FlyTheNest

SpinningHugo

(And the Tories are not going anywhere until 2020). You seem to be almost relying on that in order that your dream of the future of the Labour Party might be realised. We are no longer in 2007. Sorry? Are you really expecting a government with a majority of 16 to fall between now and the next 5 yea...

SpinningHugo

The Orange Book: Reclaiming Liberalism was out in 2004 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Orange_Book:_Reclaiming_Liberalism#Ideology" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; Clegg elected as leader in 2007 From that point on the LibDems were not to the left of Labour. As I pointed o...

SpinningHugo

:roll: 'You are Mr Kolly Kibber Dan Hodges, I claim the Daily Messenger prize Trying to be serious, do you think it was wise to step down immediately and have this contest straight away? As with Brown in 2010, I understand why he personally felt that is what he wanted to do, but was it wise? I real...

SpinningHugo

Hugo, stop trolling. You are better than that. Back in the 1990s our core vote really did "have nowhere else to go". Now, it does (and a substantial, traditionally essential part of our old electoral coalition already *has*) Any leader who does not take account of this risks sending the U...

SpinningHugo

Miliband again. :roll: 'You are Mr Kolly Kibber Dan Hodges, I claim the Daily Messenger prize Trying to be serious, do you think it was wise to step down immediately and have this contest straight away? As with Brown in 2010, I understand why he personally felt that is what he wanted to do, but was...

SpinningHugo

The great existensial threat to Labour in 2020 is not losing the marginals again, but the aftermath of the EU referendum campaign meaning UKIP do to us in our northern heartlands what the Nats have just achieved in Scotland. Burnham is the best placed to win UKIP voters back and stop others defecti...

SpinningHugo

Miliband again. What a terrible decision his selfish act of instant resignation now looks (as was Brown's in 2010). We now have a rushed and premature contest, with the probable winner very bland. For a Tory making this point see http://www.spectator.co.uk/columnists/politics/9560902/does-labour-sti...

SpinningHugo

Cooper is having a good campaign now after a rather unimpressive start. Still inclined to Burnham overall, but he needs to do better than last night - he is capable of it. Can't see either the first or last proposition being true myself. https://vine.co/v/eizxzUam3n6" onclick="window.open...

SpinningHugo

There was one zinger https://vine.co/v/eizxzUam3n6" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; and it could be damaging if he wins. I suspect lots will have liked Corbyn. I loathe the man. Silly simplistic Bennite stuff. In a real debate the others would have torn into him, but sadly th...

SpinningHugo

Now *that* has brightened up my day :dance: :dance: Credit to Ali for doing the decent thing - though I was never quite sure why she wanted to stand in the first place, ditto Eagle. Bradshaw I can and I hope he also gets on. Tom Watson will not be pleased, anyway - he faces a real fight now :) I th...

SpinningHugo

Hmm! Claims to be a Marxist but describes employers as wealth creators. Also, people who ask if someone is 'credible' on the economy usually mean 'are they neoliberal enough?' I could be wrong but I'm deeply suspicious of the contradictions in that blog. A little bit of investigation should show yo...

SpinningHugo

https://brianbackblog.wordpress.com/2015/06/16/liz-kendall/ Hmm! Claims to be a Marxist but describes employers as wealth creators. Also, people who ask if someone is 'credible' on the economy usually mean 'are they neoliberal enough?' I could be wrong but I'm deeply suspicious of the contradiction...

SpinningHugo

https://brianbackblog.wordpress.com/201 ... z-kendall/

SpinningHugo

1. Old rich pensioners will die off. No. The demographics of this (and the age distribution of wealth) indicates exactly the opposite. Seriously? The pensioners today are a golden generation, their replacements much less so. Retirement age is heading up, pensions are far far less generous. Seriousl...

SpinningHugo

Willow904 wrote:e Tory trickle down neoliberalism is unsustainable and on the verge of collapse.

great, so we win when capitalism collapses?

Must be soon now, sure.

SpinningHugo

TechnicalEphemera wrote:
1. Old rich pensioners will die off.

No. The demographics of this (and the age distribution of wealth) indicates exactly the opposite.

SpinningHugo

Darling is a complete twat. I do not agree. He was by some margin the best Chancellor since Healey. He made the call that Ed would lose and he was better off spending his time trying to defend the Union. He was right. He would have served under his brother, but that is that. However after Sturgeon ...

SpinningHugo

Cameron was kept in power by one age demographic, and they are getting older, their replacements are getting poorer. So, we just wait until all the old people are dead, and then we win? The one demographic getting larger is the one the Tories do best in. That is very bad news. The denials on here t...

SpinningHugo

t the evidence is there in the 4m voters Blair lost over his premiership. I think this is one of the laziest ideas of the left. What matters is percentage of votes cast and winning. Blair still won in 2005, even after the Iraq War (and without my vote). If you want to win more than once you'll need...

SpinningHugo

IMO Labour's problems were and are different from what you thought. Neither Miliband nor the manifesto was the problem, not even the combination of those. Well that is a new and interesting line of thought. If you don't think we could have done any better with a different leader or different polici...

SpinningHugo

That means, looking forward, we try to work out how to win in Nuneaton. Scotland is not a big slice of the country anyway. that means working out how to close the 6.5% gap between us and the Tories. With no further Lib Dem collapse to help out, that means working out how to appeal to a slice of vot...

SpinningHugo

I said we'll win, Miliband is useless, and the manifesto contained lots of stuff I thought poor. I have been saying much the same on the Graun for five years). But, I see now I was wrong. Labour's problems were and are far larger than I thought. IMO Labour's problems were and are different from wha...

SpinningHugo

Thank you for the answer. I don't think Burnham will make it to 2020 (almost fingers crossed as it would hopefully be for a good reason, e.g. someone more suited appears) and the less I say about Tom Watson, the better. So, hypothetically then, SH, who is your "Dream Team" for 2020 or 202...

SpinningHugo

I have. I was optimistic that Miliband would be PM. I thought the fundamentals were so strongly in Labour's favour that even under what I considered to be weak leadership with poor policy proposals we would win. (And if you go back you'll see that on here before the election I said we'll win, Milib...

SpinningHugo

And I also don't agree that it is great that someone like Corbyn is there to represent people of his views https://twitter.com/jeremycorbyn/status/185542633056239616" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; Ultra loyalty from Corbyn there. It is depressing that the Bennites are back...

SpinningHugo

And I also don't agree that it is great that someone like Corbyn is there to represent people of his views https://twitter.com/jeremycorbyn/status/185542633056239616" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; Ultra loyalty from Corbyn there. It is depressing that the Bennites are back.

SpinningHugo

Here's one of the co-authors of the Orange Book. Sitting in the DfE as a non-exec director. Yes, still. https://www.gov.uk/government/people/paul-marshall" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; Left wing alternative my arse. Doesn't matter whether they were. Matters whether that w...

SpinningHugo

Blairism was concieved at a time when left-inclined voters really did "have nowhere else to go" - that is emphatically no longer the case (and UKIP are also around to offer cheap but superfically attractive populism) This is quite wrong. From 1997 onwards Labour was flanked to the left by...

SpinningHugo

So you think the SNP will remain totally dominant in Scotland forever then? I agree with Tim Bale in that link I gave. I thought and think Milband was useless, but I don't really blame him for Scotland. There wasn't much to be done. The only way back will be when the SNP screw up tangibly in govern...

SpinningHugo

2015-06-16_091522.jpg https://twitter.com/JJ_159/status/610484039615672320 What a depressing graph that is. Look at the 2015 intake. See how many more than from the other groups nominate Corbyn, and how many fewer nominate Kendall. The party is drifting left, further and further away from winning e...

SpinningHugo

2015-06-16_091522.jpg https://twitter.com/JJ_159/status/610484039615672320 What a depressing graph that is. Look at the 2015 intake. See how many more than from the other groups nominate Corbyn, and how many fewer nominate Kendall. The party is drifting left, further and further away from winning e...

SpinningHugo

I personally feel that Labour isn't in need of a new message, but rather a new messenger. I'd have more confidence that that was all that was required if the people saying this were not also the same people who had said how great the previous messenger was. Systemic over-optimism seems to be a trai...

SpinningHugo

My only hope is that Cameron and cohorts make such an almighty mess of an event or occasion that in the tide of anger against them, with such a small majority, they'll be brought down. Fair chance that will happen tbh, especially since many Tories seem to think they won with a majority of 120 not 1...

SpinningHugo

I was surprised by Mark Ferguson deciding to quit LabourList and work for her campaign ... If he is behind the more extreme stance - I can't square it with him (when still at LabourList) writing about how unhelpful and flawed it was to frame everything as Blairite, Brownite etc etc. He has enough s...

SpinningHugo

I'm calling bull**** on that headline anyway. If she continues with such an extreme "more Blairite than Blair" platform, she will do well to get 20% of the vote. Most of the party simply doesn't want what she is currently offering (and quite rightly) and we aren't going to be bullied by t...

SpinningHugo

This is interesting on why the current leadership election is so dire

http://ericjoyce.co.uk/2015/05/the-red- ... rtherners/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

SpinningHugo

Unsurprisingly, I think Kendall is our best hope. Cooper very much a second choice.

Continuity Miliband (ie Burnham) won't get us anywhere.

SpinningHugo

I can't let this go without thanking you for writing my own thoughts about the 2015 GE. Many, many thanks. http://www.bellaterreno.com/graphics/bird_owl/owl_hoop.gif Ok let us assume, for the sake of argument, that that is all true. What do we do? My view is that we either rail pointlessly about th...

SpinningHugo

@SpinningHugo We didn't do too badly considering. You can't call a majority of ten a resounding success. No. It was disastrously bad. Any one of (i) The rise of the Ukip (ii) The collapse of the Lib Dems (iii) Years of incompetence and austerity Should have been enough to see a majority, let alone ...

SpinningHugo

Many thanks Ephie – you’ve said very clearly more or less what I’ve been thinking and I was beginning to wonder if it was just me! I think we’re being (have been) sold a big lie. Labour did not lose the election because of its policies, nor did it lose because they didn’t talk to, listen to and rea...

SpinningHugo

If you are going to criticise anyone on the 'right' of the party, I'd single out Tristram Hunt. The Education policy was ridiculously bland, and no effort was made to sell it. Not quite sure what you think Hunt could have done - education wasn't seen by any party as one of the key issues this time....

SpinningHugo

Hugo I asked a few day ago (following your "we would all prefer Tony Blair's government than what we have now" post,) why it is that those on the right of the party suggest that others with different Labour views should get behind a right(ish) wing candidate because they would be "be...

SpinningHugo

Hugo I asked a few day ago (following your "we would all prefer Tony Blair's government than what we have now" post,) why it is that those on the right of the party suggest that others with different Labour views should get behind a right(ish) wing candidate because they would be "be...

SpinningHugo

And you think one of your precious Progressites would have done a better job? . Yes, I do. Indeed I am certain of it. I don't think we could have held Scotland, but I do think that with a better leader with a better policy mix we would not have scared off the English, and would have made enough pro...

SpinningHugo

Noble's got fuck all to do with it. If you stand for something, you don't budge. As SS is cut to the bone, you would hope that more people would see the benefits of your viewpoint. Nuneaton and Swindon, where we need to win, are not populated by quite so many people who share your viewpoint as you ...

SpinningHugo

It doesn't help that the main event so far has been a f***ing Progress jamboree :evil: Still, we shouldn't despair too much - real party members will have a chance to hold them to account in the next few months. I expect they will. (it was how Ed made much of his reputation last time, don't forget)...

SpinningHugo

Agreeing with what others have said. If you're a political party, you can't just abandon your values going in search of some mythical middle ground. You have to stand by your values and wait for the electorate to come to you. Meanwhile you work using whatever means you have to explain both your val...

SpinningHugo

Agreeing with what others have said. If you're a political party, you can't just abandon your values going in search of some mythical middle ground. You have to stand by your values and wait for the electorate to come to you. Meanwhile you work using whatever means you have to explain both your val...

SpinningHugo

the leadership candidates are indeed extremely disappointing. plus they need to be getting on with dealing with the damm tories. I think they are seriously missing the point of a) the role of the opposition and b) the role of the leadership. It is not to redesign the manifesto according to who is l...

SpinningHugo

I freely admit I don't understand the Scotland scenario - the visceral hatred that seems to be very much aimed at Labour. I have no idea how it will go in the future ... all very unknown ... but probably best that nothing re Scotland is relied upon and let Labour in Scotland try to do what it think...

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