It's the usual pattern with extreme parties, pretend there are easy solutions to complex issues. UKIP and the SNP have a lot in common, both telling people they can leave the political institution they are part of without any negative consequences.
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UKIP win Clacton by-election by a landslide
- Thread starter MikeG
- Start date
It's the usual pattern with extreme parties, pretend there are easy solutions to complex issues. UKIP and the SNP have a lot in common, both telling people they can leave the political institution they are part of without any negative consequences.
angrysoba
Philosophile
Excellent advice! It's a shame that political parties prefer daft slogans rather than rational ideas such as these.
It seems that a lot of talk about taxation is removed from what it was surely intended to do, i.e to raise necessary revenue for the functioning of the state and seems to be thought of as a legitimate means of punishment for sinning (i.e smoking and drinking or driving cars which have too many pollutants) or else taxes to punish the wealthy for having all the money. Neither makes sense in and of itself.
I think that both the bedroom tax and the mansion tax could be argued to be fair if equally imposed according to a principle of fairness along the lines of Mill, however, I think the intent with both are more along the lines of punishment, either to coerce the poor into not living in social housing that they have made their home, or to punish those who own large premises but don't really have the money to pay the mansion tax on.
But I don't think that either can be said to be a reliable means of raising revenue in a sustainable way.
theprestige
Penultimate Amazing
Surely the right to own property includes the right to transfer property ownership--otherwise you're just a tenant of the state.
You may be able to tell us, in the light of your contributions at #97 and #99. I think it is relevant, because it illustrates that UKIP are not simple proletarian boozers as they sometimes pose as, but people with an agenda of further increasing inequality, and their evident desire to shift the burden of taxation from rich to poor is evidence of that, as I'm sure the people of Clacton and elsewhere will discover ere long.
Surely the right to earn a living implies the right to receive a wage. Otherwise you're just a slave. But, dear me, wages are taxed. Well so are very large estates. Taxation of a transaction does not mean abolition or even disapproval of the right to engage in it. Taxation is required to meet the collective expenses of the state and of society. If there was no law, you would receive no wages. You have a duty to pay - a reasonable contribution - to this and other social costs.
Well it illustrates how a scattergun of populist policies can help to deliver support. For example, MikeG is generally opposed to UKIP's policies but has found that their policy on inheritance tax has merit. If MikeG was less inclined to take a balanced view or if MikeG had decided that inheritance was the single most important thing in his life (as might be the case with some elderly wealthy people) then it is possible that MikeG's vote might have been bought.
Enough of these types of policies and you can start to build support from people who look at the one, two or three policies which address their particular concerns and ignore the rest. If another party happens to bring up the fact that these policies don't form a coherent manifesto or that they aren't costed or affordable then UKIP can just respond with "business as usual".
I have no idea about their desires or tax policies, (I am sure you have evidence which you haven't yet shown us), because they are irrelevant. However, it is noticeable that you seem to think that people only fall into one of two categories: rich or poor. The reality is that the vast majority of people are neither, however much you wish it be so to suit your agenda.
I became so interested in the discussion in the thread that I forgot we were getting off topic. I am sure that if UKIP and the Tories get anywhere near a foothold in the next parliament everyone not just in the UK but in the EU will bear the consequences of a UK that has moved further to the right that I ever really believed possible.
I think that, and other UKIP policies, are obviously highly relevant to the question of the significance of their electoral success. But if you wish to switch to a discussion of other UKIP policies, and their significance in the light of the election of a UKIP MP, then please go ahead and do so.
I know what you are saying, and I know you are only using me as an example, but does anyone actually cast votes like that in general elections? I dunno, maybe they do, but I prefer to think that people look at the balance of policies. I find most of Ukip's policies to be somewhere between ridiculous and nauseating, and agreeing with the odd one or two wouldn't ever sway my vote. I wonder if the current disillusionment with politics in this country is partly to do with people actually realising that none of the parties (typically) has a policy agenda which suits any one person. That is, whoever you vote for would do some stuff you disagreed with if they came to power.
Really? Are you too young to remember Margaret Thatcher?
That's entirely at odds with what you wrote at #29
i.e. with the UKIP policy of abolishing inheritance tax. This is very relevant, as is consideration of their other policies.
You misunderstand me (and misrepresent me).
I have no idea whatsoever about the totality of their tax policy. I know nothing about it other than they would propose abolishing inheritance tax. I only know that because it was posted in this thread.
When I said their tax policies were irrelevant I meant that because they won't be forming the next government, their tax policies are an irrelevance. They are in the position the Lib Dems thought they were in prior to the last election: able to promise absolutely anything at all, knowing it unlikely they would have to make the sums add up. Don't forget, though, UKIP fund everything by "removing the massive economic burden that membership of the EU imposes".....(I precis their argument, rather than actually quoting them word for word). If you can magic figures out of the air like they do over that particular claim, then you don't actually need a coherent tax policy.
The success of single issue candidates like Martin Bell (or that doctor chap who was campaigning against the closure of a local hospital) indicates to to me that people are willing to be swayed by a single policy if that single policy is important enough to them.
IMO in most cases it's much more complicated than that.
- There are some people who will vote for a party regardless of their policies because it's what they, their parents or their grandparents have always done. I get a feeling that in some of the safest seats that there is a lot of this going on
- There are some politicians who are so much of a celebrity and/or who are so effective that their constituents vote for them regardless of party affiliation
- In some cases (this has been me on one occasion) people find that they cannot vote for a party because of their position on a single, important issue
- Generally I feel that most people vote for a party based on the general tenor of that party's policies and how that aligns with the person's own views
What I find interesting about UKIP is that, due to the broad-brush way in which they work and their reluctance to get mired in the detail, they can actually pitch themselves in various contradictory ways in an attempt to garner votes. They are by parts....
- Staunchly Euroskeptic
- Looking after the elderly
- A wind of change for the working classes
- Libertarian, sweeping away silly restrictions on personal freedoms
Good post, The Don.
Picking one single point from it......As you say, there are single issue policies which would prevent me voting for a party even if I agreed wholeheartedly with the entirety of the rest of their programme (unlikely as that is). Science denial is one of those issues. Any party denying the science of climate change can go whistle as far as I am concerned, and UKIP, of course, falls into that category. That is far from the only issue that I would put in that category, and far from the only reason I would never contemplating supporting UKIP.
Picking one single point from it......As you say, there are single issue policies which would prevent me voting for a party even if I agreed wholeheartedly with the entirety of the rest of their programme (unlikely as that is). Science denial is one of those issues. Any party denying the science of climate change can go whistle as far as I am concerned, and UKIP, of course, falls into that category. That is far from the only issue that I would put in that category, and far from the only reason I would never contemplating supporting UKIP.
I hope you're right, but in their panic, both Cameron and Miliband may adopt UKIP-friendly policies to mitigate possible defection to that party. Miliband is already making UKIP style noises about immigration. That is the main danger, that UKIP may infect the larger parties without itself gaining a majority.
I hope I misunderstand, rather than misrepresent.
I wish I was but I think the combination of UKIP and the Tories constantly moving even further to the right in an attempt to keep any of their voters moving to UKIP might make even Thatcher seem like the lesser of two great evils.
I should have inserted "thus" between "and" and "misrepresent". Apologies.