wishful thinking (in the grim circumstances in which we find ourselves)

'for arendt, the key precondition for totalitarianism was the pulverization of civil society, which produced the isolation of mass society, full of disoriented individuals available for demagogic mass movements...

... it must be emphasized that despite (hannah arendt's) 'the origins of totalitarianism's' many interesting insights... its central argument is largely wrong.'

dylan riley (in the new left review) takes after hannah arendt

civil society, that place that is not the state, is held to be the place where we must battle our misguided fellow citizens. 

horsemouth has heard the view expressed before that it was not the weakness of civil society that led to the rise of fascism in germany and italy but its strength. a society with lots of sporting clubs, societies, women's guilds, scout groups etc. is ripe for takeover. because all the fascists have to do is take over these bodies. (he just can't remember where he read it. gramsci probably). 

for his sins horsemouth spends a lot of time watching political opinion videos

there are a number of right wingers he regularly listens to;

(a word of warning. let us be blunt about this, these people are stone racists and anti-semites. this is not a way of being in the world that horsemouth approves of. he thinks that you owe it to yourself, and to the people you meet, to make efforts to overcome your racisms and prejudices). 

an elite theorist might think that small highly organised minorities actually have a real political effect and run things and that large (populist) movements do not, hence what we see is a  populist delusion. thus the populist movements we are seeing will not work, or at least not take people where they want to go.

alternately another might agree with the thesis that the pulverisation of civil society has produced the isolation of mass society, full of disoriented individuals. whether that can actually be organised into a movement to do what is needed is another matter. 

many on the right commentariat seem to think tommy robinson is a grifter and (in that they are anti-semites) are offended that he is in receipt of israeli money.

ultimately there are limits to how far the great british public (in their wisdom) will support rampaging racist football hooligans. (it's just not a good look).

many on the right commentariat think the flag campaign is moving things into a pointless empty symbolic rhetoric - the flag can basically mean anything and be embraced by anyone (even sir keir). 

on the other (electoral) hand many on the right commentariat seem to think that reform/ nigel farage is leading people back into the morass of electoral politics (and that reform is insufficiently racist being only interested in immigration controls, sovereignty etc.). should he be elected he would confront the british deep state - the unelected and largely invisible true power structure of the country - whether he could get his hands on any levers of power is another matter. 

the right remains divided (but then the former labour vote will split too). the tories have poisoned  themselves (first by ingesting neo-liberalism to excess, then by actually taking the UK out of the EU). they have burst and are haemorrhaging voters and supporters to reform, to the lib dems. 

but similarly labour will haemorrhaging voters and supporters to the lib dems, the greens and the ex-labour left. 

in this situation sir keir's digital ID cards plan is insanely stupid and dangerous. it is actually likely to unite the right in resistance to it. 

of course the next uk general election could be as late as 15th august 2029 so all these tendencies have a lot of time in which to work themselves out/ people have a long time to become even more frustrated with the 'political process'. 

and of course what horsemouth is indulging in here might be described as cope  - wishful thinking in the grim circumstances in which we find ourselves.