redsquirrel
This Machine Kills Progressives
Of course you apply similar moral judgements to other Labour Party MPs and former leaders - such as Tony Blair who was very happy to cosy up to dictators that boil their enemies alive.
Jeremy Corbyn's time is up
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SpookyFrank
A cheap source of teeth for aquarium gravel
Ooh he fucked with an autocue, that's much worse than inventing ISIS.
SpookyFrank
A cheap source of teeth for aquarium gravel
As for a member of the British army whinging about war crime denial and mentioning Northern Ireland in the same breath, well I don't know what the fuck to do with that.
SpookyFrank
A cheap source of teeth for aquarium gravel
Much easier to just shoot your enemies in the back then get the government to pass a law saying you can't get in trouble for it.
kebabking
Not a Girly Swot, but I like them....
You out got anything on the long term genocide denial, the war crimes denial, the unfortunate lifelong associations, writing a position piece on the Ukrainian war that, iirc, mentioned Russia twice, Putin once, and NATO and the US endlessly?
Or is that just the rough and rumble of politics?
SpookyFrank
A cheap source of teeth for aquarium gravel
Sorry chum, can't hear you over your material and political support for an ongoing genocide.
kebabking
Not a Girly Swot, but I like them....
Yeah, problem is that there's some ambiguity over allies and enemies in Corbyns politics...
See, I don't think Corbyn wants a mutually beneficial/acceptable outcome, he wants one side to win. If he wanted a negotiated settlement, he'd be talking to all sides, finding out where their flexibilities are, what their red lines are, and what their real red lines are - which you'd only get by spending time with them. Would you like to take a guess at how many times - in his 30+ years of *peace seeking * in the South Atlantic - Corbyn has visited the Falklands for example, to find out what the people who live their think?
You could apply the same to unionism/Loyalism in NI, or Israelis - he can't realistically claim to be looking to be urging negotiation when he has absolutely no idea where any kind of flexibility might be because he won't talk to one of the sides of the conflict.
It would be akin to me trying to negotiate with the Met Police on behalf London's young black men despite being a middle aged white bloke from Worcestershire who has only the most fleeting contact with young black kids from London - you would rightly describe me as delusional, egotistical, ignorant, a crank, and probably with some unsavoury opinions under the veneer of 'peacemaking'.
The amusing thing, is that despite being a middle aged white bloke from Worcestershire who has only the most fleeting and, to my shame, the shallowest conversations with young black, working class kids from London, I have greater contact with them than The Great Peacemaker has had with Falkland Islanders, or Zionist Israelis, or Unionist/Loyalists - and I am laughably unqualified to stick my nose in their business.
two sheds
Least noticed poster 2007
I disagree with him (and Chomsky) on involvement with Ukraine, too, but I do take their point that joining in with the US in bombing the shit out of people in the past hasn't led to universally good outcomes, and in this case too risks war between the US and Russia. Allowing Ukraine to use our weapons might still lead to all-out nuclear war with Russia, for example. I think it's worth that risk but I can understand people who don't.
After Theresa May's decision to bomb Syria he said in 2018 that she should have consulted parliament rather than just blindly following Trump. Corbyn wanted to give "OPCW the chance to fully investigate everything, including the debris of the bombing attack, but also ... go back to UN and promote a resolution and work might and main to get Russia and the US together on this so we do get a political process in Syria as well of course the removal of chemical weapons … as was done in 2013 when several hundred tons of chemical weapons were destroyed ... rather than the danger of risking a proxy war between the US and Russia”.
I don’t see him there impugning “the OPCW when it finds against against his friends” as you accuse – indeed he was the one saying they should be given the chance to go in to find evidence, it was rather May and Trump who sidelined the OPCW.
Same with the UN. He said he could “only countenance involvement in Syria with the backing of the UN because we should show the international community that we abide by international law. I’m surprised you seem to disagree with him that we should get UN involvement before bombing countries.
He similarly got a lot of stick for saying that he wanted proof that Putin was responsible for the Salisbury attacks, but that was actually before there was any proof that Putin was responsible. As I recall, when he saw the evidence he did say that Putin was responsible, but I’d have thought that was the right way round to do it myself.
I’ve noticed with right wingers that their criticisms of Chomsky in particular are often along the lines of your criticisms of Corbyn: “Corbyn says …” but when you look at what he actually said it was often nothing like what he was being accused of saying by the Daily Mail, the Telegraph, the tory party and the rest of the people who hate him irrespective of his actual views.
Interesting that in your extensive reply that you don't actually answer my very simple question of whether you agree with him on not invading Iraq, though, kebabking.
After Theresa May's decision to bomb Syria he said in 2018 that she should have consulted parliament rather than just blindly following Trump. Corbyn wanted to give "OPCW the chance to fully investigate everything, including the debris of the bombing attack, but also ... go back to UN and promote a resolution and work might and main to get Russia and the US together on this so we do get a political process in Syria as well of course the removal of chemical weapons … as was done in 2013 when several hundred tons of chemical weapons were destroyed ... rather than the danger of risking a proxy war between the US and Russia”.
I don’t see him there impugning “the OPCW when it finds against against his friends” as you accuse – indeed he was the one saying they should be given the chance to go in to find evidence, it was rather May and Trump who sidelined the OPCW.
Same with the UN. He said he could “only countenance involvement in Syria with the backing of the UN because we should show the international community that we abide by international law. I’m surprised you seem to disagree with him that we should get UN involvement before bombing countries.
He similarly got a lot of stick for saying that he wanted proof that Putin was responsible for the Salisbury attacks, but that was actually before there was any proof that Putin was responsible. As I recall, when he saw the evidence he did say that Putin was responsible, but I’d have thought that was the right way round to do it myself.
I’ve noticed with right wingers that their criticisms of Chomsky in particular are often along the lines of your criticisms of Corbyn: “Corbyn says …” but when you look at what he actually said it was often nothing like what he was being accused of saying by the Daily Mail, the Telegraph, the tory party and the rest of the people who hate him irrespective of his actual views.
Interesting that in your extensive reply that you don't actually answer my very simple question of whether you agree with him on not invading Iraq, though, kebabking.
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
It's a projection based on demographics, not a poll taken from the constituency. It's worthless in this specific instance. IPSOS themselves admit as much.
The39thStep
Urban critical thinker
Would you like to take a guess at how many times a UK Foreign Secretary has visited the Falklands in the last 30 years? Once , Cameron was there in February , on his way to a G20 summit in Brazil, the first to do so since Douglas Hurd in 1994.
Which means that you've had greater contact with them than The Great Pig Fucker.
two sheds
Least noticed poster 2007
And the views of the Falkland Islanders aren't actually unreported in the UK. There was a great deal of sympathetic coverage of them as I recall in the UK press, whereas the views of the Argentinians got somewhat less sympathetic coverage so if you're going to try to defuse the situation by negotiation then it makes sense to know what they actually are.
So not quite the same as negotiating with the Met about young black kids in London. And I'd actually imagine Corbyn has had quite a bit of involvement with young black kids in London - possibly even more than you have kebabking - is fairly well aware of their problems, and would have a better idea of how to solve them than the government or most of the rest of the Labour party,
So not quite the same as negotiating with the Met about young black kids in London. And I'd actually imagine Corbyn has had quite a bit of involvement with young black kids in London - possibly even more than you have kebabking - is fairly well aware of their problems, and would have a better idea of how to solve them than the government or most of the rest of the Labour party,
kebabking
Not a Girly Swot, but I like them....
Because I don't think he was 'right' - simply because his position was never based on a careful consideration of knowns, unknowns, risks, potential benefits, known and potential costs, and then eventually coming down on one side or another based on years of learning and experience.
It was a simple gut reaction.
It's very much like equivalencing the opinion of a qualified dietician on the risks and benefits of a keto diet (whatever the fuck that is) and a toddler who throws vegetables off their plate and onto the floor in a tantrum.
They might give you the same answer, but for very different reasons.
There were lots of very switched on people with great experience and knowledge of Iraq who thought it was a catastrophically bad idea because their knowledge, and the reasonable supposition based on that knowledge and experience told them it was a bad idea - particularly given the abject lack of interest in the White House about What Happens Next - but Corbyn was never one of those people. He'd got a placard, and that was the end of his thought process.
Rob Ray
Weight is meaningless
I think this fundamentally misunderstands who Corbyn is. You seem to think of him as Anyone But Britain, a left position which does have some adherents in the anti-imperialist scene, but he's not one of them. He's a peacenik, lifelong, and while I think some of his positions are naive he seems to hold them honestly (certainly incredibly consistently). In that tradition talking to all sides, and yes sometimes calling them friend (I fucking hate this playground shit, same bollocks as having to qualify every sentence about Palestine with a mention of October 7) is core practice with the hope of coming to an agreement. I certainly think he has sympathies for the underdog in these conflicts which show up sometimes, but his logic is that peace benefits everyone.
And the trouble with looking on him as having sinister ulterior motives is you saw him in power as leader of the Labour Party, so you saw how utterly shit at being underhanded he is. It was in fact his biggest weakness, because people who actually are lying fucks destroyed him.
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nino_savatte
No pasaran!
In other words, 'feelings'. The emphasis on personalities and 'feelings' is what leads to the shitty, directionless politics we've had for nearly 30 years.
Silas Loom
Advanced. Forthright. Signifficant.
He compensated for this quite effectively when Labour leader by surrounding himself with sinister devious moral vacuums like Seumas Milne, Andrew Fisher and Karie Murphy, though.
Rob Ray
Weight is meaningless
If you view the outcome of the 2015-19 period as an example of effective underhanded behaviour by the Corbyn left I hate to think what you reckon ineffective underhanded behaviour would look like.
two sheds
Least noticed poster 2007
So he was wrong to oppose the invasion of Iraq even though he wasn't wrong. Yes, I see.
I would have thought that the wrongness of bombing the shit out of civilians in a country to kill a million people and displace nearly two million more largely based on a US PR company campaign (later itself discovered to be full of falsehoods) and Blair lying to parliament about Iraq's WMD capabilities was fairly fucking obvious - after even the slightest careful consideration of knowns, unknowns, risks, potential benefits, known and potential costs.
You still don't say whether you agreed with the invasion yourself though. Perhaps you did at the time.
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
Could you post something to substantiate the shallow nature of corbyn's thinking on the invasion of iraq or is this as I suspect a lie of blairite proportions?
E2a so it's not enough iyo to be right, you must be right for the right reasons. Desperate stuff, kk
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ska invita
back on the other side
The thing with unprovoked illegal invasions is you have to consider the potential benefits...riiiight ...spoken like the war criminal you are
Serge Forward
Just enjoyin' my coffee.
It was in the papers so it must be true!
Anyone with the slightest awareness of history and of the 2003 Al Qaeda situation was baffled by the decision to invade Iraq. Including me. (My enemy's enemy is my friend and all that.) In 1941, after the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union, Churchill declared that the UK's policy would be to support the Soviets, and to the extent we were able, we made good on that. We rightly reversed our previous geopolitical posture towards the Soviets.
Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. So the decision to invade was inexplicable.
I am sure Corbyn supported that position, because he is a principled pacifist and we can see he made sure to place himself close to Robin Cook when he made his famous resignation speech.
But when we search for Corbyn interventions in the House of Commons on the subject of Iraq in the 2 year period of 2002 to 2003, (using key search words "Iraq" "war" "invasion" and "United Nations") we get a big fat blank.
Compare and contrast with Michael Foot during the Falklands conflict. Face it, Corbyn is not a Parliamentarian in anything like the same mould as Foot, or Benn or Bevan. He is first and last a very good constituency MP. Which is commendable, but it's a mystery how he ever thought he could be an effective party leader, who would need to command the respect of the Parliamentary Labour Party, from whom would need to come the members of an effective Opposition or future Labour government.
Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. So the decision to invade was inexplicable.
I am sure Corbyn supported that position, because he is a principled pacifist and we can see he made sure to place himself close to Robin Cook when he made his famous resignation speech.
But when we search for Corbyn interventions in the House of Commons on the subject of Iraq in the 2 year period of 2002 to 2003, (using key search words "Iraq" "war" "invasion" and "United Nations") we get a big fat blank.
Compare and contrast with Michael Foot during the Falklands conflict. Face it, Corbyn is not a Parliamentarian in anything like the same mould as Foot, or Benn or Bevan. He is first and last a very good constituency MP. Which is commendable, but it's a mystery how he ever thought he could be an effective party leader, who would need to command the respect of the Parliamentary Labour Party, from whom would need to come the members of an effective Opposition or future Labour government.
This is a fair point, but the same accusation could surely be made of any foreign policy. Tony Blair clearly knew fuck all about Iraq and made a point of ignoring advice from people who did. I also doubt he had anything but the most superficial knowledge of Kosovo, Bosnia and Serbia, Afghanistan or Sierra Leone.
It is also definitely true that ignorance of Northern Ireland among Westminster (which continues to this day) contributed to the escalation of violence there, especially after the Falls Curfew of 1970, without which the violence would probably have fizzled out within a couple of years.
Whagwan
.
But isn't it well documented that Corbyn only put his hat in the ring in 2015 as it was "his turn" to do so from the Campaign group and nobody expected him to win at that point.
When he won, his commitment to democracy meant he had to follow through...
bellaozzydog
rolling turds in glitter
What a pile of wiffle
bellaozzydog
rolling turds in glitter
freshapple
Active Member
They don’t say that on their website
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JimW
支那暗杀团
That's a novel way of sharing content available online!
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