This Once Great Movement Of Ours

[CumbrianLefty]

People have been doing the same ad nauseam with Boris Johnson and he isn't as universally reviled as Corbyn. I think it's because has some redeeming features - humourous, intelligent, annoys the right people - which Corbyn didn't have.

Cynically, his main "redeeming feature" compared to Corbyn is that he has lots of the media on side.

[CumbrianLefty]

This was always inevitable

[CumbrianLefty]

What about Starmers treatment by the media compared to Corbyn's?

Well it is, unsurprisingly, better.

Equally though, its hardly 1990s Blair.

One talking point on both the right and Corbynite left, btw, is that the Tories have a blitz prepared on his time as DPP (you know, "he let Savile go free" and similar) if they ever felt really under threat by him. Even were such a plan to exist, it would surely be high risk tho.

[CumbrianLefty]

Centrists are actually much keener on a major purge of the left from Labour's ranks (this would mean actual mass expulsions btw, not the largely tokenistic even if symbolically important measures just announced by the party) than the right, on the whole. Which maybe tells its own story.

[CumbrianLefty]

Lots on the right think "the media" is biased against them. And anyway, surely what the big newspapers think is less important in an age of social media?

The point is, right wingers have much less justification for thinking so (especially since the BBC was effectively neutered a decade or so ago)

And tbh I used to think the same about newspapers, but even whilst their actual circulations continue to drop relentlessly the broadcast media obediently follow their agendas as much as ever. As long as that remains the case, the hard right megalomaniacs who are almost their sole owners will continue to see them as a viable prospect - even as money is being obstensibly chucked down the drain.

[CumbrianLefty]

In other news, R*s*e D*f*i*l* is doing transphobia again

[CumbrianLefty]

Its actually quite interesting in that respect - whilst there *is* a strand of Labour right politics that is quite receptive to TERFery (and the overlap with "lifestyle feminism" types is pretty strong) there are plenty of others on that wing - including several well known Blairites - who are very pro-trans rights. And some on the Corbynite wing (eg Burgon and Pidcock) who have at least dabbled in GC politics, plus certain Labour left activists lower down the party who are unashamed TERFs.

[CumbrianLefty]

Which doesn't stop the usual nonsense online about both Savile and "grooming gangs".

[CumbrianLefty]

Apsana Begum MP found not guilty of serious fraud offences.

Restoration of the Labour whip will presumably follow.

[CumbrianLefty]

I don't think its quite as simple as that, but yes there *is* an element close to the leadership who seem addicted to cosplaying Neil Kinnock "heroically facing down the left" in the 1980s.

[CumbrianLefty]

Ah the usual briefing to the Observer. Who could that be?

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2021/jul/31/keir-starmers-aide-warns-labour-has-lost-touch-with-target-voters

This can only be done if Labour adopts clearer, sharper, more uplifting messaging about the party’s values and Starmer’s vision, rather than throwing too many policy commitments at voter

Contains the choice claim by an unidentified "source" that "millions of Labour voters went Tory" at the last GE - I hope that Starmer's strategists are at least better informed than that.

[CumbrianLefty]

Its circulation figures have dropped so low that they are no longer officially released, but.....

[CumbrianLefty]

The point about the tribune MPs group is very good. There are MPs more right wing than me who sit in it! 

This was to a degree true in the "good old days", but its de facto relaunch a few years ago was as an explicitly anti-Corbyn operation - so the above really shouldn't be surprising.

[CumbrianLefty]

I see the TBGBs is set to be aired again in a new BBC documentary this autumn.

Wonder how on earth they’ll find something new to say…

I'm sure there will be some hyped up "revelations".

[CumbrianLefty]

Its true that the Corbyn matter needs resolving at some point though. A deal where he regains the whip in return for a genuine statement of contrition (and, maybe, an agreement to stand down at the next GE) remains both possible and surely - all things considered - desirable. The question then would be how to sell that to those both in the media and the headbanging right within the party who have fallen in love with the idea of not just expelling JC, but thousands upon thousands of left leaning members with him (often in the totally delusional belief that this will win Labour the next election)

[CumbrianLefty]

Victory for the Labour left in the internal elections for the CAC, but turnout was even more dismal than usual (forgot to vote in this one myself, which doesn't often happen)

[CumbrianLefty]

Though the "reparations for Taliban" wheeze from Burgon takes some beating for idiocy.

[CumbrianLefty]

Some truth in it - and few will doubt that the "centrist"/liberal elements in the party have badly lost their way in recent years - but its view of history is somewhat one dimensional.

Labour has never *just* been about narrow economism for its "class" - political reform was part of its make up from the beginning, same with internationalism.

[CumbrianLefty]

Coyne winning despite being outvoted by the left roughly 2 to 1 would be a banter heuristic for sure.

[CumbrianLefty]

Coyne came third in a supposed two horse race, that cannot fail to amuse.

[CumbrianLefty]

Apparently there are more Tories in Unite than the voter turnout.

Not that that's particularly surprising when you think about it.

Coyne tried to get some of them to vote for him, clearly not terribly successfully.

[CumbrianLefty]

Trouble is that during the Corbyn years the Labour right lionised some absolutely terrible Labour MPs.

[CumbrianLefty]

Seems to be some silliness going on regarding Young Labour and the coming party conference.

[CumbrianLefty]

Just abolish it.

YL, or the conference?

[CumbrianLefty]

I actually agree with this. I thought the article was very disappointing, featured too many of the ‘golden gang’ and really didn’t capture the actual issues facing Labour over the last decade. The quote from Douglas Alexander on Scotland was laughable.

Also seemed devoid of the extra parliamentary left and the other liberation politics- something that’s had a huge impact on Labour since 2010 really.

Would be interested what others thought.

https://mobile.twitter.com/JamesMills1984/status/1433580089258749955

What was that?

The "hottest take" for me regarding Scotland was John McTernan's assertion that Labour's collapse there would never have happened.......if only......David Miliband had been elected leader!!

And of course the contributions from "OUR SAVIOUR OVER THE WATER" were typically risible.

(McTernan really is a strange one, though - just the other day he was strongly defending Labour as a "broad church" party, a barely coded rebuke to the macho-rightist tendency in the party who often quite genuinely seem to desire everybody to the left of Starmer expelled)