That Starmer fella...

Sir Starmer has been to see Queenie and is a respected Barrister and QC.

BoJo is now looking like a Dangerous Commie as he is spending loads of dosh.

Starmer plays well with people like Starmer.

I am not like Starmer, and he plays well with me. In fact no-one I know who likes Starmer, is like Starmer.

my friend who is a staunch corbynite hates starmer, i just found out

But Johnson has always enjoyed the support of the Telegraph, well in excess of all the other Tory rags I think.

I couldn't read that whole article due to paywall, but it's says a lot that Starmer apparently has the image that they're able to run such a headline. Had Corbyn (or Milliband probably) been asking the exact same questions I think it's unlikely that they would have done.

No, you're a case in point.

At the moment, the Tory papers are still busy, posthumously, demolishing Corbyn. If they immediately attacked Starmer how much they attacked Corbyn, they'd risk not creating a perceivable difference between them.

Take a look at Michael Deacon's Twitter feed. He's a right wing hack but as well as Boris, he's currently being super critical of Nadine Dorries and also highlighting negative coverage of the government's treatment of homeless people too.

The right wing press aren't a homogeneous mass and at least some of them are very sensitive to what they perceive to be competence - something they often value above ideology, at least as long as ideology is within a certain acceptable boundary.

Starmer has what they view as competence in spades, and Corbyn didn't. It's superficial, but I think a huge portion of the public think the same way.

The Daily Telegraph parliamentary sketch writer is not representative of the Telegraph as a whole.
And that article allows the Telegraph to have it both ways. Boris supporters can dismiss it because “well he would say that wouldn’t he?” (imo Michael Deacon is pretty even-handed, for Torygraph readers = dangerous leftie). At the same time it does put a shot across the bows of the Tory party.

In a previous sketch, that also got a lot of attention, Deacon compared Johnson v Starmer to Bertie Wooster up in front of a judge, the morning after stealing a policeman’s helmet on boat race night (a recurring motif in PG Wodehouse).

This is a part of the bigger problem we have where, instead of sacking him and his cabinet for lying, bungling, general gross incompetence, we turn Boris into this loveable twit, whom we indulge and work-around-his-mess because -hehe- Boris is a madlad, one of us, yeah?

Tl:dr - Tory newspaper farts, world turns.

Oliver, Cuba was East Germany in the Caribbean; and for some of it's residents it still is.
Largely propped up by the USSR hence it's problems once the USSR was dissolved.

Last Friday, on VE day, they ran the front page with a piece by Starmer on the need for the Government to do more protecting those in care homes

Starmer plays well with people like Starmer.

I'm not convinced by this. He's also winning people over by appearing prime ministerial. I wouldn't underestimate the impact of a middle-aged bloke in a nice suit.

Although PMQs as a whole aren't that relevant, the snippets from it that make up the news and the way it directs the political coverage do influence people.

There is some truth in this.

At PMQs he doing a good job of being a QC at an enquiry, but so he should.

Which is why he was a good choice for leader at this time

He’ll be able to pick holes in Johnson’s arguments with ease, on both Covid and Brexit. Whether he will be a good leader overall is another matter. Coming as a long-time Corbyn supporter I’ve had to bite the bullet over this on the grounds that the PLP needs to get back on an even keel, and Starmer can probably do that, with the public at least.

Starmer can look as competent as you want now, but announce an election and the press will make it look like he can’t put his trousers on without help. Meanwhile, Johnson and co are royally fucking up and they get the mildest of reprimands in the broadsheets. Starmer will continue to talk strong at the Johnson, which is going to have fuck all effect in terms of improving lives but will look great for the 12 people who read the Telegraph for the political sketch.

Who else then?

Fuck off, I’m not playing your dumb game of naming some rando MP. Starmer is going to be a useless squib of an opposition leader but feted in the right (wing) places. However, what he absolutely will not do is be effective in using the Corbyn supporters that joined the Labour Party looking for real change and community action - those guys are already fucked off by the dossier that came out and dropping party affiliations. What’s the sell to ground pounders now? “Starmer: he’s like nice solicitor guy who drives an Audi but is actually ok”

Ah. All problems & no solutions. Bye.

fuck off

Chill out

What’s the sell to ground pounders now?

Suck it up and tow/toe (?) the party line, show party unity the way the more-left wanted the less-left to show it when corbyn came in.

Some of us who have been around long enough to have voted for Michael Foot don't much care if the new blow-ins disappear as rapidly as they appeared. What we need is a Labour government united(ish) behind a leader. If Starmer can deliver that's fine. If he can deliver the vote of enough of the middle ground to oust the Tories, who cares what he drives?

Agree
Unelectable Corbyn ranting in pmqs, Even if I was idealogically on his side was less than helpful.

The Starmer attn to detail, lawyer like is so much more effective, to left and right.

Especially now that in economic policy left is the new right

But, as per the example @greentricky posted, aren't the typical media outlets happy to mildly criticise government right wing opinions or actions, but then they will inevitably revert to type when an election is in the offing?

This.

Now that Sunak has had a wander and found the Magic Money Tree it will be hard to try and impose austeriy again.

If they try to limit public service wages after relying on public service workers there will be blood.

Agree that Starmer is good at PMQs, as you'd expect him to be. I do fear that his alleged qualities of 'electability' aren't really founded in anything material, as when he's outside of a parliamentary environment he can be a very uninspiring speaker in my opinion. Hopefully this will change though. He will certainly be a better media operator than Corbyn regardless, and the Telegraph front page was impressive: Labour is manifestly unpopular amongst the older voters who make up much of the Telegraph's readership so this seemed shrewd. I will put to one side for now the question of whether Starmer will be able to sustain any good favour in the press.

Policy wise the alarm bells are ringing for me personally, though—he's appeared almost completely unwilling to push the government for anything substantial in terms of Coronavirus policy, or even to criticise the government in general. I understand some of the reasons behind this (the government are polling very highly and Starmer doesn't want to be seen to be playing party politics during a moment of international crisis), but asking the difficult questions now can shift policy in a positive direction which will lessen the material impact of the virus. Like them or not, Corbyn and McDonnell have been doing exactly that for a long time now. There are signs that Starmer is starting to take a more interrogative approach but he needs to be more vocal and more comprehensive in his criticism of the government in my opinion.

No, you're a case in point

You're saying I am similar to Kier Starmer?

In many ways we are the exact opposite from each other. You've got this wrong.

I really hope this is true but I fear that it won't be. The arguments for austerity are already coming thick and fast from certain Tories, even though constraining fiscal spending at this time would be absolutely catastrophic. What I would like to see Starmer do is capitalise upon the fact that the Tories have 'found the magic money tree' and use this to rebuke the caustic 'common sense' that government spending is like household spending, and as an argument for public spending more generally. Now is surely the moment at which the importance of a well-funded public sphere has become most clear.

Instead, I fear he will fall into the trap that the Milliband administration did, which was trying to play the same game of 'fiscal conservatism' as the Tories. I hope not though!