Momentum's "Pulling up the ladder" video

[T_i_B]

Last edited Sat Aug 5, 2017, 11:38 PM - Edit history (3)

Now I may be no fan of Momentum, but this video by them does lay bare a lot of the very real hypocrisy that informs British politics to a large degree. It may be clearly very "London-centric" but I have seen these sort of dreadful attitudes about higher education, housing and opportunity from quite a number of people in real life (especially from a good many people of the older generation) and this sort of conceit needs to be exposed.

[BeekeeperInVermont]

1. I seem to remember somebody else who

promised everything and gullible people just fell for it. Now, who was that? Trump, perhaps? We liberals have been beating the drum about how Trump voters were sold a pig in a poke, but, just maybe, being manipulated by politicians isn't only a failure of conservatives.

My husband's English family, from the young to the old, working class all, have told us that Corbyn promised the unattainable to people and got the votes on that basis. They don't expect much from him, but are hoping that maybe they'll be surprised.

[T_i_B]

2. Actually, if Britain stays in the EU....

...then much of the Labour platform is actually quite affordable. The only idea that has had to be discarded for cost reasons is the extremely laudable but unrealistic idea of abolishing student debt.

However, Corbyn is as wedded to leaving the EU, and the inevitable economic suicide and collapse of government revenue that will follow as the Tories are. That's where the problems are for Labour's policy platform and funnily enough, it's a policy designed to try and appease the same sort of elderly voters who are being attacked in this video!

Also worth bearing in mind that the Tories platform was just as uncosted as Labour's, which made their "magic money tree" attacks on Corbyn during the general election a lot less effective.

[Ken Burch]

3. The only possible hope for staying in the EU is to work for a Labour victory.

Last edited Fri Aug 11, 2017, 10:35 PM - Edit history (2)

For one thing, with Vince Cable now in as Liberal Democrat leader, and seemingly committed to a "stay the course" program, even on tuition fees, any chance of a LibDem recovery at the next election is most likely gone-assuming it wasn't going to take another one or two general elections for the voters to even begin to forgive the party for backing Cameron's government.

If the Tories stay in power at the next election because Remainers are campaigning against Labour over not still supporting Remain(as was repeatedly proved, Corbyn campaigned hard for the Remain side in the referendum), it would be too late to work for Remain after that.

Getting the Tories out outweighs all other concerns. And there's no possible alternative Labour leader(or at least none the PLP would allow on a leadership ballot) who'd be both pro-EU AND committee to humane, anti-austerity social democratic values. The ones who'd put fighting to stay in the EU first are all sectarian Blairites as far as I can see; if you know of any of them who actually care about defending the working and non-working poor, I'd like to hear of them.

If you really want to persuade Corbyn to change on that issue(remember, the next election will be the last chance to prevent Brexit), you'd need, I think, to do two things:

1) Persuade him that all Remainers would back a Labour government that stayed in the EU and defied the EU's deficit restrictions(a government that agrees to those restrictions is agreeing to just keep slashing social benefits for the rest of eternity);

2) Make a case for how there'd be any chance for a return of high-paying jobs with union representation in the North of England within the EU;

[T_i_B]

4. Since you are ignorant of the process.....

Let me explain.

The government (with Labour support) has already triggered article 50 before the last election and negotiations to leave the EU will have concluded well before the next election, so your claim that the next election is the last chance to prevent this are untrue.

The government is making catastrophic error after catastrophic error in the negotiations to leave the EU, but Corbyn won't hold them to account on this.

Labour are becoming increasingly pro-Brexit just as it is becoming apparent that the whole thing is a total disaster. To be honest their opposition to this calamity is as feeble as the Tories were over Iraq.

Under Corbyn Labour won't change on their current strategy of "disaster socialism", i.e encouraging the complete gutting of the UK economy then claiming that only they can fix the mess. And it is becoming increasingly obvious that Corbyn's craven fanboys care far more about keeping the useless twonk on as Labour leader then getting anything done to make this country a better place to live.

Vince Cable has already been voicing many of the concerns raised in the video in the OP. The Lib Dems have a major weakness on this with tuition fees, but the EU is Labour's elephant in the room. And the daft thing is, Labour's EU policy is aimed squarely at the sort of old farts Momentum are attacking in this video!