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

[Jareth]

53 minutes ago, ml1dch said:

It's an interview for The Times. Are you suggesting that he should refuse to speak to any journalist who works for The Times, Telegraph, FT et al?

Yes, I suggest he does not court Murdoch editors. 

[bickster]

1 minute ago, Jareth said:

and will not suddenly switch back to Labour

I don't beleive many people in the UK think it will be an overnight change of direction from that subset of the electorate. But if Labour is to stand a chance, it has to persuade some of them to change and its all about planting seeds and not felling trees

[bickster]

7 minutes ago, Jareth said:

Yes, I suggest he does not court Murdoch editors. 

It really is a neccessary evil.

[Jareth]

1 minute ago, bickster said:

I don't beleive many people in the UK think it will be an overnight change of direction from that subset of the electorate. But if Labour is to stand a chance, it has to persuade some of them to change and its all about planting seeds and not felling trees

As a disgruntled ex member (having voted for Starmer on a left-ish platform for him to swiftly swing right) I cannot help myself sniping about events like today's Times piece. I disagree that it is necessary - but I agree it makes sense to change direction after a big loss, but an architect of Labour Remain as the leader to recapture enough of the Leave voters? This is seriously flawed, glaringly flawed. That aside I also don't know how Labour can beat Bozza with Starmer, one is full of flaws but voters know that and accept it, the other is defined by who he is not and very little by who he actually is. 

[bickster]

6 minutes ago, Jareth said:

I disagree that it is necessary

You would be in a very smaill minority of extremists on that position, even the Corbyn stalwarts understood it was neccessary. Classic ideology vs pragmatism.

Quote

The Interview: John McDonnell talks Corbyn, private schools and revolution

“People think that revolution is violent. We use the word transformation now.” Interview by Decca Aitkenhead

Sun 24th Nov 2019 - The Sunday Times

[Jareth]

1 minute ago, bickster said:

You would be in a very smaill minority of extremists on that position, even the Corbyn stalwarts understood it was neccessary. Classic ideology vs pragmatism.

Sun 24th Nov 2019 - The Sunday Times

Yes, Corbyn's Labour was often cosying up to Murdoch wasn't it - I'm gobsmacked as to why they were so hostile to Labour back then given their obvious friendship. But it's fine now, because Mandelson's got a plan - take the biggest Remainer Labour have got, have him never discuss who he actually is because to do so would be to talk about his remainy self - target the leave voters by agreeing that the British press is not racist - and sweep Boris out of power. And if that's not what makes you hard, then it must be all those interesting policies Starmer has announced lately. Yep, Labour's back baby!

[bickster]

12 minutes ago, Jareth said:

having voted for Starmer on a left-ish platform for him to swiftly swing right

See this nonsense is imaginary. You have no idea where he stands on anything. As anyone with an interest knows, it it the party that decides policy and there hasn't been a conference yet for the party to decide that or for Starmer to address the membership.

You keep saying it, along with others. You can't actually know right now

You may have an inkling but you keep stating it as fact.

Had you stayed in the Labour Party, eventually you'd have had a democratic say on shaping that policy. You no longer have, you just have some disgruntles apparently

I'm not a Labour Party member, haven't been for decades but what is clear to me is that many people who were and have left "because Starmer" or even "because Corbyn". never really understood what they were part of

[Jareth]

1 minute ago, bickster said:

See this nonsense is imaginary. You have no idea where he stands on anything. As anyone with an interest knows, it it the party that decides policy and there hasn't been a conference yet for the party to decide that or for Starmer to address the membership.

You mean he could be a closet Nazi and we just don't know yet?

[bickster]

1 minute ago, Jareth said:

You mean he could be a closet Nazi and we just don't know yet?

That is no sillier than anything else you've posted today

[Jareth]

1 minute ago, bickster said:

That is no sillier than anything else you've posted today

No you're silly! 

(Obvs just a playground retort sent in jest). 

Edited April 11, 2021 by Jareth

[meregreen]

Not sure Labour have to move toward leavers. When the economic disaster that will unfold in time, causes the people who voted for it, to realise they were lied to on a massive scale. They will look to punish those liars and charlatans. Might take a while for the penny to drop, no one likes to think they’ve had the wool pulled over their eyes. But when it does, provided Labour hold the line and don’t try to become Tory Light. Then a hell of a lot of those votes will return. The British electorate has always been fickle.

[ml1dch]

44 minutes ago, Jareth said:

That aside I also don't know how Labour can beat Bozza with Starmer, one is full of flaws but voters know that and accept it, the other is defined by who he is not and very little by who he actually is. 

As I've said before, he won't. And nor will any other Labour leader while the left-of-centre vote is split three or four ways, while the Tories turn the 40% racist minority into a permanent parliamentary majority. 

But until they realise that, petulantly refusing to give interviews to journalists would definitely be a good way to make sure their vote-share stays as low as it can go.

[chrisp65]

16 minutes ago, meregreen said:

Not sure Labour have to move toward leavers. When the economic disaster that will unfold in time, causes the people who voted for it, to realise they were lied to on a massive scale. They will look to punish those liars and charlatans. Might take a while for the penny to drop, no one likes to think they’ve had the wool pulled over their eyes. But when it does, provided Labour hold the line and don’t try to become Tory Light. Then a hell of a lot of those votes will return. The British electorate has always been fickle.

Anybody thick enough to believe Johnson and vote tory isn’t going to let a little thing like unfolding facts get in the way.

If it does go horribly wrong long term, and I hope it doesn’t, then it will be the fault of people that haven’t backed leave hard enough, it will be the fault of President Macron, Sinn Fein, Nichola Sturgeon, bastards that only wear poppies in November, immigrants, Spain, and Joe Biden.

We’ll simply need to double down and cut benefits to make it work.

[Jareth]

1 minute ago, ml1dch said:

But until they realise that, petulantly refusing to give interviews to journalists would definitely be a good way to make sure their vote-share stays as low as it can go.

I disagree - the whole strategy at Labour HQ presently is to scrub the Corbyn years from history and go full throttle New Labour 2.0 - IMHO Starmer will fail to pick up the people he's targetting, whilst losing some of the voters from those Corbyn years - it is his gamble and he has made it, but it's going to fail. 

[ml1dch]

7 minutes ago, Jareth said:

...it is his gamble and he has made it, but it's going to fail. 

Of course it's going to fail. Like literally every other strategy he, and they could possibly pursue that doesn't involve courting at least two, and probably three other parties.

Unless I've got this wrong - who do you see as the "missing" 10-15% of voters needed for a Labour majority who don't vote Labour now and could be convinced to? Without either (a) losing large numbers of current voters to the Tories / Greens / Lib Dems / SNP or (b) entering into some sort of formal or informal arrangement with at least one of the latter three of those parties?

Who are those people currently voting for, and what is your plan to attract them?

[Jareth]

11 minutes ago, ml1dch said:

Of course it's going to fail. Like literally every other strategy he, and they could possibly pursue that doesn't involve courting at least two, and probably three other parties.

Unless I've got this wrong - who do you see as the "missing" 10-15% of voters needed for a Labour majority who don't vote Labour now and could be convinced to? Without either (a) losing large numbers of current voters to the Tories / Greens / Lib Dems / SNP or (b) entering into some sort of formal or informal arrangement with at least one of the latter three of those parties?

Who are those people currently voting for, and what is your plan to attract them?

I don't think it can be won - like you - and that all Labour is doing right now is the final death throes of itself - I want Labour to split, all non Tory parties to form an electoral pact, and take the tories down by working together. 

[ml1dch]

31 minutes ago, Jareth said:

I don't think it can be won - like you - and that all Labour is doing right now is the final death throes of itself - I want Labour to split, all non Tory parties to form an electoral pact, and take the tories down by working together. 

Excellent. Although I think I struggle with the realpolitik of an acrimonious split in the Labour party leading to electoral pacts between the two (or more?) factions. 

The closest we've seen to a dress-rehearsal of that dynamic saw the party spend huge amounts of money to try and defeat the likes of Luciana Berger in Golders Green. I don't really see how a new Corbyn / Burgon/ Long-Bailey / Abbott party is handled any differently to how they handled the Change UK lot. 

Don't get me wrong, I'd be delighted if they did. But I'm pretty sure it just turns arguments about who does and doesn't count as a socialist or a Blairite from an intra-party pissing contest into a extra-party pissing contest.

Edited April 11, 2021 by ml1dch

[Jareth]

24 minutes ago, ml1dch said:

Excellent. Although I think I struggle with the realpolitik of an acrimonious split in the Labour party leading to electoral pacts between the two (or more?) factions. 

The closest we've seen to a dress-rehearsal of that dynamic saw the party spend huge amounts of money to try and defeat the likes of Luciana Berger in Golders Green. I don't really see how a new Corbyn / Burgon/ Long-Bailey / Abbott party is handled any differently to how they handled the Change UK lot. 

Don't get me wrong, I'd be delighted if they did. But I'm pretty sure it just turns arguments about who does and doesn't count as a socialist or a Blairite from an intra-party pissing contest into a extra-party pissing contest.

Yes as it stands the chances of this being a decision that is made amicably is entirely zero - but minds might change when Starmer gets nowhere (he may not of course and I will gladly eat humble pie) and folks look at it in the cold light of day and also realise the game is up. I'm sure they could come to some sort of rule to decide who stands where but obvs this will only work if all parties are committed to it and concede it's the only way. Change UK's error IMHO was switching party and not going back to their voters - instead insisting that calling a by-election would be the wrong thing to do. If the Labour left, left, I would expect them not to do that. 

[bickster]

11 minutes ago, ml1dch said:

Excellent. Although I think I struggle with the realpolitik of an acrimonious split in the Labour party leading to electoral pacts between the two (or more?) factions. 

The closest we've seen to a dress-rehearsal of that dynamic saw the party spend huge amounts of money to try and defeat the likes of Luciana Berger in Golders Green. I don't really see how a new Corbyn / Burton/ Long-Bailey / Abbott party is handled any differently to how they handled the Change UK lot. 

Don't get me wrong, I'd be delighted if they did. But I'm pretty sure it just turns arguments about who does and doesn't count as a socialist or a Blairite from an intra-party pissing contest into a extra-party pissing contest.

The far left faction will not split into one, it will split into a number of factions. The SWP may pick up a few but just as likely is a few other new parties get formed in no short space of time, this has always been the nature of the far left of British politics. It is only the Labour Party that has been keeping them together as the Broad Church. It will be a story of arguments and expulsions and ever decreasing circles. In British Far Left politics it could not be any other way.

Life of Brian nailed it and nothing has or can change it.

The people who lead these far left factions have never really been interested in democratic politics, for them it has always been about building a mass movement of workers The arguments about direction and approach are more interesting to them than actually defeating the real enemy because they deep down have no interest in a western style democracy.

Anyway getting sidetracked there, there will be more than one far left faction and they will soon disappear to the same irrelevant corners of the country that Ted Grant, Gerry Heally, Tony Cliff and their ilk have disappeared to

[HanoiVillan]

Maybe - stay with me here - 'not Tory' is not a consistent and unifying political position, and that lots of people who do not identify as Tories in fact have wildly different political philosophies.