ska invita
back on the other side
i blame journalists, they parrot this stuff
the fact that Levelling Up is talked about with a straight face shows how cretinous the whole thing is
Liz Truss’s time is up
- Thread starter Dogsauce
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the fact that Levelling Up is talked about with a straight face shows how cretinous the whole thing is
bluescreen
tofu eating wokerati
It was repeated so often in her speech journos were picking up on it and mocking it straight away. So it's had exposure through people criticising it as well as those who seem to think it's actually A Thing. (I have no idea how many of the latter there may actually be.)
story
Changing the facts
The midnight news on the Beeb last night was using it as if it was an established idea of substance. No piss taking involved. Just a direct reference to “the anti-growth coalition”.
That may be intended as an exasperated in joke but it does the job of getting into general consciousness very neatly.
Smokeandsteam
Working Class First
Growth, economically speaking, is a relatively new metric by which to measure how a place is doing. What Truss doesn’t get or doesn’t care about is that it emerged as the key economic measure in Britain at a specific time (after the Second World War) and for a specific reason (the desire, shared by both main parties, to rebuild and then build a national economy.
Whilst growth is obviously desirable and necessary- even under a globalised market economy - there are also obvious sensible limits and social, cultural, environmental, political and economic nuances and considerations, some of which are discussed here: Truss neither understands growth or the steps required to deliver it
Then there is the fact that the Truss growth plan seemingly acknowledges that Britain is a major economy, but one with low growth, low wages, low investment, substantial debts and a large dependence on imports for essential supplies, such as natural gas. She seems to believe that these now embedded deformities can be overcome by a) a market led financial boom a la the 1980’s (Truss really should have walked on to the conference stage to Wham rather than M People such is the overwhelming nostalgia of everything she says and does) and b) just saying ‘growth’ over and over again until it appears.
Her idea is briefly: ahistorical, ground in really very basic economic misunderstanding and nostalgia, economically illiterate given the current and long run conditions and is visibly unable to even command the support of those it is designed to unleash. As a strategy it’s already in tatters and politically toxic. I give it another 4 weeks before it’s dumped except in name only.
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Who's adopted it? ATM it's just being reported as a line in a lame speech Truss gave yesterday - I can mostly just see a mixture of mockery and bemusement so far. These things can become embedded, but I doubt this one will.
brogdale
Coming to terms with late onset Anarchism
Put more simply, it's also the only metric that they're (publicly prepared to admit to) that a) interests them or b) they believe that their class war policies could possibly achieve.
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Artaxerxes
Look out, he's got a gnu!
The press love a good catchphrase and are unable to do the basic thing of asking a politician directly “what do you mean by woke/Anti Growth Coalition? Can you define it in a sentence?” And are fundamentally incapable of challenging the hand that feeds them anonymous WhatsApp messages from the cabinet
Mainstream news is essentially just a parrot factory that does little but amplify the worst of politicians views
Karl Masks
Birds Angel Delight
She's too vacuous to deploy a phrase like that.
Get Brexit Done is essentially neutral and can mean anything to anyone. Remain and Leave alike. All want Brexit 'done'.
Anti Growth can also mean anything, but inevitably is hostile
Get Brexit Done is essentially neutral and can mean anything to anyone. Remain and Leave alike. All want Brexit 'done'.
Anti Growth can also mean anything, but inevitably is hostile
billy_bob
Air of bewilderment model's own
True. Imagine the kind of narcissist you'd have to be to actively put yourself forward to be in this position, standing on a small hillock on a desert island shouting 'I'm the king of the castle' as the sea level rises rapidly, surrounded by seethingly shark-infested waters, and all you have to defend you is a pack of starving wolverines that might turn on you any moment.
Isn't this the precise situation Jeremy Corbyn found himself in in 2016?
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
Some big differences, I would think. Corbyn had a bunch of loyal supporters from the same wing of the party. He was clean when it came to the Iraq War and various other New Labour atrocities - that gave him some moral standing. He believed in something and could rally those with similar beliefs behind him.
Strikes me by comparison that Truss really is on her own. Even her biggest supporters are only supporting her tactically. Precious few people actually believe in her or what she stands for. What does she stand for?
story
Changing the facts
But Growth is also an embedded tenet of capitalism anyway so the notion underpins every market economy. I get what you’re saying but it’s also a kind of tautology to mention it, as if it’s something they invented, at all.
ska invita
back on the other side
when we see large rallies for Truss and hundreds of thousands joining the tory party because of her platform then the comparison holds up
its an ego trip if you are in your own cabal, much less so if you have popular support
its an ego trip if you are in your own cabal, much less so if you have popular support
billy_bob
Air of bewilderment model's own
Corbyn had actual supporters around him. Not just in the membership but on his front bench. OK, they may not have been very effectual in the end and they may have shared the bench with a wolverine or two, but some of them were genuinely on his side. I'm not sure that's the case for Truss.
I'm also not convinced she's 'ideologically driven' in the same way Corbyn was - or to make a closer-to-home comparison, in the way Thatcher was. Thatcher was vicious but even those who despised her can acknowledge that to some extent it was rooted in a genuine belief that small state etc. was better for people. When Truss talks about 'the right thing to do' it's hard to see even a grain of anything but instrumentalism in it - it just means 'the best way to wring what we can out of this place before someone grabs the wheel off us'.
I'm also not convinced she's 'ideologically driven' in the same way Corbyn was - or to make a closer-to-home comparison, in the way Thatcher was. Thatcher was vicious but even those who despised her can acknowledge that to some extent it was rooted in a genuine belief that small state etc. was better for people. When Truss talks about 'the right thing to do' it's hard to see even a grain of anything but instrumentalism in it - it just means 'the best way to wring what we can out of this place before someone grabs the wheel off us'.
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
Not convinced. She resuscitated some bastardised form of early-years Thatcherism during the tory leadership campaign because she could see - correctly - that promising tax cuts and a smaller state would win with that particular electorate. 'ideology' as a means to power.
Corbyn is an entirely different case. I'd argue that it wasn't really about him. He himself, at the start at least, insisted that it wasn't really about him. You didn't need to find Corbyn inspirational as a leader - you could back him because of what he stood for. It may be that we find Truss's Thatcher tribute act laughable, but it's an attempt at being an inspirational leader. She's amazingly bad at it, but it's what she's trying to do.
That's what lots of people thought, then she followed through with the promises as soon as she won - actions she definitely didn't need to take. She's into all that mad shit, for sure.
rubbershoes
not the only raver in the village
So many of the tory MPs interviewed about the Truss policies have commented that it'll affect their chances of being re-elected.
That's what they care about, not the effect the policies will have on people's lives
E2a I don't recall a single interviewer pulling them up on this
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story
Changing the facts
Was listening to the late night news and the newsreader used the phrase as if it was an established and widely recognised thing. Normally the Beeb clarify things repeatedly on the day the news is made because people will be catching up and may not have heard the earlier bulletins in that 24 hour period. This time they didn’t.
The way it was just… there, as part of the narrative, made me think of the way the American media suddenly and universally started referring to Antifa. We Europeans mostly had a very different and more nuanced and more accurate understanding of what Antifa is but suddenly the term meant something different and really quite specific (and largely wrong) once the US press started saying it.
Just, yunno, interested to see a term used almost as slang and it may mean different things as it travels.
Like this three times repeat thing that’s taken off. Every speech writer knows that you say three things, or the same thing three times in three different ways to get the point across. They simplified that to great effect with education, education, education and now that’s been dumbed down to point of being a zombie version of itself.
story
Changing the facts
I‘m not so sure she wasn’t just kinda pushed along by the wind of her own bluster.
Let‘s see if (if she hangs on past the NY) she has any more Big Ideas or just sort of slumps into the mire.
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Wilf
Slouching towards Billingham
... Your boys took one helluva beating!
The scary thing is that it makes you realise how effective a politician Thatcher was, objectively. Truss is completely and utterly stupid and incompetent and if this leads to the end of the Tories for at two more election cycles then I think we can suck up her incompetence for 2 years right? If they change leader there's every chance it won't be the predicted record landslide they're currently looking at.
maomao
普費斯
Some of us were hoping for a centrist Tory to get rid of Starmer.
cesare
shady's dreams ♥
You realise the sort of people you’re going to attract, don’t you killer b? Thugs, bully-boys, psychopaths, sacked policemen, security guards, sacked security guards, racialists, Paki-bashers, queer-bashers, Chink-bashers, anybody-bashers, Rear Admirals, queer Admirals, Vice-Admirals, fascists, neo-fascists, crypto-fascists, loyalists, neo- loyalists, crypto-loyalists.
this is a fairly accurate summary of what's left of Liz Truss' electoral coalition tbf
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
Do you think so? He thought recruitment might be difficult.
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
This is the bind for the Tories. Stick with Truss and face possible disaster or change again and, well, face possible disaster. I don't think the tories changing leader twice during a five-year term is a recipe for electoral success.
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