Ken vs. Boris: It's So On

if boris wins I may seriously have to think about moving out of London. He's the worst sort of Tory - the "likeable buffoon", insidious cunt more like.

hmmm in my temp capacity i'm watching the company that runs the tubes slide into adminstration. this could be v bad for the ken's chances.

Why? Ken was dead against the PPP deal in the first place and has spent most of the past few years trying to find a way to sack Metronet.

to be fair i think ken did not want whatever nightmarish PFI set-up it is that runs the tube, i think it was imposed by our new PM. i'm not sure what ken's job is except for appeasing the labour left and weirdo islamists.

well it would be very easy to play as his fault as certain folks around me seem to be doing.

xp

Argh, why did I just register to vote? this may be the first election I have to participate in. How am I gonna do this?

Boris will win this, if he gets the Tory nomination, which I wouldn't bet on.

There's an "I love you but I can't vote for you" box.

Or is that a radiohead song?

You can be mayor of my heart, but not of my town, Boris my dear..."

Wait, no that's Suede.

They should just have a bicycle race instead of an election.

The idea that Johnson will win a mayoral election in the UK's most ethnically diverse city is hilarious.

If he does, I'm leaving London. He will only get in if millions of people vote for him because "he's a character". And I don't want to live in a city where people are so thick as to base their choice of elected representatives on such things.

Plus he thinks women should stay home and raise the kids while MANLY MEN go off and do work, hunt mammoth, etc. Which makes him a grade 1 TWUNT.

I give him roughly two months before he greets heads of the Muslim community by doing an impression of the dude from Short Circuit.

xp

597 that's such bullshit. he's an evil tory but not a racist so far as i can tell.

whereas ken's anti-semitism won't exactly rock the golders green/hampstead garden suburb vote.

The compere at the Rise gig yesterday said if we vote Ken they'll get Snoop Dogg next year. Good enough for me.

I love you but I've chosen Boris

"that's such bullshit. he's an evil tory but not a racist so far as i can tell"

I think Boris's problem is that he's the sort of person who thinks doing an impression of the guy out of Short Circuit would be a jolly wheeze and would then be mortified and a little confused when someone called him a racist as a result.

Clearly the stage is set for a plucky and possibly well-known independent with a populist cause to promote. Possibly something to do with hospitals.

Guys, I don't think Boris actually knows what Short Circuit is. Also what little credit I'd give him would be to know which gaffes fall on the 'acceptable' side of 'oh that Boris look at his bufoonish ways getting him into trouble again'. Pulling a comedy Indian accent = definitely on the other side of that line.

after some pretty well-documented gaffes in that area from ken this is all pretty wtf.

wasn't the guy in short circuit sikh?

Precisely.

ok well, i don't think boris is that stupid.

I don't think he's stupid at all. Just an idiot. Two very different things.

http://www.moviezone.cz/rubrics_images/novinky/6/johnpet_1.jpg

Ken has been a good mayor, apart from the cosying up to the muslim right wing; the congestion charge and cheaper busses have been good, policing doesn't seem to be any worse, he has bugger all power over anything else. Boris must be crust and humiliated at all costs.

crust = crushed

someone at m4tron4t just suggested they "bring in alan sugar".

Boris must be crust... what, so I can eat him with curds and whey?

Mostly I've been pretty happy with Ken. Except for the bloody stupid Olympics thing.

simon cowell

> and cheaper busses

what are these cheaper buses of which you speak? when ken came to power it was the 70p / 100p split, and a day ticket was £2... (now singles are £1 oyster, £2 cash and £3 daily. (or free if it's a bendy bus and you get on at the back))

haha yeah otm. buses are not cheaper. nor is the tube.

The Tube is cheaper if you have an Oystercard. And hey, what with the glorious new bendy buses you can travel for free most of the time!

Cheaper than what? I'm pretty sure a travelcard was cheaper pre-Ken than on Oyster, even allowing for inflation.

have they ever gotten cheaper, other than during the GLC?

the oyster fares themselves have gone up above inflation, i'm pretty sure. even then it's insanely expensive compared with its european equivalents.

The idea that the tube should pay for itself through the fare box is completely out of Ken's hands, but it's a fucking travesty all the same.

cheaper buses??!?

oh xxxxxposts!

it would be interesting to see a pre- and post-ken comparison of bus fare vs. number of buses on the roads, the latter of which has gone up considerably since he became mayor (not to mention average bus speed); it's not just a simple jacking-up of price (cf. the new york MTA), there are concrete additional and improved services being offered for the fare increase

i think ken's great, he should be mayor for life. he's not who i would grow in a lab to be my Ideal Mayor, but look at the alternatives.

but i thought the congestion charge money was going to be used to improve buses etc.

+i'm sure the metrocard was like $2 a day last time i was in new york, and you get 24 hour trains!

but yeah, boris for mayor sounds a bit crap. Can't we just have Arnold Schwarzenegger?

Not seeing much in the way of improved or additional services on the Victoria line at the moment :(

Do you really think that BORIS* would make the trains run on time?

Come on, this is a man who looks like he can't even match his socks in the morning.

*and I mean Johnson, no the Japanese noize band. Though having a Japanese Noize band for mayor might be quite good.

No, I would definitely vote for Ken over Boris (or probably any of the other candidates). Just moaning.

I know. I just don't want my FIRST ELECTION TO EVER HAVE VOTED IN, OR EVEN BEEN LEGALLY ABLE TO VOTE IN to have to vote against the man I want to father my children. :-(

The first election I ever voted in, I (indirectly, obv) voted for Tony Blair... oh such optimistic days etc. Worcester got its first ever Labour MP thanks to me though (well and partly due to redrawing the boundaries so most of the surrounding farmland got shifted to Wychavon or Malvern or wherever so the constituency only covers the actual city now)

poor children :(

red ken doesn't control the tubes though, does he?

ken c, those things are true of the MTA in new york, but remember that the subways are on about the same frequency - or less - than london buses. and also that the NYC bus system is a joke.

red ken has also told virtually every PFI venture that's gone tits up that they can go hang if they expect a bailout from local government

i mean, as zany as boris is, could even he out-zany this deal that red ken made?? (ans: yes, but it would benefit a handful of his friends rather than a quarter million londoners on income support)

that is the right kind of zane

apart from the cosying up to the muslim right wing

jog my memory?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/4165691.stm

peter watts linked a beef ken had with ed 'the islamist' husain on the today prog recently where ken got his ass handed to him.

Qaradawi is hardly a right-wing Muslim

Oh god, I think I wanna have your babies...

http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/44000000/jpg/_44000588_boris203_bbc.jpg

I don't really understand all these "anyone but Ken!" haterz. Though I suppose the things that people complain about (the congestion charge) are exactly the sort of things I think make him a great mayor. These things may not be popular, but they make London a better place for the people that LIVE here.

<i>Qaradawi is hardly a right-wing Muslim</i>

True enough, antisemitism is very left these days.

God, I sound like Nick Cohen.

not always

xpost

he's pretty right-wing, tracer. the ken of the '80s was, if memory serves, quite sanctimonious about LBG issues etc...

xpost

whereas boris is a fun-loving leftie

this thread is actually worse than boris being mayor would be.

blueski for mayro

actually oh god no

ok, enlighten me on Qaradawi's right-wingness, i'm totally willing to be wrong here. but i remember poring over transcripts when that story broke in 2004 and finding nothing very remarkable about Qaradawi's views (the homophobia is unfortunate but unremarkable if you consider that the guy's a Muslim cleric; i mean, try asking the Archbishop of Canterbury how he's livin these days on that issue; still, Ken addressed the homophobia head-on)

http://normblog.typepad.com/normblog/2007/07/blurring-the-li.html

gives some sense of the husain vs livingstone thing. i need to google "ed husain mi5 mossad" now to see how it's gone down.

oh well, if the guy's a muslim cleric then i guess he gets a free pass.

come on Galloway...

galloway vs ken vs boris vs... littlejohn

"you coudn't make it up"

enrique i'm not giving Qaradawi a free pass; i'm giving Ken one.

and i will continue to do so! forever! until he says something like "that Qaradawi guy has some good ideas about Jews."

that's what quitney hears ken say every time he opens his mouth.

being a mod, you'd know all about being a NAZI CONCENTRATION CAMP GUARD.

jokes bruv.

that's what i thought when i said "actually oh god no"

But leaving aside anti-semitism, what is Ken doing hanging out with somebody who believes women should be beaten (lightly and not around the face) and homosexuals executed (perhaps dropped from high windows or burnt, he's not quite sure how)? It is a bit strange.

exactly.

"hanging out" - you make it sound like they're drinking tequila sunrises down at dale's clam shack

"what is churchill doing hanging out with somebody like josef stalin??"

ed husain for mayor

actually, ken is the only one to have made a vocal guest appearance on a blur song

ken didn't have to literally embrace him and say he was 'truly, truly welcome'.

stalin had something to offer churchill. why does ken need to meet this guy?

free tequila.

galloway vs. ken vs. boris vs. littlejohn vs. barnes vs. lawton vs. alibhai-brown vs. greer

vs. a.a.gill

vs. dom passantino

"You coudn't make it up"

being a mod, you'd know all about being a NAZI CONCENTRATION CAMP GUARD.

as a Gentile born many years after the Holocaust i take real offense to this.

i'm also really offended that someone (let's call them ken c) would hate the idea of me as Mayor Of London.

This might as well go here - someone I used to work with just forwarded me this, smells like BNP to me:

We need to act now before its to late.

Don't know if you have heard about this but Ken Livingstone is apparently planning to use tax payer's money to build an enormous mosque costing an estimated £100M in the docklands.

Wouldn't it be better to spend the money on a new hospital or improved transport facilities? Anything but such a scheme as this:
The mosque will be BIGGER THAN ST PAUL'S!!!

The plan is for the mosque to be so big so that people flying in from all over the world for the 2012 Olympics will see it as the biggest landmark in London, bigger than St Pauls, Westminster Abbey or Wembley Stadium.

The vote so far is 56 % in favour. It looks like the Muslim community in the UK is casting its vote in droves, and as usual the British are burying their heads in the sand....

It is an undemocratic use of British Tax payer¹s money, especially when our Churches that are 100's of years old get no government funding to keep their structures standing, and we are supposedly a Christian Nation.

To vote to "Scrap the 'Mega-Mosque" please sign the official Government petition in the link below.

http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/ScrapMegaMosque/#detail
http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/ScrapMegaMosque/#detail

After voting, forward this to as many people as you can.

Thank you.

in re my earlier comment about ken telling metronet to go f*ck themselves if they think they're getting a penny from the government to bail them out of their £2billion hole, that's only half right as today's news makes clear - metronet's tube deal is a PPP, not a PFI, and the structure of the deal means the public IS on the hook for the yawning debt metronet have racked up.

"Livingstone steps in as Metronet faces financial collapse"
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/publicservices/story/0,,2128201,00.html

it still looks as though ken is going to try and figure out a way for the govt. NOT to pay for this, though, which is great

toynbee's column today about boris is a masterwork of rhetoric, and i think it's grebt

Wow.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Columnists/Column/0,,2127917,00.html

Much though I love Boris as a personality, I agree with pretty much most of the things she says about him.

Can't we invent some figurehead role for Boris to fulfill? Like, make him Lord Mayor of London, while Ken gets on with the real work of running the city?

it sunk in last night what will happen when Johnson takes part in live TV debates for this (as Ken did). carcrash television that should kill his chances dead but probably won't somehow.

colonel poo, here's a link that addresses that email:

http://www.mayorwatch.co.uk/news.php?slug=Mayor-Attacks-Mosque-Email-Campaign&article_id=634

the key quote:

The Mayor repeated his past statement that "there is no proposal to use any public money at all for such a mosque; there is no link between plans for a mosque and the Olympics; and, as widely reported, there are actually no plans for a mosque on the scale claimed in the email."

Andrew Gilligan: "Boris has come to save our great city from Ken's ghastly empire of bureaucrats, bendy buses and earnest Cuban festivals."

what's he got against the enormous, ubiquitous Cuban community of 'our fair city'?

the one thing in that toynbee column that threw me was her description of the Evening Standard as "London's only proper newspaper"

?? what does she mean?

i guess she means the only one people have to pay for

I thought it was only proper evening paper?

"Can't we invent some figurehead role for Boris to fulfill? Like, make him Lord Mayor of London, while Ken gets on with the real work of running the city?"

apart from tories and nimbys, does anyone but you want boris anywhere near london/anything?

Obviously other people do, or else someone wouldn't be putting up the money for him to run.

And you can write off those people as "tories and nimbies" but that doesn't stop them from having a valid opinion, albeit one you don't agree with.

it doesn't stop them having an opinion.

yeah i think it must be a subediting error, she can't possibly have meant what ended up getting printed!

Tracer, thanks for the link, that's what I thought I'd heard about it. Mosque bigger than Wembley Stadium! It's Political Correctness gone mad etc! Wankers.

That Toynbee piece is boring rhetoric BUT she makes a valid point in that this could potentially be a massive embarassing disaster for the Tories.

It's also occurred to me that I have lost all perspective as to how popular Ken actually is. If he still is.

yeah matt it's not really provocative or counterintuitive but i just thought it was very neat the way she sewed it all up with "even if he wins, the torys lose"

plus managed to get "toff" and "sociopath" into the headline.. maybe she really does admire the evening standard after all!

Livingstone has earned respect with the bravery and skill of his congestion charge, his London bus revolution and his imposition of 50% affordable housing on every development.

i did not know about the last part.

Yeah, these are great in principle but don't quite work in practice cos the developers tend to hive off the affordable housing element into a separate building, or with a separate entrance, meaning there's little integration and they don't hold their value. Plus, if you're buying in Zone 1, you still have to be on a decent salary (c30k) to qualify. Nice idea though.

facebook: 4 pages of boris groups only one anti. 4 pages of ken groups only two pro.

i didn't know about the affordable housing thing either. but the £30k thin's even more bewildering - so you need a minimum salary of that to qualify? huh??

acebook: 4 pages of boris groups only one anti. 4 pages of ken groups only two pro.

further proof if proof were needed that facebook is full of daily mail (probably just the Metro TBH) reading middle class wankers

Yep, cos even if you're only buying 25 per cent mortgage/75 per cent rent the property is still worth 220k+ (for a one-bed zone 1 flat) so they want to be sure you earn enough to be able to pay that monthly charge without getting repossessed.

If you're out of zone 1 or have a big deposit, that's less of a problem.

if boris gets in i'm blaming Have I Got News For You?

but how many of the pro-Johnson groups on Facebook are 'ironic' or at least based on appreciation of him as comedy character rather than politician or journalist. there must be a big bunch of people out there (mainly tories and nimbys i suppose) who claim to think he's great but wouldn't vote for him.

metronet go into administration at 5.

Is that going to be good for Ken because he refused to spend £££££££ taxpayers' money to bail them out or bad because the tube engineering works are going to be even more delayed now?

there's no guarantee that ken won't have to go to the treasury, hat in hand, and ask for £2 billion to plug the gap

regardless, it's conceivably very good for ken because he opposed PPP from the get-go - now he can turn around and say "look where this kind of thing gets you" with the advantage of actually being honest and correct about it

apparently a third party has delivered $$$s

there is now a "red ken can't be trusted" / "good old boris" conversation happening a few feet away from me.

If there's gonna be a marked increase in "lol Boris Johnson is a legend" talk as a result of this I think I might actually murder someone

the bloke opposite is now singing "keep the blue flag flying high". i think he is being provocative.

this is clearly THE opportunity for Ken to seize control of the Tube, right??

apparently he said this to metronet employees: "You'll be working for us for a while, while we get this sorted out."

what kate said.

er, wait, i mean this bit about ken - Mostly I've been pretty happy with Ken. Except for the bloody stupid Olympics thing not any of the things about boris. and i'd add bendy buses. bendy buses in london and the olympics in london are both fucking stupid ideas, other than that me and ken are cool.

surely no one seriously thinks boris gives a shit about anyone other than himself?

yeah, even guiliani had a career as a firebreathing prosecutor behind him before he ran for mayor of NY

ken "can't be trusted", boris "is a laugh, he doesn't take himself too seriously". FFS.

kill them now, no judge in the land would convict you.

You know what my definition of trust is? "Would I feel comfortable if they knew the PIN for my bank account."

Yeah, I'd probably be OK with Ken having it. Wouldn't let Boris have it, even if he WOULD sleep with me.

and earnest Cuban festivals

I went to this and it was great, exactly what London parks should be used for. It also had the biggest cross section of Londoners, in terms of age and ethnicity, I've seen anywhere outside of the tube network.

Ken has been great a putting on a lot of new events and increasing the size of new ones. It feels like a european city. A lot more fun.

Plz to stop objectifying male celebrities. It is v sexist and wouldn't be acceptable the other way round.

wait.. that thing about the mosque that's BIGGER THAN WEMBLEY?!?!?!?!?

and costing only £100M?!?!?!?!??!?!?!?!?!?!?

I'd vote for Ken just for that if that's the case?!??! That's bargain of the century!

On time and under budget? İnşallah!

Hire them to upkeep the tube!

If there's gonna be a marked increase in "lol Boris Johnson is a legend" talk as a result of this I think I might actually murder someone

OTM, I might just join that single anti-BJ group now.

it's pretty ridiculous that that anti mega-mosque petition doesn't even mention Tablighi Jamaat

MIKE READ OUT

http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/mike_read/2007/07/im_backing_boris.html

"I've spoken to lots of young kids in gangs or 'crews' as they prefer to be known..."

Boris reminds me of some people I went to school with. Cunts, all (except for Chuck Tatum and a handful of others).

FWIW, I think Ken's good. Obv I don't live there no more but I like to see the place in good nick when I pop back for a visit.

My choice for mayor would be someone like JG Ballard or Neil from the "Up" series.

http://image.blingee.com/images12/content/output/2007/7/17/57467881_d5758d2c.gif
Make Your Own Glitter Graphics

lol @ toynbee calling boris a toff. i mean, seriously.

"i didn't know about the affordable housing thing either. but the £30k thin's even more bewildering - so you need a minimum salary of that to qualify? huh??

-- CharlieNo4, Tuesday, July 17, 2007 1:43 PM (6 hours ago) Bookmark Link"

it's called 'shoring up the base' duh.

http://www.flickr.com/photo_zoom.gne?id=780751356&context=pool-433899@N22&size=l

the number of pro-boris groups on facebook is terrifying. he is a tory, end of.

It's fucked. It's also fucked that a lot of normal, decent people I know are joining them.

Cameron doesn't seem to be doing too well with style over substance (particularly in ealing) so there is hope.

as we are now sold politics as 'management' and have managerial politicians, its not a surprise that 'character' politicians spur interest, and its no surprise there are pro-boris groups on facebook, how many of those people would actually vote for boris is questionable, if only because how many of those people would actually vote at all...is questionable

the number of pro-boris groups on facebook is terrifying. he is a tory, end of.

Anti-Boris facebook group

321 members in three days -- you can't front on that.

mayors have a long history of being charismatic bastards, much more so than legislators have - viz "he's OUR asshole" - i think people sort of like their city being run by some raffish rake, as long he he gets things done - the latter part is the problem for boris

Shittiest thing about Facebook - you can't even look at it unless you are a member.

um that's kind of a good thing?

My name-a Boris! I like sex! Is nice!

Opik Only One

I am not sure how I feel about the Cheeky Girls having any kind of influence on the running of Our Fair Cit-E...

And Warwick Lightfoot has an even better name...

the cheeky girls would be better than this shower.

As posted by Enrique

I am not Enrique. I suppose we all look the same to you, is that it?

who all look the same to you? what?

what about John Big Issue Bird? He is considering standing as an independent.

don't get uppity, mong guy.

Always holdin the mong guy down

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/graphics/2007/07/16/nboris116.jpg
He clearly doesn't measure up for the job...

Opik not standing now...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/6926020.stm

The beeb are re-using urls so if you click on 'Lembit poised to enter London race' on the right hand side you get 'Lembit declines to enter London race'.

Warwick Lightfoot is a very well known london tory. Tried to get Chelsea and Kensington whne Portillo got it and again when Rifkind got it. He must be getting pissed off with getting bumped by famous faces.

http://politics.guardian.co.uk/gla/story/0,,2141480,00.html

Paddick to run for Lib-Dems?

Qaradawi is like the most liberal Muslim cleric in world whose liberalism has not taken him into heresy

In an article written in October 2002, Mr Johnson described the Queen meeting "piccaninnies", adding that when the prime minister arrives in the Congo "the pangas will stop their hacking of human flesh, and the tribal warriors will all break out in watermelon smiles to see the big white chief touch down in his big white British taxpayer-funded bird".

Make this man a symbolic figurehead for London tout se suite!

de suite bah

I would be more offende by that "big white chief" excerpt if it wasn't clearly being used as part of a scathing attack on the Prime Minister in question and presumably used with heavy irony.

I would be able to take the above defence a lot more seriously if it wasn't for the "piccaninnies" quote and, well, the fact that it's coming from Boris Johnson. Cunt.

I do wonder how much any of this will be used against him in any campaign, and more worrying, if it IS used against him, whether or not it will actually be damaging.

in a way it already is being used, just not directly. maybe mrs lawrence picked up the phone without prompting, but i wouldn't bet on it.

you can insinuate the shameful colonial history of the UK and how the PM's visit to the Congo represents a modern-day extension of it without using the words "piccaninnie" and "watermelon" and any politician with half a brain would have done so

Tracer - yeah of course, that's kind of what I was getting at.

NRW - Re Doreen Lawrence - If she didn't, would it invalidate her point?

The best thing to happen in this campaign would be a no-holds-barred dirty tricks-fest of the "grrr you hate black people", "grrr you hate Jews" variety. I doubt this will happen because both will be too concerned about playing up their respective charismatic personas to the press.

Quite how this will play at a time when charisma and charm seem to be going out of fashion in British politics in comparison to heavyweight seriousness (cf Cameron/Blair vs Brown) and I'm still claiming a plucky independent with the right cause could clean up.

The best thing to happen in this campaign would be a no-holds-barred dirty tricks-fest of the "grrr you hate black people", "grrr you hate Jews" variety

They did "grrr you hate brown people", "grrr you hate Jews" in Bethnal Green and Bow two years ago. It was shit.

"Re Doreen Lawrence - If she didn't, would it invalidate her point?"

no, but i'm just saying -- it's already so on, per the title.

Yeah the Jews lost out bigtime.

You can also read the above quote as the (hopefully used) biggest weapon against Boris that he is more interested in being a journalist and professional celebrity than he is in being a politician.

edited highlights of um someone's facebook friends submitted here as statistical proof of something or other:

Boris For Mayor ▪ VICE MAGAZINE ▪ emo people suck and should jump off a bridge and die ▪ If You Don't Like Peep Show, You're Probably Not Worth Knowing ▪

don't forget to vote for your Tory nominee heh heh

a madman rants

# Boris Johnson is MP for Henley drummer for Gay Dad

to be fair, that is one of the more sane articles he's written, really.

his 'buses don't hang on for mums with pushchairs or old ladies with shopping because they're not operating on a passenger increase=funding increase basis' reasoning and how much he's hingeing things on it is just...staggering.

he didn't want to lose potential voters by giving the real reason, ie bus drivers = bastards.

I see bus drivers waiting for running mums/businesswomen/elderly/youth all the time.

maybe it's just the likes of me that don't get waited for.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/comedy/fastshow/characters/images/unlucky_alf2.jpg

ken attacks

i wish ken would stop with the 'has the most vibrant cultural life of any capital' baloney tho

i can probably accept the 'buses cost more because there are more, better buses' thing. makes more sense than whatever johnson is spouting about at least.

woah, ken is on a 'law and order' tip.

london is a crazy place and to be honest given that it's the capital of the capitalist world, home to innumerable non-dom, non-tax paying billionaire crooks, with its housing market structured accordingly; of course it should be run by a soi-disant socialist rather than, you know, a tory. that's the british way.

i wish ken would stop with the 'has the most vibrant cultural life of any capital' baloney tho

thatsracist.gif

"a faster role out"? ken: geddan editah

Now it's for real!

warwick lightfoot?! i would have voted for him (her?) on spec.

Yeah, I mentioned him upthread - once again bumped by the famous name. I would imagine he would have done better (marginally) if it had been a Conservative Party only poll.

http://www.rbkc.gov.uk/YourCouncil/YourCouncillor/lightfoot2.jpg

lol

I kind of feel sorry for him - he looks so optimistic on his website
http://www.lightfootforlondon.com/

The job of the Mayor is simple - to get people to work on time, to ensure people feel safe on the streets...
http://image.guardian.co.uk/sys-images/Society/Pix/pictures/2007/09/03/BorisJohnsontwo128.jpg

http://www.masonicinfo.com/images/mussolini_hitler.jpg

I'm sorry, I know it was obvious...

But seriously, what are his chances? I find it very difficult to gauge Ken's popularity. Obviously Johnson feels his best bet is winning the 'burb vote.

Ken Livingstone 4/7
Boris Johnson 2/1
Brian Paddick 25/1

And what were the odds on him winning last time?

Ken, that is, obv.

I might put a coupla quid on Boris if those are the current odds

what's the total turnout, and how does it break down, is the big question. in a nebulous sense probably more londoners would vote ken. but which londoners will actually vote is the thing.

Andrew Boff is a great name

i love the way that victoria borwick's surname can be frankensteined out of the other two also-rans' names. identikit conservatives!

and add a 'w'

omg if boris does a speech saying "i looked up myself on facebook and found the group "boris johnson is a fucking tory for christ's sake"" then all these years on ilx will have paid off.

Yes.

http://www.facebook.com/s.php?q=boris+johnson&init=q

First result!

Or is that cos I'm in it?

It's because you're in it.

using another login it would seem it is 5th

If Boris actually gets elected that group's gonna have to become an organisational hub for hunting down and maiming the members of the pro-Boris groups.

how does a mayor make a city more or less "multicultural" anyway?
short of ethnic cleansing, i don't see how this is possible.

More to the point how do you do it in a city where 1/3 of people living here weren't evn born in this country let alone within the city limits.

And at least they actually live there 24/7

I sincerely hope Boris comes third or 4th.

too high

well yes, what I would like is for him to fall under the wheels of a number 15 bus but this is less liukely to happen.

Is that the 15 (heritage) or the bog standard one?

A Routemaster would be sweet indeed

A bendy bus would be more fitting.

Or being smashed in two by a revenge sumo headbutt from that German dude he maimed in the football match, whichever

the group "boris johnson is a fucking tory for christ's sake" is packed with crypto-tory cunts talking about how rich people get where they are cos they work bloody hard at it. i guess i'm not a "big tent" kind of guy.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/apr/03/livingstone.boris

ooooo

Ken's going to win this

They really have been making an effort to tidy Boris' hair.

I don't know what to do. I don't really want to vote for Ken, but I suspect that a vote for anyone else is essentially a vote for Boris anyway.

People stupid enough to base their vote on what the leader writer of the Standard tells them rather than their own first-hand experience and observations deserve the Mayor they get.

I met Boris once. He was exactly the same as his public persona. I'm having a hard time understanding how anyone could think he could be competent as a mayor, never mind his politics.

Tory support is highest in Outer London

Phear the Bushey Bible Belt.

I don't know what to do. I don't really want to vote for Ken, but I suspect that a vote for anyone else is essentially a vote for Boris anyway.

erm, single transferable vote.

What does that mean?

I predict Ken will scrape it. I also predict that whatever the outcome is, it won't make a vast ammount of difference to the average Londoner's life.

if boris does what he promises, it will, in the negative. but he won't.

actulaly it's "supplementary vote"

if you don't vote boris or ken (and assuming they'll end up as top two), you can put one of them as a "second preference" and your vote will go to that.

God, English politics is more confusing than cricket. Sorry for being a dummy, this is the first election I've ever been legally allowed to vote in, in my life.

It's peculiar to council/mayoral elections - you only get one main vote in the generals.

So I can actually vote for the Nigel Havers Alliance or the Monster Raving Loony Party or whatever, but if whoever I choose doesn't get close, my vote can default to Ken rather than Boris?

Yes.

Be interesting to see how the LibDem second votes break down.

OK, that's awesome. Who on earth shall I vote for?

but kate i thought you <3 boris

It makes the whole process rather more tactical. The Greens, for example, are advising their supporters to put Ken as second choice.

we all heart boris in a way. but at the same time think he's a vile, moronic tory cunt.

Be interesting to see how the LibDem second votes break down.

-- Matt DC, Thursday, April 3, 2008 11:25 AM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

43% to Boris, 30% to Ken, according to Yougov.

I don't even like his personal, I hate affable toffs.

(xpost lol LibDems outed)

Persona, even.

(xpost lol LibDems outed)

Too right

I want to make the sexing with Boris. I do NOT want to have him responsible for decisions that affect me or the city I live in, in any way, shape or form. I mean, I wouldn't elect Sonic Boom mayor of London, either! (Despite the "drugs and analogue synths for all" platform being a clear winner.)

Hott or not, I think my hand would physically cramp up and start twitching if I even tried to force it to vote for an Tory.

I guess it's Sian Berry, then. That was easy.

(xpost lol LibDems outed)

Too right

Indeed they are.

'Right as opposed to left' as opposed to 'right as opposed to wrong' iykwim

I heart Boris in the sense that I would like it if he died

Be interesting to see how the LibDem second votes break down.
-- Matt DC, Thursday, April 3, 2008 11:25 AM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Link
43% to Boris, 30% to Ken, according to Yougov.

so that makes it what? 24 extra votes to Boris and 18 to Ken amirite lololoolololol etc

I heart Boris in the sense that I would like it if he died

on the same day as Thatcher and the Queen preferably

Thatcher and the Queen dying on the same day would be beyond awesome, Thatch would be totally eclipsed!

In a bendy bus crash caused by Jim Davidson's reckless driving.

xpost

Thatcher and the Queen dying on the same day would be beyond awesome, Thatch would be totally eclipsed!

Bit like how Mother Teresa dying was eclipsed by Diana dying in the same week - well here in Godless Protestant Britain at least

"she was the people's parasite..."

Then again Thatcher's resignation defeat in 1990 bumped Khomeini's death off the front page so there'll be a few wanting revenge...

So many wicked people revelling in the prospect of a fellow human being's death. I am uncertain as to what she did that was so morally repugnant anyway, or in what sense decent folk would have been better off had she failed to be elected.

Wicked, wicked people, that's us.

1,2,3,4, get with the wicked

We started off as Decent Folk but ended up as Wicked People, thanks to Thatcher

http://www.fastfloors.com/media/catalog/Wood_Floors/Pioneered_Wood/Concord_Knotty_Pine/Concord_Knotty_Pine.jpg http://www.stalking-pages.co.uk/images/drfox.jpg

wood doctor? unlucky

So many wicked people revelling in the prospect of a fellow human being's death.

Like Thatcher did in the Falklands "war."

It's getting so hard to spot satire in here

I met Boris once.

I was supposed to have dinner with him (and 300 other people, but he was supposed to be sat at my table) but the rude bastard turned up late, did his flustered toff act for a few minutes and left. Ian Hislop was quite annoyed by his rudeness.

i saw him at highbury fields once. he was talking on his phone to someone.

he was quite fat

Yeah, I know it's silly but the fact is that the bastard uses this buffoon bollocks to hide the fact that he's an old school arrogant tory twat who pretty much thinks he can do what he likes and people will love him. And they do.

I've saw him lots of times. On his bike. Jogging. Wandering about aimlessly.

This blog probably best sums up my problems with Johnson, although admittedly I do wish for a more appealing vote than Ken, but what are you gonna do?

He's one of the few Tories with actual face/name recognition power in the general public, so on that count, his schtick has clearly worked.

I'm actually kind of glad, in a weird way, that he did run for Mayor because, well - I used to think "oh, he's not really a proper Tory, ha ha, he's so cute and loveable and rides a bike and all!" but the moment he started actually opening his mouth and publicising his views, well, there they were. Cured me of that idea post haste.

Still fancy him, though.

Well THAT certainly got my office's attention. s-post

A friend and I heckled Boris from the public gallery of the commons once. We were there on an economics trip and chose to call "Booooooooooooris. Booooooooooris." at him. Not imaginiative but did get his attention. And us thrown out.

i'm going to become really fat in 4 years' time and run for mayor and win.

red ken vs fat ken

Fat Ken gets my vote!

If you maintain your message board presence would that make you the Fat Ken Troller?

http://davehill.typepad.com/london3ms/

dave hill keeping a very good mayor blog here.

http://torytroll.blogspot.com/2008/04/bnp-say-back-boris.html

http://www.stopboris.org/

i might use LOLRUS festival as a launchpad for mayor 2012 campaign

http://icanhascheezburger.files.wordpress.com/2007/05/lolrus-prezidenshul-candida.jpg

omg roflsburg

lolololol boris did coke! ken has five kids!

ken's quote is choice:

"I don't think anybody in this city is shocked about what consenting adults do. As long as you don't involve children, animals or vegetables they leave people to get on and live their own life in their own way."

i'm sure he's a great father to all three sets of kids and everything, but this is typical ken arrogance -- kind of saying f u and yr bourgeois morality to potential voter. of course, ken often sucks up to people who care *very much* what consenting adults do but hey-ho.

Not siding with Ken, but f bourgeois morality tho.

i'm kind of indifferent on that score. if everyone's happy, kudos. im just saying, as a populist politician, it's kind of a dick move.

Yeah it is but one of the many things I don't dig about politicians is sucking on the cock of popular morality.

I think that's a pretty good way of killing the issue there and then - BoJo has been a bit of a shagger in his time as well and is unlikely to attack on those lines, while it goes "haha you and your ridiculous overmoralising" to the media.

the media is only part of the "ridiculous overmoralising". people wouldn't buy rothermere titles if they didn't go in for it themselves. because he looks like an idiot and because no kids were involved, BJ's serial shagging is probably less of a liability. large swathes of london are made up of not so liberal types -- not that ken doesn't go in for ridiculous overmoralising or a certain form when it suits him.

There's always the Darius Guppy stuff

The only reason there were no kids involved in Boris's shagging is because he paid for an abortion. They're both potential liabilities on this score, which is why they've agreed not to attack along these lines.

I like Ken's statement and can't see why you have a problem with it

I hate BJ, like KL, so perhaps that explains my attitude

actually, KL's siring all these kids makes me like him all the more, given the woes and worries catalogued on 'Do You Want To Have Kids?' thread -- on a issue said by all to be scary, he has been courageous ... 5 times

Think of his poor womb.

i need to do some serial shagging before i stand for mayor in 2012

probably should do that before i become very fat too

johnson isn't so fat these days, and livingston never has been as far as i know

they can have as many rugrats as they like provided they all have to carry oyster cards if they wanna ride the bus for free

large swathes of london are made up of not so liberal types

How many of these people are likely to be voting for Ken? I mean, it's a pretty calculated comment masquerading as an off-the-cuff joke, Ken knows that *his* support is unlikely to be eroded that much.

has it been revealed yet as to which way do BJ/KL wipe?

pinefox, i guess it's because "As long as you don't involve children, animals or vegetables they leave people to get on and live their own life in their own way" the use of vegetables seems to make mock of the notion that we should try to not to "involve" children.

we don't know what they're "involved" in in his case so maybe he was editorializing too far anyway.

and for someone who regards driving a big car as immoral, it's a bit rich.

How many of these people are likely to be voting for Ken? I mean, it's a pretty calculated comment masquerading as an off-the-cuff joke, Ken knows that *his* support is unlikely to be eroded that much.

-- Matt DC, Friday, April 4, 2008 4:46 PM (49 seconds ago) Bookmark Link

yeah i see that, but to win elections you need to reach outside your base? i don't know -- if i were a politician i probably wouldn't go out of my way to pointlessly alienate potential voters but he seems to do alright.

and for someone who regards driving a big car as immoral, it's a bit rich.

he has 5 kids with different mums so that he wouldn't have to drive them to school all in the same car innit.

everyone seems to be glossing over the possibility of these children being ken/newt hybrids

http://www.best-horror-movies.com/images/Aliens-newt.jpg

That's some sick shit dude.

so you think his statement suggests paedophilia is OK, and that's why you don't like it?

I don't think that's what he was trying to say.

'immoral' is a strong word, but KL is correct to think that some vehicles are more needlessly polluting than others, and has been bold in trying to do something very practical about this problem. I'm glad about this and I think it is another reason to vote for him. (exact results, nuances and implications of congestion charge no doubt = a complex topic in itself)

I think it's maybe more immoral to do unnecessarily terrible things to the natural environment than to have consenting relationships with other people, which change and end, and are, I would generally think, private

so you think his statement suggests paedophilia is OK, and that's why you don't like it?

no.

i don't know what he means by 'involve' tbh, hence my scare-quotes.

pinefox are you trying to say that you're going to be voting based on the candidates' abilities to apply practical and effective strategies to improve the living standards of london, as opposed to who has fewer illegitimate children?

I think banry thinks fathering kids "involves" them, and he has a point. But yeah, kudos to Ken for introducing a tax that disproportiantely affects poor people.

I think it's maybe more immoral to do unnecessarily terrible things to the natural environment than to have consenting relationships with other people, which change and end, and are, I would generally think, private

-- the pinefox, Friday, April 4, 2008 4:58 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Link

ech, either it's private or it isn't pinefox! i'm, as i said, indifferent; so i'm not going to moralize about it either way. the car thing is purely about revenue and of not much significance to the fate of the environment. calling it "unnecessarily terrible" is hyperbolic -- the difference between big and small cars doesn't justify it. i don't and can't drive so i'm ok saying this, i think.

but i thought "small cars" are getting a reduction in the fees.

£2 reduction in fees compared to likely average income of big car/small car owners = lulz, insult, injury

So BJ took coke as a teenager. Rich bastard.

exactly

I think it's time someone posted that picture of teenage toff Boris at Oxford!

wonder when cameron will have to take this particular plunge

What a haircut?

There seem to be nuff fuckwits in this country who like the firm smack of patrician authority for the poshness not to be an ish.

http://img.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2007/02_1/CameronEton_600x539.jpg

Oh god, yes.

No 7 is the best, he's some kind of uber-toff.

£2 reduction in fees compared to likely average income of big car/small car owners = lulz, insult, injury

don't understand this bit.. explain?

Nah, 5 is the toffiest toff. I want to know who the unnumbered dude next to Boris is - he's definitely the most attractive. I guess he never ended up in politics.

no 7 is DAN from alan partridge

I swear my brother went to school with no. 6.

xxxpost

The charge disproportionately hits people on low incomes, like all indirect taxes, right? So giving peeps a reduction for smaller cars still means people on lower incomes pay more, as a proportion of their income, than wealthier people who are likely to be driving big cars and will happily pay a pittance for their right to do so.

Or can afford to buy another smaller car just to get cheaper drive round London fees.

I keep seeing that new Citroen advert and thinking it's a Tory PPB.

I don't understand Banriquit's POV

pollution is bad and it's generally good when people try to do things to stop it

terrible things happen to the natural environment, as result of human actions; it is not in the least hyperbolic to say this

It's a congestion charge, not a pollution charge.

so what you're saying is that they're not making a big enough step in the reducing small car + hit big car thing?

reducing fee for small car i mean

Pretty much every tax that isn't income tax disproportionately affects the poor - some people have more money to use to their advantage than others; unfortunate, but that's the way it is for the time being. The congestion charge is not a Thatcherite ploy to fleece the less fortunate, it's a way of disuading people from using private vehicles in Central London, which is a good thing. A handful of people are hit unfairly hard by it, I'm sure, but that's unavoidable, and I'm convinced it remains a postive thing for the city on the whole.

and the charge is about driving through the congestion charge zone still, right? i guess poor people who live within the congestion charge zone gets it bad..

pollution is bad and it's generally good when people try to do things to stop it

terrible things happen to the natural environment, as result of human actions; it is not in the least hyperbolic to say this

-- the pinefox, Friday, April 4, 2008 5:26 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

three separate justifications exist for the charge: congestion (the original justification), revenue (paddick says this is ken's real reason), and the environment -- ken's current public justification.

restricting transport in central london is less than a drop in the ocean in terms of global warming. it's nothing. to quibble about big or small cars is even more absurd.

far far far more has to be done -- you sound like a puffed-up idiot saying it's 'not in the least hyperbolic' to think that making drivers pay a few quid to drive in a few square miles of one city matters a damn.

I generally don't like indirect taxation because of this bias against poorer people, ken. I don't live in London and I don't know what an ideal solution would look like, but I'd say if cities are serious about reducing traffic pollution they'll have to be more draconian i.e. near-compulsory park and ride schemes; and if you go the pay to play route then yeah there should be a system that's closer to being equally discouraging for all drivers.

So I disagree with chap then but I'm basically a socialist.

B: I'm not quibbling about big or small cars - I know nothing about them

I think that policies that reduce driving / traffic / pollution, anywhere, are good

and that it may take bold politics to achieve these, and KL has done that

no, it's not in the least hyperbolic to say what I said, which was: humanity does terrible things to the only planet it has - this is a fact. so it's good when someone tries to reverse or limit these in any way

sounds like you don't think any of us should do anything, pro-environment, in our own lives. OK, up to you, but others will differ

you don't sound very nice, above - that's a pity, and quite surprising to me

I have socialist leanings myself, I just think singling out the CC as being part of some malevolent Capitalistic agenda is absurd. Maybe I'm being naive, but I think the intent behind it is good.

xpost

I don't care about intent, I'm interested in effect. Indirect taxation seems very, very unsocialist to me.

The environment, for some people, has become a kind of "somebody please think of the children!" trump card. But capitalism has played a good healthy part in fucking it up, so I think it's reasonable to be suspicious of a little bit of capitalist tinkering providing a serious solution: it's more profitable to pollute.

how redistributive does a congestion charge have to be? shouldn't it be judged a success by how much it actually reduces congestion?

the identification of big car = rich, small car = not rich has a ton of holes in it, too, btw

you can kind of only tax a couple things at a time: where you drive (simple enough), how big the car is (yup), AND how much money you have (uh ok)?

I think I used enough "generally"s to make it clear I wasn't saying all big car owners = ver rich. Of course all small cars = not necessarily less polluting, too. If a congestion charge reduces congestion then yeah, it's done its job. But Ken, who probably still likes to think of himself as a socialist, ought to be aware of how his charge works. If you're wealthy enough, you can still drive into the centre of London as much as you want. If you're poorer, you can't. Maybe this isn't discrimination. Looks like it tho.

I think your beef is with THE SYSTEM rather than this small and relatively benign part of it. As I said earlier, rich people can afford to do more stuff. Hopefully that will change one day, but that just has to be taken as a given the way things are at the moment.

helenlovejoy.jpg

no, it's not in the least hyperbolic to say what I said, which was: humanity does terrible things to the only planet it has - this is a fact. so it's good when someone tries to reverse or limit these in any way

sounds like you don't think any of us should do anything, pro-environment, in our own lives. OK, up to you, but others will differ

reading comprehension time: you said that to drive in central london is to do "unnecessarily terrible things to the natural environment". this is plainly so far out of proportion to be hyperbolic. where do chinese coaul-burning power stations rate on your scale of environmental doom?

thinking driving a bigger car as opposed to a smaller one is of any global significance involves a dose of bad faith.

and in general thinking stopping people who can't afford a fee from driving in central london will have any effect on climate change is lunatic, and the charge was not introduced to do this.

sounds like you don't think any of us should do anything, pro-environment, in our own lives.

quite the opposite, to the extent that i haven't learned to drive. i think much bigger efforts are needed.

proportion AS to be , chinese

coal

since when did having a car become a basic right? It's always been a luxury. Having a car in the city, no matter if big or small, means you're rich. The rest of us use public transport.

Also even if the real motive isn't helping the environment, London should be commended for trying to get rid of cars. If you've been to any Asian city lately, you'll know you can hardly breathe because of the traffic.

Having a car in the city, no matter if big or small, means you're rich.

this is stupid, not been true for a very long time.

no-one is calling car ownership a 'basic right', but, on the other hand, i'm unclear where the right comes from for arbitrary taxation.

Results 1 - 3 of 3 for eco-calvinism. (0.14 seconds)

reading comprehension time: you said that to drive in central london is to do "unnecessarily terrible things to the natural environment". this is plainly so far out of proportion to be hyperbolic. where do chinese coaul-burning power stations rate on your scale of environmental doom?

i think who ever becomes London Mayor should try and introduce a congestion charge in China. is that what you're saying?

thinking driving a bigger car as opposed to a smaller one is of any global significance involves a dose of bad faith

seems like you're talking about any individual as opposed to millions of individuals ie a big enough number for car size/economy to actually become an issue no?

yeah, but charging the consumer for driving a big car-rather-than-small makes it about personal choice -- and we're not going to turn things around that way. to make it real they have to hit Big Carbon.

(and the reduction of car use in central ldn during the daytime is still a tiny gesture.)

Lets have those stats for car ownership for the lowest income groups then NRQ.

Also, you ridiculous contention regarding the point(lessness) of the congestion charge is laughable. No-one is saying that it will change the world, but that it is important to take what steps one can, where you can. Claiming they made all the difference is idiotic; claiming that they make no difference is asinine.

The only people who think differently, of course, are new labour ministers, tories, and academic posturers who make nice sounding points on messageboards but are strangers to actual political engagement in the real world. Which one are you?

oooooooooooooooooh

Lets have those stats for car ownership for the lowest income groups then NRQ.

haha you dick, your guy said "only rich people" have cars. not "people above the lowest income groups" (which groups btw?). get your head out of the 1930s.

idea that only the rich own cars is palpably absurd. by all means, let's have those stats.

i don't know what your "actual political engagement in the real world" credentials are -- but this is a pretty fruitless line of argument to pursue: most people have no practical engagement. they are still entitled to think that pinefox's comment was hyperbolic.

if you think the charge -- which i'm not even against as such -- is about saving the environment yr a bigger idiot than i already thought.

i don't know what your "actual political engagement in the real world" credentials are

he predicted alan johnson would succeed tony blair

Alol Johnsontory

anyway, to answer the question, i'm a new labour minister.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/apr/14/charliebrooker.boris

Calvin Trillin's take:

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/04/14/080414fa_fact_trillin

(I guess they're not sharing the whole article.)

I'm genetically predisposed to hate the Tories. It's my default, hard-wired position.

except blonde and pretty ones if i hear right.

But Boris isn't that pretty

That C Brooker piece pretty much sums up my feelings on the matter.

The extent to which Ken's caught up with Boris in the polls should be alarming for the Tories. The Evening Standard needs to have a humdinger of a story up its sleeve I think.

Also "too close to call" elections usually fall to the incumbent, right?

Fuck the Standard, they were quite happy to employ his partner for years.

I think the STV voting system favours that. Also Mr Johnson is having to open his mouth more and more which was always going to be the problem for him.

xpost

Which way is the Sun leaning?

Tee hee! Boris has had an affair! Arf! Now he's offended the whole of Liverpool! Crumbs! He used the word "picaninnies"! Yuk yuk! He's been caught on tape agreeing to give the address of a reporter to a friend who wants him beaten up!

8 million bald people fighting over two combs.

Which way is the Sun leaning?

http://img.thesun.co.uk/multimedia/archive/00468/breast_mayor_468206a.jpg

except blonde and pretty ones if i hear right.

-- banriquit, Monday, 14 April 2008 09:18 (1 hour ago) Bookmark Link

Courtney Love isn't a Tory. Or pretty

http://politicalbetting.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/04/standard-yg-poll.JPG

is that just the Standard's own poll? i have trouble believing Boris was ever really that far ahead in enough Londoner's minds - but wilful optimism maybe

I think the standard's polling sample is the 17:37 Waterloo to Epsom.

The extent to which Ken's caught up with Boris in the polls should be alarming for the Tories. The Evening Standard needs to have a humdinger of a story up its sleeve I think.

-- Matt DC, Monday, 14 April 2008 09:21 (2 days ago) Bookmark Link

So yeah, what's this I hear about Ken's campaign being run by a guy who loves suicide bombing?

i wouldn't mind that, but running it out of the nonce wing of wormwood scrubs... has he no respect?

What does current Scrubs lanky jailbird with hat on Pete Doherty have to say about all this?

Use of the word 'runs' in the headline might be overstating it a bit:

An advocate of suicide bombing is among leaders of a group trying to mobilise Muslim voters to back Ken Livingstone, the Standard reveals today.

For the past year, the group has been working on a strategy to win an estimated 200,000 Muslim votes in an effort to re-elect the Mayor.

It includes a campaign of vilification aimed at his Conservative rival, Boris Johnson. It is being waged by Muslims 4 Ken, led by 39-year-old lecturer Anas Altikriti and Palestinian-born Azzam Tamimi, a supporter of Hamas, the militant group dedicated to the creation of an Islamic state of Palestine.

While Mr Altikriti says he abhors violence and favours dialogue to further the Muslim cause, Mr Tamimi has praised suicide bombers and said he would volunteer for a suicide mission in Palestine.

"For us Muslims martyrdom is not the end of things, but the beginning of the most wonderful of things," he has said. "If I can go to Palestine and sacrifice myself I would do it. Why not?"

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard-mayor/article-23478705-details/Suicide+bomb+backer+runs+Ken%27s+campaign/article.do

'Muslims 4 Ken' is a blog hosted on blogspot.com, by the way, not an "Islamic alliance backing Ken's campaign".

The Evening Standard enters the 20th century. Well done, them.

BORIS PLEDGES: "NO JAY-Z GIGS IN LONDON ON MY WATCH"

Boris: "There's a new music that's taking over the country..."

it's amazing in a way that the ES has held back as much as it has -- they could hit ken's economic adviser john ross and the otehr ex-socialist action menks a lot harder if they wanted. perhaps they're holding back on that.

Boris wants to ban drinking on the tube. Now I dunno about anyone else, but I think most people who are drunk and causing trouble on the tube probably were already drunk when they got on there.

I just called my local authority to confirm I don't need a polling card to vote, cos the fuckers still haven't sent me one. Luckily I don't need one, and apparently don't even need to bring ID with me to vote!

i've drunk on trains so it's probably better to not be hypocritical and just say they should ban rowdy, sport-liking fuckwits rather than drink per se.

What's it got to do with liking sport?

I'm biased because I personally enjoy having a beer on the tube, and will be mightily annoyed if I'm to be arrested for doing so.

I think it's already technically illegal to drink alcohol on tubes anyway, just not enforced.

there does seem to be some correlation between the two, tom, but yeah i was basically trolling there.

Enrique gets a little tearful when there are nasty rough working class men near him on public transport.

even a stopped clock^^

(tho i was gonna put 'rugby-shirt wearing' initially -- aaaaaaaah)

the amount of time it takes to get from east to west on the Hammersmith+City (yes, I know i shouldn't bother with the H+C anyway) without a bottle or two i'd sober up by the time I got home. can't be having that.

What the fuck is Michael Philip Philip Philip philip Annoyman's problem?

banriquit is Michael Philip Philip Philip philip Annoyman's problem

lady if you have to ask

I'd like Ken FTW but does this really affect anyone outside the M25?

Yes because voting for Boris = letting the Nazis in BY THE FRONT DOOR

i'm sad i missed Johnson's "I'm down the with ethnics, you can't out-ethnic me" trolling on Asian Network, as referred to on The Politics Show

i can't get with this 'beer on the tube' mindset tho

ok by me if they ban champagne-sloshed toffs on bicycles too.

beer on the tube is almost as good as beer in the shower

very few things are as good as beer in the shower.

Smoking in the shower

Glass of wine in the bath

A good zing

If Boris wins will it give the Cameron bandwagon momentum? Or will he be worried that Boris will fuck up badly and spoil it for Nu Con?

ok by me if they ban champagne-sloshed toffs on bicycles too.

Banriquit not gonna be pleased with this one.

I usually have my slave serve me Pimms on the train, will this be banned too?

Depends where they're pouring it, I guess.

I just called my local authority to confirm I don't need a polling card to vote, cos the fuckers still haven't sent me one. Luckily I don't need one, and apparently don't even need to bring ID with me to vote!

*ponders strategic trip to london*

seriously, fuck one boris.

joyously, an old friend of mine got to take the piss out of boris and his campaign manager today. to their faces. for some time.

london, FFS, don't vote for him. i know ken's a tit, but he's NOT BORIS.

.... to vote Boris is to..

A vote for Boris Johnson is a vote for Fascism. May God have mercy on your soul if you vote Conservative.

And I mean that most sincerely folks.

Anyone watch newsnight yesterday? thoughts?

it was short-sighted of labour to bring in the idea of a mayor; it's come to represent the future fortunes of the party. london is disproportionately labour, so a win is not that much of an achievement, and a lose comes to look like a BFD (and, well, it will be). all this over a guy whose main job is rimming developers and running the buses.

A vote for Boris Johnson is a vote for Fascism. May God have mercy on your soul ruthlessly sodomise you with a bale of barbed wire for all eternity if you vote Conservative.

And I mean that most sincerely folks.

london is disproportionately labour

whoah ... explain please?

If only Brian Paddick didn't feel the need to impersonate a stuffed bear every time he's on TV.

in the GE london isn't exactly a 'swing state'.

xpost

so the symbolic value of labour winning is far less than that of a tory winning.

yeah, read it again and got the meaning second time. At first i thought you were implying London ought to vote con/lib but somehow always ended up Labour.

it's been a very strange election campaign, at least seen from outside, almost entirely based on the two candidates slandering each other. there probably are a few people who would vote for a candidate on the grounds that they'll raise the congestion charge to £25 for people in big cars, just as there might be a few weirdos who want to see the routemaster back. but most of the slanging has been about who's a bigger racist/anti-semite/islamophobe/useful idiot of islamists.

I do get the impression that they're like two good mates trading banter though. Its more a sense of who can ridicule the other in the most creative way than the knives really being out

aka the London Election Zing Crew

the real arguing is done by proxy -- cf a million evening standard articles about ken's trot cronyism and a million guardian pieces on boris using the word 'picaninnies'.

The Standard headline boards are the worst aspect of this campaign.

otm

I do get the impression that they're like two good mates trading banter though

definitely. some back-slapping as they walked off the set at the end of last night's Question Time.

The Standard headline boards are the worst aspect of this campaign.

i have been sorely tempted to grab these and through them in the thames, when greeted by them at waterloo station

I have been sorely tempted to grab the Evening Standard leader writers and throw them in the Thames, but it's a bit of a walk from High Street Ken.

High Street Ken vs Red Ken

Just got a Boris-promoting leaflet through my door in which he boasts he's going to withdraw the free bus passes of all the young people who break the Behaviour Code on buses. I really wish he meant he was going to confiscate them personally and I would have liked to have seen him fecking try.

I hope Boris and people intending to vote for him know that this is already the case.

I hope Boris and people intending to vote for him die.

There is one photo in the leaflet that drips smugness. He is SMIRKING in it! Which either means his pr peeps are really thick or they really are playing up to the lovable buffoon thing.

I might burn it, actually, it's ruining my afternoon.

Fuck, the galloway bus just came by and I had nothing to throw.

you should have thrown yourself

The fucking Galloway bus went past me again on Saturday, dude is stalking me clearly.

Are people really going to vote for Boris because he's "funny"?

He's not funny

He's "funny".

I'm hoping that there are very few who would vote for him only for that reason.

The lib dems have put three leaflets through my letterbox in the last two days. Live in Hounslow, where apparently EVEN KEN would vote lib dem (so they're claiming). There are a whole load of charts explaining why this is the case but...ahem, recycle bin.

i wonder if anyone is voting for sian berry 'cos she's quite fit'

me

Hmm, can't decide:

http://www.green-engage.co.uk/SianBerry2forweb.pdf.jpg

Berry does look attractive, when I see pictures of her.

I don't believe in "'funny'". Either you're funny or you're not. BJ is not.

Are people really going to vote for Boris because he's "funny"?

Believe this is called getting the student vote.

she is fittest out of the four.

i would vote green anyway, out of contempt.

But there aren't any other reasons to vote FOR Boris are there? (As opposed to voting against Ken.)

All of the London students on my course who I've asked about Boris/Ken say they are heading back to uni this week and are therefore not heading back to London again to vote.

(Even though their university is only in Surrey.)

members of my family are actively campaigning for boris :(

To suggest a possible answer to Tracer: incipient Toryism still the love that dare not speak its name, especially amongst under 40s, so "because he's funny" may well be cover-phrase for "because I am repellent Tory shitebag".

I was going to put Green as my 2nd choice, but I'm not sure after that whole "taking a taxi is greener than taking an empty bus, even though the bus is going to run anyway you stupid twat" thing. I guess Paddick might as well get it, it's not going to matter anyway.

not sure many people vote FOR ken, do they, as opposed to against boris?

^^

Yeah, when I hold my nose and tick the Labour box for our local elections on Thursday it's not cos I want to dick-ride Gordon Brown et al.

i wasn't going to vote anyway but turns out i will be in london rather than where im registered so fortunately i go through this teflon style.

Well Boris wasn't running in the last mayoral election and Ken managed to get in.

The only real problem I see with Ken is that he rolls over for any property developer with a business card. But his "rule" that 50% of all new housing be affordable is unheard of in, say, the US for instance, and mitigates this for me some.

I will vote for the Labour candidate and against the Conservative one.

I suppose I will tick second preference Green though I guess that won't do them any good.

Let's hope for your sakes, London, that this whole Boris For Mayor stuff is just one elaborate Rickroll at everyone's expense.

For what it's worth, at the last election I voted in, I voted the Green candidate because she was a BBW. To my shock, she got voted in.

I heard some folks plan to tick Green first Ken second, claiming it will Send Ken A Message but not actually hinder his chances - the theory being that Boris won't get over 50% of 1st choice votes so all those 2nd choices will count for Ken. Does that makes sense? Strikes me as risky.

I briefly considered doing that, but it's not worth the risk. BORIS SURGES AHEAD IN POLLS etc.

In our local elections...

One very glossy/professional leaflet from the Tories,

One medium cost printed picture leaflet from LibDems, plus doorstep visit from candidate herself,

One photocopied a4 sheet (no pics), from Labour.

Guess which currently has no seats on our council, and aren't exactly holding breath...

I still wonder whether enough voters actually understand Second Transferable Vote to make this fannying around worthwhile.

Our current Lib Dem councillor is using the "tidal wave of ever more chummy, ever more horrible leaflets thru the door day after day after day", the Sean Hughes-looking crypto-Tory tossbag. Unfortunately I figure he'll keep his seat.

i like the idea of 'affordable housing', though it's aimed at people who earn "less than £60,000" which is not exactly the neediest sector of society! it's also skewed toward trad state employees, which i don't understand -- working for a "contractor" for the nhs,* doing work that the nhs used to do and has to do, i'm not sure why i'd be less eligible.

*it's more complex than that but...

incipient Toryism still the love that dare not speak its name, especially amongst under 40s

It feels like 1992 to me. All those liars who said they weren't going to vote for Major because it was slightly embarassing to admit it in public, once in the privacy of the polling booth, reverted to type.

Under STV it's OK to vote Greens 1, Ken 2 because Ken will get all those votes when the Green candidate is eliminated. Just make sure Boris is your last preference, alright?

Presumably a significant proportion of Boris's votes (whether he wins or loses) are gonna be anti-Labour rather than anti-Ken?

Fairly sensible of him to go purple rather than red for his campaign literature though.

As DC has just said - I'm not sure I understand the system. I'm less sure after the last few posts here. I think I'll just have to vote for Ken Livingstone and be happy with that.

I wonder if I know anyone who will vote for Boris. It is possible there could be one or two - but even those likely to vote Tory in next election might feel Johnson's inexperience rules him out.

He may be inexperienced but Boris is the candidate of CHANGE and HOPE.

YES

WE

CAN

Johnson did make me laugh last week. He was answering questions put to him by various people via youtube clips and when one hooded teenage boy did his turn Johnson responded by mocking the kid by going "Yeeah!" and an attempt at finger-snapping in a way that seemed more playful than anything else. But I'm easily amused.

I thought the transferable vote thing was fairly well-known but my boss (who studied political history and is always having 'discussions' with any foreign members of staff about what's going on over 'there') had no idea about it, and was slightly incredulous when I drunkenly tried to explain it the other day to him. So maybe not.

Looking at the results from 2000 and 2004 it seems most people do use the second vote, but they seem to use most of their 1st votes on the big three, and then spread it about with the secondary, which suggests people don't understand how it works.

Look here, a quick STV example for you stupid Englishers!

Say you vote like this:

1. Fit Greens Bird
2. That Gay Lib Dem Dude
3. (A Message To You) Ken
4. That Idiot Boris

Now let's say after the results come in that the Greens candidate has the least amount of votes. Well, all his votes get sent to the next preferred candidate on the voting slips. In that case it goes to the Lib Dem. Now it looks like this:

1. Lib Dem
2. (A Message To You) Ken
3. That Idiot Boris

Now with the final three, the Lib Dems have the least amount of votes. That means his votes including those second preferences from those originally voted Green will go to your NEXT preference on the voting slip...

1. (A Message To You) Ken
2. That Idiot Boris

Therefore, Ken gets your vote in the end yet a message has been sent to him. Ken stays Mayor with his lesson learnt whilst Boris goes on a profitable tour of Universities across the country with his LOLcat Powerpoint Slide Show.

YES, IT'S THAT SIMPLE

this background image amuses me too
http://www.backboris.com/images/header_blue.jpg

"hmmm, fillet mignon or the sea bass?"

Livingstone's result as an Independent in 2000 looks stunning to me.

Thanks, King Boy, for your help, but I'm still not sure I have got the hang of this, so I had better stay safe and simple as possible.

However, if you feel like just voting Green or Lib Dem, just give them the No. 1 and your preferences will be directed automatically according to their wishes. Which should mean it'll go to Ken instead of Boris (well, I hope for their sake).

yeah, ken winning against a tory nonentity who was dropped in after jeffrey archer got done for perjury was a real shock.

xpost

He won against a Labour nonentity as well! If by 'nonentity' you mean 'former cabinet minister'. Actually this goes for Norris as well.

no the shock was more his ability to undermine Labour (candidate) at the same time, as well as he did - crap tho Dobson also came across as. xp

did anyone here NOT vote Ken in BOTH of the previous elections?

Me - I didn't vote.

Mind you I wasn't eligible to vote in 2001 as I moved to London in June.

look at all you tourists

Terrible innit? Especially as the first Mayoral election was in 2000.

I was living in Oxford at the time, however, so couldn't vote.

Was it 2000? In that case I was even less eligible to vote.

Ah yes it was the General Election in 2001. Didn't vote in that either come to think of it. That's apathy for you.

"Donut mayor": good political meme/bad political meme?

I have been looking through a Mayoral Manifesto leaflet.

First up are the BNP. They begin: "Remember London the way it used to be? Clean, friendly and safe". I find this implausible. Does anyone remember such a London? It was doubtless cleaner re. pollution etc, but is possibly less polluted now than say 30 years ago? Not sure about this - but the river for instance. It's true that there is a lot of terrible behaviour in London, but I don't think that means it used to be friendly, or safe. I don't really remember it that way, having lived here most of my life.

They also quote a woman who says she is voting BNP because she's Irish and they care about 'the indigenous peoples of these islands'. I'm not sure this a coherent position. If they're the *British* National Party, then surely to stick up for Irish people in Britain is just opportunism on their part?

The BNP's logo looks ugly to me; maybe this just chimes with the sense that they are ugly in some deeper way too.

Lindsey German of left list looks old, though some of her policies sound decent.

The Tory manifesto features a load of BS language - 'Beef up the police presence' and 'Stretch the taxpayer pound'.

Sian Berry does look lovely! and she is younger than me, for heaven's sake. I would love her to be Mayor of London, I suppose.

Brian Paddick's yellow / purple colourscheme is odd. I do feel, though, that a veteran senior cop, who also considers himself a liberal, ought on the face of it to be a good candidate for running London.

Alan Craig stands for Christian Choice. He wants to champion people including the unborn. I was amused by his promise to 'End the (alleged) corruption at City Hall'. The legalistic (alleged) utterly undermines the force of the promise.

The English Democrats seem anti-Scottish - this seems obnoxious to me. I like Scotland.

Ken Livingstone comes last. The whole left page with just a picture of his weary old smiling face and not many words; the right page listing achievements and what needs to be done. I was struck by the authority of this presentation, against all the others. It stands out, visually, from them all. It confirms my affection for Ken Livingstone and my desire to see him elected.

"Remember London the way it used to be? Clean, friendly and safe"

http://www.imageandnarrative.be/illustrations/_img/greatplague.jpg

http://dustyloft.files.wordpress.com/2007/09/great_fire_london.jpg

http://www.portcities.org.uk/london/upload/img_400/H3222.jpg

but you could leave your door open and they loved their mums

I had exactly the same feeling about Ken's page in that pamphlet (although I thought he looked well cheesy in the photo). Just soooo much more pro than the others. V effective.

(Maybe he was going for the new austerity aesthetic.)

Goodness, that shot of a bombing plane is just remarkable.

That is nice to know, Zoe (austerity or no). I suppose my feeling about photos of him is different - I look at him and see a man in his 60s, his face sagging, bags under his eyes, most of his hair gone, no claim at all on glamour - just a sort of droopy-eyed smile, and a lot of wry knowledge and experience in his gaze. I like something about this - the way he can be an attractive candidate without being physically attractive? (Don't know where his 5 children etc fits with this.)

In what I've seen of debates, he's been calm and 'statesmanlike', perhaps deliberately against the table-thumping bombast he knew BJ would bring; I like this too. He impresses me; I realize that others don't share that response.

I got the booklet today! I guess I'll vote for the Green lady, not sure about the 20mph speed limit though.

Jel, I hope you will vote Ken 2nd. Though of course you may not want to listen to what anybody else hopes.

Lindsey German is "old", I guess. I wonder why she doesn't receive the same sympathetic words that Ken's wrinkled face provokes? I heard her speak once and I liked what she said.

You're right, Hand - I apologize for the inconsistency. I just don't feel like I am 'supporting' her in this election, so I am not turned on to sympathizing with her. And something puts me off her historically, re. SWP / Respect / whatever. I had never seen a picture of her before an hour or so ago, so it was a surprise to me, how old she looks. Like I said, maybe the policies are good. I don't think people should be disqualified because they're old, unless they really are too old.

Fantastic clip of Paxman owning Boris 'LOL U LEGERND!' Johnson: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5EujXtSlOwA

but is possibly less polluted now than say 30 years ago

I keep forgetting that 30 years ago was only the 70s. London (and every city in Britain) is cleaner than it was it the 1970s, don't let anyone tell you any different. Of course, the BNP is probably talking about the 50s, before all them dirty foreigners arrived with their smells and garlic breath.

The Great Smog of 1952-53 killed 12,000 people.

Also dog shit. And I know there is still a lot of dog shit but believe me it was worse in the 70s.

Ah but at least in the 70s it was white dog shit.

So the Standard is all "OMG BORIS SURGES INTO THE LEAD WE ARE SO CLOSE WE CAN TASTE THE PRECIOUSSSSSS" and Thelondonpaper says Ken has edged into the lead.

So basically, no one has a fucking clue who's going to win?

Also, that Paxman clip is astonishing, especially when he starts walking towards him.

Paxman in "fuck you, pay me" mode is still the funniest zingster on TV.

Incidentally, did anyone start a thread on Nigel Lawson's last Newsnight appearance/climate change denial/possible Alzheimer's? Paxman's opening salvo that night was spectacular.

i read the oddest review of his book by uber-leftist alex (or patrick) cockburn, saying lawson was a pussy for allowing the theory that co2 causes global warming. had no idea cockburn was that way inclined.

I think his scientific expertise is on a par with Lawson's.

The night of the Stern report, was that?

You're right, Paxman is heroic in scenarios like that BJ encounter - in a way he shouldn't have let him get away with it. Perhaps he didn't.

I think Ned T Rifle is right about London's dirty past.

i will be glad when it's over, whatever cunt wins.

I won't. I will be happy if KL wins, and unhappy if BK wins.

that is, BJ.

Think it was later than the actual release of the report, but Lawson was certainly very critical of it, without being able to articulate why. A lot of comparisons to the David Kelly affair tossed about.

Anyway, it's here on Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=74E2D6oNSHc

What makes me laugh the most is that Viz regularly run stories about authors with controversial theories who are clearly pathetic fantasists who've written their book after a heavy night in the pub. Lawson is v. reminiscent of this, especially his ray-gun idea.

Mathew d'Ancona, class traitor and defender of the downtrodden, backs Ken for Mayor.

Not really.

i clicked on it anyway because i like the song

No rickrolls from me I'm afraid - it's all too serious attempt to make Boris sound heavyweight...

Imagine Giuliani’s ‘zero tolerance’ of crime woven into Disraelian Toryism: Robocop with a sense of compassion.

I was interested in this 'fact' - that there are now nearly twice as many robberies with violence a year in London than in the larger city of New York - anyone know where this comes from?

Robocop had a sense of compassion. I'll assume the rest of his puff piece is that badly researched. Amateur.

xpost

I think it comes from the NYPD shooting random people sitting quietly in their car.

Imagine London as a Tory stronghold against the Gordon Empire, with Boris as our clean-shaven Asterix. And — unlike the PM — he would have an electoral mandate

I'm no big fan of Brown but this "he doesn't have a mandate" stuff just makes me want to shout 'FUCK OFF' repeatedly.

he doesn't have a mandate

more like man-date if the rumours are true

"rumours"

Who is Paxman voting for?

Spectator might be slightly biased there.

ya fink?

that Paxman pwning of Boris was a treat. The way he steps down from the plinth and then, instead of persisting with his question in the manner of the Michael Howard interview, just dismisses him as an utterly contemptible moron that we all know he is.... supoib.

^^^

http://youtube.com/watch?v=5EujXtSlOwA

"i despair"

this is one bj i do not want lol!!!!!!

i don't see the fuss about the Johnson thing there. Paxman was deliberately needling pedantically for a figure but it felt more of an obstruction rather than some much needed expose of Johnson incompetence. it's pretty obvious why Johnson didn't want to specify an amount (not just his tendency to fudge the maths) and 'it'll cost the same as whatever Ken wants to do' is a standard fob-off so it just felt pointless to me.

the dubbing of the three candidates arguing over footage of George, Zippy and Bungle was better.

but it won't cost the same as whatever ken wants to do 'cause ken doesn't want to design and build a fleet of buses exclusively for tfl.

i don't understand why it's so outlandish an idea, or why bj has made it a major plank: obviously bendy buses are shitty, but why nu-routemasters particularly? in a city that will hosty the olympics in four years time, even £50m for new buses is pretty small beer, and shit, maybe bj could land some kind of reciprocal deal with a dictator of the right, a la ken's pact with chavez, to get it done.

Sarkozy?

"bring the routemasters back" is not a grown up transport policy proposal and paxman's question exposed exactly how unserious boris is about it

xpost

and i don't think for a second that boris can be the kind of operator that ken is - that any mayor of a city like london needs to be - and certainly not the kind that can cut deals with latin american heads of state

why does nrq always end up defending boris' corner??

because he hates ken more

xpost sure but i just think paxman could've gone about it better - i didn't see the rest of the programme tho

don't think i've really defended boris but this

and i don't think for a second that boris can be the kind of operator that ken is - that any mayor of a city like london needs to be - and certainly not the kind that can cut deals with latin american heads of state

-- Tracer Hand, Tuesday, April 29, 2008 12:21 AM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

is hilarious.

ken is certainly an 'operator', yes.

ok so why don't you like ken livingstone?

partly the anti-semitism, partly the creepy trot thing, partly the manifestly awful public persona -- these last two i wouldn't mind sooooo much if he wasn't 10 miles up the arse of the city and the developers. i thought his attempts at statesmanship, eg on 7/7, have been absurd, and that one in particular really fucked me off (couldn't say exactly why tbh -- unctiousness? bad faith? everyone in my office -- ordinary working londoners is the phrase -- felt similar. the chavez thing kind of ties into the trot thing -- old-school fondness for authoritarian regimes, however complex the situation is. (ie 'over there', for ken, things are black-and-white. over here, one has to make accommodations...) as a non-driver i'm happy to say i think the flat congestion charge is regressive and favours the wealthy. and the way he called trevor phillips quasi-bnp for disagreeing with him was completely fucked.

bendy buses can eat a dick but im not that bothered.

ok thanks for spelling it out

i didn't realise ken was anti-semitic

i don't know what "the creepy trot thing" is?

also, trevor phillips is a dick

i didn't realise ken was anti-semitic

read about the context of the one incident this claim is based on and you may still not realise

you should look up the trot stuff -- search 'socialist action' -- if only for the lols c. 1990. ken's beef with the evening standard guy and those iranian guys was pretty gross, no? i mean, i didnt get into the embracing-of-al-qaradawi thing; whatever you might say about it, ken did a shitty job of explaining why he was quite so open-armed about the guy.

i'm not sure it's relevant if trevor phillips is a dick. i don't think he is -- he's certainly less of a dick than al-qaradawi -- but that doesn't make it ok to say he's like the bnp. especially when ken uses accusations of racism to defend a provenly corrupt colleague -- sub-ilm tactics at best.

obv the old trot left has its share of openly anti-semitic guys too, like ken's friend gerry healy.

how would/will you vote?

sub-ilm tactics at best.

A bit like accusing someone who isn't an anti-semite of being one?

Ken may well have courted al-qaradawi, and for reasons I admit I'm unclear about, but he has consistently put hisLondoners money into LGB stuff which, for me, counts more.

Also Gerry Healy died 18 years ago. I think I've probably had some dodgy mates over the last 20 years. Back then all kinds of alliances were made because, at the height of Thatcherism, you basically made what deals you could. His friendship with Healy was probably more to do with getting his paper printed than anything particularly ideological.

well that's just it, ken is above all a pragmatist, so you make what deals you can: you can embrace the homophobic guy, and then shove some pork in the direction of the LGBT community. you can employ trotskyist activists in your inner sanctum and build the city up to the clouds. you can be friends with healy -- go to his funeral, claim mi5 had him taken down, long after the printing deal went bad -- and pose as a feminist. a similar kind of me-first ruthlessness has him say trevor phillips will soon be with the BNP. ken has this mystical aura of right-on-ness and gets away with it, but i can't imagine any other pol doing so.

I think this thread, in general, has been guilty of underestimating the visceral dislike a lot of people now have for Ken. It's one reason why Boris is doing so well and why I'm not sure "ah well a lot of people will just vote tactically to keep Boris out" quite stands up.

From what I've seen the worst candidate has to be Paddick, he's like the arrogant robot from some Star Trek spinoff: no personality, an ability to think systematically with no capacity for imaginative and speculative thought, no empathy with mammalian species... that kind of thing. Plus scratch the surface and you know there's a Tory underneath, a Liberal in other words.

you watch star trek spin-offs? geek

Of course, what I meant to say is I imagine he's like the arrogant robot from a Star Trek spinoff

Did anyone see the interview with Paddick in Time Out? He just lost it completely, for no apparent reason.

He's out of this depth

this depth? LOLz

From what I've seen the worst candidate has to be Paddick, he's like the arrogant robot from some Star Trek spinoff: no personality, an ability to think systematically with no capacity for imaginative and speculative thought, no empathy with mammalian species... that kind of thing.

More like this guy amirite?

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/0/04/Rimmer1.jpg/250px-Rimmer1.jpg

Less sympathetic

What's wrong with being a pragmatist? When it comes down to it KL does give money to LGB (and even T's) causes, he does set up equality initiatives, and he does try to do things for those lower down economic scale. So the fuck what if he's 'pretending' and goes home and gets pissed and tells a few fanny jokes? With BJ you're going to get that crap (with added public school racism) and without any of the good stuff and a whole load of bollocks about Routemasters and the good old days on top. ffs London isn't fucking Henly on Thames.

Did anyone see the interview with Paddick in Time Out? He just lost it completely, for no apparent reason.

-- Matt DC, Tuesday, April 29, 2008 10:32 AM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

http://www.timeout.com/london/features/4561/Brian_Paddick-interview.html

holy shit, what an idiot ^^

doctorcroc (21 hours ago) Show Hide
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id rather have routemasters at any cost instead of taxpayers paying for a mega mosque funded and security paid for by the taxpayer

Thing is it's all those Henley on Thames types in the suburbs who are going to get BJ in (Ned xp).

steveallen808909 (5 days ago) Show Hide
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vote ken out if u dont want to pay for the east london mega mosque which will be a security nightmare and a sacluded community

What's wrong with being a pragmatist? When it comes down to it KL does give money to LGB (and even T's) causes, he does set up equality initiatives, and he does try to do things for those lower down economic scale. So the fuck what if he's 'pretending' and goes home and gets pissed and tells a few fanny jokes? With BJ you're going to get that crap (with added public school racism) and without any of the good stuff and a whole load of bollocks about Routemasters and the good old days on top. ffs London isn't fucking Henly on Thames.

-- Ned Trifle II, Tuesday, April 29, 2008 10:39 AM (31 seconds ago) Bookmark Link

it matters, being a pragmatist, if you're posing as a man of principle. with the money thing -- i have no idea, it's a bit vague to say he has given money "to lgb causes", it just sounds like pandering. i don't know what "the good stuff" is from livingstone -- bread & circuses stuff, i'm assuming. i have no idea what he does for those low down the economic scale. the cost of living in london (everywhere else too, but...) has risen like a motherfucker in the time he's been in power because the house-price boom (in london especially) has brought about inflation by flooding the city with (homeowners' borrowed) money. the one thing i'll say for ken is at least the price of a bus journey hasn't risen toooo much, but the tube is still astoundingly high-priced. when i lived in london, well under the average wage, i was simply priced out of riding it. so bfd if there are a few public beanos each year.

Thing is it's all those Henley on Thames types in the suburbs who are going to get BJ in (Ned xp).

Pre-fucking-cisely. We can argue the toss for ever about Ken's odd bedfellows and worry about Trot cults from the past, and in the meantime London is going to get one right wing fucker who thinks black people are alright as servants and gay people are the same as dog fuckers. Your choice London.

I really couldn't care less if Livingstone is a hate-filled hypocrite or not. The only important thing is whether, within the narrow remit of the London mayorship, he's made things better or worse. Transport is one of the few things he has any control over (and even then he had the tube ppp contracts imposed on him) - I don't live in London any more but I visit regularly and it seems to me the transport situation is about ten times better than it was ten years ago. It is actually possible to go a few stops on a bus these days without being stuck in traffic for an hour. I guess the congestion charge as a flat tax is unfair, but before it was getting almost impossible to get around central London. For those opposed to the congestion charge, what would you do instead?

the one thing i'll say for ken is at least the price of a bus journey hasn't risen toooo much

90p with an Oyster Card? That's pretty impressive. Plus I think if you're on New Deal or sumthin', it's actually only 45p.

Bariquit, the Dr Morbius of london politics

Tom D OTM, price of buses has fallen.

Buses without an Oyster card are fucking extortionate nowadays.

Fleecing the tourists is a fine old London tradition

even my mum has an oyster card, and she doesn't live or work in london.

Why isn't Phil the Godhead Scouser with the megaphone running for Mayor?

Oyster cards only cost £3 or something these days, don't they? Tourists aren't priced out of getting them.

I agree that the tube is still outrageously priced compared with other major capital cities - but at least it's possible to get a bus these days with a decent chance of getting to wherever you're going on time. The traffic before the congestion charge was pretty unbelievable. I used to get the 137 home and sometimes it would take an hour just to get from Marble Arch to Hyde Park Corner.

Whereas now it can take an hour just to get from Sloane Square to Chelsea Bridge!

big question re where the media's leading over the next two years is: on friday will the story be 'ken pulls it back from the brink' or 'labour demolished countrywide'? i think both of those things will happen, but in terms of creating a narrative, it will be interesting to see where the commentary goes.

Can't wait to see cheap tube fares under Johnson. Or see him dealing with the RMT. I would love to be in that meeting.

xps

fuck a travelcard being nearly £6 off-peak, this is not progress

Bariquit, the Dr Morbius of london politics

and movies

and, uh, just life in general

So, what's the greatest margin Ken can lose the first ballot by and still get in on 2nd-choice votes? He'll surely get 60%+ of Paddick voters and 70%+ of Berry voters, I would think? Enough to overturn a four-point deficit, maybe? I guess Boris will hoover up the BeeEnPee alternates.

I thought Paddick votes broke down more in favour of Johnson?

Mike: you mean Pamela's giving 30% of her vote to someone else?

I agree with what Polly Toynbee says in her column:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/apr/29/london08.boris
It moved me, and I wrote to tell her so, and that I will be happy to vote Labour on Thursday.

The only thing I don't agree with, in her largely spot-on commentary, is the use of the word 'effete' to describe BJ. I thought it had to do with effeminacy, and I actually think BJ is macho and hideously aggressive. Looking in a dictionary, I see that it apparently means 'exhausted, lacking vigour, barren'. I don't think BJ is that either. So I think she chose the wrong word, when she perhaps meant to convey 'upper-class / out of touch' or the like.

Otherwise, I think that it is a tremendous column.

I thought Paddick votes broke down more in favour of Johnson?

Yes, Liberals would prefer a Tory mayor

Can't wait to see cheap tube fares under Johnson. Or see him dealing with the RMT. I would love to be in that meeting.

I would love to be there too. I get a free tube pass soon coz of the silver lining (for me) of the Metronet fuck up.

ok we get it (xp)

I thought Paddick votes broke down more in favour of Johnson?

Oh really? I haven't seen any polls on that. Damn, I'm still living in some kind of SDP past, probably. I suspect the 2nd-choice votes aren't going that differently proportioned to the 1st-choice votes then.

With all these widely-differing polls around, are pollsters working with ludicrously small samples or something? Can't believe it's this volatile so close to election day. Maybe it's the push-pull of Standard smears vs dawning-realisation-it's-Boris.

Stop Boris. Stop London Becoming LOLdon.

He has reinvented himself to suit London's needs. The City, to its own surprise, responds positively to him, giving him much credit for seeing off Frankfurt as a competitor and even trouncing New York.

i was very moved by this, pinefox. i asked keir hardie and he agreed.

Dave Hill also gives reasons to vote Labour, though he is too generous to the Tory really:
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/dave_hill/2008/04/the_london_list.html

What year is your SDP past, Mike -- 1982 or so? I think they were past their electoral peak by 15 May 1985.

am or pm?

I don't think we need to bother with the latest propaganda issued by Millbank apparatchik Toynbee.

Ah, yes, ILM's reality-challenging "Polly Toynbee is a Blairite" thing, which requires you to either a) not know who she is, b) not know who Tony Blair is, or c) be really fucking thick.

are you off your meds?

toynbee : labour :: gilligan : livingstone

lol i mean gilligan : johnson

Dr Kelly died so that Gilligan might live.

Hasn't Toynbee always been rather more of a Brownite?(Though she must have a tremendously powerful microscope)

And there is no divergence of views within the Labour party?

Is Livingstone a Blairite too?

Is John Mcdonnell (sp?) a Blairite?

xpost

She was Brown's John the Baptist, before she realized along with everyone else that Brown wasn't quite Jesus

And there is no divergence of views within the Labour party?

I borrowed Toynbee's microscope....and I saw some!

I don't recall either Livingstone or McDonnell living in a Clapham Park slum for like one night then working at United Biscuits for approx. half an hour then writing a book about the poverty of the nation with a ten-page preface about her five-storey house across the road.

It's a good job no one is required to vote for Polly Toynbee then.

For the time being.

laxalt otm

classic toynbee here:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2003/feb/26/iraq.foreignpolicy2

I think people get her mixed up with Jackie Ashley, too.

I'm not saying you're not allowed to dislike despise her, Marcello. I'm just saying it's a little, tiny bit, er, moronic, to pretend that just because someone supports the Labour party they are a Blairite, or even a Brownite (whatever that means - microscope point well taken).

But back to Ken/Boris ... sorry.

Fuck off moron, is that good enough for you?

Is this the day to say no? No to what? Yet if not now, then when?

Is this off the new Elbow album?

This is very boring.

The first one wasn't bad though.

column after column by toynbee is as close to actual party literature as you could possibly get. she doesn't just support the party: she supports the leadership. differences between blair and brown were largely to do with power and presentation; ideologically you could barely get a rizla paper between them. as p-toyn has basically acknowledged -- that the myth of brown as 'the real deal' compared with blair built up over those years of feuding was bollocks.

xpost yes this is boring

I like Polly Toynbee. I think that she (experimentally / journalistically) lived on low wages for longer than has been suggested. She has old roots in the feminist movement. She is different from, and better than, Jackie Ashley, as I have said before. I think she is a good progressive woman.

I was thinking about what it will be, or would be, like to have BJ as mayor. Every time his name is mentioned or his face appears on TV, as it often will, I will have to turn off. Stuff bearing that face will be stuffed into my letterbox every fortnight. He will constantly pop up to speak for London. It will be difficult to bear; part of me will have to shut down to shut it out.

I like Polly Toynbee. I think that she (experimentally / journalistically) lived on low wages for longer than has been suggested.

I haven't taken her seriously since

Those old midthread blues again.

PT is a bore with a famous dad and therefore good connections. She is canting retrogression writ large.

If BJ becomes Mayor will the last person to leave London please etc.

Stuff bearing that face will be stuffed into my letterbox every fortnight.

it will be interesting to see if he does continue with those godawful and wasteful newsletters.

i think toynbee sent her kids to private school? kind of lame given her defence of the quality of education under new lab.

yeah at least abbott had the decency to keep slagging it off

I was thinking about what it will be, or would be, like to have BJ as mayor. Every time his name is mentioned or his face appears on TV, as it often will, I will have to turn off. Stuff bearing that face will be stuffed into my letterbox every fortnight. He will constantly pop up to speak for London. It will be difficult to bear; part of me will have to shut down to shut it out.

Unfortunately, that is exactly how lots of people feel about Livingstone, and why Boris is doing as well as he is.

George Orwell, that clown, I've never taken any of his books seriously since he pretended to be a tramp.

I'm not a big fan of ms toynbee, as usual though, the hateful reader comments posted after her piece make me feel more sympathetic to her, even though I don't really want to. They also make me want to emigrate.