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Sensational Theresa May!
I was a pessimist about England’s new Prime Minister. She was not in favor of Brexit, and nothing about her seemed to shout, “Bravely going to change things!”
But here we are. Theresa May is now openly saying what I have been praying for her to say: that the UK will be the global leader in Free Trade. By pursuing free trade with the entire world, she will end up forcing the EU to follow the UK, just to keep up. If she succeeds, Brexit will turn the UK into Singapore or Hong Kong writ large. Wow.
Today we know that Theresa May is not a mere one-trick pony. Her education policy is radical, indeed. If by radical you mean meritocractically allowing students to go to the best school they can get into – and with government dollars. In US terms this would be like allowing every public school to become a Charter School, admitting students based solely on test scores (with quotas to include low-income families) – as well as reject students based on religion. It is a far bigger step than any taken anywhere else in the Western World, as far as I know.
The Conservatives are in no danger of losing power now. She could have easily played it safe, retaining power for its own sake like most dominant political parties do. But no: this is bold stuff. Theresa May is the bee’s knees.
Published in General
From the article:
Thanks so much for this update, iWe! I haven’t been following the aftermath of Brexit very closely, so it’s good to know that she’s off to a great start. I would love to see Britain forge ahead!
Fingers are crossed. So far she seems at least courageous, unlike the milquetoast one just driven out.
Encouraging. Thanks for sharing.
iWe, you used to live in the UK. Do you still keep in touch with friends over there, and do they have some interesting reflections on the current situation that you could share?
I was visiting my in-laws not long after the Brexit vote, and my father-in-law was amazed at my barely restrained joy, since he reads the NY Times and thought it was cause for gloom and doom.
I also was unsure when she vanquished rivals in the Tories, but have been hopeful that Teresa May would prove to be as tough as she is.
Thanks for the updates and good cheer.
The education policy is fairly micromanaging.
It’s ridiculous to say you are ending discrimination by wealth by requiring quotas. The people who lose those quota seats because of their non-poverty are the ones actually being discriminated against on the basis of wealth.
The voucher system itself at least partially addresses ability to pay.
I absolutely would not trust the Brits to run such a system.Who is going to lose those seats to the quota? Not the “right kind of people” (bluebloods), not the kids of billionaires, not people of favored ethnicity or other demographics. It really will affect those pesky Jews, some other upper middle class whites, and perhaps Chinese and Indians.
The micromanaging is explained in the article:
Another reason to abolish the House of Lords.
I was too. I was shocked by the universal despair. If not for Ricochet I would have thought I was alone in the world.
Thanks, iWe for pointing this out. Brexit has mostly drifted off my radar.
I do – and I still maintain residency there as well. With 5 of my kids holding UK passports, I am always hedging my bets. I am American to my bones, but an America of Trump or Clinton may not be what I’d like to think it is.
Most Jews in the UK were against Brexit, but that is because they are terrified that change will bring even worse things for Jews, and because, like most people, they tend to defer to “experts.” I don’t. I know too many gormless experts.
You end discrimination, ultimately, by allowing every school to become a selective school. The reason why grammar schools end up selecting for wealth is because there is a very limited supply of these schools.
This move opens up supply. Increased supply, not the quotas, will allow for real socio-economic mobility.
Remember that the UK central government micromanages a lot that we delegate to local authorities. They have a national education inspector, OFSTED, that audits every school that receives government money. Which is just about everyone.
Even religious schools in the UK have all their non-religious education funded by the state (as long as they meet OFSTED curriculum minimums). Which would be phenomenal here – education would be much finer in the US if every private school received the same per-student funding from the state that the public schools do.
Woo-Hoo! Can we borrow her, please?
iWe,
I’m right with you on this. I was leery of her at first but I’m 100% impressed now. The Brexit Vote was Independence Day for Britain. Now it’s May Day in Britain. Theresa May Day that is. By the way, she is bold but also a savvy team player. She put together a group of aggressive experienced people and is employing them to the max.
Smart Lady.
Regards,
Jim
May has been surprisingly conservative. Appointed a reasonably conservative cabinet (returning David Davis from the Cameroon wilderness) and seems to be insisting that “Brexit means Brexit” means Brexit.
And she is working with a very slender majority and a House of Lords packed with Labour luvvies and vengeful Lib Dem grandees.
It’s worth taking a clear look at what “conservative” amounts to Great Britain: tax reform which lowers the top rate to 45% (in a country with a VAT), gun confiscation, video monitoring of every street corner (even inside selective houses), and impeccable political correctness about every subset of every sexuality (though we’ve seen that at National Review already).
Worth taking a look because that’s what American conservatism will be after eight years of Hillary, Chuck Schumer’s immigrant and felon voting rights bills and a stacked federal judiciary which doesn’t even pretend that the text of the constitution or federal and state law should impede social justice.
The UK also has no tax on income earned outside the country, with no cost for bringing it in. Offshore trusts are also legal and common.
If the US did this, the economy would be much happier. UK Conservatism is not all bad. And if May succeeds in her educational and free trade reforms, it will be a huge triumph for conservatism and freedom, especially compared to the US, which does not allow private schools to receive public school funding. And neither candidate in the US today is promoting free trade.
Didn’t mean to imply UK Conservatism is bad at all, just that the game is often played between the 20 and 40 yard lines on their side of the field (wrong football metaphor, I know).
UK Conservatives operate in an even lefter culture than the US and there are neither party primaries nor, most importantly, a libertarian impulse alive within UK Conservatism.
Jim Messina is an adviser to the Conservative Party after all, and David Axelrod was an informal adviser for the Conservatives during the last election.
Daniel Hannan supported Obama in 2008.
And most English conservatives I know think anyone to the right of Paul Ryan and Mitt Romney is bat guano crazy.
Also the entire UK is smaller than Michigan, so centralized management is a lot less unwieldy for them.
I love reading this.
It is good news.
Indeed. In her introductory comments, May brushed away economic achievements in order to prattle on about “social justice.”
You were doing so well. Example please.
That is not on the issues. That is because they read a very leftist press, and are unaware of it.
Mark Steyn was sent off the Happy Warrior page with a dishonorable discharge for relating two amusing and inoffensive gay jokes told by Bob Hope and Frank Sinatra.
iWe, on what issues are English conservatives even remotely as conservative as American conservatives?
Abortion, gun rights, local control of education, federalism, religious freedom, death penalty, restrictions on state surveillance, homeschooling, flat taxes, affirmative action quotas … ?
They simply aren’t as conservative or suspicious of government ordering of their lives.
Again, the lack of a lively libertarian impulse and any centrifugal federalism is key, in my opinion.
I wouldn’t blame their press. Is the BBC more partisan than the MSM? At least the Times and the FT feature some solid centrist conservatives. Though even here my Conservative friends are faintly embarrassed by Tim Montgomerie’s conservatism. And there’s The Spectator, the Telegraph and a set of tabloids which are entertainingly anti-liberal.
The reason there is no prominent National Review, Weekly Standard, or Reason magazine in Great Britain is the lack of many principled liberty-centered conservatives.
Not that temperamental conservatism and patriotic one nation Toryism is a bad option compared with Obama, Reid and Pelosi.
Nice to read about what’s happening across the pond, @iwe.
I lived in England a few years ago when my son was still young enough for us to go through the whole school choice thing.
A flaw in this system?
As I recall, you could live next door to the best school in your area, but if it was “oversubscribed,” you might have a problem getting into it.
You were only guaranteed a seat in your district, and that might not be in the closest/best school, so you had “choice,” but you couldn’t necessarily go anywhere you desired.
Therefore, I think it’s great that they’re allowing for more schools to open without religious bias. They need a bigger supply of good choices.
As for the free trade aspect…
I hope May gets a handbag as big as Thatcher’s and knocks her opponents into really growing the economy. I’m sympathetic to Brexit, but I do think there will be some bumps on the road. Sounds like the PM will be a competent leader for the transition. :)
(If she does well, maybe our leaders will stop knocking trade again.)
She will be an excellent influence on President Trump. If you remember, Maggie Thatcher had to drag Reagan along quite a bit.
That doesn’t seem to mesh with this:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/3146450/replies?c=94
I don’t want to turn this into another Steyn vs. NR post, however I think that Jack Fowler’s post in your link squares with my understanding as well. The main reason why Steyn left NR is a disagreement over legal strategy. The getting criticized by an editor was just the straw that broke the camel’s back. Besides, apparently Steyn can go on a three month hiatus without writing anything (Mark hasn’t updated his website since July 10th).
iWe,
I hope you are right about May.
Glad to read the comments from May!
I’ve been in the Michael Gove camp ever since the interview he did with Jay Nordlinger a few years ago. He just has a solid understanding of First Principles and conservatism.
Maybe she is the best option after all.
What are you talking about? Mark Steyn left voluntarily because he wanted to pursue a different legal strategy against Michael Mann.