That's what they keep doing. They come out with all these ideas hoping to get a 'hit' from one. Funnily when it goes wrong they brush it under the mat very quickly? I see Annaliese Dodds has had a reboot! She was on this morning without all the sparks... although she was stating the bloody obvious.
I'm surprised you didn't say more Watford? Let the EU worry about confiscating ham sandwiches and we will worry about £200b trade deals.
I heard. She will be lucky to be in a job the way the knives are coming out... saying that it is the EU and you don't get elected or unelected.
If Starmer thinks that jumping on the Tory Nationalist bandwagon is the way forward, he can **** off.
Totally agree. He needs to stand by his morals and not try and win votes masquerading. Saying that I did say he was another dud.
I agree. It’s a bit route one for now. Ultimately flag shaggers will vote for the flag-shagging party so just being a bit flag-shagging is dumb but for now we’re in ‘war’ mode and people conflate patriotism with blindly backing the government. He can’t afford for Labour to be again painted as anti-UK for daring to want people to not be treated as third-class citizens while the Tories **** off half the country.
Sorry Bracknell but I disagree......as I’ve said before, historically Labour has been a Party of working class patriotic people with more traditional values...less internationalist in thinking and more inclined to reject the notion of ‘identity politics’ This of course changed with the invention of ‘new Labour’ and the likes of Blair and his embrace of the “free market” ideology. You could say that Labour is trying to make peace now with its natural supporters (people like Col, if he doesn’t mind me mentioning him). Sometimes, and I’m really not having a dig but just passing comment, the likes of yourself are playing right into the Tories hands.
I get you. I worded the post a bit clunkily but I agree with you, I think. I’d love for Labour to stand for actual ‘British values’ (whatever those might be) and appeal to those with a genuine sense of patriotism rather than the faux-patriotism on display with the current government. I’d really like them to fight for policies that will actually help working class people rather than telling them what they want to hear. I think that’s possible as well as embracing the EU where we might differ but we can bond over our mutual love of taking the piss out of Ellers for being a ridiculous caricature.
He's an empty vessel, no real strategy, many of his MPs are Corbyn at heart and the fact he's had a charisma by-pass really isn't going to get him anywhere. The fact the Tories have stepped into Soft Left territory with furloughs and SEISS plus the Brexit deal leaves him between a rock and a hard place. It'll take a monumental cock-up by Boris for him to have any chance. That said...
You mean the hard working class you refer to as flag shaggers in nearly every post? Idiot. You have mentioned me twice today. Sadly Watford you just don’t get it. As I said before, Blair brainwashed you into believing that when you finish last in a race, if you cry enough, the result will change. You’re just another remoaner. Good luck with the Labour Party.
Bloody hell I was only joking about Swampy! I have just heard on the news that the real one is actually in one of those tunnels! Fair play to him. They should give the hippy a spade to dig with. He hasn’t aged a bit. All that underground living has kept him looking young.
You don’t have to be working class to be a flag-shagger and you don’t have to be a flag-shagger to be working class. I appreciate why you’d want to conflate the two. I’ve said enough times I don’t expect Labour to win the next election and even if they do it doesn’t mean I wholly support everything they choose to do. If we all blindly supported the side most likely to win regardless of what we thought of them then we’d be the political equivalent of new Man City fans. If you really believe in this version of the Tories rather then I’m embarrassed for you. They stand for nothing but retaining power and milking the system they preside over.
Spot on. I've said a few times that I'd definitely vote for a sensible, centre left party if I liked the look of them ( I'm not this far right supporter that some on here try to paint me as). Unfortunately, I don't see Starmer's Labour as that party. I've never liked him and I stand by my assertion that we have a terrible generation of politicians. Too many people confuse patriotism with Nationalism and try to score political points by purposely confusing the two.
Totally mate, and for someone like you to be painted as such does you a disservice. You, to me it seems, are the typical voter that Labour needs to win back. I know I keep harping in about it mate....but to someone like yourself, I think Paul Embery’s book would really strike a chord. He makes a whole lot of sense, in my opinion and talks about voters like you, being utmost in the future success. Embery would make a good Labour leader
/ I’m going to break my silence on this thread, ask one question, then retreat again to observe. There seems to be a lot of middle ground around the idea that a British working class has values, which are good values, and they have been betrayed by Labour (as well as the Tories, naturally). That’s Labour since 1945, if you accept the thesis that Embrey has built on, drawing from Frank Field and Maurice Glasman that centralism, including a central welfare state is bad, and we should look after people on local, mutualist, communitarian principles. Economically relatively left wing, socially conservative (small c), both Glasman and Embrey are happy to use the shorthand ‘Family, faith, flag’. Philip Blond, on the Tory side, promotes very similar ideas. Would you and others think it logical now to abandon the terminally woke, liberal dominated Labour Party (exaggerating for effect) for a Blue Labour/Red Tory alternative? I’m genuinely interested in people’s thoughts on this, with no intent to debate or argue about it. It seems there is an opportunity for a new political grouping which will feel materially different to whatever the last middle ground party was*, and which will appeal to an interesting cross section of voters? Why wait for Labour to change itself? * Change UK! I had to look it up.
You have referred to those who voted Brexit as flag shaggers. Don’t worm out of it mate. You have also been detrimental to anyone who doesn’t share your views (political) you call Tories voters Right-wing, when most are just normal decent people working hard. Their only crime is that they did not want to vote for some antisemite. Whenever a Tory speaks on TV you call them a ‘nonce’ even though you don’t have a clue about them. The thing you seem to miss about Brexit is that people from all walks of life voted leave. Young/old Rich/poor Intelligent/stupid. The same as people who voted remain? Saying that people that voted remain or vote the Limp Dims are somehow on a high level of intelligence is one of the reasons remain lost. You are now applying that same failed opinion on Tory voters... and once again you will fail. Not because they are sheep or right-wing but the fact that the opposition is s22t and unelectable.
It seems to me that many of the working class patriotic people you describe hold 'traditional' values of racism and bigotry and wanted to 'Get Brexit Done' for these reasons. If these are the ones that abandoned Labour last time round, Starmer would be wrong to court them by wrapping Labour in the flag, in my opinion. The party may need to make peace with its traditional support in other ways, but not this.
