Throughout the Labour leadership contest, one thing has struck me more than any other. It is perhaps the key factor in Corbyn’s rise to become the heir apparent, in fact. It’s that Corbyn’s ideas have been presented over and over again by pretty much every campaign and centre-left voice of any description as mostly being […]
Archives for September 2015
The thing that was going to tear the Tories apart, may ironically rip Labour in half
In the wake of their unexpected, slender majority, the Tories were overly concerned about one thing in May: Europe. It was a topic that had the potential to rip the Conservative Party into pieces, particularly now that Cameron had to hold the referendum he’d pledged to have if he ever found himself in just such […]
What if Cooper or Burnham DID win on Saturday?
To start with, I am in no way wavering in my prediction: Corbyn will be Labour leader in four days time. So the following is simply an academic exercise. Call it a thought process for those moderates in Labour who want to survive the Corbyn era. Saturday, September 12, 2015. The day many of us […]
Why, in retrospect, Corbynism was inevitable
Jeremy Corbyn entered the Labour leadership contest with odds of 200-1 of winning, a number we endlessly hear about these days. However, it’s still worth bringing up as an example of how little anyone saw the whole thing coming. But like so much of life, it all seems obvious in hindsight. Labour conference 2013, Brighton. […]
Go see “Suffragette” when it comes out – it’s a great film
I was lucky to have had an opportunity to see a motion picture that won’t be on general release until October this past Friday night. Given how far away it is from hitting the cinemas, I will be extra careful in terms of not offering spoilers up for “Suffragette”, starring Carey Mulligan, directed by Sarah Gavron, […]
The “500 council seats lost” claim by the Burnham campaign is pretty desperate stuff
Still not convinced Jeremy Corbyn has the Labour leadership in the bag? Yesterday we witnessed the fag-end of modern political campaigning. If you want to know what the sound of the barrel being scraped in Westminster is like, you just had to tune into what emitted from the Burnham camp yesterday. They claimed to the […]
Here’s one time I’m glad Cameron has a habit of backing down
Every once in a while, an image so powerful it can change public opinion, or turn it even further in one direction, comes along. The day before yesterday, we were given one such image: that of a small boy lying face down on a beach, dead. If you have children of your own – and […]
Chuka Umunna’s latest statement regarding Corbyn perfectly summaries why I’m not a Labourite
The man who quite reasonably in many respects (given what was happening at the time) thought running for the leadership of the Labour Party was not for him, spoke in Amsterdam this week about several things, not least of which was the leader elect, Mr Jeremy Corbyn. Only there was none of this “coalition of […]
Eurosceptic Tories are a lot like the Nats: they will never take no for an answer
The Electoral Commission have decided that the wording on the EU referendum ballot needs changing. Instead of being a yes or a no question, there will be two boxes – one to remain in the EU, one to leave – and you tick one of the other. Actually, this seems completely fair to me. The […]
This is the only scenario in which an SDP-style new party would be possible
So Corbyn becomes leader of the Labour Party – will there be another split a la 1981 as a result? There are many factors working against that happening any time soon. For or a start, 1981 itself. As you may recall, that didn’t go so well. The “prepare for government” quip looked foolish in light […]