At last from Australia

Apologies for the profligacy of posts but just in case anyone is staying up for Australia…… Looks like the Welsh girl’s got it… The Australian says Labor’s great escape. Worth a browse…..oh and they are still counting. AV a wonderful system…mmm. Anyway now we’ve won Australia I await an Alliance surge with you – after all David Ford is Welsh… DewiWelsh Nationalist. Rugby Fan. Know a bit about History and Railways…

Australia decides..

What the campaign lacked in lustre the count is making up for it in excitement. Watch it live here. Could be a tie and maybe a Green MP…… DewiWelsh Nationalist. Rugby Fan. Know a bit about History and Railways…

Of Water….

Firstly, unless you get valleys drowned by evil Saxon neighbours I don’t think you have that serious an issue……

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Convery for Lord Mayor? Kyle as Deputy?

So it is coming round to our eighth birthday with the annual race for Lord Mayor of Belfast (we came in when the first Sinn Fein councillor was successfully elected), it seems Pat Convery is hotly tipped for the top post. There are whispers that one prominent UUP councillor is canvassing for the support of Dr John Kyle of the PUP as Deputy Mayor. It remains to be seen how much political capital Kyle can realistically call in given the …

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Poster boys (& girls) – mapping offenders

Daphne Trimble posing in front of an election poster mounted on a trailer

It is now time for election posters to be removed from display. So lets do the stragglers a favour by locating those still up. If you have a Google account you should be able to add the details directly to this map, then click on Edit, zoom in to the area, and click on the map pin icon to add your poster. If not post the information and I will enter it for you. Location, offending party/candidate and date spotted …

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After the election: The Conservatives’ big liberal gamble

So is it game and set and match to Mr Cameron? Although, judging by an exceptionally peppery editorial in the Spectator today, not everyone on the Tory benches is happy with arrangement. Still, it seems that the two Edwardian gentlemen agree in principle as early as Saturday night, over Pizza, that cohabitation would be a thoroughly fine thing. This was a classic vindication of the old saw, work for victory, but plan for disappointment. Many in his party will say, …

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After the elections: Labour must get its ‘soul’ right with C1s, C2s.

It may be that this was a good election to lose for Labour (which, I suspect, is some of what lay behind that old fashioned politics Janet was lauding the other day), though it may not feel like that for many of their voters/supporters at the moment. (BTW, the Telegraph were still live blogging up to last night) Why? Because the challenges being faced by the Tories and Lib Dem coalition are huge, particularly on the international front (it’s no coincidence …

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After the election: A Unionist game that is shaken rather than stirred…

In a special article for Slugger O’Toole, David Gordon examines the General Election fall-out for unionism – with a couple of quotes from his newly-updated book, The Fall of the House of Paisley. Released over Easter, it has a new final chapter entitled The Fall of the House of Robinson? Cometh the hour, here comes Arlene? If Peter Robinson goes as DUP leader, the smart money seems to be on Nigel Dodds as party leader, with Arlene Foster as First …

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Quote of the week…

Sheer class from @ShaneHegarty on Twitter: That UK coalition deal in full: David Cameron to be PM; Nick Clegg to be his fag. Mick FealtyMick is founding editor of Slugger. He has written papers on the impacts of the Internet on politics and the wider media and is a regular guest and speaking events across Ireland, the UK and Europe. Twitter: @MickFealty

Photograph of the Day – Yes she did

Yes she did

Moochin PhotomanPhotographer and visual artist based in Belfast. I have facilitated community based workshops with groups as diverse as visually impaired individuals in Dungannn, Travellers across Northern Ireland, Young Offenders and many community groups across Belfast. My work has exhibited extensively here in Northern Ireland in group and individual shows and has been shown in North America and i had my first solo international exhibition in New Zealand. I have been the recipient of a number of grants from the …

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Britain’s Wizard of Oz election…

It struck me the other day that, in Britain at least, we’re witnessing something of a Wizard of Oz election… Now please forgive the crude charaterisations here, it’s certainly not intended to wound or make light of profoundly serious matters, but it seems to me that the three party leaders roughly approximate to the characters of scarecrow, the tinman and the cowardly lion… So for starters, you have Gordon Brown as the lion wishing he had the nerve… Then Nick …

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Poorly spun electoral yarn

I like a bit of spinning and manipulation during an election, it’s a dirty business and most parties are up for some deceit and/or dishonesty. Though Alliance are pushing their luck a bit with the claim ‘It’s Naomi or Robinson’ in their election cartoon – the claim is supported with the essentially correct statistic that only 52 votes separated them in 2007. Though it completely masks the fact that the total DUP vote of 11,155 dwarfed Alliance’s 5,583 and even the UUP were …

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Election 2010: Things I believed in yesterday…

I picked this up this morning, it’s a Tory leaflet warning people of the big danger of a hung Parliament… 24 hours ago it was a decent pitch. Today, I’m not sure anyone believes Gordon can be PM any more… Mick FealtyMick is founding editor of Slugger. He has written papers on the impacts of the Internet on politics and the wider media and is a regular guest and speaking events across Ireland, the UK and Europe. Twitter: @MickFealty

Gordon Brown’s gaffe ‘detoxifies’ Tory immigration policies…

Interesting times. Danny Finkelstein said on Newsnight last night that Brown’s clumsiness comes already discounted with the price, and therefore this won’t have much of an effect. I beg to differ Danny. It will have an effect almost precisely because in comparison with the larger affairs of state, it is relatively trivial. It will matter, because it shifts more of those crucial folk with light preferences in politics (ie, the ones who still ‘don’t know’ when they lift the pencil …

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Ford tries to ‘bump’ Long over the line?

I’ve not been able to take politicians forecasts of their own fortunes seriously since Mitchel McLaughlin told me in all seriousness that he was going to win the Foyle seat in 2005. Now David Ford is pushing his candidate in East Belfast as a real possibility for taking a seat, without quite saying that. With Sammy Morse’s warnings against any party (including his own presumably) who relies on canvass returns ringing in my ears, I would say the Alliance party …

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FST’s ‘shotgun marriage’ may not cut it for Unionist electorate…

Last week Ben Lowry was asking whether those behind the Unionist unity campaign had taken account of its natural response: nationalist unity? The publication of the High Court’s judgement against Fermanagh District Council won’t help the unity candidate down there. Toals already have the incumbent Michelle Gildernew fractionally ahead of the council’s former CEO Rodney Connor, even though, theoretically, the numbers should add up to slight unionist majority. As I argued back in January, some of form of unionist unity …

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Elections now mean power sharing within parties

The one sure outcome of this election is the end of a system that produced the phenomenon of the Swish family Robinson. By that I mean not the personal dramas, (although there’s a connection of course), but the accumulation of personal influence and the development of politics as a small family business, all of it apparently within the rules but now about  to be greatly reduced.  Mr Robinson himself will be less affected than his colleagues.  He’s bidding to retain his …

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DUP kettle calling Cameron’s fiscal pot black?

Here’s a nice piece of balance to the headlines in today’s News Letter and Belfast Telegraph… It’s the first paragraph of the economy section of the 2010 DUP manifesto [Emphasis added]: Growing the private sector is the key to economic success. It will be the private sector that will lead the UK into economic recovery.We need low interest rates and must reign back public spending and invest more wisely. Spending reductions must be pursued rather than seeking to increase taxes, …

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