Corb Blimey!

[E10 Rifle]

Corb Blimey!

It's part of the problem with having such a shit electoral system: it encourages people to read things in crude, broad-brush exaggerations. So Middlesborough is seen as full of nothing but racist Labour voters and London consists entirely of 'liberal-elite' remainers, even though more people in London voted to leave the EU than voted for Sadiq Khan to be our mayor.

[Fussbudget]

Corb Blimey!

Actually I've just realised that the Middlesbrough result in the referendum is for the council area rather than constituency, so about a quarter of the 21,181 people who voted to remain are likely in the Middlesbrough South & East Cleveland constituency (the difference in turnout/electorate size startled me a little!) That could still leave 85%+ of Labour voters in the Boro seat being pro-Remain though (again unlikely but.)

[Tubby Isaacs]

Corb Blimey!

E10 Rifle wrote: I disagreed with the three-line whip too, but this is all sound and fury really. The bill got through because the Tories won the 2015 general election, and hardly any of their "principled" pro-Remain MPs rebelled. They appear to be attracting a curious lack of anger from the people who want Corbyn's head on a spike.

The Tories won the 2015 General Election, the cunts. This is why we are where we are.

If the entire PLP had voted against last night the government would still have won.

And the welfare bill Harman abstained (on one reading) on "would have won anyway". But there was hell to play over that, and it brought Corbyn in. So he isn't getting away with this.

And are you really saying "What about Anna Soubry?" there. What about her? Good speaker on the EU, but I don't generally expect her to vote the way I want.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Corb Blimey!

Fussbudget wrote: Actually I've just realised that the Middlesbrough result in the referendum is for the council area rather than constituency, so about a quarter of the 21,181 people who voted to remain are likely in the Middlesbrough South & East Cleveland constituency (the difference in turnout/electorate size startled me a little!) That could still leave 85%+ of Labour voters in the Boro seat being pro-Remain though (again unlikely but.)

I think that's a very important point. The "North", "Wales" etc has more Kippers and Tories about than people think. Deduct them as being more Eurosceptic, and you're left with a far less clear picture that Labour MPs are "literally crapping in their voters' mouths" by supporting Remain.

Also the demographics- I'd suggest the older Labour voters in heartlands were more Eurosceptic, as was true of all kinds of older voters. What's this capitulation going to mean for the younger voters there? The Greens could get a boost in working class areas, which is what they've lacked so far.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Corb Blimey!

johnr wrote: None of the leaflets I distributed said 'Labour In: but if we win it's only advisory, and we might come out later'. We all knew. It was In or Out.

'Labour should be out arguing against a Trumpian Brexit and for worker's rights. freedom of travel, and so on.'

We will be.

I know you will be, and respect to you for that.

But I'd have rather the point was made now, much more strongly, on the back of redlines like was suggested by Corbyn in November.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Corb Blimey!

Team Corbyn's red hot communications unit:

@EmilyThornberry
LibDem MPs voted for Art 50, against & abstained. To go in 3 directions yesterday when there's only 9 of you is really quite an achievement

They didn't go in 3 directions- 7 against, 2 abstain. And managed by their leadership in a sensible way.

Thornberry jumped in there to some obscure bloke tweeting he supported the Lib Dems. Like some manic tail ender charging down the track to a spinner and missing the ball.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Corb Blimey!

As ever, you can see what he means, but...

‘We’re with you, we’re in solidarity with you,’ he said. ‘Your triumphs are our triumphs.

‘Our defence of you is a defence of all of humanity and the right of people to practise the life they want to practise, rather than be criminalised, brutalised and murdered, simply because they chose to be gay, they chose to be lesbian, they were LGBT in any form.’

http://metro.co.uk/2017/02/02/jeremy-corbyn-under-fire-for-saying-people-choose-to-be-gay-6423405/#ixzz4XYIgMedb

[johnr]

Corb Blimey!

Tubby Isaacs wrote: Team Corbyn's red hot communications unit:

@EmilyThornberry
LibDem MPs voted for Art 50, against & abstained. To go in 3 directions yesterday when there's only 9 of you is really quite an achievement

They didn't go in 3 directions- 7 against, 2 abstain. And managed by their leadership in a sensible way.

To be fair, it's a bit easier managing a few MPs than a few hundred I think, they could just have a chat round a pub table. And as we know, the LibDems can say anything at the moment, nobody's listening (except Thornberry...), and they're after propping up the Tories in a coalition again. Brexit is, to a degree, their fault.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Corb Blimey!

It's not their fault, except for doing so badly in the election that Cameron had to keep his promise and hold the referendum. Nobody much expected it, least of all Cameron.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Corb Blimey!

.

[johnr]

Corb Blimey!

Tubby Isaacs wrote: It's not their fault, except for doing so badly in the election that Cameron had to keep his promise and hold the referendum. Nobody much expected it, least of all Cameron.

Blimey. So the vote in the referendum was not in any way a result of communities across the country being abandoned - indeed, fucked - by the policy of austerity, fully endorsed by the LibDems? That's astonishing.

[johnr]

Corb Blimey!

By the way, I wasn't trying to wrongfoot you there. It's what I meant by the earlier post, but didn't elaborate on it.

[GCostanza]

Corb Blimey!

Tubby Isaacs wrote: It's not their fault, except for doing so badly in the election that Cameron had to keep his promise and hold the referendum. Nobody much expected it, least of all Cameron.

Rubbish! They lied to the electorate and paid the price.
Uusally in being replaced by Tories in those type of two-way marginals, with Labour (typically) splitting the anti-Tory vote.

Not that it was good this happened, but they should never have ceded to the Tories in 2010, fools.

[E10 Rifle]

Corb Blimey!

If Brexit was in part a consequence of the (Europe-wide) collapse of the political centre, then the performance of the LibDems in government is certainly a contributor to that story. So if we're going to throw around blunt-instrument words like "fault", then yeah, they have at the very least some culpability.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Corb Blimey!

There's no Brexit in any other country because their Tory parties haven't been taken over by pound shop Enochs.

[E10 Rifle]

Corb Blimey!

There's no Brexit in other countries because they don't begin with "Br" mainly.

However, some of them may be about to elect fascist governments. I mean, I agree that the pound-shop petty nationalism of modern (and not so modern) Tories is in some ways a uniquely British trait, but I'm not into this exceptionalist idea that we're uniquely narrow-minded and nationalistic. Pan-Europeanism is in trouble, across the continent. The EU is in trouble.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Corb Blimey!

Think Trump is concentrating minds.

The stakes are high though. I can't blame anyone for walking away from the Lexiter-Kipper farce that is Labour at the moment. The stakes are way higher than austerity, for that matter.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Corb Blimey!

Think Trump is concentrating minds.

The stakes are high though. I can't blame anyone for walking away from the Lexiter-Kipper farce that is Labour at the moment. The stakes are way higher than austerity, for that matter.

[E10 Rifle]

Corb Blimey!

Maybe, but they're intricately linked to it.

[Fussbudget]

Corb Blimey!

E10 Rifle wrote: There's no Brexit in other countries because they don't begin with "Br" mainly.

However, some of them may be about to elect fascist governments. I mean, I agree that the pound-shop petty nationalism of modern (and not so modern) Tories is in some ways a uniquely British trait, but I'm not into this exceptionalist idea that we're uniquely narrow-minded and nationalistic. Pan-Europeanism is in trouble, across the continent. The EU is in trouble.

I don't know, nationalism and xenophobia are obviously not specifically British traits, but the UK is unique in never having bought into the whole idea of cooperation and being part of a bigger whole in the first place. As has been mentioned previously, pro-EU sentiment has actually had a resurgence on the continent post-Brexit.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Corb Blimey!

Rebecca Long-Bailey seems to have "emerged" as the Future of the Left.

There couldn't be a "you want Jez gone? You put Rebecca on the ballot then" deal coming, could there?

[Lucy Waterman]

Corb Blimey!

I struggle to imagine any Labour MP will now be in a hurry to nominate any candidate they don't wholeheartedly believe in, but stranger things have happened and continue to happen on a near-daily basis. Such a deal would surely be slightly pointless if it didn't also involve the defenestration of Milne, McDonnell and Abbott.

[NHH]

Corb Blimey!

As it has been for 18 months, the future of the Labour Party is in the hands of the PLP right. If they enabled the nomination of a genuine left-winger not called Corbyn, I think the pressure on Corbyn to go would be impossible to stop. The main reason - true, or rhetorical - offered as to why he shouldn't stand down is that he is the only candidate able to be nominated who can command the clear preference of the membership for a left candidate. The trouble is, he's rubbish. This is a Mexcian standoff between 500,000 members and 150 MPs. The MPs hope that the 500,000 will cave looks at best forlorn, and at worst a suicidal 'you want the left, let's strap in and see how that fucking works out with this dickhead'. If they enabled the nomination of someone else not called Corbyn, it's be over in a matter of weeks.

The question then is what do they hate? They'd like it to be seen as Corbyn, because electabliity, but for a great many it's the left, because ideology. The softer left very unsure about Corbyn need to make themselves heard to get behind someone else on the left.

[NHH]

Corb Blimey!

I mean, I think Corbyn would be persuadable, but you'll have to get through Abbott, Milne, Fletcher and McDonnell first. Very doable though.

[Lucy Waterman]

Corb Blimey!

GCostanza wrote:

It's not their fault, except for doing so badly in the election that Cameron had to keep his promise and hold the referendum. Nobody much expected it, least of all Cameron.

Rubbish! They lied to the electorate and paid the price.
Uusally in being replaced by Tories in those type of two-way marginals, with Labour (typically) splitting the anti-Tory vote.

Not that it was good this happened, but they should never have ceded to the Tories in 2010, fools.

We'll never know what would have happened if the Lib Dems went with Labour in 2010, but I can imagine it working out comparably badly for them.

How about this: Nick Clegg backs Labour's top-up fees and reaps the same whirlwind. The South West are so appalled at the Lib Dems getting into bed with Labour that they still kick them out in 2015. And because they never had the mind-sharpening experience of Tory government, enough of the voters who switched to the Lib Dems in 2005 remain appalled that Nick Clegg can have propped up the party that took us to war in Iraq. Hornsey and Cambridge elect their first Green MPs in the 2015 election that sees David Davis's Conservatives defeating Pat McFadden's increasingly shambolic Labour Party.

Bit of fun.