Balbi
Hey, Dean Yager!
Softly softly though. Not shotgun feet.
Strike!
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Softly softly though. Not shotgun feet.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Nah, now is the time to be shouting, to be heavy handed. Whilst there is still something left to to be shouting about.
Balbi
Hey, Dean Yager!
Yes, shouting with people - not shouting something which will divide the tenative coming together of some disparate groups of people. Divide and rule is meant to be their tactic, not ours.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
If you care about workfare (and polls indicate majority support for all forms) or the NHS then you're not going to be put off by Cameron calling an enemy an enemy. Softly softly and vote labour in 2015 is not enough - it will be too late.
weepiper
I fix the machines that fight climate change
28th of March is the next strike day. I imagine he's talking about another big march?
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Why on earth are you assuming that this will be the result? Why might it not deepen peoples committment to other and the issues under an easily batted away common attack?
belboid
Exasperated, not angry.
sorry, are you trying to say that because a couple of right-wing papers (and a couple of pseudo-lefty prats) have said 'boo, this is all SWP led,' the groundswell of opposition to NHS & workfare policies has ended? Because it hasn't. More companies are still pulling out of workfare, opposition to the NHS bill is as high as ever.
McLuskeys words will, hopefully, do what they were intended to - galvanise the members of his union (including the new community section), make them believe that they will actually be supported in fighting back, and in taking the action that could actually achieve our goals.
Balbi
Hey, Dean Yager!
Not everyone's on a broad spectrum anti-coalition line. Some will be against just the NHS, some just workfare. Most people don't have the time to develop the full opposition. There'd only just been a sustained effective public opinion vocally opposed to government policy. I fear McCluskey's interview just made some of those people sit down and shut up.
articul8
Dishonest sociopath
He should have deflected the Olympics question by saying we've got weeks to save the NHS not months or something. It wasn't clever to get drawn in this way.
Balbi
Hey, Dean Yager!
No, I'm saying that the governments answer seemed ridiculous. Mothers, families, grandparents, professionals etc - as trots etc? Hahahaha.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
But how and why? I really do not see why you're assuming this will inevitably be the case. I can see you think it, but beyond saying that the tories and tory papers will attack labour (?) and the unions (as they will anyway) i can't see any real reasons for your believing this.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Damn right, lets have politicians style weasel answers - we most certainly don't want to inflame the situation in any way.
belboid
Exasperated, not angry.
Unite represent 28,000 bus workers in London, who are in dispute over extra payments for the extra work they'll do in the Olympics - they're not getting the measly offer that the tube & train workers are getting. It would have been an utter disgrace, an abject failure to represent his members if McLuskey had said that the Olympics were sacrosanct and couldn't be affected in any way.
And, batting away a question like that would have made him look like just another slimy politician, a tosser who wouldn't say what he thinks, and would still have led to, essentially, the same headlines - "What wont Leftie Len Tell Us About His Evil Olympics Plans?
And, batting away a question like that would have made him look like just another slimy politician, a tosser who wouldn't say what he thinks, and would still have led to, essentially, the same headlines - "What wont Leftie Len Tell Us About His Evil Olympics Plans?
belboid
Exasperated, not angry.
aah, fair do's, sorry. But then, surely, you see that this will just be dismissed in a similar way? Most people wont care about how the lying press portray one persons comments
articul8
Dishonest sociopath
You don't give your enemy what they want - Cameron loves this, perfect opp to bang on about unions being unpatriotic anti-British wreckers etc.etc. He should have focused his anwers on what would make the Cameron squirm not squirm with pleasure.
Balbi
Hey, Dean Yager!
It's the fact that person's seen as a signficant figure for the unions. Up until now it's been attack to government, and it's effective. Now McCluskey's stated something which won't play well, I expect, with the general public.
And butchers - I just predict it. Public support's easy to lose, especially with big bold statements about disruption etc. There's still not a lot of love for unions out there.
Balbi
Hey, Dean Yager!
Time which could have been spent on the policies, will now be spent on this punch and judy show.
articul8
Dishonest sociopath
Agree it would've been wrong to rule out action during the olympics - but the critical thing is not allowing yourself to be led down a path your enemies want you to take. That's not being a slimy politician, it's about having some political nouse.
frogwoman
No amount of cajolery...
hang on - why are people saying the olympics wouldn't/shouldn't be affected? there is going to be one of the biggest police presences in the country for the olympics. they are going to be used as an excuse to bring in more and more authoritarian practices/legislation as a "natural" state of affairs. damn right there should be strikes during the olympics, because many of the people who will be employed during that time will be among the most exploited. so many people didn't want them anyway. it's like saying that strikes shouldn't affect the royal wedding because lots of people liked and enjoyed it on television, FFS. I seem to remember that the writers' strike in America affected the production of some of the best loved shows and films but i'm assuming most people on here would have supported that?
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Whatever he said would have been spun as that. So instead, concentrate on not being directed how to answer by fear of a nasty tory saying that you're a bad man. His answers were largely irrelevant to the tory and tory media responses. To argue as you have is to capitulate to their agenda. Fear of looking like you give a shit about the NHS, pensions, public services is not a strength
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
It's nous. And if you think he didn't mean to make the question of aggressive union action during the olympics a public issue then you don't know what it means.
frogwoman
No amount of cajolery...
if they don't start going down a more militant path we're going to be left with nothing.
belboid
Exasperated, not angry.
If you read the article, he actually talks about 'actions', alongside his talk about legal civil disobedience, and 'UKUncut style' campaigns. It doesn't, for one second, mean actually disrupting the Games, it will be protests - of the kind banned during the Chinese games - that gain worldwide media attention and embarrass the British government a little.
No one will actually be put off anti-government campaigns by this, the only ones making any noise will be the noes who support the bloody government anyway. And, dont forget, about half the country couldn't give a flying ferrets fuck about the Olympics anyway.
The boys played a blinder.
No one will actually be put off anti-government campaigns by this, the only ones making any noise will be the noes who support the bloody government anyway. And, dont forget, about half the country couldn't give a flying ferrets fuck about the Olympics anyway.
The boys played a blinder.
DotCommunist
So many particulars. So many questions.
I don't think the country is as in the vinegars about the Olympics as TV and press makes out tbf.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
Cameron calling us the enemy is a badge of fucking honour, the soapy Tory cunt.
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