Author | Lightnews

Reposted by Conrad

Sarah de Lange @sldelange.bsky.social · 13h

With the official prognosis giving one additional seat to PVV and one to FvD compared to the ext poll, the narrative should really not be that the Netherlands/Jetten has beaten the radical right. The far right bloc remains remarkably stable.

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Conrad @conradaml.bsky.social · 23h

Yeh I hadn't thought about that, but also seems like any rw government would probably be forced to work with BBB in the Senate either way I guess but dk if that means they actually keep them in the coalition

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Conrad @conradaml.bsky.social · 23h

Barring too much change, hard to see how any government other than a right-wing D66+VVD+CDA+JA21 coalition can be formed.

Potentially forces D66 into an awkward position where they're governing much more to the right than most of their new voters would like — migration is not a key issue for them

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Conrad @conradaml.bsky.social · 1d

D66 last minute surge has them coming out on top in the exit poll (though within margin of error between them and PVV and VVD), and clearly some of this coming at the expense of GL/PvdA who underperform the polls and are not in contention for largest party. Also showing some resilience for VVD.

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Reposted by Conrad

Dorian Lynskey @dorianlynskey.bsky.social · 6d

To go from "Who is Katie Lam?" to "Everybody hates Katie Lam, the Tory Idi Amin" in less than a week is exemplary "rising star" behaviour

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Reposted by Conrad

Sunder Katwala (sundersays) @sundersays.bsky.social · 6d

The Plaid vote will include Plaid loyalists + much of the half of Labour voters unhappy with the government *and* a big chunk of the half of the Labour vote that is OK with the government but wanted to stop Reform representing their town. It is a winning coalition for different motives

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Conrad @conradaml.bsky.social · 6d

And also turnout was already relatively high for a by-election at 46%. Caerphilly getting above 50%, especially for a Senedd by-election, is exceptional and it's hard to see Labour at this point motivating people to vote at that level, given their support has gone down since May.

Conrad @conradaml.bsky.social · 6d

If you go back to Runcorn, that was a clear Reform v Labour contest. LibDem vote went down by 2 and there wasn't much to lose there. But Green vote went up by 1 to 7%. That's not huge and probably the Greens could've won more if Labour weren't seen to be trouble, but notable that it wasn't squeezed.

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Conrad @conradaml.bsky.social · 6d

Based on reporting we can maybe interpret this as high turnout driven by tactical anti-Reform voting. I think the question is though whether this holds if it had been viewed as Labour v Reform. Both Reform and Plaid benefit from challenger status here.

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Conrad @conradaml.bsky.social · 7d

Don't remember a time where severe delays have persisted on the Northern line for multiple days, crazy stuff. Can't imagine TfL staff have been having a fun week.

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Reposted by Conrad

mathieu gallard @mathieugallard.bsky.social · 10d

📊 Publication aujourd'hui de la 13ème vague de l'enquête "Fractures Françaises", réalisée par
@ipsosfrance.bsky.social pour @lemonde.fr, @cevipof.bsky.social, @institutmontaigne.bsky.social et @fondationjjaures.bsky.social 👇 www.ipsos.com/fr-fr/fractu...

Fractures françaises 2025

En 2025, les Français affichent un niveau de pessimisme inédit face à la situation politique et sociale du pays. Pouvoir d’achat, déclassement social, déclin national, mais aussi défiance généralisée ...

www.ipsos.com

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Reposted by Conrad

Oceania Elects @oceaniaelects.bsky.social · 12d

New Zealand: 37 territorial authorities and 5 regional councils held referendums on whether to keep or remove their Māori ward for future local elections.

24 councils voted to remove their Māori ward, while 18 councils voted to keep their Māori ward.

➤ oceaniaelects.com/new-zealand

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Reposted by Conrad

The New York Times @nytimes.com · 15d

If the Supreme Court strikes down Section 2 of the 1965 Voting Rights Act, which has been interpreted to require the creation of majority-minority districts, Republicans could eliminate upward of a dozen Democratic-held districts across the South. Here's how.

The Supreme Court Case That Could Hand the House to Republicans

Democrats would be in danger of losing around a dozen majority-minority districts across the South if the court struck down part of the Voting Rights Act.

nyti.ms

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Reposted by Conrad

Public Opinion Analytics Lab (POAL) @poalab.bsky.social · 22d

ESRC-funded PhD @lsegovernment.bsky.social × Campaign Lab: New Ways to Think Political Persuasion (start Sep 2026, 3.5 yrs)

Methods-heavy (experiments/computation)

Topics: multi-stage persuasion, interpersonal mechanisms, AI–voter interactions

📅Apply by 10 Dec 2025: www.lse.ac.uk/study-at-lse...

LSE Collaborative Studentship with Campaign Lab

www.lse.ac.uk

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Conrad @conradaml.bsky.social · 29d

And at a certain point, politicians have to be able to have values conversations, and appreciate their ability to shape public opinion not just follow it. If you frame an entire decision (or word in this case) on the basis on a snap poll you will always miss the bigger picture.

Conrad @conradaml.bsky.social · 29d

This is not borne out in the data used in the article — 44% say Farage isn't racist... which means that Starmer has told the median voter they are racist and there'll be a backlash as result??? Insane jump

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Conrad @conradaml.bsky.social · 29d

I know it's only a doorstep interview but given it's one of the biggest issues of the past couple of years and one Luke Akehurst has been very vocal about, it's absolutely bizarre how he just has nothing to back up his point of view on this and how techy he is

Owen Jones @owenjones.bsky.social · 29d

Apparently Israel’s genocidal acts are just “daft”.

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Conrad @conradaml.bsky.social · Sep 28

But the opposition is of course taking from the Trump playbook and casting doubt if election integrity

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Conrad @conradaml.bsky.social · Sep 28

🇲🇩PAS could be on the verge of a majority once the remaining votes are counted, which are very fabourable for PAS

PAS: 45.7%
Parliamentary opposition: 48.0% (or if PPDA drop below 5% then PAS will have a majority anyway)

Remarkable resilience in the face of constant Russian interference

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Conrad @conradaml.bsky.social · Sep 26

I wrote about a recent poll in Alberta that had some very eye-catching numbers — it's a key case of needing to be cautious to not draw too many conclusions from a single poll, even when it shows something dramatic

conradaml.substack.com/p/is-alberta...

Is Alberta's party system changing? Not yet.

A shock new poll from Cardinal Research suggests big change could be underway in Alberta, but there's reason to be sceptical

conradaml.substack.com

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Conrad @conradaml.bsky.social · Sep 26

Yeh I mean I do sort of get that — it's also just like we know a lot of the things a Reform government would do anyway, it's hard for the proposed digital IDs to raise my concerns about Reform more than what we already know, is how I'm feeling

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Conrad @conradaml.bsky.social · Sep 26

It's not that how Reform could use state institutions isn't concerning, it very much is, but something like digital ID they could and probably would introduce regardless and with a view towards much more state control than under Labour

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Conrad @conradaml.bsky.social · Sep 26

I generally lean towards sorting digital ID, though I get some of the criticisms. One I don't get is people saying that a potential future Reform govt could use it maliciously — it's true but they'd be a far-right authoritarian government anyway, they could introduce their own ID scheme anyway

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Conrad @conradaml.bsky.social · Sep 25

A five point increase is a weird middle ground where you can reasonably confidently say if you swapped out Starmer for Burnham right now Labour would get a bump in the polls — but it's not really big enough to justify a messy leadership challenge right now 🤷

George Eaton @georgeeaton.bsky.social · Sep 25

Excl: Labour would take a two-point lead over Reform with Andy Burnham as leader, new More In Common polling shows. www.newstatesman.com/politics/lab...

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Reposted by Conrad

John Oxley @joxley.jmoxley.co.uk · Sep 15

Don't attack them for being hypocritical, attack them for being homophobes.

It is, again, something that sets them out from the British public, even on the right.

Adam Schwarz @adamjschwarz.bsky.social · Sep 15

Nigel Farage:

"Children who have two stable parents have a better chance in life... The most stable relationships, the ones that last the longest, tend to be between men & women... There's an awful lot of kids in the country not getting the kind of start... they deserve."

Farage has two ex-wives.

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