Thanks!

I know you weren't!

If you want to catch up on the state of the Australian Labor party, this essay shows it's almost a mirror image of the Starmer Labour Party. (Extract only, don't have full essay, sorry)
www.quarterlyessay.com.au/essay/2025/1...

Nice on Lachlan I am after good sources on stuff going on in Australia / NZ atm.

Listening back, Alan's groan when I mentioned John Gray was very funny.

Anthony I just don't understand how you actually infer that from anything either of us said.

yes

This is me. I emphatically want to believe that most people, especially most Labour people, entered politics for pure reasons and that there are reasons beyond individual venality for them to act the way they do.

This belief will not survive contact with the current Labour govt.

It’s also that people who belong to particular, relatively protected, social groups really don’t want to believe that the right-wing populists are right about anything, and they associate cynicism with politicians and managers strongly with those people.

There's a certain resistance that comes from people knowing it is true, but feeling duped if that is indeed the case, and so cleaving tighter to the fantasy that it's a calumny on the very public service-motivated Ministers we're jolly lucky to have

This is a point made time and again by @jemgilbert.bsky.social - many people hearing it think it sounds facile, or even conspiratorial, but is better understood as anthropological observation.