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New Brexit Opportunities Minister is major shareholder in company that would be a major beneficiary of policies to be decided by the Brexit Opportunities Minister.

Cutting out the middle man. Don't need lobbyists if you're directly channelling money to yourself.

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I'm pretty sure the paeadothilliae meme is of American origin. Unfortunately our brain worms have contaminated the far-rights of the world over the past few years (e.g. the popularity of Q-Anon among the right in Germany and Japan.)

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Our far rights used to hark back to the European far right: fascists, Nazis, and so on. It was easy to discredit these hankerers after a vision that we'd fought against. Nowadays, our far right looks to the American far right for inspiration. Their supporters dismiss any description of them as far right by pointing out that they are nothing like neo-fascists, neo-Nazis, and so on. No they're not. It's Q-Anon, Proud Boys, Trumpians, etc. that are their model.

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This is really good - well worth a watch:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g75OIszvopk

Complicated stuff - definately not reducable to a soundbite.

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And the Tories' Attorney General (their top legal advisor) confirms that democracy trumps law. If the PM is found to have broken the law, we should recognise that democracy is the foundation of law, she says.

"I would just say that fundamental to the rule of law is also democracy: and I'm very proud to be supporting this prime minister, a prime minister who's honoured democracy by delivering Brexit."

So delivering Brexit absolves the PM from breaking the law if he's found to have broken it, says the Tories' top legal expert. I wonder if rory rolls his eyes whenever the Tories hold up Brexit as a thing to be proud of, whatever the question actually was. Or whether the mockery only pertains the other way.

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It is possible to share the same view as someone whilst viewing them with contempt. As I've said repeatedly, I was for Brexit but not for the Tories; equally there is nothing in the EU that would have stopped Boris doing what he's done.

Politicians failing to answer questions is hardly a new phenomenon, nor the senior lawyer making the law fit the demands of the PM - as Tony Blair's stooge showed us.

As we celebrate 70 years of the Queen passively allowing the rot to worsen I do wonder why living a long time is more highly thought of than trying to make the state fu ctuon better.

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I didn't say that the EU would have stopped Johnson from doing what he was doing. I merely pointed out that you rolled your eyes when I said that, in the eyes of the Tories, Brexit justifies everything. I didn't make everything about Brexit, as you were implying. I was pointing to how the Tories think, and the AG Braverman demonstrated in her own words what I was saying. Law is trumped by the will of the people, which is founded on Brexit.

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That is what one person said, not what a judge found. A soundbite, not a ruling.

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You mean governments should not respect the law until it's imposed on them by the courts? One would expect governments to work within the law, not do whatever they think they can get away with until grown ups force them to recognise that they can't get away with it any more. Especially since the one person saying it isn't any random person, but supposedly the top legal brain in government. If it's ok for the chief legal advisor to advocate doing whatever they can until the courts stop them, I don't see how it's any better than what Giuliani and co were doing.

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As I have been bemoaning for some time this is surely a point where the Monarchy should step in given every other part of our bodge job of a system has failed.

Failing that the police should investigate and arrest if required. Which - with extreme reluctance - they are.

So I yes it is a media statement and holds no weight. Does anyone believe them?

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I hope the system corrects itself and the British voters start believing that the top politicians should be held accountable. The problem is I see the US far right has brought their politics here, gaming the system by solidifying a base and then manipulating everything surrounding the democracy to get enough votes to win, and then using that to further manipulate the system and so on.

I think one of the things that needs to be looked at is the right wing news media, which have pretty much completely abandoned journalistic standards, and strengthening the BBC to question the establishment without fear of extinction. If the Tories, who have shown themselves completely unbound by ethics, have complete support from most of the right wing media in their dissemination of lies, we don't have an informed electorate. And a democracy without an informed electorate isn't a functioning democracy.

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More from the top legal mind in the UK government:

"our Parliament must retrieve power ceded to another place – the courts" - Suella Braverman, currently Attorney General.

Another gem. Braverman defends the democratic credibility of the European Research Group, pointing out that it's funded by public money and everything. She then refuses to reveal who's in it, meaning the ERG is funded by public money but is not publicly accountable. According to our current Attorney General.

Does accountability and democracy begin and end with the size of the Commons majority?

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Sadly she seems too knowledgeable for this to be ignorance. And is more Operation Red Meat as opposed to reality - the Courts can only rule on the law. If the Commons want they can make new laws. Y'know, as they do when the GCHQ etc break the law, they appeal it and in the meantime pass another law.

I would even go as far as to say with our "unwritten" hodgepodge of common law, it is an accepted norm that the interpretation of existing laws does slowly drift over time - decades ago swearing at the police would be a crime, now such language is common enough that this (generally) is not itself an offence; [insert group] shaming, however, is increasingly being found to be a crime; where free speech ends and offense of other starts is another arena where the courts have given their view but of course the Government is within its rights to specify more concretely.

In essence, this whole issue is basically a symptom of the Commons passing poorly thought out and poorly written laws over a course of years often with more eyes on headlines than what exactly they will do or how they fit with existing laws.

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https://metro.co.uk/2022/02/11/boris...gate-16089867/

Fair enough. There can't have been many people working from home during the lockdown period. Apart from the rest of the country, that is.

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PM gives thumbs up from cockpit of RAF jet in yet ANOTHER photo op that appears straight out of North Korean ruler's propaganda playbook

From wiki, RAF Waddington:

NB. RAF Waddington is a station dedicated to surveillance. It serves surveillance aircraft. Johnson climbed into a Typhoon fighter on a visit to Waddington. Which meant the Typhoon was specially flown to Waddington so that the PM could have his photo op. At a time when Russian planes have been buzzing our air space.

And yet he endures, and people will still find excuses to vote for him.

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I haven't heard many good things about Starmer's Labour, and this certainly doesn't help.


Isn't this just insulting to the intelligence of all and sundry?

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It depends what colour rosette you wear. If you wear red, then what Raynor said is an offence to human rights and will lose the support of all right minded liberals. If you're wearing a blue rosette, then it's reaffirming the party of law and order and will win the votes of the working class.

What I can tell you is that the political talking class will take offence at what Raynor said, and declare that Labour is no longer the party for them. But they are outnumbered by the casual voters, who won't vote Labour unless they take the view that Raynor is espousing.

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Is it that you think of the policies implied by the rhetoric as effective and appropriate means to reducing crime, or that the casual voters who currently reject Labour will interpret it as a dealmaking answer to their problems rather than as comical pandering?

Because I'm unsure if contemporary Republicans would take such messaging seriously, and their elected officials are currently demonizing as a murderer someone who worked to exonerate wrongful convictions.

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What do you think of this phrase? "Tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime."

The liberal left has a reputation for caring more about the rights of criminals than victims. The previous Labour leader has a deserved reputation for siding with other countries in disputes involving Britain. Including with terrorists.

To be considered electable, Labour has to stand tough on crime, those who perpetrate it, and so on. Those who argue on theoretical rights don't like it, and frequently say that this is a line crossed. But it is accepted political reality, demonstrated in practice, that Labour has to take that stance in order to be considered acceptable by the majority of voters. See that line above for a more nuanced take on it, but which contains that hardline approach all the same.

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The above has been confirmed. One of the planes was flown from a nearby base, another was flown in from Scotland, so that the PM could have his photo op. How much money has been wasted, and how much is our security being compromised, to shore up Johnson's political fortunes?

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You didn't answer the question, and I very much doubt that making counterterrorism an extra-free-fire operation, police going out of their way to "annoy" "anti-social" people, publicly shaming drug users, or doubling down on marijuana criminalization can seriously be argued as either tough on crime or tough on its causes.

But maybe one would argue that regardless of the integrity of such rhetoric, it is something most voters are eager to hear. In which case the folly of the public is to be exploited to electoral advantage. Now, to the extent you would hold this presumption (for argument's sake let's treat it as correct), I detect a basic tension between it and your lament that "And yet [Johnson] endures, and people will still find excuses to vote for him."

Don't you think?

If it is "accepted political reality" that the aforesaid rhetoric is demanded by the majority of voters, then why would you be surprised that they prefer what the Conservatives have to give them regardless of their record? Any voter so softheaded as to entrust their security to a politician on the basis of such a frivolously-spiteful farrago as unleashed by the shadow government already has what they need from the genuine article currently in government.

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Erm, 1997. You post some pointed questions and wonder if the voters are so soft-headed to fall for this and that. I point to past successful electoral strategy. I have no idea whether the arguments I've posited make sense to you (or me for that matter). I only know that they make sense to British voters.

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It's best not to introduce too many different questions. In this reply alone, we're adding:

1. What role did Blair Labour's rhetoric or platform on crime play in its 1997 victory?
2. If there was a successful strategy previously, is the quoted rhetoric from Starmer's Labour credibly instantiating it?

These are deep questions, to add to those of good policy and good platform across the board today. But I don't get the impression that Labour leadership is trying to position itself in a calculated rather than reflexive way. I'm no longer so naive as to think that identifying social problems and proposing well-constructed recourses against them will garner recognition, but this conceit of "tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime" as a frontpiece is just Labour whistling past the graveyard. Lemme lay down a real political reality on you: When anyone can see that the government is not doing jack diddly about crime (promising to shoot terrorists gooder is not an anti-crime proposal), people notice, and it's left-wing, not right-wing, parties get blamed. They can have identical policies to their right-wing counterpart, but only they will be blamed for the lack of effect.

But let's drill down to the only question I want you to answer, here. The sentences I quoted from Labour are ludicrous. You attest that they are popular. Why should one expect people allegedly comforted by the obviously insubstantive and condescending posturing undertaken in the quotes not to be more impressed by Boris Johnson's fighter jet photoshoot or clubby ramblings, or rather to be fatally offended by his... indiscretions? He's much better poised in this territory you know.

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Firstly, and I don't think I explained well enough in my previous answer, much of UK politics is box ticking. The Tories by default have some boxes ticked, Labour by default have some other boxes ticked. The Tories have the advantage of having their boxes deemed more important by the voters, and a super majority of the media are also heavily biased towards the Tories. The party that has the most boxes ticked, weighted by importance, will have the advantage with swing voters.

Johnson has the huge advantage of being a shameless liar. Which means he will promise everything to everyone, thus ticking all boxes. Does it matter that he is a liar and repeatedly and concretely proven so? I don't know. I've asked many, many times, why he is not held to account for promises like 350 million per week for the NHS, but you can see for yourself how excuses are made, that other, more nebulous issues that can never be measured are somehow more important. Is this representative of the British voters? I don't know.

Also, I'm told that Rayner's quote was part of a wider interview, that the quote was meant to illustrate how people can't simply be categorised as left or right. I don't know myself, not having listened to or read the entire interview.

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tee-hee:

https://youtu.be/0kZ03v019rg?t=353

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I understand the principle of it. What I'm trying to say is, it doesn't make sense to worry about the British voter being susceptible to cheap talk and bluster, obtuse to scandal and corruption, if you're also trying to win them over with cheap talk and bluster - that nevertheless the other side has a provably superior competency in. If one expects the British people to crave bullshit of the sort the Deputy Leader indulged in, Boris Johnson is a vastly-superior bullshitter than Starmer and team has ever been revealed to be. Labour can't out-Brawndo Boris Johnson (though perhaps they could stick him sufficiently unlikeable, but that's a grassroots matter).

Imagine:

John Q Public: "What will the government do about crime?"
Politician: "Let's out the dirty weed-huffing hippies on the village square. For the greater good."
JQP: "I am reassured by this reasoned and well-developed answer to our problems."

If the above is taken as an accurate reflection of the electorate's condition (or an influential segment thereof), one can hardly expect JQP to be in the market for staid, accountable government in other contexts.

You should really be hoping this isn't an accurate picture of boxes to tick, not in this manner. Or you're... whatever the British slang for 'not in a good condition' is.


As the video alerts us, the extra funding (mostly temporary pandemic stimulus AFAIK) is unrelated to Brexit, and is barely keeping pace with growth in demand and population, let alone reversing Cameron/May cuts to the NHS, which has become infamously overburdened. And - I can't help but note that the Blair era, for all the criticisms of its healthcare policy, saw hefty funding increases pushed to the NHS. Leaving this as a promise kept at Johnson's feet is a bit like giving Trump credit for vowing to put less priority on cutting Medicare and Social Security than the Republican establishment did.

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Box ticking is not necessarily a bad thing. Done in the right way, it can be a good thing. Hence my citing of "Tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime." Labour has to be seen to be tough on criminals and not favouring them in the justice system. In the case of Rayner, who grew up in a rough area (as did I), people would be justifiably peeved with any politician who favoured theoretical discussions of rights over safeguarding them from harm. But Blair paired that with being tough on the causes of crime, ie. working on the economic and social deprivation that fostered crime in working class communities. And thus the numbers of police grew under Labour, crime fell under Labour, and poverty fell under Labour. Tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime, measurable by metrics.

If you disregard these successes, and demand that Labour offer a plarform that's philosophically sound and consistent to you, you're demanding something that most of the population has no interest in. Especially if you dismiss the tough on crime bit, which most of the population are definitely interested in. Go to a council estate, and ask them whether they're more interested in civil rights or less crime.

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Sure, but the framing of the argument against boris/brexit isn't nuanced [in any way], it starts and stops with the shrill wailing of:

"LIAR, WHERE IS THE THREE HUNDRED AND FIFTY MILLION? LIAR!"

Nothing more need be said when the question is framed thus.

"There is your money."

I have no problem with the nuance of the matter, but we are beyond such petty considerations in the public realm.

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The PM lies, again, this time about Roman Abramovich. Labour MP tries to correct him, and asks the PM to stay for just a moment longer for this. PM gives one look back, then continues walking out.

Do we have a Parliamentary democracy?

https://twitter.com/Haggis_UK/status...25761870340104

Boris Johnson walks out on Chris Bryant.

"I hope the PM can just stay for a brief moment, as it relates to what he said about Roman Abramovich. (Johnson looks back, then continues walking) I don't think that's a courtesy to the house when the Prime Minister leaves in that way... "

Is there any excuse for this?

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Layla Moran names 35 Russian oligarchs who should be sanctioned, including one that the PM lied about yesterday. 7 cabinet members have received Russian money, including the deputy PM (the supposed no.2) and the chancellor (the actual no.2). Foreign secretary excuses it by saying that Russian influence is part of the UK political system.

Just how compromised is this government by a country which we should have been suspicious of, and that is now openly showing to be hostile?

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