Jeremy Corbyn's time is up

[Wilf]

“I’m just as radical as Jeremy,” he said. “I’ve got wider life experience than Jeremy has, to fuel my radicalism. It helps having worked in the private sector. It helps having lived in Surrey, in order to see the massive gap that exists between the life experiences,

Absolute arsehole, mebbes if he had lived in Ashington or Blyth ( two very deprived areas around here) he might have had a whiff of credibility, but to claim a knowledge of hardship from living in the leafy Surrey suburbs! He is totally representative of everything those voting for Corbyn hate and resent.
Putting this shytehawk up as Corbyns opponent could really be the move that destroys the tattered remains of the PLP, or I can hope.

Let’s get the terms right – I was never a lobbyist. I was head of policy at Pfizer, then director of health economics and corporate affairs at Amgen

In some future People's Tribunal, he'd better not choose to defend himself, or he'll be up against the wall as quick as you can say Nye Bevan.

 

[Guineveretoo]

Lots of detail on past and previous labour leadership contests, for anyone who wants to geek-o-splurge on it:
http://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN03938/SN03938.pdf

That's a surprisingly badly written document for a HoC library briefing!

 

[Wilf]

That's a surprisingly badly written document for a HoC library briefing!

Even worse, I just thought I'd spotted a very odd umlaut placed over the word Labour - then realised it was a fly on the screen.

 

[8ball]

Labour could do with an umlaut.

 

[ItWillNeverWork]

Regardless of whether Corbyn is shit or not, the PLP cannot be allowed to win after the nonsense they have pulled. That right there is one of the reasons his approval rating has been going up since they tried to stab him in the back. It's an anti-Blairite thing as much as it is a pro-Corbyn one.

 

[coley]

Owen's 'furious':
Owen Smith 'furious' at Corbyn's performance against Theresa May

"He said he would like to see Corbyn become Labour “president” – in charge of the party in the country, not in parliament"

I bet he would,the arrogant prick,
Corbyns answer to that should have been along the lines of "thank you for the offer, should the membership choose to support me, then I would like to offer you,an yer marras, a few years on the dole"

 

[YouSir]

"He said he would like to see Corbyn become Labour “president” – in charge of the party in the country, not in parliament"

I bet he would,the arrogant prick,
Corbyns answer to that should have been along the lines of "thank you for the offer, should the membership choose to support me, then I would like to offer you,an yer marras, a few years on the dole"

On a giant fucking spike more like.

 

[Kaka Tim]

Owen is such a terrible choice of candidate to put against corbyn that you almost wonder if the PLP did it on purpose. A blow in with zero background in any campaigning who glided into a safe seat having worked as a fucking lobbyist for a drugs company. He's represents everything about nu-labour and its empty-suited, mealy mouthed debasement of politics that was overwhelmingly rejected at the last leadership election.

He is a worse candidate by far than any of the beige trio of Cooper, Kendal and Burnham. His desperate bullshitting about being some sort of leftwinger only makes it worse.
I hope someone challenges him to provide any evidence of any sort of campaigning work he done in the past - I bet the cunt cant even produce a single signature on a petition, let alone an example of him addressing a demo. Yeah Owen - you were deeply opposed to the iraq war - like fuck you were.

He is going to get flattened in the leadership election (in no small part as a reaction to the gerrymandering and assorted anti-membership antics of the PLP) - and corbyn will be doing his tour of packed out rallies again, his often obscured message re-broadcast. He may well end having an even bigger mandate than last time. A new NEC will have a more corbynite slant, the party will have huge number of new members who will be overwhelmingly pro-corbyn - and have full coffers.

The anti-corbyn faction have proved themselves to so fucking useless that their actions have made Corbyns position far stronger than if they'd have just carried on muttering and moaning under their breath.

 

[coley]

Regardless of whether Corbyn is shit or not, the PLP cannot be allowed to win after the nonsense they have pulled. That right there is one of the reasons his approval rating has been going up since they tried to stab him in the back. It's an anti-Blairite thing as much as it is a pro-Corbyn one.

Very true, and though I have me doubts as to whether JC is electable,he is laying the ground, hopefully, for a new class of labour politicians who will actually listen to their constituents.
JCs task is in the cleaning of the PLP Augean stables, 30 years plus of Shyte needs a lot of shifting.

 

[jakethesnake]

"He said he would like to see Corbyn become Labour “president” – in charge of the party in the country, not in parliamen"

They just don't see it... Corbyn isn't a personality cult, we're in it for the democracy lol

 

[coley]

What's amazed me, and I hold me hands up, I have,like many others of my generation 'tuned out' as far as politics goes over the last thirty years.
But the realisation,that most of the PLP are just Tories that couldn't make the grade in Tory heartlands and had to pretend to be pro WC to use the voters in these areas to propel them onto the political gravy train.
Does anyone know of a site where there is an honest unbiased record of members of the PLP, their backgrounds, their beliefs and voting records?

 

[free spirit]

voting records?

Theyworkforyou.com

 

[coley]

Theyworkforyou.com

Used it before, bit " bare bones"

 

[Bernie Gunther]

They just don't see it... Corbyn isn't a personality cult, we're in it for the democracy lol

I think there's a bit of a danger of it becoming 'about Corbyn' while struggling with people for whom sellability of a charismatic front-person is all-important.

 

[Ole]

Tom Watson's Ill-founded Attempt to Divide Our Union Will Fall Flat on Its Face

McCluskey:

He underestimates the unity, strength and determination of Unite - which was so evident at our Policy Conference last week - qualities which cannot be undone by anyone. If we support Jeremy Corbyn it is because this decent and progressive man has secured the overwhelming backing of our democratic structures, which Tom Watson was once proud to associate himself with.

Tom also invents a fictitious £250,000 which Unite is supposed to be donating to Jeremy Corbyn’s campaign. Nothing like that sum has been agreed by the union, nor even requested. It is a made-up figure bearing no relationship to reality.

Yet Tom alleges that Unite members would be disturbed by such a phantom donation. He had no such scruples about verifying the members’ views when this union gave him £70,000 for his deputy leadership election campaign last year. Nor when we donated £50,000 to fund his personal tour of key constituencies before the last General Election.

And only last year he sought half a million pounds of our members’ money to launch an online news journal. We could not support that project, but it was not for want of Tom trying to float his ambitious plans on a sea of Unite money.

Indeed, Tom was more than keen on Unite members’ money in the days before he fell for the charms of Max Mosley’s support. His complaints now are hypocritical, as well as ill-founded, and his attempt to divide our union will fall flat on its face.
​

£500k for a poxy centrist online news journal. What a waste of skin he is.

 

[Sprocket.]

Owen's 'furious':
Owen Smith 'furious' at Corbyn's performance against Theresa May

Was Smith hoping that Corbyn would start by lobbing a few bricks at the Tory front bench.
(I would to be honest!)

ETA: I mean I would be the MP representing Lobber of Bricks constituents!

 

[chilango]

Owen's 'furious':
Owen Smith 'furious' at Corbyn's performance against Theresa May

Who gives a fuck about the "dispatch box"? if Corbyn isn't playing the stupid PMQ game beloved of the bubble then that's a plus for me.

 

[Guineveretoo]

Who gives a fuck about the "dispatch box"? if Corbyn isn't playing the stupid PMQ game beloved of the bubble then that's a plus for me.

Except that the Great British Public get to see him being bested by Theresa May.

 

[chilango]

Except that the Great British Public get to see him being bested by Theresa May.

Do they? Who watches PMQs anyway?

Its just part of conning us into thinking politics is just a spectator sport.

 

[Gromit]

183,000 people registered at £25 each to vote.

That's £4.5mill.

Apparently the decision to allow the leader to stand in the election challenge to his leadership is being taken to the high court. How much of Labour's membership money is being wasted on that I wonder?

 

[redsquirrel]

Do they? Who watches PMQs anyway?

Its just part of conning us into thinking politics is just a spectator sport.

Yes, the idea that PMQs is something important to people outside the Westminster bubble is ludicrous.

 

[chilango]

Yes, the idea that PMQs is something important to people outside the Westminster bubble is ludicrous.

It only matters if we keep believing them telling us that it matters.

 

[billy_bob]

Who gives a fuck about the "dispatch box"? if Corbyn isn't playing the stupid PMQ game beloved of the bubble then that's a plus for me.

FWIW I thought Ed Miliband was, at least some of the time, pretty good at PMQs. Didn't ultimately make any difference because Labour wasn't genuinely opposed to any of the bad things the coalition were doing - only promising to round off their sharpest edges. So 'who gives a fuck' is right if there's nothing of substance behind it.

In contrast, Corbyn is not often great at the dispatch box, but I thought his tactic when being jeered by May as 'unscrupulous' (still find that a bizarre choice of all the possible lines of attack against him) -- of looking down, reading his notes and looking like he had his mind on more important things -- was as good as any.

I think when he says he wants a different, more civil kind of politics he really does mean it (he's having trouble getting McDonnell on board with that, but that's another story) and if that's the case then a kind of disdainful indifference is probably the best response in these situations. The PM might 'win' a few bouts, but a Tory who thinks they're winning is a particularly unappealing one - boorish, smug and high-handed. And too much of that might be a good way for May to chip away at one of the few things in her favour -- that she seems like a more grown-up, serious politician than her predecessor and any of the people she beat to the top job.

 

[andysays]

183,000 people registered at £25 each to vote.

That's £4.5mill.

Apparently the decision to allow the leader to stand in the election challenge to his leadership is being taken to the high court. How much of Labour's membership money is being wasted on that I wonder?

None of it (see upthread for more details of the challenge)

I wonder how much of the total will be used to check the backgrounds of those registering and other spurious "administrative" measures. I suspect the eventual net income to the LP will be significantly less than £4.5 million...

 

[billy_bob]

Except that the Great British Public get to see him being bested by Theresa May.

Even if Corbyn wiped the floor with her, the media's agenda is such that it just wouldn't be shown anyway, or would be framed in some other unhelpful way -- so it's just the same media-bias problem taht Corbyn and co have whether he's good at PMQ or not.

 

[Sprocket.]

Yes, the idea that PMQs is something important to people outside the Westminster bubble is ludicrous.

As someone pointed out on 5live following Cameron's last performance that out of the four thousand plus questions asked of him he answered one.
The rest were prepared statements and poor humour.
The listener suggested renaming it
Prime ministers statements and remove the questions that are mostly asked by the governments own backbencher's cloying for attention.

 

[two sheds]

Don't think they would be interested, I think they may have more pressing concerns than the moans of a disgruntled would be Corbyn supporter
Then again, the disgruntled factor may bite them in the arse.

I meant more inform them that you were unable to register without saying you're supporting Corbyn. Having such a short registration period was clearly aimed at limiting the number, and I've heard of a few people saying the site kept timing out. The more people who let them know they couldn't vote, the more ludicrous they look.

They may also let you register because you tried within the deadline.

 

[Flanflinger]

As someone pointed out on 5live following Cameron's last performance that out of the four thousand plus questions asked of him he answered one.
The rest were prepared statements and poor humour.
The listener suggested renaming it
Prime ministers statements and remove the questions that are mostly asked by the governments own backbencher's cloying for attention.

Turn it into a pub style quiz. Winner gets to run the country.

 

[nino_savatte]

Except that the Great British Public get to see him being bested by Theresa May.

Hilarious.

 

[two sheds]

Even if Corbyn wiped the floor with her, the media's agenda is such that it just wouldn't be shown anyway, or would be framed in some other unhelpful way -- so it's just the same media-bias problem taht Corbyn and co have whether he's good at PMQ or not.

He didn't preface his question with "Simon says ..."