General Election – Observations and Misunderstandings

When we – the Brits – had our General Election last December I got excited. I even got caught up in it a little. Deep down I don’t think I ever really expected Corbyn to win, there were just too many things against him such as half his own party, all the other MP’s and the entirety of the mainstream media. But I had hope. He was a man offering something different to this neoliberal shit show we as a people have been enduring since before I was born with the election of Margaret Thatcher. He seemed to actually give a shit about people and that it turns out is an extremely rare quality in a politician, at least a successful one anyway.

I watched some of the debates between him and the Conservative candidate Boris Johnson. There were moments the whole thing frustrated me, mainly Johnson being his buffoonish self but I was also frustrated with Corbyn for not just turning round and calling him a total lying prick. He didn’t even call him a buffoon. Corbyn it turns out was a man of integrity, he refused, even when it could have benefited him. Last night, Joe Biden had no such problems.

I didn’t watch the whole debate because I’m on Greek time and have better things to do than rise at whatever ridiculous time it would have been. I did watch the highlights and I know that makes it seem even more exciting than it really was, but wow, it was exciting and offensive. Trump behaved as everyone expected him to. He behaved as he always has. Biden didn’t seem to expose his aging mind, which is the main accusation levied against him. He also didn’t get a chance to with the constant interruptions, and constant may even be an understatement. That was no debate, it wasn’t even an argument, it was two men shouting at each other.

Trump was clearly bullied when young, probably by his father, about being dumb. His response to the smart jibe was classic “I’m like the smartest President in the history of Presidents” as he convinces nobody but himself. His “Stand back and stand by” message to the far right Proud Boys was concerning. It definitely seemed like an order to mobilise and be ready. But then Biden is awful too, it would be like voting for Keir Starmer and the only thing worse than that would be voting for Boris Johnson.

But this is politics now. Trump is a star of reality television and politics nearly everywhere has already gone down the cult of personality route, why not take it further and turn it into a reality television series. It’s great entertainment though, that is the truth. He get’s good ratings. American politics is going to have to completely reinvent itself after he’s gone because they can’t try and make it even more exciting but it can’t become boring either. Some middle ground respectability just to give everyone a break and a chance to breathe. It even makes our politics and politicians seem credible, and they’re not, not even in the slightest. There are five weeks until the election, the game has now really begun and it’s going to get messy(er).

The more I think about it the British General Election back in December was an even bigger loss than I thought at the time. Don’t get me wrong I was pretty desponded, as the annuls of this blog can attest, but this is a deeper realisation. At the time it was clearly a missed opportunity. The Labour manifesto was in places a sensation, an attempt to strip back years of neoliberal skullduggery and corruption. It was relatively radical by an measure of what depths British politics has sunk to, we were going to have drastic and crazy levels of social welfare in line with Germany and France. Perish the thought. Apparently that was going to be Communism in the heart of Europe, well the departing heart of Europe. This realisation that we were instead about to be dragged out of Europe and forced onto our proverbial knees by an aggressively self-serving United States. To sit by as those supposedly negotiating and supposedly on our behalf pretended they were going to act tough even though they had already admitted they had put all our eggs in the Yankee basket. The neoliberal con was about to have it’s one last job before going into retirement. Of course I was despondent.

And now as the world has descended into whatever we can call this shit show, it is beyond doubt that there will be lasting effects and change coming out of all of this. Nobody who says they know really has any idea because it genuinely is all open. All open in the way that power still holds all the cards even though they’re blank. Depending how long this goes on for will depend on how your average persons view of the world changes in an open compassionate way, and that means a lot of suffering I suspect. Right now after a month of this it’s far from long enough to have any lasting change and I must point out I’m not a believer in ends justifying means or innocent people suffering. I don’t want the world necessarily to change for the better if it means innocents dying. Anyone who believes this misses the point. But had power not been this corrupt bunch of self-serving scumbags then at least this rebuild may have been done with someone other than their own and the tax dodgers interests at the top of the pile.

What an opportunity. We thought it was going to be bad having five years of a majority government of some of the worst Tories in my lifetime calling the shots. Now these people will rebuild what comes out of this and I am not looking forward. Boris is no hero despite what the media are attempting to convince you, and I doubt he had an intensive care bed epiphany about the value of the NHS and freedom of movement despite his foreign NHS nurse holding his precious little hand throughout. Imagine the vitriol had Jeremy Corbyn been in charge, there is simply no way his government would be getting let off as easily as this current mob. They would most likely blame him for the state of the NHS despite only being in power for a few months after ten years of Tory austerity and ideological cuts. We could be about to move into a period of rebuilding society and the economy with people being put first, the whole populace, not the depending on bank account version. So it is a missed opportunity, but is it a lost opportunity? This is only something time can tell. We’ve certainly not made it easy on ourselves though.

Tag: General Election

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