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The Saturday open thread – politicalbetting.com
The Saturday open thread – politicalbetting.com
One of the best reads this morning is this – The Crisis at the hearts of the Conservative Party by Johnson Oxley in the Speccie
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1.11 Liz Truss 90%
10 Rishi Sunak 10%
Next Conservative leader
1.1 Liz Truss 91%
10 Rishi Sunak 10%
However, that’s irrelevant. Far more importantly, it doesn’t have a clue, and hasn’t for a long time now.
The linked article is excellent.
I can only hope that Labour doesn’t prove as useless when it comes to actually governing.
Buckland now wants to be lead by Liz.
Who would have thought Leon might over react.
🇸🇰🇺🇦
https://twitter.com/visegrad24/status/1558353124020174849
Whether the Labour project exists and is being kept under wraps until the election through magnificent self-discipline, or is merely "we are the sensible people who will govern fairly", I'm genuinely not sure. Next week should ptovide some clues. Just as Biden won by being the non-Trump, it's possible to see Labour winning by being the non-crazy non-Tories, but it would be nice to feel a sense of direction.
The problem isn't the Tory party, its the voters. People want contradictory things but refuse to accept there is a contradiction. A series of events have empowered them to believe their genuine ignorance on a subject holds the same weight as actual knowledge and experience. They aren't wrong, the experts are wrong.
People don't understand their problems so can't ask for solutions. So they tie the politicians up in knots, demanding solutions they can't have for problems they utterly misunderstand. Tories - and Labour for that matter - have to sing stupid songs because that has become the only way to get elected.
There is a way through though - find us a new Blair or Thatcher, someone who does know what they are talking about and has political umph. People said "that is Boris" but as all but the remaining holdouts now accept Boris stood for nothing, with no great policies delivered and settled in his time.
Is there such a politician?
He was the problem
Excellent comment highlighting the impossibility of governing in this moment in time
It is not just the conservatives or labour parties, but nobody has a solution to the intractable problems facing not only the UK but Europe and beyond
If Starmer was Blair he would talk about vision and opportunity. But he isn't. Labour simply have nobody with vision and a compelling voice, just as the Tories lack a Thatcher. Either we find someone to lead us out of the morass the country is now in or it will just fall apart.
The classic for me is a refusal to see that good services cost money. For all that Teresa Mays attempt to do something about social care was ham fisted, at least it was an attempt. And what happened? Millions reacted in horror at the thought of not being able to pass on some of their inheritance to their kids. No sense of community. No understanding that when a care worker comes in four times a day it costs money.
I’m lucky. I don’t need an inheritance, but will likely get decent ones when my folks and my mother in law pass away ((hopefully a long time in the future). But if that money has had to go into care spending so be it. Much of it will have been ‘earned’ by house price inflation, so it’s not even being taxed twice on the same income, as so many bewail.
The nation needs a serious discussion about what it wants to be. Perhaps opposition for the Tories might help start this. I’m yet to be impressed that Starmer has a vision other than being a ‘straight kinda guy’, if he’s even that.
Leon was two drinks away from getting into QAnon and CondescendingCutlets was weeping into his M&S Chablis while watching Dunkerque. Lovely stuff.
We're getting to the point where some people now recognise things are broken, but have a reason that simply is wrong and a solution that is mad - "nationalise everything" etc etc. Others think everything is great and the only people complaining are the "other" - the woke, the remoaners, the lefties etc etc.
Mr P, our late leader did stand for something; Brexit! The only trouble was it was an idea for him, not something which needed careful thought! As somebody said about him long ago, he was a sort of chap who saw which way a crowd was running, got in front of it and shouted "follow me"!
I’m surprised they found one, let alone two.
People like BoZo for the same reason they liked Jimmy Saville.
It is not a failure of politics that people didn't turn against them
https://www.theguardian.com/sport/blog/2022/aug/13/cricket-is-about-to-reach-tipping-point-with-power-grab-of-alternative-season
BoZo told people his shitshow was a masterpiece. That none of the inevitable problems it caused would happen. That it would cure imaginary ills.
If the problem is politicians not prepared to tell voters the truth and have them believe it, Brexit is the case study in why not.
"Islam's sword is mightier than the blasphemer's pen"
A mistake, on both counts.
BTW it implies (but just evades saying it direct - a classic Speccie tactic) that if you have a post tax household income of £31.5k you face 'destitution' if your energy bills are £4400 pa.
Back in the real world a household with two keen smokers can spend that amount.
Both were popular. Both were handed power and responsibility as a result. Both abused it.
Popularity turns out to be a poor judge of character.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missoula_floods
The Yellowstone supervolcano erupting is more likely. The Toba supervolcano eruption on Sumatra, 74,000 years ago, triggered a 6- to 10-year global winter that nearly wiped out the nascent human race.
Jess Phillips has a bit of it about her as well but less convinced she could deliver.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/f5ff4648-1a8b-11ed-b1f4-627a202c7457?shareToken=5c0c3c632caac02b05ad9da0839d29d0
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Flood_of_1862
BTW did you ever read of the Moray flood of 1829? Lauder's book is great and is online, and so is the McEwen and Werritty paper if you can get access (on researchgate?).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muckle_Spate
What we do need is collegiate Cabinet Government working as a team to resolve the issues of the day. Maybe Sunak could have been your man?
We don't need Blair, Thatcher blowhards, and we certainly don't need Johnson/Truss.
My train journey today: "Sorry, we have no driver." Also today, no trains AT ALL on many lines. Next week, three days of strike chaos.
What an absolute shit show this country is right now. Here's hoping @trussliz gets us back on track
https://twitter.com/IsabelOakeshott/status/1558364817752211456
This one, in the Elbe river, is from 1616 and says: "If you see me, cry" https://twitter.com/Citizen09372364/status/1557665431888056320/photo/1
Cabinet ministers, MPs and officials fear weeks of zombie govt on cost of living — plus a long, bitter and out of touch leadership contest — will do irreparable damage to the party’s standing
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-08-13/uk-conservatives-fear-fallout-from-sunak-truss-attacks
https://twitter.com/bayraktar_1love/status/1558180748611522564
If you are in a debate with someone shameless and dishonest enough, it can be really hard to persuade an audience.
It tends to go this;
BORIS-ALIKE Something involving cake and eat it
RORY-ALIKE (because he at least tried) That's not possible- once you have eaten your cake, it's gone...
BORIS-ALIKE There you go, with your doomy gloomy negativity. Remember we are Great Britain! We are being held back by your fears... (Continues ad nauseum.)
Boris style cakeism is a really attractive prospectus. It's awfully hard to argue against, because deep down we want it to be true, and want to believe that there's some meanie stopping it being true for us. That's been the case since the apple/snake/Eve fiasco in Genesis.
It would have been better for the UK had someone successfully argued us out of Borisism, but I'm not convinced that was possible.
It would have been better for the Conservatives and the UK to have not fallen for Borisism, but that required human nature to be something it isn't.
The culpability for (gestures round) all of this belongs with the clique who proposed it, who lied to the public about it, who smeared and deposed those who questioned it.
Not particularly with those who fell for it, and certainly not with those who did their best to argue against it.
Unless you had a better plan to argue against Boris, in which case I'm all ears.
"I'm sorry prime minister, they aren't actually on strike. They are working their contracted hours".
"No, that can't be right. We all agreed we would end their commie strike and send them back to work".
"But they are at work Prime Minister. There just aren't enough of them"
"And whose fault is that?"
"The Department for Transport"
Etc
Its 'people like them' who should be paying.
And its not just good services which people think they're entitled to.
Its rising house values and increasing consumer spending and whatever else suits their needs and desires.
A decade ago I predicted it wouldn't be long before the upper middle classes believed themselves entitled to unlimited cheap, servile domestic skivvies:
https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/medialse/2021/06/21/how-mumsnet-discussions-about-domestic-cleaners-still-keep-them-invisible/
Again, ignorance has been weaponised to be a virtue. How to tell ignorant people that actually they are wrong?
What's happening here is happening all across Europe, we just don't hear about it because their news isn't in English.
So far as I am aware, no one has yet tried to argue that 'it' was the fault of LibDem ministers during the coalition years!
What tends to happen here is that countries with bad government fail. If they are lucky, moderately bad failure is enough to make the point. If they are unlucky, they end up like Argentina.
Blair achieved peace in Northern Ireland, setup devolved governments, introduced a minimum wage amongst many other things.
I’ve said this since day one, the current Tory Party is good at winning but utterly hopeless at actually doing anything!
That's the sort of unreality bubble the country currently inhabits. Where is the money going to come from to help the most vulnerable households if not from the households that are not vulnerable? We cannot just magic the energy crisis away.
This is the lack of seriousness that Rory talked about. I think, I hope, that the voters can be serious, but it requires a lot of politicians to be serious for a long time to persuade them of the necessity. It takes a lot longer than one leadership campaign.
But who is there in the Commons who is being serious about our problems?
I supported Johnson on brexit, covid and Ukraine but he lost me from Paterson onwards
Starmer would have had our economy in lockdown forever if he could, and it is to Johnson's credit he opened the economy when he did
I wondered when Brexit would become the remainers fault.
it'll be Postman Pat's and Dangermouse's fault soon.
We have always been at war with Eastasia
In what way is that reality? That's politics as rote-learning, trivial game-playing. It's not doing anything to face the reality.
He then came up with a reasonable idea of running for Mayor against Khan. And then he flounced.
He now makes a reasonable living I guess from being the Gary Neville of politics. A bit of Twitter sarkiness and some podcasting where he works to make it sound like he knows best with everyone else in the world a giant ignoramus in his field. Some would say that Basrah was Stewart’s version of running Valencia, I don’t know enough to say. I did enjoy his book all those years ago and it’s a shame he’s turned to bitter and irrelevance rather than sticking in there.