Danny

Absolutely - compromises but still with some firm red lines, namely opposing austerity, prioritizing good public services and help for the poor over deficit/surplus hysteria, and making the case that the super-rich and big businesses must be forced to make a much bigger contribution. But if the Blairite lunatic fringe is going to continue to kick up a huge stink about even moderate soft-left policies like that, then as we're now seeing you will provoke much of the grassroots into full-on loony-leftism (abolishing capitalism completely, nationalising everything, declaring "solidarity" with every tinpot dictator under the sun, etcetc.).

No, there's moderates (Miliband, Burnham and Cooper all just about fit into that category even though they're often too timid to even admit they'd go that far) and then there's the swivel-eyed right-wing ideologues (Blairites/Progress).

Callum Smith ‏@callumrsmith 41m41 minutes ago Fascinating that Labour centrists wanted JC to stand to prove the left was irrelevant yet are now panicking he might win & plotting against. Callum Smith ‏@callumrsmith 39m39 minutes ago It says so much about the Labour Party. Its roots are still left wing but those in control are bureaucrats and grasping careerists.

The funniest thing is I don't think Corbyn even wants the job, he's said openly he's only interested in "having a debate". If he does somehow get elected, I'd expect an immediate resignation.

Hilariously, Jeremy Corbyn looks like he might be a proper contender. Current nominations from local constituency parties: Burnham - 31 Corbyn - 26 Cooper - 24 Kendall - 4

Yup, the problem with him IMO is how shifty and flustered he'd always come across in interviews (tbf, that might have been because of his stammer).

Yeah, I don't think she's leader material but she'd be a perfect shadow chancellor, since the main job of that role is to be reassuringly dull and make it seem like you'd always keep your head in a crisis, like Brown in the 1990s (who could've been reading out the contents of 'Das Kapital' and still been trusted because of how his personality naturally came across).

So you think, policies/'positioning' aside, Kendall would be a better leader than Ed? In any case I'm not talking about going to the left - as I said the other day, I'm talking about just having the guts to stand up and challenge the Conservatives on the key arguments and the central premises (that the deficit is the big issue, that the poor need to be 'incentivised', that it's 'anti-aspiration' to make the rich pay more, that it's Communist to say that businesses have a responsibility to society rather than just maximising their profits) and try to change people's minds, rather than hide in a corner and hope public opinion changes on its own, or that they can just sneak into government and then quietly implement the right policies there.

Sorry, but this was always the argument you used for why Miliband was not challenging the Tories on the big issues. If it didn't work then, why would it work now? The approach of trying to sneak back into government by stealth, without taking the risk of standing up and making a left-wing case even in the teeth of whining from the media, has surely been tested to destruction now. Public opinion doesn't exist in a vacuum, it's influenced by the arguments that politicians make. 5 years ago, the Tories would never have dared cutting pay for the low-paid - that they have is just testament to how timid Labour have been and how much they've allowed the Tories to move the debate so far to the right. Labour continuing to not challenge them will give them licence to move even further to the right, AND will mean they don't win - if people think the big issues of the day are right-wing ones (cutting the deficit, making the economy "competitive"), then they will inevitably turn to the market leaders Tories for the answers, regardless of how much Labour parrots what the focus groups say.

But why would the same strategy from the last parliament get a different result this time? They're going to allow the Tories to set the terms of debate, yet again. There's no way out for them until they start challenging the central arguments that the deficit is the big overriding issue, and that the super-rich and big businesses aren't pulling their weight.

http://www.politics.co.uk/blogs/2015/07/08...the-working-poo

Indeed - that prat of a shadow chancellor whose name escapes me is already touring the studios saying how much he agrees with everything in the budget. What exactly do Labour plan to spend the next 5 years talking about if they're too scared to depart from the Tory parameters on all economic/spending issues? The EU? :rofl: I'm sure that'll get the swing voters flocking back to them. They haven't learnt a thing from the last parliament.

Rachel Reeves (apparently Burnham's choice for shadow chancellor) doing her best to torpedo Andy's chances by spouting this Tory nonsense about surpluses and welfare caps: http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2015/...nister-must-act

http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/politics/pol...r-2015052298524

That's probably a bit of a factor, but people's views on the actual issues tend to be different round here. When I was canvassing in the Wirral a few years ago, LOADS of people were saying how upset they were about welfare cuts in particular (and how they wished Labour would oppose them more strongly) -- with how consistently the polls say that the nation as a whole is in favour of welfare cuts, I think now that Merseyside is the exception. Which leads me to believe it's been caused by the local politicians constantly from the 1980s onwards making the argument that poor people often can't be blamed for their predicament and that rich people have a responsibility to help much more than they do since they never would have got anywhere if "society" hadn't helped them get where they were -- arguments which have gradually gained ground as they were shared with friends, family, etc. It's not even really about being more "left-wing" as such, it's just about having the courage of your convictions to make the fundamental arguments, and keep making them over and over again even if you get some resistance at first (something Miliband and Balls were dismal at). I imagine there was a similar process in Scotland, until the big reversal over the last year.

I agree with that, and think the hard-lefties who say they don't want impure Tory voters to vote Labour are ridiculous - but it's the Progress wing who are making the mistake of thinking all Tory voters have signed up chapter-and-verse to Tory policies, by advocating Labour move almost wholesale over to the Tory position on most policies. Merseyside is a great example of what can happen, even in very middle-class and white areas, if the local Labour party makes a forceful, coherent argument against right-wing nostrums. (Bill Esterson in particular is one of the more left-wing Labour MPs, and he got one of the biggest swings to Lab in the country, in a seat which had a 20% Tory majority in 1992.)

I interpreted it as them saying Corbyn couldn't possibly win the Labour election, but that they wanted to make their voice heard all the same. In any case, have you revised your opinion of me being a loony-leftie when comparing to a lot of the Corbynistas who've been dominating Twitter in recent weeks? :angel:

Yes, it's weird how tactically un-astute the whole campaign is. I can only assume they severely mis-read the mood of Labour members and thought victory would be in the bag for her so they could afford to say whatever they liked -- maybe they swallowed the Rentoul/Hodges echo chamber nonsense that the grassroots were "Blairite" based on David Miliband narrowly winning with the membership in 2010 (ignoring the fact that the main reason he won was because people thought David would be seen as a PM so were willing to swallow compromises on policy in return for someone who was perceived as a guaranteed winner, whereas Kendall just doesn't have that going for her).

TBF, he's done well to last as long as he has, with his game being so physical. I remember even back in 2007-08, the commentators were saying he wouldn't have much longevity because his game always put so much pressure on his knees. I think he might have another French Open in him because he can win on clay even when way below his best, but his days of winning on the quicker surfaces are surely gone for good. ** I wonder if Heather Watson will even get 5 games against Serena tomorrow.

Harry Thompson ‏@HMThompson_ 1h1 hour ago After a few hours canvassing in what should be prime Kendall territory, I'm pretty much ready to predict this: Liz Kendall will come last Harry Thompson ‏@HMThompson_ 1h1 hour ago been thinking it for a while, but calling up a middle class area and having her come dead last confirms it in my mind!

Survey of Labour councillors Leadership 36% Andy Burnham 30% Yvette Cooper 19% Jeremy Corbyn 15% Liz Kendall Deputy 40% Tom Watson 27% Caroline Flint 18% Stella Creasy 8% Angela Eagle 7% Ben Bradshaw

No - in that Andrew Marr interview, when she was trying to sound "tough", she gave off all the gravitas of a supply teacher. Fairly or unfairly, I also think she comes across as pretty dim tbh - Dan Hodges aptly compared her to Sarah Palin. She does have a tendency like Palin to sound like she's memorised a few lines without really understanding what she's saying. (To be fair, Burnham would have much the same problems - although I think people would like him, and certainly wouldn't have any time for this laughable idea that he was "left-wing", I do wonder if people might think at the end of the day that he was too nice to be "tough" enough to be PM.)

Not really, she's just done what Miliband did: thrown out some woolly talk about how bad inequality is, without having the nerve to suggest anything that would combat it. But a strong challenge in the primaries might hopefully force her hand.

I agree Hillary will win the nomination, but I could see Sanders taking a few primariies. In the US, like everywhere, there's a feeling that the centre-left leaders need to grow some balls and finally take a tough stance on the super-rich and big businesses, rather than continue to endlessly give in to the Right.

Not really. Apparently even in Scotland, focus groups would be one minute castigating Labour for signing up to Tory cuts, then the next minute saying they didn't trust Labour with the economy. The competence problem has nothing at all to do with how much or little they talk about cuts, it's to do with the perception they messed things up last time, and the only way to remedy the competence problem is to correct that perception. (I also think there was an additional leadership thing where people thought Ed would be too weak to stand up to strong-willed people if demands were made of him, which is why the "Ed in Salmond's pocket" meme was so damaging -- and that's probably the one and only good argument for Yvette Cooper since she's the only one who seems "tough".) Straw-man alert!