Kaka Tim
Half Arsed and Slapdash till I Die
They cant have another leadership challenge for another year.
Jeremy Corbyn's time is up
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They cant have another leadership challenge for another year.
frogwoman
No amount of cajolery...
I know a guy in the labour party, a long term member who is voting for smith after having campaigned for corbyn initially, and says that he thought the result is going to be a lot closer than anyone thinks. He also agreed with me that smith has a tendency to say stupid shit but reckons there is such a lack of talent on the front benches that they have to make do with him. 
he says that he likes corbyn's ideas but not him, for various reasons.
I don't like smith at all lol but I find it interesting that he thinks the result could be a lot closer than most people are assuming. then again it might just be wishful thinking on his part
he says that he likes corbyn's ideas but not him, for various reasons.I don't like smith at all lol but I find it interesting that he thinks the result could be a lot closer than most people are assuming. then again it might just be wishful thinking on his part
Raheem
Well-Known Member
It seems pretty clear that this can't happen, at least not simply. Who the official opposition is and who gets the money is based on the most recent GE results, not on the number of MPs each party has at a given time.
Wilf
Slouching towards Billingham
The pollsters have fucked up on, well, pretty much everything over the last few years. That's a world I like.I know a guy in the labour party, a long term member who is voting for smith after having campaigned for corbyn initially, and says that he thought the result is going to be a lot closer than anyone thinks. He also agreed with me that smith has a tendency to say stupid shit but reckons there is such a lack of talent on the front benches that they have to make do with him.
I don't like smith at all lol but I find it interesting that he thinks the result could be a lot closer than most people are assuming. then again it might just be wishful thinking on his part
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Short money isn't key to who owns the party name and assets though. It might make up part of any splitters argument though.
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
This is the bit I don't get. Corbyn can't win in 2020, they say. But surely they must know that Smith can't win in 2020. He'll turn in an election performance of such cringeworthy mediocrity that he'll make Ed Milliband look like a statesman. So they can't be voting for Smith because they want to win the next election.
DotCommunist
So many particulars. So many questions.
how can anyone look at smith and think 'there's a geez, I like his policies and I think he's got the best chance'
slow motion meltdown of the labour party. Who ever thought you'd see the day
slow motion meltdown of the labour party. Who ever thought you'd see the day
Wilf
Slouching towards Billingham
Given the way the pollsters have indeed fucked up and are probably finding it difficult to do effective surveys on Labour's changing electorate, there's almost a reversion to old fashioned ways of reading the runes in this contest. It's a bit like the way they judged who was going to win a general election 100 years ago, on the strength of mass meetings, canvassing and letters to local papers (even if today's 'letters to the editor' are facebook and twitter).I don't like smith at all lol but I find it interesting that he thinks the result could be a lot closer than most people are assuming. then again it might just be wishful thinking on his part
Wilf
Slouching towards Billingham
Yep, they are trapped in an 'anyone but Corbyn/it's my party and I'll cry if I want to' thing and are not making decisions that are either rational or strategic.
brogdale
Coming to terms with late onset Anarchism
Of course they're not; this is pure factional warfare...to the death. They want 'their' party back.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
I think there's a bit too much 'they' going on in this thread recently - and from mason etc - i don't think there is a 'they' anymore.
brogdale
Coming to terms with late onset Anarchism
Do you not think the group-think/'campaigning' from the 172 of the PLP represents the core of 'they'? Are they not acting as an effective, anti-leftist whole?
There was some 'insider' comments at the start of the coup saying there was at least three different factions in the anti-corbyn PLP, and they couldn't agree on anything. I guess the apparent lack of strategy is down to that?
frogwoman
No amount of cajolery...
From what he said it's not only about the election, as also being able to unite the party and work effectively in a team, he cited the thangam debbonaire thing as another example and also was put off by the behaviour of some of the momentum supporters. I have to admit when he told me I was surprised since he was quite a strong Corbyn supporter before. He's a mate although we don't share most of the same views politically and I don't want to repeat my entire conversation with him on here though. He reckons that restricting some of the rules as to who can vote in the contest will also have an impact as to whether corbyn wins or not.
im not really prepared to take the statistics in the polls seriously or what people say on facebook or twitter tbh. he might be talking total bollocks but I also suspect there are going to be some "shy" smith supporters who don't say anything on facebook or anything (and maybe don't use it) but vote for him anyway. I still reckon corbyn will win though.
im not really prepared to take the statistics in the polls seriously or what people say on facebook or twitter tbh. he might be talking total bollocks but I also suspect there are going to be some "shy" smith supporters who don't say anything on facebook or anything (and maybe don't use it) but vote for him anyway. I still reckon corbyn will win though.
frogwoman
No amount of cajolery...
yeh, their not united at all.
DownwardDog
Riding a Brompton with a power meter.
2020 is a lost cause but Smith would at least have the self-awareness to quit afterwards giving them a chance in 2025. I doubt losing 50 or even 100 seats would cause Corbyn to step down voluntarily.
brogdale
Coming to terms with late onset Anarchism
United in one thing, though?
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
My reading is at the start the factions were able to unite under an anti-corbyn FOC - they thought it would be a piece of piss and were happy to then fight it out for the new leader. When that went to pot they fell apart. That, i think is the reason for the silence and lack of apparent strategy. And the reason why (i keep going back to that mason piece i know) people are filling in the gaps with stuff an ideally placed unified opposition would do - if it existed. I think there's a a massive overestimation of the anti-corbyn types and their capabilities. Understandable given their previous hold over the party since the early mid 90s -and their current more pervasive media contacts/presence.
Wilf
Slouching towards Billingham
I think there's certainly a 'they' as defined by anti-Corbynism. There are no doubt a range of ideological positions in there in terms of how they've escaped from the neo-liberalism in power. However another thing that does seem to unite them is their horror about the possibility that Labour might become some vaguely defined activist/grassroots driven party. To be honest I'm far from convinced that a good chunk of the pro-Corbyn forces have actually come round to that position either.
brogdale
Coming to terms with late onset Anarchism
I suspect you may well be right, and that I may be as guilty of 'filling the void' as Mason, but it has to be said that what we are seeing/Mason describes...could have resulted from the simple strategy of unify/truce to kill off Corbyn, then let the old soft left/centrist/right factional battle recommence?
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
That's what's so odd about this - where is that battle? Where is the competing agendas and programs being forwarded by a stable group of recognisbale people. There's just...nothing. Which is why i can't see any 'they' anymore.
lazythursday
Averagely-Known Member
Could it be that the right of the party have actually developed some self-awareness - eg that they are toxic to a large part of the membership and that for the duration of this leadership contest they had best be quiet? Tactically it's probably better for them that Smith does as well as possible, especially if they are going to go for the line that the party has been 'taken over' but the real long standing members don't want Corbyn. Hence the use of has-beens like Brenda Dean to front up new outfits while the likes of Chukka and Tristram keep their heads down for now?
brogdale
Coming to terms with late onset Anarchism
But consistently and exclusively playing the man excuses the 172ists from any requirement for an explicit agenda/programme that might threaten their....nearly said momemtum!
Maybe this is what intra-party, factional conflict looks like in the post-truth, post-democracy age?
Wilf
Slouching towards Billingham
I'm sure you're right and at that level there isn't a 'they'. I didn't watch any of the debates but haven't got any sense of 'new' or 'radical' ideas emerging from the centre/centre right groupings. Again, as you suggest I think the headline reason for that is that they are only united by what they oppose. The other thing is, what could they actually say about policy? That they don't favour rail nationalisation or that want more private sector involvement in the nhs? There's not much along those lines that will help them win either the leadership or a general election. The 'third way' is long gone. The other thing is the right haven't and can't have much to say as to who Labour are appealing to. It isn't in their vocabulary to say working class - and they are not appealing to the working class anyway. What's left to say - 'working people and their families? All been said and done.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
This is what makes this difficult to talk about really - the above sort of starts from the assumption there still is a 'they'. It's unavoidable gap filling. I can't see how they would have gone from the public incompetence of the leadership challenge ball rolling of only last month to a tightly knit and disciplined group following a medium-long term strategy 4 weeks or so later. The mess they made of getting the ball rolling on the leadership challenge suggests to me that this isn't a people capable of that.
DotCommunist
So many particulars. So many questions.
I had considered this but then I thought about private school bluffers and how much they buy their own bullshit and the bullshit of their frenemies. Its possible but I don't think so. Could be wrong
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Yes - there's not much they can say. They can't articulate a different political position because they haven't got one. They haven't got any politics full stop. That's why this is simply a battle for control, for ownership. Which is why i think this 'they're not scared of corbyn, they're scared of you' is so much desperate please let it be true guff. They're scared for their individual jobs.
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