Ne'er get thee stitched til Booris be ditched: UK General Election 2019

But it's not just about Jonathan Freedland. He summarizes the views of an important segment of the Jewish community, including many who are by no means hostile to Corbyn's policies.

well, shit, guess they're gonna vote against the policies they like then

was going to post that. my personal feeling is that he’s made some ill-judged moves usually on some sort of Palestine vector, which is a problematic space on the left and includes some nasty anti-semitic fellow travellers, but has himself supported religious communities of all sorts including Jewish communities and their interests.

xp

pom also correct - using my friend as an example to generalise from, freedland’s view is representative of a large segment of jewish people.

My sister-in-law would definitely vote Labour but for Corbyn, she's anti-Independence so voting SNP is a problem, but I reckon that's what she'll end up doing. Her constituency is Tory just now.

The footage of the 'British sense of humour' speech still makes me deeply uncomfortable, I'm not convinced he personally is antisemitic but he has definitely been guilty of unthinkingly repeating antisemitic tropes and playing to an antisemitic crowd. Whether there's any difference there really I don't know, I wouldn't blame any Jewish person for feeling trepidation at the very least and it's a bad look for anyone to be dismissing or belittling that. It's also not the only example of antisemitism we've seen from Labour (Michael Howard as a pig, anyone) and I have no time for non-Jews who only decide antisemitism is bad when it suits them politically.

At the same time it's awful to see the concerns of the black British community, who have seen friends and relatives literally involuntarily repatriated, overlooked in these 'can't put Corbyn into Number 10' pieces. Like it or not it's Corbyn or Johnson and British Jewish people are not the only minority with reasons to feel fearful right now.

I mean Tory MEPs literally voted in support of Viktor Orban but apparently there's only one party with an antisemitism problem.

the tories are also rabidly anti-muslim as a party and there's way less ink-spilled regarding that

that british sense of humour thing was bad on many levels.

yes - that is one of the most frustrating parts of this discussion. the focus on tory party islamophobia elides their own very real issues with antisemitism. the simon wren-lewis article is really good. definitely accept the party has a problem & there’s no doubt that JC’s ascendancy has let fringe elements (suppressed by new labour hegemony) resurface

focus in massive inverted commas there

True, but the Jewish vote plummeted in the Miliband years, when EM made recognition of a Palestinian state official Labour policy. Obviously Corbyn hasn’t altered the two-state policy at all, but I find the “it’s nothing he’s ever *said* but we know what he’s *thinking*’ assertions about him really awful in light of that rationale being trotted out by antisemites re: Jewish people having a hive mind about various things.

tbf to my sister-in-law when one of her friends said he was voting Tory she said "But Boris is an Islamophobe".

Also MDC OTM.

... she also said she'd encountered anti-Semitism from SNP supporters, which I can believe.

Re: that mainly macro blog post:

Corbyn was commenting after the Palestinian ambassador to the U.K., who was born and raised in Jerusalem, had made an ironic statement. Corbyn made the observation that when the ambassador had made the same comment in his address to parliament, some Zionists in the audience “berated” the ambassador for what he said.

He said that those who berated the ambassador “don’t want to study history, and secondly, having lived in this country for a very long time, probably all their lives, don’t understand English irony either.” By comparison, Corbyn went on, “Manuel does understand English irony, and uses it very effectively.” So Corbyn was not making a remark about all Zionists, let alone all Jews, but a few in particular - those who had misunderstood the ambassador’s remark at the time. There is no hint of any generalisation from a particular group of Zionists to all Zionists in the UK.

I fail to see how context exonerates him in this particular instance? He could've (and should've) just said 'they don't understand irony' tout court.

Jews not understanding irony seems unlikely ime!

I believe he was talking about two men who regularly go to these events mostly to heckle Palestinians, and have form for being rude and disruptive (I watched the footage when it first came to light and it came off, to me, like someone telling off a native English speaking bigot for being rude to someone whose first language isn’t English, who nevertheless has a better command of it than the rude native).

https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/germany-ends-tampon-tax/

^ Labour could knock our socks off by going further on this

I was talking to a friend from Germany and has two children over there the other day and he was telling me about some of their loony left (well according to right wing uk commentariat) policies like free childcare, free school dinners, and think he also said people on benefits get free heating/electricity. He also said the kids at school have a dinner monitor encouraging them to eat their greens or something .. possibly that's nanny state going to far!

yeah, basically germany under christian democrat hegemony seems to be basically luxury space communism compared to anywhere in the anglophone world

need to use basically less

What does that make France?

well france nobody under 40 has a job it seems like so it seems less exciting

I just want to echo what Matt said above re other communities, and we are way past the point of being toxic and this is way too far into people playing communities off each other for their own benefit. Sorry to cite SV’s post yesterday, but a lot of the more racist view is that Corbyn is deliberately peddling antisemtism to appeal to Muslim voters - a view that has been thoroughly discredited and is shockingly racist, yet one constantly alluded to by people who should really know better. Feeling like Lionel Hutz going “there’s racism and there’s racism” - where one is bad and evil and needs rooting out, and the others the kind you do for votes.

In French public discourse Germany's 'mini jobs' are often held up as the slippery last step before zero-hour neo-liberal dystopia.

xp

my kids’ dinner ladies in London definitely tell them to eat their greens! it has provoked a phalanx of inventive skullduggery to get around. take that, Target Culture UK

strange things occurring on AQ tonight. I understand it's probably purdah why the host gave Diane Abbott a warm intro but weird listening to a Surrey studio audience clapping her, but it's obv a very remain audience. Shock horror Claire Fox thinks government owning means of fibre-optic communication is sinister stuff.

The thing that always sticks in my mind about fibre optic cable is that if it breaks in your hands and cuts you it can send a tiny crystal shard of death straight through your bloodstream and into your heart and kills you dead!

I like being killed by fibre optic cable, I think it's good

death by copper cable is so 20th century

https://www.northnorfolknews.co.uk/polopoly_fs/1.6378414.1573835351!/image/image.jpg_gen/derivatives/landscape_630/image.jpg

Tories hope to bag 'Norman factor' voters

I can't believe this North Norfolk News headline is actually referring to Sir Norman Lamb and not the current tory candidate in the picture.

can't believe it's not referring to the 11th Century tbh

that "Norman factor" is still going very strong!

tommy robinson endorsement... yikes

Big fire on an (apparently clad) block of student flat in Bolton tonight

Btw I've decided to officially endorse labour at this with election

Chris Mason mainly quite good on AQ i thought. That said I loved Abbot just flicking away his attempted gotcha.

2.1m views for that clip of boris johnson failing to say "I like a cup of tea, I like fish and chips, I'm a loving dad, I like boxsets, I love to watch england playing rugby and football etc"

I can’t believe people whinging about it being a “weird” or “unfair” question - it’s piss easy!

Corbyn is in Huddersfield talking about nationalising trains.

you mean Train Communism?

With Rod Stewart as Secretary of State for Transport.

I think the bizarre decision of the tories to run the hated Ken Davy as their candidate in Hudds will mean even the hated Barry Sheerwaste will be in a safe seat. But good to see them leaving nothing to chance.

Bolton Cube fire not a surprise. Bob Neil has been rightly banging on about fact that while local authorities have stripped their cladding, private landlords and freeholders have not - and government has done little to compel them.

— Stephen Bush (@stephenkb) November 16, 2019

no deaths so it is fair to say it's not too soon to politicise the fuck out of this: weak on landlords, weak on building regs that are there to stop people dying. Chairman Mao would have sorted this out years ago.

can’t believe the invisible hand of the free market hasn’t sorted this out yet

only one thing for it: more tax cuts for the rich

I saw this classic three year old Hedges tweet
(Re yesterday)

I also have impeccable left wing credentials, but when it comes to the big day I vote Tory just like you do, I can't help myself

— Simon Hedges #BeKindOnline (@Orwell_Fan) September 26, 2016

Anymore on this?

🚨 Met Police say they are looking into two allegations of “electoral fraud and malpractice" regarding offers from the Conservatives to Brexit Party candidates to incentivise them to stand down 🚨

Several Brexit Party figures claim they were offered inducements. Tories deny.

— Paul Brand (@PaulBrandITV) November 16, 2019

awful

The home secretary, Priti Patel, made a last-minute intervention to block a rescue operation to bring British orphans and unaccompanied minors home from Syria, the Observer has revealed.

Patel was backed by several other ministers, including the defence secretary, Ben Wallace, when she objected to the extraction of British children from the war-ravaged country during National Security Council meetings last month and internal discussions.

Mark Townsend, the Observer’s home affairs editor, reports:

More than 60 British minors, including at least three orphans, had been identified, and a quick and safe route identified to take them out of north-east Syria and then to Erbil, Iraq, where they would be flown home direct to the UK.

It has also emerged that not only had the extraction plan been prepared but that a number of councils in the UK had offered the care package and reintegration programme necessary for the children following their arrival in the UK.

The charity Save the Children, which has officials working in north-east Syria, described the resistance from ministers such as Patel as “grievous irresponsibility” and said that “playing politics” with children’s lives was unacceptable.

Classy of the Observer to refer to them as ‘Isis children’ in the headline

playing politics with children’s lives is the conservative m.o.

Will only extract the children they’ve sent over to fight in the first place.