on the UK election

1. Contrary to the headlines, it's highly misleading to say that Labour won the election. They had little more of a vote percentage than the last election five years ago, when they did poorly in the results. What really happened this time is that the Conservatives lost decisively, and Labour got to pick up the pieces..

2. In the west of England, the Conservatives lost due to tactical voting for the Liberal Democrats, the longstanding third party, which has finally rid itself of the stain of its unfortunate coalition with the Conservatives in 2010-15, and now has more seats than it's had since its predecessor party in the 1920s.

3. In the east of England, they lost due to defections to Reform, which got a lot of votes but only 4 seats, fewer than they were expecting. That's specifically why Liz Truss, the infamous momentary prime minister, lost her parliamentary seat. And now Nigel Farage, Reform's toxic leader, is an MP. Well, there have been toxic MPs before and the kingdom has survived; remember Ian Paisley?

4. As of now, mid-afternoon Friday British time, two seats have still not declared a winner. What's with that? This was supposed to have been completed by early this morning.

5. Labour has about as many seats as it did during the last blowout, in 1997, and it follows the same pattern: purging the party leadership of its leftist elements and adopting some of the less savory principles of the Conservatives. Only this time, they went so far as to expel their previous leftist leader, Jeremy Corbyn. Who won his seat as an independent, a feat expelled party members rarely achieve. (Because tribal unity has been so strong in the UK, a feature now evidently on the wane.)

6. The main difference from 1997 is, though, that nobody seems very excited about Labour, as witnessed by their vote share and voters' comments. Maybe the voters learned their lesson from the overblown hopes of last time. Maybe it's because Labour's policies are so damp and unexciting, or maybe it's because Keir Starmer, the new PM, is damp and unexciting.

7. Starmer is so private that his two teenage children have never been seen in public and even their names are literally unknown. I'm astonished an intrusive media lets him get away with this.

8. Starmer is also an atheist. His wife is Jewish, and that's how they're raising their children, just about the only thing they've ever said in public about them. Hard to imagine an atheist getting elected to any major office in the US. Also, his wife is a vegetarian. Starmer himself eats fish but not other meat. Another thing hard to imagine among major politicians in the US.

9. The new Chancellor of the Exchequer is a woman, first ever in that job. Rachel Reeves is her name. They've had 3 woman prime ministers, but never before one of these.