The Home Secretary Priti Patel been critical of people like premier league footballers taking the knee against racism.Seems to me over the top.Surely peaceful protest in a democracy is a good thing.
It's just virtue signalling for the benefit of a xenophobic audience from Priti
That and the standard culture war tactic of conflating BLM, Antifa and violent ‘Marxist’ protest. Thankfully we don’t see that kind of thing on PB.
I (obviously) liked Corbyn personally but it was the policies for me, I think the vast majority of Corbyn supporters would have easily transferred over to someone actually offering 'Corbynism without Corbyn' as it was termed, I think everyone knew the game that was being played with people stating that without meaning it at all.
Almost regardless of what happens from this point on I can't see myself voting Labour next election..
I agree with you, at least in part.
Corbyn very definitely excited a whole bunch of people to vote for him. I remember many friends (including some unexpected ones) being very, very exhilarated by the Labour 2017 manifesto.
The buzz & excitement that Corbyn generated could & should have been followed up by the Labour party to build him up as a winner in 2019. Instead, his enemies destroyed him and it was obvious he was going down to a big defeat. Some people in Labour preferred that, because they could then recapture the party.
A reasonable analogy is George McGovern. It is absolutely clear in 'Fear & Loathing' that many Democrats preferred to see McGovern completely destroyed in 1972, so they could regain control of the Democratic Party, So, they were happy to collude in the smearing of McGovern as the 'Amnesty, Abortion, Acid' candidate. It remains the biggest ever US Presidential loss.
I can't see anyone being very excited by SKS -- except elderly Liberal Democrats with no hair. This constituency is well represented on pb.com, though
I shall never forget or forgive what they did.
Interesting bit about George McGovern there, I wonder if that whole amnesty and abortion angle they played on their own side came back to bite them at some point... nah probably not.
So you attribute no blame at all to Corybn and his policies and positions?
You realise there is a difference between agreeing with others that Corbyn and left wingers are the source of all evil in the world and that Corbyn is the perfect person.
Labour policies and positions along with Corbyn are a large part of why it did so much better in 2017 than previous leaders Brexit a large part of of the loss of votes from 2017 to 2019 (which combined with the previous big increases in Tory vote led to a disaster)
What evidence do you have for that? All the evidence I have seen suggests the opposite - that in 2017 Remainers voted a Labour to protest at Tory rhetoric in spite of Corbyn’s ‘fully costed’ policies (such as £300 million for 10,000 extra police) and then in 2019 they voted Tory because of his woeful leadership and unrealistic policies.
Polling at the time showed that Labour's 2017 programme was genuinely popular, much to the surprise of papers like the Mail which helpfully gave it enormous coverage in the belief that readers would be appalled. At that point, Corbyn was fairly new and many people were willing to give him a hearing, especially as May's government seemed sub-optimal to many.
In 2019, Corbyn's reputation had been severely damaged by the anti-semitism controversy, and the programme jumped the shark with weird promises like free broadband. Johnson's cheery offer seemed the safer alternative to floating voters. But I agree with The Jezziah that the respoinse to the 2017 programme showed that people are up for a healthy dose of social democracy plus some nationalisation. I also think that offering nothing very much would be unwise - a boring Labour Party has no obvious appeal to anyone.
Thank you for repeating the same assertions. Do you have evidence, please? Because, again, the evidence I saw said something very different. I’m willing to be corrected if you can prove your statements.
(Incidentally, again, the polling I saw suggested that individual policies were popular but nobody thought they were properly costed.)
I (obviously) liked Corbyn personally but it was the policies for me, I think the vast majority of Corbyn supporters would have easily transferred over to someone actually offering 'Corbynism without Corbyn' as it was termed, I think everyone knew the game that was being played with people stating that without meaning it at all.
Almost regardless of what happens from this point on I can't see myself voting Labour next election..
I agree with you, at least in part.
Corbyn very definitely excited a whole bunch of people to vote for him. I remember many friends (including some unexpected ones) being very, very exhilarated by the Labour 2017 manifesto.
The buzz & excitement that Corbyn generated could & should have been followed up by the Labour party to build him up as a winner in 2019. Instead, his enemies destroyed him and it was obvious he was going down to a big defeat. Some people in Labour preferred that, because they could then recapture the party.
A reasonable analogy is George McGovern. It is absolutely clear in 'Fear & Loathing' that many Democrats preferred to see McGovern completely destroyed in 1972, so they could regain control of the Democratic Party, So, they were happy to collude in the smearing of McGovern as the 'Amnesty, Abortion, Acid' candidate. It remains the biggest ever US Presidential loss.
I can't see anyone being very excited by SKS -- except elderly Liberal Democrats with no hair. This constituency is well represented on pb.com, though
I shall never forget or forgive what they did.
Interesting bit about George McGovern there, I wonder if that whole amnesty and abortion angle they played on their own side came back to bite them at some point... nah probably not.
So you attribute no blame at all to Corybn and his policies and positions?
You realise there is a difference between agreeing with others that Corbyn and left wingers are the source of all evil in the world and that Corbyn is the perfect person.
Labour policies and positions along with Corbyn are a large part of why it did so much better in 2017 than previous leaders Brexit a large part of of the loss of votes from 2017 to 2019 (which combined with the previous big increases in Tory vote led to a disaster)
What evidence do you have for that? All the evidence I have seen suggests the opposite - that in 2017 Remainers voted a Labour to protest at Tory rhetoric in spite of Corbyn’s ‘fully costed’ policies (such as £300 million for 10,000 extra police) and then in 2019 they voted Tory because of his woeful leadership and unrealistic policies.
But if perpetual opposition floats your boat, Corbyn is your man.
Ydoethur, in what way has Brexit been a failure? It's difficult not to associate our vaccine success, for example, with our departure from the EU, who are stuck in a bureaucratic quagmire.
One swallow and all that. Yes GB's vaccination programme seems to have been a success, and as I posted yesterday I am no fan of Frau Dr van den Leyen, who doesn't, in spite (?because of) her good academic qualifications to be the nimblest thinker. There could be any number of reasons for Europes comparative failure, but being in the middle of a change of government probably didn't help.
So far, though, I have heard of no exporting or employment successes, only failures, or difficulties.
I would summarise it as they worked on improving the efficiency of the process, rather than realising they needed a new process with a different purpose.
Not helped by the nature of the EU being procedural - as even emdebbed Euronauts will say. That is also why they say that Boris' / Gove's current attempted swashbuckling style of politics will not shift much.
The EU is great at managing a trading bloc but is terrible at being a quasi-federal government. Which is why a sensible Brexit would have involved the Single Market in one way or another. The EU describes itself as sui generis but with a flag, anthem and ambassadors accredited as if it were sovereign (and Lisbon made some aspects of its sovereignty explicit) it’s hard to criticise those that point out that if it walks like a duck etc. I identify as European but would rather be in a Europe which was explicit one thing or another. You can’t be half a country.
2. The far left members and MPs of the party who seem to spend their every waking hour plotting to undermine Starmer will rejoice in that outcome.
What goes around comes around.
Yep. For many on the right of the Labour Party and at Party HQ the notion of winning under Corbyn was a Plan Z. They preferred a Tory government.
It was also striking that although many in this group adopted "Remain" as their governing political identity once their career prospects in Labour took a dive, when the chance arose to try to bring down May and put in Corbyn as PM with a mandate to reverse Brexit and little else, most had no interest.
Remainers? Give me a break. Pure careerists.
I generally assume that regardless of party all politicians go into politics because they want what they perceive is best for people.
Given how horrendous a Corbyn government would be and how destructive to people's livelihoods it would be if those you call the Labour right would prefer a Tory government than a Corbyn one then they're patriots putting country and their electorate before the party. Good for them.
We can none of us know what the effect of a Corbyn government would have been.
I appreciate your views are sincerely held but it's wrong of you to state your view of its impact as if it were fact. In all honesty how do you think you would have preceived the prospect of an Attlee government in the June 1945?
Probably negatively. Which it was, it put us on the wrong track in a lot of ways.
But either way Kinabalu falsely claimed that the Labour right were "careerists" for not wanting a Corbyn Government. Putting Corbyn into office would be the best thing for their political career.
Many on the Labour right sacrificed their political career in stopping Corbyn. I'm impressed with them - it's not about my views it's about theirs.
The real careerists were the likes of Starmer. Starmer clearly thought Corbyn was bad but he put his personal career first serving in his Shadow Cabinet.
The Home Secretary Priti Patel been critical of people like premier league footballers taking the knee against racism.Seems to me over the top.Surely peaceful protest in a democracy is a good thing.
It's just virtue signalling for the benefit of a xenophobic audience from Priti
I don't see how you can virtue signal something like xenophobia.
Please leave the 'virtue signalling' epithet for those of us progressives who, you know, have some virtues.
I (obviously) liked Corbyn personally but it was the policies for me, I think the vast majority of Corbyn supporters would have easily transferred over to someone actually offering 'Corbynism without Corbyn' as it was termed, I think everyone knew the game that was being played with people stating that without meaning it at all.
Almost regardless of what happens from this point on I can't see myself voting Labour next election..
I agree with you, at least in part.
Corbyn very definitely excited a whole bunch of people to vote for him. I remember many friends (including some unexpected ones) being very, very exhilarated by the Labour 2017 manifesto.
The buzz & excitement that Corbyn generated could & should have been followed up by the Labour party to build him up as a winner in 2019. Instead, his enemies destroyed him and it was obvious he was going down to a big defeat. Some people in Labour preferred that, because they could then recapture the party.
A reasonable analogy is George McGovern. It is absolutely clear in 'Fear & Loathing' that many Democrats preferred to see McGovern completely destroyed in 1972, so they could regain control of the Democratic Party, So, they were happy to collude in the smearing of McGovern as the 'Amnesty, Abortion, Acid' candidate. It remains the biggest ever US Presidential loss.
I can't see anyone being very excited by SKS -- except elderly Liberal Democrats with no hair. This constituency is well represented on pb.com, though
I shall never forget or forgive what they did.
Interesting bit about George McGovern there, I wonder if that whole amnesty and abortion angle they played on their own side came back to bite them at some point... nah probably not.
So you attribute no blame at all to Corybn and his policies and positions?
You realise there is a difference between agreeing with others that Corbyn and left wingers are the source of all evil in the world and that Corbyn is the perfect person.
Labour policies and positions along with Corbyn are a large part of why it did so much better in 2017 than previous leaders Brexit a large part of of the loss of votes from 2017 to 2019 (which combined with the previous big increases in Tory vote led to a disaster)
What evidence do you have for that? All the evidence I have seen suggests the opposite - that in 2017 Remainers voted a Labour to protest at Tory rhetoric in spite of Corbyn’s ‘fully costed’ policies (such as £300 million for 10,000 extra police) and then in 2019 they voted Tory because of his woeful leadership and unrealistic policies.
Polling at the time showed that Labour's 2017 programme was genuinely popular, much to the surprise of papers like the Mail which helpfully gave it enormous coverage in the belief that readers would be appalled. At that point, Corbyn was fairly new and many people were willing to give him a hearing, especially as May's government seemed sub-optimal to many.
In 2019, Corbyn's reputation had been severely damaged by the anti-semitism controversy, and the programme jumped the shark with weird promises like free broadband. Johnson's cheery offer seemed the safer alternative to floating voters. But I agree with The Jezziah that the respoinse to the 2017 programme showed that people are up for a healthy dose of social democracy plus some nationalisation. I also think that offering nothing very much would be unwise - a boring Labour Party has no obvious appeal to anyone.
Tip - I think you'll find the fashionable phrase is public ownership not 'nationalisation.'
Definitely popular things in Labour's 2017 programme but I suspect many were voting AGAINST dementia tax, hard Brexit and a big Tory majority fully in the knowledge Corbyn would not be PM.
The Home Secretary Priti Patel been critical of people like premier league footballers taking the knee against racism.Seems to me over the top.Surely peaceful protest in a democracy is a good thing.
And freedom of opinion is too.
I think taking the knee is absolute rot. People are entitled to do it. I'm entitled to criticise it.
I can’t see the fuss myself. Much was made of it by Trump when the NFL started the trend. It’s a benign form of protest compared to what followed last May’s events.
It's not all bad news. Chuka's infiltrated JP Morgan and will be continuing the fight from there. One good man on the inside of the machine is worth a thousand impotents yelling from the sidelines.
Nice to see you back anyway. Some strong points made too. Especially on the 17 election. That was close. Painting it as a rejection of the left is utter nonsense. Then in 19, awful but unwinnable. "Boris" and "Get Brexit Done" was a killer proposition for the country in the mood it was in. Just a matter of how big the Con win was going to be.
So let's not throw out the radical baby with the Corbyn bathwater. It's a balance for me. I want a Labour government to really change things. Otherwise what's the point? But I also do want a Labour government now and again. Otherwise what's the point?
I voted for Nandy but I'm ok with Starmer. Too early to be getting disillusioned. And eye ALWAYS vote Labour. I'm Labour soup to nuts, Foot to Blair.
Stay with us, Comrade, stay with us.
The significance of 2017 is overdone. I know that the arguments are well-rehearsed, but they're perhaps worth repeating at this juncture: voters were mainly looking at the Tory car crash (a suicide note manifesto and an exceptionally poor campaigning performance by May,) Corbyn was still a relatively new leader whose platform did not receive as much scrutiny as it deserved, and besides most people thought he had no hope of winning and that a Labour protest vote was safe, especially if motivated to do so by the European issue.
And yet, despite everything, the Conservatives still finished 55 seats ahead of Labour. By 2019, those effects had mostly dissipated, and we all know what happened then.
There is no hope, at this point and probably for many years hence, for Labour in running on anything that might be described as a radical left manifesto. It's exciting to a lot of voters, but a turn-off to the new Tory electoral coalition - older and more affluent voters combined with moderate social conservatives - which is too large for Labour to get around. Appeals to a return to some kind of Corbynism but with a better salesperson are effectively calls to avoid the necessary compromises with the Tory voting electorate that are needed, and to somehow win by squeezing the minor progressive parties and attracting loads of non-voters to get around the problem. That didn't work in 2017 and it's very hard indeed to see it working against a Government with a better managed campaign and a less problematic manifesto at the next election, either. The Tories aren't going to do a repeat run of wooden top May and the dementia tax. They're not that stupid.
What Labour is probably going to need next time around is to try to cultivate an air of managerial competence (free of loony Left personalities and outbursts) and to promise a careful recalibration leftwards on socio-economic policy rather than a revolution (with a particular emphasis on well-costed and realistic sounding policies that don't involve another half-a-trillion pounds' worth of borrowing.) Given both how very far behind they are and the Scottish problem it may well not be enough, but the alternative - retreat into the comfort zone and then celebrating X-million votes for socialism after being crushed again - is worse.
Morning. I see BoZo's biggest fan is up with the lark.
Personally, I cannot stand the slovenly buffoon with a penchant for fancy dress photo opportunities. Its like watching the Generation Game at times, and sometimes worse.
The Home Secretary Priti Patel been critical of people like premier league footballers taking the knee against racism.Seems to me over the top.Surely peaceful protest in a democracy is a good thing.
And freedom of opinion is too.
I think taking the knee is absolute rot. People are entitled to do it. I'm entitled to criticise it.
I can’t see the fuss myself. Much was made of it by Trump when the NFL started the trend. It’s a benign form of protest compared to what followed last May’s events.
Of course taking the knee only spread because the right objected to it. Streisand effect.
2. The far left members and MPs of the party who seem to spend their every waking hour plotting to undermine Starmer will rejoice in that outcome.
What goes around comes around.
Yep. For many on the right of the Labour Party and at Party HQ the notion of winning under Corbyn was a Plan Z. They preferred a Tory government.
It was also striking that although many in this group adopted "Remain" as their governing political identity once their career prospects in Labour took a dive, when the chance arose to try to bring down May and put in Corbyn as PM with a mandate to reverse Brexit and little else, most had no interest.
Remainers? Give me a break. Pure careerists.
I generally assume that regardless of party all politicians go into politics because they want what they perceive is best for people.
Given how horrendous a Corbyn government would be and how destructive to people's livelihoods it would be if those you call the Labour right would prefer a Tory government than a Corbyn one then they're patriots putting country and their electorate before the party. Good for them.
My point exactly. Although supposedly on the Left and Remainers they served the interests of the Right and of Hard Brexit. So of course you would approve.
The Home Secretary Priti Patel been critical of people like premier league footballers taking the knee against racism.Seems to me over the top.Surely peaceful protest in a democracy is a good thing.
It's just virtue signalling for the benefit of a xenophobic audience from Priti
I don't see how you can virtue signal something like xenophobia.
Please leave the 'virtue signalling' epithet for those of us progressives who, you know, have some virtues.
It was supposed to be an ironic comment, but ho-hum.
It looks likely that: 1. Labour will do relatively poorly in the May elections. 2. The far left members and MPs of the party who seem to spend their every waking hour plotting to undermine Starmer will rejoice in that outcome.
If the 'far left' are behaving like Blairites were in a similar position then I assume that is a good thing because they are grown ups who want to govern or something like that....
The Alice Roberts Stonehenge documentary last night on BBC2 is well worth a watch
Indeed. Watching In was reminded of the book on the genetics of the British and how they showed the patterns of migration, the title of which I cannot remember, but which opined that the evidence demonstrated that post Ice-Age Britain was repopulated from two main and one minor directions; up the west coast of what is now France, from Iberia and into the Western part of the British Isles and from the East, across the Channel and North Sea. The Westerners uniting with the Easterners might well have accounted for the movement of the Henge.
That was Oppenheimer's book. I enjoyed that too, and found it convincing - especially the earlier chapters before it descended deeply into the minutiae of the DNA.
But Tyndall told me it has mostly since been discredited.
New evidence sadly. It is now apparent that the original post glacial inhabitants of the British isles were almost entirely wiped out at the end of the Neolithic. It appears there is a 90% plus annihilation of the pre-existing population of the British isles within perhaps as little as one generation and their replacement by a new peoples originating (we think) in Spain. I was educated in the 80s in exactly the sort of migration hypothesis you talk about but it is now well out of date.
It is not clear what actually led to the almost complete removal of the native population - disease is the most obvious cause with the new arrivals inadvertently bringing something with them that they themselves were immune to. But no one knows for sure.
This is how the Independent reported the new hypothesis back in 2018
The Home Secretary Priti Patel been critical of people like premier league footballers taking the knee against racism.Seems to me over the top.Surely peaceful protest in a democracy is a good thing.
It's just virtue signalling for the benefit of a xenophobic audience from Priti
I don't see how you can virtue signal something like xenophobia.
Please leave the 'virtue signalling' epithet for those of us progressives who, you know, have some virtues.
It was supposed to be an ironic comment, but ho-hum.
2. The far left members and MPs of the party who seem to spend their every waking hour plotting to undermine Starmer will rejoice in that outcome.
What goes around comes around.
Yep. For many on the right of the Labour Party and at Party HQ the notion of winning under Corbyn was a Plan Z. They preferred a Tory government.
It was also striking that although many in this group adopted "Remain" as their governing political identity once their career prospects in Labour took a dive, when the chance arose to try to bring down May and put in Corbyn as PM with a mandate to reverse Brexit and little else, most had no interest.
Remainers? Give me a break. Pure careerists.
I generally assume that regardless of party all politicians go into politics because they want what they perceive is best for people.
Given how horrendous a Corbyn government would be and how destructive to people's livelihoods it would be if those you call the Labour right would prefer a Tory government than a Corbyn one then they're patriots putting country and their electorate before the party. Good for them.
My point exactly. Although supposedly on the Left and Remainers they served the interests of the Right and of Hard Brexit. So of course you would approve.
Because even the right and Brexit is better in their eyes than Corbyn. That should maybe stop and make you think. That despite them opposing the right and Brexit they viewed Corbyn as worse.
They sacrificed their careers to stop a catastrophe. They are the opposite of careerists. Starmer sacrificed his principles to further his career serving in Corbyn's Shadow Cabinet.
Restore Pre-Decimalisation Pounds, Shillings, and Pence Currency (£sd) System
I'm sure that this is something that can unite PBers.
Combining base 12/20/10 for currency and base 16/14/10 for weight gave us Brits the mental agility that built us an empire....
Given the difficulty of using a calculator or an excel spreadsheet, the young would have to learn new skills - like mental arithmetic.
Surely it would take a few minutes for someone with the knowledge to program Excel to do the job? And it wouldn't be long before desktop calculators specifically designed for the task flooded the market.
The main issue would be with the computer systems of the banks. Could be the TSB disaster on steroids.
I (obviously) liked Corbyn personally but it was the policies for me, I think the vast majority of Corbyn supporters would have easily transferred over to someone actually offering 'Corbynism without Corbyn' as it was termed, I think everyone knew the game that was being played with people stating that without meaning it at all.
Almost regardless of what happens from this point on I can't see myself voting Labour next election..
I agree with you, at least in part.
Corbyn very definitely excited a whole bunch of people to vote for him. I remember many friends (including some unexpected ones) being very, very exhilarated by the Labour 2017 manifesto.
The buzz & excitement that Corbyn generated could & should have been followed up by the Labour party to build him up as a winner in 2019. Instead, his enemies destroyed him and it was obvious he was going down to a big defeat. Some people in Labour preferred that, because they could then recapture the party.
A reasonable analogy is George McGovern. It is absolutely clear in 'Fear & Loathing' that many Democrats preferred to see McGovern completely destroyed in 1972, so they could regain control of the Democratic Party, So, they were happy to collude in the smearing of McGovern as the 'Amnesty, Abortion, Acid' candidate. It remains the biggest ever US Presidential loss.
I can't see anyone being very excited by SKS -- except elderly Liberal Democrats with no hair. This constituency is well represented on pb.com, though
I shall never forget or forgive what they did.
Interesting bit about George McGovern there, I wonder if that whole amnesty and abortion angle they played on their own side came back to bite them at some point... nah probably not.
So you attribute no blame at all to Corybn and his policies and positions?
You realise there is a difference between agreeing with others that Corbyn and left wingers are the source of all evil in the world and that Corbyn is the perfect person.
Labour policies and positions along with Corbyn are a large part of why it did so much better in 2017 than previous leaders Brexit a large part of of the loss of votes from 2017 to 2019 (which combined with the previous big increases in Tory vote led to a disaster)
What evidence do you have for that? All the evidence I have seen suggests the opposite - that in 2017 Remainers voted a Labour to protest at Tory rhetoric in spite of Corbyn’s ‘fully costed’ policies (such as £300 million for 10,000 extra police) and then in 2019 they voted Tory because of his woeful leadership and unrealistic policies.
Polling at the time showed that Labour's 2017 programme was genuinely popular, much to the surprise of papers like the Mail which helpfully gave it enormous coverage in the belief that readers would be appalled. At that point, Corbyn was fairly new and many people were willing to give him a hearing, especially as May's government seemed sub-optimal to many.
In 2019, Corbyn's reputation had been severely damaged by the anti-semitism controversy, and the programme jumped the shark with weird promises like free broadband. Johnson's cheery offer seemed the safer alternative to floating voters. But I agree with The Jezziah that the respoinse to the 2017 programme showed that people are up for a healthy dose of social democracy plus some nationalisation. I also think that offering nothing very much would be unwise - a boring Labour Party has no obvious appeal to anyone.
One of the main reasons why Boris won big in 2019 is that he was utterly ruthless with his party.
Boris simply kicked out 21 MPs who disagreed with him -- including Gauke, Soames, Hammond, Letwin, Grieve
Boris instigated a ... Stalinist ... purge of dissenters. There is no other word for it, it is really unprecedented in modern UK politics.
Compare Boris to Jeremy.
Corbyn lost badly because he was ... erm ... not Stalinist enough . He led a disunited party, with some openly undermining him.
The Labour right really is the best treated minority group in the country ... and they are always bleating that they are being badly treated. Look what Boris did to his dissenting MPs.
I (obviously) liked Corbyn personally but it was the policies for me, I think the vast majority of Corbyn supporters would have easily transferred over to someone actually offering 'Corbynism without Corbyn' as it was termed, I think everyone knew the game that was being played with people stating that without meaning it at all.
Almost regardless of what happens from this point on I can't see myself voting Labour next election..
I agree with you, at least in part.
Corbyn very definitely excited a whole bunch of people to vote for him. I remember many friends (including some unexpected ones) being very, very exhilarated by the Labour 2017 manifesto.
The buzz & excitement that Corbyn generated could & should have been followed up by the Labour party to build him up as a winner in 2019. Instead, his enemies destroyed him and it was obvious he was going down to a big defeat. Some people in Labour preferred that, because they could then recapture the party.
A reasonable analogy is George McGovern. It is absolutely clear in 'Fear & Loathing' that many Democrats preferred to see McGovern completely destroyed in 1972, so they could regain control of the Democratic Party, So, they were happy to collude in the smearing of McGovern as the 'Amnesty, Abortion, Acid' candidate. It remains the biggest ever US Presidential loss.
I can't see anyone being very excited by SKS -- except elderly Liberal Democrats with no hair. This constituency is well represented on pb.com, though
I shall never forget or forgive what they did.
Interesting bit about George McGovern there, I wonder if that whole amnesty and abortion angle they played on their own side came back to bite them at some point... nah probably not.
So you attribute no blame at all to Corybn and his policies and positions?
You realise there is a difference between agreeing with others that Corbyn and left wingers are the source of all evil in the world and that Corbyn is the perfect person.
Labour policies and positions along with Corbyn are a large part of why it did so much better in 2017 than previous leaders Brexit a large part of of the loss of votes from 2017 to 2019 (which combined with the previous big increases in Tory vote led to a disaster)
What evidence do you have for that? All the evidence I have seen suggests the opposite - that in 2017 Remainers voted a Labour to protest at Tory rhetoric in spite of Corbyn’s ‘fully costed’ policies (such as £300 million for 10,000 extra police) and then in 2019 they voted Tory because of his woeful leadership and unrealistic policies.
Polling at the time showed that Labour's 2017 programme was genuinely popular, much to the surprise of papers like the Mail which helpfully gave it enormous coverage in the belief that readers would be appalled. At that point, Corbyn was fairly new and many people were willing to give him a hearing, especially as May's government seemed sub-optimal to many.
In 2019, Corbyn's reputation had been severely damaged by the anti-semitism controversy, and the programme jumped the shark with weird promises like free broadband. Johnson's cheery offer seemed the safer alternative to floating voters. But I agree with The Jezziah that the respoinse to the 2017 programme showed that people are up for a healthy dose of social democracy plus some nationalisation. I also think that offering nothing very much would be unwise - a boring Labour Party has no obvious appeal to anyone.
Re 2017 I wonder whether you are overplaying this? My recollection is that the Tories got punished for an opportunistic attempt to destroy Labour; the electorate didn`t take to kindly to the arrogant over-confidence.
That plus May poor at campaigning and lacking charisma and Corbyn promising to pay of student debts which was popular with the obvious beneficiaries of this idea.
It's not all bad news. Chuka's infiltrated JP Morgan and will be continuing the fight from there. One good man on the inside of the machine is worth a thousand impotents yelling from the sidelines.
Nice to see you back anyway. Some strong points made too. Especially on the 17 election. That was close. Painting it as a rejection of the left is utter nonsense. Then in 19, awful but unwinnable. "Boris" and "Get Brexit Done" was a killer proposition for the country in the mood it was in. Just a matter of how big the Con win was going to be.
So let's not throw out the radical baby with the Corbyn bathwater. It's a balance for me. I want a Labour government to really change things. Otherwise what's the point? But I also do want a Labour government now and again. Otherwise what's the point?
I voted for Nandy but I'm ok with Starmer. Too early to be getting disillusioned. And eye ALWAYS vote Labour. I'm Labour soup to nuts, Foot to Blair.
Stay with us, Comrade, stay with us.
The significance of 2017 is overdone. I know that the arguments are well-rehearsed, but they're perhaps worth repeating at this juncture: voters were mainly looking at the Tory car crash (a suicide note manifesto and an exceptionally poor campaigning performance by May,) Corbyn was still a relatively new leader whose platform did not receive as much scrutiny as it deserved, and besides most people thought he had no hope of winning and that a Labour protest vote was safe, especially if motivated to do so by the European issue.
And yet, despite everything, the Conservatives still finished 55 seats ahead of Labour. By 2019, those effects had mostly dissipated, and we all know what happened then.
There is no hope, at this point and probably for many years hence, for Labour in running on anything that might be described as a radical left manifesto. It's exciting to a lot of voters, but a turn-off to the new Tory electoral coalition - older and more affluent voters combined with moderate social conservatives - which is too large for Labour to get around. Appeals to a return to some kind of Corbynism but with a better salesperson are effectively calls to avoid the necessary compromises with the Tory voting electorate that are needed, and to somehow win by squeezing the minor progressive parties and attracting loads of non-voters to get around the problem. That didn't work in 2017 and it's very hard indeed to see it working against a Government with a better managed campaign and a less problematic manifesto at the next election, either. The Tories aren't going to do a repeat run of wooden top May and the dementia tax. They're not that stupid.
What Labour is probably going to need next time around is to try to cultivate an air of managerial competence (free of loony Left personalities and outbursts) and to promise a careful recalibration leftwards on socio-economic policy rather than a revolution (with a particular emphasis on well-costed and realistic sounding policies that don't involve another half-a-trillion pounds' worth of borrowing.) Given both how very far behind they are and the Scottish problem it may well not be enough, but the alternative - retreat into the comfort zone and then celebrating X-million votes for socialism after being crushed again - is worse.
Very well put. This constant harking back to 2017 and the "what if" narrative is tiring and moreover the electorate don't care. Corbyn is, as he always was, yesterdays man. He. Didn't. Win. In. 2017. Nowhere near a majority even. Not even close. In lottery terms he probably only won a tenner - which gave him enough cash to have another play.
Corbyn supporters are now just being the bloke down the pub boring his mates with stories that he was "so close on the other numbers I could have won the whole lot". Interesting the first time maybe, but Christ after nearly 4 years....
I (obviously) liked Corbyn personally but it was the policies for me, I think the vast majority of Corbyn supporters would have easily transferred over to someone actually offering 'Corbynism without Corbyn' as it was termed, I think everyone knew the game that was being played with people stating that without meaning it at all.
Almost regardless of what happens from this point on I can't see myself voting Labour next election..
I agree with you, at least in part.
Corbyn very definitely excited a whole bunch of people to vote for him. I remember many friends (including some unexpected ones) being very, very exhilarated by the Labour 2017 manifesto.
The buzz & excitement that Corbyn generated could & should have been followed up by the Labour party to build him up as a winner in 2019. Instead, his enemies destroyed him and it was obvious he was going down to a big defeat. Some people in Labour preferred that, because they could then recapture the party.
A reasonable analogy is George McGovern. It is absolutely clear in 'Fear & Loathing' that many Democrats preferred to see McGovern completely destroyed in 1972, so they could regain control of the Democratic Party, So, they were happy to collude in the smearing of McGovern as the 'Amnesty, Abortion, Acid' candidate. It remains the biggest ever US Presidential loss.
I can't see anyone being very excited by SKS -- except elderly Liberal Democrats with no hair. This constituency is well represented on pb.com, though
I shall never forget or forgive what they did.
Interesting bit about George McGovern there, I wonder if that whole amnesty and abortion angle they played on their own side came back to bite them at some point... nah probably not.
So you attribute no blame at all to Corybn and his policies and positions?
You realise there is a difference between agreeing with others that Corbyn and left wingers are the source of all evil in the world and that Corbyn is the perfect person.
Labour policies and positions along with Corbyn are a large part of why it did so much better in 2017 than previous leaders Brexit a large part of of the loss of votes from 2017 to 2019 (which combined with the previous big increases in Tory vote led to a disaster)
What evidence do you have for that? All the evidence I have seen suggests the opposite - that in 2017 Remainers voted a Labour to protest at Tory rhetoric in spite of Corbyn’s ‘fully costed’ policies (such as £300 million for 10,000 extra police) and then in 2019 they voted Tory because of his woeful leadership and unrealistic policies.
Ydoethur, in what way has Brexit been a failure? It's difficult not to associate our vaccine success, for example, with our departure from the EU, who are stuck in a bureaucratic quagmire.
One swallow and all that. Yes GB's vaccination programme seems to have been a success, and as I posted yesterday I am no fan of Frau Dr van den Leyen, who doesn't, in spite (?because of) her good academic qualifications to be the nimblest thinker. There could be any number of reasons for Europes comparative failure, but being in the middle of a change of government probably didn't help.
So far, though, I have heard of no exporting or employment successes, only failures, or difficulties.
I would summarise it as they worked on improving the efficiency of the process, rather than realising they needed a new process with a different purpose.
Not helped by the nature of the EU being procedural - as even emdebbed Euronauts will say. That is also why they say that Boris' / Gove's current attempted swashbuckling style of politics will not shift much.
The EU is great at managing a trading bloc but is terrible at being a quasi-federal government. Which is why a sensible Brexit would have involved the Single Market in one way or another. The EU describes itself as sui generis but with a flag, anthem and ambassadors accredited as if it were sovereign (and Lisbon made some aspects of its sovereignty explicit) it’s hard to criticise those that point out that if it walks like a duck etc. I identify as European but would rather be in a Europe which was explicit one thing or another. You can’t be half a country.
I think that "Ever Closer Union" is the EU version of "Manifest Destiny".
Restore Pre-Decimalisation Pounds, Shillings, and Pence Currency (£sd) System
I'm sure that this is something that can unite PBers.
Combining base 12/20/10 for currency and base 16/14/10 for weight gave us Brits the mental agility that built us an empire....
Given the difficulty of using a calculator or an excel spreadsheet, the young would have to learn new skills - like mental arithmetic.
Surely it would take a few minutes for someone with the knowledge to program Excel to do the job? And it wouldn't be long before desktop calculators specifically designed for the task flooded the market.
The main issue would be with the computer systems of the banks. Could be the TSB disaster on steroids.
It appears there was a special COBOL PIC clause on ICL (ICT) 1900 computers? It was certainly history by the time I started programming on ICL 1900s in 1981.
It's not all bad news. Chuka's infiltrated JP Morgan and will be continuing the fight from there. One good man on the inside of the machine is worth a thousand impotents yelling from the sidelines.
Nice to see you back anyway. Some strong points made too. Especially on the 17 election. That was close. Painting it as a rejection of the left is utter nonsense. Then in 19, awful but unwinnable. "Boris" and "Get Brexit Done" was a killer proposition for the country in the mood it was in. Just a matter of how big the Con win was going to be.
So let's not throw out the radical baby with the Corbyn bathwater. It's a balance for me. I want a Labour government to really change things. Otherwise what's the point? But I also do want a Labour government now and again. Otherwise what's the point?
I voted for Nandy but I'm ok with Starmer. Too early to be getting disillusioned. And eye ALWAYS vote Labour. I'm Labour soup to nuts, Foot to Blair.
Stay with us, Comrade, stay with us.
Comrade Kinabalu, it is a pleasure, I hope you have a supply of good vodka to keep you warm in these cold times.
Fooling the capitalists with a fake argument between Chuka and Corbyn was certainly a good plan, I have on good authority that man is so left wing he even bleeds red.
You are reasonable and agreeable as always but I fear the teachings of the church no longer reach me, I have embraced the godlessness of atheism.. (there is this one green god I've been interested in but she doesn't do services in my area) I am sure there is a chance we shall end up in the same congregation sooner or later but not for now.
Restore Pre-Decimalisation Pounds, Shillings, and Pence Currency (£sd) System
I'm sure that this is something that can unite PBers.
Combining base 12/20/10 for currency and base 16/14/10 for weight gave us Brits the mental agility that built us an empire....
Given the difficulty of using a calculator or an excel spreadsheet, the young would have to learn new skills - like mental arithmetic.
Surely it would take a few minutes for someone with the knowledge to program Excel to do the job? And it wouldn't be long before desktop calculators specifically designed for the task flooded the market.
The main issue would be with the computer systems of the banks. Could be the TSB disaster on steroids.
The backstories of both the Dune Series and the 2003 Battlestar Galactica reboot have always made me wary of over reliance on technology. We’re only a Carrington Event away from having to use abacuses (for a while anyway).
New model shows late March before we see decent cuts in covid hospitalisations:
"Our model suggests substantial reductions in hospital and ICU admissions will not occur until late March and into April 2021."
"An inflection point, when 50% of the adult population has been vaccinated – with deaths reduced by 95% and hospital admissions by 80% – may be a useful point for re‐evaluating vaccine prioritisation. "
Thank you for repeating the same assertions. Do you have evidence, please? Because, again, the evidence I saw said something very different. I’m willing to be corrected if you can prove your statements. (Incidentally, again, the polling I saw suggested that individual policies were popular but nobody thought they were properly costed.)
I don't think there's any doubt that the policies were popular as shown here - I don't remember a specific question on being properly costed, but the public are always sceptical (and they're usually right) about parties claiming that, and will often vote for a party on the basis that if they turn out to be able to afford half of it that's not bad. Corbyn was competitive with May as the BBC link shows, though many will think that a low bar - my recollection is that he attracted both more enthusiasm and more hostility than May but it evened out in 2017. What people think/thought of Corbyn is a bit irrelevant now, of course - we're discussing the policies.
There was also a survey (which I can't find) suggesting that Labour's vote increased more among people who thought Labour might win than people who didn't, which is a pretty normal pattern but contradicts the theory that people voted Labour because they were sure they'd lose. People don't in general think like that, in my experience.
I (obviously) liked Corbyn personally but it was the policies for me, I think the vast majority of Corbyn supporters would have easily transferred over to someone actually offering 'Corbynism without Corbyn' as it was termed, I think everyone knew the game that was being played with people stating that without meaning it at all.
Almost regardless of what happens from this point on I can't see myself voting Labour next election..
I agree with you, at least in part.
Corbyn very definitely excited a whole bunch of people to vote for him. I remember many friends (including some unexpected ones) being very, very exhilarated by the Labour 2017 manifesto.
The buzz & excitement that Corbyn generated could & should have been followed up by the Labour party to build him up as a winner in 2019. Instead, his enemies destroyed him and it was obvious he was going down to a big defeat. Some people in Labour preferred that, because they could then recapture the party.
A reasonable analogy is George McGovern. It is absolutely clear in 'Fear & Loathing' that many Democrats preferred to see McGovern completely destroyed in 1972, so they could regain control of the Democratic Party, So, they were happy to collude in the smearing of McGovern as the 'Amnesty, Abortion, Acid' candidate. It remains the biggest ever US Presidential loss.
I can't see anyone being very excited by SKS -- except elderly Liberal Democrats with no hair. This constituency is well represented on pb.com, though
I shall never forget or forgive what they did.
Interesting bit about George McGovern there, I wonder if that whole amnesty and abortion angle they played on their own side came back to bite them at some point... nah probably not.
So you attribute no blame at all to Corybn and his policies and positions?
You realise there is a difference between agreeing with others that Corbyn and left wingers are the source of all evil in the world and that Corbyn is the perfect person.
Labour policies and positions along with Corbyn are a large part of why it did so much better in 2017 than previous leaders Brexit a large part of of the loss of votes from 2017 to 2019 (which combined with the previous big increases in Tory vote led to a disaster)
What evidence do you have for that? All the evidence I have seen suggests the opposite - that in 2017 Remainers voted a Labour to protest at Tory rhetoric in spite of Corbyn’s ‘fully costed’ policies (such as £300 million for 10,000 extra police) and then in 2019 they voted Tory because of his woeful leadership and unrealistic policies.
Polling at the time showed that Labour's 2017 programme was genuinely popular, much to the surprise of papers like the Mail which helpfully gave it enormous coverage in the belief that readers would be appalled. At that point, Corbyn was fairly new and many people were willing to give him a hearing, especially as May's government seemed sub-optimal to many.
In 2019, Corbyn's reputation had been severely damaged by the anti-semitism controversy, and the programme jumped the shark with weird promises like free broadband. Johnson's cheery offer seemed the safer alternative to floating voters. But I agree with The Jezziah that the respoinse to the 2017 programme showed that people are up for a healthy dose of social democracy plus some nationalisation. I also think that offering nothing very much would be unwise - a boring Labour Party has no obvious appeal to anyone.
One of the main reasons why Boris won big in 2019 is that he was utterly ruthless with his party.
Boris simply kicked out 21 MPs who disagreed with him -- including Gauke, Soames, Hammond, Letwin, Grieve
Boris instigated a ... Stalinist ... purge of dissenters. There is no other word for it, it is really unprecedented in modern UK politics.
Compare Boris to Jeremy.
Corbyn lost badly because he was ... erm ... not Stalinist enough . He led a disunited party, with some openly undermining him.
The Labour right really is the best treated minority group in the country ... and they are always bleating that they are being badly treated. Look what Boris did to his dissenting MPs.
I thought I recognised you. Don't you sell the Socialist Worker from below Bevan's statue on Queen Street?
It's not all bad news. Chuka's infiltrated JP Morgan and will be continuing the fight from there. One good man on the inside of the machine is worth a thousand impotents yelling from the sidelines.
Nice to see you back anyway. Some strong points made too. Especially on the 17 election. That was close. Painting it as a rejection of the left is utter nonsense. Then in 19, awful but unwinnable. "Boris" and "Get Brexit Done" was a killer proposition for the country in the mood it was in. Just a matter of how big the Con win was going to be.
So let's not throw out the radical baby with the Corbyn bathwater. It's a balance for me. I want a Labour government to really change things. Otherwise what's the point? But I also do want a Labour government now and again. Otherwise what's the point?
I voted for Nandy but I'm ok with Starmer. Too early to be getting disillusioned. And eye ALWAYS vote Labour. I'm Labour soup to nuts, Foot to Blair.
Stay with us, Comrade, stay with us.
The significance of 2017 is overdone. I know that the arguments are well-rehearsed, but they're perhaps worth repeating at this juncture: voters were mainly looking at the Tory car crash (a suicide note manifesto and an exceptionally poor campaigning performance by May,) Corbyn was still a relatively new leader whose platform did not receive as much scrutiny as it deserved, and besides most people thought he had no hope of winning and that a Labour protest vote was safe, especially if motivated to do so by the European issue.
And yet, despite everything, the Conservatives still finished 55 seats ahead of Labour. By 2019, those effects had mostly dissipated, and we all know what happened then.
There is no hope, at this point and probably for many years hence, for Labour in running on anything that might be described as a radical left manifesto. It's exciting to a lot of voters, but a turn-off to the new Tory electoral coalition - older and more affluent voters combined with moderate social conservatives - which is too large for Labour to get around. Appeals to a return to some kind of Corbynism but with a better salesperson are effectively calls to avoid the necessary compromises with the Tory voting electorate that are needed, and to somehow win by squeezing the minor progressive parties and attracting loads of non-voters to get around the problem. That didn't work in 2017 and it's very hard indeed to see it working against a Government with a better managed campaign and a less problematic manifesto at the next election, either. The Tories aren't going to do a repeat run of wooden top May and the dementia tax. They're not that stupid.
What Labour is probably going to need next time around is to try to cultivate an air of managerial competence (free of loony Left personalities and outbursts) and to promise a careful recalibration leftwards on socio-economic policy rather than a revolution (with a particular emphasis on well-costed and realistic sounding policies that don't involve another half-a-trillion pounds' worth of borrowing.) Given both how very far behind they are and the Scottish problem it may well not be enough, but the alternative - retreat into the comfort zone and then celebrating X-million votes for socialism after being crushed again - is worse.
A big factor in the 2017 election was Philip Hammond, off in a sulk because it looked like he would be moved from number 11. His invisibility during the campaign meant the Labour Manifesto got far, far less scrutiny than it should have had.
It was just a flavour of how much of an arse he would be until the 2019 election.
The Alice Roberts Stonehenge documentary last night on BBC2 is well worth a watch
Indeed. Watching In was reminded of the book on the genetics of the British and how they showed the patterns of migration, the title of which I cannot remember, but which opined that the evidence demonstrated that post Ice-Age Britain was repopulated from two main and one minor directions; up the west coast of what is now France, from Iberia and into the Western part of the British Isles and from the East, across the Channel and North Sea. The Westerners uniting with the Easterners might well have accounted for the movement of the Henge.
That was Oppenheimer's book. I enjoyed that too, and found it convincing - especially the earlier chapters before it descended deeply into the minutiae of the DNA.
But Tyndall told me it has mostly since been discredited.
New evidence sadly. It is now apparent that the original post glacial inhabitants of the British isles were almost entirely wiped out at the end of the Neolithic. It appears there is a 90% plus annihilation of the pre-existing population of the British isles within perhaps as little as one generation and their replacement by a new peoples originating (we think) in Spain. I was educated in the 80s in exactly the sort of migration hypothesis you talk about but it is now well out of date.
It is not clear what actually led to the almost complete removal of the native population - disease is the most obvious cause with the new arrivals inadvertently bringing something with them that they themselves were immune to. But no one knows for sure.
This is how the Independent reported the new hypothesis back in 2018
New model shows late March before we see decent cuts in covid hospitalisations:
"Our model suggests substantial reductions in hospital and ICU admissions will not occur until late March and into April 2021."
"An inflection point, when 50% of the adult population has been vaccinated – with deaths reduced by 95% and hospital admissions by 80% – may be a useful point for re‐evaluating vaccine prioritisation. "
I (obviously) liked Corbyn personally but it was the policies for me, I think the vast majority of Corbyn supporters would have easily transferred over to someone actually offering 'Corbynism without Corbyn' as it was termed, I think everyone knew the game that was being played with people stating that without meaning it at all.
Almost regardless of what happens from this point on I can't see myself voting Labour next election..
I agree with you, at least in part.
Corbyn very definitely excited a whole bunch of people to vote for him. I remember many friends (including some unexpected ones) being very, very exhilarated by the Labour 2017 manifesto.
The buzz & excitement that Corbyn generated could & should have been followed up by the Labour party to build him up as a winner in 2019. Instead, his enemies destroyed him and it was obvious he was going down to a big defeat. Some people in Labour preferred that, because they could then recapture the party.
A reasonable analogy is George McGovern. It is absolutely clear in 'Fear & Loathing' that many Democrats preferred to see McGovern completely destroyed in 1972, so they could regain control of the Democratic Party, So, they were happy to collude in the smearing of McGovern as the 'Amnesty, Abortion, Acid' candidate. It remains the biggest ever US Presidential loss.
I can't see anyone being very excited by SKS -- except elderly Liberal Democrats with no hair. This constituency is well represented on pb.com, though
I shall never forget or forgive what they did.
Interesting bit about George McGovern there, I wonder if that whole amnesty and abortion angle they played on their own side came back to bite them at some point... nah probably not.
So you attribute no blame at all to Corybn and his policies and positions?
You realise there is a difference between agreeing with others that Corbyn and left wingers are the source of all evil in the world and that Corbyn is the perfect person.
Labour policies and positions along with Corbyn are a large part of why it did so much better in 2017 than previous leaders Brexit a large part of of the loss of votes from 2017 to 2019 (which combined with the previous big increases in Tory vote led to a disaster)
What evidence do you have for that? All the evidence I have seen suggests the opposite - that in 2017 Remainers voted a Labour to protest at Tory rhetoric in spite of Corbyn’s ‘fully costed’ policies (such as £300 million for 10,000 extra police) and then in 2019 they voted Tory because of his woeful leadership and unrealistic policies.
I've showed you the reasons people voted for Labour in 2017 previously, you purposefully forget because it doesn't suit your agenda.
Ydoethur, in what way has Brexit been a failure? It's difficult not to associate our vaccine success, for example, with our departure from the EU, who are stuck in a bureaucratic quagmire.
One swallow and all that. Yes GB's vaccination programme seems to have been a success, and as I posted yesterday I am no fan of Frau Dr van den Leyen, who doesn't, in spite (?because of) her good academic qualifications to be the nimblest thinker. There could be any number of reasons for Europes comparative failure, but being in the middle of a change of government probably didn't help.
So far, though, I have heard of no exporting or employment successes, only failures, or difficulties.
I would summarise it as they worked on improving the efficiency of the process, rather than realising they needed a new process with a different purpose.
Not helped by the nature of the EU being procedural - as even emdebbed Euronauts will say. That is also why they say that Boris' / Gove's current attempted swashbuckling style of politics will not shift much.
The EU is great at managing a trading bloc but is terrible at being a quasi-federal government. Which is why a sensible Brexit would have involved the Single Market in one way or another. The EU describes itself as sui generis but with a flag, anthem and ambassadors accredited as if it were sovereign (and Lisbon made some aspects of its sovereignty explicit) it’s hard to criticise those that point out that if it walks like a duck etc. I identify as European but would rather be in a Europe which was explicit one thing or another. You can’t be half a country.
It has other virtues than being a trading block and more important ones in my opinion. The French EU Minister was on Hard Talk yesterday and was asked as an openly gay Minister what were the EU going to do about Poland and Hungary where certain areas still had discriminatory laws? 'We are prosecuting them at the moment and if they fail to comply with these basic rules of membership they will be fined or ultimately they can have their membership withdrawn'
For me that's what this organisation is about. Taking 27 disparate nations and as a condition of membership there are certain civilised norms that have to be complied with. We couldn't for example allow Saudi Arabia to join unless they had a serious change of policy and those who worry about the instincts of Priti Patel could have slept more easily at night.
I think that's right. Many on the left, who supported the policies, were not fans of Corbyn personally; they were sceptical about his leadership abilities and his ability to be an effective PM. The Corbyn cult was noisy but not as large as it seemed, even with the party.
Incidentally, once Starmer starts developing a policy offer I don't think he will tack to the right as much as you fear. The patriotic stuff is symbolic, rather than indicative of policy.
I (obviously) liked Corbyn personally but it was the policies for me, I think the vast majority of Corbyn supporters would have easily transferred over to someone actually offering 'Corbynism without Corbyn' as it was termed, I think everyone knew the game that was being played with people stating that without meaning it at all.
Plenty of pro Corbyn people I follow on twitter and my own personal reaction to Starmer was okay not my choice but be reasonable give him a chance and his leadership campaign was sorta left wing as well, some people (quite a decent number) I follow pro Corbyn voted for him as leader over RLB. Novara media were I'd almost say cautiously optimistic, the actual immediate anti Starmer reaction was very small.
The problem is (we can argue it is perception or whatever) Starmers leadership has consisted of punching left and breaking pledges he made in the leadership campaign to the left. The anti Starmer mood from even people who voted for Starmer on my twitter is evident. If you are left wing at this point why would you trust Starmer?
Almost regardless of what happens from this point on I can't see myself voting Labour next election..
Fantastic news. For the Tories.
I know you think I am or the people I support are evil etc. but to help you understand me if Anna Soubry had taken over the Conservatives and spent her times attacking right wing voters for being all kinds of terrible and overruling democracy within the party kicking out MPs for being right wing and you thought Labour weren't much different...
Would you vote for her Tories or prefer Labour to beat them?
On the basis that I’d prefer a Conservative government to a Labour government, of course I’d vote Tory.
It’s always better to be inside the tent pissing out, and Soubry would agree with more of my views than any Labour leader, even though we might disagree on matters European.
There comes a point when the elastic eventually snaps. Take Douglas Carswell, or Rory Stewart. Unless you are going to LUV the party 4 EVAH, which is the path many Conservative loyalists have swallowed, it's sometimes right to just go.
But if Starmer- let's face it, he's pretty left wing- is a sellout then something's gone wrong with your calibration.
I'm sure Starmer will say more left wing stuff in the future, I am sure he has said some in the past. Quite frankly though considering his leadership campaign and the contrast with his actual leadership there is absolutely no reason to believe any left wing promises from him.
Starmers entire approach has been to punch left, what the hell would be the point in working your ass off to get rid of the left and piss them all off in the process to present a left wing manifesto which you intend to follow through with?
Just work with them to start with, it isn't complicated. The reason to take this route is because you don't want to go in a left wing direction.
Just maybe because you don't think it will be acceptable to the people who really matter? Not Labour activists, but the electorate.
Well they got a better vote for those left wing things from the electorate than previous non left wing things, if you don't want the electorates votes they by all means don't offer them, I just think the right wing anti left wing vote is probably mostly already sown up by the actual Tories.
It's not all bad news. Chuka's infiltrated JP Morgan and will be continuing the fight from there. One good man on the inside of the machine is worth a thousand impotents yelling from the sidelines.
Nice to see you back anyway. Some strong points made too. Especially on the 17 election. That was close. Painting it as a rejection of the left is utter nonsense. Then in 19, awful but unwinnable. "Boris" and "Get Brexit Done" was a killer proposition for the country in the mood it was in. Just a matter of how big the Con win was going to be.
So let's not throw out the radical baby with the Corbyn bathwater. It's a balance for me. I want a Labour government to really change things. Otherwise what's the point? But I also do want a Labour government now and again. Otherwise what's the point?
I voted for Nandy but I'm ok with Starmer. Too early to be getting disillusioned. And eye ALWAYS vote Labour. I'm Labour soup to nuts, Foot to Blair.
Stay with us, Comrade, stay with us.
The significance of 2017 is overdone. I know that the arguments are well-rehearsed, but they're perhaps worth repeating at this juncture: voters were mainly looking at the Tory car crash (a suicide note manifesto and an exceptionally poor campaigning performance by May,) Corbyn was still a relatively new leader whose platform did not receive as much scrutiny as it deserved, and besides most people thought he had no hope of winning and that a Labour protest vote was safe, especially if motivated to do so by the European issue.
And yet, despite everything, the Conservatives still finished 55 seats ahead of Labour. By 2019, those effects had mostly dissipated, and we all know what happened then.
There is no hope, at this point and probably for many years hence, for Labour in running on anything that might be described as a radical left manifesto. It's exciting to a lot of voters, but a turn-off to the new Tory electoral coalition - older and more affluent voters combined with moderate social conservatives - which is too large for Labour to get around. Appeals to a return to some kind of Corbynism but with a better salesperson are effectively calls to avoid the necessary compromises with the Tory voting electorate that are needed, and to somehow win by squeezing the minor progressive parties and attracting loads of non-voters to get around the problem. That didn't work in 2017 and it's very hard indeed to see it working against a Government with a better managed campaign and a less problematic manifesto at the next election, either. The Tories aren't going to do a repeat run of wooden top May and the dementia tax. They're not that stupid.
What Labour is probably going to need next time around is to try to cultivate an air of managerial competence (free of loony Left personalities and outbursts) and to promise a careful recalibration leftwards on socio-economic policy rather than a revolution (with a particular emphasis on well-costed and realistic sounding policies that don't involve another half-a-trillion pounds' worth of borrowing.) Given both how very far behind they are and the Scottish problem it may well not be enough, but the alternative - retreat into the comfort zone and then celebrating X-million votes for socialism after being crushed again - is worse.
A big factor in the 2017 election was Philip Hammond, off in a sulk because it looked like he would be moved from number 11. His invisibility during the campaign meant the Labour Manifesto got far, far less scrutiny than it should have had.
It was just a flavour of how much of an arse he would be until the 2019 election.
Hammond was a truly atrocious Chancellor.
His self pitying whinging article in the papers the other day showed what an inappropriate, unprincipled and awful person he was for the role.
I (obviously) liked Corbyn personally but it was the policies for me, I think the vast majority of Corbyn supporters would have easily transferred over to someone actually offering 'Corbynism without Corbyn' as it was termed, I think everyone knew the game that was being played with people stating that without meaning it at all.
Almost regardless of what happens from this point on I can't see myself voting Labour next election..
I agree with you, at least in part.
Corbyn very definitely excited a whole bunch of people to vote for him. I remember many friends (including some unexpected ones) being very, very exhilarated by the Labour 2017 manifesto.
The buzz & excitement that Corbyn generated could & should have been followed up by the Labour party to build him up as a winner in 2019. Instead, his enemies destroyed him and it was obvious he was going down to a big defeat. Some people in Labour preferred that, because they could then recapture the party.
A reasonable analogy is George McGovern. It is absolutely clear in 'Fear & Loathing' that many Democrats preferred to see McGovern completely destroyed in 1972, so they could regain control of the Democratic Party, So, they were happy to collude in the smearing of McGovern as the 'Amnesty, Abortion, Acid' candidate. It remains the biggest ever US Presidential loss.
I can't see anyone being very excited by SKS -- except elderly Liberal Democrats with no hair. This constituency is well represented on pb.com, though
I shall never forget or forgive what they did.
Interesting bit about George McGovern there, I wonder if that whole amnesty and abortion angle they played on their own side came back to bite them at some point... nah probably not.
So you attribute no blame at all to Corybn and his policies and positions?
You realise there is a difference between agreeing with others that Corbyn and left wingers are the source of all evil in the world and that Corbyn is the perfect person.
Labour policies and positions along with Corbyn are a large part of why it did so much better in 2017 than previous leaders Brexit a large part of of the loss of votes from 2017 to 2019 (which combined with the previous big increases in Tory vote led to a disaster)
What evidence do you have for that? All the evidence I have seen suggests the opposite - that in 2017 Remainers voted a Labour to protest at Tory rhetoric in spite of Corbyn’s ‘fully costed’ policies (such as £300 million for 10,000 extra police) and then in 2019 they voted Tory because of his woeful leadership and unrealistic policies.
New model shows late March before we see decent cuts in covid hospitalisations:
"Our model suggests substantial reductions in hospital and ICU admissions will not occur until late March and into April 2021."
"An inflection point, when 50% of the adult population has been vaccinated – with deaths reduced by 95% and hospital admissions by 80% – may be a useful point for re‐evaluating vaccine prioritisation. "
New model shows late March before we see decent cuts in covid hospitalisations:
"Our model suggests substantial reductions in hospital and ICU admissions will not occur until late March and into April 2021."
"An inflection point, when 50% of the adult population has been vaccinated – with deaths reduced by 95% and hospital admissions by 80% – may be a useful point for re‐evaluating vaccine prioritisation. "
It's not all bad news. Chuka's infiltrated JP Morgan and will be continuing the fight from there. One good man on the inside of the machine is worth a thousand impotents yelling from the sidelines.
Nice to see you back anyway. Some strong points made too. Especially on the 17 election. That was close. Painting it as a rejection of the left is utter nonsense. Then in 19, awful but unwinnable. "Boris" and "Get Brexit Done" was a killer proposition for the country in the mood it was in. Just a matter of how big the Con win was going to be.
So let's not throw out the radical baby with the Corbyn bathwater. It's a balance for me. I want a Labour government to really change things. Otherwise what's the point? But I also do want a Labour government now and again. Otherwise what's the point?
I voted for Nandy but I'm ok with Starmer. Too early to be getting disillusioned. And eye ALWAYS vote Labour. I'm Labour soup to nuts, Foot to Blair.
Stay with us, Comrade, stay with us.
Comrade Kinabalu, it is a pleasure, I hope you have a supply of good vodka to keep you warm in these cold times.
Fooling the capitalists with a fake argument between Chuka and Corbyn was certainly a good plan, I have on good authority that man is so left wing he even bleeds red.
You are reasonable and agreeable as always but I fear the teachings of the church no longer reach me, I have embraced the godlessness of atheism.. (there is this one green god I've been interested in but she doesn't do services in my area) I am sure there is a chance we shall end up in the same congregation sooner or later but not for now.
I (obviously) liked Corbyn personally but it was the policies for me, I think the vast majority of Corbyn supporters would have easily transferred over to someone actually offering 'Corbynism without Corbyn' as it was termed, I think everyone knew the game that was being played with people stating that without meaning it at all.
Almost regardless of what happens from this point on I can't see myself voting Labour next election..
I agree with you, at least in part.
Corbyn very definitely excited a whole bunch of people to vote for him. I remember many friends (including some unexpected ones) being very, very exhilarated by the Labour 2017 manifesto.
The buzz & excitement that Corbyn generated could & should have been followed up by the Labour party to build him up as a winner in 2019. Instead, his enemies destroyed him and it was obvious he was going down to a big defeat. Some people in Labour preferred that, because they could then recapture the party.
A reasonable analogy is George McGovern. It is absolutely clear in 'Fear & Loathing' that many Democrats preferred to see McGovern completely destroyed in 1972, so they could regain control of the Democratic Party, So, they were happy to collude in the smearing of McGovern as the 'Amnesty, Abortion, Acid' candidate. It remains the biggest ever US Presidential loss.
I can't see anyone being very excited by SKS -- except elderly Liberal Democrats with no hair. This constituency is well represented on pb.com, though
I shall never forget or forgive what they did.
Interesting bit about George McGovern there, I wonder if that whole amnesty and abortion angle they played on their own side came back to bite them at some point... nah probably not.
So you attribute no blame at all to Corybn and his policies and positions?
You realise there is a difference between agreeing with others that Corbyn and left wingers are the source of all evil in the world and that Corbyn is the perfect person.
Labour policies and positions along with Corbyn are a large part of why it did so much better in 2017 than previous leaders Brexit a large part of of the loss of votes from 2017 to 2019 (which combined with the previous big increases in Tory vote led to a disaster)
Looking at the reasons for the Tories big vote increase with Johnson mostly maintained rather increased Brexit is a massive factor.
One thing you could pin on Corbyn directly related to that, I don't think the Labour right would have worked as hard with others to force Labour to move to a peoples vote position if Labour had a right wing leader. They would have been more interested in electability, you can see that in how easily many of them dropped it (although some people did do it out of principle)
The argument for Corbyn being bad relies on a centrist Labour leader not only inspiring the same vote Corbyn did in 2017 to combat the Tories but actually an even better vote than that....
Look at Starmer, the any other leader would be 20 points ahead line was a joke from the very beginning. I don't see that a centrist leader would have got anywhere near achieving Labour biggest swing since 1945 in 2017 let alone bettering it and getting into government. 2019 was (in vote share) better than Brown and Miliband, and similar to current Labour polling. It was as poor as the standard centrist Labour leader, a reversion to the mean.
I can pick lots of individual faults with anyone given enough time and evidence but Corbyn was a better overall package than a couple before him and at least one after him.
You're now doing something you accused others of doing - blaming defeat on others but claiming all 'successes' for your Messiah.
Starmer is polling better against the same opponent, Johnson, than whopped your absolute boi just over a year ago.
Topping 2017 isn't going to work. Because Mrs May isn't PM anymore....
Sorry which point did you disagree with?
Happy to back up the facts on the Tory vote raising and Brexit being a big factory in that. I can blame Corbyn for not doing well enough but compared to the centrists he did far better in 2017 and probably about the same in 2019 so no it isn't his fault Labour lost, it is thanks to him they got that close in the first place. If he was even better they could have done even better.
This will be Starmer's first election, how will he do compared to Corbyn's first election? 40%? Almost a hung parliament?
Not a chance, back to the mean for Labour under a centrist leader. Which is a much worse performance than the absolute boy!
Still that is why you Tories are so desperate to back Starmer as your opposition leader.
New model shows late March before we see decent cuts in covid hospitalisations:
"Our model suggests substantial reductions in hospital and ICU admissions will not occur until late March and into April 2021."
"An inflection point, when 50% of the adult population has been vaccinated – with deaths reduced by 95% and hospital admissions by 80% – may be a useful point for re‐evaluating vaccine prioritisation. "
Thank you for repeating the same assertions. Do you have evidence, please? Because, again, the evidence I saw said something very different. I’m willing to be corrected if you can prove your statements. (Incidentally, again, the polling I saw suggested that individual policies were popular but nobody thought they were properly costed.)
I don't think there's any doubt that the policies were popular as shown here - I don't remember a specific question on being properly costed, but the public are always sceptical (and they're usually right) about parties claiming that, and will often vote for a party on the basis that if they turn out to be able to afford half of it that's not bad. Corbyn was competitive with May as the BBC link shows, though many will think that a low bar - my recollection is that he attracted both more enthusiasm and more hostility than May but it evened out in 2017. What people think/thought of Corbyn is a bit irrelevant now, of course - we're discussing the policies.
There was also a survey (which I can't find) suggesting that Labour's vote increased more among people who thought Labour might win than people who didn't, which is a pretty normal pattern but contradicts the theory that people voted Labour because they were sure they'd lose. People don't in general think like that, in my experience.
The "fully costed" was a short memo, iirc, which was heavily debunked within 24-48 hours.
The Home Secretary Priti Patel been critical of people like premier league footballers taking the knee against racism.Seems to me over the top.Surely peaceful protest in a democracy is a good thing.
And freedom of opinion is too.
I think taking the knee is absolute rot. People are entitled to do it. I'm entitled to criticise it.
You are. However as a young boy I remember the black USA athletes as they took their medals, at the 1968 Olympics putting their arm in the air with a black glove.Made a big impression on me and helped me understand the racism they were enduring.
2. The far left members and MPs of the party who seem to spend their every waking hour plotting to undermine Starmer will rejoice in that outcome.
What goes around comes around.
Yep. For many on the right of the Labour Party and at Party HQ the notion of winning under Corbyn was a Plan Z. They preferred a Tory government.
It was also striking that although many in this group adopted "Remain" as their governing political identity once their career prospects in Labour took a dive, when the chance arose to try to bring down May and put in Corbyn as PM with a mandate to reverse Brexit and little else, most had no interest.
Remainers? Give me a break. Pure careerists.
I generally assume that regardless of party all politicians go into politics because they want what they perceive is best for people.
Given how horrendous a Corbyn government would be and how destructive to people's livelihoods it would be if those you call the Labour right would prefer a Tory government than a Corbyn one then they're patriots putting country and their electorate before the party. Good for them.
My point exactly. Although supposedly on the Left and Remainers they served the interests of the Right and of Hard Brexit. So of course you would approve.
Because even the right and Brexit is better in their eyes than Corbyn. That should maybe stop and make you think. That despite them opposing the right and Brexit they viewed Corbyn as worse.
They sacrificed their careers to stop a catastrophe. They are the opposite of careerists. Starmer sacrificed his principles to further his career serving in Corbyn's Shadow Cabinet.
There was no sacrifice. Noses were out of joint and personal prospects dimmed because the party had changed direction. Ultra Remain was adopted as a way to stay in the game. It was then ditched when it became a possibility. Not talking about all of them, I stress. But many. We all know the names. The wankers to bankers tendency.
I (obviously) liked Corbyn personally but it was the policies for me, I think the vast majority of Corbyn supporters would have easily transferred over to someone actually offering 'Corbynism without Corbyn' as it was termed, I think everyone knew the game that was being played with people stating that without meaning it at all.
Almost regardless of what happens from this point on I can't see myself voting Labour next election..
I agree with you, at least in part.
Corbyn very definitely excited a whole bunch of people to vote for him. I remember many friends (including some unexpected ones) being very, very exhilarated by the Labour 2017 manifesto.
The buzz & excitement that Corbyn generated could & should have been followed up by the Labour party to build him up as a winner in 2019. Instead, his enemies destroyed him and it was obvious he was going down to a big defeat. Some people in Labour preferred that, because they could then recapture the party.
A reasonable analogy is George McGovern. It is absolutely clear in 'Fear & Loathing' that many Democrats preferred to see McGovern completely destroyed in 1972, so they could regain control of the Democratic Party, So, they were happy to collude in the smearing of McGovern as the 'Amnesty, Abortion, Acid' candidate. It remains the biggest ever US Presidential loss.
I can't see anyone being very excited by SKS -- except elderly Liberal Democrats with no hair. This constituency is well represented on pb.com, though
I shall never forget or forgive what they did.
Interesting bit about George McGovern there, I wonder if that whole amnesty and abortion angle they played on their own side came back to bite them at some point... nah probably not.
Why don't you and your happy band of Corbynistas just set up your own party? You could call it Momentum, the Corbyn Party or you could simply join the SWP. Let us see how that flies. I can't wait to watch the red wall Tory vote tumble.
Or here is an idea a party for Labour, rather than the rich, you could call it the Labour party, people who want a party for the rich could join the Conservative party...
New model shows late March before we see decent cuts in covid hospitalisations:
"Our model suggests substantial reductions in hospital and ICU admissions will not occur until late March and into April 2021."
"An inflection point, when 50% of the adult population has been vaccinated – with deaths reduced by 95% and hospital admissions by 80% – may be a useful point for re‐evaluating vaccine prioritisation. "
"We made the following assumptions in our model... Vaccination will be complete in all groups with 100% take‐up. "
Curious assumption.
“We have undertaken sensitivity modelling to demonstrate how the model varies if take‐up rates are 90% (95% for those over 80), and also if vaccine effectiveness is 90% (Table 4).“
The Alice Roberts Stonehenge documentary last night on BBC2 is well worth a watch
Indeed. Watching In was reminded of the book on the genetics of the British and how they showed the patterns of migration, the title of which I cannot remember, but which opined that the evidence demonstrated that post Ice-Age Britain was repopulated from two main and one minor directions; up the west coast of what is now France, from Iberia and into the Western part of the British Isles and from the East, across the Channel and North Sea. The Westerners uniting with the Easterners might well have accounted for the movement of the Henge.
That was Oppenheimer's book. I enjoyed that too, and found it convincing - especially the earlier chapters before it descended deeply into the minutiae of the DNA.
But Tyndall told me it has mostly since been discredited.
New evidence sadly. It is now apparent that the original post glacial inhabitants of the British isles were almost entirely wiped out at the end of the Neolithic. It appears there is a 90% plus annihilation of the pre-existing population of the British isles within perhaps as little as one generation and their replacement by a new peoples originating (we think) in Spain. I was educated in the 80s in exactly the sort of migration hypothesis you talk about but it is now well out of date.
It is not clear what actually led to the almost complete removal of the native population - disease is the most obvious cause with the new arrivals inadvertently bringing something with them that they themselves were immune to. But no one knows for sure.
This is how the Independent reported the new hypothesis back in 2018
Interesting. I might read his book again to see where, other than looking for evidence for a preferred conclusion, his analysis might be flawed
I don't think it is necessarily fair to say his analysis was flawed. It was based on the evidence available in the early 2000s. Obviously if he was still persisting in claiming everything he said was true one might question whether he is rather stuck in the mud. But the new evidence only emerged in 2018 so I don't think he can be accused of preferring a particular conclusion at the time of writing
It's not all bad news. Chuka's infiltrated JP Morgan and will be continuing the fight from there. One good man on the inside of the machine is worth a thousand impotents yelling from the sidelines.
Nice to see you back anyway. Some strong points made too. Especially on the 17 election. That was close. Painting it as a rejection of the left is utter nonsense. Then in 19, awful but unwinnable. "Boris" and "Get Brexit Done" was a killer proposition for the country in the mood it was in. Just a matter of how big the Con win was going to be.
So let's not throw out the radical baby with the Corbyn bathwater. It's a balance for me. I want a Labour government to really change things. Otherwise what's the point? But I also do want a Labour government now and again. Otherwise what's the point?
I voted for Nandy but I'm ok with Starmer. Too early to be getting disillusioned. And eye ALWAYS vote Labour. I'm Labour soup to nuts, Foot to Blair.
Stay with us, Comrade, stay with us.
Comrade Kinabalu, it is a pleasure, I hope you have a supply of good vodka to keep you warm in these cold times.
Fooling the capitalists with a fake argument between Chuka and Corbyn was certainly a good plan, I have on good authority that man is so left wing he even bleeds red.
You are reasonable and agreeable as always but I fear the teachings of the church no longer reach me, I have embraced the godlessness of atheism.. (there is this one green god I've been interested in but she doesn't do services in my area) I am sure there is a chance we shall end up in the same congregation sooner or later but not for now.
Am I missing Socialist Saturday?
Morning Comrades
It's a takeover! Da da da der - Da da da der ... ✊
I (obviously) liked Corbyn personally but it was the policies for me, I think the vast majority of Corbyn supporters would have easily transferred over to someone actually offering 'Corbynism without Corbyn' as it was termed, I think everyone knew the game that was being played with people stating that without meaning it at all.
Almost regardless of what happens from this point on I can't see myself voting Labour next election..
I agree with you, at least in part.
Corbyn very definitely excited a whole bunch of people to vote for him. I remember many friends (including some unexpected ones) being very, very exhilarated by the Labour 2017 manifesto.
The buzz & excitement that Corbyn generated could & should have been followed up by the Labour party to build him up as a winner in 2019. Instead, his enemies destroyed him and it was obvious he was going down to a big defeat. Some people in Labour preferred that, because they could then recapture the party.
A reasonable analogy is George McGovern. It is absolutely clear in 'Fear & Loathing' that many Democrats preferred to see McGovern completely destroyed in 1972, so they could regain control of the Democratic Party, So, they were happy to collude in the smearing of McGovern as the 'Amnesty, Abortion, Acid' candidate. It remains the biggest ever US Presidential loss.
I can't see anyone being very excited by SKS -- except elderly Liberal Democrats with no hair. This constituency is well represented on pb.com, though
I shall never forget or forgive what they did.
Interesting bit about George McGovern there, I wonder if that whole amnesty and abortion angle they played on their own side came back to bite them at some point... nah probably not.
So you attribute no blame at all to Corybn and his policies and positions?
You realise there is a difference between agreeing with others that Corbyn and left wingers are the source of all evil in the world and that Corbyn is the perfect person.
Labour policies and positions along with Corbyn are a large part of why it did so much better in 2017 than previous leaders Brexit a large part of of the loss of votes from 2017 to 2019 (which combined with the previous big increases in Tory vote led to a disaster)
Looking at the reasons for the Tories big vote increase with Johnson mostly maintained rather increased Brexit is a massive factor.
One thing you could pin on Corbyn directly related to that, I don't think the Labour right would have worked as hard with others to force Labour to move to a peoples vote position if Labour had a right wing leader. They would have been more interested in electability, you can see that in how easily many of them dropped it (although some people did do it out of principle)
The argument for Corbyn being bad relies on a centrist Labour leader not only inspiring the same vote Corbyn did in 2017 to combat the Tories but actually an even better vote than that....
Look at Starmer, the any other leader would be 20 points ahead line was a joke from the very beginning. I don't see that a centrist leader would have got anywhere near achieving Labour biggest swing since 1945 in 2017 let alone bettering it and getting into government. 2019 was (in vote share) better than Brown and Miliband, and similar to current Labour polling. It was as poor as the standard centrist Labour leader, a reversion to the mean.
I can pick lots of individual faults with anyone given enough time and evidence but Corbyn was a better overall package than a couple before him and at least one after him.
You're now doing something you accused others of doing - blaming defeat on others but claiming all 'successes' for your Messiah.
Starmer is polling better against the same opponent, Johnson, than whopped your absolute boi just over a year ago.
Topping 2017 isn't going to work. Because Mrs May isn't PM anymore....
Sorry which point did you disagree with?
Happy to back up the facts on the Tory vote raising and Brexit being a big factory in that. I can blame Corbyn for not doing well enough but compared to the centrists he did far better in 2017 and probably about the same in 2019 so no it isn't his fault Labour lost, it is thanks to him they got that close in the first place. If he was even better they could have done even better.
This will be Starmer's first election, how will he do compared to Corbyn's first election? 40%? Almost a hung parliament?
Not a chance, back to the mean for Labour under a centrist leader. Which is a much worse performance than the absolute boy!
Still that is why you Tories are so desperate to back Starmer as your opposition leader.
The most centrist Labour leader in the last 2 decades was Blair who got a higher voteshare in 1997 and 2001 than Corbyn did even in 2017. Even in 2005 Blair got a higher voteshare than Corbyn got in 2019 and more seats than Corbyn won in either 2017 or 2019.
Starmer also has higher favourables than Labour does overall
I (obviously) liked Corbyn personally but it was the policies for me, I think the vast majority of Corbyn supporters would have easily transferred over to someone actually offering 'Corbynism without Corbyn' as it was termed, I think everyone knew the game that was being played with people stating that without meaning it at all.
Almost regardless of what happens from this point on I can't see myself voting Labour next election..
I agree with you, at least in part.
Corbyn very definitely excited a whole bunch of people to vote for him. I remember many friends (including some unexpected ones) being very, very exhilarated by the Labour 2017 manifesto.
The buzz & excitement that Corbyn generated could & should have been followed up by the Labour party to build him up as a winner in 2019. Instead, his enemies destroyed him and it was obvious he was going down to a big defeat. Some people in Labour preferred that, because they could then recapture the party.
A reasonable analogy is George McGovern. It is absolutely clear in 'Fear & Loathing' that many Democrats preferred to see McGovern completely destroyed in 1972, so they could regain control of the Democratic Party, So, they were happy to collude in the smearing of McGovern as the 'Amnesty, Abortion, Acid' candidate. It remains the biggest ever US Presidential loss.
I can't see anyone being very excited by SKS -- except elderly Liberal Democrats with no hair. This constituency is well represented on pb.com, though
I shall never forget or forgive what they did.
Interesting bit about George McGovern there, I wonder if that whole amnesty and abortion angle they played on their own side came back to bite them at some point... nah probably not.
Why don't you and your happy band of Corbynistas just set up your own party? You could call it Momentum, the Corbyn Party or you could simply join the SWP. Let us see how that flies. I can't wait to watch the red wall Tory vote tumble.
Or here is an idea a party for Labour, rather than the rich, you could call it the Labour party, people who want a party for the rich could join the Conservative party...
Win, win.
Question: do those who aspire to be rich - or at least, comfortable enough to look after their family - get anything out of either this new party of the Left or the existing Labour Party? Or should they join the Conservative Party?
It's not all bad news. Chuka's infiltrated JP Morgan and will be continuing the fight from there. One good man on the inside of the machine is worth a thousand impotents yelling from the sidelines.
Nice to see you back anyway. Some strong points made too. Especially on the 17 election. That was close. Painting it as a rejection of the left is utter nonsense. Then in 19, awful but unwinnable. "Boris" and "Get Brexit Done" was a killer proposition for the country in the mood it was in. Just a matter of how big the Con win was going to be.
So let's not throw out the radical baby with the Corbyn bathwater. It's a balance for me. I want a Labour government to really change things. Otherwise what's the point? But I also do want a Labour government now and again. Otherwise what's the point?
I voted for Nandy but I'm ok with Starmer. Too early to be getting disillusioned. And eye ALWAYS vote Labour. I'm Labour soup to nuts, Foot to Blair.
Stay with us, Comrade, stay with us.
The significance of 2017 is overdone. I know that the arguments are well-rehearsed, but they're perhaps worth repeating at this juncture: voters were mainly looking at the Tory car crash (a suicide note manifesto and an exceptionally poor campaigning performance by May,) Corbyn was still a relatively new leader whose platform did not receive as much scrutiny as it deserved, and besides most people thought he had no hope of winning and that a Labour protest vote was safe, especially if motivated to do so by the European issue.
And yet, despite everything, the Conservatives still finished 55 seats ahead of Labour. By 2019, those effects had mostly dissipated, and we all know what happened then.
There is no hope, at this point and probably for many years hence, for Labour in running on anything that might be described as a radical left manifesto. It's exciting to a lot of voters, but a turn-off to the new Tory electoral coalition - older and more affluent voters combined with moderate social conservatives - which is too large for Labour to get around. Appeals to a return to some kind of Corbynism but with a better salesperson are effectively calls to avoid the necessary compromises with the Tory voting electorate that are needed, and to somehow win by squeezing the minor progressive parties and attracting loads of non-voters to get around the problem. That didn't work in 2017 and it's very hard indeed to see it working against a Government with a better managed campaign and a less problematic manifesto at the next election, either. The Tories aren't going to do a repeat run of wooden top May and the dementia tax. They're not that stupid.
What Labour is probably going to need next time around is to try to cultivate an air of managerial competence (free of loony Left personalities and outbursts) and to promise a careful recalibration leftwards on socio-economic policy rather than a revolution (with a particular emphasis on well-costed and realistic sounding policies that don't involve another half-a-trillion pounds' worth of borrowing.) Given both how very far behind they are and the Scottish problem it may well not be enough, but the alternative - retreat into the comfort zone and then celebrating X-million votes for socialism after being crushed again - is worse.
Very well put. This constant harking back to 2017 and the "what if" narrative is tiring and moreover the electorate don't care. Corbyn is, as he always was, yesterdays man. He. Didn't. Win. In. 2017. Nowhere near a majority even. Not even close. In lottery terms he probably only won a tenner - which gave him enough cash to have another play.
Corbyn supporters are now just being the bloke down the pub boring his mates with stories that he was "so close on the other numbers I could have won the whole lot". Interesting the first time maybe, but Christ after nearly 4 years....
He came pretty close to PM at GE17. This is a stone cold fact. In the early hours after many results were in he went odds on fav for a time.
@Roger No. That’s legally incorrect. Article 7 of the TEU means that certain rights can be suspended from a member state, and then only if the EU Council unanimously find a breach, but there is no legal mechanism to expel a member. None. One of the things that has shaken my still relatively firm Europhilia is the fact that the EU, despite what was said in Hardtalk, is not doing anything remotely as severe against Poland and Hungary as suggested. Infringement proceedings you refer to began in 2017 and 2018 respectively and nothing, nothing, has happened. There was can kicking when it came to last year’s budget, no pressure applied via that route, and the Art 2 infringement proceedings are now nearly 4 years old with no sign of resolution.
Ydoethur, in what way has Brexit been a failure? It's difficult not to associate our vaccine success, for example, with our departure from the EU, who are stuck in a bureaucratic quagmire.
One swallow and all that. Yes GB's vaccination programme seems to have been a success, and as I posted yesterday I am no fan of Frau Dr van den Leyen, who doesn't, in spite (?because of) her good academic qualifications to be the nimblest thinker. There could be any number of reasons for Europes comparative failure, but being in the middle of a change of government probably didn't help.
So far, though, I have heard of no exporting or employment successes, only failures, or difficulties.
I would summarise it as they worked on improving the efficiency of the process, rather than realising they needed a new process with a different purpose.
Not helped by the nature of the EU being procedural - as even emdebbed Euronauts will say. That is also why they say that Boris' / Gove's current attempted swashbuckling style of politics will not shift much.
The EU is great at managing a trading bloc but is terrible at being a quasi-federal government. Which is why a sensible Brexit would have involved the Single Market in one way or another. The EU describes itself as sui generis but with a flag, anthem and ambassadors accredited as if it were sovereign (and Lisbon made some aspects of its sovereignty explicit) it’s hard to criticise those that point out that if it walks like a duck etc. I identify as European but would rather be in a Europe which was explicit one thing or another. You can’t be half a country.
It has other virtues than being a trading block and more important ones in my opinion. The French EU Minister was on Hard Talk yesterday and was asked as an openly gay Minister what were the EU going to do about Poland and Hungary where certain areas still had discriminatory laws? 'We are prosecuting them at the moment and if they fail to comply with these basic rules of membership they will be fined or ultimately they can have their membership withdrawn'
For me that's what this organisation is about. Taking 27 disparate nations and as a condition of membership there are certain civilised norms that have to be complied with. We couldn't for example allow Saudi Arabia to join unless they had a serious change of policy and those who worry about the instincts of Priti Patel could have slept more easily at night.
Strange then that they are so complicit with China and Russia. When do you expect Poland and Hungary to be kicked out? Makes you wonder why they let Poland and Hungary in in the first place. What action do you expect them to take against the French minister who criticised Le Pen for being too soft on Muslims?
New model shows late March before we see decent cuts in covid hospitalisations:
"Our model suggests substantial reductions in hospital and ICU admissions will not occur until late March and into April 2021."
"An inflection point, when 50% of the adult population has been vaccinated – with deaths reduced by 95% and hospital admissions by 80% – may be a useful point for re‐evaluating vaccine prioritisation. "
Ydoethur, in what way has Brexit been a failure? It's difficult not to associate our vaccine success, for example, with our departure from the EU, who are stuck in a bureaucratic quagmire.
One swallow and all that. Yes GB's vaccination programme seems to have been a success, and as I posted yesterday I am no fan of Frau Dr van den Leyen, who doesn't, in spite (?because of) her good academic qualifications to be the nimblest thinker. There could be any number of reasons for Europes comparative failure, but being in the middle of a change of government probably didn't help.
So far, though, I have heard of no exporting or employment successes, only failures, or difficulties.
I would summarise it as they worked on improving the efficiency of the process, rather than realising they needed a new process with a different purpose.
Not helped by the nature of the EU being procedural - as even emdebbed Euronauts will say. That is also why they say that Boris' / Gove's current attempted swashbuckling style of politics will not shift much.
The EU is great at managing a trading bloc but is terrible at being a quasi-federal government. Which is why a sensible Brexit would have involved the Single Market in one way or another. The EU describes itself as sui generis but with a flag, anthem and ambassadors accredited as if it were sovereign (and Lisbon made some aspects of its sovereignty explicit) it’s hard to criticise those that point out that if it walks like a duck etc. I identify as European but would rather be in a Europe which was explicit one thing or another. You can’t be half a country.
It has other virtues than being a trading block and more important ones in my opinion. The French EU Minister was on Hard Talk yesterday and was asked as an openly gay Minister what were the EU going to do about Poland and Hungary where certain areas still had discriminatory laws? 'We are prosecuting them at the moment and if they fail to comply with these basic rules of membership they will be fined or ultimately they can have their membership withdrawn'
For me that's what this organisation is about. Taking 27 disparate nations and as a condition of membership there are certain civilised norms that have to be complied with. We couldn't for example allow Saudi Arabia to join unless they had a serious change of policy and those who worry about the instincts of Priti Patel could have slept more easily at night.
Strange then that they are so complicit with China and Russia. When do you expect Poland and Hungary to be kicked out? Makes you wonder why they let Poland and Hungary in in the first place. What action do you expect them to take against the French minister who criticised Le Pen for being too soft on Muslims?
Recently they were debating making EU funding into individual countries subject to QMV.
@Roger No. That’s legally incorrect. Article 7 of the TEU means that certain rights can be suspended from a member state, and then only if the EU Council unanimously find a breach, but there is no legal mechanism to expel a member. None. One of the things that has shaken my still relatively firm Europhilia is the fact that the EU, despite what was said in Hardtalk, is not doing anything remotely as severe against Poland and Hungary as suggested. Infringement proceedings you refer to began in 2017 and 2018 respectively and nothing, nothing, has happened. There was can kicking when it came to last year’s budget, no pressure applied via that route, and the Art 2 infringement proceedings are now nearly 4 years old with no sign of resolution.
My understanding is that major sanctions against Hungary and Poland have been ruled out because
- This would really create a 2 speed Europe. - A fear that this would fuel anti-European sentiment in those countries. Memories of the effects of the interventions in Italy and Greece.
I (obviously) liked Corbyn personally but it was the policies for me, I think the vast majority of Corbyn supporters would have easily transferred over to someone actually offering 'Corbynism without Corbyn' as it was termed, I think everyone knew the game that was being played with people stating that without meaning it at all.
Almost regardless of what happens from this point on I can't see myself voting Labour next election..
I agree with you, at least in part.
Corbyn very definitely excited a whole bunch of people to vote for him. I remember many friends (including some unexpected ones) being very, very exhilarated by the Labour 2017 manifesto.
The buzz & excitement that Corbyn generated could & should have been followed up by the Labour party to build him up as a winner in 2019. Instead, his enemies destroyed him and it was obvious he was going down to a big defeat. Some people in Labour preferred that, because they could then recapture the party.
A reasonable analogy is George McGovern. It is absolutely clear in 'Fear & Loathing' that many Democrats preferred to see McGovern completely destroyed in 1972, so they could regain control of the Democratic Party, So, they were happy to collude in the smearing of McGovern as the 'Amnesty, Abortion, Acid' candidate. It remains the biggest ever US Presidential loss.
I can't see anyone being very excited by SKS -- except elderly Liberal Democrats with no hair. This constituency is well represented on pb.com, though
I shall never forget or forgive what they did.
Interesting bit about George McGovern there, I wonder if that whole amnesty and abortion angle they played on their own side came back to bite them at some point... nah probably not.
Why don't you and your happy band of Corbynistas just set up your own party? You could call it Momentum, the Corbyn Party or you could simply join the SWP. Let us see how that flies. I can't wait to watch the red wall Tory vote tumble.
Or here is an idea a party for Labour, rather than the rich, you could call it the Labour party, people who want a party for the rich could join the Conservative party...
Win, win.
The Conservatives are no longer the party of the rich.
In 2019 for example the Tories got 40% amongst voters earning over £70,000 a year compared to 43% overall.
Even Corbyn Labour got 31% amongst voters earning over £70,000 a year so did almost as well with the rich as they did overall where they got 32%.
The party of the rich is now the LDs, the LDs got 20% amongst voters earning over £70,000 a year in 2019 compared to just 11% overall
It's not all bad news. Chuka's infiltrated JP Morgan and will be continuing the fight from there. One good man on the inside of the machine is worth a thousand impotents yelling from the sidelines.
Nice to see you back anyway. Some strong points made too. Especially on the 17 election. That was close. Painting it as a rejection of the left is utter nonsense. Then in 19, awful but unwinnable. "Boris" and "Get Brexit Done" was a killer proposition for the country in the mood it was in. Just a matter of how big the Con win was going to be.
So let's not throw out the radical baby with the Corbyn bathwater. It's a balance for me. I want a Labour government to really change things. Otherwise what's the point? But I also do want a Labour government now and again. Otherwise what's the point?
I voted for Nandy but I'm ok with Starmer. Too early to be getting disillusioned. And eye ALWAYS vote Labour. I'm Labour soup to nuts, Foot to Blair.
Stay with us, Comrade, stay with us.
The significance of 2017 is overdone. I know that the arguments are well-rehearsed, but they're perhaps worth repeating at this juncture: voters were mainly looking at the Tory car crash (a suicide note manifesto and an exceptionally poor campaigning performance by May,) Corbyn was still a relatively new leader whose platform did not receive as much scrutiny as it deserved, and besides most people thought he had no hope of winning and that a Labour protest vote was safe, especially if motivated to do so by the European issue.
And yet, despite everything, the Conservatives still finished 55 seats ahead of Labour. By 2019, those effects had mostly dissipated, and we all know what happened then.
There is no hope, at this point and probably for many years hence, for Labour in running on anything that might be described as a radical left manifesto. It's exciting to a lot of voters, but a turn-off to the new Tory electoral coalition - older and more affluent voters combined with moderate social conservatives - which is too large for Labour to get around. Appeals to a return to some kind of Corbynism but with a better salesperson are effectively calls to avoid the necessary compromises with the Tory voting electorate that are needed, and to somehow win by squeezing the minor progressive parties and attracting loads of non-voters to get around the problem. That didn't work in 2017 and it's very hard indeed to see it working against a Government with a better managed campaign and a less problematic manifesto at the next election, either. The Tories aren't going to do a repeat run of wooden top May and the dementia tax. They're not that stupid.
What Labour is probably going to need next time around is to try to cultivate an air of managerial competence (free of loony Left personalities and outbursts) and to promise a careful recalibration leftwards on socio-economic policy rather than a revolution (with a particular emphasis on well-costed and realistic sounding policies that don't involve another half-a-trillion pounds' worth of borrowing.) Given both how very far behind they are and the Scottish problem it may well not be enough, but the alternative - retreat into the comfort zone and then celebrating X-million votes for socialism after being crushed again - is worse.
Very well put. This constant harking back to 2017 and the "what if" narrative is tiring and moreover the electorate don't care. Corbyn is, as he always was, yesterdays man. He. Didn't. Win. In. 2017. Nowhere near a majority even. Not even close. In lottery terms he probably only won a tenner - which gave him enough cash to have another play.
Corbyn supporters are now just being the bloke down the pub boring his mates with stories that he was "so close on the other numbers I could have won the whole lot". Interesting the first time maybe, but Christ after nearly 4 years....
I would like to congratulate you on finishing off that guy who insists Corbyn be leader of the party.
I mean I can't find any of his posts but all of you are making really good points against him.
The point isn't bring back Corbyn, I suspect that strawman is being built by people unable to address the argument.
The entire point is it is all well and good complaining the left still lost even if they did it closely but take away most of the Scottish seats lost by the Blarites and the entire damn point is the left did better than the right did before it and after it...
So if you want to win you need it to be closer to what the left did than the constantly failed right wing Labour strategy.
Now I realise you are probably a Tory voter so you want Labour to pursue a strategy which has proven less successful for winning over new voters (this millenium) but my argument is if Labour want more votes they should do what got them more votes.
Fully appreciate you want them to adopt a strategy which sees them get less votes.
@Roger No. That’s legally incorrect. Article 7 of the TEU means that certain rights can be suspended from a member state, and then only if the EU Council unanimously find a breach, but there is no legal mechanism to expel a member. None. One of the things that has shaken my still relatively firm Europhilia is the fact that the EU, despite what was said in Hardtalk, is not doing anything remotely as severe against Poland and Hungary as suggested. Infringement proceedings you refer to began in 2017 and 2018 respectively and nothing, nothing, has happened. There was can kicking when it came to last year’s budget, no pressure applied via that route, and the Art 2 infringement proceedings are now nearly 4 years old with no sign of resolution.
My understanding is that major sanctions against Hungary and Poland have been ruled out because
- This would really create a 2 speed Europe. - A fear that this would fuel anti-European sentiment in those countries. Memories of the effects of the interventions in Italy and Greece.
It’s more fundamental than that. It is unlikely that the other 2 Visigrad countries, or some others in Eastern Europe, would vote to institute Art 7 and unanimity is required. So for the reasons you give and that reason it will never happen. The EU had a golden opportunity to apply pressure via other means, through the budget, this last year, and failed to do so. I am a “Diehard Remainer” ((c) HYUFD) but this episode has shaken that faith.
I (obviously) liked Corbyn personally but it was the policies for me, I think the vast majority of Corbyn supporters would have easily transferred over to someone actually offering 'Corbynism without Corbyn' as it was termed, I think everyone knew the game that was being played with people stating that without meaning it at all.
Almost regardless of what happens from this point on I can't see myself voting Labour next election..
I agree with you, at least in part.
Corbyn very definitely excited a whole bunch of people to vote for him. I remember many friends (including some unexpected ones) being very, very exhilarated by the Labour 2017 manifesto.
The buzz & excitement that Corbyn generated could & should have been followed up by the Labour party to build him up as a winner in 2019. Instead, his enemies destroyed him and it was obvious he was going down to a big defeat. Some people in Labour preferred that, because they could then recapture the party.
A reasonable analogy is George McGovern. It is absolutely clear in 'Fear & Loathing' that many Democrats preferred to see McGovern completely destroyed in 1972, so they could regain control of the Democratic Party, So, they were happy to collude in the smearing of McGovern as the 'Amnesty, Abortion, Acid' candidate. It remains the biggest ever US Presidential loss.
I can't see anyone being very excited by SKS -- except elderly Liberal Democrats with no hair. This constituency is well represented on pb.com, though
I shall never forget or forgive what they did.
Interesting bit about George McGovern there, I wonder if that whole amnesty and abortion angle they played on their own side came back to bite them at some point... nah probably not.
So you attribute no blame at all to Corybn and his policies and positions?
You realise there is a difference between agreeing with others that Corbyn and left wingers are the source of all evil in the world and that Corbyn is the perfect person.
Labour policies and positions along with Corbyn are a large part of why it did so much better in 2017 than previous leaders Brexit a large part of of the loss of votes from 2017 to 2019 (which combined with the previous big increases in Tory vote led to a disaster)
Looking at the reasons for the Tories big vote increase with Johnson mostly maintained rather increased Brexit is a massive factor.
One thing you could pin on Corbyn directly related to that, I don't think the Labour right would have worked as hard with others to force Labour to move to a peoples vote position if Labour had a right wing leader. They would have been more interested in electability, you can see that in how easily many of them dropped it (although some people did do it out of principle)
The argument for Corbyn being bad relies on a centrist Labour leader not only inspiring the same vote Corbyn did in 2017 to combat the Tories but actually an even better vote than that....
Look at Starmer, the any other leader would be 20 points ahead line was a joke from the very beginning. I don't see that a centrist leader would have got anywhere near achieving Labour biggest swing since 1945 in 2017 let alone bettering it and getting into government. 2019 was (in vote share) better than Brown and Miliband, and similar to current Labour polling. It was as poor as the standard centrist Labour leader, a reversion to the mean.
I can pick lots of individual faults with anyone given enough time and evidence but Corbyn was a better overall package than a couple before him and at least one after him.
You're now doing something you accused others of doing - blaming defeat on others but claiming all 'successes' for your Messiah.
Starmer is polling better against the same opponent, Johnson, than whopped your absolute boi just over a year ago.
Topping 2017 isn't going to work. Because Mrs May isn't PM anymore....
Sorry which point did you disagree with?
Happy to back up the facts on the Tory vote raising and Brexit being a big factory in that. I can blame Corbyn for not doing well enough but compared to the centrists he did far better in 2017 and probably about the same in 2019 so no it isn't his fault Labour lost, it is thanks to him they got that close in the first place. If he was even better they could have done even better.
This will be Starmer's first election, how will he do compared to Corbyn's first election? 40%? Almost a hung parliament?
Not a chance, back to the mean for Labour under a centrist leader. Which is a much worse performance than the absolute boy!
Still that is why you Tories are so desperate to back Starmer as your opposition leader.
The most centrist Labour leader in the last 2 decades was Blair who got a higher voteshare in 1997 and 2001 than Corbyn did even in 2017. Even in 2005 Blair got a higher voteshare than Corbyn got in 2019 and more seats than Corbyn won in either 2017 or 2019.
Starmer also has higher favourables than Labour does overall
Any examples from the centre that won over new voters this millennium?
Hey if we want to travel back in time to the late nineties then Blairs Labour beats Corbyns Labour happy to concede that Blair was an excellent vote winning politician in his time, he pretty much took over great polling from Smith and everyone agrees the Conservatives were in terrible state.
I think time has moved on since then, trying tactics from the late nineties isn't necessarily going to work as well
It's not all bad news. Chuka's infiltrated JP Morgan and will be continuing the fight from there. One good man on the inside of the machine is worth a thousand impotents yelling from the sidelines.
Nice to see you back anyway. Some strong points made too. Especially on the 17 election. That was close. Painting it as a rejection of the left is utter nonsense. Then in 19, awful but unwinnable. "Boris" and "Get Brexit Done" was a killer proposition for the country in the mood it was in. Just a matter of how big the Con win was going to be.
So let's not throw out the radical baby with the Corbyn bathwater. It's a balance for me. I want a Labour government to really change things. Otherwise what's the point? But I also do want a Labour government now and again. Otherwise what's the point?
I voted for Nandy but I'm ok with Starmer. Too early to be getting disillusioned. And eye ALWAYS vote Labour. I'm Labour soup to nuts, Foot to Blair.
Stay with us, Comrade, stay with us.
The significance of 2017 is overdone. I know that the arguments are well-rehearsed, but they're perhaps worth repeating at this juncture: voters were mainly looking at the Tory car crash (a suicide note manifesto and an exceptionally poor campaigning performance by May,) Corbyn was still a relatively new leader whose platform did not receive as much scrutiny as it deserved, and besides most people thought he had no hope of winning and that a Labour protest vote was safe, especially if motivated to do so by the European issue.
And yet, despite everything, the Conservatives still finished 55 seats ahead of Labour. By 2019, those effects had mostly dissipated, and we all know what happened then.
There is no hope, at this point and probably for many years hence, for Labour in running on anything that might be described as a radical left manifesto. It's exciting to a lot of voters, but a turn-off to the new Tory electoral coalition - older and more affluent voters combined with moderate social conservatives - which is too large for Labour to get around. Appeals to a return to some kind of Corbynism but with a better salesperson are effectively calls to avoid the necessary compromises with the Tory voting electorate that are needed, and to somehow win by squeezing the minor progressive parties and attracting loads of non-voters to get around the problem. That didn't work in 2017 and it's very hard indeed to see it working against a Government with a better managed campaign and a less problematic manifesto at the next election, either. The Tories aren't going to do a repeat run of wooden top May and the dementia tax. They're not that stupid.
What Labour is probably going to need next time around is to try to cultivate an air of managerial competence (free of loony Left personalities and outbursts) and to promise a careful recalibration leftwards on socio-economic policy rather than a revolution (with a particular emphasis on well-costed and realistic sounding policies that don't involve another half-a-trillion pounds' worth of borrowing.) Given both how very far behind they are and the Scottish problem it may well not be enough, but the alternative - retreat into the comfort zone and then celebrating X-million votes for socialism after being crushed again - is worse.
Very well put. This constant harking back to 2017 and the "what if" narrative is tiring and moreover the electorate don't care. Corbyn is, as he always was, yesterdays man. He. Didn't. Win. In. 2017. Nowhere near a majority even. Not even close. In lottery terms he probably only won a tenner - which gave him enough cash to have another play.
Corbyn supporters are now just being the bloke down the pub boring his mates with stories that he was "so close on the other numbers I could have won the whole lot". Interesting the first time maybe, but Christ after nearly 4 years....
He came pretty close to PM at GE17. This is a stone cold fact. In the early hours after many results were in he went odds on fav for a time.
But. He. Didn't.
I came close to winning the Euromillions last night. But I didn't. Shall on go on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on about it?
It's not all bad news. Chuka's infiltrated JP Morgan and will be continuing the fight from there. One good man on the inside of the machine is worth a thousand impotents yelling from the sidelines.
Nice to see you back anyway. Some strong points made too. Especially on the 17 election. That was close. Painting it as a rejection of the left is utter nonsense. Then in 19, awful but unwinnable. "Boris" and "Get Brexit Done" was a killer proposition for the country in the mood it was in. Just a matter of how big the Con win was going to be.
So let's not throw out the radical baby with the Corbyn bathwater. It's a balance for me. I want a Labour government to really change things. Otherwise what's the point? But I also do want a Labour government now and again. Otherwise what's the point?
I voted for Nandy but I'm ok with Starmer. Too early to be getting disillusioned. And eye ALWAYS vote Labour. I'm Labour soup to nuts, Foot to Blair.
Stay with us, Comrade, stay with us.
The significance of 2017 is overdone. I know that the arguments are well-rehearsed, but they're perhaps worth repeating at this juncture: voters were mainly looking at the Tory car crash (a suicide note manifesto and an exceptionally poor campaigning performance by May,) Corbyn was still a relatively new leader whose platform did not receive as much scrutiny as it deserved, and besides most people thought he had no hope of winning and that a Labour protest vote was safe, especially if motivated to do so by the European issue.
And yet, despite everything, the Conservatives still finished 55 seats ahead of Labour. By 2019, those effects had mostly dissipated, and we all know what happened then.
There is no hope, at this point and probably for many years hence, for Labour in running on anything that might be described as a radical left manifesto. It's exciting to a lot of voters, but a turn-off to the new Tory electoral coalition - older and more affluent voters combined with moderate social conservatives - which is too large for Labour to get around. Appeals to a return to some kind of Corbynism but with a better salesperson are effectively calls to avoid the necessary compromises with the Tory voting electorate that are needed, and to somehow win by squeezing the minor progressive parties and attracting loads of non-voters to get around the problem. That didn't work in 2017 and it's very hard indeed to see it working against a Government with a better managed campaign and a less problematic manifesto at the next election, either. The Tories aren't going to do a repeat run of wooden top May and the dementia tax. They're not that stupid.
What Labour is probably going to need next time around is to try to cultivate an air of managerial competence (free of loony Left personalities and outbursts) and to promise a careful recalibration leftwards on socio-economic policy rather than a revolution (with a particular emphasis on well-costed and realistic sounding policies that don't involve another half-a-trillion pounds' worth of borrowing.) Given both how very far behind they are and the Scottish problem it may well not be enough, but the alternative - retreat into the comfort zone and then celebrating X-million votes for socialism after being crushed again - is worse.
I find this no more persuasive or less jaundiced than its mirror image - that it was a triumph which showed conclusively there is massive appetite for a radical left government in the UK. My view is it was a strong performance but was artificially boosted by 2 things. The low expectations and campaign starting point. And Brexit. Brexit cost Labour big time in 19 but in 17 it flattered to deceive.
Nutshell conclusion for me. Do not junk the radicalism for 90s style sheen and triangulation. That is not only a dead end but the journey to it has no scenery. It's both depressing and futile at the same time. But do make sure the leader looks like a PM, do make sure the policies stack up and have a theme, do not make schoolboy errors like Salisbury, do not allow internal debate to dominate.
Fight the Tories. They're a shower. Especially this bunch. Fight fight fight the Tories and GTTO.
@Roger No. That’s legally incorrect. Article 7 of the TEU means that certain rights can be suspended from a member state, and then only if the EU Council unanimously find a breach, but there is no legal mechanism to expel a member. None. One of the things that has shaken my still relatively firm Europhilia is the fact that the EU, despite what was said in Hardtalk, is not doing anything remotely as severe against Poland and Hungary as suggested. Infringement proceedings you refer to began in 2017 and 2018 respectively and nothing, nothing, has happened. There was can kicking when it came to last year’s budget, no pressure applied via that route, and the Art 2 infringement proceedings are now nearly 4 years old with no sign of resolution.
My understanding is that major sanctions against Hungary and Poland have been ruled out because
- This would really create a 2 speed Europe. - A fear that this would fuel anti-European sentiment in those countries. Memories of the effects of the interventions in Italy and Greece.
No, there are far more practical reasons. Action can only be taken unanimously which means they need Hungary to vote for sanctions on Poland and for Poland to vote for sanctions against Hungary. Obviously this is a complete non-starter and not just that, other countries such as Czechia and Slovakia would also need to vote for sanctions and that seems extremely unlikely as the four nations tend to be fairly well aligned regardless of the political parties in power in each.
I (obviously) liked Corbyn personally but it was the policies for me, I think the vast majority of Corbyn supporters would have easily transferred over to someone actually offering 'Corbynism without Corbyn' as it was termed, I think everyone knew the game that was being played with people stating that without meaning it at all.
Almost regardless of what happens from this point on I can't see myself voting Labour next election..
I agree with you, at least in part.
Corbyn very definitely excited a whole bunch of people to vote for him. I remember many friends (including some unexpected ones) being very, very exhilarated by the Labour 2017 manifesto.
The buzz & excitement that Corbyn generated could & should have been followed up by the Labour party to build him up as a winner in 2019. Instead, his enemies destroyed him and it was obvious he was going down to a big defeat. Some people in Labour preferred that, because they could then recapture the party.
A reasonable analogy is George McGovern. It is absolutely clear in 'Fear & Loathing' that many Democrats preferred to see McGovern completely destroyed in 1972, so they could regain control of the Democratic Party, So, they were happy to collude in the smearing of McGovern as the 'Amnesty, Abortion, Acid' candidate. It remains the biggest ever US Presidential loss.
I can't see anyone being very excited by SKS -- except elderly Liberal Democrats with no hair. This constituency is well represented on pb.com, though
I shall never forget or forgive what they did.
Interesting bit about George McGovern there, I wonder if that whole amnesty and abortion angle they played on their own side came back to bite them at some point... nah probably not.
Why don't you and your happy band of Corbynistas just set up your own party? You could call it Momentum, the Corbyn Party or you could simply join the SWP. Let us see how that flies. I can't wait to watch the red wall Tory vote tumble.
Or here is an idea a party for Labour, rather than the rich, you could call it the Labour party, people who want a party for the rich could join the Conservative party...
Win, win.
Well we certainly weren't the party for labour in 2019. Holding Canterbury and losing seats in Stoke sounds like a poshos party to me.
Being the party of middle class handwringers shedding a tear for the destitute is not a winning formula. As I keep saying, we should not be fixated on the top 10% and bottom 10%. It is the 80% in the middle who we need to appeal to.
It's not all bad news. Chuka's infiltrated JP Morgan and will be continuing the fight from there. One good man on the inside of the machine is worth a thousand impotents yelling from the sidelines.
Nice to see you back anyway. Some strong points made too. Especially on the 17 election. That was close. Painting it as a rejection of the left is utter nonsense. Then in 19, awful but unwinnable. "Boris" and "Get Brexit Done" was a killer proposition for the country in the mood it was in. Just a matter of how big the Con win was going to be.
So let's not throw out the radical baby with the Corbyn bathwater. It's a balance for me. I want a Labour government to really change things. Otherwise what's the point? But I also do want a Labour government now and again. Otherwise what's the point?
I voted for Nandy but I'm ok with Starmer. Too early to be getting disillusioned. And eye ALWAYS vote Labour. I'm Labour soup to nuts, Foot to Blair.
Stay with us, Comrade, stay with us.
The significance of 2017 is overdone. I know that the arguments are well-rehearsed, but they're perhaps worth repeating at this juncture: voters were mainly looking at the Tory car crash (a suicide note manifesto and an exceptionally poor campaigning performance by May,) Corbyn was still a relatively new leader whose platform did not receive as much scrutiny as it deserved, and besides most people thought he had no hope of winning and that a Labour protest vote was safe, especially if motivated to do so by the European issue.
And yet, despite everything, the Conservatives still finished 55 seats ahead of Labour. By 2019, those effects had mostly dissipated, and we all know what happened then.
There is no hope, at this point and probably for many years hence, for Labour in running on anything that might be described as a radical left manifesto. It's exciting to a lot of voters, but a turn-off to the new Tory electoral coalition - older and more affluent voters combined with moderate social conservatives - which is too large for Labour to get around. Appeals to a return to some kind of Corbynism but with a better salesperson are effectively calls to avoid the necessary compromises with the Tory voting electorate that are needed, and to somehow win by squeezing the minor progressive parties and attracting loads of non-voters to get around the problem. That didn't work in 2017 and it's very hard indeed to see it working against a Government with a better managed campaign and a less problematic manifesto at the next election, either. The Tories aren't going to do a repeat run of wooden top May and the dementia tax. They're not that stupid.
What Labour is probably going to need next time around is to try to cultivate an air of managerial competence (free of loony Left personalities and outbursts) and to promise a careful recalibration leftwards on socio-economic policy rather than a revolution (with a particular emphasis on well-costed and realistic sounding policies that don't involve another half-a-trillion pounds' worth of borrowing.) Given both how very far behind they are and the Scottish problem it may well not be enough, but the alternative - retreat into the comfort zone and then celebrating X-million votes for socialism after being crushed again - is worse.
Very well put. This constant harking back to 2017 and the "what if" narrative is tiring and moreover the electorate don't care. Corbyn is, as he always was, yesterdays man. He. Didn't. Win. In. 2017. Nowhere near a majority even. Not even close. In lottery terms he probably only won a tenner - which gave him enough cash to have another play.
Corbyn supporters are now just being the bloke down the pub boring his mates with stories that he was "so close on the other numbers I could have won the whole lot". Interesting the first time maybe, but Christ after nearly 4 years....
He came pretty close to PM at GE17. This is a stone cold fact. In the early hours after many results were in he went odds on fav for a time.
But. He. Didn't.
I came close to winning the Euromillions last night. But I didn't. Shall on go on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on about it?
Come back to me when you understand the word "close".
The Alice Roberts Stonehenge documentary last night on BBC2 is well worth a watch
Indeed. Watching In was reminded of the book on the genetics of the British and how they showed the patterns of migration, the title of which I cannot remember, but which opined that the evidence demonstrated that post Ice-Age Britain was repopulated from two main and one minor directions; up the west coast of what is now France, from Iberia and into the Western part of the British Isles and from the East, across the Channel and North Sea. The Westerners uniting with the Easterners might well have accounted for the movement of the Henge.
That was Oppenheimer's book. I enjoyed that too, and found it convincing - especially the earlier chapters before it descended deeply into the minutiae of the DNA.
But Tyndall told me it has mostly since been discredited.
New evidence sadly. It is now apparent that the original post glacial inhabitants of the British isles were almost entirely wiped out at the end of the Neolithic. It appears there is a 90% plus annihilation of the pre-existing population of the British isles within perhaps as little as one generation and their replacement by a new peoples originating (we think) in Spain. I was educated in the 80s in exactly the sort of migration hypothesis you talk about but it is now well out of date.
It is not clear what actually led to the almost complete removal of the native population - disease is the most obvious cause with the new arrivals inadvertently bringing something with them that they themselves were immune to. But no one knows for sure.
This is how the Independent reported the new hypothesis back in 2018
Interesting. I might read his book again to see where, other than looking for evidence for a preferred conclusion, his analysis might be flawed
I don't think it is necessarily fair to say his analysis was flawed. It was based on the evidence available in the early 2000s. Obviously if he was still persisting in claiming everything he said was true one might question whether he is rather stuck in the mud. But the new evidence only emerged in 2018 so I don't think he can be accused of preferring a particular conclusion at the time of writing
As I recall, a big part of his conclusion was that the population of much of England was already speaking some form of Germanic language before the anglo saxons arrived, and therefore before the Romans arrived, rather than being celtic as often assumed. The prior population replacement by the beaker people post-2000 BC isn’t in itself total disproof
It's not all bad news. Chuka's infiltrated JP Morgan and will be continuing the fight from there. One good man on the inside of the machine is worth a thousand impotents yelling from the sidelines.
Nice to see you back anyway. Some strong points made too. Especially on the 17 election. That was close. Painting it as a rejection of the left is utter nonsense. Then in 19, awful but unwinnable. "Boris" and "Get Brexit Done" was a killer proposition for the country in the mood it was in. Just a matter of how big the Con win was going to be.
So let's not throw out the radical baby with the Corbyn bathwater. It's a balance for me. I want a Labour government to really change things. Otherwise what's the point? But I also do want a Labour government now and again. Otherwise what's the point?
I voted for Nandy but I'm ok with Starmer. Too early to be getting disillusioned. And eye ALWAYS vote Labour. I'm Labour soup to nuts, Foot to Blair.
Stay with us, Comrade, stay with us.
The significance of 2017 is overdone. I know that the arguments are well-rehearsed, but they're perhaps worth repeating at this juncture: voters were mainly looking at the Tory car crash (a suicide note manifesto and an exceptionally poor campaigning performance by May,) Corbyn was still a relatively new leader whose platform did not receive as much scrutiny as it deserved, and besides most people thought he had no hope of winning and that a Labour protest vote was safe, especially if motivated to do so by the European issue.
And yet, despite everything, the Conservatives still finished 55 seats ahead of Labour. By 2019, those effects had mostly dissipated, and we all know what happened then.
There is no hope, at this point and probably for many years hence, for Labour in running on anything that might be described as a radical left manifesto. It's exciting to a lot of voters, but a turn-off to the new Tory electoral coalition - older and more affluent voters combined with moderate social conservatives - which is too large for Labour to get around. Appeals to a return to some kind of Corbynism but with a better salesperson are effectively calls to avoid the necessary compromises with the Tory voting electorate that are needed, and to somehow win by squeezing the minor progressive parties and attracting loads of non-voters to get around the problem. That didn't work in 2017 and it's very hard indeed to see it working against a Government with a better managed campaign and a less problematic manifesto at the next election, either. The Tories aren't going to do a repeat run of wooden top May and the dementia tax. They're not that stupid.
What Labour is probably going to need next time around is to try to cultivate an air of managerial competence (free of loony Left personalities and outbursts) and to promise a careful recalibration leftwards on socio-economic policy rather than a revolution (with a particular emphasis on well-costed and realistic sounding policies that don't involve another half-a-trillion pounds' worth of borrowing.) Given both how very far behind they are and the Scottish problem it may well not be enough, but the alternative - retreat into the comfort zone and then celebrating X-million votes for socialism after being crushed again - is worse.
Very well put. This constant harking back to 2017 and the "what if" narrative is tiring and moreover the electorate don't care. Corbyn is, as he always was, yesterdays man. He. Didn't. Win. In. 2017. Nowhere near a majority even. Not even close. In lottery terms he probably only won a tenner - which gave him enough cash to have another play.
Corbyn supporters are now just being the bloke down the pub boring his mates with stories that he was "so close on the other numbers I could have won the whole lot". Interesting the first time maybe, but Christ after nearly 4 years....
He came pretty close to PM at GE17. This is a stone cold fact. In the early hours after many results were in he went odds on fav for a time.
But. He. Didn't.
I came close to winning the Euromillions last night. But I didn't. Shall on go on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on about it?
Come back to me when you understand the word "close".
Comments
(Incidentally, again, the polling I saw suggested that individual policies were popular but nobody thought they were properly costed.)
But either way Kinabalu falsely claimed that the Labour right were "careerists" for not wanting a Corbyn Government. Putting Corbyn into office would be the best thing for their political career.
Many on the Labour right sacrificed their political career in stopping Corbyn. I'm impressed with them - it's not about my views it's about theirs.
The real careerists were the likes of Starmer. Starmer clearly thought Corbyn was bad but he put his personal career first serving in his Shadow Cabinet.
Please leave the 'virtue signalling' epithet for those of us progressives who, you know, have some virtues.
Definitely popular things in Labour's 2017 programme but I suspect many were voting AGAINST dementia tax, hard Brexit and a big Tory majority fully in the knowledge Corbyn would not be PM.
And yet, despite everything, the Conservatives still finished 55 seats ahead of Labour. By 2019, those effects had mostly dissipated, and we all know what happened then.
There is no hope, at this point and probably for many years hence, for Labour in running on anything that might be described as a radical left manifesto. It's exciting to a lot of voters, but a turn-off to the new Tory electoral coalition - older and more affluent voters combined with moderate social conservatives - which is too large for Labour to get around. Appeals to a return to some kind of Corbynism but with a better salesperson are effectively calls to avoid the necessary compromises with the Tory voting electorate that are needed, and to somehow win by squeezing the minor progressive parties and attracting loads of non-voters to get around the problem. That didn't work in 2017 and it's very hard indeed to see it working against a Government with a better managed campaign and a less problematic manifesto at the next election, either. The Tories aren't going to do a repeat run of wooden top May and the dementia tax. They're not that stupid.
What Labour is probably going to need next time around is to try to cultivate an air of managerial competence (free of loony Left personalities and outbursts) and to promise a careful recalibration leftwards on socio-economic policy rather than a revolution (with a particular emphasis on well-costed and realistic sounding policies that don't involve another half-a-trillion pounds' worth of borrowing.) Given both how very far behind they are and the Scottish problem it may well not be enough, but the alternative - retreat into the comfort zone and then celebrating X-million votes for socialism after being crushed again - is worse.
Little has changed since.
They sacrificed their careers to stop a catastrophe. They are the opposite of careerists. Starmer sacrificed his principles to further his career serving in Corbyn's Shadow Cabinet.
The main issue would be with the computer systems of the banks. Could be the TSB disaster on steroids.
https://twitter.com/hawkayescotland/status/1360520648729198594?s=21
Can I offer a free Owl?
Boris simply kicked out 21 MPs who disagreed with him -- including Gauke, Soames, Hammond, Letwin, Grieve
Boris instigated a ... Stalinist ... purge of dissenters. There is no other word for it, it is really unprecedented in modern UK politics.
Compare Boris to Jeremy.
Corbyn lost badly because he was ... erm ... not Stalinist enough . He led a disunited party, with some openly undermining him.
The Labour right really is the best treated minority group in the country ... and they are always bleating that they are being badly treated.
That plus May poor at campaigning and lacking charisma and Corbyn promising to pay of student debts which was popular with the obvious beneficiaries of this idea.
Corbyn supporters are now just being the bloke down the pub boring his mates with stories that he was "so close on the other numbers I could have won the whole lot". Interesting the first time maybe, but Christ after nearly 4 years....
In the end it will break itself.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Decimal_Day#Pre-Decimal_Computer_Programming
Try asking half the public eg what the change is if you buy something for £18.72 and pay with a £20 note.
Much of the public can't even do base 10 mental arithmetic right, they're not going to master base 10, 12, 14 and 16 simultaneously.
Fooling the capitalists with a fake argument between Chuka and Corbyn was certainly a good plan, I have on good authority that man is so left wing he even bleeds red.
You are reasonable and agreeable as always but I fear the teachings of the church no longer reach me, I have embraced the godlessness of atheism.. (there is this one green god I've been interested in but she doesn't do services in my area) I am sure there is a chance we shall end up in the same congregation sooner or later but not for now.
"Our model suggests substantial reductions in hospital and ICU admissions will not occur until late March and into April 2021."
"An inflection point, when 50% of the adult population has been vaccinated – with deaths reduced by 95% and hospital admissions by 80% – may be a useful point for re‐evaluating vaccine prioritisation. "
https://associationofanaesthetists-publications.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/anae.15442
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/may/12/labour-party-voters-polls-policies-manifesto-jeremy-corbyn
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-42414394
I don't think there's any doubt that the policies were popular as shown here - I don't remember a specific question on being properly costed, but the public are always sceptical (and they're usually right) about parties claiming that, and will often vote for a party on the basis that if they turn out to be able to afford half of it that's not bad. Corbyn was competitive with May as the BBC link shows, though many will think that a low bar - my recollection is that he attracted both more enthusiasm and more hostility than May but it evened out in 2017. What people think/thought of Corbyn is a bit irrelevant now, of course - we're discussing the policies.
There was also a survey (which I can't find) suggesting that Labour's vote increased more among people who thought Labour might win than people who didn't, which is a pretty normal pattern but contradicts the theory that people voted Labour because they were sure they'd lose. People don't in general think like that, in my experience.
It was just a flavour of how much of an arse he would be until the 2019 election.
Curious assumption.
https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politics/articles-reports/2017/07/11/why-people-voted-labour-or-conservative-2017-gener
Maybe they all lied and secretly told you the real reason they were voting Labour?
I'll take your word for it.
It should be a part of everyone's education.
Certainly more useful than attending PPE lectures at Bullies College, Oxford.
For me that's what this organisation is about. Taking 27 disparate nations and as a condition of membership there are certain civilised norms that have to be complied with. We couldn't for example allow Saudi Arabia to join unless they had a serious change of policy and those who worry about the instincts of Priti Patel could have slept more easily at night.
His self pitying whinging article in the papers the other day showed what an inappropriate, unprincipled and awful person he was for the role.
"Jeremy Paxman says each member of the public should have to pass a series of tests before being allowed to vote" (£)
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2021/02/13/jeremy-paxman-has-plan-save-democracy-unfortunately-completely
Morning Comrades
Happy to back up the facts on the Tory vote raising and Brexit being a big factory in that. I can blame Corbyn for not doing well enough but compared to the centrists he did far better in 2017 and probably about the same in 2019 so no it isn't his fault Labour lost, it is thanks to him they got that close in the first place. If he was even better they could have done even better.
This will be Starmer's first election, how will he do compared to Corbyn's first election? 40%? Almost a hung parliament?
Not a chance, back to the mean for Labour under a centrist leader. Which is a much worse performance than the absolute boy!
Still that is why you Tories are so desperate to back Starmer as your opposition leader.
https://www.politico.eu/coronavirus-in-europe/
Hospital admissions have fallen from 4,576 on 12/01 to 1,908 on 08/02.
https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/details/healthcare
However as a young boy I remember the black USA athletes as they took their medals, at the 1968 Olympics putting their arm in the air with a black glove.Made a big impression on me and helped me understand the racism they were enduring.
Win, win.
Da da da der - Da da da der ...
✊
Starmer also has higher favourables than Labour does overall
How to damn yourself in nine words.
Also - "Although groups 1 and 2 have been vaccinated together, we have assumed each group is vaccinated in sequence."
The thing that stands out is that their work doesn't seem to reference the effects of other measures. They seem to be ignoring lockdown completely.
All in all, it seems to be a simplistic effort of showing the effect of vaccination on the various groups.
- This would really create a 2 speed Europe.
- A fear that this would fuel anti-European sentiment in those countries. Memories of the effects of the interventions in Italy and Greece.
In 2019 for example the Tories got 40% amongst voters earning over £70,000 a year compared to 43% overall.
Even Corbyn Labour got 31% amongst voters earning over £70,000 a year so did almost as well with the rich as they did overall where they got 32%.
The party of the rich is now the LDs, the LDs got 20% amongst voters earning over £70,000 a year in 2019 compared to just 11% overall
https://d25d2506sfb94s.cloudfront.net/cumulus_uploads/document/wl0r2q1sm4/Results_HowBritainVoted_2019_w.pdf
https://twitter.com/attorneygeneral/status/1360569250088423430?s=20
And whats it got anything to do with her?
I mean I can't find any of his posts but all of you are making really good points against him.
The point isn't bring back Corbyn, I suspect that strawman is being built by people unable to address the argument.
The entire point is it is all well and good complaining the left still lost even if they did it closely but take away most of the Scottish seats lost by the Blarites and the entire damn point is the left did better than the right did before it and after it...
So if you want to win you need it to be closer to what the left did than the constantly failed right wing Labour strategy.
Now I realise you are probably a Tory voter so you want Labour to pursue a strategy which has proven less successful for winning over new voters (this millenium) but my argument is if Labour want more votes they should do what got them more votes.
Fully appreciate you want them to adopt a strategy which sees them get less votes.
https://twitter.com/rtenews/status/1360286089525796865?s=20
This is some what disappointing. It seems the government don't see a massive expansion in jabbing rate over the next 6 months.
Hey if we want to travel back in time to the late nineties then Blairs Labour beats Corbyns Labour happy to concede that Blair was an excellent vote winning politician in his time, he pretty much took over great polling from Smith and everyone agrees the Conservatives were in terrible state.
I think time has moved on since then, trying tactics from the late nineties isn't necessarily going to work as well
@bigjohnowls Comrade
I came close to winning the Euromillions last night. But I didn't. Shall on go on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on about it?
Nutshell conclusion for me. Do not junk the radicalism for 90s style sheen and triangulation. That is not only a dead end but the journey to it has no scenery. It's both depressing and futile at the same time. But do make sure the leader looks like a PM, do make sure the policies stack up and have a theme, do not make schoolboy errors like Salisbury, do not allow internal debate to dominate.
Fight the Tories. They're a shower. Especially this bunch. Fight fight fight the Tories and GTTO.
Being the party of middle class handwringers shedding a tear for the destitute is not a winning formula. As I keep saying, we should not be fixated on the top 10% and bottom 10%. It is the 80% in the middle who we need to appeal to.
You said he didn't come close. He did.