Comments by "Ash Roskell" (@ashroskell) on "Professor Tim Wilson"
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But surely, of all people, a UN ambassador understands that recognition of the State of Palestine is the recognition of a peoples and a country, NOT the terrorists within it? In the face of Israeli history, such gesture politics come off as shrill and hysterical. And such gestures have a way of backfiring. The next allegation his country makes of unfair treatment can be answered with, “But you shredded the UN charter, publicly and cannot invoke its protections now.” If not by UN politicians themselves, certainly by other hostile politicos and radicals.
This ratification is simply a step (a rather small one in reality) in the direction of preventing further genocide. We can debate how intentional this genocide is, but not that it is occurring.
On the first day, when we all heard about the Hamas attack and saw the appalling footage, I told my wife that Netanyahu would seize upon this as his lifeline and that Israel’s response would be disproportionate and will be seen, even by Israel’s allies, as a massive overreaction. My wife was sceptical, asking, “How can you overreact to that?” She pointed to a thumbnail of horror which I won’t describe on YouTube. My response was, “Give it a week, and you’ll see. Just remember I said this.”
We simply cannot afford to lose sight of the fact that this is what is keeping Netanyahu a free man, and free of public shaming, opprobrium and the disgrace of a series of trial after being voted out of office in a probable landslide. The theatrics are a necessary part of his survival plan. So long as the war rages, he remains untouchable, and he knows from experience that he can keep this war raging for decades.
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Do you remember the good ole’ days, when the Tories at least had the decency to stand at the podium and make a speech when they lost an election? Even the execrable Michael Portillo took his lumps like a good ‘un. This lot don’t even hang around for the count to finish, let alone THANK all those people who went door to door in the rain for them, hung on the phones and worked so hard in other ways in closely contested seats. They flee as soon as they know they’ve lost because they are the lowest caliber of people, who cannot bear losing and worse still, being seen to lose.
Leadsom is just tired and it’s etched into every line of her face. She can see that there’s nothing to look forward to for an ambitious politician. She knows that the first few years of opposition promise nothing but the bloodiest, most unedifying, cruelest civil war the Tories have ever seen, and potentially all whilst being in Third Party status.
Andrea Leadsom didn’t get to where she is today by, “listening,” to people. She has convictions, for sure. But they are misguided and come with all the usual baggage of a Tory, arrogance and overweening self interest which they persuade themselves is, “self belief.”
I believe you encountered some of that in her surgery. When she was tired, defences down a little, and she showed you something of her true, unvarnished character. We have a Prime Minister who has never heard the views of a working person, let alone, “listened,” to anybody who wasn’t promising him lots of money. People are a bit curt when under pressure and I cut them slack for that, but when they flatly refuse to listen, that tends to be because they’re afraid of what you have to say.
A tearful Leadsom is about as plausible to me as a weeping crocodile. I just hope you don’t let it put you off spending time in your representative’s surgeries in the future.
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Imagine showing up to a casualty department, horribly wounded and a crash team of doctors rushes out to treat you, but just before they start life saving treatment they say, “This was a road traffic accident, right? If it was anything else, we’re not treating you. In fact, if it was any other form of incident we’re calling the police and having you locked up indefinitely in a special prison in which the conditions are of a notably lower standard than regular prison.” Does that sound hyperbolic, arbitrary and extreme to you? I hope so.
But, to anyone arguing that the way Tory policies and attitudes treat asylum seekers is any different from the above analogy, I defy you to explain to me, how so?
Deeming an asylum seeker as, “illegal,” on the basis of the mode of transport they used is comprehensively ludicrous, arbitrary and wilfully cruel.
I would argue that even attempting to do so should be outlawed, as it flies in the face of international and domestic laws in both spirit and letter, and is simply vindictive. Labour has always made this argument, if somewhat weakly, which is why they say they should target the traffickers and NOT the trafficked.
It is also illogical, since our country actually NEEDS MORE migrants, not fewer!
This vile woman should be vilified for her article, as should the rag that published it.
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If any company MUST be re-nationalised, it IS THE POST OFFICE. The current arrangement is the same as nationalisation anyway, in terms of financing, but the, “privatisation,” aspect has afforded these government jobsworths all the protections of legally protected cloaks and daggers, which are finally being exposed. The British people are entitled full accountability and to get their money’s worth from an organisation that THEY OWN and upon which THEY RELY!
The existing system has FAILED in every important respect and every measurable metric. The competition has outstripped them on reliability and public confidence; major businesses (such as Amazon and Argos) do not use them for the above stated reason; the left hand clearly doesn’t know what the right hand is doing, showing a fundamental breakdown in organisation, as so clearly illustrated by the excerpts you played us; and countless lives have been destroyed by what was a flat out culture of denial around the Fujitsu Scandal, AT BEST, and systematic conspiracy of silence and criminal profiteering at worst (we still do not know!).
Obviously, the people put in charge were incapable of fulfilling their remit, yet they were ostentatiously rewarded for many years of abject failure in a culture with ZERO ACCOUNTABILITY! “Culpable Negligence,” doesn’t even cover it!
These people belong behind bars, not getting gongs from his majesty! And the public deserves an open service, fully accountable to them at every level, since they are PAYING for it!
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While I see the convergence between Putin’s opportunism and Britain’s withdrawal from Europe, I think it is a step too far to say his invasion of Ukraine could not have happened but for Brexit. It, “helped,” certainly. But there are so many moving parts to that diagram it would be impossible for me to martial an argument against the idea without writing an essay. An essay, using your five steps, I hasten to add.
But, to your point, you touch it with a needle once again. At the very moment of the Brexit referendum result, the British government, “should,” have had a prepared plan of action, ready to go, comprising of diplomatic efforts to ensure strengthening bonds between ourselves and all other nations in Europe, as well as assurances to the wider world.
We, “should,” have had state visits by every available member of the Royal Family, our diplomats all singing from a single, unified hymn sheet, and politicians from the Foreign Office and Cabinet, all busy out in Europe, making clear our intentions to maintain and strengthen our relationships with all countries inside the European project. We should have never allowed any breast beating and victory laps, and assured the Europeans that our withdrawal would be handled with discretion and minimum fanfare. Even if the vote had been 100% in favour we should have seen to that.
Now, we’re naval gazing and waving our shrinking little union flags in the faces of those from whom we most the most help, in the belligerent manner of a toxic teen, incapable of respecting the adults in the room and bent on showing them so at every opportunity.
It’s time we ALL collectively faced up to the fact that the remainers had a point, and even the pro-Brexiteers did NOT get the Brexit they were promised. It failed and is still failing. We must STOP all this backward, past-focussed thinking, all this insularism and, “little Englander,” mindset, stuff. We need to grow up and accept we have been conned, instead of squandering increasing amounts of hard cash and soft power on the very mob who lead us down this dark alley only to get mugged.
And we must accept that these people in charge are not just squalid, self interested con artists, like so many politicians before them, but they represent a new class of politico: The incomparably THICK. In the last ten years, I have never seen a more STUPID collection of people in one room as I have in the Cabinet Office of Number 10 Downing Street. They must be replaced as a matter of national security.
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Well, we do know indisputably that two of the complaints against Raab were upheld. Given the extraordinarily high bar that needs to be proved beyond doubt, we can be certain that there was at least substance to the other claims. What I noted was that Raab’s resignation letter demonstrated the obtuseness and passive aggression that shows he’s unfit for high stress working environments.
I find the specious, “argument,” that he and Jacob Rees Mogg (among others) put forward in Raab’s defence particularly obtuse and galling. They keep saying, “It’s right to get angry with people who get it wrong or do their job badly,” and I haven’t yet heard a journalist return with the obvious riposte, “The complaints are not about Raab’s internal emotional state. They are about his behaviour.” Literally everyone in a high stress job gets angry with their colleagues from time to time. But there’s a world of difference between using the supervision procedure to identify mistakes and learn from them, setting goals for improvement and deciding on what to do differently in the future, and calling someone personal names and attacking the way they look, sound or behave in front of their colleagues. The defence being used misses that point and only serves to demonstrate that he either simply doesn’t get it (and therefore was unfit for his post) or he lacks the humility and wisdom to apologise and constructively move forward, which would improve the odds of him saving what looks to be an increasingly unsafe seat at the next election.
As to Sunack’s response to all this, he has done a classic Sunack: tried to avoid upsetting either side, merely serving to upset both sides further with his obvious pusillanimity. He allowed Raab to, “get his retaliation in first,” with a resignation letter that stopped just short of calling his victims, “snowflakes,” instead of sacking him immediately. And we all know he will have spoken to Raab on the phone, letting him know he will have to sack him but asking him how he would like to handle it.
At a time when Britain has never needed firm decisive leadership more, since WWII, we’re being lead by a flaccid vacillator who seems to want to demonstrate his own indecision and weakness at every opportunity.
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The Tories survived after the ‘97 wipeout because they remained the opposition, still had clients in the press and, as the opposition, were able to control the narrative. The opposition still gets all the same invites to all the same panel shows, public events and functions, Royal protocols and diplomatic events, et. And they get to set the agenda for the manner in which the government of the day is held to account.
I hope and pray that this time we get a different opposition. The Lib Dems would ask good, appropriate questions, hold the governments feet to the fire and avoid all of the, “personality politics,” and craven appeals to, “culture wars,” and other vacuous attempts at misdirection from issues that matter.
Just last night we had Jacob Reese Mog bleating on his private TV show about, “free speech,” whilst forgetting to mention that his party is the ONLY party that has introduced laws designed to curb free speech and the right to protest. I cannot see how losing that level of craven hypocrisy would do our country any harm?
Let us all vote for Tory annihilation so that we can have a responsible government, doing its job in an honest and boring manner whilst being challenged by responsible adults, not just out to make money for themselves and their friends and their families, holding them to account.
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The Lords were nothing short of ingenious in this vote! They have not voted for or against the bill, nor even asked for any amendments, at least yet. They have simply said, “If Rwanda is a, ‘safe,’ place to send asylum seekers, please prove that to us?” A very reasonable sounding request on the face of it. There are contesting opinions as to the safety of Rwanda. We have been accepting refugees FROM Rwanda, even since this whole, “stop the boats,” nonsense began!
So, all the government needs to do is prove that Rwanda is as safe as they claim and not the danger hotspot that opponents claim. And how do you do that, when there are opposing opinions on a crucial aspect of a bill? You get a court ruling, right? And, oh dear . . . Seems the courts have already ruled on this, so the government will need to persuade them to take up the case again. And to do that, they would need to persuade them that there is new evidence to look at. Now, given that the court’s ruling sited UN, NATO and EU laws and treaties to which we are committed (certainly NOT just the EU legislation the Tories keep banging on about!) where will they find any new evidence that would so much as challenge all three bodies enough to persuade them that there is even any reason to take up the case a second time, let alone actually find in their favour?
In short, it was a stroke of sheer, artful genius! And, incidentally, coming back to an earlier discussion you raised, one of the best arguments for keeping a second chamber in the first place.
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It’s a difficult one to speculate about. If the Duchess was approached by a representative of Big Brother and didn’t give a flat, “no,” immediately, anyone can stretch a point and call that, “negotiations.” But, what I remember about her, most of all, was an interview she gave not long after divorcing the Prince. She ended the interview abruptly, when questioned about her corrupt financial dealings and has never answered for any of that as far as I know. Seems she was cut from a similar cloth to Edward?
EDIT: I should qualify that. I’m referring to the 60 Minutes interview, in which they discussed a News Of The World sting operation (footage still available on YouTube) in which the Duchess was selling access to Prince Andrew to business representatives, while Andrew was still the Business Ambassador. She destroyed the world’s trust in the idea of the Brits as fair dealing, as well as a good deal of trust in the Royal family.
Andrew claimed no knowledge of her dealings, which only begs the question. If you look at the footage, she is as brazen and blatant as they come, putting a $50,000 dollar price on, “Doors opened, full access,” to Andrew for trade discussions and, presumably, preferential treatment over others who just go through legitimate channels. So, if he really didn’t know, that makes her twice the con artist she already appears to be.
Yes, she said she had a, “wake up call,” and claims she was only ever corrupted that one time. But it is obvious that she had been running this scam for a long time, with price points for each level of her shady dealing. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn she’d had booklets published, to save time with the patter.
In the end, she got to reframe the whole thing, used super injunctions to silence the press, told a pack of lies in her book about it, and got away with the whole thing. She disgusts me.
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I was struck by Johnson’s unapologetic and vehement performance in that enquiry hearing. He appeared to dig his own grave by stating that he thought he got advice from all of the right people, took the right steps, etc, even knowing what he knows now; meaning that he would do it all again, in the same way! Note: the very final question from the chair, who seemed to read him so well, all but walked him into a trap of his own making, by simply asking, “Well, is there anything you’d like to add?” But the way she framed it so cleverly, making it clear that this was his the opportunity to say, “If I had known then what I know now, here’s what I would have done differently.” By then, she had seen him sticking so vehemently to this, “I believe I did the right thing,” rhetoric, that she rightly surmised that the real meaning of the question would pass over his head. And he duly obliged the committee by stating that he had learned NOTHING from his experience and is a liability who would repeat all of the same mistakes; not change who advised him, not change his actions, not take better care of the health and safety of his own people, etc, not do ANYTHING differently, regardless.
And I think that will be the key line the findings of this enquiry will take: That even though we cannot read minds and establish what is truly in Mr Johnson’s, “heart,” as he would have do, Boris Johnson has stated in his own words that he has not learned anything from his own failings and stated unequivocally that he would not do anything differently, even if he had full knowledge of the potential harm he could have caused, or the harm he was doing politically to his party.
In short, they gave him enough rope and he hung himself. That would be the headline of my findings if I served on that committee, at any rate. And I would not fail to mention his pusillanimous response to outside influence and intimidation of committee members either. He reminded me of Donald Trump when he told them he would, essentially, be against the mob if he was exonerated, but for the mob should he be found guilty. That was a dark moment that I won’t be forgetting.
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What Starky, once again, wilfully overlooks is the fact that everyone voted AGAINST the Tories, which is why Labour won by default. People weren’t voting FOR Labour so much as blocking the Tories because they were wrecking Britain.
Starky has always enjoyed being venomous and spiteful, indeed tried to build a career out of it, playing the, “bad guy,” on BBC Radio 4 for several years, treating guests with contempt and being an exemplar of the specious argument. Always the classic appeals to authority, precedent, commonality and every other rhetorical trick in the book.
A dim person who thinks they’re clever is often more damaging than an actually clever person and Starky proves that point. He has extremist Tory written through him like a stick of Blackpool Rock.
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You look a little out of sorts in this video. Probably the weather? I do hope you are looking after yourself?
As to the rebellion discussion I simply say this: I find I can agree with neither side on this debate. Thatcher was paraphrasing Lincoln’s, “A house divided against itself cannot stand.” As I argued months ago, the Tories are paralysed by indecision, delaying an election in the vane hope that things might just get better, despite the fact that, as I predicted, things have gotten far worse for them.
To put it as succinctly as possible, in the hope that we do not lose sight of the main issues here: When your, “flagship legislation,” is a bill to illegally persecute THE most vulnerable people on Earth, you have a problem with morality and are simply unfit for office.
Neither side in this debate represents the views of the majority of the British people. The, “manner,” in which an asylum seeker reaches the country should be irrelevant to their legal status AS an asylum seeker. They either are asylum seekers or they are not. What’s next? Rejecting claims on the basis of the colour of shirt they wear?
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I’m glad, personally, that you are sticking with this coverage. I too would love to hear a solicitor’s views on this. I wonder if the popular YouTuber and barrister, The Black Belt Barrister, would be willing to share an opinion with you?
Any other government, including previous conservative governments, would have kicked her out of their party by now and removed the whip. She should be stripped of her title. Her best, “defence,” so far has been, “Let me remind you, lying to the media is not a crime.” I only wish that journalist had had the presence of mind to respond, “Can you see how that will make no difference to the people who lost loved ones?”
Indeed, I would have asked her what she hoped to achieve at all, by appealing to the public and doing this interview in the first place? In the last few years I have been genuinely shaken by the moral degeneracy pervading public life. Not just appalled by the government’s criminality and callous disregard for human life, but chilled to the bone that such people have power over us, when they are so clearly unfit to run a summer fait, let alone any organisation with the power to alter the lives of others.
Our country is out of control. And it’s frightening.
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I have always appreciated your authenticity and have never, for a moment, considered that you would speak differently or seem and any different if I were to meet you face to face. Indeed, for me, that is part of your appeal and what keeps me coming back, whether I agree wholeheartedly with you or not on any given topic.
I looked up the video of the Margolyes interview, before finishing this video, to see what you were talking about. And I did feel I understood her point. We all feel genuine, heartfelt anger toward some people, especially politicians. Though we can be happy enough for our feelings to be known about us, by the public at large, we would not necessarily want to spit our bile into the face of that person, simply because the opportunity presents itself.
There are times when I feel I could cheerfully do actual physical harm to at least some of the politicians who literally laughed at us while we lost isolated loved ones during the Covid crisis and they partied on. Especially since I have learned about Boris Johnson’s attitude toward Covid as a natural way of killing off the old to make way for wastrels like himself. Their sheer callous disregard for all decency hurts all the more when I think of my father dying without me by his side.
But it is not just the fear of legal consequences that would restrain me if I were to bump into Johnson in bar. Nor, necessarily, my sense of responsibility to the people around us, just minding their own business and not wishing to witness any violent actions or language. It is merely my fundamental belief that I am better than him in every important respect, more capable of self control and measured language, that I believe would govern my actions overall.
I don’t think Margolyes betrayed any degree of hypocrisy so much as she simply expressed what she was thinking about the man, rather than willing to say to him. Smart people know that simple name calling merely fuels the confirmation bias of your enemies, making it too easy for them to dismiss you as, “just another hater,” or whatever, without ever thinking over what you said to them or why. She doesn’t care that people know (and, by extension, Jeremy Hunt knows) what she really thinks of him, but she is above confrontational abuse and I applaud her self restraint. Especially since it’s her, famous for speaking without apparent restraint.
Simply abusing the man would have done neither party any good, but could have done harm.
As to the BBC Radio 4 headquarters being a, “temple,” I am with you 100%. I see it as a soiled, somewhat sullied temple, badly in need of renovation and restoration to its former independence. But that’s a whole other conversation.
If you read all of this, thank you for your patience. I hope you can see the distinction I was making?
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When I was an older teenager, I attended a residential weekend with my youth club. One of the, “youth workers,” decided that it would be a good, “social experiment,” if he persuaded my two older sisters, the rest of the staff, and all those other young people in attendance to completely ignore me as though I wasn’t there for the first 24 hours. Sounds like a small thing, when I say it in a short sentence like that.
I will never be able to describe the utter psychological harm that did to me. I never spoke of it for more than 20 years, and even then, I told it as an anecdote about something that happened to someone else. The shame and pain of it was so traumatic. To suddenly and inexplicably become completely insignificant to the point of none existence, in a set of new anxiety invoking circumstances was a shock to my system that still, to this day, causes me to catch myself arguing out loud with ghosts of my memories, like a mentally ill person, expressing the rage I want to pour out on the person responsible, who was completely unfit for his position of power.
I couldn’t agree more with your assessment, though I have not seen the show, nor will I. I think it was after the first season of Big Brother that I stopped watching what I called, “Hate TV.” And ever since then I’ve watched the popularity of Hate TV gradually grow. It is the same form of manipulation and deep psychological scarring that people cannot comprehend until it’s already too late, being committed to a public screening, judging from the trailer I just watched for the sake of context.
There is something of the anxiety dream, such as the one you described about the loss of your mother, about this dystopian vision we seem to be sleepwalking into.
I keep thinking of the film, Gladiator, and Derek Jacobi saying, “He will give them blood, and they will love him for it.” The producers will be careful to avoid breaking any laws, but reckless about breaking people’s spirits.
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Absolutely with you on this call to action, sir. Anyone who tells you that writing to your MP is a waste of time is either wholly misguided or speaking in bad faith. And any MP who does not hold surgeries is not an MP, but rather someone exploiting the title and privileges of an MP for their own nefarious means.
As to freedom of speech, I’d put it even more simply: There is a simple difference between expressing your beliefs and opinions, and incitement. And, if you are inciting along with other inciters, you are taking part in a conspiracy. And conspiracies that lead to criminal harm are criminal conspiracies. As these people are beginning to discover, we already have multiple laws on the statute books which cover such instances.
People on the far right, whilst using social media, love to use expressions like, “educate yourself,” and, “echo chamber,” when dealing with anybody who disagrees with their egregious take on the world. Well, now they are having it proved to them that they should have practiced what they preached.
These are the lessons that will have a far greater impact on the far right, and will go further toward remedying the hate speech so rampant in modern discourse. It’s not just rounding up a few well photographed, well documented thugs, 70% of whom turned out to have previous convictions for violence and football hooliganism. But getting at the puppeteers and cutting their strings. I applaud the sentencing of this woman, and hope to God she will learn something from her experience.
And I bet there are multiple other online, “activists,” urgently seeking legal advice as we speak. I do hope we jail at least double digits more of them?
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I disagree. Yes, our 1930’s British language was just as bad as 1930’s Germany’s. And that too serves as a reminder that we could have gone down the same road, had our economic situation been as dire as that of 1930’s Germany. But the fact is that there were running battles in the streets of London between Mosely’s Blackshirts and the people who stood against Nazis, whereas in Germany, it was the lies they told themselves about why they lost the First World War that (which had been around for over a decade) that were able to gain traction, because of the language that became commonplace in the street and the media; the othering of the Jews was just the beginning. But, that only means that any country can fall prey to such othering, in the requisite circumstances. When we said, “Never Again,” that was supposed to mean erring on the side of caution, not punishing people for being offended by flagrant hate, perpetrated by hypocrites in government.
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I cannot agree. Yes, we do benefit from the stings of a gadfly. But not an intellectually baron egomaniacal gadfly who stings for attention? Hardly Socratic, is he? Colour for colour’s sake? That’s what got us into this mess we call Britain in the first place.
I’d take a Hitchensesque type of gadfly and tolerate such a form of irritation in politics as something we should protect, despite my abhorrence for the surviving Hitchens. Someone in parliament, continually testing our assumptions, with no other purpose apparent, and constantly pulling out all those rhetorical loose threads, would be healthy for us all, let alone Westminster. But Galloway doesn’t have the intellectual chops, the self discipline or the respect for institutions.
Yet, I shouldn’t worry about it if I were you. He’ll make himself known to us again, soon enough. His ego won’t allow him to ride off into the sunset, even if crowds of people gathered and cried out for him to just follow the light.
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This video is not as advertised. This is not about the Arlington incident at all. It feels like a bait and switch, so that you could get something else (however legitimate your criticisms are) off your chest.
This unedifying coda to the Afghan war at Arlington was just another case of Trump having no respect for tradition, the rules, or the fallen. He and his team knew that the cemetery does not permit pictures of any kind to be taken over or near the graves of the recently deceased and ignored that, so as to get a picture of Trump, family members and his campaign team, grinning with their thumbs up, over the graves of a group of US veterans who were killed in a suicide bombing.
That incident, in isolation, deserves some attention, since we know it was a monstrous act, with no obvious gains to be gleaned from it that I can see. Worse still is the fact that, when the Arlington staff attempted to remind the trump’s of the rules and to prevent them taking pictures, there was a physical altercation (the details of which are sketchy) which is just ghoulish and horrific to contemplate.
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I appreciate you taking a moment to process this moment that so many will either shy away from, or discuss in a sensationalistic, immature manner. Thank you, once again, for being our, “adult in the room.”
We see so many stars abuse their privileges and take their public for granted, only to be like Icarus flying too close to the sun. But in their cases, it’s only their own lives they’re truly ruining, when they crash into the sea, as the splash settles, the waves are restored and the ocean forgets them. Only Daedalus remembers who they really were. With people like Glitter, Saville and Harris, the oily stain remains atop that ocean, keeping the shattered corpse afloat for all to see, having soiled that patch of ocean forever and threatening to stain any who swim too close. Whilst Daedalus looks down and wonders which of his creations was more ill-conceived.
The deepest, longer lasting, unseen tragedy of Rolf Harris is the worry and guilt he infected so many parents, producers, colleagues, and so on, with. The sensation of being the parent of a child who sat in that group of kids on Rolf’s Cartoon Club, unsupervised, or those kids in those Teach Your Kids To Swim public information things and so on. The conversations those situations must have forced people to have with (possibly adult by now?) loved ones; the doubt; the breaking of trust . . . The unforgivable selfishness of the sexual predator who exploits his privileges to gain access to children is more chilling than any horror narrative I could dream up.
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If any population is alive to the possibilities of tactical voting, it’s the Scots. I live just south of the constituency you speak of, with our eldest daughter living there. The vastness of the tactical voting campaign has reached the ears and eyes of everyone up here. And it has provided voters with a rational response to the corruption of both the Tories AND the SNP. Where the Tories are not an issue in Scotland, the SNP is far more vulnerable to Labour. But on the east coast, where the Tories have done pretty well, traditionally, people have never had a stronger reason to vote for the leading opponent, SNP.
I have cast my tactical vote, against the Tories and for a party I do not believe in, but which I do believe will spend the next parliament cleaning out its stalls. They do have many excellent policies, but I am a unionist at heart. Could I be anything other, as an Englishman living in Scotland, with a Scottish wife? We have every reason to expect vast improvements in the probity of the SNP in the future as they have to accept that it is the stink of corruption that has done them the most harm of late.
Yet they remain the main opponent to beat the cons in my constituency.
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@zuluwarrior1648 : Oh, I can answer that. But, if you need this to be explained to you in the first place, you are clearly not qualified for this discussion. The Committee was initially, “accountable,” to the people who created it, which would include Boris Johnson, Mogg and the rest of the entitled blow hards who are complaining about it now. Oh, and the British people, as it is a Parliamentary Committee and, therefore, “accountable,” to us in the same way that ALL of Parliament is. I suggest a little reading on how Parliament works and what it is?
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This is a classic case of being shocked without being at all surprised for me. For my sins, I spent the first 20 years of my career working with family, “at risk,” of breakdown in various roles. And whether the child had a biological factor, behavioural factor, ADHD, or any of the other countless issues going on in their life to account for needing social services in the first place or not, the truly antisocial kids always had an antisocial parent behind them. They were lonely, underachieving, unhappy kids, looking for any group that would accept them. And the far right are so very good at making the antisocial, vulnerable child feel welcome and accepted, for the first time in their lives, usually.
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Well, if anyone knows about, “smug,” it’s Farage. Of course it’s very personal. The whole journey for Farage has been built on, “personality politics,” without any truth or substance to back him up. He reminds me of that oily character (sadly) named Ash in John LeCarré’s The Spy Who Came In From The Cold. Lemas says of him, “He’s an empty space. There’s nothing there!” And he means a very similar thing. Once you lift the, “performance,” away and ask grownup questions about, “policy,” “foundation,” “facts,” “costs,” “statistics,” there is literally NOTHING there, other than lies.
Cameron is one the Tories’ greatest assets. He still has some credibility with conservative voters. (Lord knows why?)
Farage’s problem is the same as Braverman’s. When the cold, hard facts explode your, “policy,” nonsense, you can’t talk about them. You must redirect public discourse, urgently. And the only reliable way to do that is to get personal.
It worked for Braverman, who dodged all questions at the dispatch box regarding the workability of her plans, the costs, the active harm it was doing to innocent people, by simply spewing out a series of epithets about the, “Soy bean eating, Guardian reading, wokerarty,” etc. which dominated the headlines and became the talking point of all the editorials, opinion pieces and BBC interviews in its wake! We never got ANY direct answers as to the costs (human or otherwise) from parliamentary discussions! Not once! Not from Braverman.
But we did get a dividing line drawn through the metropolitan political landscape, which gave us protest marchers, angry far right activists suddenly back in the headlines and new, apparently equally urgent, discussions about our own personal freedoms and our rights to freedom of speech and freedom of expression. Oh, it worked so beautifully for that twisted little harpy that she decided to make that, “technique,” a lifestyle choice!
And where did this parvenu learn her techniques if not at the feet of the drama QUEEN of harpy’s egg layers himself, Nigel Farage. Who needs facts, accountability or an estimate of the costs when they’ve got personal attacks, personality politics, populism and popular anger to misdirect?
It’s little wonder Braverman wants to get into the harpy’s nest with the harpy queen himself. They’re otherwise idle and superfluous anyway. So they can spend all their time circling the turrets of Westminster, telling all the black crows to, “go back to where they came from,” and choose their targets to swoop down upon, getting all tangled in their hair if they’re lucky, flapping their harpy wings and squawking at the top of their lungs, causing a horrific spectacle that focuses all public discourse on their attacks without them ever having to account for themselves! By the time someone steps up with the appropriate shotgun it’s too late, as they are back up in the battlements, leaving the press circle standing around their victim to ask, “What was it like to be dive bombed by a harpy?” And, “Did that harpy have a point?”
But I still think it won’t be too long before Braverman finds that she is suddenly the cuckoo in Farage’s nest, to be shunned like the Ugly Duckling. And that will serve her right.
Yes, “Thank God for Cameron,” indeed! Hold the line!
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johnslavin2270 : As to the morality of my view, that can only be judged by every individual for themself. But, for me, exploitation of this type is unconscionable. As to the legality of what these, “employers,” are doing, that is all on the statute books of national and international law, for you to read at your leisure.
As to statistics of the finances, there are two answers to that, which I offer in lieu of having any figures to offer you: 1) There is the common sense conclusion that an employer who does not pay tax or insurance for their, “employees,” is robbing the state of income. And employees who do not pay income tax are also robbing the state of income. Three sources of income absent from the economy, which yet must provide services, education, healthcare, street maintenance, policing, etc for these people, whether they show up on the books or not.
2) You will not find any of the five major parties in Parliament who disagree with this obvious (not received) common sense conclusion. Therefore, to deny it would be to contradict all parties simultaneously. I say this because, if you take a look at the manifestos of each party, and particularly the one you support, (or at least voted for) you will find in that section, the same conclusions I have just laid out for you, but with their unique take on that; especially when it comes to the best course of action.
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If a trial is politically motivated, especially by those in power, one should attend the trial and expose that fact in hopes of correcting the laws. If one shows repeated contempt of court, we should not be angry that the individual gets punished by that court, we should be angry that so many get away with it. Paula Vennels committed perjury yet no one wants to even address that. Why? No one has even appeared in court over the Grenfell tower mass corporate manslaughter. Why? I could go on.
Yes, this could just be a Tory hoping to appeal to the centrists by saying, “Look how we don’t support Nazis,” whilst simultaneously courting the very man who is robbing them of their votes and who poses the most serious threat to their future.
But if Robinson can prove he had no involvement in this leak; or, more importantly (since this is how our legal system works) if the prosecution cannot prove that he was directly responsible in some way for the leaked video, then he will walk free and have been handed even more ammunition to claim state persecution. I would assume that an attorney general would not be stupid enough to chance his arm on a gamble unless he had some sort of evidence?
But it is the Tories we’re talking about, who have long since abandoned rationality and logic, so who knows? Maybe Mr Robinson hurt the feelings of a Tory, or a Tory family member? That would be as plausible a rationale for their behaviour in any given circumstance.
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My best guess is that Prigozhin was after a settlement and forcing the issue, all dressed up to look like he would take Putin’s throne. Shoigu is in as much trouble as Prigozhin now, being under virtual house (or office) arrest, while a video was released of him inspecting troops (probably weeks ago) without any write up, context or voice over on Russian Telegram, apparently. That’s a very Russian thing, like playing Swan Lake to accompany a test card, while there’s an upset, noises off, throughout the country and no one wants to get arrested for showing literally anything on TV. A meaningless place filler video, for people to speculate about while all the internal power plays and reshuffling are settled.
No one even knows where Putin is! Last seen fleeing Moscow two nights ago! He could quite literally be anywhere from a bunker in Syria, the top office of the Kremlin or in his grave and I would not be shocked at any of those outcomes!
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Now that we have reasonably reliable records on demographics, we have learned that there is a simple equation that never fails: The nations with a young and growing population will succeed as economic blocks. Those with large ageing populations face economic ruin. China has slowly come to recognise this, but has been able to slow their crisis using their one and only advantage, state control over generations.
The fear mongering around, “illegal immigration,” seems to me to be just one more attempt by Britain’s hard right to, “Americanise,” our politics and turn migration into a hot button issue. Yet the fact is that we actually NEED to grow our population and we should be admitting as many young families as possible.
If I were to be ruthless about it, in the interests of simply growing our nation’s power and economic influence on the globe, I would push for only one level of, “discrimination,” and incentivise the young adult populations of other lands to migrate to us, favouring them over anyone aged 50 or above. I am 56 btw, so I am speaking from a merely logical point of view, without compassion.
The incentives should be sweetened for 20 somethings, especially those with children.
While they seem to have forgotten it now, this has been the very model that America’s enormous economic success was built upon. We should be welcoming refugees and providing work permits to as many young families as possible, so the country can benefit from their economic activity and taxable incomes.
The utter bogusness of the Tories, attempting to appeal to the lowest common denominator by inspiring panic, literally results in self harm as far as the country is concerned.
It also prevents us from building a coherent system of the type we will need in the near future, when there actually is a genuine crisis of being overwhelmed, in the wake of a war or natural disaster. But currently, we are literally being offered one of the most precious resources and refusing it. Not just refusing it, but viciously rejecting it. The resource of humanity is incalculable. That’s just hard science.
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I know very little about the Philip Schofield of these times. As a 55 year old, all of my memories of him are fond, as a dark haired young man with Gordon The Gopher as his side kick, revolutionising the presentation style of children’s television with a model that would be copied by other channels and then morning television. There would have been no Roland Rat (who appealed to adults mainly) without the Schofield-as-anchorman-between-children’s-shows innovation, for which I remain eternally grateful.
Though I was aware of the, “Cue-Gate,” ahem, “scandal,” which looked to me like it was simply more of a general misunderstanding of how television works, I was not aware of his brother’s issues (indeed, I still have no idea of the details) until the last few days. The same is true of the apparent strain in his professional relationship between him and Holly Willoughby.
When two popular presenters were meant to shoot footage of themselves passing the Queen’s coffin, which effectively meant that their producers, camera operators, sound engineers, etc, would also have had to cue with them, that would have been an unreasonable demand to make on their team, surely? If their job was to help the nation process a sad but inevitable event, that was a professional undertaking, of which they were one part, and I simply saw the whole misunderstanding as risible, rather than career shattering.
Obviously, I can understand how the public becomes attached to daytime TV presenters, feeling like they have shared so much history with them as they did their housework, or studies with these people in their background. They become a part of the set dressing on the stage of people’s personal history plays. But, I was never a fan of couch based daytime television and I have to admit to being somewhat bemused by all the attention this is getting? Will Rishi Sunack be answering questions in The House about this soon? It almost feels like this couple have become more than icons, but a literal cultural identity in themselves? And it is as though it’s as painful for some commentators as a divorce?
I hope to be understood that I am not asking these questions in an, “ironical,” tone, nor do I in the least bit wish to belittle a matter which is of great cultural importance to so many. But, I would like to understand it better? What is actually going on here? Why has he really quit? And why is the entire nation so fixed on this drama right now?
Schofield always struck me as a good and decent man, to whom British television owes a debt. It is becoming clear to me that he has faced some truly unpleasant domestic issues around his brother, and struggles with his work place. But, were they so insoluble? Are we going to lose Schofield forever? That would be a bad thing. Like the C of E, though I never paid him much mind, it was always reassuring to know he was there. His influence on the British public has always been one of kindness, sincerity, humour and depth of feeling: all qualities we would do well to foster in our society. So I just hope I am not missing something of greater importance, by not having followed his day to day dramas more closely?
I wish him well, from my less well informed position, and hope very much to see him return to television or the web in some other way.
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It is wise of you and appropriate that you reflect on the fact that other countries are having this discussion at this time, with political division being evident as other countries seek their own solutions. I would add that it is time that we stopped being so parochial in our thinking and started talking to other countries (especially European ones) about a uniformed approach. Not just on the legalities and technicalities of implementing the laws and addressing issues of human rights, but serious diplomatic attempts need to be made at uniting a, “spirit,” by which attitudes and approaches of governments take on what is certain to be a growing issue.
We know there will be further environmental change, probable disasters, and wars. And all governments are bracing themselves for the potential of massive influxes of asylum seekers for a range of reasons. It’s surely time that the west got its act together and started talking about, “International,” “Unified,” responses to the issue?
I would have thought that most, “genuine,” asylum seekers would jump at the chance to do some work and earn some money (and studies show they are almost all genuinely fleeing some form or other of oppression) which is eminently logical. It’s not just economic activity being generated but taxable incomes, which in turn contribute to the cost of dealing with asylum seekers in the first place.
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There will always be the moneyed class, and people with money who believe they are inherently superior than others. Such a society is not based on the amount of money you, “earn,” but that which you have, whether by inheritance, hard work, crime, corruption, or sheer luck. America has a very distinct class system, which is most keenly observed whenever you see criminals face the justice system. Poor people do jail time for none violent offences and have their labour exploited for a pittance, even for highly hazardous tasks, like fire fighting as we’ve recently witnessed, with no insurance cover for life changing injury or death. Rich people don’t do prison time, usually. Not unless there is public outrage at their offences and, even then, sentences will watered down by expensive lawyers. They pay fines that barely register in their bank accounts; indeed, are worth paying instead of upholding the law, as a kind of entitlement tax.
That is the class system of America, and increasingly of the rest of the developed, “free,” world.
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Well, OF COURSE there’s SOMETHING going on that just ain’t right. We just don’t know what . . . yet. My first thoughts, honestly, (though they do me little credit) were that Owen is either one of three things:
1) A former squeeze?
2) Another Russian Spook?
3) Someone with compromat on Johnson, possibly connected to either of the above speculations, or perhaps something else?
The idea that she might have been his, “love child,” hadn’t occurred to me at first, I’m sorry to say. I mean, who in Westminster (outside of the opposite benches) hasn’t had to contend with Johnson’s johnson?
The idea that holds the most water for me is that she has something on him and is working for Russia, either directly or indirectly. I just hope to GOD that someone investigates this case thoroughly and gets to the, “bottom,” of it!
I would caution that absence of evidence (at this point) is NOT evidence of absence. It may well transpire.
But anyway, I do appreciate the larfs. Your Kenneth Williams is so good it should be bottled and sold!
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I think people, including Prof Wilson here, are leaping to conclusions without seeing the potential for a bigger picture, let alone looking at it. Labour made a manifesto promise, to go after the traffickers. How do you go about that, if not by rounding up a whole bunch of people who use exploitative labour, isolating them simultaneously and squeezing them for their connections? You work your way up the chain. Why is anyone assuming this operation is, “one week,” long? And, does anyone seriously think that Yvette Cooper cooked up a plan, put on a flack jacket, rounded up her A Team and started kicking in doors? Or, do you think, perhaps, she asked the police to present proposals for getting to the traffickers, as promised, and signed off on THEIR plan, which THEY are executing in the hopes of doing some good with more than a one week shelf life?
Better this than using their victims as a political football? As to legislation, Parliament is not even in session, so shall we wait and SEE what they plan to do, before laying accusations of myopia on their doorstep?
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Please could you give me a reference to look this story up? Regrettably, I missed it completely. I would very much like to know what this head teacher is saying and how he explains his rebellion? It is a bold and brave thing to do, regardless of his reasoning, right or wrong.
Prima facia I stand with him. Though I too recognise the enormous importance of memorialising those among us who make the ultimate sacrifice for the rest of us, it seems fairly plain that even the over-propagandised Russians know that their cause is unjust, their methods brutal and their sacrifice too great for the sake of a tiny oligarchy’s ambitions, flinging all of the laws of diplomacy and war into the teeth of an outraged democratic world.
Usually, when one person bravely takes a stand like this, they are merely expressing what everyone about them is thinking and feeling. And, if I had to guess, I would bet real money that this educator is not unwilling to memorialise the fallen soldier, as he is to accept the propaganda that they propose to hedge about his plaque? He will argue that it is the war he is opposing, not the boy.
And that is a dilemma, which I am sure he must be feeling keenly. He may even feel that he is sacrificing his own future, liberty and possibly more, for the sake of that soldier as much as for his community. He does not have the luxury of distance that we do, knowing his actions must have an impact and that his time has come (presumably?) for this gesture. It will be easy for the Russian state to mobilise arguments similar to the one you expressed.
But, for me at least, it does not take a great leap of the imagination to picture a head teacher who once knew this boy, knew his values, his hopes and dreams, his anxieties and fears, and perhaps is in a position to know that the person who would be most offended by a memorial of this type would be that boy himself?
And that is just one of so many scenarios that leap to my overactive writer’s mind (“an imagination trained to misbehave,” as Stephen King once put it) that may fully justify this head teacher in a more personal, moral stance than we see on the face of it?
That is why I would very much like to know where this story came from, read it myself and maybe use the search terms to find other journalistic takes on the situation? Such matters are close to my heart too.
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You touched on, and then passed by, the biggest problem in your opening remarks. Setting aside the attacks and the attacker just to comment on that: The rumours and disinformation. As you said, they will be all over the press by morning. There was a time when the leading press outlets would refer to the fact that there are rumours out there and pointedly state that they would not repeat what any of them say, as you indeed did. You display a high standard that we used to be able to expect from the BBC and other leading outlets. Now, we know that these rumours will occupy more column inches than the actual story.
You asked the right question, “Do we have a right,” to hear all the bollox that will be spread by the cruel, the craven, the insane and the viscous. My answer is yes we do, but we also should expect responsible news outlets ignore them all. We don’t want to hear about them from such sources.
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I do think there is something wrong with a culture that takes the, “official complaint,” as the first line of response to a problem rather than simply speaking to the person responsible. The man in question gave an eminently reasonable response and I think people should have their complaints summarily dismissed unless they can evidence their own attempts to approach the person in question to seek a remedy. We need to foster a culture of cooperation and community. And to foster a society that judges the official complaint as a form of failure in itself. Unless you are elderly and infirm, or in some other way disabled and have no one to act on your behalf, why do we feel we have the right to use up the precious resource of official time?
Of course the ice cream van is an import, as is the Christmas Tree, Halloween celebrations and countless other little joys that I recall as a part of the landscape of my childhood. So what? Why should that have any bearing? Should we ban American Halloween? German Christmas Trees? Or should we remember that little ray of sunshine that sparkled in our own childhoods when we heard the chimes of the ice cream van coming?
From your description, the ice cream vendor seems a harmless, polite man, plying his trade as best he can and keen to reach a resolution without bothering any, “officials.” We all know our rights, don’t we? How many of us know our responsibilities as well, and in such detail, as those rights?
I don’t doubt he did let his chimes play on too long, and would apologise and stop doing it, if he’d merely been asked. But no. Mr, or Ms, Angry had to reach for the phone or their keyboard and waste the time and resources of, “officialdom,” just to make a point. Presumably because peeing on all four corners of the street to mark out their territory has gone out of style? Phooey, to Mr or Ms Angry. The guy’s just trying to make a living. Who doesn’t love an ice cream van? Other than certain members of the Scottish Mafia, but that’s another tale altogether.
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Never has the expression, “You can’t polish a turd,” been more apt. Delusion and gaslighting just can’t cut it, even amongst the most, “loyal,” Tories. Braverman is gleeful, making her best play for leadership, which relies on the destruction of the current iteration of the Tories, so she’s as toxic as ever, but at least the people who created her are being forced to taste some of their own bitter brew.
For Sunack, who will leave for America after the election; who has nothing to lose in terms of real power (being a money man on Wall Street gives him more power than leading a political party, and he knows it) he only has his ego to protect now. And we should not underestimate the power of that. He sees the spectre of the worst Tory defeat since the war, possibly ever. And that makes him dangerous.
The American political wonks, who have their hooks deeply into our Tufton (sorry if I misspelled Tufton?) Street Tories, make public speeches in their country about the, “dangers of education,” and the Tories have actively taken up that message. They know it is only the uneducated who can be persuaded to vote against their own interests. Soon, teachers will be like doctors, only contactable by phone and social media, if we continue down this road.
Much as I admire your call for Sunack’s Dickensian, Damascene conversion toward even the obvious, let alone a legacy of doing SOME good before he leaves, I fear the reality will be far more like the Black Adder version of A Christmas Carol, in which he will lose all of his last inclinations toward kindness and reason and simply try to leave as insoluble a mess as possible. The reasoning being that he will hope that no incoming government will be able to fix our problems, which will provide him with legacy excuses.
If, “reason,” or rationality had ever been a factor in this government, we would not be where we are now. Instead of practical, rational, good faith policy making we’ve seen nothing but opposition baiting, emotive and emotional cruelty and victimising of the most helpless members of society. We’ve seen public services quite callously exploited, looted and eviscerated, from our water supply to health, policing and education. And now Sunack proposes doing away with National Insurance!?
It’s like he’s TRYING to alienate the last bastion of solid support he might have expected to count on! The elderly! Is he going to raise retirement to 75? It looks that way. Not that he’ll ever get the chance. But the Tories have emptied the public purse and are desperately scrambling to find ANY source of income that does NOT involve taking money from the very richest people in society or offending the client press’s sensibilities.
I don’t envy the next Labour government. I just hope that they would have the character and good sense to form a coalition, regardless of their numbers, so that we really can, “work together as a nation,” as you said, and put a PR system in place, whilst we solve the nation’s problems collectively. And I pray that includes some accountability for those callous criminal goons who ran the postal service’s scamming machines and ruined honest people’s lives.
Sorry for going on. That was not my intention. You really do get me thinking hard. People like you give me hope that not all is lost. Thank you, if you read all of this. And thank you anyway. Your service, this channel, is a jewel in YouTube’s crown.
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As to your broader commentary on the Afghan war, I find myself in agreement with almost all of what you said. Though I think it is important to note two things. Firstly, with regard to making the people who planned 911 regret taking part in that act of terrorism, and deterring nations and terror groups from contemplating further such acts, the invasion of Afghanistan was a 100% success. Ask any Afghani Taliban older than 30 if they think another atrocity along those lines would be worth carrying out? They would run a mile and, if they really thought you were seriously capable of doing it, they would probably eliminate you.
The second point is that Nation Building was the cardinal error of that campaign. That works in secular, developed countries, which is why it worked so well in Germany and Japan after WWII. But such a model had already been shown as impossible to implement in Iraq and the intractable issues surrounding the Middle East conflicts were also lessons ignored.
They never actually, “made progress,” of any kind. The allies tricked themselves into believing that, in the same way they tricked themselves into believing that Putin was a man we could do business with. The fact was that it was always going to be washed away unless the west committed to staying there permanently, which was something that was never on the cards.
Yet, once again, despite the fact that neither side comes out of that with anything but shame and disgrace, at least Biden’s administration is only guilty of misreading the situation and botching it. Trump’s is guilty of that too, but we must also add to that his wilful betrayal of America, releasing over a thousand KNOWN terrorists in one fell swoop, and inviting their bloody leaders to Camp David. An almost sacrilegious smearing of a national place of honour with his attempts at wheeler dealing with terrorist murderers. And all to no avail.
Unless you count the chaos to which trump deliberately added, which he saw as a win, because it, “looked bad,” for Biden? The cost in human lives never entered his thinking.
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As I’ve said before, allowing the ONLY man who has a vested interest in prolonging the conflict to remain in charge of that conflict and that country, was Israel’s fundamental mistake. They responded to terrorism with passion and outrage, setting aside the obvious consequences of an election cycle that would be underway by now, had all things remained equal.
For all concerned, Hamas’s desperate actions have harmed everyone’s interests including their own. Whether you’re Israeli or Palestinian, whether you’re elsewhere in the world, as Jewish citizens of America and other countries are finding, this latest iteration of the conflict has destabilised world affairs and hurt the interests of any who support freedoms and democracy, in innumerable ways, some not yet manifest, but sure to be.
And the only person to have benefitted from this is Benjamin Netanyahu. Collectively, we can say that Russia and Iran are direct, if minor, beneficiaries, as is China. But Netanyahu is the only individual for whom this state of affairs has been a GIFT!
Especially in the light of the legal ruling that has stymied his attempts to exempt himself from legal responsibilities for potentially criminal activities. He will have to answer those charges now. And he remains free for only so long as his country remains in this state of war. What do people EXPECT him to do? He is a sociopath.
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Corrections: David Tenant did NOT say that Badenoch, “should be silenced,” or anything even close to that. “I just wish she’d shut up,” is a personal desire, not a statement of intent, or a suggested mandate. That misinterpretation; misrepresentation matters! There is a gulf between what he said (and meant) and the words you are putting into his mouth. And how many people will take you at your (otherwise wholly reliable) word, without ever checking the clip for themselves?
And that, “medieval theology,” about true freedom that you referenced is actually Ancient Greek philosophy, repurposed by medieval thinkers and clerics, as so much of their work was.
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Agreed. At no point did Boris ever tell us, “Here is what you think.” But, wasn’t that what the whole, “Stop The Boats,” rubbish was about in the first place? I still, to this day, cannot find a single person who even asked for that policy or who sees it as important. Plenty who express horror and alarm at it, even among conservative voting friends. And when I ask them, they agree that it seemed to drop out of a clear blue sky!
Ipsos MORI polls consistently show that migration and asylum seekers are among the LOWEST priorities among voters! And the numbers don’t lie either. We take far fewer immigrants of any kind in the UK than all of our European counterparts!
It strikes me that Sunak and his other two brown skinned brown shirts (Priti Patel and Suella B) have been attempting social engineering with this notion since the start? Telling us we, “care,” about this, so as to sweep up the far right and the low level bigots along with the nose-holding conservatives faithful, all under one big tent? They have seen the Americanisation of politics as a future in which they will prosper. That’s my theory.
Stoking deliberate fear, division and anger (which always draws more attention on the internet than anything positive: there are comprehensive studies to show this, and platforms like Twitter have been exploiting the fact for over a decade now) are the way to command the greatest number of eyes on screens, ears to listen and, (who knows?) votes at the polling booths? It’s a cynical strategy, metastasised from within a morally bankrupt corporation, masquerading as a political party, calling itself, “The Conservatives.” An oxymoron if ever there was one.
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Navalny’s remains will be cremated before any independent scientific eyes are allowed to see it. Those people asking, “why,” you think Navalny was murdered are obviously either ignorant of world affairs or just sinister shills, asking in bad faith. There is no middle ground there.
As ever, Putin will be content with various opposing stories to come out. That’s how his system works. The truth is irrelevant. Only that there are many versions of it, which people will argue over until Russians shrug and say, “What’s the point? We’ll never know.”
The more relevant question is, “Why now?” And I suspect that is to do with the fact that Russia is holding their, “elections,” next month. The message to any potential pro-democracy candidates, anyone gathering up their courage, is clear: “This is what happens to my opponents.”
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Wait a minute? This, “week long crack down,” as you describe it, is actually the first step in getting to the people smugglers! It leads to getting the bastards who exploit these desperate people in the first place! There is FAR MORE than just display going on here. Just think about it? How DO you get the smugglers?
Labour did promise that they would go after the traffickers instead of all of this bullying of the migrants themselves, as the Tories prefer! The Home Office will have signed off on this operation, but it will have been the police who proposed them, not Yvette Cooper.
All of these business GOT their, “staff,” from somewhere, right? And if you round up a whole bunch of these receivers and exploiters in one go, so they cannot talk to each other, you work on them to get to their sources! You find out who their contacts are, and work your way up the chain! That’s precisely what they SHOULD be doing!
And is this Yvette Cooper, or a received response? Is this not the actions of the police? Somehow, I don’t picture Ms Cooper donning a flack jacket and kicking down doors? She merely signed off on a police action, presumably proposed BY the police, didn’t she?
Yes, we need changes in policy. But Parliament is not even in session, so GIVE THEM A CHANCE, for crying out loud!? I support the idea of better policy AND going after the evil traffickers AS PROMISED in Labour’s manifesto!
You seem to have made too many assumptions here that you cannot possibly be in a position to know? A habit formed from seeing our last government always doing as little as possible while shouting as much as possible, no doubt. But, I suspect this operation is intended to shake more intelligence out of the trees and get to those sods who need catching. And I say, wait and see BEFORE judging! They’ve barely had time to get their suspects into the station and you’re dismissing the whole thing as flannel? Why?
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Ah but, there’s you, speaking logically about the NHS and policing and poverty, applying common sense and problem solving suggestions. Where’s the profit margin in that? How do they get to hand out contracts for private security firms and private healthcare providers, transport companies, water companies and postal companies in order to get those generous campaign donations and assurances of, “consulting,” jobs once they’re all unceremoniously kicked out of Westminster, unless they deliberately sabotage the very infrastructure the country depends upon and create the vacuums in services that desperately need filling, to the point where even a left winger would accept privatisation over no post, no healthcare, no clean water, no law enforcement, no FOOD?
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If having languages were a basis for one country’s invasion of another, we all would have been more reluctant to attend our French or German lessons in school! Being able to speak a language doesn’t make that your first language, let alone your identity.
The irony about your Kremlin mouthpiece commenter, there, is that the very word, “Duma,” is an Old English word, meaning, “deliberation.” It comes to Russia via Germanic languages, wherein it meant, “thought.”
Therefore, let us use the Duma’s argument, shall we? We will henceforth consider the Duma German sovereignty, or British. And, to any Russian who complains, we can simply explain that we are merely living up to Russian, “ideology,” and acting upon their instigation.
Perhaps it is time the west invaded Russia anyway and put an end to all this Tsarist, 19th Century style imperialism, which threatens the world’s stability and be done with it? Putin is so fond of what he calls, “history,” and the rest of the world calls laughable, “revisionism,” that I feel sure he will understand that Russia has certainly provided us with the necessary pretext.
“Just playing it by your rules, Vlad,” we can say as the British Tiger tanks trundle through Red Square.
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Well, at least you have shone a light on much of the drama for me. I have been wondering why this apparent perfect storm of events in the life of one TV presenter has held the attention of the nation so much? I haven’t followed Schofield’s career since I was a child, and all of my memories of him and Gordon the Gopher are fond ones. That model of being the anchorman between children’s television shows was a stroke of genius that was copied around the world and recreated for adult audiences with creations like Roland Rat, for good or ill, you decide.
But, despite only ever seeing him when he cropped up on a YouTube video that their algorithm pointed me at, I have never seen any of his shows. I knew, obviously, that he and Holly Willoughby were television Royalty, and that the whole, “cue-gate,” scandal was a risible misunderstanding by the general public about how television works.
But all of these other issues, of which I’ve been vaguely aware in the last couple of weeks, just seem to have, “Private matters ripe for misrepresentation, incorrect assumption and darkly obtuse gutter press coverage,” written all over them.
As far as I still know, Philip Schofield has contributed hugely to the tone and culture of our country since his early years in television, which owes him a debt in that regard. He has always struck me as a kind, thoughtful, humorous, sincere man and a good influence on the public therefore. Until I am disabused of that notion, with concrete evidence, I will continue on in my belief, hoping he will return to the public in some other forum of equal popularity. Even though I’ve personally seen very little of him, I am smart enough to know that our culture is better off with people like him influencing it. So, I just hope we haven’t lost him, and that the scurrilous rumours about him are nothing more than that, gutter press rumouring.
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I no longer think of him as a, “Boris.” He’s a, “Johnson,” to me now. “Boris,” is almost affectionate and certainly familiar. Whatever face we think we see of him, Boris is an unknowable cypher, like any crook who turns out to be as concomitantly dangerous as was once powerful. He clearly wields a great deal of power still.
To hear people even countenance the view, “It would set a dangerous precedent,” to fully punish a politician for his degenerate disregard for the rules, and his subsequent lies and downplaying of his responsibility in that, appalls me almost as much as the parties themselves. It angers me in the way that it did when I saw that press secretary literally laughing out loud, when I had not been allowed anywhere near my father, who died of Covid which he caught in the hospital. It reignites the flame of revolutionary rage in my heart.
There are just too many things I want to say to that, but I’ll leave it at this: The most dangerous precedent was already set, when Johnson CRIMINALLY disregarded the law and partied while people DIED, as though he and his staff had nothing better to do.
Thank you for these videos. They’re a soothing balm to me. Just hearing people who, “get it,” speaking out, helps enormously. 👍
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“Mad,” Hancock and Jeremy (frequently mispronounced but well earned last name) Hunt, have gotten away Scott free with deliberate (DELIBERATE!) harm to the NHS and it wasn’t only the post Brexit migration of staff that caused its ruination. When will people FINALLY UNDERSTAND?! The decay of the NHS is NOT a bug! It’s a FEATURE!
They intend to run it into such a hopeless, and prohibitively expensive to repair, state that they can openly privatise the entire thing, whilst getting nothing but a gasp of relief from the continually waterboarded public who will be offered tax cuts in return for giving up on the whole project! That’s the PLAN!
And the stealth privatisation model (whilst working so well for some, far richer now, friends and family of the Tory MP’s responsible) has not moved swiftly enough for them! The complacent, arrogant Tories just didn’t expect that they would find themselves about to be punted out of office before the completion of their diabolical plan.
This will be our LAST opportunity to save the NHS (one of the last defining features of Britain still standing, of which we can claim some collective national pride!) and put in legal safeguards to protect it, enshrined in law, and actually criminalising any further attempts at insider dealing, stealth privatisation and deliberate sabotage! The new government will be our last, best hope. If they don’t act in the new Parliament, then it’s all over.
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I would take issue with one of your points there. This is far from the first time that Putin has showed his hand in this manner. I’m not speaking of Prigozhin either, as he was a, “legitimate target,” in the minds of Russians on both sides of the pro or anti democratic fence.
But, Putin has been murdering people rather routinely, at home and abroad. He murdered a popular, well known journalist in front of the Kremlin. Had her shot in the back of the head to make his point. To put that in terms we can really identify with, imagine it’s the following week after the infamous Prince Andrew interview over the Epstein affair. In front of Buckingham Palace the body of Emily Maitliss is found with a single gunshot wound to the back of her head. By the following day, the press reveals that all clues as to the identity of the killer lead back to MI5. Then . . . radio silence. No more press coverage. No closure. Nothing.
Imagine the impact that would have on the British people? With rumours swirling about other journalists who attempted to cover the story who got fired. Krishnan Guru-Murthy is, “let go,” from Channel 4 with no reason given to the public, but internet chatter suggesting he was upset about the death of Maitliss and wanted to do a follow up story. He is never available for comment and has closed his Twitter account.
That paranoia and unease that everyone would be going through is just the start of the deliberate fear and loathing that Putin wants his people to feel. Yet the list of his most famous and infamous victims, at home and abroad, is now larger than Stalin’s.
I think you could be right that this straw could break the camel’s back. After all, we none of us predicted the fall of communism in Russia. Nor did the world, by all accounts, foresee the fall of the Tzars. So, I would never count out a groundswell of anger to grow into something bigger.
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She is positioning herself for leadership after Sunak, and this issue is the hobby horse that she made for herself. And, as she will see it, migration is the issue that Reform are riding on and the main place where she will find future allies, if she gets to reshape the new, “conservative,” party. She can be the only, “conservative,” talking about the issue and stealing Farage’s oxygen.
The recent changes in migration laws were a blatant attempt to skirt international laws and protections for the most vulnerable people on Earth. They were cruel, sociopathic and they remain borderline illegal. Also, as we’ve seen, they are unworkable. But that hasn’t mattered much to the Braverman types, because they did give them what they sought, which was merely to look, “hard,” and to be unnecessarily cruel, probably killing people in the process, certainly causing a great deal of physical harm and suffering to desperate people who were entitled to care, sympathy and, if nothing else, the process of law.
I cannot see the old guard of the conservative movement following her over that cliff post election. Nor can I imagine any of the truly conservative, “conservatives,” wishing to join her in a headlong charge toward a system that cannot result in anything less than her own doom. After all, she is visibly the type of ethnic minority that Reform voters fear and loath so much. So she is building her own gallows in the long term, for the short term advantage she believes she can wangle now.
My guess is that the Conservative Party will fracture, outright, down this racist fault line, leaving the one nation, cooler headed, old fashioned conservatives to rely on their friends in the city and the press, their trust funds and the Royal Family to rebuild from a much diminished foundation.
But the new brand of Reform will also have friends in the press and money and backing from America, which is, after all, where they get all their, “ideology,” and their divisive tactics from.
Of course, there can be only one leader, and it is entirely possible that Farage and Braverman may pass each other, like ships in the night, to take charge of one another’s respective parties? But, I suspect it is more realistic that Braverman will find herself on the outside, ultimately. Either losing the whip and being rejected by reform, or being demoted by Farage from within the Tory party because he doesn’t want his own most likely successor hovering over him like the Angel of Death.
She won’t be enough of a puppet for the Reform party to control, being too, “driven,” by her own demons, so that would end badly for her, since the Reformers would only want her as a, “useful idiot,” and mascot that argues against them being racists, despite them now having erstwhile BNP candidates officially standing in their ranks right now.
All I am sure of is that the battle for both supremacy of the right, and to define what, “the right,” is, will be bloody and take no prisoners. And whilst we see many getting their well earned just desserts, it will be at the cost of other well known crooks, deadbeats and racists, climbing up on the ruins of their rival’s careers.
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1) Inflation is controlled (if, “controlled,” at all?) by The Bank Of England.
2) Inflation going down does NOT result in a reduction in prices; especially for daily essentials like food, fuel, electricity and heating.
I am heartily sick of this gaslighting of the people by our, “government.” I genuinely believe such deliberately misleading, egregious lies should be criminalised.
As to Labour using the prospect of a May election against Rishi Sunak, SO THEY SHOULD. After all, he DID put up the prospect, therefore having no one else to blame for that. And, if Labour can build up a sufficient wave of expectation in the minds of the public, perhaps Sunak will see the truth of his situation? That further disappointing the electorate with further delay may well buy the Tories six more months, but that will be six more months of British economic decline, the official declaration of Britain’s Recession and an angry public, chomping at the bit, just waiting for their opportunity to punish Sunak’s Tories for that additional delay!
Maybe (just maybe?) Sunak will have enough sense to recognise that he should quit while he’s behind, rather than set un unbeatable record for the biggest Tory defeat in democratic history? All he can do now is preside over a civil war within his own party and see their popularity further decline. Nothing will change that now. Memories are short. But they’re not THAT short.
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I too believe in taking each situation on its own merits (or demerits) and assessing them accordingly. One must be willing to admit mistakes and change one’s point of view. I have never doubted your integrity, sincerity or open mindedness in this regard.
You touch on something that has occupied my mind a lot lately. When I hear people dismissing others with an overused epithet like, “woke,” they immediately lose something in my heart and mind. There’s a negative internal recoiling within me. And it is at that, “tribalism,” I think. It is so depressing that people use these terms instead of doing the heavy lifting intellectually, for the sake of convenience and so as to, “identify,” themselves with their tribe.
As with all of these American imports, the, “culture wars,” are a deliberate attempt to dumb down discourse, tribalise all talking points and to remove responsible intelligent engagement with ideas or situations that make people uncomfortable. And because it’s easy, it’s appealing.
I nearly always find that people who use, “woke,” as a pejorative cannot define the term at all, or will often describe it as something it is objectively not.
What it actually is (as I can best describe it) can be articulated as a disparaging term of suspicion and categorisation of the, “other,” as someone who uses, “virtue signalling,” (another ridiculous term) and the appearance of seeking equality and diversity falsely, as a stick with which to beat down others in matters of art, politics and culture. It was invented (or rather, re-invented) by far right wing Americans of the Steve Bannon / Roger Stone ilk, seeking to deepen divisions in society and to raise their own boats on a tide of bile.
Anything that provides the user with a catch-all term that excuses intellectual interrogation of the facts or issues in hand is useful to the types of people who make a living from the, “outrage,” and unhappiness of others.
One of the many things I most admire about you, sir, is that you do not subscribe (so far as I can tell) to any one prescription or mode of thought, be that philosophically, politically or intellectually. You seem, rather, to encourage interrogation of the facts, analysis and consideration. You are also capable of changing your views and accounting for them. That is part of your charm as far as I’m concerned.
Perhaps the real problem is that a fully rational, open minded person, will never be able to please all the people all the time? Perhaps they should never seek to? Heck! My wife and I disagree about lots of political matters, so I would be hard pressed to conform to any one group’s best groupthink, even if I tried. But we respect one another and do not see our disagreements as a reason to lose any of that respect.
Perhaps that is the test of character we should be most concerned about? When the pejoratives and ad hominems start flying, that is usually just someone’s attempt to brow beat another person (or persons) into conforming to their tribe’s groupthink. A form of emotional blackmail. And that is another reason why I find it hard to respect people who use terms in such a manner.
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Let us remember that Lee Anderson is guilty of, “pranking,” the public in a far more egregious manner. He was caught red handed, FALSIFYING a so called, “spontaneous,” meeting with a member of the, “general public,” whilst on campaign. He didn’t realise the mic was still on him and working, whilst he was setting it up on his phone.
So, for Lee Anderson, OF ALL PEOPLE, to get all thin skinned about it and to demand an apology from LBC for the behaviour of, “the public,” is beyond absurd! It’s downright hypocritical! How about HE apologises to all of us his own falsifications?
Rachel Johnson responded in a perfectly appropriate manner, ending the call swiftly, yet ever so politely and with expressions of appropriate concern, stating instantly that the issue was one of a, “private and personal,” nature. What more could she have done on a LIVE radio show?
To be honest, I didn’t get the impression that the caller was necessarily ill in any way (though he could have been?) but merely camping it up for a laugh. His performance had something of Monty Python about it to me. If he was being sincere, he is obviously in need of mental health care (fat chance of that in the current NHS) but I honestly felt he was performing for comic effect.
And yes, he was entirely, “credible.” And Anderson’s loud complaints only serve to add further credibility. If he’d made a simple statement for the press and let it go at that, we wouldn’t even be discussing it now. The fact that it seems to have struck a nerve is what intrigues me now.
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Just imagine if the police were investigating a fraud and the suspects started saying, “Well, we’ll sift through all the evidence and hand over what is relevant, but you don’t need to decide that for yourself, or actually, ‘investigate,’ anything.” . . . 😮? . . . Any onlooker would be astounded at the sheer gall of this person! Especially when that suspect turns to the onlooker and says, “That will be half a million quid, please? Oh, didn’t I tell you? Yes, you’re paying for my lawyers. I didn’t like the state appointed ones; not bent enough. No, you don’t get any say in the matter. You were just unlucky enough to have been born into the same country as me. Not sure why you’re suddenly so indignant, since I’ve been raiding the tax payer’s pockets for years now?” . . . 😮🤦♂️
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This was a criminal conspiracy which resulted in the ruination of countless lives and family members. Deaths, false imprisonments, reputations and careers destroyed. The police should be charging a whole raft of people with perjury, fraud, perverting the course of justice, falsifying official records, reckless endangerment, criminal intimidation and many other offences.
And, most of all, each victim should be receiving full exonerations from the High Court and SEPARATE compensation and ALSO damages. The issue of punitive damages should be referred to the state as yet a third matter for the courts. And, being the, “biggest,” miscarriage of justice in British history (arguably among the worst too) it is incumbent upon the highest courts in the land to fully air this dirty laundry.
It would make heroes of those with the courage to see to it. And then we would all know who Kemi Badenoch really is.
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This is rapidly becoming the Farage Show, which is exasperating to me. But, in fairness, these are issues that do merit discussion and would naturally make your YouTube followers naturally interested . . . I mean the followers who aren’t playing the client media’s Farage game.
As to Farage’s response to the outing of his racist party members, come on, Prof Wilson? P-lease? . . . It’s the standard far right play book. Make a virtue out of every hint of dodginess, calling it, “speaking for the man in the street,” or making a, “joke,” out of it. And when it gets too blatant to handle, call it a, “CONSPIRACY,” and blame someone else! Usually the very people who exposed you or whom do you the most harm in that set of circumstances.
Surely you don’t give Farage ANY credence, do you?
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Kier Starmer has a flat and uninspiring delivery but he may well grow into his job. But at least he won’t be clowning like Johnson, Robotic and disconnected like Sunak, or plain loopy like Truss. Boring, honest and consistent will do me just fine thanks.
Many private schools are bastions for the privileged and should pay their fair share. I think you’re clutching at straws when you harken to this ECHR idea, since you could use the same argument (and legal mechanisms) to point out that all other industries and businesses have to pay their fair share of taxes and there is no lawful reason to exempt private education, making them, “special,” in some way. Remember, child care homes, elderly residences, care centres, hostels and accommodation for the disabled ALL have private sector investors, making profits out of public need and paying their taxes for them. What makes private education so special? The only thing the public can see is that it’s the Tory MP’s kids who all attend these schools. That doesn’t seem fair?
But, here’s the kicker. The latest MRP poll to study this issue in recent weeks (as discussed on the YouTube channel, A Different Bias) shows us that, despite any personal and anecdotal evidence you may have to the contrary, the one demographic that has little to no objection to private education paying VAT is the parents of privately educated children.
They, like the majority of the country, do NOT object to paying taxes nearly so much as they object to the breakdown of the services that those taxes are supposed to pay for!
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I haven’t read the article and now feel compelled to ask, would I get anything out of reading it now, since you have already imparted the salient facts? I’d rather not read anything from that rag if I don’t have to, but if you feel it’s one of those topics that needs more attention in order to form an informed opinion, I will.
I think certainly you’re right, as it’s precisely the type of exploit that so strained his relationships with his tutors at Eton.
Consider the themes of that article? MONEY. It’s always the topic of money that is used to ding that antisemitic bell, isn’t it? And to use that term you described (one I didn’t know of before now) in a complaint related to finances is obviously meant to trigger antisemitic images in the mind of the reader. His calculation will have been that he would get away with it because it’s a largely unknown term and its full meaning will pass many by, despite having a sufficiently Semitic chime to it to strike a chord in the imaginations of readers, yet only chiming fully with the crowd that he intends to raise a nod and a wink from.
He also will have considered that he could dismiss any complaints from within the Labour Party by suggesting that their track record on antisemitism is not so great. If I were thinking in truly Machiavellian terms, I might even suggest that this could be just the first in a series of attacks to come? Johnson’s way of, “sending up a balloon,”to see if he can refocus the public discourse onto Labour’s weak spots? But, perhaps that’s a little deep, even for him?
Johnson is a lot of things, but the bumbling buffoon persona is all part of the act, convenient for defending himself at times like these. He’s a good writer and he knows exactly what he’s doing as a skilled manipulator of the reader’s imagination (once again taking notes from his idol, Winston Churchill) especially in prose, when he’s had time to martial his thoughts and edit himself.
A Times editor would probably have questioned his use of that term, perhaps even spiked it, but a Daily Mail editor is more likely be one of the nodding winkers that Johnson is attempting to appeal to.
I hope someone with a little pull over there lodges a formal complaint. I certainly think someone should.
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Correction: I double checked this, but Newman did NOT ask Oakshot, “how much,” she got paid. She merely mentioned that she had, “accepted a lot of money,” from Hancock, and seemed to be coming to the question; At what point did you decide to betray his trust? I think Oakshot sensed this difficult question was coming, and the potential for the timeline to show that she already knew Hancock’s darkest secrets and merely plotted to get more out of him until she felt she could get no more, rather than instantly responding in shock to terrible revelations which she felt the public should know? Her response was to very slyly throw up this red herring of getting indignant about a question she had not been asked and to fixate on it, thus (in her own distorted imagination) providing a context for which she could indignantly end the interview. It was a very Rees Mogg type of response in fact, attempting to draw the focus onto a none existent question.
Yes, Newman’s handling was somewhat inept, as I kept expecting her to simply say, “I didn’t ask you how much you were paid and I don’t care. The point is, you took a lot of money to do a job and then decided to betray your client’s trust; something for which you have a history,” or something along those lines. But the whole thing degenerated into a rather unedifying display in the end, which did nothing for either party’s reputation.
However, Newman was right to remind Oakshot that she was as much, “the story,” as Hancock. I think that prospect alarmed her more than anything? The idea that people will be constantly bringing up her history of betrayal and unsubstantiated rumour-mongering, rather than her getting to be the pundit who casts judgement upon the souls of others, probably reminds her that she will one day be sharing a waiting room in Hell with Matt Hancock.
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Who was it who said, “Politics is about the art of the possible”? In that sense, people vote with a sense of optimism, of possibility, dare I say, “hope,” even? We can forgive lying in politics, but it’s very much about what you lie about, when and how? We interpret political misdirection in certain ways, internalise it and quite often colour the result with our own filters, making some politicians able to get away with more, just because we like them.
Johnson was one such case in point, until he did real, palpable harm to the public. People are still grieving over Covid, Grenfell Tower and various other scandalously mishandled injustices, and they’re taking those grievances to the polling booths in three weeks.
What happened at the end there? Very abrupt and mid-sentence? Did your battery run flat?
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The irony is that their coverups draw more attention and cause them to be even less popular than the actual things they’re covering up! I mean, who the hell will be even remotely, “surprised,” that all of these WhatsApp messages contain nothing more than a gag reel of sick jokes at the bereaved’s expense, confessions of knowingly doing harm, insider dealing for their friends and family’s brand new, “companies,” meant to provide the protection equipment for hospitals, and MP’s handing off all of their own responsibilities to civil servants!?
My dad, having had a series of mini strokes, was like that protagonist in the Christopher Nolan film Memento, where he couldn’t make new memories and he kept asking for his wife, my mum, whom we’d buried the year before. He had it explained to him over and over again that his four children were not allowed to be with him, and why, but forget again within minutes. So, in his world, he died of Covid, alone, and heart broken, unable to comprehend why he was alone.
After going through a series of loopholes, so I could get permission to attend his funeral, travelling from Scotland to England, I returned home, weary and emotionally exhausted, so I only have myself to blame for putting on a current affairs program. But the first image I saw when I got back, now SEARED into the scar tissue of my neuro-divergent brain, was some Tory press wonk, standing before the agog press and a live camera, ACTUALLY LAUGHING OUT LOUD at the drunken antics of Cabinet members and Number 10 staff at a series of parties for Boris Johnson’s birthday!
I can never relate that vertigo inducing sensation you get when you have been forced against your better judgement to place your trust in the government at a time of genuine, worldwide crisis, only to see that they drunk at the wheel! And LAUGHING IN YOUR FACE! I know there are many out there who went through something similar, some of them with worse mental health issues than me to begin with. And I will NEVER forgive or forget that utterly self-entitled, reckless, arrogant, cruel indifference to the fates of so many trusting fools like me.
So now, when I hear that they want to cover up what we all KNOW we will find - cruelty, selfishness, indifference, arrogance, theft under the guise of business as usual and flat out incompetence - I once again feel that revolutionary RAGE boiling in my blood. It will be good for the country when the Tories are sent into the wilderness and not allowed to re-enter the corridors of power until they’ve culled their far right deliberate antagonists of the people and self enriching Masonic lodge Liberal Economics clubs they call, “think tanks,” altogether. But in the mean time, we have one HELL of a mess to clean up and a MOUNTAIN of hard cash to reappropriate for the people who earned it.
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So, I went off to look at the inaugural The Culture Report video, letting Mr Robertson know that it was on the strength of your recommendation that I was there and I must say, I was transfixed. This is not something that MSM seems to be discussing in any detail at all, yet the noises of dissent seem particularly numerous and loud in Russia right now, if TCR is to be believed?
The question for me is more to do with how much his video speaks of hope over judgement? Or whether this guy really has his finger on the pulse and is sensing the real, growing rumblings of change in Russia?
I certainly hope he is right, but only time will tell. He shows clips and clearly uses sources correctly. But, as to how, “controlled,” all of this stuff is remains another question. If Putin is flushing out dissenters, by using agents to speak out, so as to encourage others, in a, “glasnost,” like sham, just to identify these people for a new, “hit list,” it wouldn’t be the first time.
I’ll give this guy a chance and follow his channel for now, to see where this leads, if anywhere.
But, I do disagree about Putin being dead (you offer no sources or links to follow up on that assertion that I know of) and I do believe that if he were to be bumped off or, like Nikita Khrushchev after the Cuban Missile Crisis, forced into, “early retirement,” that would present Russia with a face saving opportunity to withdraw troops from Ukraine (either partially or entirely) and seek a, “reset,” with with west in return for sanctions relief. Do you not see that as a possibility?
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It’s a worrying statistic if you’re a monarchist, I suppose. And if that survey company is a reliable one, which I can’t guess at. I have always been a republican (with a small, “r”) despite having huge admiration for Queen Elizabeth II’s character and personality. Though I hear the arguments in support of the institution with a sympathetic ear, largely because I respect our nation’s history and ideas about continuity. And because I do see the royals as having a hugely beneficial role to play in diplomacy and what they call, “the feel good factor,” of the nation. I site those examples above tourism, though the coin tourism generates is not to be sniffed at.
I do not doubt for a moment that Elizabeth would, “put him away,” now, regardless of her alleged request of Charles that he, “look after,” Edward on her deathbed. A request that could be read in any number of ways.
The royal family has the resources to offer Edward a reasonable income and a comfortable retirement in a foreign land and to keep the whole thing within the family, without touching the public purse. And, as you indicated yourself, we have precedent for this in the Wallace Simpson case.
A monarch’s first loyalty must be to his country, or s/he renders the institution obsolete. The moment that family becomes a liability to the public good, the clamour of republicanism will grow all the louder and carry more weight. And, to stand by Edward at this point, is to signal the world that moral degeneracy is acceptable to the royals and stands up there as a symbol of who we are as Britains, which is after all, what their role is. They represent what Britain is as the, “model,” family. This was why Edward VIII’s position was considered untenable, because the institution can never be seen to place personal loyalties above the public good.
Even Edward VII, who’s proclivities were infamous in his own lifetime, never stooped to the exploitation of underage girls! The fact that Edward’s track record is also tainted with scandal speaks to character flaws that have run unchecked for too long. At least the succession is secure and he no longer stands to inherit the throne if something unforeseen happens to Charles. Cold comfort to his victims.
Cold comfort for people like me, who have witnessed the fierce, manipulative and deceitful face of child sexual abuse first hand. Whatever happens, Charles is the soul responsible party now. It’s his job.
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I disagree fundamentally with your opening point. The goals of the expedition were to hunt down Osama Bin Laden, carry out punitive attacks on the main body of the enemy and allies of the perpetrators of 911. This included the identification of the Taliban and their allies, and inducting local allies to assist in those aims. And it was to be carried out by a coalition of UN countries, either directly or through practical support, funding, logistical input and so on. That expedition met all of its stated aims and can be called a complete success.
The delusion was, “National Building,” and the wrong headed notion that a new, democratic, western style government could installed in place of the enemy, which could last independently without permanent western support.
Adding to that, the whole thing ended with betrayals. We had craven politicians using our erstwhile allies and Taliban prisoners as equal chips to be traded, or pawns to be played in their domestic political point scoring games, with absolutely no regard for honour, friendship, or even human life. Literally thousands of Taliban terrorists were set free by the previous US administration, just for the sake of a deal that the then president believed would make him, “look good,” creating the kind of chaos with the final evacuation that most US journalists compared it to the last days in Saigon! . . . Terrorists! The murderers of US and British and other allied soldiers! Invited to take coffee at Camp David, for crying out loud!
Now, we uncover yet more cravenness and betrayal lead from the top.
I share your feelings though, for me, it is more a sense of exhaustion, as the pit of pure rottenness has no bottom to it. There’s no lengths to which these gangsters will not stoop, so I cannot feel horror, which would require surprise or shock to ignite it. Disgust, surely. But, that hasn’t changed from the sense of betrayal and disgust at watching these goons make themselves rich as the number of children in poverty breaks new records. My shock-meter, horror-meter, and the gauge on my outrage detector have all been broken long ago.
Now, I’m searching at the bottom of my backpack for any sight of my old, disused Hope-Meter. It’s not beeping yet, so it’s harder to find.
This would be a perfect time to fully reform the military and its systems, since we’ve left Europe, changed our stance with the US and have military leaders all begging for root and branch reforms, and MONEY, of course. Our system is starting to look more like a Russian oligarchy, where huge chunks of cash go missing or get spent on, “off budget,” “expenses,” because it is as squalid and corrupt as all the other major branches of government, despite (strangely) not drawing so much attention as the others.
Yes. I hope some articulate youth, in uniform, really sticks it to Sunak without raising his voice or using a single expletive and asks him, “Who is actually responsible and what will be done about this?” Maybe, after Sunak’s word salad of meaninglessness, one or two of the other speakers will speak truth to power? Maybe Starmer will promise his government will get to the bottom of the whole thing and introduce reforms?
But I doubt the BBC will allow it.
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I only knew of the root of that expression from its Irish origins, not the wooden fence, or Jewish connotations. I have a few books on etymology, which has always fascinated me, ever since I heard Noam Chomsky explain how the languages we use today are a recent, largely political, development, in a world where it was the norm to speak a range of dialects across all of Europe, with a good chance of being understood and understanding others wherever you went. Whereas, conversely, you could live in Bordeaux and go to Paris and not understand anything people were saying, as recently as two or three hundred years ago.
Neal Stephenson’s Baroque Cycle - a series of novels set during the enlightenment, involving spies, pirates, natural philosophy (science), philosophy and all manner of fascinating developments in that period of history - delves rather eloquently into that whole language issue, showing through fiction the manner in which languages evolved and why they were used in the way they were, among a new species of, “vagabond,” and upper classes alike, who suddenly found themselves capable of rapid communications and transport for the first time in human existence.
I don’t want to bore you with this digression, but I would only urge you, (if you have time for reading fiction at all?) to read those novels. To a man of your stamp, I cannot think of anything more likely to entertain, make you laugh out loud, and to fascinate you, from an intellectual point of view. I would imagine you read very little fiction in your spare time? But, if you have read Voltaire, Diderot or the lighter works of René Descartes and found them the least bit intriguing, then you will thoroughly enjoy the ingenuity, creativity, subtlety, scholarly knowledge and sheer entertainment value of these books.
As always, thank you. This time, for imparting a little knowledge to me which I did not previously have. I do love to learn knew things. ✌️👍
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Absolutely. Braverman has, “said the quiet parts out loud,” hasn’t she? The mere concept of, “Service,” is alien to her and that is what she repeatedly makes clear in this diatribe! It’s extraordinary that she made this public at all, but useful to Sunak and his supporters, who can all sit back and say, “told you so.” But even they won’t be saying that as loudly as Labour MP’s will.
But what she’s really saying is that her, “ideology,” (if it can be called that?) does not match that of the Conservative Party! She is confessing an authoritarian, anti-democratic type of governance that is incompatible with democratic rule!
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Ahh, but isn’t that Sunak’s problem, Professor Wilson? Micro-management is an expression of paranoia, after all. How can an utterly untrustworthy man, who owes his position to betrayal and skullduggery, ever believe that he can let others around him just get on with it and protect his interests? He knows he wouldn’t in their place.
To snub any European power at a time when we so desperately need to win back trust and partnerships is obviously egregious. But it probably feels like the smaller price to pay for self protection, by not leaving the kids to play out of sight?
Now the German and French premiers get to say, “Well, I would show up to visit you but, would you even be guaranteed to show up? Sorry, I’m just too busy to risk wasting my time.” Well done, Richie. Was it worth it?
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Who was it who famously said, “Justice delayed is justice denied,” can anyone recall?
Here’s a summary of the situation as it stands now, from the point of view of the Post Office:
“We are facing bankruptcy, regardless of this scandal, as our business model has been mismanaged so badly, it may as well have been actively sabotaged. (Indeed, we might suspect that it was?) And our reputational damage cannot get any worse, regardless of what happens. So, we stonewall, call in every favour and use every possible contact to help use fudge the issues as much as possible. Otherwise, if we pay out everyone’s compensation and damages in one go, we are officially bankrupt and out of business. Many of our victims will be gone in the next few years anyway. We just need to outlast them.”
That’s sounds about as malignant and cynical as it’s possible to be. But I believe I’m right. The only remedy would be for the barristers pursuing this case to call for specific punitive damages to take into account any further delay in justice (“Justice delayed is justice denied”) and especially swinging punitive damages for the families of the deceased victims. And, more importantly, to keep the public on board, by publicly organising and campaigning with them.
The clock must be reset. So its ticking favours the victims and doesn’t work against them. The Post Office must be made to feel the urgency that the victims were so wrongly made to feel when forced into paying back monies they didn’t owe, or giving false confessions.
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Hmmm . . . Well, one can always argue that Johnson made both Truss and Sunack a thing, and as to lasting damage, that’s hard to quantify. We’ll never know how things would have played out if he had supported Teresa May’s plans for Brexit, instead of sabotaging what would have been a far less bumpy ride for Britain than what we got, whilst stabbing her in the back and front, merely for his own Machiavellian ends.
Seldon does write well and entertainingly. He - or, he and his colleagues (whom are fully accredited as co-authors on the covers of his books, btw) - is/are insightful and his book on Johnson seemed wholly accurate and justified to me . . . as well as just a good read.
So, whilst I too will take some convincing, I will at least listen to his arguments with an open mind, as I would to almost anyone who is a true believer is history and its importance as a learning tool for us all.
But I must contradict you on one point. Truss has absolutely zero, “ideas of her own.” I can understand why they seem that way, given how outlandish her political philosophy seemed at the time, even to her fellow party members. But, if you know anything about the, “Tufty Club,” or the Tufton Street so called, “think tanks,” and their American financial backers, you will see that her entire philosophy, as stated out loud and as attempted in reality, was directly derived from their Neo Liberal clap trap, of the type that the Tea Party and other far right American financial cartels spout. Nothing new or original in any of it, and most certainly not, “her,” ideas.
She has merely acted as an empty vessel for these foreign and domestic investors who took advantage of her, “born again,” zeal, and the fact that she was more or less a blank slate to be filled with whatever nonsense they fed her.
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Morgan has shown us who he is, long ago. I’m old enough to remember his televised spat with Ian Hislop in which he directly threatened Hislop and, sure enough, followed up, sending, “journalists,” to root through his bins and harass him on his doorstep. Is anyone suggesting that this Piers Morgan has, “grown,” or, “changed,” for the better since then? When every utterance from his poisonous mouth since has been flecked with the angry spittle of invective? It’s because of, “journalists,” like Morgan that the world is in such an egregious state.
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Oh they, “realise the enormity of their own failing,” alright. The Post Office and co are fighting a desperate rear guard action. One MP who was attempting to fight the PO on this matter early on, told Channel 4 last night that the police should be perusing a criminal investigation.
Several of these, “honoured,” PO representatives LIED to the enquiry! They have committed perjury, fraud, conspiracy, perverting the course of justice, tampering with evidence, the list goes on and on! They need to be dealt with in the same manner as the law routinely deals with organised crime! As this was, and is, nothing short of that!
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@markgriffiths6540 : I get what you mean and, for some lost causes, that will always be true. But, evidently you can fight tribalism, as the polls are showing. Otherwise, we would have to accept that most of the nation has always been floating voters and that the Tory, “tribe,” has only ever consisted of 10 to 30% of the voting population.
Indeed, the history of humanity shows that fighting tribalism, only to replace tribes with new ones, is pretty much the whole story. We’ve done very little else.
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I agree with you, though I would reverse the order of action. I think they should exile Andrew immediately, firmly and without hiding anything. Then they should build bridges with Harry and Megan, but taking their time and doing so with digression. Having been a family therapist, in a former life, among the chief tools at your disposal which MUST be put to good use, is time.
It takes time and processing to forgive. It begins with honesty and acknowledgement. But all parties then need time to process, to gage the sincerity of other parties, assess what they need from the process, AND what they offer.
The issue is complicated in this case by the aspect of, “duty,” that is unique to a royal dynasty. And for which the, “playbook,” offers little help, as their family history involves everything from Parliamentary interventions and private negotiations, to outright kidnapping and murder to settle all manner of publicly debated disputes.
What I don’t question about Harry and Megan is that they both seem like good, decent people, attempting to navigate a tempest without a compass. I can only imagine the litany of mistakes I would make in their place. But I do not doubt their fine character, or their desire to, “do the right thing,” in all cases, despite what the, “Tory, client press,” has to say about them in their usual bad faith.
A good father should be seeking reconciliation and closure for his son, acceptance of his choice of wife, regardless of the manner in which the gutter press attempts to steer public opinion against them (a topic that Charles, of all people, knows about) and remember his DUTY to the crown.
If we are to have any faith in this institution, then the Royal Family MUST be made to understand; The British people don’t care about the mistakes people have made nearly so much as they do about the coverups and refusal to acknowledge wrongdoing where it is unquestionably present! Everyone makes blunders. Not everyone refuses to apologise, admit to them, or correct the situation.
We need to see Charles’s good will. His attempts to be both a good father and a good head of state. He must put away his brother and fire those of his inner circle who are too cosy with the far right media, along with him. He must create the space and the trustworthy environment into which Harry and Megan can gradually re-enter. Rather than the current lion’s den it comes across as now.
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Thank you! I honestly felt like I was going a bit mad! It’s not just me then? The guy should be the nonentity clown side show he’s always been, but somehow always ends up with disproportionate power to do real world harm, because the press and pundits just cannot get enough of the guy!
Ed Davy, who, lest we forget, stands the biggest chance of forming the opposition after the Tories, has to fling himself off a bridge or parachute into a BBC studio, just to get a line in the Guardian or Telegraph! Whereas Farage bleats just one of his perennial LIES of the type that we’re all used to hearing from, “a bloke down the pub,” and he’s on the front pages of the tabloids and broadsheets across the land!
WT actual F???
And this is all as a result of the client media being too cowed by the possibility of him becoming the leader of the party that signs their cheques and Tory MP’s being unwilling to take him on because they all want to be on his good side for the same reason. The right side, presumably? The further right the better. Add to that the fact that Farage has not raised his game one iota, but the Tories have LOWERED theirs to the point that they’re now indistinguishable from the known liar and clown side show act that’s chasing them wherever they go and soaking up their supporters!
I’ve challenged Prof Wilson to get a grip and stop making every other video about Farage, but I doubt he’ll pay any attention to me, as it’s probably getting him higher views than more important matters like the post office scandal being the biggest conspiracy in British political history, or our water supply being polluted to deadly levels simply because it’s cheaper to treat fines as a business cost rather than fix the problem, or insider gambling networks, etc.
I have huge respect for Prof Wilson, but he can be so wrong about some issues (admittedly, rarely in my view) and this is one of them.
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And the irony is pointed, don’t you think? Who actually, “knows more than they’re letting on,” about that targeted, organised riot, if not Farage, who had probably prepared his script before the riot began? Who, in their right mind, can discuss this terrible tragedy without ONE reference to the depraved act of attacking the very beleaguered community that has just been shaken so badly, only to have to deal with anti-British, “nationalists,” organised and funded by hostile foreign powers? How better could Farage prove that he doesn’t care one iota for the victims, their families, their friends or their community, than to completely ignore the fact that they were just invaded by rioting outsiders?
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When you ask about how to manage your YouTube account; how to ban accounts or delete people’s comments, what I would suggest is either one of two things:
1) Reach out to other YouTubers and get advice on what they do? You have so many contacts and know so many people of influence that surely one or more of those people should be able to connect you with an Editor?
2) You are based at a prestigious academic establishment, are you not? Why not approach someone from one of the other departments that uses social media or trains people on its workings? You will likely be able to find a gifted student whom you can hire for a single session every once in a while, cleaning out your channel for you? Or, better yet, hire someone from the drama, media, political history, or one of those departments to train you? Using the, “Teach a man to fish . . .” philosophy of having them train you in the technicalities of running your channel?
There is also 3) YouTubes own videos, teaching creators about managing their channels, and their online tools which are a suit available to all channel owners?
Your solution probably lies in a mix of the above, but I see how finding time might be a factor? So, my suggestion would be to make that time by (BRIEFLY) stopping your output and using that time to learn the tools? That is, only if you cannot find time anywhere else? Just as a train must stop for repairs, sometimes on the track, much to the chagrin of the passengers. But everyone is glad when the repairs are done and they get a better, more reliable service thereafter.
I wish I had these skills, as I would offer them to you for free. But, surely, if you are serious about solving these issues, the solutions you seek are in the above? You are surrounded by the help you need and paint an image of a man swimming in a fresh water lake, dying of thirst.
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I understand that ancient history made it necessary that the founding of a post WWII Israeli State had to be, geographically, where it was. But, with my 20/20 hindsight, I so wish the Balfour Declaration, or the post war decision had been to set up a new Israel in Europe. It might sound a little crazy to some, but when you think of the debt owed the Jews by Germany, Austria, Hungary in particular, and of how different history might have been with Israel as a European state . . . Well, it’s just a, “what-if?” pipe dream of impossibility, due to the geographic situation of key historical places, so central to Jewish identity.
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You raise a whole raft of questions though. Who are these sources? What is their track record for reliability? Doppelgängers may exist, but that doesn’t mean they exist because of Putin’s absence or death? Moreover, what is the advantage of keeping this myth of Putin being alive going?
Surely, Putin’s death would present the oligarchy with an opportunity for a reset with the west? A change of policy and to sue for peace in Ukraine? They could withdraw and put in a new leader with policies that could rescue Russia’s standing in the world, and their beleaguered economy?
So I ask, WHY? I cannot see any advantage to it. Like flat Earthers, when you ask them, why would anyone want to spread the sphere narrative? To what advantage? They never have an answer to that.
Can you give us links to your sources, so we can look for ourselves?
Putin would, if anything, find it helpful for the rumour to spread in the west, that he might be dead, because his whole approach to information is inspired by Stalin’s, where the public just can’t be sure about what is true. He wants us to throw up our hands and just say, “Well, I don’t know.”
In summary, tell us what you think Russia could gain from keeping up the illusion? And show us your sources to examine for ourselves, please?
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Apropos nothing, really, but I saw that thumbnail and thought, “Quentin Tarantino’s really let himself go,” before rubbing my eyes and getting a second take. To your point, there needs to be some better, more public accountability. We have seen that our regulators are uninterested and toothless at best, in cahoots and a client of the government at worst. Sitting MP’s presenting, “news,” and current affairs shows is illegal, yet happening in Britain.
And talent shows may seem like harmless fun and less important than direct government corruption, but they’re really not. The fact is that producers are like rising water levels, constantly rising to increasingly threatening levels unless people keep bailing to stop us all from drowning in exploitation, cruelty and ultimately, tragedy.
The producers of these shows should be monitored by unbiased OFFCOM officials with the power to shut down a production on the spot and refer crimes where they are found. They will find that producers are always breaking the law, blackmailing, victimising, bullying, manipulating and pulling strings that no decent person would touch in, “real,” life.
I rarely, if ever watch, “reality TV.” I prefer the good, honest truth that makes good fiction so compelling.
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I’ll be pondering your thoughts for the rest of the day, quite possibly. As it seems increasingly the case that, to do nothing about Edward, would be a mistake for The Windsor’s. And to attempt his rehabilitation into public life could prove fatal to their future.
It’s interesting to note that all of the names that appear on Epstein’s guest list had already been tainted by scandal, previous to any of us learning about their stays on his island. Some of them sexual in nature; all of them grubby. It certainly seems that Epstein preferred (or attracted?) a certain . . . “type.” I’ve never been a fan of the expression, “There’s no smoke without fire,” as it’s usually used by those with only suspicions and no evidence. But in Edward’s case it does seem fitting.
We do have the circumstantial evidence that he lies; about his whereabouts in a pizza establishment, for instance. As well as risible lies, such as that of his inability to sweat. We have the evidence of a multimillion pound settlement with his accuser. And photographic evidence that he lied about having met the woman, only later, “adjusted,” to, “I do not recall,” having met her.
From this (and other statements) we know that he is fundamentally dishonest. Also that he’s not very bright. Like Donald Trump he chooses to fabulate unnecessarily at times, about things that will prove to be demonstrably and necessarily false; and for which there was simply no need to lie in the first place, only serving to further undermine his own credibility.
On a personal level, I see a very different man in his infamous Maitliss and other, more successful interviews, from the other Royals. I could envision myself as having a great deal to talk about with King Charles in light conversation, to our mutual interest. I am positively charmed by Princess Anne and always have been. She actually reminds me of you in some ways, as she too has that ineffable capacity to mix compassion with sound reasoning, from an informed and well educated position. Her commitment to the public good seems to equal that of her mother, along with a personal (if rarely witnessed) capacity to personally charm.
Edward is someone I would never feel comfortable around, who with whom I doubt a truly intelligent conversation would be possible. I know it’s unfair to judge on the little I actually know about the man, but my gut has proved a reliable tool in my history, which has saved my life on more than one occasion, so I don’t ignore it.
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So, “other ethnic groups,” do not get the suffix of, “British,” attached to them, even though, “White British,” is a category in this article which is entirely about British people in Britain, which makes ALL of them, “British.”
Can you see the wilful myopia in these terms being used? So, what is, “White British,” in this context, when set against, “other ethnic groups,” if not low level racism? . . . It would not seem so egregious if the article used terms like, “Black British,” and, “Asian British, “ as well, but it is using, “White British,” and, “other ethnic groups,” which is inherently racist.
By differentiating, “other ethnic groups,” without attaching, “Britishness,” to them, yet putting them alongside, “white British,” people rhetorically, the author betrays an unexamined, hopefully unconscious, inherent, low level racism of the type that has fanned the flames of division in Britain so effectively in these last years.
I am guilty of making my own assumptions here, since I am only going on what your video says, not having read the article, as I assume that the author is both white and British? But, even if either of those values measures differently, I doubt that changes the effect of their content very much, if at all.
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Example: Farage says, “I said was awful. What more do you want me to say? Of course it was an apology.”
Journalist COULD have responded: “You made a, ‘comment,’ NOT an apology. Since you ask, I want you to either apologise or explain WHY you refuse to apologise?”
Basic, syllogistic, chain of reasoning logic, that would have cornered Farage into showing us more of the truth of who he is.
Example: Farage asks, “Have you covered the Labour MP . . .” etc.
Journalist: “Your job is to answer the questions and mine is to ask them.” Or better still, “Isn’t it an insult to British intelligence that you think you can avoid answering tricky questions by trying to pose your own, when you happen to know that the people want you to answer this question?”
Example: Better even still, in response to Fargage’s, “awful,” dodge; “So, why do you refuse to apologise for such abhorrent racism in your party?” Being PREPARED to field the next move, “I already said it’s awful,” with the above, “That’s an observation and comment, NOT an apology.”
See? It’s all about whether the journalist cares and is prepared. Though I hasten to add, I do not judge this particular journalist, as I don’t know her, and don’t know what circumstances she was labouring under. But I would hope she would agree that she could have done a much better job?
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Do you think so? Why would that be? I’m asking sincerely, as I am somewhat out of the loop on this whole drama. But it seems to have the nation’s attention and I’m uneasy about what’s happening more broadly on a cultural level.
To me, Schofield represents fond memories of childhood. He revolutionised children’s television, with an anchorman model that was repeatedly copied around the world. Would Roland Rat have even been a thing, had it not been for Gordon the Gopher? He has always struck me as a kind, sincere, humorous and thoughtful kind of man, who’s approach to TV presentation has been a good influence on the general public.
But, not being a daytime TV sort of person myself, I haven’t followed him or his career with any great, “interest,” despite seeing him frequently crop up in many famous YouTube clips. What is really going on here? Is it as culturally important as some seem to think it is?
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I worked in a government profession who’s basis for existing was based on the idea that people can change, grow, be redeemed, learn, contribute and make good any harms done. This was in a previous life as a youth worker, then a social worker, then a family therapist.
I learned several valuable life lessons from that line of work, such as that the people working in these jobs are generally more in need of such services than the general public. But, I also learned that people may change their behaviour; some are smart enough to learn from facts and information; but none will ever change who they are at their core.
Like that old Jesuit saying about giving them the child until he’s 7 years old and they, “will give you the man.” People may change tribes, but only to serve that unchanging core of their being.
I too have given Generic (as I call him, since he strives so hard to be a blandly typical Tory) too much credit. Sir, “ethically emboldened,” sounds inspiring to me. Sometimes you have such a great way with words.
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People always expect the Devil to be the terrifying, cloven hoofed demon, brimstone smoking about his reddened form as he spouts expletives in a gravelly baritone from a horned head. And that’s their biggest mistake. If the Devil has truly marked you for ruination, he puts on his best clothes and his most charming smile, flatters you and expresses an empathy that touches your very soul in a way that no other person has ever done for you. He makes you his willing slave with kind words and understanding.
You will only see his true form, uncloaked, if and when you attempt to turn back from the path he set you on. And that’s what Putin’s minions are paid to do. They are simply his imps and demons, sowing pain and suffering in the world, for the sake of the Devil’s lusts. Ego, power, and money, in that order: The simplest, three word summary of Putin.
Slava Ukraine. 🇺🇦
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I am a devotee of Orwell’s essays and I have always argued that if you juxtapose his complete essay collection with Winston Churchill’s glossy history books, therein lies the truest picture of British history you can find, so long as you understand the concept of historiography and close reading.
As to how people like Musk are hijacking Orwell, that simply reflects the Russification of far right tactics that we have seen increasingly, since Putin spread his tendrils into our media discourse at every level. The tried and tested Stalin technique of accusing your opponents of the things you are guilty of, or accusing them of doing things that you yourself are about to do, began in earnest in the west with Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign, at a time when trump’s ties with the Kremlin were far less opaque and almost his entire campaign team were found guilty of crimes relating to either domestic campaign laws, or to their spying and infiltration efforts on behalf of Putin. Remember Paul Manafort, anyone?
If your goal is to muddy the waters so badly that everyone gives up trying to discern the truth, a good way to approach that is by taking the figures people who tried to warn the world about people like yourself and grafting them onto the faces of your own monsters. Have your, “creations,” utter the very phrases that people should be applying to you, and preempt that, by applying them to those who would stop you.
It barely matters that the quotes you used were out of context, misunderstood, inappropriate or just plain wrong. In some senses that helps, as you get to accuse people correcting you of looking down their noses at you and being, “liberal elites,” blah, blah, blah. All that matters to the far right is that the comments are incendiary and get attention.
Whether deliberately, by osmosis or just because of a general ongoing degradation of the quality of public discourse, Stalin’s tactics for making collective conclusions about the truth unattainable have been on the increase over the past 20 or so years, gathering momentum in the last decade, so far as I have observed them. Anyone who has read Simon Seabag Montefiore’s books on Russia, particularly his biographies of Stalin, will see what I mean, I hope?
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The Americans will never reward atrocities by descaling or pulling back. Right or wrong, that’s just not how they do things. And, given that Iran is the universal link, supplying weapons to Hamas in the Middle East and supplying Putin with his missiles for his war in Ukraine, the Iranians seem to be deliberately seeking escalation?
America will see it as solving a lot of problems at once, if they can neutralise Iranian threats at the source. These events will crystallise such thinking in the minds of American decision makers, I would have thought.
Biden would need something tangible (offers up front) before he would even consider risking the optics of shuttle diplomacy in the light of the deaths of American service personnel. While there will be others, both within and without his own party, calling for embargoes to cut off their supply chains.
Iran is at the heart of the two most destabilising events in world affairs right now.
I cannot say what I would do in Biden’s shoes. His intelligence reports may cast a whole other light on things. But I do know, as does he, that words alone will not be enough.
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We still don’t know who these people were working, “for.” Even if they turn out to be Ukrainians, their government has spent more than a year rooting out pro-Putinistas. No way would Zelensky have betrayed the west’s trust at such a crucial time. Given Russia’s long storied history of double and triple bluffs, as well as their deep infiltration of Germany’s upper echelons, I am not prepared to believe anything until proven.
It’s also worth noting the fact that the suspects themselves were tipped off before they could be picked up, more than once, after showing up in Western Europe and then disappearing again when warrants were issued. Where were these tipoffs coming from? Russia? Germany? Elsewhere? The one country least capable of getting such information was Ukraine, since they do not even have representation in the investigation, unlike Russia, being the alleged, “victim,” of the attack and with a whole network of spies inside Germany where this investigation was initiated.
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Perhaps she feels she can do more good from behind the scenes? Perhaps she has a diagnosis of something she doesn’t want to share, or suffer in the public eye? . . . Who knows? . . . The problem with, “shock,” events like these is that, without further information, all we’re left with is speculation. I wish her well, regardless. And every blessing on her son, that he might carry out his duties responsibly and with the dignity and tact his office calls for.
Happy New Year to you too, sir. You have been a great source of wisdom, comfort and, occasionally, humour through 2023. I feel like it’s tempting fate to say 2024 cannot be any worse, so I will simply wish you health and happiness anon.
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It might be wrong to say, “All Conservatives are like this.” But it is right to say that ALL Conservatives work for and vocally support the very most rotten members of their organisation. Even the nicest Conservatives candidate still works for an organisation that has bought out the press; silenced critics through foul means; hidden corruption in its own ranks and covered for corrupt businesses outside of them; polluted our water; dismantled our NHS; put children in harm’s way in their schools and left them to struggle in poverty, whilst blaming their parents for not being born with their advantages; lied about the benefits of leaving Europe, whilst betting against the pound in the city at the economy’s most vulnerable moments; undermined policing; removed accountability mechanisms; destroyed the postal service whilst ruining the lives of pillars of countless communities; perjured themselves in parliamentary committees; shown utter contempt for the bravest generation at the D Day memorial and placed a blatant LIE about the opposition’s economic policy plans as the centre piece of their own election campaign!
And that list is FAR from exhaustive. So, whilst even the nice Tories may mind their P’s & Q’s, tell charming after dinner stories and speak of their dismay at the far right lurching, crushing incompetence and manifest greed and corruption of their leadership, they need to be reminded that they are perhaps WORSE than the worst MP’s in their own parties, because they remain enablers, whilst professing to know better.
I’m sorry, Prof. Wilson, but, on this score I’m with The Inglorious Basterds. (Yes, that’s how they spell it in the movie title) If I see one of them in that uniform, they’re a legitimate target, along with all the rest and they do not deserve mercy. Certainly not a seat on our governing body at least.
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I understand that I’m not focusing on the actual point you’re making here, but hearing you discuss this issue has triggered deep abiding emotions for me.
The first rule of being burgled is: You are now on their list. If they get away with it once, they will do it over and over to the same address. They are generally not smart people robbing you, and often rather desperate. Drug addicts are generally the worst, since their carelessness and desperation shows in their methods, which are usually the most destructive.
It is worth hiring a private investigator, as identifying the crook/s burgling your house is not usually the problem. Proving it is. Even if there are no obvious clues, you will find that a concerted investigation will quickly track down the culprit. Note: The police didn’t forensically go over your house for clues, did they? They didn’t dust for prints or anything, as they would for a, “serious,” crime, right? They just don’t have the time or resources.
When it happened to me, I took an enormous risk (DON’T try this yourself, dear readers) and pursued the burglars myself, that very night. This was in a former life, many years back, and I did it because I had experience from my work background, having worked with criminal types professionally for over 20 years and knew how to approach the burglars when I located them, which was within an hour of the robbery taking place.
I literally tricked one of them into coming with me back to my house and into the waiting arms of the police. My actions were irresponsible, really. But I knew the statistics and didn’t want to be on that, “repeat visit,” list. My partner and I were both working full time and I knew that our house would become the local drug addict’s ATM if the culprits weren’t caught swiftly. The only alternative would have meant a change to our lifestyles and spending a fortune on security apparatus, which still wouldn’t have bought us any certainty.
I took a calculated risk (under the influence of alcohol) based on what I knew would be the likely, repeated outcome and, having a partner whom I cared deeply for, that factor was the decider for me. I wanted to, “protect,” her. Even though I knew what I was doing, I knew I should not have done it.
The two culprits had both just completed prison sentences and the one I lured back was actually being investigated for another, violent, offence and wanted for questioning. But for the grace of God I might have found myself in a physical struggle for my life at any point with this character. Having blown their paroles, they were both shuttled back to jail and the matter was swiftly resolved.
All I would say is, take every precaution and don’t be afraid of overkill when it comes to your security arrangements. Burglars a looking for easy access and a quiet place to work. Deny them this and they’ll move on to the next target. If you share your home with others, there really is no excuse not to secure the place. 99% of all burglaries occur because the burglar seized an opportunity presented to them.
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Yes, you touched it with a needle. This internal fight within the, “conservative,” movement has been such a long time coming. Since the days of Winston Churchill, the European project has been causing division with the Tory party, but has remained manageable so long as it was both a distant, background feature, in a landscape filled with more pressing issues, and the leadership was strong enough to whip their party into line behind their own vision.
The referendum was blunder, but what resulted was the flare up wherein the competing visions of conservatism were finally put to the flame at a crucial moment when there was no leader with any vision and no sight of one on the horizon! That was further compounded by the moral bankruptcy of flinging open their doors to literally anybody who could win their seat due to their, “personality,” or, “performative,” populist politics. They no longer cared about their record, experience or background, so long as they could WIN, and they ended up with stiff necked grifters, with no vision beyond their own immediate, personal interests, or, “ideologues,” with the type of visions that would startle Oswald Mosley!
And then they act all, “surprised,” when they found they couldn’t manage this pit of vipers, and stunned at the fact that these unmanageable newcomers acted like they OWNED the place and had the right to make demands! And while the last season of party, “leaders,” got progressively more bonkers and weaker at party discipline with each yank on the Westminster fruit machine handle, this influx of vipers started fighting each other instead of their opposite numbers, NAME CALLING anyone in the general public who didn’t agree with their extremist views, FROM THE DISPATCH BOX . . . REPEATEDLY, (without even the suggestion that the PM might even rein them in let alone discipline them!) and scrapping in the open, for all the press to see, over policies that were either objectively unworkable, or objectively cruel and un-British!
And, as if the point needed to be made any more abundantly clear, at the moment Richie calls his election, five MP’s jump ship THAT SAME DAY!
Any party with that kind of a record deserves its wilderness years. May they be long and painful for them, as their years in office were for us.
It is to my great SHAME that I admit to voting for the Tories at the last election. Never, NEVER again. So long as ANY of this lot are around.
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I passionately agree with you. I so deeply wish I had some influence in any direction to help the victims of this appalling conspiracy. Paula, “Venoms,” (as I now call her) is the spider at the heart of this web. And she knows that MP’s stand to be disgraced (at the very least) alongside her. Therefore, she has been counting on government help with the coverup. And, so far, that has worked!
Justice delayed is justice denied. And the government seems to be flailing as much as the Post Office witnesses for excuses to fudge and delay any remedies to this sickening situation. Their inaction is making it worse each day that passes.
And it’s yet another example of Richie Sunack’s appalling judgement. He could have (SHOULD have) lead the charge and made this his cause. The political points he could have scored with the public, simply by justifying his personal intervention on the basis that this truly is the, “biggest,” if not the most depraved, miscarriage of justice in British history, are innumerable. The longer he leaves it, the more he will looked forced into action and out of apathy, if not like a party with a vested interest in the coverup.
The biggest miscarriage of justice in British history has become the biggest conspiracy in British history. And what darkens the horizon in the minds of the public is the suspicion that it is still ongoing. The government AND the police have given us no reason to doubt that, so far.
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We can’t judge them entirely on their first King’s Speech, as it takes a lot of time and hard work to get through all these policies. Also, as we’ve seen, Labour are reviewing all of the damage that’s been done to departments and are finding shocking sabotage in many cases, such as the prisons’ services for example. So it’s hard to be specific since they don’t know what they’ll find.
The voting age reduction, for example, is a piece of legislation that can be done fairly quickly and easily, relatively speaking, so they can afford to defer that, whilst they work on gaining cross party support for it. Always better to pass bills on the nod than with huge, loud opposition.
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A slight aside here, professor. But I just wanted to remind you of how much I admire your channel and your work on it. And to say thank you for it. We really NEED people like you, commenting over this election period. I don’t agree with all of your views, and I sometimes want to shout at the screen. But that’s rare. Yet, one of the things I admire most about you is your openness to criticism and your ability to NOT take it personally, but rather, welcome divergent opinions.
Your style, frankness, openness, patent honesty, depth of knowledge and, as I’ve said before, your capacity to blend compassion with rational, logical thinking, is a rare and valuable quality that I cherish.
At times like these, when the pressure is on and anyone who wants to do justice to certain topics will be kept up late at night, it is services like yours that do the most good. I believe there is genuine value in a sincere reminder that there are people out there who value, greatly what you do for us (whether they split their infinitives or notwithstanding) and who wish to encourage and support you. All I have are my words and my sincere gratitude. But what I have is yours.
Thank you, Professor Wilson.
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If Braverman had ever been either, “transparent,” or, “honest,” she never would have been Home Secretary in the first place. For all we know, she could be simply laying out a new negotiating position for something else she’s not telling us, which would be totally in keeping with her MO. Let us see if she really will be instrumental in bringing down the Rwanda Bill? And, as you say, anyone prepared to burn down the house with everyone in it, will NEVER be considered leadership material, even by the bigoted and congenitally stupid.
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It’s time we faced the fact that there has been a consistent and concerted effort to take over the media at every level by the right, over the last 10 years. Since the Tories have stopped threatening the BBC’s license fee and almost daily whining about them being a, “leftie,” organisation, I have been paying closer attention to why that might be? The public were tossed a bone, in the form of a resigning Chairman, Richard Sharp, under a cloud of Tory sleaze scandal and then, radio silence from the front and back benches? Which just so happens to coincide with a suddenly more favourable coverage of Tory policies, downplaying of scandals and burying leads.
Just look at how they covered the, “Let them die,” revelation about Sunak from the Covid Enquiry? He’s our current, serving PM! Yet the BBC’s reporting of that shockingly callous indifference was buried right at the very end of a litany of allegations against his enemy at large, Boris Johnson. A couple of sentences of coverage, tacked on to the very final seconds of the report I saw, in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it, moment.
We’ve seen the launch of a right wing, “news,” station and Parliament unable to get any answers from the regulator about MP’s blatantly breaking the law by anchoring programs and dressing up political opinion as news. If you watched any of the enquiries into those, the regulator comes off as pusillanimous at best. We have most of the press leaning to the right, which has done for decades, but never with such impunity and insolence. And they all seem to have their, “message,” agreed before anything goes to print or broadcast.
Something is deeply rotten in the state of Denmark. And the coverage of the King is just an example of something we will likely see more and more of in the coming years: careless arrogance from the people in charge.
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From the paranoid perspective of an Israeli government advisor, all they’re seeing is that the people funding HAMAS (Iran, et al) are now the ones calling time and offering back hostages, right at the point that Israel was about to smash a central support hub for HAMAS’s whole operation. Now there are Israelis who are chomping at the bit, thinking they may find other things when they get in there? Whether that be intelligence, billions of dollars worth of fighting technology and weapons, who knows what else? The actual remaining hostages, perhaps?
But, because this call from HAMAS to accept Israel’s ceasefire proposal (And being Israel’s terms and conditions, so you would think they would accept them instantly?) come from Iran and their allies, Netanyahu instinctively feels the need to get in there and see what it is that they’re so keen to protect.
Humanitarian concerns will have not have even crossed Netanyahu’s mind, nor those of his opponents in this complex war.
And we must never forget, so long as Netanyahu is fighting this war, he is keeping the sword of Damocles from dropping on his head, in the form of elections, criminal charges and facing the corruption charges of which he is already accused. In that respect Netanyahu is very much like Vladimir Putin. Now, he is a warlord or he is nothing. It is not just in his political interests to keep this war raging (so long as he can maintain a significant minority of supporters), it is his lifeline.
We are asking a proud, callous, sociopathic man to face shame, indignity after indignity, humbling and probably jail time or even self termination (the YouTube algorithm makes my comments disappear if I use more appropriate words), or he can fight a war. He is THE WORST person to be leading Israel at this crucial moment in their history.
Whatever happens, this cannot end well for the Israelis. As for the Palestinians . . . Well, it’s already gone about as badly as it can and will get worse. But the innocent paying for the crimes of the guilty is a feature, not a bug, in this conflict, on both sides.
Unless American pulls the plug, which they show no signs of doing, there can be no end to this conflict until Palestine ceases to exist. We are watching a genocide. And we’re doing very little about it, except helping to protect the perpetrators from Iranian missiles.
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Indeed, the Tory party lost all of its, “states,” men and women, years ago. I felt that the likes of Cameron were more like the donors and influencers within the elite, holding the fort until more talented MP’s could rise again. Then, after he resigned, we were left with the genuinely untalented leftovers who would NEVER have risen so high in less chaotic times. The, “characters,” the chancers and Neo-Libs, who, as you point out, acted with callous indifference, entitled cruelty, incompetence and corruption.
It is truly sad that the, (oxymoronically named) “Conservatives,” are now having their civil war in the public domain, in this unedifying, unbecoming manner. But that’s what you get when no one has any ideology or ideas. The Tories have no, “story,” to tell about national identity, national character, our destiny or even our general direction.
I think they do know what direction they all agree upon, in which they really want to take the country, but they know they cannot sell that story to the British people, as it would horrify even their most rabid supporters. A Neo-Liberal hellscape, in which corporations from all over the planet own everything, including security, policing and healthcare, is not any voter’s idea of a good time.
You’re right. They’re all out of fig leaves, and they don’t even have sufficient self respect or decency to step into the shadows, admit defeat and see to their domestic squabbles in the privacy of their own homes. We must partake in the public spectacle as if politics was just I’m A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here!
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Oh, I can tell you who is better off because of Brexit. Those business, “insiders,” who got tip offs from inside Westminster and who, “shorted,” (bet against) the Pound on the international markets. They made a killing and went back for seconds when Liz Truss told her, “think tanks,” all about her insane Neo-Liberal plan to turn Britain’s entire economy over to the business owners. One cannot help wondering how much of that was her and Kwasi Kwarteng and how much of it was the brainwashing of those quangos and far right infiltration units that she spent all of her free time plotting with? Because she really behaved like a Manchurian Candidate throughout her mercifully brief tenure.
But we must never be tempted to fall for the line that, just because the country has been haemorrhaging money, someone in-country hasn’t been profiting. That way, madness lies. We often think policy makers are being wilfully self destructive and even illogical, but there’s always an evil method to their madness.
And, of course, Boris profited immensely, as he was able to back-stab his way to power, which he would have sustained, even (dare I say) maintained to this day with laurels to polish, if only he’d had just enough of an IQ not to mess it up, so wilfully and in such an entitled, spoiled, idiotically callous fashion. But he did profit by Brexit, along with all those who hung on his coat tails, and whom we witness publishing bitter memoirs or galavanting in jungles to be tormented by the British viewing public.
At least the people who vote to toss a former MP into a pit of black widows, or to eat a rhino’s testicles, know their votes have a more meaningful outcome (certainly more gratifying) than general enfranchisement has granted them in the last 20 years.
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@hutsuls : Appreciated. But, rather than going down a rabbit hole of conspiracy theorists, what I actually want to understand is why HE specifically chooses to, “believe,” this extraordinary thing. I doubt I will be persuaded, but I want to know what specifically persuaded HIM? Who HIS sources are? BTW, I am not, “shouting,” those alt-cap words, but I have no way to put italics or underlining into my text.
There are probably a million different theories about how, when and where just about every famous person has died, been abducted or been replaced by lizard people on the web, so I wouldn’t have any problem constructing a theory of my own, collating all of my, “sources,” and building a web page called, “I’m right dot com @, ‘educate yourself!!!’ for the insecure bubble dwellers incorporated,” and have my own following and donation pages by sundown.
I’m just too old and too bored with all that rubbish to bother.
I am simply going to repeat the question, each time I witness him making this assertion. Though probably way more briefly in future. It’s HIS reasoning I’m after and which, incidentally, I believe we are all entitled to, since Prof Wilson is a professional educator, broadcasting to the public, with a significantly large, consistent (if not, “loyal”) audience. He of all people ought to know that he has a responsibility to that audience. You just can’t go around saying stuff like that without offering a shred of evidence to back up your assertions! He has criticised many others for doing the same thing.
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Opening with Robert Peel was rather an elegant touch, I thought. I gave myself a quick refresher by reading Katie Carpenter’s brief summary on the Corn Laws, on the Parliamentary website, before continuing. Notably, Peel knew that repealing the laws would cost him dear and, sure enough, he lost his premiership amid a civil war within the Conservatives.
Yet, he was ultimately vindicated.
All of the fears expressed by the Corn Law supporters were proved false. There was no surge in foreign wheat, glutting the British markets. Prices did not plummet to unmanageable figures. Instead, the people at, “the coal face,” (so to speak) who dealt and traded with Spain, Norway and the other bogey men countries mentioned in pro Corn Law petitions, came up with solutions that benefitted all parties and took the broader consequences of international trade into account.
One could hypothesise that a new form of, “internationalism,” or, an awakening within the trading classes, as to a broader influence on the country’s affairs through international trade, began. Not for nothing had Napoleon dismissed the British as a, “nation of shop keepers,” well within living memory. The British have always had a better grasp of economics and reale politic than their leaders have given them credit for.
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We don’t want the BBC doing investigative work, do we? Exploring the motives and workings of our institutions and government, might leave too many people being informed? I 100% believe that this cutback is a direct result of pressure from our Tory, “government.”
There is a direct correlation between the government’s sudden radio silence about the BBC and that institution’s sudden apparent silence on any news that looks bad for the Tories. We have gone from almost daily attacks on the BBC, even from the Dispatch Box, continually threatening the licence fee, occurring all the way up to Boris Johnson’s tenure at Downing Street, to this apparent acquiescence on the part of the Beeb, frequently quashing headlines that would embarrass the government, demonstrating appalling pro-government biases (which themselves have grabbed headlines) and having the old boy network appointees quietly slipped into positions of leadership throughout the whole organisation.
The irony, of course, is that people like me, who were once fierce defenders of that license fee, find the best argument for ending it in their becoming a propaganda mouthpiece for whatever government happens to be in power! It has been truly distressing to watch the decline in standards of this precious jewel in the nation’s crown.
The three things that speak most loudly to me of, “Britishness,” have always been 1) Our independent judicial system, still able to make judgements that can even stymy the worst laid plans of Prime Ministers, as both Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak have found, to their chagrin. 2) Our NHS, providing healthcare from cradle to grave, FREE at the point of need; still heroically standing, however embattled. And 3) Our independent journalism, with its finest exemplar, setting the standard that the world still follows (or aspires to) in the BBC. An organisation with literal global reach, scope and influence. People huddled in trenches in some God forsaken African war zone or East European war zone, or some Middle Eastern hell hole, dodging missiles and trying to find out what’s really going on out there so they can decide what to do next, do NOT tune in to Fox, CNN, Al Jazeera or the RT propaganda outlets. They tune in to the BBC World Service, to get unalloyed, simple FACTS, coming from gallant journalists worthy of the name, often risking their lives or their freedom, just to get the TRUTH out to the world about matters of ultimate urgency.
And our government has done more to undermine those three institutions in the last 13 years than any previous government in the last 13 decades! This cut back will lead directly back to some influential Tory, or Tories, I have no doubt.
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I have encountered, about a thousand times, YouTube commenters who spot an, “ad hominem,” and think they have invalidated everything else you say on that basis. Usually they follow up their remarks with their Wiki, or online dictionary definition of the term, in the hopes that they can get you arguing about what an, “ad hominem,” remark is and indeed, whether or not you used one, rather than the topic in hand.
In other words, people who get upset about ad hominem attacks are generally incapable of discussing the matter in hand and are trying to distract you.
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It would seem only fair that Johnson should be forced to face his own constituency, if he did choose to remain in politics and win, lose or draw there, where he owes the greatest responsibility.
As to the behaviour of Mogg and Dorise, et al (👈 may have misspelled, “Dorise?” Sorry) they should first be reminded that this is THEIR committee, formed by THEM, and that it has a Conservative majority. Harriet Harmon has zero power over the other members as the Chair, simply performing an administrative role of organising and as spokesperson, so singling her out is wrong headed to begin with.
Yes, Parliament ought to have strict rules about respecting the process and they should be swiftly enforced. For instance, while these people are tossing around allegations about the committee, like churlish, entitled school children, they should be made to prove them or withdraw their remarks with an apology, or face legal consequences. At the very minimum, they should face censure and sanction through the Parliamentary processes?
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I think it is worth asking yourself, who are you explaining this stuff to? Is there a single Jew on Planet Earth who can grasp the points you’re making, who supports Trump, let alone suspects he of all people is, “the chosen one?” I seriously think you will not find one. You may find a handful of wealthy, powerful Jews who are on trump’s gravy train in one form or other, but no one else.
Trump was, “chosen,” by the GOP to reach the ignorant, the lowest achievers, the fearful and cowardly. It is a deliberate strategy, calculated to reach people who are simply incapable of following your points.
I’m afraid you are preaching to the choir in this case.
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Here’s a revolutionary notion. How about we WELCOME the much NEEDED migrants to our workforce, generating economic activity and the taxes that PAY for stuff? Y’know? Just spit-balling here.
Meanwhile, we just go back to PROCESSING asylum seekers, instead of dumping them in prison hulks and repurposed B&B’s, putting back some of that extra cash from those taxes to expand the immigration services, who were doing a very good job until the Tories messed up their mojo? They were just overwhelmed by a problem that is being felt WORLD WIDE!
So we NEED diplomatic, WORLD WIDE treaties and solutions to address migration on a GLOBAL scale! If we stopped giving the middle finger to Europe long enough to negotiate SHARED policies and solutions for mass migration, we might be better off?
How about we talk to other leaders about devoting a new, entire department of Interpol (or Europol, or any other international police forces, including America’s FBI) to these people smugglers? Coordinated policing, concentrated on the key places they operate from is what’s going to stop the trafficking! And, “Stop The Traffickers,” can be Labour’s new slogan.
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Seldon writes with almost brutal frankness and honesty, and with a captivating prose style. He seems to have a co-writer on nearly all of his most recent projects. He self describes his biography of Boris Johnson as a, “cautionary tale of individual and institutional failure,” which was spot on.
I was fascinated by the parallels he drew between the careers and personalities of Johnson and Lloyd George, which I found deeply insightful. Contrasting their differences too was salient.
He hopes we can learn lessons from contemporary history and I will always give my time and attention to a true believer in history as a project for learning. After all, it was Johnson’s idol, Winston Churchill, who told a journalist that the way to get good at leadership in politics was to study, “History, history and history. Therein lay all the secrets of statecraft.”
Therefore, on that basis, I am willing to hear out Seldon’s argument. Like you, I doubt very much if Seldon will convince me that Truss was a better PM than . . . well, frankly, anyone. But, “scatty,” or not; relying on his co-writers or not, he deserves to be heard with an open mind.
If Seldon were to stand a serious chance of convincing me, the focus would necessarily have to be on how much, “worse,” Johnson was than I realised, rather than convincing me that Truss had any redeeming characteristics as a political leader. We already know she has literally nothing that she can point to and call an, “achievement.” And she has so much damage to account for, which continues to pass unacknowledged by her or any of her people, let alone apologised for. Her electoral defenestration was as close as we’ll ever get to, “accountability,” with her.
But, Seldon will entertain me and enlighten me, whether he convinces me or not. So, I’ll get the audiobook to see me through the home improvements I’m working on and my mornings walking the doggle. It will be worth a listen.
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Thank you for exploring Seldon’s book a bit further with us.
The mere fact that Truss has the instinct to, “defend,” her record and not to, “account,” for it, even APOLOGISE for it, shows more of that, “personal and institutional failure,” that Seldon refers to in the introduction to his book on Johnson that is characteristic of the current brand of Tory and speaks to the core of what is really wrong with them.
For over a decade now the Tories have fostered this culture of thin skinned, defensive aggression in their ranks and lauding these qualities in their leaders, aping the Republican manner of doing politics and Americanising their approach to every topic. This aggressive, divisive and unreasoning approach has rendered actual debate impossible and dialectics out of the question.
And we do need a healthy, capable opposition that can hold the government’s feet to the fire on important policy issues, rather than squandering every opportunity by either uniformly running off to America, rattling their begging tins at their Republican puppeteers, or writing op eds for the domestic client press that read as being wholly out of touch with reality, let alone the British people, set on driving further wedges into society.
If you were to ask me, “What makes a, ‘good,’ politician, Ash?” I would probably describe someone with a POSITIVE vision, FUTURE FOCUSSED, whilst being realistic about the present, well EDUCATED in law and history, but most of all, like Winston Churchill in 1941, able to UNITE the British people with a sense of joined destiny, purpose and prosperity.
I don’t think I need say much more about those politicians who do the diametric opposite of what I just described. I need only say, “Liz Truss,” and the point is made.
That is why, for me, Seldon’s book on Truss will face a tall order convincing me that Truss was not the worst PM Britain has ever had since Walpole first, sort of, created the post. But, because he believes in the salutary, educational value of contemporary history, I look forward to reading (listening to) his book.
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And in the midst of all this national chaos, Katie Price, a supermodel, feels a bit shy and doesn’t want to show up in court? And she’s twisting the courts around her little finger, at tax payer expense, creating delays and further backlogs, while the courts are stretched to breaking point! Truly sickening behaviour.
THIS is the, “two tier,” justice system that we SHOULD be talking about! How the wealthy get away with murder just because they have a, “name,” or MONEY, even when they pretend they don’t.
It’s funny how these, “influencers,” seek public attention 24/7 yet are allowed to escape the public gaze when accountability is called for? She can afford elective surgery, trips to exotic locations and, as one journalist recently observed, she was sunning herself and relaxing as the press pack tracked her down and didn’t appear to be, “working,” at all, despite telling the court that she was.
And she has been playing the media game for decades now, so I don’t believe she doesn’t know what she’s doing, or is so, “vulnerable,” and alone, whilst paying for a film crew and her entourage to skulk off to Turkey.
She’s not just getting away with it, but rubbing our noses in it. I know people who are on medical waiting lists for surgeries that are not desired or, “elective,” by any description, yet she has the funds to pay for a fatter lip or whatever the heck she’s having done this time. It truly is sickening to me and I would like to see the courts send in a receiver to liquidate her assets and put them to the service of the country. Not coo and role over when she says she, “doesn’t like appearing in public,” and grant her video links to the court from around the bloody corner! THAT’S two tier justice! Always in favour of the monied class.
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That’s not accurate! Ukraine ceded its nuclear arsenal to Russia, yes. But IT IS CRUCIAL to understand that it was at AMERICA’S PERSUASION that they gave them up! In return for AMERICAN PROMISES OF PROTECTION from RUSSIAN AGGRESSION! And that support has been pusillanimous at best! We in the west OWE Ukraine, for going along with our desire to prevent nuclear proliferation and taking a MASSIVE RISK which backfired on them, BECAUSE we did not prevent a Russian invasion DESPITE PREDICTING IT AND WATCHING ITS PREPARATIONS IN REAL TIME!
And, now that Ukraine has been so badly let down, lost so many people, suffered so much loss, torture, theft, rape and humiliation at Russian hands, the VERY LEAST we in the west can do is see to it that they get EVERY SQUARE INCH of Ukraine BACK into UKRAINIAN HANDS!
“There is only one Nazi contingent in this conflict,” and they are sitting in the Kremlin, being lead by Putin!
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Well, I watched your video (compilation?) with great interest and was riveted. Your knowledge and expertise in languages is genuinely impressive, but unsurprising. Despite entertaining the Old Testament translation debates in a manner more original than I’m used to hearing from most theologues and cleverly expressed, I still feel it’s a trap unworthy of falling into, as the Old Testament laws are no longer pertinent to Christians who follow Christ’s teachings. However, you do go on to point this out, or reference Christ’s fulfilment of the laws. So, one could say you were simply being thorough and, as an academic, I’m sure you enjoyed the exercise for its own sake.
I was struck by how gently you touched on most points when drawing your conclusions; or even indirect?
I cannot deny I learned an awful lot, as I don’t have any other languages (not really), let alone ancient ones, and I have had to rely on the research of others and the help of books like The Strongest Strong’s for translation and deeper understanding.
I think you and I are closer to agreement on these issues than I first believed, though probably not 100%.
I thank you for the link and the education, though, entertaining and informative as it was. I have things to ponder and pray about as a result.
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Let us face facts. Conservatism is dead. The, “Conservative,” Party is already no more. Tories are a PLC masquerading as a political party. Even the most conservative voter has to admit that there is no single, “ideology,” to speak of, around which anyone within the party can unite, let alone the voting public.
We have witnessed years of incompetence, “personality,” politics and opportunism, combined with callous indifference to public welfare. We’ve seen carpet bagging and fleecing the last of the nation’s wealth, all conducted with a sense of urgency that you only see from jewellery shop thieves, clearing up before the inevitable arrival of the police.
And all of this is presented to us now, by a vacillating PM who employs his excuses of the week, which nearly always directly contradict his excuses of the previous week. A PM unfit for purpose and every bit as morally corrupted and personally vain as Boris Johnson ever was, yet he presents in the manner of a badly programmed Artificial Intelligence. His last interview was appalling.
I can only imagine that people who still vote for this party do so because they believe the lies of their client media, or because they’re downright racists . . . Or because they’re already very rich and see a pliable, corrupt [arty which will be easily manipulated for the right price?
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Honestly, I’m getting so tired of hearing about Farage and all this disproportionate coverage. I get why you would do it. He’s colourful, says things that stick with people and nearly always epically wrong. So there’s a lot to say, if you want to assist in raising his profile, and if you understand that Farage being wrong makes no difference to his success as a public figure. All he needs is ongoing discussion about him.
Like the figure of Colonel Kurts in Apocalypse Now, we didn’t need to see Marlon Brando for him to dominate the picture, because everyone talks about him the whole time, acts either for or against him and makes it clear throughout the entire journey that everything we see happening is happening because of him. The fact that we don’t even get a clear look at him by the end of the movie, and that he mumbles a few lines from the shadows before making his exit, was neither here nor there. It is still credited as one of Brando’s biggest films!
I think it’s related to, “The Streisand Effect,” in that respect. The press and people like you are building Farage up, way beyond all reasonable proportion. And the result will be that he will be empowered to take over the remains of the, “Conservative,” Party BECAUSE of people like you never shutting up about him! I’m certain there was an element of this distraction toward the bright and shiny objects involved in the rise of other historical dictators. And make no mistake, if everyone keeps playing his game, by his rules, fuelling him with the oxygen of attention, just because he says something a bit weird or different from the mainstream (right, wrong or indifferent) it will be those people (you included) who will have given him that power.
The Tories are being exposed for what their opponents have long suspected to a wider cross section of the public and it is merely the fact that they are so empirically awful that makes right leaning voters confused. They no longer see Farage as the purely risible clown figure he once cut, but not because he’s gotten any better, more competent, less of a blatant liar, but simply because he’s no longer distinguishable from the rottenness we see from Tories at every turn! And the pundits and MSM are turning him into that viable alternative!
You should act more responsibly, covering the many, many political issues and stories that are burning out there and limit your time on Farage to something more reasonable! Or forever take responsibility for the role you played in his rise to eventual power and the end of our democracy!
I know you think I exaggerate. I’m being, “hysterical,” or, “hyperbolic,” perhaps? Well, let us see how well these words age?
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Your words of wisdom are a balm to my troubled spirit in these unsettling times. I am grateful that you take the time to talk to us and offer an alternative perspective to the, “mainstream,” (a term I use advisedly in this case) norm.
Using Johnson’s connections, Truss has hit the money making circuit, apparently not thinking about what she actually planned to say, almost until the moment she got to the podium. There was a moment when she referred to the US Constitution and our Magna Carta, adding something like, “and there are many such documents I could name.” An awkward, if brief, pause followed during which I just WISHED that someone shouted out, “Can you really, Liz? Go on then? Name just one?”
But what alarmed me was that she was really pushing that Neo-Liberal agenda, from the, “think tanks,” that she belongs to (who are probably the source of her scripts?) and stating that she plans to stay in politics for that, “cause,” alone.
To me, her speech sounded like an advertisement. “I am available, along with all of my Westminster connections, for Lobby work and setting up private meetings,” was my translation.
We are increasingly creating a false sense of class in Britain, like the old Tudor notion of the, “worthy,” “impotent,” poor (which are, by design, very few in number) whilst everyone else must be seen as, “unworthy,” or, “indolent.” This seems to be born from a sense that the wealthy are directly threatened by the growing numbers of, “have nots,” so long as they remain enfranchised, educated and having access to accurate information. And the blatancy with which Britain’s elites are actively working to take away those three vital tools of democracy seems, to me at least, to be on the increase.
Every time I hear the term, “woke,” from the mouth of a far right hack like Cruella Braverman or Liz Truss, I feel it is a deliberate attempt to define a separation between, “them and us,” in direct opposition to the role and responsibility of a politician, who’s job is meant to be concerned with uniting the people.
I am unmoved by Truss’s bandwagoning attempts at baiting better people than herself in society, with such deliberate hostility she spits at those whom she meant to lead. That’s just like being harangued by an angry toddler who feels personally slighted at being made to go to bed. But I am disturbed that overtly divisive rhetoric is considered acceptable from this, “political,” party, which is so gleefully breaking its social contract by attacking its own population, rather than attempting to reason with them and calm their anger. When a party is all out of political ideas and has no longer got any, “ideology,” to lay claim to (other than an extremist version of neo-liberalism which they know the general public finds as unrealistic and immoral as proposing we become a communist dictatorship) people like Liz Truss are scraped up, from the very bottom of the barrel.
It’s the, “normalisation,” of allowing leaders to be actively hostile and baiting of those in their charge which is truly unprecedented in British politics. I only hope it becomes recognised as a key reason for their defeat at the next election?
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If you were to make a special video, looking more deeply into the ideas, history and uses of conspiracy theories, it would be worth discussing the use (abuse) of the Blood Libel which, as current events demonstrate, is alive and well to this day and has been since the early medieval period, in one form or other. Indeed, the blaming of, “migrants,” (for, “migrants,” see, “Jews,” in the history books) for horrific acts of violence, on highly spurious grounds, has ever been the cry of the privileged classes at the moments when they have felt their power slipping. That is all we’re seeing with these riots. And that is why no stone should be left unturned to discover the people funding and organising them.
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These rules already exist! You cannot be a, “news anchor,” as an MP, but all second jobs should be illegal in my view. The arguments to the contrary are completely specious! The real problem is that OFCOM is toothless and corrupted the by, “friends and families,” of Tory MP’s! THAT organisations needs to be completely swept clean and re-staffed with genuinely INDEPENDENT people who believe in DEMOCRACY, and invested with REAL POWERS to subpoena people, fine organisations, and make criminal referrals to the CPS!
Anything that levels the playing field, or makes media fair and balanced, the Tories oppose.
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Yes, we should introduce a Stolen Valour act, using the American model as a template. Within that act of Parliament, criminalising such fraud, there should be equal punishment for casting aspersions on the validity of genuine medal winners. An equal and opposite offence, for casting doubt upon people who have served their country with such excellence that they have won a medal for it, should be seen as equally egregious, as it does precisely the same thing! To claim a genuine medal recipient is, “faking it,” is to, “steal,” their, “valour,” in the eyes of the public for the purposes of personal, political, or otherwise tangible gain! It is no less despicable!
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When a political party has internally abandoned all pretensions of ideology and simply wishes to create a neo-liberal free-for-all, wild west, society of haves and have nots, this is what you get.
All of the crooks, who are considered, “talented,” at stealing Britain’s wealth, resources, industries, lands, etc. and selling it all off for personal profit, are put to work to do exactly that. So putting people in the shop window, as a front for the organisation, comes almost as an after thought. Liz Truss was scraped up from the very bottom of their barrel, to distract the press and their party members and keep them busy, while the elites who fund the whole operation from their, “think tank,” lobby groups could get on with the business of instructing, “our,” elected representatives on exactly what they’re going to do whilst in office.
That’s why truss is like a ghost of Victorian Christmas past, blaming the, “woke,” for her downfall, even though anyone with half a brain would tell her that the banks, financial institutions and back-stabbers of her own party were the ones who put an ignominious end to her idiocy, whilst the, “woke,” (whomever TF they are?) had no say in the matter.
That’s why they like Sunack for now. He’s quieter, not deliberately baiting the public (whom it is his, “job,” to, “unite,”) like Cruella Braverman is . . . at least not so much as people like her and Truss are.
And, because he’s willing to do unprecedentedly anti-democratic stuff, like locking the press OUT of their upcoming party conference, allowing them to train up their worker bees, our MP’s, in their dark arts in a shameless, unvarnished manner without ANY public scrutiny. Knowing they will to lose their mandate next year, they have about one year to clean us out completely, in an Everything Must Go sale of Britain’s best and brightest hopes.
They don’t want the likes of you and me paying attention to any of that!? So, they’ll have Braverman spew out a bit more borderline racism at about the same time as their conference, putting on a good dog and pony show for us all to get distracted by, while they’re going through your pockets (and any pockets you may own in the future) to clean them out.
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I knew some of the gang members in the Hazel Grove constituency, in a former life. Not well, and only due to others I knew having run ins with them. It has been one of the most crime ridden areas in Greater Manchester for years. I was kind of hoping that it would have improved, if not been cleaned up, by now. It really couldn’t happen to any of us. You’re right there. I don’t know the Willy Wragg story well, but I wouldn’t, “sext,” my own wife! Not because of any poe faced Puritanism, but simply because everything you put into the either stays there, like a human stain, and can be accessed by third parties at any time, either as a result of security failures or human errors, technological failures, or spies (political and industrial) collecting vast swathes of data. I’d be more comfortable putting a lurid neon sign outside my house! Never say anything in the either, YouTube very much included, that you wouldn’t be willing to repeat in front of the people concerned, your own family, a judge or the police. If MP’s don’t all know this, they’re not fit to serve.
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I will write to her on her social media to wish her well. I am also gladdened and relieved to hear that you are, “presumed,” well, and I do hope to be seeing your YouTube output for many years to come.
I hope you do appreciate that your videos have huge, inherent, “value,” and that I will not be the only one who has been comforted, entertained and educated by your unique takes on the nation’s affairs.
It is frightening to find that, if you do not stay continually on top of the minutia, the NHS will not see things through for you. I have been there on numerous occasions, though I have not yet faced anything so dire as a live or death diagnosis, as you have. The temptations to go private are too big for many, though I will not yield, determined as I am to hound my representatives into saving the service.
I certainly hope that you are not considering giving up your YouTube career? You must, of course, do what is right for yourself and I will support any decision you make in that regard, 100%. But, I would miss you terribly. I have come to count on you for help with processing this mad and maddening world we find ourselves stuck in. Your wisdom and insight are one thing, but your ability to deal constructively with criticism and disagreement are an all too rare example that more should follow.
Wishing you all good things.
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As to your vote this year, I wouldn’t deign to tell you how to vote, but I do have a suggestion. From all of your videos it is clear to me that you are one of the most knowledgeable and authoritative voices on British politics out there. So, you must know that it’s more important right now, not just to get this particular brand of Tories out, but to lay down a lesson for the ages about who we are as Britons. I am hoping that the Tories do not even retain opposition status after this election and that the message becomes clear: The more far right wing your politics, the less chance you have of achieving power.
This election cycle promises at least that much opportunity. Whether the British people take it or not remains to be seen.
But, for myself, I have joined the tactical voting scheme that has grown and organised itself rather brilliantly around the country. They have websites which make it really easy to find out which candidate stands the greatest chance of defeating the Tory candidate in your area (and is not right of them politically) which they regularly update with the latest quality polling information. That information becomes vital in marginal seats.
In my area, in the East of Scotland, it is not the same, as the Tories don’t traditionally do well here anyway. But I have spread the word to my friends and family all around England and Wales, (I don’t know anyone in Northern Ireland) and given them the links showing them how easy it is to get genuinely helpful guidance, if your aim is simply to irradiate the Tories as a political entity.
Sorry, to get to my point: Please consider a tactical vote? If not, I would love to hear you account for why you think tactical voting is a bad idea, or just not for you personally; but, of course, I fully respect your right not to account for anything, let alone disclose your voting intention. Yet you did discuss it to some degree there.
With the campaign itself, having gained so much traction around the country, I do feel it is a worthy topic for your channel and you may like to share some thoughts on it in a more generalised discussion, perhaps?
Your output is so vast that it’s quite possible that you have already done this and I have missed it? Much as I’d love to see all of your videos, I cannot fit them is with everything else I’m trying to keep up with right now. But if you have already discussed tactical voting, perhaps you could direct me to that video?
Edit: I should add that the tactical voting website also gives helpful information on the local issues in your area, the voting records of the candidates and any public record titbits about their speeches, or other relevant facts about these candidates, that a voter may feel it is important to know.
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It has ceased to surprise me that people like Truss can be so mendacious, selfish and wilfully destructive of the very institutions upon which we rely for our democratic process. Is she so clinically thick that she cannot see what her casual abuse does to the country? Is she so deranged that she, “believes,” her own fantasies?
Imagine you’re watching the Wimbledon Tennis finals and, by some strange quirk of fate, the star British player pulls out of the match and is replaced by a random person in the audience. And when that random person is soundly thrashed, as all expected, in a humiliating defeat that the entire world watched on live services, she does not accept the reality that everyone else witnessed, but blames the umpire, the ball boys and ball girls, her coach, and her opponent’s trainers, of all conspiring against her in a conspiracy she dubbed, “the deep state.” These last years have been like that.
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I do so admire your capacity to conjoin compassion with rationality into one coherent thought process. We have much to learn from people like you.
And I am so glad to hear this terminology challenged. Let’s face it? The reason Tories use the term, “illegal migrant,” is purely manipulative and a psychological, “technique.” They want to instil racist mental images in the minds of the public; Muslim suicide bombers, Russian spies and a generally semi-vagrant, criminal underclass, skulking about our cities stealing to survive and stealing our jobs from under our noses too.
Two ironies with this (well, actually countless ironies, but the two I’ll mention are):
1: They are using the same technique that the Nazis used against Jews in the 1930’s, which are the same techniques that such people are fleeing, and would be fleeing from Britain if there was any substantive action being taken to back up the claims of their, “criminality.” But, as Robespierre points out, there have been no arrests, because migration and asylum seeking are not crimes.
2: The mental image of the, “illegal migrant,” these schemers foster is such a distortion that it results in unthinking people looking at their neighbours with suspicion, even if they have been born and bred in Britain, simply because their skin is the same colour as that of our PM and previous couple of Home Secretaries. And those same people then complain loudly in the pub about, “these illegals,” to a guy with white skin and an odd accent who is nodding along and not about to tell this bigot that he has outstayed his visa for years and would be deported under current laws!
All this, “government,” seems capable of is making up entirely false problems, promising to fix what no one saw as a problem until they started going on about it, and then making it worse by every empirical measure! They are a national security threat!
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Suella Braverman is that most dangerous cocktail of things; driven by pathological belief in her, “mission,” wrong headed, sociopathic and intellectually speaking, plain stupid. The reason for the, “Conservative crisis,” has far more to do with broken trust with the voters (a series of incompetent PM’s for example) due to their callous indifference to the real problems of average people.
It is useful, manipulative, to both the far right, “conservatives,” like her and people in the Farage Garage, to pretend that migration is the central issue of this election. But the stark reality is that we now pay record levels of tax while our public services are in record decline. And we’ve all seen that this was due to Brexit lies, theft, incompetence, callous indifference to Covid (and the previous mentioned issues), insider dealing, corruption and waste!
We’ve watched them make themselves, their friends and their families much richer at the direct cost of justice, fairness and the voters’ pockets.
But, let’s just come down to one basic case in point, shall we? As I see it, any cabinet minister who literally calls vast swathes of voters names, from the dispatch box, is unfit for ANY role in public life! Not just once, and not just one name, but a list of deliberately hurtful epithets, in several speeches, questions or pre-prepared responses to questions, DRIVING HOME the point that not only does she not care about what people who disagree with her think, but she actively hates them and seeks to punish them!
She is just wrong in every respect; factually, intellectually, emotionally, historically, you name it. Wrong and wrong headed. I genuinely believe she would benefit more from spending time with a good psychotherapist than in public life. She’s obviously deeply unhappy. But why is she entitled to make the rest of us live in her own personal hell with her?
Away with her. Forever!
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This Kursk incursion mission has multiple objectives; diplomatic, logistical, psychological, journalistic even and, of course, addressing the practical matter of defeating an illegal, terroristic, mafia style theft operation and invasion.
I agree with your guess that, if something big happens in Moscow or St Petersburg, “it will be fast.” The quality of life has diminished in Russia, even in the metropolitan centres, while money is getting more expensive and resources growing scarce. When the wheel turns in Russia, it is always sudden and, apparently, out of a clear blue sky.
The Russian revolution set a precedent that was, apparently, set in stone and has repeated itself multiple times over the last century or so. And it is the nature of the state apparatus that makes it so. The death of Stalin caused an upheaval because no one knew how to cope or what to do (I cannot recommend Armando Iannucci’s movie about that enough, btw) and then Nikita Khrushchev was suddenly deposed after losing his game of nuclear chicken with the Americans.
The fall of communism came out of that same clear blue sky so far as the west was concerned. Anyone who says they saw that coming is misremembering or lying to you. Then there was an attempted counter revolution by the old guard (which people barely remember these days) during which the Kremlin was besieged by tanks and from which emerged the figure of an apparent, “hero,” Boris Yeltsin, who turned out to be more of the same but without the restraints of communist doctrine to act as guard rails against his particular brand of debauchery and gangsterism.
The Wagner revolt was certainly not predicted by Putin, as was made so abundantly clear by the fact that there were no defences between Wagner and Moscow when they came barrelling up the motor way with, as you mentioned, the popular cheers of the people of Rostov at their backs. But that fell apart due to Prighozin’s allies backing out at the last moment. That was one time when Putin’s positioning of people into senior posts for their loyalty, not their ability, paid off.
Yet, what all of these events in Russian history have in common is, when it happens, it happens fast and, often, out of a clear blue sky.
So, settle in, buy some popcorn and enjoy the End Of Putin Show while it lasts. Look away from your screens for too long and you may miss a revolution?
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Streeting knows that saving the NHS from the stealth privatisation and outright sabotage of the Tories (so they could sell us complete privatisation as some kind of, “rescue plan”) will need to be explained to the public, as we will have to dig deep in our pockets and be patient waiting for meaningful results. To be quite frank, all major departments will need root and branch reform. And comprehensive reviews are a smart move, as the media will be filled with evidence of what the Tories were really up to behind closed doors, and subsequent committees will haul them over the coals.
And this will be better than letting the Tories get away with their usual playbook of screaming, “Oh look how expensive Labour’s plans are!” and, “We’re still waiting for results!” in every client media outlet. Expose them for what they did and show the public how it was a deliberate plan to sabotage the NHS so as to force us into a private, Americanised, “service,” that makes Tory friends and families rich . . . again! Go for it, Wes!
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@ilokivi : The myth of, “scarcity,” is the one that boils my blood, out of that huge list (that I don’t doubt we could compile together) because they exploit people’s fears into CAUSING that very scarcity (the, “who’s gonna’ pay for . . .?” mob) that everybody fears!
Some nations are on the brink of economic and social collapse, because they have ageing populations and not enough birth rates to replace the dwindling younger populations who would support their pensions and the growing need for elderly healthcare that all countries are seeing as life expectancy goes up. The Chinese are in a real crisis due to their, now reversed, single child policy and Russia too is at the top of that list, due to them squandering young men on an unwinnable war in Ukraine, and frightening off all their best and brightest youths, from their draft. At the last count, over a million service aged men have fled Russia in the last year.
And what would Britain benefit most from, right now? An injection of young adults, who will have babies and generate taxable income and economic growth? Perhaps the sort of younger people who have the courage and gumption to risk reprisal rather than commit genocide? Perhaps the sorts of people from all over the world willing to risk life and limb because they say NO to fascists and demagogues? Those people educated enough and committed enough to get here, willing to do the million or so jobs (at last count) that we Brits feel are beneath us, like picking crops, cleaning the streets, warehouse work, etc?
The very solutions to our problems are on our doorstep, literally banging on the door and asking to be let in, but our government wrongly believes that they can stir up Nazi levels of hatred against, “the other,” and desperately cling to power like limpet mines, going off and taking another chunk of the country’s institutions with them, destroying the very foundations of our identity and law, for their sociopathic egos and greed.
I’m not expecting any great insights or meaningful leadership from Labour, but at least they don’t encourage fascism in their party! So, I’ll take them over the Tories any day of the week.
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@ConradAinger : I was speaking of the industrially advanced nations in which war, famine and pandemics are not common and do not happen at all on their native soil (for the most part). The countries of the whole continent of Africa are not susceptible to the same analysis, largely because their development was arrested and exploited by empires well into the late 20th century. And these days they are still being exploited by empire builders, but in a more deliberately hidden and perverted fashion. China and Russia are the main culprits in that regard, but far from the only ones.
Or, to put it more simply; countries in which war, famine and epidemics are still a regular occurrence, while the vested interests of large oil, mineral and nuclear companies work hand in glove for the governments of their respective nations, (toppling a dictatorship or a democracy here, replacing it with a more cooperative dictatorship or democracy there) still have a direct influence in the outcomes of these wars and disputes, the same measuring stick does not apply.
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I believe she will seek to settle out of court in the civil case. I do not believe you are being too hard on her though. Far from it!
How utterly tone deaf is it, for ANY politician to flaunt their wealth at any time? Let alone at a time when the number of food banks is only growing and the number of children falling below the poverty line is increasing. All as a direct result of Tory policies. She really does cut a Marie Antoinette figure.
But, the fact that none of the whips dressed her down for this behaviour, or even explained to her why it would be perceived as trolling the general public, the poorer one is, the more painful their conclusions, says so much about the degenerate state of morality in modern politics. No one intervened. She did it over and over again.
WTF did she EXPECT! I’m afraid the Sans-Culottes will be coming for her Capet head. It’s bad enough when people rub their wealth in the faces of the poor and blame them for their own predicament. But to do so as a politician is unacceptable in its lack of decorum. And to do so as a titled (en-titled) privileged politician, the public can only perceive that as a direct threat!
The fact that she doesn’t understand this alone, is proof of her unfitness for her position. But, the fact that she swooped in to a national crisis, carpet bag in hand, is truly sickening. “Off with her head,” I say. Metaphorically speaking, of course.
But can we not at least empathise with those who have lost loved ones and whom may well have calculated that her actions contributed to the deaths of their nearest and dearest? Can we blame them for wanting to do murder? I at least empathise with them, having lost my father to Covid.
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Sunak’s JOB is to REPRESENT our nation, not speak FOR us, nor take into his own hands the personal squabbles he wishes to start at our EXPENSE! He is meant to be an ADULT capable of speaking to his counterpart, face to face, as arranged. Frankly, the average Britain (not me) will have no opinion about the Marbles and be more concerned with matters like Ukraine’s security, and TRADE! He simply has NO RIGHT, regardless of the issue. It’s not just a STUPID hill to die on, but it was utterly unnecessary! Face the man, Rishi, you abject COWARD!
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@neilwarren4573 : And at the heart of that squalid pit of vipers will be the producers; the silent assassins, who spread gossip, whisper in the apprentice’s ears and tell them, “You should not stand for that,” or something to that effect. I saw a documentary looking at how the producers of the Jeremy Kyle show worked from the shadows, skilfully and with experience, manipulating the weaknesses, fears and vulnerabilities of their, “guests,” with such aplomb that they could send them out onto the stage like emotional suicide bombers, giving maximum, “entertainment,” value at the cost of every day after for the rest of the participants’ lives.
Real sociopaths. If I met someone in a bar, who introduced themselves to me as a producer on such a show, I don’t know if I could be responsible for myself! And if I did allow myself to slap them (involuntarily, of course) I would feel as though such a dangerous manipulator cannot be left to avenge themselves on me, with all the resources and zero morality they command, so I would have to dispose of their remains somewhere quiet.
Of course, I’m not serious. But my contempt for such people, informed by my own damaging experience of manipulators, stirs such dark feelings in me, even now, that I would have no sympathy for any one of them, should they meet such an end at someone else’s hands. That’s awful, I know. And I should be ashamed of myself. But it’s honest.
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You have to suck it and see with policies like these. To many elites, money isn’t the issue, but the name of the institution and exclusivity of being in the, “club.” People ALWAYS, “threaten,” to walk away when their wallets are threatened. And, for many elites, they are used to such tantrums being sufficient to get their own way. But most are just bluster, in my experience, like the people who say they’ll leave the country if the Tories lose the election, yet whom never leave. Call their bluff.
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@dorsetbigcats6292 : What makes you think I, “accept,” anything from Wikipedia? Read my words more carefully. My point is that Mr Yaxley-Lennon does not challenge this description of him. He has never asked Wiki to change it, so they claim.
The fact that you leapt, so readily, to the wrong conclusion, does not speak highly of your processing skills, but we all make mistakes before our first coffee of the day, so I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt. However, I would urge you to consider treating people you don’t know with better basic manners? Raise a question, by all means; outright challenge my conclusions; but there’s no call for you to disparage me, simply because you don’t like what I have to say.
I expressed no opinion. Only fact.
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Would it not be better if people like you, sensible, intelligent, compassionate, thoughtful, “influential,” set aside time to discuss the likes of Farage in a summary discussion once a week? Yes, we cannot ignore him, and we cannot dismiss his role in the riots (which I suspect is far deeper and more forewarned than he’s letting on) and a discussion about how to defeat the message of the far right must be had. But the fatal error here is that you discuss Farage several times a day! Your followers have Farage on their minds each day and will be discussing him with their friends, families and colleagues, because YOU talk about little else these days!
Please don’t mischaracterise this comment as a call to ignore Farage completely? But I do think it is genuinely game changing when the grownups re-contextualise far right leaders and most importantly, STOP giving them exactly what they want! Which is their faces, voices and words in the headlines as much as possible.
When you talk about Farage to such a disproportionate extent, you make him much bigger in the minds of the general public, and it becomes more plausible in the public consciousness that such a man could assume more power, because he has always loomed so large on the political landscape. It should be shocking to everyone that such a man is even in Parliament, let alone such a big influence on the nation’s woes.
I don’t know exactly how you view yourself as a, “player,” on the political stage, but you must know that you are influential? And with that influence comes responsibility. Not just the type of responsibility that you are accustomed to as an educator (which I don’t doubt is comprehensive enough) but as a YouTuber, you also (I would hope?) are aware of the journalistic responsibilities of a broadcaster?
I really worry that you are making a mistake by making Farage far too big a focus for discussion, making him far more powerful than he should be, and playing directly into his hands. Sometimes, having smart observations to share and not making them can be frustrating. But Farage is the one individual who would be most gratified by what you are doing here. And I think you should give serious thought to reconsidering your approach to him.
I apologise for such a long comment, but I assure you I am completely sincere and, as the record shows, a genuine admirer of you and your work.
If I am wrong, please show me how so?
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It’s like listening to the testimony of an alcoholic who has just been hauled out of the gutter directly after their latest binge. In the manner of an alcoholic, these people simply, flatly refuse to acknowledge that there even is a problem, let alone ANY possibility of a remedy. You cannot solve a problem unless you admit it EXISTS. And therein lies the issue.
These people have remained steadfast in denial, while the Post Office has run itself into the ground, letting down its customers, actively promoting competition and destroying the lives of their best staff in the process.
Now, call me paranoid if you wish but, when I see government hacks being given a gong for actively destroying a British institution, I can only conclude that this was their goal from the outset. There are countless delivery services in Britain now. Every time I receive a parcel or piece of mail I seem to get an email from some new company I’d never heard of before, asking me to, “give feedback,” on the quality of their service.
I would bet real money that some senior Tory policy makers are also accepting large, “donations,” from the owners of Evri and Lord knows what other fleet of foot delivery services that have been capitalising on the decline of our standard Royal Mail.
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The Prime Minister needs to remove the current Chair of the BBC and appoint a new, unbiased one, with actual journalistic or editorial experience and NO history of being a major donor to any party.
I have no problem with the BBC honouring their contract with Edwards up to the point where he was proved to be guilty of a crime. And, assuming that he gave assurances that he intended to prove his innocence. I don’t know if that was the case, but I would hope it was. The nature of the contract itself, whether they were paying him too much, is another issue. But, if they had been assured of his innocence, they should sue for those wages paid from the point of the arrest, on the basis that he lied to them. That should be cut and dried . . . ?
I stand with you on the notion of censorship. Rolf Harris, much like Jimmy Saville, did public information films about being safe in the water (chillingly, surrounded by children in swimwear) but I don’t intend to drown myself or my offspring due to the revelations about the man.
The current state of the BBC reflects the broader problem of OFCOM being a bunch of Tory pals in an organisation with no teeth even if they did decide to do their jobs. We should be hearing from them on EVERY SINGLE issue that involves moral dilemmas and where thoughtful guidance is needed. That organisation is completely meaningless as it is and THAT is the problem.
We NEED a centralised independent overseer of all media in this country, with subpoena powers and the powers to make firm recommendations that will be followed. AND they should have the power to make referrals to the Crown Prosecution Service! We need an organisation with teeth, staffed with believers who understand how important these issues are to democracy and the democratic process as a whole.
As it is, the BBC does not represent the nation, or the nation’s interests. And, as you touch on, this act of censorship looks more like a personal act of censureship, in a lame attempt to, “punish,” a man who hurt their feelings.
And what of all the other artists, writers, technicians and producers who made that episode of Dr Who, who are now to be punished along with Huw Edwards? Why should they be flogged along with the guilty and innocent alike? It makes no sense. Especially since people will already have their box sets, which will now have a, “special,” collector’s value. You can’t block ANYTHING in the internet age. But you can act out of hubris and make more money for those willing to exploit your hubristic foolishness.
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I read some excerpts from this, (soon to be pulped, or bought up in bulk by her mates) “memoir.” These are NOT the Alan Clarke or Tony Ben diaries, are they? Not actually interesting, insightful, funny, witty, or revealing anything about the machinations of Westminster that we didn’t already know, or hadn’t guessed at.
Let’s face it? You KNOW as soon as any scene is set up, exactly how it’s going to play out, in the same way that you know how an adolescent’s self justifications are going to play out, when they air their unedifying grievances on Twitter about some group of, “Mean Girls,” they recently fell out with over a boyfriend!
In terms of fabulation, she has more in common with Geoffrey Archer. And that utterly disingenuous pretence that she’s quoting from her diaries, as written at the time, when everyone and their pet knows that she’s making it all up after the fact, to fit a 20/20 hindsight, that somehow still manages to be factually skewed, simply because her book is NOT a great, “revelation,” at all. It is the squalling of an angry toddler, who, “took her bat and ball home,” when she was refused her gong (the one decision of Sunak’s that I can get behind) and who will do anything to stay in the limelight to which she has become so addicted.
Just one more shrill screech of attention seeking and sour grapes from an intellectual midget who has had far too much attention already. It’s way past her bedtime and I dearly wish someone would just put her out of our misery.
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He has a very warm, naturalistic and comfortable performance style. And the Dem advisors have started him out with a stroke of genius, contrasting him with the, “weirdness,” of both his opposition candidates and their invasive policies that belie their, “conservative,” credentials, such as controlling women’s bodies, arresting women and doctors for crossing state lines for abortions and many other, “Big State,” policies.
Both the Republican candidates are plainly, “weird,” on multiple levels and, “weird,” has become the Democrat buzz word, as it is striking a resounding chord with voters. Americans don’t like interfering governments and Republicans are supposed to stand for the opposite of what they stand for now. They want to micro manage free speech and are LITERALLY BURNING BOOKS!!!
I for one am particularly impressed with Walz. My second favourite, “Tim.”
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The more we learn, the more dismayed I feel. The duplicity, mismanagement and criminality seems all set to go unpunished. By mixing their responsibilities like this, they have managed to create such an unpickable legal knot that I am reminded of Charles Dickens’s, “Circumlocution Offices.”
And I suspect it has all been deliberate. Another plan to promote the private interests of rival businesses, in a similar manner to the stealth privatisation of the Health Service? But now backfiring?
The only hope for a remedy that I can see (and it’s one that this corrupt network of clowns will never go for) would be to replace the entire upper tier of management of both The Post Office and Royal Mail, forthwith. Set up a new, independent inquiry, but have it lead by the QC who is willing to take charge of the running of both organisations, with a view to replacing the upper management and harmonising their respective services.
That way, the inquiry can be certain that no one can interfere with evidence, or have to battle to get access to evidence (as has been the case in the current inquiry) and that no one with a vested interest in protecting their own reputation has any further access to anything pertinent. They will only be appearing at the inquiry as ex-employees, to defend their records.
Meantime, the job of rebuilding the new postal service can continue unhindered.
And, while we’re at it, perhaps Kier Starmer can ask, will the tax payers be able to look forward to a reduction in taxes that reflects the reduction in public services? If we’re no longer getting weekend deliveries, we should not have to continue paying for them, surely?
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I said that Fujitsu was directly profiting from all of this. Any monies that could not be paid back by the victims will have been insured against criminal theft, so they will have put in claims for that. But now we learn they were charging to give evidence which they KNEW was unsafe! That is a criminal conspiracy! They need to be investigated by Scotland Yard and charged!
Yes. These victims need 1) Full exoneration: Certainly honours are due to those who worked so tirelessly on behalf of their fellow victims.
2) Full Compensation: Including costs, inflation adjusted for any and ALL losses incurred, not just the enforced repayments of monies they never took, but damaged credit ratings, other losses of interest in their savings, or sold assets to make good the amounts, and any other related losses through legal fees, lost business opportunities, depreciation of assets, etc.
3) Damages: A high figure to each individual, so they never have to worry about money again. A figure representing emotional damages, psychological damages, losses to the grieving relatives of the suicide cases, and representative of the hard work victims were forced to put in to restore their good names (still pending from a legal point of view), etc. All aspects of their suffering and time lost should be represented in that figure.
4) Punitive Damages: Again, an eye-wateringly high figure, representing the damage Fujitsu has done to the Post Office’s and the government’s reputations, the harm to public trust in their institutions, the time that it has taken, the bad faith they showed in their submissions of evidence and their, “cooperation,” with the enquiry, which the judge has already left comments on the record about, the callousness of their disregard for hard evidence and their CONSPIRACY to cover up their mistakes at ANY cost, including that of human life, quite literally! The tax payers deserve to be made whole and to have their faith in the legal system upheld too.
5) A Criminal Investigation: Separate from this enquiry, but using the evidence referred to above, which shows beyond question that the spirit and letter of the law was recklessly disregarded in a conspiracy against these victims, the government (who are the shareholders and therefore owners of the Post Office) and against the tax paying public: the funders of the government.
And it must be STIPULATED that ALL remedial measures to relieve the victims will be taken as a matter of urgency and ARE NOT to be held up by any further enquiries. Even if a special bill needs to be passed in the House in order for this to take place.
6) A Review of the Honours System: to include the King’s representatives alongside the government’s, with a view to stripping honours from all those who took part in this conspiracy and were in any way responsible, either criminally or through sheer stupidity, and ensuring that the credibility and respectability of of honours is not further diminished by such appalling miscarriages of justice, by root and branch review and reordering.
I know I’m living out a fantasy here. Howling at the moon, even. But all of the above steps, carried out swiftly and with the same determination and urgency that Fujitsu and the PO showed in their commitment to conspiracy, framing people and getting false confessions out of them, would be the only way I could see for justice to be done. And if the Prime Minister was to lead the way on this, it might do his otherwise appalling fortunes some actual good in the polls?
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I know I don’t sound particularly Christmas spirited, but when I think of Michelle Mone fighting to lift herself out of hardship (if not actual poverty) I see a woman who looked down on all those like herself and felt the urge to exploit them, after pulling up the ladder of escape behind herself.
Mone is the sort of person who gets on the Titanic life boat and launches it before anyone else can get aboard, so as to have all the extra supplies. In a well ordered society she would be in jail by now. In many ways, she is worse than the narcissists and wasters born into privilege, because she knows what she is condemning others to, first hand.
Perhaps she is Americanised, or just plain stupid, enough to believe that she can somehow rescue herself in the court of public opinion, but I doubt it? I fear the possibility that she could, but I stand by my previous comments, that she only did that car crash BBC interview so as to ensure her threats of grassing reached the other politicians who are not taking her calls right now.
And should those people cave to her threats, they may well stymy the process, but she will remain ruined, sooner or later, if not actually imprisoned.
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As I understand it, this Foxian, “rugging,” debacle comes down to the GB Bees’s, “journalist,” in question, who allowed the comment to pass unchallenged and, from what I hear, giggled along and actively encouraged the hateful performance?
The man himself is clearly filth, with no place in the public sphere, let alone discussing journalists or anywhere NEAR politics. But the incel mindset pervades the webosphere and is being fed by people like Fox and, as we can see, GB Bees, because that’s what happens when the entitled start losing; they get very angry and aggressive and try to threaten their way to the results they’re used to.
I’m always pleased to receive threats, personally. It is a sure indication that I have won my argument and that my opponents have none to counter with. Plus, I don’t fear anyone. However, it’s just not the same for women. Choosing my words with equal care, here: The evidence is that women can be victims of, “involuntary rugging,” and that 90% of the perpetrators will never even be charged with anything, let alone see the inside of a court room. And the conviction rate is even more depressing, when combined with the investigation statistics.
But then, that’s why cowards target women in this way. They certainly don’t have the courage to risk any personal skin in the game.
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I am going to ask you for your empathy. And I beg your patience, since this comment turned out far longer than I intended when I began. Please believe my sincerity and hear my point?
Look, Prof Wilson, surely you can see that this behaviour is unfair on your viewers and somewhat confusing? You are normally so sound on political matters, indeed, the voice of reason and calm when all about us are losing their heads. Yet, you repeatedly make this astonishing claim about Putin without EVER responding to the very reasonable request to offer SOME REASON as to WHY you believe this, let alone EVIDENCE or even LINKS to your sources or articles . . . ANYTHING!
I don’t understand WHY you are doing this? Do you want to convince us? Then give your evidence. Do you want us to research it for ourselves? Then SAY SO! Maybe give us a starting point? Are you just trolling us with unsubstantiated, outrageous claims of Trumpian proportions? Then, please stop it!
I wish I could convey the effect this has on me personally and probably many other disconcerted viewers. I come to you as a TRUSTED source of political discussion, sketch offerings, debate, think pieces, etc. I have disagreed with you on several occasions, but NEVER ONCE have I doubted your honesty, integrity or compassion.
To a man like me, an agoraphobic, with several mental health conditions, who consequently doesn’t get out much, you are a man upon whom I can rely, for some well adjusted, thoughtful, compassionate, well informed and often surprisingly entertaining videos, to which I turn for help with processing world events; you help me to see other points of view; help me through my, often, troubled days.
I like you, personally, (from what I see presented) and believe that, if we ever met (vanishingly unlikely, but) you and I would get along famously.
Yet, PLEASE try to imagine for yourself what it might FEEL like if one of your most reliable, TRUSTED sources of information AND solace; a person to whom you turn for sensible, dare I say, “comforting,” input, suddenly kept making an allegation like, “Kier Starmer is not the real PM, but a doppelgänger,” and every single time you asked, “What makes you think that?” they flatly ignore you. They reply to other questions and comments, but NEVER this one. They offer no evidence, no reason for you to agree with their findings, and behave as though it’s all just a bit of fun. And they repeatedly assert it as though it were established fact, heedless of any effect such a destabilising assertion may have on their broader following or how that ripples out into the wider community.
How would that make YOU feel?
Someone you trust, like and rely upon as an oasis of sanity in a world gone mad, on this one particular issue, simply will not stop making these completely (to me) groundless allegations that have implications for everyone on Earth! And they flatly will not offer you ANY reasoning behind their thinking, let alone a SOURCE!
For me, it ultimately leaves me saddened. I honestly thought you were one of the, “normals,” not one of the conspiracy nut jobs. But how else does one describe a man who makes these outrageous assertions with no evidence?
If I have missed your evidence, links or whatever, in a previous video, please direct me to that? But, PLEASE!? For the love of Mike!? Will you please STOP making these assertions, UNLESS you site your EVIDENCE (even if it is just links under your video) and back up your claims EACH TIME you make them? You SHOULD be offering links to your sources in every single video in which you make this claim. You must understand that?
Can’t you see how irresponsible this behaviour is??? You realise some people actually take you seriously, right???
From a genuine admirer, a long time subscriber and a sincere commenter, I ask you, please consider what I am asking of you with an open mind?
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@CloudyMcCloud00 : That opening comment is unfair and unfounded. You know nothing about me or my capacity for, “self reliance.” Nor do I, “invest emotional and intellectual capital in someone else’s [specific] viewpoint.” My investment is in him, as a man of standing and standards, which he appears to be letting down in this regard. If he never replies to me, and chooses to make this (to me) unfounded allegation to the end of his days, I will be disappointed and he will slip in my estimation. But - and I thank you for your, “concern,” - the experience will not break me. I will continue to be happy and handsome, regardless.
As to his responses to comments, he and I have engaged on previous topics, so I can evidence the fact that he does read at least some of the comments. He has explained his reasoning as to why he puts out his own likes, (“seal of approval?” whatever you wish to call it) in previous videos, of which you are demonstrably unaware.
But, in the end, patronising strangers merely for the sake of it is the behaviour of an internet troll in my view. Your whole comment could be summed up as, “I don’t like or trust Prof Wilson,” seasoned with the familiar trolly trope of, “Do your own research.”
In that context, let us ask: Was the really ANY point to your comment at all?
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@CloudyMcCloud00 : As I explained, my capital is invested in him, not what he says, per se. I respect and admire his sincerity, honesty and willingness to risk ridicule for his beliefs, let the chips fall where they may. Even when I disagree with him I find him knowledgeable and well informed, as well as often entertaining.
I took a risk of my own, by attempting to reach the man on a different level, sharing some of my own experience in that process, in order to make clear my sincerity. But there is the broader responsibility of an educator and broadcaster to think of in his case too. Something he has chided others for failing to respect.
None of that is to say I, “depend,” upon him in any way, certainly not emotionally. I don’t even depend on people I know, but I’ve had that sort of a life. An impassioned argument is not necessarily a passionate argument, and I think that is where the confusion lies. I probably expressed myself poorly, as it was a stream of consciousness.
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Richie Sunack was already getting his excuses in, blaming Labour for this, before it happened, so he must have had some forewarning? Of course, the logical amongst us know that the Tories have such a large majority in the Second House that it is impossible to blame Labour Lords for this, much as Kier Starmer would love to take credit for blocking such an unpopular bill.
As you said in a previous video, Sunack needs to stick to what he knows: finance. And he needs to stop trying to be a, “politician,” because he’s so bad at it, it’s literally painful to watch him try! His interviews are always, without fail, cringeworthy, because he doesn’t know how to communicate with, “Normals.”
Outside of Westminster NO ONE gives a DAMN about, “the boats,” much less wants to, “stop,” them. They care about their bills, the cost of food and fuel, their job and pension security and the broader thinking ones care about the country’s reputation in the world.
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And because they know that the civil war to follow will be the most unedifying, wretched event in Tory history. Labour will be able to bury a lot of bad news under the headlines of yet another allegation or criminal conviction levelled at ex Tory MP’s in the next year at the very least, if not two or three years.
It is a joy to me to see the Tories paying the price for populism, flinging open their doors to every incompetent grifter or far right nut job, just because they could win them a seat in the short term, with no thought to the future of their party or anything so esoteric as, “ideology.”
Why would an ambitious old school, “Conservative,” with 1950’s values, want any part of the blood bath to come? They could barely keep their hands off each other’s throats in the last three years! Now all of those, “guest,” players who think they own the Tories and want to see swastikas on the board of education’s logo, or just want one last chance to raid the country’s coffers before losing the respectability that being in a political party conferred on them, can’t believe it’s all coming to an abrupt end! They thought they could plot against Sunack until next year at least!
Best summer ever.
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They’re simply frustrated, Prof Wilson, that they cannot issue direct threats for fear of losing their platforms or being arrested for incitement. So these, “premonitions,” and doom mongerings are all they dare to spit out at us. That type of intimidation tactic works on cowards like them, so they assume it will work on the rest of us, not realising that it merely stiffens our resolve to crush these monsters who demonise the desperate, victimise those in need and who use others as their goons to carry out their violence, whilst they hide away in their safe spaces.
Starky is a classic example of a gammon faced loon, masquerading as an, “intellectual,” and bleating because he sees the far right being rejected on all fronts. He criticises the Tories for, “failing to address,” these issues, whilst he is FAILING TO ADDRESS that very issue! The Tories CREATED these divisions, deliberately and he KNOWS IT! And he played his role in that. Now he’s bleating because their tactics FAILED and British decency won out over the indolent, craven Tory plan to set us at each others throats while they loot the country and sell it off piecemeal!
Now people on the right wing, who see that trump is about to lose the election in America, therefore Ukraine will get increased support to defeat Putin and the Labour Party has comprehensively defeated the Tories at home, are simply livid that they’ve lost.
Their only plan B is probably a coup! Just as trump is planning one in America, again. We should be prepared for them on every front. And hold those low level threateners to account, rather than slap them on the back for having, “foresight.” The only insight people like Starky have comes from their conspiracies and plotting.
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@dogglebird4430: That last comment is simply not true. Do you think that the Nazi Party had, “Exterminate 6,000,000 Jews,” in their campaign leaflets? Adolf never had the vast majority of his policies in the campaign literature at all. That always comes AFTER his election. But, as your dog will explain to you, you cannot get around the FACT that Reform is where the former BNP candidates are now! When the fascists are IN YOUR PARTY, that’s a pretty big giveaway.
And you don’t have to be a, “fascist,” to vote Reform, as you may just be less politically aware, manipulated, or simply less intelligent than your own politicised dog. But if you are a fascist, Reform is the only party you can vote for.
Are we learning yet, son?
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@dogglebird4430 : A) A political ideology is not the same thing as the personal bigotry that people build parties around.
B) Hitler never put, “Start a world war and exterminate 6,000,000 Jews,” on his campaign leaflets. Why? Because he didn’t have to. Simply, “not,” admitting to being racist in your publicity doesn’t stop you from being a racist.
C) Most Labour members with, “former,” extremist ideologies I don’t trust either, but they aren’t racists.
D) Most Labour members with, “former,” extremist ideologies have since then disavowed their past and claimed to have grown out of it, making apologies for former statements or associations where necessary. Your racists have never even admitted being at fault, let alone apologised for anything.
E) You can check all of this with your politicised dog. Which I’d be willing to bet is one of those, “dangerous,” breeds on a government list?
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@dogglebird4430 : Where does it even suggest that people don’t change their political views in my comments? Pay attention. I was pointing out the disingenuous nature of your defence of people who have never accounted for their shady political pasts, never apologised far past offences, never addressed any, “change in political views,” or claimed any. You seem to think they have changed their views, with zero evidence. Unlike people in the Labour Party who have publicly accounted for their past views, associations and memberships and apologised if and when necessary. That is what we call, “hypocrisy,” due to the obvious double standard.
I didn’t read the rest of your comment, because, again, TLDR.
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It’s what happens when a party implodes. Brexit brought the Tories to a point of internal battle that had been brewing for generations, but which they had never quite had to face before, or just had very strong leadership who took no prisoners when enacting their own vision of dealing with Europe.
It’s all because of that craven lust for power, that lead them down the path of flinging open their doors to anyone who looked like they could win their seat in that moment and give them the numbers they needed for a majority. They let in more and more fringe types with extremist views, more and more dodgy types, with criminal connections but lots of money, and they made a special effort to let in the, “personality politicians,” with their amusing haircuts and entertaining line of patter that gets a larf on Have I Got News For You, without checking ANYONE’S record, background or credentials. As the old guard, the ones with quaint, old fashioned things like, “ideologies,” and, “beliefs,” retired, the remaining MP’s increasingly found that these new kids weren’t content to simply play a role as show ponies, but they demanded a seat at the top table and started acting like they owned the place.
Then Brexit happened and it was the flashpoint between, “Are we isolationists and extremists, or are we centrist, single nation, leaning to conservative, ‘values,’ kind of Tories?” And they had to confront this finally, in the sort of battle that is usually fought in the respectable privacy of a period out of office, because it was HAPPENING right now, and they saw that the sort of Brexit we get now, will define them and the country for generations. So they’ve been fighting among themselves ever since! In the most unedifying and disgraceful fashion at times.
They even had the Home Office minister using the dispatch box to call the nation NAMES and deliberately deepen division! The one minister whom you’d expect to at least pay lip service to uniting Britain was (and still is, from the side lines) screaming for the most extreme, un-British, exploitation of THE most vulnerable people on EARTH (asylum seekers) as her personal political football, with a scheme that was so heartless and insane Charles Dickens would have blushed!
I site that example because it crystallises what was really going on. It was an attempt on the part of the party’s minority to hijack the defining characteristics of the party and make it seem to stand for this new, extremist vision, like we have become Cold War East Germany or something! Overnight!
Ask yourself this question. Before this all became the hot topic of the day, do remember what the world was like? How it was a world wide discussion about how global weather patterns, various conflicts and economic pressures were going to cause an influx of asylum seekers all over the western world; and the fact that we needed to seek some international cooperation and planning to deal with it, before it gets out of hand? Then this whole, “Stop The Boats!” drama was literally dropped on us out of a clear blue sky!? Remember? Like ANYONE has ASKED for that? Or thought it an urgent issue in quite the same way that the extremists did?
Again, that’s just one example. But my point here (and if you’re still with me, thank you for your patience) is there was a catastrophic period of backstabbing and internal division (still far from settled) that killed off all the leading politicians and when the dust settled, they looked around and saw that there were no actual educated, experienced, articulate, well informed politicians left! They’d betrayed them all, driven them off into retirement, or otherwise disillusioned and frightened off their most trusted and talented people!
All they had left to draw on were the dregs! The people who would, in the normal state of things, be staffers, fetching the coffee or doing the paperwork. And THAT’S why they’re SO BAD at their jobs. They’re just not the real thing anymore. None of them have the least clue what they’re doing, how to handle the press, how to speak in public and how to avoid one catastrophic gaff after another! Half of them don’t even want to be there, and I honestly think Sunack is one of them!
He’s already had a no confidence vote and was probably (as I believe will be revealed after the election) being threatened with yet another palace coup! Why put up with this snake pit of entitled, talentless, unqualified nonentities, all clawing their way to Number 10 over the destroyed bodies of their colleagues, when he could be sitting in a Californian air conditioned corner office, having the staff bring him what he wants, making lots of money and working on his memoirs?
They just don’t have anyone left capable of doing the job and their leader has given up on his own party and probably wants to avenge himself on them, seeing as how they’ve ensured that he will go down in history as the leader who lead them to their worst ever defeat and possibly off the opposition benches altogether. With that kind of a legacy staring you in the face, what else is there to do but ensure you get a little revenge? Especially if you’re the sort of politician who doesn’t EVER think about piffling tiny matters like, “the good of the country,” or the suffering of your fellow beings?
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@massivehero4871 : Yeah, you, “could go on.” Please don’t. Farage is King Cnut telling the tide to stop. You can’t just say, “zero net migration,” and watch as it happens, son. But, people who know better than you will explain why we NEED, “positive net migration,” to grow our economy, our workforce, our power. Shrinking populations is the biggest threat to western development in the developed world.
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@peteredwards338 : Oh, that old classic. I was wondering how long it would take before someone wheeled out the hoary old, “They’re as bad as each other,” false equivalency scam. Anyone who genuinely thinks that this current iteration of the Labour Party is anywhere NEAR as corrupt, inept, wilful, entitled, callously indifferent to human suffering, bogus, wasteful and at times, downright criminal, as the Tory Party, simply hasn’t been paying attention.
But then again, most trolls don’t even live in Britain anyway.
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@peteredwards338 : Oh, here we go, with the old, “False Equivalency Scam.” When the track record of your, “team,” is too shameful to defend, just say, “Well, they’re all as bad as each other.” That old copout usually works on the weak minded. And you don’t need a single, “fact,” at your disposal either.
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@peteredwards338 : Oh, here we go, with the old, “False Equivalency,” chestnut. When the track record of your, “team,” is too shameful to defend, just say, “Well, they’re all as bad as each other.” That old copout usually works on the weak minded. And you don’t need a single, “fact,” at your disposal either.
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Indeed, simply not being Tory was not enough. Gordon Brown was ousted largely because people felt his tenure had begun anti-democratically, with a back room deal. Many liberal voters (with a small, “l”) like myself, were so disillusioned that they couldn’t bring themselves to vote for anyone. I voted Liberal, because of the promise to get rid of student debt. Genuinely. I had three teens to think about at that time. Well, that was a mistake. But Brown was deeply unpopular.
In that sense, the Tories are so openly corrupt and contemptuous of law and order, and their lies about Covid, Brexit, Taxes, the NHS, etc, so plain for all to see, that they are unpopular enough to lose comprehensively. But the landslide that Labour hopes for would only materialise if one of their more popular personalities (GOD! I hate the very notion of, “personality politics!”) were to take the helm, like Angela Rayner. But that’s not going to happen in a party that is desperate to show its consistency and stability before the election.
BTW, Have you considered writing and directing Election: The Musical? You’d be excellent in it if you leaned on the humour and empathy. 😉
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@2november1917BD : It’s a mess to be sure, but I can’t help wondering how much the press are responsible for in all this? The Royals have long been subscribed to this Faustian pact, particularly with the right wing media, and it frequently blows up in their faces, with them seeming to learn nothing. Like politicians, “briefing against,” their enemies, the press leaks stories about particular royals just to keep the kettle boiling and the soap drama drawing in viewers. In such a toxic environment, it’s hard to know what’s true.
The fact that this has historically been the case with the royals is evidenced by the fact that the idea of a royal (Edward VII) being the true identity of Jack The Ripper caught fire so easily in fiction and popular speculation. It was just so easy to believe of any family with that much power, money and secrecy; all three of which are necessarily protected by the state!
I doubt any of us really know the facts in this case. Nor are we likely to until they’re all long gone. That Edward is a nasty piece of work, I have no doubt. But the extent of his depravity is probably yet to be revealed. I feel like I will be the only person who isn’t going to be surprised.
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Indeed, I believe that at least some of those, “advisors,” represent a bigger threat to the institution of British royalty than do the royals themselves. Charles needs to act swiftly, show good faith and good intention, and put away Andrew: exile him, sooner, rather than later. That must take place as prelude to reconciliation with Harry and Megan. Regardless of the mistakes they may or may not have made (and who among us can claim we would do any better in their shoes?) they are clearly decent people with good intentions. Andrew is demonstrably not. He represents a threat to the legacy of Queen Elizabeth II, as much as anything else. And his ongoing presence in the country is a distraction. It rests with Charles now, to take responsibility and act, as both head of his family and head of state. For the sake of his duty, he has no alternative.
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@Tvjunkieful12 : There is more evidence than that. And we know the photo has not been, “tampered with,” as it has already been tested. There are the lies Andrew has told. And I’m not just referring to risible abject falsehoods, like, “I don’t sweat.” His denials were firm in the beginning until the proof shifted him back into the retreating rhetoric of, “Well, I don’t recall.” He lied about his visit to a pizza restaurant, also now a proven fact.
As other journalists have pointed out, Scotland Yard has previously opened investigations on far less evidence before. Yet his track record of lying, the photographic evidence and multiple eye witness accounts are not enough for them to even look into the case? . . . Odd, don’t you think?
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“Ignorance,” is not to Miriam’s, “credit,” is it? If she’d been doing her job, she would have been aware of the abuses going on under her watch, as you said. Tories still don’t grasp how exhausted we voters are with the same old tired excuses, constantly being trotted out. Frankly, I don’t believe her.
Here’s an irony for you. The sorts of people who think conversion therapy (regarding sexual identity or proclivity) is a worth while enterprise, are the sorts of people who really would benefit from intervention and therapy.
I am a Christian believer, if a poor example for my faith. There is no prohibition against homosexuality as a, “life choice,” in the Bible, that I know of. When we read terms like, “abomination,” in connection with, “Sodom,” or, “sodomy,” we are reading a story about sexual violence, not consent.
But, wilful misinterpretation is meat and drink to most, “Christian,” churches. It’s was more authoritative to tell Galileo that he’s defying, “scriptures,” than for him to get away with telling them, “No. You’ve read it wrong,” which would have resulted in an instant violent sentencing. Nothing in science, “contradicts,” scripture, as my youngest daughter will attest who has just passed her PhD and become a Doctor of Physics at St Andrews University.
It so often comes down to vicious little cliques, wilfully exploiting the vagaries of dubious translations of the Bible for their own ends. I doubt Christ will find many Christians in the churches if and when he comes back for us.
I certainly know that many Christians don’t even know that we are not meant to live by the laws of the Old Testament at all! Jesus was pretty unambiguous about this! But, churches tend to be hypocritical in their selective adherence to the Old Testament ways, gladly accepting tithes (preferably in cash, not 10% of what you produce) but they never request a burnt offering for some reason? . . . Oh, don’t get me started on the institutions of, “Christianity.” Few of them are real.
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If Putin was to be, “replaced,” it would necessarily follow that the new leadership would be seeking sanctions relief and an end to the Ukraine war, surely? After all, that would be their reason for replacing him. Certainly, the people speaking out against Putin are a mixed bunch, most of whom echo the above reasoning, but not all. There are some who don’t believe Putin has gone far enough, and it is those whom we should fear, if anyone.
Prof Wilson says, “it wouldn’t change anything,” but I think he’s demonstrably wrong, again, for the above stated reasons. Whomever takes over from Putin would necessarily be seeking a, “reset,” with the west, in hopes of getting their MONEY flowing again.
Whether partially or entirely, they would have to start withdrawing forces from Ukraine, or they would remain in the same pickle, after having taken all of the risks that attend a coup in the first place.
We just need to hope that it isn’t a Hawk that gets in Putin’s chair, rather than a Dove.
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I so LOVED your Anthony Seldon impression. And I revelled in the gossipy tone of that vignette, which had me genuinely laughing out loud. I’m thinking you’re probably a superb dinner guest, able to set a table roaring with laughter, when you’re in the right mood? I wonder what other impressions you have in your arsenal? But, THANK YOU, for the giggles. Seriously. It is a relief to be able to find the, “funny,” in all of this sometimes. There’s so little to laugh about in British politics right now, and you sir, are a tonic for my troubled soul. I so enjoyed that, I will play it again. God bless you, sir. 🤭👍✌️
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I don’t remember what YEAR I opened my last bank account, let alone the DAY! These sods seem to forget who is doing whom the FAVOUR here! I am letting them make money from MY MONEY, and I should NEVER have to go cap in hand and answer a bunch of invasive security questions as if I was a suspect being cross examined by MI5, when I should be entitled to FULL UNFETTERED ACCESS to my OWN MONEY at ANY time.
And, as you say, it is these ridiculous procedures that make it possible for fraudsters to operate AND make people less inclined to report crimes, because they don’t want to be put through the emotional ringer and waste so much of their precious time.
The next time you ask for someone’s name, you need to insist that you are entitled BY LAW to have sufficient identification of the person calling you. Yet, there is confusion about what that means. They may well withhold their real name, but you should be given sufficient information to identify where they are calling from, and who they are, so they can be identified at a later time, should the need arise. And it is precisely that ACCOUNTABILITY that they are wilfully avoiding, yet which is enshrined in law. I NEVER let them get away with that.
You must, by law, be able to identify the individual or you can break contact and there will, according to law, be no negative consequence to you for so doing.
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And the only power Sunack retains, as the rest of the Tories sub-divide into their respective camps, hoping that their candidate becomes the new leader, is that power to slap an election on the party if they get too disloyal in the coming weeks. Any policy revolts will be met with, “Let’s put it to the nation then!” and that will keep them quiet, with diminishing returns as the clock ticks.
I just keep thinking of Oliver Cromwell’s big day in Parliament. (I’m paraphrasing here, but) he just got so fed up one day he shouted, “For the love of God just go! Be gone! If you have any shame just leave! GTFOOH!” We just need one senior Tory with the courage to say that, or even read the quote out, and that would probably trigger an election.
The fact is that it’s not even a question of, “no confidence,” in the leadership, OR any of his potential rivals. The nation has zero confidence in the party! And it would only take one front bencher of sufficient cabinet rank to say that quiet part out loud, and we can get on with the damned election and move on!
God knows we have so much cleaning up to do . . .
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@Tad1945 : Trolls arrive illegally. But, when you ignore international law and say, “Anyone who arrives in a boat is now breaking the law,” then we know there has been a break down in law. What’s next? Anyone who uses the channel tunnel is now to be criminalised? Anyone who arrives wearing a tie? Anyone called, “Anthony,” who arrives on, “Tony Tuesdays,” will be outlawed? Anyone using the YouTube name, “Tad,” could be next. You simply cannot make an arbitrary divide and decide, “All the people on this side of the line are fine, but all the people on THAT side are criminals.” At least, not if you want your system to work.
We are STILL subscribers to international, BINDING laws, which insist that each asylum seeker MUST be assessed on the merits of their case, NOT their mode of travel.
And I have yet to see a SINGLE example of any migrant or asylum seeker that has taken resources from the public, or bread out of the mouths of the working, tax paying public. This government has squandered all your cash, turned hotels into overcrowded prisons and liners into prison hulks, breaking the law in the process of emptying our wallets. We used to simply process asylum seekers, let them in, get work and contribute to the economy by generating economic activity and paying taxes, under the last government. And those cases that failed to meet the criteria resulted in swift deportation.
The Tories stopped all of that and gave massive cues and expensive waiting lists of people that cost the tax payer a fortune to imprison while they don’t get processed and get busy catching diseases and getting huge settlements through their human rights lawyers!
Learn the FACTS, son. You cannot afford to be this angry at the wrong people, while the people who are robbing you blind are telling you who to blame. And anyone will do, so long as it isn’t them. That’s a hostage mentality that can only do you harm.
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Conversion therapy is guilty of all the things it seeks to prevent. And its perpetrators are generally in need of therapy themselves, or sociopaths seeking money and power. I will always concede that, gender, “dysmorphia,” will be, in some cases, a genuine mental health condition that needs treatment from qualified, compassionate, professionals who are removed from all, “ideologies,” by both their professional oaths and their disinterested appointment by the state as a mental health professional, who’s job is to protect the interests of their patient above all other considerations. “Do no harm.” Only such professionals would be able to discern whether their patient needs a gender reassignment or needs to process damage from their history before being able to make that decision.
As to your video on the Biblical concerns: You don’t need Hebrew to discern this issue, Prof Wilson. The New Testiment tells us, unambiguously, that we Christians do NOT live by the Old Testament laws. They have been, “fulfilled,” by Jesus and dispensed with. That is why we no longer put witches to death, or attempt to burn offerings at our church alters. We would be shown the door, outside of which the police would be waiting. Ignorant churches keep the old traditions alive (selectively) because they want your tithes. Those who use Old Testament teachings as dogma are charlatans.
The Levites were disbanded by Jesus’ day and Leviticus was already dead lore. Only history, morality, philosophy, mythology and general education remain to be gleaned from the Old Testament for a modern Christian. Hence, it remains invaluable to a Christian, for understanding your faith, its place in history and its context in the world, but it is useless as a guide to life and worse than useless as a guide to Christianity!
This issue frustrates me immensely. I will watch your video with great interest, but I do hope you do not fall into the trap of dealing with Old Testament laws as though they are relevant to Christianity? That is rather like disputing the colour of the car that ran me over, when simply establishing that I was run over is all that matters.
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I don’t think Braverman has nearly as much support within her Westminster bubble as she does in the loud, vociferous, yet tiny minority of the country? We fought and scraped through a war to end the threat of people like her and the fascist mob she whipped up at the weekend. Most of the country gets it.
And, on immigration: WHEN will people FINALLY get it into their heads? We NEED population GROWTH! URGENTLY! The type of people who are willing to refuse the will of violent dictators and risk their lives to protect their families and get to Britain are primarily young, determined, honest, hard working, principled people, seeking to live in a democracy and contribute to society. These are the VERY PEOPLE Britain NEEDS right now. Young workers who will produce taxable income and prevent the growing aging population from facing pensions wipeouts and destitution in under funded hospitals, hospices and, “care homes,” in which a Health Secretary might well consign you to a DEATH SENTENCE, merely for existing, rather than spending a penny on your welfare!
Sorry to get so excited about this, but I sometimes feel like I have woken up in a nightmare, wherein everyone seems to believe the opposite of simple truth! We should be doing everything in our power to stimulate young population growth, for the sake of the economy, our position in the world and our future as a nation with some power at the negotiating table. And, let’s face it? We have SO MUCH left to negotiate! Not just with Europe either.
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