Also In The News - part 3

[Claridge]

Can't believe the change is Keir Starmer, what a depressing point that he is the answer

[Lionator]

41 minutes ago, Claridge said:

Can't believe the change is Keir Starmer, what a depressing point that he is the answer

He’s incredibly boring but I think people will just tolerate competent government at this point. 

[Lionator]

The Kuensberg show is mad.

 

Braverman gets an easy ride, the government minister gets an easy ride and the Labour Party guy gets destroyed 🤣

[Legend_in_blue]

47 minutes ago, Claridge said:

Can't believe the change is Keir Starmer, what a depressing point that he is the answer

 

The charisma of a peanut?

 

I'd take that over the current gov't.  

[st albans fox]

25 minutes ago, Lionator said:

The Kuensberg show is mad.

 

Braverman gets an easy ride, the government minister gets an easy ride and the Labour Party guy gets destroyed 🤣

To be fair

Braveman and the tories are now irrelevant for five years 

the Labour guy is going to be forming the next govt

 

good for him to get some practice

 

 

[Lionator]

4 minutes ago, st albans fox said:

To be fair

Braveman and the tories are now irrelevant for five years 

the Labour guy is going to be forming the next govt

 

good for him to get some practice

 

 

I do feel bad for Labour with the Israel/Gaza situation because they can’t really win with it. If they unequivocally go on the side of Palestinians then the anti-semitism claims will rise again. Vice versa they get called war criminals and genociders. And you can’t take a middle ground in this or else both sides eat you up. 

[st albans fox]

8 hours ago, Lionator said:

I do feel bad for Labour with the Israel/Gaza situation because they can’t really win with it. If they unequivocally go on the side of Palestinians then the anti-semitism claims will rise again. Vice versa they get called war criminals and genociders. And you can’t take a middle ground in this or else both sides eat you up. 

More votes on one side though which makes their evolved position in the middle ground more laudable imo

 

we are drifting towards a ceasefire (hopefully) and it will soon become difficult in the sense that to maintain a ceasefire, Hamas will have to ‘leave’ Gaza and I don’t see that being feasible. the hostages remain their lifeline which was obvious back in October. They’ve managed to eke it out this far so no likelihood that they would make an agreement whereby they hand over all of them. Sinwar remains a very clever bloke ( although the people who he is supposed to be fighting for probably wouldn’t agree ).  Strange dichotomy whereby both sinwar and netenyahu are being seen not as leaders but as responsible for the suffering being dragged out on both populations.  The removal of netenyahu is ultimately straightforward via democracy but sinwar will be more difficult.  Could it be possible that the paymasters in Qatar will dump him for a solely political route forwards ???

 

EDIT: developments today enough to make you bang your head against the wall

the Americans have spent months trying to force the Israelis to open the northern border crossing into Gaza so they can massively increase aid the the north and a few days after it’s been opened, Hamas launch rockets at the Israeli army base near the crossing forcing it to be closed again. 

Edited 5 May by st albans fox

[MPH]

16 hours ago, Sampson said:

Yeah there’s zero chance the LibDems would work with this current Tory party, 

 

Lib Dems have always been the most pro-EU and pro-immigration and supra-nationalism major party and far more aligned to Starmer’s New Labour style party than the post-Cameron Tories who are becoming increasingly nationalist, anti-immigration and anti-internationalist.
 

Starmer is ultimately trying to portray Labour as far more of a free market party and more right wing economically than under Milliband or Corbyn so it will make them compatible enough for the LibDems I think. 
 

It’s irrelevant though. It’s a Labour majority at the GE for sure.

 

There’s definitely a bit of Blair about him…

[Sampson]

No surprise that Tory MPs already saying the answer to this is to shift even further to the right. 

 

It's funny, back in the 80s people used to mock the left in the UK and saying they always thought the answer was to shift further to the left and the "real communism has never been tried" was a much mocked reapeated phrase. Nowadays it feels like exactly the same thing is happening to the right in the UK. "This  isn't real Brexit, they screwed it up in how they enacted it" has become to the 2020s what "real communism hasn't been tried" was to the 1980s when the only way it could be harder is to stick a hard border in Ireland and essentially guarantee Irish reunification and this constant answer to get more and more right wing as the answer to overwhelming defeat.

 

I sincerely hope the right will eat itself but the clear different is they have the newspaper press on their side in the way the left never have had.

Edited 5 May by Sampson

[Sampson]

 

In reference to this especially. Sadly there are many out there who have the same line of thinking.

[Brizzle Fox]

1 hour ago, Sampson said:

 

In reference to this especially. Sadly there are many out there who have the same line of thinking.

But thankfully nowhere near as many as the right wing press, Twitter or nut jobs like Cruella think. 

 

Elections are won in the centre ground and as we've seen once again in the local elections, the majority of people voted for centre or centre left parties.

 

Most  British people are basically decent and moderate in their views, and the more parties move to the left or the right then the more they alienate the masses.

 

To me that is extremely reassuring.

 

 

[Paninistickers]

4 hours ago, MPH said:

 

There’s definitely a bit of Blair about him…

I guess you mean political spectrum? You are probably right, except nobody really knows what Starmer stands for apart from his fanatical anti anti semitism. 

 

If you mean a Blair comparison in terms of status, charisma and missionary zeal, Starmer isn't even 0.1% of Blair

Edited 5 May by Paninistickers
Anti anti!

[Sir Shep]

Why is the celebrity death list closed? Anyway RIP Yosser/Bernard Hill. 

[Sampson]

28 minutes ago, Paninistickers said:

I guess you mean political spectrum? You are probably right, except nobody really knows what Starmer stands for apart from his fanatical anti anti semitism. 

 

If you mean a Blair comparison in terms of status, charisma and missionary zeal, Starmer isn't even 0.1% of Blair

Well in many ways it doesn’t make sense to release their policy plans in advance so the Tories can attack them before the election is called so I get the fence sitting to an extent.

 

Starmer was a strong remainer and campaigned for a 2nd referendum so he’s definitely pro-EU, although he seems too scared to admit it now he’ll almost certainly try and steer the uk back to the eu. Even if it’s just to allow long term residents who are EU citizens the vote in general elections and referendums the same way commonwealth citizens who are long-term residents have, that’s one thing I think most people expect to be on the Labour manifesto. Most non-British citizens who have the vote overwhelmingly vote Labour so it also could help keep them in power for a generation if they suddenly have potentially millions of extra voters who overwhelmingly vote Labour. I expect it makes a future referendum on rejoining the eu/single market in 2029 election a long term strategy 

 

I also don’t find him an inspiring pick but this is the most right wing government probably any of us have even had in our lifetimes even over Thatcher and it’s clearly got the point where most of the country want to kick it to the curb. 

Edited 5 May by Sampson

[Jon the Hat]

Starmer doesn’t need to be charming, engaging or exciting.  Boris was that and look where that got us. 

[MPH]

57 minutes ago, Paninistickers said:

I guess you mean political spectrum? You are probably right, except nobody really knows what Starmer stands for apart from his fanatical anti anti semitism. 

 

If you mean a Blair comparison in terms of status, charisma and missionary zeal, Starmer isn't even 0.1% of Blair

 

Yes I definitely meant politically. Little bit closer to the center like Blair was!

[Paninistickers]

8 hours ago, Legend_in_blue said:

 

The charisma of a peanut?

 

I'd take that over the current gov't.  

I know what you mean but wouldn't it be nice to actually have a political elite that actually had a mix of charisma, leadership qualities and a political vision with integrity? 

 

Being forced to settle for the mundane in the face of no other options isn't particularly appealing 

[Trav Le Bleu]

30 minutes ago, Jon the Hat said:

Starmer doesn’t need to be charming, engaging or exciting.  Boris was that and look where that got us. 

He might need to be to win an election. The politics of personality are disproportionately powerful to the politics of actuality.

[Paninistickers]

Just now, Trav Le Bleu said:

He might need to be to win an election. The politics of personality are disproportionately powerful to the politics of actuality.

Itsy a point I made earlier, but I'd love for my constituency to have a local independent candidate to stand with a genuine interest/passion/theme that they were prepared to campaign for in parliament. 

 

I will not be voting Tory or Labour. Neither deserves endorsement. They just govern by ChatGPT to garner the odd % point of popularity here and there. Government shouldn't be a sport to win, Dave Brailsford style. They should have the decency to lay out a format they believe in and let the public say yes or no. 

[Tommy Fresh]

52 minutes ago, Trav Le Bleu said:

He might need to be to win an election. The politics of personality are disproportionately powerful to the politics of actuality.

To win this next one he doesn't need to be really, he just needs to not be a massive tool

[Silebyfox_89]

R.I.P Bernard Hill

 

Theoden King!

[foxy boxing]

1 hour ago, Silebyfox_89 said:

R.I.P Bernard Hill

 

Theoden King!

Thanks for playing Theoden, it was an honour.

 

For the King. .

[Bellend Sebastian]

Blimey, this is an interesting read: 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2024/may/04/youre-going-to-call-me-a-holocaust-denier-now-are-you-george-monbiot-comes-face-to-face-with-his-local-conspiracy-theorist

 

 

[MPH]

1 hour ago, Bellend Sebastian said:

Blimey, this is an interesting read: 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2024/may/04/youre-going-to-call-me-a-holocaust-denier-now-are-you-george-monbiot-comes-face-to-face-with-his-local-conspiracy-theorist

 

 

 

Very interesting article. However I finished reading it feeling Monbiot missed an opportunity  to go into a bit more detail as to WHY Liosatos was wrong on several things,  especially as this article likely reached people similar to Liosatos. Little bit too much point scoring, possibly?

 

 

still, an interesting read, thank you for sharing.

Edited 5 May by MPH

[urban.spaceman]

On 04/05/2024 at 20:26, Jon the Hat said:

Who is stealing money from the public purse presently?

The Tory party.