Post by Lemon Bloody Cola on Sept 6, 2010 18:52:42 GMT
Well as my natural political home with the Lib Dems has all but gone up in smoke thanks to them committing hari-kari for perceived short term gain by entering into the coalition 
I suppose as a progressive it's time I started looking to the Labour party for an alternative to our current government.
What are you thoughts on the candidates for the leadership? Ed Miliband has slowly grown on me, though I don't think he's electable, maybe he seems especially vulnerable and ripe to being easy meat for the Tories and right wing media to me because a lot of his outer presentation reminds me of myself.. weird asymmetrical face, weak lisping voice, awkward geekiness
. Can a man with a lisp really be elected pm? It's so depressing that in the post Blair PR-politics era that's actually a serious concern...
This endears me to him and more importantly I like the stance he's taking away from New Labour values (that Tony Blair doesn't like him is also a BIG plus), and pushing things like the living wage. Not so sure about his "no head of a company should earn 20 times more than it's lowest paid employee" schtick though... nice idea, but seems a bit unrealistic, how would they implement it without semi-sovietisation? Or perhaps the people who clean the bogs at Old Trafford could expect one hell of a pay rise to level them up with Wayne Rooney. Also he was the only one of the candidates who showed support for Harriet Harman's idea to to enforce a 50/50 gender quota of the Labour shadow cabinet which might endear him to some of you, but worries me in the sense I fear he might be a bit left-authoritarian. ("blah blah you can't force equality on people artificially via legislation, doesn't work, I believe real change can only come though voluntary, organic change of attitudes"- Josh circa any debate on feminism on wolfboard ever)
David Miliband is so blah, he does have a statesmanly air about him but he's just a Tony Blair clone that went horribly wrong and came out as black eyed insect-demon. I don't get all the "he's so electable!" talk to.. I think he'll come across as a cold intellectual technocrat lacking in warmth to the casual voter especially compared to David Cameron who seems quite good at the very least faking "down to earth" accessible humanity.
Diane Abbott is the candidate I'd most like to go for a pint with, but I don't think she's a realistic possibility. She's been an MP since 1983 and has never even had a junior ministerial post, this lack of status in the party combined with her relatively far-left stance makes me think she wouldn't be able to command the support of the existing MPs, even if she miraculously won I think her reign would be short lived.
I'm not quite sure why everyone hates Ed Balls, but his "populist" stance on immigration rules him out for me from the get go.
It doesn't look like he has a chance of winning but I think Andy Burnham is the most electable of the bunch, he's a good orator, accessibly northern and good looking but he shares Balls' take on immigration.
So I say, Ed.. though I may live to regret it. My Mum's a member of Unison so she got to vote, they also sent her a leaflet helpfully telling her who to vote for (she ignored them and put Abbott as her first pref)
I suppose as a progressive it's time I started looking to the Labour party for an alternative to our current government. What are you thoughts on the candidates for the leadership? Ed Miliband has slowly grown on me, though I don't think he's electable, maybe he seems especially vulnerable and ripe to being easy meat for the Tories and right wing media to me because a lot of his outer presentation reminds me of myself.. weird asymmetrical face, weak lisping voice, awkward geekiness
. Can a man with a lisp really be elected pm? It's so depressing that in the post Blair PR-politics era that's actually a serious concern...This endears me to him and more importantly I like the stance he's taking away from New Labour values (that Tony Blair doesn't like him is also a BIG plus), and pushing things like the living wage. Not so sure about his "no head of a company should earn 20 times more than it's lowest paid employee" schtick though... nice idea, but seems a bit unrealistic, how would they implement it without semi-sovietisation? Or perhaps the people who clean the bogs at Old Trafford could expect one hell of a pay rise to level them up with Wayne Rooney
. Also he was the only one of the candidates who showed support for Harriet Harman's idea to to enforce a 50/50 gender quota of the Labour shadow cabinet which might endear him to some of you, but worries me in the sense I fear he might be a bit left-authoritarian. ("blah blah you can't force equality on people artificially via legislation, doesn't work, I believe real change can only come though voluntary, organic change of attitudes"- Josh circa any debate on feminism on wolfboard ever)David Miliband is so blah, he does have a statesmanly air about him but he's just a Tony Blair clone that went horribly wrong and came out as black eyed insect-demon. I don't get all the "he's so electable!" talk to.. I think he'll come across as a cold intellectual technocrat lacking in warmth to the casual voter especially compared to David Cameron who seems quite good at the very least faking "down to earth" accessible humanity.
Diane Abbott is the candidate I'd most like to go for a pint with, but I don't think she's a realistic possibility. She's been an MP since 1983 and has never even had a junior ministerial post, this lack of status in the party combined with her relatively far-left stance makes me think she wouldn't be able to command the support of the existing MPs, even if she miraculously won I think her reign would be short lived.
I'm not quite sure why everyone hates Ed Balls, but his "populist" stance on immigration rules him out for me from the get go.
It doesn't look like he has a chance of winning but I think Andy Burnham is the most electable of the bunch, he's a good orator, accessibly northern and good looking but he shares Balls' take on immigration.
So I say, Ed.. though I may live to regret it. My Mum's a member of Unison so she got to vote, they also sent her a leaflet helpfully telling her who to vote for (she ignored them and put Abbott as her first pref)
