Zompist Bboard Again

Salmoneus wrote: ↑Wed Jun 12, 2019 7:31 pm There is one. Nobody much cares.


There are only two candidates: future leader Jo Swinson, and Sir Ed Davey. Swinson will win.

For the record, Swinson has, now, in fact, won.

Raphael wrote: ↑Mon Jul 22, 2019 10:28 am

Salmoneus wrote: ↑Wed Jun 12, 2019 7:31 pm There is one. Nobody much cares.


There are only two candidates: future leader Jo Swinson, and Sir Ed Davey. Swinson will win.

For the record, Swinson has, now, in fact, won.

Given some of Swinson's previous policy positions, that means that we have the following amazing choice between the top four parties:

Pro-hard Brexit Tories under Boris
Pro-hard Brexit proto-fascists under Nigel
Anti-Brexit yellow Tories under Jo
A Labour party too busy fighting itself to be pro- or anti- anything

Boris has just won with two-thirds of the vote. Boris will now go on to unite the Conservative Party and the country, deliver Brexit on the 31th of October, and Make Britain Great Again.Won't he?

chris_notts wrote: ↑Tue Jul 23, 2019 6:14 am

Raphael wrote: ↑Mon Jul 22, 2019 10:28 am

For the record, Swinson has, now, in fact, won.

Given some of Swinson's previous policy positions, that means that we have the following amazing choice between the top four parties:

Pro-hard Brexit Tories under Boris
Pro-hard Brexit proto-fascists under Nigel
Anti-Brexit yellow Tories under Jo
A Labour party too busy fighting itself to be pro- or anti- anything

Oh, when it comes to most of the Labour leadership's position on Brexit, I think their position is pretty clear: they're pro-Brexit but aren't willing to say so openly, or at least too openly.

(What tends to get lost in the discussions about Labour's stance towards that whole mess is that there are perfectly valid reasons to dislike the EU from a left-wing perspective. Whatever the high ideals of the EU might be, given how the system of EU legislation works, the main practical impact of the EU is to make it more and more difficult to change the status quo in more and more fields of public policy. Which kinda sucks if your ultimate goal is to move public policy in this or that field to somewhere to the left of the current status quo. It's not a good enough reason to actually leave the EU, IMO, but still a perfectly legitimate reason to have issues with it.)

alice wrote: ↑Tue Jul 23, 2019 6:21 am Boris has just won with two-thirds of the vote. Boris will now go on to unite the Conservative Party and the country, deliver Brexit on the 31th of October, and Make Britain Great Again.Won't he?

Condolences. You forgot to mention the Really Great Deal he'll get from the EU, much much much better than May's bad deal!

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I said Corbyn and May are equally terrible, and that both Hunt and Johnson are worse than May. I guess by that logic, I should prefer Corbyn as PM?

Well, it could be worse - at least Johnson is instinctively relatively liberal and not too right-wing (although he frequently panders to those who are). And his famous laziness and lack of interest in policy will hopeful prevent any great disasters.

He responded to his victory by exclaiming "Dude!"

To be clear, Johnson will not actually become PM until tomorrow.

Meanwhile, he has already survived his first prime ministerial crisis. Long-serving Tory heavyweight Sir Alan Duncan - perhaps best known for being the first openly gay Tory MP, and Johnson's de facto former deputy at the Foreign Office - attempted to trigger an emergency debate on whether Johnson could command a majority, but the Speaker denied the request.

It also seems as though he's going to survive his second crisis: there were suggestions that the Opposition might try to bring him down with a VONC. Johnson's coalition has an effective majority of only three, and a dozen or more of his own MPs have threatened to vote to remove him. But the threat of triggering an election - and worse, the prospect of potentially gaining power - have apparently led the Labour leadership to back down. They're now saying they'll probably have another think about a VONC maybe after the summer holidays.



Some targets Boris may have in mind:
120 days - if he reaches this milestone, he won't be the shortest-ruling PM since records began*, as he'll overtake George Canning**.
131 days - to become third-shortest-ruling PM, and the second-shortest-ruling PM not to have died in office, overtaking FJ Robinson, the Viscount Goderich, Canning's immediate successor.
364 days - to cease being the shortest-ruling PM in the last 100 years (overtaking Sir Alec Douglas-Home)
2 years, 319 days - to cease being the shortest-ruling PM of the 21st century so far (overtaking Gordon Brown)


*as we've mentioned before, Prime Ministers are conventionally numbered from Robert Walpole - Johnson will be the 55th Prime Minister. However, the term did not actually become standardised for another half-century after Walpole, and can equally be applied to several of Walpole's predecessors as "Chief Minister", going back to the Civil War. A few Chief Ministers lasted for an even shorter length of time than Canning.

**George Canning, Prime Minister in 1827. Despite being our PM of shortest tenure, he's actually rather admired by historians, mostly for his time as Foreign Secretary. Among other things, Canning secured the independence of the spanish and portuguese colonies in south america and protected them from french expansion. When he became Prime Minister, he split the Tories in two between his moderate Canningites and Wellington's "Ultras", and was forced to build a coalition government with the Whigs. After his death, his government was taken over by Goderich, who also lasted less than six months, before the coalition collapsed. Goderich's successor as party leader then became the first person registered as having died in a train accident, and the remaining Canningites defected to the Whigs to create Earl Grey's majority; the split is also credited as the instigation for the emergence of the Conservative Party out of the wreck of the divided Tories.

Salmoneus wrote: ↑Wed Jul 24, 2019 10:06 am Habemas ministrum primum

Habemus, dammit! What do the schools teach them nowadays?

Boris Johnson* is possibly the first PM to use the words "awesome foursome" in his opening remarks.

A brief note: the British political system is much less keen on oratory than the American. Although there is a tradition of speeches in Parliament, it's mostly limited to comings and goings: the 'maiden speech' of new MPs and the resignation speeches of bitter departing government ministers. Filibusters are possible and do occur, but are ineffectual, and generally ignored; the Budget is a very long speech, but is more a recitation of facts and figures than an opportunity for posturing (though some chancellors do try). Our equivalent of the "State of the Union", the Queen's Speech, is intentionally given to an apolitical figure.

As a result, and reflecting the more... fluid... system we have of appointing and humiliatingly dismissing our leaders, there are no "Inaugural Speeches" as there are in America - indeed, there is very little inauguration. As you know, Johnson was chosen as the next PM yesterday, and today - no three-month wait required - he is PM. Overnight, Theresa May's furniture was quietly shuffled out the back of Number Ten in a removals lorry, and Johnson's stuff brought in. The process of becoming PM is quick and simple: the PM-to-be is driven to the Palace, he goes inside, chats with the Queen confidentially, and then comes out as PM, before heading to Number Ten to get on with the job. The dual procession - from wherever he happens to be to the Palace, and from the Palace to, presumably, Number Ten (though he could stop off at McDonalds if he wanted, there's no obligation on him now) is followed by the media for people with nothing better to do, and is sometimes waylaid by the occasional flag-waving supporter or, more likely, placard-holding protester, but there is no official pomp and ceremony about the process. It is to a large extent the purpose of the Queen and her family to act as magnets for pomp and ceremony, so that as little as possible attaches to the actual politicians, in order to keep them in their place.

However, over time a tradition has developed whereby the first public act of a new prime minister is to deliver a speech from a lectern outside the door of Number Ten (if nothing else, it gives them some happy memories to dwell on when, later, they stand at the same lectern to officially announce their resignation). These remarks are relatively brief - usually only a few minutes - are more concerned with establishing a mood and ethos than with specific policies. They are often in hindsight regarded as hypocritical and/or delusional. Theresa May's, for example, was a powerful denunciation of "burning injustice", and a commitment to "social justice" specifically in the form of greater aid for the poor - although her administration then set about dismantling aid for the poor and increasing inequality. The most famous example is that of Thatcher, who led with "I would just like to remember some words of St. Francis of Assisi which I think are really just particularly apt at the moment. 'Where there is discord, may we bring harmony'", before becoming the most divisive PM in living memory. The only vital part of these speeches is that the new PM has to formally announce that they are indeed the PM.

These remarks have been growing in length and significance (Thatcher's remarks were more of a brief interview with a passing journalist) - alongside the decline in the prime ministerial TV broadcast - but they haven't yet got any official name.



*Boris Johnson, the Prime Minister. "Prime Minister" is only a job description, not a title. He will sometimes be called "Prime Minister Boris Johnson" (an apposition disguised as a title), but "Prime Minister Johnson" is flat-out wrong and an Americanism. Similarly, it's "Jeremy Hunt, the Foreign Secretary" or, if you're really in a hurry, "Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt", but never "Foreign Secretary Hunt" or "Secretary Hunt" or the like. These people do have a title or form of address - "The Right Honourable Boris Johnson" etc, as with any privy councillor, but it's not usually heard outside of formal introductions.

alice wrote: ↑Wed Jul 24, 2019 10:16 am

Salmoneus wrote: ↑Wed Jul 24, 2019 10:06 am Habemas ministrum primum

Habemus, dammit! What do the schools teach them nowadays?

Sorry, you're obviously right, I was just distracted by there being a new prime minister. I shall refocus my priorities. And avoid reading about Habermas, whose fault it probably is.

Great, we now have Sajid Javid as Chancellor, Priti Patel as Home Secretary and Dominic Raab as Foreign Secretary. Expect attempts at Randian economics and bringing back the death penalty.

Frislander wrote: ↑Wed Jul 24, 2019 1:06 pm Great, we now have Sajid Javid as Chancellor, Priti Patel as Home Secretary and Dominic Raab as Foreign Secretary.

Presided over by Boris Kemal as Prime Minister!

Richard W wrote: ↑Wed Jul 24, 2019 3:11 pm

Frislander wrote: ↑Wed Jul 24, 2019 1:06 pm Great, we now have Sajid Javid as Chancellor, Priti Patel as Home Secretary and Dominic Raab as Foreign Secretary.

Presided over by Boris Kemal as Prime Minister!

I think this makes him our first PM with Circassian ancestry!

While I'm no supporter of Boris, I don't think that labelling him with the non-Anglo-Saxon birth-surname of an ancestor is a particularly good look. Yes, he's of multiethnic origin, but there are much better reasons to dislike him than the nationality of his grandfather.

Oh yeah and I forgot thay Failing Grayling^TM has been jettisoned finally woohoo I guess.

Salmoneus wrote: ↑Wed Jul 24, 2019 5:03 pmWhile I'm no supporter of Boris, I don't think that labelling him with the non-Anglo-Saxon birth-surname of an ancestor is a particularly good look. Yes, he's of multiethnic origin, but there are much better reasons to dislike him than the nationality of his grandfather.

Besides, if you're going to do that, why on earth wouldn't you go with "von Pfeffel" instead?

It is like all those people who attacked Disraeli by antisemitic caricture instead of policy rebukes

Linguoboy wrote: ↑Wed Jul 24, 2019 5:08 pm

Salmoneus wrote: ↑Wed Jul 24, 2019 5:03 pmWhile I'm no supporter of Boris, I don't think that labelling him with the non-Anglo-Saxon birth-surname of an ancestor is a particularly good look. Yes, he's of multiethnic origin, but there are much better reasons to dislike him than the nationality of his grandfather.

Besides, if you're going to do that, why on earth wouldn't you go with "von Pfeffel" instead?

Because "Alexander de Pfeffel" still sounds white...