It's Prime Minister Boris Johnson: Tech industry speaks its brains on Brexit-monger's victory The United Kingdom, incorporating Kingston*, has a new prime minister. That prime minister is Boris Johnson, and tech industry mouthpieces are falling over themselves to tell us what they think of him and his policies. Johnson was elected by Conservative party members, winning 66 per cent of the vote against rival contender …
How is it, in the 21st century, that someone gets to be PM simply because he himself thinks he's entitled to it?
Frankly it's his brother I (sort of) feel sorry for. I mean, can you imagine it? Raised in the same household, by the same parents child minder nanny team of governesses, both go in to the same line of work and he turns out to be LESS successful than Boris of all people? That's got to be hard to take.
In Trumplandia there were two brothers named Bush. The idiot brother became president. The much better qualified brother became "his brother", preventing any future possibility of a competent Bush presidency.
Wonder how many people have changed their names just to have a chance at leaving behind the negative relatives?
Two brothers?
We've had two President Bushes. The first had two brothers (Jonathan and William, aka "Bucky"), making - let me know if I'm going to fast here - three in total. Bush the Elder was not what you'd call a good president, but he wasn't an "idiot".
One of his sons became the second President Bush. He's no intellectual, but compared to Twitler, he has a certain cunning and low wit; I don't think "idiot" is justified, if only because we want to save that for the present sometimes occupant of the Oval Office.
Bush the Younger has three brothers: Jeb, former governor of Florida; Neil, famous for his role in the US S&L scandal; and Marvin, who apparently has managed to behave like a responsible human being and thus mostly escape media attention.
It's been said [citation needed] that the Bush family plan was to get Jeb, the "smart one", into the White House, but Jeb lost his first run for Florida in '94. That put him in the mansion for 1998-2006, meaning he wasn't available to run for President in 2000. Meanwhile George the Lesser had made it to Governor of Texas in '94, so he was on schedule for the big leagues in 2000.
But you're right that George's presidency was something of an obstacle to Jeb's candidacy for that position. Didn't stop Jeb from running against the Incoherent Cheeto and the rest of the shitstorm that was the 2016 Republican field, but the anti-incumbency, anti-dynasty political winds were against him.
"he has a certain cunning and low wit"
My view was that it was always a Cheney presidency, with junior being in effect the veep. As long as junior was sound, in a Sir Humphrey sense, then he could do all the dog and pony shows while Cheney ran the place.
It's the presidency that expanded executive power the most* which included allowing the veep to act with presidential authority, but also the practical and legal methods of deploying lethal force without involving congress.
* followed by Obama. Nothing like a lawyer to make assassinations legal.
"Who, in their right mind, would want to be PM at this time?
That's right -no one!"
No, that's wrong. Any decent person would make a better PM than the right wing extremist pillock we are stuck with, and such people who are really decent would be willing, unlike oour current PM; to undergo the pain of trying to run a government that would do something useful instead of doing a lot of damage to Britain.
At least I hope that there are people who would willingly take on the task despite the horrors of putting up with trying to get a couple of hundred spineless idiots and a couple of hundred racist facists and a couple of hundred extremist communists (those three groups constitue the vast majority of our parliament - there are some decent MPs, but they're vastly outnumbered by MPs whose only concern is what's in it for them) to do something sensible in the next couple of months so to avoid the effective destruction of the British economy and the triggering of an almost certain rapid split up of the United Kingdom of GB and NI into two separate states plus plus part of a reintergrated Ireland.
>Frankly it's his brother I (sort of) feel sorry for. I mean, can you imagine it? Raised in the same household, by the same parents child minder nanny team of governesses, both go in to the same line of work and he turns out to be LESS successful than Boris of all people? That's got to be hard to take.
Remember he has another two brothers (and another sister) that are even less successful than Jo and Rachel.
Pretty sure it's the right-wing press owned by unpatriotic tax-dodging foreign billionaires that's doing the job of making the most right-wing tory party in history look moderate, but whatevs :D
Ignore the emotional flim-flam that passes for news in this country and look at the policies of the main parties. You'll find one party is fresh-out of ideas apart from moar tax cuts for the rich (seriously, BoJo has suddenly found a mult-billion magic money tree for this), no-deal brexit and, errr... that's it. Oh no, we have the bonfire of employment rights too (disguised as 'cutting red tape').
And you'll find the other party full of widely supported, moderate, sensible policies.
If only their leadership did a better job of selling them. But then, see the opening sentence.
The dipshit will destroy the Tories for years to come.
Hopefully true, but the damage he will do to the country will take decades to fix - He's very much like Trump in that respect: completely devoid of any redeeming qualities whatsoever.
His only concern is to prevent impending EU legislation that will close down tax avoidance loopholes from impacting his wealth.
"The Guardian covered it, mostly to highlight the loopholes."
Citations welcome. All I know of is a couple of articles from 2017:
one in the Business section:
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/jun/18/european-commission-to-crackdown-on-offshore-tax-avoidance
"Brussels will publish proposals this Wednesday to force financial intermediaries to automatically disclose any new cross-border tax schemes offered to clients. Those designing and promoting aggressive avoidance structures will have five working days to file details with their local tax authority, according to a leaked version of the proposals, drawn up by the European commission.
The clock will begin ticking as soon as the scheme has become available to a client. Where there are several intermediaries in the chain, one will be made to take responsibility for disclosure. And where all intermediaries in the chain are based outside European member states, the obligation to disclose will fall to the client. ..."
and one Opinion article not directly related to the EU legislation:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/dec/07/eu-tax-haven-blacklist-whitewash-west-imperialism-tackle-avoidance
a request from the Queen
That is 'meaningless' pomp formality - it's not as if she can refuse with the excuse 'He's a slimey, oafish oik with unkempt hair and moronic ingratiating grin.'
I expect the conservative MPs know he's got a lot of personality (a lot of the other contenders had none), and the British public makes allowances for a 'bit of a rogue personality'
Can she refuse if she thinks he can't hold a majority?
Yes. Her job is to pick someone who can form a government, it doesn't even have to be an MP. Custom is that she picks the leader of the largest party to give them the first chance at creating a government, but there have been exceptions for past coalition governments.
unkempt hair and moronic ingratiating grin.
Carefully cultivated. There's a story about how he came out of a business meeting very smartly dressed, and just before exiting the lift to confront the press he intentionally ruffled his hair to get the 'clown' look. People who dismiss him as a stupid buffoon may be in for a surprise.
"Carefully cultivated. There's a story ..."
There's another story about that:
"... it tells the tale of how Vine was booked to speak with Johnson at two separate corporate events and was startled to witness the former foreign secretary give two wildly chaotic but entirely identical speeches. The experience made Vine wonder whether, as many have done before and since, the Johnson buffoonery is all an act.
Source:
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/why-do-only-men-and-posh-ones-at-that-get-away-with-winging-it-wcwgkcbvv
Long version:
https://reaction.life/jeremy-vine-my-boris-story/
Well, he learned how to be a complete and utter self-centred bastard on the playing fields of Eton.
Further refined by learning how to make a complete twat of himself and treat women like dirt on in the dining rooms of the Bullingdon Club.
And finally how to further his own finances, yet bring down the economy, in the Westminster kindergarten ... aka ‘The House of Commons’
My last faint hope is that Boris is just a figurehead* for a shadowy group that has the UK's best interests** at heart. Remember how he went quiet for a while? I assumed that was his handlers muzzling him to stop him putting his foot in it.
* Quite possible.
** Pretty unlikely.
Or, more recently:
"The post which he held by this precarious tenure carried with it the title of king; but surely no crowned head ever lay uneasier, or was visited by more evil dreams, than his." (Golden Bough 1.1 Para 3 line 1).
The following text has equally pithy and disturbing parallels. e.g.
"such a custom savours of a barbarous age". Really?
While I don't like BoJo and do not think he will be a good PM, there is a massive amount of misunderstanding about how the political system works in this country.
BoJo did not get to be PM because he thought he was entitled to it. He ran as an MP and got more votes than any other candidate in his constituency. Then, upon TM standing down as Tory party leader (and hence PM), he was elected by the party as it's leader (and hence PM).
Under our current system, we do not have a vote on who should be Prime Minister. We don't even have a vote on which party should make up the government. In a general election, we vote for one single thing alone: a person to represent our constituency in parliament. That's a person, not a party. The party which forms the government is a side effect of this: it's whichever party (or group of parties) can command enough votes to get their business through. The Prime Minister is just a side effect of this side effect, the leader of the party who forms the government.
I've seen so many comments about unelected Prime Ministers, and about MPs who resign from their parties. The fact is that none of this has any bearing on anything in our current system. The PM is never "elected", except by members of the party and by voters in their constituency. Those who resign their party are entitled to do so, as they are not there to represent their party, but their constituents, and are elected as individuals. This is how our political and electoral system works.
Now I know that, in the real world, this is not how voters think. They will mainly vote for whoever is on the ballot who represents the party they wish to support, and the leader of that party will often have more influence on that decision than the policies in their manifesto. However, this doesn't alter how the system works. If you want it changed, campaign to change the electoral and political system, don't just whine about unelected PMs or MPs resigning their parties.
"first past the post makes the above questionable"
I don't like first past the post, but it doesn't make that statement questionable at all. The whole premise of FPTP is that the candidate with the most votes wins. The most votes could well be only 25%, say, of the votes cast, but to win that will be more votes than any of the other candidates received. Basic maths (i.e. about as much as a clever politician is able to cope with).
"Just over 50% each time, so he had an absolute majority."
50.8% to 40% for Labour in the last one. About 5k majority in a 70k electorate.
https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/local-data/constituency-dashboard/
BoJo is the sitting MP for Uxbridge and South Ruislip.
When he was MP for Henley (until 2008) I'm pretty sure he had a massive majority, It's about the safest of seats, been conservative since... the civil war I guess? They could put up an actual piece of gammon as the conservative candidate and it would win.
Still a majority, so FPTP or not wouldn't have made a difference
Only if you assume that everyone votes for the candidate they want under FPTP, which is not always the case.
For example, only once have I voted for my preferred candidate as, except for that time, they never had a chance of winning. Instead, I voted tactically for my least-worst realistic option. Under a proportional system, this behaviour can change, which can radically alter the results in many circumstances.
"The PM is never "elected", except by members of the party and by voters in their constituency."
Agreed. I've also felt the need to make this clear in these very forums a couple of times in the past too.
And yet we still have the media and "people in power" spouting off about Broris having a "mandate" because he got 66% of a vote from a very small group of people. As leader of the Tories, yes, he does have a significant mandate. But as PM he has no more of a mandate than T. May.
>And yet we still have the media and "people in power" spouting off about Broris having a "mandate" because he got 66% of a vote from a very small group of people. As leader of the Tories, yes, he does have a significant mandate. But as PM he has no more of a mandate than T. May.
IIRC his 66% is less of a mandate than the 67% that David Cameron enjoyed in the last leadership election.
He ran as an MP and got more votes than any other candidate in his constituency.
In a safe tory seat. For other examples of policians in safe seats, see also the repellant Kate Hoey, who manages to be a rabid brexiter in the most leave constituency in mainland Britain.
Then, upon TM standing down as Tory party leader (and hence PM), he was elected by the party as it's leader (and hence PM).
Out of a candidature of a small number of around 400 tory MPs, after the better choices had been exhausted (if you can consider the victors in the previous two tory leadership elections better choices), whittled down to 2 unpalatable choices from the 8 or 9 who decided they wanted to pick up the poison chalice of brexit, and then selected by 0.1% of the population (those members of the Tory party that actually voted for him).
I'm not going to claim he didn't go through what are, technically, the correct channels to get the job, but it's no shining example of representative democracy in action.
@Loyal Commenter
"and then selected by 0.1% of the population (those members of the Tory party that actually voted for him)."
How does this compare with the elections in the EU? Wasnt there an outcry of a lack of democracy for a winner recently? Not speaking for or against Boris becoming PM, its not an enviable job right now.
@Loyal Commenter
"You mean that bit where NF complained about someone winning an election with 52% of the vote, apparently with no sense of irony?"
So the remoaners are also complaining against her appointment from such a small majority? But didnt the outcry go against the back room deals to get this person into a position of power when the EU is already seen as unaccountable and opaque?
Not quite, Tory MPs did not have to vote for him in the first few rounds of the selection process. If anything they are more to blame for the choice of the two candidates that went to party members. Just like everything else MPs have done recently, they have proved themselves to be incompetent beyond any reasonable belief.
The only plus to this is that he may get sufficient support to do something and that has got to be better than the last 3 years of crap. If he doesn't and we end up with a General Election then all bets are off. I don't see any party having a majority to govern with out the support of the many minority groups. It is just a total and utter f**kup.
I don't see any party having a majority to govern with out the support of the many minority groups. It is just a total and utter f**kup.
Perhaps its time to ditch the ancient two party system. Many countries have successful and stable coalition governments, so no reason why it shouldn't work in UK.
"Many countries have successful and stable coalition governments, so no reason why it shouldn't work in UK."
Agree. Obviously there will be tensions between the different parties in a coalition. But the UK now has two main parties with great internal tensions (both the Conservatives and Labour have MPs in favour of and against the EU, etc.) which makes them both ineffective and unattractive to voters. And if after a general election you get a different party in power you get more discontinuity (= inefficiency and expense) than when you get another coalition with a slightly different flavour.
Anyway, the supply and confidence agreement which the Conservatives currently have with the DUP is v similar to a coalition. The main difference is that the DUP get most of the benefits of a coalition without any of the responsibilities.
Many countries have successful and stable coalition governments, so no reason why it shouldn't work in UK.
Our lot would need significant retraining - the result for a couple of decades is likely to be akin to when the Swedes switched what side of the road they drove on...
Knife fights in the Parliament bar would need less, they'd only have to change to stabbing in the front.
Many countries have successful and stable coalition governments, so no reason why it shouldn't work in UK.
The most immediate and obvious barrier to this is the FPTP system which unnaturally skews election results in the favour of larger parties, so that minority parties get little or no representation. It's hard to have a "rainbow coalition" with two colours. We need electoral reform to a proper proportional system first, which is not in the interests of the large parties who are the ones who have it in their power to change.
Who is this "Ivanka Trump" anyway?
Ivanka Trump is a made up character, a pun or play on words. You see, since (in the UK at least) "Trump" is another word for "Fart", someone thought it'd be really funny to pretend he really didn't know this (and probably really doesn't in all fairness) so gave his daughter a name which sounded like "I want a" and so just threw some random letters together until they got close to the effect that they wanted. Hence the joke is that Donald's daughters name sounds like "I want a Trump".
I'm sure it's all a joke though. Even he isn't that stupid.
And there’s a Kingston in Ontario. Legend (in Jamaica) has it that the reason why the Rockfort guarding the north end of Kingston harbour was built of locally quarried limestone was that the bricks for what would have been the fort there went to the Kingston in Canada by accident. Allegedly the Canadian fort had nothing much to do until it was tapped to house some students in the Empire Flying Program. Including, also allegedly, a future Prime Minister of Jamaica.
Note that I have no idea how accurate any of the above might be.
…which was largely destroyed by said bridge, a portent of things to come?
(The Kingston Bridge is, unfortunately, not any ordinary bridge but a high-level 10-lane hulking motorway which ripped through several inner city communities, destroying most of the neighbourhoods that it was built though, and passing, several storeys high, barely metres away from several attractive older buildings, including the Co-op headquarters just south of the river.
This post has been deleted by its author
There is life outside of the London Boroughs
For pity's sake keep your voice down! Don't you know the plan has always been to keep them contained within the M25 and convinced it's an amazing place to live, with everyone crammed on top of one another and no room even to fart? If they discover how nice it is out here, they'll all want to move and that'd ruin it!
Er..not to worry Londoners, everything north of Watford looks like Newcastle, it's hideous, really!
And there was me thinking it was a reference to Kingston-Upon-Thames, which like Richmond and many other naicewest London suburbs is likely to want to declare independence from a post-Brexit England? The Tories are going to bleed orange in all such constituencies in their fruitless chase after Brexit Man.
So, comments from one illiterate biz-speak pressure group, one accountant, and an estate agent. What an informative article!
It's on par with most other articles about Brexit(*). The amount of taurine stercor produced by both (all?) sides over the last three years has been truly phenomenal. If only we could use it to generate power we'd have full energy independence.
(*) Or about Alexander Boris de Piffle Crickey Whiff Whaff Whaffle Gawdelpus Johnson for that matter.
Well, yes. That should have been obvious, given the choices. You’d have been fucked if the other guy had won, too. The only question is which one is worse.
True. The difference between the two though is that Bojo has stated (in discussion with an EU official - I can't remember which one) that his policy on Brexit is "f*** business". Sadly I'm not paraphrasing.
his policy on Brexit is "f*** business".
ITYF that was his policy on letting business decide the political direction of the country. Given that Amazon, Google etc. care about little but their own profits, and love the EUs twisted tax codes because they can abuse them, I can't say he was wrong.
As a Liberal Democrat living in the fabled wilderness beyond The Last Homely Ring Road, I have to report that quite a few of my neighbours are right at this moment cheering the roof down.
Do they love Boris? Maybe, maybe not, but they sure expect him to deliver Fibre To The Lonely Mountain at last.
Fantasy takes many guises.
"the shortest sitting prime minister"
Not sure if he's the winner of the title, but the Duke of Wellington only managed about a month his second time around (separate from and not contiguous with his first time around). Or does it not count if he had previous longer term?
Jeez, you create a competition and don't tell us the rules!!!
Yeah he got booted out...
In other news: Boris has taken cntrol of the Beeb and now all it shows is Attenborough held hostage on a desert island.
https://account.bbc.com/account/error?code=1007&ptrt=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.bbc.co.uk%2F
Tell Trump that: it will be interesting to see how he responds...
The man has a history of being reckless at the expense of others.
Here's just a small sample: 10 fire stations in London shut down in 2014 to save money, and then he goes and starts a garden bridge project that ultimately failed, costing the taxpayers £43 million, yet no construction work was even started...
I dread to think how he's going to impact the rest of the country after that little demonstration of his time as mayor of London.
I know nobody who uses "Johnson" in that way. We Yanks know of it as slang, yes, but I have never actually heard anybody using it outside the movies. No doubt this will change thanks to current events :-)
In other news (literally), one of the Talking Heads on a local TV news broadcast this evening made the somewhat surprising statement that Boris Yeltsin is the new PM of GB ... And here I thought he'd been dead these last dozen years or so.
It is said (it's probably a myth) that driving on the right came when the Florentine officials had to regulate traffic on an extremely busy bridge, and was a quite arbitrary decision that spread across Europe. Whereas driving on the left is logical because if someone approaches you who you don't like the look of, you hold the reins on the left and free your sword arm. Those who have gear sticks also get to keep the leading hand on the wheel while changing gear.
Whatever, the country that makes the best cars drives on the correct side of the road.
"Political satire became obsolete when Henry Kissinger was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize"
"The Clinton jokes are all about Monica Lewinsky and all that stuff and not about the important things, like the fact that he wouldn't ban land mines ... I'm not tempted to write a song about George W. Bush. I couldn't figure out what sort of song I would write. That's the problem: I don't want to satirize George Bush and his puppeteers, I want to vaporize them."
Both by Tom Lehrer
This has happened because sensible Conservatives got disgusted with the EU-obsessed weirdos in their local parties, while the UKIP members joined. It was an internal coup, if you like.
I'd say we should all join the Conservative Party and wait for the next leadership election, but it'll probably be between Steve Baker and Javid, and another Hobson's choice.
I think you underestimate the media blitz from the BBC (nowadays about as impartial as a very partial thing, frightened of losing its licence money), the Mail, Telegraph, Express and the Murdoch Press. Johnson won't fail. The wicked EU will sabotage him at every step. When he steps down, the UKIP in the constituencies will demand ever harder Brexiters.
My hat off to you, sir for taking such an uncomfortable decision (like changing football team allegiances) and being prepared to admit in a public forum. The Tories had plenty of opportunities to reform and kick out the militants (as Labour had to do in the 1990s) but they repeatedly shied away from it, and gave ground to the loonies at every turn.
Of course, reap what you sow. I suspect some people are due for a rude awakening when they see just was a self-centred tool BoJo is. He could drive the country off a cliff edge, if parliament lets him. He could lose a confidence vote and a subsequent election, if Bercow lets it happen. But he's also just as capable of deciding that the Brexit thing was just a means to an end… his becoming Prime Minister.
"My hat off to you, sir for taking such an uncomfortable decision"
Not uncomfortable at all I can assure you, dear folks - I made it in the 1970s (can't remember exactly when, ahem, but it was back in the days when we were still just the plain Liberal Party) and I have never regretted it.
>But he's also just as capable of deciding that the Brexit thing was just a means to an end… his becoming Prime Minister.
Perhaps someone should tell Boris, that PM's get to be members of a rather exclusive club: The European Council, and as an ex-PM's could be a candidate for President of the Commission...
You've presented the list as if all the policies were her ideas, which they weren't. The Liberal Democrats were the minority party of a coalition with the Tories. Some people fail to understand that coalitions means compromise. What were the alternatives? The Labour Party was discredited after years in government and unable to form a government. A minority Tory government with even more odious policies? Another general election?
Personally, I think the biggest mistake was not getting parliament to vote on changing the electoral system, but leaving it to a referendum which the two big parties campaigned against.
And what's happened since? Labour has descended into incomprehensibility and the Tories into bisyllabic shouting.
RFC822,
"As a lifelong Conservative voter, I've been thinking for some time about joining the Lib Dems.
Today's the day I'll actually do it."
Sorry ...... don't believe you !!!
Long term Conservative voters would never do anything to 'harm' the 'Party!!!
We are where we are today because the 'Party' comes first.
The country can go up in flames *BUT* the 'Party' will always be protected from all harm.
My view is that Bojo has been given the PM role so that the 'Brexit Problem' and its prime supporter/instigator can be associated clearly in full public view.
Bojo and Brexit will fail in one glorious implosion and the 'Party' can abdicate any connection with the whole mess as it lets him take the fall for the failure.
I can guarantee that the loyal 'Party' voters will be electing a new Conservative govt within months, with a clean slate and no memory of the problems caused.
Labour, LibDems, Brexit Party etc etc will not be a problem as none of them are a viable alternative and the somewhat right leaning press will support their friends as usual !!!
(Note how conveniently the Labour Party has 'self-destructed' (!!!???) to ensure that they are not even noticed as an opposition party and are most assuredly not in the running as a future govt even if Attila the Hun was the only other choice.)
He could see the blame that was coming (as I said at the time):
The master plan was obviously a Boys Own scenario: come to power at the nadir of the the worst crisis since the 1970s (perhaps even the 1940s, at least in his dreams) and turn the country around. But that needed a scapegoat, to take the impossible (but eminently blameable) decisions that will now lead us to that low point. Cameron’s resignation today came too early for the master plan: he’s not going to be that scapegoat. So now it seems Boris has to take over too early and take that blame, or else chicken out at this obvious moment.
Sadly he successfully sidestepped it.
Well said, sir.
When the Labour Party split itself between Corbynites & Blairites (Full disclosure: Personally I'm left-wing so I guess that makes me a Corbynite, though I don't support him personally) - The outcome should have been that the Tories trounced them.
When the Conservative party fragmented over Brexit, it was an opportunity for Labour to reunite and bounce back. But they wasted it.
A pox on both their houses. While they're all pissing about, implementing "the peoples will" needed a steady hand on the tiller to avoid a risky decision becoming a disaster.
>When the Conservative party fragmented over Brexit, it was an opportunity for Labour
Labour are even more divided over Brexit than the tories.
The Blairites love it because you can get some wonderful cheese and the wine in Tuscany is so reasonable.
The left hate it because it's all a zionist conspiracy run for big business
Any London MP with immigrant/educated voters love it (or so their focus groups tell them)
Any Northern MP with a constituency of Sun reading ex-miners hate it (which is easy cos they're foreigners)
"The country can go up in flames *BUT* the 'Party' will always be protected from all harm"
Sounds rather familiar, as in the erstwhile Eastern Bloc. It didn't work there - they're still paying the price 20 years after it folded. Maybe we're in for the same.
The biggest problem is conceptual, as demonstrated by almost everyone (including the press) referring to the office of prime minister as the "top job". It's not - it's the position of the public servant with maximum responsibility for the welfare of the populace of the nation. The assumption of it being the "top job" takes us right back to the divine right of kings, which we abolished in England in the 17th century. Sadly, the "parties" emerged as a direct consequence of the Commonwealth and Restoration, which just goes to show that the tendency to grab power is deeply embedded in human nature.
The Americans got the principle right in "of the people, by the people, for the people", but [a] "the people" were very narrowly defined, and [b] even that version of principle didn't persist there either.
Mike 137,
"The Americans got the principle right in "of the people, by the people, for the people", but [a] "the people" were very narrowly defined, and [b] even that version of principle didn't persist there either."
So glad you realised that the "People" originally referenced is no longer the "People" who count as Corporate America has Politics well and truly in its pocket.
As evidenced by Trump the American version of 'Politics' is pure tribal opposition without any reference to actual policies (Real or imagined). The Tribal contest keeps the 'People' occupied while Corporate America gets on with doing whatever it wants. Now with Trump they have almost reached 'Corporate Nirvana' as he attempts to roll back any 'impediments' to making yet more profits and 'People' be damned in the process. (A few promises of reversed fortunes for a old Industry sector or two and diversions such as the 'Wall' will be all it takes to keep the 'People' occupied.)
Unfortunately, it would appear he is on course for yet another Term, which is bad for everyone both in and outside America.
Luckily, the world has a nice diversion watching a country go to hell in a handcart ........ namely the UK fail at leaving the EU. This should mean that the USA will be able to do anything as the rest of the world is too busy ROFL'ing !!!
Sorry ...... don't believe you !!!
Long term Conservative voters would never do anything to 'harm' the 'Party!!!
Well, I joined the Lib Dems last night, and my membership card is in the post, so you're very welcome to pop around and see it when it arrives!
The Conservative party has changed out of all recognition - May made lots of noises about not being the nasty party and being a party for all the people, but then made the decision to move towards the extremist/lunatic right-wing fringes. A fringe populated by people with little ability and no intelligence (and I include the empty vessels like Rees-Mogg and BoJo who try to disguise their intellectual paucity with a veneer of expensively-purchased private education).
The Conservative MPs who defected to Change UK said that they had not left the party; the party had left them. I understand how they felt.
Well done.
I found my EU vote was wasted though sadly, as I voted for Change UK*. Even got beaten by kippers.
I find "Pencil in a suit" very punchable and cannot understand how it can be in the same party as people like Heseltine, Major and co.
* Regional no 1 was local and I have met some of their family.
RFC822,
If you have jumped ship then I apologise *BUT* unfortunately it will do little to save the UK from the fallout to come.
One wonders what else can happen before the year is out !!!
In comparison, Hong Kong is begining to look like a nice peaceful place to go to for the next decade or two !!! ;) :)
Sorry ...... don't believe you !!!
Long term Conservative voters would never do anything to 'harm' the 'Party!!!
The party we knew is gone.
As a supporter of Thatcher in my youth, I cannot possibly support the charlatans whose agenda is now to lose us her greatest achievement - the European Single Market. It's not at all the same party.
Libdems are far too lefty for me, but right now they're our least-bad option by a long way. Insofar as they are an option.
He said voter not member.
Most Conservative voters are really anti Labour voters rather than Conservative voters.
Yes there is a hard core of must vote that way, but I have voted for 5 different political groupings in a year. None Labour. None Brexshit. None Kipper.
I was a long term Conservative voter. The last time was 1997 - the MP was a decent guy, I liked him a lot, he lost narrowly. Since then we've had a succession of truly awful Conservative candidates, one of whom got in in 2015 with the help of "Lord" Ashcroft.
Unless Michael Heseltine or Ken Clarke discover the Fountain of Youth and stand in our constituency, that's it for the Conservative Party and me.
Thinking the same here.
But it has been infighting since forever, since pencil in a suits dad was an MP.
Where as to many the coalition put LD off the voting intentions, to many it put them on. My daughter is a LD supporter, she thought they did well in the coalition, so when she was of age, she chose them.
They understand why I have voted in the past, the older MPs with more individual experience than the whole of the cabinet.
They are no longer the home of politicians like Heseltine and Clarke and are now the home of idiots like BoJo and pencil in a suit.
Sir Loin Of Beef,
"The stupidest person in UK Politics is now PM?
God help you all."
Correction:
The Stupidest person is each and evey one of the electorate who allowed the fiasco of the last 3 years to go on and on and on .......
It was apparent from day 1 that the Referendum result was *NOT* going to be actioned.
The majority of the MP's did not agree with it and it has been stymied at every possible point.
No one was brave enough to simply say 'NO I will not do it !!!' because of fear of the fall out.
Now they have a scapegoat to blame the failure on when Bojo fails and they can all pretend that they would have supported the result as that is Democratic But ..... Bojo messed it up ..... what a shame !!!!
... wish you had spent more time and energy putting your own house in order, instead of expending all that hot air on Trump?
The term "whistling past the graveyard" comes to mind ...
On the bright side, perhaps all y'all will be rid of him before our own idiot in chief scurries off with his tail between his legs, bleating about fake votes and the like. (We're stuck with Trump until the next election, alas ... because the alternative (Pence) doesn't bear thinking about).
Some of us did try. My father in particular spent a lot of time trying to explain the EU and foreign affairs to what he calls the "fellow inmates" of his sheltered housing.
As a result, he is now of the opinion that most of the electorate is too thick to be allowed to vote.
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Now you can't make fun of us for Trump anymore, and hopefully we can correct our mistake before you correct yours!
Seriously though, I guess this means hard Brexit since he won't be able to negotiate anything Parliament will pass any more than May did. The outcome of that can't lead to him being in power very long before he's pushed out like May was. I think a lot of people in government want to see him there because they know whoever is in No. 10 when the effects of Brexit are finally felt will get a lot of blame. Everyone else wants to be the 'white knight' who comes in after them and picks up the pieces (or blames everything on BoJo the clown)
Whoever the democrats nominate Trump will claim he or she is a socialist regardless of views. His strategy is pretty clear - he knows his popularity ceiling is about 45% so he needs to make enough democrats dislike their nominee and stay home, as he did in 2016. Problem is, he had a 25 year head start from the right in spewing Hillary hate, he'll have to do that in 6-9 months with the 2020 nominee.
Funny how republicans used to deride democrats as "liberals" but liberal isn't a dirty word outside of hardcore republican circles anymore, so they have to take it to the next level. Having an avowed "democratic socialist" running helps I guess, but it will be hard to paint most of them with that brush. Especially when the "socialist" policies they advocate for like some form of single payer / nationalized health care are now popular with a clear majority of Americans. All the effort republicans spent trying to hamstring Obamacare and insure it wasn't a success worked, but not in the way they wanted.
Whoever the democrats nominate Trump will claim he or she is a socialist regardless of views.
That is absolutely not the point.
Trump will fling mud, but does that mud have substance? If yes, the uncommitted voters will have to weigh up which is the lesser of evils, and *might* pick Trump again. If no then it's a no-brainer: we have an electable candidate and they'll thrash Trump.
the uncommitted voters will have to weigh up which is the lesser of evils
You have too much faith in voters if you think they will "weigh up" anything. Most people respond emotionally, which is why candidates slinging mud and calling names always beat those who talk policy and solutions.
"insert broadband into every orifice, of every home"
You may like to go around inserting things into orifices you shouldn't be interfering with, but I'd prefer you to keep your hands off my wifi. I believe that others may have told him to keep his hands off their wifi too, although I might have slightly misheard that.
"Given one-time chancellor George Osborne's untrue promise that a referendum vote to leave the EU would send house prices crashing through the floor,"
With the GBP falling, UK house prices are looking increasingly attractive, if you've got a pile of better currency and can wait for a decade or two for a return to sanity and recovery. Which doesn't help young people in the UK at all...
The thing is, they kind of did crash. Estate agents are publicly stating otherwise, but the reality is that at least here in London, prices were still rising until 2016 and then they started falling. I bought a house last year and paid 25% less than the asking price. It wasn't a particularly unusual asking price either.
The house I had before had also fallen in value. Not as much because it's a smaller house and more in-demand. I decided not to sell and to rent it instead, because while rental costs have also fallen, they're still very high.
I spent over a year casually looking for houses and a lot of those that were on the market simply didn't sell. On a few occasions the seller pulled the price down a lot, on others they decided to stay put, and a few have ended up on the rental market.
Of course, this is circumstantial, based on a leafy part of South West London. But while prices in the window are pretty much as they were, the market is stagnant at best.
"The thing is, they kind of did crash. Estate agents are publicly stating otherwise, but the reality is that at least here in London, prices were still rising until 2016 and then they started falling. I bought a house last year and paid 25% less than the asking price. It wasn't a particularly unusual asking price either."
Yes, but it it's pretty much ONLY London house prices that are falling. Everywhere else, they are still rising, though maybe not as quickly. Historically, rUK housing prices have followed London prices with a short lag. The lag is longer than ever and still growing.
PM questions typically involve the "let's pretend" shenanigans where the PM gets a grilling on something properly directed at one of his/her Ministers but answers because it's a "follow up" question to something like "Does the PM intend to visit Lower Slurpington cum Chokeberry?". This has devolved into a shouting of numbers instead of the standard questions, like the old story about telling jokes in prison, followed by the odd-to-foreigners "I refer the Hon. Member to the answer I gave previously".
Will the Boris stand for such nonsense? Will he simply launch himself across the aisle at his interlocutor, or just dismiss the initial approach with "Fwah fwah load of rubbish"? An anxious world awaits the answer.
Boris is a performer. He'll put on a show. He'll relish it in 'normal' times (when he has nothing particularly topical to hide), and (on past performance) absent himself at times when it could be embarrassing.
This could be difficult for the opposition. Put Jo Swinson against him and she'll sound whiny, even when she's firmly in the right about something. Corbyn may do better on occasion (when he has really good material), but probably not often.
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