Sadiq Khan in Rio: war of words with 'climate wrecker' Donald Trump
Sir Sadiq Khan has criticised Donald Trump in a set-piece opening speech at a Brazil climate change conference - the London mayor’s fifth foreign trip of the year.
He told the “biggest-ever gathering of mayors” that the US president was one of the climate “wreckers” they needed to fight back against to reduce the threat of global warming.
No mention of a "fight back" against Xi Jinping though, must be a reason for that.
It's a reminder of a 1933 Hugh Walpole quote about a fight he foresaw between what he called the 'type' and the individual. In this sense Sadiq Khan is a 'type', a conformist progressive, he based his career on it. Trump is an individual.
I couldn’t help thinking yesterday as I listened to him that that may be the fight the whole earth is slipping into — the type against the individual.
Hugh Walpole - Vanessa (1933)
I couldn’t help thinking yesterday as I listened to him that that may be the fight the whole earth is slipping into — the type against the individual.
Hugh Walpole - Vanessa (1933)
4 comments:
You can make a good argument that the last 100 years of politics (h/t Hugh Walpole) has been the gradual domination of the 'type' over the individual. The recent global liberal consensus perhaps marks the outcome of progressively progressive advances.
My suspicion is that the progressive tide is receding slightly but because 'types' are part of a collective they are much harder to reorientate than changing a single individual.
The lobby correspondent - i.e. comic writer - for the Telegraph said this morning that Reform had been accused of being a one-man band. He obvs wanted me to think "as opposed to Labour who are a no-man band."
And given that they can't define "woman", a no-woman band too.
We do indeed, AKH, fight "the type" and the vast weaponry it brings to bear.
DJ - I once read a claim that Victorians were more eccentric than we are due to the modern effect of closer proximity on our natural tendency to imitate each other. Among other things this would be easier travel, cinema, television, radio, modern communications, advertising and mass advocacy.
dearieme - yes that's the empty suit impression Starmer creates, maybe it's why the fit isn't very good, especially the trousers.
James - yes that's the problem, the vastness of the weaponry.
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