nycbos

nycbos's Journal

June 9, 2017

Words of wisdom from Sir Humphrey Appleby

Given this was election day in the UK I thought this was relevant

Bernard asks Sir Humphrey "If it is our job to help the government carry out its policies should we believe in them"

Humphrey laughs and responds.

"Bernard, I have served eleven governments in the past thirty years. If I had believed in all their policies, I would have been passionately committed to keeping out of the Common Market, and passionately committed to going into it. I would have been utterly convinced of the rightness of nationalising steel. And of denationalising it and renationalising it. On capital punishment, I'd have been a fervent retentionist and an ardent abolitionist. I would've been a Keynesian and a Friedmanite, a grammar school preserver and destroyer, a nationalisation freak and a privatisation maniac; but above all, I would have been a stark, staring, raving schizophrenic."

June 8, 2017

UK election head scratcher.

I am aware that there are traditional Labour areas that voted leave in the EU referendum, and had a decent UKIP share of the vote the last general election.

It seems in these Labour areas the party is getting a large share of the old UKIP vote. This seems pretty odd given the differences on policy

Any explanation?

June 8, 2017

Watching the BBC returns.

One thing I have noticed.

Labour areas of the country report their results faster than the Tory areas. Which is the opposite of the United States

Here Republican areas report the faster then Democratic areas.

I find this a interesting fact for my inner nerd.

June 8, 2017