Could somebody explain why Corbyn shouldn't be voted for as Labour party leader?

[Myturnnow4]

I've listened to people argue this, but haven't heard a reasoned argument yet. The main criticism appears to be, "he's on the left" but don't go on to explain why that in itself is a bad thing.

Brilliant article by George Monbiot Understands what is happening, but gets it wrong when he thinks that Corbyn cannot be elected PM.

Farage gave people hope - hope that we could have ordinary people in charge, an end of the backslapping Establishment metropolitan elites sneering at the people and imposing their crap consensus on us But Corbyn gives even more hope - that the country can be fixed, railways be nationalised, the rich can be taxed, manufacturing and jobs can return and that investment in infrastructure and the people will be prioritised above investment in bankers and cronies. It is the politics of hope, the politics of dreams rather than the Establishment Oxbridge candidates' politics of lies and despair. That is why Corbyn will win, because the people have optimism and never give up even though many feel like it when they look at and listen to the robotic party automatons from Oxbridge that the Establishment promotes.

"Only a disruptive political movement, that can ignite, mesmerise and mobilise, that can raise an army of volunteers – as the SNP did in Scotland – could smash the political concrete.

To imagine that Labour could overcome such odds by becoming bland, blurred and craven is to succumb to thinking that is simultaneously magical and despairing. Such dreamers argue that Labour has to recapture the middle ground. But there is no such place; no fixed political geography.
...
Labour’s inability to provide a loud and proud alternative to Conservative policies explains why so much of its base switched to Ukip at the last election. Corbyn’s political clarity explains why the same people are flocking back to him.

Are they returning because he has tailored his policies to appeal to the hard right? Certainly not. They are returning because he stands for something, something that could help them, something that was not devised by a row of spadbot mannikins in suits, consulting their clipboards on Douglas Alexander’s sofa.

Nothing was more politically inept than Labour’s attempt before the election to win back Ukip supporters by hardening its stance on immigration. Why vote for the echo when you can vote for the shout? What is attractive about a party prepared to abandon its core values for the prospect of electoral gain? What is inspiring about a party that grovels, offering itself as a political doormat for any powerful interest or passing fad to wipe its feet on?
...
Rebuilding a political movement means espousing what is desirable, then finding ways to make it feasible. The hopeless realists propose the opposite. They assemble a threadbare list of policies they consider feasible, then seek to persuade us that this package is desirable."

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/aug/18/jeremy-corbyn-rivals-chase-impossible-dream

Corbyn will do good for the country and the people overall.

Claig - I amazed that you wrote that.
You professed to be a Farage supporter and now you're supporting the very antithesis of his views. Corbyn wants us out of NATO, unilateral disarmament, etc struggle to see how that will be 'good'.

I have said that I prefer commonsense Farage to left wing politically correct naive Corbyn on most issues. But, I have said that Corbyn has more courage and vision than Farage in changing things that will make life better for the people and the country as a whole. While Farage is right on most things, the ones he is wrong on are more important and while Corbyn is wrong on most things, the ones he is right on and more important.

Foreign policy and immigration are issues that are less significant to most eople than housing, employment, health and a better future and that is where Corbyn scores as he is prepared to change the game entirely and challenge the bankers' logic which te Establishment candidates all say is not credible. I think it will be shown to be credible - that TTIP, GM food, nationalisation of railways etc etc will all be credible and better for the people.

Scrapping of Trident is a popular policy as seen by the SNP's popularity and by polls in Scotland and elsewhere in the country. As far as I understand it, we are not allowed to use them unless the US agrees, so there is a question about how independent they really are.

As for NATO, I am not sure that COrbyn will be allowed to leave NATO so it may just be theoretical. However, NATO is a club like the EU is a club and club members are not truly independent and go along with NATO expansion and wars against Yugoslavia without really being able to say no.
I agree with Farage that NATO expansion is one cause of the crisis with Russia over Ukraine. I don't think Russia would attack the UK if we were not in NATO, but I think it is much more likely that NATO will attack Russia and drag us into a war with Russia.

I think Farage is right, as usual

"Ukip leader Nigel Farage however blamed the desire of Western governments to expand Nato and the European Union for triggering the latest instability.

"I've looked at what Michael Fallon said today. I have to say there's one missing part to everything that is being said and that is, actually, who was it that really started all this?" he said during a campaign visit in Kent.

"I'm not defending Putin's behaviour since, but we still aren't capable of actually admitting that it was us, through expansionism, through wanting Nato and the EU to expand to include the Ukraine, that actually began much of this instability."

www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/uk/russian-bombers-off-cornish-coast-ukips-farage-blames-west-and-eu-for-mounting-tensions-after-raf-jets-scambled-31005327.html

But on the really big issues such as providing a good future and good prospects for the ordinary people of this country, I think Corbyn has more courage than Farage and will appeal to more people than Farage because Corbyn has torn up the bankers' rules and changed the entire game which is why every bigwig and has-been has been told to get on our TV screens and turn the eople against Corbyn. Its Stop Corbyn and stop the people for the bankers.

Foreign policy didn't even come upin our General Electionand foreign policy has not even come up really by the Establishment candidates against Corbyn because the Etsbalishment candidates have no real say over it and have to do as they are told.

Farage tried to bring Ukraine, EU expanionism, Isis and the immigration on boats from Libya up in our Genereal Election, but the BBC and the Etsbalishment didn't want to discuss it, because they have no real say over any of it. These are international and EU policies out of the hands of most of them. Farage is for indepedence, but they are not indeendent. Corbyn, of course, will also set an independent foreign policy, and discussion of it would highlight the Establishment's lack of independence which is why it s off the table.

The Establishment are not independent on foreign policy or on domestic policy. They are beholden to international multinational clubs, as can be seen over Calais etc, and to bankers. If discussion of those issues was allowed on the BBC, their lack of indeendence would soon become apparent and then both Farage and Corbyn would gain popularity as it would be obvious that they were independent.

The next question would then be who would do better for the country and the people, and I think it would be Corbyn because he would offer solutions on housing, manufacturing, health, childcare, lifelong learning, tuition fees, fracking, GM food, employment, nationaliation etc that Farage would not be able to go anywhere near.

Don't forget that Corby has been a leading figure in Stop the War for many years. With Corbyn, there will be no wars - in Syria, Libya or with Russia. The same with Farage, but I don't think the same can be said about the rest.

you know, I'm coming round to the idea of Corbyn being the leader, I think the GM article has helped relax my view on him, I was thinking Labour needs a leader who can win in 2020, but if you accept it's unlikely that any of the 4 can win in 2020 no matter what (which is a depressing thing to accept) then Corbyn would a more interesting 'caretaker' than the others.

He's not likely to get much loyality from the party having completely ignored the whip so many times, but if he's not the PM, it doesn't really matter that much, he'll give the party a more defined position, and even if that's an unpopular one long term, it's worth a punt for a few years. He'll be 76 by the time of the 2025 general election, have turned 80 by the end of that term, so not as likely he'd still be party leader by then - it's only really 2020 he'd be leading the party for, and if we've mentally written that off, why not use this decade to try to redefine what the Labour party is about, and see if the public could be attracted to a more left wing opposition.

That said, I can't get over my disappointment that Labour - the main 'progressive' party - has never picked a female leader. We're more likely to have the country's second female PM from the Tories than Labour. That's very depressing.

Both Farage and Corbyn are a threat to the Establishment and their banker bosses because they are both independent. Corbyn is the antithesis of Blair, Corbyn will not go to war like Blair, he will not do as the bankers tell him, he will not get a job in JP Morgan when he leaves politics, he will go back to his allotment. And that is why the bankers have to Stop Corbyn, he won't do as he is told.

Much as I like Farage's commonsense, he is not going to be Prime Minister ever. He hasn't got enough policies on all issues. But, inspite of what Labour's Establishment candidates say about Corbyn, there is a real chance that Corbyn could become Prime Minister. That is why the bankers are in panic and that is why every bigwig and has-been has been told to get on TV and Stop Corbyn.

I don't however, think his stance on "no war, ever" would be all that helpful in a PM - if your allies and enemies alike know that war is never an option for the UK for political reasons, no matter what happens or what they do, it makes our level of influence in talks/negotiations harder.

The idea that we can just decide wars won't happen is rather over assuming our influence - all we can do is say we won't be involved - that doesn't mean other countries will do the same.

I don't think Corbyn is a pacifist. If someone attacked us, then we would go to war. But Corbyn would do his utmost to make it unlikely.

To be fair Claig - Blair was only 54 with his youngest DC being only 7 when he stopped being the leader of the Labour party, Corbyn's already 66, saying he'll just retire to his allotment rather than get another job after being the leader (so at least another 5 years when he's nearly 70) is hardly a moral stance, more practical/realistic!

oh typo - obviously in around 5 years time the 66 year old won't be 'nearly' 70 but 'just over' 70!

oh and just looked up Corbyn's age to be certain I'd got it right that he's 66, seen he's on his 3rd marriage and claimed he divorced his 2nd wife over arguments about which school to send his DCs to - I foresee the right wing press having a field day with that!! (I would have said I can't believe anyone would get divorced over state school choices, but having seen the insanity on some of the threads on here, I can easily see some woman might dump their DH over it!)

True, but Blair was Fettes public school and Oxford PPE. He was the Establishment's man. He took over Labour for the Establishment and ruined it, made it Tory-lite. Corbyn is restoring the heart and soul of Labour, making it a party for the people and not the bankers.

Corbyn will never work for a bank, because he has different principles, ideals and values. He stuck with socialism when it went out of style, out of fashion. They laugh about his woolly jumpers and his beard, but he doesn't care and nor do the people, because everyone knows he is his own man, not the bankers' bag man.

'I foresee the right wing press having a field day with that'

Yes, they will try everything they can, but I don't think any of it will work. Corbyn is not as commonsense as Farage, but I don't think it will matter because his good policies will far outshine his negatives in the public's eyes.

He will just repeat "we do not do personal abuse" and the public will ignore all the personal abuse against him because they understand that his opponents are desperate, that he has challenged their entire game and that their game is almost up.

Here is the Guardian's excellent Seumas Milne, a good Oxford PPE.

If you read between the lines, you see that the battle of the elites and their servants to stop Corbyn is the battle of the Establishment against the people. Everything has changed overnight, and they are desperate.

"What is taking place in the Labour party is a democratic explosion unprecedented in British political history.
...
After years of handwringing about declining participation in party politics, you might imagine the political class would be delighted at this grassroots surge. Not a bit of it. The political and media establishment has linked arms to resist it. This is one of Her Majesty’s parties of government, after all. The idea of it falling into the care of someone outside the boundaries of political acceptability is unthinkable.

So one New Labour grandee after another – from Tony Blair to David Miliband – have taken time out from their lucrative post-ministerial careers to brand Corbyn as the road to electoral oblivion. Far from welcoming this vast influx, they want the party declared full up.
...
But the more New Labour’s college of cardinals brands the Corbyn surge a self-indulgent spasm, the more it exposes official politics as a closed system whose rules of what is credible and electable are set by the powers that be rather than by voters or party members.
...
You only have to go to one of the campaign’s huge rallies to understand that the idea this is the product of political or union manipulation is laughable – and that his supporters don’t only want a different kind of Labour leader: they want to change the political system.
...
The real objection is that Corbyn represents a break with City-backed austerity and a powerful commitment to public investment. Add to that his opposition to Trident renewal and endless British warmaking, and the challenge he represents to the establishment consensus is obvious enough.

So as each denunciation has failed to dent Corbyn’s lead, they have become more poisonous.
...
But the desperation is a measure of what is at stake."

www.theguardian.com/politics/commentisfree/2015/aug/19/jeremy-corbyn-coalition-labour

Their whole game is at stake. It started with Farage and UKIP - 4 million people had had enough. Now it has spread to Labour and they are in panic modeand at a loss of how to stop it. Bigwigs and has-beens are being thrown over the paprapets like sacrifiicial lambs. Their warnings fall on deaf ears, their lies are laughed off, the people have had enough.

They have a real problem on their hands. They are apparntly plotting coups but that will just incnse the people even more and show them how the elite control them and Corbyn has warned them

"Jeremy Corbyn tells Labour MPs: if you don't back me, the grassroots will rise up"

www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/jeremy-corbyn-tells-labour-mps-if-you-dont-back-me-the-grassroots-will-rise-up-10462770.html

Will they risk it, will they topple Labour's most popular politician in decades because he won't d as he is told?? They may have no choice for their whole game is at stake.

And to make things worse for them, today the elite open their newspapers ad read that Russell Brand has thrown his lot in with the people, with Corbyn. Can things get any worse for the elite? Jez they can!

"Russell Brand backs Jeremy Corbyn in Labour leadership race

Comedian turned political activist endorses the leftwing frontrunner and mocks warnings that the party would face annihilation under him"

www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/aug/19/russell-brand-backs-jeremy-corbyn-in-labour-leadership-race

The elite know that if Corbyn succeeds in winning over the savviest, most trenchant critics of the status quo, the most switched-on portion of the electorate - UKIP voters (otherwise known as the People's Army) - then it is game over. That is what keeps them awake at night.

"Jeremy Corbyn Targets Ukip Supporters As Harriet Harman Calls In The Lawyers

Labour leadership frontrunner Jeremy Corbyn claimed on Tuesday his anti-austerity message could win back support from former Labour voters who have drifted to Ukip. The veteran MP said his call for higher public spending has gained support on the campaign trail in areas where Ukip has performed well.

Speaking after addressing a packed rally of 1,200 supporters in Newcastle, Corbyn said: "We lost seats due to the lack of any clear economic alternative and I found campaigning in Ukip areas that when I engaged people on the level of jobs, on schools, on housing and on health and on anti-austerity we got support. But if all we could offer was cuts, but done in a slightly different way than the Tories had done for the last five years, then people simply didn't want to know."

www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2015/08/18/labour-calls-in-lawyers-over-its-leadership-contest_n_8006932.html

"I took to Tinder to convince people to vote for Jeremy Corbyn. Here's what I learned

If Tinder's any guide, Jeremy Corbyn may be the best choice to win over Ukip supporters."

www.newstatesman.com/2015/08/i-took-tinder-convince-people-vote-jeremy-corbyn-heres-what-i-learned

Why do the elite fear the UKIP voter more than any other? Because they know that the UKIP voter understands the game and has their finger on the pulse of public opinion more than any teenage think tank whizzkid form Oxford with a PPE who works for a polling company.

Personal attacks are used when all else fails and Corbyn has the wherewithal to say that. I doubt it will be that much of an issue tbh as if/when Cameron steps down, the guy replacing him has his own chequered past to deal with and it's much more interesting than Corbyns....

"Jeremy Corbyn tells Labour MPs: if you don't back me, the grassroots will rise up"

In Brown we had 'the clunking fist' and now we have 'the chainmail vest' - claig you really should be mentioned in despatches for your services to every political party, other than the Labour one.

Russell Brand backs Corbyn, nuff said.

Personally I don't think it worth countering your posts based on how often you've been wrong on our leadership material and their general election results, so with Corbyn now a Labour leader shoe-in - thanks to his friends in well left of centre places ignoring the obvious as warned by many learned people (a-hem lol) - I want to just sit back and be fascinated by the Labour Parliamentary Party aftermath.

I say fascinated, as I take no democratic joy having the only real united opposition party in Westminster, only representing their own 5 million citizens (allegedly).

'In Brown we had 'the clunking fist' and now we have 'the chainmail vest''

No, in Brown we had the Establishment clunk, in Corbyn we have the £1.50 market trader's vest and in the Tories we have the vested interests.

In Farage and Corbyn we have simply the best and simply the vest.

So what would weapons would Corbyn use to go to war with Claig, if he was forced to do do? Don't forget he'll have given up the nuclear deterrent. Or will he expect the Americans to bail us out for. 3rd time.

I've joined the labour party to vote for jez. Everything he has gone against the whip for I would to. I feel our views are aligned and I want him as a left winger to lead a left wing opposition. It will draw attention to how right the cons are going and I love that people my age (27) and under have enthusiasm for politics again because of him.
As for your question OP from talking to the labour counsellor and my neighbour an ex labour mp secretary as much as they agree with corbyns views they don't believe he will win. They want his ideal world but think it's all a tory conspiracy about his popularity.
I'm voting jez because he best represents my views and isn't that why we elect and vote for these people. I'm not strategy voting I'm consciously voting. I can't understand a left wing party not wanting to be left anymore, if that's the case join another party that aligns with your centre or right views.

I'm so surprised at claig on this thread,I remember this fervour over ukip. I hope other ukip voters can find what they were looking for in politics with jez as alot of my school friends voted ukip. I was horrified at the time as I believe they are the bnp Britain's first type, maybe jez has what it takes to bring them back in the fold.

I find it hilarious that so much is being projected onto Corbyn, when he's actually revealed very few hard policies.

Is he to become the leader of the Population Front of Judea or the Judean Popular Front?

If Corbyn is thought of as a solution it just shows what dire straits the Labour party is now in.

I hope the Blairites leave and set up a new centre party. The wet Tories can join it too and we can get back to real choice of left, centre and right wing party choices

Claig - your reasoning is completely irrational.

As I understand it, our nuclear weapons are dependent on the Americans.

"UK's nuclear deterrent entirely dependent on the US – crossparty report"

www.theguardian.com/uk-news/defence-and-security-blog/2014/jul/01/trident-nuclear-weapons-uk

If Corbyn fired them at a country which has them, then I wouldn't like to think of what the retaliation would be like, and he wouldn't fire them at a country that didn't have them.

Even some of our generals don't think they are that useful

"Trident nuclear missiles are £20bn waste of money, say generals"

www.theguardian.com/uk/2009/jan/16/trident-is-20bn-waste-say-generals

The wars of the future are likely to be using conventional weapons. For anything nuclear, America would bail us out because it would be in their interests to do so. There is no charity involved, everything is about self interest.

'I remember this fervour over ukip'

That's right because 4 million people didn't vote UKIP because they agree with what Douglas Carswell says or what we know of Farage's policies. 4 million voted UKIP because they have had enough of how the country is run by the metropolitan elite, and what we are seeing with Corbyn is exactly the same discontent.

Everyone is now waiting for the best solutions and Corbyn will win back lots of disaffected voters who turned to UKIP in exasperation with how the country is being run.