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Labour Leader: Keir Starmer IV

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I’m not going to get too excited, if this is the start of LD’s rising in the polls I doubt they will make a challenge to the Tories, if past experience is anything to go by they’ll get all giddy headed and join them yet again

They have done that exactly once! Contrast with say Labour and authoritarianism, which they increase every single time they get to power!

More seriously I hope it is an indicator that Johnson’s far-right popularism and ethnic nationalism is not playing well in the nicer parts of the Tory heartlands. Given we do not live in a functioning democracy and have the most useless “opposition party” imaginable anything that tempers the Tories third-rate Trump impression has to be welcomed. It is clear removing the Tories from power is impossible at present as we have so little in the toolbox (thanks to Labour), so I’ll take anything that steers them away from the current path of far-right tabloid popularism and kleptocracy.
 
What does structural mean in this instance? How would the public notice if the structure was different?

I’m not going to write an essay on the structure of the Labour Party, suffice it to say that those in control have only one idea which is to adopt Tory values on the grounds that that is what got the Tories elected.

The problem is that, unsurprisingly, the Tories still hold their own ground quite firmly and meanwhile they’ve moved into the ground abandoned by Labour as it has shifted right.

The success of the Tories has been to identify that even in those areas that might be economically leftist, they are also culturally very right wing.

Labour has abandoned leftish economics and the Tories have gratefully filled the vacuum.

The Tories now have the economic left and the cultural right all to themselves and Labour has nowhere to stand.

The public might notice Labour if they knew where Labour stands, what it stands for, what are it core ideas and beliefs. But they don’t.
 
What does structural mean in this instance? How would the public notice if the structure was different?

I see massive reluctance to attack the Tories on issues their former Red Wall support has bought into for fear of never getting them back. I see no effort to get into the voters that the Tories have abandoned in their quest to shift towards nationalism and culture wars. Meanwhile, voters seem reluctant to hear that the government they just elected made such a rickets of the COVID response and Brexit negotiations, preferring to concentrate on the one thing they haven't screwed up - a vaccine roll out where they were forced to use the NHS.

The fact that Test and Trace was and continues to be an abject failure doesn't bother people along with most of the COVID response in general. The hugely inflated death toll over that we could have expected with swift action caused hardly a ripple. The shovelling of vast sums of public money to their funders as a result of a health crisis doesn't set off any alarms. They are also paying no price for a criminal immigration stance, that has seen attempts to cross the channel increase when they were selling the idea that membership of the EU was the cause of that. The lies and duplicity has been laid bare with documentary evidence on matters as serious as the emptying of the elderly from hospitals into care homes with disasterous consequences, but still people are not ready to think they may have over-estimated Boris.

It reminds me of Thatcher, post Falklands there were plenty of people proud of their vote and you could understand that if not agreeing with it. As things decended into chaos around Poll Tax and Heseltine, Howe and so on it was hard to find people who would admit having voted for her. But they still marginally preferred to give a slightly more moderate Tory a go rather than vote Labour - such is the time it takes to recover from a huge defeat. It's hard for me to see that as 'structural'. Labour have got to decide who they want to be and if that includes trying to get the 'Red Wall' genie back in the bottle - they might as well pack it in now. It will always be easier for the Tories to tack left on economics and keep core supporters than Labour to move to the far right on culture and retain theirs.
So what you're saying is, tack left economically, since that seems to be working for the Tories in places like Hartlepool; but go back to the left culturally as well to keep the metropolitan and youth vote. It's audacious, but recent electoral history does suggest that you might be on to something!

As regards structure, I'm loathe to use a business analogy, but businesses don't restructure because they think consumers love restructuring, they do it with a view to making the business work better, so that it can produce things consumers want to buy. Keith's right, IMO: what we're seeing now is a pure expression of the Labour Party's structural issues.

The party is structured defensively: it's designed so that once people get into positions of power it's hard to get them out. At the same time power flows upwards: to get into a position of power, and to move up the ladder, you depend on those above you: there's almost no pressure from below, except in freak circumstances. So what you get is sclerotic patronage networks at all levels, and local and national leadership that is unaccountable and, by this stage, completely out of touch with local communities and voters generally. You saw them in Hartlepool: they genuinely thought Mandelson was a vote winner! They honestly don't have a clue.

There is nothing new about the current strategy: it's simply what Blairites do when they're in charge of the party. They can't do anything else, and nobody else can shift them, so this is what the party will continue to do until...Well, I've no idea: there's no built-in self-correction system so it's a matter of fate throwing up some kind of opportunity, and there still being people around who care enough to seize it.
 
Batley will be far more telling...

Yes, that will be fascinating. It is a real annoyance that attention-seeker Galloway is standing as even though he is an utter bellend he will still skew the vote somewhat. Given the recent history of that seat even I’d vote Labour there just to support Jo Cox’s sister. I’ll be amazed if the Tories don’t take it though.
 
Yes, that will be fascinating. It is a real annoyance that attention-seeker Galloway is standing as even though he is an utter bellend he will skew the vote somewhat. Given the recent history of that seat even I’d vote Labour there just to support Jo Cox’s sister. I’ll be amazed if the Tories don’t take it though.

I'm sure she's a nice person but it takes much more than that. Tbh it's a bit of an insult to go house to house talking about bin collections when it's your own party that runs the council. Galloway will help to see of the fascists (2 of them) and other assorted right wing riff raff if nothing else by forcing Labour to address the real issues. If they don't then Galloway might do fairly well.
 
I'm sure she's a nice person but it takes much more than that. Tbh it's a bit of an insult to go house to house talking about bin collections when it's your own party that runs the council.
Why is that an insult? The reduction in services at council level are due to the Tory austerity budget cuts imposed on them.
Don't tell me Labour want to take the rap for that as well as causing the financial crisis?
 
They have done that exactly once! Contrast with say Labour and authoritarianism, which they increase every single time they get to power!

More seriously I hope it is an indicator that Johnson’s far-right popularism and ethnic nationalism is not playing well in the nicer parts of the Tory heartlands. Given we do not live in a functioning democracy and have the most useless “opposition party” imaginable anything that tempers the Tories third-rate Trump impression has to be welcomed. It is clear removing the Tories from power is impossible at present as we have so little in the toolbox (thanks to Labour), so I’ll take anything that steers them away from the current path of far-right tabloid popularism and kleptocracy.
Ignoring your first paragraph, as any sensible person should (can I just say Jo Bloody Swinson), I agree with everything else you say.

If there is going to be a challenge to the Tories it will have to come from a coherent ideological opposition to their politics. If there is to be a shift it will have to come by undermining the far right populism and ethnic nationalism that you describe. The populism and nationalism of the Tories is defined by what it excludes. It excludes BLM, Climate change activism, an accurate understanding of our history and a whole heap of other stuff

If that is going to be opposed in an ideological sense, it will have to come from an inclusive politics, a sense of national identity that includes BLM, that fully embraces climate change to an extent that militant activism is not necessary, that recognises that the role of slavery and colonialism is what our greatness is built on, not to promote a sense of guilt, but to promote and celebrate the inclusion of every part of our nation in our national identity.

The politics of inclusion would also have to include an electoral system that includes and gives value to as many votes as possible, which our current system most certainly does not. It would also need to ensure as many children as possible are included in the best education possible which our current system does not. In fact it would have quite far reaching implications all round!

Of course, there is no such ideological opposition, not from the Lib Dems and certainly not from Labour.

The future is depressing, the future is blue.

But I still share you hope!
 
Why is that an insult? The reduction in services at council level are due to the Tory austerity budget cuts imposed on them.
Don't tell me Labour want to take the rap for that as well as causing the financial crisis?

Because it's hardly the issue of the day is it?
 
Because it's hardly the issue of the day is it?
In fairness one of the reasons Labour voters switch to the Tories in national elections is because they see it as a vote against the local Labour aristocracy, partly on the basis of their dissatisfaction with mundane issues like this. In a way it's not fair on councillors because as Kendo says much of this is driven by austerity. But on the other hand ____ them, because they've had over a decade to get their head around that trap and they've prioritised holding onto safe council seats.
 
In fairness one of the reasons Labour voters switch to the Tories in national elections is because they see it as a vote against the local Labour aristocracy, partly on the basis of their dissatisfaction with mundane issues like this. In a way it's not fair on councillors because as Kendo says much of this is driven by austerity. But on the other hand ____ them, because they've had over a decade to get their head around that trap and they've prioritised holding onto safe council seats.

I took that as read. Would you want to talk about bin collections just now in a national byelection?
 
If there is going to be a challenge to the Tories it will have to come from a coherent ideological opposition to their politics.

That is it in a sentence. The LDs, Greens, SNP and PC are all doing this. Labour seem to be forever trapped paralysed in a room surrounded by focus groups and Dominic Cummings-style whiteboards since ‘that bigoted womangate’. They are the Atomic Kitten of politics, but without the success or irony. A formulaic manufactured blandness that serves no purpose whatsoever.
 
If it's an issue where they're canvassing, (ie. fortnightly collections/overfilled bins/vermin etc), then why not?

Because they will get thumped. There's the far right attacking the muslims (two overtly fascist candidates as I've said), Covid third wave, Gaza - this is a strong Pakistani Muslim area, do you really think bins is the burning issue on everyone's lips?

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https://www.theguardian.com/comment...batley-and-spen-jeremy-corbyn-scottish-voters
 
I took that as read. Would you want to talk about bin collections just now in a national byelection?
I've done it! But right now, in that constituency, no. Literally nothing else to talk about though because of the overall uselessness of the party.
 
The politics of inclusion would also have to include an electoral system that includes and gives value to as many votes as possible, which our current system most certainly does not.
And in the woke (or some other) thread you suggest that citizens from a certain age onwards should be prevented from voting. Now I don't understand ?!
 
"Maybe if I browse some Union Jack wallpaper in Piers Morgan's house, I can turn things around in time for Batley and Spen?"

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Dull grey man stands in front of Tory blue sky wearing what looks to be a price sticker.

Ideology sale! Close-out deals on everything! Half price morals, still factory sealed!
 
Ideology sale!
Maybe, but is ideology really what Britain needs at the mo ? What it now needs are practicable solutions for addressing the huge problems caused by that bloody Brexit, and a large part of the population is or will be affected by it. I'm not 100% sure a focus on ideological topics for privileged lefties is going to bring the left more votes.

Most social-democratic parties in Europe are making the same mistakes, nevertheless they still don't feel responsible in any way for their self-destruction. The sad thing is that the alt-right (and I mean the actual, dangerous alt-right) happily jumps in.
 
I would be more concerned that Starmer completely failed at PMQs this week, when he was gifted fantastic ammunition by Cummings an hour before.
He should have murdered Johnson.
 
Maybe, but is ideology really what Britain needs at the mo ?

The parties that don’t hide from it seem to be doing rather better than Labour at present. Sure, the fact we don’t live in a representative democracy is hugely damaging to their chances of achievement anything, but I can’t help but think if there was a party as credible and dynamic as say the SNP in England the Tories would be toast long ago. The Tories are about as bad as politics can get; fundamentally corrupt, racist, divisive, nationalistic, yet Labour prove time and again you can’t fight shit with more shit.
 
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