I mean, I’m old enough to have been studying American studies when James Carville coined that line and it’s really not applicable here

Starmer’s self image is “I never lie, I always follow the rules”. Jeremy’s self image was “I have been an anti-racist all my life”. Look at the sniffy fury both of them display when their self-image is challenged. That inability to accept criticism and grow is their original sin.

Also - a point that many Starmerite Ultras won’t accept here but let’s throw it out there - his fatal sin is not remotely accepting challenges to his self-image, which was *precisely* the problem with Corbyn.

Fact

Ok but my point is they are arguing with the process, not the substantive moral points?

If I was going to vote for an opposition party, I would vote for one that primarily focused on the political and moral error of appointing Mandelson. But instead they are playing process games, I don’t care about process games, I don’t care whether the Deputy Under-Secretary sent a memo or not

Another point to make here, in passing, is that by getting fixated on the “did he or didn’t he lie” legalistic process based approach to things, the opposition parties also absolutely show that they are not remotely ready to replace Starmer?

Tbf, whilst not arguing with your main point, I would say “squint quite a lot”

Zahava Stadler reveals her linguistic quibbles

I can only bow down in tribute

Also my cousin’s new husband (the…5th? I want to say 5th?) has a proper Sam Elliott moustache

It (and glue before it) was a fucking plague for half a decade, I think. Then it kinda subsided. But I don’t think anyone who wasn’t there could understand how grim it was in the 80s.

(On a far less cheery note we are now on how many of my cousins that were heroin addicts in the 80s and…it’s not a small amount)

Game’s gone

Breweries are going to fold when that generation goes

Also: day drinking and I feel woozy after two and my 80 year old father is on 5 and extremely animated

Eh, my grandfather had a world class bald head, its very much a callback conversation

Tbf it was, I’m not arguing

At a valleys wake (for my late aunt) and the conversation is always about hair loss (specifically, mine, and how bad it was)

Also the man on man dynamics are quite weird in the cap movies - a hint of subservience, a hint of mentorism, a hint of homoeroticism - which throws things for me.

But also then it just…does a lowkey recap of that (hah - ReCAP) in the last movie which just feels an extra snub to people who watched the show

(Sorry: the Donald Trump 2 era)

That’s absolutely true but also, I think the Falcon as envisioned by Disney is an Obama era avatar of the African American experience which feels awkward in the post George Floyd era and positively jarring in the Donald Trump era.

And Captain America: God Are We Still Doing This Shit About The Falcon Being Conflicted literally had him onscreen for one scene. So it was obviously the worse.

All the Captain America related projects are substantially better in the scenes where Sebastian Stan is onscreen. From the Chris Evans movies through to Wyatt Russell as Cap knock off in Thunderbolts. The problem with FATWS was it was mainly F, and not enough TWS

Also, that ludicrous version of Namor, do we really have to have him turn up, he was terrible

Is it really a little known fact, Dan? And where did you hear this little known fact?

Because he’s terrible at most aspects of his job