Boonta Vista - EPISODE 127: The Absolute Boy (Feat. Riley Quinn)
Episode Date: December 3, 2019EDIT: The issue with the show cutting off has been fixed :) Riley from TRASHFUTURE joins us for an update on the imminent UK election, including the BBC's cockups, the British media and a Q&A from ou...r listeners. Find Riley on Twitter: https://twitter.com/raaleh Listen to TRASHFUTURE: https://trashfuturepodcast.podbean.com/ *** Support our show and get exclusive bonus episodes by subscribing on Patreon: www.patreon.com/BoontaVista *** Email the show at mailbag@boontavista.com! Call in and leave us a question or a message on 1800-317-515 to be answered on the show! *** Twitter: twitter.com/boontavista Website: boontavista.com Merchandise: boontavista.com/merchandise Twitch: twitch.tv/boontavista
Transcript
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That are you with a real ad that ran on Adelaide's Nova 911.
I have so many questions.
Please.
If, is your first question, did that person really say mutilate those little
cunts beyond recognition on the radio and the answer is yes. Weirdly that's my
second question my first question is what 4295 like what 399 499 4499 those are
normal prices 4295 is quite a strange price.
Oh yeah we got them in Australia those are those a big W prices.
Yes, they're just trying to try to just disorient you with pricing like that.
Yeah, no, it's just, it's, look, when a person is asked to think of a number between one and ten,
they'll tend to think of five or seven because that is like the middle of the middle.
And 4295 just, it doesn't seem right.
Look, all of that stuff they said mutilate those, whatever.
This is the weird bit in my opinion.
It is contrary to logic.
It's why I find your country strange.
I think all, I think our brains got melted in the 90s, right?
Because like there was this big trend in the 90s with our department stores where they're
all of their pricing was like $13.48 and like like like Edgsey says just to
like disorient you into thinking like you just you drop everything you go
well I don't know whether that's a good price or not and purchase it wait wait wait wait I need to ask a question yeah do you th th th th th you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you th you th th the to th to to the to to to to to to the to to to the to the the to the the to to to the to the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the to the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the th th th th th is thus thus thus thus the the te tea teaugh te tea tea tea tea teaughe te to try. to to to to to better get my kids me elated. I need to ask a question.
Do you have sales tax added on at the till or is the price the price?
We're not those people.
Why would you do that?
Why does it make sense to anyone to have that, the way that things function? Although, it's, in the UK, the price is the price, but in Canada, in, in, in, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price and the States, something's like, yeah, it's $10, you come up to the till,
and it's like it's $11.50,
and I'm aware this is like a very Dennis Leary complaint to have,
but why isn't the price the price?
I think they have to be reminded at all times of every tax that they're paying.
Yeah, it's to breed resentment.
That ad, I I I that ad ad ad ad also here's the other thing about that ad, the soundtrack, what was
the ad for?
Was it for a dance?
The children's ear piercings.
Base drops on this beauty store advertising on the radio station.
That is what every Australian radio station sounds like now, 24-7.
You switch it on, you switch the dial to any of our radio stations and you will be subjected
to just a random noise generator pumping out that signal.
And of course, the advertising all has one quality, which is someone reading to you directly
from a script, we are selling product X for price Y. That's it.
It feels to me like Australia has really not passed the financial, you're still
in a pre-financial crisis world, strangely. It feels like all of your advertising is still
caught in the mid-2000s. You haven't experienced the resurgence of like a sort of electoral like left
coalition. It just it seems like you're still in the politics of like George
Bush. Oh we yeah absolutely we feel we feel no shame about capitalism here like
this is this is our being we absolutely have not but maybe maybe you've
right maybe maybe there is a theory that
we haven't experienced the financial crisis because I think we did very well out of the
financial crisis or certainly much better than everyone in the OECD. So maybe our brains didn't
get impacted by that steel rod. Well, here's the weird thing before I do what I do now I was
a an economics researcher at a university and there is a like there's like a
quite let's say non-trivial body of theory that says that when your sort of
entire economy and currency is pegged to the export of commodities, then you
essentially did well out of the financial crisis because as money fled out of
stocks it went into things like purchasing of oil, timber, metals, etc., etc.,
which means that more of your money needed to be purchased, which means better
purchasing power against the rest of the world. So Australia and Canada basically still have centrist liberal parties
because the contradictions haven't been forced there to the point that they have everywhere else?
Oh yeah, we have very much a steady hand on the rudder kind of country.
We just want like, no changes, please.
Just keep driving the boat in one direction, please.
More of the same.
So it's like time hasn't passed for you guys.
The same, oh it hasn't.
It time hasn't passed for Australia or indeed Canada in the way that it has in the rest of the world.
It's like my home country, not my current country.
And you guys are, well,
not Lucy because she's in America, but you know, the group of people that are in those places
are sort of like in a kind of groundhog day of the 2012 Olympics opening ceremony in London,
where everything is just sort of nice and everyone is just sort of happy with stuff.
And there's a lot of celebrities.
Well it's probably absolutely not a coincidence then that all of the episodes that we have
done on Blackface and Golicorg sales are all from Canada and Australia.
You get, you don't get both, like you pick, you pick one, right?
Like a socialist sort of, um,
a grassroots movement and, uh,
not selling gollywogs at the corner store.
Oh, and speaking of that, it must be time for a message from our next advertiser,
Gollywog warehouse.com.a. You. I thought that, it must be time for a message from our next advertiser, Gollywog Warehouse.com.
Dot a you.
I thought that place burnt down.
Sex Calderin.
So I'm welcome.
I'm fully ready for you to play an ad for that.
That has the same tone, same music, same cadence, everything.
Welcome to Buente Vista.
You're joined by me, Andrew Lucy from Hawaii. Hello Lucy.
Hi. We got Theo all the way up in Brisbane.
We sure do. And joining us all the way from the UK for the Trash Future podcast,
it is our British election correspondent Riley. How you doing?
Hi, my voice is disappointing to people who want to hear a British accent.
Can you just do one for the podcast? I mean I can't, okay, I'm about, okay my best British accent,
it just, it sounds just awful. Like I've lived here for like like eight nine years and I still can't do a good one
Like okay, I'm gonna read the in our studio. There's a whiteboard. It says
I'm gonna read the sentence gave free t-shirt to injured fan. Okay. Give a free t-shirt to injured fan.
Oh boy, that is not good. Wow
So that's way closer to Australian than it really is. Yes, absolutely you you could pitch that as an Australian accent I'm sorry maybe it's just that you're in the room with us. I'm so sorry we gave a free t-shirt to the injured fan. Oh, that's not bad. Oh, that's nice. I need to relax. Oh, that's a the the the the the the the th. the th. the th. th. the th. th. th. the th. the th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's that's th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. the the the th. th. the the th. the th. th. the. th. that's way. th. that's way. that's way. that's that's that's way. that's way. that's not bad. That's nice. I needed to call it. You need more that tough energy. I needed to relax, because the only one I can do is the tough one. I needed to relax into it as well.
I'm so sorry.
We gave a free tea the injured fan, but like,
I'm sure we could find you like a Camusol or like some short shorts. doing Hussein from your podcast. Yes, it's me, Hussein.
But yes, hello, Buntavista.
I am as ever very glad to be here.
The injured fan is okay, by the way.
He was hit by a car while listening to Trashfugeur, then post about it on Twitter.
Then I saw the post that was like, oh, I was hit by a car while listening to Trash
Fuge. Oh, I'm thi. Just, th. Just, th. Just, just th. Just, just th. Just, just thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thu, thu, thi, thi, thi, thu- is thu-is-up, thu, thu, thu, thu, thu, thu, thu, thu, thu, thu, thu, thu, thu, thu, thu, thu, thu, thu, thu, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi. thi's thi's thiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii. thiiii's thi. th while listening to Stratfugger. And I was like, oh my god. I'd better send you a t-shirt.
He's fine now.
Which is to keep all the organs in.
A medical t-shirt.
So, uh, so we thought we would get Riley on to give us a little update about the impending
British election.
Because look, we like to stay pretty far away from
international politics on this podcast and also Australian politics. They're both
but no Andrew boat watch that's true that's that's a bit more local than the
than the old national politics we like to yeah I feel like local politics
we can really dig into because like if we get it to the thi. It's a thi. thi tho the the thi thi the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. tho- the. the. the. the. the. the the the the the the the the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. to. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. the. th get into the nitty gritty. We can really dig into because if we get it wrong, there'll only be like four people screaming
at us, which is great, I can handle that number.
Yeah, and you know, if we don't do anything about their complaints, who are they going to
tell?
The other three people?
They have to find themselves first.
I literally have no idea how many people live in Australia. I don't, I don't know how many people this matters to.
Like if you said 30 million or 6 million, I'd be like, yeah probably.
Well it's closer to 30 these days.
We're getting there.
One day, we haven't hit 30 yet, have we guys?
No, I think I looked at this the other day.
It's 20, 20 something.
No, surely not we'll work
this out everybody look at your window and start counting as many people as
you can see for reference that's the population of the greater Toronto
area or Canada that's a what number we have cracked 25 million congratulations to us
well done us congratulations to us. Well done us.
Congratulations to Australia, you finally did it.
We are full, I hear.
We're very full.
It's too many.
Oh, that explains all the border security stuff.
Right.
That's fine.
So, we thought we would check in and see how is is the absolute boy, Jezza, doing in this
his second crack at a general election?
Indeed, this is the second crack at a general election for Jeremy Corbyn.
If I was to summarize things, I would say, we have no idea how things are going and that's okay.
To unpack that idea, it would be that I would have to say that like the UK is unique in a number of ways as an electorate.
I've actually said on this show before that labor has two modes.
It has out when it's in opposition. It has out of election mode and in election
mode. Out of election mode because we're dealing with a largely hostile
Tory-owned press, like 50% of the news outlets are owned by six billionaires, all of whom
are like actual fascists. So like if Jeremy Corbyn like jaywalks,
that it will be a huge story about how he doesn't respect the rule of law and you can't trust
him with the prime ministership, like it will, it is quite literally that bad. So out of
rules around PURDA, which require regulated press outlets, especially on TV, to give
equal coverage to both manifestos and parties and not show preference, then labor's poll share
just plummets. And the idea out of election mode is to keep it as high as possible while
knowing that we're playing defense. And then, as soon as it goes into election mode, we go on offense.
So we have gone up about 13% in the polls in the last two and a half weeks.
Who?
And this is what happened in 2017 as well, where we were polling at like 17, 18,
19, 20% because there are like several pollsters and some of them count and they all count differently.
And so there are some who do only landline polls which you can basically discount because
they're only calling like old people who believe that you know their Polish made is
stealing their their pocket money or whatever like discount that people who have
have landlines which is yeah exactly.
And then there are polls that like we internet surveys that will look at people who are likely
to vote rather than certain to vote, blah blah blah, who will look at newly registered voters
and so on.
And those ones tend to get it much more close.
So, but the whole idea is you look at the direction of travel.
A poll release today actually put labor up 5% since
it last polled at the same time last week, which is quite a considerable jump.
Because once the manifestos are released, once PURDA happens, you have to cover it equally,
which means that if labor announces a spending plan, you can't
just say labor spending plans guaranteed to bankrupt economy.
You have to say, labor's spending plans are as follows, and you can't editorialize it
that much?
God imagine.
And this is probably one of the things that stuck out the most to me as a, you know, not British
watching this election is that, like, before this, before this, this, this, this, this, this, this........, this. this. this. this. this. this most to me as a, you know, not British person watching this, watching this
election is that, like, before this rule kicked in, Boris Johnson could just be like wandering
the streets with horrible old pants around his ankles, just muttering to himself.
And all you would ever see is that like Jeremy Corbyn stands in crowd with
somebody who was Hitler's third cousin's grandson and like that's it and it's
it's mind boggling to me like the way that the British Paris will frame this stuff.
And the photo of Boris Johnson is like cropped from the waist up.
Yeah of course. Well here's the weird thing.
I mean, Andrew, like, you kind of hit it on the nail,
hit the nail on the head here,
which is they always crop the photo of Boris Johnson
from the waist up.
Because, and this is the passion project of someone who actually was like
a center-right journalist who just found himself disgusted with the British press and the way it operates politically called Peter O'Bourne, whose crusade now is against what
he calls client journalism or court journalism, which is the UK press industry that makes its
whole business about courting the favor of Boris Johnson, so they're always the first to get the scoop. And so what they'll do is, is it's the whole thi thi is the thi. is, is thi, is thi, is thi, is thi, is thi, is thi, is thi, is thi, is thi, is thi, is thi, is thi, is thi, is the thi, is the the the the thi, the thi, thi, thi, the thi, thi, called, called, called, called, called, called, the the the the the thi, called, the the thi, the the thi, the the thi, the the thi, the the the the the thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi.. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi. thi. thi. thi. their, th, so they're always the first to get the scoop.
And so what they'll do is they will consistently frame stories
pro-Johnson anti-Corbon to the point where there are some journalists
where labor will have announced a policy, for example,
that says we are going to eliminate hospital car park charges. So if you're going to park your car in a hospital for an hour, it's usually 2 pounds 50, if you're they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they're they're they're they're they're they're they're they're they're they're they're they're they're they're they're they're they're th. And they're th. And so they're they'll they'll they'll they'll they'll they'll. And so they'll. And so they'll they'll. And so they'll they'll they'll. And so they'll they'll they'll. And so they'll. And so they'll they'll, and they'll they'll, and th. And th. And they'll they're they're th. And they're they're they're th. And th. And they're they're th. And th. And th. And th. And so th. they're th. the. they're the. they're they're they're they're they're they're they're they're they're they're they're they're th. they're th. we are going to eliminate hospital car park charges. So if you're going to park your car in a hospital for an hour,
it's usually 2 pounds 50.
If you're there overnight to care for a sick relative, it adds up.
The conservatives announced an almost similar, the same policy,
but ridiculously means tested, uncosted, and probably more expensive and less helpful.
And the same journalist, a guy called James Ball, reacted to the first policy by saying, oh, it's unrealistic, how are we going to pay for it? I don't think
this is really going to work, bad policy by labor, reacted to the second policy and said, an interesting
policy, let's see how it plays the electorate. This could really win things for the conservatives. Where it's like, it's like, it's the same policy. It's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same same, the same, the same, the same, the same, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, the the the the the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same, the same policy. Hang on, you have to pay 2 pounds 50 for hospital parking?
Yeah, because we are fucking up.
Yeah. Under the last labor government, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, they just, they fucked everything up.
They privatized, not just the hospital building. All of the infrastructure around the NHS got privatized
and there's something called PFI or Private Finance Initiative.
So basically, if you had a hospital,
what they would do is they would say,
we're going to sell the building and the infrastructure
to a private company that's gonna rent it back to the state.
But then, because the private company was like, wait a minute, we're the only ones allowed to perform services on this whole estate, we can say, all right, you want to change a light
bulb in this room?
That's 100 pounds to change a light bulb.
You want to fix the wiring here?
Thousand pounds?
Oh, you want to park?
A parking lot?
It's two pounds 50 an hour to park? A parking lot? Oh, it's 2 pounds 50 an hour to park. Oh, your staff?
It's still 2 pounds 50 an hour.
Oh, you're a nurse and you make 21,000 pounds a year a year,
year.
Yeah.
It's actually going to be a seventh of your wage, total a year, gross, to park at your job.
And we were just fine with that. So, you've sort of touched on the very tight control of the media over there from all of your fun fascist media owners.
We are very... We just bought another one.
Viscount Ruthermere, the guy who owns the Daily Mail, who's called Viscount Ruthermere.
Why are they all cartoons? Sorry, say his name. Excuse me? I don't know his actual name. I just know he's the Viscount Rothermere.
Is this a fucking Ostergoth?
I mean, I'm sure that he's like has a mosaic of himself somewhere.
You know, holding a scepter and an orb.
But no, this is a guy called the Viscount Rothermere and he owns the Daily Mail and he owns a couple... The Viscount Rutherbeer.
Yep. His father, the first Viscount Ruthermare, started the company, he inherited it,
and then kept it doing fascism.
And now they've bought another newspaper called The Independent, which used to be independent, but now isn't.
So the confusing thing here, the daily mail, sorry. The confusing thing here is all of our newspapers have the same names as your newspapers.
They really do.
Except instead of being owned by the Viscount Rothermere, they're owned by like 17 fail sons,
all of which are named Duncan.
They get into fist fights at the parking lot of McDonald's.
So here's the thing.
Our fail sons are still getting into fist fights, but not in the parking lot of McDonald's,
they're getting into fist fights like in the stair case leading up to White's gentlemen's in May there.
Oh, dear. So, as you said, it's, you guys do have that dominated media as well, but you also have the public broadcaster, the BBC.
Oh no.
Now, this is a very familiar concept to us as people who have the ABC, our own public
broadcaster with its legislated impartiality, that kind of thing, but we also have our own interference
from the government in the sense of, you know, conservative governments appointing...
Let's wait for one second. the sense of conservative governments appointing.
Let's wait for one second.
We have our own problems with conservative governments then saying,
oh, the ABC is so biased towards the left when, you know, in reality, all of the surveys
that they do around trust in the media consistently shows the ABC
to be the most trusted source of news in the country.
All the other ones are owned by some Murdoch guys, so I don't know why that happens to be
the case.
So, the conservative governs that we have then get in, and when they're up to you know appoint a new chairman of the board
for the ABC will say hey we've appointed some guy named Mr. Murdoch Jr.
or whatever. Very very subtle power moves you know. So it seems like you guys
are having a similar issue at the moment where the BBC seems to have been
fucking up a whole lot during this election. But strangely all of the fuckups seem to just favor to the to the to the to to get get get get get get get get get get get get get.... to get get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in to get in. to get to get. to get. to get. to get. to get. to get. the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the to the the the the the to to the to the to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to fucking up a whole lot during this election.
But strangely, all of the fuck-ups seem to just favor Boris Johnson and the Tories?
What a damn coincidence?
Isn't that strange?
Can you walk us through some of the examples of this happening throughout the
Capitol? Yeah, so there are a few, right?
And you can think of them on a few levels,
so you can think of them like systemic level fuck-ups,
where like Jeremy Corbyn was invited on and went on,
the most confrontational, famously difficult interview show
that the country can provide, right?
Andrew Neal, and then, like, right? Um, Andrew Neal.
And then, like, had like a very hard time,
had a lot of very hard and some would say unfair questions asked of him.
Um, and then Boris Johnson's team said, ah, oh, the BBC forgot to fix a time with us,
and you know what, we're not going to go on Andrew Neal, so,
whoopsie doodle anyway, uh, see you with the polls the polls the polls y doodle anyway see you at the polls because the conservative strategy has been to
like hide Boris Johnson from the people because every time he goes in front of
the British public like the conservative lead drops precipitously but the
other so these these the big thing right, where it's like they clearly just forgot
to schedule Boris Johnson for like the hard interview, right?
And then after the attack that happened on London Bridge yesterday where some guys were like
got some knives out and started stabbing some people, the police had to intervene, it was classed
a terror attack and so on, they were like, we're inviting Boris Johnson on to Andrew Marr, the like softball interview
show where the hardest question they ask you is, how's your day been?
To heal the nation in the wake of the gruesome terrorist attack, this kind of thing. Like, you're like, oh, come on, you have to be fucking, you don't do this by accident if this, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you, you, you don't, you don't, you don't, you're, you're, you're, you're, you're, you're, you're, you're, you, you, you, you, you, you, you. the, you. the, you. the, you. the, you. the, you. the, you. the, you. the, you. the, you. the, you. the, you. the, you. the the, you. the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the th. the the the the th. the the the the the the the the th the the the th the the the the the the the the if this is one of 30 times something like this has happened.
And then there are the small things, right?
So one of the best examples, one of the ones that's really stuck in my mind is that as part
of the Green New Deal, labor has announced or the Green Industrial Revolution because
America had a new deal. We had an industrial revolution.
We've said we're going to plant two billion trees and that sounds like a lot of trees If you don't think about it and don't do any comparative research
If you do five minutes of just Googling you'll find oh
About a thousand people employed seasonally for a few years could plant two billion trees. That's completely reasonable if you have a few people employed full-time seasonally, a few people like a thousand people employed full-time seasonally. That's what Canada does. That's what, like, lots of countries do.
But a lot of BBC figures immediately jumped on that 2 billion number and said,
oh, this is the election of Boris Johnson's lies versus Jeremy Corbyn's 2 billion trees and
just didn't bother to check if like that number that seemed big when you look at it and
don't think about it is reasonable. There couldn't possibly be two billion
trees in the world. No, two billion. A billion is too much of anything. I couldn't.
They take the same approach that Mitch Hedberg takes to pasta, which is I'm never
going to eat a bowl of pasta because I don't want to have a thousand of something.
Where it's like, yeah, but it's small.
And it's the same thing, whereas like, yeah, two billion trees.
What?
No, no one can plant two billion trees.
the Canada plants like, and as many years with a pretty reasonable amount of people. And they were like, nope, it's $2 billion, it's big, that's clearly a lie, Corbyn's lying, blah, blah, blah,
because the BBC and the journalist they employ,
this is purely my theory.
And you can see it, especially with ones like Laura Koonsburg,
I think, see themselves as the guardian of what's acceptable.
And so they look at their jobs as pointing out and highlighting when politicians say things
that are beyond the pale, because their job is to warn people of when politicians are beyond
the pale.
But when your Overton window is the Tory right from Enick Powell, which it's always been, which has been like, a thing that's been accepted in this country since forever, that we have this like fascist tendency that has
to be like accepted but managed.
And then you've got like the post Thatcher left, which is, you know, crushed unions and
Tony Blair deciding just to like make Thatcher-ism friendly, which is what his whole legacy was. When you move beyond that Overton window, then, thine, thine, thine, that, thine, that, thine, that, thine, that, that, the, the, the, the, the, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, the, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, th, th, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the the the, the, the, the, the, thri.e, the, the, thrie, the, the, the, the, thee, theeee, thrie, th friendly, which is what his whole legacy was.
When you move beyond that Overton window, then the BBC reports everything you do is outrageous
because most of its journalists are like 50, 60 years old, like there are people who have
come up, they've all gone to the same school, they've all gone to Oxford or Cambridge together.
They like all kind of know each other. They've all been friends for decades.
And they've got this idea, whether they recognize it or not,
like they probably don't wake up saying,
well, time to fuck with Jeremy Corbyn.
They probably just say, well, time to protect Britain
from unreasonable ideas by alerting the public to what's strange, eerie, and weird. And so they can't understand, or they refuse to understand,
or as part of becoming a BBC journalist,
you have to replace all the piping in your house with lead piping
so you get extra stupid.
And you just then begin to think of yourself as the guardian against anything that
is beyond the 2012 consensus of what society should be. And so if you get too redistributed, like, no, no, no, or, or, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or to, or, or, or, or, or, or to, or to, or to, or to, or to, or to, or to, or to, or to, or to, or to, or to, or to, or to, or to, or the, or the, or the, or, or, or, the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the to, the to, to, the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the 2012 consensus of what society should be.
And so if you get too redistributive, like, oh, nope, that way, that's the Soviet Union.
I remember them. Oxford said they were bad.
And then if you get to fascist, they're like, oh, we should do what they want so they don't get more fascist.
Because they came up in a fundamentally right-wing atmosphere where
the right was normal.
Like the center right was what's regular.
And so they just, they cannot accept that the ground has shifted under their feet.
And so my concern is that our public broadcaster and like don't get me wrong having a
public broadcaster is an incredible resource like something that is
required by law to be impartial is amazing if that can be done properly if that can
be rigorously enforced if that can change with the times if that can
understand what impartial is when the Overton window changes but the BBC has shown itself to be incapable of that can change with the times, if that can understand what impartial is when the Overton window changes.
But the BBC has shown itself to be incapable of that.
It is stuck in this pre-financial crisis, like liberal viewpoint,
and it's just not able, it's not able to move past it.
It is still negotiating with fascism
and pretending the left is illegitimate.
So it's quite frustrating to deal with.
I think we, we seem to be on the verge of this very similar thing in Australia,
where I think that we have a relatively similar journalistic class in that the majority,
not everybody, but I think
that like a lot of prominent journalists and people who write for the larger papers are
primarily white private school kids who went to the same private schools that our
politicians went to. There's those other traditions that I
think a lot of people see a problem with like we have a thing in Australia
called the Midwinter Ball which yeah which is once a year. It's very similar to
the what's the name of it the White House press correspondence dinner thing you know?
How they have one night where they all get together and have a good laugh? just impartially. the their th-- the the the th, th, th, th, like, like, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, like, thi, thi thi tho, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, thi thi thi thi thi th people th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th th, th th th th th th thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, a lot their their their their thi, a lot thi the thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi, a thi, thi, you know? How they have one night where they all get
together and have a good laugh. Just impartially, just impartially hanging out with my politician
buddies. Letting their hair down with all the people that are, you know, implementing Robodebt,
it's fine. Yep, we all give each other a polite roasting. And even worse though than the press correspondence dinner
is that in Australia there is like a little,
a little friendly agreement between.
A little friendly agreement between the politicians and the press
that nobody will air anything that goes on at the midwinter ball.
So basically they have a bunch of politicians and a
bunch of members of the press get up and all make funny jokes about all the
things that happen throughout the year and everybody agrees that nobody will
actually say anything to the public about what went on there. And
apparently there's just a whole shitload of people who can't see any kind of
issue with the press and politicians being closer to each other than
they are to the electorate?
Who needs integrity?
Journalistic integrity, it's not necessary.
No big deal.
No big deal.
And we have our own...
People love trusting journalists in Australia.
The public trusts every journalist.
We of course have our own issues around access journalism as well, with very much the same thing you were
describing around. There are a lot of journalists who, it seems, will basically not air things
that are critical of particular politicians because they still want to get, they still
want to get drops from them, they still want to get anonymous tips about things.
We do, there are, you know, some journalists like a friend of the show. Andrew, if I can jump in, I I I I th, I th, I th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th,s. We do, there are, you know, some journalists like a friend of
the show. Andrew, if I can jump in, I'll say, we don't even have that. Our
journalists don't even want anything in return for showing deference to the
government. They have, and this is like Peter O'Bourn has been like quite good
about this and criticizing court journalism.
He's interviewed senior BBC figures who've knocked on the record saying,
they don't think it would be proper to show that the Prime Minister is a liar,
because it would undermine trust in British democracy.
Oh, I remember this.
So they're not even getting anything for it.
They just don't think it's right to do because of some code of rules that they invented.
Which is definitely not like a, it's not unique to any one place, so even in America, which has an entirely different press situation, it's taken them a very long time to come around to the idea that maybe you can call Donald Trump, who is a quite obviously a pathological liar,
he's a very racially charged man.
Where, yeah, that's right, where this sort of, they have no idea what actual impartiality means,
right? So they hold on to that and say that it means not saying anything at any, at any time. And we get a lot of that, you know, certainly I think, from, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, they's, they's, they's, they's, they's, they's, they's they's they's they's they's they's they's they's they's they's th is they's their, he's their, he's their, he's, he's, he's, he's, he's their, he's their, he's, he's their, he's is is is their, he's is their, he's is their, he's is their, he's their, he's their, he's their, he's their, they's they's they's they's they's they's they's they's they's they's they's they's their their th. their their their th. their th. th. their the, their the, their the, their, their the, to that and say that it means not saying anything at any at any time.
And we get a lot of that, you know, certainly I think from our ABC where there's been a
big, you know, constant tug of war, as kind of Andrew was saying, with trying to keep up
the appearance of being impartial because if you ask the person on the street
and they don't happen to be you know left left wing they will say that the that the ABC has a left bias right so they are
always always now trying to trying to remain you know quote unquote impartial but it's not in the
it's not in the sense of impartiality to,
you know, it doesn't matter who's,
which side is right or wrong, it's just whatever's true.
Now you know, you can't say what's true
without couching it in the language of also,
well, another thing might be, the thing that's false,
might also be true. Who's to say, right? Like we've just lost our minds as far as what actual journalism and truth-telling in journalism is.
Yeah, Theo, I think you've hit the nail on the head here.
And this is true of the US as well, the UK rather as well, which is that journalists
at all of the supposedly either impartial or even like left of center outlets
have all kind of bought the narrative, hook line and sinker, that they're left-wing biased,
and so they massively overcompensate to the right.
And so there's this idea, I think, at the BBC, where I don't think they're pro-Johnson. I think if you asked any BBC person, if you gave them an injection of sodium pentathol,
they wouldn't, they would say, no, I am rigorously fair. But I, of course, as a person, I, Laura
Koonzberg, am obviously a journalist and I'm a liberal elite, which means I have to make an effort to understand and couch all of my tongue, all of what I say in,
well, hang on, I'm left-wing bias, so I should make sure I'm being fair to the right as
well.
But A, I mean, they're just, they're liberals, they're sort of centrist, establishment,
whatever, whatever. But what it means is, because they bought this narrative that there is an authentic British person
who's smeared in coal dust and saying the N-word at a pub on Tuesday at noon, you know,
like that's the real British person and that that's the person they have to play to.
But that's a total invention of other people at like right-wing think tanks
and right-wing-owned, like thethe Daily Mail that that's the invention of what an authentic British person is. Well that's
entirely false. It's a complete fabrication. But most BBC journalists have
just bought this fabrication hookline and sinker and then just pander to
uninvented authentic Brit. I mean so there's this there's this idea and I see it
in Australia but like it it's really at its greatest sort of sharpness in
Britain called Authentocracy which is like when Owen Smith a right-wing
challenger of Jeremy Corbin who once said actually I'm very, I'm very normal. I have a wife and children.
Yeah, they was quoted in the paper as saying that exactly.
I get up every day and say that.
Hmm, another day of being regular.
I'm Owen Smith.
I wake up literally every morning and now his time to be regular and say my name. No, so he once, he once went to a coffee shop in his constituency in Wales. They said, ah, Mr. Smith, you're regular, and they handed
him a cup, but then it was a cappuccino, and so he like panicked and said, oh, I, I don't
know what this kind of frothy coffee, he pretended not to know what a cappuccino was,
he was very clear he was faking. But I feel like there would be some actual real psychic
damage done to a country where you saw a prime minister ship destroyed by eating a bacon
sandwich wrong. Yeah, I mean it's because like the British press like really like it sees its role as
the guardian of reasonability,
but reasonability is construed in the Britain as such a like upper middle class
version of what's reasonable.
And so Ed Miliband was portrayed as beyond the pale.
Gordon, people forget this.
Gordon Brown was portrayed as beyond the pale left.
Like the Lib Dems, at the time that Brown was prime minister said, okay, we could work with another labor leader, but not Gordon Brown.
He's too left wing.
He was Blair's chancellar.
Hey, we've had some technical difficulties with our audio and we've lost a little chunk.
But, like a true wonderful friend, Riley has come back in the space of like 24 hours
to record a little bit more so that we've got something to fill that void in your podcast
and your heart, I assume.
Yeah.
So, Ryan, I'm here doing what I do best, taking up space.
Just killing time. Prof. Just killing time.
Professionally killing time.
Just doing some of that dumb Twitter shit
where they're like, oh, it's a hot dog, a sandwich.
And it's like, no.
All you're doing is being like, hey, I'm bored.
I'd like to say something, but I'm not thinking about anything enough for it to be meaningful. Oh. Is it emotional labor to ask your to to to to to to to to to to to to listen to listen to listen to listen to listen to listen to listen to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to the their their the to to to to to to to to to to to to their.. their. their. And. And. And. And. And. And, their. And, their. And, their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their th. And. And. And,'re never going to talk to them again,
but that you've transferred them enough money for some professional therapy.
There you go.
That really is the most considerate thing you can do.
So with that, we will segue into their thiwaista.
We've asked for some questions from the Buonto Vista, which you too can get access to by going to Patreon.com slash Buntavista, slapping down your five American
wingwangs a month.
So we ask for some questions about UK election time for Riley and our dear sweet beautiful
patrons that have come through.
Flashman, a friend of the show Flashman, asks, what kind of self-care are you practicing
or do you recommend during the election Riley? Um, okay. A lot of what I do to keep from like going crazy during the election is I have
to remind myself that like all of the news you read is part of the organization of capital, essentially,
that there is, that there is,
that there really is sort of these people,
part of these people's jobs is to keep Jeremy Corbyn out of office
by just making him look bad.
So you have to understand that a lot of what you read
just isn't neutral, it's part of the other team.
And so you can stop, you can stop feeling sort of down about it,
because it's like saying, it's like if you're
playing football and the other side sort of has the ball and is sort of making a play up
the field, it's like, ah, damn, they're going to score.
It's like, wait a minute, no, it's part of the game to make sure they don't.
So it's like putting everything in the context of, no, this is part of the contest, this isn't neutral reporting on the contest.
The other team says that they've scored five goals to the referee.
You can't just be like, oh, what, really?
Wow.
I didn't know how they manage that.
That's a lot of goals just now, and I didn't see any of the go in. So a bit of compartmentalizing, basically, to, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, the, thi, the, thi, thi, thi, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so the the the thi, so, so, so, so thi, so the the their, so their, so their, so their, so the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so a bit the the the the the the the the the to be able to, and I know this sucks and it's really predictable,
you also really do have to be able to turn off.
But I'll tell you, but that's not just what I want to say.
I'll say one last thing on this, then we can move on to another question, which is,
you, when I used to be in university, I get like horrible, anxiety, like awful anxiety. I would walk around, I'd be going to lunch,
and I'd be like, I can't believe I'm gonna get zero
on this exam, and the only way I could make those feelings go away
was to revise, because I'd be like, well,
I could either be revising or not revising,
and the thing that's gonna make me less likely to get zero is to revise. and so, and so, and so, and so, and so, basically, and so, and the the the the the thi. And so thive. And so thi. And so thi. And so thi. And so thi, basically, basically, basically, basically, basically, basically, basically, thi, thi, thi, thi, thin, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, the thi, the the the the the the the the the the the the the the th, and th, and th, and th, and th, and th, and th, th, th, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, I thin, I thin, I thin, I thin, I thin, I thin, I's thin, thin, thin, thin, thin, thin, thin, thin, thin, thin, thin, thin, thi's thi's thi's thi's thi to revise. And so basically it means that whenever I feel really, really
anxious about the campaign, I go canvas.
Huh.
Well, that's good advice really, isn't it?
Yeah.
Let's see, we also have wife of the show, Aaron, sorry, lover of the show,
I've accidentally upgraded him, asks, does Labor have a Matt Hancock-esque Labrador candidate?
Ooh. Now listeners of Trash Future might be more familiar with the concept of a
Matt Hancock-esque Labrador candidate. Yeah, so to explain to anyone who does
and also listen to our show what a Matt Hancock-esque Labrador candidate is, the
secretary of, like the minister in charge of health and
social care in the UK is just sort of like a like a really like a really
optimistic and cheerful for lack of a better word Labrador who like gets
deliriously excited at the prospect of like putting another element of the
health of the country's health services on
your phone as an app, but like is a true believer in the idea that like Skype could replace
your doctor, like as though we haven't had phones for quite some time?
But the fact that he gets sort of so deliriously excited about things on face value is what we call him a Labrador.
Is there a Matt Hancock equivalent for labor?
Let's see.
Well, I mean, I think part of the whole point of being on the labor left is that like being
on the left is the product of a critique.
It is inherently based on a critical understanding of society in a way that you can see it's the, it is, it is inherently based on a critical
understanding of society in a way that you can see its flaws and want to change
them. Whereas, you know, being up Matt Hancock Labrador is specifically about not
asking typical questions and having your first and last reaction to anything be,
ooh cool. Well, something that I remember across the last couple of years in UK politics was both
the, a lot of the very large expenses scandal stuff, but also I seem to recall a lot of people
leaving the party over Jeremy Corbyn, becoming leader, and breaking off and forming, you know,
the smart, independent party,
and immediately like sinking into the ocean, you know.
I mean, it would be one of them.
Yeah, I was gonna say, I'm sure I would be right to assume.
So I would say like, the dumbest members of the party.
In terms of current front bench, like they're really, like there are better
and worse front bench members,
but I'm not willing to say that any of them
are a Matt Hancock style of dumb
just because it doesn't lend you to being there.
But I mean, I think that like all of the, or many of the Change UK people, I think Mike Gapes. I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I, I, I, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, the, th, the, th, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, are, the, the, the, are, are, are, the, are their, are their, their, are, are, their, are, are, their, are, their, are, their, are, their, are, their, are, are, their, are, are, their, their, are, their, the or many of the like I guess many of the change UK people I think Mike
Gapes like I'm gonna go with Mike Gapes final answer love saying that name
he's he's not a Labrador style of dumb he's a more of like a sort of aging
attack dog style of dumb in that he only knows charge bark and bite except the
difference is he is shaped like and has
the politics of a perfectly red Pac-Man, but if all of the dots that Pac-Man
bites are little nukes and then the big dots that Pac-Man bites are big
nukes and the ghosts are everyone on the left, everyone in another country, because he loves
war, because he is elected in the 1990s on the basis of being a serious Blerite labor guy
who's serious about national defense and doesn't want any of these social services coddling
our boys. And who doesn't love a spot of war? You know?
Not Mike Gapes. I can tell you that much for sure. The last funny thing about
Mike Gapes is that every after he left and joined the independent group or
change UK or whatever it was calling itself at the time. A. I believe he's the only
continuity member. All the rest of them have either joined the Lib Dems or formed other breakaway parties. So he's like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like like th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, not th, not thi, not thi, not tho, not tho, not tho, not tho, not thi, not thi, not tho, not tho, not tho, not tho, not. Not tho, not. Not thi. Not, not. Not. Not. Not. Not. Not. Not. Not. Not. Not. Not. Not. Not. Not, not. Not, not. Not, not. Not, not. Not, not. Not, not. Not, not. Not, the the the the the the the the the the the the the thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. member. All the rest of them have even joined the Lib Dems or formed other breakaway parties.
So he's like, continuity change UK.
And he, whatever you want, every time he would post on Twitter, people would be like,
yo, call a by-election if you were so confident that like the people of Ilford South wanted
you and not Jeremy Corbens Manifesto. And so he used to post his majority on his Twitter.
He was like, I'd elected in 2017 with a majority of 10,000.
And now he's polling at like, I don't know, 50 votes.
Oh, Mike.
Yeah, and of course the funniest thing about Mike Gapes is Mike Gapes.
Yes, folks, he does.
Endlessly gaping.
Friend of the show DeBesa asks, will Corbett nationalize games workshop and if so, will
we get to choose our faction or will it be assigned?
No, everyone will have to play Imperial Guard.
Oh no!
And also they're taking away. It's interestingly, the
Imperial Guard are no longer called the Imperial Guard. They're now called
the Astra Militarum, not because Games Workshop has a weird Latin fetish,
although they do, but because Imperial Guard was a difficult term to
copyright because so many different things could be called Imperial
Guard. And Games Workshop loves its copyrights. Like loves its copyrights. So under a Corbyn
Premiership, generic Games Workshop alternatives will be more available to all.
Lover of the show Willis asks, so how long has the Queen been dead for? Oh, um, the lizard people that inhabit Buckingham Palace aren't meaningfully alive or dead in any sense.
They're sort of like the scramblers from blindsight.
I would put it to the Queen that that which is dead cannot die, you know?
Yeah, yeah. You know, they're, I mean, the question is, are they great old ones or are they blindsight aliens?
And that's, maybe we'll find out post-election depending on what happens.
Yes, it turns out the queen actually wasn't a person in the traditional sense.
She was radially symmetrical and had neurons distributed throughout her entire body.
And while she wasn't conscious, she was hyper-intelligent.
Now we've got a question here from...
A friend of the show, Retro Vertigo asks, best guess is to when Scotland succeeds.
I mean, it really... I'm going to sort of default to something that frequent guest of and friend of a trash
future Tom Cabassay likes to say, which is that only suckers in politics are making predictions
now.
All you can really say is that volatility is up.
So when you say volatility is up in politics, what you mean is that the, if you like the, the bridge,
the bridge of predictability from zero, which is current things you're currently experiencing
now to the odds of something happening later gets much longer.
So a wider, a wider range of outcomes is entirely possible. So I wouldn't say that
I'm willing to say when Scotland could go independent, but depending on the outcomes of certain, well,
other elections, it's actually more likely to have its vote get put back to, uh,
the independence vote get put back to the people, and that could happen in a couple of ways.
So they could unilaterally demand it if Johnson gets a majority and then they would say
that the actual practice of Brexit has changed, materially changed the Constitution and
that they are going to do a second independence referendum, and that would get quite messy.
Or it could, a second independence referendum could be part of a Corbin Sturgeon agreement because
Corbyn is unlikely to get into Downing Street without help from Sturgeon but you
know you can so we can say that those two scenarios it's
are entirely possible but you know and also who can say if they would two scenarios are entirely possible.
But also, who can say if they would win?
I mean, a more sort of socialist UK that has more concession,
meaningful concessions to social democracy in Scotland.
I mean, that's less, you're likely to have a vote for a vote for Scottish independence,
but you're more likely probably to get a no vote than the more chaotic Boris Johnson-led option, which would be a the, thi, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, the, the, the, the, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, and thi, thi, who thi, who tho, who tho, who tho, who thi, who thi, who thi, who thi, who thi, who th, who th, who th, who th, who th, who th, who th, who th, who th, who th, who th, who th, who th, who th, who th, who th, who thi, who thi, who thi, who thi, who thi, who thi, who thi, who can thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thii thii thi thi, who thi, who you're more likely probably to get a no vote
than the more chaotic Boris Johnson-led option,
which would be a unilateral declaration
of a Scottish independence referendum
with a more likely yes vote.
So it's you can see that you can't meaningfully say,
well, this is gonna happen then.
What you can say is we are in a situation where volatility is so high, it's
better to think of what are the paths to these certain outcomes than what are the likelihood
of them.
Hmm.
Let's see, continuing on.
We've got wife of the show NAND asks, please explain how Australia has basically only
two parties in a preferential voting system while the UK UK has fuck a 15 million parties in First Pass the Post.
I can't say much about Australia.
I think the UK, again, it's very, very interesting because the legacy of the UK's parties are,
essentially like, there always have been the Tories, like as long as
there's been a parliamentary system there has been the Tories and it was the
Tories and the Wigs, the Tories and the Liberals, now the Tories in Labor, and the
Tories in labor, and the the different parties tend to be split from either the Tories or whatever the
opposition party is. This is partly because the first pass the post system in
Britain sort of is built to favor the Tories. I mean before there were sort of
rationalizations that happened in the 20th century. There used to be boroughs of like
10 guys that would just like be bought off by someone who's never been to
that area to
just vote for them every year.
So and the story also of how we get so many parties now is one of splits.
So the liberal Democrats, they actually split from labor in the early 1980s because Michael
Foot was just too damn left wing. Just like Change UK split from labor in the early 1980s because Michael Foote was just two damn left wing.
Just like Change UK split from labor because Jeremy Corbyn was too damn left wing.
The difference was the people of the 1980s, Roy Jenkins and the like, people in the Houston
Declaration were at least minimally competent and weren't just like huffing their own farts
given back to them in a jar by journalists.
And so they managed to at least like have a party that always had a couple of seats, even
though they were sort of always awful and deluded about their own electoral prospects.
On the right, parties have tended to sort of split from the Tories.
That's sort of a new phenomenon. The parties didn't really didn't use to split to split to split to split to split to split to split to split to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to the the to the the the the the the the the the the their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their the the the the too. too. tea. ta. ta. ta. ta. ta. ta. ta. ta. toe. the the the the the their their their. theirories. That's sort of a new phenomenon. The parties really didn't use to split from the Tories.
But Europe just proved to be such a wedge issue
after the European exchange rate mechanism fiasco of the early 1990s, which is basically
a sort of highly technical monetary policy thing that I won't go into here
because it's just, it would take too long to thing that I won't go into here because
it's just it would take too long to explain and the payoff isn't very great.
Suffice to say that our association with Europe as we attempted to like align with the European
Exchange Rate Mechanism sort of insanely fucked our economy.
And this was written around the same time as a book called Britannia Unchained,
which basically was all about how Britain could become
a first-rate global nation if it freed itself
from the bonds of the European community.
And this has basically defined the ideology that has split the Tory party for the first time
into hard-right nationalists and pro-business interests and they've only recently come
together again as the hard-right nationalists have basically capitulated as
sort of sorry the pro-business people have basically capitulated to the
hard-right nationalists on every element of their relationship with
Europe and accepted the reconfiguration of the Tories a largely
Atlantis project. So you're going to see you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, the, to see, the, the, the, to see, the, pro, pro- the, pro- the, pro- the, pro-ifiguration of the Tories, a largely Atlantisist project.
So you're going to see UKIP stopped mattering, not because it was defeated, but because it
won.
It turned the Tories into UKIP, and the Brexit Party exists also to pull the Tories right
on Brexit similarly. So that's kind of the basics of how we have so many parties in a first-pass-the-post system.
It's because they're trying to influence one another by threatening votes in marginal seats,
and therefore, and thereby use a small amount of influence to change the direction of the big parties.
So the reason we have many parties is very different from the reason Australia might have might reasonably have several
parties. Also the other thing and also I'll let you go into one more after
this is that within the within the UK's political parties there's a lot more there's a lot more
variety so from what I can tell in Australian politics like the liberal the liberal national parties like the the the liberal, the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the's a lot more there's a lot more variety so from what I
can tell in Australian politics like the liberal national party is it's
basically just sort of one thing there aren't sort of different blocks in it
whereas earlier this year you know there's the liberal party and the
national party the liberal party yes right they're in
coalitions right so the liberal party right so the two big blocks the two big blocks so what they mean I mean they the they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they they the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the the they they they they they they they they the the are they they they they they they they they they they the they they they they in coalitions, right? So the Liberal Party, right? The two big blocks. The two big blocks, sir. What I mean is, see, I know fuck all about
Australian politics, but from what I can tell, the parties are pretty internally consistent,
whereas here, like, 22 Tory MPs were fired from the Tory Party all at once, for basically scuppering the Prime Minister's plans to get Brexit through, where, or like, their, to, their, to, their, their, to, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, toe, their, toe, toe, their, toe, toe, their, toe, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, toe, toe, toe, toe, toe, toe, their toe.e.e.e.e.e.e.e. toe.e. toe, toe, their, their, toeing the Prime Minister's plans to get Brexit through,
or like labor has like a far left, soft left, and like a right wing that have been consistently at war,
and have essentially been different parties who wear the same colored rosette.
So I'd say that the UK politics, because there are so many discrete fights to have,
tends to fracture along many different lines, but resolve in a first-past-the-post system.
Whereas it seems like in Australian politics, there just aren't as many fights to have,
although I do despair for your labor party because I wonder where your left is. Yeah, yeah, they have a way of consuming people from
the left who say, well if I want to do something to pull anything in the country
to the left I need to, there's the whole fallacy of, well if you want to change
anything you have to be in power to do it, therefore it's only worth joining a party
that already has power, there, I will join the Labor Party
because they're theoretically the center left party.
And then you join the Labor Party
and their powerful right faction
then goes to the party conference every year
and says, we will be punishing refugees.
And once it's been voted on to the party conference,
everybody is obliged to vote in favor of that policy for the entire year.
So basically, just lots of people who join up saying, hey, I'm going to make a difference.
And as soon as they get in there, they go, there will be no differences.
I think, I mean, is the Labor Party in Australia, is it a mass membership party,
like the labor party here, where you could sign up and like vote on the policies and elect the leader and this
things of that nature? Yes there's there's kind of a split between how much of
a like on various things like voting for the leader of the party there is a
certain percentage of that vote that goes to rank and file members and then
another amount of the vote that comes from like office holders. Oh my god, office holders. No, that's the
Australian word for it. There's a burp in the middle of it? So yeah, it's
it's depressing is the short answer. But yes, this whole thing of like people
saying, oh well you can't vote for the Greens because they're not in office so they can't do anything and it's like. oh oh oh oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, tho, tho, tho, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, tho, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, th, th, th, th, th, th, th th, th, th, tho, tho, that's that's that's that's tho, that's that's tho, that's that's that's tho, the the the the the the the the tho. the the thoomoomorrow, tho. that's tho, oh, oh, oh well, you can't vote for the Greens because they're not in office,
so they can't do anything. And it's like, yeah, that's almost like that's the voting part.
Like if all the people who looked at a particular political party with a stance and said, oh, I'd
vote for them but I'd be throwing my vote away because they're not in power, if all the people who had that thought all actually voted for that party th th th th th th thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi thi's thi's thi's thi, so thi. So thi. So thi. So thi. So thi. So thi. so thi thi thi thi thi th so th so th so th so th so th so th so th so th so th so th so th so th so th so thi thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi. thiiiiiiiiiiiii. thii's thii. thi's thi. thi's thi, thi, 'd vote for them but I'd be throwing my vote away because they're not in power.
If all the people who had that thought all actually voted for that party, how much would
the situation change?
But instead people seem to do this kind of precluding of the result by saying, well if they're
not currently in party, I cannot see a future in which they would be.
Well, I mean, one of the big things that happened, right, was that there were these moments
in recent UK history that caused mass class consciousness among like large groups of people.
So, like for example, the, the, when the coalition happened in 2010, they were, when they raised the, they promised not to raise tuition fees and they raised them by 6 by by 6 by 6 by 6 by 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6, their their their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their, their raised the they promised not to raise tuition fees and they raised them by six thousand pounds.
There was a mass movement of students that was like ended up being the germ of the of the
larger movement that sort of brought Jeremy Corbine to power in the labor party and hopefully
we'll be bringing him to power in the country in the next couple weeks.
where like it is it was a mass protest movement
that then got, that then made tons of people who are now in their like, you know, mid to late
20s and early 30s realize that they had a stake in and could change politics.
And, you know, this is the beginning of like all of the sort of the young left candidates,
the young left intellectuals and stuff, like the mass movement politics in the UK.
I mean, it's not the beginning of mass movement politics in the UK, obviously, but it's
the beginning, it was the beginning of like this wave of it. So if you want your labor party to be changed, like, their contradiction. You need an event that causes a mass mass mass mass a mass mass mass mass mass mass a mass mass mass mass mass, the mass, that, tha, tha, tha, the, the, the, the, threat, threat, threat, threat, threat, threat, the, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, the, and, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, theen the contradictions, you need an event that causes a mass outbreak of class consciousness among Australian people, most likely
younger Australian people. We should probably stick a pin on it there, I think.
Hey, stick a pin right in all of those questions and answers. Yes.
So thanks for coming back.
I'm going to jam this back into the show, and then we're going to shift the big gear stick, and we'll
be right back into the part that we didn't have any problems with.
So thank you again, Riley, and we'll hear from you in like two seconds.
The polls in Britain are looking pretty good.
We have, we are closing it on the conservative party.
We're actually nearer to the conservative lead than we were in 2017.
Like, even the polls that traditionally undercount labor are already predicting a hung parliament.
Don't get excited excited like we did.
Nothing good ever happens.
Good things aren't possible.
I tend to like only look at polls for direction of travel, not for point of travel,
but the excitement, the crowd size, the social media engagement and shit.
Like, conservative MPs and candidates can't go anywhere without getting
like booed by everyone in town.
Like, they're constantly being run out of wherever they go outside of like the Tory
Heartland Shires around London. So, like, I'm not saying that things are looking good,
but we are currently campaigning in a position of strength.
And if everyone focuses and keeps knocking on doors
with their constituency parties, and keeps telling people
that labor has the positive message for us to win,
that all of these policies that the BBC have said are hopelessly complicated,
like the Brexit policy, which is just taken off the peg deal and put it back to the people in a referendum, are hopelessly complicated.
These aren't hopelessly complicated. You can explain them. You can win people around. You
can win your friends' round. You can go knock on doors for all the British Buntivista
listeners. Like, it's out there for us to win and it's within reach and it's more within reach than it was in 2017. So we have to keep going.
Uh, fingers crossed.
I'm going to vote for him twice.
Yeah.
All right.
So, actually, the daily mail invented a scandal
around someone of like some university student on Facebook saying, vote labor early and
vote labor often, being like, how deep does the criminal conspiracy go? There were multiple articles about it.
Oh there was also there's also all of the news about all the increased voter
registration as well right? I think like two two and a half million increased
voter more voters before the thanks stormy. And then and then of course
going back to the stuff
around the BBC, the stuff that the BBC was running on its social media
channels in the hours before the closing of voter registration was like, isn't
politics just shitty sometimes? What do you like more than politics? Answer here.
And people were like, hey, rather than politics, wouldn't you have an extra episode of,
The Kardashians?
That's it.
That's that's voter engagement.
It's like, I'm not a conspiracy theorist about the BBC,
but I have to make an effort to not be.
Yeah, they make it hard.
Yeah, and as I've seen people point out, like, there is a,
there is a difference between this idea of like, there's a massive conspiracy to control
this entire arm of our media, which again, very similar to Australia with the ABC, where, you know,
there are people who very clearly think, like a lot of, say, boomer-aged,
you know, center-left people, who think that there is like a conspiracy by which the Prime
Minister's office is contacting the ABC and like directly telling them which stories to run
and that kind of thing. But there's a difference between that, which would be a very legitimate
conspiracy theory,
versus the realities of a publicly funded institution, which needs to be protected by the electorate.
Because what happens if nobody external to that shows any interest in it is,
that the people who get to exert external pressure are the people who are deciding on how much funding it gets.
And you know, it's probably a good analogy to the NHS, where if it's a publicly funded
thing and you've had a conservative government for a while, they can just set about doing
things like, you know, appointing people who are favorable to their ideology, to different positions in editorial and boards and that kind of thing,
but they can also do things like, you know, successive rounds of reducing funding,
so that then, when the ABC does something like they have had to do, like, say,
we will know, you know, we're not going to cover the Olympics.
They've said they aren't going to cover the Olympics on their radio broadcast because
they had their funding reduced by like $700 million last year.
And in turn, you immediately see conservative commentators turn around and say, oh, well if the
public broadcaster isn't going to cover the Olympics, what's the point in even having them?
And it's just the classic conservative thing of chip away at the funding for a thing,
note that the quality of the services has been reduced, or the expanse of the services
has been reduced, and then complain that, you know, why are we giving all this money to
a thing that we aren't getting the best possible results out of.
Classic move, very NHS. You'll love to see it. Can I do one more thing before we move on, which, which, which, which, which, which, which, which, which, which that, which that, which the that, which the the the the the th th th th th the th th th the th the the the the th the the the the quality the quality the quality the quality the quality the quality the quality the quality the quality the quality that that that that that that that the quality the quality the quality the quality the quality the quality the quality the quality the quality the quality the quality the quality the quality the quality the quality the quality the the the the the the the the the the th th th th th th th th th th th th. th. thi, thi, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, that, note that, note that, note that, that, note the quality of that, note NHS, you love to see it.
Can I do one more thing before we move on, which is that Britain is doing another twist
on this? Which is that channel... I will just say, I'll let it around this stuff, but we've
kind of done an hour already, so I think that we should just keep going and then just
have it be an election special. Nice. So channel 4 hosted a climate debate, like a debate specifically on climate, and Boris Johnson
and Noddell Farage declined to attend, and so they were empty chaired, so like, they were two
melting ice sculptures in their place and now so they
actually did the ice sculptures I read this but I didn't know if it was a
jerk unfortunately it wasn't ice sculptures of Boris Johnson and Nigel Farage
it was just ice sculptures of a globe it'd be way cooler if it was a
much more awesome be awesome but no unfortunately it was just globes
and uh and now i the conservative government is re-elected,
they're going to review Channel 4's license to continue broadcasting.
Cool.
So, yeah.
That they basically, they didn't ac- because they were going to send like, not the leader,
because it was a leader's debate, they were going to send Michael Gove, who's like, tried
to be leader three times, failed, and then just was Defra, so the environment secretary,
they were going to, no, you can talk to our environment secretary, all the other leaders the leader, and they were like, nope, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, it, the, the, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, they're, they're, they're, they're, thi, thi, they're, they're, they're, they, they, they, they, they, they, they, and they, and they, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, so, so, and, so, so, and, so, so, th, th, th other leaders are conducting the environment secretary. And they were like, nope, it's going to be the leader.
And they didn't budge.
And now Boris Johnson's like, well, if we get back into power, your license is being reviewed.
So...
Very unsubtle stuff.
Deeply und-
Well, they don't need to be subtle. Like, they just have the power to do what they want they to do to do to do to do to do to do to do to do to do to do to do to do to do to do to do to do to do to do to do their their their to do to do to do to do to do to do to do to do to do to do to do their to do to do to do to do to do to do to do to do to to to to to to to to to to be to be to be to be to be to be to be to be to be to be to be to be to be to be to be to be their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their their tooooome., the., the. the. th want to do, and 40% of the country is going to vote conservative regardless.
Because they all, like 40% of the country either is like a wealthy landowner or is a petty
bourgeoisie guy who bought his council flat in 1984 for like 10,000 pounds, like a 20th of its
value from the government, because Thatcher realized in the 80s,
she was like, people only vote conservative when they are property owners.
So we have all of this social housing, so let's just make a generation of property owners.
So every single person in Britain is a property owner, but no one in Britain is ever going
to either be a property owner again or access any kind of housing service again.
So she basically bought the conservative party this impenetrable generation of voters by
people who were just made rich under her when she just gave away the whole public sector
for like a tenth of its worth, which by the way is how you run a country like a business,
because businesses just sell all their productive assets for nothing and then rent them back from whoever they sell them to.
Yeah, so like there is just 40% of the country that's going to vote
conservative no matter what.
And that's sort of why.
But yeah, it's uh, and so we're never going to get to those people.
So what we have to do, I mean, this is true, I th the states I'm very excited for this to be true in Australia as well I mean you you guys
haven't yet had your sort of big electoral left movement but I'm waiting for it
is appeal to the people who are like understand that you're never going to get
those people on side like their material interests are with the conservatives
fine they're off doing their thing. to to to just. to just. to just they're off doing their thing. We have to just get more people on our side.
Well, they have folks. Fingers crossed for Jeremy.
Ah, hoping for the boy.
You can find Riley on the Trash Future podcast.
You can.
Available from all places that podcasts are at.
Literally all of them.
Pretty much all of them.
If you can't find them, you can go on to tw-
Complained Andrew.
Well, yeah, you can complain to me.
If you can't find us, complain at, at, I-L-L-L-L-Y-O-C-E-O-C-N, E-N, N, N, N, on on on on on on Twitter, on Twitter, on Twitter, on Twitter, on Twitter, on Twitter, on Twitter, on Twitter, on Twitter, on Twitter, on Twitter, on Twitter, to-N, to-N, to-N, to-N, tw, tw, t, t, t, t, to-I, to-I-I-I, to-I, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to-I, to-I, to-I, to-I, to-I, to-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-I, I to-I, I to-T-Y-O-C-E-A-N on Twitter. Yeah. But yeah, trash feature, check
them out, they cover in all this sort of stuff, all kinds of good things. If you're
in the UK go to their live shows. Oh actually can I do the quick plug before we go?
Please do, please do. When's this coming out? One day? Monday? Monday? Monday? Monday? Monday? On a day. tod tod tod tod tod tod to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to th. th. th. th. th. th. th. their their their their th. their to to to to to to their their their their their their their their their their their their their. their. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. to to to to to to to to too. toe. toe. toe. toe. toe. toe. to toe. to to to to to to to their their the is this coming out? Monday.
Monday?
On a day.
Tomorrow.
Well, if you're in the UK, then on Tuesday, our day, I don't know when their day is.
I'll peek behind the curtain.
I got here 12 hours early because I thought this was going to be recorded tomorrow
morning.
I'm still tromorrow morning. I'm still drunk on port. We are having a live show with Rob Delaney,
star of stage and screen, on December 3rd at Voxel Comedy Club. So do please come along
to that. The link will be in the description of whatever our most recent episode was.
So check it out there. There you go, folks. And as always from us, if you would like an extra bonus episode every week,
you can head on over to Patreon.com slash Punta Vista.
And don't ask us to do live shows. It's not, it's never going to happen.
It's very logistically difficult.
It's very difficult. You guys do live shows in the discord?
We live in too many countries. We live in too world wide wide. We're. We're. We're. We're. We're. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. the world. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. th. tho. tho. tho. tho. tho tho tho tho tho tho tho. to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to to th. th. th. th. th. tho. tho. tho. tho. tho. tho tho tho tho tho tho tho tho tho tho tho tho tho tho tho tho thoo tho tho thoooo tho to in too many countries. We live in too much. We're the pit bull of podcasts.
If you would like to write into the show with a question please write into mailbag at
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We should get a PO box for gifts.
Yeah, but then people send stuff to it.
They'll send us a mail bomb.
Yeah, you should get one of your enemies to get a PO box in your name.
Oh my goodness.
Find out one of your enemies addresses and say that's your PO box. Nice. Well, that's it everybody. Thanks for stopping by, and thank you, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, th, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, to thi, to thi, we to to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to get to to to to to to thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi, thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. thi. th box. Nice. Well, that's it everybody.
Thanks for stopping by and thank you Riley for giving us the old British update in it.
Jeez, Governor.
I'll clap.
It's right mental.
Oh, gave freebie to injured fan.
It's the only things I could do folks.
That is just a reminder to you folks if you would would like a Trashfut t-shirt, please
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We don't let the Tories take it away.
That's right.
Tories are looking to defund podcast t-shirts, and we can't let that happen.
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Bye. you the