The BBC and corporate media coalesce around an extremely narrow consensus of political thought, and ensure that anybody who steps outside that consensus is ridiculed and marginalised. That consensus has got narrower and narrower. I was delighted during the general election to be able to listen to Nicola Sturgeon during the leaders’ debate argue for anti-austerity policies and for the scrapping of Trident. I had not heard anyone on broadcast media argue for the scrapping of Trident for a decade – it is one of those views which though widely held the establishment gatekeepers do not view as respectable.
The media are working overtime to marginalise Jeremy Corbyn as a Labour leadership candidate on the grounds that he is left wing and therefore weird and unelectable. But they face the undeniable fact that, Scottish independence aside, there are very few political differences between Jeremy Corbyn and Nicola Sturgeon. On issues including austerity, nuclear weapons, welfare and Palestine both Sturgeon and Corbyn are really very similar. They have huge areas of agreement that stand equally outside the establishment consensus. Indeed Nicola is more radical than Jeremy, who wants to keep the United Kingdom.
The establishment’s great difficulty is this. Given that the SNP had just slaughtered the Labour Party – and the Tories and Lib Dems – by being a genuine left wing alternative, how can the media consensus continue to insist that the left are unelectable? The answer is of course that they claim Scotland is different. Yet precisely the same establishment consensus denies that Scotland has a separate political culture when it comes to the independence debate. So which is it? They cannot have it both ways.
If Scotland is an integral part of the UK, Jeremy Corbyn’s policies cannot be unelectable.
Nicola Sturgeon won the UK wide leaders debate in the whole of the United Kingdom, despite the disadvantage of representing a party not standing in 90% of it by population. She won not just because she is clever and genuine, but because people all across the UK liked the left wing policies she articulated.
A Daily Mirror opinion poll following a BBC televised Labour leadership candidates’ debate this week had Jeremy Corbyn as the clear winner, with twice the support of anyone else. The media ridicule level has picked up since. This policy of marginalisation works. I was saddened by readers’ comments under a Guardian report of that debate, in which Labour supporter after Labour supporter posted comment to the effect “I would like to vote for Jeremy Corbyn because he believes in the same things I do, but we need a more right wing leader to have a chance of winning.”
There are two answers to that. The first is no, you don’t need to be right wing to win. Look at the SNP. The second is what the bloody hell are you in politics for anyway? Do you just want your team to win like it was football? Is there any point at all in being elected just so you can carry out the same policies as your opponents? The problem is, of course, that for so many in the Labour Party, especially but not just the MPs, they want to win for personal career advantage not actually to promote particular policies.
The media message of the need to be right wing to be elected is based on reinforced by a mythologizing of Tony Blair and Michael Foot as the ultimate example of the Good and Bad leader. These figures are constantly used to reinforce the consensus. Let us examine their myths.
Tony Blair is mythologised as an electoral superstar, a celebrity politician who achieved unprecedented personal popularity with the public, and that he achieved this by adopting right wing policies. Let us examine the truth of this myth. First that public popularity. The best measure of public enthusiasm is the percentage of those entitled to vote, who cast their ballot for that party at the general election. This table may surprise you.
Percentage of Eligible Voters
1992 John Major 32.5%
1997 Tony Blair 30.8%
2001 Tony Blair 24.1%
2005 Tony Blair 21.6%
2010 David Cameron 23.5%
2015 David Cameron 24.4%
There was only any public enthusiasm for Blair in 97 – and to put that in perspective, it was less than the public enthusiasm for John Major in 1992.
More importantly, this public enthusiasm was not based on the policies now known as Blairite. The 1997 Labour Manifesto was not full of right wing policies and did not indicate what Blair was going to do.
The Labour Party manifesto of 1997 did not mention Academy schools, Private Finance Initiative, Tuition Fees, NHS privatisation, financial sector deregulation or any of the right wing policies Blair was to usher in. Labour actually presented quite a left wing image, and figures like Robin Cook and Clare Short were prominent in the campaign. There was certainly no mention of military invasions.
It was only once Labour were in power that Blair shaped his cabinet and his policies on an ineluctably right wing course and Mandelson started to become dominant. As people discovered that New Labour were “intensely relaxed about people getting filthy rich”, to quote Mandelson, their popular support plummeted. “The great communicator” Blair for 90% of his Prime Ministership was no more popular than David Cameron is now. 79% of the electorate did not vote for him by his third election
Michael Foot consistently led Margaret Thatcher in opinion polls – by a wide margin – until the Falklands War. He was defeated in a victory election by the most appalling and intensive wave of popular war jingoism and militarism, the nostalgia of a fast declining power for its imperial past, an emotional outburst of popular relief that Britain could still notch up a military victory over foreigners in its colonies. It was the most unedifying political climate imaginable. The tabloid demonization of Foot as the antithesis of the military and imperial theme was the first real exhibition of the power of Rupert Murdoch. Few serious commentators at the time doubted that Thatcher might have been defeated were it not for the Falklands War – which in part explains her lack of interest in a peaceful solution. Michael Foot’s position in the demonology ignores these facts.
The facts about Blair and about Foot are very different from the media mythology.
The stupid stunt by Tories of signing up to the Labour Party to vote for Corbyn to ridicule him, is exactly the kind of device the establishment consensus uses to marginalise those whose views they fear. Sturgeon is living proof left wing views are electable. The “left unelectable” meme will intensify. I expect Jeremy Corbyn’s biggest problem will be quiet exclusion. I wish him well.
Interesting, Macky, that you refer to me as, ‘SS’ and in the recent past have accused me of “playing the race card”. Only Alfred has really done that, as far as I can see. Just an observation.
Ba’al Zevul, I cannot agree that the two sides should be treated the same. If Hamas were not dismissed as terrorists by Israel, primarily and the West in general, then we might have some dialogue with them. It suits Israel to be able to claim they have no partner in peace. They have no intention of becoming involved; even if they had Mother Theresa sat on the other side of the table. All the time that Israel are able to avoid negotiation, they are stealing more land. Never a day goes by that Palestinians aren’t given eviction notices for one reason or another. Israel has managed to avoid making any concessions whilst the Palestinians have slowly had any hopes of a two state solution taken away by the influx of illegal settlements.
We are led to believe that Israel are a responsible, legitimate government and that Hamas a bunch of blood thirsty militants and if that were the case (if they really wanted peace), surely they would try to involve Hamas, not that much differently from what happened with the IRA and the British government?
A people with nothing and barely existing cannot be held to the same standards as one of the top military forces in the world. Yet Hamas only killed six civilians in comparison to sixty seven soldiers in the conflict, which exposes Israel as either incompetent, or more likely the case, killing as many Palestinians as they can, with no concern if they are military targets or not.
Fedup: “A man/woman raiding a “charity” clothes dumpster is a thief, and a scoundrel that needs to be jailed.”
Another example where the value of human life is demoted by a message from the State; it would rather risk a person freezing to death than not subject that transaction through the money nexus; similar to that old man who was given jail time because he refused to stop giving food to the homeless.
Fedup at 11.28 pm. Thank you for the additional information about Saakashvili. I should have mentioned that his Dutch wife was running the prisoner supplementary organ-supply scheme. Organs were removed from prisoners and their bodies returned to families. This is the eugenics all fascist regimes have resorted to, like the Nazi death-camps, with lampshades made from human skin and soap from the bodies. I know there are many Jewish people worldwide opposed to this Kiev government, understandably.
This is emeritus professor of New York University and now Princetown University, Stephen Cohen, giving a very enlightened analysis of the situation in Ukraine. For all his faults I notice the “good Catholic” Habby has stayed fairly quiet on Ukraine, for what reason I know not. Perhaps he can see the parallels that have been obvious to the prescient from the start.
http://rt.com/shows/worlds-apart-oksana-boyko/267982-violence-tensions-relations-us/
American and British support for Israel shows that colonial sentiments are not dead in either country.
For you good folks in North America here’s your radiation highs for last week. These are mostly beta counts. 50 counts per minute (CPM) used to be alert status. You are all being fried, folks, but the corporations love it because they make bucketloads of money out of cancer treatments. God, how sick is the human race…
Normal Radiation is 5 to 20 CPM. [6]
488 CPM Concord, NH Gamma and Beta Radiation Combined.
342 CPM Boston, MA Partial Radiation Data Only.
296 CPM New York City, NY. Partial.
624 CPM Pittsburgh, PA. Gamma and Beta Radiation Combined. Welcome
614 CPM Raleigh, NC. Partial.
325 CPM Atlanta, GA. Partial.
502 CPM Miami, FL. Partial.
232 CPM Chicago, IL. Partial.
346 CPM Ft Wayne, IN. Gamma and Beta Radiation Combined CPM.
291 CPM Indianapolis, IN. Partial.
525 CPM St Paul, MN. Gamma and Beta Radiation Combined CPM.
448 CPM Lincoln, NE. Gamma and Beta Radiation Combined CPM.
318 CPM Des Moines, IA. Partial.
462 CPM Aberdeen, SD. Partial.
458 CPM Rapid City, SD. Partial.
360 CPM Kansas City, KA. Partial.
269 CPM Tulsa, OK. Partial.
608 CPM Little Rock, AR. Gamma and Beta Radiation Combined CPM.
271 CPM Dallas, TX. Gamma and Beta Radiation Combined CPM.
387 CPM San Angelo, TX. Gamma and Beta Radiation Combined CPM.
318 CPM Lubbock, TX. Partial.
365 CPM South Valley, NM. Partial.
—- CPM Albuquerque, NM.
375 CPM Grand Junction, CO. Partial. They are back, Gamma only.
866 CPM Billings, MT. Partial.
554 CPM Phoenix, AZ. Gamma and Beta Radiation Combined CPM.
672 CPM Tucson, AZ. Gamma and Beta Radiation Combined CPM.
225 CPM Las Vegas, NV. Partial.
371 CPM San Diego, CA. Partial.
553 CPM Bakersfield, CA. Gamma and Beta Radiation Combined CPM.
317 CPM Los Angeles, CA. Partial.
217 CPM San Francisco, CA. Partial.
456 CPM Spokane, WA. Partial.
http://www.veteranstoday.com/2015/06/20/your-radiation-this-week-no-12/
Suhayl Saadi; “Interesting, Macky, that you refer to me as, ‘SS’ and in the recent past have accused me of “playing the race card”. Only Alfred has really done that, as far as I can see. Just an observation.”
It’s precisley to stop you playing your cheap race card games; I still can’t believe you made out that my use of “Sly Saadi” was a racial slur, rather than it being a reference to my perceptive of the disingenuous nature of your arguments, and I’m quite partial to using a same letter prefix; ie Doopey Dreoilin, Crazed Clark, etc
It’s ok, no need to apologise ! 😉
PS No I not Alfred, only myself as far as I can tell ! 😀
“Another example where the value of human life is demoted by a message from the State”.. Thats states for you.
“You promised soon that they world have a paper, give them the right to kill quite legally.”
Yes states (that are always and only really self ‘justifying’) come with degrading human rights embedded. One of the first things Obama did was bomb some warehouse with people in.
This is the grown up’s terror-tory. Ask many on this blog. .
I don’t understand this argument that an increased supply of labour does not put pressure on wages.
Surely supply and demand would indicate that it did. Isn’t that fundamental in economics.
And we know that across the Western world wages have remained fairly stable since the 1990s, replaced of course with loans for all.
As Lysias mentioned, Ireland was the reserve pool for Britain, and this continued after independence.
It was policy and very likely a policy agreed at independence, until the Irish PM, Lemass, and his Northern counterpart, O’Neill, in the early 1960s came together with a view to doing mutually beneficial business deals, which would have improved the economies of both.
Then the spooks moved in, rising their local assets.
O’Neill was forced from office. Lemass retired early. The economic links were never made. The North and South of Ireland’s relationship deteriorated to something like N and S Korea.
The North fell into what looked like a low intensity civil war, but in reality was just spooks fighting spooks and all of them murdering civilians to keep the show on the road.
And all that because the northern and Southern Irish leaders wanted to develop their economies.
Suhayl Saadi; “Something is rotten at the heart of the US state and has been since before its beginning (500 years)”
Yes, but are these mass murder incidents occuring more often ?; a symptom that things are coming to a head ?
If so why ?
“Yes, but are these mass murder incidents occuring more often ?; a symptom that things are coming to a head ? ”
Not really. Having a “Black man in our WHITE House” has brought a bit more excitement to the knee-jerk racists, so they’ve got a bit more interested in politics than simply voting in some carpet-bagging redneck opportunist for another term.
We’re seeing a lot more of it because of social media – both outrage at racist offence, and racist comment. But it’s definitely not more pronounced than it ever was – attitudes remain largely the same.
The US of A has a very, very long way to go before it fulfills its aspiration of being our moral guiding light, I’m afraid. Notwithstanding the fact it thought it was there right from the beginning.
The rest of the world is getting a better look at just how racist, backwards, ignorant, and all round screwed up Amerika is too – which is shining a light on those areas it would definitely rather ignore.
You need to live there for a while – particularly in the South – to understand just how ineducable vast proportions actually are.
Don’t believe anything from Veterans Today.
It’s disinfo.
Glenn_uk; “Not really”
Well this indicates otherwise;
http://www.forbes.com/sites/dandiamond/2015/06/18/charleston-deaths-are-an-american-tragedy-mass-shootings-are-rising/
“Don’t believe anything from Veterans Today.
It’s disinfo.”
How do you work that out Herbie. I’ve read some convincing arguments from VT. But I am open to hearing another view, or even seeing another sound. 🙂
@Herbie
23 Jun, 2015 – 12:28 am
I agree that Veterans Today do publish a lot of conspiracy theory pieces. However, Bob Nichols knows his stuff and it’s all taken from official US government figures, from here:
http://www2.epa.gov/radnet
Otherwise I’ll direct you to a propaganda rag like the Daily Mail, where you’ll learn an awful lot about nothing.
Daniel writes-
Anybody familiar with The Cream report will be aware that it demolishes the argument that immigrants put a burden on the economy
Well Daniel, if you accept Cream’s definition of ‘immigrant’ that may well be the case.
Firstly, the report makes no proper adjustment for foreigners here for a limited period- for example, commonwealth citizens under 26 (still overwhelmingly antipodean)here on working holiday visas, and senior managers of foreign owned multi nationals here on secondments. Both these categories of ‘immigrant’ clearly contribute fiscally whilst also making only slight demands on the NHS and virtually no demand at all on the stock of social housing. However, the Labour Force survey, upon which the report relies unduly, cannot differentiate between these ‘expat’ workers here for a year or two and real ‘immigrants’ who intend to settle here.
Secondly, as the Cream report itself obliquely acknowledges-
‘second generation immigrants can only be identified while they are children (i.e. while they are living in their parents’ households), which is also the age range at which they
consume educational services. When grown up, working and paying taxes, and making fiscal contributions, they are not identifiable in the survey data available to us. In our analysis, therefore, we consider immigrants’ children under the age of 16 as immigrants regardless of birth country but classify as natives everyone who is at least 16 and UK born, regardless of parents’ birthplace.’
The Cream report in other words assumes that second generation immigrants are ‘making fiscal contributions’ when in fact data from other sources (ignored by the report) shows that, for many immigrant communities, that just isn’t the case- employment rates for second generation Bangladeshis, Pakistanis, West Africans and Somalis are lower than the UK average- much lower in some cases. Furthermore, local authorities with large numbers of residents from these communities are compensated for their presence by central government funding- an implicit recognition that such communities are a net economic burden, and not a benefit. If these communities were of net economic benefit to their localities, central government would clearly not need to make special subsidies available to the local authorities hosting them.
The part of the report re second generation immigrants which reads ‘When grown up, working and paying taxes, and making fiscal contributions’ should thus in truth read ‘When grown up, and in numerous cases claiming out of work benefits at a higher rate than the white British population’.
John
I’ve heard it’s funded by ADL, to purposes one would normally expect ADL to oppose.
Foxy, foxy, eh.
RobG
I’m not dissing you on the Fukushima thing.
I listen to Corbett and Ry Dawson and a few others who live in Japan and they talk about it occasionally, but it just doesn’t seem to be the most important issue to them.
Why don’t you listen to some of their stuff on it:
https://www.corbettreport.com/?s=Fukushima
Rob G, If it aint Nuclear war, it may indeed be Fukushima. Or a space Rock… All that £ $ spent on Wars, Death n Destruction, Re the Space Rocks btw, it’s not a Question of if, but when, and now we have a Big one passing inside the Earth-=moon distance End of the world party ????
Also Rob, And Herbie, Another source of info on Fukushima –
http://fukushima411.com/1000000-bqm3-of-sr-90-detected-in-seawater-of-fukushima-plant-port-highest-in-recorded-history/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter
..Nighty o, Sleep well all
P.s Robert Crawford – great to see you back…Keep up the recovery.
@Herbie
23 Jun, 2015 – 1:06 am
Both Corbett and Dawson are CIA. I know how that will sound to you, but you have to understand that as well as taking over the mainstream media, the security services have also taken over most of the so-called ‘alternate media’.
Ask yourself why the likes of Corbett constantly bang on about well-worn 9/11 stuff, but never really address Fukushima, or the death of the Pacific Ocean.
The death of the Pacific Ocean is now being widely documented in the mainstream media (although of course none of them ever mention Fukushima).
Little CIA pricks like Corbett and Dawson will not tell you anything meaningful about what’s happening in the Pacific.
Maybe I’m wrong and you can link to a video?
“Both Corbett and Dawson are CIA”
Where are you getting that from?
Herbie, the way Corbett and Dawson downplay the Fukushima disaster, who the fuck do you think they work for?!
And all the while the Pacific Ocean is dying.
The greatest crime in history.
Macky: “Well this indicates otherwise;”
Thank you so much for ignoring every point I made, in a direct answer to you personally.
Is this supposed to be a discussion, or just some “gotcha” session?
My explanation about casual, often violent racism is based on experience with the US and my gained understandings of it.
Pretty much all the mass shootings referenced in your Forbes article has absolutely nothing to do with racism. This – race – was the point of discussion by Suhayl, with whom you were corresponding about race, and I hoped to add to the conversation – again, about race.
But now you say I’m contradicted with some Forbes article which is concerned only with mass shootings. And nothing at all to do with race.
Are you just out for an argument, Macky? Is there any good faith to be had – anywhere – in a discussion with you?
“Herbie, the way Corbett and Dawson downplay the Fukushima disaster, who the fuck do you think they work for?!”
I’m not sure they downplay it.
It just isn’t as imminent a disaster for them as it is for you.
I mean, you’ve self-described as lying there in sunny French olive groves awaiting the apocalypse.
Almost as if you’re willing it.
I’d focus on the economic chaos if I were you.
That’s normally where the real action is.
Glenn-uk; “This – race – was the point of discussion by Suhayl, with whom you were corresponding about race”
No, the whole point of my raising this issue was to disagree with Suhayl, whose original Post was fixated only around the race aspect; that he later disingenuously backtracked by suddenly agreeing that it was actually a deeper problem, is par the course for Mr Saadi; I refer you to my opening sentence to him;
“Here you go SS; I think you & Jon Stewart are wrong, and so is Obama, because the cliches of ‘race’ and “too many guns” are just symptoms of a deeper sickness.”
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2015/06/nicola-corbyn-and-the-myth-of-the-unelectable-left/comment-page-4/#comment-534290
@Macky: I’m sorry, I thought we were discussing issues, not just Suhayl’s famous tendency for disingenuity. But please understand the rest of us are up against your singular standard of perfection – so you have to give credit for mere human failing.
“(BTW Ishmael seems to right about you having anger issues !)”
Indeed.
*
If you want to discuss issues concerning race and violence in the US, when you have time of course, please feel free.
Well, I also did wonder if he was your dad Macky.
Just shooting in the dark, I know it’s pretty meaningless bollox,(mother?)…but I need the unproductive to enjoy sometimes.
Distracts me from all the wana be father figures. Self masturbatory intellectualism? whatever…
“I don’t understand this argument that an increased supply of labour does not put pressure on wages.”
The reserve army of labour is intrinsic to capitalism. It is part and parcel of the system, wired into it from its very birth – and not something created by immigration. By its very nature capitalism pits workers against each other, forcing them to compete for jobs and money, rather than cooperating for the common good.
Newspapers such as the Sun do all they can to suggest that if you can’t get a job it is because of migrants. But as the London School of Economics made clear, “The evidence on the UK labour market suggests that fears about adverse consequences of rising immigration regularly seen in opinion polls have not, on average, materialised.”
Unemployment goes up when bosses throw workers on the scrapheap, because the system is in recession or because they brought in new methods of production.
Migrants travel looking for work and don’t go to places where they won’t find jobs. Some people come here, just as workers from Britain go to Germany or the Gulf.
When recession means there are fewer jobs immigration goes down. This is what happened in the 1980s, the early 1990s and after 2008, unrelated to changes in immigration controls.
Numerous academic studies (some of which have been mentioned above) and others that include the London School of Economics highlighted, conclude that there is at best a minimal relationship between immigration and lower wages.
According to the most recent study by The Migration Observatory published in March, immigration is said to actually lead to a rise in the average wage of all workers:
http://www.migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/briefings/migrants-uk-labour-market-overview
In the long term, immigration can also create new jobs through increased demand for goods and services which then requires more low-skilled workers.
In March last year it emerged that Home Secretary, Theresa May had suppressed a government report which, based on a comprehensive overview of research since 2003, concluded that the effect of immigration on “indigenous” jobs was negligible:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/exclusive-impact-of-immigrants-on-british-workers-negligible-9171752.html
All this immigration/jobs/workers in the UK is distraction,as perfected by D’Acre and his boot boys in thrall to Tory policy diktats.
The bottom line remains,whether you’re a Wetherspoons or Tesco manager the rules are simple:
You offer the job to the most desperate who will accept zero hours contracts and minimum wage.
Creed,colour and nationality matter not a hoot.
The only colour is green.
Its all piss n vinegar this “debating” ahout democracy n systems etc..
The game’s rigged from centuries back.
Theyre laughing as they torture us now.
Hobson’s Choice-as it were..
Anyway…enuff of my yackin..
A wee snippet when the fire was still flamin’
Enjoy!-or otherwise =)
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=iPuBCfvMrBA