Brexit and the waning days of the United Kingdom

[Josquius]

Makes sense to me. Definitely a vibe I got. And I can relate.

I love the idea of being a politician in the played too many strategy games sense.
Coming up with solutions to the country's problems.

I hate the idea of being a politician in the sense of actually doing politics full time. Constant sales and relationship building and double speak and being always on... The worst parts of most normal jobs but amped up to 11.

[Tamas]

Makes sense to me. Definitely a vibe I got. And I can relate.

I love the idea of being a politician in the played too many strategy games sense.
Coming up with solutions to the country's problems.

I hate the idea of being a politician in the sense of actually doing politics full time. Constant sales and relationship building and double speak and being always on... The worst parts of most normal jobs but amped up to 11.

Yeah pretty much.

[Sheilbh]

I love the idea of being a politician in the played too many strategy games sense.
Coming up with solutions to the country's problems.

That's being a civil servant/functionary

[Josquius]

I love the idea of being a politician in the played too many strategy games sense.
Coming up with solutions to the country's problems.

That's being a civil servant/functionary

Alas the civil service is more "government says we have to coat every traffic light button in poo.
How do we implement it? What colour poo is best for this?"

[mongers]

That's an efficient recovery at least:

[Valmy]

I love the idea of being a politician in the played too many strategy games sense.
Coming up with solutions to the country's problems.

That's being a civil servant/functionary

Alas the civil service is more "government says we have to coat every traffic light button in poo.
How do we implement it? What colour poo is best for this?"

As a civil servant this is...painfully true. My career is just a bunch of memos giving advice on how best to achieve the government's poo traffic light button goals.

[Grey Fox]

  My GF works for the government wing that builds & manages the gorvernment's buildings. Poo is a very popular colour.

[Sheilbh]

Alas the civil service is more "government says we have to coat every traffic light button in poo.
How do we implement it? What colour poo is best for this?"

I think that maybe depends on type of civil servant though. Like the ones focused on policy, in central government departments advising ministers are very much on the coming up with solutions bit.

I think it's part of the problem that and other pieces flag is it was really difficult for those civil servants to do their job under Starmer because they didn't really have a sense of what his politics/agenda were (because he didn't have one). So under Thatcher or Major they'd know to focus on private market solutions, privatisation, less state - under Blair the focus was public-private partnerships, even recently Sunak was always particularly interested in solutions involving tech. Starmer had no preferences. It was just a void where there should have been ideology and politics - so it's really difficult to identify solutions or know what he wants.

Separately love the New Statesman cover (I was concerned about McTague becoming editor but he is a vast improvement on Jason Cowley):

[mongers]

 

Very nice.

[Sheilbh]

Enjoyed the quote from a senior Labour figure explaining Labour's failure again to choose a female leader (while the Tories are on their fourth) - by being sexist

The reason Labour have always craved, but also been cautious about, a female leader is because, in a Labour government, she could have an unashamedly female agenda, focused on health, education, family finances and issues like safer streets, social care, online safety for kids, that are disproportionately important to women. [This would be] unlike the Tories' female leaders, who re under internal pressure - and the weight of history - to show how tough they are on traditionally male issues. Along comes Andy, surrounded by female advisers and backers, but more importantly, genuinely passionate about all those traditionally female-oriented issues and much less so with the bombs and budgets. So could we finally see what Labour has failed to deliver all these years - a female PM in all but sex?

I hve never been so sure of anything as I am sure that was said by a senior Labour man.

I'd add that not to diminish the "female agenda" but given the state of the public finances and a literal war in Europe, I suspect any PM is going to have to focus quite a lot on bombs and budgets.

Having said that was listening to some journalists on Burnham. And I don't mind journalists of different traditions disliking their opponents' party leaders. That's fine. But this is the first time where I think there's such a degree of sneering and snobbishness, I think, at both of the main party leaders - which I think is slightly revealing of who is in journalism. It is one of the most privately educated, posh, white sectors in the UK - vastly more so than politics, or the City, or law firms (I assume because it's not necessarily very well-paid and until recently has been very keen on recruiting via unpaid internships based in one of the most expensive cities in the world). I think it might cause problems and a bit of a reaction from both sides in the next few years because I think Burnham and Badenoch are in different ways just not like them/"one of us" in the way that, say, Sunak or a human rights barrister like Starmer or an ex-journalist like Johnson were. I'm just not sure a bunch of posh southerners chortling about whether we could have a Scouse Prime Minister etc is going land very well (it's one day and I'm already reaching for the pitchforks).

[garbon]

Burnham who did the anti-establishment thing of being educated at Cambridge?

[Richard Hakluyt]

The "privately educated, posh, white" segment of our society have been fucking useless for many years now, with an impressive list of failures and missteps. Hence the support for Reform; though why Reform supporters have not noticed that Farage is just another member of that over-privileged and over-represented bunch of numpties is beyond me.

[Sheilbh]

Burnham who did the anti-establishment thing of being educated at Cambridge?

Sure but has an accent that isn't from the South and kind of made his name/career regionally too ("he's not got the scouse scouse accent.." "no - could we have a scouse prime minister?" Hilarity ensues). It's less extreme than with Rayner but the same thing. And sort of to that point he doesn't have a Scouse Scouse accent - it's a wool accent - while Rayner is properly Manc.

[garbon]

Burnham who did the anti-establishment thing of being educated at Cambridge?

Sure but has an accent that isn't from the South and kind of made his name/career regionally too ("he's not got the scouse scouse accent.." "no - could we have a scouse prime minister?" Hilarity ensues). It's less extreme than with Rayner but the same thing. And sort of to that point he doesn't have a Scouse Scouse accent - it's a wool accent - while Rayner is properly Manc.

Oh certainly. It is just funny when going "he's not like us" when they are all much more similar than the average UK citizen.

I, for one, would like an answer as to why he was chill about his now wife, then girlfriend, going on a date with someone on Blind Date. Would you let someone you love get that close to Cilla Black?

[Richard Hakluyt]

It is a catch-22 though. As soon as someone starts to be successful they take on at least some of the attributes of the elite ruling class. Otherwise they would just be another white person moaning in a terraced house or a Muslim in a ghetto frightened of what the future might hold for their children. The important thing is how many of their core values they retain as they enter a world where it is possible to get directorships, speaking gigs for £100k a time or whatever.