LIVE THREAD: UK Election Results (Update - Early Exit Polls Show Tory Upset)

BBC ^ | May 5, 2005 | anonymous

[tellw]

The Vote is under way!

[GiveEmDubya]

BUMP

Sunderland South is going to try to be the first seat to declare for the last 4 elections in a row...they did it in 43 minutes last year.

Using that as a gage, the very first numbers could be in as early as 5:40-5:45 Eastern Time this afternoon. There likely will not be any suspense in that seat, as Labour holds down a 43.8% majority (13,667 votes). If there is a big swing, however, it could be very telling.

There will only be one seat not holding an election this time (Staffordshire South) as the Lib Dem candidate recently died. In any event, when they do vote there, the Conservatives should hold it (they have a majority of 6,881 from last time), so factor that one in with what's going on tonight.

[Jimmyclyde]

Such a handsome couple...

[Celtjew Libertarian]

And I should know better, considering how much British TV, folk music, and general culture I ingest. Not to mention having been brought up near enough to the Canadian border for the CBC to have been my fourth major network growing up.

Apologies.

[GiveEmDubya]

I've taken a look at some of the more marginal Labour seats, and it is entirely possible that a Lib Dem surge would allow the Conservatives to come up the middle in several races. With any luck, they can crack 200 seats tonight but we'll have to wait and see.

[Huck]

DENNIS: You're fooling yourself. We're living in a dictatorship.
A self-perpetuating autocracy in which the working classes--
WOMAN: Oh there you go, bringing class into it again.
DENNIS: That's what it's all about if only people would--
ARTHUR: Please, please good people. I am in haste. Who lives
in that castle?
WOMAN: No one live there.
ARTHUR: Then who is your lord?
WOMAN: We don't have a lord.
ARTHUR: What?
DENNIS: I told you. We're an anarcho-syndicalist commune. We
take it in turns to act as a sort of executive officer for the
week.
ARTHUR: Yes.
DENNIS: But all the decisions of that officer have to be ratified
at a special biweekly meeting.
ARTHUR: Yes, I see.
DENNIS: By a simple majority in the case of purely internal
affairs,--
ARTHUR: Be quiet!
DENNIS: --but by a two-thirds majority in the case of more--
ARTHUR: Be quiet! I order you to be quiet!
WOMAN: Order, eh -- who does he think he is?
ARTHUR: I am your king!
WOMAN: Well, I didn't vote for you.
ARTHUR: You don't vote for kings.
WOMAN: Well, 'ow did you become king then?
ARTHUR: The Lady of the Lake, [angels sing] her arm clad in the
purest shimmering samite, held aloft Excalibur from the bosom of
the water signifying by Divine Providence that I, Arthur, was to
carry Excalibur. [singing stops] That is why I am your king!
DENNIS: Listen -- strange women lying in ponds distributing
swords is no basis for a system of government. Supreme executive
power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some
farcical aquatic ceremony.
ARTHUR: Be quiet!
DENNIS: Well you can't expect to wield supreme executive power
just 'cause some watery tart threw a sword at you!
ARTHUR: Shut up!
DENNIS: I mean, if I went around sayin' I was an emperor just
because some moistened bint had lobbed a scimitar at me they'd
put me away!
ARTHUR: Shut up! Will you shut up!
DENNIS: Ah, now we see the violence inherent in the system.
ARTHUR: Shut up!
DENNIS: Oh! Come and see the violence inherent in the system!
HELP! HELP! I'm being repressed!
ARTHUR: Bloody peasant!
DENNIS: Oh, what a give away. Did you hear that, did you hear
that, eh? That's what I'm on about -- did you see him repressing
me, you saw it didn't you?

[gary_b_UK]

Short of winning the election, what would be good for the Tories is a hung parliament, or a Labour majority of 60 seats or less.

That is because if the majority gets down to that level, it makes Blair vulnerable in votes in the House of Commons to the Socialist Campaign Group of far-left MPs and other leftists in his parliamentary party. He would not be able to get his "radical" (by Labour standards) agenda through, and he would be paralyzed. That would set the stage for a Conservative win in 2009/2010, possibly even a landslide if things got really bad for Labour.

[TheBigB]

For as iron-willed as TB has been on Iraq, I would dearly love to see the Conservatives find an actual, honest-to-goodness fighter in the Thatcher mold. One who's blunt-spoken and honest.

[gopwinsin04]

Check out Heather Teather! From Wednesday Question time

[toadthesecond]

In all fairness she did give birth a few days back so she's probably not at her best.

[Jimmyclyde]

Wednesday question time is perhaps the best show on TV these days...

[liberty2004]

The Conservative daughter,Larissa, has intelligent eyes and a beautiful smile. The lib's wife probably has poor teeth :)

[Destro]

Go Tony Blair- as in go away!

[GiveEmDubya]

The polls seem to be suggesting another Labour landslide, not quite on the order of 1997 and 2001, but a fairly thumping Commons majority. I'm not completely sold yet as I don't think Labour has been able to hold all of their support base together this time around. My guess is for a modest swing to the Conservatives. HOWEVER, if we start seeing big swings pan out early in the night, something good will be brewing for certain.

And yes, Tony Blair has been a great ally to us on the War on Terror, but behind that, he's still rather socialist and pro-Europe. In addition, I hear he's more conservative than his own party. With any luck, the Tories will do well, grow a collective spine, and get back to their glory days.

[Ohioan]

All we Americans can do for our British friends is to pray that their neighbors recover the spirit and sense to turn against that political abomination, that is the British Labour Party. Conceived by Fabian Socialists, bent upon appropriating individual freedom by deception, the party has always been a force for undermining traditional values, across a very wide spectrum. While not so extreme as the Communists, its tactics have yielded incredible successes not achievable by the more obviously radical forces on the Left.

Unfortunately, today's muted "Conservatism," in Britain, will not inspire too many voters to really critically examine what the Labour Party is now, and always has been, all about. It is part of the tragic decline of a once truly great people.

William Flax Return Of The Gods Web Site

[massgopguy]

"HELP! HELP! I'm bein' repressed"

[gopwinsin04]

CSPAN runs it in the middle of the night so sometimes I'm a little foggy on the names...Sarah Teather?

[massgopguy]

The Chads are hanging out with the Jeremys. Hurrumph! Well I'm dating myself.

[areafiftyone]

((((((GROAN))))))

[conservativebabe]

Her head is very nearly twice the size of his.

[MadIvan]

I hope that it proves to be a message to the Tories - they are not going to win on opportunism alone. I am only enthusiastic about one politician who is standing at the moment:

Greg Hands, Conservative Candidate for Hammersmith & Fulham

If he wins tonight, there's a chance he could catapult to the leadership in fairly short order - I've met him, he's intelligent, articulate and is not afraid to take on the Socialists.

Regards, Ivan