This is the logical endpoint of positioning, spin and marketing being all, and policy being nothing. It’s driven by the Internet in part, but as much by complaisant media-political class who indulge lies, and focus on palace intrigue and horserace. twitter.com/pmdfoster/stat…
Why is lying – actual outright lying – now seen as politically acceptable? Because the risks of being called out for it are so low – low likelihood, low impact. You just bluster it out, and next cycle everyone has forgotten it.
Why are self-evidently disastrous policies continually put forward as solutions when they are nothing of the sort? Because having journalists who care about and understand policy is expensive, and policy bores people so it doesn’t get the clicks.
I don’t blame voters for this. The first thing to remember about voters is they don’t have time or motivation to follow politics even 1% as much as those who have a professional interest. They make their choices on the basis of what they are told.
How could it be any other way? Only in politics do you hear the argument “well, I was lying, but they believed me so they can just suck it up”. You can’t sell a packet of crisps on that basis, let alone huge policy decisions. There is a reason “caveat emptor” isn’t
the rule where the seller has vastly more information and power than the buyer. Yet, not just in the UK and US but worse there than others, political accountability through media has broken down completely. There is no effective check and balance – and we’ll all suffer for it.
Like John Major, I think society needs to condemn a little more.
Originally posted as a thread of 7 tweets on Twitter on 22 May 2019. View the original thread.