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

[blandy]

1 hour ago, OutByEaster? said:

I think that's almost right, but that the reasoning is different - through the 80's and 90's real power in managing the economy moved away from Politics and into banks and the markets - the influence on the economy that politicians had was hugely reduced and the concept of political idealism changing economic reality was largely removed. It's a closed shop.

I think then in the vacuum below that, there needs to be something that can occupy the voters and help differentiate the politicians, personal politics, identity and 'causes' have filled that gap and helped people feel that they still have some power in defining the societies they live in. The people who have real power are very happy to let us argue about those things and it creates a public realm that's occupied and busy and suggests change. Social media is brilliant at that, and politicians love it because it allows them to ride waves of public opinion to power.

I think you're right on how social media affects public debate, but that debate is already completely restricted before it starts - people don't vote on economic change anymore because we've all been persuaded that economic change isn't possible and that we should instead concentrate on social change.

Yeah, that's definitely a massive factor, too, in the change in Landscape that happened - the Reagan/Thatcher years, where between those two absolute weapons they invited in Big Capitalism and the like of Murdoch to suck the blood of society and gorge themselves, and that genie's (vampire) never been put back in it's box (coffin).

I guess the slight difference i see is that once that became the norm, new splintering occurred (as I wrote), but you're dead right that those vile people set the conditions for it to happen. 

[Jareth]

2 hours ago, blandy said:

I think one of the things that has changed, not just in the UK, but in the West in particular is the impact of social media - as follows:

In the before times, people tended to vote on economic grounds - like is portrayed simplistically by "Tories were for the rich and Labour was for the working man" and so on.  And then there were smaller parties that kind of sucked up the niche voters - Liberals, Green party, Nationalists - but mainly it was about financial interests and about who got to benefit from workers outputs.

Since social media, though, it doesn't seem like that - because everyone suddenly was given a "platform" to say what they thought and felt and broadcast it to the world (even if "the world" was their 15 followers) so many people have become tribal about stuff - be it Veganism, Free speech, Identity, Racism, sexism, Environment...etc  - and they identify with those causes or ethics or views and everyone else who doesn't is blocked or cancelled or muted and is "the enemy". Brexit was an example of this, obviously.

And I think that has led to Labour's problems in particular. The left (of the centre) in politics is quite diverse, more so than the right. So trying to unite those tribes of social media led  divisions of people and voters is really tricky. There's not one (or a few) identifiable thing(s) that they all want - they seem to fight like cats about, I dunno Trans rights v Women's rights and actively hate those that hold any view slightly different to their own, to the extent that the Right of centre gets a free ride.

Labour also made (in hindsight) huge errors in taking left voters for granted - whether that be in Scotland (rise of the SNP) or in the North and Midlands - Labour under Blair became popular because they offered a credible alternative to the (then) tired and divided Tories and because they appealed not just to traditional Labour voters, but also to LDs and Centre Tories and Scots and Welsh. They'd then squandered that 10 years or so  later because of Iraq and then the World Financial crash allowed the Tories to re-state their "revitalisation".

Since the Tories got in 11? or however many it is, years ago, Labour has not (yet) remotely looked like it's revitalised, and in that time the Social Media tribe thing has broken out. It's not about economic competence any more, for voters - it was Brexit, and now it's Corollafungus Pandemical diseases and Vaccines and planting flags in silos of whatever view. While the Tories have basically reversed their previous stance of "austerity" pretty completely yet no-one's there going "hold on - you effing did all this damage" and we've suffered massively as a consequence". Instead we've got the Labour Left saying "put up taxes in a downturn" and attacking the labour soft left for saying "don't put up taxes in an economic catastrophe". It's about emotion, and tribalism to particular ideologies, not about what will work, or what is necessary to improve people's lot.

I guess the hope is that the Tory mistakes and nastiness becomes stark for people generally to see, and at that point, instead of directing anger at each other, it gets directed by the Country to the deserving recipients, and that by then Starmer will have made Labour a credible opposition ready to take over.

Yeah I agree about social media - it doesn't often reflect society, just small numbers being very vocal. However, in fairness it was the only way previously for Labour to get their messaging out because it was quite obvious that nearly every media outlet was either opposed to Corbyn or happy to report on Labour in a very quiet manner, almost to the point of not covering it. Now there is almost the opposite problem, media outlets queuing up to cover Starmer, but an equally awful lead for the tories yet again. It's looking pretty grim for Labour whoever they choose as leader. 

[blandy]

1 hour ago, OutByEaster? said:

That brought the membership to around 800,000 for a period

It's incidental, but no it didn't

 

Edited March 4, 2021 by blandy
tidied pic

[OutByEaster?]

Just now, blandy said:

I guess the slight difference i see is that once that became the norm, new splintering occurred (as I wrote), but you're dead right that those vile people set the conditions for it to happen. 

I think what Tony Blair did brilliantly was concede one fight to win another - he got the money and the media on his side by being the first Labour leader to say, I can't win the fight on economy, it no longer belongs to government, I concede it to the markets, but what I can do is try to get the least harmful version of the system we can and then use power when we have it to try to tackle some social issues where we can do some good.

I think that was his ideal. A sort of "Things are bad and we can't change them, but I can bring about the least bad reaction to them and maybe help some people while I'm at it." It wasn't sold like that, it was sold as cool - that's the benefit of having the media onside. Unfortunately for Tony, once you concede the first fight, you become a tool of that economic system and you give up more than you should - stuff like principles, your soul, the party.

We're now sadly left with a government whose mantra is "Things are bad and we can't change them, but we can at least make some money for ourselves and our mates while we're here".

I think Starmer is caught between a peculiar orthodoxy that I'm not sure enough people believe in and an unfinished sentence  "Let's trust business to take care of us and the economy and I'll......" and you'll what Kier?

 

[blandy]

11 minutes ago, OutByEaster? said:

The bad news is that if he is losing voters to the Tories, then they are from the centrist edge and those are exactly the people he's courting - the most moderate Conservatives, the swing voters, he won't want to be losing the only voters he seems to be chasing. 

It may be nothing, but there's something else at play, isn't there. There are lots of seats where the nearest challengers to the baby eaters are not Labour. In those seats, actually losing voters to the second placed party  - e.g. Lib Dems helps Labour, if they go on to knock out a Tory.

Despite the winners pretty much always being wither Tory or Labour overall, the other parties are a factor in results. The decline of the LDs in National elections has helped the tories - they took lots of seats from them. If they revive themselves (yeah, right!) then Labour benefits as well as the LDs themselves. 

[OutByEaster?]

2 minutes ago, blandy said:

It may be nothing, but there's something else at play, isn't there. There are lots of seats where the nearest challengers to the baby eaters are not Labour. In those seats, actually losing voters to the second placed party  - e.g. Lib Dems helps Labour, if they go on to knock out a Tory.

Ah, in that case, sorry Kier, there is no good news in that polling.

 

[HanoiVillan]

6 minutes ago, blandy said:

It may be nothing, but there's something else at play, isn't there. There are lots of seats where the nearest challengers to the baby eaters are not Labour. In those seats, actually losing voters to the second placed party  - e.g. Lib Dems helps Labour, if they go on to knock out a Tory.

Despite the winners pretty much always being wither Tory or Labour overall, the other parties are a factor in results. The decline of the LDs in National elections has helped the tories - they took lots of seats from them. If they revive themselves (yeah, right!) then Labour benefits as well as the LDs themselves. 

Yes and no, though; in seats where the main challenger to the Tories are not Labour, there usually aren't many Labour votes to be distributed to eg the LDs in the first place.

[blandy]

31 minutes ago, OutByEaster? said:

A sort of "Things are bad and we can't change them, but I can bring about the least bad reaction to them and maybe help some people while I'm at it." It wasn't sold like that, it was sold as cool - that's the benefit of having the media onside. Unfortunately for Tony, once you concede the first fight, you become a tool of that economic system and you give up more than you should - stuff like principles, your soul, the party.

I guess it depends on your perspective.

I don't see all business as bad and inherently predatory. I don't see that the state simply must regulate or control or own everything, and I detect that that was the instinct of Corbyn and still is of a significant part of the left (OK, I might be exaggerating a bit, but only a bit, in terms of running everything). I agree that the US/UK model is wrong and not how it should be at all. I think the system needs changing and I don't think it's the case that it simply can't be changed, that the horse has bolted.

Politicians of all hues have kowtowed too much to the likes of Murdoch and big Finance, but they don't have to. Nor do they have to nationalise everything. The state is as awful sometimes as the big businesses.

Another factor to be dealt with is globalisation - multi-nationals and money flowing to wherever it incurs the least drag. That's impossible to tackle on a national basis and I think that's more where Governments have just given up/are happy to allow/can't manage to work together to address.

[villakram]

2 hours ago, HanoiVillan said:

@villakram I know you love a good candidate video, make sure you watch this one all the way to the end:

 

Hipster London... cool, jazzy, snappy... insert extra from Midsomer Murders 

[darrenm]

I thought this was a joke at first but it's real. 

 

 

[Chindie]

Shameful numbers.

[Jareth]

17 minutes ago, darrenm said:

I thought this was a joke at first but it's real. 

And this is where the Tories will start from as of now - if a pandemic in which they accidentally kill 100k people through sheer negligence doesn't affect them - nothing will. Maybe we need some proper opposition, even if we're gonna lose anyway. 

[HanoiVillan]

1 hour ago, villakram said:

Hipster London... cool, jazzy, snappy... insert extra from Midsomer Murders 

It's the J-horror-style flickering effect that gets me

[markavfc40]

That polling is shocking and a poor reflection on those who think it is right to support and endorse a government who have overseen a diabolical response to the pandemic going from one shocking decision to another resulting in one of the worst death rates in the world and the worst recession in the G7. 

It is also though a poor reflection on Starmer and his failure to go after the government for those numerous failings with any venom. He has pussy footed around according to some playing a long game. 

Given the last year these polls should at worse show the opposite and a 13 point lead for Labour. If Starmer can't gain favour over the Tories now then I doubt he ever will. 

Edited March 4, 2021 by markavfc40

[chrisp65]

I guess for an awful lot of people, they have the government and its media telling them the government have done a great job. Plus an opposition that isn’t opposing them.

If you only had a passing interest in the news and politics, you’d see a government that gave the people their Brexit, a government that made a great guess on what vaccines to buy, a government that has extended furlough, and an opposition that if they’ve said anything it was just to say now isn’t the time to rock the boat.

 

 

[Only2McInallys]

I am not sure people should be obsessing about the poor showing of Labour in the opinion polls at the moment.

The Government are riding high due to the impressive vaccine rollout.People think all our problems will be over and we will go back to normal.

I think we have very tough times ahead.Certain businesses such as retail may never recover and things won’t get back to normal until whole world is vaccinated 

The real effects of Brexit will become apparent as time passes and the eventual inquiry into the handling of Covid may hurt the Tories.

For me Starmer has to be a real alternative for voters who in the past had voted Tory in a way Corbyn wasn’t.

 

 

 

Edited March 4, 2021 by Only2McInallys

[Kuwabatake Sanjuro]

 

[HanoiVillan]

15 minutes ago, Kuwabatake Sanjuro said:

 

I mean, 32% is literally less than Corbyn got in 2019 . . .

It's just not a big surprise to me though. Why would any 2019 Tory voters feel that they regret their vote at this stage? I think voters think that the virus was an Act of God, and that the government have been generous enough. The middle of the public are happy to be sitting on bigger savings in their bank account than ever before. Meanwhile, the only consistent line the opposition have tried is 'competence', but that looks stupid now because Matt Hancock watched 'Contagion' one night last year and now we've got a world-leading vaccination programme. 

Labour don't have either a clear argument about what the government have done wrong, or what they would be doing differently from here (and opposing a tax increase that voters were in favour of by a 7:1 margin isn't going to have helped), and the public perceive their criticisms to be opportunistic carping (correctly).

[Chindie]

Yeah but they aren't lead by Corbyn so that's at least +50% in any poll.

[markavfc40]

Good to see him step up to the plate on this and actually speak with real conviction. He needs to take advantage of more of these open goals.