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Let your next career move come to you.

Populism is on a death spiral

The idea of promising the things that no-one previously promised (well, not since the 1930s, wink wink) to attract the votes of those who don't vote was gr8 for a bit.

But once you engage with it, what the "we only want what everyone wants but they're too afraid to say it" group actually wants are things that are impossible or actually don't work. 

So we aren't we seeing a distancing / pivot?  

 

Why aren't US Republicans saying "Trump was great, but he's had his day. Biden squeaked the election, We need to rebuild the Republican message and introduce new blood"? A young, dynamic, moderate Republican would wipe the floor with Biden. 

Same here.  Rishi swept in with the whiff of "new guy" but he's doubled down on all the populist shite. Backing 30p Lee on the fook off back to France was bizarre. 

 

I get there's a hardcore of bigots, but when you pander to them all the time, you're just the bigot party. You lose the rump of your support who, in 2015-2020 said "not sure about this, but we'll back it for now". 

People are saying 

in the US it’s because it’s federal. Trump delivered for the GOP and nobody else polls as well. 

Here well who knows? They’ve got away with it so far. Britain is so fvcked psychologically by brexit, covid and post-colonial guilt most people don’t know if they’re coming or going.

Jellymonster 09 Aug 23 07:22

Same here.  Rishi swept in with the whiff of "new guy" but he's doubled down on all the populist shite. Backing 30p Lee on the fook off back to France was bizarre. 

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I guess when you've been promising for 13 years that everying is about to be amazing and you're going to Northern Powerhouse or Level Up or something if voters will just trust you one more time and you have not on failed to deliver but spectacularly pushed the country in the completely opposite direction and into levels of shittness barely remembered, then all you've really got while careening towards an election is to try to make noise about headline grabbing shit that doesn't really affect people's lives 

 

Yeah, but it's all.pointing to Armageddon at the next election. Surely the job is to steal ground back from the Labour party. Culture war stuff is fun for them, but doesnt win seats. 

In the US, Halley or Binkley - not sure why huge sums aren't being thrown at them. 

Jellymonster09 Aug 23 07:35

Yeah, but it's all.pointing to Armageddon at the next election. Surely the job is to steal ground back from the Labour party. Culture war stuff is fun for them, but doesnt win seats. 

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yeah, I mean the latest polling albeit for channel 4 is saying something like the tories get left with 90 seats which is mental

I have been suspecting that maybe the tactic now is to try to save/preserve what they can rather than really try to win, but even that is weird because they aren't playing to the tory core vote (maybe they assume nobody will vote lib dem or labour and don't have to - ask scottish labour how well that works!) they're playing to a cartoonish version of the red wall

Populism is engrained in the psyche. The "fook off back to France" people will go to be replaced by the "punch a fooking bigot" people. The only way it would end would be if the yknow what let's be adults about this and lead by example people won. And probably social media was banned.

What Rishi is facing is being the PM that lost everything. He's going to lose, but he seems to not see a difference between returning 90 seats or 200 seats. 

Work Experience isn’t a serious politician. He will be under massive pressure from the back benches who backed and prefer Hunt. He’s just doing pretty much what he likes until it burns down. He will probably not even feature fully in their campaign. 

I dont likw the rhetoric but works because the policies have at least some and probably quite a lot of popular support.

- People want a govt rhag controls borders. Ans they really hate bwing told that wanting this makes them racist bigots etc

- Increasingly it seems they are reacting against the likely costs of Net Zero

If labout could find a way to outflan the Tories on these issuew they could wipe them out.

I think the Tories have realised that focusing on these issues is the difference between 200 seats and 90 seats and they understood the importance.

Canary Worf09 Aug 23 08:25

I dont likw the rhetoric but works because the policies have at least some and probably quite a lot of popular support.

1. People want a govt rhag controls borders. Ans they really hate bwing told that wanting this makes them racist bigots etc

2. Increasingly it seems they are reacting against the likely costs of Net Zero

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1. the UK has a weird thing about fairness and at the same time knowing your place. If you see forrins getting stuff for free that offends the sense of fairness and at the same time inflames someone not properly knowing their place. I think this is the root why asylum seekers trigger so many people and why it is not really rooted in racisim (or at least american style racisim) 

problem for the tories is that they can't really do anything about it and I'm pretty sure not in the year before an election. We're not Australia, we're a lot closer to France and therefore Africa and the level of shouting about this I think is making it a bigger issue that they are being judge to be failing on

2. for labour the response is easy, you just shout that it'll be more expensive to not go for net zero, look at the energy price spikes caused by unstable gas prices etc etc, you won't win over nutters but you were never going to win over nutters, you keep your core voters and the middle class worried about climate change and you muddy the waters enough for the people on the fence

I think

Any party that campaigned on abandoning Net Zero would win a majority.

All you need to do is 2 campaign posters, side by side.

One with a cutaway photo of a house on a winter's evening, with massive heat pump installation outside, but with the occupants shivering inside under blankets. And a strap-line - "Have you got  £30,000 to spend on this?"

The other shows a family in their house, same winter's evening,  with a their gas boiler purring away, nicely settled in front of the gas fire watching Strictly on a winter's night. And a strap-line - " No to Net Zero. Vote X Party"

 

 

Trouble is Davos, all you rich and pampered London lawyers haven’t got a scooby-do  as to how normal folks outside London live and think.

Look at the Brexit vote and the last few elections.

You all just assumed that as you and your pampered pals suffer from Islington Group-Think, the rest of the country does.

You have been proved wrong over, and over, and over again.

Marshall is sadly right of course. But that backward and backwoods take just keeps the country feudal and plays into the hands of Russian stooges like dux. You’re alright Jack. 

Marshall Hall09 Aug 23 09:09

Trouble is Davos, all you rich and pampered London lawyers haven’t got a scooby-do  as to how normal folks outside London live and think.

Look at the Brexit vote and the last few elections.

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I don't live in London

the brexit vote is a 50/50 on a promise that all the UKs problems would be fixed by brexit, the follwing election wasn't exactly a ringing endorsement for conservative policy, the 2019 election had both sides offering the same polices but with 1 leader who was a miserable arsehole and 1 leader who was a hilarious man of the people cheeky chappie 

the winning leader turned out to be an absolutely corrupt and incompetent arsehole

nobody in the Uk has a heat pump now, they all have nice leccie or gas boilers and they've been hammered by spiralling prices caused by energy being shipped in from 1000 miles away

the problem here MH is that you are in the exact bubble you think everyone else is in, that the very abstract "net zero" is the issue everyone is worried about when it's really the economy stupid 

Trouble is Davos, all you rich and pampered London lawyers haven’t got a scooby-do  as to how normal folks outside London live and think.

Look at the Brexit vote and the last few elections.

You all just assumed that as you and your pampered pals suffer from Islington Group-Think, the rest of the country does.

You have been proved wrong over, and over, and over again.

IGNORE THE OPINION POLLS!!

REAL PLUCKY BRITS ARE DELIGHTED WITH THE PERFORMANCE OF THE CONSERVATIVE PARTY AND CAN'T WAIT TO GIVE THEM 14 MORE YEARS IN POWER TO FURTHER COMPOUND WHAT THEY'VE ALREADY DONE TO THIS COUNTRY!!

NOTHING TO WORRY ABOUT!!

Problem is man isnt a herd animal, we are fundamentally pack animals and prefer operating in small like-minded tribes.

In an ideal world there would be enough space and distance for me to say, nah stupid right wing thicko, and nah-blue-haired achingly woke leftie, neither of you are the same tribe as me, but live and let live and may the invisible hand of the market determine which tribes measure of internal organisation is more effective in survival and flourishing. 

The problem is when you get a large enough population it will inevitably split, the more populated you are the less an individual voice matters unless you go onto full on chinese state control style which is unattractive and will eventually fall.   

The US is an example of this, its no longer one united nation, its two massive tribes that hate each others guts now and its a sum zero game - they should just split and organise geographically along those lines.

we take our cultural lead from the Yanks - the nat con conference is the yank PACs - lite. Our currently push for diversity takes an american racial issue and makes it a british problem as if we were the ones with the Jim Crow laws in the 1960s and our police were murdering many hundreds of people a year. 

I wish we wouldnt as they feel more and more alien to me over time, but media-types absolutely love the way the americans do things. 

Trouble is Davos, all you rich and pampered London lawyers haven’t got a scooby-do  as to how normal folks outside London live and think.

WORKING CLASS PEOPLE ARE ALL LIKE LEE ANDERSON

THAT IS MY VIEW OF WORKING CLASS PEOPLE

AN ARMY OF LEE ANDERSONS

WORKING CLASS = LEE ANDERSON

 

 

"The US is an example of this, its no longer one united nation, its two massive tribes that hate each others guts now and its a sum zero game.."

 

do people think this is actually true? I suspect the differences/hatred are wildly exaggerated for political purposes and are primarily a function of a 2 party political system rather than actual popular feeling.  even in states which are almost always blue or red , you have large votes for the other party

I can never work out why these debates systematicaly descend into trivialitie about "who is the most working class" and castigating those who seek to achieve financial "success", when in reality, none of us are probably working class and all of us try to maximise our income (with varying degrees of success).

This embittered "them" vs "us" taunting is what creates populism and serves no-one in the long-term.  There's a lot to be said for trying rise above it, although I agree that can be hard.

The reason the Tories are behind in the polls is the economy, not policies like stop the boats, and not because Lee said fook off back to France.

These policies are not going anywhere because they are popular and will remain popular.

Wokeism always gets punished hard at the ballot box. If anything is declining it is woke policies in terms of their actual adoption by politicians (although they're very persistent in the civil service).

When Labour attack the Tories on immigration, they say that the Tories aren't getting a grip and too many people are coming in. They don't attack them from a Care 4 Calais type perspective because doing that would be electoral poison for them.

Well, yes BB, there is indeed a lot of overlap between "wokeists" and "lefty trendos." :)

Both groups have been instrumental to the Tories' many election successes, and in getting Brexit over the line. The Tories just have to say "look at that sorry lot, don't want to let *their* party win, do you?" and the electorate oblige and tick the right box. Many thanks for your assistance in helping the Tory cause. :)

Problem is the economy is a bit too shyte for it to work this time round.

I think Conservative Party HQ should be alerted to BB’s tremendous satire.

Deployed correctly his perceptive wit and humour would guarantee the Tories another 2 terms in office.

Keep it coming fella

The Tories just have to say "look at that sorry lot, don't want to let *their* party win, do you?" and the electorate oblige and tick the right box
 

Hopefully this is the standard of thinker employed at CCHQ 

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