This is the thing that’s really annoying me about this government (among many others). They are bulletproof, in parliamentary terms, yet they’re acting like they have a single-digit majority and a looming GE. Get on with it. Govern with positivity and pride.

One thing I really hoped for was a reset of national values towards positive service, compassion, national character etc which could come from not always shitting themselves about an election. Sigh.

Yes exactly

God, this 10000%. They're trapped in a right-wing media bubble and behave as if that media bubble will destroy them tomorrow. They could tell the whole media apparatus to fuck off whilst they do some really great reforms, but instead they are shitting bricks every day.

the simpler explanation of course being that this is just what Starmer and co actually wanted to do with power and now they've got it

It’s probably both tbf

I think what annoys me most is how unaware they seem to be that they were mainly elected simply because they're not the Tories, and yet seem bent on enacting some of the Tory-est policies I've ever seen (institutionalised transphobia comes to mind).

What if - hear me out - they are in fact exactly what they appear to be?

I will never understand the brainworms that made them think becoming a 2nd Reform would help them in any way, it just makes the Reform voters go “see even Labour agrees we should do what Reform says” and completely alienates everyone who wanted actual Labour policies instead of Reform bullshit

Not only this, but they've been catering to the far-right for a while now and the Reform poll gains have just kept going

Are Labour "advisors" the same people as US Democrat "advisors"? Because they keep telling Democrats similar garbage and some of them are listening.

Honestly, it really feels like Labour in the UK, Democrats in the US, and mass media on both sides of the pond, care more about *winning elections* than. Y'know. Actually doing anything after the fact. For gods sakes. You won! Now do your bloody jobs instead of obsessing over the next election.

Have people memory-holed the terrible election campaign Labour ran? There were concerns that they would be exactly like this before the election, because Starmer's statements and endorsing of McSweeney were pretty solid clues about how he intended to run the government. This is what Labour want.

It's also worth remembering that in 2019, Labour got 10.2 million votes, and in 2024 got 9.6 million. They only won because the Tory vote dropped from 13.9 million to 6.8 million.