bojo is king, brexit is on, stuff is fvcked, tomorrow starts here -- new govt new thread new battle

was specifically thinking about antisemitism when I wrote that - Labour leadership dragged on this and just hoped it would go away

I'm sure dead cats and memorable slogans would countered antisemitism just great -lol!

ofc the print media is completely stacked against Labour, so what do we do about it? Should be a qualifying question for any leadership candidate.

Rapid Response Unit ffs.

If Review Of London Books opens her campaign by holding aloft a copy of the Sun and burning it I will jump aboard so quickly

The Sun is comic book stuff, no-one takes it seriously, however the Times and the Telegraph still have an air of respectability despite, in the case of the Telegraph especially, becoming full on propaganda sheets.

or even better, the Times!

to some extent the aim used to be to get these newspapers on board but i think now a clean and decisive break is needed from these radicalised newsletters

lol that was an xp to self

You know how Corbz was fond of his Lenin hat. Maybe Becky could adopt an IRA bandanna?

btw the Museum of Neoliberalism was superb and the satire was spot-on - made and run by a N Englander of Irish extraction after calz's own heart - pay a visit if you're in the Lee area #se12 #myendz

https://www.spellingmistakescostlives.com/museumofneoliberalism

ofc the print media is completely stacked against Labour, so what do we do about it? Should be a qualifying question for any leadership candidate.

Someone that can stick up for themselves

Corbz never fought back on it, but didn't exactly apologise either. Caught between two stools. "Right we got rid of Steve, that guy in Derby, and that other one, any others you want looking at? Send them over, ok next question".

Things stick in part because you let them stick, classic bully behaviour and you get respect by standing up to a bully

Murdoch paper doused in lighter fluid and torched while held in fireproof glove during job application. Do it

Rapid Response Unit ffs.

― santa clause four (suzy), Monday, December 23, 2019 4:27 AM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

Was coming here to get pilloried for saying that labour’s media operation needs to be as good as the Alistair Cameron/rapid rebuttal unit era. Let’s make it clear that the mid 90s are a template because, as that open democracy article above, dealing with the mid 90s Murdoch press is child’s play compared to the weaponised social media we have todayand a broadcast media that more stacked against labour than I Can remember. But labour need to be that good in today’s environment.

I know 20 people who could happily serve in such a unit, time to fly my pretties!

"dealing with the mid 90s Murdoch press is child’s play compared to the weaponised social media"

that's a huge understatement, it isn't just the right wing press they are dealing with now. They are also dealing with the bbc who I can safely say have been a wing of CCHQ without sounding like a conspiracy nut. They are dealing with all the melt PLP internal wreckers who will happily give quotes to the enemy for free. They are dealing a Tory party with a huge budget (bolstered by Russian oligarch money) for social media smearing/campaigning. I am not even covering everything (cos I'm shit at long-posting!) here but Rapid Response these days would be like sending cavalry charges against Howitzers.

They can still be taken, with genuine populism, well thought out gulag construction and PEDs

sack seumas milne and appoint frankie boyle. not even joking

"well thought out gulag construction and PEDs"

I think big Tom Watson has a book out about PEDs (as opposed to PEDo conspiracies)

Thornberry's wretched leadership bid: if my polling is bad and the wider PLP reject me I'll stand down. Inspirational stuff.

What a pathetically transparent attempt to circumvent party democracy/show your contempt for the membership and showing your true (ever so to the right of centre left) colours at the same time. It's not like she was going to be in the next shadow cabinet anyway, so she's got nothing to lose I suppose.

Thornberry has big have I left the iron on energy. A jumble sale come to life, this is going nowhere

I could learn to like that style tbh! And i would get behind that messy style if her political instincts and politics weren't so wretched. Those people that get called all sorts of names on here always go on about message discipline, well McD had to send RLB out in Thornberry's place cos hers was so undisciplined. An unfortunate old clip of Clive Lewis from 2016 surfaced the other day, where he was saying he could have accidentally shot a civilian when he was serving in Afghan and wouldn't have earned an enquiry ...etc.. oh dear!

pic.twitter.com/gKkQb46s9C

— Howard Zinn's 10 Million McDonnell Relief Plan (@ZinnTruther) December 22, 2019

Talking of football forum idiots, an utter cock + posh uber-melt from my board and area (which I have abandoned tbh - well the board - i'm stuck in the region!) who accused me of "being on the spice" because I said he was a risible cunt for using "politically homeless". He has just got likes from both Sherriff and Brabin for saying he is "agonising" over joining the Labour Party (what is so difficult about it dickhead?) so he can vote for a melt candidate, and he adds his only previous political affiliation was being a student LibDem member. Lol what an absolute cunt!

just to make it better he is a wannabe stand-up comedian on the thriving Heavy Woollen District comedy scene (a network of 3 real ale pubs with an average crowd of 8 people in there and a blind whippet), and his comedy role model is Billy Connolly.

pic.twitter.com/gKkQb46s9C

— Howard Zinn's 10 Million McDonnell Relief Plan (@ZinnTruther) December 22, 2019

snap!

it feels like that time of year when commentariat trash that have been disseminating lies and bigotry and racism all year round post some nonsense about how we all need to be kinder to each other and actually get paid for it!

My personal favourite is when they handwring about the woes of the white working class while saying nothing about UC, housing, working conditions...

The leader of Britain First has joined the Conservative Party, the far-right group has claimed.

Paul Golding was now a paid-up member of the Bexleyheath and Crayford Conservative Association, it said. The extremist group posted an image of what it claimed was an email from the Conservative membership team that said Golding’s membership was now “activated”.

But the Tories said his application had not been formally approved and was likely to be revoked.

be awfully big of them to revoke his membership, but I haven't seen any evidence that they have yet.

On a lab Comms strategy:

(1) Labour obv needs - and had - a conventional media strategy: Message discipline, rebuttal, a grid etc, and 'picking fights' ( it was better in 2017 than 2019, largely for political reasons, Inc not bring lumbered with a stupid Brexit/Referendum policy)

— Solomon Hughes (@SolHughesWriter) December 23, 2019

One of the many reasons the Labour vote is so polarised by age is because of media strategy - older voters are much more likely to get their news straight from traditional media, particularly newspapers. Friends of mine who went canvassing would report back on people basically regurgitating Sun/Mail attack lines back at them. That proved disastrous in seats with ageing populations where there was no long term ground game.

The other problem is that you're dealing with lives that are less likely to be organised around work even if there are jobs available. No one has really provided much detail about how a successful ground game would work without a sizable union presence and without making people feel like they're being evangelised, patronised or preached to.

I was having lunch in the pub when the Labour manifesto was being launched onscreen and the headline was around the massive social housing pledge. A policy that would help hundreds of thousands of people and create thousands of jobs. A bloke sitting behind me immediately parped up with an incredulous "where are they gonna build them?" He had immediately written it off as unworkable and unrealistic - that's the sort of knee jerk dismissiveness that needs to be tackled. It's also why I think the broadband pledge - and the general overstuffedness of the manifesto - did more harm than good. People have to believe you will be able to deliver what you say you will.

that array of policies was definitely too much information for some of these morons, should have concentrated on a few big ones and had all the arguments ready to shut down the naysayers.

There’s an FT long read about the campaign saying the only time the Tories wavered was when the Labour manifesto launched and their focus groups were responding positively. Unfortunately the coverage was drowned by events, and they never recovered the momentum after that.

I think a trio of Housing, Broadband and Trains would have been perfect. Especially as further season ticket hikes were being announced during election week.

or is that too much as well? fuck knows tbh!

Trouble is much of the time 'yes but how will you pay for it'/'where will you build new homes' type questions are coming from people with no desire to see these policies actually implemented. For them more homes means more people/more immigrants and free this or that means other people not earning it like they have.

The other thing is that broadband is a popular policy but just isn't a short term priority for most people - what really matters to them that it's in your power to fix? Housing is a massive one obviously but everything needs to be grounded in sustainable job creation at national and local level. The Tories have finally seemed to understand that with the pledge to increase infrastructure investment in the North - even if it never materialises.

Also don't drop dozens of policies at once two weeks before an election when people have spent years not really knowing what you stand for. You need to fix them in people's minds over years not weeks - obviously that carries risks but things like the minimum wage were announced years in advance.

Two-thirds of voters want Boris Johnson‘s government to ban zero-hours contracts, a poll has found.

The public also wants workers’ rights protected after Brexit and tax rises for higher earners, according to the survey for the Trade Union Congress (TUC).

sad lol. But more evidence that the Labour manifesto wasn't unpalatable to most of the electorate.

"Trouble is much of the time 'yes but how will you pay for it'/'where will you build new homes' type questions are coming from people with no desire to see these policies actually implemented"

Some of them yes but not all - there has to be a willingness to take this stuff on head-on and win the argument over time.

I did not say 'all'.

I don't get your point anyway though re 'years not weeks' - in a six week campaign with huge ground to gain the opposition obviously has to balance running off what seemed to work last time with some updates re policies.

I mean surely the big success here is the consensus on austerity? That the government is rolling out spending promises after years of “difficult decisions have to be made”? How did they change that narrative?

"A bloke sitting behind me immediately parped up with an incredulous "where are they gonna build them?" He had immediately written it off as unworkable and unrealistic - that's the sort of knee jerk dismissiveness that needs to be tackled. It's also why I think the broadband pledge - and the general overstuffedness of the manifesto - did more harm than good. People have to believe you will be able to deliver what you say you will."

I get this critique of the difference between the '17 and '19 manifestos. I'll just note that this criticism of the housing policy from #blokeinapub would not have been answered by the '17 manifesto either.

Obviously if you said you would requisition land from aristos, or make sure that all development is 99% social housing this guy would still be incredulous. Important to note the work here is to re-make Labour as a party that attacks property rights. Something that Corbyn and McDonnell hinted at and that will become necessary as and when the housing market fails for most people.

Not even re-make but to keep pushing the conversation in those directions.

People, even blokes in pubs, are generally in favour of building houses, so I would say this particular bloke in a pub was an outlier.

I've seen a lot of nimby mobilisation against proposed new build sites locally. Lots of Fields Not Houses type posters are popping in Shaw Cross. At least they can't blame Corbyn!

Also I bet that Nimbyism increases tenfold when you tell them the plan is to build social housing there.

Obviously the situation is different in London due to the green belt and a lack of suitable build sites generally but you see that general type of incredulity everywhere. People have been conditioned into believing that good things are unachievable.

Whereas if you offer the achievable, and deliver nothing, that's all right then.

London is brimming with construction work on overpriced (and increasingly unsold) apartments though. Lots of new housing here (if you can afford it), apparently not so much elsewhere.

I see Daniel Hannan is claiming that “Labour voters like cats and Tory voters like dogs”. RIP calz and comrade barcode