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

[peterms]

1 hour ago, Risso said:

The leader of the Labour Party, at a time when the government is in disarray over Brexit, thought it would be a good idea to have some high brow chat about a cap on earnings.

There's been a lot of talk in the last few months about Labour needing to address the concerns of the "left behind" in constituencies where people have turned to Ukip.  One of the factors in that is thought to be economic insecurity and growing inequality.

It seems a perfectly natural issue for the leader of the party to raise both in its own right, as it's one of the core concerns of the party, and from the point of view of political strategy.  It's also clearly a response to May's recent comments about tackling unfairness, or however she phrased it.

I really don't follow why you see it as a distraction from what he should be talking about.  It would be very odd if he weren't talking about this.

[blandy]

1 hour ago, peterms said:

Evidence that his own party are briefing against him?  Seriously?  Or that there is a campaign by people in the Labour Party to bring him down?  Again, are you serious?

How about evidence for this

Quote

are briefing against him as part of a long and cafefully planned campaign to bring him down.  It's part of a struggle that's been going on for many years.

Because to be fair that seems well, I don't want to be rude, but...

[blandy]

11 minutes ago, peterms said:

I really don't follow why you see it as a distraction from what he should be talking about.  It would be very odd if he weren't talking about this.

And therein lies the problem.

It's quite true that executive pay is out of all proportion to merit, and that inequality is a massive problem.

Strategically, this is an issue that a leader could and should raise. Timing is everything. Currently the media is full of stories about the disaster of the NHS. The media is also full of stories about Brexit. Both of these are things that the Labour party and Leader should clearly, obviously, be taking advantage of. They're things that show the Gov't in a terrible light, where the media is already primed waiting for quotes, contributions, input from people.

What does Corbyn do. Talk about a limit on maximum earnings. and talk about being both in favour of an against migration controls (I paraphrase).

The bloke is an utter liability, unfit for his role and a clueless eff-tard in leadership terms.

Raise inequality at a time that fits the situation, not in the middle of an NHS crisis ffs

[peterms]

2 minutes ago, blandy said:

How about evidence for this

Because to be fair that seems well, I don't want to be rude, but...

I hardly know where to start.

The struggle I refer to has been taking part in the Labour Party for decades.  It's not a secret.  Corbyn's election and the campaign to undermine and remove him is one more iteration of that.  Again, it's no secret that parts of the party, especially a number of MPs but going well beyond them, have been trying to get rid of him.

Are you seriously doubting that, or asking that reference to it be evidenced?

[peterms]

3 minutes ago, blandy said:

Strategically, this is an issue that a leader could and should raise. Timing is everything. Currently the media is full of stories about the disaster of the NHS. The meid is also full of stories about Brexit. Both of these are things that the Labour party and Leader should clearly, obviously, be taking advantage of. They're things that show the Gov't in a terrible light, where the media is already primed waiting for quotes, contributions, input from people.

He has been raising the NHS, over and over.  In August, he was criticised for doing so, because he "should have been talking about Brexit".  He made it an issue again in November.  He's been raising it this week, demanding answers from May.

[chrisp65]

Yes, it's a perfectly legitimate conversation. It's an extension of May's empty waffle about just about managing and previous tory waffle about hard working families and all being in it together.

No complaint with the subject matter. Just disappointment (on my part) about the timing. Plus that once he was in the moment, he went for such a knee jerk solution that fails even the slightest scrutiny. It suggests he has ideas and ideals which he can't project in to real world scenarios until it's too late.

Personally, this week, I might have gone for something on public transport or social care budgets or the number of available hospital beds. Next time Philip Green is a current topic, go with taxing the super rich a tiny bit more.

I am judging him by a different standard to that by which I judge a tory. I will happily listen to a scorpion promise, but still expect to get stung. I always hope for more from the good guys.

[blandy]

1 minute ago, peterms said:

I hardly know where to start.

The struggle I refer to has been taking part in the Labour Party for decades.  It's not a secret.  Corbyn's election and the campaign to undermine and remove him is one more iteration of that.  Again, it's no secret that parts of the party, especially a number of MPs but going well beyond them, have been trying to get rid of him.

Are you seriously doubting that, or asking that reference to it be evidenced?

So what you're saying isn't that Sections of his own party are briefing against him and have been doing so for many years, but that for a long time the opposite is true - that Corbyn and his cohorts have spent a long time trying to undermine previous labour leaders, it's just that the tables have turned?

In that case, I see what you're saying. That a minority of hard left Labour MPs have always been out of tune with mainstream labour, until recently, where the situation in terms of momentum and wave of new members and a change to the way the leader is elected has reversed that. OK, I agree. Where does that leave us? With a monumentally ineffective opposition, and an irrelevant Labour party. Sweet, that's done the country a great service. Not.

[Jon]

I love the guy, but he's patently not a good leader of a mass political party with differing strands. He refuses to engage with much of the media. I can't quite work out if he's incompetent at the leadership game, or just unwilling to engage in it.

I love what he stands for, and almost all of his policies/aims.

But he's not willing or able to 'play the game' of Westminster/mainstream media and politics, so I just don't see how he can win an election. I had hoped to be wrong on this. But he just seems to be getting more invisible, at a time, IMO, of national crisis, in terms of  Brexit and the NHS and the widening poverty gap. We need someone to grab the media and the tories by the gonads, and I'm sad to say it's not going to be Jez

I'm hoping King Clive takes over the mantle ..... 

[peterms]

45 minutes ago, blandy said:

So what you're saying isn't that Sections of his own party are briefing against him and have been doing so for many years, but that for a long time the opposite is true - that Corbyn and his cohorts have spent a long time trying to undermine previous labour leaders, it's just that the tables have turned?

In that case, I see what you're saying. That a minority of hard left Labour MPs have always been out of tune with mainstream labour, until recently, where the situation in terms of momentum and wave of new members and a change to the way the leader is elected has reversed that. OK, I agree. Where does that leave us? With a monumentally ineffective opposition, and an irrelevant Labour party. Sweet, that's done the country a great service. Not.

There are factions within political parties.  Sometimes the differences between them are marginal and containable, sometimes they grow into something more serious.  This is not news.  Sometimes the factions use the media as a tool, sometimes the media are more interventionist in looking for and playing up stories of internal division.  I think we all know that politicians sometimes brief against their own side for factional advantage.  The evidence of each individual instance often doesn't emerge, or may come out in diaries years later, or may slip out by accident.  But no-one actually denies it regularly happens.

In the case of the Labour Party, the media tend to be more well disposed to the right wing than the left wing of the party.  Again, this is not a secret.  That makes it easier for the right wing to use the media to brief against the left, than vice versa.  Possibly the left would use media briefings more actively against their colleagues if the media were more receptive - I don't know.

In the Labour Party, one of the main grounds on which political differences have been played out is in the selection of MPs.  The left pressed for many years to make it easier to deselect MPs who were seen to be out of step with the membership.  The right, through control of the party machinery, subverted selection processes in order to engineer the selection of their favourites.  They were pretty successful for many years, and we now have a parliamentary party which on the whole is further to the right than it seems the party membership are. 

Part of the game is about framing the debate, and getting the media to use terms like "hard left" and "moderates" to create and reinforce perceptions.  "Mainstream" is another term in the lexicon.  I think left and right are more neutral and less loaded terms.

We had a situation for some years under Blair where the left held back on internal opposition because the party was electorally successful.  Sometimes, like on Iraq, people held back when more of them should have opposed more forcefully.  We now seem to be in a position where the right either don't think the election can be won under Corbyn, or else don't want to win it if it means greatly strengthening that wing of the party.  The long game is creating a narrative that the Labour Party can only successfully be led from the right (aka "centre").  Creating a perception of uncontrollable disarray is part of that.  It's a risky approach, and I think a foolish one, but it's what's happening.  I don't really see how the left can just acquiesce in that, and accept that party loyalty is something that can be demanded of them, but not reciprocated.

 

[Amsterdam_Neil_D]

24 minutes ago, Jon said:

he's not willing or able to 'play the game'

I think this it is a nutshell.  I think he objects to the existence of "The Game" and refuses to play it at all.  

[darrenm]

2 hours ago, blandy said:

And therein lies the problem.

It's quite true that executive pay is out of all proportion to merit, and that inequality is a massive problem.

Strategically, this is an issue that a leader could and should raise. Timing is everything. Currently the media is full of stories about the disaster of the NHS. The media is also full of stories about Brexit. Both of these are things that the Labour party and Leader should clearly, obviously, be taking advantage of. They're things that show the Gov't in a terrible light, where the media is already primed waiting for quotes, contributions, input from people.

What does Corbyn do. Talk about a limit on maximum earnings. and talk about being both in favour of an against migration controls (I paraphrase).

The bloke is an utter liability, unfit for his role and a clueless eff-tard in leadership terms.

Raise inequality at a time that fits the situation, not in the middle of an NHS crisis ffs

On 1/8/2017 at 21:14, darrenm said:

Apart from Corbyn. I don't think he lies or deceives at all. Which is why people don't like him. They want him to turn populist like everyone else. This saddens me.

You make decent points @blandy (even if I disagree) but is there really any need for the name calling and personal attacks? It just devalues your position and makes it seem like you have personal hatred rather than reasoned opinions.

Disappointed to see that lots of people here would rather Corbyn become populist and leave the things he feels strongly behind to just become a.n. other politician who tells people what they want to hear. Not for me I'm afraid.

[TrentVilla]

46 minutes ago, peterms said:

We had a situation for some years under Blair where the left held back on internal opposition because the party was electorally successful.  Sometimes, like on Iraq, people held back when more of them should have opposed more forcefully.  We now seem to be in a position where the right either don't think the election can be won under Corbyn, or else don't want to win it if it means greatly strengthening that wing of the party.  The long game is creating a narrative that the Labour Party can only successfully be led from the right (aka "centre").  Creating a perception of uncontrollable disarray is part of that.  It's a risky approach, and I think a foolish one, but it's what's happening.  I don't really see how the left can just acquiesce in that, and accept that party loyalty is something that can be demanded of them, but not reciprocated.

 

That is one way to look at it.

Another would be to say that Blair was a strong enough leader of the party to unite it, to a point, in order to deliver success. That his strength of leadership and his skill with people was such that he was able to control those who otherwise would have acted differently.

I'm not sure you can with any real validity say the left are/were able or willing to hold back but the right can't and completely remove the factor of leadership from the equation.

I think the suggestion that the party is in disarray is a created perception is a little generous as well.

[darrenm]

So Corbyn trounces May on every PMQs, he's fighting them on policies people care about, but people can't wait to get the knives out about one particular policy among many that will be popular with traditional Labour voters. Just in case anyone's commenting without bothering to find out what actually happened, on the radio yesterday morning, he said "I would like there to be some kind of high earnings cap, quite honestly" when discussing the current inequality. Then his speech in the afternoon included the policy about a 20:1 maximum company ratio which was also proposed by David Cameron previously.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/blog/live/2017/jan/11/pmqs-may-corbyn-nhs-simon-stevens-10-plays-down-reports-of-rift-with-nhs-chief-simon-stevens-politics-live

PMQs - Verdict: One of the challenges of leadership is not just doing the right thing but being seen to do the right thing. Taking charge, getting on the front foot, seizing the initiative. Not just leading, but showing leadership. And that was Theresa May’s main problem today. She could respond to Jeremy Corbyn’s questions about the NHS with a measure of authority, but she did not sound like someone engaging with the scale of the problems afflicting the NHS or with much idea about what to do about them. Corbyn won comfortably.

...

I have not done a count, but Corbyn now seems to have won most of the encounters he has had with May since the autumn of last year. They are not flashy, knock-out victories, but he is asking solid questions and exposing May’s weaknesses. Before Corbyn became party leader many people assumed that PMQs would be the one area where his deficiencies would be most exposed. But, surprisingly, PMQs is now becoming one of the arenas in which his leadership is at its most assured.

[tonyh29]

24 minutes ago, darrenm said:

 

You make decent points @blandy (even if I disagree) but is there really any need for the name calling and personal attacks? It just devalues your position and makes it seem like you have personal hatred rather than reasoned opinions.

Disappointed to see that lots of people here would rather Corbyn become populist and leave the things he feels strongly behind to just become a.n. other politician who tells people what they want to hear. Not for me I'm afraid.

tbf I didn't read it that way , he said he's a liability, which is  true  and not a personal attack , and a f- tard in Leadership terms  (which is also true)  but specifically refers to the him as a leader , not him as a person or even at a policy level

anyway ..carry on

 

[peterms]

7 minutes ago, TrentVilla said:

That is one way to look at it.

Another would be to say that Blair was a strong enough leader of the party to unite it, to a point, in order to deliver success. That his strength of leadership and his skill with people was such that he was able to control those who otherwise would have acted differently.

I'm not sure you can with any real validity say the left are/were able or willing to hold back but the right can't and completely remove the factor of leadership from the equation.

I think the suggestion that the party is in disarray is a created perception is a little generous as well.

I'm sure Blair would give himself credit for wonderful leadership skills, uniting disparate factions.  At the time, there was quite a bit of discussion about holding together despite differences.  You have to remember that the party had been out of office for many years, there was deep concern about the damage done under Thatcher and afterwards, and there had been the enormous disappointment of losing the previous election when it seemed all but won.  There was a feeling of something approaching desperation, and that the party simply had to do whatever it took to win - more so than would be expected in the normal run of things.  Those things led to quite a lot of people exerting a lot of self-discipline and putting up with things that made them pretty uncomfortable.  Blair personally was always seen as an arse by many people in the party.

I'm absolutely not saying the disarray at present is only a perception.  It's real enough.  I'm saying it is the intent to create a perception that under a left leader, there will inevitably be disarray.  What is odd is that it's the left that seems to get the blame for that, rather than the ones who plan to overthrow the leadership, fabricate stories about bricks through Angela Eagle's window, meet with the Israeli embassy bag-carrier to develop a narrative about antisemitism (no, I don't have proof of that, I await revelations of this with interest, and I will be utterly astonished if that didn't happen), and so on.

[blandy]

1 hour ago, peterms said:

The long game is creating a narrative that the Labour Party can only successfully be led from the right (aka "centre"). 

In terms of winning elections, that's the absolute reality. The UK, and England particularly just is not and never has been left wing enough to elect a left wing Labour Gov't. I doubt it ever will be.

1 hour ago, Amsterdam_Neil_D said:

I think this it is a nutshell.  I think he objects to the existence of "The Game" and refuses to play it at all.  

Agreed. And it's monumentally stupid.

[darrenm]

Just now, blandy said:

In terms of winning elections, that's the absolute reality. The UK, and England particularly just is not and never has been left wing enough to elect a left wing Labour Gov't. I doubt it ever will be.

It was until Thatcher. She made the country neoliberal.

[blandy]

1 hour ago, darrenm said:

You make decent points @blandy (even if I disagree) but is there really any need for the name calling and personal attacks? It just devalues your position and makes it seem like you have personal hatred rather than reasoned opinions.

Disappointed to see that lots of people here would rather Corbyn become populist and leave the things he feels strongly behind to just become a.n. other politician who tells people what they want to hear. Not for me I'm afraid.

Thanks. Re the personal attacks - ??  I don't think I've been personal to other posters, have I ? I apologise if I've upset you or anyone else. I didn't intend to cause any offence.

If you mean personal attacks on Corbyn (?) I consider him to be utterly unsuitable to be a leader, to be stubbornly and wilfully harming the prospects of millions of people being better represented and governed, of being at times, duplicitous, deceptive, hypocritical. He's a major asset to the tories, and it's a disgrace. He's incompetent. He's inadvertently helping May and Fox and Hunt and all the other country wrecking scoundrels.

[darrenm]

Just now, blandy said:

Thanks. Re the personal attacks - ??  I don't think I've been personal to other posters, have I ? I apologise if I've upset you or anyone else. I didn't intend to cause any offence.

If you mean personal attacks on Corbyn (?) I consider him to be utterly unsuitable to be a leader, to be stubbornly and wilfully harming the prospects of millions of people being better represented and governed, of being at times, duplicitous, deceptive, hypocritical. He's a major asset to the tories, and it's a disgrace. He's incompetent. He's inadvertently helping May and Fox and Hunt and all the other country wrecking scoundrels.

No, don't hold back. I want to know what you really think

[TrentVilla]

21 minutes ago, darrenm said:

It was until Thatcher. She made the country neoliberal.

Or what went before did. Or a little of both.

Whichever it is, it is what it is.

A left wing Labour Party won't win power.