Afternoon music
Tweets seen
“Communism“? Socialism, surely? I thought that Hitchens was once a Marxist (Trotskyist)?
“From the sublime to the ridiculous”, 1960s Prime Minister Harold Wilson almost invariably smoked a pipe in public to show that he was one of “the people”, whereas in fact he preferred cigars (Havanas), not a very “proletarian” choice (even in Cuba).
Unwilling to register with the Independent, I cannot read that article, but the conclusion seems (based on the quoted remark) to be right. Starmer, the Jewish Lobby puppet, is (as I predicted from the start) hopeless and as dull as ditchwater, but he is no more “the problem” for Labour than was the rather different Corbyn.
Labour’s problem is that there is no longer a “proletariat” or (in the old sense) a “working class”, there is no more a bloc “Labour vote”, there are no more, or very few, “working class communities”, as such, no nationalized industries of any size, and no great loyalty to Labour, even in its traditional North and North-East heartlands.
The Labour Party itself has changed out of all recognition since its highest point of popularity in 1945. From being a largely socialist party, it moved to social-democracy and then, arguably, in the 1990s under Blair, ditched even that. It became really just a label (or as the egregious waste of space, freeloader, and careerist, Jess Phillips MP, put it, “just a ****ing rose“). Rather like those Latin American countries where the almost-identical parties distinguish themselves by colour: the Blancos v. the Colorados. Like football teams, or the racing silks in the Hippodrome at Byzantium.
It is hard to see now for what the Labour Party stands. Starmer seems to be saying that he supports almost all of what Boris-Idiot’s maladministration does, but that “Boris” should do it better!
In fact I saw a satirical comment to the effect that, were the “Conservative” misgovernment to reintroduce workhouses, Labour under Starmer would agree, but cavil that that should be done more efficiently and slightly more humanely! A joke? Yes, sort-of…but then look at the attack on the unemployed, disabled etc over the past 15-20 years. Which party really started that? Labour…Yes, the “Conservative” Jew-lobby regime of David Cameron-Levita made it worse, but all that nonsense started under Gordon Brown and his lunatic misgovernment, via Alastair Darling, Stephen Timms etc. They, not the Conservatives, brought in the crazily dysfunctional —and also dishonest— ATOS carpetbaggers, for example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Work_Capability_Assessment#History.
As I have often said, Labour is now basically the party of the blacks and browns and/or public service workers, which is why Labour eulogizes the NHS constantly (though the NHS is a very hit-and-miss service overall).
Really, one has to ask (again), “what (and who) is Labour for?”
I imagine that the victor in the upcoming local elections will be apathy, with few people turning out to vote.
This is the moment when a social-national party might make hay. If a social-national party actually existed. A real one, I mean, not the joke ones presently around.
Well, this week I did no better than John Rentoul; we both scored only 4/10 (though if I were to follow Rentoul’s usual practice, I could award myself an extra half-point for knowing that Father Ted was set on an Irish island, though I did not know its name). I had no idea as to questions 1, 2, 7, 8, and 10.
Late tweets
Shchi [щи], or Russian cabbage soup, is one of those things that can be either very pleasant or not very pleasant, other examples being borshch [борщ](beetroot soup), kvass [квас](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kvass) etc.
I suppose it is true of some British foods too. In the end, it is, of course, a question of taste. De gustibus non est disputandum. I like oysters; many do not. I like caviar (when afforded); many do not. I like (boiled and then fried) buckwheat kasha (probably because I ate it daily at one time, long ago); many do not, and think such a choice very odd indeed.
I have no particular animus against Boris-Idiot’s latest “ho” (to use the amusing American black term), but it is scandalous if (and it seems that) the woman has any but purely peripheral and personal influence on national affairs. After all, with the best will in the world, she got to her present position of influence on her back, to put it perhaps slightly crudely and…well, let’s leave that there! Suffice to say that she has never been elected, or even appointed, to any position of significance (and, no, I do not regard her unsuccessful period pumping out propaganda for Conservative Party HQ as that).
The woman likes animals, we are told. I approve heartily of that; and if (as it seems from what I have seen in photos) she has no taste, or employs an expensive interior decorator who has no taste, well…that is the way of the world. If her refurbishment at Downing Street is more “nouveau” than simply new, well…again…these things happen.
I should not like to tar Carrie Symonds with the brush justly censuring Boris-Idiot, but that immunity disappears if, as often claimed, she is interfering with, or even deciding, policy.
Late music
Ian Robert Millard 
https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/police-uncover-600-modern-slavery-20437082 UK: the “slavery” capital of Europe, no wonder with the failed Politicians we have in Westminster!
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Watcher:
Usually, though not always, the Irish “tinker” “Gypsy” element, which has been pandered to for decades, are the perpetrators.
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