Corb Blimey!

[GCostanza]

Corb Blimey!

MsD wrote: It was thought FPTP favoured Labour and that PR would result in everyone's second choice being elected in many seats that should have been Labour, IIRC. Also would encourage fringe parties, and those who should remain at the fringes.

PR including 84 Ukip seats? No thanks.

[tuckwat]

Corb Blimey!

Isn't the usual reply to this, that if there was a pr system people would vote differently than in a fptp system.Not saying that will happen.

[Snake Plissken]

Corb Blimey!

GCostanza wrote:

It was thought FPTP favoured Labour and that PR would result in everyone's second choice being elected in many seats that should have been Labour, IIRC. Also would encourage fringe parties, and those who should remain at the fringes.

PR including 84 Ukip seats? No thanks.

So you would rather 65% of the electorate not have a voice in order to prevent a much smaller number from having a voice?

[DCI Harry Batt]

Corb Blimey!

The TUC is in favour of PR.

[DCI Harry Batt]

Corb Blimey!

Lucy Powell, appointed by Mr Corbyn this week as shadow education secretary, has spelled out plans to bring existing academies and free schools back in line with other state-maintained schools.

[Jimski]

Corb Blimey!

Did anyone here watch McDonnell on Question Time last night? I've heard good things, but would be curious to know what others thought.

[MsD]

Corb Blimey!

I watched it. Basically good but he made a bit of a blunder in over-apologising. Apologising for praising the IRA, good, and the joke about assassinating Thatcher, OK, maybe, but he seemed to imply that he had been conciliatory to the IRA and used their language simply in order to get them on board i.e. he hadn't meant it. An audience member picked up on it and asked if he was willing to say anything to anybody to get results?

For a politician whose almost USP is his honesty and willingness to defend unpopular views, it was a mistake.

Sandi Toksvig and Alex Salmond were decent, the latter called out the Telegraph as "extreme" when their man described Corbyn and McDonnell as such.

[Duncan Gardner]

Corb Blimey!

Agree with MsD.

The BBC pretending that throwaway comments 10 or 15 years ago is a bigger story that vicious Tory spending cuts is almost funny.

Various Demotic Unionist hacks turned up later to take the moral high ground, having obviously decided this was better than ramping up the exaggerated outrage.

So here's a brief explanation of the difference. McDonnell and Corbyn have said some daft things while hanging out with the Paramilitaries' political wing: the DUP leader WAS a paramilitary back in the day, if only self-styled. That's even before you consider his antics in stirring sectarian tension down the interfaces more recently.



The increasingly useless Dimblebore fitted in only three questions: is Jezza unelectable, should he sing for Betty Windsor, and how many refugees should we welcome into the country.

I'd vote for Sandi, #2 preference.

[meregreen]

Corb Blimey!

I didn't think he acquitted himself that well. He basically apologised for most of the controversial things he had said. Which left people wondering what he does believe him. Furthermore, he hugely elevated his role in the peace process - implying that he only praised the IRA to keep them at the negotiating table - in a way that was open to ridicule.

Also, he said he'd asked Corbyn about the national anthem furore and said Corbyn told him that he normally sings it, but was lost in thought at the time. It was unconvincing. I'd have preferred it if he'd defended his right not to sing it rather than go along with the 'disrespectful' meme.

It's the first time I've watched Question Time in 20 years and I won't be returning in a hurry. Salmond came over quite well as did Toksvig, but generally it was the same partisan stuff that we've become used to and which puts people off.

[Vulgarian Visigoth]

Corb Blimey!

Bored of Education wrote:

It was quite well known in left circles, the past Abbott-Corbyn fling. It's, in a way, another example of how shit the political media are at their jobs that they've only just found this out. A sorry mediocre hack pack of churnalists they are

Not only that but they don't appear to have recognised that, compared to Currie/Major when he was in power and open to blackmail, this was years ago between two consenting single adults. Even the "fling/affair" language is beyond petty. Mind you, not as petty as the Mail's expose that Corbyn's wife is selling £10 jars of Mexican coffee where the workers are earning less than the national average wage. Even Mail readers are going to find that laughable.

The Right's default position has long been 'OK, we openly admit we're cunts, but you're a bit cunty too'. The rational response to this would be to choose Little Cunt over Big Cunt, but the argument works wonders with the Daily Mail crowd.

[EIM]

Corb Blimey!

I thought McDonnell was brilliant, even making the Alistair Darling silver hair with black eyebrows look good.

[MsD]

Corb Blimey!

Silver fox, for sure. He looked a bit like a less pointy John Foxx (if that's not massively politically incorrect etc.).

[MsD]

Corb Blimey!

Roderick Spodes black shorts wrote:

Not only that but they don't appear to have recognised that, compared to Currie/Major when he was in power and open to blackmail, this was years ago between two consenting single adults. Even the "fling/affair" language is beyond petty. Mind you, not as petty as the Mail's expose that Corbyn's wife is selling £10 jars of Mexican coffee where the workers are earning less than the national average wage. Even Mail readers are going to find that laughable.

The Right's default position has long been 'OK, we openly admit we're cunts, but you're a bit cunty too'. The rational response to this would be to choose Little Cunt over Big Cunt, but the argument works wonders with the Daily Mail crowd.

Do you mean ... the Right make no secret of their selfishness, of prioritising "me and my family" above all, whereas the Left claim to act in the interests of the greater good, therefore any falling short of that higher standard is seen as something far worse, because it is hypocritical?

If so, yes, that is a bullshit argument used against the Left; that if they own anything, don't live in a hut and share all their possessions with the poor, they are hypocrites, and the Right can say "at least we're honest". In this case "at least we don't claim to give a fuck about coffee farmers" would be the subtext.

[Vulgarian Visigoth]

Corb Blimey!

MsD wrote:

Not only that but they don't appear to have recognised that, compared to Currie/Major when he was in power and open to blackmail, this was years ago between two consenting single adults. Even the "fling/affair" language is beyond petty. Mind you, not as petty as the Mail's expose that Corbyn's wife is selling £10 jars of Mexican coffee where the workers are earning less than the national average wage. Even Mail readers are going to find that laughable.

The Right's default position has long been 'OK, we openly admit we're cunts, but you're a bit cunty too'. The rational response to this would be to choose Little Cunt over Big Cunt, but the argument works wonders with the Daily Mail crowd.

Do you mean ... the Right make no secret of their selfishness, of prioritising "me and my family" above all, whereas the Left claim to act in the interests of the greater good, therefore any falling short of that higher standard is seen as something far worse, because it is hypocritical?

If so, yes, that is a bullshit argument used against the Left; that if they own anything, don't live in a hut and share all their possessions with the poor, they are hypocrites, and the Right can say "at least we're honest". In this case "at least we don't claim to give a fuck about coffee farmers" would be the subtext.

Exactly this. 'We are amoral so we don't have to measure up to any moral standard, but we'll hold you accountable for unreachable standards of moral probity' or in other words 'Yeah, right; if you're so left-wing how come you wear shoes?' or the classic 'Everybody is racist - at least I'm honest enough to admit it'.

[E10 Rifle]

Corb Blimey!

urthermore, he hugely elevated his role in the peace process - implying that he only praised the IRA to keep them at the negotiating table - in a way that was open to ridicule.

I think people are misrepresenting McDonnell's position on this, but largely because of omissions McDonnell himself has made in explaining himself.

And those omissions are kind of understandable, and they are these: McDonnell has long been sympathetic to Irish republicanism. He therefore has an audience on the UK and Irish left, and among Irish republicans generally, who are inclined to listen to him, even though he's just been a backbencher. He has an audience on this issue (he also has a fairly Irish constituency). So as a result of that he's been at gatherings and meetings which will have included some provies eager to get their fingers back on the trigger. So he was talking with those sorts of people in mind. He can't give a fuller explanation because then we'd be dragged into the "ah but you're a biased republican" shitstorm cycle again.

And, in a rare move, I'm going to agree with the entirety of a DG post on Ireland up there.

[Bored Of Education]

Corb Blimey!

Yes, I agree with 99% of this page. Well done, comrades.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Corb Blimey!

I don't know how much of a problem the remarks will be, and they are nothing more than careless in context.

What might be a problem though is the implicit Republicanism. I think his explanation is fine and he had a constuctive role. But the follow up question is "Why did you have an audience among Republicans?"

Will the electorate care about a would-be chancellor having been a "Republican sympathiser" like that?

[Tubby Isaacs]

Corb Blimey!

TonTon wrote:

Lucy Powell, appointed by Mr Corbyn this week as shadow education secretary, has spelled out plans to bring existing academies and free schools back in line with other state-maintained schools.

The plan before was a common system of oversight, I think, though not with LAs so involved. So not that much of a change.

[E10 Rifle]

Corb Blimey!

Will the electorate care about a would-be chancellor having been a "Republican sympathiser" like that?

Some will, some won't. It's not as toxic an issue as it once was. Martin McGuinness, after all, has exchanged bantz with the Queen.

[E10 Rifle]

Corb Blimey!

Some decent appointments to the rest of the front bench.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Corb Blimey!

E10 Rifle wrote:

Will the electorate care about a would-be chancellor having been a "Republican sympathiser" like that?

Some will, some won't. It's not as toxic an issue as it once was. Martin McGuinness, after all, has exchanged bantz with the Queen.

Yeah, it's probably too long ago to matter all that much.

[Jimski]

Corb Blimey!

Yeah, 6 of the 10 from the new intake who called for an anti-cuts leader back in May have been included, which is good to see.

[Calvert]

Corb Blimey!

E10 Rifle wrote:

Will the electorate care about a would-be chancellor having been a "Republican sympathiser" like that?

Some will, some won't. It's not as toxic an issue as it once was. Martin McGuinness, after all, has exchanged bantz with the Queen.

Phil The Greek's hilarious flight from creepy Marty when the Deputy First Minister tried to engage him in conversation a while back suggests he's not totally onboard with the Bon Jovies. and who can blame him, frankly.

to DG.

[N est à?]

Corb Blimey!

The plan before was a common system of oversight, I think, though not with LAs so involved. So not that much of a change.

Oh to be a fly on the wall in Lord Adonis's office today though.

[E10 Rifle]

Corb Blimey!

You could even argue that these days Scottish nationalism is more of a bogeyman with the electorate - and certain OTFers – than its Irish counterpart.