No good for commuting though

 

The line from Angela

Rayner says it's now or never to kick out Keir as former deputy plots her No10 putsch with allies

Angela Rayner has told Labour MPs the time to oust Keir Starmer from No 10 is ‘now or never’ as the Prime Minister faces a critical week in his fight for political survival.

With the former Deputy Prime Minister now the frontrunner to succeed the embattled Sir Keir if he is toppled, backbenchers claimed that Ms Rayner and her allies were spending the weekend canvassing support among her colleagues.

One MP said: ‘The line from Angela is that it needs to happen now otherwise this deadly stalemate will drag on forever. That it’s now or never.’

What a choice, surely the party has better options than this. Politics has never seemed closer to a substandard TV soap opera desperate to hang on to a dwindling audience.  

A Sinister Poster in a Doctor's Waiting Room

 

The almost impious pace of twelve miles an hour

All western coaches had been quickened lately by tidings of steam in the North, which would take a man nearly a score of miles in one hour; and though nobody really believed in this, the mere talk of it made the horses go. There was one coach already, known by the rather profane name of Quicksilver, which was said to travel at the almost impious pace of twelve miles an hour.

R. D. Blackmore - Perlycross: A Tale of the Western Hills (1894)


The novel was published in 1894 but set in 1835 to 1836 when Blackmore would have been ten or eleven years old living in the rural Doone country of Exmoor. Imagine his excitement as a boy in an age of horses, carriages and carts when he first heard tales of a magical machine from the North which could carry passengers almost twenty mile in one hour.

Come to think of it, I only averaged about 18 miles per hour for my daily Nottingham commute. Progress I suppose.

Psychodrama

Unpopular Starmer is a hindrance on the doorstep, Labour mayors warn as they fear local elections wipeout

The widespread unpopularity of Sir Keir Starmer and his government – largely fuelled by “psychodrama” in Westminster – is hitting Labour hard on the doorstep, three regional mayors have warned as they brace for major losses in next month's local elections...

Jonathan Brash, the MP for Hartlepool, this week called on the government to “get a grip” as he became the first Labour MP to call for Sir Keir to go over the Madelson saga.

“I am completely fed up to the back teeth of this psychodrama in Westminster, the own goals that are coming from the heart of this government,” he said.

Psychodrama? 

Psychodrama, an experiential form of therapy, allows those in treatment to explore issues through action methods (dramatic actions). This approach incorporates role playing and group dynamics to help people gain greater perspective on emotional concerns, conflicts, or other areas of difficulty in a safe, trusted environment.

BBC Folk

It’s remarkable how easy it has become to guess that certain people rely heavily on BBC News for their grasp of current affairs. They emphasise and de-emphasise as the BBC does, ignore what the BBC ignores, exaggerate what the BBC exaggerates.

The most striking aspect is how easy it is to detect. Not so much a lack of curiosity, but comfortably managed curiosity. Heavily managed in the case of the BBC.

What on Earth is the point of the Lib Dems?

Elliot Keck has an entertaining Critic piece on the Lib Dems and the remarkable level of political irrelevance they have achieved.


What on Earth is the point of the Lib Dems?

With neither power nor principles, the party is an absolute waste of space

Power versus principles — it is the trade off that is at the heart of politics. To what extent should a political party sacrifice its deeply held principles in the pursuit of winning an election?

It is not a new question, or one that has only appeared in the context of democratic politics. It was the central theme in the first part of Sir Thomas More’s Utopia, which was published during the reign of Henry VIII in the 16th century. In a discourse between More and the fictional philosopher Rapheal Hythloday, More argues: “You must not abandon the ship in a storm because you cannot control the winds… You must strive to guide the business as well as you can, and what you cannot turn to good, you must at least make as little bad as you can.”

The whole piece is well worth reading because at the moment, polls suggest that about 12% of UK voters would vote Lib Dem. What do they think are they voting for? More paddle board stunts from Ed Davey?


So what is the excuse of the Liberal Democrats? There is no party in British politics more guilty of slavishly and pathetically following public opinion than Ed Davey’s and his gang of do-gooders. I remember sitting next to one of them on the Politics Live sofa — a bloke called Ben Maguire. In 45 minutes not a single intelligent word came out of his mouth. All he could manage was absurd and unrelated outbursts about Liz Truss, Tufton Street and anything else his staffer had no doubt mentioned to him prior to going on national television to humiliate himself in the belief that these almost Tourette’s-like tics might appeal to a certain slice of middle England.