Seizing back control: The ILX lol brexit is how we're all gonna die thread.

xps to FH:

André Gide quipped that 'on ne fait pas de la bonne littérature avec de bons sentiments', which can be parsed in many ways, but I think it's fairly uncontroversial to say that we cannot judge a work of literature on the basis of good intentions alone, although these may of course factor into the equation. Conversely, terrible intentions – Dostoevsky's panslavic Christian Orthodox suprematism, for instance – can and often do result in supposedly 'demonic' characterizations that are, in fact, more interesting than whatever benevolent or heroic figure they were meant to foil in the first place. We tend to assume (rightly, in my opinion) that a good writer is able to temporarily suspend the political 'utopia' they wish to see prevail in day-to-day existence.

Literature (and/or art) turns the world upside down, for good or ill, and it even deflects authorship on some level: Gogol or Céline or Lovecraft are partly robbed of their proper names by the act of writing fiction, wherein 'I' routinely refers to someone or something other than the author him/herself, whereas Hobson – or any other economist/social scientist/political analyst, etc. – writes as a citizen, even as an 'expert' exerting his right to participate in public discourse, which implies infinitely more ethical agency and responsibility than literature. In other words, Hobson must potentially answer (and be tried) for his views in person, whereas in modern democratic societies the artist is generally exempt from that responsibility (assuming it concerns a work of art and not an essay, in which case the exact same rules apply).

That said, I do think it's important to highlight unsavoury biographical data when prefacing, say, Taras Bulba, as long as the overarching thesis isn't something unforgivably simplistic such as 'what you are about to experience, dear reader, is a barely veiled antisemitic pamphlet, and nothing else'. Hobson's case is even more straightforward, especially when you're invited to write a preface to a book that itself contains antisemitic passages. After all, your responsibility as prefacer is to shape the reader's interpretation, even 'improve' it – you are there precisely to direct the reader's attention towards key aspects of a book on which you are presumed to be an authority.

Anyhow, this very much ties in to the discussion we were having earlier over in the metal thread about a beloved Polish band whose members are likely fascists.

Williamson gone.

Stupid to leak, unbelievably stupid to lie about it.

Gavin Williamson not just new Defence Sec but also - as young, Northern, comprehensive educated son of Labour voters - new tip for next PM

— Nick Robinson (@bbcnickrobinson) November 2, 2017

lol

Jeremy Who? J.A. What? This story has just blown Corbz The Anti-Semite right off the front pages for the foreseeable.

lol at Sky's coverage for the last 15 minutes consisting of a film of Williamson leaving No. 10 and walking off right frame followed by a film of Williamson entering from left frame and walking into No. 10 followed by film of Williamson leaving No. 10 and walking off right frame followed by a film of Williamson entering from left frame and walking into No. 10 followed by film of Williamson leaving No. 10 and walking off right frame followed by a film of Williamson entering from left frame and walking into No. 10 followed by film of Williamson leaving No. 10 and walking off right frame followed by a film of Williamson entering from left frame and walking into No. 10 followed by film of Williamson leaving No. 10 and walking off right frame followed by a film of Williamson entering from left frame and walking into No. 10...

It was completely fucking obvious he was the leak from the start and he should probably be sacked for being too stupid to be trusted in a vital Cabinet post.

My favourite Gavin Williamson story is when he decided to pardon two ferocious army dogs following a campaign by The Sun and turned up to do the photoshoot only to find them ready to rip his throat out, so had to be positioned a longggg way in front. https://t.co/gj5yumhmag pic.twitter.com/402LkQBCfW

— Jim Waterson (@jimwaterson) May 1, 2019

Been ages since we had a traditional Wednesday sacking.

I will always wonder what he had on the PM to get that job. He was always incredibly unpopular and ill-suited.

Who next? Will the Tugmonster be asked to step up to the big leagues? Is it finally time for Alan Mak to shine?

It's Penny Mordaunt.

Used to be the Chief Whip, so I'm sure he knows a lot of juicy stuff. (xp)

Ah balls.

CRONUS IN YR COUNTRY'S HOUR OF NEED

Tower of London for Gav surely?

xp eight legs bad, four legs better

Penny Mordaunt brings her own cat to Westminster office to tackle mouse problem https://t.co/vvioFDiylD

— The Telegraph (@Telegraph) September 15, 2016

I expect nothing less than Williamson's immediate resignation from the World Owl Trust btw.

This is a hell of a sacking, that letter is fierce as the genre goes. Suspect it’s partly because GW is about the sole individual T. May can actually be strong against, and not least because he is only there in the first place because she was too weak to put anyone with support in that job.

So it’s something of a self-own, in that light, but because nobody likes GW it won’t come across that way.

In the 2016 Prime Minister's Resignation Honours, Williamson was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) "for political and public service".[51]

Rory Stewart replacing Mordaunt at DFID.

wee homunculus looking fuck

Rory doesn't have to resign for residing over prison minister fail now.

Like he promised he would if it he didn't turn things around within a year.

think he meant in a Titanic deckchairs way

Spoken to Gavin Williamson. He swore on his children’s life to me that he didn’t leak the Huawei news and neither did his staff. Said he believes this is the settling of a vendetta between him and Mark Sedwill

— Alistair Bunkall (@AliBunkallSKY) May 1, 2019

The disgraced Dr Liam Fox has some competition.

lol! thought it was just common thugs that "swear down on their bairn's lives" when they are clearly lying their arses off.

Will be interesting to see how the Telegraph reports this.

peterborough by-election triggered too. good

Didn't swear on the life of Cronus, I see.

Peterborough a severe marginal and a major gain for Labour two years ago but figure it will flip back blue.

lol! thought it was just common thugs that "swear down on their bairn's lives" when they are clearly lying their arses off.

― calzino, Wednesday, 1 May 2019 17:57 (thirty-four minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

and harry kane!

Gavin Williamson’s Instagram stories: a highlights reel pic.twitter.com/EvCJKyf4HZ

— Helen Nianias (@helennianias) May 1, 2019

i'm really really going to miss the game where you have to guess if someone is briefing against Gavin Williamson or if Gavin is briefing to try to make himself look good

— Kane Malone (@kanemals) May 1, 2019

haha jfc

THE NEW EUROPEAN: Brexit’s Big Brother #tomorrowspaperstoday pic.twitter.com/Y3T7qdhGYP

— Neil Henderson (@hendopolis) May 1, 2019

jiminy bollocks on MR seumas milne

Peterborough a severe marginal and a major gain for Labour two years ago but figure it will flip back blue.

UKIP didn't stand in Peterborough last time and Farage has already said the Brexit Party will field a candidate, which will probably hurt the Tories more than Labour.

Williamson’s position seems to currently e that, yes, he did speak to the Telegraph after the meeting but someone else must have leaked the info to them separately.

xxxp is Mr Seumas Milne going to snort Corbyn or has he sneezed him out of one of his giant nostrils like a Stalinist snot

The New European, besides being shite, is a good example of a print publication that’s far Too Online.

New European just isn't even read enough to bother with.

My local shop stocked it for a while back and I’m not really sure why - think they pulled it. This is in a very Leave constituency too (same shop still sells The Morning Star though?!)

Toilet roll shortage?

Isn’t it like £3 a pop, you could buy several tabloids for that if you were caught short? It’s not even better quality paper like

I think Archant, the publisher of The European, has links to the Co-Op and puts out their in-house magazine, which might partly explain it.

"It’s not even better quality paper like"

It's the journalism

That fishhooking won’t pay for itself!

NEW: @georgegalloway tells me that he has approached @Nigel_Farage directly to say he wants to stand in Peterborough by-election for his Brexit Party. But if not selected, he could stand as an independent.

— Pippa Crerar (@PippaCrerar) May 1, 2019

Seumus Milne's Big Brother.

I got a letter from the co-op recently informing me about some vote I can make. I was like Brenda - got local elections tomorrow, Euro ones coming up - fuck off with this ilm poll shit.

are Labour co-op MPs selected through different means than just Labour MPs? I’ve never really understood how that works.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Co-operative_Party

Just back on Hobson. This thread is pretty good, looking at how Corbyn might've engaged with it in the first place. He is more of a liberal than his enemies think, and in turn less of a radical than his friends think.

It occurs to me that one of the reasons people are so horrified by the Hobson thing is that they don't actually read anything from the canon, so it may help to clarify that most of it is as evil as fuck, and it's standard scholarly practice to just blithely pretend not to notice.

— the beat of civilised political discourse (@Lafargue) May 1, 2019