Remember when Boris told Starmer to admit he wanted to cancel Xmas?

[Thomas]

quite like this article on starmer and it sums up him and his parties problems for me..

Keir Starmer is Labour's Iain Duncan Smith

Quiet men in their party's comfort zone on Europe don't have a habit of winning.


A party riven over Europe, whose last electoral collapse was overseen by a leader from the 'wrong side' of that debate. The victorious candidate represents the position of the membership and the parliamentary party, but not the country at large. Happy with their choice, who's run a rearguard action against the outgoing leader, the party membership see better days ahead.

His leadership launches in the middle of a pandemic, and he struggles to gain attention, traction, or the poll bounce that new leaders hope for. It could be Keir Starmer, and COVID-19. Or it could be Iain Duncan Smith and Foot and Mouth disease.

I'm quite sure that those happy that the Labour party's leadership is no longer in the hands of the left, will disagree. As will those happy to have a leader who's always been a Remainer.

But it's worth remembering how the Iain Duncan Smith leadership went. He was an understated politician. Like Starmer. He was very much in the party's comfort zone. Like Starmer. The maxim that divided parties lose elections was a significant factor in the election of Duncan Smith. As it was for Starmer.

The Parliamentary Labour Party can now back their leader at Prime Minister's Questions. The Labour HQ can focus their efforts on winning elections, rather than finding other priorities.

But there's a more profound similarity. For the Tory electorate choosing Duncan Smith was putting the key issues of the day at the heart of their party's appeal: Labour were popular in 2001 on almost all issues, except for Europe. The salience of the European issue was, of course, the problem. It wasn't – at that time – important for the electorate.

Iain Duncan Smith was not a charismatic leader. His leadership came to an end with a Conservative Party Conference speech in which he tried to turn this to his advantage. 'Do not underestimate the determination of a quiet man' was his line. At the following Prime Minister's Questions, he was met by Labour MPs shushing the chamber for his question. He was removed by party grandees weeks later.

Keir Starmer makes a similar appeal. He is serious, unshowy and competent. But his position on the key issues will sabotage him. The commitment to Remain that won him the leadership looks exactly like the Tory obsession with Europe in the early 2000s to many of the voters he needs to win back.

He might be comfortable for those who longed to have the leadership back from the left of the party. He may play well with Remainers. But those aren't the voters he needs to persuade.

Most significantly he has misdiagnosed the problem. Labour can never again win by appearing credible to the swing Labour-Tory voters who they won in the 1997 election. This strategy depended on the rock-solid support of Labour voters in the seats lost in 2019. You can only tack to the centre if your core vote won't desert you.

Labour's strategy needs to be one of building broad social alliances on issues where the Tories can't win. Starmer's approach is to eschew those movements for media approval. And that media approval is fickle and almost inevitable to vanish before the next election, just as it did for Ed Miliband before the 2015 election. The media swallowed the Tory line that a Miliband government would lead to 'chaos'.

And it's simply not possible to pursue both a movement approach and the media-oriented elite strategy Starmer is pursuing. The media are jealous partners and won't countenance the development of a social movement – which is why Robert Peston and Laura Kuenssberg were so keen to report an unverified claim that a Labour activist had 'punched a Tory advisor' in the December 2019 election. It turned out that this claim was false. But it fitted their narrative that having activists is but one step away from street violence.

https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/opendemocracyuk/keir-starmer-labours-iain-duncan-smith/

[Thomas]

Your news feed is somewhat spun from the actual interview. Bojo was doing his usual bluster with no substance.

what i want to see is starmer getting a grilling from the media  , instead of hiding away in the background and hoping events do all the work for him.

I keep asking this to you labour supporters time and again , but whats starmers view on world and national events , and how would he tackle the issues at hand?

He wont get elected on a manifesto of silence pappy , and once again , you will be stuck wae the tories wont you?

[Borchester]

Plus all he has to do is nothing and let Bojo-The-Clown carrying on digging an ever deeper hole. (Which he did very effectively on the Andrew Marr show this morning.)

Maybe we were watching different shows Pappy. Andy Marr didn't roll over and ask Boris to tickle his tum, but he came close.

Bojo just bumbled away happily while Andy just seem to huddle in the corner

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-hV3TEc_wk4

[papasmurf]

My news feed says Marr was doing the usual BBC moaning about leaving the EU and attempting to set traps asking what ifs about whats not . Johnson at the end told him to cheer up and not be so downbeat about everything .

Just saying

Your news feed is somewhat spun from the actual interview. Bojo was doing his usual bluster with no substance.

[Streetwalker]

Plus all he has to do is nothing and let Bojo-The-Clown carrying on digging an ever deeper hole. (Which he did very effectively on the Andrew Marr show this morning.)

My news feed says Marr was doing the usual BBC moaning about leaving the EU and attempting to set traps asking what ifs about whats not . Johnson at the end told him to cheer up and not be so downbeat about everything .

Just saying

[Thomas]

I#ll take your word for that, I have better things to do on a Sunday Morning than listen to that arse.... well, either of them actually...

completely agree. Feckin andrew marr  , another tosspost never mind johnson or starmer.

[johnofgwent]

Plus all he has to do is nothing and let Bojo-The-Clown carrying on digging an ever deeper hole. (Which he did very effectively on the Andrew Marr show this morning.)

I#ll take your word for that, I have better things to do on a Sunday Morning than listen to that arse.... well, either of them actually...

[Thomas]

Plus all he has to do is nothing and let Bojo-The-Clown carrying on digging an ever deeper hole. (Which he did very effectively on the Andrew Marr show this morning.)

labour have been saying the same or similar since 2010.

I remember you saying the same about cameron and osbourne digging a hole and how labour only had to sit back , and milliband would walk into power.

Then 2015  happened. Labours big plan.......they know they are crap , and have nothing to offer the electorate, but if they sit back long enough , someone  else will do their dirty work and put them in power.

Not much of a manifesto is it?The poor , the poor , we invented the nhs once upon a time , and the tories are bad.?

I dont think much of your predictions pappy , about the only forum member i know of who has a worse record than you is quack quack.

[papasmurf]

Be fair now, his political masters in the Knesset have not exactly been forthcoming in telling him what to say ....

Plus all he has to do is nothing and let Bojo-The-Clown carrying on digging an ever deeper hole. (Which he did very effectively on the Andrew Marr show this morning.)

[johnofgwent]

The most amsuing thing about the whole covid 19 scenario when discussing uk politics is how utterly totally useless keir starmer has been throughout the whole process. He has been practically invisible and silent on this issue ( and many others of course as i have pointed out relentlessly) and while the tories have stumbled from one crises to the next , starmer has largely failed to oppose them , which is his job , while having the fence stuck so far up his arse he has been completely immobile.

Be fair now, his political masters in the Knesset have not exactly been forthcoming in telling him what to say ....

[Nick]

Perfect.

[Thomas]

Take it from me, don't waste too much time trying to crack the code - there isn't one!!!

quackers your quackers.

Why you talking to a guy who is banned ?

I dont fink you could" quack "dynos code either.

Stick to writing dear diary posts and gazing into your crystal ball thats never correct.

[HDQQ]

Trolling doesn't work if none of it's true I'm afraid.

As for your other jibber jabber I dunno what it's supposed to mean, but even if I knew what you were talking about it'd still be tedious..   

Merry xmas hen, try to cheer up a bit.   

Take it from me, don't waste too much time trying to crack the code - there isn't one!!! 

[Thomas]

If immigrants swamp the country like some posters oversize pics swamp the forum, there'll be tough times ahead...

Who woke the snowflake up?

[patman post]

Not jist that , he wants sir keir to give free passage to every migrant in a dinghy , and open the uk back up for mass immigration when labour are back in power.

Thank feck for priti patel the voice of common sense and reason!

You can't trust labour with the economy nor mass uncontrolled immigration from the worlds cesppits.

If immigrants swamp the country like some posters oversize pics swamp the forum, there'll be tough times ahead...