Keir Starmer's time is up

[JimW]

True, you got me there, though I'm pretty sure it's because people still keep using the term remoaners when anyone says anything at all negative about Brexit. And I don't think adding psycho helps anyone except maybe feeding trolls.

I'm still pissed off that people voted for a Tory Brexit (under a Labour govt, I might have voted leave too, or at least would have very seriously considered it), but that's what we have to fucking deal with.

Not a great word I grant you,but after all we've learned about the nature of the EU in this painful process, anyone keen to get back in is severely mistaken or a wrong'un and must confess I was in part responding to a couple of pages of comments from the latter.

 

[mauvais]

Remainers not remoaners. The psycho ones are the ones who still want to join again after all this is over. Might help if we read what each other wrote too.

When will it be over?

 

[two sheds]

Not a great word I grant you,but after all we've learned about the nature of the EU in this painful process, anyone keen to get back in is severely mistaken or a wrong'un and must confess I was in part responding to a couple of pages of comments from the latter.

Well yes but we've learned a bit about the tory government, too. It's just as true that anyone keen on the tory Brexit is severely mistaken or a wrong'un as well.

 

[mauvais]

Good ideas appear to me to be:

(a) give up and rejoin the EU, or

(b) hold on tight and fully lean into an accelerated repositioning of the British or possibly English state which really began with the end of empire but is far from concluded, undergoing a massive, crisis-induced public transformation of national identity where we are forced to confront what we are rather than were, meaningfully adapt to that and whatever our new economic and political conditions turn out to be, and eventually come out the other side a bit like Germany after WWII. Effectively secede from our own history through a big old highly unpleasant national cognitive behavioural therapy. Or, you know, revolution.

Not a lot in between, IMO, other than suffering for no reason.

One of those is probably better than the other but I'm not particularly sure I want to be here while it happens. And it doesn't make a very good manifesto.

 

[MrSki]

Not gone down well on gogglebox.

 

[TopCat]

When Rafael Bher or whatever he is called gives him praise you know he is a scab tory.

 

[Kevbad the Bad]

I bumped into a Labour friend in town today (socially distanced bump, of course) who said that some lefties in the local party had left, but this was outweighed by new members joining. Is this Starmer attracting more Blairite support, for want of a better word, and getting more electable? Or are lefty types still pondering a decision to leave?

 

[brogdale]

I bumped into a Labour friend in town today (socially distanced bump, of course) who said that some lefties in the local party had left, but this was outweighed by new members joining. Is this Starmer attracting more Blairite support, for want of a better word, and getting more electable? Or are lefty types still pondering a decision to leave?

Those "new" members will most likely be the nasty old right-wingers who bailed when the party elected a socialist leader; they'll do fuck all campaigning.

 

[Streathamite]

Not a great word I grant you,but after all we've learned about the nature of the EU in this painful process, anyone keen to get back in is severely mistaken or a wrong'un

Sorry, but what do you mean by this?
To me, it's the antics of the British government and the Tory brexiteers that are almost entirely at fault - their endless variations of cakeism, and fantasyland politics. Their demanding full benefits of the club they/we are leaving.
To my eyes, it seems the EU have been logical and consistent, and maintained an entirely logical position, and they've conducted their side of things in a manner which any reasonable-minded person could expect. They've acted throughout to protect the SM, the CU, their members' interests and the GFA. The same GFA we are legally-binding signatories to.
After all, it's not the EU which is rushing through a bill to enable them to break international law.

 

[Streathamite]

Those "new" members will most likely be the nasty old right-wingers who bailed when the party elected a socialist leader; they'll do fuck all campaigning.

absolutely correct.

 

[JimW]

Sorry, but what do you mean by this?
To me, it's the antics of the British government and the Tory brexiteers that are almost entirely at fault - their endless variations of cakeism, and fantasyland politics. Their demanding full benefits of the club they/we are leaving.
To my eyes, it seems the EU have been logical and consistent, and maintained an entirely logical position, and they've conducted their side of things in a manner which any reasonable-minded person could expect. They've acted throughout to protect the SM, the CU, their members' interests and the GFA. The same GFA we are legally-binding signatories to.
After all, it's not the EU which is rushing through a bill to enable them to break international law.

I mean that the EU is one of the institutions of late capitalism normalising technocracy rather than democracy and pushing the market further into previous unopened areas, all the more dangerous even than domestic buffoons because it presents a benign face (quite likely most of its staff have benign intentions) and is not susceptible to change except through extremes like leaving it altogether.

 

[Streathamite]

I mean that the EU is one of the institutions of late capitalism normalising technocracy rather than democracy and pushing the market further into previous unopened areas, all the more dangerous even than domestic buffoons because it presents a benign face (quite likely most of its staff have benign intentions) and is not susceptible to change except through extremes like leaving it altogether.

Agreed, but:
1) we knew all that about the EU from way back, decades in fact. It's hardly come out as as result of the Brexit process - it was there in Maastricht.
2) the EU is the consequence and by-product of capitalism, not the other way round. Leaving the EU will not move us one inch furhter towards socialism - quite the opposite, given the current lot in charge in the UK. Equally, the general demise of the EU will not hasten the advent of socialism on a global basis - again, quite the opposite
3) Actually, the EU is showing signs of progressive reform, albeit that these have been forced on it by the virus
4) Thanks to the social chapter, anti-market abuse laws and other things, the EU has done more in my lifetime to advance, uphold and defend workers rights, consumer protection and environemntal protection, and also to curb capitalists' abuse and excesses, than any British government of my lifetime. I grant you, that bar is low, but.....
I am not an uncritical EU junkie. It is a 100% capitalist, and indeed neoliberal construct whose founding premise was 'peace through capitalism'. As such, in the long term it can never be part of any solution, it can only be the problem.

However, in the short term pragmatism has its' virtues. Which is why Brexit is sheer idiocy. As people are about to find out, rather painfully

 

[JimW]

Thanks to the social chapter, anti-market abuse laws and other things, the EU has done more in my lifetime to advance, uphold and defend workers rights, consumer protection and environemntal protection, and also to curb capitalists' abuse and excesses, than any British government of my lifetime. I grant you, that bar izs low, but.....

Just on this point, I think in many ways this was the EU serving its purpose to help undermine and subsume the institutions the working class built for itself as part of its aim to better manage capitalism with the final outcome that our protections are something that drop on high not something we fight for and defend ourselves.
Obviously capital has competing wings, short termers and the more "reasonable", but the reasonable ones will still shaft us in the end and don't blink at things like the deal with Turkey or the camps in Libya, or the fiscal medicine for Greece. And all the while they normalise a warped internationalism of trade and interests rather than solidarity and the idea that the world is now too complex to be left up to ordinary voters - which is true because that's how they're making it but I really think we should do whatever we can to resist that happening. They'll "reform" while the world burns because of the resource demands of the economics that is the centre of their existence.

 

[Streathamite]

Just on this point, I think in many ways this was the EU serving its purpose to help undermine and subsume the institutions the working class built for itself as part of its aim to better manage capitalism with the final outcome that our protections are something that drop on high not something we fight for and defend ourselves.
Obviously capital has competing wings, short termers and the more "reasonable", but the reasonable ones will still shaft us in the end and don't blink at things like the deal with Turkey or the camps in Libya, or the fiscal medicine for Greece. And all the while they normalise a warped internationalism of trade and interests rather than solidarity and the idea that the world is now too complex to be left up to ordinary voters - which is true because that's how they're making it but I really think we should do whatever we can to resist that happening. They'll "reform" while the world burns because of the resource demands of the economics that is the centre of their existence.

Don't disagree with any of that. All very fair points.

 

[cantsin]

I bumped into a Labour friend in town today (socially distanced bump, of course) who said that some lefties in the local party had left, but this was outweighed by new members joining. Is this Starmer attracting more Blairite support, for want of a better word, and getting more electable? Or are lefty types still pondering a decision to leave?

word is that membership numbers are in steep decline - but suspect the left exodus won't happen until the NEC elections results are out, and if the left slate wins, a lot more of us might stay on / stay in.

But no way would I be pounding the pavement for this shower in the Council Elections next year, regardless

 

[Streathamite]

word is that membership numbers are in steep decline - but suspect the left exodus won't happen until the NEC elections results are out, and if the left slate wins, a lot more of us might stay on / stay in.

But no way would I be pounding the pavement for this shower in the Council Elections next year, regardless

Likewise. i was briefly tempted to rejoin, when my old mentor became leader - and then I remebered why I left this party in the first place.
The same reason holds true today.

 

[two sheds]

Ooh he's got 10 pledges and he's signed them

Just needs to carve them in stone now

 

[redsquirrel]

So we should no longer be voting for Labour councillors now?

 

[Wilf]

He's less florid than Kinnock, less twinkly than John Smith, less cunty than Blair, less socialist than Corbyn. He's just less.

Vote Void!

 

[cantsin]

So we should no longer be voting for Labour councillors now?

personally, cldn't give a monkeys - it felt like across the UK, 2015-19, the % of wrong un's who were Labour councillors was comparable to the PLP, ie : around 90 %, minus the Leftwing leadership presence that the PLP had for 5 yrs, (eg : the entrenched, corrupt, revolving door property devpt consultant New Lab divs in Lambeth , Southwark etc )

 

[brogdale]

He's less florid than Kinnock, less twinkly than John Smith, less cunty than Blair, less socialist than Corbyn. He's just less.

Vote Void!

Focus-group man.

 

[Wilf]

Focus-group man.

Ford-Focus Group man.

 

[Wilf]

That's the thing, if I was asked to think about Keir Starmer's car in a focus group, I'd immediately say neat and tidy. Maybe a coffee cup in a holder with the lid very secure, after an emergency meeting where he went and stopped terrorism, but otherwise everything in its place. Coldplay on as well.

 

[belboid]

Coldplay on as well.

tbf, his musical taste doesn't appear to be awful - http://camdennewjournal.com/article...9xkd6TnZt_8B-Akdf_Qt1rt_yNfBOTYoW__7wVGfYDbfA

 

[Chilli.s]

Much as he seems a pail blue shade to my fiercely red, the country still needs a realistic second choice when it comes to voting. So if it's gotta be a centrist dad party then I guess he's the man for the job.

 

[Knotted]

tbf, his musical taste doesn't appear to be awful - http://camdennewjournal.com/article...9xkd6TnZt_8B-Akdf_Qt1rt_yNfBOTYoW__7wVGfYDbfA

Except it looks like it has been selected by a committee for its messaging.

 

[Wilf]

Except it looks like it has been selected by a committee for its messaging.

... and much as I like the ode to joy, I'd have kept well away from it circa September 2019.

 

[teqniq]

 

[Shechemite]

Tanking in the polls

 

[Wilf]

Tanking in the polls

I'm struggling to see that as anything done by Labour/Starmer, more a case of being handed a lead by johnson.