Posted on 05/08/2010 11:55:26 AM PDT by Chet 99
General Election 2010: David Cameron has had this coming to him
Dave Cameron abandoned conservatism five years ago because he believed it would get his party elected. It didn't.
By Simon Heffer
Published: 4:53PM BST 07 May 2010
Dave had to fight a widely despised Prime Minister leading a Government incompetent and destructive on a scale unseen in living memory. Seldom has there been a softer target; but seldom has one been missed so unnecessarily. With just 36 per cent of the vote, the Tories stood almost still since 2005. They are now on their knees to their other enemy, the Lib Dems.
-snip-
It should not have come to this. As I rang round Tory MPs some were incandescent at the conduct not just of the campaign, but of the whole anti-core vote strategy that has alienated many natural Tory voters. George Osborne, both as campaign co-ordinator and also as an inept shadow chancellor, was quickly selected as the scapegoat. But let us not forget that the roots of this problem go back to 2005. The party has chosen to mimic and validate the policies of its opponents, with the result that the public found little to choose between the main parties. This was exemplified in the television debates, in which the leaders fell over themselves to agree not only with any contention put to them by the public, but even with each other.
And not only was there no real choice, with many people feeling disfranchised, or driven to vote for fringe parties; there was no attempt in the campaign to address in depth the issues that really matter to so many of our people.
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
It shouldn’t be that confusing...small ‘c’ conservative traditionalism is about keeping things the way they are/have been. Since the end of WWII, the UK has been a Socialist country. Traditional voters in the UK may want to stay out of the EU, keep out immigrants, etc., but they still want their socialist nanny state handouts.
Disagree. Plenty of conservatives are against the Afghan War and thus defected to Clegg (who wasn't that much different than Cameron on domestic issues anyway).
That's a fair distinction. There are really two "Midwests" in the US; The industrialized Midwest, and the farm-belt. Detroit, Cleveland, Milwaukee are a LOT like the industrialized areas of Norther England and Scotland.
It couldn't have been too many. The LibDems lost five seats.
Good point....though didn’t they can in the total percentage of the vote? Could be wrong about that.
I believe I read on BBC website, that their % of the total vote was almost unchanged from last election - perhaps a 1/2-point increase, or thereabouts.
Labour is who really suffered, both in terms of seats lost, and percentage of total vote lost.
Not really. The Social Democrats were a splinter group from Labour, but on the right wing of that party; who decided to go it alone as Labour veered sharply leftwards towards European-style Marxism after its 1979 defeat by Thatcher. The SDP were concensus centrists who briefly seemed likely to be a major new force, but merged with the Liberals when their star rapidly waned.
Nay mate.That’d be this area (Lincolnshire).
Nay mate.That’d be this area (Lincolnshire).
It's not quite true that Cameron had no competition to his right. Perhaps they're akin to the Birchers Bill Buckley wisely purged from our right, but there is a party, which claims to be to Cameron's right and may have cost him seats, the UK Independence Party Although it didn't win any any in the House of Commons this time, the UKIP does have two seats in the House of Lords and, if Wiki is correct, some in the European Parliament. I've seen claims that had the 3.1% of the vote the UKIP drew this time gone to Cameron's party the Tories would have won the majority. With the proportional representation the UKIP want they'd have won 20 seats on their own. Of course with that the Tory's tally would have been 70 less seats, so you have to be careful for what you ask! I'm no expert on UKIP, other than knowing they've been accused of lots of things by the liberal press, but I'm not aware of them being accused of being leftists. So there is at least alleged rightist noise, if not seats, on Cameron's right.
BTW, with proportional voting Labour would also have 70 fewer seats, but LibDems would have had 92 more resulting in a Labour/LibDem majority coalition. I suspect they’re better off with the hung Parliament.
Unfortunately it’s not Reagan’s US anymore, either
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