Should Corbyn remain as Labour leader?

[cloggypop]

I am outraged that George Galloway went hundreds of miles out of his way to avoid a pregnant Jewish woman. Disgusting. 

[Brownie]

1 hour ago, Strontium Dog said:

 

You are utterly clueless.

 

Galloway is what he is. If it doesn't bother you, fine, but don't deny it.

I didn’t mention anything about anyone other than you. You’re a troll, do one.

[Rico1304]

Watson asking for the decision on Hatton to be revisited. 

[Red Phoenix]

Extract from a 2018 Jonathan Cook article, interesting take on what's currently happening :

 

Has Jeremy Corbyn stumbled onto a battlefield, little prepared for the historic burden he shoulders?

 

. . .

Different languages

Two camps, two entirely different languages and narratives.

 

These camps may be divided, but it would be seriously misguided to imagine they are equal.

 

One has the full power and weight of those corporate structures behind it. The politicians speak its language, as do the media. Its ideas and its voice dominate everywhere that is considered official, objective, balanced, neutral, respectable, legitimate.

 

The other camp has one small space to make its presence felt – social media. That is a space rapidly shrinking, as the politicians, media and the corporations that own social media (as they do everything else) start to realise they have let the genie out of the bottle. This camp is derided as conspiratorial, dangerous, fake news.

 

This is the current battlefield. It is a battle the first camp looks like it is winning but actually has already lost.

 

That is not necessarily because the second camp is winning the argument. It is because physical realities are catching up with the first camp, smashing its illusions, even as it clings to them like a life-raft.

 

The two most significant disrupters of the first camp’s narrative are climate breakdown and economic meltdown. The planet has finite resources, which means endless growth and wealth accumulation cannot be sustained indefinitely. Much as in a Ponzi scheme, there comes a point when the hollow centre is exposed and the system comes crashing down. We have had intimations enough that we are nearing that point.

 

It hardly needs repeating, except to climate deniers, that we have had even more indications that the Earth’s climate is already turning against humankind.

Out of the darkness

Our political language is rupturing because we are now completely divided. There is no middle ground, no social compact, no consensus. The second camp understands that the current system is broken and that we need radical change, while the first camp holds desperately to the hope that the system will continue to be workable with modifications and minor reforms.

 

It is on to this battlefield that Corbyn has stumbled, little prepared for the heavy historic burden he shoulders.

 

We are arriving at a moment called a paradigm shift. That is when the cracks in a system become so obvious they can no longer be credibly denied. Those vested in the old system scream and shout, they buy themselves a little time with increasingly repressive measures, but the house is moments away from falling. The critical questions are who gets hurt when the structure tumbles, and who decides how it will be rebuilt.

 

The new paradigm is coming anyway. If we don’t choose it ourselves, the planet will for us. It could be an improvement, it could be a deterioration, it could be extinction, depending on how prepared we are for it and how violently those invested in the old system resist the loss of their power. If enough of us understand the need for discarding the broken system, the greater the hope that we can build something better from the ruins.

 

We are now at the point where the corporate elite can see the cracks are widening but they remain in denial. They are entering the tantrum phase, screaming and shouting at their enemies, and readying to implement ever-more repressive measures to maintain their power.

 

They have rightly identified social media as the key concern. This is where we – the 99 per cent – have begun waking each other up. This is where we are sharing and learning, emerging out of the darkness clumsily and shaken. We are making mistakes, but learning. We are heading up blind alleys, but learning. We are making poor choices, but learning. We are making unhelpful alliances, but learning.

 

No one, least of all the corporate elite, knows precisely where this process might lead, what capacities we have for political, social and spiritual growth.

 

And what the elite don’t own or control, they fear.

Putting the genie back

The elite have two weapons they can use to try to force the second camp back into the bottle. They can vilify it, driving it back into the margins of public life, where it was until the advent of social media; or they can lock down the new channels of mass communication their insatiable drive to monetise everything briefly opened up.

 

Both strategies have risks, which is why they are being pursued tentatively for the time being. But the second option is by far the riskier of the two. Shutting down social media too obviously could generate blowback, awakening more of the first camp to the illusions the second camp have been trying to alert them to.

 

Corbyn’s significance – and danger – is that he brings much of the language and concerns of the second camp into the mainstream. He offers a fast-track for the second camp to reach the first camp, and accelerate the awakening process. That, in turn, would improve the chances of the paradigm shift being organic and transitional rather than disruptive and violent.

 

That is why he has become a lightning rod for the wider machinations of the ruling elite. They want him destroyed, like blowing up a bridge to stop an advancing army.

 

It is a sign both of their desperation and their weakness that they have had to resort to the nuclear option, smearing him as an anti-semite. Other, lesser smears were tried first: that he was not presidential enough to lead Britain; that he was anti-establishment; that he was unpatriotic; that he might be a traitor. None worked. If anything, they made him more popular.

 

And so a much more incendiary charge was primed, however at odds it was with Corbyn’s decades spent as an anti-racism activist.

 

The corporate elite weaponised anti-semitism not because they care about the safety of Jews, or because they really believe that Corbyn is an anti-semite. They chose it because it is the most destructive weapon – short of sex-crime smears and assassination – they have in their armoury.

 

The truth is the ruling elite are exploiting British Jews and fuelling their fears as part of a much larger power game in which all of us – the 99 per cent – are expendable. They will keep stoking this campaign to stigmatise Corbyn, even if a political backlash actually does lead to an increase in real, rather than phoney, anti-semitism.

 

The corporate elites have no plan to go quietly. Unless we can build our ranks quickly and make our case confidently, their antics will ensure the paradigm shift is violent rather than healing. An earthquake, not a storm.

 

https://prruk.org/jeremy-corbyn-stumbles-onto-a-battlefield-little-prepared-for-the-historic-burden-he-shoulders/

[deiseach]

27 minutes ago, cloggypop said:

I am outraged that George Galloway went hundreds of miles out of his way to avoid a pregnant Jewish woman. Disgusting. 

"It took a lot of effort on George's part," a close friend told the Sun on condition of anonymity, "but he found it liberating. It's like his motto in German, arbeit macht frei."

[AngryOfTuebrook]

6 minutes ago, Rico1304 said:

Watson asking for the decision on Hatton to be revisited. 

Well, spank my ass and call me Charlie! Who would have guessed that The Artist Formerly Known as Fat Cunt isn't a Degsy fan?

[Strontium]

19 minutes ago, Brownie said:

I didn’t mention anything about anyone other than you. You’re a troll, do one.

 

You're a moron. I'm here in good faith to discuss British politics in a civil manner. If anyone should fuck off, it's you.

[Strontium]

10 minutes ago, Rico1304 said:

Watson asking for the decision on Hatton to be revisited. 

 

Please no. Hatton is worth several seats to us in the upcoming council elections on his own. Absolute box office poison.

[Brownie]

21 minutes ago, Strontium Dog said:

 

You're a moron. I'm here in good faith to discuss British politics in a civil manner. If anyone should fuck off, it's you.

Get fucked.

[Nelly-Szoboszlai]

I've had a feeling of late that political discourse in this country is on its arse and is somewhat dictated by social media. We're all guilty of it, in differing degrees.

 

Somebody will tweet something, it'll be retweeted and agreement given to it without any real critical thinking being given to what the original message says. 

 

That's jumped out even more with Derek Hatton. I'm not arsed if he is or isn't admitted back into the Labour Party as a lowly card carrying member. I'd have issues if it looked like he was going to gain a position of influence in the party. 

 

But, all we're getting on it appears to be somebody says Hatton shouldn't be admitted, they must be right, let's blindly share their opinion. 

 

Nobody scrutinises anymore. He did some dodgy things about 40 years ago. Why aren't most of his detractors putting forward a case of WHY he shouldn't be admitted into the party, provided his membership complies with the relevant party rules?

 

It's just a really dull argument, totally lacking in substance. Oooh, Tom Watson/some random columnist doesn't think that Hatton should be in the party! And what? Who cares?

[Nelly-Szoboszlai]

And the Luciana Berger out, while Derek Hatton is in rhetoric is equally as mundane. 

 

And what? She fucked off of her own accord. Derek Hatton isn't coming as an MP. 

 

It's all a load of soundbitey, nonsensical bollocks. 

[Boss]

16 minutes ago, Nelly-Torres said:

I've had a feeling of late that political discourse in this country is on its arse and is somewhat dictated by social media. We're all guilty of it, in differing degrees.

 

Somebody will tweet something, it'll be retweeted and agreement given to it without any real critical thinking being given to what the original message says. 

 

That's jumped out even more with Derek Hatton. I'm not arsed if he is or isn't admitted back into the Labour Party as a lowly card carrying member. I'd have issues if it looked like he was going to gain a position of influence in the party. 

 

But, all we're getting on it appears to be somebody says Hatton shouldn't be admitted, they must be right, let's blindly share their opinion. 

 

Nobody scrutinises anymore. He did some dodgy things about 40 years ago. Why aren't most of his detractors putting forward a case of WHY he shouldn't be admitted into the party, provided his membership complies with the relevant party rules?

 

It's just a really dull argument, totally lacking in substance. Oooh, Tom Watson/some random columnist doesn't think that Hatton should be in the party! And what? Who cares?

Well, one of their rules is that your aims must comply with the aims of the Labour Party. That's why he was kicked out in the first place. But the thing is, his views do comply with the views of the party nowadays.

 

[Captain Howdy]

Derek Hatton, fucking hell, what a mess we really are in

[Red Phoenix]

58 minutes ago, Strontium Dog said:

You're a moron. I'm here in good faith to discuss British politics in a civil manner. If anyone should fuck off, it's you.

 

37 minutes ago, Brownie said:

Get fucked.

 

[Skidfingers McGonical]

2 hours ago, Strontium Dog said:

 

The shameless careerism of giving up a career in a political party to, in all probability, lose your seat at the next election.

That should be the next by-election that they should be calling.

 

 

[Skidfingers McGonical]

19 minutes ago, Boss said:

Well, one of their rules is that your aims must comply with the aims of the Labour Party. That's why he was kicked out in the first place. But the thing is, his views do comply with the views of the party nowadays.

 

 

Do they? Have you sat down with Degsy and asked him about this? Has he changed his outlook on things since living out in Cyprus? 

 

I bet bet you don’t really know at this stage do you. 

[Rico1304]

But Hatton won’t be a lowly member will he? He’ll be invited on TV and radio and get to talk...actually, Stronts is right.  Carry on. 

[Captain Howdy]

Hatton, Galloway....Labour will sink without trace, can people on here honestly not see this?

[Numero Veinticinco]

1 minute ago, Captain Howdy said:

Hatton, Galloway....Labour will sink without trace, can people on here honestly not see this?

Labour aren’t going anywhere. 

[Skidfingers McGonical]

5 minutes ago, Rico1304 said:

But Hatton won’t be a lowly member will he? He’ll be invited on TV and radio and get to talk...actually, Stronts is right.  Carry on. 

 

Well considering he used to present talk shows on the radio, this wouldn’t be out of the ordinary. 

 

 

[A Red]

7 minutes ago, Skidfingers McGonical said:

 

 

I bet bet you don’t really know at this stage do you. 

Is Degsy actually now a fully signed up member, did he get the papers, get the papers?

[Brownie]

Can someone please educate me on Hatton and Galloway? I've heard bits but it's before my time, cheers.

[Captain Howdy]

5 minutes ago, Hank Moody said:

Labour aren’t going anywhere. 

I agree 

[A Red]

1 minute ago, Brownie said:

Can someone please educate me on Hatton and Galloway? I've heard bits but it's before my time, cheers.

Ones an Evertonian the other a United fan.

[Numero Veinticinco]

Just now, Brownie said:

Can someone please educate me on Hatton and Galloway? I've heard bits but it's before my time, cheers.

Galloway, anti-Israel to the max. Long term labour MP expelled over the Iraq war, ripped New Labour a new one. Met with Saddam Hussein to convince them to let weapons inspectors in and to stop the oil for food scheme that cost lots of lives. Is controversial in the same ‘likes terrorists’ way that Corbyn is. Ripped the arse out of America in the senate. Good orator, very good, but a bit of a demagogue.