David Cameron lets his mask slip with 'do up your tie' jibe at Corbyn

[Denzil_DC]

It had been heading for a dull stalemate. Two men arguing over NHS statistics neither really seemed to have much of a grip on. Though it goes without saying that both David Cameron and Jeremy Corbyn were far more clued up than the health secretary; no one seems to have less of an idea about the NHS than Jeremy Hunt.

Then came the playground game-changer. In reply to a heckle from Labour’s Angela Eagle about his own mother’s opposition to his welfare cuts, Dave let rip: “I know what my mother would say. I think she’d look across the dispatch box and she’d say: ‘Put on a proper suit, do up your tie and sing the national anthem’.”

The Tory benches roared their approval and proceedings were halted for 30 seconds while Dave lapped up the applause; it isn’t often he scores an outright winner and he was determined to milk the moment. He ran the length of the chamber with his arms outstretched, before kicking over the corner flag and sliding to his knees in front of the main entrance to the Commons. Only then did he realise that he’d just fired a 35-yard rabona into the top corner of his own net.

Here was Dave unscripted: the Dave that Dave would rather you didn’t see. This wasn’t about his mother, it was about him. His values; the Dave of pomp, circumstance and entitlement.

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/feb/24/cameron-strays-from-the-script-with-corbyn-do-up-your-tie-jibe

Not the most consequential story of the week, but it does add to my sense that Cameron's unravelling somewhat.

I mean, John Crace, never mind Corbyn, didn't even have the heart to reach for the obvious riposte.

Put on a proper suit, do up your tie and sing the national anthem.

No, not that one. I meant, "What did your mother say about shoving your todger in a pig's gob?"

[Anarcho-Socialist]

1. Probably the most self-damaging thing Cameron has ever done

The fact the Tory backbenchers ate it up meant that they also own it. The class warrior tendency in the Tory Party has been exposed for all to see.

Cameron is obviously under pressure. He thought the City of London and the CBI's clamouring to keep EU membership would be enough for the Tory crazies to hold their noses and campaign to 'Remain'. But the thirst for power and opportunity is strong for the ambitious individual Tory. For example Boris Johnson would happily injure the interests of British finance capital in the short-term if it meant a crack at Number 10 Downing Street. Johnson feels he doesn't need to wait until 2019 as Cameron is under pressure now and his obvious rival Osborne is deeply unpopular. So he strikes and Cameron makes unforced errors.

Taking on the junior doctors is another unforced error, especially since you're talking about a workforce that Britain cannot do without. You're talking about a group of young and mobile professionals who are in demand from other First World countries. You can't exactly bus load in some scabs and starve the doctors back to work. This could turn into the Poll Tax and Black Wednesday rolled-up into one.

[Denzil_DC]

2. It wasn't even an original line.

He ripped it off from Telegraph hack Tim Stanley, who blurted it out on BBC Question Time back in September last year:

Tim Stanley says he has a “confession”: he was left-wing when he was younger and got suspended from school for refusing to sing the national anthem at prize day. The difference is that as Labour leader, Corbyn is a “statesman” and when representing people at a public event “you do up your tie, you put on a proper suit and you sing lustily”.

https://politicalhyndsight.wordpress.com/2015/09/21/bbcqt-wembley/

It's not been a fun week for Flashman.

His concessions from Europe have been a damp squib in the media.

His Justice Secretary Michael Gove took a flying dump on what positive headlines the EU deal might have garnered, once Boris had finished his grandstanding, by sparking off a spat about how legally binding the deal is that's meant Cameron's had to ban the Justice Ministry from showing Gove any documents relating to the EU.

The Treasury finally had to back down at the last minute in negotiations with the Scottish government and honour the "no detriment" aspect of the Smith Commission devolution agreement, having tried to screw Scotland out of £7 billion over the next five years.

The doctors' strike shows no signs of petering out.

And his mum's embarrassed by him, suit and tie and anthem and all.

[LeftishBrit]

9. And that, I think, is the whole point

I was at first surprised that he actually said it, because it didn't sound like something that the real upper classes would approve of saying. The traditional Gentlemanly code differentiates in an odd way between having certain attitudes and putting them into words: it is appropriate to look down on other people for wearing the 'wrong' clothes, having the 'wrong' accents, etc. but it is itself lower-class to actually say in words why one is looking down on them! Thus, Cameron's mother might well have told him off for being 'vulgar' if she'd been there!

However, Cameron is inclined to copy all sorts of stupid and crude stuff from his advisors and from the media, and can get really nasty when he does. I'm not surprised that this originated with Tim Stanley - horrible character, and e.g. one of the few British people who likes Santorum.

Another point, of course, is that if you have to resort to commenting on your opponent's tie, you probably don't have many convincing arguments to make on the issues!

[Denzil_DC]

10. There's an old debate-obfuscating tactic,

it was encapsulated by Linton Crosby as "throwing a dead cat on the table."

It can work as a desperate distraction technique, but used clumsily in the heat of the moment in inexpert hands on a trivial issue, it just leads to the reaction, "What the hell, man?! You just threw a dead cat on the table!"

[Ghost Dog]

5. Our private school elite’s dominance isn’t just unfair. It damages us all

Also Guardian today, a propos:

A personal spat between two men who attended the same school, friends since university, both members of the restaurant-trashing Bullingdon Club: that is what has become of the debate over Britain’s EU membership. It doesn’t stop at the Boris Johnson-David Cameron psychodrama, of course. Stanley Johnson, the London mayor’s father and a former Conservative MEP, takes to the airwaves to defend his son from allegations of careerism. And his brother, the Conservative minister Jo, deletes a retweet of their other brother, the broadcaster Leo, ridiculing Boris’s stance.

Dizzy? As the latest Sutton Trust study into the backgrounds of Britain’s elites underlines, we shouldn’t be surprised. It underlines the findings of repeated studies: that from politics to the media (yes, this newspaper included) to high court judges to film and theatre, the privately educated – 7% of the population – reign supreme.

More than seven in 10 of Britain’s top military brass had parents with the means to send them to private schools; the proportion is even higher with top judges. The world of journalism is dominated by gilded backgrounds: according to the study, over half of the top journalists are privately educated, with just 19% having attended a comprehensive. As for politics: well, half the cabinet went to fee-paying schools very few of their electors could hope to attend. Further, over two-thirds of all Oscar-winning Brits are privately educated; and while that figure drops to 42% among Bafta winners, it still remains completely out of sync with the population as a whole. Unless you believe that being privileged and being gifted are the same thing, then nobody can look at these figures as a fair distribution of talent and ability...

/... http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/feb/25/private-school-elite-dominance-damages-all

[Nihil]

13. Picking up on your last paragraph there ...

> Taking on the junior doctors is another unforced error, especially since you're talking
> about a workforce that Britain cannot do without. You're talking about a group of young
> and mobile professionals who are in demand from other First World countries.
> You can't exactly bus load in some scabs and starve the doctors back to work.

That is what "The Management" have been doing to the NHS for at least the last two decades:
bringing in cheap (+ less qualified) staff from abroad whilst raising the bar to ridiculous levels
for people in this country who wanted to be medical staff.

Even at the appalling rate of pay for junior doctors, it is still far better than where the "scabs"
originate and so they will continue to put up with whatever crap comes out of Jeremy *unt's
mouth - thus undermining the dedicated doctors who not only do their jobs but also protest
the injustice of the system currently dedicated to crushing them.


(Yes, I have many friends across the medical field and am yet to find one in favour of
the spreadsheet-driven strategies of "our glorious corporate leaders".)

[T_i_B]

3. Maybe Corbyn could turn up to PMQ's dressed like Liberace?

It would certainly be a refreshing change!

Politics is a business with a very rigid, very conservative dress code. Politicians are expected to be in their suits 24/7. I can't help but wonder if this is a bad thing sometimes. Maybe politicians wouldn't seem so odd to the rest of us if they were occasionally spotted without a tie on?

[Ghost Dog]

6. Here are some recently-elected polticians

at work in the Spanish parliament:

[Bad Dog]

8. Are you sure that's not Jon Richardson?

[Bad Dog]

4. Am I the only one who heard an MP telling Boris to tuck his shirt in earlier this week?

Corbyn's a bit sandally, but Johnson's a real mess.

[LeftishBrit]

11. Ironically, this may be one of his attractions to some

Many people are a bit fed up with seemingly identical politicians in identical suits, and may treat a somewhat unconventional or dishevelled-looking politician as possibly more honest and original: not true in Boris' case, of course.

[Bad Dog]

12. He plays on it.

His hair is quite often deliberately left unkempt.

[Denzil_DC]

7. Newsthump takes no prisoners:

Man who fucked a dead pig chooses to mock another man’s suit

Closely followed by:

Tramp to be buried naked after Jeremy Corbyn acquires new suit

In other news:

Boris Johnson wakes from 4-day bender hoping he didn’t do anything stupid