Let me make it clear; the Treeza Rant thread

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  • MoyessaMoyessa Shipmate
    Barnabas wrote: »
    Lots of speculation that as the democratic, according to the rules, no objections, vote of no confidence the Conservatives had before didn't give them the answer that they wanted they are going to change the rules and have another one asap. Presumably they won't need to have the actual vote as surely even Mrs May will accept the metaphorical whisky and revolver at that point?

    She's already downed a bottle and a half and has been seen taking potshots at pigeons from the garden at no 10, while screaming "I've been absolutely clear about this, stop shitting on my fucking ROOF!"

    LOL

  • She thinks it's pigeons shitting on her roof. It's actually the entire nation lobbing milkshakes at her.
  • Double :lol:
  • Barnabas62Barnabas62 Purgatory Host, 8th Day Host, Epiphanies Host
    Gove v Johnson? MPs will vote Gove, party members will vote Johnson. The Tory split will continue. The elderly and greatly reduced party membership will see to that. The majority seem to want a pseudo-UKIP Tory Party.

    Mrs May may be bloody difficult but I don't think she's where she is today because of failed political ambition. History may treat her with greater kindness. I think she is blamed for trying to square an unsquareable circle.

    Party before country? Frankly, I'm not sure there was even a "country before party" deal with the present composition of the Commons.

  • Barnabas62 wrote: »
    I think she is blamed for trying to square an unsquareable circle.

    She is blamed for making a circle a square, then insisting that it had been a square all along. She was politically inept. She lived and died on the red lines that only she was responsible for creating. She threw away her working majority in an act of hubris. She steered right at every opportunity and inexplicably sought to gain a few votes from the ERG knowing that she'd lose more on the left of her party.

    She'll go down in history as a reactionary, purblind fool. And that's being kind.
  • CathscatsCathscats Shipmate
    Past tense? Has she actually gone?
  • la vie en rougela vie en rouge Circus Host, 8th Day Host
    Barnabas wrote: »
    Lots of speculation that as the democratic, according to the rules, no objections, vote of no confidence the Conservatives had before didn't give them the answer that they wanted they are going to change the rules and have another one asap. Presumably they won't need to have the actual vote as surely even Mrs May will accept the metaphorical whisky and revolver at that point?

    She's already downed a bottle and a half and has been seen taking potshots at pigeons from the garden at no 10, while screaming "I've been absolutely clear about this, stop shitting on my fucking ROOF!"

    Quotesfile :smiley:
  • Cathscats wrote: »
    Past tense? Has she actually gone?

    She's like Hitler in the Downfall meme.
  • Cathscats wrote: »
    Past tense? Has she actually gone?

    Not quite past but very, very tense.
  • HugalHugal Shipmate
    Many papers this morning had a very Thatcher like picture of her shedding a tear in the back of her car. They think she has all but gone.
  • sionisaissionisais Shipmate
    Barnabas62 wrote: »
    Gove v Johnson? MPs will vote Gove, party members will vote Johnson. The Tory split will continue. The elderly and greatly reduced party membership will see to that. The majority seem to want a pseudo-UKIP Tory Party.

    Mrs May may be bloody difficult but I don't think she's where she is today because of failed political ambition. History may treat her with greater kindness. I think she is blamed for trying to square an unsquareable circle.

    Party before country? Frankly, I'm not sure there was even a "country before party" deal with the present composition of the Commons.

    The Tory party hasn't put country before party since the repeal of the Corn Laws in 1846. The split there was between the landowners and the merchants & traders, which has similarities of the situation with the EU.

    If you look at other parties, Ramsey McDonald did so back in the twenties, and was stabbed in the back by the Labour party and Nick Clegg's Lib Dems got shafted after trying to create a coalition for which the LibDems, not the Conservatives, got the blame.

    The Tories have a long, dishonourable and entirely consistent record in this respect.
  • Such a lack of dignity now, with tear-strewn pictures of May in the press, and her apparently hanging on, while the vultures gather. I know that all careers end in failure, but this is sordid.
  • sionisaissionisais Shipmate
    This incarnation of the Tory party really is a bunch of bastards. I doubt even Nye Bevan would believe it.
  • chrisstileschrisstiles Shipmate
    edited May 2019
    sionisais wrote: »
    Nick Clegg's Lib Dems got shafted after trying to create a coalition for which the LibDems, not the Conservatives, got the blame.

    In electoral terms this is understandable; the voters for the Conservatives got the manifesto they asked for, so at that point were happy. The voters for the Lib Dems did not get the manifesto they asked for (they may have got a very slightly triangulated version of austerity instead[*]), so they weren't happy.

    [*] The apogee of which was Clegg's Director of Policy revealing that they had got the 5p tax on plastic supermarket bags through by agreeing to tougher benefit sanctions
  • I wrote this two years ago:
    Is this May's Waterloo?

    I was quite proud of this blog post because it was written the week before the election and (unusually for me) my prediction that May would lose her majority came true. I think the analysis of May's decision-making and the sense that she went to the country because she believed she would achieve a decisive, knock-out blow against Corbyn's Labour was spot on. It's just the last line that's problematic - as I believed May losing her majority would end her leadership of the Tory party.
    So, yes, it could indeed be Mrs May's Waterloo. Indeed if she does not secure a majority, then it surely will be and like Napoleon she must step down from power within a few days of the result.

    What's interesting here is that I would maintain I was wrong for the right reasons. Under our constitutional system and with the balance of power held by the DUP, it was always likely that the Conservatives would continue in power as May has done so. The reason I believed May would herself have to go is because the Conservative Party has an incredibly ruthless streak and will often commit regicide to maintain power.

    What I hadn't anticipated back in 2017, and became clear over the following few months is that the Conservative party was also totally ruthless in keeping a leader in place that no-one really wanted because the warring factions feared each other's champions. The moderates did not want an ERG acolyte or Johnson and the Eurosceptics feared a leader who would not give them the Brexit they wanted. May herself seemed to have a stubbornness and self-belief that no-one else could do the job.

    We have now - it seems - reached the endpoint of all this. The Eurosceptics now know that May cannot deliver the Brexit they want* and the left-wing of the Tory party will not allow the headbanger’s vision of Brexit to be pushed through. This ruthlessness continues - it is seen in May being kept in post and it is the same imperative that will see her gone as she reaches the end of her usefulness.

    Once May goes, then what happens next is an open question. The two factions of the party are both similar and different. Similar in the sense that they desperately want to keep the Tories in power, different in their view on Europe. Polling suggests the membership will anoint Boris whilst most Tory MPs know he would be totally unsuited to the role and are keen to ensure that he isn't one of the two that the membership get to vote on.

    One other prediction though - if the next PM is indeed a Tory MP - expect a quiet resignation of her seat from Mrs May and a peerage as acknowledgment of her 'great service to the nation**'

    AFZ

    *Mostly because it is impossible.
    ** As both Home Secretary and Prime Minister she has done great damage to our country. I do not believe history will be kind.
  • DafydDafyd Shipmate
    I do not believe history will be complimentary. But there's plenty of room for history to be uncomplimentary and still kind.
  • BoogieBoogie Shipmate
    She’s a master of delaying tactics.
  • Dafyd wrote: »
    I do not believe history will be complimentary. But there's plenty of room for history to be uncomplimentary and still kind.

    Interesting. I agree, I think.

    Mainly what I am getting at is how history, whilst clearly not immune, it's much less vulnerable to spin, than contemporary thinking. It would take a significant myopia to rate Mrs May as a 'good' Prime Minister by any meaningful metric. Conversely the juxtaposition with her immediate predecessor and successor* will probably be somewhat flattering.

    AFZ

    *I may be wrong but there is not one of her potential successors who shows promise
  • I have had to keep checking the news today to see if she had gone yet.

    Sadly not. But she is fatally wounded. Nobody expects her to survive. Of course, there are no good replacements.
  • DafydDafyd Shipmate
    Nobody expects her to survive.
    Yes, but that's been true at any point in the last two years.

  • Dafyd wrote: »
    Nobody expects her to survive.
    Yes, but that's been true at any point in the last two years.

    True - but it is now in terms of days or weeks, not months, I think.
  • KarlLBKarlLB Shipmate
    Boris.

    I thought May had put Boris in the cabinet so he could make an arse of himself and so neutralise him as a threat. Amazingly he made an arse of himself and is now the front runner.

    What are the requirements for immigrating into New Zealand? It's as far as I can reasonably get from Boris.
  • Barnabas62Barnabas62 Purgatory Host, 8th Day Host, Epiphanies Host
    Doc Tor wrote: »
    She lived and died on the red lines that only she was responsible for creating.

    Only she? I thought those red lines (and their internal ambiguities) represented a collective Tory Cabinet view in advance of negotiation. But maybe I'm wrong on that?

  • Given that she was losing more Tory votes than she gained every time she tacked to the right, and that she (inexplicably) won a motion of no confidence from the 1922, it might have given her a clue that her red lines represented nothing but a shibboleth. I don't pretend to understand her thought processes, but how she got from a narrow 52-48 Leave vote to an incredibly and increasingly hard Brexit is a mystery to me. But it's a disaster of her own making. She is (again, inexplicably) Prime Minister.
  • You'd think a clue would have come in the election, when it seemed that millions of people voted Labour, partly to deny her view of Brexit. So she lost her majority, but didn't seem to think of reaching out to other parties, except the DUP. Could it have worked then? Dunno, but I suppose the right wing would be after her.
  • Marvin the MartianMarvin the Martian Admin Emeritus
    Doc Tor wrote: »
    how she got from a narrow 52-48 Leave vote to an incredibly and increasingly hard Brexit is a mystery to me.

    To be fair to her, the WA that she keeps pushing is a relatively soft Brexit. It’s not her fault that a significant proportion of her own party refuses to support it.
  • sionisais wrote: »
    Nick Clegg's Lib Dems got shafted after trying to create a coalition for which the LibDems, not the Conservatives, got the blame.

    In electoral terms this is understandable; the voters for the Conservatives got the manifesto they asked for, so at that point were happy. The voters for the Lib Dems did not get the manifesto they asked for (they may have got a very slightly triangulated version of austerity instead), so they weren't happy.
    Doc Tor wrote: »
    how she got from a narrow 52-48 Leave vote to an incredibly and increasingly hard Brexit is a mystery to me.

    To be fair to her, the WA that she keeps pushing is a relatively soft Brexit. It’s not her fault that a significant proportion of her own party refuses to support it.

    It's only soft by the standards of no deal. In the context of discussions prior to and shortly after the referendum it is among the very hardest options that actually include a deal at all.
  • Barnabas62Barnabas62 Purgatory Host, 8th Day Host, Epiphanies Host
    edited May 2019
    Given that the Tory rejections are for divergent reasons (either too soft or not soft enough) I'm not sure there is. a deal that any Tory PM could reach which would be acceptable to the EU, avoid a Party split and get through the House. That is not Mrs May's fault. It's a consequence of the endemic deep divisions.
  • BoogieBoogie Shipmate
    edited May 2019
    Barnabas62 wrote: »
    Given that the Tory rejections are for divergent reasons (either too soft or not soft enough) I'm not sure there is. a deal that any Tory PM could reach which would be acceptable to the EU, avoid a Party split and get through the House. That is not Mrs May's fault. It's a consequence of the endemic deep divisions.

    I agree. She’s tried to do the undoable. Her mistake was in not giving up much sooner - after the ill fated election.

    The Tory party needs to spilt so that the erg (more like aaaarg!) nutcases types can go their own way and stop contaminating it. I don’t agree with Tory policies anyway, but this lurch to the right is very worrying.

  • At the end of the day, nothing has changed since 2015. Before it's possible to hold a meaningful referendum there's a democratic process that needs to be followed. Starting with at least one political party holding leaving the EU as a (possibly the) major policy priority, for that party to stand through multiple election cycles refining that policy outline into a more specific plan as they talk to people on door steps, engage in hustings and other debates, hear the criticisms of others and address them. And, of course, for that policy to be popular enough that they have a significant presence in Parliaments and councils. Then if they have sufficient support to form a government, or be a significant smaller party in a coalition, they're in the position to get Parliament to support their policy (with further details included as a result of those debates). Get there, then get a confirmatory vote from the people in a referendum and the Parliamentary process of leaving the EU is a walk in the park (the actual negotiations with the EU to achieve something close to that might be another matter).
  • It doesn't matter how many times you say it @Alan Cresswell , you're still right. It is a failure of our democratic process that got us to this point because David Cameron believed he could use a referendum to heal the divisions in the Conservative Party and thus was criminally negligent in the process. I've said that rather a lot too.

    AFZ
  • BoogieBoogie Shipmate
    It doesn't matter how many times you say it @Alan Cresswell , you're still right.

    Yep.

  • KarlLBKarlLB Shipmate
    edited May 2019
    This. Totally bonkers and there is one man to blame - David Cameron. He had form for using referenda to put the kibosh on groups agitating for policies he didn't want - he did it to the Lib Dems to get their collaboration in 2010. This time it backfired and he buggered off.

    QT on the telly last night (I don't normally watch it but thought it might be interesting for once) was telling - Camilla Cavendish was on the panel (former Director of Policy for David Cameron) and when Simon Jordan said that there had obviously been a policy or plan in place if the vote went for Brexit she gave a nervous smile and started to shake her head. I couldn't tell whether it had been a rhetorical comment intended to elicit a confession that there was no plan or a genuine assumption.

    This wasn't intended as a referendum. It was intended as a way to shut up the Eurosceptic wing of the Tory Party.
  • And she's gone. Or at least, going on the 7th.

    Good.
  • Even in her resignation speech, she continues to be deeply disingenuous. You can claim all these things Prime Minister, but your actions have had the very opposite effect to the things you have just said. Your actions continue to speak so much louder than your words.

    AFZ
  • It was an incredible standing down speech - full of things she's supposedly done, which felt as if she was mouthing platitudes, because her actions have not achieved those things.
  • AndrasAndras Shipmate
    And her delusion continues in her self-absorbed resignation speech. Has the woman ever cared for a single other human being?

    Still, at least she'll only be the worst PM this country has ever had until BoJo takes over.
  • Barnabas62Barnabas62 Purgatory Host, 8th Day Host, Epiphanies Host
    KarlLB wrote: »
    This wasn't intended as a referendum. It was intended as a way to shut up the Eurosceptic wing of the Tory Party.
    Instead, it energised it. Bloody Cameron. I'm not surprised there was no Plan B. Other than to scarper.
  • sionisaissionisais Shipmate
    Andras wrote: »
    And her delusion continues in her self-absorbed resignation speech. Has the woman ever cared for a single other human being?

    Still, at least she'll only be the worst PM this country has ever had until BoJo takes over.

    Her resignation from Leader of the House may well give Andrea Leadsom entry to the run-off, which may then give her a chance against a remainer who may be selected or a hard-liner, as compared to many she is a centrist. Then again so is the ex-PM to be.
  • Andras wrote: »
    And her delusion continues in her self-absorbed resignation speech. Has the woman ever cared for a single other human being?

    As Stephen Bush said this morning:

    "She bowed out with the rampant shamelessness that has typified her public statements: talked about compromise “not being a dirty word” in the exact same square foot where she tried to whip up an angry mob against Parliament not two months ago. She talked about making sure Grenfell doesn't happen again, having taken two years to do anything to get the same cladding removed from private tower blocks. "
  • sionisaissionisais Shipmate
    edited May 2019
    In other news this bloody awful government has prevented "thousands" of EU citizens from voting in yesterday's EU elections, because they had not completed a form that has been introduced in a hurry.

    You can make your own mind up as to the motive underlying this new form. The Electoral Commision is not impressed.
  • Dishonest to the end, and shameless.
  • BoogieBoogie Shipmate
    No sympathy.
  • Interesting point about May, she's not very intelligent. Maybe that's not essential, but her political stupidity has been awesome.
  • sionisaissionisais Shipmate
    Interesting point about May, she's not very intelligent. Maybe that's not essential, but her political stupidity has been awesome.

    High intellect isn't essential. If you can persuade other people who are powerhouses to work for and advise you, then provided you can tell good advice from bad, you can do well. FWIW I don't think Jim Callaghan was desperately smart but Peter Shore and Denis Healey were while Jim could handle people (both gently and firmly). John Major was no powerhouse either. OTOH but from over the Pond, Nixon was very clever but a crook.
  • CrœsosCrœsos Shipmate
    Doesn't this seem like needless cruelty?
    The prime minister will remain in Downing Street, to shoulder the blame for what are expected to be dire results for her party from Thursday’s European elections – and to host Donald Trump when he visits.

    Or is it necessary cruelty, as a deterrent to future PMs?
  • la vie en rougela vie en rouge Circus Host, 8th Day Host
    Too right she hosts El Presidente. She's the one who invited him.
  • RocinanteRocinante Shipmate
    She could offer him her services as White House press secretary, with her track record of defending the indefensible and stating blatant untruths to incredulous audiences.
  • Better the devil you know...

    According to the Daily Wail and the Daily Distress, yesterday's MEP elections proved conclusively that The Will Of The People is that Ukland wants nowt to do with those Horrid Foreigners, and that Niggle The Garbage is our only True Saviour!
    :fearful:

    A truly ghastly scenario would be a General Election which saw the rise of The Garbage and his Brexshit Party to a position of power.
  • KarlLBKarlLB Shipmate
    Better the devil you know...

    According to the Daily Wail and the Daily Distress, yesterday's MEP elections proved conclusively that The Will Of The People is that Ukland wants nowt to do with those Horrid Foreigners, and that Niggle The Garbage is our only True Saviour!
    :fearful:

    A truly ghastly scenario would be a General Election which saw the rise of The Garbage and his Brexshit Party to a position of power.

    Since they haven't even published any exit polls, that's remarkable of them.
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