Popular Post The Fun Factory Posted February 23, 2023 Popular Post Share Posted February 23, 2023 16 minutes ago, cheltenham_villa said: Starmer is a tory, those 5 missions all but confirm it. Also might explain the rise in popularity. Time to accept that the majority of the country are aligned to more traditional tory principles than labour ones. If you want to be in power, be somewhere towards the middle. There is quite a big difference between being in the middle, to what the current tory party is. 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chrisp65 Posted February 23, 2023 Share Posted February 23, 2023 They are dragging the middle further and further to the right. Baby eating will soon be seen as middle ground. But hey, look, there was a good social policy in the last labour manifesto where they were pro the 4 day week. An extensive study has just shown it can have more positives than negatives so there’s a genuinely progressive policy that would put space between baby eating and LabourLite that even Starmer surely wouldn’t reverse on. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
magnkarl Posted February 23, 2023 Share Posted February 23, 2023 (edited) 34 minutes ago, cheltenham_villa said: Starmer is a tory, those 5 missions all but confirm it. Also might explain the rise in popularity. Time to accept that the majority of the country are aligned to more traditional tory principles than labour ones. If you want to be in power, be somewhere towards the middle. I think the years under Corbyn has shown that the alternative he came with, albeit popular with young people and people who couldn't count, was badly costed, likely not possible to do and would not gain the votes needed. To enact change you actually need to be in power, something JC's quite frank blind spots made him useless for. (STW, Iran, give your country away for peace!, all my mates are Putin-shills, the West is at fault for everything, was that my shadow or a capitalist lurking behind the curtain!? +++). Edited February 23, 2023 by magnkarl Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post blandy Posted February 23, 2023 Moderator Popular Post Share Posted February 23, 2023 28 minutes ago, cheltenham_villa said: Starmer is a tory, those 5 missions all but confirm it. Also might explain the rise in popularity. Time to accept that the majority of the country are aligned to more traditional tory principles than labour ones. If you want to be in power, be somewhere towards the middle. He isn't a Tory. Nowhere near. And the country isn't and has almost always never been aligned to Tory principles. It's unfortunate that for most of the time, there's been one Tory party (the right) and several left parties, which split the vote, meaning Tories won more often. But I completely agree that to win power "be somewhere towards the middle" - in that way (whether Tory or Labour or other) you are able to pick up more of the available votes. It's not about me or you or anyone specific thinking this or that party is better, it's about maths. If party moves "too far" away from wherever the middle lies, they abandon, obviously, any hope of winning the votes of those on the opposite end, but also the votes of the section in the middle. Just maths. Then when the party gets in they can do their lefty-ish, or righty-ish stuff and change some things for (in their eyes) the better. No one can please all of the people all of the time, only some of the people some of the time, and it's the number of those "some of the people" that a party appeals to that determines their electoral success. I'm certain the Labour strategy people have returned to that principle, and that's why we're seeing them do what they're doing. Labour had been scaring the horses, for one reason or another, for well over a decade, and now it's stopped doing that. Meanwhile the Tories who had promised various stuff, are now widely seen as scary and incompetent. Labour does need to put more info out there, for us, about specifically what they will do, but they're steadily starting to do that. Again, it's deliberately not too radical - if they start promising stuff that will only appeal to a relatively small minority of people, they'll get a lot of adverse reaction. So they concentrate on broken things, or should do - everyone can see what's broken. Explaining how they will fix it and make things better is what they have to do - provide more detail, but don't do it so early the Tories steal their policies and leave them empty handed - and the Tories will steal any popular policies - See energy price cap, see windfall tax etc. etc. 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jareth Posted February 23, 2023 Share Posted February 23, 2023 Starmer caveated his 10 pledges to the membership, upon which he won the leadership, with a statement saying none of these pledges could be implemented if Labour did not win power. If I was a tory looking to vote Labour I'd be very careful - because the implication of this is that he still intends to go quite far to the left, after power has been won. OR - he's actually a tory. The problem is absolutely nobody knows which one of these is true. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bickster Posted February 23, 2023 Moderator Share Posted February 23, 2023 2 minutes ago, Jareth said: Starmer caveated his 10 pledges to the membership, upon which he won the leadership, with a statement saying none of these pledges could be implemented if Labour did not win power. That isn't a caveat. It's stating the obvious. Clearly Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ml1dch Posted February 23, 2023 Share Posted February 23, 2023 8 minutes ago, Jareth said: ...he still intends to go quite far to the left, after power has been won. OR - he's actually a tory Those aren't the only two positions that exist on the political spectrum. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bickster Posted February 23, 2023 Moderator Share Posted February 23, 2023 1 minute ago, ml1dch said: Those aren't the only two positions that exist on the political spectrum. Correct, the two positions are with us or agin us 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cheltenham_villa Posted February 23, 2023 Share Posted February 23, 2023 1 hour ago, The Fun Factory said: There is quite a big difference between being in the middle, to what the current tory party is. But we're probably a loss closer at the point of the last election. My large mistrust of politicians is their inability find middle ground. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sidcow Posted February 23, 2023 VT Supporter Share Posted February 23, 2023 1 hour ago, chrisp65 said: They are dragging the middle further and further to the right. Baby eating will soon be seen as middle ground. I've heard that The Bishop of Bath and Wells is considering standing at the next election. 3 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sidcow Posted February 23, 2023 VT Supporter Share Posted February 23, 2023 Seriously, if they can improve the NHS and just make it possible to see a doctor again, they'll have to really really **** up not to stay in power for a long time. All through the 80s and early 90s it was always "remember the strikes" In future if anyone suggests the Tories it will be "remember the broken NHS and how it was impossible to see a doctor" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jareth Posted February 23, 2023 Share Posted February 23, 2023 1 hour ago, ml1dch said: Those aren't the only two positions that exist on the political spectrum. Cash money to you if you can tell me starmers position Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bickster Posted February 23, 2023 Moderator Share Posted February 23, 2023 2 minutes ago, Jareth said: Cash money to you if you can tell me starmers position Right of Corbyn, Left of Blair You can donate it to VT EDIT: I'll actually go further, the most left-wing PM Labour will have elected since the 1960s 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ml1dch Posted February 23, 2023 Share Posted February 23, 2023 15 minutes ago, Jareth said: Cash money to you if you can tell me starmers position Somewhere in the massive political space between "Tory" and "the positions that he took to win the Labour leadership". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jareth Posted February 23, 2023 Share Posted February 23, 2023 3 minutes ago, ml1dch said: Somewhere in the massive political space between "Tory" and "the positions that he took to win the Labour leadership". That pinpoints it then. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jareth Posted February 23, 2023 Share Posted February 23, 2023 18 minutes ago, bickster said: Right of Corbyn, Left of Blair You can donate it to VT EDIT: I'll actually go further, the most left-wing PM Labour will have elected since the 1960s Well we know he's right of Jezza, he hasn't been accused of antisemitism by Margaret Hodge yet. And left of Blair - how left? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ml1dch Posted February 23, 2023 Share Posted February 23, 2023 (edited) 7 minutes ago, Jareth said: That pinpoints it then. I made no claim that I was able to "pinpoint" it. Edited February 23, 2023 by ml1dch Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jareth Posted February 23, 2023 Share Posted February 23, 2023 4 minutes ago, ml1dch said: I made no claim that I was able to "pinpoint" it. That could be a quote from starmer himself 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OutByEaster? Posted February 23, 2023 Moderator Share Posted February 23, 2023 5 hours ago, Jareth said: Starmer caveated his 10 pledges to the membership, upon which he won the leadership, with a statement saying none of these pledges could be implemented if Labour did not win power. If fairness, he might have caveated it by letting us know he'd abandon all ten of them prior to testing whether he could win power - which is what he did. He's not a Tory, he's especially not whatever madness the modern Tory party is - but he's very much to the right of the modern middle and modern middle is a fair bit right of where it was a while back - he's sort of where Blair and the Cameron/Clegg creature were - corporate enough to win an election, but hoping to ask for the odd concession, like, hopefully, a working health service. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OutByEaster? Posted February 23, 2023 Moderator Share Posted February 23, 2023 4 hours ago, bickster said: Right of Corbyn, Left of Blair The first bit is I think inarguable; what makes you think he's left of Blair? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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