TLP Weekend Edition (July 6-7, 2024)

What we're reading, watching, and listening to this weekend.

Britain’s new Prime Minister Keir Starmer addresses the nation outside 10 Downing Street after his Labour Party’s landslide election victory. (Photo by Paul Ellis/Getty Images)

📰 “How Labour Defeated Populism,” by Anne Applebaum. Atlantic contributor Anne Applebaum interviewed new British Prime Minister Keir Starmer ahead of the Labour Party’s epic electoral triumph on July 4th. She argues that Starmer’s genuine normalcy and lack of ideological bombast—plus his central focus on delivering better living standards for workers and their families—is a big part of his success in beating left- and right-wing populism.

“Populism,” Starmer told me Saturday, thrives on “a disaffection for politics. A lack of belief that politics can be a force for good has meant that people have turned away in some cases from progressive causes.” We were speaking in Aldershot, a garrison town known as the unofficial home of the British army, where he had just met with veterans. “We need to understand why that is, to reconnect with working people,” he said. “The big change we’ve made is to restore the Labour Party to a party of service to working people. I believe we’d drifted too far from that.”

📚 Austerity Britain: 1945-1951, by David Kynaston. Speaking of the Labour Party, social historian David Kynaston’s first book in his excellent multi-volume series exploring British life and politics after World War II begins with a look at how a devastated nation rebuilt itself through the new Labour government’s commitment to creating a strong welfare state that would benefit all people (including the launch of the National Health Service in 1948). The best bits in the book include personal reflections by working people from all walks of life on what daily existence was like during this unprecedented period of redevelopment. The series continues up until 1979 and the rise of Margaret Thatcher.

📖 “On Danish Exceptionalism,” by Ed West. In his great Substack, Wrong Side of History, British journalist Ed West looks at why Denmark rightly enjoys the world’s envy for its high quality of living and relative political stability. As West describes it, national identity is the key ingredient to its success:

Denmark’s happiness, relative equality and sense of cohesion will never be imitated by Britain, let alone the United States. Denmark is like it is because it’s full of Danes—and they’re quite keen on keeping it that way.

The trade-off between diversity and solidarity is a long-established finding of social science, a fact of human behaviour visible in almost any setting. Yet it’s a dilemma that politicians and social commentators across the western world hope can be overcome through good will and education, despite all evidence to the contrary. On this Denmark is the exception; here even centre-Left politicians take a relatively hard-line stand on multiculturalism, considerably to the Right of any other government in western Europe.

Important social scientific insights that American readers will find interesting—and provocative.

📹 Longest Ski Jump World Record, by Ryōyū Kobayashi. Watch this Japanese master fly 291 meters (and 10 seconds) through the Icelandic air to a flawless landing and ski jump world record. The filming and reactions are superb and will make you smile.

🎸 Double Nickels on the Dime, by the Minutemen. This week marks the 40th anniversary of this absolute gold album from southern California punk greats, the Minutemen. Released by the legendary SST Records in 1984, the 45 fast-moving tracks on the record go beyond normal punk to include elements of jazz and funk while covering topics ranging from politics to linguistics.

The Minutemen were always on a different level than other hardcore bands:

When hardcore punk emerged in the early ’80s, it was partially a reaction to the tired old rules of bloated commercial rock’n’roll. But it didn’t take long for hardcore to start devising its own rules, which is why the Minutemen were such a welcome jolt to the scene. They weren’t outsiders; formed in 1980 in the southern Los Angeles community of San Pedro, they often opened for neighboring hardcore trailblazers Black Flag, whose guitarist Greg Ginn signed the Minutemen to his SST label after the first time he saw them play.

They had punk bona fides, too: bassist Mike Watt, guitarist D. Boon, and drummer George Hurley were working-class kids, sons of a sailor, a mechanic, and a machinist. They all held onto day jobs and stayed loyal to San Pedro throughout the band’s existence.

Not coincidentally, since it inspired D. Boon and Mike Watt to write more songs for this album, this week also marks the 40th anniversary of Hüsker Dü’s cracker 23-song concept album, Zen Arcade, likewise released by SST.

When existential angst weighs you down, put on the Minutemen and remember—“Maybe Partying Will Help.”