Here we fecking go...

On Wednesday 22^nd May, the UK Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak, stepped out into Downing Street in the pouring rain, stood at a lectern that for his height was oversized, and announced that there would be a general election on Thursday 4^th July. A fair number of commentators thought that Sunak looked pretty tense when he was making the announcement. There's a view that the optics of the announcement were far from brilliant - I'll comment on that later on in this piece. Meanwhile, on with the actual 'contest', that's if elections are your thing...

Note the use of quote marks around the word 'contest'. The reality is that it's a management re-shuffle in Westminster - one desired by a range of actors who most definitely do not have our interests at heart. Which may be why the managerialist Labour leader, Keir Starmer, is widely tipped to be the next 'elected'/appointed Prime Minister of the shitshow that's the UK. If for some inexplicable reason that doesn't happen, then colour me shocked! That will be down to a fair number of people not reading their carefully prepared scripts. Cynical? Moi? Guilty as charged:) Given what's been done to us since 2020 and the ongoing psyops that are being conducted against us, why would anyone still trust the official narrative on anything?

Anyway, the weeks until July 4^th are going to be filled with endless commentary, speculation, waffle, bullshit and most likely, enough hot air to keep us warm throughout the next winter. It's all theatre to make it look as if there's an actual contest between parties that have each have a genuine vision for the future. The old saying, attributed to the anarchist, Emma Goldman - If voting changed anything, they'd make it illegal - has never been truer. So, take the forthcoming commentary from the pundits with the proverbial pinch of salt. Also, bear in mind that this is the first general election in the UK since the lockdowns of 2020 and 2021 that so many people are trying to memory hole, so in many ways, we're in new territory.

Anyone who has followed us for a while will be aware that we're somewhat obsessed with election turnouts, both local and general. This is what we had to say about the (non)turnout at the local elections in Bristol at the start of May: Firstly, they turn their backs... 4.5.24.

Change will only happen when a tipping point is reached and things blow up. The people in the marginalised, peripheral estates have already turned their backs on the political process. What happens next is down to them. Suffice to say, a breaking point will eventually be reached, manifesting itself in a way that will shock a lot of people. I and a fair few others have been warning people about this for sometime.

As for the turnout at the general election on July 4^th, my gut feeling is that it will be a fair bit lower that the last election, when Brexit was the major issue. Suffice to say that once the election is done and dusted and the new management team have been installed at Westminster, embarrassing issues like a low turnout, a high number of spoiled ballot papers, or both, will be swept under the carpet. This is because both of these would be clear signals of a rising number of people turning their backs on the shitshow that's UK politics. Any acknowledgement of this by the mainstream media would not be conforming to the narrative, or indeed, the script. Suffice to say, I will definitely be commenting about the turnout!

There's an interesting discussion as to how those of us who can see through the shitshow that's UK politics express our feelings. Do we abstain or do we go along to the polling station to spoil our ballot papers? Spoiling the ballot paper is an indication of an active rejection of the system. There's a lot of satisfaction to be gained by scrawling NOTA (None Of The Above) across the ballot paper, folding it up and then depositing it in the box with a smile on your face. Simply abstaining and not making the effort to go to the polling station could be seen by some as a passive rejection of the system that doesn't carry as much weight as spoiling a ballot paper. However, it could also be seen that you've already decided to reject the shitshow and are moving on from it... I'll admit that I'm still deciding on which course of action to take.

If the powers that be actually care about turnouts, what would worry them the most? Would it be those actively going along to the polling station to spoil their ballot papers? Or would it be those silently staying at home, not participating in the shitshow in any way?

Spoilt ballots are at least something that the powers that be can quantify and analyse, if they choose to do so, because they want a picture of who's doing this. In extremis, as ballot papers have serial numbers, they could choose to track those who have made the decision to actively spoil their ballot papers. With abstention, the powers that be have, on the face of it, no idea of what those abstaining are actually thinking. However, all it would take is a polling station by station breakdown of turnout matched to the demographics of the area they're located in, and the reasons for abstention should then be blindingly obvious. Bear in mind that if the will is there, those abstaining can also be tracked. With Starmer very likely to be leading the new managerial team at Westminster, I wouldn't put anything past the bastards!

As for the optics of how the election was announced, standing out in Downing Street at an oversized lectern for your diminutive height while it's pissing down with rain isn't exactly what you'd call slick, is it? There's this interesting commentary from The Naked Emperor's Newsletter: The Crisis Machine Has Gone Into Overdrive 22.5.24:

Why not check the weather forecast before picking a time to speak? Why not stick your hand out the window, check if it is raining and delay until the shower has passed 10 minutes later.

The optics were terrible. The image was of a weak, wet, powerless man who has capitulated. Not exactly what you want the country to think when you are asking them to re-elect you. It’s almost as if Sunak was given his marching orders and told to give Starmer the keys ASAP.

Sunak doesn’t care either. He will be on the first plane to California with his multi-millionaire wife the day after the election.

Worryingly, when a reporter asked a senior member of Team Sunak as to why the election was called now, he said “Things have started to go wrong…that’s going to keep happening. You don’t want to be sat there in Downing Street all summer while they do”.

I'll leave you, the reader, to make your own mind up about what the feck is actually going on. My gut feeling is that something, whatever it may be, is up and that Team Sunak will be quite happy for the new management team at Westminster to deal with whatever shite comes our way. As would the range of actors that want that new management team in place. We do indeed live in strange times: Are things really getting weird? 10.4.24.

We can argue as much as we want about the way this sense of weirdness may or may not be getting amplified by social media and communications technology but that would be a distraction from looking the problem right in the face and dealing with it head on. We've become so divorced from the natural world that sustains us and in an atomised world, from each other, it's no wonder that things are getting weird. We're in danger of losing track of what it is that makes us truly human and allowing ourselves to be sucked into an alienating, digitised world where we're subjected to a constant bombardment of distraction while everything thing we do and say is increasingly monitored and controlled.

The short answer is that yes, things are getting weird and the forthcoming general election, particularly the way it was announced, is a part of that weirdness. It's going to be an interesting second half of 2024, that's for sure... Particularly if there's actually no decisive result and we end up with a coalition, most likely to be led by the managerial 'safe pair of hands' that's Keir Starmer. If that coalition somehow morphs into a government of national 'unity', that's the time to start getting really worried!