Political Betting - Leaders Debates

With the much-hyped leaders debate just a day away, and with the content likely to be pretty dull all round, this observer thought he'd take a bit of a (all-be-it small) punt on the betting markets to spice things up a bit.

Ladbrokes have what looks to be the best selection of bets at the moment, with a particularly tempting set of common words and phrases that you can bet on one of the leaders saying at any point throughout the entire hour and a half long program.

The word "Obama" for instance fetches 3/1, with "Binge Drinking" coming in at 4/1 (surely a shoe-in with the topic being domestic affairs) and my personal favourite "Fire up the Quattro" coming in at a not too bad 20/1.

David Cameron's tie colour can also be betted on; "Blue" sadly was evens, but "Green" at 8/1 and "No Tie" at 10/1 were too good to resist.

I've uploaded a screenshot of my betting slip so you can have a look. Wish me luck!

My Windows-Parody Vote-Tory Ad

You know those highly annoying "8 seconds to teach you something about Microsoft Windows" adverts that bombard us whenever we switch on the TV these days? Well this observer decided to create one on a slightly different theme. Enjoy...

Feel free to repost as you see fit.

A problem with the National Citizen Service

Big Dave : "Hi there social outcast 16 year old, how about instead of committing crime and lurking about on street corners you instead join our National Citizen Service where you get to run around after old people and essentially do community service?"

Hoody : "Do I have to?"

Big Dave : "Well, no, it's voluntary - but I think it'll make you a better person. So hows about it?"

Hoody : "Eh.... no?"

Big Dave : "Fuck!"

A joke to brighten up your Wednesday morning.

Three doctors are in a room discussing cases. The French doctor says "we transplanted a lung from Paris into a sick man in Cannes and in 6 weeks he was looking for work". The German doctor says "we had a heart from Berlin transplanted into a man from Frankfurt and in 4 weeks the man was looking for work". Lastly the English doctor steps forwards and says "yeah, well we transplanted an arsehole from Scotland into 10 Downing Street and now the whole country is looking for work!".

Positive action? - what a joke!

This article from the BBC has just depressed me. Not because it's unfair or badly written (as you might legitimately expect a BBC article to be) but rather because it reminds me that the Tory top brass can be just as retarded on occasion as their Labour counterparts.

For those too lazy to follow the link above, the BBC report is of David Cameron's new "initiative" to force local Conservative associations to pick candidates from all-female shortlists.

The idea is apparently to push up the number of women MP's in parliament; a worthy aim to be sure, it's just that this aim is going to be achieved by artificial means and probably at the expense of some extremely able candidates who's only flaw appears to be that they are of the wrong sex.

Surely it stands to reason that as a (hopefully) incoming government, we'd want the very best people possible representing us. Be they female or otherwise. Narrowing our options down to all-female shortlists is needlessly cutting off perfectly good candidates for the purposes of looking "balanced".

"What utter bullshit this is!", says this observer. A more gender-balanced ratio of MP's in the party would indeed be great, but the way to achieve that is to encourage more women to stand as candidates in the first place, not needlessly pushing through ridiculous and divisive rules to temporarily boost headline figures.

Over the last 12 years (and to be fair, also before) Labour have been characterised as a party of spin rather than substance, as a party who regulate away problems instead of encouraging and helping people to better themselves... Let's not as a party fall straight into the temptation of doing exactly the same simply because it grabs headlines and looks like the easy option.

UPDATE: Excellent articles on this have since appeared on Iain Dale's blog here, at the Spectator here and also over at Con Home here.

Family, Community, Country

Having just watched David Cameron's keynote conference speech on the TV, I have this to say: It was EXACTLY what this observer was hoping to hear!

Light on policy, heavy on vision. Not triumphalist, but not downbeat either. Commentators on the BBC are saying it fell slightly flat, but to a Conservative party member watching at home it was everything This Observer was hoping it would be.

Cuts in public spending, an increased focus on science and technology, provisions for front-line troops, decentralisation of power (including from the EU), supporting the family, abolishing the "CCTV state" and rewarding those who go out and work hard to provide for themselves.

Anyone watching that speech now has a measure of the man that would be PM, let's hope they share my opinion that any government working towards the vision and principles laid out in that speech would be a MONUMENTAL improvement over what we're lumbered with at the moment.

15 year old girl demands apology from Brown

Annabel Shaw, a 15 year old girl (pictured above), addressed the Tory party conference just a minute ago in the main hall and demanded an apology from Gordon Brown for the mountains of debt that her and her generation will be sadled with.

In what is potentialy quite an excellent coup from the Conservatives, bringing in "the children" (of "think of the children" Daily Mail fame) to drive home their point about the massive budget deficit will likely hit all the right spots in the tabloids.

George Osbourne is expected to make his keynote speech shortly, hopefully the combination of some solid policies, plus dear old young Annabels contribution should overshadow Alistair Darling's dirty tricks of last night!