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

here is what Loach wrote after

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/oct/05/ken-loach-i-give-no-legitimacy-to-holocaust-denial

god, he does choose exactly the wrong moment to crack out that line doesn't he. unfortunate. that said, expelling him over that seems excessive and definitely politically motivated. but it was a really terrible choice/timing of words ngl

it is sad that leftists have to safeguard themselves against starmerian opportunism, but it's also a game that isn't too hard to play even while expressing palestinian solidarity

he's asked a hypothetical based on an allegation - that there was this discussion at the party conference - that he doesn't believe. while he still wants to question that allegation he gives a dumb response to the broader hypothetical - in the spur of the moment. then afterwards he publicly states that he's not a Holocaust denier.

it's nothing but bad faith to use that as a gotcha to call him an antisemite and it's potentially libellous if that's all you've got to base calling him a Holocaust denier on imo

That’s not what he has been expelled for, as far as I can tell, either.

It looks like he was caught in the purge of members of proscribed groups within Labour, rather than for anything he’d actively done.

xp oh ofc, but it's still a v impolitic choice of answer. he isn't a politician tho so he shdn't have to be quite so careful

and yeah purges of 'proscribed groups' is v problematic, although if starmer keeps it up it will result in schism, which would be progress

oh yeah, the expulsion appears to be for him refusing to condemn other comrades who were expelled, because that's very normal

the "Loach is a Holocaust denier" bit has just been bandied about by exactly who you'd expect because god forbid they admit the Labour right is running a purge

there was a Loach interview on 5 live the other night and I felt quite sorry for him to some extent, but why bother remaining in the party? Some have commented that one of the things Starmer supporters used as evidence of what a decent soft-left knight-of-the-realm human rights barrister he is, was his role at the centre of the Ken Loach McLibel doc!

I've never watched it, but the scene where Kieth gets pissy with an office assistant because he's too thick to understand how a floppy disk works was classic Kieth.

'maybe he shouldn't have been mocking the guy's name'

'he's normally great but this is bad, he should apologise'

willing to die on this hill: no. no. no.

the weaponising of antisemitism-calling by hard-right cunts is the only cultural evil here. even making out that stewart lee has anything to apologise for is deeply fucking wrong imo, it is capitulation to the absolute and disingenuous fuckery of these true bastards and their attempts to shut down criticism by any ad hominem means necessary

― imago, Monday, 18 May 2020 bookmarkflaglink

look at their self-righteous tone, look at how their lickspittle followers descend on 'racist' stewart lee with unrestrained venom. this is the culture war and they try to make the most preposterous bullshit look like common sense. and we are too scared of offence to call them out properly. lee is not even remotely close to being antisemitic, nor is punning on tugendhat's name, and these cunts need to be told

― imago, Monday, 18 May 2020 bookmarkflaglink

this has made me so fucking enraged for some reason. i bet there's a retraction of some kind. no surrender, please

― imago, Monday, 18 May 2020 bookmarkflaglink

i see brendan o'neill has taken the same attitude as me, maybe time to quit the internet lol

― imago, Monday, 18 May 2020 bookmarkflaglink

i don't quite follow what your point is

stewart lee doing a routine based on the striking nature of an MP's name is not even comparable to what loach did there

"there was a Loach interview on 5 live the other night and I felt quite sorry for him to some extent, but why bother remaining in the party?"

Whatever his reasons he wants to remain in the party. One reason could be that Starmer is v much a lame duck, you wouldn't give him much more than 18 months in the post.

fair enough and he is a high profile member. Was just thinking he's left before - possibly a couple of times. There is also a good chance it won't be worth re-joining again in his lifetime.

Ken said in the interview Kieth wants a smaller party, that is Murdoch friendly + funded by billionaires - can't argue with that. He's doing well with two of them already, once they've changed the voting rules - which I'm not sure how this happens but it has been hinted at - then there will be literally nothing to stay and fight for?

Thing is you get to meet ppl that have been in the party since the early 80s no breaks. Thatcher, Blair, with Foot and Corbyn on either side. Internally members have left but quite a lot still remain in it.

Lots of dead years for many, if they are not kicked out.

the way i feel about it is that the party is quite a lot bigger than just starmer and his cronies. not all of it good mind! but a lot of it. i pay every month for that stuff to still have a budget. even if my own CLP has been banned from meeting lol

Some familiar figures are pushing the absurd and defamatory claim that Ken Loach supports Holocaust denial. The story of this bogus talking-point, which relies upon multiple layers of falsehood and guilt-by-association, makes for a revealing case-study. 1/

— Daniel Finn (@DanFinn95) February 11, 2021

A tweet from 11.2.2021.

Tracer: I still pay for it also, maybe just because I still haven't bothered to stop ... but I'm not sure that I see the good things that you mention. For a while I justified being in the party as 'supporting JC' (against KS, et al), but now JC isn't even allowed to be a Labour MP ... It's harder and harder to find any good rationale for our being in a party that is apparently profoundly opposed to our own views.

Does you and me being in the party help Zarah Sultana? If so, it could be worthwhile ... But we're not her constituents. Maybe the most I can say is that I vote in internal bureaucratic elections for people who support her. But no doubt those people will be expelled on false pretences if somehow elected!

There is now a humanitarian emergency in Afghanistan. We must urgently meet our obligations to Afghan refugees, while learning the lessons of two decades of devastating war and failure. pic.twitter.com/4RURLNRnph

— Jeremy Corbyn (@jeremycorbyn) August 16, 2021

You don't want to play Sir Keir Starmer at law.

— Simon Hedges (@Orwell_Fan) August 16, 2021

Alpaca gets a stay of execution all thanks to Kieth!

A leadership challenge cannot be far behind.

Labour is shedding 90 jobs due to huge financial pressures but staff being told with less workers they can turn things round with new ways of working to 'prepare and deliver elections'. That's if they can work out the below... pic.twitter.com/XgeBAIIM5J

— Kate Proctor (@Kate_M_Proctor) August 17, 2021

Hell yes.

Just a bit of agile.

None of this is difficult to decipher if you have worked in a mid-to-large sized company since about 2016, tbf, but excited to see what the rapid prototyping means in practice. Perhaps empowering Wes Streeting to keep making policy on the fly in TV interviews and issuing a string of increasingly elaborate corrections afterwards.

I feel like even if I was fluent in bullshit corporate-speak I'd be scratching my head in puzzlement at most of them

I swear if someone spoke in that language to me I wouldn't be able to not tell them to fuck off.

agile ceremonies is when the high-wire artists are married there in the big top and the vicar is also on her own trapeze iirc

"adopt a product-mindset" is when Labour canvassers also double up as a door-to-door Kleeneeze salesforce

'Appen they love an agile ceremony in the Red Wall.

Has the irony of this classic do-more-with-less bullshit management pivot struck the “Labour” party yet? I’m guessing no.

They are clueless in a way I wouldn't have thought credible but... evidence of the old glazzies.

Lord Barwell reminds us he is a thing

“The lesson for Europeans is clear. Whoever is president, the US is unlikely to offer the same support that it used to in parts of the world where its vital interests are not involved.

“Europeans are going to have to develop the capability to intervene without US support. That’s not going to be cheap. And the EU and Britain are going to have to work out how to cooperate on this because we face the same threats.”

Excited for Luke akehurst scrum master

— orseti (@orseti3) August 17, 2021

-'Concerned' about increased risk of terror.
-‘Completely wrong’ for PM and Dominic Raab to be on holiday.
-It was ‘obvious’ we were heading toward very serious situation.
-Taliban should NOT be recognised as Afghanistan's legitimate govt.
-‘Deeply concerned’ Biden doesn’t recognise wider consequences of action.

the Kieth-master 2001

Starmer S1E6 - The Manager Frets

Excited to find out who Labour will regard as the government of Afghanistan if, as looks inevitable, the US recognises the one currently in place.

https://www.expressandstar.com/resizer/CQ6KAQfB_d_qbH4SB7Bai-xCaho=/1200x0/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/mna/ZMXDJ6NFTZDHDFBTARHFTHQI7U.jpg

As the Labour leader made his way from the train station, up past the Grand and onto Dudley Street, before popping into Bilston Street nick for a chat with officers, one thing was immediately noticeable.

And it was that hardly anybody seemed to care.

Sir Keir's appearance was greeted with complete disinterest.

There was nary a murmur in his direction from any member of the public he wandered past. No requests for selfies were made and no one called his name out.

To illustrate the point, a woman approached the entourage with her phone raised, then immediately lowered it when she saw what was in front of her, disappointment etched across her face.

please clap

Kieth going hard on the neocon dream today in Parliament, truly cynical, murderous stuff

this will be very exciting for him, another re-boot for him as a conviction neocon. Gloves off.. launch the drones

Risk assessments for refugees

Wild to see so many people who have presented themselves as the serious foreign policy pragmatists, concerned with achievable outcomes aligned with international partnerships, over the last few years flip to ‘why can’t Boris Johnson fix this?’ and ‘what if we just said the Taliban isn’t the real government?’.

it's only at times like that ghoulish Labour hawks like Jarvis and Benn truly feel alive.

Tory MP Desmond Swayne appears to suggest Afghan refugees are cowards for "queuing at the airport" rather than joining "the resistance."

— Adam Bienkov (@AdamBienkov) August 18, 2021

That guy is like a pantomime villain.

Oh no he isn't