Cock and Balls torture
Into a British podcast market already awash with political horrors, a new contender arrives: George Osborne and Ed Balls chummily gumming the news.
Previously: Bad Reflection
A grim campaign targeting shoplifters over corporate criminals is a reminder that The Mirror is no less reactionary than The Sun.
Dupes — from Aldi’s Cuthbert the Caterpillar ripping off M&S’ more famous Colin to various handbags that look like the luxury versions but don’t come with the price tag — are all over the place in the modern world. And that word, ‘dupe’, makes it all sound a little cuter and cosier than longer standing terms like “knock off” or “counterfeit”.
Sometimes though, you wonder why anyone has bothered replicating the pre-existing product. That’s definitely the case with Political Currency, the ersatz version of The Rest is Politics, presented by ‘frenemies’ — the former went to the latter’s recent cursed wedding, for fuck’s sake — Ed Balls and George Osborne.
While it is another sign that humanity is doomed, it’s undeniable The Rest is Politics is a huge hit; there are a lot of people who really love hearing the professional wrestling-style interplay between definitely-not-a-spook, Care Bear-turned-human, obscure military cosplay enthusiast and brittle ego owner Rory Stewart and pop-eyed, bagpipe bothering, war crimes enabling, diary daubing sociopath Alastair Campbell.
Stewart and Campbell do at least have personalities — however emetic — and some measure of personal charisma with each other. Balls and Osborne — a man who consumes jobs like some kind of smug singularity — are like Marmite if it were made entirely of tepid water and mud; it’s not just an acquired taste, you’d have to be set on hurting yourself to ‘enjoy’ it, to a given value of the word ‘enjoy’.
In a piece headlined, How I learnt to love Ed Balls, Osborne writes of the term ‘centrist dad’:
[It is] meant as an insult, apparently. I’m not sure why. Do we want the world run by extremist bachelors?
Osborne slashed the British state not just to the bone but until the marrow was leaking out; he is a man so guilty of crimes against the state he should be standing in front of a jury, not a microphone. Both he and Balls are extremists; their shared belief in the power of the private sector and the fundamental rightness of giving off vital services to rapacious outsourcing companies is, in large part, why this is a nation of crumbling schools, collapsing hospitals, closing libraries, and shrinking public spaces.
In the promotion for the podcast, Balls and Osborne have stressed that they were never really enemies. Decca Aitkenhead writes in The Times:
When Balls, 56, entered parliament, his wife, Yvette Cooper, now the shadow home secretary, told him he would meet “two rising stars of the Conservative party”. David Cameron would probably “walk right past” him, “disengaged”, but Osborne would be very friendly. “And that was exactly what happened. David was always aloof, but from the first time I talked to George, in my second week, it was always relaxed and open.”
The first episode of the podcast opens with clips of Balls and Osborne sparring with each other in parliament before the pair chucklingly discuss them and reveal what pals they are now. They would no doubt argue, in typically ‘centrist’ fashion, that this is a good thing — “Look how grown up we are!” — but it simply highlights something that angers people who are paying attention: Politics is a game to these people and they never lose.
Balls & Osborne — the name of a tedious new off-licence that sells over-priced wine and ‘nibbles’ that all seem to include truffles — make a big deal about them “losing [their] jobs” and “no longer being insiders” but this is as much a performance as their parliamentary enmity was; both have been handsomely rewarded since they sloped out of ‘frontline’ politics and both remain influential in their respective parties.
The topics for their first episode — Chinese spies; the Pensions Triple Lock (the only one they even attempt to seem ‘angry’ with each other about); and global oil prices — are dealt with in a manner so relaxed it’s almost as horizontal as Jacob Rees Mogg on the front bench, lounging with the same patrician ease. Balls’ take on the spy story: “I think China has become a bigger concern over the last 25 years…” Wow! Revelatory
Osborne — the former chancellor, who has shrugged in interviews that he was “never really an economist” — offers similarly bland ‘insights’ into oil prices:
You are subject to big global forces, and the decisions of other countries. It’s just a reminder that whatever the government’s plan, which is we’re going to go into the election with inflation falling and the economy growing, the real world may come and intrude.
In Lidl, the ‘dupe’ Marmite is called Maribel Yeast Extract. Political Currency is Maribel Yeast Extract to The Rest is Politics’ Marmite: They both leave a bitter taste and, like them or not, production isn’t going to stop any time soon.
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Osborne calling others extremist? Jeez.
Everything that is wrong with UK politics, politicians and news media. A pair of shameless chancers.