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[PJV3]

Corbyn hinting he might not go if Labour lose the general election has got to be a huge warning sign for the party, he doesn't really care about Westminster because he's personally comfortable and secure.

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/aug/07/jeremy-corbyn-could-stay-as-leader-if-labour-loses-next-election

 

[Baybars]

Corbyn hinting he might not go if Labour lose the general election has got to be a huge warning sign for the party, he doesn't really care about Westminster because he's personally comfortable and secure.

labour are fucked. I am telling you, they are fucked

 

[Sir_Crocodile]

Corbyn's a shockingly selfish guy

 

[PJV3]

labour are fucked. I am telling you, they are fucked

Yeah, momentum will keep supporting him as it is the only way for them to be relevant and keep influence, it's a circle of shit.

 

[Hazzuh]

Why would he stand down? His project has nothing to do with what goes on in parliament. It's about changing the Labour party, not changing the country. His enemies are the people in the party who disagree with him, not the Tories.

 

[Royal_Phalanx]

Corbyn you selfish fucker.

 

[daviyoung]

Why would he stand down? His project has nothing to do with what goes on in parliament. It's about changing the Labour party, not changing the country. His enemies are the people in the party who disagree with him, not the Tories.

exactly, he's there to cleanse the party of New Labour

 

[Juicy Bob]

I get the legitmate concerns of people over Corbyn and electibility because you have to win an election first to get into power, but all I can say as someone who has never voted Labour before is that I would vote Labour if Corbyn was leader and I don't think I would if Smith was leader.

 

[War Peaceman]

exactly, he's there to cleanse the party of New Labour

They are already done for!

 

[Fevaweva]

exactly, he's there to cleanse the party of New Labour

A purge that has been a long time coming and is well deserved.

 

[Maledict]

exactly, he's there to cleanse the party of New Labour

And any chance the party ever has of winning, or accomplishing anything for anyone ever.

See my post on the previous page. New Labour was by no means perfect, but they accomplished more than Corbyn ever has or ever will do to make life better for the poor and the working class, and led over a redistribution of wealth unseen in recent decades.

 

[Sir_Crocodile]

I get the legitmate concerns of people over Corbyn and electibility because you have to win an election first to get into power, but all I can say as someone who has never voted Labour before is that I would vote Labour if Corbyn was leader and I don't think I would if Smith was leader.

Who would you vote for if Smith was leader then?

 

[Maledict]

A purge that has been a long time coming and is well deserved.

Do you have *any* answers at all to what I posted on the previous page?

Can you name anything the labour party has accomplished outside of new labours time in office, in our lifetimes, to make the country a better place?

 

[Juicy Bob]

Who would you vote for if Smith was leader then?

The Greens. Again.

 

[Royal_Phalanx]

On the other hand, I hate Blair's tendency towards the nanny state to solve all problems. Weren't there hundreds of new laws a month or something?

 

[Hazzuh]

I get the legitmate concerns of people over Corbyn and electibility because you have to win an election first to get into power, but all I can say as someone who has never voted Labour before is that I would vote Labour if Corbyn was leader and I don't think I would if Smith was leader.

Just wondering why you feel like that? Policy differences or do you just think Smith seems like a smarmy git?

 

[PJV3]

A purge that has been a long time coming and is well deserved.

As someone who remembers the 79 election and lived through the glorious years of the Thatcher era, you can't be serious.

The real right are loving this.

 

[Sir_Crocodile]

The Greens. Again.

Are you in a marginal seat?

 

[Juicy Bob]

Just wondering why you feel like that? Policy differences or do you just think Smith seems like a smarmy git?

For me personally, it's because Corbyn has a proven voting history that reflects him sticking to his ideals even through the New Labour years. I think we put too much emphasis on personality in modern politics and I try not to let that influence me if I can.

I didn't vote Labour last year not because I had any issues with Miliband, but because I didn't feel from the debates that he and the party were offering enough of an alternative to what the Tories were. And I get that Labour kind of have to pander to the middle-ground voters to have any realistic chance of winning the election, but I fear the same could happen again if Smith takes the reigns.

I like Smith's voting record and I like the things he's been saying about equality and he seems like a perfectly reasonable politician and I would much rather have him in No. 10 than May right now, but if there was an election tomorrow I would be more inclined to back the bloke who wanted to scrap Trident - which I fundamentally agree with - over the bloke who voted to spend billions of pounds on renewing it against a backdrop of national Tory-driven austerity.

Are you in a marginal seat?

Last year our Conservative incumbent was returned to Westminster with 48.9% of the vote, up 3.2% on 2010. Labour came second with only 24.2%.

 

[Sir_Crocodile]

Was going to say that under owen it would be an alternative that is further left then the tories and is at the same time electable, but if you're in a safe tory seat you're SOL anyway.

 

[Guileless]

I've been reading about UK politics so much I dreamed I saw a car commercial starring Ed Miliband and Boris Johnson. They drive an SUV to a football stadium and park it to tailgate.

 

[Juicy Bob]

Was going to say that under owen it would be an alternative that is further left then the tories and is at the same time electable, but if you're in a safe tory seat you're SOL anyway.

It's like I say, if there was an election tomorrow I would vote Labour with Corbyn at the helm whereas I "don't think" I would do the same with Smith leading.

Should Smith win the leadership, he and Labour will have multiple years to convince me to vote for them in 2020 and I'll keep my mind open to that. But until then I honestly still find the Greens the most agreeable in terms of policies and I would continue to endorse them for that.

 

[Oregano]

Corbyn hinting he might not go if Labour lose the general election has got to be a huge warning sign for the party, he doesn't really care about Westminster because he's personally comfortable and secure.

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/aug/07/jeremy-corbyn-could-stay-as-leader-if-labour-loses-next-election

Jesus if Corbyn ever did somehow get into power I'd be concerned about the country becoming a dictatorship.

If its clear you'll never be in a position to enact real change surely your obligation to the people you're meant to represent would need you to step aside.

 

[Moze]

Just to address the welfare comment, from wikipedia:



The Tories of course would have done EXACTLY the same. The re-writing of history to pretend New Labour didn't do fucking amazing things for the working class and the poorest in society is one of the most unpleasant aspects of the liberal left under Corbyn. Let's compare what Blair accomplished in his 8 yers to what Jeremy Corbyn has accomplished his entire life for the poorest people in society.

First of all, at no point have I claimed Blair's government was as bad as the Tory government before it.

That is not good enough. Looking after poor pensioners is indeed a great thing, and it is something that is extremely important to any party due to how much that group votes compared to other poor groups. Child poverty was always a big thing for Blair's government, and it did do many good things. I was raised on welfare during Blair's term and never remember any of the issues poor families face today with food banks and such.

Possibly the most important right for anybody, the right to housing was was a huge issue for poor people with Blair's government. Blair gave absolutely no fucks about social housing. He was happy to pass social housing into private hands. He was happy to sell social housing to more well off working class people and leave the less well off on the waiting list.

He fucked over people who were unable to work, and pretty much created the blueprint for how to fuck over disabled people for the future Tory government. Blair's government is actually responsible for arguably the most callous and controversial welfare policies of recent years. The 'work capability assessment', a policy in which the government pays a private company to ignore the advice of GPs and take disabled people off of disability benefits using a points system that trivialises the issues that disabled people face. And we are not talking about slowly taking them off of benefits and easing them into work with the support they need. We are talking about an unqualified private company telling disabled people to go to work and telling their GP to get fucked with actual medical advice. Throughout his whole term, he had a vendetta against disabled people and the benefits they received.

It's okay looking after pensioners because they vote. It's okay looking after children because they are the future. Looking after poor people who could not work was always a problem for Blair because they provided nothing in return.

 

[CyclopsRock]

A purge that has been a long time coming and is well deserved.

Not being funny, but the purge of New Labour is basically why the party has no talent anymore. When your ideological battle is personified by Corbyn vs Owen, that doesn't suggest a deep well of quality. Why? They all left to run think tanks where they won't get call Tories just for trying to win an election.

First of all, at no point have I claimed Blair's government was as bad as the Tory government before it.

I suspect the idea was that - and I dunno if you did this, but it's usually the reason Blair gets compared to Major/Hague Tories - if you help support a leader you know can't win an election then it's a de facto support of the Tories. If you choose to support Corbyn over Owen, you're basically supporting the Tories being re-elected. This is why it's useful to compare the "sacrifices" that the left have to make to get elected to the Tories, because they are the only two options that'll win.

 

[Goodlife]

Not being funny, but the purge of New Labour is basically why the party has no talent anymore. When your ideological battle is personified by Corbyn vs Owen, that doesn't suggest a deep well of quality. Why? They all left to run think tanks where they won't get call Tories just for trying to win an election.



I suspect the idea was that - and I dunno if you did this, but it's usually the reason Blair gets compared to Major/Hague Tories - if you help support a leader you know can't win an election then it's a de facto support of the Tories. If you choose to support Corbyn over Owen, you're basically supporting the Tories being re-elected. This is why it's useful to compare the "sacrifices" that the left have to make to get elected to the Tories, because they are the only two options that'll win.

A Smith led Labour will not be winning anything
He's a joke

 

[benjipwns]

I've been reading about UK politics so much I dreamed I saw a car commercial starring Ed Miliband and Boris Johnson. They drive an SUV to a football stadium and park it to tailgate.

 

[CyclopsRock]

A Smith led Labour will not be winning anything
He's a joke

But there aren't simply two options, "win" and "lose". The degree of the loss and how the campaign goes could have repercussions way beyond 2020. If we're all in agreement that neither Corbyn nor Owen will win, then you have to start looking at the degree of loss and what that could mean.

 

[RedShift]

But there aren't simply two options, "win" and "lose". The degree of the loss and how the campaign goes could have repercussions way beyond 2020. If we're all in agreement that neither Corbyn nor Owen will win, then you have to start looking at the degree of loss and what that could mean.

Yeah, Corbyn doesn't just worry me because I think he could lose the election, he worries me because I think he could lose the official opposition.

 

[travisbickle]

The problem is politics is out-doing itself in spin. Everyone needs to calm down. I heard another politician blame the EU referendum loss solely on Corbyn. 9 million people voted for Labour last election (with est. 65% voting remain), 17 million voted to leave the EU. The Labour party wishes it had enough voters to sway the election result.

 

[Bojanglez]

The problem is politics is out-doing itself in spin. Everyone needs to calm down. I heard another politician blame the EU referendum loss solely on Corbyn. 9 million people voted for Labour last election (with est. 65% voting remain), 17 million voted to leave the EU. The Labour party wishes it had enough voters to sway the election result.

Yeah, this is because many people use the term 'Labour voters' as a euphemism for 'working class people'. For some reason it seems it is the sole responsibility of the Labour party to win those people over.

 

[kmag]

A Smith led Labour will not be winning anything
He's a joke

A Corbyn led Labour will not be winning anything either. There lies the rub. Neither joker has a chance, but one joker has already proven himself to be tactically terrible, inept communicator who couldn't manage a union branch office nevermind a political party.

 

[Moze]

Not being funny, but the purge of New Labour is basically why the party has no talent anymore. When your ideological battle is personified by Corbyn vs Owen, that doesn't suggest a deep well of quality. Why? They all left to run think tanks where they won't get call Tories just for trying to win an election.



I suspect the idea was that - and I dunno if you did this, but it's usually the reason Blair gets compared to Major/Hague Tories - if you help support a leader you know can't win an election then it's a de facto support of the Tories. If you choose to support Corbyn over Owen, you're basically supporting the Tories being re-elected. This is why it's useful to compare the "sacrifices" that the left have to make to get elected to the Tories, because they are the only two options that'll win.

The way some people talk is like Corbyn is some sort of dictator who somehow got control of the party. Corbyn was democratically elected as leader using the system set in place and agreed by the party.

Corbyn was unelectable as leader until he was elected as leader. Then people decided he is unelectable as prime minister 5 years before the general election.

How are these people judging the political landscape of the next 5 years and where were they when the last two labour governments failed miserably? The last labour leader in particular was polling highly throughout his whole term but still managed to actually do worse than the previous leader.

Regardless of whether people feel he is unelectable, it is disgusting to see people look down on passionate Corbyn supporters. Some people feel passionately about voting for something they believe in. Other people take a more tactical approach to democracy. Both are valid and the result should always be respected.

 

[JonathanEx]

Chris Mason ‏@ChrisMasonBBC
BREAKING: 5 new members of Labour Party have won a High Court battle over their legal right to vote in the forthcoming leadership election.

Pissup, meet brewery

 

[Jezbollah]

RIP Labour.

Corbyn is going to get the party HE wants - a movement with a few MPs.

Split inbound?

 

[JonathanEx]

Hey think any of those £25 supporters will want their money back

 

[SolicitorPirate]

I sometimes wish I was conservative so that I could actually enjoy watching the left constantly shoot itself in the foot

 

[Huw_Dawson]

Split inbound?

I'd say so. Labour are defunct as the opposition due to having no route to power that doesn't involve winning England now due to the SNP kicking them out of Scotland. Ergo the time of the current Labour Party being the dominant anti-Tory force is over. Labour is scrabbling for a new direction and is now retreating into the socialist wilderness.

The party that will defeat the Tories in 2020 will be a progressive alliance of centre-left politicians. Hopefully Labour's right will help create that new alliance.

 

[twobear]

The party that defeats the Tories in 2020 doesn't exist. The current population is clearly very happy with having a Tory government in power; if anything, the Tories could even stand to be a little more to the right than they currently are and still have good poll numbers. The populace does not want a left-wing government. It's time to start laying the intellectual groundwork for elections in 2040.

 

[BanGy.nz]

The party that defeats the Tories in 2020 doesn't exist. The current population is clearly very happy with having a Tory government in power; if anything, the Tories could even stand to be a little more to the right than they currently are and still have good poll numbers. The populace does not want a left-wing government. It's time to start laying the intellectual groundwork for elections in 2040.

This is the most depressing thing I've read in awhile.

 

[Acorn]

Labour is done for whoever is the leader. They need us in Scotland to get into govt and that's not happening so permanent cunt govt.

 

[HazySaiyan]

Labour's fucking finished, this isn't a political party it's a personality cult.

Granted they're probably finished regardless of who's leader but still this is troubling.

The party that defeats the Tories in 2020 doesn't exist. The current population is clearly very happy with having a Tory government in power; if anything, the Tories could even stand to be a little more to the right than they currently are and still have good poll numbers. The populace does not want a left-wing government. It's time to start laying the intellectual groundwork for elections in 2040.

Also this, seems the population are perfectly happy with a Tory government. Probably won't get another left wing government for a generation at this rate.

God that's depressing

 

[Kuros]

This is the most depressing thing I've read in awhile.

It's completely true though.

 

[Acorn]

Labour's fucking finished, this isn't a political party it's a personality cult.

Granted they're probably finished regardless of who's leader but still this is troubling.

One party nation is always troubling. That's how thatcher destroyed lives, sold everything for pennies etc. Because of the one party domination in the 80s much of tory policy became untouchable.

Edit tories do shit that can't be reversed unlike labour.

 

[Maledict]

I'd say so. Labour are defunct as the opposition due to having no route to power that doesn't involve winning England now due to the SNP kicking them out of Scotland. Ergo the time of the current Labour Party being the dominant anti-Tory force is over. Labour is scrabbling for a new direction and is now retreating into the socialist wilderness.

The party that will defeat the Tories in 2020 will be a progressive alliance of centre-left politicians. Hopefully Labour's right will help create that new alliance.

It's worth remembering that Blair would have won every election he fought without a single Scottish seat. It is possible for labour to win an election without the Scottish seats - they just need to actually be a credible opposition and party of government. In 1997 we saw tactical voting on a scale never before seen in England in order to get the conservatives out and labour in.

Labour can win in England, and it can win big in England. It does need to have a message that goes beyond the bottom 10% and top 10% and actually talks positively about things rather than framing everything as a negative that must be opposed.

(I know not every message labour gives is like this, but it's absolutely the overall tone of their messaging now and it just doesn't work).

 

[BanGy.nz]

It's completely true though.

That's why it's so depressing.

 

[Acorn]

We're going to turn into right wing shithole.

 

[twobear]

This is the most depressing thing I've read in awhile.

Well, it's true. Can you name a single instance in the last decade in the UK when it was shown that the British population, on the whole, showed that they have any love for the left? We've had the Tories upselling their minority government to a majority in 2010 (in spite of making a pig's ear of running the country), the EU referendum delivering a damning rejection of left-wing opinion on integration and internationalism, and on top of that we've got the Labour Party on a course to self-destruct.

The reality is that the left needs to go back to the drawing boards, like the right did back in the 60s and 70s, and plan for elections decades away. The Labour party has run out of intellectual and ideological steam. As much as I like the idea of a 'proper left wing' Labour Party in principle, I can't pretend that Corbyn's reheated 50s Socialism is going to win an election.

 

[Acorn]

Well, it's true. Can you name a single instance in the last decade in the UK when it was shown that the British population, on the whole, showed that they have any love for the left? We've had the Tories upselling their minority government to a majority in 2010 (in spite of making a pig's ear of running the country), the EU referendum delivering a damning rejection of left-wing opinion on integration and internationalism, and on top of that we've got the Labour Party on a course to self-destruct.

The reality is that the left needs to go back to the drawing boards, like the right did back in the 60s and 70s, and plan for elections decades away.

The left will just fight over bullshit if they even try to plan anything.

We suck at collaboration and working gung ho like right wingers do.

 

[HazySaiyan]

One party nation is always troubling. That's how thatcher destroyed lives, sold everything for pennies etc. Because of the one party domination in the 80s much of tory policy became untouchable.

Yeah this pretty much gives the Tories roughshot to do whatever the hell they want for years. Who knows what's going to happen to the traditional Labour strongholds? A lot of them might end up voting UKIP, god that's a nightmare scenario.

The left will just fight over bullshit if they even try to plan anything.

We suck at collaboration and working gung ho like right wingers do.

I don't know why the left are so much worse than playing politics than the right are. The left have no fucking spine and it pisses me off.