Brown Bottles It

[matgb]

So, El Gordo has chickened out and is 'treating people as fools', almost certainly as a result of this News of the World poll. He's attempted to defend the decision but I concur with the Observer, this has sparked a Crisis for Brown as election ruled out. All of this leads me to this YouTube vid by Will/whoukmy friend Mr Pack^[1]:

Scary analysis of it from the perspective of the Tories:

A poll to be published by Sunday's News of the World puts the Tories ahead by 6% in marginal seats, with the party overall at 44% against Labour's 38%.

Translated into a general election, it would mean a hung Parliament with Labour holding 306 seats and the Tories 246.

They'd win 6% more votes, but 60 less seats according to the analysis. Can we have STV now PLZKTHX. Oh wait, that sort of forward thinking is beyond the Stupid Party isn't it.

The real question I guess is has this damaged Brown more for the obvious reasons, or has he hurt the Cameron Project by forcing Davy to tack to the right and go for a core votes strategy?

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Crossposted on my journal and to ukpolitics here

[1] Message from Mark: Will's work, but I put it all down to the management, so amended accordingly

Comments

[matgb]

On the latter point, agreed, didn't know much about him but did some reading and liked what I saw, shame he stayed out for so long really.

On the former point, opinion remains that unless Ming steps down on ill-health grounds another leadership contest would do more damage than keeping him in, and that he's in a good position to negotiate post-election. It's just the run up to that causes the issues.

Structurally, the party is better off than it was under the Kennedy neglect, and I genuinely don't think Clegg's ready. Let Campbell lead, with help, into the next General, and see how we do.