Election: while we wait for full results ...

 ... here's what happened in my manor (Croydon) in the Elected Mayor stakes:

Yup, at first glance it appears Reform dented the Tories a lot less than the Greens dented Labour.

It was an interesting campaign.  The Tory Mayor (whose majority last time was even slimmer) is a solid, worthy and honourable guy, who was dealt a dreadful hand by the outgoing Labour regime that had bankrupted the borough to what I believe to be the deepest degree in the annals of UK local government failures.  The least one could say is, he stabilised things: more positively, he made the best of a bad hand, broke some crazy impasses and has made some visible improvements.  But he has been subject of a relentless and dishonest sniping campaign (hey, it's politics), not by the official Labour opposition leadership - who publicly paid due regard to the fact it was their predecessors that brought the town low - but by a rather by the young woman councillor who eventually became Labour's (losing) mayoral candidate.

She's a bit of an object lesson.  She thoroughly suborned the widely-read local website, Inside Croydon, which started life as a fairly even-handed platform but latterly became her mouthpiece - presumably by her giving it a great deal of her attention including, allegedly (let her sue if she dares), leaking a lot of Council stuff to them.  She also ran a fairly adroit social meejah campaign; and put herself about the town bigly wearing bright red coats, to the extent her personal recognition factor was quite astonishingly high for a local politician.  She promised all things to all people (naturally) and there were no surprises whatsoever when Labour adopted her as their candidate.  Based on all this, very many people - and most certainly Inside Croydon (noticeably reticent this morning, haha) - bruited it about that she'd win easily, in spite of Starmer.  After all, the demographics of this "diverse" London borough seem strongly to favour Labour anyway, and we have no history of third parties whatsoever since the last of the "Residents and Ratepayers" candidates were elected more than 40 years ago. 

But here we are.  How so?  

(a) the Tories waged a fairly adroit campaign themselves.  (Running as "Local Conservatives" was a good start.)  Somehow, on our canvass returns, some bright spark took it upon themselves to classify electors into "anyone but Reform" or "anyone but Labour" - I'm not sure how - and voters got personalised letters accordingly.  The "abL" letter was signed by the single most well-known and admired woman in the borough, a long-time Labour stalwart and councillor of 36 years who has for decades been an omnipresent and ultra-personable networker at civic and civic-related occasions, and a tireless, nay saintly, and highly entrepreneurial charity worker.  She has long been vocally disgusted at the behaviour of said Labour mayoral candidate-woman, and gave the Tory her glowing endorsement.  In a 1,000-vote majority, I'm guessing her backing alone made the 500-voter difference.

(b) as reported earlier, Reform here are, in the immortal words of Father Jack, a shower of bastards, and certainly not sufficiently organised to take a fatal bite out of the Tories.  (Farage even cancelled a campaign visit when the infighting made it look to o risky for him.)  A better-run Reform effort could have made serious inroads into the vast traditional white working-class estate of New Addington (meriting 5 councillors - that's big) where even the Tories often have success.  At the time of writing, we haven't had the councillor results through, so maybe they did; we'll see.  But whatever, it wasn't enough to impact the mayoral outcome.

(c) as also written here before (in the context of the 2011 riots) the population of Croydon is quite exceptionally diverse and, unusually, no single ethnic group predominates.  If anything, it's black and Tamil, with Hindu and Moslem in the mix: but the latter not in remotely such numbers as make it a Green prospect (there aren't lots of "young unemployed graduates" either) - just enough to take a fair bite out of Labour in a close race.  Also, the Tories have long had very decent representation among all these groups (and the Poles) excepting possibly the Moslems - though we did have a very prominent Tory Moslem Deputy Mayor; and the blacks are very split between progressives and deeply, deeply socially conservative (= hostile to LGBTIQX+Y). 

So there we have it.  A story of just one specific local situation.  But it could very well be that local situations will be more of a factor in English politics going forward, than ever before. 

More on the overall results when we have them, no doubt.

ND

UPDATE - Croydon remains 'no overall control' - but that's a misnomer in this borough as the executive remains in the hands of the (Tory) elected mayor.  Though given that the Commissioners are in, because of the bankruptcy, even he lacks genuine control.  Other aspects:

• Minimal impact by Reform is confirmed but they did get 2 of the 5 New Addington seats (see above) 
• Kier Starmer's 20-something niece, parachuted in from absolutely nowhere with the ink still wet on her membership card, secured a seat (involving the deselection of a pretty reasonable Labour incumbent councillor and no selection process at all, needless to say) 
• Mark Adderley, husband of Nadia Sawalha, is returned as a Green despite being suspended for allegedly antisemitic remarks (and not just a few).

All good Toytown fun.

FINAL UPDATE:  here's the map.  Geo-explanation (see also above):

• the wedge on the eastern side is the mighty New Addington estate: when I was on the council, donkeys years ago, it was Labour's last and final bastion when the 'Falklands Factor' reduced them to a tiny rump.  Since then, Labour have retreated to the northern end of the estate - terraces of '60s houses & flats, 'diverse' occupants.  The Tories have worked hard on the trad white / mostly houses / right-to-buy southern end: we finally took it a few years ago but now Reform have taken over.  The only surprise is, that's about all they managed.
• The stripy top north-east sector is Crystal Palace and its lower slopes: it's gentrifying fast, with the result you see.  Labour being squeezed out accordingly, into ...
• ... the western wilds of 'Fort Neaf' (Thornton Heath) and Norbury, where I grew up.  NOT gentrified - yet - but look at Brixton!
• the rest: essentially aspirational of whatever colour or creed; plenty of successful first-generation wealth and easily recruited for the Tory cause, as can be seen from the colouring.  The odd LibDem occasionally sneaks in.

In sum: if the Tories can weather the multi-decade 'urbanisation' of the north of the borough while the gentrification spreads west and south from the top corner, there's no reason to give up on being politically competitive here; and the ghastly 8 years 2014-2022 when Labour had total control and bankrupted the place, could seem like an aberration.  Demographics, eh?

And something of a lesson with wider application?

Conjuring Putin's "Victory" out of thin air: a masterclass

Further to last week's post, Trump and Putin: making up war aims on the fly, I had intended to offer my own suggestions for an "Absolute Victory26" framing within which Putin can declare successful completion of his inane war, and call everyone back home for tea, medals, and of course a proper Victory Parade with real tanks, as opposed to the demeaning Dad's Army spectacle they are reduced to this year. 

In the meantime, something much better than my own poor efforts has emerged: a professional Kremlin strategy document [1] entitled "After Victory" on how to allow L'il Volodya his glorious day on the parade rostrum any time he cares to call it quits.  What, in bullet-points, are the declarations Russia will make that, they'll claim, add up to absolute victory?  It's referred to in the doc as "The Image of Victory" which pretty much captures what these PR men are up to.  And it meets my test of "essentially in the bag already", i.e. could be delivered tomorrow, if desired. 

I'll summarise here the proposed approach, which is quite evidently the work of some genuinely strategic thinkers:  

• 'De-Nazification' has been achieved by the deaths of so many Ukrainian soldiers [2]
• Putin has thwarted the West's plans to expand and prolong the conflict
• Victory has been achieved over a much stronger opponent than Ukraine - the "collective West"
• No longer will the West provocatively test Russia's strength
• The EU has been dealt a major economic blow
• There are territorial conquests; seizure of natural resources; a land route to the Crimea and the coast of the Sea of Azov (new holiday resorts!); and the acquisition of millions of new Russian-speaking fellow citizens
• A 'humanitarian catastrophe' was prevented in the Donbas: Russia has protected its own
• The Russian army is now 'the most combat-ready in the whole world' and has withstood confrontation with '50 countries'
• Thanks to sanctions, Russian industry has developed new capabilities and markets
• All this without general mobilisation!

Plus some conditional stuff relating to what a deal with the west might look like in terms of a final territorial settlement and sanctions lifted. [3] 

It wouldn't be hard to dispute and/or mock some of these if taken at face value - not quite the capture of Kyiv, or the expulsion of Zelensky, or, errrr, unconditional surrender, eh?  And this from the heirs of the conquerors of the Wehrmacht at Berlin '45 ...  

But that's not the point.  In its own right this is serious stuff: I can only applaud the competence of these strategising Kremlin PR-merchants.  They should be offering their services to Trump.  For a fat fee.  A 'Deal', wouldn't you think?

ND

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[1] One always needs to ask "are we be played here?" - of course - but this one doesn't have that feel to it at all.  There might be one subtlety: the doc is a signal to the West: "see, we have an off-ramp - so let's get round that table and we'll find a way to call it quits".  Maybe.

[2] Recall that de-Nazification of the whole body politic was one of only two stated war aims at the outset: so, silent here on regime change, of course.  The other was, ahem, de-militarisation of Ukraine ...  

[3] They assume Russia gets Donbas + existing gains in the south (parts of Kherson & Zaporizhia), but relinquishes gains in the north (around Kharkiv and Sumy): and that US sanctions are lifted but not EU

Today's elections: a small prediction

A subject we've touched on before is the stupidity of Starmer thinking that giving votes to 16- and 17-year olds will boost Labour's prospects.  Must have seemed a good idea when Team Starmer were plotting back in 2021-2, but the rise of Green and Turquoise tik-tok populism must surely have given them pause, even before we mention Andrew Tate and 'Amelia'.

But of course in Scotland and Wales, teens do indeed get the vote.

I'm betting Team Starmer will be analysing the demographics of today's voting patterns very, very carefully before proceeding with this particular manifesto promise. 

(And indeed Team Successor, if Starmer really is for the chop.  Though it it's to be the gurning Miliband, he really fancies himself on titk-tok.  For some reason.) 

ND

Polanski riding for a well-deserved fall

Whenever "Tommy Robinson" appears in the meejah it is customary to add "whose real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon".  But somehow it never seems necessary to add "real name David Paulden" to mentions of that remarkable political chameleon and all-round showman "Zack Polanski".

Part of this is to do with the meejah's unfailing instinct to be ultra-hesitant when contemplating a hatchet job on a new, rising political star who might one day hold the reins of power; and who even in the shorter term might not be willing to grant interviews etc if they are treated unkindly.  Well, Zach certainly qualified for this auto-deference all through his meteoric rise to prominence last year.  So of course did Kier Starmer, on an industrial scale, all through 2022-24.  Even Farage still gets a bit of auto-deference, and there's nothing new-fangled about him - just his remarkable lead in the polls.

But all these happy honeymoons come to an end.  Starmer was rapidly turned on with a combination of fury and glee by even the 'left/liberal' meejah: they knew they'd been duped, and he wasn't long in office before he presented them with plenty of pretext.    

And surely, "Polanski" has it coming soon - even when the Greens do well this week.

Because he's quite clearly a ... real piece of work, as well as being as slippery as a greased eel.  The Economist recently did a neat, gentle, but highly pointed mini-hatchet job on his being an "ego-surfing" social media narcissist-obsessive, and extremely thin-skinned and vengeful with it.  Have a read - there's lots going on beneath the surface there.  Clearly plenty in the meejah have got his number and are just waiting.

And there have been other straws in the wind.  A while back he did a podcast with the Rest is Politics team where they bounced him with a totally legitimate question on which economists guide his thinking on financial policy.  Clearly caught out, he blustered ineffectually - pretty damning for the leader of a would-be major party.  Afterwards, Rory Stewart let it be known that in the post-interview wrap-up, "Polanski" rounded on them and said (my recollection here) something to the effect of "Hey, why didn't you tell me you were going to ask that?  You know I'm just a showman: I'd have boned up on it it you'd told me".  

Is anyone surprised?

And for all his breezy hyper-adroitness on the stump, he's relentlessly digging holes for himself, presumably based on that thin-skinned egoism which seems to come with a strong aversion for being seen to back down.  He's lied about, but not totally resiled from, his "bust-boosting hypnotism" past.  And note the "not happy about unarmed coppers kicking murderous knifeman" episode of last week: he's crafted a clever-clever faux-apology but is clearly intending to maintain and even pursue the substance of his intervention.  

I think we know which of his constituencies he reckons this is a dog-whistle for (with May 7 just around the corner): but he ain't gonna get far with this line of sectarian adventurism before some hefty pushback. 

Have a care with the wording of any BTL contributions.  I'll let you know if this post gets taken down! 

ND

Trump and Putin: making up war aims on the fly

You don't need to be a second Clausewitz to know that wars of choice should have well-defined goals before even the planning gets underway, let alone the execution[1].  In saying this, nobody is advocating total inflexibility thereafter; but to launch a war without proper goals at the outset is just buccaneering adventurism.

It's a commonplace observation that Trump hasn't a clue what he's doing in the Middle East, beyond representing a vague, atavistic American fixation with Iran, and harbouring a ludicrously and dangerously false equation between Venezuela 2026 and Iran 2026.  To the extent he sometimes feels the urge to state one or more war aims, he's issued so many over the hours, days and weeks that it merely goes to reinforce his brainlessness.  (To its credit, the intelligentsia in the USA is gradually shaking off its paralysis of 2025 and is ready to call him out in scathing detail -  see this from the estimable Ryan Evans.)  Already we can offer his Iranian adventure as a perfect illustration of the principle given above: and we haven't remotely seen the full downside potential yet.

But there's another perfect illustration bubbling away somewhere north of Iran, where Putin still conducts his own ill-conceived war on Ukraine.

At the very outset, he articulated two war aims, plus a long list of gripes and grievances.  They were: (A) to "de-Nazify" Ukraine's body politic; and (B) to "demilitarise Ukraine".  In the same announcement he declared he had no territorial claims on Ukraine (sic), although it's fair to note that at the same time he was asserting that Luhansk and Donetsk were independent countries.  And of course he assumed that after his lightning war, there would be a puppet regime in Kyiv, Belarus-style, that would render territorial conquest irrelevant.

[In the runup to the "special military operation" (which was "defensive, in aid of Luhansk and Donetsk"), he had of course demanded that NATO and the EU shun Ukraine, and that the former must withdraw to pre-accession borders.  But those were hardly war aims: he hoped they'd fall into his lap at the negotiating table when Ukraine was, errr, defeated.]

Given A and B above, manifestly he has completely and utterly failed even by his own lights; and everyone in Russia knows it.  There has been no regime change in Kyiv, whatever childish political label he wants to attach to it.  And demilitarisation?  Pound for pound, Ukraine now has the best army in the world, a thriving defence industry, world-leading expertise in drone warfare, etc etc; and is reducing a vastly larger force to ruinously costly advances through unimportant hamlets at snail's pace.   Oh yes, and on the other side of the front line it is degrading Russia's mighty energy industry to a material degree; periodically grounding its civil air movements; blocking its ports; sinking its ships; and (in conjunction with sanctions) hobbling its economy.   

Here's where it gets interesting for the theme of this post.  Reports from fairly reliable Russian sources suggest Putin is under tremendous internal political pressure to find an off-ramp before the economy nosedives.  Those oligarchs still have some sway, if they conduct themselves cautiously.  One major thrust of this exercise[2] is to come up with some - wait for it - War Aims, such as can plausibly be declared duly accomplished.  Then it's "home for tea and medals" as we say in the British Army.

What, then, do we imagine his newly-forged war aims will be?  It's a serious question, notwithstanding  that sarcastic suggestions come quickly to mind.  

We'll take both kinds BTL - let's see what we can come up with to help L'il Volodya with Project "Absolute Victory26".

ND 

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[1] Long-time readers will know I often laud George HW Bush (Bush Snr) for his adherence to this principle when setting out to evict Saddam from Kuwait, 1990-91.  More on that conflict by following the 'Kuwait' and 'Saddam' tags on that post.

[2] Another is to keep plugging away at Trump, trying to persuade him that utter Ukrainian defeat is just around the corner, so why not tell Zelensky to surrender?  Yeah, right.  I have a feeling the moment for this gambit has passed.