"we'll change the things that need changing and that's all we'll change": the paSUKification of post-brexit politics 2021

@jamiemannersRIP @TreborRhurbarb Labour won just 622 votes in the Chesham & Amersham by-election. But every one of those people formed a band.

— Casmilus (@Casmilus) June 18, 2021

Damn what was the last seat to change hands after the incumbent's death?

― nashwan, Friday, 18 June 2021 08:57 (forty-two minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

I don't think its that unusual, particularly when the incumbent was a local "face" and the new candidate doesn't have the same recognition factor.

pic.twitter.com/JYsI2UZol8

— KateMcK (@TheKateMcK) June 17, 2021

The Tory line is I think that this sort of thing happens all the time, incumbents are regularly given a kicking when it's a by-election because the actual government isn't in danger of changing - it serves them well to reframe this as what didn't happen in Hartlepool, because they consider Labour more of a threat than the Lib Dems (though still not much I suspect).

He can't even appeal to the very people he was elected to appeal to.

— epiplexis (@epiplexis_) June 18, 2021

Sort of. Maybe so when he was campaigning to be leader but he hasn't spent any time courting that constituency since. Maybe he thought that not being Corbyn and wearing a suit would be enough. It's clearly not.

I think he thought getting some lukewarm approval from the bbc and the right-wing press would shield him as well, it hasn't and even lots of disengaged people have noticed he's a cunt.

Howard Beckett pulls out of Unite general secretary race and endorses Steve Turner

:-(

Lib Dem leader Ed Davey demolishes a “blue wall” with a small orange hammer to represent his party’s victory in Conservative seat Chesham and Amersham pic.twitter.com/o4tqjhwNZe

— Joseph Cassidy (@josephdcassidy) June 18, 2021

I guess you could just about call that a hammer.

Nice repurposing of signs that used to say "Also here"

Kieth Hammer

is this going to be the start of another lib dem surge news cycle? Guess we haven't had one in a while.

🤔🤔🤔

Obv early days, but there's a possible English future coming into view now: Lib Dems & Greens as parties of the suburbs/commuter towns/hipster enclaves; Tories a coalition of shires & post-industrial towns; Labour the party of cities.

— John Harris (@johnharris1969) June 18, 2021

ha, without fucking fail

Hipster enclaves?

If they exist, aren't they in cities?

siri, show me what fucking clueless looks like

nothing like a single by-election victory to get the sensible centrists talking up sensible centrism! I for one am predicting a Lib Dem general election victory in 2023, followed by Britain's triumphant re-entry to the EU.

does he realy believe this utter shit? I have an awful feeling that he actually does.

Ha ha ha...YES!!!

I am dying https://t.co/SAEDLfUBBp pic.twitter.com/DkaSbxzTBD

— Charlie (@vampiretraums) June 18, 2021

the pernicious spread of Kiethism is nationwide now, it's long since broke free of its shitposting echo chamber origins!

Has he got any supporters though?

I've heard Jenny C will walk through brick walls for him.. and some more

Sharon Graham said: "The announcement of the Turner/Beckett ticket, along with the Gerard Coyne candidacy, now completes the Westminster Brigade. I am the workplace candidate and will be standing to ensure the voice of Unite members is heard."

— Sienna Rodgers (@siennamarla) June 18, 2021

Hipster enclaves?

If they exist, aren't they in cities?

― the pinefox, Friday, 18 June 2021 11:51

PF I *think* he means places like St Leonard's / Brighton / Ramsgate / Frome and so on - the kind of places where people complain about "DFLs" and "London refugees"; I *think* that constitutes the green part of his pipe-dream.

I don't think he knows what he's on about.

🚨 BATLEY AND SPEN 🚨

Lip readers have observed Sir Keir Starmer refer to Batley as "a complete shithole" and that the locals are "gravy drinking idiots" during meal with Labour candidate Kim Leadbeater. pic.twitter.com/EioDsfhz2t

— Politics For Everyone (@Pols4Everyone) June 18, 2021

Angela Rayner spoke against fire & rehire with Jeremy Corbyn.

When she came under the slightest pressure for doing so, she claimed via a source that "Corbyn photobombed her" "unnoticed" & she "did not talk to him".

Here's a video of Corbyn's photobombing technique. pic.twitter.com/XR1KZUGIJH

— Alex Nunns (@alexnunns) June 18, 2021

if I was an unscrupulous liar I'd simply make my lies a little bit more convincing

what catches my attention there is more that she's confident enough the current leadership is toast to even do this in the first place

Kieth will be furious that from that vid you can work out from previous pics with Rayner that he's 5"6

I'm just imagining the palpable despair if by some miracle Labour wins Batley and S now!

Meanwhile back at the Tories:
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/jun/18/tory-mp-faces-trial-over-alleged-2008-assault-on-15-year-old-boy

OTM

this isn't tracking for me, they want a centre right party that propped up a tory govt for 5 years to lose, but want a centre right party that propped up a tory govt for 1 year to win? pic.twitter.com/QkZeHKtG1i

— pez (@periuspb) June 18, 2021

totally fucking clueless and useless account. Labour Accelerationists is much better.

and a whole truckload of non-Corbynite backbenchers are desperate to avoid another Corbynite leader winning with the membership

— Chaminda Jayanetti (@cjayanetti) June 18, 2021

I've seen this view expressed in a few places, that no matter how bad things get the PLP is unlikely to get rid of Starmer in the short term because they're afraid the membership might elect a left-winger in a leadership election held under the current rules. Presumably changing the party rules to prevent a Corbyn-type figure from ever being elected again has to be a priority for the Labour right - does anyone know of an article setting out how these changes would be made/how likely they are to succeed/what moves are already going on to achieve this etc?

changing the party rules around how leadership elections are run, that is

BREAKING: Very significant Labour news. Ben Nunn, the party's Director of Communications has quit. Source: "He was the brains and the muscle of the whole party operation. That's it for the Labour party." https://t.co/6VUpA3LGCG

— Simon Vessey (@Simon_Vessey) June 18, 2021

It probably will be happening sooner rather than later. Kieth's last shake-up or maybe he's already been urged to walk by some Labour grandee and they are clearing the decks early

It's really striking that in the real Westminster, the Amersham result has been the cue for a meltdown in Team Starmer, but in the 'Savvy Westminster Reporting' world it is, via charts, and "actually's" somehow good for Starmer.

— Solomon Hughes (@SolHughesWriter) June 18, 2021

xxp

Without any Labour Right stitch-up a bigger bloc of the membership still voted Starmer over RLB and Ian Murray and Rayner over Dawn Butler etc and that was before they were shedding 10 k members a week. But I suppose they could still contrive to meddle with the candidate process to block anyone who is decent.

pic.twitter.com/HyAzidKrrx

— black lives matter (@jrc1921) June 18, 2021

xp Starmer's pitch in the leadership election was basically 'vote for me you'll get the Corbyn policy agender with a leader who can win elections', I think it would be difficult for a potential successor to run the same kind of campaign after Starmer has failed to deliver on both of parts of that promise.

I see people on the left arguing that the failure of the Corbyn project shows that any attempt to organise through the Labour party is doomed to failure, even when the left managed to capture the leadership they were undermined by the right, therefore socialists should focus on trying to build new projects outside of Labour - but even if it's a longshot, getting another leftist elected as Labour leader and reconstituting the make up of the PLP seems like a more plausible vision of how the left could effect change in the UK in the short to medium term, certainly more plausible than the idea some new electoral force to the left of Lab. It's strange to me that people became so fatalistic about the chances of the left in the Labour party after Starmer's election given the relative strength of the Labour left in 2020 versus immediately before Corbyn became leader in 2015.

'vote for me you'll get the Corbyn policy agender with a leader who can win elections'

anyone who had their pockets picked this easy probably would still vote for Rayner/Burnham/some other charlatan over Zarah Sultanna/some other inspiring principled MP that I'm struggling to think of rn.

Batley & Spen, constituency voting intention:

CON: 47% (+11)
LAB: 41% (-2)
WPGB: 6% (+6)
LDEM: 3% (-2)

No Local Ind Grp (-12) and Brex (-3) as prev.

via @Survation, 09 - 17 Jun
Chgs. w/ GE2019

— Britain Elects (@BritainElects) June 18, 2021

even the PrOgRessIvE AlliAnCe looks completely fucked here

Clearly Galloway should follow Howard Beckett's example and withdraw https://t.co/FGUQUlH3Tj

— Luke Akehurst (@lukeakehurst) June 18, 2021

lol this wanker really believes if Galloway withdrew (for honour!) then the votes would transfer to Labour. Stupid motherfucking orange faced muppet.

got to say I wasn't expecting Galloway to be polling on 6% though. Was talking about Batley with an Asian woman I know and there was full agreement that Kieth is a cunt but then an awkward silence when I dissed Galloway. Afterwards I thought: shit, never be too presumptuous about gorgeous George when he's been doing his grift in the area.

of course Akehurst doesn't really believe that, it's just a bit of racist vote-shaming. Such a great way of winning back the Asian voters who've been alienated by Kieth.

Back to well over 10k in covid cases, with over 1k in hospital :-(

fuckshit country

Trending in United Kingdom
Thorpe Park
Trending with Rosa Parks

Without any Labour Right stitch-up a bigger bloc of the membership still voted Starmer over RLB and Ian Murray and Rayner over Dawn Butler etc

Sure but they also voted for Corbyn in the first place - post-2019 panic was perhaps inevitable but equally Starmer's doing everything possible to show that a more centrist approach yields zilch and I'd imagine a lot of the younger voters in particular would be less inclined to fall for the same trick twice.

That being said yeah most of these ppl are currently no longer in the party.

Who’d even be a serious left candidate at the moment? Trickett has the shortest odds and is 20/1.

Rebecca Long Burnham

Rebecca Long Covid