14th November Movement for Left Unity

[articul8]

you are "attempting to prepare" but failing to do so competently, let alone credibly. In fact you are arguably making the task harder not easier.

 

[chilango]

A Labour victory would be less catastrophic than a Tory victory. Being organised inside and outside the LP maximises the chances of limiting how bad it might be. Potential triggers for the left to split from Labour exist eg
1) the termination of the link (union votes at conference/NEC attacked, state funding)
2) Labour agreeing to form some kind of national government or grand coalition (even a coalition with the LDs could help to precipitate a split, but it wouldn't happen overnight)

what?!?



fucking hell a8.

 

[treelover]

Plenty of people on here have said they will be voting Labour, there's a thread on it, tbh, I was very surprised at how many.

 

[articul8]

what?!?

what - are you really saying that you would be perfectly happy to see another term of Tory government? And you think this is a view widely shared by the working class?

 

[chilango]

what - are you really saying that you would be perfectly happy to see another term of Tory government? And you think this is a view widely shared by the working class?

it wasn't your first sentence that left me so aghast.

it was the fantasy that followed.

 

[chilango]

Plenty of people on here have said they will be voting Labour, there's a thread on it, tbh, I was very surprised at how many.

and?

 

[articul8]

it was the fantasy that followed.

I said they were *potential* triggers - ie. they won't necessarily happen, and if they did this won't necessarily need to a split. But they could and it might.

 

[chilango]

I said they were *potential* triggers - ie. they won't necessarily happen, and if they did this won't necessarily need to a split. But they could and it might.

what?

triggers?

wtf?

who's splitting where?

utter fantasy.

seriously.

 

[articul8]

Strikes me that both Left Unity and TUSC are predicated upon there being some further split to the left in Labour (at least in its electoral base) - or else what was the point of picketing the Special Conference about the Collins reforms?

 

[chilango]

seriously articul8 there is no left of any consequence in the Labour Party.

...and the handful of individuals that would self-define as the Labour Left ain't going anywhere.

Even if they did, lets just go along with fantasy for a moment, where would they go? what would they do? would anyone even notice?

fucks sake.

just crack on and enjoy hanging out at Westminster and stuff and stop kidding yerself.

 

[articul8]

the handful of lefts that include - for example - people in the leadership of Britain's biggest trade union (for example)? At least a dozen MPs (a dozen more than any putative left group will have the other side of the election). And a fair percentage of the membership given the last NEC election results...

So, whilst it would be wrong to argue that the left is anywhere near running the show, it's not as minimal or marginalised as all that.

 

[J Ed]

I think that one thing that we can be sure of is that Labour will be worse on welfare than the Tories, they have promised that over and over.

 

[SpackleFrog]

the handful of lefts that include - for example - people in the leadership of Britain's biggest trade union (for example)? At least a dozen MPs (a dozen more than any putative left group will have the other side of the election). And a fair percentage of the membership given the last NEC election results...

So, whilst it would be wrong to argue that the left is anywhere near running the show, it's not as minimal or marginalised as all that.

So you reckon there's "at least a dozen MP's" ready to jump ship to a new party? What the fuck are they waiting for then?

 

[chilango]

the handful of lefts that include - for example - people in the leadership of Britain's biggest trade union (for example)? At least a dozen MPs (a dozen more than any putative left group will have the other side of the election). And a fair percentage of the membership given the last NEC election results...

So, whilst it would be wrong to argue that the left is anywhere near running the show, it's not as minimal or marginalised as all that.

You're being pretty generous in how you're defining the Labour Left there aren't you?

 

[articul8]

no - I mean there's at least a dozen MPs who could play a useful role in any future left formation. But to jump now would be consign themselves to almost inevitable defeat.

 

[articul8]

You're being pretty generous in how you're defining the Labour Left there aren't you?

yes

 

[SpackleFrog]

no - I mean there's at least a dozen MPs who could play a useful role in any future left formation. But to jump now would be consign themselves to almost inevitable defeat.

 

[Nigel Irritable]

Send in the imaginary battalions

 

[articul8]

let's stand as many hopeless candidates as we can, to make this the most hopeless attempt to stand against Labour since 1945!

 

[SpackleFrog]

So you reckon there's "at least a dozen MP's" ready to jump ship to a new party? What the fuck are they waiting for then?

I just love the idea that in your mind, John McDonnell et al have been on standby for the last 15 years saying "Steady now...wait for it...not yet, or we'll be defeated."

 

[SpackleFrog]

let's stand as many hopeless candidates as we can, to make this the most hopeless attempt to stand against Labour since 1945!

Lets abando hope and consign ourselves to begging Labour to be merciful.

 

[chilango]

yes

Too generous.

Labour Left is rendered meaningless (for our purposes) under your terms. You may as well talk about the Lib Dem Left.

 

[chilango]

let's stand as many hopeless candidates as we can, to make this the most hopeless attempt to stand against Labour since 1945!

It's more honest at least.

 

[articul8]

It's more honest at least.

desperate is what it is.

 

[Hocus Eye.]

The Charge of the Left Brigade

Onward onward rode the er twelve or so, cannons to the right of them...

 

[articul8]

However, as if to demonstrate that idiocy is not only found outside the party, here comes a very poor sociologist:

Labour is less a "(bourgeois) workers' party" of Leninist providence and more a proletarian party, embracing everyone dependent on selling their labour power for a living - be they the salt-of-the-earth or the nice professional with a nice salary

http://averypublicsociologist.blogspot.co.uk/2014/03/left-unity-and-labour-movement.html?spref=fb

 

[butchersapron]

However, as if to demonstrate that idiocy is not only found outside the party, here comes a very poor sociologist:



http://averypublicsociologist.blogspot.co.uk/2014/03/left-unity-and-labour-movement.html?spref=fb

No, he's spot on: " Labour refracts the sectional interests and differential advantages of its base, which explains why Labourism as a set of ideas is notoriously pragmatic, cautious, and compromised.". His general defence of the labour party is pretty much the same as yours? Do you consider your defence of the same to be 'very poor?

 

[chilango]

desperate is what it is.

Nah.

TUSC is many things. Few of them particularly impressive.

But it is not "desperate".

 

[Coolfonz]

Very little since 1981 in all honesty. NMW and Sure Start were both good ideas (although limited). There's a case that the left's opposition to Iraq war helped prevent them from supporting invasion of Syria.

Crikey old chap that is a bit rich. Not that you would say such a thing of course.

 

[Coolfonz]

Also there is principle sometimes. There are quite a lot more war criminals in Labour than LU afaik.
I mean the bedroom tax is bad enough but Labour taxed Iraqi bedrooms by helping fly a fuckload load of explosives through the window and blowing your kids up. Plus a bit of the old torture, rendition, making shit up...they're fucking sewer dwellers.

Personally I don't see it as taking votes from Labour, or indeed anything to do with Labour, I just see that there is no effective left wing party in the UK. Zip, nowt etc. And so LU or TUSC or MFI, KFC, TLC etc basically anyone else should aim to take votes from the right. That includes Labour. They are a party of the right and that's it. That bit isn't complicated. It's the making a political party that is.