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Senator Howard Baker’s question: “What did the President know and when did he know it?” went to the heart of the Watergate scandal. But it was another question, asked almost as an aside, which provided the damning evidence: the question to Alexander Butterfield, a Nixon aide, about what recording devices, in addition to the taped instructions given by Nixon to his secretary, there were in the White House. Those tapes provided the evidence that the conspiracy went right to the…

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What I find striking about these figures are the scores for social media and newspapers for likely Labour voters. My hunch is the written media will not have such an impact on Labour as in the past but that this election campaign could be swung online against Labour where things aren’t quite so tightly regulated. TSE

One of the reasons I am confident that Joe Biden will prevail in November is abortion and Donald Trump’s poor ratings with Independents and these poor ratings now extend to the Republicans. Whilst the Democrats have poor ratings with Independents but not as bad as the GOP as Boris Johnson can attest you can win a general election with poor ratings when your opponent has even worse ratings. I do expect the ratings to get worse for the GOP over…

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What I find really interesting about this MRP is that it sees Labour increase its number of seats from 385 seats in the last YouGov MRP in January which means we may need to stop talking about swingback but the opposite of swingback could happen. Labour will be delighted that this is the first MRP this year showing Scotland rejecting division and secession. I will advise PBers that MRPs can be glorified standing voting intentions and only become more accurate…

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Britain’s two longest-serving prime ministers since the 19th century – Margaret Thatcher (11 years, 208 days) and Tony Blair (10 years, 56 days) – have at least one thing in common. They both decided to work in parliamentary terms of four years (approx) and to seek re-election on each occasion in either May or June. They won every time – each PM adding two re-election wins to their victories from opposition.  Perhaps they recognised that voters feel happier in Spring…

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This couldn’t even be classed as a Pyrrhic victory but success equals performance minus anticipation. TSE

Every poll seems to bring a new a record breaking poll for Reform and Ladbrokes have a market on whether YouGov will have a poll reaching the apotheosis of outpolling the the Tories before the general election. I can see it happening in a very narrow window after the Tories get gubbed in the locals and there’s a vote of confidence in Sunak and the Tories commit their regular bout of seppuku however as Ladbrokes are not offering both sides of…

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“You do not examine legislation in the light of the benefits it will convey if properly administered but in the light of the wrongs it would do and the harms it would cause if improperly administered.” (LBJ) Wise advice. A great pity it was not heeded by Scotland’s Justice Minister in 2021 when The Hate Crime and Public Order Act was passed. It is one of the SNP’s most badly drafted, illiberal and dangerous laws, despite stiff competition from the…

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