Blairite toy chucking

It started as Jeremy Corbyn was delivering his victory speech - as he was praising his rivals in the leadership contest and praising his opponents for their courage, tenacity and principals.

James 'No, I've never heard of him either' Reed announced his resignation from the shadow cabinet, using twitter to ensure that everyone - well, his family and friends, more likely - knew about it, and so the first question Corbyn faced could be "Do you know James Reed is resigning?"

He even appended a copy of his letter of resignation, to try to increase the possible damage.

A more mature, less destructive response - one that actually acknowledged a duty to the Labour Party - would have been to do it quietly, during the process of establishing the new cabinet.  But this was not the route chosen by Reed.  He preferred to flick two fingers to the new leader and the 59.5% of voters in the leadership election who backed him.  And to the party, and the people who will suffer under the Tories, as disunity rather than ideology 'extremity' has been what has kept Labour out of power.

A decent man would not have acted as you did, Mr Reed.

Also within minutes of the announcement of the result, Rob Marchant, a Labour party blogger and journalist published a near hysterical rant titled, "Jeremy Corbyn becomes Labour leader: Today is our darkest hour – we have become unelectable" and nailed his colours firmly to the mast with a series of what he probably thought were devastating broadsides against Corbyn - a man who was still giving his victory speech at the time, remember:

The harsh truth: this is a disastrous, collective decision made by Labour’s comfort zone, aided and abetted by hard-left dinosaurs leading the big unions, some wide-eyed youth looking for inspiration, a few leftover Trots and some three-pound political tourists. 

It is almost a storyline for a low-budget comedy film, where the Monster Raving Loony Party candidate unexpectedly claims the seat of the Prime Minister. It is something which so hits the party’s credibility, it is difficult to see it recovering by 2025, let alone 2020.

Nothing like unity, eh, comrade?

If this had been posted before the deadline for votes, it would have counted as a valid contribution; a truculent, petty contribution, but a valid one none-the-less.

Posted minutes after Corbyn wins with 60% of the votes cast, this is at best spiteful mischief making. Though a more likely explanation is that it is self promotion. You had this little poison epistle ready to go because you wanted - had - to be the first one to make like Cassandra and pronounce doom thundering down upon us in the moment of triumph.

This is really all about you, isn't it, Jamie? Making youself out as the Fearless Truthspeaker Cutting Through The Hype And Excitement To Deliver Uncomfortable Home Truths To The Deluded Fools.

Because if you though these ... thoughts ... of yours were really that important, you'd have shared them with us before. I suppose we should be grateful that your instinct for self promotion spared us being treated to your wisdom earlier.

Why are you doing the Tories' job for them?

Much has been made - especially by Marchant is his fulmination - of how Corbyn is a throwback, a 1980s relic. Maybe so. But his Blairite opponents then make a specious claim that Labour lost in the 80s because of the policies Foot and Benn imposed on the party.

That's a dubious reading of history. In the 80s, Labour split, with a generous portion of soft-left support forming the SDP. This fatally split the centre-left vote, allowing Thatcher to enjoy a landslide victory on a minority - and a diminished one at that - of the votes cast. History, to paraphrase Marx, tends to repeat, first as tragedy, then as farce. The Blairites, not the membership, are the ones intent on repeating the mistakes of the 80s, retreating to their comfort zone in a fit of pique instead of accepting that, yup, that's what their party is.

(Though if they are going to argue that the Labour Party is essentially Blairite, they then have to think about why they have failed so massively - how come they were utterly drubbed by an old, short wearing 'dinosaur'? The uncomfortable answer is that if Labour is not essentially leftwing, then the rightwing candidates must be really, really bad to have driven so many to embrace Corbyn.)

And in doing so they risk producing the same result - a fatal split allowing a Tory hegemony to develop.

One wonders why they are so blind? Are they so grief stricken at having the reins of power so rudely seized by the man they described as the 'Pied Piper'?

(An interesting analogy - are they suggest the members of the Labour Party are misguided children ... or rats?)

Or is there a deeper motive, a deliberate strategy to try to wreck Corbyn's leadership in time to get a shot at regaining control before 2020?

Corbyn is old, and it is possible he intends to step down anyway, in 2018 or 19 - even if he isn't pushed out befor that. If so, it is important for the Blairites to make it look as if he is being forced out, not going of his own volition. Their greatest fear is not Corbyn, in this scenario, but a Corbyn successor - John McDonnell or Lisa Nandy. To secure the vacant leadership in 2018 or 19, the tem 'Corbynite' needs to be invested with the sort of loathing that 'Blairite' has come to carry.

It would be deeply, unspeakably cynical. But perhaps the prospect of a weak and increasingly unpopular Conservative administration, losing votes over Europe and with its majority whittled away, is too tantalising for the Blairites.

And in their greed for power, they'll deliver Cameron's successor - not Corbyn's -a gift in 2020.

(I think they will fail in making 'Corbynite' a term of abuse, however, as I think they misjudge their party. And it isn't like a peacable cove like Corbyn will be launching any invasions from the opposition benches.)

Cowards, flinch! Accept that maybe, just maybe, the membership know better than you what they and people like them want. That maybe Jeremy Corbyn won't immediately start calling for Das Kapital to be on the school curriculum. And that even if he does harbour such dreams, he's more likely to realise them if he gets to fill his Shadow Cabinet with his mates.

Still, Blairites never seem happy being in the tent, pissing out, unless they own the tent.

Citizen Corbyn

It's been a Long March indeed, but it is almost over.  There's a wee while still to go, so amuse yourself with Robert Lindsay as Jeremy Corbyn Wolfie Smith:

Power to the people!

Odd thing is, I think the only reason Corbyn was put forward for the leadership was because Lisa Nandy was busy having a baby.  So, basically, it is all the fault of some bloke called Andy.

Down with the shine

Tony Blair has intervened, yet again, in the Labour leadership race, clearly oblvious to the fact that no-one likes him any more, and the more he begs people not to do something the more likely they are to do it.  If he truly loved the Labour Party as he he claims, he'd simply shut up and go away.  The Labour Party does not want him.  That much is obvious.

Whether or not we get him again, or rather one of the three dwarves that accompany his Snow White routine, is another matter.  Democracy doesn't always deliver, if the Powers That Be have anything to do with it.  And Tony Blair - once the glistening insurgent against the vested interests of Old Labour - is now undoubtedly one of the Powers That Be.

Anyway, let's play some music so we don't have to listen to his tiresome scolding.  Frankly, I'd drive off a cliff if it meant I didn't have to hear him any more.

"In with the new, and out with the old."  Only reverse it.  Out with the New (Labour) and in with the old (geezer).

Down with the glistening shine!

Jack McConnell says, "I'm stupid!"

'Baron' (aka Jack) McConnell, the ineffectual former first minister for Scotland, who oversaw the demise of Labour in Scotland, the man who achieved the impossible by losing Scotland for Labour, has decided to weigh in to the Labour leadership debate by offering his brains on the matter:

“This is a ridiculous situation and I cannot believe that when the initial decision was made in May to open up the membership in this way over the summer that somebody at a higher level in the party, or somebody in one of the at that time three main campaigns didn’t express some concerns,” he said.

Yes, Jack.  Only, the decision to open up the membership was not taken in May.  It was taken last year, and was voted on and accepted, and it was endorsed by that other gurning clown, Tony Blair.

I believe the only person on Labour's National Executive Committee who voted against the changes was Dennis Skinner, the intransigent left winger.  But I'm not 100% certain of this.

Campbell and Corbyn

Now Alastair Campbell has weighed into the Labour leadership debate, begging people to vote for any candidate as long as it isn't Jermey Corbyn.

(Note to future left-wing contenders - don't have a family name beginning with C.  It is like having a great big brightly coloured target on your back.  With fairy lights around it.)

t must be galling to Campbell to know that it is lrgely down to his slick, sick inducing spintastic years in Downing Street that Blairism is being rejected by the party.  Whatever the accomplishments of the Blair years - and there were many, at least until megalomania, corruption, sleaze and hypocrisy corroded whatever patina of principle the administration retained in 1997 - they are obscured by the memory of puke inducing, wretched spinnery, dodgy dossiers, David Kelly and Iraq.  And no-one embodies those gut-wrenching qualities better than Campbell.

(Campbell actually comes across as a decent bloke in his memoirs.  But we're talking about perception here.   As with all things Blairite, it is about how things seem, how they play with the focus groups, not how they are.)

Now, ad hominems aside, about Corbyn.

Let's be honest. It is highly unlikely that Jeremy Corbyn will lead Labour into the 2020 election. I doubt Jermey Corbyn imagines he lead Labour in 2020. Not because he won't win (he might, though my gut is that Burham or Cooper will pick up enough 2nd and 3rd preferences to creep across the line) but because of his age. He'll be 70 in 2015.

The likelihood is he'll serve for a couple of years, introduce a few constitutional changes so it will be easier for the leftwingers to get on the ballot in the future, and then step aside for a younger candidate.

His greatest service will be stopping Burnham / Cooper / Kendall winning. In 2018 the likely candidates will be Keir Starmer Dan Jarvis, Lisa Nandy, Michael Dugher and (long shot, but my persponal preferred option from 2010) Jon Cruddas.

The astonishing thing is, none of these names make you want to punch the bearer of it repeatedly. Labour has some good talent coming through, they just have to wait until the Blairite bonehead wannabees in the current leadership round finally get the message that their time has passed.

Alternately, elect Naz Shah as leader, on the principle that anything annoying to George Galloway is a good idea.

The Corbyn Clause

Yesterday the Independent published an article that claimed Jeremy Corbyn (inexplicably, they seemed to have omitted the customary 'far left' that precedes his name) wished to restore Clause IV, the commitment to “common ownership of the means of production, distribution and exchange.”

They published the interview under the not-exaclt-ambivalent headline, "Jermey Corbyn to Bring Back Clause IV."

Clause IV was removed from the Labour Party constitution under Tony Blair.

The Indie interview makes it clear that Corbyn was asked directly if he wanted to restore Clause IV. A direct question.  He didn't bring it up himself, he was asked about it.

He said, in response, “I think we should talk about what the objectives of the party are, whether that’s restoring clause IV as it was originally written or it’s a different one. But we shouldn’t shy away from public participation, public investment in industry and public control of the railways.”

I think it is bloody refreshing that he answered the question openly, and didn't prevaricate in a Blairite manner.

As for his answer, he said he wants a discussion about how Labour should approach public ownership - whether it is the return of the old clause IV or a new version. He doesn't actually indicate his preference, or even if he supports either the old or a new version of Clause IV, merely saying, "we shouldn’t shy away from public participation, public investment in industry and public control of the railways."

That's a long, long way away from a commitment to “common ownership of the means of production, distribution and exchange.”

A statement has been released from Camp Corbyn to clarify his position following the Indie's insanist headline.  The Mail, of course, immediately proclaimed this to be a 'backtrack'.

The Blairites and the right are gnashing their teeth like anything over Corbyn's popularity.

They must be frustrated that they can't find any other dirt on him.  He's not a hypocrite, unlike Blair; he's not prone to Lear like rages, unlike Brown; even though his climate change denying brother Piers could probably do with a bit of back-stabbing, Corbyn can't be accused of that; and he's scrupulously honest and frugal with his expenses claims.

Even the "terrorist sympathiser" doesn't seem to be sticking.  Because, I suspect, most people are happier with the uneasy compromise in Ulster and would probably have had it sooner; and can see that talking to Hamas, like talking to the IRA, might be an unpleasant but necessary step.  A bit like talking to the Israeli government, in fact.

They must be fuming.

Labour's electoral disfunction

John Cruddas - the man I hoped might have been Labour leader in 2010 - has delivered his initial conclusions (if that isn't an oxymoron) about Labour's defeat in 2015.

The first hard truth is that the Tories didn’t win despite austerity, they won because of it. Voters did not reject Labour because they saw it as austerity lite. Voters rejected Labour because they perceived the Party as anti-austerity lite. 58% agree that, ‘we must live within our means so cutting the deficit is the top priority’. Just 16% disagree. Almost all Tories and a majority of Lib Dems and Ukip voters agree.

I'm confused about the idea the Tories are deemed economically competent.

Between 2010 and 2015, they managed to deliver Alastair Darling's economic plan - halving the deficit over a parliament.

George Osborne, you'll recall, wanted to eliminate it. He failed, and also strangled growth.

So I think the narrative is not that Labour lost because flaky on the economy but that Labour lost because of the perception that it was flaky on the economy. If anything, the Tories should have been castigated into atoms because of their failure to deliver their plan, their suffocation of the recovery and their reckless over-promising and under-delivering.

Of course, getting people to understand counter intuitive things - that it's not a bad idea to spend on infrastructure to help tomorrow's tax payers today is not actually a bad idea, and that cutting spending reducing economic growth - in an environment where reasoned argument is stifled by the mad wailing of the Mail, is another matter entirely.