Labour leadership

[belboid]

when was the last time a labour party leader sported a beard? These are historic times we live in.

there hasn't been a bearded PM since Labour were formed, i believe

 

[gosub]

when was the last time a labour party leader sported a beard? These are historic times we live in.

Last Prime Minister to have one was Lord Salisbury over a hundred years ago

 

[Pickman's model]

clem the gem was a red menace in his day?

when he wanted to be

 

[agricola]

Last Prime Minister to have one was Lord Salisbury over a hundred years ago

and what a beard it was:

 

[SpackleFrog]

Yup. But given your position that a new workers party will have been formed if JC wins what will your line be at this 'defend the leader of the new workers party' conference?

Will it be for JC, Owen Jones, the AWL etc to resign and join TUSC?

We would be interested in any kind of formation that embodied a degree of federalism/right to exist as internal current and had a fairly concrete attitude to the question of austerity. We wouldn't dissolve ourselves into any new party but we would be prepared to consider abandoning TUSC for a larger formation I think. Would be equally happy for the Corbyn/Jones/Campaign Group axis to sit on the steering committee of TUSC of course. Dunno why you're asking about the AWL. Who cares?

 

[belboid]

We wouldn't dissolve ourselves into any new party but we would be prepared to consider abandoning TUSC for a larger formation I think.

prepared to consider? You'd bloody jump at the chance!

 

[DotCommunist]

and what a beard it was:

compared to that corbyns facial foliage is a mere 5 oclock shadow

 

[gosub]

At some stage in my later life , i will probably live to see a PM humilitated by photos of him as a hipster uni student a la Blair's Ugly rumours

 

[J Ed]

Wrong uns

 

[weltweit]

At some stage in my later life , i will probably live to see a PM humilitated by photos of him as a hipster uni student a la Blair's Ugly rumours

Is that Blair's equivalent to Cameron's Bullingdon club pic?

 

[ddraig]

is it?
does it look like it?

 

[DotCommunist]

are those ironic boaters? because if not...

 

[killer b]

it's a fancy dress party ffs. look at the hat on the right.

 

[DotCommunist]

yes the bonnet had quite escaped everyones attention

 

[ItWillNeverWork]

it's a fancy dress party ffs. look at the hat on the right.

It's a bit like the satire thing again. You can never quite tell these days.

 

[J Ed]

Jeremy Corbyn opens up 22point lead in the Labour leadership election race

Jeremy Corbyn has opened up an astonishing 22point leader over his rivals in the race for the Labour leadership.

Private polling seen by the Daily Mirror shows Mr Corbyn set to top the ballot with 42%, way ahead of Yvette Cooper on 22.6%, Andy Burnham on 20% and Liz Kendall on 14%.

But once second preferences have been taken into account the veteran leftwinger is ahead by just two points on 51% to Ms Cooper’s 49%.

Some Labour MPs are now urging supporters of Mr Burnham and Ms Kendall to either back Ms Cooper or at least ensure she gets their second preference votes as the only way of stopping the Corbyn bandwagon.

 

[belboid]

Jeremy Corbyn opens up 22point lead in the Labour leadership election race

whoever wrote that headline can't count

 

[weltweit]

Normally someone polling 42% against someone else with 22% would win. This second preference business is insidious and I am not at all sure it is fair.

 

[Wilf]

when was the last time a labour party leader sported a beard? These are historic times we live in.

This was my earlier estimate on such matters:

To cut to the real issues, by my reckoning he would be the first Labour Leader with a beard since Keir Haride - and after his inevitable electoral victory, the first PM with a beard since Lord Salisbury. Take that you pogonophobic bastards!

 

[DotCommunist]

This was my earlier estimate on such matters:

For too long has the House been home to people shorn of beardage. Its high time for a more hirsute sort of politician to come in and do the business. While corbyns snowy chin may not rival the salisbury's or kropotkins- nor even the mighty beard of marx himself- it is certainly a step in the right direction. A hairy direction

 

[teqniq]

For too long has the House been home to people shorn of beardage. Its high time for a more hirsute sort of politician to come in and do the business. While corbyns snowy chin may not rival the salisbury's or kropotkins- nor even the might beard of marx himself- it is certainly a step in the right direction. A hairy direction

Are you on a mission from god?

 

[Wilf]

 

[redsquirrel]

I think escalating it to armed struggle is probably not appropriate at this point.

Aw, spoilsport.

 

[Wilf]

Highpoint under Engels, slowdown under Lenin, then that wrongun Stalin. Andy Burnham's shorn face is the objective end of the communist project, even if his flourishing eyebrowery provides the illusion of scientific socialism.

 

[brogdale]

Highpoint under Engels, slowdown under Lenin, then that wrongun Stalin. Andy Burnham's shorn face is the objective end of the communist project, even if his flourishing eyebrowery provides the illusion of scientific socialism.

Maybe, but anarchists have better hats...

 

[Wilf]

After several years in the Peter and Paul Fortress I seem to remember he had less teeth than Shane McGowan. The hat's clearly a ruse to draw your eyes upwards. Ditto Andy Burnham's puppetish brow warmers.

 

[brogdale]

After several years in the Peter and Paul Fortress I seem to remember he had less teeth than Shane McGowan. The hat's clearly a ruse to draw your eyes upwards. Ditto Andy Burnham's puppetish brow warmers.

How old are you?

 

[free spirit]

FWIW Google trends shows that Jeremy Corbyn's generated by far the most online public interest of any of the candidates.

 

[free spirit]

Esp in that specific seat where the rise in the green vote may have cost the labour party the seat and handed it on a plate to the lib-dems.

As I've said before, the Greens here took significantly more votes off the lib dems than we did from Labour, so without the Greens standing the Lib Dems would have won by a bigger margin.

Totalling up the council wards, Greens had 13% vs 7% in the GE, and Labour were almost neck and neck with Lib Dems, but in the GE the lib dems won by 6.8%. So we took almost all of that winning percentage off the Lib Dems at council level, but couldn't do it in the GE probably due to the personal vote for the MP.

So you're talking shit.

 

[free spirit]

Yes. It's basic democratic principles. And, yes, they did run basic checks on people in previous elections.

Anyone who joins whilst being a member of another party is a dishonest turd, and should be removed from membership by both.

This is a vote for the only potential left of center challenger for prime minister there is likely to be, so ultimately it's a vote for who I'd prefer to see as Prime Minister. Now the SNP have the whole of Scotland, the chances are this will be a coalition or minority government with confidence and supply by other left of centre parties, but either way in any successful challenge to the tories, the leader of the Labour party will become the prime minister heading up either a majority labour government, a coalition or minority labour government.

We don't get to vote directly for prime minister in this country, so this is the only real chance any of us have to directly influence that selection of the person I'd want to end up as prime minister.

The Green Party would probably offer confidence and supply arrangements to any minority labour government, definitely with Corbyn as leader, whereas it wouldn't for a Tory government. So I'd see us more as potential allies than opponents, and with a less partisan none neoliberal leader that alliance could be put on a more formal basis.

Not that the Green Party would amount to much with Corbyn as Labour leader as we'd lose a hell of a lot of votes and members to a centre left labour party, so I doubt we'd have more than the 1 MP we've got now.

The best I could hope for with the Green party at the last election was that it would pull Labour to the left, and potentially help counter the prevailing austerity narative - which I think happened to some extent. +I suspect that the surge in support for Corbyn's position now has been helped a lot by the inclusion of real anti-austerity voices in the debates (SNP being the strongest, but the Green Party activists were making that case at a more local level across most of England).

ps I was working on the assumption that being a registered supporter was different to being a party member, if not then why set that category up?