When digging a hole, find your bottom

How interesting (this is presenter Evan Davies’s catch phrase on the BBC PM Programme). As usual, we heard on the teatime news (whilst I was eating a very nice cheese and tomato omelette) only the views of Tory MPs. I suppose right now there could be an argument why the Beeb might only be talking to ‘senior’ Tory backbenchers about why they may vote against the government’s plan for another lockdown. Perhaps this is likely to be more interesting to hear than what some Labour MPs would have to say, since most of them have it seems very little to say which actually ramps up the debate. So we heard from leaders of the Tory 1922 backbench committee declaring that their government was becoming totalitarian, bent on attacking our liberties. Having spent some of the weekend dipping into the Freiraum [Freedom] Festival, with a parade of lefty arty types also having a take on how the pandemic could—is—leading to a more authoritarian state (aided by technology) I found the declarations of rightwing Tory MPs quite surprising—for the use of the same language. I’m quite sure they’re not talking about the same thing. The totalitarianism the Tories are talking about is the clampdown on capitalism’s freedom to do what it wants, dressed up as the right of the individual to do what she/he wants. With the Freiraum set, it’s quite the opposite. As things stand, the deceptive use of the word totalitarianism represents a fear on the former’s part and an opportunity on the latter’s, since the crisis throws a penetrating light on the fracturing nature of capitalism when individual lives are seen by governments even of a neo-liberal ilk of being worth saving. Life before profit? Always the mantra of the left, and now it has become the focus of the war. Even Johnson is confused, as demonstrated by the stark warnings of his recidivist backbenchers. Poor chap. He is being forced to look deep inside himself to see if he’s got any politics apart from self promotion, and so far he hasn’t found very much of a foundation. Unlike Trump, who obviously doesn’t give a shit about individual lives (a bit like Stalin) and is very firmly grounded in his ‘philosophy.’