UK endorsements

Liberal Democrats > Conservatives >>>>>>> Labour

In England and Wales vote for Liberal Dems where they have a chance, otherwise vote Conservative. In Scotland, replace Liberal Democrats with Scottish nationalists.

I presume the Northern Irish will vote for their tribe. Wales? I know nothing about Wales.

I expect the Conservatives to win. Will Brexit be delayed long enough for Bryan Caplan to keep his perfect record intact?

PS. Tony Blair is a sad reminder of what happens when you are in office at the wrong time. Imagine if Bill Clinton had been in office during 9/11 and also the collapse of the housing boom.


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18 Responses to “UK endorsements”

  1. Gravatar of Ben Ben
    14. November 2019 at 15:15

    Wales is much ‘more English’ than Scotland or Northern Ireland. So they tend to vote for English parties – the nationalist ‘Party of Wales’ usually only wins a number of seats in the low single digits.

    Even if this election means we have to be governed by the ideologically empty Conservatives for 5 more years (Brexit for the sake of it, more state spending just to win votes, no motivation to cut taxes or spending on anything anymore, endless fiddly policies that look good), hopefully this means the death of Marxism in this country for another 40 years.

    I’m not betting on it – Labour are particularly bad at changing to win elections.

  2. Gravatar of Doug M Doug M
    14. November 2019 at 16:25

    “Imagine if Bill Clinton had been in office during 9/11 and also the collapse of the housing boom.”

    Are you suggesting that W’s reputation has been misunderestimated for serving in a challenging period of history?

  3. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    14. November 2019 at 18:43

    Doug, Yes!

  4. Gravatar of Arilando Arilando
    14. November 2019 at 20:47

    Tony Blair destroyed his country through mass immigration.

  5. Gravatar of ChrisA ChrisA
    14. November 2019 at 22:04

    The economy will be devastated if Labour gets in, that should rule any voting considerations. The problem with voting LibDem is that if they hold the balance of power almost certainly they will put in Labour as the Government. So the choice is clear, if you don’t want a Labour government, vote Conservative. The SNP are also a high tax and spend party, how could any libertarian support voting for them? And more to the point you have stated your opposition to Brexit because of trade disruption, surely that logic applies in spades to Scottish independence?

    I suspect you are doing usual and making recommendations based on reading the NYT. Remember the Gell-Mann effect. Truth is that your views as expressed here are probably most in line with Boris Johnson’s, as a liberal minded internationalist.

  6. Gravatar of Matthias Goergens Matthias Goergens
    15. November 2019 at 04:04

    Arilando says:

    > Tony Blair destroyed his country through mass immigration.

    What are the symptoms of desctruction that you see, and how are they connected to immigration?

  7. Gravatar of Matthias Goergens Matthias Goergens
    15. November 2019 at 04:05

    ChrisA says:
    > And more to the point you have stated your opposition to Brexit because of trade disruption, surely that logic applies in spades to Scottish independence?

    If the rump UK and Scotland both stay in the EU, there shouldn’t be too many trade interruptions?

  8. Gravatar of gurevise gurevise
    15. November 2019 at 06:35

    Scott,
    Please elaborate on W’s performance during aftermath of 9/11 and housing crisis ? Thanks.

  9. Gravatar of msgkings msgkings
    15. November 2019 at 09:19

    @Doug M:

    Exactly right, and Clinton’s is overestimated for the same reason. Our opinion of presidents is generally based on a lot of luck (the time they happened to be there).

    Obama is another good example. His rep is helped by coming in during a crisis and being there for an 8 year recovery, which would have happened if a different person was president.

  10. Gravatar of ChrisA ChrisA
    15. November 2019 at 10:28

    @Gurevise The EU would be unlikely to allow a separatist state like Scotland to join due to the fear of encouraging other separatist movements. The rump UK would also be much more likely to leave the EU if Scotland left if it hadn’t already, since Scotland was one of the only areas to vote remaine.

  11. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    15. November 2019 at 11:14

    ChrisA, The Conservatives have become too nationalistic for my taste. But at least I prefer them to Labour, whereas I prefer Sanders over Trump.

    LOL at your claim that I form my views based on the NYT. That’s why I liked Reagan? The NYT told me to?

    Gurevise, I oppose the Patriot Act, and the Bush economic policies of 2008. But any other president would have done much the same. Only one senator voted against the Patriot Act.

  12. Gravatar of Lorenzo from Oz Lorenzo from Oz
    15. November 2019 at 16:30

    These are voting recommendations that are delightfully contrarian to a lot of framings of the UK elections. Well done.

    Post-Presidencies can tell you a lot about a person. W’s post-presidency has been a lot more creditable than Bill Clinton’s post-presidency.

    While that does not say much about their actual performances as President, it does in some areas. Compare the Enron story under W (executives going to gaol, no pardons) with somewhat similar instances under Bill.

  13. Gravatar of Lorenzo from Oz Lorenzo from Oz
    15. November 2019 at 16:34

    On migration and the UK, mass migration was brought in without any voter endorsement or honest debate. There is evidence that confronted with matters over which they have no levers of control, people seek support in congenial identities. It is therefore hardly surprising if UK politics is pushed into a more nationalist direction.
    https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-00571718/document

    The sexual exploitation of under age girls by predatory Muslim gangs did not help.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotherham_child_sexual_exploitation_scandal#Jay

  14. Gravatar of ChrisA ChrisA
    15. November 2019 at 22:39

    Scott – you said “The Conservatives have become too nationalistic for my taste.” but you just endorsed voting for an explicitly nationalistic party, the SNP (Scottish National Party)! You are like people who say they are against Brexit because they support free trade – ignoring the fact that the EU is explicitly against free trade with tariffs and import restrictions and other anti-free trade measures.

    I would challenge you to provide a statement from the current leadership of the Tories that is “nationalistic”.

    Your response on the NYT (But I like Reagan!) actually is my point. You know enough about US politics and the actual positions and actions of US politicians to tune out the mis-information in main stream media about Reagan. But you don’t know enough about UK politics to do that, so you uncritically absorb media implicit biases (not just the NYT, but the FT and the Economist). One particular bias the US media have is they see the Tories as an equivalent to the Republicans, and Labour as Democrats. Hence your recommendations. I have also seen this approach called the Economist Fallacy – people read a few columns in the Economist about a far off country and count themselves informed on the situation there. Of course the Economist writers are providing one particular analysis, based on their particular politics, often trying to put the picture in the foreign country into the politics of their home country.

  15. Gravatar of Rob Rob
    16. November 2019 at 14:42

    Hi Scott,

    I think you should probably withdraw your recommendation for the Scottish nationalists – they are pretty much to the left of – if not close to – the politics of Corbyn; and they’re the most likely coalition partners to allow his socialist policies through effectively unopposed.

    I agree that the Conservatives are the least bad option but the Lib Dems have also come out as being very illiberal, especially on for example campus safe-spaces and freedom of speech. No-one in the UK sees them any longer as a Liberal party rather than as a Socialist-Democratic party.

    I as a British voter am increasingly disillusioned with Johnson, but like a lot of other voters have seen him as a Libertarian candidate compared to his opponents, especially on issues such as Immigration and Drugs, and that’s why he still has my support. I expect to be disappointed, but he’s the only leader who at least suggests that Libertarian policies such as these might be implemented if he wins. He has, for instance, supported open borders as editor of the spectator, and while I don’t expect that policy to be introduced – I think it should influence his policies in office.

    As I say, I expect to be disappointed, but I think for Libertarians, Johnson is way ahead of his opponents.

    I’m a long-time reader btw and thoroughly support your ideas for NGDPLT for major economies.

  16. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    16. November 2019 at 21:44

    ChrisA, You said:

    “One particular bias the US media have is they see the Tories as an equivalent to the Republicans, and Labour as Democrats. Hence your recommendations.”

    You are making no sense at all. I favor the Conservatives over Labour and the Dems over the GOP. In what possible sense am I confusing the two countries?

    You are right that I don’t know much about the Scottish nationalists. Other than favoring independence for Scotland, are they all that nationalistic? My main goal is to deny the Conservatives a big majority (I assume they will win.)

    Rob, You said:

    “I agree that the Conservatives are the least bad option”

    Agree with who? That’s not my view. I find it hard to believe that the Scottish nationalists are as bad as Corbyn, who I view as basically a communist. Do the Scottish Nationalists also favor the Venezuelan model?

    I hope I’m wrong about Johnson—I’d be delighted if he turned out to be a libertarian. So far the signs are not good.

  17. Gravatar of ChrisA ChrisA
    17. November 2019 at 06:27

    Scott – I didn’t mean you personally saw other countries in terms of US politics, just that the US media has trend for this – picking heroes and villains based on what they see the main political issues are in the US.

    The Scottish Nationalists are basically a soft left party in terms of social policies, like welfare and so on. I don’t think they would really go in for nationalisation and other such silly policies like Corbyn. But they are nationalistic in the sense that they want to have Scotland for the Scots. If you put that in British terms – “I want my country to be for British people” it would sound quite offensive. The only reason that they get away with this rhetoric is because of the “punching” up lens that media often romanticise.

    My personal view (as someone with close ties to Scotland and owning some property there although I am not Scottish) is that just like Brexit in the long run independence would be very healthy for the Scots. The basic character of the Scots is of course financially frugal and they don’t tend to tolerate nonsense too much. So I think you would end up with a nice country with good infrastructure and sensible tax rates. But the biggest issue driving the Nats is the cultural dominance of the English and that won’t go away. And ambitious people from Scotland will still want to move to London to further their careers. So it seems like a lot of work and disruption for very little long term benefit, especially if the rump Uk wanted to make things like customs an issue (but they probably won’t). I think the idea that Scotland has been mistreated by the English is a pretty silly one as well.

    Boris Johnson is probably as socially libertarian as you can find. My fear on him is his tendency to be less strong on fiscal issues and a populist tendency in terms of industry. Hopefully the other members of his cabinet will restrain him. There is no reason for anyone of the libertarian tendency to vote against the Tories in this election though, as all the practical alternatives, as Rob says, are much much worse.

  18. Gravatar of W. Peden W. Peden
    21. November 2019 at 09:06

    “Do the Scottish Nationalists also favor the Venezuelan model?”

    Only a few of them, though more than the few who support the Singapore model. 12 years ago, their models were Ireland and Iceland. After the financial crash, it was Norway in the lead up to the 2014 referendum. After oil prices fell? As far as I can tell, they want the Norway model without the oil wealth, with the cake to come from our staying in the EU (just like Norway).

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