Further Reading

Transcript

EPISODE 53

Hello and welcome to the Partly Political Broadcast episode 53. I’m Tiernan Douieb and as always I’m recording this show from London, the new capital of terror, which will upset Transylvania somewhat, and let me tell you, I’m cowed right now. Really bloody cowed and afraid. By that I mean I’ve had a glass of milk and I’m really not sure if it’d gone off or not.

Yes last week there was a violent assault on Westminster tragically leaving 5 dead including the attacker. A horrible bit of news, made all the worse by the news, and politicians constant inability to have simple human empathy and instead see the event as an opportunity to push an agenda. Fox News, a channel that generally would be more useful if it did just report on things small red haired mammals do, interviewed their terrorism pundit Walid Phares who said that one man had shut down London which simply wasn’t true. The only way one man could shut down this city of 9 million people would be if he kept trying to use his broken oyster card at the Oxford Circus ticket barrier during rush hour on a Friday. They followed this by speaking to Nigel Farage a man who were he given a penny for his thoughts, he’d be bankrupt on account of all the refunds people would want plus compensation. Sadly Fox News did actually pay him in dollars and Nige obliged by saying that this attack was due to uncontrolled immigration, something he refused to retract when it emerged the attacker was, like Nigel is, a 52 year old man from Kent. I know, I’m shocked too. I mean Farage looks like he’s at least 65 right? Though to be fair, Emperor Palpatine also exudes hate & it’s done nothing for his skin too. So the big question now is whether Nigel will start trying to ban 52 year old men from Kent from coming to the UK, which might be tricky as most of them are already here, or perhaps he’ll campaign to close maternity wards to stop more British born threats. Though that’ll be tough as the Conservatives already have that angle covered.

After Farage, Fox spoke to the woman who makes Ramsey Bolton look like philanthropist of the year, Katie Hopkins who insisted that London was cowed, afraid and not united. Which wasn’t true as if a man with a knife and a car terrified Londoners then none of us would’ve gone outside for years due to the influx of 17 year old hoodies and celebrity chefs. Now I don’t want to get too home proud of the city I’ve always lived in but I’m reminded of being in Kings Cross station about a month after 7/7 when evacuation sires went off and a voice over the tannoy told everyone to leave the station immediately. You could tell who all the tourists were as they were the ones racing up the stairs in panic, while all the Londoners queued for the escalator then loudly grumbled about ‘more fucking delays’ and ‘oh god it’ll take me fucking ages to get home’. That’s how we react to crisis. But yes I’m sure many, like myself, were saddened by the attacks and sent our thoughts to those who were killed or hurt and their families but afraid? Cowed? Bear in mind that every year on November 5th we celebrate a failed attack on Parliament with fireworks and baked potatoes. This hasn’t stopped lots of idiots believing Hopkins and Farage but to be honest, if all of them are afraid to come to London, as a Londoner, I’d be pretty relieved.

ISIS claimed responsibility for the attack, but they are always so quick to claim things someone should really call them up about mis-sold PPI they might have. Actually police have said Khalid Masood, the attacker was inspired by terrorism, so not dissimilar to the TV series Homeland, and that he was a lone actor rather than a lone wolf. Presumably because a lone wolf glorifies and makes him sound more terrifying, whereas lone actor sounds like someone who’ll keep telling you about that bit part in casualty they once had but how they’re now just between jobs and you’ll quickly get bored and walk off. But Masood did use the phone app WhatsApp an hour before the attack and so now the woman who watched Lives Of Others backwards, Home Secretary Amber Rudd, wants backdoor access to end to end encryption messaging apps. Rudd still fails to understand that if there is backdoor access for security services then they are also open to hackers which is exactly why many politicians use WhatsApp to avoid that. Rudd says the best people to solve the issue were those who understand the technology and understand the necessary hashtags. No I’ve no idea what she means either, but I hope she doesn’t mean whoever came up with hashtag susanalbumparty as I’d definitely not trust them with getting messages across correctly.

Theresa May’s speech after the attack paid tribute to the emergency services. The problem is after all the cuts the government have made to the police force, ambulance teams and fire brigades, they’d have probably preferred it if she’d just paid them cash.

Oh and in a week where Article 50 is being triggered and the UK begins it’s process of leaving the EU, the clocks went forward an hour on Saturday. So it’s nice something is making an attempt to be progressive in the UK.

Phew, how are you? Really, oh sorry about that but I hear there’s a cream that should clear it up. Me? Oh thanks for asking, I’m dandy thanks and even more so because you lovely lot are listening to this, so thank you for that. And since Apple have popped this show on New and Noteworthy – yes I know this show isn’t new so it must be noteworthy, or a mistake – listenership almost doubled last week so hello newbies. Welcome and if you are new to the show why not go back and listen to some old episodes to indulge in reverse nostalgia where you hear interesting interviews about stuff people still haven’t taken on board or fixed and can dwell in remembering that ‘wow, things were shit then as well.’ Big thanks this week to Vicky who popped me some money on the ko-fi.com account and if you fancy giving me a few quid for this show, please head to ko-fi.com/parpolbro or for a more monthly regular thing, the patreon at patreon.com/parpolbro which I’ll be popping an extra bit of this week’s interview on that soon, plus a video ooooh. I’ll be honest, we’re meant to be filming it near Parliament on Wednesday but I suspect that may not be particularly sensitive or easy considering the past week. Well done me. Also if you fancy giving this show a review on the iTunes page or stitcher or attaching it to a balloon and releasing it so it can get stuck in a tree and make children cry, then please do that. I mean, if you are going to go to those levels of effort why not just go to the iTunes and review it there instead & save the balloon costs for some tasty snacks?

Couple of bits before we crack on with this week’s show. I had a nice email from Simon who I met at my Edinburgh preview in Sheffield a few weeks ago and is a podcast listener and he said:

Hallo,

It’s Simon here (the T1* dude from Sheffield). It was interesting hearing a Lords perspective on the latest podcast, and it put me in mind of a book called Against Elections that encourages sortition (like jury service) for consultative chambers:

I think it makes quite a convincing case and I’m part of a political book club that’s going to discuss it next month.

Anyway, keep up the good work and stop making old men collapse.

Cheers!

Simon

*Not a terminator

I haven’t had a chance to read it yet but it looks very interesting and probably worth checking out. I love that there are political book clubs. I can’t stop imagining people sitting round saying ‘well of course you can’t help but judge it by its cover, it’s called his little red book for god’s sake’. It’s the last week of March so I wanted to do a last few #trypod recommendations for you all. Again if you haven’t taken part in this, it’s an incentive during March to get people listening to more podcasts so if you’re on Twitter and want to recommend this show or others to people, stick the #trypod on there – a necessary hashtag – and hopefully it’ll get more people on board. Doing my bit for it, this week I’d highly recommend this lot – Cognative Dissonance which is a US skeptic’s podcast with a wonderfully dark sense of humour, the Prestige podcast which is lovely, sometimes super indepth film discussion, Cheap Show podcast which is well, as it says, a very funny comedy podcast about cheap stuff, the Weekly Economics Podcast which is a very useful 30 minute easily digestable chunk of economics coverage and my brother’s podcast Thanks For Trying where he interviews two mates from the world of entertainment while they get very drunk on free booze. Go check all those out and please do recommend this one too. Also if you fancy giving us a vote on the British Podcast Awards Listener’s Choice head to https://www.britishpodcastawards.com/vote/ and type us in.

Almost lastly, thanks to everyone who came to the Stand Up For Refugees show at the Lowry in Salford on Friday. I was backstage helping run it all rather than onstage for once, but the line-up was stupidly good and definitely didn’t need me on it. We raised just under £10k for Help Refugees which is amazing, and there are more shows coming up so check the standup4refugees page on FB for info. And lastly lastly, bit of a short notice this, but I’m hosting Stand Up For EU Nationals at Conway Hall on Wednesday which looks like a brilliant night raising money for the Joint Council Of Welfare Of Immigrants and has comedy from Sindhu Vee, Grainne Maguire, Shazia Mirza and me, plus facts about EU migrants and the post Brexit future from former podcast guest Ian Dunt and Phillip Legrain from Reality of EU Immigration. Tickets are somehow between £8 and £18, not sure why, and it starts at 7.30pm at Conway Hall in Holborn so please do come along.

Right on this week’s show I speak to James Devoy who is a Scottish producer and political satirist for STV and BBC Scotland on what’s next for the land that is the knowing haggard face of Britain on top of England’s withered arse. Then there’s Trump stuff and of course more bloody Brexit because if you’re listening to this after Wednesday then Article 50 has already triggered harder than an alt-right teenager when you ask them why they’re scared of women. So all of that, but of course, let’s not forget this:

HEADLINES

CARSWELL

Last week was full of tragedy as on Saturday the sudden death of UKIP was announced as it’s only MP Douglas Carswell, a man who looks like the nightmares The Muppets might have, left the party. Leaving the Conservatives to join UKIP in August 2014, a move that many considered was the political equivalent of stepping sideways into a bush made of turds, Carswell willingly resigned his seat as an MP, and then won a by-election in Clacton becoming the party who hate the establishment’s first member of the establishment. Since then he’s received constant abuse from former UKIP leader and the 1% of bacteria Domestos can’t kill Nigel Farage and party donor & human pedal bin Aaron Banks both of whom were incredibly angry that Carswell had helped progress their party and now are even more angry that he’s left saying that he worked aganst UKIP. I mean, I can’t imagine UKIP has ever needed any help in failure. Carswell admits that he joined UKIP to help run the direction the Brexit campaign would go but now says that job is done and to be fair if you can think of anything else UKIP stand for other than aiding party leader Paul Nuttall’s compulsive lying addiction then you’re doing better than me. Let’s be fair, Carswell never really did fit in at UKIP. Sure he’s very right wing and very anti-Europe but he’s never been caught saying something racist and he actually won a seat at an election so it’s totally at odds with the rest of them. There’s speculation as to whether Dougie will go back to the Conservatives or not, and while he says he’ll run in his constituancy in 2020 as an ‘independent candidate’ there are growing calls for him to call a by-election now. Whatever happens and whatever you think about him and for the record I do think he’s a devious shit who forever appears and sounds like someone who can constantly see ghosts, he did aide UKIP both by joining the party and now by leaving. I mean without any MPs UKIP truly are the party that, as Paul Nuttall says, represent the ordinary folk. Because ordinary folk have zero MPs too.

NHS

Do you remember back before the election in 2015 when George Osborne was in training for his job as Evening Standard editor by making terrible news for the headlines? Well back then Osborne promised the NHS an extra £2bn to front line services because he said the economy was strong. Well research by the Health Foundation has shown that £901m of the £2bn allocated to the NHS by George Osborne before the 2015 election is going to private companies because it seems the strong economy thrives on most people not remotely benefiting from it. The Health Foundation say the issue is that NHS providers haven’t had the capacity to deal with rising demand, why? Because of a lack of funding of course! And so what better way to aid the issue of underfunding than by giving funding to private companies who don’t pay taxes and send any patients that don’t get the treatment they want back to the NHS, causing the NHS to be further underfunded? Why not solve the problem of being hungry by giving someone your money to buy a sandwich to eat in front of you and keep the change? It’s almost as if every time Theresa May says ‘the NHS is not for sale’ it’s because she knows that no one will want to buy it when it’s completely hollowed out. The NHS are banned from hiring agency staff in April, and this is amid more and more nurses who are EU nationals leaving the NHS. So in a matter of months understaffing could be worse, meaning the NHS will have to rely on private companies even more. May has mentioned a UK/US healthcare deal so it could in theory get worse. Still on the plus side, at least Casualty will finally gain the edge ER, House or Grey’s Anatomy gets when there’s the episode about the patient who can’t afford their treatment and those one’s always win Emmys.

I’ve discussed the NHS and the crisis it’s in loads on this podcast so do check back to Episode 41 with Emma Runswick or episode 38 on the how Virgin Care really do not pay any tax ever.

NI

What’s the worst thing that happens if you miss a deadline? Sometimes I get told ‘ok but I need it in by tomorrow’ or at worst ‘the competition to win a year’s worth of custard is now closed’. Well in Northern Ireland, today the deadline to form a new power sharing agreement in government passed and…well one wasn’t made. So it doesn’t look like they can just slide it under the door in the morning either as neither Sinn Fein nor the DUP seem keen to make one at all, blaming each other for the lack of agreement. Sinn Fein’s Michelle O’Neill said the DUP didn’t have the right attitude which I’m guessing in Sinn Fein’s mind would be ‘let’s give Sinn Fein all the power.’ And DUP leader who has refused to step down despite the Cash For Ash scandal Arlene Foster has said that Sinn Fein ‘was not in agreement finding mode’ and she’d know as she’s clearly pushed all their buttons in an attempt to find it. So with the Assembly session to appoint and first and second deputy minister suspended, it’s over to Nothern Ireland Secretary the aptly named James Brokenshire, who says there is no appetite for a fresh election, which is probably true when there’s only really two main courses no one’s keen on to choose from. But a new election is one of the only three choices there is. The other two are direct rule from Westminster which isn’t very popular and somehow wasting a lot of time until he can work something out or the parties compromise. So yeah, number three isn’t really an option in itself but if there’s no taste for a new election, Brokenshire faffing about stalling for time is probably the best appetiser to keep things going before everyone leaves the restaurant unhappy. Yes it’s a shit analogy. Yes you’re right. And now there’s still no NI solution and I’m hungry.

INTERVIEW

You know Scotland right? The United Kingdom’s shabby beehive, the land of the brave but not other Pixar films. Ah Scotland a country that in 2014 voted to stay part of the union of the United Kingdom on account of promises that we’d stay in the European Union and they’d get further devolved powers. Three years later we’re about to leave the European Union, Westminster hasn’t handed over any of the powers Holyrood wanted, and you can suddenly see why Scotland is feeling a tad mugged off. And having performed to an angry crowd in Glasgow more than a few times, trust me, they aren’t the people you want to upset. So now the Scottish National Party, the party with the majority in Scottish Parliament want a second referendum, a secorendum if you like. You don’t? Oh sorry. Prime Minister Theresa May is visiting them this week to persuade them to stay attached to the UK despite all the love lost, like a friend who doesn’t want you to leave your dead relationship because it means they have to think about theirs. For Scotland to rejoin the EU as an independent country after leaving it as part of the UK in Brexit, ain’t as simple as just popping back to say you had to leave because your friend was a confused mess but you’ve got them in a cab now so you thought you stick around. So this week I spoke to James Devoy who is a producer and satirist for STV and BBC Scotland, and very much knows all about Scottish politics so that he can spend time mocking it. Exactly the right sort of person to speak to. Waaay back in episode 20 I interviewed Adam Ramsay from Open Democracy about Scottish politics and he was very pro-independence which riled a few of you up, so I’m pleased to say James is pretty non-partisan throughout as well as being very interesting, clear and at one point schooling me in my shit geography. Oh and I’m afraid there’s a quick:

EXCUSES EXCUSES

This week the thing I always record through that always works decided not to work very well and so some of the audio of my questions was ruined, however James’s was fine. So I’ve re-recorded some of my bits, which may mean it might sound a bit odd in places. But let’s be fair, I go to many places and sound odd so it’s nothing knew.

Here’s James:

And we’ll be back with James in a minute, but first:

BREXIT FALLOUT

If you’re listening to this before Wednesday then it is only a matter of hours before Theresa May triggers Article 50, which isn’t really a trigger, it’s just a formal notification of intention to withdraw from EU. Yes yes, I’ve spent about 10 minutes sniggering at that too. It’s amazing how we’re basically saying we’re going to stop fucking you because we need to totally fuck ourselves now. So May will say ‘hey we’re leaving EU’ and the two year countdown will start like an egg timer aiming for the most ultimate of boiling points.

Of course if you’re listening to this after Wednesday then you’re probably unable to hear anything I’m saying on account of all the celebrations and street parties as people eat their strictly British canapés…..oh…. and their cans of Stella and glasses of wine….oh. It’s going to be a bunch of people in the rain sharing a Soreen isn’t it?

So Article 50, then the Great Repeal Bill on Thursday then at least a couple of months before we even begin talking to Europe again unless of course we drunk sext it at 2am because we’re trying to forget. So with all of this imminent it makes perfect sense that Labour should jump in last minute as the ticking clock hits 00.01 to save everything at the last second, you know, after voting through the Article 50 bill and voting against MPs having a say in the Brexit deal. So yeah more like jumping in at the last minute and being caught even more directly in the blast than you were before which isn’t ideal if you’re divided already. Labour have said they won’t support the government on any Brexit deal unless it meets six tests. These are a fair migration system for UK business and communities, retaining a strong, collaborative relationship with the EU, protecting national security and tackling cross border crime, delivering for all nations and regions of the UK, protecting workers’ rights and employment protections and renaming it ‘Brexshit ps Labour are the best’. Sorry, I mean ensuring same benefits currently enjoyed within the single market. So as you can see some of those are pretty much what the government has said it wants anyway, with things like ‘same benefits enjoyed in the single market’ being that last question on the test that you never studied for and when you get to it realise your pen is broken.

Though to be fair Brexit minister and official emoji for contradiction David Davis said in January in the Commons that the government have come up with and I quote ‘is the idea of a comprehensive free trade agreement and a comprehensive customs agreement that will deliver the exact same benefits as we have, but also enable my right hon friend the secretary of state for international trade to go and form trade deals with the rest of the world, which is the real upside of leaving the European Union.” So either this is a clever plan from Labour to enforce a Brexit they want, or it’s a plan that completely forgets that it’s impossible for a deal that meets all six, so Labour won’t back the plan which some of them voted against having to have a say in, then May will go ahead and just enforce a deal no one likes and Labour will have lost even more favour with everyone. So we’ll see but I worry that even if they’ve got there in time to stop the explosion, that Labour will be cutting both the red and the blue wire at the same time. UKIP have also set their list of six tests but frankly any test UKIP set you can probably pass just by spelling your name right in the first place and they don’t even have an MP anymore, so they can fuck off.
A think tank has said that Wales is going to be hit the hardest by Brexit, as more than 60% of their exports go to the EU and losing all the EU funding. At the same time they’ll barely be affected by loss of EU workers because they don’t really have any anyway, as if you’ve lived in a hot country all your life you’re not going to head to a place that’s 99% rain and 1% rugby are you? Of course Welsh Conservative leader Andrew Davies has said this is all project fear because apparently anything is unless it’s projecting that Brexit will increase imports of unicorns by 6000% and we’ll automatically be pissing gold. It’s go petty. Only last week 72 MPs have written to the BBC to complain that their coverage of Brexit has been pessimistic and skewed. YOU WON GET OVER IT! That was only a few days after a number of MPs demanded, and were thankfully denied, that the Brexit Bill be printed on vellum because we may as well make as many creatures suffer with this as possible.

There’s currently a BBC Question Time Brexit special on right now and I’m not watching it because I don’t hate myself but I did watch a bit because hey, no one’s that confident and what struck me apart from UKIP’s Suzanne Evans having a voice that could attract bats, was how often the audience seemed to not understand that just because you want something to be a certain way, it might not happen. How long does that continue for and what’s the end game? Sure if it all somehow goes swimmingly, then great, but if not and we’re fucked and then we set fire to everyone who screams anti-Brexit heresy then we’ll have even less of an export and all the high tariff costs of firewood from Europe will destroy the economy. I did turn Question Time off on account of blood pressure fears but also hearing a man say refer to the money we may have to pay the EU when we leave as ‘just the bully in the playground taking your lunch money’ was too much to bear. I mean, do the bullies at his school make you sign contracts? They are damn advanced. Also Alex Salmond mentioned ‘exports of Scottish Salmon’ and no one shouted ‘that’s you that is’ or ‘are you going on holiday? So why put myself through that?

JINGLE: Can you guess, who this week is it, that’s leaving the UK because of Brexit?

Yes a new jingle for a new regular Brexit fallout feature. And that’s right, this week it’s Fentimanns! You know, the ones who make Curiosity Cola where you’re mainly curious about why it costs so much when it just tastes like cola. But their bad guy in a Liam Neeson film Brexit supporting owner Eldon Robson said they’ll move their drinks plants abroad if exporting costs became too high. Mate, your drinks are in bottles! Just pop them in the sea and hope they float the right way! But food and drink looks like it’s going to be in a bad way without a decent trade deal with Europe. The National Farmers Union, the Food and Drink Federation and the British Retail Consortium have all written to the Prime Minister saying they need a free trade deal with the EU otherwise food costs could rise sharply. Hey still, those fancy celebrities are always saying we need to get back into foraging and hunting for our own food right? And James Dyson says he’s very optimistic about Brexit. Though to be fair, he loves anything that sucks. No I’m not sorry.

And now back to James:

INTERVIEW PART 2

Big thanks to James for speaking with me. James can be found on Twitter @jwdevoy and do check out his videos from BBC Timeline and STV. The one were he joins a Scottish Conservative campaigner as she goes cavassing back in May last year had me in fits of laughter. Just brilliant stuff. One of the journalists he recommended following is also on Twitter @aidan__Kerr.

I’ve managed to get the next 2-3 weeks of guests lined up which is amazingly pro-active of me and very rare indeed, but if you have anyone you’d like me to interview or any political subject you think I’ve not covered yet that you’d like me to interview someone about, please drop me a line @parpolbro on Twitter, parpolbo on Facebook, partlypoliticalbroadcast@gmail.com or drop me a line on WhatsApp just to upset Amber Rudd.

PARTLY BIG QUESTION

This week with Carswell’s departure from UKIP being well, really the only news story that I felt I could ask you to make trivial jokes about, I thought the best question of the week would be to ask you lot what campaign slogan should he have when running as an independent candidate in 2020?

@budgie “vote for the one politician you know in advance you can’t trust…”

“Vote Douglas Carswell and piss off everyone in politics who isn’t Douglas Carswell.”

@flahr His campaign song should be Winifred Atwell’s “Let’s Have Another Party”

Philip Alexander A bit of Destiny’s Child?
?All the bigots
Who are independent
Throw your hands up at me ?

@EthanDLawrence Carswell: Independence Harder. Independence with a Vengeance. 4.0 A Good Day To Be Independent.

@grahamtriggs “I see no reason why there needs to be a vote”

@MattHossComedy His slogan, instead of employing words, would simply be the sound of a long fart.

Vauny Earl “Carswell that ends well… VOTE CARSWELL and finally kill off UKIP forever”

@Broadbeak All’s well that Carswell!

@scottmckeating Hopping from party to party like a fly doth do on piles of caca.

@mrdavegill Vote for Douglas, the kami-Carsie kipper!

@lordmarkstanley
“A vote for Carswell is a vote for the forever floating voter”

Well I hope Douglas is listening and takes all of those into consideration. Though it is unlikely as he blocked me on Twitter in 2015 when he posted a tweet about Hello Kitty World on his account which apparently his young daughter posted and I responded with concern that his Hello Kitty World didn’t have appropriate borders to stop Miffys from coming in and stealing all the jobs.

TRUMP

I’m not saying President of America and only man to survive being bitten by a radioactive hi-vis jacket Donald Trump spends a lot of time golfing but it was a news story that he actually spend the last weekend in the White House which is something that shouldn’t be a news story. You’d only report ‘the lion slept tonight’ if a zookeeper accidently spilled a barrel of red bull in it’s water and it had concerningly been awake solidly for 6 weeks. Reporting something is how it’s meant to be isn’t a good sign at all. But incredibly despite Trump never working, maybe it’s because the amount of damage he causes in the little time he does means that White House staff are literally shooing him out the door with golf caddy ready just to save America.

Notable moments last week include a ban on people flying from certain countries to the US to bring onboard any electronic devices larger than a mobile phone. The countries affected by this are Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Turkey, Egypt, Morocco, Qatar, Kuwait and UAE, all predominantly middle eastern Muslim countries. This is a response apparently to a terrorist group putting explosives in laptops last year, although there is also every chance they were just Samsung products. Experts say blocking laptops from being in the hand luggage really won’t make much difference to security as if they have an explosive in them and get put in the hold instead, where they are allowed, they’ll still explode and everyone on the plane will die. Plus it makes the whole security screening process much slower, except for the other week when I got stuck behind an idiot kid because he was too busy looking at his iPad to remember to take his belt off. But Gatwick isn’t included on the list so sadly he’ll still be a dick. Kindles are included in the ban because who knows when a terrorist might get on your plane with over 200 books and terrorise passengers by ruining the endings of them. The UK has also inflicted a ban which while excludes four of the countries on the US lists, but does include national airlines when the US one doesn’t. Why have they made different decisions? Well it could be that they both have a lack of information as to why this needs to happen, or also, according to a Middle Eastern Emirati commentator, it’s because a lot of the Middle Eastern airlines now offer flights to the US and UK and this will put off passengers using them & go for US and UK airlines instead. Which if that’s true then hoping they can bore people onto their flights will work is a stupid idea. I mean, just wait till people realise they’ll have several hours where they won’t be able to watch the news or any of the horrible shit Trump or May are currently doing to the world. I’d almost pay extra!

There are still lots of on going investigations into Trump’s connections with Russia including Trump’s former campaign manager Paul Mannafort having a contract for tens of millions of dollars to greatly benefit the Putin government all of which is not only shady but exactly the sort of thing Manafort and Trump were saying Clinton did. Everyone seemed to forget that when you drain the swamp the swamp residue needs to go somewhere and it seems to have been rerouted via the White House. No wonder Trump goes golfing all the time.

But the big big – and yes I know the laptop ban is big – but the big story is that Trumpcare, the repeal and replacement of Obamacare, was rejected by the House of Representatives, by both Republican and Democratic sides. Now American healthcare confuses the hell out of me, but from what I gather it Trump’s proposed policy aimed to continue subsidising private health plans, shrink Medicaid by 25% and give people who earn more massive tax breaks. So basically taking from the poor to give to the rich like a bright orange evil Robin Hood. Now as I said, I don’t fully understand it all but what I do know is that an outright rejection by both sides of the house has lead to Trump’s approval ratings at just 44% and he’s now broken over 60 of his campaign promises. Of course Trump has blamed the Trumpcare failure on the democrats and then on the conservatives which looks ridiculous and pathetic but hey, at least he seems to be keeping to his promise of uniting America by making them all come together to reject his policies. So that’s 64 promises broken, but headlines: President keeps one campaign promise! And in other news that lion is still asleep and might actually be dead.

END

And that is all for this week’s Partly Political Broadcast. I will be back next week because my diary is really empty right now and going outside means my hay fever kicks in. I don’t know who the high pollen count is, but when I find the castle he lives in I’m going to have words. Please do give this show a review on iTunes, or Stitcher, throw me a quid or two at ko-fi.com/parpolbro or patreon.com/parpolbro and drop me a line about pretty much anything @parpolbro on Twitter, the parpolbro group on FB or partlypoliticalbroadcast@gmail.com. I mean really, anything. My diary is so so empty.

This week’s show was brought to you by the number 0 which is both the amount of MPs that UKIP now have and the amount of sympathy I give them about it.

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