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On various occasions when Conservative leaders have appeared almost sensible superficially – and other moments where they have come across as completely unhinged, yet continued to be cherished by their base. We are not in that situation. A leading Tory failed to inspire attendees when she spoke at her conference, even as she offered the provocative rhetoric of migrant-baiting she thought they wanted.

The issue wasn't that they’d all arisen with a renewed sense of humanity; rather they were skeptical she’d ever be able to deliver it. In practice, an imitation. The party dislikes such approaches. An influential party member apparently called it a “jazz funeral”: noisy, energetic, but nonetheless a farewell.

What Next for the Group Having Strong Arguments to Make for Itself as the Most Historically Successful Democratic Party in History?

A faction is giving a fresh look at a particular MP, who was a definite refusal at the beginning – but with proceedings winding down, and everyone else has departed. Others are creating a buzz around a rising star, a recently elected representative of the latest cohort, who looks like a countryside-based politician while filling her socials with immigration-critical posts.

Might she become the figurehead to beat back the rival party, now surpassing the Conservatives by 20 points? Does a term exist for defeating opponents by adopting their policies? And, should one not exist, maybe we can adopt a term from fighting disciplines?

Should You Take Pleasure In Such Events, in a Downfall Observation Way, in a Just-Deserts Way, It's Comprehensible – But Completely Irrational

You don’t even have to examine America to grasp this point, or consult Daniel Ziblatt’s groundbreaking study, Conservative Parties and the Birth of Democracy: your entire mental framework is screaming it. The mainstream right is the key defense preventing the far right.

Ziblatt’s thesis is that democracies survive by satisfying the “wealthy and influential” happy. I’m not wild about it as an guiding tenet. It feels as though we’ve been catering to the affluent and connected for ages, at the expense of other citizens, and they don't typically become sufficiently content to cease desiring to make cuts out of disability benefits.

However, his study is not speculation, it’s an comprehensive document review into the Weimar-era political organization during the Weimar Republic (combined with the England's ruling party around the early 1900s). When the mainstream right loses its confidence, if it commences to chase the terminology and symbolic politics of the radical wing, it hands them the steering wheel.

We Saw Some of This Throughout the EU Exit Process

Boris Johnson cosying up to an influential advisor was a clear case – but far-right flirtation has become so pronounced now as to overshadow all remaining party narratives. What happened to the established party members, who value predictability, tradition, legal frameworks, the national prestige on the global scene?

Why have we lost the progressives, who described the United Kingdom in terms of economic engines, not powder kegs? Let me emphasize, I didn't particularly support either faction either, but it’s absolutely striking how such perspectives – the one nation Tory, the modernizing wing – have been marginalized, superseded by ongoing scapegoating: of newcomers, religious groups, benefit claimants and demonstrators.

They Walk On Stage to Themes Resembling the Theme Tune to Game of Thrones

While discussing what they cannot stand for any more. They characterize protests by elderly peace activists as “festivals of animosity” and use flags – national emblems, patriotic icons, any item featuring a bold patriotic hues – as an open challenge to those questioning that total cultural alignment is the highest ideal a human can aspire to.

There appears to be no any built-in restraint, encouraging reassessment with core principles, their historical context, their own plan. Whatever provocation Nigel Farage presents to them, they’ll chase. So, no, it’s not fun to observe their collapse. They’re taking civil society down with them.