brexit negging when yr mandate is is trash: or further chronicles of a garbage-fire

the vitally important frontbench role he was born for

Evening Standard front page is a picture of Arlene going into no.10 with the headline "We're the masters now", in case you were wondering how Osborne is taking it.

osborne fairly well-versed in master/servant relationships on several levels iirc

As the DUP leadership turn up in Downing Street this lunchtime, here's our second edition @EveningStandard ... pic.twitter.com/O2ODW3pmDD

— George Osborne (@George_Osborne) June 13, 2017

We're the Masters Noyyyyy, So We Are

look at those shit-eating grins

so much for the humourless ulster unionists

if anyone's going to gorge himself on free icecream until vomiting and comatose, it's osborne -- imagining the design room eye-rolling at one another as he charges across the office for the third time in an afternoon: "let's do a new front page! do it! doooooo it!

i hope you're not suggesting osborne's boundless energy and regular attacks of the munchies are chemically-induced

https://img.buzzfeed.com/buzzfeed-static/static/2015-03/18/9/enhanced/webdr09/anigif_original-grid-image-25709-1426684476-28.gif?crop=225:225;26,-1&downsize=715:*&output-format=auto&output-quality=auto

i am suggesting he does not always pace himself

corbyn looking fly as fuck in the commons right now with a red tie and giant red rose on his lapel

looking, dare i say, prime ministerial in fact

does the DUP not remember how this coalition thing worked out for the lib dems?

They only have to please a tiny local vocal constituency

Further thoughts on the election that I hadn't really processed until now:

- Amazing the extent the which the economy was barely an issue this time round. It's usually centre stage and I think this was a serious error on the Tories' part. Health, education, immigration, security, social care, transport and taxation all came up time and time again but usually the economy blows all of those away when it comes to influencing voting. Not this time.

- The decline of the Tories as the party of aspiration. This is *huge*. Labour leadership candidates, playing catch-up to the Tories, banged on about aspiration so much in 2015 that they barely saw Corbyn coming. In practice, "aspirational" policies have tended to mean lower taxes, help onto the property ladder and rising house prices thereafter. But we're talking about a generation now that feels their aspirations are being shredded - who cares about lower taxes when you feel like your route to a well-paying job has been cut off? Housing equity means nothing if you feel like you're going to be renting for the rest of your life. The focus on "strong and stable" ignored the question "stability for whom?"

- The frustrating thing about Sensible Labour (RIP) is how it always seemed to be fighting the last campaign - Burnham, Cooper and Kendall all immediately seized on the results of those 'Why didn't you vote Labour?' surveys and made them the centrepieces of their campaigns, without stopping to think about whether that would be the case in 2-5 years' time, or thinking too deeply about what underlying truths they might be revealing below the surface. The same goes for publications like the Guardian and the Staggers, except this time it was Brexit they were obsessing over. If they'd spent half as much time trying to understand Corbyn voters as they did trying to understand UKIP voters, they might have seen this coming.

Brexit perhaps the gloomy background constant that allowed the manifesto to make the impact it did?

shurely you mean the golden road to the future prosperity the parties were fighting over

Brexit was certainly a catalyst for increased voter turnout, but Labour neutralised it successfully during the campaign by making it about everything except Brexit.

I think it might be dawning on younger voters that when somebody on the news says "this is bad for the economy" then what "the economy" means is "wealthy exploitative scumbags"

I think it was more that a substantial part of the Tory leadership privately thought that Brexit was going to destroy the economy anyway and tried not to mention it.

oh I was just showboating but inasmuch as the vote breaks down across age lines the young have way less reason to be enthralled by the abstract Economy

Brexit is now our third rail: because it splits across party lines (apart from the Libs), most politicos are wary of talking about it for fearing of alienating a section of their vote. (Eg witness baby storm after McDonnell comments the other day).

And you can't raise the economy without someone raising Brexit so that also becomes something to avoid, aside from generic "we need a strong economy" refs.

(Of course, it was too late for the Tories anyway. They might not have mentioned it in the campaign, but their Remain vote heard them hammering on about hard-as-hard-can-be Brexit for the months leading up to the campaign.)

booming 'further thoughts' post from matt dc there

obviously "it wz the youth whut wun it" is incorrect anyway, but insofar as the perspectives of the young mattered, it's partly bcz they impact on the perspectives of, like, their parents! who love them and worry abt them!

(i know i know #notallparents but #plentyofparents)

so the 35-45 cohort aren't just voting self-absorbedly here either

lol bastani is calling for a 650-seat strategy

deny him that you melts

more tweets like this plz

George Bridges off (the talented one in DexEU). DUP deal tricky. Scot Tories drawing red lines. Arguments over Brexit. Gvt weaker & weaker

— Sam Coates Times (@SamCoatesTimes) June 13, 2017

- The decline of the Tories as the party of aspiration. This is *huge*. Labour leadership candidates, playing catch-up to the Tories, banged on about aspiration so much in 2015 that they barely saw Corbyn coming. In practice, "aspirational" policies have tended to mean lower taxes, help onto the property ladder and rising house prices thereafter. But we're talking about a generation now that feels their aspirations are being shredded - who cares about lower taxes when you feel like your route to a well-paying job has been cut off? Housing equity means nothing if you feel like you're going to be renting for the rest of your life. The focus on "strong and stable" ignored the question "stability for whom?"

Yeah, "aspiration" was all over the 2015 Labour pledges. Looking at it now, I'm staggered by just how mealy-mouthed and vague it all is, offering absolutely nothing concrete to suggest what Miliband's fantasy government would've done differently from Cameron's.

https://lbpreston.files.wordpress.com/2015/04/img_5445.png

110 of these mugs. Did any get bought? I'd like to believe they were ground up to a fine powder and buried in an unmarked grave along with that tombstone Ed was photographed standing in front of.

http://www.cityam.com/assets/uploads/content/2015/03/labour-mug-55195e39b3dc0.jpg

this is amazing:

Research has shown that in this seat any mention of local issues will push voters to Labour. I know it is tempting to discuss local issues as this is Labour’s approach, but we must not be tempted. If we once discuss local issues on literature, social media or the doorsteps, we risk losing this seat. I know you have put together pledges that you wanted to get out in the final few days, this simple cannot happen now, if it does we will risk losing the seat. By discussing local pledges you'll push voters away from us.

http://www.economist.com/blogs/speakerscorner/2017/06/how-tories-lost

i'm trying to remember how much salience this all had when it was gordon brown doing the same deal -- when it was more or less pre-internet, certainly pre-twitter

Wait holdup is this 2010? You'd had a twitter account for at least a year dude (and had been on the internet IE here for most of a decade)

This is amazing as regards Theresa May's inability to correct what's wrong with her (though she is presumably hoping that she won't face the public for another five years)

https://www.indy100.com/article/uk-general-election-2017-hung-parliament-conservatives-theresa-may-repeats-buzzword-7785491

yes for some reason (unrelated to my advancing years i'm certain) i was confusing 2010 with 2000: however i still do NOT recall its salience on the internet much, or indeed twitter -- so what we're talking abt as much as anything is the changed nature energised political ecologies?

That advice is genuinely astonishing.

hah! don't remind the electorate of how austerity is destroying their local services, just deal in platitudes. I could just imagine how popular that must have been with the doorstep campaigners.

resident opens door, canvasser screams "STRONG AND STABLE" in their face, tip of the hat, move on

This was classic from yesterday.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hw129jaW4Sk

Someone at work just burst out the other day "oh I am so tired of hearing about 'strong and stable'!"

So much for hammering a message.

RMDE if people are slating Ellie Mae O'Hagan, who has been broadly supportive throughout, actually bothered to talk to Momentum supporters and understand them, and literally went out campaigning for Corbyn in marginal seats, then they aren't able to tolerate the tiniest bit of even constructive/healthy dissent.

The animosity largely comes from this blog.

Anyone who argues Labour’s woes are purely the fault of Jeremy Corbyn is living in a fantasy land. However — and here’s the rub — anyone who thinks that Corbyn isn’t transforming an existential crisis into an unmitigated catastrophe is equally delusional.

Except she didn't call him to step down so I don't share it, so avoiding the trap that someone like Owen Jones fell into - but like I said some people who really stuck with him are now lashing out and I certainly don't want to know how sorry anyone who wrote those pieces are. They just need to withdraw from public life and do something else.

Jeremy Corbyn gets standing ovation as he comes into Commons for first time since the election pic.twitter.com/6mZQxVhMvp

— Esther Webber (@estwebber) June 13, 2017

MUST SEE: "Oh! Jeremy Corbyn!!!"... Jeremy Corbyn greeted on first day back in Parliament with chant from delighted Labour MP's. pic.twitter.com/HPDZ5RuyxJ

— EL4C (@EL4JC) June 13, 2017

looking forward to the Ealing Studios biopic

passport to parliament is the best i can do, sorry folks

the boy in the absolute suit

I think that blog post falls into the category of well-meaning wake-up call fwiw. The majority of people who supported Corbyn clearly didn't think he'd make it this far, and a lot of writers who did support him were constantly belittled (usually with a hefty dose of misogyny in for good measure). After the by-elections you would have been forgiven for fearing a wipeout and the destruction of the left, but he got his shit together after that and these writers swung behind him when it mattered. There's a gulf between that and people like Jason Cowley and Sarah Ditum.

You know who's been really quite lately? Tom Watson.

slowly, but surely...

DUP MP tells me there may be no deal with Tories until weekend & is predicting Queen Speech won't be until Monday 26 June, put back a week.

— joncraigSKY (@joncraig) June 13, 2017

How is it possible that this is still going on? They have to be deliberately putting this shit out there to win as many concessions as possible.

Labour probably have a vested interest in keeping this thing on life support for a while yet, the longer it goes on the worse the headlines will get. The caveat to that is that we're in a highly unstable political and economic environment right now (and the turnaround in Labour's fortunes since the local elections proves that) - difficult to see how they can come back from having to bargain to get every bit of legislation through, mind.

Do they have that long? I thought they had 14 days to form a government before Corbyn gets to have a go. And Brexit negotiations due on 19th

(I'm not sure where I got this 14 day figure from though: it's not in the FTPA, and I learned about it from a tweet)

Ah, it is in the FTPA, but Elections and Queen's Speeches don't count: 14 days from a failed no-confidence vote and that alone.

This is fantastic:

While the usual commentators are scratching their heads, guy this nails Corbynism in 85 seconds. Book him on all yr current affairs shows. pic.twitter.com/qlNrxyqx5m

— hrtbps (@hrtbps) June 12, 2017

I think that blog post falls into the category of well-meaning wake-up call fwiw.

'delusion' in respect to supporters and Momentum members fell into slurs. Agree that O'Hagan's heart was in the right place and she did excellent work thereafter.

I'd argue that a lot of those supporters privately feared the worst and they kept on campaigning anyway. Not to feel any doubts at all about the likelihood of success would be pretty weird.

looking forward to the Ealing Studios biopic

Meanwhile, who the fuck is going to want to watch a docudrama depicting Theresa May's rise to power last year?

Theresa vs Boris: How May Became PM was commissioned before Mrs May called the snap election.

... I'll bet it was. Nice try BBC.

Its one thing to have doubts but 'delusion' is a bit over the top.

Tom Crewe at the LRB also talked to Momentum members earlier this year to similar effects at times. Defending them and yet..

Can't wait for his follow-up. And fuck knows what Runciman is going to write.

Unexpected playoff win and promotion means fairweather fans and glory hunters. We'll need those lads to compete for the title. They'll be dancing in the streets of Westminster tonight