next labour leader
- Thread starter sun_tzu
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I hope Dennis skinner is in there
If your going to make us unelectable at least let us have a laugh about it
That's a vote winner right there
He is at turns either vehement or your typical shifty politician. I don't happen to believe that Corbyn is anti-Semitic, although some of his connections (as well as how he explains them) are going to prove to be problematic. Did he simply consider them to be acceptable political collateral in his campaigning for Palestine, how would this bear on his conduct as leader e.t.c.
Corbyn has also come across as rather defensive in those interviews whenever the questions have been more challenging, therefore it'll be interesting to see if he modifies that nature or attempts to harness it in a Farage-esque like fashion.
I know that some Corbynites now view the Guardian in a similar light to an EDL newsletter, yet it is they and Independent which have been responsible for the majority of articles/source material in recent pages.
Some of the reaction has been reminiscent to how UKIP's rise was received, at least in these early stages. Established partly hierarchies don't always respond well to sprightly political movements of course (as we've seen with some of the candidates here), however the Tories have five years with which to decide upon a strategy, as well as an improving economy behind on their hands.
Corbyn isn't necessarily all that bad at identifying problems, it is his proposed solutions where the difficulty comes in. John Harris alluded to such in the Politics Weekly podcast i posted earlier.
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So, all this is just light hearted frivolity, then?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/search/?queryText=jeremy+corbyn&sort=relevant
The left may be in ideological crisis, but the right have been scaremongering their little jodhpurs off.
Though tbf, if anyone was in doubt of the old adage that the right are rubbish at satire, you've at least done them a favour by posting this...Which is an almost impressively Buzzfeed level of weak.
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It's funny and insightful. Your saying otherwise doesn't make it so.
Proving my point, tbf. At least you're in good company.
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That piece largely isn't satire.
You guys are so winning me round.
I almost paid the £3 to vote for Corbyn. He's better than the rest by fair. And if it pisses Blair off all the better.
Not even kidding, go back through the last few pages of this thread and I think you'll find examples of all of them. Except perhaps neoliberal, I don't remember that one.
That Channel 4 interview is ridiculous when you actually stop and think about it for a minute.
Jeremy, do you apologise for putting money in a collection bucket at a memorial service for a massacre 15 years ago, because the man organising it, who at the time was not a holocaust denier, is now a holocaust denier.
Fecking hell. She did lie about being ushered out of a mosque though, so I probably shouldn't be surprised.
Jeremy, do you apologise for putting money in a collection bucket at a memorial service for a massacre 15 years ago, because the man organising it, who at the time was not a holocaust denier, is now a holocaust denier.
Fecking hell. She did lie about being ushered out of a mosque though, so I probably shouldn't be surprised.
So from what I gather looking at his Wikipedia page, Corbyn appears to be a walking Comment Is Free column.
Why exactly would Labour elect someone who could never win in a General Election? Bernie Sanders has 0 chance of winning the election, but his candidacy is basically to drive the Democrats left rather than center in their primary.
Why exactly would Labour elect someone who could never win in a General Election? Bernie Sanders has 0 chance of winning the election, but his candidacy is basically to drive the Democrats left rather than center in their primary.
Sanders is an interesting parallel. Whatever you think of his election chances he actually stands a very good chance of winning the nomination.
So if Burnham is voted in will Yvette Cooper want to be a part of his cabinet.Seems to have shot herself in the foot
Again the point is being missed. The general public is sick and tired of internal political agenda's, spin, lies and deception. It's the fact that Corbyn is a "walking Comment Is Free column" that makes him so appealing.
It has been ugly on both sides.
Corbyn has kept his dignity but that is not an inaccurate portrayal of his hard left supporters.
I hope Dennis skinner is in there
If your going to make us unelectable at least let us have a laugh about it
Never actually happened
I would switch that around. I think it's actually the much harder task him winning the nomination. If he manages to do it, I don't see how he will lose the election proper against a right-wing Republican.
Why are you so certain Sanders would lose against a Republican? When would you say was the last time the Democrats ran for president on a left-wing platform?
I think basically the UK needs a vigorous and committed left wing party / movement to remind itself of the logic for creating New Labour in the first place. There's a whole generation now of politically active people who have never really experienced it, or only remember it vaguely from their childhoods, before they really gave it much thought. And I include myself in that, Blair's first landslide victory was the first election I voted in.
It may be that things are different now. By the time of the next election we will have had 10 years of the Tories, 5 years of them with a majority government, and who knows what the state of the county will be following all the cuts that will come. No doubt the country's finances will look a lot better at the macroeconomic level but what about social indicators like crime, hospital waiting times, mobility, use of food banks etc. People saying Corbyn is unelectable (I have said this) may be underestimating the level of hatred that may exist for the Tories by then. A lot of people who voted for the Tories may find the cuts have implications for them that they didnt foresee. It may create an environment in which the left can thrive.
Or it may be that, even under these circumstances, Corbyn's agenda does not stand up to scrutiny, and Labour has to go through the whole process of finding the centre ground again. But at least a new generation will have had the opportunity to actually examine "socialism" or themselves, rather than just accepting as true the inherited wisdom that it doesnt work, or does not appeal to the English psyche, or whatever.
I guess this is why things move in cycles. Decisions are taken, but periodically the logic that caused that decision to be taken in the first place gets lost or forgotten, and people need to remind themselves or check that it is still valid. I suspect in this case it is. People get very tired of the right wing scaremongering about the left, but I dont see many examples of countries run along socialist lines that I would want to live in. Politics does get tedious when everyone hogs the middle ground but there is a reason why parties have gravitated there in recent decades.
It may be that things are different now. By the time of the next election we will have had 10 years of the Tories, 5 years of them with a majority government, and who knows what the state of the county will be following all the cuts that will come. No doubt the country's finances will look a lot better at the macroeconomic level but what about social indicators like crime, hospital waiting times, mobility, use of food banks etc. People saying Corbyn is unelectable (I have said this) may be underestimating the level of hatred that may exist for the Tories by then. A lot of people who voted for the Tories may find the cuts have implications for them that they didnt foresee. It may create an environment in which the left can thrive.
Or it may be that, even under these circumstances, Corbyn's agenda does not stand up to scrutiny, and Labour has to go through the whole process of finding the centre ground again. But at least a new generation will have had the opportunity to actually examine "socialism" or themselves, rather than just accepting as true the inherited wisdom that it doesnt work, or does not appeal to the English psyche, or whatever.
I guess this is why things move in cycles. Decisions are taken, but periodically the logic that caused that decision to be taken in the first place gets lost or forgotten, and people need to remind themselves or check that it is still valid. I suspect in this case it is. People get very tired of the right wing scaremongering about the left, but I dont see many examples of countries run along socialist lines that I would want to live in. Politics does get tedious when everyone hogs the middle ground but there is a reason why parties have gravitated there in recent decades.
Good post. However, I would like to point out that compared to the UK governments of the past 35 years there have been plenty of what the Brits call "socialist governments" in EU countries such as Germany, the Netherlands or France. I would certainly make a strong case to argue that for most the standard of living in any of those countries is higher than in the UK.
Maybe. I dont know. Germany has gone through the whole right wing structural reform process that the UK did with Thatcher, in terms of having flexible labour markets (making it easy to sack workers) and low corporate taxes. It now reaps the benefits of those measures. France is very definitely more inclined to left wing lurches than we are in the UK. Is the standard of living higher there? I guess it depends on your metric. They have a more generous social safety net for sure, but higher unemployment, especially youth unemployment. There are more French people working in London than any other foreign nationality, mainly because young people cant find work in France.
So I dont know, on the standard of living thing. I guess it is highly subjective, you pay your money and make your choice. But even in France they back away from the most extreme parts of the socialist agenda. Hollande came to power promising an 80% top rate of tax, but he didnt do it in the end. If he had, what would have happened? Like I said in my previous post, I know people get tired of the right wing scaremongering, and after the last few years many people would say good riddance to flighty rich people taking their money out of the country. But such people feel that way with the security of knowing they wont be held responsible when it happens. Hollande would have been, and that is why he didnt do it. Because actually, boring as it sounds, if you taxed rich people at 80%, they would leave, and take their money, and their taxes, somewhere else, and that wouldnt do France any good at all.
Just voted (for Corbyn). Really agonised over a 2nd preference but just couldn't endorse any of the other candidates. Burnham is the sort who'll say anything to get a bit of power, I was going to put Cooper but the mood of her campaign and rhetoric has gotten really nasty over the course of the last week. I simply don't agree with, or trust, Kendall.
France is an oddity that's for sure. But even the current 'right wing' governments of Germany and the Netherlands have a social conscience that would be considered dangerously left-wing by UK standards. And I haven't even yet touched upon the manufacturing industries of Germany & the Netherlands.
I think even the most subjective person would have a lot of difficult not admitting the standard of living in Germany & the Netherlands is much higher than in the UK.
I'm probably going to do the same when I get my ballot.
Who did you vote for deputy? They all seem a bit underwhelming but I'll probably lean towards Tom Watson because of his work in the Murdoch hacking scandal.
Oh yes and on France, and its relatively more socialist governments, it is also repeatedly spoken about as being next in line, after the PIGS (Portugal, Ireland, Greece and Spain) for a sovereign debt crisis. It barely grows and has massive debts. Its economy is not in a good way at all, it isnt just toddling along quite happily, congratulating itself on its generous welfare system, it is in dire need of reform. We have a problem in the UK with how we are going to afford to pay for the next generation of retirees, but it pales in comparison with France's. So if there is a strong case to be made right now that France has a higher standard of living than the UK, and clearly it is debatable and people will have their own opinions on that, that case might weaken over coming years.
I agree those countries have a much stronger case. But then there are different factors for them in play as well. They have the euro which has generally been calibrated to Germany's advantage, at the expense of other eurozone states. For example, a euro that was considerably weaker than the mark would have been, making German cars cheaper for Southern and Eastern European consumers (and encouraging those consumers to run up massive debts to help them pay for them).
Its all too complex to be attributed to one thing, be that left or right, this currency or that, a rabid, right wing press or not, whatever. I dont disagree, Continental Europe has a very different appetite for aspects of socialism than the UK does, and I would like to see the UK adopt a more left wing stance than it does. But at the end of the day, it is what it is. The UK does appear to have this aversion to left wing policies, we will see whether what has traditionally been true remains so when confronted with Corbyn. And similarly, we will see, if Corbyn ever does get into power, whether he remains true to himself, or whether he does what Hollande did, and backs away from certain pledges.
I agree those countries have a much stronger case. But then there are different factors for them in play as well. They have the euro which has generally been calibrated to Germany's advantage, at the expense of other eurozone states. For example, a euro that was considerably weaker than the mark would have been, making German cars cheaper for Southern and Eastern European consumers (and encouraging those consumers to run up massive debts to help them pay for them).
Its all too complex to be attributed to one thing, be that left or right, this currency or that, a rabid, right wing press or not, whatever. I dont disagree, Continental Europe has a very different appetite for aspects of socialism than the UK does, and I would like to see the UK adopt a more left wing stance than it does. But at the end of the day, it is what it is. The UK does appear to have this aversion to left wing policies, we will see whether what has traditionally been true remains so when confronted with Corbyn. And similarly, we will see, if Corbyn ever does get into power, whether he remains true to himself, or whether he does what Hollande did, and backs away from certain pledges.
"The Blairites" has become a pejorative term. But I wouldnt say no to a government along the lines of Blair's first one right now, it did a lot of very good things.
Gonna have to cave and put Burnham 3rd after all, can't take the risk of it going to final preferences and tacitly endorsing Corbyn by leaving it blank.
I’m not really a socialist, but even I think that the UK does not have a fair society. The UK has a much larger gap between rich & poor compared to other similar countries and the UK treats its most needy citizens like dog shit.
Them's Tory words.
I went Eagles, Watson, Creasy. I like Watson and I don't agree with Eagle on a lot of things but ideally the leadership duo should have life experience beyond that of two straight white men. Having said that, I expect Watson to win and I wouldn't be unhappy with that.
Absolutely agree, 100%.
This seems taken for granted but if we reach 2020 without a market crash that will be unprecedented. The UK stock market has been rising for six and a half years. On only two other occasions has it done so for longer: the lead-up to the 1929 crash and the dotcom bubble of the early 00s.
....and this debt nonsense, which has been for a large part caused by governments having to bail out the banks.
I also think it's important to point out that the debt problems countries like Greece, Italy and Portugal have mainly been caused by the fact they do not have a system in place to properly collect tax which the government is owned, and not because they've had socialist governments. In fact all 3 have mostly had right wing governments the past 20 years!
I also think it's important to point out that the debt problems countries like Greece, Italy and Portugal have mainly been caused by the fact they do not have a system in place to properly collect tax which the government is owned, and not because they've had socialist governments. In fact all 3 have mostly had right wing governments the past 20 years!
Well the stock market could fall without it being a crash. And it wouldnt necessarily mean the UK's finances were in worse shape, if the Tories keep slashing spending at the current rate.
But it is true, the country's finances wont necessarily be in better shape. I suspect they will, like I said, but the flip side will be the country will look and feel a lot worse, with mass homelessness like we had in the 80s, and a lot of other people, who do have homes, still basically struggling to keep their heads above the water, working long hours for peanuts.
Corbyn is himself a socialist, but he certainly isn't running on a socialist platform here, nor would he in a general election. He is promising social democracy, which New Labour essentially gave up on and which is why even some of the right-wing of the old Labour Party were so critical of the shift.
As @Rams pointed out quite correctly, many countries in Europe in particular have had lasting social-democratic legacies to this day which give the working man and woman a higher standard of living than the British. Germany, France, Norway, Denmark, Sweden, Finland etc. It's a complete fallacy to suggest that since the British Labour Party abandoned social-democracy, it must be because it's not tenable. This is demonstrably false as soon as you take one look outside of this country.
Its absolutely crazy... the blair years were the longest sustained perios of labour government and whilst Iraq was ultimately too divisive an issue and the infighting between blair / brown loyalists became seemingy more important than fighting the actual opposition it should be remembered how much they achieved.
since 1945 election labour has won 7 victories (3 of them blair) only on 4 occasions since 1945 have they had majorities in double figures (3 of them blair)
In fact since England won the world cup the only labour leader to deliver a double figure majority has been Blair.
Yet some people want to distance themselves from the centrist policies of the Blair era... well thats fair enough but when it comes to 2020 it will be over 45 years since any labour leader other than Blair won an election and there have been plenty of more left wing options who got smashed in the polls in that period so when it happens again perhaps they will finally learn the lesson history is screaming at them - you win elections from the centre ground!
I assume everyone has seen this
but will people actually want to pay for it?
These tax rates apply to single people with no children, on an average salary for their country.
- Belgium- 42.80%
- Germany - 39.90%
- Denmark - 38.90%
- Hungary- 35%
- Austria -34%
- Greece - 25.4%
- OECD Average - 25.10%
- UK - 24.90%
I think this is something which hasn't been stressed enough this campaign. The media and Corbyn's rivals are making out that he's running on some sort of Trotskyite platform, whereas really he's just offering the bread and butter social democratic policies which have been commonplace in many European countries. And I'd expect these policies to be increasingly appealling as middle class people start to feel disillusioned with the Tory's ideological cuts and austerity that may have detrimentally affected their personal circumstances.
If the Labour party actually abided to its authentic values, then his policies would in no way be deemed radical or dangerous, its just that the New Labour wing have successfully duped everyone into believing that the centre-right platform is where the party always stood.