on both sides of the pond- the extreme left is scuppering their own cause

Grandad1943

growstuff

Grandad Views such as yours aren't persuading me.

With views such as yours growstuff, I would not ever expect they would.

Some of us have subscribed to the Labour Movement for over fifty years and not just come across when the party they supported at the last General Election was virtually wiped out.

Well, I'm so sorry that I don't have a Labour-voting pedigree, but AFAIK my vote still counts and if all Labour supporters are like you, I'm really not tempted in the slightest.

I'm not sure what you mean by my "views". I certainly don't follow any political party's dogma, but generally my views and what I'd like to see happen in this country are far to the left of yours.

I think Jabberwok is correct in that the reason the ‘^.......public, you know, those ordinary folk without degrees or think tanks or statistics, people who are not, by and large intellectuals, who don’t read the Guardian..............^ those people opted in my humble opinion to ‘get Brexit done.’ We might not like it, or indeed we may like it, but that as I see it, is the bare truth. Secondly, I believe Jeremy Corbyn was seen, rightly or wrongly, by these very same people, as a person unsuited to lead the country.

I believe it to be very possible that Keir Starmer may well be our next PM.
I have not decided which way I will vote at present. I will watch and wait to make my decision nearer the time.

Jabberwok, I would agree with your post @10:30 today that Brexit was the main defining factor in the December General Election.

Labour had an unbridgeable divide between it's Brexit supporting traditional voters in the North of England and it's remain voting supporters in the South of England.

However, the political and personal damage to Corbyn had been done much earlier than that Election campaign, and much of that damage emanated from the right within the Labour Party.

Why isn't Starmer's Labour Party 20 points ahead?

@RachaelSwindon Blog asking this question.

rachaelswindon.blogspot.com/2020/08/why-isnt-keir-starmers-labour-party-20.html

If the establishment doesn’t attack everything that you do, make up lies about you, harass you on your doorstep every day, discredit you, smear you, and hold you to a higher level of accountability than the government themselves, you ain’t no Labour leader, bruv.

Galaxy

And in my view those who supported corbyn were those to whom having a labour government mattered the least.

Corbin was the democratically elected leader of the Parliamentary Labour Party with a total vote of over three hundred and thirteen thousand votes and that is democracy which all should have supported

No If's, no but's, just get behind that democracy.

Perhaps if so-called "Labour supporters" had a very different government would be in place now.

I think there is one thing that has been forgotten in this saga of skullduggery and general monkey business, and that is that the election was won by a landslide by Boris's definite promise to 'get brexit done!) The general public, you know, those ordinary folk without degrees or think tanks or statistics, people who are not, by and large intellectuals, who don't read the Guardian, preferring the Mirror or the Sun, were sick and tired of JC and Co flip flopping and procrastinating, being, as these poor dim unintellectual people saw it, completely baffling as to what labour really thought or meant! Labour threw the election away, it didn't need any help from any outsiders, ordinary people saw to that, those millions of everyday folk that have the last say-in the ballot box!

growstuff

Grandad Views such as yours aren't persuading me.

With views such as yours growstuff, I would not ever expect they would.

Some of us have subscribed to the Labour Movement for over fifty years and not just come across when the party they supported at the last General Election was virtually wiped out.

And in my view those who supported corbyn were those to whom having a labour government mattered the least.

I live in one of those constituencies growstuff, the most accurate summary I saw of the situation was Alan Johnson on election night, a clear understanding of what was going on.
I can only say that our ex MP was in despair at what was happening, she had held the seat for years (to be fair it had been a labour seat for years) she was stopped repeatedly by people telling her they couldn't vote for corbyn. Her replacement who spent a lot of time expressing views on subjects of no relevance to her constituents lost the seat.

Grandad Views such as yours aren't persuading me.

PS. Like Callistemon, I have a floating vote up for grabs. If Labour wants it, it's going to need to sell itself to me.

I wonder how many people on here live in the "red wall" constituencies and/or have talked to people who were former Labour voters, but voted Conservative.

Admittedly I've only chatted to a few, but my impression is that the reasons had little to do people plotting against Corbyn within the party or even the broad sweep policies.

I know what I personally think, but I'm interested in the views of people with real experience.

Galaxy

And I am sure calling people little dictatorswill achieve that.

Galaxy, So how would you describe those employed by the party who it is strongly alleged took it upon themselves to work against Labour victory in 2017.

How would you describe those employed by the party who it is strongly alleged commiserated that the party did so well in the above democratic election?

How would you describe those employed by the party who it is strongly alleged diverted funds away from left leaning candidates in winnable seats and towards right wing candidates in unwinnable seats in the above election?

How would you describe those employed by the party who it is strongly alleged verbally abused those who would not join them in their efforts to bring down an elected leader?

How would you describe those employed by the party who it is strongly alleged rejoiced when a female Labour MP was reduced to crying in the toilets at Labour Central Office brought on by the abuse she had received when she was already at a very low ebb in her personal health.

Describing the persons who are alleged to have carried out all the above as little dictators is very appropriate I believe, for they surely have no place for democracy within them.

And I am sure calling people little dictatorswill achieve that.

In Britain it is the right within the Labour Party that has torn down democracy. An unelected few decided that they knew better than those which elected Jeremy Corbyn as leader on two occasions with the largest majorities ever gained in any Labour leadership election.

We now have those, even on this forum, who support those "little dictators" who carried out the above actions and then go on to talk about democracy not being upheld by the left.

The Labour Party in Britain will not be elected to government until it once again has a leader that can draw all in the Labour Movement together in support of broad policies and a broad-based leadership in which all sectors of the party and movement feel engaged to support.

Sadly the Labour Party appears not to have such a person as it's leader at the present time and therefore factionalism will continue and may well grow further.

I've been perusing the morning papers on line. Evidently in Georgia there were protests involving white supremacists, bikers and confederate supporters -v- Black Lives Matter and anti facsist/anti racists groups. The white supremacist supporters appeared to be very well tooled up with what looked like military type hardware. The other lot were carrying banners opposing racism.
Absolutely terrifying to see this kind of thing in the land of the free, on the weekend we commemorate VJ Day and the triumph of democracy over facism .

exactly Varian, FGS

Yawn.

Back in the midtwentieth century Russia might have wanted the UK to have a Labour govt, but in the 21st century Russia has pulled out all the stops to support the Tories, especially the brexit brigade. It suits Russia just as mucb to have a Vote Leave govt in the UK as it does go have Trump in the White House.

If anyone wants to return to the OP.....the left on both sides of the pond need to give their heads a wobble, as a previous poster used to say.

If only they were rationed Gaga?

If you prefer.......No quiet moaning about ‘sham democracy’
If Corbyn had won the election.

lemongrove

I dare say there would be no squealing about a ‘sham democracy’ if Corbyn had won the last GE.

No squealing lemongrove. Calm acceptance, acknowledgment. Working with what is now.

It isn’t left wing supporters that start these threads, just calm rationed responses to right wing nit picking and rehashing.

MaizieD I think Starmer's treatment of Rebecca Long Bailey and his payment to the people suing the LP show a distinct tendency to favour the right. I hope I am wrong but I fear not.
Callistemon there are a massive number of people using the trains who would welcone Nationalisation, in fact over 60% are in favour of it fullfact.org/economy/do-public-want-railways-renationalised/

A few focus groups? As opposed to the whole country voting?
I have no idea why left wing posters are so fixated on ‘sham democracy’ ‘foreign interference’ and so on.....coukd it be because the LP lost?
Russia would have loved him to be in Number Ten, in any case.

I don’t think you read it either MaizieD ?
Some people see conspiracies everywhere.As I already posted, there would be no outrage along these lines if Corbyn had won the GE.