Keir Starmer should be Britain’s next prime minister | The Economist endorses Labour for the first time since 2005

[u/extraneous_parsnip]

https://www.economist.com/leaders/2024/06/27/keir-starmer-should-be-britains-next-prime-minister

[u/zanpancan]

Eh. They seem weirdly dismissive of Brown's accomplishments with 08, pointing to "tiredness" & "scandal" as reasons to not vote for him.

They seem to favor the Cons for austerity while seemingly neglecting that Labour was going down the austerity route aswell.

The best criticism they have of Brown is his clear attempts to sabotage Blair's reform agenda for public services, but that's about it.

Debt and spending was large in scale and depth but I remain unconvinced that the resolution to this problem was voting in party that spent its campaign fearmongering against globalization, that too when its Eurosceptic fringe was becoming more and more prominent.

[u/YouLostTheGame → u/zanpancan]

You don't see how a party claiming that they will fix the economy after 13 years in power has any parallel to next week's election?

Labour had lost credibility by that stage in the same way the Tories have today.

has run a grim campaign (see Bagehot), scarcely bothering to defend his record and concentrating instead on scaring people about the Tories' plans.

Swap the parties and it could be written today

[u/Defacticool → u/YouLostTheGame]

Bit of a difference between a global financial crisis and whatever the shit the tories have been up too from brexit and onwards, wouldn't you say?

The supposed "good" economic arguments from the tories as they challenged brown included such eminent prescriptions like "we need austerity because an economy is like a household budget".

The UK quite literally would have avoided the almost decade long economic malaise suffered under the tories as a result of austerity if they had elected brown instead.

The fact that the economist was convinced by the tory manifesto with the charlatan merit as actual economics does not paint them in a positive light (it borderline negates their right to carry that name on the publication, IMO).

The fact that the Brits have a tendency to change government after economic woes without consideration on the underlying causes of those woes does not mean that it's therefore good to do so. And it's especially nonsense when coming from a supposedly data driven and empiric publication like the economist.

It needs to be faced, they are undeniably ideologically driven to a fault. Other publications are too, but that doesn't excuse the economist.

[u/YouLostTheGame → u/Defacticool]

Bit of a difference between a global financial crisis and whatever the shit the tories have been up too from brexit and onwards, wouldn't you say?

Like COVID and Russia invading Ukraine? I think it's notable that all of the G7's incumbents up for election this year are deeply unpopular.

The UK quite literally would have avoided the almost decade long economic malaise suffered under the tories as a result of austerity if they had elected brown instead.

On what basis? All three major parties were proposing some form of austerity. Budget deficits of c11% of GDP leave no alternative.

[u/Defacticool → u/YouLostTheGame]

Like COVID and Russia invading Ukraine? I think it's notable that all of the G7's incumbents up for election this year are deeply unpopular.

You think the Brits economic woes started with covid?

Do I really have to hand you a history book about the UK from 2010 to 2019?

[u/YouLostTheGame → u/Defacticool]

What do you think is common to all G7 economies that has meant that Meloni is the least unpopular one?

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2024/06/13/welcome-to-the-most-unpopular-g7-summit-ever/