Gordon :-p

[Cambabol]

Sinners! I can't believe there's no Gordon Brown thread! So.... what do you think?! I can't wait to see the new cabinet! Wasn't his entrance into number 10 excruciatingly awkward? What do you reckon about David Miliband as Foreign Secretary? I hope he gives Ed Miliband a cabinet position too...

[McK]

Quoting Cambabol from 09:17, 28th Jun 2007
Sinners! I can't believe there's no Gordon Brown thread! So.... what do you think?! I can't wait to see the new cabinet! Wasn't his entrance into number 10 excruciatingly awkward? What do you reckon about David Miliband as Foreign Secretary? I hope he gives Ed Miliband a cabinet position too...

I rejoice only because that stupid woman Patricia 'Mad Patty' Hewitt has finally gone from Health. There can rarely have been such an incompetent in charge of such an important public service. Junior Doctors will be pleased, but their joy will be tinged with the bitterness of having been screwed over by her ridiculous MTAS system.

[Fozzy Bear]

The sooner a general election is called, the better as far as i'm concerned. I think it is dreadful that he was just given the job of the most powerful person in the country without even having to fight for it.

I don't think he should be allowed to run parliament without winning the post (in an election for a party leader at least but we know how that turned out)..

[orudge]

Quoting Fozzy Bear from 13:41, 28th Jun 2007
The sooner a general election is called, the better as far as i'm concerned. I think it is dreadful that he was just given the job of the most powerful person in the country without even having to fight for it.

I'm astounded by the number of people who seem to think that Brown is required to call a general election, simply because he wasn't elected "by the people". These people don't seem to be aware of how our government works. We elect our own MPs. The parties elect their own leader, and the party with a majority provides the Prime Minister. We don't vote for a "President" like the States.

Maybe I've just been reading too much of the delightful BBC HYS, but it really does seem to show quite a lack of understanding.

Quoting Fozzy Bear from 13:41, 28th Jun 2007I don't think he should be allowed to run parliament without winning the post (in an election for a party leader at least but we know how that turned out)..

Well, effectively, he did win the post, as the party had no other suitable candidates that could command a majority of the votes!

[hr]

http://www.owenrudge.net/
http://standrews.facebook.com/profile.php?id=37103734

[McK]

Quoting Fozzy Bear from 13:41, 28th Jun 2007
The sooner a general election is called, the better as far as i'm concerned. I think it is dreadful that he was just given the job of the most powerful person in the country without even having to fight for it.

I don't think he should be allowed to run parliament without winning the post (in an election for a party leader at least but we know how that turned out)..

No, no, no. In this country we do not vote for a Prime Minister. We vote a particular party into power, and then the Queen asks the one with a majority to form a government. The idea that we should have a general election just because the PM has changed actually goes against our British constitutional tradition.

The Tories who are clamouring for a general election now Brown is in need only look back to John Major, who came in and stayed another 18 months 'unelected' after Thatcher. Also, Prime Ministers Douglas-Home, Callaghan and Eden - to name but a few - came into office the same way. There is nothing unusual in it, I don't think.

[Fozzy Bear]

I never said he should be required to call an election, i said he should call one.
Yes the party won the election but Gordon Brown won no election to become the party leader. Not even members of his party got to have a say in whether he became the leader or not, just MPs (as far as i remember). If even one other person got nominated i wouldn't be bothered but i don't like the fact that he stood unopposed in an election for such an important position.

edit: stupid mistakes

[munchingfoo]

The reason he stood unopposed is because no one else had enough nominations to run against him.

So we can conclude that a full vote including Brown would then result in? Yes, thats right, more votes for Brown than the other candidates.



Its okay, I appreciate we aren't all actually gifted enough to study here.

[hr]

Tired Freudian references aside - your mother played my mighty skin flute like a surf crowned sea nymph trying to rouse Poseidon from his watery slumber!

[Griggsy]

It is not required he calls an election but the fact remains that the Prime Minister of this country has more power in his hands than any other Western democratic leader. Furthermore, although people vote for a party, a large reason they vote for that party is through the leader, and a change of leadership must therefore demand an election.

As both the Tories and Lib Dems said on Newsnight last night, Gordon Brown does have a mandate to carry out Labour's policy , but he can't then turn around and say he's going to change that policy on it's head whilst still arguing it's covered by that same mandate.

[hr]

'I run wild in the shadowy jungle of erotic adventures.'

[Midget]

I quite like the cabinet and I hope that Brown will return government to being more cabinet centred, as it was before Thatcher and Blair embarked on their egotrips.

It should be a stronger cabinet it does after all have some Balls!

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IMAGE:img9.imgspot.com/u/04/241/18/160019.jpg new shite
http://standrews.facebook.com/profile.php?id=37100090

[Steveo]

I can't believe the Balls' wife, Yvette Cooper, the incompetent sham of a minister has been promoted. She was responsible for the Home Information Packs farce, and then let Ruth Kelly take the flak for it.

[hr]

Get off my internet.

[Raindog]

Did you see the standing ovation for Blair in the house of commons. Even the Tories but no nationalists. Bah humbug

[Mr Grande Marnier]

Quoting raindog from 17:32, 28th Jun 2007
Did you see the standing ovation for Blair in the house of commons. Even the Tories but no nationalists. Bah humbug

Possibly still pissed off at the fact that Blair didn't have the courtesy as PM to congratulate Alex Salmond on becoming FM.

[Lid]

Quoting raindog from 17:32, 28th Jun 2007
Did you see the standing ovation for Blair in the house of commons.

I know, scandalous wasn't it. I don't know if anyone will correct me, but isn't that unprecedented - and in fact a fineable offence?

[hr]

Mathematical Anti Telharsic Harfatum Septomin

[David Bean]

Quoting Steveo from 17:23, 28th Jun 2007
I can't believe the Balls' wife, Yvette Cooper, the incompetent sham of a minister has been promoted. She was responsible for the Home Information Packs farce, and then let Ruth Kelly take the flak for it.

I know - and he promoted her to Minister for Housing, of all things! What's next, Jade Goody for Education and Kenneth Lay for the DTI? When I read about it I wondered whether the BBC was playing a joke or something, but alas, it seems the only joke here is the Labour government - and it's a bad one.

[hr]

Psalm 91:7

[Jono]

Doon Wit Gordon Broon, Ye Scunners!

[hr]


Exclusive to The Sinner, and all other fora.

[exnihilo]

Quoting Lid from 20:17, 28th Jun 2007
I know, scandalous wasn't it. I don't know if anyone will correct me, but isn't that unprecedented - and in fact a fineable offence?

It was presented by the BBC (gack) as being an amazing endorsement of an unprecedentedly popular PM, where, in fact, it simply shows that there's nobody left in Parliament with the first notion of custom, order, precedent, dignity, gravitas, or any of the other things one might hope for in one's leaders.

[Starla]

Quoting exnihilo from 04:07, 29th Jun 2007

Quoting Lid from 20:17, 28th Jun 2007
I know, scandalous wasn't it. I don't know if anyone will correct me, but isn't that unprecedented - and in fact a fineable offence?

It was presented by the BBC (gack) as being an amazing endorsement of an unprecedentedly popular PM, where, in fact, it simply shows that there's nobody left in Parliament with the first notion of custom, order, precedent, dignity, gravitas, or any of the other things one might hope for in one's leaders.

Wow, I have never heard a sentence that makes anyone sound like such a pretentious asshole.

[hr]

"We all live in our Fantasy and only endure our Reality..." - R.A.Wilson

[Eliot Wilson]

Quoting exnihilo from 04:07, 29th Jun 2007

Quoting Lid from 20:17, 28th Jun 2007
I know, scandalous wasn't it. I don't know if anyone will correct me, but isn't that unprecedented - and in fact a fineable offence?

It was presented by the BBC (gack) as being an amazing endorsement of an unprecedentedly popular PM, where, in fact, it simply shows that there's nobody left in Parliament with the first notion of custom, order, precedent, dignity, gravitas, or any of the other things one might hope for in one's leaders.

The staff maintain those things!

Certainly not a fineable offence; so far as I'm aware, Mr Speaker cannot fine Members for anything in the Chamber.

[hr]

Bill and Ted beat the Grim Reaper at Twister

Bill: "You played very well, Death, especially with your totally heavy Death robes."

Death: "Don't patronise me."

[Anon.]

Quoting McK from 13:53, 28th Jun 2007
No, no, no. In this country we do not vote for a Prime Minister. We vote a particular party into power, and then the Queen asks the one with a majority to form a government. The idea that we should have a general election just because the PM has changed actually goes against our British constitutional tradition.

We don't vote for a party, we vote for an indivudual to represent our constituency. That individual need not be a member of a Parliamentary party (e.g. the member for Birmingham Ladywood) or s/he can change parties (e.g. the member for Grantham and Stamford), but they still remain the member for that constituency. The Prime Minister is usually the person who can command the allegiance of the majority of individual MPs, but these MPs need not all be of the same party (e.g. Ramsay MacDonald in 1935). In fact the Prime Minister need not even have an absolute majority at all (e.g. Harold Wilson in February 1974). Actually the Queen can ask whomever she pleases to form a government, but if she picked someone who couldn't get anyone to vote for him/her in the Commons not much would get done.

[exnihilo]

Indeed, HM chooses someone who enjoys the confidence of the Commons, that that tends to be the leader of the largest party is, constitutionally, happenstance.