2005 election

heh, great stuff.

Quote: Choodessny_Gromky_Koshka_

Damn it, I've failed you all! Michael Howard came to my town this morning and I didn't go out and 'greet' him
I had a chance to egg Kilroy a few weeks back too and didn't...

But it's ok, I saw it on the news and Tamworth people were doing a good job of asking Howard arkward questions and generally heckling.

i know! i missed the chance to egg kilroy a few weeks ago, shame. mind you, mate told him he sucked a*se, which was marginally funny.

i ask myself that question every thursday night when i go out and get w*nkered.

Right. Here's my Election Rant that I'm plastering everywhere on the internet...

So May 5th is nearly upon us. Election day. The nation decides. But are the choices really even worth deciding about? The whole thing seems like a waste of time, all the polling stations, all the campaigning.. Whatever happens, we're going to have a terrible government.

I'm going to take a few moments to talk about some of the parties this country has to offer. Starting with Labour. The Labour party, Tony Blair. Do people really want another four years of Blair being in power? He's already had eight, and what's he done with them? Kept things in the state that Thatcher and Major left the country in. And gone to war illegally. Why should we keep Blair in? So we can become another state of America? So we can go invading Iran for no good reason? It's not worth voting Labour, innocent people will lose their lives for no good reason at all, because we will end up going to war with Iran, and if it goes further than that, North Korea. And they won't be afraid to use their WMDs.

Next up, the Conservatives. Well, last time the Tories were in power, they really messed things up for Britain. Michael Howard is likely to continue where they left off. He looks like a vampire anyway, and one of his policies is to cull badgers. There's no good reason for it, he just doesn't like them, claims they cause problems for farmers. Someone from the Agricultural Society has already said that badgers shouldn't be scapegoats for all the farming problems, it simply isn't their fault. And Michael Howard wants to kill them. One vote for Tory will result in one badger dying. Anyone with any kind of care for nature and the environment just should not vote Tory, simply put.

So that brings us on to the Liberal Democrats. The real alternative. The problem here is that the Lib Dem supporters are mostly going to be voting Labour to keep the Tories out. If Lib Dem supporters actually voted Lib Dem, they might stand a chance of getting in. Of the main three parties, I would say Lib Dem are the best choice, but will Charles Kennedy make that good a leader of the country? I couldn't say. I think it's worth giving him a chance, though. Anything is better than Tory, or another four years of Blair.

The smaller parties are all classed as throwaway votes. Well, UKIP and BNP are both bigoted (and so are Tory to an extent), I personally don't want racists and/or fascists running the country. The Green Party seem to care about the environment slightly too much, I don't think the economy would be able to survive were the Greens in power. Of all the other parties - in fact, of all the parties in the election - Monster Raving Loony's policies make the most sense. If you have a Monster Raving Loony Party candidate in your area, vote for them, if not vote Lib Dem. But Monster Raving Loony have the best ideas, and it really is a shame there's not enough of them to get the majority of seats.

Remember, though, just because you may have supported Tory or Labour all your life, that doesn't mean you can't change now. In fact, if you support Labour or Tory (or UKIP or BNP (what are you thinking)) then you should change now. Monster Raving Loonies all the way.

But what do I care, I'm only 17. I don't get a say. I'm still forced to pay taxes, but can I decide who spends them? But that's a whole different rant..

So when you're voting tomorrow, just consider the options carefully. Please don't kill innocent people - or badgers, please don't let racists run the country... Please just be careful.

That'll do.

Quote: Plug_In_Baby_

This has been a party political broadcast on behalf of the Landa Party.

Finally! A party that I actually want to vote for!

Sign me up.

Yes. It's now I realise it's today. As in May 5th......so, happy voting day now. make use of your vote.

what does everyone have against vampires??? that aside, I'm still not voting for him.

yeah!!!!!!!!!! i'll be making my way to the village pavillion tomorrow, in my 'hah-get-my-bad-self-i-can-vote-this-time-suckers!' outfit. It's not that special, just consists of the usual t shirt, baggies and hoodie combo. YAY!!!!!!

remember...if you DON'T want the liberal democrats to win, then TICK all the other boxes and put a giant CROSS on their box. Ok? Everybody clear? Goodo.

Voter apathy sucks. Who am I voting for? I'm not saying. But I am voting. I've travelled 90 miles to do so. If you're eligable to vote, but aren't going to, then why the f*ck not?

I've made the efrfort, and so should everyone else.

I have indeed voted, and I voted for the Liberal Democrats as promised.

One last note - I wouldn't vote for the Tories anyway, but something happened recently that made me absolutely disgusted by the Tories in our area.

Firstly, an SNP leaflet came through the door, suggesting that if the council election vote shares of 2003 in the council wards that make up the constituency I'm in, Paisley & Renfrewshire North, were translated into the vote shares for this election, the SNP would win. As I live what is essentially a Labour fiefdom, I thought, "Aye, well, it's nice saying this but it's not going to happen." As you do.

The next day, out comes another Tory leaflet (I had already received one) saying that the SNP had misrepresented the Tory share of the vote in the various wards, and were lying when they said that it was a two-way race between the SNP and Labour.

"Well, maybe." I thought, not putting it past the SNP. Of course, then I noticed what the Tories claimed to be misrepresented by. According to them, the SNP had misrepresented their vote making it six times lower than what it should actually be. So I thought "Oh, they must have said 1% or 2% when Tory support's probably just over 10%." I checked the SNP leaflet. Tory share according to it was around 11% or 12%, although admittedly it was a little difficult to read exactly. For the SNP to misrepresent the Tory vote by six times, the Tories would have had to have had a vote share in all the wards making up what is now Paisley and Renfrewshire North of around 70%. To which, of course, I said "Aye, I'm f*cked if that's right." But, being a kind and generous soul (stop laughing), I was prepared to check this totally. First: council seats in Renfrewshire Council, of which Paisley & Renfrewshire North makes up half. Number of Conservatives: 1. You'd have thought if they'd got 70% in half of the area, they'd get a few more, wouldn't you? To be totally fair, I took all the ward results in the wards that make up Paisley & Renfrewshire North, and calculated the vote share. (Yes, I did have lots of time on my hands) The SNP, give or take a percentage point or two, were dead on in their original leaflet. The Tories were lying completely and totally. This infuriated me.

Not because it was a lie, you understand. We see enough of them in politics. But because it was so blatant. There is no statistic on this earth that could have been twisted to give the Tories that vote share here, and so it is quite obvious the Tories show a contempt for the intelligence for the ordinary voter here that is completely and totally reprehensible. It shows an idea that as long as you write somethign down, the gullible fools won't bother to check, although it took me about only a quarter of an hour to completely refute their scurrilous claims. It made me totally sick to my stomach, and it still does.

Ah, I've just realised I should have put "Not old enough to vote."
Oh well.
I voted for the Green Party at our mock elections in school.

There is a definate case for breathalysing voters, my housemate was still drunk from last night and voted for Veritas, because the candidate had a cool name, 'Roseblade'. Goddammit.

A third Labour victory - not really in doubt i suppose, but it doesn't look like Blair will be able to ram through shoddy legislation with such a majority.

What about Howard? Surely, he should go now?

Did Alan Duncan lose his seat for the Tories too?

hopefully it'll only be a matter of time until brown takes over from blair

Quote: Hurri_

Four more years of B-Liar. Whoop di doo.

Nah, two at the most...

We have the dubious honour in Leicester South of being the only seat that Labour gained.

Favourite moment? Kilroy being humiliated.

I loathe both of them - Oona King because she's a Blairite drone, and Galloway because of his general f*ckwittery. The Paxman interview was stupid though. Galloway came forth as an arrogant a*se, and Paxman didn't come off much better, suggesting basically that he should feel shamed for beating King because she was black and a woman, and not because she was a decent MP.

Alright, doing it absolutely properly this time, with 645 seats declared, a proportional parliament would have the following seats attributed to each party:

Labour: 228
Conservative: 209
Liberal Democrat: 143
DUP: 6
SNP: 10
Sinn Fein: 5
Plaid Cymru: 5
SDLP: 4
UUP: 4
Respect: 2
UKIP: 15
Green: 7
BNP: 5
SSP: 2

Down here in Ireland we have the great honour of voting for politicans I can't name and can barely distinguish between. That's what happens when your party system is based on a war that happened eighty years ago, and not on any real ideological divide.

You realise how hypocritical that sounds when you have a link in your signature saying "SSP. Go vote"?

That aside, I have to say that "stopping everyone from voting" sounds to me like you're focussing on the wrong thing. Voting is not the cause of our democratic troubles, but the system it is used to prop up - by which I mean more than the voting system, but the entire system of patronage and priveledge that is endemic in the Westminster system. The day we can stop people from voting, the day people lose all faith in the democratic process. The day all people lose faith in the principles of democracy, the day we lose all hope of a progressive government whatsoever. Why, indeed, if the democratic process wanes in the way you say, should the elites not step in and say "obviously, the masses do not want to have a say in the government, so we should take over ourselves?" Why, indeed, is it not playing straight into the hands of an unrepresentative dictatorship? To me, it looks like nothing more than a step backwards from the people who fought to get the vote - the Chartists, the suffragettes and the suffragists, all of the people who were thought to be too poor, too ignorant, or too female to matter in the governing of the country.