Current Affairs Labour and Anti Semitism.......

[davek]

It's a shame that bemoaning the 'mainstream media' seems to be page 1 of the populist playbook. It's a lie that says our fantasy land would be reality if only crooked people weren't brainwashing you otherwise.



Have you thought at all that large chunks of the British population are sick to the back teeth of the Tories, and would gladly vote for someone that wasn't Jeremy Corbyn? Heck, if Blair was running for Labour in an election tomorrow, they would probably get my vote, and I've never voted Labour in my entire life. You've got in your mind that Labour are polling so well because of Corbyn, when the reality is they're polling so poorly because of him.

All of that flies in the face of the catastrophe of Brown and Miliband's leadership and electoral reversals.

And let's have this right: it was Corbyn not the LP that re-energised the party's vote at the last election.

Still, if Labour had some safe pair of hands careerist like Keir Starmer in charge things would be better than leading the Tories in the opinion polls.

In short: your analysis beggars belief.

 

[Number_25]

Ask any long-term Labour activist, and they'll tell you the apathy toward the party onward from Blair.

The Labour Party is now a real Labour Party, a party that wants to radically shift the economy toward a fairer - more sustainable system.

 

[Number_25]

I'd say it's more about policies that appeal to the Guardian rather than Morning Star to be honest.

It shows how far right we've gone that social democracy is now seen in the same light as revolutionary politics.

And we all wonder why there are so many angry people...

 

[Bruce Wayne]

All of that flies in the face of the catastrophe of Brown and Miliband's leadership and electoral reversals.

And let's have this right: it was Corbyn not the LP that re-energised the party's vote at the last election.

Still, if Labour had some safe pair of hands careerist like Keir Starmer in charge things would be better than leading the Tories in the opinion polls.

In short: your analysis beggars belief.

All of that flies in the face of the catastrophe of Brown and Miliband's leadership and electoral reversals.

And let's have this right: it was Corbyn not the LP that re-energised the party's vote at the last election.

Still, if Labour had some safe pair of hands careerist like Keir Starmer in charge things would be better than leading the Tories in the opinion polls.

In short: your analysis beggars belief.

You assume that things operate in a bubble and Labour's popularity is solely down to what Labour and their supporters do. The reality is that most governments have a shelf life, and by the time Brown had got into power, Labour had been in government for ten years, so it would have been very hard for any leader to have kept them in government at that point as people were ripe for a change. That he coincided with the biggest recession in a century was enough to do for him.

I'm not at all confident that this government will last the full term, but if they do, they will have also been in office for over ten years, and I would lay odds on whoever Labour put up displacing them because of both it being 'time' for a change, and the god awful job they've done in office.

The reality is that Blair and Cameron were very similar in terms of their policies, and proved popular with the electorate. Both Labour and the Tories have faltered when they were succeeded by politicians who veered from that in Brown and May. So yes, I think a Starmer or Benn would have probably won the last election for Labour.

 

[Bruce Wayne]

Ask any long-term Labour activist, and they'll tell you the apathy toward the party onward from Blair.

The Labour Party is now a real Labour Party, a party that wants to radically shift the economy toward a fairer - more sustainable system.

It shows how far right we've gone that social democracy is now seen in the same light as revolutionary politics.

And we all wonder why there are so many angry people...

You yourself described Labour strategy to radically move the economy. That sounds revolutionary to me.

 

[Number_25]

You yourself described Labour strategy to radically move the economy. That sounds revolutionary to me.

I love you bruce, but that's a stinker.

Radicalism is not revolution.

 

[abelard]

The reality is that Blair and Cameron were very similar in terms of their policies, and proved popular with the electorate. Both Labour and the Tories have faltered when they were succeeded by politicians who veered from that in Brown and May. So yes, I think a Starmer or Benn would have probably won the last election for Labour.

The economy has been driven into the ground, every last public institution is collapsing, and people want more of the same (only delivered with Labour apologies rather than Tory sneers)?

Sorry Bruce, but I think this is the most delusional notion in this entire thread - and I was up all night attempting a conversation with @davek!

 

[davek]

You assume that things operate in a bubble and Labour's popularity is solely down to what Labour and their supporters do. The reality is that most governments have a shelf life, and by the time Brown had got into power, Labour had been in government for ten years, so it would have been very hard for any leader to have kept them in government at that point as people were ripe for a change. That he coincided with the biggest recession in a century was enough to do for him.

I'm not at all confident that this government will last the full term, but if they do, they will have also been in office for over ten years, and I would lay odds on whoever Labour put up displacing them because of both it being 'time' for a change, and the god awful job they've done in office.

The reality is that Blair and Cameron were very similar in terms of their policies, and proved popular with the electorate. Both Labour and the Tories have faltered when they were succeeded by politicians who veered from that in Brown and May. So yes, I think a Starmer or Benn would have probably won the last election for Labour.

That last sentence is staggering. You think the odious war-mongering of Hilary Benn and the pro-EU, pro-market ideology that is common to both him and Starmer would have been welcomed by a population (that rejects those very things) and led to a better showing than Corbyn got?

You're still living in another era. The centre ground is in complete disrepute. How do you not see that and carry on believing, despite all evidence to the contrary, that is not the case? You use the word Populist as a derogatory comment to lash at the politics that sit outside that centrist-globalist view - as if all politics to the left and right are someohow morally equal and that there is no alternative to the madness of an unfettered market.

Bruce, you and people like you who think that way have been left marooned.

 

[Bruce Wayne]

The economy has been driven into the ground, every last public institution is collapsing, and people want more of the same (only delivered with Labour apologies rather than Tory sneers)?

Sorry Bruce, but I think this is the most delusional notion in this entire thread - and I was up all night attempting a conversation with @davek!

I think the notion that public services are being driven into the ground is a touch melodramatic personally. We've got to make our minds up on this one. We can't complain that the media are turds who don't give our Jezza a fair crack, and then swallow every line they print about this or that department being in crisis. They can't be both lying toerags and bastions of truth at the same time.

Services are having a difficult time, I don't dispute that, but I think people gloss over the fact that we've had the biggest recession in a 100 years as though it's a mere speed bump and everything should carry on as usual. It was a monumental event, and in comparison to how it was handled in the Depression is quite remarkable tbh. Global GDP back then fell by 15% with unemployment rates in the US of 25%. In the UK unemployment has peaked at roughly 1/3 the peak from the Depression. Lets have a bit of context here.

 

[Number_25]

I think the notion that public services are being driven into the ground is a touch melodramatic personally. We've got to make our minds up on this one. We can't complain that the media are turds who don't give our Jezza a fair crack, and then swallow every line they print about this or that department being in crisis. They can't be both lying toerags and bastions of truth at the same time.

Services are having a difficult time, I don't dispute that, but I think people gloss over the fact that we've had the biggest recession in a 100 years as though it's a mere speed bump and everything should carry on as usual. It was a monumental event, and in comparison to how it was handled in the Depression is quite remarkable tbh. Global GDP back then fell by 15% with unemployment rates in the US of 25%. In the UK unemployment has peaked at roughly 1/3 the peak from the Depression. Lets have a bit of context here.

You genuinely believe that things are going well?

 

[Number_25]

Actually, I'm going to point out that a thread that was written to delve in Labour's anti-Semitism situation has now become a thread in which Labour's (left wing) socioeconomic policies are being discussed.

Strange, that.

 

[Bruce Wayne]

I love you bruce, but that's a stinker.

Radicalism is not revolution.

Not in the Che Guevara sense of, no, but if you speak to anyone with any grounding in change, they will regard revolution as a radical change that is opposite to evolution/iterative change.

That last sentence is staggering. You think the odious war-mongering of Hilary Benn and the pro-EU, pro-market ideology that is common to both him and Starmer would have been welcomed by a population (that rejects those very things) and led to a better showing than Corbyn got?

You're still living in another era. The centre ground is in complete disrepute. How do you not see that and carry on believing, despite all evidence to the contrary, that is not the case? You use the word Populist as a derogatory comment to lash at the politics that sit outside that centrist-globalist view - as if all politics to the left and right are someohow morally equal and that there is no alternative to the madness of an unfettered market.

Bruce, you and people like you who think that way have been left marooned.

I look at the evidence from the last 50 years to support my notion that the liberal consensus has done incredible good for the world, yes.

 

[Number_25]

Not in the Che Guevara sense of, no, but if you speak to anyone with any grounding in change, they will regard revolution as a radical change that is opposite to evolution/iterative change.

Have another read of that.

 

[Bruce Wayne]

You genuinely believe that things are going well?

I'm hoping you can appreciate that 'well' is itself a relative thing. If you compare the way the economy and our society has reacted to the financial crisis and how it reacted to the depression, then yes, it has done very well, and the impact has not been anywhere near as damaging. Is it doing well in comparison to, say, 2000-2006, probably not.

As the recession was largely global in nature, it's fairly easy to compare national performance isn't it? If you discount countries with huge natural resources (ie Australia, Norway etc. are there examples of countries that have adopted Corbynite policies that have performed markedly better? France, for instance, spend comfortably the most on government in the G8, have they done better than the UK?

 

[davek]

Not in the Che Guevara sense of, no, but if you speak to anyone with any grounding in change, they will regard revolution as a radical change that is opposite to evolution/iterative change.



I look at the evidence from the last 50 years to support my notion that the liberal consensus has done incredible good for the world, yes.

The liberal consensus and the globalism it rests on has, outside of the developoed world, been a disaster. Just in terms of environmental damage that is palpably so. Then we have decades of neo-imperialist colonisation and regional wars, not to mention a growing disparity of wealth in the system's "priviledged" regions of western Europe and North America.

That system is a success for half a century only if you are white and relatively rich.