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

[OutByEaster?]

It seems pretty much everyone is anti-EU except the Conservatives and the Blue parts of Labour, albeit for different reasons.

 

The EU is essentially a device for putting public money into private hands, where lobbyists from all sorts of companies and interest groups 'campaign' (see also bribe and bully) for European taxes to be spent with their companies.

 

In the case of Corbyn, he wants out because he wants more things to go back into the hands of the taxpayer, in the case of UKIP, I've always suspected it's because they believe they could make more from the 'campaigns' if they didn't have to share them with other European members - one dislikes it because it goes to far, the other because it doesn't go far enough.

 

I don't think immigration is the issue here - I don't really think immigration is that much of an issue save for it's hugely inflated profile through our media. The issue around the EU is the way in which it moves public money.

 

Corbyn wants more of it for people. UKIP want more of it for themselves. Our corporations and banks want to keep having it without any undue attention - it's no surprise that our major parties support the third of those options as they are largely funded, backed, employed and are stakeholders in those companies and their jobs rely to a large extent on the positions that the press are informed to take on them by the handful of media barons who are also largely, funded, backed, employed and are stakeholders in those companies.

 

Corbin can't break that system. UKIP can't either. 

[Mantis]

It seems pretty much everyone is anti-EU except the Conservatives and the Blue parts of Labour, albeit for different reasons.

 

The EU is essentially a device for putting public money into private hands, where lobbyists from all sorts of companies and interest groups 'campaign' (see also bribe and bully) for European taxes to be spent with their companies.

 

In the case of Corbyn, he wants out because he wants more things to go back into the hands of the taxpayer, in the case of UKIP, I've always suspected it's because they believe they could make more from the 'campaigns' if they didn't have to share them with other European members - one dislikes it because it goes to far, the other because it doesn't go far enough.

 

I don't think immigration is the issue here - I don't really think immigration is that much of an issue save for it's hugely inflated profile through our media. The issue around the EU is the way in which it moves public money.

 

Corbyn wants more of it for people. UKIP want more of it for themselves. Our corporations and banks want to keep having it without any undue attention - it's no surprise that our major parties support the third of those options as they are largely funded, backed, employed and are stakeholders in those companies and their jobs rely to a large extent on the positions that the press are informed to take on them by the handful of media barons who are also largely, funded, backed, employed and are stakeholders in those companies.

 

Corbin can't break that system. UKIP can't either. 

Loads of Tories are anti-EU - far more than in any other major party barring UKIP. I honestly don't know where you've got this impression from that the Tories are suddenly really pro-EU?

Edited August 19, 2015 by Mantis

[HanoiVillan]

 

Many UKIP votes were indeed protest votes but that still doesn't change the fact that immigration is pretty much the core issue of the party. I'm not denying that Corbyn will likely take away some of their support because he's not a typical politician but I don't expect UKIP voters to switch to Labour in their droves.

 

UKIP have already peaked IMO.

Immigration isn't the core issue of UKIP at all. EU membership is most definitely the core issue. Leaving the EU is most definitely THE issue that binds them all together. In fact their policy on just about everything else tends to move with Farages bowel movements. Even their immigration policy changed quite regularly. They are to all intents and purposes a single issue party with lots of xenophobes as supporters. Doesn't mean they won't vote for a Corbyn Labour Party.

Really they want to privatise the NHS but they couldn't get away with it, they completely changed their policy because most of their supporters want the NHS, their backers don't but….

 

 

This isn't right. Take a look at this post from (boo! hiss!) ConservativeHome:

 

Are UKIP a one trick pony? A party set up with the sole aim of, as the name suggests, withdrawing the UK from the European Union, has had to develop beyond that narrow remit with its increased exposure. And indeed the European Union is, in fact, only fifth on the list of UKIP supporters’ concerns; a fifth (18%) saw it as among the most important issues facing Britain in 2012 with the economy, race relations and immigration, unemployment and crime all rated as more important than the EU. However, the one in five UKIP supporters naming the European Union is much higher than the 6% of the general public overall.

 

As among the wider public, UKIP supporters were more concerned about the economy than any other issue. Six in ten (59%) UKIP supporters placed it among the most important issues in 2012. However, unlike the public on average, the second issue of concern for UKIP supporters was race relations and immigration; 51% of them mentioned it compared with just a fifth (21%) of Britons overall. Crime and law and order is also more important to UKIP supporters than to the general public. Race relations and immigration are also particularly important issues for Conservatives as well as UKIP supporters, highlighting once again the similarities between the two sets of voters.

 

So, 18% said Europe was amongst the most important issues, 51% said 'race relations and immigration' was. The reasons for this are complicated, but have to do with the fact that the Euro-obsessives have generally been in UKIP since the late nineties, and are towards the top of the party hierarchy, but are small in number, whereas nearly half the membership has joined since 2010, and are generally disillusioned voters from all sides who don't care about the EU. 

Edited August 19, 2015 by HanoiVillan

[HanoiVillan]

An interesting article from before the election on Labour and UKIP, which I think will cast a few lights on the discussion we've been having:

 

Ukip has divided the left, not the right, and cut Labour off from its 'old' support

 

According to conventional wisdom, Ukip has "divided the right". By targeting Europe, immigration and politicians in Westminster, Nigel Farage is tearing off a section of the Conservative base that David Cameron desperately needs if he is to triumph in 2015.

 

But while it is true that Ukip is currently winning over most of its support from people who voted Conservative in 2010, this actually tells us less than commentators often claim.

In 2010 Labour was at a low ebb, Gordon Brown was extremely unpopular and traditional Labour voters were angry about immigration and the financial crisis. Defining "the right" as 2010 Conservative voters is therefore risky. A lot of those who voted Conservative in 2010 may not have been natural Conservatives at all, backing Cameron despite their misgivings about his party, as a vote against a failed and unpopular Labour government.

 

A more sensible way of defining left and right is in ideological terms. Ever since Clement Attlee's 1945 Labour victory, British politics has been structured around a conflict over the economy and the proper role of the state.

 

The left has favoured higher taxation, redistribution and greater state intervention. The right has favoured free markets, low taxes and a small state. This is still a central dividing line today.

 

Ed Miliband's most celebrated policy announcement called for state regulation of gas and electricity prices, and he has shown a distrust of big business, and a desire for greater taxation of the rich, and greater government help for the less well-off. The Conservatives, meanwhile, retain their traditional faith in free markets and private enterprise.

If Ukip is just dividing the right then we would expect to see Ukip voters falling consistently on the Conservative side of this longstanding divide. But as our chart below shows (based on new data from the British Election Study), the opposite is in fact true.

An average of 71% of Ukip voters agree with five leftwing ideological statements, far above the Conservatives (43%) or even the Liberal Democrats (65%). They are only a little behind Labour (81%).

 

When Ed Miliband argues that big business takes advantage of ordinary people, employees on zero-hour contracts are being exploited by management, that the rich exempt themselves from the rules that apply to others, and that ordinary workers are not benefitting from a recovery for the rich, Ukip voters agree with him. On these core economic issues, Farage and Ukip do not divide the right. They divide the left.

 

 

This raises an obvious but also awkward question for progressives. If Ukip's struggling, pessimistic and left-behind voters find these economic messages appealing, why are they supporting Farage, not Miliband?

 

The problem for Labour is that these voters no longer think about politics in general, or Labour in particular, in economic terms. Labour has encouraged this: New Labour played down traditional leftwing ideology in favour of social liberalism and pragmatic centrism. Now many voters with longstanding "old left" economic values associate Labour more with "new left" social liberalism: feminism, multiculturalism and support for immigration.

 

Ukip's rise has exposed this division on the left and made it harder to heal. Many of the "new left" voters attracted to Labour by its social liberalism cannot stomach Ukip voters' strong opposition to immigration, which they regard as an expression of ignorance and prejudice, and so refuse to engage with "old left" voters on the economic issues where the two groups share common ground.

 

Conversely, "old left" voters retain a strong distrust of Labour's middle-class elites, after decades of feeling ignored and marginalised as New Labour chased the middle-class swing vote, and cannot abide lectures from privileged "new left" activists about the virtues of immigration and diversity.

 

Tony Blair's winning recipe in 1997 was to bury the traditional "old left" Labour ideology, gambling that he could expand Labour's coalition without losing traditional support, as the voters who endorsed it had nowhere else to go. Nigel Farage's rise has made this Blairite balancing act impossible. Ukip has divided the left, splitting the old from the new, and cutting Labour off from struggling voters it seeks to champion.

 

I think we've clearly seen some evidence for this article in the last few pages of this thread. 

Edited August 19, 2015 by HanoiVillan

[mjmooney]

Europe (rather than immigration) may well be the core issue for UKIP the party. But their voters are a different matter. Before the last election I spoke to a lot of people who were intending to vote UKIP and they barely mentioned Europe. It was ALL about immigrants - and Muslims.

[Awol]

I think we've clearly seen some evidence for this article in the last few pages of this thread

Read this at the time and there was a lot of similar work done by the authors including a book called "Revolt on the Right". It clearly demonstrates how far off the mark the pre-election coverage was regarding UKIP but I think it suited the MSM to portray them as a threat to the Conservatives.

Labour didn't really help themselves by ignoring the empirical proof, choosing instead to believe a narrative constructed mainly by their own luuvie supporters (in print and broadcast media) who variously presented UKIP voters as anything from insane weirdos to Neo-Nazis.

A classic case of manipulating the evidence to support their pre-conceived stereotypes. Epic fail.

[CarewsEyebrowDesigner]

Backed by Murdoch.

 

Cooper it is then

[CarewsEyebrowDesigner]

In a more interesting/just as sinister development, it appears as though a host of people's applications for membership to the Labour party are being denied 'arbitrarily'. Lolz.

 

Hm, it also seems as though long term members and donators are being turned away.

 

 

 

How long before the split?

Edited August 20, 2015 by CarewsEyebrowDesigner

[coda]

 

Yes, a member of 35 years received this.

[Awol]

Yes, a member of 35 years received this.

This fiasco is Ed Miliband's parting gift to Labour and I thank Christ he didn't become Prime Minister. An absolute waste of skin. Edited August 20, 2015 by Awol

[HanoiVillan]

The £3 vote idea was Harriet Harman's, as I understand it. 

[Awol]

The £3 vote idea was Harriet Harman's, as I understand it. 

Maybe, but some Labour MP's are certainly holding him responsible:

 

Ed Miliband 'should apologise for ridiculous leadership rules'

 

 

 

 

Former Labour leader Ed Miliband is facing calls to apologise for the "disastrous" voting system being used to elect his successor.

Mr Miliband changed the system under which he was elected to "one member one vote" and allowed the public to take part for a £3 fee.

The move was overwhelmingly backed by a special Labour conference last year.

But backbench Labour MPs Simon Danczuk and Graham Stringer said the new system was too open to abuse.

Mr Miliband, who is on holiday in Australia, has opted not to comment on the leadership election.

'Laughing stock'

Mr Stringer said he had left an "unworkable" system under which the party cannot know whether new supporters are members of other political parties who are joining to create mischief.

The veteran Labour backbencher believes the party will be seen as a "laughing stock" by Conservatives and left-wingers taking part in the ballot.

Rochdale MP Simon Danczuk said Mr Miliband should "come out and apologise" for the "ridiculous leadership election rules".

He said the experiment in moving the party to the left under Ed Miliband failed and moving it further to the left in the future would not help.

"If you get something so badly wrong on a range of points it's right and proper you come out and say sorry," Mr Danczuk told BBC News.

A Labour Party spokesman said: "The Labour Party has a robust system to prevent fraudulent or malicious applications.

"All applications to join the Labour Party as a member, affiliate or supporter are verified and those who do not share Labour's aims and values will be denied a vote."

 

Cont'd on link

 

[MakemineVanilla]

 

Yes, a member of 35 years received this.

 

It is all very reminiscent of when they chucked out Walter Wolfgang from the Labour Party conference, for daring to heckle Jack Staw.

 

They claim to be a broad church but these sorts of incident speak otherwise.

[OutByEaster?]

As an aside, I wonder how much the Labour Party has made out of populist politician Jeremy Corbyn and his people friendly policies - maybe £600k?

 

Am I being too cynical?

[Awol]

On the actual race itself it seems people are belatedly taking a closer at good 'ole Jezza and checking out some of his pals.... Holocaust deniers, racists and a charming chap who said 'every dead British Soldier was a victory'.  Interestingly Jeremy denied knowing him during a Radio 4 interview, despite having shared a platform with him and lobbied the Home Office to have allowed into the country (he is understandably banned for his comments). Oh Mr Corbyn..Liar, liar, pants on fire...

 

The Labour Uncut website had this to say:

 

 

 

Corbyn’s skeletons are already tumbling out of the closet. What would happen if he was leader?

 

by Rob Marchant

 

If current polls are to be believed, Jeremy Corbyn is about to become Labour leader, not just by a small margin but by a landslide.

That is, as our own Atul Hatwal pointed out on Monday, a pretty significant “if”. For a number of reasons; protest voting in polls but not in elections, “shy” voters, ease of manipulation by flashmobs of more informal polls, difficulty of accuracy polling such a select group, further change in the final few weeks and so on. Given this, it is still perfectly possible that Corbyn will fall at the ballot stage, despite Westminster’s prevailing wisdom.

 

But let us suppose for a moment that he is genuinely on course to win.

 

In this case, we are at a genuinely historical turning point – a convulsion – for the party; one of a kind it has not really experienced since Ramsay MacDonald’s “betrayal” in the 1930s.

In short, the wilderness years of the Fifties and Eighties would soon start to look like a tea-party.  In the few short weeks following the election, the psychological state of at least a segment of the party, like any person after a cruel blow, has been evolving rapidly. In this case, from initial denial; through collective tantrum, angry with the world; through to depressive isolationism and potentially actual self-harm.

 

And the divide over the Corbyn “insurgency” is no longer an issue of right and left. While you might expect to hear noises from the political centre at Uncut, the concern here is not merely from the point of view of his politics, disastrously out of touch with the British electorate though it might be (for the record, Anthony Painter makes an admirable fist of taking these seriously and rebutting them point by point here).  No, for many on the party’s left as well as the right, the reality is that the party is looking to take on a leader with personal credentials considerably less attractive than those of Michael Foot. If you still doubt this, read on.

 

We have already heard about Corbyn’s disturbing apologism for the IRA in its heyday, his “friends” Hamas and Hezbollah. Phenomena comfortably explained away by his supporters as “engagement” in the cause of peace. But in the space of twenty-four hours, two rather more damning stories have surfaced. First, Monday night’s Channel 4 interview. Over the last couple of weeks, his campaign has sat in awkward silence over claims that he donated to, and attended meetings of, Deir Yassin Remembered (DYR), a pro-Palestinian campaign which even the highly questionable Palestine Solidarity Campaign (see here) sees as extreme. It is run by a self-confessed Holocaust-denier, Michael Eisen. Naturally, Corbyn’s supporters – in true hard-left (or SNP) fashion – have dismissed this as a “smear”.

 

When pressed in that Monday interview, Corbyn finally admitted – back, metaphorically, to the wall – that he may have donated to DYR: but it was ok, on the grounds that Eisen wasn’t an anti-Semite when he met him, it would have been cash not a cheque, and that it was years ago.  Today, in response to the Jewish Chronicle’s questioning on the matter he shifted position to now say “he has no recollection of contributing” to DYR.  He also says “he did attend DYR events in the past but no longer does so.”

 

Inconvenient then that there’s a photo of Corbyn attending DYR’s meeting in 2013. Which was not really so many years ago and, indeed, Eisen is on record as calling himself a Holocaust denier in 2012. In the same interview, Corbyn was questioned on his links to Raed Salah, the renowned hate-preacher, convicted not only of funding Hamas but of spreading the “blood libel”, an age-old anti-Semitic trope that Jews bake bread with the blood of gentiles. His answer was, and I quote: “He did not at any stage utter any anti-Semitic remarks to me”. Well, that’s sorted that out, then. He can’t possibly be anti-Semitic, I guess.  

 

Second: that same night, former Tory MP Louise Mensch published the rather unwelcome fact that, apart from once being booked to appear speaking on the same platform as Salah, Corbyn had in 2009 himself invited another unsavoury character to speak at Parliament. In this case, the Lebanese activist Dyab Abou Jahjah. Mensch’s piece on “Every dead British soldier is a victory” Jajah is a good read, deftly pointing out his violent anti-Semitism, homophobia and Holocaust revisionism. Nice. It was picked up by the Daily Mail and was the centre-piece of Corbyn’s slot on the World At One earlier.

 

These two stories surfaced within twenty-four hours. Now imagine the damage which could be done to the party inside twenty-four months. Exactly how much more evidence of one hapless man’s inability to distinguish good people from bad do we need? The thing is with the Corbynistas, they have missed two vital vulnerabilities about their man’s wanting to be a party leader and potential prime minister. One: that you have to really want it, which it is certainly arguable that Corbyn does not. Two: In order to really want it, a pre-requisite is that you have spent a large part of your political career behaving yourself, so as not to leave hostages to fortune later.

 

This has clearly not happened here. The campaign was a largely unplanned scramble and it shows. Two: as I have observed before about Labour’s former Mayor of London, the age of the internet has created a cruel trap for the careless. In the blink of an eye, a blog photo or a YouTube video of you on can show the world something questionable you did a decade ago, and in a way that cannot be disputed. It is hard to misdirect the public (“look over there!”) do a soft-shoe shuffle and hope no-one notices. They will suss you. You cannot seriously attempt to lead a party under such circumstances. Even if the polls are right, it is yet quite possible that Corbyn’s leadership bid will self-destruct well before voting is over. At the current rate of skeletons exiting closets, the campaign is fast becoming a political Night of the Living Dead.

 

So, lovers of an electable Labour party, as a force for helping the many not the few: take heart. There is still all to play for. But uncomfortable truths will, and must, out. We should not be shy of speaking them.

 

 

 

 

 

EDIT: 

 

Interesting stuff.  Had a Tory MP being leading the race for his party leadership with a CV like this the UAF and every left wing talking head in the land would calling for their job and/or liberty while shouting "smash the fascists!!"  Indeed the kind of people Jeremy really does associate with are the types that the media were unsuccessfully trying to link to UKIP prior to the election.

 

Is it simply that elements of the British left are stunning hypocrites, or do the ends justify the means - therefore nullifying their oft made claims to moral superiority?  When the leader of HM's Official Opposition has a list of associates that reads more like the population of A Wing in HMP Belmarsh the media will quite rightly take it all apart forensically.  Rupert will regret this one. 

 

If Corbyn wins he won't just make Labour unelectable, he may damage the party beyond recovery.  

Edited August 20, 2015 by Awol

[OutByEaster?]

I'm disappointed it's taken them so long - what have they been doing in the press?

 

A very predictable smear campaign - what's interesting is that they haven't waited until after he's won.

[Awol]

I'm disappointed it's taken them so long - what have they been doing in the press?

A very predictable smear campaign - what's interesting is that they haven't waited until after he's won.

That's from a Labour site... Anyway, it's only a smear if it's not true. In the case of that article it clearly is and I listened to his phone in on WATO yesterday. Corbyn flat out lied when he said he'd never heard of the bloke, he'd actually invited him to speak in Parliament and lobbied the Home Office to let him enter the country!

The man in question then took to Twitter and said he didn't know why Jeremy was saying that and confirmed they had a good professional relationship.

No smears, just uncomfortable truths.

[Demitri_C]

I'm disappointed it's taken them so long - what have they been doing in the press?

 

A very predictable smear campaign - what's interesting is that they haven't waited until after he's won.

Yep was wondering why it hadnt have happened yet. They must fear him for some reason. Now saying he is anti jewish. Load of crap with no foundation whatsoever

[HanoiVillan]

There's a stream - not quite a torrent yet - of articles coming out stating in the opening paragraph 'I don't personally believe he's an anti-semite BUT he met so-and-so who is . . .' with a heavy and unmistakable implication present.

 

The sad reality is that there are a lot of anti-semites in the Palestinian Solidarity movement, so there probably will be plenty of ammunition to fire at him on this subject.  

[CarewsEyebrowDesigner]

I'm sure the man has met all sorts over the years, but his positions are largely consistent: he supports the struggle of minorities. Often that leads to rubbing shoulders with arseholes, but that's to be expected, and any newspaper or politician that pulls him up on that shit is a hypocrite.

Edited August 20, 2015 by CarewsEyebrowDesigner