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Politics

Well done Labour NEC - Corbyn can stand

414 replies

claig · 12/07/2016 20:02

They have voted 18-14 to allow Corbyn to stand in the leadership election.

One less stitch-up in a season os stitch-ups.

Go Corbyn!

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LowDudgeon · 19/07/2016 12:36

So it sounds like she acted as professionally as she could, until she was so ground down by Team Corbyn's lack of professionalism that she could no longer continue in the job

But all the resignations happened several weeks ago - they would have appeared much more understandable (& less conspiratorial) if the resigners with these grounds had produced their statements at the time.

GlassCircles · 19/07/2016 14:47

they would have appeared much more understandable (& less conspiratorial) if the resigners with these grounds had produced their statements at the time.

Not sure what you mean - are you talking about Thangam Debbonaire and Lilian Greenwood? If so, do two make a conspiracy? Are you saying their statements are probably untrue?

GlassCircles · 19/07/2016 14:56

Interesting stats on Labour Party membership from Prof Tim Bale:

"They are an unusual set of people - for a start they joined a political party, only about 1 to 2 % of people ever do that"

"They are unusual as well because about three-quarters of them are middle class people, over half of them are graduates, average age is around 51, so they don't really represent the population as a whole."

Bit rich that they keep trotting out the line of 'the Members are the all-important ones - ie the ones who represent the ordinary people of this country unlike those nasty Blairite MPs' - as if they have sole rights to being 'ordinary people'.

LowDudgeon · 19/07/2016 15:08

are you talking about Thangam Debbonaire and Lilian Greenwood? If so, do two make a conspiracy? Are you saying their statements are probably untrue?

No, I'm saying that their statements offer perfectly reasonable grounds for a minister to resign, so I'm wondering why they weren't produced at the time when ministers were resigning at (pre-arranged) regular intervals throughout the day.

GlassCircles · 19/07/2016 15:51

I have no idea - my guess would be that they didn't have pre-prepared written statements at the time, and it was only later that they decided to document their reasons. Perhaps - being understandably disgruntled at their treatment - they will have now timed them to cause inconvenience to JC. That's just my guess though. What do you think?

I also have no idea whether they had all arranged to resign at the same time - but if they hadn't it seems reasonable to guess that if there were a large group of disgruntled MPs then resignations would snowball once they started.

Nobody will want to be the ones left to defend the leader they have no faith in - who appears to have no respect for them or their opinions - on what they perceive to be a sinking ship.

LowDudgeon · 19/07/2016 16:07

Telegraph report on 13th June about planned post-referendum coup

Telegraph report on 25th June about Hilary Benn's "orchestrated mass resignation" plot, before he was sacked

I think at least some of them must have had time to write out resignation statements detailing their grievances!

GlassCircles · 19/07/2016 16:45

I think the point is that they did have grievances, at the way they were being forced to work - ie in what sounds like an unprofessional, exclusive and chaotic manner, which did nothing to further Labour's chances of 1) being an effective opposition or 2) winning an election.

The exact machinations of resignations, plots/plans and associated statements aren't really relevant to that point, are they? If they were being well-led nobody (or at least the vast majority) would have wanted to resign in the first place.

oldbirdy · 19/07/2016 16:55

Have you ever resigned from a job, Dudgeon? You don't write a letter saying 'I am resigning because you are all a bunch of cunts and I find you deeply unprofessional'. You say 'regrettably I am tendering my resignation, thank you for the opportunity but I find I haven't been able to carry out my role with as much success and enjoyment as I had hoped'. There is no need to air dirty laundry. That exact damning circumstances were not revealed at that time is entirely consistent with professionalism. Had Corbyn stepped down, as the PLP clearly experience Ted him to, as John Smith said any labour leader who lost the support of his colleagues would, as every other politician ever in similar circumstances has done, his colleagues would never have had to make it clear exactly how and why they cannot work with him. Their hand has been forced because of this strange cult of St Jeremy and his enormous hubris. There is nothing, nothing, psychologically suspicious in resigned colleagues only revealing supporting info now. They are doing it out of desperation because the membership isn't hearing them, so now they are giving actual examples in the hope of changing a few members' minds before the leadership vote.

oldbirdy · 19/07/2016 16:56

Experience Ted should be expected.

derxa · 19/07/2016 17:08

But if their resignations, & the whole orchestrated attempt to destabilise him, had such sound reasoning behind them, I wonder why it has taken so long for these details to come out?"
Yes and they're doing the rounds of the political discussion programmes.

GlassCircles · 19/07/2016 17:18

They are doing it out of desperation because the membership isn't hearing them, so now they are giving actual examples in the hope of changing a few members' minds before the leadership vote.

Yep - that makes perfect sense. Also agree that they wouldn't have said anything immediately as they thought he might resign so they wouldn't have to. Especially since a lot of them genuinely seem to like him as a person.

claig · 19/07/2016 17:49

It's Corbyn vs Smith, the people vs the favourites

"Owen Smith to face Corbyn in Labour leadership challenge

Angela Eagle steps aside to make way for single challenger in race to lead party after receiving fewer nominations than Smith"

www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/jul/19/owen-smith-jeremy-corbyn-labour-leadership-angela-eagle

The entire Establishment and the 172 have their fingers crossed that Smith can do the job for them and beat Corbyn.

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claig · 19/07/2016 18:09

'Jeremy Corbyn's poll ratings soar as Angela Eagle withdraws from Labour leadership election'

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/07/19/jeremy-corbyn-poll-angela-eagle-owen-smith-nominations-labour/

The news just keeps getting worse for the Establishment. They are still reeling from Brexit when the people beat them, but now after they have got a leadership challenge against Corbyn, they find that Corbyn 's polls soar and the people are with him. The Establishment are just waiting to go on their summer hols, the people just keep winning.

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claig · 19/07/2016 18:17

'Jeremy Corbyn increases dominant lead over Angela Eagle and Owen Smith among Labour Party members, poll finds'

Jeremy Corbyn would beat Angela Eagle or Owen Smith by a margin of at least 20 percentage points, a new poll shows.

The current leader maintains his popularity among members, despite the internal turmoil and mass resignations over recent weeks."

labourlist.org/2016/07/corbyn-would-easily-beat-eagle-or-smith-in-run-off-according-to-new-poll/

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AllThePrettySeahorses · 19/07/2016 18:22

Has she, Claig? That's a shame. I have a lot of respect for her. The abuse she has received is absolutely appalling. I'm not overly keen on Smith but I've not seem him speak, as I have the other two, so I'll reserve judgement, although I will vote for him.

claig · 19/07/2016 18:28

To be fair, Smith does come across well for Labour. Out of all of them, he is probably the best, apart from Corbyn, because Smith looks serious, is not smarmy and arrogant like some of the other favourites, and comes across as having humility.

It remains to be seen if that is enough to beat Corbyn and the left wing agenda that the Corbynistas like.

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AllThePrettySeahorses · 19/07/2016 18:32

I hope he does beat him, although his chances aren't great. I wish the lovely Andy Burnham would stand again, to be honest. I'd really like Jess Phillips because of her big mouth but I know she'd have no chance :)

claig · 19/07/2016 18:36

' I wish the lovely Andy Burnham would stand again'

I wasn't keen on Burnham during the Miliband period. But my respect grew for him in the way he accepted defeat by Corbyn and carried on working constructively for Corbyn. Burnham put personal ambition aside and put the party first. He was the most honourable of the leadership challengers.

The trouble is he is still Establishment even though he is saying more populist things. The tie of the people has changed beyond recognition in just two years. There is no going back to the Establishment for a long time yet, I think. People want change.

Proportional representation will be next and that will usher in real change and democracy and Corbyn's Labour will be a real socialist party.

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AllThePrettySeahorses · 19/07/2016 20:17

And privately educated, career politician Corbyn isn't part of the Establishment? Wink

claig · 19/07/2016 21:04

'And privately educated, career politician Corbyn isn't part of the Establishment?'

No, because if he was, then the Establishment and the 172 would not be trying to remove him and prevent him even appearing on the ballot. The media will now give free access to the 172 on the BBC etc in order to slag Corbyn off and you won't see many Corbyn backing MPs invited onto the BBC.

The media pressure will mount on Corbyn and staff we have never heard of will be given primetime media access to tell the public how unorganised Corbyn is and how he ruins pre-planned publicity stunts (worked on by apparatchiks for months) and pre-planned media stunts by announcing cabinet reshuffles when the event planners had wanted the media to attend a stunt instead.

It won't work because the Corbyn supporting Labour members are wise to the Establishment game.

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claig · 19/07/2016 22:14

"Jeremy Corbyn And The People Versus The Media

In future history classrooms, students will likely be told the tale of the tag-team assault on Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn by the mainstream media and MPs. It will be taught as a harbinger of what is erupting into the most pivotal crisis facing Western politics in half a century: the chasm between ordinary people and the elites. We are seeing it with the Republican establishment’s failed efforts to derail the Trump train and the Democratic establishment’s more successful efforts to extinguish the Bern.
...
The unrelenting bullying of the ordinary Party members’ choice of leader may even represent the death-throes of a ‘politico-media complex’ in futile denial that it has lost the hearts and minds of the masses. We may be witnessing the beginning of the end of what Noam Chomsky eloquently deconstructed in his Manufacturing Consent.
...
Most people, however, are declining the Kool-aid on offer. Throughout the West, the chasm between the elite and the other 99% is unprecedented, not only in wealth distribution, but in the perceptions of politics and politicians. The system of manufacturing consent is facing an unprecedented challenge, one that seems still wilfully ignored in the MsM echo chamber.
...

Politicians most in touch with the current popular anti-establishment mood are lampooned as relics of the past. Headlines report an attack on Corbyn by an ‘LGBT activist’ while dutifully omitting any reference to Jeremy’s long history of LGBT activism, including back when it wasn’t fashionable.

The MsM, reassured within its echo-chamber, has mistakenly continued to assume each one of us believes that all our neighbours buy this, that everyone else supports the officially sanctioned line and you’d be a tinfoil-hat-crackpot not to. Instead, a thing called the internet and its social media component have empowered ordinary people to, at least to some extent, see what their fellow citizens really think and connect with them.

These platforms have become stages upon which a rebuff is occurring, one as embarrassing to the MsM as the leadership vote. Article after article, Youtube video after video produced by the MsM touts the official talking points proclaiming Corbyn and other Left figures’ incompetence, bigotry, unpopularity etc. In every one of these, however, a quick scroll down to the comments section reveals hundreds of real people, almost exclusively saying the opposite of what the article/video instructed them to think."

www.huffingtonpost.com/kadira-pethiyagoda/jeremy-corbyn--the-people_b_11048424.html

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lljkk · 19/07/2016 23:22

Was Corbyn privately educated? I can't find out which school he went to that was supposed to be private.

I am actually considering renewing my L-party membership just so I can vote against him, though. Argh. Shouldn't waste the £25, but pondering just so we can get a decent opposition.

Noitsnotteatimeyet · 19/07/2016 23:44

He went to a prep school followed by a grammar school lljkk

lljkk · 20/07/2016 00:54

Ta.

oldbirdy · 20/07/2016 07:10

No, he went to a prep school followed by a private school, which has 'grammar' in its name. It is/ was a fee paying school not a Grammar in the way they are traditionally understood.