This Once Great Movement Of Ours

[Wiswylfen]

And the reason she isn't is her trans obsession, which only really took off a few years ago.

And she was part of it in the first place. I do not do this as a factional thing but it does seem clear that Open Labour is uniquely attractive to small-l liberals whose politics mainly consist of reacting to things and who have little interest in the Labour Party in and of itself.

I have some time for the organisation as one of the relatively few in the party who seriously tried to find some common ground during the Corbyn era.

As to your substantive point here - one thing that anyone active in the Labour party for any length of time discovers, is that it has an awful lot of "small-l" liberals in it. And this applies very much to the left as well as the right, there is indeed an argument that both Jez and his mentor Viscount Stansgate were/are as much very radical liberals as socialists at the end of the day.

Unfortunately!

[CumbrianLefty]

But that has basically been the case for a full century now.

When the old Liberals splintered and collapsed, their more left leaning people had to go somewhere.

[TheTide]

Basically many of the FBPErs and the Corbynistas have more in common with each other than they would like to admit, just as the Bennites and the Woystas of 40+ years ago did.

[Wiswylfen]

But that has basically been the case for a full century now.

When the old Liberals splintered and collapsed, their more left leaning people had to go somewhere.

I am more than aware of that. I am a left-Liberal myself.

[Wiswylfen]

I think that connecting this to proper Liberalism is--shall we say--misguided. The main issue is not Liberalism but liberalism. The former tradition, in which I count myself, is a perfectly respectable tradition and in its most refined form an embodiment of all the good in England against all the evil that afflicts it as represented by Toryism.

Liberalism is not at all incompatible with socialism. You can absolutely be a Liberal and a socialist (though I am not): Tony Benn was proof of that. Small-l liberalism, however, is the movement of those who would put the public-sector professionals (though often they will hypocritically attack this, if factionally left or right, as representative of the other) ahead of the working class. It is actively subversive and seeks to hijack the Labour Party to be a vehicle of some sort of 'progressivism' (and, as we can see, this progressivism takes various forms).

[Blair]

Basically many of the FBPErs and the Corbynistas have more in common with each other than they would like to admit, just as the Bennites and the Woystas of 40+ years ago did.

Off topic but one thing that melts your brain when you first dip into THIGMOO was that some the strongest critics of New Labour in its early period was people from the Labour right from the 1980s- Hattersley comes to mind.

All while Michael Meagher and Chris Mullins served in Government.

[Wiswylfen]

Basically many of the FBPErs and the Corbynistas have more in common with each other than they would like to admit, just as the Bennites and the Woystas of 40+ years ago did.

Off topic but one thing that melts your brain when you first dip into THIGMOO was that some the strongest critics of New Labour in its early period was people from the Labour right from the 1980s- Hattersley comes to mind.

All while Michael Meagher and Chris Mullins served in Government.

Despite the recent revisionism there is still a strong case to be made that New Labour was fundamentally a project of the party's (soft) left. Chris Mullin has an, er, interesting understanding of politics: his 'sequel' to that famous book, which changes the first name of the Labour leader halfway through, has Harwich vote Labour as part of the #realignment.

[CumbrianLefty]

Mullin's diaries famously have him writing "we're going to lose again" about a week before the 1997 GE - based on not much at all really.

[Wiswylfen]

Could be worse: there were Labour MPs who genuinely thought they were going to lose their seats in 1997, according to David Evans.

[Torrain]

Could be worse: there were Labour MPs who genuinely thought they were going to lose their seats in 1997, according to David Evans.

Wasn’t aware that the Rt. Hon SnowLabrador MP had the Labour whip in ‘97.

[Wiswylfen]

Could be worse: there were Labour MPs who genuinely thought they were going to lose their seats in 1997, according to David Evans.

Wasn’t aware that the Rt. Hon SnowLabrador MP had the Labour whip in ‘97.

The main thing you have to know to understand politics is that a lot of MPs don't.

[Blair]

Basically many of the FBPErs and the Corbynistas have more in common with each other than they would like to admit, just as the Bennites and the Woystas of 40+ years ago did.

Off topic but one thing that melts your brain when you first dip into THIGMOO was that some the strongest critics of New Labour in its early period was people from the Labour right from the 1980s- Hattersley comes to mind.

All while Michael Meagher and Chris Mullins served in Government.

Despite the recent revisionism there is still a strong case to be made that New Labour was fundamentally a project of the party's (soft) left. Chris Mullin has an, er, interesting understanding of politics: his 'sequel' to that famous book, which changes the first name of the Labour leader halfway through, has Harwich vote Labour as part of the #realignment.

I think Al had a post on this thread a while back about how Blair was actually the last Marxist in the Labour party!

[Wiswylfen]

Basically many of the FBPErs and the Corbynistas have more in common with each other than they would like to admit, just as the Bennites and the Woystas of 40+ years ago did.

Off topic but one thing that melts your brain when you first dip into THIGMOO was that some the strongest critics of New Labour in its early period was people from the Labour right from the 1980s- Hattersley comes to mind.

All while Michael Meagher and Chris Mullins served in Government.

Despite the recent revisionism there is still a strong case to be made that New Labour was fundamentally a project of the party's (soft) left. Chris Mullin has an, er, interesting understanding of politics: his 'sequel' to that famous book, which changes the first name of the Labour leader halfway through, has Harwich vote Labour as part of the #realignment.

I think Al had a post on this thread a while back about how Blair was actually the last Marxist in the Labour party!

Well I would disagree with him there on both counts.

[EastAnglianLefty]

I've seen councillors insist they were going to lose their seats whilst standing in front of the counting tables, on which you could clearly see that they had upwards of 60% of the vote.

[CumbrianLefty]

Basically many of the FBPErs and the Corbynistas have more in common with each other than they would like to admit, just as the Bennites and the Woystas of 40+ years ago did.

Off topic but one thing that melts your brain when you first dip into THIGMOO was that some the strongest critics of New Labour in its early period was people from the Labour right from the 1980s- Hattersley comes to mind.

All while Michael Meagher and Chris Mullins served in Government.

Despite the recent revisionism there is still a strong case to be made that New Labour was fundamentally a project of the party's (soft) left. Chris Mullin has an, er, interesting understanding of politics: his 'sequel' to that famous book, which changes the first name of the Labour leader halfway through, has Harwich vote Labour as part of the #realignment.

I think Al had a post on this thread a while back about how Blair was actually the last Marxist in the Labour party!

I always thought that was John Reid.

(or, as he insisted on being referred to for quite some time, *Dr* John Reid)

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Today is the one hundredth anniversary of the first Labour Government, a minority administration formed as the only viable option in a spectacularly hung parliament, despite Labour being only the second largest party in the Commons.* The government did not last very long (and the centenary of the event that triggered its fall will be interesting), but it was an extremely important moment in British history, and was understood as such at the time. It was also an active government that tried - with a surprising amount of success - to implement policy, despite its weak parliamentary position.

All of which takes us to its dominant figure, Ramsay MacDonald. The critical thing about him is that up until the 1931 crisis he was an effective Prime Minister (both times) and an adroit political leader who did much to move Labour into a position where it could be the main beneficiary of the Great Liberal Party Civil War. It is understandable that for a very long time it was hard not to view the man through what happened in 1931 (and also, and perhaps more so, his utterly wretched state afterwards), but this is all long enough ago now that we can (and should) look with fresh eyes and with historical perspective. Housing, for instance, is a case in point: the MacDonald governments did what others had tried and failed to do and successfully laid down the groundwork that enabled council house construction on a mass scale.

_{*It was the last election fought over the Free Trade vs. Protection issue: Baldwin attempted to win a majority for Protection and failed to do so. This also meant that it was impossible for the Liberals to support a Conservative administration of any kind during that Parliament.}

[Blair]

It was remarked by someone at an online talk I saw that if Ramsay had died in say 1930 he would likely be remembered as a hero in THIGMOO. A very remarkable man as he probably had the most experience of being in and around the party out of any leader bar maybe Foot?

I’ve read so little about 1931 and always just blamed it on King George V! But I’m sure it was much wider than that

[EastAnglianLefty]

It says something about the culture of the Labour Party than when I went to Cambridge CLP's centenary event, one of the questions for the panel was "Can you forgive Ramsay Macdonald?"* This was prompted by the questioner having cleaned out an old storeroom in the party offices a few months before and having found an old picture of him that had been purposefully turned towards the wall.

*It also says something about Cambridge CLP in particular, of course.

[CumbrianLefty]

I’ve read so little about 1931 and always just blamed it on King George V! But I’m sure it was much wider than that

Fair to say that yes, it was.

[Battista Minola 1616]

Speaking of Ramsay MacDonald, recently I was reading his Wikipedia page and I stopped on this quote from his book A Socialist In Palestine, an account of his visit there from 1922.

The other section is composed of the rich plutocratic Jew, who is the true economic materialist. He is the person whose views upon life make one anti-Semitic. He has no country, no kindred. Whether as a sweater or a financier, he is an exploiter of everything he can squeeze. He is behind every evil that Governments do, and his political authority, always exercised in the dark, is greater than that of Parliamentary majorities. He has the keenest of brains and the bluntest of consciences. He detests Zionism because it revives the idealism of his race, and has political implications which threaten his economic interests.

That a Labour leader in that time would view Zionism positively as a Socialist project is not surprising, but the contrast with this awfully detailed version of the "rootless cosmopolitan" caricature sounds almost surreal. The past is truly a foreign country.

[Wiswylfen]

It says something about the culture of the Labour Party than when I went to Cambridge CLP's centenary event, one of the questions for the panel was "Can you forgive Ramsay Macdonald?"* This was prompted by the questioner having cleaned out an old storeroom in the party offices a few months before and having found an old picture of him that had been purposefully turned towards the wall.

*It also says something about Cambridge CLP in particular, of course.

What did Cllr Owers think?

[EastAnglianLefty]

I don't recall, but I can't imagine him ever turning down an opportunity for a pointless grudge.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Gething has been racking up major Trade Union endorsements and now has the backing of Unite and the CWU to add to USDAW and the GMB (he also has the Community endorsement which is somewhat symbolically useful right now).

[Wiswylfen]

I don't recall, but I can't imagine him ever turning down an opportunity for a pointless grudge.

I can see the Tory Socialist Case for the National Government.

[Pulaski]

I've commented before on Starmer's seemingly lacklustre performances at PMQs, and how surprising it is to me given his years of experience as a barrister.

I've started to wonder if his seeming overreliance on his notes, constantly flitting his eyes back down at them, is a deliberate understatement on his part, deflecting attention away from himself. It's a tactic that has basically defined his broader political strategy, so it would make sense for him to be deploying it at PMQs too. Sometimes I wonder if there's anything written on the paper he's looking at.