Kwarteng and Truss were the personification of the reactionary, nationalist ideology of Brexit. If anyone was going to make it work, and carry it out, it was them, along with the rest of their motley crew of Brexitories, such as Rees-Mogg et al. But, they tried and failed miserably. As I have set out over the last few years, we have had a class war between two great class camps, fought out over Brexit, much as a similar class war was fought out in the 17th century in the name of religion. On the one side is the ruling class that owns its wealth in the form of fictitious capital, the revenues from which (and so ultimately the capitalised values of which, and attendant capital gains) depends upon the profits of large-scale socialised capital, which, in turn depends upon social-democracy, and upon the development of large-scale single markets such as the EU. Its champion has been the capitalist state, and all of the global financial markets.
On the other side has been the petty bourgeoisie, whose numbers and social weight increased significantly from the 1980's onwards, and which captured conservative parties such as the Tories, Republicans and so on, and who have attempted to pursue policies in the interests of that reactionary petty bourgeoisie, which are inimical to the interests of the ruling class. The state necessarily acted via Bonapartist methods, but the petty-bourgeoisie, heterogeneous in nature, and always, therefore, dependent upon a Bonapartist leader to impose order upon it, also operated via such Bonapartist methods, reflected in the rise of several such charismatic figures such as Trump, Farage and so on. As I have set out in the past, the battle has been waged by two competing Bonapartisms, with the working-class excluded from the struggle, much as it was, indeed, during the EU referendum itself.
The response to the Brexitory budget was swift from financial markets. The £ sank like a stone, and UK bond yields soared, sending the costs of UK borrowing sky high. They showed just who really does have control over Britain and its economy, and it was not the Brexitory government. It was only a matter of time before Kwarteng went, and Truss's early willingness to try to make him the scapegoat, indicated that time was short. Now, she's sacked him, and the fact it is today, is also not an accident.
Today is the day that the Bank of England has said it will stop bailing out UK pension funds, as they were faced, last week, with a fire sale of their assets, as they faced margin calls on long-dated UK gilts, whose prices have been crashing in response to the policies of the Brexitory government, leading to the soaring yields, which are also sending mortgage rates higher, hitting at the other large constituent of Tory support, as those higher rates mean crashing property prices, shattering the delusions of the elderly Tory property owners that inflated paper prices for their houses had somehow made them rich.
The Bank of England is a fundamental part of the capitalist state, and so agent of the ruling class, whose interest have been undermined by Brexit, and the attendant petty bourgeois agenda being pursued by the Brexitories. Without Kwarteng going and those polices being reversed, Monday would have seen a bloodbath for UK gilts, and for the £. The global ruling class has shown that not only can it tell governments what policies to pursue, but it can even tell them what Ministers are acceptable to it or not. Truss is next in the firing line.
In actual fact, the global ruling class, and its state has shown itself far more progressive and effective in opposing the reactionary nationalism of the Brexitories than has the Blue Labour PLP of Starmer. Instead of holding to a principled and progressive, internationalist position, Starmer himself capitulated to petty bourgeois reactionary nationalism, and became himself a Brexitory, if only a cheap imitation of it. It is a tragedy that once again, as these big events play out, the working-class is again being excluded from having an independent, progressive role, as a result of its main political party, being historically bankrupt, riven with the most egregious careerism and opportunism, and itself part of the problem rather than the solution, as it offers itself, only reactionary nationalist, and jingoistic policies, in search of the ephemeral votes of reactionary petty bourgeois layers of society, themselves still mostly sewn up by the Tories or others to their Right.
The fact that well known Remainer, Jeremy Hunt, is being touted as the next Chancellor, and that other leading Brexitories, like Rees-Mogg, are being lined up for the chop indicates that this is also the beginning of the end for the reactionary, utopian agenda of Brexit, which has failed miserably. Yet, at the very time that is happening, the best that Starmer can offer is that, where the actual proponents of Brexit failed miserably, he will somehow make it work, that he will implement some kind of Labour Brexit. In other words, just more of the same nonsense that the problem with Tory policies was their implementation, not that the policies themselves were idiotic and reactionary, and bound to fail. It is a repeat of the idea of "having cake and eating it", as though Britain could somehow have all the benefit of being in the EU, but without actually being in it, and also having all of the obligations that go with it.
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