Now I've watched the whole Trump/Biden debate, some more analysis: to Brits the constant interruptions and hyperbole was not a "shitshow" - we reached this level of scratchiness in 2015: it's a feature of neoliberal nationalism not a glitch... 1/ newstatesman.com/world/2020/09/…
2/ Biden's problem is a) that Trump continually plays left arguments back at him - "superpredator" etc b) he psychologically doesn't want to land the hardest blows: he said Trump's a liar and a clown but his deference to the office made him pull the punch...
3/ Yet Biden did look presidential - not that it matters in a partisan head-count election: he made a conscious attempt to speak to Republican voters...
4/ On the Proud Boys controversy (see column), Trump got pushed into a corner - and in addition to handing the Democrats a killer talking point, he was reeling under the pressure... newstatesman.com/world/2020/09/…
5/ I can't gauge the psychological effect on US voters of seeing a President and VP descend to the debating level of Aussie backbench MPs, but it should be salutary: democracy is headed for the trash can if Trump wins. It's v simple. newstatesman.com/world/2020/09/…
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"We shall have only one class in this country - the working class..." Who said that? The woman in the picture behind @RachelReevesMP as she prepares the first real growth budget for 14 years. 1/ Here's what that means...🧵
2/ Today's budget is about choices. The first choice Labour will make is to promote growth - because the 2008 crisis, Brexit and post-Covid have all suppressed it, and we cannot deliver to working class people without growth...
3/ In the election, I heard people in leafy, Green supporting areas of Bristol come out of £2m houses and say "I cannot support Labour because you are in favour of growth"... so today's pro-worker Budget is a •choice• the Greens could never deliver...
See what's happening here? Putin's sympathisers - far left and far right - are calling Ukraine's justified demand for permission to defend itself "escalation" ... 1/ but it's not just about StormShadows for Ukraine ...
2/ The Western alliance of democratic countries is on the verge of big choices that, once taken, will lead to Russia's defeat. First off - ignoring Putin's claim that permission to strike equals direct war. If true Iran would be at war with Ukraine
3/ But 🇺🇦 doesn't just need permission to strike deep into Russia - it needs Western arms, money, aid and technical help, including targeting. & if RAF Typhoons can shoot down Iranian missiles over Jordan why can't they shoot down Russian ones over Ukraine?
Today's OBR report into the the long-term impacts of climate and ageing on UK debt is typically sobering: to follow neoliberal strictures, we would need 50 years of unremitting austerity...1/ But here's why we don't need to...🧵
2/ The OBR methodology is to project demands on spending against policies in place in March 2024. This always produces dire graphic projections... but there is good news: higher productivity wipes out the debt burden of demographic ageing and climate
3/ The report gives progressive politics some ammunition: (a) the economic costs of climate are higher if we miss the 2 degree target (b) most of the cost is not transition to Net Zero - it's lost revenue from petrol taxes and the damage from extreme events...
Last night's anti-racist demos were a moral victory over fascism - much bigger in their political impact than their local effect 👇... but it's only the start. 1/ The fact remains: hundreds of thousands of English people hate their neighbours badly enough to attack them in riots...
2/ I was at Walthamstow. It was relaxed, peaceful, confident and well policed. But one train-load of "football lads" arriving would have led to disaster because - make no mistake, the targeted communities are ready for self-defence...
3/ So why did things go so well, here and elsewhere? a) Because the "hit-list" was largely ignored by potential rioters: they're not interested in legal premises - they want to attack Mosques and hotels...plus word went out it was a "state provocation"....
About tonight's fascist hit-list. It's been widely circulated but some far-right influencers are now putting it around that it's a "state provocation", and saying don't show up... 1/ There are counter-demos planned, and strong policing/security in the most likely targets - but...
2/ the real test comes this weekend. I am monitoring far-right channels and can see no further public calls for targeting. The fascist networks are now stirring a new narrative: that it is Muslims perpetrating the violence...hence the fascists most likely COA is provocations...
3/ ... plus the Utopia of a "white strike" against Uber, delivery riders and takeaways... it is possible, because the entire wave was stimulated by weaponised info networks, that they will switch this off for a few weeks and let the culture war take over...
The latest from numbskull county... what's happening on UK far right channels today 1/ They're warning each other to ditch phones, remove exif data and mask up...might have been sensible to do this *before* committing riot and disorder but hey...
2/... known far right influencers are saying "don't target Mosques because we're not ready for that conflict... yet" - instead the emerging fantasy is of an economic boycott of taxi and food apps (because their workforce is minority) and a run on the banks...
3/ ... lots of attempts to ass-cover by saying "I'm not advocating attacking X but if I did go I would mask up, beware of provocateurs" - which still counts as incitement....