Er, yes. I said in part, remember?
Now is not then.
What about Lincoln in 1864? His campaign was that the war would continue until the South was defeated. The Democrats, although badly split, tried to campaign on an “end the war by negotiations” platform. Lincoln himself thought he would lose, until Sherman won the Battle of Atlanta.
In Canada, the 1917 federal election was fought over conscription and staying in the war in Europe. Voluntary enlistment had dried up and to maintain its position in the war in support of Britain, the Borden government decided to institute conscription. The conscription issue wracked the country and caused a tremendous French-English split, but Borden won the campaign on a platform of conscripting young men to go off to the meat grinder of the western front.
Could a candidate survive by telling the hard truth that we have to dramatically slash military spending?
Maybe if they frame it as eliminating waste and inefficiency.
It seems to me that slashing military spending means either doing this, or weakening your military; and even if I thought the latter were necessary, I’m not sure I’d want to announce my plans to do so to the rest of the world.
In what sense do we “have to”? It’s certainly not a requirement for solvency. It might be a darn good idea to slash such spending; what we’re doing now *might *be a poor use of our money. But “have to” implies something is a fact. Please support your assertion of this fact.
As a matter of fact, our economy could easily support double the current military budget. Many countries over the years have spent that higher percentage, often for years.
Again I’m *not *suggesting that we should do that. I’m merely asserting that your saying we have to do anything to reduce military spending is unsupported by fact.
Okay, the country was not clamouring for more austerity. Happy now?
There really was no credible alternative for anti-austerity folks at the 2015 election outside Scotland. The Greens, sure, and they got a tiny bump but they’re not very good at campaigning at all and generally not taken seriously (which IMO is their own damn fault). The LibDems as noted were a spent force and Labour wasn’t challenging austerity. Corbyn’s election happened not that long afterward.
*“When you people reproduce, you’re not sending us your best. You’re sending us people with lots of problems. You’re bringing drugs. You’re bringing crime. And some of you, I assume, are good people.” * – A candidate yet to be named in August of 2027.
And in August of the following year, the crowd chanted “Lock us up! Lock us up!” “That’s right, folks! Lock you up – you deserve it, you worthless thugs.”
And in October of that year, the candidate yet to be named retorted with “'Cause you’d all be in jail” and the crowd howled!
And in November of 2016, they elected him in a stunning defeat of democratic challenger Jesus Lincoln who promised free schools, free healthcare, and obligatory pensions.
And yet the cuts to tax credits for the low paid were so unpopular Osborne had to scrap them in the 2015 autumn statement. Conclusion: many people who voted Conservative didn’t realise that they were in the frame for austerity-driven cuts.
Well, sure. It’s always the other people who are getting undeserved benefits and thus ought to have them taken away. My benefits are entirely deserved.