Liz Truss has resigned

[T_i_B]

45 days in office. Didn't manage to outlast the Daily Star's lettuce.

And now we have another Tory leadership contest to fill the airwaves.

[SallyHemmings]

1. Was her direct deposit set up?

[Lovie777]

2. I read that they might bring back BoJo......

Conservatives overall really do not govern to well.

[LetMyPeopleVote]

3. The head of lettuce out lasted Truss

Link to tweet

[Baitball Blogger]

14. So, Ukrainian Americans should get out the vote.

Dems should get that campaign ad out now.

[Cracklin Charlie]

4. 4 Scaramuccis?

That was fast.

I may have missed some things. What did she do that was so wrong?

[global1]

5. I Have The Same Question.....nt

[Emrys]

9. You definitely missed a lot of things.

Maybe read down this UK Group's recent posts for a taste of them.

She came in to office interpreting her win among Tory members as carte blanche to enact some of the most regressive tax policies the country's ever seen - and this at a time of crisis when sane policies were desperately required - thanks to her spiritual sponsorship by a UK lobby of right-wing "think tanks" referred to as Tufton Street. The money markets rebelled, and she and her chancellor were forced into a series of devastating U-turns in quick succession.

She then proceeded to throw her chancellor under the bus when it became clear what a liability the policies she had agreed with him were in reality and electorally, with the Tory vote collapsing and Labour's stock rising astronomically in a series of polls. Then she lost one of the most right-wing home secretaries the UK's ever had, supposedly over a transgression by that home secretary, but mainly because they fell out over the horrible policies she wanted to enact, which were too much even for Truss.

On the level of personality, shortcomings that were only too obvious from her past political career and the Tory hustings were unignorable in a prime minister. She was physically awkward, mentally vacant and emotionally deadpan to the point where many of us had to conclude there was something seriously wrong with her, and she never engaged even in one phone call with the leaders of the devolved assemblies. She also failed to engage with her parliamentary party, which never clearly favoured her as a candidate. That erupted last night into near-brawls in the voting lobbies and utter chaos as the party whips resigned then seemingly unresigned, and there were accusations of literal physical bullying by members of her cabinet. Her personal shortcomings were not dissimilar to Boris Johnson's, but he had that inexplicable Woodhousian bluster that for some reason let him sail through a long series of crises and scandals until he finally had to resign.

It was hard to imagine someone less well suited to the role of prime minister than Boris Johnson, but by jingo, she gave it her level best shot.

[Cracklin Charlie]

20. That's a lot for 45 days.

Damn.

[Emrys]

21. More than enough, according to concensus!

I just barely scratched the surface, and Muriel's fleshed things out a bit more downthread.

In Scotland, we have a term: clusterbourach. It can be roughly translated as clusterfuck.

If only I had any faith that matters would improve with whoever inherits Truss's poisoned chalice. It's always delicious seeing chickens come home to roost, but in the mean time, people are suffering and winter's coming fast.

[T_i_B]

27. I don't think this forum covers even half of it

The sheer volume of crap that's happened in the past 6 weeks is difficult to comprehend.

The thing that perplexes me most is how Truss managed to get as far as she did when her flaws had been known for some time. People who remember her stint in the Lib Dems are invariably less than kind about her (see the below tweet for an example) and it beggars belief that Tories didn't pick up on the issues with Truss that others did.

Link to tweet

?t=aua7AEDe39No6g4GZYh-cw&s=09

[Emrys]

28. No, indeed.

That blast from the past deserves reproducing in fuller form:


I was struck that Truss's persona in one onstage speech she gave at a Lib Dem conference (where she infamously came out as anti-royalist etc.) is at least somewhat natural in terms of timing, body language and response to the audience, some small evidence of a sense of humour even, whereas in later life she's famously robotic and physically and verbally very awkward, to the extent that I've wondered at times whether she's had some sort of stroke or other unfortunate affliction.

Her astonishing self-regard is illustrated by the various heavily posed photos she's had taken over the years (many aping Thatcherian images) and her yearning to appear on the cover of Vogue. An old pal of mine used to use the expression "delusions of adequacy", which seems apt.

There may be a degree of sexism in some of the criticism of her, but as a would-be woman leader, she's done the cause of feminism no favours, and not ridiculing her idiocy and flat-footedness would itself be a form of sexism given the pasting male politicians take on a daily basis.

She evidently served some influential people's interests well - or so they hoped - not least the Tufton Street lobbyists and those behind the dark money that's infested our politics.

But she's not unique. How the hell is archetypal caricature stuffed shirt Rees-Mogg anywhere near the reins of government, or Thérèse Coffey within a heartbeat of being prime minister (for the next week or so at least), not to mention any of the other contenders for leadership or the cabinet at the moment?

The Tories under Johnson pruned away any semblance of competence and credibility in its hierarchy when the splits between Brexit true believers and any who had a marginally saner view of the world meant the government was stacked with barely functional swivel-eyed ideological loons and grifters - or worse, those who do know better and have some grasp on reality, but can see which side of their career's bread is buttered, so feign the lunacy to fit in and get on.

[T_i_B]

29. The likes of the IEA and Tax"payers" Alliance...

...are the ones who I've been most disgusted by from the past few weeks. Truss brings them into the heart of their operation, and they play a major role in creating a financially illiterate mini budget that the markets these people laud based on theory absolutely hate in reality as the sums didn't add up at all.

The IEA and other dark money Tufton Street groups then spend their time furiously gaslighting and doing everything they can to blame everyone else for the mess they played a major role in creating. And ending up making ideological purity arguments that would make a Marxist blush. Maybe they wouldn't be quite so contemptable if they could actually admit to having made serious mistakes.

These groups keep getting invited onto current affairs TV, even though their knowledge on the subjects they pronounce on is somewhere between minimal and non-existent and it's time that TV news channels kicked them off and started inviting on guests who are actual experts with practical experience. Groups like the IEA didn't have much credibility to begin with outside of partisan right wing circles and the Truss disaster should serve to fully discredit them.

And yes, their funding needs to be fully disclosed. These groups tend to call themselves think tanks but it's difficult to avoid the conclusion that they are just high-profile lobbyists for their anonymous donors.

[muriel_volestrangler]

10. She sacked the non-political head of the Treasury, then said she'd make radical tax changes

such as abolishing the top 45% tax rate (so the richest would just pay the 40% rate below that). But she didn't want the Office for Budget Responsibility, set up to be an independent assessor of government finances, to assess what this (and her solution for the high energy costs) would do to government finances. So the money markets took a look, and reckoned the government was now a dodgy thing to lend to, and demanded more interest (which then meant personal mortgage rates went up too). That higher interest also nearly caused pension companies to go bust - higher interest meant the existing government bonds they held were worth less. So the Bank of England had to intervene to stop a crash.

Paul Krugman dubbed this the "moron risk premium" - markets demanded a premium to lend to the UK because it has morons in charge.

She binned the plan to abolish the 45% rate, then sacked her political Treasury head with whom she'd cooked it up (ie threw him under the bus). The replacement, Jeremy Hunt, made her reverse most of her other proposed changes. Polling for the Tories has plummeted (one estimate was that, if a general election were held now, they'd only win about 50 out of 650 seats).

This week, Truss apparently had a shouting match with the then Home Secretary, who was in charge of immigration - Truss wanted some more, because there are low-paying jobs that aren't getting filled, and Braverman is ideologically against immigration. Braverman resigned/was fired, depending on how you look at it.

No one thinks anyone trusts Truss to run something, now. The Tories are in a few factions, which they somehow think will be able to choose a new leader who is generally acceptable amongst them. I can't see it, myself.

[calimary]

6. Well that was quick.

[Murphyb849]

7. She is the British example of "everything that Trump touches dies"

Starting with the Queen.

[vanlassie]

18. I appreciate her sense of urgency to fuck up and get it over with.

So we can forget about her asap.

[Tetrachloride]

8. I called it 5 days ago. Others were

probably a couple weeks ahead of that.

[muriel_volestrangler]

11. I see Hunt has said he's not standing for leader

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/uk-politics-63309400?ns_mchannel=social&ns_source=twitter&ns_campaign=bbc_live&ns_linkname=6351436d34a915418162daf3%26Hunt%20not%20running%20to%20be%20PM%262022-10-20T12%3A48%3A36.061Z&ns_fee=0&pinned_post_locator=urn:asset 422740d-4720-49ef-8f4c-2f95c12a874b&pinned_post_asset_id=6351436d34a915418162daf3&pinned_post_type=share

that makes things a bit simpler.

[malaise]

13. BBC is suggesting that a tweet says

Boris is willing- the saboteur in chief😀😀😀😀

[muriel_volestrangler]

15. 'Mad Nad' - Nadine Dorries, a rather loopy MP who was Boris' Culture Secretary

(in charge of demolishing the BBC, when a Tory) was singing his praises this morning. I don't think I've seen a 'leading' MP with such a crush on a leader before.

Boris was popular with many Tories, but they need reminding he went when it became known he'd appointed a known groper to a senior position, and didn't care. After all the lockdown parties, and other things that make him distasteful to the general public.

Link to tweet

'A Tory MP has just sent me this tweet and says: "If this happens I will immediately defect to the Labour party."'

[malaise]

16. Ha😀

Boris will lose.
What an infernal mess.

[T_i_B]

22. Tory twitter seems to be wanting Boris back

They clearly don't have very good memories!

Tory members who voted for Truss need to ask themselves a few questions as they clearly made a very poor choice in going for Truss over Sunak.

In the past couple of weeks the various right wing factions have been furiously blaming each other for the problems with Liz Truss's administration. The worst cuplrits being the Tufton Street mob, who were the most heavily involved in Truss's calamities. To be honest, the more they blame each other, the more I blame the whole lot of them.

[malaise]

23. It's fun to watch so called conservatives across the planet prove over and over that they have

no fucking beliefs or ethics - power, and wealth are all they want by any means necessary.

[GreenWave]

12. They should sneak the other Liz Truss into the job.

The one with the Liz Truss twitter account.

She told the Swedish PM to send her over some svedish meatballs.

[mitch96]

17. Vlad is smiling.. I wonder if he had a hand in mucking things up.. He would do it just for fun.nt

[muriel_volestrangler]

19. There has never been a more self-inflicted political defeat than this

It will be in the text books as What Not To Do. Yes, the Russians are happy about it, but they didn't have to do a thing.

[LetMyPeopleVote]

24. "We now go live to 10 Downing Street."

Link to tweet

[ShazzieB]

25. "...for a message from the new P.M., Ms. Hedda Lettuce!"

[LeftishBrit]

26. Yes, the lettuce would be a better Prime Minister

Perhaps with some tofu as Home Secretary to appeal to the 'Guardian reading wokerati'.