xxlshirts_fit_all
Well-known member
Why do we need to insult people we don’t agree with… 
Sun to endorse starmer?
- Thread starter xxlshirts_fit_all
- Start date
BiggEggo
Well-known member
Have they claimed their victory for Sun motorists yet? The one on forcing the govt to maintain the freeze on fuel duty?
Boro.Fur
Well-known member
You're not getting a yes or no answer from me on that. You know the reason why. The framing of your questions is disingenuous. Instead I will quote what Starmer actually said verbatim and you can make up your own mind (yes I know you already have).
On the day of the leadership hustings in January 2020 he said "I certainly won't be giving any interviews to The Sun during the course of this campaign."
Later that day in a sit down interview it was suggested to him that he would need the support of Sun readers to become PM. He replied "Well, let's get to be leader first, and then you can come back and ask me again."
You can have a yes on that one because it's a matter of public record. But quite how you can deduce from his attendance at a function that he's 'sold out' to Murdoch only you can explain. Most people would be uneasy about his attendance but not many would put quite the same spin on it as you have.
Failing to accurately lay out Starmer's actual comments is hardly nuance. So working on the basis that your FACT #2 is reliant on FACT #1 being true then I'll give you 1 out of 3. Not as good as Meatloaf but better than nothing.
I'm sure there's an insult in there somewhere but I'll let it go.
Yes I want the Tories out but I know we live in a democracy so what will be will be. That's hardly being needy, more pragmatic I would say.
Yet you use them yourself all the same.
Final point from me on this thread and it's not because I want the final word, I don't. It's just exhausting dealing with negativity.
Kelvin MacKenzie is scum. As is anyone who contributed to the lies published by The Sun newspaper.
But not all Sun readers are right wing voters. Not all of them are anti-Liverpool FC. Not all of them believed the lies then and continue to do so. I'm not sure what your line of work is but I've worked on construction sites, manufacturing facilities and fabrication yards most of my career. Not so much now maybe but walk into any canteen or mess room and there'll be a copy of The Sun newspaper on the table. Being PM means you do your best for everyone even if they do read The Sun, The Daily Mail etc. etc.
These readers need 'courting' as much as anybody else.
Your criticism will be that Starmer doesn't put the same effort into persuading the Left to come on board and I fully understand that.
Over and out.
Lefty
Well-known member
Not the orange ball in the sky, that’s way off shining for him but the old red top scum of the MSM…
I guess they’re wanting to claim they’ve won it for him…
But for me it shows just how far to the right he’s taken labour…
I’ll still vote for them to help get the tories out but they best start making a difference or they’ll be as toast as the tories at the next election…
Have you read Starmer's biography by Tom Baldwin?
Have you read Oliver Eagleton's? - The Starmer Project: a Journey to the Right
Lefty
Well-known member
Jonny Ingbar
Well-known member
Many traditional Labour supports may not like the way Starmer operates, but you can't argue he hasn't achieved his aims.
First by winning the leadership contest and secondly, almost certainly ,the election in a few weeks time and by a huge majority too.
Blair courted Murdoch before his landslide victory, despite the uneasiness it caused Brown and Starmer has done the same.
Labours moderate position is what's needed to win, as it was for Blair and that's not going to sit well with some, but the harsh reality is that the more left Labour sits, the more unelectable it becomes.
First by winning the leadership contest and secondly, almost certainly ,the election in a few weeks time and by a huge majority too.
Blair courted Murdoch before his landslide victory, despite the uneasiness it caused Brown and Starmer has done the same.
Labours moderate position is what's needed to win, as it was for Blair and that's not going to sit well with some, but the harsh reality is that the more left Labour sits, the more unelectable it becomes.
Andy_W
Well-known member
How can anyone cross off a list, when they've not been in power to do anything? They've had ~200 seats for the last 4.5 years.
Also, that was written in January 2020, it's not 2020. To not expect a lot of that to be watered down, or not even make the list of the top priorities now would be completely ignoring what has happened in the last 4.5 years. Need to get with reality, if Labour hadn't changed their pledges or moved on from this for their manifesto I wouldn't be voting for them, as it's largely out of date. That whole list went out the window in March 20 with Covid, and what came as a result of that, never mind the wars, energy crisis, inflation, high interest rates, poor economy, massive debt etc.
But, as for the list:
1 - They will do a far better job cutting tax avoidance, than the Tories, see changing non dom rules as an example.
2 - They will do better than the Tories, do you not think 400+ Labour MP's will not want this? They will get the NHS waiting lists down, no doubt about it, but it will take time. Healthcare workers don't grow on trees, and loads of our voting clowns don't want us in the EU so hard to get them from abroad. 6,500 new teachers should help learning.
3 - Not doing too bad on this already to be honest, and Labour will advance that even more than the Tories. Tons of wind farms, solar, BESS sites and interconnectors being built now, and Labour will remove some of the stupid constrains to speed this up. Also GB Energy and onshore wind. Banning new ICE cars from 2030 too.
4 - Unproven either way, but they will support Ukraine and defence, no doubt about it.
5 - GB Energy (good idea), promised to nationalise rial within 5 years (bad idea, but will appease some of the left I imagine). Can't buy out everything when we're skint either.
6 - Migrants rights will be far better than they are now, stopping the people traffickers is not a bad idea. Not sure what they're doing about the voting, but have allowed 16+ to vote.
7 - Unions are on Labour's side
8 - Difficult to do this with all the far right/ right kicking off, investment will be touch unless we sort the economy out, and with high debt and high finance charges.
9 - Labour will be far more for equality than the Tories, no doubt about it.
10 - Job done, no longer needs to be the opposition, as they're going to win the election. Need to ensure they're in for at least two terms though.
Scrote
Well-known member
Because it's a list of pledges where the content of the pledge has since been watered down by things that have been published or said by Starmer or his Shadow Cabinet members.
Which says everything about the voters Starmer has attracted. You've also gone through the list to explain how Labour are still applying the pledges which rather contradicts your voting intention.
The fact it was written in 2020 matters not a jot. What have "illegal wars" got to do with covid? What have workers rights go to do with covid? etc.
Really? Unite union refuses to endorse Labour manifesto
r00fie1
Well-known member
Ask Starmer.
They were his pledges when he campaigned for Labour leader.
He has since reneged publicly on all his own pledges.
Don't shoot the messenger.
Lefty
Well-known member
His mistake was making such unusually specific promises in the first place, instead of broader principles, rather than reneging on them.
Remember, this was January/February 2020. I can think of a few really significant things that have happened since then to the economy, can't you?
Personally, I want someone who will adapt to circumstances leading the country, rather than someone who can't. Imagine someone in charge who has big social and economic plans refusing to revisit them when the pandemic came along in 2020, when the Ukraine War began in February 2022 and impacted the global economy and energy prices and when the markets reacted like they did to the Truss/Kwarteng budget in September 2022 and lost us billions.
In any case, the main pledge that got Starmer elected was that he would get Labour back into power. This was from a position where he was 20pts behind in the polls. Nobody thought it was realistic in just one electoral cycle. He hasn't reneged on that one.
Remember, this was January/February 2020. I can think of a few really significant things that have happened since then to the economy, can't you?
Personally, I want someone who will adapt to circumstances leading the country, rather than someone who can't. Imagine someone in charge who has big social and economic plans refusing to revisit them when the pandemic came along in 2020, when the Ukraine War began in February 2022 and impacted the global economy and energy prices and when the markets reacted like they did to the Truss/Kwarteng budget in September 2022 and lost us billions.
In any case, the main pledge that got Starmer elected was that he would get Labour back into power. This was from a position where he was 20pts behind in the polls. Nobody thought it was realistic in just one electoral cycle. He hasn't reneged on that one.
clublandrefugee
Active member
It was always coming. Well, 'you sup with the Devil...'. Won't make him popular in Liverpool.
One thing I have noticed canvassing in the election is how, despite a general tolerance/goodwill towards the party, large segments of the working-class have been definitively lost. The problem was defined in an article in (you guessed it) The Guardian yesterday. Black and brown people - working-class or otherwise - aboslutely solid (notwithstanding Muslim anger/concerns over Gaza). They understand on a fundamnental level that Labour represents their interests. White working-class is a different matter. A Saturday morning recently I was out canvassing in a fairly middle-class urban area close to Northampton town centre, and meeting an overwhelmingly positive response on the doorstep. The encounter that stood out, was an exchange with a couple of scaffolders who were working in the street.
"Voting Labour lads?!
"No mate."
It was the way he said it. Immediate close down. I looked at our group of 10 or 12 - including the candidate (a white female London lawyer); the former MP before it went Tory (another fragrant middle-class lady); assorted social workers, retired sociology lecturers etc; a couple of black and brown folk - whom they must have seen going up and down the street. The disconnect was palpable: You are not my tribe. (You use words like 'whom' and 'palpable'!)
The 'PMC' class
Now, to be fair to Starmer, he gets that this is a problem, hence his somewhat clunky references to his working-class background alluded to in the piece. The question is, can anything be done about it, and if so, what?
I think the danger is that Starmer governs with this air of 'PMC' paternalism. As some of the ill-feeling towards him on this thread shows, he's been an insider for a long time, however much he quails about his toolmaker father. Would he, for instance, legalise cannabis? That would get him a hell of a lot of goodwill among the white working-class! Well, in Don King's phrase, "slim just left town". He'd dissemble about 'anti-social behaviour' and 'county lines' etc, but what would help stop the consumption patterns that give rise to county lines would be a grown-up drugs policy that accepted people were entitled to make decisions about what they wished to consume - and encouraged dope dealers to take out micro loans to set up cannabis cafes! As for cocaine and ecstasy, why not take steps to decriminalise these, the first step being to allow the many middle-class users of the drug to register privately as consumers in order that it they were caught in possession they could not face criminal sanction but were automatically offered 'treatment' (if they wanted it)?
It won't happen, alas, because Keir's instincts are solidly PMC: We know what's best for you.
The other thing that could save the country for the PMC class, at least in the medium term, would be PR, which, provided they govern halfway competently, would keep a centre-left majority - appalled by the nativism that would be its main opponent - out of power. That's essentially the deal in lots of European nations, and is what Macron is (possibly fatally) banking on.
I hope we don't fall into this trap in Britain. I hope Angie Rayner remains prominent and isn't sidelined eventually, as happened to Prescott. And I hope the messaging is bold and muscular: 'We are Labour and we will never not represent the working-class because that is who we are, where we came from', but also, 'educated, 'middle-class' people are not your enemy'. Because ultimately, the mobilisation of a 'tribe' mentality is what has peeled off those scaffolders, peeled off millions to Boris, and is peeling off increasing numbers of the young on TikTok towards Farage and whatever gobshi*e comes after him - probably Andrew F***ing Tate!
One thing I have noticed canvassing in the election is how, despite a general tolerance/goodwill towards the party, large segments of the working-class have been definitively lost. The problem was defined in an article in (you guessed it) The Guardian yesterday. Black and brown people - working-class or otherwise - aboslutely solid (notwithstanding Muslim anger/concerns over Gaza). They understand on a fundamnental level that Labour represents their interests. White working-class is a different matter. A Saturday morning recently I was out canvassing in a fairly middle-class urban area close to Northampton town centre, and meeting an overwhelmingly positive response on the doorstep. The encounter that stood out, was an exchange with a couple of scaffolders who were working in the street.
"Voting Labour lads?!
"No mate."
It was the way he said it. Immediate close down. I looked at our group of 10 or 12 - including the candidate (a white female London lawyer); the former MP before it went Tory (another fragrant middle-class lady); assorted social workers, retired sociology lecturers etc; a couple of black and brown folk - whom they must have seen going up and down the street. The disconnect was palpable: You are not my tribe. (You use words like 'whom' and 'palpable'!)
The 'PMC' class
Now, to be fair to Starmer, he gets that this is a problem, hence his somewhat clunky references to his working-class background alluded to in the piece. The question is, can anything be done about it, and if so, what?
I think the danger is that Starmer governs with this air of 'PMC' paternalism. As some of the ill-feeling towards him on this thread shows, he's been an insider for a long time, however much he quails about his toolmaker father. Would he, for instance, legalise cannabis? That would get him a hell of a lot of goodwill among the white working-class! Well, in Don King's phrase, "slim just left town". He'd dissemble about 'anti-social behaviour' and 'county lines' etc, but what would help stop the consumption patterns that give rise to county lines would be a grown-up drugs policy that accepted people were entitled to make decisions about what they wished to consume - and encouraged dope dealers to take out micro loans to set up cannabis cafes! As for cocaine and ecstasy, why not take steps to decriminalise these, the first step being to allow the many middle-class users of the drug to register privately as consumers in order that it they were caught in possession they could not face criminal sanction but were automatically offered 'treatment' (if they wanted it)?
It won't happen, alas, because Keir's instincts are solidly PMC: We know what's best for you.
The other thing that could save the country for the PMC class, at least in the medium term, would be PR, which, provided they govern halfway competently, would keep a centre-left majority - appalled by the nativism that would be its main opponent - out of power. That's essentially the deal in lots of European nations, and is what Macron is (possibly fatally) banking on.
I hope we don't fall into this trap in Britain. I hope Angie Rayner remains prominent and isn't sidelined eventually, as happened to Prescott. And I hope the messaging is bold and muscular: 'We are Labour and we will never not represent the working-class because that is who we are, where we came from', but also, 'educated, 'middle-class' people are not your enemy'. Because ultimately, the mobilisation of a 'tribe' mentality is what has peeled off those scaffolders, peeled off millions to Boris, and is peeling off increasing numbers of the young on TikTok towards Farage and whatever gobshi*e comes after him - probably Andrew F***ing Tate!