the day after the deadline: can the union survive brexit and other deep questions

how many more times will another damp squib of a Lamehouse Declaration be described with "epoch changing" type hyperbole in the frigging Graun? They do need to realise they look a bit of joke when they do this!

Chapter headings included, “evidence not ideology”; and “representative democracy not populism”.

"soma not spice"

"D:Ream not Drill"

monkey turds not monkey dust!

glad to see that last Centrist Party, started by that whizz kid that posted DVDs to ppl, really shook up the two party system!

Carbona Not Glue <----- would get my vote.

Was not was

Top 10 most viewed is more like a normal silly season august rn:

Jamie Oliver's jerk rice dish 'a mistake', says Jamaica-born chef
Francis Ford Coppola agrees Winona Ryder and Keanu Reeves might be married
Summer weather is getting 'stuck' due to Arctic warming
'Disgrace and shame': Alan Moore points to Boris Johnson in Grenfell fire comic
Sticker protest on Antony Gormley's beach statues accused of 'trans hatred'
Live England v India: third Test, day three – live!
Prospect of a new UK party grows as Brexit shifts ground at Westminster
Adam Rowe's jobcentre joke crowned funniest of Edinburgh fringe
Labour condemns 'sickening' Lehman Brothers reunion party
Asia Argento accused of paying off young actor who says she sexually assaulted him

"Summer weather is getting 'stuck' due to Arctic warming" is the ringer among those silly season news souffles. I've been noticing for several years that weather patterns have become unusually persistent, which is especially noticeable when the patterns are extreme heat or cold.

The Tories generated £1.5million in membership fees in 2016 but that figure dropped 43 per cent to £835,000 in 2017, according to official statistics.

Meanwhile, the Tories were given £1.7million in 2017 in the form of bequests, compared to £301,000 in 2016.

if they are receiving more legacy cash from dead members than breathing mofos. Then they were definitely telling porkies when in March when they claimed to have 124000 members.

Did they specify whether they were still breating though?

https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/dune/images/2/29/Third-Stage_Guild_Navigator.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20121221201610

I know it's obvious but there's something notably wicked about being able to leave money to a political party in your will - "I want to continue fucking with a world I no longer have a stake in".

by same token a govt would arguably not be able to make decisions with impact further than their term or you couldnt morally idk plant a tree

there's a difference of kind there somehow I think, no government I can remember has ever suffered from long-term thinking for one thing.

I guess i R's specifically political parties that seem unworthy objects of a legacy, but then they're unworthy full stop really.

the argument for a 100% estate tax grows stronger every day

The Sun mocks and attacks Con defence secretary:

https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/7079320/gavin-williamson-tractor-budget/

I'm 100% certain that was the plot of an episode of Allo Allo. Maybe all of them.

"beach assault craft"

bloody hell, those Danes better get their defences on N Jutland sorted out, we got plans!

there's a difference of kind there somehow I think, no government I can remember has ever suffered from long-term thinking for one thing.

I guess i R's specifically political parties that seem unworthy objects of a legacy, but then they're unworthy full stop really.

― Noodle Vague, Thursday, 23 August 2018 08:35 (one hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

the argument for a 100% estate tax grows stronger every day

― ghost beef (bizarro gazzara), Thursday, 23 August 2018 08:41 (fifty-five minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

just ftr i agree with these

But sources say ex-furniture salesman Williamson’s failure to grapple with the detail and refusal to heed expert advice is proving disastrous.

Murdoch obv. doesn't like this guy much.

obv that moment when he offered Putin out on live tv wasn't an isolated "shit the bed" moment, but pretty much his f/t m.o.

Not to mention the owl thing. I forgotten what it was exactly but I assume it's on this thread somewhere.

lol at Raab's cake and eat it speech. can hear the hand wringing in brussels from over here.

https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/alex-salmond-reported-cops-over-13129661.amp?__twitter_impression=true

Scottish Government conducts investigation into the former First Minister over two sexual assualt allegations and finds sufficient evidence to pass the file to Police Scotland.

Salmons sues the Scottish Government for applying rules that weren't brought in until after he left office.

arsehole

I think reading between the lines (of the long winded windbag's response here), the RT presenter might be a bit full of shit and completely guilty in this case.

Technically correct, the *best* kind of correct

As they say in Glasgow, YASSSSSSSSSSSSS!

It all snacks a bit of what happened with Keith O'Brien.

"How dare you say that about me, I'll sue! I would never do such a thing! Wait, who was it?"
<reads names>
"It's a fair cop."

Today's going to be a fucking humdinger for fans of 'he's on our side so it doesn't matter' political Twitter.

Also for people with good jobs and secure housing to declare themselves ‘politically homeless’ which seems to me to be a tone-deaf way to express party political alienation when they’re passing dozens of rough sleepers in the street each day. Tactless.

I don't see how the LibDems don't represent these ppl, but these melts are very self-deluding creatures and seem more concerned with Corbyn blocking at all costs, rather than than any discernible ideological stance.

melts and self-deluding yes but even they recognise the uselessness of the libdems

aye, it would take some strong drugs to start believing the libdems are useful! But they are backing a 2nd ref and have a manifesto which probably wouldn't be radically different to whatever team Yvette Cooper was planning in '15.

Also for people with good jobs and secure housing to declare themselves ‘politically homeless’ which seems to me to be a tone-deaf way to express party political alienation when they’re passing dozens of rough sleepers in the street each day. Tactless.

― suzy, Friday, August 24, 2018 8:44 AM (fifty-two minutes ago) Bookmark

OTM, I think the journo Solomon Hughes made a similar point recently. Fine to be a centrist melt, that's up to you, but stop whining on about how that hurts you to the bottom of your heart and there's no one who will ~understand your pain~

And +1 Suzy's point that ppl like Lineker declaring themselves "politically homeless" in an era where no gov dept is counting how many homeless ppl are dying on the streets, is some next level vulgarity.

That ‘heavy heart’ thing (apart from being a massive clunking cliché) is a bit OH PLEASE too.

Thing is the Lib Dems are really ripe for infiltration and takeover and somehow making less useless. I think the issue is that the brand is so comprehensively trashed that no one wants to be associated with it.

A really wacky idea that would probably improve the country immeasurably in the long run would be for all these hundreds of thousands of destitute centrists to infiltrate the Tories. If their membership is as low as its rumoured to be it would be pretty easy and it would offset the threat of infiltration by the actual far right. But it would be career suicide for anyone to attempt it.

Stephen Bush's analysis that a centrist party might actually hurt the Tories more than Labour was reasonably convincing yesterday.

god bless you Matt and the idea that there's a possible "not useless" version of the Lib Dems

I said "less useless".

Stephen Bush's analysis that a centrist party might actually hurt the Tories more than Labour was reasonably convincing yesterday

"Labour do have things to worry about as far as their 2017 coalition goes: in my view, they should be more worried than they are that around a third of their 2017 vote is not keen on Jeremy Corbyn. It’s not certain that in a close election, this group will stay with Labour: they might stay home or vote for someone else, and either is potentially disastrous for that party’s hopes in 2022. Labour’s central priority should be getting more people to see Corbyn as a Prime Minister-in-waiting.
But the other thing about this group is that they are, on the whole, Leavers not Remainers. So it is hard to see how this new, anti-Brexit party becomes the default second home for these votes."

Is there any evidence for that?

doesn't affect yr query but that actual quote is from a piece bush wrote in april, not the one he wrote yesterday

i'm assuming the reading comes from a breakdown of preferences in a post-election poll (or polls), an area bush is on the whole smart on rather than bad at -- but yes, he doesn't actually point at what he's resting the claim on

Ah, have you got a link to what he wrote yesterday?

https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/uk/2018/08/labour-party-split-inevitable-corbyn-MPs I suspect

Don't think so - that doesn't say anything about how "a centrist party might actually hurt the Tories more than Labour"

https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/elections/2018/08/don-t-be-so-certain-new-party-would-hurt-labour-more-tories

it's this one!

https://www.ft.com/content/4f0ea43e-a77e-11e8-926a-7342fe5e173f

xp Oh yeah fair point