I confess I had never considered the railway uniforms were such an essential element of imperialism that it needed addressing. Wasn't Cricket also a part of it?
He wrote a book I really enjoyed called How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big.
After been cancelled, I believe he has been doing daily streams and talked for several months now about how he had a short time left. I think he spoke last week that he believed he only had a few days left.
Abortion is a health matter, surely, and the Federal Government decides who recieves Federal Health funds. They are under no obligation, surely, to distribute it to people who they disagree with.
Also: I would point out that the current Supreme Court said that States and Cities were under no obligation to help the Federal Government as regards immigration enforcement. That's why Sanctuary Cities are legal. And this is not a Supreme Court that has bent over backwards to make things easy for liberals: it's because the constitution is very clear about the separation of powers.
Dreadful poll for Reform and Labour with the numbers suggesting Plaid are very close to taking majority control of the Senedd.
The Westminster numbers are (changes on the July 2024 GE):
Plaid 29 (+14) Reform 25 (+8) Lab 13 (-24) Con 12 (-6) Green 12 (+7) Lib Dem 6 (-0.5) Other 2 (-0.5)
Astonishing numbers...
Much as I predicted this morning [11.32] and not a surprise for me
Plaid Green will be very interesting but as for labour, a disaster
I confess to considerable ignorance in Welsh politics but the Senedd projection looks remarkable - Labour down to 8, the Conservatives to 6, the LDs to 3.
Could a Plaid-Green coalition work? The numbers suggest a healthy majority and were this to happen it would be a huge personal triumph for Rhun ap Iorwerth and a significant shift in Welsh politics.
I have no idea how Plaid Green would work out but the state of labour in Wales is deserved with decades of their arrogant entitlement to rule
The LD are not nearly as popular as years ago and 3 seats is very possible as are 6 conservatives
Plaid Green would be an utter disaster for Wales and probably send it near bankrupt
And people would notice the difference, because...?
Even keeping Labour would be better than Plaid Green
You know nothing about Wales to make such a statement
Labours arrogant entitled rule has to end
But at least they don't want to break up the UK.
Plaid have stated Independence will not be considered in their first term
Iranians are being massacred - in their thousands, if some of the reports out of Iran are accurate, with executions to start tomorrow but, hey, let's discuss MoTs instead.
I mentioned the other night that my Persian friends said when the internet was cut in Iran that was a bad sign, that's usually the precursor for state murder and repression.
Random localised outages must be an extremely stressful occurence.
Dreadful poll for Reform and Labour with the numbers suggesting Plaid are very close to taking majority control of the Senedd.
The Westminster numbers are (changes on the July 2024 GE):
Plaid 29 (+14) Reform 25 (+8) Lab 13 (-24) Con 12 (-6) Green 12 (+7) Lib Dem 6 (-0.5) Other 2 (-0.5)
Astonishing numbers...
Much as I predicted this morning [11.32] and not a surprise for me
Plaid Green will be very interesting but as for labour, a disaster
I confess to considerable ignorance in Welsh politics but the Senedd projection looks remarkable - Labour down to 8, the Conservatives to 6, the LDs to 3.
Could a Plaid-Green coalition work? The numbers suggest a healthy majority and were this to happen it would be a huge personal triumph for Rhun ap Iorwerth and a significant shift in Welsh politics.
I have no idea how Plaid Green would work out but the state of labour in Wales is deserved with decades of their arrogant entitlement to rule
The LD are not nearly as popular as years ago and 3 seats is very possible as are 6 conservatives
Plaid Green would be an utter disaster for Wales and probably send it near bankrupt
And people would notice the difference, because...?
Even keeping Labour would be better than Plaid Green
You know nothing about Wales to make such a statement
Labours arrogant entitled rule has to end
But at least they don't want to break up the UK.
Plaid have stated Independence will not be considered in their first term
Dreadful poll for Reform and Labour with the numbers suggesting Plaid are very close to taking majority control of the Senedd.
The Westminster numbers are (changes on the July 2024 GE):
Plaid 29 (+14) Reform 25 (+8) Lab 13 (-24) Con 12 (-6) Green 12 (+7) Lib Dem 6 (-0.5) Other 2 (-0.5)
Astonishing numbers...
Much as I predicted this morning [11.32] and not a surprise for me
Plaid Green will be very interesting but as for labour, a disaster
I confess to considerable ignorance in Welsh politics but the Senedd projection looks remarkable - Labour down to 8, the Conservatives to 6, the LDs to 3.
Could a Plaid-Green coalition work? The numbers suggest a healthy majority and were this to happen it would be a huge personal triumph for Rhun ap Iorwerth and a significant shift in Welsh politics.
I have no idea how Plaid Green would work out but the state of labour in Wales is deserved with decades of their arrogant entitlement to rule
The LD are not nearly as popular as years ago and 3 seats is very possible as are 6 conservatives
Plaid Green would be an utter disaster for Wales and probably send it near bankrupt
It could be substantially worse. Reform, or even worse Welsh Conservatives.
Both would be miles better than Plaid Green
No they wouldn't. I can list all the shite that they have already claimed they would do. It is a list not dissimilar to my top twenty list of things I don't wasn't to happen in Wales.
Anyway if Reform or Jenrick Tories take over in England I'd vote for independence and hope for the best.
Well neither would give you a vote on independence anyway even if they did take over the UK
We'll declare UDI.
Means little, the Senedd could be suspended and direct rule applied from London, Madrid and Catalonia style
As I've already mentioned. We have your tanks, oh and your drinking water.
You certainly don't have any tanks, the army is controlled by the UK government and plenty of lakes in England in the Lake District etc
It’s mountainous terrain though. Ideal for asymmetrical warfare. It was the inspiration for Dire Straits’ Brothers in Arms.
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Dreadful poll for Reform and Labour with the numbers suggesting Plaid are very close to taking majority control of the Senedd.
The Westminster numbers are (changes on the July 2024 GE):
Plaid 29 (+14) Reform 25 (+8) Lab 13 (-24) Con 12 (-6) Green 12 (+7) Lib Dem 6 (-0.5) Other 2 (-0.5)
Astonishing numbers...
Much as I predicted this morning [11.32] and not a surprise for me
Plaid Green will be very interesting but as for labour, a disaster
I confess to considerable ignorance in Welsh politics but the Senedd projection looks remarkable - Labour down to 8, the Conservatives to 6, the LDs to 3.
Could a Plaid-Green coalition work? The numbers suggest a healthy majority and were this to happen it would be a huge personal triumph for Rhun ap Iorwerth and a significant shift in Welsh politics.
I have no idea how Plaid Green would work out but the state of labour in Wales is deserved with decades of their arrogant entitlement to rule
The LD are not nearly as popular as years ago and 3 seats is very possible as are 6 conservatives
Plaid Green would be an utter disaster for Wales and probably send it near bankrupt
And people would notice the difference, because...?
Even keeping Labour would be better than Plaid Green
You know nothing about Wales to make such a statement
Labours arrogant entitled rule has to end
But at least they don't want to break up the UK.
Plaid have stated Independence will not be considered in their first term
For a few weeks last year Keir Starmer was constantly trying to persuade us all that mandatory digital ID was an essential part of modern society and would tackle all sorts of harms.
I have no doubt he’ll be telling us soon that he always said he had concerns about it being mandatory, now.
Iranians are being massacred - in their thousands, if some of the reports out of Iran are accurate, with executions to start tomorrow but, hey, let's discuss MoTs instead.
Why does any BBC mention of the events in Iran seem to compulsorily include that “the protests were sparked by anger over the collapse of the Iranian currency and soaring cost of living“, and not mention anger over the despotic Islamist regime?
I swear I heard something the other day that basically said ISIS were "alleged Islamic terrorists", as though there might be someone who would dispute the description. I'm pretty damn sure that if you phones ISIS HQ for a statement they would proudly agree that they are indeed "Islamic terrorists".
Iranians are being massacred - in their thousands, if some of the reports out of Iran are accurate, with executions to start tomorrow but, hey, let's discuss MoTs instead.
I mentioned the other night that my Persian friends said when the internet was cut in Iran that was a bad sign, that's usually the precursor for state murder and repression.
Random localised outages must be an extremely stressful occurence.
Yup, like the Israelis in Gaza, this is why it is good to have foreign journalists in a country to observe and report.
If anyone ever slags off the BBC I would tell them the BBC Persian/world service is so important.
Q: The premier of Greenland said today, 'We prefer to stay with Denmark.'
TRUMP: Who said that?
Q: The premier of Greenland
TRUMP: Well, that's their problem. I disagree with him. I don't know who he is. Don't know anything about him. But that's gonna be a big problem for him.
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
YouGov has just polled me asking, "Does former Conservative MPs joining Reform UK make you think more positively or more negatively towards Reform UK, or does it make no difference?"
Possibly depends on the Conservative MP? Most, in fact all, of them have been roasters of the highest order.
Rather liked Michael Crick's comments in the light of recent events:
"Two things always amaze me about highly intelligent politicians - their stubborn refusal ever to apologise; and their complete inability to judge character and spot a wrong-un."
Q: The premier of Greenland said today, 'We prefer to stay with Denmark.'
TRUMP: Who said that?
Q: The premier of Greenland
TRUMP: Well, that's their problem. I disagree with him. I don't know who he is. Don't know anything about him. But that's gonna be a big problem for him.
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
That is probably a good summary of it. Clearly there are people who deeply dislike him, but anecdotally it doesn't feel visceral, and more as though no one is putting much effort in defending him.
Q: The premier of Greenland said today, 'We prefer to stay with Denmark.'
TRUMP: Who said that?
Q: The premier of Greenland
TRUMP: Well, that's their problem. I disagree with him. I don't know who he is. Don't know anything about him. But that's gonna be a big problem for him.
Q: The premier of Greenland said today, 'We prefer to stay with Denmark.'
TRUMP: Who said that?
Q: The premier of Greenland
TRUMP: Well, that's their problem. I disagree with him. I don't know who he is. Don't know anything about him. But that's gonna be a big problem for him.
YouGov has just polled me asking, "Does former Conservative MPs joining Reform UK make you think more positively or more negatively towards Reform UK, or does it make no difference?"
Possibly depends on the Conservative MP? Most, in fact all, of them have been roasters of the highest order.
Rather liked Michael Crick's comments in the light of recent events:
"Two things always amaze me about highly intelligent politicians - their stubborn refusal ever to apologise; and their complete inability to judge character and spot a wrong-un."
I wonder if it is the sort of thing where an area of strength can simultaneously be an area of weakness. So politicians, in general, can be pretty good at judging (and using) character, know that they are, and as such can refuse to accept they might have been mistaken about someone. Or police investigators who have good instincts about crime, but which leads them to get tunnel vision based on hunches, leading to disaster.
Or a batsman with a glorious cover drive who also keeps getting out seeking to use it.
Q: The premier of Greenland said today, 'We prefer to stay with Denmark.'
TRUMP: Who said that?
Q: The premier of Greenland
TRUMP: Well, that's their problem. I disagree with him. I don't know who he is. Don't know anything about him. But that's gonna be a big problem for him.
Trump wants to invade Greenland. Johnson doesn't want to talk about it to reporters.
Indeed, though it has long been common for Trumpists to claim the more outrageous things should not be taken literally, but also that Trump is always right and should be listened to when he says stuff.
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
That is probably a good summary of it. Clearly there are people who deeply dislike him, but anecdotally it doesn't feel visceral, and more as though no one is putting much effort in defending him.
On here, outright hatred for Keir Starmer is a minority opinion. But here isn't representative. People genuinely hate him in a way I don't remember for previous PMs. From the article:
A YouGov poll last week found that he was more disliked by Britons than Benjamin Netanyahu or Hamas. At the weekend a far-right march against Starmer’s government in Bristol was met with a leftwing counter-protest bearing the slogan “We hate Keir Starmer more than you”.
Meanwhile the song itself has become a kind of standard, the soundtrack to our lives, perhaps even a unifying balm in troubled times. As well as the darts, you hear it at football grounds up and down the country, in nightclubs at 2am, at music festivals, pretty much anywhere large groups of young people congregate in a public place.
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
I am more and more persuaded by the theory that Starmer never wanted to be an MP/the summit of his ambition was to be Attorney-General/Lord Chancellor.
He stood down as DPP in late 2013 and there was a narrow window for him to decide to become an MP, had there been a longer period between standing down and the next general election he would have decided politics wasn't for him.
I suspect had Corbyn and Brexit not happened he would have achieved his summit.
YouGov has just polled me asking, "Does former Conservative MPs joining Reform UK make you think more positively or more negatively towards Reform UK, or does it make no difference?"
Results here:
My favourite is the 5% of Reform voters who haven't changed their opinion as they already dislike Reform, beaten only by the 8% of LDs who already think of Reform positively.
YouGov has just polled me asking, "Does former Conservative MPs joining Reform UK make you think more positively or more negatively towards Reform UK, or does it make no difference?"
Possibly depends on the Conservative MP? Most, in fact all, of them have been roasters of the highest order.
Rather liked Michael Crick's comments in the light of recent events:
"Two things always amaze me about highly intelligent politicians - their stubborn refusal ever to apologise; and their complete inability to judge character and spot a wrong-un."
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
That is probably a good summary of it. Clearly there are people who deeply dislike him, but anecdotally it doesn't feel visceral, and more as though no one is putting much effort in defending him.
On here, outright hatred for Keir Starmer is a minority opinion. But here isn't representative. People genuinely hate him in a way I don't remember for previous PMs. From the article:
A YouGov poll last week found that he was more disliked by Britons than Benjamin Netanyahu or Hamas. At the weekend a far-right march against Starmer’s government in Bristol was met with a leftwing counter-protest bearing the slogan “We hate Keir Starmer more than you”.
Meanwhile the song itself has become a kind of standard, the soundtrack to our lives, perhaps even a unifying balm in troubled times. As well as the darts, you hear it at football grounds up and down the country, in nightclubs at 2am, at music festivals, pretty much anywhere large groups of young people congregate in a public place.
I have said this before, I am somewhat confused by how genuinely hated he is by the public.
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
I am more and more persuaded by the theory that Starmer never wanted to be an MP/the summit of his ambition was to be Attorney-General/Lord Chancellor.
He stood down as DPP in late 2013 and there was a narrow window for him to decide to become an MP, had there been a longer period between standing down and the next general election he would have decided politics wasn't for him.
I suspect had Corbyn and Brexit not happened he would have achieved his summit.
That would suggest the last two leaders for Labour had no real ambition for the top job (though once there certainly took to it).
Starmer was floated as a potential Leadership candidate weeks after becoming an MP, if he had no ambitions in that direction the people who saw something in him even then were very mistaken about him.
YouGov has just polled me asking, "Does former Conservative MPs joining Reform UK make you think more positively or more negatively towards Reform UK, or does it make no difference?"
Q: The premier of Greenland said today, 'We prefer to stay with Denmark.'
TRUMP: Who said that?
Q: The premier of Greenland
TRUMP: Well, that's their problem. I disagree with him. I don't know who he is. Don't know anything about him. But that's gonna be a big problem for him.
"My favorite line in Powell’s Sunday night remarks was this: “Public service sometimes requires standing firm in the face of threats. I will continue to do the job the Senate confirmed me to do, with integrity and a commitment to serving the American people.”
How many Republican lawmakers would have the guts and integrity to make that statement? So far, you don’t need more than two hands to count them.
Iranians are being massacred - in their thousands, if some of the reports out of Iran are accurate, with executions to start tomorrow but, hey, let's discuss MoTs instead.
Why does any BBC mention of the events in Iran seem to compulsorily include that “the protests were sparked by anger over the collapse of the Iranian currency and soaring cost of living“, and not mention anger over the despotic Islamist regime?
I swear I heard something the other day that basically said ISIS were "alleged Islamic terrorists", as though there might be someone who would dispute the description. I'm pretty damn sure that if you phones ISIS HQ for a statement they would proudly agree that they are indeed "Islamic terrorists".
Legal disclaimer - do not attempt to phone ISIS HQ for comment, the authorities will not accept your explaination of why.
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
I am more and more persuaded by the theory that Starmer never wanted to be an MP/the summit of his ambition was to be Attorney-General/Lord Chancellor.
He stood down as DPP in late 2013 and there was a narrow window for him to decide to become an MP, had there been a longer period between standing down and the next general election he would have decided politics wasn't for him.
I suspect had Corbyn and Brexit not happened he would have achieved his summit.
That would suggest the last two leaders for Labour had no real ambition for the top job (though once there certainly took to it).
Starmer was floated as a potential Leadership candidate weeks after becoming an MP, if he had no ambitions in that direction the people who saw something in him even then were very mistaken about him.
People love lawyers, I think an outsider like this gathers support.
I remember in 1997 people thought Archie Norman should run for the leadership/would do so in the future because being Chief Exec of Asda is the perfect finishing school to be Tory leader/PM.
Iranians are being massacred - in their thousands, if some of the reports out of Iran are accurate, with executions to start tomorrow but, hey, let's discuss MoTs instead.
Why does any BBC mention of the events in Iran seem to compulsorily include that “the protests were sparked by anger over the collapse of the Iranian currency and soaring cost of living“, and not mention anger over the despotic Islamist regime?
I swear I heard something the other day that basically said ISIS were "alleged Islamic terrorists", as though there might be someone who would dispute the description. I'm pretty damn sure that if you phones ISIS HQ for a statement they would proudly agree that they are indeed "Islamic terrorists".
Legal disclaimer - do not attempt to phone ISIS HQ for comment, the authorities will not accept your explaination of why.
Especially if it includes discussion about prompts to get generative AI to make celebs in bikinis?
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
That is probably a good summary of it. Clearly there are people who deeply dislike him, but anecdotally it doesn't feel visceral, and more as though no one is putting much effort in defending him.
On here, outright hatred for Keir Starmer is a minority opinion. But here isn't representative. People genuinely hate him in a way I don't remember for previous PMs. From the article:
A YouGov poll last week found that he was more disliked by Britons than Benjamin Netanyahu or Hamas. At the weekend a far-right march against Starmer’s government in Bristol was met with a leftwing counter-protest bearing the slogan “We hate Keir Starmer more than you”.
Meanwhile the song itself has become a kind of standard, the soundtrack to our lives, perhaps even a unifying balm in troubled times. As well as the darts, you hear it at football grounds up and down the country, in nightclubs at 2am, at music festivals, pretty much anywhere large groups of young people congregate in a public place.
I have said this before, I am somewhat confused by how genuinely hated he is by the public.
I think a lot of it is actually timing more than anything. He’s just a huge letdown at a time people were desperate for an alternative, and finding out he’s a less likeable and charismatic version of the people he replaced has cemented it. It doesn’t help that he seems very much “of the system” and people really want something different.
There is also something that I don’t think any of us can quite put our finger on, but it just makes him unlikeable (certainly in power, it wasn’t really there when he was LOTO). I guess it’s a sum total of quite a few factors. I dont think the voice helps, I don’t think he can do false sincerity very well, he cannot mount a passionate argument for anything much, and he has a rather prickly air when challenged, that just lands badly.
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
I am more and more persuaded by the theory that Starmer never wanted to be an MP/the summit of his ambition was to be Attorney-General/Lord Chancellor.
He stood down as DPP in late 2013 and there was a narrow window for him to decide to become an MP, had there been a longer period between standing down and the next general election he would have decided politics wasn't for him.
I suspect had Corbyn and Brexit not happened he would have achieved his summit.
That would suggest the last two leaders for Labour had no real ambition for the top job (though once there certainly took to it).
Starmer was floated as a potential Leadership candidate weeks after becoming an MP, if he had no ambitions in that direction the people who saw something in him even then were very mistaken about him.
People love lawyers, I think an outsider like this gathers support.
I remember in 1997 people thought Archie Norman should run for the leadership/would do so in the future because being Chief Exec of Asda is the perfect finishing school to be Tory leader/PM.
Apparently at least 193 candidates at the last GE were lawyers. I don't know how many were elected, but given there were 4000 candidates I would guess that the success rate of lawyers standing for parliament versus other professions was pretty high, showing that people like lawyers becoming politicians I guess.
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
That is probably a good summary of it. Clearly there are people who deeply dislike him, but anecdotally it doesn't feel visceral, and more as though no one is putting much effort in defending him.
On here, outright hatred for Keir Starmer is a minority opinion. But here isn't representative. People genuinely hate him in a way I don't remember for previous PMs. From the article:
A YouGov poll last week found that he was more disliked by Britons than Benjamin Netanyahu or Hamas. At the weekend a far-right march against Starmer’s government in Bristol was met with a leftwing counter-protest bearing the slogan “We hate Keir Starmer more than you”.
Meanwhile the song itself has become a kind of standard, the soundtrack to our lives, perhaps even a unifying balm in troubled times. As well as the darts, you hear it at football grounds up and down the country, in nightclubs at 2am, at music festivals, pretty much anywhere large groups of young people congregate in a public place.
I have said this before, I am somewhat confused by how genuinely hated he is by the public.
Personally I just found him extremely unlikeable the minute I saw him interviewed. For a long time on here I was mocked for this, but it is now the mainstream view. He hasn’t done anything THAT bad, he’s just boring, but kind of smug, snidey & insincere with it.
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
I am more and more persuaded by the theory that Starmer never wanted to be an MP/the summit of his ambition was to be Attorney-General/Lord Chancellor.
He stood down as DPP in late 2013 and there was a narrow window for him to decide to become an MP, had there been a longer period between standing down and the next general election he would have decided politics wasn't for him.
I suspect had Corbyn and Brexit not happened he would have achieved his summit.
That would suggest the last two leaders for Labour had no real ambition for the top job (though once there certainly took to it).
Starmer was floated as a potential Leadership candidate weeks after becoming an MP, if he had no ambitions in that direction the people who saw something in him even then were very mistaken about him.
People love lawyers, I think an outsider like this gathers support.
I remember in 1997 people thought Archie Norman should run for the leadership/would do so in the future because being Chief Exec of Asda is the perfect finishing school to be Tory leader/PM.
Apparently at least 193 candidates at the last GE were lawyers. I don't know how many were elected, but given there were 4000 candidates I would guess that the success rate of lawyers standing for parliament versus other professions was pretty high, showing that people like lawyers becoming politicians I guess.
So many good news stories at the moment. Here's another one.
"Europe | Charlemagne Why Europe is rediscovering the virtues of cash In a world of payment apps and digital euros, the coin is staging a modest comeback" (£)
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
If you define his tribe as the broad left-of-centre, a fair chunk blame him for the fall of Jeremy. Same as a chunk of the right imagine that, if it hadn't been for rotten old Starmer, King Boris's reign would have continued to this day.
There's also the issue that very many governments worldwide are very unpopular right now. It's too late to remove the punch bowl before the party gets too rowdy; the bowl is empty, except for some questionable slices of orange. And hangovers aren't meant to be fun.
There's also the poor at electoral politics and weirdly afraid to get rid of a terrible adviser things.
But he doesn't seem to be salting the Earth like late-era Sunak. He's less mad than Truss, and not as shameful as Boris. That takes us back to May; someone else who normally wouldn't have got near the top job, but was the least bad option available at the time.
If a nation gets the quality of leaders it deserves, we need to work out what we're doing wrong.
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
Yes, I think that rings true. If you can fight for something passionately (even if it’s the status quo) it allows people to believe in you and support you as one of them.
Starmer is nothing much to anyone. He has spent excessive amounts of political capital running around trying to appease all sorts of different sections of the electorate, only to caveat, row back and disavow pretty much all of it, whilst claiming it is his settled belief.
Political masters can land that sort of extreme doublethink. But those people are rarer than hen’s teeth. Blair was one. Cameron managed it on occasion. Starmer is not one of those people.
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
If you define his tribe as the broad left-of-centre, a fair chunk blame him for the fall of Jeremy. Same as a chunk of the right imagine that, if it hadn't been for rotten old Starmer, King Boris's reign would have continued to this day.
There's also the issue that very many governments worldwide are very unpopular right now. It's too late to remove the punch bowl before the party gets too rowdy; the bowl is empty, except for some questionable slices of orange. And hangovers aren't meant to be fun.
There's also the poor at electoral politics and weirdly afraid to get rid of a terrible adviser things.
But he doesn't seem to be salting the Earth like late-era Sunak. He's less mad than Truss, and not as shameful as Boris. That takes us back to May; someone else who normally wouldn't have got near the top job, but was the least bad option available at the time.
If a nation gets the quality of leaders it deserves, we need to work out what we're doing wrong.
Errhhhhhh....the whole budget strategy is going to end up in exactly the same way the latter days of Sunak / Hunt. Borrow loads of money now on promise we will definitely sort it in 2028/2029, then they won't, they will fudge it and the next government will be start having to make shitty decisions.
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
That is probably a good summary of it. Clearly there are people who deeply dislike him, but anecdotally it doesn't feel visceral, and more as though no one is putting much effort in defending him.
On here, outright hatred for Keir Starmer is a minority opinion. But here isn't representative. People genuinely hate him in a way I don't remember for previous PMs. From the article:
A YouGov poll last week found that he was more disliked by Britons than Benjamin Netanyahu or Hamas. At the weekend a far-right march against Starmer’s government in Bristol was met with a leftwing counter-protest bearing the slogan “We hate Keir Starmer more than you”.
Meanwhile the song itself has become a kind of standard, the soundtrack to our lives, perhaps even a unifying balm in troubled times. As well as the darts, you hear it at football grounds up and down the country, in nightclubs at 2am, at music festivals, pretty much anywhere large groups of young people congregate in a public place.
I have said this before, I am somewhat confused by how genuinely hated he is by the public.
Because he's the government at the moment and since the country lapsed into politica della fantasia with Brexit and all that came after, it's becoming ungovernable. The country has immense structural and sociological problems that have blocking minorities that impede all attempts at resolution.
This is nothing compared to how people will feel after 18 months of Farage as PM. I suspect and hope that he won't be able set foot outside without genuine fear for his life.
Speaking of the benefits of politicians who were lawyers, an update on one of the weirder attempted self-coups of the last few years.
Prosecutors have asked for South Korea's former president Yoon Suk Yeol to be handed a death sentence if he is found guilty over his botched attempt to impose martial law.
Worth remembering his party attempted to ride it out at first and did not support his impeachment.
I don't know whether his actions meet the legal standard in this case, but this is surely a novel defence, don't let Trump read it as a suggestion: Yoon has denied the charges against him, arguing that martial law was a symbolic gesture to draw public attention to the wrongdoings of the opposition party.
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
Yes, I think that rings true. If you can fight for something passionately (even if it’s the status quo) it allows people to believe in you and support you as one of them.
Starmer is nothing much to anyone. He has spent excessive amounts of political capital running around trying to appease all sorts of different sections of the electorate, only to caveat, row back and disavow pretty much all of it, whilst claiming it is his settled belief.
Political masters can land that sort of extreme doublethink. But those people are rarer than hen’s teeth. Blair was one. Cameron managed it on occasion. Starmer is not one of those people.
This is one reason why, despite my general dislike of intense ideology, I do think true political leaders need to display some kind of vision and coherent direction, which inevitably will be rooted in some kind of inherently irrational ideology.
I confess I had never considered the railway uniforms were such an essential element of imperialism that it needed addressing. Wasn't Cricket also a part of it?
Yup.
One of the other major airbrushing going on is about the British Indian Army in WWII.
It’s bit embarrassing that it is the largest volunteer army in human history.
Iranians are being massacred - in their thousands, if some of the reports out of Iran are accurate, with executions to start tomorrow but, hey, let's discuss MoTs instead.
Why does any BBC mention of the events in Iran seem to compulsorily include that “the protests were sparked by anger over the collapse of the Iranian currency and soaring cost of living“, and not mention anger over the despotic Islamist regime?
I swear I heard something the other day that basically said ISIS were "alleged Islamic terrorists", as though there might be someone who would dispute the description. I'm pretty damn sure that if you phones ISIS HQ for a statement they would proudly agree that they are indeed "Islamic terrorists".
Legal disclaimer - do not attempt to phone ISIS HQ for comment, the authorities will not accept your explaination of why.
Unless it's the neutron diffraction lab near Oxford.
"I'm off to work with ISIS"... how we used to laugh in the crystallography lab. Though I probably wouldn't have said it if I had any plans to visit America.
I confess I had never considered the railway uniforms were such an essential element of imperialism that it needed addressing. Wasn't Cricket also a part of it?
Yup.
One of the other major airbrushing going on is about the British Indian Army in WWII.
It’s bit embarrassing that it is the largest volunteer army in human history.
Doesn’t fit the evil colonialism storyline.
That's dispiriting. With that general all but gone, how many will even remember it if it no longer fits the official narratives?
I confess I had never considered the railway uniforms were such an essential element of imperialism that it needed addressing. Wasn't Cricket also a part of it?
Yup.
One of the other major airbrushing going on is about the British Indian Army in WWII.
It’s bit embarrassing that it is the largest volunteer army in human history.
Doesn’t fit the evil colonialism storyline.
That's dispiriting. With that general all but gone, how many will even remember it if it no longer fits the official narratives?
I’ll remember it, I have my great-grandfather’s medals.
YouGov has just polled me asking, "Does former Conservative MPs joining Reform UK make you think more positively or more negatively towards Reform UK, or does it make no difference?"
Possibly depends on the Conservative MP? Most, in fact all, of them have been roasters of the highest order.
Rather liked Michael Crick's comments in the light of recent events:
"Two things always amaze me about highly intelligent politicians - their stubborn refusal ever to apologise; and their complete inability to judge character and spot a wrong-un."
He was referring to NZ defection. However, I think he gives too much credit to Farage by suggesting that he failed to judge Zahawi correctly. I think he very much did understand Zahawi's character and motivation - that's the point. NF is a lot more like Trump than he is given credit for.
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
I am more and more persuaded by the theory that Starmer never wanted to be an MP/the summit of his ambition was to be Attorney-General/Lord Chancellor.
He stood down as DPP in late 2013 and there was a narrow window for him to decide to become an MP, had there been a longer period between standing down and the next general election he would have decided politics wasn't for him.
I suspect had Corbyn and Brexit not happened he would have achieved his summit.
That would suggest the last two leaders for Labour had no real ambition for the top job (though once there certainly took to it).
Starmer was floated as a potential Leadership candidate weeks after becoming an MP, if he had no ambitions in that direction the people who saw something in him even then were very mistaken about him.
People love lawyers, I think an outsider like this gathers support.
I remember in 1997 people thought Archie Norman should run for the leadership/would do so in the future because being Chief Exec of Asda is the perfect finishing school to be Tory leader/PM.
Apparently at least 193 candidates at the last GE were lawyers. I don't know how many were elected, but given there were 4000 candidates I would guess that the success rate of lawyers standing for parliament versus other professions was pretty high, showing that people like lawyers becoming politicians I guess.
"I don't believe it. I don't believe it! You're meant to come down here and defend me against these characters, and the only one I've got on my side is the bloodsucking lawyer!" - John Hammond.
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
That is probably a good summary of it. Clearly there are people who deeply dislike him, but anecdotally it doesn't feel visceral, and more as though no one is putting much effort in defending him.
On here, outright hatred for Keir Starmer is a minority opinion. But here isn't representative. People genuinely hate him in a way I don't remember for previous PMs. From the article:
A YouGov poll last week found that he was more disliked by Britons than Benjamin Netanyahu or Hamas. At the weekend a far-right march against Starmer’s government in Bristol was met with a leftwing counter-protest bearing the slogan “We hate Keir Starmer more than you”.
Meanwhile the song itself has become a kind of standard, the soundtrack to our lives, perhaps even a unifying balm in troubled times. As well as the darts, you hear it at football grounds up and down the country, in nightclubs at 2am, at music festivals, pretty much anywhere large groups of young people congregate in a public place.
I have said this before, I am somewhat confused by how genuinely hated he is by the public.
Because he's the government at the moment and since the country lapsed into politica della fantasia with Brexit and all that came after, it's becoming ungovernable. The country has immense structural and sociological problems that have blocking minorities that impede all attempts at resolution.
This is nothing compared to how people will feel after 18 months of Farage as PM. I suspect and hope that he won't be able set foot outside without genuine fear for his life.
While I don't disagree with your central premise, for some reason Starmer seemed to cause this strong reaction, in a way that Sunak also a pretty boring middle manager type individual and way out of depth as a leader with no real clear policy strategy, never hit the heights of dislike. The Tory brand in general absolutely, but personally, Sunak the public reaction was more eye rolling.
Q: The premier of Greenland said today, 'We prefer to stay with Denmark.'
TRUMP: Who said that?
Q: The premier of Greenland
TRUMP: Well, that's their problem. I disagree with him. I don't know who he is. Don't know anything about him. But that's gonna be a big problem for him.
I think occasionally he imagines he has some sort of influence on Trump.
See also: Mike Johnson: One of the things the president probably had not thought through is when you bring interest rates down to 10% the problem is that the credit card companies would just stop lending money https://x.com/atrupar/status/2011103372477419738
His default mode, though, is pretending he's just too busy with 'important stuff' to know what the President has just gone and done this time.
So many good news stories at the moment. Here's another one.
"Europe | Charlemagne Why Europe is rediscovering the virtues of cash In a world of payment apps and digital euros, the coin is staging a modest comeback" (£)
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
I am more and more persuaded by the theory that Starmer never wanted to be an MP/the summit of his ambition was to be Attorney-General/Lord Chancellor.
He stood down as DPP in late 2013 and there was a narrow window for him to decide to become an MP, had there been a longer period between standing down and the next general election he would have decided politics wasn't for him.
I suspect had Corbyn and Brexit not happened he would have achieved his summit.
That would suggest the last two leaders for Labour had no real ambition for the top job (though once there certainly took to it).
Starmer was floated as a potential Leadership candidate weeks after becoming an MP, if he had no ambitions in that direction the people who saw something in him even then were very mistaken about him.
People love lawyers, I think an outsider like this gathers support.
I remember in 1997 people thought Archie Norman should run for the leadership/would do so in the future because being Chief Exec of Asda is the perfect finishing school to be Tory leader/PM.
Apparently at least 193 candidates at the last GE were lawyers. I don't know how many were elected, but given there were 4000 candidates I would guess that the success rate of lawyers standing for parliament versus other professions was pretty high, showing that people like lawyers becoming politicians I guess.
"I don't believe it. I don't believe it! You're meant to come down here and defend me against these characters, and the only one I've got on my side is the bloodsucking lawyer!" - John Hammond.
I read the book for the first time this year - John Hammond was a dangerous lunatic, getting a kindly old man to play him in the film was a heck of a change.
So many good news stories at the moment. Here's another one.
"Europe | Charlemagne Why Europe is rediscovering the virtues of cash In a world of payment apps and digital euros, the coin is staging a modest comeback" (£)
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
That is probably a good summary of it. Clearly there are people who deeply dislike him, but anecdotally it doesn't feel visceral, and more as though no one is putting much effort in defending him.
On here, outright hatred for Keir Starmer is a minority opinion. But here isn't representative. People genuinely hate him in a way I don't remember for previous PMs. From the article:
A YouGov poll last week found that he was more disliked by Britons than Benjamin Netanyahu or Hamas. At the weekend a far-right march against Starmer’s government in Bristol was met with a leftwing counter-protest bearing the slogan “We hate Keir Starmer more than you”.
Meanwhile the song itself has become a kind of standard, the soundtrack to our lives, perhaps even a unifying balm in troubled times. As well as the darts, you hear it at football grounds up and down the country, in nightclubs at 2am, at music festivals, pretty much anywhere large groups of young people congregate in a public place.
Song?
And can't the band play on? Just listen, they play my song Ash to ash Dust to dust
Fortune, fame Mirror vain Gone insane Fortune, fame Mirror vain Gone insane Dance little tin goddess…
Uk banks hold a lot of uk debt (20%?) after the quantitative easing spree a while back. We are also paying those banks interest on that debt. ~~ £20bn.
That easing was to iirc, increase the velocity of money. I was reminded by the above post from Casino.
I’m not sure why we are paying the banks that £20bn? Are we paying them to hold gilts we pretty much gave them? Is that a very expensive bung obviously better spent on re-arming and security.
Surely the banks would prefer a safer country. A deal should be done.
Speaking of the benefits of politicians who were lawyers, an update on one of the weirder attempted self-coups of the last few years.
Prosecutors have asked for South Korea's former president Yoon Suk Yeol to be handed a death sentence if he is found guilty over his botched attempt to impose martial law.
Worth remembering his party attempted to ride it out at first and did not support his impeachment.
I don't know whether his actions meet the legal standard in this case, but this is surely a novel defence, don't let Trump read it as a suggestion: Yoon has denied the charges against him, arguing that martial law was a symbolic gesture to draw public attention to the wrongdoings of the opposition party.
Korean media are reporting it as a "life or death" case.
OTOH they haven't actually carried out a capital sentence since 1997.
I confess I had never considered the railway uniforms were such an essential element of imperialism that it needed addressing. Wasn't Cricket also a part of it?
Yup.
One of the other major airbrushing going on is about the British Indian Army in WWII.
It’s bit embarrassing that it is the largest volunteer army in human history.
Doesn’t fit the evil colonialism storyline.
The expansion of the (British) Indian Army in WW2 was pretty key to how modern India formed. It started the war as a lightly equipped, white officered combination of regiments from what the British considered "The Martial Races", and ended up as a very different army, representing all of India and Pakistan as well as equipped with modern heavy weapons and a largely domestic officer class.
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
That is probably a good summary of it. Clearly there are people who deeply dislike him, but anecdotally it doesn't feel visceral, and more as though no one is putting much effort in defending him.
On here, outright hatred for Keir Starmer is a minority opinion. But here isn't representative. People genuinely hate him in a way I don't remember for previous PMs. From the article:
A YouGov poll last week found that he was more disliked by Britons than Benjamin Netanyahu or Hamas. At the weekend a far-right march against Starmer’s government in Bristol was met with a leftwing counter-protest bearing the slogan “We hate Keir Starmer more than you”.
Meanwhile the song itself has become a kind of standard, the soundtrack to our lives, perhaps even a unifying balm in troubled times. As well as the darts, you hear it at football grounds up and down the country, in nightclubs at 2am, at music festivals, pretty much anywhere large groups of young people congregate in a public place.
I have said this before, I am somewhat confused by how genuinely hated he is by the public.
Because he's the government at the moment and since the country lapsed into politica della fantasia with Brexit and all that came after, it's becoming ungovernable. The country has immense structural and sociological problems that have blocking minorities that impede all attempts at resolution.
This is nothing compared to how people will feel after 18 months of Farage as PM. I suspect and hope that he won't be able set foot outside without genuine fear for his life.
While I don't disagree with your central premise, for some reason Starmer seemed to cause this strong reaction, in a way that Sunak also a pretty boring middle manager type individual and way out of depth as a leader with no real clear policy strategy, never hit the heights of dislike. The Tory brand in general absolutely, but personally, Sunak the public reaction was more eye rolling.
Absolutely correct. It's totally to be expected that many dislike Starmer but this, as said above, visceral hatred of him is hard to fathom.
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
Yes, I think that rings true. If you can fight for something passionately (even if it’s the status quo) it allows people to believe in you and support you as one of them.
Starmer is nothing much to anyone. He has spent excessive amounts of political capital running around trying to appease all sorts of different sections of the electorate, only to caveat, row back and disavow pretty much all of it, whilst claiming it is his settled belief.
Political masters can land that sort of extreme doublethink. But those people are rarer than hen’s teeth. Blair was one. Cameron managed it on occasion. Starmer is not one of those people.
He campaigned in 2017 on accepting the referendum result ‘as a matter of principle’, then spent two years blocking every deal and ended up demanding a second referendum. That’s who he was, is and always will be; an unlikeable, two faced, boring snide.
He’s a vegetarian out of principle, wouldn’t let his kids eat meat, but scoffs chicken if he’s hungry. I just don’t get how people don’t see this as a major character flaw.
Q: The premier of Greenland said today, 'We prefer to stay with Denmark.'
TRUMP: Who said that?
Q: The premier of Greenland
TRUMP: Well, that's their problem. I disagree with him. I don't know who he is. Don't know anything about him. But that's gonna be a big problem for him.
I think occasionally he imagines he has some sort of influence on Trump.
See also: Mike Johnson: One of the things the president probably had not thought through is when you bring interest rates down to 10% the problem is that the credit card companies would just stop lending money https://x.com/atrupar/status/2011103372477419738
His default mode, though, is pretending he's just too busy with 'important stuff' to know what the President has just gone and done this time.
It is a full-time job keeping track of Trump's daily gyrations. Not all of them to the Village People.
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
That is probably a good summary of it. Clearly there are people who deeply dislike him, but anecdotally it doesn't feel visceral, and more as though no one is putting much effort in defending him.
On here, outright hatred for Keir Starmer is a minority opinion. But here isn't representative. People genuinely hate him in a way I don't remember for previous PMs. From the article:
A YouGov poll last week found that he was more disliked by Britons than Benjamin Netanyahu or Hamas. At the weekend a far-right march against Starmer’s government in Bristol was met with a leftwing counter-protest bearing the slogan “We hate Keir Starmer more than you”.
Meanwhile the song itself has become a kind of standard, the soundtrack to our lives, perhaps even a unifying balm in troubled times. As well as the darts, you hear it at football grounds up and down the country, in nightclubs at 2am, at music festivals, pretty much anywhere large groups of young people congregate in a public place.
I have said this before, I am somewhat confused by how genuinely hated he is by the public.
Because he's the government at the moment and since the country lapsed into politica della fantasia with Brexit and all that came after, it's becoming ungovernable. The country has immense structural and sociological problems that have blocking minorities that impede all attempts at resolution.
This is nothing compared to how people will feel after 18 months of Farage as PM. I suspect and hope that he won't be able set foot outside without genuine fear for his life.
While I don't disagree with your central premise, for some reason Starmer seemed to cause this strong reaction, in a way that Sunak also a pretty boring middle manager type individual and way out of depth as a leader with no real clear policy strategy, never hit the heights of dislike. The Tory brand in general absolutely, but personally, Sunak the public reaction was more eye rolling.
Absolutely correct. It's totally to be expected that many dislike Starmer but this, as said above, visceral hatred of him is hard to fathom.
He’s like Slater, the bent copper in Only Fools and Horses. The other characters are all flawed but have some redeeming feature, while he has none.
Speaking of the benefits of politicians who were lawyers, an update on one of the weirder attempted self-coups of the last few years.
Prosecutors have asked for South Korea's former president Yoon Suk Yeol to be handed a death sentence if he is found guilty over his botched attempt to impose martial law.
Worth remembering his party attempted to ride it out at first and did not support his impeachment.
I don't know whether his actions meet the legal standard in this case, but this is surely a novel defence, don't let Trump read it as a suggestion: Yoon has denied the charges against him, arguing that martial law was a symbolic gesture to draw public attention to the wrongdoings of the opposition party.
Korean media are reporting it as a "life or death" case.
OTOH they haven't actually carried out a capital sentence since 1997.
This I hadn't realised: ..Under Korea’s Criminal Act, the crime of leading an insurrection carries only three possible penalties: death, life imprisonment with labor or life imprisonment without labor. Fixed-term sentences and suspended sentences are not permitted...
Yoon is appearing in the same courtroom as (Gwanju massacre instigator) Chun Doo-hwan, who received a death sentence for the same crime in 1997 (commuted to life imprisonment).
As a law student, Yoon participated in a mock trial of Chun...
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
That is probably a good summary of it. Clearly there are people who deeply dislike him, but anecdotally it doesn't feel visceral, and more as though no one is putting much effort in defending him.
On here, outright hatred for Keir Starmer is a minority opinion. But here isn't representative. People genuinely hate him in a way I don't remember for previous PMs. From the article:
A YouGov poll last week found that he was more disliked by Britons than Benjamin Netanyahu or Hamas. At the weekend a far-right march against Starmer’s government in Bristol was met with a leftwing counter-protest bearing the slogan “We hate Keir Starmer more than you”.
Meanwhile the song itself has become a kind of standard, the soundtrack to our lives, perhaps even a unifying balm in troubled times. As well as the darts, you hear it at football grounds up and down the country, in nightclubs at 2am, at music festivals, pretty much anywhere large groups of young people congregate in a public place.
I have said this before, I am somewhat confused by how genuinely hated he is by the public.
Imho it all started with the blatant gorging on free suits, tickets, etc. After all the excesses from Boris etc it was a real kick in the teeth to those voters who naively thought things were gonna change. Since then the general incompetence, turns have just added to it.
I don't have a telegraph account - is the whole digital id scheme being scrapped, or just the bit about needing it for employment for migrants? I can only see the sub-heading which says "Migrants will no longer need to show identity cards to prove right to work".
The digital ID was more than just "I seem a bit foreign - here's my ID" though, wasn't it? Or am I muddling it with the Blair-era one where it was a blanket "Show your card, citizen" vibe?
Rogan: "You don't want militarized people in the streets just roaming around, snatching up people — many of which turn out to be U.S. citizens that just don't have their papers on them. Are we really gonna be the Gestapo, 'Where's your papers?' Is that what we've come to?" https://x.com/OfTheBraveUSA/status/2011153857976668290
Rogan: "You don't want militarized people in the streets just roaming around, snatching up people — many of which turn out to be U.S. citizens that just don't have their papers on them. Are we really gonna be the Gestapo, 'Where's your papers?' Is that what we've come to?" https://x.com/OfTheBraveUSA/status/2011153857976668290
Yes they really are. And it's gone well beyond "where's your papers ?"
This woman looked horrified while she frantically tried to explain to the ICE agents ripping her out of the car that she’s disabled and was on her way to the doctor, then other agents in the background try to shield the scene from photographers.
Rogan: "You don't want militarized people in the streets just roaming around, snatching up people — many of which turn out to be U.S. citizens that just don't have their papers on them. Are we really gonna be the Gestapo, 'Where's your papers?' Is that what we've come to?" https://x.com/OfTheBraveUSA/status/2011153857976668290
Yes they really are. And it's gone well beyond "where's your papers ?"
This woman looked horrified while she frantically tried to explain to the ICE agents ripping her out of the car that she’s disabled and was on her way to the doctor, then other agents in the background try to shield the scene from photographers.
I don't have a telegraph account - is the whole digital id scheme being scrapped, or just the bit about needing it for employment for migrants? I can only see the sub-heading which says "Migrants will no longer need to show identity cards to prove right to work".
I don't pay for the Telegraph either, but just having a free account allows you to read some articles.
Interesting to see how Sam Coates reported the YouGov numbers this morning. It was almost as though he was trying to convince people the Conservatives were leading a poll by listing them first. The Reform share is the lowest since last May's local elections.
Once again, the glaring differences between pollsters are obvious - the Freshwater poll in the field at or around the same time has very different numbers for Reform, the LDs and Greens for example.
As for fraud, let's not call a spade a garden implement. Fraud exists even in the best of societies - in the worst, it's endemic and usually perpetuated by the regime and its allies/friends on the rest of the population. Running a country as your personal bank and business is nothing unusual and utilising the resources for the advantage of such allies also hardly without precedent.
Even in democratic societies, allegations and accusations of fraud by opponents of the Government or in areas controlled by the Opposition occur as a way of undermining support for said Opposition and especially so when the reporting of such allegations comes from a source politically supportive of the Government. That's why there has to be scrupulous impartiality and thorough evidence gathering before fraud can be alleged rather than a politically motivated scare.
Auditing where and how and by whom public money is spent is or should be a serious business - too often, the mechanisms for measuring such accountability are the first thing to be compromised if a Government or regime starts to move away from democratic norms including scrutiny to a less balanced regimen.
I think the Right / Far Right (by which I mean from the Lam / Jenrick / Philp xenophobic wing of the Tories, through Reform, and further right, though precision is not very relevant just for the observation) is now starting to Balkanise, and that opens a larger niche and opportunity for Kemi to stay somewhat sane and avoid much of her perceived need to outflank Farage.
Farage may be about to do the splits, hopefully not in his black shorts.
Yaxley-Lennon diving heavily into Gulf Arabs vs Persians (also Qatar vs UAE) advocacy, including the old Sudan Government vs Janjaweed / Rapid Support Forces, is interesting.
Rogan: "You don't want militarized people in the streets just roaming around, snatching up people — many of which turn out to be U.S. citizens that just don't have their papers on them. Are we really gonna be the Gestapo, 'Where's your papers?' Is that what we've come to?" https://x.com/OfTheBraveUSA/status/2011153857976668290
If they've lost Joe Rogan it bodes ill for the MAGA movement.
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
That is probably a good summary of it. Clearly there are people who deeply dislike him, but anecdotally it doesn't feel visceral, and more as though no one is putting much effort in defending him.
On here, outright hatred for Keir Starmer is a minority opinion. But here isn't representative. People genuinely hate him in a way I don't remember for previous PMs. From the article:
A YouGov poll last week found that he was more disliked by Britons than Benjamin Netanyahu or Hamas. At the weekend a far-right march against Starmer’s government in Bristol was met with a leftwing counter-protest bearing the slogan “We hate Keir Starmer more than you”.
Meanwhile the song itself has become a kind of standard, the soundtrack to our lives, perhaps even a unifying balm in troubled times. As well as the darts, you hear it at football grounds up and down the country, in nightclubs at 2am, at music festivals, pretty much anywhere large groups of young people congregate in a public place.
I have said this before, I am somewhat confused by how genuinely hated he is by the public.
Because he's the government at the moment and since the country lapsed into politica della fantasia with Brexit and all that came after, it's becoming ungovernable. The country has immense structural and sociological problems that have blocking minorities that impede all attempts at resolution.
This is nothing compared to how people will feel after 18 months of Farage as PM. I suspect and hope that he won't be able set foot outside without genuine fear for his life.
While I don't disagree with your central premise, for some reason Starmer seemed to cause this strong reaction, in a way that Sunak also a pretty boring middle manager type individual and way out of depth as a leader with no real clear policy strategy, never hit the heights of dislike. The Tory brand in general absolutely, but personally, Sunak the public reaction was more eye rolling.
Absolutely correct. It's totally to be expected that many dislike Starmer but this, as said above, visceral hatred of him is hard to fathom.
What is surprising is it comes from all spectrums. Boris had mainly the FBPE crowd baying against him, Starmer has managed to unite vast swathes of the country against him, farmers, eco types, business, working class, everyone seems to have an axe to grind.
Its the poor ratings he has and the fact he is unlikely to be shifted before May which makes me conclude that the Senedd, Holyrood and locals are a bloodbath in waiting for Labour.
I didn't think he would see out a 5 year term when he took office, more 3 and half/4 years before handing over and shuffling off to retirement. But now I think the chances of him still being PM at Christmas are dropping daily. The biggest sticking point is how difficult it is to remove a Labour leader
Rogan: "You don't want militarized people in the streets just roaming around, snatching up people — many of which turn out to be U.S. citizens that just don't have their papers on them. Are we really gonna be the Gestapo, 'Where's your papers?' Is that what we've come to?" https://x.com/OfTheBraveUSA/status/2011153857976668290
Yes they really are. And it's gone well beyond "where's your papers ?"
This woman looked horrified while she frantically tried to explain to the ICE agents ripping her out of the car that she’s disabled and was on her way to the doctor, then other agents in the background try to shield the scene from photographers.
I'm going to sleep better having read "Britain’s world: The strategy of security in twelve geopolitical maps"
Provided we fund defence properly, our geopolitical security position is stronger than I thought - even into the mid 21st Century.
I saw that recommended somewhere - it may have on The Rest is Politics. I think in particular that the Defence trajectory is stronger than it is given credit for.
I think an insight that some are missing in their focus on working to improve trade relaionships with the EU (which is vey important) is sleepwalking into a position where we are forced to lose other improved Trade Relationships, such as the CPTPP and developing closer ties with Canada.
That is an opportunity, and an important bit of leverage over say the USA and the EU - when the USA emerges from their black hole, if they do, we have a Veto over their CPTPP relationship.
I knew they died en-route to a Hallow'een party, and that they were dressed up, but I didn't know what they were dressed as. And no, I wouldn't have guessed.
The people in the comments mocking the parents or Saavik don't come across well. They died in fear and pain, she lost her parents traumatically, and I can't think of a joke.
There have of course been other useless prime ministers in our time: prime ministers who have started wars, killed thousands through neglect or cruelty, plunged millions into poverty, been duplicitous or corrupt, who have been turfed out in disgrace. But with the brief exception of Liz Truss, even the most divisive of them took years to become the focal point of mass rage. Starmer has managed to hit the sweet spot within barely a year. People genuinely, viscerally loathe this guy. Why him? Why now? And why like this?
Do they ? I think he's fairly crap, but rage ? Don't be daft.
His problem is that unlike most recent prime ministers, he doesn’t command the partisan loyalty of his own tribe. Hence the deep trough in net ratings.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
That is probably a good summary of it. Clearly there are people who deeply dislike him, but anecdotally it doesn't feel visceral, and more as though no one is putting much effort in defending him.
On here, outright hatred for Keir Starmer is a minority opinion. But here isn't representative. People genuinely hate him in a way I don't remember for previous PMs. From the article:
A YouGov poll last week found that he was more disliked by Britons than Benjamin Netanyahu or Hamas. At the weekend a far-right march against Starmer’s government in Bristol was met with a leftwing counter-protest bearing the slogan “We hate Keir Starmer more than you”.
Meanwhile the song itself has become a kind of standard, the soundtrack to our lives, perhaps even a unifying balm in troubled times. As well as the darts, you hear it at football grounds up and down the country, in nightclubs at 2am, at music festivals, pretty much anywhere large groups of young people congregate in a public place.
I have said this before, I am somewhat confused by how genuinely hated he is by the public.
Because he's the government at the moment and since the country lapsed into politica della fantasia with Brexit and all that came after, it's becoming ungovernable. The country has immense structural and sociological problems that have blocking minorities that impede all attempts at resolution.
This is nothing compared to how people will feel after 18 months of Farage as PM. I suspect and hope that he won't be able set foot outside without genuine fear for his life.
While I don't disagree with your central premise, for some reason Starmer seemed to cause this strong reaction, in a way that Sunak also a pretty boring middle manager type individual and way out of depth as a leader with no real clear policy strategy, never hit the heights of dislike. The Tory brand in general absolutely, but personally, Sunak the public reaction was more eye rolling.
Starmer has lots working against him, and nothing in his favour. He is the embodiment of an entitled, arrogant and incompetent political class that is widely seen to have failed at least since the financial crisis. He has no political judgement or charisma, and no experience in, or skill at, government beyond his very narrow experience as a prosecutor - and even there, he seems to have been mediocre at best. The left will always loathe him because the magic money tree dried up three years ago and he hasn't deposed Netanyahu yet, and the right will always resent him for failing to stop national economic decline and in many cases ethnic dilution. The non-political see prices and taxes going ever higher with no end in sight and no solutions provided to pressing social problems.
In addition, like many senior politicians, he has a huge sense of personal entitlement, as shown in the Free Gear scandals, and he seems incapable of saying clearly what his government is for, or in sticking to unpopular decisions he believes to be right.
Given all that, what's surprising is perhaps not that he's so unpopular, but that he has any support at all.
Comments
Also: I would point out that the current Supreme Court said that States and Cities were under no obligation to help the Federal Government as regards immigration enforcement. That's why Sanctuary Cities are legal. And this is not a Supreme Court that has bent over backwards to make things easy for liberals: it's because the constitution is very clear about the separation of powers.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugLc8sZlK0s&list=RDugLc8sZlK0s&start_radio=1
I think he's fairly crap, but rage ?
Don't be daft.
I have no doubt he’ll be telling us soon that he always said he had concerns about it being mandatory, now.
This government has no clue what it’s doing.
I could give you 1,000 tries to guess how Kirstie Alley’s parents were dressed when they died in a car accident and you wouldn’t get it right
https://x.com/thewapplehouse/status/2011112077499248995?s=46&t=CW4pL-mMpTqsJXCdjW0Z6Q
If anyone ever slags off the BBC I would tell them the BBC Persian/world service is so important.
Q: Do you think the president should state explicitly that the concept of a military takeover of Greenland is off the table?
MIKE JOHNSON: I don't think anybody is considering that. I think it's a media narrative that's been created
https://bsky.app/profile/atrupar.com/post/3mccvetfki22b
Q: The premier of Greenland said today, 'We prefer to stay with Denmark.'
TRUMP: Who said that?
Q: The premier of Greenland
TRUMP: Well, that's their problem. I disagree with him. I don't know who he is. Don't know anything about him. But that's gonna be a big problem for him.
https://bsky.app/profile/atrupar.com/post/3mcdkk2ln252f
Kirstie Alley was the true Saavik, if only they could have convinced her to come back in The Undiscovered Country to replace Valeris.
A divisive, partisan tribalist would maintain a base level of support even if they were deeply crap.
Rather liked Michael Crick's comments in the light of recent events:
"Two things always amaze me about highly intelligent politicians - their stubborn refusal ever to apologise; and their complete inability to judge character and spot a wrong-un."
Or a batsman with a glorious cover drive who also keeps getting out seeking to use it.
A YouGov poll last week found that he was more disliked by Britons than Benjamin Netanyahu or Hamas. At the weekend a far-right march against Starmer’s government in Bristol was met with a leftwing counter-protest bearing the slogan “We hate Keir Starmer more than you”.
Meanwhile the song itself has become a kind of standard, the soundtrack to our lives, perhaps even a unifying balm in troubled times. As well as the darts, you hear it at football grounds up and down the country, in nightclubs at 2am, at music festivals, pretty much anywhere large groups of young people congregate in a public place.
He stood down as DPP in late 2013 and there was a narrow window for him to decide to become an MP, had there been a longer period between standing down and the next general election he would have decided politics wasn't for him.
I suspect had Corbyn and Brexit not happened he would have achieved his summit.
My favourite is the 5% of Reform voters who haven't changed their opinion as they already dislike Reform, beaten only by the 8% of LDs who already think of Reform positively.
What planet are these people from?
https://x.com/i/status/2011122509244998059
Starmer was floated as a potential Leadership candidate weeks after becoming an MP, if he had no ambitions in that direction the people who saw something in him even then were very mistaken about him.
https://www.theguardian.com/law/2015/may/17/keir-starmer-rules-himself-out-labour-leadership-contest
Friedman, NYTimes:
"My favorite line in Powell’s Sunday night remarks was this: “Public service sometimes requires standing firm in the face of threats. I will continue to do the job the Senate confirmed me to do, with integrity and a commitment to serving the American people.”
How many Republican lawmakers would have the guts and integrity to make that statement? So far, you don’t need more than two hands to count them.
Shame, shame, shame on all of them."
I remember in 1997 people thought Archie Norman should run for the leadership/would do so in the future because being Chief Exec of Asda is the perfect finishing school to be Tory leader/PM.
There is also something that I don’t think any of us can quite put our finger on, but it just makes him unlikeable (certainly in power, it wasn’t really there when he was LOTO). I guess it’s a sum total of quite a few factors. I dont think the voice helps, I don’t think he can do false sincerity very well, he cannot mount a passionate argument for anything much, and he has a rather prickly air when challenged, that just lands badly.
https://www.globallegalpost.com/news/from-braverman-to-starmer-the-many-lawyers-seeking-election-to-the-uk-parliament-1450900921
https://www1.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2025/06/28/robert-jenricks-secret-weapon-being-a-lawyer-as-the-country-loves-lawyers/
There's also the issue that very many governments worldwide are very unpopular right now. It's too late to remove the punch bowl before the party gets too rowdy; the bowl is empty, except for some questionable slices of orange. And hangovers aren't meant to be fun.
There's also the poor at electoral politics and weirdly afraid to get rid of a terrible adviser things.
But he doesn't seem to be salting the Earth like late-era Sunak. He's less mad than Truss, and not as shameful as Boris. That takes us back to May; someone else who normally wouldn't have got near the top job, but was the least bad option available at the time.
If a nation gets the quality of leaders it deserves, we need to work out what we're doing wrong.
Starmer is nothing much to anyone. He has spent excessive amounts of political capital running around trying to appease all sorts of different sections of the electorate, only to caveat, row back and disavow pretty much all of it, whilst claiming it is his settled belief.
Political masters can land that sort of extreme doublethink. But those people are rarer than hen’s teeth. Blair was one. Cameron managed it on occasion. Starmer is not one of those people.
This is nothing compared to how people will feel after 18 months of Farage as PM. I suspect and hope that he won't be able set foot outside without genuine fear for his life.
Prosecutors have asked for South Korea's former president Yoon Suk Yeol to be handed a death sentence if he is found guilty over his botched attempt to impose martial law.
A court in Seoul heard closing arguments in Yoon's trial, in which he was accused of being the "ringleader of an insurrection".
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cq6vyqq5r0do
Worth remembering his party attempted to ride it out at first and did not support his impeachment.
I don't know whether his actions meet the legal standard in this case, but this is surely a novel defence, don't let Trump read it as a suggestion:
Yoon has denied the charges against him, arguing that martial law was a symbolic gesture to draw public attention to the wrongdoings of the opposition party.
One of the other major airbrushing going on is about the British Indian Army in WWII.
It’s bit embarrassing that it is the largest volunteer army in human history.
Doesn’t fit the evil colonialism storyline.
"I'm off to work with ISIS"... how we used to laugh in the crystallography lab. Though I probably wouldn't have said it if I had any plans to visit America.
See also:
Mike Johnson: One of the things the president probably had not thought through is when you bring interest rates down to 10% the problem is that the credit card companies would just stop lending money
https://x.com/atrupar/status/2011103372477419738
His default mode, though, is pretending he's just too busy with 'important stuff' to know what the President has just gone and done this time.
OMG.
Either the level is normal and you can breathe easy, or the level is raised and a nurse sticks a finger up your arse.
And can't the band play on?
Just listen, they play my song
Ash to ash
Dust to dust
Fortune, fame
Mirror vain
Gone insane
Fortune, fame
Mirror vain
Gone insane
Dance little tin goddess…
OTOH they haven't actually carried out a capital sentence since 1997.
There was no going back after that.
He’s a vegetarian out of principle, wouldn’t let his kids eat meat, but scoffs chicken if he’s hungry. I just don’t get how people don’t see this as a major character flaw.
..Under Korea’s Criminal Act, the crime of leading an insurrection carries only three possible penalties: death, life imprisonment with labor or life imprisonment without labor. Fixed-term sentences and suspended sentences are not permitted...
Yoon is appearing in the same courtroom as (Gwanju massacre instigator) Chun Doo-hwan, who received a death sentence for the same crime in 1997 (commuted to life imprisonment).
As a law student, Yoon participated in a mock trial of Chun...
Lawyers, eh.
If that's any excuse...
https://x.com/OfTheBraveUSA/status/2011153857976668290
And it's gone well beyond "where's your papers ?"
This woman looked horrified while she frantically tried to explain to the ICE agents ripping her out of the car that she’s disabled and was on her way to the doctor, then other agents in the background try to shield the scene from photographers.
ICE is terrorizing our city.
https://x.com/NortonMpls/status/2011150506039918740
Farage may be about to do the splits, hopefully not in his black shorts.
Yaxley-Lennon diving heavily into Gulf Arabs vs Persians (also Qatar vs UAE) advocacy, including the old Sudan Government vs Janjaweed / Rapid Support Forces, is interesting.
Its the poor ratings he has and the fact he is unlikely to be shifted before May which makes me conclude that the Senedd, Holyrood and locals are a bloodbath in waiting for Labour.
I didn't think he would see out a 5 year term when he took office, more 3 and half/4 years before handing over and shuffling off to retirement. But now I think the chances of him still being PM at Christmas are dropping daily. The biggest sticking point is how difficult it is to remove a Labour leader
I think an insight that some are missing in their focus on working to improve trade relaionships with the EU (which is vey important) is sleepwalking into a position where we are forced to lose other improved Trade Relationships, such as the CPTPP and developing closer ties with Canada.
That is an opportunity, and an important bit of leverage over say the USA and the EU - when the USA emerges from their black hole, if they do, we have a Veto over their CPTPP relationship.
The people in the comments mocking the parents or Saavik don't come across well. They died in fear and pain, she lost her parents traumatically, and I can't think of a joke.
In addition, like many senior politicians, he has a huge sense of personal entitlement, as shown in the Free Gear scandals, and he seems incapable of saying clearly what his government is for, or in sticking to unpopular decisions he believes to be right.
Given all that, what's surprising is perhaps not that he's so unpopular, but that he has any support at all.