Westminstenders: Magical Thinking

[RedToothBrush]

This week has seen reports of the government editing footage of Johnson to avoid embarrassing questions about the early government response.

We've been asked to accept that the rules were different to what we were told to excuse the law breaking behaviour of a senior government advisor. As Johnson said he was being a responsible father (as if Johnson knows what this is) and it wasn't as if he was visiting a lover (this Johnson would know all about). Let's be honest Johnson is the master of brazening out controversy.

We also have the ERG complaining they were lied to by Gove about the new Withdrawal Agreement and the border in the Irish Sea which surprises precisely no one else.

They appear to be a little upset by the Cummings debarkable too.

A 'few old grannies' can die if it helps the international neo-capitalist oligarchs cause.

Except the few old grannies are either a lot of their voters or the now dead relatives of their voters.

And this is a very weird Twitter thread. I'm not usually one for conspiracies, and I have no idea how archiving of blogs works, so it could be a load of bollocks, but the implication is that Cummings added information into older blogs.

twitter.com/faisalislam/status/1265011724111011845

Is that the article Johnson dispargingly referenced at the press conference? I noticed he made a point of referring to a Guardian article in a predictable way.

Oh, it might have been Edith. I was wondering whether it was anything to do with Whitty et al not appearing - the article came out about 5 o'clock - when they were probably all inside practicing for an arranged 6 pm press conference, which was later moved to 7.

I'd love to be a fly on the wall in No 10 this afternoon.

So Dom apparently editted his posts in April to make them look like he posted them in 2019. Which is fucking scary given my opening post.

A little reminder from a post from 2016, that this country didn't vote for political accountability in 2016. Now has it since. So what do we think has fundamentality changed? The public sent a very clear message that dickheads were free to get away with bullshit and that they should merely brazen it out.

Do you think thats changed yet?

It hasn't.

RedToothBrush Thu 16-Jun-16 14:51:52

BOTH sides are using quite black propaganda. I think that Leave is being a little more clever and positive in the way they are doing it.

Historically, studies tend to show that the public favour positive messages so I'm not surprised its going down better. It may well win it for them.

It is detracting from what people really have to choose between though.

I don't find that terribly democratic in approach to be honest.

To me democracy is not just about layers of civil service and our ability to vote. Its also about how politicians decide to manipulate voters. Democratic debate should rest on getting to the heart of issues and coming up with policies as potential solutions to problems so that the public can make an educated and informed decision.

Do you think that's what we are getting?

And we are all whinging about the EU? And some see Leave as some sort of saviour from this?

*Nor has it since

Manipulation of the public is right.

As far as I can see after today's shit show, the public is divided in two. Those who have obeyed the rules and those who have lost loved ones think Cummings is a shit. Those who have been breaking lockdown anyway, don't really care what he did.

He's banking on the majority caring only about themselves, not about the greater good for everyone else. Just like Brexit.

Putin's strategy is to fragment opposition and to obliterate the concept of the truth by planting multiple explanations and playing divide and conquer along social fractures in society.

We know that Cummings studied this. He spent a significant amount of type in Russia.

He's been accused of being a Russian agent. But he doesn't need to be. He could just use methods for his own advantage.

Nothing has stuck on Cummings before. I doubt it will this time.

Those people who are breaking the lock down won't have been listening to what Johnson and Cummings said anyway.

Nothing has stuck - we have to make this stick. Not because I am not a Tory, because people have died unnecessarily because of their arrogance. However, getting rid of Johnson is no good, if he's just replaced by Gove. Gove would be just as in hock to Cummings.

Also shops reopening on 15th June is the thumb screws being turned on the schools who are not reopening quickly enough.

No childcare for shop workers.

Nothing has stuck - we have to make this stick. Not because I am not a Democrat, because people have died unnecessarily because of their arrogance.

Bit late but ...

So, Cummings sister is a director of Idox, the company given the contract for track and trace app. She lives in Durham.

The contact tracing app is being developed by Marc Warren and his company Faculty, who is a Cummings Vote Leave buddy and has been awarded 7 government contracts in the last few months.

bylinetimes.com/2020/05/06/whitehall-analytica-vote-leave-firm-tied-to-cambridge-analytica-will-configure-nhsx-contact-tracing-app/

www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/04/vote-leave-ai-firm-wins-seven-government-contracts-in-18-months

Alice Sarah Louise Cummings born 1963 has been made a NED at Idox plc and people seem to be assuming this is Cummings’ sister.

Except Cummings’ sister is called Francesca McDonald Cummings and was born in 1975.

Did anyone else notice the big bag shouting "MEAT" as a signal to those Brexiteers that this is "their man's man, not a libtard vegan type" He really is using every opportunity to style himself.

Wakefield can drive - she's written about it before www.facebook.com/TerribleTories/photos/a.665981803603525/1418334658368232/?type=3&theater. Cummings apparently unable to make the simple decision to allow her to drive, preferring to put them all at risk of his poor eye sight, if we are to believe his account or if you have had a lobotomy

That guardian article with the behavioural science bloke shows that they havent really been 'following the science' despite what we have been told. That has been alluded to in other articles as well.
Anyone else feel like the subjects of a very scary experiment?!

Anyone else feel like the subjects of a very scary experiment?!

Nah. Costly Signalling in religious and quasi-religious contexts is by now so well established that it's as unremarkable as sunrise. If you've bought into the cult so deeply that you're willing to drink the KoolAid, you're not going to even slightly concerned about other people dying (in fact, the more Costly the Signal, the greater your psychological reward).

This from my local Tory Mp who has always backed the government....
www.peteraldous.com/content/statement-peter-aldous-mp

No childcare for shop workers.
DH and I were talking about this last night. At one of my DC school, you have to give 2 days notice and they may still not take your child if they don't have the staffing levels. But they're only dealing with year 6 so may not be an issue. At the other school though, they're operating a 3 week rota, the first is already locked in so the earliest you'll be able to get a child in now is 22nd June. However, that's only if you have a child in one of the eligible years. A good friend of ours is probably going to be required to go back to work, most likely at reduced hours anyway with neither of her children eligible for school and unable to send to grandparents as both sets have a shielding member. Perhaps if they'd opened schools to those who needed childcare regardless of year instead of picking years out of a hat then maybe it would all be a little moot.

I think they didn't do that because they want to maintain an illusion/ ambition (delete as appropriate!) that those who return to school will be getting proper education now, not childcare.

Prior to this it was made pretty clear that keyworker children were getting glorified childcare, so that will now have to change.

Many schools will not be able to maintain wrap around care either as it mixes bubbles, so I foresee a mess ahead which will be blamed on teachers

It seems the government is possibly now rowing back on the original plan to get primaries completely open around June 15th : no mention of that at all yesterday or the day before.

Lots of confusion also about whether this gives a green light to grandparent/ family care.

Nadine Dorries has not made one single comment on Cummings. Presumably due to her recent rap on the knuckles.

That must kill her! She must be desperate to convey her opinion.

What I really don't understand is how any SPAD does not have to be a member of the Party he or she is advising? They are not Civil Servants, expected to be impartial and serve whichever Government is in power. Perhaps the Tory party could look to its rules and sort that out. If Cummings was a member he could be kicked out for bringing the party into disrepute. The MPs postbags will be a pointer to whether he has done that.

I wondered what Farage thinks - since he's been ticked off by the Kent Police, and as far as we know he wasn't ill and spreading his germs.

I also doubt whether either of the Cummings had Covid - there have been plenty of nasty bugs going around.

Don't trust what you see or know to be true:

Jim Pickard @pickardje
Michael Gove now says there was not really any reason to think Cummings' wife had coronavirus when she fell ill:

"It is the case that while Mary was ill it was not the case that she had covid-19 symptoms, she did not have a fever or persistent dry cough...."

feel free to feel confused

Paul Waugh .@paulwaugh
^michaelgove says that Cummings' reason for his 'test drive' to Barnard Castle was because he was "preparing to go to work".
.@Marthakearney says "‘Preparing to go to work’ isn’t in the regulations.."^
Gove replies: "No..."

.@michaelgove says that Cummings' reason for his 'test drive' to Barnard Castle was because he was "preparing to go to work".
^.@Marthakearney says "‘Preparing to go to work’ isn’t in the regulations.."
Gove replies: "No..."^

Of course, the law isn't a matter of what a minister, or an individual, 'believes'.
It's now upto the local cops to assess whether to fine Cummings.
His own testimony yesterday appeared to confirm that he broke the law (there is zero exemption for testing yr eyesight).

The fact is that not only did he break the guidelines but attempting to drive when you think your eyes might be fucked isn't exactly wholly within the DVLA guidelines either (and is probably illegal cos you can't be driving with due care if your eyesight is fucked).

Kay Burley @kayburley
"It threatens to undermine that sense of community."

Stephen Reicher, one of the scientists advising the Government during the COVID-19 outbreak, says the PM's backing of Dominic Cummings undermines his own coronavirus messaging. JJ

The experts have had enough of politicians.

The experts have had enough of politicians.

They know that Johnson and Cummings will try to palm the blame off onto them. I wonder what they can do though - all resign en masse on the grounds that since the Government is not listening to their advice they are redundant?

Kay Burley on sky news asked Michael Gove when SpecSavers is reopening.

Whitty and Vallance were due at that briefing last night, showed up about 4 and left about 620. No 10 apparently said it was felt they weren't needed as the questions would be about political issues however they could have figured that one out long before 4pm, especially as the statement was initially pencilled in for 3. I wondered last night if they were at odds with the reopening announcements and it was a giant fuck this shit from them.