DEM not gonna CON dis NATION: Rolling UK politics in the short-lived post-Murdoch era

They also know they're preaching to the converted, in this instance.

yes, I guess I'm basically comparing this to the last time they were in power. The Thatcher conferences had some serious headslappers.

Opposition conferences are generally a bit more reined in, unless the party's imploding a la 80s Labour

kinda wish we'd import clint eastwood moments tho

what, cameron talking to an empty chair?

Or, as we call him, Boris.

More like an overstuffed recliner.

Despite the change of government following the May 2010 General Election. it was reported in August 2010 that Milburn had been offered a role in the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition as 'social mobility tsar'.[10]

social mobility tsar

haha

"democracy fuhrer"

http://www.itv.com/news/granada/2012-10-19/george-osborne-refuses-to-sit-in-standard-class-despite-not-having-first-class-ticket/

love that pic too

Disappointed lines of coke are out of shot.

is £160 a special upgrade price for ppl who bought the wrong ticket or does that + standard price (has be £40/£50ish at least right?) = the actual price for a fucking train tikcet from cheshire to london?

yes special on-the-train-fuck-you price

his aide there looks more like a lib dem apparatchik than a proper foxblood and claret sodden tory imo

they seem to be having a fun time together anyway

double checked this but it's £70 off peak single, £140 anytime, £189 first class. not sure where the £160 comes from, mb he booked in advance

£49 to fly

Aaaaaaaaand Andrew Mitchell has resigned.

terrible management from dcam

the whole 'oh firing him straightaway would call his judgment in appointing him into question' was stupid, the police fed / tabs were going to make this run and run

a small amount of derision for appointing a slightly too unpleasant & obnoxious chief whip but a missed chance for the eton crowd to reaffirm symbolic fealty to the shire tory rank and file

felt-tip pen for sincerity

https://twitter.com/JohnRentoul/status/259346331263463424/photo/1/large

As he disembarked at London's Euston station and found himself greeted by a small posse of reporters and photographers, Osborne smiled grimly and declined to answer questions fired at him by journalists and Labour party and student activists.

Asked if reports suggesting he had bought a standard-class ticket but had sat in first class were correct, he replied: "I'm sure it will be, um … "

George Osborne and his aide on the train. Photograph: ITV/Granada
The chancellor appeared increasingly awkward as his minders and members of Network Rail staff ushered him through a security gate and in the direction of a government car.

Osborne found himself at the centre of a Twitter storm after his apparently innocuous arrival on the 15.11 from Wilmslow was spotted by an ITV journalist also on board. Rachel Townsend posted reports on Twitter that, despite having a standard ticket, the chancellor had gone directly to sit in a first-class carriage.

There is nothing I don't love about this.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2012/oct/19/george-osborne-inspector-train-ticket

"The guard went on gathering tickets and later told me Osborne had agreed to cough up the £160."

"cough up the £160" presumably = "add £160 to expenses claim"

Which begs the question, why he didn't pay up immediately without fuss?

something something entitlement something plebs something place something

I'm sure he had nothing at all to do with ticket purchasing and just went to where he'd expect to sit. I think there's every chance someone's taken a bollocking for buying pleb class in the first place.

daily mail laying hard into osborne, mitchell and some other loser today. did they ever shiv thatch like this BITD?

Don't think so. Her cabinet, maybe, but not her.

In 2010 Osborne issued new rules that any dept with staff travelling First would have their budgets docked unless they could show exceptional circumstances

innit marvelous

It's nice that Osborne's actions so perfectly encapsulate the way he treats the country as a whole.

Suppose the thing with this lot is blend of casual arrogance with incompetence which I don't really remember with Thatcher's lot in quite the same way. This sense that they don't really give a shit how it looks even to their own voters.

Oh hang on it's Tebbit himself sticking the knife in.

*michaeljacksonpopcorn.gif*

Suppose the thing with this lot is blend of casual arrogance with incompetence which I don't really remember with Thatcher's lot in quite the same way

Oh no, it's pretty much exactly the same it's just that, post-Falklands, Thatcher herself went into full Iron Lady/ She Who Must Be Obeyed mode and became less of a Prime Minister and more of a Generalissimo. Noticing the reactions here, from... uh... our younger contributors, on the Tory Party conference, along the lines of "Were they always this bad?", the answer is YES. Why do you think us old farts hate them so much?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/8583592/Disabled-should-work-for-less-than-minimum-wage-Tory-MP-suggests.html

Tom - we know they were always this bad, if not worse, but did they couple it with being this... inept?

They were always this inept - 'back to basics' springs to mind - but with 24/7 world communication it's easier to notice. Nice side-effect of being THAT self-centred. What, oh what, will be next?

They remain, (funda)mentally, the party of Kicking Michael Foot's Stick Away.

he was the chancellor without a ticket to ride. This week he hopes to be able to say that after a hard day's night fixing a hole in the budget deficit, things are finally getting better.

oh larry

^^^I guess the UK needed its own dennis perrin

he was the chancellor who said we can work it out but it seems that the economy is being run for the benefit of mr kite

If you ever want to hone your hatred to a stiletto sharp point, watch this

OH MY GOD

http://www.mirror.co.uk/tv/tv-news/im-a-celebrity-2012-nadine-dorries-1419022

DYING OF LAUGHTER AND ANTICIPATION

i'm nadine dorries get me out of here

it's almost as if parliamentary democracy was a game show

No results found for "noncervative party"

Is this the late Cyril Smith or someone else? Cover-up allegations would be huge.

Cyril Smith was Liberal so unlikely to be him.

So he was!

Twitter claims to have the answer or at least a consensus.

Dorries is officially suspended. Wonder if she will come back as UKIP.

She's off to New York I thought