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

hang on is blowing up Tory caravans bad or good

One of the many reasons that Labour lost the last election was that they bet too much on groups of voters (including mythical silent-majority groups) that didn't turn out to be as large as expected, or were concentrated in the wrong parts of the country. The challenge is how you add other groups to yr coalition of voters without either going full Blair and alienating your existing voters, or just waiting for the Tories to lead us into economic disaster.

One of the things that give me pause when Sanders, etc, talk about 'activating non-voters' in the US.

When was the last time we had a change of government that wasn't precipitated by an economic crisis? The 60s?

xp

good but better when they are inside it or some of smouldering blast debris sets their house ablaze as well!

my favourite self-own of Starmer's was when he said his father was a humble tool-maker.

It doesn't matter what signals Starmer is putting out now imo. What is beyond doubt is that he will be completely pliable to the right of the party, even if some of his intentions are honourable right now he's shown he has a history of completely lacking any conviction and always following the path of least resistance.

actually lacking conviction is unfair he was a committed Remainer and had a steadfast commitment to locking up more poor people!

the problem with many of these "swing voters" I think is that they've totally internalised the every-person-for-themselves idea that the economy owes them nothing that they don't deserve anything that anyway they've worked hard for what they have and earned it that they don't need or want help and probably that they doubly don't want other people who do need help to have "hand outs"

the only way out is to have them persuaded that none of this is desirable nor natural that the economy should and can afford everyone a better standard of living that we all stand to benefit from no one having to endure the desperation and precarity that feature in many people's daily lives and actually that doing otherwise is a huge waste of money and energy for everyone involved

to some people poverty is an inherent weakness rather than external factors like economic crashes and austerity stripping away the tax credits that kept them out of it. I don't know how you get through to such people other than them experiencing the horrors of UC themselves when their livelihoods are knackered by a ndb or whatever will follow next year.

You can't get through to those people and it's pointless trying. Anything that might appeal like say cast iron pledges on fuel duty are incompatible with the green agenda and can be outflanked by the Tories anyway.

But there's another group - who don't like to think about themselves as NOT caring about the poor but when push comes to shove don't prioritise policies that benefit them. Those voters can be split off but they won't be if they don't see the leader first and foremost as a safe pair of hands. Unfortunately this is also an area where the media can really go to town on the candidate, as they will do even with Starmer if he wins.

When was the last time we had a change of government that wasn't precipitated by an economic crisis? The 60s?

― ShariVari, Tuesday, 28 January 2020 bookmarkflaglink

There will also be a climate crisis that will depress productivity and growth.

And that's when I think the narratives Conrad talks about will matter the most and what Matt talks in regards to the media and 'safe pair of hands' (which is another narrative) may also matter less.

I would be vary of extracting too much about the electorate from the last election, which was a Brexit election.

missed the "except the 1%" off the end of my last post

Arguably these narratives aren't mutually exclusive, in order to be persuaded it needs to be someone they're prepared to listen to and will trust.

In any case, we can't sit around and wait for the climate crisis to become acute and hope that's going to benefit the left, because the concurrent economic crisis is just as likely to motivate people to try and protect what they've got.

(Obviously this isn't all top down by any means, quite the opposite actually)

I think the next election (putting the imminent apocalypse aside) will be much tougher for the governing party. Even if brexit doesn't prove as disastrous for the economy as seems to be the most likely outcome. Nobody has disputed that the economy will definitely contract after it, and however much it does some levels of unemployment rising and average earnings falling seem like certain outcomes. It's difficult to put a good spin on that.

"we can't sit around and wait for the climate crisis to become acute and hope that's going to benefit the left, because the concurrent economic crisis is just as likely to motivate people to try and protect what they've got."

Certainly not advocating for sitting about, just reacting to posts above that were saying that it's tough to talk people round and that it's very difficult to get a new government in without an economic crisis.

Certainly electing RLB, pushing policies that will become important, getting our councils up to scratch (important whether RLB is elected or not) is a start xp

But yes a governing party has only been ejected twice in the past 40 years which feels insanely low for any democracy. No idea if it is or not.

Both Starmer and RLB (and also some increasingly brainwormed relatives of mine) have raised this idea Labour need more for the "aspirational" and a lack of it cost them the election

Still just sounds like 'oh no we've upset 80K Man' pandering rn tho

I think RLB was saying socialism is an aspiration for all of us .. and something about how too much of the manifesto was unveiled as "handouts" to a self-interest group rather than everybody. That's the way I interpreted it at the time at least.

They are all bad tbh though. Sometimes I can't wait for this to finish so I can burn my card and never vote for them again for the rest of my life!

RLB's reaching for loads of off-the-peg campaign stuff like that, people just don't care because she's RLB. Either that or castigating her for not saying the sort of thing the other candidates are saying, even though she is, constantly. The whole contest is so bland so far.

https://www.versobooks.com/blogs/4555-the-case-against-keir-starmer

he altered legal guidelines so that those improperly claiming benefits could be charged under the Fraud Act, which carries a maximum sentence of ten years (Emily Thornberry argued it should be increased to fourteen)

lol the new left and right wings of the PLP :(

believe it or not my conclusion from reading that piece is that he is a cop and a tory. But there is always something new on this guy that you've missed it seems: the stuff about giving more power to crack down on protesters is new layer of slime to me.

Meanwhile in the UK: Please sign my petition to have an Oxford Comma added on the Brexit 50p coin https://t.co/mX2NJ2Fc9a

— Marijam Didžgalvytė (@marijamdid) January 28, 2020

can't wait to see the extensive coverage of these protests on the evening news tonight

I'm going to Paris next week, I'll let you know what's happening.

Are there right wing thinktanks in France that would dare say aloud that pension age should raised to 75? I doubt it somehow.

Only for black people and Muslims.

Team Keir’s latest email – really pushing that backstory, complete with photo of young KS 👇 pic.twitter.com/83FptphQA2

— Sienna Rodgers (@siennamarla) January 28, 2020

at least now we've finally got our own young dynamic Macron type figure.

gonna tell my children this was Kraftwerk

lool!

https://i.ibb.co/T1VpxLw/photograph-singer-Andy-Mc-Cluskey-interview-Nick-Mc-Grath-580791.jpg

that's pretty uncanny

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-fYtjbAt_Jl8/VOSacGGjUzI/AAAAAAAAdFY/I_2jel86U-s/w1200-h630-p-k-no-nu/OMD%2B0%2BSmash%2BHits%2B-%2B17th%2BFebruary%2B-%2B2nd%2Bmarch%2B1983.jpg

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/E0cImLnhBPo/hqdefault.jpg

Dawn says any MP who goes on tv to slag the leader gets expelled

— Becky Boi (@GAYLEXITNOW) January 28, 2020

😘😘😘

She's talking to you as well, Lammy!

I'd add taking a selfie with Chris Williamson or publicly being an apologist for this grim crank as other offences where expulsion should be considered eh Burgon and Pidcock?

just read that Led by Donkeys were one of the big contributors towards the Jess Phillips campaign, if they wont literally commit seppuku over brexit as their grand finale then piss all the money away on pure futility (again) eh?

looking at YouGov polls and commenting on them a month after an election and in the midst of a leadership election is as pointless as showing a football table after the first game.

just on about some predictably simpering claptrap from Lucy Powell. But then some fools are saying they polling badly and yet Starmer is the current front-runner to be next leader so it's on him... lol stop it all of youse!

great news everyone, jess phillips has written a piece for grazia magazine about why she stepped down from the leadership race why she's great and also why her friends are dumbasses

I’ve had total kindness from everybody; literally thousands and thousands of people have messaged me. Saying that, my husband didn’t even mention it. We went for dinner at my mother-in-law’s the evening after my announcement and spent the night discussing other things. Hardly any of my family and friends follow politics, which is exactly why we need to make sure we’re cutting through to the public because normal people have a million other things to think about. We talk about what’s going on at school and real things in our lives. When I went on Question Time, my friend asked if I’d won because she thought it was Mastermind!

"normal people"

Specialist subject - Jess Phillips.

tbf to jess, her implication that people who pay attention to politics are abnormal is absolutely borne out by the contributors to ilxor dot com's politics threads

she's finally nailed something!

Excuse me

how dare you, sir

the anti-normalist campaign will be a bloody and epic one, but it is the only the way to destroy both absolute class enemies: the melt assisting tories and the tory assisting melts. Gonna need a lot of JCBs and some very deep pits!

“Normal people don’t give a shit about politics, btw I’m dead normal” - Jess Philips

she went to 2 russell group unis btw, so surely she must be pretending to be so thick.