Your monthly reminder that Labour lost votes the last election and only won because Reform split the right wing vote. The country is moving solidly to the far right, along with the rest of the world. Calls to implement more radical left wing policies from Labour may mean we get the worst of all options…
Labour are pretty damn far from being socialist, but to say they won’t implement any leftwing policies isn’t particularly true, surely?
There’s rail renationalisation, a nationalised energy firm, there’s an increase in workers’ rights, there’s the windfall energy tax, social care reforms, actually taxing the wealthiest farmland owners, etc.
Far more could be done, and some other aspects of their government is basically just more of the same, but it’s unhelpful to pretend there’s no left-wing policies coming from them.
You’re right. These are leftwing policies. Especially in relation to where the middle is right now. But on the one hand these are being implemented by a faction within Labour that is continuously shrinking, and on the other pale against what is being considered priority across the board now: Subordinating everything to the divine prospect of growth. Look at the AI initiative for example, it’s ludicrous.
Much as I’d like more left-wing policies from Labour (or whoever!), the fact is just over 51% of thr UK population favour far right policies. Do we stick to our guns and lose the next election? Will a more radical left idealogy somehow persuade those voting for reform to vote Labour instead?
Look back to the hatchet job done on Jeremy Corbyn. He had his issues, for sure, but the right wing has spent the last decades fine tuning their political warfare. For Corbyn, it was that he supported Palestine. For Kamela, it was she didn’t support Palestine. I get what you are saying, but this perfect-or-nothing attitude landed the US with Trump. And the rightnwing know the left loves to find an excuse to not vote and leverage that over and over again. If we want to stop the fascists, we need to wake up to the way we are being manipulated.
I am not so sure. I think people were much more inclined to vote left, had Labour (and the Left internationally as well) mobilised opposition to the radical neoliberal agenda of the last fucking! 40years. Instead they went with it and moved the Overton Window by a lot. It’s difficult to come back from that of course. 8 years ago under Corbyn they tried though and were really successful. If I am not mistaken Corbyn got more votes than Starmer. They were just unlucky at the time. With Brexit and Boris and all that shit. But I am not sure whether the rightwing media and public are responsible for the purge of actual leftwing politicians inside Labour. To me it seems, the old guard of Labour undertook that purge. Picking some young ambitious wanker to come up with an idea of how to get rid of the business damaging lefties. And here we are.
I also don’t think Palestine was really in any way responsible for the outcome in the US elections.
Your monthly reminder that Labour lost votes the last election and only won because Reform split the right wing vote. The country is moving solidly to the far right, along with the rest of the world. Calls to implement more radical left wing policies from Labour may mean we get the worst of all options…
Mmm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_United_Kingdom_general_election#Results
Con + Reform was 38% of vote. Lab + Lib + Green + SNP + Plaid was 54.5% of the vote.
The country pretty much always is progressive. It’s just the progressive vote is more split.
If we didn’t have FPTP it would all be so different.
This Labour government won’t implement leftwing policies. But calls for those are certainly not the cause for this shift to the extreme right.
Labour are pretty damn far from being socialist, but to say they won’t implement any leftwing policies isn’t particularly true, surely?
There’s rail renationalisation, a nationalised energy firm, there’s an increase in workers’ rights, there’s the windfall energy tax, social care reforms, actually taxing the wealthiest farmland owners, etc.
Far more could be done, and some other aspects of their government is basically just more of the same, but it’s unhelpful to pretend there’s no left-wing policies coming from them.
You’re right. These are leftwing policies. Especially in relation to where the middle is right now. But on the one hand these are being implemented by a faction within Labour that is continuously shrinking, and on the other pale against what is being considered priority across the board now: Subordinating everything to the divine prospect of growth. Look at the AI initiative for example, it’s ludicrous.
Much as I’d like more left-wing policies from Labour (or whoever!), the fact is just over 51% of thr UK population favour far right policies. Do we stick to our guns and lose the next election? Will a more radical left idealogy somehow persuade those voting for reform to vote Labour instead?
Look back to the hatchet job done on Jeremy Corbyn. He had his issues, for sure, but the right wing has spent the last decades fine tuning their political warfare. For Corbyn, it was that he supported Palestine. For Kamela, it was she didn’t support Palestine. I get what you are saying, but this perfect-or-nothing attitude landed the US with Trump. And the rightnwing know the left loves to find an excuse to not vote and leverage that over and over again. If we want to stop the fascists, we need to wake up to the way we are being manipulated.
I am not so sure. I think people were much more inclined to vote left, had Labour (and the Left internationally as well) mobilised opposition to the radical neoliberal agenda of the last fucking! 40years. Instead they went with it and moved the Overton Window by a lot. It’s difficult to come back from that of course. 8 years ago under Corbyn they tried though and were really successful. If I am not mistaken Corbyn got more votes than Starmer. They were just unlucky at the time. With Brexit and Boris and all that shit. But I am not sure whether the rightwing media and public are responsible for the purge of actual leftwing politicians inside Labour. To me it seems, the old guard of Labour undertook that purge. Picking some young ambitious wanker to come up with an idea of how to get rid of the business damaging lefties. And here we are.
I also don’t think Palestine was really in any way responsible for the outcome in the US elections.