nodealbrexiteer
Forum Regular
non aligned favour no deal brexit!
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Post by nodealbrexiteer on Sept 15, 2020 11:15:25 GMT
From a John rentoul article in early 2015:
Indeed, it can be argued that the voters never get elections wrong. This is known as Daniel Finkelstein’s Friend’s Law. It was proposed by an anonymous friend of the Tory peer and Times columnist, who wrote about it in 2008. The law is formulated thus: “In every contest since universal suffrage in 1928 the party that was more fit to govern has been victorious.”
I'm sure there are arguments to counter this for many elections from 1929
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Post by greenchristian on Sept 15, 2020 16:22:59 GMT
From a John rentoul article in early 2015: Indeed, it can be argued that the voters never get elections wrong. This is known as Daniel Finkelstein’s Friend’s Law. It was proposed by an anonymous friend of the Tory peer and Times columnist, who wrote about it in 2008. The law is formulated thus: “In every contest since universal suffrage in 1928 the party that was more fit to govern has been victorious.” I'm sure there are arguments to counter this for many elections from 1929 Even if we assume that the overwhelming majority of voters are choosing who to vote for based on which party is more fit to govern (which is a highly dubious assumption), this "law" confuses "is more fit to govern" with "is widely believed to be more fit to govern", which are not the same thing. Even if you could demonstrate that the two coincide over a given period, the sample size of UK general elections is low enough (and the circumstances of each election different enough) that you can't really conclude that the pattern is more than co-incidence.
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nodealbrexiteer
Forum Regular
non aligned favour no deal brexit!
Posts: 4,447
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Post by nodealbrexiteer on Sept 15, 2020 21:37:27 GMT
To be fair 1929 given it was when men and women voted on an equal level for the first time makes it a reasonable place to start, a lowish sample overall of elections but still a fair few and in more recent times so we can get a better get a feel of the mood of the times.
Also I always took it to mean sometimes the 'less fo two evils' not always that one party was clearly more fit to govern.
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The Bishop
Labour
Down With Factionalism!
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Post by The Bishop on Sept 16, 2020 12:05:47 GMT
Well, 1992 is the one that stands out for me.
Even quite a few Tories privately admitted they did not deserve to win that one, and even more regretted doing so before too long.
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nodealbrexiteer
Forum Regular
non aligned favour no deal brexit!
Posts: 4,447
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Post by nodealbrexiteer on Sept 17, 2020 12:29:35 GMT
Well, 1992 is the one that stands out for me. Even quite a few Tories privately admitted they did not deserve to win that one, and even more regretted doing so before too long. How hard we laughed the next 5 years!  |
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