Scrutable

TimW wrote: Tue Oct 18, 2022 7:44 am BREAKING NEWS: Truss still PM.

Grumble wrote: Tue Oct 18, 2022 8:08 am If I was a member and had voted for her then the parliamentary party had stripped her of all powers and reversed essentially everything that she promised I might be a bit cross with the tories right now.

The things she promised were bat sh.t, but she did deliver the things she promised to enact to the membership. Now the members have to be persuaded that they were at fault, effectively.

Grumble wrote: Tue Oct 18, 2022 8:08 am If I was a member and had voted for her then the parliamentary party had stripped her of all powers and reversed essentially everything that she promised I might be a bit cross with the tories right now.

The things she promised were bat sh.t, but she did deliver the things she promised to enact to the membership. Now the members have to be persuaded that they were at fault, effectively.

Grumble wrote: Tue Oct 18, 2022 8:08 am If I was a member and had voted for her then the parliamentary party had stripped her of all powers and reversed essentially everything that she promised I might be a bit cross with the tories right now.

The things she promised were bat sh.t, but she did deliver the things she promised to enact to the membership. Now the members have to be persuaded that they were at fault, effectively.

TopBadger wrote: Tue Oct 18, 2022 7:57 am

TimW wrote: Tue Oct 18, 2022 7:44 am BREAKING NEWS: Truss still PM.

Well, I lolled at that.

Saw a headline that she'll lead the party until the next election... when every man and his dog is wondering if she'll make it to the next weekend. How long will the Tory party let her occupy no 10? That seems to be her only function now.

Woodchopper wrote: Tue Oct 18, 2022 9:44 am

Grumble wrote: Tue Oct 18, 2022 8:08 am If I was a member and had voted for her then the parliamentary party had stripped her of all powers and reversed essentially everything that she promised I might be a bit cross with the tories right now.

The things she promised were bat sh.t, but she did deliver the things she promised to enact to the membership. Now the members have to be persuaded that they were at fault, effectively.

Will be interesting to see whether there is actually a split in the Tory Party. I expect that Nigel Farage would be happy to lead the Batshit Tory Splinter Fraction.

bjn wrote: Tue Oct 18, 2022 11:19 am

Woodchopper wrote: Tue Oct 18, 2022 9:44 am

Grumble wrote: Tue Oct 18, 2022 8:08 am If I was a member and had voted for her then the parliamentary party had stripped her of all powers and reversed essentially everything that she promised I might be a bit cross with the tories right now.

The things she promised were bat sh.t, but she did deliver the things she promised to enact to the membership. Now the members have to be persuaded that they were at fault, effectively.

Will be interesting to see whether there is actually a split in the Tory Party. I expect that Nigel Farage would be happy to lead the Batshit Tory Splinter Fraction.

You could argue that the Tory party is well down that path already, with the saner elements like Rory Stewart and the like no longer members. It's close to being a rump kipper/libertarian party.

bjn wrote: Tue Oct 18, 2022 11:19 am

Woodchopper wrote: Tue Oct 18, 2022 9:44 am

Will be interesting to see whether there is actually a split in the Tory Party. I expect that Nigel Farage would be happy to lead the Batshit Tory Splinter Fraction.

You could argue that the Tory party is well down that path already, with the saner elements like Rory Stewart and the like no longer members. It's close to being a rump kipper/libertarian party.

dyqik wrote: Tue Oct 18, 2022 1:43 pm

bjn wrote: Tue Oct 18, 2022 11:19 am

Woodchopper wrote: Tue Oct 18, 2022 9:44 am

Will be interesting to see whether there is actually a split in the Tory Party. I expect that Nigel Farage would be happy to lead the Batshit Tory Splinter Fraction.

You could argue that the Tory party is well down that path already, with the saner elements like Rory Stewart and the like no longer members. It's close to being a rump kipper/libertarian party.

You can't argue that it's a libertarian party while Braverman, Patel, etc. are in it and banning protest. It's a fascist party while they are in it.

It's a rump kleptocratic oligarchy/fascist party, akin to Putin's Russia. The only reason the donors supported Brexit was to allow more extraction of money through corruption than the EU would allow, and it's necessary for them to suppress dissent while they do so.

FlammableFlower wrote: Tue Oct 18, 2022 2:13 pm Truss in particular, but the Tories in general, seem to be bouncing between "we've got a mandate, and we really are sticking to what we promised" to "nope, we're doing this now". How will that sit with the members? Particularly given the general demographic and the abandonment of the pension triple lock which is definitely the opposite of what's in their manifesto and Truss was supporting it only the other week.

monkey wrote: Tue Oct 18, 2022 2:26 pm Most Tory members think that Truss should quit - clicky. ...
And Johnson is their favourite.

IvanV wrote: Tue Oct 18, 2022 3:43 pm

monkey wrote: Tue Oct 18, 2022 2:26 pm Most Tory members think that Truss should quit - clicky. ...
And Johnson is their favourite.

Even though almost 40% of those who voted for Truss think she should resign, it's not that surprising. They haven't necessarily changed their mind. Probably they never wanted her. They just weren't offered their favourite candidate, ie Johnson.

So almost half of the Tory membership are sufficiently batshit their first choice for leader remains Johnson, even though he is now clearly electoral bad news and unacceptable to the parliamentary party. If they have another leadership election, Johnson can stand, at least so far as we can tell from the Schedule 3 of the Conservative Party Constitution, the small part of their election rules that is in the public domain. But he'd have to get enough Tory MPs to vote for him to be offered to the membership. That's probably unlikely at this point. Or is it?

Potential strong or sensible options for leader of the conservative party have had difficulty getting elected as leader, or sometimes even getting very far in the election, because such strong and sensible candidates are generally detested by at least half the party. In fact, often they don't even bother standing because they know they have no chance. Or perhaps because it's no fun being a sensible conservative leader and getting attacked at every point by the batshit right.

Examples of the difficulty of relatively sensible leaders getting elected include John Major (beating Hurd and Heseltine), Duncan Smith (beating Clarke), Howard (unopposed - the alternatives didn't even bother), May (sensible candidates again didn't bother) and Johnson (beating *unt). And maybe relatively sensible candidates would in any case like to wait until after the next general election, when they can replace whoever lost it. And potentially keep themselves a bit further disassociated from the mess of the last few years of Tory government. Or maybe having seen the membership prefer Truss over Sunak, and Johnson over *unt, the relatively sensible may now think that they will always lose in the end to a populist, under the current election rules.

Michael Gove believes it is a matter of when not if Liz Truss is removed as prime minister.

The former cabinet minister, who backed Rishi Sunak in the summer, also warned Britons to expect “a hell of a lot of pain in the next two months” due to the economic situation.

At a private event Gove was asked whether it was “no longer a question of whether Truss goes, but when she goes,” Gove agreed that was “absolutely right”.

He added: “The question for any leader is what happens when the programme or the platform on which you secured the leadership has been shredded.”

In remarks first reported by The Guardian, the former education secretary said when Truss was a junior minister at that department he had been her boss — “a role which is now a jobshare between Jeremy Hunt and the bond markets”.

Gove suggested that Sir Keir Starmer’s first question at prime minister’s questions tomorrow could be: “Why?”

Gove told The Guardian that the comments had been made under the Chatham House rule.

plodder wrote: Tue Oct 18, 2022 10:26 pm Looks like it. Pretty amazing really.

I’m loving this idea that Tory party members don’t know how to pick winning leaders. Not exactly backed up by the election results over the past century or so.

dyqik wrote: Tue Oct 18, 2022 10:19 pm So she's really going to stay in post long enough to get to PM's questions tomorrow?