I find this headline bizarre as clearly the Labour Party has been working tirelessly on the subject of anti-Semitism, so much so that they have moved support for anti-Semitism into the mainstream (sometimes under the guise of ‘anti-Zionism’ but increasingly Labourites are not even bothering with that fig-leaf). In my opinion the last thing we need is the Labour Party doing even more on anti-Semitism! 😉
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Headline states: ‘Labour Party not doing enough on anti-Semitism’October 16th, 2016 |
 63 comments to Headline states: ‘Labour Party not doing enough on anti-Semitism’ |
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Nice 😈 Also looking at the actual headline, ‘lawmakers’ is an unlovely Americanism. What’s wrong with ‘Parliamentarians’? Or even ‘Elected Labour Gobshites’?
Read & re-read this post but am missing it’s point. Unless it is written in a 100% ironic tone.
As a libertarian I am a free speech absolutist. I do not think hate groups should be banned – not even the Labour Party. 🙂
Britain has 3.0 million Muslims and maybe 300,000 Jews. Simple math. Not much different than much of Western Europe. Politicians on the left are not stupid and want a reliable voting bloc – they have found the Muslims to be a perfect source of votes.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Jews
https://pjmedia.com/election/2016/10/13/12-percent-of-muslim-voters-still-undecided-as-4-percent-back-trump/
In the US, the trend is similar. We have a large Jewish population but they historically vote Left about 75% of the time. To many that appears suicidal today. Democrats this time will get 84% to 96% of the Muslim vote. It’s not Trump at all. Muslims vote left all over the Western World – same % in Canada and Donald Trump is not on the ballot there.
What is the point of all this? The Koran, Hadith and Sira are explicit in their Jew hatred. The Leftist parties embrace of Islam guarantees anti-Jewish and anti-Israel sentiment and policy. Any bullshit about opposing anti-Semitism is just that: bullshit.
You think? I can only assume you are American 😛
Me too! Indeed I can hardly conceal my delight every time some prominent member of the Labour party opens their mouth to talk about football, Marmite or the weather and somehow Hitler and/or The Jews manage to get a mention 😀 With every utterance, they inch closer to the political event horizon. Oh I LOVE free speech!
Actually they are profoundly and intensely stupid. The Jews vs. Muslims ratio scarcely matters at all. What matters is how overt anti-Semitism flies with the vast majority of the country who are neither Jews nor Muslims. It is not a vote winner, it is a vote loser par excellence. It makes Labour tagging the Tories as the Nasty Party laughable. It is the weapon with which Labour can be beaten over the head again and again and again. It is the weapon that never blunts because these dumb fucks obligingly keep sharpening it and so I use it at every opportunity.
Indeed. The vast majority of people are decent and find that shit repugnant.
As for this side of the pond (as JGIII has already touched on it) the recent “revelations” about Trump don’t appear to be getting much traction at all in the circles that I move in, despite the media’s best efforts.
The most common response is along the lines of “Yes, so he’s a dick. We already knew that, but she’s still worse.”
The irony in this post reminds me of something i read here before … oh yes, here it is.
That was my reaction too, but i don’t agree with the article at the link, that it’s about expressing and understanding messages at face value, for reasons that i won’t go into here. Instead, i’ll tell a vaguely related joke:
A Danish newspaper asks readers for contributions on the Swedish sense of humor.
A Dane sends in a blank sheet of paper.
Next day, the editor receives a letter from a Swedish reader, asking if that was supposed to be a joke.
Having lived in Sweden once I can totally believe that 😆
Politicians on the left are not stupid and want a reliable voting bloc
Why would Muslims be solid left? They are socially conservative, and strongly oppose moves like gay marriage. Generally they are authoritarian in background, preferring strong leaders. The left/right thing isn’t their deal at all.
In the US people whinge about how the Democrats are going to allow millions of Hispanics to be legalised and they’ll vote Democrat for generations. Except that the Hispanics also tend to be social conservatives and the Republicans could easily be their natural home. The GOP leaders know this, which is why they don’t go down the Trump route of building a wall. That the Republican voters spurn them with their nativist leanings is the GOP’s lost opportunity. They could have even had a Spanish-speaking man running for them, which could have made a serious dent into the Hispanic vote.
In New Zealand the immigrant Pacific Islanders were solid Labour, but after too many socially liberal moves by the Labour Party they are starting to vote National. The National party have seen this, and are running Islander candidates in the right electorates.
The idea that immigrants will vote left is mostly unchallenged. It need not be true.
Chester, I agree completely
This does indeed play very badly with many. There is the motiveless nastiness of it. There is the perverseness of it (one lot of immigrants have a high crime rate and a tendency to terrorism – let’s make it a crime to criticise them; another group of people are long-standing residents, well-integrated into British society, with a low crime rate – let’s criticise them a lot). There is the bizarre dishonesty that those who yelled ‘nazi’ if you disagreed now channel the nazis’ most infamous idea (abroad, some manage to do both at once). There is the faint ’30s aroma it gives to our times – which justly does nothing to make people feel safe and welcoming.
I am of course glad that the party of all this is not doing so well in public opinion just at the moment. It’s comical, but I’d trade the joke for the Britain of a couple of decades ago when this state of things still seemed absurd.
@Chester,
Some things about the Hispanic vote: one, their support for a welfare state trumps (hehe) their social conservative leanings. Bush and co had the CRA which led to the crisis of 2008 – in it they allowed Hispanics to have greater leeway in loans. Of course that turned out badly. And in gratitude the Hispanics replied with a mere 25% (IIRC) of the vote for Bush. Such natural conservatives!
In terms of voting percentage, the Hispanics are also notorious for not turning up at all. Their turnout rates are quite low, which tells you something about their sense of belonging to the US.
Finally, even if the growing hispanic population decides to vote for the Repubs by letting more of them in (which is no sure thing), it still means the US will have forsaken its place as a superpower, because the ethnic Hispanic (Mexican) stock is not high on many attributes (IQ, sports, achievements in general). Conquistador-Hispanics, sure, they are talented, but they are few.
It’s ok. China is on the rise, and I’m supposed to side with them after all.
Unfortunately, here in Australia, we seem to have the best politicians that money can buy. Going cheap! We recently had a Labor Senator who said nice things about China, and seemed to have links to a pro-China foundation, nothing illegal, but he did try not to ever mention it, and claim that the views he expressed were his own.
And we have a former State Premier, Bob Carr, who admitted that the constituents of his electorate were becoming more muslim (immigration), and that he felt compelled to reflect their anti-Israel beliefs in the Labor party.
Our PM, Malcolm Turnbull, lives in an electorate with a large number of Jewish residents, so that balances out. But I do worry about the future.
Labour just return to the roots of Marxism.
I can’t remember where I saw it, but for big autocratic states like China, it’s far more effective to spend their money on subverting foreign politicians to weaken their enemies than on weapons systems.
Or maybe they have better things to do than pretend voting in party political races between two corrupt establishments actually makes that much difference. Anyone bothering to vote for the ‘better’ candidate in the next US election is certainly deluding themselves.
Labour really is circling the drain, the obsession with JEWS is like late senile dementia settling in, and there ain’t anyway back from that. So much so, it’s time to figure out what opposition politics in Britain will look like. UKIP might or might not disintegrate but all those voters will still be there: if it does blow up completely, something will fill the void. If it doesn’t, then that’s probably the core around which Her Majesty’s Opposition will coalesce. But it’s looking more and more likely that won’t be Labour, because it’s coming close to the point someone needs to stick a fork in ’em because they’re done, just another hate group loony tunes fringe party.
Maybe that’s true. Still the choice is between arsenic and unknown berries.
I’m glad I have the luxury to watch from a distance and enjoy the entertainment no matter the outcome. Any effects on me and my country will take some time and probably not all bad. It’d be interesting to see how a victorious Hillary will treat post-Brexit UK though…
You can’t accuse them of being behind the times now.
Sorry if I’m being naive or out-of-the-loop, but can anyone give examples of Labour MPs being expressly antisemitic, rather than “anti-Zionist”?
There’s countless examples where Labour people rail against The Jews rather than Zionists. Jews caused the crash, Jews run the media, Jews financed the slave trade, Jews caused Brexit, Jews, Jews, Jews, Jews. Call them out and suddenly “nah mate, we’re just anti-Zionist, doncha know!”. And if someone gets suspended from from Labour for some particularly toolish remark about Jews that embarrissingly ends up in print, rest assured they’ll be forgiven as soon as the ruckus dies down a bit, because that particular cunt was just saying what the others think.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/naz-shah-readmitted-to-labour-party-following-anti-semitism-row-a7121746.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-kent-36405130
http://stv.tv/news/politics/1360507-labour-councillor-terry-kelly-reinstated-after-zionism-row/
These people are scum, total rubbish whose brown shirts are probably just at the cleaners.
Seems to me the left have no problem with anti-Semitism. They’re absolutely fine with it.
“Anyone bothering to vote for the ‘better’ candidate in the next US election is certainly deluding themselves.”
Take me, and nine other people of supposed conservative viewpoints. Figure out how to draw a Venn diagram of our positions on various important issues.
You don’t get ten identical circles which all disappear into one consensus. You get ten slightly offset circles, all still distinct by themselves.
Point is, even in the “best” of elections, we never get to vote on a candidate who is in perfect alignment with our own minds. There’s always some variance. So, instead of voting to empower our own exact viewpoint, we’re always basically trying to nudge the system closer to our viewpoint while recognizing that we’re empowering some points of view at variance to ours.
This election differs only in that the spread of the Venn circles is a lot wider. I can vote for Clinton, whose circle has exactly no overlap with mine, or I can vote for Trump, knowing that his circle and mine have at least some small overlap.
Yeah, both choices suck. But one of them does nudge some small aspects of society in the direction I’d like it to go. The other choice nudges all aspects of society away from how I’d like to see it go. One of those two choices will prevail – we don’t have the luxury of waiting for better choices.
Staying home simply erases any possible nudge I could add, leaving all nudging to people who like Clinton.
Of course, I’d then have the benefit of being able to speak of the act of voting with absolute disdain, but that seems to value ego over society.
As libertarians, we’re hardly ever in the position of voting for someone whose Venn circle coincides with our own. We’re always voting, to some extent, for the least worst choice. We’ve never had the Magic Candidate; we usually go with the Less Sucky Candidate. We can take our ball and go home, but nobody else really wants our ball anyway.
Scapegrace, none of the three links answer my question – but thanks for the effort regardless.
Sorry Bobby but this time the negatives on the alternative to the horrendous Clinton are just too numerous for me to see him as “better”. I’d rather not legitimise the process with what I see as a meaningless choice between two such utterly extricable people. Even as an atheist I could justify rooting for Cruz on the basis of real-world-politics, but Trump? Forget it. He is not a lesser evil, just a different evil, and speaking as a foreigner, Trump and his probable kowtowing to Putin & the likelihood he will kick off a protectionist trade war with, well, the entire world, makes him actually more detrimental to *my* interests than even the ghastly and vile Clinton, not that an American should necessarily care. And they are both civil liberties nightmares.
Worse, antisemitism is just another form of envy-based socialism. That said, not all socialists (or anti-Zionists, for that matter – at least in theory) are antisemites (and not all antisemites are socialists?)
I understand that the terms “better” and “less bad” share the same essential meaning, but I would never call Trump the “better” choice. Sticks in the craw, ya know? The evil that will befoul us – all of us – with a Clinton presidency towers over the evil Trump would bring.
Putin and Trump? Two such consuming egos could never get along. One will undoubtedly say something vile about the other, and then all bets are off. But still, in a safer way than it would be with Clinton.
I still fall back to my belief that Trump as president results in a complete deadlock in our government – which would be a huge improvement. Making stupid and venal people STOP is always good.
But that is not the point, Bobby – the point is that I would vote for a candidate who on balance would improve the situation, from my perspective. Note the emphasis on ‘improving the situation’, rather than ‘be an improvement over X or Y’ – AKA ‘the least worse/the lesser evil’. I am willing to vote for someone who would be better (even slightly, I’m not spoiled), not less bad. To me, that is a significant, even if subtle difference.
You may think that Trump is it, but I don’t – and that is where I do take your point. I also think that Cruz could have been it, but that’s water under the bridge.
The big plus to the way the Labour Party has gone is locking them in as a party for not just parasites but also hateful people. The key to keeping them out of office is to make it hard for the wishy washy middle to vote for them just to make themselves feel good about themselves. Make the idea of voting for Labour like voting for killing puppies, because Corbyn and his smelly crew are making that an easy sell. That’s why it really matters when people in the pub or at work say they support Labour, put them on the defensive with accusations of antisemitism and the assumption that they must be a hateful nasty person. It’s really important to rip away the cloth and show them for them for that they are, and let people know they will be tarred by association.
Alisa, let me phrase this one more way, and then I’ll shut up.
If you controlled a SMOD, and could aim it at either Trump or Clinton, but not both . . .
Frankly, i don’t see the point of discussing who is the lesser evil in this election. The fact is that, in a 2 party system, there is another factor, which should actually be the overriding factor for voters, unless one of the alternatives is clearly better (or, in this case, clearly worse) than the other. Except in such a case, then in a 2 party system, elections are primarily a referendum on the party in power. Do you approve of the policies of the last 8 years? that is the only question that really matters this year — or was, until the FBI whitewashed the email scandal. Now there is another question that matters: do you accept that the Clintons are above the law?
Observant readers will remember that the idea that an election is a referendum on the people in power, comes from Popper. Just think about that: Popper providing the rationale to vote for Trump! Anyway, Obama himself adopted Popper’s view a few weeks ago, when he addressed Black Americans to warn them that not voting for Hillary means a rejection of his policies.
I think there are quite a few questions really, such as “yeah I know I’m in part responsible because I’ve been willing to vote the Lesser Evil since the start of the 1990s just because I hate the Democrats, thereby creating no motive whatsoever for the GOP to run actually conservatives to get my vote, but are you fucking joking by running this guy?” 😡
That would certainly be my question.
Very true, Alisa. It’s worth noting, though, that when a bunch of Republicans withdrew their endorsements of Trump, Cruz did not. His rationale appears to be that the mere chance of Trump sticking to his published list of potential Supreme Court nominees is worth gambling on.
It’s a view that I share. In 2012 I said “screw it” and voted Johnson. This time around, I don’t think that I have that luxury.
Let me put it this way: You’d never jump out of an aeroplane without a parachute, would you? But now the aeroplane is on fire, there are no parachutes and you look out of the gaping hole in the side, see that you’re over a wintry forest and dimly remember some stories from your childhood, about WWII pilots surviving chuteless descents when their fall was broken by trees or snow drifts…
The answer is neither one, as it would accomplish nothing. These two are mere symptoms of the real problem – that real problem having been explained by Perry several times over the years, and lately in the comment right above this one.
Thanks, but no thanks. I am a Jew who grew up in Russia, so believe you me I know there is real antisemitism in this world. I have seen it in the US as well, occasionally. I have seen it even among my fellow Jews, including in Israel. I’m sure there are antisemites in the Labour party, or in any other political party anywhere, for that matter. But all that said, I am really getting sick and tired of people who see an antisemite behind every tree, or those who see it in anyone criticizing Israel. Of course Israel is very often criticized unjustly, or based on double standards, but it still does not necessarily mean that such misplaced criticism is a manifestation of thinly veiled antisemitism – sometimes it is, sometimes it isn’t.
Getting back to the quoted comment, my point is that the last thing I’d like to see as a Jew is for accusations of antisemitism becoming the new accusations of racism, with which to beat one’s political opponents.
(Sorry for the rant, I’m feeling better now).
PS: if you think, as i do, that the Obama admin has been a disgrace even by standards much lower than those of Lincoln and Gladstone; and that Hillary makes Berlusconi look almost as honest as Lincoln and Gladstone by comparison; then it is wickedly good that Trump is the Republican candidate. Voting for Trump sends a clear message: that you’d rather vote for the most crass and vulgar sort of American than for the party of Obama and the Clintons.
Just to be clear: i want to maintain plausible deniability. Should Trump be elected, i shall accept no responsibility for his actions, unless they turn out to be much better than i expect.
Having said that, here are 2 more reasons to vote for Trump.
The first, from the Wobbly Guy:
Rumsfeld said something similar: Hillary is a known known, Trump is a known unknown.
It’s almost a one-way bet: Hillary can turn out better than expected, but it’s highly unlikely; Donald can turn out better than expected, which is also unlikely, but not highly unlikely.
The exception here is foreign policy: it seems to me that they are both highly unpredictable on that front. The only comfort is that it takes more than one person to lob ICBMs.
The second, from Bobby:
Glenn Reynolds keeps saying something similar: Trump would be kept in check by Congress (even a Republican Congress), and by the media. I myself would trust even a Republican Congress to be more effective as a check on Donald than as a check on Hillary.
Did Cruz actually say that, Rob?
As to that airplane, in my truly humble opinion: by voting for either of these creatures, you’re just adding some more gasoline to the fire and are locking the doors from the inside.
Perry: your idiot voter who says:
is clearly not a Popperian. A Popperian does not vote for the lesser evil: a Popperian votes for the evil that is not in power.
Since this voter is not a Popperian, i was not appealing to him/her.
Trump made a career out of making deals with politicians, especially of the Democratic persuasion. And if there is a Republican Congress, I think we can delete the word ‘deadlock’ from the vocabulary altogether for the duration. But hey, uknowns and all that.
“Trump made a career out of making deals with politicians, especially of the Democratic persuasion. And if there is a Republican Congress, I think we can delete the word ‘deadlock’ from the vocabulary altogether for the duration.”
Indications to date are that we’ll have a House and Senate controlled by Republicans (barely). The “barely” is important, as it means that, while the Democrats won’t be able to keep passing leftist legislation to throw at Trump to sign or not, the Republicans won’t be able to override the Dem filibusters that will keep most Republican legislation from being enacted.
No Dem is going to cross the aisle to vote for Trump-inspired legislation – he’s just too hated by their constituents. The Republicans might cross the aisle to vote with the Dems to stop any Trump initiatives.
No, I think “deadlock” is going to remain very much in play. Thank goodness.
(As an added fun, fun benefit, though, I really want to watch the Dems decry our new Obama-inspired enabling of the Executive Order as a way to bypass Congress. Imagine Trump’s Exec Orders! “IRS – stop partisan targeting!” “DHS – enforce existing immigration laws!” “BLS – stop making up sh . . . uh, stuff!”)
Perry de Havilland (London), October 17, 2016 at 5:28 pm, I don’t think you’ve phrased “the question” quite right. You could ask that question of the Democratic party. They gave Clinton double-headed coins to toss and stacked decks to cut and in every way are wholly responsible for running a candidate who must win to stay out of jail. Saying to them “are you fucking joking by running this gal?” makes sense – it is of conscious foreseen intent. And a majority of primary voters endorsed her.
The tea party was an attempt by the Republican base to shout in the Republican party’s ear. That didn’t (sufficiently) get their attention, so a more downmarket plurality of primary voters screamed an obscenity in the Republican party’s ear. The party has much responsibility for this state of affairs, but your question is not quite right. A republican party chief would reply “We did not intend to run him!” and only a different question would engage their real responsibility for the current situation.
Perhaps “Deep Thought” could be asked to run a million-year program to determine the correct question. 🙂
Er, not sure where you get that idea. I think a Popperian just forms a critical preference for a theory about the candidates and then says “fuck it” and spends election day on a beach in Cancun slamming tequila.
Not really Niall. I have always maintained the Democratic Party is not the problem, never has been (at least in living memory). They are what they are. The problem is the GOP, a party who briefly had a few actual genuine ideas with Reagan (who was an ideologue), and from then on the GOP has been determined to make sure that never happened again (hence the deep seated antipathy to the Tea Party & indeed Ted Cruz, who are all ideological rather than just governmentalists). They did not intend to run Trump, I agree, but it mattered more to the establishment to keep an ideologue like Cruz out, so Trump was their lesser evil. Tells me all I need to know about the Republican establishment. GOP needs to burn to the ground and I suppose Trump is the best person for that job, particularly if he loses 😆
Well Bobby, you may yet be proven right – unknowns are unknowns. But there are too many conditionals in your scenario for me to put any money on. Plus, I have already voted anyway.
” . . . particularly if he loses.”
He’s going to lose by a landslide. Which means Hilary is going to win by a landslide. Imagine giving someone like her such a mandate. I’ll join you in Cancun.
Effectively, yes, Alisa. In his statement endorsing Trump he identified the Supreme Court issue as the “First, and most important” factor informing his decision.
Here’s a link.
bobby b’s point about gridlock is another one that plays well with me, but the USSC matter is my primary reason.
“Plus, I have already voted anyway.”
I never understood early voting. What if someone dies or withdraws? What if we learn something that changes our views on something important? What if we find that Hilary is an intelligent, honest, honorable conservative and pragmatic thinker and would be a wonderful president? Or that Gary Johnson has been a secret Communist Party member since 1975? Or that (fill in the blank) diddles goats?
(Although, I guess the “diddles goats” one wouldn’t really alter my opinion of any of our candidates.)
I suspect this is an in-joke, bobby… I imagine Alisa has already voted… in Israel 😉
Ya know, I had that exact thought very shortly after the “edit” option expired.
I think I would do better with a twelve-hour edit timer.
This would be that “irony” thing, right?
(Or is it “irouny” there?)
I want pictures!
I did vote early, by mailing an absentee ballot. FWIW Bobby, I share your concerns about early voting – but circumstances often force one to make decisions earlier than one would have otherwise preferred.
Fair enough, Rob, and thanks.
Bobby b, and Alisa- wait until one of them wins, and let the meteorite clobber the winner, as they’re being sworn in, in Washington! What was so hard about that? P.S. make sure to get the Vice-President as well.
I suppose the Leader of the house would be the next leader, but this would bring the fun back into politics!
And they’d get the added stimulus of redesigning the Capital city- what an economic stimulus!
Yes there are exceptions. But the excuse of claiming to be anti Israel rather than anti Jew is wearing thin, the more so as the left commonly believe (or pretend to believe) every word spoken by blatantly anti Jewish organisations in the ME.
Nicholas:
Indeed, that was pretty obvious.
Only if Hillary wins.
Perry:
I am much more cynical on this issue: for me, what the Dem. Party is, is what ALL parties are: bureaucratic machines designed to win elections. That means that all parties have an in-built statist tendency: if you want to get to power, then it stands to reason that you also want to increase the power that you want to get.
The problem with the xxi century Democrats is not that they are statists: it is that they have become (a front for) a suicide cult. That is the common thread of their policies, in economics, health care, education, law+order, race relations, sex(ual) relations, and last but not least foreign policy.
Vice versa, what i find most despicable about the GOP is not their statist tendencies: i could live with that, if the alternative is a suicide cult. What i find despicable is that they cannot win elections even when they run against a suicide cult.
That’s because most of them drank the Koolaid that makes one suicidal.
Yes!! Jim Jones helps to understand the modern Democrats much better than Lenin or Mussolini do!
…But i thought that one must become suicidal BEFORE drinking the KoolAid!
Unfortunately, no: they market it in a pretty environmentally-friendly, racially-tolerant, gender-nonspecific bottle, it contains no sugar or fat, and it tastes just like regular apple juice. Failing that and just in case, they also add it to the water system at the school-district level.
Going back to the original topic, i take issue with this remark by J.G.III:
Yes, i know, other people here have already taken issue with that.
What i am bringing, is some stats on the percentage of people in the UK holding negative views of:
Jews: 7%
Muslims: 28%
Given that 3M Muslims is about 5% of the UK population, one might think that bashing Jews gains 7% of the vote (I assume that the 7% figure includes the antisemitic fraction of British Muslims), while bashing Muslims can gain as much as 28-5 = 23% of the vote.
It’s not so simple, however, because we must also consider the percentages of people in the UK holding positive views of:
Jews: 76%
Muslims: 64%
Bashing Jews would lose a net 69% of the vote, while bashing Muslims would lose a smaller, but still huge, net 41% of the vote.
Following the links, you’ll find that roughly the same conclusions apply to most other European countries.
@Snorri,
Wait til political correctness and demographics run their course.
Snorri Godhi (October 18, 2016 at 8:25 pm), remember shy Tory effect.
“percentages of people in the UK holding positive views of Muslims:
Jews: 76%
Muslims: 64%”
Everyone knows the penalties for islamophobia – and that those for anti-semitism are in practice much less to worry about. Shy Tories are shy everywhere – except the polling booth.
Niall: I agree, there will be shy antisemites, and shy “islamophobes” as well, and at a guess, the latter will outnumber the former.
bobby b.
other rob.
Niall.