Well maybe not. Sunak to appear with mini-lectern at 5.40pm to talk about "recent events". Perhaps the "wrong" things that 30p Lee has been up to. Not to mention Swella who went quite a bit further. More likely it's how he really won Rochdale because the Cons got more votes than Labour.
Which actually is a bit weird, in every way, thinking about it.
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...you're going to be rounded up in the first wave... ;-)
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It's OK. He's determined to protect our democracy after 5 years of his party finding ways to undermine it.
Not a word about Suella claiming the UK is controlled by Islamists.
Last edited by: Manatee on Fri 1 Mar 24 at 17:58
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I thought it was going to be we are going on a war footing type of announcement, just a bit of waffle instead.
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Breathtaking lack of self awareness.
"There are forces trying to tear us apart", "we must all stand together".
It was just baffling.
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What he was really thinking, I would guess, is that there are forces trying to tear the Tory Party apart. By "us" he wanted to hope that the electorate equates the Tories with the rest of the country. He would have us believe that the disintegration of the Tories is the disintegration of the nation.
Sounds like an attempt to divert from the descent into the abyss of the Tory Party.
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Not sure I would have made a state of the nation speech within days of Putin making a state of the nation speech.
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...but which Nation is in the better state....?
There's only one way to find out........fight!!
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Rochdale was a very safe Labour seat with a majority of 10k in 2019.
They managed to select an antisemitic candidate ultimately disowned by the party after unacceptable prevarication.
They lost to a Palestinian supporting independent and barely managed to get their deposit back.
This was a complete Labour party screw up. Indefensible. That the Tories failed to do better is unsurprising - they had little prospect of ever winning.
IMHO Galloway fails the fundamental decency test. But his overwhelming majority in a democratic election (despite what the losers may suggest) should be a wake up call to the traditional moderate political elite (left and right) that something is going seriously wrong.
To suggest Sunak's observations are somehow flawed or bizarre is a denial of all that should be reasonable in a stable democracy. Valuing tolerance and "respect" in a civilised society should be a characteristic supported by both Labour and Conservative.
Sunak's attempts to criticise mob rule politics should be supported, not criticised simply on the basis of personal party political allegiance. That we may each support different political futures is a matter of personal belief.
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>> Rochdale was a very safe Labour seat with a majority of 10k in 2019.
It was held by the Liberals for quite a while after Smith won it 1972 so not all that safe.
Labour screwed up by pushing the writ for the byelection too fast and skipped proper diligence. I guess they hoped to be on a roll after Wellyboro etc.
Instead they ended up with a candidate who should have failed validation.
The fact he fell for a daft conspiracy thing about 7 October could have been excused/explained with an apology.
Unfortunately there was a second recording which was clearly anti-Semitic.
I wonder though how the Tories might do with a candidate who expressed anti Islamic sentiments in the same way/timescale.
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>>I wonder though how the Tories might do with a candidate who expressed anti Islamic sentiments in the same way/timescale.
You don't need to wonder. Braverman's still there as far as I know.
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>>I wonder though how the Tories might do with a candidate who expressed anti Islamic sentiments
Why shouldn't they? I know muslims who loudly state anti-semitic views. They proudly declare they want to turn this country into a muslim state. Why shouldn't there be an opposition to that?
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>> Why shouldn't they? I know muslims who loudly state anti-semitic views. They proudly declare they
>> want to turn this country into a muslim state. Why shouldn't there be an opposition
>> to that?
I have met Muslims whose views fail the UK government's definition of anti-Semitism becuase they see Israel's annexation of Palestinian land as similar to the concept of Lebensraum.
Frankly, I agree with them.
No doubt there are a handful on extremists who would want to see the UK as an Islamic State. They're a tiny group of nutjobs with no influence whatsoever. To suggest that such views justify the sort of stuff 30p Lee and Braverman - who seems untouchable - have come out with is to me nonsense in stilts as Bo Jo would put it. .
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What Hamas have done and did is indefensible, what the state of Israel have done and doing is equally indefensible. Gaza has no functioning governance, and Israel has an election process that assures loonies run the asylum, so the peoples of both states are up a creek without.
Little wonder there is noise from both of those in this country. However its nothing to do with us, we have no control or influence over either, so they should be told to shut up or shove off.
Last edited by: Zero on Sat 2 Mar 24 at 11:36
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>> Little wonder there is noise from both of those in this country. However its nothing
>> to do with us, we have no control or influence* over either, so they should
>> be told to shut up or shove off.
I mean seriously, who the hell who matters out there is going to take a blind bit of notice of a resolution in parliament by the SNP. Its an abuse of our limited governance timetable.
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I mean seriously, who the hell who matters out there is going to take a
>> blind bit of notice of a resolution in parliament by the SNP. Its an abuse
>> of our limited governance timetable.
>>
I thought the same, what a waste of time arguing over the definable of a ceasefire. All hot air. Bog roll statements from MPs carry as much weight with the Israelis as statements from the Mongolian education dept do.
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as much weight with the
>> Israelis as statements from the Mongolian education dept do.
>>
Historical footnote.
Mongol armies reached and raided Palestine in the twelfth century so perhaps they have an interest
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Palestine has been perpetually invaded by everyone from before christ Its no wonder that the boundaries of an area of population is confused. One must wonder if the "homeland of the Jews' is nothing more than a myth. They were as nomadic as the rest of the population. Same people separated by religion.
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One must wonder if the "homeland of
>> the Jews' is nothing more than a myth.
Not really. The First Temple in Jerusalem (Solomon’s ) dates back to around 1000 years BCE The Jews are an ancient people who lived in the area known as Judah for a very long time,
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...that may be so, but (for example) many in the UK of Anglo-Saxon origin could, by similar rationale, lay claim to much of mainland Europe (and probably quite a bit of Scandinavia :-) )...
Untrammelled history is a dangerous thing to base land ownership on.
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I'm not a great world traveller but Jersualem is the most awe-inspiring place I can imagine ever visiting.
You can/could peer into the excavation by and under the wailing wall where they basically have 5,000 years of history in strata. Since I last visited 15 or so years ago there is a new Western Wall Heritage Centre that I would love to see. Probably not just now:(
Incredible place. I'm sure my awe is increased by the association of place names with all those bible stories, despite me being a heathen.
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>> Historical footnote.
>> Mongol armies reached and raided Palestine in the twelfth century so perhaps they have an
>> interest
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
I wondered if anyone would pick up on that.
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>> I wondered if anyone would pick up on that.
I think the Mongolian dept of Education got in touch.
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>>
>> >> I wondered if anyone would pick up on that.
>>
>> I think the Mongolian dept of Education got in touch.
>>
Perhaps their influence is far and wide after all.
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...I think Sadiq Kahn is a descendent of Genghis..... ;-)
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Samuel Johnson was of course a very clever man, but where we fundamentally differ is on his opinion of London. My work required me to visit that city on a regular basis for more than four decades and I even had to live there for a while.
I may never return. The very best view of it in my opinion is that in the rear view mirror when heading up the M1.
;-)
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>> ...I think Sadiq Kahn is a descendent of Genghis..... ;-)
>>
I'm certain of it. Have they found anybody who isn't? Or was that your wink? (humour detector value out of range).
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>> I mean seriously, who the hell who matters out there is going to take
>> a
>> >> blind bit of notice of a resolution in parliament by the SNP
>>
>> I thought the same, what a waste of time arguing over the definable of a
>> ceasefire. All hot air. Bog roll statements from MPs carry as much weight with the
>> Israelis as statements from the Mongolian education dept do.
I agree violently. If the term "virtue signalling" didn't exist it would have had have been invented for all these ceasefire resolutions.
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>> To suggest Sunak's observations are somehow flawed or bizarre is a denial of all that
>> should be reasonable in a stable democracy. Valuing tolerance and "respect" in a civilised society
>> should be a characteristic supported by both Labour and Conservative.
I can't disagree with that, but when are they going to start?
Your loyalty does you credit.
The party deliberately creating division is the Conservatives. Their very election strategy is division and they work very hard at it.
The danger to democracy started and continues with them, using statutory instruments for non-manifesto legislation to prevent parliamentary scrutiny.
They have disapplied part of the ECHR to remove human rights for asylum seekers. Human rights are for all humans, not just the ones he likes.
The police have been doing a good job with peaceful protests, with very few arrests. Sunak clearly wants the police to give protesters a harder time and is prepared further to muck about with the law.
He will not say that Anderson is racist or Islamophobic, just "wrong". Braverman has gone even further and has not even been suspended although her statement that the UK is under Islamist control and that Labour is in hock to Islamists is if anything worse. Anderson has clarified his remarks to say that London is not under Islamist control but Mayor Khan is (he clearly isn't).
None one of the Ministers like Michael Tomlinson in the following clip, have been allowed to say Anderson's words were Islamophobic although they clearly were is that Anderson was doing his job, creating division and stirring up hatred. It's what they do and what Braverman has done too. Just imagine that she had said Labour was controlled by Jews. would that have been anti-semitic or not?
www.dailymail.co.uk/video/news/video-3134065/Video-Heated-moment-Nick-Ferrari-cuts-minister-Lee-Anderson.html
This is satire. I think. I can't tell the difference any more.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=0QVkfu41ziU
Had Sunak gone on to say that he was cleaning his own house starting with saying what made Lee Anderson "wrong" and throwing out Braverman and Truss (who has been back-slapping in the US with Steve Bannon while he referred to right wing extremist Steven Yaxley-Lennon as a "hero") then he might have been taken seriously.
It was the most disingenuous twaddle from start to finish. I wasn't going to go on about it, but really...there's none so blind as will not see. And Sunak seemed entirely blind to the ridiculousness of what he was saying.
I'll be honest, I'm absolutely loving this. If he and his party could actually do what he has just described, they'd do better in the polls. But they just can't stop digging.
The business in Rochdale is embarrassing for Labour but comparatively trivial. The man's gone, with little if any "prevarication". Just substitute "Jews" for "Islamists" in Andersen's and Braverman's remarks to see what I mean.
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Nothing more than a predictable smokescreen to try to hide the ruination of 13 years of their crap.
A sad attempt to define an "enemy" that only the Tories can defeat.
Frankie Boyle said it best:
"I once knew a guy who worked for a gang that would take all the stuff out of empty office buildings: wiring; copper; the lead off the roof.
His job was to stand at the front desk in a security outfit and soothe and reassure anyone who came in to ask what was going on back there.
Anyway, that’s what this Rishi Sunak speech reminded me of."
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From our credit back channels...
A bank that I used to work at has suspended a couple of credit underwrites for continuously putting certain customers' files to the bottom of the pile for underwriting new facilities. Needless to say, the customers were from a specific community and the underwriters were from another.
Both members of staff were part time on a job share and they would pass the files back and forth to each other at the end of their working "week". claiming that they didn't have time to look at them.
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Dont they call that "the too difficult pile"?
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Easy to be critical of Sunak if you start with the proposition the Tories are incompetent, divisive, dishonest etc. This is not completely unfounded - nor is it wholly justified.
Sadly there is zero clarity about what the opposition intend when they win power (very likely). Their strategy seems dominated by criticise the current incumbents, plus generic platitudes rather than clear and explicit policy plans.
It avoids commitment to what may be undeliverable, limiting more expectation U-turns. It does nothing to engender confidence in their future governance. Perhaps they have picked up the Boris Brexit playbook - fluff over substance, but missing the panache Boris could deploy.
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Parties of both sides spend their first term of power fixing the crap left by the other.
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>>Sadly there is zero clarity about what the opposition intend when they win power.
That simply isn't true, despite Sunak saying it endlessly (and the Daily Mail shamelessly repeating it when it knows it to be untrue?)
The Labour manifesto will be published when the election is announced.
Meanwhile, here is the policy platform from the conference.
labourlist.org/2023/10/labour-national-policy-forum-final-document-summary-policy-manifesto-party-conference/
It's pretty obvious where events have overtaken this but I think it should give an idea where priorities will lie.
>>Their strategy seems dominated by criticise the current incumbents
I think it's more "just let them keep digging". The Conservative strategy is of course the culture wars stuff and what Bromptonaut calls dog whistling, pointing the finger at whomever they are trying to blame and what they are supposed to have done. To which I would add simply lying with maximum repetition.
>>It avoids commitment to what may be undeliverable, limiting more expectation U-turns.
Very sensible at the detail level as it turns out.
Never mind. Rumour is that Hunt will nick the non-dom status pledge. Good.
Yes it's easy to criticise when when starting from the assumption that they are self-serving, dissembling and incompetent. I'm just following a hypothesis and finding the evidence
Starmer is pretty smart. While the SNP guy and Ed Davey have taken the same indignant line as me (basically "how dare he!") Starmer has avoided falling into the trap, by showing his unwavering support for motherhood and apple pie...
"... [Sunak] was "right to advocate unity and to condemn the unacceptable and accusatory behaviour that we have seen recently" and
"It is an important task of leadership to defend our values and the common bond that holds us together...Citizens have a right to go about their business without intimidation and elected representatives should be able to do their jobs and cast their votes without fear or favour... this is something agreed across the parties and which we should all defend".
I started off rather lukewarm about Starmer but the more I see and learn the better I like him. I particularly like the absence of charisma, which I have come to think of as an aptitude for demagoguery.
You can't argue with a 20 point lead. Hang on to that Ming vase Keir.
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>
>> labourlist.org/2023/10/labour-national-policy-forum-final-document-summary-policy-manifesto-party-conference/
>>
I wonder how many people know as them labour though? Election campaign still to come etc etc. You could probably take quite a of them and shove on the con parties site and no one would think them out of place.
Mind you with the lead they have it probably doesn't matter.
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>>You could probably take quite a of them and shove on the con parties site and no one would think them out of place.
I think Terry made the point that most obligations are common to whoever governs even if the policy for delivering differs. I mean, who isn't going to say they will improve services? Including the people who have made every one of them worse:)
(with the possible exception of the Blue Passport Office who, had they been any quicker, would have got my new passport to me before I applied for it)
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>>A sad attempt to define an "enemy" that only the Tories can defeat.
A sad attempt to define an "enemy" that the Tories have largely created and that only the Tories can defeat.
A technique for which there is considerable historical precedent.
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...when it comes to the State of the Conservative Party Nation, don't listen to Rishi's words, just follow the actions...
www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/03/02/lee-anderson-applauded-appearance-tory-fundraising-dinner/
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>> ...when it comes to the State of the Conservative Party Nation, don't listen to Rishi's
>> words, just follow the actions...
>>
>> www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2024/03/02/lee-anderson-applauded-appearance-tory-fundraising-dinner/
Even I wouldn't draw any conclusions about general opinion or even Conservative voters from the party membership, which is a fairly paltry number and a breed completely apart.
They are the real swivel-eyes, who don't seem to have gone off Truss at all. They would put her back tomorrow if they got the chance.
You won't believe this but one of my best friends is a Conservative party member. We just don't argue. I know he is utterly deluded, and he 'knows' I am. He is agreeing with me at the moment that his lot have done a very bad job and lost the plot. But he still wouldn't vote Labour "because of Corbyn"!
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Good grief how did I offend with that? Swivel-eyes?
It's a quote. Coined by a Conservative for the associations i.e. the members, and AIUI still employed with that meaning, often ironically.
It is not a term I would apply to any individual, certainly not any honourable member in this place.
Can I apologise while insisting there was no wrong-doing?
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>> A technique for which there is considerable historical precedent.
Indeed, a technique that created the Labour Party, a technique the Tory party only embraced later.
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>> Indeed, a technique that created the Labour Party, a technique the Tory party only embraced
>> later.
Bit of a leap there Zeddo.
Labour rose from a two party system comprised of a party the would not and another that said it could not improve the lot of the Working Class.
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>> Bit of a leap there Zeddo.
>>
>> Labour rose from a two party system comprised of a party the would not and
>> another that said it could not improve the lot of the Working Class.
"the enemy of the people"?
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I think we should all have to watch "Brass" again for educational purposes.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=xku4HTKFi94
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Labour rose from a two party system comprised of a party the would not and another that said it could not improve the lot of the Working Class.
A nice piece of rhetoric but a complete distortion of the facts. The 1930s under Baldwin was an era of social reform and saw the birth of one nation conservatism, very much an attempt to reduce the divide identified by Disraeli .
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>> A nice piece of rhetoric but a complete distortion of the facts. The 1930s under
>> Baldwin was an era of social reform and saw the birth of one nation conservatism,
>> very much an attempt to reduce the divide identified by Disraeli .
Except that by the 1930s under Baldwin Labour was an established political force.
Was thinking of turn of the 19th to 20th centuries.
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One could argue, from a position of almost total ignorance in my case, that at least part of Balfour's impulse towards more liberal values was due to the existence of Labour and the demise of the Liberals. In fairness I think Baldwin is now regarded as a decent PM on whatever scale they use for that.
Unrelated, I listened this week to the Rest is History podcasts on Britain in 1974. Most entertaining and flattering neither to Heath nor Wilson. I laughed out loud at Wilson's doctor suggesting that he could bump off Marcia Falkender (not funny, but it's the way they tell'em).
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The “Rest is History” is absolutely brilliant. Just finished the four parter on Carthage. Looking forward to “The most famous monkeys in history”
Reading “Dominion” by Tom
Holland. excellent.
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If you like Tom Holland try Rubicon. Very good.
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www.car4play.com/redirect.php?https://labourlist.org/2023/10/labour-national-policy-forum-final-document-summary-policy-manifesto-party-conference/
Sadly I tired after looking at ~25% of this.
Our American cousins may call it motherhood and apple pie - all (or mostly) utterly worthy, but what are the plans to actually implement these good intentions - legislation, tax rises, tax cuts (less likely), education, public awareness campaign, communication, carrot or stick etc etc etc.
There may be the odd policy within the "policy platform" with which I fundamentally disagree - but the good intentions could be replicated by Tories, Liberals, SNP simply by changing the title page.
This is not a distinctive credible plan - just (entirely worthy) fluff designed to create the illusion they have clear intentions - the "what", "when" and "how" are important!.
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I don't know what you expected. I haven't read it either.
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If the Tories get in they will be even worse - no party improves with time in power.
If Labour get in then if they are terrible, the Tories get back in.
If Labour get in and aren't terrible, and the Tories move further right, Labour stay in.
If Labour get in and aren't terrible, and the Tories move towards the centre, Labour may not get a second term.
Pity Sunak doesn't have the balls to kick Truss and Braverman - a realistic show of taking centre ground would work better than this "Enemy Within" hokum.
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I don’t really understand why they don’t understand that to win they have to command the centre ground . The fact that extreme right wing or indeed left wing parties don’t win elections in the UK seems lost on them.
Last edited by: CGNorwich on Sat 2 Mar 24 at 22:03
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>> I don’t really understand why they don’t understand that to win they have to command
>> the centre ground . The fact that extreme right wing or indeed left wing parties
>> don’t win elections in the UK seems lost on them.
>>
They no doubt know that, but their policies are centre ground to them. Few people in politics think they have extreme positions.
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>> Pity Sunak doesn't have the balls to kick Truss and Braverman - a realistic show
>> of taking centre ground would work better than this "Enemy Within" hokum.
That's the mystery for me, it's so obvious. Labour would have a real problem if they all woke up tomorrow and realised 30p Lee getting mailbags of fan letters cannot win them the election.
It seems obvious that some of them must realise that, possibly including Sunak. But such is the penetration of hard right extremists that there is simply no support. Brexit brought the Conservatives and UKIP together, a large group of new entrants in 2019 possibly drawn from that mix, and Johnson's purge of sensible centrists just made it worse. It's the parts that make up the parliamentary Party that make it what it is, and a one nation party can't be made out of those bits.
If they can't win, then those parts might well think Sunak wasn't right wing enough. The associations almost certainly would.
He really should kick those two out, and for that reason I hope he doesn't.
They really aren't anything like the Conservatives of 2010, or of the 1990s. Were I a long standing middle of the road Conservative voter think I'd be as mad as hell at them.
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State of the Nation - tyrednemotional
