Giles Fraser has written an article in the Guardian entitled, “Rejoice! Centrism in British politics is dead and big ideas are back“, which stomps on the grave of centrism in the UK. In it he tells us: “Ever since the English civil war, the British have feared ideology as a reason that fellow countrymen would […]
Archives for June 2017
This is probably what will happen in Syria in the next few years – and few in the West care at all
I saw an item on Channel 4 news last night that is depressing me still. It was about Syria and the latest attacks on ISIS, and it reminded me about where the conflict in Syria, I believe, is inevitably headed, and how depressing it is that very few people in the West seem to care. […]
This is what still gets me about the general election result
I have been writing less of late, blog-wise. There are several reasons for this, not the least of which has been the birth of my son this past week, but I have to admit there are more than simple pragmatic considerations standing in the way of my standard verbosity. It has to do with the general […]
Labour won’t be able to play it both ways on Brexit forever
Angela Rayner appeared on Channel 4 news this week, alongside Vince Cable and Ken Clarke. They were all supposed to be on there essentially as Team Remain, but the cracks began to appear very quickly in this façade. Partly due to differences of opinion on how to deal with austerity, but not surprisingly it had more to do […]
How long will Theresa May be prime minister for from here? Here’s what I think
How long Theresa May will remain in Number 1o has become the million pound question in British politics. It is a genuinely perplexing one for which no one has the answer. I don’t either, incidentally – but I think going over the possibilities is worth the time. One is that she stays on until spring/summer of […]
Should the Lib Dems try and do a deal with the Tories now?
One of the big promises of the Lib Dems general election campaign was that there would be “no deals, no coalitions”. However, now that Tim Farron has resigned as leader, it does leave room for the new leader of the party, whomever they may be, to reverse this decision. The outline of such a deal […]
If Corbyn doesn’t take this one chance to unite the Labour Party, he’ll come to regret it
For a brief moment a few days ago, it looked as if Corbyn understood the nature of the moment. He hinted that there could be a shadow cabinet reshuffle, with some of the big names currently languishing on the backbenches coming in from the cold. But just as quickly as that possibility flickered, it seems […]
Try as hard as I did all weekend, I still can’t see how Thursday’s result was good for the Lib Dems
Given the fact that the Lib Dem election campaign had failed to launch right from the start, and that many (myself included) were predicting electoral meltdown for the Liberal Democrats, a net gain of three seats could be viewed as a positive result for the party in context. However, I feel alienated from most Lib Dems’ […]
This is what the election has taught me about democracy in general
The biggest thing I learned from the result of the general election was that the electorate have a much lower threshold for being taken for granted than I would have ever imagined. Theresa May spent the campaign going from one staged “rally” to another; airplane hangers or factories, stocked with Tory activists given pre-arranged lines […]
A hung parliament. Here’s what I think happens next – and it’s not great for Remainers
I need to start off by saying that I very badly got the election wrong in terms of what I predicted, being sure of a Tory landslide right up until the exit poll was released last night. So take everything I say for a while with a grain of salt as my finger is not […]