Tories on a roll, but don't tell me what to call IS

The decisive election victory of the Tories in May has left them free to enact many of the changes they were stymied from introducing by the Libdems. The latter paid heavily for their perceived duplicity (their U turn on tuition fees, for example) by having their 60-strong parliamentary showing whittled down to just 8. In hindsight the decision to abandon them wholesale might now seem a trifle disingenuous, as the Tries go full steam ahead into their ultra-right wing agenda.

We have seen George Osborne launch his new budget in triumph, his position immensely enhanced by the outright Tory majority and now apparently in pole position to take over from DC when he retires in 2020. Yesterday the end of subsidies for onshore wind farms was announced, and it can only be a matter of time before the green light is given to fracking projects around the country- doubtless with subsidies offered to them instead. So we can see how little the Tories care about the environment, if weren't sure already.

And last week David Cameron registered his objection to the BBC calling IS IS. "It isn't Islamic, and it isn't a state" is the gist of his comments, and seemed to imply the BBC were offering comfort to them by giving them that moniker. I see they have now started calling them "so called IS" which may or may not be what DC had in mind. Of course the Beeb has a lot more to worry about from the Tories than this little detail: there are some in their ranks who would disband the whole socialist project (as they see it) altogether, and even more benign elements say the BBC is too big and should be scaled down considerably.

But back to IS for a moment. The last time I checked IS is a state by any normal definition of the word. They control a huge swathe of Iraq and Syria, four times the size of Britain. They run the schools, the hospitals and much of the infrastructure. They are in charge in Mosul, Iraq's second city. That's like them being in control of Birmingham.

It's no good thinking you can change reality by changing a name. It doesn't work. I recall in the aftermath of 911 when Fox news started referring to suicide bombers as "homicide bombers", even though every bomb I've ever heard of humans making was designed to kill and maim. Truth was they didn't like to admit the frightening reality that certain people were so committed to their cause they were prepared to die for it. I don't know whether Fox still uses this "doublethink" strategy when discussing suicide bombers, but DC's insistence we don't call Islamic State Islamic State is very much in the same  ridiculous vein. Hey, David? We're not stupid.