The Establishment Parties Suck So Bad, That Fascism Is Rising
A virulent anti-Semite, Sir Oswald Mosley was a Baronet who sat in Parliament as a Conservative, an independent and then as a member of Labour, before founding his own party, BUF— the British Union of Fascists in 1932. He was imprisoned in 1940. After the war he was a Holocaust denier and ran for Parliament on a racist agenda (deporting Caribbean migrants and prohibiting mixed-race marriages). He lost and lived out the rest of his life in France, dying there in 1980, age 84.
Yesterday, my favorite U.K. political commentator, Jonathan Pie (Tom Walker), described Nigel Farage, the head of the Reform UK Party (basically MAGA but MBGA doesn’t have the ring so… Reform UK). You would have to be excused if you thought he was describing Señor Trumpanzee. Give it a listen; he’s very entertaining.
I’ll offer a little background and context in case you don’t follow U.K. politics much. Farage has a well-known history of making racist and anti-Semitic comments, although he’s tried toning it down lately, especially in public. His xenophobia, though— “Take back control”— is still front and center, not unlike Trump’s.
Both of these populist clowns present themselves as “men of the people” battling the political elite. Both emphasize their plain-speaking manner and “common sense” approach. Despite this persona, Farage comes from a privileged background, having attended Dulwich College, a prestigious private school, and worked in the City of London as a commodities broker. Señor T, of course, was born into a super-rich neo-Nazi family and inherited his wealth… and his fascist perspective.
Both of them and media savvy and each leverages fear and grievance with divisive, inflammatory and hateful rhetoric to mobilize their society’s bigots and losers. Both have polarized their countries’ politics.
I use YouGov for reliable polling (in both the US and UK). The poll released Friday shows Labour with a seemingly insurmountable lead but with the Conservative losing voters not to them but to Reform UK! Take a look at this:
Labour- 37%
Reform- 19%
Conservative- 18%
LibDem- 14%
Green- 7%
Reuters reported that when a Conservative member of Parliament was asked whether the trend away from Conservative and towards Reform would stick, the response was “Yes. I think people are fed up with the Tories (Conservatives), but not with Conservatism. So they are moving to another Conservative party.”
So is this going to translate into actual seats? Reuters seems to think not. I disagree. If I had to guess which constituencies are ready to go whole-hog fascist I’d start with these 4:
Clacton, where Farage is running himself and which was a very strong UKIP area.
Ashfield, where Lee Anderson, a former Conservative who defected to Reform UK, is running.
Boston and Skegness, where Richard Tice, a multimillionaire ex-Conservative who ran Reform as Chairman while Farage was buried up Trump’s ass for the last couple of years, is running. (He had been elected to the European Parliament in 2019)
South Yorkshire where seats like Barnsley and Doncaster seem especially flippable since the Brexit Party performed so well there in the 2019 elections
It’s worth mentioning that sentiment has significantly shifted against Brexit since the referendum in 2016. Recent polls indicate that a majority of Brits now believe Brexit was a mistake and would prefer to rejoin the EU if given the chance. A survey by Redfield and Wilton Strategies earlier in the year found that 57% of Brits would vote to rejoin the EU, while only 43% still prefer to remain outside— a record 14-point lead for the rejoin camp, reflecting increasing dissatisfaction with the economic and political outcomes of Brexit. Additionally, an Ipsos poll revealed that 70% of respondents believe Brexit has negatively impacted the UK economy. The same survey indicated that only 13% of Britons view Brexit as more of a success than a failure, with 57% considering it more of a failure. The LibDems are campaigning on a gradual rejoin platform. The Conservative-lite party— AKA Keir Starmer’s version of Labour— doesn’t understand how to use this issue.
Three more polls released last night— just before Brits start receiving their mail-in ballots— are very bad news for the Conservatives: electoral extinction anyone? Basically, Labour continues to rise and the Conservatives continue in their well-deserved death spiral. One pollster suggested the Conservatives could wind up with just 72 seats in the House of Commons (out of 650), their lowest number since they were founded 2 centuries ago.
Back to Señor T for one tiny moment— does this sound vaguely familiar? Pie on Farage: “That’s how populism works: promising the world without fear you’ll ever have to deliver. He’s a dangerous grifter.”
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