Labour. The way forward.

I think you might have something here.

It’s about how a story is remembered. Tell someone a story and they will remember the end, have a reasonable idea about some bits in the middle, and only a vague recollection of the beginning.

So, under Johnson’s leadership two massive stories have reached their ending. Brexit and Covid.

Most people, even Remainers, were desperate to see the end of the Brexit saga. Johnson, as he promised took us out. Covid had dominated our lives for over a year and the vaccination programme is a success. Again, this was under Johnson’s leadership.

Two great endings that folk will remember. Boris gets things done. People want change, he is the man to bring about change.

The middle bits of Brexit - if remembered at all - aren’t as important. Yes, Brexit took years and Labour appeared indecisive but so were the Tories, and Brexit was their idea with Johnson one of those responsible for the infighting. As for the beginning, the lies the whole thing was built on, never defining what Brexit was? All in some vague past.

The middle bits of Covid. Johnson’s dithering approach to Christmas, conflicting messages, Barnard Castle, no longer seem important. Even a derisory pay rise for the very people we clapped is forgotten. Johnson’s ineptitude at the beginning that led to tens of thousands of deaths? All in some vague past.

The two endings are everything and even stronger because they have a direct impact on people. Lies, corruption, cronyism and sleaze don’t affect people directly. The fact he’s a liar can be overlooked as long as he gets things done. Lies don’t matter as long as they don’t affect your life. It’s when they do - as the financial implications of both stories start to kick in – that Johnson’s downfall will begin.

The best example about the ending of a story being the most important thing, come from a POW camp in early 1945. The British airmen noticed a change in the tone of letters they received after D Day. One pilot had been shot down over Dunkirk and though wounded he managed to save his crew. He’d been a POW for the whole war and received a letter from his fiancé telling him it was all over because, “I’d rather marry a 1944 hero than a 1939 coward.”

 

Doesn't that show how powerful the media are in what is a story and what isn't? That with collusion with politicians, key news can be suppressed or glossed over. You only have to look at the zeal in the Starmer pile on by the press, and the same with Sturgeons spat with Alex Salmond

DePfeffel did lie about Brexit. Repeatedly. And is still doing so. I read just this morning that the freeport programme they alleged was only possible do to leaving the EU is a **** up because of the signed agreement and that it will face tariffs and failt to benefit from the tax breaks they alleged.

The NI protocol. That customs checks would not be required, that there would be no border in the Irish sea, the powder keg tensions of NI simmering once more, the lies to fisherman on both sides of the channel.

Brexit isn't "done", however much DePfeffel professes it to be. And on Brexit too, he is very much a liar.

 

There aren't enough people wanting a socialist government in this country to ever win an election - it might be 30% of the population (with roughly 30% capitalist and 40% centrist). The electoral system and constituency boundaries are such that it would need a new party to get around 40% of the vote, against both Tory and Labour. It isn't going to happen - and the price of 30 years of continuous Tory rule would be too high for many.

 

Voting is a bit like the Grand National. Horse racing happens year round, but most people aren’t bothered, but come National day everyone is having a bet. No idea on form, weights or when it last run, but the jockey has nice colours. Or it won last year. Or the horse has a name with something in common.

Politics happens year round, but most people only sit up and take notice when it’s time to vote.

At headline level, Brexit is done. Everything you’ve stated that were lies or haven’t happened will be just a paragraph somewhere at the bottom of the article, that the reader will not get down to as the willlhave lost interest before then.

Yes, it shows how the media can be manipulated, and I’d have no idea of what Labour can do to counter-act this.

 

Agree with everything you're saying there ST except that last paragraph smacks of a BS post on Facebook. Apologies if it's true but might be wise to post the source for a statement like that. Also one swallow does not a summer make. My dad was in Burma during the war and he kept his letters, the exact opposite of what you said.

 

https://www.jewishvoiceforlabour.or...rs-10-socialist-pledges-forensic-gaslighting/

 

The "fun" in Jersey last week was caused by the British government deciding to put the fishing rights for the Channel Islands into the Brexit deal at the 11th hour. Both Jersey and Guernsey are sovereign states and the British government had no legal right to include them in any deal.

 

I'm always flabbergasted by the amount of folk who still think the Labour Party give a damn about them. We know the Tories don't, there's nothing new to discover there. In some ways, that works for them. But let's not pretend that today's Labour party give two hoots about you or me. They treat the electorate with contempt, and they've proven themselves to be just as sleazy as the Tory party.

 

But is a centrist Labour rule doing much more for the poorest of society? I posted something on another thread showing that according to the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, poverty levels have been fairly consistent since 1992, so whoever we have voted in has made little difference. Also New Labour started the ball rolling for making students poorer by introducing tuition fees, so that's young people and poor people who are no better off in nearly 30 years.

 

Given that the vast majority of the media is owned by right wing leaning owners, and even the centrist and neutral ones are or are being lent on by tories (the BBC for example).

I agree not everyone follows politics intently, but I think it might be more than you think. And I don't believe it's a case that people aren't aware of certain things (corruption and lies etc), but more that they ignore it. It's no coincidence this government have been more overtly xenophobic in its messaging.

 

If labour were to become centrist they should go for Andy Burnham- older northern voters would vote for him.

I'm a socialist Labour supporter so not my choice, but at least maybe the Tories would deservedly lose sometimes

 

“The personality of the political candidate and the way he is projected by the advertising experts are the things that really matter.

In one way or another, as vigorous he-man or kindly father, the candidate must be glamorous. He must also be an entertainer who never bores his audience. Inured to television and radio, that audience is accustomed to being distracted and does not like to be asked to concentrate or make a prolonged intellectual effort.

The methods now being used to merchandise the political candidate as though he were a deodorant positively guarantee the electorate against ever hearing the truth about anything.”

Aldus Huxley, Brave New World Revisited 1958

 

How?

 

So is there evidence in the public domain about Starmer actually going against all 10 of these broad principles? That seemed a very subjective hatchet job rather than explicit confirmation of going against those things.

I mean, isn't one of the criticisms that people don't know what his policies are? Which is somewhat contradictory if there are suggestions he's against various pledges?

 

I don’t disagree with your analysis but you discount the responsibilities of the wider electorate. People are not generally fools. They know what they are voting for. They keep voting for the things/people that many on this site despise and have trouble coming to terms with. To add to the problem the current Labour Party are a million miles from offering anything different. I don’t even know what they stand for any more.
At the last election they stood on a Western European centrist programme (which wouldn’t have looked out of place in a 1950s Conservative manifesto). It was portrayed as extremist left wing and they got battered. Principally because what many people in this Country consider to be centrist has moved substantially rightward in the last 40 years. In those terms Labour can only be elected on a centre right programme. That’s not for me.
I think they need to get on the ‘right side of history’ and get two basics right. Stop being a Unionist party in Scotland (look who they line up alongside - shameful) and stop seeing Westminster as the be all and end all. The only hope for the North of England (imo) is a situation where we have far more control over our own lives and destiny - within a Federal England/Wales preferably, but outside of it if the only other option is continued dominance by Westminster. This can’t go on.

 

Since 1992 how many more people are homeless? How many foodbanks are there? These two things have increased substantially in the last ten years. I'm not sure how the JT foundation arrives at their conclusions, but my eyes tell me otherwise.

 

Didn’t read all of it...

But in the intro it describes the analysis as ‘forensic’, and let’s look at point 1.

Starmer pledged to increase corporate taxes. And the ‘evidence’ that he’s dropped that pledge is him saying (during a pandemic when most businesses are struggling) NOW is not the time to be raising taxes. And the Tories are desperate to start raising taxes to get back the Covid money.

F uck me blind; when did it stop being ‘left wing’ to argue against raising taxes during a recession?

 

My perception is that theres unlikely to be anything but considerable tory majorities for at least the next generation. But people are fickle. And it's not uncommon to see complete about faces on things people say they'd never do. How many are voting blue now that pledged over their dead body 5-10 years ago?

I think the issue thats just not being addressed, and frankly, I don't even know how you would address it, is globalisation. On one had we benefit from cheap imports. But that reliance on importing affects our ability to create jobs in manufacturing and the industries the labour heartlands were built on. Coal, steel, mills, fabric, shipping. All just about gone as near as damn it.

How do you shift that globalisation when the Uk is such a rampant consumer of goods and has grown accustomed to cheap and more of it, whatever the impact?

Although the EU has failings, it's unfairly criticised for being the cause of globalisation. The US and far east are much more a cause.

I don't think being socialist is a way out. The right wing media have successfully followed the US lead in rebranding socialism to mean communism. So you just aren't going to get the volumes unless the Lib Dems successfully eat into the tory majority. It's been a very long shift of the overton window, it would take an equally long push back, so trying to go all the way in one go isn't going to work.

I think what politicians have failed to do for a long period is educate, is to share why. They state a policy, but don't say why, what they are trying to fix. What problem they are trying to remove.

The biggest change needed is to find a way of debunking the blase spurious 3 word mantras that are hollow but still resonate. To find a way to make people question things and make their own minds up rather than allow them to be manipulated.

To do that a person of compassion and conviction would be required. And I'm not so sure that many exist in politics anymore.

 

It’s basically saying Starmer said one thing in his campaign to be leader and has done nothing afterwards to support those ‘pledges’ . He should listen to John McDonnell , he won’t but ditching the snake Mandleson from his advisory team should be the first thing , put a halt to his paranoid purge on even soft left activists , at the moment Starmer stands for nothing .
https://inews.co.uk/opinion/john-mc...LOnIsd0S7-5Aicn0ha0h7SD97kNX6K1PBx7FDVdHX6f4I

 

I know what is being implied by the article, but it seems loose and tenuous at best to say he's ditched every pledge going. I thought there would be speeches or quotes or policy announcements that explicitly go against those things, but I'm guessing he hasn't?

I've certainly been unimpressed with him for so many reasons, but he has done some good things too. The simple truth is whoever is Labour leader is a dead duck at the minute. If you go left, the media will do for them and centrists will obviously be critical, if you go nearer the centre, momentum and unite will fuel skwarkbox and the canary to do the hatchet job.