Charles Dyer’s play, later a film, The Rattle f a Simple Man tells the story of a Northern mill worker who goes to London to find out if he is up to the job of bringing charismatic success into his life. It is success as a lover he seeks and hence that is a big difference to Sir Keir Starmer whose aim is politics (though the ‘Sir’ added to Keir Starmer rings increasingly empty and denotes merely the status quo he has reduced his party to ‘defending’ or bolstering). And, of course, the politician is not a working man, nor even a toolmaker, but the ‘son of a toolmaker’.
After a short period as the government of the UK, the photograph above shows Sir Keir campaigning for change as if he was still on the election hustings – as if all he had to do was all he did before – which was to lambast Jeremy Corbyn. If no-one noticed that there was a ‘Plan for Change‘ in the last few months in this lacklustre government, there is no doubt that a faltering badly-delivered speech in a film studio (with poor jokes comparing himself to James Bond that were bound to fall flat with bathos rather than tickle with humour) will not do the job and convince people.
The next day, the newspapers carried the watering-down of a pledge, admittedly only made by Health Secretary Wes Streeting, on Accident and Emergency waiting lists. Watering down is very much the nature of this government’s rhetoric, in the aim of not promising what it can’t deliver.
A party once of the moderate left now only stands for a policy of economic growth at any cost (liberating bankers to earn huge bonuses again, for instance) as a starting policy. Meanwhile it boasted of being tough on anyone who wanted an end to child poverty (a sure conclusion of ending the 2-child cap on child benefit) , or the use of non-means-tested benefits like the once-Labour flagship winter fuel universal benefit (for elders again – the loss of which is set this winter to increase already high excess winter fatalities amongst those elders).
It is tougher still on those who want a much more ethical foreign policy and who are willing to state the truth about the implementation of genocide in Palestine. Of domestic justice, they say: ‘We will do it when ‘we’ can afford it’, as their defence of a silently implemented trickle-down economic policy a bit more efficient than that of Tories including Liz Truss.
The new home of the Starmerites on social media is now Blue-sky, Twitter having tweeted its last decent breath, strangled by a falling X and a management supporting policies of hate. They bleat about people pointing out Starmer’s lack of principles and willingness to twist facts but now defend themselves by saying he is better than Farage.
What has the Labour Party following become – reduced to middle-class people only speaking of moderation, as they watch without action the definition of moderation moving relentlessly to the right. Thus, it always was with ‘centrist’ politics. The definition of the centre is not in the control of anyone except the ever-present voice of an unintelligent populism, and they mistake a black hole, sucking them, and us, in for something solid and supposedly decently middle-of-the road – dead, in fact, in the middle of the road.
Speaking of skunks, the chief polling beneficiary of Labour’s reset – which-must-not-be-called-a-reset – seems to be Nigel Farage’s Reform Party, according to The Independent. But I need to take that slur back. Skunks are beautiful and noble beasts whilst Farage is not, and, when ‘dead in the middle of the road’, beautiful animals are worth mourning which Starmer is not, having determined he can no longer boost himself by hitting out at left-of-centre politics and politicians.
A jelly that has liquefied, so watered-down was it, can neither be reset nor consumed – even drunk it is vile. Politics was once a matter of the pursuit of policies that moved as near as possible to some principle of justice and was pragmatic. The Starmer government has no principles, only goals of management. It contains, moreover, only time-serving politicians waiting to be mature enough to be invited onto Strictly Come Dancing. Of course, that is the nature of political maturity these days.
I despair. As Global Warming sets in and its evidence is felt irrevocably, it is likely that the politicians we have now will embrace massive populist denial and water down action on that threat even more. Get ready to drown if you embrace this madness. The cause of global warming – unsustainable economic growth – has become this government’s primary, and perhaps only, political goal.
With love
Steven
Steve_Bamlett_blog 