Can Restore Britain be salvaged?

While not by any means an official source, the above tweet from Lance Forman is instructive. Lowe has distanced himself from Steve Laws and antisemitism. This is the part where Restore’s nationalist support base throw their toys out of the pram and insist that Restore is "cucked by zionists" or something equally retarded. Ironically, that might just be enough to revive Restore's fortunes.

Meanwhile, The Spectator has just released an interview with Rupert Lowe, in which he makes it clear his Party is not built on ethnonationalism. “There was this spate of accusations of ethnonationalism and all this sort of rubbish, I can assure you the actual structure of the party has none of that in it”. Hopefully his lieutenants get the memo.

This is actually quite significant. It's the closest Lowe has come to explicitly defining the ideology of Restore Britain (something that should have been done from the get-go specifically to deter disruptive cranks). Now the job is to firm up whatever it is the party does stand for. That means a bit of message discipline - and radio silence until they've got their ducks in a row.

Of itself, I don't find ethnonationalism objectionable. It's all the horseshoe nationalism and socialist bollocks that goes with it that makes sensible people run a mile. Once you throw in the rabid, paranoid antisemitism (and the nasty crackpot activism it attracts) it starts to look a lot like neo-nazism and you simply cannot build a mainstream party with those people in the mix (even if you're pretending they're not there). Rupert Lowe was always going to have to have to put up ideological guide rails here or watch his party disintegrate into a mess of infighting and disastrous PR.

For those who wanted Restore to be an explicitly ethnonationalist party, you should recall that you had one not so long ago, but decided to blow it all up in favour of putting stickers on lamp posts. Nobody owes you a political home. Go build your own.

For my part, I don't see any point in the purity spiral because if the platform rests on serious policy then a hardline civnat manifesto is practically identical to a sensible ethnonationalist prospectus (which is what Kenny Smith, to his credit, was trying to build). A compromise could have been built around a system of principles but that could only function if the ethnonat contingent was willing to tone down the rabid Jew hate - which was always beyond their abilities.

Consequently, Restore will have to compete on hardline NatCon civnattery (which is entirely acceptable) - only the problem is that its too close to Reform's turf. The way to disambiguate from Reform was to compete on quality of policy and competence. But a year down the line is looks every bit as much the slop party that Reform is. They can't say they weren't warned. Ultimately, Uncle Rupe is just as much the slop merchant as Farage, and periodic policy papers by Harrison Pitt is not going to change that - nor will it make up for their dire candidates.

While today is something of a watershed for Restore, so that well adjusted people can join with some degree of confidence, overcoming the credibility problem is the next mountain to climb. For that to happen, Lowe is going to have to take his role as leader much more seriously, tone down the slop-tweeting, and let policy inform his messaging. I’m not holding my breath - but stranger things have happened.