Mr. Flunchy posted:

Has anyone got access to the Times? I've got a perverse desire to read the latest Philip Collins article on Corbyn - it's supposed to be bizarre as gently caress.

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/opinion/columnists/article4513159.ece

quote:

Lefties are turning Labour into the stupid party. They have nothing to offer but puerile slogans and a road to oblivion

Vertigo, wrote Milan Kundera, is the secret desire to jump. Only the Labour party is capable of a suicidal jump from such a low base. Yet the constituency nominations and the union endorsements suggest Jeremy Corbyn is a serious contender to lead the Labour party. Serious, that is, only in the sense that this self-mutilation now has to be contemplated.

Before it is contemplated it needs to be dismantled. The stupidity and nastiness within the Corbyn campaign is belied by its avuncular figurehead. When Dave Ward, general-secretary of the Communication Workers’ Union, proclaims Mr Corbyn the antidote to the “Blairite virus” in the party, it is time to answer in kind. There is, I am afraid, no courteous way to say this. Politically, these people are idiots. The Labour party must not succumb to the temptation they offer to jump.

Labour is a scriptural party which is in the mood for biblical vengeance. Not, you understand, against the silent assassins of its fortunes, Brown and Miliband. No, it is victory rather than defeat that the Labour party is unable to forgive. Every revolution in the Labour party is a palace revolution, an assault on those who succeed. The heresy-hunting and the accusations of treason that echo all the way from Ramsay MacDonald in 1931 have been cast largely at Liz Kendall. Truly, this is now the stupid party which has revived the Bennite accusation that Ms Kendall, and all those who support her, should be castigated as Tories because none of us fall for their left-wing nostrums.

It is a pathetic insult, of course, to which, as the product of a working-class Tory family, I take particular exception. Do Mr Corbyn’s supporters suppose my parents were so stupid, so morally dissolute that they could not tell good from evil? I don’t think so. I don’t think either that people who voted Tory in 2015 are either terrible or deluded. They made a choice which, given Labour’s anaemic offer, it is hard to dispute. It is especially witless, even by the low standards of some people on the left, to insult that part of the electorate that it most needs to attract back.

That said, I do think, as I always have, that the Conservative party pays too little attention to those who, through unearned misfortune, have a poor start in life. I do not accuse Tories of not caring. I accuse them of not caring enough. I also think that, in their rush to cut spending, Conservative governments end up eating into the bone of public services on which poorer citizens depend.

If it didn’t make for a dull paragraph I could enumerate the social policies enacted during the Blair years, none of which would have happened under a Tory government. Let the point stand in this way. If the Labour party were to spiral into complete insanity, my bet is that all the high-profile Blairites will stay and fight it out. Not one of them, not a single one, will align with the Tories. That’s because conservative is the last thing they, we, are.

So let me, dear leftie, illustrate the point with respect to my own radical views. I hold a set of beliefs which would, to put it gently, try the patience of the British people. I believe the monarchy is an embarrassment to a meritocracy. I believe children have done nothing to merit their parental inheritance which should be taxed heavily. I think gains in the property market should be treated as unearned income and taxed accordingly. I have every reason to believe, from being abused in the street to an abundance of polling data, that these views are unpopular.

This gives me a dilemma if I decide to run for public office. Do I, as no doubt you would, dear naive leftie, proclaim these beliefs loudly in the certain knowledge I am right and the public is wrong? Or do I concentrate on other issues, such as economic prosperity? Do I perhaps even have enough respect for the electorate to concede that, in a democracy, I have no mandate for my republican views? For the Corbynite left, this shows a flinching coward and a sneering traitor. For anyone with a less adolescent view of the world this is no “hypocrisy” or “betrayal”. It’s politics in a democracy. Here’s the rub, simple-minded leftie, in words of one syllable: grow up.

I apologise to readers of an intelligent disposition for the next sentence. If Labour is not in power, the Conservatives are. The Labour party was formed to send the representatives of working men to parliament and form a government. Mr Corbyn is a loser who will help to ensure the original purpose of the Labour party is frustrated. Making this case, which ought to be obvious, is not helped by writers who waste their fluency on a pitiful attempt to cast Mr Corbyn as the heir of anti-politics. No, clever-clogs commentator, Mr Corbyn is not the messiah. He’s just a very naughty boy. The tip-off for this sort of rubbish is the use of the meaningless term “neo-liberal”. Anyone who dares compromise with reality is, for the mock intellectuals of the left, a “neo-liberal”. Whatever it means, I’d rather be neo-liberal than Neolithic.

So, where is the political fightback? At every leadership hustings Liz Kendall tells Labour the truth while Andy Burnham and Yvette Cooper compete to see who can tread lightest on Jeremy’s dreams. Mr Burnham is blowing himself a bubble in which he now sits, declaring over and over that he is not in the Westminster bubble. One of the pair of them, and preferably both, has to take Mr Corbyn on. Take a risk; show some mettle. The leader who summons the passion to argue the greater good of the Labour party against the unwitting Tory double-agents of the Corbyn campaign will win the contest, and will deserve to.

If Mr Corbyn does win, Labour is for the jump. Lemmings, it should be said, have always been unjustly maligned. They do not, as legend has it, leap in suicidal formation off the ledge. We need a new symbol of pointless sacrifice and I suggest the term “lefties”. Mr Corbyn has nothing to offer except puerile slogans screamed at the public as the Labour party falls down the chasm.

People like Dave Ward would like to see the back of the Blairite side of the party. We’re going nowhere, Mr Ward, because in the end we will win. The reason we will win is because it is only when we do that Labour has any hope of getting into government. Enjoy your moment of infamy but don’t get accustomed to it because your failure is certain and, when you send the party to the inevitable, we will be there to make it right again. We know which side we are on, you see. I only wish you did.

Pork Pie Hat posted:

Down here in this corner of theTory Essex badlands they sell it in Tesco and WHSmiths. We're totes lucky like that.

OvineYeast posted:

It's very odd that he talks about Jeremy Corbyn 'screaming' puerile slogans. Does he actually know who Jeremy Corbyn is?

LemonDrizzle posted:

OvineYeast posted:

It's very odd that he talks about Jeremy Corbyn 'screaming' puerile slogans. Does he actually know who Jeremy Corbyn is?

tdrules posted:

lol at that shop assistant from Bedford saying that we shouldn't tax rich people because she could be one if she put her mind to it.

We are all temporarily embarrassed millionaires right?!

Tesseraction posted:

Oh God I'm so ashamed of my hometown.

One time I accidentally walked into a Labour media appearance with my ex-MP (and still current candidate) doing a speech with Ed Balls. I'd previously given him grief over Labour's rightward shift and so his advisors made sure that I was whisked away from him before the cameras could catch me with him.

Trickjaw posted:

When I saw it in our Tesco, their was one copy and I thought someone had put there as a joke.

Pork Pie Hat posted:

Is that the Springfield Road Tesco? They tend to only have a couple. I know one guy who buys it there every day on his way to work.

Trickjaw posted:

Yep, that one. It is deliciously ironic that they sell it. I wonder if you get clubcard points?

Bozza posted:

Sup fellow Bedford goon!

Kegluneq posted:

Sending in Army recruiters would make more sense. Twenty years of service will get you citizenship, barbarians

Tesseraction posted:

Bankers or Pilgrims?

feedmegin posted:

If I remember correctly the US literally does this (one way to get US citizenship is to join their army).

Bozza posted:

The Bear

OwlFancier posted:

Why is it when Corbyn says things it's populist bollocks but when the other candidates say things it's Very Serious Politics?

ukle posted:

Complete aside but if you haven't seen it already -

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b063s4gx/bbc-proms-2015-season-radio-1-ibiza-prom

BBC Ibiza Prom's - Royal Albert hall, Heritage Orchestra playing classic dance songs

Its things like this only the BBC can do, and the reason why it needs to be left alone.

Angepain posted:

If anyone has any hilarious Jeremy Corbyn puns for the next thread title, speak now or forever hold your peace

OwlFancier posted:

Why is it when Corbyn says things it's populist bollocks but when the other candidates say things it's Very Serious Politics?

LemonDrizzle posted:

OwlFancier posted:

Why is it when Corbyn says things it's populist bollocks but when the other candidates say things it's Very Serious Politics?

Alertrelic posted:

http://wire.novaramedia.com/2015/07/curb-your-corbynthusiasm-5-thoughts-on-the-politics-of-corbynism/

Pretty good look at some of the problems Corby has/might face, and its not just "he's not left' enough".

quote:

7. He hasn’t got a strategy to deal with the inevitable consequences of a social democratic government.

In 1981 Francois Mitterand won the French presidency promising better pay and pensions, shorter working hours and, generally speaking, a Keynesian strategy to expedite economic growth and job creation. By 1983, following rampant inflation, he backtracked on that platform.

Ever since then it’s been clear that in an increasingly globalised economy, social democracy – let alone socialism – in one country simply can’t work. If Corbyn was to be prime minister after the next general election in 2020 there would be significant capital flight and an attack on the pound. In response to that his answer was wilfully naive: “We’ve got to say ‘hang on, we live in a democracy’ and if the people of this country vote for an economic strategy which is about redistribution of wealth…then that’s that.”

Only it isn’t. The point is globalised capitalism means nations aren’t sovereign and the old repositories of democratic accountability are no longer, if they ever were, up to the job. Social democrats like Corbyn (still) don’t seem to have an answer to that.

---

1. Social democracy has a money problem.

Aaron’s final point is the most difficult, and is a question that has resonances across Europe at the moment. That is, how can you fund the classical model of strong-welfare states without either: a) the domestic growth and explosion in international trade characteristic of post-WW2 Europe, or b) a hugely crisis-prone finance industry undergirding your state revenue?

In Europe specifically, this is also a political question, because the way the EU and its institutions are arranged make it difficult to pull this off, both in terms of capital flight and the unremitting hostility of its high functionaries to left programmes – but even without an EU, it’s not clear there’s any simple answer to this question for ‘mature’ capitalist economies. This is the difficulty faced by social democrats in Europe at the moment.

quote:

4. Labour councils are still a problem.

Labour still has a local problem: that Labour councils are generally dens of corruption and venality, or agents of gatekeeping and social cleansing – especially (but not only) in London. You can answer this (and Corbyn perhaps might) by saying Department for Communities and Local Government cuts – of unbelievable severity – force councils into difficult situations in which there are no winners (adult social care, already hanging by a thread, is in serious danger under this government.)

By reversing such cuts, one might claim, councils will be relieved of their worst aspect. But is this true? Does it even begin to address the question? How councils behave, not just in the political conduct of office holders, but in the treatment of their constituents, is a litmus test of progressive government: this is especially true because for most people in need and worst hit by austerity, whose first point of contact isn’t national government but council-run services.

Why do Labour councils behave as they do, above and beyond ‘difficult decisions’, with councillors merrily hopping on the gravy train to handsomely rewarded non-executive board positions in property development after a term spent ‘regenerating’ an area? Is it not also true that state institutions themselves have an overbearing, almost irresistible, logic that is hard to resist and independent of the holder of office? How does one deal with that? And – though wanting to avoid Kremlinology – how would a Corbyn-led Labour party relate to local government bodies headed by people like Southwark’s dire Peter John?

Angepain posted:

If anyone has any hilarious Jeremy Corbyn puns for the next thread title, speak now or forever hold your peace

Tesseraction posted:

Good choice. Haven't been there in a while. Haha, actually last time I was forced to down half a shaken beer (basically a pint of foam) and had to have a quick vom in the loos before continuing.

My mate's visitors from Lancaster have weird drinking games.

ukle posted:

Complete aside but if you haven't seen it already -

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b063s4gx/bbc-proms-2015-season-radio-1-ibiza-prom

BBC Ibiza Prom's - Royal Albert hall, Heritage Orchestra playing classic dance songs

Its things like this only the BBC can do, and the reason why it needs to be left alone.