Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2018/10/22/big-cornflakes-shriveled-souls.html
…
3 Likes
The prime minister’s official spokesman said: “Personal vitriol has no place in our politics.”
Pretty sure that’s the defining characteristic of politics
8 Likes
Roger That!
3 Likes
Well, what do you expect from a party whose name is derived from the Gaelic word for “bandit”?
8 Likes
The members of a party dedicated to sociopathy turning on one another and stabbing each other in the back. How unexpected!
12 Likes
Tonight, the even more extreme wing of the Tory party is going to vote against firearms legislation (supported by the police and security services) that would outlaw a certain category of military weapons, purely so they can throw down a gauntlet to Theresa May.
We’ve reached the point where the nutters are playing with gun laws to get their way.
8 Likes
You think that’s bad? Visit sunny Florida!
3 Likes
Or Texas.
2 Likes
You do realize it’s Theresa May herself who coined the phrase “the nasty party”, right?
4 Likes
She didn’t invent it “You know what some people call us: the nasty party,” Mrs May told a stunned conference."
From that article.
7 Likes
Reached the point? To get their way?
Playing with gun laws is what nutters do. Hard stop.
1 Like
I note that there wasn’t this much fuss when Jess Phillips said she’d stab Corbyn in the front.
4 Likes
Noted. What do you think the explanation for that is?
But, to give her credit, she is associated with the idea of trying to make the Tories not live up to that name. The threats in this story are against her, not by her. You can say a lot of things about May, but she does seem to be less vitriolic than other Tory leaders have been. I’m a regular watcher of PM Question Time, and she comes off as almost nice there (by UK politician standards, of course).
1 Like
It was a metaphorical response to a metaphorical comment about other MPs stabbing him metaphorically in the back. That’s the explanation. She would not betray him behind his back, she’d do it to his face.
2 Likes
True on all counts. She is more measured and less full of rhetorical nastiness than her colleagues. UK parliamentary posh schoolboy pantomime question Time is a disgrace. You must struggle to take any politician seriously engaged in that ridiculous, pointless, nasty play acting.
But not to get carried away with her positive traits: up until recently her singular contribution to English politics was the idea of getting rid of protection of human rights in UK courts. She’s not BJ: a disgusting, selfish, narcissist adventurer. She’s not Rees Mogg: a man whose moral principles are utterly vile. She’s not Michael Gove: a thorough sociopath, a creepy scary walking malignancy. She is i guess the best of a bad lot. But as Hannah Arendt said: when you choose the lesser of two evils it’s easy to make yourself forget that you are choosing evil.
4 Likes
As far as I could tell this was pure political self preservation. She’s a decent politician, she’s become and more importantly remained prime minister which I guess is no small achievement, but I’ve yet to detect a strain of humanity in her. All her actions seem designed to further her only true goal, gaining power and retaining it. Maybot is a very apt nickname, in more than one way.
2 Likes
I love PMQs; I got hooked on it when I lived in England in the 80s. The exercise forces the PM to be aware of the major issues of the day, and they generally don’t get away with just giving vague pat answers. It would have been a nightmare for the two most recent US GOP Presidents, while the two most recent Democrats would have been fine.
I dunno. She seems like a typical dork to me, and I find that endearing. Of course, she’s way over her head with the Brexit mess Cameron left her, and her policies at the Home Office on things like privacy were a nightmare, but I chalk that up to general ignorance coupled with classic Tory “law and order” principles.
The things she did on immigration were the true nightmare.
6 Likes
I think that can be chalked up to general ignorance coupled with classic Tory racist principles.
Driving scary billboards around, an approach to law enforcement we associate with BBC licenses, is a pretty benign way to deal with illegal immigration. IIRC Farage was outraged that it was an excuse not to do something much harsher. Reminding immigrants about how racist the government is might be considered a public service.
