U.K.

Another unelected Prime Minister for the U.K.?

A bit ago, I made a (likely inebriated) prediction to Estes that I suspected that David Miliband, who had served as Foreign Secretary in the last Labour government, would be Prime Minister before 2011. And, gosh darn it, it looks as though it might be closer to reality. Gordon Brown today announced that he will resign as soon as a new government is formed, an action that had been predicted would be a necessary preerequisite to any deal with the Liberal Democrats to form a government. The Lib Dems had first approached the Tories because the Tories...

Continue reading...

With Apologies to Howard Dean: What Happened Yesterday

(Some quick thoughts while Estes collects his) Well, the U.K. voted yesterday. The results were not terribly surprising: The Tories won a plurality of seats, but not enough to form a majority government. This much was expected. However, what was not expected was the relative strength of Labour or the precipitous downfall of the Liberal Democrats. I’ll start where the story is now, and move on to what I suspect happened. The onus is on Gordon Brown to form a government, and if he cannot, to step down and allow somebody else to do so. I don’t...

Continue reading...

Polltracking the Revolution

Here’s a handy little interactive widget to play with to see how everybody’s doing in the horsey-race that is the upcoming U.K. election: http://cloud.del.co.uk/clients/betfair/betfairelection/tmg-tracker/tmg-election-chart.swf The important thing to know, for those not completely fluent in U.K. electoral politics, is to get a majority and build a majority government, a party needs to win 325 seats. Current polling seems to suggest that the Tories are closing in on 333-335, while Labour + Lib Dems are only at 286 (317 if you count all the “others”). Of course, Labour and the Lib Dems may not, or even probably won’t,...

Continue reading...