just like the last one.

David Cameron and his finance minister George Osborne intended to overcome the consequences of the financial crisis ASAP, using painful austerity and slashing essential public services. Except, all the social and public cuts never brought the desired effect. Even today, Britain keeps having the 4th largest deficit among the countries in trouble - only Greece, Iceland and Ireland have a bigger one. Although the conservative-liberal coalition has managed to liven up the economy somewhat in the last couple of years, and achieve a 2.6% growth, tax revenue remains at a record low, because the boom at the labor market mostly created low-paid jobs, which didn't contribute much in that respect.

The Britons have felt very little of the promised prosperity, and the economic signs for the first quarter of 2015 haven't been that impressive either, so the Tories' election slogan "We have a long-term development plan" may've become rather obsolete now. Truth be told, the government's detractors were predicting such a new balloon, and this time it was expected to happen in the bank investment sphere.

Despite some achievements in the modernization of society (like the decision to allow same-sex marriage, and the relatively successful economic policy), Cameron cannot be sure in his election victory this time. He's not particularly popular among his people, and on top of that, the Tories' election campaign has been too stale and boring, despite the PM's pathetic attempts to present himself as "a people's guy" on some occasions.

The Britons are concerned about the future of public health-care and the social system, about the declining living standard, about the immigrant influx. In the meantime, the conservatives have put a very different topic at the center of their election campaign: Britain's possible exit from the EU after the promised referendum in 2017. But this topic seems too abstract for the majority of the public, and frankly, not interesting at all.

And mind you, Cameron is getting pressure from the right as well - from the UKIP populists, the xehophobic, Eurosceptic party. From the left, the pressure comes from the Scottish Nationalists, who've enjoyed a serious upsurge in recent times. If they manage to win all MP seats from Scotland, Labour could form a minority government with their support - if it had the stomach for it. But Cameron's main problem right now is that he just doesn't have a reliable coalition partner. He may be still assuring himself that the Tories could form a majority on their own, but that doesn't seem very likely. As a commentator wrote at The Independent, "Keep dreaming, Cameron!"

And what about the opposition? For a long time Ed Miliband, the Labour's leader, was considered a Mr Nobody in the best case, Mr Awkward in the worst. Cameron even said it outright on a number of rallies: "If you want Ed Miliband for prime-minister, you should vote Labour. If you prefer me to him, you should vote Conservative". Couldn't get any clearer.

Well, Ed Miliband may've actually done quite a bit to reinforce Cameron's notion of him. For instance, at the latest TV debate he slipped, and in the literal sense. After a TV appearance in Yorkshire, he tripped off at the podium and lost his balance. This could've turned into one of those little moments that tend to brand a politician for life, even put an end to a political career. But Miliband managed to hold to his feet at the last moment - and many saw some symbolism in this, a sign of his remarkable ability to fight to the last. Until just a year ago, even the most hardline Labour supporters wouldn't have bet a penny on Miliband winning the election. All polls seemed to show catastrophic results for him. Most people believed he was Labour's main obstacle, because he was himself unelectable: unpopular, hard to comprehend, with clumsy manners - those were the predominant estimates.

There's always at least one Ed Miliband in every school class - a serious, gifted guy, bit clumsy, a computer-crazed geek that you'd probably place somewhere at the bottom of your list of people you'd ever invite to a party. Such a guy could easily end up being some obscure professor, or a manager at an IT firm, but you wouldn't expect to see him sitting in the main chair at No10. Not in the era of permanent media coverage and superstar politicians. Last year Miliband was caught on camera looking weird while munching a bun with bacon. His opponents used that footage to mock him. You know... all means are allowed in the cruel election war, anything you could use to present your opponent in a bad light is fine.

That said, the leader of Labour has a stainless political and profesisonal biography, especially from a leftist standpoint. The younger son of Marxist political scientist prof. Ralph Miliband, he grew up together with his elder brother David in North London in a family of intellectuals with a leftist orientation. His parents were Polish Jews who had settled in Britain to flee Nazi Germany. Both brothers studied at Oxford, then made a political career at the Labour Party during Tony Blair's time. Under Gordon Brown, David became foreign minister, and Ed was responsible for the matters of energy and climate change. Two stellar political careers - until the political "fratricide" at the Labour congress in 2010 that we mentioned the other day.

After his election defeat, Gordon Brown resigned as chairman of the party. David Miliband was considered the logical successor - he was charismatic, cosmopolitan, and he was part of the prominent right wing within Labour (led by Tony Blair). But his nomination brought a rift between the two brothers, and Ed eventually won the chairman's post. With help from the labor unions, Ed managed to earn a narrow win over his bro. The press wrote of a "drama" akin to that of Cain and Abel. The relations between the two have remained cold to this day. This story has made some of Ed's detractors allege that he's cunning and unreliable. Moreover, he has often said that his feud with his brother isn't a family quarrel, but a conflict of principles about the preferred political line of the Labour Party.

Specifically, Ed Miliband favors the abandonment of Tony Blair's neoliberal policy. He wants to curb social inequality in the country, save public health-care, cut the taxes for the working class, and lower the extremely high university fees. He advocates for a united Europe and a society of equal opportunity - in other words, in Germany he would've easily ended up being a Social-Democrat. Some Labour voters believe their PM candidate doesn't have a real, big, and resounding message that could win him the election. But the thing is, he just prefers not to give bombastic promises that'd then turn out to be completely unrealistic. He's not a populist. He's a pragmatist - an unremarkable, perhaps boring one, but a pragmatist nonetheless.

And then in March, something clicked into place in the Labour Party. It could've been thanks to Obama's advisor, David Axelrod, who's now the chief of Ed Miliband's campaign team. Axelrod managed to make Ed show his true image during the TV debates and the campaign rallies. And suddenly, everyone started seeing the tall, sophisticated politician, the man with a sense of humor and spontaneous behavior, a politician who stands by his convictions, and also a cordial guy who's able to listen to the other's opinion. This new image turned out so appealing that the British teenagers are now queueing to shoot selfies with him. They've organized Ed Miliband fanclubs around the social networks. All of this, of course, part of a successful political PR project, but also a sign that he may be finally turning into an "understandable" politician.

It's still unclear, of course, whether this political transformation would play a crucial role for the outcome of this election. The Britons are very tired of politics right now, and many see in Ed Miliband just another representative of the despised political elite. In any case, neither Miliband nor Cameron will be able to easily form a government after the final result is known sometime tomorrow. The polls seem to indicate a very tight race, and a scramble for every single vote. And none of them having a good chance to form a government without a coalition. So they'll have to look to the smaller parties again.

But one thing is for sure. A possible Labour government would mostly depend on the Scottish Nationalists, who'll be sure to score very well. The problem is, Miliband has vowed not to form a coalition with them, because they keep insisting on a Scottish secession. In the best case, he could form a minority government, because Labour and the Scottish Nationalists do have a lot in common on the other issues. If the polls haven't got it all totally wrong, in about 24 hours Britain could be facing a very painful and protracted government-forming process, and even possibly a completely changed political landscape.

Comments

[luvdovz.livejournal.com]

If no party forms a stable majority, nothing good awaits Britain. And the outdated election system is to blame for that.

[policraticus.livejournal.com]

If I am understanding the polls correctly, Labour might well be shut out of Scotland entirely in favour of the SNP. That is a huge block of formerly reliable Labour votes which traditionally countered the more conservative strongholds in England. That means Milliband will have to make common cause with SNP, a party that Labour worked tirelessly to thwart in the recent Scottish independence vote. Whoever wins a plurality, Tory or Labour, will have to either hold their nose and deal with the Scots. In fact I think Cameron and Milliband have both pledged, in the past, to not form a government with SNP. Perhaps Downing Street will be judged as worth the loss of integrity. In any case, the next government does look to be very weak by UK standards.

It is times like this that the US's boring old two party system really shows its worth.

[htpcl.livejournal.com]

But is it representative enough? And how does a two-party system essentially differ from a one-party system in terms of levels of oligarchic presence?

[unnamed525.livejournal.com]

It doesn't.

[policraticus.livejournal.com]

There are always rich or powerful people who have an outsized influence on society, even at the height of the Soviet enterprise or in the depths of Cultural Revolution, .

In the US's case, the proof of the pudding is in the eating, I'd say. We've had 228 years of mostly stable, mostly successful constitutional democracy, baring that little contretemps in the 1860's. The Constitution bends and changes with the times, adapts to crisis, ignores fads, all according to rules established by men who never saw the internet and were completly ignorant of Darwinism or the dangers of greenhouse gases. Will it last forever? No. Will it out live us? Probably.

It's easy to snark, and the system gives us a lot of cause, but, given what we've seen in the last 4 presidential cycles, you can't say that the process isn't responisve to the electorate. Within the parameters of reason, the US system broadly reflects the public's will from election to election. The fortunes of parties and of individual polititians are too variable to be otherwise. We don't swing from Randian (Ayn, not the senator) anarchocapitalism to North Korean Juche Ideal, but that doesn't mean there are no differences between a government headed by Pelosi/Reid/Obama and one headed by McConnell/Boehner/Obama, etc.

Now if you are sitting on either the fringe of political spectrum, the system will seem unresponsive and unfair. But that is a defect caused by the perspective of the fringe commenter. When you're policy prescriptions are rejected by nearly everybody, you are going to be a marginalized party. If you insist on making The Perfect the enemy of the Possible then you will never be happy.

Just because we haven't literally eaten the rich yet does not mean we are living in dystopian neo-feudal keptocracy. I hope.

[htpcl.livejournal.com]

Let's face it, yours is an oligarchy. The apparent two-party system only serves as a facade for this. If political stability is your top priority, and representation is the price you're prepared to pay for it, fine. Just don't pretend to be a representative democracy.

> Just because we haven't literally eaten the rich yet does not mean we are living in dystopian neo-feudal keptocracy

The thing with false dichotomies is that they're useless.

[telemann.livejournal.com]

I asked a colleague for his insights; he was born and raised in Scotland, went to St. Andrews, he's pretty aware and informed politically, (for what it's worth, he voted against the independence for Scotland referendum)

‘I far prefer the idea of proportional representation. In Scottish elections we get two votes: one for the individuals name on the ballot sheet and another for the party. The individuals are all elected, and "top up" seats are allocated according to the total votes cast per party in smaller countries it ensures (or promotes the idea) that it’s good for politicians to work together for the good of the country. We have too much bitching and blame game-stuff between the major parties.

Cameron has done nothing for the last two years but blame Labour for the state of the economy, which was actually caused by the financial crash, way out of the control of any government; in fact, the Institute for Fiscal Studies (our economic Big Brother) says the last labour government did a better job of lowering the deficit than Cameron and Co have done since they took power through the swaithing cuts of austerity.’

About your reading of how this could possibly play out, he said:

‘There is that on one side, and UKIP eating into the Tory vote on the other, they want us to ban immigration (overstating it a little, but essentially that's the key), instant withdrawal from the EU, and many other things that make them as unpalatable as the SNP & Labour jumping into bed, either way, it's a rough ride.

Cameron has promised a referendum on EU membership. Nicola Sturgeon wants ANY alliance that will prevent Cameron returning to power, but if she gets the swing she's predicted and the SNP win the majority of Scottish seats - which actually I can see happening - then there will inevitably be another referendum on Scottish independence eventually. I found myself voting for them today, for one simple reason - there were seven candidates on the sheet, and only the SNP guy and the Conservative candidate actually live in this part of the world. How DARE the other parties have someone stand to represent me who doesn't even live here! I have not had a single person come to the door canvassing for my support. Nothing. As long as I draw breath I will never vote conservative.’

[policraticus.livejournal.com]

Interesting.

Too much bitching between the parties? Voting for SNP, despite the fact he opposes their program, because he despises the Tories even more? A rough ride no matter who wins? Sounds like your average GOP or Democratic voter in the US.

Politics is rarely a clean choice between good and bad, it is usually a flight from the horrible to the merely awful.

[telemann.livejournal.com]

Perhaps.

[htpcl.livejournal.com]

DQ. The last line, I mean.

[adjectivegail]

It's actually not all that unusual to have candidates for elections over here who don't live in the constituencies they're standing in. Particularly for the smaller parties, but even in the larger ones an up-and-coming candidate might be given a crap shoot consituency to stand for, basically to give them experience and see how they handle it. If they do well then later on they'll get the opportunity to stand for a more sensible seat.

I mean, it's not the norm, but it's certainly not unusual.

[johnny9fingers.livejournal.com]

Indeed.
And the minute someone lands an opportunity for a contestable seat, they start making plans for moving into the constituency. After all, Clegg's association with Sheffield started with politics. He was a Home Counties lad originally.

[telemann.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I'm sure he's aware of that, as I stated he's a native to Scotland, etc.

[adjectivegail]

Yeah. No. All the opinion polls were wrong. Way wrong.

[ddstory.livejournal.com]

Yes, that's an interesting outcome that could reshape the UK's global role for years: their relationships with the EU, NATO and the US could all be affected.

Plus, a strong result by the SNP could fuel a renewed push for Scottish independence.

Let's see how the Tories will be able to tackle the huge deficit, now that they'll be forming a government alone.

This also calls into question about the credibility of all those pollsters and analysts.

[adjectivegail]

I'm pretty sure we'll be seeing another vote about Scottish independence pretty soon. Not to mention leadership campaigns for... gosh, most of the parties? Cameron said he'd stand down so Tories need a new leader. Milliband is rumoured to be resigning as we speak. Farage said he'd quit if he lost, which he now has.

Re the Tories' tackling the huge defecit, I read this the other day and am still trying to fact check his data interpretations, but certainly it didn't inspire confidence lol
http://benjaminstudebaker.com/2015/05/02/britain-for-the-love-of-god-please-stop-david-cameron/

[ddstory.livejournal.com]

Will Cameron really step down? He has won a great victory for the Tories now.

[johnny9fingers.livejournal.com]

This has been bizarre. Though the Beeb's exit polls were pretty damn accurate.

Goodbye welfare. Goodbye NHS. Goodbye Scotland...and maybe even goodbye EU.

Goodbye to all that.

Now Little Englanders all over will be able to draw their belts tighter and express themselves properly and completely by mowing the lawn on Sunday afternoons, secure in the knowledge that they will be made safe from fortress Europe, and the hordes of hard-working Poles and Romanians coming over here to take our jobs. Our zero-hour contract minimum wage jobs, obvs: because those appear to be all we have.

But at least we won't have Ed Miliband as Prime Minister. So the Mail is happy. And our leaders know that they can keep comparing our country's economy to that of a household, safe in the electorate's ignorance of basic macro-economics.

Why should I care enough for sarcasm? I suppose I'm all right no matter what, being part of the top 1%. England has gotten what it deserves - the dish it ordered from the menu: now to see how digestible that dish is. As for me, I can already taste my own vomit.

[airiefairie.livejournal.com]

Will Scotland really go? They did have a referendum recently...

[adjectivegail]

The referendum was a lot closer than had been expected - it heated up towards the end of the campaigning. And such widespread votes for the SNP is a pretty big indicator of the mood of things. I think it didn't help that when the referendum result came back with a 'no', practically the first thing Cameron said was "okay, so we promised you lots of stuff in order to persuade you to vote no, but this has been really traumatic for us poor people here in England, so in order to be fair we've now got to focus on English issues and exclude Scotland from the conversation because you don't live here."

I paraphrase for effect, but you get the drift. Let's just say it didn't really convince people in Scotland that they'd made the right choice.

[johnny9fingers.livejournal.com]

I'd give it one more election, then...

The Scots don't want to be ruled by English Tories any more than the Insular English Tories want to be ruled by the Scots. England and Scotland appear to have polarised pretty comprehensively: what do you think the odds of the Union remaining intact are in these circumstances? I think they are poor, but I'd love to be wrong.

[htpcl.livejournal.com]

Sounds a bit apocalyptical. Something tells me you guys will be allright - even despite Cameron.

[johnny9fingers.livejournal.com]

Of course we'll survive: we'll just turn more like the US.

More poverty, more infant mortality, less social cohesion. More unrest.

Of course the best way to help society cope with this is to have your underclass opiated out of the heads most of the time. Religion and culture will do instead of drugs, as Marx said, but IMHO some sort of social self-medication will need to be universal, sooner or later, when two hundred people own the whole world.

As an aside, all this cutting back on education is pretty good for some sorts of political parties.

[mahnmut.livejournal.com]

Now Little Englanders all over will be able to draw their belts tighter and express themselves properly and completely by mowing the lawn on Sunday afternoons, secure in the knowledge that they will be made safe from fortress Europe, and the hordes of hard-working Poles and Romanians coming over here to take our jobs

I doubt anyone would dare touch the existing system where cheap labor is imported from those countries to clean the streets, pick up the crops from the fields, and do the laundry of coddled delicate Engurlanders who don't feel like dirtying their soft hands. If there are no more East Europeans coming in, I don't see who'd be doing all those jobs.

[johnny9fingers.livejournal.com]

If there are no more East Europeans coming in, I don't see who'd be doing all those jobs.

Well, when the disabled get thrown off benefits, I can employ my schizophrenic ex-schoolchum as a child minder, I suppose. Or let him wander the streets muttering to himself. I guess folk in wheelchairs won't make very good fruit pickers...There may however be new opportunities for disabled prostitutes, who knows? The world is new made, and the benison of market forces will soon make us joyful and happy. "Oh frabjous day..." as the great philosopher wrote.