Monday 11 November 2019

Farage Makes His Move

To the utter disgust of some of the purist BTLers on Mr Raedwald's fine blog, Farage has made his move.  An entirely logical move, and actually the cleverest use of the leverage he has carefully assembled.  And, as luck would have it, more or less exactly what Raedwald asked of him first thing this morning.  Everybody's been thinking the same the past few days - we said it ourselves in our post at the end of last week. 

Two of Drew's Laws of Politics are in play here:

#4:  The lines of logistics in politcs are short.    Meaning, (most) decisions can be taken - by the right collection of people - in the small confines of a smoke-filled room: and if they are decisive people (unlike, e.g. May or Corbyn) they can be taken quickly, in a single sitting.  

Neatly, Farage ensured he entered the fray with the shortest possible lines of logistics in the context of a democracy (more or less), his party being quite literally a one-man band reserving unilateral powers of decision-making to N.Farage, esq.  Doesn't get tidier than that, short of being J.Stalin or A.T.Hun. 

#1:  Never buy off anybody at a price higher than absolutely necessary.   One of the neatest tricks in politics, as in business, is to get oneself into a position where one can threaten to make the obviously stronger party suffer a severe but avoidable nuisance.  Then sit back and wait to be bought off; to exact a fat fee for the ransom-strip so cunningly acquired.  In practice this frequently works out much more lucratively than it should - in business, as in politics.  Just as most businessmen secretly hanker after a monopoly, (and criminals seek enrichment without time-consuming effort), so most politicians dream of unopposed election, victory by acclaim (vide both Blair and Brown in turn).  Their inclination, therefore, is to rush for the metaphorical (or actual) chequebook and do a deal.  

Fearing more inconvenience than is actually plausible, they generally pay too much.  What would Cameron give for the opportunity to recalibrate his own offer to the electorate in 2015?   What joy came to Tony Blair by giving Brown full and explicit control of both the Treasury and domestic policy?   Etc etc etc: this particular strand of human history has been playing on a loop since 4004 BC.

Though further and better particulars are awaited in the present case, it looks very much as though Boris has held his nerve superbly, and paid nothing.  And Farage, making his own calculations, needed the concurrence of precisely nobody to carry his conculsions through.

I expect much wailing and gnashing of teeth across the public domain at this hilarious development.

ND

16 comments:

Matt said...

Craig Whittaker (Calder Valley) is an waste of O2 and I won't be voting for him. No BXP candidate now either so spoilt ballot paper (None of the above).

Anonymous said...

I had to look up the Ussher chronology.
Nice to learn something new though.

E-K said...

I'm a bit spoilt. My MP is an ERG member and I also have a Brexit candidate.

I don't care so much about which party gets in rather than as many Brexit MPs as we can get.

The issue of the day transcends party politics and Remaining as-was is an impossibility now - all that is on offer in that regard is Hard Remain or Harder Remain.

E-K said...

D'oh !

Raedwald said...

Nick - I do feel for the many hard Brexiteers who are feeling tonight betrayed again. But I did warn in a previous comment here that those minded like me were quite prepared to use Nigel and TBP as a lever and drop him at will once he had served his purpose. Sadly for the true believers, that time is now.

This is a hard business, not a hobby or pastime. The wreckage of lives devoted to politics and service, men and women now culled from the Conservative party for being on the losing side, is not pleasant to behold.

There will be much bridge building to be done - after we win. If we win. Magnanimity will be the order of the day.

We are witnessing once again the Conservative party's extraordinary capacity for survival by reinventing itself yet again, as a modern, socially liberal, pragmatic party committed to a mixed economy, a tax take at the upper end of the national GDP stop (36%? 38%?), internationalist in outlook, wary both of supranationalism and unalloyed nationalism, with an aspiration to be the most business-friendly nation in Europe. That's a message that can be told to voters with the confidence of belief.

Maybe after the 12th the players can go out and the gentlemen come back in again.

Nick Drew said...

Yes, survey the scene at Xmas and, if in the position to do so, exercise magnanimity. On these pages I have more than once cited how Britain behaved towards the Boer after defeating him: with millions in treasure for reconstruction

resulting in the Boer providing some of the Empire's best troops and leaders (Smuts et al) for the greater wars that followed - against a nation with which many of them might have had far more affinity

david morris said...

Really struggling to understand what is meant by "hard brexiteers"

Jan said...

My local Tory MP who is standing again is a remainer. The other 2 candidates are Labour or Lib so I too have no-one to vote for.

This is Chippenham so please Nigel give us a Brexiteer. I agree with EK in that I don't care too much about the party. Parliament just needs as many Brexiteers as posssible.

Thud said...

For once I'm feeling mildly optimistic, I've forgotten how that feels.

andrew said...

What are the laws of politics?

Nick Drew said...

The are idiosyncratic, andrew

Drew's Laws !

andrew said...


Like Coles laws but less cabbagey then.

Anonymous said...



An interesting comment.

What if .... the gentlemen get voted into safe Tory seats and decide they don't want to toe the line. Will Boris withdraw the whip or will he make the calculation that his interests lie in a lie? So far he has done wonders with the Tory party's relationship with both BXP, DUP and quite a bit of the party.

One would think it was deliberate as he can't be that stupid.

What are the laws of politics?

In a FPTP system it is Durverger's law which explains the Lab/Con con as they say. BXP know this but still try to give the appearance of making Britain better.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law

Have to say going through GE2017 constituency by constituency, can't see where Boris is going to make his breakthrough having damaged relations with other groups so badly so far.

But there is still time on the clock.

Nick Drew said...

yes, less cabbagey!

I may muster a post some time

E-K said...

As long as it's not .... JUNK post.

(Private joke)

Nick Drew said...

I'm folding up with laughter ...