What is the point of Labour ?

[Chapelhall chap]

4 hours ago, G51 said:

I kind of know what Ash means but as I presume that is Charles 1 , then  he was executed by the English State and of course James 11 was overthrown by the English state for having the wrong faith, but  I suppose since 1707 the "British " monarchy has been fairly stable, though not always inspiring faith in  it. Keir is talking tripe. The monarchy is institutionally un egalitarian and tied up in hereditary privilege  which the "British" people may be unconcerned about that but should he? Maybe Ash is a bit "Anglo" equals "British" as well

Edited April 12, 2021 by Chapelhall chap
Lack of understanding

[scottsdad]

15 hours ago, spongeheid15 said:

One of the sheep

Righty-oh 

[Antlion]

16 hours ago, spongeheid15 said:

One of the sheep

 

[Antlion]

15 hours ago, Chapelhall chap said:

I kind of know what Ash means but as I presume that is Charles 1 , then  he was executed by the English State and of course James 11 was overthrown by the English state for having the wrong faith, but  I suppose since 1707 the "British " monarchy has been fairly stable, though not always inspiring faith in  it. Keir is talking tripe. The monarchy is institutionally un egalitarian and tied up in hereditary privilege  which the "British" people may be unconcerned about that but should he? Maybe Ash is a bit "Anglo" equals "British" as well

To be fair, the Union of the Crowns had already happened in 1603 so she’s correct in that there was a British monarch and the two countries were in “personal” union when Charlie got his head chopped off and James II was deposed. Post 1707 though, there were significant republican movements in the 1870s because Victorian did f**k all. The government shat itself and convinced her to engage in a PR blitz of carriage riding and waving and the proles soon realised what a difficult and valuable job she had. 

Edited April 13, 2021 by Antlion

[Antlion]

33 minutes ago, Pato said:

Absolutely. I can't get my head round folk like David Starkey who think that was the absolute high point of British civilisation then you see photos from the time of the desperate poverty normal people lived in. The whole thing was a sham to make 1000 people very rich from the start, it's nonsense.

Aye, the UK fetishisation of the past seems to have really gone mental post empire, when folk saw Britain declining as a world power and hurriedly put on the rose-tinted specs to lionise the supposedly glorious past. Not so glorious if you were scratching a living in Whitechapel or the highlands, or happened to be a minority. It’s no surprise that a lot of UK nationalists’ go-to arguments are based on the past (“three hundred years of shared history and culture! Wasn’t it glorious? The most successful union everrrr! Wasn’t it glorious? Fighting Hitler! Wasn’t it glorious? We kicked f**k out them darkies in Bongo Bongo Land! Wasn’t it - sorry, didn’t mean to say that one out loud.”)

Edited April 13, 2021 by Antlion

[Detournement]

Corbyn broke the right wingers' brains so bad that they can't comprehend that they actually need to stop sabotaging the Labour Party now. 

[tirso]

had hopes for Starmer until I heard him speak.  

he reminds me of Walter the softy out the beano.

Probably a decent chap but can't believe how far Labour has fallen.

[tamthebam]

On 12/04/2021 at 19:40, Chapelhall chap said:

I kind of know what Ash means but as I presume that is Charles 1 , then  he was executed by the English State and of course James 11 was overthrown by the English state for having the wrong faith, but  I suppose since 1707 the "British " monarchy has been fairly stable, though not always inspiring faith in  it. Keir is talking tripe. The monarchy is institutionally un egalitarian and tied up in hereditary privilege  which the "British" people may be unconcerned about that but should he? Maybe Ash is a bit "Anglo" equals "British" as well

Charles I was in the hands of the Scots army at Newcastle when they handed him over to the Parliamentarians for a fat pile of cash.

Maybe we could do the same with Randy Andy next time he visits Scotland if the Yanks are prepared to stump up..

[Dunning1874]

A lot of pundits talking about how yesterday was a great performance by Starmer at PMQs. This is being held up as an example of a zinger.

Forensically admitting that yes actually, we are also guilty of corruption, but we're not talking about us just now so that's fine.  As if public opinion on politics works the same way as a courtroom and there's a judge you can appeal to when the other side engages in whataboutery which appeals to the electorate.

He's fucking useless. Also good of him to remind us of his authoritarian credentials, mentioning shoplifting to make people think of all the people he got locked up for 6 months for taking a drink from a stolen bottle of water.

[sparky88]

34 minutes ago, Dunning1874 said:

A lot of pundits talking about how yesterday was a great performance by Starmer at PMQs. This is being held up as an example of a zinger.

Forensically admitting that yes actually, we are also guilty of corruption, but we're not talking about us just now so that's fine.  As if public opinion on politics works the same way as a courtroom and there's a judge you can appeal to when the other side engages in whataboutery which appeals to the electorate.

He's fucking useless. Also good of him to remind us of his authoritarian credentials, mentioning shoplifting to make people think of all the people he got locked up for 6 months for taking a drink from a stolen bottle of water.

Johnson gets utterly pasted every time he goes anywhere near PMQs,but he knows it doesn't matter as long as he gets a line or two on the news. Starmer seems to completely misunderstand this.

[Dunning1874]

They are so shit at this. Imagine accepting this framing

 

[GordonS]

1 hour ago, Dunning1874 said:

They are so shit at this. Imagine accepting this framing

 

Trade Unions are covered by the Scottish lobbying register, as are charities and anyone else. I think it's a good thing, government business should be done in public as much as possible. 

https://theferret.scot/lobbying-register-businesses-scottish-ministers/ 

[NotThePars]

24 minutes ago, GordonS said:

Trade Unions are covered by the Scottish lobbying register, as are charities and anyone else. I think it's a good thing, government business should be done in public as much as possible. 

https://theferret.scot/lobbying-register-businesses-scottish-ministers/ 

I think it's more that as Tory corruption begins to cut through into the press cycle there's a supposed Labour MP on hand to shift the focus on to those bloody trade unions. 

Rachel Reeves is an especially egregiously horrible woman though.

[GordonS]

7 minutes ago, NotThePars said:

I think it's more that as Tory corruption begins to cut through into the press cycle there's a supposed Labour MP on hand to shift the focus on to those bloody trade unions. 

Peston did that though, she just accepted that the register could be widened and moved on. If she hadn't it would have been used as a stick to beat her.

Quote

Rachel Reeves is an especially egregiously horrible woman though.

I'm very much not going to argue against that!

[NotThePars]

1 minute ago, GordonS said:

If she hadn't it would have been used as a stick to beat her.

 

This is justification for pure political cowardice and is a good reason why the Labour Party are a lost cause.

I'm at the point where if we're tethered to this CDU by 2024 and people like Rachel Reeves are at the front of the party unable or unwilling to mildly challenge the Tory narrative then I hope they get smashed to the point of Pasokification.

[GordonS]

5 minutes ago, NotThePars said:

This is justification for pure political cowardice and is a good reason why the Labour Party are a lost cause.

I'm at the point where if we're tethered to this CDU by 2024 and people like Rachel Reeves are at the front of the party unable or unwilling to mildly challenge the Tory narrative then I hope they get smashed to the point of Pasokification.

I disagree, she had to accept or reject the premise of trade unions being covered by the lobbying requirement, and the right political choice was to accept it as quickly as possible and move on. You'd have been right if she'd been the one to bring it up, but once it had been asked she needed to answer.

As for Labour, I can't blame them for trying to get elected. It's been impossible to win an election in England from the left since the 1970s. They get the politicians they deserve, same as most places.

[NotThePars]

Just now, GordonS said:

I disagree, she had to accept or reject the premise of trade unions being covered by the lobbying requirement, and the right political choice was to accept it as quickly as possible and move on. You'd have been right if she'd been the one to bring it up, but once it had been asked she needed to answer.

As for Labour, I can't blame them for trying to get elected. It's been impossible to win an election in England from the left since the 1970s. They get the politicians they deserve, same as most places.

She doesn't have to do that. She can easily say that it's irrelevant to the discussion which is Tory corruption. She chose to because she's a shitebag and right-wing or an idiot.

It hasn't been impossible to win from the left, people made conscious choices not to do that when it was possible.

If you think Labour are currently doing what they're doing for electoral reasons then again you're incredibly naive. 

[GordonS]

Just now, NotThePars said:

She doesn't have to do that. She can easily say that it's irrelevant to the discussion which is Tory corruption. She chose to because she's a shitebag and right-wing or an idiot.

Do you really not see what the follow-up question would have been? Come on. It's fair enough to hate her guts but a cop-out would have made it look like double standards. 

Quote

It hasn't been impossible to win from the left, people made conscious choices not to do that when it was possible.

It was never possible once they all got mortgages and cars and most of them moved to new-build estates. The English, as a collective, don't want it. We're not that much different, but we're different enough that the balance of power lies in a different place and the constitutional issue has made us appear further left than we are, and has exacerbated the differences.

Quote

If you think Labour are currently doing what they're doing for electoral reasons then again you're incredibly naive. 

If you think Labour are currently doing what they're doing for anything other than electoral reasons then you're incredibly naive. It's the right approach, badly executed. What they're doing isn't supposed to appeal to you or to me. It's supposed to appeal to the voters they lost directly to Johnson less than 18 months ago.

[NotThePars]

Any halfway competent politician can cope with a follow up question from fucking Robert Peston . Even if he does take two weeks to put it forth.

28 minutes ago, GordonS said:

It was never possible once they all got mortgages and cars and most of them moved to new-build estates. The English, as a collective, don't want it. We're not that much different, but we're different enough that the balance of power lies in a different place and the constitutional issue has made us appear further left than we are, and has exacerbated the differences.

Lenin's left baw with a Union Jack would've won in 1997 given how much the Tory vote collapsed. Even he might not have shed millions of votes in 2001 and 2005 by not being a massive disappointment. 

28 minutes ago, GordonS said:

If you think Labour are currently doing what they're doing for anything other than electoral reasons then you're incredibly naive. It's the right approach, badly executed. What they're doing isn't supposed to appeal to you or to me. It's supposed to appeal to the voters they lost directly to Johnson less than 18 months ago.

No they're not. Any party serious about winning an election doesn't further alienate their electoral base, shed potentially hundreds of thousands of members and do their level best to decimate their funding.

Also the last sentence is completely undermined by the current leader being the architect of Labour's election losing Brexit position. And you can only sincerely believe they're trying to win back the Red Wall vote with this current strategy if you have the same insulting authentocratic view of the North that the commentariat have which in fairness is entirely possible.

ETA: that it's the right approach badly executed is undermined by the fact that it's that approach which saw the Labour vote decline and decline from 1997 and was only briefly arrested in 2017 with a radically different approach that on some level outmanoeuvred all the obstacles put in place to stop it happening. To say that it's the right approach in 2021 going into 2024 is ahistorical. 

Edited April 15, 2021 by NotThePars

[GordonS]

35 minutes ago, NotThePars said:

Any halfway competent politician can cope with a follow up question from fucking Robert Peston . Even if he does take two weeks to put it forth.

I think you're getting distracted by the people. The question he asked was fine, straightforward and didn't give an out. She either accepted his point or she didn't.

Quote

Lenin's left baw with a Union Jack would've won in 1997 given how much the Tory vote collapsed. Even he might not have shed millions of votes in 2001 and 2005 by not being a massive disappointment. 

Anyone who thinks that obviously doesn't remember 1992.

Quote

No they're not. Any party serious about winning an election doesn't further alienate their electoral base, shed potentially hundreds of thousands of members and do their level best to decimate their funding.

That's literally what Corbyn did.

Membership... nothing could be more irrelevant that how many members a party has. All that matter is how many voters, and where. You can have half of North London signed up to your party but it makes bugger all difference if you're losing working class seats in County Durham.

Quote

 

Also the last sentence is completely undermined by the current leader being the architect of Labour's election losing Brexit position. And you can only sincerely believe they're trying to win back the Red Wall vote with this current strategy if you have the same insulting authentocratic view of the North that the commentariat have which in fairness is entirely possible.

ETA: that it's the right approach badly executed is undermined by the fact that it's that approach which saw the Labour vote decline and decline from 1997 and was only briefly arrested in 2017 with a radically different approach that on some level outmanoeuvred all the obstacles put in place to stop it happening. To say that it's the right approach in 2021 going into 2024 is ahistorical. 

 

In 2017 Theresa May shot herself in the foot with a pathetic agenda, a party split over Brexit and her own cabinet working against her. In a normal country Labour would have won that election. The idea that it shows England will vote for the left is pretty obviously mistaken.

Apart from that, all I can say that I've not already said is that's your opinion and I don't share it.