The Chairman Mao resembling, Monarchy hating, threat to Britain, Labour Party thread

[blandy]

1 hour ago, HanoiVillan said:

what makes him 'the Tories worst nightmare'?

That's maybe a bit OTT, but a "credible" leader of Labour with an appeal to the general voting population rather than someone who looks like a geography teacher, but with less charisma and a lot less leadership nouse than the average teacher is clearly a massive improvement.

[MakemineVanilla]

31 minutes ago, blandy said:

That's maybe a bit OTT, but a "credible" leader of Labour with an appeal to the general voting population rather than someone who looks like a geography teacher, but with less charisma and a lot less leadership nouse than the average teacher is clearly a massive improvement.

That is ironic because while Labour have a leader who is said to look like a geography teacher, the Tories are soon to get someone with a degree in geography, as leader.

I actually suspect this is really a case of virulent pogonophobia, masquerading as something more acceptable. 

[HanoiVillan]

16 minutes ago, blandy said:

That's maybe a bit OTT, but a "credible" leader of Labour with an appeal to the general voting population rather than someone who looks like a geography teacher, but with less charisma and a lot less leadership nouse than the average teacher is clearly a massive improvement.

The Tories don't need to worry about Labour no matter who the leader is. Labour have problems that Dan Jarvis won't fix; much bigger problems than any individual, including Corbyn. 

As best we know, 70% of Labour members voted to Remain. About 95%, in my guess, of party activists will have supported Remain, about 98% of MP's and 100% of the shadow cabinet. Yet the country voted 52-48 in favour of Leave. Right now, the Labour party doesn't have a policy on invoking Article 50, but before long they will have to create a policy on the single most dominant political issue since at least the Iraq War, and probably much earlier. And when they do come up with a policy, that policy will destroy them. If they decide to favour a form of Brexit, the party will look craven and cowardly, the activists won't turn out, the unions will keep funding to a minimum and they'll be smashed in an election. If they decide to favour never invoking article 50, they will be mercilessly slaughtered in the right wing media for ignoring the 'democratic will of the country'. It's Sophie's Choice. 

It gets worse as well. Since the Tory party are both a] in government, and b] utterly split on what to do about Brexit, nobody will even really be paying attention to Labour anyway. On any given Brexit question you're likely to be able to find two opposing voices closer to power than the Leader of the Opposition. There's only one political conversation that matters in this country right now, and it's happening inside the Conservative Party about Brexit. 

And on top of that, there has been a long term, secular decline in popularity among centre left social democratic parties in western Europe. Of western Europe's powerhouses (Britain, Germany, France, Spain, Italy, Holland) all are governed by the centre right except Spain (which has no government) and France, where Francois Hollande's approval ratings are in single digits and his party are more or less certain to be soundly beaten by the National Front in any near-term election. Centre left parties have gone from having unpersuasive arguments about the financial crisis to having no answer at all to Brexit or the drifting apart of Europe. 

If I say I don't think Dan Jarvis can make much progress into these headwinds, it's not meant as an insult to him (as I said, I barely know anything about him). But he'd have to be an all-time political colossus to turn Labour around now. In reality, any possible Labour leader is going to look like King Canute trying to hold back the tide. 

[Awol]

3 hours ago, HanoiVillan said:

Okay, so Dan Jarvis has a good CV, we've established that. But what makes him 'the Tories worst nightmare'? I'm asking genuinely, this isn't a gotcha. But if he's just another Blairite* but with tours of duty it's not going to be enough to turn Labour around. 

It's the intellectual bankruptcy of the centre left that has led to Corbyn, and it's not a pattern limited to this country, but is observable all around western Europe. 

*I should stress I know very little about him. I thought he was a Blairite, but am I just dreaming that?

I mean from the perspective of where do the Tories attack him? 

I've never met him but know blokes who worked with him in 2006 on the Helmand break in tour. They say he's very bright, unflappable and effective. 99/100 with his CV he'd be a Tory so for a party that likes to get personal where do they punch?

His politics may be and probably are more practical, but if Labour fancy the idea of actually being a government not a protest movement that's where they have to go. 

I don't have an answer to Labour's ideological bankruptcy but the future, if they are to have one, isn't trying to refight the 1970's.

They need to find a way to become relevant to the people who are losing out to globalisation. That's an election winning size constituency as the referendum has demonstrated.

Whatever Corbyn thinks his policies are doing it's not winning those people over. Can Labour reconnect with the w/class? I don't know but their future as a party depends on it. 

[Chindie]

Jarvis won't burn his chances on this current predicament. He'll have a crack at it sooner or later, it'll be once the ship is steady and they're a force again.

On that note, is it me or has the wind gone out of the sails of the coup? Kuennsbetg run out of Corbyn hatchet pieces or are there no more 'heavy hearted' (snigger) resignations to come?

[snowychap]

To be fair, I don't think there's anyone other than Tom Watson left to resign.

[Awol]

9 minutes ago, Chindie said:

Jarvis won't burn his chances on this current predicament. He'll have a crack at it sooner or later, it'll be once the ship is steady and they're a force again.

I think that's right. Hence being reduced to Angela Eagle as a stalking horse, the woman who came 4th to Tom Watson in the Deputy Leader contest...

See her in the ITV debate? Squawking away like a partially strangled chicken. Awful. 

Edited July 1, 2016 by Awol

[snowychap]

15 minutes ago, Awol said:

I mean from the perspective of where do the Tories attack him? 

I've never met him but know blokes who worked with him in 2006 on the Helmand break in tour. They say he's very bright, unflappable and effective. 99/100 with his CV he'd be a Tory so for a party that likes to get personal where do they punch?

But aren't you describing the very landscape with which voters are apparently disenchanted, i.e. the undistinguishable middle ground?

I don't see where comments such as idealogical bankruptcy come in to it when you're effectively arguing that their future lies in refighting the late 90s.

[Chindie]

I'm looking forward to more crocodile tears tbh.

I do also like how completely transparent the whole thing is, but there appears to be some unwritten rule that you can't call it out for what it is in the media.

[Awol]

7 minutes ago, snowychap said:

But aren't you describing the very landscape with which voters are apparently disenchanted, i.e. the undistinguishable middle ground?

I don't see where comments such as idealogical bankruptcy come in to it when you're effectively arguing that their future lies in refighting the late 90s.

No, I'm arguing that the start point is having an effective leader. The bit of my post you didn't quote was saying they need to rethink how to represent those who feels disenfranchised - not sure why you cut that bit off. 

[sharkyvilla]

I'm sure Dan Jarvis would be extremely popular with the centre ground which I still believe is where election wins lie, but he didn't run last time because of his family and I can't see how it's changed this quickly.  If Angela Eagle is the only person they can get to oppose Corbyn then God help them.  She will be humiliated.

[snowychap]

7 minutes ago, Awol said:

No, I'm arguing that the start point is having an effective leader. The bit of my post you didn't quote was saying they need to rethink how to represent those who feels disenfranchised - not sure why you cut that bit off. 

Partly because it seemed to run contrary to the idealogically bankrupt point you'd already made, Jon. Otherwise because it appeared to be very much about being led rather than leading.

[Awol]

15 minutes ago, snowychap said:

Partly because it seemed to run contrary to the idealogically bankrupt point you'd already made, Jon. Otherwise because it appeared to be very much about being led rather than leading.

Sorry I'm a bit tired so can't quite grasp your point. 

[snowychap]

3 minutes ago, Awol said:

Sorry I'm a bit tired so can't quite grasp your point. 

No worries, it probably wasn't very clear anyway!

I made a couple, I hope: that the idealogically bankrupt criticism doesn't really fit with the call to arms for pragmatism, and that the problem with our democracy is that the representatives are seeking to address the concerns of the people in a hollow manner, i.e. to parrot the same thing as all of the other [politicians].

It's the second point that seems more important to me and when I meant leading not being led, I'm not suggesting some kind of authoritarian way forward which ignores what the public want but actually giving actual different options to the public and then allowing them to make a decision on those proposals. Not just saying, for example (there are many other policy examples so sorry to pick this one), "Well, obviously immigration must be managed." simply because advisors have told them that immigration is a trending topic and this is what eveyone else is saying to ameliorate the public concern.

[coda]

1 hour ago, sharkyvilla said:

I'm sure Dan Jarvis would be extremely popular with the centre ground which I still believe is where election wins lie, but he didn't run last time because of his family and I can't see how it's changed this quickly. 

I think he regretted not running. Said he wasn't given much time following Miliband's departure.

[HanoiVillan]

14 hours ago, Awol said:

I mean from the perspective of where do the Tories attack him? 

I've never met him but know blokes who worked with him in 2006 on the Helmand break in tour. They say he's very bright, unflappable and effective. 99/100 with his CV he'd be a Tory so for a party that likes to get personal where do they punch?

His politics may be and probably are more practical, but if Labour fancy the idea of actually being a government not a protest movement that's where they have to go. 

I don't have an answer to Labour's ideological bankruptcy but the future, if they are to have one, isn't trying to refight the 1970's.

They need to find a way to become relevant to the people who are losing out to globalisation. That's an election winning size constituency as the referendum has demonstrated.

Whatever Corbyn thinks his policies are doing it's not winning those people over. Can Labour reconnect with the w/class? I don't know but their future as a party depends on it. 

Thanks for the response. 

On the first points, it sounds like you have to attack Jarvis on policy, rather than personality. He seems, from reading a bit more about him, to be a decent and honourable person. However, everyone can be criticised for something.  

My more substantial disagreement comes from the last two lines. You seem to be implying that Labour can win by rebuilding the Leave constituency. We need to remember that 70% of Labour voters voted for Remain. 60% of Tory voters voted for Leave. If you look at a map of the area around London for example, Remain turned into Leave in areas like Epping Forest. These aren't working class areas. Lots and lots of working class people did vote for Leave, of course, but that doesn't mean that they're natural Labour voters. A lot of working class Leavers appear, from the data we have, to be non-Labour voters living in Labour constituencies. Labour are not going to be able to build a coalition out of right-wing Tories and working class people who don't like Labour, and if they try - and early indications are they might - they simply create a huge anti-Brexit space for the Lib Dems and Greens to pick off their middle-class Remain support. 

This is what I mean about being between a rock and a hard place. 

14 hours ago, Chindie said:

Jarvis won't burn his chances on this current predicament. He'll have a crack at it sooner or later, it'll be once the ship is steady and they're a force again.

On that note, is it me or has the wind gone out of the sails of the coup? Kuennsbetg run out of Corbyn hatchet pieces or are there no more 'heavy hearted' (snigger) resignations to come?

You know the coup is struggling now that news emerges that Tom Watson is going to have a 'please Mr Corbyn, won't you consider resigning' meeting. It should be a bigger story to be honest. Over last weekend, more than 20 members of the shadow cabinet resigned, in a manner totally unprecedented in British politics, staggered every hour or so for maximum media impact and embarrassment in a coordinated attack, and what difference did it make? Barely any. Corbyn remains leader, and he'd almost certainly win a leadership election against any potential challenger. 60,000 people - including our own @dAVe80 - have signed up for the purpose of defending him in any putative leadership election just since the referendum. The shadow cabinet pulled out their trump card, all proud of it, and now it looks like they're standing there with their limp dicks in their hands. 

Edited July 2, 2016 by HanoiVillan

[Davkaus]

 

Davao del Norte is in the Phillipines. Her Majesty's Most Loyal Opposition, ladies and gentleman.

 

I will never vote for a party that has Dianne **** Abbott in a senior position. 

[Awol]

@HanoiVillan I don't know what the answer is but I'm absolutely confident of one thing; if Labour go into the next GE with Corbyn as leader they will get demolished as a party.

If they can't unseat him maybe something better will emerge from the split - after the loony left & their activists have plunged down the rabbit hole.

[brommy]

Is it possible that the Labour party could run the next GE campaign on an 'in Europe' ticket in the hope of collecting millions of votes from people of all political persuasions who are strongly in favour of being in the EU? I assume the UK will have completed Article 50 and left the EU by then, but there is an 'Article' for entering the EU.

[chrisp65]

Just now, brommy said:

Is it possible that the Labour party could run the next GE campaign on an 'in Europe' ticket in the hope of collecting millions of votes from people of all political persuasions who are strongly in favour of being in the EU? I assume the UK will have completed Article 50 and left the EU by then, but there is an 'Article' for entering the EU.

It's possible, but then 35% of their 'natural' electorate voted leave (apparently this is the personal failing of Corbyn), so they would need to replace that 35% with new supporters plus find some more on top of that to get anywhere near.

Their main problem will be, for all the bluster and marching and tweeting of the last week, an awful lot of those offended and upset at our exit probably won't quite make it out of bed and in to the polling stations...again.