Brighton Sky Blue
Well-Known Member
Blaming the civil service for not being able to polish ministers’ turds while knowing that they aren’t allowed to defend themselves is pretty weaselly blameshifting.
Blaming the civil service for not being able to polish ministers’ turds while knowing that they aren’t allowed to defend themselves is pretty weaselly blameshifting.This is a good article.
He’s talking about his first hand experiences in running government day-to-day. In other interviews he’s hinted at speaking to Labour figures who have suggested that Morgan McSweeney is finding his experience similar to Cummings. All vague insinuations but interesting nonetheless.
The civil service is a problem and in need of reform (reinventing). 300 civil servants signed a letter to David Lammy to protest selling arms to Israel. Now, you might agree with this principle, however, this is another example of the civil service stepping out of line. Their purpose is to deliver the priorities of the government, not vice versa.
What is it you're advocating? It sounds like you want a totalitarian regime with no dissent
Don’t be stupid. The unelected civil service isn’t there to debate the elected government. This is a strange response because the permanent security to the foreign office wrote a letter in response to this was: ‘resign if you don’t like it’.
Governments are elected to deliver their manifestos and they vote on laws with all the other elected MPs. It is not the role of unelected officials to frustrate the government of the day.
Do you know what the civil service actually is?Don’t be stupid. The unelected civil service isn’t there to debate the elected government.
Blaming the civil service for not being able to polish ministers’ turds while knowing that they aren’t allowed to defend themselves is pretty weaselly blameshifting.
The civil service is absolutely there to debate government. They made an entire show about it in the 80s
How can you give impartial advice to someone without debating them?Simply not true. Their stated purpose is to provide ‘impartial’ advice and support the government implementing their priorities.
How can you give impartial advice to someone without debating them?
Is this a serious question?
I’ll humour it anyway. With a quick google search, here’s a neat table showing the differences (attached).
On the specific issue I raised, 300 civil servants were trying to lobby the minister to take a specific course of action and to promote a specific viewpoint. It wasn’t impartial advice and ultimately, breaching the civil service code. So the permanent secretary was right to tell these civil servants that if they didn’t like it, they could always resign and give up their gold plated pensions.
Their job is to implement the will of the government who was elected by us.
"Every week in London and across Britain, people openly marched demanding a second Holocaust."
asking people to take anything said in that article as credible or genuine is nuts. Bloke has gone off the reservation and resorted to writing clickbait for a paycheque. Come on!
This is a bizarre hit and run, but to suggest that the tens (if not hundreds) of thousands of British people who marched for a ceasefire in Gaza were actually calling for a "second Holocaust" is clearly insane.Have you ever thought about the implications are of the following chants regularly heard at these protests?
“From the river to the sea”
“From London to Gaza, globalise the intifada!”
Or regular calls for jihad and ‘allahu Akbar’ on the streets.
Even the merchandise you see people wearing at the marches has the Palestinian flag over the shape of Israel. These people aren’t calling for a two-state solution. For example, Hizb ut-Tahrir is a group regularly in attendance and they are a proscribed terrorist group in many Middle East countries.
There are many well meaning people at these marches but anyone denying that there is some dark and sinister undertones at these protests is either naive or hasn’t been paying attention.
Before we continue, I don’t want to get drawn into a wider debate about the Palestine/Israel conflict.
Before we continue, I don’t want to get drawn into a wider debate about the Palestine/Israel conflict.
Don't refer to articles as 'interesting' when they post inflammatory sh*te on the subject, then. FFS!
Israel has, frankly, ethnic cleansing intent and doesn’t even hide it in what they say.There’s a lot more to the article than the one quote you picked out in a separate issue.
Particularly when you’re wrong that there because there are people from groups that are proscribed terrorist groups (in other countries) at these protests who have, frankly, genocidal intent and don’t even hide it in what they say.
Israel has, frankly, ethnic cleansing intent and doesn’t even hide it in what they say.
There’s a lot more to the article...
It depends on where you think free speech should be restricted if at all. I don’t agree with either side to be clear.Suppose that’s true, does it make it right for people on UK streets to call for the same thing? Two wrongs don’t make a right.
It was one quote by Dominic Cummings and frankly, doesn’t invalidate what he said because is at least partly true.
If there were large scale pro-Israel protests specifically calling for global holy war and calling for the eradication of the Palestinians… I’d want them them arrested.
With respect, I don’t fancy seeing global conflicts play out on British streets.
That seems unlikely while we're supplying arms to one side, training their troops and sending our own armed forces to the region to support them.With respect, I don’t fancy seeing global conflicts play out on British streets.
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Did right wingers just not leave their bedrooms for the last 14 years? It’s like they’ve only just noticed they turned the country to shit.
Cummings is an unelected civil servant who alienated nearly everyone he worked in during his time in government, and now - shock! - believes that everyone else was the problem and sacking the unelected civil servants who hated him would fix everything. He failed to display any kind of effective leadership during the first historic test of the Johnson premiership and crashed out in the most humiliating and public way imaginable, torpedoing public confidence in the government during a public health crisis. Since then the chip on his shoulder has become the size of the Angel of the North, and he's reduced to firing out tired variations of the same Substack posts he was posting years ago, pockmarked with the conspiracy-adjacent garbage, pseudo-intellectual Reddit-speak and thinly veiled xenophobia that plays well on the remote corners of the internet where he's still taken remotely seriously.
Go and have a look at the civil service codeSimply not true. Their stated purpose is to provide ‘impartial’ advice and support the government implementing their priorities. Even if it were true, who gave them this power? They weren’t elected and they can’t be removed from their posts.
The 80s is also a poor example to use given how transformative the Thatcher years were.
Must have been all the NPCs' faultIts not just that, in his time he shut the vast majority of the economy down, made it illegal to have your girlfriend stop the night or have too many people at a picnic, perhaps the greatest show of state power since the war, then whines he can’t get anything done.
It must be remembered that the smart arse got easily outwitted by "the trolley" (Boris Johnson) once he was no longer usefulCummings is an unelected civil servant who alienated nearly everyone he worked in during his time in government, and now - shock! - believes that everyone else was the problem and sacking the unelected civil servants who hated him would fix everything. He failed to display any kind of effective leadership during the first historic test of the Johnson premiership and crashed out in the most humiliating and public way imaginable, torpedoing public confidence in the government during a public health crisis. Since then the chip on his shoulder has become the size of the Angel of the North, and he's reduced to firing out tired variations of the same Substack posts he was posting years ago, pockmarked with the conspiracy-adjacent garbage, pseudo-intellectual Reddit-speak and thinly veiled xenophobia that plays well on the remote corners of the internet where he's still taken remotely seriously.
Must have been all the NPCs' fault
It depends on where you think free speech should be restricted if at all. I don’t agree with either side to be clear.
As for Cummings, I agree with parts of the speech promoting science and technology, I disagree with other parts (eg ‘fake schools, fake exams etc etc’). What he’s written on the US is comical given that the Trump regime is now cracking down on free expression in ways no president previously dared.
I dunno, the piece gives strong ‘we’ve had enough of experts’ vibes to me.
It must be remembered that the smart arse got easily outwitted by "the trolley" (Boris Johnson) once he was no longer useful
Go and have a look at the civil service code
That seems unlikely while we're supplying arms to one side, training their troops and sending our own armed forces to the region to support them.
No one here is a 'grooming gang apologist' ffs. Piss off with that shit.
Boris ran rings around him. Carrie ran rings around him ffs!100% - he was a like a jilted bride for the duration of the Tory government. He’s on a v different crusade now.
Would many people disagree with his assessments on Boris though?
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