The Political Thread

[Steven Denton]

I just heard a quote by British playwright, William Archer: "Drama is anticipation mingled with uncertainty." It seems to me that this sentiment could be applied equally well to politics. (Not a criticism, an observation.)

it could equally apply to standing on an office chair.

But yes, Politics is far more interesting when there is the opportunity for change and uncertainty as to weather change will come about and if it does how that change will work out. 

[Professor Bear]

Jeremy Corbyn has appointed someone as Shadow Chancellor - holy crap it's like something out of Warhammer - who is on the record as saying he wants to travel back in time to the 1980s and assassinate Margaret Thatcher, was once barred from the House after trying to grab a ceremonial mace during a heated argument, and thinks Corbyn is not confrontational enough.  Naturally, the Guardian is outraged, as he was apparantly not born with a vagina - and no, I am not actually joking there, this is something they are genuinely angry about.

[Dandontdare]

the right wing press haven't wasted any time with the hatchet job -  the Sun says he's going to abolish the army, and the mail and Express aren't much better.

[IndigoPrime]

Scolaighe Ó'Bear: Given McDonnell's stance on a number of issues, I'm not surprised some people went batshit about this announcement. As for the gender angle, I imagine much of this is down to Corbyn's promises to make 50 per cent of the shadow cabinet women, and then giving men all of the top jobs. This has been dismissed by Corbyn's team as an "old fashioned view", but there can be no doubting that there are different tiers of jobs, and all of the 'main' ones are filled by men.

Frankly, I'm a little surprised Angela Eagle isn't Shadow Chancellor, although she at least got the consolation prize of business, in much the same way Cable did in the ConDem coalition. Interesting, though, to see Diane Abbott as shadow secretary of state for international development, after saying she was happy as a backbencher. I kind of hoped she'd get a role, because when else will she get to properly put her money where her mouth is? (I sometimes find Abbott difficult to deal with, but she's smart, and was notably so during this campaign.)

[Old Tankie]

It doesn't really matter who is in his shadow cabinet as they are never going to be in the cabinet.

[M.I.K.]

I see the Conservatives now have grainy black and white footage of Corbyn on youtube being quoted out of context while scary music plays in the background.

L is for Labour - L is for Lice

[Professor Bear]

there can be no doubting that there are different tiers of jobs, and all of the 'main' ones are filled by men.

This is a deeply misleading reading of the situation, as it's the fucking shadow cabinet - all the jobs are equally useless.

[IndigoPrime]

I see the Conservatives now have grainy black and white footage of Corbyn on youtube being quoted out of context while scary music plays in the background.

That 'friends' thing is going to haunt him. Guru-Murthy desperately wanted that quote and threw a massive hissy-fit when he didn't get it. Still, that video's easy to reframe by Labour:

- Believes Bin Laden's death was a 'tragedy' — It was, for any kind of person who believes in democracy and fair trial.
- Describes known terrorists as 'friends' — In the most general generic sense, not in the sense of actually liking them.
- Wants to surrender our nuclear defences — The ones essentially run by the USA, and which we are about to spend a shit-load of money on for no good reason. They aren't a deterrent against anything these days.
- Wants to dismantle our Armed Forces — This is the one point they have, although it's inaccurate, in that he wants a review of spending with a view to dropping the amount the armed forces get. Frankly, I'd ditch Trident and use some of that savings to properly fund our armed forces, but also have said forces primarily repositioned as peacekeepers, rather than following the US whenever Obama, Bush and co. say "jump". But then, according to Tories, I'm probably some kind of Commie Leftie.

[Jimmy Baker's Assistant]

The mud's being slung, but nothing's really sticking yet.

The sexism charge is hilarious, and the idea that Corbyn's a terrorist sympathiser is risible.

Indeed, the more the media focuses on baseless lies and the less it actually looks at what Corbyn really does want to do the better for him.

[Professor Bear]

I don't think they've quite cottoned on yet that a gulf has begun to open between old and new media, and new media has taken Corbyn as its own.  Facts are simply too easy to check these days because it can be done on the same device people are using to receive the initial misinformation, so it's fast reaching the point where the blowback from having disinformation revealed outweighs the potential gains of it going unchallenged - many news sites, for instance, only ran with the Tories' "Corbyn is a threat to your security" stuff as part of a story about how it was being ridiculed.

[IndigoPrime]

McDonnell, though, is going to be a tougher sell. Feels like rewarding your chum and kicking the PLP when it's down and not really putting his money where his mouth is regarding women in the most senior positions. It's a massive risk, given Angela Eagle was an option.

Still: early days. And given the options, I'd sooner see Corbyn in number 10 in four years than G.O. or, God forbid, Boris.

[Richmond Clements]

Dennis Skinner FTW. Watch it right to the end. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHGDDMAP5qU&feature=share

[Jimmy Baker's Assistant]

McDonnell, though, is going to be a tougher sell. Feels like rewarding your chum and kicking the PLP when it's down and not really putting his money where his mouth is regarding women in the most senior positions. It's a massive risk, given Angela Eagle was an option.

I admire Corbyn for appointing a Shadow Chancellor who actually agrees with him, rather than a New Labour "big name" who would spend the next four and a half years trying to stop Jezza from doing what he's been elected to do.

The number one risk to Corbyn's leadership is disillusionment, the longer he keeps that at bay the longer he stays Captain of the ship.

Corbyn specifically promised a 50/50 gender split in the shadow cabinet, and he's delivered it. Pretty good going, especially since Cooper and Kendall, who should have bagged top posts, have selfishly refused to serve.

[Ghastly McNasty]

I've had me a hoot these last few weeks on The Guardian comments section. The whole Corbyn coverage from The G has been, apart from a small handful of articles, an all out attack on the bearded one and everything he stands for. Lies, misinformation, skewing the facts to support its agenda. The paper has disgraced itself.

[Professor Bear]

The Guardian has been creating clickbait in order to drive up their web traffic, which entails baiting their lefty readership so they keep revisiting pages for the debates in the comments sections, but the end result has been to destroy their reputation for impartiality.  If I was in their shoes, I'd be praying like Hell that no-one starts a new liberal news/comments hub anytime in the near future, because there are a lot of disgruntled lefties over there right now, and the Tory trolls won't stick around without them.

Their worst offence for me wasn't anything Corbyn-related, though - it was their adolescent baiting of Terry Pratchett fans with a string of articles following-up on complaints about their spoilering events in his final novel in their review, which caused a spike in visits to their arts section.  They comissioned more articles about Pratchett (you will notice how few they had before the incident) explaining that their readers weren't bright enough to understand how criticism works - unironically followed by an article where someone who had never read a Terry Pratchett novel explained why Terry Pratchett was a mediocre writer of a ghetto genre.
It was pretty shameless stuff, reaching its apex when one Guardian writer tried to drag Pratchett's daughter into things.  Last time I looked, though, the guy who rubbished Pratchett's writing had a follow-up article entitled something like "I've read Pratchett now and he's middling at best", but I figured why reward the twat with clicks?