According to Rod Liddle, it's bloody time moderate Labour MPs did resign en masse. His article on the subject today:
Snuggle down on your bed of nails, Blairites: you made it yourselves
Rod Liddle
My personal vat of sympathy is not infinite. I keep it by the garage and it’s topped up from time to time by a firm based in Maidstone. But in this searingly hot weather evaporation is a real problem. And sometimes I scoop around in it with my ladle and the ladle comes up dry.
So it was last week when I tried to find some sympathy for moderate, or Blairite, Labour MPs. They say they are being “bullied” and “intimidated” by the Trot-Snowflake Momentum caucus that now runs the party and would, if there were an election tomorrow, run Britain.
A fairly jubilant caucus, then. It has also been reported that there are moves afoot to deselect some of these poor moderate moppets, people like Luciana Berger and Thangam Debbonaire. So, the ladle goes in. And the ladle comes out bone dry. If ever a bunch of people were getting their just deserts, these are the ones. And if there were any issue on which Corbyn, John McDonnell et al were morally and practically totally in the right, beyond all argument, this is it.
Why? Because the moderate drongos of the Parliamentary Labour Party have made their own beds. Not only made their own beds but offered a turndown service and left a couple of chocolates on the pillow too.
After Labour’s lamentable defeat in 2015, when everybody thought it would win, or come close, these same Labour moderates decided to offer the right to vote for a new leader for three quid to anyone and everyone — come and take part in our exciting election! Cue a massive Trot-snowflake kiddie influx. The moderates did that, nobody else.
Next, a whole bunch of what used to be called “sensible left MPs” — including, incredibly, Frank Field — decided to make the leadership contest more interesting by seconding the nomination of the bearded proto-commie loser Jeremy Corbyn. Yes, without those nominations Corbyn wouldn’t have stood a chance. The moderates did that. And then to their horror, he won, easily.
Who does New Labour represent any more? Nobody. It is devoid of purpose
The moderates then started carping, cavilling and moaning, resigning their front-bench posts, confident Corbyn could be ousted and that he would be a disaster. They then fashioned out of plywood a credulous idiot to challenge Corbyn in a second leadership election, in a manner that was unfair, derisive of party democracy and, worst of all, inept. Owen Smith got hammered and this strengthened Corbyn’s position enormously. The moderates did all that.
After that debacle, they continued to moan and undermine Corbyn, when a better policy might have been to get behind him or get out, as Tristram Hunt did. When the general election was announced they went on attacking their leader — for his incompetence, leftism and supposed lack of voter appeal.
And then when this “Corbyn factor” actually saved not only their seats and careers but also added a bunch of other seats, the Blairites were suitably chastened — for about 25 seconds. Then, shamelessly and as ever ineffectually, they started putting the boot in again. They voted against the leader’s instructions on the crucial Brexit vote.
Hell, I do not like Corbyn and still less that Marxist thug McDonnell, and I will not vote for the party while they run it. But on this issue Corbyn has been a lot more patient than I would have been. Who do the Blairites represent any more? Nobody. There is no strand of thought they represent that appeals to the public. They are devoid of purpose, meaning and voter base. Even more so if Blair himself is eventually arraigned on war crime charges. A zombie mentor from a time of delusion and perfidy.
Corbyn’s lot are right. These Labour MPs should join the Liberal Democrats. Or form a new party that has a commitment to the working class of this country (rather than Hamas, Venezuela, the IRA and Cuba). But I suspect they lack the guts and chutzpah. Either way, why would anyone feel sorry for them?
