Hi Tim I think you might have meant Simone Weil's jeremiad against political parties. A jeremiad is a long mournful complaint or lamentation. Happy to be corrected!
Do you mean the line about smaller parties? I genunely wasn't thinking of them, more the disaffection represented by small rightwing parties. Still, as you mention it, I don't think the Greens are above criticism, and knowing many party members, my impression is that the internal organisation can be deeply problematic. Nonetheless, it should be clear from everything I have written that I see them as an essential part of the minority government I am hoping for.
Agree entirely. The two major parties - and the media that sustains the fiction that these are our only choices - are all invested in keeping this charade in motion. If there are ends in this decades-long kabuki play, it is about holding power for its own sake and keeping the other side out. 'Issues' are seized upon as branding opportunities, if nothing else or a way of maximising donations from the people who really run the country - the fossil fuel lobby, the banks, the 'gaming' industry, the arms industry and the junk tanks that run their propaganda. 'Politics' is a play run for the benefit of the people on the stage (the parties, the media) not for the audience (the public). We're not watching it anymore because we can see nothing ever changes. There is no end game other than to keep the confected drama going. It's corrupt and exhausted and utterly meaningless. We need to tear it all down and start again.
Sing it, brother. Obviously, I agree, but the whole thing is really making me angrier by the day. There is such a tendency to blame the "idiots of Maga" for the Donald Trump, but Trump is an elite concoction at the end of the day and you can see the same thing happening here, in the ways that you've described. It's a disgrace.
I find the persistent asking /beseeching that I give Labor money to help them beat “others” shows an inability to look at their actions on fossil industry who are still receiving largesse from Labor I have written to Labor but ..🤷🏾♀️. No one reads just another plea for help .
This is happening a lot in the US too and I think it speaks clearly to the disconnect that is going on: big parties have become very good at extracting financial support through online tools, but far less successful at simply engaging with people at a community level..
Hi Tim I think you might have meant Simone Weil's jeremiad against political parties. A jeremiad is a long mournful complaint or lamentation. Happy to be corrected!
Got it, thanks!
Powerful piece TD. Please may we make it so this election.
Tim, why the unsubstantiated swipe at the Greens?
Do you mean the line about smaller parties? I genunely wasn't thinking of them, more the disaffection represented by small rightwing parties. Still, as you mention it, I don't think the Greens are above criticism, and knowing many party members, my impression is that the internal organisation can be deeply problematic. Nonetheless, it should be clear from everything I have written that I see them as an essential part of the minority government I am hoping for.
Agree entirely. The two major parties - and the media that sustains the fiction that these are our only choices - are all invested in keeping this charade in motion. If there are ends in this decades-long kabuki play, it is about holding power for its own sake and keeping the other side out. 'Issues' are seized upon as branding opportunities, if nothing else or a way of maximising donations from the people who really run the country - the fossil fuel lobby, the banks, the 'gaming' industry, the arms industry and the junk tanks that run their propaganda. 'Politics' is a play run for the benefit of the people on the stage (the parties, the media) not for the audience (the public). We're not watching it anymore because we can see nothing ever changes. There is no end game other than to keep the confected drama going. It's corrupt and exhausted and utterly meaningless. We need to tear it all down and start again.
Sing it, brother. Obviously, I agree, but the whole thing is really making me angrier by the day. There is such a tendency to blame the "idiots of Maga" for the Donald Trump, but Trump is an elite concoction at the end of the day and you can see the same thing happening here, in the ways that you've described. It's a disgrace.
I find the persistent asking /beseeching that I give Labor money to help them beat “others” shows an inability to look at their actions on fossil industry who are still receiving largesse from Labor I have written to Labor but ..🤷🏾♀️. No one reads just another plea for help .
This is happening a lot in the US too and I think it speaks clearly to the disconnect that is going on: big parties have become very good at extracting financial support through online tools, but far less successful at simply engaging with people at a community level..