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Labour Leader: Keir Starmer V

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Unquestionably. I have a habit of getting Labour leaders wrong; I voted for Blair in ‘97 (never again, obviously, nor Brown), I liked Ed Milliband (still do, he seems a decent bloke). More recently I got suckered by both Corbyn and Starmer, initially thinking each had way more backbone and integrity than turned out to be the case.

I’ve learned my lesson. Just not my party. I’ll stick to prodding it with a stick from a safe distance.

PS I do still like some individual MPs, mainly the ones who break their career programming and actually speak with some moral conviction (Rayner, Lammy etc).
Fair enough. I predict that both Rayner and Lammy will eventually disappoint you. ;)
 
No doubt!

PS I like Dawn Butler and RLB too, plus I’m sure there are more who I can’t instantly bring to mind. My problem is the evasive career-driven nature of the party bureaucracy and that I view it as largely anachronistic and irrelevant. It just doesn’t seem to belong in this century, never has any concept of small business etc.
 
It depends entirely on your perspective. I love ‘now’. It has presented amazing opportunities to those of us who chose not to fit in preset boxes. I wish I was young now rather than wasting so much of my life banging my head against the expectations, conventions and restrictions of the tiny little world of the 1980s. The ability for anyone to create and sell anything to anyone from their own home now is just staggeringly liberating. I can not imagine life prior to the internet. It really was the dark ages for someone like me.


Here’s a catchy pop song. An ode to the dull grey office blocks of the old times.
Good for you.
Not all of us want to be shopkeepers though.
 
Not all of us want to be shopkeepers though.

The opportunity is there for all creative things, e.g. music, art etc. You can make a good living on Youtube these days, countless specialist channels across all manner of subjects. I’m subscribed to about 140 or so across computing, music, audio, art etc, many are full time ventures. It is a whole different world and one thankfully no longer pre-defined by school results or personal contacts.
 
The opportunity is there for all creative things, e.g. music, art etc. You can make a good living on Youtube these days, countless specialist channels across all manner of subjects. I’m subscribed to about 140 or so across computing, music, audio, art etc, many are full time ventures. It is a whole different world and one thankfully no longer pre-defined by school results or personal contacts.
I think it’s correct that creative people have more opportunity to be creative these days, YouTube, the internet in general etc, but we’re only talking about a small fraction of the population. The majority will never benefit from these platforms, and require decent wages, working conditions and, job security (in as much as that’s possible in a free market economy). I would argue that unions play an important role in fighting for these things.
 
Historical perspective from David Edgerton, quite impressed with Reeves, who he thinks has come up with a new way of thinking about the economy:

https://www.davidedgerton.org/blog/2021/9/29/renewing-labour
Edgerton said:
Unlike the zombie Blairism and stiff nationalism that Starmer offers, Reeves has mined Labour thinking to plant a seed of renewal. Will it grow?
No. The plan for what to do is super, the methodology for putting it into effect is fundamentally against the aims. He didn't mention her 'fiscal rule' (reminiscent of Brown's 'Golden Rule' so not that far away from zombie Blairism). He's lists the noble aims, and they are noble. When the Tories come to ask: 'but how do you pay for it?', this is where it will unravel. And not at all because it's impossible.
 
Unquestionably. I have a habit of getting Labour leaders wrong; I voted for Blair in ‘97 (never again, obviously, nor Brown), I liked Ed Milliband (still do, he seems a decent bloke). More recently I got suckered by both Corbyn and Starmer, initially thinking each had way more backbone and integrity than turned out to be the case.

I’ve learned my lesson. Just not my party. I’ll stick to prodding it with a stick from a safe distance.

PS I do still like some individual MPs, mainly the ones who break their career programming and actually speak with some moral conviction (Rayner, Lammy etc).
The inconsistency is that you don’t prod the Lib Dems with the same stick. To be clear, I agree with you about the Labour Party being unfit for purpose and has been for two decades or more, but the Lib Dems have proved themselves to be part of the problem too.

Blair, Clegg, Swinson, Johnson and Starmer are politicians who have used the politics of lies, broken pledges and smoke and mirrors and all deserve to be prodded equally with the same stick
 
Stronger future together? I first saw that on the Steve bell cartoon and thought it was a joke!
Future together stronger, together stronger future, stronger together future.

So you take the very successful Tory three word slogan strategy and totally misunderstand it to create a baffling, confusing and ineffective non-message.

https://www.theguardian.com/comment...ference-speech-cartoon?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

"Stick a fork in their ass and turn 'em over, they're done!”
 
The posts above indicate why Labour is not electable. The back biting shows that it is almost impossible to get behind any leader whether left, right or centre and until the in-fighting stops, nothing will change. Looking at this from a distance, Starmer's only problem is that he is honest compared to the others. OK he did not protest earlier but that was the time that the Politburo would have eliminated him, remember the mayor of manchester sucked up to Corbyn for quite a while. Give Kier a free hand to build his team and then see what will happen.

FF
 
Blair, Clegg, Swinson, Johnson and Starmer are politicians who have used the politics of lies, broken pledges and smoke and mirrors and all deserve to be prodded equally with the same stick
In a delicate place with the stick sharpened.
 
A post script -

I even joined the party to vote for Jeremy, my mistake as I thought that JC was Jeremy Clarkson!! Now he would be an interesting as a party leader.
 
The posts above indicate why Labour is not electable. The back biting shows that it is almost impossible to get behind any leader whether left, right or centre and until the in-fighting stops, nothing will change. Looking at this from a distance, Starmer's only problem is that he is honest compared to the others. OK he did not protest earlier but that was the time that the Politburo would have eliminated him, remember the mayor of manchester sucked up to Corbyn for quite a while. Give Kier a free hand to build his team and then see what will happen.

FF
Comedy's good on here today. I gather you haven't followed the Sir's career all that closely?
 
Is Andy Burnham any better?? What about Tony B Liar?? Who would you propose to unseat the government of BoJo.

It is just politics!!

Slogan of the day is "Get Brexit Working".
 
Is Andy Burnham any better?? What about Tony B Liar?? Who would you propose to unseat the government of BoJo.

It is just politics!!

Slogan of the day is "Get Brexit Working".
Andy Burnham is a plonker. He's not a horrible person (see an older post of mine where I said I worked on his initial election campaign), but he's totally in line with the New Labour 'fiscal rectitude' econ approach... even though he's faced the idiocy of it head-on against his own current mayorship in Manchester. Tony Blair? He doesn't exist as a realistic person to me, he's a sideline commentator who lives in the 1990s.

If I was being totally practical, in a cynical sort of way, I would say if people only want to unseat Johnson, they can get behind and vote for any centrist Labour leader. What that will achieve is just unseating Johnson, only that. Then Labour will be keeping the seats warm for however long they occupy them, but will come unstuck because their admirable policy desires won't be manageable under the incoherent fiscal rules they impose upon themselves. Then they'll be hung, drawn and quartered for 'profligacy' and the Tories voted back on a promise. It's like this never sinks in.
 
No. The plan for what to do is super, the methodology for putting it into effect is fundamentally against the aims. He didn't mention her 'fiscal rule' (reminiscent of Brown's 'Golden Rule' so not that far away from zombie Blairism). He's lists the noble aims, and they are noble. When the Tories come to ask: 'but how do you pay for it?', this is where it will unravel. And not at all because it's impossible.
In fairness that’s a question Labour will be asked incessantly, by everyone, whatever they do, and Reeves’ approach is far from the worst they might have taken in anticipation. But yes, when the going starts to get tough we’ll see how committed they are.
 
The inconsistency is that you don’t prod the Lib Dems with the same stick.

Tony is willing to forgive the Lib Dems anything (even being a Tory enabler and therefore a big part of the chaos we now find ourselves in), given they support the single issue he cares most about.
 
In fairness that’s a question Labour will be asked incessantly, by everyone, whatever they do, and Reeves’ approach is far from the worst they might have taken in anticipation. But yes, when the going starts to get tough we’ll see how committed they are.
They can demolish the question definitively by saying: "exactly the same way you have paid for everything during your premiership." Which opens a discussion they can easily dominate, should they care to. Instead they are falling into the trap of saying they will keep within artificial boundaries.
 
The inconsistency is that you don’t prod the Lib Dems with the same stick. To be clear, I agree with you about the Labour Party being unfit for purpose and has been for two decades or more, but the Lib Dems have proved themselves to be part of the problem too.

Blair, Clegg, Swinson, Johnson and Starmer are politicians who have used the politics of lies, broken pledges and smoke and mirrors and all deserve to be prodded equally with the same stick

I agree, they have been disappointing in recent years and as stated several times I’ve stopped voting for them. I always previously voted for them as they had a firm manifesto pledge for PR and also proved substantially to the left, liberal, anti-authoritarian side when compared to Labour. They also have a vastly better grasp of small business, an area Labour is always totally blind to.

To put things in perspective for me PR is 85% of it. The way I see things is the UK is a failing dictatorship unless we obtain a functional representative democracy. It is only then we can even think about killing the two-headed beast that hold us in the last century and imprisons us with aristocratic tradition. We are living in a failed system. The only hope in hell of forward movement is to vote for parties that believe in fundamental reform. Neither Labour nor Conservative do. They both actively oppose it, so no matter how poor the alternatives are they are the only logical options on the table. I’ve switched to Green and helping crowdfund The Good Law Project, Stop Funding Hate and Led By Donkeys. Protest is all we realistically have at present.
 
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