Thread 25 Starmer - Cheers for a falling out among thieves

[DuncinToffee]

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https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/_chat/5338688-thread-24-starmer-casting-the-net-wider?

I was born 1978 so similar age. Thatcher/Major were in charge my entire childhood and I was a student for the “Things can only get better” era. I’m usually the youngest at various social things by a good decade or two.

I really liked Gordan Brown, but he was too closely associated with the Global Financial Crash and Labour had been in for 13 years, he also faced a very hostile media, which went out of their way to never portray the real GB....

I mean the storm that blew up over his Bigot remark... probably made the difference between the hung parliament we had and Labour winning outright.

I don't think that is the case. I don't deny the damage she did; I think her actions were appalling and the changes she instigated have damaged the country massively going forward - but I genuinely believe that she had a vision that she believed was the right thing to do and she stuck to it. The same could of course also be said of Hitler.
I've no idea however what (for example) Starmer or Johnson really believe in or what their real values are, other than self promotion.

I guess we will never know for sure on Thatcher but if you re right about her, how come, when the damage became very obvious, did she not change tack?

The selling of state owned utilities made many people, favourable to the Tory party, extremely rich, same with numerous privatisations of public services & tax cuts.

She carried on doing these, despite many in her party telling her it was wrong, backed up by the outcomes.

Starmer seems to be trying to put right the many years of poor public policy, i don't think he is into self promotion or if he is, he is rubbish at it!!!

Personally, i don't know why he wanted the job, the country is in a terrible mess.

I will not comment on any form of comparison to Hitler.

if you re right about her, how come, when the damage became very obvious, did she not change tack?
Because she still believed she was right.

You're right about Starmer and self promotion - the sentence got away from me 🤣. Started with not knowing what Blair believed in, changed it to Starmer, then added the bit about self promotion still thinking of Blair. Oops 😁.

Finally I apologise about the comparison to Hitler. I meant it purely in terms of having an unwavering image of the future and the drive to deliver it, I was definitely NOT intending to compare the actions and policies of the two.

This is what gets me about people dismissing comparisons to Hitler.

Hitler was able to hold an audience. To use words and speeches to convince an audience they were being hard done to and someone was to blame. When you hear some of his speeches, he had his audience in his grasp.

I could compare say that some other modern day politicians have exactly that same ability.

But people say "But you're comparing them to Hitler". Well actually, you're comparing their ability to hold an audience and to persuade an audience to Hitler's ability to do the same.

You're not comparing their policies to Hitler's policies.

but I genuinely believe that she had a vision that she believed was the right thing to do and she stuck to it

A bit like her greatest imitator - Truss.

Re-read. I said exactly what you did.

Sir Keir Starmer believes in The UK.
That is why he is our PM.
In my opinion.

Ken Livingstone, in his banned book "If voting changed anything they'd abolish it" was able to admire what Thatcher achieved.

(It's always worth picking up on enemies praise).

He believed that before 1979, the UK electorate was like a pyramid where the lowest tier - the working classes - could outvote the middle and upper tiers.

The genius (his word) of Thatcher was she turned it into an egg. Quoting someone saying "If you treat people middle class, they vote middle class".

Form that point on, the middle classes set the agenda.

Now that's up for debate. But someone has to suggest it first. Moreover, if you accept it is a valid theory, then you have to ask how do you "treat" people as middle class ?

Whilst this thread and indeed forum may not be able to resolve those points, I think it's indisputable that someone has (or did) and used those findings to drive policy and presentation ever since.

And it's possible the current electoral swirl has come about because that truism is no longer true ? Remember all parties in Westminster (except Reform obviously) have realised the current electoral system is no longer fit for purpose. And one way to read that sentiment is that the middle classes are no longer winning, If you were unduly cynical. Which, luckily for this thread and board, I am not.

Regarding Thacher ... unless you grew up during the war and post-war, you may not be using the same goggles she had to view the world.

As someone sprung from the 60s, my world view of Germany, would be the country where "The Great Escape" was set. For those of my grandparents generation (i.e. the generation that elected Thatcher) Germany was the country that was doing it's best to eliminate us.

I don't think even the dimmest bulb in the set would try and say those are nuanced positions.

I give zero fucks for sounding like a stuck record, but history really matters. It doesn't make things "interesting". It makes them sensible in context. "They who command the past command the future.". As Orwell would have said to demonstrate his rejection of a pronoun-based power system.

Is Livingstone’s book banned? You can buy it on Amazon for £3.

All PMs end up with something like “I’m right and no one else has the vision”. If you don’t have something like this, then you’ll never survive this insanely tough job at all. The ones that don’t have this ruthlessness or toughness don’t survive.

Thatcher admittedly got odd towards the end of her reign. I say reign, because she assumed this rather regal presence, and the clothes! Extraordinary stuff. Men do not have those sort of options to convey power. She was all gold buttons, shoulder pads, overripe Chanel suits, hair lacquered in a power helmet (did anyone see it move?). Queasy feeling when you thought of the economic devastation she caused and the misery people experienced.

I don’t know about Starmer. He strikes me as someone who is ruthless enough for the job, he certainly likes power and is very effective (to judge from his international work) but the vision thing i don’t see. He doesn’t have to be a figurehead like that of course, and he can rely on his cabinet. I do think he’s quite patriotic, which I like much better than nationalism, so my vote remains with Labour for now.

I just visited the Tommy Robinson thread. Very useful, it demonstrates where some (not all of course, many or most are just ordinary Tories) of the regular right-wing posters are really coming from.

That thread is very revealing, agreed.

What is notable is the general undercurrent of wanting TR to be accepted on some legal basis. I find it creepy.

The naivety is extraordinary, it’s never occurred to most of them that it was a business decision and Hawksmoor was protecting its reputation. And yes it’s deeply unpleasant, who knew his admirers were so numerous?

It's a turn of phrase for these banterous threads.

It may as well be banned, because I haven't met anyone else in over 30 years who has heard of it, let alone read it. Their loss.

I have a soft spot for Red Ken. When I was at sixth form, and annoying the college political societies, he was the only elected figure to take up an invitation to speak at a debate. And when you heard him speak and answer questions that weren't on the BBC, there was a lot more sense. In particular over how the UK should deal with the question of Irish terrorism. And ultimately - despite being vilified for it in 1982, he was shown right in 1997.

I can't remember who the Young Conservatives invited, but they got a signed pamphlet in return and an invitation for one or two to "pop down one day" to County Hall. And I distinctly remember Mr. Livingstone noting that the invitation didn't mention the train fare, or lunch and that the one or two would be expected to pay them.

I won a few quid when Ken became mayor of London. 😀

Thatcher admittedly got odd towards the end of her reign. I say reign, because she assumed this rather regal presence, and the clothes!

It reached a nadir when no. 10 contacted the palace to suggest the Queens aides should let them know what the Queen was wearing so Mrs. Thatcher could avoid any embarrassment. Apparently the palace just replied that "Her Majesty takes no notice of others apparel".

"We are a grandmother" 😀

A lot of TR admirers are absolutely desperate to become mainstream. They would also like his views to be considered another form of an acceptable view.

This is also why similar people go on about Lucy Connolly. Such people really really want racial and religious hatred laws removed.

Yes she went funny. Really odd. I’d forgotten the use of her royal we.

Had she got another term my feeling is that she would have placed pictures of herself across the country.

The closer you get to your Yaxley-Lennons and Farages, the dimmer the crowd.

I read Livingstone’s book decades ago. Having discovered it for sale at a knockdown price I’m about to order and re read it. Thanks for the reminder Serendipity.

We were definitely headed that way.

Weirdly we expect our leaders to be atypical, and yet whine incessantly when they are.

Or when they aren't

Funny old world innit ?

The depiction of Margaret Thatcher in The Crown was joyous. They really went for her in a major way!

(I do know that it was fiction and not reality, but still …)

This quote:

There is no such thing as society: there are individual men and women, and there are families.

Sums up exactly why I couldn’t bear her and her politics.