Book Review
Deadlier Than Lies: Empire, Credibility, and the Road to Baghdad
On Dennis Fritz’s Deadly Betrayal
The rest of the blog
On Dennis Fritz’s Deadly Betrayal
On Daniel Finkelstein’s Defence of Police Violence and the Thatcherite Rewriting of Class Struggle
Tommy Robinson doesn’t live the life he claims to defend. He parachutes into protest scenes when there’s chaos to film, then jets off to sun himself abroad. He’s not the voice of the working class, he’s a voyeur of decline, turning grievance into spectacle for clicks and cash. What he sells isn’t solidarity. It’s resentment dressed up as nostalgia.
A man, his car, and his gun. This is pure Americana, not the myth of reinvention, but the fantasy that remains when everything else is lost. Sovereign begins with poverty. The ideology comes later.
John Rentoul has never understood the left. A Blairite to his core, he sees politics as something to be managed, not transformed. His call for Starmer to copy Macron isn’t about defeating Farage, it’s about using him. The aim isn’t to inspire, but to frighten voters back into line. Like Macron, Starmer doesn’t oppose the far right. He needs it.
Gary Smith says Britain’s net zero policy has exported jobs and imported virtue. But what he’s really defending isn’t working-class power, this is fossil capital in a hard hat. Decarbonisation without class politics is a gift to Farage. But the answer isn’t more oil. It’s public ownership, planning, and a transition built by workers, not against them.
Live Aid was forty years ago. Today, we are haunted once again by the images of starving children (and now, starving adults) in Gaza. But this time, it doesn’t seem to register. No concerts. No campaigns. No national reckoning. Why? Because the system can only process suffering when it’s stripped of politics. Ethiopia’s famine was framed as fate. Gaza’s is a siege, and Britain is complicit. That’s the difference.
Trumpism and Putinism are reshaping the global order, through a new brand of reactionary nationalism. As the world looks more unstable, the left cannot afford to rely on old slogans or abstract theory, because when bombs fall and occupations expand, resistance is not a thought experiment.
As global tensions intensify and militarism gains momentum, how do we maintain principled opposition to war while effectively confronting authoritarian threats? Reflecting on recent debates, I explore the urgent need for genuine internationalist solidarity.
Trump’s return to power signals not just a political shift but a profound restructuring of the American state—one that fuses corporate power with authoritarian governance. This transformation, driven by figures like Elon Musk and the influence of think tanks such as the Heritage Foundation, represents the latest stage in capital’s ongoing march towards unaccountable dominance.
