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Britain Trump: Could it happen here? – politicalbetting.com
Britain Trump: Could it happen here? – politicalbetting.com
President Donald Trump late yesterday said he may consider rejoining the World Health Organization — days after signing an executive order announcing America's intention to leave.
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In our system the leader/PM is always vulnerable in the way that a President simply isn't.
And by the way Incitatus was way more qualified to be Health Secretary than RFK. Not even close.
I surmise that we lacked smart, evil fcukers (sorry Dom) and a project 2025 to back up the limited abilities of BJ.
USDA inspector general escorted out of office after defying Trump order
If we did get a PM like Trump it would be Farage but even then polls suggest that would only be with Tory support in a hung parliament at most. The House of Lords where the vast majority are appointed anti Reform peers could also delay his legislation unlike the elected Republican Senate majority which backs Trump like the US House.
Thank god we also have our King as it could even be President Farage otherwise
When he announced withdrawal his big issue was that the US paid $500m and China paid something like $30m and that “wasn’t fair”.
I can see him rejoining if the WHO accept parity of payments with China and the US either increasing China’s bill or slashing the US bill.
Then Trump can tell the public that he got them a good deal. He made a great deal. The WHO needs him so much they accepted his amazing deal. And he screwed China.
Rome and the Greek City States relied hugely upon conventions/gentlemens’ agreements, for their constitutions to function. Power was dispersed, checks and balances existed. You served your term in office, retired to the backbenches, then a few years later, sought election to higher office. If you proposed legislation, and a large majority of your peers disliked it, you backed off, or amended it.
But, populist strongmen realised that conventions provided no legal barrier to stop them from doing what they wanted. So they smashed those conventions, while keeping the outward form of their constitutions in place. And eventually, they and their opponents resorted to violence.
Getting all candidates to sign a pre-emptive resignation letter as a condition of standing?
Thanks for the stunning insight that the attacks are being performed by Ukraine. Until you said, I had thought that American F35s were doing it.
As you well know, the Ukrainians have been operating under relatively strict rules of engagement. I was following the 2024 attacks on Russian refining assets and capacity impacts closely. Seemed clear to me at the time the order was that it was ok to impede surplus capacity to reduce exports but the line was to ensure Russia would not become a net importer of refined products. Something’s changed in the last fortnight, I wonder what it could be…
As for arms, it is by now obvious to all with a passing interest in this conflict that the Sullivan wing’s mindset was ascendant since autumn 2022. The MAGA Congress block last year was a gift to them, because it gave them a bogeyman to blame, when they had little intention of promptly sending the kit Zelensky was asking for anyway. Z himself railed against this in Oct 2024.
I am cautiously optimistic that Ukraine might achieve a lasting peace in the next 12 months, far more so than I was last summer.
When people compare Boris to Trump they are letting Trump off lightly, there are more apt comparisons for Trump.
https://x.com/heraldscotland/status/1885795259369783676?s=61&t=LYVEHh2mqFy1oUJAdCfe-Q
Hypothesis: a fearty, vow breaking, Tory-lite Labour government is as damaging to the Union as a Johnson-led Tory one. Worse in a way as the ‘if only you vote for us progressives things will be better’ appeal is entirely gone.
I am sure my musings are full of errors as I am no Constitutional lawyer, and wasn't it Caligula who proposed his horse for the role?
Our own government's are increasingly prone to governing by perogative powers rather than legislation. Even when using legislative powers they very often give only cursory time for debate in the house, for example the Assisted Dying Bill.
Both major parties want to greatly restrict judicial review too.
The fact that the charismatic charlatan I have in mind was a lazy, feckless grifter negated any seriously dangerous abuse of power, but in wrong hands the results could be incendiary. The media were fully on board with whatever our charismatic charlatan said or did, until it turned out his message wasn't as forthright (particularly on immigration) as theirs. In the future if our charismatic charlatan for the future stays on message they will be fine (which makes it likely our Dictatorship will come exclusively from the right). We even had the highly educated PB cohort defending the indefensible "he is just an amiable clown genius, move along, nothing to see". Maybe next time the defence will be one of " he/ she is just a dangerous, cruel tyrant, but he/she likes us and they don't like the people we don't like, move along, nothing to see"
It’s called “The Belgrano Diary” produced by the London Review of books and its quite chunky, 6 episodes over just under 6 hours but a brilliant insight into the events leading up to and after the sinking of the Belgrano (unsurprisingly given the title.)
It’s based on the diary of the supply officer on Conqueror which were leaked and seized on by Tam Dalyell (he published ten articles in the LRB which is prob why they produced the podcast).
Am two hours in but it’s fascinating hearing the parliamentary debate clips with Thatcher, Foot, Enoch Powell all sounding like grown-ups and highlighting how poor our current politicians debate.
V interesting listening to the diaries of the preparations and travel to the Falklands of Conqueror, the stalking of the Belgrano, the sinking. Interviews with crew of Conqueror and a survivor from the Belgrano.
Anyway, thought I would recommend it and post a link so everyone with apple products can easily listen via Apple Podcasts.
https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-belgrano-diary/id1736951748
A dangerously incompetent and off-the-wall government could come from Farage and Reform. Or the Left reasserting control over Labour.
One fascinating snippet in that piece:
"When asked how they would vote if a Westminster election was held tomorrow, of the 1,334 people questioned by Find Out Now between 15 and 20 January, 31% said SNP, while 18% said Labour.
They were only just ahead of Reform who are on 17%."
Yes, Labour in Scotland are only ONE POINT ahead of Reform, at Westminster
Same with his trade tariffs, crazy as they are some financial commentators support them.
A sea-change in British politics, and one, I think, that we can all applaud. As we unite, as a nation, behind Big Nige
However the weak link in your chain is the loyalty of the party. The Republicans kneel because they are afraid of being voted out in the next primary. That’s far harder to do in the UK - the individual constituency parties are separate, the central mechanism is clunky and has consequences (sack enough MPs and you lose your majority) and money is restricted.
Without fear or loyalty, the MPs would quickly kick this leader out (that’s what happened with Truss - it was her lack of internal support not the media that did for her)
I'm sure that there are other fiddle factors and bits to the calculation, but the actual basic assessed numbers for 24/25 are China $180m vs USA $260m.
https://www.who.int/publications/m/item/assessed-contributions-payable-summary-2024-2025
And when one's interlocutor is a BS-artist, it's difficult to do anything.
Does Trump have the right to do many of his executive orders? If not then who can legally apply the brakes?
The same applies here with government increasingly by Statutory Instrument rather than primary legislation. I understand that our commitment to Net Zero was by SI for example rather than debate and vote in Parliament.
Increasingly we have an executive government, with fairly cursory legislative oversight.
Johnson's fate also shows the British system having I think a bit more resistance to a Trump-like figure. Conservative MPs got rid of him, in a way that isn't really possible with a US president. The lack of primaries means that political parties are stronger (a good thing imo), and the relatively smaller role of money in UK politics (you don't need tems/hundreds of millions to win an election) I think gives politicians more chance to be somewhat principled.
Of course, if Conservative MPs had thought that Johnson was an electoral asset they probably wouldn't have dumped him, and there is perhaps little to stop a popular prime minister with a loyal parliamentary majority bending the rules, and breaking the conventions.
Yes it could happen, but somehow it never has.
I've always viewed Jewish people as successful in business, partly because of the long term, cautious nature of the community, and the values of the religion taken (typically) into business. But when I started tracking surveys of antisemitism in political movements 15 or so years ago done by bodies such as the CST it came to my attention that some would view that as an antisemitic trope. To me it's actually a huge compliment, and a statement of admiration.
A similar one might be how the Labour adverts against Michael Howard * (swinging a stopwatch, and as the head no a flying pig) were characterised as anti-semitic by the Conservatives at the time. Even if there is no basis it is possible to land in "if you're having to explain, you're losing" elephant traps before you realise. Sometimes the tactical error is being in a place where an explanation is needed. My photo quota is the "Fagin" one:
A further two-interpretations one was around Corbyn. I think that he tipped over into antisemitic language in his over-enthusiasm to attack Israel and rather desperare defences of himself (eg around the cemetery visit), and some of his allies were off the wall imo. But OTOH Jewish groups attacking him were putting around phrases such as "self-hating Jew" for his supporters. Anti-Corbyns were the Jewish Labour Movement; pros were the Jewish Voice for Labour.
It's all complex.
* https://www.theguardian.com/media/2005/feb/01/politics.advertising
Fundamentally he’s a bully. What he wants he takes (I’d include rape within this, for example). Without caring about the wishes of the other party or the consequences of his action.
Unity is the only way to face him down
It’s like that first tiny, elusive, fugitive glimpse of spring in - yes - early February. When the sun suddenly feels a little bit warmer on your sorrowing face, and you turn your eyes towards it and you faintly smile, and realise: Yes, someday even this winter will end
It is faraway in the future; and yet it is now on the horizon; a precious promise to our children of better times to come
REFORM
But as we have repeatedly seen the rules of the parties are one thing but ultimately the Cabinet can bring them down as we saw with Boris.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/feb/02/heathrow-expansion-puts-the-government-on-the-flight-path-to-years-of-trouble-and-strife?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other
Reeves' motive for putting Heathrow expansion as the main feature of her speech could be:
1) To enhance her brand as Rawnsley suggests. The iron lady. Never mind the issue but make the measure of success way beyond your likely tenure. Cynical politics.
2) She really believes the economic case. The economic case she refers to was commissioned by Heathrow and will contain assumptions provided by Heathrow on the economy and enviroment. It will be trashed and so will she. Naive politics.
I'm torn between the two possible explanations but tend towards 1). Surely she can't be that naive!
Rather than picking a single target for his trade wars (e.g. China, or Panama) that he can bully into concessions, he is on the path to applying tariffs to nearly everyone. Canada, Mexico and China today, but almost certainly the EU (big trade deficit) and others soon after.
The rational response to this is that everyone does targeted retaliatory tariffs back, as Canada has already announced. Which means Trump will increase the US tariffs. And then rest of the world theirs. Etc etc.
The end result is other countries displace the US in their supply chains with each other. And the US brings manufacturing back home. But that will take time, and be at a higher cost for consumers.
Remember this is a man who has bankrupted a casino. It will be his economic incompetence that brings him down. Not his wider failings.
A bit like I wouldn't use the middle name Barack Hussein Obama unless it was relevant.
My understanding is that the coroner has indicated that the full certificate will be released imminently, but I do feel this amounts to an unintended consequence of the new legislation.
Of Lee and Nigel, or Rupert, James and Richard
SAVIOURS of the nation, archangels of a new and glitt'ry British firmament. Reaching out across the silver sea, to our mighty cousin Donald
UNITED
Reform are a serious danger to Labour as well as the Conservatives and the sort of things Labour to Reform swingers like, such as repatriation of foreigners and the hanging of nonces isn't really in the DNA of any Labour government, so they do have a problem.
Election in 2028, Nigel in Number Ten
IT'S HAPPENING
We'll see. Time will tell. It always does...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mendelssohn_(surname)
I’m part Jewish, by the way.
Mandelson got the Prince of Darkness moniker from some Labour people. He was adept at using press leaks of embarrassing information against his opponents, among other things.
It's not a principle this over-cautious government applies elsewhere however, eg on relations with the EU or welfare.
I'm assuming Leon is heavily invested in both markets.
https://x.com/britainelects/status/1885347888705720480?s=46
Worth a read. There are 4 Labour defences of which one would be projected to go Reform in a GE under current polls, a Tory defence which would also be projected to go Reform, and a Lib Dem defence in their Surrey heartland where the movement in Tory vote share will be interesting to watch.
So all things being equal you’d expect 2 Ref pickups next Thursday night, one from each party.
Also, the last time a King dismissed a government on this own initiative was in 1834. The resulting government lasted nine months and was then voted out.
#pedanticbetting.com
It is an interesting point, and I think @StillWaters is a bit optimistic about the ways MPs can avoid a purge (withdrawing the whip eliminates a candidate as Johnson’s purge and to a lesser extent Lloyd Russell Moyle shows). It is true though that such idiots can be quickly got rid of in this country, which a bad President can’t be in the US.
Consider - their convictions had been proven to the world to have been obtained by fraud and repeated, intentional, perjury. But the Justice System, as a whole, refused to do what must be done, in a timely fashion. Too many Good People would be embarrassed, or something.
So Parliament had to vote to overturn the convictions, in a sort of reverse Bill of Attainder.
The Day The Law Died?
Whichever, not sure it will play out for all of them. I wouldn't want to be a Tesla franchise owner in Canada.
One strength of the British system, though, is that it is Parliamentary and manifestly unfit leaders: Johnson, Truss, can be removed quickly. Of course this does require MPs to think for themselves and focus on their duties as representatives rather than as party delegates...
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2024/sep/14/its-nil-nil-labour-warned-the-political-race-with-the-conservatives-isnt-over
Whatever his shortcomings, and they are voluminous, Corbyn actually has a profound belief in democracy, and respects the rule of (UK) law and our unwritten constitution.
They are BITING
https://x.com/WatchdogTh96012/status/1885652589158518947
But who is making them? Anyone know?
Shame no one sold the idea of growing ground nuts in Africa for carbon neutral aviation fuel, to go with it…
Nothing really on closer ties with Europe, taxation on wealth, defence against Trump and Russia and equalising society both socially and geographically.
I said much the same here in March 2020 - ignored by all, sadly.
https://www1.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2020/03/11/political-rights-and-wrongs/
I followed it up here - https://www1.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2020/03/12/amber-warnings-what-might-be-the-signals-that-all-is-not-well-in-a-democracy/
https://www1.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2024/01/11/hobsons-choice-the-subpostmaster-issue/
Digital paralysis is the new lockdown..🧐🥴
https://x.com/Error404GBR
In fact, the Lords' power (to delay but not block) is identical regardless of whether the item is in the manifesto. The thing about the manifesto is just convention, not law.
One thing I am good at is spotting the start of what will turn out to be bloody great scandals or disasters (see the Online Safety Bill, for instance). The Cassandra of PB, that's me.
Blanket tariffs on every single import are ultimately self-defeating: Autarchy is not the route to prosperity.
https://www.thetimes.com/comment/columnists/article/trumps-scapegoating-threatens-the-entire-basis-of-aviation-safety-5hnp98030
The 3 key points:
1. "the most beautiful thing about aviation’s safety culture is that the cardinal sin is not to make a mistake (since we all do) but to fail to report it."
2. "How will they feel about being open and honest when .... their testimony might be surgically removed from context and weaponised by competing sides......? Let me suggest that the result will be a movement away from openness and learning and towards secrecy and concealment."
And finally this -
3. "As one put it: “How can investigators do their job objectively when they know that if their findings don’t conform to what Trump wants to hear, they might be publicly rebuked?”"
Discouraging the reporting of problems, encouraging concealment and dishonesty and believing what you want to be true so that you do not get told the truth are at the heart of all scandals. If this happens in aviation people will die.
Psychopathy is a neuropsychiatric disorder marked by deficient emotional responses, lack of empathy, and poor behavioral controls, commonly resulting in persistent antisocial deviance and criminal behavior.
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4321752/#:~:text=Abstract,antisocial deviance and criminal behavior.
When you understand that, a lot of what he says and does becomes a lot more explicable.
https://open.spotify.com/track/7t5a28dyiW0JajSQ3CFuzg?si=410wfkDNShm5gLVVjaVmtw
Draw your own conclusions, but Donald Trump is not behaving like a leader who expects democratic accountability for himself or his party next year or in 2028.
Cummings was not personally stuffing BoZo's pockets with gold.
I think Trump runs the risk of a) countries ganging up against the US and b) others turning to China
https://x.com/mattzeitlin/status/1885848056437919936
Am i the only one who sees the vision here?
1. Mass layoffs in the government and nonprofit sector
2. Tariffs on our biggest agricultural trade partners
3. Mass deportation of the agricultural workforce
It seems pretty obvious he is has a narcissistic personality disorder. Adjudicating the borderline between that and psychopath is for the professionals.
Old Heathrow would become a Canary Wharf west - built a new city on the site.
Properly managed, it would pay for itself.
Chunk £22 billion into delivering usable bio-fuel. As in subsidies for actual delivery of usable quantities at usable prices.
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12h
Trump is running the country like a business. Unfortunately, he’s running it like one of his businesses.
Those end in fraud, lawsuits, and bankruptcy.
Certainly, English lacks words to describe spiritual states, perhaps because the British/English are a pragmatic, empirical people not given to religious passons, and when we do - the Reformation - it goes horribly wrong. Thus the language reflects its creators?
Consider all the many words for different kinds of snow, in Inuit; if we constantly experienced spiritual moments the way Greenlanders experience snow, we'd likely have a better lexicon to differentiate these raptures and miseries
Noom is one attempt to fill the gap
Firstly, we have a Parliamentary system, not a Presidential system. That means that, at any time, 326 MPs can vote to dismiss the Prime Minister. That's a safeguard that simply doesn't exist in the American system, which is why Presidential systems naturally tend towards dictatorship, while Parliamentary systems can be prone to paralysis (see the French Fourth Republic and Italy for the stereotypical examples of that). Impeachment is a constraint, but a pale shadow of what we have.
Secondly, we have a tradition of peaceful evolution and democratic practices unequalled in the world, with a couple of insignificant exceptions (Switzerland and Iceland). While historians no longer like looking at our history solely as the inevitable triumph of the Parliamentary system and representative democracy, there is no doubt that history is a hugely important constraint here. Left-wingers undermine respect for our history, or to pretend that democracy is a sham for the exploitation of the poor/blacks/trans people/fashionable minority du jour, but I've never got the feeling that they really believe it. Americans do not understand or celebrate history the way old world societies do (an American friend once told me that the best thing about the past is that it's over), so this constraint does not operate in the same way there. But insofar as they do, they glorify violence and revolution rather than peaceful evolution - one of the most famous political quotes there is Jefferson's moronic saying about how a little rebellion now and again is a good thing.
While our system does not make it easy for authoritarians, however, there are two circumstances in which one could gain some traction.
Firstly, paralysis, like we saw between 2016 and 2019, when the government was unable to implement the will of the people, expressed in the largest democratic vote for anything in the country's history. The public was astonishing patient, but if that had continued much longer, we could easily have seen a loss of confidence in the political system, leading to some kind of authoritarian. The answer to this is that governments respond to the will of the people if directly expressed in a referendum, which after all the government held in the first place.
Secondly, a continued stagnation or decline in living standards. The answer to this is to implement policies that basic economics says deliver growth - low taxes, low spending and light regulation.
A responsive, economically literate government then is the best answer to the Trumps or Corbyns of this world. And a clueless, out-of-touch, arrogant, economically illiterate government is their best friend.
Oh shit maybe we're in more trouble than I thought ...
Genius plan, definitely no risk.
In today's politics, Starmer is not a change candidate - his Government is largely turbocharging all of Sunak's shittest policies. As the world goes right, Starmer's Government is a last redoubt of crappy Davos social democracy, with no solutions to today's problems. The rightward insurgency is Reform. And the Tories (so far) are the mushy middle, because they can't decide what they think.
So (as I think someone said on the Planet Normal pocast, it's not my original thought) Starmer is more like Jim Callaghan, coming in after a profligate Tory Government, but not having any solutions (at least none he can implement) due to being the Labour Party. He then gets swept away by a right wing insurgency. At the moment, the Tories don't want to be that, so it's a clear field for Reform.
For a start, by the time of the next election there will be 13 years worth of voters who didn't vote in 2016.
Also, if the public decides that Starmer and Labour needs to go, they're going to go for the person best placed to replace him, regardless of their plan for power - just like when they decided Sunak and the Tories had to go they went for Starmer, regardless of him having none.
The conclusion, therefore, is that people who see Farage as the biggest threat need to ensure that Labour don't collapse before the Tories have sorted themselves out.