As Tory conference looms, the PM cuts a diminished figure after squandering much of her political capital
The PM seems to be gradually willing to publicly accept a link between her policies and market turmoil - describing this overnight as "short-term disruption" - but there is no sign she is considering reversing any of the measures.
But oppositions have the illimitable range of objections at command, which need never stop short at the boundary of knowledge, but can draw forever on the vasts of ignorance.
George Eliot - Middlemarch (1871-1872)
To my mind there is no pressing need to take sides in the current turmoil over the recent actions of the Liz Truss government. We are in a position where there are no good exits anyway. It is more useful to take note of how the establishment trains all of its guns on any major change which appears to threaten its tottering comfort zones. We saw something similar with Donald Trump.
In these cases, and as George Eliot wrote, opposition need never stop short at the boundary of knowledge. The current storm of opposition may turn out to have read or manipulated the runes correctly as far as that is still possible. Yet Eliot was also pointing out how opposition can choose never to be wrong. As we saw and still see, Brexit opposition has chosen never to be wrong. We see it with climate change too. Liz Truss sees it now.
5 comments:
Good point.
Opposition relies on theories, which if untested can never be wrong. For people who actually do things, the results are actually real, albeit sometimes vague.
It's almost as if politics favours lazy impractical speculators, isn't it...
Sam - yes it is almost as if politics favours lazy impractical speculators. Tabloid politics going for the mass market I suppose. It isn't easy to see how it could be different and possibly it can't without major upheaval.
Trump, Boris, Truss (and to a lesser extent Farage, Banks, Gove, Cummings). It's almost as if the greatest sin of all is to challenge the comfortable status quo. And yet if the status quo is so wonderful why is it not working?
I sincerely hope that Truss faces down the critics. Perhaps we should have a Prediction Review Body that reviews predictions after 6 months, then a year, and so on and publishes the results. There would be a lot of 'respected' pundits and critics whose reputation would take a knock.
Ask everyone who opposes the abolition of the bankers' bonus cap what exactly the bonus cap was. Do you think as many as 1% would get it right?
People who moan about inflation: ask them whether they supported the lockdowns. If they say "yes" tell them that they are the bloody fools to blame for much of the inflation.
Do they think NATO was right to have provoked and then extended a war in the Ukraine? If they say "yes" tell them that the fuel shortage is their doing.
DJ - I hope Truss faces down the critics too. Not because she is right but because she is trying to break out of the deadening establishment consensus which hasn't achieved anything.
dearieme - good questions, but as you suggest, many people do not seem to make any connection between believing what the media told them and the mess we are in now.
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