Is Ed Davey the Anti-Trump? We digest the Lib Dem Conference.

PLUS: A crazy 48 hours for Trump, even by Trump standards.

Naomi Smith, Alex Andreou and special guest, Cambridge Law Professor, former Lib Dem MP and former Electoral Commissioner, David Howarth, discuss the rising threat of illiberalism, and the antidote.

Including regular feature 'Grin And Share It'.

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“Of the top twenty least-deprived constituencies in the country more than half of them are held by the Lib Dems. So, when Ed Davey says ‘we are the party of Middle England’ it sounds to many that he means ‘the middle class’. This is the party that allegedly chose its target seats on the basis of being outside London but with a Gail’s.”

“The problem is assuming politics is about buying people’s vote. That’s an invitation for instability because you end up always disappointing voters - who feel they didn’t get enough or others got too much. A politics based on values that offers hope can appeal to lots of people in different circumstances, and is not all about giving you an extra fiver and taking a fiver off the other lot.”

“One of the things about Ed Davey is that what he says drives Reform UK party people crazy. And that’s good. Because one of the major rules of politics is to work out what your opponent least wants you to say and say it.”

“We need to be inside the new EU pact on migration and asylum. It is a burden sharing pact, but most of the things that people complain about would be solved within it: more information about the people we take, much easier returns, and an obligation for asylum seekers to apply only once, in the first country they land.”

“What we are seeing [from Farage] is sinister. Reform is adopting a policy of ‘national preference’ - the fundamental policy of the far right in France. I starts with citizenship. Who counts as a citizen? Who should be a citizen? If you listen to Le Pen, it shifts to dual citizens. Suggests they have divided loyalties. It then goes to a very dark place all about having ‘the right’ ancestry.”

“The gov’t has a moral responsibility to reform the electoral system. We are not in a situation where Labour’s partisanship over first-past-the-post ends up delivering a vaguely incompetent centre-right gov’t. It could deliver a far-right gov’t on 30% of the vote. It is morally reprehensible and irresponsible not to change the system.”

“I’m much more worried about the rise of fascism than the rise in autism. All this Tylenol stuff is part of a portrayal of Gilead, basically, where women should not work or participate in civic society, but be at home, pregnant, and enduring as much pain as possible, in order to support the white patriarchy.”

“I worry that all this forms a pattern of attack against evidence, a concerted attack on science, a sort of Endarkenment, an attempt to return people to a state of not knowing what to trust, in which Leader’s Word becomes the only source of truth.”

“This idea of ‘behind the scenes’ doesn’t really work with Trump. There is no ‘behind’. All of it is played out on the stage. Trump has this idea that he has to win the day, of a reality show, where at the end of each episode, Trump must be the winner.”

CALLS TO ACTION:

Subscribe to David Howarth's substack here.

Sign up for PBS America from the UK.

GRIN AND SHARE IT:

BONOBO BEBEH HERE!!!! :-)

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With Naomi Smith, Alex Andreou and Kenny Campbell.

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