Labour Leadership 2016

aah - ok. I wonder how that translates to seats though

Badly for Labour as there would be, according to this, a split in the vote.

Peltier tech blog can show you how to make those charts in excel. If you want to.

I can't see anything other than an utterly embarrassing defeat for Owen Smith Politico Bot 2.0

Liverpool Rallies...

4 Attachments

surely Smithulon should do the honourable thing and throw in the towel? might go some way to preventing the party splitting .

I read Corbyn rejected a progressive alliance with the greens.

DoNotGet. The Greens are very close on social policies (a little less on environmental yes). The English greens had a bloody barmy manifesto on some things, but surely nothing can be lost reputation wise by going with the Greens in a Corbyn Labour? As in, close enough fit?

[I think?]

He did. Bothers me as well. At the same time, however, he has to say that right now. Common knowledge would say you can't run a campaign for leadership of the Labour party and talk about electoral alliances (or any election - see Miliband and the SNP).

The fact remains, however, that he said it and that it's all we have to go on.

Here's an article on the claim: http://www.theargus.co.uk/news/14658211.Jeremy_Corbyn_rules_out_progressive_pact_with_Caroline_Lucas_in_Brighton/

What he actually says is a little bit less concrete:

But Mr Corbyn appeared to rule out any policy when speaking exclusively with The Argus.

He said: “At the moment no. What we are doing as a party committed to the Labour cause and position, in opposition in parliament in order to maximise votes against the government obviously we cooperate with other opposition parties.

“Does this translate into electoral pacts? No.”

I.e., it does not translate to electoral pacts, nor does it exclude them.

Ah I see, sort of a "Sorry can't really commit ATM".

Hope it will happen. Labour candidates in Scotland were ejits hence the damage. Corbyn and Greens could possible work if the reputation of both in both camps is OK.

Owen Smith maybe not, but we have to wait and see. And if Labour fucks out the SDLP in NI that would be nice. It's slowly reforming but losing power to SF and too regressive. Its wilting away and many people won't vote "proper" socialist. It would also give better communication lines to Westminster perhaps.

By the way, that Owen Smith ice cream truck was apparently giving out free 99 flakes... christ knows how many would have hung around had it not been there.

:-))

Smith. The more I heard from him the debate made my blood boil. Repeating his point over and over (any variant of "we need to win") typical lazy media attention seeking trick from slick PR politicians, determined that one thing they say gets into the Metro the next day. He'll fail.

More on a particular Smith 'soundbite'--quite an angry article:

http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/as-a-corbyn-supporter-who-used-to-work-at-sports-direct-i-found-owen-smiths-remarks-deeply-upsetting-a7150971.html

That soundbite thing bothers me, as well. Back in 2010, Polly Toynbee did interviews with the then Labour leadership candidates.

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/series/toynbee-test

I thought they were all worth watching, even Diane Abbott. At the time, I thought Ed Miliband was the only one who said some concrete, non-soundbitish things. I thought his brother was the worst, talking completely vapid, soundbite-infected bollocks. The others were all somewhere in between.

Needless to say, Ed Miliband didn't exactly stay off the soundbites during his time as leader, and, of course, lost the next general election, so it's anyone's guess if this is of any importance. I imagine if someone was very good with the soundbites, as opposed to clumsy and obvious, they would stand a better chance of being elected, although perhaps it is already testament to people being clumsy with soundbites if we recognise them as such, and being skilled with them would be interpreted as 'consistently on-message' and 'good communicator'. :)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HnbNGCq6TjU

I thought this was an interesting interview:

https://www.theguardian.com/membership/2016/aug/05/peter-kilfoyle-liverpool-labour-momentum-jeremy-corbyn

It touches briefly on the leadership election and is quite even-handed in dishing out praise and criticism.

Fuck me, I'd forgotten that. It's like a a Chris Morris sketch.

Broader comment on 'message discipline'. I think the political class in this country is very fucking cynical and very fucking naive about how they talk to the general public. They've picked up on some of the worst of American political culture and forgotten that people talk very differently here. And that American political culture is a lot richer than CNN/Fox News.

Yeah, good interview

bbc takes grubby tory cuntery tattletale story and skilfully morphs it into a rehashed kick corbyn in the balls tattletale story.

balance. you're doing it wrong.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-36986977

Are you serious? He's not mentioned until the 16th paragraph and doesn't feature in the headline, the lede, the nutgraph or actually any of the paragraphs that actually matter!

It's a writeup of a Beeb documentary "Brexit: The Battle for Britain" which (in order to be balanced) will need to have considered all sides of the campaign and how each party handled it. So if Corbyn wasn't mentioned there'd be accusations of bias left right and centre.

Or maybe just the left.

I'm this close to giving up on politics.

OK, I'm going to out myself as a Tory. Not a Thatcherite Tory, but a liberal Tory (it is a thing, honestly). I like very much that the Overton window has shifted a long way to the left for the Conservative party in recent years. Jeremy is way too far to the left for my compass, but I genuinely like the man, his principled approach and his apparent honesty. Personally I consider him to be highly electable. The nit from the Valleys is precisely the opposite in every sense.

What I can't stand is the self serving, opportunistic behaviour we've seen from both the PLP and the conservatives over the last few months. It has nothing to do with good governance and EVERYTHING to do with career advancement via the use of long knives in shadowy corners. Politics is always thus but recent behaviour has been egregious from all sides.

I know none of you will ever talk to me again now, but there you go.

Peace!

Scum!

OK, I'm going to out myself as a Tory.

Wow, brave. It's a shame people with different views get shouted down on here. Where do you vote?