Politics is a fickle business. After Sir Keir Starmer won a majority of 170, he must have thought the world was his oyster. Instead it seems he has lunched on a bad oyster, as everything he touches fails.
Nigel Farage is in the opposite position, every bet he takes seems to pay off, as if he were the man who broke the bank at Monte Carlo. His visit to Elon Musk is further evidence of both.
The Farage phenomenon has been going for years, with remarkable political significance. His leadership of UKIP forced David Cameron to offer a referendum on membership of the EU. This won Cameron the election in 2015, but he then had to, albeit reluctantly, deliver on his promise.
Farage was then part of the coalition that won the 2016 referendum, with an especially strong appeal in what is now known as the Red Wall. Then, with the help of the Brexit Party, he completed the defenestration of Theresa May that allowed Boris Johnson to ‘get Brexit done’.
The pace has picked up further in the last two years. His programme on GBNews gives him a regular platform, which has been the base for it. It enables him to talk directly to people who feel let down by mainstream politics, and previously had no outlet in the media.
This upset what was described by Adam Bolton, a leading light of Sky TV for many years, as the ‘delicate ecosystem’ of British broadcasting. The left wing, traditional companies such as the BBC, Channel 4 and Sky were too snooty to spend much time on crime and immigration. Nigel on GBNews is not, and this continues to build his position.
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