[Politics] Tory meltdown finally arrived [was: incoming]...

[beorhthelm]

Just a thought, Mordant is popular with grassroots and that is dangerous for the rest of the candidates and i just wonder if it's going to become a Stop Mordant situation?

i saw she was an early favorite for next PM before Johnson resigned, based on member polling. i'm still not clear why.

odds 2/5 favorite currently.

 

[Machiavelli]

It's a weird one this. On the one hand, low taxes, small government and personal responsibility sound fine. The problem for me is that these seem to mean very different things when they come out of an MPs mouth. Note, I don't take small government to mean small services.

Well, if a shrunk government isn't delivering smaller or fewer services, what is it doing? Badenoch at least had the honesty to say that if you deliver tax cuts, it means the state doing fewer things (although has not, as yet, indicated what a state under her wouldn't be doing).
Do also factor in that the state has been hammered for 12 years now by cuts which means that barristers are on strike, and may well be followed by teachers, junior doctors, nurses, ...

 

[The Clamp]

Exactly how I felt about Corbyn. There really are some shocking candidates in recent years. Milliband, Boris, potentially Truss. They’re all absolutely dire.

I never really knew much about Corbyn. I don’t believe Starmer is anyone’s fool and he is certainly not as clumsy and oblivious as Truss but overall Labour has a pattern of putting spineless mice in charge and the Tory’s have a pattern of putting nasty ******** in charge.
Something in between please!

 

[lawros left foot]

I haven't a clue and would like to know myself.

Hmmmm, I was drafted to Dolphin Wardroom galley , twice and I once had a call round on HMS Opposum, and my nephew was a Chief Tiff on nuclear boats, maybe I’ll put in a belated request for some dolphins myself.

 

[Thunder Bolt]

All the videos of Penny Mordaunt's lies about Turkey and Britain not having a veto, are being shared this evening. Last night she tried to blame David Cameron for it, which is why the clips are being shown.

She's as untrustworthy as Johnson imo.

 

[jcdenton08]

I never really knew much about Corbyn. I don’t believe Starmer is anyone’s fool and he is certainly not as clumsy and oblivious as Truss but overall Labour has a pattern of putting spineless mice in charge and the Tory’s have a pattern of putting nasty ******** in charge.
Something in between please!

I’d prefer Starmer to everything else on the table. Sadly, he’s not on the table - or anywhere near the table - he’s in the lobby sitting twiddling his thumbs as louder and more obnoxious diners are shown to their seats, drunk from wine at a “work event” they’ve just come from at Number 10.

I appreciate the table analogy got away from me a little bit there.

 

[Thunder Bolt]

Hmmmm, I was drafted to Dolphin Wardroom galley , twice and I once had a call round on HMS Opposum, and my nephew was a Chief Tiff on nuclear boats, maybe I’ll put in a belated request for some dolphins myself.

I sent signals to submarines, and had a day on our first nuclear Polaris sub at Faslane. I could wear them.

 

[clapham_gull]

It's going to take an election defeat for the Conservatives to finally wise up that appealing to their core vote is a strategy of diminishing returns.

I'm also observing the culture wars approach has bitten them on the arse. The transgender debate doesn't impact on 99.9% of the population and is mainly a fierce debate within feminism.

Unfortunately they've used it to divide and conquer and now some of candidates are either doubling down or have to clarify things they've said in the past.

Johnson's legacy, the toxification of the Conservative Party. For a man with no politics or policies to speak of that's quite an achievement.

I've got a book on the worst political decisions in UK history and I'd imagine it's worth a new edition. Clearly needs a chapter on when Cameron persuaded Johnson to be the London Mayoral Conservative Candidate.

 

[Thunder Bolt]

I’d prefer Starmer to everything else on the table. Sadly, he’s not on the table - or anywhere near the table - he’s in the lobby sitting twiddling his thumbs as louder and more obnoxious diners are shown to their seats, drunk from wine at a “work event” they’ve just come from at Number 10.

I appreciate the table analogy got away from me a little bit there.

Labour are 20 points ahead in the polls at the moment. Starmer hasn't got the numbers in Parliament to change anything yet. He is forensically thorough and using quiet tactics. Wait until the next election to see what happens.

 

[jcdenton08]

It's going to take an election defeat for the Conservatives to finally wise up that appealing to their core vote is a strategy of diminishing returns.

Well, quite honestly, that sounds an awful lot more like Labour prior to Starmer than the Tories. They got battered in elections and changed absolutely nothing. Labour made a tactical decision to go left for their “core vote” and it’s only recently they’ve discovered they don’t have one. Moving back into the centre - as with Blair - is their only chance of winning and I’m relieved they’ve finally seen it.

What concerns me is a whiff of power being close, the appeasement of Momentum and the unions will restart and all their good work will come undone.

 

[The Clamp]

I’d prefer Starmer to everything else on the table. Sadly, he’s not on the table - or anywhere near the table - he’s in the lobby sitting twiddling his thumbs as louder and more obnoxious diners are shown to their seats, drunk from wine at a “work event” they’ve just come from at Number 10.

I appreciate the table analogy got away from me a little bit there.

We find ourselves in agreement

 

[Neville's Breakfast]

Well, if a shrunk government isn't delivering smaller or fewer services, what is it doing? Badenoch at least had the honesty to say that if you deliver tax cuts, it means the state doing fewer things (although has not, as yet, indicated what a state under her wouldn't be doing).
Do also factor in that the state has been hammered for 12 years now by cuts which means that barristers are on strike, and may well be followed by teachers, junior doctors, nurses, ...

Perhaps though it means a more traditional clear dividing line between the parties. Under Blair and assorted Tory leaders we had two roughly identical parties. Since 2016 we have had a dividing line on Europe that is somewhat artificial, toxic and divisive. Differentiation on levels of taxation and public services is an ideological difference on which to fight the next election.

 

[Gwylan]

It's going to take an election defeat for the Conservatives to finally wise up that appealing to their core vote is a strategy of diminishing returns.

It's bizarre. Having witnessed Labour under Corbyn appeal to its members and ignoring the concerns of the average voter, the Conservative party is doing exactly the same thing. If they had any sense, they'd choose Tugendhat, who's broadly centrist and is not tainted by the Johnson regime, but he's going to be eliminated next and they'll choose someone who'd play into Labour's hands.

I don't get the appeal of Mordaunt. She's been part of the government, so she's got the stench of Johnson on her, but only a short time in cabinet before she was fired. It's not exactly a scorching CV. Mind you, she has to be better than Truss or Braverman - the champagne corks would be popping at Labour HQ if either of those was the opponent.

 

[beorhthelm]

I'm also observing the culture wars approach has bitten them on the arse. The transgender debate doesn't impact on 99.9% of the population and is mainly a fierce debate within feminism.

there's a school of thought that it impacts on 50.59% of the population, certainly moved beyond feminist groups. anyone in public asked about it has to take a position and face fierce opposition which ever way they go.

 

[clapham_gull]

Well, quite honestly, that sounds an awful lot more like Labour prior to Starmer than the Tories. They got battered in elections and changed absolutely nothing. Labour made a tactical decision to go left for their “core vote” and it’s only recently they’ve discovered they don’t have one. Moving back into the centre - as with Blair - is their only chance of winning and I’m relieved they’ve finally seen it.

What concerns me is a whiff of power being close, the appeasement of Momentum and the unions will restart and all their good work will come undone.

It applies to both parties and history should tell us the same. The odd thing about the Tories at the moment is they are behaving like themselves when they found themselves newly out of power.

If anyone remembers William Hague's really odd lurch to the right in opposition and thinking that Iain Duncan Smith or Michael Howard were anywhere near electable.

 

[Hugo Rune]

there's a school of thought that it impacts on 50.59% of the population, certainly moved beyond feminist groups. anyone in public asked about it has to take a position and face fierce opposition which ever way they go.

50.59%?

That school of thought must have a profoundly bizarre definition of the word ‘impact’.

But you are right, there are more groups determined to impose ‘your gender is your biological sex’ dogma on trans people.

Step forward, the LGB Alliance. Equality for non heterosexual people but without the ‘T’.

“Fact: Gender transition can be the result of homophobia
Very many children, and quite possibly adults, enter the process of gender transition as a result of the homophobia of their parents, peer group, or their own internalised dislike of their sexual orientation. Young gay men or lesbians are being sold a myth that they can be straight, that lesbians are really straight men and that gay men are really straight women. This is homophobic conversion therapy.”

https://lgballiance.org.uk/facts/

 

[Tom Hark Preston Park]

Fashionable quote du jour, parroted multiple times today v slippery politicians, which is to say all of them: "I see you've decided not to engage with my question". Same as it ever was

 

[clapham_gull]

there's a school of thought that it impacts on 50.59% of the population, certainly moved beyond feminist groups. anyone in public asked about it has to take a position and face fierce opposition which ever way they go.

Having worked in the public sector I fundamentally disagree. Even if you have to take a position on it, it's little more than a grain of sand in terms of policy and those policies themselves have no impact on the daily lives of most the population.

No-one is forced to use pro-nouns in the email signature irrespective of what the Daily Mail tells you.

A school of thought that says 50.59% are impacted is from the school of contrarian bullshit.

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

Perhaps though it means a more traditional clear dividing line between the parties. Under Blair and assorted Tory leaders we had two roughly identical parties. Since 2016 we have had a dividing line on Europe that is somewhat artificial, toxic and divisive. Differentiation on levels of taxation and public services is an ideological difference on which to fight the next election.

Blair versus Hague, perhaps (albeit Hague was a tad more right wing than Mr Tony).
Blair vs the Japanese cougher Duncan Smith, and man of the pipple, Howard, not. Tories had lurched to the right by then and were a joke.
It was only 'call me Dave' who dragged the party back to the centre, only to spaff it all over Brexit (he lost, you won, I know).

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

Having worked in the public sector I fundamentally disagree. Even if you have to take a position on it, it's little more than a grain of sand in terms of policy and those policies themselves have no impact on the daily lives of most the population.

No-one is forced to use pro-nouns in the email signature irrespective of what the Daily Mail tells you.

A school of thought that says 50.59% are impacted is from the school of contrarian bullshit.

Correct.

I also work in the public sector and although #supporfordiversity is enshrined in all we do......it has zero impact on what we do, what we think, what we say, what we plan, what we believe.

Maybe that's because our staff and students are not characteristically a bunch of genderphobic, transphobic, homophobic, sexist, racist prats.