bing181

Composure again. Silly free from Tyson, brain-fade from ANB.

Can't fault the intensity.

Yes, but the PM is nominated by the President, not elected from within a party. The PM would need to come from the majority party on the floor of the house, but there's some elbow room there. The cabinet ministers are also directly nominated by the President, but they don't need to necessarily come from the party in the majority - Macron himself is an example. Presumably the Republicans (right) are going to get a majority in the upcoming Legislative elections (June), and that's what Macron will have to deal with. However, there are a big slab of Republicans who are centrist (also PS), so you'd expect he'll be able to push through most of his program.

Polls were accurate, outcomes within 1% it seems. All over bar the shouting. Right across the political spectrum, political figures (including Fillon) are calling to vote Macron. LePen's percentage might go up a little from a few out on the margins, helped along by some abstentions, but she's light years away from 50%.

Yes, polls show Mélenchon would comfortably beat her. "Far-left" isn't the dirty word here that it is in some/many countries, and there are still towns with openly communist mayors. There are a few candidates that are to the left of Mélenchon as well, so while he's certainly left, he could just about still find a place in the Labour Party. Polls - well, different discussion. Most US polls were within their range of error. Statistics is never meant to be about certainties. The trouble is, that kind of ambiguity isn't all that useful for us, so we join the dots. Even when they aren't really there.

I don't know that polls are all that tricky if you look at what they're actually polling and the results. Even in the US election, there was very little that was outside the margin of error. But the way the polls are done here is apparently quite different to in the US (they use different statistical techniques ... but don't quote me). Also, as Nate Silver pointed out, there's a bit difference between polls being out when candidates are running within 5% of each other, to when the differences are 10 - 20% or more. You're right though, she as a candidate does better than her party - but that's not really saying much.

Just to say as well (sorry, rabbiting on here), support for the EU has swung back the other way since Brexit became a reality. Everyone here is coming to understand the reality of what "being out on your own" actually means, and all recent polls have the French fairly solidly pro-EU (though it does vary depending on what you're actually talking about, e.g. agriculture), and very solidly pro-Euro. There's also a sense that with the UK out, France becomes an even more major player in the EU, which is seen as a positive and giving France more control/influence. There's a big difference between "we don't like everything you do" and "we want out", that sometimes these articles fail to pick up on, and the French are very good at bitching.

It's hard to know where the "success of her campaign" idea comes from. She's currently polling lower than she did a few years back, and support for the FN, as shown by actual votes in actual elections (local government, regions etc.) consistently fails to crack +/- 25%. There's no great recent movement towards the FN. That happened, such as it did, 5 or so years back when she took over the leadership. The one big change is the collapse of the two main left/right parties, which tends to show her/the FN in favourable light, but if you look at what support she actually has, there's not much change. The shootings on Thursday might give her a point or two extra, but even there, hard to see things shifting all that much. Also, FWIW, pretty well the same article could be written about the rise of Melanchon/the hard left.

She'll do about as well as predicted. Her base/support has hardly moved for 3 or more years, though given most of her support is a disenfranchised working glass, she has lost some to the hard left candidate Melanchon. The FN have no wider base, and don't control a single elected body above a few town halls: so, no Département, no Region, and a measly 2 seats out of nearly 600 in the National Assembly (federal lower house). Apart from her, the FN has no profile and no established or recognised figures, and they're also seen as being woefully incompetent. Yes, she represents the views of a substantial minority, in the same way as Pauline Hanson does. But in the second round, you have to get above 50% of the vote, and even the most optimistic polls have her falling way, way short of that. The closest she would run would be with Fillon, because left and centrist voters would have trouble stomaching either of them, but even with Fillon it's almost impossible to imagine she'd get the numbers. Will know more tonight.

That's simply not true, you're confusing concussion with a head knock. Concussion is a specific condition with specific symptoms. Not all head knocks lead to concussion, e.g., the knee to the head that Brayshaw received last AFL game.

Yes. And one more reason why form at VFL level needs to be taken with a grain of salt.

Every player who runs onto a footy field at this level faces a serious injury that could end their career. Hyperbole not helping. If it's potentially such a serious injury, then it merits a serious discussion.

Coincidence, regression to the mean, etc. etc. A broken clock is right twice a day.

Don't kid yourself. A handful of malcontents on a footy forum is not a large portion of anything.

Seems fairly straightforward. Every player has a role to play, and a way to play it - as do their team mates. Not playing to instructions will get you dropped, while toiling manfully at what you're supposed to be doing, even if it doesn't always come off, will get you the support of the coaches and presumably, team mates.

Good to see Mitch White back amongst the disposals. Still young, could be useful going forward.

Bugg 4 goals already, in everything. Perhaps he's one of those players who stars at this level, but doesn't quite make the AFL grade.

Wasn't that the cause of one of the concussions last year as well?

Is that confirmed somewhere? Wait and see, but no, doesn't sound good.

Also perhaps it's more structural, wanting to move Salem up the ground or into the mids, and there's no like-for-like half-back replacement (Wagner injured, White coming back from injury). Lewis comes back next week as well, so that's the spot Melksham is keeping warm. Still think Melksham will turn out fine, but a year off/away from footy isn't nothing.

Was something that I think it was Plapp commented on, that he needed to work on the defensive side of his game, so perhaps not as surprising as what it might seem.

Unfortunately true. The problem isn't the calling, it's the seeing.

It just means he's on the extended AFL bench, along with Kent and probably Bugg. The only certainties are that a) Hogan isn't playing VFL so presumably comes straight back in and b) Meksham not named in the VFL means that either he keeps his place or he's injured (or being penalised?) and doesn't play anywhere.

I thought they did in the past, not sure if this is a new system in place.

Seems that teams won't be announced till Saturday.