Jeremy Corbyn 2

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Apparently anyone who is not bought and paid for by the ruling elite is interchangable with people like Trump.

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And a question I would ask is, what principles are shared by Donald Trump and Jeremy Corbyn?

This isn't about who's "bought and paid for" and it's not about politics, or principles or ethics.

But what if they both have as much charm as a dead mouse in a loaf of bread?  Does that matter?  Can it be said out loud?

sherpa-finn wrote:

IMHO, you need to lighten up, Michael. 

Rev and Ken are actively and enthusiastically advocating in support of an out-of-the-mainstream political leader who all polls suggest is being swept along by a committed and energized membership base that has failed to translate that energy into wider support in the populace, - and who is poised to perhaps do irrevocable damage to the brand of that party. In so doing, they knowingly run the risk of surrendering the power of government to their opponents for a generation.  And they consider this risk worth it, - on the faint hope that against all odds their man may indeed somehow prevail at the polls. 

Let's tell it like it is. The damage to the Labour Party brand was done by Tony Blair. His despicable actions during his time as Prime Minister did more damage to Labour than Corbyn could do in a hundred years. Add in the rise of the Scottish National Party (and the other 'national' parties) and you'll see where the Labour Party went (leaving behind a coterie of careerists, comfortable in their 'safe' seats. No rocking the boat there).

Blaming Corbyn for the current state of the Labour Party is ludicrous.

The question isn't how badly will Corbyn do, the question is, who could do any better? When it came down to it, all those comfortable MPs couldn't raise enough support within their safe seats to prevent Corbyn from becoming leader. What does that tell you about the level of support they actually have amongst their constituents.

sherpa-finn wrote:

...Perhaps you happen to think that this analysis applies to Trump and the Republican Party, but not to Corbyn and the Labour Party. I respectfully disagree.  Both are likely cruising for an electoral bruising, leaving their supporters disconsolate and alienated and their respective parties in shambles.

To ignore the similarities (acknowledging all the while that the leadership of one of these parties has obviously lurched to the right while the other has obviously lurched to the left) seems like willful blindness. 

Personally I don't think your analysis applies to anything. When you say that the Republican Party has 'lurched to the right' what do you mean? There are many Republicans more right-wing than Trump. Trump is not 'right-wing', Trump is (as I've said elsewhere) a racist, bigoted demagogue, and his politics are pure populism.

And it may have escaped your attention, but the Labour Party is a party of the left. Or at least is was before it 'lurched to the right'. Corbyn isn't 'lurching to the left', he's returning the party to the left principles it held before Blair swept them aside in his rush to convince the USA of his reliability.

Rev Pesky wrote:

Let's tell it like it is. The damage to the Labour Party brand was done by Tony Blair. His despicable actions during his time as Prime Minister did more damage to Labour than Corbyn could do in a hundred years. Add in the rise of the Scottish National Party (and the other 'national' parties) and you'll see where the Labour Party went (leaving behind a coterie of careerists, comfortable in their 'safe' seats. No rocking the boat there).

Agreed.

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The question isn't how badly will Corbyn do, the question is, who could do any better? When it came down to it, all those comfortable MPs couldn't raise enough support within their safe seats to prevent Corbyn from becoming leader. What does that tell you about the level of support they actually have amongst their constituents.

Yes.

Jeremy Corbyn pushes Theresa May over 'shambolic Tory Brexit'

Labour leader accuses prime minister of appeasing backbench MPs rather than protecting living standards of Britons

“Is the prime minister really willing to risk a shambolic Tory Brexit, just to appease the people behind her?” Corbyn asked.

In another question, he said: “This is a government that drew up no plans for Brexit, that now has no strategy for negotiating Brexit, and offers no clarity, no transparency, and no chance of scrutiny of the process for developing a strategy.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/oct/12/jeremy-corbyn-pushes-th...

Here are the questions Corbyn opponents have an obligation to answer, yet consitently dodge:

1) If continuing to try to press Corbyn to resign and let the right wing of the party reassert total, market-Stalinist control of the Labour Party was really such an obviously necessary thing, as you believe it to be, how do you explain the fact that there not been one poll, since Corbyn took over, that shows that the party would do significantly better against the Tories if a Blairite restoration(which is the only thing the PLP will accept) were imposed?

2) Corbyn was just re-elected leader by an increased margin.  Given that, aren't you being completely anti-democratic to STILL be calling for his removal?

3) If Corbyn were somehow forced out by PLP pressure, after just having been re-elected leader in a landslide, what right would anyone who replaced him in the job possibly have to even ask Corbyn's supporters(who are the overwhelming majority of the party now) for their support and votes at the next general election, given that the PLP won't accept anyone as leader who isn't a pro-austerity, pro-war, anti-union and anti-immigrant reactionary? 

4) Why are you still relentlessly attacking Corbyn and his supporters rather than listening to them and actually trying to make some sort of common cause with them?  You do realize that Labour can't win if those people are expelled from the party or only allowed to stay in a position of helpless powerlessness, don't you?  Why not embrace the idea that Corbyn's supporters are a good group of people and could bring positive things to the party if allowed to remain and have a say?  Why, instead, treat them as nothing but a nuisance and the principles they fight for as foolishness to be got over? 

5) Why don't you support at least agreeing to carry on Corbyn's program of restoring internal party democracy?  a contract to do that and an agreement not to try and drive Corbyn's supporters out of the party might actually have persuaded the guy to stand down(he's probably the most egoless figure in modern British politics).  Why, instead, was he offered no agreement to accept his supporters' continued presence in the party and nothing at all but a meaningless, irrelevant and humiliating position as "party president"-a job in which he would have been allowed no say in policy and would have been forced to publicly endorse every right-wing tack his successor as leader would have undemocratically imposed from above? 

6)Do you want the Labour Party to be significantly different from the Tories, or to reduce itself to what David Miliband wanted-i.e., "it's enough that it's US doing the cuts, and it's ok when its US doing the bombing"?

sherpa-finn wrote:

I appreciate that some of Corbyn's most fervent supporters such as Ken are keen to push a purge-like scenario with some combination of pledges of allegiance and reselection / deselection processes of perceived traitors to the cause.

But from what I can see, the grown-ups in the room are actually finding ways to make the situation work, despite awkwardness, discomfort and presumably some tensions on both sides. 

In the past few weeks, a number of 'lesser' rebel MPs have re-joined the shadow cabinet; Andy Burnham the most likely challenger to the throne has shuffled off to Manchester to run for mayor; and other leading lights amongst the rebels (Hilary Benn, Yvetter Cooper, etc) seem satisfied with the prospect of taking up residence on the backbenches while playing leading roles as chairs of influential select committees. 

The most 'traitorous' comment I have heard since the leadership vote came from Peter Mandelson who simply mused that he would like to see the Tories call a snap election. Surely that's not something Team Corbyn would object to?

Time to put down the pitchforks and flaming torches, Ken. 

If you were to delete the tendentious first and last sentences, this would be an interesting and instructive post. I hope that we all would like to see Labour do well in the next general election, and compromise is clearly needed for that to be a possibility. However, Corbyn will be the leader in that election, and his opponents must accept that fact, and do the best they can in the circumstances.

They used to blame the “plotters” – maybe they should look at their own hapless leadership

Until September 24th the red team’s leadership had a ready made excuse whenever terrible polling numbers came out – it was all the fault of the MP plotters who had launched the confidence move against Corbyn in the aftermath of the referendum.

Well Corbyn got re-elected in September and the LAB’s polling position is still appalling and miles behind where the lead opposition party should be if it is to have any chance whatsoever at a general election.

Today we’ve got two new Westminster polls out and the numbers are very much the same. LAB is in the 20s while CON is in the 40s.

Corbyn doesn’t seem to have desire or expertise to resonate with ordinary voters. He only seems to care about true believers. He appears happiest at rallies when he is enthralling the faithful. His main aides, John McDonnell and PR man Seamus Milne are no better just part of the irrelevance. This is all about controlling the party without having any regard to the country.

It is if they have already given up on the general election.

http://politicalbetting.com/

"You don’t need a weatherman
To know which way the wind blows".

- Bob Dylan, Nobel Laureate, 2016. 

Corbyn is STILL being undermined by the right wing of his parliamentary party.  That, by itself, makes it impossible for Labour to gain in the polls.  If all the MPS on the left had treated Tony Blair like this(at the time Blair took over,  there were still about 70 MPs who called themselves "Labour Left"), Labour would have been just as weak in the polls as it is now.

There is nothing to be gained from continuing to try to dump the guy.  If there was any evidence that Labour support would soar if only the party had a leader who loved bombing Arabs and hated unions, we'd have seen polls released showing that.

It's a myth that Labour's support would soar if only it replaced Corbyn with a leader who hated the Left.  Most ordinary people don't want corporate power left unconstrained anymore, or who would vote Labour if only it renewed the Blairite commitment to keeping the workers powerless, and there isn't even THAT much of an insistence on keeping the Bomb.  There IS no large group of currently non-Labour supporters who are shouting that they would instantly swing over if only Yvette Cooper was leading, or anyone else to Corbyn's right(and certainly not anyone the PLP would ever want a leader).

And it continues to remain the case that there would be no possible way, if Corbyn were dumped, for anyone who was chosen as his successor on an anti-Corbynite platform to say or do anything at all that could win the support of the hundreds of thousands of members of the Corbyn movement within the party, and that no one at all would come in to the party to replace them if they left.  

I post this as someone who wants a Labour government in the UK, unlike the anti-Corbynites.

Ken Burch wrote:  Corbyn is STILL being undermined by the right wing of his parliamentary party.  That, by itself, makes it impossible for Labour to gain in the polls.  If all the MPS on the left had treated Tony Blair like this(at the time Blair took over,  there were still about 70 MPs who called themselves "Labour Left"), Labour would have been just as weak in the polls as it is now.

Not so fast, Ken. The political dynamics are entirely different.  If there had been some sort of in-house left-wing insurgency against Tony Blair, it would have been coming from the margins of the party, not the centre. As such, Blair may actually have had the political capital to lead an anti-left purge - and won further popular support for standing up to "left-wing loonies" and "bullies". In fact, that is probably why the left did not rise at the time, - they did the political calculus and saw it as too big a risk. And of course, Blair held the prospect of government power in his grasp, - with all its related inducements.

None of that applies to the current scenario. Corbyn is seen as a leader coming from the margins to capture the centre: any purge he leads will be against more the mainstream MPs which would have huge negative repurcussions in the population as a whole. And since no one really expects him to win an election any time soon, he simply does not have the inducements of imminent power to offer to keep people in order.  

So, a silly comparison. 

Ken Burch wrote: There is nothing to be gained from continuing to try to dump the guy.  I do not see any credible Labour supporter going on about dumping Corbyn apart from yourself. The worst I have seen is the suggestion "Better an earlier election than a later one, to 'rid us of this troublesome priest'".  

Ken Burch wrote: It's a myth that Labour's support would soar if only it replaced Corbyn with a leader who hated the Left.  A myth only you and the feral Left seem eager to spread. 

Ken Burch wrote: I post this as someone who wants a Labour government in the UK, unlike the anti-Corbynites.  We also want a world of rainbows and unicorns. But wanting and wishing for stuff is not quite enough.

But you Corbynites go for it! This was your idea and your cause, so over to you to do the heavy lifting on this one (ie convincing the population at large that Corbyn is fit to be PM when his own caucus has already shown to the world what they thought of that idea).  Good luck!

And don't worry about us. We (the "soft left") will always vote Labour, and will be around to pick up the pieces after this debacle is over.  We have done it before, and we will do it again. We are in this for the long if incremental haul, not just for the adrenalin rush of rallies and red flags down at the Market Square. 

Yes, the response to Sanders in the socialism-averse US was even more remarkable of a resurgence of actual social-democracy (Corbyn's programme is not revolutionary) in a country with such a tradition. It is no longer a matter of a soft left, but of parties such as Blairist Labour and the SP in France not offering anything remotely "left" or pro-labour.

sherpa-finn

If any of the people who stood against Corbyn in 2015 was inherently more electable than he was, that person would have been chosen.  Why is it so hard to accept that none of his opponents(Liz Kendall, Yvette Cooper, Andy Burnham, Owen Smith) had any popular appeal? 

What is it that he stands for that you find so odious?

There is no longer any good reason for the UK to have the Bomb, and support for getting rid of it is growing.

The monarchy no longer has any reason to exist, and takes away funds that could be used to make people's lives better(while giving nothing of value to the people who are forced to fund it while they themselves lose ground economically).

The House of Lords serves no good purpose and there's no massive public demand to keep it in place.

Hardly anyone in the UK still thinks that a market economy is compatible with humane, democratic values anymore.

The public there no longer wants corporations to have unchallenged dominance over the economy.

It isn't possible for working people to have any chance of defending themselves while Thatcher's anti-worker laws are kept in place.

Nothing progressive can be done within the constraints of a balanced budget.

Remain would not have won if Jeremy had promised to restrict immigration in a way everyone knew the EU would never allow him to do. Defying the EU on immigration policy is impossible while staying in.

And there is no broad public support in the UK nor any morally defensible case for any continuing Anglo-American military involvement in the Arab/Muslim world(bombing Syria would mainly kill innocent civilians without doing anything at all to weaken ISIS).

The way to win voters in "the centre" is to present a clear programme for changed with the support of a united party behind you-NOT to treat socialism as a heresy and socialists as the enemy.  If it worked for Thatcher when she promised radical evil, it can equally work for Labour if they unite on a program of radical good.

Why can't you just work WITH Jeremy and the majority of the party that support him?

And why even try to get voters in "the centre"?  There is no large group of people

By the way, sherpa, I wasn't calling for a purge and you knew it.  What I was calling for was for the anti-Corbynites to stop sabotaging their own party. 

Corbyn's re-election victory makes the old PLP vote moot.   It's too late to demand Corbyn's resignation.

If Labour is to win, it HAS to have the passionate support of Corbyn's supporters.  You can't name anyone that the anti-Corbynites would accept as leader who could ever get that support. 

Obviously heavy lifting will need to be done.  But the problem is that many of those in the PLP seem to think that they will be personally rewarded by their constituents for making it harder for Jeremy and the majority of the party who support him to do that lifting.

Corbyn's supporters can't do the job by themselves.  The anti-Corbyn wing needs to do its part and work with them.  If nothing else, they need to announce that they will give up on any further efforts to remove the guy as leader (particularly since they've offered no alternative to Corbyn who would be more popular at the polls), need to stop disrespecting him in the HoC, and need to admit that Corbyn's supporters were never guilty of any of the accusations of antisemitism, homophobia, or violence.

Going into dialog with Corbyn's supporters, accepting the legitimacy of their long-term presence in the party and actually showing some respect for the convictions that animate their activism, rather than pretending that the whole lot are either spoiled children or leftover Eighties "Trots", would also be a constructive choice, as would agreeing to accept Corbyn's proposals to restore internal party democracy. 

Victory requires partnership, which requires mutual respect.

BTW, however small Labour's chances look right now, they looked just as small going into the 1945 election.  No one thought Attlee would lead the party to a landslide majority over Churchill's Tories...including Attlee. 

nicky wrote:

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/jan/02/labour-election-jeremy-... The Fabian Society says Corbyn will cripple the Labour Party's electoral prospects.

An interesting idea. It may be based on a false premise, however.

The premise of course is that people reside on the middle, left or the right and winning can only come from appealing to the centre while pulling those from your side with you.This used to be a fairly solid position based on the idea that a person would be attracted by something reasonably close to a position they have already taken.

Times may have changed somewhat or it is possible that political leaders thinking this way have been proven wrong and they always were.

Today, I think, people want to be convinced of a narrative. They want someone with a world view that will argue for it with passion. They want to be spoken to notat and want their lives to be acknowledged. They want a hopeful message carried by a person who has not, for the purpose of sales, adopted whatever compromise was designed to get the most votes. Average melted away and people are there to be convinced. Populism is popular and not just on the right. People do not want the middle.

Conventional wisdom seems to be that the way to fight right wing populism is to stick to the centre and be safe and boring.

What if all that is wrong?

What if the people want someone to argue coherently and with integrity and passion for a real vision? And if they can't be coherent or have integrity, passion will do.

Large numbers of people won't vote and the mushy middle will not bring them out. Corbyn is losing now but the election will come after a campaign. If people like what they see he could win and confound the observers.

The majority of his opposition within his party seems to be complaints from those who think that he cannot win rather than those who have trouble with what he stands for.

I think a bland middle of the road leader would get creamed. I am not sure whether he would win or lose but I think only someone like him could win.

Sean wrote: I think a bland middle of the road leader would get creamed. I am not sure whether he [Corbyn] would win or lose but I think only someone like him could win. 

Well, there will be lots of opportunity to track progress. WIth a byelection forthcoming in one former Labour seat, another Labour MP has just stepped down. (To run the Victoria and Albert Museum, no less.)  

http://labourlist.org/2017/01/tristram-hunt-resigns-to-become-director-o...

Jewish Labour Group May Take Legal Action Against Al Jazeera over Undercover Filming

https://www.rt.com/uk/373615-jewish-labour-al-jazeera/

"One of the organizations targeted in an undercover Al Jazeera investigation, exposing Israeli influence in British politics is considering legal action against the broadcaster. The Jewish Labour Movement (JLM) has seen cause to consider a legal complaint against Al Jazeera after its series 'The Lobby' recorded the group's director Ella Rose, in tears after an encounter with former Momentum organizer Jackie Walker.

The reports have led to the resignation of Israeli embassy official Shai Masot, who was also exposed by Al Jazeera conspiring to 'take down' pro-Palestinian MPs."

 We don't have this problem in Canada, because  our MPs are all fully subservient and supportive of the Zionist project, as evidenced by the No Difference Party's careful exclusion of any Israel-critical candidate in the last federal election.

Sean in Ottawa wrote:

...I am certainly not predicting anything other than to say a bland leader would not win. A more populist and controversial one could win or could lose -- that's what happens when you take stronger less-safe positions  -- they work or they don't. I am saying there is no place for the kind of safe positions that many left parties have tried to occupy.

The left base, I think in all countries, has less patience for sunny words and BS and expects substance.

I think this will come to Canada after a time as well.

I agree with Sean on this, and after all, if Labour, or any other 'left' party, is just going to parrot the positions already taken by the right in the hopes of getting elected, what's the point?

In the end, you have to have principles, and you have to defend them. That may not win elections, but at least you can keep your integrity, and in the end you can say you stuck by what you believed to be true. There is nothing wrong with that.

One of the reasons Bernie Sanders got the reception he did, even though he called himself a 'socialist' in a country that despises socialism, is that he was perceived to have that integrity.

For the left, there is no other way forward.

I cannot underline enough that the change is that there are more people than ever before prepared to not vote.

I (and others here) have attacked them here many times. However, they may be able to correctly claim that by not voting for bland options they are making it possible for a more left like option to run and win. It is an argument I never accepted but have to confront even if I am not fully convinced.

It is this large mass of people willing to stay home if there is no good option that means the middle can no longer say that theya re a more viable option than a person who actually stands for something like Corbyn.

In the past if you were the most left option, you only had to worry about the centre as the people left of you had nowhere to go. With staying home a more popular option, those who go after the centre by selling people out on the left can no longer count on their votes.

Two things can happen: either the left no longer has a chance and the right will win or the left may choose a better leader who can bring these people out on the left. The argument the nonvoters will make is that a Blairite is not different enough from a Conservative to make the slight increase in electablity worth giving up on something meaningful. By boycotting lousy options the left may win less often but when it does win it may actually do something worthwhile.

The right have the same realization. this is why the swings may be greater on both sides.

The benefit is that a left leader who is actually left may serve to help awareness of alternatives and possibilities.

I think that we will have a new debate on the value of not voting -- the side I have long supported may not win it. I will still examine the claims but it is a discussion worth having.

Whatever else you can say about him, JFK did the same.  Kennedy beat Nixon(by the narrowest of margins, but he did beat him)in 1960 because his campaign was able to get about seven million more people to vote than there had been in 1956:

1956:                                         1960:      

Eisenhower  35,579,180               Nixon 34,108,157

Stevenson  26,028,028                Kennedy 34,220,984

Exactly.  It is crucial to actually create enthusiasm, or, as the Tim Hardin lyric put it "a reason to believe".

Michael Moriarity wrote:

Ken Burch wrote:

Exactly.  It is crucial to actually create enthusiasm, or, as the Tim Hardin lyric put it "a reason to believe".

That's a most unfortunate analogy, Ken. This is one of my favourite songs. It tells of repeated unfaithfulness by a lover, whose lies the singer still desperately wants to find a reason to believe. We don't want to be like that.

It is an appropriate analogy.

We could argue that the Liberals gave a reaosn to vote for them but failed to give a reason to believe -- like the cheating lover the Liberals are doing the same thing they always do. This would be a good song to sing at the Liberals in the next election when they make the same promises they broke this time all over again.

So in fairness voters need two things -- a reason to vote (proposal) AND a reason to believe it (Integrity)

Jeremy Corbyn Accused of Being Russia 'Collaborator' For Questioning NATO Troop Buildup

https://twitter.com/ggreenwald/status/821100989193351172

"Western discourse: 1) question NATO troop buildup on Russia border: 2) get branded a Kremlin 'collaborator'"

Seems right-wingers are much the same on this the world over, whether a British Armed Forces minister or a Canadian 'progressive', 'leftist' on Babble. 

Calling people who right wing who are clearly not is a tactic used to attack people on this board since most poeple ehre would rather be called anything else. It is a 'legal' personal attack. It should not be respected anymore than calling a person anything else derogatory.

And you should have to back it up solidly -- not just with your opinion that not likely Putin means a person is necessarily right wing.

It is also cowardly and lazy to characterize without any support whole classes of unrealted opinion in this way. It is nothing less than propaganda to paint an area of opinion as unacceptable. Quicker than debating a point of view on its merits but not worthy of respect.

Yes, I'm really sick of that shit. I do NOT support a NATO buildup anywhere. I'm opposed to NATO and always have been, and the only political party I belong to (Québec solidaire) opposes it.

Nowadays, as there is no more Eastern Bloc, there is no longer even a suppsedly logical reason for NATO's existence.

Bully for Corbyn. Shame on those who contrive to sully the good name of left activists who aren't Putin fans (remember: homophobia? support for the religious establishment?) as somehow useful idiots of Empire. (Note the glissement from imperialism to Empire...).