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

psyched that we’re gonna officially overtake the italian death toll in the next day or two, let’s fuckin’ show johnny eu how it’s done just before we pull the hard brexit ripcord

Whatever makes you feel better.

― The Corbynite Maneuver (Tom D.), Sunday, 3 May 2020 bookmarkflaglink

This is not a feeling, just how I think it might play out.

Like I said yesterday almost everyone in every country (bar maybe Brazil and the US) is backing the current government and what they do. It's not about the Tories being infallible but you do you.

how do people keep their faith in the great british public (a mostly powerless minority aside) eventually "getting it", now, in light of the past decade or few?

Who mentioned anything about the Tories being infallible btw?

Lol

I think people get it when they can't pay their bills.

Absolutely no point making any predictions about the next election, we're in the middle of a once-a-century upheaval and no one has any idea how it's going to play out.

I do think people are underestimating quite how bad the recession is going to be though, modern economies aren't meant to just be stopped for months on end, we're in uncharted territory but it's going to make 2008 and onwards look like a walk in the park.

Like I said yesterday almost everyone in every country (bar maybe Brazil and the US) is backing the current government and what they do.

About that.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EXFmEvhWkAAlmuR?format=jpg&name=small

I don't get the sense the French or Spanish government are going to fall.

And yet you get the sense that the British goverment is going to.

What I don't understand is, given that politics in the UK was already completely distorted and irrational before this crisis even started, why anyone is so confident that 1 plus 1 will add up to 2 after it - when it wasn't adding up to 2 before it.

It's less about a rational "well perhaps we need an improved safety net and these guys aren't going to provide it" and more of a desire to punish the government.

Ironically the danger zone for the Tories is if things have started improving significantly by 2024 - Labour governments tend to be elected during moments of national optimism. But the election is four and a half years away and no one has any clue what's going to happen in the next month.

it's unclear/doubtful if there's anyone in the position to take advantage of upcoming disasters and upheaval

And yet you get the sense that the British goverment is going to.

― The Corbynite Maneuver (Tom D.), Sunday, 3 May 2020 bookmarkflaglink

Lol not at all. I just said why they are doing well, and why they might not in future. Whereas you seem to be saying the Tories will get away with it because the public are so irrational they will give Boris slack as the economy goes down the drain

XP to Tom

the kind of economic settlement that'll be necessary once the immediate crisis has dwindled - whatever that might mean - is not going to be something that any of the major parties are conceptually prepared for or good at. best guess is that a Tory government will at some point try to go hard on an austerity for recovery programme, but it won't work. electorates generally blame governments for their economic suffering (perceived or real) whether the sitting government is actually at fault or not. so nothing is a given as far as future elections are concerned.

all feels like a sideshow tbf but that's where we are and that's why assumptions based on the past are more or less meaningless

All I'm saying is I'm wary of all this "Well, when X then Y" conjecturing when there's actually some evidence that Y might not necessarily follow X - I wouldn't exactly call the former breezy optimism but nonetheless.

well i wouldn't underplay the current blitz spirit either, the nation seems to be in a fever dream it's probably never experienced before and the rona is only one of the factors in that

Worth remembering end of the og blitz spirit was getting rid of Churchill

yeah but there's a ton of reasons why i don't think this compares much, it's a fantasy of a mentality almost nobody really remembers, which is why i think this is unparalleled. we're in a Disney blitz spirit

but also yes, again, all bets are off, all predictions are based on very little

Lots of middle England wanking off in their sheds while playing the sound fx of bomber squadrons, pretending they are in an Anderson shelter. That's the level of unreality some people seem to be living in.

Some of these lot are just as nutso as the 5g anti-lockdown gang in their own frazzled way.

Worth remembering end of the og blitz spirit was getting rid of Churchill

Indeed but that was all about optimism, it's kind of in short supply at the moment plus Keir Starmer.

Reading Henry Green gives the distinct impression that the war was seen as a massive pain in the arse by people in London at the time. I'm sure that was outweighed by sheer fear but the whole Blitz spirit mythos is something that's been concocted in retrospect.

exackly

also a lot of the looting, fucking and murdering written out of it

The tories were quite reluctant to open up the tube stations for the great unwashed to shelter in during the blitz iirc.

(xxp) One of my favourite novels! I think there's the sheer tedium of hanging about wating for something to happen which, when it does happen, is worse than you expected.

When you compare the blitz to what happened to Warsaw or the war of annihilation and hunger plan to starve 30m to death in the Soviet Union. Its like endlessly talking about an autoglass cup final from '94 or something.

The idea that Jonson are co are going to suffer from this makes no sense to me. This is a national disaster. Cummings' MO is making hay from disasters. They will spin this so that upsides are created out of thin air, foreigners, immigrants, the press, the public themselves will be blamed and scapegoated for the economy (and eat it up), the PR will reach new levels of Brave New World totality, mendacity and psychological penetration, and the press will dutifully report it because the tone will be overwhelmingly "Don't do down Britain". Lies work, we have seen that, and lies are are supremely effective when you only need 42% of the vote, or polling.

And Keir Starmer will go along with all of it.

the other complicating factor is that we’re in all likelihood going to end up with a catastrophic brexit so fuck knows what state we’ll be in by the time of the next election and how the great british electorate will be taking it

Twitter bots all using same text about “journalism missing the mood” - I’ve heard that same phrase from some people too. Who is paying for this? pic.twitter.com/bB5jFjhPSo

— Paul Joyce (@bergersmicer) May 3, 2020

I was going to say I can't wait for them to turn on the NHS but they've already started with that Mail story rubbishing doctors with links the Labour Party.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sxqvwkmTNy8

> already started with that Mail story rubbishing doctors with links the Labour Party.

there were a ton of nhs fuckup stories in the news at the start of the year (just as brexit was being "done"). almost every day some neo-natal unit was underperforming or something was massively over budget. felt like an attack at the time and i wonder how much worse it would've got without the covid thing.

09 dec Deaths of 4,600 NHS patients linked to safety incidents
09 jan A&E staff 'despair' as NHS delays are at their worst ever level
21 jan GPs in revolt over NHS England's plan to increase their workload
23 jan England's poorest 'get worse NHS care' than wealthiest citizens
13 feb Record number of A&E 'trolley waits' reached in January, NHS say
26 feb NHS failing stroke patients with 'postcode lottery rehabilitation'

(and that's just the Guardian articles)

and the war stuff on tv is being ramped up this week too, what with VE day on friday. it includes that big churchill thing, Darkest Hour.

55 years since VE Day? What kind of a crappy anniversary is that?

LOL 75! OK, fair enough.

still crap, still maddening

"it includes that big churchill thing, Darkest Hour."

lol just look up the ludicrous train scene on youtube if you want a laugh!

every day is VD day when boris is pm.

lots of countries national myths are mostly bullshit, but I don't think many have the same levels of delusional triumphant smugness as the UK.

I recall reading some UK foreign office attache colonel major type made a pissed up prick out of himself at a drinks event during the Tehran conference in '43 by insisting that blitz had been much worse anything they had suffered!

I will bet money there'll be a picture of Boris flicking the Vs by the end of the week.

When you compare the blitz to what happened to Warsaw or the war of annihilation and hunger plan to starve 30m to death in the Soviet Union. Its like endlessly talking about an autoglass cup final from '94 or something.

Sure, but if plan A is the UK realising that history happened to other people as well, you'll need a Plan B.

Matt, that's the same text from the Jay Owen article you posted yesterday though - it seems to be genuinely going viral (though it's no less chilling that people are happy to just repost it)

*Owens

Claire Danes performance in Homeland has to stand as a landmark in 21st century acting / dramatising a thing most ppl don't even know exists, via a vulnerability that is all too familiar. Homeland is over but the reality it portrays sadly not... pic.twitter.com/iW9QNfVlHw

— Paul Mason (@paulmasonnews) May 3, 2020

"a landmark in 21st century acting" no wonder this clueless cunt thinks Starmer is the bee's knees.

French House asking for donations to make rent??

Save the French House https://t.co/pmgT8dcn5B

— The French House (@FrenchHouseSoho) May 3, 2020

The Minister for the Cabinet Office is antisemtic?!?

Just for a second, imagine if Corbyn posted a picture of a book by David Irving on display in his home.

Michael Gove has a full curriculum of white supremacist propaganda on his bookshelf. You don't acquire that by accident. pic.twitter.com/ZDQV3hgKSV

— jewdⒶs // ייִדהודה (@jewdas) May 3, 2020

he likes a plurality of holocaust denial/nazi voices!

Just kill him