One of the real political disappointments for me was that when Gordon Brown finally became PM there was no great vision for what he wanted for the country. I didn't agree with Thatcher, but at least she had a purpose - and I think Blair did too before he got wrapped up in Bush/Iraq. I'm not sure that Sunak/Mordaunt/Truss have any vision. I think Braverman does but is nuts. Tugenhadt would bring a John Major type decency back to the office. Hunt makes my skin crawl for some reason. Zahawi would be a Johnson continuation scandal wise. Badenoch I know so little about to have an opinion. Of all the ones that started I preferred Javid. I think we will end up with Mordaunt - I saw that the loathsome Andrea Leadsom was her main ringmaster this morning - and I saw David Davis and Michael Fabricant in the front row at her launch. God help us.
My favourite line of Penny's this morning was 'we are going to modernise government with the white heat of modernisation' which got a round of applause.
Some of us remember who came up with that notion in the first place ...
And won a huge landslide.
Labour can learn a thing from that.
A majority of four isn't a landslide.
A majority of 98 is
But the first election after that speech saw Labour with a majority of four.
I suspect John Profumo played more of a role than that speech.
It defined both Wilson and Home, and Labour and Tory, in a single phrase, as the optimistic Sixties was about to kick off. As a soundbite it was one of the greats. Which is why we all still know it.
The Winds of Change speech was more important and transformative.
Policy wise yes. Oh for a Harold now. He also spectacularly avoided killing shed loads in Vietnam.
Also one of the few leaders to actually sound like a normal person.
Harold? Normal? Were you alive back then? I was a child and I don't think anyone back then thought of him as such. The Mike Yarwood impression was very funny.
Penny Mordaunt says that Britain has lost its sense of self
She compares it to Paul McCartney's set at Glastonbury - 'he was playing new tunes but what we really wanted was the good old stuff'
Didn't Paul play literally loads of old stuff, or did I watch a different performance
Five years ago I thought politicians obsessing over the future of the BBC was a bit weird. Five months ago it was them obsessing about individual newsreaders at the BBC. Yesterday it was did they like particular sitcoms made 50 years ago and set even further back. Today it is what songs a musician chooses to play!
Come up with a good plan for the economy, jobs, family, education, health and social care, defence, policing please and stay out of the rest of it.
Penny says people are fed up with them not delivering.
They've had 12 years.
The public are going to give them another chance, really?
They will use Brexit as a convenient BC/AD break though. And in a sense this is both a very different country and a very different government to that pre 2019 or pre 2016. Tories 22 arent even in the same ballpark as the Cameroons.
So she's going to be a change to Cameron, May, Johnson all at the same time? If she pulls this off, well fair play she's a genius
Thats not what im saying (but yes, every politician and therefore PM is different). The current givernment arent still trying to deliver the coalitions policies (hence 'had 12 years' is irrelevant). Austerity is gone, we are no longer in the EU, there is no drive for AV ir referenda on Europe etc etc. We are about to dnter the '7th iteration' of Tiry adminustration type and style - Cameron coalition, Cameron majority, May majority, May minorty/DUP, Boris Minority/DUP, Boris landslide, ??? All have different styles, aims and approaches. Tldr - its not a 12 year continuity
It was genuinely a sincere point, not meant to sound sarcastic. If she wins another majority and is another "change" candidate she's genuinely a genius. That takes real skill.
If there’s one thing the Tory Party has succeeded in over the past 12 years, it’s the fact it’s managed to reinvent itself so often that people don’t see it as a 12 year long government but essentially a serious of 3-5 year long phases. Stops voter fatigue. But doesn’t lend itself to good governance IMHO.
Penny Mordaunt says that Britain has lost its sense of self
She compares it to Paul McCartney's set at Glastonbury - 'he was playing new tunes but what we really wanted was the good old stuff'
Didn't Paul play literally loads of old stuff, or did I watch a different performance
Good old stuff is what we need. Badger baiting, workhouses, rickets, the Gordon riots, disembowelling, socage, Knight service, manorial rights. Can't wait.
My favourite line of Penny's this morning was 'we are going to modernise government with the white heat of modernisation' which got a round of applause.
Some of us remember who came up with that notion in the first place ...
One of the only two election winners for Labour in my lifetime.
Three surely.
Corbyn won in 2017 and also won the argument in 2019.
Off to the gulag.
I was arguing with somebody the other day about this, another Labour member.
In summary, I support war criminals.
Most of Labour's post war election winning leaders have the blood of so many dark people on their hands.
Blair with Iraq and Atlee with partition of India.
You forgot Wilson in Biafra - barely remembered today, but perhaps as deadly as India.
Penny says people are fed up with them not delivering.
They've had 12 years.
The public are going to give them another chance, really?
They will use Brexit as a convenient BC/AD break though. And in a sense this is both a very different country and a very different government to that pre 2019 or pre 2016. Tories 22 arent even in the same ballpark as the Cameroons.
So she's going to be a change to Cameron, May, Johnson all at the same time? If she pulls this off, well fair play she's a genius
Thats not what im saying (but yes, every politician and therefore PM is different). The current givernment arent still trying to deliver the coalitions policies (hence 'had 12 years' is irrelevant). Austerity is gone, we are no longer in the EU, there is no drive for AV ir referenda on Europe etc etc. We are about to dnter the '7th iteration' of Tiry adminustration type and style - Cameron coalition, Cameron majority, May majority, May minorty/DUP, Boris Minority/DUP, Boris landslide, ??? All have different styles, aims and approaches. Tldr - its not a 12 year continuity
It was genuinely a sincere point, not meant to sound sarcastic. If she wins another majority and is another "change" candidate she's genuinely a genius. That takes real skill.
Absolutely! Reinventing the wheel yet again. What % of the old can whomever wins paint as new and what distance between them and the undoubted clusterfuckery determines how far they might push tory chances up in the face of 'significant' headwinds
Same thing with SINDYRef - the number of Nat who swore they'd leave if Scotland was too cowardly to vote for independence......walk amongst us yet....
My favourite line of Penny's this morning was 'we are going to modernise government with the white heat of modernisation' which got a round of applause.
Some of us remember who came up with that notion in the first place ...
And won a huge landslide.
Labour can learn a thing from that.
A majority of four isn't a landslide.
A majority of 98 is
But the first election after that speech saw Labour with a majority of four.
I suspect John Profumo played more of a role than that speech.
It defined both Wilson and Home, and Labour and Tory, in a single phrase, as the optimistic Sixties was about to kick off. As a soundbite it was one of the greats. Which is why we all still know it.
The Winds of Change speech was more important and transformative.
Policy wise yes. Oh for a Harold now. He also spectacularly avoided killing shed loads in Vietnam.
Also one of the few leaders to actually sound like a normal person.
Harold? Normal? Were you alive back then? I was a child and I don't think anyone back then thought of him as such. The Mike Yarwood impression was very funny.
Penny Mordaunt says that Britain has lost its sense of self
She compares it to Paul McCartney's set at Glastonbury - 'he was playing new tunes but what we really wanted was the good old stuff'
Didn't Paul play literally loads of old stuff, or did I watch a different performance
Good old stuff is what we need. Badger baiting, workhouses, rickets, the Gordon riots, disembowelling, socage, Knight service, manorial rights. Can't wait.
I’m assuming the old stuff also includes no female suffrage and no female MPs?
The Torygraph seems undecided about who is Labour's worst nightmare
Both of them would give Labour a challenge. But Kemi has the potential to completely knock them over. The idiot Femi Sorry on Twitter earlier shows you how many knots her ascendency would tie them in.
Does Femi Sorry have anything to do with the Labour party at all? The only thing I can find is that his application to join the party was rejected in 2020.
Penny Mordaunt says that Britain has lost its sense of self
She compares it to Paul McCartney's set at Glastonbury - 'he was playing new tunes but what we really wanted was the good old stuff'
Didn't Paul play literally loads of old stuff, or did I watch a different performance
I sense there may be a possibility that Penny did not in fact watch Macca at Glasto.
The points in her favour just keep piling up.
Please stop before you even start.
You droning on about how right you are about the Beatles being rubbish is a close-run thing with 'guess the height/weight of x politician' as the most mundane PB topic of all time.
My favourite line of Penny's this morning was 'we are going to modernise government with the white heat of modernisation' which got a round of applause.
Some of us remember who came up with that notion in the first place ...
And won a huge landslide.
Labour can learn a thing from that.
A majority of four isn't a landslide.
Weirdly though a Labour majority of four would feel a bit like a landslide if it happened at the next GE. It'd mean they'd probably have won Basingstoke, Bromley and Bassetlaw.
Yah, would put Starmer, in terms of net gains as LOTO, in the Atlee, Blair, and Cameron territory.
You are forgetting Heath. The last time a working majority for one side was turned into a working majority for the other was 1970.
I refer the honourable gentleman to this chart.
Miliband is a bit decieving, he moved forward against the Tories unlike every other LOTO going backwards - completely overshadowed by the LD collapse and SNP surge though which worked to overwhelm Labour's gain of Tory seats.
The Torygraph seems undecided about who is Labour's worst nightmare
Both of them would give Labour a challenge. But Kemi has the potential to completely knock them over. The idiot Femi Sorry on Twitter earlier shows you how many knots her ascendency would tie them in.
Does Femi Sorry have anything to do with the Labour party at all? The only thing I can find is that his application to join the party was rejected in 2020.
- Her previous statements suggest she would be big on culture war, which would put me off - It's fine to be small state, I respect such arguments, but what the Conservatives have failed to express for a very long time is a coherent reformist vision of how public services should be organised to make that possible, preferring salami slice and degrade. Badenoch's initial forays don't seem to suggest she has that vision either. - I must tackle culture and upbringing, because if your vision doesn't suggest an understanding of a broad swathe of British society, clues from your upbringing do come into play. Boris's cosseted existence and his limited understanding of broader society, and basic rules of conduct were an obvious fail on this front. And spending almost your entire childhood in the US and at an International school and having a religious upbringing in Nigeria doesn't convince me. Far from thinking Badenoch has views antithetical to what a "black person should have", to paraphrase the stereotype of how the left think, I'd say her views are not at all unexpected given her upbringing. Some convincing to do, for me. - Her pre-politics CV is an odd one. One minute she's a software engineer, the next, without qualification, she's an associate director at Coutts. What happened? I'd like to think it was sheer recognised talent, that a corporate employer forwarded her within normal process, that her part time degree plus associacy was part of an open fast track scheme. Good luck, if so, excellent. But it'd be nice to see that confirmed.
she reminds me of US military brat culture, overlayed with a Govian belief that her position in the Tory party is due to talent/hard work rather than good fortune
My favourite line of Penny's this morning was 'we are going to modernise government with the white heat of modernisation' which got a round of applause.
Some of us remember who came up with that notion in the first place ...
And won a huge landslide.
Labour can learn a thing from that.
A majority of four isn't a landslide.
A majority of 98 is
But the first election after that speech saw Labour with a majority of four.
I suspect John Profumo played more of a role than that speech.
It defined both Wilson and Home, and Labour and Tory, in a single phrase, as the optimistic Sixties was about to kick off. As a soundbite it was one of the greats. Which is why we all still know it.
The Winds of Change speech was more important and transformative.
Policy wise yes. Oh for a Harold now. He also spectacularly avoided killing shed loads in Vietnam.
Also one of the few leaders to actually sound like a normal person.
Harold? Normal? Were you alive back then? I was a child and I don't think anyone back then thought of him as such. The Mike Yarwood impression was very funny.
No I wasn't, I've only listened to his speeches.
I hear Wilson was one of the few recent PMs to be reliably pleasant and down-to-earth on a personal basis, John Major being another.
My favourite line of Penny's this morning was 'we are going to modernise government with the white heat of modernisation' which got a round of applause.
Some of us remember who came up with that notion in the first place ...
And won a huge landslide.
Labour can learn a thing from that.
A majority of four isn't a landslide.
Weirdly though a Labour majority of four would feel a bit like a landslide if it happened at the next GE. It'd mean they'd probably have won Basingstoke, Bromley and Bassetlaw.
Yah, would put Starmer, in terms of net gains as LOTO, in the Atlee, Blair, and Cameron territory.
You are forgetting Heath. The last time a working majority for one side was turned into a working majority for the other was 1970.
I refer the honourable gentleman to this chart.
Miliband is a bit decieving, he moved forward against the Tories unlike every other LOTO going backwards - completely overshadowed by the LD collapse and SNP surge though which worked to overwhelm Labour's gain of Tory seats.
Nah, if he hadn't lost eight seats to the Tories, then Dave doesn't win a majority.
My favourite line of Penny's this morning was 'we are going to modernise government with the white heat of modernisation' which got a round of applause.
Some of us remember who came up with that notion in the first place ...
And won a huge landslide.
Labour can learn a thing from that.
A majority of four isn't a landslide.
Weirdly though a Labour majority of four would feel a bit like a landslide if it happened at the next GE. It'd mean they'd probably have won Basingstoke, Bromley and Bassetlaw.
Yah, would put Starmer, in terms of net gains as LOTO, in the Atlee, Blair, and Cameron territory.
You are forgetting Heath. The last time a working majority for one side was turned into a working majority for the other was 1970.
I refer the honourable gentleman to this chart.
Miliband is a bit decieving, he moved forward against the Tories unlike every other LOTO going backwards - completely overshadowed by the LD collapse and SNP surge though which worked to overwhelm Labour's gain of Tory seats.
Nah, if he hadn't lost eight seats to the Tories, then Dave doesn't win a majority.
He won more than 8 from the Tories I think though ?
I just found another promised "benefit of Brexit" that was promised and hasn't happened. Apparently Ken Livingstone said he would leave the country if the 2016 went leave. Had I known this, I might have even been tempted to vote leave. Alas it turns out to have been another lie!
Read the small print. He said he would start thinking about it. Very different to doing it.
My favourite line of Penny's this morning was 'we are going to modernise government with the white heat of modernisation' which got a round of applause.
Some of us remember who came up with that notion in the first place ...
And won a huge landslide.
Labour can learn a thing from that.
A majority of four isn't a landslide.
A majority of 98 is
But the first election after that speech saw Labour with a majority of four.
I suspect John Profumo played more of a role than that speech.
It defined both Wilson and Home, and Labour and Tory, in a single phrase, as the optimistic Sixties was about to kick off. As a soundbite it was one of the greats. Which is why we all still know it.
The Winds of Change speech was more important and transformative.
Policy wise yes. Oh for a Harold now. He also spectacularly avoided killing shed loads in Vietnam.
Also one of the few leaders to actually sound like a normal person.
Harold? Normal? Were you alive back then? I was a child and I don't think anyone back then thought of him as such. The Mike Yarwood impression was very funny.
No I wasn't, I've only listened to his speeches.
I hear Wilson was one of the few recent PMs to be reliably pleasant and down-to-earth on a personal basis, John Major being another.
Margaret Thatcher was very popular with Downing Street staff
Penny says people are fed up with them not delivering.
They've had 12 years.
The public are going to give them another chance, really?
They will use Brexit as a convenient BC/AD break though. And in a sense this is both a very different country and a very different government to that pre 2019 or pre 2016. Tories 22 arent even in the same ballpark as the Cameroons.
So she's going to be a change to Cameron, May, Johnson all at the same time? If she pulls this off, well fair play she's a genius
Thats not what im saying (but yes, every politician and therefore PM is different). The current givernment arent still trying to deliver the coalitions policies (hence 'had 12 years' is irrelevant). Austerity is gone, we are no longer in the EU, there is no drive for AV ir referenda on Europe etc etc. We are about to dnter the '7th iteration' of Tiry adminustration type and style - Cameron coalition, Cameron majority, May majority, May minorty/DUP, Boris Minority/DUP, Boris landslide, ??? All have different styles, aims and approaches. Tldr - its not a 12 year continuity
It was genuinely a sincere point, not meant to sound sarcastic. If she wins another majority and is another "change" candidate she's genuinely a genius. That takes real skill.
Absolutely! Reinventing the wheel yet again. What % of the old can whomever wins paint as new and what distance between them and the undoubted clusterfuckery determines how far they might push tory chances up in the face of 'significant' headwinds
Same thing with SINDYRef - the number of Nat who swore they'd leave if Scotland was too cowardly to vote for independence......walk amongst us yet....
If I wanted to be cruel I could post the comments from @TLG86, @Ishmael_Z, @Leon, @OllyT, and others on the evening of the champions league final.
A French inquiry into the security fiasco at the Uefa Champions League final in Paris in May has found that it was caused by a string of administrative errors and failings.
The French government initially blamed Liverpool fans and fake tickets for the crowd chaos that led to supporters being tear-gassed and robbed.
But a Senate report has found authorities blamed them unfairly.
Dysfunctional mistakes were made at every level, it said.
Two Senate committees investigated what went wrong on the night of the Champions League final between Liverpool and Real Madrid on 28 May, taking evidence from Liverpool fan and club representatives as well as French officials.
Liverpool fans have told the BBC that the problems were caused by digital tickets not working properly on the night, leading to problems at the turnstiles. A rail strike made things worse leading to bottlenecks as supporters arrived for the match.
Penny says people are fed up with them not delivering.
They've had 12 years.
The public are going to give them another chance, really?
They will use Brexit as a convenient BC/AD break though. And in a sense this is both a very different country and a very different government to that pre 2019 or pre 2016. Tories 22 arent even in the same ballpark as the Cameroons.
So she's going to be a change to Cameron, May, Johnson all at the same time? If she pulls this off, well fair play she's a genius
Thats not what im saying (but yes, every politician and therefore PM is different). The current givernment arent still trying to deliver the coalitions policies (hence 'had 12 years' is irrelevant). Austerity is gone, we are no longer in the EU, there is no drive for AV ir referenda on Europe etc etc. We are about to dnter the '7th iteration' of Tiry adminustration type and style - Cameron coalition, Cameron majority, May majority, May minorty/DUP, Boris Minority/DUP, Boris landslide, ??? All have different styles, aims and approaches. Tldr - its not a 12 year continuity
It was genuinely a sincere point, not meant to sound sarcastic. If she wins another majority and is another "change" candidate she's genuinely a genius. That takes real skill.
Absolutely! Reinventing the wheel yet again. What % of the old can whomever wins paint as new and what distance between them and the undoubted clusterfuckery determines how far they might push tory chances up in the face of 'significant' headwinds
Same thing with SINDYRef - the number of Nat who swore they'd leave if Scotland was too cowardly to vote for independence......walk amongst us yet....
My favourite line of Penny's this morning was 'we are going to modernise government with the white heat of modernisation' which got a round of applause.
Some of us remember who came up with that notion in the first place ...
And won a huge landslide.
Labour can learn a thing from that.
A majority of four isn't a landslide.
Weirdly though a Labour majority of four would feel a bit like a landslide if it happened at the next GE. It'd mean they'd probably have won Basingstoke, Bromley and Bassetlaw.
Yah, would put Starmer, in terms of net gains as LOTO, in the Atlee, Blair, and Cameron territory.
You are forgetting Heath. The last time a working majority for one side was turned into a working majority for the other was 1970.
I refer the honourable gentleman to this chart.
Miliband is a bit decieving, he moved forward against the Tories unlike every other LOTO going backwards - completely overshadowed by the LD collapse and SNP surge though which worked to overwhelm Labour's gain of Tory seats.
Nah, if he hadn't lost eight seats to the Tories, then Dave doesn't win a majority.
He won more than 8 from the Tories I think though ?
The Torygraph seems undecided about who is Labour's worst nightmare
Both of them would give Labour a challenge. But Kemi has the potential to completely knock them over. The idiot Femi Sorry on Twitter earlier shows you how many knots her ascendency would tie them in.
Does Femi Sorry have anything to do with the Labour party at all? The only thing I can find is that his application to join the party was rejected in 2020.
Doubt he is a member, but he is an activist.
But not a labour party activist - like I said his application to join was rejected because he seems to be publicly anti-Labour, so I'm failing to see the connection?
If I wanted to be cruel I could post the comments from @TLG86, @Ishmael_Z, @Leon, and @OllyT on the evening of the champions league final.
A French inquiry into the security fiasco at the Uefa Champions League final in Paris in May has found that it was caused by a string of administrative errors and failings.
The French government initially blamed Liverpool fans and fake tickets for the crowd chaos that led to supporters being tear-gassed and robbed.
But a Senate report has found authorities blamed them unfairly.
Dysfunctional mistakes were made at every level, it said.
Two Senate committees investigated what went wrong on the night of the Champions League final between Liverpool and Real Madrid on 28 May, taking evidence from Liverpool fan and club representatives as well as French officials.
Liverpool fans have told the BBC that the problems were caused by digital tickets not working properly on the night, leading to problems at the turnstiles. A rail strike made things worse leading to bottlenecks as supporters arrived for the match.
I just found another promised "benefit of Brexit" that was promised and hasn't happened. Apparently Ken Livingstone said he would leave the country if the 2016 went leave. Had I known this, I might have even been tempted to vote leave. Alas it turns out to have been another lie!
Read the small print. He said he would start thinking about it. Very different to doing it.
Couldn't someone persuade him? How about the Department for Brexit Opportunities giving him a visit?
My favourite line of Penny's this morning was 'we are going to modernise government with the white heat of modernisation' which got a round of applause.
Some of us remember who came up with that notion in the first place ...
And won a huge landslide.
Labour can learn a thing from that.
A majority of four isn't a landslide.
Weirdly though a Labour majority of four would feel a bit like a landslide if it happened at the next GE. It'd mean they'd probably have won Basingstoke, Bromley and Bassetlaw.
Yah, would put Starmer, in terms of net gains as LOTO, in the Atlee, Blair, and Cameron territory.
You are forgetting Heath. The last time a working majority for one side was turned into a working majority for the other was 1970.
I refer the honourable gentleman to this chart.
Miliband is a bit decieving, he moved forward against the Tories unlike every other LOTO going backwards - completely overshadowed by the LD collapse and SNP surge though which worked to overwhelm Labour's gain of Tory seats.
Nah, if he hadn't lost eight seats to the Tories, then Dave doesn't win a majority.
He won more than 8 from the Tories I think though ?
The Torygraph seems undecided about who is Labour's worst nightmare
Both of them would give Labour a challenge. But Kemi has the potential to completely knock them over. The idiot Femi Sorry on Twitter earlier shows you how many knots her ascendency would tie them in.
Does Femi Sorry have anything to do with the Labour party at all? The only thing I can find is that his application to join the party was rejected in 2020.
Doubt he is a member, but he is an activist.
But not a labour party activist - like I said his application to join was rejected because he seems to be publicly anti-Labour, so I'm failing to see the connection?
Alastair Campbell is also excluded from being a Labour Party member. And yet is clearly one of their activists and cheerleaders.
You would have thought that the Alba MPs would want to behave themselves and make the most of their time in the Commons given they won't be there after the GE!
Penny Mordaunt says that Britain has lost its sense of self
She compares it to Paul McCartney's set at Glastonbury - 'he was playing new tunes but what we really wanted was the good old stuff'
Didn't Paul play literally loads of old stuff, or did I watch a different performance
Five years ago I thought politicians obsessing over the future of the BBC was a bit weird. Five months ago it was them obsessing about individual newsreaders at the BBC. Yesterday it was did they like particular sitcoms made 50 years ago and set even further back. Today it is what songs a musician chooses to play!
Come up with a good plan for the economy, jobs, family, education, health and social care, defence, policing please and stay out of the rest of it.
The reason they focus on the rest of it is because they cannot provide a good (or even non crap, would last more than 30 seconds) plan for the economy, jobs, family, education, health and social care, defence, policing and justice systems.
So they try and focus on something else - for a demonstration of the end game see the SNP, the Scottish Government and their use of Independence as the cure for everything.
You would have thought that the Alba MPs would want to behave themselves and make the most of their time in the Commons given they won't be there after the GE!
You get paid regardless and given that it's 8 days to the end of the Parliamentary session they can now have an early holiday.
Telegraph got it priority right in regards to cost of living crisis stories...
Families have been hit by the biggest jump in childcare costs on record.....terrible....how do families manage...oh wait what, they aren't talking about after school clubs...with fees charged by nannies hitting an all-time high of close to £3,000 a month.
Penny Mordaunt says that Britain has lost its sense of self
She compares it to Paul McCartney's set at Glastonbury - 'he was playing new tunes but what we really wanted was the good old stuff'
Didn't Paul play literally loads of old stuff, or did I watch a different performance
Five years ago I thought politicians obsessing over the future of the BBC was a bit weird. Five months ago it was them obsessing about individual newsreaders at the BBC. Yesterday it was did they like particular sitcoms made 50 years ago and set even further back. Today it is what songs a musician chooses to play!
Come up with a good plan for the economy, jobs, family, education, health and social care, defence, policing please and stay out of the rest of it.
The reason they focus on the rest of it is because they cannot provide a good (or even non crap, would last more than 30 seconds) plan for the economy, jobs, family, education, health and social care, defence, policing and justice systems.
So they try and focus on something else - for a demonstration of the end game see the SNP, the Scottish Government and their use of Independence as the cure for everything.
Indeed, but is it really so impossible to tackle at least a couple of those areas successfully?
Penny Mordaunt says that Britain has lost its sense of self
She compares it to Paul McCartney's set at Glastonbury - 'he was playing new tunes but what we really wanted was the good old stuff'
Didn't Paul play literally loads of old stuff, or did I watch a different performance
Yes – terrible analogy. Not content with having a pop at Dad’s Army, she’s now having a pop at Paul McCartney.
There’s the kernel of a point here. A nation is a nation because of the stories it tells itself about itself and has in common; common cultural reference points, beliefs, and so on. There are fewer and fewer of these. We have less and less in common; both our view of our common history and our view of our common culture*. And so the Glastonbury Festival – which even thirty years ago was still quite a long way from the mainstream – is presented as the centrepiece of the British Summer; but it is headlined by a man playing songs from 60 years ago because that was our last common cultural reference point.
I’m just scratching at this issue; I’m not convinced I’m going at it right and I’m not sure where it leads. There are side issues about education, sport, situation comedy, the BBC, pubs, online and real life interactions. There’s a persuasive point about British society in here somewhere, and reflections about the extent Britain is typical or atypical of the west in the 21st century, but I’m not sure what it is or what to do about it.
I’m not a massive Paul McCartney fan, by the way. I prefer my music less melodic. But I do recognise a) his talent, and b) his cultural importance, and c) that he pitched his set excellently.
*On which point, I urge anyone to visit the Comedy Carpet in Blackpool, which is the best example we have of a common cultural reference point. It’s about half an acre of polished paving into which have been embossed dozens and dozens of punch lines and catch phrases which almost all British people and only British people will understand. “Don’t tell him, Pike – I’m playing all the right notes but not necessarily in the right order – Infamy, infamy, they’ve all got it in for me.” You don’t have to find any of it funny – though if absolutely none of it raises a smile you are either foreign or dead – but marvel at the fact that you can contextualise almost all of it without having had to try. And rejoice that there is at least something that we still have in common.
Telegraph got it priority right in regards to cost of living crisis stories...
Families have been hit by the biggest jump in childcare costs on record.....terrible....how do families manage...oh wait what, they aren't talking about after school clubs...with fees charged by nannies hitting an all-time high of close to £3,000 a month.
Quite like this Finkelstein quote. The comparison will irritate Tory Brexiteers. And socialists.
"Real Brexit is, like real socialism, a sort of abstract, undefined idea, always a little over the horizon, always waiting for someone bold enough, a true believer to guide us to the promised land."
Comments
I'm not sure that Sunak/Mordaunt/Truss have any vision. I think Braverman does but is nuts. Tugenhadt would bring a John Major type decency back to the office. Hunt makes my skin crawl for some reason. Zahawi would be a Johnson continuation scandal wise. Badenoch I know so little about to have an opinion.
Of all the ones that started I preferred Javid.
I think we will end up with Mordaunt - I saw that the loathsome Andrea Leadsom was her main ringmaster this morning - and I saw David Davis and Michael Fabricant in the front row at her launch. God help us.
Five months ago it was them obsessing about individual newsreaders at the BBC.
Yesterday it was did they like particular sitcoms made 50 years ago and set even further back.
Today it is what songs a musician chooses to play!
Come up with a good plan for the economy, jobs, family, education, health and social care, defence, policing please and stay out of the rest of it.
Almost owt could happen.
To be debated on Monday.
You droning on about how right you are about the Beatles being rubbish is a close-run thing with 'guess the height/weight of x politician' as the most mundane PB topic of all time.
Arf. Expect a third story on Torygraph news on this subject later today.
Crikey.
Surely that's Labour's stunt to pull.
I was right to look forward to this.
Did they read the standing orders? Did they read and UNDERSTAND them??
A French inquiry into the security fiasco at the Uefa Champions League final in Paris in May has found that it was caused by a string of administrative errors and failings.
The French government initially blamed Liverpool fans and fake tickets for the crowd chaos that led to supporters being tear-gassed and robbed.
But a Senate report has found authorities blamed them unfairly.
Dysfunctional mistakes were made at every level, it said.
Two Senate committees investigated what went wrong on the night of the Champions League final between Liverpool and Real Madrid on 28 May, taking evidence from Liverpool fan and club representatives as well as French officials.
Liverpool fans have told the BBC that the problems were caused by digital tickets not working properly on the night, leading to problems at the turnstiles. A rail strike made things worse leading to bottlenecks as supporters arrived for the match.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-62146769
This one does a much blunter "SHUT UP"
So what is the point of Alba as a party?
Johnson does that kind of self-deprecating humour quite well. Not that many would have used that line.
Paging @oxfordsimon
L
O
L
And has SKS got even less funny?
Starmer can't do jokes, though. He may struggle if the Tories choose someone who looks and sounds human.
So they try and focus on something else - for a demonstration of the end game see the SNP, the Scottish Government and their use of Independence as the cure for everything.
[starts sitting down]
"...and I'm looking for one"
Genuine LOL.
https://twitter.com/AdamBienkov/status/1547155259348422656
Penny Mordaunt says if she becomes Prime Minister she will give MPs control of "social capital pots" to dish out in their constituencies.
Devolving electoral bribery to the constituency MP.
Families have been hit by the biggest jump in childcare costs on record.....terrible....how do families manage...oh wait what, they aren't talking about after school clubs...with fees charged by nannies hitting an all-time high of close to £3,000 a month.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/consumer-affairs/parents-stung-3000-a-month-nannies/
There’s the kernel of a point here. A nation is a nation because of the stories it tells itself about itself and has in common; common cultural reference points, beliefs, and so on. There are fewer and fewer of these. We have less and less in common; both our view of our common history and our view of our common culture*. And so the Glastonbury Festival – which even thirty years ago was still quite a long way from the mainstream – is presented as the centrepiece of the British Summer; but it is headlined by a man playing songs from 60 years ago because that was our last common cultural reference point.
I’m just scratching at this issue; I’m not convinced I’m going at it right and I’m not sure where it leads. There are side issues about education, sport, situation comedy, the BBC, pubs, online and real life interactions. There’s a persuasive point about British society in here somewhere, and reflections about the extent Britain is typical or atypical of the west in the 21st century, but I’m not sure what it is or what to do about it.
I’m not a massive Paul McCartney fan, by the way. I prefer my music less melodic. But I do recognise a) his talent, and b) his cultural importance, and c) that he pitched his set excellently.
*On which point, I urge anyone to visit the Comedy Carpet in Blackpool, which is the best example we have of a common cultural reference point. It’s about half an acre of polished paving into which have been embossed dozens and dozens of punch lines and catch phrases which almost all British people and only British people will understand. “Don’t tell him, Pike – I’m playing all the right notes but not necessarily in the right order – Infamy, infamy, they’ve all got it in for me.” You don’t have to find any of it funny – though if absolutely none of it raises a smile you are either foreign or dead – but marvel at the fact that you can contextualise almost all of it without having had to try. And rejoice that there is at least something that we still have in common.
Labour must think he’s a shoo in. I think they’re wrong.
Absolutely shafted the au pair market.
I was never happy with my au pairs, a certain genre of movies left me with unrealistic expectations for what an au pair would be up for.
The comparison will irritate Tory Brexiteers. And socialists.
"Real Brexit is, like real socialism, a sort of abstract, undefined idea, always a little over the horizon, always waiting for someone bold enough, a true believer to guide us to the promised land."