How will you vote in the Labour Leadership election?

reluctantly

rlb/butler

really can't get behind the push for burgon, who always struck me as fairly useless despite his decent politics

I have to decide in one day?

Reluctantly is correct but RLB / Burgon.

opden kayfabe be damned for one post. as it stands, rlb/rayner, unless there's some really compelling reason you all have for voting butler that isn't specious bullshit about rayner being Bad Actually (the other three are obviously joke candidates)

'reluctantly' covers it nicely. none of the main candidates have much force of personality and none of them convince me. starmer is considerably more useless than his fanbase would claim - there's nothing compelling about him or his beliefs - and he'll only win because too many people who should know better have projected Competent Man fantasies onto him. rlb seems sound and all but feels unsuited for spearheading an election campaign. guess we'll have to (try and) find out. nandy might even be the most competent public figure of the three but also manifestly the most evil

RLB/Butler, I’m not impressed by Burgon even if he’s the most left deputy.

burgon is a chump but not sure any of the other candidates for deputy are any better

I quite like AR but she doesn’t need my 1st pref vote and she is too right wing for me, I think.

Why don't people like Rayner now? I have been following as well as I can but have missed this bit.

Rayner an immigration hawk, no?

I'm going to watch some deputy hustings before deciding if I want to put Butler and/or Burgon ahead of Rayner, who looks like the leading contender to be the leader after next

I’m not sure many people actively dislike Rayner but she has never really identified much with the left of the party and doesn’t back open selection.

RLB/Allin-Khan as I have forgotten any reason why the latter may not be good.

also don't really give a fig who be the dep

rotate it with the moon lads

Rayner got a lot of (deserved) flack for saying she, too, has been mistaken for other politicians/women. This on the tail of MPs Oppong-Asare and Eshalomi raising the issue of being confused for another politician (ie. other black women). It was tone deaf for sure.

I don't think this went far beyond the twitterverse, but... it stuck with me tbf

RLB/Butler. Burgon is too allied to the cranks and is a bumptious bungler. I'm finished with Rayner forever as with anyone who expresses solidarity with their fellow working class comrade Jess Phillips in aid of being reductive about a black person's experiences of party racism. I nearly went for Starmer after that scintillating bit of humorous storytelling the other day. But I would actually rather commit slow painful suicide than give even a 2nd pref to that tory cunt!

I didn’t think you’d manage to surprise me itt, calz, and tbf, you haven’t.

those moon lads in full

https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.broadbandtvnews.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2016%2F03%2FClangers.jpg&f=1&nofb=1

Rayner was also attacking Labour's proposal to teach unvarnished BE history to a clapping crowd of bigoted muppets.

those bigoted muppets in full

https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=http%3A%2F%2Fimg3.wikia.nocookie.net%2F__cb20111129001847%2Fmuppet%2Fimages%2Ff%2Ffa%2FTheMoopets.jpg&f=1&nofb=1

not wite enough!

Friend who used to work at the union head office once voiced vague concern Rayner might be in their pocket a bit. I think RLB/Rayner wld be a good and effective team/unity ticket

RLB/Rayner for that very reason for me too.

I can only conclude that Burgon voters are swayed by his taste in metal and full brows.

RLB/Allin-Khan as I have forgotten any reason why the latter may not be good.

― nashwan, Tuesday, 18 February 2020 16:20 (eleven minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

who's gonna post that minister of fabulosity clip

sorry that was two posts! just as well I have a ridiculously complex board game to play now eh

(while I'm here, the 'unvarnished empire history' thing was poorly worded but I do genuinely think she got misconstrued. still open to positive arguments for butler)

rlb butler

And to think I almost joined the Labour Party. RLB/Rayner, the shine has very much gone off the former but look at the alternatives, as for the former, nobody's perfect. I've never been particularly impressed by Butler but maybe I haven't been paying attention. I might vote Tory if Burgon gets the nod.

Dawn Butler has a very respectable track record of not being a wrecker when working with a way to the left of her leader who she didn't vote for. She came across very well and very decent likeable person for a pol on that recent novara interview. I can't recall her ever being disloyal to Corbyn or trying play to the Labour Right gallery. It probably doesn't really matter that much who the deputy is as long they aren't another habitual mischief maker, cracking up from too many dodgy dietary supplements.

Yes, the Deputy Leader, who cares really?

I confess I'm not really following this process at all now though.

AR is going to absolutely walk it so in a real sense nobody’s choice itt for deputy matters

Virtually every other choice I could make some sense of bit I honestly can't fathom the logic of voting for Burgon over Dawn Butler.

The best argument for Rayner is that she isn't a wrecker (given previous incumbent this is even more of a plus rn) and that Butler would be deprived of a good shadow cab post.

From day one it's been RLB/Butler. Almost nothing has made me question it.

Whoever goes in will have their biggest fight to just keep Labour as any kind of electoral force. Given that the Tories will re-draw boundaries, look for voter suppression efforts and anti-union legislation their task might be completely different to what the contestants think it is now.

They might not need to suppress my vote the way this leadership competition is going.

I don't know that much about Allin-Khan in terms of positions and policies, I had a look at her website and twitter feed but it's all pretty non-specific? I did find out that her mother was a member of Filipinki, 1960s Poland's most popular girl-group:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PpzwA-VOO08

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

https://cdn0.tnwcdn.com/wp-content/blogs.dir/1/files/2016/08/Duke-Nukem-796x398.jpg

yes we can

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

Nandy/Burgon 2

:D

6 starmerite roaders amongst us!

the grown-ups that dare not speak their name

this is not the level of lockstep idological purity i expect from the uk politics cru, crying and shaking rn

I usually try and sabotage political polls on twitter by clicking Yes I love tories option, but I couldn't do it on this one.

30 votes?

hows that tally with contributors to say ukpol thread?

WRECKERS

RLB elected leader, going to have to go to second prefs to for deputy with butler edging rayner atm

Jo Bird, candidate for NEC, was briefly suspended when someone complained abt her "jew process" joke, now back in the running. where we're at rn

I went with 'Not a member but: RLB/Allin-Khan'. Don't know all the ins and outs of all the deputy candidates, but Allin-Khan, for me, stands out as someone deeply rooted in her local community. Something, I think, is key for Labour to bounce back: weaving a web of solidarity, knowledge and organizing a grass roots campaigns. In mosques, churches, town halls, food banks. T make people see how damaging the Tories are (as apparently people still don't see this enough to not vote for that scum). Her curriculum vitae is impressive, having worked in Asia and Africa as a doctor there. Bonus point: she's a boxer!

this is not the level of lockstep idological purity i expect from the uk politics cru, crying and shaking rn

I didn't actually vote here I think?

i mean i'm not gonna fault anyone for not spending sufficient time in the uk politics threads tbrr xp

If the Nandy/Murray voter could de-lurk that would be good thanks I'd like to...congratulate you.

Maybe they thought this was SPOTY /trulypatheticjoke

from what I can see only one candidate has expressed public solidarity with ucu members today. unqualified support for strikers hasn’t always been guaranteed by labour leaders - let’s use this leadership election to make sure that it continues https://t.co/QQbLVIBBaX

— mike (@michael_millar_) February 20, 2020

can't decide how to rank butler&burgon. more I've seen of rayner the less I'm convinced she knows what she's doing, seems more abt energy than coherence. deputy is a weird role tho you are basically the hype so you can make a case for that approach and she is popular w/ members and good on the ground on a wet tuesday in stoke etc. butler is more measured and thoughtful and has some genuine warmth and humour. burgon comes across poorly imo but has the slightly better voting record & line on open selection, public ownership etc. although there isn't all that much to pick between the candidates.

it does seem atm that all the candidates for both positions are much closer together than you wld think reading the discourse. it's been interesting to see the 3 leadership candidates kind of coalesce and seem to get on better through the hustings. some of this overlap is just the weird abyss of meaninglessness politicians fall into when faced w/ stupid/delicate/impossible questions (the nuke question was fkn odd and totally unenlightening - keir backs trident, won't say if he'd nuke, nandy doesn't back trident but would nuke, rlb doesn't want to change anything and is vague abt nuking - hard to really say after all that what they really think it's all just messaging abt values but this is to be expected) but they do seem to be generally agreeing quite a lot and the commitment to all being in the shadow cabinet reflects this. even the nominal right/blue labour candidate has come out strong for immigration and challenged the nonsense issue of reducing numbers which I think is fairly promising.

Starmer actually did put out a tweet backing the UCU strike so I think he is playing this well.

I saw some of the younger members I follow utterly losing their shit with RLB and going 'I'm leaving Labour blah blah'. Put it down as Sunday night blues however RLB hasn't played this well. It's a weird question but you say no every single time. You differentiate yourself like that.

pic.twitter.com/Vs3yzH0R2I

— Nihilists for Labour (@Nihilists4Lab) February 24, 2020

that's my kind of content

It's a stupid question, as was the one about whether they'd consider themselves 'zionists' - and Starmer has handled both better than either of the others. It seems pretty obvious that RLB's honest answers to both questions would be 'no' and she feels like she's forced into giving these fairly absurd answers to placate the press. It's understandable, to some extent, but she's not good at it and it doesn't bode well for the future.

I think questions about RLB's leadership qualities will prove academic anyway, but she has seemed very unfocused at times. I don't even know why I'm still paying the direct debit when really in my heart of hearts I know the job is fucked and the reasoning I had for joining the party is gone, the cunts will be running the show again soon enough and I won't be troubling a polling station possibly again in my lifetime. Especially going the way cycles of power in the Labour party seem to go, the right could be in charge again for much longer than Corbynism lasted. But in some ways that might be liberating tbh.

None of the frontrunners in this are as good as Corbyn, and Corbyn is highly contentious in approach ffs. Looking forward to performing the ceremonial membership cancellation though.

Corbyn was massively underrated by people right across the spectrum. These useless fuckers are minnows in his shadow, and none of them could be an improvement.

It feels more like a funeral than leadership election tbh

RLB has shown inexperience and it might be the wrong time for her however I like some of the new intake. Still a lot for the left to do around council selection and organising around issues in our communities. Building things from below is still the lonely, arduous task and that remains the case whether RLB wins or loses.

For undecideds, people who don’t have a vote, or just passers by like silby.

Even if she loses RLB can have a second bite at it in the future. I think she'd do better with more experience under her belt and some time working as part of a different group.

The Labour right are already quietly gunning for Starmer. Andrew Rawnsley's column was heavily damning in its faint praise and he's usually a reliable barometer of what they want journalists to think.

I give KS 2 years before being challenged*, but RLB shouldn't and won't be the challenger

*unless he massively outperforms all of our expectations, but our expectations exist for many good reasons

Changing leader again before the next GE is just pure idiocy

Depends how unpopular the leader is and what the challengers are like. The Tories probably benefited from binning IDS and replacing him even with Michael Howard.

There doesn't appear to be a surefire winner even among the likely challengers to Starmer so they'll probably end up sticking with him unless something really bad happens.

Also depends on the level of pure idiocy in the Parliamentary party obviously.

The winner of this contest will not be challenged.

yeah, because starmer will win.

(rlb would be challenged)

RLB would bring open selection, which is a gun to every potential coup plotter's head, and she strikes as far more ruthless than Corbyn.

At this stage I'm fairly convinced that open selection will just lead to most CLPs reselecting the incumbent and even if they do there's no guarantee it'll favour the left candidates. The wider appetite for it appears fairly limited.

CLPs don't seem quite as left as a lot of people here think/hope they are.

absolutely. My centrist da fits right in at his.

if there was open selection more ppl would be inclined to join, there are quite a few CLPs where the incumbent wouldn't win and lots more where a contest would be a good thing. long term it would lead to more local candidates

I think Starmer will prove to be a real *enigma*. Soon people will start noticing he is soft as shit against pressure from the right of the party and constantly capitulates to them in milliseconds. But then proves to be quite a stubborn tough-minded bullshitting lawyer cunt against pressure from the left of the party. It will become almost like "we could do with some principled Corbyn type figure here, because this phoney doing a soft-left routine is killing us!"

quote me on this in a year I know I'm right.

how did it come from Corbyn to a fucking worthless cockroach melt in a suit with Luke fucking Akehurst whispering sweet nothings in his ears. I'm sorry but I'm still in angry and grieving stage.

This is a serious concern. Everyone around Starmer must be searched for hair removal creams immediately, they could be embittered Stalinists in disguise. https://t.co/QFn2Zx53OU

— Simon Hedges (@Orwell_Fan) February 24, 2020

CLPs don't seem quite as left as a lot of people here think/hope they are.

― Load up your rubber wallets (Tom D.), Monday, 24 February 2020 bookmarkflaglink

absolutely. My centrist da fits right in at his.

― frederik b. godt (jim in vancouver), Monday, 24 February 2020 bookmarkflaglink

Lol I know CLPs are full of mummy and daddy. That's why Starmer is winning. Unity is pure family talk.

At this stage I'm fairly convinced that open selection will just lead to most CLPs reselecting the incumbent and even if they do there's no guarantee it'll favour the left candidates. The wider appetite for it appears fairly limited.

― Matt DC, Monday, 24 February 2020 bookmarkflaglink

Open selection would return the sitting MP in 95% of cases. But what I am saying is that should RLB win MPs going for the shenanigans we saw during Corbyn's time would often not go down well at CLP level, and we have seen a lot of tension at some CLPs.

Has anyone got their ballot yet?

I was wondering about that. not me, ftr.

not yet, but .. lol.. just found out all my Labour emails have been going into junk for months. I got an e-mail yesterday entitled "Your Ballot" which actually wasn't my ballot, but told me to chill and there is plenty of time ..to melt!

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/ERnRMoeWoAc3TX3?format=jpg&name=large

Ian "gets it" apparently, what a load of fucking ringing endorsements - the kind guaranteed to consign you to the ash heap of labour Party history!

horny blair: "ian murray can get it"

I have voted.

Horny Dunty: “Tony Blair can get it”

xp ffs and I’m not going to bother coming home if you voted Burgon

Guess we’re divorced now

Yep.

Horny Dunty famously said every PM needs a Willie!

fwiw my ballot ended up as:

1. RLB
2. Starmer

Only as insurance against the nightmare scenario of RLB being knocked out in the first round and Nandy getting in on second prefs.

Deputy was:

1. Burgon
2. Butler
3. Khan
4. Rayner

Nothing much to pick between 3. and 4. other than my inherent bias towards ppl called Khan.

If Starmer get's in on second prefs I'm blaming it all on you!

The only way that happens is if RLB gets booted in the first round, so fingers crossed it doesn’t come to that.

I'm putting a write in nom for Nandy's dad as my second pref

a lot of my depression is based on the melty uselessness of the CLP's and that jan 18th YouGov poll on the members. I keep hoping I'm going to be pleasantly surprised in april, but it's a forlorn hope - this is going to be a fucking Starmer cakewalk and I knows it.

EXCLUSIVE: Deputy leadership hopeful Richard Burgon wants to set up a 'Tony Benn University of Political Education' as he says Labour has "failed miserably in relation to political education in the last few years" – and much more in our new interview: https://t.co/zlHOu4tDY0

— LabourList (@LabourList) February 25, 2020

lol what a fucking awful idea!

Guess we’re divorced now

Don't worry no-one will blame you, we all know where the blame lies.

And how will you be voting?

I'm politically homeless.

We found the Nandy/Murray, lads

think Tom might be politically lost and should try a course at the Tony Benn University of Political Re-education, Hero of Socialist Labour medal holder, honorary professor Chris Williamson will put him on the correct path!

I asked Lisa Nandy if it was ethical that her campaign has allegedly received funding from corporate types in energy and private water companies tonight at #GuardianLive - she said she didn’t know if it had or not https://t.co/bYzl2AqyQh

— Beth Redmond (@redbethmond) February 25, 2020

there is a lot of talk that Stalemer has spent an unprecedented million on his campaign without any transparency of whose pocket he's in. Most of that spend could be accounted for with that mailshot with grotesque face image and hd pimple that went straight into the recycle bin.

I never received any RLB mail.

starmer has received money from unison, ppl have quit over it and lots more are v unhappy

The NEC election looks a total shambles. Five of the nominees have been suspended under a very opaque disciplinary process - two have been cleared, three are still under investigation aiui.

Not read any reports on unison unrest, glad to hear there is some.

I'm politically homeless.

― Load up your rubber wallets (Tom D.), Tuesday, 25 February 2020 bookmarkflaglink

For someone not in Lab you seem to know a lot about CLPs

I presume these CLP meetings are mainly attended by middle aged/middle class white men, that's 90% of the knowledge there!

My dog is dead and he’s still barking?

”You have got to get back to the grassroots. She’s also not afraid to say that she disagrees with people in the shadow cabinet like Diane Abbott,” said Proctor. At the hustings, Nandy claimed the shadow home secretary had said that Brexit voters were either “too stupid to read the question” or “xenophobic”.

especially as Thornberry turned up at the Labour conference, practically wearing blue face paint.

Look at whose parliamentary reception I stumbled upon today...!

I wonder if they were lobbying for working people, or for their super-rich shareholders? 🤔 pic.twitter.com/Z9iyrC0E6x

— Zarah Sultana MP (@zarahsultana) February 25, 2020

Post leadership this will be a Zarah Sultana fan thread like the Berners sorry I don't make the rules.

Campbell has been dissing her maiden speech, couldn't really ask for a better seal of approval.

the only positive I can take from the Labour Party is that some of the younger intake seem pretty cool and are pissing off all the right people and are too angry to melt.

She seems to have the attitude, force of personality and awareness. Haven't seen her under fire yet but promising early signs

She’s been under fire since before she was elected! Some NUS grudgeholder had screenshots of tweets made and deleted years ago under an account that doesn’t exist anymore just waiting to be passed to the press, which they did, and the party was under pressure to deselect her.

I meant in a mano-a-mano interview/debate scenario! But point taken and I'm sure she'd hold her own/take some names. Just think, if RLB had a strong emoji game we'd never have gotten to bickering in the first place

For someone not in Lab you seem to know a lot about CLPs

Evidence of the old glazzies.

Sure Sultana will show her inexperience sooner or later and the likes of imago will be the first to shoot her down

We're back in business, eh?

wrong thread ffs

I am only interested in lack of nerve, something which Sultana seems gratifyingly free of. We need more like her

We're back in business, eh?

― romanesque architect (pomenitul), Wednesday, 26 February 2020 bookmarkflaglink

Never out of business

Sure Sultana will show her inexperience sooner or later and the likes of imago will be the first to shoot her down

― xyzzzz__, Wednesday, February 26, 2020 11:32 AM (twenty-four minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

Bcz imago is known for shooting down the inexperienced? Grasping at straws her...

You can't win an election with kids.

If Sultana gets any notoriety out of the Westminster bubble he'll concern troll her left-wing opinions like there's no tomorrow. Talk about how his football forum pals don't like her etc. XP lol

Is Guy On Football Forum the new Man In Pub? Possibilities for a Guardian thinkpiece there.

The same football forum 'pals' I constantly defend the Labour left from!

Concern-trolling left-wing opinions has never been my thing and I was solidly behind all of Corbyn's policy stances and so forth. I'm much more concerned about image, performance and other supposedly irrelevant minutiae :)

Anyway I'm overstepping my remit here. Good luck to Sultana and all like her. May they body their interlocutors

have now voted how i indicated upthread

still not got my ballot, every time I re-check my junk mail i keep seeing the same unread my 3 pledges to you from Richard Burgon!

I sent them a query today about my ballot so hoping they’ll let me know if I’m not eligible (I should be because I joined beginning of January, but it would be funny if I wasn’t as it’d mean tons of centrists also aren’t)

no ballot for me either, i am being silenced4truth

Given Starmer said he wouldn't talk to The Sun and later admitted it was a lie to impress a Liverpool audience, how do we know his promise not to sell weapons to Saudi wasn't a lie to impress a Labour audience?

— Blue Labour Bodybag (@LamentablyAwake) February 26, 2020

"i would sell weapons to the sun", admits starmer in SHOCK new interview

xxp
the day Starmer spent his Unison stash deleting us fules!

Starmer quietly admitting he was bullshitting the scousers, if that didn't set alarm bells ringing among the bovine nominally left membership, then fuck every last one of them - they should join the LibDems.

whoah! ballot has just arrived this sec. I'm so fucking excited!

calz taking great pleasure in not giving KS a preference

got to admit I stuck twos up at and repeatedly said fuck off cunt to his drag and grab ballot icon. A futile and childish gesture for sure but it felt good!

What were your deputy prefs?

1. Dawn Butler
2. Lolchard Burgon

in light of the civility in politics awards I think it behooves us to recall that seemingly futile rudeness is an important part of british political culture and has a fine pedigree, going back at least to what must surely be the origin of "i fart in your general direction" at the siege of exeter, in response to the freshly installed king william gouging out the eyes of a local prisoner to demoralise the inhabitants, one of the ppl of exeter got his bum out and did a fart at them - we can only say fair play

xp but why though

Yeah why Burton?

Burgon

god knows tbh! Angela Rayner is probably a shoe in for deputy anyway and it was just a meaningless anyone but her gesture!

Burton listening to the Meatls has clearly worked!

Meatls, Keir, squalid

fwiw (not much) Burgon was nominated by McDonnell, Abbott, Ribeiro-Addy and the sainted Zarah Sultana. He's the only member of the Socialist Campaign Group running and is the only one who has backed RLB's position on open selection.

Don't tell me no-one has used the nickname, The Burgonmeister, yet?

xp Yeah but he's a known dimwit and a figure of fun. I mean sure Prescott but he was at least somewhat formidable (citation...needed?)

My ballot should be arriving soon #inittogether

credit where credit's due, prescott could throw a punch

If Burgon punches someone in the next 24 hours I'll throw him a preference

Prescott supported Corbyn and was generally better than most of the others in that gov afaict?

Oh, agreed! He was quite a useful presence as well, despite the mockery

think I'm going burgon, butler, rayner

was thinking Burgon could end up being a similar pain in the arse for Starmer that Watson was for Corbz. Not sure there is much strategic advantage in that, but I think the rest of them including Dawn, would prefer him as leader over RLB.

Burgon psyching out Starmer by constantly blasting out metal in the LOTO offices is the only way I can see that happening. And also, it’s a bad look if the membership returns two men.

I don't think there is a realistic chance of Burgon winning, but if he is as socialist as he claims then maybe he might not be happy when Starmer starts going soft on Universal Credit about 3.6 seconds into his tenure!

Burgon's not going to win anyway but I'm not especially convinced by the logic of voting for someone you privately think isn't really competent because they're ideologically aligned, people like that can set the cause back more than advance it. I'm largely unfussed by the results of this contest (partly because it's so obvious who's going to win both positions), but it probably will make me quite angry if Burgon gets more votes than Dawn Butler.

Also if he does get the position under Starmer he'll shut up and do what he's told. Literally impossible for anyone to be a bigger pain in the arse than Watson was.

(Obviously I'm not suggesting voting for someone you actively disagree with, before anyone jumps on that)

I’ve published my list of donors over £1500 https://t.co/zbfn3fWtZm

— Rebecca Long-Bailey (@RLong_Bailey) February 26, 2020

see this fuckers in the pocket of big energy/water companies and shadowy former labour donors who fucked off when Corbyn became leader, this is what transparency looks like.

A Starmer-Burgon result from them being the only two men in it would be pretty fucking offensive tbh

not seen anyone make much of a case for butler beyond general palatability

Worked better with Corbyn leadership despite not being that left
Always willing to speak up against bullshit
Has actual ministerial experience

You’d really have to make the case for Burgon beyond “CLPD candidate” tbh

xps Matt otm!

Burgon as the most senior/prominent leftie in the party would be an absolute bonanza for anyone who wanted to undermine the left. Every time he made a terrible TV appearance they'd be able to point and go 'see?'

I definitely laughed at the 2nd reason though

Ballots begin to drop today.

Vote Dawn Butler number 1 if you want someone who will #PrepareforPower from day one, energise our Labour movement and unite our Party. #Dawn4Deputy pic.twitter.com/vCf9ICqo2G

— (((Dawn Butler))) (@DawnButlerBrent) February 24, 2020

"A Starmer-Burgon result from them being the only two men in it would be pretty fucking offensive tbh"

I don't even want one of the men to win, but I'd take the fool Burgon if it was part of some Faustian pact to have Starmer dumped into the ash heap of Labour Party history.

You’d take Nandy over Starmer?

No, rightly or wrongly I don't even factor her into the equation and just assume she's a wooden spoon shoe in!

but don't think for a minute Starmer wouldn't take a similar road to her, because as you know he follows the path of least resistance - like melt-water.

There's a real mountain to slither down right now.

think I'm going burgon, butler, rayner

burgon, butler, rayner, spy

competence is not some desirable abstract attribute (you cld say all the worst ppl are competent) but a subjective, normative assessment of something situational and it gets raised as an issue in a similar way to realism & being 'out of touch', so I'm always a little wary of it.

afaict butler's biggest pluses are having significant non-union job experience, which I value more than ministerial exp, being a strong liberal*, and being a clear thinker and good communicator (inc some humour even). she strikes me as being measured rather than a watson/phillips type of renegade opinion-haver. rayner is the high energy candidate and has a similar voting record, isn't from london, is an effective part of the party/union machine (a sort of competence which is probably overall slightly more bad than good), and I have a faint suspicion abt the clarity of her liberal convictions, mb unfairly. burgon is the one I agree with most, and open selection is a fundamental q of power and democracy and so imo central. he's the poorest communicator of the three and as w/ rayner he's more of a work in progress shall we say, and the most ripe for patronisation (tho the oxbridge minister for fabulosity arguably deserves it more)

*hi B-)

good breakdown u have my first preference

I guess Rayner is the #towns candidate too, tho Leeds is an overgrown town let's be honest

I will concede she has a slightly risqué rhetorical style that at times codes as dogwhistling. "Forget about [nice, wholesome but slightly abstract thing], how about [other nice, wholesome and fairly concrete thing]!" It's a little bit of a verbal triangulation - it doesn't make me doubt her principles (voting record, always the voting record) but it does render her liable to have ten-second clips of her disseminated among left twitter with accompanying #yikes, #cancelled and so on.

I won't deny I'm naturally drawn to the hi-nrg candidate in any otherwise fairly even circumstances tho, ty ogmor for crystallising it

Could still vote Butler. Will check both voting records and then watch a few videos etc

what do you think the odds are of a shock result here, ogmor? At the moment it seems to me fucking Starmer/Rayner is as short odds as doubling a Schumacher podium finish with Celtic versus some Highland league shitkickers back in the day kind of odds on.

no idea but does seem unlikely, the best hope RLB has is that starmer will lose more votes to nandy than she will, mb esp if starmer seems nailed on?

been quite a bit of debate among labour pals on the q "is rayner daft?". hard to gauge but I can say: rayner's high school < my high school < nandy's high school < owen jones' high school

Butler seems like she would be a good counter-balance to RLB but not to Starmer. I feel like Rayner might be a token leftish ventriloquist's dummy to Starmer's reluctant, electable shift rightwards.

the best hope RLB has is that starmer will lose more votes to nandy than she will, mb esp if starmer seems nailed on?

Only if the new Nandy voters don't bother with second prefs surely?

Both Starmer and Rayner broadly speaking play for the team they're asked to when leaves them both as gigantic unknown quantities in terms of the actual programme that they'd pursue as leader and deputy. If I had to guess I'd still say soft leftish on economic issues, definitely anti-austerity but with a big headline-grabbing rightward shift on law and order.

And #towns obviously.

Hold on here, imago and xyzzz are members of the same political party?

They are in fact, brothers in the Labour Family?

Does it not look like a family dispute to you?

I can't possibly imagine any bitter rivalries and recriminations between members of the same political party.

I'm not sure I explained myself very well in my last post - any voters shifting from Starmer to Nandy are likely to stick Starmer down as second preference anyway. I'm assuming Nandy finishes in third whatever happens but I've really lost any sense of how popular she is with the voter base. My general sense though is that RLB has a baseline below which she pretty much can't fall.

What would a Labour pivot on law and order look like? They were already quite far down that road with 'get more bobbies on the beat', etc, under Abbott.

None of which convinced when you had the shadow chancellor openly supporting Lush against dodgy cops. My guess is...say goodbye to civil liberties!

why does it always somehow manage to come back to shit 90's indie bands on ILX?

you can take the kids out of the Belle and Sebastian fansite

yeah, I imagine nearly all nandy voters will second pref starmer but just imagine if he went out in the first round. lots of nandy fans round my way. it's a funny one for the next leader bc despite the alleged need to change and listen, all the polling suggests brexit and immigration are now fast fading as concerns and instead the focus is on environment, poverty&inequality, and housing. as SV says the corbyn leadership wasn't even v lib on crime or interested in constitutional reform, so there's v little obvious stuff to use as a way to signal a break with corbynism beyond style and presentation

The good NS has some thoughts on it here
https://newsocialist.org.uk/media/thumbnails/I_AM_ONCE_AGAIN_ASKING_small_wx8Y4MQ.jpg

Aside from the early release of people arrested under terrorism offences, crime wasn't really much of an electoral issue last year. There was the usual "Sadiq Khan has given a knife to every Londoner" dogwhistling but that'll be a bigger issue this year.

"More bobbies on the beat" is pretty mild stuff compared to what Labour came out with in government and was at least in part a way of making a point about austerity in any case.

just imagine if he went out in the first round

Big El-Hadji Diouf against France energy.

In many ways I'd probably prefer Nandy to Starmer. I'm not quite frothing at calz level 😅 but I'm developing serious animosity to the smarmy establishment cop cunt.

I think my instincts are good on Starmer and a couple of years down the line when Patel has had me dragooned into doing social care work and I luv Tories because they have made financially active again. Well by then you'll have a thread dedicated to telling Starmer to fuck off, or suggesting your favoured ways of seeing him executed. i guarantee you this. lying to scousers is just the tip of the meltberg with this cunt!

Nah I personally can’t stick Nandy. Blatantly insincere and lying about stuff that’s easily disprovable, far too right wing, happy to throw Diane Abbott under the bus and pander to legitimate concerns and let’s never forget this ton of shite

Labour’s @wesstreeting and @lisanandy tell @johnmcdonnellMP that he is not telling the truth on how previous cases of antisemitism were dealt with within the Labour Party.

Full interview 11.10pm @ITV #Peston pic.twitter.com/kZHFHW49L9

— Peston (@itvpeston) February 27, 2019

I was with John when this decision was taken - he's telling the truth. I like Wes & Lisa, so nothing personal at all, they just don't have all the details on this specific case. It happened in John's office, straight after our STT meeting. JC made the ultimate call, acted swiftly https://t.co/5jYd5KGCFS

— James Mills (@JamesMills1984) February 27, 2019

Yeah OK she's evil but so's the cop

Idk I do tend to prefer candidates who aren’t constantly moaning to the media and undermining the party

The thing that irritates me about Nandy is the number of chattering classes idiots who will immediately sit up and wag their tails because she's telling the party hard truths etc, but its all platitudes really. I'm not convinced she has any real solutions and her lines on immigration are incoherent and contradictory.

she was going really random in the last week - all over the fucking shop, but I think pretty much is her m.o.

God help the Labour Party tbh. Democratic reform is essential but I can't help but think it's the nature of political parties to be bureaucratic, hierarchical, alienating and a magnet for career cunts.

Labour leadership voting intention:

Keir Starmer: 53%
Rebecca Long Bailey: 31%
Lisa Nandy: 16%

via @YouGov, 20 - 25 Feb
Includes members, affiliates and registered supporters

— Britain Elects (@britainelects) February 26, 2020

and the members aren't much fucking cop either:(

Ah well, back to drunky anarchist nihilism

The working class fucking hates itself

fuck parliamentary democracy and fuck the Labour Party is how I'm feeling tbh.

Hold on here, imago and xyzzz are members of the same political party?

― Load up your rubber wallets (Tom D.), Wednesday, 26 February 2020 bookmarkflaglink

Didn't you realise it when imago was needing to be convinced (fresh from using his tactical voting app ofc) about RLB?

Plenty of that to go around now.

Fucking state of this

Labour deputy leadership voting intention:

Angela Rayner: 47%
Richard Burgon: 19%
Dr Rosena Allin-Khan: 13%
Dawn Butler: 12%
Ian Murray: 9%

via @YouGov, 20 - 25 Feb
Includes members, affiliates and registered supporters

— Britain Elects (@britainelects) February 26, 2020

at least that fucking jambo twat Murray is in the doldrums

You've still gotta fear for the 9% of bellends who think he's an acceptable choice

It's pretty funny that he has won the endorsement of both Blair and Brown and he can't get into double figures.

All evidence suggests it is his resemblance to a pickled egg with with a few coconut hairs glued on top is why he failed, nowt to do with the objectionable politics and Blairite love imo

Tbf you would expect to be given a goldfish in a bag prize if you slammed a wooden ball hard into his head and knocked the cunt onto the deck.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/ERuTWcrWAAAUHTq?format=jpg&name=large

even this fucking clown has stopped pretending Starmer is a left candidate now victory is imminent.

The Labour Party can go fuck itself. I happily never had anything to do with them until 2015, if they want to return to that wretched 2015 consensus they won't get a vote off me, any more money, my support, the steam off my piss etc.. for however much time I've got left on this rock. I won't take delight in watching them repeatedly getting wiped out in elections in future, but won't particularly want to slit my wrists either.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/ERuIxCHXUAABV5I?format=png&name=large

Paul Mason is an absolute clown of a boy

it isn't even about politics and improving people's lives to that cunt, it's all about about getting revenge on a faction that have mercilessly ripped the piss out of him for years.

calzino you’ll probably never watch ford v. ferrari but I’ll always imagine you as ken miles as portrayed in that film.

especially preparing for the first race that’s in the movie.

Feeling some minor regret about slagging off Burgon quite so much when I see insufferable music writer and ex-ilxor slagging him off on twitter. There’s something absolutely vile about the way centrists carry on and there always has been. Especially when you consider how successful they were at winning over people to the Remain view.

xp
probably will watch it at some point I have a screener of it! But I'm not trying to become some stuck record, but this is a really shitty time in UK politics - it's literally the 2nd major death of hope incident in 3 fucking calendar months. it's too much to fucking take.

xp yeah that fucking shitty slimeball makes me a friend of Burgon as well. he's the absolute pits. And his George Orwell books - what a real life parody!

What makes a man turn centrist? Lust for gold? Power? Or was he born with a heart full of centrality?

you are just born with the innate knowledge that the establishment is fucking whizzo, just might need some minor tweaking in the next 500 years though.

You’ll find absolutely no mentions of Windrush, or deportation flights, or black citizens in the past two weeks but absolutely tons of Burgon dunks in the same period. But when you’re yuk-yuk-yuking it up with Corbyn apartheid arrest truthers and patting yourselves on the back about how clever you are, it’s to be expected. And yes, it’s extremely depressing. And again, reminded of how very shallow “we-love-immigrants” liberals are, esp fbpes. If you don’t stand up for brown and black fellow citizens, you can hardly be expected to stand up for foreigners.

calz brings the rage, I bring the...despair? Surely there is someone who’s better at despair in these threads than me.

Pretending that 1984 is a centrist classic is just mean

xp
I'm not really good at anything gyac, you though are an excellent poster!

Burgon's a clown regardless of who hates him or his doctorate from Tony Benn University.

Having said that, Blobby himself could be Deputy Leader of the Labour Party and it wouldn't matter a jot.

xps who else has an endless supply of incredible family stories, cute dog stories and can shift immediately to colourful violent language about liberals on a whim?! you undersell yourself! and ty, I wouldn’t even say that myself!

I always say that leaders are a product of wider historical factors that would have put someone like them in charge sooner or later - that's as true for Thatcher or Blair as it was for Corbyn. But that 57% of new joiners voting for Starmer is telling a story definitely.

Depends how many of them there are, so it's either an influx of disgruntled centrists but I'm wondering if it's a more general pro-European vote or maybe a lot of ex-Lib Dems. There's a lot of overlap in the Venn diagram obviously.

A lot of people in the media piping up in right now saying that Labour absolutely have to form a pact with the LibDems but they probably have more to fear than anyone else from a Starmer victory.

I've totally failed to notice whether there's even a LibDem leadership contest going on at all.

I guess there is per that Graun article but yeah I'd forgotten. Jo Swindon we hardly knew ye.

I’d guess there are quite a few people who left over the last few years who are rejoining.

I prefer to think of it as slinking back.

It might be, it might not. While the membership are overwhelmingly pro-Europe, he still wins on pre-15 members. Idk about you but a decent chunk of leftish people I know have been absolutely traumatised by the election loss - and in my case, several of those were people who only got interested in/involved in politics in the last few years. They didn’t see 2015 as the same, 2017 gave everyone hope, and if you’re on the left I suppose it’s very difficult to see light at the end of the tunnel. That’s why we’re all hoping for Bernie!

But the Keir Starmer factor is less anything about him as an individual and more about “who can ensure I never have to feel this devastated again”. This, I think, is why you see a lot of younger people melting - they might not have been that interested or involved a few years ago but they are now and this is really difficult, esp if they were canvassing. Whereas if you look at the stats, he’s much less popular between 25-49 - people already crushed by 2015, Brexit, the awfulness of Ed Miliband’s leadership etc. The oldest ones who were angry about the Iraq war and indefinite detention at the time, who probably marched against Iraq and went all in for Corbyn because he wasn’t that.

But...just my barely awake thinking. And my ballot still hasn’t come!

Yeah that's OTM about the voter base, definitely. Worth mentioning that a lot of people who weren't natural lefties voted for Corbyn in 15. Most left candidates would have won - in fact anyone prepared to stick their hand up and sincerely oppose austerity would have been a lightning conductor for votes in 2015. Their politics could have been closer to Gordon Brown and they would have won. Corbyn won in large part because of a vacuum that the other candidates created as well as a swell in the young left vote.

Perhaps a more centrist Labour might have been able to end austerity and the hostile environment by now. But it's very difficult to see how with the candidates that were available and the constraints of Brexit. All the candidates this time look less inspiring than Corbyn in 2015 but they look a lot better than Owen Smith or Andy Burnham.

There was some research a while back suggesting that an Owen Smith-style challenger to Corbyn would have been much more successful at the time, had it not actually been Owen Smith.

I don’t think RLB has come close to doing enough to winning over anyone wavering, tbh.

And as well as that, I’m thinking about the pre-2015 party. Your young person who’s got housing issues and is broadly left looks at the Labour Party and what do they see? Ghouls like Chris Leslie, Simon Danczuk and Rachel Reeves telling them, basically, that life is shit and change is incremental at best. What kind of a message is that? Who would go out and canvass for those people in the rain?

I think this applies to outside party structures too - recently read about Wes Streeting in his NUS days censuring Bell Ribeiro-Addy for protesting a BNP speaker at their university. If you’re a young left person, what message are you taking from that? That you’re nothing more than a vote and your concerns don’t matter. Why would you ever want to get involved in a politics that doesn’t give a shit about you, especially when it’s your own fucking side? Thankfully Bell is an MP now, but absolutely shithousing like this and 99% of Luke Akehurst’s contributions to the party have been like this too.

And Corbyn hoovered up a load of Green votes - you’ll probably see young people drift back to voting Green unless Labour go as hard on climate change as Corbyn did.

Adding to that that anyone still believing in a mythical era called "the centre ground" where "most voters" can be found is likely to be in for a nasty surprise over the next few years.

Fwiw I think climate change stuff wins way more votes than it repels so it's going to stay. Even Cameron draped himself in the green flag for years in opposition.

I'd love to know what difference between Starmer and Smith/Burnham is tbh. He might have served (or collaborated as a famous sex pest would have it) under Corbyn but I don't there was ever any illusions over which wing of the party he belongs to. I bet their voting records are practically identical and they are all in the same WhatsApp groups etc. The only thing that is different this time is the cowardly bunch of melts in the membership imo.

Like there appears to be a presumption that a Starmer victory means a return to a Miliband approach but I can't see that happening - in large part because of what an electoral damp squib the Miliband era was.

Worth mentioning as well that Johnson and the Tories have barely seen fit to mention Labour since the election. Cameron and Osborne were hammering Labour and banging on about them every day, setting up the austerity narrative. That gives Labour the opportunity to create a more hopeful and less defensive narrative than during the Miliband era. Especially given that Johnson's own narrative is going to be about Britain bouncing back and splurging cash everywhere.

Problem is as much with the special advisers they have around them - Labour's have been useless for a decade at least and the likes of Luke Akeshurst should probably be binned en masse.

Most Starmer supporters aren’t bad people, they’re just people utterly devastated by the election, and a lot of them will have campaigned for the party. It’s better for the left to shut the right out - and the right is absolutely where almost all of the Nandy support is coming from - and Starmer needs the left too. You don’t get that % of votes without a good chunk of left voters.

Bin the Lukes, the Ayeshas and anyone who only bothers to mention poverty when they’re using Sure Start centres to tell the left that Iraq didn’t matter.

Starmer's 10 pledges do commit him to most of the 2019/17 manifesto, including Green New Deal. i expect the devil to come out in the deal. i have to assume that even his terrible advisers aren't stupid enough to revisit the EU in the next 5 years.

in the detail, obv.

I'm guessing the split between Starmer and Nandy among people who really wanted Big Jess is two thirds to one

she should get a key Shadow Cabinet role, Minister for Brummagem or something

Smith's biggest problem, other than his big pharma history, was that he was so personally obnoxious / clownish.

Akehurst has always been a fairly fringe figure, however much he wants to see himself as a major player. Labour First members do have a role in Starmer's inner circle but idk if they're directing it, rather than hitching their wagon, temporarily, to the guy who's going to win. Starmer's presumably smart enough to realise that undiluted Milibandism won't work either with the party base or the electorate. I'm pretty sure Miliband also understands this now.

I wonder which of the money behind his campaign he is delaying disclosure of until next week.

Is Bernie Ecclestone still alive?

Miliband has repeatedly said he wished he followed his own closer to 2017 instincts before, rather than be steered by advisors to the right of him.

Ayesha Hazakaria can get in the sea and while there, find out that the Controls on Immigration mug she rode in on doesn’t float.

Labour First might not be steering him now but the pressure on him from the right of the party will increase as time goes on. When people from the right are emboldened enough to talk about Reeves coming back to the shadow cabinet, as unlikely as that seems right now it does show how the imminent Starmer victory is increasing their confidence. And I wouldn't make any assumptions about the makeup of the membership any more. If most of them voted for *this* then I wouldn't assume they have any political conviction or principals at all tbh.

I wld vote Burnham over Starmer, he's another one who's been better & stronger over the last few years

I don't think Burnham would happily vouch for a lock up minor benefit fraudster reform tbf on him.

For example I'd be worried about commitments to scrap UC would become a compromised Reform UC. There would be so much compromise going on in the direction of the party it will end up Miliband-lite, even though much of the electorate are burnt out on austerity, the Right of Labour have historically got that "they've got nowhere else to go" arrogance to work around right-wing compromises. I don't see green shoots of recovery anywhere, just fucking invasive weeds choking the party to death.

xxxp I think that indicates that the right have the party have very little to do other than to chat shit, tbh.

*of the party

well they are just chatting shit, but nobody is laughing at them now.

i have to assume that even his terrible advisers aren't stupid enough to revisit the EU in the next 5 years.

I'm not 100% sure what you mean here, but I'm pretty sure the EU will be a rock in Labour's shoe whatever happens (and whatever the party's position on it is).

Starmer had said the Brexit policy was fine (it may have been right but it's not something you say given the way that turned out) so I expect more mistakes to be made.

Because as a matter of policy Labour's best move for the next five years is not to mention the EU except in the context of our post-Brexit relationship Andrew. That may not be the right action but it's the only sane one at the moment.

He's probably going to be fucked in the north/midlands even if he doesn't mention the EU, if he does he might as well just stand down because the job will be fucked. I've heard quite a few gammony Labour voters saying they didn't vote in the last election because of his Brexit policy and wont vote for him as leader. Even if the economy is knackered I don't think this brexit divide is just going to disappear in one electoral cycle, studies show the UK electorate aren't the most rational bunch!

Starmer's presumably smart enough to realise that undiluted Milibandism won't work either with the party base or the electorate. I'm pretty sure Miliband also understands this now.

'Milibandism' was never really a thing, was it? I like Ed M quite a lot but he always gave the impression of being blown around by forces further to the right than him - both within the party and outside it. The manner of his victory - both the narrow margin over his brother and the reliance on union votes - meant he never really had the political capital to stamp his authority or give a clear sense of direction, he was always at the mercy of the press and bad advisors.

Corbyn lacked political capital for different reasons but at least he had a big mandate from the membership. Starmer will be in a different situation yet again because if that poll is accurate he'll be the first leader since Blair (!!!) to have a strong mandate from both MPs and members.

Worth pointing out the membership was also heavily in favour of a second referendum, in a democratic party they'd have arrived at that Brexit policy regardless and may indeed have settled on something even more Remainy.

yes that's true and i don't think the policy was down to Starmer alone, but ffs learn the lesson, move on, give the demographics a few years to possibly shift, if rejoining is going to seem desirable that's going to have to come from the ground up. i feel like given British (English) exceptionalism, that desire might never come but let's be optimistic.

I'm talking about the perception of Starmer out there* of him as a Remain poster boy. The pressure from membership was there yes but, he was the one stanning for a policy that was a complete failure.

*in this case a couple of pubs and a park!

If he starts banging on about rejoining the EU immediately then he's a complete idiot, but he's clearly not going to do that.

(some xps)

The context of our post-Brexit relationship is going to grow and grow though, particularly if (as threatened today) Boris might take his ball back as early as June. I'm definitely not suggesting that the next Labour leader do anything to try and stop Brexit, but "what are you proposing to do if you get in?" will be a pretty divisive question.

For the record, I don't think "rejoin! rejoin!" is a good answer, because I can't imagine the EU accepting the UK back when the policy of the other party is going to be "leave again as soon as possible". But it not being a good idea won't stop the loud voices pointing out that it's still a very popular option with voters, let alone the membership.

From a very cynical point of view, and on this specific issue, the drubbing at the election will be good because there really is fuck all that any Labour leader can do on this, and the higher the chance of the shitshow being owned by the Tories, the better.

Yeah he won't do that except he will be seen as one of the chief architects of the Brexit policy and will be painted as such...just sends a signal that after a period of reflection Lab has returned someone like that, except with a nice suit and haircut xp

"nice"

there won't be no grime4starmer campaign that much is sure. When you are a cop (IN A NICE SUIT) who has publicly given your blessing to a foul tory publicity stunt like the night courts during the 2011 riots that is your goose cooked there - a fucking stain on your rep that never washes off. Corbyn was very popular with BAME voters even if labour's law and order stance was a bit rocky under his leadership - he got a lot of younger BAME voters onto the electoral register as well.

the RW narrative on the crash/austerity was v weak so they basically replaced politics with brexit and I think the extreme amt of attention on labour atm is bc it fills the brexit void in the discourse and they haven't worked out what else they can talk about.

reading reams of polling data was part of my post-election coping mechanism and my best guess is that keeping the 2017 policy would have swapped a bunch of seats but wouldn't have made much difference in overall numbers. it might have seen labour return marginally more seats but probably slightly fewer overall votes. my reasoning is that a lot of labour's losses were quite marginal defeats in leave voting seats, with the brexit party-tory pact being effective (and weirdly under-discussed?). overall it looks like labour lost well over a million 2017 voters to lib dems, snp, and greens, which helped flip some leave voting seats, and maybe 700k-1 million pro brexit 2017 labour voters to tories and bxp (with another few hundred k of them sitting out entirely). tories lost over a million remain voters but gained very slightly more leave voters, and helped by the v late surge of bxp voters. 2017 policy would have saved a few seats in the north (for one election at least!) and lost a few in the south, basically.

obv impossible to truly know but despite the dismal result it may well have been the least bad policy, esp given that ime a lot of the lexit types that ppl say don't exist but I somehow keep meeting in the labour party and unions do not actually care that much abt brexit, and that a no-remain policy wld have hurt labour with young & minority voters and party members, which cld have a nasty electoral legacy w/ what is now a huge part of the labour base

I’m thinking the ‘red wall’ seats fell Conservative because the Brexit Party pulled out of every single race where the Tories won and those voters plus disaffected Labour pro-Brexit voters who had no alternative to Lab other than Tories did the dirty deed.

The people I've talked won't cop for that, they told me didn't bother voting. But you just never know what goes on in that ballot booth despite what people say.

voting booth! lol ballot booth wtf!

seen some estimates of 200k ppl who voted leave and lab 2017 switching to lib dems/green/SNP in 2019, including a significant chunk in the red wall. but yes more didn't vote. only half of voters have voted the same way in the last 4 general elections which is an all time low

I think it was only around half the seats Labour lost that they would've held, at least for another electoral term, had BXP not run alongside Tories - assuming the bulk of the BXP vote were 'former Labour never - at least still not yet - Tory'

There’s also the possibility that some of the wc Tory vote was originally Brexit/UKIP.

Stoke on Trent North had a particularly bad turnout drop of around 10% but most other places Labour lost seemed to be down more like 5% or less

lab the beneficiaries of lots of doomed tactical voting too ofc

Think it’s probably Labour voters staying home in the end, and actual levels of switching Lab-Con being relatively low, but we’ll have to wait for the BES report to confirm. Having said all that, the people voting Lib Dem in Kensington, Green in Stroud will forever be cunts of the highest order.

Wait, Labour Leave to the Lib Dems? Jaysis.

Somethib something.. the hated grey squirrel coming over here and taking all our jobs...

Prob at least 3x as many labour remain voters to lib dems but yeah. everyone massively underrates how unusually chaotic and turbulent the electorate has been lately, within constituencies, wards and households even more than between regions or groups.

lab leave > con must have been a big thing unless the issue which has split the Tory party and seen off their leaders for 30 years suddenly stopped mattering to tories bc there wldnt be enough voters to make up the shortfall in tory remain voters otherwise

Datapraxis did the best GE report by miles imo, altho the demographic tribal groupings are p questionable it at least beats the idea that there is any sort of explanatory narrative that features less than abt 20 different things going on simultaneously

Lots of Tory marketing (nearly 4x as well funded as labour sez the electoral commission today) was v much aimed at labour leave voters, Get Brexit Done came up in a focus group meeting in bury iirc and they ran with it

my reasoning is that a lot of labour's losses were quite marginal defeats in leave voting seats, with the brexit party-tory pact being effective (and weirdly under-discussed?).

This was written up fairly quickly, really the main reason for Labour's loss and under-discussed even by Labour in the post-mortem, which suits a lot of people.

https://theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/dec/13/brexit-party-nigel-farage-boris-johnson-labour-leavers

xxp

xxp idk, I’m sure if you look at the actual vote counts the Tories weren’t much different from 17 whereas Lab fell off? And 17 was a high water mark for both cos May got ~80% of the UKIP votes. Even the 19 Lab vote was more comparable to their votes in 15 & 10 and it was 17 that was the outlier.

yeah tories were slightly up overall despite losing their remainers. lab lost voters a bit in all directions

Just got an actual phone call from KS campaign, told them I was voting for RLB.

At this point they have also sent me 2 text messages and one letter and countless FB ads

give him his due, the lad really wants it

he's covering every blade of grass is this lad!

Hardest working ventiloquist's dummy in showbiz.

shane long-bailey runs about a lot and works very hard for the team as well.. but is that enough?

Same people funding Starmer’s leadership bid probably https://t.co/hKUluFESzU

— Rosewood Shoehorn (@apiarism) February 27, 2020

the net closes in on Starmer's mystery campaign donors and lol at the LibDems!

Monbiot backing Nandy (?????)

I thought it was widely agreed RLB is the greenest candidate with the bonus of not working with former fucking UKIP honchos?

Nandy also got a ringing endorsement from the good ppl of dewsbury last night despite paying lip service to neoliberalism and drip down economics. I think some folk just like her!

"she’s got a lovely touch, she gets the collaborative nature of what politics now needs to be”

lol all she ever does is legit concerns, predictions of doom or random jukebox hour.. what the fuck is he smoking?

you dirty .. dirty dirty old man.

just got an email from doreen lawrence backing starmer

maybe they swapped bending to royals tips at some point?

non-politics ppl I know are complaining abt starmer's voice. "I never want to listen to him again". I wonder if his offputting nasal southernness is why ppl up here are backing nandy

Nandy’s support is majority men, complete opposite of the other two.

ppl who like her sincere raised eyebrows expression

Monbiot pro-fracking now as well?

Labour has written to me telling me they can’t find me on my local electoral register and therefore I am not eligible to vote unless I prove otherwise? Possibly this is due to the version of the register (I opt out of the public one), but what a pain. I’ve forwarded them some proof, hopefully they let me know soon.

Nesrine Malik has a short piece about Nandy’s inability to triangulate

This fear of looking weak is why the opportunity to take on the Conservative party, and the right in general, by presenting a clear counter-narrative is missed again and again. There is already someone “listening” to people on immigration, already a party that has achieved the job of not making people feel irrational or racist for having anti-immigration views. Labour’s task is not to provide more of the same, but to spell out clearly the colossal trick that the right has played on the country, in taking the despair that should be directed at austerity, the gutting of the NHS, the corporatisation and dehumanisation of the state, and saying clearly that immigration has nothing to do with it.

She was literally coming out with 100% Tory lines on taxation at my local hustings, as in saying we can't have great the public services we enjoy if we overtax billionaires and the bunch of self-hating mugs gave her a round of applause. That's why they call her "Towns" I guess.

Honestly I was done with her the second she started lying about buses.

it's proof that lame as fuck libs like Monbiot are quite happy to vouch for pols despite being absolutely oblivious to what kind of policies they represent. I mean she has quite a scattergun approach but you get enough info to know that she is fiscally way to the right for starters.

https://www.newstatesman.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/screenshot_2020-02-28_at_16.30.04.png?itok=-hghMFIY

for a more thorough set of stats including data that might be able to answer the question: 'is alex sobel one of the top 8 most powerful LW forces in UK electoral politics?'

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Myl8IpeobHwTJQv4GPKHHIi5JrRXPgwOYh9Xl3uzh-E/edit#gid=0

come on, lads, I’ve given ye the evidence

https://i.postimg.cc/J4kvrCLb/8066-D47-D-657-D-4-B57-B67-E-B2-E2-B36-C6297.jpg UGH

sobez hopes to become the first gamer PM but he is a hardcore civ 5 zealot and will not upgrade to civ 6. first flavor flav gets kicked out of PE and now this - when will the left stop tearing itself apart?

I don’t really care about his Civ stance, I’m more interested in which fighting game series he likes more. I’m not voting for someone who likes Street Fighter.

This is a good interview from Starmer:

As Labour leader, what steps would you take to challenge the vilification of trans people in the media? And how would you educate people within the Labour Party and the wider population who still hold anti-trans views?

The Labour Party stands up for people who are being abused and vilified, and we always will we always should. Trans rights are human rights and I support the right to self identification. The Gender Recognition Act was a step in the right direction, but it doesn’t go far enough. Other countries have now gone past us with more rights; therefore, it does need extending. I agree about the dehumanising aspects of the [gender recognition] process. But we want to have this debate in the right spirit. I don’t think it helps to have too heated a debate about it, it must be possible to move forward in the right spirit.

The media’s role in this is really, really important because they’re amplifying some of the hatred. And I see the echoes of Section 28. The same arguments, the same examples that were used when we were battling Section 28 are now being used in a different context. And just as we battled it then, so we have to battle it now. I think we will look back at this period, at some of the media coverage in particular, and be ashamed of what’s gone on, just as we’re ashamed of what went on when we were battling Section 28. So that’s how I would approach it as a leader of the Labour Party.

A nice way to think about it, however idealistic, is that the closer RLB gets to him, the more attention he'll have to pay to these issues

I mean in fairness he was a human rights lawyer, I'm pretty sure he didn't suddenly start thinking about transphobia because he was looking over his shoulder at the RLB campaign.

That last answer though, indefensible.

Wait til you find out he’s an Arsenal season ticket holder and mentions this fact on his website.

One rule for Jezza

Not a season ticket holder!

he just pretended to be a gunner to own the ilx melts!

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/ELm8v4GW4AMfE0V?format=jpg&name=900x900

https://www.thesun.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/nintchdbpict000401793302-e1524773971454.jpg

The top pic is Corbs and Starmer y/n

Islington North is Goonerville.

I know, I’ve spent a lot of time there!

I bet if you did a Herbert Chapman to the 70's Arsenal pub quiz Corbyn would kick Starmer's fucking arse.

(1)One oddities of the "Soft Left" in Labour, IMO, is while a v. large chunk of members are arguably "soft left", it has v.weak organisation, which leads to the "Soft Left" being easily pulled one way or the other (sadly IMO more often one way than the other)

— Solomon Hughes (@SolHughesWriter) March 3, 2020

think this is right and might even assuage the fears of the more generous starmer sceptics

it's proof that lame as fuck libs like Monbiot are quite happy to vouch for pols despite being absolutely oblivious to what kind of policies they represent. I mean she has quite a scattergun approach but you get enough info to know that she is fiscally way to the right for starters.

― calzino, Monday, March 2, 2020 2:14 AM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

monbiot is just a ditherer. he came round to the Scooby-doo Marxist view of climate disaster - capitalism did it! - in recent years but remains a fucking centrist when it comes down to it. useless

stanning for what is essentially the pro-fracking UKIP candidate in the labour leadership election and then feigning concern for the environment is it?

I have missed twitter like a stone in my shoe. But much of what I need to do I can only do here. Please join me and the noted ecologists @GeorgeMonbiot and @DaleVince in backing this case that might well rewrite our energy policy. https://t.co/oyE2e3lzYz

— Jo Maugham QC (@JolyonMaugham) March 3, 2020

lol, Monbiot has friends in high windmills

democratic, impassioned, modest; i don't know what anybody could have against these lads

I was so surprised to receive the Labour leadership ballot I was entitled to that I became overwhelmed with a sense of conciliatory cross-party goodwill and accidentally voted for Lisa Nandy, with an A4 piece of paper with the words "real opposition" written on it as Deputy

Sorry to break the news to you. Boris Johnson is racist. pic.twitter.com/UPE0Ixyhro

— (((Dawn Butler))) (@DawnButlerBrent) March 5, 2020

I'm voting Dawn now, but only in my imagination. We have definitely crossed the being called a racist being more offensive than being a racist rubicon.

If my damn ballot ever comes through I’ll slam that 1st preference for both of us

Love her, my ballot came through while I was away for the weekend so haven't cast my vote.

went for dawn! :)

yeah given the polling I think I will go butler > burgon > rayner

Long-Bailey enjoyed a misspent youth in the early Noughties in Manchester, where she went clubbing four nights a week, had rainbow-dyed hair and a lower lip piercing, wore baggy trousers with a vest and was a “bit of a skater girl”, although she says: “I could only go in a straight line. [The board] was more of a prop to make me look cool.”

https://www.standard.co.uk/news/politics/rebecca-longbailey-interview-labour-leadership-race-a4382071.html

even more glad now of my vote

are you Not a member but: Starmer/Allin-Khan 1? I can't imagine you being in favour of either moshers or nandy, but mb I have you wrong

My ballot still hasn’t come

Looks like I’m calling tomorrow >:(

Mine came ages ago but I'm deliberating

didn't realise RLB was a mosher, that might explain why she doesn't seem to know shit about The Fall!

Ballot’s here!

https://i.postimg.cc/ZKMwKzbK/C8728-DEC-DDA7-4-FF9-A5-F7-BB69590744-CD.jpg

https://i.postimg.cc/dVZ4hN3R/9-DB15-EE5-F6-BF-4-C62-AFA4-121661-E8-FA36.jpg

This right here is why I voted Starmer 2nd preference:

🎙️ Is it Islamophobic?

🗣️ It’s not for me to pronounce if it’s Islamophobic or not

🎙️ Why not?

Labour leadership candidate @lisanandy reacts to news ex-UK equality watchdog chief Trevor Phillips has been suspended from Labour over Islamophobia claimshttps://t.co/fO6OxEMO6Y pic.twitter.com/t6eJ1qlPVV

— Victoria Derbyshire (@VictoriaLIVE) March 10, 2020

Nah I’ve come back to this - Nandy doesn’t wanna call islamophobia what it is because she knows that a large section of the “legitimate concerns” coalition she’s built don’t think anti-muslim racism is real. She’s even referred to “debates in Islam” over what TP has said??? https://t.co/DpZDBs9XYd

— Jase (@jasebyjason) March 10, 2020

tbh is Starmer's lawyerly silence on T Phillips any fucking better? :p

ah RLB is doing the same!

what does the P in PLP stand for again ? erm pigeonhearted, pusillanimous...fuck this party!

There is a lot of talent here. What a waste.

The debate around identity and protecting gender rights is complicated. People deserve so much better than this kind of flippant disregard. pic.twitter.com/5LLZuIVsQt

— Lisa Nandy (@lisanandy) March 10, 2020

sometimes she shows true potential and I really want to like her, it's just a shame she thought going back into that UKIP/legit concerns quagmire and a conservatively neoliberal approach to the economy was the correct route to take Labour into power.

She's right on gender self-ID but so were Theresa May and Penny Mordaunt. The bar isn't that low.

I thought it was now tbh!

in the personal sense I would probably much prefer her irl to that loathsome oily piece of shit Starmer!

she held herself genuinely impressively in that, and used a bit of humour well. shame about some of her policy stances as (as i've said above) ceteris paribus she is by far the most impressive of the three in debate or public speech

so long as Islamophobia isn't the issue at hand ;)

She was good on No Deal brinksmanship and coronavirus/the economy in the Guardian the other day as well, even if her approach would be seized upon by Cummings as continuing to try and frustrate Brexit etc it's probably a line that whoever wins needs to keep hammering in preparation for when everything goes wrong.

When they finally announce the winner no one outside the Labour Party will give a shit, the country hasn't exactly been riveted by the contest and people will have other things to worry about.

Starmer's humourless boring demeanour and sort of posh boss who everyone calls a wanker behind their back persona will be a major problem in the north for the Labour party, not just his voice or the Remoaner perception. I'm almost looking forward to seeing him getting hilariously brutalised by the opposition tbh. I know that is bad praxis, but I want the stupid membership to own their boy and reap what they have sown - the bunch of softy-lefty-melty fuckwits!

He’s a lot less posh than most of the media gatekeepers and right-wing arseholes (yes, overlapping Venn diagram) who would have to sell that line. Maybe his obvious lower middle class discomfort in certain circumstances is a positive? Will it get anywhere with the demographic of people with THIS FAMILY BELIEVES IN LOVE wall transfers in their kitchen extensions/women who call each other Hunni on FB/people who watch the One Show?

I’ve just started applying to adopt a whippetlurcher so I can’t wait to see what the rescue pages will make of the Dilyn situation. I can’t imagine it will go down well at all.

my soul is chilled by that glimpse into suzy's world of normies

the writing fad needs more analysis imo, can't tell how much sheer stupidity is betrayed by getting so caught up on signifiers. someone bought us a teaspoon that has the word 'lovely' written vertically down the handle am i relatable now

sort of posh boss who everyone calls a wanker behind their back persona

TBF this accounts for most of our recent Prime Ministers.

Nandy is probably just as posh as him, but did you see his humorous anecdote about valentine's night in Newcastle recently? It had all the hallmarks of a nauseating bore being who is used to being a boss figure and politely indulged by underlings that daren't tell him he's a complete wanker!

Sign up to a few pet rescue pages and suddenly these people are EVERYWHERE (and I forgot the ‘fleece, Crocs and shite tattoos’ grouping).

nandy's bg is posher than starmer's despite the fact she's tried to turn herself into the exotically northern townsperson the media like to see her as

I know I'd read her common touch is quite a performance, but I'd be cool with that if she wasn't such a tory in disguise.
xps

May was more like the stern but (lol) fair boss who you don't fuck with because you know they have a vindictive streak. Starmer seems more ingenuous but just as charmless as well, type of boss who gets the basic minimum of respect.

the writing fad needs more analysis imo, can't tell how much sheer stupidity is betrayed by getting so caught up on signifiers. someone bought us a teaspoon that has the word 'lovely' written vertically down the handle am i relatable now

xp

Ms Nandy, Tory in disguise

When we were looking at houses, the number of houses that featured Union Jack décor

noticed a while ago how many airbnb places had Union Flag cushions - but properties on estate agents sites too. Keep Calm And Have A Cuppa type shit all over the walls too natch.

tbf, this stuff spans quite a few social demographics and there are i am sure subtleties distinguishing between the cath kidston set and honest hardworking twee patriots

absolutely coating the walls in tat with 'love' and 'we believe in love' and 'omg love' and 'this is a house of love' = strong correlation with divorced mothers

Hahahahaha the direness of wall transfers is the one thing my mum and I agree on - she says she imagines the daddy of all interfamilial shouting matches going on with a wall transfer with FAMILY MEANS LOVE or similar lurking in the background.

HOWEVER I’ve had this waiting to be framed for ages, sort of undermining the wall transfer concept:

http://www.artnet.com/artists/christopher-wool-and-felix-gonzalez-torres/poster-untitled-xwP6-K_r8FAx3DVlAmpvQg2

They’re worth about a grand now, whoa!

We were due a new sneering at the little people thread.

Are the petty-bourgeois/boring middle-class types under discussion “the little people”?

this was on the wall of a house we looked round

https://i.imgur.com/SIQjFAS.jpg

union jack cushions = working-class couples who've made some money & developed a pioneer spirit. sometimes these places are otherwise v good airbnbs

this is not sneering this is cool-headed analysis. the most egregious 'house of love' was my friend's mother who is a v v v high-powered city lawyer/pr type

i can only say fair play

omg ogmor

Oh FFS, leave us to criticise people who have more money and less taste than most of us in the precariat.

that picture getting better of course when you recall how euro 2004 ended for england (portugal's goalie scoring in a shootout)

omg ogmor, that is traumatizing!

personally I salute it

This way, please:

Real England

Doc not missing a beat here, dropping an email on Corona in my inbox

I'd consider giving her my 2nd pref if she said 'Rhythm of the Night: Classic or Dud?'

When does this finally end? At this rate they'll just give it to the last one left alive.

that'll be Corbyn back in as interim leader then, call this competition off - they're all useless!

wld be a great time to get members busy locally, nothing. starmers comments so weak

Yeah WhatsApp momentum groups are doing a bit of that

Camden’s mutual aid group is VERY active.

Have we noted anywhere that the coronavirus "over 70s don't come to work" rule excludes Corbyn from Westminster for the remainder of his tenure? guess it wasn't for long anyway.

A journalist explicitly asked about parliamentarians yesterday - presumably to confirm the govt had just excluded the leader of the opposition from parliament.

Presumably second house almost empty too...

Jez sez:

“I raised this very specific issue, not for myself but for other people. It’s more important that those who have underlying health problems, be it diabetes, be it heart conditions, be it lung conditions, be it people with emphysema, or industrial injuries that they’ve suffered, they’re likely to be more vulnerable than those that are healthy. So it is not just an age thing.

Personally speaking, I will carry on with my work, I will carry on accepting the responsibilities that I have in this position.”

Sometimes you just need to do your fucking bit and follow the protocols.

This will prompt thousands of "healthy" 70 year olds to follow suit. Age is as much of an indicator of complications as any other health measure.

Over 70s wouldn’t vote for Corbyn so idk why they’d choose to follow him now?

gpwm

I work with a 72yo veg farmer who will be leaving his farm only twice weekly, going to a specific place for six hours each time to trade (while taking extra hygiene precautions) so that everyone else can have fresh, healthy food. Healthy 70+ people who are still in work and provide essential services are not keen on self-isolation as long as their family members don’t exhibit symptoms.

sorry but the idea that the nation's 70-year-olds will self-isolate only if Jermy Cromblyn does is pretty funny, think more of them would socialise much more just to spite him

if things aren't depressing enough right now, the idea of a fucking diaphanous melt jellyfish in a suit with a stupid fucking voice being the next LOTO is enough to make want to give up. By the end of the week Raab will be to the left of him on proposed C 19 responses.

It's not that people will follow his example. It's that his is an example of the "that doesn't apply to me I'm important" individualism that breaks down group protection.

People won't follow him, but they will say if it's good enough for the political classes it's good enough for us real people swapping food and money at markets oh look

Yeah they're not likely to do it because of Corbyn but I can easily see a lot of people who hate him going "fucking Jeremy Corbyn's still going out so why can't I?"

TBH though people who think like that are probably going to carry on regardless of what Corbyn does.

Got my ballot.

1. RLB

1. Dawn Butler

Excellent work. Hope you’re feeling ok (or at least not worse).

otm

Interesting how, "Labour should suspend the leadership election, keep Corbyn as leader & rerun it later" has shifted from being a joke rooted in a certain sad, self-ironisation to an entirely sensible and correct demand.

— Tom Gann (@Tom_Gann) March 17, 2020

Keir Starmer getting flanked to the left by the *checks notes* DUP https://t.co/Y4CQELL6Rp

— Loki (@Lokinash06) March 18, 2020

Excellent work. Hope you’re feeling ok (or at least not worse).

― gramsci in your surplice (gyac), Tuesday, 17 March 2020 bookmarkflaglink

Thanks feeling ok now think it was just a cold..

Unionism in NI (and Scotland) doesn't really work in a left/right way tbf.

true, but any excuse for a dig at the diaphanous melt!

Calz! XD XD XD

https://medium.com/@Rich_Penny/keir-starmer-builds-an-ikea-cabinet-7732f9789cf8

heh! completely read that in his voice as well!

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/ETfHqUpXYAIfdMo?format=jpg&name=large

£5.95 is embarrassing when ao3 is free. (Though always happy to see artists getting paid for their work).

please tell me that magazine is a spoof

Astonishingly the Starmer content isn't the worst thing about that front page. The winner of that would be 'The feminist case for Jordan Peterson', by a landslide.

oh god it's real is it Spiked in disguise?

The Critic exists to push back against a self-regarding and dangerous consensus that finds critical voices troubling, triggering, insensitive and disrespectful. The point is not provocation or trolling. The point of honest criticism is to better approach truth, not deny its possibility.

oh good.

ARE YOU TRIGGERED YET SNOWFLAKES??

tbh i'm calling "Getting on in literary London" as worse than the Peterson fanfic

it's like that audience with Iannucci and Jess Phillips thing, did it really happen? or is it some part of the extended Hedges universe. It can't be fucking real!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QZzDgU2-X4k

Me rn:

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BpNsf2jCAAAQG_s?format=jpg&name=small

https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn%3AANd9GcSBMEQDjNizaPNy6ve0aJThKhF73XrIyAdUW6HSMXw4EpjrEgDV&usqp=CAU

At least there’s not going to be a big triumphalist conference speech.

psyched to add another dissonant note to the huge crashing chord of doom that’s been playing in my head for weeks

Finally an effective opposition is going to return. Effective at almost complete invisibility and anonymity. Months wil roll past with no mention of this guy. Even in 3 years time no one will have heard of him. It'll probably turn out he's been playing for West Ham on an 18 month contract

Can’t wait for Yvette Cooper & Rachel Reeves to be back and outflanking the government from the right.

I *think* the idea will be to deploy the deputy as the bad cop, but the buck stops with the leader and if the leader can't oppose effectively then what hope do we have? I'm willing to be surprised but I fear I won't be. The only crumb of comfort is that Labour need the broadest church possible, so they can't just disregard the left of the party. You'd hope.

I've been waiting so long for the best Labour leader of my lifetime to be replaced by a dismal melt with soft tory tendencies, what a dream day.

the left had their chance, and the people have spoken - they want a tory, but not an electable one

this is how political compromise works

Remember when Labour really needed the left of the party between 1997 and 2015?

Sickener.

Lol @ good/bad cop 'idea'.

Tbh this is just the cap on the dread I felt when the exit poll came out. On their heads be it.

if only it was just on their heads :(

I managed without having anybody to vote for 20 years, should be easy to get back in the groove

The website crashed.

The void won. pic.twitter.com/o7wHLZep2Q

— Nihilists for Labour (@Nihilists4Lab) April 4, 2020

brb gonna get some ‘don’t blame me i voted rlb’ badges printed up

Labour leadership result:

Keir Starmer: 56.2%
Rebecca Long Bailey: 27.6%
Lisa Nandy: 16.2%

— Britain Elects (@britainelects) April 4, 2020

fucking dismal

Fuck you too you fucking idiots

63% turnout

Time to leave this sinking shithole oh wait

Anybody fancy a doorstep clap for the Labour membership tonight?

More depressed by the Nandy % than the Starmer one.

oh god the comments on that post are just apocalyptic

Don’t read them, the worst winners in history. No ideas, no humility, no integrity.

Labour deputy leadership result, first round:

Angela Rayner: 41.7%
Richard Burgon: 17.3%
Rosena Allin-Khan: 16.8%
Ian Murray: 13.3%
Dawn Butler: 10.9%

— Britain Elects (@britainelects) April 4, 2020

still at least in these straitened times i’ll be able to save a few quid a month by cancelling my labour membership

Those deputy figures are a fucking disgrace

Dawn Butler below that cunt Murray. Fuck.

Labour deputy leadership result, second round:

Angela Rayner: 46.5% (+4.8)
Rosena Allin-Khan: 19.5% (+2.7)
Richard Burgon: 19.2% (+1.9)
Ian Murray: 14.3% (+1.0)

Butler eliminated (-10.9)

— Britain Elects (@britainelects) April 4, 2020

Labour deputy leadership result, third round round:

Angela Rayner: 52.6% (+6.1) ELECTED
Rosena Allin-Khan: 26.1% (+6.6)
Richard Burgon: 21.3% (+2.1)

Murray eliminated (-14.3)

— Britain Elects (@britainelects) April 4, 2020

xp didn’t you know the party hates black women already?

Yes, but not that much. Ian Murray?! Jesus fuck.

oh well at least I won't be on suicide watch next time Labour get trounced in a GE

You’ll probably actively enjoy it!

too tired to dunk on British columnists and leader writers who, even in the midst of a pandemic and seeing a country where Tory policies will kill hundreds of thousands, still think the actual problem are young leftists who saw their struggles represented in Corbyns labour

— hk (@HKesvani) April 4, 2020

I won't be as classless as Jess Phillips was on election night, because Tories doing well isn't anything to celebrate. I will just be rather apathetic and probably won't even stay up and definitely won't be arsed about voting.

Unsurprising really, the RLB campaign was very quiet in the end, it never really seemed to take off at all and Starmer didn't have to do anything except sit there. I'd be surprised if most of the country even notices right now.

TBH the paltry share of the vote that Nandy recieved is heartening. The response that Butler got is gutting and says a lot.

In reality it's what Starmer does from here on in that matters. He'll have to do a fuck of a lot better than he's done so far.

Probably the worst part is going to be the crowing from the people who have been banging on about the need to unite the party for years. You don't unite anything by gleefully shitting on the last guy.

Not paltry enough ime. I’m not going to forget her refusing to condemn Trevor Phillips in a hurry, and she was an appalling candidate.

I'd be surprised if most of the country even notices right now.

You don't say.

I'd be surprised if most of the country even notices right now.

Thats kind of the point? All Premier Leagues need a Bournemouth

Fucking stupidly interminable election process had already strangled any interest before outside events intruded.

suggest the next UK pol thread is called "Let's Get Forensic"

well... bummer

gutted by the Butler results, though Rayner is all right imo (I expect to hear why she isn't soon)

as ilx's resident melt I wanted to believe Starmer was Not That Bad for a lot longer than anyone else here, but he's been completely invisible during this whole crisis and tbh I'm dreading whenever he does finally pop up in case it's to say something motivating like "don't let's be beastly to the landlords"

His job is to be invisible, and (hopefully) inaudible.

tbh the actual post of deputy is immaterial but the massive dis to the candidate who was probably best qualified for the job is kinda jaw-dropping in its blatancy

Affiliates
Long-Bailey 16,970 (22.31%)
Nandy 18,681 (24.56%)
Starmer 40,417 (53.13%)

Member
Long-Bailey 117,598 (29.29%)
Nandy 58,788 (14.64%)
Starmer 225,135 (56.07%)

Registered
Long-Bailey 650 (5.00%)
Nandy 2,128 (16.36%)
Starmer 10,228 (78.64%)

Trade Union members are Affiliates? Is that right?

this cuts to the heart of it

Cancel your direct debit now folks, for fuck's sake. It's their shambling corpse, let them have it.

— Jimatron (@JP_Maybe) April 4, 2020

Oh no, here's Jess Phillips.

does she have some thoughts on which part of the body she's prepared to stab Starmer in?

Not before he gives help to the goverment, 'like a grown up'.

https://i.postimg.cc/65qHZjgb/0-B158297-0-F05-4-F4-C-8468-74690260-B52-F.jpg 😌 I’m sure the big donors will come back now anyway