Category: Political
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#365daysofpolitics day 4: every little helps
Today was a family day so I make no apologies for doing one tiny thing today, and accepting a contribution to the GE2015 data project.
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#365daysofpolitics day 3: Officialdom
Today I recommitted to the political party that sprang out of the OpenPolitics Manifesto project. While I got involved a while ago my participation in the last six months has been almost non-existent due to the other pressing issues in my life. That changed today when I agreed to be Something New’s technology officer. I’ll…
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#365daysofpolitics day 2: independent, machine-readable election stats
Having stayed up all night to watch the election (depressing as it was) I took the opportunity to collate the general election results. The project gives us an open data source showing the results for each constituency, and the seats. It’s not quite finished, and I plan to add JSON as well as CSV versions…
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#365daysofpolitics day 1: Voting
Today I voted in the parliamentary and local (district and parish) elections. Choices for the local elections were in desperately short supply. I ended up having to vote Labour just to say no to the Tories.
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Why I voted in a safe seat
A little while ago I posited the argument that not voting is a proxy vote for the winner. Now I’m going to suggest that it’s worth voting even in a safe seat where you’re voting against the incumbent. In Lichfield I’ve voted for Rob Pass, the Green Party candidate. He won’t get anywhere close to…
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8 reasons I’m voting Conservative and UK Independence Party
The merger of the Conservative and Unionist Party and the United Kingdom Independence Party is the greatest thing to happen in British politics since Maggie’s valiant fight against Europe. Proposed by their former election chief in 2012, pushed forward by Douglas Carswell and Mark Reckless and finalised by David Cameron with his promise to deliver an EU referendum, the joining…
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Anger is a gift
Use that anger. That’s what Andy Bennetts, parliamentary candidate for Class War in Lichfield said during a hustings at the weekend. A favourite song of mine is Freedom by Rage Against The Machine. It includes this line: Anger is a gift. I love that because I believe it. My anger at our political system has…
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It’s down to politicians to persuade non-voters otherwise, not to force them to vote.
It’s down to politicians to persuade non-voters otherwise, not to force them to vote. http://leftfootforward.org/2015/01/compulsory-voting-no-sweeping-intervention-can-fix-our-electoral-system/
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Liberal Democrat complicity in Tory ideology makes then irrelevant in 2015
Re: Vince Cable slams excessive Conservative cuts on working poor The Liberal Democrats seem to think there are some sort of moderating government party, whose job it is to form coalitions and keep the majority partner on the straight and narrow. Except that thanks to their complicity with the Tories since 2010 they have worsened…