How does the idea of 8+ more years of Conservative rule grab you? What does it mean for the left?

[butchersapron]

I think it's more a question of giving them enough rope - the unions should independently decide a set of demands that each candidate would need to sign upto in order to get their support and cash. They can call the PLP's bluff - and if the MPs effective choose to break the link then it's clear for all to see. Patient is flatlining.

And then what? You repeatedly argue that people have nowhere else to go so a hard faced realism dictates that you must stay and work within labour etc. How does your scenario change a damn thing? You have the exact same situation as now. Nothing has changed at all. Where are the people going once you've brought this blinding insight to them?

(Aside from the fact that a) a huge chunk of labour voters know the parties shit and b) the mental idea that the unions are to the left of the labour party leaders or membership rather than paid up neo-liberals, part of the the bloody leadership)

 

[articul8]

yes, at times you say join labour, at times you say smash labour, at times you say join labour to smash labour, at times you say reject labour to save labour, at times you say reject labour to smash labour.

And sometime you forget which head/face you're supposed to have on.

Unless you want to say something as basic as Labour's always been shite or Labour's always been great there is bound to be more of a complex argument. But I've never argued that Labour is in some sense adequate to the needs of working people - and that it could be saved as it is or was.

 

[butchersapron]

I didn't say that you did - i said that you offer contradictory and mutually exclusive arguments depending on what audience you think that you're talking to.

 

[ViolentPanda]

That's interesting. And then I guess you have policy coming from top down (oxbridge etc) think-tanks rather than from the grassroots.

If the connections were as clear-cut as that life would be easier, however...
...what we have with most think-tanks is much as the Yanks have had for the last three-quarters of a century - a group of nominally-independent private concerns with ideological connections to a particular political party or political POV.
And yes, it truly does mean that policy becomes entirely top-down, because policy is no longer mostly informed by what is necessary for the mass, but by what power wants.

I imagine that the trade union leaders have more power than that if they really wanted to throw it about, despite what you say, but my impression is that the majority are ultimately on board with the direction new labour goes in, despite grumblings made predominantly for the sake of their members. Its all realpolitik, play the game and get what you can 'realism' at that top level.

Factor in the careerism innate to many members of the union and TUC hierarchies. That's what sometimes motivates the seemingly slavish devotion to core NL values. Many of those people see for themselves a natural progression from union baron to MP or peer.

I don't see anything wrong in principle with those who want to work to change the labour party - its no less a fantasy than any other counter political activity, and history tends to show that what seems impossible one minute becomes possible the next as circumstances change - but the structural problems of how the whole thing is set up seem like the biggest obstacle. No easy way around that.

I don't see anything wrong in principle or with the principle, I merely don't see any existing basis on which it could be achieved without "capturing" the majority of the party and re-writing the constitution and the membership articles again.

 

[articul8]

And then what? You repeatedly argue that people have nowhere else to go so a hard faced realism dictates that you must stay and work within labour etc. How does your scenario change a damn thing? You have the exact same situation as now. Nothing has changed at all. Where are the people going once you've brought this blinding insight to them?

It's no blinding insight but it removes for good the idea that the unions are "in their" fighting for us, that it's in some sense "our" party - that they are listened to at the top level. It would confront the unions directly with question "well clearly we don't have a political voice, not even the appearance of one" and therefore re-opens the questions of alternatives in such a way that leaves open the possibility of working with those Labour MPs who did sign up to their agenda and lay the basis for a viable alternative structure. It would bring the big unions onto the same page as PCS etc.

I don't accept that "the unions" have become neoliberal. There is a bureaucratic element - principally the TUC and some of the right-wing leaderships - for whom this is true. But I don't think it can be justly levelled at McCluskey, say, whatever his structural separation from the interests of his members. He's more of a reformist like a Scanlon or Jones.

 

[coley]

I think it's more a question of giving them enough rope - the unions should independently decide a set of demands that each candidate would need to sign upto in order to get their support and cash. They can call the PLP's bluff - and if the MPs effective choose to break the link then it's clear for all to see. Patient is flatlining.

The patient has been dead a long time but now the corpse is beginning to stink, mebbes socialism has had its day?

 

[articul8]

I didn't say that you did - i said that you offer contradictory and mutually exclusive arguments depending on what audience you think that you're talking to.

No - I did change from thinking that it was possible to build an alternative to Labour from outside (Socialist Alliance), to thinking that the circumstances didn't make that possible. That's true - I don't argue today in the same terms I used to. But I don't see where I'm arguing mutually incompatible things, at least unless the question of explusion arose.

 

[coley]

Factor in the careerism innate to many members of the union and TUC hierarchies. That's what sometimes motivates the seemingly slavish devotion to core NL values. Many of those people see for themselves a natural progression from union baron to MP or peer.

And that has been the case for many a year

 

[Random]

My reply is "you're right" - I'm fighting to change Labour.

Now I'm confused. You say you're fighting to change Labour, but you just said before that you recognise that the party cannot be won by your left faction.

Actually, I'm not confused. I can see that you're holding (at least) two mutually contradictory ideas at the same time, because it suits you. The hallmark of the successful party political intellectual. You go to a different excuse depending on the problem, as long as it allows you to stay inside Labour where you're comfy.

 

[Monkeygrinder's Organ]

Factor in the careerism innate to many members of the union and TUC hierarchies. That's what sometimes motivates the seemingly slavish devotion to core NL values. Many of those people see for themselves a natural progression from union baron to MP or peer.

And that has been the case for many a year

How many people have gone from being a union official to Labour MP recently? My impression is that the standard route in now is more or less the same old school tie - oxbridge - party professional route as it is for wannabe Tory MPs.

 

[articul8]

This thread is a case study in the difficulties some people have with dialectical thought. This is the classic argument of entryists in the 20th C - they argue they are fighting to change Labour not because they think Labour is an adequate vehicle to realise a revolution (ha!) and overthrow capitalism, but because they think that it's strategically advantageous.

The contradiction isn't in my head, it's in the historical role and social composition of the Labour party. Elements of the Labour left are both a necessary but insufficient components of a new left formation. It might *change* in the process of what it's becoming.

 

[coley]

How many people have gone from being a union official to Labour MP recently? My impression is that the standard route in now is more or less the same old school tie - oxbridge - party professional route as it is for wannabe Tory MPs.

Lavery from these parts is one, but your right' the traditional route is fast drying up and they are all becoming clones, university, researcher, MP, regardless of 'party'

 

[butchersapron]

It's no blinding insight but it removes for good the idea that the unions are "in their" fighting for us, that it's in some sense "our" party - that they are listened to at the top level. It would confront the unions directly with question "well clearly we don't have a political voice, not even the appearance of one" and therefore re-opens the questions of alternatives in such a way that leaves open the possibility of working with those Labour MPs who did sign up to their agenda and lay the basis for a viable alternative structure. It would bring the big unions onto the same page as PCS etc.

I don't accept that "the unions" have become neoliberal. There is a bureaucratic element - principally the TUC and some of the right-wing leaderships - for whom this is true. But I don't think it can be justly levelled at McCluskey, say, whatever his structural separation from the interests of his members. He's more of a reformist like a Scanlon or Jones.

No it wouldn't. It would leave the same structural reasons for the trade unions role in the labour parties (not the leaderships) historical accommodation with capitalism. This is the politics of exposing what people already know - the idiocy of urging a vote for labour sod that people can see what they're really like - it's a close relation of the image obsessed style of mainstream party leadership, that assumes that people are dopes who need a nice simplified message to rally around rather than recognising that people identify their own issues and come up with their own solutions.

The unions are tied to the continued existence of capital - they don't have to become neo-liberal (and i didn't argue that they did) they simply have to reflect the interests of the currently dominant model of capital organisation within political parties and the w/c. Which is why the idea of a) exposing them via tealling us what we all already know and b) having them lead some challenge to their very foundational structures is as mad a fantasy as the LRCs dream of taking over the labour parties leadership.

 

[articul8]

How many people have gone from being a union official to Labour MP recently? My impression is that the standard route in now is more or less the same old school tie - oxbridge - party professional route as it is for wannabe Tory MPs.

No, union official is a not uncommon route - Rachel Reeves, Jack Dromey, Ian Lavery, John Cryer (sure there's more) all came in at 2010

 

[butchersapron]

This thread is a case study in the difficulties some people have with dialectical thought. This is the classic argument of entryists in the 20th C - they argue they are fighting to change Labour not because they think Labour is an adequate vehicle to realise a revolution (ha!) and overthrow capitalism, but because they think that it's strategically advantageous.

The contradiction isn't in my head, it's in the historical role and social composition of the Labour party. Elements of the Labour left are both a necessary but insufficient components of a new left formation. It might *change* in the process of what it's becoming.

Excellent, he's into the finger wagging. That went well for him last time didn't it?

Neil Kinnock - the 20th centuries great dialectician.

 

[Random]

This is the classic argument of entryists in the 20th C - they argue they are fighting to change Labour not because they think Labour is an adequate vehicle to realise a revolution (ha!) and overthrow capitalism, but because they think that it's strategically advantageous.

So you mean you're lying really, when you say you're trying to change Labour?

 

[butchersapron]

No, union official is a not uncommon route - Rachel Reeves, Jack Dromey, Ian Lavery, John Cryer (sure there's more) all came in at 2010

Oxbridge, business planner and economist for the bank of England - no job beyond this.

 

[butchersapron]

So you mean you're lying really, when you say you're trying to change Labour?

Dialectics comrade, dialectics. Not for the hoi polloi

 

[articul8]

No it wouldn't. It would leave the same structural reasons for the trade unions role in the labour parties (not the leaderships) historical accommodation with capitalism. This is the politics of exposing what people already know - the idiocy of urging a vote for labour sod that people can see what they're really like - it's a close relation of the image obsessed style of mainstream party leadership, that assumes that people are dopes who need a nice simplified message to rally around rather than recognising that people identify their own issues and come up with their own solutions.

there's a difference between what people know intuitively and knowledge that becomes concretely objectified in institutions. Yes people already know "what they're really like" but the very act of asking them a question you already know the answer to is an act with political consequences.

The unions are tied to the continued existence of capital - they don't have to become neo-liberal (and i didn't argue that they did) they simply have to reflect the interests of the currently dominant model of capital organisation within political parties and the w/c. Which is why the idea of a) exposing them via tealling us what we all already know and b) having them lead some challenge to their very foundational structures is as mad a fantasy as the LRCs dream of taking over the labour parties leadership.

agency somehow doesn't exist now in relation to unions? Maybe you could us poor dupes out of our misery and set forward your strategic sense of where the left goes from here?

 

[articul8]

Oxbridge, business planner and economist for the bank of England - no job beyond this.

I thought she said this. Maybe it was Liz Kendall.

 

[butchersapron]

I wonder, when you're tweeting to your 'talented team' of labour MP mates (including the above Reeves) do you mention to them that you're planning to dialectically destroy their party? If you do, how do they respond? Good luck and thanks for all the donkey work?

 

[articul8]

So you mean you're lying really, when you say you're trying to change Labour?

There's a difference between "I am trying to change Labour" and "I am confident that we will take over the Labour party and this is enough".

 

[butchersapron]

there's a difference between what people know intuitively and knowledge that becomes concretely objectified in institutions. Yes people already know "what they're really like" but the very act of asking them a question you already know the answer to is an act with political consequences.

What?

agency somehow doesn't exist now in relation to unions? Maybe you could us poor dupes out of our misery and set forward your strategic sense of where the left goes from here?

You think that unions aren't dependent on the continued existence of capital? This is the ABC of trade unionism - even the unions say this. Misery? I think you're perfectly happy trotting out this shit to your bubble mates and then trying to peddle some form of ultra-leftism on here. Where does the left go? It's gone. And it's gone because of people like you.

 

[articul8]

I wonder, when you're tweeting to your 'talented team' of labour MP mates (including the above Reeves) do you mention to them that you're planning to dialectically destroy their party? If you do, how do they respond? Good luck and thanks for all the donkey work?

it is a broad church

 

[butchersapron]

it is a broad church

No it's not. It's a very restricted church with a limited sense of what views are acceptable. As we can chart in your descent into hackery over the last 5 or so years.

 

[articul8]

You think that unions aren't dependent on the continued existence of capital? This is the ABC of trade unionism - even the unions say this.

I didn't say it wasn't. But dependence isn't the same as "totally predetermined by" - trade unions occupy a contradictory role in society. More dialectics comrade!

Misery? I think you're perfectly happy trotting out this shit to your bubble mates and then trying to peddle some form of ultra-leftism on here. Where does the left go? It's gone. And it's gone because of people like you.

yes yes I'm the evil demonic incarnation of everything that's wrong with the left...

 

[articul8]

No it's not. It's a very restricted church with a limited sense of what views are acceptable. As we can chart in your descent into hackery over the last 5 or so years.

Hackery? To an extent with the AV campaign - I should have got out before that debacle. Nowhere else. It's a lesson I won't be repeating in a hurry.

 

[butchersapron]

I didn't say it wasn't. But dependence isn't the same as "totally predetermined by" - trade unions occupy a contradictory role in society. More dialectics comrade!

In the sense that it limits what options are open for it. That's what is totally predetermined.

Do you only have one argument btw? One of right-wing leaders holding back left-wing members? You've used it on the lib-dems, the labour party, the unions and probably many others. You do seem to struggle with the objective structures of things don't you? Which leads you to a simplistic one more effort and we can change the functioning (and functions) of long established institutions with well embedded interests entwined 100% with the defence of the status quo. All about the people.

Better MPs is the watchword inscribed on this sort of shit banner.

 

[butchersapron]

Hackery? To an extent with the AV campaign - I should have got out before that debacle. Nowhere else. It's a lesson I won't be repeating in a hurry.

You're repeating it right now. And yes, hackery.

Nice to see you sharing the AV responsibility around everyone but yourself btw - what a way to build up trust and mutual solidarity.

 

[butchersapron]

Hackery? To an extent with the AV campaign - I should have got out before that debacle. Nowhere else. It's a lesson I won't be repeating in a hurry.

To what extent? How did your hackery manifest itself?