Rest in pieces Beer Korma
A cruel man
On some level I will always have affection for Keir Starmer because, being a Britpopper, he is the age of my parents, their friends, and my friend’s parents. The faux chumminess, the pretence to interest in football and the stilted attempts at vegetarianism all summon up warm nostalgic memories. It is also occasionally an interesting intellectual exercise to try and find the good in a politician that you dislike (though this can often turn into seedy power worship).
But contrary thinking aside we must not forget who the real Keir Starmer was. The real Keir Starmer spent his time as a Barrister working assiduously to expand human rights laws to protect foreign criminals and spent his time as Director of Public Prosecutions doing his level best to restrict press freedoms.
He left this behind to enter Parliament where his career was first dominated by attempts to frustrate two democratic mandates – as Shadow Brexit Secretary he was part of a movement which coordinated with foreign nationals to try and subvert the referendum result, and the election of Corbyn by the Labour membership, which he and his lieutenant Morgan McSweeney worked tirelessly to undermine, often through smears.
Starmer came to power in 2020 during a Labour leadership election overcast by the beginning of the Cofvid-19 scamdemic. After winning the leadership on false pretences – telling nonstop egregious lies about his intentions – he spent the next two years demanding harsher and harsher restrictions in defiance of any economic logic or respect for liberties. He, with the connivance of bitter ex special advisers and the left wing press, conspired against Boris Johnson for having the temerity to be near a slice of cake. Whilst he engaged in this hystericism he also attended parties of his own where he earned the moniker Sir Beer Korma.
Since coming to power Starmer’s government has launched a full frontal assault on digital freedoms, both in the Online Safety Act and his ‘legacy’ of the social media ban for under 16s, whilst accusing opponents of the legislation of being on the side of sexual predators. His government plan to force ‘algorithms’ to give prominence to ‘trusted sources’ like the BBC. As we write they press ahead with banning VPNs such that there is no escape from the information environment he wants you to exist in. He has likened his main electoral threat to the Nazis by referencing the 1930s while discussing Reform UK. He has repeatedly accused Farage and others of being in cahoots with Vladimir Putin.
He was an authoritarian lunatic transported from the German Democratic Republic and you should not forget this when the PR team he hires begins the long process of changing his image in the press. For Gordon Brown the transition from universal hatred to ‘statesman’ took around four years (IndyRef). Cameron’s process took longer because of the Greensill scandal. Sunak managed his own within a year.
For Starmer I suspect the narrative Baldwin and others will try to spin is that he was a good man playing a difficult hand. Remember that this is not true. Remember that whatever economic challenges the country had, that Starmer went of his way to tear up liberties and replace them with ‘human rights’, like the right to be stabbed by a thug and handcuffed to bleed on the floor by the police officers they’ve summoned. That’s real Britain. That’s real Starmer. That’s why in the last thrashing moments of his regime he launched an attack on online anonymity and teenagers who prefer using the internet to watching Gogglebox.
If Starmer was a distilled form of bureaucratic evil in Britain, Burnham represents the banal backdrop in which they commit their crimes. That police officer who beats down your front door because of your online harms, well he’s an Everton fan first and a Stone Roses man second. Get that social worker who sends concerned Rotheram parents on diversity training courses on the Good Morning Britain sofa in between Noel Gallagher and are Jimmeh.
Burnham is not even Prime Minister yet and I am already bored of thinking about him. ‘Modern’ Britain should have died with Starmer losing an election to Nigel Farage. Our sins should have died with Starmer as it was in the days of Aaron.
