UK General Discussion: 2017 and onwards, Mayhem

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@TomMcTague

1) Corbyn is desperate to stop banging on about Europe. Why? All out Brexit opposition, his inner circle’s concluded, only leads to a culture war they can’t win, undermining Lab’s core electoral strategy: populist economics based on class interest.

2) Lab wants to fight an election on populist economics which appeals to a clear majority: tax the rich few to give to the ordinary many. (See second home tax, private school tax etc). Brexit blows this up, offering ordinary leavers a cultural reason to vote Tory, Corbyn’s team say

Why Corbyn is (still) half-hearted about Europe

https://www.politico.eu/article/why-jeremy-corbyn-is-still-half-hearted-about-europe/

It is funny watching media hacks trying to explain Corbyn’s position as some grand political plan because they cannot tell their readers the truth, he never has been a fan of the EU. He was a eurosceptic before it was cool. But pointing that out would scare the #FBPE horses.

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It is funny watching media hacks trying to explain Corbyn’s position as some grand political plan because they cannot tell their readers the truth, he never has been a fan of the EU. He was a eurosceptic before it was cool. But pointing that out would scare the #FBPE horses.

Jeremy Corbyn makes the case for Brexit

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXTvsqUphMc

Jeremy Corbyn on the single currency

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZZcq25TTiQ

^^ everybody political hacks knew he was a eurosceptic, the Remain camp were so frustrated by his lack of interest and enthusiasm during the referendum campaign
you can just look at how he campaigned during last election and the referendum..  

but he's not a die hard eurosceptic like Bill Cash or Tony Benn, he cares more about social justice issues..

Corrected. Seriously ask some random people, especially the student demographic, and I seriously doubt they have seen that vote leave video or know about his long history of euroscpeticism. No he hasn’t called directly to leave like some but neither is he going to lift a finger to keep us in. Spinning this as some kind of strategy is delusion.

“He cares more about social issues” lol, sounds like someone’s been buying the spin. If you listen to what he says he points out that the EU by design is about economic and political disenfranchisement. He’s an old school communist, not a progressive wet.

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Jeremy Corbyn is not a communist ffs

He can call himself whatever he likes, it doesn't change the fact he surrounds himself with people who are. Murray officially is, Milne is in all but name, and until recently McDonnell was far more outspoken about his communist sympathies and miraculously finds himself at rallies in front of soviet flags. The list goes on.

That and there doesn't appear to be a communist dictator he doesn't like.  It is just a usual tactic of the extreme to brand oneself as more centrist than they actually are.  Hence the “He cares more about social issues” bollocks.

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I don't want Javid to be PM, but I'd I was a conservative I'd probably want him given he is broadly acceptable to all factions and doesn't have any glaring personality flaws (e.g. Hunt is too superficial, Leadsom is dumb, Gove is a weasel, BoJo is a human disaster)

Very funny business with the mace, although he could have theatrically waved it around like Heseltine.

I'm probably being too judgmental about right-wingers, but I feel like Javid's ethnic background could be a severe liability.

Considering the Conservatives are the only major party to have had a female leader (two in fact) and its base elect them PM then yes it’s not only judgemental but hypocritical. No other major party has demonstrated a willingness to elect a minority leader either, so what has this got to do with right wingers?

That said Javid would be awful for the Conservatives.  Another weak sauce leader unable to herd the cats. Acceptable to everyone will quickly turn into acceptable for no one.  Of course that’s not saying the Conservatives, or anyone, have many options given the dire lack of talent in Parliament.

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I don't want Javid to be PM, but I'd I was a conservative I'd probably want him given he is broadly acceptable to all factions and doesn't have any glaring personality flaws (e.g. Hunt is too superficial, Leadsom is dumb, Gove is a weasel, BoJo is a human disaster)

Very funny business with the mace, although he could have theatrically waved it around like Heseltine.

I'm probably being too judgmental about right-wingers, but I feel like Javid's ethnic background could be a severe liability.

Considering the Conservatives are the only major party to have had a female leader (two in fact) and its base elect them PM then yes it’s not only judgemental but hypocritical. No other major party has demonstrated a willingness to elect a minority leader either, so what has this got to do with right wingers?

Benjamin Disraeli was pretty minority.

Well I was meaning minority in the sense of visible minority, which is really what those on the left care about. To them Jews are white and thus privileged already. Being massacred in the millions somehow doesn't change that formula.

But yes Disraeli does prove my wider point that it isn't conservatives who are the problem.

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How will the UK government and everyone against Scottish independence justify blocking Scottish indyref2?
If it's good enough for the UK to have 2 referendums within 3 years, why can't Scotland call for a 2nd referendum (it will be 5 years since 2014 when the thing is done)?

A point leavers have been making for 2 1/2 years now as to why the EU referendum decision must be enacted.

But let's call the BS. You already stated you support Scottish independence so this just seems to be concern trolling.

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on an issue that nobody even cared about

Repeating a blatant lie doesn’t make it any more true.

 
Anyway, the Conservative party could have respected the result of the vote, not to mention the vast majority of their voters, they’ve chosen not to.  On their head be it.

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on an issue that nobody even cared about

Repeating a blatant lie doesn’t make it any more true.

Oh, so the consistent polling pre-2016 that consistently rated EU membership as a marginal issue was lying was it?

...And those polls rated by far the most pressing issue as immigration, which is intimately tied to freedom of movement and thus EU membership.  

The fact that the referendum vote was the largest democratic mandate in this country's history, larger than any general election, proves you are talking bollocks.

Call me strange but I consider a 33 million sample somewhat more informative than a 1000 person one.

As someone who voted leave and will probably vote leave again...

Pull the other one. This is just gaslighting, and frankly it's a bit pathological.

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on an issue that nobody even cared about

Repeating a blatant lie doesn’t make it any more true.

Oh, so the consistent polling pre-2016 that consistently rated EU membership as a marginal issue was lying was it?

...And those polls rated by far the most pressing issue as immigration, which is intimately tied to freedom of movement and thus EU membership.  

The fact that the referendum vote was the largest democratic mandate in this country's history, larger than any general election, proves you are talking bollocks.

Call me strange but I consider a 33 million sample somewhat more informative than a 1000 person one.

As someone who voted leave and will probably vote leave again...

Pull the other one. This is just gaslighting, and frankly it's a bit pathological.

Lol, imagine being this hysterical about the fact that people don't care about the EU as much as you

Ah yes, pointing out someone is talking bollocks is "hysterical".  Right.  Gotcha.

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So now Corbyn tables a VONC, May looses, and we have a snap general election with May in charge of the campaign.

What could possibly go wrong.

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So now Corbyn tables a VONC, May looses, and we have a snap general election with May in charge of the campaign.

What could possibly go wrong.

But would enough of the Conservatives who voted against May in this vote also vote against her in a vote among Parliament as a whole?

The Conservatives do not have enough votes, they have a minority government propped up by the DUP.  And the DUP have already stated they will vote against her if she continues pushing her backstop arrangement.

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So now Corbyn tables a VONC, May looses, and we have a snap general election with May in charge of the campaign.

What could possibly go wrong.

But would enough of the Conservatives who voted against May in this vote also vote against her in a vote among Parliament as a whole?

The Conservatives do not have enough votes, they have a minority government propped up by the DUP.  And the DUP have already stated they will vote against her if she continues pushing her backstop arrangement.

They said they would only vote against her if the WA passed.

But no WA she manages to get the votes for will be acceptable to the DUP anyway.

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202-432. Was that even worse than expected or on par?

I think it's fair to say worse. Losing by perhaps 150-200 seems to have been expected.

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Three Labour MPs voted with the Government: Ian Austin (Dudley North), Kevin Barron (Rother Valley), John Mann (Bassetlaw).  All other Labour MPs voted against, except for Deputy Speakers and Paul Flynn (Newport West) who I understand is too ill to attend.

Among the Independents, Sylvia Hermon (North Down), Stephen Lloyd (Eastbourne) and Frank Field (Birkenhead) voted with the Government; Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North), Ivan Lewis (Bury South), Jared O'Mara (Sheffield Hallam), Fiona Onasanya (Peterborough) and John Woodcock (Barrow & Furness) voted against.

118 Tories voted against the Government, 196 (plus 2 tellers) with.  No abstentions, other than Eleanor Laing who is a Deputy Speaker and so doesn't vote.

All SNP, Plaid, Green and DUP MPs voted against.

Which Tory MPs voted against the Brexit deal? The Reamainers or the Hard Brexit supporters?

MPs who support leaving on decent terms.

So aside from wasting nearly a third of the remaining available time, delaying the vote by a month achieved... what exactly?

Running down the clock was probably precisely the plan...

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From what I understand from this latest round of voting, no deal has just become much more likely.

It was always somewhat likely given it is the default and parliament is hopelessly divided on any alternative.  The most significant thing from today IMO was it demonstrated that there is no majority in parliament to frustrate brexit. If there is no majority for delay there is likely no majority for a 2nd ref or revocation. Will be interesting to watch how MPs change tack in the coming weeks.

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I do have a question:  Say The the Cooper amendment which would extend Article 50 to 12/31/19 passed.  Is that something that the UK decide unilaterally?  Even if it passed would not the EU have to agree to that as well ? 

Overall it seems May's strategy is still to get her original deal passed by waiting until the night of 3/29 when it will become clear that there is no majority for No Deal Brexit, no majority for delaying Brexit ergo there has to be a default majority for the May deal.  All the stuff she will be up to talking to the EU is just a smokescreen of showing that "she is trying to get a new better deal."

No the UK could not decide unilaterally. It would require all 27 EU countries to agree, and they have said they wouldn’t extend unless there was a clear plan that a deal could be agreed within that time, which is fair.  Hence why the Cooper amendment was no less pie in the sky than asking the EU to renegotiate the WA.

Yes that does seem to be her plan, the question is will parliament back her deal at the last minute? That’s a gamble that based on current evidence I wouldn’t want to touch with a barge pole.

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6 members may be ready to jump, but also according to the reports there's perhaps a dozen more helping out behind the scenes who might eventually go.

Still it's stupid, they will get squished even more so than the SDP did, this ain't no gang of four.

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Labour and Tory MPs in talks over setting up new centrist party

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Why not simply join the Lib Dems outright?

For better of for worse the Labour brand is very strong; The logic may be that "Continuity New Labour" may be more successful in pulling away Labour "moderates" rather than simply cannibalising the existing Lib Dem vote.

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Newspaper reports have correctly predicted about thirty of the past zero Labour splits. Doesn't mean that nothing will happen - there's a huge amount of strain at present for various reasons - but people need to avoid being credulous.

To be fair the murmurings this time seem to be coming from multiple reporters across the spectrum.  Whether the MPs end up bottling it or not, the media have obviously heard things which suggest it's closer to crunch time.

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Yet; the SDP wasn’t formed straight away either. They may wait until the Lib Dems in the Tory party join.

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Probably a good idea to drag it out though so they remain in the headlines.

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Given the hard left hounded them out you'd think Corbynites would be happier.

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Given the hard left hounded them out you'd think Corbynites would be happier.

They're not taking any sort of principled stand by leaving. They're doing it for publiciity, because the public are idiots and love people who 'heroically fall on their sword'.

I suppose congratulations are in order to the Blairites. They've successfully undermined Labour's first left-wing leader in years by painting him as some sort of left-wing Hitler (despite the fact he was elected leader both times with over 50% of the vote).

Well, if you want a more pure Labour Party, shouldn't all the Blairites leave, and then get all the votes from more Blairite-minded voters when elections come around?

Not the point.

Corbyn was twice elected leader. Once over four other candidates. Once when he faced a cabinet revolt. Both times with a huge mandate.

You know who else got a huge democratic mandate...?

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Given the hard left hounded them out you'd think Corbynites would be happier.

They're not taking any sort of principled stand by leaving. They're doing it for publiciity, because the public are idiots and love people who 'heroically fall on their sword'.

I suppose congratulations are in order to the Blairites. They've successfully undermined Labour's first left-wing leader in years by painting him as some sort of left-wing Hitler (despite the fact he was elected leader both times with over 50% of the vote).

Well, if you want a more pure Labour Party, shouldn't all the Blairites leave, and then get all the votes from more Blairite-minded voters when elections come around?

Not the point.

Corbyn was twice elected leader. Once over four other candidates. Once when he faced a cabinet revolt. Both times with a huge mandate.

You know who else got a huge democratic mandate...?

Ah, so now you are openly comparing him to Adolf Hitler.

Nice. Never thought someone would actually be capable of sinking that low.

Since you aren't British you won't have gotten that line was a reference to Ken Livingston's rants about Hitler.  Nice attempt to turn the tables though, but it won't work.

No i'm not attempting to compare him to Hitler, he isn't that capable for a start.

The point was you clearly weren't getting that simply being democratically elected isn't logically a defence from being an anti-semitic nutjob.

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So how much of this is due to anti-semitism in Labour

I'd be genuinely suprised if any of it was.

It seems to be a combination of brexit and people wanting attention.

Yeah, can't imagine why a female Jewish MP who has been mercilessly racially abused by Corbynites would want to leave the party.