Just got back from supper with friends to find myself being urged by my Facebook Friend (and actual friend) Tim Evans to read Corbyn’s road map to a communist Britain by Giles Udy. This piece, says Tim, is “spot on”.
Sample quote:
At no point is there any question of the revolutionary Left’s presumed right to overthrow the existing order and impose its own socialist system. Indeed, it claims it represents “the interests of the working class and the whole population” – an intriguing conflation given that the Monster Raving Loony Party gained three times the votes of the CPB in the 2015 general election and the fact that all the far-left parties combined scored just 0.02 per cent of all the votes cast. But the arrogance is pure Lenin: the revolutionary elite must take power because the people do not know what is good for them. When the Left says it opposes rule by tiny elites, it exempts itself.
Did we, at the last General Election, reach Peak Corbyn? Have enough voters who thought they were voting for an amiable geography teacher now get that Corbyn is a far nastier piece of work than that? I wish I could be sure enough about this to remove the question marks. Nevertheless, were the Corbyn tendency to win power at the next general election, I would not only be aghast; I’d also be surprised. It cheers me up, as it must cheer up any anti-Corbynite, that Labour are now doing rather badly in the polls, despite facing a Brexit-deranged Conservative government.
But, does Corbyn even care about winning the next general election? What matters to him, surely, is him and his comrades first getting total command of the Labour Party. What does make chilling sense is that a financial melt-down may occur, any decade now, at which point the Corbynite take-over of the Labour Party will have been completed and communistic stridency (designed to gather all the comrades into one political organisation) will have been replaced by much more organised and conventionally presented duplicity (with all the comrades on message). At which point, all the horrors described in the article linked to above may start seriously to happen. Voters, worrying about far more than mere Brexit turbulence, may then take, in sufficient numbers, whatever bait is dangled in front of them.
Of course, I fervently hope that this is wrong. And actually, if I had to place a bet, I’d bet that it is wrong. But betting is one thing. Being sure about that bet is quite another.
Anybody who thinks they know what is in everybody’s best interests is both deluded and evil.
But the alternative to a Corbynite Labour party is a Blairite Labour party or a Blairite Conservative party. Blairism is insidious and just as damaging as Corbynism.
I want to vote for a small state, low tax party. The only party likely to become that is the Conservative party, but it must be re-made. To do that it will have to be demolished in its present form which requires a long period out of office. The obvious thing to do is to vote for a Corbynite government.
Quibble: I do feel comfortable saying that free markets are in everybody’s best interests. It’s when restrictions on freedom are so ascribed that delusion and evil leap into the fray.
This essentially mirrors my thoughts right before Obama won a second term, handily. Never overestimate the perceptiveness of the masses.
When Obama won, I was aghast. And surprised. I wouldn’t bet serious money against Corbyn.
Their view of the Establishment is at least forty years out of date. It ain’t Bishops and Generals any more. At least half of the Establishment, far from ‘resisting’ with all means possible, will be enthusiastic cheerleaders for them.
Myno,
Point taken but… I think free markets are different in that they result from the state (or whatever) leaving things alone.
Anyway, Corbyn is, to extmporise on Brian an Tim’s metaphor merely the driver of the jalopy to Wankchester. McDonnell is the team-manager and pit-lane captain.
mickc (February 4, 2019 at 7:06 am), the burden of the only serious comment (so far) on the linked article is “Say not the struggle naught availeth” in the Labour party and while I think the commenter too optimistic, I’d agree that Corbyn has not managed to deselect all his MPs and replace them with ideological reliables yet, so needs more than a bare majority to make ‘ghastly’ into ‘horrific’.
Likewise, as regards the Tory party, one of the possible gains from Brexit was always “the alternative leadership story”, i.e. getting a leader whose support for Brexit was a sign of relative sanity on various issues. Thanks to Gove’s treachery at the moment of the establishment’s greatest weakness, that has not yet happened, but until the long-deferred-by-the-establishment party-in-country vote is finally held, we do not know it will not. So, as regards the more drastic medicine of a long Tory spell in opposition to a Corbyn government, as the alternative to Blairite Labour and Blairite Tory,
This evil, this idea that the Revolutionaries spoke for “the people” whether the individual people “thought they agreed” or not, comes from Rousseau.
Marxists do not like being told they are taking stuff from Rousseau – but they are. Specifically this idea that the General Will is not the same as the “will of all”. Marxists call “the will of all” (what people say they believe in) “false consciousness”. And the “Revolutionary Vanguard” are the Marxist version of Rousseau’s “Lawgiver” who carries out “the will of the people” the “General Will” even if all the flesh and blood humans are saying “please do NOT do this”.
Rousseau knew what people “really” wanted better than they did.
Ditto Marxism – each Marxist knows what the people really want, even if they are screaming that they do not want it. The Marxist knows their true “Class Interests” determined by the “Laws of History”.
And it turns out that what the people really want (even though they do not know it) is the Marxists in charge.
Plato would smile – as would Francis Bacon with his Collectivist “New Atlantis” and so would Jeremy Bentham with his 13 Departments of State controlling every aspect of life.
Marxism redefines words – just as Rousseau did. The “freedom” that both Karl Marx and Rousseau push endless is really SLAVERY.
Where did Rousseau get his practice of redefining words from?
He makes no secret about where he got this trick from – he got it from his reading of THOMAS HOBBES (the servant of Francis Bacon and much later the inspiration of Jeremy Bentham).
Thomas Hobbes still used such words as “freedom”, “liberty”, “justice”, “law” and so on – but he redefined all these words, sucking out their moral content.
Thomas Hobbes was a human shaped weasel – sucking the contents out of concepts (as if they eggs) leaving just the empty shells.
And Rousseau and Karl Marx took after Thomas Hobbes.
I have been persuaded of Tim Evans’ idea that for Corbyn and his gang, the mentality is rather like that of the IRA, of which Corbyn was a keen supporter during its campaign of murder and mayhem: “They (enemy of choice) have to be lucky every time; we have to be lucky only once”.
Now of course while Corbyn & Co move to take control of the Labour Party completely, forcing out “moderates” (such as people who still seem hostile to a great deal of freedom and basic economic sense, as well as often being fervently pro-EU), one should not assume that nothing else changes. The Tories cannot in my view just plod along, led by a sort of “Theresa the Useless” sort of character.
There are several risks. If the economy gets a lot better for various reasons, then some of the thicker elements of the electorate might think we can afford to take a punt on the Labour Party because if it all goes Venezuelan than we can revert to a different party, but I fear that the current LP would not demur at rigging elections, closing down opposition parties, nationalising the media, and other measures, to hit dissent. These guys are not democrats in any real sense. So ironically, a booming economy might not necessarily keep them out unless others can craft a persuasive narrative.
About six months ago the anti-semitism situation seemed at last to be really hurting Corbyn, and I thought the local council by-elections, with the failure of Labour to take north London seats with large Jewish populations, was a sign of that Corbyn’s nastiness and that of his allies was beginning to be picked up where it mattered. That seems to have faded a bit of late, but I am unclear what the situation is on this point. Maybe if Brexit gets done in some way the Tories might find the energy to really go after the bastards.
The 2017 election saw both Conservative and Labour increase their vote share and increase the number of votes cast in their favor (as opposed to 2015). To a large part this may be put down to people voting both for and against Corbyn, the Labour larger share was probably motivated by Momentum’s activism, which wont be a factor again once the Conservatives start using the same tactics or employ counter tactics.
Both took votes from the other parties, including SNP and UKIP, which may not happen again.
Corbyn has a serious split looming. Whichever way he turns on the EU he will alienate a sizeable portion of the party, MPs and core electorate, this is something that wont affect the Conservatives much, unless they go all out pro-EU again.
Corbyn is getting desperate for an election, mainly because he is getting too old and also because of the possible split. The danger is not so much Jeremy “Old Major” Corbyn becoming PM, but the active little Napoleons and Snowballs behind him.
I read the last GE as indicating that people dislike Cornyn even more than they distrust May. Both parties are split- Labour between the socialist membership and the working class voters, the Conservatives between the cronyist MPs and the conservative/classical liberal membership.
Most “Conservative” votes are actually anti-Labour votes and vice versa.
The parties are propping each other up, when one goes so will the other.
A socialist takeover of the Labour party would induce much of its vote to stay home, or even jump ship. I note that UKIP membership has been regrowing the last year, and I doubt that’s from Tory defectors.
Ah,so what your saying is that if a Corbyn Led Labour Party returns the majority of seats at the next election it will be because voters are insufficiently educated to make the correct choice. Funny. I’ve been hearing that argument about something else recently. Well maybe you sufficiently educated types should form a Rejecters faction & use your wiles to ensure a CINOG. A Corbyn In Name Only Government.
Which is what would likely happen without your help. As we’ve seen with Brexit, the vested interests & the Deep State will hamper & prevent anything that threatens their hold on power.
If it was of concern to me, which thankfully it isn’t, I’d welcome a short period of the Trots in the driving seat. Whilst they were fighting the Deep State towards mutual destruction, give a chance to tackle the real enemy. The Tory Party. The rotting corpse of which slumps stinking on the right of centre ground, pretending to be market orientated & virtually a forgotten word – conservative whilst managing to out socialist the majority of socialists & out progress the majority of progressives.
I’d prefer not to wreck the UK with experiment of the Magic Grandpa although part of me thinks it will do some people good to taste what socialism is really like. As for the Deep State, my worry is that so much of the Whitehall system tilts Statist that it wouldn’t be that upset about a hard Left government – until it’s too late.
I read where Corbyn was going to meet and chat with “She Guevara:” Alexandria Ocasio Cortez. Maybe Corbie will develop AOC style Crazy Eyes.
But Blairism did not leave, only Blair did. Blairism remained under Brown, then Cameron, then May.
The USSR changed leaders not its character.
The only hope is a Corbynite government, thus being a catalyst for a revolution in the country or the Tory party.
The USSR fell because it was bankrupt. ..not because of the internal opposition.
The struggle did avail naught…the economics availed all….
mickc: “I want to vote for a small state, low tax party.”
There’s ya problem.
Political parties are generally “symbiotic” with “the state”.
“Party” status? At what “legal” point does a bunch of like-minded types LEGALLY become a “party” for the purposes of electoral laws?
As “Politics is show-business for ugly people”, for the punters, political parties are little different from football clubs.
Think: Loud but blind loyalty to a somewhat amorphous body. Vast sums of money subject to all manner of “creative accounting”, “committees” and factions studiously beavering away, doing things often far removed from the originally stated reasons for the existence of the organization. This happens to a LOT of “organizations” from huge corporations to the local stamp-collecting club. Political “clubs” are NO exception.
“Clubbed” to death?
How many times in human history have people combined into organizations in order to fight to take away power from organizations?
Anyone who thinks that the EU is a Tory division is deluded. Sure, they are more openly at war with each other over BRExit, but Labour and even the SNP are similarly divided with their MP/MSP’s reflecting a pro-EU stance that their constituents do not share.
Hopefully, once BRExit is over and done with we can focus back on what matters (jobs, taxation, NHS, welfare, etc.) and the shift of Labour from centre left under the Blairites to hard left under Corbyn will be more apparent. The British (at least most of the English) have never been very wedded to the idea of socialism and I can’t see that changing any time soon.
I’ve always believed that Corbyn was unelectable and that his “leadership” of the Labour party would be more destructive for Labour itself than for anybody else. The use of Momentum as a movement to oust centre Left candidates in favour of hard Left candidates is destructive and continues apace.
Even with the disastrous Treason May in 10 Downing Street, both the Tories and May are doing better than Labour and Corbyn. If Corbyn was ever a genuine threat, that was in the 2017 General Election. He might have one more GE in him, but I think that will be it. He is a busted flush.
I’m more worried about someone like Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell getting the Labour leadership, since he is younger and far more dangerous.
Hopefully, the Tories can heal the divisions of the last 30 years once BRExit is over and get back to sensible and electable government. Getting a bit too old to be worrying about another Labour government. Even a Labour coalition would be horrific enough.
“I want to vote for a small state, low tax party. The only party likely to become that is the Conservative party, but it must be re-made.”
Why not this one?
It’s not that you can’t vote for a small state, low tax party. It’s that nobody else will.
Nullius, excellent point. 😥
Whence the quote? As they say in the UK, “Right on!” …
John Galt (February 5, 2019 at 12:42 am), while you are quite right that even the natz are split, they may be the sole party in your list where at least a clear majority do not disagree with the leadership. I would guess a full third of their voters appreciate the absurdity of wanting to become independent of the UK by becoming yet more dependent on the EU, but I’m not sure you could get a majority of them to face it. (But I note that the party’s rule about members not contradicting the party line in public means one hears less from those who doubt it.) Except in Scotland’s north-east, even Scots Tories lean more remainish than Tories elsewhere.
(And, of course, the LibDems are united on the issue. The 7.4% of the vote they got last time consisted in large part of intellectuals without intellects who know they are the clever ones who should rule, and feel intense and angry surprise that the rest of us cannot see something so obvious.)
I currently live in Perth, Scotland and campaigned here for BRExit alongside a guy ousted from the SNP for the sacrilege of wanting Scottish Independence from both the UK and the EU.
Even among the SNP supporters I spoke to there was a sizeable proportion that couldn’t understand the parties position of supporting independence in one form, but dogged obeisance in another.
As for the Scottish Tories, given that they were mostly farmers (this being pretty rural Perthshire), they were more worried about having their bribes from the EU cut.
Leaving the EU may at least have the benefit of removing some deep fractures from within our political parties, although whether the disconnect between the parties and the electorate can be healed is another matter.
I wouldn’t like to call the results of the 2022 General Election at this moment. I doubt the Tories could secure a majority, but Labour even less so. The only thing which might change the dynamic is the fracturing of Labour into Blairite and Corbynite factions (possible, but unlikely) or a major electoral wipeout of the SNP (fairly likely given the hatred of First Minister Wee Jimmy Krankie), regardless I suspect that we’ve reached peak SNP.
Difficult times lie ahead I suspect.