Lothar
lotharschmid.bsky.social
Lothar
@lotharschmid.bsky.social
Will the catholics file for Habeas Corpus Christi?
November 8, 2025 at 7:21 PM
It's a bit like choosing to hang out in a bar which has a clientele you vibe with.
November 4, 2025 at 5:55 PM
Die Union ist nicht meine politische Heimat, aber ich wünsche Ihnen viel Erfolg mit dieser Initiative.
Eine konservative Partei mit einem demokratischen und sozialen Wertefundament ist wichtig für unsere pluralistische Demokratie.
October 29, 2025 at 6:00 PM
But that's a countrywide average, that's not how people in their constituency (=district in the US) vote.
The winning candidate usually gets >40% of the vote in their constituency. See below an example from the last election for the Labour Party.
Source: election2024.electoral-reform.org.uk
October 28, 2025 at 9:20 AM
When Starmer was elected Labour leader in 2020, the party published a full breakdown.
Back then there were 553k members and 231 affiliates/supporters eligible, a total of 784k.
And now it's 970k eligible in total? Despite membership falling?
(2020 results here: web.archive.org/web/20200404...)
October 26, 2025 at 12:59 PM
Media not doing their job, which is, ahem, scrutinising the details of Tory draft legislation, so the Tory MPs don't have to?
October 23, 2025 at 7:12 PM
Und als Abschluss dann bitte: Die Gespenster die ... rief, die wird ... nun nicht los.
October 23, 2025 at 11:46 AM
This will end up like Brexit, where the proponents made contradictory promises to different groups to achieve a majority.
October 23, 2025 at 8:14 AM
They're being vague deliberately so they can appeal to both the most extreme racists, and the moderates who will convince themselves that this policy will reviewed carefully and made 'fair' before it's enacted.

And neither the government nor the media is not calling them out on it.
October 23, 2025 at 8:12 AM
Starmer could have mentioned this at PMQs today.
October 22, 2025 at 4:55 PM
Checking carefully rather than charging ahead?
October 16, 2025 at 9:29 AM
In Germany, there was a wealth tax after the 2nd World War: 50% of wealth in 1948, payable over 30 years in quarterly installments.
A comparable tax would raise 200 billion a year in the UK.
October 14, 2025 at 5:58 PM
Alternative arrangements?
October 10, 2025 at 11:44 AM
Of course this would be seen as absurdly draconian, and rightly so.
But if you do the same to immigrants, it's suddenly OK.
September 29, 2025 at 7:27 PM
The logical next step would be to apply similar rules to citizens as well. Why should someone with British ancestors have access to public funds unless they have paid in and volunteered for at least ten years?
Why give them the benefit of British citizenship if they have broken the law?
September 29, 2025 at 7:27 PM
You can keep your German citizenship.
The last German government changed the rules on dual citizenship.
September 29, 2025 at 8:34 AM
I agree with you, but I can't see this government set up such a regularisation route. Starmer is not making the case for it, and he has had plenty of opportunity to do so if he wanted to.
So this is setting up a future reform attack line, demanding mass deportations of those 600k people.
September 26, 2025 at 8:36 AM
I think a big part of the problem is that the social safety net is disappearing.
Building an equivalent private safety net on your own is much more expensive. So even those who can afford to do this feel squeezed, and the many others for who this is out of reach feel extremely insecure.
September 25, 2025 at 10:24 AM
Would that not give a hypothetical vacc-sceptic devolved first minister the power to obstruct?
September 24, 2025 at 7:25 AM