Welcome to the completely normal world of British right-wing politics, where ideological purity matters enormously - unless the ideology in question is fucking Nazism.
As I said earlier in a reply to another article, I've long been frustrated by the squabbling among ‘the left’ and its consequent splintering into ever smaller factions instead of concentrating their arguments against ‘the right’. If that's what's now happening on the right, particularly to Fartrage, then I can only watch with glee. You might call it extreme Schadenfreude 😊.
Thank goodness you pointed this out Bear. Even James O'Brien was confused this week by Badenoch's doublespeak.
Question is, do we want a more competent leader of His Majesty's Official Opposition, or someone more competent but equally craven to the demands of right wing populism?
Either way, the world, I fear, will continue to burn, both literally and metaphorically.
Thanks for doing what you do to help stem the tide. People like you help me sleep better at night
I did not see any undue swearing; if it is there, enjoy it, swearing is an entirely appropriate reaction to the current mess that is (British) politics, in addition it cleanses the soul, and apparently shows intelligence.
So you keep doing you, I fckng agree!
Have to say that I quite enjoy the right wing nut jobs imploding before our very eyes, yes, Farage may well regain his seat but his antics have done very little to shore up support for their business fortunes.
Anyway the saga doesn't stop with the election result. There is the parliamentary investigation process to saviour as well as its outcome. Looking forward to it all.
Unfortunately there is some more work to be done before we can retreat to our salons and sip our respective drinks; the fascist right is still riding too high!
Both (Bedenoch & Reform) aided & abetted by a media that happily picks up the latest bit of nonsense & amplifies it.
BBC Newsnight, I’m looking at you. The channel/navy story & the social housing stories both featured last night, along with an atrocious piece from Thetford.
There is so much that is deserving of good, solid reporting but that gets ignored in favour of Badenoch’s batshittery or Yusuf’s latest wheeze to ensure that the NHS finally succumbs or that the navy gets to send all the big boats to Brighton Marina.
It’s just occurred to me that Badenoch is largely flying solo in reducing the Tories to dust but that Reform a firing on four or five cylinders if Farrage, Tice, Yusuf, Generic & 30p all get stuck in.
It's been a fun week watching the right tie themselves in knots. Notwithstanding Trump's confusion over who's turn it is to declare that they are reopening the strait, ending the war, and gaslighiting the global community, there is also the small matter of the small, hairy creature that has nested on Trump's head.
That's actually 2nd to Rupert Lowe's car-crash on Radio 4. His 5 minute long bacofoil rant left Nick Robinson flabbergasted. When he refuse to say whether Charles was a 'true Brit', you could feel Robinson's jaw hit the floor. Then it cratered as Lowe tried to pretend a prediction is a fact.
Zia Yusuf and Nigel Farage seem determined not to be left out, though. It's hard to work out which is the best example of 'reality-devoid-policy-making'. Option 1: dumping migrants back on Frances's beaches with the added bonus of inciting a diplomatic row with a nation that is capable of strangling British travel to the continent. Option 2: introducing legislation that has been kicking around for decades but is generally unusable. Tough call, really.
But Kemi does seem to have decided she wants to outdo them all, doesn't she? Approving a candidate that makes Tommy Robinson look fairly tame is an interesting move. What is more interesting is the multi-layered cognitive dissonance of claiming that the man is entitled to a second chance, having rehabilitated himself, whilst simultaneously calling for hundreds of prisoners to be denied a chance of freedom because she didn't believe they had been rehabilitated.
Presumably, she has met with every person who is up for early-release, looked them in the eyes, scrutinised their souls, and determined that they had failed rehabilitation. Impressive stuff, is it not?
Oh, and it turns out America is now running out of everything except nukes. Just in case anyone feels the world isn't scary enough.
You have to realise the political strategy on the right. While Farage survives, Reform will remain the dominant force. But the rest are jockeying for position in anticipation of the day they expect and hope for soon- when Farage walks away (again) in a hissy fit and Reform implodes. The only electorally important battle then is who can establish themselves as the dominant force of the right block by hoovering up the great bulk of Reform voters. This is the point of Lowe's disingenuous overtures to Farage- he's really speaking to Reform voters saying 'Look! I'm your kind of guy, safe to jump ship to me when the time comes!' It's also the point of Badenoch's repositioning of the Conservatives as a 'new party' with no place for those who support party policies from less than a decade ago, nothing to do with those old Tories, a safe home for those whose instincts might otherwise be Restore-curious. She's happy to make homeless a few Tories who can't stomach ejection of the last vestiges of the One Nation Tory brand in her slavering pursuit of the debris from Reform's disintegrating 25% vote share.
I absolutely agree "But this is what the right of UK politics looks like at the moment - a mass of contradictions that all fall flat the moment a sane person looks at it. It’s a raft of policies, movements and pronouncements that seem less focused on actually communicating what plans are, and more to see who can out-batshit each other."
And as you said, it is obviously aimed at social media engagement. We have a bunch of pantomime performers not politicians in the far right parties. It is very depressing that the grown-ups seem to have left the room.
As I said earlier in a reply to another article, I've long been frustrated by the squabbling among ‘the left’ and its consequent splintering into ever smaller factions instead of concentrating their arguments against ‘the right’. If that's what's now happening on the right, particularly to Fartrage, then I can only watch with glee. You might call it extreme Schadenfreude 😊.
I thought the tories had hit rock bottom with Truss, but then BadEnoch tells us to hold her beer.
Until last week, even so, there were some small signs of progress.
But one genuinely good crack at Burnham, and off she goes, saying a merry cheerio to the rails & taking her party back off to lala land.
Supposedly, Count Binface is the joke candidate?
Thank goodness you pointed this out Bear. Even James O'Brien was confused this week by Badenoch's doublespeak.
Question is, do we want a more competent leader of His Majesty's Official Opposition, or someone more competent but equally craven to the demands of right wing populism?
Either way, the world, I fear, will continue to burn, both literally and metaphorically.
Thanks for doing what you do to help stem the tide. People like you help me sleep better at night
I did not see any undue swearing; if it is there, enjoy it, swearing is an entirely appropriate reaction to the current mess that is (British) politics, in addition it cleanses the soul, and apparently shows intelligence.
So you keep doing you, I fckng agree!
Have to say that I quite enjoy the right wing nut jobs imploding before our very eyes, yes, Farage may well regain his seat but his antics have done very little to shore up support for their business fortunes.
Anyway the saga doesn't stop with the election result. There is the parliamentary investigation process to saviour as well as its outcome. Looking forward to it all.
Unfortunately there is some more work to be done before we can retreat to our salons and sip our respective drinks; the fascist right is still riding too high!
Seems they’ve all got sunstroke.
Please can we just put all of them in prison? Or better still, get Musk Rat to take them all to Mars? I'm so sick of them 🤬
Both (Bedenoch & Reform) aided & abetted by a media that happily picks up the latest bit of nonsense & amplifies it.
BBC Newsnight, I’m looking at you. The channel/navy story & the social housing stories both featured last night, along with an atrocious piece from Thetford.
There is so much that is deserving of good, solid reporting but that gets ignored in favour of Badenoch’s batshittery or Yusuf’s latest wheeze to ensure that the NHS finally succumbs or that the navy gets to send all the big boats to Brighton Marina.
It’s just occurred to me that Badenoch is largely flying solo in reducing the Tories to dust but that Reform a firing on four or five cylinders if Farrage, Tice, Yusuf, Generic & 30p all get stuck in.
It’s very tiring & effin’ depressing.
It's been a fun week watching the right tie themselves in knots. Notwithstanding Trump's confusion over who's turn it is to declare that they are reopening the strait, ending the war, and gaslighiting the global community, there is also the small matter of the small, hairy creature that has nested on Trump's head.
That's actually 2nd to Rupert Lowe's car-crash on Radio 4. His 5 minute long bacofoil rant left Nick Robinson flabbergasted. When he refuse to say whether Charles was a 'true Brit', you could feel Robinson's jaw hit the floor. Then it cratered as Lowe tried to pretend a prediction is a fact.
Zia Yusuf and Nigel Farage seem determined not to be left out, though. It's hard to work out which is the best example of 'reality-devoid-policy-making'. Option 1: dumping migrants back on Frances's beaches with the added bonus of inciting a diplomatic row with a nation that is capable of strangling British travel to the continent. Option 2: introducing legislation that has been kicking around for decades but is generally unusable. Tough call, really.
But Kemi does seem to have decided she wants to outdo them all, doesn't she? Approving a candidate that makes Tommy Robinson look fairly tame is an interesting move. What is more interesting is the multi-layered cognitive dissonance of claiming that the man is entitled to a second chance, having rehabilitated himself, whilst simultaneously calling for hundreds of prisoners to be denied a chance of freedom because she didn't believe they had been rehabilitated.
Presumably, she has met with every person who is up for early-release, looked them in the eyes, scrutinised their souls, and determined that they had failed rehabilitation. Impressive stuff, is it not?
Oh, and it turns out America is now running out of everything except nukes. Just in case anyone feels the world isn't scary enough.
You have to realise the political strategy on the right. While Farage survives, Reform will remain the dominant force. But the rest are jockeying for position in anticipation of the day they expect and hope for soon- when Farage walks away (again) in a hissy fit and Reform implodes. The only electorally important battle then is who can establish themselves as the dominant force of the right block by hoovering up the great bulk of Reform voters. This is the point of Lowe's disingenuous overtures to Farage- he's really speaking to Reform voters saying 'Look! I'm your kind of guy, safe to jump ship to me when the time comes!' It's also the point of Badenoch's repositioning of the Conservatives as a 'new party' with no place for those who support party policies from less than a decade ago, nothing to do with those old Tories, a safe home for those whose instincts might otherwise be Restore-curious. She's happy to make homeless a few Tories who can't stomach ejection of the last vestiges of the One Nation Tory brand in her slavering pursuit of the debris from Reform's disintegrating 25% vote share.
À propos nothing, but while I have your attention…
I’m sat in my local Caffé Nero in sleepy Bury St Edmunds catching up and the piped muzak just ran, back to back:
Jackson Browne - The Pretender
The Eagles - In The City
Linda Ronstadt - Poor Poor Pitiful Me
Tom Waits - The Heart of Saturday Night
So either there is a god or all is not quite as shite as we think!
Three out of four ain't bad.
I absolutely agree "But this is what the right of UK politics looks like at the moment - a mass of contradictions that all fall flat the moment a sane person looks at it. It’s a raft of policies, movements and pronouncements that seem less focused on actually communicating what plans are, and more to see who can out-batshit each other."
And as you said, it is obviously aimed at social media engagement. We have a bunch of pantomime performers not politicians in the far right parties. It is very depressing that the grown-ups seem to have left the room.