Month: May 2010

Henry Farrell wonders what happens if moderates break for the Lib Dems instead of the Tories:

[T]here are a lot of unhappy right wing conservatives, who have grudgingly accepted Cameron’s push toward moderation, because they are desperate to get back into power. If Cameron’s centrism doesn’t win the election, then they are likely to try to pull the party back sharply to the right. And they have a very good chance of succeeding. Together, these two mechanisms would have two consequences. First – a Conservative party that is much further to the right and less electable over the short term (and perhaps the long term too). Second – a Liberal Democrat party that positions itself a little to the right of center (and likely makes Nick Clegg a happier leader in the process).

John Gray worried about a Tory loss awhile back:

If the Conservatives fail to emerge as the largest single party Cameron’s position as leader will surely be challenged, and it is not hard to see a return of the mayhem that kept them out of power for so many years. The small and much resented cabal that imposed a public face of moderation would be rejected, the ideological passions that have remained beneath the surface would re-emerge and the Conservatives would once again become a rancorous, ungovernable rabble.

Cowen quotes the end of Gray's essay, which critiques Oakeshott, patron saint of the Dish.

Josh Green says the oil spill has damaged the climate bill:

What's so infuriating about the Washington response so far is that there's no indication the disaster has prompted Obama or anyone else to reconsider his position. In the past, major disasters shifted the terms of debate. This time, nobody is budging. But the support for offshore drilling that the White House was willing to trade for reductions in carbon emissions — the crucial achievement in any climate bill — is no longer feasible. As Florida Senator Bill Nelson put it, any bill that includes drilling is "dead on arrival.''

A Hong Kong architect shows how to arrange 344 square feet in 24 different ways.

Tunku Varadarajan embarrasses himself by writing that it's a shame Tony Blair is not running for office "since he was the best British prime minister America has had since Maggie Thatcher (who was, herself, the best since Winston Churchill)."

Well since there was only one prime minister between Thatcher and Blair – the much under-rated John Major – that's not exactly a sweeping statement. But it's a little odd reading a conservative praise such a massive increase in government spending as a share of GDP and a war that can only be called the biggest foreign policy mistake since Vietnam – until you realize that this was exactly what the Rove Republicans achieved as well. So the WSJ is only being consistent, I guess. Larison dutifully counters.

Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania, 4.08 pm

Henry Olsen has some advice. Anthony Wells sizes up the exit polls:

In terms of past accuracy, the exit poll last time got the Labour majority exactly right (though they were slightly off with Conservative and Lib Dem seats). Unless something goes terribly wrong, we should have a broad idea of the result a couple of minutes after 10 o’clock.

That's 5 pm our time. Stay tuned.

A reader writes:

So those lucky bastards in Merry Ole England can vote drunk?  At a pub, no less?  While we poor unlucky bastards here in Indiana (who voted on Tuesday) can’t even BUY alcohol on election day

Alcohol is served in restaurants and bars on Monday through Saturday from 7 a.m. to 3 a.m. and from 10:30 a.m. to 12:30 a.m. on Sundays.

Alcoholic beverages can be purchased from private retail package stores, and beer and wine can be bought in grocery stores, convenience stores, and drug stores. No alcohol is sold on Christmas Day and Election Day.”

As I said, it's a civilized place.

A pair of Star Wars geeks are having a pair of kids:

Nate Silver sketches out various scenarios:

My intuition is that most of the risks are still to the downside on Labour's vote, given the history of overestimating their vote in the past and that some pollsters are distributing undecideds based on how people claimed to have voted in the last election — something which tends to help Labour because their voters seem the most indifferent about this election. On the other hand, our model is more aggressive than most others in taking away seats from Labour for a given vote share.

As of this writing, betting markets now give Conservatives about a 38 percent chance of claiming a majority. I don't know that there's much arbitrage either way there, but I'd be slightly inclined to take the Tories on those odds.

Ruffini, booster of conservative chances, predicts that the "Tories wind up with 328 seats and the chance to form a Government outright."