Westminstenders: The end of tribalism

[RedToothBrush]

There are signs that traditional party alignment might well have broken.

The Tories have split, labour are pretending they have not.

The pattern so far seems to be closely following the EU. This favours a Tory majority.

A long way to go.

Berger was critical of Jeremy Corbyn, who was elected Labour leader in 2015, and resigned from the Shadow Cabinet in 2016.[6] She criticised what she considered to be increasing antisemitism in the Labour Party and said that, under Corbyn, Labour contained "institutional anti-Semitism". In 2019, members of her local party briefly proposed motions of no confidence in her for "continually" criticising Corbyn. She later joined other former Labour and Conservative MPs in forming Change UK, but left this group in June 2019 to sit as an Independent MP,[7][8] before joining the Liberal Democrats in September 2019.[9]

Antisemitic abuse
In January 2013, a Merseyside music promoter, Philip Hayes was convicted of a racially aggravated public order offence and fined £120 after making a series of antisemitic remarks about Jews to Berger at the Liverpool Music Awards. He later apologised and said he had been drunk and was acting out of character.[70][71]

In October 2014, Garron Helm, a member of the neo-Nazi National Action youth group, was imprisoned for four weeks after he sent an antisemitic tweet to Berger in August 2014. He served two weeks before being released.[72][73][74]

Following the conviction, it was reported that similar messages to her were being posted on Twitter.[75] According to Berger in December 2014, "[a]t the height of the abuse, the police said I was the subject of 2,500 hate messages in the space of three days" using the same hashtag.[76] She has had to take security measures where she lives in Liverpool and London, and has accused Twitter of insufficient action to counter the problem. In her view, the site "could start by proactively banning racist words which aren't allowed to be printed in newspapers or broadcast on TV that could never be used in a positive way".[76]

During the 2015 general election, right-wing UK Independence Party parliamentary candidate for West Lancashire Jack Sen was suspended from the party after sending an allegedly antisemitic tweet to Berger.[77]

Joshua Bonehill-Paine, a supporter of Helm and a self-described far-right antisemite, was convicted of racially-aggravated harassment of Berger in December 2016. He was sentenced to two years.[78][79]

In February 2017, John Nimmo was sentenced to 27 months in prison after pleading guilty to nine charges, including sending Berger death threats and antisemitic messages signed "your friend the Nazi".[80]

After Berger asked Jeremy Corbyn's office in March 2018 why in 2012 he had queried the removal by a local council of an allegedly antisemitic mural by Mear One, she received further online abuse which she stated came from left-wing individuals.[81][82]

In July 2018, Jack Coulson, a teenager obsessed with Neo-Nazism and who allegedly had told an acquaintance that he was going to kill Berger, was jailed for eight and a half months for possessing a document for terrorist purposes. He had a past conviction for making a pipe bomb.[83]

Continuity that's interesting, I'm not a climate change sceptic, but I do think that extrapolations and causes for climate change need greater scientific explration and analysis.

I absolutely support anti-pollution measures and environmental preservation and sustainability as priorities and that all policies and human actions need to account for them.

On another note and irrespective of all the rhetoric - it has been asked many times what does Brexit look like and very few times what does Remain look like.

The response to the Remain question has always been - like it looks now. Except, even though we still Remain, since the 2016 Ref it looks, and is, different now.

Remain Alliance candidates in about 60 Constituencies have agreed that they know what Remain 'looks like' - less than 10% of all the Constituencies.

Is there any consensus of what Remain looks like that doesn't rely on critiqueing what Leaving the EU looks like?

No you didnt bellini, I meant if Corbyn was trying to open dialogue between hezbollah and hamas it would have hardly been beneficial to call them murderous cunts

I in no way shape or form meant anything you said bellini sorry for the confusion on that

Corbyn should also be speaking to Israeli voices if he actually gives a shit about peace in the Middle East.
But he doesn't appear to do that.

The Israeli Labour Party, the party of Rabin, a political hero of mine, got fed up waiting for Corbyn to respond to their invitation to meet and withdrew the offer.

Hodge provides no evidence of such horrific wrongdoing by Corbyn, nor by ‘mainstream’ Labour members. Her own submissions to the Labour Party certainly don’t do the job: General Secretary, Jennie Formby reported that Hodge’s 200 complaints comcerned 111 individuals, of whom only 20 were actually Party members.

You think it’s ok that 20 Party members were involved? I don’t have a lot of time for people who demand ‘proof’ of racism whoever the object. It indicates they don’t really understand how racism works. And are most invested in dismissing it. Abuse, bullying, freezing out, tone, manner, rudeness, dismissiveness, superiority etc is very difficult to prove.

The Israeli Labour Party, the party of Rabin, a political hero of mine, got fed up waiting for Corbyn to respond to their invitation to meet and withdrew the offer.

He's an idiot for not doing it if he was given the offer, anymore on it so I can read up Mockers?

but the discussion about climate change and human behaviour hasn't been one about global cooling.

I read Geological Sciences back in the 1980s. Our Quaternary prof was convinced that we’re currently in an interstadial and a global cooling period was on its way.

You think it’s ok that 20 Party members were involved?

1 case is 1 too many

Ellman’s perspective from her resignation letter.

So its Corbyns fault that idiots say idiotic things Tatiana? At leasr I know with Jenny Formby in charge of the process they will have been dealt with and expelled I should imagine.

Feel like I'm getting it in the neck here, I know I'm not but its been an all day thing just because I'm 1 of the more vocal fans of Corbyn but I always welcome your input *Ghost( because you have a much better way with words than I do

The conflict within Labour over Israel is not new at all , although Corbyn becoming leader seems to have been like throwing a lighted match onto petrol ....

I witnessed a Labour row about anti-semitism ... back in about 1975:

I attended - for the one and only time - a meeting of the uni Labour society because they had Ian Mikardo PM as their special guest

He was a hard left firebrand and also an ardent zionist and supporter of Israel
There were quite a few like that - the pro Israel Jewish MP lobby certainly weren't some moderate centrist group.

Mikardo lambastered British troops in NI, very harsh language for their treatment of civilians
Then a student - who sounded pissed about our soldiers being criticised like that - said if that was so terrible then we should condemn Israel for doing similar to the Palestinians

Mikardo was absolutely furious and said Israel was a totally different case, that it was disgusting to compare Israel to NI
Some other students, now including Palestinian supporters, then said there should be the same standards for all soldiers.
Mikardo was shouting them down very agressively, using the mike

The whole meeting degenated into a mass row, in a packed hall with hundreds of students
Horrible aggressive atmosphere
I never attended another meeting there, dreadful impression of Labour and I expect many others felt the same.

Corbyn is very much a fool and not a knave. His contribution to the HoC Queen's Speech debate included his list of bad countries to be condemned for their human rights abuses. Newly added to the list is Ecuador, still ruled by the same leftie party he used to support, but under President Lenin (yes, really) Moreno having to deal with his predecessor's mismanagement built on free Venezuelan oil.

Also Colombia is a Very Bad Country in Corbyn's world, but not Venezuela who he resists condemning with every fibre in his being, nor Boliva where the lefties have just tried to rig an election and ballsed it up.

Also very keen to call out the Sauds, but strangely silent as ever on the folks in Gaza who drag decapitated bodies through the streets behind motorbikes, but then they are his 'friends.'

DH knows a couple of people who work on the periphery of climate science who are sceptical about the maths and the error range of the measurements when it comes to anthropomorphic effects.

If they work "on the periphery" and are academics then they need to publish their findings. Bitching from the sidelines means you don't have the data.

There is a lot of work on how much of the current warming is attributable to human activity, and much of it is accessible to any lay person with basic statistics eg www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2013/10/the-ipcc-ar5-attribution-statement/ (this is by Gavin Schmidt, now director of the NASA Goddard Institute).

anymore on it so I can read up Mockers?

(The Israeli Labour Party leader) "...invited Corbyn to visit Yad Vashem, the Israel Holocaust memorial museum, “to witness that the last time the Jews were forcibly transported it was not to Israel but to their deaths”. Corbyn declined the invitation, citing diary difficulties."

www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/apr/10/israeli-labor-leader-cuts-ties-jeremy-corbyn-antisemitism

It’s Corbyn’s fault that under him idiotic people saying idiotic things has become mainstream and he has not taken sufficient steps to curb it. That he has lost good Jewish MPs because of this. That he has said idiotic things himself. That according to whistleblowers top Labour figures interfered with investigations into AS.

Thank you Mockers

Corbyn is very much a fool and not a knave.

I kind of agree but there’s a point at which foolishness becomes negligent and culpable.

Indeed. By his foolishness he facilitates knaves.

A rather late PMK

I find this really interesting. DH knows a couple of people who work on the periphery of climate science who are sceptical about the maths and the error range of the measurements when it comes to anthropomorphic effects.

If you take my suggestion, it doesn't matter why the climate is changing (whether cooling, warming, or both at the same time). The bottom line is you need to factor it into your future plans in a way that the fact we are still building on flood plains suggests we aren't currently.

Yes, it is, and volcanic eruptions in the past have given rise to Little Ice Ages.... but the discussion about climate change and human behaviour hasn't been one about global cooling.

(With apologies to Nancy Sinatra) depends where you've been discussing, I guess ...

Aren't we in

I absolutely support anti-pollution measures and environmental preservation and sustainability as priorities and that all policies and human actions need to account for them.

Funnily enough, so do I. But because they just feel the right way to live anyway. But an awful lot of measures needed to achieve them fly in the face of economic "growth" as measured by the people who measure such things in inches-of-wallet.

Ouch @BigChoc. No wonder you didn't go back.

I was encouraged to join the Labour Party by Jewish friends, who are hanging in there.

Why are we hanging in? Many reasons - but the main one is that the Labour Party is worth fighting for. And we will fight.

I have nothing but sympathy and respect for those who have left. I think their reasons are valid. They needed to do it. The had to do it.

For me, I've chosen a different strategy. Not better, not worse: different. The aim, the long-term aim, is, I think, the same.

And it's hard.

But I feel, if I leave, I leave a hugely important part of our political landscape to ... what? What will become of it?

I would suggest joining. I really would. It costs £3 and there is a vote coming up for Deputy Leader. It will probably determine the direction of travel for the next 4 years.

You need do nothing after spending that £3, other than check your emails - and vote.

As for the here and now, well ... the chances of Corbyn becoming PM are precisely zero.

The manifesto is likely to be good.

If it is implemented, it will be under a different Leader, as a series of compromises in a hung Patliament.

And, frankly, it will require a miracle of us working together to get that.
The scenario most of us on this thread are trying to avoid - which is the most likely scenario - is a Tory majority.

It's worth bearing that in mind.

Reality check time.

Well I ain't disagreeing with you Rosetti on your environmental perspectives. I look forward to more of us working together on this.

Ian Mikardo PM as their special guest

MP surely ?

Now there's a blast from the past ... (starts humming G&S in his head).

Didn't Churchill once tear him a new one in the 50s ?

Not as nice as he looks ...

In other news: I went out to buy a Russian Honey cake as a gift for my child's teacher - who has sorted lots of things out for her & consequently brought sunshine into my life.

I hope he likes it.

Apparently, it's the most awarded cake in London!!

Who knew?

And I met a lovely man from Glasgow, here doing some building work, who had come to see Westfield East. And I explained I'd travelled all the way from South London just for a cake - & we laughed at how madly busy it was.