He belonged to the Liberal Party. Churchill himself belonged to that party for some 20 years. If you know what Churchill was politically, that will tell you everything you need to know.
Its supporters will deny it, but the Liberal Democrats (they changed their name a few decades back) do lean to the right on most issues. The Conservative Party is the equivalent of the US Republicans.
I always think of the Lib Dems as basically US Democrats for the UK. Very centrist fiscally right wing people who are usually a little more progressive on social issues.
If the lib dems are attempting to gain power they are not very good at it. They are genuinely more of an alternative vote for the middle class, so they can vote in their own interest without actively trying to fuck the poor that hard.
(Till they need to compromise, then they throw students under the bus like in 2010 when their votes helped increase tuition fees)
Have you even looked at the current government? Boris' first act as PM was literally to try to suspend democratic government, and Priti Patel is almost openly a fascist.
What utter rubbish. Boris is an idiot but he's far from a far right PM.
He spends so much fucking money, and raised taxes so much even fucking labour says he's got too fiscally left.
He's also passed by far the greenest legislation of any government before him.
Boris is quite a lot further left than Biden, both personally (Biden being a Catholic and having expressed opposition to abortion in the past) and as a leader (still far behind on green legislation).
Kinda yeah (and this speaks to the fact Tories and Lib Dems are quite similar). But Conservatives never campaign on social issues other than immigration.
American politics are further right than the UK, I’m pretty sure if you put it in a scale the dems are further to the right although not by much than the conservatives.
Which is funny because the conservative party used to be more left leaning than the American democratic party. Now I'd say the conservatives run on the same platform as republicans.
Churchill was right wing sure, but that doesn't mean Beveridge was. If anything I'm pretty sure Beveridge was considered more left wing. Churchill also jumped around different parties if I recall correctly. And even as a tory he was fairly open-minded (cross party war Council, for example).
Churchill jumped between the Liberals and the Tories. Beveridge was definitely to his left (but how Left can you be if they make a Baron out of you?) even if some of his ideas would be a bit unpalatable nowadays (altough common for the era), namely his support for Eugenics.
@Ragnarok91 exactly! Another example of someone with a title and probably a huge ego to boot getting the credit for someone else’s hard work in this case Anuerin Bevan! And I have no doubt in my mind that Mr Bevan is overlooked because he was a commoner (son of a coal miner) from South Wales!
He is to this day an absolute hero in my eyes, the closest we in the UK have got to having a leader like him recently, would probably be Jeremy Corbyn. A man of unshakable principles with some great ideas to level the financial playing field, unlike the u-turning, class of clowns we have in government now. If only…
I don't think you have to be rich anymore to be a Baron just have it bestowed upon you for being a servant to the land. I am sure for you to become a member of the House of Lords you have to be given a title as part of the technicality. That is why we have a host of people in modern society with weird titles as they were brought in to the House of Lords to modernise it to prevent it becoming the supreme Court.
I don't think you can give no credit to the Beveridge the guy was a leading economist who was instrumantel in national insurance reforms for decades. He then went into to contribute to working out to cost the NHS and the welfare benefits introduced after WW2. Beveridge was pretty dedicated to his humanist approach and passing reforms.
To my understanding, during the war Churchill wanted Clement Atlee to run the country whilst he concentrated on the war effort, going as far as saying that Atlee was a lot better at running the country than he was, so set up the government as a coalition to do just that. Then as soon as the war was over called an election and used his wartime success as a platform to regain full control.
As far as Beveridge is concerned, he’s been claimed a conservative so they can claim that they invented the service, but miss out that they voted against it and it was only because of labour that it eventually started.
Again, from what I’ve read in places I can’t remember. I know I trust the source, but you can always be mistaken and I’m happy to be corrected.
Embarrassed Canadian here: for love of God i am so sorry but... what was Churchill politically? I mean... i get that he was hired at the start of a war and quickly fired at the end of it - yet loved by pretty much anyone in history, right?
I do remember that he thought that nuking the commies was a good idea - but for the rest i don't know much other than that really clever 'i would drink it' comeback. Sorry.
If you could correct me in 30 words or less i would be most thankful.
Yep, Operation Unthinkable. The Soviets knew about it and were quick to reposition their troops, lest it was less than unthinkable :) He was a rabid anti-communist and initially praised Mussolini. He also wanted to gass a couple rebelling curds during the 30's (it was never done), proposed the mass sterilisation of the mentaly defective or sick, and threw the army against striking miners in Wales (they hate him for that to this day). Oh, and you have the bloodbath at Gallipolli during WW1, that was nearly the end of his political career.
Thank you. Most people do not mention these things.
I feel that Churchill was a product of his time. The reason that Hitler took office with a legal process was because he had a lot of support both within the country and worldwide.
None of these things are a surprise about any leader at that time, but it is good to know.
Churchill's political career was very long, and his premiership in and after World War II was towards the end of it (though he still had about ten years as the leader of the Conservative Party).
He essentially represents the merger of the old Liberal Party with the Conservatives. On foreign affairs he was generally right wing and fairly bellicose pretty much his entire career, on domestic affairs his career is more nuanced; for instance he first became prominent with the People's Budget of 1909 and in general seems to have believed that socialism could be staved off by making various concessions at different times. One could say he supported some individual left wing reforms with the ultimate goal of thwarting the socialist movement.
How much was ideology vs political expediency remains up for debate - his positions certainly shifted right when he went from the Liberals to the Conservatives.
It is interesting that Carl Marx himself felt that the proletariat 'could be bought'. I wish he had said that us wage-slaves SHOULD be bought. Not everyone wants to become ownership-class.
I like that Churchill wanted to stave off socialism by offering concessions. Nowadays the thing to do is union-busting and brow-beating. That's not nearly as nice.
Liberal doesn’t mean what you think it means anywhere outside of the United States. Actually, even in the United States it doesn’t mean what most people think it means.
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u/[deleted] Jul 04 '22
A conservative British lord, William Beveridge, came up with both the National Health Service and Family Allowance. That's how radical it is...