Almost exactly two years ago, this website suggested that it might not be the smartest idea for Labour to go along with Theresa May’s call for a snap election. (Under the Fixed Term Parliaments Act, it couldn’t have happened without Labour’s support.)
And it occurred to us today that if they hadn’t, the current government would only have a maximum of one year left to run.
So there was a football match at the weekend.
At least three people were stabbed, one very seriously, in violent incidents the likes of which haven’t been seen around Scottish football for years.
But it was probably just a random, unforseeable one-off, right?
Regular readers of this site will be impressed, if perhaps less than astonished, at the new high score achieved this week in the timeless game of McTernan Predicts:
It’s 4.36am. I’m going to go to bed in a minute. I’m hoping that I get up in a few hours and laugh at this, delighted at my own unfounded pessimism.
Back in May we wrote this:
The prediction duly came true, as most of ours do. Sometimes we hate being right.
Exactly two years ago today (how time flies), we wrote this:
It doesn’t seem overly immodest to say that we pretty much nailed it. But if that was then and this is now, what of tomorrow?
On the left, the Conservatives’ 2015 general election manifesto.
On the right, yesterday’s Press & Journal. We wish we could even fake surprise.
Alert readers will recall that this site has expended some energy on debunking the lazy myth – which suits the media and Labour alike – that a significant factor in the unexpected Conservative majority in May’s general election was voters being scared back to the Tories by a fear campaign about the prospect of the SNP influencing a minority Labour government.
Today we stumbled across an hour-long programme buried away in the depths of BBC Parliament, which televised “a seminar organised by Nuffield College Oxford at which leading academics and pollsters analyse the result of the General Election”.
The most interesting contribution came from a team at the University of Manchester who made two absolutely key findings from the extremely large and detailed British Election Study of the “short campaign” period, involving tens of thousands of voters.
Attention spans are brief these days, so we’ve cut it down to four minutes for you.
We’ve been keeping an eye out for something for a while now.
And today we found out.
Over and over again in the years leading up to the independence referendum, Scots were warned of the many dire consequences of voting Yes. Among the No campaign’s prime targets for scare tactics were subsidies for renewable energy.
UK government subsidies drying up certainly sounded like a scary prospect.
Much of the commentariat and media has been in a froth for the last 24 hours about the supposed failure of the nation’s pollsters to predict the Conservative victory. This, for example, was Labour’s highly-paid election guru David Axelrod:
But the truth is that the polls – just like the heavily-maligned exit poll which turned out to be bang on the money – got nothing wrong. The people interpreting them did.
The media might be shocked. But readers of Wings aren’t.
Because there’s simply no excuse for anyone acting surprised.
Wings Over Scotland is a (mainly) Scottish political media digest and monitor, which also offers its own commentary. (More)
And now after all that I have to watch Lesley fucking Laird. I am SO giving myself a fat payrise this year.
Rory Stewart now telling us that the answer to everything is "unity" and "coming together". Sounds really simple! Let's do that!
"We would not support revocation of Article 50", says Corbyn, in the first clear position he's taken in this interview.
Just been leaked a copy of Corbyn's briefing sheet for this Marr appearance. Says "MAKE MEANINGLESS NOISE UNTIL TIME RUNS OUT."
Wings Over Scotland
