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Well, much of the rest of the country saw him as a plausible threat as well..I know you think it’s all down to mischaracterisation by the media but there’s more to it than that.
And why was that? Plausible threat like nationalised energy? We have that already in the UK through EDF.... Prior to 2016 90% of the population probably had never heard his name. You are right though it wasn't the only thing. The parliamentary Labour party, Labour hq, and the centerist/liberal/ moderate media fought him not just the right wing media. The Labour leader was basically savaged not just from the right but from the centre too. Given the centre would not accept leadership from the left why would the left accept it from the centre. And that's why it's a strategic folly for the left to back the centre - because you end up supplying votes/money and getting zip back. This is why Unite is where it is regards funding for the Labour party
True enough, so give them as little ammunition as possible, the most the RW media has come up with recently is bottleofbeergate. Is seems to me that in trying to open up a fissure in the Labour Party that you are in danger of doing the RW media’s job for them but that fissure has become a chasm that the media is struggling to bridge right now due to the strategy pursued by Starmer.
A fair point but the reality is 'ammunition' is anything to the left of Pinochet. The problem for Starmer is that this meltdown is already being eclipsed by Ukraine. Hence the 48hrs to war chat. We've seen it before.
For those reasons I am now much more of a centrist than I once was. The Tories have vacated the centre ground in recent years and I’m more than happy if Labour manages to occupy that territory. They don’t stand a chance of forming a government if they don’t.
They have vacated the centre socially and culturally but economic policy is in my opinion more complex. For example it is possible that Reeves' programme will be more austere and certainly not deliver badly needed structural reform than Johnson (to please the RW media) - although possibly not Sunak's.
I do think though that labours long term problems will continue. The electoral coalition is difficult to get back together due to demographic, cultural, economic and geographic challenges. Which to me is why mandleson's formula being followed by KS will not work. A much bolder vision is needed.
“The RW media attack the Labour party at any time”
so give them as little ammunition as possible
The right to remain silent and not incriminate themselves is a poor strategy for the leader of any political party to take.
Offer people a persuasive argument and the result is far more likely to be positive. This inability to do so presumably explains why despite weeks of daily negative media coverage for the Tories the Labour poll lead is mostly in single figures.
Obviously to offer a persuasive argument it requires the person to sincerely believe in something. And here lies the problem with Starmer, the only thing he appears to believe in is that he should be PM.
"Obviously to offer a persuasive argument it requires the person to sincerely believe in something"
Politics is a pragmatic affair, not a religion. Ideally politicians don't really run countries, countries run themselves and politicians manage them.
Starmer believes in the rule of law and that's what the country needs right now, competence and stability. It's the kind of vision I think much of the country wants to buy into and I think it's the territory the next general election will be fought on. Someone who shows to much passion and who harps on constantly about principles tends to put the greater part of the public off.
Every time Labour has gone down the idealistic path (Foot, Corbyn twice) it has ended up favouring the Tories and dragged most of the country into a worse position.
Starmer believes in the rule of law and that’s what the country needs right now, competence and stability.
Clearly that's driving this latest poll in the opposite direction. (Of course we do need that but it's not a vote winner on its own.)
https://twitter.com/BritainElects/status/1493184335570157569?s=20&t=gL6mNZKyh0Fo1wJv5TxlsQ
If you want to get votes - you need defecting MPs, floating voters, good performances in PMQs, pro-War, neoliberal economics, market driven utilities, flags etc. All the good things the liberals love because that's what will swing the electorate.
Only it appears to not be working.
People want a positive political opposition - not just around the houses on the shambles of the yeti.
Every time Labour has gone down the idealistic path (Foot, Corbyn twice) it has ended up favouring the Tories and dragged most of the country into a worse position
Lol -you don't have anything without ideology to take the Tories to task on.
https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/keir-starmer-brexit_uk_620a1851e4b03230246d43a2
And then insert whatever facepalm gifs you want...
That would be the 'are-you-surprised-face-palm.'
Offer people a persuasive argument and the result is far more likely to be positive. This inability to do so presumably explains why despite weeks of daily negative media coverage for the Tories the Labour poll lead is mostly in single figures.
Born out by the latest You-Gov poll. (as above) Labour down to 3pts. Starmer might be gone before Johnson at this rate. 😉
By May the Tories will be having street parties.
Starmer believes in the rule of law and that’s what the country needs right now
Hang on when did the rule of law break down? I've been longing for the great people's revolution for 30 years and you're telling me I missed it? Or perhaps your just talking bollocks, as usual?
The polls reflect the current shenanigans in Downing Street, not Starmers policy on Ukraine or anything else.
They certainly don't reflect the situation in the country in a couple of years time. Economic woes will dominate the agenda not culture wars.
The polls reflect the current shenanigans in Downing Street, not Starmers policy on Ukraine or anything else.
Correct. So the current polls don't in anyway acknowledge that the Labour leader has contributed anything useful to the Tories downfall.
They did it all themselves, and now as predicted it's wearing off - leaving Starmer where exactly? I mean it's not as if he hasn't tried to court the right.
I’ve been longing for the great people’s revolution for 30 years
Clearly, though letting off steam on here to depress the rest of us must be some compensation? I can't see Sir Keir setting fire to shopping trolleys, it's true. Whilst we do have a rule of law in this country it's being pushed with dodgy award of contracts, appointments to public bodies, restriction on voting rights etc etc etc. There'd probably have been fewer taking the piss parties in No.10 had Starmer been PM, though we'll never know.
On rejoining the EU, I'd love this to happen but it ain't going to happen in the next five or ten years so no need to have a destructive argument about it, I'm guessing would be the political judgement right now. Get these clowns out of office, get the other side of the bad times we're about to go into, and the wind could be blowing in a different direction. But not whilst the tories are in power.
Get these clowns out of office ...But not whilst the tories are in power.
Yet again.
How is this actually happening? In what way - according to the latest poll is it working out? I mean we've just had the biggest political upset in decades - and the defacto approach of leave your enemy to make their own mistake appears to be failing.
Could it possibly be because he's not inspiring anyone that there is an alternative? I think so.
I think so
Tantalising...
On rejoining the EU, I’d love this to happen but it ain’t going to happen in the next five or ten years so no need to have a destructive argument about it,
Did you not read the link? That is not what Starmer said. According to him there is no chance ever :
The Labour leader insisted there is no chance of the UK ever becoming a member of the bloc in the future during a visit to Newcastle.
Obviously that was what he said today in Newcastle who knows what he will say tomorrow at a different location, after all it is a fairly well established fact that he is both a liar and a fraud.
Clearly that’s driving this latest poll in the opposite direction.
I thought that yesterday's Opinium poll which gave Labour only a 3% lead might have been a bit of a rogue poll but apparently not if a YouGov poll today gives the same identical figures.
The Tories must be finding it very reassuring to see how little Labour appears to be benefiting from their self-inflicted woes.
Kier seems to be making the right noises, unlike the tories.
It's just a shame the lib dems, as 3rd biggest party are often denied any kind of platform in the UK media.
EDIT - in fact the lib dems are, it's just the usual protagonists ignoring it and perpetuating the two party system that we have to choose between labour and Conservative.
he is both a liar and a fraud
Jesus, even when he backs the policy you support you're hyperbolically negative about him.
I thought that yesterday’s Opinium poll which gave Labour only a 3% lead might have been a bit of a rogue poll but apparently not if a YouGov poll today gives the same identical figures.
Has Richard Burton been on the telly recently?
Diane's "stop the war" support can't have had that much traction
even when he backs the policy you support.....
Precisely. No one knows what he will be claiming that he supports in a week's time. Why should anyone believe what he is saying today?
His own website is full of stuff which he claims to believe in but he has actually argued against. Including praising Jeremy Corbyn and his 10 pledges.
EG :
We must stand shoulder to shoulder with trade unions.
Local Party members should select their candidates for every election. The NEC should not impose candidates on local parties.
People were inspired in their thousands by Jeremy Corbyn to join Labour, and we must not lose that idealism and radicalism.
Those are all things which Starmer claims on his website he supports. This is clearly not true, he is very obviously lying. He is a fraud.
https://keirstarmer.com/plans/reformandunite/
"They did it all themselves, and now as predicted it’s wearing off – leaving Starmer where exactly? I mean it’s not as if he hasn’t tried to court the right"
Not sure what Starmer should have been doing these last few weeks, I can't imagine what policy initiative or stunt would have managed to grab the headlines or galvanised the public's imagination during the current shenanigans?
We're you expecting the polling gap we saw a couple of weeks back to be maintained? Those numbers were a knee jerk reaction to an extraordinary situation.
“Then, gentlemen,” said Napoleon, “let us wait a little; when your enemy is executing a false movement, never interrupt him.”
King of the World, smirking and enjoying the fact that his Saville slur has worked…
https://twitter.com/itvnewspolitics/status/1493202353234788352?s=21
…that it was amplified as much by the left, as the right, must give him extra satisfaction.
Job done.
that it was amplified as much by the left, as the right, must give him extra satisfaction.
Who from the left amplified it? I heard many on the left protesting about it if that’s what you mean? If it is then his own MPs amplified it too. 🤷♀️
I heard many on the left protesting about it if that’s what you mean?
I get the impression that's not what Kelvin meant.
Although you are right to be confused by his comment. The Morning Star, which is widely seen as rather left-wing, had an extraordinarily long editorial denouncing Johnson's attempts to smear Starmer over Savile.
They quite rightly described it as a
diversionary tactic and helpfully reminded their readers Johnson's previous claim that “prosecuting child abuse cases was money spaffed up a wall".
They also pointed out :
Savile, the notorious Tory-supported paedophile, intimate of Margaret Thatcher and a man whose status as a TV celebrity and wide-ranging social connections seemed to confer immunity against prosecution, became the subject of a serious police investigation only in 2009. But he died in 2011.
We’re you expecting the polling gap we saw a couple of weeks back to be maintained? Those numbers were a knee jerk reaction to an extraordinary situation.
But he had to drive home the advantage and at least sustain it for a period. But instead he started attacking the left and demonstrating that the policy he was willing to stake the 2019 election on was actually a waste of time. Did he really believe in a 'peoples' (sic) vote' or did he do it to undermine Corbyn? Who knows. The latter would suggest a real political operator, so probably the former.
A phrase that used to be popular applies now "Any other leader would be 20 points ahead"
Great lawyer, mince politician.
Boris 'pedo' slur against Starmer (in session) was a shocking new low, even for the conservatives. Just when you thought they couldn't punch any lower.
buckle your belts boys.
Idiotic comment quite frankly. Corbyn is doing what he’s always done, which is campaign for peace and social justice.
Pass the koolaid comrade
Pass the koolaid comrade
You need some to make a useful and valued contribution?
I get the impression that’s not what Kelvin meant.
You’re quite right. While denouncing Johnson’s slur does amplify it (his Vote Leave time has honed his use of dishonest lines to control the narrative, for sure), that wasn’t what I was referring to. I was referring to those on the far left happy to join in making the slur stick to Starmer. Social Media was awash with it. Skwawkbox, Galloway, the usual best avoided commentators and hangers on. But if you want to keep it to this thread, Scotroutes shared a very disappointing piece by Craig Murray. All the same sort of thing, implying a connection between the Savile case and Starmer, and an “establishment closing ranks” because people across the political spectrum were calling out Johnson’s slur, or at least refusing to repeat it.
I was referring to those on the far left
No you weren't. You referred to "the left" as in : "it was amplified as much by the left, as the right".
You are now trying to backtrack because you know it is nonsense with "I meant the far left".
And since when has the Morning Star not been far left?
Or for that matter since when has Craig Murrey been far left? He seems to me to be some sort of maverick LibDem/Scottish Nationalist, I wasn't aware that he speaks on behalf of the far left.
Sigh - of course not everyone on the left joined in with Johnson’s slur, and nor did everyone on the right as it happens. I didn’t say or mean to imply that everyone on the left joined in. Very few did. Most did not. Citing sources that didn’t does not mean that none did. You are not a robot. And I didn’t say that Murray was far left either.
of course not everyone on the left joined in with Johnson’s slur, and nor did everyone on the right as it happens.
According to you, : "as much by the left, as the right". Which sounds like quite a few on the left..... as much as on the right in fact.
But all you have come up with is Skwawkbox, some Scottish geezer who supported the Brexit Party, and another one who supported the LibDems and Scottish Nationalists.
Your evidence that as many on the left relished Johnson's Savile smear as did on the right is hardly overwhelming, is it?
I didn’t “come up with” Murray, someone else posted his blog on the matter in this thread, which was my only reason for referring to him. The other examples were off the top of my head/memory. I’m not going to waste time going back to find tweets and other posts and comments on social media by people on the left. There, you’ve bored me into giving up. No one on the left helped amplify Johnson’s slur, I just made it up, it never happened. Have a nice sleep.
So now you are not going to provide any evidence "that it was amplified as much by the left as the right" because I have bored you. Not because you haven't got any.
Well that's taught me....... now I will never see the evidence.
For what it is worth you have also bored me, you need to just let some things go rather than keep on, and on, and on about it clinging onto ever word someone has typed on an MTB forum.
you need to just let some things go
The trouble with that is that it’s the johnson/trump tactic of speaking untruths until everyone gets bored and it becomes accepted as truth. Kelvin wasn’t doing anything different to those on the right wing except his target was ‘the left’ (whoever they are) rather than Starmer.
I gave two quick examples off the top of my head, and pointed to an example posted in this thread. How many do I need to go and trawl up?
https://twitter.com/nazirafzal/status/1491045187543769090?s=21
https://twitter.com/1swordoftruth/status/1491141526369767424?s=21
For what it is worth you have also bored me
Thank you for sharing that with me. Yes as you can imagine I am concerned to hear that people like yourself and Kelvin might be bored with me challenging your constant false accusations concerning the left.
Maybe what this thread needs is for everyone to agree as they do on the Brexit and Johnson threads to make it less boring.
Or more pictures from binners. Pictures always help to add a bit of interest.
https://twitter.com/skwawkbox/status/1489913788488949770?s=21
Including this wonderful line…
So there are apparently no records to show that Keir Starmer had ‘nothing to do with it’.
That’s enough going back through Twitter for today. It doesn’t make it easy to find older stuff, does it.
How many do I need to go and trawl up?
Apart from George Galloway? I don't think a man who backed the Brexit Party is very representative of the British Left.
To be honest I don't think George Galloway represents anyone other than himself.
The Morning Star on the other hand is widely seen to be representative of a significant section of the left within the Labour Movement, it was scathing in its attack on Johnson for attempting to smear Starmer over Savile.
And in case you have forgotten, you suggested that as many on the left as on the right backed Johnson's smear attempt.
Oh FFS, Social media was awash with left wing accounts trying to get Johnson’s slur to stick to Starmer, and calling it an establishment coverup that people across the political spectrum were denouncing it. I’m not spending the morning copy and pasting examples. Have a good day.
I’m not spending the morning copy and pasting examples.
LOL! George Galloway and skwawkbox?? I bet that took you hours!
Btw it is perfectly reasonable to talk of an establishment coverup with regards to Savile. The Morning Star makes that point in its editorial attacking Johnson for attempting to smear Starmer over Savile.
It points out that Johnson previously claimed that historic child abuse investigations were a waste of money, that Savile was very close to Margret Thatcher and the Tories, and what undoubtedly protected him was his connections with the establishment. Do you dispute that?
I haven't got hours. If I have time later, how many examples do you want? And, I repeat, citing a good piece in the Morning Star does not mean that all responses were the same.
FWIW a wheelchair using journalist who used to volunteer at Stoke Mandeville hospital 20 years ago said to me it was made very clear by the hospital that nobody new or young was to be left in a room alone with Sir Jimmy. If they all knew what he was up to the authorities weren't doing a very good job if they didn't.
citing a good piece in the Morning Star does not mean that all responses were the same.
It wasn’t just the morning star. Almost all the usual Twitter suspects (you know who they are) condemned Johnson, left wing labour MPs condemned Johnson, as did the main left wing commentators. The only people who didn’t were socialist worker cranks and loons.
The right wing were successful largely because they branded the mainstream left as extremist nutjobs. Your comment did exactly the same. Who needs enemies on the right when there are people supposedly on the left doing their job for them?
The only people who didn’t were socialist worker cranks and loons.
The right wing were successful largely because they branded the mainstream left as extremist nutjobs.
cognitive dissonance?
That's odd, my mate votes Tory but I supposed to that extent he could be described as a crank and a loon.
The latest opinion poll which was conducted yesterday gives Labour a 5% lead
https://redfieldandwiltonstrategies.com/latest-gb-voting-intention-14-february-2022/
cognitive dissonance?
I have a 25 year old problem with the socialist workers from my days as an environmental activist. Maybe they've changed in that period but the ones I came across were perfectly described as cranks and loons.
^^^I mean I agree, based on rock against racism and experiences with something called national union of school students further back in the day which turned out to be an SWP vehicle with fighting NF in town thrown in. They can be perfectly nice people with it of course, though not all. There's that culty thing of inveigling people in... It's just that from perspectives further to the right (so not mine) it could all look a bit, oh dear I'm going to say it, a bit people's front of judea. There. Post pic to taste.
it could all look a bit, oh dear I’m going to say it, a bit people’s front of judea. There. Post pic to taste.
When it comes to the socialist workers, I've no problem with monty python comparisons (I can think of far worse). My problem is with people who should know better painting the mainstream democratic socialist left (which includes Corbyn, Momentum et al) as one and the same.
The right wing were successful largely because they branded the mainstream left as extremist nutjobs. Your comment did exactly the same. Who needs enemies on the right when there are people supposedly on the left doing their job for them?
It's been a few pages since you've been advocating manning the barricades and setting fire to things so who knows where people get these ideas that the mainstream left are extremists?
One thing the left and the right have in common is they both hate the left...
Hilarious!
Come on Bill... fill in the gaps again please. What is this one about?
Oh, it's skwawkbox :
Yes, Corbyn was leader once, and so older photos will contain campaigning material with Corbyn on it. So?
He's just released a photo which was taken during the 2019 election campaign when Corbyn could pull out a crowd and it seems, to the inexpert eye, very badly photoshopped. A bit like Stalin and Trotsky's shoes. Apologies, it made me laugh.
Actually, I'm not sure the original wasn't photoshopped, which is doubly funny.
Another thread where a very small number of posters succeed in boring others away.
Why not send flowers, kiss'n'cuddle and move on?
a photo which was taken during the 2019 election campaign
Of course. Did you know there has been a pandemic? Have you heard of social distancing? That there are no more recent photos of him with constituency campaigners should come as no surprise. A non-story from a non-news source.
It's not photoshopped, it's from after Corbyn they've just used an old placard and got a kid to stand in front of the pic of uncle Jeremy. The other, photoshopped, image with the kid obscured is by some daring truth warrior exposing the lie at the heart of this travesty
Another thread where a very small number of posters succeed in boring others away.
That's the point I was making yesterday but apparently the endless bickering and point scoring is required otherwise;
"The trouble with that is that it’s the johnson/trump tactic of speaking untruths until everyone gets bored and it becomes accepted as truth. "
Anyone, I am bored of it and so are you but as long as the 3 important people can keep picking fights by scrutinising every word that has been written on a thread with around 6 people contributing on an MTB forum all is good...
That’s the point I was making yesterday
Yawn. Lighten up, Starmer is so boring and pointless we have to find amusement where we can. Seems to me the fact he's using a 2019 placard shows the labour party are so skint they can't afford any new ones. Or perhaps the problem is they haven't yet decided what the slogan should be because they're a bunch of vacuous principle free careerist zombies?
Or that the photo was pre-pandemic, when there was a campaign where he could have a photo taken with local campaigners.
An interesting article here explaining how recent polls might have actually exaggerated support for Labour and why Opinium felt it was necessary to change their methodology.
"Labour officials are well aware of this danger – a source close to Labour Party leader Sir Keir Starmer have suggested that the party’s priority was now to convince people who have switched from the Conservatives to “don’t know” that they should take a gamble on the Opposition. If they fail, Mr Johnson’s chances of clinging on to power will be enhanced."
Makes sense. Other people have long observed (in this thread) that you need to keep on eye on the Conservative>DoNotKnow figures to truly understand the polls since Labour got ahead of the Conservatives. It’s not that the polls were over emphasising the lead in how people were answering the voting question, it is that they didn’t, without further digging, really tell the full story about how people were likely to vote at an election. Rather than leave that interpretation to readers, they are modifying how they report… which seems sound to me.
Yup Starmer only converting about 15% of the tory dks
They are the ones to watch, but as the head of polling for opinium has pointed out there's no guarantee that the dks will go back to tory either
https://twitter.com/chriscurtis94/status/1493900263849082886?t=hrRtuiVNq7RDhk29qq0hTg&s=19
At last, a senior Labour politician says what Daily Mail readers have been saying for years :
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/angela-rayner-labour-shoot-first-crime-terrorist-b983111.html?amp
Obviously the policy needs to be applied with a bit of sensible profiling, ie, "does the suspect look like a terrorist?" Other questions can be asked later. The strategy seems to work okay in the US, except for cases where innocent people die.
And in London (Jean Charles de Menezes).
Would have been great in the case of the Birmingham 6 too eh? What a tool.
I've never known a period when I've found so many politicians to be so thick and unsophisticated.
Ms Raygun needs to remember this:
Shooting of Harry Stanley - Wikipedia
It is a particularly strange time to suggest that the police should take a more relaxed attitude towards the rule of law considering the battering public confidence in the Met has taken recently, and those who insist on 'taking the knee' talking about institutionalised racism.
Is now really the best time to say that the police should go with their instincts and use lethal force first, then ask questions?
What makes it even more bizarre is that I am not aware that the police are claiming that the fight against terrorism and the threat of terrorism is being hampered by a need to ask questions before shooting someone. In what recent case has this been an issue?
The whole thing appears to be nothing more than an attention-seeking exercise by Angela Raynor.
Interestingly if the same identical comment had been made by a Tory such as Rees-Mogg I would have expected an avalanche of justified criticism. However the very people who I would expect to be outraged had a Tory made the comment appear none too bothered. Still, she probably didn't mean it, eh?
It's a rum deal when you get pulled up by a tory:
David Davis@DavidDavisMP · ....
This kind of heavy handed approach cost Jean Charles de Menezes his life. I wonder if the former Director of Public Prosecutions would back such a move @Keir_Starmer 🤔 twitter.com/Independent/st…
The whole thing appears to be nothing more than an attention-seeking exercise by Angela Raynor.
i think I’d be prepared to give her the benefit of the doubt and say that if I was in a job where I’d seen 2 of my colleagues murdered in the last few years my views on cops shooting people might be different from the mainstream.
These people are potential poilicy makes. Now I knew a bloke down the pub....
i think I’d be prepared to give her the benefit of the doubt and say that if I was in a job where I’d seen 2 of my colleagues murdered in the last few years my views on cops shooting people might be different from the mainstream.
I don't think it's a stretch to say her views on this are probably mainstream for Ashton under Lyne
Hopefully the first thing that is drummed out of police on firearms training
2 of Davis's colleagues?
i think I’d be prepared to give her the benefit of the doubt and say that if I was in a job where I’d seen 2 of my colleagues murdered in the last few years my views on cops shooting people might be different from the mainstream.
You think she might have been serious?
I was prepared to give her the benefit of the doubt and accept that she probably wasn't being serious.
She was shooting from the hip.
Edit: strategy presumably being to counter perceptions that the left are anti-police. People in deprived communities are disproportionately victims of crime, and also at the sharp end of bad policing/beneficiaries of good policing.