I don’t think it will come as a shock to any of us that Bobby J bears a number of the traits of an opportunist, but there is a particular sense of whiplash to seeing him telling us all the Tories are a broken party who destroyed Britain when he was an active member of their frontbench 12 hours ago.
I do wonder if this might be the moment that Farage’s fortunes start to dwindle…. The Tory Reject narrative is starting to take hold….
It would be a funny outcome if successfully securing a high profile defection tipped the scales for people who preferred an impression of insurgent new politics.
Badenoch is already playing the “it shows the party has changed, we’re getting rid of all the bad eggs” card. It’s a bold and high risk move and far from enough, but it gives her a tiny pinch of “detoxification” magic dust that most opposition parties wait years to come into possession of.
When Benedict launched the Ordinariate, it was described as 'give us your racists and your homophobes' by mainstream Anglicans.
Reform is now 'give us your racists, your failures and your crooks.'
Will it go the way of the Ordinariate, I wonder?
To be fair the Ordinariate was more anti women priests and bishops than anything.
Though yes the Tory to Reform path goes most strongly via the hardline anti immigration or Truss backer route
More MPs follow Jenrick over the next few months. Badenoch's authority evaporates. By-elections are bloodbaths with Tories coming third. Donors threaten to pull funding. She survives a confidence vote in spring but 40%+ vote against her.
Then the real madness begins. Truss and her allies start pushing the "I was right all along" narrative - pointing to economic data, claiming the mini-budget was just bad timing. She's been banging on about immigration and culture war stuff since leaving office, so she can credibly say she'd stop the Reform bleeding.
Local elections in May are a disaster. Badenoch quits. Parliamentary party is in full panic mode about extinction. In the rushed leadership contest, Truss becomes the "unity candidate". She’s bold, recognisable, appeals to both traditional Tories and the right wing. Someone steps down so she can get back in the Commons.
Liz Truss is back to "finish what I started.". Labour collapse and a GE is called…somehow (I need to figure that bit out) and hey presto, Liz is back in Parliament, back in Number 10.
Get on that train before it leaves the station. You heard it here first.
Truss is now more likely to lead Reform than the Tories
I've no time for either of them but does seem like Kemi has won this battle of the media briefings.
You mean, a sacking-defection or straightforward defection - which would have been worse? In that other Russell Crowe film, where over dinner on sail ship they are choosing lesser of two weevil’s.
This is Day 1. Whoever has the better Day 1 doesn’t always win a war. Question is what are Tory MPs, councillors, donors, activists and members going to make of it and do in coming days and weeks? Are they going to say, look, the Jenricks of this world can leave saying why he has, but we think the future lies with the Tory party, because.
Will it ultimately lead to more switching to Reform? Will pressure grow to have an alliance with Reform?
Meanwhile professional journalists - the shit stirring bastards - start to probe what efforts were made to keep him. Yes work hard to actually keep him aboard., because Ultimately, if many take Jenrick’s lead, huge defections creating existential threat to the Conservatives, it will be put would it not have been better to have kept him aboard, so was it all down to Kemi’s psychological immaturity and personality flaws she couldn’t?
But, good news, Machado has confirmed she gave her Nobel medal to Trump!
I understand why people are falling over themselves to do this sort of thing. It seems like the way to curry favour. But the collective effect is really pretty dangerous as it feeds Trump's sense of entitlement and you don't want the guy in charge of the world's strongest military to feel that he should have things just because he wants them.
Very much so. Individual nations appeasing him to try and gain the best outcome for themselves means worse outcomes in aggregate and for everbody. Collective resistance would be in the interests of all participants if there were enough of them. This is why Trump and Co are so anti international bodies. If everything boils down to brute force bilaterals between nation states the US will dominate every country in the west and many others besides. And since Trump equates the political with the personal it means HE dominates. No need for values or 'win win' negotiations or alliances or complex sustained diplomacy, just swagger about talking trash and waving your dick around.
I was pretty good academically at 18. But Cambridge never aopealed to this northerner. Reasons I didn't apply to Cambridge (or indeed Oxford): - it wasn't really made explicit the advantages you might get from going there - 'just get a degree'. - it sounded like hard work for no obviously better outcome (see above) - having grown up in Manchester, my perception was that Cambridge wasn't really the most exciting of places (compared to eg Manchester, Sheffield, Newcastle, Edinburgh etc) - it was expensive - I didn't like the way they served the beer - it was very flat
I knew so few genuinely posh people that it didn't even occur to me that people there would be posh and I might not fit in.
Cambridge is now over 70% state educated students. Exeter, UCL, Edinburgh, and Oxford and St Andrews and Imperial and the Royal Agricultural University are posher and indeed Durham now has more posh private school pupils than either Oxford or Cambridge
Quite staggering really. His opponents should hammer him for it. If it were Sir Keir I would be! Why is Farage still doing these videos? I thought they were a thing he did a few years ago when he was more of a tv presenter than politician
BBC News Mason: "[Jenrick joining] is one hell of a coup'
LOL
Farage will go to bed tonight thinking how the fuck did we end up with this 'look at me' social media dead weight albatross
In the real world, people are furious about things like fare dodging, something Jenrick highlighted.
What did he do about any of the hundred things he moans about when he was at the heart of government? Anything positive at all? Just one little morsel?
Why would it be any different if he were in a future Reform cabinet?
But, good news, Machado has confirmed she gave her Nobel medal to Trump!
I understand why people are falling over themselves to do this sort of thing. It seems like the way to curry favour. But the collective effect is really pretty dangerous as it feeds Trump's sense of entitlement and you don't want the guy in charge of the world's strongest military to feel that he should have things just because he wants them.
Very much so. Individual nations appeasing him to try and gain the best outcome for themselves means worse outcomes in aggregate and for everbody. Collective resistance would be in the interests of all participants if there were enough of them. This is why Trump and Co are so anti international bodies. If everything boils down to brute force bilaterals between nation states the US will dominate every country in the west and many others besides. And since Trump equates the political with the personal it means HE dominates. No need for values or 'win win' negotiations or alliances or complex sustained diplomacy, just swagger about talking trash and waving your dick around.
Extorting a nobel prize (or at least the offer) from someone is just gross, and he revels in that.
I was pretty good academically at 18. But Cambridge never aopealed to this northerner. Reasons I didn't apply to Cambridge (or indeed Oxford): - it wasn't really made explicit the advantages you might get from going there - 'just get a degree'. - it sounded like hard work for no obviously better outcome (see above) - having grown up in Manchester, my perception was that Cambridge wasn't really the most exciting of places (compared to eg Manchester, Sheffield, Newcastle, Edinburgh etc) - it was expensive - I didn't like the way they served the beer - it was very flat
I knew so few genuinely posh people that it didn't even occur to me that people there would be posh and I might not fit in.
Cambridge is now over 70% state educated students. Exeter, UCL, Edinburgh, and Oxford and St Andrews and Imperial and the Royal Agricultural University are posher and indeed Durham now has more posh private school pupils than either Oxford or Cambridge
For my sins, I listened to all of Jenrick's defection speech. It can be summarised as: "The country has gone to the dogs and everything is shit (except you Nigel)".
Others have rightly raised the issue of who's responsible for 'broken Britain', But I'm also wondering if people might get a bit sick of people like Jenrick constantly telling us how awful our country now is, finding nothing but misery in our realm. In reality, most people have pretty good, reasonably prosperous lives, and I think they may start getting fed up with being told that they don't. Of course we have challenges, but things aren't that bad.
I don’t think it will come as a shock to any of us that Bobby J bears a number of the traits of an opportunist, but there is a particular sense of whiplash to seeing him telling us all the Tories are a broken party who destroyed Britain when he was an active member of their frontbench 12 hours ago.
I do wonder if this might be the moment that Farage’s fortunes start to dwindle…. The Tory Reject narrative is starting to take hold….
It would be a funny outcome if successfully securing a high profile defection tipped the scales for people who preferred an impression of insurgent new politics.
Badenoch is already playing the “it shows the party has changed, we’re getting rid of all the bad eggs” card. It’s a bold and high risk move and far from enough, but it gives her a tiny pinch of “detoxification” magic dust that most opposition parties wait years to come into possession of.
Yes. I agree with you. It can only be good news and great day for the Conservatives the opportunist Snake has gone.
Jenrick was more open in his racism than Farage, and this was promoting and normalising doubts to the huge success cultural integration has been in the UK, doubts the Conservative Party has never, and will never hold or suggest.
We owe it to Kemi Badenoch, as the stop Jenrick candidate, to have blocked Jenrick from the leaderships most powerful position. But now as TSE explained in the earlier header, this puts Badenoch’s position in question, now she is is no longer blocking the vile and dangerous Jenrick to the right. The right have other fresh faces, far more loyal to Conservative Party values than Robert the Snake, who can throw hat in ring if the next election result is as bad as looks possible. But if Kemi cannot turn the polling around, the threats to remove her this side of the election are now to the left of her, as she can be replaced by an experienced centerist candidate James, Tom or Mel, whose political values are closer to the traditional UK centre ground so bring wider appeal across all the public, and is the party’s best hope of getting best possible result in 2029, hopefully to move us back over 200 seats.
Cleverly is now odds on to be Tory leader if Kemi fails to see the Tories beat Labour in the NEV after the May local elections. Cleverly will be more loyal to Kemi than Jenrick though and if Kemi resigned or lost a VONC Cleverly now likely gets it by coronation
That’s right. And I say what you have posted explains why this is a fantastic day.
And TSE was quick to flag this up in his earlier header. Not just how it changes betting markets, TSE realised the huge danger here for Badenoch, who owes her position to being the stop Jenrick candidate and then stop Jenrick firewall.
Out of James, Tom, Mel and Kemi, who is closest to your own politics? Or are you a Taliban type, whoever is leader is supreme.
Kleptomaniac Trump gets his Nobel Peace Prize afterall. He can display it next to his donated Purple Heart and his purloined FIFA Club World Cup trophy.
I was worried Katie Lam might be next to defect, but she retweeted the video in which Badenoch expelled Jenrick, so I think it must be pretty unlikely.
But, good news, Machado has confirmed she gave her Nobel medal to Trump!
I understand why people are falling over themselves to do this sort of thing. It seems like the way to curry favour. But the collective effect is really pretty dangerous as it feeds Trump's sense of entitlement and you don't want the guy in charge of the world's strongest military to feel that he should have things just because he wants them.
Very much so. Individual nations appeasing him to try and gain the best outcome for themselves means worse outcomes in aggregate and for everbody. Collective resistance would be in the interests of all participants if there were enough of them. This is why Trump and Co are so anti international bodies. If everything boils down to brute force bilaterals between nation states the US will dominate every country in the west and many others besides. And since Trump equates the political with the personal it means HE dominates. No need for values or 'win win' negotiations or alliances or complex sustained diplomacy, just swagger about talking trash and waving your dick around.
Extorting a nobel prize (or at least the offer) from someone is just gross, and he revels in that.
It really is pathetic. The great country of America is being debauched beyond recognition.
For my sins, I listened to all of Jenrick's defection speech. It can be summarised as: "The country has gone to the dogs and everything is shit (except you Nigel)".
Others have rightly raised the issue of who's responsible for 'broken Britain', But I'm also wondering if people might get a bit sick of people like Jenrick constantly telling us how awful our country now is, finding nothing but misery in our realm. In reality, most people have pretty good, reasonably prosperous lives, and I think they may start getting fed up with being told that they don't. Of course we have challenges, but things aren't that bad.
Yes, I was looking after my mum after an operation last week so staying with them. She reads the Telegraph at breakfast and watches GB News at lunchtime. Each is a relentless stream of bile against this country in general and the government in particular. It was pretty painful to sit through but her and my dad have been brainwashed by it. The country is rotten it seems despite them living on a good pension in a nice warm house in the pleasant and prosperous market town of Romsey.
BBC News Mason: "[Jenrick joining] is one hell of a coup'
LOL
Farage will go to bed tonight thinking how the fuck did we end up with this 'look at me' social media dead weight albatross
In the real world, people are furious about things like fare dodging, something Jenrick highlighted.
What did he do about any of the hundred things he moans about when he was at the heart of government? Anything positive at all? Just one little morsel?
Why would it be any different if he were in a future Reform cabinet?
Well, political parties almost by definition believe (or profess to believe) that they will be immune to the kind of non-partisan flaws of factional infighting, incompetents rising too high, and misplaced priorities, that are inherent in the formation of any government, even when they have sufficient historical knowledge and experience to know damn well they will face the same challenges. It's part of the game, and they all agree to pretend, and even switch lines when going in and out of office.
Of course, there is a chance a Reform Cabinet could be better at facing those challenges than the others, and fair enough to paint a rosy picture, but Jenrick's moan about his shadow cabinet colleagues who might not believe Britain is broken as if that is a capital offence, just makes me think he will be disappointed if he thinks all his Reform colleagues will be of one mind about things.
They aren't laying down and taking it enough. Trump thinks they are weak (and compared to America everywhere is), and perhaps he despises that they don't accept how weak they are and just do what the strong (he and Putin) say?
With all this news surrounding Jenrick I was wondering who I despise most. Jenrick, Vance, Hegseth, Miller or Jesse Watters. And I think that is my top five in order finishing with the worst of the worst. Although Miller and Watters was a close call.
I think Labour’s attack lines have become a lot easier after yet another Tory defects.
I know they’re getting a Labourite next week (although I note Farage said “Labour figure” today, not MP). Who could it be?
But the idea this is not just another Tory iteration seems harder and harder to counter.
A Labour figure - any theories?
In the history books, and plays like James Graham‘s This House, Labour MPs and the Union Barons and shop stewards are the most anti semitic, racist, misogynistic MP’s, activists, members and voters of all. This is what working class and Labour people are historically ingrained with.
A list of who is about to and later will don the Reform Nazi uniform will be easy. It should also be a successful betting opportunity for PBers.
I have Blunket top of the list. Alongside Glasman.
Kleptomaniac Trump gets his Nobel Peace Prize afterall. He can display it next to his donated Purple Heart and his purloined FIFA Club World Cup trophy.
Stolen valour. What is the market on Trump a) being impeached for a record third time and b) even completing his term ?
I think the US will lose patience with the mango mafioso well before 2029... unless the Almighty loses patience before then of course.
Quite staggering really. His opponents should hammer him for it. If it were Sir Keir I would be! Why is Farage still doing these videos? I thought they were a thing he did a few years ago when he was more of a tv presenter than politician
Taking a lead from his lodestar across the pond perhaps. The 'not like normal politicians' shtick.
For my sins, I listened to all of Jenrick's defection speech. It can be summarised as: "The country has gone to the dogs and everything is shit (except you Nigel)".
Others have rightly raised the issue of who's responsible for 'broken Britain', But I'm also wondering if people might get a bit sick of people like Jenrick constantly telling us how awful our country now is, finding nothing but misery in our realm. In reality, most people have pretty good, reasonably prosperous lives, and I think they may start getting fed up with being told that they don't. Of course we have challenges, but things aren't that bad.
Yes, I was looking after my mum after an operation last week so staying with them. She reads the Telegraph at breakfast and watches GB News at lunchtime. Each is a relentless stream of bile against this country in general and the government in particular. It was pretty painful to sit through but her and my dad have been brainwashed by it. The country is rotten it seems despite them living on a good pension in a nice warm house in the pleasant and prosperous market town of Romsey.
Strange how when "the left" criticise the Government, they are accused of "talking down Britain" but the Mail, Telegraph and GB News constantly criticise the Government and nobody accuses them of talking the country down.
There are genuine problems, there is relative poverty and a lot which can be done to improve the lives of many of our citizens but, and I heard thisd listening to friends at lunch today, the main topics were Greenland and whether the Freedom Pass in London will be withdrawn oe restricted to travel on buses only.
The complaint from one of my Reform supporting friends was "if Sadiq didn't give free school meals to children, the Freedom Pass could be preserved" When I pointed out the Freedom Pass cost London Councils £372 million and the £3 per meal subsidised by Khan costs £140 million while the Government covers the other costs, she started blustering as Reform supporters often do when faced with facts rather than half truths.
I think Labour’s attack lines have become a lot easier after yet another Tory defects.
I know they’re getting a Labourite next week (although I note Farage said “Labour figure” today, not MP). Who could it be?
But the idea this is not just another Tory iteration seems harder and harder to counter.
A Labour figure - any theories?
In the history books, and plays like James Graham‘s This House, Labour MPs and the Union Barons and shop stewards are the most anti semitic, racist, misogynistic MP’s, activists, members and voters of all. This is what working class and Labour people are historically ingrained with.
A list of who is about to and later will don the Reform Nazi uniform will be easy. It should also be a successful betting opportunity for PBers.
I have Blunket top of the list. Alongside Glasman.
Kleptomaniac Trump gets his Nobel Peace Prize afterall. He can display it next to his donated Purple Heart and his purloined FIFA Club World Cup trophy.
We know who will be first in world to complete Panini World Cup album, if there’s a betting market
Find it interesting that Farage has set a hard deadline of May for any further defections. Could be to set a ticking clock, but also may reflect that having too many switchers from the Cons near to the next GE, may not help Reform with ex lab voters.
Yeah, like if Boris Johnson gave him the nod in June he wouldn't bite his hand off.
For my sins, I listened to all of Jenrick's defection speech. It can be summarised as: "The country has gone to the dogs and everything is shit (except you Nigel)".
Others have rightly raised the issue of who's responsible for 'broken Britain', But I'm also wondering if people might get a bit sick of people like Jenrick constantly telling us how awful our country now is, finding nothing but misery in our realm. In reality, most people have pretty good, reasonably prosperous lives, and I think they may start getting fed up with being told that they don't. Of course we have challenges, but things aren't that bad.
Yes, I was looking after my mum after an operation last week so staying with them. She reads the Telegraph at breakfast and watches GB News at lunchtime. Each is a relentless stream of bile against this country in general and the government in particular. It was pretty painful to sit through but her and my dad have been brainwashed by it. The country is rotten it seems despite them living on a good pension in a nice warm house in the pleasant and prosperous market town of Romsey.
Strange how when "the left" criticise the Government, they are accused of "talking down Britain" but the Mail, Telegraph and GB News constantly criticise the Government and nobody accuses them of talking the country down.
There are genuine problems, there is relative poverty and a lot which can be done to improve the lives of many of our citizens but, and I heard thisd listening to friends at lunch today, the main topics were Greenland and whether the Freedom Pass in London will be withdrawn oe restricted to travel on buses only.
The complaint from one of my Reform supporting friends was "if Sadiq didn't give free school meals to children, the Freedom Pass could be preserved" When I pointed out the Freedom Pass cost London Councils £372 million and the £3 per meal subsidised by Khan costs £140 million while the Government covers the other costs, she started blustering as Reform supporters often do when faced with facts rather than half truths.
I try not to argue politics with my folks, picking up only on the most egrecious falsehoods.
This has been since Brexit, which they voted for while all their children and grandchildren opposed. Its quite sad really as we used to be able to do so.
I think Labour’s attack lines have become a lot easier after yet another Tory defects.
I know they’re getting a Labourite next week (although I note Farage said “Labour figure” today, not MP). Who could it be?
But the idea this is not just another Tory iteration seems harder and harder to counter.
A Labour figure - any theories?
In the history books, and plays like James Graham‘s This House, Labour MPs and the Union Barons and shop stewards are the most anti semitic, racist, misogynistic MP’s, activists, members and voters of all. This is what working class and Labour people are historically ingrained with.
A list of who is about to and later will don the Reform Nazi uniform will be easy. It should also be a successful betting opportunity for PBers.
I have Blunket top of the list. Alongside Glasman.
No chance Blunket. I'm slightly worried about Alan Sugar.
I think Labour’s attack lines have become a lot easier after yet another Tory defects.
I know they’re getting a Labourite next week (although I note Farage said “Labour figure” today, not MP). Who could it be?
But the idea this is not just another Tory iteration seems harder and harder to counter.
A Labour figure - any theories?
In the history books, and plays like James Graham‘s This House, Labour MPs and the Union Barons and shop stewards are the most anti semitic, racist, misogynistic MP’s, activists, members and voters of all. This is what working class and Labour people are historically ingrained with.
A list of who is about to and later will don the Reform Nazi uniform will be easy. It should also be a successful betting opportunity for PBers.
I have Blunket top of the list. Alongside Glasman.
No chance Blunket. I'm slightly worried about Alan Sugar.
It might just be Big Dave, the barman at the Croydon Labour Club.
I think Labour’s attack lines have become a lot easier after yet another Tory defects.
I know they’re getting a Labourite next week (although I note Farage said “Labour figure” today, not MP). Who could it be?
But the idea this is not just another Tory iteration seems harder and harder to counter.
A Labour figure - any theories?
In the history books, and plays like James Graham‘s This House, Labour MPs and the Union Barons and shop stewards are the most anti semitic, racist, misogynistic MP’s, activists, members and voters of all. This is what working class and Labour people are historically ingrained with.
A list of who is about to and later will don the Reform Nazi uniform will be easy. It should also be a successful betting opportunity for PBers.
I have Blunket top of the list. Alongside Glasman.
No chance Blunket. I'm slightly worried about Alan Sugar.
I think Labour’s attack lines have become a lot easier after yet another Tory defects.
I know they’re getting a Labourite next week (although I note Farage said “Labour figure” today, not MP). Who could it be?
But the idea this is not just another Tory iteration seems harder and harder to counter.
A Labour figure - any theories?
In the history books, and plays like James Graham‘s This House, Labour MPs and the Union Barons and shop stewards are the most anti semitic, racist, misogynistic MP’s, activists, members and voters of all. This is what working class and Labour people are historically ingrained with.
A list of who is about to and later will don the Reform Nazi uniform will be easy. It should also be a successful betting opportunity for PBers.
I have Blunket top of the list. Alongside Glasman.
No chance Blunket. I'm slightly worried about Alan Sugar.
I think Labour’s attack lines have become a lot easier after yet another Tory defects.
I know they’re getting a Labourite next week (although I note Farage said “Labour figure” today, not MP). Who could it be?
But the idea this is not just another Tory iteration seems harder and harder to counter.
A Labour figure - any theories?
In the history books, and plays like James Graham‘s This House, Labour MPs and the Union Barons and shop stewards are the most anti semitic, racist, misogynistic MP’s, activists, members and voters of all. This is what working class and Labour people are historically ingrained with.
A list of who is about to and later will don the Reform Nazi uniform will be easy. It should also be a successful betting opportunity for PBers.
I have Blunket top of the list. Alongside Glasman.
No chance Blunket. I'm slightly worried about Alan Sugar.
He won’t switch to them, he’s Jewish.
Well blimey, I never knew Blunket was a convert to the faith.
I think Labour’s attack lines have become a lot easier after yet another Tory defects.
I know they’re getting a Labourite next week (although I note Farage said “Labour figure” today, not MP). Who could it be?
But the idea this is not just another Tory iteration seems harder and harder to counter.
A Labour figure - any theories?
In the history books, and plays like James Graham‘s This House, Labour MPs and the Union Barons and shop stewards are the most anti semitic, racist, misogynistic MP’s, activists, members and voters of all. This is what working class and Labour people are historically ingrained with.
A list of who is about to and later will don the Reform Nazi uniform will be easy. It should also be a successful betting opportunity for PBers.
I have Blunket top of the list. Alongside Glasman.
No chance Blunket. I'm slightly worried about Alan Sugar.
It might just be Big Dave, the barman at the Croydon Labour Club.
People are saying this puts and end to any possibility of a Conservative/Reform coalition, but does it actually? If they win 350 seats between them at the next election, are they really going to turn down running the country?
I think Labour’s attack lines have become a lot easier after yet another Tory defects.
I know they’re getting a Labourite next week (although I note Farage said “Labour figure” today, not MP). Who could it be?
But the idea this is not just another Tory iteration seems harder and harder to counter.
A Labour figure - any theories?
In the history books, and plays like James Graham‘s This House, Labour MPs and the Union Barons and shop stewards are the most anti semitic, racist, misogynistic MP’s, activists, members and voters of all. This is what working class and Labour people are historically ingrained with.
A list of who is about to and later will don the Reform Nazi uniform will be easy. It should also be a successful betting opportunity for PBers.
I have Blunket top of the list. Alongside Glasman.
Thats a bit of an old stereotype, and not true of the current PLP.
If there is to be a Lab to Ref defection then I would look at the Red Wall, and someone rather socially conservative and shamelessly opportunistic. Almost certainly someone unknown even to political nerds.
Not Blunkett, who despite being turned social reactionary by being Home Sec is on the economically left.
I was worried Katie Lam might be next to defect, but she retweeted the video in which Badenoch expelled Jenrick, so I think it must be pretty unlikely.
If even Lam is now on Team Kemi, looks like Jenrick at most will provoke a trickle not an avalanche to Reform
I was pretty good academically at 18. But Cambridge never aopealed to this northerner. Reasons I didn't apply to Cambridge (or indeed Oxford): - it wasn't really made explicit the advantages you might get from going there - 'just get a degree'. - it sounded like hard work for no obviously better outcome (see above) - having grown up in Manchester, my perception was that Cambridge wasn't really the most exciting of places (compared to eg Manchester, Sheffield, Newcastle, Edinburgh etc) - it was expensive - I didn't like the way they served the beer - it was very flat
I knew so few genuinely posh people that it didn't even occur to me that people there would be posh and I might not fit in.
Cambridge is now over 70% state educated students. Exeter, UCL, Edinburgh, and Oxford and St Andrews and Imperial and the Royal Agricultural University are posher and indeed Durham now has more posh private school pupils than either Oxford or Cambridge
Do you also have a ranking of universities by expected inheritance?
I would imagine St Andrews, Royal Agricultural University and Durham and a few of the poshest Oxbridge colleges like Trinity Cambridge and Magdalen Oxford
I think Labour’s attack lines have become a lot easier after yet another Tory defects.
I know they’re getting a Labourite next week (although I note Farage said “Labour figure” today, not MP). Who could it be?
But the idea this is not just another Tory iteration seems harder and harder to counter.
A Labour figure - any theories?
In the history books, and plays like James Graham‘s This House, Labour MPs and the Union Barons and shop stewards are the most anti semitic, racist, misogynistic MP’s, activists, members and voters of all. This is what working class and Labour people are historically ingrained with.
A list of who is about to and later will don the Reform Nazi uniform will be easy. It should also be a successful betting opportunity for PBers.
I have Blunket top of the list. Alongside Glasman.
No chance Blunket. I'm slightly worried about Alan Sugar.
He won’t switch to them, he’s Jewish.
They're picking up votes from most ethnicities I'm not sure why being Jewish makes it a no-no.
Quite staggering really. His opponents should hammer him for it. If it were Sir Keir I would be! Why is Farage still doing these videos? I thought they were a thing he did a few years ago when he was more of a tv presenter than politician
Taking a lead from his lodestar across the pond perhaps. The 'not like normal politicians' shtick.
There has always been an air of Holiday Camp/Bruce Forsyth/bingo hall geeing up the blue rinse brigade about Farage, that I passed off as necessary to keep the old age vote entertained, but I can’t have the future PM being paid to do shout outs, especially if he’s not checking what he’s saying. Poor form Nige.
I think he is better suited to being an agitator than PM. It will be the ruin of him. For his sake I hope he passes the baton to someone else, preferably Kemi, and is a junior partner in a coalition. Let him be Foreign Minister in a Tory/Reform govt, or Clegg style DPM
People are saying this puts and end to any possibility of a Conservative/Reform coalition, but does it actually? If they win 350 seats between them at the next election, are they really going to turn down running the country?
Well if my aunty had balls she'd be my uncle.
Increasingly I think Reform are a flash in the pan...
I think Labour’s attack lines have become a lot easier after yet another Tory defects.
I know they’re getting a Labourite next week (although I note Farage said “Labour figure” today, not MP). Who could it be?
But the idea this is not just another Tory iteration seems harder and harder to counter.
A Labour figure - any theories?
Tom Harris? He left Labour in 2018 and has boasted of voting Conservative subsequently, but that should be no obstacle to Farage’s ‘Labour figure’ narrative. Farage seems to have adopted Trump’s news cycle as tv show with all this announcement bullshit.
I don’t think it will come as a shock to any of us that Bobby J bears a number of the traits of an opportunist, but there is a particular sense of whiplash to seeing him telling us all the Tories are a broken party who destroyed Britain when he was an active member of their frontbench 12 hours ago.
I do wonder if this might be the moment that Farage’s fortunes start to dwindle…. The Tory Reject narrative is starting to take hold….
It would be a funny outcome if successfully securing a high profile defection tipped the scales for people who preferred an impression of insurgent new politics.
Badenoch is already playing the “it shows the party has changed, we’re getting rid of all the bad eggs” card. It’s a bold and high risk move and far from enough, but it gives her a tiny pinch of “detoxification” magic dust that most opposition parties wait years to come into possession of.
Yes. I agree with you. It can only be good news and great day for the Conservatives the opportunist Snake has gone.
Jenrick was more open in his racism than Farage, and this was promoting and normalising doubts to the huge success cultural integration has been in the UK, doubts the Conservative Party has never, and will never hold or suggest.
We owe it to Kemi Badenoch, as the stop Jenrick candidate, to have blocked Jenrick from the leaderships most powerful position. But now as TSE explained in the earlier header, this puts Badenoch’s position in question, now she is is no longer blocking the vile and dangerous Jenrick to the right. The right have other fresh faces, far more loyal to Conservative Party values than Robert the Snake, who can throw hat in ring if the next election result is as bad as looks possible. But if Kemi cannot turn the polling around, the threats to remove her this side of the election are now to the left of her, as she can be replaced by an experienced centerist candidate James, Tom or Mel, whose political values are closer to the traditional UK centre ground so bring wider appeal across all the public, and is the party’s best hope of getting best possible result in 2029, hopefully to move us back over 200 seats.
Cleverly is now odds on to be Tory leader if Kemi fails to see the Tories beat Labour in the NEV after the May local elections. Cleverly will be more loyal to Kemi than Jenrick though and if Kemi resigned or lost a VONC Cleverly now likely gets it by coronation
That’s right. And I say what you have posted explains why this is a fantastic day.
And TSE was quick to flag this up in his earlier header. Not just how it changes betting markets, TSE realised the huge danger here for Badenoch, who owes her position to being the stop Jenrick candidate and then stop Jenrick firewall.
Out of James, Tom, Mel and Kemi, who is closest to your own politics? Or are you a Taliban type, whoever is leader is supreme.
What is it with Tories and familiar first names? Are you permanently in the Traitors turret?
Never let it be said that the anoraks who constantly post opinion polls and polling averages are wasting everyone's time, because the one and only reason that Jenrick has defected is because the polls showed the Tories very slightly edging ahead of Labour recently. If that hadn't happened and the Tories were still in third place, he wouldn't have defected because he would have been hoping to still take over as Tory leader because of the pressure on the current Tory leader.
Would that not indicate that he expects to become Reform leader? I find that doubtful. At the very least, he won't become it before the next election, which according to your theory is his preferred timescale.
I think Labour’s attack lines have become a lot easier after yet another Tory defects.
I know they’re getting a Labourite next week (although I note Farage said “Labour figure” today, not MP). Who could it be?
But the idea this is not just another Tory iteration seems harder and harder to counter.
A Labour figure - any theories?
In the history books, and plays like James Graham‘s This House, Labour MPs and the Union Barons and shop stewards are the most anti semitic, racist, misogynistic MP’s, activists, members and voters of all. This is what working class and Labour people are historically ingrained with.
A list of who is about to and later will don the Reform Nazi uniform will be easy. It should also be a successful betting opportunity for PBers.
I have Blunket top of the list. Alongside Glasman.
No chance Blunket. I'm slightly worried about Alan Sugar.
He won’t switch to them, he’s Jewish.
I know it's Reform and therefore anything is permissible, but explicit accusations of Nazism are quite gamey. Might want to rein it in a bit.
I think Labour’s attack lines have become a lot easier after yet another Tory defects.
I know they’re getting a Labourite next week (although I note Farage said “Labour figure” today, not MP). Who could it be?
But the idea this is not just another Tory iteration seems harder and harder to counter.
A Labour figure - any theories?
In the history books, and plays like James Graham‘s This House, Labour MPs and the Union Barons and shop stewards are the most anti semitic, racist, misogynistic MP’s, activists, members and voters of all. This is what working class and Labour people are historically ingrained with.
A list of who is about to and later will don the Reform Nazi uniform will be easy. It should also be a successful betting opportunity for PBers.
I have Blunket top of the list. Alongside Glasman.
No chance Blunket. I'm slightly worried about Alan Sugar.
He won’t switch to them, he’s Jewish.
They're picking up votes from most ethnicities I'm not sure why being Jewish makes it a no-no.
I don’t think it will come as a shock to any of us that Bobby J bears a number of the traits of an opportunist, but there is a particular sense of whiplash to seeing him telling us all the Tories are a broken party who destroyed Britain when he was an active member of their frontbench 12 hours ago.
I do wonder if this might be the moment that Farage’s fortunes start to dwindle…. The Tory Reject narrative is starting to take hold….
It would be a funny outcome if successfully securing a high profile defection tipped the scales for people who preferred an impression of insurgent new politics.
Badenoch is already playing the “it shows the party has changed, we’re getting rid of all the bad eggs” card. It’s a bold and high risk move and far from enough, but it gives her a tiny pinch of “detoxification” magic dust that most opposition parties wait years to come into possession of.
Yes. I agree with you. It can only be good news and great day for the Conservatives the opportunist Snake has gone.
Jenrick was more open in his racism than Farage, and this was promoting and normalising doubts to the huge success cultural integration has been in the UK, doubts the Conservative Party has never, and will never hold or suggest.
We owe it to Kemi Badenoch, as the stop Jenrick candidate, to have blocked Jenrick from the leaderships most powerful position. But now as TSE explained in the earlier header, this puts Badenoch’s position in question, now she is is no longer blocking the vile and dangerous Jenrick to the right. The right have other fresh faces, far more loyal to Conservative Party values than Robert the Snake, who can throw hat in ring if the next election result is as bad as looks possible. But if Kemi cannot turn the polling around, the threats to remove her this side of the election are now to the left of her, as she can be replaced by an experienced centerist candidate James, Tom or Mel, whose political values are closer to the traditional UK centre ground so bring wider appeal across all the public, and is the party’s best hope of getting best possible result in 2029, hopefully to move us back over 200 seats.
Cleverly is now odds on to be Tory leader if Kemi fails to see the Tories beat Labour in the NEV after the May local elections. Cleverly will be more loyal to Kemi than Jenrick though and if Kemi resigned or lost a VONC Cleverly now likely gets it by coronation
That’s right. And I say what you have posted explains why this is a fantastic day.
And TSE was quick to flag this up in his earlier header. Not just how it changes betting markets, TSE realised the huge danger here for Badenoch, who owes her position to being the stop Jenrick candidate and then stop Jenrick firewall.
Out of James, Tom, Mel and Kemi, who is closest to your own politics? Or are you a Taliban type, whoever is leader is supreme.
What is it with Tories and familiar first names? Are you permanently in the Traitors turret?
If it's any help I'd knife Jessy tonight. She's much more of a threat to Stephen than Matt.
I think Labour’s attack lines have become a lot easier after yet another Tory defects.
I know they’re getting a Labourite next week (although I note Farage said “Labour figure” today, not MP). Who could it be?
But the idea this is not just another Tory iteration seems harder and harder to counter.
A Labour figure - any theories?
In the history books, and plays like James Graham‘s This House, Labour MPs and the Union Barons and shop stewards are the most anti semitic, racist, misogynistic MP’s, activists, members and voters of all. This is what working class and Labour people are historically ingrained with.
A list of who is about to and later will don the Reform Nazi uniform will be easy. It should also be a successful betting opportunity for PBers.
I have Blunket top of the list. Alongside Glasman.
No chance Blunket. I'm slightly worried about Alan Sugar.
He won’t switch to them, he’s Jewish.
They're picking up votes from most ethnicities I'm not sure why being Jewish makes it a no-no.
FWIW, here in King County (Seattle and most Seattle suburbs) the MetroKC buses have recently been displaying "Fares required", alternating with the usual route numbers.
(As far as I know, the problem of fare dodging is mostly confined to Seattle itself. And I suspect it became much worse during the Covid pandemic.)
I can't say, given all that's been written about him, that Jenrick shafting the party he'd "served since I was sixteen" was a huge surprise.
But still I find that his openly lying to colleagues of decades, about a defection clearly planned for months, as he took "copious notes" at their strategy meetings, is still a bit shocking.
The man is evidently a sociopath, and cannot be trusted about anything except his own ambition.
I don't like Jenrick but watching him field questions in the Reform Press conference he was clearly head and shoulders above most Reform politicians. He answered the questions without getting annoyed (largely) and sounded credible. The companions with Zahawi was striking.
I think Labour’s attack lines have become a lot easier after yet another Tory defects.
I know they’re getting a Labourite next week (although I note Farage said “Labour figure” today, not MP). Who could it be?
But the idea this is not just another Tory iteration seems harder and harder to counter.
A Labour figure - any theories?
In the history books, and plays like James Graham‘s This House, Labour MPs and the Union Barons and shop stewards are the most anti semitic, racist, misogynistic MP’s, activists, members and voters of all. This is what working class and Labour people are historically ingrained with.
A list of who is about to and later will don the Reform Nazi uniform will be easy. It should also be a successful betting opportunity for PBers.
I have Blunket top of the list. Alongside Glasman.
No chance Blunket. I'm slightly worried about Alan Sugar.
He won’t switch to them, he’s Jewish.
I know it's Reform and therefore anything is permissible, but explicit accusations of Nazism are quite gamey. Might want to rein it in a bit.
"Nothing is true, everything is permitted"
I was re-reading some William Burroughs over Christmas. I keep having the feeling we're falling into a world that Anthony Burgess, Ballard, Burroughs and Hunter S. Thompson would have had a yage evening giggling in horror about as they watched and reported.
Find it interesting that Farage has set a hard deadline of May for any further defections. Could be to set a ticking clock, but also may reflect that having too many switchers from the Cons near to the next GE, may not help Reform with ex lab voters.
I just thought it was straightforward spin and lies from Farage.
The times over recent years we have discussed what makes the rise of Farage’s latest vehicle and the disunited Right an existential concern for the Conservative Party, the consensus had been not necessarily the polling, but the quantity of defections, MPs, Councillors, activists, members, and donors. Perhaps also loss of support of newspapers to not only not shilling, but undermining.
For a long time not even a trickle of such movement, recently, more than a trickle in some of those columns on spreadsheet, but still nothing to demonstrate an existential crisis for the Conservative Party or anything to suggest Farage’s last hurrah is but time limited and doomed.
I don’t think it will come as a shock to any of us that Bobby J bears a number of the traits of an opportunist, but there is a particular sense of whiplash to seeing him telling us all the Tories are a broken party who destroyed Britain when he was an active member of their frontbench 12 hours ago.
I do wonder if this might be the moment that Farage’s fortunes start to dwindle…. The Tory Reject narrative is starting to take hold….
It would be a funny outcome if successfully securing a high profile defection tipped the scales for people who preferred an impression of insurgent new politics.
Badenoch is already playing the “it shows the party has changed, we’re getting rid of all the bad eggs” card. It’s a bold and high risk move and far from enough, but it gives her a tiny pinch of “detoxification” magic dust that most opposition parties wait years to come into possession of.
Yes. I agree with you. It can only be good news and great day for the Conservatives the opportunist Snake has gone.
Jenrick was more open in his racism than Farage, and this was promoting and normalising doubts to the huge success cultural integration has been in the UK, doubts the Conservative Party has never, and will never hold or suggest.
We owe it to Kemi Badenoch, as the stop Jenrick candidate, to have blocked Jenrick from the leaderships most powerful position. But now as TSE explained in the earlier header, this puts Badenoch’s position in question, now she is is no longer blocking the vile and dangerous Jenrick to the right. The right have other fresh faces, far more loyal to Conservative Party values than Robert the Snake, who can throw hat in ring if the next election result is as bad as looks possible. But if Kemi cannot turn the polling around, the threats to remove her this side of the election are now to the left of her, as she can be replaced by an experienced centerist candidate James, Tom or Mel, whose political values are closer to the traditional UK centre ground so bring wider appeal across all the public, and is the party’s best hope of getting best possible result in 2029, hopefully to move us back over 200 seats.
Cleverly is now odds on to be Tory leader if Kemi fails to see the Tories beat Labour in the NEV after the May local elections. Cleverly will be more loyal to Kemi than Jenrick though and if Kemi resigned or lost a VONC Cleverly now likely gets it by coronation
That’s right. And I say what you have posted explains why this is a fantastic day.
And TSE was quick to flag this up in his earlier header. Not just how it changes betting markets, TSE realised the huge danger here for Badenoch, who owes her position to being the stop Jenrick candidate and then stop Jenrick firewall.
Out of James, Tom, Mel and Kemi, who is closest to your own politics? Or are you a Taliban type, whoever is leader is supreme.
What is it with Tories and familiar first names? Are you permanently in the Traitors turret?
I think Labour’s attack lines have become a lot easier after yet another Tory defects.
I know they’re getting a Labourite next week (although I note Farage said “Labour figure” today, not MP). Who could it be?
But the idea this is not just another Tory iteration seems harder and harder to counter.
A Labour figure - any theories?
In the history books, and plays like James Graham‘s This House, Labour MPs and the Union Barons and shop stewards are the most anti semitic, racist, misogynistic MP’s, activists, members and voters of all. This is what working class and Labour people are historically ingrained with.
A list of who is about to and later will don the Reform Nazi uniform will be easy. It should also be a successful betting opportunity for PBers.
I have Blunket top of the list. Alongside Glasman.
No chance Blunket. I'm slightly worried about Alan Sugar.
He won’t switch to them, he’s Jewish.
I know it's Reform and therefore anything is permissible, but explicit accusations of Nazism are quite gamey. Might want to rein it in a bit.
"Nothing is true, everything is permitted"
I was re-reading some William Burroughs over Christmas. I keep having the feeling we're falling into a world that Anthony Burgess, Ballard, Burroughs and Hunter S. Thompson would have had a yage evening giggling in horror about as they watched and reported.
There's an almost-consensus emerging that we are actually living thru "Brave New World" (Huxley).
I keep saying they are too complacent. Having said that, Gosport isn't naturally a LibDem place, so the surprise is not that they lost it but that they held in in the first place.
I think Labour’s attack lines have become a lot easier after yet another Tory defects.
I know they’re getting a Labourite next week (although I note Farage said “Labour figure” today, not MP). Who could it be?
But the idea this is not just another Tory iteration seems harder and harder to counter.
A Labour figure - any theories?
In the history books, and plays like James Graham‘s This House, Labour MPs and the Union Barons and shop stewards are the most anti semitic, racist, misogynistic MP’s, activists, members and voters of all. This is what working class and Labour people are historically ingrained with.
A list of who is about to and later will don the Reform Nazi uniform will be easy. It should also be a successful betting opportunity for PBers.
I have Blunket top of the list. Alongside Glasman.
No chance Blunket. I'm slightly worried about Alan Sugar.
He won’t switch to them, he’s Jewish.
They're picking up votes from most ethnicities I'm not sure why being Jewish makes it a no-no.
They obviously didn't do well with Jews but saying a Jewish person would never support them is ridiculous.
I apologise.
if I have over stepped the mark into the land of ridiculous in being too quick to second guess any Jewish persons opinion of reform, it’s probably because i have Farage himself fresh in my mind
* Shouting "shut up you Jew" in a class. * Making references to the Holocaust, such as "Hitler was right" or "gas 'em". * Teaching a racist version of a song with the chorus "gas 'em all, gas 'em all, gas them all".
One of Farage's former teachers described him in a letter from 1981 as a "fascist" who "publicly professed racist and neo-fascist views".
Zia Yusuf"liked" an antisemitic social media post calling a Conservative MP a "traitorous Zogbot" (a derogatory term for a Zionist) with a "Jewish wife and family", an action Farage dismissed as "one little mistake".
you are entitles to your opinion, it’s still a free country without everyone bullying each other and grassing them up at the moment. But the Jewish community are entitled to be more suspicious about reform than you are right now, in my opinion.
I think Labour’s attack lines have become a lot easier after yet another Tory defects.
I know they’re getting a Labourite next week (although I note Farage said “Labour figure” today, not MP). Who could it be?
But the idea this is not just another Tory iteration seems harder and harder to counter.
A Labour figure - any theories?
In the history books, and plays like James Graham‘s This House, Labour MPs and the Union Barons and shop stewards are the most anti semitic, racist, misogynistic MP’s, activists, members and voters of all. This is what working class and Labour people are historically ingrained with.
A list of who is about to and later will don the Reform Nazi uniform will be easy. It should also be a successful betting opportunity for PBers.
I have Blunket top of the list. Alongside Glasman.
No chance Blunket. I'm slightly worried about Alan Sugar.
He won’t switch to them, he’s Jewish.
I know it's Reform and therefore anything is permissible, but explicit accusations of Nazism are quite gamey. Might want to rein it in a bit.
A lot of candidates Reform have dropped been for sharing Hitler memes, praised aspects of the Nazi regime, or associated with known neo-Nazi individuals and groups. For some reason they seem to attract such people, what is it?
Maybe its the excessive focus on race and immigration, that they say is main reason for everything wrong in country today, like you can’t get house, dentist, don’t have enough money, see your community changing around you etc. So the policies that will fix what is broken Britain is place “foreigners” at the bottom of housing lists, ban "transgender propaganda" in schools, etc. and remove 750,000 migrants under the “borders plan”.
Also the authoritarian streak that runs through everything Reform. A reform MPs response to a police officer stamping on a man’s head at Manchester Airport was: “These police should be commended, I’d give them a medal.” “My constituents,”“are fed up with seeing police dancing around rainbows and being nice to people”.
Anything I have listed here so far that doesn’t read across to EXACTLY how NAZI parties always FISH for VOTES?
You say rein it in - but when is it acceptable political cut and thrust or should be reigned in, take this as example, fair enough from the Conservatives wasn’t it?
Ultimately is Reform not a populist party and cult of personality party, banging on about corrupt elites running the country? What political platform can be any less Nazi than that?
An employee of El Paso County’s Office of the Medical Examiner said it is likely to classify the death of Geraldo Lunas Campos at an ICE detention center as a homicide. A detainee says he witnessed Campos being choked to death by guards. https://x.com/washingtonpost/status/2011936104555905064
Quite staggering really. His opponents should hammer him for it. If it were Sir Keir I would be! Why is Farage still doing these videos? I thought they were a thing he did a few years ago when he was more of a tv presenter than politician
Cameo was fun during the pandemic, when there were loads of unemployed actors, singers, comedians, and other artists, who still needed to pay their mortgages and would say happy birthday to your friend for $50 or $100.
Dangerous for politicians though, for the reasons we see here, even if it seems like an easy way to both make money and engage with the public there’s always going to be opponents and activists looking to trip you up.
Now the unemployed artists all went back to their regular jobs after the pandemic, it’s rather surprising that Cameo still exists.
Find it interesting that Farage has set a hard deadline of May for any further defections. Could be to set a ticking clock, but also may reflect that having too many switchers from the Cons near to the next GE, may not help Reform with ex lab voters.
I just thought it was straightforward spin and lies from Farage.
The times over recent years we have discussed what makes the rise of Farage’s latest vehicle and the disunited Right an existential concern for the Conservative Party, the consensus had been not necessarily the polling, but the quantity of defections, MPs, Councillors, activists, members, and donors. Perhaps also loss of support of newspapers to not only not shilling, but undermining.
For a long time not even a trickle of such movement, recently, more than a trickle in some of those columns on spreadsheet, but still nothing to demonstrate an existential crisis for the Conservative Party or anything to suggest Farage’s last hurrah is but time limited and doomed.
Farage is a flim-flam man. He'll change it again later when he judges it convenient.
This deadline is imo to hold onto to votes from the anti-Conservative parts of the Reform support base for the local elections in May.
Farage hinted that their Welsh Leader would be a Senedd insider.....that could mean: Laura Anne Jones (racist expense fiddler) Andrew RT Davies (sponsored by Greggs) Mark Reckless (more parties than Boris)
LAJ might be the least toxic - RT would be massively toxic but highly entertaining - Reckless is a non-entity who would bring nothing - certainly wouldnt bring any voters.
I think Labour’s attack lines have become a lot easier after yet another Tory defects.
I know they’re getting a Labourite next week (although I note Farage said “Labour figure” today, not MP). Who could it be?
But the idea this is not just another Tory iteration seems harder and harder to counter.
A Labour figure - any theories?
In the history books, and plays like James Graham‘s This House, Labour MPs and the Union Barons and shop stewards are the most anti semitic, racist, misogynistic MP’s, activists, members and voters of all. This is what working class and Labour people are historically ingrained with.
A list of who is about to and later will don the Reform Nazi uniform will be easy. It should also be a successful betting opportunity for PBers.
I have Blunket top of the list. Alongside Glasman.
Picking up on your point re Sugar, Maurice Glasman is also Jewish!
Blunkett might fit in. A serially failed minister who was forced out for dodgy share dealing and abuse of power.
Farage hinted that their Welsh Leader would be a Senedd insider.....that could mean: Laura Anne Jones (racist expense fiddler) Andrew RT Davies (sponsored by Greggs) Mark Reckless (more parties than Boris)
LAJ might be the least toxic - RT would be massively toxic but highly entertaining - Reckless is a non-entity who would bring nothing - certainly wouldnt bring any voters.
I was pretty good academically at 18. But Cambridge never aopealed to this northerner. Reasons I didn't apply to Cambridge (or indeed Oxford): - it wasn't really made explicit the advantages you might get from going there - 'just get a degree'. - it sounded like hard work for no obviously better outcome (see above) - having grown up in Manchester, my perception was that Cambridge wasn't really the most exciting of places (compared to eg Manchester, Sheffield, Newcastle, Edinburgh etc) - it was expensive - I didn't like the way they served the beer - it was very flat
I knew so few genuinely posh people that it didn't even occur to me that people there would be posh and I might not fit in.
Cambridge is now over 70% state educated students. Exeter, UCL, Edinburgh, and Oxford and St Andrews and Imperial and the Royal Agricultural University are posher and indeed Durham now has more posh private school pupils than either Oxford or Cambridge
Farage hinted that their Welsh Leader would be a Senedd insider.....that could mean: Laura Anne Jones (racist expense fiddler) Andrew RT Davies (sponsored by Greggs) Mark Reckless (more parties than Boris)
LAJ might be the least toxic - RT would be massively toxic but highly entertaining - Reckless is a non-entity who would bring nothing - certainly wouldnt bring any voters.
Just to stir things up, how about Mark Drakeford?
No chance - but as an outsider for a defection what about Jonathan Edwards?
Farage hinted that their Welsh Leader would be a Senedd insider.....that could mean: Laura Anne Jones (racist expense fiddler) Andrew RT Davies (sponsored by Greggs) Mark Reckless (more parties than Boris)
LAJ might be the least toxic - RT would be massively toxic but highly entertaining - Reckless is a non-entity who would bring nothing - certainly wouldnt bring any voters.
Just to stir things up, how about Mark Drakeford?
This where pictures would help... Fat, male, white, 60s, redwall constituency... I think a peer is more likely...
More MPs follow Jenrick over the next few months. Badenoch's authority evaporates. By-elections are bloodbaths with Tories coming third. Donors threaten to pull funding. She survives a confidence vote in spring but 40%+ vote against her.
Then the real madness begins. Truss and her allies start pushing the "I was right all along" narrative - pointing to economic data, claiming the mini-budget was just bad timing. She's been banging on about immigration and culture war stuff since leaving office, so she can credibly say she'd stop the Reform bleeding.
Local elections in May are a disaster. Badenoch quits. Parliamentary party is in full panic mode about extinction. In the rushed leadership contest, Truss becomes the "unity candidate". She’s bold, recognisable, appeals to both traditional Tories and the right wing. Someone steps down so she can get back in the Commons.
Liz Truss is back to "finish what I started.". Labour collapse and a GE is called…somehow (I need to figure that bit out) and hey presto, Liz is back in Parliament, back in Number 10.
Get on that train before it leaves the station. You heard it here first.
Truss is now more likely to lead Reform than the Tories
Liz Truss is not a natural fit for Reform, being more interested in the economy than migration.
Indeed, this shows the dilemma, and possibly the elephant trap, for Kemi and the Conservative Party. Should it embrace culture war issues, chase after Reform on boats and hotels, or try to carve out a distinct but credible niche on the economy and perhaps competence and efficiency in public services. Kemi might do worse than ask Jeremy Hunt for some ideas on low-hanging fruit. He's been around the top of government for years and (more importantly perhaps, is not after Kemi's job).
But whatever route is chosen, Kemi still needs at some point to answer voters' most basic question – what is the Conservative Party for?
Farage hinted that their Welsh Leader would be a Senedd insider.....that could mean: Laura Anne Jones (racist expense fiddler) Andrew RT Davies (sponsored by Greggs) Mark Reckless (more parties than Boris)
LAJ might be the least toxic - RT would be massively toxic but highly entertaining - Reckless is a non-entity who would bring nothing - certainly wouldnt bring any voters.
Just to stir things up, how about Mark Drakeford?
This where pictures would help... Fat, male, white, 60s, redwall constituency... I think a peer is more likely...
I keep saying they are too complacent. Having said that, Gosport isn't naturally a LibDem place, so the surprise is not that they lost it but that they held in in the first place.
It's not consistent with the post-2024 Lib Dem map for sure. It really goes back to the 1970s Liberal theory of pavement politics; identify local (even parochial) grumbles and play them back to people. And now Reform play that game more effectively.
Terrible result for the old two though. Admittedly, third and fourth in a two horse race is never a pleasant place to be. But Bridgemary used to be the Labour banker in the 80s and 90s. Since then, Right To Buy has changed the demographics massively. Suspect that the elderly RTB homeowners aren't keen on the changes caused by the people living in the private and social rented houses that remain.
Farage hinted that their Welsh Leader would be a Senedd insider.....that could mean: Laura Anne Jones (racist expense fiddler) Andrew RT Davies (sponsored by Greggs) Mark Reckless (more parties than Boris)
LAJ might be the least toxic - RT would be massively toxic but highly entertaining - Reckless is a non-entity who would bring nothing - certainly wouldnt bring any voters.
Just to stir things up, how about Mark Drakeford?
No chance - but as an outsider for a defection what about Jonathan Edwards?
Too much of a big leap for me, you guys are just guessing, as for Blunkett, I just can't see it.
I think Labour’s attack lines have become a lot easier after yet another Tory defects.
I know they’re getting a Labourite next week (although I note Farage said “Labour figure” today, not MP). Who could it be?
But the idea this is not just another Tory iteration seems harder and harder to counter.
A Labour figure - any theories?
In the history books, and plays like James Graham‘s This House, Labour MPs and the Union Barons and shop stewards are the most anti semitic, racist, misogynistic MP’s, activists, members and voters of all. This is what working class and Labour people are historically ingrained with.
A list of who is about to and later will don the Reform Nazi uniform will be easy. It should also be a successful betting opportunity for PBers.
I have Blunket top of the list. Alongside Glasman.
No chance Blunket. I'm slightly worried about Alan Sugar.
He won’t switch to them, he’s Jewish.
I know it's Reform and therefore anything is permissible, but explicit accusations of Nazism are quite gamey. Might want to rein it in a bit.
A lot of candidates Reform have dropped been for sharing Hitler memes, praised aspects of the Nazi regime, or associated with known neo-Nazi individuals and groups. For some reason they seem to attract such people, what is it?
Maybe its the excessive focus on race and immigration, that they say is main reason for everything wrong in country today, like you can’t get house, dentist, don’t have enough money, see your community changing around you etc. So the policies that will fix what is broken Britain is place “foreigners” at the bottom of housing lists, ban "transgender propaganda" in schools, etc. and remove 750,000 migrants under the “borders plan”.
Also the authoritarian streak that runs through everything Reform. A reform MPs response to a police officer stamping on a man’s head at Manchester Airport was: “These police should be commended, I’d give them a medal.” “My constituents,”“are fed up with seeing police dancing around rainbows and being nice to people”.
Anything I have listed here so far that doesn’t read across to EXACTLY how NAZI parties always FISH for VOTES?
You say rein it in - but when is it acceptable political cut and thrust or should be reigned in, take this as example, fair enough from the Conservatives wasn’t it?
Ultimately is Reform not a populist party and cult of personality party, banging on about corrupt elites running the country? What political platform can be any less Nazi than that?
It reads like a confected collage of gripes and anecdotes. It reads nothing like evidence of a party being Nazis as you've accused Reform.
I think Labour’s attack lines have become a lot easier after yet another Tory defects.
I know they’re getting a Labourite next week (although I note Farage said “Labour figure” today, not MP). Who could it be?
But the idea this is not just another Tory iteration seems harder and harder to counter.
A Labour figure - any theories?
In the history books, and plays like James Graham‘s This House, Labour MPs and the Union Barons and shop stewards are the most anti semitic, racist, misogynistic MP’s, activists, members and voters of all. This is what working class and Labour people are historically ingrained with.
A list of who is about to and later will don the Reform Nazi uniform will be easy. It should also be a successful betting opportunity for PBers.
I have Blunket top of the list. Alongside Glasman.
Picking up on your point re Sugar, Maurice Glasman is also Jewish!
Blunkett might fit in. A serially failed minister who was forced out for dodgy share dealing and abuse of power.
It is very unlikely that any Labour defection would not be an MP. An MP defector would be doing so largely to keep their job. A peer or other public figure wouldn't need to, and even if they shared some views with Reform (Blunkett, Glassman) would always stay Labour and campaign from inside.
Comments
Though yes the Tory to Reform path goes most strongly via the hardline anti immigration or Truss backer route
In that other Russell Crowe film, where over dinner on sail ship they are choosing lesser of two weevil’s.
This is Day 1. Whoever has the better Day 1 doesn’t always win a war. Question is what are Tory MPs, councillors, donors, activists and members going to make of it and do in coming days and weeks? Are they going to say, look, the Jenricks of this world can leave saying why he has, but we think the future lies with the Tory party, because.
Will it ultimately lead to more switching to Reform? Will pressure grow to have an alliance with Reform?
Meanwhile professional journalists - the shit stirring bastards - start to probe what efforts were made to keep him. Yes work hard to actually keep him aboard., because Ultimately, if many take Jenrick’s lead, huge defections creating existential threat to the Conservatives, it will be put would it not have been better to have kept him aboard, so was it all down to Kemi’s psychological immaturity and personality flaws she couldn’t?
Why would it be any different if he were in a future Reform cabinet?
"The country has gone to the dogs and everything is shit (except you Nigel)".
Others have rightly raised the issue of who's responsible for 'broken Britain', But I'm also wondering if people might get a bit sick of people like Jenrick constantly telling us how awful our country now is, finding nothing but misery in our realm. In reality, most people have pretty good, reasonably prosperous lives, and I think they may start getting fed up with being told that they don't. Of course we have challenges, but things aren't that bad.
New haircut and makeover: £900
Six months of Mounjaro: £1500
Social media campaign: £3000
Defection speech left on photocopier: PRICELESS
😅🤣😅😂
https://x.com/PeterMannionMP/status/2011782563371549019?s=20
And TSE was quick to flag this up in his earlier header. Not just how it changes betting markets, TSE realised the huge danger here for Badenoch, who owes her position to being the stop Jenrick candidate and then stop Jenrick firewall.
Out of James, Tom, Mel and Kemi, who is closest to your own politics? Or are you a Taliban type, whoever is leader is supreme.
Russia bombs Ukrainian civilians, causes a humanitarian crisis in Kyiv amidst freezing temperatures, and continues to demand unrealistic concessions.
Yet somehow, Ukraine is the problem.
https://x.com/BohuslavskaKate/status/2011641047731093670
Of course, there is a chance a Reform Cabinet could be better at facing those challenges than the others, and fair enough to paint a rosy picture, but Jenrick's moan about his shadow cabinet colleagues who might not believe Britain is broken as if that is a capital offence, just makes me think he will be disappointed if he thinks all his Reform colleagues will be of one mind about things.
A list of who is about to and later will don the Reform Nazi uniform will be easy. It should also be a successful betting opportunity for PBers.
I have Blunket top of the list. Alongside Glasman.
I think the US will lose patience with the mango mafioso well before 2029... unless the Almighty loses patience before then of course.
Trump is truly a contemptible cur.
There are genuine problems, there is relative poverty and a lot which can be done to improve the lives of many of our citizens but, and I heard thisd listening to friends at lunch today, the main topics were Greenland and whether the Freedom Pass in London will be withdrawn oe restricted to travel on buses only.
The complaint from one of my Reform supporting friends was "if Sadiq didn't give free school meals to children, the Freedom Pass could be preserved" When I pointed out the Freedom Pass cost London Councils £372 million and the £3 per meal subsidised by Khan costs £140 million while the Government covers the other costs, she started blustering as Reform supporters often do when faced with facts rather than half truths.
This has been since Brexit, which they voted for while all their children and grandchildren opposed. Its quite sad really as we used to be able to do so.
If there is to be a Lab to Ref defection then I would look at the Red Wall, and someone rather socially conservative and shamelessly opportunistic. Almost certainly someone unknown even to political nerds.
Not Blunkett, who despite being turned social reactionary by being Home Sec is on the economically left.
What does it actually mean to be listed in London?
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/37925560/robert-jenrick-tories-reform-farage-kemi/
Finland and Estonia announced joining Denmark-led military exercise in Greenland.
https://x.com/The_Ba_Se/status/2011852147302846688
Our token presence is not something to be proud of.
I think he is better suited to being an agitator than PM. It will be the ruin of him. For his sake I hope he passes the baton to someone else, preferably Kemi, and is a junior partner in a coalition. Let him be Foreign Minister in a Tory/Reform govt, or Clegg style DPM
Increasingly I think Reform are a flash in the pan...
Farage seems to have adopted Trump’s news cycle as tv show with all this announcement bullshit.
Are you permanently in the Traitors turret?
https://www.jpr.org.uk/insights/2024-uk-general-election-voting-preferences-british-jews-and-other-minorities
https://x.com/JamesCleverly/status/2011860084104532313?s=20
(As far as I know, the problem of fare dodging is mostly confined to Seattle itself. And I suspect it became much worse during the Covid pandemic.)
But still I find that his openly lying to colleagues of decades, about a defection clearly planned for months, as he took "copious notes" at their strategy meetings, is still a bit shocking.
The man is evidently a sociopath, and cannot be trusted about anything except his own ambition.
bloody hell he is good.]
I was re-reading some William Burroughs over Christmas. I keep having the feeling we're falling into a world that Anthony Burgess, Ballard, Burroughs and Hunter S. Thompson would have had a yage evening giggling in horror about as they watched and reported.
The times over recent years we have discussed what makes the rise of Farage’s latest vehicle and the disunited Right an existential concern for the Conservative Party, the consensus had been not necessarily the polling, but the quantity of defections, MPs, Councillors, activists, members, and donors. Perhaps also loss of support of newspapers to not only not shilling, but undermining.
For a long time not even a trickle of such movement, recently, more than a trickle in some of those columns on spreadsheet, but still nothing to demonstrate an existential crisis for the Conservative Party or anything to suggest Farage’s last hurrah is but time limited and doomed.
https://metro.co.uk/video/nigel-farage-pays-tribute-ian-watkins-cameo-video-3587359/
Me, I think it's "The Machine Stops" (Forster) or "The Year Of The Sex Olympics" (Kneale) or "Glass Earth Inc" (Baxter), or, or, or...
https://www.thelocal.de/20260115/german-economy-grew-0-2-percent-in-2025
if I have over stepped the mark into the land of ridiculous in being too quick to second guess any Jewish persons opinion of reform, it’s probably because i have Farage himself fresh in my mind
* Shouting "shut up you Jew" in a class.
* Making references to the Holocaust, such as "Hitler was right" or "gas 'em".
* Teaching a racist version of a song with the chorus "gas 'em all, gas 'em all, gas them all".
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHMpd7VJ7U0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eq7bPr1V1ic
One of Farage's former teachers described him in a letter from 1981 as a "fascist" who "publicly professed racist and neo-fascist views".
Zia Yusuf"liked" an antisemitic social media post calling a Conservative MP a "traitorous Zogbot" (a derogatory term for a Zionist) with a "Jewish wife and family", an action Farage dismissed as "one little mistake".
you are entitles to your opinion, it’s still a free country without everyone bullying each other and grassing them up at the moment. But the Jewish community are entitled to be more suspicious about reform than you are right now, in my opinion.
Maybe its the excessive focus on race and immigration, that they say is main reason for everything wrong in country today, like you can’t get house, dentist, don’t have enough money, see your community changing around you etc. So the policies that will fix what is broken Britain is place “foreigners” at the bottom of housing lists, ban "transgender propaganda" in schools, etc. and remove 750,000 migrants under the “borders plan”.
Also the authoritarian streak that runs through everything Reform. A reform MPs response to a police officer stamping on a man’s head at Manchester Airport was: “These police should be commended, I’d give them a medal.” “My constituents,”“are fed up with seeing police dancing around rainbows and being nice to people”.
Anything I have listed here so far that doesn’t read across to EXACTLY how NAZI parties always FISH for VOTES?
You say rein it in - but when is it acceptable political cut and thrust or should be reigned in, take this as example, fair enough from the Conservatives wasn’t it?
https://www.gbnews.com/politics/reform-uk-nazi-comparison-kemi-badenoch-crybabies
Ultimately is Reform not a populist party and cult of personality party, banging on about corrupt elites running the country? What political platform can be any less Nazi than that?
https://x.com/washingtonpost/status/2011936104555905064
Dangerous for politicians though, for the reasons we see here, even if it seems like an easy way to both make money and engage with the public there’s always going to be opponents and activists looking to trip you up.
Now the unemployed artists all went back to their regular jobs after the pandemic, it’s rather surprising that Cameo still exists.
This deadline is imo to hold onto to votes from the anti-Conservative parts of the Reform support base for the local elections in May.
Laura Anne Jones (racist expense fiddler)
Andrew RT Davies (sponsored by Greggs)
Mark Reckless (more parties than Boris)
LAJ might be the least toxic - RT would be massively toxic but highly entertaining - Reckless is a non-entity who would bring nothing - certainly wouldnt bring any voters.
Blunkett might fit in. A serially failed minister who was forced out for dodgy share dealing and abuse of power.
Cambridge should be 1 place lower in % ranking, you'd think AI would manage sort by %...
Fat, male, white, 60s, redwall constituency...
I think a peer is more likely...
Calling for a full withdrawal has boxed the Tories in .
The policy should have been caveated . So unless there are fundamental changes to the ECHR the Tories would leave .
For many Stop Reform voters leaving the ECHR would be a red line .
Indeed, this shows the dilemma, and possibly the elephant trap, for Kemi and the Conservative Party. Should it embrace culture war issues, chase after Reform on boats and hotels, or try to carve out a distinct but credible niche on the economy and perhaps competence and efficiency in public services. Kemi might do worse than ask Jeremy Hunt for some ideas on low-hanging fruit. He's been around the top of government for years and (more importantly perhaps, is not after Kemi's job).
But whatever route is chosen, Kemi still needs at some point to answer voters' most basic question – what is the Conservative Party for?
Terrible result for the old two though. Admittedly, third and fourth in a two horse race is never a pleasant place to be. But Bridgemary used to be the Labour banker in the 80s and 90s. Since then, Right To Buy has changed the demographics massively. Suspect that the elderly RTB homeowners aren't keen on the changes caused by the people living in the private and social rented houses that remain.
Hence Reform.
Your man who was on the spot long ago.