British Election

[ISiddiqui]

The Exit Polling just came out (which has been very accurate in the past) and it shows, well, quite a shock:

326 seats are needed for a majority.

Before today the seats were:

Con: 330
Lab: 229
SNP: 54
Lib Dem: 9

The exit polls are showing:

Con: 314
Lab: 266
SNP: 34
Lib Dem: 14

Election 2017: Tories to be largest party - exit poll - BBC News

A stunning blow for the Conservatives if this holds up. They had a 20 point lead a few months ago. There will have to be a coalition, but this time I'd imagine the very pro-EU Lib Dems aren't interested.

[SirFozzie]

Oof. 314-314 if it hangs on,but it just makes more likely a no-confidence vote or what have you

[ISiddiqui]

Well there are other small parties that have a seat or two (The Green Party would still have one seat and Plaid Cymru would still have three seats) . Those doesn't necessarily cobble together all that well (they would add up to 22 seats out of the 650 in the House of Commons, but maybe May can find 12+ of those willing to join up, but what will they extract).

But of the major players... maybe Labor and Lib Dems can find common cause, but no one wants to partner with SNP, because they'd demand another Scottish Independence referendum in the deal.

[bhlloy]

If it's anything close to that then Brexit is going to be a nightmare because there are a wide range of opinions on that topic even inside the Conservative party. A major reason for the early election was they looked odds on to increase the majority and she could essentially bypass any bloc of the party that might have caused her problems

[bhlloy]

Tories privately admitting they won't have an overall majority. Given recent elections I'm not sure we should be surprised at a surprising result but I would never have guessed it to this extent

[JPhillips]

May has to step down, right? This is one of the biggest self-inflicted wounds I can remember.

[bhlloy]

Nice to see that fucking waste of space Clegg finally loses his seat

[JPhillips]

Worst high 5 of all time...? pic.twitter.com/XyIE5oYt7H

— Dan Hewitt (@danhewittsky) June 9, 2017

[RainMaker]

Do people like this result on the forums? Corbyn seems like utter trash but the alternatives seem bad too.

[miami_fan]

Originally Posted by RainMaker

Do people like this result on the forums? Corbyn seems like utter trash but the alternatives seem bad too.

I am wondering the same thing. This seems to be a push in the opposite direction from the Brexit referendum. I am curious in the opinions of our British contingent.

[bhlloy]

Corbyn is a clown but May and austerity are terrible for the country. In a choice of bad alternatives I'm as happy as I can be. Also very very happy to see the second Scottish independence referendum soundly rejected by the voters north of the border.

[cartman]

Can't wait for the next issue of The Economist to arrive.

[miami_fan]

Dola,

I also acknowledge my ignorance of the issues outside of UK-EU relations in this election so I don't know if those issues are more important to the voters.

[nol]

Originally Posted by JPhillips

May has to step down, right? This is one of the biggest self-inflicted wounds I can remember.

Betting markets have Corbyn with the highest odds of becoming PM.

[SirFozzie]

Everything I heard from May pissed me off, but I'm sure she'd be Jon's favorite with statements like "If Human Rights get in the way of safety, we'll get rid of them".

I'm hoping that it's the Trump-populist-Right Wing-Austerity fever breaking, but who knows.

[bronconick]

A Conservative seat in Canterbury may be lost for the 1st time in 160 years.

Canterbury general election results

[bhlloy]

Canterbury did end up flipping to Labour, as well as Warwick and rumored to have also picked up Kensington and Chelsea. Those 3 are about as traditional Tory as you can get.

[RainMaker]

Originally Posted by bhlloy

Corbyn is a clown but May and austerity are terrible for the country. In a choice of bad alternatives I'm as happy as I can be. Also very very happy to see the second Scottish independence referendum soundly rejected by the voters north of the border.

I agree May is bad but who has been supportive of Islamic extremists and terrorists doesn't seem like a good direction either. Perhaps someone more moderate would be best.

I mean you're making a guy who loved Chavez and praised Venezuela your Prime Minister. I'm sure news makes it across the pond on what's happening in that country.

[JPhillips]

Corbyn won't be PM.

May would have a solid majority if it weren't for a manifesto that said they were going to give everything to the rich. The Tories made the mistake of telling voters what they actually want to do.

[Critch]

Looks like the Conservatives are going to squeak through with a reduced majority. May's useless, but it looks like Davis or Johnson will replace her and ones as bad as her and the other is a nightmare.

Sad that Labour have fallen so far that a poor second is being treated like a massive victory. I'm hoping Corbyn will be out, get Dan Jarvis in as leader.

[bhlloy]

Originally Posted by JPhillips

Corbyn won't be PM.

May would have a solid majority if it weren't for a manifesto that said they were going to give everything to the rich. The Tories made the mistake of telling voters what they actually want to do.

Yup, the British people have finally figured out what austerity actually means

[JPhillips]

So was UKIP really battered in response to Brexit or did they basically fold up the tent and all but disband after their "victory"?

[SirFozzie]

Basically, their voters decamped to the Conservatives once Brexit had been acheived

[JPhillips]

The only Tory coming out of this looking good is the Scottish woman that won a bunch of seats from the Scottish Nationalists. She won't be PM, but she's the only one that comes out of this looking good.

[Critch]

Ruth Davidson is the Scottish Tory leader, very popular for a Scottish Tory. She's a member of the Scottish Parliament though, so not in the UK elections.

The collapse of the SNP vote will have killed off any chance of a second Scottish Independence referendum for a few years, almost 50% down to 37-ish%.

[SackAttack]

Originally Posted by Critch

Sad that Labour have fallen so far that a poor second is being treated like a massive victory.

The fact that these aren't regularly scheduled elections is pretty significant context here, though.

May doesn't call for a snap election if she's feeling vulnerable or fears that Labour could sweep into power. She did it because she was feeling her oats, and expected that the Tories could increase the majority they already held to give her more of a mandate.

So even if "all" Labour managed, at the end of the day, was to take the Tories from an outright majority to casting about for a coalition partner to stay in power, that's still the sort of outcome that just does not happen in a "snap election" environment unless the minority party either ran a helluva campaign, the majority party shot themselves in the nether regions with alacrity, or some combination of the two.

Maybe you'd rather call it a massive defeat for the Tories than a massive victory for Labour, and while I see that as splitting hairs to an extent, the bottom line is still that May's leadership has been sorely compromised; even if the Tories pull together a coalition, there is a non-zero chance that somebody else is in 10 Downing Street a couple weeks hence.

Corbyn may not have "won," but he for damn sure didn't lose.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by SirFozzie

Everything I heard from May pissed me off, but I'm sure she'd be Jon's favorite with statements like "If Human Rights get in the way of safety, we'll get rid of them".

I'm more of a UKIP guy really, but May beats a lot of alternatives.

And, as I avoided even glancing at returns last night, whaddya know ... relative sanity does appear to be staying in power after all is said and done

Good call on my part last night, that would have been worry invested for no real reason.

[JPhillips]

It's fun reading about the ultra-extreme DUP that's going to form a government with the Tories and thinking, they don't sound as extreme as the typical Republican legislator.

[ISiddiqui]

Originally Posted by RainMaker

Perhaps someone more moderate would be best.

Tbf, you had that in David Cameron and in Tony Blair before him. This is, to put it bluntly, not a 'moderate age' in politics (with the notable exception of the French election).

[nol]

Democrats: "We know how the Labour party's success can lead us into 2018"
*Newly renamed Demoucratic Party loses in a landslide*

— Tom Keiser (@keisertroll) June 9, 2017