Why won't the British working class listen to Their Betters?
The neoliberal politicians that dominate Britain's Labour Party keep trying to lead their membership, but for some strange reason the membership refuses to follow, and nothing represent this betrayal of the peasants better than Jeremy Corbyn.
Jeremy Corbyn's landslide victory - the largest mandate ever won by a party leader - will at least come as no suprise to him...
No leader in the party's 115-year history has ever been elected with so little support from MPs. Corbyn, the most left-wing figure to hold the post, won the public backing of just 14 (6 per cent) of his colleagues.
Labour MPs tried to explain how Corbyn would destroy the party, and they were right. If your definition of "destroy" means a huge surge in membership.
Almost every constituency party across the country we contacted reported doubling, trebling, quadrupling or even quintupling membership, and a revival of branches that had been moribund for years and close to folding...
The survey findings are borne out by Labour’s national figures, released to the Guardian in a break with party tradition of keeping them secret. Membership jumped from 201,293 on 6 May last year, the day before the general election, to 388,407 on 10 January.
Since the membership wouldn't listen to their political Betters, maybe they would listen to their Betters in journalism. What happened was almost unprecedented in British history.
The media researchers found that in 52 per cent of articles about the Labour leader, his own views were not included – while in a further 22 per cent they were “present but taken out of context” or otherwise distorted.
In just 15 per cent of 812 articles analysed, Mr Corbyn’s views were present but challenged, and in only 11 per cent were they present without alteration.
“Our analysis shows that Corbyn was thoroughly delegitimised as a political actor from the moment he became a prominent candidate and even more so after he was elected as party leader,” Dr Bart Cammaerts, the project director concluded.
“These results relating to sources and ‘voice’ are evidently troublesome from a democratic perspective.
Then came Brexit and the MPs coup attempt. Corbyn lost a no-confidence vote badly.
Labour MPs do not just want to oust a leader with massive support among party members. They have hamstrung him from the outset so that he could not lead the political revolution members elected him to begin. And now he is being made to pay the price because he privately backs a position that, as the referendum has just shown, has majority support.
The peasants just won't listen to reason. They must be shown that this is all being done for their own good. Corbyn is a dangerous radical that must be removed.
So how did the lowly workers respond to their leaders coup attempt?
The Labour Party has gained at least 100,000 new members in the space of just 10 days, and most are believed to be supporters of under-pressure leader Jeremy Corbyn.
The party's membership has surpassed half a million for the first time since its records began, according to the Huffington Post.
The report adds that 80% of the new members who disclosed their motive for signing up cited their support for Corbyn.
That's insane. It's almost as if the peasants don't believe all the slanderous news articles and neoliberal politicians.
The Labour leader has been told to resign by the vast majority of his own MPs in the wake of a "vote of no confidence" against him, and a host of shadow cabinet resignations.
However, despite his popularity plummeting among Labour MPs, it is clear that Corbyn continues to enjoy strong grassroots support.“It’s a huge surge for Jeremy,” a source told the Huffington Post. It is the latest symptom of just how severe the disconnect between the parliamentary Labour party and the membership really is.
This news comes as some of the Labour MPs who supported an attempted coup against Corbyn appear to have given up any hope of removing the former rebellious backbencher.
If I didn't know better, I would think that Britain's working class doesn't like or trust Their Betters.
In fact, their recent measurable actions, both at the ballot box and in membership dues could be interpreted as a Big FU.
Comments
Will Corbyn Rise To The Challenge?
This is the real test he faces: will he lead his followers out of the corrupt Labour Party and form a new political bloc? I don't see that he has anything to lose, and everything to gain.
Vowing To Oppose Everything Trump Attempts.
Or take back the Labour Party
From the likes of Tony Blair and his Third Way ( think DLC) friends - sadly the Labour party was corrupted by the cronies of Clinton and Shrub ( what Molly Ivins called Little Bush.)
With the numbers Corbyn has added to the party - seems he's got a chance to do what Bernie Sanders wasn't able to do with/to the Democratic Party.
Third parties in the UK haven't ( historically) been long term effective.
Lucky they didn't teach Blair
Lucky they didn't teach Blair how to cheat electorally - although I suppose that's why the Clinton faction were so desperate to blatantly cheat Bernie and the people across the pond, they having learnt from Corbyn's and the people's success not to let the people actually vote for the non-corporate candidate, when one finally appeared. And I don't expect that the British people would let obvious false electoral results lie 'to be fixed next time'.
Edited to fix sentence - need sleep.
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
The Labour Party is his ground, and there he will fight.
He's not likely to leave it.
On the other hand, he will fight for the right of the membership to choose their leader, despite the efforts of the PLP (Parliamentary Labour Party) to oust him and his defiance of the purge of the left of the Labour Party begun under Kinnock and extended under Blair.
And if the PLP sees a number of MP's resign the Labour Party and start a new Social Democrats party, he won't shed a tear to see the back of them.
-- Virtually, etc. B)
It should be repeated every day on both sides of the Atlantic:
Those who control the political economy are out to beggar the wage earning class and if they are not stopped then a life of penury and need and exploitation will be our lot.
The corporate class and their lackeys of the for-profit press; the military; the intelligence agencies;the political class; and fundamentalist preachers are waging class war and we're the target. Ignore this at the peril of you, your loved ones, and generations to come.
When people get a chance to speak out in the USA, the people are a fairly progressive bunch. Sanders probably won enough delegates to be the nominee if blatant and systematic cheating hadn't taken place. If the monopoly capitalists have the gall to deprive Al Gore from his victory, they sure have the gall to rob Sanders and his supporters.
It's the people vs Big Money and the politicians $$$ has bought.
"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"
yep
i wish Americans would finally wake up and stop eating the b.s. they're being fed by both major political parties. maybe the country is just too large and widespread to get people to act collectively. some have woken but not in enough numbers to alter the direction of the 2016, at least not that i've seen yet. anything can happen between now and November.
Americans have been propagandized since the end of WW2
that socialism is bad, bad. We hear this from the media; the politicians; and Hollywood.
The FBI hounded Charlie Chaplin out of the USA and would not let him return. Federal authorities harassed all manner of public people, concentrating on entertainers, like Pete Seeger, Buffy Sainte-Marie, and the Hollywood Ten. The House Unamerican Activities Committee suppressed people in academia. AIM was targeted as were the Black Panthers and MLK, JR. The list is very long.
It's a wonder there's as much push back as there is. Now a whole generation is under the boot. Collective action, as you say, is what is needed.
"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"
They Don't Believe in Public Policy. They Believe in Business.
They are not governing, they are marketing.
Public Policy is often a terrible business plan.
“Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” ~ Sun Tzu
Hooray for our cousins across the pond!
Life is strong. I'm weak, but Life is strong.
the family resemblance of PLP and DLC
sounds much like Hillarist hegemony with all the kumbaya at TOP and apparently at NN16
@eState4Column5
I find it astounding that 2 similar politicians have arisen now
The British have acted most decisively with Brexit. Corbyn's huge popularity with rank-and-file Labourites despite disdain from Labour MPs may have an effect on the upcoming vote for Prime minister. MPs are more susceptible I think to de-election (electoral defeat) than their American counterparts in congress. Part of the reason is that British electoral districts contain far fewer people than ours, which makes campaigning a more intimate "retail" type as we see in NH and IA quadrennially.
Of course, I couldn't let this comment go by without a mention of Medusa: Corbyn might win PM because he doesn't have a Clinton to oppose him. Tony Blair is a light-weight by Clinton standards (if Clintons can be said to have any standards at all).
The "most left wing figure" is hysterical.
On economic policy, he definitely isn't. Clement Attlee set up the NHS and nationalized several industries. Corbyn is talking about ending austerity and overturning some budget cuts in order to support the economy and help ordinary people. Nothing particularly radical.
I see a lot of echoes in the media treatment of Sanders. Neither figure is particularly radical on economic policy -- both are definitely on the left, but what's changed is the frame of reference in both the U.S. and the UK. On economic policy they only seem radical if a person focuses on the past 10-20 years, and ignores the past 50-70 years. Corbyn's stance on nuclear weapons is a different story. I also think he's getting beat up because of his views regarding Israel. e.g. the "audacious" idea that Palestinians are human beings too with their own rights.
The Lib-Dems seem like a much more natural fit for some of the Labour PMs.
Here's the one trying to replace Corbyn
Another Blairite war hawk
Actually, there is now infighting as to who should fight Corbyn
Labour divisions widen as anti-Corbyn leadership rivals turn on each other
-- Virtually, etc. B)