Tory Covid rebellion means Johnson, and any future leader, need Labour votes to uphold science-based public health strategy - here's why newstatesman.com/comment/2021/1…
... This is an incoherent government with conflicting political philosophies - and the public health costs of that are deadly - my @NewStatesman column tonight newstatesman.com/comment/2021/1…
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The US press this w/e is full of well sourced briefing about the scale of Putin's threatened invasion of Ukraine. What do we learn? Thread: 1/ from WaPo that the Pentagon sees 100+ battalion equivalents attacking on multiple fronts ...
2/ ... that State Dept has understood Putin's red lines are advancing ... to start heaving NATO-friendly countries in Nordics/Balkans...
3/ ... and that this is about a strategic outcome for VVP, not just another demonstration of power... and that USA is short of options. It's a kind of "wake up weekend" for US political pundits...
Don't celebrate the "10% swing to Labour" in Bexley/Sidcup. In 2019 under Corbyn Labour scored 14,000 votes there; last night, with a corrupt, racist, incompetent Govt, we scored <7,000 - while the UKIP vote returned for Tice... 1/
2/ Around half the normally loyal Tory vote stayed at home - but in a by-election that's easier to do than in a general election where the stakes are existential ...
3/ Bexley/Sidcup shows why Labour has to win the North and Midlands... large parts of suburban southern England are genealogically addicted to racist Toryism and will never "swing"
Labour's reshuffle. A thread. 1/ It's a move to the right - slightly across the whole team, but significantly in one area: crime, policing and security. @YvetteCooper will go toe to toe with Patel over her serially failing Dept, on a traditional Labour agenda...
...2/ and Cooper's politics are not my politics - as you can see from this exchange... but Labour needs to cut thru with Tory-Labour switchers, esp in northern England, and their #1 issue (for many) is crime and personal security - so I see the logic...
3/ Lammy for Nandy is a good swap, and promotion for someone who - again - has started to cut thru with Tory-Labour switchers via LBC... Streeting for Ashworth is basically Old Labour for Soft Left... but buries a potential challenger to KS in a tough portfolio...
Tony Blair offering great solutions for Potemkin Village CLP here 1/ seeks unity with "non-Labour progressive forces" but no mention of Greens, SNP, Plaid ... and it gets worse ... thetimes.co.uk/article/tony-b…
2/ ... yeah "longevity in office" - not committing the U.K. to an illegal war and a doomed occupation, or overseeing financial boom-bust, or the most aggressive adoption of FOM in Europe...
3/ ... now he sees the left as the source of "woke" politics - good job he's not been to an SCG meeting recently - and wants young MPs who are not "woke" - there'll be plenty in Potemkin Village CLP...
I've been monitoring UK far-right Telegram channels following the tragic drowning of migrants in the Channel... there is predictable crowing over the deaths - but also racist venom directed at Priti Patel 1/...
2/ ... the politician who's done the most to stoke expectations of pushbacks and forced deportations is (no doubt because she is Asian) the far right's new hate figure...
3/ ... another disgusting theme of far-right commentary in the chans is that "this was staged to gain sympathy"... often coming from the type of accounts that look manipulated (ie follow the Trump or Russian agenda)...
Belarus crisis: 1/ British troops at the Poland-Belarus border... why? First, because that's what NATO's "enhanced forward presence" is designed for: to make any attack on Poland/Baltic states an attack on all... or as the IR put it, a "trip wire"...
2/ The more worrying context is the Pentagon briefing to the EU that Russia may be about to attack Ukraine... think about the logic...
3/ You threaten Poland, which is protected by Art V of NATO, and lots of NATO countries/electorates go "WTF" and don't immediately react; you simultaneously threaten Ukraine, which has no guarantee...