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Poll: Who Should Be Leader of HM Most Loyal Opposition? This poll is closed. |
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| Jeremy Corbyn |
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95 | 18.63% |
| Dennis Skinner |
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53 | 10.39% |
| Angus Robertson |
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20 | 3.92% |
| Tim Farron |
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9 | 1.76% |
| Paul Ukips |
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7 | 1.37% |
| Robot Lenin |
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105 | 20.59% |
| Tony Blair |
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28 | 5.49% |
| Pissflaps |
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193 | 37.84% |
| Total: | 510 votes | ||
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jabby posted:I've seen this opinion a few times and it never ceases to amaze. Who shall we blame for Tory policies? The Tories? The people who support them? Nah, let's blame the people who are completely ideologically opposed to them. That makes good logical sense. Nick Cohen posted:In an election, they would tear them to pieces. They will expose the far left’s record of excusing the imperialism of Vladimir Putin’s gangster state , the oppressors of women and murderers of gays in Iran, the IRA, and every variety of inquisitorial and homicidal Islamist movement, while presenting itself with hypocritical piety as a moral force. Will there be 150, 125, 100 Labour MPs by the end of the flaying? My advice is to think of a number then halve it. I'm drawing a blank on the first paragraph, can someone point me in the right direction to what this is referring to? Not that Corbyn is particularly "far left". The second paragraph - there's been plenty of pressure, just you can't reverse 6 years of the media bleating "national credit card" when hardly any of them actually publish anything to reverse this bullshit. Onto the "we journalists and tories EXPOSED THE BUDGET FIASCO", yes we were all too stupid to see the tories' blatant bullshit, and noone else said anything about it. EVER.
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Mar 19, 2017 19:48
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The newspapers took the heroic stand of getting a policy reversed and keeping their journalists tax bills at their current level while the general budget, set to be worse than the 2008 crash for the poorest in society, is otherwise waved through. Cheers for that.
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Mar 19, 2017 19:50
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radmonger posted:Be a plausible next government, so that your position on things matter more than a wet fart But it's clearly not about being a plausible next government, it's about being a potential government the news media considers plausible. Subtle but important difference there. Given most of the media's political orientation this of course means 'move to the right'. I'm saying this as someone who thinks Corbyn could be doing better. It is true that the media will always hate him and has been subject to ridiculous pressure from within Labour, but even so he has dropped the ball on multiple things. But regardless of that, he could be a super charismatic firebrand and never put a foot wrong policy-wise, and he'd still be in trouble. If there was a hypothetical socialist with these qualities waiting in the wings I'd say let them have a go - they'd possibly do marginally better - but I'm resigned to the fact that they would be pilloried regardless. But regardless there is no such person ready to take over (some of the 2015 intake have potential but very little experience) so what are our options? Moving right cannot be acceptable, ever, because we'd lose even if Labour went on to win as a party. I think one thing that really should happen is the Labour left should stop trying to tell (because the media will ignore or distort them) and start showing. Foodbanks, community work etc etc etc. They have the resources to do it after the Corbyn influx. Make it loving obvious that Labour is actively helping people on a day-to-day basis in a way that cannot be ignored. tbh I'm just thoroughly disillusioned with parliamentary democracy and think we're getting to the point where direct action might be the only option if we want things to improve.
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Mar 19, 2017 19:59
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radmonger posted:Be a plausible next government, so that your position on things matter more than a wet fart, Remember UKIP?
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Mar 19, 2017 20:03
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namesake posted:How is plausible government to be defined? By having numbers coming in from polls and bye-elections such that it is plausible they will win a general election election. Labour's current policies, individually considered, have support from up to 65% of the electorate. Succeeeding in presenting the possibility of government based on those popular beliefs is not obviously harder now than any of the times it has been done before. The Daily Mail was not founded in 2015.
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Mar 19, 2017 20:03
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Nick Cohen is an Islamophobic right wing poo poo.
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Mar 19, 2017 20:10
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Don't Lol me posted:Same with the "He's ruining democracy", as if it were somehow one persons fault for everyone voting tory due to the dreaded immigrant threat. Corbyn has defended the Venezuelan government, worked for PressTV and RT, and talked to Iran, Hamas and the IRA before. He'd get eviscerated at an actual election.
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Mar 19, 2017 20:09
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Not So Fast posted:Corbyn has defended the Venezuelan government, worked for PressTV and RT, and talked to Iran, Hamas and the IRA before. He'd get eviscerated at an actual election. Ah, I knew Cohen would be sore about anything not pro-Israel, and the IRA, was unaware of the other stuff. A drop in the ocean compared to most tories, however he probably would not defend himself adequately as reasoning is not as effective as pithy soundbites.
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Mar 19, 2017 20:19
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radmonger posted:By having numbers coming in from polls and bye-elections such that it is plausible they will win a general election election. This would be the circular argument people keep referring to, and it's coming up a lot in interviews. The idea that Labour are bad because they are unpopular, and they are unpopular because they are bad. You'll notice it doesn't contain any reference towards policy or really anything specific that Labour should be doing apart from 'be better'.
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Mar 19, 2017 20:19
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Not So Fast posted:Corbyn has defended the Venezuelan government, worked for PressTV and RT, and talked to Iran, Hamas and the IRA before. He'd get eviscerated at an actual election. That's all out in the open already and has been harped on endlessly by the press to the point it's kind of numb and deadening. The president of the United States openly bragged about sexually assaulting women, has been accused of multiple rapes and hired prostitutes to piss a hotel bed for him and all this was public knowledge before he even took office. Slinging poo poo can only carry you so far in knocking down a political candidate, they really do have to fall on their own sword pretty hard to really kill their chances if they have enough momentum behind them. The sad truth of it is that Corbyn has either been unwilling or unable to capitalise on the huge extraparliamentary support he once had and he's just been loving up every chance he gets since he won the second leadership election.
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Mar 19, 2017 20:23
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ThomasPaine posted:I think one thing that really should happen is the Labour left should stop trying to tell (because the media will ignore or distort them) and start showing. Foodbanks, community work etc etc etc. They have the resources to do it after the Corbyn influx. Make it loving obvious that Labour is actively helping people on a day-to-day basis in a way that cannot be ignored. Certainly works well at the council level, attending and speaking at rallies doesn't seem to be helping much. Mucking in helping foodbanks, shelters, clearing parks, etc might be more effective.
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Mar 19, 2017 20:24
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radmonger posted:Be a plausible next government, so that your position on things matter more than a wet fart, This is circular, though. Corbyn's not getting coverage because he's not going to win the next election, and he's not going to win the election because he can't get coverage.
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Mar 19, 2017 20:24
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Julio Cruz posted:As a Coventrian, seconded. Bonus if you can get Birmingham and Wolverhampton in the blast radius too. Many many pages late but A loving Men
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Mar 19, 2017 20:25
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I'm beginning to think that the sheer volume of polling data sharted to the wind is all so that, when the pollsters inevitably have their headline figures savaged at the next election (whatever it ends up being), they can dig through 5 years of chaff and find the one crumb of data that YEAH WE WERE RIGHT ALL ALONG OKAY, PEOPLE JUST LIED TO US OKAY?
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Mar 19, 2017 20:27
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^^^^Nah it's Jurassic Park meets Big Data. 'Your pollsters were so preoccupied with whether or not they could that they didn't stop to think if they should.' There's endless news cycles to try and track, new papers and policies announced all the time and enough storage and manpower to track it all now, so we do.ThomasPaine posted:tbh I'm just thoroughly disillusioned with parliamentary democracy and think we're getting to the point where direct action might be the only option if we want things to improve. Pretty much, and even if you're still not radical enough to want to overthrow bourgeois democracy it's painfully obvious that the electoral cycle as it stands is far too long to actually reflect the changing needs of the public (cue argument about why unresponsive government is good because it doesn't respond to kneejerk opinions, etc). radmonger posted:By having numbers coming in from polls and bye-elections such that it is plausible they will win a general election election. No but consider my argument about identity voters rather than policy. We can know a policy will or won't work based on best evidence and yet that has very bad corresponding polling due to general publics lack of awareness or total distrust of that knowledge. Politics is currently being driven by trust and not truth and so adopting the position of 'it's not a vote winner, dump it' results in a loss of identity, a loss in trust and a loss in votes, but conversely having a crackerjack manifesto but the general opinion (heavily influenced by media) of you is 'bunch of untrustworthy, infighting wankers' you're going to poll badly as well. You want firm, trustworthy people agreeing on a position and then conveying that sense of trust and position in a relatible fashion to the public; Labour doesn't have this and so it's suffering for it. namesake fucked around with this message at 20:33 on Mar 19, 2017 |
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Mar 19, 2017 20:27
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Spectacle is king in modern politics. Back when UKIP were polling lower than the greens they still got poo poo-tons of coverage by comparison to the greens or the libdems. Farage's loving face was everywhere because the media flocks to spectacle like flies to poo poo. If Corbyn or McDonnell stopped being openly hostile to the press for misrepresenting them and just instead opened the doors to them and invited them along to every march or press conference and said something hugely controversial to get on the news they'd at least be getting their message out, whatever it is.
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Mar 19, 2017 20:28
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Not So Fast posted:Corbyn has defended the Venezuelan government, worked for PressTV and RT, and talked to Iran, Hamas and the IRA before. He'd get eviscerated at an actual election. Farage is on RT all the time isn't he?
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Mar 19, 2017 20:31
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RT interviews and gives guest spots to literally anyone who badmouths the USA, NATO and the EU no matter how inconsistent they are with other people or even themselves. They'd interview Occupy Wall Street activists and then give spots to RON PAUL horde gold, kill your parents libertarians in the same segment.TomViolence posted:Spectacle is king in modern politics. Back when UKIP were polling lower than the greens they still got poo poo-tons of coverage by comparison to the greens or the libdems. Farage's loving face was everywhere because the media flocks to spectacle like flies to poo poo. If Corbyn or McDonnell stopped being openly hostile to the press for misrepresenting them and just instead opened the doors to them and invited them along to every march or press conference and said something hugely controversial to get on the news they'd at least be getting their message out, whatever it is. This does occasionally happen but press coverage of actual activism is super loving spotty at best unless they want some riot porn shots.
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Mar 19, 2017 20:38
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Don't Lol me posted:Certainly works well at the council level, attending and speaking at rallies doesn't seem to be helping much. Mucking in helping foodbanks, shelters, clearing parks, etc might be more effective. I really do think it's a key lesson for the left in general. Rallies and marches and demonstrations are just preaching to the converted. They're essentially just masturbatory nonsense. I guess maybe they might raise awareness a little at best. The key is sticking to the material reality and doing what you can to show that left-wing politics is not all po-faced whining but can have a genuine benefit to the lives of everyone, while physically undermining those things that stand in the way of this. I would not be opposed to a group that did community work were also...more militant in their approach to businesses and commercial interests.
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Mar 19, 2017 20:48
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Gorn Myson posted:Pretty much all of the arguments against Corbyn's failure are defeatist. Its "the British public has no appetite for left wing politics", its "the media hates him because its all right wing", its "New Labour keep sabotaging him". For all your moronic repetition of "hope is a lie" you all sure like to equate realism with defeatism. How ironic that you believe in hope after all. Hope that once Corbyn is gone Labour will sweep to victory with 98% of the vote. What the gently caress is going on in this thread? Because you hate Corbyn so much you've decided the media aren't a big shower of bastards. This is very recent. Suddenly the public are all misguided angels rather than ignorant dickhead racists. Suddenly new Labour are not horrible center-right corporatists. Get a loving grip. It's ok to say "Well no one can do anything about the media so Corbyn should go and someone harder for the media to spin against should be selected". See how this implies the media is poo poo but acknowledges that Corbyn isn't helping? You could also try this: "New Labour are sabotaging Corbyn so he needs to go and someone that they can't get their teeth into needs to replace him". Here we've acknowledged that New Labour are shits but also that Corbyn has an unhelpful past that leaves him open to criticism by the center ground. Amazing how we don't have to give clearly bad intentioned groups the benefit of the doubt just to have a go at Corbyn. I can ever do the first one: "The British public don't have an appetite for left wing politics but maybe a better leader could soften the concept to at least some of them". See? We didn't have to lie about the British public, who clearly are right wing in their outlook. We don't have to pretend they're just misguided by Corbyn just because he really pisses us off. You just have to use words and nuance and not be a complete dick like Pissflaps (or as I call him Meany-bo-beany Flaps).
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Mar 19, 2017 20:51
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TomViolence posted:Spectacle is king in modern politics. Back when UKIP were polling lower than the greens they still got poo poo-tons of coverage by comparison to the greens or the libdems. Farage's loving face was everywhere because the media flocks to spectacle like flies to poo poo. If Corbyn or McDonnell stopped being openly hostile to the press for misrepresenting them and just instead opened the doors to them and invited them along to every march or press conference and said something hugely controversial to get on the news they'd at least be getting their message out, whatever it is. Corbyn demonstrated this pretty well when he dropped the idea of a maximum wage. It dominated the news cycle for at least a day, resulted in Tories being asked difficult questions on air like 'why shouldn't we have a maximum wage?', and within a couple of days there was a poll saying most people supported the idea. The fact that in practice it was rather unworkable didn't matter. This trouble is you run into the issue of when should Corbyn do this? He is leader of the opposition after all, and the election is likely several years away. If he dropped a radical policy whenever there was a slow news day it might boost Labour's popularity but by the time the election came around it would all be old hat. Part of me hopes that Corb's is just playing an extremely long game and when 2020 rolls around he's going to lay out an incredibly radical left-wing manifesto that actually makes the public sit up and take notice. I'm not holding my breath, but it's arguably true that if he does have big policy ideas now is not the time to deploy them.
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Mar 19, 2017 20:54
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namesake posted:RT interviews and gives guest spots to literally anyone who badmouths the USA, NATO and the EU no matter how inconsistent they are with other people or even themselves. They'd interview Occupy Wall Street activists and then give spots to RON PAUL horde gold, kill your parents libertarians in the same segment. Are there even any mainstream UK politicians they wouldn't host these days anyway? I think basically all of them dislike one of those things.
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Mar 19, 2017 20:55
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ThomasPaine posted:I really do think it's a key lesson for the left in general. Rallies and marches and demonstrations are just preaching to the converted. These things have a very specific purpose though, and when stripped of conflict with authority that's morale. That's an incredibly important thing to have, in tory austerity britain. Rallies, marches and demonstrations have historically been useful to forment revolutionary thought when you a) confront an authority, often with force and b), importantly, actually loving win. There are notable failures that will get press attention if the police get heavy handed, as has historically been the case, but any revolutionary message contained within is basically acab It's good to have rallies and marches and we should have more and there should be no flegs involved. But it'd be nice if that turnout then meaningfully seized some property while they were there.
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Mar 19, 2017 20:56
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ThomasPaine posted:I really do think it's a key lesson for the left in general. Rallies and marches and demonstrations are just preaching to the converted. They're essentially just masturbatory nonsense. I guess maybe they might raise awareness a little at best. The key is sticking to the material reality and doing what you can to show that left-wing politics is not all po-faced whining but can have a genuine benefit to the lives of everyone, while physically undermining those things that stand in the way of this. I would not be opposed to a group that did community work were also...more militant in their approach to businesses and commercial interests. I'd recommend people look into http://www.acorncommunities.org.uk/ The Bristol group does some really good support work and direct actiony things like demonstrate outside letting agents and assemble at peoples homes when they're being revenge evicted and things. Not a hell of a lot of other groups around the country sadly but maybe that'll change! Whoa there, no need to get angry. There are valid criticism to make about Corbyn, just so long as Pissflaps isn't making them.
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Mar 19, 2017 20:57
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Lots of complete crap from Nick Cohen, but:quote:He and George Osborne used to worry about how Ed Balls and Chuka Umunna would strike back against their austerity programme.  That they would "strike back" as in agree with them completely?
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Mar 19, 2017 21:04
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Lord of the Llamas posted:Lots of complete crap from Nick Cohen, but: George Osborne lies in bed staring up at the ceiling, his brain racing as he wonders what part of the budget Ed was going to say was cutting too deep and too fast but otherwise raising no criticisms of. Oh no wait that the coke keeping him up at night.
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Mar 19, 2017 21:07
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The way that a labour leader can counter the right wing press to present him or herself as a competent, credible alternative to the current regime. They'll happily go after a failing Tory leader just as readily as a confused old fuckwit.
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Mar 19, 2017 21:13
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Pissflaps posted:The way that a labour leader can counter the right wing press to present him or herself as a competent, credible alternative to the current regime. They'll happily go after a failing Tory leader just as readily as a confused old fuckwit. May isn't a failing Tory Leader to the public though.
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Mar 19, 2017 21:17
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jabby posted:Part of me hopes that Corb's is just playing an extremely long game and when 2020 rolls around he's going to lay out an incredibly radical left-wing manifesto that actually makes the public sit up and take notice. I'm not holding my breath, but it's arguably true that if he does have big policy ideas now is not the time to deploy them. Yea. I don't think he IS doing that but I definitely agree that it's pointless putting anything out there right now because only around 5% of the population follows politics when it isn't a general election.
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Mar 19, 2017 21:18
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Extreme0 posted:May isn't a failing Tory Leader to the public though. Because, crap as she is, she still looks better than the alternative.
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Mar 19, 2017 21:20
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Taear posted:Yea. I don't think he IS doing that but I definitely agree that it's pointless putting anything out there right now because only around 5% of the population follows politics when it isn't a general election. Every person who will be voting in the next election will all have an opinion on the current state of each party.
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Mar 19, 2017 21:22
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Neither the Cabinet Office nor the Department for Exiting the EU knows how many negotiators are available to the government for the talks on leaving the EU, or what qualifications those unknown negotiators do or do not have: I am enconfidencefied!
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Mar 19, 2017 21:23
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Lord of the Llamas posted:Lots of complete crap from Nick Cohen, but: They'd say things like bankers were responsible for the economic crash rather than nurses, and therefore Osborne should stop freezing public sector pay and instead tax the bankers more.
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Mar 19, 2017 21:23
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Spangly A posted:These things have a very specific purpose though, and when stripped of conflict with authority that's morale. That's an incredibly important thing to have, in tory austerity britain. Fair point that, but I think a lot of people trick themselves into thinking they're sufficient in themselves. Maybe there is room for marches etc but they're not enough without militant action (legal and possibly illegal). Lenin did nothing wrong when he arranged bank robberies.
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Mar 19, 2017 21:23
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Regarde Aduck posted:You could also try this: "New Labour are sabotaging Corbyn so he needs to go and someone that they can't get their teeth into needs to replace him". Why would you not instead say "New Labour are sabotaging socialism so they need to go"?
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Mar 19, 2017 21:24
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Pissflaps posted:Because, crap as she is, she still looks better than the alternative. this is neoliberalism there is no alternative
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Mar 19, 2017 21:25
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https://twitter.com/tomroyal/status/843556085470511106
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Mar 19, 2017 21:28
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LemonDrizzle posted:Neither the Cabinet Office nor the Department for Exiting the EU knows how many negotiators are available to the government for the talks on leaving the EU, or what qualifications those unknown negotiators do or do not have: I know the maximum bound for that. 1 per every other country in the EU.
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Mar 19, 2017 21:28
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ThomasPaine posted:I really do think it's a key lesson for the left in general. Rallies and marches and demonstrations are just preaching to the converted. They're essentially just masturbatory nonsense. I guess maybe they might raise awareness a little at best. The key is sticking to the material reality and doing what you can to show that left-wing politics is not all po-faced whining but can have a genuine benefit to the lives of everyone, while physically undermining those things that stand in the way of this. I would not be opposed to a group that did community work were also...more militant in their approach to businesses and commercial interests. Nah, for people who're really hit by the issue they're a reminder that A: You exist and B: People are angry enough to literally go stand up for you. For the electorate as a whole maybe it's not so useful but authoritarian regimes have typically banned public gatherings for a reason and it's not because it's masturbatory nonsense that raises awareness a little at best.
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Mar 19, 2017 21:31
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LemonDrizzle posted:Neither the Cabinet Office nor the Department for Exiting the EU knows how many negotiators are available to the government for the talks on leaving the EU, or what qualifications those unknown negotiators do or do not have: poo poo I'll do it. Paxman posted:They'd say things like bankers were responsible for the economic crash rather than nurses, and therefore Osborne should stop freezing public sector pay and instead tax the bankers more. “Let me be clear, including to those who would wish it were not so: Labour will need to cut public spending in the next parliament to balance the books." - Ed Balls, 1 Jan 2015 Inspiring. His MO (and Ed Milibands by extension) was literally 'too far, too fast' which I can't imagine was very concerning for the Tories. Having agreed that vital and healthy limbs must be removed, Labour and Tories argued if it should be above or below the elbow.
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Mar 19, 2017 21:31
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