UK General Election 2019

[Gilrandir]

Worse than Rospierre? We talking domestically worst or internationally?

Rospierre was complicit in atrocities and paid the price - he also betrayed the spirit of the Revolution in an attempt to save it.

I hate to interfere, but it's RoBEspierre! Or did you mean Ross Perot?

[Beskar]

The Tories seem to have a better strategy:

- Say brexit lots
- step up personal attacks
- hide all Tory candidates (Rees mogg and gove hid under a rock for the whole campaign)
- repeat

Well, Rees Mogg only did after the fire fighter thing,

[Greyblades]

I hate to interfere, but it's RoBEspierre! Or did you mean Ross Perot?

Evidently I was talking about the tyrannical rule of EDS.

[a completely inoffensive name]

What is the target here? The Church? I'm not even getting into that one with you, sufficed to say that any "reign of Terror" on the part of the Roman Catholic Church would have lasted, at worst, about 600 years from the point of view of Mr Twain, and would have included very few burnings of heretics. Whilst the burning of heretics absolutely did happen in the medieval period it's primarily a Renaissance thing - as is religious extremism. It's also pretty easy to judge Europe's low life expectancy from the perspective of a country that never experienced a mass outbreak of Plague.

If you are trying to argue that modern France came out of the Revolution I would argue modern France came out of Napoleon's defeat, which led to a Constitutional Monarchy in France which eventually led to a democratic Republic. If you want to argue that the Revolution led to democracy in modern France I'll argue that Romulus is responsible for all modern western Civilisation - we can keep playing that game until we get back to a hominid named Ug who discovered fire, if you like.

Phil, he is not talking about the church (from my recollection). Twain is referring to the succeeding hereditary* monarchies that ruled the Kingdom of France since the early middle ages.
Monarchies (authoritarian systems in general) by their nature elevate a faction above the rest of society for the purpose of governing. It was the long wars with England, the extravagances of the Sun Kings and the lack of accountability of the Ancien Regime that when contrasted with the simple and vulnerable means that 'French' communities (bad term to say when pre-modern France was much more culturally diverse) lived their lives constitute this silent but long reign of terror. He is talking about the degree to which French ruling classes failed to provide adequate welfare to their subjects for centuries.

You can recognize the sentiment in the more modern political sentiment against big corporations. "Millionaires and billionaires giving themselves big bonuses while average citizens struggle to pay the bills." The struggle is a terror many people are living through right now, so it was for the unlucky Frankish communities that lived under such a poor system of government.

What is always surprising about the French Revolution is despite the degree to which historians and conservatives (rightly) point out it was brutal, savage and ultimately failed in its immediate goals...so many European movements tried to emulate it across the continent for over 100 years after Napoleon. There must have been some recognition that what was here now would be worse than what could be following a brief stint of political violence. Twain's statement is briefly alluding to the driver behind that calculation.

[Gilrandir]

Evidently I was talking about the tyrannical rule of EDS.

EDS=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ehlers...nlos_syndromes?

[Greyblades]

Ross perot's EDS: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_Data_Systems

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Phil, he is not talking about the church (from my recollection). Twain is referring to the succeeding heretical monarchies that ruled the Kingdom of France since the early middle ages.
Monarchies (authoritarian systems in general) by their nature elevate a faction above the rest of society for the purpose of governing. It was the long wars with England, the extravagances of the Sun Kings and the lack of accountability of the Ancien Regime that when contrasted with the simple and vulnerable means that 'French' communities (bad term to say when pre-modern France was much more culturally diverse) lived their lives constitute this silent but long reign of terror. He is talking about the degree to which French ruling classes failed to provide adequate welfare to their subjects for centuries.

You can recognize the sentiment in the more modern political sentiment against big corporations. "Millionaires and billionaires giving themselves big bonuses while average citizens struggle to pay the bills." The struggle is a terror many people are living through right now, so it was for the unlucky Frankish communities that lived under such a poor system of government.

What is always surprising about the French Revolution is despite the degree to which historians and conservatives (rightly) point out it was brutal, savage and ultimately failed in its immediate goals...so many European movements tried to emulate it across the continent for over 100 years after Napoleon. There must have been some recognition that what was here now would be worse than what could be following a brief stint of political violence. Twain's statement is briefly alluding to the driver behind that calculation.

OH, I see. I assume you meant to write "hereditary" instead of "heretical" though?

Of course, what people emulated was the outcome after the Terror, which is when the French started cosplaying as the Romans. That's it, right? Everybody wants to be the Romans again - except the English who want to be the Anglo-Saxons (who wanted to be the Romans). The Romanish view the French Republic has of itself is reflected in modern Parisian architecture and Republican iconography - all of which also pertains to the United States.

There's actually a whole body of medieval literature on the role of the King as the interface between the oligarchic nobles and the common people - and the problem was recognised as far back as Aristotle, at least. That notwithstanding Aristotle recommended a benign and competent monarch or tyrant over democracy as the best form of government. Of course, he was tutoring Alexander the Great at the time. By the medieval period political theory had moved on and academics of the day distinguished between the King who "loved the common profit and thereby his own profit" and the Tyrant who "loved his own profit and thereby the common profit so far as it accordeth with his own" to roughly paraphrase John Trevisa's translation of de regium princepum.

Mr Twain's comment looks rather naive when you consider both the America he grew up in and the America of today. I have to say, whilst I'm in favour of Democracy I've never been impressed by Republicanism.

[a completely inoffensive name]

OH, I see. I assume you meant to write "hereditary" instead of "heretical" though?

Of course, what people emulated was the outcome after the Terror, which is when the French started cosplaying as the Romans. That's it, right? Everybody wants to be the Romans again - except the English who want to be the Anglo-Saxons (who wanted to be the Romans). The Romanish view the French Republic has of itself is reflected in modern Parisian architecture and Republican iconography - all of which also pertains to the United States.

There's actually a whole body of medieval literature on the role of the King as the interface between the oligarchic nobles and the common people - and the problem was recognised as far back as Aristotle, at least. That notwithstanding Aristotle recommended a benign and competent monarch or tyrant over democracy as the best form of government. Of course, he was tutoring Alexander the Great at the time. By the medieval period political theory had moved on and academics of the day distinguished between the King who "loved the common profit and thereby his own profit" and the Tyrant who "loved his own profit and thereby the common profit so far as it accordeth with his own" to roughly paraphrase John Trevisa's translation of de regium princepum.

Mr Twain's comment looks rather naive when you consider both the America he grew up in and the America of today. I have to say, whilst I'm in favour of Democracy I've never been impressed by Republicanism.

Yeah, auto correct strikes again. I'll have that update to say hereditary.

Not sure I understand your point though. I don't think the history was lost on people that the Roman Republic fell into a dictatorship, so I don't think it was a desire to cosplay. It was more borrowing the legitimacy of the Roman state to lend credence to the development of more democratic government in Europe which was solely autocratic for over a millennia.

I really don't get the second paragraph and the last statement. I'll need you to elaborate some more. Remember I'm not Monty so I am not as learned on political theories here.

[Montmorency]

A Labour friend of mine told me exit polls indicate Corbyn was the deciding factor in many cases, so this Conservative breakthrough may be a one-off. It's basically Trump V Clinton - the Left put up a detestable candidate in the belief people would fight the other candidate more detestable, leavened by Corbyn's limited success against May. Really, though, isn't a quarter of Labour voters enough to qualify as "many"? If you try to say by "many" I meant "majority" I won't have it. I said that many on the Far Left of Labour are Eurosceptic

Clinton was well-liked in the Democratic Party, and Trump was well liked in the Republican Party, and the 2016 vote demographics looked a lot like the 2012 vote demographics. Partisan favorability might translate, but the UK vote demographics have clearly shifted between 2015, 2017, and 2020. So an unsound understanding of one case leads to an unsound analogy.

Really, though, isn't a quarter of Labour voters enough to qualify as "many"? If you try to say by "many" I meant "majority" I won't have it. I said that many on the Far Left of Labour are Eurosceptic

We're talking about different things, haven't you noticed? There is minority of Labour Leavers, which is distinct from the minority among Leavers of far-left Labour Leavers who are Leavers because ideologically opposed to the EU. The latter are a tiny minority. If you're saying that specifically among the far-left of Labour, those who are Leavers are themselves mostly ideological Leavers, I can believe that. If you're saying that most among the far-left of Labour are Leavers - which is itself not equivalent to being Euroskeptic - I would solicit some corroborating polling.

What is the target here? The Church?

The aristocracy, and the Church. The existence whereof was the terror, the misery of millions. The whole traditional world order was evil. It's a pretty well-known book.

https://www.pagebypagebooks.com/Mark...reemen_p3.html

Or as Frank Wilhoit contributed:

Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition, to wit:

There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect.

There is nothing more or else to it, and there never has been, in any place or time.

For millenia, conservatism had no name, because no other model of polity had ever been proposed. “The king can do no wrong.” In practice, this immunity was always extended to the king’s friends, however fungible a group they might have been

If you are trying to argue that modern France came out of the Revolution I would argue modern France came out of Napoleon's defeat, which led to a Constitutional Monarchy in France which eventually led to a democratic Republic. If you want to argue that the Revolution led to democracy in modern France I'll argue that Romulus is responsible for all modern western Civilisation - we can keep playing that game until we get back to a hominid named Ug who discovered fire, if you like.

It's noteworthy how you keep dipping into caricatured postmodernism when I say something about history that impinges on the aspects you most admire "understand." Here, history is impossible to scry (for the duration of your momentary purpose) because everything is preceded by something and contingent epistemologies reign. And you imply by parallelism that Napoleon's defeat preceded the French Revolution.

Actually, the chapter is about more than financiers, it's about all those who profit from Imperialism, including the industrialists and the military, and those fulfilling military contracts.

Correct, finance makes up the third section. The summary of the first section is useful to quote:

In all the professions, military and civil, the army, diplomacy, the church, the bar, teaching and engineering, Greater Britain serves for an overflow, relieving the congestion of the home market and offering chances to more reckless or adventurous members, while it furnishes a convenient limbo for damaged characters and careers. The actual amount of profitable employment thus furnished by our recent acquisitions is inconsiderable, but it arouses that disproportionate interest which always attaches to the margin of employment. To extend this margin is a powerful motive in Imperialism.

These influences, primarily economic, though not unmixed with other sentimental motives, are particularly operative in military, clerical, academic, and Civil Service circles, and furnish an interested bias towards Imperialism throughout the educated classes.

The fact that Hobson equates financiers with Jews taints the latter two parts of that chapter and his comments should be seen as antisemitic.

Uh, there wasn't a disagreement here.

Moreover, his comments need to be recognised as dangerous because they legitimise the narrative of the Jewish conspiracy - the mention of anarchist assassins is particularly pointed in the later context of World War I.

That sentence is not making a point about events being controlled by Jewish financiers, it's saying Jewish financiers find a way to profit from any "shock." Hobson does commit just above to a belief that there are some events that cannot occur if financiers are "set [...] against" them, naming wars and state loans. His attachment of Jews to finance can be recognized as dangerous in a more thorough engagement, such as in a review or a discussion in a book of intellectual history.

Funny thing - close intermarriage between monarchical families is... you guessed it... mostly a Renaissance thing. The medieval Catholic Church and Salic Law both disallowed marriage between people related up to the... 12th? degree. That's an incredibly strict standard, much more so than modern marriage law. Application for dispensation need to be seen in this light, people were not often marrying their first or second cousins.

If you're marrying between families, that entails that you're not marrying within your own family. I wasn't making a reference to dynastic inbreeding but to the (unsurprising) fact that nobility married nobility, often across kingdoms and the continent. My idea being to speciously attribute this to ethnic practices of Jewry. Though on a real historical note I'll admit I am not aware of what extent of difference there was in geographic distance of matches between early and high Medieval times.

Such a statement would demonstrate sloppy historiography, because it's inaccurate. Casting monarchy in Europe as a conspiracy enacted by a Jewish elite would invalidate anything worthwhile the author might say. The mere fact that his observations were occasionally accurate would not merit giving any weight to his analysis. That is not to say all of his analysis would automatically be wrong, but I wouldn't use his work to teach without the aforementioned intellectual hazmat suit.

For many texts this is the case; they are now of no interest outside subfields of historiographic research. But for those sufficiently old and weighty tracts, weighty on a subject or for the author's influential descent across time, most would disagree. You yourself would inevitably find an exception in your own field. There is hardly a limit to the number of examples.

Again, this assumption that I support Boris Johnson.

It's not an assumption. It's right there in your words. You can't explicitly speak in support (and "understanding") of someone and negate it by saying the words "I don't support them." This is one of those things that makes you look dishonest.

You saw the facebook post where I described them as two sides of the same crooked penny, yes?

It's weird that you would think I'm following you on social media, but anyway... You can't say one thing and expect it to be taken seriously if all your other statements contradict it. I could say "I like every Org patron equally" but it wouldn't take long observation to give the lie to that. And I won't get into the philosophical debate on the nature of "the lie," the vernacular works fine here.

You clearly don't understand Boris Johnson, where I think you do understand Corbyn. So, I don't think you need Corbyn explaining to you. What part of "You don't have to like someone to understand them" isn't getting through?

I don't think you understand Johnson because you haven't been furthering understanding, you've been maligning one while forgiving another on standards that would more consistently arrive at the opposite. You've never treated either Johnson or Corbyn as characters simply to be understood or described.

You can be banned you malign posting and antagonising other posters. If you don't want to report me why don't you start a thread attacking my posts directly

There have been far worse than you here, and it would be unprecedented to ban you just for being a bad guy.

instead of hijacking every other thread to insult me?

You're the one who, unprompted, chose to perpetuate your lies from another thread, which despite the problems with your treatment of anti-Semitism remains the worst conduct I've ever witnessed from you. You're the one who, as an avowedly religious man, revealed liar, and one vocally and professedly antagonistic and inflexible toward me personally, said talking to me was like talking to a religious zealot. What a joke.

I was frankly a bit miffed at your apparent surprise.

It's the difference between abstract and concrete knowledge obviously. Or it should be obvious. We all know people die violently all the time, that doesn't mean (most of us) could easily stomach a graphic execution video.

It's really not about you. I dislike that you are rude to people, uncaring of their feelings and seem to make a virtue of insults.

You haven't had the perception that I am very targeted about it? I can't get more opprobrious than this, so maybe I'm doomed to always be coddling you as you'll erroneously interpret my attitude toward you as basically the same all the time.

That word, "coddlesome", it's the same as "infantalise" which is what you were doing to me until recently.

And I'm sorry for it. I was trying to treat you kindly and supportively, with kids' gloves really, but you became all grotesque.

That has nothing to do with my, frankly, passing judgement on another academic's work. I think my original comment was "book looks dodgy, cutting off a quote like that." I explained why I think that's bad practise, usually employed to misled readers, I quoted a review from when the book was published where someone far more versed in the subject than I criticised the author for misrepresenting evidence and I quoted the AHRC Style Guide on the proper, and improper, use of ellipsis.

You are lying about what you did, what you said, about the inciting material, and about the references you provided. This isn't debatable. You lied and refuse to own up to it.

I just don't think it's very good from what I've seen. Yeesh.

I posted the full text and explained how the context further undermined your absurd reaction, but I see you didn't pay attention. "From what you've seen," huh? Yet another example of PVC's freaking mendacity: he SAW literally only quotes from a contemporaneous army report on racial tension at the airbase, because that was the entirety of what I originally posted. What a crock.

You see malignancy because you wish to see it, you do not wish to see any nuance, you are not actually interested in what I think - I'm just a target for you to attack. Prior to that I was a target for you to try to convert, once it became apparent I'd rather die than think like you you moved from conversion to attack.

You're wrong. It's an inescapable pattern of behavior from you that sours my opinion, and so I become more hostile because you escalate until many of your major commentaries become objectionable to an insolent degree not because of content per se but because of their repeated deceptiveness. Right now I can't hold warm feelings toward you because I see you keep trying to feed me excrement and tell me it's ice cream. And so your self-righteousness about how I'm actually the one mistreating you becomes easy to categorize as more effrontery, more gaslighting. I don't think reconciliation is possible on this track.

I'm not here to be serious Monty, never really have been.

Unseriousness does not excuse lies, let alone doubling down on lies. Is it too much to ask that you not screw with me? Or is screwing with people secretly the height of civility?

It's also apparent from your posts you can't really distinguish between me, Furunculus and Greyblades.

It's apparent if you don't read my posts.

Being serious, for a moment, much of the Labour manifesto was attention grabbing nonsense - like the pledge to give everyone free high speed broadband. That was an eye-catching pitch but what I want to hear about is road repair, restoration of the dismantled rails links in the county and repair of the roads. One of the reasons Devon and Cornwall are impoverished is that they are physically difficult to access. It's no good having high speed internet to allow you to quickly process online transactions if you have no way to ship materials in or good out to actually make anything.

You know, in the past I would just attribute this comment to ignorance, to not having checked your claims. Like when you claimed to have read Chief Justice Roberts' decision in Rucho, on gerrymandering, and agreed with it. You never addressed the arguments against his decision, but I at least believed you had read his decision. Now I have to assume you're always just lying and revise my past opinions accordingly.

The Labour Manifesto provisions hundreds of billions for regional investment.

My basic problem with you is you put on a lot of airs but you increasingly fail to live up to your stated principles and premises, whether it's trans issues, American politics, or UK politics. What I mean is, like for example on your argument for how we know Corbyn is anti-Semitic, a neutral observer might reflect on your arguments and think, 'Hmm, this isn't a good argument at all.' He might wonder why the argument is so poor, and what a better one might look like. I think your argument is of the quality it is because you don't know what a good argument might look like, and you don't know what a good argument might look like because you don't really care to examine the issue. And then you try to trick your interlocutors. I don't care why you're acting this way, but it taints everything about you. You've put me into a state of despair about your character and I don't want to deal with it.

I'm not getting how that view is 'morally problematic'.
Both myself and my wife grew up in dictatorships (different ones as it happens), and it doesn't seem 'immoral to take from that experience the desire to limit the power of the state to rule over the lives of its citizens. I know what arbitrary state power means when a family friend can be dumped on his wife's doorstep in a hessian sack, who is then told if she makes a fuss her child will never receive an education. My wife knew what life was like to have a gov't spy in every village - known by all, but utterly untouchable in her role of reporting on unpatriotic village activity.

Limitation achieved in two parts:
1. Functionally - in starving the state of the resources to act out tyrannical ambitions (i.e. tax-n-spend)
2. Socially - in reducing the authority of the state to arbitrate on private matters (i.e. regulation)
As it happens I have no real feeling about the absolute value, 40% is just a usefully marketable value in the context of UK political history.

Again, we talking about spending more than canada does here, so I struggle with how this is 'morally problematic'.

You don't have any concept of what your ideology of "limited" state - yet apparently very powerful and interventionist militarily, but leaving that aside - means in practical, and therefore moral terms?

You've never thought about it? Never observed countries in a comparative way? Single countries across history? These aren't numbers in a spreadsheet, they're human lives.

And isn't it inconsistent with limited government that you're promoting and anticipating substantial social engineering by the state in terms of its shaping the economy through Brexit and subsequent trade deals?

I can't see from the context of what you were quoting why you are telling me this...?

Circular firing squad aspect of Momentum. I mean, sure, they're traitors, but anyone should understand better a LibDem traitor than a Tory in Parliament. Here was the fruit of personal vindictiveness overtaking raw political logic. Labour should have ceded campaigning in those seats. Even for nothing in return from LibDems they should have ceded those seats.

Scottish independence and UK independence are the same questions: with whom do we consider a collective "us" for which there is sufficient trust in the values that inform their decision making that we assent to common rule in line with the collective will.
I don't see sufficient commonality that this collective will would not lead too far away from the english notion of liberalism (derived from the individual) towards the french notion of liberalism (derived from the collective), and so I do not assent to common rule.

This is a purely abstract philosophical concept. Let's say it is perfectly valid to feel that the EU in its construction - or projected future construction - is not owed your assent in governance except in the most limited diplomatic and trade association, but the polity circumscribed by "United Kingdom" is.

But feelings are one thing, what about reality? The one millions of people have to live in? What is that like for them, what are the results? Is it right to uphold ideology regardless of outcomes or circumstances? Whichever dictatorship you are from, it is likely its rulers were accused of dogmatism harmful to the polity.

If there is a thin FTA there will be very little in the way of level playing field commitments.
Even May's deal - which included a common customs unions and the presumption of quite high alignment - only had 'non-regression', and I think Canada style FTA will have even less.
BTW - the economic cost to hard brexit/scexit does not derive from the level playing field regs, which includes: social/environment/employment.
No, the cost derives from technical regulation and NTB's on specific fields automotive, sanitory/phytosanitory, chemicals, etc.
It is this that Scotland will need to consider when looking at the 60% of its 'exports' that go to rUK
Level playing field regs are just the social penalty the EU likes to apply to 'justify' the economic integration of the single market to its more statist members.

Do you agree that failure to adhere to level playing field will result in hard Brexit in trade negotiations, and that the government would be willing to accept this rather than accept high alignment?

"‘Get Brexit done’ won the vote"

To say this is to do a grave disservice to the role Corbyn['ism] played in the result!

i.e. asking the british society built on english individualist-liberalism (<40% GDP) to transform into collectivists on french state-liberalism (>45% GDP).

The Labour Manifesto, as far as I am aware, was fairly popular. Corbyn was not popular. I also suspect Idaho underplays the effect of not taking a position on Brexit. The centrist referendum call was a good one, if a year later in coming than appropriate. But to refuse to take a position on whether a Labour government would support its own WA or trade deal with the EU if it came to that - I didn't know that!

That's not a credible position, and Idaho, even outright staking an official pro-Leave position would have been electorally smarter than hoping each voter would project their own imagination onto a Labour canvass.

Speaking of, what were those shenanigans during the September Labour conference, suppressing a count on an official Remain motion? But it's too late now.

Yeah, auto correct strikes again. I'll have that update to say hereditary.

Not sure I understand your point though. I don't think the history was lost on people that the Roman Republic fell into a dictatorship, so I don't think it was a desire to cosplay. It was more borrowing the legitimacy of the Roman state to lend credence to the development of more democratic government in Europe which was solely autocratic for over a millennia.

I really don't get the second paragraph and the last statement. I'll need you to elaborate some more. Remember I'm not Monty so I am not as learned on political theories here.

He's referring to the theory that a proper king, a hereditary monarch, has the welfare of the realm as his highest end both actively and merely by virtue of his position (i.e. there's a certain circularity).

He's right to point out that not Mark Twain's America, nor ours, lived up to our rhetoric. Which kind of then misses the point of both Mark Twain's career and our whole political ideology (maybe mine more than yours).

[Furunculus]

You don't have any concept of what your ideology of "limited" state - yet apparently very powerful and interventionist militarily, but leaving that aside - means in practical, and therefore moral terms?

You've never thought about it? Never observed countries in a comparative way? Single countries across history? These aren't numbers in a spreadsheet, they're human lives.

And isn't it inconsistent with limited government that you're promoting and anticipating substantial social engineering by the state in terms of its shaping the economy through Brexit and subsequent trade deals?

Just so I clear: did you spend a long time trying to justify why there is nothing 'morally questionable' about why I support the 40% of GDP thing?
I only ask as I didn't pick up much of consequence by way of an explanation for how that might be morally questionable...

Re: your lovely diversion to defense and Foriegn Policy: "powerful and interventionist militarily, but leaving that aside - means in practical, and therefore moral terms?"
Yes, it looks almost exactly like Britains post-war Foriegn Policy and Defence configuration.
Morally questionable...?
Cobblers. It is simply the responsibility of a nation that seeks to justify its place on the UNSC.

Circular firing squad aspect of Momentum. I mean, sure, they're traitors, but anyone should understand better a LibDem traitor than a Tory in Parliament. Here was the fruit of personal vindictiveness overtaking raw political logic. Labour should have ceded campaigning in those seats. Even for nothing in return from LibDems they should have ceded those seats.

Sure, i can see the logic, but still not sure how you're addressing this to something I have taken a position on.

This is a purely abstract philosophical concept. Let's say it is perfectly valid to feel that the EU in its construction - or projected future construction - is not owed your assent in governance except in the most limited diplomatic and trade association, but the polity circumscribed by "United Kingdom" is.

But feelings are one thing, what about reality? The one millions of people have to live in? What is that like for them, what are the results? Is it right to uphold ideology regardless of outcomes or circumstances? Whichever dictatorship you are from, it is likely its rulers were accused of dogmatism harmful to the polity.

I'm sorry, does everyone have to justify everything they do against the moral index you recommend?
Want to vote labour - better reflect on the mores recommended by mOnty!
Want to skip the granola for breakfast - whay does mOnty have to say on ethnic cleansing in chechnya?
My choices are valid against [my] moral code. That is enough for me. It certainly ought to be enough for you too.

Do you agree that failure to adhere to level playing field will result in hard Brexit in trade negotiations, and that the government would be willing to accept this rather than accept high alignment?

That's a meaningless question.
If you want a useful reformulation of those words, we could use:
"The deeper and more frictionless access one requires to the single market, the more that will be demanded in level playing field commitments"
The government will seek the deepest integration with the least commitment... just like every other government seeking a trade deal in history.

The Labour Manifesto, as far as I am aware, was fairly popular. Corbyn was not popular. I also suspect Idaho underplays the effect of not taking a position on Brexit. The centrist referendum call was a good one, if a year later in coming than appropriate. But to refuse to take a position on whether a Labour government would support its own WA or trade deal with the EU if it came to that - I didn't know that!

That's not a credible position, and Idaho, even outright staking an official pro-Leave position would have been electorally smarter than hoping each voter would project their own imagination onto a Labour canvass.

Speaking of, what were those shenanigans during the September Labour conference, suppressing a count on an official Remain motion? But it's too late now.

Research from Matthew Goodwin that Labour's heap of giveaways was simply not deemed credible by the electorate. i.e. Corbyn'ism - moving from <40% of GDP to >45% of GDP. Of course we [could] do that in theory, but it was not deemed credible in [practice].
Yes, Brexit.
Yes, Corbyn as an individual.
Yes - too - to Corbyn'ism.

[Montmorency]

Just so I clear: did you spend a long time trying to justify why there is nothing 'morally questionable' about why I support the 40% of GDP thing?
I only ask as I didn't pick up much of consequence by way of an explanation for how that might be morally questionable...

If fiscal austerity or disestablishment had no material consequences of any sort, it wouldn't have conservative advocates who value those consequences, obviously. But some of those consequences include a decline in the living standards of thousands or millions of people. That has moral implications.

Cobblers. It is simply the responsibility of a nation that seeks to justify its place on the UNSC.

Having a powerful and interventionist military is the UK's responsibility, but doing more to provision for its citizens is not?

Here's what I think is part of a general pattern with conservatives. They want the state interfering in other people's lives for their own (perceived) benefit, but if it's something that may affect them personally they recoil. In both cases they do not consider what government action or inaction means for other people.

I'm sorry, does everyone have to justify everything they do against the moral index you recommend?

This isn't a question for you specifically, it is just a general rubric that anyone can hold anyone against. It's a useful metric for anyone to think through how a policy may advance or detract from one's values, especially as with respect to the wellbeing of people (the basic units of society and politics).

My choices are valid against [my] moral code. That is enough for me. It certainly ought to be enough for you too.

That's what I'm asking about. Are they really? Have you thought through the consequences?

The government will seek the deepest integration with the least commitment... just like every other government seeking a trade deal in history.

But that's certainly not true, or you wouldn't support them. This particular government deprioritizes both integration and commitment, is what I'm saying.

Research from Matthew Goodwin that Labour's heap of giveaways was simply not deemed credible by the electorate.

They might not trust Corbyn, but the material is there to work with.

https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politics...-so-why-arent-

i.e. Corbyn'ism - moving from <40% of GDP to >45% of GDP.

Ordinary people don't actually frame policy in those terms, and really no one should.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Clinton was well-liked in the Democratic Party, and Trump was well liked in the Republican Party, and the 2016 vote demographics looked a lot like the 2012 vote demographics. Partisan favorability might translate, but the UK vote demographics have clearly shifted between 2015, 2017, and 2020. So an unsound understanding of one case leads to an unsound analogy.

Certain sections of the electorate loathed Clinton, remember Strike's point that in Texas "Hilary Clinton is the Devil" was a slogan? Anyone that divisive is never getting elected. Trump arguably got elected because he was facing Hilary Clinton.

We're talking about different things, haven't you noticed? There is minority of Labour Leavers, which is distinct from the minority among Leavers of far-left Labour Leavers who are Leavers because ideologically opposed to the EU. The latter are a tiny minority. If you're saying that specifically among the far-left of Labour, those who are Leavers are themselves mostly ideological Leavers, I can believe that. If you're saying that most among the far-left of Labour are Leavers - which is itself not equivalent to being Euroskeptic - I would solicit some corroborating polling.

Well, the majority of Labour voters are not hard left. That being said, a lot of Hard-Left Labour politicians are Leavers. Corbyn, MacDonnell, Len Mcclusky. To that list you should add the Late Michael Foot and Tony Benn, both from the Left of the party, both ardently Eurosceptic.

The aristocracy, and the Church. The existence whereof was the terror, the misery of millions. The whole traditional world order was evil. It's a pretty well-known book.

https://www.pagebypagebooks.com/Mark...reemen_p3.html

Or as Frank Wilhoit contributed:

I've not read much Mark Twain, American 19th Century literature was never required reading and it didn't interest me much - nor does most British literature from the same period. However, I do not agree with that view of medieval France and I submit it reflects a memory of the Anciens Regime which, despite the name, was entirely an enlightenment affair begun with Loius the Sun King.

It's noteworthy how you keep dipping into caricatured postmodernism when I say something about history that impinges on the aspects you most admire "understand." Here, history is impossible to scry (for the duration of your momentary purpose) because everything is preceded by something and contingent epistemologies reign. And you imply by parallelism that Napoleon's defeat preceded the French Revolution.

No, The Revolution was an inflection point that led to Napoleon whereas Napoleon's defeat was an inflection point that led to democracy, eventually. In retrospect the English Civil War was always liable to lead to dictatorship because Parliament was not organised in such a way it could govern without a King and there was no real mechanism for reform. On the other hand, whilst the restoration of Charles II was foreseeable the ascension and deposition of his brother James and the subsequent Glorious Revolution was not.

Correct, finance makes up the third section. The summary of the first section is useful to quote:

The caricature of Jews comes in the second section.

Uh, there wasn't a disagreement here.

Then you should be able to concede the book is dangerous and endorsing it without qualification is foolhardy.

That sentence is not making a point about events being controlled by Jewish financiers, it's saying Jewish financiers find a way to profit from any "shock." Hobson does commit just above to a belief that there are some events that cannot occur if financiers are "set [...] against" them, naming wars and state loans. His attachment of Jews to finance can be recognized as dangerous in a more thorough engagement, such as in a review or a discussion in a book of intellectual history.

I realise this, I am explaining why that sentence is so problematic - because the idea that the Jewish financiers find a way to profit is the first step to concluding they orchestrate events.

If you're marrying between families, that entails that you're not marrying within your own family. I wasn't making a reference to dynastic inbreeding but to the (unsurprising) fact that nobility married nobility, often across kingdoms and the continent. My idea being to speciously attribute this to ethnic practices of Jewry. Though on a real historical note I'll admit I am not aware of what extent of difference there was in geographic distance of matches between early and high Medieval times.

The reason that Jews habitually intermarry is because they are all (theoretically) descended from the same family. The aristocracy (nobility is not necessarily applicable here, technically) tended to marry people in the same economic strata for Reasons of State, but this was not always the case and the vast distances/cultural boundaries involved meant that seeing them as a single class didn't really work even at the time. You havee Imperial East Roman princesses marrying Russian and Bulgarian Tsars, Muslim concubines descended from Mohammed marrying Spanish Kings etc...

For many texts this is the case; they are now of no interest outside subfields of historiographic research. But for those sufficiently old and weighty tracts, weighty on a subject or for the author's influential descent across time, most would disagree. You yourself would inevitably find an exception in your own field. There is hardly a limit to the number of examples.

I'm going to quote an old tutor of mine here, Paul Scade, here who said to us in our first year, "All western Philosophy is a Footnote to Plato". He was, perhaps, not being entirely serious but the point that you need to read Plato and Aristotle to understand a lot of Western Philosophy, especially metaphysics is absolutely valid. Likewise, you need to read Saint Augustine to understand Western Theology, especially the doctrines on clerical celibacy; Adam Smith to understand Capitalism, Marx to understand Communism etc.

These are not "dead" texts. On the other hand, I don't see a lot of value in Hobson. Of course, I likely would have seen little value in it at the time, either.

https://humanities.exeter.ac.uk/classics/staff/scade/

It's not an assumption. It's right there in your words. You can't explicitly speak in support (and "understanding") of someone and negate it by saying the words "I don't support them." This is one of those things that makes you look dishonest.

Have I said, during the election campaign, the words "Boris Johnson is a jolly good chap, I think he's thoroughly trustworthy and I support him and his program for the country"?

Or, rather have I said things like "I prefer Boris" or "I don't think Boris is that dangerous" or "Boris is at least more interesting."

Going back a few years I'm sure you can find me endorsing him in more glowing terms, but since then he's done rather unfortunate things like needlessly suspend Parliament for five weeks triggering a permanently damaging Constitutional Crisis and expelling Ken Clarke from the Conservative Party.

Ken Clarke - the man actually like Churchill, the great Conservative Prime Minister we never had - and possibly one of the few men who might actually have been able to achieve meaningful EU Reform. As little as a few months ago people on the moderate Left and Right in this country were whispering in hushed tones about a National Unity Government led by Ken Clarke. Also, it was not to be - whether you blame Corbyn or Boris is up to you but I'm inclined to think the issue was that Corbyn refused to get out of the way.

In this case the word "unfortunate" is a stand in for something more... colourful.

It's weird that you would think I'm following you on social media, but anyway... You can't say one thing and expect it to be taken seriously if all your other statements contradict it. I could say "I like every Org patron equally" but it wouldn't take long observation to give the lie to that. And I won't get into the philosophical debate on the nature of "the lie," the vernacular works fine here.

This post: https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showt...post2053801787 I posted a screenshot, just to show you that, actually, I do treat them the same in "real" life and I absolutely will tarr Johnson with the same brush, and I do.

Read that post, click the link. In case you don't think that's me, remember that A: I changed my name and B: "Homovallumus" is a Latinisation of "Wall-Ander".

I don't think you understand Johnson because you haven't been furthering understanding, you've been maligning one while forgiving another on standards that would more consistently arrive at the opposite. You've never treated either Johnson or Corbyn as characters simply to be understood or described.

I don't think you've been reading my posts thoroughly - or more likely my register doesn't translate well into yours. I consider Corbyn more dangerous, for one thing he's a Republican, and I also consider him a hypocrite. Johnson I think would be more pleasant to spend time with and more engaging, but that is not an endorsement of him on anything other than a superficial level.

There have been far worse than you here, and it would be unprecedented to ban you just for being a bad guy.

No excuse for tolerance of bad actors.

You're the one who, unprompted, chose to perpetuate your lies from another thread, which despite the problems with your treatment of anti-Semitism remains the worst conduct I've ever witnessed from you. You're the one who, as an avowedly religious man, revealed liar, and one vocally and professedly antagonistic and inflexible toward me personally, said talking to me was like talking to a religious zealot. What a joke.

You accused me of lying - I'm always going to fight you on that. If you don't want to to have this fight you need to stop using words like "malign" or "liar" to describe me.

It's the difference between abstract and concrete knowledge obviously. Or it should be obvious. We all know people die violently all the time, that doesn't mean (most of us) could easily stomach a graphic execution video.

Your reaction was obtuse, it also technically breached forum rules. If you had said something like "I can't believe people would have said something like this" that would be more understandable but there was literally no context in your original post. So I had to guess at your point - all I got was that you were offended.

You haven't had the perception that I am very targeted about it? I can't get more opprobrious than this, so maybe I'm doomed to always be coddling you as you'll erroneously interpret my attitude toward you as basically the same all the time.

I refer you to my previous response. The fact you think that ATPG is a swell guy and when I raised an old conflict between him and I that went to moderation you entirely took his side demonstrates you and I have a very different conception of "polite".

And I'm sorry for it. I was trying to treat you kindly and supportively, with kids' gloves really, but you became all grotesque.

It was offensive, and some of your comments of the last month have been intellectually insulting. Ironically, it's actually less insulting to be accused of lying because at least this precludes errors through stupidity. I'm 33 years old, I don't need an education in political theory to help me see the error of my ways. If that's something you want to try you might consider Greyblades a better subject for your ministrations as he's quite a few years younger.

You are lying about what you did, what you said, about the inciting material, and about the references you provided. This isn't debatable. You lied and refuse to own up to it.

No, I did not. I posted a review which very clearly indicates the author misrepresents a report into racism in the USAF, although not whether that misrepresentation is deliberate.

I posted the full text and explained how the context further undermined your absurd reaction, but I see you didn't pay attention. "From what you've seen," huh? Yet another example of PVC's freaking mendacity: he SAW literally only quotes from a contemporaneous army report on racial tension at the airbase, because that was the entirety of what I originally posted. What a crock.

At time of writing I've been spending an hour writing this reply - your posts are too long not for me to have missed something. Anyway, you missed the screenshot I posted so you can't accuse me of "lying" because I missed something you wrote in an essay that length. In any case, my issue is with the author's prose, not his point. I made the point at least once that sloppy prose undermined an otherwise worthy point (the degree of endemic racism in the US Army at the time). Assuming the quote he cut off was, in fact, as fundamentally racist as the others he quote that does not in my view excuse him cutting it off.

I wanted the whole quote - otherwise the work looks suspect, and therefore my gut reaction is to be suspicious of the author's intention. This is, and always was, about a narrow technical academic point. It has nothing to do with racism in the US, past or present - only historiography. You are the one who decided this was a hill one of us needed to die on.

You're wrong. It's an inescapable pattern of behavior from you that sours my opinion, and so I become more hostile because you escalate until many of your major commentaries become objectionable to an insolent degree not because of content per se but because of their repeated deceptiveness. Right now I can't hold warm feelings toward you because I see you keep trying to feed me excrement and tell me it's ice cream. And so your self-righteousness about how I'm actually the one mistreating you becomes easy to categorize as more effrontery, more gaslighting. I don't think reconciliation is possible on this track.

The word "insolent" implies I should defer to you, I am under no such obligation - I do not recognise you as my superior. You see your own views as so obviously right you conclude I must be malign in opposing you.

Unseriousness does not excuse lies, let alone doubling down on lies. Is it too much to ask that you not screw with me? Or is screwing with people secretly the height of civility?

Screwing with people is only the height of civility if they don't realise you're doing it - and it's still morally wrong. You believe I'm lying, you see bad faith, any protestation on my part will simply be interpreted as more bad faith. Been there, done that, as you say reconciliation is impossible. However, as long as you attack my character I will oppose you and repay you in kind.

It's apparent if you don't read my posts.

It's apparent you don't read mine, either. Evidently we could both do better in that regard.

[quote]You know, in the past I would just attribute this comment to ignorance, to not having checked your claims. Like when you claimed to have read Chief Justice Roberts' decision in Rucho, on gerrymandering, and agreed with it. You never addressed the arguments against his decision, but I at least believed you had read his decision. Now I have to assume you're always just lying and revise my past opinions accordingly.

The Labour Manifesto provisions hundreds of billions for regional investment.

Once again you take a narrow point and spin it out into something it's not. The point was that "Free high speed Internet for everyone" is an eye-catching pledge but in my view unserious when the country is virtually bankrupt and there are other things to spend that money on. I guarantee you that Labour infrastructure spending plans do not include new track for the Tarker Line.

My basic problem with you is you put on a lot of airs but you increasingly fail to live up to your stated principles and premises, whether it's trans issues, American politics, or UK politics. What I mean is, like for example on your argument for how we know Corbyn is anti-Semitic, a neutral observer might reflect on your arguments and think, 'Hmm, this isn't a good argument at all.' He might wonder why the argument is so poor, and what a better one might look like. I think your argument is of the quality it is because you don't know what a good argument might look like, and you don't know what a good argument might look like because you don't really care to examine the issue. And then you try to trick your interlocutors. I don't care why you're acting this way, but it taints everything about you. You've put me into a state of despair about your character and I don't want to deal with it.

I don't understand this point frankly, when the argument is "look, here are 11 examples of Corbyn promoting antisemitic views, associating with antisemitic people and being endorsed by antisemitic people - and here are a bunch of British Jewish organisations and sitting HP's accusing him of antisemitism," I don't see the need to expound at great length. The argument is, really, "If it walks like a duck, floats like a duck and sounds like a duck it's probably a duck." Granted, there is no "smoking gun" here but I don't feel I need one and I'm hardly alone in that on the Left or the Right.

At the end of the day you're completely, diametrically, opposed to me on almost every issue. You're never going to like my opinions but that's not the point. I'm not here to try to convince you of anything - I don't ever expect you to concede a single point to me, ever, I merely offer my opinions as my opinions. So perhaps the real problem is that you're expecting a well-crafted argument and I'm just not that invested in giving you one?

He's referring to the theory that a proper king, a hereditary monarch, has the welfare of the realm as his highest end both actively and merely by virtue of his position (i.e. there's a certain circularity).

He's right to point out that not Mark Twain's America, nor ours, lived up to our rhetoric. Which kind of then misses the point of both Mark Twain's career and our whole political ideology (maybe mine more than yours).

A "proper king" is not hereditary, he is elected by his people - that is the core theory of Feudalism of which the Kingdom of Jerusalem was supposed to be the most pure expression. In any case, De Regime Princepum was commission by Philip III to educate his son the future Philip IV and the translation made by John Trevisa was commissioned by Thomas IV, Lord Berkeley. This is "only a theory" in the same way that the idea that elected politicians are servants of the people is "only a theory". Which is to say, despite decidedly spotting application this was the accepted norm people were supposed to live up to.

[Greyblades]

It was offensive, and some of your comments of the last month have been intellectually insulting. Ironically, it's actually less insulting to be accused of lying because at least this precludes errors through stupidity. I'm 33 years old, I don't need an education in political theory to help me see the error of my ways. If that's something you want to try you might consider Greyblades a better subject for your ministrations as he's quite a few years younger.

He can try but it's been a long time since I have last been inclined to consider him an authority on the subject.

Come to think of it there are few political mentor figures in my life who didnt fall from grace in 2016. Many masks fell that year.

[Furunculus]

If fiscal austerity or disestablishment had no material consequences of any sort, it wouldn't have conservative advocates who value those consequences, obviously. But some of those consequences include a decline in the living standards of thousands or millions of people. That has moral implications.

Where would you stop?
Surely we'd have the least 'implications' if we spent 100% of GDP on government services, no?
I don't see any argument why aiming for some other arbitrary figure like 45% of GDP is less 'morally questionable' than sticking with our historic trend.

Having a powerful and interventionist military is the UK's responsibility, but doing more to provision for its citizens is not?

So not 'morally questionable then, huh?

Here's what I think is part of a general pattern with conservatives. They want the state interfering in other people's lives for their own (perceived) benefit, but if it's something that may affect them personally they recoil. In both cases they do not consider what government action or inaction means for other people.

Well, if you want to invent straw men to knock down then be my guest.
In my experience it tends to be the left that specialises in this - in justifying individual limitation for the collective good.

This isn't a question for you specifically, it is just a general rubric that anyone can hold anyone against. It's a useful metric for anyone to think through how a policy may advance or detract from one's values, especially as with respect to the wellbeing of people (the basic units of society and politics).

And you believe we do not?

That's what I'm asking about. Are they really? Have you thought through the consequences?

But you [have] really thought about the consequences, unlike the rest of us? I mean really thought about them! As in bent your formidable intellect to the problem in a way that we are not really equipped to emulate... :D

But that's certainly not true, or you wouldn't support them. This particular government deprioritizes both integration and commitment, is what I'm saying.

Of course its true, I want a great deal of alignment and integration in the realm of goods.
I just want nothing of the political union that comes with the deepest integration, i.e. membership
I also want to retain freedom for services, for as discussed many times it is DEEPLY inappropriate for the EU to be our regulator in financial services.

They might not trust Corbyn, but the material is there to work with.

https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politics...-so-why-arent-

We shall see, roll on 2024

Ordinary people don't actually frame policy in those terms, and really no one should.

This is of course short hand that also includes the assumption of collectivism that justifies greater intervention in individual life in regulating legal activity on the basis of achieving collective good. You could with very little effort have reached this same conclusion.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

He can try but it's been a long time since I have last been inclined to consider him an authority on the subject.

Come to think of it there are few political mentor figures in my life who didnt fall from grace in 2016. Many masks fell that year.

You are experiencing a flowing of wisdom and cynicism - don't let yourself believe you are *too* wise, though.

[Greyblades]

If this is wisdom, it has not brought happiness.

[rory_20_uk]

If this is wisdom, it has not brought happiness.

Hence the phrase "ignorance is bliss..." and the inverse relationship between intelligence and happiness.

Blessed is the mind too small for doubt.

[Montmorency]

I interrupt the bellyaching to submit some thread-relevant election analysis.

From Wiki:

Year	Con (mil)	Lab (mil)	Lib (mil)	SNP (mil)	UKIP17/Brexit19 (mil)
2017	13.6	12.9	2.4	1	0.6
2019	14	10.3	3.7	1.2	0.6

So, I was off the mark about the degree of demographic shift. The numbers say it must mostly have been a matter of turnout and tactical voting.

Notice that the drop in Labour votes from '17 to '19 is more than 6 times the gain to Cons and Brexit Party. There's a huge jump, over 50%, in LibDem votes, but as the Ashcroft data below show up to half of 2017 LibDem voters may have defected this time (mostly to Labour), with the difference made up and more by similar shares of defectors from both Cons and Labour - at least a million each.

84% of 2017 Conservative voters stayed with the Tories, with 8% going to the Lib Dems, 5% going to Labour and 2% going to the Brexit Party. 79% of those who voted Labour in 2017 stayed with the party, while 9% went to the Conservatives, 7% to the Lib Dems, 2% to the Greens and 1% to the Brexit Party. Three quarters of 2017 UKIP voters switched to the Conservatives, with 11% going to the Brexit Party.

Referring to the above from Ashcroft Polls, my biggest error earlier was in speculating that most Labour Leave voters had defected to the Conservatives/Brexit Party and that this represented an electoral realignment. This was premature. In fact both Labour Leavers and Conservative Remainers were about equally loyal this election at ~2/3 (a quarter of Labour Leavers went to Cons, a fifth of Con Remainers went to LibDems). As I said however, in the key swing constituencies of the North defections to the Cons probably played a large role in Labour's defeats there.

My earlier pass over individual constituencies gave me the impression that third parties (esp. LibDem & BP) had a minimal effect on Labour losses. With the Ashford data on interparty flows in hand, I wanted to check this conclusion while being generous in identifying potential third party influence. For my methodology, I treated LibDems as balanced - arguably the Ashford mix of defections to and from would weigh against Cons - and reapportioned BP votes 2/3 to Labour and 1/3 to Cons, which could be an overstatement of the gap and doesn't account for hardcore BP voters. If reapportionment put Labour ahead of Cons for votes, I sorted it as high-probability of 3P influence. If the reapportionment put Labour a couple of points behind Cons, I (generously) called it a stretch and sorted it in low-probability. I don't know how Plaid Cymru interacted with Labour, and Greens drew 1% of Cons, 2% of Labs, 4% of LibDems from 2017, but to be generous I upgraded low-probability items to high where Greens and Plaid (and miscellaneous independents) were also present and had significant improvements over 2017 that could close the gap. I'm not trying to simulate a preferential voting scheme, or the landscape with no third party candidates between Conservatives and Labour. I can't do that. I'm just making a judgement on how net vote flows from the Big Two to third parties may have played out. An important caveat is that I'm examining Lab-Con losses here, and so have nothing to say on races in which a Con-Lab flip could have been foiled by third parties (though as repeatedly noted the LibDems suffered a heavy penalty due to Labour interference themselves). The biggest caveat is that voters in individual constituencies may have deviated from statistics derived from national figures (e.g. maybe in some constituency Labour voters were especially likely to defect to LibDems and especially unlikely to defect to BP). Such possibilities are beyond my pay grade.

From a survey of results in every one of the 55 Lab-Con flips I found 14 seats where third party shifts probably fatally handicapped Labour and 12 more where it could be plausible.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

High: Ashfield; Blyth Valley; Bolton North East; Bridgend; Burnley; Bury North; Bury South; Gedling; Heywood and Middleton; High Peak; Kensington; North West Durham; Stoke-on-Trent Central; Ynys Môn
Low: Birmingham Northfield; Clwyd South; Delyn; Derby North; Dewsbury; Don Valley; Hyndburn; Keighley; Leigh; Warrington South; West Bromwich East; Wolverhampton South West;

Kensington is special because either Labour or LibDems ceding the race to the other would likely have resulted in Cons defeat. Same for Ynys Môn and Labour vs. Plaid Cymru.

Ashfield had a huge performance by a unique local third party. I have no idea what they stand for.

Altogether, even discarding the "low probability" category, a quarter of Lab-Con losses could be written off as decided by third parties, especially BP and Greens. Of the high-probability contests one could have been swung by Greens or LibDems in the absence of any BP candidate, one was probably swung by a very strong performance by a local independent party, one was probably swung by competition between Labour and LibDem, and one by competition between Labour and Plaid Cymru. At least four were placed in that category due to the concurrence of BP and Green influence. In the rest the Brexit Party alone was probably decisive. I stand by my assessment that LibDems alone had a minimal effect on Labour losses, or at least there is little reason to think so compared to the opposite. In almost all the applicable races the LibDems were hardly a going concern anyway.

SNP of all third parties hurt Labour the most, first by flipping 6 Labour seats (10% of losses) and second by winning many low-margin pluralities and thus depriving Labour of what in another generation should have been a key source of seats. But this was limited to Scotland.

So that leaves anywhere from 1/2-2/3 of Labour defeats (out of 61) not being explicable to any large degree by reference to third parties. In these the necessary explanation is Labour defections to Conservatives, a partisan turnout imbalance, or both. All the foregoing makes me think that despite all the defections and tactical turmoil going on with all parties in this election, Labour's core problem was that it simply could not mobilize voters the way it did in 2017; they were discouraged where other parties' bases were not. Turnout plus the constituency-specific defections to Conservatives should explain the majority, if not the vast majority, of Labour losses and Conservative gains. A relevant observation I saw in the media is that Labour's vote was down almost everywhere, including in their holds.


Assorted observations from Ashcroft:

For the record, it remains the case that 1/4-1/5 of both Con and Lab voters represent the minority position on Brexit within their parties.

Just over a quarter (26%) of all voters said they were trying to stop the party they liked least from winning, including 43% of those who voted Lib Dem and 31% of Labour voters.

Con/Brex voters almost unanimously thought Johnson a likely better PM than Corbyn. Of all other voters very few agreed, but many (even among Labour voters) couldn't state a lean either way so Corbyn did not enjoy a default symmetric benefit.

NHS was the most consensus important issue among the electorate. Labour voters did not prioritize "stopping Brexit" as much as LibDem and SNP voters did.

In the Brexit split a fifth of Remainers voted pro-Brexit parties and a fifth % of Leavers voted Labour or pro-Remain parties, indicating strong cross-pressures that may mitigate partisan polarization somewhat.


Observation for Americans: I had not realized this, but with 650 constituencies and each containing about 100,000 residents, UK elections have the potential to be much more volatile than American national elections. Our House districts, the most similar counterpart, range from half-million to million residents. In a UK constituency, a swing of even five or ten thousand voters can result in a landslide; winning parties are typically carried by votes in the 20-thousands or 30-thousands. On a local level third parties can definitely have an impact in this environment.

It was offensive, and some of your comments of the last month have been intellectually insulting.

It was offensive that I politely disagreed with you. Cut the DARVO.

If that's something you want to try you might consider Greyblades a better subject for your ministrations as he's quite a few years younger.

It occurs to me that you just insulted Greyblades here out of the blue, and likely neither of you realized it at first.

He can try but it's been a long time since I have last been inclined to consider him an authority on the subject.

Come to think of it there are few political mentor figures in my life who didnt fall from grace in 2016. Many masks fell that year.

So you changed all your views on politics and economics and became indoctrinated into fascism? I don't know why you would ever hold me up as an authority in anything, it's up to the informed reader to make a reasonable assessment. But it doesn't matter who's talking if you marinate in a worldview that's practically wholly debased and false.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

It was offensive that I politely disagreed with you. Cut the DARVO.

To whit:

Wouldn't you say the ideas you communicate in your academic context are more restricted, refined, and specialized than those offered here? If you wanted to lecture me on the proper translation and interpretation of Beowulf in the context of linguistic and archaeological evidence, I wouldn't have anything to say to you; I would just respectfully listen.

I consider this an insulting infantalisation of my craft - you gave it the lie later because you wouldn't even listen to me explain a single Anglo-Saxon word in its historical and archaeological context, and you certainly didn't listen.

It occurs to me that you just insulted Greyblades here out of the blue, and likely neither of you realized it at first.

No, I just invited you to insult him by drawing the link between youthfulness and maleability - but as we see Greyblades is able to speak for himself.

So you changed all your views on politics and economics and became indoctrinated into fascism? I don't know why you would ever hold me up as an authority in anything, it's up to the informed reader to make a reasonable assessment. But it doesn't matter who's talking if you marinate in a worldview that's practically wholly debased and false.

Fascism? Really? Do you even know what Fascism looks like?

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Observation for Americans: I had not realized this, but with 650 constituencies and each containing about 100,000 residents, UK elections have the potential to be much more volatile than American national elections. Our House districts, the most similar counterpart, range from half-million to million residents. In a UK constituency, a swing of even five or ten thousand voters can result in a landslide; winning parties are typically carried by votes in the 20-thousands or 30-thousands. On a local level third parties can definitely have an impact in this environment.

This is a key reason many in the UK, including people and on the right and the left, question whether America is governable. More to the point, it is a major reason people in the UK question whether the EU is governable - elected politicians being so remote from their constituents.

[Greyblades]

So you changed all your views on politics and economics and became indoctrinated into fascism? I don't know why you would ever hold me up as an authority in anything, it's up to the informed reader to make a reasonable assessment. But it doesn't matter who's talking if you marinate in a worldview that's practically wholly debased and false.

Yeah the more you do this the more I am convinced my young mind was merely dazzled by your extreme verbosity and superhuman endurance.

Hail, Chief Talk-much Say-nothing.

[Montmorency]

Where would you stop?
Surely we'd have the least 'implications' if we spent 100% of GDP on government services, no?
I don't see any argument why aiming for some other arbitrary figure like 45% of GDP is less 'morally questionable' than sticking with our historic trend

I told you the framing is arbitrary. Why did you proceed on the premise that I meant a specific number?

There could be a law saying, "At the beginning of every fiscal year a check to the amount of 5% of the previous year's GDP shall be mailed to a random citizen." That would instantly raise government spending by ~5% of GDP. It would have no effect on the public good and would not be justifiable according to any political or ideological goal.

Discussion in terms of spending targets is arbitrary. The point is what spending buys. If you reduce spending (relative to GDP or to whatever) that almost invariably means a decline in social spending, in infrastructure investment, in education and healthcare, in the arts and sciences, etc. This almost by definition worsens the lives of thousands to millions. Any discussion of alleged benefits to cutting spending must reckon with these costs. If 100% of GDP spending were a sustainable way to improve people's lives then of course it should be done. To the extent that it is not it should not be.

The point here is that this isn't a game or an intellectual exercise in repose. Government policy cannot be pursued or prioritized for the sake of government policy. Government policy has some effects - so the case should be made that those effects are altogether more desirable than either inaction or some other action.

In the context of breaking with the EU and any subsequent relationship, you treat your goals as eo ipso sufficient. You want to leave the EU because you don't like being in the EU. You want lower government spending because you don't want higher government spending (except on the military). Surely there must be some reasons though, something you want to achieve beyond adjustments to government reports and web pages, for which you have an idea of how benefits weigh against drawbacks.

For example, even when you discuss the details of trade barriers and regulations, as far as I recall you always speak in terms of their existence. What about their contents, their implementation and impact? If as a result of Brexit some regulation is lost or undermined, is that good? Is that bad? Who knows, it doesn't enter your public assessment.

Or turning it around, why do I want the government to do this or that? So I can say they did it? If I support a particular limitation on the waste disposal practices of copper mining concerns, it is not because I hate the copper industry, or because the promulgation of regulations pleases me in itself. It is because I have seen the evidence that the absence of this regulation has permitted unquantifiable environmental damage and has devastated the health of thousands, and that with the regulation in place historical evidence and reliable projections show that the ill effects can be remediated. I recognize that such a regulation can apply a greater or lesser subtraction from the operating margins of sectoral firms. That is a sacrifice I can recognize, and it is one I am (very) willing to make on utilitarian grounds. (At the same time, it is not impossible that the quality, projected effectiveness, or costs of a particular regulation cannot decisively weigh against its adoption.)

Without beating around the bush: To your understanding what are the ranges of positive and negative effects from Brexit, from the variety of likely EU-UK trade deals following Brexit, and from your choice of government spending cuts - besides the tautology of their existence? And what implications for your support do they have?

So not 'morally questionable then, huh?

Why not? I'm asking.

Well, if you want to invent straw men to knock down then be my guest.
In my experience it tends to be the left that specialises in this - in justifying individual limitation for the collective good.

It's a description of what you said about your priorities, namely that spending should be decreased and that a more aggressive military posture "is simply the responsibility" of the UK's Security Council membership.

Your experience doesn't check out.

And you believe we do not?

From the way you talk about it it's not clear, see above.

But you [have] really thought about the consequences, unlike the rest of us? I mean really thought about them! As in bent your formidable intellect to the problem in a way that we are not really equipped to emulate... :D

If I think about it a little, and you don't think about it at all, then maybe. That's why it's important for me to ask.

Of course its true, I want a great deal of alignment and integration in the realm of goods.
I just want nothing of the political union that comes with the deepest integration, i.e. membership
I also want to retain freedom for services, for as discussed many times it is DEEPLY inappropriate for the EU to be our regulator in financial services.

But your desire is plainly inconsistent with the development of negotiations and the political situation. This is the oft-invoked "cakeism."

A question to encapsulate the dilemma you don't seem to recognize: Why go through leaving the EU just because you don't like it?

We shall see, roll on 2024

This is of course short hand that also includes the assumption of collectivism that justifies greater intervention in individual life in regulating legal activity on the basis of achieving collective good. You could with very little effort have reached this same conclusion.

So you don't care how spending is cut, just that it is cut? All spending = collectivism (which is uncomplicatedly bad), so less spending = less collectivism? Would a universal budgetary sequester do it for you? If this is so, then I can't see how it would be in line with your values unless you literally have no values other than cutting spending (which no human has as their sole value). At least, you have not explained your values or how they lead to a certain conclusion in a certain constellation of facts. Hence, my prompts.

I consider this an insulting infantalisation of my craft

The it is, that referring to a specialization as a specialization is infantilizing rather than respectful. But you know how I know you're full of it, yet again? Because just in your latest post(s) you told me that you're not here to be "serious" (as though that means something). So in fact you literally confirm that "the ideas you communicate in your academic context are more restricted, refined, and specialized than those offered here." Yet you attack me for it. You're looking for any pretext to antagonize me. You're a pisstaker, mate. Bollocks to you.

you gave it the lie later because you wouldn't even listen to me explain a single Anglo-Saxon word in its historical and archaeological context, and you certainly didn't listen.

I did listen to you, and I pointed out where you went wrong with regard to what was under discussion in the first place. It is not that most of what you said about Medieval England was incorrect, but that it didn't support your relentless and uncompromising derision of a quite anodyne analogy. I thought we had at least moved past this, but apparently you are adamant about keeping your head in yourself.

No, I just invited you to insult him by drawing the link between youthfulness and maleability - but as we see Greyblades is able to speak for himself.

So you insulted him hoping to goad me into calling him too young to understand? There's no way I can understand your thought process here.

Fascism? Really? Do you even know what Fascism looks like?

Is Vladimir Putin still a fascist?

This is a key reason many in the UK, including people and on the right and the left, question whether America is governable.

It's not proving any less governable than the UK so far. Do you want a Cornish microstate? Such ideas have been floated here before.

Want to hear something funny? In the UK, a national health service is normal, but a national postal service is Communism (according to David Cameron and Vince Cable). In the USA, a national postal service is normal, but national health insurance (let alone a health service) is Communism.

Certain sections of the electorate loathed Clinton, remember Strike's point that in Texas "Hilary Clinton is the Devil" was a slogan? Anyone that divisive is never getting elected. Trump arguably got elected because he was facing Hilary Clinton.

Clinton was divisive, unlike Trump? That the Republicans, Russians, FBI, and American media (the former and latter for a generation) had it out for Clinton in particular can hardly be held against her. There were also events, such as the 2016 Midwestern mini-recession (still basically in effect btw) and the thermostatic effect against the incumbent party, that limited the Democrats' ceiling irrespective of the candidate or opposing actors - yet weirdly enough conservatives are satisfied in blaming one of the least blameworthy persons in the event.

I've not read much Mark Twain,

I knew you would say this. It's not that you haven't read the book - I read the abridged version - or even that you didn't know of the book - I learn about titles all the time that were or are famous - but that you could easily have looked it up.

The caricature of Jews comes in the second section.

Um, I see the header above that section and it reads "III". I just can't wrap my head around it, because as a lie this would be so petty that I struggle to believe it could be deliberate. In another context I would instantly judge it a mistake.

Then you should be able to concede the book is dangerous and endorsing it without qualification is foolhardy.

No, I have demonstrated that's an absurd standard that would not stand application to analogous non-fiction.

Have I said, during the election campaign, the words "Boris Johnson is a jolly good chap, I think he's thoroughly trustworthy and I support him and his program for the country"?

You engage in a pattern of sympathizing with conservatives while denouncing leftists on shakier ground, ground that if taken seriously would in turn demand a harsher treatment of the former.

It's like I said, the way you discuss politics reveals a diminished regard for the agency of conservatives as individuals, or else an elevated one for the agency of leftists. It's similar to the people who assure us they don't support Trump, but mostly seem to have time for criticizing people who criticize Trump for criticizing Trump.

This post: https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showt...post2053801787 I posted a screenshot, just to show you that, actually, I do treat them the same in "real" life and I absolutely will tarr Johnson with the same brush, and I do.

I don't think you've been reading my posts thoroughly - or more likely my register doesn't translate well into yours. I consider Corbyn more dangerous, for one thing he's a Republican, and I also consider him a hypocrite. Johnson I think would be more pleasant to spend time with and more engaging, but that is not an endorsement of him on anything other than a superficial level.

The faux neutrality of 'both sides are the same' doesn't do you the credit you think it does here. Leaving aside the paramount question of evidence, you don't behave as though both sides were truly the same.

If you thought Corbyn were worse for something like republicanism or incoming cabinet etc., then (once more leaving aside the moot question of why at this time) you should have been harping about his republicanism or whatever. But you chose to prioritize specious attacks (even when stronger variants were easily conceivable) on a sliding standard 'inexplicably' offering Johnson mulligans. That you clearly didn't care about Johnson's anti-Semitism for its own sake, nor about Corbyn's putative anti-Semitism, is seen in your deprioritizing one while emphasizing the other with a weak - I might say disposable - narrative. If you truly believed Johnson was not as "dangerous" for Jews as Corbyn, you would have been behooved - and I invited you - to describe the concrete danger posed by Corbyn. The best you could offer is that he believes in a Jewish "problem" that demands a solution, and then backtracked and pretended that the Jewish Problem means something other than what it has always meant. What makes it dishonest is that you sidelined your substantive disagreements with Corbyn for the sake of an approach chosen less for your convictions or its independent soundness than for the rhetorical prospect of slamming Corbyn for something (anti-Semitism) you might imagine people on the left take more seriously than on the right.

No excuse for tolerance of bad actors.

Show me someone who's been banned for being dishonest.

Well, look. If it makes you happier to be here, then who am I to say you should depart. Your presence isn't inherently disruptive or abusive so it doesn't rise to being bannable in my opinion. Contemplating a demand for the removal of a longstanding member of a rather small community on account of personal antipathies makes me deeply uncomfortable, and I would ask you to stop bluffing me.

I refer you to my previous response. The fact you think that ATPG is a swell guy and when I raised an old conflict between him and I that went to moderation you entirely took his side demonstrates you and I have a very different conception of "polite".

I have a somewhat-extensive personal experience with the fellow and you don't compare favorably. That should present an occasion for self-reflection.

Your reaction was obtuse, it also technically breached forum rules. If you had said something like "I can't believe people would have said something like this" that would be more understandable but there was literally no context in your original post. So I had to guess at your point - all I got was that you were offended.

Your compulsion that I explain something obvious that needed no elaboration was obtuse.

No, I did not. I posted a review which very clearly indicates the author misrepresents a report into racism in the USAF, although not whether that misrepresentation is deliberate.

You posted a sentence of something, unclear what it was, that indicated no such thing. Here I could count it as two lies on your part but I'll be generous and treat it as one. The effect is the same.

I explained thoroughly what makes misrepresentation and how it can be assessed, and why there was no evidence of misrepresentation of a primary source - which you never acknowledged in favor of indulging bald, unsupported assertions, and lies like the above.

This is, and always was, about a narrow technical academic point.

Your point was indefensible on its face. Everything you said was horseshit and obviously so. To assume misrepresentation demands supporting evidence, and you had no evidence other than your motivated gut feeling. I provided evidence that your gut feeling was misguided and you ignored it. Nothing narrow, technical, or academic about it.

The word "insolent" implies I should defer to you, I am under no such obligation - I do not recognise you as my superior. You see your own views as so obviously right you conclude I must be malign in opposing you.

It's not that you're opposing me. It's perfectly possible to oppose me without bullshitting me. If you act like you can bullshit me with impunity and I just have to take it, that's insolence.

Once again you take a narrow point and spin it out into something it's not. The point was that "Free high speed Internet for everyone" is an eye-catching pledge but in my view unserious when the country is virtually bankrupt and there are other things to spend that money on. I guarantee you that Labour infrastructure spending plans do not include new track for the Tarker Line.

There are a lot of aspirational proposals in the manifesto, which if implemented all at once would be as revolutionary as anything accomplished by Napoleon or Joseph Stalin in a similar period of time. There was never a possibility of it all being accomplished at once, barring the biggest Labour majority in history. The government would have to prioritize. A vague instinct that the government would not prioritize correctly, or would not prioritize as you see fit, is hard to contest. But Labour had plans for infrastructure investment, and complaining that they didn't lay out every single local project ahead of time (as though the central government were responsible for it all in the first place) is reminiscent of a small-town grumbler complaining that the bureaucrats in DC are doing nothing about the potholes in his neighborhood.

Granted, there is no "smoking gun" here but I don't feel I need one and I'm hardly alone in that on the Left or the Right.

I'll give you a final tip: You would look more serious if you dropped the unremarkable fluff about name pronunciation and a book foreword and focused on Corbyn's alt-right style comment about "British irony."

And if you knew far-left ideology, you would know: Not taking affirmative action within your power against racism IS racist. End of story.

At the end of the day you're completely, diametrically, opposed to me on almost every issue. You're never going to like my opinions but that's not the point. I'm not here to try to convince you of anything - I don't ever expect you to concede a single point to me, ever, I merely offer my opinions as my opinions. So perhaps the real problem is that you're expecting a well-crafted argument and I'm just not that invested in giving you one?

How many times do I have to tell you it's not the fact of disagreement but the form and content? If you tell me you're ideologically opposed to something, fine, I can think it's terrible but it's honest. If you misrepresent text, sources, your own actions and intentions, then

The ellipses debacle was by far the worst conduct I've encountered from you, and it's what basically turned me against you.

You accused me of lying - I'm always going to fight you on that. If you don't want to to have this fight you need to stop using words like "malign" or "liar" to describe me.

Let's take stock of where we are at in the flame war. I think you're an incorrigible varlet and you ostensibly think I'm just peeved that you present a contradicting perspective (even though you and everyone else here have done that forever). I could offer to split the difference and assign blame to Both Sides, but I'm unsure either of us would take that to heart. I'm pessimistic about your character and ability to recognize and acknowledge where you've misstepped, so I don't see the use in nagging you further. Since nothing will get resolved on the existing set of disputes, continuing to stir the pot is a waste of our lives. But there's no burying the hatchet on past disputes when it's almost certain one of us will sooner or later grievously misbehave in the other's view. My best resolution is just to avoid confrontation when I think you're indefensibly full of it from now on.

A "proper king" is not hereditary, he is elected by his people

Source please. Even the modern-day legitimists say succession is rightly by familial descent of some form, that kings are justified by being the supreme arbiter of justice and law, stewards of the land and the people, who both transcend the realm and equally represent its regions, classes, etc.

Yeah the more you do this the more I am convinced my young mind was merely dazzled by your extreme verbosity and superhuman endurance.

Hail, Chief Talk-much Say-nothing.

As an incomplete recap of why I refer to Greyblades as indoctrinated into fascism:

His ideology is subsumed to the priority of opposing all forms of political and social leftism and liberalism as treacherous cosmopolitanism and bourgeois values.

He repeats verbatim and uncritically standard lies of avowed European fascist and identitarian movements on the inferiority and menacing character of non-whites, immigrants, and refugees.

He excuses and supports government coercion to suppress the above disfavored categories.

He occupies an entire alternate reality to accommodate the above, and can be relied on produce objectively false statements on any subject of political proportions.

He never misses an opportunity to troll.

The one thing I can say in his favor is that he at least sounds like a normal person when conversing about UK politics.

[Furunculus]

I told you the framing is arbitrary. Why did you proceed on the premise that I meant a specific number?

There could be a law saying, "At the beginning of every fiscal year a check to the amount of 5% of the previous year's GDP shall be mailed to a random citizen." That would instantly raise government spending by ~5% of GDP. It would have no effect on the public good and would not be justifiable according to any political or ideological goal.

No, covered already:
"As it happens I have no real feeling about the absolute value, 40% is just a usefully marketable value in the context of UK political history.
Again, we talking about spending more than canada does here, so I struggle with how this is 'morally problematic'."
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showt...post2053801826

In the context of breaking with the EU and any subsequent relationship, you treat your goals as eo ipso sufficient. You want to leave the EU because you don't like being in the EU. You want lower government spending because you don't want higher government spending (except on the military). Surely there must be some reasons though, something you want to achieve beyond adjustments to government reports and web pages, for which you have an idea of how benefits weigh against drawbacks.

No, covered already (to give at least one reason):
"Both myself and my wife grew up in dictatorships (different ones as it happens), and it doesn't seem 'immoral to take from that experience the desire to limit the power of the state to rule over the lives of its citizens. I know what arbitrary state power means when a family friend can be dumped on his wife's doorstep in a hessian sack, who is then told if she makes a fuss her child will never receive an education. My wife knew what life was like to have a gov't spy in every village - known by all, but utterly untouchable in her role of reporting on unpatriotic village activity.

Limitation achieved in two parts:
1. Functionally - in starving the state of the resources to act out tyrannical ambitions (i.e. tax-n-spend)
2. Socially - in reducing the authority of the state to arbitrate on private matters (i.e. regulation)"
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showt...post2053801826

Why not? I'm asking.

Why not indeed, I've answered.
You have produced nothing to evidence your implication that i hold 'morally questionable' notions.

Your experience doesn't check out.

Not that you have evidenced...

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

To those who witnessed my previous outburst I apologise unreservedly for losing my temper. My behaviour was unacceptable, my language reprehensible, and I am deeply ashamed.

Please note, however, that I continue to deny all accusations made against me by a certain member.

[Gilrandir]

Source please. Even the modern-day legitimists say succession is rightly by familial descent of some form, that kings are justified by being the supreme arbiter of justice and law, stewards of the land and the people, who both transcend the realm and equally represent its regions, classes, etc.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_elections_in_Poland

[Beskar]

Just a gentle reminder to all, do steer away of personal accusations. It is can be very tempting and easy to accuse someone of lying, and likewise, it is very tempting to feel the other poster is being dishonest. I know, I have been there before and it is not pleasant for anyone involved. Things have gotten heated on the subject, so I kindly request we steer away from that avenue. Staff team (red & green names) will contact and handle things privately.

Also, the Winter Truce is soon.


From your friendly backseat driver moderator.

[Montmorency]

Furunculus, you're not answering the questions. What you've said so far shows no consideration for the effects of the things you want. If my question is "What consequences would limit your policy preferences?" your response appears to be that there is no need to ponder consequences, your ideology is absolute.

I suppose, as some dictators are said to have said, you need to break a few eggs to make an omelet?

[Furunculus]

No. You just don't like them.

[Greyblades]

As an incomplete recap of why I refer to Greyblades as indoctrinated into fascism:

This should be good.

His ideology is subsumed to the priority of opposing all forms of political and social leftism and liberalism as treacherous cosmopolitanism and bourgeois values.

He repeats verbatim and uncritically standard lies of avowed European fascist and identitarian movements on the inferiority and menacing character of non-whites, immigrants, and refugees.

He excuses and supports government coercion to suppress the above disfavored categories.

He occupies an entire alternate reality to accommodate the above, and can be relied on produce objectively false statements on any subject of political proportions.

Ah, quite the cartoon, an ideal opposition, exquisite in his simplicity and convenience.

Does such a man exist I wonder. Can he? I suppose if it's creator can be writing before my eyes anything is possible.

Sadly such a man is not here, you are stuck with merely me and I can tell you with great confidence such reductionism is not a viable method to deal with the increasing disconnect between the state of the world and your conception of it.

He never misses an opportunity to troll.

You mistake me for some kind of scoundrel. I am a respected member of the community, to even insinuate is the height of bad manners. Lies, lies and slander.

The one thing I can say in his favor is that he at least sounds like a normal person when conversing about UK politics.

And yet you call me indoctrinated into fascism. Is this some dig at the normal person perhaps? Le gasp.

A sublime condensation of falsehood, misinterpretation and ideological redefinition. Half of it doesnt even make sense to support an accusation of fascism above any number of different ideological leanings opposed to leftism, and the idea that trolling is an indicator of any ideology is just ridiculous

"no I didnt" "no it isnt" and "that doesnt mean what you think it means": Apply as appropriate.

[Montmorency]

No. You just don't like them.

Can you explain why someone would like them?

Someone who demanded further integration into the European Union of any nature and under any terms - including terms that the EU would itself reject under conceivable circumstances - and someone who claimed that government spending should be raised to exceed 50% of GDP through indiscriminate new programs and budgetary inflation, to be funded by the abolition of the military, on the principle that any expansion of the state is inherently good, could be asked what motivates and justifies such an agenda. They could be asked about potential limitations or pitfalls of the agenda, and whether it furthers the welfare of the polity. If such a person were to reject the opportunity to defend their commitments and implicitly rely on the self-sufficient and self-evident justice of their cause, they would rightfully be described as excessively dogmatic.

This should be good.

You were forthrightly demonic throughout 2017 and you haven't changed. The elements I named are all core features of fascism across time and place, and you embody them. Just a notice that other people see you choosing to align yourself with titanic world-historical depravity.