It would be *bold* to declare any kind of victory when the majority of the population is still waiting.
A big number from England, and another absolutely excellent return from our Scottish and Welsh friends. The NHS might roll this over without requiring the final counting day on Monday.
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 I was educated in the 80s in exactly the sort of migration hypothesis you talk about but it is now well out of date.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
Not sure that is a popular theory with linguists. Much of the naming of rivers and other natural features are definitely not Germanic and I have never seen any evidence that there as widespread usage of any form of Germanic language in Britain before the Romans. What is possible is that during the RB period there was a massive influx of Germanic speakers as Foederati and settlers but that doesn't support the idea of an extant Germanic population prior to the 1st century AD.
The whole period 400 to 600 is such a blank canvass in our country's history. What do you think happened during that period?
Historically it is blank. Archaeologically not so much. For example at West Heslerton in Yorkshire they have been able to use isotope analysis of teeth to understand where the inhabitants in the supposedly Anglo-Saxon cemetery grew up. Somewhat surprisingly in spite of dating to the start of the invasion period and being dressed in an Anglian fashion, the majority were born and grew up in Lancashire and Cumbria.
Personally I think the picture developed by Francis Pryor which is now pretty mainstream is probably the most accurate.
Starting with the Roman occupation, you have the land stripped of most of its Iron-age inhabitants who are concentrated into towns and onto large Roman industrial farming villas. Across much of Southern and Eastern Britain native occupation outside of the villa economy almost ceases to exist.
Later there are large influxes of Germanic peoples well prior to the end of the RB period as a result of the use of Foederati from the German tribes and the associated settlement.
This is followed by a series of great plagues across the Empire during the 4th century and the withdrawal of the main Roman authority from Britain at the start of the 5th century. This results in the collapse of the villa landscape and the whole economy. Due to the previous dominance of the villa landscape this leaves much of lowland Britain effectively unoccupied or at least sparsely occupied.
You then get the continuation of the mass migrations of Germanic peoples into Britain but rather than coming as aggressive conquerors they are coming to settle in a much underpopulated landscape. This is, to a large extent, a peaceful settlement with most of the conflict being in the West on the fringes of what was Roman Britain where the native population survived.
At West Haslerton there is continuous occupation of the site from the Bronze Age to the late AS period with the first indications of violence not occurring until the 9th century when the Danes arrived. There are many cemeteries across the country where RB and AS funerary practices are seen side by side in the same cemetery from the same period.
Is this a true reflection of what happened - probably not exactly but it certainly matches the evidence far better than the traditional narrative which is why it is .
+1
Agree, a great post.
Pryor’s books on the subject, however, are mostly of the same period as Oppenheimers. I notice he has one due for publication this autumn, which hopefully will update previous thinking?
Just caught up. Given what we know of the Justinian plagues sounds entirely reasonable. Would also account for many of the rivers, etc in the East having basically Germanic names. If there was no-one to say what they were called before....
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.
Why should I support the Conservative Party, when my family heritage is standing shoulder to shoulder with Jim Griffith's and the miners of East Carmarthenshire.
Jeremy Corbyn is not representative of the party of Keir Hardie, Bevan or Bevin. He is a man who conflates and confuses hostile military intervention against individual Palestinians on behalf of Netanyahu with a hatred of the both the State of Israel and Judaism. He is an idiot who took the Labour Party down a Soviet style blind alley. He no more represents working people than does Jacob Rees Mogg.
The Labour Party can only survive as a left of centre Social Democratic Coalition, and it is not there yet. Socialist Workers need not apply.
You told me to join the SWP, I am just sending you to your natural home of voting Tory.
My grandad was a South Wales Coal Miner, my other Grandad was a factory (and in the navy or merchant navy at some point, I rarely saw this guy TBH) worker in the midlands, my grandmothers did secretarial and other that sorta of low paid women's (at the time) work, I was raised by a single mother who worked in the NHS almost her entire life I grew up in my grandparents house (with my mum) a little terraced house in a poor part of south wales before moving to a slightly smaller terraced house in an even poorer rougher part of Wales.
I have more fucking Labour in the DNA of my little finger than you do in your entire pitiful existence, don't you dare question me Tory boy, Labour wasn't built to screw over the poor, however much you may have forgotten your heritage I have NOT!
Labour was not founded to support Apartheid, my grandparents (the mining one) Labour to their core were telling their kids decades and decades ago about Apartheid they wouldn't have not supported it against the Muslims anymore than they did the Black South Africans. Because they are proper Labour, it didn't matter if people claiming South Africa was our ally, Nelson Mandela is a communist, Nelson Mandela is a terrorist, they knew right from wrong.
If Corbyn didn't represent working people he would have had rich donors like Starmer telling him what to do, he wouldn't have turned the Labour party membership into a much poorer, younger one and he wouldn't have won with working voters in 2017.
It is retired people Corbyn doesn't represent, which TBH was the problem, if Corbyn didn't represent working people but instead represented retired (basically a 2017 reversal)people he would have won.
My paternal grandfather was a miner at Carway Colliery as were all his brothers and my paternal grandmother's brothers. My maternal grandmother's brothers were miners in the colliery between Burry Port and Pwll. My grandfather's working life was always as a coal miner except for working at the ROF in Pembrey during the war, which was equally dangerous. He retired from Cyneidre Colliery in 1966.
I don't want to appear like the Monty Python Yorkshiremen, trying to outdo your Labour Party credentials, but please don't tell me I am a liberal middle class Tory sell-out fraud.
A Labour Party in perpetual opposition, which would be the electoral outcome under a Corbynista programme for Government, is as much use as a chocolate teapot.
These “my dad is more socialist than your dad” type arguments are exactly the type of purity test that alienates so many from the left.
I'll be honest the part that makes it confusing for me is MexicanPete doesn't even really like the left, hell he doesn't even seem that enthused by the current right wing led Labour party which is spending its time prioritising kicking left wing people like me bringing back in members who wished left wing activists died in fires...
I mean if this right wing led thoroughly anti left wing Labour party is still too left wing for him why he is even arguing about his family being 'leftier than thou' (an argument he started) I didn't try and claim a more centrist existence or background than him!
Edit: I shouldn't be here recruiting but seriously the current leadership of the Labour party despise left wingers more than MexicanPete could possibly dream, if you genuinely aren't a Tory shouldn't that be right up his street?
The single purpose of Jeremy Corbyn is to undermiine the Labour leadership, be that Starmer, Milliband, Brown, Blair or Kinnock, to perpetuate Conservative Governments. It has worked almost perfectly since 1979, except Blair blotted his copybook with Corbyn, not once but three times.
That would make sense if Corbyn had done 1,000th of what the Labour right did to him during his leadership. The entire point of the Labour right has been to help the Conservatives, they do it election after election because the party isn't enough like the Conservatives for the liking...
They didn't just do it to Corbyn, they did it to Ed as well, constant briefing that helped push Ed so far to the right he made an offer not worth voting for. After the 2017 election he said he should have offered that manifesto, that extremely popular vote winning manifesto that back in 2015 could have been enough to make the difference...
Why couldn't Ed present a left wing manifesto that would have been in line with his views as leader of the Labour party?
The Tories best friend, the Labour right, there to give them a helping hand when they need it, don't worry David we'll stop Ed offering anything appealing so you can win and we can replace him with Blair mark 2.
I notice you avoided the question and just went on the attack, wonder why? bit awkward for you?
PB Tories must be loving this red on pink Tory action.
I would like to see a non- Conservative Government, and I consider Johnson to be a scoundrel. That does not make me blind to faults on my side of argument. Blair's role as Bush's lapdog over Iraq was outrageous, and Starmer needs to pull his finger out if he plans any sort of centre-left revolution. However Corbyn was never a magic bullet to see the back of the Tories. His behaviour either directly or indirectly towards Luciana Berger for example was that of a xenophobic bully. Simply horrible. I would go on about the unrealistic spending plans, although events, and Boris Johnson have shot that argument down in flames.
Now go and harrass some proper Tories.
I wish he would he has dominated this site all day.
Others frequently do the same without being admonished for doing so.
Yeah, sorry about that, been posting too much myself today
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.
Why should I support the Conservative Party, when my family heritage is standing shoulder to shoulder with Jim Griffith's and the miners of East Carmarthenshire.
Jeremy Corbyn is not representative of the party of Keir Hardie, Bevan or Bevin. He is a man who conflates and confuses hostile military intervention against individual Palestinians on behalf of Netanyahu with a hatred of the both the State of Israel and Judaism. He is an idiot who took the Labour Party down a Soviet style blind alley. He no more represents working people than does Jacob Rees Mogg.
The Labour Party can only survive as a left of centre Social Democratic Coalition, and it is not there yet. Socialist Workers need not apply.
You told me to join the SWP, I am just sending you to your natural home of voting Tory.
My grandad was a South Wales Coal Miner, my other Grandad was a factory (and in the navy or merchant navy at some point, I rarely saw this guy TBH) worker in the midlands, my grandmothers did secretarial and other that sorta of low paid women's (at the time) work, I was raised by a single mother who worked in the NHS almost her entire life I grew up in my grandparents house (with my mum) a little terraced house in a poor part of south wales before moving to a slightly smaller terraced house in an even poorer rougher part of Wales.
I have more fucking Labour in the DNA of my little finger than you do in your entire pitiful existence, don't you dare question me Tory boy, Labour wasn't built to screw over the poor, however much you may have forgotten your heritage I have NOT!
Labour was not founded to support Apartheid, my grandparents (the mining one) Labour to their core were telling their kids decades and decades ago about Apartheid they wouldn't have not supported it against the Muslims anymore than they did the Black South Africans. Because they are proper Labour, it didn't matter if people claiming South Africa was our ally, Nelson Mandela is a communist, Nelson Mandela is a terrorist, they knew right from wrong.
If Corbyn didn't represent working people he would have had rich donors like Starmer telling him what to do, he wouldn't have turned the Labour party membership into a much poorer, younger one and he wouldn't have won with working voters in 2017.
It is retired people Corbyn doesn't represent, which TBH was the problem, if Corbyn didn't represent working people but instead represented retired (basically a 2017 reversal)people he would have won.
My paternal grandfather was a miner at Carway Colliery as were all his brothers and my paternal grandmother's brothers. My maternal grandmother's brothers were miners in the colliery between Burry Port and Pwll. My grandfather's working life was always as a coal miner except for working at the ROF in Pembrey during the war, which was equally dangerous. He retired from Cyneidre Colliery in 1966.
I don't want to appear like the Monty Python Yorkshiremen, trying to outdo your Labour Party credentials, but please don't tell me I am a liberal middle class Tory sell-out fraud.
A Labour Party in perpetual opposition, which would be the electoral outcome under a Corbynista programme for Government, is as much use as a chocolate teapot.
These “my dad is more socialist than your dad” type arguments are exactly the type of purity test that alienates so many from the left.
I do apologise. It is not normally something I would feel obliged to share. However I decided to put the Jezziah's accusation of my public-school Tory-boy status to the sword. My own upbringing I would have to concede was nonetheless very comfortable. Does that necessarily make me a Tory?
This can get overthunk imo. You're a Tory (and for that matter a Leaver) if you voted Tory at GE19. That's my start point. That's the default. It can be set aside on a case by case basis but only if there were extremely extenuating circumstances, e.g. you'd lost your glasses and couldn't see the ballot paper properly.
That looks like a crude oversimplification. Are there really 13,966,451 Tories in the UK?
Yes. And it's not crude - it's a bullshit strainer.
It's extremely silly. Labour isn't entitled to take the loyalty of its voters for granted.
How am I saying that?
The voters change sides, they get written off as "Tories," which is evidently a form of insult. The Lab-Con defectors aren't all Tories, they're people who have given up on Labour. That's not the same thing at all.
I am sure the media will manage to spin a negative story out of the success of the vaccine roll out.
Rowland Manthorpe on sky news was giving the good old British try yesterday claiming it wasn't working, because reduction in hospital admissions among the old compared to the rest hadn't come down more.
You don't need to be an expert to know 3 weeks min from vaccination to a starting to get protection and 3 weeks from getting infected to needing to go to hospital, so only those vaccinated prior to Christmas can be compared (which he wasn't doing).
I see the Lincoln Project has basically collapsed. Ontop of the alleged sexual predator amongst their management they turned a blind eye to (and I wonder how many in the media did too, as they were such a powerful anti-Trump operation), looks like very sleazy all round.
They should rename themselves as the Trump Project.
I am sure the media will manage to spin a negative story out of the success of the vaccine roll out.
Rowland Manthorpe on sky news was giving the good old British try yesterday claiming it wasn't working, because reduction in hospital admissions among the old compared to the rest hadn't come down more.
You don't need to be an expert to know 3 weeks min from vaccination to a starting to get protection and 3 weeks from getting infected to needing to go to hospital, so only those vaccinated prior to Christmas can be compared (which he wasn't doing).
To be honest I'm glad the media are doing this.
As part of the vaccine rollout my father will doing shortly one of the things that has been flagged up is the number of recipients who think the moment they get their first jab they think they are invulnerable to Covid-19.
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.
Why should I support the Conservative Party, when my family heritage is standing shoulder to shoulder with Jim Griffith's and the miners of East Carmarthenshire.
Jeremy Corbyn is not representative of the party of Keir Hardie, Bevan or Bevin. He is a man who conflates and confuses hostile military intervention against individual Palestinians on behalf of Netanyahu with a hatred of the both the State of Israel and Judaism. He is an idiot who took the Labour Party down a Soviet style blind alley. He no more represents working people than does Jacob Rees Mogg.
The Labour Party can only survive as a left of centre Social Democratic Coalition, and it is not there yet. Socialist Workers need not apply.
You told me to join the SWP, I am just sending you to your natural home of voting Tory.
My grandad was a South Wales Coal Miner, my other Grandad was a factory (and in the navy or merchant navy at some point, I rarely saw this guy TBH) worker in the midlands, my grandmothers did secretarial and other that sorta of low paid women's (at the time) work, I was raised by a single mother who worked in the NHS almost her entire life I grew up in my grandparents house (with my mum) a little terraced house in a poor part of south wales before moving to a slightly smaller terraced house in an even poorer rougher part of Wales.
I have more fucking Labour in the DNA of my little finger than you do in your entire pitiful existence, don't you dare question me Tory boy, Labour wasn't built to screw over the poor, however much you may have forgotten your heritage I have NOT!
Labour was not founded to support Apartheid, my grandparents (the mining one) Labour to their core were telling their kids decades and decades ago about Apartheid they wouldn't have not supported it against the Muslims anymore than they did the Black South Africans. Because they are proper Labour, it didn't matter if people claiming South Africa was our ally, Nelson Mandela is a communist, Nelson Mandela is a terrorist, they knew right from wrong.
If Corbyn didn't represent working people he would have had rich donors like Starmer telling him what to do, he wouldn't have turned the Labour party membership into a much poorer, younger one and he wouldn't have won with working voters in 2017.
It is retired people Corbyn doesn't represent, which TBH was the problem, if Corbyn didn't represent working people but instead represented retired (basically a 2017 reversal)people he would have won.
My paternal grandfather was a miner at Carway Colliery as were all his brothers and my paternal grandmother's brothers. My maternal grandmother's brothers were miners in the colliery between Burry Port and Pwll. My grandfather's working life was always as a coal miner except for working at the ROF in Pembrey during the war, which was equally dangerous. He retired from Cyneidre Colliery in 1966.
I don't want to appear like the Monty Python Yorkshiremen, trying to outdo your Labour Party credentials, but please don't tell me I am a liberal middle class Tory sell-out fraud.
A Labour Party in perpetual opposition, which would be the electoral outcome under a Corbynista programme for Government, is as much use as a chocolate teapot.
These “my dad is more socialist than your dad” type arguments are exactly the type of purity test that alienates so many from the left.
I'll be honest the part that makes it confusing for me is MexicanPete doesn't even really like the left, hell he doesn't even seem that enthused by the current right wing led Labour party which is spending its time prioritising kicking left wing people like me bringing back in members who wished left wing activists died in fires...
I mean if this right wing led thoroughly anti left wing Labour party is still too left wing for him why he is even arguing about his family being 'leftier than thou' (an argument he started) I didn't try and claim a more centrist existence or background than him!
Edit: I shouldn't be here recruiting but seriously the current leadership of the Labour party despise left wingers more than MexicanPete could possibly dream, if you genuinely aren't a Tory shouldn't that be right up his street?
The single purpose of Jeremy Corbyn is to undermiine the Labour leadership, be that Starmer, Milliband, Brown, Blair or Kinnock, to perpetuate Conservative Governments. It has worked almost perfectly since 1979, except Blair blotted his copybook with Corbyn, not once but three times.
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.
Why should I support the Conservative Party, when my family heritage is standing shoulder to shoulder with Jim Griffith's and the miners of East Carmarthenshire.
Jeremy Corbyn is not representative of the party of Keir Hardie, Bevan or Bevin. He is a man who conflates and confuses hostile military intervention against individual Palestinians on behalf of Netanyahu with a hatred of the both the State of Israel and Judaism. He is an idiot who took the Labour Party down a Soviet style blind alley. He no more represents working people than does Jacob Rees Mogg.
The Labour Party can only survive as a left of centre Social Democratic Coalition, and it is not there yet. Socialist Workers need not apply.
You told me to join the SWP, I am just sending you to your natural home of voting Tory.
My grandad was a South Wales Coal Miner, my other Grandad was a factory (and in the navy or merchant navy at some point, I rarely saw this guy TBH) worker in the midlands, my grandmothers did secretarial and other that sorta of low paid women's (at the time) work, I was raised by a single mother who worked in the NHS almost her entire life I grew up in my grandparents house (with my mum) a little terraced house in a poor part of south wales before moving to a slightly smaller terraced house in an even poorer rougher part of Wales.
I have more fucking Labour in the DNA of my little finger than you do in your entire pitiful existence, don't you dare question me Tory boy, Labour wasn't built to screw over the poor, however much you may have forgotten your heritage I have NOT!
Labour was not founded to support Apartheid, my grandparents (the mining one) Labour to their core were telling their kids decades and decades ago about Apartheid they wouldn't have not supported it against the Muslims anymore than they did the Black South Africans. Because they are proper Labour, it didn't matter if people claiming South Africa was our ally, Nelson Mandela is a communist, Nelson Mandela is a terrorist, they knew right from wrong.
If Corbyn didn't represent working people he would have had rich donors like Starmer telling him what to do, he wouldn't have turned the Labour party membership into a much poorer, younger one and he wouldn't have won with working voters in 2017.
It is retired people Corbyn doesn't represent, which TBH was the problem, if Corbyn didn't represent working people but instead represented retired (basically a 2017 reversal)people he would have won.
My paternal grandfather was a miner at Carway Colliery as were all his brothers and my paternal grandmother's brothers. My maternal grandmother's brothers were miners in the colliery between Burry Port and Pwll. My grandfather's working life was always as a coal miner except for working at the ROF in Pembrey during the war, which was equally dangerous. He retired from Cyneidre Colliery in 1966.
I don't want to appear like the Monty Python Yorkshiremen, trying to outdo your Labour Party credentials, but please don't tell me I am a liberal middle class Tory sell-out fraud.
A Labour Party in perpetual opposition, which would be the electoral outcome under a Corbynista programme for Government, is as much use as a chocolate teapot.
These “my dad is more socialist than your dad” type arguments are exactly the type of purity test that alienates so many from the left.
I'll be honest the part that makes it confusing for me is MexicanPete doesn't even really like the left, hell he doesn't even seem that enthused by the current right wing led Labour party which is spending its time prioritising kicking left wing people like me bringing back in members who wished left wing activists died in fires...
I mean if this right wing led thoroughly anti left wing Labour party is still too left wing for him why he is even arguing about his family being 'leftier than thou' (an argument he started) I didn't try and claim a more centrist existence or background than him!
Edit: I shouldn't be here recruiting but seriously the current leadership of the Labour party despise left wingers more than you could possibly dream, if you genuinely aren't a Tory shouldn't that be right up your street?
In the meantime this pointless bickering has lost the votes of many who had voted Labour their whole lives - including me. Take your arguments into a room, hammer out a position, and present it as a united front to the public. You two having this argument here and, to pick a random example, Oxford Uni Labour Society’s public pillorying of John McDonnell yesterday just make people think “I’m never going to be good enough for these people”. The right have their arguments too, but they are welcoming to converts. The left make it clear you cannot have any ideological skeletons whatsoever.
The extreme left within the Labour Party had a choice in April, to work constructively with Starmer or to undermine his leadership. They chose the latter from the very start. Starmer had no alternative but to act against first Long-Bailey and then more significantly Corbyn in response to their very specific provocations. What you are seeing play out is so far very much a rerun of the actions that Kinnock took against Militant in the 1980s. I don't think it's going to lead to many expulsions, because Momentum are not a "party within a party" in the same way that Militant were, but it clear that their members still see their loyalty first and foremost to Momentum rather than to the wider Labour Party.
The overwhelmingly public generally support Starmer's actions. IPSOS-Mori found that 48% think that Starmer has changed Labour for the better, and only 4% think the change is for the worse. Of the electorate who voted Labour in 2019, under Corbyn's leadership, the figures are 54% for the better and still only 8% for the worse.
They made a big push of those figures but if the net result of improving the party is not improving the parties electoral fortunes what is the point?
The party is going backwards in polls. I mean if for example Tories who don't plan on voting Labour are happy Starmer is attacking the left whilst people who do vote Labour aren't and thus plan on stopping voting Labour then it is actually counter productive...
Lots of Tories on here who have no plans at all to vote Labour will think the party has improved because they are attacking the left and moving right but if they aren't actually voting for you then it doesn't help.
These polling numbers in conjunction with Labour voting numbers moving in the right direction would indicate Starmer's approach is working. What seems to be happening instead is he is pleasing people who aren't voting Labour but annoying people who were voting Labour.
The figures speak for themselves. As does your attempt to rubbish such an overwhelmingly conclusive poll.
I didn't rubbish the figures, I mean the poll could be wrong in any number of ways and we haven't got any other polls I don't really know how the question was asked and what other questions were asked around it...
So maybe I should have actually rubbished the figures but I didn't. I put them in context.
Votes are more important than people saying nice things when it comes to winning elections. If I offered you 60% of people say Labour is improving and you get 33% in the GE or 60% of people is say Labour is getting worse and you get 37% in the GE you would take the latter, because people saying a party is improving doesn't mean a damn without votes.
Now an example to help you understand the problem with preferencing people are saying nice things over actually winning votes.
UKIP 2015 there was some perception of being racist, xenophobically anti immigrant (not claiming any of this is accurate or not) if UKIP had gone to war with its own voters to 'clean up its image' then the party would have been seen as improving by a lot of people, probably more than 60%
Can anyone guess why this widespread approval from people who probably still wouldn't vote UKIP would be entirely counter productive?
Clue: It is because the votes actually matter more.
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.
Why should I support the Conservative Party, when my family heritage is standing shoulder to shoulder with Jim Griffith's and the miners of East Carmarthenshire.
Jeremy Corbyn is not representative of the party of Keir Hardie, Bevan or Bevin. He is a man who conflates and confuses hostile military intervention against individual Palestinians on behalf of Netanyahu with a hatred of the both the State of Israel and Judaism. He is an idiot who took the Labour Party down a Soviet style blind alley. He no more represents working people than does Jacob Rees Mogg.
The Labour Party can only survive as a left of centre Social Democratic Coalition, and it is not there yet. Socialist Workers need not apply.
You told me to join the SWP, I am just sending you to your natural home of voting Tory.
My grandad was a South Wales Coal Miner, my other Grandad was a factory (and in the navy or merchant navy at some point, I rarely saw this guy TBH) worker in the midlands, my grandmothers did secretarial and other that sorta of low paid women's (at the time) work, I was raised by a single mother who worked in the NHS almost her entire life I grew up in my grandparents house (with my mum) a little terraced house in a poor part of south wales before moving to a slightly smaller terraced house in an even poorer rougher part of Wales.
I have more fucking Labour in the DNA of my little finger than you do in your entire pitiful existence, don't you dare question me Tory boy, Labour wasn't built to screw over the poor, however much you may have forgotten your heritage I have NOT!
Labour was not founded to support Apartheid, my grandparents (the mining one) Labour to their core were telling their kids decades and decades ago about Apartheid they wouldn't have not supported it against the Muslims anymore than they did the Black South Africans. Because they are proper Labour, it didn't matter if people claiming South Africa was our ally, Nelson Mandela is a communist, Nelson Mandela is a terrorist, they knew right from wrong.
If Corbyn didn't represent working people he would have had rich donors like Starmer telling him what to do, he wouldn't have turned the Labour party membership into a much poorer, younger one and he wouldn't have won with working voters in 2017.
It is retired people Corbyn doesn't represent, which TBH was the problem, if Corbyn didn't represent working people but instead represented retired (basically a 2017 reversal)people he would have won.
My paternal grandfather was a miner at Carway Colliery as were all his brothers and my paternal grandmother's brothers. My maternal grandmother's brothers were miners in the colliery between Burry Port and Pwll. My grandfather's working life was always as a coal miner except for working at the ROF in Pembrey during the war, which was equally dangerous. He retired from Cyneidre Colliery in 1966.
I don't want to appear like the Monty Python Yorkshiremen, trying to outdo your Labour Party credentials, but please don't tell me I am a liberal middle class Tory sell-out fraud.
A Labour Party in perpetual opposition, which would be the electoral outcome under a Corbynista programme for Government, is as much use as a chocolate teapot.
These “my dad is more socialist than your dad” type arguments are exactly the type of purity test that alienates so many from the left.
I'll be honest the part that makes it confusing for me is MexicanPete doesn't even really like the left, hell he doesn't even seem that enthused by the current right wing led Labour party which is spending its time prioritising kicking left wing people like me bringing back in members who wished left wing activists died in fires...
I mean if this right wing led thoroughly anti left wing Labour party is still too left wing for him why he is even arguing about his family being 'leftier than thou' (an argument he started) I didn't try and claim a more centrist existence or background than him!
Edit: I shouldn't be here recruiting but seriously the current leadership of the Labour party despise left wingers more than MexicanPete could possibly dream, if you genuinely aren't a Tory shouldn't that be right up his street?
The single purpose of Jeremy Corbyn is to undermiine the Labour leadership, be that Starmer, Milliband, Brown, Blair or Kinnock, to perpetuate Conservative Governments. It has worked almost perfectly since 1979, except Blair blotted his copybook with Corbyn, not once but three times.
That would make sense if Corbyn had done 1,000th of what the Labour right did to him during his leadership. The entire point of the Labour right has been to help the Conservatives, they do it election after election because the party isn't enough like the Conservatives for the liking...
They didn't just do it to Corbyn, they did it to Ed as well, constant briefing that helped push Ed so far to the right he made an offer not worth voting for. After the 2017 election he said he should have offered that manifesto, that extremely popular vote winning manifesto that back in 2015 could have been enough to make the difference...
Why couldn't Ed present a left wing manifesto that would have been in line with his views as leader of the Labour party?
The Tories best friend, the Labour right, there to give them a helping hand when they need it, don't worry David we'll stop Ed offering anything appealing so you can win and we can replace him with Blair mark 2.
I notice you avoided the question and just went on the attack, wonder why? bit awkward for you?
PB Tories must be loving this red on pink Tory action.
I would like to see a non- Conservative Government, and I consider Johnson to be a scoundrel. That does not make me blind to faults on my side of argument. Blair's role as Bush's lapdog over Iraq was outrageous, and Starmer needs to pull his finger out if he plans any sort of centre-left revolution. However Corbyn was never a magic bullet to see the back of the Tories. His behaviour either directly or indirectly towards Luciana Berger for example was that of a xenophobic bully. Simply horrible. I would go on about the unrealistic spending plans, although events, and Boris Johnson have shot that argument down in flames.
Now go and harrass some proper Tories.
I wish he would he has dominated this site all day.
Others frequently do the same without being admonished for doing so.
Yeah, sorry about that, been posting too much myself today
Actually Jezza is a member of the Labour party, the NEC restored the whip to him then Starmer had to personally withdraw the whip... and that perfectly planned stitch up where Starmer could feign innocence went out the window and Starmer had to take responsibility for his decision...
Don't listen to @Yorkcity -- I am very interested to hear your views. You (or anyone else) is welcome to "dominate the site all day" in his terminology.
In posting on pb.com, it is important to remember its peculiar demographics.
Oh yes, there is a good mix of red-blooded Socialists and Liberals here, but they enjoy their Sunday dinner with a Jereboam ... and not Jeremy.
It is often quite modest -- just Oysters Rockefeller to start, or a clear consomme, followed by Striploin Wagyu beef steak with a very good bottle & creme brulee to finish.
In fact, the site is at its most amusing when it functions as a fashion, drink and food blog -- bespoke tailoring, high-end restaurants & best apres-ski in Courchevel or Zermatt, etc.
In truth, the Tory/LibDem posters often start the discussion, but what passes for the Left usually joins in with gusto.
Er, speak for yourself. My Sunday dinner will be a mock-chicken masala and a Coke, while playing a computer game, and very nice too. But I agree that the demographics of PB are fun - the most diverse arena tha tI know, bar none.
Actually Jezza is a member of the Labour party, the NEC restored the whip to him then Starmer had to personally withdraw the whip... and that perfectly planned stitch up where Starmer could feign innocence went out the window and Starmer had to take responsibility for his decision...
Don't listen to @Yorkcity -- I am very interested to hear your views. You (or anyone else) is welcome to "dominate the site all day" in his terminology.
In posting on pb.com, it is important to remember its peculiar demographics.
Oh yes, there is a good mix of red-blooded Socialists and Liberals here, but they enjoy their Sunday dinner with a Jereboam ... and not Jeremy.
It is often quite modest -- just Oysters Rockefeller to start, or a clear consomme, followed by Striploin Wagyu beef steak with a very good bottle & creme brulee to finish.
In fact, the site is at its most amusing when it functions as a fashion, drink and food blog -- bespoke tailoring, high-end restaurants & best apres-ski in Courchevel or Zermatt, etc.
In truth, the Tory/LibDem posters often start the discussion, but what passes for the Left usually joins in with gusto.
Er, speak for yourself. My Sunday dinner will be a mock-chicken masala and a Coke, while playing a computer game, and very nice too. But I agree that the demographics of PB are fun - the most diverse arena tha tI know, bar none.
We should still be looking to help out Ireland, as soon as we have the spare capacity. They are trundling along and will continue to represent a potential pool of mutation possibilities that can literally walk across the border. For public health reasons if nothing else, they are part of the UK's risk potential.
I am sure the media will manage to spin a negative story out of the success of the vaccine roll out.
Rowland Manthorpe on sky news was giving the good old British try yesterday claiming it wasn't working, because reduction in hospital admissions among the old compared to the rest hadn't come down more.
You don't need to be an expert to know 3 weeks min from vaccination to a starting to get protection and 3 weeks from getting infected to needing to go to hospital, so only those vaccinated prior to Christmas can be compared (which he wasn't doing).
What would you prefer?
Slavish adherence to Government propaganda - does the media no longer have the right to ask questions or to scrutinise or does it simply have to unfailingly accentuate the positive of a pro-Government position?
Great that 500k+ a day jabs is, we really need to push on. I would love to see the government with a new stretch target of 1 million a day capacity.
We will see that once we get second jabs going as well, I think the government has got it's attention on making sure they can run the second dose programme without slowing down first doses. That's the next big challenge, not doing an extra 50-60k per day right now. We can't be in a position where we slow down to a crawl for new first doses when the supply needs to be used for second doses. The 12 week policy has bought us enough time to allow the pharma industry to catch up to allow supply for a simultaneous programme but it won't allow us to do more than 500k per day of first and second doses each.
I am sure the media will manage to spin a negative story out of the success of the vaccine roll out.
Rowland Manthorpe on sky news was giving the good old British try yesterday claiming it wasn't working, because reduction in hospital admissions among the old compared to the rest hadn't come down more.
You don't need to be an expert to know 3 weeks min from vaccination to a starting to get protection and 3 weeks from getting infected to needing to go to hospital, so only those vaccinated prior to Christmas can be compared (which he wasn't doing).
What would you prefer?
Slavish adherence to Government propaganda - does the media no longer have the right to ask questions or to scrutinise or does it simply have to unfailingly accentuate the positive of a pro-Government position?
Journalists should at least try to understand what they are talking about, don't you think?
The eulogy you gave to Drakeford in November after his fire break, was quickly punctuated by most fatalities per 100,000 outside Belgium. So please don't tempt fate again.
It would be *bold* to declare any kind of victory when the majority of the population is still waiting.
The finish line is in sight IMO. It's a minor miracle that we're anywhere near this.
If the industry rumours are to be believed then AZ have continued to ramp up their UK production to a level that allows for second doses to be given without needing to slow down the first dose programme. Once we add in new vaccines from April we could be in a position to do 3-4m first doses per week as well as the 3m doses per week that we need for second doses.
Oh, I don't think a million doses a day is impossible. And the biggest impact on transmission will happen when we start vaccinating the 18 to 35 year old group.
Great that 500k+ a day jabs is, we really need to push on. I would love to see the government with a new stretch target of 1 million a day capacity.
Lets get loads of drive thru ones up.and running, as you should be able to jab tonnes of people that way.
Supply is the key thing. Both of vaccines and those needing it. I believe the first 1-4 target has put brakes on to some extent, so from next week many more arms will be available. We also will eventually get a much bigger supply, but just setting a target of 1 million a day is not the magic bullet.
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.
Why should I support the Conservative Party, when my family heritage is standing shoulder to shoulder with Jim Griffith's and the miners of East Carmarthenshire.
Jeremy Corbyn is not representative of the party of Keir Hardie, Bevan or Bevin. He is a man who conflates and confuses hostile military intervention against individual Palestinians on behalf of Netanyahu with a hatred of the both the State of Israel and Judaism. He is an idiot who took the Labour Party down a Soviet style blind alley. He no more represents working people than does Jacob Rees Mogg.
The Labour Party can only survive as a left of centre Social Democratic Coalition, and it is not there yet. Socialist Workers need not apply.
You told me to join the SWP, I am just sending you to your natural home of voting Tory.
My grandad was a South Wales Coal Miner, my other Grandad was a factory (and in the navy or merchant navy at some point, I rarely saw this guy TBH) worker in the midlands, my grandmothers did secretarial and other that sorta of low paid women's (at the time) work, I was raised by a single mother who worked in the NHS almost her entire life I grew up in my grandparents house (with my mum) a little terraced house in a poor part of south wales before moving to a slightly smaller terraced house in an even poorer rougher part of Wales.
I have more fucking Labour in the DNA of my little finger than you do in your entire pitiful existence, don't you dare question me Tory boy, Labour wasn't built to screw over the poor, however much you may have forgotten your heritage I have NOT!
Labour was not founded to support Apartheid, my grandparents (the mining one) Labour to their core were telling their kids decades and decades ago about Apartheid they wouldn't have not supported it against the Muslims anymore than they did the Black South Africans. Because they are proper Labour, it didn't matter if people claiming South Africa was our ally, Nelson Mandela is a communist, Nelson Mandela is a terrorist, they knew right from wrong.
If Corbyn didn't represent working people he would have had rich donors like Starmer telling him what to do, he wouldn't have turned the Labour party membership into a much poorer, younger one and he wouldn't have won with working voters in 2017.
It is retired people Corbyn doesn't represent, which TBH was the problem, if Corbyn didn't represent working people but instead represented retired (basically a 2017 reversal)people he would have won.
My paternal grandfather was a miner at Carway Colliery as were all his brothers and my paternal grandmother's brothers. My maternal grandmother's brothers were miners in the colliery between Burry Port and Pwll. My grandfather's working life was always as a coal miner except for working at the ROF in Pembrey during the war, which was equally dangerous. He retired from Cyneidre Colliery in 1966.
I don't want to appear like the Monty Python Yorkshiremen, trying to outdo your Labour Party credentials, but please don't tell me I am a liberal middle class Tory sell-out fraud.
A Labour Party in perpetual opposition, which would be the electoral outcome under a Corbynista programme for Government, is as much use as a chocolate teapot.
These “my dad is more socialist than your dad” type arguments are exactly the type of purity test that alienates so many from the left.
I do apologise. It is not normally something I would feel obliged to share. However I decided to put the Jezziah's accusation of my public-school Tory-boy status to the sword. My own upbringing I would have to concede was nonetheless very comfortable. Does that necessarily make me a Tory?
This can get overthunk imo. You're a Tory (and for that matter a Leaver) if you voted Tory at GE19. That's my start point. That's the default. It can be set aside on a case by case basis but only if there were extremely extenuating circumstances, e.g. you'd lost your glasses and couldn't see the ballot paper properly.
That looks like a crude oversimplification. Are there really 13,966,451 Tories in the UK?
Yes. And it's not crude - it's a bullshit strainer.
It's extremely silly. Labour isn't entitled to take the loyalty of its voters for granted.
How am I saying that?
The voters change sides, they get written off as "Tories," which is evidently a form of insult. The Lab-Con defectors aren't all Tories, they're people who have given up on Labour. That's not the same thing at all.
Quite so
And as explained that's not where I'm coming from. Just that it's useful (imo) to take the subjectivity out of "who is a Tory?" Then you escape so much nonsense. A Tory is a Tory voter and a Tory voter is a Tory. It's a perfect one to one exclusive and inclusive correlation.
But it's not the end of the analysis. Of course it isn't. Since there are 5 types:
The Habitual Tory: Self explanatory. Don't even think about it. The Committed Tory: Believe in their values and policies. The Passionate Tory: As above but with added key ingredient. HATE the left. The Reluctant Tory: Would love to not do it but consider TINA. The Accidental Tory: Misunderstand the offering. Suckers.
There were 13m or so in aggregate last time. Labour's mission under Starmer is to get that right down by 2024.
The last 2 categories of Tories are the Tories in play.
We should still be looking to help out Ireland, as soon as we have the spare capacity. They are trundling along and will continue to represent a potential pool of mutation possibilities that can literally walk across the border. For public health reasons if nothing else, they are part of the UK's risk potential.
We won't be in a position to help Ireland for some time, and I think it unlikely that they would accept even if we did.
Meanwhile, in Rookworld, Mum (cohort 5) had her first jab today, so that's all the olds in the immediate family done.
Back of a fag packet calculation suggests that about 27% of the adult population has now been vaccinated.
It would be *bold* to declare any kind of victory when the majority of the population is still waiting.
The finish line is in sight IMO. It's a minor miracle that we're anywhere near this.
If the industry rumours are to be believed then AZ have continued to ramp up their UK production to a level that allows for second doses to be given without needing to slow down the first dose programme. Once we add in new vaccines from April we could be in a position to do 3-4m first doses per week as well as the 3m doses per week that we need for second doses.
Oh, I don't think a million doses a day is impossible. And the biggest impact on transmission will happen when we start vaccinating the 18 to 35 year old group.
Half a million people fully vaccinated: just four serious cases and no deaths.
And remember, Israel isn't immune to mutations from South Africa or Brazil or wherever. It's unequivocally good news.
Yes, it's definitely not impossible, I think what we need to be aiming for is 500k first doses per day constant and whatever we need for second doses without any slowdown.
I am sure the media will manage to spin a negative story out of the success of the vaccine roll out.
Rowland Manthorpe on sky news was giving the good old British try yesterday claiming it wasn't working, because reduction in hospital admissions among the old compared to the rest hadn't come down more.
You don't need to be an expert to know 3 weeks min from vaccination to a starting to get protection and 3 weeks from getting infected to needing to go to hospital, so only those vaccinated prior to Christmas can be compared (which he wasn't doing).
What would you prefer?
Slavish adherence to Government propaganda - does the media no longer have the right to ask questions or to scrutinise or does it simply have to unfailingly accentuate the positive of a pro-Government position?
Journalists should at least try to understand what they are talking about, don't you think?
They know a lot about summer holidays, which is what they’ve mostly been talking about for the past few days.
It would be *bold* to declare any kind of victory when the majority of the population is still waiting.
The finish line is in sight IMO. It's a minor miracle that we're anywhere near this.
If the industry rumours are to be believed then AZ have continued to ramp up their UK production to a level that allows for second doses to be given without needing to slow down the first dose programme. Once we add in new vaccines from April we could be in a position to do 3-4m first doses per week as well as the 3m doses per week that we need for second doses.
Oh, I don't think a million doses a day is impossible. And the biggest impact on transmission will happen when we start vaccinating the 18 to 35 year old group.
Half a million people fully vaccinated: just four serious cases and no deaths.
And remember, Israel isn't immune to mutations from South Africa or Brazil or wherever. It's unequivocally good news.
I’ve become quite the amateur epidemiologist and immunologist these last few months. In my self proclaimed gentleman amateur status I am very encouraged by the T-Cell responses to even the SA variant shown by both Pfizer and AZN. Yes, people become reinfected, but it matters little if the immune system can target and eliminate the virus quickly.
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.
Why should I support the Conservative Party, when my family heritage is standing shoulder to shoulder with Jim Griffith's and the miners of East Carmarthenshire.
Jeremy Corbyn is not representative of the party of Keir Hardie, Bevan or Bevin. He is a man who conflates and confuses hostile military intervention against individual Palestinians on behalf of Netanyahu with a hatred of the both the State of Israel and Judaism. He is an idiot who took the Labour Party down a Soviet style blind alley. He no more represents working people than does Jacob Rees Mogg.
The Labour Party can only survive as a left of centre Social Democratic Coalition, and it is not there yet. Socialist Workers need not apply.
You told me to join the SWP, I am just sending you to your natural home of voting Tory.
My grandad was a South Wales Coal Miner, my other Grandad was a factory (and in the navy or merchant navy at some point, I rarely saw this guy TBH) worker in the midlands, my grandmothers did secretarial and other that sorta of low paid women's (at the time) work, I was raised by a single mother who worked in the NHS almost her entire life I grew up in my grandparents house (with my mum) a little terraced house in a poor part of south wales before moving to a slightly smaller terraced house in an even poorer rougher part of Wales.
I have more fucking Labour in the DNA of my little finger than you do in your entire pitiful existence, don't you dare question me Tory boy, Labour wasn't built to screw over the poor, however much you may have forgotten your heritage I have NOT!
Labour was not founded to support Apartheid, my grandparents (the mining one) Labour to their core were telling their kids decades and decades ago about Apartheid they wouldn't have not supported it against the Muslims anymore than they did the Black South Africans. Because they are proper Labour, it didn't matter if people claiming South Africa was our ally, Nelson Mandela is a communist, Nelson Mandela is a terrorist, they knew right from wrong.
If Corbyn didn't represent working people he would have had rich donors like Starmer telling him what to do, he wouldn't have turned the Labour party membership into a much poorer, younger one and he wouldn't have won with working voters in 2017.
It is retired people Corbyn doesn't represent, which TBH was the problem, if Corbyn didn't represent working people but instead represented retired (basically a 2017 reversal)people he would have won.
My paternal grandfather was a miner at Carway Colliery as were all his brothers and my paternal grandmother's brothers. My maternal grandmother's brothers were miners in the colliery between Burry Port and Pwll. My grandfather's working life was always as a coal miner except for working at the ROF in Pembrey during the war, which was equally dangerous. He retired from Cyneidre Colliery in 1966.
I don't want to appear like the Monty Python Yorkshiremen, trying to outdo your Labour Party credentials, but please don't tell me I am a liberal middle class Tory sell-out fraud.
A Labour Party in perpetual opposition, which would be the electoral outcome under a Corbynista programme for Government, is as much use as a chocolate teapot.
These “my dad is more socialist than your dad” type arguments are exactly the type of purity test that alienates so many from the left.
I do apologise. It is not normally something I would feel obliged to share. However I decided to put the Jezziah's accusation of my public-school Tory-boy status to the sword. My own upbringing I would have to concede was nonetheless very comfortable. Does that necessarily make me a Tory?
This can get overthunk imo. You're a Tory (and for that matter a Leaver) if you voted Tory at GE19. That's my start point. That's the default. It can be set aside on a case by case basis but only if there were extremely extenuating circumstances, e.g. you'd lost your glasses and couldn't see the ballot paper properly.
That looks like a crude oversimplification. Are there really 13,966,451 Tories in the UK?
Yes. And it's not crude - it's a bullshit strainer.
It's extremely silly. Labour isn't entitled to take the loyalty of its voters for granted.
How am I saying that?
The voters change sides, they get written off as "Tories," which is evidently a form of insult. The Lab-Con defectors aren't all Tories, they're people who have given up on Labour. That's not the same thing at all.
Quite so
And as explained that's not where I'm coming from. Just that it's useful (imo) to take the subjectivity out of "who is a Tory?" Then you escape so much nonsense. A Tory is a Tory voter and a Tory voter is a Tory. It's a perfect one to one exclusive and inclusive correlation.
But it's not the end of the analysis. Of course it isn't. Since there are 5 types:
The Habitual Tory: Self explanatory. Don't even think about it. The Committed Tory: Believe in their values and policies. The Passionate Tory: As above but with added key ingredient. HATE the left. The Reluctant Tory: Would love to not do it but consider TINA. The Accidental Tory: Misunderstand the offering. Suckers.
There were 13m or so in aggregate last time. Labour's mission under Starmer is to get that right down by 2024.
The last 2 categories of Tories are the Tories in play.
'The Passionate Tory' would be a great title for a blue movie.
We should still be looking to help out Ireland, as soon as we have the spare capacity. They are trundling along and will continue to represent a potential pool of mutation possibilities that can literally walk across the border. For public health reasons if nothing else, they are part of the UK's risk potential.
It would be *bold* to declare any kind of victory when the majority of the population is still waiting.
The finish line is in sight IMO. It's a minor miracle that we're anywhere near this.
If the industry rumours are to be believed then AZ have continued to ramp up their UK production to a level that allows for second doses to be given without needing to slow down the first dose programme. Once we add in new vaccines from April we could be in a position to do 3-4m first doses per week as well as the 3m doses per week that we need for second doses.
It's unequivocally good news.
Doubtless why we haven't seen Sean around here for a while?
It would be *bold* to declare any kind of victory when the majority of the population is still waiting.
The finish line is in sight IMO. It's a minor miracle that we're anywhere near this.
If the industry rumours are to be believed then AZ have continued to ramp up their UK production to a level that allows for second doses to be given without needing to slow down the first dose programme. Once we add in new vaccines from April we could be in a position to do 3-4m first doses per week as well as the 3m doses per week that we need for second doses.
Oh, I don't think a million doses a day is impossible. And the biggest impact on transmission will happen when we start vaccinating the 18 to 35 year old group.
Half a million people fully vaccinated: just four serious cases and no deaths.
And remember, Israel isn't immune to mutations from South Africa or Brazil or wherever. It's unequivocally good news.
I’ve become quite the amateur epidemiologist and immunologist these last few months. In my self proclaimed gentleman amateur status I am very encouraged by the T-Cell responses to even the SA variant shown by both Pfizer and AZN. Yes, people become reinfected, but it matters little if the immune system can target and eliminate the virus quickly.
The paranoia over the SA strain seems overblown. The first red flag was our very own erotic flintknapper wailing about it in the week. This week a comment of mine suggesting we can cope with people getting mild infections was described as 'moronic' by another poster. Meanwhile, like you I've been looking at the data and been reassured.
So, last night we were out at dinner (outside) with friends, and they told us they were heading off to Israel for a friend's wedding in a couple of months.
I expressed surprise that (a) they were travelling, and (b) that Israel was allowing tourism.
They pointed out that they were vaccinated (although, not their son), and that Israel was full of vaccinated people. Which was fair enough.
This morning, I went to the Israeli government page on travel.
All entry to foreign citizens, it says, is prohibited unless you belong to an exempt category.
1. Married to a Israeli or permanent resident. Fair enough. 2. Parent or child of ditto. OK. 3. Visa holder. Right. 4. Diplomat. Yep.
5. Going to a wedding. WTF? 6. Going to a Bar/Bat Mitzvah. Aarrrggh.
It seems like you're only allowed into Israel if you are actually planning on going to a superspreader event.
It would be *bold* to declare any kind of victory when the majority of the population is still waiting.
The finish line is in sight IMO. It's a minor miracle that we're anywhere near this.
If the industry rumours are to be believed then AZ have continued to ramp up their UK production to a level that allows for second doses to be given without needing to slow down the first dose programme. Once we add in new vaccines from April we could be in a position to do 3-4m first doses per week as well as the 3m doses per week that we need for second doses.
Oh, I don't think a million doses a day is impossible. And the biggest impact on transmission will happen when we start vaccinating the 18 to 35 year old group.
Half a million people fully vaccinated: just four serious cases and no deaths.
And remember, Israel isn't immune to mutations from South Africa or Brazil or wherever. It's unequivocally good news.
I’ve become quite the amateur epidemiologist and immunologist these last few months. In my self proclaimed gentleman amateur status I am very encouraged by the T-Cell responses to even the SA variant shown by both Pfizer and AZN. Yes, people become reinfected, but it matters little if the immune system can target and eliminate the virus quickly.
The paranoia over the SA strain seems overblown. The first red flag was our very own erotic flintknapper wailing about it in the week. This week a comment of mine suggesting we can cope with people getting mild infections was described as 'moronic' by another poster. Meanwhile, like you I've been looking at the data and been reassured.
I’ve often wondered whether the erotic flintknapper has another job on the side. Some sort of writer perhaps, maybe he enjoys writing that enhances tension, thrillers perhaps? 🤔
It would be *bold* to declare any kind of victory when the majority of the population is still waiting.
The finish line is in sight IMO. It's a minor miracle that we're anywhere near this.
If the industry rumours are to be believed then AZ have continued to ramp up their UK production to a level that allows for second doses to be given without needing to slow down the first dose programme. Once we add in new vaccines from April we could be in a position to do 3-4m first doses per week as well as the 3m doses per week that we need for second doses.
Oh, I don't think a million doses a day is impossible. And the biggest impact on transmission will happen when we start vaccinating the 18 to 35 year old group.
Half a million people fully vaccinated: just four serious cases and no deaths.
And remember, Israel isn't immune to mutations from South Africa or Brazil or wherever. It's unequivocally good news.
I’ve become quite the amateur epidemiologist and immunologist these last few months. In my self proclaimed gentleman amateur status I am very encouraged by the T-Cell responses to even the SA variant shown by both Pfizer and AZN. Yes, people become reinfected, but it matters little if the immune system can target and eliminate the virus quickly.
The paranoia over the SA strain seems overblown. The first red flag was our very own erotic flintknapper wailing about it in the week. This week a comment of mine suggesting we can cope with people getting mild infections was described as 'moronic' by another poster. Meanwhile, like you I've been looking at the data and been reassured.
I’ve often wondered whether the erotic flintknapper has another job on the side. Some sort of writer perhaps, maybe he enjoys writing that enhances tension, thrillers perhaps? 🤔
His prose is certainly very impressive. Some enterprising editor should make contact and suggest he write reviews, perhaps of holiday destinations?
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.
Why should I support the Conservative Party, when my family heritage is standing shoulder to shoulder with Jim Griffith's and the miners of East Carmarthenshire.
Jeremy Corbyn is not representative of the party of Keir Hardie, Bevan or Bevin. He is a man who conflates and confuses hostile military intervention against individual Palestinians on behalf of Netanyahu with a hatred of the both the State of Israel and Judaism. He is an idiot who took the Labour Party down a Soviet style blind alley. He no more represents working people than does Jacob Rees Mogg.
The Labour Party can only survive as a left of centre Social Democratic Coalition, and it is not there yet. Socialist Workers need not apply.
You told me to join the SWP, I am just sending you to your natural home of voting Tory.
My grandad was a South Wales Coal Miner, my other Grandad was a factory (and in the navy or merchant navy at some point, I rarely saw this guy TBH) worker in the midlands, my grandmothers did secretarial and other that sorta of low paid women's (at the time) work, I was raised by a single mother who worked in the NHS almost her entire life I grew up in my grandparents house (with my mum) a little terraced house in a poor part of south wales before moving to a slightly smaller terraced house in an even poorer rougher part of Wales.
I have more fucking Labour in the DNA of my little finger than you do in your entire pitiful existence, don't you dare question me Tory boy, Labour wasn't built to screw over the poor, however much you may have forgotten your heritage I have NOT!
Labour was not founded to support Apartheid, my grandparents (the mining one) Labour to their core were telling their kids decades and decades ago about Apartheid they wouldn't have not supported it against the Muslims anymore than they did the Black South Africans. Because they are proper Labour, it didn't matter if people claiming South Africa was our ally, Nelson Mandela is a communist, Nelson Mandela is a terrorist, they knew right from wrong.
If Corbyn didn't represent working people he would have had rich donors like Starmer telling him what to do, he wouldn't have turned the Labour party membership into a much poorer, younger one and he wouldn't have won with working voters in 2017.
It is retired people Corbyn doesn't represent, which TBH was the problem, if Corbyn didn't represent working people but instead represented retired (basically a 2017 reversal)people he would have won.
My paternal grandfather was a miner at Carway Colliery as were all his brothers and my paternal grandmother's brothers. My maternal grandmother's brothers were miners in the colliery between Burry Port and Pwll. My grandfather's working life was always as a coal miner except for working at the ROF in Pembrey during the war, which was equally dangerous. He retired from Cyneidre Colliery in 1966.
I don't want to appear like the Monty Python Yorkshiremen, trying to outdo your Labour Party credentials, but please don't tell me I am a liberal middle class Tory sell-out fraud.
A Labour Party in perpetual opposition, which would be the electoral outcome under a Corbynista programme for Government, is as much use as a chocolate teapot.
These “my dad is more socialist than your dad” type arguments are exactly the type of purity test that alienates so many from the left.
I do apologise. It is not normally something I would feel obliged to share. However I decided to put the Jezziah's accusation of my public-school Tory-boy status to the sword. My own upbringing I would have to concede was nonetheless very comfortable. Does that necessarily make me a Tory?
This can get overthunk imo. You're a Tory (and for that matter a Leaver) if you voted Tory at GE19. That's my start point. That's the default. It can be set aside on a case by case basis but only if there were extremely extenuating circumstances, e.g. you'd lost your glasses and couldn't see the ballot paper properly.
That looks like a crude oversimplification. Are there really 13,966,451 Tories in the UK?
Yes. And it's not crude - it's a bullshit strainer.
It's extremely silly. Labour isn't entitled to take the loyalty of its voters for granted.
How am I saying that?
The voters change sides, they get written off as "Tories," which is evidently a form of insult. The Lab-Con defectors aren't all Tories, they're people who have given up on Labour. That's not the same thing at all.
Quite so
And as explained that's not where I'm coming from. Just that it's useful (imo) to take the subjectivity out of "who is a Tory?" Then you escape so much nonsense. A Tory is a Tory voter and a Tory voter is a Tory. It's a perfect one to one exclusive and inclusive correlation.
But it's not the end of the analysis. Of course it isn't. Since there are 5 types:
The Habitual Tory: Self explanatory. Don't even think about it. The Committed Tory: Believe in their values and policies. The Passionate Tory: As above but with added key ingredient. HATE the left. The Reluctant Tory: Would love to not do it but consider TINA. The Accidental Tory: Misunderstand the offering. Suckers.
There were 13m or so in aggregate last time. Labour's mission under Starmer is to get that right down by 2024.
The last 2 categories of Tories are the Tories in play.
In contrast to you earlier claims I would suggest there is also a small group of occasional Tories. They would not usually claim to vote for any party but will consider any of them if their policies at the time align. I would consider myself in that grouping although I haven't voted Tory since 2001 and before that 1987.
Such occasional Tories could equally qualify as Occasional Labour or Occasional Lib Dems.
So, last night we were out at dinner (outside) with friends, and they told us they were heading off to Israel for a friend's wedding in a couple of months.
I expressed surprise that (a) they were travelling, and (b) that Israel was allowing tourism.
They pointed out that they were vaccinated (although, not their son), and that Israel was full of vaccinated people. Which was fair enough.
This morning, I went to the Israeli government page on travel.
All entry to foreign citizens, it says, is prohibited unless you belong to an exempt category.
1. Married to a Israeli or permanent resident. Fair enough. 2. Parent or child of ditto. OK. 3. Visa holder. Right. 4. Diplomat. Yep.
5. Going to a wedding. WTF? 6. Going to a Bar/Bat Mitzvah. Aarrrggh.
It seems like you're only allowed into Israel if you are actually planning on going to a superspreader event.
The Ultra Orthodox Jews are adamant that nothing will stop their religious events, and if Covid-19 kills them then that is Yahweh's will.
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.
Why should I support the Conservative Party, when my family heritage is standing shoulder to shoulder with Jim Griffith's and the miners of East Carmarthenshire.
Jeremy Corbyn is not representative of the party of Keir Hardie, Bevan or Bevin. He is a man who conflates and confuses hostile military intervention against individual Palestinians on behalf of Netanyahu with a hatred of the both the State of Israel and Judaism. He is an idiot who took the Labour Party down a Soviet style blind alley. He no more represents working people than does Jacob Rees Mogg.
The Labour Party can only survive as a left of centre Social Democratic Coalition, and it is not there yet. Socialist Workers need not apply.
You told me to join the SWP, I am just sending you to your natural home of voting Tory.
My grandad was a South Wales Coal Miner, my other Grandad was a factory (and in the navy or merchant navy at some point, I rarely saw this guy TBH) worker in the midlands, my grandmothers did secretarial and other that sorta of low paid women's (at the time) work, I was raised by a single mother who worked in the NHS almost her entire life I grew up in my grandparents house (with my mum) a little terraced house in a poor part of south wales before moving to a slightly smaller terraced house in an even poorer rougher part of Wales.
I have more fucking Labour in the DNA of my little finger than you do in your entire pitiful existence, don't you dare question me Tory boy, Labour wasn't built to screw over the poor, however much you may have forgotten your heritage I have NOT!
Labour was not founded to support Apartheid, my grandparents (the mining one) Labour to their core were telling their kids decades and decades ago about Apartheid they wouldn't have not supported it against the Muslims anymore than they did the Black South Africans. Because they are proper Labour, it didn't matter if people claiming South Africa was our ally, Nelson Mandela is a communist, Nelson Mandela is a terrorist, they knew right from wrong.
If Corbyn didn't represent working people he would have had rich donors like Starmer telling him what to do, he wouldn't have turned the Labour party membership into a much poorer, younger one and he wouldn't have won with working voters in 2017.
It is retired people Corbyn doesn't represent, which TBH was the problem, if Corbyn didn't represent working people but instead represented retired (basically a 2017 reversal)people he would have won.
My paternal grandfather was a miner at Carway Colliery as were all his brothers and my paternal grandmother's brothers. My maternal grandmother's brothers were miners in the colliery between Burry Port and Pwll. My grandfather's working life was always as a coal miner except for working at the ROF in Pembrey during the war, which was equally dangerous. He retired from Cyneidre Colliery in 1966.
I don't want to appear like the Monty Python Yorkshiremen, trying to outdo your Labour Party credentials, but please don't tell me I am a liberal middle class Tory sell-out fraud.
A Labour Party in perpetual opposition, which would be the electoral outcome under a Corbynista programme for Government, is as much use as a chocolate teapot.
These “my dad is more socialist than your dad” type arguments are exactly the type of purity test that alienates so many from the left.
I do apologise. It is not normally something I would feel obliged to share. However I decided to put the Jezziah's accusation of my public-school Tory-boy status to the sword. My own upbringing I would have to concede was nonetheless very comfortable. Does that necessarily make me a Tory?
This can get overthunk imo. You're a Tory (and for that matter a Leaver) if you voted Tory at GE19. That's my start point. That's the default. It can be set aside on a case by case basis but only if there were extremely extenuating circumstances, e.g. you'd lost your glasses and couldn't see the ballot paper properly.
That looks like a crude oversimplification. Are there really 13,966,451 Tories in the UK?
Yes. And it's not crude - it's a bullshit strainer.
It's extremely silly. Labour isn't entitled to take the loyalty of its voters for granted.
How am I saying that?
The voters change sides, they get written off as "Tories," which is evidently a form of insult. The Lab-Con defectors aren't all Tories, they're people who have given up on Labour. That's not the same thing at all.
Quite so
And as explained that's not where I'm coming from. Just that it's useful (imo) to take the subjectivity out of "who is a Tory?" Then you escape so much nonsense. A Tory is a Tory voter and a Tory voter is a Tory. It's a perfect one to one exclusive and inclusive correlation.
But it's not the end of the analysis. Of course it isn't. Since there are 5 types:
The Habitual Tory: Self explanatory. Don't even think about it. The Committed Tory: Believe in their values and policies. The Passionate Tory: As above but with added key ingredient. HATE the left. The Reluctant Tory: Would love to not do it but consider TINA. The Accidental Tory: Misunderstand the offering. Suckers.
There were 13m or so in aggregate last time. Labour's mission under Starmer is to get that right down by 2024.
The last 2 categories of Tories are the Tories in play.
[Raises hand nervously]
What about... Instinctively Tory (but I hope of a genial, One Nation type, voted for Howard wouldn't have voted for IDS- that's where my personal elastic snaps)... who simply couldn't vote for Johnson, because he is too ghastly? Not fundamentally because of you-know-what, but more the refusal to apologise for anything, "vote against us in 2024 if you don't like it, until then suck it up you sucker" vibe?
Politico.com - House Republican pleads for Pence, Trump aides to speak out on Jan. 6 insurrection "If you have something to add here, now would be the time," Herrera Beutler (R-Wash.) wrote in a statement released late Friday.
Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler, one of 10 House Republicans to support Donald Trump's impeachment for inciting the Capitol insurrection, pleaded with those close to the former president — and former vice president Mike Pence — to come forward and reveal what they know about Trump's conduct.
"To the patriots who were standing next to the former president as these conversations were happening, or even to the former Vice President: if you have something to add here, now would be the time," Herrera Beutler (R-Wash.) wrote in a statement released late Friday, on the eve of what is expected to be the Senate's final vote in Trump's impeachment trial.
Herrera Beutler issued the statement amid a new wave of attention on a story she has been telling since last month: that House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy relayed details of a phone call he had with Trump while the violent mob was ransacking the Capitol.
In Herrera Beutler's telling, McCarthy urged Trump to call off the mob, to which Trump initially responded that he couldn't because it was made up of left-wing extremists — a falsehood that has been debunked by federal investigators.
When McCarthy refuted Trump, the former president responded, "Well, Kevin, I guess these people are more upset about the election than you are," according to Herrera-Beutler.
Addendum - yours truly worked in 2018 and 2020 on behalf of Congresswoman Herrera-Beutler's Democratic challenger. She's a conservative and an evangelical, but (unfortunately for her opponent) NOT a right-wing wing-nut.
She's sure enough proved THAT in the past month.
IF there is any Republican who deserves to be included in a 21st-century re-write of "Profiles in Courage" by JFK, it is surely JHB.
She makes me proud to be a Washingtonian, and an American.
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.
Why should I support the Conservative Party, when my family heritage is standing shoulder to shoulder with Jim Griffith's and the miners of East Carmarthenshire.
Jeremy Corbyn is not representative of the party of Keir Hardie, Bevan or Bevin. He is a man who conflates and confuses hostile military intervention against individual Palestinians on behalf of Netanyahu with a hatred of the both the State of Israel and Judaism. He is an idiot who took the Labour Party down a Soviet style blind alley. He no more represents working people than does Jacob Rees Mogg.
The Labour Party can only survive as a left of centre Social Democratic Coalition, and it is not there yet. Socialist Workers need not apply.
You told me to join the SWP, I am just sending you to your natural home of voting Tory.
My grandad was a South Wales Coal Miner, my other Grandad was a factory (and in the navy or merchant navy at some point, I rarely saw this guy TBH) worker in the midlands, my grandmothers did secretarial and other that sorta of low paid women's (at the time) work, I was raised by a single mother who worked in the NHS almost her entire life I grew up in my grandparents house (with my mum) a little terraced house in a poor part of south wales before moving to a slightly smaller terraced house in an even poorer rougher part of Wales.
I have more fucking Labour in the DNA of my little finger than you do in your entire pitiful existence, don't you dare question me Tory boy, Labour wasn't built to screw over the poor, however much you may have forgotten your heritage I have NOT!
Labour was not founded to support Apartheid, my grandparents (the mining one) Labour to their core were telling their kids decades and decades ago about Apartheid they wouldn't have not supported it against the Muslims anymore than they did the Black South Africans. Because they are proper Labour, it didn't matter if people claiming South Africa was our ally, Nelson Mandela is a communist, Nelson Mandela is a terrorist, they knew right from wrong.
If Corbyn didn't represent working people he would have had rich donors like Starmer telling him what to do, he wouldn't have turned the Labour party membership into a much poorer, younger one and he wouldn't have won with working voters in 2017.
It is retired people Corbyn doesn't represent, which TBH was the problem, if Corbyn didn't represent working people but instead represented retired (basically a 2017 reversal)people he would have won.
My paternal grandfather was a miner at Carway Colliery as were all his brothers and my paternal grandmother's brothers. My maternal grandmother's brothers were miners in the colliery between Burry Port and Pwll. My grandfather's working life was always as a coal miner except for working at the ROF in Pembrey during the war, which was equally dangerous. He retired from Cyneidre Colliery in 1966.
I don't want to appear like the Monty Python Yorkshiremen, trying to outdo your Labour Party credentials, but please don't tell me I am a liberal middle class Tory sell-out fraud.
A Labour Party in perpetual opposition, which would be the electoral outcome under a Corbynista programme for Government, is as much use as a chocolate teapot.
These “my dad is more socialist than your dad” type arguments are exactly the type of purity test that alienates so many from the left.
I do apologise. It is not normally something I would feel obliged to share. However I decided to put the Jezziah's accusation of my public-school Tory-boy status to the sword. My own upbringing I would have to concede was nonetheless very comfortable. Does that necessarily make me a Tory?
This can get overthunk imo. You're a Tory (and for that matter a Leaver) if you voted Tory at GE19. That's my start point. That's the default. It can be set aside on a case by case basis but only if there were extremely extenuating circumstances, e.g. you'd lost your glasses and couldn't see the ballot paper properly.
That looks like a crude oversimplification. Are there really 13,966,451 Tories in the UK?
Yes. And it's not crude - it's a bullshit strainer.
It's extremely silly. Labour isn't entitled to take the loyalty of its voters for granted.
How am I saying that?
The voters change sides, they get written off as "Tories," which is evidently a form of insult. The Lab-Con defectors aren't all Tories, they're people who have given up on Labour. That's not the same thing at all.
Quite so
And as explained that's not where I'm coming from. Just that it's useful (imo) to take the subjectivity out of "who is a Tory?" Then you escape so much nonsense. A Tory is a Tory voter and a Tory voter is a Tory. It's a perfect one to one exclusive and inclusive correlation.
But it's not the end of the analysis. Of course it isn't. Since there are 5 types:
The Habitual Tory: Self explanatory. Don't even think about it. The Committed Tory: Believe in their values and policies. The Passionate Tory: As above but with added key ingredient. HATE the left. The Reluctant Tory: Would love to not do it but consider TINA. The Accidental Tory: Misunderstand the offering. Suckers.
There were 13m or so in aggregate last time. Labour's mission under Starmer is to get that right down by 2024.
The last 2 categories of Tories are the Tories in play.
In contrast to you earlier claims I would suggest there is also a small group of occasional Tories. They would not usually claim to vote for any party but will consider any of them if their policies at the time align. I would consider myself in that grouping although I haven't voted Tory since 2001 and before that 1987.
Such occasional Tories could equally qualify as Occasional Labour or Occasional Lib Dems.
Yes. But per my model such an Occasional Tory only becomes an actual Tory - their Toryness crystalising if you will - when they vote Tory and at that point they will fit one of my categories, namely Reluctant or Accidental.
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.
Why should I support the Conservative Party, when my family heritage is standing shoulder to shoulder with Jim Griffith's and the miners of East Carmarthenshire.
Jeremy Corbyn is not representative of the party of Keir Hardie, Bevan or Bevin. He is a man who conflates and confuses hostile military intervention against individual Palestinians on behalf of Netanyahu with a hatred of the both the State of Israel and Judaism. He is an idiot who took the Labour Party down a Soviet style blind alley. He no more represents working people than does Jacob Rees Mogg.
The Labour Party can only survive as a left of centre Social Democratic Coalition, and it is not there yet. Socialist Workers need not apply.
You told me to join the SWP, I am just sending you to your natural home of voting Tory.
My grandad was a South Wales Coal Miner, my other Grandad was a factory (and in the navy or merchant navy at some point, I rarely saw this guy TBH) worker in the midlands, my grandmothers did secretarial and other that sorta of low paid women's (at the time) work, I was raised by a single mother who worked in the NHS almost her entire life I grew up in my grandparents house (with my mum) a little terraced house in a poor part of south wales before moving to a slightly smaller terraced house in an even poorer rougher part of Wales.
I have more fucking Labour in the DNA of my little finger than you do in your entire pitiful existence, don't you dare question me Tory boy, Labour wasn't built to screw over the poor, however much you may have forgotten your heritage I have NOT!
Labour was not founded to support Apartheid, my grandparents (the mining one) Labour to their core were telling their kids decades and decades ago about Apartheid they wouldn't have not supported it against the Muslims anymore than they did the Black South Africans. Because they are proper Labour, it didn't matter if people claiming South Africa was our ally, Nelson Mandela is a communist, Nelson Mandela is a terrorist, they knew right from wrong.
If Corbyn didn't represent working people he would have had rich donors like Starmer telling him what to do, he wouldn't have turned the Labour party membership into a much poorer, younger one and he wouldn't have won with working voters in 2017.
It is retired people Corbyn doesn't represent, which TBH was the problem, if Corbyn didn't represent working people but instead represented retired (basically a 2017 reversal)people he would have won.
My paternal grandfather was a miner at Carway Colliery as were all his brothers and my paternal grandmother's brothers. My maternal grandmother's brothers were miners in the colliery between Burry Port and Pwll. My grandfather's working life was always as a coal miner except for working at the ROF in Pembrey during the war, which was equally dangerous. He retired from Cyneidre Colliery in 1966.
I don't want to appear like the Monty Python Yorkshiremen, trying to outdo your Labour Party credentials, but please don't tell me I am a liberal middle class Tory sell-out fraud.
A Labour Party in perpetual opposition, which would be the electoral outcome under a Corbynista programme for Government, is as much use as a chocolate teapot.
These “my dad is more socialist than your dad” type arguments are exactly the type of purity test that alienates so many from the left.
I do apologise. It is not normally something I would feel obliged to share. However I decided to put the Jezziah's accusation of my public-school Tory-boy status to the sword. My own upbringing I would have to concede was nonetheless very comfortable. Does that necessarily make me a Tory?
This can get overthunk imo. You're a Tory (and for that matter a Leaver) if you voted Tory at GE19. That's my start point. That's the default. It can be set aside on a case by case basis but only if there were extremely extenuating circumstances, e.g. you'd lost your glasses and couldn't see the ballot paper properly.
That looks like a crude oversimplification. Are there really 13,966,451 Tories in the UK?
Yes. And it's not crude - it's a bullshit strainer.
It's extremely silly. Labour isn't entitled to take the loyalty of its voters for granted.
How am I saying that?
The voters change sides, they get written off as "Tories," which is evidently a form of insult. The Lab-Con defectors aren't all Tories, they're people who have given up on Labour. That's not the same thing at all.
Quite so
And as explained that's not where I'm coming from. Just that it's useful (imo) to take the subjectivity out of "who is a Tory?" Then you escape so much nonsense. A Tory is a Tory voter and a Tory voter is a Tory. It's a perfect one to one exclusive and inclusive correlation.
But it's not the end of the analysis. Of course it isn't. Since there are 5 types:
The Habitual Tory: Self explanatory. Don't even think about it. The Committed Tory: Believe in their values and policies. The Passionate Tory: As above but with added key ingredient. HATE the left. The Reluctant Tory: Would love to not do it but consider TINA. The Accidental Tory: Misunderstand the offering. Suckers.
There were 13m or so in aggregate last time. Labour's mission under Starmer is to get that right down by 2024.
The last 2 categories of Tories are the Tories in play.
[Raises hand nervously]
What about... Instinctively Tory (but I hope of a genial, One Nation type, voted for Howard wouldn't have voted for IDS- that's where my personal elastic snaps)... who simply couldn't vote for Johnson, because he is too ghastly? Not fundamentally because of you-know-what, but more the refusal to apologise for anything, "vote against us in 2024 if you don't like it, until then suck it up you sucker" vibe?
So that's easy. You didn’t vote Tory. You are ergo not a Tory.
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.
Why should I support the Conservative Party, when my family heritage is standing shoulder to shoulder with Jim Griffith's and the miners of East Carmarthenshire.
Jeremy Corbyn is not representative of the party of Keir Hardie, Bevan or Bevin. He is a man who conflates and confuses hostile military intervention against individual Palestinians on behalf of Netanyahu with a hatred of the both the State of Israel and Judaism. He is an idiot who took the Labour Party down a Soviet style blind alley. He no more represents working people than does Jacob Rees Mogg.
The Labour Party can only survive as a left of centre Social Democratic Coalition, and it is not there yet. Socialist Workers need not apply.
You told me to join the SWP, I am just sending you to your natural home of voting Tory.
My grandad was a South Wales Coal Miner, my other Grandad was a factory (and in the navy or merchant navy at some point, I rarely saw this guy TBH) worker in the midlands, my grandmothers did secretarial and other that sorta of low paid women's (at the time) work, I was raised by a single mother who worked in the NHS almost her entire life I grew up in my grandparents house (with my mum) a little terraced house in a poor part of south wales before moving to a slightly smaller terraced house in an even poorer rougher part of Wales.
I have more fucking Labour in the DNA of my little finger than you do in your entire pitiful existence, don't you dare question me Tory boy, Labour wasn't built to screw over the poor, however much you may have forgotten your heritage I have NOT!
Labour was not founded to support Apartheid, my grandparents (the mining one) Labour to their core were telling their kids decades and decades ago about Apartheid they wouldn't have not supported it against the Muslims anymore than they did the Black South Africans. Because they are proper Labour, it didn't matter if people claiming South Africa was our ally, Nelson Mandela is a communist, Nelson Mandela is a terrorist, they knew right from wrong.
If Corbyn didn't represent working people he would have had rich donors like Starmer telling him what to do, he wouldn't have turned the Labour party membership into a much poorer, younger one and he wouldn't have won with working voters in 2017.
It is retired people Corbyn doesn't represent, which TBH was the problem, if Corbyn didn't represent working people but instead represented retired (basically a 2017 reversal)people he would have won.
My paternal grandfather was a miner at Carway Colliery as were all his brothers and my paternal grandmother's brothers. My maternal grandmother's brothers were miners in the colliery between Burry Port and Pwll. My grandfather's working life was always as a coal miner except for working at the ROF in Pembrey during the war, which was equally dangerous. He retired from Cyneidre Colliery in 1966.
I don't want to appear like the Monty Python Yorkshiremen, trying to outdo your Labour Party credentials, but please don't tell me I am a liberal middle class Tory sell-out fraud.
A Labour Party in perpetual opposition, which would be the electoral outcome under a Corbynista programme for Government, is as much use as a chocolate teapot.
These “my dad is more socialist than your dad” type arguments are exactly the type of purity test that alienates so many from the left.
I do apologise. It is not normally something I would feel obliged to share. However I decided to put the Jezziah's accusation of my public-school Tory-boy status to the sword. My own upbringing I would have to concede was nonetheless very comfortable. Does that necessarily make me a Tory?
This can get overthunk imo. You're a Tory (and for that matter a Leaver) if you voted Tory at GE19. That's my start point. That's the default. It can be set aside on a case by case basis but only if there were extremely extenuating circumstances, e.g. you'd lost your glasses and couldn't see the ballot paper properly.
That looks like a crude oversimplification. Are there really 13,966,451 Tories in the UK?
Yes. And it's not crude - it's a bullshit strainer.
It's extremely silly. Labour isn't entitled to take the loyalty of its voters for granted.
How am I saying that?
The voters change sides, they get written off as "Tories," which is evidently a form of insult. The Lab-Con defectors aren't all Tories, they're people who have given up on Labour. That's not the same thing at all.
Quite so
And as explained that's not where I'm coming from. Just that it's useful (imo) to take the subjectivity out of "who is a Tory?" Then you escape so much nonsense. A Tory is a Tory voter and a Tory voter is a Tory. It's a perfect one to one exclusive and inclusive correlation.
But it's not the end of the analysis. Of course it isn't. Since there are 5 types:
The Habitual Tory: Self explanatory. Don't even think about it. The Committed Tory: Believe in their values and policies. The Passionate Tory: As above but with added key ingredient. HATE the left. The Reluctant Tory: Would love to not do it but consider TINA. The Accidental Tory: Misunderstand the offering. Suckers.
There were 13m or so in aggregate last time. Labour's mission under Starmer is to get that right down by 2024.
The last 2 categories of Tories are the Tories in play.
'The Passionate Tory' would be a great title for a blue movie.
"I'm a naughty Tory!" ☺
And that's you of course. You're a Passionate Tory.
Indeed we have several examples of all 5 categories on PB.
Comments
https://twitter.com/peterdonaghy/status/1360624425989718023
https://twitter.com/RidgeOnSunday/status/1360541824482484230
Drakeford is the people's Prince of Wales.
Many,many thanks.
When will we see
Your leek again?
Rowland Manthorpe on sky news was giving the good old British try yesterday claiming it wasn't working, because reduction in hospital admissions among the old compared to the rest hadn't come down more.
You don't need to be an expert to know 3 weeks min from vaccination to a starting to get protection and 3 weeks from getting infected to needing to go to hospital, so only those vaccinated prior to Christmas can be compared (which he wasn't doing).
As part of the vaccine rollout my father will doing shortly one of the things that has been flagged up is the number of recipients who think the moment they get their first jab they think they are invulnerable to Covid-19.
So maybe I should have actually rubbished the figures but I didn't. I put them in context.
Votes are more important than people saying nice things when it comes to winning elections. If I offered you 60% of people say Labour is improving and you get 33% in the GE or 60% of people is say Labour is getting worse and you get 37% in the GE you would take the latter, because people saying a party is improving doesn't mean a damn without votes.
Now an example to help you understand the problem with preferencing people are saying nice things over actually winning votes.
UKIP 2015 there was some perception of being racist, xenophobically anti immigrant (not claiming any of this is accurate or not) if UKIP had gone to war with its own voters to 'clean up its image' then the party would have been seen as improving by a lot of people, probably more than 60%
Can anyone guess why this widespread approval from people who probably still wouldn't vote UKIP would be entirely counter productive?
Clue: It is because the votes actually matter more.
Lets get loads of drive thru ones up.and running, as you should be able to jab tonnes of people that way.
I know @Big_G_NorthWales and @ydoethur will be the first to congratulate him this evening.
A true hero of the Welsh nation.
Slavish adherence to Government propaganda - does the media no longer have the right to ask questions or to scrutinise or does it simply have to unfailingly accentuate the positive of a pro-Government position?
And then there is this: https://www.timesofisrael.com/hmo-sees-only-544-covid-infections-among-523000-fully-vaccinated-israelis/
Half a million people fully vaccinated: just four serious cases and no deaths.
And remember, Israel isn't immune to mutations from South Africa or Brazil or wherever. It's unequivocally good news.
But it's not the end of the analysis. Of course it isn't. Since there are 5 types:
The Habitual Tory: Self explanatory. Don't even think about it.
The Committed Tory: Believe in their values and policies.
The Passionate Tory: As above but with added key ingredient. HATE the left.
The Reluctant Tory: Would love to not do it but consider TINA.
The Accidental Tory: Misunderstand the offering. Suckers.
There were 13m or so in aggregate last time. Labour's mission under Starmer is to get that right down by 2024.
The last 2 categories of Tories are the Tories in play.
Meanwhile, in Rookworld, Mum (cohort 5) had her first jab today, so that's all the olds in the immediate family done.
Back of a fag packet calculation suggests that about 27% of the adult population has now been vaccinated.
He's even a Latinist!
(I do think that is a harsh red card.)
Narrator: Pump and dump is a financial crime, but not in political betting markets.
I expressed surprise that (a) they were travelling, and (b) that Israel was allowing tourism.
They pointed out that they were vaccinated (although, not their son), and that Israel was full of vaccinated people. Which was fair enough.
This morning, I went to the Israeli government page on travel.
All entry to foreign citizens, it says, is prohibited unless you belong to an exempt category.
1. Married to a Israeli or permanent resident. Fair enough.
2. Parent or child of ditto. OK.
3. Visa holder. Right.
4. Diplomat. Yep.
5. Going to a wedding. WTF?
6. Going to a Bar/Bat Mitzvah. Aarrrggh.
It seems like you're only allowed into Israel if you are actually planning on going to a superspreader event.
Such occasional Tories could equally qualify as Occasional Labour or Occasional Lib Dems.
See here as well.
https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-health-coronavirus-britain-wedding-gu-idUSKBN29R164
[Raises hand nervously]
What about... Instinctively Tory (but I hope of a genial, One Nation type, voted for Howard wouldn't have voted for IDS- that's where my personal elastic snaps)... who simply couldn't vote for Johnson, because he is too ghastly? Not fundamentally because of you-know-what, but more the refusal to apologise for anything, "vote against us in 2024 if you don't like it, until then suck it up you sucker" vibe?
New Thread
Next stop UK LAB leader after Starmer!
"If you have something to add here, now would be the time," Herrera Beutler (R-Wash.) wrote in a statement released late Friday.
https://www.politico.com/news/2021/02/12/house-republicans-pence-trump-riot-468983
Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler, one of 10 House Republicans to support Donald Trump's impeachment for inciting the Capitol insurrection, pleaded with those close to the former president — and former vice president Mike Pence — to come forward and reveal what they know about Trump's conduct.
"To the patriots who were standing next to the former president as these conversations were happening, or even to the former Vice President: if you have something to add here, now would be the time," Herrera Beutler (R-Wash.) wrote in a statement released late Friday, on the eve of what is expected to be the Senate's final vote in Trump's impeachment trial.
Herrera Beutler issued the statement amid a new wave of attention on a story she has been telling since last month: that House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy relayed details of a phone call he had with Trump while the violent mob was ransacking the Capitol.
In Herrera Beutler's telling, McCarthy urged Trump to call off the mob, to which Trump initially responded that he couldn't because it was made up of left-wing extremists — a falsehood that has been debunked by federal investigators.
When McCarthy refuted Trump, the former president responded, "Well, Kevin, I guess these people are more upset about the election than you are," according to Herrera-Beutler.
Addendum - yours truly worked in 2018 and 2020 on behalf of Congresswoman Herrera-Beutler's Democratic challenger. She's a conservative and an evangelical, but (unfortunately for her opponent) NOT a right-wing wing-nut.
She's sure enough proved THAT in the past month.
IF there is any Republican who deserves to be included in a 21st-century re-write of "Profiles in Courage" by JFK, it is surely JHB.
She makes me proud to be a Washingtonian, and an American.
And that's you of course. You're a Passionate Tory.
Indeed we have several examples of all 5 categories on PB.