UK General Discussion:The Rt. Hon Alex Boris de Pfeffel Johnson, Populist Hero

[CumbrianLefty]

Does it matter in the slightest what the polls are saying now?

No. There is functionally no politics at present.

And there aren't likely to be any actual electoral contests - even at parish council level - for months to come. Given that the main purpose of polls is arguably to "predict" elections, that matters.

[brucejoel99]

Boris Johnson is now out of the hospital

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bbc.com/news/amp/uk-politics-52262012

On Easter Sunday, no less! The memes will be writing themselves today.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

Boris Johnson is now out of the hospital

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bbc.com/news/amp/uk-politics-52262012

On Easter Sunday, no less! The memes will be writing themselves today.

[Blair]

PMQs today; as someone on twitter wrote it was like watching a trained QC going up against a trainee city solicitor (oh wait it was) Starmer was pushing the govt over testing/PPE supplies

Starmer much more punchier than even I expected; as people (like me!) who watched his time as Brexit Secretary he's in his element doing this- as someone noted the new layout with very few MPs actually in the chamber (and much less heckling) means that it is very much like a court room.

[CumbrianLefty]

Of course he was up against Dominic "supply teacher" Raab, which likely didn't do him any harm

[PSOL]

Ministers plan to give more UK public bodies power to hack phones

Ministers want to expand the scope of UK surveillance laws to give more public authorities – including a pensions watchdog and the Environment Agency – the power to hack phones and computers.

Five additional public bodies are to be allowed to obtain communications data under the Investigatory Powers Act – frequently dubbed the snooper’s charter – as they are “increasingly unable to rely on local police forces to investigate crimes on their behalf”, according to documents published by the government.

[afleitch]

What's with the armed forces sharing the stage at the daily briefing? They can fork right off with that.

[CumbrianLefty]

Robert "Pesto" Peston made a dick of himself (not for the first time) last night. Exactly why Jeremy Corbyn continues to exist rent-free so prominently in his head would make a fascinating case study, not least into the neuroses of our pundit class more generally.

[cp]

And in considerably more chilling, if wholly unexpected news, the Tories' update to the Gender Recognition Act looks set to be despicable load of TERF nonsense

[brucejoel99]

I didn't wake up today expecting Vince Comrade Cable to come out in support of Dengism, but here we go.

I assume he's being serious here, but I honestly have no idea:

https://twitter.com/vincecable/status/1253020673573871617

[Antonio the Sixth]

I didn't wake up today expecting Vince Comrade Cable to come out in support of Dengism, but here we go.

I assume he's being serious here, but I honestly have no idea:

https://twitter.com/vincecable/status/1253020673573871617

MARX ENGELS LENIN STALIN CLEGG CAMERON

[Intell]

The fact that "young labour" is celebrating Lenin is a disgrace.

[Kingpoleon]

I didn't wake up today expecting Vince Comrade Cable to come out in support of Dengism, but here we go.

I assume he's being serious here, but I honestly have no idea:

https://twitter.com/vincecable/status/1253020673573871617

To be fair, there are way worse socialists he could have complimented.

[CumbrianLefty]

Lenin had some useful insights, even if he also did some bad things.

Pretending he was no different to Stalin/Mao just shows up those who make such an ahistorical claim.

[Kingpoleon]

Lenin had some useful insights, even if he also did some bad things.

Pretending he was no different to Stalin/Mao just shows up those who make such an ahistorical claim.

Sure, and Franco wasn’t as bad as Hitler. But you don’t hear me go around complimenting Francisco Franco.

[Cassius]

Odd to celebrate the legacy of Lenin and the Russian Revolution with regards ‘peace and socialism’ given that he failed to create either.

[EastAnglianLefty]

Lenin had some useful insights, even if he also did some bad things.

Pretending he was no different to Stalin/Mao just shows up those who make such an ahistorical claim.

Come off it. This is just London Young Labour's committee making yet another attempt to demonstrate their loyalty to the crank faction, in the hope they can graduate to jobs with Unite and/or retweeting antisemites from the main Young Labour twitter account.

Lenin was brutal dictator and you can't give somebody bonus points for not being responsible for the Holodomor. He's still a figure that a democratic socialist party should have no truck with. I mean for Christ's sake, this is a man who called for support of the UK Labour Party "like the rope supports a hanged man." Approval of Lenin is just about the biggest tell there is that somebody does not have the best interests of the Labour Party at heart.

[CumbrianLefty]

Lenin had some useful insights, even if he also did some bad things.

Pretending he was no different to Stalin/Mao just shows up those who make such an ahistorical claim.

Come off it. This is just London Young Labour's committee making yet another attempt to demonstrate their loyalty to the crank faction, in the hope they can graduate to jobs with Unite and/or retweeting antisemites from the main Young Labour twitter account.

Lenin was brutal dictator and you can't give somebody bonus points for not being responsible for the Holodomor. He's still a figure that a democratic socialist party should have no truck with. I mean for Christ's sake, this is a man who called for support of the UK Labour Party "like the rope supports a hanged man." Approval of Lenin is just about the biggest tell there is that somebody does not have the best interests of the Labour Party at heart.

Again, "approval" is one thing.

(I don't "approve" of VIL for all sorts of very good reasons)

Accepting that he had some valid historical insights, despite all that was wrong with him, is quite another IMO. And to respond to an earlier post, that's not really true of Franco is it?

Its equally true that some of the people shock-horroring about this are playing tedious factional games of their own - a lot of this is performative on both sides.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Accepting that he had some valid historical insights, despite all that was wrong with him, is quite another IMO. And to respond to an earlier post, that's not really true of Franco is it?

It's not true of Franco, no, but if somebody who was ideologically predisposed to think it was--a Traditionalist Catholic politician like JRM, or even a run-of-the-mill RIGHT-WING #POPULIST --tweeted out a postmortem happy birthday to the guy, I sort of doubt the likes of Vince Cable would retweet it.

[Kingpoleon]

Again, "approval" is one thing.

(I don't "approve" of VIL for all sorts of very good reasons)

Accepting that he had some valid historical insights, despite all that was wrong with him, is quite another IMO. And to respond to an earlier post, that's not really true of Franco is it?

Franco recognized the weakness of the Spanish state, modernized it in many ways, restored a monarch who eventually overthrew the dictatorship, advanced its economy, and made many Spaniards feel proud and safe. But I try not to compliment him because he, seeing weakness and resentment from the Spanish population, elevated them and their country to advance his own dictatorship, and did so with the suppression of a million people and the deaths of 100,000.

Yeah, Lenin and Franco took power because they were manipulative: they filled a desire in the populace. But you don’t get credit for “valid historical insight” when you massacre tens of thousands of people, murder a Tsar, his, wife and kids, and suppress all opposition. Compared to Lenin’s brutal suppression of his opposition, Franco was a moderate liberalizer. Yet you wouldn’t take kindly to Boris Johnson praising him.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Compared to Lenin’s brutal suppression of his opposition, Franco was a moderate liberalizer.

Let's please not go here.

[CumbrianLefty]

Anyway, I believe there has been some recent news regarding our Sun King.

[CumbrianLefty]

Our PM has admitted in an interview how close he was to dying from his COVID-19 infection.

Makes the dissembling from "government sources" at the time all the more ridiculous and shameful. We were grown up enough to be told the truth that he was extremely ill.

[Silent Hunter]

The stock market probably wasn't.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

https://twitter.com/dmk1793/status/1257752634817236993