While an election is expected next autumn — and could be as late as January 2025 — Starmer and his chief strategist Morgan McSweeney have told their troops that they think Sunak might go as early as May.
If the public begins to acknowledge that the economy is improving, that would clear the way for the Tories to campaign on a message of “we are turning the corner, don’t let Labour ruin it”. Going in May could prevent local election results damaging the Tories further, and would avoid another summer of small boat arrivals.
A senior Labour source said: “They seem to be keeping the option of May open and making it viable in a way they weren’t before. They’ve speeded-up candidate selection. They’re doing a lot more direct mail.”
We are a pretty fickle bunch if we buy an economic recovery after a couple of months of 4% inflation figures. Does Rishi understand inflation is cumulative? I suppose he could always reheat "eat out to help out" or whatever it was called.
I think that he just has to believe that voters will think "A smaller number - phew!". It's not like the current media landscape is exactly encouraging understanding of what inflation is.
That and a couple of tweaks to tax policy - who knows. Sad though it makes me - I can see them winning and chugging downwards for another few years yet.
I think HMS Taxcut may have definitively left the harbour this week. There's both the actual need to spend shedloads of cash and the perception that cutting taxes when schools'n'hospitals are falling down is rather uncouth.
But there's always a need to spend shedloads of cash on boring old 'keeping the roof in order'.
A shiny tax cut though. And who really needs roofs anyway? When you think about it?
Teaching lessons in the open air was quite a thing in the 1920s and 1930s, admittedly I believe in the drier and sunnier south of England. Might take off again. Who knows?
Finished early because the exam hall was at risk of collapse.
On topic- it would be interesting to see the split by current views of Brexit. Are the blue to red switchers more Bregretters, or Confident Leavers (Brexit is fine and not in peril)?
I suspect that most people (who, bizarrely, don’t read PB) have largely forgotten about it. We are out and it has not proved as transformational as some promised but neither have any of the downsides manifested themselves. The revisals of our GDP earlier this week removed the final remnants of the “economic disaster “ claim but they also showed that we are doing no better than average. We want a government that can do better and it doesn’t appear to be this one.
Er .... the UK is not "out". Not by a long shot, if you are in impexp. HMG still hasn't sorted out customs. Partly, reportedly, for fear of the effect on inflation.
And the impact on the "united" bit of the UK remains to be seen, notably but not only in NI.
The UK is out, 100% out.
As a sovereign and independent country it is entirely up to us whether or how we choose to "sort out" customs.
We could choose to waive customs checks from here until eternity, and we'd remain out, that's the point of sovereignty we get to choose what our priorities are rather than having another institution determine what our priorities and checks are.
r "We don't really need to worry about all those things we Brexiters were going on and on about for decades" isn't entirely a convincing argument.
Especially when sovereignty over a large chunk of the former UK has been signed away in part.
Except customs checks on EU imports weren't something Brexiteers were going on and on about for decades.
I couldn't care less if those checks are waived indefinitely. So long as the UK can implement its own laws domestically, I have no objections whatsoever to recognising EU imports as an equivalence while not being bound to EU laws.
"We want to be different from the Europeans" *means* customs checks, at the most fundamental level. To stop all those nasty foreign jars of stuff measured in kg, for instance.
Pretending you don't want them is just not a reasonable argument.
No, it doesn't.
I can drive a Right Hand Drive vehicle that is different to Europeans Left Hand Drive vehicles, even if others import and drive Left Hand Drive vehicles.
Or I can choose to buy goods measured in kg even if others choose to buy goods measured in lb.
No reason that can't apply to other goods and services too.
We can have our own domestic standards that we apply, and if people aren't happy with that and import foreign standards, then there's nothing wrong with that at all.
"One size fits all" is one of the worst things about the EU. When the EEC began it was about recognising standards as equivalents, not unifying them, a return to that is to be welcomed.
More choice. That's a good thing, not a bad thing.
The problem is that we are European. Leaving the EU was like Rhode Island leaving the US. That is the only reason why we haven't, as we are required to do by international treaty, put up customs posts. "Sovereignty" is, and always has been, a myth. As soon as we are reunited with the rest of our country the better.
That's not a problem, because its not true.
We are European as in the continent, we are no more European as in EU than Canadians are "Americans".
The UK isn't Rhode Island, the UK is Canada.
As a sovereign country its our choice whether we put up customs posts or not, we are not obliged to do so. Many countries choose not to.
We are not, and have never been, a “Sovereign Country”. Parliament claims to be sovereign, but can only assert that as a result of a Dutch Invasion of England. Sure, it was an invasion by RSVP, but an invasion nonetheless. Many invasions happen after a faction asks for intervention, and you can be sure that if William had failed we’d be celebrating it now.
Britain, or more specifically England, has never been able to operate in a purely sovereign manner. We have always, throughout our history, been part of larger unions. We act at the behest of other European nations, always have, always will. Placing outside the formal structures of the EU doesn’t change that, just gives the government less influence on the decisions that affect us. People who say we are “sovereign” make about as much sense as Freemen on the Land types
What a load of codswallop.
England, or Britain post-union, has been sovereign for almost all of its existence.
Yes we have foreign relations. Always have, always will. So does Canada, who incidentally still have our monarch.
The idea we're not sovereign post-Brexit, because we have foreign relations, is utterly absurd. We don't act at the best of other European nations, we act at the behest of our own voters, and our own politicians.
Even in the EU, we were typically on foreign relations closer aligned to our closest allies like America, than to other European nations. Which is why pooling sovereignty in foreign relations within the EU was such a terrible idea and one that never worked for us.
The idea we weren't sovereign pre-Brexit is also absurd.
It depends upon if you mean practically sovereign (UK Parliament/UK Government sets UK laws), or theoretically sovereign (EU Parliament/EU Commission sets EU laws which apply to the UK, but UK can leave the EU whenever it chooses).
The UK was theoretically sovereign but not practically sovereign. Now its both. That's a meaningful change.
Its like if a couple are married but the man insists upon making all decisions for the couple. The wife can get divorced, but otherwise doesn't get a say in making decisions.
If the husband insists upon making all decisions, then is the wife making the decisions, because she's choosing not to get divorced?
As already explained, the marital analogy isn't helpful. The EU is an organisation of sovereign states.
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Many who met hitler socially thought he was charming
I think not. Talked relentlessly. Never listened. Bad breath too.
Not true. The earlier, younger Hitler was apparently quite charming. He was good at seducing upper class German ladies into donating money. Got invited to posh parties: as the amusing firebrand plebiean radical who nonetheless knew a lot about opera and art
There's a quite good R4 dramatisation of his early life and rise just called 'Fuhrer'. Rather focuses on the negatives as I remember. Very little social gaiety.
Finished early because the exam hall was at risk of collapse.
On topic- it would be interesting to see the split by current views of Brexit. Are the blue to red switchers more Bregretters, or Confident Leavers (Brexit is fine and not in peril)?
I suspect that most people (who, bizarrely, don’t read PB) have largely forgotten about it. We are out and it has not proved as transformational as some promised but neither have any of the downsides manifested themselves. The revisals of our GDP earlier this week removed the final remnants of the “economic disaster “ claim but they also showed that we are doing no better than average. We want a government that can do better and it doesn’t appear to be this one.
Er .... the UK is not "out". Not by a long shot, if you are in impexp. HMG still hasn't sorted out customs. Partly, reportedly, for fear of the effect on inflation.
And the impact on the "united" bit of the UK remains to be seen, notably but not only in NI.
The UK is out, 100% out.
As a sovereign and independent country it is entirely up to us whether or how we choose to "sort out" customs.
We could choose to waive customs checks from here until eternity, and we'd remain out, that's the point of sovereignty we get to choose what our priorities are rather than having another institution determine what our priorities and checks are.
r "We don't really need to worry about all those things we Brexiters were going on and on about for decades" isn't entirely a convincing argument.
Especially when sovereignty over a large chunk of the former UK has been signed away in part.
Except customs checks on EU imports weren't something Brexiteers were going on and on about for decades.
I couldn't care less if those checks are waived indefinitely. So long as the UK can implement its own laws domestically, I have no objections whatsoever to recognising EU imports as an equivalence while not being bound to EU laws.
"We want to be different from the Europeans" *means* customs checks, at the most fundamental level. To stop all those nasty foreign jars of stuff measured in kg, for instance.
Pretending you don't want them is just not a reasonable argument.
No, it doesn't.
I can drive a Right Hand Drive vehicle that is different to Europeans Left Hand Drive vehicles, even if others import and drive Left Hand Drive vehicles.
Or I can choose to buy goods measured in kg even if others choose to buy goods measured in lb.
No reason that can't apply to other goods and services too.
We can have our own domestic standards that we apply, and if people aren't happy with that and import foreign standards, then there's nothing wrong with that at all.
"One size fits all" is one of the worst things about the EU. When the EEC began it was about recognising standards as equivalents, not unifying them, a return to that is to be welcomed.
More choice. That's a good thing, not a bad thing.
The problem is that we are European. Leaving the EU was like Rhode Island leaving the US. That is the only reason why we haven't, as we are required to do by international treaty, put up customs posts. "Sovereignty" is, and always has been, a myth. As soon as we are reunited with the rest of our country the better.
That's not a problem, because its not true.
We are European as in the continent, we are no more European as in EU than Canadians are "Americans".
The UK isn't Rhode Island, the UK is Canada.
As a sovereign country its our choice whether we put up customs posts or not, we are not obliged to do so. Many countries choose not to.
We are not, and have never been, a “Sovereign Country”. Parliament claims to be sovereign, but can only assert that as a result of a Dutch Invasion of England. Sure, it was an invasion by RSVP, but an invasion nonetheless. Many invasions happen after a faction asks for intervention, and you can be sure that if William had failed we’d be celebrating it now.
Britain, or more specifically England, has never been able to operate in a purely sovereign manner. We have always, throughout our history, been part of larger unions. We act at the behest of other European nations, always have, always will. Placing outside the formal structures of the EU doesn’t change that, just gives the government less influence on the decisions that affect us. People who say we are “sovereign” make about as much sense as Freemen on the Land types
What a load of codswallop.
England, or Britain post-union, has been sovereign for almost all of its existence.
Yes we have foreign relations. Always have, always will. So does Canada, who incidentally still have our monarch.
The idea we're not sovereign post-Brexit, because we have foreign relations, is utterly absurd. We don't act at the best of other European nations, we act at the behest of our own voters, and our own politicians.
Even in the EU, we were typically on foreign relations closer aligned to our closest allies like America, than to other European nations. Which is why pooling sovereignty in foreign relations within the EU was such a terrible idea and one that never worked for us.
The idea we weren't sovereign pre-Brexit is also absurd.
It depends upon if you mean practically sovereign (UK Parliament/UK Government sets UK laws), or theoretically sovereign (EU Parliament/EU Commission sets EU laws which apply to the UK, but UK can leave the EU whenever it chooses).
The UK was theoretically sovereign but not practically sovereign. Now its both. That's a meaningful change.
Its like if a couple are married but the man insists upon making all decisions for the couple. The wife can get divorced, but otherwise doesn't get a say in making decisions.
If the husband insists upon making all decisions, then is the wife making the decisions, because she's choosing not to get divorced?
As already explained, the marital analogy isn't helpful. The EU is an organisation of sovereign states.
The EU is a nascent, sovereign federal state in its own right.
Which is perfectly fine if you want a federal United States of Europe, there's absolutely nothing wrong with that, but it should be held democratically accountable.
If you don't want a federal Europe, then the sovereign states should be sovereignly and independently setting their own laws.
While an election is expected next autumn — and could be as late as January 2025 — Starmer and his chief strategist Morgan McSweeney have told their troops that they think Sunak might go as early as May.
If the public begins to acknowledge that the economy is improving, that would clear the way for the Tories to campaign on a message of “we are turning the corner, don’t let Labour ruin it”. Going in May could prevent local election results damaging the Tories further, and would avoid another summer of small boat arrivals.
A senior Labour source said: “They seem to be keeping the option of May open and making it viable in a way they weren’t before. They’ve speeded-up candidate selection. They’re doing a lot more direct mail.”
We are a pretty fickle bunch if we buy an economic recovery after a couple of months of 4% inflation figures. Does Rishi understand inflation is cumulative? I suppose he could always reheat "eat out to help out" or whatever it was called.
I think that he just has to believe that voters will think "A smaller number - phew!". It's not like the current media landscape is exactly encouraging understanding of what inflation is.
That and a couple of tweaks to tax policy - who knows. Sad though it makes me - I can see them winning and chugging downwards for another few years yet.
I think HMS Taxcut may have definitively left the harbour this week. There's both the actual need to spend shedloads of cash and the perception that cutting taxes when schools'n'hospitals are falling down is rather uncouth.
But there's always a need to spend shedloads of cash on boring old 'keeping the roof in order'.
A shiny tax cut though. And who really needs roofs anyway? When you think about it?
Teaching lessons in the open air was quite a thing in the 1920s and 1930s, admittedly I believe in the drier and sunnier south of England. Might take off again. Who knows?
Eurythmics and eugenics might come back into fashion. The Mail will be delighted...
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
Everything about that story is so Peter Mandelson.
What, he goes to Waitrose like the original poster?
My issue with Mandelson in this story is that it’s not really possible to get edible sushi from a supermarket in Britain.
My local Asda has a sushi counter where the sushi is freshly made and prepared.
That is completely edible and a world of difference from traditional supermarket sushi.
Its also priced accordingly, its £10 for a sushi box that would be £3 for the same sized box in the sandwich fridges typically, but you pay for quality.
Waitrose has the same in some shops. Replete with Japanese staff so the Rogers of this world can feel sophisticated:
Given inflation has almost halved since he took over from Truss as PM I think Sunak has some room to claim credit for that. Plus if he doesn't boast about his government's achievements, who else will?
Why does Sunak deserve credit for that?
Sunak hasn't taken any meaningful decisions that made inflation fall. The inflation spike was always temporary for known reasons and was always going to fall. Its fallen globally.
Your logic is like saying if the temperature falls between August and February that the PM deserve credit for resolving global warming.
He and Hunt reversed Truss' inflationary tax cuts and kept a lid on public sector wage demands
Given inflation has almost halved since he took over from Truss as PM I think Sunak has some room to claim credit for that. Plus if he doesn't boast about his government's achievements, who else will?
Why does Sunak deserve credit for that?
Sunak hasn't taken any meaningful decisions that made inflation fall. The inflation spike was always temporary for known reasons and was always going to fall. Its fallen globally.
Your logic is like saying if the temperature falls between August and February that the PM deserve credit for resolving global warming.
Politicians quite frequently claim credit for things they do not deserve credit for...
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Homophobia in the mix, I suppose.
Also, Mandelson never bothered to disguise his centrism, so the left abjured him, and he was seriously clever, and never tried to hide that either, which annoyed everyone
He would have made an excellent, Machiavellian prime minister. A British Macron
Ooh, there's a nice challenge for a warm dark evening.
How do you get Mandelson into Number Ten?
Hard to see how that happens, but yes, smart enough to do an elegant job once butterflied there.
Possibly a Starmeresque "made LotO to do an internal cleanup before handing over to the next PM,but the Conservatives collapse prematurely" job...
He's on my list of people who could maybe have made great, if controversial and unliked UK prime ministers (in my adult lifetime). For the purposes of this list I am ignoring political opinion, just sheer political skill or brainpower+charm
So far it is
1. Alex Salmond 2. Peter Mandelson 3. William Hague - if only he had waited 5-10 years 4. Ed Balls? 5. Fuck it: Michael Gove! OK he's not charming but he is smart and generally capable
If only Labour had been led by Mandelson after Blair (rather than Brown), Hague, rather than Cameron, Labour then by Ed Balls (rather than Miliband or Corbyn), and then Tories by Gove rather than Truss/Sunak
The younger Salmond would have made an excellent UK PM whenever
Yes I know that hotel and region well. The golden villages of the beaujolais
I did a whole piece about it over a week. I found the food a bit hit and miss and I got bored of gamay wine but those villages are charming and that particular hotel is fabulous. Enjoy!
They also gave me a red 2CV to pootle around in. I have never felt so French
It’s a lovely region. A bit Italian in architecture and scenery. It’s just over an hour south of our house near Cluny and we usually come for the day and eat somewhere like Oingt (pronounced like a rude word) but as there’s an occasion to celebrate and we’re without children this weekend we’re staying overnight.
Given inflation has almost halved since he took over from Truss as PM I think Sunak has some room to claim credit for that. Plus if he doesn't boast about his government's achievements, who else will?
Why does Sunak deserve credit for that?
Sunak hasn't taken any meaningful decisions that made inflation fall. The inflation spike was always temporary for known reasons and was always going to fall. Its fallen globally.
Your logic is like saying if the temperature falls between August and February that the PM deserve credit for resolving global warming.
He and Hunt reversed Truss' inflationary tax cuts and kept a lid on public sector wage demands
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Homophobia in the mix, I suppose.
There are various rumours on the internet about Mandelson but none proved of course.
Finished early because the exam hall was at risk of collapse.
On topic- it would be interesting to see the split by current views of Brexit. Are the blue to red switchers more Bregretters, or Confident Leavers (Brexit is fine and not in peril)?
I suspect that most people (who, bizarrely, don’t read PB) have largely forgotten about it. We are out and it has not proved as transformational as some promised but neither have any of the downsides manifested themselves. The revisals of our GDP earlier this week removed the final remnants of the “economic disaster “ claim but they also showed that we are doing no better than average. We want a government that can do better and it doesn’t appear to be this one.
Er .... the UK is not "out". Not by a long shot, if you are in impexp. HMG still hasn't sorted out customs. Partly, reportedly, for fear of the effect on inflation.
And the impact on the "united" bit of the UK remains to be seen, notably but not only in NI.
The UK is out, 100% out.
As a sovereign and independent country it is entirely up to us whether or how we choose to "sort out" customs.
We could choose to waive customs checks from here until eternity, and we'd remain out, that's the point of sovereignty we get to choose what our priorities are rather than having another institution determine what our priorities and checks are.
r "We don't really need to worry about all those things we Brexiters were going on and on about for decades" isn't entirely a convincing argument.
Especially when sovereignty over a large chunk of the former UK has been signed away in part.
Except customs checks on EU imports weren't something Brexiteers were going on and on about for decades.
I couldn't care less if those checks are waived indefinitely. So long as the UK can implement its own laws domestically, I have no objections whatsoever to recognising EU imports as an equivalence while not being bound to EU laws.
"We want to be different from the Europeans" *means* customs checks, at the most fundamental level. To stop all those nasty foreign jars of stuff measured in kg, for instance.
Pretending you don't want them is just not a reasonable argument.
No, it doesn't.
I can drive a Right Hand Drive vehicle that is different to Europeans Left Hand Drive vehicles, even if others import and drive Left Hand Drive vehicles.
Or I can choose to buy goods measured in kg even if others choose to buy goods measured in lb.
No reason that can't apply to other goods and services too.
We can have our own domestic standards that we apply, and if people aren't happy with that and import foreign standards, then there's nothing wrong with that at all.
"One size fits all" is one of the worst things about the EU. When the EEC began it was about recognising standards as equivalents, not unifying them, a return to that is to be welcomed.
More choice. That's a good thing, not a bad thing.
The problem is that we are European. Leaving the EU was like Rhode Island leaving the US. That is the only reason why we haven't, as we are required to do by international treaty, put up customs posts. "Sovereignty" is, and always has been, a myth. As soon as we are reunited with the rest of our country the better.
That's not a problem, because its not true.
We are European as in the continent, we are no more European as in EU than Canadians are "Americans".
The UK isn't Rhode Island, the UK is Canada.
As a sovereign country its our choice whether we put up customs posts or not, we are not obliged to do so. Many countries choose not to.
We are not, and have never been, a “Sovereign Country”. Parliament claims to be sovereign, but can only assert that as a result of a Dutch Invasion of England. Sure, it was an invasion by RSVP, but an invasion nonetheless. Many invasions happen after a faction asks for intervention, and you can be sure that if William had failed we’d be celebrating it now.
Britain, or more specifically England, has never been able to operate in a purely sovereign manner. We have always, throughout our history, been part of larger unions. We act at the behest of other European nations, always have, always will. Placing outside the formal structures of the EU doesn’t change that, just gives the government less influence on the decisions that affect us. People who say we are “sovereign” make about as much sense as Freemen on the Land types
What a load of codswallop.
England, or Britain post-union, has been sovereign for almost all of its existence.
Yes we have foreign relations. Always have, always will. So does Canada, who incidentally still have our monarch.
The idea we're not sovereign post-Brexit, because we have foreign relations, is utterly absurd. We don't act at the best of other European nations, we act at the behest of our own voters, and our own politicians.
Even in the EU, we were typically on foreign relations closer aligned to our closest allies like America, than to other European nations. Which is why pooling sovereignty in foreign relations within the EU was such a terrible idea and one that never worked for us.
The idea we weren't sovereign pre-Brexit is also absurd.
It depends upon if you mean practically sovereign (UK Parliament/UK Government sets UK laws), or theoretically sovereign (EU Parliament/EU Commission sets EU laws which apply to the UK, but UK can leave the EU whenever it chooses).
The UK was theoretically sovereign but not practically sovereign. Now its both. That's a meaningful change.
Its like if a couple are married but the man insists upon making all decisions for the couple. The wife can get divorced, but otherwise doesn't get a say in making decisions.
If the husband insists upon making all decisions, then is the wife making the decisions, because she's choosing not to get divorced?
As already explained, the marital analogy isn't helpful. The EU is an organisation of sovereign states.
I'm just surprised Leon has never compared Brexit with leaving a swingers' party.
I note than @JamesKelly has now abandoned Scottish political blogging. It's a shame, as he was rather good within that tiny genre, and also sane and polite, in general (not always the case in online indy Scotch politics)
For me it says Sindy is over for ANOTHER generation. 20 years. This will have ramifications for British politics as Scots focus once again on Westminster, in the absence of indy to drive them, as an imminent reality
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
The Tories face a number of horrible challenges. One, the fiscal and monetary situation is one where there are no good choices; and actually it is hard to think even of electorally bad choices that are going to do the trick. That is a good moment to hand over a Novichok chalice to Labour.
Secondly, no-one has any idea what core principles are now the distinctive and unique property of the Tory party. Until they discover a vision and set of principles that make sense and can inspire voters, and unite their rabble of MPs and members, they are stuck.
Labour have the same problem in this regard, but that is a problem for another day. We shall soon find out if Sir K is up to the job of winning an election and then discovering he is a stateman. If he is, and if he isn't, politics then enters a new phase about which it is currently impossible to see much.
Did @JamesKelly not get kicked off PB for highlighting Scottish subsamples?
And not saying that they were.
Exactly, as long as you say they are subsamples it is absurd to ignore them as it could be Labour gains from the SNP that make the difference between Starmer having a majority or just most seats in a hung parliament
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Homophobia in the mix, I suppose.
Also, Mandelson never bothered to disguise his centrism, so the left abjured him, and he was seriously clever, and never tried to hide that either, which annoyed everyone
He would have made an excellent, Machiavellian prime minister. A British Macron
Ooh, there's a nice challenge for a warm dark evening.
How do you get Mandelson into Number Ten?
Hard to see how that happens, but yes, smart enough to do an elegant job once butterflied there.
Possibly a Starmeresque "made LotO to do an internal cleanup before handing over to the next PM,but the Conservatives collapse prematurely" job...
He's on my list of people who could maybe have made great, if controversial and unliked UK prime ministers (in my adult lifetime). For the purposes of this list I am ignoring political opinion, just sheer political skill or brainpower+charm
So far it is
1. Alex Salmond 2. Peter Mandelson 3. William Hague - if only he had waited 5-10 years 4. Ed Balls? 5. Fuck it: Michael Gove! OK he's not charming but he is smart and generally capable
If only Labour had been led by Mandelson after Blair (rather than Brown), Hague, rather than Cameron, Labour then by Ed Balls (rather than Miliband or Corbyn), and then Tories by Gove rather than Truss/Sunak
The younger Salmond would have made an excellent UK PM whenever
I think Gove would make a good leader of the opposition if Starmer wins. Actually on top of facts, nay even forensic. And his unlikeability isn't relevant because he won't be becoming the PM anyway.
Given inflation has almost halved since he took over from Truss as PM I think Sunak has some room to claim credit for that. Plus if he doesn't boast about his government's achievements, who else will?
Why does Sunak deserve credit for that?
Sunak hasn't taken any meaningful decisions that made inflation fall. The inflation spike was always temporary for known reasons and was always going to fall. Its fallen globally.
Your logic is like saying if the temperature falls between August and February that the PM deserve credit for resolving global warming.
He and Hunt reversed Truss' inflationary tax cuts and kept a lid on public sector wage demands
Strike one.
Truss and Hunt reversed Truss's tax cuts.
Try again.
After they collapsed the markets as they weren't accompanied by spending cuts and thus were inflationary
While an election is expected next autumn — and could be as late as January 2025 — Starmer and his chief strategist Morgan McSweeney have told their troops that they think Sunak might go as early as May.
If the public begins to acknowledge that the economy is improving, that would clear the way for the Tories to campaign on a message of “we are turning the corner, don’t let Labour ruin it”. Going in May could prevent local election results damaging the Tories further, and would avoid another summer of small boat arrivals.
A senior Labour source said: “They seem to be keeping the option of May open and making it viable in a way they weren’t before. They’ve speeded-up candidate selection. They’re doing a lot more direct mail.”
We are a pretty fickle bunch if we buy an economic recovery after a couple of months of 4% inflation figures. Does Rishi understand inflation is cumulative? I suppose he could always reheat "eat out to help out" or whatever it was called.
I think that he just has to believe that voters will think "A smaller number - phew!". It's not like the current media landscape is exactly encouraging understanding of what inflation is.
That and a couple of tweaks to tax policy - who knows. Sad though it makes me - I can see them winning and chugging downwards for another few years yet.
I think HMS Taxcut may have definitively left the harbour this week. There's both the actual need to spend shedloads of cash and the perception that cutting taxes when schools'n'hospitals are falling down is rather uncouth.
But there's always a need to spend shedloads of cash on boring old 'keeping the roof in order'.
A shiny tax cut though. And who really needs roofs anyway? When you think about it?
Teaching lessons in the open air was quite a thing in the 1920s and 1930s, admittedly I believe in the drier and sunnier south of England. Might take off again. Who knows?
I note than @JamesKelly has now abandoned Scottish political blogging. It's a shame, as he was rather good within that tiny genre, and also sane and polite, in general (not always the case in online indy Scotch politics)
For me it says Sindy is over for ANOTHER generation. 20 years. This will have ramifications for British politics as Scots focus once again on Westminster, in the absence of indy to drive them, as an imminent reality
I doubt the Scots are going to focus on Westminster any time soon.
"Big fish in a small pond" thinking is going to keep them in Holyrood. Same reason why Celtic and Rangers will never go to the Premier League, they'd have to exchange being part of a duopoly set for winning the League to struggling to avoid relegation instead.
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Many who met hitler socially thought he was charming
I think not. Talked relentlessly. Never listened. Bad breath too.
Not true. The earlier, younger Hitler was apparently quite charming. He was good at seducing upper class German ladies into donating money. Got invited to posh parties: as the amusing firebrand plebiean radical who nonetheless knew a lot about opera and art
That is not the impression Cyril Coles (former senior MI officer in Germany who knew both Conrad Adenauer and Hitler during the 1920s) gave in his fictionalised memoirs.
He portrayed Hitler as a boorish, lightweight misogynist, summed up by one character commenting, with a laugh, 'your saviour of Germany is quite the funniest [as in, weirdest] little man I've ever met.'
He might not have been to the taste of aristo Brits in 20s Germany (except, err, the Mitfords, and some of the royals), but he was clearly good at finding and tickling the fash clitori of rich and pwoerful men and women
if he was this tedious, monotonous, misogynistic boor - as portrayed - then he would have got precisely nowhere. Instead he went from prole Austrian corporal to radical urban hero to supreme (and widely adored, at first) national leader. That does not happen by sheer accident
Given inflation has almost halved since he took over from Truss as PM I think Sunak has some room to claim credit for that. Plus if he doesn't boast about his government's achievements, who else will?
Why does Sunak deserve credit for that?
Sunak hasn't taken any meaningful decisions that made inflation fall. The inflation spike was always temporary for known reasons and was always going to fall. Its fallen globally.
Your logic is like saying if the temperature falls between August and February that the PM deserve credit for resolving global warming.
He and Hunt reversed Truss' inflationary tax cuts and kept a lid on public sector wage demands
Strike one.
Truss and Hunt reversed Truss's tax cuts.
Try again.
After they collapsed the markets as they weren't accompanied by spending cuts and thus were inflationary
The markets were dealing with a plethora of issues, including the actions that week of the Bank of England and the Energy bailout.
Either way though, Hunt reversed it pre-Sunak, so no Sunak doesn't deserve credit for that.
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Homophobia in the mix, I suppose.
Also, Mandelson never bothered to disguise his centrism, so the left abjured him, and he was seriously clever, and never tried to hide that either, which annoyed everyone
He would have made an excellent, Machiavellian prime minister. A British Macron
Ooh, there's a nice challenge for a warm dark evening.
How do you get Mandelson into Number Ten?
Hard to see how that happens, but yes, smart enough to do an elegant job once butterflied there.
Possibly a Starmeresque "made LotO to do an internal cleanup before handing over to the next PM,but the Conservatives collapse prematurely" job...
He's on my list of people who could maybe have made great, if controversial and unliked UK prime ministers (in my adult lifetime). For the purposes of this list I am ignoring political opinion, just sheer political skill or brainpower+charm
So far it is
1. Alex Salmond 2. Peter Mandelson 3. William Hague - if only he had waited 5-10 years 4. Ed Balls? 5. Fuck it: Michael Gove! OK he's not charming but he is smart and generally capable
If only Labour had been led by Mandelson after Blair (rather than Brown), Hague, rather than Cameron, Labour then by Ed Balls (rather than Miliband or Corbyn), and then Tories by Gove rather than Truss/Sunak
The younger Salmond would have made an excellent UK PM whenever
All of those would likely have lost the next general election except maybe Hague in 2010. However more likely Hague should have backed Howard in 1997 for leader and then he could have been the new leader after the 2001 defeat rather than IDS (and the 2005 leader ended up being Howard anyway).
Gove was charming the one time I met him and yes very intelligent and erudite.
I note than @JamesKelly has now abandoned Scottish political blogging. It's a shame, as he was rather good within that tiny genre, and also sane and polite, in general (not always the case in online indy Scotch politics)
For me it says Sindy is over for ANOTHER generation. 20 years. This will have ramifications for British politics as Scots focus once again on Westminster, in the absence of indy to drive them, as an imminent reality
Well, take it for what it's worth as it may just be attention grabbing and mostly seems wrapped up in unhappiness at the SNP's gender focus, but everyone's favourite Bath based Scottish blogger Wings has a typically loooong piece with the claim that they'd struggle to be motivated if there was a referendum tomorrow.
The honest truth, friends, is that if there was somehow a referendum tomorrow and I had a vote, I’d struggle to get myself out of the house. (I feel a bit uncomfortable about putting forward ideas on how to make it happen, but the main point of doing so is to expose the SNP’s total lack of interest in it to those who still haven’t woken up. We’ve done all the work for them and put the solutions on a plate, if they don’t take them up they can’t claim it’s because they didn’t know.)
I could never, ever vote No in a thousand years. I’d rather die. But as someone who’s believed in independence since I was in Primary 3 I’m far from sure that I could bring myself to bear any responsibility for the nightmarish Aunt-Lydia nanny state the likes of Richard Walker, Humza Yousaf, Patrick Harvie, Shirley-Anne Somerville, Karen Adam, Maggie Chapman, Ross Greer, John Nicolson, Lorna Slater and all the rest of their gruesome horde of Gestapo-wannabe bedwetters are ostensibly determined to create.
While an election is expected next autumn — and could be as late as January 2025 — Starmer and his chief strategist Morgan McSweeney have told their troops that they think Sunak might go as early as May.
If the public begins to acknowledge that the economy is improving, that would clear the way for the Tories to campaign on a message of “we are turning the corner, don’t let Labour ruin it”. Going in May could prevent local election results damaging the Tories further, and would avoid another summer of small boat arrivals.
A senior Labour source said: “They seem to be keeping the option of May open and making it viable in a way they weren’t before. They’ve speeded-up candidate selection. They’re doing a lot more direct mail.”
We are a pretty fickle bunch if we buy an economic recovery after a couple of months of 4% inflation figures. Does Rishi understand inflation is cumulative? I suppose he could always reheat "eat out to help out" or whatever it was called.
I think that he just has to believe that voters will think "A smaller number - phew!". It's not like the current media landscape is exactly encouraging understanding of what inflation is.
That and a couple of tweaks to tax policy - who knows. Sad though it makes me - I can see them winning and chugging downwards for another few years yet.
I think HMS Taxcut may have definitively left the harbour this week. There's both the actual need to spend shedloads of cash and the perception that cutting taxes when schools'n'hospitals are falling down is rather uncouth.
But there's always a need to spend shedloads of cash on boring old 'keeping the roof in order'.
A shiny tax cut though. And who really needs roofs anyway? When you think about it?
Teaching lessons in the open air was quite a thing in the 1920s and 1930s, admittedly I believe in the drier and sunnier south of England. Might take off again. Who knows?
Legacy of the flu pandemic ?
I don't know. I suspect more worries about TB and also a more generalised worship of fresh air and sun. Soaking up the Vitamin D would help with rickets, certainly - that was a time when one would see photos of children in nothing but white briefs and goggles beign exposed to ferocious looking UV lamps.
While an election is expected next autumn — and could be as late as January 2025 — Starmer and his chief strategist Morgan McSweeney have told their troops that they think Sunak might go as early as May.
If the public begins to acknowledge that the economy is improving, that would clear the way for the Tories to campaign on a message of “we are turning the corner, don’t let Labour ruin it”. Going in May could prevent local election results damaging the Tories further, and would avoid another summer of small boat arrivals.
A senior Labour source said: “They seem to be keeping the option of May open and making it viable in a way they weren’t before. They’ve speeded-up candidate selection. They’re doing a lot more direct mail.”
We are a pretty fickle bunch if we buy an economic recovery after a couple of months of 4% inflation figures. Does Rishi understand inflation is cumulative? I suppose he could always reheat "eat out to help out" or whatever it was called.
I think that he just has to believe that voters will think "A smaller number - phew!". It's not like the current media landscape is exactly encouraging understanding of what inflation is.
That and a couple of tweaks to tax policy - who knows. Sad though it makes me - I can see them winning and chugging downwards for another few years yet.
I think HMS Taxcut may have definitively left the harbour this week. There's both the actual need to spend shedloads of cash and the perception that cutting taxes when schools'n'hospitals are falling down is rather uncouth.
But there's always a need to spend shedloads of cash on boring old 'keeping the roof in order'.
A shiny tax cut though. And who really needs roofs anyway? When you think about it?
Teaching lessons in the open air was quite a thing in the 1920s and 1930s, admittedly I believe in the drier and sunnier south of England. Might take off again. Who knows?
Eurythmics and eugenics might come back into fashion. The Mail will be delighted...
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Many who met hitler socially thought he was charming
I think not. Talked relentlessly. Never listened. Bad breath too.
Not true. The earlier, younger Hitler was apparently quite charming. He was good at seducing upper class German ladies into donating money. Got invited to posh parties: as the amusing firebrand plebiean radical who nonetheless knew a lot about opera and art
That is not the impression Cyril Coles (former senior MI officer in Germany who knew both Conrad Adenauer and Hitler during the 1920s) gave in his fictionalised memoirs.
He portrayed Hitler as a boorish, lightweight misogynist, summed up by one character commenting, with a laugh, 'your saviour of Germany is quite the funniest [as in, weirdest] little man I've ever met.'
He might not have been to the taste of aristo Brits in 20s Germany (except, err, the Mitfords, and some of the royals), but he was clearly good at finding and tickling the fash clitori of rich and pwoerful men and women
if he was this tedious, monotonous, misogynistic boor - as portrayed - then he would have got precisely nowhere. Instead he went from prole Austrian corporal to radical urban hero to supreme (and widely adored, at first) national leader. That does not happen by sheer accident
Hitler was one of the most evil men of the 20th century but yes undoubtedly charismatic in person when he wanted to be, energetic and a very powerful orator
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
While an election is expected next autumn — and could be as late as January 2025 — Starmer and his chief strategist Morgan McSweeney have told their troops that they think Sunak might go as early as May.
If the public begins to acknowledge that the economy is improving, that would clear the way for the Tories to campaign on a message of “we are turning the corner, don’t let Labour ruin it”. Going in May could prevent local election results damaging the Tories further, and would avoid another summer of small boat arrivals.
A senior Labour source said: “They seem to be keeping the option of May open and making it viable in a way they weren’t before. They’ve speeded-up candidate selection. They’re doing a lot more direct mail.”
We are a pretty fickle bunch if we buy an economic recovery after a couple of months of 4% inflation figures. Does Rishi understand inflation is cumulative? I suppose he could always reheat "eat out to help out" or whatever it was called.
I think that he just has to believe that voters will think "A smaller number - phew!". It's not like the current media landscape is exactly encouraging understanding of what inflation is.
That and a couple of tweaks to tax policy - who knows. Sad though it makes me - I can see them winning and chugging downwards for another few years yet.
I think HMS Taxcut may have definitively left the harbour this week. There's both the actual need to spend shedloads of cash and the perception that cutting taxes when schools'n'hospitals are falling down is rather uncouth.
But there's always a need to spend shedloads of cash on boring old 'keeping the roof in order'.
A shiny tax cut though. And who really needs roofs anyway? When you think about it?
Teaching lessons in the open air was quite a thing in the 1920s and 1930s, admittedly I believe in the drier and sunnier south of England. Might take off again. Who knows?
If they were smart the government could have promote that as an idea 12 months ago, and so go 'Well, you were going to be outside a bit anyway'.
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Many who met hitler socially thought he was charming
I think not. Talked relentlessly. Never listened. Bad breath too.
Not true. The earlier, younger Hitler was apparently quite charming. He was good at seducing upper class German ladies into donating money. Got invited to posh parties: as the amusing firebrand plebiean radical who nonetheless knew a lot about opera and art
Your post reads like you are a fan. Whatever floats your boat, I guess.
I note than @JamesKelly has now abandoned Scottish political blogging. It's a shame, as he was rather good within that tiny genre, and also sane and polite, in general (not always the case in online indy Scotch politics)
For me it says Sindy is over for ANOTHER generation. 20 years. This will have ramifications for British politics as Scots focus once again on Westminster, in the absence of indy to drive them, as an imminent reality
Could well be. The SNP had a fabulous opportunity to prove their superior competence, integrity and policy making, and threw it away. The person who understands what the SNP need to do to achieve their ends is Kate Forbes. Unionists are fortunate that the SNP was crazy enough not to appoint her.
Throwing away the chances seems popular. May in 2017; Boris - genius who threw away his life's ambition for a tiny bit of sense and self discipline; Truss; Labour choosing Jezza; the Republican party; the Democrats....
I note than @JamesKelly has now abandoned Scottish political blogging. It's a shame, as he was rather good within that tiny genre, and also sane and polite, in general (not always the case in online indy Scotch politics)
For me it says Sindy is over for ANOTHER generation. 20 years. This will have ramifications for British politics as Scots focus once again on Westminster, in the absence of indy to drive them, as an imminent reality
Well, take it for what it's worth as it may just be attention grabbing and mostly seems wrapped up in unhappiness at the SNP's gender focus, but everyone's favourite Bath based Scottish blogger Wings has a typically loooong piece with the claim that they'd struggle to be motivated if there was a referendum tomorrow.
The honest truth, friends, is that if there was somehow a referendum tomorrow and I had a vote, I’d struggle to get myself out of the house. (I feel a bit uncomfortable about putting forward ideas on how to make it happen, but the main point of doing so is to expose the SNP’s total lack of interest in it to those who still haven’t woken up. We’ve done all the work for them and put the solutions on a plate, if they don’t take them up they can’t claim it’s because they didn’t know.)
I could never, ever vote No in a thousand years. I’d rather die. But as someone who’s believed in independence since I was in Primary 3 I’m far from sure that I could bring myself to bear any responsibility for the nightmarish Aunt-Lydia nanny state the likes of Richard Walker, Humza Yousaf, Patrick Harvie, Shirley-Anne Somerville, Karen Adam, Maggie Chapman, Ross Greer, John Nicolson, Lorna Slater and all the rest of their gruesome horde of Gestapo-wannabe bedwetters are ostensibly determined to create.
I don't really buy it, if they got one a lifelong supporter would be down the voting booth not to miss the chance, but it's a nice thought.
Actually can well believe it. I wanted us out the eu for a long long time...I didnt vote for the tories in 2015 when they promised a referendum. I didnt vote for may nor boris
I note than @JamesKelly has now abandoned Scottish political blogging. It's a shame, as he was rather good within that tiny genre, and also sane and polite, in general (not always the case in online indy Scotch politics)
For me it says Sindy is over for ANOTHER generation. 20 years. This will have ramifications for British politics as Scots focus once again on Westminster, in the absence of indy to drive them, as an imminent reality
You note wrong, James is soldiering on meantime. I guess that means Sindy is not over for ANOTHER generation. I suspect having Alba as the vehicle for his aspirations is taking its toll on his positivity.
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
What winner? Even Mordaunt would probably at most save a few more of the furniture, most other alternative leaders do even worse than Rishi. The fact is most voters have decided they want a change of government it seems, much like 2010, 1997 and 1979. Once they are in that mood whoever is PM won't make much difference.
Given inflation has almost halved since he took over from Truss as PM I think Sunak has some room to claim credit for that. Plus if he doesn't boast about his government's achievements, who else will?
Why does Sunak deserve credit for that?
Sunak hasn't taken any meaningful decisions that made inflation fall. The inflation spike was always temporary for known reasons and was always going to fall. Its fallen globally.
Your logic is like saying if the temperature falls between August and February that the PM deserve credit for resolving global warming.
He and Hunt reversed Truss' inflationary tax cuts and kept a lid on public sector wage demands
Strike one.
Truss and Hunt reversed Truss's tax cuts.
Try again.
After they collapsed the markets as they weren't accompanied by spending cuts and thus were inflationary
The inflation was largely caused by UKs exposure to Gas Imports being more expensive, but we couldn’t say no. Not Liz Truss top rate tax cut. [and let’s not forget, for every year of the last Labour government the tax was just Truss set it to, Brown only sneaked this premium on weeks before losing power, in the same way he hid fresh fish under a wardrobe on Downing Street].
Inflation was made worse in UK and Germany by too many billions handed out in support to too many people who didn’t need it. It was the wrong scheme, too expensive and not targeted enough. Billions borrowed, future taxes and energy bills up, to pay for hand outs to many who didn’t even need one, who, rather than sensibly being more prudent, spent the largess on luxuries fuelling inflation.
This is what happened. And in UK is owned by the Tory Party.
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Many who met hitler socially thought he was charming
I think not. Talked relentlessly. Never listened. Bad breath too.
Not true. The earlier, younger Hitler was apparently quite charming. He was good at seducing upper class German ladies into donating money. Got invited to posh parties: as the amusing firebrand plebiean radical who nonetheless knew a lot about opera and art
That is not the impression Cyril Coles (former senior MI officer in Germany who knew both Conrad Adenauer and Hitler during the 1920s) gave in his fictionalised memoirs.
He portrayed Hitler as a boorish, lightweight misogynist, summed up by one character commenting, with a laugh, 'your saviour of Germany is quite the funniest [as in, weirdest] little man I've ever met.'
He might not have been to the taste of aristo Brits in 20s Germany (except, err, the Mitfords, and some of the royals), but he was clearly good at finding and tickling the fash clitori of rich and pwoerful men and women
if he was this tedious, monotonous, misogynistic boor - as portrayed - then he would have got precisely nowhere. Instead he went from prole Austrian corporal to radical urban hero to supreme (and widely adored, at first) national leader. That does not happen by sheer accident
Warning! Hitler fanboi alert! Hitler fanboi alert!
Given inflation has almost halved since he took over from Truss as PM I think Sunak has some room to claim credit for that. Plus if he doesn't boast about his government's achievements, who else will?
I note than @JamesKelly has now abandoned Scottish political blogging. It's a shame, as he was rather good within that tiny genre, and also sane and polite, in general (not always the case in online indy Scotch politics)
For me it says Sindy is over for ANOTHER generation. 20 years. This will have ramifications for British politics as Scots focus once again on Westminster, in the absence of indy to drive them, as an imminent reality
He is still going. He hasn’t gone pop yet. His last post was Thursday. Support for Scottish independence is still strong, but is disconnecting from support for the SNP, with no realistic alternative. It remains to be seen what the effect of the forthcoming election catastrophe for the SNP will be.
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
I don't even understand this comment - I know you still yearn for the reassuring embrace of Truss and Kwarteng but you have to move on - we all have.
The question is surely what, after 13 years, has the Conservative Government done to deserve anyone's vote? All they have left are the ideologues or those perpetually in fear of a Labour Government though, to be blunt and to paraphrase a more famous quote, Starmer is about as frightening as being savaged by a dead sheep.
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
I don't know if anyone could win from here, but they could at least be trying to do so. Sunak doesn't seem to have any ambitions to try to reach out to more people, just a pure core vote strategy.
I'll repost my exercise from earlier this week. Curious how others would rate potential alternative leaders as potentially better or worse than Sunak.
Tory MPs who might be better than Sunak, in my personal view:
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Many who met hitler socially thought he was charming
I think not. Talked relentlessly. Never listened. Bad breath too.
Not true. The earlier, younger Hitler was apparently quite charming. He was good at seducing upper class German ladies into donating money. Got invited to posh parties: as the amusing firebrand plebiean radical who nonetheless knew a lot about opera and art
That is not the impression Cyril Coles (former senior MI officer in Germany who knew both Conrad Adenauer and Hitler during the 1920s) gave in his fictionalised memoirs.
He portrayed Hitler as a boorish, lightweight misogynist, summed up by one character commenting, with a laugh, 'your saviour of Germany is quite the funniest [as in, weirdest] little man I've ever met.'
He might not have been to the taste of aristo Brits in 20s Germany (except, err, the Mitfords, and some of the royals), but he was clearly good at finding and tickling the fash clitori of rich and pwoerful men and women
if he was this tedious, monotonous, misogynistic boor - as portrayed - then he would have got precisely nowhere. Instead he went from prole Austrian corporal to radical urban hero to supreme (and widely adored, at first) national leader. That does not happen by sheer accident
Hitler was one of the most evil men of the 20th century but yes undoubtedly charismatic in person when he wanted to be, energetic and a very powerful orator
Probably a bit like Trump in terms of charisma - either compelling, or a ludicrous boor, depending on the audience.
The Tucker C effect is similar - comes across as charming and intelligent to some, and a whiny bellend to others.
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Having voted Tory for nearly 50 years I would be delighted to do so again but I am not going to. Which 'winner' did you have in mind?
Finished early because the exam hall was at risk of collapse.
On topic- it would be interesting to see the split by current views of Brexit. Are the blue to red switchers more Bregretters, or Confident Leavers (Brexit is fine and not in peril)?
I suspect that most people (who, bizarrely, don’t read PB) have largely forgotten about it. We are out and it has not proved as transformational as some promised but neither have any of the downsides manifested themselves. The revisals of our GDP earlier this week removed the final remnants of the “economic disaster “ claim but they also showed that we are doing no better than average. We want a government that can do better and it doesn’t appear to be this one.
Er .... the UK is not "out". Not by a long shot, if you are in impexp. HMG still hasn't sorted out customs. Partly, reportedly, for fear of the effect on inflation.
And the impact on the "united" bit of the UK remains to be seen, notably but not only in NI.
The UK is out, 100% out.
As a sovereign and independent country it is entirely up to us whether or how we choose to "sort out" customs.
We could choose to waive customs checks from here until eternity, and we'd remain out, that's the point of sovereignty we get to choose what our priorities are rather than having another institution determine what our priorities and checks are.
r "We don't really need to worry about all those things we Brexiters were going on and on about for decades" isn't entirely a convincing argument.
Especially when sovereignty over a large chunk of the former UK has been signed away in part.
Except customs checks on EU imports weren't something Brexiteers were going on and on about for decades.
I couldn't care less if those checks are waived indefinitely. So long as the UK can implement its own laws domestically, I have no objections whatsoever to recognising EU imports as an equivalence while not being bound to EU laws.
"We want to be different from the Europeans" *means* customs checks, at the most fundamental level. To stop all those nasty foreign jars of stuff measured in kg, for instance.
Pretending you don't want them is just not a reasonable argument.
No, it doesn't.
I can drive a Right Hand Drive vehicle that is different to Europeans Left Hand Drive vehicles, even if others import and drive Left Hand Drive vehicles.
Or I can choose to buy goods measured in kg even if others choose to buy goods measured in lb.
No reason that can't apply to other goods and services too.
We can have our own domestic standards that we apply, and if people aren't happy with that and import foreign standards, then there's nothing wrong with that at all.
"One size fits all" is one of the worst things about the EU. When the EEC began it was about recognising standards as equivalents, not unifying them, a return to that is to be welcomed.
More choice. That's a good thing, not a bad thing.
The problem is that we are European. Leaving the EU was like Rhode Island leaving the US. That is the only reason why we haven't, as we are required to do by international treaty, put up customs posts. "Sovereignty" is, and always has been, a myth. As soon as we are reunited with the rest of our country the better.
That's not a problem, because its not true.
We are European as in the continent, we are no more European as in EU than Canadians are "Americans".
The UK isn't Rhode Island, the UK is Canada.
As a sovereign country its our choice whether we put up customs posts or not, we are not obliged to do so. Many countries choose not to.
We are not, and have never been, a “Sovereign Country”. Parliament claims to be sovereign, but can only assert that as a result of a Dutch Invasion of England. Sure, it was an invasion by RSVP, but an invasion nonetheless. Many invasions happen after a faction asks for intervention, and you can be sure that if William had failed we’d be celebrating it now.
Britain, or more specifically England, has never been able to operate in a purely sovereign manner. We have always, throughout our history, been part of larger unions. We act at the behest of other European nations, always have, always will. Placing outside the formal structures of the EU doesn’t change that, just gives the government less influence on the decisions that affect us. People who say we are “sovereign” make about as much sense as Freemen on the Land types
What a load of codswallop.
England, or Britain post-union, has been sovereign for almost all of its existence.
Yes we have foreign relations. Always have, always will. So does Canada, who incidentally still have our monarch.
The idea we're not sovereign post-Brexit, because we have foreign relations, is utterly absurd. We don't act at the best of other European nations, we act at the behest of our own voters, and our own politicians.
Even in the EU, we were typically on foreign relations closer aligned to our closest allies like America, than to other European nations. Which is why pooling sovereignty in foreign relations within the EU was such a terrible idea and one that never worked for us.
The idea we weren't sovereign pre-Brexit is also absurd.
It depends upon if you mean practically sovereign (UK Parliament/UK Government sets UK laws), or theoretically sovereign (EU Parliament/EU Commission sets EU laws which apply to the UK, but UK can leave the EU whenever it chooses).
The UK was theoretically sovereign but not practically sovereign. Now its both. That's a meaningful change.
Its like if a couple are married but the man insists upon making all decisions for the couple. The wife can get divorced, but otherwise doesn't get a say in making decisions.
If the husband insists upon making all decisions, then is the wife making the decisions, because she's choosing not to get divorced?
As already explained, the marital analogy isn't helpful. The EU is an organisation of sovereign states.
The eu wants to be a superstate it is in the 1950's charter
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Many who met hitler socially thought he was charming
I think not. Talked relentlessly. Never listened. Bad breath too.
Not true. The earlier, younger Hitler was apparently quite charming. He was good at seducing upper class German ladies into donating money. Got invited to posh parties: as the amusing firebrand plebiean radical who nonetheless knew a lot about opera and art
Your post reads like you are a fan. Whatever floats your boat, I guess.
Any analysis of evil authoritarians is going to have come up against the fact that they must have had qualities besides luck and pure evil in order to get where they did and achieve the terrible things they did, since they wouldn't have risen so high or maintained power through luck and kicking puppies all day. It's possible they even had qualities which, in other circumstances, would be admirable, put to or for others covering over horrific purpose.
Hence Clarendon's famous quote on Cromwell.
In a word, as he was guilty of many crimes against which Damnation is denounced, and for which hell-fire is prepared, so he had some good qualities which have caused the memory of some men in all Ages to be celebrated; and he will be look’d upon by posterity as a brave bad man
While an election is expected next autumn — and could be as late as January 2025 — Starmer and his chief strategist Morgan McSweeney have told their troops that they think Sunak might go as early as May.
If the public begins to acknowledge that the economy is improving, that would clear the way for the Tories to campaign on a message of “we are turning the corner, don’t let Labour ruin it”. Going in May could prevent local election results damaging the Tories further, and would avoid another summer of small boat arrivals.
A senior Labour source said: “They seem to be keeping the option of May open and making it viable in a way they weren’t before. They’ve speeded-up candidate selection. They’re doing a lot more direct mail.”
We are a pretty fickle bunch if we buy an economic recovery after a couple of months of 4% inflation figures. Does Rishi understand inflation is cumulative? I suppose he could always reheat "eat out to help out" or whatever it was called.
I think that he just has to believe that voters will think "A smaller number - phew!". It's not like the current media landscape is exactly encouraging understanding of what inflation is.
That and a couple of tweaks to tax policy - who knows. Sad though it makes me - I can see them winning and chugging downwards for another few years yet.
I think HMS Taxcut may have definitively left the harbour this week. There's both the actual need to spend shedloads of cash and the perception that cutting taxes when schools'n'hospitals are falling down is rather uncouth.
But there's always a need to spend shedloads of cash on boring old 'keeping the roof in order'.
A shiny tax cut though. And who really needs roofs anyway? When you think about it?
Teaching lessons in the open air was quite a thing in the 1920s and 1930s, admittedly I believe in the drier and sunnier south of England. Might take off again. Who knows?
Eurythmics and eugenics might come back into fashion. The Mail will be delighted...
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Many who met hitler socially thought he was charming
I think not. Talked relentlessly. Never listened. Bad breath too.
Not true. The earlier, younger Hitler was apparently quite charming. He was good at seducing upper class German ladies into donating money. Got invited to posh parties: as the amusing firebrand plebiean radical who nonetheless knew a lot about opera and art
Your post reads like you are a fan. Whatever floats your boat, I guess.
Oh good fucking God. No, I'm not a fan of "Adolf Hitler"
What is this low-watt, low-IQ version of PB that cannot understand you can make political judgements without endorsing the political beliefs of anyone you mention
Tell you what, here is a list of people who, to my mind, had or have undoubted political skill - whether that is "charisma", or persuasive ideas (good or bad or evil) and the ability to enthuse others, or a brilliance at naked politicking, or that thing called "leadership", meaning people will follow you
Hitler Wartime Stalin Goebbels Jeremy Corbyn ("magic grandpa!") Boris Johnson Che Guevara Tony Blair Queen Elizabeth 1 The Prophet Mohammad (PBUH) Julius Ceasar JFK Ben Stokes Donald Trump Abraham Lincoln Mahatma Gandhi David Penhaligon, MP for Truro and Otto von Bismarck
Good luck sorting out ny political inclinations from that list
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
I don't know if anyone could win from here, but they could at least be trying to do so. Sunak doesn't seem to have any ambitions to try to reach out to more people, just a pure core vote strategy.
I'll repost my exercise from earlier this week. Curious how others would rate potential alternative leaders as potentially better or worse than Sunak.
Tory MPs who might be better than Sunak, in my personal view:
Finished early because the exam hall was at risk of collapse.
On topic- it would be interesting to see the split by current views of Brexit. Are the blue to red switchers more Bregretters, or Confident Leavers (Brexit is fine and not in peril)?
I suspect that most people (who, bizarrely, don’t read PB) have largely forgotten about it. We are out and it has not proved as transformational as some promised but neither have any of the downsides manifested themselves. The revisals of our GDP earlier this week removed the final remnants of the “economic disaster “ claim but they also showed that we are doing no better than average. We want a government that can do better and it doesn’t appear to be this one.
Er .... the UK is not "out". Not by a long shot, if you are in impexp. HMG still hasn't sorted out customs. Partly, reportedly, for fear of the effect on inflation.
And the impact on the "united" bit of the UK remains to be seen, notably but not only in NI.
The UK is out, 100% out.
As a sovereign and independent country it is entirely up to us whether or how we choose to "sort out" customs.
We could choose to waive customs checks from here until eternity, and we'd remain out, that's the point of sovereignty we get to choose what our priorities are rather than having another institution determine what our priorities and checks are.
r "We don't really need to worry about all those things we Brexiters were going on and on about for decades" isn't entirely a convincing argument.
Especially when sovereignty over a large chunk of the former UK has been signed away in part.
Except customs checks on EU imports weren't something Brexiteers were going on and on about for decades.
I couldn't care less if those checks are waived indefinitely. So long as the UK can implement its own laws domestically, I have no objections whatsoever to recognising EU imports as an equivalence while not being bound to EU laws.
"We want to be different from the Europeans" *means* customs checks, at the most fundamental level. To stop all those nasty foreign jars of stuff measured in kg, for instance.
Pretending you don't want them is just not a reasonable argument.
No, it doesn't.
I can drive a Right Hand Drive vehicle that is different to Europeans Left Hand Drive vehicles, even if others import and drive Left Hand Drive vehicles.
Or I can choose to buy goods measured in kg even if others choose to buy goods measured in lb.
No reason that can't apply to other goods and services too.
We can have our own domestic standards that we apply, and if people aren't happy with that and import foreign standards, then there's nothing wrong with that at all.
"One size fits all" is one of the worst things about the EU. When the EEC began it was about recognising standards as equivalents, not unifying them, a return to that is to be welcomed.
More choice. That's a good thing, not a bad thing.
The problem is that we are European. Leaving the EU was like Rhode Island leaving the US. That is the only reason why we haven't, as we are required to do by international treaty, put up customs posts. "Sovereignty" is, and always has been, a myth. As soon as we are reunited with the rest of our country the better.
That's not a problem, because its not true.
We are European as in the continent, we are no more European as in EU than Canadians are "Americans".
The UK isn't Rhode Island, the UK is Canada.
As a sovereign country its our choice whether we put up customs posts or not, we are not obliged to do so. Many countries choose not to.
We are not, and have never been, a “Sovereign Country”. Parliament claims to be sovereign, but can only assert that as a result of a Dutch Invasion of England. Sure, it was an invasion by RSVP, but an invasion nonetheless. Many invasions happen after a faction asks for intervention, and you can be sure that if William had failed we’d be celebrating it now.
Britain, or more specifically England, has never been able to operate in a purely sovereign manner. We have always, throughout our history, been part of larger unions. We act at the behest of other European nations, always have, always will. Placing outside the formal structures of the EU doesn’t change that, just gives the government less influence on the decisions that affect us. People who say we are “sovereign” make about as much sense as Freemen on the Land types
What a load of codswallop.
England, or Britain post-union, has been sovereign for almost all of its existence.
Yes we have foreign relations. Always have, always will. So does Canada, who incidentally still have our monarch.
The idea we're not sovereign post-Brexit, because we have foreign relations, is utterly absurd. We don't act at the best of other European nations, we act at the behest of our own voters, and our own politicians.
Even in the EU, we were typically on foreign relations closer aligned to our closest allies like America, than to other European nations. Which is why pooling sovereignty in foreign relations within the EU was such a terrible idea and one that never worked for us.
The idea we weren't sovereign pre-Brexit is also absurd.
It depends upon if you mean practically sovereign (UK Parliament/UK Government sets UK laws), or theoretically sovereign (EU Parliament/EU Commission sets EU laws which apply to the UK, but UK can leave the EU whenever it chooses).
The UK was theoretically sovereign but not practically sovereign. Now its both. That's a meaningful change.
Its like if a couple are married but the man insists upon making all decisions for the couple. The wife can get divorced, but otherwise doesn't get a say in making decisions.
If the husband insists upon making all decisions, then is the wife making the decisions, because she's choosing not to get divorced?
As already explained, the marital analogy isn't helpful. The EU is an organisation of sovereign states.
The eu wants to be a superstate it is in the 1950's charter
The EU is a nascent federal state.
I wouldn't use the prefix super. Its simply a federal state.
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
I don't know if anyone could win from here, but they could at least be trying to do so. Sunak doesn't seem to have any ambitions to try to reach out to more people, just a pure core vote strategy.
I'll repost my exercise from earlier this week. Curious how others would rate potential alternative leaders as potentially better or worse than Sunak.
Tory MPs who might be better than Sunak, in my personal view:
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
I don't know if anyone could win from here, but they could at least be trying to do so. Sunak doesn't seem to have any ambitions to try to reach out to more people, just a pure core vote strategy.
I'll repost my exercise from earlier this week. Curious how others would rate potential alternative leaders as potentially better or worse than Sunak.
Tory MPs who might be better than Sunak, in my personal view:
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
I don't know if anyone could win from here, but they could at least be trying to do so. Sunak doesn't seem to have any ambitions to try to reach out to more people, just a pure core vote strategy.
I'll repost my exercise from earlier this week. Curious how others would rate potential alternative leaders as potentially better or worse than Sunak.
Tory MPs who might be better than Sunak, in my personal view:
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
The potential winner is anyone but Sunak, in the sense that he himself cannot successfully sell a 're-set' of his failed Government. He came in on a ticket of 'adults' being needed to manage the economy, and he's utterly failed by his own yardstick - successful management of the economy. A new leader gets a new hearing. An old leader just keeps trying to relaunch their clapped out Government like May relaunching her clapped out Brexit deal.
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
I don't know if anyone could win from here, but they could at least be trying to do so. Sunak doesn't seem to have any ambitions to try to reach out to more people, just a pure core vote strategy.
I'll repost my exercise from earlier this week. Curious how others would rate potential alternative leaders as potentially better or worse than Sunak.
Tory MPs who might be better than Sunak, in my personal view:
Not put down Javid or Wallace as they're standing down.
Mogg would fire up the Tory core vote much like Corbyn did for the Labour core vote, even if they both turned off centrists.
The worst leaders, electorally at least, are often those who both turn off centrists and fail to fire up the base eg Ed Miliband in 2015 or Hague in 2001
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Many who met hitler socially thought he was charming
I think not. Talked relentlessly. Never listened. Bad breath too.
Not true. The earlier, younger Hitler was apparently quite charming. He was good at seducing upper class German ladies into donating money. Got invited to posh parties: as the amusing firebrand plebiean radical who nonetheless knew a lot about opera and art
That is not the impression Cyril Coles (former senior MI officer in Germany who knew both Conrad Adenauer and Hitler during the 1920s) gave in his fictionalised memoirs.
He portrayed Hitler as a boorish, lightweight misogynist, summed up by one character commenting, with a laugh, 'your saviour of Germany is quite the funniest [as in, weirdest] little man I've ever met.'
He might not have been to the taste of aristo Brits in 20s Germany (except, err, the Mitfords, and some of the royals), but he was clearly good at finding and tickling the fash clitori of rich and pwoerful men and women
if he was this tedious, monotonous, misogynistic boor - as portrayed - then he would have got precisely nowhere. Instead he went from prole Austrian corporal to radical urban hero to supreme (and widely adored, at first) national leader. That does not happen by sheer accident
Hitler was one of the most evil men of the 20th century but yes undoubtedly charismatic in person when he wanted to be, energetic and a very powerful orator
Probably a bit like Trump in terms of charisma - either compelling, or a ludicrous boor, depending on the audience.
The Tucker C effect is similar - comes across as charming and intelligent to some, and a whiny bellend to others.
Trump I find a fascinating example of charisma, because he certainly draws and keeps attention like no one else, and some people obviously genuinely love him for his combative style, but he is so narcissistic and odious in his manners, so offensively rude and insulting even to people who were close allies of his, that I cannot imagine how good I would have to think he was policy wise to exuse what a horrible person he appears to be. Sure, we could all slide a bit on the personal morals and manners of someone who we think is a good politician, but he really tests that to destruction.
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
If they replace the PM with anyone between now and the election they will be so detested by the voters you’re talking wipeout. It would be tantamount to the Tory party thumbing its nose at the electorate. I think public opinion after Truss was already sick and tired of the 1922 committee running the country like a politburo.
Plus there’s nobody remotely like a winner out there, so it’s a hypothetical question.
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
The potential winner is anyone but Sunak, in the sense that he himself cannot successfully sell a 're-set' of his failed Government. He came in on a ticket of 'adults' being needed to manage the economy, and he's utterly failed by his own yardstick - successful management of the economy. A new leader gets a new hearing. An old leader just keeps trying to relaunch their clapped out Government like May relaunching her clapped out Brexit deal.
No he hasn't. Inflation is half the level Truss left it at and just this week UK growth is now up to the middle of the G7 not the bottom as projected when he took over
Finished early because the exam hall was at risk of collapse.
On topic- it would be interesting to see the split by current views of Brexit. Are the blue to red switchers more Bregretters, or Confident Leavers (Brexit is fine and not in peril)?
I suspect that most people (who, bizarrely, don’t read PB) have largely forgotten about it. We are out and it has not proved as transformational as some promised but neither have any of the downsides manifested themselves. The revisals of our GDP earlier this week removed the final remnants of the “economic disaster “ claim but they also showed that we are doing no better than average. We want a government that can do better and it doesn’t appear to be this one.
Er .... the UK is not "out". Not by a long shot, if you are in impexp. HMG still hasn't sorted out customs. Partly, reportedly, for fear of the effect on inflation.
And the impact on the "united" bit of the UK remains to be seen, notably but not only in NI.
The UK is out, 100% out.
As a sovereign and independent country it is entirely up to us whether or how we choose to "sort out" customs.
We could choose to waive customs checks from here until eternity, and we'd remain out, that's the point of sovereignty we get to choose what our priorities are rather than having another institution determine what our priorities and checks are.
r "We don't really need to worry about all those things we Brexiters were going on and on about for decades" isn't entirely a convincing argument.
Especially when sovereignty over a large chunk of the former UK has been signed away in part.
Except customs checks on EU imports weren't something Brexiteers were going on and on about for decades.
I couldn't care less if those checks are waived indefinitely. So long as the UK can implement its own laws domestically, I have no objections whatsoever to recognising EU imports as an equivalence while not being bound to EU laws.
"We want to be different from the Europeans" *means* customs checks, at the most fundamental level. To stop all those nasty foreign jars of stuff measured in kg, for instance.
Pretending you don't want them is just not a reasonable argument.
No, it doesn't.
I can drive a Right Hand Drive vehicle that is different to Europeans Left Hand Drive vehicles, even if others import and drive Left Hand Drive vehicles.
Or I can choose to buy goods measured in kg even if others choose to buy goods measured in lb.
No reason that can't apply to other goods and services too.
We can have our own domestic standards that we apply, and if people aren't happy with that and import foreign standards, then there's nothing wrong with that at all.
"One size fits all" is one of the worst things about the EU. When the EEC began it was about recognising standards as equivalents, not unifying them, a return to that is to be welcomed.
More choice. That's a good thing, not a bad thing.
The problem is that we are European. Leaving the EU was like Rhode Island leaving the US. That is the only reason why we haven't, as we are required to do by international treaty, put up customs posts. "Sovereignty" is, and always has been, a myth. As soon as we are reunited with the rest of our country the better.
That's not a problem, because its not true.
We are European as in the continent, we are no more European as in EU than Canadians are "Americans".
The UK isn't Rhode Island, the UK is Canada.
As a sovereign country its our choice whether we put up customs posts or not, we are not obliged to do so. Many countries choose not to.
We are not, and have never been, a “Sovereign Country”. Parliament claims to be sovereign, but can only assert that as a result of a Dutch Invasion of England. Sure, it was an invasion by RSVP, but an invasion nonetheless. Many invasions happen after a faction asks for intervention, and you can be sure that if William had failed we’d be celebrating it now.
Britain, or more specifically England, has never been able to operate in a purely sovereign manner. We have always, throughout our history, been part of larger unions. We act at the behest of other European nations, always have, always will. Placing outside the formal structures of the EU doesn’t change that, just gives the government less influence on the decisions that affect us. People who say we are “sovereign” make about as much sense as Freemen on the Land types
What a load of codswallop.
England, or Britain post-union, has been sovereign for almost all of its existence.
Yes we have foreign relations. Always have, always will. So does Canada, who incidentally still have our monarch.
The idea we're not sovereign post-Brexit, because we have foreign relations, is utterly absurd. We don't act at the best of other European nations, we act at the behest of our own voters, and our own politicians.
Even in the EU, we were typically on foreign relations closer aligned to our closest allies like America, than to other European nations. Which is why pooling sovereignty in foreign relations within the EU was such a terrible idea and one that never worked for us.
The idea we weren't sovereign pre-Brexit is also absurd.
It depends upon if you mean practically sovereign (UK Parliament/UK Government sets UK laws), or theoretically sovereign (EU Parliament/EU Commission sets EU laws which apply to the UK, but UK can leave the EU whenever it chooses).
The UK was theoretically sovereign but not practically sovereign. Now its both. That's a meaningful change.
Its like if a couple are married but the man insists upon making all decisions for the couple. The wife can get divorced, but otherwise doesn't get a say in making decisions.
If the husband insists upon making all decisions, then is the wife making the decisions, because she's choosing not to get divorced?
As already explained, the marital analogy isn't helpful. The EU is an organisation of sovereign states.
The eu wants to be a superstate it is in the 1950's charter
The EU is a nascent federal state.
I wouldn't use the prefix super. Its simply a federal state.
Federal state is the first goal....I suspect after that the next goal is the commission becomes all powerful in the eu and the council of europe becomes like the parliament
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Many who met hitler socially thought he was charming
I think not. Talked relentlessly. Never listened. Bad breath too.
Not true. The earlier, younger Hitler was apparently quite charming. He was good at seducing upper class German ladies into donating money. Got invited to posh parties: as the amusing firebrand plebiean radical who nonetheless knew a lot about opera and art
That is not the impression Cyril Coles (former senior MI officer in Germany who knew both Conrad Adenauer and Hitler during the 1920s) gave in his fictionalised memoirs.
He portrayed Hitler as a boorish, lightweight misogynist, summed up by one character commenting, with a laugh, 'your saviour of Germany is quite the funniest [as in, weirdest] little man I've ever met.'
He might not have been to the taste of aristo Brits in 20s Germany (except, err, the Mitfords, and some of the royals), but he was clearly good at finding and tickling the fash clitori of rich and pwoerful men and women
if he was this tedious, monotonous, misogynistic boor - as portrayed - then he would have got precisely nowhere. Instead he went from prole Austrian corporal to radical urban hero to supreme (and widely adored, at first) national leader. That does not happen by sheer accident
Warning! Hitler fanboi alert! Hitler fanboi alert!
I'm going to support Leon on this one.
First, although he's got some seriously dodgy right-wing tendencies, there's zero evidence Leon is a fan of Hitler. Indeed if you're a sucker for all that right-wing crap you ought to hate Hitler because he did the hard-right cause immeasurable damage.
Second, and most important, there is surely no doubt that Hitler was a mesmerising, charismatic speaker. How else could such a physically unprepossessing, shallow-thinker have seduced an entire nation?
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Many who met hitler socially thought he was charming
I think not. Talked relentlessly. Never listened. Bad breath too.
Not true. The earlier, younger Hitler was apparently quite charming. He was good at seducing upper class German ladies into donating money. Got invited to posh parties: as the amusing firebrand plebiean radical who nonetheless knew a lot about opera and art
Your post reads like you are a fan. Whatever floats your boat, I guess.
Oh good fucking God. No, I'm not a fan of "Adolf Hitler"
What is this low-watt, low-IQ version of PB that cannot understand you can make political judgements without endorsing the political beliefs of anyone you mention
Tell you what, here is a list of people who, to my mind, had or have undoubted political skill - whether that is "charisma", or persuasive ideas (good or bad or evil) and the ability to enthuse others, or a brilliance at naked politicking, or that thing called "leadership", meaning people will follow you
Hitler Wartime Stalin Goebbels Jeremy Corbyn ("magic grandpa!") Boris Johnson Che Guevara Tony Blair Queen Elizabeth 1 The Prophet Mohammad (PBUH) Julius Ceasar JFK Ben Stokes Donald Trump Abraham Lincoln Mahatma Gandhi David Penhaligon, MP for Truro and Otto von Bismarck
Good luck sorting out ny political inclinations from that list
Plus Thatcher, Obama and Bill Clinton and Berlusconi and Princess Diana and Muhammad Ali even if they weren't strictly politicians
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
The potential winner is anyone but Sunak, in the sense that he himself cannot successfully sell a 're-set' of his failed Government. He came in on a ticket of 'adults' being needed to manage the economy, and he's utterly failed by his own yardstick - successful management of the economy. A new leader gets a new hearing. An old leader just keeps trying to relaunch their clapped out Government like May relaunching her clapped out Brexit deal.
No he hasn't. Inflation is half the level Truss left it at and just this week UK growth is now up to the middle of the G7 not the bottom as projected when he took over
Does that make the average person feel better off after the last three years' inflation accumulated and baked in? No, it does not. It is useless in that respect.
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Homophobia in the mix, I suppose.
Also, Mandelson never bothered to disguise his centrism, so the left abjured him, and he was seriously clever, and never tried to hide that either, which annoyed everyone
He would have made an excellent, Machiavellian prime minister. A British Macron
Ooh, there's a nice challenge for a warm dark evening.
How do you get Mandelson into Number Ten?
Hard to see how that happens, but yes, smart enough to do an elegant job once butterflied there.
Possibly a Starmeresque "made LotO to do an internal cleanup before handing over to the next PM,but the Conservatives collapse prematurely" job...
He's on my list of people who could maybe have made great, if controversial and unliked UK prime ministers (in my adult lifetime). For the purposes of this list I am ignoring political opinion, just sheer political skill or brainpower+charm
So far it is
1. Alex Salmond 2. Peter Mandelson 3. William Hague - if only he had waited 5-10 years 4. Ed Balls? 5. Fuck it: Michael Gove! OK he's not charming but he is smart and generally capable
If only Labour had been led by Mandelson after Blair (rather than Brown), Hague, rather than Cameron, Labour then by Ed Balls (rather than Miliband or Corbyn), and then Tories by Gove rather than Truss/Sunak
The younger Salmond would have made an excellent UK PM whenever
The last two particulrly I think would have been* fine party leaders/PMs.
Even though I don't agree with his general politics, Balls is a loss to Parliament.
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
The potential winner is anyone but Sunak, in the sense that he himself cannot successfully sell a 're-set' of his failed Government. He came in on a ticket of 'adults' being needed to manage the economy, and he's utterly failed by his own yardstick - successful management of the economy. A new leader gets a new hearing. An old leader just keeps trying to relaunch their clapped out Government like May relaunching her clapped out Brexit deal.
The counter argument is that, despite having failed, they just aren't going get another reset past the public.
I'd argue that part of the problem they have is that the public never really bought the reset from Truss, in the sense that Boris managed after taking over from May. Even though the polling stabilised, the brand was unable to withstand the internal strife from Boris being ousted, Truss's appalling lack of preparation, and then the ignominy of another immediate ousting.
So even though it seemed like what the public was demanding, the public never really rewarded them for it, and since then the reset hasn't even succeeded on its own merits economically. So even if someone now came in with a Truss 2.0 plan, done right this time, and it really worked, I don't think the public would give them a look in.
Sure, they could at least try it, but I can understand the party thinking it's just too late now, too much has happened, and just holding onto hope.
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Many who met hitler socially thought he was charming
I think not. Talked relentlessly. Never listened. Bad breath too.
Not true. The earlier, younger Hitler was apparently quite charming. He was good at seducing upper class German ladies into donating money. Got invited to posh parties: as the amusing firebrand plebiean radical who nonetheless knew a lot about opera and art
That is not the impression Cyril Coles (former senior MI officer in Germany who knew both Conrad Adenauer and Hitler during the 1920s) gave in his fictionalised memoirs.
He portrayed Hitler as a boorish, lightweight misogynist, summed up by one character commenting, with a laugh, 'your saviour of Germany is quite the funniest [as in, weirdest] little man I've ever met.'
He might not have been to the taste of aristo Brits in 20s Germany (except, err, the Mitfords, and some of the royals), but he was clearly good at finding and tickling the fash clitori of rich and pwoerful men and women
if he was this tedious, monotonous, misogynistic boor - as portrayed - then he would have got precisely nowhere. Instead he went from prole Austrian corporal to radical urban hero to supreme (and widely adored, at first) national leader. That does not happen by sheer accident
Warning! Hitler fanboi alert! Hitler fanboi alert!
I'm going to support Leon on this one.
First, although he got some seriously dodgy right-wing tendencies, there's zero evidence Leon is a fan of Hitler. Indeed if you're a sucker for all that right-wing crap you ought to hate Hitler because he did the hard right cause immeasurable damage.
Second, and most important, there is surely no doubt that Hitler was a mesmerising, charismatic speaker. How else could such a physically unprepossessing, shallow-thinker have seduced an entire nation?
Well he is a big fan of the Spectator, who used to spend a lot of time and energy reassuring us that pro-Trump groups like the Proud Boys weren't extremists.
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
The potential winner is anyone but Sunak, in the sense that he himself cannot successfully sell a 're-set' of his failed Government. He came in on a ticket of 'adults' being needed to manage the economy, and he's utterly failed by his own yardstick - successful management of the economy. A new leader gets a new hearing. An old leader just keeps trying to relaunch their clapped out Government like May relaunching her clapped out Brexit deal.
No he hasn't. Inflation is half the level Truss left it at and just this week UK growth is now up to the middle of the G7 not the bottom as projected when he took over
Does that make the average person feel better off after the last three years' inflation accumulated and baked in? No, it does not. It is useless in that respect.
As wage rises on average are now about level with inflation going forward it will
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
The potential winner is anyone but Sunak, in the sense that he himself cannot successfully sell a 're-set' of his failed Government. He came in on a ticket of 'adults' being needed to manage the economy, and he's utterly failed by his own yardstick - successful management of the economy. A new leader gets a new hearing. An old leader just keeps trying to relaunch their clapped out Government like May relaunching her clapped out Brexit deal.
No he hasn't. Inflation is half the level Truss left it at and just this week UK growth is now up to the middle of the G7 not the bottom as projected when he took over
Does that make the average person feel better off after the last three years' inflation accumulated and baked in? No, it does not. It is useless in that respect.
Quite so - people have long memories on this stuff.
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
I don't know if anyone could win from here, but they could at least be trying to do so. Sunak doesn't seem to have any ambitions to try to reach out to more people, just a pure core vote strategy.
I'll repost my exercise from earlier this week. Curious how others would rate potential alternative leaders as potentially better or worse than Sunak.
Tory MPs who might be better than Sunak, in my personal view:
Not put down Javid or Wallace as they're standing down.
Where do you put Baker?
Good question.
Years ago I would have put him in the worse category, but the more I saw of him over Covid and speaking on things other than being an EU bore the more he impressed me.
Don't really think of him as he's never really been in the Cabinet, but I think he could be very good. Would put him in the better camp now (would have said worse years ago), but he'd definitely be rolling the dice.
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
The potential winner is anyone but Sunak, in the sense that he himself cannot successfully sell a 're-set' of his failed Government. He came in on a ticket of 'adults' being needed to manage the economy, and he's utterly failed by his own yardstick - successful management of the economy. A new leader gets a new hearing. An old leader just keeps trying to relaunch their clapped out Government like May relaunching her clapped out Brexit deal.
No he hasn't. Inflation is half the level Truss left it at and just this week UK growth is now up to the middle of the G7 not the bottom as projected when he took over
Don't appear more stupid than you need to, it's not cute.
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
The potential winner is anyone but Sunak, in the sense that he himself cannot successfully sell a 're-set' of his failed Government. He came in on a ticket of 'adults' being needed to manage the economy, and he's utterly failed by his own yardstick - successful management of the economy. A new leader gets a new hearing. An old leader just keeps trying to relaunch their clapped out Government like May relaunching her clapped out Brexit deal.
No he hasn't. Inflation is half the level Truss left it at and just this week UK growth is now up to the middle of the G7 not the bottom as projected when he took over
Does that make the average person feel better off after the last three years' inflation accumulated and baked in? No, it does not. It is useless in that respect.
As wage rises on average are now about level with inflation going forward it will
I said, accumulated inflation over the last thre years. Your reply ignores that, quite callously.
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
The potential winner is anyone but Sunak, in the sense that he himself cannot successfully sell a 're-set' of his failed Government. He came in on a ticket of 'adults' being needed to manage the economy, and he's utterly failed by his own yardstick - successful management of the economy. A new leader gets a new hearing. An old leader just keeps trying to relaunch their clapped out Government like May relaunching her clapped out Brexit deal.
No he hasn't. Inflation is half the level Truss left it at and just this week UK growth is now up to the middle of the G7 not the bottom as projected when he took over
Does that make the average person feel better off after the last three years' inflation accumulated and baked in? No, it does not. It is useless in that respect.
As wage rises on average are now about level with inflation going forward it will
Proving once again you don't understand taxes, economics or fiscal drag.
Since tax thresholds are frozen pay rises level with inflation helps the Exchequer, not the Employee.
If the Chancellor reversed Sunak's choice to freeze tax thresholds, that'd be different.
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Many who met hitler socially thought he was charming
I think not. Talked relentlessly. Never listened. Bad breath too.
Not true. The earlier, younger Hitler was apparently quite charming. He was good at seducing upper class German ladies into donating money. Got invited to posh parties: as the amusing firebrand plebiean radical who nonetheless knew a lot about opera and art
That is not the impression Cyril Coles (former senior MI officer in Germany who knew both Conrad Adenauer and Hitler during the 1920s) gave in his fictionalised memoirs.
He portrayed Hitler as a boorish, lightweight misogynist, summed up by one character commenting, with a laugh, 'your saviour of Germany is quite the funniest [as in, weirdest] little man I've ever met.'
He might not have been to the taste of aristo Brits in 20s Germany (except, err, the Mitfords, and some of the royals), but he was clearly good at finding and tickling the fash clitori of rich and pwoerful men and women
if he was this tedious, monotonous, misogynistic boor - as portrayed - then he would have got precisely nowhere. Instead he went from prole Austrian corporal to radical urban hero to supreme (and widely adored, at first) national leader. That does not happen by sheer accident
Warning! Hitler fanboi alert! Hitler fanboi alert!
I'm going to support Leon on this one.
First, although he's got some seriously dodgy right-wing tendencies, there's zero evidence Leon is a fan of Hitler. Indeed if you're a sucker for all that right-wing crap you ought to hate Hitler because he did the hard-right cause immeasurable damage.
Second, and most important, there is surely no doubt that Hitler was a mesmerising, charismatic speaker. How else could such a physically unprepossessing, shallow-thinker have seduced an entire nation?
I think sometimes we'd like to believe evil person A was just despicable in every possible way, and incompetent in every way to boot, since for obvious reasons no one with any sense wants to praise such people. But regrettably people can be pretty able in some ways and terrible, and there's no point denying that.
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Many who met hitler socially thought he was charming
I think not. Talked relentlessly. Never listened. Bad breath too.
Not true. The earlier, younger Hitler was apparently quite charming. He was good at seducing upper class German ladies into donating money. Got invited to posh parties: as the amusing firebrand plebiean radical who nonetheless knew a lot about opera and art
That is not the impression Cyril Coles (former senior MI officer in Germany who knew both Conrad Adenauer and Hitler during the 1920s) gave in his fictionalised memoirs.
He portrayed Hitler as a boorish, lightweight misogynist, summed up by one character commenting, with a laugh, 'your saviour of Germany is quite the funniest [as in, weirdest] little man I've ever met.'
He might not have been to the taste of aristo Brits in 20s Germany (except, err, the Mitfords, and some of the royals), but he was clearly good at finding and tickling the fash clitori of rich and pwoerful men and women
if he was this tedious, monotonous, misogynistic boor - as portrayed - then he would have got precisely nowhere. Instead he went from prole Austrian corporal to radical urban hero to supreme (and widely adored, at first) national leader. That does not happen by sheer accident
Warning! Hitler fanboi alert! Hitler fanboi alert!
I'm going to support Leon on this one.
First, although he's got some seriously dodgy right-wing tendencies, there's zero evidence Leon is a fan of Hitler. Indeed if you're a sucker for all that right-wing crap you ought to hate Hitler because he did the hard-right cause immeasurable damage.
Second, and most important, there is surely no doubt that Hitler was a mesmerising, charismatic speaker. How else could such a physically unprepossessing, shallow-thinker have seduced an entire nation?
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Many who met hitler socially thought he was charming
I think not. Talked relentlessly. Never listened. Bad breath too.
Not true. The earlier, younger Hitler was apparently quite charming. He was good at seducing upper class German ladies into donating money. Got invited to posh parties: as the amusing firebrand plebiean radical who nonetheless knew a lot about opera and art
That is not the impression Cyril Coles (former senior MI officer in Germany who knew both Conrad Adenauer and Hitler during the 1920s) gave in his fictionalised memoirs.
He portrayed Hitler as a boorish, lightweight misogynist, summed up by one character commenting, with a laugh, 'your saviour of Germany is quite the funniest [as in, weirdest] little man I've ever met.'
He might not have been to the taste of aristo Brits in 20s Germany (except, err, the Mitfords, and some of the royals), but he was clearly good at finding and tickling the fash clitori of rich and pwoerful men and women
if he was this tedious, monotonous, misogynistic boor - as portrayed - then he would have got precisely nowhere. Instead he went from prole Austrian corporal to radical urban hero to supreme (and widely adored, at first) national leader. That does not happen by sheer accident
Warning! Hitler fanboi alert! Hitler fanboi alert!
I'm going to support Leon on this one.
First, although he's got some seriously dodgy right-wing tendencies, there's zero evidence Leon is a fan of Hitler. Indeed if you're a sucker for all that right-wing crap you ought to hate Hitler because he did the hard-right cause immeasurable damage.
Second, and most important, there is surely no doubt that Hitler was a mesmerising, charismatic speaker. How else could such a physically unprepossessing, shallow-thinker have seduced an entire nation?
Didn't mesmerise an entire nation. The NSDAP, if I recall rightly, did worse than the Remainers in the referendum, and I haven't seen you claiming that the Remainers won Brexitref.
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
The potential winner is anyone but Sunak, in the sense that he himself cannot successfully sell a 're-set' of his failed Government. He came in on a ticket of 'adults' being needed to manage the economy, and he's utterly failed by his own yardstick - successful management of the economy. A new leader gets a new hearing. An old leader just keeps trying to relaunch their clapped out Government like May relaunching her clapped out Brexit deal.
No he hasn't. Inflation is half the level Truss left it at and just this week UK growth is now up to the middle of the G7 not the bottom as projected when he took over
Does that make the average person feel better off after the last three years' inflation accumulated and baked in? No, it does not. It is useless in that respect.
As wage rises on average are now about level with inflation going forward it will
I said, accumulated inflation over the last thre years. Your reply ignores that, quite callously.
That was down to the Ukraine war and Kwarteng's budget mainly, neither to do with Sunak
I note than @JamesKelly has now abandoned Scottish political blogging. It's a shame, as he was rather good within that tiny genre, and also sane and polite, in general (not always the case in online indy Scotch politics)
For me it says Sindy is over for ANOTHER generation. 20 years. This will have ramifications for British politics as Scots focus once again on Westminster, in the absence of indy to drive them, as an imminent reality
You note wrong, James is soldiering on meantime. I guess that means Sindy is not over for ANOTHER generation. I suspect having Alba as the vehicle for his aspirations is taking its toll on his positivity.
Good luck to him (honestly). He's a sincere man fighting for a genuine cause (however much I disagree). He is also civil, intelligent and interesting when you get beyond indy (but he's also candid about indy)
However his latest blogpost is not exactly full of hope for your cause
"The real problem we face now, though, is not that the Yes vote isn't high enough but that the SNP vote isn't high enough. A huge Yes vote is devoid of all value if there aren't going to be enough pro-independence elected politicians to put the people's wishes into action. Strictly in terms of party political voting intentions we're in a weaker position than we've been at any time for around a decade. Rather than everything suddenly going from wrong to right, as Given and Heather would have you believe, the events of 2023 have at dizzying speed taken the SNP from being in a commanding position to being on the ropes and trying to find a way of fighting back.
"Worse still, the independence movement is not starting to resemble the healthy state it was in back in 2014, as Given and Heather claim, but in fact is more demoralised than it's been since 2014 due to Nicola Sturgeon suddenly nipping away without having kept her promises, the lies about SNP membership numbers, the poor leadership of Humza Yousaf, and the essentially rigged election process which installed him."
Fairly bleak
No Sindy referendum til the late 2030s, is now my guess .
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
I don't know if anyone could win from here, but they could at least be trying to do so. Sunak doesn't seem to have any ambitions to try to reach out to more people, just a pure core vote strategy.
I'll repost my exercise from earlier this week. Curious how others would rate potential alternative leaders as potentially better or worse than Sunak.
Tory MPs who might be better than Sunak, in my personal view:
Not put down Javid or Wallace as they're standing down.
Mogg would fire up the Tory core vote much like Corbyn did for the Labour core vote, even if they both turned off centrists.
The worse leaders, electorally at least, are often those who both turn off centrists and fail to fire up the base eg Ed Miliband in 2015 or Hague in 2001
Probably pretty accurate. I wonder what happened to Julian Smith, he seemed to excel in Northern Ireland, maybe could be a future leader. And I do think that Kemi Badenoch (whom we used to know personally) is a very nice person, and could one day be worth considering with quite a bit more experience. And that Braverman (whom we have also come across) is just as unpleasant as she seems.
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
I don't know if anyone could win from here, but they could at least be trying to do so. Sunak doesn't seem to have any ambitions to try to reach out to more people, just a pure core vote strategy.
I'll repost my exercise from earlier this week. Curious how others would rate potential alternative leaders as potentially better or worse than Sunak.
Tory MPs who might be better than Sunak, in my personal view:
Not put down Javid or Wallace as they're standing down.
Mogg would fire up the Tory core vote much like Corbyn did for the Labour core vote, even if they both turned off centrists.
The worst leaders, electorally at least, are often those who both turn off centrists and fail to fire up the base eg Ed Miliband in 2015 or Hague in 2001
If the Tories want to become electable again, they need to do what Labour have done after replacing Corbyn. They need to marginalise their extremists, including the ERG, and, if necessary remove them from the party and not be so frightened of Reform.
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Many who met hitler socially thought he was charming
I think not. Talked relentlessly. Never listened. Bad breath too.
Not true. The earlier, younger Hitler was apparently quite charming. He was good at seducing upper class German ladies into donating money. Got invited to posh parties: as the amusing firebrand plebiean radical who nonetheless knew a lot about opera and art
That is not the impression Cyril Coles (former senior MI officer in Germany who knew both Conrad Adenauer and Hitler during the 1920s) gave in his fictionalised memoirs.
He portrayed Hitler as a boorish, lightweight misogynist, summed up by one character commenting, with a laugh, 'your saviour of Germany is quite the funniest [as in, weirdest] little man I've ever met.'
He might not have been to the taste of aristo Brits in 20s Germany (except, err, the Mitfords, and some of the royals), but he was clearly good at finding and tickling the fash clitori of rich and pwoerful men and women
if he was this tedious, monotonous, misogynistic boor - as portrayed - then he would have got precisely nowhere. Instead he went from prole Austrian corporal to radical urban hero to supreme (and widely adored, at first) national leader. That does not happen by sheer accident
Warning! Hitler fanboi alert! Hitler fanboi alert!
I'm going to support Leon on this one.
First, although he's got some seriously dodgy right-wing tendencies, there's zero evidence Leon is a fan of Hitler. Indeed if you're a sucker for all that right-wing crap you ought to hate Hitler because he did the hard-right cause immeasurable damage.
Second, and most important, there is surely no doubt that Hitler was a mesmerising, charismatic speaker. How else could such a physically unprepossessing, shallow-thinker have seduced an entire nation?
Didn't mesmerise an entire nation. The NSDAP, if I recall rightly, did worse than the Remainers in the referendum, and I haven't seen you claiming that the Remainers won Brexitref.
Hardly comprable! But I suppose it is somewhat of a comfort to think that Remain was a bit more popular than NSDAP.
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
I don't know if anyone could win from here, but they could at least be trying to do so. Sunak doesn't seem to have any ambitions to try to reach out to more people, just a pure core vote strategy.
I'll repost my exercise from earlier this week. Curious how others would rate potential alternative leaders as potentially better or worse than Sunak.
Tory MPs who might be better than Sunak, in my personal view:
Not put down Javid or Wallace as they're standing down.
Interesting list. Why the positive sense from Donelan for example? I've not seen much of her, other than a funny clip which revealed she, like a lot of people, didn't understand the difference between her 'attending Cabinet' as a minister of state, and being a Member of the Cabinet, since she claimed to have been in Cabinet at the time some event happened.
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
The potential winner is anyone but Sunak, in the sense that he himself cannot successfully sell a 're-set' of his failed Government. He came in on a ticket of 'adults' being needed to manage the economy, and he's utterly failed by his own yardstick - successful management of the economy. A new leader gets a new hearing. An old leader just keeps trying to relaunch their clapped out Government like May relaunching her clapped out Brexit deal.
No he hasn't. Inflation is half the level Truss left it at and just this week UK growth is now up to the middle of the G7 not the bottom as projected when he took over
Does that make the average person feel better off after the last three years' inflation accumulated and baked in? No, it does not. It is useless in that respect.
As wage rises on average are now about level with inflation going forward it will
I said, accumulated inflation over the last thre years. Your reply ignores that, quite callously.
That was down to the Ukraine war and Kwarteng's budget mainly, neither to do with Sunak
The public being reknowned for their generosity to leaders who suffer bad luck through global events.
Leaders take credit for things beyond their control, and get blamed for the same.
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
I don't know if anyone could win from here, but they could at least be trying to do so. Sunak doesn't seem to have any ambitions to try to reach out to more people, just a pure core vote strategy.
I'll repost my exercise from earlier this week. Curious how others would rate potential alternative leaders as potentially better or worse than Sunak.
Tory MPs who might be better than Sunak, in my personal view:
Not put down Javid or Wallace as they're standing down.
Mogg would fire up the Tory core vote much like Corbyn did for the Labour core vote, even if they both turned off centrists.
The worst leaders, electorally at least, are often those who both turn off centrists and fail to fire up the base eg Ed Miliband in 2015 or Hague in 2001
If the Tories want to become electable again, they need to do what Labour have done after replacing Corbyn. They need to marginalise their extremists, including the ERG, and, if necessary remove them from the party and not be so frightened of Reform.
We are only in 2009 in terms of getting to Starmer if you want the Labour comparison. On that basis Sunak is Brown and hasn't even lost power and a general election yet!
Though for all his faults Corbyn made enough gains to get a hung parliament in 2017 and got a higher voteshare in 2017 and 2019 than either Brown did in 2010 or Ed Miliband did in 2015
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
The potential winner is anyone but Sunak, in the sense that he himself cannot successfully sell a 're-set' of his failed Government. He came in on a ticket of 'adults' being needed to manage the economy, and he's utterly failed by his own yardstick - successful management of the economy. A new leader gets a new hearing. An old leader just keeps trying to relaunch their clapped out Government like May relaunching her clapped out Brexit deal.
No he hasn't. Inflation is half the level Truss left it at and just this week UK growth is now up to the middle of the G7 not the bottom as projected when he took over
Does that make the average person feel better off after the last three years' inflation accumulated and baked in? No, it does not. It is useless in that respect.
As wage rises on average are now about level with inflation going forward it will
I said, accumulated inflation over the last thre years. Your reply ignores that, quite callously.
That was down to the Ukraine war and Kwarteng's budget mainly, neither to do with Sunak
Fiscal drag is entirely due to Sunak.
Not Kwarteng, not Putin, just Sunak.
Since pay rises have over the time period roughly matched inflation then without fiscal drag it would have hurt nowhere near as much less. The pain is primarily because fiscal drag has destroyed take home pay, for that Sunak bears sole responsibility.
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Many who met hitler socially thought he was charming
I think not. Talked relentlessly. Never listened. Bad breath too.
Not true. The earlier, younger Hitler was apparently quite charming. He was good at seducing upper class German ladies into donating money. Got invited to posh parties: as the amusing firebrand plebiean radical who nonetheless knew a lot about opera and art
That is not the impression Cyril Coles (former senior MI officer in Germany who knew both Conrad Adenauer and Hitler during the 1920s) gave in his fictionalised memoirs.
He portrayed Hitler as a boorish, lightweight misogynist, summed up by one character commenting, with a laugh, 'your saviour of Germany is quite the funniest [as in, weirdest] little man I've ever met.'
He might not have been to the taste of aristo Brits in 20s Germany (except, err, the Mitfords, and some of the royals), but he was clearly good at finding and tickling the fash clitori of rich and pwoerful men and women
if he was this tedious, monotonous, misogynistic boor - as portrayed - then he would have got precisely nowhere. Instead he went from prole Austrian corporal to radical urban hero to supreme (and widely adored, at first) national leader. That does not happen by sheer accident
Warning! Hitler fanboi alert! Hitler fanboi alert!
I'm going to support Leon on this one.
First, although he's got some seriously dodgy right-wing tendencies, there's zero evidence Leon is a fan of Hitler. Indeed if you're a sucker for all that right-wing crap you ought to hate Hitler because he did the hard-right cause immeasurable damage.
Second, and most important, there is surely no doubt that Hitler was a mesmerising, charismatic speaker. How else could such a physically unprepossessing, shallow-thinker have seduced an entire nation?
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
The potential winner is anyone but Sunak, in the sense that he himself cannot successfully sell a 're-set' of his failed Government. He came in on a ticket of 'adults' being needed to manage the economy, and he's utterly failed by his own yardstick - successful management of the economy. A new leader gets a new hearing. An old leader just keeps trying to relaunch their clapped out Government like May relaunching her clapped out Brexit deal.
No he hasn't. Inflation is half the level Truss left it at and just this week UK growth is now up to the middle of the G7 not the bottom as projected when he took over
Does that make the average person feel better off after the last three years' inflation accumulated and baked in? No, it does not. It is useless in that respect.
As wage rises on average are now about level with inflation going forward it will
I said, accumulated inflation over the last thre years. Your reply ignores that, quite callously.
That was down to the Ukraine war and Kwarteng's budget mainly, neither to do with Sunak
Fiscal drag is entirely due to Sunak.
Not Kwarteng, not Putin, just Sunak.
Since pay rises have over the time period roughly matched inflation then without fiscal drag it would have hurt nowhere near as much less. The pain is primarily because fiscal drag has destroyed take home pay, for that Sunak bears sole responsibility.
And if he had not allowed that then the deficit and inflation would maybe have been worse too
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
The potential winner is anyone but Sunak, in the sense that he himself cannot successfully sell a 're-set' of his failed Government. He came in on a ticket of 'adults' being needed to manage the economy, and he's utterly failed by his own yardstick - successful management of the economy. A new leader gets a new hearing. An old leader just keeps trying to relaunch their clapped out Government like May relaunching her clapped out Brexit deal.
No he hasn't. Inflation is half the level Truss left it at and just this week UK growth is now up to the middle of the G7 not the bottom as projected when he took over
Does that make the average person feel better off after the last three years' inflation accumulated and baked in? No, it does not. It is useless in that respect.
As wage rises on average are now about level with inflation going forward it will
Proving once again you don't understand taxes, economics or fiscal drag.
Since tax thresholds are frozen pay rises level with inflation helps the Exchequer, not the Employee.
If the Chancellor reversed Sunak's choice to freeze tax thresholds, that'd be different.
An interesting marker is that a lot more people are paying income tax on their savings interest [edit] over the 1K allowance* - IIRC the last tax year saw a rise of roughly half as many, and this current TY will see many more. Much of it is fiscal drag, just as you say.
Sure, it's partly increased interest rates so people are getting money - but the interest rates themselves have not kept up with inflation - as Martin Lewis et aliis have been pointing out very loudly and correctly. And to pay tax on that will feel unfair. It certainly does in MailOnlineCommentsLand.
*if total income not to high - but that itself suffers fiscal drag.
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
I don't know if anyone could win from here, but they could at least be trying to do so. Sunak doesn't seem to have any ambitions to try to reach out to more people, just a pure core vote strategy.
I'll repost my exercise from earlier this week. Curious how others would rate potential alternative leaders as potentially better or worse than Sunak.
Tory MPs who might be better than Sunak, in my personal view:
Not put down Javid or Wallace as they're standing down.
Mogg would fire up the Tory core vote much like Corbyn did for the Labour core vote, even if they both turned off centrists.
The worst leaders, electorally at least, are often those who both turn off centrists and fail to fire up the base eg Ed Miliband in 2015 or Hague in 2001
Though if Sunak is there with the aim of placating centrists, he's not doing very well. But by postwar Conservative standards, he is pretty right wing.
Of Bart's list, Gove has probably annoyed too many people, but could do the job. Hunt fine, but I doubt the party would wear it Mordaunt would be interesting, but there's a lot we don't know about her beliefs. The rest are nobodies.
But the key thing is that two midterm changes of PM has already stretched the elastic of democracy. A third would be taking the piss, however good the candidate.
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
The potential winner is anyone but Sunak, in the sense that he himself cannot successfully sell a 're-set' of his failed Government. He came in on a ticket of 'adults' being needed to manage the economy, and he's utterly failed by his own yardstick - successful management of the economy. A new leader gets a new hearing. An old leader just keeps trying to relaunch their clapped out Government like May relaunching her clapped out Brexit deal.
No he hasn't. Inflation is half the level Truss left it at and just this week UK growth is now up to the middle of the G7 not the bottom as projected when he took over
Does that make the average person feel better off after the last three years' inflation accumulated and baked in? No, it does not. It is useless in that respect.
As wage rises on average are now about level with inflation going forward it will
I said, accumulated inflation over the last thre years. Your reply ignores that, quite callously.
That was down to the Ukraine war and Kwarteng's budget mainly, neither to do with Sunak
Fiscal drag is entirely due to Sunak.
Not Kwarteng, not Putin, just Sunak.
Since pay rises have over the time period roughly matched inflation then without fiscal drag it would have hurt nowhere near as much less. The pain is primarily because fiscal drag has destroyed take home pay, for that Sunak bears sole responsibility.
And if he had not allowed that then the deficit and inflation would maybe have been worse too
Other choices could have been made instead.
"Pay restraint" could have applied to the triple lock and not just wages for instance.
Either way, the pain of the last few years isn't Kwarteng's fault and isn't Putin's fault. It was Sunak who chose to freeze tax thresholds, that was a nasty and mendacious tax rise that has been kept. It reversed the policy of Cameron and Osborne who'd raised tax thresholds.
Sunak should be held to account for what he's done to people's take home pay.
I don't think Sunak is anything like such a flawed character as Boris Johnson but in terms of political electability he is far worse. He is not (yet) the liability that Liz Truss was but he is extraordinarily tone deaf to where people are at. And he becomes petulant when questioned: how dare any minion be so rude as to doubt his truth?
I have Conservative friends who really dislike him and that's not a good sign.
Good evening
Sunak is the best the conservatives have got, despite his flaws, and the mountain that the toxic legacy of Johnson and the diabolical Truss left him is a very tall order to overcome
If tonight's poll by Opinium in the Guardian is anything to go by neither Sunak or Starmer are setting the narrative alight with only 27% and 23% respectively seeing Starmer better than Sunak as PM
I expect the conservatives to pay a price at the next GE, but even Starmer's most avid fans must accept he is hardly inspiring the nation
Other pollsters also do best PM and Opinium are by far the stingiest in Starmer’s lead. Of other pollsters have recently polled this, Starmer leads Sunak 44-34 (R&W) and 37-28 (We Think) on the "better PM" question. Even in unliked outgoing governments it’s supposed to be hard for a PM to fall so far behind on this measure.
No, Sunak is not “the best the Conservatives have got” not by any measure. You are dangerously misreading this situation. Sunak is now out of touch with the public, not because he is filthy rich but because his politics and that of the government he leads has been revealed to be too dry and right wing for the UK today. He promises, over promises, and doesn’t deliver. Which makes every new promise, vow and policy, worthless. The result is voters are no longer listening to him selectively quoting and talking up we have never had it so good, and they won’t all they way up to voting day.
The scale of the Tory catastrophe at the next General Election does not rest at all on Starmer and his policy’s “inspiring the nation”, it will be based on the breadth and depth of voters no longer listening to the Conservatives, making the weeks of the election campaign all about how sleazy, useless, out of touch and dangerous the Tory Party are.
The best hope for the Conservatives now is to change these faces and voices at the top of the government to more everyday, grounded and in touch fresh faces, in order for a more aspirational message that has more broader appeal across more voters to be listened to and considered.
Hunt and Sunak cannot deliver that message, because they are no longer listened to. From here the Conservatives need to be listened to again, to save as many seats as they can. That’s why Sunak, Hunt and Braverman have to go.
I think that Sunak probably is the best person for the job, which is to lose with enough dignity that the Tories can regroup.
Funnily enough, everyone who dislikes the Tories wants Sunak to stay and 'lose with dignity' - God forbid the Tories should actually put a winner in place, nothing to upset the handover.
Who is left as a winner? Boris could have won a by-election, the fact some nobody won it shows he probably could have, and potentially be on hand at least, but they have no winners to pick from.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
I don't know if anyone could win from here, but they could at least be trying to do so. Sunak doesn't seem to have any ambitions to try to reach out to more people, just a pure core vote strategy.
I'll repost my exercise from earlier this week. Curious how others would rate potential alternative leaders as potentially better or worse than Sunak.
Tory MPs who might be better than Sunak, in my personal view:
Not put down Javid or Wallace as they're standing down.
Mogg would fire up the Tory core vote much like Corbyn did for the Labour core vote, even if they both turned off centrists.
The worst leaders, electorally at least, are often those who both turn off centrists and fail to fire up the base eg Ed Miliband in 2015 or Hague in 2001
If the Tories want to become electable again, they need to do what Labour have done after replacing Corbyn. They need to marginalise their extremists, including the ERG, and, if necessary remove them from the party and not be so frightened of Reform.
We are only in 2009 in terms of getting to Starmer if you want the Labour comparison. On that basis Sunak is Brown and hasn't even lost power and a general election yet!
Though for all his faults Corbyn made enough gains to get a hung parliament in 2017 and got a higher voteshare in 2017 and 2019 than either Brown did in 2010 or Ed Miliband did in 2015
Taking that approach - that Sunak is Brown (or Major), we are due to have someone half presentable, more on the wings than the predecessor but not popular enough to win back votes yet, a Hague or Ed. So perhaps someone like Cleverly. Then they go completely batshit and elect an IDS/Corbyn (Mogg). Then they turn sensible with a Starmer/Howard. Before the charismatic unifier (but Labour appear not to need this step to win).
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Many who met hitler socially thought he was charming
I think not. Talked relentlessly. Never listened. Bad breath too.
Not true. The earlier, younger Hitler was apparently quite charming. He was good at seducing upper class German ladies into donating money. Got invited to posh parties: as the amusing firebrand plebiean radical who nonetheless knew a lot about opera and art
That is not the impression Cyril Coles (former senior MI officer in Germany who knew both Conrad Adenauer and Hitler during the 1920s) gave in his fictionalised memoirs.
He portrayed Hitler as a boorish, lightweight misogynist, summed up by one character commenting, with a laugh, 'your saviour of Germany is quite the funniest [as in, weirdest] little man I've ever met.'
He might not have been to the taste of aristo Brits in 20s Germany (except, err, the Mitfords, and some of the royals), but he was clearly good at finding and tickling the fash clitori of rich and pwoerful men and women
if he was this tedious, monotonous, misogynistic boor - as portrayed - then he would have got precisely nowhere. Instead he went from prole Austrian corporal to radical urban hero to supreme (and widely adored, at first) national leader. That does not happen by sheer accident
Warning! Hitler fanboi alert! Hitler fanboi alert!
I'm going to support Leon on this one.
First, although he's got some seriously dodgy right-wing tendencies, there's zero evidence Leon is a fan of Hitler. Indeed if you're a sucker for all that right-wing crap you ought to hate Hitler because he did the hard-right cause immeasurable damage.
Second, and most important, there is surely no doubt that Hitler was a mesmerising, charismatic speaker. How else could such a physically unprepossessing, shallow-thinker have seduced an entire nation?
I note than @JamesKelly has now abandoned Scottish political blogging. It's a shame, as he was rather good within that tiny genre, and also sane and polite, in general (not always the case in online indy Scotch politics)
For me it says Sindy is over for ANOTHER generation. 20 years. This will have ramifications for British politics as Scots focus once again on Westminster, in the absence of indy to drive them, as an imminent reality
@JamesKelly went head-to-head with OGH in a dick-measuring competition, forgetting that Mike owns the ruler. The inevitable occurred
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Many who met hitler socially thought he was charming
I think not. Talked relentlessly. Never listened. Bad breath too.
Not true. The earlier, younger Hitler was apparently quite charming. He was good at seducing upper class German ladies into donating money. Got invited to posh parties: as the amusing firebrand plebiean radical who nonetheless knew a lot about opera and art
Your post reads like you are a fan. Whatever floats your boat, I guess.
Oh good fucking God. No, I'm not a fan of "Adolf Hitler"
What is this low-watt, low-IQ version of PB that cannot understand you can make political judgements without endorsing the political beliefs of anyone you mention
Tell you what, here is a list of people who, to my mind, had or have undoubted political skill - whether that is "charisma", or persuasive ideas (good or bad or evil) and the ability to enthuse others, or a brilliance at naked politicking, or that thing called "leadership", meaning people will follow you
Hitler Wartime Stalin Goebbels Jeremy Corbyn ("magic grandpa!") Boris Johnson Che Guevara Tony Blair Queen Elizabeth 1 The Prophet Mohammad (PBUH) Julius Ceasar JFK Ben Stokes Donald Trump Abraham Lincoln Mahatma Gandhi David Penhaligon, MP for Truro and Otto von Bismarck
Good luck sorting out ny political inclinations from that list
I wasn't suggesting you shared his politics, although if you do, that's your business. It was more that your post intimated a "get a room, for goodness sake" sort of fandom.
Just finished another eleven hour shift, so up to sixty hours hours since the Bank Holiday. I think I’ll get to seventy-five for the week after working tomorrow and Monday
I popped into Waitrose on the way home and got cheap dinner (a minted pea and bacon quiche for £1.39!). On my way in, I saw Peter Mandelson at the checkout (buying sushi and what looked like stir fry ingredients). I’ve known for years that he lives nearby, but it’s the first time I’ve seen him
You should have stolen his place in the queue, after asking him if he knew who you are?
That would have been quite some manoeuvre given I didn't yet have shopping and there was an empty self checkout next to the one he was using!
I know quite a few people that have met him socially, or served him in shops, or worked at his place, and they've all liked him. Even though most of them haven't liked his politics
I’ve met him and he seemed perfectly charming. I never did understand the loathing he induced
Many who met hitler socially thought he was charming
I think not. Talked relentlessly. Never listened. Bad breath too.
Not true. The earlier, younger Hitler was apparently quite charming. He was good at seducing upper class German ladies into donating money. Got invited to posh parties: as the amusing firebrand plebiean radical who nonetheless knew a lot about opera and art
That is not the impression Cyril Coles (former senior MI officer in Germany who knew both Conrad Adenauer and Hitler during the 1920s) gave in his fictionalised memoirs.
He portrayed Hitler as a boorish, lightweight misogynist, summed up by one character commenting, with a laugh, 'your saviour of Germany is quite the funniest [as in, weirdest] little man I've ever met.'
He might not have been to the taste of aristo Brits in 20s Germany (except, err, the Mitfords, and some of the royals), but he was clearly good at finding and tickling the fash clitori of rich and pwoerful men and women
if he was this tedious, monotonous, misogynistic boor - as portrayed - then he would have got precisely nowhere. Instead he went from prole Austrian corporal to radical urban hero to supreme (and widely adored, at first) national leader. That does not happen by sheer accident
Warning! Hitler fanboi alert! Hitler fanboi alert!
I'm going to support Leon on this one.
First, although he's got some seriously dodgy right-wing tendencies, there's zero evidence Leon is a fan of Hitler. Indeed if you're a sucker for all that right-wing crap you ought to hate Hitler because he did the hard-right cause immeasurable damage.
Second, and most important, there is surely no doubt that Hitler was a mesmerising, charismatic speaker. How else could such a physically unprepossessing, shallow-thinker have seduced an entire nation?
Boris Johnson says hello!
On a very small scale, the same thing... Johnson has charisma. Johnson's not a great orator nor, fortunately, is he an evil megalomaniac (more a bumbling idler) but he does have charisma.
Starmer otoh clearly does not have charisma; if he did the Tories would be beyond doomed. However, Attlee had zero charisma and still managed to make his mark as one of the most influential PMs ever.
Comments
Which is perfectly fine if you want a federal United States of Europe, there's absolutely nothing wrong with that, but it should be held democratically accountable.
If you don't want a federal Europe, then the sovereign states should be sovereignly and independently setting their own laws.
https://www.waitrose.com/sushidaily
It's better than the off the shelf stuff, but nothing to write home about. But I'm no sushi connoisseur, so I defer to others.
So far it is
1. Alex Salmond
2. Peter Mandelson
3. William Hague - if only he had waited 5-10 years
4. Ed Balls?
5. Fuck it: Michael Gove! OK he's not charming but he is smart and generally capable
If only Labour had been led by Mandelson after Blair (rather than Brown), Hague, rather than Cameron, Labour then by Ed Balls (rather than Miliband or Corbyn), and then Tories by Gove rather than Truss/Sunak
The younger Salmond would have made an excellent UK PM whenever
Truss and Hunt reversed Truss's tax cuts.
Try again.
Mandelson also holidayed with Epstein on St Barts
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7412517/Peter-Mandelson-Jeffrey-Epstein-Ex-Labour-minister-shopping-depraved-financier-2005.html
Of course nobody resigns for trivial matters such as lying to mortgage providers or doing dodgy favours for billionnaires anymore.
I note than @JamesKelly has now abandoned Scottish political blogging. It's a shame, as he was rather good within that tiny genre, and also sane and polite, in general (not always the case in online indy Scotch politics)
For me it says Sindy is over for ANOTHER generation. 20 years. This will have ramifications for British politics as Scots focus once again on Westminster, in the absence of indy to drive them, as an imminent reality
The Tories face a number of horrible challenges. One, the fiscal and monetary situation is one where there are no good choices; and actually it is hard to think even of electorally bad choices that are going to do the trick. That is a good moment to hand over a Novichok chalice to Labour.
Secondly, no-one has any idea what core principles are now the distinctive and unique property of the Tory party. Until they discover a vision and set of principles that make sense and can inspire voters, and unite their rabble of MPs and members, they are stuck.
Labour have the same problem in this regard, but that is a problem for another day. We shall soon find out if Sir K is up to the job of winning an election and then discovering he is a stateman. If he is, and if he isn't, politics then enters a new phase about which it is currently impossible to see much.
"Big fish in a small pond" thinking is going to keep them in Holyrood. Same reason why Celtic and Rangers will never go to the Premier League, they'd have to exchange being part of a duopoly set for winning the League to struggling to avoid relegation instead.
if he was this tedious, monotonous, misogynistic boor - as portrayed - then he would have got precisely nowhere. Instead he went from prole Austrian corporal to radical urban hero to supreme (and widely adored, at first) national leader. That does not happen by sheer accident
Either way though, Hunt reversed it pre-Sunak, so no Sunak doesn't deserve credit for that.
Gove was charming the one time I met him and yes very intelligent and erudite.
Salmond would have had no interest in being UK PM
The honest truth, friends, is that if there was somehow a referendum tomorrow and I had a vote, I’d struggle to get myself out of the house. (I feel a bit uncomfortable about putting forward ideas on how to make it happen, but the main point of doing so is to expose the SNP’s total lack of interest in it to those who still haven’t woken up. We’ve done all the work for them and put the solutions on a plate, if they don’t take them up they can’t claim it’s because they didn’t know.)
I could never, ever vote No in a thousand years. I’d rather die. But as someone who’s believed in independence since I was in Primary 3 I’m far from sure that I could bring myself to bear any responsibility for the nightmarish Aunt-Lydia nanny state the likes of Richard Walker, Humza Yousaf, Patrick Harvie, Shirley-Anne Somerville, Karen Adam, Maggie Chapman, Ross Greer, John Nicolson, Lorna Slater and all the rest of their gruesome horde of Gestapo-wannabe bedwetters are ostensibly determined to create.
https://wingsoverscotland.com/how-to-change-peoples-minds/
I don't really buy it, if they got one a lifelong supporter would be down the voting booth not to miss the chance, but it's a nice thought.
Though at this point they'd be more than happy if they could put May in and repeat 2017.
Throwing away the chances seems popular. May in 2017; Boris - genius who threw away his life's ambition for a tiny bit of sense and self discipline; Truss; Labour choosing Jezza; the Republican party; the Democrats....
I suspect having Alba as the vehicle for his aspirations is taking its toll on his positivity.
Inflation was made worse in UK and Germany by too many billions handed out in support to too many people who didn’t need it. It was the wrong scheme, too expensive and not targeted enough. Billions borrowed, future taxes and energy bills up, to pay for hand outs to many who didn’t even need one, who, rather than sensibly being more prudent, spent the largess on luxuries fuelling inflation.
This is what happened. And in UK is owned by the Tory Party.
The question is surely what, after 13 years, has the Conservative Government done to deserve anyone's vote? All they have left are the ideologues or those perpetually in fear of a Labour Government though, to be blunt and to paraphrase a more famous quote, Starmer is about as frightening as being savaged by a dead sheep.
I'll repost my exercise from earlier this week. Curious how others would rate potential alternative leaders as potentially better or worse than Sunak.
Tory MPs who might be better than Sunak, in my personal view:
Gove
Hunt
Mordaunt
Barclay
Cleverly
Dowden
Donelan
Tugendhat
McVey
Worse:
Braverman
Badenoch
Shapps
Patel
Hancock
Williamson
Armageddon worst:
Mogg
Not put down Javid or Wallace as they're standing down.
The Tucker C effect is similar - comes across as charming and intelligent to some, and a whiny bellend to others.
Hence Clarendon's famous quote on Cromwell.
In a word, as he was guilty of many crimes against which Damnation is denounced, and for which hell-fire is prepared, so he had some good qualities which have caused the memory of some men in all Ages to be celebrated; and he will be look’d upon by posterity as a brave bad man
What is this low-watt, low-IQ version of PB that cannot understand you can make political judgements without endorsing the political beliefs of anyone you mention
Tell you what, here is a list of people who, to my mind, had or have undoubted political skill - whether that is "charisma", or persuasive ideas (good or bad or evil) and the ability to enthuse others, or a brilliance at naked politicking, or that thing called "leadership", meaning people will follow you
Hitler
Wartime Stalin
Goebbels
Jeremy Corbyn ("magic grandpa!")
Boris Johnson
Che Guevara
Tony Blair
Queen Elizabeth 1
The Prophet Mohammad (PBUH)
Julius Ceasar
JFK
Ben Stokes
Donald Trump
Abraham Lincoln
Mahatma Gandhi
David Penhaligon, MP for Truro
and
Otto von Bismarck
Good luck sorting out ny political inclinations from that list
I wouldn't use the prefix super. Its simply a federal state.
I would not include Dowden nor McVey.
The worst leaders, electorally at least, are often those who both turn off centrists and fail to fire up the base eg Ed Miliband in 2015 or Hague in 2001
Plus there’s nobody remotely like a winner out there, so it’s a hypothetical question.
First, although he's got some seriously dodgy right-wing tendencies, there's zero evidence Leon is a fan of Hitler. Indeed if you're a sucker for all that right-wing crap you ought to hate Hitler because he did the hard-right cause immeasurable damage.
Second, and most important, there is surely no doubt that Hitler was a mesmerising, charismatic speaker. How else could such a physically unprepossessing, shallow-thinker have seduced an entire nation?
Even though I don't agree with his general politics, Balls is a loss to Parliament.
*Technically still could be in Gove's case.
I'd argue that part of the problem they have is that the public never really bought the reset from Truss, in the sense that Boris managed after taking over from May. Even though the polling stabilised, the brand was unable to withstand the internal strife from Boris being ousted, Truss's appalling lack of preparation, and then the ignominy of another immediate ousting.
So even though it seemed like what the public was demanding, the public never really rewarded them for it, and since then the reset hasn't even succeeded on its own merits economically. So even if someone now came in with a Truss 2.0 plan, done right this time, and it really worked, I don't think the public would give them a look in.
Sure, they could at least try it, but I can understand the party thinking it's just too late now, too much has happened, and just holding onto hope.
Years ago I would have put him in the worse category, but the more I saw of him over Covid and speaking on things other than being an EU bore the more he impressed me.
Don't really think of him as he's never really been in the Cabinet, but I think he could be very good. Would put him in the better camp now (would have said worse years ago), but he'd definitely be rolling the dice.
Since tax thresholds are frozen pay rises level with inflation helps the Exchequer, not the Employee.
If the Chancellor reversed Sunak's choice to freeze tax thresholds, that'd be different.
However his latest blogpost is not exactly full of hope for your cause
"The real problem we face now, though, is not that the Yes vote isn't high enough but that the SNP vote isn't high enough. A huge Yes vote is devoid of all value if there aren't going to be enough pro-independence elected politicians to put the people's wishes into action. Strictly in terms of party political voting intentions we're in a weaker position than we've been at any time for around a decade. Rather than everything suddenly going from wrong to right, as Given and Heather would have you believe, the events of 2023 have at dizzying speed taken the SNP from being in a commanding position to being on the ropes and trying to find a way of fighting back.
"Worse still, the independence movement is not starting to resemble the healthy state it was in back in 2014, as Given and Heather claim, but in fact is more demoralised than it's been since 2014 due to Nicola Sturgeon suddenly nipping away without having kept her promises, the lies about SNP membership numbers, the poor leadership of Humza Yousaf, and the essentially rigged election process which installed him."
Fairly bleak
No Sindy referendum til the late 2030s, is now my guess
.
Leaders take credit for things beyond their control, and get blamed for the same.
Though for all his faults Corbyn made enough gains to get a hung parliament in 2017 and got a higher voteshare in 2017 and 2019 than either Brown did in 2010 or Ed Miliband did in 2015
Not Kwarteng, not Putin, just Sunak.
Since pay rises have over the time period roughly matched inflation then without fiscal drag it would have hurt nowhere near as much less. The pain is primarily because fiscal drag has destroyed take home pay, for that Sunak bears sole responsibility.
Sure, it's partly increased interest rates so people are getting money - but the interest rates themselves have not kept up with inflation - as Martin Lewis et aliis have been pointing out very loudly and correctly. And to pay tax on that will feel unfair. It certainly does in MailOnlineCommentsLand.
*if total income not to high - but that itself suffers fiscal drag.
Of Bart's list,
Gove has probably annoyed too many people, but could do the job.
Hunt fine, but I doubt the party would wear it
Mordaunt would be interesting, but there's a lot we don't know about her beliefs.
The rest are nobodies.
But the key thing is that two midterm changes of PM has already stretched the elastic of democracy. A third would be taking the piss, however good the candidate.
"Pay restraint" could have applied to the triple lock and not just wages for instance.
Either way, the pain of the last few years isn't Kwarteng's fault and isn't Putin's fault. It was Sunak who chose to freeze tax thresholds, that was a nasty and mendacious tax rise that has been kept. It reversed the policy of Cameron and Osborne who'd raised tax thresholds.
Sunak should be held to account for what he's done to people's take home pay.
Starmer otoh clearly does not have charisma; if he did the Tories would be beyond doomed. However, Attlee had zero charisma and still managed to make his mark as one of the most influential PMs ever.