Comments by "Ash Roskell" (@ashroskell) on "A Different Bias"
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Honestly, this is becoming the, “Nigel Farage is Bad,” channel. He is bad, but come ohhhn? You said it yourself, “You can argue that it works for populism in general.” Here’s a genuine idea for combatting the spread of Faragistic populism: STOP putting his face on EVERY OTHER THUMBNAIL!
Can’t you see it? You can empirically PROVE that Farage is greedy, stupid, manipulative, racist, criminal and just plain WRONG about everything! Yet that won’t make the slightest difference to his followers except to reassure them that he is the top bogey man figure for everyone left of Thatcher. You are actually HELPING him! YOU are establishing Farage THE man to watch, regardless. And you are allowing him to, “dictate the narrative.” The very thing you just warned against!
Isn’t it worth sacrificing a few thousand clicks? All you are doing is making him the de facto leader of the right wing and the right wing themselves are taking their cues from people like YOU; and those whom the centre and the left keep putting up as their bogey man.
Yes, he needs to be discussed and regularly, and seriously . . . when HE DOES SOMETHING! But it was NOT necessary for you to use him in this thumbnail AT ALL for this video, since this is a general topic about tackling populism, not just him!
I am speaking in good faith, as a fan of yours, who has followed your channel for years. I understand that his face is probably getting you higher viewing figures. But you have a RESPONSIBILITY here. Please think about what I’m arguing here?
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Sunack’s election, “pledges,” are actually deeply alarming. Most people don’t know how, “inflation,” works and, “halving,” that doesn’t necessarily mean that food or petrol prices will come down at all. Note; Tories avoid putting it in terms of, “cost of living,” because they don’t intend to bring prices down.
“Growing the economy,” only means Stock Market and big business stuff, which has NO MEANING to the person on the street, who needs to understand that economic growth does NOT benefit people unless they’re already wealthy! It’s just a sound bite. And sinister at that.
As is, “Reducing NHS waiting lists.” NOT, “Improving the NHS,” or making pay and conditions better and therefore more attractive for people seeking to work in the caring professions. Why do they target waiting lists? Because they want to PRIVATISE more and more of the NHS and shortening waiting times is the bribe they intend to use to get privatisation in through the back door: which they have increasingly done throughout their time in office and which they only did more vehemently when Covid struck!
And, don’t even get me STARTED on, “Stop The Boats!” Literally NO ONE wants that, asked for that, or sees it as ANY kind of a, “priority!” No one except Swastika-tattooed Nazis and brown-skinned brown-shirts like the PM, Cruella Braverman and her predecessor, which constitute an apparent new breed of Nazi that’s emerged to confuse the hell out of Brits these days, including the Nazis themselves! In fact, we NEED immigration desperately! And these people are more than willing to do the more than ONE MILLION JOBS in Britain that are going begging because the locals don’t like stacking shelves, picking fruit and hod carrying for some Polish guy with a better grasp of economics than any Tory and moderately better communication skills! But THAT would be too much like common sense for the Tories! Instead we get TOLD that we are racists who want to turn THE most vulnerable humans on the face of planet Earth into political footballs for the lowest common denominator!
Seriously, people! F*ck these racist, feckless, entitled, lying, thieving, Tory scum!
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Invite Rory Stewart! For a one off, to which he may return on an ad hoc basis? He would be perfect! He has Tory values, yet he is HONEST. And he is a podcaster himself, so he would be gleaning material for his own channel. He has the experience of Westminster and service as an MP and I do not doubt he would do a link up with you if invited and if he saw samples of your channel.
AND, perhaps most importantly, he is genuinely sincere about rescuing the old fashioned, one nation, Conservative project for Britain. Therefore, he has good reasons to want to reach your audience. That is why, after all, he shares a podcast with Alistair Campbell, wherein they argue politics but both try to appeal to the, “middle way,” voters who seek UNITY in British politics, emphasising areas of AGREEMENT.
His is precisely the kind of voice that is drowned out at a time like this, but from which it is most important to hear.
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If OFCOM is forcing punishment it must to protect Rishi from being criminally charged. They usually do nothing about outrageous infractions when it comes to conservatives, so they must have been under extreme pressure to act. What we should be calling for is a root and branch reform of OFCOM, replacing their staff with people who BELIEVE in democracy and who see the connection between broadcast media and political influence.
Example: They are STILL, “investigating,” Jacob Reese Mogg for being a, “news anchor,” whilst being a sitting MP! That complaint has been going on for many YEARS now!
Maybe GB news are fighting this because it’s the first time OFCOM have actually done ANYTHING about them? Or maybe this is their attempt to beat OFCOM into an even more pliant shape?
Either way, we need a new OFCOM with new people, subpoena powers, public hearings, public annual reviews, unlimited fine powers and the ability to make recommendations to the CPS.
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@audreymcgready4329 : They are literally like a private club, who’s soul aim is to break down Britain and sell off the parts for scrap! Those, “think tanks,” they all belong to are morally aligned with Satanic Cults, and you have to be a bit of a cult to join one! The most important and transformative legislation Britain could come up with, to save our fortunes collectively, would be to ban private lobby groups of any kind. Certainly, any hint of money or influence being attained by back door dealings should be ruthlessly crushed out of political life. The mere fact that I have suggested that is probably enough to get me onto a watch-list or ten!
But all services upon which the public rely should be in public ownership and administrated by their elected representatives. There would be no place for the Johnson’s, Truss’s and Sunack’s of a logically run Britain. Probably none for the Starmer’s either, but at least he’s a step in the right direction. I just pray that tactical voting catches fire this election and the Tories are relegated to a poor third place, while Labour and the Lib Dem’s are forced into a successful coalition. We need representative voting reform and a TOTAL BAN on business lobbying. Except through the usual, public channels that charities and issue campaigners are forced to use, of course.
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It really upsets me that even, “friendly,” media keeps headlining this story as an, “end,” to the Winter Fuel Allowance instead of what it is! Even my wife described as that yesterday! I had to explain to her that they’re NOT ending it at all! They’re MEANS TESTING it!
Who WOULD NOT say it is FAIR to ensure that poor people WHO NEED the allowance GET the allowance? And those with lots of money already, who DON’T NEED the allowance, WON’T GET the allowance!?
Labour has fumbled this by not announcing it as a, “MEANS TEST,” and stomping out all talk of an, “End to Winter Fuel Allowance.”
They failed to make their position eminently logical and fair in the minds of voters, which it actually is! They need to sack their image makers and get a new team in. The Youth Mobility Scheme has been handled in the same way, though that’s caught far less attention in the minds of voters.
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You’re probably right, but it needn’t be that bleak? I mean, isn’t it obvious to everyone, what actually happened? . . . “Brexit changed left wing voting habits,” as this streamer put it, for the simple reason that the general public were more alarmed by the possibility of a government overturning a democratic referendum and the UK no longer being a democracy, than they were about which party was in power. The Tories were promising to honour the Brexit vote, and that’s what won them the election.
The fact that we did not get the Brexit that was advertised came as a surprise to precisely no one, except for those far right wing voters who were naive enough to actually believe in people like Nigel Farage and Boris Johnson.
I, and many people I know, voted Tory at the last general election, not for any their ideological reasons. I simply believed that overturning a national referendum was such an egregious mistake that we would no longer even be a democracy anymore and we could easily wind up with governments that refuse to accept other votes, like election results, as we later saw the Republicans attempt in America.
What we actually DO about this now seems equally obvious to me too. We simply have to seek terms with Europe that closely align us on trade, human rights, strategic military goals and justice, without surrendering our sovereignty and without sacrificing our right to make policies on a case by case basis, when it comes to new crises affecting the world. We still have considerable economic clout, which buys us a seat at such a negotiating table, if for no other reason than everyone still likes having MONEY.
Yet, alignment with Europe is something that the Tories have been openly fighting against since the days of Margaret Thatcher. So, we have no alternative but to change our government, if for no other reason than getting friendly faces into power that the Europeans will find acceptable, in order that we can iron out new deals without the baggage of the Euro-Skeptic politicians round our necks.
European politicians cannot abide Boris Johnson, or his acolytes. We need people who Europe can do business with and whom they don’t hate on a visceral level.
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@fang_xianfu : Whilst another referendum would be potentially disastrous, not to mention possibly humiliating, should the UK vote to return to Europe only to be told, “Non,” or having to accept painful terms as punishment, whilst the spectre of a divided nation threatens to hold yet another referendum in the future, for the 40% or so of Euro-skeptics that will remain (making everyone think about how Scotland’s SNP refuses to take no for an answer and won’t accept that people actually only vote for them for their liberal policies and not to leave the UK) it’s not an issue that can be shelved either.
Some sort of resolutions will simply have to be reached on many issues that will not go away. And only a new party can realistically reach those settlements, given how much our current government is not just distrusted, but actively loathed, by the electorate, but is equally distrusted and loathed by European leaders. And we’ve given them every reason not to trust us, by breaking our word on trade agreements, showing active hostility to human rights conventions and international justice accords and frequently entering into bad faith negotiations designed to play to the domestic galleries whilst making things hard for everyone at the European negotiating tables.
The only solution that remains is to get busy negotiating new settlements that serve everyone’s best interests. And the only way to get those deals is with new, trustworthy faces.
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In the, “taxing and spending,” debate, surely, “the working people,” they intend to, “protect,” are those who earn less than a certain amount? Isn’t it? Seems obvious to me. Those who, “produce,” the stuff of, “value,” by their, “labour,” which chiefly benefits their bosses, managers, owners, shareholders, etc. You can put a number on that, but it’s only helpful as a general guide until you specify for individual categories.
The question is: How detailed; how, “granular,” do you want to get? The more the better, so long as it doesn’t overwhelm the civil service or the people responsible for delivering the packages.
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Better yet, what you just said, but first, Ben Wallace crosses the House with an offer from Keir Starmer to continue on as Defence Secretary? As far as I can see, he is the ONLY actually talented diplomat, hard working MP, who has actually done a GOOD job as our Defence Secretary, and who seems at least to be more concerned about service and the good of the country than his own career. The new constituency divisions have made his seat no longer a thing now anyway, and he would be welcomed by our allies in NATO and Ukraine, where he is established and well liked anyway. A big show of crossing the House, and the loss of the ONLY talent the Tories have would be sure to hasten the election, before more MP’s follow suit, as so often happens, and everyone wins . . . except the carpet baggers in power right now.
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I wonder if you can tell us how MP’s calculate letters and emails these days? The received wisdom, years ago, was that one letter was seen as equal to roughly 500 other voters who felt the same way, but hadn’t bothered to write in about it. Meaning that 20 or so letters from different people (and not from an obviously coordinated campaign) could make a significant dent in your MP’s attitudes towards that issue.
Nowadays, with electronic communications and the TikTok generation, the calculus must be very different. And the received wisdom I accepted back in the day might well have been a myth anyway, for all I know?
So, it would be really helpful, I think, to explore that issue on your channel and give people a sense of which types of communication are most effective, the ways to go about your own preferred approach, as well as any follow up information or connected issues that might pertain?
I also think it would be very encouraging for viewers who just need a nudge in that direction. As most of us feel we’re likely to be ignored unless we get really pushy, which many have neither the time nor inclination to do. But equally many would try to pressure their MP’s if they actually believed it was worth their while, or that they could just tilt the scale that little bit.
I would also encourage them to express themselves far more briefly than I am doing here, whilst remaining polite, of course.
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Whilst it is gratifying to see these repellant Tories wallowing in self pity at their self inflicted wounds, backed by nothing more than their own unjustified sense of self regard, it is also chilling. It’s not the unedifying spectacle of former leaders airing their permanent sense of grievance, whether they’re in power or out of it, or their willingness to be seen as saboteurs with no regard for the future of their own party, as that’s been a feature, not a bug, for the way they do business anyway. It’s the idea of either one of the alternatives seizing the reigns of power, even for a short-lived pre-election period! Johnson does not need explaining, as we’ve all seen the empirical evidence that he cannot run his own financial affairs without corruption, let alone a country. But the very idea that we would put a proto-Nazi like Cruella Braverman in the job of Home Secretary has been hard enough for Britain to stomach and I believe that many Brits would identify her as their least likeable or competent MP! The secret services have identified her as a security risk, siting SIX separate occasions when she broke the law and Home Office regulations, which got her fired! But the idea of a PM who actively, vocally despises a significant chunk of the electorate, calling them names and deliberately seeking to DIVIDE the nation, makes her unfit to sweep our roads, let alone hold ANY public office! I simply cannot believe she is, “popular,” amongst any group that doesn’t also sport Swastikas? And those same people would probably gleefully burn her at the stake once they’ve gotten their full use out of her!
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