Pensioners show us how it's done.

From The Express:

OLDER voters are considering withholding support from the Tories if Chancellor Rishi Sunak ditches the Government's pledge to hike the state pension in line with average earnings, a survey warns today...

In a series of interviews last month, Mr Sunak refused to say whether the Triple Lock guarantee would be honoured this year.

“The Triple Lock is the government’s policy but I very much recognise people’s concerns,” he said in response to concerns about the potential cost. I think they are completely legitimate and fair concerns to raise. We want to make sure the decisions we make and the systems we have are fair, both for pensioners and for taxpayers,” the Chancellor added.

Whatever the rights and wrongs of an issue, the lesson is that if you want something, you just have to vote for it ('green' measures, Brexit, high pensions etc). Voter turnout among pensioners is very high, with corresponding results, so all parties have to be at least as 'generous' as the others.

And if you want the government to collect taxes from land values instead of from wages and ouput, just vote for it. If you're in Scotland, vote for the Scottish Greens; if you're in Yorkshire, vote for the Yorkshire Party and everywhere else, you have to get on the ballot paper for Young People's Party (we are still waiting to hear from El Comm on the name change).

The NIMBYs must be celebrating.

From the BBC:

The government has been sent a "warning shot" by voters over planning reforms for England and the HS2 rail link, the co-chairman of the Tories has said. Writing in the Daily Telegraph, Amanda Milling said voters' concerns were "loud and clear" after the Lib Dems won the Chesham and Amersham by-election...

Local opposition to the HS2 high-speed rail line being built through the constituency and the government's proposed changes to the planning system, which could see more homes being built in rural areas, were major factors in the poll.

Seems that Home-Owner-Ism is reasserting itself at the dominant ideology in the UK. Who cares about jobs, pollution, equality, balance of trade and all that peripheral stuff?

This also goes to show, that if you want something to happen, the best tactic is to vote for a single-issue party and nudge the government in your direction. The Lib Dems perform well at by-elections because they will jump on any old local bandwagon or champion whatever single issue bothers local voters. They aren't bogged down with anything like coherent, national issues or having to worry about what they'd do if they were actually in charge.
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As a contrast to this, it looks like the Tories are going to win the by-election in the former Labour constituency, Batley and Spen:

Johnson went to Batley to campaign with Ryan Stephenson, Tory candidate in the Batley and Spen by-election... Mr Johnson said: "That means looking at all the issues that matter, whether that's people's education, improving skills in this area, working with Kirklees to improve skills, putting more money into apprenticeships.

"Opportunity isn't equally distributed and the objective of levelling up is to work with great people in West Yorkshire, in Batley, to give young people growing up in the area the chances they deserve."

Of course, the Tories have no intention of doing anything of the sort - can anybody point to any single 'levelling up' measure they have implemented since December 2019? - but the propaganda seems to be working for now. And if they win, they won't need to worry about voters trying to nudge the government in any particular direction, they can just cheerfully ignore them and continue plundering the taxpayer.

They would say that, wouldn't they?

Item 1, from Business Insider:

WeWork's CEO said your desire to go to an office depends on how "engaged" you are at work.

Sandeep Mathrani, who stepped in as CEO of the coworking startup last year, said that people most comfortable working from home are the "least engaged" with their company, while the "overly engaged" want to go to the office.

Is he seriously trying to guilt trip people into paying rent?

Item 2, from the BBC:

Queen's Speech 2021: Key points at-a-glance

A Dissolution and Calling of Parliament Bill will get rid of the fixed five-year period between general elections and return the power to call early elections to the prime minister.

Wow. This law came in under the Tory-Lib Dem coalition in 2011. David Cameron stuck to it, and called a General Election after his five years were up (which he won convincingly). Then his successors called snap elections in 2017 and in 2019 and made a mockery of the whole thing. It must be one of the least observed laws in living memory.

Plans to force voters in Great Britain to to prove their identity when they vote at general elections will be introduced in an Electoral Integrity Bill

A Judicial Review Bill will set out the government's plans to change how its decisions can be challenged in the courts

I do not like either of these at all, but that's Tories for you (and I'm not saying that Labour haven't been just as authoritarian).

Reader's Letters Of The Day

All from today's Metro:

As the LIberal Democrats are now the Remain party, I'm expecting 48% of voters to back them - unless, of course, they feel British party politics is more important than remaining in the EU.

Richie, London.
---------
In reply to Julian Self (MetroTalk, Thu), Boris Johnson never pledged £350 million to the NHS, he stated it 'could' be used by the NHS - a bit of a difference.

John Nightingale, London.
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I'm looking forward to six weeks of Conservative MPs answering questions by criticising Jeremy Corbyn.

Where Art Thou, London.
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To Tom, the short, fat, badly dressed guy on the Hertford North line who says he is despondent about never being the subject of a Rush-Hour Crush (MetroTalk, Thu). Your bags are in the front garden.

Tom's Wife, Enfield.

By-election fun

From the BBC:

The Liberal Democrats have won the Brecon and Radnorshire by-election, leaving new PM Boris Johnson with a working majority in Parliament of one...

Now, with the thinnest majority, he will have to rely heavily on the support of his own MPs and his confidence-and-supply partners the DUP to get any legislation passed in key votes.

His majority is thinner than that!

The Parliament.gov.uk website has been updated and shows a majority of precisely zero.

650 MPs. minus Speaker (who doesn't vote) and minus seven Sinn Fein MPs, who refuse to attend = 642, divided by 2 = 321.

There are now 311 Conservative MPs plus 10 DUP MPs, who are in a sort-of-coalition with the Conservatives, total 321.
------------------------------------------------------------------
UPDATE: Bayard reminds us that there are also two opposition deputy speakers and a Conservative deputy speaker, who don't cast a vote, which would bring the Conservative + DUP majority back up to one.
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Also, apart from the Lib Dems slavish Remainism and Climate Alarmism, I still have a bit of a soft spot for them and would like to say, well done for finally electing a woman as party leader!

Of the main political parties, this leaves only Labour which does not and/or never had a woman as leader. Yup, even UKIP briefly had a woman as leader and Brexit Party is relatively new (and might disappear again soon).

The European Election results - you can spin them any way you like...

From the BBC:



Leavers: Brexit Party got far and away the most votes and seats, so we won.

Remainers: Ah, but if you add the votes of the hard remain parties (Lib Dems, Greens, SNP, Plaid Cymru and Change UK), we won.

[Let's skip the debate about whether votes for the Conservatives or Labour are proxy votes for Leave and Remain respectively, Lord Ashcroft's polls say that the number one reason that people voted for those parties was 'Because I always do.'

Leavers: Ah, but lots of people would have voted Lib Dem, Green etc anyway, regardless of their EU policies.

Remainers: So let's look at the swing. Total Hard Leave (Brexit Party/UKIP) only up 7.4% compared to the 2014 elections, and the total vote share of Hard Remain parties (list as above) up by 22.4%. The net shift from Conservative/Labour to Hard Leave was 7.4% and from those two to Hard Remain was 22.4%. [Yes, those shifts add up to 29.8% and BBC give combined losses for Lab/Con as 26.1%, not sure where the other 3.7% came from]. That's a significant swing to Hard Remain.

Leavers: Hang on, weren't you moaning after the Referendum that with a 52%/48% result on a 72% turnout, strictly speaking only 37% voted to Leave and 63% didn't. This this time Hard Remain got 40% on a laughably low turnout of 37%, that means only 15% voted to Remain, which is a lot less than 37%.

Remainers: So why are you lauding Brexit Party's votes; they got 32% of 37%, that's only 14$%, hardly a mandate for a No Deal Brexit. Of 17.4 million people who voted Leave back in 2016, only 5.2 million voted Brexit Party, clearly 12 million of them have lost interest.

[And so on, ad infinitum].

Fun with numbers - splitting the Remain vote at the MEP elections

The MEP elections in Great Britain, to be next held on 23 May 2019, use the d'Hondt system for allocating seats in each of eleven constituencies/regions.

Whether the Remain parties (Lib Dem, Green and Change UK) have shot themselves in the foot (feet?) by competing over the same small pool of voters is an interesting question.

Let's treat this as an unofficial In-Out Referendum and assume votes cast are in line with current opinion polls and are the same in each constituency, as follows:

Leave
Brexit Party - 31%
UKIP - 4%

Remain
Lib Dem - 10%
Green Party - 10%
Change UK - 10%

Undecided - neutral - ambivalent
Labour - 22%
Tories - 13%

The more seats there are in a constituency, the closer the result is to proportional representation; the fewer seats, the closer the results are to FPTP.

If you crunch the numbers (or use Paul Lockett's fine calculator) for the largest constituency with ten seats (South East), the end result is the same whether the Remain parties had put up a single list or not - Leave 4 seats, Remain 3 seats and Undecided 3 seats.

The difference is that with a single list and 30% of the vote, Remain would win seats 2, 5 and 9; with three competing Remain parties, they will win seats 7, 8 and 9. So they will do relatively worse in smaller constituencies and relatively worse overall.

The reverse is true for Leave, only not as markedly. If Remain had put up a single list, Leave would win seats 1, 4, 8 and 10 of a ten-seat constituency. With the Remain vote split, they will win seats 1, 3, 5 and 10.
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To sum up, for various sizes of constituency with a split Remain vote, seats will be as follows:

3 seats = Leave 2, Undecided 1
4 seats = leave 2, Undecided 2
5 seats = Leave 3, Undecided 2
6 seats = Leave 3, Undecided 3
7 seats = Leave 3, Undecided 3, Remain 1
8 seats = Leave 3, Undecided 3, Remain 2
9 sweats = Leave 3, Undecided 3, Remain 3
10 seats = Leave 4, Undecided 3, Remain 3

As only five constituencies have seven or more seats, Remain have definitely messed up badly. With a single list Remain vote, seats would be as follows:

3 seats = Leave 1, Undecided 1, Remain 1
4 seats = leave 2, Undecided 1, Remain 1
5 seats = Leave 2, Undecided 1, Remain 2
6 seats = Leave 2, Undecided 2, Remain 2
7 seats = Leave 2, Undecided 3, Remain 2
8 seats = Leave 3, Undecided 3, Remain 2
9 sweats = Leave 3, Undecided 3, Remain 3
10 seats = Leave 4, Undecided 3, Remain 3

Just sayin'...

More Brexit LOLZ

From The Electoral Commission website:

European Parliamentary elections (Great Britain)

We have published our guidance for the European Parliamentary elections scheduled to take place on 23 May 2019.

The elections will take place in other EU Member States between Thursday 23 and Sunday 26 May 2019.

This page contains our guidance and resources on how to comply with the rules in Great Britain.

An overview document gives instructions on how to use this guidance and who does what at these elections. Read the Overview (PDF)

We have produced a timetable with all of the relevant deadlines. View the election timetable (DOC).

If you are a candidate or agent in Northern Ireland please see Guidance for candidates and agents at European Parliamentary elections in Northern Ireland.

This whole Windrush generation fiasco - questions

Background here.

So some people grew up and lived here all their lives on the reasonable assumption that they were British citizens (for most things, being permanently resident here is good enough), even though technically they weren't.

What strikes me, is that only UK and Commonwealth citizens are entitled to vote at most elections (different for EU Parliament elections, which we won't need to worry about any more).

So, with the benefit of hindsight, either all their votes were invalid; they were de facto accepted as British citizens (in which case the matter is settled); or there is some leap of bureaucratic logic that says they were notionally citizens of their [parents'] country of origin (most likely a Commonwealth country), despite that country probably having no record of them?

I also wonder why this wasn't noticed decades ago, at the latest when they were old enough to need their own (British) passport to go abroad on holiday, which surely plenty of them must have done.

Hmm.

Round-up of the week

I was very busy at work this week; Mrs W was abroad on holiday all week so I was on single-parent duty (which is not that difficult once your kids are school-age) and the weather was nice so sitting in the garden was always the obvious thing to do.

But lots of things caught my eye:

1. From The Sun:

YOUNG families are being milked by councils who are now charging to take away nappies as part of their household rubbish.

The charges – for either big bins or special plastic bags – have been slammed as being unfair on families and could cause fly-tipping.

It is complete nonsense.
- The cost of emptying household bins (and those of most businesses) is surprisingly small, average £100 to £200 per year per household/business.
- If they are going to charge extra for nappies, why not charge extra for everything that people throw away?
- If they are going to levy specific amounts for what people put in the bin, the most efficient way of doing it would be to levy the charge when they buy it new. I covered all that years ago. That largely solves the fly tipping and enforcement issues.

If you want to simplify it and put a number on it, a flat tax of 1% of the value of all the products which households and businesses buy would cover the cost of refuse collection. Seeing as VAT is already 20% on most things, people buying e.g. disposable nappies have already paid for the cost twenty times over.

2. My view is that each election is actually a referendum in which everybody can choose their own question.

So while the Greens and UKIP have had little electoral success (apart from in meaningless EU Parliament elections), they did manage to shift the terms of debate in their favour and the two big parties adjusted their policies accordingly.

That being so, the Tories messed up the election because Labour nearly outflanked them with their two main vote grabbing proposals - "an end to austerity" and "reducing tuition fees". Lots of people voted for the former and they got an extra few million younger people who'd like to see the end of tuition fees.

Hey presto:

From The Guardian:

One of the key architects of David Cameron’s austerity programme has suggested the government must consider tax rises and increased spending on public services to respond to overwhelming pressure on social care, schools and the NHS.

From the BBC:

The Conservatives must "change hard" to win over young voters who backed Labour in June's general election, Theresa May's most senior minister has warned.

Damian Green told Tories to modernise after losing their majority in the general election and trailing behind Labour by 30% among voters aged 18-35... Speaking at the Bright Blue liberal conservative think-tank's conference in central London, Mr Green said a new "city Conservativism" would woo young, metropolitan voters... Mr Green also suggested there was a "national debate that we need to have" about university tuition fees.

This is all tokenism of course, there is no sincerity on either side, but it confirms my suspicion that there is no need for - or any real prospect of - any YPP candidate with Georgist policies to be - or being - elected. As soon as we are getting a few per cent of the vote, the big two parties will modify their policies accordingly to try and put us out of business.

(The most successful UK movement of recent years doesn't even bother having their own party - it's the old age pensioners. They push out simplistic and inherently contradictory slogans i.e. "We have worked hard and paid taxes and saved hard all our lives". The "worked hard and paid taxes" justifies higher old age pensions, plus all the extra NHS spending. The "paid taxes and saved hard" bit is the argument against taxing land values i.e. clawing back inflated house prices. Hang about here - if they really have saved so hard, how come they need hand outs and subsidies? A century of deficit spending suggests they weren't paying enough taxes, doesn't it? But they get what they want because they bother to go out and vote, that's it, one tick every few years, job done, don't bother with silly protest marches, get on with more important things - a winning strategy.)

3. EU v Google.

Disclaimer - I am big fan of Google: their search engine, gmail, Blogger, Google maps, Google translate, Chrome are all free to use, work very well and make the world a better place. I am no fan of the EU for various reasons. But every now and then the EU get it right.

As I said last year, we all now that these supra-national corporations take the piss on corporation tax, which is not actually that important, because they get stung for VAT, PAYE and Business Rates which are more difficult to evade. National governments know this but find it difficult to draw up and enforce rules which would make them pay "the right amount" of corporation tax in any country.

So the EU doesn't bother with all that, it just invents some trumped up anti-competitive practices and fines them a few billion every few years.

From The Telegraph:

The European Union has fined Google €2.42bn (£2.14bn) after a seven-year investigation into claims the technology giant abused its internet search monopoly.

The penalty is the biggest ever competition fine from the European Commission, doubling the previous record handed to Intel in 2009. The EU said Google had broken EU competition law by exploiting the power of its search engine to promote its online shopping service, at the expense of other price comparison sites.

Which doesn't make sense on their terms - it's Google's search engine and they can use it to advertise what they like, surely? You wouldn't expect the Tesco website to carry advertising for competitors.

The real point, which the EU seem to have missed is not just that Google have a competitive advantage that amounts to a monopoly, it is that what they are charging their advertisers is rent. As with land rent, the value arises from agglomeration benefits (same as Air BNB or Uber), consumers use it because so many sellers use it and vice versa. It is surely more efficient for everybody to use the same marketplace for buying and selling, that's fine, what is not so fine is for a third party, to siphon off part of the producer and consumer surplus.

4. On the topic of Google, Microsoft etc, Benjamin' emailed me a link to a splendid lecture by a succesful Silicon Valley insider/investor called "Competition is for losers".

It's fifty minutes long but I watched it all the way through. I gritted my teeth at the appalling typo at 25 minutes 14 seconds; applauded at 31 minutes when he points out that the main beneficiares of the British Industrial Revolution were landowners ("The workers didn't make that much, the capitalists didn't make that much either"). The most telling bit is where he cheerfully admits that competition and free markets are good for society as a whole, but promptly dismisses it as a way for an individual businessman to make money (I didn't make a note of when he says it).



5. Right, I'm off back into the garden, shame to waste the sunshine.

YPP's three candidates in the 2017 General Election

Now confirmed:

Thomas Hall - Epping Forest (west Essex).

Ben Weenen - Cities of London & Westminster.

Jon Collings - City of Durham.

If you live in or near any of those places and have time, energy and/or money to contribute, please get in touch.

"Electoral fraud: Voters will have to show ID in pilot scheme"

From the BBC:

Voters will have to show proof of identity in a government pilot scheme to reduce electoral fraud.

Some councils in England, including Birmingham and Bradford, will trial the scheme at local elections in 2018. Constitution minister Chris Skidmore said the pilot would "ensure the integrity of our electoral system".

Fair enough, but actual fraudulent voting at the ballot box is negligible, it would require real nerves and you'd have to gamble on the person whose vote you are stealing not having already voted.

The real big frauds all relate to postal voting, they ought to tighten up on that and they've fixed 90% of fraudulent voting…

There will also be reforms to improve the security of the postal ballot system, such as requiring postal voters to re-apply every three years.

In other words, they are not taking this seriously at all. I suppose there are two kinds of postal voter, the disabled and people who happen to be going away at the time of the election. Seeing as ballot cards are sent out a couple of weeks before an election, couldn't we just ask those people to use their ballot cards in advance, the disabled can drop them off at their GP or something else convenient for them and those who are going to travel can vote early at the nearest town hall?

Fun With Numbers

US election, share of popular vote:

Hillary Clinton, Democratic Party, 48%, 59,814,018 votes

Donald Trump, Republican Party, 47%, 59,611,678 votes

Gary Johnson, Libertarian Party, 3%, 4,058,500 votes

Jill Stein, Green Party, 1%, 1,213,103 votes

This is how George W Bush was elected in 2000, as it happens.

And well done, Gary Johnson, I would have voted for you*, and failing that I'd have voted Jill Stein just for the heck of it.

* Obvs, he's a Faux Libertarian not a proper libertarian, as the American Libertarian Party thinks that VAT is better than income tax and income tax is better than LVT i.e. they have it completely arse-backwards, but hey.

A Goldsmith fashions his own demise

Well, he said he would if Heathrow went ahead, and he has gone and done it. I hope you don't mind if I sit back and enjoy it from my seat in the grim, North. I would have voted for expansion for Blackpool or John Lennon myself. Plenty of capacity and anything is better than the planned fracking.

The one fact we can assume from the situation though, is that Tory HQ in London has had plenty of time to consider what to do if Prime Minister May chose tarmac over the sexy, old Etonian.

Many of you here, no doubt, had already guessed they would shoot Zac's fox by not standing against him. Just a little disagreement amongst the sixth form boarders, nothing to get the whole school worried, don't you know. United front. With, 'Neat solution old chap' echoing down the quad.

But what a chance for the Labour Party, up the ante, and also not stand a candidate? Interesting. Take some faux, outraged, moral high ground and bring it straight back to pure 'Blue on Blue' fire. (Always assuming the electorally challenged, Lib Dems, play with a straight bat). Now, even a very average cavalry commander, in battle, seeing utter disorder in the enemy ranks would simply turn his horses around and charge straight through the gap.

But Labour's top brass in Parliament, is cursed by senior commanders who have long records of persistent, misjudged, half-hearted, confused failure when fantastic opportunties present themselves.

So take the wisdom of  serial offender, Staff Officer, Tom Watson here:
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/oct/26/labour-frontbenchers-urge-party-not-to-contest-richmond-park-byelection

In short, faced with heaping pain on the enemy, all Watson can contribute is the lazy idea, that Labour is a 'national party' and focus on the old internal issue of always fielding a candidate no matter what.

So the question is, how many here agree or disagree with Jabber the Hut above: Labour is still a 'National Party' and we can show this ideal in any way we like, except by winning a general election?

Fun Online Polls: Our next PM & The Chilcot Report

The results to last week's Fun Online Poll were as follows:

Please indicate the ones you would definitely NOT like to see as Prime Minister.

Leadsom, Andrea 42 votes
Gove, Michael 61 votes
Fox, Liam 82 votes
Crabb, Stephen 94 votes
Smith, Owen 103 votes
May, Theresa 107 votes
Corbyn, Jeremy 116 votes
Eagle, Angela 122 votes

Total 166 voters

Just goes to show that 'exaggerating' on your CV doesn't do you any harm. And being the most rabid Home-Owner-ist of the lot counts as a plus.
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Chilcot: The Daily Mash and Newsthump responded with satire, Nick Drew responded in rhyme.

So that's this week's Fun Online Poll:

"Which of the following revelations in the Chilcot report were NOT blindingly obvious back in 2002 or 2003?"

Vote here or use the widget in the sidebar.

Vote early, vote often, vote Leave!

This'll be our last chance for another forty years to give them all a good kick up the arse.

It is highly unlikely that we would actually leave the EU, even in the event of a largish majority for Brexit, that's not the point, is it?

The point is to shake them up a bit/a lot and give our pol's a stronger hand when they go back to Brussels to do some serious re-negotiation of how the EU is supposed to work, not just on behalf of the UK but on behalf of all those countries who are getting a far worse deal than we are, maybe they'd have the nerve to speak up this time.

Beyond satire.

Exhibit One:

Tony Blair has said it would be a “very dangerous experiment” if Jeremy Corbyn or a populist politician like him were to form a government.

In an interview with the BBC, the former Labour prime minister said populist politicians, whether on the left like Corbyn or on the right, were worrying and he spent a lot of time thinking about how people in the centre should respond.

Blair famously said last summer that anyone thinking of voting for Corbyn as Labour leader because it was what their heart told them to do should “get a transplant”, but his latest comment may be his harshest yet.

Exhibit Two

An unfortunate mobile phone salesman was tied up and beaten by an angry crowd in Cixi City, China, after he was mistaken for a baby snatcher.

Exhibit Three

Channel 4 comedy Raised By Wolves is being adapted for American TV by Diablo Cody, the writer of Juno...

Now The Guardian has reported that Moran and Cody have been in contact about reworking the action from Wolverhampton to the US…

The remake is being made by Berlanti Productions, whose credits include the less down-to-earth shows Supergirl and Legends of Tomorrow.

Exhibit Four

Lack of unity on the EU, UK government challenges and UKIP all contributed to the Welsh Conservatives losing seats at the assembly elections, leader Andrew RT Davies has said.

But...

Ruth Davidson, the Scottish Tory leader, has declared herself a “John Major”-style Conservative, after leading the party to its best election result in Scotland for almost 60 years.

I saw another good one last week but I've forgotten it.

Vote for me!

If you live in Buckhurst Hill West ward, you can vote for me in the locals. I did.
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From City AM (print edition):

"Polish prince" John Zylinski is an outsider with odds of 100/1 to win today's [London Mayor] election, but he's already planning to run in 2020 and tells us he's forming his own political party.

The property developer is critical of Sadiq Khan's proposed rent controls, but last night he let slip he has an ulterior motive for going into politics.

"It's every developer's dream to become mayor. You can grant your own planning permission."

Too honest for his own good, the rent seeking twat.

Ha ha, serves them right!

From Open Democracy:

The Government’s rush to implement Individual Electoral Registration (IER) – against expert advice to phase-in the policy over a longer period – has knocked more than 800,000 people off the electoral register over the last year. The House of Commons Library warns: “Local authorities with high concentration of students appear to have been more affected by IER as their registers decreased more significantly than the average.”

Fewer young, poor and left orientated voters on the electoral register is likely to help the Conservatives in local and national elections on May 5, as well as skewing the soon-to-be redrawn boundaries of parliamentary constituencies to their advantage.

In the context of the European referendum though, that is a substantial number of likely Remain votes lost. The changes to electoral registration also puts Remain at a geographic disadvantage. Five of the ten top Europhile locations in Britain are London boroughs, according to YouGov.

But London has lost the highest number of voters, with 394,000 falling of the register since the 2012 Mayoral election. In Hackney alone, which was the eighth most pro-EU place in of Britain, there has been a 6 per cent slump in voter registration. A double victory for Conservative Mayoral candidate and Brexiteer, Zac Goldsmith, but more bad news for Remain.

Story emailed in by MBK.

Fun Online Polls: Shaving & The US presidential race

The results to last week's poll were as follows:

The power of advertising: do you use a dry-electic shaver or disposables?

Dry/electric - 23%
Disposables - 28%
Both - 20%
Neither - 29%

One 'other' was cut-throat razor, fair enough. Roy said safety razor with replaceable blades, which I would count as disposables.

I asked the question because I was puzzled by the vast amount of advertising for disposable relative to advertising for dry/electric. It would appear that they know what they are doing, as more people use the former than the latter, so there's more to play for and people replace them more often.

Thanks to all 102 of you who took part and helped clear that up for me.
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This whole US presidential election thingy is dragging on and on, it won't be over until November, at a cost of billions of dollars

So let's see if we can predict it for them for a minimum of hassle. This week we will choose a candidate from each party and next week we'll have the final round.

List of candidates from a recent The New York Times, don't blame me for inaccuracies and omissions.

Vote here or use the widget in the sidebar.