UK General Discussion: Rishecession

[ingemann]

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https://twitter.com/christopherhope/status/1576941908806418432

How could the parliamentary Tories appoint a PM though? Wouldn't have to totally reform the Party bylaws? Or is that easier than I'm thinking it is?

Nothing stopping them from just appointing a new PM if they have enough votes.

[ingemann]

Did anyone realize after the 2015 Exit Poll dropped that it had set in motion events for the collapse of the British government?

Yes, honestly anyone with a surface level of understanding of the British economy, how EU functions and basic human psychology could have predicted that. There was a reason why Cameron left so fast and May tried to keep the status quo going. Of course I didn’t predict precisely how it would turn out, I thought the Conservatives would have made a Brexit in name only and the Tories would have collapsed in infighting over that, I had not predicted they would make the worst possible Brexit, but after they did that it was pretty obvious that the economic consequences would result in something like this, through I expected it would have been with Johnson in charge and the collapse being smaller.

[ingemann]

https://twitter.com/RedfieldWilton/status/1622641270572154880

So the Tories will replace Sunak soon?

[ingemann]

Yeah what does Cameron actually do? Isn't he a bit bored? Is he just a retired country gent who occasionally lobbies the UK gov through back channels? What happened to his bid to become NATO sec gen. For all his hubris and faults, by all accounts he seemed to be an excellent operator in the "summit" type setting in terms of knowing his brief and everyone elses.

I can’t see Cameron getting any international job where he would need to deal with leaders from other European countries. While Cameron may or may not be personally loathed by non-British European politicians, they have still spend years and large amount of political capital on cleaning up the mess he left behind.
Cameron next problem is that no one owe him anything, you usually get an international job by your country’s  government sponsoring you and by calling in favors abroad.

[ingemann]

So hold up, just to be clear: Sunak thought bringing back the man who simultaneously is both most responsible for Brexit and is absolutely loathed by Brexiteers might breathe some new life into his failing, flailing party?

Do I have that right?

More likely that he need someone who can do the job without embarrassing UK or making a lot of intrigue. I see the selection of Cameron more as a way to remove potential dangers than gaining anything. The foreign ministry is very important, you can’t place some idiot there, but it’s also a position which an ambitious man can use to gain popularity.

So the choice of Cameron is more a sign of Sunak being so weak and his position so shaky that he can’t afford to let anyone competent gain any popularity, because it would be a potential challenger to him. Strong leaders prefer clear heir, weak leaders can’t afford that.

[ingemann]

The Tories will be dead by 2050. Anything else is basically cope.

Extremely predictable (but contrary to the #narrative) poll on voting intention by supermarket. For non-UK posters, it’s basically a class graph, with the exception of the Co-op which despite being linked with Labour is average for them, but has the Greens on 15% and the Tories on only 9%!

Somehow this has had some cut-through with people not deeply involved in this sort of thing. Had it brought up to me out of the blue yesterday at the dinner table.

Strongly doubt the bolded part there.

The Tories will evolve and re-invent themselves, but they won't cease to be unless the political system of the UK as we know it evolves into something completely different.

Honestly I think the Tories is somewhat stuck, maybe two election out of power will allow them to change, but honestly the risk is that another party takes over as the main opposition party.

[ingemann]

Pure speculation, but I’d say a November election is likely if one takes for granted that Sunak has the vanity in him to want to make it to two full years as PM.

This is actually a quite reasonable point.

And may matter at least as much as the IMO over-rated "they will want to save loads of councillors" line used as the clincher as to why they "have" to go in May. If the polls remain as they are currently, Tories are going to have big council losses even if they go for a GE simultaneously - especially given when most of the seats up next year were last fought. And even the "they will lose activists for a later GE" thing may be exaggerated - one thing the Tories are not short of even now is money, which means they can and will pay people to deliver their propaganda on the fabled doorstep.

Yes, I think we should stop asking the question “what’s best for the Conservatives” and instead ask “what’s best for Sunak”. Because that’s how the time for the next election will be decided. So the factors which will decide when the election when the election happens, is whether he can find a more interesting job elsewhere, and whether there will be another coup attempt in the Conservatives. So I suspect that if none of these two things happens he will simply let the time run out.

[ingemann]

The Reasonable Moderates are currently trying to dox Keir Starmer's children because one of them might be trans, if you were unaware.

I don’t really see how anyone could think this is a winning move to make.

[ingemann]

I cannot understand anyone who ever liked the man, much less the foreign fandom--as it is to an extent--surrounding him.

It was not really fandom, but in a completely dysfunctional political situation filled with slimy smug worms like Rees-Mogg, he at least kicked them over the shin. You need to remember most of the time no one outside UK follow what happens in the British parliament outside a few headlines, but suddenly because of the importance of the Brexit negotiations, people outside the UK followed and it became something of a reality show, and that’s how his fame outside UK should be seen, no one knew anything about him, but he yelled at the right people and was a somewhat comical fat little charming man with a funny accent.

[ingemann]

Parris has always hidden some quite unpleasant views behind that shit-eating grin.

But has recently got a free pass from many because he opposed Brexit.

There's a long list of genuinely unpleasant Tories (certainly unpleasant in terms of views) who in recent years have been counted as fluffy moderates in certain circles due to not being staunch Brexiteers. One such example is Phillip Hammond - staunchly on the dry side of the Tory Party from what I can gather, and seemingly isn't too keen on LGBT rights either.

Boris Johnson, whatever else you might say about him, isn't as bad as a good 100 or more current Tory MPs in an ideological sense. Mostly because he doesn't have much of an ideology.  

I think politicians without an ideology are worse than politicians with terrible ideologies. If you go into politics only for yourself, you don’t have any limits for what you will do, which I think Boris Johnson is a great example of.

[ingemann]

It might be hard for foreigners to understand this but literally people don't talk about Brexit any more. It's not popular, but no-one really cares and it definitely isn't hurting the Tories - they do that well enough themselves.

Maybe not, but I think it’s a mistake by the Conservatives to not to talk about it, as big a pile of fecal matter it have been, it has been the only real success of the Conservatives. Yes, it won’t let them win the election, but it may remind some of their potential voters that they delivered on their promises.

[ingemann]

The genius of Cummings’ and Johnson’s “Get Brexit Done” slogan wasn’t in its appeal to hardcore Brexiteers (most of whom were fully behind the Tories by the end of 2019), but rather in its appeal to a huge swathe of the country, Leaver and Remainer alike, who were absolutely sick of the issue and never wanted to hear about it again. When you think about it, it wasn’t exactly a positive endorsement of the policy.

Despite Starmer’s obvious deep aversion to Brexit, Labour can clearly see there’s absolutely no point in dredging up the issue. If the Tories want to do so then that’s their prerogative, but it would be a textbook definition of fighting the last war.

Yes, but right now they’re losing the next war disastrous, pulling up the old gimmicks can at least limit the loss.

If I was the conservatives, I would:

1: Replace Sunak* and hold an election fast, before the new leader’s skeletons came out of the closet.
2: Focus on promising to keep UK out of the EU, promises new tax cuts, stopping immigration etc.

The point is no longer to win, but to avoid being decimated.

*People says that Sunak is the least bad option, but I think people ignore the racist vote. A reason in my opinion  why the Conservatives can’t get votes back from Reform, is likely because Sunak is South Asian. Yes, I know the British says no one cares about Sunak’s color because he’s upper class, but
I don’t believe it. I think no one says it out loud, because it’s socially unacceptable to say it.