Moving swiftly on (ahem), is Braverman going to be sacked tomorrow? Next week? Not at all?
What's the PB consensus?
I think I'm on the side of it not happening. I would quite like it to happen however because I think it could precipitate a vonk.
I'm sceptical too, and suspect a lot of the pressure for Rishi to sack Suella comes from mischief-makers looking to weaken the Prime Minister. Leaving that aside, the timing is awkward because it will mean a new Home Secretary for the Rwanda verdict, and a full-scale reshuffle is hard because the Chancellor's Autumn Statement is imminent.
If he delayed his reshuffle until Wednesday, he could sack Suella after the Rwanda verdict, and have a reason that didn’t need to be related to the threat to his authority. However, being frit and tactically naive, he won’t.
If he’s going to sack her it needs to be tomorrow . At the moment the government looks more likely to win the appeal so it would look strange to get rid of her after that . And if they lose then it looks like she’s being blamed for that when Sunak owns any loss just as much as Braverman.
Electoral Calculus puts it a bit higher, and without taking tatical voting into account.
It gives high and low estimates too. if you take the extreme low for the Tories it is not inconceivable they would not be the Official Opposition. Wonder what odds you could get on that?
At the lowest point of Truss' premiership when the Tories were heading for less than 50 seats maybe. Not now under Sunak where they are in the 100-150 range which would be even below 1997 levels but still firmly keep them the main Opposition, especially with the SNP projected to lose seats to Labour too
The Tories would need to win less than 59 seats to finish behind the SNP. Next time, though, below 25 seats.
I wish protestors and demonstrators would stick to one topic. Trying to mesh everything into one unified theory of opposition can just lead to confusion and some truly odd combinations.
A lot of the US pro-Palestine supports are doing just that meshing US racial politics onto the middle east and hence why you get Trans for Terrorists etc.
I think she's probably gone for the full package.
It's what social media can funnel you to these days.
France is having a march against antisemitism. Jean Luc Melenchon won't be there as he thinks it is a 'rendezvous for unconditional supporters of the massacre' - referring to Gazans. Hopefully it will attract large numbers and might be an inspiration for something in the UK. The figure of Le Pen will loom large, which I don't doubt is a problem for many but hopefully the event is as broadly based as possible.
FPT: great idea. Likewise I hope Le Pen’s sport won’t put others off - I’d be interested in how many would attend this sort of march as well as a ceasefire March. I would.
The Germans have just - apparently - banned the chant "from the river to the sea"
It would take a brave politician to do that here, and an even braver policeperson to try and enforce it on tens of thousands of protestors
I think this is what makes people angry. The sense that the police are engaging in appeasement.
It clearly makes you angry. I don't hear many people talking about it tbh.
You don't think it outrageous that the police thought it necessary to take down pictures of children being held hostage in Gaza?
The inability of PB-ers - and many many others - to put themselves in the minds of British Jews is quite startling and depressing. Theory of Mind means you should be able to do it unless you're properly dumb - or neurodivergent
Within living memory an extremely powerful European nation tried to kill every Jew on earth, and they got as far as killing maybe half of them - and if Hitler had won they could easily have killed 80%. Even today the global Jewish population has not recovered from the Holocaust
And yesterday we had a woman casually yelling "death to all Jews" in a British railway station, and no one doing anything, no outrage, no anger, nothing - apparently...
It was posted in the replies to the Met hate crime Twitter thread, so with any luck that will not be true. As they said, they intend to pursue such reports. I hope they identify her.
And there's plenty of anger about it, even if those in the immediate vicinity didn't express any.
What would you do if someone shouted "Death to all Jews" right next to you at Victoria Station?
This is a serious question, but not a personal one. I've been asking myself the same, ever since I saw the vid
I hope I would have given her a ticking off and told her to shut the F up and go away. But I fear I might have been so shocked - and so used to British politeness - I would have just stood there in silent surprise, gobsmacked and mute
If there is any good to come out of this, it is that these incidents have shaken away any complacency about anti-Semitism. It exists, it is out there, it is deeply nasty, and it needs to be confronted
The problem is you say something, the mob reacts, filming starts and if you aren't careful you are the one labelled as a racist.
There was a viral clip a couple of months ago with a lady who was having her bike stolen, reacted, and before she knew it she was labelled as crazy Karen racist lady.
Very good point
Imagine if you did react, and said "Shut up you stupid woman, shut your filthy mouth and go away" and then someone filmed that but cut the "death to Jews" provocation at the start - suddenly you are a racist man abusing a BME woman and before the entire footage emerges you are cancelled and finished
Not great. So you say nothing?
As Bob Stewart found out, a couple of loose words in the heat of the moment and he has a criminal record. It doesn't matter the guy was calling him all sorts of things under the sun.
The problem is those kind of people are there to have a fair minded debate. I would say that the likes of the stop antisemitism twitter accounts are highly effective, where they collate footage of people and ensure the relevant authorities are made aware.
France is having a march against antisemitism. Jean Luc Melenchon won't be there as he thinks it is a 'rendezvous for unconditional supporters of the massacre' - referring to Gazans. Hopefully it will attract large numbers and might be an inspiration for something in the UK. The figure of Le Pen will loom large, which I don't doubt is a problem for many but hopefully the event is as broadly based as possible.
FPT: great idea. Likewise I hope Le Pen’s sport won’t put others off - I’d be interested in how many would attend this sort of march as well as a ceasefire March. I would.
The Germans have just - apparently - banned the chant "from the river to the sea"
It would take a brave politician to do that here, and an even braver policeperson to try and enforce it on tens of thousands of protestors
I think this is what makes people angry. The sense that the police are engaging in appeasement.
It clearly makes you angry. I don't hear many people talking about it tbh.
You don't think it outrageous that the police thought it necessary to take down pictures of children being held hostage in Gaza?
The inability of PB-ers - and many many others - to put themselves in the minds of British Jews is quite startling and depressing. Theory of Mind means you should be able to do it unless you're properly dumb - or neurodivergent
Within living memory an extremely powerful European nation tried to kill every Jew on earth, and they got as far as killing maybe half of them - and if Hitler had won they could easily have killed 80%. Even today the global Jewish population has not recovered from the Holocaust
And yesterday we had a woman casually yelling "death to all Jews" in a British railway station, and no one doing anything, no outrage, no anger, nothing - apparently. And this was just one anti-Semitic incident amongst hundreds these last weeks, and many thousands around the world
The virus of Jew-hatred is BACK. Jews are frightened. And anyone with an ounce of empathy can surely see why they are frightened, and share it, no?
Entirely correct. And this should be obvious to all people of good will regardless of where they stand on the particularities of the mutual barbarities that have been and are being meted out in Israel/Palestine.
But it appears this sort of thing is only a problem when it is 'the far right' doing the hate. Of course, it is a problem when we have the far right doing it. But on yesterdays' evidence the far right amounts to about 200 thugs who quite like football and fighting. They are undoubtedly a bad thing, but not really a big thing. Whereas the far left are virulent AND numerous. But it is somehow impolite to criticise them.
Quite right. I think over the years there has been a sense among sane centrists (most people) that the far right are evil and support evil outcomes while the far left are only misguided but they support generally decent outcomes, so the left are more immune from attack.
Maybe this is wrong. Maybe far left now include lots of chancers who have no real desire for a better or more moral world but just want their faction to be top dog.
Re the events of yesterday, the great mass of the population don't attend or support either group of demonstrators. Maybe no-one (except the great Peter Tatchell) was there to represent support for all good people and opposition to all bad people.
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
"Each year on Remembrance Sunday, we assemble at the Cenotaph to honour the sacrifice of the fallen and pay tribute to the servicemen & women we place in harm’s way.
Today - as every day - we will remember them. #LestWeForget"
Traumatic amnesia. I find it difficult to remember her. I was watching something about the Queen's death on YouTube and was slightly taken aback when Truss spoke outside No 10. I know she was PM, and I agree with @Luckyguy1983 that she had a consistent approach that addressed the issue (whilst disagreeing it would work in 2022/3), but other than the bald facts she begins to slip away. I remember she had an awkward manner and unfortunate voice, but other than that... um?
Electoral Calculus puts it a bit higher, and without taking tatical voting into account.
It gives high and low estimates too. if you take the extreme low for the Tories it is not inconceivable they would not be the Official Opposition. Wonder what odds you could get on that?
At the lowest point of Truss' premiership when the Tories were heading for less than 50 seats maybe. Not now under Sunak where they are in the 100-150 range which would be even below 1997 levels but still firmly keep them the main Opposition, especially with the SNP projected to lose seats to Labour too
The Tories would need to win less than 59 seats to finish behind the SNP. Next time, though, below 25 seats.
Indeed and even the final Survation poll last year before Truss resigned on 20th October would have given the Tories 29 seats, albeit then the LDs would now be the main Opposition on 31 seats to 29 Tory seats and 21 SNP and Labour on 546 MPs
France is having a march against antisemitism. Jean Luc Melenchon won't be there as he thinks it is a 'rendezvous for unconditional supporters of the massacre' - referring to Gazans. Hopefully it will attract large numbers and might be an inspiration for something in the UK. The figure of Le Pen will loom large, which I don't doubt is a problem for many but hopefully the event is as broadly based as possible.
FPT: great idea. Likewise I hope Le Pen’s sport won’t put others off - I’d be interested in how many would attend this sort of march as well as a ceasefire March. I would.
The Germans have just - apparently - banned the chant "from the river to the sea"
It would take a brave politician to do that here, and an even braver policeperson to try and enforce it on tens of thousands of protestors
I think this is what makes people angry. The sense that the police are engaging in appeasement.
It clearly makes you angry. I don't hear many people talking about it tbh.
You don't think it outrageous that the police thought it necessary to take down pictures of children being held hostage in Gaza?
The inability of PB-ers - and many many others - to put themselves in the minds of British Jews is quite startling and depressing. Theory of Mind means you should be able to do it unless you're properly dumb - or neurodivergent
Within living memory an extremely powerful European nation tried to kill every Jew on earth, and they got as far as killing maybe half of them - and if Hitler had won they could easily have killed 80%. Even today the global Jewish population has not recovered from the Holocaust
And yesterday we had a woman casually yelling "death to all Jews" in a British railway station, and no one doing anything, no outrage, no anger, nothing - apparently. And this was just one anti-Semitic incident amongst hundreds these last weeks, and many thousands around the world
The virus of Jew-hatred is BACK. Jews are frightened. And anyone with an ounce of empathy can surely see why they are frightened, and share it, no?
Entirely correct. And this should be obvious to all people of good will regardless of where they stand on the particularities of the mutual barbarities that have been and are being meted out in Israel/Palestine.
But it appears this sort of thing is only a problem when it is 'the far right' doing the hate. Of course, it is a problem when we have the far right doing it. But on yesterdays' evidence the far right amounts to about 200 thugs who quite like football and fighting. They are undoubtedly a bad thing, but not really a big thing. Whereas the far left are virulent AND numerous. But it is somehow impolite to criticise them.
Quite right. I think over the years there has been a sense among sane centrists (most people) that the far right are evil and support evil outcomes while the far left are only misguided but they support generally decent outcomes, so the left are more immune from attack.
Maybe this is wrong. Maybe far left now include lots of chancers who have no real desire for a better or more moral world but just want their faction to be top dog.
Re the events of yesterday, the great mass of the population don't attend or support either group of demonstrators. Maybe no-one (except the great Peter Tatchell) was there to represent support for all good people and opposition to all bad people.
I see no difference between the "Right" and the "Left" in this example - it's just each side uses the other term as a perjorative.
France is having a march against antisemitism. Jean Luc Melenchon won't be there as he thinks it is a 'rendezvous for unconditional supporters of the massacre' - referring to Gazans. Hopefully it will attract large numbers and might be an inspiration for something in the UK. The figure of Le Pen will loom large, which I don't doubt is a problem for many but hopefully the event is as broadly based as possible.
FPT: great idea. Likewise I hope Le Pen’s sport won’t put others off - I’d be interested in how many would attend this sort of march as well as a ceasefire March. I would.
The Germans have just - apparently - banned the chant "from the river to the sea"
It would take a brave politician to do that here, and an even braver policeperson to try and enforce it on tens of thousands of protestors
I think this is what makes people angry. The sense that the police are engaging in appeasement.
It clearly makes you angry. I don't hear many people talking about it tbh.
You don't think it outrageous that the police thought it necessary to take down pictures of children being held hostage in Gaza?
The inability of PB-ers - and many many others - to put themselves in the minds of British Jews is quite startling and depressing. Theory of Mind means you should be able to do it unless you're properly dumb - or neurodivergent
Within living memory an extremely powerful European nation tried to kill every Jew on earth, and they got as far as killing maybe half of them - and if Hitler had won they could easily have killed 80%. Even today the global Jewish population has not recovered from the Holocaust
And yesterday we had a woman casually yelling "death to all Jews" in a British railway station, and no one doing anything, no outrage, no anger, nothing - apparently. And this was just one anti-Semitic incident amongst hundreds these last weeks, and many thousands around the world
The virus of Jew-hatred is BACK. Jews are frightened. And anyone with an ounce of empathy can surely see why they are frightened, and share it, no?
Entirely correct. And this should be obvious to all people of good will regardless of where they stand on the particularities of the mutual barbarities that have been and are being meted out in Israel/Palestine.
But it appears this sort of thing is only a problem when it is 'the far right' doing the hate. Of course, it is a problem when we have the far right doing it. But on yesterdays' evidence the far right amounts to about 200 thugs who quite like football and fighting. They are undoubtedly a bad thing, but not really a big thing. Whereas the far left are virulent AND numerous. But it is somehow impolite to criticise them.
Quite right. I think over the years there has been a sense among sane centrists (most people) that the far right are evil and support evil outcomes while the far left are only misguided but they support generally decent outcomes, so the left are more immune from attack.
Maybe this is wrong. Maybe far left now include lots of chancers who have no real desire for a better or more moral world but just want their faction to be top dog.
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
There's a piece in the draft section of the PB servers which says
'Was the 2019 election for the Tories what. 1906* was for the Liberals?'
I may finish it soon.
*or 1910, which is the reason I haven't finished it.
I may need to speak to @ydoethur to hear his thoughts.
France is having a march against antisemitism. Jean Luc Melenchon won't be there as he thinks it is a 'rendezvous for unconditional supporters of the massacre' - referring to Gazans. Hopefully it will attract large numbers and might be an inspiration for something in the UK. The figure of Le Pen will loom large, which I don't doubt is a problem for many but hopefully the event is as broadly based as possible.
FPT: great idea. Likewise I hope Le Pen’s sport won’t put others off - I’d be interested in how many would attend this sort of march as well as a ceasefire March. I would.
The Germans have just - apparently - banned the chant "from the river to the sea"
It would take a brave politician to do that here, and an even braver policeperson to try and enforce it on tens of thousands of protestors
I think this is what makes people angry. The sense that the police are engaging in appeasement.
It clearly makes you angry. I don't hear many people talking about it tbh.
You don't think it outrageous that the police thought it necessary to take down pictures of children being held hostage in Gaza?
The inability of PB-ers - and many many others - to put themselves in the minds of British Jews is quite startling and depressing. Theory of Mind means you should be able to do it unless you're properly dumb - or neurodivergent
Within living memory an extremely powerful European nation tried to kill every Jew on earth, and they got as far as killing maybe half of them - and if Hitler had won they could easily have killed 80%. Even today the global Jewish population has not recovered from the Holocaust
And yesterday we had a woman casually yelling "death to all Jews" in a British railway station, and no one doing anything, no outrage, no anger, nothing - apparently. And this was just one anti-Semitic incident amongst hundreds these last weeks, and many thousands around the world
The virus of Jew-hatred is BACK. Jews are frightened. And anyone with an ounce of empathy can surely see why they are frightened, and share it, no?
Entirely correct. And this should be obvious to all people of good will regardless of where they stand on the particularities of the mutual barbarities that have been and are being meted out in Israel/Palestine.
But it appears this sort of thing is only a problem when it is 'the far right' doing the hate. Of course, it is a problem when we have the far right doing it. But on yesterdays' evidence the far right amounts to about 200 thugs who quite like football and fighting. They are undoubtedly a bad thing, but not really a big thing. Whereas the far left are virulent AND numerous. But it is somehow impolite to criticise them.
Quite right. I think over the years there has been a sense among sane centrists (most people) that the far right are evil and support evil outcomes while the far left are only misguided but they support generally decent outcomes, so the left are more immune from attack.
Maybe this is wrong. Maybe far left now include lots of chancers who have no real desire for a better or more moral world but just want their faction to be top dog.
Re the events of yesterday, the great mass of the population don't attend or support either group of demonstrators. Maybe no-one (except the great Peter Tatchell) was there to represent support for all good people and opposition to all bad people.
I see no difference between the "Right" and the "Left" in this example - it's just each side uses the other term as a perjorative.
It's not that all sides will be equally bad, depending on the situations and the times one may well be worse, but the extreme ends will always be awful, awful people.
I wish protestors and demonstrators would stick to one topic. Trying to mesh everything into one unified theory of opposition can just lead to confusion and some truly odd combinations.
It certainly does; Ms Thunberg is absolutely open to reparations claims from those affected by Viking invasions and their casual way of occupying any territory that took their fancy. "Justice for Lindisfarne: Remember 8th June 793AD".
France is having a march against antisemitism. Jean Luc Melenchon won't be there as he thinks it is a 'rendezvous for unconditional supporters of the massacre' - referring to Gazans. Hopefully it will attract large numbers and might be an inspiration for something in the UK. The figure of Le Pen will loom large, which I don't doubt is a problem for many but hopefully the event is as broadly based as possible.
FPT: great idea. Likewise I hope Le Pen’s sport won’t put others off - I’d be interested in how many would attend this sort of march as well as a ceasefire March. I would.
The Germans have just - apparently - banned the chant "from the river to the sea"
It would take a brave politician to do that here, and an even braver policeperson to try and enforce it on tens of thousands of protestors
I think this is what makes people angry. The sense that the police are engaging in appeasement.
It clearly makes you angry. I don't hear many people talking about it tbh.
You don't think it outrageous that the police thought it necessary to take down pictures of children being held hostage in Gaza?
The inability of PB-ers - and many many others - to put themselves in the minds of British Jews is quite startling and depressing. Theory of Mind means you should be able to do it unless you're properly dumb - or neurodivergent
Within living memory an extremely powerful European nation tried to kill every Jew on earth, and they got as far as killing maybe half of them - and if Hitler had won they could easily have killed 80%. Even today the global Jewish population has not recovered from the Holocaust
And yesterday we had a woman casually yelling "death to all Jews" in a British railway station, and no one doing anything, no outrage, no anger, nothing - apparently. And this was just one anti-Semitic incident amongst hundreds these last weeks, and many thousands around the world
The virus of Jew-hatred is BACK. Jews are frightened. And anyone with an ounce of empathy can surely see why they are frightened, and share it, no?
Entirely correct. And this should be obvious to all people of good will regardless of where they stand on the particularities of the mutual barbarities that have been and are being meted out in Israel/Palestine.
But it appears this sort of thing is only a problem when it is 'the far right' doing the hate. Of course, it is a problem when we have the far right doing it. But on yesterdays' evidence the far right amounts to about 200 thugs who quite like football and fighting. They are undoubtedly a bad thing, but not really a big thing. Whereas the far left are virulent AND numerous. But it is somehow impolite to criticise them.
Quite right. I think over the years there has been a sense among sane centrists (most people) that the far right are evil and support evil outcomes while the far left are only misguided but they support generally decent outcomes, so the left are more immune from attack.
Maybe this is wrong. Maybe far left now include lots of chancers who have no real desire for a better or more moral world but just want their faction to be top dog.
Re the events of yesterday, the great mass of the population don't attend or support either group of demonstrators. Maybe no-one (except the great Peter Tatchell) was there to represent support for all good people and opposition to all bad people.
It all makes more sense if we evoke the horseshoe theory and say things as they are. Fundamentalism and jihadist islamism are far right. Just a different type of far right. They epitomise everything the right wing is about: protection of tradition, patriarchy, authoritarianism etc.
The left wing as a concept comes from the pre-revolutionary French parliament. Left wing means reformists, people who want to change and modernise.
That’s why islamofascism is a thing, and also why the Soviet Union was for most (all?) of its life essentially conservative.
And Lib Dems only 13 seats, which seems a bit off. The MRP is based on much better national vote share for the Tories than most other polling.
Apparently it shows the Tories only holding 2 seats in London, with 1 of them being Finchley, which seems unlikely. Orpington, Upminster and Romford are far safer.
Finchley skewed by the strong showing for Luciana Berger last time?
Some of the other results look unlikely; Labour gain Winchester looks pretty implausible. I guess one of the problems at the moment is that there's no way for an MRP to take account of the "how many bajillion Focus leaflets are going through letterboxes" factor.
Fun fact: the poll was carried out by Survation on behalf of the UK Spirits Alliance. Basically it shows the Conservatives don't have a ghost of a chance.
Wasn't Baron David Frost of Fuckwit's previous job running something like the UK Spirits Alliance?
Admittedly a lot of the Brexit process makes more sense if you admit the possibility that our chief negotiator was permanently sloshed on Scotch at the time.
France is having a march against antisemitism. Jean Luc Melenchon won't be there as he thinks it is a 'rendezvous for unconditional supporters of the massacre' - referring to Gazans. Hopefully it will attract large numbers and might be an inspiration for something in the UK. The figure of Le Pen will loom large, which I don't doubt is a problem for many but hopefully the event is as broadly based as possible.
FPT: great idea. Likewise I hope Le Pen’s sport won’t put others off - I’d be interested in how many would attend this sort of march as well as a ceasefire March. I would.
The Germans have just - apparently - banned the chant "from the river to the sea"
It would take a brave politician to do that here, and an even braver policeperson to try and enforce it on tens of thousands of protestors
I think this is what makes people angry. The sense that the police are engaging in appeasement.
It clearly makes you angry. I don't hear many people talking about it tbh.
You don't think it outrageous that the police thought it necessary to take down pictures of children being held hostage in Gaza?
The inability of PB-ers - and many many others - to put themselves in the minds of British Jews is quite startling and depressing. Theory of Mind means you should be able to do it unless you're properly dumb - or neurodivergent
Within living memory an extremely powerful European nation tried to kill every Jew on earth, and they got as far as killing maybe half of them - and if Hitler had won they could easily have killed 80%. Even today the global Jewish population has not recovered from the Holocaust
And yesterday we had a woman casually yelling "death to all Jews" in a British railway station, and no one doing anything, no outrage, no anger, nothing - apparently. And this was just one anti-Semitic incident amongst hundreds these last weeks, and many thousands around the world
The virus of Jew-hatred is BACK. Jews are frightened. And anyone with an ounce of empathy can surely see why they are frightened, and share it, no?
Entirely correct. And this should be obvious to all people of good will regardless of where they stand on the particularities of the mutual barbarities that have been and are being meted out in Israel/Palestine.
But it appears this sort of thing is only a problem when it is 'the far right' doing the hate. Of course, it is a problem when we have the far right doing it. But on yesterdays' evidence the far right amounts to about 200 thugs who quite like football and fighting. They are undoubtedly a bad thing, but not really a big thing. Whereas the far left are virulent AND numerous. But it is somehow impolite to criticise them.
Quite right. I think over the years there has been a sense among sane centrists (most people) that the far right are evil and support evil outcomes while the far left are only misguided but they support generally decent outcomes, so the left are more immune from attack.
Maybe this is wrong. Maybe far left now include lots of chancers who have no real desire for a better or more moral world but just want their faction to be top dog.
Re the events of yesterday, the great mass of the population don't attend or support either group of demonstrators. Maybe no-one (except the great Peter Tatchell) was there to represent support for all good people and opposition to all bad people.
Anti-Semitism is literally the totem of someone who's far-right.
And yet, they said nothing.
It's all words. All about social proof. All performative. Nothing of substance.
I wish protestors and demonstrators would stick to one topic. Trying to mesh everything into one unified theory of opposition can just lead to confusion and some truly odd combinations.
It certainly does; Ms Thunberg is absolutely open to reparations claims from those affected by Viking invasions and their casual way of occupying any territory that took their fancy. "Justice for Lindisfarne: Remember 8th June 793AD".
I suppose we could start by renaming seemingly innocent settlements that are, in reality, monuments to hideous oppression.
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
No we aren't, maybe 6 might have been possible last October, it certainly isn't now.
Given the economic situation and inflation Starmer will face if he becomes PM I certainly wouldn't count on his getting a long honeymoon either
France is having a march against antisemitism. Jean Luc Melenchon won't be there as he thinks it is a 'rendezvous for unconditional supporters of the massacre' - referring to Gazans. Hopefully it will attract large numbers and might be an inspiration for something in the UK. The figure of Le Pen will loom large, which I don't doubt is a problem for many but hopefully the event is as broadly based as possible.
FPT: great idea. Likewise I hope Le Pen’s sport won’t put others off - I’d be interested in how many would attend this sort of march as well as a ceasefire March. I would.
The Germans have just - apparently - banned the chant "from the river to the sea"
It would take a brave politician to do that here, and an even braver policeperson to try and enforce it on tens of thousands of protestors
I think this is what makes people angry. The sense that the police are engaging in appeasement.
It clearly makes you angry. I don't hear many people talking about it tbh.
You don't think it outrageous that the police thought it necessary to take down pictures of children being held hostage in Gaza?
The inability of PB-ers - and many many others - to put themselves in the minds of British Jews is quite startling and depressing. Theory of Mind means you should be able to do it unless you're properly dumb - or neurodivergent
Within living memory an extremely powerful European nation tried to kill every Jew on earth, and they got as far as killing maybe half of them - and if Hitler had won they could easily have killed 80%. Even today the global Jewish population has not recovered from the Holocaust
And yesterday we had a woman casually yelling "death to all Jews" in a British railway station, and no one doing anything, no outrage, no anger, nothing - apparently...
It was posted in the replies to the Met hate crime Twitter thread, so with any luck that will not be true. As they said, they intend to pursue such reports. I hope they identify her.
And there's plenty of anger about it, even if those in the immediate vicinity didn't express any.
What would you do if someone shouted "Death to all Jews" right next to you at Victoria Station?
This is a serious question, but not a personal one. I've been asking myself the same, ever since I saw the vid
I hope I would have given her a ticking off and told her to shut the F up and go away. But I fear I might have been so shocked - and so used to British politeness - I would have just stood there in silent surprise, gobsmacked and mute
If there is any good to come out of this, it is that these incidents have shaken away any complacency about anti-Semitism. It exists, it is out there, it is deeply nasty, and it needs to be confronted
The problem is you say something, the mob reacts, filming starts and if you aren't careful you are the one labelled as a racist.
There was a viral clip a couple of months ago with a lady who was having her bike stolen, reacted, and before she knew it she was labelled as crazy Karen racist lady.
Very good point
Imagine if you did react, and said "Shut up you stupid woman, shut your filthy mouth and go away" and then someone filmed that but cut the "death to Jews" provocation at the start - suddenly you are a racist man abusing a BME woman and before the entire footage emerges you are cancelled and finished
Not great. So you say nothing?
In order for ordinary people to get involved in calling out/dealing with any sort of public kerfuffle they have to have deep trust in the police and other bits of state to see things the same way as they do. I don't think that trust quite exists. At the most basic level, there isn't even a trust that they will turn up, but there are lots of other distrusts too.
France is having a march against antisemitism. Jean Luc Melenchon won't be there as he thinks it is a 'rendezvous for unconditional supporters of the massacre' - referring to Gazans. Hopefully it will attract large numbers and might be an inspiration for something in the UK. The figure of Le Pen will loom large, which I don't doubt is a problem for many but hopefully the event is as broadly based as possible.
FPT: great idea. Likewise I hope Le Pen’s sport won’t put others off - I’d be interested in how many would attend this sort of march as well as a ceasefire March. I would.
The Germans have just - apparently - banned the chant "from the river to the sea"
It would take a brave politician to do that here, and an even braver policeperson to try and enforce it on tens of thousands of protestors
I think this is what makes people angry. The sense that the police are engaging in appeasement.
It clearly makes you angry. I don't hear many people talking about it tbh.
You don't think it outrageous that the police thought it necessary to take down pictures of children being held hostage in Gaza?
The inability of PB-ers - and many many others - to put themselves in the minds of British Jews is quite startling and depressing. Theory of Mind means you should be able to do it unless you're properly dumb - or neurodivergent
Within living memory an extremely powerful European nation tried to kill every Jew on earth, and they got as far as killing maybe half of them - and if Hitler had won they could easily have killed 80%. Even today the global Jewish population has not recovered from the Holocaust
And yesterday we had a woman casually yelling "death to all Jews" in a British railway station, and no one doing anything, no outrage, no anger, nothing - apparently...
It was posted in the replies to the Met hate crime Twitter thread, so with any luck that will not be true. As they said, they intend to pursue such reports. I hope they identify her.
And there's plenty of anger about it, even if those in the immediate vicinity didn't express any.
What would you do if someone shouted "Death to all Jews" right next to you at Victoria Station?
This is a serious question, but not a personal one. I've been asking myself the same, ever since I saw the vid
I hope I would have given her a ticking off and told her to shut the F up and go away. But I fear I might have been so shocked - and so used to British politeness - I would have just stood there in silent surprise, gobsmacked and mute
If there is any good to come out of this, it is that these incidents have shaken away any complacency about anti-Semitism. It exists, it is out there, it is deeply nasty, and it needs to be confronted
The default reaction these days is to video it on your phone - and in this case thankfully someone did. But we’ve all seen people standing back filming on their mobile and doing nothing in situations where more urgent intervention is needed.
More cheerfully.
Thousands gathered in Paris today to stand in solidarity with the Jewish community, in the wake of an alarming rise of antisemitism.
Peter Tatchell is I think deserving of the national treasure moniker, now he’s advancing in years.
For most Lib Dems, the Southwark and Bermondsey by-election is the greatest single source of shame for the party. More than the coalition or tuition fees, or not bothering with new nuclear power.
France is having a march against antisemitism. Jean Luc Melenchon won't be there as he thinks it is a 'rendezvous for unconditional supporters of the massacre' - referring to Gazans. Hopefully it will attract large numbers and might be an inspiration for something in the UK. The figure of Le Pen will loom large, which I don't doubt is a problem for many but hopefully the event is as broadly based as possible.
FPT: great idea. Likewise I hope Le Pen’s sport won’t put others off - I’d be interested in how many would attend this sort of march as well as a ceasefire March. I would.
The Germans have just - apparently - banned the chant "from the river to the sea"
It would take a brave politician to do that here, and an even braver policeperson to try and enforce it on tens of thousands of protestors
I think this is what makes people angry. The sense that the police are engaging in appeasement.
It clearly makes you angry. I don't hear many people talking about it tbh.
You don't think it outrageous that the police thought it necessary to take down pictures of children being held hostage in Gaza?
The inability of PB-ers - and many many others - to put themselves in the minds of British Jews is quite startling and depressing. Theory of Mind means you should be able to do it unless you're properly dumb - or neurodivergent
Within living memory an extremely powerful European nation tried to kill every Jew on earth, and they got as far as killing maybe half of them - and if Hitler had won they could easily have killed 80%. Even today the global Jewish population has not recovered from the Holocaust
And yesterday we had a woman casually yelling "death to all Jews" in a British railway station, and no one doing anything, no outrage, no anger, nothing - apparently...
It was posted in the replies to the Met hate crime Twitter thread, so with any luck that will not be true. As they said, they intend to pursue such reports. I hope they identify her.
And there's plenty of anger about it, even if those in the immediate vicinity didn't express any.
What would you do if someone shouted "Death to all Jews" right next to you at Victoria Station?
This is a serious question, but not a personal one. I've been asking myself the same, ever since I saw the vid
I hope I would have given her a ticking off and told her to shut the F up and go away. But I fear I might have been so shocked - and so used to British politeness - I would have just stood there in silent surprise, gobsmacked and mute
If there is any good to come out of this, it is that these incidents have shaken away any complacency about anti-Semitism. It exists, it is out there, it is deeply nasty, and it needs to be confronted
The default reaction these days is to video it on your phone - and in this case thankfully someone did. But we’ve all seen people standing back filming on their mobile and doing nothing in situations where more urgent intervention is needed.
More cheerfully.
Thousands gathered in Paris today to stand in solidarity with the Jewish community, in the wake of an alarming rise of antisemitism.
Brown, Blair and Major manage to all effectively look the same age there, whereas Cameron doesn't look too far off where he was in 2016.
I presume Boris is moonlighting as Doc Brown in the BTTF stage production.
Apart from looking dishevelled, the thing that struck me that he was the only former PM not wearing a coat.
He's so disorganised, it is what was inevitable about his premiership unravelling.
Hairstyle even looks like Michael Foot. Has he gone gray ?
I know somebody who occasionally gets to see Boris Johnson up close and personal (no, not like that) and they are convinced Boris Johnson is developing a bald patch which he is desperate to hide.
France is having a march against antisemitism. Jean Luc Melenchon won't be there as he thinks it is a 'rendezvous for unconditional supporters of the massacre' - referring to Gazans. Hopefully it will attract large numbers and might be an inspiration for something in the UK. The figure of Le Pen will loom large, which I don't doubt is a problem for many but hopefully the event is as broadly based as possible.
FPT: great idea. Likewise I hope Le Pen’s sport won’t put others off - I’d be interested in how many would attend this sort of march as well as a ceasefire March. I would.
The Germans have just - apparently - banned the chant "from the river to the sea"
It would take a brave politician to do that here, and an even braver policeperson to try and enforce it on tens of thousands of protestors
I think this is what makes people angry. The sense that the police are engaging in appeasement.
It clearly makes you angry. I don't hear many people talking about it tbh.
You don't think it outrageous that the police thought it necessary to take down pictures of children being held hostage in Gaza?
The inability of PB-ers - and many many others - to put themselves in the minds of British Jews is quite startling and depressing. Theory of Mind means you should be able to do it unless you're properly dumb - or neurodivergent
Within living memory an extremely powerful European nation tried to kill every Jew on earth, and they got as far as killing maybe half of them - and if Hitler had won they could easily have killed 80%. Even today the global Jewish population has not recovered from the Holocaust
And yesterday we had a woman casually yelling "death to all Jews" in a British railway station, and no one doing anything, no outrage, no anger, nothing - apparently. And this was just one anti-Semitic incident amongst hundreds these last weeks, and many thousands around the world
The virus of Jew-hatred is BACK. Jews are frightened. And anyone with an ounce of empathy can surely see why they are frightened, and share it, no?
Entirely correct. And this should be obvious to all people of good will regardless of where they stand on the particularities of the mutual barbarities that have been and are being meted out in Israel/Palestine.
But it appears this sort of thing is only a problem when it is 'the far right' doing the hate. Of course, it is a problem when we have the far right doing it. But on yesterdays' evidence the far right amounts to about 200 thugs who quite like football and fighting. They are undoubtedly a bad thing, but not really a big thing. Whereas the far left are virulent AND numerous. But it is somehow impolite to criticise them.
Quite right. I think over the years there has been a sense among sane centrists (most people) that the far right are evil and support evil outcomes while the far left are only misguided but they support generally decent outcomes, so the left are more immune from attack.
Maybe this is wrong. Maybe far left now include lots of chancers who have no real desire for a better or more moral world but just want their faction to be top dog.
Re the events of yesterday, the great mass of the population don't attend or support either group of demonstrators. Maybe no-one (except the great Peter Tatchell) was there to represent support for all good people and opposition to all bad people.
I see no difference between the "Right" and the "Left" in this example - it's just each side uses the other term as a perjorative.
Political discussion would be more interesting and informative if labels such as right and left were avoided altogether, and only focussed on the actual contents of opinion, action and belief.
Eg, in normal centre ground politics 'right' can signify both a strong belief in free trade and globalisation and also its opposite, protectionism and localism.
"Each year on Remembrance Sunday, we assemble at the Cenotaph to honour the sacrifice of the fallen and pay tribute to the servicemen & women we place in harm’s way.
Today - as every day - we will remember them. #LestWeForget"
A third of a century of the residents of 10 Downing Street - a shocking selection of no-marks. Plus a whiter-than-white guy who has gone on to make gazillions.
France is having a march against antisemitism. Jean Luc Melenchon won't be there as he thinks it is a 'rendezvous for unconditional supporters of the massacre' - referring to Gazans. Hopefully it will attract large numbers and might be an inspiration for something in the UK. The figure of Le Pen will loom large, which I don't doubt is a problem for many but hopefully the event is as broadly based as possible.
FPT: great idea. Likewise I hope Le Pen’s sport won’t put others off - I’d be interested in how many would attend this sort of march as well as a ceasefire March. I would.
The Germans have just - apparently - banned the chant "from the river to the sea"
It would take a brave politician to do that here, and an even braver policeperson to try and enforce it on tens of thousands of protestors
I think this is what makes people angry. The sense that the police are engaging in appeasement.
It clearly makes you angry. I don't hear many people talking about it tbh.
You don't think it outrageous that the police thought it necessary to take down pictures of children being held hostage in Gaza?
The inability of PB-ers - and many many others - to put themselves in the minds of British Jews is quite startling and depressing. Theory of Mind means you should be able to do it unless you're properly dumb - or neurodivergent
Within living memory an extremely powerful European nation tried to kill every Jew on earth, and they got as far as killing maybe half of them - and if Hitler had won they could easily have killed 80%. Even today the global Jewish population has not recovered from the Holocaust
And yesterday we had a woman casually yelling "death to all Jews" in a British railway station, and no one doing anything, no outrage, no anger, nothing - apparently. And this was just one anti-Semitic incident amongst hundreds these last weeks, and many thousands around the world
The virus of Jew-hatred is BACK. Jews are frightened. And anyone with an ounce of empathy can surely see why they are frightened, and share it, no?
Entirely correct. And this should be obvious to all people of good will regardless of where they stand on the particularities of the mutual barbarities that have been and are being meted out in Israel/Palestine.
But it appears this sort of thing is only a problem when it is 'the far right' doing the hate. Of course, it is a problem when we have the far right doing it. But on yesterdays' evidence the far right amounts to about 200 thugs who quite like football and fighting. They are undoubtedly a bad thing, but not really a big thing. Whereas the far left are virulent AND numerous. But it is somehow impolite to criticise them.
Quite right. I think over the years there has been a sense among sane centrists (most people) that the far right are evil and support evil outcomes while the far left are only misguided but they support generally decent outcomes, so the left are more immune from attack.
Maybe this is wrong. Maybe far left now include lots of chancers who have no real desire for a better or more moral world but just want their faction to be top dog.
Re the events of yesterday, the great mass of the population don't attend or support either group of demonstrators. Maybe no-one (except the great Peter Tatchell) was there to represent support for all good people and opposition to all bad people.
It all makes more sense if we evoke the horseshoe theory and say things as they are. Fundamentalism and jihadist islamism are far right. Just a different type of far right. They epitomise everything the right wing is about: protection of tradition, patriarchy, authoritarianism etc.
The left wing as a concept comes from the pre-revolutionary French parliament. Left wing means reformists, people who want to change and modernise.
That’s why islamofascism is a thing, and also why the Soviet Union was for most (all?) of its life essentially conservative.
Yes exactly
IslamISM (not Islam) is as close to pure Fascism as it is possible to find, these days. The only difference from the classic definition is that The Faithful have replaced The Nation, but it makes no difference to the observation
Everything else is there. The cult of the leader, the worship of violence, the adoration of war, the reverence for valour, the misogyny and patriarchy, the notable homophobia, the insistence on procreation, the jailing of women in the home, the disdain for democracy, the contempt for the other, the outsiders, the minorities - anyone not of The Faithful...
Which makes it so profoundly bizarre that the Crank Left makes common cause with Islamism, do they not even notice how fascist it is? Andrew Tate has noticed
And Lib Dems only 13 seats, which seems a bit off. The MRP is based on much better national vote share for the Tories than most other polling.
Apparently it shows the Tories only holding 2 seats in London, with 1 of them being Finchley, which seems unlikely. Orpington, Upminster and Romford are far safer.
Finchley skewed by the strong showing for Luciana Berger last time?
Some of the other results look unlikely; Labour gain Winchester looks pretty implausible. I guess one of the problems at the moment is that there's no way for an MRP to take account of the "how many bajillion Focus leaflets are going through letterboxes" factor.
Fun fact: the poll was carried out by Survation on behalf of the UK Spirits Alliance. Basically it shows the Conservatives don't have a ghost of a chance.
Wasn't Baron David Frost of Fuckwit's previous job running something like the UK Spirits Alliance?
Admittedly a lot of the Brexit process makes more sense if you admit the possibility that our chief negotiator was permanently sloshed on Scotch at the time.
You mean the chap who tried to use the EU to defeat democratically elected [edit] within-the-UK government policies? Ah yes, the high heidyin of the Scotch Whisky Association of imperishable memory around indyref1 time.
Brown, Blair and Major manage to all effectively look the same age there, whereas Cameron doesn't look too far off where he was in 2016.
I presume Boris is moonlighting as Doc Brown in the BTTF stage production.
Apart from looking dishevelled, the thing that struck me that he was the only former PM not wearing a coat.
He's so disorganised, it is what was inevitable about his premiership unravelling.
Hairstyle even looks like Michael Foot. Has he gone gray ?
I know somebody who occasionally gets to see Boris Johnson up close and personal (no, not like that) and they are convinced Boris Johnson is developing a bald patch which he is desperate to hide.
Brown, Blair and Major manage to all effectively look the same age there, whereas Cameron doesn't look too far off where he was in 2016.
I presume Boris is moonlighting as Doc Brown in the BTTF stage production.
Apart from looking dishevelled, the thing that struck me that he was the only former PM not wearing a coat.
He's so disorganised, it is what was inevitable about his premiership unravelling.
Hairstyle even looks like Michael Foot. Has he gone gray ?
I know somebody who occasionally gets to see Boris Johnson up close and personal (no, not like that) and they are convinced Boris Johnson is developing a bald patch which he is desperate to hide.
I think there were some telling shots when he was still doing PMQs- some of the camera angles in the Chamber are pretty brutal.
Mostly because I remember developing a BoJo=Samson theory.
Electoral Calculus puts it a bit higher, and without taking tatical voting into account.
It gives high and low estimates too. if you take the extreme low for the Tories it is not inconceivable they would not be the Official Opposition. Wonder what odds you could get on that?
At the lowest point of Truss' premiership when the Tories were heading for less than 50 seats maybe. Not now under Sunak where they are in the 100-150 range which would be even below 1997 levels but still firmly keep them the main Opposition, especially with the SNP projected to lose seats to Labour too
Wasn't suggesting it was likely, H, but if you take the T's projected worst case, it's only marginally better than the LD's best case.
Moving swiftly on (ahem), is Braverman going to be sacked tomorrow? Next week? Not at all?
What's the PB consensus?
I think I'm on the side of it not happening. I would quite like it to happen however because I think it could precipitate a vonk.
Presume you mean VONC? Not a chance.
Yes. She has more supporters than signatures needed.
He's doing quite well not rising to it when she's clearly longing to be sacked to position herself nicely for the leadership.
Yes but Sunak would clearly win any VONC, so why would Braverman's supporters provoke one at this point?
I don't think he'd fight it. And I also think even him winning would be just 'doing a Major' winning his back me or sack me leadership vote before getting obliterated by Labour. What would be the point? Fuckety bye.
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
No we aren't, maybe 6 might have been possible last October, it certainly isn't now.
Given the economic situation and inflation Starmer will face if he becomes PM I certainly wouldn't count on his getting a long honeymoon either
Draw a straight trend line through the Tory support chart on this and think long and hard about where it takes you to by next October.
Moving swiftly on (ahem), is Braverman going to be sacked tomorrow? Next week? Not at all?
What's the PB consensus?
I think I'm on the side of it not happening. I would quite like it to happen however because I think it could precipitate a vonk.
Presume you mean VONC? Not a chance.
Yes. She has more supporters than signatures needed.
He's doing quite well not rising to it when she's clearly longing to be sacked to position herself nicely for the leadership.
Yes but Sunak would clearly win any VONC, so why would Braverman's supporters provoke one at this point?
I don't think he'd fight it. And I also think even him winning would be just 'doing a Major' winning his back me or sack me leadership vote before getting obliterated by Labour. What would be the point? Fuckety bye.
What would you do if someone shouted "Death to all Jews" right next to you at Victoria Station?
This is a serious question, but not a personal one. I've been asking myself the same, ever since I saw the vid
I hope I would have given her a ticking off and told her to shut the F up and go away. But I fear I might have been so shocked - and so used to British politeness - I would have just stood there in silent surprise, gobsmacked and mute
If there is any good to come out of this, it is that these incidents have shaken away any complacency about anti-Semitism. It exists, it is out there, it is deeply nasty, and it needs to be confronted
I was once in a queue for a taxi at Victoria when the Latin American-looking girl in front of me was next up. Two young City types grabbed the taxi. One looked a bit hesitant but the other one said "Come on! Whose fucking country is it anyway?"
In retrospect I wish I'd said to the driver "These are queue-jumpers and I've taken your number and will report you if you let them jump the queue." But, as you say, I was too British and merely stared in horror. As the cab drove off, I said to the girl, "I'm so sorry" and she smiled and said "Is all right." But still...
In your case, though, with no direct target, I'd still ignore the shouter, as I would any drunk or loony. The same would apply if she was shouting "Death to all Labour supporters" or something else that I felt affected me. Can't be bothered to argue the toss with a random nutter.
Moving swiftly on (ahem), is Braverman going to be sacked tomorrow? Next week? Not at all?
What's the PB consensus?
I think I'm on the side of it not happening. I would quite like it to happen however because I think it could precipitate a vonk.
Presume you mean VONC? Not a chance.
Yes. She has more supporters than signatures needed.
He's doing quite well not rising to it when she's clearly longing to be sacked to position herself nicely for the leadership.
Yes but Sunak would clearly win any VONC, so why would Braverman's supporters provoke one at this point?
I don't think he'd fight it. And I also think even him winning would be just 'doing a Major' winning his back me or sack me leadership vote before getting obliterated by Labour. What would be the point? Fuckety bye.
Good point. Then who?
This will be far too gamey for most here, but I think Jake Berry. Populist Northern Trussite. Not as problematical image-wise as Suella. I admit it's slim pickings. Any winner will need to agree to resign and trigger a full leadership election should the Tories lose the GE.
What would you do if someone shouted "Death to all Jews" right next to you at Victoria Station?
This is a serious question, but not a personal one. I've been asking myself the same, ever since I saw the vid
I hope I would have given her a ticking off and told her to shut the F up and go away. But I fear I might have been so shocked - and so used to British politeness - I would have just stood there in silent surprise, gobsmacked and mute
If there is any good to come out of this, it is that these incidents have shaken away any complacency about anti-Semitism. It exists, it is out there, it is deeply nasty, and it needs to be confronted
I was once in a queue for a taxi at Victoria when the Latin American-looking girl in front of me was next up. Two young City types grabbed the taxi. One looked a bit hesitant but the other one said "Come on! Whose fucking country is it anyway?"
In retrospect I wish I'd said to the driver "These are queue-jumpers and I've taken your number and will report you if you let them jump the queue." But, as you say, I was too British and merely stared in horror. As the cab drove off, I said to the girl, "I'm so sorry" and she smiled and said "Is all right." But still...
In your case, though, with no direct target, I'd still ignore the shouter, as I would any drunk or loony. The same would apply if she was shouting "Death to all Labour supporters" or something else that I felt affected me. Can't be bothered to argue the toss with a random nutter.
And what if someone was shouting "Lynch all the N****rs" at black people, or "rape the Asian bitches" as Chinese girls walked past?
I don't believe you would calmly do nothing. You would at least be deeply conflicted, as would I
Perhaps our cowardice/British reserve would overcome us, as you say (delete as appropriate). I hope I would be a little braver, but I am not sure...
The brute fact it was a woman shouting "death to all Jews" would probably help, as I wouldn't be scared of getting my face smashed in if I told her to shut up
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
There's a piece in the draft section of the PB servers which says
'Was the 2019 election for the Tories what. 1906* was for the Liberals?'
I may finish it soon.
*or 1910, which is the reason I haven't finished it.
I may need to speak to @ydoethur to hear his thoughts.
As much as I would like this to be true I’m not sure it is. A major factor in the decline of the Liberals was the emergence of a party which could better represent one of its core constituencies, unionised labour. Unless a viable party emerges that can win the right of centre, patriotic type of vote then the Tories will always have enough support to remain the official opposition.
Incidentally I’ve always thought it was a tragedy that Labour eclipsed the Liberals as the second party because in reality they were much worse at competing with the Conservatives as a party of government. The old Liberal Party could put together a far wider coalition of voters than Labour has ever been able to do with the exception of Blair. We might have been better governed throughout the 20th century if the Tories weren’t quite so electorally dominant.
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
There's a piece in the draft section of the PB servers which says
'Was the 2019 election for the Tories what. 1906* was for the Liberals?'
I may finish it soon.
*or 1910, which is the reason I haven't finished it.
I may need to speak to @ydoethur to hear his thoughts.
Seems unlikely the Tories will win enough seats at the next two elections to hang on with the support of Irish MPs.
And the Liberal performance in both elections in 1910 was underwhelming. Much more comparable to 2017.
If you are looking for a situation where a storming victory was followed by disappearance I would suggest the Whigs in 1837. Having got what they wanted by parliamentary reform and kept locking out their unelectable opponents, the Whigs had run out of ideas and never actually won another majority in their own strength (contrary to what Wikipedia claims about the 1857 election). In the end were forced to merge with two other parties.
Sample: "What I saw [20 years ago as an undergraduate] was a worldview that replaced basic ideas of good and evil with a new rubric: the powerless (good) and the powerful (bad). It replaced lots of things. Colorblindness with race-obsession. Ideas with identity. Debate with denunciation. Persuasion with public shaming. The rule of law with the fury of the mob."
Judging people by the color of their skin, rather than the content of their character.
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
There's a piece in the draft section of the PB servers which says
'Was the 2019 election for the Tories what. 1906* was for the Liberals?'
I may finish it soon.
*or 1910, which is the reason I haven't finished it.
I may need to speak to @ydoethur to hear his thoughts.
As much as I would like this to be true I’m not sure it is. A major factor in the decline of the Liberals was the emergence of a party which could better represent one of its core constituencies, unionised labour. Unless a viable party emerges that can win the right of centre, patriotic type of vote then the Tories will always have enough support to remain the official opposition.
Incidentally I’ve always thought it was a tragedy that Labour eclipsed the Liberals as the second party because in reality they were much worse at competing with the Conservatives as a party of government. The old Liberal Party could put together a far wider coalition of voters than Labour has ever been able to do with the exception of Blair. We might have been better governed throughout the 20th century if the Tories weren’t quite so electorally dominant.
Indeed, in Canada for example the Liberals have been in power for more of the last 100 years than the Canadian Conservatives have been, the NDP like Labour would have been less attractive to centrist voters.
In France too Macron's liberal En Marche have proved rather more effective electorally than the French Socialists
Moving swiftly on (ahem), is Braverman going to be sacked tomorrow? Next week? Not at all?
What's the PB consensus?
I think I'm on the side of it not happening. I would quite like it to happen however because I think it could precipitate a vonk.
Presume you mean VONC? Not a chance.
Yes. She has more supporters than signatures needed.
He's doing quite well not rising to it when she's clearly longing to be sacked to position herself nicely for the leadership.
Yes but Sunak would clearly win any VONC, so why would Braverman's supporters provoke one at this point?
I don't think he'd fight it. And I also think even him winning would be just 'doing a Major' winning his back me or sack me leadership vote before getting obliterated by Labour. What would be the point? Fuckety bye.
Good point. Then who?
This will be far too gamey for most here, but I think Jake Berry. Populist Northern Trussite. Not as problematical image-wise as Suella. I admit it's slim pickings. Any winner will need to agree to resign and trigger a full leadership election should the Tories lose the GE.
I'd keep plenty of Sunakites in the Cabinet - Sunak Foreign Sec if he wanted it, but offer him Ambassador to the US. Jeremy Hunt to the NHS, as long as his death-grip on the economy ceases I'm happy.
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
No we aren't, maybe 6 might have been possible last October, it certainly isn't now.
Given the economic situation and inflation Starmer will face if he becomes PM I certainly wouldn't count on his getting a long honeymoon either
Draw a straight trend line through the Tory support chart on this and think long and hard about where it takes you to by next October.
Around 25-30% of the vote but once Labour are in power they are responsible for the economy
"Each year on Remembrance Sunday, we assemble at the Cenotaph to honour the sacrifice of the fallen and pay tribute to the servicemen & women we place in harm’s way.
Today - as every day - we will remember them. #LestWeForget"
Traumatic amnesia. I find it difficult to remember her. I was watching something about the Queen's death on YouTube and was slightly taken aback when Truss spoke outside No 10. I know she was PM, and I agree with @Luckyguy1983 that she had a consistent approach that addressed the issue (whilst disagreeing it would work in 2022/3), but other than the bald facts she begins to slip away. I remember she had an awkward manner and unfortunate voice, but other than that... um?
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
No we aren't, maybe 6 might have been possible last October, it certainly isn't now.
Given the economic situation and inflation Starmer will face if he becomes PM I certainly wouldn't count on his getting a long honeymoon either
Draw a straight trend line through the Tory support chart on this and think long and hard about where it takes you to by next October.
Around 25-30% of the vote but once Labour are in power they are responsible for the economy
They couldn't possibly do any worse than your incompetents.
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
Some of us started off with:
0. Boris might even increase his majority at the next election.
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
There's a piece in the draft section of the PB servers which says
'Was the 2019 election for the Tories what. 1906* was for the Liberals?'
I may finish it soon.
*or 1910, which is the reason I haven't finished it.
I may need to speak to @ydoethur to hear his thoughts.
Clearly not 1906 otherwise the Tories would be heading for narrow re election as the Liberals did in 1910.
Fortunately for the Conservatives, ReformUK, while on the rise, are still a long way from the voteshare they would need to overtake them as the main party of the right, as Labour gradually overtook the Liberals as the main party of the left in the early 20th century
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
There's a piece in the draft section of the PB servers which says
'Was the 2019 election for the Tories what. 1906* was for the Liberals?'
I may finish it soon.
*or 1910, which is the reason I haven't finished it.
I may need to speak to @ydoethur to hear his thoughts.
As much as I would like this to be true I’m not sure it is. A major factor in the decline of the Liberals was the emergence of a party which could better represent one of its core constituencies, unionised labour. Unless a viable party emerges that can win the right of centre, patriotic type of vote then the Tories will always have enough support to remain the official opposition.
Incidentally I’ve always thought it was a tragedy that Labour eclipsed the Liberals as the second party because in reality they were much worse at competing with the Conservatives as a party of government. The old Liberal Party could put together a far wider coalition of voters than Labour has ever been able to do with the exception of Blair. We might have been better governed throughout the 20th century if the Tories weren’t quite so electorally dominant.
The Liberals won majorities in 1859 (for a given value of 'Liberal' since the party didn't actually exist until after the election) 1865, and 1868.
Then in 1880 and 1906.
All those elections bar the last have in common that they were fought on a very restricted franchise.
They weren't actually very good at appealing to mass segments of the population. After the 1885 reforms, which widened the franchise to effectively the majority of adult males, they won one overall majority. That was forty years before Labour emerged.
In particular, they were opposed to votes for women because they knew that women were unlikely to vote Liberal in large numbers (with very rare exceptions - 1906 would have been one).
Give us the strength to show them how to do both now.
🎶Because the greatest love of all Is happening to me I found the greatest love of all Inside of me The greatest love of all Is easy to achieve Learning to love yourself It is the greatest love of all 🎶
Brown, Blair and Major manage to all effectively look the same age there, whereas Cameron doesn't look too far off where he was in 2016.
I presume Boris is moonlighting as Doc Brown in the BTTF stage production.
Apart from looking dishevelled, the thing that struck me that he was the only former PM not wearing a coat.
He's so disorganised, it is what was inevitable about his premiership unravelling.
Hairstyle even looks like Michael Foot. Has he gone gray ?
I know somebody who occasionally gets to see Boris Johnson up close and personal (no, not like that) and they are convinced Boris Johnson is developing a bald patch which he is desperate to hide.
Yep, deffo balding. I hear the same
You do not need to hear it. You can see great patches of pink scalp, but it is more like thinning than a classical bald patch, so to that extent TSE might have new information.
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
No we aren't, maybe 6 might have been possible last October, it certainly isn't now.
Given the economic situation and inflation Starmer will face if he becomes PM I certainly wouldn't count on his getting a long honeymoon either
Draw a straight trend line through the Tory support chart on this and think long and hard about where it takes you to by next October.
Around 25-30% of the vote but once Labour are in power they are responsible for the economy
They couldn't possibly do any worse than your incompetents.
Oh they could, inflation going up again, taxes up further, strikes etc
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
Some of us started off with:
0. Boris might even increase his majority at the next election.
It made sense to me at the time!
At one point in 2019 it didn't seem totally unrealistic to speculate on whether Labour might slip to third.
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
There's a piece in the draft section of the PB servers which says
'Was the 2019 election for the Tories what. 1906* was for the Liberals?'
I may finish it soon.
*or 1910, which is the reason I haven't finished it.
I may need to speak to @ydoethur to hear his thoughts.
Seems unlikely the Tories will win enough seats at the next two elections to hang on with the support of Irish MPs.
And the Liberal performance in both elections in 1910 was underwhelming. Much more comparable to 2017.
If you are looking for a situation where a storming victory was followed by disappearance I would suggest the Whigs in 1837. Having got what they wanted by parliamentary reform and kept locking out their unelectable opponents, the Whigs had run out of ideas and never actually won another majority in their own strength (contrary to what Wikipedia claims about the 1857 election). In the end were forced to merge with two other parties.
Effectively the Whigs joined with the Radicals and Peelites to form the Liberals which became the main opposition to the Tories
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
No we aren't, maybe 6 might have been possible last October, it certainly isn't now.
Given the economic situation and inflation Starmer will face if he becomes PM I certainly wouldn't count on his getting a long honeymoon either
Draw a straight trend line through the Tory support chart on this and think long and hard about where it takes you to by next October.
Around 25-30% of the vote but once Labour are in power they are responsible for the economy
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
No we aren't, maybe 6 might have been possible last October, it certainly isn't now.
Given the economic situation and inflation Starmer will face if he becomes PM I certainly wouldn't count on his getting a long honeymoon either
Draw a straight trend line through the Tory support chart on this and think long and hard about where it takes you to by next October.
Around 25-30% of the vote but once Labour are in power they are responsible for the economy
They couldn't possibly do any worse than your incompetents.
Oh they could, inflation going up again, taxes up further, strikes etc
Questions are- how long can Labour field the "clearing up the mess left by the Tories" line? And can they genuinely fix the economy before that excuse wears out?
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
There's a piece in the draft section of the PB servers which says
'Was the 2019 election for the Tories what. 1906* was for the Liberals?'
I may finish it soon.
*or 1910, which is the reason I haven't finished it.
I may need to speak to @ydoethur to hear his thoughts.
As much as I would like this to be true I’m not sure it is. A major factor in the decline of the Liberals was the emergence of a party which could better represent one of its core constituencies, unionised labour. Unless a viable party emerges that can win the right of centre, patriotic type of vote then the Tories will always have enough support to remain the official opposition.
Incidentally I’ve always thought it was a tragedy that Labour eclipsed the Liberals as the second party because in reality they were much worse at competing with the Conservatives as a party of government. The old Liberal Party could put together a far wider coalition of voters than Labour has ever been able to do with the exception of Blair. We might have been better governed throughout the 20th century if the Tories weren’t quite so electorally dominant.
The Liberals won majorities in 1859 (for a given value of 'Liberal' since the party didn't actually exist until after the election) 1865, and 1868.
Then in 1880 and 1906.
All those elections bar the last have in common that they were fought on a very restricted franchise.
They weren't actually very good at appealing to mass segments of the population. After the 1885 reforms, which widened the franchise to effectively the majority of adult males, they won one overall majority. That was forty years before Labour emerged.
In particular, they were opposed to votes for women because they knew that women were unlikely to vote Liberal in large numbers (with very rare exceptions - 1906 would have been one).
If we went back to a franchise restricted to the top 10-20% by wealth and property that would do more for Liberal prospects than PR would, the typical LD voter now an upper middle class Remainer. Won't happen of course
The far right turn up with other parties on a march against anti-Semitism, but the far left refuse.
In recent years there has been a mass exodus of Jews from France to an extent that makes claims of antisemitism in Britain or under Corbyn seem laughable. (That said, iirc France still has a larger Jewish population than this country.)
Sample: "What I saw [20 years ago as an undergraduate] was a worldview that replaced basic ideas of good and evil with a new rubric: the powerless (good) and the powerful (bad). It replaced lots of things. Colorblindness with race-obsession. Ideas with identity. Debate with denunciation. Persuasion with public shaming. The rule of law with the fury of the mob."
Judging people by the color of their skin, rather than the content of their character.
Give us the strength to show them how to do both now.
I believe the children are our future…….
Teach your children well
Because the DfE certainly fucking won't.
They will “Teach your children…. well….”
I always liked the very French head admin for the Free School my youngest went to.
Her aim was
1) keep the school running. 2) prevent the nut job type of parent from making life hell for the staff. 3) prevent the nut jobs in The System making life hell for the staff.
She is still there - and everyone respects her. God help you if you got on her wrong side….
Interesting how few on here who were critical of the ceasefire marches are willing to condemn far right violence, instead in some cases bending over backwards to distort reality (‘the Met only policed the far right march not the ceasefire march’ or ‘The EDL-types were only trying to get into Whitehall to pay their respects’).
Hypocrisy is hypocrisy, whoever does it.
Really? Have not seen anyone trying to say the right-wing violence is ok, mainly because it wasn't - they were thuggish yobs out for trouble.
Interesting how few on here who were critical of the ceasefire marches are willing to condemn far right violence, instead in some cases bending over backwards to distort reality (‘the Met only policed the far right march not the ceasefire march’ or ‘The EDL-types were only trying to get into Whitehall to pay their respects’).
Hypocrisy is hypocrisy, whoever does it.
No one on PB is excusing the football louts. They were - and I saw them - a bunch of ugly idiots, fulled on beer, weed and 'ooter. I saw one abuse a copper horribly (and escape arrest) - I saw another hurl racist slurs at some Muslim girls. Thoroughly nasty
But they WERE tiny in number, 200-300? And kind of pathetic. Saddos
Across London 300,000 marched, and whatever you think of that march, 300,000 people is impressive and definitely not "pathetic", and is therefore worthy of proportionately more scrutiny
@leon@thekitchencabinet mea culpa, apologies. I was dipping in and picking up on particular messages, including some from both of you.
Now the kids are in bed I’ve read back properly and can see that both of you have definitely called out the far right group, I just missed it.
ETA: and I’ve seen the ‘kill all Jews’ video. Horrific.
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
No we aren't, maybe 6 might have been possible last October, it certainly isn't now.
Given the economic situation and inflation Starmer will face if he becomes PM I certainly wouldn't count on his getting a long honeymoon either
Draw a straight trend line through the Tory support chart on this and think long and hard about where it takes you to by next October.
Around 25-30% of the vote but once Labour are in power they are responsible for the economy
They couldn't possibly do any worse than your incompetents.
Oh they could, inflation going up again, taxes up further, strikes etc
Questions are- how long can Labour field the "clearing up the mess left by the Tories" line? And can they genuinely fix the economy before that excuse wears out?
The Tories managed the “there’s no money left” play for about 7-8 years. They succeeded with “winter of discontent” for about 13 years. I’d say Blair managed to live off “Tory sleaze” and “NHS waiting lists” for a good 9 years too. So I reckon Labour will be able to riff off the Trussterfuck and crumbling Britain for 2 terms.
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
No we aren't, maybe 6 might have been possible last October, it certainly isn't now.
Given the economic situation and inflation Starmer will face if he becomes PM I certainly wouldn't count on his getting a long honeymoon either
Draw a straight trend line through the Tory support chart on this and think long and hard about where it takes you to by next October.
Around 25-30% of the vote but once Labour are in power they are responsible for the economy
They couldn't possibly do any worse than your incompetents.
Oh they could, inflation going up again, taxes up further, strikes etc
Questions are- how long can Labour field the "clearing up the mess left by the Tories" line? And can they genuinely fix the economy before that excuse wears out?
"Don't let the lefties in because they will wreck everything!" has been a Tory battle cry for as long as I can remember so clearly some excuses can last for decades.
And as for the lefties wrecking everything.... I wonder have the Tories noticed the state that they themselves have left the place in?
Moving swiftly on (ahem), is Braverman going to be sacked tomorrow? Next week? Not at all?
What's the PB consensus?
I think I'm on the side of it not happening. I would quite like it to happen however because I think it could precipitate a vonk.
Presume you mean VONC? Not a chance.
Yes. She has more supporters than signatures needed.
He's doing quite well not rising to it when she's clearly longing to be sacked to position herself nicely for the leadership.
Yes but Sunak would clearly win any VONC, so why would Braverman's supporters provoke one at this point?
What supporters? She has at best a dozen of the fruitcake brigade imho who would reliably turn out for her.
As a founder member of the Royal Society For The Protection of The Reputation of Comestibles of a Fruitage Nature I must object to your description of political loons.
Even when covered in a strong but indifferent brandy, and set on fire, political loons remain defiantly inedible. Fruitcake on the other hand…
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
There's a piece in the draft section of the PB servers which says
'Was the 2019 election for the Tories what. 1906* was for the Liberals?'
I may finish it soon.
*or 1910, which is the reason I haven't finished it.
I may need to speak to @ydoethur to hear his thoughts.
As much as I would like this to be true I’m not sure it is. A major factor in the decline of the Liberals was the emergence of a party which could better represent one of its core constituencies, unionised labour. Unless a viable party emerges that can win the right of centre, patriotic type of vote then the Tories will always have enough support to remain the official opposition.
Incidentally I’ve always thought it was a tragedy that Labour eclipsed the Liberals as the second party because in reality they were much worse at competing with the Conservatives as a party of government. The old Liberal Party could put together a far wider coalition of voters than Labour has ever been able to do with the exception of Blair. We might have been better governed throughout the 20th century if the Tories weren’t quite so electorally dominant.
The Liberals won majorities in 1859 (for a given value of 'Liberal' since the party didn't actually exist until after the election) 1865, and 1868.
Then in 1880 and 1906.
All those elections bar the last have in common that they were fought on a very restricted franchise.
They weren't actually very good at appealing to mass segments of the population. After the 1885 reforms, which widened the franchise to effectively the majority of adult males, they won one overall majority. That was forty years before Labour emerged.
In particular, they were opposed to votes for women because they knew that women were unlikely to vote Liberal in large numbers (with very rare exceptions - 1906 would have been one).
If we went back to a franchise restricted to the top 10-20% by wealth and property that would do more for Liberal prospects than PR would, the typical LD voter now an upper middle class Remainer. Won't happen of course
I sometimes like to consider various restricted franchises as a thought-experiment. For example, suppose you restricted the franchise only to people who were parents, on the basis that only parents have a long-term stake in the country? What might be the result?
Would it encourage people to have children a bit earlier, to gain a vote? Aside from the after difference, how differently do childless people vote?
Sample: "What I saw [20 years ago as an undergraduate] was a worldview that replaced basic ideas of good and evil with a new rubric: the powerless (good) and the powerful (bad). It replaced lots of things. Colorblindness with race-obsession. Ideas with identity. Debate with denunciation. Persuasion with public shaming. The rule of law with the fury of the mob."
Judging people by the color of their skin, rather than the content of their character.
"On June 7, 2020, the Times editorial page editor, James Bennet, resigned after more than 1,000 staffers signed a letter protesting his publication of an op-ed[27] by U.S. Senator Tom Cotton saying that since "rioters have plunged many American cities into anarchy," soldiers should be sent as backup for the police to end the violence. Bennet later stated he had not read the op-ed beforehand.[48] Weiss characterized the internal controversy as an ongoing "civil war" between what she called young "social justice warriors" and what she identified as older "free speech advocate" staffers.[48][49][50] This characterization was disputed by some other journalists and opinion writers at the Times; Taylor Lorenz, a technology reporter who covers internet culture, described it as a "willful misrepresentation" that ignored the numerous older staffers who had spoken out, while Jamal Jordan, the Times' digital storytelling editor, criticized her for not listening to her black colleagues and instead dismissing their concerns as a "woke civil war"." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bari_Weiss
Sample: "What I saw [20 years ago as an undergraduate] was a worldview that replaced basic ideas of good and evil with a new rubric: the powerless (good) and the powerful (bad). It replaced lots of things. Colorblindness with race-obsession. Ideas with identity. Debate with denunciation. Persuasion with public shaming. The rule of law with the fury of the mob."
Judging people by the color of their skin, rather than the content of their character.
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
No we aren't, maybe 6 might have been possible last October, it certainly isn't now.
Given the economic situation and inflation Starmer will face if he becomes PM I certainly wouldn't count on his getting a long honeymoon either
Draw a straight trend line through the Tory support chart on this and think long and hard about where it takes you to by next October.
Around 25-30% of the vote but once Labour are in power they are responsible for the economy
They couldn't possibly do any worse than your incompetents.
Oh they could, inflation going up again, taxes up further, strikes etc
Questions are- how long can Labour field the "clearing up the mess left by the Tories" line? And can they genuinely fix the economy before that excuse wears out?
"Don't let the lefties in because they will wreck everything!" has been a Tory battle cry for as long as I can remember so clearly some excuses can last for decades.
And as for the lefties wrecking everything.... I wonder have the Tories noticed the state that they themselves have left the place in?
"Each year on Remembrance Sunday, we assemble at the Cenotaph to honour the sacrifice of the fallen and pay tribute to the servicemen & women we place in harm’s way.
Today - as every day - we will remember them. #LestWeForget"
Truss is expected to turn up every year for the rest of her life, and every year everybody is going to ask "Who is that and why is she there?"
There's an old joke about a lawyer who is defending a man accused of killing another man, a boy, and a dog. The defendant's lawyer produces the dog, and tells the jury they must acquit.
It is distressing how often educated people will base a general argument on a single example.
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
No we aren't, maybe 6 might have been possible last October, it certainly isn't now.
Given the economic situation and inflation Starmer will face if he becomes PM I certainly wouldn't count on his getting a long honeymoon either
Draw a straight trend line through the Tory support chart on this and think long and hard about where it takes you to by next October.
Around 25-30% of the vote but once Labour are in power they are responsible for the economy
They couldn't possibly do any worse than your incompetents.
Oh they could, inflation going up again, taxes up further, strikes etc
Questions are- how long can Labour field the "clearing up the mess left by the Tories" line? And can they genuinely fix the economy before that excuse wears out?
"Don't let the lefties in because they will wreck everything!" has been a Tory battle cry for as long as I can remember so clearly some excuses can last for decades.
And as for the lefties wrecking everything.... I wonder have the Tories noticed the state that they themselves have left the place in?
Now I'm craving a remake of the Yellow Pages advert with the French Polisher....
"Each year on Remembrance Sunday, we assemble at the Cenotaph to honour the sacrifice of the fallen and pay tribute to the servicemen & women we place in harm’s way.
Today - as every day - we will remember them. #LestWeForget"
Truss is expected to turn up every year for the rest of her life, and every year everybody is going to ask "Who is that and why is she there?"
"Each year on Remembrance Sunday, we assemble at the Cenotaph to honour the sacrifice of the fallen and pay tribute to the servicemen & women we place in harm’s way.
Today - as every day - we will remember them. #LestWeForget"
Truss is expected to turn up every year for the rest of her life, and every year everybody is going to ask "Who is that and why is she there?"
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
No we aren't, maybe 6 might have been possible last October, it certainly isn't now.
Given the economic situation and inflation Starmer will face if he becomes PM I certainly wouldn't count on his getting a long honeymoon either
Draw a straight trend line through the Tory support chart on this and think long and hard about where it takes you to by next October.
Around 25-30% of the vote but once Labour are in power they are responsible for the economy
They couldn't possibly do any worse than your incompetents.
Oh they could, inflation going up again, taxes up further, strikes etc
Questions are- how long can Labour field the "clearing up the mess left by the Tories" line? And can they genuinely fix the economy before that excuse wears out?
"Don't let the lefties in because they will wreck everything!" has been a Tory battle cry for as long as I can remember so clearly some excuses can last for decades.
And as for the lefties wrecking everything.... I wonder have the Tories noticed the state that they themselves have left the place in?
Amazing how we have pretty much all gone through a sequence since the 2019 GE of:
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority. 2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time. 3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament. 4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority. 5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
There's a piece in the draft section of the PB servers which says
'Was the 2019 election for the Tories what. 1906* was for the Liberals?'
I may finish it soon.
*or 1910, which is the reason I haven't finished it.
I may need to speak to @ydoethur to hear his thoughts.
As much as I would like this to be true I’m not sure it is. A major factor in the decline of the Liberals was the emergence of a party which could better represent one of its core constituencies, unionised labour. Unless a viable party emerges that can win the right of centre, patriotic type of vote then the Tories will always have enough support to remain the official opposition.
Incidentally I’ve always thought it was a tragedy that Labour eclipsed the Liberals as the second party because in reality they were much worse at competing with the Conservatives as a party of government. The old Liberal Party could put together a far wider coalition of voters than Labour has ever been able to do with the exception of Blair. We might have been better governed throughout the 20th century if the Tories weren’t quite so electorally dominant.
The Liberals won majorities in 1859 (for a given value of 'Liberal' since the party didn't actually exist until after the election) 1865, and 1868.
Then in 1880 and 1906.
All those elections bar the last have in common that they were fought on a very restricted franchise.
They weren't actually very good at appealing to mass segments of the population. After the 1885 reforms, which widened the franchise to effectively the majority of adult males, they won one overall majority. That was forty years before Labour emerged.
In particular, they were opposed to votes for women because they knew that women were unlikely to vote Liberal in large numbers (with very rare exceptions - 1906 would have been one).
If we went back to a franchise restricted to the top 10-20% by wealth and property that would do more for Liberal prospects than PR would, the typical LD voter now an upper middle class Remainer. Won't happen of course
I sometimes like to consider various restricted franchises as a thought-experiment. For example, suppose you restricted the franchise only to people who were parents, on the basis that only parents have a long-term stake in the country? What might be the result?
Would it encourage people to have children a bit earlier, to gain a vote? Aside from the after difference, how differently do childless people vote?
That's an interesting thought experiment.
I think it would be quite similar to the way things work now with the grey vote. Only instead of the Tories pandering to pensioners at the expense of the rest of us, you'd have the main parties tripping over each other to offer parent-friendly policies.
People like me, childless by choice, would probably just leave the country, on the basis of a) being disenfranchised and b) seeing an increasing amount of our taxes being spent on things we don't use in ways we can't change. The tax take and population may actually shrink as a result.
Then you have people who are childless through infertility. People literally born without a vote. That's before getting into the complexities of gay people, transgender people, etc.
I'm not sure I would want to live in a parent-ocracy. At least with a gerontocracy, I can guarantee I'm going to get old (or won't be around to care).
If you want to raise birth rates, I'd do it with tax breaks. An additional 10% off your taxes for every additional child. Pop ten out and never pay tax again! Breed for Britain, etc...
"Each year on Remembrance Sunday, we assemble at the Cenotaph to honour the sacrifice of the fallen and pay tribute to the servicemen & women we place in harm’s way.
Today - as every day - we will remember them. #LestWeForget"
Traumatic amnesia. I find it difficult to remember her. I was watching something about the Queen's death on YouTube and was slightly taken aback when Truss spoke outside No 10. I know she was PM, and I agree with @Luckyguy1983 that she had a consistent approach that addressed the issue (whilst disagreeing it would work in 2022/3), but other than the bald facts she begins to slip away. I remember she had an awkward manner and unfortunate voice, but other than that... um?
Immutable truths have not ceased to be so because it's 2022/3. Overtax and overregulate and economic activity will diminish. This was observed by Adam Smith, and was true long before him, and is true to this day.
"Each year on Remembrance Sunday, we assemble at the Cenotaph to honour the sacrifice of the fallen and pay tribute to the servicemen & women we place in harm’s way.
Today - as every day - we will remember them. #LestWeForget"
Truss is expected to turn up every year for the rest of her life, and every year everybody is going to ask "Who is that and why is she there?"
Comments
I presume Boris is moonlighting as Doc Brown in the BTTF stage production.
It's what social media can funnel you to these days.
The problem is those kind of people are there to have a fair minded debate. I would say that the likes of the stop antisemitism twitter accounts are highly effective, where they collate footage of people and ensure the relevant authorities are made aware.
Maybe this is wrong. Maybe far left now include lots of chancers who have no real desire for a better or more moral world but just want their faction to be top dog.
Re the events of yesterday, the great mass of the population don't attend or support either group of demonstrators. Maybe no-one (except the great Peter Tatchell) was there to represent support for all good people and opposition to all bad people.
He's so disorganised, it is what was inevitable about his premiership unravelling.
1. Labour will take at least two elections to demolish that 80 seat majority.
2. The Tories may struggle to maintain a clear majority next time.
3. We could be heading for a Labour-led hung parliament.
4. We could be heading for a small Labour majority.
5. We could be heading for a 1997-style Labour landslide...
... and we're now edging into:
6. The Tories might not even be the official opposition!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_next_United_Kingdom_general_electionhttps://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/fcgi-bin/usercode.py?scotcontrol=Y&CON=23&LAB=52&LIB=11&Reform=2&Green=3&UKIP=&TVCON=&TVLAB=&TVLIB=&TVReform=&TVGreen=&TVUKIP=&SCOTCON=19.5&SCOTLAB=33.5&SCOTLIB=5.5&SCOTReform=1&SCOTGreen=2.5&SCOTUKIP=&SCOTNAT=34&display=AllChanged&regorseat=(none)&boundary=2019base
'Was the 2019 election for the Tories what. 1906* was for the Liberals?'
I may finish it soon.
*or 1910, which is the reason I haven't finished it.
I may need to speak to @ydoethur to hear his thoughts.
The left wing as a concept comes from the pre-revolutionary French parliament. Left wing means reformists, people who want to change and modernise.
That’s why islamofascism is a thing, and also why the Soviet Union was for most (all?) of its life essentially conservative.
As a PM he was like Theresa May.
Admittedly a lot of the Brexit process makes more sense if you admit the possibility that our chief negotiator was permanently sloshed on Scotch at the time.
And yet, they said nothing.
It's all words. All about social proof. All performative. Nothing of substance.
And it's very very scary.
Teach our kids moral courage.
Give us the strength to show them how to do both now.
Given the economic situation and inflation Starmer will face if he becomes PM I certainly wouldn't count on his getting a long honeymoon either
But we’ve all seen people standing back filming on their mobile and doing nothing in situations where more urgent intervention is needed.
More cheerfully.
Thousands gathered in Paris today to stand in solidarity with the Jewish community, in the wake of an alarming rise of antisemitism.
Thank you ❤️🇫🇷
https://twitter.com/eurojewcong/status/1723729491350978950
For most Lib Dems, the Southwark and Bermondsey by-election is the greatest single source of shame for the party. More than the coalition or tuition fees, or not bothering with new nuclear power.
Sorry, Peter.
Has he gone gray ?
Eg, in normal centre ground politics 'right' can signify both a strong belief in free trade and globalisation and also its opposite, protectionism and localism.
IslamISM (not Islam) is as close to pure Fascism as it is possible to find, these days. The only difference from the classic definition is that The Faithful have replaced The Nation, but it makes no difference to the observation
Everything else is there. The cult of the leader, the worship of violence, the adoration of war, the reverence for valour, the misogyny and patriarchy, the notable homophobia, the insistence on procreation, the jailing of women in the home, the disdain for democracy, the contempt for the other, the outsiders, the minorities - anyone not of The Faithful...
Which makes it so profoundly bizarre that the Crank Left makes common cause with Islamism, do they not even notice how fascist it is? Andrew Tate has noticed
https://dailybusinessgroup.co.uk/2015/12/european-court-rules-against-minimum-pricing-of-alcohol/
https://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/fp/news/uk/939293/dont-turn-back-eu-says-frost/
https://scotchwhisky.com/magazine/latest-news/11540/swa-urged-to-abandon-minimum-pricing-fight/
He's doing quite well not rising to it when she's clearly longing to be sacked to position herself nicely for the leadership.
Mostly because I remember developing a BoJo=Samson theory.
He's not coming back.
I think I'd want 50/1 though.
In retrospect I wish I'd said to the driver "These are queue-jumpers and I've taken your number and will report you if you let them jump the queue." But, as you say, I was too British and merely stared in horror. As the cab drove off, I said to the girl, "I'm so sorry" and she smiled and said "Is all right." But still...
In your case, though, with no direct target, I'd still ignore the shouter, as I would any drunk or loony. The same would apply if she was shouting "Death to all Labour supporters" or something else that I felt affected me. Can't be bothered to argue the toss with a random nutter.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-67378893
The far right turn up with other parties on a march against anti-Semitism, but the far left refuse.
I don't believe you would calmly do nothing. You would at least be deeply conflicted, as would I
Perhaps our cowardice/British reserve would overcome us, as you say (delete as appropriate). I hope I would be a little braver, but I am not sure...
The brute fact it was a woman shouting "death to all Jews" would probably help, as I wouldn't be scared of getting my face smashed in if I told her to shut up
Incidentally I’ve always thought it was a tragedy that Labour eclipsed the Liberals as the second party because in reality they were much worse at competing with the Conservatives as a party of government. The old Liberal Party could put together a far wider coalition of voters than Labour has ever been able to do with the exception of Blair. We might have been better governed throughout the 20th century if the Tories weren’t quite so electorally dominant.
And the Liberal performance in both elections in 1910 was underwhelming. Much more comparable to 2017.
If you are looking for a situation where a storming victory was followed by disappearance I would suggest the Whigs in 1837. Having got what they wanted by parliamentary reform and kept locking out their unelectable opponents, the Whigs had run out of ideas and never actually won another majority in their own strength (contrary to what Wikipedia claims about the 1857 election). In the end were forced to merge with two other parties.
Sample: "What I saw [20 years ago as an undergraduate] was a worldview that replaced basic ideas of good and evil with a new rubric: the powerless (good) and the powerful (bad). It replaced lots of things. Colorblindness with race-obsession. Ideas with identity. Debate with denunciation. Persuasion with public shaming. The rule of law with the fury of the mob."
Judging people by the color of their skin, rather than the content of their character.
Having such heterodox ideas forced her to leave the NYT. In spite of her ticking several "diversity" boxes.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bari_Weiss
In France too Macron's liberal En Marche have proved rather more effective electorally than the French Socialists
0. Boris might even increase his majority at the next election.
It made sense to me at the time!
Fortunately for the Conservatives, ReformUK, while on the rise, are still a long way from the voteshare they would need to overtake them as the main party of the right, as Labour gradually overtook the Liberals as the main party of the left in the early 20th century
Then in 1880 and 1906.
All those elections bar the last have in common that they were fought on a very restricted franchise.
They weren't actually very good at appealing to mass segments of the population. After the 1885 reforms, which widened the franchise to effectively the majority of adult males, they won one overall majority. That was forty years before Labour emerged.
In particular, they were opposed to votes for women because they knew that women were unlikely to vote Liberal in large numbers (with very rare exceptions - 1906 would have been one).
Is happening to me
I found the greatest love of all
Inside of me
The greatest love of all
Is easy to achieve
Learning to love yourself
It is the greatest love of all 🎶
Never had you down as a Whitney fan CR
With hindsight it does.
NYT covering Hillary Clinton’s “deplorables” remark vs NYT covering Donald Trump’s “vermin” remark.
https://twitter.com/TUSK81/status/1723544091341062582
I always liked the very French head admin for the Free School my youngest went to.
Her aim was
1) keep the school running.
2) prevent the nut job type of parent from making life hell for the staff.
3) prevent the nut jobs in The System making life hell for the staff.
She is still there - and everyone respects her. God help you if you got on her wrong side….
Now the kids are in bed I’ve read back properly and can see that both of you have definitely called out the far right group, I just missed it.
ETA: and I’ve seen the ‘kill all Jews’ video. Horrific.
Over to you Rishi...
And as for the lefties wrecking everything....
Even when covered in a strong but indifferent brandy, and set on fire, political loons remain defiantly inedible. Fruitcake on the other hand…
Would it encourage people to have children a bit earlier, to gain a vote? Aside from the after difference, how differently do childless people vote?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bari_Weiss
His veterans day message.
https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1723743778341560404
Hitler adjacent.
The NYT has a very long history of seriously bad calls.
https://www.nytimes.com/1924/12/21/archives/hitler-tamed-by-prison-released-on-parole-he-is-expected-to-return.html
It is distressing how often educated people will base a general argument on a single example.
https://youtu.be/iKb3J9mctlo
Rishi as the floppy haired guy, Truss as the "Who's she?" girl.
Except the final scene is a messy house.
HAPPY RESHUFFLE EVE?
💥Grid empty (ht @MrHarryCole )
💥Whitehall officials apparently “preparing” for change
💥Ministers plotting/panicking/packing
💥Tipped by colleagues for chop inc Barclay, Coffey “and Suella obviously”
💥No10 tonight:🤐
Can’t wait…
I think it would be quite similar to the way things work now with the grey vote. Only instead of the Tories pandering to pensioners at the expense of the rest of us, you'd have the main parties tripping over each other to offer parent-friendly policies.
People like me, childless by choice, would probably just leave the country, on the basis of a) being disenfranchised and b) seeing an increasing amount of our taxes being spent on things we don't use in ways we can't change. The tax take and population may actually shrink as a result.
Then you have people who are childless through infertility. People literally born without a vote. That's before getting into the complexities of gay people, transgender people, etc.
I'm not sure I would want to live in a parent-ocracy. At least with a gerontocracy, I can guarantee I'm going to get old (or won't be around to care).
If you want to raise birth rates, I'd do it with tax breaks. An additional 10% off your taxes for every additional child. Pop ten out and never pay tax again! Breed for Britain, etc...