Jeremy Corbyn vs Angela Eagle

It's the classic 'scoundrel defence'

owen smith comes across as a grasping little shit.

the guy some ppl think will 'save Labour'

Smith seems to be repeating talking points from this awful Tristram Hunt article, Corbyn is "metropolitan", squeamish about patriotism an so on:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/may/15/therell-always-be-an-england-tristram-hunt-labour-patriotism

seems an awkward fit with Smith's attempts to outflank Corbyn by being more pro-EU, talking about a second EU referendum etc. the idea that this was an area of vulnerability for Corbyn - where there is a gap between his position and that of many of his supporters - seems accurate to me, but Smith hasn't given any indication that he has the right stuff to be able to take advantage of this

hey, turns out it's the first refuge of a scoundrel

I don't really understand who he thinks that's going to play with.

A lot of the MPs who claim that the party doesn't understand non-metropolitan working class communities carry on supporting austerity. Or equivocating over it at the very least.

Is he trying to coax the Labour voters who left for UKIP back now that that party's goals are apparently achieved?

Or does he envision a future with a National Socialist Party?

Those voters aren't going to eligible and they certainly aren't going to pay £25 to support a guy who wants a second referendum.

Dude should just stick "any port in a storm, eh?" on all his campaign literature and leave it at that.

Is it me, or is his entire campaign just coming across like a bit of a botched robbery. Only instead of moving on when he realises that he can't get in to steal anything he's getting himself photographed holding the brick?

Ugh. It's edifying, watching Owen Smith try to suggest Corbyn is unpatriotic.

THe high Court case being taken by the multi-millionaire Labour donor Aseem Allam is starting today. The one about whether Corbyn needed 50 MPs' support to be on the ballot.
Allam was just talking on the BBC News channel. My tv signal screwed up while he was talking but the bit I did hear was going on about how the Left Wing leaning of the Labour Party should be a thing of the past because fo teh vast success they had heading right.

Norman Smith the Parliament correspondent was saying it might be a bit of an uphill battle for thechallengers since Judges don't like to get involved in Party political decisions. Not that this is a pointless case or anything.

Her also aid that the precedent being given of Neil Kinnock coming up with the 50+ signatures when his leadership was being challenged may well have been him simply ostentatiously showing what support he had. Looks like the Corbyn side are saying that the Labour Party rules don't actually say that the challengers themselves have to show that amount of supporters either.
Which might be a bit of a dodgy precedent to set. Though maybe the idea that anybody with no support challenging a standing leader is already a losing battle.

Allam really struggles with not getting his own way

but i return to my regular point that millionaire business people should not be welcome within a hundred miles of the Labour Party

CON 43% (+4)
LAB 27% (-2)

Typo in my last post it should be He also said not Her also aid

6 years into Tory austerity, a disastrous referendum and the resignation of the PM you'd be hoping the numbers there would be a little uh different

Given that McDonnell has said Corbyn will quit if he doesn't win an election (although I'm not sure I believe that) this is really a question of when and how Corbyn fails, not if, and what he actually expects to achieve in the meantime.

Incoming PMs usually enjoy a substantial polling bounce though. Even Gordon Brown was briefly very popular after assuming office.

Is that voting intention Matt? Yes, Ipsos MORI has this astonishingly line from 2007:

20-26 September 2007
CON: 31%
LAB: 44%
LD: 15%

I think it was October 07 when he announced that he wasn't going to call an election and his popularity collapsed and never recovered. And the economic cracks were only beginning to show back then. Given the challenges she faces, a similar collapse in May's ratings is far from impossible, although it doesn't follow that those votes would transfer to a Corbyn-led Labour.

Presumably no more so for a Labour with an alternative leader. Though that would be even more speculative anyway.

Of course, we can never know, but I believe a new PM gets a popularity boost, which would evap if they actually called an election based on "I'm popular right now"

I'm not sure how much credence to give polls after the last general election

Virtually none but a constant in recent polls has been a tendency to underestimate the right-wing vote.

Yeah I'm not making claims for a hidden left vote but there are a lot of potential voters outside the tribal categories now

Are people actually reacting against visible statistics by making protest votes that they don't think will alter perceived trends.

I was trying to remember the term for when a situation is altered by the fact that it's being observed.

QUANTUM VOTING

The uncertainty principle

xp

Sadiq Khan, the only Labour politician with any actual power, has declined to endorse Owen Smith.

back from two weeks away and is owen smith meant to make angela eagle look welcome in retrospect? he's really been building on that "progressive case for restricting freedom of movement" reputation as a nasty little shit that was my introduction to him two hours after brexit

Owen smith referencing having grown up during the miners strike for his bona fides (in email)

xp
Does that count as a Corbyn endorsement from Khan though? I vaguely recall him snubbing him after winning the mayoral election - or at least it was reported thus.

I think it qualifies as "not going anywhere near this clusterfuck".

Yes, I don't think Sadiq Khan is any supporter of Corbyn's.

He proposed Corbyn as a candidate for leader in the first instance

I don't think Khan has any truck with Corbyn as leader but he either feels closer to him politically or, more likely, is savvy enough to distance himself from the Blue Labour wing of this contest

xp
yeah but so did Margaret Beckett and she cried a river about it recently on R4

Are people actually reacting against visible statistics by making protest votes that they don't think will alter perceived trends.
I was trying to remember the term for when a situation is altered by the fact that it's being observed.
― Stevolende, Tuesday, 26 July 2016 12:54 (3 hours ago) Permalink

QUANTUM VOTING
― illegal economic migration (Tracer Hand), Tuesday, 26 July 2016 12:54 (3 hours ago) Permalink

The uncertainty principle
xp
― Le Bateau Ivre, Tuesday, 26 July 2016 12:56 (3 hours ago) Permalink

Except labour is dead no matter whether or not you look

or which way you vote

Bercow has dismissed Malhotra's claims of unauthorised entry into her office, it sounded like bullshit.

Author of Corbynomics continues to slate Corbyn and his team, backs Smith:

http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2016/07/26/there-is-only-one-chance-of-a-green-new-deal-right-now-and-jeremy-corbyn-has-never-been-near-the-idea/

I keep hearing the Malhotra story without emphasis that the supposed intruder was herself female. So hope that's the end of that story and it doesn't gain momentum as chinese whispers like the 'Constituency office' window seems to be getting.

What really isn't a good look is Malhotra's self-victimising behaviour when it is her action that had a member of staff fearing for her job and profusely apologising for doing no real harm to anyone.

I agree, main point of what I said there was that I was hearing the story emerging at the time that people were talking about women MPs being harassed. So I'd be thinking that it would automatically be assumed it was a senior male MP or something that 'intruded'.
It was one of McDonnel's points on Sunday morning that people shouldn't be causing distress to powerless staff. That in the same comment as the appeal to stop tearing the party apart. In fact I think he led from the comment in response to the aide's story coming up in the Marr interview into that appeal.

I agree, main point of what I said there was that I was hearing the story emerging at the time that people were talking about women MPs being harassed. So I'd be thinking that it would automatically be assumed it was a senior male MP or something that 'intruded'.

That's really really dumb... If this was - which it isn't - a misogynist male MP trying to harass a female MP, it would make sense to order a female staff member to do the dirty work.

Please stop playing detective to uncover the truth behind all harassment. It's exhausting.

Please stop electing yourself to being the list police. What you were saying the other night was embarrasing.

Have u guys met

List police?

"Owen Smith says UK cannot scrap Trident while Donald Trump could end up "with his finger on nuclear button" in US."