It kept being said that seven prime ministers in 10 years is unacceptable. Questions were asked. But no one that I saw made the obvious point. Everyone of these people was or is a neoliberal.
And the reality is neoliberalism has failed. Of course, no prime minister can deliver a failed idea.
Not a very good definition, but a definition all the same.
If Starmer, May and Boris are all described as neoliberals then what word is there left to decribe someone like me?
Or maybe the system of government by departments and quangos no longer allows a PM to make a difference. But Starmer should never have been PM and after it was clear that he was not up to it there was no proper mechanism to get rid of him. He was like Grandad insisting he’s a good driver and everyone else on the road is an idiot. Grandad won’t give up driving. Sttarmer ‘I’m not walking away’ until forced to long after he should have been. Maybe therevshould be a recall process, although it must be very tightly drawn to avoid malicious or machiavellian use.
“Neoliberalism” isn’t really any sort of definition anymore, if it ever was. What definition can put Starmer and Truss in the same category, apart from “White European”?
Most people who use the term ‘neoliberal’ use it vaguely to describe someone or something they don’t like, if the dislike is stronger they navigate to ‘fascist’ or ‘Nazi’ regardless of whether it makes any real sense. They say the meaning of words can change, but what happens when that change means the word no longer has much of a meaning at all?
So it turns out the problem with the nazis wasn’t the anti-semitism, the socialism, the private vs state relationship, the invading countries, the genocide (all of which are approved on the left) but the nationalism all along. As demonised by Starmer’s not-quite-farewell speech, even though he was elected in a national election by a nation to be PM of the nation. Let’s see what the Bill of Rights has to say about that:
The Bill of Rights 1689 prevents foreign princes and external authorities (most notably the Pope and the Catholic Church) from holding or exercising any spiritual, ecclesiastical, or temporal power within England. It legally affirmed that allegiance was owed solely to the English Crown and Parliament
From the ‘Glossary’
Neoliberalism is a term used by some, mainly on the left of the political spectrum, to describe a political and economic ideology that emphasises the importance of free markets, individual liberty, and limited government intervention in the economy.
The described by others as neoliberals by others rarely describe themselves as neoliberal, preferring the terms ‘conservative’ or ‘neoclassical’.
So in essence it’s a made-up, pseudo scientific concept to describe people you don’t like?
Neoliberalism developed after World War II century as a response to the perceived threats from Keynesian economics and the welfare state model.
Neoliberalism’s principle architect were Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman. James Buchanan contributed considerably to the ideology.
The ideas were promoted through an organisation created in 1947 by Hayek and Friedman called the Mont Pelerin Society, and subsequently by a wide range of right wing think tanks in the USA, UK and elsewhere. Many of these think tanks have dominated the recent political thinking and policy creation of parties such as the Republicans in the USA and Conservatives in the UK, but their reach has extended to both Democrats in the US and Labour, Liberal Democrats and even some in the Scottish National Party in the UK.
This is both historically inaccurate and a mythology assiduously promoted by the likes of Zack Polanski and sundry other Corbynite morons. The notion that the SNP could be called ‘Free market’ is on a par with saying the Pope is an evangelical. They are dyed in the wool Stalinists.
Sorry for the pendantry, but you can be Roman Catholic and evangelical. Actually quite a lot are.
Hallowed be – Apologies – you’re quite right of course! I missed the obvious Protestant qualifier!!
V_P. Never get involved in the flavours of God Botherers. It’s too complicated. ie the CofE is not Protestant but is Catholic. When it comes down to it, the number of religions equals the number of the religious.
emphasises the importance of free markets, individual liberty, and limited government intervention
That’s called “freedom”. I can see why Lord Spudcup hates it so.
Popular leaders often need to identify an enemy so as to get people to rally behind them. Despite Murphy not being very popular, or a leader and having just days ago saying that his politics if care does not need an enemy, his intent is clear.
He can’t help it. It’s reflexive.
I don’t mind that description, but it does not apply to any of our past 10 PMs, apart from perhaps Truss.
They call you a Fascist or Nazi to justify using violence against you.
Commie speak: It is not meant to communicate, it’s to manipulate.
I see the fucker has recovered.
Don’t forget, he was one of the first in the UK to have covid and has had it at least ten times since, so he’s obviously made of stern stuff.
But didn’t he get jabbed? And I seem to recall quite a few ‘experts’ telling us if you got jabbed you wouldn’t get sick.
Or were they fibbing?
Not only that you wouldn’t get sick but also that it was sterilising and therefore you couldn’t transmit the virus.
Some of us preferred to think of it as covid catching him multiple times.
Not at death’s door then? Fucking hypochondriac.
Obviously you’re a Fascist/ Nazi Tim. That’s just how it works now…
As Tim has repeatedly pointed out neoliberalism has lifted billions of people out of grinding poverty. In what alternate universe is that a failure?
Neoliberalism didn’t destroy the Aral Sea, either.
Of course, no prime minister can deliver a failed idea.
Yes. Socialism.
What Brexit has done is to expose the hollowness at the heart of many of our systems of government – not entirely surprisingly after four decades of government largely by diktat from the EU. “We’d love to get immigration under control, but those nasty people in Brussels/The Hague won’t let us.” None of this applies any more, but the wheels are still spinning futilely on the clown car of governance.
When the economy was expanding faster than the population, the large majority of the population wasn’t worried about immigration.
That’s because the large majority of the population didn’t have to deal directly with goat- and monkey-fuckers. They do now, and they don’t much like it.
Also because we didn’t have millions unemployed. That wasn’t the fault of the immigrants.
…
On the subject of Brexit, or more precise Remainers, this is very good:
https://spectator.com/article/who-wants-to-govern-britain/
If you go through 7 PM’s in 10 years, then maybe, just *maybe* , the whole process that gives rise to those PM’s is, I don’t know,….. deeply flawed, and is exposing some embarrassing truths about Brit politics?