To think we don’t know how lucky we are under Starmer.

and this.

In this "instant" age where people have got used to having answers at their fingertips, some seem to think it's like a magician or Genie in a bottle where things instantly can change when someone snaps their fingers. Of course real life isn't like that.

Unfortunately you get that oik Chris Mason given 50% of the news programme every night to make up his little fantasies, and when things get repeated often enough, people begin to presume they must be true. He chooses to continually look for issues with a man getting on with his job - which of course has been made FAR more complicated and challenging by Trump having been elected in USA - rather than presenting a fair, unbiased reflection of what is going on in Parliament. I just sit a squirm at so much of his questioning each night.

This

I've said this all along. KS has a PR problem. Blair also had Alistair Campbell.

And to people talking about Ed Milliband as a good possible successor: all The Sun had to do was print a front page picture of the man eating a bacon roll on election day to put people off voting Labour.

Whoever replaces KS is already on borrowed time.

This.

The media is so broad these days that it can’t be said to just represent the elites any more. Social media, which is now more prolific than traditional media, creates an echo chamber effect where people are fed repetitive and reductive messages, for example.

Certain social media platforms and TV programs are used to flatten nuance rather than report in a broad and balanced way, even more so than in the past. There is plenty of anti-establishment media now.

Yes, you’re right that people have just voted - I think it’s fairly well known that there have just been elections and lots of people on here will have voted in them. People don’t vote in a vacuum, however. People are as much products of the culture in which they live as they are producers and we’re all influenced by media, hermits excepted.

You also right that it’s called democracy. It was also called democracy at the last lot of elections and the lot before that, so unless something fundamental about human judgement and nature has changed this time around, pointing out the obvious facts that people have voted and that it’s called democracy doesn’t suddenly make it the failsafe system for positive change that it has never previously been.

Definitely keep him. He’s steady, sensible, grown up and knows what he’s doing. I have no fucking idea why he’s still bothering, with all the shit he gets. I’d have been fucking it off and going to live in Barbados months ago.

Also, charisma is wildly overrated in world leaders.

I agree OP. Starmers doing a decent job given the shitshow going on in world politics. The economy isn’t b doing badly. I dread the chaos that’s coming next.

Same.

Yep. The media are driving a frenzy to get rid of a prime minister who didn't rush us into the war in Iran.

I’m just so glad I’ve found this thread! Was actually just despairing that the entire population appeared to have been brainwashed and I was the only one thinking he was making some small but significant in the long term changes (unlike Boris et al).

The media didn't magic up mandelson . They didn't fake the famous interview , what constitutes a woman.
They didn't fake the rose dufflied atrocity...the media didn't drag labors feet to sort out the Rotherham stuff and so on

arent you influenced?! We all are to some extent.

I agree. I think he’s a decent, intelligent man and I despair at the electorate who would rather see Farage in no. 10. People are influenced by social media, and believe unthinkingly the nonsense they read.

Reversing the 2 child cap doesn’t mean those kids are taken out of poverty. Waiting lists going down… not everywhere or for everyone. Foreign policy?! What about our international aid spending.

I don’t hate Starmer . I think he’s weak and clueless but he definitely doesn’t deserve the hate. But Labour collectively are doing a shit job

The same is true of The Guardian and any Tory leader

I like him and I really don’t get the hate. He’s doing a great job on foreign policy, they’ve taken 500k children out of poverty by reversing the two child cap, NHS waiting lists are going down. I’d like education policy to be a bit more radical, but I do think things will improve a bit. Closer ties with Europe should be a no brainer, surely will improve the economy. I don’t think there’s the money for a more radical left agenda and I think things would be much worse under conservatives or god forbid reform.

That’s the impression but I don’t think it’s true in real life.

Radicalised in what form? Anti semitism? black or brown people - but maybe only poor ones , men or TRANS or let’s kill the Karen’s - the list of problem people goes on

increasingly you can agree with one party on a few things but also agree with a different party on their approach.

The Telegraph and Mail were seething and baying for blood from day one.

The Mail went from 'Bloody boomers, taking all the money' to 'poor pensioners going to die from the cold' when the winter fuel allowance was cut.

Nothing Starmer could have done would have satisfied them.

YANBU. No prime minister is going to please everyone, he’s not perfect by any means but I believe he is what we need for the time being. There have been a number of positive things achieved under Starmer that have already been mentioned upthread and that will benefit this country and its people long term, that seem to be going unnoticed and unrecognised by the media. Instead they focus on ‘small boats’ which has been an issue for decades, possibly even centuries and that no PM has ever been able to resolve, and so called benefit scroungers. Two easy targets that the media knows will get people frothing at the mouth when the real reasons people are struggling are glossed over. Brexit royally fucked us over, whether people accept it or not.

We tolerated 14 years of Tory madness, they made a mess of everything they touched yet kept being voted back in again and again, played musical chairs with the prime minister position to the point where as a country we now think it is normal to change PM every 5 minutes rather than allowing the person who was democratically voted in to complete a full term. People lack patience and want things done yesterday, not understanding that undoing the chaos he walked into is going to take time. Barely two years of a Labour government and people are calling for his head, it’s ridiculous. It’s going to take a lot longer than two years to undo the mess caused by Brexit, Covid and years of austerity. Let the man complete a full term at least.

He’s not charismatic, he’s not an entertaining personality, but he’s a politician not an entertainer. He’s there to do a job and despite the media attacks, he’s getting things done. He is sane compared to our other options, and leaders of other countries who are genuinely dangerous and a threat to us all. I hope he doesn’t resign, I can’t think of any better options. And if Reform are voted in at the next general election, well we are truly doomed but if that’s what the people want, fine. We live in a democracy after all.