love* in the time of plague (and by love* i mean brexit* and other dreary matters of uk politics)

The Hancock ukelele is tremendous.

you need to listen to people, any party that doesn't listen is doomed, but you need to understand not just what people are saying but also why they're saying it

Could 'Controls on immigration' mugs not be considered an example of this?

Were they not a product of listening and understanding?

All depends on which people

oh nm I re-read and see what you mean

But one was a manifesto type pledge (of several) and the other was an actual campaign slogan (what was the Conservative slogan for GE15? anyone remember?) from one side of a very clear choice.

Prior to that Labour and Tories had a very similar attitude to the issue (immigration). It wasn't one, so you only needed to pretend it was at surface level, or so they both thought.

Not really. It's not listening below the surface, it's going "well, people are saying they want controls on immigration, we'll offer them controls on immigration". Leaving aside the question of what those controls would look like, the Tories are always going to be able to outflank you on that. What are the underlying anxieties and resentments that are driving that? You can't do anything about straight-up bigotry and but you can, if framed intelligently, do something about anxiety over jobs, housing, bills etc to break enough voters away from the right, or prevent them voting for them in the first place.

With the exception of one energy policy, Miliband's Labour tended to gloss over the specifics of this and bundle it together under the please-nobody phrase 'legitimate concerns' - at best that was ceding the playing field to the right, at worst it was giving them license to go even further in that direction. Corbyn's Labour did actually understand that but full on Brexit warfare had broken out by the time they went to the polls and drowned most of that out.

(xpost)

This was quite a good response to that piece. The left is small, it does not have that ecosystem that can weigh against the right.

I agree with this but it doesn’t go anywhere near far enough. https://t.co/dtVo4pPUXg

— Sonia (@yet_so_far) July 16, 2020

lmao idiot

Some people have asked for a clip. Here is the moment it happened.

For reference:
- Labour Councillors have the plain backgrounds.
- Mayor of Wandsworth is on the top right.
- Independent Cllr bottom-right.
- Tory Councillors top-left, bottom-left and center. pic.twitter.com/yTSlecQBKY

— Dr Rosena Allin-Khan (@DrRosena) July 16, 2020

CSA appoints @ChrisLeslieUK, former MP, Minister and Shadow Minister as CEO with effect from 1 August.https://t.co/V0TJEg1z81 pic.twitter.com/I5ecyqXkf3

— CreditServicesAssoc (@CreditServicesA) July 16, 2020

hey, what could be more consistent with a lifelong belief in social democracy than joining a...checks notes...PR front for loan sharks?

I will vote for CuK.. P. P. P please don't break my legs!

so govt now saying Russia tried to interfere in UK elections by leaking govt documents on social media

"Corbyn is Putin's puppet!" never gained much traction before but guessing they're willing to give it another go

Feels like straightforward flooding the zone with shit to me. There's probably more substance to the vaccination hacking story but the timing is convenient to say the last.

State of these cunts

Monsieur Zen is back pic.twitter.com/Gix08VNuEZ

— John Stevens (@johnestevens) July 16, 2020

that's fucking horrible

That was what it was like the whole time he was leader.

i guess i saw bits of it, news dodger that i am. he seems more vulnerable now somehow as a backbencher just trying to go about his day to day

I'm so glad he didn't have an unlock door fail moment. helping the Tories defeat him isn't enough for these vindictive bastards, they always need more.

So the covid testing kits are poisonous or something?

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jul/16/uk-government-orders-halt-randox-covid-19-tests-over-safety-issues

fucking lunatic reporter there at cromryn's door

ironing my hair to get the Starmer quiff then turning the steam up and ironing my face to imitate his complexion

— Rosewood Shoehorn (@apiarism) July 16, 2020

"Randox was awarded a £133m contract in March to produce the testing kits for England, Wales and Northern Ireland without any other firms being given the opportunity to bid for the work."

i wonder who they know.

If you believe in shady Russian interference in Brexit then why would they be interfering on behalf of the party with a second referendum in their manifesto?

Easy for the right to play this as Corbyn choosing politics over patriotism (in an 'allegiance to The West' sense). Doesn't really make a blind bit of difference to anything.

it doesn't need to make any sense for it to be effective unfortunately. As if the Tories aren't the party of Russian oligarchs as well, they probably have been amongst the top donors in the last decade and most of these lads are subordinate to Putin still.

Feel sorry enough for Jez having to haul his bike through the front door every day and presumably out to the back garden. That is not figuring out how to live lad.

Why this journalists are harassing us and not asking the government about the suppressed #RussiaReport? pic.twitter.com/ImlaKseIqK

— Laura Alvarez (@LauraAlvarezJC) July 16, 2020

@pestononsunday had to go outside to take picture of El Gato as he's not too impressed with your guest pic.twitter.com/OOa6vWzeWU

— Jeremy Corbyn (@jeremycorbyn) May 22, 2016

no, the back gardens are small in those. this is his neighbour's
https://assets.themodernhouse.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/4_Berriman-Rd_HIGH-RES-5-1600x1068.jpg

always funny when you see JC's unkempt garden (left) next to the pristine fussiness of his neighbour's (middle)
https://assets.themodernhouse.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/1_Berriman-Rd_HIGH-RES-44-1600x1068.jpg

that's an extension though. Very nice room.

The government’s chief scientific adviser has said the UK does not yet have the capacity to carry out 350,000 coronavirus tests a day over winter.

Tennessee, which is a COVID basket case right now, is already doing this many tests a day.

Wait sorry I got those numbers wrong :/

NEVER TRUST ANYTHING I SAY, I’VE TOLD YOU FOOLS THIS BEFORE

This afternoon I spoke to Keir and asked to step back from the front bench duties as Minister for Air Quality and the Natural Environment but remain a Labour and Co-operative MP for Brighton Kemptown and Peacehaven.

See my statement below. 👇 pic.twitter.com/g1I8T7QLVg

— Lloyd Russell-Moyle MP🌹🇪🇺🏳️‍🌈 (@lloyd_rm) July 16, 2020

R-M stepping down due to attacks and harassment.

That's really awful, I don't even want to know the nature of some of those messages but you can well imagine.

Feel sad for the ace with the mace and I bet he'll be replaced by someone with more melt adjacency

Looking forward to reading the broadsheet thinkpieces decrying his cancellation

I do like LRM but also find him a bit embarrassing, he reminds me of a friend who has a similar way of talking / presenting himself, so might be a "me" problem.

He would on his last chance with Starmzy. I think he already was on a written warning for publicly politicising politics as opposed to the forensic strategy.

All those people who went on for weeks about Angela Eagle’s office getting a brick have been extremely silent over LRM and Dawn Butler.

Melts are such champion self-victimisers as well. I've forgotten the one who reported someone to the police for posting she should go jump in the water. What? Are you threatening to drown me?

He has been targeted over the last two weeks by Collier, Philipps, et al.

Who are now campaigning for him to have the whip removed.

Fuck this party.

depressing that he would get heat for these stances p much in any country/big tent "left" party.

Wait is there a backstory here? Assumed it was a coordinated far right thing.

2009 Facebook post, made when he was 22, calling Zionism a ‘dangerous nationalist idea’, which he subsequently deleted and apologised for.

and the jk rowling thing

it's quite clear Starmer Labour is no big tent, which is not how the slippery melt campaigned for the leadership. Seriously I hope a spear of ice-piss from the sky goes straight through his skull.

McKinsey coming into 'restructure' the civil service.

Big news in same story too: McKinsey has been given a £800k contract for "Provision of Consultancy Services for Civil Service Modernisation and Reform".
The Cummings revolution has started.

— Paul Waugh (@paulwaugh) July 16, 2020

But that's fuck all really, given the task, so I expect renewals when they only deliver 5 pages.