I remember this as well. It was quickly followed up with, "He'll be a lot more radical in his second term."
John Major: let's keep the Coalition after the next election
- Thread starter goebfwai
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I remember this as well. It was quickly followed up with, "He'll be a lot more radical in his second term."
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
There was a fair bit of media (mis)representation going on in 96/97 that Blair was really a socialist, honest, but I'm not sure it got much traction out in the constituencies (although it did in many constituency parties).
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
Indeed he was. His self-satisfied asides had my wife and I choking on our tea and toast.
Like I said, I heard it most from LP members and ex-members. The type of people who think the main thing is to get elected, as if the Tories and not the system in itself are the main problem.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
Followed, as inevitably as night follows day, with "Brown will take the party leftwards again, once he takes over from Blair".
Thought I hadn't just imagined it. As if New Labour hadn't bent over backwards to spell out that nothing would change and that the 'Thatcherite reforms' were irreversible.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
I was an ex member of many years standing by then, and I frankly couldn't believe some of the wishful thinking I heard, and this after everything that had been done to neuter the party of control over policy, or of anything that didn't align the party with market interests.
Of course, even now people who have seen that the problem isn't "just getting elected", still cling to the idea that a Labour govt would do things differently from the last shower, even though E. Miliband has nailed his colours to the neo-liberal mast.
I remember an NME front page around 1998 with a picture of Blair on the cover and the headline, "Ever get the feeling you've been cheated?" I remember thinking, er, no, I've been reading the papers for the last few years.
Followed, as inevitably as night follows day, with "Brown will take the party leftwards again, once he takes over from Blair".
Not all of these Labour activists were so gullible. In 2010 some of them ended up stuffing envelopes for Nick Clegg.
Blair came to power promsing to stick to Tory spending limits for 2 years. He didd not come to power promising large scale reforms. In contrast to Old Labour who made loads of promises they never kept,New Labour did more than was expected in terms of social justice. eg Minimum income guarantee, tax credits,minimum wage,EMA, doubling spending on health and education etc......
I know it doesnt suit the miserabilist agenda but them be the facts......
Again it's an inevitable system or there being no coherent alternative being presented, and the absence of organisational structures for carrying it through anyway.
Streathamite
ideological dogmatist
y'know, I'm really not so sure about this. The people who are being hit hard by these cuts, the people who have been out on the streets, the people who will be out on the streets, are amongst the most disillusioned, anti-mainstream parties generation we've ever had. They've learnt the hard way that looking to Labour to deliver real social justice is pointless. They know Labour ain't 'their' party.
There's real, boiling anger out there, - loads of it - primed to explode. It will explode I think, unless a Labour victory is followed by a massive swing left (to whit, pigs might fly).
e2a: I genuinely believe that the potential for an effective mass movement is there, and I can see riots and the rest, certainly
Streathamite
ideological dogmatist
these people are certainly, right now, an irrelevance - thank fuck!
He'd already begun to take away 'hope' by then. Thankfully Obama found it in 2008 and gave it a good dusting down. Don't know what he's done twith it since, but it must be lying about somewhere.
I know he didn't promise large scale reforms. That's what I said.
The rest of what you mantion wasn't more than expected-it was what was in their manifestos. Not that I want to argue for old Labour, but NL broke just as many promises as olfd Labour. All governments inevitably break promises. And none of the social justice measures can hide the fact that New Labour was just as much about noe-liberal economics as any Tory government would have been. Neo-liberalism inevitably ended in the economic ruin we're seeing being played out now under both nominally centre-right governments and nominally centre-left ones and their responses to the 2008 crash were all pretty much the same.
It's anger combined with political incoherence though. The question of political power is what matters. Militancy hasn't been this high across Europe in some time, but the main beneficieries are the centre left parties, as well as, in some countries other left parties who aren't big enough to rule, and provide few convincing answers to conmbat a globalised capitalism spiralling out of control.
You can't riot your way to a political alternative.
Crikey.....I think you may have turned into the John Major of the miserable left!
ymu
Niall Ferguson's deep-cover sock-puppet
Where did I say you were a Labour apologist?
We? We are the people, the protesters, the people who will suffer the consequences of the cuts. The people who pay for the economy that makes a handful of wankers rich. We are the people who can and will effect change, because no left sect is up to it. They can join in if they want to, but they ain't gonna be calling the shots this time.
ymu
Niall Ferguson's deep-cover sock-puppet
Well, you can - it is one means by which a revolution can occur, and I'd rather that than have it orchestrated by vanguardist scum. But more realistically, you can riot your way to an alternative political consensus. The twentieth century saw huge gains for the working class between 1930 and 1980. Not a revolution, but things got better, and carried on getting better for quite a while. And then it all got rolled back by Thatcher, Reagan and their bastard offspring.
It's our job to turn back the tide. It's the very least we can achieve.
It's up to us to make sure history repeats itself, as it is wont to do.
Streathamite
ideological dogmatist
agreed - so this is where we need for our campaigns to productively harness that anger, via education, propaganda and debate, and that lead us to a point where we combine popular unrest with a platform for alternatives. The alternative is simply defeatism.
Where did I say you were a Labour apologist?
We? We are the people, the protesters, the people who will suffer the consequences of the cuts. The people who pay for the economy that makes a handful of wankers rich. We are the people who can and will effect change, because no left sect is up to it. They can join in if they want to, but they ain't gonna be calling the shots this time.
The left sects have never called the shots.
While a lot of people seem set to protest the cuts, those who actively do so are only a minority of the working class, let alone of the population as a whole. And most of these will, as I said, place getting rid of the coalition as the main priority in the long run. Which unfortunately means voting Labour. Who will, as usual, ignore them, despite what they may say to the contrary prior to being elected. And so it goes on.
Well, you can - it is one means by which a revolution can occur, and I'd rather that than have it orchestrated by vanguardist scum. But more realistically, you can riot your way to an alternative political consensus. The twentieth century saw huge gains for the working class between 1930 and 1980. Not a revolution, but things got better, and carried on getting better for quite a while. And then it all got rolled back by Thatcher, Reagan and their bastard offspring.
It's our job to turn back the tide. It's the very least we can achieve.
It's up to us to make sure history repeats itself, as it is wont to do.
What are you talking about? Riots may have occurred now and again during the period you mention, but they are a mere historical footnote. Any 'alternative political consensus' that came about between 1930(?) and 1980 was not due to rioting.
As for the present, so you riot (and I've no particular objection if some people do.) And then what happens? And how is the tide going to be turned back in the absence of a political alternative that stands even the slightest chance of being implemented? I'm not denying that victories against the cuts are not there to be won, but as for the overall change of direction that would see them vanquished, who is going to do it?
True. But the past record indicates that by the time something even halfway viable is cobbled together, most of the proposed cuts will have been implemented, either by the present shower or by Labour.
ymu
Niall Ferguson's deep-cover sock-puppet
Once more, this is not 18 or 13 years into a shit government - it's 6 months after Labour were kicked out for being utter cunts. No-one's going to be giving them a honeymoon if we kick the coalition out in the next few months. And we will. As long as people don't get all demoralised by prannets moaning about it being pointless because we'll only get more of the same ...
ymu
Niall Ferguson's deep-cover sock-puppet
We riot until we get a government that does what the electorate demands. It's absolutely normal for countries where coalition governments are common to hold elections every few months in times of turmoil. How the fuck are we going to change the political consensus if we give up as soon as the first victory is achieved, and why the fuck would you assume that this is what will happen?
Okay, so let's pretend that we won't get more of the same if and when Labour get back into government. Let's get carried away and pretend that revolution is in the air. We'll all be disappointed as usual when nothing of the kind materialises, but then we're used to it. We can always blame 'prannets' demoralising people on internet boards that a few dozen people read.
For somebody who despises vanguards, you seem to think exactly like a vanguardist. The vast majority who are not involved in any kind of political campaigning do not think in terms of there being 'no honeymoon for Labour.' They cast their vote in the vague hope that 'they'll be better than the other lot.'
Once again, who is this 'we' that you claim is going to keep on rioting? There is no electorate with a unified set of demands. Society has never been more fragmented.
I haven't suggested anybody gives up anything. I've said that I think victories against some of the cuts are probably inevitable.
ymu
Niall Ferguson's deep-cover sock-puppet
Where did I say we wouldn't get more of the same from Labour? And did I say people would have to be told that Labour could not be trusted, or did I say that people's memories ain't that fucking short?
Do you read posts at all before responding to them?
Do you read posts at all before responding to them?
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