Did you vote for Starmer?

[Smokeandsteam]

Take on the tories.

The task is to win back Scotland from the SNP. Shore up Labour support in the cities. Win back working class voters in the Midlands, Wales and the North, retain the young people who have gravitated to it AND to “take on the Tories”. I ask again how will this group do that in your opinion

 

[kebabking]

Healy - new Shadow Defence Secretary - is an old government hand at least, so while he's never (to my knowledge) made any comments on defence or wider foreign policy matters, at least he has some understanding of what the job is and how it might be done.

Nandy shadowing FCO should at least be interesting: she's a thinker and can communicate those ideas, and is no adherent of the ancient regime's ODP fuckwittery.

Never heard of most of them....

 

[fakeplasticgirl]

The task is to win back Scotland from the SNP. Shore up Labour support in the cities. Win back working class voters in the Midlands, Wales and the North, retain the young people who have gravitated to it AND to “take on the Tories”. I ask again how will this group do that in your opinion

SNP is a difficult one. Sturgeon is basically soft left Labour with added nationalism. Plus, even if Scottish people want to vote Labour, if it’s snp v tories they’ll have to vote tactically, so not sure about that.

I see no reason why a competent shadow cabinet not sunk by antisemitism or corbyn’s perceived “anti-western” views, putting forward progressive policies wouldn’t necessarily appeal to the working class & young alike though. Corbyn sure as hell did not appeal to the working class! After 5 years of Johnson, people might want “boring” starmer.

 

[YouSir]

Healy - new Shadow Defence Secretary - is an old government hand at least, so while he's never (to my knowledge) made any comments on defence or wider foreign policy matters, at least he has some understanding of what the job is and how it might be done.

Nandy shadowing FCO should at least be interesting: she's a thinker and can communicate those ideas, and is no adherent of the ancient regime's ODP fuckwittery.

Never heard of most of them....

 

[Mr Moose]

Fuck me, what an awful line up:

Keir Starmer, Leader of the Opposition

· Angela Rayner, Deputy Leader and Chair of the Labour Party

· Anneliese Dodds, Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer

· Lisa Nandy, Shadow Foreign Secretary

· Nick Thomas-Symonds, Shadow Home Secretary

· Rachel Reeves, Shadow Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster

· David Lammy, Shadow Justice Secretary

· John Healey, Shadow Defence Secretary

· Ed Miliband, Shadow Business, Energy and Industrial Secretary

· Emily Thornberry, Shadow International Trade Secretary

· Jonathan Reynolds, Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary

· Jonathan Ashworth, Shadow Secretary of State for Health and Social Care

· Rebecca Long-Bailey, Shadow Education Secretary

· Jo Stevens, Shadow Digital, Culture, Media and Sport

· Bridget Philipson, Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury

· Luke Pollard, Shadow Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Secretary

· Steve Reed, Shadow Communities and Local Government Secretary

· Thangam Debbonaire, Shadow Housing Secretary

· Jim McMahon, Shadow Transport Secretary

· Preet Kaur Gill, Shadow International Development Secretary

· Louise Haigh, Shadow Northern Ireland Secretary (interim)

· Ian Murray, Shadow Scotland Secretary

· Nia Griffith, Shadow Wales Secretary

· Marsha de Cordova, Shadow Women and Equalities Secretary

· Andy McDonald, Shadow Employment Rights and Protections Secretary

· Rosena Allin-Khan, Shadow Minister for Mental Health

· Cat Smith, Shadow Minister for Young People and Voter Engagement

· Lord Falconer, Shadow Attorney General

· Valerie Vaz, Shadow Leader of the House

· Nick Brown, Opposition Chief Whip

· Baroness Smith, Shadow Leader of the Lords

· Lord McAvoy, Lords’ Opposition Chief Whip

Maybe, but remind us of those great minds that missed the cut.

Slightly surprised nothing for Clive Lewis or Yvette Cooper given their prominence. And I thought Hilary Benn would re-emerge also.

RLB’s position an important gesture towards unity.

 

[Smokeandsteam]

SNP is a difficult one. Sturgeon is basically soft left Labour with added nationalism. Plus, even if Scottish people want to vote Labour, if it’s snp v tories they’ll have to vote tactically, so not sure about that.

I see no reason why a competent shadow cabinet not sunk by antisemitism or corbyn’s perceived “anti-western” views, putting forward progressive policies wouldn’t necessarily appeal to the working class & young alike though. Corbyn sure as hell did not appeal to the working class! After 5 years of Johnson, people might want “boring” starmer.

In summary then you are predicting a resurgence of popular support for a politics based on the effective management of the existing system?

What is it that you think will bring citizens back to a position of trusting the system and seeking an effective manager of it?

 

[Smokeandsteam]

RLB’s position an important gesture towards unity.

Yes, everyone looking at the appointments can see the attempt at unity Sir Haircut has attempted here

 

[kebabking]

Cooper is already a big, powerful beast with sharp teeth by dint of being chair of the Home Affairs Select Committee - leaving her there (she may of course have refused an appointment) gives labour two bites at the the Home Office. The new Shadow HS (who's name I've forgotten already...) may turn out to be crap, or brilliant - though it's hard to imagine anyone struggling against Patel.

 

[Smokeandsteam]

Paul Mason thinks Starmer’s Shadow Cabinet is to the left of the 1945 Labour Government:

 

[fakeplasticgirl]

Yes, everyone looking at the appointments can see the attempt at unity Sir Haircut has attempted here

Almost everyone is from the soft left. Might be wrong but I think there’s one blairite and one corbynite?

I think you just irrationally loathe starmer...

 

[Mr Moose]

Yes, everyone looking at the appointments can see the attempt at unity Sir Haircut has attempted here

We’re talking a bone here. But there are actually a few who did serve on the ill-fated HMS Corbo.

 

[Anju]

I have no idea who most of the new shadow cabinet are or their politics but I will be voting labour solely to be able to see the name Thangam Debbonaire on TV as much as possible.

 

[The39thStep]

Thers quite a few Greater Manchester MPs in that shadow cabinet

 

[fakeplasticgirl]

We’re talking a bone here. But there are actually a few who did serve on the ill-fated HMS Corbo.

Unity doesn’t just mean appointing corbynites. Seems v soft left to me.

 

[Smokeandsteam]

Almost everyone is from the soft left. Might be wrong but I think there’s one blairite and one corbynite?

I think you just irrationally loathe starmer...

The (really very badly) wrong line from the corbynite left is that this is a soft left Shadow Cabinet that ‘will work with’ the left.

It won’t. And more than this, the idea that drives that wrong headed analysis - which is rooted in a carefully constructed myth about a return to grown up politics’ offering an imagined new juncture at some point in the future where the managerial soft left blends radical commitment and mass appeal is a complete mirage.

The reality is that this type of process just keeps moving away until you have lost any sense of where it was supposed to be going in the first place.

 

[belboid]

Almost everyone is from the soft left. Might be wrong but I think there’s one blairite and one corbynite?

I think you just irrationally loathe starmer...

They're really not. Reeves is the Blairite you refer to? Pollard, Debonnaire, Murray, Allin-Kahn are all soft-right. The 'Blairite' label is just for those with frozen thinking, but these people are not in on the centre-left of the party.

 

[belboid]

The (really very badly) wrong line from the corbynite left is that this is a soft left Shadow Cabinet that ‘will work with’ the left.

really? Funnily enough, I haven't seen anyone apart from Mason arguing that. Everyone else is talking about when/how to leave.

 

[William of Walworth]

Never heard of most of them....

Embarassingly, that goes for me as well
Or if some names are vaguely familiar, I'd have to research to find out anything much beyond their names. I'll have to do that when I need to.

And I thought I followed politics

 

[fakeplasticgirl]

They're really not. Reeves is the Blairite you refer to? Pollard, Debonnaire, Murray, Allin-Kahn are all soft-right. The 'Blairite' label is just for those with frozen thinking, but these people are not in on the centre-left of the party.

Soft right? As in actually right wing? Or do you mean to the right of the PLP?

 

[Smokeandsteam]

really? Funnily enough, I haven't seen anyone apart from Mason arguing that. Everyone else is talking about when/how to leave.

 

[William of Walworth]

The only name I'm actively glad about is Ed Miliband, but I'm not sure (with 'Energy' in his job title) how climate change responsibilities (specifically) would divide between Miliband and Luke Pollard, who I know fuck all about

 

[Smokeandsteam]

 

[belboid]

Soft right? As in actually right wing? Or do you mean to the right of the PLP?

in terms of the Labour Party. Tho in Reeves' case, in terms of humanity.

 

[belboid]

bejesus. Ellie Mae-Hagan wasn't someone to take very seriously, but christ thats laughable immediate capitulation.

 

[redsquirrel]

I get that impression too. The same people who are always finger wagging at me on here for my contempt for Trump/Le Pen/Boris/Farage supporters tend to be the very same people who denounce, in the strongest terms, anybody who supports soft-left or centrist candidates or movements. It's an interesting mindset to say the least.

Mate a few weeks ago you were railing against liberals, last week you were insisting that the LP was the only route to socialism now it's not fair for people to criticise the soft-left/liberals. I know much of it is comic exaggeration but do try to maintain at least some consistency/logic.

 

[Mr Moose]

Unity doesn’t just mean appointing corbynites. Seems v soft left to me.

Yes, but we knew he was going to appoint soft left and so called ‘moderates’. Any unity on offer needed to be towards the left, which is a pretty sizeable constituency in the Labour Party.

 

[redsquirrel]

They believe, not unreasonably, that there will never be a Labour government of the type redsquirrel et al want. Many others don't want that party anyway and feel that a soft or centre left party is more aligned with them or simply the only way to get the Tories out. Squirrel can shout them down as 'non-socialists', Liberals, Tories, cunts, or whatever but at the end of the day those are just different terms for 'not what I want'.

Bit of an aside but there cannot be a LP "I want" because the LP I would want would not be a LP anymore it would be a totally different beast, and 'm perfectly aware that my politics are not shared by many other people.

But the second part (that these are just different terms for 'not what I want') is nonsense isn't it. If socialism (or any other political ideology) is going to mean anything it has to mean subscribing, via ones actions, to a set of principles that distinguish socialism from other political ideologies. This is not some sort of insistence on ideological purity it's a simple acknowledgement that that there are different political ideologies, and that our actions are key to our place us within those political ideologies.

Lets take the example of Polly Toynbee, who declares herself a socialist, despite this she was at one time an active member of a party that was opposed to the LP, then she supported a LP that backed austerity and attacking workers and she recently actively worked against a move in the LP for move to the left and opposition to austerity. Now lets compare her against Tolly Poynbee, who was also a member of the SPD, who also worked to get Copper and Smith elected, who opposed Corbyn, who in short took exactly the same actions as Polly Toynbee but declares herself a liberal. Are we going to say the Polly is a socialist and Tolly a liberal simply because in their heart of hearts they consider themselves as such, nevermind that their actions are identical?

Do you remember Shevak, the Lib Dem who insisted that they were some type of anarchist? Are we to conclude that they were an anarchist because they felt agreement with anarchist ideals in some way (despite their actions being utterly inconsistent with such principles)? Is there as much validity in the argument that Blair was a socialist as that he was a neo-liberal? If someone is a member of the Conservatives or LibDems but only because they think this is the best way to support socialism are we to take them seriously. Such positions would be absurd.

If someone is going to argue and actively take measures to push the LP to the right, to take up positions that accord more with liberalism than socialism then it is not ideologically purity to point out that they are, to a greater or lesser extent, a liberal.

-----

With respect to the more important issue of engaging with comrades in the LP.
There are people in the LP I absolutely recognise and am proud to call comrades, I don't agree with the decision they've made politically, strategically or tactically but I can understand their viewpoint that the LP is the best way to advance class warfare while not agreeing with it. But that certainly does not apply to all in the LP, there are a fucking ton of shits in the LP that I don't consider my comrades.There's a lot of talk about Tory austerity but the LP signed up for attacking workers under the banner of austerity. Are attacks on workers less bad if the person doing them wears red rather than blue, bollocks they are. I don't consider my comrades those that are currently attacking library/museum workers in Bradford, I don't consider those that support scabbing comrades, I don't consider those that smeared the IWCA as comrades. I might understand their political decisions, I may even forgive them, but when it counted they put themselves on the wrong side of the line. They picked Labour over labour.

 

[treelover]

I was going to vote for nandy, but found her too pro open borders, then i was definitely voting for rosena, but got dates mixed up and missed the date, some ok people in shoadow cabainet though.

 

[treelover]

Thers quite a few Greater Manchester MPs in that shadow cabinet

suprised Lucy Powell never got anything.

 

[treelover]

And why does any revolutionary socialist give a flying fuck for who is leader of the Labour party? Did you all expect RLB to deliver socialism on a plate? No you didn't.

I learned there was a thing called a disillusioned socialist when I was about 18. Doesn't mean I have to follow their path or agree with them. But I certainly understand why that's 'a thing'. Writing them off as liberal pricks or 'toddlers' serves no purpose whatsoever.

Yes, call them on their choices by all means. But that's far divorced from the language being used here. And not supporting the Miners in the midst and battles of that era is far from a poxy vote for a right wing candidate in a party we have no interest in, no?

I think its because so many of them were exposed to the SWP at college, apparently when it now seems i was seen as one of them when i was NUS, yet never have been.