Never mind. There will be another Menzies or Wragg next week, accused of grifting for dosh, or generously sharing their genitals with the rest of us — or, as in the case of Paul Maynard MP, allegedly siphoning off vast amounts of taxpayers’ money for his own campaign funds. It all points to one thing: death, like a big black bat, is flapping its wings over this administration. It has become wholly enmired in complacency, arrogance and corruption, and with each miscreant dragged, bellowing their innocence, into the daylight, it becomes more and more evident that the centre cannot hold. Any notional discipline has gone. The ship is sinking, and the honourable members don’t really give a monkey’s.
Personally I don’t think so though. Rather, all politics is like this all the time. The fin de siecle part is just that as it’s obvious this lot are at the end of their rope folk are willing to talk about it, write it up, reveal.
Of course, that I think all politics is like this all the time is why I think it’s such a lousy way of running anything.
It is indeed true that many ministers – including those touted as future leaders – have given up and can’t be arsed. As a parent, I can only attribute it to poor leadership. Of course, much of the ennui has developed because the politicians are all bankers (it’s me Cockney coming aht, innit) but Sunak is busy getting all his acolytes into positions of influence to ensure his continued fame (infamy?) after he’s kicked out and many ministers and MPs are infected by this attitude.
Of course, that I think all politics is like this all the time
Disagree somewhat, Tim.
The kiddy table is a post-1997 phenomenon. We used to have adult conversations in politics. The deliberate estrangement of MP’s and our wider system of law and governance from anything approaching the public interest or the public will (“But I didn’t vote for any of this!” cried the British voter. “LOL!” said the permanent civil servant. “ROFL!”) is also still fairly new.
The fin de siecle part comes because they’re deliberately crashing our country into the twin towers of Net Zero and Infinity Immigration and have no plans for us plebs to survive. We’re in trillions of debt and most MP’s are too busy raping boys to care.
Lions.
A few backhanders or greased palms or getting caught with a prossie was standard fare and indeed expected of politicians, especially where local politics was involved. We only need to look at how the satrapies in Scotland developed to see the power of patronage at that level.
Steve is right above. There is this cynicism in politics today. It indeed comes from the post 1997 attempt at making the legislature a managerial exercise. This new generation: policians, judges and lawyers, civil servants et al imbued in the hatred of Thatcher that came from the schools and universities of the 1980s, live in their own intellectual bubble, protected from the Wrongthink of the masses. They are in all parties and all levels of the bureaucracy.
Khan is a perfect example. He had all the same teachers as I did and he believed their shit while I didn’t.
The perverts and rapists are tolerated because they serve a purpose to vote the right way and praise whicheve Glorious Helmsman is in charge, but once the game is up as it is today, they can be thrown aside and no one really cares except for the Hoi Polloi and no one cares about what they think anyway. It doesn’t make any difference who one votes for it is the same shit as ever. Forever.
Figuratively, sure. If they were literally at the end of the rope then the next lot would be less problematic.
It does come down to leadership and the likes of Sunak doesn’t want to block his WEF copybook with anything that might stop him being invited onwards-and-upwards once his post-coup life is over.
Equally, by promising gongs and baubles to the supporting players, he gets to continue cosplaying as PM until the lights go out, next election.
Given the appalling polling, it looks like we’re going to be forced to watch this particular pantomime to the end in January 2025. How tiresome.
Steve’s wrong about the tigers though.
Sharks. Hungry, man-eating sharks. Great White’s ideally (or is that racist?)
John Galt:’…he gets to continue cosplaying as PM until the lights go out…’
What does he get out of it, though? A man with his money can surely do better with his life.
Beyond me Julia. I mean, once you’ve got the money, go for power and then status, perhaps?
Then again, all political lives not cut short inevitably end in failure, so maybe being PM is some kind of fulfilment of his Napoleon complex?
Buggered if I know.
“so maybe being PM is some kind of fulfilment of his Napoleon complex?”
Bingo, JG.
One would have thought that with all the work he had put into becoming PM, he’d at least have had a plan. But he didn’t.
That’s what I don’t understand. If you expend so much political capital getting to No. 10 and then do sweet phuq all once you’re there, what’s the phuqing point? He could have left BoJo in the job, at least he seemed to occasionally enjoy being PM.
To reach No. 10 and then sit on your arse while just bitching about ECHR, Rwanda scheme and all that without doing anything is just a waste of time and energy.
Talking of adults, this morning I got my local election leaflet from the Communist candidate. He looks about 16. But of the whole bunch on my ballot paper, he comes across as the most sensible. Yes, some of the policies listed are mad, but he’s smartly dressed, properly shaved with a decent haircut…. oh dear… I’m getting dragged in….
@jgh: we’re lucky, we have an Independent who gives every appearance of sanity.
But what to do about Police Commissioner? Only the three standard parties.
It will be easy in Scotland. The Scotnaz are surely a busted flush and Sir Kneel has announced that Labour is the party of English patriotism. So, back to the Tories ye erses, eh?
I’m voting Reform here in Perth, if they manage to get on the ballot. Not that it’ll go anywhere but I’d rather do that than vote for any of the other mainstream parties.
“It is indeed true that many ministers – including those touted as future leaders – have given up and can’t be arsed“
Replacing Sunak won’t make any difference to the election result so how many of them are just waiting until after the election so they don’t have the loss on their record
Matthew Parris in Saturday’s Times points out that politicise attracts the rash and reckless. he includes himself:
I’ve always thought that many rich and powerful people have just been fortunate all their lives – their toast has never landed butter side down, and this colours their judgement (which may well have been a bit cloudy to begin with). This view was confirmed for me by Chris Huhne, whom you may recall ‘persuaded’ his wife to lie that she was driving his car, to avoid 3 pts and a temporary ban. At the time of the speeding (2003, the “perverting the course of justice” charge was 10 years later), he was an MEP, so could easily have afforded a chauffeur, let alone a few taxis.
Why take a potentially career-ending risk over something so minor? Because he’d always been a liar and a cheat, and had always got away with it – so the immediate thought was “I can lie and cheat my way out of this.”
Many such cases.
Chris Miller is right, they are all crooked bloody chancers. And probably selected as such by people for whom that is a recommendation and a control mechanism for the whips. By the previously mentioned Dougie Smith and equivalents in the other parties.
I park the car on one side of the common, my house being on the other, to walk across parkland. I know very well that gay men “cruise” there, as I have done. Two young white men walk towards me. Before I know it I’m down, my jaw broken, being kicked in the ribs and bleeding.
Just think about this for a moment. I’ve actually stumbled across this sort of thing more than a few times. Hampstead Heath when I lived in Agincourt Road at the bottom end & used to stroll back across the Heath from a pub at the top. (No! Not Jack Straw’s thankyou) And in Finsbury Park where I walked the dogs. One guy giving another up the arse almost in plain sight. What is f*****g wrong with these people? How often do you see hetrosexual couples doing the same? Maybe a bit of heavy petting on a park bench but usually they’re capable of finding somewhere securely out the way. And bearing in mind even in the most enthusiastic claims the hetro/homo ratio’s around 10:1 And Parris wonders why a couple of lads gave him a kicking? I’d be inclined to give them medals.
It makes one wonder whether these MP’s actually want to get caught.