Because making ourselves America's b*tch has always worked out so well for us.
Has Putinguy1983 hacked your account?
Pretty much, yes, absolutely it has, though as the article says Truss has been out in front of Biden and Blinken, and not just behind following them. Johnson was too.
I think our foreign and security policy should be guided by our own interests, not Neocon talking points. On Russia, which represents a security threat to us, we should absolutely be standing up to Putin alongside America and anyone else who is up for it. Read through my posts, I have never said anything different. But the China-US rivalry is different, as China isn't a threat to our security, and frankly a lot of the bluster on the US side is down to their own sense of supremacy being threatened. That is their problem, not ours.
China absolutely is a threat to our security, even more than Russia is.
As horrendous as Putin's invasion of Ukraine is, China invading Taiwan would be an order of magnitude worse. Ukraine is a substantial grain exporter and Russia a substantial energy exporter so this war has helped fuel a cost of living crisis with energy and food, but Taiwan is the leading global supplier of high end electronic chips that run the modern economy and China is the leading global exporter full stop.
A China/Taiwan war would be utterly catastrophic for the global economy and thus our own security in a way that would absolutely dwarf our current crisis. Joining with the USA, Japan, Australia and other allies in deterring that risk is great value for money and is another reason why Putin's invasion of Ukraine must be seen to fail, to deter China too.
The world today is all interconnected, you can't look at one alone and ignore the rest of the globe.
The deterrence value of whatever paltry forces we could project in the Taiwan Strait is not going to be the difference between China invading Taiwan or not. This is the kind of Neocon talking points that got hundreds of British servicemen and women killed in Iraq. If the world economy is that dependent on key components from a geopolitical flash point I would suggest investment in supply diversification may represent a safer and cheaper course of action.
To do my best Chandler Bing impression - Could you be any more wrong?
The deterrence value of UK forces operating alone would not be the difference, that is true.
But the UK isn't operating alone. The deterrence value of the UK and the USA, Australia, India, Japan, Poland and the rest of the civilised world standing together in unison is immense. This is one area whereby working together we are more than the sum of our parts.
You are as utterly naive and reprehensible as the so-called "realists" who wanted to sell out Ukraine at the start of the conflict as Putin's victory was "inevitable" so we may as well accept that reality.
Team Truss obviously very happy. Team Sunak very happy. But perhaps the happiest people I’ve spoken to this afternoon are Labour people… Mordaunt was, by some way, the candidate that there were most worried about. They’ve been hoping for some time it would be Sunak V Truss. https://twitter.com/BenKentish/status/1549791598019575808
The problem with Mourdaunt was that people projected on her all their hopes and dreams and created the image of some sort of perfect Tory leader, but the brutal reality was that didn’t stack up. That and the Daily Mail did for her.
I was very much Team Penny, I don’t think anyone thought she was perfect. I think most people thought that her many strengths outweighed her weaknesses. The viciousness of the onslaught of briefings and what masquerades as journalism was in no way proportionate. It’s a very serious stain on the broad centre right space. I’m the bitterest I’ve been as a party member in a long time.
The attacks on Mourdaunt were unfair and brutal, I am not surprised you are bruised. It was not acceptable. My only hope is the next time this stuff is dished out at a Labour leader you don’t buy into it.
True, but the viciousness of the attacks on Mourdaunt were striking. Especially when they contrasted at the easy time given to preferred candidates, who seemingly can get away with any old rubbish.
The connection between a narrow section of the Tory party and certain newspaper editors who seem to have licence to print the most aggressive campaigns masquerading as news is one of the major problems we have in our democracy. It’s nasty, nasty stuff.
Normally Labour is the focus, but it was revealing to see this turned on Mourdaunt.
It’s nasty but not 100% confined to the right if we are being entirely honest. The problem is that the media on both sides want to be players in the game as well as commenting on the match.
Whilst there is nastiness everywhere, there is something particularly pointed about the operation focussed on certain parts of the Tory party and certain editors.
What did we expect. Tory Party = Nasty Party.
There are some deep-rooted unpleasant traits of both the Left and the Right imo, which biased though I know I am, I will summarise as:
Right: Nasty, selfish, greedy.
Left: Smug, superior, controlling.
There, I've tried to balance it out.
The right doesn't have a monopoly on selfishness and greed. The right mainly represents those in the private sector - they want lower tax and spend so they get more money. The left mainly represents those working for the state. They want higher tax and spend so they get more money. Somehow the motives of one group are called greedy and selfish and the motives of the other are called public spirited.
I do hope that the English Conservatives keep banging on about Margaret Thatcher. The Scottish Conservatives hate it.
Everyone keeps banging on about Thatcher - left and right - because for good or for ill she did mark a decisive turning point in British politics in a way no other politician has remotely managed since. The left would say for the worse, the right for the better. They're both oversimplifications, but hey, politicians don't really do nuance.
It may be that the current crisis will see a leader emerge who has a similarly dramatic impact and then we will move on from Thatcher as she moved us on from Attlee. Looking at today's crop of politicians I have my doubts, but then there were no shortage of people who thought Thatcher would be an ineffectual lightweight and lucky to last one term in May 1979.
Thank you for confirming that, because @Morris_Dancer thinks it is just The Guardian.
The Thatcher myth was built on her nicking North Sea Oil revenues.
Norwegian national pension fund = gargantuan
Scottish national pension fund = non-existent
Reason: Margaret Thatcher oil snatcher.
The case for Scottish independence should not be based on inventing a time machine to go back and recover those revenues.
Team Truss obviously very happy. Team Sunak very happy. But perhaps the happiest people I’ve spoken to this afternoon are Labour people… Mordaunt was, by some way, the candidate that there were most worried about. They’ve been hoping for some time it would be Sunak V Truss. https://twitter.com/BenKentish/status/1549791598019575808
The problem with Mourdaunt was that people projected on her all their hopes and dreams and created the image of some sort of perfect Tory leader, but the brutal reality was that didn’t stack up. That and the Daily Mail did for her.
I was very much Team Penny, I don’t think anyone thought she was perfect. I think most people thought that her many strengths outweighed her weaknesses. The viciousness of the onslaught of briefings and what masquerades as journalism was in no way proportionate. It’s a very serious stain on the broad centre right space. I’m the bitterest I’ve been as a party member in a long time.
If they'd been against Truss, they could have absolutely destroyed the woman; it's not like the material wasn't there - she was a Lib Dem ffs.
That she was a Lib Dem is not a weakness. Churchill was once a Liberal too. People who evolve are more interesting than those who don't.
Tony Blair when he was young was an avowed Trotskist, while Darling, Milburn, Reid and Mandelson were all avowed Communists when they were young too. People change.
Changing your mind is fine. The thing about Truss is how polarised the changes are. Utterly convinced about one thing and then utterly convinced about the opposite. No nuance, It’s not an evolution, it’s chaos.
Mr. Jonathan, a shift to absolutes away from nuance is one of the hallmarks of unhealthy political division. It seems part of the polarisation in the USA. While we obviously have splits here, we're fortunate they aren't so bad.
I do hope that the English Conservatives keep banging on about Margaret Thatcher. The Scottish Conservatives hate it.
Everyone keeps banging on about Thatcher - left and right - because for good or for ill she did mark a decisive turning point in British politics in a way no other politician has remotely managed since. The left would say for the worse, the right for the better. They're both oversimplifications, but hey, politicians don't really do nuance.
It may be that the current crisis will see a leader emerge who has a similarly dramatic impact and then we will move on from Thatcher as she moved us on from Attlee. Looking at today's crop of politicians I have my doubts, but then there were no shortage of people who thought Thatcher would be an ineffectual lightweight and lucky to last one term in May 1979.
Thank you for confirming that, because @Morris_Dancer thinks it is just The Guardian.
The Thatcher myth was built on her nicking North Sea Oil revenues.
Norwegian national pension fund = gargantuan
Scottish national pension fund = non-existent
Reason: Margaret Thatcher oil snatcher.
You like to pretend that Scottish Nationalism is more progressive and less selfish than Toryism, but this shows you are basically the same. The basis of Scottish Nationalism is not wanting to share North Sea oil revenues with the English.
The SNP have done a blinding job on persuading people in Scotland that they're cuddly progressives when they're the same as the nasty selfish Tories.
Team Truss obviously very happy. Team Sunak very happy. But perhaps the happiest people I’ve spoken to this afternoon are Labour people… Mordaunt was, by some way, the candidate that there were most worried about. They’ve been hoping for some time it would be Sunak V Truss. https://twitter.com/BenKentish/status/1549791598019575808
The problem with Mourdaunt was that people projected on her all their hopes and dreams and created the image of some sort of perfect Tory leader, but the brutal reality was that didn’t stack up. That and the Daily Mail did for her.
I was very much Team Penny, I don’t think anyone thought she was perfect. I think most people thought that her many strengths outweighed her weaknesses. The viciousness of the onslaught of briefings and what masquerades as journalism was in no way proportionate. It’s a very serious stain on the broad centre right space. I’m the bitterest I’ve been as a party member in a long time.
If they'd been against Truss, they could have absolutely destroyed the woman; it's not like the material wasn't there - she was a Lib Dem ffs.
That she was a Lib Dem is not a weakness. Churchill was once a Liberal too. People who evolve are more interesting than those who don't.
Tony Blair when he was young was an avowed Trotskist, while Darling, Milburn, Reid and Mandelson were all avowed Communists when they were young too. People change.
Changing your mind is fine. The thing about Truss is how polarised the changes are. Utterly convinced about one thing and then utterly convinced about the opposite. No nuance, It’s not an evolution, it’s chaos.
It is evolution, it is perfectly normal that once you have changed you accept your new position with the "zeal of the convert".
I was a Remainer at the start of the EU referendum campaign. I now have views in line with Truss's. Its not chaos, its evolution.
Flip-flopping back and forth rapidly at the drop of every opinion poll showing +1 to one side and then +1 to the other would be chaos. Not following with a zeal your new position once you've reached it.
Mr. Jonathan, a shift to absolutes away from nuance is one of the hallmarks of unhealthy political division. It seems part of the polarisation in the USA. While we obviously have splits here, we're fortunate they aren't so bad.
I think that's partly our wisdom in not letting screwballs on either side have automatic weapons.
Because making ourselves America's b*tch has always worked out so well for us.
Has Putinguy1983 hacked your account?
Pretty much, yes, absolutely it has, though as the article says Truss has been out in front of Biden and Blinken, and not just behind following them. Johnson was too.
I think our foreign and security policy should be guided by our own interests, not Neocon talking points. On Russia, which represents a security threat to us, we should absolutely be standing up to Putin alongside America and anyone else who is up for it. Read through my posts, I have never said anything different. But the China-US rivalry is different, as China isn't a threat to our security, and frankly a lot of the bluster on the US side is down to their own sense of supremacy being threatened. That is their problem, not ours.
China absolutely is a threat to our security, even more than Russia is.
As horrendous as Putin's invasion of Ukraine is, China invading Taiwan would be an order of magnitude worse. Ukraine is a substantial grain exporter and Russia a substantial energy exporter so this war has helped fuel a cost of living crisis with energy and food, but Taiwan is the leading global supplier of high end electronic chips that run the modern economy and China is the leading global exporter full stop.
A China/Taiwan war would be utterly catastrophic for the global economy and thus our own security in a way that would absolutely dwarf our current crisis. Joining with the USA, Japan, Australia and other allies in deterring that risk is great value for money and is another reason why Putin's invasion of Ukraine must be seen to fail, to deter China too.
The world today is all interconnected, you can't look at one alone and ignore the rest of the globe.
The deterrence value of whatever paltry forces we could project in the Taiwan Strait is not going to be the difference between China invading Taiwan or not. This is the kind of Neocon talking points that got hundreds of British servicemen and women killed in Iraq. If the world economy is that dependent on key components from a geopolitical flash point I would suggest investment in supply diversification may represent a safer and cheaper course of action.
To do my best Chandler Bing impression - Could you be any more wrong?
The deterrence value of UK forces operating alone would not be the difference, that is true.
But the UK isn't operating alone. The deterrence value of the UK and the USA, Australia, India, Japan, Poland and the rest of the civilised world standing together in unison is immense. This is one area whereby working together we are more than the sum of our parts.
You are as utterly naive and reprehensible as the so-called "realists" who wanted to sell out Ukraine at the start of the conflict as Putin's victory was "inevitable" so we may as well accept that reality.
You are being naïve if you think the US is simply defending the "free world" here rather than defending its own hegemonic position. Of course the US has every right to do this, and in many ways its hegemony is preferable to the alternatives, but I just don't think this is our conflict. Ukraine is our conflict, because it will determine the security of the whole of Europe and Russia is an expansionist power on our doorstep. Anyway, I look forward to you signing up so you can put your own life at risk in pursuit of America's foreign policy goals, rather than just other people's.
"I was then told this idea of borrowing to grow the economy then let it pay for itself is ludicrous ... What have we just heard [from the Tory leadership contest is] let’s borrow to grow the economy.
It’s extraordinary they’re repeating my agenda but at the same time, doing it in a way which, to be frank, I think is completely unrelated to the real world we’re living in which is the immediate crisis of the cost of living and climate change."
Truss was truly awful on R4 Today. The betting issue is complicated. How awful and illiterate do you have to be for this to matter with the Tory membership? Are there limits? And if Truss is found out by the membership, will they find Sunak better?
And having the choice of 2 candidates who spent 6 months not resigning from a corrupt government, where do they go?
Labour should have no trouble destroying either of these.
So I feel neutral as to which will win the membership vote; inclined to look carefully at 'Labour most seats'.
Is this the eagerly awaited (by me) moment when you move from that '45% each of 2, Con maj or Hung Parliament' assessment?
I am sorry to say it is. At this moment it looks to me like odds on that the next government will be Labour led. About 60 - 40. And an overall majority can't be entirely discounted, though I still think it's unlikely.
No-one can deny that the Tories are straining every sinew to lose the next election, and with their current talent pool I think they are wise to do so.
If the Labour party were normal, and normal times I would say that a Labour government is a certainty. It isn't. Labour would only have to spend a few weeks reminding us of the merits of Burgon, Abbott, Pidcock and Jezza, of what some of its members think of Jewish people, of how many Jewish people have been driven out of the party for everything to change.
And of course the Scottish problem.
The truth remains that all politics is relative. It used to be a luxury to have two parties capable of governing. Now it's a luxury to have one.
It's kind of you to hang on my every word, especially as I am always wrong. In particular recently in thinking it impossible that the MPs could be so dim as to leave Sunak and Truss as the only choices.
Kate Ferguson @kateferguson4 · 1h Liz Truss - a former Remainer turned Brexiteer - challenged on her switch
“I was wrong and I’m prepared to admit I was wrong”
====
Just pure horseshit. She doesn't mean she was wrong she means her side lost and so that's the end of it. That's different to being wrong. Has she really looked again at all the for and anti arguments and thought I have been persuaded I was wrong? No way.
Hmm I think Truss is a genuine convert. Like a reverse Rochdale Pioneers.
Kate Ferguson @kateferguson4 · 1h Liz Truss - a former Remainer turned Brexiteer - challenged on her switch
“I was wrong and I’m prepared to admit I was wrong”
====
Just pure horseshit. She doesn't mean she was wrong she means her side lost and so that's the end of it. That's different to being wrong. Has she really looked again at all the for and anti arguments and thought I have been persuaded I was wrong? No way.
What she really means is "Brexit is a heap of shit but if I don't pretend to be zealot for it I cannot be PM".
Kate Ferguson @kateferguson4 · 1h Liz Truss - a former Remainer turned Brexiteer - challenged on her switch
“I was wrong and I’m prepared to admit I was wrong”
====
Just pure horseshit. She doesn't mean she was wrong she means her side lost and so that's the end of it. That's different to being wrong. Has she really looked again at all the for and anti arguments and thought I have been persuaded I was wrong? No way.
I think that she very clearly does mean that. She touched on the fact that the apocalyptic warnings given have not come to pass and she emphasised the benefits including the trade deals that she has signed. Whether she is right to reach that conclusion will, apparently, be debated until the end of time (and quite possibly thereafter) but she is a born again leaver who thinks that this was in the UK's interests.
Overall, I thought that she did pretty well in the interview. Her economic plan seems to me to be somewhat irresponsible but I have to hold my hands and say that if someone had suggested that we could possibly borrow and print as much money as we did during Covid I would have thought that they were mad. Sound money people like me have to accept that the envelope was way bigger than I appreciated and that governments had more room for manouvre than conventional economics suggested. Whether that envelope is big enough to encompass Truss's plans remains to be seen.
Kate Ferguson @kateferguson4 · 1h Liz Truss - a former Remainer turned Brexiteer - challenged on her switch
“I was wrong and I’m prepared to admit I was wrong”
====
Just pure horseshit. She doesn't mean she was wrong she means her side lost and so that's the end of it. That's different to being wrong. Has she really looked again at all the for and anti arguments and thought I have been persuaded I was wrong? No way.
Hmm I think Truss is a genuine convert. Like a reverse Rochdale Pioneers.
No she is still a Lib Dem who was infiltrated into the Tory party
Because making ourselves America's b*tch has always worked out so well for us.
Has Putinguy1983 hacked your account?
Pretty much, yes, absolutely it has, though as the article says Truss has been out in front of Biden and Blinken, and not just behind following them. Johnson was too.
I think our foreign and security policy should be guided by our own interests, not Neocon talking points. On Russia, which represents a security threat to us, we should absolutely be standing up to Putin alongside America and anyone else who is up for it. Read through my posts, I have never said anything different. But the China-US rivalry is different, as China isn't a threat to our security, and frankly a lot of the bluster on the US side is down to their own sense of supremacy being threatened. That is their problem, not ours.
China absolutely is a threat to our security, even more than Russia is.
As horrendous as Putin's invasion of Ukraine is, China invading Taiwan would be an order of magnitude worse. Ukraine is a substantial grain exporter and Russia a substantial energy exporter so this war has helped fuel a cost of living crisis with energy and food, but Taiwan is the leading global supplier of high end electronic chips that run the modern economy and China is the leading global exporter full stop.
A China/Taiwan war would be utterly catastrophic for the global economy and thus our own security in a way that would absolutely dwarf our current crisis. Joining with the USA, Japan, Australia and other allies in deterring that risk is great value for money and is another reason why Putin's invasion of Ukraine must be seen to fail, to deter China too.
The world today is all interconnected, you can't look at one alone and ignore the rest of the globe.
The deterrence value of whatever paltry forces we could project in the Taiwan Strait is not going to be the difference between China invading Taiwan or not. This is the kind of Neocon talking points that got hundreds of British servicemen and women killed in Iraq. If the world economy is that dependent on key components from a geopolitical flash point I would suggest investment in supply diversification may represent a safer and cheaper course of action.
To do my best Chandler Bing impression - Could you be any more wrong?
The deterrence value of UK forces operating alone would not be the difference, that is true.
But the UK isn't operating alone. The deterrence value of the UK and the USA, Australia, India, Japan, Poland and the rest of the civilised world standing together in unison is immense. This is one area whereby working together we are more than the sum of our parts.
You are as utterly naive and reprehensible as the so-called "realists" who wanted to sell out Ukraine at the start of the conflict as Putin's victory was "inevitable" so we may as well accept that reality.
That is true, although, in strictly military terms, the only country that really counts in that list in deterring China is America. The deterrence of the UK, Australia, India, etc. isn't really that great, but add America to that list and all of a sudden any rational dictatorship would think twice.
It is like being world famous - you're not until you're famous in America. Though you can be famous in America without being world famous. For all its faults, America remains the essential country.
Because making ourselves America's b*tch has always worked out so well for us.
Has Putinguy1983 hacked your account?
Pretty much, yes, absolutely it has, though as the article says Truss has been out in front of Biden and Blinken, and not just behind following them. Johnson was too.
I think our foreign and security policy should be guided by our own interests, not Neocon talking points. On Russia, which represents a security threat to us, we should absolutely be standing up to Putin alongside America and anyone else who is up for it. Read through my posts, I have never said anything different. But the China-US rivalry is different, as China isn't a threat to our security, and frankly a lot of the bluster on the US side is down to their own sense of supremacy being threatened. That is their problem, not ours.
China absolutely is a threat to our security, even more than Russia is.
As horrendous as Putin's invasion of Ukraine is, China invading Taiwan would be an order of magnitude worse. Ukraine is a substantial grain exporter and Russia a substantial energy exporter so this war has helped fuel a cost of living crisis with energy and food, but Taiwan is the leading global supplier of high end electronic chips that run the modern economy and China is the leading global exporter full stop.
A China/Taiwan war would be utterly catastrophic for the global economy and thus our own security in a way that would absolutely dwarf our current crisis. Joining with the USA, Japan, Australia and other allies in deterring that risk is great value for money and is another reason why Putin's invasion of Ukraine must be seen to fail, to deter China too.
The world today is all interconnected, you can't look at one alone and ignore the rest of the globe.
The deterrence value of whatever paltry forces we could project in the Taiwan Strait is not going to be the difference between China invading Taiwan or not. This is the kind of Neocon talking points that got hundreds of British servicemen and women killed in Iraq. If the world economy is that dependent on key components from a geopolitical flash point I would suggest investment in supply diversification may represent a safer and cheaper course of action.
To do my best Chandler Bing impression - Could you be any more wrong?
The deterrence value of UK forces operating alone would not be the difference, that is true.
But the UK isn't operating alone. The deterrence value of the UK and the USA, Australia, India, Japan, Poland and the rest of the civilised world standing together in unison is immense. This is one area whereby working together we are more than the sum of our parts.
You are as utterly naive and reprehensible as the so-called "realists" who wanted to sell out Ukraine at the start of the conflict as Putin's victory was "inevitable" so we may as well accept that reality.
You are being naïve if you think the US is simply defending the "free world" here rather than defending its own hegemonic position. Of course the US has every right to do this, and in many ways its hegemony is preferable to the alternatives, but I just don't think this is our conflict. Ukraine is our conflict, because it will determine the security of the whole of Europe and Russia is an expansionist power on our doorstep. Anyway, I look forward to you signing up so you can put your own life at risk in pursuit of America's foreign policy goals, rather than just other people's.
If it were only the US that were worried about the risk of China invading Taiwan you might have some credibility that it is just the US defending its own position. Its not though, its the entire civilised world who are uniting because they know the threat is very real.
Stop and look at what China has already been willing to do with the Tibetans, Hong Kong and the Uighur. That you can look at that and seriously say "China is not a threat" is baffling, you are an apologist for evil.
Team Truss obviously very happy. Team Sunak very happy. But perhaps the happiest people I’ve spoken to this afternoon are Labour people… Mordaunt was, by some way, the candidate that there were most worried about. They’ve been hoping for some time it would be Sunak V Truss. https://twitter.com/BenKentish/status/1549791598019575808
The problem with Mourdaunt was that people projected on her all their hopes and dreams and created the image of some sort of perfect Tory leader, but the brutal reality was that didn’t stack up. That and the Daily Mail did for her.
I was very much Team Penny, I don’t think anyone thought she was perfect. I think most people thought that her many strengths outweighed her weaknesses. The viciousness of the onslaught of briefings and what masquerades as journalism was in no way proportionate. It’s a very serious stain on the broad centre right space. I’m the bitterest I’ve been as a party member in a long time.
If they'd been against Truss, they could have absolutely destroyed the woman; it's not like the material wasn't there - she was a Lib Dem ffs.
That she was a Lib Dem is not a weakness. Churchill was once a Liberal too. People who evolve are more interesting than those who don't.
Tony Blair when he was young was an avowed Trotskist, while Darling, Milburn, Reid and Mandelson were all avowed Communists when they were young too. People change.
Changing your mind is fine. The thing about Truss is how polarised the changes are. Utterly convinced about one thing and then utterly convinced about the opposite. No nuance, It’s not an evolution, it’s chaos.
It is evolution, it is perfectly normal that once you have changed you accept your new position with the "zeal of the convert".
I was a Remainer at the start of the EU referendum campaign. I now have views in line with Truss's. Its not chaos, its evolution.
Flip-flopping back and forth rapidly at the drop of every opinion poll showing +1 to one side and then +1 to the other would be chaos. Not following with a zeal your new position once you've reached it.
I’m not sure the zeal of a convert is necessarily a good quality for a pm. A conviction politician who changes their convictions regularly is a new one. We’ll have to see how it goes.
People's perspectives change and if the political party you're hitched too can't accommodate that, its time for a change.
@Pulpstar mentioned me, and yes I am quite happy having switched from Labour. But it wasn't sudden - I nearly made the move in 2003. I probably don't act / sound like I am happy - became crushingly depressed in 2020 and tried to rejoin Labour because I was desperate to feel normal again and that had been 25 years of my life, and then quit the LibDems for a day last year having realised I would probably vote against them in the 24 GE.
I switched, I'm happy I switched, I'm trying to make amends for some of the unconscionable shit I found myself pressured into supporting in 2015-16 during another (at that point undiagnosed) deep depression. What amazes me are the people who seem to insist that they are *true* [insert party here] people having switched, disowning their former position completely. Which is Truss.
Kate Ferguson @kateferguson4 · 1h Liz Truss - a former Remainer turned Brexiteer - challenged on her switch
“I was wrong and I’m prepared to admit I was wrong”
====
Just pure horseshit. She doesn't mean she was wrong she means her side lost and so that's the end of it. That's different to being wrong. Has she really looked again at all the for and anti arguments and thought I have been persuaded I was wrong? No way.
It's interesting that some people seem to think they have a direct line into another person's mind. No-one can possibly know whether someone else genuinely believes something or not.
Because making ourselves America's b*tch has always worked out so well for us.
Has Putinguy1983 hacked your account?
Pretty much, yes, absolutely it has, though as the article says Truss has been out in front of Biden and Blinken, and not just behind following them. Johnson was too.
I think our foreign and security policy should be guided by our own interests, not Neocon talking points. On Russia, which represents a security threat to us, we should absolutely be standing up to Putin alongside America and anyone else who is up for it. Read through my posts, I have never said anything different. But the China-US rivalry is different, as China isn't a threat to our security, and frankly a lot of the bluster on the US side is down to their own sense of supremacy being threatened. That is their problem, not ours.
China absolutely is a threat to our security, even more than Russia is.
As horrendous as Putin's invasion of Ukraine is, China invading Taiwan would be an order of magnitude worse. Ukraine is a substantial grain exporter and Russia a substantial energy exporter so this war has helped fuel a cost of living crisis with energy and food, but Taiwan is the leading global supplier of high end electronic chips that run the modern economy and China is the leading global exporter full stop.
A China/Taiwan war would be utterly catastrophic for the global economy and thus our own security in a way that would absolutely dwarf our current crisis. Joining with the USA, Japan, Australia and other allies in deterring that risk is great value for money and is another reason why Putin's invasion of Ukraine must be seen to fail, to deter China too.
The world today is all interconnected, you can't look at one alone and ignore the rest of the globe.
The deterrence value of whatever paltry forces we could project in the Taiwan Strait is not going to be the difference between China invading Taiwan or not. This is the kind of Neocon talking points that got hundreds of British servicemen and women killed in Iraq. If the world economy is that dependent on key components from a geopolitical flash point I would suggest investment in supply diversification may represent a safer and cheaper course of action.
To do my best Chandler Bing impression - Could you be any more wrong?
The deterrence value of UK forces operating alone would not be the difference, that is true.
But the UK isn't operating alone. The deterrence value of the UK and the USA, Australia, India, Japan, Poland and the rest of the civilised world standing together in unison is immense. This is one area whereby working together we are more than the sum of our parts.
You are as utterly naive and reprehensible as the so-called "realists" who wanted to sell out Ukraine at the start of the conflict as Putin's victory was "inevitable" so we may as well accept that reality.
That is true, although, in strictly military terms, the only country that really counts in that list in deterring China is America. The deterrence of the UK, Australia, India, etc. isn't really that great, but add America to that list and all of a sudden any rational dictatorship would think twice.
It is like being world famous - you're not until you're famous in America. Though you can be famous in America without being world famous. For all its faults, America remains the essential country.
In Economics (and probably elsewhere too) we frequently use the phrase a "necessary but not sufficient condition".
America is the necessary but not sufficient condition. America is essential as you say, but America on its own may not stay the course and also economically may be circumvented.
When the rest of the free world unites with America, then we amplify the significance. Had Britain, Poland and other European nations not been strongly pro-Ukraine then America would have been more tempted to slouch off and the sanctions on Russia would have been far less consequential.
The civilised world uniting with America in the Pacific to deter a Chinese invasion of Taiwan is tremendous value for money. A China/Taiwan war relative to the Russia/Ukraine war would be like WWI relative to the Boer War. Its another reason too why ensuring Ukraine wins is value for money too, if it helps ensure both Ukraine and Taiwan's freedom we kill two birds with one stone.
The whole world is connected, we can't just shove our heads in the sand and let the bad men like Putin and Xi do what they want as we're too afraid to stand up to them.
Kate Ferguson @kateferguson4 · 1h Liz Truss - a former Remainer turned Brexiteer - challenged on her switch
“I was wrong and I’m prepared to admit I was wrong”
====
Just pure horseshit. She doesn't mean she was wrong she means her side lost and so that's the end of it. That's different to being wrong. Has she really looked again at all the for and anti arguments and thought I have been persuaded I was wrong? No way.
Hmm I think Truss is a genuine convert. Like a reverse Rochdale Pioneers.
No she is still a Lib Dem who was infiltrated into the Tory party
Parties overlap. There was a clear overlap between the orange book wing of the LDs and the Cameroon wing of the Tories, just as there was overlap between Charlie Kennedy and Paddy Ashdown before him and Blair's Labour.
When that happens a step across is much easier. Same thing happened to Churchill. Twice.
"I was then told this idea of borrowing to grow the economy then let it pay for itself is ludicrous ... What have we just heard [from the Tory leadership contest is] let’s borrow to grow the economy.
It’s extraordinary they’re repeating my agenda but at the same time, doing it in a way which, to be frank, I think is completely unrelated to the real world we’re living in which is the immediate crisis of the cost of living and climate change."
I do hope that the English Conservatives keep banging on about Margaret Thatcher. The Scottish Conservatives hate it.
Everyone keeps banging on about Thatcher - left and right - because for good or for ill she did mark a decisive turning point in British politics in a way no other politician has remotely managed since. The left would say for the worse, the right for the better. They're both oversimplifications, but hey, politicians don't really do nuance.
It may be that the current crisis will see a leader emerge who has a similarly dramatic impact and then we will move on from Thatcher as she moved us on from Attlee. Looking at today's crop of politicians I have my doubts, but then there were no shortage of people who thought Thatcher would be an ineffectual lightweight and lucky to last one term in May 1979.
Thank you for confirming that, because @Morris_Dancer thinks it is just The Guardian.
The Thatcher myth was built on her nicking North Sea Oil revenues.
Norwegian national pension fund = gargantuan
Scottish national pension fund = non-existent
Reason: Margaret Thatcher oil snatcher.
The case for Scottish independence should not be based on inventing a time machine to go back and recover those revenues.
Well it can be (to demonstrator how unfair life is) but it's not going to solve the problem that the pension fund doesn't exist..
People's perspectives change and if the political party you're hitched too can't accommodate that, its time for a change.
@Pulpstar mentioned me, and yes I am quite happy having switched from Labour. But it wasn't sudden - I nearly made the move in 2003. I probably don't act / sound like I am happy - became crushingly depressed in 2020 and tried to rejoin Labour because I was desperate to feel normal again and that had been 25 years of my life, and then quit the LibDems for a day last year having realised I would probably vote against them in the 24 GE.
I switched, I'm happy I switched, I'm trying to make amends for some of the unconscionable shit I found myself pressured into supporting in 2015-16 during another (at that point undiagnosed) deep depression. What amazes me are the people who seem to insist that they are *true* [insert party here] people having switched, disowning their former position completely. Which is Truss.
That isn't me.
It makes sense though for Truss and williamglenn etc to do as they've done though as the Project Fear bollocks that was being spouted by them both pre-referendum has been shown up to be bollocks. Truss can see as well as anyone how great Brexit is going and how ridiculous in hindsight that the Project Fear shit was, so wholesale adopting pro-Brexit views makes perfect sense given that.
Team Truss obviously very happy. Team Sunak very happy. But perhaps the happiest people I’ve spoken to this afternoon are Labour people… Mordaunt was, by some way, the candidate that there were most worried about. They’ve been hoping for some time it would be Sunak V Truss. https://twitter.com/BenKentish/status/1549791598019575808
The problem with Mourdaunt was that people projected on her all their hopes and dreams and created the image of some sort of perfect Tory leader, but the brutal reality was that didn’t stack up. That and the Daily Mail did for her.
I was very much Team Penny, I don’t think anyone thought she was perfect. I think most people thought that her many strengths outweighed her weaknesses. The viciousness of the onslaught of briefings and what masquerades as journalism was in no way proportionate. It’s a very serious stain on the broad centre right space. I’m the bitterest I’ve been as a party member in a long time.
If they'd been against Truss, they could have absolutely destroyed the woman; it's not like the material wasn't there - she was a Lib Dem ffs.
That she was a Lib Dem is not a weakness. Churchill was once a Liberal too. People who evolve are more interesting than those who don't.
Tony Blair when he was young was an avowed Trotskist, while Darling, Milburn, Reid and Mandelson were all avowed Communists when they were young too. People change.
Changing your mind is fine. The thing about Truss is how polarised the changes are. Utterly convinced about one thing and then utterly convinced about the opposite. No nuance, It’s not an evolution, it’s chaos.
It is evolution, it is perfectly normal that once you have changed you accept your new position with the "zeal of the convert".
I was a Remainer at the start of the EU referendum campaign. I now have views in line with Truss's. Its not chaos, its evolution.
Flip-flopping back and forth rapidly at the drop of every opinion poll showing +1 to one side and then +1 to the other would be chaos. Not following with a zeal your new position once you've reached it.
" I was a remainer" . Pull the other one. You are the most reactionary poster on this site. You are the original young fogey Colonel Blimp. You might think making this claim adds cred to your position but it doesn't. It just points out to us that you are honest as Boris Johnson and Liz Truss. Both of whom you clearly admire in spite of their obvious problem with telling the truth.
People's perspectives change and if the political party you're hitched too can't accommodate that, its time for a change.
@Pulpstar mentioned me, and yes I am quite happy having switched from Labour. But it wasn't sudden - I nearly made the move in 2003. I probably don't act / sound like I am happy - became crushingly depressed in 2020 and tried to rejoin Labour because I was desperate to feel normal again and that had been 25 years of my life, and then quit the LibDems for a day last year having realised I would probably vote against them in the 24 GE.
I switched, I'm happy I switched, I'm trying to make amends for some of the unconscionable shit I found myself pressured into supporting in 2015-16 during another (at that point undiagnosed) deep depression. What amazes me are the people who seem to insist that they are *true* [insert party here] people having switched, disowning their former position completely. Which is Truss.
That isn't me.
It was more your leave -> remain change. I wasn't aware you felt pressured into joining the leave cause - I had you down as a genuine leaver sincere of your beliefs and I also have taken your change to remain as a whole hearted movement of views.
Kate Ferguson @kateferguson4 · 1h Liz Truss - a former Remainer turned Brexiteer - challenged on her switch
“I was wrong and I’m prepared to admit I was wrong”
====
Just pure horseshit. She doesn't mean she was wrong she means her side lost and so that's the end of it. That's different to being wrong. Has she really looked again at all the for and anti arguments and thought I have been persuaded I was wrong? No way.
Hmm I think Truss is a genuine convert. Like a reverse Rochdale Pioneers.
No she is still a Lib Dem who was infiltrated into the Tory party
Parties overlap. There was a clear overlap between the orange book wing of the LDs and the Cameroon wing of the Tories, just as there was overlap between Charlie Kennedy and Paddy Ashdown before him and Blair's Labour.
When that happens a step across is much easier. Same thing happened to Churchill. Twice.
I don't think there's much overlap between the LibDems and what she is now. Unless that is indeed a sleeper agent...
I do hope that the English Conservatives keep banging on about Margaret Thatcher. The Scottish Conservatives hate it.
Everyone keeps banging on about Thatcher - left and right - because for good or for ill she did mark a decisive turning point in British politics in a way no other politician has remotely managed since. The left would say for the worse, the right for the better. They're both oversimplifications, but hey, politicians don't really do nuance.
It may be that the current crisis will see a leader emerge who has a similarly dramatic impact and then we will move on from Thatcher as she moved us on from Attlee. Looking at today's crop of politicians I have my doubts, but then there were no shortage of people who thought Thatcher would be an ineffectual lightweight and lucky to last one term in May 1979.
Thank you for confirming that, because @Morris_Dancer thinks it is just The Guardian.
The Thatcher myth was built on her nicking North Sea Oil revenues.
Norwegian national pension fund = gargantuan
Scottish national pension fund = non-existent
Reason: Margaret Thatcher oil snatcher.
You like to pretend that Scottish Nationalism is more progressive and less selfish than Toryism, but this shows you are basically the same. The basis of Scottish Nationalism is not wanting to share North Sea oil revenues with the English.
The SNP have done a blinding job on persuading people in Scotland that they're cuddly progressives when they're the same as the nasty selfish Tories.
Projecting a judgment of a whole party (which contains multiple views on many subjects) from one post is it? Excellent work.
I was under the impression that the most recent PB collective view on NS oil was that Nasty Nic and the EssEnnPee were single-handedly preventing the UK from squeezing the last bit of profit from it by means unknown to anyone who has a clue about how devolved government works.
Dr. Foxy, willing to work with China is not a plus. That was one of the most naive approaches of Cameron-Osborne, and the West generally.
The hard problem is that, from a very strategic perspective, ideally we need to work with Russia to contain China. There were many missed opportunities over the last 2-3 decades on this front, and the current situation is a tragedy that should have been avoided.
India. No-one mentions India. Possibly because they're non-aligned, introverted, disorganised, corrupt and massively unpredictable.
But, they're no fans of China and are overtaking them in population this year and will be 50% bigger by 2050 and possibly the bigger economy.
We need to do whatever we can to strengthen ties with India as, empire histrionics aside, they basically share our core values.
'Empire' is your obsession. It's what gives you a rosy feeling about yourself and the country you were born in. You're an anachronism and unfortunately there are still too many of you around on the peripheral right to be completely ignorable but unless we can this country's going to continue to necrotise
Because making ourselves America's b*tch has always worked out so well for us.
Has Putinguy1983 hacked your account?
Pretty much, yes, absolutely it has, though as the article says Truss has been out in front of Biden and Blinken, and not just behind following them. Johnson was too.
I think our foreign and security policy should be guided by our own interests, not Neocon talking points. On Russia, which represents a security threat to us, we should absolutely be standing up to Putin alongside America and anyone else who is up for it. Read through my posts, I have never said anything different. But the China-US rivalry is different, as China isn't a threat to our security, and frankly a lot of the bluster on the US side is down to their own sense of supremacy being threatened. That is their problem, not ours.
China absolutely is a threat to our security, even more than Russia is.
As horrendous as Putin's invasion of Ukraine is, China invading Taiwan would be an order of magnitude worse. Ukraine is a substantial grain exporter and Russia a substantial energy exporter so this war has helped fuel a cost of living crisis with energy and food, but Taiwan is the leading global supplier of high end electronic chips that run the modern economy and China is the leading global exporter full stop.
A China/Taiwan war would be utterly catastrophic for the global economy and thus our own security in a way that would absolutely dwarf our current crisis. Joining with the USA, Japan, Australia and other allies in deterring that risk is great value for money and is another reason why Putin's invasion of Ukraine must be seen to fail, to deter China too.
The world today is all interconnected, you can't look at one alone and ignore the rest of the globe.
The deterrence value of whatever paltry forces we could project in the Taiwan Strait is not going to be the difference between China invading Taiwan or not. This is the kind of Neocon talking points that got hundreds of British servicemen and women killed in Iraq. If the world economy is that dependent on key components from a geopolitical flash point I would suggest investment in supply diversification may represent a safer and cheaper course of action.
To do my best Chandler Bing impression - Could you be any more wrong?
The deterrence value of UK forces operating alone would not be the difference, that is true.
But the UK isn't operating alone. The deterrence value of the UK and the USA, Australia, India, Japan, Poland and the rest of the civilised world standing together in unison is immense. This is one area whereby working together we are more than the sum of our parts.
You are as utterly naive and reprehensible as the so-called "realists" who wanted to sell out Ukraine at the start of the conflict as Putin's victory was "inevitable" so we may as well accept that reality.
You are being naïve if you think the US is simply defending the "free world" here rather than defending its own hegemonic position. Of course the US has every right to do this, and in many ways its hegemony is preferable to the alternatives, but I just don't think this is our conflict. Ukraine is our conflict, because it will determine the security of the whole of Europe and Russia is an expansionist power on our doorstep. Anyway, I look forward to you signing up so you can put your own life at risk in pursuit of America's foreign policy goals, rather than just other people's.
If it were only the US that were worried about the risk of China invading Taiwan you might have some credibility that it is just the US defending its own position. Its not though, its the entire civilised world who are uniting because they know the threat is very real.
Stop and look at what China has already been willing to do with the Tibetans, Hong Kong and the Uighur. That you can look at that and seriously say "China is not a threat" is baffling, you are an apologist for evil.
Apologist for evil, give me a break. You drink too much coffee. You can't divide the world up into white hats and black hats. China has done lots of bad stuff, as have other countries. I am not defending them, I find their system of government reprehensible. But they are not an aggressively expansionist power and never have been, unlike Russia or for that matter Britain. I don't think we need to get involved in some war on the other side of the world where the link to British interests is not absolutely clear. And to be honest I find it odd that people who claim to be British patriots are so ready to embrace the agenda of another foreign power on this issue.
I do hope that the English Conservatives keep banging on about Margaret Thatcher. The Scottish Conservatives hate it.
Everyone keeps banging on about Thatcher - left and right - because for good or for ill she did mark a decisive turning point in British politics in a way no other politician has remotely managed since. The left would say for the worse, the right for the better. They're both oversimplifications, but hey, politicians don't really do nuance.
It may be that the current crisis will see a leader emerge who has a similarly dramatic impact and then we will move on from Thatcher as she moved us on from Attlee. Looking at today's crop of politicians I have my doubts, but then there were no shortage of people who thought Thatcher would be an ineffectual lightweight and lucky to last one term in May 1979.
Thank you for confirming that, because @Morris_Dancer thinks it is just The Guardian.
The Thatcher myth was built on her nicking North Sea Oil revenues.
Norwegian national pension fund = gargantuan
Scottish national pension fund = non-existent
Reason: Margaret Thatcher oil snatcher.
You like to pretend that Scottish Nationalism is more progressive and less selfish than Toryism, but this shows you are basically the same. The basis of Scottish Nationalism is not wanting to share North Sea oil revenues with the English.
The SNP have done a blinding job on persuading people in Scotland that they're cuddly progressives when they're the same as the nasty selfish Tories.
Projecting a judgment of a whole party (which contains multiple views on many subjects) from one post is it? Excellent work.
I was under the impression that the most recent PB collective view on NS oil was that Nasty Nic and the EssEnnPee were single-handedly preventing the UK from squeezing the last bit of profit from it by means unknown to anyone who has a clue about how devolved government works.
Team Truss obviously very happy. Team Sunak very happy. But perhaps the happiest people I’ve spoken to this afternoon are Labour people… Mordaunt was, by some way, the candidate that there were most worried about. They’ve been hoping for some time it would be Sunak V Truss. https://twitter.com/BenKentish/status/1549791598019575808
The problem with Mourdaunt was that people projected on her all their hopes and dreams and created the image of some sort of perfect Tory leader, but the brutal reality was that didn’t stack up. That and the Daily Mail did for her.
I was very much Team Penny, I don’t think anyone thought she was perfect. I think most people thought that her many strengths outweighed her weaknesses. The viciousness of the onslaught of briefings and what masquerades as journalism was in no way proportionate. It’s a very serious stain on the broad centre right space. I’m the bitterest I’ve been as a party member in a long time.
The attacks on Mourdaunt were unfair and brutal, I am not surprised you are bruised. It was not acceptable. My only hope is the next time this stuff is dished out at a Labour leader you don’t buy into it.
True, but the viciousness of the attacks on Mourdaunt were striking. Especially when they contrasted at the easy time given to preferred candidates, who seemingly can get away with any old rubbish.
The connection between a narrow section of the Tory party and certain newspaper editors who seem to have licence to print the most aggressive campaigns masquerading as news is one of the major problems we have in our democracy. It’s nasty, nasty stuff.
Normally Labour is the focus, but it was revealing to see this turned on Mourdaunt.
It’s nasty but not 100% confined to the right if we are being entirely honest. The problem is that the media on both sides want to be players in the game as well as commenting on the match.
Whilst there is nastiness everywhere, there is something particularly pointed about the operation focussed on certain parts of the Tory party and certain editors.
What did we expect. Tory Party = Nasty Party.
There are some deep-rooted unpleasant traits of both the Left and the Right imo, which biased though I know I am, I will summarise as:
Right: Nasty, selfish, greedy.
Left: Smug, superior, controlling.
There, I've tried to balance it out.
The right doesn't have a monopoly on selfishness and greed. The right mainly represents those in the private sector - they want lower tax and spend so they get more money. The left mainly represents those working for the state. They want higher tax and spend so they get more money. Somehow the motives of one group are called greedy and selfish and the motives of the other are called public spirited.
That private v. state sector is simplistic bollocks.
Do you have any evidence that for the voting split of private versus state sector employees?
If it were true the Tories would be in a permanent massive majority. In 2020 16.7% of employees (5.5m) worked in the state sector according to this study.
Team Truss obviously very happy. Team Sunak very happy. But perhaps the happiest people I’ve spoken to this afternoon are Labour people… Mordaunt was, by some way, the candidate that there were most worried about. They’ve been hoping for some time it would be Sunak V Truss. https://twitter.com/BenKentish/status/1549791598019575808
The problem with Mourdaunt was that people projected on her all their hopes and dreams and created the image of some sort of perfect Tory leader, but the brutal reality was that didn’t stack up. That and the Daily Mail did for her.
I was very much Team Penny, I don’t think anyone thought she was perfect. I think most people thought that her many strengths outweighed her weaknesses. The viciousness of the onslaught of briefings and what masquerades as journalism was in no way proportionate. It’s a very serious stain on the broad centre right space. I’m the bitterest I’ve been as a party member in a long time.
If they'd been against Truss, they could have absolutely destroyed the woman; it's not like the material wasn't there - she was a Lib Dem ffs.
That she was a Lib Dem is not a weakness. Churchill was once a Liberal too. People who evolve are more interesting than those who don't.
Tony Blair when he was young was an avowed Trotskist, while Darling, Milburn, Reid and Mandelson were all avowed Communists when they were young too. People change.
Changing your mind is fine. The thing about Truss is how polarised the changes are. Utterly convinced about one thing and then utterly convinced about the opposite. No nuance, It’s not an evolution, it’s chaos.
It is evolution, it is perfectly normal that once you have changed you accept your new position with the "zeal of the convert".
I was a Remainer at the start of the EU referendum campaign. I now have views in line with Truss's. Its not chaos, its evolution.
Flip-flopping back and forth rapidly at the drop of every opinion poll showing +1 to one side and then +1 to the other would be chaos. Not following with a zeal your new position once you've reached it.
" I was a remainer" . Pull the other one. You are the most reactionary poster on this site. You are the original young fogey Colonel Blimp. You might think making this claim adds cred to your position but it doesn't. It just points out to us that you are honest as Boris Johnson and Liz Truss. Both of whom you clearly admire in spite of their obvious problem with telling the truth.
Oh give over the broken record. The fact that you're too thick to let the fact many people, not just myself, confirm I was pro-Remain penetrate your one-dimensional caricatured worldview of people just goes to show how stupid you are. People are more complicated than you can wrap your head around it seems.
I am not reactionary, Indeed I have frequently been called "woke" in a lot of the other debates on this site.
What I am is someone who unabashedly thinks that democracy and therefore nationalism is a very good thing and so too is low tax economics. I think internationalism undermines democracy, but that isn't reactionary - I wanted to see a more democratic EU which I thought was viable until Cameron's reforms failed which is when I switched to Leave and I haven't looked back since.
That you consider nationalism to be terrible is your own weakness, not mine.
People's perspectives change and if the political party you're hitched too can't accommodate that, its time for a change.
@Pulpstar mentioned me, and yes I am quite happy having switched from Labour. But it wasn't sudden - I nearly made the move in 2003. I probably don't act / sound like I am happy - became crushingly depressed in 2020 and tried to rejoin Labour because I was desperate to feel normal again and that had been 25 years of my life, and then quit the LibDems for a day last year having realised I would probably vote against them in the 24 GE.
I switched, I'm happy I switched, I'm trying to make amends for some of the unconscionable shit I found myself pressured into supporting in 2015-16 during another (at that point undiagnosed) deep depression. What amazes me are the people who seem to insist that they are *true* [insert party here] people having switched, disowning their former position completely. Which is Truss.
That isn't me.
It makes sense though for Truss and williamglenn etc to do as they've done though as the Project Fear bollocks that was being spouted by them both pre-referendum has been shown up to be bollocks. Truss can see as well as anyone how great Brexit is going and how ridiculous in hindsight that the Project Fear shit was, so wholesale adopting pro-Brexit views makes perfect sense given that.
Lol. Brexit is going great apparently. What bubble do you live in? I guess you don't work for a living, so it is a very different one to those of us that do. Truss is an obvious charlatan. A mild improvement on Johnson whom you also worshipped until it became unfashionable. You are the backer of two of the most obvious liars that have ever been in the Tory Party. We can judge you by the people you admire and know not to believe a word you write.
McDonnell is a strange old cove. He is clearly a player and a schemer, but is a snappy dresser and always comes across as very measured and personable on telly. Victoria Atkins and Nick Timothy were his fellow panellists last night and seemed to get on very well with him.
"I was then told this idea of borrowing to grow the economy then let it pay for itself is ludicrous ... What have we just heard [from the Tory leadership contest is] let’s borrow to grow the economy.
It’s extraordinary they’re repeating my agenda but at the same time, doing it in a way which, to be frank, I think is completely unrelated to the real world we’re living in which is the immediate crisis of the cost of living and climate change."
Yes, as I listened I could hear almost word-for-word reminders of some of the John McDonnell interviews. It was a mock-Thatcherite remix of his policies.
To be fair, she actually did quite well in the interview, but that doesn't alter the fact that she's peddling the same kind of magic fairy dust as McDonnell used to.
Team Truss obviously very happy. Team Sunak very happy. But perhaps the happiest people I’ve spoken to this afternoon are Labour people… Mordaunt was, by some way, the candidate that there were most worried about. They’ve been hoping for some time it would be Sunak V Truss. https://twitter.com/BenKentish/status/1549791598019575808
The problem with Mourdaunt was that people projected on her all their hopes and dreams and created the image of some sort of perfect Tory leader, but the brutal reality was that didn’t stack up. That and the Daily Mail did for her.
I was very much Team Penny, I don’t think anyone thought she was perfect. I think most people thought that her many strengths outweighed her weaknesses. The viciousness of the onslaught of briefings and what masquerades as journalism was in no way proportionate. It’s a very serious stain on the broad centre right space. I’m the bitterest I’ve been as a party member in a long time.
The attacks on Mourdaunt were unfair and brutal, I am not surprised you are bruised. It was not acceptable. My only hope is the next time this stuff is dished out at a Labour leader you don’t buy into it.
True, but the viciousness of the attacks on Mourdaunt were striking. Especially when they contrasted at the easy time given to preferred candidates, who seemingly can get away with any old rubbish.
The connection between a narrow section of the Tory party and certain newspaper editors who seem to have licence to print the most aggressive campaigns masquerading as news is one of the major problems we have in our democracy. It’s nasty, nasty stuff.
Normally Labour is the focus, but it was revealing to see this turned on Mourdaunt.
It’s nasty but not 100% confined to the right if we are being entirely honest. The problem is that the media on both sides want to be players in the game as well as commenting on the match.
Whilst there is nastiness everywhere, there is something particularly pointed about the operation focussed on certain parts of the Tory party and certain editors.
What did we expect. Tory Party = Nasty Party.
There are some deep-rooted unpleasant traits of both the Left and the Right imo, which biased though I know I am, I will summarise as:
Right: Nasty, selfish, greedy.
Left: Smug, superior, controlling.
There, I've tried to balance it out.
The right doesn't have a monopoly on selfishness and greed. The right mainly represents those in the private sector - they want lower tax and spend so they get more money. The left mainly represents those working for the state. They want higher tax and spend so they get more money. Somehow the motives of one group are called greedy and selfish and the motives of the other are called public spirited.
That private v. state sector is simplistic bollocks.
Do you have any evidence that for the voting split of private versus state sector employees?
If it were true the Tories would be in a permanent massive majority. In 2020 16.7% of employees (5.5m) worked in the state sector according to this study.
"I was then told this idea of borrowing to grow the economy then let it pay for itself is ludicrous ... What have we just heard [from the Tory leadership contest is] let’s borrow to grow the economy.
It’s extraordinary they’re repeating my agenda but at the same time, doing it in a way which, to be frank, I think is completely unrelated to the real world we’re living in which is the immediate crisis of the cost of living and climate change."
Corbyn did say they had won the argument in 2019.
Boris and CCHQ focus grouped and adopted the popular parts of Corbyn's 2017 platform. The Conservative government's discovery of state intervention was not dreamed up in response to the pandemic. Boris ran against May and Cameron's governments. The irony is that Labour's 2019 offering was more reminiscent of Ed Miliband's 2015 disaster.
Team Truss obviously very happy. Team Sunak very happy. But perhaps the happiest people I’ve spoken to this afternoon are Labour people… Mordaunt was, by some way, the candidate that there were most worried about. They’ve been hoping for some time it would be Sunak V Truss. https://twitter.com/BenKentish/status/1549791598019575808
The problem with Mourdaunt was that people projected on her all their hopes and dreams and created the image of some sort of perfect Tory leader, but the brutal reality was that didn’t stack up. That and the Daily Mail did for her.
I was very much Team Penny, I don’t think anyone thought she was perfect. I think most people thought that her many strengths outweighed her weaknesses. The viciousness of the onslaught of briefings and what masquerades as journalism was in no way proportionate. It’s a very serious stain on the broad centre right space. I’m the bitterest I’ve been as a party member in a long time.
If they'd been against Truss, they could have absolutely destroyed the woman; it's not like the material wasn't there - she was a Lib Dem ffs.
That she was a Lib Dem is not a weakness. Churchill was once a Liberal too. People who evolve are more interesting than those who don't.
Tony Blair when he was young was an avowed Trotskist, while Darling, Milburn, Reid and Mandelson were all avowed Communists when they were young too. People change.
Changing your mind is fine. The thing about Truss is how polarised the changes are. Utterly convinced about one thing and then utterly convinced about the opposite. No nuance, It’s not an evolution, it’s chaos.
It is evolution, it is perfectly normal that once you have changed you accept your new position with the "zeal of the convert".
I was a Remainer at the start of the EU referendum campaign. I now have views in line with Truss's. Its not chaos, its evolution.
Flip-flopping back and forth rapidly at the drop of every opinion poll showing +1 to one side and then +1 to the other would be chaos. Not following with a zeal your new position once you've reached it.
" I was a remainer" . Pull the other one. You are the most reactionary poster on this site. You are the original young fogey Colonel Blimp. You might think making this claim adds cred to your position but it doesn't. It just points out to us that you are honest as Boris Johnson and Liz Truss. Both of whom you clearly admire in spite of their obvious problem with telling the truth.
Oh give over the broken record. The fact that you're too thick to let the fact many people, not just myself, confirm I was pro-Remain penetrate your one-dimensional caricatured worldview of people just goes to show how stupid you are. People are more complicated than you can wrap your head around it seems.
I am not reactionary, Indeed I have frequently been called "woke" in a lot of the other debates on this site.
What I am is someone who unabashedly thinks that democracy and therefore nationalism is a very good thing and so too is low tax economics. I think internationalism undermines democracy, but that isn't reactionary - I wanted to see a more democratic EU which I thought was viable until Cameron's reforms failed which is when I switched to Leave and I haven't looked back since.
That you consider nationalism to be terrible is your own weakness, not mine.
I too think nationalism is a 'bad thing' on the whole. It's been the cause of many wars and has been repeatedly, and still is, used to stoke up hatred.
Overall, I cannot see what it's good for. We can cherish our history and our cultures without nationalism.
McDonnell is a strange old cove. He is clearly a player and a schemer, but is a snappy dresser and always comes across as very measured and personable on telly. Victoria Atkins and Nick Timothy were his fellow panellists last night and seemed to get on very well with him.
Labour would have formed a minority Government in 2017 if he'd been the leader.
People's perspectives change and if the political party you're hitched too can't accommodate that, its time for a change.
@Pulpstar mentioned me, and yes I am quite happy having switched from Labour. But it wasn't sudden - I nearly made the move in 2003. I probably don't act / sound like I am happy - became crushingly depressed in 2020 and tried to rejoin Labour because I was desperate to feel normal again and that had been 25 years of my life, and then quit the LibDems for a day last year having realised I would probably vote against them in the 24 GE.
I switched, I'm happy I switched, I'm trying to make amends for some of the unconscionable shit I found myself pressured into supporting in 2015-16 during another (at that point undiagnosed) deep depression. What amazes me are the people who seem to insist that they are *true* [insert party here] people having switched, disowning their former position completely. Which is Truss.
That isn't me.
It makes sense though for Truss and williamglenn etc to do as they've done though as the Project Fear bollocks that was being spouted by them both pre-referendum has been shown up to be bollocks. Truss can see as well as anyone how great Brexit is going and how ridiculous in hindsight that the Project Fear shit was, so wholesale adopting pro-Brexit views makes perfect sense given that.
Because making ourselves America's b*tch has always worked out so well for us.
Has Putinguy1983 hacked your account?
Pretty much, yes, absolutely it has, though as the article says Truss has been out in front of Biden and Blinken, and not just behind following them. Johnson was too.
I think our foreign and security policy should be guided by our own interests, not Neocon talking points. On Russia, which represents a security threat to us, we should absolutely be standing up to Putin alongside America and anyone else who is up for it. Read through my posts, I have never said anything different. But the China-US rivalry is different, as China isn't a threat to our security, and frankly a lot of the bluster on the US side is down to their own sense of supremacy being threatened. That is their problem, not ours.
China absolutely is a threat to our security, even more than Russia is.
As horrendous as Putin's invasion of Ukraine is, China invading Taiwan would be an order of magnitude worse. Ukraine is a substantial grain exporter and Russia a substantial energy exporter so this war has helped fuel a cost of living crisis with energy and food, but Taiwan is the leading global supplier of high end electronic chips that run the modern economy and China is the leading global exporter full stop.
A China/Taiwan war would be utterly catastrophic for the global economy and thus our own security in a way that would absolutely dwarf our current crisis. Joining with the USA, Japan, Australia and other allies in deterring that risk is great value for money and is another reason why Putin's invasion of Ukraine must be seen to fail, to deter China too.
The world today is all interconnected, you can't look at one alone and ignore the rest of the globe.
The deterrence value of whatever paltry forces we could project in the Taiwan Strait is not going to be the difference between China invading Taiwan or not. This is the kind of Neocon talking points that got hundreds of British servicemen and women killed in Iraq. If the world economy is that dependent on key components from a geopolitical flash point I would suggest investment in supply diversification may represent a safer and cheaper course of action.
To do my best Chandler Bing impression - Could you be any more wrong?
The deterrence value of UK forces operating alone would not be the difference, that is true.
But the UK isn't operating alone. The deterrence value of the UK and the USA, Australia, India, Japan, Poland and the rest of the civilised world standing together in unison is immense. This is one area whereby working together we are more than the sum of our parts.
You are as utterly naive and reprehensible as the so-called "realists" who wanted to sell out Ukraine at the start of the conflict as Putin's victory was "inevitable" so we may as well accept that reality.
You are being naïve if you think the US is simply defending the "free world" here rather than defending its own hegemonic position. Of course the US has every right to do this, and in many ways its hegemony is preferable to the alternatives, but I just don't think this is our conflict. Ukraine is our conflict, because it will determine the security of the whole of Europe and Russia is an expansionist power on our doorstep. Anyway, I look forward to you signing up so you can put your own life at risk in pursuit of America's foreign policy goals, rather than just other people's.
If it were only the US that were worried about the risk of China invading Taiwan you might have some credibility that it is just the US defending its own position. Its not though, its the entire civilised world who are uniting because they know the threat is very real.
Stop and look at what China has already been willing to do with the Tibetans, Hong Kong and the Uighur. That you can look at that and seriously say "China is not a threat" is baffling, you are an apologist for evil.
Apologist for evil, give me a break. You drink too much coffee. You can't divide the world up into white hats and black hats. China has done lots of bad stuff, as have other countries. I am not defending them, I find their system of government reprehensible. But they are not an aggressively expansionist power and never have been, unlike Russia or for that matter Britain. I don't think we need to get involved in some war on the other side of the world where the link to British interests is not absolutely clear. And to be honest I find it odd that people who claim to be British patriots are so ready to embrace the agenda of another foreign power on this issue.
Some parts of the world are shades of grey, but (and this must be my famous "reactionary" attitude according to @Nigel_Foremain ) I greatly dislike the antiquated term "black and white" since it implies black = bad and white = good. Same reason allowlist and blocklist is a far better language than blacklist and whitelist.
I'd rather say what I mean, which is good and evil, than antiquated racist euphemisms like black and white. And yes Putin and Xi are evil, while the free world and democracy while not perfect are good.
China absolutely is an aggressively expansionist power. In my lifetime alone they repeatedly been willing to use violence to expand Beijing's power and control, whether in Tian'an'men Square, or Hong Kong, or Tibet, or against the Uighur.
It is naivety in the extreme to look at that litany of evil and suggest that if we don't deter them they won't be willing to do the same against Taiwan.
"I was then told this idea of borrowing to grow the economy then let it pay for itself is ludicrous ... What have we just heard [from the Tory leadership contest is] let’s borrow to grow the economy.
It’s extraordinary they’re repeating my agenda but at the same time, doing it in a way which, to be frank, I think is completely unrelated to the real world we’re living in which is the immediate crisis of the cost of living and climate change."
Corbyn did say they had won the argument in 2019.
Boris and CCHQ focus grouped and adopted the popular parts of Corbyn's 2017 platform. The Conservative government's discovery of state intervention was not dreamed up in response to the pandemic. Boris ran against May and Cameron's governments. The irony is that Labour's 2019 offering was more reminiscent of Ed Miliband's 2015 disaster.
It was clear if you read Left Out that Corbyn and the left had basically given up by the start of 2019, the manifesto is the culmination of that.
Andrew Fisher who wrote 2017 abandoned ship and the talent they had all left.
2017's manifesto was written by a literal Communist but was moderate because him and McDonnell understood electability as well as Tony Blair and Mandelson. Corbyn and his chums did not.
People's perspectives change and if the political party you're hitched too can't accommodate that, its time for a change.
@Pulpstar mentioned me, and yes I am quite happy having switched from Labour. But it wasn't sudden - I nearly made the move in 2003. I probably don't act / sound like I am happy - became crushingly depressed in 2020 and tried to rejoin Labour because I was desperate to feel normal again and that had been 25 years of my life, and then quit the LibDems for a day last year having realised I would probably vote against them in the 24 GE.
I switched, I'm happy I switched, I'm trying to make amends for some of the unconscionable shit I found myself pressured into supporting in 2015-16 during another (at that point undiagnosed) deep depression. What amazes me are the people who seem to insist that they are *true* [insert party here] people having switched, disowning their former position completely. Which is Truss.
That isn't me.
It makes sense though for Truss and williamglenn etc to do as they've done though as the Project Fear bollocks that was being spouted by them both pre-referendum has been shown up to be bollocks. Truss can see as well as anyone how great Brexit is going and how ridiculous in hindsight that the Project Fear shit was, so wholesale adopting pro-Brexit views makes perfect sense given that.
"...Truss can see as well as anyone how great Brexit is going..." ??
Mods alert - Barty's account has clearly been hacked by a spoofer!
People's perspectives change and if the political party you're hitched too can't accommodate that, its time for a change.
@Pulpstar mentioned me, and yes I am quite happy having switched from Labour. But it wasn't sudden - I nearly made the move in 2003. I probably don't act / sound like I am happy - became crushingly depressed in 2020 and tried to rejoin Labour because I was desperate to feel normal again and that had been 25 years of my life, and then quit the LibDems for a day last year having realised I would probably vote against them in the 24 GE.
I switched, I'm happy I switched, I'm trying to make amends for some of the unconscionable shit I found myself pressured into supporting in 2015-16 during another (at that point undiagnosed) deep depression. What amazes me are the people who seem to insist that they are *true* [insert party here] people having switched, disowning their former position completely. Which is Truss.
That isn't me.
It makes sense though for Truss and williamglenn etc to do as they've done though as the Project Fear bollocks that was being spouted by them both pre-referendum has been shown up to be bollocks. Truss can see as well as anyone how great Brexit is going and how ridiculous in hindsight that the Project Fear shit was, so wholesale adopting pro-Brexit views makes perfect sense given that.
I do hope that the English Conservatives keep banging on about Margaret Thatcher. The Scottish Conservatives hate it.
Everyone keeps banging on about Thatcher - left and right - because for good or for ill she did mark a decisive turning point in British politics in a way no other politician has remotely managed since. The left would say for the worse, the right for the better. They're both oversimplifications, but hey, politicians don't really do nuance.
It may be that the current crisis will see a leader emerge who has a similarly dramatic impact and then we will move on from Thatcher as she moved us on from Attlee. Looking at today's crop of politicians I have my doubts, but then there were no shortage of people who thought Thatcher would be an ineffectual lightweight and lucky to last one term in May 1979.
Thank you for confirming that, because @Morris_Dancer thinks it is just The Guardian.
The Thatcher myth was built on her nicking North Sea Oil revenues.
Norwegian national pension fund = gargantuan
Scottish national pension fund = non-existent
Reason: Margaret Thatcher oil snatcher.
Yes, we should have built up a sovereign wealth fund like the Norwegians have.
Because making ourselves America's b*tch has always worked out so well for us.
Has Putinguy1983 hacked your account?
Pretty much, yes, absolutely it has, though as the article says Truss has been out in front of Biden and Blinken, and not just behind following them. Johnson was too.
I think our foreign and security policy should be guided by our own interests, not Neocon talking points. On Russia, which represents a security threat to us, we should absolutely be standing up to Putin alongside America and anyone else who is up for it. Read through my posts, I have never said anything different. But the China-US rivalry is different, as China isn't a threat to our security, and frankly a lot of the bluster on the US side is down to their own sense of supremacy being threatened. That is their problem, not ours.
China absolutely is a threat to our security, even more than Russia is.
As horrendous as Putin's invasion of Ukraine is, China invading Taiwan would be an order of magnitude worse. Ukraine is a substantial grain exporter and Russia a substantial energy exporter so this war has helped fuel a cost of living crisis with energy and food, but Taiwan is the leading global supplier of high end electronic chips that run the modern economy and China is the leading global exporter full stop.
A China/Taiwan war would be utterly catastrophic for the global economy and thus our own security in a way that would absolutely dwarf our current crisis. Joining with the USA, Japan, Australia and other allies in deterring that risk is great value for money and is another reason why Putin's invasion of Ukraine must be seen to fail, to deter China too.
The world today is all interconnected, you can't look at one alone and ignore the rest of the globe.
The deterrence value of whatever paltry forces we could project in the Taiwan Strait is not going to be the difference between China invading Taiwan or not. This is the kind of Neocon talking points that got hundreds of British servicemen and women killed in Iraq. If the world economy is that dependent on key components from a geopolitical flash point I would suggest investment in supply diversification may represent a safer and cheaper course of action.
To do my best Chandler Bing impression - Could you be any more wrong?
The deterrence value of UK forces operating alone would not be the difference, that is true.
But the UK isn't operating alone. The deterrence value of the UK and the USA, Australia, India, Japan, Poland and the rest of the civilised world standing together in unison is immense. This is one area whereby working together we are more than the sum of our parts.
You are as utterly naive and reprehensible as the so-called "realists" who wanted to sell out Ukraine at the start of the conflict as Putin's victory was "inevitable" so we may as well accept that reality.
You are being naïve if you think the US is simply defending the "free world" here rather than defending its own hegemonic position. Of course the US has every right to do this, and in many ways its hegemony is preferable to the alternatives, but I just don't think this is our conflict. Ukraine is our conflict, because it will determine the security of the whole of Europe and Russia is an expansionist power on our doorstep. Anyway, I look forward to you signing up so you can put your own life at risk in pursuit of America's foreign policy goals, rather than just other people's.
If it were only the US that were worried about the risk of China invading Taiwan you might have some credibility that it is just the US defending its own position. Its not though, its the entire civilised world who are uniting because they know the threat is very real.
Stop and look at what China has already been willing to do with the Tibetans, Hong Kong and the Uighur. That you can look at that and seriously say "China is not a threat" is baffling, you are an apologist for evil.
Apologist for evil, give me a break. You drink too much coffee. You can't divide the world up into white hats and black hats. China has done lots of bad stuff, as have other countries. I am not defending them, I find their system of government reprehensible. But they are not an aggressively expansionist power and never have been, unlike Russia or for that matter Britain. I don't think we need to get involved in some war on the other side of the world where the link to British interests is not absolutely clear. And to be honest I find it odd that people who claim to be British patriots are so ready to embrace the agenda of another foreign power on this issue.
Some parts of the world are shades of grey, but (and this must be my famous "reactionary" attitude according to @Nigel_Foremain ) I greatly dislike the antiquated term "black and white" since it implies black = bad and white = good. Same reason allowlist and blocklist is a far better language than blacklist and whitelist.
I'd rather say what I mean, which is good and evil, than antiquated racist euphemisms like black and white. And yes Putin and Xi are evil, while the free world and democracy while not perfect are good.
China absolutely is an aggressively expansionist power. In my lifetime alone they repeatedly been willing to use violence to expand Beijing's power and control, whether in Tian'an'men Square, or Hong Kong, or Tibet, or against the Uighur.
It is naivety in the extreme to look at that litany of evil and suggest that if we don't deter them they won't be willing to do the same against Taiwan.
India is a democracy (yay!) and formerly part of Our Great Empire (double yay!) and as racist, classist, bigoted, corrupt, violent and rapey a place as you could reasonably hope to find on a world map. It is not imperfect but good.
Team Truss obviously very happy. Team Sunak very happy. But perhaps the happiest people I’ve spoken to this afternoon are Labour people… Mordaunt was, by some way, the candidate that there were most worried about. They’ve been hoping for some time it would be Sunak V Truss. https://twitter.com/BenKentish/status/1549791598019575808
The problem with Mourdaunt was that people projected on her all their hopes and dreams and created the image of some sort of perfect Tory leader, but the brutal reality was that didn’t stack up. That and the Daily Mail did for her.
I was very much Team Penny, I don’t think anyone thought she was perfect. I think most people thought that her many strengths outweighed her weaknesses. The viciousness of the onslaught of briefings and what masquerades as journalism was in no way proportionate. It’s a very serious stain on the broad centre right space. I’m the bitterest I’ve been as a party member in a long time.
The attacks on Mourdaunt were unfair and brutal, I am not surprised you are bruised. It was not acceptable. My only hope is the next time this stuff is dished out at a Labour leader you don’t buy into it.
True, but the viciousness of the attacks on Mourdaunt were striking. Especially when they contrasted at the easy time given to preferred candidates, who seemingly can get away with any old rubbish.
The connection between a narrow section of the Tory party and certain newspaper editors who seem to have licence to print the most aggressive campaigns masquerading as news is one of the major problems we have in our democracy. It’s nasty, nasty stuff.
Normally Labour is the focus, but it was revealing to see this turned on Mourdaunt.
It’s nasty but not 100% confined to the right if we are being entirely honest. The problem is that the media on both sides want to be players in the game as well as commenting on the match.
Whilst there is nastiness everywhere, there is something particularly pointed about the operation focussed on certain parts of the Tory party and certain editors.
What did we expect. Tory Party = Nasty Party.
There are some deep-rooted unpleasant traits of both the Left and the Right imo, which biased though I know I am, I will summarise as:
Right: Nasty, selfish, greedy.
Left: Smug, superior, controlling.
There, I've tried to balance it out.
The right doesn't have a monopoly on selfishness and greed. The right mainly represents those in the private sector - they want lower tax and spend so they get more money. The left mainly represents those working for the state. They want higher tax and spend so they get more money. Somehow the motives of one group are called greedy and selfish and the motives of the other are called public spirited.
That private v. state sector is simplistic bollocks.
Do you have any evidence that for the voting split of private versus state sector employees?
If it were true the Tories would be in a permanent massive majority. In 2020 16.7% of employees (5.5m) worked in the state sector according to this study.
Twice as many people (11m) are pensioners, many dependent on state benefits, but as we know they break for the Tories 58% - 42%.
So you don't disagree with the principle, just the numerical specifics? That's good.
For the avoidance of doubt, where I say: "That private v. state sector is simplistic bollocks", please take that to mean I disagree with the principle, for which I do not believe you have any evidence.
"I was then told this idea of borrowing to grow the economy then let it pay for itself is ludicrous ... What have we just heard [from the Tory leadership contest is] let’s borrow to grow the economy.
It’s extraordinary they’re repeating my agenda but at the same time, doing it in a way which, to be frank, I think is completely unrelated to the real world we’re living in which is the immediate crisis of the cost of living and climate change."
Yes, as I listened I could hear almost word-for-word reminders of some of the John McDonnell interviews. It was a mock-Thatcherite remix of his policies.
To be fair, she actually did quite well in the interview, but that doesn't alter the fact that she's peddling the same kind of magic fairy dust as McDonnell used to.
I remain convinced that post-Cameron that the Tories have been out of ideas and out of policy.
What happened was that Corbyn came along and Johnson temporarily stopped it as a result. As soon as Corbyn went the chasm reappeared, which was always there. The Tories need to go into opposition now and go back to being centre ground and somebody centrists can vote for.
"I was then told this idea of borrowing to grow the economy then let it pay for itself is ludicrous ... What have we just heard [from the Tory leadership contest is] let’s borrow to grow the economy.
It’s extraordinary they’re repeating my agenda but at the same time, doing it in a way which, to be frank, I think is completely unrelated to the real world we’re living in which is the immediate crisis of the cost of living and climate change."
Corbyn did say they had won the argument in 2019.
Boris and CCHQ focus grouped and adopted the popular parts of Corbyn's 2017 platform. The Conservative government's discovery of state intervention was not dreamed up in response to the pandemic. Boris ran against May and Cameron's governments. The irony is that Labour's 2019 offering was more reminiscent of Ed Miliband's 2015 disaster.
It was clear if you read Left Out that Corbyn and the left had basically given up by the start of 2019, the manifesto is the culmination of that.
Andrew Fisher who wrote 2017 abandoned ship and the talent they had all left.
2017's manifesto was written by a literal Communist but was moderate because him and McDonnell understood electability as well as Tony Blair and Mandelson. Corbyn and his chums did not.
I used to wonder if Seamus Milne was a CCHQ plant in Corbyn's office, secretly undermining the left.
People's perspectives change and if the political party you're hitched too can't accommodate that, its time for a change.
@Pulpstar mentioned me, and yes I am quite happy having switched from Labour. But it wasn't sudden - I nearly made the move in 2003. I probably don't act / sound like I am happy - became crushingly depressed in 2020 and tried to rejoin Labour because I was desperate to feel normal again and that had been 25 years of my life, and then quit the LibDems for a day last year having realised I would probably vote against them in the 24 GE.
I switched, I'm happy I switched, I'm trying to make amends for some of the unconscionable shit I found myself pressured into supporting in 2015-16 during another (at that point undiagnosed) deep depression. What amazes me are the people who seem to insist that they are *true* [insert party here] people having switched, disowning their former position completely. Which is Truss.
That isn't me.
It makes sense though for Truss and williamglenn etc to do as they've done though as the Project Fear bollocks that was being spouted by them both pre-referendum has been shown up to be bollocks. Truss can see as well as anyone how great Brexit is going and how ridiculous in hindsight that the Project Fear shit was, so wholesale adopting pro-Brexit views makes perfect sense given that.
Do you sell anything to anyone outside the UK?
Brexit's an absolubte clusterfuck for anyone who trades with Europe. But the truth is not even Starmer's going to get us back in the EU VAT regime, which is the big one for business. Tax lawyers & dutch accountants will do nicely out of it all.
Team Truss obviously very happy. Team Sunak very happy. But perhaps the happiest people I’ve spoken to this afternoon are Labour people… Mordaunt was, by some way, the candidate that there were most worried about. They’ve been hoping for some time it would be Sunak V Truss. https://twitter.com/BenKentish/status/1549791598019575808
The problem with Mourdaunt was that people projected on her all their hopes and dreams and created the image of some sort of perfect Tory leader, but the brutal reality was that didn’t stack up. That and the Daily Mail did for her.
I was very much Team Penny, I don’t think anyone thought she was perfect. I think most people thought that her many strengths outweighed her weaknesses. The viciousness of the onslaught of briefings and what masquerades as journalism was in no way proportionate. It’s a very serious stain on the broad centre right space. I’m the bitterest I’ve been as a party member in a long time.
If they'd been against Truss, they could have absolutely destroyed the woman; it's not like the material wasn't there - she was a Lib Dem ffs.
That she was a Lib Dem is not a weakness. Churchill was once a Liberal too. People who evolve are more interesting than those who don't.
Tony Blair when he was young was an avowed Trotskist, while Darling, Milburn, Reid and Mandelson were all avowed Communists when they were young too. People change.
Changing your mind is fine. The thing about Truss is how polarised the changes are. Utterly convinced about one thing and then utterly convinced about the opposite. No nuance, It’s not an evolution, it’s chaos.
It is evolution, it is perfectly normal that once you have changed you accept your new position with the "zeal of the convert".
I was a Remainer at the start of the EU referendum campaign. I now have views in line with Truss's. Its not chaos, its evolution.
Flip-flopping back and forth rapidly at the drop of every opinion poll showing +1 to one side and then +1 to the other would be chaos. Not following with a zeal your new position once you've reached it.
" I was a remainer" . Pull the other one. You are the most reactionary poster on this site. You are the original young fogey Colonel Blimp. You might think making this claim adds cred to your position but it doesn't. It just points out to us that you are honest as Boris Johnson and Liz Truss. Both of whom you clearly admire in spite of their obvious problem with telling the truth.
Oh give over the broken record. The fact that you're too thick to let the fact many people, not just myself, confirm I was pro-Remain penetrate your one-dimensional caricatured worldview of people just goes to show how stupid you are. People are more complicated than you can wrap your head around it seems.
I am not reactionary, Indeed I have frequently been called "woke" in a lot of the other debates on this site.
What I am is someone who unabashedly thinks that democracy and therefore nationalism is a very good thing and so too is low tax economics. I think internationalism undermines democracy, but that isn't reactionary - I wanted to see a more democratic EU which I thought was viable until Cameron's reforms failed which is when I switched to Leave and I haven't looked back since.
That you consider nationalism to be terrible is your own weakness, not mine.
As I have said before Barty, I doubt most people that read my posts and then yours would consider you to be more intelligent than me. Now that Malc is no longer on this site (I very much hope), I think you might just be vying for his most unenviable title.
You are an admirer of the most dishonest man ever to have been PM. You wish to have him replaced by his natural heir. You clearly admire dishonesty, or at least think it completely acceptable. Therefore I do not believe you have been on a "journey". You are a natural hard right winger. A headbanger, a swivel-eyed nutjob and a laughing stock, just like your idol Johnson.
I must now go and do something you clearly do not have time for. work. Have a nice day Pinocchio. Keep making up the stories.
I do hope that the English Conservatives keep banging on about Margaret Thatcher. The Scottish Conservatives hate it.
Everyone keeps banging on about Thatcher - left and right - because for good or for ill she did mark a decisive turning point in British politics in a way no other politician has remotely managed since. The left would say for the worse, the right for the better. They're both oversimplifications, but hey, politicians don't really do nuance.
It may be that the current crisis will see a leader emerge who has a similarly dramatic impact and then we will move on from Thatcher as she moved us on from Attlee. Looking at today's crop of politicians I have my doubts, but then there were no shortage of people who thought Thatcher would be an ineffectual lightweight and lucky to last one term in May 1979.
Thank you for confirming that, because @Morris_Dancer thinks it is just The Guardian.
The Thatcher myth was built on her nicking North Sea Oil revenues.
Norwegian national pension fund = gargantuan
Scottish national pension fund = non-existent
Reason: Margaret Thatcher oil snatcher.
Yes, we should have built up a sovereign wealth fund like the Norwegians have.
I totally agree.
There was two different paths. The Norwegians went the sovereign wealth fund, what exactly is the name of the path we took? Was it driven more by ideology than a stronger, future proofing your country’s future finances judgement?
I don't think Johnson going will have a material impact on our practical support for Ukraine. The only difference might be presentational and it would be a positive one - that we see less of the conflict being used to distract from scandals at home and a touch less wild exaggeration of how important we and our PM are to it.
Ukraine was another "I got all the big calls right" crock.
Johnson saw Ukraine as a Partygate "get out of jail free card". He raised his profile in Ukraine and due to our good fortune in importing Norwegian rather than Russian oil could appear slightly more hawkish than his European counterparts. Johnson's Ukrainian cheerleader profile was also hoisted high by his media flag wavers. Despite the Ukrainian refugees fiasco, he did OK in Ukraine, but no better than his successor will muster.
Yes I agree. I found his 'war leader' posturing a cringe but my sensibilities are not really as important as providing the practical support, and we've done that under him as we'd almost certainly have done under somebody else.
Team Truss obviously very happy. Team Sunak very happy. But perhaps the happiest people I’ve spoken to this afternoon are Labour people… Mordaunt was, by some way, the candidate that there were most worried about. They’ve been hoping for some time it would be Sunak V Truss. https://twitter.com/BenKentish/status/1549791598019575808
The problem with Mourdaunt was that people projected on her all their hopes and dreams and created the image of some sort of perfect Tory leader, but the brutal reality was that didn’t stack up. That and the Daily Mail did for her.
I was very much Team Penny, I don’t think anyone thought she was perfect. I think most people thought that her many strengths outweighed her weaknesses. The viciousness of the onslaught of briefings and what masquerades as journalism was in no way proportionate. It’s a very serious stain on the broad centre right space. I’m the bitterest I’ve been as a party member in a long time.
If they'd been against Truss, they could have absolutely destroyed the woman; it's not like the material wasn't there - she was a Lib Dem ffs.
That she was a Lib Dem is not a weakness. Churchill was once a Liberal too. People who evolve are more interesting than those who don't.
Tony Blair when he was young was an avowed Trotskist, while Darling, Milburn, Reid and Mandelson were all avowed Communists when they were young too. People change.
Changing your mind is fine. The thing about Truss is how polarised the changes are. Utterly convinced about one thing and then utterly convinced about the opposite. No nuance, It’s not an evolution, it’s chaos.
It is evolution, it is perfectly normal that once you have changed you accept your new position with the "zeal of the convert".
I was a Remainer at the start of the EU referendum campaign. I now have views in line with Truss's. Its not chaos, its evolution.
Flip-flopping back and forth rapidly at the drop of every opinion poll showing +1 to one side and then +1 to the other would be chaos. Not following with a zeal your new position once you've reached it.
" I was a remainer" . Pull the other one. You are the most reactionary poster on this site. You are the original young fogey Colonel Blimp. You might think making this claim adds cred to your position but it doesn't. It just points out to us that you are honest as Boris Johnson and Liz Truss. Both of whom you clearly admire in spite of their obvious problem with telling the truth.
Oh give over the broken record. The fact that you're too thick to let the fact many people, not just myself, confirm I was pro-Remain penetrate your one-dimensional caricatured worldview of people just goes to show how stupid you are. People are more complicated than you can wrap your head around it seems.
I am not reactionary, Indeed I have frequently been called "woke" in a lot of the other debates on this site.
What I am is someone who unabashedly thinks that democracy and therefore nationalism is a very good thing and so too is low tax economics. I think internationalism undermines democracy, but that isn't reactionary - I wanted to see a more democratic EU which I thought was viable until Cameron's reforms failed which is when I switched to Leave and I haven't looked back since.
That you consider nationalism to be terrible is your own weakness, not mine.
I too think nationalism is a 'bad thing' on the whole. It's been the cause of many wars and has been repeatedly, and still is, used to stoke up hatred.
Overall, I cannot see what it's good for. We can cherish our history and our cultures without nationalism.
Agreed, but I also really value times when someone I disagree with lays out their views so clearly, as @BartholomewRoberts has done. I think it raises the tone of political debate, and prompts good discussions that can move people's thinking on.
I am interested in exploring this further. I think if I had to hang my hat on one aspect of our political system that I'd fight for, it would be democracy itself. In that sense I agree with Bart. But I also agree with Benpointer that valuing democracy doesn't mean you need to value nationalism, indeed nationalism more often stymies democracy than helps it (e.g. I think the EU could function more democratically if, throughout its development, nation states had been less important, and both hyper-local and supra-national groupings had been seen as the key ones to focus on).
Bart - can you say more about why you pin democracy to nationalism in this way? Specifically, can you answer why you think democracy works better at the national level than, say, a combination of much stronger regional assemblies with an overarching supra-national assembly (I'm tempted to cite the US as an example of what I mean, but as soon as you cite specific examples it is easy to focus on their specific flaws, so maybe better to keep the discussion theoretical).
In my view democracy at the national level is precisely the wrong scale to be working at - big enough to be impersonal and to leave many constituencies out in the cold (cf Scottish nationalism), but small enough to be unable to cope with the major issues we currently face (climate change, Chinese aggression, effective taxation of global businesses).
"I was then told this idea of borrowing to grow the economy then let it pay for itself is ludicrous ... What have we just heard [from the Tory leadership contest is] let’s borrow to grow the economy.
It’s extraordinary they’re repeating my agenda but at the same time, doing it in a way which, to be frank, I think is completely unrelated to the real world we’re living in which is the immediate crisis of the cost of living and climate change."
Corbyn did say they had won the argument in 2019.
Boris and CCHQ focus grouped and adopted the popular parts of Corbyn's 2017 platform. The Conservative government's discovery of state intervention was not dreamed up in response to the pandemic. Boris ran against May and Cameron's governments. The irony is that Labour's 2019 offering was more reminiscent of Ed Miliband's 2015 disaster.
It was clear if you read Left Out that Corbyn and the left had basically given up by the start of 2019, the manifesto is the culmination of that.
Andrew Fisher who wrote 2017 abandoned ship and the talent they had all left.
2017's manifesto was written by a literal Communist but was moderate because him and McDonnell understood electability as well as Tony Blair and Mandelson. Corbyn and his chums did not.
I used to wonder if Seamus Milne was a CCHQ plant in Corbyn's office, secretly undermining the left.
That Seumus was kept away from the 2017 manifesto and co-wrote the 2019 tells you all you need to know.
It was McDonnell and Mills who realised that Seumus's ramblings on the Russian poisonings had lost them the GE. Bearing in mind they are/were probably Marxists.
You see it is a myth that the left cannot believe in electability, they can. But only some of them.
I do hope that the English Conservatives keep banging on about Margaret Thatcher. The Scottish Conservatives hate it.
Everyone keeps banging on about Thatcher - left and right - because for good or for ill she did mark a decisive turning point in British politics in a way no other politician has remotely managed since. The left would say for the worse, the right for the better. They're both oversimplifications, but hey, politicians don't really do nuance.
It may be that the current crisis will see a leader emerge who has a similarly dramatic impact and then we will move on from Thatcher as she moved us on from Attlee. Looking at today's crop of politicians I have my doubts, but then there were no shortage of people who thought Thatcher would be an ineffectual lightweight and lucky to last one term in May 1979.
Thank you for confirming that, because @Morris_Dancer thinks it is just The Guardian.
The Thatcher myth was built on her nicking North Sea Oil revenues.
Norwegian national pension fund = gargantuan
Scottish national pension fund = non-existent
Reason: Margaret Thatcher oil snatcher.
You like to pretend that Scottish Nationalism is more progressive and less selfish than Toryism, but this shows you are basically the same. The basis of Scottish Nationalism is not wanting to share North Sea oil revenues with the English.
The SNP have done a blinding job on persuading people in Scotland that they're cuddly progressives when they're the same as the nasty selfish Tories.
Projecting a judgment of a whole party (which contains multiple views on many subjects) from one post is it? Excellent work.
I was under the impression that the most recent PB collective view on NS oil was that Nasty Nic and the EssEnnPee were single-handedly preventing the UK from squeezing the last bit of profit from it by means unknown to anyone who has a clue about how devolved government works.
I am glad that the SNP spoke out against North Sea oil development, even though I know that it would become urgently in the national interest to develop more North Sea oil were Scotland to become independent. It's another one of their faux-progressive positions, and it's perfect for them that they don't have a say on it.
The more time that goes by, it becomes obvious that Corbyn's success was almost entirely down to McDonnell. He tried his best to sabotage himself - and 2017 looks like it was lucky that Corbyn didn't implode.
People's perspectives change and if the political party you're hitched too can't accommodate that, its time for a change.
@Pulpstar mentioned me, and yes I am quite happy having switched from Labour. But it wasn't sudden - I nearly made the move in 2003. I probably don't act / sound like I am happy - became crushingly depressed in 2020 and tried to rejoin Labour because I was desperate to feel normal again and that had been 25 years of my life, and then quit the LibDems for a day last year having realised I would probably vote against them in the 24 GE.
I switched, I'm happy I switched, I'm trying to make amends for some of the unconscionable shit I found myself pressured into supporting in 2015-16 during another (at that point undiagnosed) deep depression. What amazes me are the people who seem to insist that they are *true* [insert party here] people having switched, disowning their former position completely. Which is Truss.
That isn't me.
It was more your leave -> remain change. I wasn't aware you felt pressured into joining the leave cause - I had you down as a genuine leaver sincere of your beliefs and I also have taken your change to remain as a whole hearted movement of views.
Who pressured you into leave may I ask ?
There were two factors at play: 1. Political reality. We were increasingly remote from the direction of travel of the EU. A lot of talk of the "twin-track" or "two-speed" Europe to come where we would be propelled to the outer fringes. Logically it would be better to take ourselves out there than to be spun off by political centrifugal forces. 2. Political insanity. I had been adopted by former Blairites. People I respected. Who in their own Bennite drift into the far left had managed to attach me to their wagon. Hence my initial support for Corbyn and then their gaslighting of leave from a left perspective.
I don't know where I have given the impression that I was a "genuine leaver sincere of your beliefs" - I have set out the logical case to leave the EU for an EFTA or EFTA-like relationship, but I wasn't out campaigning for leave, I was out campaigning for remain and only pivoted across in the final week or so - in part thanks to the shitty campaign we were running.
So in the space of about a year I switched from being a one-nation Ed Milliband supporter to backing Jezbollah and voting to leave the EU. My "remain" stance now isn't to decry my argument about us being spun to the edges had we remained - that remains true. Its just that what we have done since has been so painfully funny bad that I would reverse my vote given a chance. Which incidentally is what a lot of people up here say about Sindy.
A couple of former comrades were somewhat unhappy that I "fucked the party up" and then defected "to the right". But whatever...
Because making ourselves America's b*tch has always worked out so well for us.
Has Putinguy1983 hacked your account?
Pretty much, yes, absolutely it has, though as the article says Truss has been out in front of Biden and Blinken, and not just behind following them. Johnson was too.
I think our foreign and security policy should be guided by our own interests, not Neocon talking points. On Russia, which represents a security threat to us, we should absolutely be standing up to Putin alongside America and anyone else who is up for it. Read through my posts, I have never said anything different. But the China-US rivalry is different, as China isn't a threat to our security, and frankly a lot of the bluster on the US side is down to their own sense of supremacy being threatened. That is their problem, not ours.
China absolutely is a threat to our security, even more than Russia is.
As horrendous as Putin's invasion of Ukraine is, China invading Taiwan would be an order of magnitude worse. Ukraine is a substantial grain exporter and Russia a substantial energy exporter so this war has helped fuel a cost of living crisis with energy and food, but Taiwan is the leading global supplier of high end electronic chips that run the modern economy and China is the leading global exporter full stop.
A China/Taiwan war would be utterly catastrophic for the global economy and thus our own security in a way that would absolutely dwarf our current crisis. Joining with the USA, Japan, Australia and other allies in deterring that risk is great value for money and is another reason why Putin's invasion of Ukraine must be seen to fail, to deter China too.
The world today is all interconnected, you can't look at one alone and ignore the rest of the globe.
The deterrence value of whatever paltry forces we could project in the Taiwan Strait is not going to be the difference between China invading Taiwan or not. This is the kind of Neocon talking points that got hundreds of British servicemen and women killed in Iraq. If the world economy is that dependent on key components from a geopolitical flash point I would suggest investment in supply diversification may represent a safer and cheaper course of action.
To do my best Chandler Bing impression - Could you be any more wrong?
The deterrence value of UK forces operating alone would not be the difference, that is true.
But the UK isn't operating alone. The deterrence value of the UK and the USA, Australia, India, Japan, Poland and the rest of the civilised world standing together in unison is immense. This is one area whereby working together we are more than the sum of our parts.
You are as utterly naive and reprehensible as the so-called "realists" who wanted to sell out Ukraine at the start of the conflict as Putin's victory was "inevitable" so we may as well accept that reality.
You are being naïve if you think the US is simply defending the "free world" here rather than defending its own hegemonic position. Of course the US has every right to do this, and in many ways its hegemony is preferable to the alternatives, but I just don't think this is our conflict. Ukraine is our conflict, because it will determine the security of the whole of Europe and Russia is an expansionist power on our doorstep. Anyway, I look forward to you signing up so you can put your own life at risk in pursuit of America's foreign policy goals, rather than just other people's.
If it were only the US that were worried about the risk of China invading Taiwan you might have some credibility that it is just the US defending its own position. Its not though, its the entire civilised world who are uniting because they know the threat is very real.
Stop and look at what China has already been willing to do with the Tibetans, Hong Kong and the Uighur. That you can look at that and seriously say "China is not a threat" is baffling, you are an apologist for evil.
Apologist for evil, give me a break. You drink too much coffee. You can't divide the world up into white hats and black hats. China has done lots of bad stuff, as have other countries. I am not defending them, I find their system of government reprehensible. But they are not an aggressively expansionist power and never have been, unlike Russia or for that matter Britain. I don't think we need to get involved in some war on the other side of the world where the link to British interests is not absolutely clear. And to be honest I find it odd that people who claim to be British patriots are so ready to embrace the agenda of another foreign power on this issue.
Some parts of the world are shades of grey, but (and this must be my famous "reactionary" attitude according to @Nigel_Foremain ) I greatly dislike the antiquated term "black and white" since it implies black = bad and white = good.
The use of white/lightness for good and black/darkness for bad long predates the use of white and black to describe skin colour.
From soundings last night Tory party member views seem to be all over the place - and unpredictably so. Plenty who detest candidates on both sides.
If I had to guess I'd say younger (by which I mean under 60) working professionals in the Tory party membership prefer Rishi but there aren't as many of them.
It does raise the question of how democratic it is to select a new PM in this manner. MPs have their own electoral mandates, so their choice is defensible. The choice of a tiny portion of the electorate, unrepresentative of even Conservative voters, is a pretty dubious one.
I agree. In a Parliamentary democracy it should be MPs choosing the leader.
"I was then told this idea of borrowing to grow the economy then let it pay for itself is ludicrous ... What have we just heard [from the Tory leadership contest is] let’s borrow to grow the economy.
It’s extraordinary they’re repeating my agenda but at the same time, doing it in a way which, to be frank, I think is completely unrelated to the real world we’re living in which is the immediate crisis of the cost of living and climate change."
Yes, as I listened I could hear almost word-for-word reminders of some of the John McDonnell interviews. It was a mock-Thatcherite remix of his policies.
To be fair, she actually did quite well in the interview, but that doesn't alter the fact that she's peddling the same kind of magic fairy dust as McDonnell used to.
I remain convinced that post-Cameron that the Tories have been out of ideas and out of policy.
What happened was that Corbyn came along and Johnson temporarily stopped it as a result. As soon as Corbyn went the chasm reappeared, which was always there. The Tories need to go into opposition now and go back to being centre ground and somebody centrists can vote for.
The Cameron project died in 2016. The hope was for sound economic management, liberal conservatism and the constitutional foxes (leaving the EU and Scottish Independence) to be shot, creating a stable and sound economy.
Brexit changed all that and it’s sent the Tories into a tailspin ever since. It’s instructive that they’ve not been able to provide a coherent economic message since then, just a lot of waffle about global Britain and deregulation from one side and levelling up and unleashing potential on the other.
This is just utter lunacy, she's honestly made McDonnell look moderate.
Borrowing to fund tax cuts...is she insane?
It's what the economically illiterate Tory membership want so technically she isn't - but they are...
I see Minford has been wheeled out for this one.
In which case I will correct my previous point - anyone listening to Minford on economics is utterly insane...
We've been borrowing money to avoid increasing taxes for the past 15 years - and it's hardly grown the economy because companies have pocketed the profits via dividends rather than investing the money in productivity enhancements.
Because making ourselves America's b*tch has always worked out so well for us.
Has Putinguy1983 hacked your account?
Pretty much, yes, absolutely it has, though as the article says Truss has been out in front of Biden and Blinken, and not just behind following them. Johnson was too.
I think our foreign and security policy should be guided by our own interests, not Neocon talking points. On Russia, which represents a security threat to us, we should absolutely be standing up to Putin alongside America and anyone else who is up for it. Read through my posts, I have never said anything different. But the China-US rivalry is different, as China isn't a threat to our security, and frankly a lot of the bluster on the US side is down to their own sense of supremacy being threatened. That is their problem, not ours.
China absolutely is a threat to our security, even more than Russia is.
As horrendous as Putin's invasion of Ukraine is, China invading Taiwan would be an order of magnitude worse. Ukraine is a substantial grain exporter and Russia a substantial energy exporter so this war has helped fuel a cost of living crisis with energy and food, but Taiwan is the leading global supplier of high end electronic chips that run the modern economy and China is the leading global exporter full stop.
A China/Taiwan war would be utterly catastrophic for the global economy and thus our own security in a way that would absolutely dwarf our current crisis. Joining with the USA, Japan, Australia and other allies in deterring that risk is great value for money and is another reason why Putin's invasion of Ukraine must be seen to fail, to deter China too.
The world today is all interconnected, you can't look at one alone and ignore the rest of the globe.
The deterrence value of whatever paltry forces we could project in the Taiwan Strait is not going to be the difference between China invading Taiwan or not. This is the kind of Neocon talking points that got hundreds of British servicemen and women killed in Iraq. If the world economy is that dependent on key components from a geopolitical flash point I would suggest investment in supply diversification may represent a safer and cheaper course of action.
To do my best Chandler Bing impression - Could you be any more wrong?
The deterrence value of UK forces operating alone would not be the difference, that is true.
But the UK isn't operating alone. The deterrence value of the UK and the USA, Australia, India, Japan, Poland and the rest of the civilised world standing together in unison is immense. This is one area whereby working together we are more than the sum of our parts.
You are as utterly naive and reprehensible as the so-called "realists" who wanted to sell out Ukraine at the start of the conflict as Putin's victory was "inevitable" so we may as well accept that reality.
You are being naïve if you think the US is simply defending the "free world" here rather than defending its own hegemonic position. Of course the US has every right to do this, and in many ways its hegemony is preferable to the alternatives, but I just don't think this is our conflict. Ukraine is our conflict, because it will determine the security of the whole of Europe and Russia is an expansionist power on our doorstep. Anyway, I look forward to you signing up so you can put your own life at risk in pursuit of America's foreign policy goals, rather than just other people's.
If it were only the US that were worried about the risk of China invading Taiwan you might have some credibility that it is just the US defending its own position. Its not though, its the entire civilised world who are uniting because they know the threat is very real.
Stop and look at what China has already been willing to do with the Tibetans, Hong Kong and the Uighur. That you can look at that and seriously say "China is not a threat" is baffling, you are an apologist for evil.
Apologist for evil, give me a break. You drink too much coffee. You can't divide the world up into white hats and black hats. China has done lots of bad stuff, as have other countries. I am not defending them, I find their system of government reprehensible. But they are not an aggressively expansionist power and never have been, unlike Russia or for that matter Britain. I don't think we need to get involved in some war on the other side of the world where the link to British interests is not absolutely clear. And to be honest I find it odd that people who claim to be British patriots are so ready to embrace the agenda of another foreign power on this issue.
Some parts of the world are shades of grey, but (and this must be my famous "reactionary" attitude according to @Nigel_Foremain ) I greatly dislike the antiquated term "black and white" since it implies black = bad and white = good.
The use of white/lightness for good and black/darkness for bad long predates the use of white and black to describe skin colour.
And I believe occurs in bantu and other impeccably black languages
"I was then told this idea of borrowing to grow the economy then let it pay for itself is ludicrous ... What have we just heard [from the Tory leadership contest is] let’s borrow to grow the economy.
It’s extraordinary they’re repeating my agenda but at the same time, doing it in a way which, to be frank, I think is completely unrelated to the real world we’re living in which is the immediate crisis of the cost of living and climate change."
Yes, as I listened I could hear almost word-for-word reminders of some of the John McDonnell interviews. It was a mock-Thatcherite remix of his policies.
To be fair, she actually did quite well in the interview, but that doesn't alter the fact that she's peddling the same kind of magic fairy dust as McDonnell used to.
I remain convinced that post-Cameron that the Tories have been out of ideas and out of policy.
What happened was that Corbyn came along and Johnson temporarily stopped it as a result. As soon as Corbyn went the chasm reappeared, which was always there. The Tories need to go into opposition now and go back to being centre ground and somebody centrists can vote for.
The Cameron project died in 2016. The hope was for sound economic management, liberal conservatism and the constitutional foxes (leaving the EU and Scottish Independence) to be shot, creating a stable and sound economy.
Brexit changed all that and it’s sent the Tories into a tailspin ever since. It’s instructive that they’ve not been able to provide a coherent economic message since then, just a lot of waffle about global Britain and deregulation from one side and levelling up and unleashing potential on the other.
What makes me laugh about the "global Britain" thing is that they have done so much to make us insular Britain.
EXCLUSIVE: I am told Keir Starmer will scrap the pledges to nationalise National Grid, water and Royal Mail.
Tuition fees remain in debate, I am told Labour will in the meantime focus on early education including bringing back SureStart.
Shit. When was the last time Labour announced actual policies? They must feel on the front foot
Two years to go - time to add some meat to the bones..
And surestart is way better policy than trying to fix Universities which are likely to blow up next year anyway for very similar reasons to the ones I highlighted with Schools on Tuesday...
Team Truss obviously very happy. Team Sunak very happy. But perhaps the happiest people I’ve spoken to this afternoon are Labour people… Mordaunt was, by some way, the candidate that there were most worried about. They’ve been hoping for some time it would be Sunak V Truss. https://twitter.com/BenKentish/status/1549791598019575808
The problem with Mourdaunt was that people projected on her all their hopes and dreams and created the image of some sort of perfect Tory leader, but the brutal reality was that didn’t stack up. That and the Daily Mail did for her.
I was very much Team Penny, I don’t think anyone thought she was perfect. I think most people thought that her many strengths outweighed her weaknesses. The viciousness of the onslaught of briefings and what masquerades as journalism was in no way proportionate. It’s a very serious stain on the broad centre right space. I’m the bitterest I’ve been as a party member in a long time.
If they'd been against Truss, they could have absolutely destroyed the woman; it's not like the material wasn't there - she was a Lib Dem ffs.
That she was a Lib Dem is not a weakness. Churchill was once a Liberal too. People who evolve are more interesting than those who don't.
Tony Blair when he was young was an avowed Trotskist, while Darling, Milburn, Reid and Mandelson were all avowed Communists when they were young too. People change.
Changing your mind is fine. The thing about Truss is how polarised the changes are. Utterly convinced about one thing and then utterly convinced about the opposite. No nuance, It’s not an evolution, it’s chaos.
Team Truss obviously very happy. Team Sunak very happy. But perhaps the happiest people I’ve spoken to this afternoon are Labour people… Mordaunt was, by some way, the candidate that there were most worried about. They’ve been hoping for some time it would be Sunak V Truss. https://twitter.com/BenKentish/status/1549791598019575808
The problem with Mourdaunt was that people projected on her all their hopes and dreams and created the image of some sort of perfect Tory leader, but the brutal reality was that didn’t stack up. That and the Daily Mail did for her.
I was very much Team Penny, I don’t think anyone thought she was perfect. I think most people thought that her many strengths outweighed her weaknesses. The viciousness of the onslaught of briefings and what masquerades as journalism was in no way proportionate. It’s a very serious stain on the broad centre right space. I’m the bitterest I’ve been as a party member in a long time.
If they'd been against Truss, they could have absolutely destroyed the woman; it's not like the material wasn't there - she was a Lib Dem ffs.
That she was a Lib Dem is not a weakness. Churchill was once a Liberal too. People who evolve are more interesting than those who don't.
Tony Blair when he was young was an avowed Trotskist, while Darling, Milburn, Reid and Mandelson were all avowed Communists when they were young too. People change.
Changing your mind is fine. The thing about Truss is how polarised the changes are. Utterly convinced about one thing and then utterly convinced about the opposite. No nuance, It’s not an evolution, it’s chaos.
It is evolution, it is perfectly normal that once you have changed you accept your new position with the "zeal of the convert".
I was a Remainer at the start of the EU referendum campaign. I now have views in line with Truss's. Its not chaos, its evolution.
Flip-flopping back and forth rapidly at the drop of every opinion poll showing +1 to one side and then +1 to the other would be chaos. Not following with a zeal your new position once you've reached it.
" I was a remainer" . Pull the other one. You are the most reactionary poster on this site. You are the original young fogey Colonel Blimp. You might think making this claim adds cred to your position but it doesn't. It just points out to us that you are honest as Boris Johnson and Liz Truss. Both of whom you clearly admire in spite of their obvious problem with telling the truth.
Oh give over the broken record. The fact that you're too thick to let the fact many people, not just myself, confirm I was pro-Remain penetrate your one-dimensional caricatured worldview of people just goes to show how stupid you are. People are more complicated than you can wrap your head around it seems.
I am not reactionary, Indeed I have frequently been called "woke" in a lot of the other debates on this site.
What I am is someone who unabashedly thinks that democracy and therefore nationalism is a very good thing and so too is low tax economics. I think internationalism undermines democracy, but that isn't reactionary - I wanted to see a more democratic EU which I thought was viable until Cameron's reforms failed which is when I switched to Leave and I haven't looked back since.
That you consider nationalism to be terrible is your own weakness, not mine.
I too think nationalism is a 'bad thing' on the whole. It's been the cause of many wars and has been repeatedly, and still is, used to stoke up hatred.
Overall, I cannot see what it's good for. We can cherish our history and our cultures without nationalism.
Agreed, but I also really value times when someone I disagree with lays out their views so clearly, as @BartholomewRoberts has done. I think it raises the tone of political debate, and prompts good discussions that can move people's thinking on.
I am interested in exploring this further. I think if I had to hang my hat on one aspect of our political system that I'd fight for, it would be democracy itself. In that sense I agree with Bart. But I also agree with Benpointer that valuing democracy doesn't mean you need to value nationalism, indeed nationalism more often stymies democracy than helps it (e.g. I think the EU could function more democratically if, throughout its development, nation states had been less important, and both hyper-local and supra-national groupings had been seen as the key ones to focus on).
Bart - can you say more about why you pin democracy to nationalism in this way? Specifically, can you answer why you think democracy works better at the national level than, say, a combination of much stronger regional assemblies with an overarching supra-national assembly (I'm tempted to cite the US as an example of what I mean, but as soon as you cite specific examples it is easy to focus on their specific flaws, so maybe better to keep the discussion theoretical).
In my view democracy at the national level is precisely the wrong scale to be working at - big enough to be impersonal and to leave many constituencies out in the cold (cf Scottish nationalism), but small enough to be unable to cope with the major issues we currently face (climate change, Chinese aggression, effective taxation of global businesses).
Nationalism and democracy go hand-in-hand. Nationalism is a belief that the people of the nation should run the nation, while democracy is a belief that those who run the nation should be elected. Having those of the nation elect those who run the nation is nationalist democracy and is a very good thing.
There antithesis of nationalism used to be imperialism. Nationalism arose in conflict to imperialism - a belief in your nation ruling over other nations. Anyone who seeks to rule over other countries is engaging in imperialism and undermining other nations nationalism.
The "wars" many people ascribe to nationalism should instead be ascribed to imperialism, which is nationalisms opposite, not nationalism.
Gandhi was an Indian nationalist, he wanted India ruled by Indians rather than Brits - there is absolutely nothing wrong with that.
Hitler was not a nationalist. He didn't want the French ruled by the French, he wanted them ruled by the Germans. He was an imperialist. Yes the name of his party included nationalist, but it also included the term socialist, sensible people recognise that there is more than just a name involved and he wasn't a socialist in the end - he wasn't a nationalist in the end either.
The people of the nation, electing those who run the nation, is modern democracy and I cherish that.
The opposite of nationalism nowadays tends to be more internationalism rather than imperialism, having unelected international bodies determine rules and laws. That too undermines democracy.
"More than 40 percent said having a ‘strong leader’ was more important than democracy and that ‘native-born white people are being replaced by immigrants’ — a racist belief known as the ‘great replacement theory’."
From soundings last night Tory party member views seem to be all over the place - and unpredictably so. Plenty who detest candidates on both sides.
If I had to guess I'd say younger (by which I mean under 60) working professionals in the Tory party membership prefer Rishi but there aren't as many of them.
It does raise the question of how democratic it is to select a new PM in this manner. MPs have their own electoral mandates, so their choice is defensible. The choice of a tiny portion of the electorate, unrepresentative of even Conservative voters, is a pretty dubious one.
I agree. In a Parliamentary democracy it should be MPs choosing the leader.
Yep - and were that the case at some point this afternoon Sunak / Truss would be PM with 7 weeks of summer allowing them to quietly prepare for what is going to be a bad autumn / winter.
What Truss and Sunak have uncovered is the fundamental flaw in the new Tory coalition, something that was only possible because of one Jeremy Corbyn.
One half wants taxes on the rich, investment and ending austerity.
The other wants tax cuts, slashing the state and "living within our means".
There is a reason the Red Wall voted Labour for so long. The Tories have nothing to offer. And as more time goes on, it becomes clear they still don't.
Comments
The deterrence value of UK forces operating alone would not be the difference, that is true.
But the UK isn't operating alone. The deterrence value of the UK and the USA, Australia, India, Japan, Poland and the rest of the civilised world standing together in unison is immense. This is one area whereby working together we are more than the sum of our parts.
You are as utterly naive and reprehensible as the so-called "realists" who wanted to sell out Ukraine at the start of the conflict as Putin's victory was "inevitable" so we may as well accept that reality.
The SNP have done a blinding job on persuading people in Scotland that they're cuddly progressives when they're the same as the nasty selfish Tories.
I was a Remainer at the start of the EU referendum campaign. I now have views in line with Truss's. Its not chaos, its evolution.
Flip-flopping back and forth rapidly at the drop of every opinion poll showing +1 to one side and then +1 to the other would be chaos. Not following with a zeal your new position once you've reached it.
Anyway, I look forward to you signing up so you can put your own life at risk in pursuit of America's foreign policy goals, rather than just other people's.
"I was then told this idea of borrowing to grow the economy then let it pay for itself is ludicrous ... What have we just heard [from the Tory leadership contest is] let’s borrow to grow the economy.
It’s extraordinary they’re repeating my agenda but at the same time, doing it in a way which, to be frank, I think is completely unrelated to the real world we’re living in which is the immediate crisis of the cost of living and climate change."
No-one can deny that the Tories are straining every sinew to lose the next election, and with their current talent pool I think they are wise to do so.
If the Labour party were normal, and normal times I would say that a Labour government is a certainty. It isn't. Labour would only have to spend a few weeks reminding us of the merits of Burgon, Abbott, Pidcock and Jezza, of what some of its members think of Jewish people, of how many Jewish people have been driven out of the party for everything to change.
And of course the Scottish problem.
The truth remains that all politics is relative. It used to be a luxury to have two parties capable of governing. Now it's a luxury to have one.
It's kind of you to hang on my every word, especially as I am always wrong. In particular recently in thinking it impossible that the MPs could be so dim as to leave Sunak and Truss as the only choices.
Overall, I thought that she did pretty well in the interview. Her economic plan seems to me to be somewhat irresponsible but I have to hold my hands and say that if someone had suggested that we could possibly borrow and print as much money as we did during Covid I would have thought that they were mad. Sound money people like me have to accept that the envelope was way bigger than I appreciated and that governments had more room for manouvre than conventional economics suggested. Whether that envelope is big enough to encompass Truss's plans remains to be seen.
It is like being world famous - you're not until you're famous in America. Though you can be famous in America without being world famous. For all its faults, America remains the essential country.
Stop and look at what China has already been willing to do with the Tibetans, Hong Kong and the Uighur. That you can look at that and seriously say "China is not a threat" is baffling, you are an apologist for evil.
@Pulpstar mentioned me, and yes I am quite happy having switched from Labour. But it wasn't sudden - I nearly made the move in 2003. I probably don't act / sound like I am happy - became crushingly depressed in 2020 and tried to rejoin Labour because I was desperate to feel normal again and that had been 25 years of my life, and then quit the LibDems for a day last year having realised I would probably vote against them in the 24 GE.
I switched, I'm happy I switched, I'm trying to make amends for some of the unconscionable shit I found myself pressured into supporting in 2015-16 during another (at that point undiagnosed) deep depression. What amazes me are the people who seem to insist that they are *true* [insert party here] people having switched, disowning their former position completely. Which is Truss.
That isn't me.
America is the necessary but not sufficient condition. America is essential as you say, but America on its own may not stay the course and also economically may be circumvented.
When the rest of the free world unites with America, then we amplify the significance. Had Britain, Poland and other European nations not been strongly pro-Ukraine then America would have been more tempted to slouch off and the sanctions on Russia would have been far less consequential.
The civilised world uniting with America in the Pacific to deter a Chinese invasion of Taiwan is tremendous value for money. A China/Taiwan war relative to the Russia/Ukraine war would be like WWI relative to the Boer War. Its another reason too why ensuring Ukraine wins is value for money too, if it helps ensure both Ukraine and Taiwan's freedom we kill two birds with one stone.
The whole world is connected, we can't just shove our heads in the sand and let the bad men like Putin and Xi do what they want as we're too afraid to stand up to them.
When that happens a step across is much easier. Same thing happened to Churchill. Twice.
This should be enough to disqualify any candidate.
Who pressured you into leave may I ask ?
I was under the impression that the most recent PB collective view on NS oil was that Nasty Nic and the EssEnnPee were single-handedly preventing the UK from squeezing the last bit of profit from it by means unknown to anyone who has a clue about how devolved government works.
You can't divide the world up into white hats and black hats. China has done lots of bad stuff, as have other countries. I am not defending them, I find their system of government reprehensible. But they are not an aggressively expansionist power and never have been, unlike Russia or for that matter Britain. I don't think we need to get involved in some war on the other side of the world where the link to British interests is not absolutely clear. And to be honest I find it odd that people who claim to be British patriots are so ready to embrace the agenda of another foreign power on this issue.
Do you have any evidence that for the voting split of private versus state sector employees?
If it were true the Tories would be in a permanent massive majority. In 2020 16.7% of employees (5.5m) worked in the state sector according to this study.
https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN05635/SN05635.pdf
Twice as many people (11m) are pensioners, many dependent on state benefits, but as we know they break for the Tories 58% - 42%.
I am not reactionary, Indeed I have frequently been called "woke" in a lot of the other debates on this site.
What I am is someone who unabashedly thinks that democracy and therefore nationalism is a very good thing and so too is low tax economics. I think internationalism undermines democracy, but that isn't reactionary - I wanted to see a more democratic EU which I thought was viable until Cameron's reforms failed which is when I switched to Leave and I haven't looked back since.
That you consider nationalism to be terrible is your own weakness, not mine.
McDonnell is a strange old cove. He is clearly a player and a schemer, but is a snappy dresser and always comes across as very measured and personable on telly. Victoria Atkins and Nick Timothy were his fellow panellists last night and seemed to get on very well with him.
To be fair, she actually did quite well in the interview, but that doesn't alter the fact that she's peddling the same kind of magic fairy dust as McDonnell used to.
Overall, I cannot see what it's good for. We can cherish our history and our cultures without nationalism.
I'd rather say what I mean, which is good and evil, than antiquated racist euphemisms like black and white. And yes Putin and Xi are evil, while the free world and democracy while not perfect are good.
China absolutely is an aggressively expansionist power. In my lifetime alone they repeatedly been willing to use violence to expand Beijing's power and control, whether in Tian'an'men Square, or Hong Kong, or Tibet, or against the Uighur.
It is naivety in the extreme to look at that litany of evil and suggest that if we don't deter them they won't be willing to do the same against Taiwan.
Andrew Fisher who wrote 2017 abandoned ship and the talent they had all left.
2017's manifesto was written by a literal Communist but was moderate because him and McDonnell understood electability as well as Tony Blair and Mandelson. Corbyn and his chums did not.
Mods alert - Barty's account has clearly been hacked by a spoofer!
This is just utter lunacy, she's honestly made McDonnell look moderate.
Borrowing to fund tax cuts...is she insane?
What happened was that Corbyn came along and Johnson temporarily stopped it as a result. As soon as Corbyn went the chasm reappeared, which was always there. The Tories need to go into opposition now and go back to being centre ground and somebody centrists can vote for.
Tax lawyers & dutch accountants will do nicely out of it all.
You are an admirer of the most dishonest man ever to have been PM. You wish to have him replaced by his natural heir. You clearly admire dishonesty, or at least think it completely acceptable. Therefore I do not believe you have been on a "journey". You are a natural hard right winger. A headbanger, a swivel-eyed nutjob and a laughing stock, just like your idol Johnson.
I must now go and do something you clearly do not have time for. work. Have a nice day Pinocchio. Keep making up the stories.
Imagine being such a pathetic dickhead that you can’t just enjoy things without using the opportunity to make it all about you.
No one is stopping you saying women, stop pretending to misunderstand gender inclusive language & creating a hostile environment for Trans people.
There was two different paths. The Norwegians went the sovereign wealth fund, what exactly is the name of the path we took? Was it driven more by ideology than a stronger, future proofing your country’s future finances judgement?
I am interested in exploring this further. I think if I had to hang my hat on one aspect of our political system that I'd fight for, it would be democracy itself. In that sense I agree with Bart. But I also agree with Benpointer that valuing democracy doesn't mean you need to value nationalism, indeed nationalism more often stymies democracy than helps it (e.g. I think the EU could function more democratically if, throughout its development, nation states had been less important, and both hyper-local and supra-national groupings had been seen as the key ones to focus on).
Bart - can you say more about why you pin democracy to nationalism in this way? Specifically, can you answer why you think democracy works better at the national level than, say, a combination of much stronger regional assemblies with an overarching supra-national assembly (I'm tempted to cite the US as an example of what I mean, but as soon as you cite specific examples it is easy to focus on their specific flaws, so maybe better to keep the discussion theoretical).
In my view democracy at the national level is precisely the wrong scale to be working at - big enough to be impersonal and to leave many constituencies out in the cold (cf Scottish nationalism), but small enough to be unable to cope with the major issues we currently face (climate change, Chinese aggression, effective taxation of global businesses).
It was McDonnell and Mills who realised that Seumus's ramblings on the Russian poisonings had lost them the GE. Bearing in mind they are/were probably Marxists.
You see it is a myth that the left cannot believe in electability, they can. But only some of them.
So did BoJo, he stole half of them.
Meanwhile, Nadine Broadcasting Company is pushing the “time for change after 20 years of failure” candidate. WHAT?
I can see why Labour feel they've found the Tory Gordon Brown.
The England persons who menstruate football team are superb. Well played Lionesses. 👏👏👏👏
1. Political reality. We were increasingly remote from the direction of travel of the EU. A lot of talk of the "twin-track" or "two-speed" Europe to come where we would be propelled to the outer fringes. Logically it would be better to take ourselves out there than to be spun off by political centrifugal forces.
2. Political insanity. I had been adopted by former Blairites. People I respected. Who in their own Bennite drift into the far left had managed to attach me to their wagon. Hence my initial support for Corbyn and then their gaslighting of leave from a left perspective.
I don't know where I have given the impression that I was a "genuine leaver sincere of your beliefs" - I have set out the logical case to leave the EU for an EFTA or EFTA-like relationship, but I wasn't out campaigning for leave, I was out campaigning for remain and only pivoted across in the final week or so - in part thanks to the shitty campaign we were running.
So in the space of about a year I switched from being a one-nation Ed Milliband supporter to backing Jezbollah and voting to leave the EU. My "remain" stance now isn't to decry my argument about us being spun to the edges had we remained - that remains true. Its just that what we have done since has been so painfully
funnybad that I would reverse my vote given a chance. Which incidentally is what a lot of people up here say about Sindy.A couple of former comrades were somewhat unhappy that I "fucked the party up" and then defected "to the right". But whatever...
Tuition fees remain in debate, I am told Labour will in the meantime focus on early education including bringing back SureStart.
It might force higher interest rates from the BoE, mind.
Certainly a risk.
Brexit changed all that and it’s sent the Tories into a tailspin ever since. It’s instructive that they’ve not been able to provide a coherent economic message since then, just a lot of waffle about global Britain and deregulation from one side and levelling up and unleashing potential on the other.
We've been borrowing money to avoid increasing taxes for the past 15 years - and it's hardly grown the economy because companies have pocketed the profits via dividends rather than investing the money in productivity enhancements.
Labour has been given a wide goal here for social democracy. Get to it Keir
Water I'm more luke warm on because it's failed under privatisation but hardly seems a priority at present.
Royal Mail is gone, what is nationalising it going to do? That's just pointlessly ideological.
And surestart is way better policy than trying to fix Universities which are likely to blow up next year anyway for very similar reasons to the ones I highlighted with Schools on Tuesday...
https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x847rfi
There antithesis of nationalism used to be imperialism. Nationalism arose in conflict to imperialism - a belief in your nation ruling over other nations. Anyone who seeks to rule over other countries is engaging in imperialism and undermining other nations nationalism.
The "wars" many people ascribe to nationalism should instead be ascribed to imperialism, which is nationalisms opposite, not nationalism.
Gandhi was an Indian nationalist, he wanted India ruled by Indians rather than Brits - there is absolutely nothing wrong with that.
Hitler was not a nationalist. He didn't want the French ruled by the French, he wanted them ruled by the Germans. He was an imperialist. Yes the name of his party included nationalist, but it also included the term socialist, sensible people recognise that there is more than just a name involved and he wasn't a socialist in the end - he wasn't a nationalist in the end either.
The people of the nation, electing those who run the nation, is modern democracy and I cherish that.
The opposite of nationalism nowadays tends to be more internationalism rather than imperialism, having unelected international bodies determine rules and laws. That too undermines democracy.
The current term is "people with a capacity for pregnancy".
"More than 40 percent said having a ‘strong leader’ was more important than democracy and that ‘native-born white people are being replaced by immigrants’ — a racist belief known as the ‘great replacement theory’."
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11032711/Americans-survey-violence-University-California-Davis-democracy-threat-civil-war-politics.html
One half wants taxes on the rich, investment and ending austerity.
The other wants tax cuts, slashing the state and "living within our means".
There is a reason the Red Wall voted Labour for so long. The Tories have nothing to offer. And as more time goes on, it becomes clear they still don't.