Corbyn is Being Destroyed, Like Blowing Up a Bridge to Stop an Advancing Army <<MOD WARNNG>>

That's true, but he's a shameless 'playing-to-the-gallery' waste of space anyway, so the sooner he's destroyed, the sooner a better leader will be elected thence (hopefully) to deserve to win the next general election - because May is an even bigger waste of space. She humiliates us wherever she goes on the world stage, the latest example of it being in Cape Town last week. Even Cameron didn't humiliate us that much.

 

Communism a genuine change and when on earth has Labour been a party of efficiency??

 

I don't think anyone can be arsed to destroy Corbyn.
The elites like him where he is.

When your enemy has a weak leader, do your best to have them keep him.

 

Yes, membership has risen significantly but unfortunately that has not been accompanied by a rise in the polls or success in national elections at a time when we have an incompetent government fumbling through the Brexit process.

Rather than providing a coherent opposition, and proposing an alternative to the completely unworkable "Chequers Plan", the Labour Party has managed to get itself dragged into an internal squabble about antisemitism, is proposing a tech tax to fund public interest journalism and is getting embroiled in an argument on whether "all women shortlists" should include people who self identify as women.

This smacks of the politics of the sixth form common room or student union. Nearly 35 years ago I was thrown out of the SWSS because I wanted to debate and protest the withdrawal of housing benefit for students because I felt that it would cause a number of students financial hardship. The leadership of the SWSS wanted to invest their time and effort into boycotting the student union shop because they sold Rowntrees Fruit Pastilles and at the time Rowntrees had links to South Africa. I was accused of being bourgeois and asked not to return. I still feel that, for the students, housing benefit was both more important and more urgent rather than holding the line on a global geopolitical point.

I think that the current Labour Party is having the same difficulty in prioritising.

That may be the case, then again it could be a replay of the "Militant" years when a relatively small number of left wing activists managed to hijack the party (rather like the Tea Party did to the GOP). I think anyone who thinks that New Labour was just "Tory-lite" needs to look at the way in which funding was improved for the NHS (which was in much worse shape than it is now), low-earning families were helped out of poverty by income tax credits and the international aid budget was increased significantly.

And yet here we are with an opposition party which, through its support for Brexit and its lack of unity is aiding and abetting the Conservative Party. There is no coherent opposition from the left. The only dissent seems to be from the far right who seem to have a vision of Brexit even more ruinous and distopian than Theresa May's.

Jeremy Corbyn may believe that, free from the shackles of the corporatist EU, the UK can finally become a workers' utopia. He fails to recognise that EU legislation is the thing currently preventing the Brexiteers from turning the UK into a sweatshop and tax haven, competing with the developing world on price and not the developed world on innovation. All of this talk about a more competitive post-Brexit UK can only be realised through a combination of and erosion of workers' rights and public and environmental protection.

The best thing that anyone opposed to Jeremy Corbyn can do is to give him a fair hearing. He's so honest, that he cannot help saying what he really thinks and believes. Unfortunately for him, that's a message that the majority in the UK are very uncomfortable with.

Get him to talk about his vision for the UK and how he intends to pay for it. It really does take me back 35 years to the sixth form common room - I was making the same arguments then than he is now.

 

I disagree, I think Jeremy Corbyn is a fundamentally decent human being with genuinely held political beliefs and who is working to see those beliefs realised. The trouble is that he is wholly unsuited to leading one of the UK's two main political parties. He's like Michael Foot without the latter's political nous.

I've yet to see too much evidence of that. Then again, I think they are more dangerous than that, they are political zealots with a real opportunity to set policy in one of our two major parties.

 

In Wales there was a significant shift to UKIP from Labour. I don't think that you can accuse New Labour of being too right wing when support is lost to a far right party. The only way that Labour could have retained the support of those who deserted to UKIP was to promise similar policies.

 

He has spent his political life being all things to all men. 'principles' comes a poor second.

 

Are we talking about the same Jeremy Corbyn ?

I think that what you say could be (somewhat unfairly) applied to someone like Tony Blair or David Cameron, people who have adapted and remodelled their policies to appeal to voters outside their party.

Jeremy Corbyn on the other hand has always been un-apologetically a socialist. As far as I know he has never compromised his own political beliefs in order to appeal to the masses. His unwillingness to follow the Labour whip is famous.

From an ideological standpoint I'd say that he's been unwavering to his left wing views as someone like Nigel Farage has been to their right wing views.

 

If he became PM, it'll be out with the monarchy, so no need for God Save The Queen, so might this be the British Anthem if his Reich comes to power?

 

But it's socialists who constitute the masses? You don't get many elitists who are socialists - they might sometimes say they are for agenda reasons of identifying with the masses, but they're few and far between, I'd suggest? But I'll give you this - when it comes to fake politics, Blair and Cameron make Corbgyn seem like an amateur.

I don't see Farage as right wing, I see him as patriotic. But I'm open to persuasion if you can give me a valid example of why you think he's right wing?

 

There is nothing wrong with Left Wing or Right Wing.
I shouldn't have to be the one to tell everybody that;
There is everything wrong with The Far Left or The Far Right.

 

If socialists are the masses, how come socialist parties cannot get elected these days ?

Socialism (unless you're going to classify anything to the left of Ghengis Khan as socialist) is a minority viewpoint in the UK - one of the reasons why New Labour abandoned Clause 4 in an attempt to appeal to the middle ground of UK politics.

You really do have an idiosyncratic view of the world. One of the few things that pretty much everyone on the UK political spectrum can agree on is that Jeremy Corbyn has, for the last 50 years or so, ploughed a determined furrow of his own making and absolutely has not bowed to the tyranny of public opinion. That's what makes him a hero to those on the left and a laughing stock and/or real and present danger to those on the right.

I know you don't but his support for laissez-faire capitalism definitely puts him on the right economically IMO. That said we're supposed to be talking about Jeremy Corbyn so apologies for dragging us OT.

 

You start by underestimating the rise (it has exploded, ensuring that Labour is now the richest party) and ignoring how Labour- despite the increasingly desperate smears- has led in the latest polls and generated gains not seen since 1945. Labour's problems can be traced back to New Labour. Achieving electoral success, they maintained the limitation of Thatcherism. This guaranteed long term decline. Indeed, this has happened across Europe. As the centre left have embraced austerity (and the myth that its unavoidable), they have seen their support plummet.

You'll be blaming Corbyn for the existence of Dan Hodges next! The smears on Corbyn are not his doing. There certainly is an internal crisis in the Labour Party, but this reflects the Chicken Coup PLP and their efforts to maintain power over the membership. The only way you could attack Corbyn here is to suggest he's been too willing to work with these people.

The interesting aspect is how far they will go. The Chicken Coup PLP are desperately split. Some want to leave the Party. They see an opportunity to break free. There's no need to bother with the nastiness of party democracy. No reason to listen to those Trotskyite single mothers. There's a new party on the horizon, purely reliant on benefactors (with over £50 million apparently already available) and a symathetic press. A continuation of neoliberalism no less! However, most of the Chicken Coup PLP are careerists. They remember the failure of the SDP. They have typically been parachuted into safe seats by Uncle Blair and co. To get these people to shift is going to take special effort. The current crisis is creating the perfect storm. They're trying to damage the Labour 'brand', maximising the chance of a post-Labour career and having cocktails with Lord Sugar and J.K. Rowling.

There's a tut here! The SU were demonstrating against apartheid. That's a jolly good thing! Corbyn today was attacked for referring to Yemen: "How dare he talk about this country we hardly know when he should be referring to Brexit". Wonder if they gave a toss when the 40 kids were blown up by Western military hardware?

This isn't a credible claim. The Labour Party derived a highly successful manifesto. They continue to innovate, ensuring- for example- that heterodox economists are included in policy debate. Buy your tickets here to get a flavour: https://theworldtransformed.org/programme

Nothing of this standard happened under the previous regimes. The likes of Progress simply debated the level of austerity that we needed.

First, Militant was deliberately overplayed. It was a power grab. Democratic practices were taken from the members. CLPs became powerless. Second, that New Labour is Tory Lite is just a matter of fact. How did NHS privatisation proceed? How did PPPs progress? And when policies were introduced, ultra-conservatism was adopted. Take the minimum wage. Was it ever introduced to the levels required? No. They allowed right wing thought to determine the rate. So when Cameron came in, abusing the term 'living wage', he managed to look like the radical.

Wrong again! Corbyn has been very clear. He will not go against the people's decision, but will fight for a deal that minimises any harm on employment and living standards. Labour's opposition to the Tories has also been insightful. Indeed, if it wasn't for the likes of Frank Field, Labour may well have brought down the government. Indeed, its that very charge that ensured Frank's local party voted to get shot of him (and why he's since jumped).

Its actually the Bennites who are in favour of Brexit. They see the EU's continued neoliberalism and of course its undemocratic nature. You again make bogus argument.

Fortunately your views, where you'd demand the continuation of Tory Lite, is unpopular among the membership. Fortunately Britain now has genuine choice. Its of course a choice that has the establishment in a panic. If Corbyn wasn't a threat, we wouldn't have the daily smears.

 

Oh, and another thing.......

This whole move towards mandatory re-selection is another part of the Momentum power grab. Get rid of experienced MPs and replace them with Momentum ideologues once the local party has been infiltrated. It's a great way for Momentum to repeat what Militiant did back in the 80's and will result in an ideologically pure left wing party which will appeal to the few hundred thousand Labour Party members but not the electorate at large.

The good news for Momentum is that they will be able to keep the purity left wing policies because they'll never be challenged with the demands of actually governing.

 

What drivel! Corbyn showed how to maintain the vote: you offer a genuine left wing package. See what happened in Wales. The vote share, despite those suggesting Tory wins, increased by 12.1%

 

Are you sure you were in the Labour Party? You seem to know very little. This is member driven. There are in fact 4 proposals over to conference. These come from: Labour International; Portsmouth North and Rochester and Strood;Bristol West, Worthing West, and Hove; Rayleigh and Wickford, Kensington, and Hastings and Rye.

The idea that democracy is a bad thing perhaps suggests you shouldn't be part of the democracy process?

 

Yes, how dare New Labour get elected, and manage to funnel tens of billions of pounds of extra funding into the NHS.

Instead, Labour should have kept to its hard-left policies - against the will of the members - and watched as the Conservative Party won election after election.

I blame Jeremy Corbyn for being a wholly ineffective leader of the opposition. He has allowed himself and his party to be dragged into all kind of side issues whilst allowing, and indeed abetting, the Conservatives in their Brexit plans.

Ah, name calling and getting the splitters to leave. Takes me back to the early 80's when I joined the party (though as I say, I had been involved for some years beforehand) and we can look forward to another decade or two of electoral irrelevance as the Labour Party is seized by left wing fervour.

Like I said, priorities - a Quixotic attack on a multinational and a terrible regime as opposed to taking action to oppose something which directly affects the members - a perfect example of what is wrong.

The Labour Brexit approach is as muddled and mutually incompatible as is Theresa May's. (This week) They want to be in the EEA and customs union but want to stop freedom of movement.

Same thing is happening again. A host of new members register, kick out the sitting MP, install a Momentum candidate and away we go.

I think you live in a fantasy world of your own making.

Corbyn has been anti-EU for decades. His embracing of official party policy during the referendum campaign was remarkable for its lack of enthusiasm.

If there's one thing that the Labour Party membership have demonstrated time and again is its ability to render the party unelectable. It's illuminating that reporting what Jeremy Corbyn has said and done is considered "smearing" him by his supporters. It's rather like the Trumpists complaining about #FakeNews when President Trump's blunders are publicised.

 

Oh come on, every time there was about to be some election the Labour Right have been screaming 'don't vote for Labour 'antisemitism. That is what has stopped Labour getting in. Even after the Brexit vote rather than using that to strengthen Labours position, you decided to try to get rid of Corbyn. The fact that the Labour Party has done so well despite the intentions of the Right wing of the PLC to destroy it is amazing. The only reason Labour is not in power now is the right of your party dissing your party.

 

I've got no problem with the democratic process but those taking part in it need to understand that the new members who are flooding into the party are doing so with a specific agenda.

I went through this more than 30 years ago and thought we had seen the back of it. I realise now that everything is cyclical.

 

If you're one of the 48% who voted Remain, you'd be insane to vote for the Labour Party - they're as committed to Brexit as the Conservative Party despite the majority of Labour Party supporters voting to Remain. If you want to look to a reason why Labour is not currently in power, that's a good start.

Regarding the antisemitism row, the reason that the accusations have proved so persistent is that the Labour Party in general and Jeremy Corbyn in particular will go and do something like refusing to use an internationally agreed definition which just adds fuel to the fire (unnecessarily IMO).

 

I look at it - and call it 'idiosyncratic' if you will - that the feckless among us are the socialists in the class sense, and in these days of planned and organized infantilization, are becoming more and more sybaritic and (I use the word again) feckless, are 'the masses'. They might be a minority now (if you believe it but I'm not convinced), but we're fast becoming outnumbered by them. I mean look at the tv viewing figures? The dross channels BBC1, 2 3 and 4 and the multiple ITV ones are proliferating, and that can only mean they're in great demand. Try and check out the film Harrison Bergeron if you can - it's all there.

That's because nobody took him seriously, apart from the easily-fooled. Mostly he was tolerated rather than idolised.

We ARE talking about Jeremy Corbyn??

 

You avoid all of the points made of course. That 5 million voters were lost is a matter of fact. That centre left parties across Europe have lost significant ground is a matter of fact. That Uncle Blair continued Thatcherite policies, guaranteeing future crisis, is a matter of fact.

Did you argue against PPP? Did you argue against privatisation of the NHS? What about the liberalisation of the financial sector? What about avoiding media reforms to keep Murdoch happy? What about the failure to introduce a living wage, maintaining a pitiful minimum wage favoured by big business?

I blame the right wing for trying to destroy Corbyn's chances. And that, unlike your opinion, is supported by the evidence (e.g. how Labour machinery was hijacked and ultra-conservative electoral tactics adopted). Corbyn managed the biggest turnaround since 1945, despite these underhand tactics. If he had received the full support of Labour (which is only happening now, given membership influence on the make-up of the NEC), I am certain he would be in government now.

So you supported the Chicken Coup PLP and their attempts to ignore the membership? Figures!

The real hijacking of Labour occurred under Kinnock. Despite being a socialist party, centralisation of the party shifted power to the unelected Progress. What has happened under Corbyn is simple: the members have reclaimed the party. Now you might hate socialism. That's your choice of course. The vast majority of members do not.

A socialist party should pursue ethical foreign policy. We are internationalists after all. Its also good economics. Our arms trade, given crowding out effects (with a small base of engineers and scientists involved in finding 'spin in' military technologies from civilian know-how), reduces economic growth and harms the manufacturing sector.

Perhaps you need to up your reading? Its always been clear to me (e.g. the 6 tests for any Brexit deal).

Which MPs have been kicked out? Have a think now!

Sounds like you can't muster a reply. Given you're responding to facts, I can appreciate your impotence. Field did prop up the government. Field did lose his support of the local party because of it (though I'm sure he was disliked already, given he writes for the Sun)

You do love to repeat the myths. Corbyn was particularly active campaigning for Remain: e.g. "A breakdown of spokespeople’s media appearances from the Loughborough University Centre for Research in Communication and Culture sheds some more light. Of Labour Party figures, Jeremy Corbyn easily tops the list, with 123 media appearances from 6 May until the referendum. By contrast, Alan Johnson – who ran Labour In For Britain and is lauded by Blairites as a great campaigner – made just 19 appearances" https://www.redpepper.org.uk/brexit-clearly-not-jeremy-corbyns-fault/

And here we have it: an open disdain for democracy.

 

The NHS doesn't need 'tens of billions of pounds', it needs to be de-bureaucratized and the lazy chav nurses weeded out. Then it needs to stop being abused every effing Friday and Saturday night, and more to the point, stop itself from being abused all nights of the week - and I'm talking Accident & Emergency here - by treating only the accident victims and those suffering unwanted adverse health episodes. Both parties think everything will be hunky-dory simply by just chucking more money its way, but at least the Tories don't chuck so much at failing services (which is all of them - name one which isn't?) that they end up bankrupting the Exchequer like Labour always does?

 

The smear campaign being orchestrated against him tells me all I need to know.

 

Aha, using your own definition of something in order to prove your point sorta like:

"The majority of people in the UK are vegetarian"

"No they're not, only around 2% are"

"As long as you classify beef, lamb, pork, fish and chicken as vegetarian the majority are"

"........."

BTW TV ratings are down across the board as people switch online.

Your argument was that Jeremy Corbyn was someone whose views and policies changed to appeal to the public. I hoped to point out that that's one thing you cannot accuse Jeremy Corbyn of. He has resolutely clung to views that were unpopular for decades.

True, but I was in danger of making it a discussion on the right wing (or otherwise) policies of Nigel Farage.