Westminstenders: Drain The Swamp

[RedToothBrush]

Johnson lost his first vote by 27.

The Commons take control again, and Johnson is now, with his majority gone, is seeking an election.

Whilst the feeling might be one of victory there is a definite sting in the tail.

Johnson has purged the party of 'trouble makers', meaning any replacements after an election are hard liners. And they will be in safe seats. Possibly many of which will be careerists parachuted in.

The party has split. The civil war is over.

Parliament has just lost some of its very best minds in the process. That bodes ill for us all in the long term. The polarisation has just jacked up a level. The centre has fallen even more.

There are no more moderates.

Polling suggests that Johnson won't be blamed for any of this and that's significant.

Take note of this tweet

Douglas Carswell @Douglascarswell
Boris Vs the political Parasites. Guess who wins across suburban Britain?

The optics are not about what you or I are seeing. Nor about what any of the politicial pundits are seeing.

The Democrats and the Media failed to see Trump coming... And this is what now concerns me. His optics are not bad with his core and targets.

Will Johnson be able to have his election?

If yes, I fear the polls look good for Johnson. People want 'Brexit over with' and don't want another extension. They may or may not understand the ramifications of that.

If no, then what? Johnson can do anything with his numbers. Does that mean potentially two governments and the Queen stuck in the middle? Or does he limp on, with no intention of doing anything but take us over the cliff by counting down the clock?

Or something else?

The Brexit Party and Conservatives now seem to have formally united one way or another. They have aligned with current politics alike the divided Opposition parties.

Tonight the penny might have dropped with a few Labour MPs too. They want May's deal to return. Its the only deal there is, in the absence of a Johnson plan and a Labour / Opposition plan. Too little too late...

This isn't going away as an issue either. Stoking up anger against the rebel alliance is a long term project for the fascist right.

Is tonight’s result a victory? Yes, but my fear is its potential to be a Pyrrhic Victory.

The battle today may have been won, but Johnson still looks set to win...

Many Leave voters won’t even understand that. RTB is right, if we are to convince people back away from this madness, we need a campaign of simple information and sound bites.

Perhaps remain should co-opt the phrase “Get On With It” - only this time to mean repairing and developing the country in a way that resonates emotionally with leave voters.

Scottish court ruled against MPs. Damn! They are appealing apparently.

Oh, Hazard.

This is too much. It's appalling.
I am so, so sorry to hear this.

And so angry that all I can do, right now, is sympathise.

You are the reason I will go on protesting.

❤️❤️

There are a lot of reasons why people are apathetic. The class system and slow socio-economic reason is one. Another is the slow destruction of local civic life and the whole fabric of social infrastructure in Britain. British culture has been trained into consumerism and taught that having the right material things is all that matters in life - taught by those higher up, when it suited them. It is worth remembering how much life has changed and how what we ask of people has changed over the last few decades. It is annoying as all hell at all times but British divisions are not actually new, as anyone coming from lower backgrounds can tell. Inequality in this country is horrendous by EU standards.

My apologies for snapping.

Scottish court ruled against MPs. Damn!

Means that the Daily Heil can't come out with Traitors to the People.

It would also mean that a Government of a different flavour could also pull the same trick, which is not to be commended.

Perhaps remain should co-opt the phrase “Get On With It

No, they really really shouldn’t! Out of context, that sounds like a call for no deal.

When are the first polls that will be affected by last night expected?

@Hazardtired I’m so sorry

I hope you have success finding what you need today.

@red

The point I was making earlier about a darkness in those who knowingly support fascism didn't come from a 'lazy' simplification. Unfortunately it comes from the painful observation of someone who used to be close and has fallen for the lies into an ever deeper attraction towards authoritarianism.
It is a complex mix of personal identity issues and external influences (propaganda) but it ultimately comes from a dark place. That person has parked compassion and tolerance somewhere out of reach. I'm not talking about those who are indifferent or complacent here, I'm talking about peopke who see where the world is headed and agree with it knowingly.
It's tragic. It my case, it's made the last few years very difficult on a personal level.
Not a lazy observation I'm afraid...

I like Jane Dodds, the winner in Breckon and Radnor's comments: We demand better.

I listened to three Con Assoc leaders on R3 Mon night, & 2 were very downhearted at the direction of the party, so I am sure that in some places local Tories are troubled.
For any GE it is essential that the youth vote comes out. Of course, there are Brexiteers, etc amongst the young, but two critical facts stand out: young people are on average more liberal-left, but, they vote at a much lower rate. They need to be engaged and urged to vote. If their percentages increased, it would counteract the uninformed Brexiteer vote we all worry about.

No, they really really shouldn’t! Out of context, that sounds like a call for no deal.

That’s exactly why I suggested it. People are only reading the headlines. Get a good remain campaign going with that as the slogan and maybe those who aren’t able to articulate what “it” is would engage with sound bite level information about why no deal is a bad idea and what the alternatives are.

@Hazardtired, Im sorry you are going through it.
Its UNFAIR, so so unfair.
With my work, I have first hand experience of how the NHS is atm and how people are left in limbo when they should be receiving care. But that is taking it to another level!

Now I have a question. What on earth is going on with medication atm? Its not just an isolated inscident but many people are not getting the medication (or liquid food!) they need. Why?
The negative in me is saying its done on purpose and some contracts havent been revewed etc... But I basically cannot understand how so many medications just arent available.... :(

I think we need one of those celebrities to lead the Remain position.They might be beter equipped to give the right message, with the right (simpler) words, to people.

You see, this is where I find that I am completely out of touch with the rest of the UK again.

The protests in London have attracted a lot of very diverse people.

And I did some organising in my local area the other day, too.

People - every kind of people you could imagine - were vocal & informed. It was clear that 'silence' was imaginary: a result of not getting an opportunity to speak & commitments (children, work - people are working very, very hard these days) getting between them and visible protest.

And the protests - I keep saying this - are drawing such a wide group of people: bankers & nurses & children (I had an 11 year old explaining to me why she feared Brexit ☹️ & a guy explaining the racism of not calling it out for what it was ('In Nigeria, they'd be calling this out for what it is') & so many people who are immigrants - well-off or struggling; long-established or recently-arrived).

It cuts right through society and community.

Women who've given their working life to the health service, and now their working-class bodies are ill from hard work - and the medicine they need is becoming hard to source.

You see, in my 'world' it is most of us who are directly affected by this. It cuts through class, culture, identity.

A lot of the culture war rhetoric slides off us - because it doesn't fit.

People, the people, that strange illusory mass, are people, who are angry, and engaged, and wanting to resist. They're not daft, or uninformed, or lumpen.

And that is when I know I'm at odds with the experience of other areas of the UK - where, apparently, this is not the case.

I've never felt so separate from parts of the UK.

Hazard

I'm at hospital with mum atm but I'm going to try and pm you x

@DarkAtEndOfUK, I agree.

And there is a good reason why some areasin the UK received some much help from the EU, as deprived areas....
Not that we ever heard about it. Too shameful to acknowedge that some parts of the UK are as deprived as Roumania whe you still see yourself on the top of the world/the Empire etc....

@Ohflippineck (sorry wouldn’t normally @ but fast moving thread) YouGov you just sign up to and there’s a daily poll everyone is eligible for (so it’s essentially self-selecting, but only ever meant to be a quick opinion snapshot), and then lots of others you get selected for for various reasons based on demographics/who the poll is for etc. Lots of boring brand/tv stuff but interspersed with being able to contribute to polls that perhaps make a difference in whatever way, especially at times when politics gets erm... more interesting.

Also YouGov just sent me the daily poll - questions were: Was it right to expel the rebels, should MPs vote for an election, and do you know who Dominic Cummings is/what he does. Interested to see the answers to those later!

Who's paying for those polls?

Peregrina completely agree we are in 3. extremists take over the structures and power base of mainstream conservatives

Thanks red and others re: analysis of ordinary people and how they end up supporting fascists. Agree entirely that it is simplistic and, indeed, 'othering' to suggest that this is due to them being evil or having 'darkness within them'.

That kind of explanation plays straight into the hands of those who would exploit them. 'They are not like us.' Yeah, they fucking well are. They are your beloved family members, your funny friends, your helpful colleagues. That is the whole point.

Hazard I’m truly very sorry you are having to deal with such an awful situation, I have no words that would adequately express how horrific it must be for you & Dh 💐

I totally agree that education is a factor in the current divide in the country but it is the education system of 1940 to 1980 that is the issue. When atlases were still pink, and colonialism implicit. Remember even in the 70s the Labour government was still resisting African self rule so that the remaining empire could continue to prop up the U.K. economy. You didn’t need to be able to think to pass O levels, just regurgitate facts, and you had only to engage brain to a minimum to pass A levels. Only at university did you suddenly get faced with the need for thinking skills and then it was a perfect storm as you hit full on Marxism Of course if you were a woman and you got through school without leaving at 16 to work in a shop or train as a nurse or being channelled into the secretarial stream you were in a minority at university, outnumbered ten to one by males. I am quite sure this is a factor in the proportion of the Leave vote that was over 40 and the fact that a higher proportion of voters voted leave in each decade over 40.

Since the 1980s whatever you might say about forcefeeding the education system and the exam system it is geared towards have required more thinking of pupils. History GCSE now requires pupils to evaluate sources and that is a skill they start to address in the primary stages as well. And so called soft subjects like media studies which really do address issues of bias and the need for critical thinking are actually more pervasive in state schools than private. Now whether the knowledge base is narrower is debatable but for sure the requirement to think has become more important not less. And of course women are no longer having to wade through treacle to get to higher education. It isn’t just that the younger generation voted in greater numbers to retain the freedoms they value and enjoy, their culture is on the whole (with some pockets of an altogether less tolerant subculture) more tolerant and liberal. It is much easier for example in general to be accepted and even celebrated by your peers as gay than in the past.

There is more to this than the gradual shift to the right as you age.

songs x-post with your last one. I agree the 'darkness' aspect is the difference between knowing and not-knowing. It is incredibly hard when you see that happening in someone you care about.

^Worries about a GE:

• under FPTP the Tories can get a working majority with 30%+, depending on how the votes split in marginals

• The Leavers are united on Leave and would just have one main parts to vote for
  if Farage stands down his party in Tory seats & those marginals the Tories might win

• and also stands against Labour or LDems in their seats^

• The great majority of Leavers - 80%, 90% ? - prioritise Brexit above anything else, even the UK holding together
  They would vote Tory / Brex, whichever stands, rather than for a party promising PV and hence a possible Remain

• Remainers would be split among 3 parties in many seats, now that Labour are pomising a PV
  Most Tory Remainers are even more scared of Corbyn than of No Deal

Oh, and the 11 year old was from the traveller community.

Honestly, I just do not experience this narrative - which is not borne out by statistics - that deprivation= uninformed = Brexit vote.

It's authoritarianism that is the strongest correlate.

We need to know that.

Johnson and co sure as hell know that.

And I do think we need a double-pronged approach: toxify authoritarianism to prise the fellow-travellers and the complascent (who are mainly comfortable); listen to those who are distressed.

To add to cat's comments - was away for a couple of days walking in a fairly remote rural area staying in a farm B&B - quite upmarket (well more so than usual for me) and wasn't going to talk about politics but left my Stop Brexit badge on my jacket and ended up leaving over an hour later than planned as was talking to my hosts about Brexit - they were Remainers (which I wouldn't have guessed necessarily) and said the whole community thereabouts was shocked and frightened about the situation.