Tag Archives: Workers Party

Diary Blog, 1 March 2024, including analysis of the result of the Rochdale by-election

Morning music

Rochdale by-election result

[Rochdale by-election result, from Wikipedia]

In my pre-polling day look at the by-election, I picked Galloway (“Workers Party”) as the winner; not very difficult under the circumstances— most journalists also thought that Galloway would win, as did the bookmakers.

Galloway scored 39.7%; oddly enough, exactly the same figure as the understandably poor turnout, which was also 39.7%. In other words, Galloway was elected via the votes of about 15% of the whole eligible electorate.

I went wrong on second place. I thought that Azhar Ali, the disowned Labour candidate, would still manage a second place on the basis that he is local, a councillor, a Pakistani Muslim and, until Jewish-lobby puppet Keir Starmer sacked him, the official candidate of the Labour Party.

In fact, Ali scored only 7.7% and a 4th place. I attribute that largely to his sacking, which means that he will not be the Labour candidate in the upcoming 2024 General Election. Also, to the fact that he climbed down and “apologised” to Starmer and the Israel lobby. In a word, he lost face, badly, by doing that. I presume that his 7.7% reflects a personal vote, mainly.

I also thought, though speculatively, that the LibDems might do rather better than they did, based on their previous (though pre-2015) showings in the constituency, and on their perhaps being a magnet for anti-Government white (English) votes in Rochdale. Not so. Seems that the LibDems are very much a spent force outside a few parts of southern England.

The LibDem vote was only 7%.

The poor turnout sank the LibDem cause in Rochdale. It is pretty clear that the Pakistanis voted but the English/white voters mostly did not. The Pakistani population of the constituency is somewhere in the 30%-40% range. Almost all Pakistanis voted (it can be surmised), but few English/white people bothered.

The independent, David Tully [https://www.rochdaleonline.co.uk/news-features/elections/election-pitch/1743/david-tully], who came second at the by-election, must have attracted most of whatever white/English vote there was. His vote, achieved without a party machine or heavy funding, was a creditable 21.3%.

The Conservative Party candidate never had a chance. This government is as unpopular as any has been in the past century or more, and Rochdale has not elected a Conservative since 1955.

Having said that, the attitude of the candidate cannot have helped. He decided to prioritize his holiday over campaigning, jetting off to the sun only a week or so before Polling Day!

That somehow fits with the whole “b*gg*r you, it’s all about me” attitude of the “Conservative” governments of the past seven, perhaps past fourteen, years. In fact, only now do I know anything of Ellison, having looked up his details (he owns a local landscaping company). https://www.rochdaleonline.co.uk/news-features/2/news-headlines/155121/rochdale-byelection-conservative-candidate-paul-ellison-sets-out-his-plan-for-rochdale.

Ellison’s 12% vote (3rd place) is around where my initial thought about the by-election, a couple of weeks ago, put him (I thought maybe 15%), but better than my most recent speculation (a day or two ago, I thought the Con vote might go as low as 5%).

Finally (leaving aside the five candidates who lost their deposit, none scoring higher than 1.7%), there is Reform UK. Oh dear…

As I wrote before the by-election, Reform UK must have been mad to take on Danczuk as its candidate. After all, he was the local Labour MP 2010-2017, who was sacked for various personal behavioural problems, and who then tried to hang on as an Independent, getting an embarrassing 1.8% vote at the 2017 General Election.

The toxic tabloid content of Danczuk’s life 2010-2017 with and around his seriously thick then wife, Karen Danczuk (known as “the selfie queen” for her self-portraits posted online, featuring both her cleavage and her buck teeth), sank him in 2017, and will still be (and obviously was) remembered by the voters of Rochdale.

Danczuk’s 6.3% vote at the by-election is about where I thought he would end up.

In my view, Reform UK has rather too much of the “Mickey Mouse” about it, too much of the “wing and a prayer” “Amateur Night” village show, to be considered a serious party.

The political scientist Matt Goodwin has been pushing the idea that Reform UK might overtake the Conservative Party in the polls. Not yet, it seems.

At Rochdale, the Conservative Party candidate managed to get twice the vote of Danczuk and Reform UK, despite not bothering to campaign much, whereas Danczuk tried hard, and was even supported by his leader, Richard Tice, riding a sky-blue battlebus.

The by-election does say something about Reform UK that goes beyond its very silly decision to put up Danczuk as a candidate. If Reform UK was going to capture the mainly white/English protest vote, this by-election would have been the place for that to take off. White English people are a majority, maybe even two-thirds, of the Rochdale constituency, yet most —probably the vast majority— did not bother to vote, and even fewer voted Reform UK.

Some may say that the above is because English people are apathetic. I say that they are apathetic for a reason, or reasons. One, in this case, was because Reform UK’s semi-“libertarian” offering just does not “hit the spot”. White English people want, though in most cases unconsciously, social nationalism, and there is not one party, even a small one, offering or proclaiming that ideology.

What does the by-election say about the Conservative Party in the run-up to GE 2024? Toast. This was the worst Con Party result (12%) at Rochdale since the Blair-Labour years (10.5% in 2005, 13.4% in 2001, 8.8% in 1997). In 2019, the Cons received 31.2%, and even in 2017 28.4%.

So there it is. Angry apathy from the white English voters, angry protest from the Pakistani Muslims, a Government without hope, but an Opposition Labour Party unable to inspire any enthusiasm yet likely to “win” GE 2024 purely by default. Also, an upstart and supposedly “populist” party, Reform UK, that has no real support.

I have said nothing about the victor, Galloway. That is because he is a maverick and, despite the “Workers Party” label, basically a one-man band. Whether he can retain his seat at GE 2024 or not is an open question. Maybe he can.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rochdale_(UK_Parliament_constituency).

Tweets seen

Talking heads and scribblers such as Tim Stanley are completely in the Jewish/Zionist/Israel lobby pocket. Totally controlled by their own careerism and greed. Also, and despite what his Wikipedia entry says, I should not be surprised were I to discover that Tim Stanley is partly-Jewish somewhere down the line. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Stanley. I have no direct evidence that he is, however. Neither is there any hint of anything of the sort in his interviews: https://europeanconservative.com/articles/interviews/stay-away-from-politics-an-interview-with-tim-stanley/.

95% of the repression on freedom of expression in the UK comes from the organized Jew-Zionist/pro-Israel lobby. I myself face sentencing in a couple of weeks, the malicious Jew-Zionist lobby having procured an entirely political prosecution of me in 2023 (and admit to having been trying to bag me for most of the past decade).

Israeli war crimes continue, supported by the Israel lobby in the UK and elsewhere.

I came to the same or a similar conclusion some years ago (rightly or wrongly).

Don’t forget, also, that Paul Mason is either half-Jewish or quarter-Jewish: see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Mason_(journalist)#Early_life_and_education.

For me, Mason runs both with the hare and the hounds too much to be trusted…

Galloway must be one of the few, one of the very few MPs who can speak in public without either reading pathetic platitudes from a written crib, or sounding like a speak-your-weight machine, or both.

The symptoms of the slowly-encroaching “woke” global (Western) police state (in the UK, in the EU, elsewhere too) are now seen everywhere; they include my own Jewish-lobby-procured political prosecution and conviction last year (sentencing hearing this month).

I agree with that. I have no idea what Tice is like as a businessman, though I note that his main work was in a company founded by his grandfather. As a politician, I have no doubt that he is “nbg” (no bloody good). As I blogged some time before the by-election, Tice’s selection of someone as sleazy as Simon Danczuk was a miscall of stunning proportions. As in…you run a “populist”, “new broom”, “clean the Augean Stables” party, so naturally you pick as your candidate someone who was not only sleazy in the sexual sense when an MP but also a grifting freeloader and moneygrubber. An example of the worst of the old parties. No, wait…

How does that work? It doesn’t.

If Tice’s judgment is in question for having, inter alia, picked Danczuk as a candidate, then that, and the by-election result, also brings into question the judgment of political academic, scribbler and blogger Matt Goodwin, who has been boosting Reform UK as a possibly-unstoppable coming political force in the land. Ha…

Goodwin is on surer ground there.

…and there.

Sam Melia

Unconfirmed reports are saying that Sam Melia of Patriotic Alternative has been sentenced in the Crown Court to 2 years in prison for supposed “incitement to racial hatred”.

I did not follow the trial, but I understand that the charge or charges related to the production of (from the little I have read) very innocuously-worded stickers. “Evidence” deemed admissible (presumably going to the Defendant’s intention) included having a picture of Hitler.

The Star Chamber would be proud of England’s 21st Century police, CPS, and judiciary.

As we know, in 2024 Britain, political crime is deemed far more serious than real crime. In a country where crimes of serious violence, or considerable and dishonest acquisition, result often in non-custodial sentences, Sam Melia will now spend about a year in prison basically for having offended or opposed the System and “the usual suspects”.

I have no idea as to whether the plight of his wife, Laura Towler, and their very young child, was taken into account. Seemingly not, or not much. I understand that Laura Towler is presently pregnant with a second child, which will now be born (in the next couple of months) while its father is incarcerated.

I hope that a crowdfunder is soon set up for Melia’s wife and children.

More tweets seen

“A huge crowd”? At a guess, 5,000. Maybe, at peak, 10,000.

Russia has ~143M people, so even 10,000 represents only 1 person in every 14,300. Out of the Moscow population of 13M, 1 person out of every 1,300. Somewhere between those two figures, then. 1 person out of every 1,300-14,300 people.

Of course, the authorities have tried to suppress visible support for Navalny, but even if the true figure is 1 out of every 1,300, and even if there are 20 secret supporters for every one on that march, that is still only, at best, 1 out of every 65 inhabitants of Moscow.

Whatever one’s view of Navalny, his percentage of even mild support was in single figures. Maybe 2%, maybe as high as 5%, of the Moscow population; probably no more than 1%, if that, among the whole population of Russia.

That film shows a seemingly larger crowd, but even if my calculations are out by a factor of 10, that would still show a visible and covert ratio of 1 Navalny supporter out of every 6 or 7 people. Significant but not overwhelming.

Anyway, such speculation is a castle in the air in the circumstances.

Quite. Someone such as Tim Stanley is the ideal political pseudo-philosopher for the present shallow age. One could say that, if “first time tragedy, second time farce” (as Marx opined in The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Napoleon), then the first time might be Roger Scruton, the second Tim Stanley. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Eighteenth_Brumaire_of_Louis_Bonaparte; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Scruton; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Stanley.

The parallels are not exact, admittedly.

Mason again. His “political philosophy” comes down to two words: “arrest them“. Nothing more. Neither a socialist nor a pro-capitalist, nor yet anything other than someone cobbling together disparate strands to make one jumbled string of pseudo-philosophy which really comes down to the exercise of State power by those who control it, and against any dissidents or dissenters.

Mason’s sheer bile is obvious to almost everyone but Mason himself. Mason’s ideal living environment would be somewhere such as the DDR, circa 1970. Maybe as a Stasi-connected academic in a concrete provincial university.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Mason_(journalist).

“Left”/”Right” are terms I never myself use. Not helpful or meaningful. Look at Mason, though, playing the role of “licensed revolutionary”. The police seem uninterested in talking to him about any inflammatory outbursts…

Mason’s MI5 “PF” (Personal File) would be a fascinating read…I would love to see my own, incidentally. I suppose it might make my ears burn…

More tweets seen

Britain needs social nationalism. No matter the intervening repressions (as seen only today and previously in the Sam Melia show trial), events are “conspiring” or converging to create, down the line…Victory.

Well, you know what to do…

Would-be dictator Caroline Lucas says that “words matter“. Is that why she wants to ban free speech (even more)? Raus!

Peter Oborne mentions almost every group but the Jewish lobby; not even “Zionists”; only “Israel”. I can only imagine (joking slightly) that he is afraid of being blackballed by one of his clubs (the Garrick? I am only guessing).

Slightly disappointing by Oborne, who has in the past made interesting anti-Israel lobby documentaries: see

What (((group))) is behind Starmer? What group is behind Sunak? What group is behind “Reform UK”, Farage, Tice etc? Yes, the Israel lobby, but of what (in the UK) is that composed?…

In some ways, Oborne’s 15-minute tweet above is very hardhitting, but it pulls a few punches when it comes to “a certain group” in UK society.

Oborne refers to the danger of the “far right” etc. In fact, any danger is actually from the two superficially opposed groups— Islamists/Zionists.

Announcement from Laura Towler

I happened to see the message below, believed to be a public announcement from Laura Towler of Patriotic Alternative:

By now you will have heard that my husband Sam Melia was sentenced today to two years in prison for his intentions behind publishing stickers that the prosecution said were both lawful and truthful. 

The sentencing guidelines gave the judge the option of choosing anywhere between 2 years and 6 years, and the minimum was given due to the lack of seriousness regarding the offence. The judge could’ve suspended the sentence (and sent Sam home) at two years, however he chose not to and said the reason why was because he wanted the sentencing to act as a deterrent to other people with the same beliefs. 

Before today, Sam met with his Probation Officer who said that Sam was no risk to the public and there was no chance of reoffending, and recommended a community order. The judge chose to ignore this. 

The worst case scenario is that Sam will serve 12 months in prison. Potentially, he could serve 6 – 8 months. He is considered low risk and could therefore be on day release from as early as in a few months. 

If you take anything from this, let it remind you why we do what we do. We live in a country where our people are attacked by the anti-White state for advocating for their own safety and interests. 

I don’t want cuddles and condolences. I don’t want thoughts and prayers. I want you to join me in filling the void that Sam leaves for the next few months. There are no excuses. Not everybody has to be on the front line. There is plenty you can do behind the scenes. 

Sam should hold his head up high knowing that he put his head above the parapet when many others dare not. He didn’t back down at any point over the last three years, nor did he take any offer they offered him. He remained defiant for us, and now it’s our turn to repay his sacrifice by carrying his flame until he is back.

[unconfirmed, but believed to be by Laura Towler]

Another example of how the British jury is now little better than a rubber stamp. As for the judge in question, I prefer not to comment, mainly because I have no wish to transgress the “contempt of Court” rules; in any case, I did not follow the case. There is also the further fact that I myself, in Biblical language, will be “in the same condemnation” in a couple of weeks, being sentenced for —in effect— telling the truth.

Sunak

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2024/mar/01/extremists-trying-to-tear-us-apart-says-rishi-sunak-in-impromptu-no-10-speech

Rishi Sunak has claimed extremist groups in the UK are “trying to tear us apart”, in a hastily arranged Downing Street statement that came hours after George Galloway won a byelection in Rochdale.

Standing outside No 10 late on Friday, the prime minister condemned what he called “a shocking increase in extremist disruption and criminality” after the 7 October massacre by Hamas and the Israeli invasion of Gaza.

He also claimed democracy itself was a target, as he condemned the election of Galloway, who easily won the seat in Rochdale on a platform that focused on anti-Israel sentiment over Gaza.

However, in a sometimes rambling and seemingly contradictory 10-minute address, Sunak made points likely to anger MPs on the right of the Conservative party such as Suella Braverman and Robert Jenrick, who have sought to frame recent tensions as almost entirely the responsibility of Islamist extremists.

Sunak was at pains to stress the recent abuse of Muslim Britons as well as the Jewish community, and to highlight the threat from far-right groups as well as Islamists.

[The Guardian]

The little Indian money-juggler presently posing as Prime Minister has made a speech in which he conflated “democracy” with “electing System candidates”, in effect.

Sunak calls for no support for “extremism”, yet he does not seem to think it “extreme” to project the Israeli flag onto 10 Downing Street and then to call for support of a war by a huge mechanized army against, mostly, civilians, half of which are under 18 years of age, and about a quarter of whom are undisputedly small children and babies.

So far, the Israeli Jews have killed about 30,000 or so in Gaza, in under 5 months. About half were children.

Starmer, that nasty ideas-free puppet bureaucrat, is no better.

Incidentally, I myself have blogged about both “democracy” and “extremism” in recent years:

More tweets

In response to the supply of Taurus missiles to Kiev, Moscow could consider the possibility of a Dagger attack on the factory of these missiles in Germany, said expert Igor Korotchenko.

Germany does not officially want to send its troops to Ukraine, but the German army is already present there as advisers and technical experts, noted expert Vladimir Evseyev. The situation is heating up after such statements. Especially after the first, the second is a statement of fact….”

[Marshal Zhukov inspects the ruins of the Reichstag, Berlin, 1945]

Founder of “Blackwater” – We can’t beat the Russian bear.

“Ukraine needs peace, otherwise it will destroy itself,” said the founder of the private military company “Blackwater” Eric Prince in a podcast with Patrick Bet-David.

He also drew attention to the poor state of the Western armies and stressed that American citizens are not obliged to provide hundreds of billions of dollars to a corrupt state, such as Ukraine.

Sam Coates parroting rubbish, much of it “antisemitism, antisemitism“. Idiots like Coates get paid half a million or more per year. Sick society; almost a (bad) joke society.

Is Sam Coates part-(((you know who)))? I wonder…

Coates was easily put in his place by Galloway. Not worth his salt.

Late music

[Lazienkowski Palace, Warsaw]

Diary Blog, 29 February 2024

Morning music

[All Souls, Oxford]

Rochdale by-election

I blogged about the by-election a few days ago: https://ianrobertmillard.org/2024/02/25/diary-blog-25-february-2024-including-a-look-at-the-upcoming-rochdale-by-election/.

The latest from the bookmakers is that George Galloway (Workers Party) is odds-on to win, followed by (around 6/4) Azhar Ali, the former Labour candidate disowned by Starmer, Azhar Ali therefore being an independent candidate in reality, though “Labour” on the ballot paper. The next in line is the LibDem, trailing the frontrunners at about 65/1. Reform UK (Simon Danczuk) is at 100/1. The rest of the field of 11— 1,000/1.

This is now between Galloway and “Labour” Azhar Ali. Former Labour MP Danczuk only got 1.8% (as Independent) in 2017, after having been sacked. The LibDem may do better than expected, being a white man and alternative to Ali and also to Scotsman George Galloway, whose campaign has been all about Gaza, and whose voters are (90%+) Muslims. Still, if I had to bet, I would probably go with the perceived favourite, Galloway.

The by-election is between two candidates trying to capture the Pakistani Muslim vote. Where do the English voters go? They are still the majority in the constituency, numerically, yet have been frozen out.

Symptomatic of System politics in the UK?

I have no sympathy for Danczuk, and little for Reform UK, but will be interested to see how they go. Had Reform UK put up a better candidate, it might have gone close. As it is, I daresay that the white (English) vote will be split several ways.

Israel declares war on “antisemitism” and “anti-Semites”

https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/article-789439

Diaspora Affairs Minister Amichai Chikii said that “the time has come to move from the defensive to the offensive, and to ensure that the perpetrators of anti-Semitism are identified and dealt with.

The time has come to move from the defensive to the offensive and to ensure that the perpetrators of antisemitism are identified and dealt with,” Chikli said.

The initiative will include a push for a government proclamation to improve Israel’s global standing and legislation to target organizations, including NGOs, and individuals engaged in antisemitism.

[Jerusalem Post]

Well, there it is. “They” want a war, and are about to launch one.

In fact, Israel already targets (via local volunteers in the UK and elsewhere) anyone opposed to Jewish/Zionist global domination.

I myself am due to be sentenced next month, following my conviction in November 2023 for political “offences” under the notorious “bad law” Communications Act 2003, s.127 (recommended for repeal by the Law Commission).

Tweets seen

What the Israelis are saying about why the Israeli response on 7 October 2023 was at first very slow, and then incompetent (killing Israeli civilians indiscriminately).

Needless to say, the “Pearl Harbor” idea, i.e. that the Israeli leadership knew of the attack plan but allowed it to happen in order to be able to flatten Gaza with a figleaf of justification, is not mooted.

1956. The year of my birth in present incarnation.

A very important message still not understood by some people.

One cannot simply dismiss that tweet as “a woman scorned”; the kind of dishonesty alleged destroys (if proven) hope for social nationalism, destroys trust.

Not that it matters in terms of realities, though. “Britain First” has no chance anyway, whether at Rochdale or anywhere else.

True, but I seem to recall that Jayda Fransen was pro-Israel not so very long ago…: see https://ianrobertmillard.org/2020/09/11/diary-blog-11-september-2020-including-a-few-notes-about-jayda-fransen-and-her-new-british-freedom-party/.

I was unaware that that bastard Pollard was still alive.

I wonder how many Jews there are in, e.g. the Security Service/MI5 and SIS? Some, for sure. Where lie their loyalties? See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonathan_Pollard.

Pollard was granted Israeli citizenship while incarcerated. He relocated to Israel in 2020.

I suppose that the Israelis thought that they owed Pollard something. After all, when he desperately appealed to the Israeli Embassy in Washington —when the FBI was on his tail— the Israeli Embassy guards were ordered to shut the gates and not let him back in. He was then immediately arrested by the FBI. He did 30 years in Federal custody, altogether (inc. 2 years of pre-trial detention).

More tweets

Israel’s war crimes continue.

Not even the heavily Muslim areas of Britain are breeding above the 2.1 replacement rate.

@DillyHussain88 thinks Britain’s Muslims are faithful and will outbreed us natives, but the truth is that even they are increasingly infected with the modernist cancer. Consumer capitalism + Usury = the Death of Nations. This System cannot be reformed or saved, it will simply totter on until collapse. Those who separate from this 21st Century Sodom and breed will build something new from the rubble. https://knightstemplarorder.com/fertility_rate_plunge.”

See also: https://ianrobertmillard.org/2019/01/26/the-tide-is-coming-in-reflections-on-the-possible-end-of-our-present-civilization-and-what-might-follow/.

Quite right.

More from the global police state

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/politics/article-justice-minister-defends-house-arrest-power-for-people-feared-to

“[Canadian] Justice Minister Arif Virani has defended a new power in the online harms bill to impose house arrest on someone who is feared to commit a hate crime in the future – even if they have not yet done so already.

The person could be made to wear an electronic tag, if the attorney-general requests it, or ordered by a judge to remain at home, the bill says.

Bill C-63 is designed to curb the proliferation of hate online, but it also establishes a new hate-crime offence, which would carry a maximum penalty of life imprisonment.

Mr. Virani said the hate-crime offence would only be applied if coupled with another crime and the life sentence would only apply in the most serious of cases – not, for example, for mischief to a garage door.

Mr. Virani said the current bill followed studies of the experiences of other countries, including Britain, France and Germany, which have produced similar legislation. Some have had to reverse course after challenges and criticism.

Since it was published on Monday, some lawyers and constitutional experts have raised fears that Bill C-63 could chill free speech.

The bill would allow people to file complaints to the Canadian Human Rights Commission over what they perceive as hate speech online – including, for example, off-colour jokes by comedians. People found guilty of posting hate speech could have to pay victims up to $20,000 in compensation.

But experts including internet law professor Michael Geist have said even a threat of a civil complaint – with a lower burden of proof than a court of law – and a fine could have a chilling effect on freedom of expression.

[The Globe and Mail]

Look at what has happened in the UK. Material (comments, cartoons) are supposed to fall into unlawfulness only if “grossly” offensive. In theory, remarks, cartoons merely “offensive” are not unlawful, but in practice one finds (as in my own case last November) that once the police, CPS and courts think that XYZ is “offensive”, then XYZ becomes, almost automatically, “grossly offensive“, and the maker is then convicted accordingly (as I was).

Free speech has then been further chilled, or killed…

Canada is asking for something akin to civil war by enacting tyrannical laws of this sort.

More tweets seen

Germany was accused of “severe misuse of intelligence data” after discovering that British soldiers were helping Ukrainian forces launch “Strom Shadow” cruise missiles, “Telegraf” reports.

“German soldiers must not at any time and under any circumstances be associated with the targets that the ‘Taurus’ can reach,” says Scholz…

The statement of the German chancellor is a confirmation of the suspicions expressed several times by some Russian officials and experts in the field of defense and weapons, that members of the armed forces of NATO countries help Ukrainian forces in managing complex weapons systems of Western origin.

We get closer and closer to the edge…

There is a clear decision in the Alliance, which was adopted two years ago and which is still in force, which is that NATO is not a party to the conflict and everything must be done to ensure that it does not become and that the possibility of direct conflict does not arise of Russia and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. It is a valid decision of the Alliance made with the consent of all members of the bloc,” said the head of Hungarian diplomacy, Peter Szijártó.

Budanov is 30 years younger than me, but I warrant that I shall still be alive when he leaves this Earth…https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyrylo_Budanov.

I hope that Prince Silly Billy is aware of this.

Late music

[painting by Victor Ostrovsky]

Diary Blog, 25 February 2024, including a look at the upcoming Rochdale by-election

Morning music

[VDNKh, Moscow]

Rochdale by-election

The by-election is to be held on Thursday 29 February 2024. It has been described as “the most radioactive byelection in living memory“: see https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2024/feb/24/a-total-total-disaster-galloway-and-danczuk-line-up-for-rochdale-push.

Of the 11 candidates, 4 could be described as Independent. There is a Green, and also a Monster Raving Loony.

Of the 5 more or less serious candidates, the LibLabCon “uniparty” has candidates, and then there is the egregious George Galloway [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Galloway], this time under the banner of the Workers Party, and also Reform UK, represented by Simon Danczuk [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_Danczuk], the one-time Labour MP who was a perennial tabloid newspaper story 2010-2017 (along with his seemingly lobotomized then wife, Karen).

The by-election is complicated by the fact that Azhar Ali, the Labour candidate on the ballot paper, was suspended and disowned by Labour for having speculated that Israel may have been involved in the attack on its own citizens in October 2023, a “conspiracy theory” which at first blush seems mad, but less mad when you look at it. A possible “Pearl Harbor” scenario, in which the Israeli leadership may have allowed the Hamas attack from Gaza to take place in order to be able to destroy and then resettle Gaza with Jews.

Leaving that aside, Ali is still a candidate and still, on paper, “Labour”. Indeed, it is possible that, despite all the publicity, quite a few voters will remain unaware that Labour has disowned him; they may vote for him on that basis.

Having said that, Ali will not be Labour’s candidate at GE 2024, so even if he were to be elected this Thursday, he would only be an MP for a few months. That will obviously harm his chances.

It comes as a slight shock to see that George Galloway is only two years older than me. I thought about 10 years or more. He is now 69.

Galloway is far and away the most interesting candidate on the by-election roster. You only have to look at his Wikipedia entry. Indeed, apart from sleazy Danczuk, Galloway is the only candidate at Rochdale who is noted on Wikipedia.

Galloway started as a Labour MP, and has travelled through other parties and profiles to get here, but his anti-Zionism has remained a constant.

An ideologue of sorts, Galloway is not exactly on the same ideological page as me (and he blocked me on Twitter when I still had an account, i.e. up to 2018). He is interested in money, though he plays that down. His net worth is probably in the millions —though I concede that that is a guess— and his income from all sources in recent years has on occasion exceeded £500,000 a year. His RT (Russia Today) show has been sunk by sanctions, but his online broadcasting etc must still bring in a very good sum.

The Workers Party of Britain [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Workers_Party_of_Britain] was founded by Galloway himself in 2019, and so far has had no electoral success, though Galloway himself achieved a notable third place at the Batley and Spen by-election in 2021— nearly 22% of the vote.

Other well-known members of the Workers Party include former Arabist diplomat and ambassador Peter Ford [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Ford_(diplomat)], and former Labour MP Chris Williamson [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Williamson_(politician)], now a broadcaster on the English-language Iranian channel Press TV. Williamson occasionally retweeted my tweets when I had a Twitter account, though he later and foolishly “blocked” me (like Galloway).

Reform UK must be mad to have allowed Danczuk to be their candidate at Rochdale. He was MP for the constituency from 2010 to 2017, and at peak (2015), under Labour banner, was voted for by 46.1% of the voters who voted, but in 2017 achieved only 1.8% as Independent, once chucked out of Labour. Since then, he has been dumped by Karen Danczuk (or vice-versa), and has married for the third time, to an African from Rwanda.

I should have thought that Reform UK would have selected a candidate of real weight at this interesting by-election, but no…

The constituency is riven by division on racial, ethnic, cultural and religious lines. Also, by the aftermath of the Pakistani “grooming gangs” scandal (sex abuse of white English girls). Further back, there was the scandal of Cyril Smith [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyril_Smith].

I rule out as serious contenders the Monster Raving Loony, the 4 Independents, the Green (who, though still on the ballot paper, has also been disowned by his party for “antisemitism”, and has withdrawn), and (probably) Danczuk/Reform UK.

That leaves Galloway/ Workers Party, Azhar Ali/”Labour”, the LibDem and the Conservative.

In the past, pre-2015, Rochdale was contended for by Labour and the LibDems and, before that, the old Liberal Party. The LibDems fell into 4th place in 2015, after the “Con Coalition” of 2010–2015.

There have been fairly good showings by UKIP and Brexit Party in the past decade, but nothing earth-shattering. Reform UK might have done better, but surely not with Danczuk as the candidate. That’s my view, anyway.

Conservative Party candidates achieved (poor) second place in both 2017 and 2019, but this time the Con has almost no chance, so unpopular is the Sunak government. Also, Sunak is Indian. The 30% of the Rochdale voters that are Asian are mostly Pakistani. The Con candidate seems to be English.

The LibDem has a Scottish name; otherwise, I know nothing of him and cannot see him getting anywhere.

While 60%-70% of the eligible voters are English, it is a question of how many are motivated to vote. In 2019, only 60% of eligible Rochdale voters voted, and that was a higher percentage than most previous recent elections. The assumption, at least, is that the Muslim vote is more powerful, as a bloc, than the actually larger English vote.

The upshot is that this is between “Labour” Azhar Ali and Galloway. Galloway must be favourite to win now that Labour has disowned Ali. The bookmakers certainly think so: at present, Galloway/Workers Party 4/7 favourite; Labour 13/8; LibDems 40/1; Reform UK 50/1; Conservatives 200/1; Greens 1,000/1; others also 1,000/1.

See also https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2024/feb/12/labours-self-sabotage-leaves-rochdale-byelection-up-for-grabs.

Latest from Rochdale

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2024/feb/25/rochdale-byelection-chaos-town-voters-main-parties-george-galloway

Byelections are traditionally a chance for voters to lodge a protest vote. But when the people of Rochdale go to the polls on Thursday, they have barely anyone to protest against.

The Labour and Green parties have ditched their candidates. The Conservative was abroad on a long-planned family holiday the week before polling day. The Lib Dem remains, but pulled out of the most high-profile political event, a local BBC radio debate.

The most energetic campaigning last week came instead from the political fringe: George Galloway, serial byelection winner and founder of the Workers Party of Britain, and Simon Danczuk, the town’s former Labour MP who was suspended by the party for sexting a 17-year-old girl and is now standing for Reform UK.

“We don’t deserve this,” said Margaret King, standing outside Marks & Spencer. “This town does not deserve to be this short of anybody decent to vote for.” This time she’s ­voting for one of the local independents.

“We’ve been Lib Dem for a long time, back to Cyril Smith, but when I think back I can’t believe I voted for him. There’s too many shadows on this town.

Back in the town centre, people at the Regal Moon were surprised to learn that the Wetherspoons pub was the official headquarters of the Monster Raving Loony party candidate. Some drinkers there raised immigration as an issue, although none considered Reform UK to be an option. “Danczuk has been here before and he didn’t do anything then,” said David Brierley, after complaining how much the town’s ethnic makeup has changed.”

[The Guardian]

A real social-national party might have won this contest.

More from the newspapers

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2024/feb/25/labour-must-spend-billions-on-welfare-or-poverty-will-soar

Labour is being warned by a powerful alliance of thinktanks and charities that poverty will soar if it comes to power and then fails to spend many billions of pounds on welfare reform to help those struggling most with the cost of living.

Poverty and extreme financial hardship have become acute problems,” the new report says. “With wages at a standstill over the last decade, recent soaring prices came at a time when many households were already struggling to meet essential costs. While some have seen their earnings increase in the period since the cost of living crisis started, for many the damage had already been done. Use of foodbanks has reached unprecedented levels, and there has been a sharp rise in households taking out loans to cover bills and daily spending.”

It says that “people on low incomes too often cycle between low-paid, insecure roles and stints of unemployment” with the number of “economically inactive” people (those out of work and not actively looking for work) at record levels. “For too long, our welfare state has taken a punitive approach, ignoring individual motivations and challenges and wasting resources on approaches to that simply don’t work.”

[The Guardian]

Iain Dunce Duncan Smith is only one of the (most) guilty System freeloaders and oppressors of the disabled etc in the UK. He has never been punished.

Tweets seen

I think that my assessment of Therese Coffey, written 5 years ago (updates added since then) has held up well: https://ianrobertmillard.org/2019/09/16/deadhead-mps-an-occasional-series-the-therese-coffey-story/.

Birmingham is or was a major hub of the sinister “Common Purpose” conspiracy, which is implicated in so many scandals, partly because its “graduates” (members) are often unqualified (except on paper) for their executive positions. For example, the shambolic social work and social worker department in Birmingham itself and, as we now see, the Birmingham local government milieu as a whole.

Birmingham is just one particularly egregious example. There are numerous others. The police throughout the UK provide other examples.

Common Purpose is a global not-for-profit on a mission to develop people who can cross cultural, institutional and social boundaries.” Wherever it takes root, laws and regulations are ignored, and administration becomes chaotic. The very sinister and sleazy Chris Bryant, MP for Rhondda, was once one of its main organizers: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Purpose_UK; and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julia_Middleton; and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Bryant.

Common Purpose (CP)

– a hidden virus in our government and schools

Although it has 80,000 trainees in 36 cities, 18,000 graduate members and enormous power, Common Purpose is largely unknown to the general public.

It recruits and trains “leaders” to be loyal to the directives of Common Purpose and the EU, instead of to their own departments, which they then undermine or subvert, the NHS being an example.

Common Purpose is identifying leaders in all levels of our government to assume power when our nation is replaced by the European Union, in what they call “the post democratic society.” They are learning to rule without regard to democracy, and will bring the EU police state home to every one of us.

Common Purpose is also the glue that enables fraud to be committed across these government departments to reward pro European local politicians. Corrupt deals are enabled that put property or cash into their pockets by embezzling public assets.

It has members in the NHS, BBC, the police, the legal profession, the church, many of Britain’s 7,000 quangos, local councils, the Civil Service, government ministries, Parliament, and it controls many RDA’s (Regional Development Agencies).

[Wikileaks] [https://wikileaks.org/wiki/Common_purpose]

Written, I think, some years ago, but still worth reading.

More tweets

Walls. Squads.

Neil Oliver says to the corrupt and self-serving MPs, “just go“, but they will not just “go” of their own accord. They will have to be “sent”…

Accurate, but not entirely. Union Street in Plymouth is not really the city centre, though not far away; more a crumbling depressed bit between the main centre and the docks and ferry port (I once commuted to and from Brittany, Plymouth-Roscoff, about once every 10 days, in the years 2005-2009, so I do know Plymouth a bit; and also used to appear quite often as Counsel at the Plymouth County Court).

Plymouth is rife, in its administration, with both freemasonry and “Common Purpose”. A very badly-run city.

That bald vlogger is the one who used to visit out-of-the-way bits of the former Soviet Union. Not sure why he no longer does that. I think that he was removed from Ukraine but am unsure.

I just saw this:

Apart from Plymouth, “Bald and Bankrupt” goes to Weston-super-Mare, a place which I have also visited a few times quite long ago now (I knew a blonde Ukrainian lady who lived there, she having married an older Englishman who then, really not long afterwards, died of a heart attack, leaving her a quite decent detached house in what passes for the best area of the town). That was circa 2000.

I remember Weston-super-Mare mainly for playing tennis on a warm sunny day with the Ukrainian lady (well, just playing around, really), and deliberately hitting her on the rear with a tennis ball when she bent over to pick up another ball, after which she fired half a dozen at me (I dodged them by running away, weaving).

“Bald and Bankrupt” then goes to Birmingham, a city I do not know, and which I have never even seen, except once or twice from a train, or car circling its endless motorways and other roads, and —once— when on a small plane that stopped at the airport to take on fuel etc.

The state of Birmingham shown in the vlog echoes that discussed in those Matt Goodwin and Sunday Times tweets.

Come, friendly Russian bombers...” (with apologies to John Betjeman…).

“Bald and Bankrupt” then goes, briefly, to Sunderland, a town I have also never visited (though my late father once played professionally for Sunderland football club, sometime around 1946).

He then goes to a semi-derelict former mining village called Hordern, where he meets a man demolishing a 19thC brick wall, the man having moved to this hopeless desolate place from Guildford (Surrey). Why? Why? Apparently because rental of property is cheaper. Even so…People are very strange…

Overall, dystopian, and not a little frightening.

Of course, much, maybe most, of England, or Britain, is not like those places. Not yet, anyway.

More tweets

The lady may be a fan of “Detective Sergeant Hathaway” in Lewis. Politically, Fox may mean well, but has not the ideological or intellectual weight to lead a new party, in my view. Also, pro-Israel, pro-Jewish lobby etc, so a non–starter as far as I am concerned.

Late music