The despair is deliberate

The election stitch-up between two socially illiberal economically right-wing parties, so we're stuck with austerity, extreme-right rhetoric, and privatisation profiteering, whichever way we vote.

The last general election with so little real choice was 2015, when all three of the Westminster establishment parties adopted varying degrees of austerity economics, but back then at least Labour’s Ed Miliband was a half-decent guy, just way out of his depth.

This time around Labour is once again pushing austerity economics, but this time with an unlikeable and profoundly dishonest wannabe tyrant in charge of the party. A fanatic who has surrounded himself with the right-wing wreckers who worked tirelessly to sabotage Labour from within between 2015 and 2019, in order to keep the Tories in power, and spent the last four years systematically purging Labour left-wingers and people of colour.

Yesterday we witnessed the sickening spectacle of Keir Starmer, Rishi Sunak, and Nigel Farage all competing to spout the most extreme, rabble-rousing anti-immigrant rhetoric, as if frothing xenophobes are the only demographic worth courting.

Imagine the absolute furore if Jeremy Corbyn had tried to outflank the Tories to the right on immigration hate-mongering, but somehow Starmer gets a total free pass from the media and the commentariat alike.

If you’re a social liberal who despises this kind of divisive rhetoric, you’ve now got nowhere to turn other than minor parties like the Greens, or nationalist parties like Plaid Cymru and the SNP if you’re lucky enough to live in Wales or Scotland.

The overwhelming majority of British people support the idea that some things are too important to be left in the hands of capitalist profiteers. The polls are absolutely clear that most people want the NHS, schools, energy, public transport, and water to be run as not-for-profit public services, but if you listen to Keir Starmer, the majority who support public ownership are an unpopular radical-left minority, that he’s done fantastically well to marginalise and purge from the Labour ranks!

Of course supporting public ownership is a minority view in the halls of Westminster, given the vast amount of lobbying cash, junkets, and jobs for the boys for those who support the continuation of privatised profit extraction, but Starmer’s lying through his teeth when he pretends that public ownership is unpopular anywhere other than corporate boardrooms, the offices of right-wing propaganda rags, and the compromised Westminster establishment class.

Who exactly are Labour trying to appeal to when they rule out public ownership of water and energy, refuse to restore local authority control over our schools, and actively promote the idea of even more private profiteering off the NHS? Because it’s definitely not the general public.

Then there’s the social welfare system to consider. Both Labour and the Tories are pushing the idea that what Britain really needs is to make life even more miserable for disabled people and low-income families, as if the last 14 years of systematically abusing disabled people and vandalism of the social security system wasn’t enough already.

If you want government to fight the scourge of child poverty and treat disabled people with dignity and respect, both the main parties are insistent that you’re in the wrong, and that stamping even harder on people in need is the correct course of action.

If you’re disgusted by divisive anti-immigrant rhetoric and politicians pandering to the extreme-right, you’ve got nowhere to turn other than minor parties* or abstention.

If you oppose austerity economics and believe Britain desperately needs investment in the drivers of future economic prosperity, you’ve got nowhere to turn other than minor parties* or abstention.

If you’re one of the majority of people who supports public ownership over privatisation profiteering, you’ve got nowhere to turn other than minor parties* or abstention.

If you believe that society has a responsibility to care for those in need, you’ve got nowhere to turn other than minor parties* or abstention.

* = Yes the SNP is not a minor party, they’re the governing party in Scotland, but they’ve got 0% chance of forming the next Westminster government.

Social liberals and the (anti-austerity, public ownership supporting) centre-left are not just politically unrepresented, we’re now being derided as dangerously radical extremists by both of the main political parties.

The idea is to eliminate us entirely, as is evidenced by Starmer’s ongoing purge of the Labour left in order to parachute Labour-right nodding dogs into almost every constituency.

If like me you find this utterly demoralising, that’s entirely the point.

The idea that Britain could adopt Scandinavian-stye social democracy and social liberalism is being erased from the discourse in order to fortify the Westminster establishment cartel’s agenda of never-ending austerity, soaring inequality, under-investment, frothing anti-immigrant hate-mongering, and perpetual national decline.

We’re left with the dispiriting choice between voting Labour or Lib-Dem to get the Tories out, but keeping all of the Tory policies like austerity, privatisation profiteering, under-investment, and welfare vandalism, or protest voting for parties that have absolutely no chance of forming the next government.

And that’s exactly the way the establishment order want it.

They want us feeling despair and powerless to change anything, because that way they can keep on looting the country for their own benefit, no matter which party forms the next government.

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