General British politics discussion thread

He is painfully wooden

That was quite a clumsy resignation speech. “I did great, but now I’m going”

Listened to a very interesting podcast recently that basically said the old Political system is breaking down and that shorter terms and more dramatic swings from one ideology to the next are likely to be the norm for x amount of time. X could be any number of years.

The breakdown is partly due to "democracy" in that there is less control of the various processes that allow individuals and parties and ideologies to develop and particularly the impact the internet and social media has had on societies.

You're completely missing the point, in a number of ways.

I don't disagree that many voters care more about local issues than they do international, or certainly middle east ones, but that doesn't mean that this particular issue isn't something that is worth paying attention to. And that's for several reasons.

Probably the most relevant concern with respect to UK politicians unreserved support for Israel is what that says about those politicians. Why is it that they should concern themselves so much about it, if their constituents, if what you say is correct, don't care about it at all really. Why should these politicians be negatively impacting those constituents with actions that are largely seen to be more favourable towards the interest of a foreign group than the citizens of the UK.

Whether it is Boris Johnson, as Foreign Secretary, meeting an ex JGB officer, or Nigel Farage getting a 5M payment from a Thai based cryptoguru or Priti Patel secretly meeting Israeli officials, all of them are at the very least indicators of a focus which is likely not necessarily in the best interest of the UK people, as a whole.

Aside from that, Western Governments through their direct and indirect support for Israel are enabling and permitting them to carry out a genocide. If Never Again meant what it was supposed to mean 80 years ago, then we should be abhorred at the inaction of our Governments to appropriately reign the Israeli's in to account.

Lastly, our societies are built on various structures which might no be perfect were developed at least with the idealistic intent to be for the betterment of society as a whole. The UN, the ECHR, the ICC etc are all parts of this structure which were intended to provide the tools to give the best chance of peace and security for the most possible people. These same structures are being undermined and all but defanged because powerful countries, institutions and individuals feel that they can ignore them if they wish while insisting they be used to protect their interests in the next breath.

Every time someone yawns and says Israel has no relevance in UK or EU politics, they are partially saying they don't care if the institutions are weakened, as long as Israel isn't admonished or curtailed.

And if none of this matters to you, as others have pointed out, the cost of living that IS impacting Joe in Slough is partially an outcome of the whole of Western Society being manipulated in to allowing Israel wreak havoc in the middle east.

Israel isn't the biggest concern of Andy Burnham, nor should it be, but it is a concern and it shouldn't be ignored or waved away as you or others wish to do.