When I set out critiquing Restore all those months ago, it was in a vague and unofficial “red team” capacity in the hope they might get their act together, and that we might have something electable in 2029. But that’s over now. The Swindon man-baby has declared me “the enemy”, and y’know what? I’ll take it. I’m done with the “insurgent right”.
I suppose I have been for a while. While I had many reservations about joining the Homeland Party, my logic was sound. I was convinced that there must be a new “sensible nationalism” and it had to be something that wasn’t yet another Farage party derivative so that we might escape the pathological amateurism. I’m still of that view, and I don’t think the right is going to achieve anything until Farage et al (Lowe included) are out of the picture.
The way it’s going right now, the one function Rupert Lowe’s party serves is to keep the right out of power in 2029, and that’s possibly the most useful thing it could do. I’m of the view that any real restoration or reform agenda is going to take a minimum of two terms, and while a slopulist party could somehow get itself elected, it wouldn’t be re-elected in 2034 and would perform so badly that the right would never get near power again.
More than that, I don’t think there is enough critical mass to leverage a sustainable victory in 2029. It has to get a bit worse before more people wake up, and it most certainly will get worse. The national grid is teetering on the brink and even the most coherent energy policy is not going to turn things around in under five years. If the grid is going to collapse, let the left carry the can.
As it happens, I don’t think I’m alone in running out of patience. Outside of the X bubble, onlookers are probably as dismayed as I am. Whatever the polls are saying right now (with indications that we‘ve reached peak Reform), the wider public will focus more in 2029 on who looks like a viable party of government. That’s not Reform and it certainly ins’t Restore. It’ll be another apathy election.
For my part, I have no particular love of the Tory party, but I do have a passable local Tory MP. He's not loudly banging the drum for any of my causes but he does turn up, and he's embedded in the community. I quite like the guy. As such, in 2029, I'm not just thinking about who I want in power. I'm asking myself whether I want to sack a decent guy in favour of some random novice with a head full of empty soundbites who has no idea how the system works.
I look at the "new right" with all its division, infighting and incompetence, and I honestly don't think they're fit to run a bath - and wouldn't trust them with so much as a TV remote. I think a lot people in my area, particularly the surrounding villages will feel the same - and even if they like Reform/Restore they'll still go and vote for the incumbent.
I want someone who can navigate the constituency without the use of satnav. I want someone I can get on the phone if I need to. I want someone who will turn up to the boring select committee meetings and local police panels. I want someone who thinks politicking is more than just racking up the likes on X.
I'm not going to vote for a shouty nihilist who thinks everything is too broken to fix, and isn't interested in working out how to fix things. I simply don't believe these people can fix the country when they can't even attend to the basics of their own organisation, and I'm certainly not voting for cranky ideologues who think I'm "the enemy" because I have different ideas.
Essentially, I have no remaining interest in the populist right. Britain’s problems are many and acute, but they’re problems we have to think out way out of. I genuinely don’t see the slop right producing anyone with the curiosity and intellect necessary to sort things out. Most of the right is wedded to decades old tropes, based on the assumptions of mediocre men who have no idea what makes a first world country tick.
I’m often told “don’t let perfect be the enemy of good”, but slop is the enemy of adequate - and it’s all they can be bothered with. The slop right is arrogant and lazy, they do not deserve power, and wouldn’t know what to usefully do with it if they had it. To blazes with them.
I understand where you're coming from. I lost patience with many of the Online Right and their livestreams, podcasts and "edgy" Discord groups some years ago and I was deeply embedded in their world for a while. But it became all about clickbait, appeasing American viewers and how to advocate for authoritarianism without actually saying that and coming up with ever more convoluted euphemisms and jargon. James Lindsay is right in one respect when he accuses many of the Online Right of using the same tactics and mindset of the Left.
In 2024 I adopted the policy of voting for who I regarded as the best candidate and not along any party lines. If the goal is to have better quality MPs I think this is a good way to go. We need the hangers on, the yes-men, the diversity hires and the PPE graduates to be purged from Parliament.
2024-25 was my time being politically homeless but now in 2026 I've found people who want to discuss politics beyond just jargon, attention seeking and slop announcements. They care about detail and thought out policy. I'm not talking about a political party but people, individuals and in groups. I'm talking about.....grassroots Conservatives. There. I've said it.
"I'm not going to vote for a shouty nihilist who thinks everything is too broken to fix, and isn't interested in working out how to fix things" lol
However, I do think you might be onto something here. Is it unfixable, or just there's no one yet who can fix it? Both. That means things will likely get a lot worse before they can get better - which puts us on the same page.