In an interview with Jeremy Vine, The Count was challenged on the general requirement for people to not wear hats in the chamber. His retort was that it's also generally required to declare donations.
In Furness to him Farrage will have to interrupt his visit to America and GBNews show to go door to door so I could see it being a quiet summer for the voters
I saw that. It was amazing. He said something along the lines of if Nigel can get away with not declaring donation then he can probably bend the rules to allow a costume in parliament.
Another take away line, after being asked if the count was worried about the monster raving looney party running in Clacton, there were words to the effect: "If anything, the monster raving looney party will split the Reform vote"
Farage won Clapton with 45% of the vote with multiple candidates. That same showing this time would lose him the vote. Which would be hilarious because not only would it unseat Farage, it would also be the fifth by-election they failed to win.
But this isn't a normal by-election this is a by-election caused by someone who is under investigation for parliamentary misconduct and also is simultaneously under police investigation for criminal conspiracy to handle stolen money.
Don't they? Do you think they didn't know exactly who they were voting for last time? And if the only other option is a guy who plays a space alien with a bin on their head do you think they'll actually show up?
The option isnt necessarily one or the other, its "do I even bother to show up at all?"
If you have two joke candidates, why bother voting for either? Meanwhile the people who have voted for Farage in the past will likely continue to do so.
This is a candidate with a fucking bin on their head, are you seriously questioning whether they're a joke candidate?
Look, I get that we all really want Binface to win but that does not mean he is not a joke. That's the whole bloody point.
And, in context, because he is a joke candidate wearing a bin, there will be lots of people who won't bother voting for him. (While many of Farage's faithful will turn out) Sorry to break to you what every sane person with an opinion is predicting...
You don't even think that Farage is a joke candidate in the same way that Binface is. Sure, Binface can crack a joke that Farage is a "joke candidate" and it makes sense but it is not the same sense.
You think Farage is a joke because he's deserving of ridicule. But Binface is a joke because he purposefully invites ridicule. Binface is in on the joke because he's the one telling it. Farage is a joke because the idea that someone so disgusting could be near to power is a (sick) joke that we, those opposed to him, tell to make ourselves feel better about the sorry state of our country. Farage doesn't believe he's a joke at all.
I got jumped on on reddit for suggesting the same thing. It feels like an active attempt to muddy the waters and dissuade honest discussion/criticism but I can't work out exactly why.
"joke candidate" usually implies someone who enters with no chance of winning just to make a joke. The implication doesn't match in this case because he has a nonzero chance of winning.
No because it's percentage of the vote not quantity of votes.
All sorts of things could happen, perhaps the poor turn out in the last by-election was because people assumed he was a shoe in so didn't bother to vote. Perhaps people forgot (it seems like the sort of place where voter apathy is quite high). Perhaps people will be more likely to vote in this election because it seems funny. Perhaps he has really pissed off a lot of his voters due to his complete absenteeism from the position.
All of these possibilities don't change the fact that your assumption about the "same showing" is unrealistic. You can't have the same showing because the candidates previously standing are not, so where do you allocate their votes? Do you think none of the 116 people who voted UKIP (yes, they still existed in 2024!) might vote Farage over Binface? What about a few of the 12,820 people who voted Conservative? Any of them might align better with Farage policies than "nationalise Adele"?
If you literally have the same showing you'll have 21,225 votes for Farage, zero votes for any other candidate, and Farage will win with 100% of the vote.
There are a few far-fetched ways in which Binface could win. It's possible - I don't dispute that - but unlikely. My point, though, was about your argument based on the "same showing".
Ah I see, so you've divided the world into your enemies and your allies and you think that people who you previously saw as your enemy will still be your enemy. The thing to remember is they don't know you exist, nor do they care about what you're thinking.
In the last election they might have voted for the conservatives because they wanted the conservatives to be in charge. A vote for the conservatives is also a vote against Farage, so perhaps their primary motivation is they don't want Reform and will vote for whatever least worst option is presented in order to not get Reform. In the last election that was a Conservative candidate, in this election that's not an option, so it's binface or Farage, and if they're voting against him then literally anything will be better.
You've also completely disregarded my point that his antics over the last 2 years may very well have pissed quite a lot of his original voters off.
perhaps their primary motivation is they don’t want Reform and will vote for whatever least worst option is presented in order
his antics over the last 2 years may very well have pissed quite a lot of his original voters off.
Let me remind you of the words you are trying to defend:
That same showing this time would lose him the vote
What "same showing" are you talking about? I think by this point it's clear you meant something other than what you said. Since my issue was with what you said, not whatever you meant to say, it's better we leave it here.
Unfortunately, this is a national poll. AFAIK, there is currently no specific poll with only Clacton voters, and some projections expect Farage to win with an even higher margin than last time.
Fun fact about the national poll: Count binface didn't just beat Farage, he also beat "neither" as a response option. So the overall public doesn't just want Farage to lose but to be humiliated by losing to a walking trash can.
I'm sure every letterbox in the area has now been stuffed with propaganda that Count Binface is a lefty woke terrorist who personally beat Ann Widdecombe to death with a dildo.
They're not, only registered voters in Clacton will be voting in the actual by-election. Someone just conducted a national poll to see what the consensus was over the entirety of the UK, and the results of that poll aren't exactly surprising
The actual vote is local only, for the people who live in Clacton.
However, though only a local election, because Farage is also the leader of a political party, the result will also be used politically, to say whether people generally support or reject him and his views, and those of his party.
Because he's a... let's say "controversial figure", then there's some degree of national hope that he'll be defeated and ideally, embarrassed.
The UK is split up into 650 areas. During a GENERAL election everybody eligible, and that can be bothered, in a constituency votes for a single candidate, the one with the most votes wins and becomes the MP for that area. 650 MP’s get elected this way.
Nige has resigned as an MP for, uh, reasons so we are having a by-election for just a specific one 650th of the UK.
Interesting. Jeremy Corbyn has an "anti-vaccine activist, conspiracy theorist" brother who is running in Clacton and apparently was a councillor for Labour in Southwark some decades ago.
As a teacher once made my class chant as we marched around the school, "singular verbs end in s". Count BinFace is the subject and wins is the verb of the clause "Count BinFace wins..."
I don't mean his binface mask, I mean the mask of politicians being anything more then entertainers with no real desire to govern for the people who elected them.
So other parties rejected not to enter the election (which is ridiculous- it feels like they’re basically told by tech oligarchs not to) but if binface also didn’t challenged him, what would have happened? Wouldn’t he just ended up resigning? Also how can you be a nominee after resigning?
AFAIK this election was triggered by Farage because he’s being investigated for some issues with donations and the outcome would be a sanction and trigger the same election, this way he can present himself like the people chose him and it wouldn’t have the sanction against him in the public opinion.
The thing is that if he is elected now, it doesn’t mean that the investigation is stopped, it would continue and find as he did things wrong and trigger the election.
Not presenting candidates against him from the major parties don’t give legitimacy to his shenanigans and don’t waste time and resources on a process that will be done again a few months down the road.
he will be winning the post uncontested, exposing the theatre play he setting up. Though i'm not sure if his supporter understand that.
resigning mean only quit the current post he's holding, basically vacating the seat and trigger a by-election, because a seat cannot be left vacated if the next election is still far away. he's still eligible as a candidate. It's very different than quitting a job
That is absolutely provably false, the reason no party put forward a candidate in this by-election was to not legitimise Farage's publicity stunt.
Farage openly claimed this was going to be a "him vs the establishment" election, so "the establishment" as he calls it refusing to contest him has successfully made him look like a fool and has him crashing out hard in interviews
85 Comments
clav64@lemmy.world · 194 pts · 21d
In an interview with Jeremy Vine, The Count was challenged on the general requirement for people to not wear hats in the chamber. His retort was that it's also generally required to declare donations.
djdarren@piefed.social · 88 pts · 21d
I enjoyed his interview with Andrew Marr.
Marr: "Are you actually going to fight a serious door-by-door, street-by-street campaign?"
Count Binface: "....No."
tazeycrazy@feddit.uk · 9 pts · 20d
In Furness to him Farrage will have to interrupt his visit to America and GBNews show to go door to door so I could see it being a quiet summer for the voters
SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca · 29 pts · 21d
His promise to build one affordable house would out perform the entire government.
His trillion dollars a week to NHS was a dig at Brexiters who promised £200M a year to NHS, which never happened.
pi3r8@lemmy.world · 10 pts · 20d
350 million a week. That was the lie they sold.
Digestive_Biscuit@feddit.uk · 26 pts · 20d
I saw that. It was amazing. He said something along the lines of if Nigel can get away with not declaring donation then he can probably bend the rules to allow a costume in parliament.
clav64@lemmy.world · 18 pts · 20d
Another take away line, after being asked if the count was worried about the monster raving looney party running in Clacton, there were words to the effect: "If anything, the monster raving looney party will split the Reform vote"
Zorque@lemmy.world · 70 pts · 21d
How much of that public actually lives in Clacton?
echodot@feddit.uk · 58 pts · 21d
Farage won Clapton with 45% of the vote with multiple candidates. That same showing this time would lose him the vote. Which would be hilarious because not only would it unseat Farage, it would also be the fifth by-election they failed to win.
FishFace@piefed.social · 21 pts · 21d
You're assuming that the "same showing" would see every person who voted for someone other than Farage vote for a joke candidate.
The premise of the "same showing" is already clearly implausible, without adding that on top
StealthLizardDrop@piefed.social · 27 pts · 21d
in our causality, is binface really a joke candidate?
FishFace@piefed.social · -9 pts · 21d
Is this a joke comment? Of course he's a joke candidate.
EDIT: instead of downvoting, explain how the literal comedian in a literal costume with a literal bin on his head is not a joke candidate.
echodot@feddit.uk · 21 pts · 21d
But this isn't a normal by-election this is a by-election caused by someone who is under investigation for parliamentary misconduct and also is simultaneously under police investigation for criminal conspiracy to handle stolen money.
The normal rules don't apply.
Zorque@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 20d
Don't they? Do you think they didn't know exactly who they were voting for last time? And if the only other option is a guy who plays a space alien with a bin on their head do you think they'll actually show up?
The option isnt necessarily one or the other, its "do I even bother to show up at all?"
If you have two joke candidates, why bother voting for either? Meanwhile the people who have voted for Farage in the past will likely continue to do so.
FishFace@piefed.social · -1 pts · 21d
This is a candidate with a fucking bin on their head, are you seriously questioning whether they're a joke candidate?
Look, I get that we all really want Binface to win but that does not mean he is not a joke. That's the whole bloody point.
And, in context, because he is a joke candidate wearing a bin, there will be lots of people who won't bother voting for him. (While many of Farage's faithful will turn out) Sorry to break to you what every sane person with an opinion is predicting...
BlaestEgnen@feddit.dk · 8 pts · 21d
But he's the establishment candidate! Just ask Farage!
SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca · 1 pts · 20d
My grand voted for a bin, my parents voted for bins....
SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca · 7 pts · 21d
And Nigel Farage is not a joke candidate? He took a £5M bribe in crypto, now seeks re election?
Ich bin ein binliner.
FishFace@piefed.social · 5 pts · 20d
Did I say that? Try to stay on topic.
You don't even think that Farage is a joke candidate in the same way that Binface is. Sure, Binface can crack a joke that Farage is a "joke candidate" and it makes sense but it is not the same sense.
You think Farage is a joke because he's deserving of ridicule. But Binface is a joke because he purposefully invites ridicule. Binface is in on the joke because he's the one telling it. Farage is a joke because the idea that someone so disgusting could be near to power is a (sick) joke that we, those opposed to him, tell to make ourselves feel better about the sorry state of our country. Farage doesn't believe he's a joke at all.
yermaw@sh.itjust.works · 2 pts · 20d
I got jumped on on reddit for suggesting the same thing. It feels like an active attempt to muddy the waters and dissuade honest discussion/criticism but I can't work out exactly why.
SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca · 0 pts · 20d
You don't get it. Farage manipulation of the electoral process, and the behavior of the other parties is the joke here.
Farage is just another Trump, staying in power to avoid prison.
SapphironZA@sh.itjust.works · 6 pts · 20d
Because he is a lot more sane than the other candidate.
FishFace@piefed.social · 2 pts · 20d
Being sane relative to someone else is completely unrelated to being a joke candidate. Next?
starelfsc2@sh.itjust.works · 0 pts · 19d
"joke candidate" usually implies someone who enters with no chance of winning just to make a joke. The implication doesn't match in this case because he has a nonzero chance of winning.
echodot@feddit.uk · 8 pts · 21d
No because it's percentage of the vote not quantity of votes.
All sorts of things could happen, perhaps the poor turn out in the last by-election was because people assumed he was a shoe in so didn't bother to vote. Perhaps people forgot (it seems like the sort of place where voter apathy is quite high). Perhaps people will be more likely to vote in this election because it seems funny. Perhaps he has really pissed off a lot of his voters due to his complete absenteeism from the position.
FishFace@piefed.social · -1 pts · 21d
All of these possibilities don't change the fact that your assumption about the "same showing" is unrealistic. You can't have the same showing because the candidates previously standing are not, so where do you allocate their votes? Do you think none of the 116 people who voted UKIP (yes, they still existed in 2024!) might vote Farage over Binface? What about a few of the 12,820 people who voted Conservative? Any of them might align better with Farage policies than "nationalise Adele"?
If you literally have the same showing you'll have 21,225 votes for Farage, zero votes for any other candidate, and Farage will win with 100% of the vote.
There are a few far-fetched ways in which Binface could win. It's possible - I don't dispute that - but unlikely. My point, though, was about your argument based on the "same showing".
echodot@feddit.uk · 1 pts · 21d
Ah I see, so you've divided the world into your enemies and your allies and you think that people who you previously saw as your enemy will still be your enemy. The thing to remember is they don't know you exist, nor do they care about what you're thinking.
In the last election they might have voted for the conservatives because they wanted the conservatives to be in charge. A vote for the conservatives is also a vote against Farage, so perhaps their primary motivation is they don't want Reform and will vote for whatever least worst option is presented in order to not get Reform. In the last election that was a Conservative candidate, in this election that's not an option, so it's binface or Farage, and if they're voting against him then literally anything will be better.
You've also completely disregarded my point that his antics over the last 2 years may very well have pissed quite a lot of his original voters off.
FishFace@piefed.social · 1 pts · 20d
Let me remind you of the words you are trying to defend:
What "same showing" are you talking about? I think by this point it's clear you meant something other than what you said. Since my issue was with what you said, not whatever you meant to say, it's better we leave it here.
thehatfox@lemmy.world · 11 pts · 21d
The last election Clayton had a 58% turnout. So there might be some potential Binface supporters who didn’t vote last time.
I don’t think Clacton is likely to flip, but there is an outside chance.
prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 2 pts · 20d
Now we just need to see if he can win Beck and Page. Maybe we can finally have a Yardbirds reunion.
rustydrd@sh.itjust.works · 62 pts · 21d
Unfortunately, this is a national poll. AFAIK, there is currently no specific poll with only Clacton voters, and some projections expect Farage to win with an even higher margin than last time.
Fun fact about the national poll: Count binface didn't just beat Farage, he also beat "neither" as a response option. So the overall public doesn't just want Farage to lose but to be humiliated by losing to a walking trash can.
Blackmist@feddit.uk · 15 pts · 20d
I'm sure every letterbox in the area has now been stuffed with propaganda that Count Binface is a lefty woke terrorist who personally beat Ann Widdecombe to death with a dildo.
M0oP0o@mander.xyz · 4 pts · 20d
So there is now a chance?
sem@piefed.blahaj.zone · 7 pts · 21d
Could you explain to a USian how a local representative is elected by the whole state?
Are people in northern Ireland and Scotland also voting on this?
SpatchyIsOnline@lemmy.world · 29 pts · 21d
They're not, only registered voters in Clacton will be voting in the actual by-election. Someone just conducted a national poll to see what the consensus was over the entirety of the UK, and the results of that poll aren't exactly surprising
fakeman_pretendname@feddit.uk · 17 pts · 21d
The poll was just a quiz, for information or fun.
The actual vote is local only, for the people who live in Clacton.
However, though only a local election, because Farage is also the leader of a political party, the result will also be used politically, to say whether people generally support or reject him and his views, and those of his party.
Because he's a... let's say "controversial figure", then there's some degree of national hope that he'll be defeated and ideally, embarrassed.
prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 9 pts · 20d
This is like if USA Today did a nationwide poll about Mamdani
sem@piefed.blahaj.zone · 3 pts · 20d
I get that now. When I read:
I took that to mean the upcoming election was national.
In the US at least we sometimes use poll to refer to election, e.g., "Pokemon GO to the Polls", "Immoral Poll Tax", etc. It is unfortunate.
Noel_Skum@sh.itjust.works · 2 pts · 19d
The UK is split up into 650 areas. During a GENERAL election everybody eligible, and that can be bothered, in a constituency votes for a single candidate, the one with the most votes wins and becomes the MP for that area. 650 MP’s get elected this way.
Nige has resigned as an MP for, uh, reasons so we are having a by-election for just a specific one 650th of the UK.
WorldsDumbestMan@lemmy.today · 3 pts · 20d
Why do people vote Farage over Bin face? Can't they see how satirists make far better leaders than any politician or business leader?
BastingChemina@slrpnk.net · 3 pts · 20d
See Zelensky
SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca · 3 pts · 21d
But Clacton has a very high concentration of fuckwits, so Farage is fine. He will build a new parking structure, the Farage Garage.
SethTaylor@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 20d
Interesting. Jeremy Corbyn has an "anti-vaccine activist, conspiracy theorist" brother who is running in Clacton and apparently was a councillor for Labour in Southwark some decades ago.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piers_Corbyn
zabadoh@ani.social · 43 pts · 21d
"I'm the sane one" Binface sings
The Bin Can Win!
ieGod@lemmy.zip · 41 pts · 20d
What in the hell is that title?
funkless_eck@sh.itjust.works · 11 pts · 20d
prefer is a transitive verb, wins is intransitive.
They've changed "[they] ...(would).... prefer [he] wins [it] than Nigel (does)" to "[they] prefer [he] wins [it] than Nigel" which is still correct.
ieGod@lemmy.zip · 1 pts · 20d
Is the "wins" that throws me. Shouldn't that be "win"?
anarchy79@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 20d
Count Binface wins. The election. They prefer he wins. The election.
EvilHankVenture@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 19d
As a teacher once made my class chant as we marched around the school, "singular verbs end in s". Count BinFace is the subject and wins is the verb of the clause "Count BinFace wins..."
Arrkk@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 20d
Yeah I'd go with "win in" personally.
snugglesthefalse@sh.itjust.works · 1 pts · 20d
They could have just used "winning" and it would have been fine
anarchy79@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 20d
We try to avoid ing.
Paddzr@lemmy.world · -8 pts · 20d
Can we get those AI titles? At least they'd be readable over this abomination.
_stranger_@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 20d
ќ.
merc@sh.itjust.works · 20 pts · 20d
Make your vote Count.
zabadoh@ani.social · 2 pts · 16d
Count Binface has adopted your slogan!
https://youtu.be/P2xsinXoQ_U
merc@sh.itjust.works · 1 pts · 16d
Cool, definitely not my slogan though. He might have had it first, or he heard it from someone else like me. I just posted it because I like it.
psx_crab@lemmy.zip · 17 pts · 21d
Really hope he win, it will be better than Farage in every possible way.
SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca · 14 pts · 21d
His costed budget is to fund NHS at a trillion dollars a week and to build one affordable house.
NihilsineNefas@slrpnk.net · 16 pts · 20d
I'm already voting for him, you don't have to sell it to me any more
SethTaylor@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 20d
I will vote for him if I can have the affordable house on weekends.
yermaw@sh.itjust.works · 13 pts · 21d
And thats even after we saw the Waldo episode of Black Mirror
prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 5 pts · 20d
I thought that episode was stupid when it first aired.
I watched it again sometime after 2016, and I no longer felt that way.
SethTaylor@lemmy.world · 12 pts · 20d
Unfortunately, in Clacton...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Clacton_by-election
scholar@lemmy.world · 8 pts · 20d
That was a decade ago; quite a lot of those voters have passed away.
anarchy79@lemmy.world · 8 pts · 20d
Too bad! What most people want isn't important, just whatever this inbred town of boomer yokels thinks!
Lydia_K@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 21d
Yes! Let's go! Pull the mask full off and things will finally change, be our hero Binface.
OwOarchist@pawb.social · 39 pts · 21d
No no -- the mask stays on. I won't be happy until I see him sitting in Parliament in full costume.
IronBird@lemmy.world · 18 pts · 21d
binface will be only one in parliament not wearing a mask
OwOarchist@pawb.social · 5 pts · 21d
Woah ... deep, man.
frunch@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 20d
He actually said in the interview that he's willing to challenge the rule barring head coverings in session LOL 😆 🗑️
Lydia_K@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 20d
I don't mean his binface mask, I mean the mask of politicians being anything more then entertainers with no real desire to govern for the people who elected them.
SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca · 1 pts · 20d
Sadly, that is illegal in Parliament.
OwOarchist@pawb.social · 1 pts · 20d
Okay, well, he'd better at least be wearing the rest of the costume, with the helmet next to him.
kreskin@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 20d
The British monarchy needs to be abolished and then recreated around Count Binface.
lemmelemmy@feddit.org · 3 pts · 21d
So other parties rejected not to enter the election (which is ridiculous- it feels like they’re basically told by tech oligarchs not to) but if binface also didn’t challenged him, what would have happened? Wouldn’t he just ended up resigning? Also how can you be a nominee after resigning?
ILikeTraaaains@lemmy.world · 16 pts · 21d
AFAIK this election was triggered by Farage because he’s being investigated for some issues with donations and the outcome would be a sanction and trigger the same election, this way he can present himself like the people chose him and it wouldn’t have the sanction against him in the public opinion.
The thing is that if he is elected now, it doesn’t mean that the investigation is stopped, it would continue and find as he did things wrong and trigger the election.
Not presenting candidates against him from the major parties don’t give legitimacy to his shenanigans and don’t waste time and resources on a process that will be done again a few months down the road.
psx_crab@lemmy.zip · 10 pts · 21d
he will be winning the post uncontested, exposing the theatre play he setting up. Though i'm not sure if his supporter understand that.
resigning mean only quit the current post he's holding, basically vacating the seat and trigger a by-election, because a seat cannot be left vacated if the next election is still far away. he's still eligible as a candidate. It's very different than quitting a job
deadbeef79000@lemmy.nz · -4 pts · 21d
These is a tradition that parties don't stand a candidate in other parties leaders' electorates.
It's 100% bullshit.
SpatchyIsOnline@lemmy.world · 11 pts · 21d
That is absolutely provably false, the reason no party put forward a candidate in this by-election was to not legitimise Farage's publicity stunt.
Farage openly claimed this was going to be a "him vs the establishment" election, so "the establishment" as he calls it refusing to contest him has successfully made him look like a fool and has him crashing out hard in interviews
supersquirrel@sopuli.xyz · 0 pts · 20d
Yeah but what is Binface's position on Israel's right to exist?
Paddzr@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 20d
Better than Farage's lol
scutiger@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 20d
Define "exist."