theresa may: is her project subtly machiavellian or merely cunning, baldrick-style?

or just "are you fucking serious?"

i can't tell if it was said as an imperative, which isn't quite as funny as it would be if it was said in the "let us pray" or "let us go to the seaside" sense.

Thing is, not only is May a hopeless campaigner, but with Cameron, Osborne and Gove gone and Johnson under wraps the Tories don't really have any good media performers.

or just "are you fucking serious?"

Or as Boaby Gillespie would say, "Ye whit?!??!"

yeah, this really is the b-team in every sense

xpost

How long before they send for Ruth 'Wonder Woman' Davidson MSP to bail them out?

"Seeing what Dr Chilton had done for showmanship frightened Senator Martin as much as anything that had happened since her daughter disappeared. Any confidence she might have had in Chilton's judgement was replaced with the cold fear that he was a fool."

^^^Everything I undersdtand abt anything I learned in this book

Caveat: I do think there's a risk here in overstating the EU side's utter ruthless cunning and competence (Varoufakis was doing this a couple of days ago). They may also misstep: neverless negotiations between two sides with extremely distant objectives from one another, are easier -- even if tougher -- when both sides are more a less on a level in terms of tactical ablity, than negotiations where some key objectives are similar (UK and EU will still be trading at the close of this, whatever the route taken) but tactical ablity is not on a level.

The Tories do have media performers - they just work for the media.

@TonyParsonsUK 52m52 minutes ago
If not for the blood sacrifice of the British, Juncker would be speaking German today. Show some respect, you puffed-up political pygmy.

@MiguelDelaney
Replying to @TonyParsonsUK
Juncker does speak German.

LOL. Clowns are performers, true.

omg

loooool Parshole

Caveat: I do think there's a risk here in overstating the EU side's utter ruthless cunning and competence (Varoufakis was doing this a couple of days ago).

Agree with this, but the thing that allows them so much leeway that it can make any aspect of what they do look sure-footed and politically astute is the possibility of No Deal. I'm now not sure of anything, but let's assume for the moment that even May, even Davis ('we haven't costed it), recognise that No Deal would be immediately and tangibly bad for the UK (and their immediate political prospects) - 30% tariffs, flight disruption, queues at borders, the whole kit and caboodle. Actually, make that two factors because time isn't on our side either. Ludicrously optimistic timelines (something I associate in the workplace with lack of competence and detailed thinking about the project ahead) suggest that there's a wall of reality to hit there as well.

Also, the fact that the EU seems to have done some documentation, and thinking about how to engage in the negotiating process and we appear to have done very little.

I mean the EU is messy, admin heavy/slow (tho this is prob a benefit in this situation), and has multiple members who can fracture in different ways, but we're in such a pathetically tight corner.

The conclusion to the first bit was 'let's assume all that' they must realise that they're going to have come round sooner or later to the EU's demands, which means that no matter what pratfalls or errors of judgement EU players make, it's not really going to make too much difference that I can see.

it reminds me of when someone says something to you at work which indicates that someone you believed grasped the situation has clearly and perhaps quite pugnaciously shown that they haven't even got the first principles down.

I think it's more than half-way to the (hopefully not universal) experience of when someone says something in work and you realise they're drunk.

i actually quite like the idea of May getting drunk and leaning over and slurring 'let's make Brexit a success' at Juncker. Maybe she was going hard at the booze during the three times Davis was going on about the ECJ judgment (what the hell was all that about? what point was he making?)

i'm half wondering whether she feels slightly frozen in some social situations like that - a feeling business dinners aren't really her scene, eating/drinking being quite a private thing and existing in a different sphere to the desk bound detail grinding.

for: she's not part of what i've seen described as the 'dinner party elite' (i.e. london social set).
against: she's wined and dined dacre (and another newspaper editor?).

There's no way that May drinks, let alone gets drunk. I think she was actually asked how much she drank a few years ago and she was weirdly evasive about it, probably because she was told that being teetotal makes you look even more distant in the eyes of a lot of the electorate.

yes, makes sense sadly (not that i have anything against teetotalism as such, but unfortunately it limits the possibility that she got stinking drunk and decided to troll juncker).

She is type 1 diabetic, which must play a part in determining her alcohol intake.

type 1 diabetics do not have to be teetotalers.

is this level of... control i guess you'd call it, something new? it's becoming really odd, is well past that in fact. is it May or is it her handlers? if May, why? surely she can't feel *that* ill at ease with humans the public? word in that lrb article was that she *liked* doing door-to-door arrests canvassing and campaigning.

Reporters hit out at Theresa May during her visit to Cornwall today after local journalists were reportedly “shut in a room” and banned from filming her.

The Prime Minister is touring the South West but local media was stopped from recording her while she visited an industrial estate.

http://www.thelondoneconomic.com/news/reporters-shut-room-banned-filming-theresa-may-cornwall-visit/02/05/

yeah I was about to say maybe it's less the canvassing and more the camera crews following her around

right, yes. it's a media than generally portrays her in a v flattering light tho. i wonder if it's the numerous quite well known photos where she's looking a bit weird. most recently eating some chips this morning. i wonder if that's somehow *got* to her.

or maybe she feels in some way that media isn't a 'real' part of being on the stump.

still odd.

Note: The media has a very thin skin for this sort of thing...

me upthread:

i think my basic intuition -- since roughly the time i began this thread -- is that, smart or dumb, the tories have zugwanged themselves

i still think this, except i now think they are many months more aware of the problem: that they are totally hemmed in by bad options -- whether or not may enjoys being on the stump, she is not a natural easy-cheesy charmer-improvisor and well knows she cannot afford to go off-message, except the message at any length beyond "strong and stable: brexit is brexit" isn't there, bcz the moment they try and fill it in, the cracks will show

hence basically trusting to their opponents' continued hapless ineptitude and the full-backing-in-a-pinch of the usual newspaper-owner suspects (which support is currently not looking as fulsome as they must want)

the measured tone of the press response is surely a fake objectivity intended to make the final week blitzkrieg look more impressive

god bless neutral Kirsty Wark, taking a stand to protect middle class families on a mere 200K per year

wrong thread, we do have an "execute every last one of the motherfuckers" thread surely?

"politics of envy" seems to be becoming more ubiquitous than "strong and stable" a lately. Not that it makes any fucking difference.

will still be voting for "eelootm" tbh

I think she, or her team, have mb correctly judged that ppl hate politics, democracy & debate even more than usual atm & won't judge her for not bothering

https://theswamp.media/theresa-may-s-father

yikes

I worked on the re-wire of the Church of The Resurrection in Mirfield while at a company that would go bust before the job was finished. I don't feel so bad about what a fucked mess we made of that job now!

"Yet just after Theresa May took over at No.10 her campaign team started to request the deletion of web addresses linked to Hubert Brasier." - Fucking shady as fuck, man.

to be fair this seems a little bit flimsy

v much so

some interesting kernels in there tho

well maybe, but I don't have much trouble believing her dad's proximity to much pederasty!

The stuff about the hospital serial killer is good though.

I found the historical Mirfield stuff interesting - obv The Black Bull is a Tesco Metro these days and about 80% of Mirfield are Tory/UKIP voting scum, but I lived there for a couple of years, so..

I remember finding a very well preserved 30's/40's Woodbine cigarette pack hidden under a floorboard under the mains board in that church. I was thinking *I wonder who left that there*

no human thumb among the woodbines no crediblity

lol!

wait i started this thread, it has taken a turn i did not anticipate

also why did i say "human" thumb?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/news/2016/10/02/110192479-theresa-may-news-large_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BqnxsVzbFt55yT5iapkHrLYW3_2sgz594JaNJ0SIIOdcE.jpg

she looks like them thumbs are severed trophies she is holding aloft!

say what you like about theresa may, at least she has regularly-proportioned fingers and thumbs

(in a jar under her bed)

if we can't get the "may's jars of human thumbs" story trending by tomorrow then we have failed as, well, twats and losers, i suppose

(again i felt the need to write "human" thumbs, i think it's the rhythm tbh)