Unfit for office
One of the main stories of the last week was a blazing row between prospective PM Boris Johnston and his live in girlfriend. He denied it had happened, and the police refused to comment, until it turned out a neighbour had recorded the row (so they had to be shouting loud enough that he could hear it in his place). Naturally the right wing media had a massive tizzy about this, calling it an invasion of privacy, while team Boris went into damage limitation mode.

Ordinary I’d agree, however there its a case of pot calling the kettle black here. Boris used to be editor of the Spectator (during the phone hacking scandal) and has regular column in the Telegraph. The UK media (when they aren’t hacking people’s phones and emails) are well known for setting up sting operations, getting a political they don’t like drunk, high or just angry and recording them, then reporting what was said out of context (most notably Vince Cable, reporting a conversation in a constituency office out of context).
So a neighbour recording a scary sounding row in the hope it might be useful as evidence for the police (something the police agreed was a sensible idea) is a nosy pleb who should mind his own business. But a tabloid hack bugging a celebrity or using a long lens to get a picture of a member of the royal family with her top off, that’s good journalism. And while the right wing media are very quick to report on the private lives of celebs or left wing politicians, they are slow to report the infidelity of right wing politicians. Boris and his girlfriends (and children out of wedlock) or Farage’s affairs are largely kept out of the newspapers.
Either way, it is merely one of a long number of reasons to doubt Johnson’s suitability for high office. Almost anyone who has had anything to do with him has said he’d make a terrible PM. And as for brexit, his plan is basically bonkers, labelled “a fantasy” by some civil servants. He plans to go to Europe, bang on the table and get a better deal. What’s actually going to happen is he’ll go there to find a sticky note on the door saying nobody home, we’ll get back to you in mid November (the EU has disbanded its negotiating team, they have to wait for the new parliament to sit and elect new members)…after the UK’s scheduled to leave.
So that would imply no deal, but he’s also said the chances of that are very low, which is probably just as well as the country is woefully poorly prepared, indeed the person in charge of no dealing planning just quit. All in all, it would appear that he’s not got a clue what he’s going to do. His sole reason for going for the job is ego. He’s posh and if his bullingdon buddy Cameron (whose not from as rich a family as Boris) can be PM, why he’s practically entitled to the job, its his by right.
Of course, given that the media is camped outside number 10 pretty much 24/7, the next blazing row with his girlfriend/wife/boyfriend will be broadcast worldwide. And if he thinks he can lie his way to office and then backtrack, think again. His could well be the shortest and most disastrous PM term in history. Interesting time perhaps. And I suppose it means for Americans, the brit’s can stop laughing at them over Trump.
Trump v’s Iran
Speaking of Trump, there’s the drum beats to war over Iran. Its possible that the plan is to provoke a war with Iran to improve Trump’s poll ratings and give him a boost ahead of the next election. Well if that’s the plan its a terrible plan, as I outlined before. Its all very reminiscent of the Gulf of Tonkin incident.

Iran is much better armed and equipped than Iraq was (including the latest in Russian air defence missile technology). Its probably inevitable the US forces would take losses. And that means captured US pilots, or sunken warships (they’ve also got subs, including Russia made Kilo class subs), a media disaster for any US president (remember what happened to Jimmy Carter!). Iran is also closely tied to the anti-Jihadi forces in Iraq and Syria, as well as to the Russians. So there’s multiple ways this could blow back on the US. An oil embargo, them being driven out of Iraq (or indeed the Iraqi forces turning on them and taking US military personnel hostage) and Syria, a rise in terrorism, you name it.
Also given that Iran has now begun enriching Uranium, it raises the risk that Trump’s actions means they get nukes anyway and his listening to right wing hawks and Israel simply helped them do so. And recall there’s a way Iran can get access to nukes very quickly – the Russians. The worst case scenario is that Iran is so intimidated by this conflict that they retreat under the protective blanket of Russia and invite the Russians to install nuclear missiles in Iran. Plus if Russia takes any casualties from US attacks (which is possible, they’ll likely have advisers and contractors on site) Russia might choose to retaliate in another theatre, most likely the Baltic.
So this can only end badly for America. We can only hope he chickens out, probably more about saving his precious ego than anything.
Working class leave
Corbyn meanwhile still goes through the routine of promising a move towards a 2nd referendum. But then he goes into a meeting with his lexiter cabinet, who seem determined to leave at any cost (even if it destroys the labour party) and emerges to backtrack. The fact is that labour’s brexit strategy is as equally divorced from reality as Johnson’s. Take a recent article from leading Lexiter Jon Turddas Curddas, saying how the working class labour supporters will never forgive labour if they back a 2nd referendum.
Excuse me, but brexit would only not happen in a 2nd referendum if the leave camp lost. So he’s saying the party should deny people a vote on this, now and until the end of time just to avoid hurting someone’s feelings. Also we need to address this myth that the working class labour supporters voted overwhelmingly leave. They didn’t. Polls show that between 90% and 70% of labour supporters backed remain (the margin depends on who you consider to be a “labour supporter”, a party member or someone who tends to vote labour). And if anything the party is swinging more and more to remain, not least given the threat no deal presents to working class jobs.

Labour is overwhelmingly a remain supporting party
Why then did some labour constituency’s vote for brexit? Well because under the UK’s decidedly unfair first-past-the-post-system an MP can be elected without a majority of votes. Its possible to win with as little as 25% of support, although 30-40% is more typical. So take 10-30% of labour support, add it to the Tory & UKIP vote, chuck in a couple of thousand people who don’t normally vote, but the bloke on the telly told them they’d get a free unicorn if they voted for this thing called “leave” and yes you can get a labour seat to vote heavily for leave. Like so many deluded leavers, Curddas assumes that everyone in his constituency agrees with him, even though polls, not to mention basic maths, do not support this.

And those polls show labour is haemorrhaging support. Does Craddas and his fellow London leave brigade seriously think that they can drag the country out of the EU, pissing off many of labours young new supporters, seeing many others lose their jobs and not suffer any sort of blow back? Like I said, they are as deluded as the Tories.
And now is the winter of our discontent
Case in point, I came across this old copy of a documentary about the infamous winter of discontent. Over the course of the winter of 1978/79 the UK was besieged by a series of strikes as the then labour government fought with its normally loyal supporters in the unions. This eventually led to an early election and the milk snatcher Maggie Thatcher winning, largely because labour party supporters stayed away from the polls.

And so its worthwhile remembering what happened, as it provides many valuable lessons for today. Firstly, yes the media made a mountain out of a mole hill. The PM Callaghan never said the famous line “crisis what crisis” (he merely said it was a matter of opinion as to how bad things were…i.e. You hacks are just trying to make hay so you can get a Tory elected). Yes the grave diggers went on strike, but only in one small part of the country. There was disruption from those strikes but it was sporadic and it didn’t last the whole of the winter. But all of that said, it was a mess (just not as big a one as the media made it out to be), the labour government fecked up, they have to take the blame for that.
And at the heart of the problem was the global economic events of the 1970‘s. Contrary to what many Corbyn/Bernie supporters believe the 70’s was not a working class utopia, quite the opposite in fact. There were several economic crises, not least of those being caused by the oil shocks. This had the effect of pushing up inflation, which caused workers to demand higher wages, which caused more inflation, which caused more jobs losses.
The labour government were determined to stop this cycle, by limiting wage increases in return for the government acting to keep living costs down (by restricting rent increases or price rises on basic food items). But there was a disconnect between those in the Westminster bubble (which included union bosses) and the rank and file union members or labour supporters in the factories, who’d effectively just taken a pay cut because of inflation.

Both groups thought the other had their back. The workers assumed a labour government won’t go against striking workers, the government assumed that working class workers won’t undermine a labour government and hand the wicked witch of Finchley the keys to number 10…who immediately went to war on those very same unionised industries. But that’s what happened. Turkey’s will literally vote for Christmas sometimes.
So the lesson for labour would be that just because those around Corbyn think brexit is a great idea (including union boss Len Mc Cluskey), doesn’t mean the rest of the country (or even his own party) agrees. If they think they can screw over remain supporting labour voters and fuming thought they’ll be, they will still vote labour in the next election, think again. Yes some will be sufficiently scared of more Tory madness, but others will make a point of voting lib dem, green (or not at all). And it doesn’t take many of them to do that to decimate labour at the polls (even just a 10% drop in support would be catastrophic, remember they need to gain support to win an election not lose it!).
And even if Corbyn gets in to power, does he really think workers whose jobs might be put at risk by his brexit policy (including much of the civil service, who, like those in the 1970’s, have taken a 30% pay cut in real terms since 2008) won’t strike and plunge his government into chaos, casting labour into the wilderness for another generation. Well history says yes they will.
And there’s lessons here for the Tories. They seem to think that they can screw over business and they’ll just take one for the team. They won’t sue the government (several have already won multi million pound payouts), speculate against the pound or move their company to Ireland….except they are and more will follow! And the Scottish Tories fear a Johnson premiership combined with a no deal brexit, could create an ironclad case for independence.
Another clip I came across recently was this bit from the Long Good Friday. A film from the Thatcher era it sees this scene where the protagonist basically telling a bunch of yanks to feck off, he’s a European and in the single market, they can stick their money, he’s going into business with the Germans (you’d have to watch the whole movie to understand the context of it….has a young Helen Mirren in it too!). Well the 2019 remake would appear to involve our protagonist kissing US booty and promising to be their bitch. That effectively is brexit in a nutshell.
Unfit to lead?
Another story was a “leak” from the civil service claiming that Corbyn is too frail to be PM and largely under the control of his advisers. On the one hand, given what I’ve said above, that kind of does make sense. Then again, you could say the same thing about May or Boris, yet nobody is questioning their suitability for office. There are procedures and rules for how such issues should be dealt with (without leaking things to the media). And I cannot help but notice that this story first appeared in the Murdoch press. If these leakers were genuinely worried, why didn’t they follow the correct policy, or approach a more credible newspaper?
One worries that this is simply a case of old Etonians in the civil service, all too aware of the dangers Johnson posses to the Tories electoral chances, they’ve decided to get ahead of themselves and start running interference well in advance. But even so, rather than take any criticism instead Corbyn wants to make a federal case out of this. Shoot the messenger and the message will die, won’t it?
Life expectancy falling
Some other disturbing news shows that the UK has now recorded the first drop in life expectancy rates in a century. While there are many reasons behind this drop, less healthy diets and lack of exercise are part of the problem, but clearly there is a link to the decline in NHS spending (while the Tories will claim to have increased it, this ignores inflation and an ageing population, which means cuts in real terms) and the impact of austerity.
And the Tory response was to make all sorts excuses ranging from old people dying of flu (actually vaccines against the flu are becoming much more effective), harsher winters (we’re getting more student cold snaps, but its winters are in general milder now than previously). And of course, life expectancy rates are still rising in the rest of the world, even in more prosperous parts. We’ve long accepted for many generations that the next generation will be better off and live longer, but the Tories have now so broken the UK that this is no longer true.
Women’s world cup
Not sure if anyone’s been watching the women’s world cup, but on the whole I think its been quite good. I cannot help but notice there’s a lot less diving and other primadonna theatrics, which just goes to show that most male professional footballers are just a bunch of overpaid wimps.

Anyone for some footie….or tea?
However there’s been some controversy over VAR (Video Assistant Referee), which has destroyed the natural rhythm of many of the games, by having the referee dash off the pitch to watch a playback of some event, often for something that could easily wait (a yellow card decision for example).
This isn’t an issue with other sports, which have used VAR for many years (while FIFA fought tooth and nail against it) and it doesn’t interrupt the game much. In hockey for example they’ve a system whereby the game just carries on as normal, save certain key decisions (e.g. did the ball go over the goal line), but either team can refer to VAR at anytime. If their claim succeeds they can make further referrals. If it fails they lose their right to do so. End result is it doesn’t really effect the flow of the game. But anything that’s a good idea, you can rely on FIFA to screw it up.
And one cannot help but notice they are tweaking the rules as they go along in the middle of a major women’s tournament, not the men’s. And the players haven’t been properly briefed about it, as became clear during the Cameron game (where a number of VAR decisions went against Cameron and they nearly walked off the pitch). Which just tells everything you need to know about FIFA.
Cycling ban
In effect last week cycling has been banned in the UK. A cyclist who hit a mobile phone zombie (she stepped in front of him while on her phone) was successfully sued. While her payout will be limited to a few thousand, he’ll have to pay up to a £100,000 in costs. Needless to say this opens a massive can of worms.
Firstly it requires cyclists (and potentially drivers) to be responsible for the irresponsible actions of others. Needless to say, this will have all sorts of disastrous repercussions. The crash for cash brigade will have a field day. All they need to do now is walk in front of a bike/car/scooter at a junction, lie down on the road and claim they were hit (a innocent “passerby” accomplice willingly testifying to the “accident”).
Well the thing is the best strategy if that happens to you on a bike is keep going. The mistake this cyclists made was stopping to check on her welfare. If he’d kept going and left her bleeding on the side of the road, he’d not be in this mess.
Which inevitably means people’s lives will be put at risk, as anyone with a lick of sense who hits someone will just ride or drive away (yes that’s technically illegal, but do you want to end up £100,000 poorer?). I hope the judge in this case and the attention seeking claimant will be happy when they learn their actions have led to an explosion in fraudulent claims, the insurance premiums of everyone in the country going up and one or two deaths because someone was left bleeding the road after an accident.
What this highlights is everything that’s wrong with the UK legal system. Given the lack of a proper constitution it means that judges can basically just make it up as they go along. Hence if you can pay enough money to lawyers you can pretty much buy whatever outcome you want, creating a horrible legal mess for everyone else in the process.
What happens in Alabama stays there
Alabama, the state that last year recently narrowly avoided electing a known kiddy fiddler, showed us everything awful about what happens when the Republican party’s toxic ideology is implemented.
A pregnant woman was shot in the stomach and she’s now been charged with manslaughter of her unborn child, while the person who shot her walks free. I mean guns only kill bad people, so it must be her fault that her body (with her baby) got in the way of the bullets aimed at her. If she was innocent god would have intervened (maybe she just didn’t pray hard enough or give enough money for her minster’s private jet).
I’ve pointed out before that in Europe the laws are such that its more gun regulation than gun control. You can pretty much get any kind of gun you can get in the US, the main restriction is what you do with it (and, oddly enough, shooting pregnant women in the stomach will get you sent to jail, and your gun ownership privileges revoked).

However, I think the NRA types are sleep walking America towards a future where instead it will be gun control. i.e. total bans on guns for all but a handful of strictly regulated purposes. And probably state funded abortions too! If they honestly think stuff like this is going to have no blow back then they are very naive. And they will only have themselves to blame when that day comes.
You have trodden on the forbidden lawn
Guardian columnist George Monbiot, and a number of academics recently produced a report on the UK’s land ownership and how it is fostering inequality, not to mention helping the wealthy to dodge tax. They have recommended to the labour party a number of measures to reform the UK’s land ownership to counter these issues.
Needless to say, this hit something of a raw nerve among right wing media barons (who just happen to be major property owners!), who launched a massive media blitz against these proposals and began using them to bash Corbyn. A reminder, while the labour party (and Corbyn) are aware of this report, they have yet to adopt any of its proposals or craft any specific policies from it.
But since when have facts stood in the way of a good hatchet job, with the gutter press duly improvising by pulling a couple of scary (and fictitious) policies out of their own arses, sticking Corbyn’s name against it and going on a massive tirade against a straw man that exists only in their own paranoid imagination. Its all very similar to the Fox news reaction to the recent Green new deal proposals.
You know you are over the target when you start taking flak. And clearly this reaction from the right wing media highlights that maybe Monbiot and co are on to something. Let’s just take one of their proposals, abolish council tax and replace it with a property tax instead, a policy I’ve long advocated (I’d include the option of a local income tax instead as well thought). This would not only be much fairer, as it would link ones ability to pay to what you pay, but also eliminate a lot of the cheating of the council tax system that goes on. While people in every income bracket do this (council tax is essentially an honesty tax, its fairly easy to avoid paying it if you don’t want too), its obviously the wealthy who are the worse offenders.
Of course, as you can probably guess, the last thing the rich want is a tax system that’s “fair” and links their wealthy property portfolio to how much tax they pay (its not as if they can move their country estate overseas, nor can they plead hardship on a multi million pound London flat which earns several thousand a month in rent), hence the over reaction to this report. Which is why I’d advice everyone to read it.
May’s legacy – Solar bashing
Theresa May is probably thinking of her legacy. She’s confronted Putin over Salisbury (good!) and promising billions towards fighting climate change ignoring the fact that the solar industry (which was growing steadily for some time) has now collapsed in the UK. With the Tories contemplating new taxes to make damn sure they kill it off for good (we can’t let the plebs generate their own power!).
What worries me is the long term consequences of all of this. As I’ve pointed out before, the UK’s energy system is badly in need of investment at nearly every level. Ageing power stations need replacing, the grid needs updating and that’s before we even tackle climate change.
By burning one industry for the crime of being successful, she and the Tories are sending a dangerous signal to industry. Yes they favour Natural Gas and nuclear. But both of those have limited room for expansion (given the recent cancellations nuclear is almost certain to contract). And brexit could be a show stopper to either. So her legacy could well be to put the UK on a route towards rising carbon emissions, power cuts and energy shortages.