Keir Starmer

[The perfect fumble]

Fair enough, I do not see them as left wing, they are liberals, comfortable with the free market and capitalism and seek to use capitalism to promote social equality. The right wing of the Labour party is full of these people.

Just so.

But Starmer and Corbyn, who disagree on just about everything, do agree on taking the knee and the importance of using the right pronouns when addressing trans women.

Identity politics has infected both the right and left of the Labour party, increasingly it's all it has.

Class is a dirty word for both wings.

Starmer is an enemy of the working class and he knows it.

And so is Corbyn, though I suspect he doesn't know it. Jeremy stands up for the working class alright! But it's a working class that exists entirely in his imagination. It's a working class as he would have it and not as it actually is.

 

[Citizen of Legoland]

I am not being pedantic , but no PM is ever elected. The person who becomes PM is the First (Prime) Minister of the party elected to form a Government.

Dismissing Atlee, possibly the greatest and most influential of all Prime Ministers, as becoming PM only because of the war is a little strange, the Labour Party was elected because of a magnificent manifesto against a PM who is considered a War Hero.

And it is not three, its four you forgot Ramsey Macdonald, he was the first Labour PM not Atlee.

Yes, I meant first PM with a majority (I'm discounting the National Government that MacDonald led). Also, I agree I was a little unkind to Atlee who was a great leader, albeit there were various reasons as to why he gained office with such a majority and this didn't exactly last long.

The point was to show how fragile Labour actually are, historically. I certainly want a choice of someone to vote for, but I've never really looked at how badly they've performed down the years, despite being a Labour supporter in the main, I always saw them on an equal footing with the Cons. I'm aware of how the voting works, but as sad as it is personalities count, and in fact that was part of the reason Atlee won - people saw Churchill as a wartime leader and were happy with that but hadn't forgotten what a bad person he was in earlier times, but if a party wants to suggest they'll nominate their leader after an election, then good luck to them, I'd predict a huge disaster with that policy.

My point being, if only Atlee, Wilson & Blair have found the formula to win (enough to form a workable government), it doesn't bode well for Starmer.

 

[Rascal]

Just so.

But Starmer and Corbyn, who disagree on just about everything, do agree on taking the knee and the importance of using the right pronouns when addressing trans women.

Identity politics has infected both the right and left of the Labour party, increasingly it's all it has.

Class is a dirty word for both wings.

Starmer is an enemy of the working class and he knows it.

And so is Corbyn, though I suspect he doesn't know it. Jeremy stands up for the working class alright! But it's a working class that exists entirely in his imagination. It's a working class as he would have it and not as it actually is.

I am not so sure it has infected the left, it is portrayed as having infected the left, It has been the case since Labour councils were portrayed as giving huge amounts of money to causes such as one legged lesbians against the bomb and other such monikers,

I genuinely can not remember ever one time when I discussed with friends who are left wing issues such as trans rights, taking the knee, or any other of these culture war issues. I have discussed with them with a friend of mine who holds very right wing views and is against people taking the knee, is against trans rights and all the other issues that the culture wars have produced. I do believe the culture war issues are created by the right wing to cause division where there was no division before. America does it with the abortion issue, where it is seen as a right wing cause to be pro-life, no doubt that issue will surface here at some point promoted by RW politicians in order to create further division.

The aim of using these issues is to divide the working class, because it suits the Capitalist class to keep the working class divided. Whilst the working class are arguing over whether taking the knee is something that began with Martin Luther King or its in support of what my RW mate says are "Marxists intent on destroying civilisation" its the capitalist class who laugh their bolloxs off and steal the countries treasure.

I mean since when has been advocating for antiracism been a bad thing, because it isn't, for the simple reason most of the victims of racism have more in common with the working class kids than they do the exploitative capitalist class as they are working class themselves. My next door neighbours are a family of Nigerian heritage, they are hard working, he works on the rigs, she works in an office and I have far more in common with them than i do with say Jacob Rees Mogg and other RW fruitcakes. Me and him talk about the football, his wife is good with my mam, the kids are polite just like kids from council estates are supposed to be towards their elders. If the Capitalist class and the RW fruitcakes get there way, i should be looking down on my neighbours as they not my equals, i am their better. Which is of course fucking nonsense.

I do think Starmer has a liberal vision for the UK, Corbyn too in some respects, because the labour party moved rightwards under Blair towards this mythical centre ground. To me being on that centrist ground means you accept that capitalism will exploit the working class and you will try and use it to distribute wealth more equally, where as i believe that is the wrong place to start and we should be subduing capitalism and getting rid of its excesses and following a state capitalist/nationalisation model where the people have more democratic say in their lives and people are put before profit.

The Labour party has to find a message that resonates with the working class, you are 100% correct in that it is not a message that involves calling Bernard from Bacup, Miss because he wears a dress, it should be about the things that matter like good housing, decent schools, a well funded health service, the stuff that means our kids get a good start in life so they can make the best of their abilities. it should never be about equality of outcome but of equality of opportunity.

 

[The perfect fumble]

I am not so sure it has infected the left, it is portrayed as having infected the left, It has been the case since Labour councils were portrayed as giving huge amounts of money to causes such as one legged lesbians against the bomb and other such monikers,

I genuinely can not remember ever one time when I discussed with friends who are left wing issues such as trans rights, taking the knee, or any other of these culture war issues. I have discussed with them with a friend of mine who holds very right wing views and is against people taking the knee, is against trans rights and all the other issues that the culture wars have produced. I do believe the culture war issues are created by the right wing to cause division where there was no division before. America does it with the abortion issue, where it is seen as a right wing cause to be pro-life, no doubt that issue will surface here at some point promoted by RW politicians in order to create further division.

The aim of using these issues is to divide the working class, because it suits the Capitalist class to keep the working class divided. Whilst the working class are arguing over whether taking the knee is something that began with Martin Luther King or its in support of what my RW mate says are "Marxists intent on destroying civilisation" its the capitalist class who laugh their bolloxs off and steal the countries treasure.

I mean since when has been advocating for antiracism been a bad thing, because it isn't, for the simple reason most of the victims of racism have more in common with the working class kids than they do the exploitative capitalist class as they are working class themselves. My next door neighbours are a family of Nigerian heritage, they are hard working, he works on the rigs, she works in an office and I have far more in common with them than i do with say Jacob Rees Mogg and other RW fruitcakes. Me and him talk about the football, his wife is good with my mam, the kids are polite just like kids from council estates are supposed to be towards their elders. If the Capitalist class and the RW fruitcakes get there way, i should be looking down on my neighbours as they not my equals, i am their better. Which is of course fucking nonsense.

I do think Starmer has a liberal vision for the UK, Corbyn too in some respects, because the labour party moved rightwards under Blair towards this mythical centre ground. To me being on that centrist ground means you accept that capitalism will exploit the working class and you will try and use it to distribute wealth more equally, where as i believe that is the wrong place to start and we should be subduing capitalism and getting rid of its excesses and following a state capitalist/nationalisation model where the people have more democratic say in their lives and people are put before profit.

The Labour party has to find a message that resonates with the working class, you are 100% correct in that it is not a message that involves calling Bernard from Bacup, Miss because he wears a dress, it should be about the things that matter like good housing, decent schools, a well funded health service, the stuff that means our kids get a good start in life so they can make the best of their abilities. it should never be about equality of outcome but of equality of opportunity.

Then the Labour Party is not for you.

The only Labour Party that is allowed to exist is the one we presently have. The Corbyn episode, which "threatened" a fundamental realignment of the economy in favour of working people was defeated both from within and without. We know this, Starmer knows this, that's why he's banned CLP discussion about Corbyn's continued denial of the whip, because it would clearly distress Jewish members! When we should all be doing a collective mea culpa for our anti-Semitic crimes.

The party is fucked, you might talk dialectical materialism and mixed economy models, but no one with any power is.

As for....

most of the victims of racism have more in common with the working class kids than they do the exploitative capitalist class as they are working class themselves.

I'm not so sure and not just because of false consciousness. The Labour Party was a class based party that's why old timers like you and I appeal to class solidarity when things look grim, but it's not a classed based party now. Both major parties are aware of the material reality of class inequality, they exploit it for their own ends but neither of them has policies to address it.

As for your Nigerian neighbour, he clearly has a nice family, I have a soft spot for Nigerians having lived there, but he might very well see himself first and foremost as a Nigerian, proud of his history and heritage, that might define how he sees himself as a person. Or he might be gay, or Catholic, or Evangelical, he might be a patriarch, or liberal or right wing, he might be Yoruba and hate the Hausa, he might be many things of which his working classness might not feature very much or not at all. And as there's no mainstream political party out to foster working class solidarity and fashion policies accordingly who could blame him?

As for culture wars, the right might well have coined the phrase and use it for its own ends, but the atomised nature of our society is there for all to see, that is simply a reality, all they've done is weaponise it for their own purposes.

Mate, if the only arrow to your bow is to downplay this reality as nothing more than cynical establishment divide and rule, and counter it with appeals to class solidarity, then you're more of a dinosaur than I am and I'm in the fossil record.

 

[The perfect fumble]

This made me smile....

 

[Rascal]

Then the Labour Party is not for you.

It isn't anymore, I have been saying this for a while.

The party is fucked,

Double fucked, it should just go quietly and disband. A new leftist party without the baggage is needed.

Mate, if the only arrow to your bow is to downplay this reality as nothing more than cynical establishment divide and rule, and counter it with appeals to class solidarity, then you're more of a dinosaur than I am and I'm in the fossil record.

I do believe it is a cynical ploy, they were at it again yesterday with this white privilige stuff and then the One Nation One Britain stuff. It may be the only arrow to my bow, but its the only arrow I have because the left can not fight it because of the manipulation from the likes of the Tufton Street and its RW think tanks. Labour are still being blamed for things even now after how many years of Tory piss taking. It is all designed to keep rich older white men in positions of power and privilige, they use their wealth to enhance their standing in society and to influence political decision making so it favours them. As long as they make sure enough crumbs are thrown to those beneath them and enough propaganda is released then the receivers of crumbs will back them. Corbyn love him or loath him, scared them to death, he scared them that much they unleashed the dogs of war on him, they did it to Ed Miliband beforehand with their cynical attacks on his father and the ridiculousness of the bacon butty episode.

A dinosaur I may be, but I am only seen as a dinosaur because of the cynicism showed towards anything vaguely left wing and the efforts that are undertaken to undermine anything remotely left wing in thought. The backing of Starmer is evidence, he is comfortable for the cynics, they can afford him to be in power, because he is no threat to their standing, their status, their wealth. He epitomises everything that the right want in a Labour leader. If they get bored of Johnson, they could live with a Starmer government, then they can proclaim how great our democracy is when surely everyone can see it is a masquerade, a sham democracy in a country resembling a shambles for many. Where dog whistles have replaced policy, where profit is more important than people. The current Johnson government is probably the most Keynesian since Atlee, it has rebooted the state, it should be a time for the left to say we were right, but we cant, because it is hidden behind this culture war bullshit. The Tories throw crumbs, the receivers of crumbs are grateful for the crumbs and then repay the crumb givers with their support, the left though is trapped as the receivers of crumbs already have there crumbs and if Labour offered more crumbs the cynics would shout en masse "how are you paying for that, how is it funded" and then they show Diane Abbott making a mistake adding up and the crumb receivers think ah, yes they can't offer more crumbs because.............

I have to accept and even acknowledge that the Tory cunts are very good at doing what Tory cunts do best, winning power and convincing people they are the best party to be in power despite them being the biggest shower of incompetent fuckwits we have ever had to suffer.

At least in the Jurassic era there were no Tories because Teddy T-Rex scoffed the fat useless fuckers for breakfast.

 

[Rascal]

This made me smile....

Made me smile too, it is sad though ain't it.

 

[mat]

I was discussing on the picket line last Sunday about the UNITE general sec election will shape the trade unions relationship with Labour. And is it time the movement repeated history and start a new political party.

Starmer doesn't want manual workers representing the people as MPs in his party. He wants lawyers, and so called professional white collar workers who are secure enough to pontificate to people who aren't. They will tut and sympathise at people they see below them and throw a tiny bone which they will deem enough to soothe their own conscious.

 

[Vic]

PMQ Kier chooses the low rape charge stats. Johnson says 200 extra staff for the CPS. After a cut of 2500

And the liar ends questions about rape with talking about vaccinations.

 

[MillionMilesAway]

PMQ Kier chooses the low rape charge stats. Johnson says 200 extra staff for the CPS. After a cut of 2500

And the liar ends questions about rape with talking about vaccinations.

Had to like the "you can tell when he's losing" comment.

It was a ridiculous approach to answering though, just random other numbers which bore no relation to the point of the question.