The Labour Thread

So. The Murdoch empire...... for or against Corbyn?
Barclay Brothers? All feels a bit grey with no-one daring to say what they feel.

HertsWolf said:

So. The Murdoch empire...... for or against Corbyn?
Barclay Brothers? All feels a bit grey with no-one daring to say what they feel.

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I'm going for against.....

Aber gas said:

The only way labour will win the next election is with a bottom up campaign. It means knocking on doors, politicising students, winning the argument on a local level, engaging with people on a community basis and myriad other things that I'm probably going to get sneered at for suggesting.

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I don't wish to piss on your chips (all power to you if you want to get involved), but I honestly doubt whether local politics, community activism and so forth actually has much bearing on how people vote in a General Election.

The basic problem is, a sensible democracy would separate the election of the executive and the legislature. But we don't. For some reason, we lazily bung the two tasks together. So while we officially go to the ballot box and vote for a parliamentary candidate (i.e. someone to represent our constituency in the legislature), virtually no one votes with that as their principal concern. Most cast their vote hoping (not unreasonably) that it will decide who forms the next government.

Even folk who recognise this design flaw – boring political nerds like me, basically –struggle with it. It doesn't matter how many times the SNP turn up on my doorstep, or how much brilliant campaign literature they stuff through my letterbox, or how effectively they organise and support projects to improve the local community. I would never vote for their candidate because I don't want them to form the next government. So I'll do what I always do, which is vote for whatever Tarquin Twiddle-Arse Gobshite Tory HQ bungs our way, even if he's a complete imbecile.

I'm not saying local/community activism is a waste of time. It's important and worthwhile for various reasons, and it's certainly not going to do any harm. My simple contention is that a General Election is pretty much won or lost on the national level, and on that level you have to reckon with the national media. I suspect mnb098mnb was being rhetorical when he asked about Ed Miliband. Brother Ed didn't lose because there was a dearth of people handing out campaign literature in Grimsby. He lost because he looked more like a muppet than a Prime Minister and because he failed to communicate clear and popular messages on various issues of national importance.

Captain Scumbag said:

I don't wish to piss on your chips (all power to you if you want to get involved), but I honestly doubt whether local politics, community activism and so forth actually has much bearing on how people vote in a General Election.

The basic problem is, a sensible democracy would separate the election of the executive and the legislature. But we don't. For some reason, we lazily bung the two tasks together. So while we officially go to the ballot box and vote for a parliamentary candidate (i.e. someone to represent our constituency in the legislature), virtually no one votes with that as their principal concern. Most cast their vote hoping (not unreasonably) that it will decide who forms the next government.

Even folk who recognise this design flaw – boring political nerds like me, basically –struggle with it. It doesn't matter how many times the SNP turn up on my doorstep, or how much brilliant campaign literature they stuff through my letterbox, or how effectively they organise and support projects to improve the local community. I would never vote for their candidate because I don't want them to form the next government. So I'll do what I always do, which is vote for whatever Tarquin Twiddle-Arse Gobshite Tory HQ bungs our way, even if he's a complete imbecile.

I'm not saying local/community activism is a waste of time. It's important and worthwhile for various reasons, and it's certainly not going to do any harm. My simple contention is that a General Election is pretty much won or lost on the national level, and on that level you have to reckon with the national media. I suspect mnb098mnb was being rhetorical when he asked about Ed Miliband. Brother Ed didn't lose because there was a dearth of people handing out campaign literature in Grimsby. He lost because he looked more like a muppet than a Prime Minister and because he failed to communicate clear and popular messages on various issues of national importance.

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I understand that view Capt. Christ knows I've lived through enough Labour defeats. I just can't see a Labour victory by fighting a campaign in the traditional manner so labour needs to change it's approach. We need to focus on getting votes from people who perhaps don't normally vote aswell as wresting the vote from the snp in Scotland, plaid in Wales and perhaps pinching the last bastions of the lib dems.
Tbh Capt I'm pretty certain you're not our target audience

^
You're too kind.

McDonnell and Mao...

It's a stunt that has put the issue into the headlines at least. What's unfortunate is the focus will be on the stunt itself rather than the point it raised, but that's the level of public, political discourse in general.
I'll admit to laughing at Osbourne's comeback.

Captain Scumbag said:

I don't wish to piss on your chips (all power to you if you want to get involved), but I honestly doubt whether local politics, community activism and so forth actually has much bearing on how people vote in a General Election.

The basic problem is, a sensible democracy would separate the election of the executive and the legislature. But we don't. For some reason, we lazily bung the two tasks together. So while we officially go to the ballot box and vote for a parliamentary candidate (i.e. someone to represent our constituency in the legislature), virtually no one votes with that as their principal concern. Most cast their vote hoping (not unreasonably) that it will decide who forms the next government.

Even folk who recognise this design flaw – boring political nerds like me, basically –struggle with it. It doesn't matter how many times the SNP turn up on my doorstep, or how much brilliant campaign literature they stuff through my letterbox, or how effectively they organise and support projects to improve the local community. I would never vote for their candidate because I don't want them to form the next government. So I'll do what I always do, which is vote for whatever Tarquin Twiddle-Arse Gobshite Tory HQ bungs our way, even if he's a complete imbecile.

I'm not saying local/community activism is a waste of time. It's important and worthwhile for various reasons, and it's certainly not going to do any harm. My simple contention is that a General Election is pretty much won or lost on the national level, and on that level you have to reckon with the national media. I suspect mnb098mnb was being rhetorical when he asked about Ed Miliband. Brother Ed didn't lose because there was a dearth of people handing out campaign literature in Grimsby. He lost because he looked more like a muppet than a Prime Minister and because he failed to communicate clear and popular messages on various issues of national importance.

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Good post. I agree on the whole "local doesn't really matter" bit and on the fact that most people will vote in an imbecile (Indeed, many have done just that) if they have the right rosette. However, I'm not sure it's as simple as not communicating the right message but more that the policies themselves were rather muddled.

It will be interesting to see, though, how Britain reacts to increasing public spending cuts over the next few years and how that affects red and blue voting.

HertsWolf said:

It will be interesting to see, though, how Britain reacts to increasing public spending cuts over the next few years and how that affects red and blue voting.

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Aye aye. Labour are currently covering a multitude of righteous issues, but they need to make this discussion the main focus. The Tory's job on the economy will inevitably be disappointing for most who salivate over the supposed importance of book balancing and so forth. Targeting a 2019/20 budget surplus of a fraction of a percent is very different indeed from the complete elimination of debt that so many people seem to believe is the masterpiece that this government is currently embarking upon. Considering the immense levels of misery this government is putting folk through in their quest for sound economics, the gains are grotesquely small, and only delayed by austerity.
The trouble is it's always incredibly hard to change the prevailing rhetoric from the wilful moronism of equating government budgets to household budgets, to shove in oversimplified populist ideas to replace the likes of these "difficult" and "grown up" decisions. Leaving thousands to die and leaving even more homeless, letting housing become unaffordable, making profit the priority in healthcare, ridding communities of their public spaces, only creating precarious and insubstantial jobs, cutting emergency services... is all that worth it just so after almost a decade you can say, "Hey, we're in more debt than ever, but at least we recouped some of it at the end"? Let's compare the situation to a household again, the metric of choice. If a gambler ate into his personal debts on the roulette wheel, sold his family heirlooms to keep going, left his children filthy, hungry and unhappy, but won £10 on a scratch card at the end of the month, wouldn't everyone around him be a bit disgusted?

Although I'm a bit confused - are you saying he should keep gambling until he wins enough to feed his family, or are you saying that the £10 win wasn't a good thing?

Neat analogy otherwise though, 8/10, would read again.

Bollocks good point—I'm not sure, I haven't read myself back. I dunno, maybe he should go back and join his brother's trade in construction again like in the early '00s when he was happy with himself? Does that work?

Pliny Harris said:

Aye aye.

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Solid post. I've said before that I have equal contempt for all the main political parties, and despise most of the smaller ones.
I agree with the sentiment that it is ridiculous to use the patronising Thatcherite maxim of household budgets. You can turn this on its head easily by suggesting that the country borrowing is no different from a person borrowing to buy a house: both can and should be good long-term investments. At national level, the blue people love to talk about the borrowing side without ever - and I mean ever - considering the investment side. Yet at household level, people look at and talk about their house (the investment) not the mortgage (the borrowing). Individuals recognise that you need to borrow to invest frequently.

While I have very mixed feelings about the miners strikes of the 70s and 80s, many of the predictions of the economic and social outcomes predicted by the red people have come true: the former mining areas are now economically and socially in a desperate situation, and are among the most impoverished areas in the country. The places that laboured to provide this nation with much of its riches are now the most destroyed and underfunded. These parts of the country deserve the post-industrial dividend as much as London and the Sarfeast. Where is the Crossrail investment for Hartlepool, the Crossrail 2 investment for Oldham, the HS1 investment for Llanelli, the integrated, publicly funded transport system for Hull or Mansfield? Let me tell you, there aren't many boarded up streets of houses with a London postcode.

Even down in the luscious south, there are many towns and cities with big social and economic problems. I can genuinely understand the need to shift away from being an industrialised nation towards a service economy, but there has to be a fucking plan! You can't put 16 million jobs into a 200 metre radius of Canary Wharf station. There needs to be a plan that is supported by investment in education, welfare, infrastructure, transport, pensions, health for the entire nation.

Why are we prepared to spend billions of pounds supporting banks and not spend a fraction of that on supporting the steel industry, the car industry, the motorbike industry, the shipbuilding industry, the computer industry, the railway industry, the power generation industry.....just name pretty much any industry except the financial services industry.

Instead of Scotland, how about the rest of the country gets independence from E14, the City and Westminster?

HertsWolf said:

Instead of Scotland, how about the rest of the country gets independence from E14, the City and Westminster?

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There is still quite abit of talk of that in many Northern areas of England.

I think it could be why tories are pushing the devolution stuff and the northern Powerhouse as a lot of people in areas, especially North East or Manchester do at the moment think it would be better to have a Northern Parliament.

but to be honest if the North split all that happens is Manchester or Leeds or Newcastle ends up being the hated place as they swipe 90% of the cash and leave the rest with scraps.........you just replace one annoyance with another.

BigDaveCUFC said:

There is still quite abit of talk of that in many Northern areas of England.

I think it could be why tories are pushing the devolution stuff and the northern Powerhouse as a lot of people in areas, especially North East or Manchester do at the moment think it would be better to have a Northern Parliament.

but to be honest if the North split all that happens is Manchester or Leeds or Newcastle ends up being the hated place as they swipe 90% of the cash and leave the rest with scraps.........you just replace one annoyance with another.

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It's a good point. I remember being in Shetland some years back and a guy there said "The only place I hate more than London is Edinburgh"

BigDaveCUFC said:

There is still quite abit of talk of that in many Northern areas of England.

I think it could be why tories are pushing the devolution stuff and the northern Powerhouse as a lot of people in areas, especially North East or Manchester do at the moment think it would be better to have a Northern Parliament.

but to be honest if the North split all that happens is Manchester or Leeds or Newcastle ends up being the hated place as they swipe 90% of the cash and leave the rest with scraps.........you just replace one annoyance with another.

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It's time for the return of the Heptarchy.

SUTSS said:

It's time for the return of the Heptarchy.

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Been saying this forever.

To be fair she said "some people would judge that..." before that line.


It is a strange thing that Communism has been left so unscathed in the public mind compared to National Socialism though.

Ebeneezer Goode said:

To be fair she said "some people would judge that..." before that line.

It is a strange thing that Communism has been left so unscathed in the public mind compared to National Socialism though.

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During the Great Leap Forward, including the Great Chinese Famine, the mortality rate in China was probably lower than it was pre-1949.

i.e. Mao's reforms kept more people alive than the famine killed.

Not that I'm a Maoist, (or an apologist for him) and the Great Chinese Famine was a horrible and avoidable disaster. Mao's own involvement/knowledge of the worst ravages of famine is still debatable - what's clear is that firstly the policies of the Great Leap Forward exacerbated the famine and secondly many of the deaths could have been avoided had China stopped exporting grain. That they exported grain was due to low-level party officials concealing harvest figures and that was driven by centralism and the pressure placed on administrators to deliver to targets.

Still waiting for someone to come up with a proper death toll for post-WWII Capitalism tbh. Interested to see how it compares with Maoist China. Mind you our political system is very good at distancing/removing itself from the slaughter necessary for it to sustain itself.

Back in sixth form, I once asked a few friends, children of Chinese immigrants, what their parents thought of Mao. They reported back that he apparently "Did some good things and did some bad things". I was surprised by those mixed reviews of such an awful person. There's also an elderly woman who lives in a farm near me, lived in Nepal half her life, an intelligent, welcoming and unique person, also a shameless Maoist.

Makes you think of how this big media primer on Mao, and how uniformly bad everything he did was, didn't actually start when, say, the Times reported Corbyn as using a "Chairman Mao-style bicycle". But as soon as it's mentioned by the other side, grief athletes are out in full force. I look forward to the same treatment being done if McDonnell mentions Stalin or Dennis Skinner mentions Pol Pot or whatever.

Ebeneezer Goode said:

It is a strange thing that Communism has been left so unscathed in the public mind compared to National Socialism though.

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Most people seem very much unclear on atrocities as committed by Stalin or Mao than Hitler, so there's not much to be scathed. I'm guessing the average person has this vague idea of the KGB and gulags but no particulars, or figures. Hence media outlets having to write small articles on Why Mentioning Mao Hurts Everyone to provide a reference.

Polls have just closed in the Oldham West and Royton by-election. Widely expected that UKIP will take a chunk out of the sizeable Labour majority. Might be a decent indicator of how well Corbyn is going down with northern working class voters.

The Ukips have fared well in recent by-elections as the dummy-out vote. Haven't they parachuted in the same bloke from when they threw everything at the Heywood by-election?

Pliny Harris said:

The Ukips have fared well in recent by-elections as the dummy-out vote. Haven't they parachuted in the same bloke from when they threw everything at the Heywood by-election?

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There's an element of truth in that. Similar to the LDs in years gone by. But normally it's seats held by the governing party that sees a big cut in the majority (or in more realistic targets than this one, the seat changing hands). If people on the Manchester/Lancashire border have had enough of the same old politics, you'd think a genuine left winger like Corbyn might hold some appeal.

Admittedly his total lack of appeal to working class patriotic voters will probably hurt him here.

I think it was inevitable the kippers were going to have a concerted push in Oldham. Wouldn't be surprised if they cut into Labour's majority. Don't think it'll be drastic though and I'm not sure it'll have much to do with corbyn's leadership tbh.

Aber gas said:

I think it was inevitable the kippers were going to have a concerted push in Oldham. Wouldn't be surprised if they cut into Labour's majority. Don't think it'll be drastic though and I'm not sure it'll have much to do with corbyn's leadership tbh.

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What will it be to do with, then? Many of the votes for Meacher being just that - a vote for the man, not the party?

We're in a time of racial/ cultural tension of which Oldham has several times been a flashpoint. Some people turn to the far right in such times which is why ukip will have specifically targeted the constituency. Exploiting tensions and rifts within communities has worked to an extent for ukip before so it might well again. I could be wrong and this is a comment on Corbyn but I'm not convinced especially in this particular constituency.

Aber gas said:

We're in a time of racial/ cultural tension of which Oldham has several times been a flashpoint. Some people turn to the far right in such times which is why ukip will have specifically targeted the constituency. Exploiting tensions and rifts within communities has worked to an extent for ukip before so it might well again. I could be wrong and this is a comment on Corbyn but I'm not convinced especially in this particular constituency.

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I won't try to claim I'm an expert on Oldham, but if the far-right still had sway in Oldham the BNP would be challenging, would they not?

It's also not clear why these cultural tensions would have become a bigger issue in the 6 months since the GE.

Alty said:

There's an element of truth in that. Similar to the LDs in years gone by. But normally it's seats held by the governing party that sees a big cut in the majority (or in more realistic targets than this one, the seat changing hands). If people on the Manchester/Lancashire border have had enough of the same old politics, you'd think a genuine left winger like Corbyn might hold some appeal.

Admittedly his total lack of appeal to working class patriotic voters will probably hurt him here.

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I suppose going from the passing of what was presumably a well-liked MP in Oldham to a councillor has that effect too, but yes, Corbyn certainly has a somewhat different appeal likes of Meacher and it will be a reason why a few are turning away.

I'd put a lot of that down to his very unedifying representation in most of the print press of course, which I'd imagine has an even greater hold than usual in constituencies like this, but also the lack of time his politics have been at the fore. With the backing to make them happen, many of his stances could be a great respite for working class constituents over the next four-and-a-half years of ever-blackening depths of Cameronite ineptitude, and even the Danczuks of this world would be able to take out a few lessons.

Ultimately we've had three months of an anti-austerity opposition. The rhetoric, ideas and man management is different and it'll take some getting used to for many to see these views reflected on a national stage. Yes it may not happen at all, but it could prove flavourful to some. I've seen quite a cross-section of people I wouldn't suspect of doing so, embrace the current opposition. For now though I hope it's McMahon who makes an impact, wins the seat and becomes an interesting MP and a positive opposition in his own right.

Not surprised to see the BNP aren't contesting this though. Less than 2,000 votes in May remember: a 99.7% decline. People are free to guess where those voters went, but those lads are bust and a couple of other far-right populist movements are running in awkward tandem instead.

Alty said:

I won't try to claim I'm an expert on Oldham, but if the far-right still had sway in Oldham the BNP would be challenging, would they not?

It's also not clear why these cultural tensions would have become a bigger issue in the 6 months since the GE.

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The Bnp won't be challenging anywhere for the foreseeable future, it's down to 500 members and grimly holding on to its 2 council seats. A lot of the brains and organisation has left. Some to ukip and a lot to edl/Bf/infidels. Your second point is fair enough but perhaps ukip were always going to run a strong campaign and recent events have ratcheted up tensions causing an increase in their vote.
Edit: beaten to it by Pliny. Damn you Pliny

Aber gas said:

The Bnp won't be challenging anywhere for the foreseeable future, it's down to 500 members and grimly holding on to its 2 council seats. A lot of the brains and organisation has left. Some to ukip and a lot to edl/Bf/infidels. Your second point is fair enough but perhaps ukip were always going to run a strong campaign and recent events have ratcheted up tensions causing an increase in their vote.
Edit: beaten to it by Pliny. Damn you Pliny

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How have they gone to UKIP? Doesn't UKIP ban ex BNP members?

Obviously UKIP have some appeal to racist followers because they're the only major party serious about getting immigration down, but I think there has to be more going on for them to get a bit of a charge on in this seat.