Seizing back control: The ILX lol brexit is how we're all gonna die thread.

Tories out!

Godwin’s got one answer to every political issue and it’s that there needs to be more immigrant-bashing in politics. I live for this cunt being shown up.

FPBEs are always insufferable, but particularly when crowing about Islington results.

As pointed out elsewhere on twitter, Islington south was a Lib Dem marginal when Thornberry first won it.

Absolutely tragic that this Conservative MEP trooper won’t be returning to Brussels:

Members of European Parliament in Strasbourg reacted with rage after Syed Kamall, the leader of the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR), said Nazis subscribed to a “left-wing ideology” and “want the same things” as Socialists do.

Kamall, the voice of the U.K. Conservative Party in the Parliament, was responding to an earlier speech by German MEP Udo Bullmann, the leader of the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats, during which he said that “right-wing nationalism and extremists” are “undermining the European Union.”

In reply, Kamall told Bullmann: “When you talk about right-wing extremists, we have to remember that Nazis were national socialists. It’s a strain of socialism.”

He then added: “It’s a left-wing ideology, they want the same things as you, let’s be quite clear.” When the chamber erupted in outrage, with some MEPs shouting out “rubbish,” Kamall said: “You don’t like the truth, do you?”

Totally confident it will be fine for Labour:

We’re witnessing a nightmare future for the Labour Party. Its metropolitan Hampstead voters have fled to the Liberal Democrats; the provincial Humberside heartlands to the Brexit party. The fence Jeremy Corbyn has been sitting on has been taken away. #EuropeanElectionResults

— Sebastian Payne (@SebastianEPayne) May 26, 2019

CHUK deny LDs a seat in wales and NE

supremely dumb election

Batshit Batten's unseated.

Yorkshire & the Humber get 6 MEPs and the 6th one is @MagicMagid for the Greens, so that (and the Batten result) is some good news which might mean it's a good time to go to bed...

Daniel Hannan out?

The Lib Dem results are arguably good for the main parties - because they act as a reminder that this is a single-issue election, and we should no more fear rule by the Brexit Party than we should fear rule by the Lib Dems.

btw this is from over an hour ago on the Graun liveblog but I felt the need to paste it here

an election agent ... found one ballot which had ‘wank’ written in every single box apart from that of the Green party. The voter left a note saying ‘not wank’ for the environmentalist party which was deemed acceptable as a vote.

Claire Fox MEP. The most depressing aspect of this election.

Apart from namby pamby Remoaners voting for a pro-austerity party.

So is there a Brexit this week or what

Was that funny in your mind

Rather unfortunately John Curtice seems unable to pronounce the word, 'European'.

xxxxxp to a passing spacecadet

Should have been 'good guy' for the greens, surely....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z_UGD7AazMI

Soubz is a mess. First talking usual bollox about CuKs lack of party tribalism and new way of doing politics etc, then angrily dismissing Heidi Allen's LibDem pact/tactical voting talk as "bizarre". It sounds like they might even split into two more parties before next GE.

is it bad? I can't even really tell - has that feeling of people seeing what they want to see

that Brexit party logo is good - massive improvement on ukip branding

it does sound like Corbyn is going to be put under increasing 2nd ref pressure. And Farage says He's Ready.

I’m VERY curious to know which agency did the Brexit Party PPB and branding, and who paid for it.

lot of calls for mr seumas milne to have a long hard look at himself this morning

Seumas Milne is George Soros for the most boring people alive.

— linkshund (@linkshund) April 27, 2019

If Seumas (still daily calls up his best pal/guru Galloway .. or Chief is it?) then he has only one degree of separation between himself and Farage and fucking Bannon. Just saying!

They’re all projecting based on Campbell’s role back when, yes?

that’s as may be. labour’s policy is formed democratically by conference though - not by the whims of the corbyn whisperer. this idea that policy is being held hostage by “lexit cranks” is conspiracist nonsense

Oh, I totally agree. There’s nothing like a Milne The Shadowy Puppetmaster hot take for making me question someone’s intelligence (and I notice that nobody itt has ever drawn that conclusion).

What I like most about the Brexit party logo is how 'Public Information' and neutral seeming it is. 'This way to the waterslides" , 'Leaving the EU is now on platform 7 over the footbridge"

It's definitely a design improvement on Ukip's pound sign travesty - jesus wept - only a dysfunctional party would have stuck with that for so long.

it's been similar to the post local elections autopsy on R4 this morning, where lots of commentators who know better - all talking in high octane speak what these results transposed to a GE would mean. I'm not saying the results are meaningless, but it's a 40% turnout and ppl vote differently in EU elections, and yes Farage is polling high in Westminster polls but erm..famous last words - don't panic or maybe do.

Claire Fox MEP. The most depressing aspect of this election.

Also anyone extrapolating these results to a GE is a total charlatan. As if, as fucking if.

What else are Lib Dems gonna do?

I just saw a Corbyn should watch it in his Islington seat thank you Jesus for this tweet.

Totally. But I do think Labour have to pivot now, as we’ve reached that stage in the conference agreement. Tories will not call a GE of their own volition and the Labour membership needs to be enthused enough to go out campaigning as they did in 2017. So that means a strong ‘stay and fight’ rather than ‘remain and reform’ message (‘reform’ being usually a term to manage cuts or privatisation in the hands of ‘modernisers’, see also ‘changes’). I also think that precariously employed Leavers in the Midlands/North can be appealed to with attention on jobs, services and attacks on the attitudes of the right.

Can't really tell - there seems to be a more cohesive effort on Farage's part to explicitly target Westminster rather than just leaving EU. The beginnings of a pivot. Whether thats successful or not is another thing entirely (and depends what you define 'successful' as). I think you're right on turnout (didn't realize turnout in last GE was almost 70%! - or that its risen for 4 straight elections!)

so yeah, extrapolating too credulously is dumb but on the other hand...is it implausible to think Farage couldn't take... 10% of Tory seats in a GE? especially if the Tories don't choose Boris? I don't really have a handle

Corbyn hasn't changed his line at all (the tweet is saying it's a shift but if it's that just look at the quote)

Most signif news of the night for Labour, @jeremycorbyn says: "With the Conservatives disintegrating and unable to govern, and parliament deadlocked, this issue will have to go back to the people" - via either an election or a referendum.https://t.co/O2Ie0WmI96

— Paul Waugh (@paulwaugh) May 26, 2019

Sorry garbled don't look at Paul Waugh's brain-dead tweet just the quote.

Basically Brexit Party (as has been shown in some of the polling) would take seats off Tories and be good for Labour.

so yeah, extrapolating too credulously is dumb but on the other hand...is it implausible to think Farage couldn't take... 10% of Tory seats in a GE? especially if the Tories don't choose Boris? I don't really have a handle

Not to harp on about this, but when Theresa May became Prime Minister, an overwhelming majority of people thought we should have a negotiated Brexit.

— Stephen Bush (@stephenkb) May 26, 2019

depressing

They will split the Tory vote...unless the new Tory leader offers some sort of incentive for them to go away.
― gyac,

Ok yea, makes sense but how does this manifest. Splitting the vote in seat a) so Labour or LDs get in, or splitting the vote in seat b) where Labour is weak, and letting Brexit party get in - and once/if they have a few seats? And what if in seat a) Labour vote is also split, some to Brexit, some to LDs, not even large amounts. Enough to let them in - how many seats is this possible in? 3? 15? 50? 0?

I’m sure that if Brexit Party wins seats at Westminster it will go into coalition with the Tories - seeing as so many of the right flit from Brexit/UKIP to Tory (as in 2017).

have to admire the brass here

The case for a #PeoplesVote with the option to remain is now unequivocal. Anti-Brexit parties beat Pro-Brexit parties by over 5%. This national election sent a clear message. Put it back to the people now! #EuropeanElectionResults pic.twitter.com/ld14Kqxiig

— Layla Moran 🔶 (@LaylaMoran) May 27, 2019

Not disagreeing with calzino's post upthread, but 40% turnout is a new high for the UK in EU elections.

Farage is demanding a seat at the negotiating table opposite the EU - he's a vain little fucker, possibly that and a knighthood would do him.

To counter Claire Fox gloom Magid got in as MEP

Totally explains why Greens came second in the People’s Republic Of South Yorkshire.

Oh good Martin Daubney MEP as well.

that’s as may be. labour’s policy is formed democratically by conference though - not by the whims of the corbyn whisperer. this idea that policy is being held hostage by “lexit cranks” is conspiracist nonsense

To an extent yes, but given a fully free hand the conference wouldn't have voted for the policy in its current form, its an awkward fudge between the membership and the leadership, and indeed between different factions of the leadership. The point was to give an impression of unity and allow different groups of voters to see what they wanted to see in it. In the end the answer was 'not much' - my guess is that most people who voted Labour voted for them despite their Brexit policy rather than because of it.

The difference is that in the meantime the Brexit middle-ground has collapsed. Regardless of parliamentary arithmetic, it looks like the parties and their voters are going to pull further apart, it's either Hard Brexit or Full Remain. Seems increasingly hard to imagine any kind of negotiated middle ground or soft Brexit being able to hold enough voters for long.

But the Parliamentary arithmetic hasn't gone away either - the Tories are going to do everything they can to avoid an election now, the CHUKs won't break the government, it just deepens the deadlock further. In the meanwhile the Tories will pivot to Hard Brexit under a new leader in desperation - that offers Labour an opportunity to evolve their policy position into something that actually makes sense to people.

A new Tory leader, bogged down by the exact same issues as May, could go hard Brexit and call an election early. We'll find out shortly. They are far more screwed than Labour this morning. Farage really fucking the Tories is funny on one level.

I think Labour has to account for the fact of low turnout and that there will be much wider policy field whenever the next election is held. The unknown are the conditions at which it is held, and when. Today is noisy, tomorrow less so - time for cool heads.

I would like to to think that the Labour left can offer better than 'Reform and Remain' as a platform.

you are the coup.

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) May 27, 2019

Mommy and daddy are fighting

Labour performed badly this time round because they failed to learn the lessons of the last few elections:

- They didn't learn the lesson of 2015, which is do not under any circumstances be seen to be working with the Tories. It killed Scottish Labour, it killed the LibDems for a long time, reaching across the aisle was the last straw for some of the younger, broadly pro-Corbyn voters I know, who went Green instead. Corbyn was right to refuse to do so the first time, and it'll be impossible to do so with whoever the new Tory leader is. The difference is it killed the Tories even worse this time round, British politics doesn't reward bipartisanship.

- They didn't learn the lesson of their own strong performance in 2017, which showed the importance of crystal clear policy positions, the opposite of what they had in 2015 and in 2019. One of the problems with trying to be all things to all people is you end up not meaning much to anyone, that's what ultimately broke New Labour. It became obvious Ed Miliband wouldn't win when the message became "our cuts are better than your cuts". "Our Brexit is better than your Brexit" is much the same, it pleases no one.

- They didn't learn the lesson of both elections, which is don't over-rely on the toxicity of your opponents, especially the LibDems this time round. I'm not going to be stupid enough to make any predictions about the next GE, but Labour need to be very alert to the possibility of toxiying themselves with enough of the electorate to cost them clear seats. One reason they outperformed expectations in 2017 was that the LibDem vote didn't rebound - essentially Labour hoovered up the anti-Brexit voters who wanted to give May's Tories a kicking - but they also hoovered up the Green vote as well. That enabled them to win a number of surprising seats and that vote peeling off next time could lose them a few as well.

Obviously the main difference is the complete collapse of the Tories this time, we all know what they're going to do next. I'm not saying a pivot to full support for a 2nd Referendum is a magic bullet for Labour, but it's hard to see any other option working better for them right now.