The Political Thread

[Will Cooling]

This is not a normal swing to the right. This is straight-up nationalism. The Tories threw Heseltine and Clarke out, for crying out loud. Thatcher would be too much of an EU-loving liberal for this party. The upshot is the Overton window is now so heavily skewed that even the likes of Dominic Grieve are seen as being worryingly left-leaning.

This would be the Thatcher that opposed the social chapter, opposed ERM let alone a Single Currency, opposed the Maastricht Treaty, and was calling for Britain to leave in the early noughties? I think you might be blinded by the early Thatcher's jumper.

[IndigoPrime]

She was also heavily responsible for the single market, remember, which the current Tories are oblivious to. I don't like Thatcher. I don't for a second think she was anything other than a right-wing horror show. But the point is she would be a moderate at worst in this current shitshow of a Conservative Party, because that's how far they've gone.

[Jim_Campbell]

She was also heavily responsible for the single market, remember, which the current Tories are oblivious to. I don't like Thatcher. I don't for a second think she was anything other than a right-wing horror show. But the point is she would be a moderate at worst in this current shitshow of a Conservative Party, because that's how far they've gone.

I heard Berhard Ingham, Thatcher's press secretary and ardent Leaver, interviewed a couple of years back and he said there was little doubt in his mind that Thatcher was a pragmatist and would almost certainly have been a reluctant Remainer if she'd been faced with binary choice of the referendum.

[IndigoPrime]

Quite possibly. Regardless, I can't imagine—as a pragmatist rather than an ideologue—she would have taken the referendum result we did get to detonate everything she and her colleagues had built. A number of the frameworks within the EU come from UK Conservative governments and the lawyers they instructed.

[Tjm86]

I don't like Thatcher. I don't for a second think she was anything other than a right-wing horror show. But the point is she would be a moderate at worst in this current shitshow of a Conservative Party ...

That really is the key point right now, isn't it?  It is hard to put a finger on what it is that is setting this shower apart.  Thatcher might have had skewed and disturbing principles but there was still an element of recognition that she had a duty to perform.  Whatever you think of the way she went about it.  For her free market liberalisation was about empowerment to some extent.  What she chose to ignore was the Darwinian dimension.

This present crowd are nothing more than craven, narcissistic opportunists.  it feels more like they are acting from a sense of self-importance and entitlement that is all about exploiting the free market for their own game.  The key takeaway that Cummings seems to have accepted from his Russia experience is how much you can get away with if you are brazen enough.  He wraps it up in pseudo-intellectual rhetoric but it all boils down to a belief that he is so much better than the rest of us.

Johnson is today trying to shore up belief in the future of the UK, all the while ignoring the damage that he is allowing to be done in his name to the union.  Lenin spoke of every nation being just 3 meals away from anarchy?  I have a suspicion we've had two already ...

[Jim_Campbell]

For her free market liberalisation was about empowerment to some extent.  What she chose to ignore was the Darwinian dimension.

The thing about both Thatcher and Major is that they weren't posh. I may have viscerally disagreed with pretty much everything they did, but I don't doubt that they at least had some notion of empowering social mobility at their political core, even if I think policies they believed would achieve that were unspeakably damaging and wrong-headed.

This shower, though, have never held proper jobs in their entire lives — they were born into privilege, which waved them through expensive public schools and Oxbridge, and then either straight into politics, or via the sort of cushy jobs that privilege makes available. They believe they can do whatever they like because their entire lives have shown them that this is true and they genuinely, at their core, believe they are better than the rest of us.

[IndigoPrime]

This also explains government by slogan. To date, that is what has worked for them. Pithy responses and snark got Johnson through his journalism career, HIGNFY, and several election wins. But it doesn't work when it comes to governance. Also, a brief look at the Thatcher and Major ministries on Wikipedia shows cabinets peppered with chancers, but also backed by some serious heavyweights who knew their shit. That's true also for Blair and—for the most part—Cameron/Clegg. Although on the last of those, the big warning light on seeing the initial cabinet is that most of the solid politicians there are Liberal Democrats.

Now, we just have people who don't know how to do the job—and mostly don't care. They lack talent, skill and empathy, but are backed by cunning tactical manipulators and strategists. This is why the opposition—all of it; not just Labour—has to get its shit together and work together. That, sadly, is about as likely as this shower of arseholes in government suddenly showing a glimmer of competence and pragmatism regarding Brexit.

[Professor Bear]

I don't like Thatcher. I don't for a second think she was anything other than a right-wing horror show. But the point is she would be a moderate at worst in this current shitshow of a Conservative Party ...

That really is the key point right now, isn't it?  It is hard to put a finger on what it is that is setting this shower apart.

Thatcher was a classic liberal who believed in individualism as the basis of society, but the current stream of cat piss are neoliberals, led by the sanctity of the free market over all other concerns, which is why they occasionally do positive - spin-friendly - things that "conservatives" as we understand them would never countenance, such as Cameron's apology for Bloody Sunday, and legalisation of same-sex marriage.  I've seen the argument made that we're one renewable energy magnate becoming a Tory donor away from seeing the party shift to supporting green energy while Labour will still be chasing "slightly" racists for votes, meaning green, student and pragmatic voters will just bite the bullet.

Lenin spoke of every nation being just 3 meals away from anarchy?  I have a suspicion we've had two already ...

If Lenin meant missing three meals, he was obviously wrong, given that the UK populace has its fair share of families in food poverty and they don't look like doing a revolution any time soon.  More's the pity.

[paddykafka]

Well, colour me surprised! Barely a couple of weeks in power, and already the Irish political piggies already have their snouts buried deep in the trough.

https://www.thejournal.ie/paschal-donohoe-junior-minister-salaries-5160153-Jul2020/

And as for the Green Party, well, they've already shown their true colours.

"The Green Party's 2020 Election Manifesto outlines a programme of transformational climate action for the Green decade ahead; initiatives that will futureproof our economy, create jobs, and reshape our society in a way that promotes fairness, equality and social justice."

https://www.irishpost.com/news/green-party-leader-eamon-ryan-falls-fast-asleep-in-dail-and-has-to-be-woken-up-189319

I gave them the benefit of the doubt at this election - but never again. Fucking hypocrites!

[Professor Bear]

The company that tracks down immigrants for ICE has been given permission to use the data collected by the NHS to combat Covid 19 to create databases recording citizens' race, religion and political orientation, because these are - apparently - important factors in whether or not one has the flu.  I could have the wrong end of the stick here, but it seems like the journalist is suggesting that the UK government opted out of the version of a Covid tracking system that actually worked so it could instead create databases of Muslims, non-whites, and political opponents.

[IAMTHESYSTEM]

The current President of the United States is now calling for a 'delay' in the forthcoming November 2020 election. 'The Tree of Liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of Patriots and Tyrants.' Thomas Jefferson.
https://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/politics/trump-suggests-unprecedented-delay-to-november-election/2542252/

[IndigoPrime]

And yet so many Americans don't see what's going on here. He's laying the groundwork now to contest the result, and especially in the case of a close win for Biden (which is what polling points to, at least in terms of the Electoral College). But also, he by law can't do this anyway; and if he did, then the USA is at that point no longer a democracy in any meaningful sense. (Arguably, it's at the moment teetering on the brink, and is enacting policy that during a sane president's time would elsewhere have likely resulted in sanctions.)

Still: we shouldn't forget more or less the same is happening in the UK. The difference here is democracy is slowly and methodically being dismantled in a much quieter manner, while Johnson provides a useful distraction in occasionally planting an outwardly progressive story—BIKES! MORE BIKES! DON'T LOOK AT VETTING GOING TO GOVE! BIKES!

My wife's increasingly of the opinion we need to get the fuck out of here, but COVID has done for that. No way to move anywhere else now.

[CalHab]

Come to Scotland. The weather is worse, but the climate is better (politically, at least).

[IndigoPrime]

We would already have moved there if Scotland had quit the UK. But there's no point in uprooting the family until that happens. If we have to go, we'll head to somewhere in the EU. The issue right now is in not being able to travel and check places out. We're also having a battle between various things we'd like from a place to live, and fast coming to the conclusion you can't have everything...

[Tjm86]

we shouldn't forget more or less the same is happening in the UK. The difference here is democracy is slowly and methodically being dismantled in a much quieter manner, while Johnson provides a useful distraction in occasionally planting an outwardly progressive story

Aye, this is why I keep saying that Johnson's revamped "catch-phrase" is actually good advice.

Stay Alert!  Watch the buggers like a hawk!