A “fair bit better” and “more scandals than there ought to be but still less than last time” would be more accurate.
I’ve asked before though - who are you proposing as an alternative?
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For that question, because I have not studied politics at any institution I have attended, what is politics? Being able to lie to the public on all sorts of matters they don’t even have a grasp of?
As has been said on here over links or posts, “just give us the bullet points”. No wonder these people make such big mistakes (with our money) they do not properly read reports with the Nuance’s but just a headline or bullet points.
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As you know (or should do by now!!), I’m of the “A plague on both your houses” camp.
I prefer much of Socialism’s principles. I don’t see them supported by Labour.
I would settle for honour and principle, as I suggested earlier.
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I think there’s a much deeper problem though, which reoccurred to me while I was reading something from the Guardian about falling support for Net Zero.
It’s that I don’t trust the government to act in the country’s best interests.
I bought a diesel car several years ago, despite the additional expense, because diesel was touted as being cleaner than petrol.
A couple of years after that, I was suddenly a climate criminal because I had a diesel car.
It’s a small, even trivial, example of how trust can be broken.
Why should I believe the present government? It is showing itself as corrupt as any which went before, and its attitude when caught out has been to gaslight the country.
The Greens are led by a charlatan; Reform too; Liberals have an attention-seeker at their head … I’m running out of choices.
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I think this is a complex subject. To what extent do politicians deliberately lie?
For Trump/Johnson/Farage I think the answer is all “the time” - Trump in particular as weaponised lying to (as I said previously) Orwellian proportions - whether it is framing Renee Good as some sort of domestic terrorist or claiming the majority of Americans think they are better off since his return to power when the reality is the opposite (the chocolate ration always goes up, to borrow from Orwell again).
Johnson would say whatever he thought the situation needed, then probably say the opposite an hour later.
Farage is somwhere in between the two.
For politicians of somewhat higher integrity then I think actual deliberate, conscious lies are less common - but there is still a need to put an “official face” on what might be heated internal differences so there might well be a need to adjust the vérité a little.
Also politicians might genuinely have and state positive intentions which circumstances derail - was the original claim a lie? Political opponents are likely to claim so.
Someone in Starmer’s position will have to rely on advisers - they don’t have the time to do a deep learn on everything. I suspect Starmer will be across the briefs though. Unlike Johnson whose attention span was famously “no more than a side of A4”.
Your choice is limited to the extant political parties. Wanting something none offer is not pragmatic.
In fact I would argue your choice is Labour, Lib Dem, Reform or Tory - no one else is in with a shout, and let’s face it the Lib Dems are unlikely to romp home with a majority so are best thought of as the biggest “also ran” party than a serious contender.
Come to that I doubt the Tories are in with much of a chance as things stand either.
Like so much in politics, whether you’re a prime minister or a voter, it’s often about choosing the least worst of a bunch of bad options. Unless, of course, you want to run yourself and solve the world’s problems.
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Great, coming from the man that just grabbed a million plus cookies, whilst he keeps all his in Monaco 
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I don’t understand where he got his super businessman reputation.
Everything he touches seems to turn to s; “t.
His chemical business survives on government handouts, the cycling team is a shadow of its former dominance, Man U are in chaos and the Land Rover clone is a joke.
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Looks like the first baby steps are being taken (in the right direction, imo)
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At one time they might have been considered to lie for what they thought to be the public good, and the scandals only got uncovered after they’ve died. Now everything is known by everyone and there is no possibility of doing that.
What I know of human nature tells me things are not worse than at other times, but they are much more public, and instead of being able to get on with the important stuff, ministers are fighting fires constantly. In the end, politics like this must fail, because the things that matter become secondary.
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I think this is an example of shifting priorities.
Diesel was felt to be “good” because of better fuel economy - then the focus shifted to particulate emissions and it was realised they are terrible for those.
Does that make the original advice bad faith - I would argue not.
Well, yes - trust takes ages to build but can be lost in a second, sometimes irrationally. That is true everywhere.
The composition of United’s first team squad seems at odds with Ratcliffe’s views on immigration…
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I think so too.
That link gives me a captcha page … in Russian. Didn’t click on anything.
Oh, weird 
They do use a captcha but I’ve never seen it in Russian.
Here’s what it looks like for me:
Try
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Certainly don’t disagree with any of the above , but OTOH even without the tax breaks, I’d be very happy to leave Middleton for Monaco…
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