Talk:House of Cards (British TV series)/Archive 1

How about a list of political dramas? Including House of Cards here, but also quasi-fictionalized versions like I, Claudius and Trudeau


 * Great idea. --Valentinian 10:49, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

I've removed the line about security clearance for the roof garden, it's not necessary (I don't have it, and I've been there). Trivial, I know --Prince Myshkin

Fourth wall: The article states that the title character breaks the 'fourth wall'. But breaking the fourth wall is where the audience is explicitly reminded that they are watching fiction. This is not technically correct in the House of Cards, as the title character is conversing with the audience as if they are watching real events.

Government majority slashed in the first movie.
I've removed example no. 1 from the list of errors, since I simply don't understand the edit.

The pre-election situation must have been that the Conservative government held 50% + 100 seats in the House of Commons -> in the election they lose 70 seats -> the post-election situation must be 50% + 30 seats, thus still a majority. I'm watching the series now, and this is how I've always understood that passage. If anyone has any additional information, feel free to correct me. Regards. Valentinian (talk) 22:06, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

"the Conservative government held 50% + 100 seats in the House of Commons -> in the election they loose 70 seats -> the post-election situation must be 50% + 30 seats,"

No it won't because it's a zero sum game and any seats lost by the government must logically be won by the opposition parties. So if you have a pre-election situation of

Conservatives 300 Opposition 200

Then if the Conservatives lose 70 seats you will have

Conservatives 230 (-70) Opposition 270 (+70)

which is 21 short of a majority. So I'll restore the comment. Valenciano 06:47, 11 April 2006 (UTC)


 * Ok, I'd remembered the number of seats in the House as lower. Makes sense now. Valentinian (talk) 07:18, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

No problem. It's an easy mistake to make and stems from thinking that a majority of 100 equals 50% + 100 seats when in fact that would make a 200 majority due to the oppos being at 50% -100 seats (200 behind.) A 100 majority will always be 50% + 50 seats. There's a few times in the series when that mistake is made and I'm surprised that with their team of political advisers that they made such an error. Valenciano 11:46, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

I've erased the section pertaining to this discussion once again. What contributed to the confusion, I believe, is how one defines or counts a majority government. Thus far, Valenciano has counted a majority government as being the difference in the number of seats between government and opposition. And if he were right, his example with regards to 300 vs. 200 would be correct. However, I believe that this may be misleading. From what I understand, the counting of a majority number of seats begins once a party breaks through the 50% + 1 threashold and proceeds from there. Using his example as 500 seats, a government would reach a majority when they get 251 seats, but in the case of 300 vs. 200, it would be a government majority of 50 seats, not 100 specifically for the reasons given above re: zero sum game. In 1990, there were 650 seats in the British House of Commons, therefore to get a majority a party needed 326 seats. If we were to use Valenciano's reasoning, then the standing in this book/show would have been 375 government vs. 275 opposition. However, I believe that when they used the term "government majority of 100" they meant 100 over the minimum standards for majority which would give the government 425 seats vs. 225 for the opposition. This being the case, a loss of 70 seats would still allow the government to have a 30 seat majority in the house, assuming majorities are counted once a party reaches the 50% +1 threshold. I'm not positive about this, but given the fact that I would assume the author of this book was knowledgeable about the British parliamentary system and had help in composing the book from people with governmental experience, I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.

--

>>>You are wrong about this. No one counts majorities in the way that you list above. See for example the following sites.

This one, one of the most respected and most used election results sites [] which gives government majorities of 30 as 50% + 15 etc.

This one re 1997 where Labour had 50% +90 "Within certain criteria, the Labour government with its near 180 majority in Westminster, has the freedom to do politically what it likes." []

This one from the Margaret Thatcher foundation [] which again lists majorities the way I have listed.

This one from the BBC, an impeccable source "The close vote saw a major reduction in the government's usual majority of 161" [] (Labour had 50% +80)

Or this one from Charter 88 : "Labour lost its majority of 3 before 1979 and the 1992 Conservative government saw its majority of 21 wiped out by 1997." [] (Labour had 319, opposition had 316, Tories in 1992 had 336, combined opposition 321)

You are perfectly entitled to your opinion and also to give the author "the benefit of the doubt" but unless you can provide evidence to support your opinion as per Wiki policy, I'll restore the comments. Valenciano 08:43, 5 May 2006 (UTC)


 * I reverted this edit >"Presuming that "majority" means "overall majority"> There is no need to 'presume' such a thing as the two are virtually the same with majority being used in a 2 party/candidate contest and 'overall majority' being used after a multi-party/candidate contest. If a party is short of 50% of the votes/seats then in political science this is called a 'plurality' [] not a majority hence the terms 'Majority government' and 'Minority Government.' [] ie in the latter case they do not have a 'majority.'

Also this edit >(although Collingridge might still lead the largest single party).< has been removed since it doesn't alter the substantive point that it's an error and is therefore irrelevant. Valenciano 11:01, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Olivier's Richard III
Do you think that Richardson modeled F.U directly from Olivier's Richard III? What with the adressing of the audience?

Why two articles with the same title?
Currently so far, there are two Wikipedia articles with the same title that headlined "HOUSE OF CARDS"!!! What is the meaning of this? How will the worldwide readers and knowledge searchers will able to find it straight-away the particular one-and-only articles that they want? Besides, how will they know that which is which on "pastime" or on "television show"? Can somebody or anybody immediately help to resolve these two articles? Whether or not both of these two needs to be redirected to another blank article for disambiguation or otherwise before another new article again with the same title comes up? In this world that we are living, surely there is no such thing (under the creation of the Almighty God) as two cloned or double-double of its own kind. Because everything was created according to its own kind in itself! However, for these two articles it is like the two of any different human beings living in separate worlds or of worlds apart can have 100% exactly the same full name!!! How pathetic! -onWheeZierPLot Tuesday, 27th June, 2006ad.


 * It is quite normal to have articles with close to identical names, e.g. "Georgia" is the name of a U.S. state and an idenpendent country. Please stop making incorrect disambiguation links as you did on at the beginning of both pages. Thank you. Valentinian (talk) 09:03, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

Dear Valentinian, kindly please read and comprehend painstakingly to my reply message (if you dare!) I've given to you back from the talk page or discussion of the article "House of cards (pastime)" regarding of what you've said or typed! -onWheeZierPLot Friday, 30th June, 2006ad.


 * You've posted an extremely long answer to a completely trivial matter, but the tone of your post is abusive and out of place, so reading a few pieces of it was more than enough. Wikipedia policies are the backbone of this project since they mean less work for everybody. Some of the core values are WP:Civil and WP:NPA. This project is building an encyclopedia and thus to convey information, so presenting misinformation is an extremely bad thing. The disambiguation links are there for a reason: to clearly state the name(s) of the other article(s). No more, no less. You changed them so they deliberately told incorrect information, and that was a bad idea, since it is very close to vandalism. We have no use the names the articles actually use, not the ones we'd like them to have. If you wish to change the name of an article, go to WP:RM and follow the procedure listed there.


 * Second: no matter what any of us think about this matter; Michael Dobb's book is in fact called "House of Cards", so that's the correct title for a page on that book. When it was published, it was quite controverisal and became pretty famous. Please note the capitalized "C" in the title; that capitalization is only used on titles for books, films etc. so any article about the pastime under that name would be incorrect. The name of the pastime is building a "house of cards" (with a lowercase "c") which is the correct title for such an article, but an incorrect title for an entry about the book. And yelling (= using bold letters) and posting personal attacks ("...if you dare...") are very bad style. Don't take my word for it, other editors feel the same way. Valentinian (talk) 13:51, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

"NOW YOU'RE TALKING! HAHAHAH!!! WHAT ABOUT THAT!!?" -onWheeZierPLot Sunday, 2nd July, 2006ad.

"Secret History" -- I removed the link to the (excellent) article on this term because House of Cards and Very British Coup are not secret histories. They do not portray secret alleged explanations for the known events of our past, but each posit an alternate near-future with different known public events. If in the House of Cards universe, someone wrote the true story of how FU has risen to power, that would be a secret history in that universe.70.91.137.57 01:32, 10 September 2006 (UTC)Dave MB

Merge YMSTICPC?
Suggest merging YMSTICPC into this article or perhaps Francis Urquhart. Dreadstar †  23:45, 17 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Just to add that YMSTICPC is currently under a deletion tag for notability concerns. Dreadstar  †  23:49, 17 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Unless there are any objections, I'll do the merge tomorrow. Dreadstar  †  21:10, 18 July 2007 (UTC)