Psychoactive Substances: Rolling UK Politics in The Neo-Con Era

grayling hapless and weaselly on newsnight

whereas evan davis just hapless and spindly

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Cl-vEiJXIAExmW2.jpg
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Cl-vF34WgAAeYBN.jpg

that's quite satisfying isn't it

George Eaton (New Statesman) on twitter:

I'm now near-certain that Corbyn voted Leave. Hear papers have more tomorrow.

John Harris‏ @johnharris1969

@georgeeaton Where's This story then? Now seen all splashes

George Eaton‏ @georgeeaton

@johnharris1969 I was just wondering same. Don't know. Was told by Chris Bryant that they'd interviewed someone told by Corbyn that he was voting Leave.

Great work.

Just to clarify, George Eaton reported having been told by Chris Bryant that he'd been told by a newspaper that they had interviewed someone who told them that Corbyn had told them he voted leave.

kind of love the idea that Corbyn and Boris would actually get into the booth and vote for each other's campaign positions, then sweat profusely on camera for months insisting that they'd voted the way they said they had

I'm sure there is some dubious source that will say that Boris voted Leave, even though it is near impossible to corroborate such bollocks.

"Instead of trying to bring the country in times of crisis he has opened the door and actively invited the UK to tear itself apart. All bravado, all tactics, no real strategy."

who says that wasnt a strategy?
#brexitparanoia

From a couple of weeks ago:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/06/13/labour-rebels-hope-to-topple-jeremy-corbyn-in-24-hour-blitz-afte/

All that planning and they couldn't come up with an alternate leader.

"England"

I live and die through England
Through England
It leaves a sadness
Remedies never were within my reach
I cannot go on as I am
Withered vine reaching from the country
That I love
England
You leave a taste
A bitter one
I have searched for your springs
But people, they stagnate with time
Like water, like air
To you, England, I cling
Undaunted, never failing love for you
England

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ik9vqRDqyu0

Been listening to this a lot since last Friday. Oddly prescient.

starting to think labour has a death wish.

theres no chance at this point that they, whether with corbyn or a new leader - less so with a new leader actually - could win an election at this stage, is there?

its tragic, as brexit might be terrible for england, but it could just - in my head at least - have worked to labours advantage.

oh well.

maybe something better will replace them in two elections time.

xxp

Revealing your dastardly plans in advance has ever worked for whom? Well apart from Blair labour, the Tories, Hitler etc ...

if winning the next election was the only reason for a political party to exist none would have ever been founded

Bullxit

http://www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2016/06/27/sadakat-kadri/bullxit/

Fine legal writer, is Sadakat.

WTF at BBC box pop with Mr Swastika Tattoo who claimed not to be racist?

*vox pop, obvs #fuckingphone

I know! Although seemed to have some kind of mental illness.

someone on twitter has let George Eaton know that his "Corbyn voted brexit" story actually *has* been published, but Times decided not to put this amazing scoop on the front page for some reason

Labour’s leader faced extraordinary claims last night that he voted Leave in the EU referendum in defiance of his party’s support for the Remain campaign.

An MP told The Times that a member of the public had got in touch to say he had been told by Jeremy Corbyn that he was voting Out. Mr Corbyn’s team vigorously denied the claim.

The man who made the claim, Martin Waplington, said that he had been dining at Meson Don Felipe, a tapas restaurant in south London on June 17, and spotted Mr Corbyn and his family at another table.

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/_TP_/article/labour-leader-denies-saying-he-d-vote-leave-2lfrn6kz2

the rest is behind a paywall. Eaton is now vigourously tweeting the link to the story at the many people taking the piss out of him

i want to believe but this is obv entirely w/out credibility - no way he disclosed a career ending vote to some dude while eating tapas w/ his family

ok, it gets better: the same story appears in the Sun, but the Sun story says that the encounter took place on 10th June rather than the 17th

https://twitter.com/msjenniferjames/status/747589450331525125

https://medium.com/@OwenJones84/my-thoughts-on-the-plight-of-labour-38413229f88?source=user_profile---------1-

Owen Jones was just waiting for an excuse.

15m ago
10:34
Farage booed by MEPs

Nigel Farage, the Ukip leader, has just finished addressing the European parliament.

MEPs turned their backs on him after he said none of them had ever done a proper day’s work, and they booed him at the end.

I will post a summary soon.

Huge (for the EP) applause for both Alyn Smith and Martina Anderson
https://twitter.com/SkyNews/status/747729114828779521

A lot of people in the Labour Party aren't going to know what to do when they can no longer use Corbyn as a lightning conductor for every excuse they need to make.

Yep. A lot of people (like Owen Jones, potentially) are also going to find it hard to unite behind an unreconstructed Brownite pushing a 'progressive case for stopping immigration', which looks like where we are heading.

The case for sticking with Labour is that 'we' collectively can push it to the left. The PLP autonomously shifting harder right and disingenuously pushing the 'we tried to be left wing and it didn't work, so never again' line will be difficult for a lot of the anti-Corbyn centrists.

Reading some of their Twitter feeds it's like they're expecting to find Barack Obama down the back of the sofa to save us all.

Both sides casting around desperately for a figurehead and there is none. When even Jeremy fucking Hunt is in the frame to be the next PM you really get a sense of how threadbare the Commons talent pool actually is.

I was thinking the same thing the other day. Has the quality of MPs declined with a shift to a more presidential style of government?

Jeremy Hunt talking about a second referendum post-negotiation, and that's a theme with a few people. But I'm curious about what the referendum would ask. Eg, what is option 2? Because the consequences of a second loss could be devastating based on that option

but if negotiations can't start til article 50 and article 50 can't be reversed then what would be the point of a second vote except to check that we're all unhappy with the way things have turned out?

Article 50 can be reversed, or at least there's nothing in it to say that it can't, and apparently EU treaty law can be treated "flexibly", i.e. can be fudged

Jeremy Hunt talking about a second referendum post-negotiation, and that's a theme with a few people.

would this even be possible now that junker has prevented all EU/MEP communications prior to Art50.

surely once we trigger Art50, then a second ref is pointless ?

xpost !

Yeah it was a clever move by Juncker that.

Possibly the worst ever time for "Don't worry, the EU will make more exceptions for the UK".

I actually don't think there's anything wrong with asking people, once they've looked over the precipice, whether they REALLY want to jump off it. But there seem to be a worrying number of people in this country who think they've voted to basically end immigration, and the boost that going back on the result could offer the far right is terrifying.

Entrusting the negotiations to someone who can negotiate properly with Brussels strikes me as the least worst option, but I don't know who that is. It's not Johnson, it's not Corbyn, it's certainly not Hunt, and it's probably not some wet-behind-the-ears Blairite either. The problem is that Labour have broadly speaking only promoted or selected yes-men for an entire generation and the paucity of imagination is there for all to see, and everyone knows what the problems with the Tories are.

There has to be an election before anything begins, that much is certain, the issue is too important to be left to Conservative Party members alone.

Interesting point - the deal negotiated with Cameron is already off the table after the referendum.

http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld201516/ldselect/ldeucom/138/138.pdf

lol is it?? loooooool if so

i mean i guess it would have to be..

Entrusting the negotiations to someone who can negotiate properly with Brussels strikes me as the least worst option, but I don't know who that is. It's not Johnson, it's not Corbyn, it's certainly not Hunt, and it's probably not some wet-behind-the-ears Blairite either. The problem is that Labour have broadly speaking only promoted or selected yes-men for an entire generation and the paucity of imagination is there for all to see, and everyone knows what the problems with the Tories are.

Yvette Cooper was talking about a cross-party panel yesterday and you could arguably build a reasonably credible negotiating team with her, Javid, Osborne and a few others but it won't deliver what the leave voters wanted and will look like a massive stitch-up when it doesn't.

Melanie Philips defending Corbyn in the Times.

no one in the "corbyn must go!!!!" brigade EVER answers "so who is your choice of replacement?"

Sentences to make you shrivel up and die

xpost

Boris "too tired" after his weekend of cricket to write proper column yesterday. Now having to tell the right wing that he will block freedom of movement. May is going to eat him up.

(This free market but no free movement plan is so weird. Does nobody understand what that means? Goods and money can flow but not labour, so massive wage disparities, job exodus to the cheaper countries etc etc. I thought these guys were meant to be capitalists? I guess racism comes first)

hey it worked for NAFTA

oh yeah except it didn't work for NAFTA at all

Cooper rules out free movement and effectively EEA, another awesome Labour leader candidate. Next.

no one in the "corbyn must go!!!!" brigade EVER answers "so who is your choice of replacement?"

I've asked this in a friendly way (I was smiling) of a few people out of genuine curiosity - nothing

its funny on my facebook feed how gleeful and petty many supposed labour supporters are about wanting corbyn out (yet dont have any better ideas, they just want to punish him, never mind what sort of void that might leave, esp at a point where we dont really have the luxury of ten other great candidates), talking about labour being a cult, not a party, people going OMG WTF about the idea that he voted brexit, etc etc. nihilism is sweeping this country, on all fronts.

The problem is that both Corbyn and his MPs have a mandate (as much as anyone does any more, which probably doesn't mean very much) and those mandates are from different and largely conflicting groups of people, this three-way disconnect between members, parliamentarians and the people they claim to represent. All parties except maybe Corbyn are continuing to ignore that structural issue and something's got to give.

I suspect what will happen is that, as last time, the ballot paper will be flooded with Blairites saying exactly the same thing with one another and Corbyn will end up winning, which will be hilarious but may also split the party. Even if MPs leave en-masse, it's quite difficult to just set up a new party when you have no sources of funding and no donors behind you (assuming the unions stick with Jeremy).

If it's a straight fight between Corbyn and one other candidate, the other candidate will probably win unless they're an obvious no-hoper.