Rayvin

Just as an aside, I watched a film the other day about sugar in food that honestly made me think that the whole world would be better off without sugar. I didn't watch this video just to be able to endorse Corbyn on it for what it's worth although it probably sounds that way. I think it's called That Sugar Film. It points out that sugar, rather than fat, is the leading cause of obesity. Apparently it compromises insulin in such a way that it adds to weight gain. The guy in the film eats only low fat foods but still puts weight on, suffers mood swings, and feels generally groggy at all times. And he's eating 'healthy' weight loss food. It was really eye opening. Problem is, getting by without sugar is really fucking hard. So back to Corbyn. Yes, not eating biscuits does make him harder for the electorate to relate to - but then, he seems to have deeply held health reasons for rejecting it. Probably based on stuff that's covered in that film. He's doing himself no favours unless you actually look at why he's doing these things. Which no one takes the time to do/attempts to misrepresent him. As for the demographics, I don't think Corbyn lost the blue collars - I think Miliband did. They deserted him at the GE, UKIP had over 4 million votes for one thing. That's nothing to do with Corbyn. His challenge is to win them back, not retain them. That said, his style is unlikely to do this when it's filtered through the mainstream media. This is why if he is to win, he has to do it without the media. In this era, with social networks and alternative news sources, this is becoming more possible. He absolutely does need to speak to people's concerns - and his policies absolutely would do. He needs to communicate them though, that's the challenge. I think I'm more desperate than enthusiastic tbh. I was disillusioned to the point of no longer voting after the GE last time. I voted Labour but really didn't want to, it was just because 'they're better than the Tories'. Corbyn came in and I saw a chance for meaningful change and went for it.

Fair enough - without that change though (electoral college) we never would have gotten these policies - Labour would have stuck it out with austerity. The more you focus on the policies in this, and not the people, the more Corbyn makes sense. And I know, it's been said to death, that Corbyn can't win because even if *I* vote for policies, most of the electorate won't. But my hope is that such an analysis is facile when the only 'alternative' is Theresa May's Tories. Who now have nowhere to hide and no one else to blame when things go wrong. What the rise of Corbyn offered was a sense that *people* mattered for the first time in an age. This is why he keeps going on about it being a movement. He was put there by *the people*. Despite everything. Twice. That's something to believe in even if it leads nowhere. Moreover, as I said, it's the media who make this about the people and not the policies. I'm going to vote based on policies and I can only suggest that every thinking person does the same thing. Buying into the media driven nonsense is just pointless, and only serves to entrench right wing values. Our democratic system is broken and gloom, from everything you've said, you're almost identical in your thinking to me. So you know it's broken. And I agree that Corbyn probably won't be the one to fix it - but I do think the movement, which I hope will outlast Corbyn, potentially could. And I'm not even in Momentum ffs. This could fall flat - but it is going to lead to change. Whether that change is PR which will need to come in due to a diminished Labour party and the need to avoid a one party state, or some of the policies put on the agenda to be discussed, this is the best chance the left has at the moment, IMO.

2-1 for me. We have to start getting back to winning again and it starts here. Hopefully.

Ok but - you say you now vote Green and Lib Dem. Do you expect them to win power? Given what you've just said, fair enough if you don't think Corbyn can win, but surely you should now be considering voting for him on the grounds that a) he isn't New Labour which you claim to have failed in the same manner I do, and that his policies aren't entirely unremoved from where you are and b ) you're voting for parties who have less capacity than he does to win an election anyway..? Unless I'm missing something.

I know you're left wing mate - I've always considered you to be more or less where I am, with a couple of exceptions going either way - the issue is your second paragraph. McDonnell made the case earlier that the money could be borrowed at low rates (true - the stock markets are actually borrowing to invest in shares at the moment, as the price of money is so low; so if the right wing, rich city bankers are doing it, why not governments?) and that therefore it is an achievable figure. I don't know if it is or it isn't, but at least his argument makes sense. I suspect his justification will be lost amongst the incredulous headlines of the Daily Mail, though. Interest rates are low to encourage us to spend - that's why they do it. It's not working though, because the government isn't spending, so there isn't enough cash in the system. This is why austerity didn't work, and McDonnell is right to view spending as they way back to growth. It's Keynesian, and it makes sense. I do see your point about pragmatism, but it only holds up if you accept that we live in a truly broken system where no one is interested in actual policies or facts, and instead are interested only in personalities and tribalism. I don't want to live in that society - so I'm voting against it. I might lose, sure - very probably will in actual fact - but my conscience will be clear as I will have tried to help in some small way to having good policies implemented with outcomes that will genuinely benefit people. Instead of a slight alleviation in misery, which is the alternative put forward by compromising with the press (EDIT: which is then reversed as soon as the Tories get back into power).

Aye but I'm talking pre-Iraq... Are you saying you just don't agree with Corbyn's policies then? That's all I'm really asking. EDIT - and by agree I mean 'broadly'. There are some I don't agree with either, but if Blair was putting them forward (i.e. someone with charisma) would you vote for them.

Let me ask (Renton and Gloom) - if Tony Blair (pre-Iraq war) had come out with Corbyn's policies, would you have voted for him?

I disagree - on the basis that the electorate need a fucking shake to get them out of their comfort zones to make a meaningful choice for once. They can't just vote for two sides of the same coin now. And did you see the report I linked to before - in a parallel universe where Britain elects parties based on policies, we would have a Green government. How can you look at that and think that compromise is what is needed? It's compromise only with the media barons and the rich. If we can get the discussion onto policies, the rest will fall into place. It'll never happen of course, but I'm sick to fuck of the system as it stands now and can't personally go on 'compromising' with the right wing media. Not when the overwhelming majority of the country agree with left wing policies. To me, the issue there is that people are force fed bullshit in the news. Not that the policies are wrong.

I would also say that New Labour in power was better, wars aside, than the Tories in power. The problem now is that New Labour are only prepared to get into power by emulating the Tories. That became clear over the last few years. Corbyn isn't a natural leader and isn't even a particularly good leader. But his policies will make a difference. Which is why he needs to make it about those policies, and not him.

Being honest, I can see your side of this totally - I was with New Labour, and Blair, and then Brown, right up until the Tories came into power. Labour surrendered the narrative on austerity and the crisis to the Tories and allowed them to rip into the country because they thought it was more important to be viewed as being in the centreground, even though the Tories had pulled it rightwards, than to be doing what was actually right. So I guess you could say, without comment on Blair or Brown, that New Labour lost me under Miliband.

Aye but their task force is international isn't it? There's plenty of racism in Eastern Europe from what we hear in the news...

Fucking hell. Fucking. Hell.

I think that's a hard one to answer. I don't know, in truth, as I've only properly been politically aware through New Labour and now the Tories. New Labour might well have been a necessary antidote to the Tories back then, but they aren't the solution now - the world has changed, inequality is higher than ever - centrist politics just isn't going to cut it. Plus there were other geopolitical forces at play back then with the fall of Soviet Russia - were the old left of Labour considered to be too close to them? I don't know in truth, I'm asking. New Labour aren't the solution now though, they lost the last election - so how can they be? I wanted to post this a while ago, and it may well have come up on here before: http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/if-people-voted-for-policies-the-green-party-would-win-the-next-election-9887199.html I think it would be very interesting if this survey could be repeated now. I suspect that more people agree with Corbyn's policies than they realise, given that when this was done in 2014, the Greens would have won. Obviously you could point to this and say that the fact that the Green policies are so popular and yet the party itself is so irrelevant are evidence that this doesn't work, but that doesn't take into consideration that we're in FPTP and Corbyn has a much bigger advantage than they would. The challenge to him is to de-toxify his brand (which his own party toxified on his behalf, incredibly) and make it about the policies in a significant enough way that people actually listen. For all CT's crowing about people choosing the party with the soundest economic theories, that report has his beloved Tories on 14%. Their policies aren't popular at all, they just have massive media bias on their side. It needs to be about policies - if we ever get to that point, we might actually start living in a functional democracy.

Aye but he can't actually leave, can he? How would you get out of Russia if your passport was revoked?

I reckon that gets him past the hypocrite accusation...? Seems consistent to me.

Is that true? Brave as fuck if so... like what?

They'll spend their way out in January. There's plenty of other teams in and around them who won't have the financial clout that they do. Although yes, after all their talk of champions league, this is enjoyable.

In fairness, there's a difference between checking a rival message board and actually having regular threads on rival team's matches. I think we've actually got some way to go before we're as bad as Sunderland. Even Essembee doesn't start match threads for them.

I fully understand your views on this fwiw, it's despicable what the Russians are doing. No one is arguing that point. I'm just not sure that your ire is well directed at Corbyn on this one (and stop the war, who seem to be campaigning, albeit not as extensively as you would like, against Britain being involved in the very actions you're condemning). That sounds like a grim Monday though. What is it you do again?

I mean, ignoring for a moment that in terms of creating the environment for this to happen, the West absolutely does share in responsibility here, Stop the War have made the following comments: http://www.stopwar.org.uk/index.php/news-comment/2174-syria-ceasefire-no-lasting-peace http://www.stopwar.org.uk/index.php/news-comment/2184-syria-foreign-intervention-and-the-end-of-the-ceasefire They are calling for all foreign intervention in Syria to end. Not just the Russians, all of it. Does that help? They also have this article detailing talking points at a convention, which makes reference to the media calling them pro-Russian: http://www.stopwar.org.uk/index.php/news-comment/2190-a-chance-to-break-with-our-addiction-to-war Excerpt: The conference will reaffirm the centrality of an anti-war movement — the largest and most significant in any Nato country — and the continued need to oppose British imperialism and its allies. This does not mean supporting British imperialism’s opponents. We have repeatedly been accused of being pro-Taliban, pro-Saddam, pro Gaddafi and pro-Assad. We are also accused of being pro-Russia. In fact, we have repeatedly condemned all foreign interventions in Syria and elsewhere, and have condemned all bombing which in every case results in the deaths of innocent civilians and often also helps fuel greater opposition. Those who attack us — and by extension Corbyn — are the same people who want to diminish criticisms of Blair and Cameron (and Brown, who continued a heavy involvement in Afghanistan), and who cheerled every escalation of war, every new intervention. They are the same people who voted for bombing Syria last December and were willing to suck up every one of Cameron’s lies to do so. As a disclaimer - I know very little about this organisation, but from the three articles I've just read and linked to here, it seems that they're an anti-Western imperialism organisation. Not a global anti-imperialism organisation. So they're doing exactly what they should be doing, based on their stated aims, aren't they? I think the last statement is particularly interesting.

Probably because the establishment has it covered? If we were in bed with the Russians and engaging in covering up what they're doing, the left would be up in arms. But we aren't - we're calling them out for what they are through the establishment media outlets. The left picks a bone with Israel and the west because we cover up the shit that we do. It needs to be exposed. There is no cover up of Russian imperialism. It's there for all to see. The only thing the left could arguably do to up the ante at this point is demand some manner of governmental militaristic response (aren't we already sanctioning Russia?). That's not in the lefty phrasebook though, so there's literally nothing to be said here. I think the better question is, why do YOU think they aren't saying anything. Is it because they're all commies? As for Russia - it's not going to come to global war. The West, and I agree with the establishment on this, sadly, is not going to run the risk of a global humanitarian catastrophe that would be world war III for the sake of Syria. Even if the Russians burn it to the ground. I don't even think the Russians would want that. There will be some manner of de-escalation shortly, I'm sure.

How do we stop the Russians exactly? Corbyn has spoken on this back in December last year and made some incredibly wise comments with respect of whether or not the UK should become involved. You seem to be wanting him and the left to virtue signal here more than anything else. I'm left wing, I can assure you that I condemn the Russians. There's no point in him making a statement on this until the government does so. I can't actually recall him making a statement on Israel while he's been leader either, actually. Let's be clear though, Russia may be hitting civilians as collateral, the Israeli army is somewhat more questionable.

True, we weren't involved, thank fuck. Shame about the rest of the Western world.

I see Russia has claimed a new world war could be upon us if the Saudis send troops in. I have no idea why Putin is so confident that he'd win this war, especially with Israel on his doorstep. That said, Russia is one of these stupid countries where they 'can't back down' as nationalism has taken such a strong hold. Much like China. Not sure what the UN is going to be able to do about this really, for all its cries of warcrimes. Russia will just brand it a US mouthpiece. I can't remember who kicked this off now, was it us? Supporting rebels against Assad or something like that? Or did the Russians just respond to the rebels and then we got dragged in?

You've framed this as a left wing issue so at the risk of poking the hornet nest, is Russian carpet bombing of civilians worse than our carpet bombing of civilians? In other words, are they collateral or are they actually being targeted? Remember that we have a track record of blowing up hospitals and red cross outposts which many people on here have argued is unfortunate but, as they're collateral, isn't morally equivalent to murder or terrorism. I disagree with this when you know that these places are going to be hit as part of an action you're taking, but apparently others don't. Have the Russians made clear that they're attacking random civilians on principle or something? Also the coalitions you mention are there to stop our atrocities, not Russia's. I think we can safely assume that they condemn the Russian bombings. That said, Russia seriously pisses me off with all of this nonsense. I can see why they feel the need to present a strong front to the Americans but I thought they'd established a little while ago that their approach of blowing everything up wasn't working. Both sides need to step down from this war, it's become fucking ridiculous. Aren't we all supposedly there for ISIS? Are they even still in Syria? How has this whole fiasco not been resolved yet? Why we or any other country entertain these fucked up wars is beyond me. I agree with gloom that media focus should be put on it though. Pictures of wounded and dead. Same as I think they should do this when we're responsible.