Friday, July 1, 2016

Labour coup attempt : have we just seen the most ludicrous misrepresentation of an opinion poll in history?

There's a new YouGov poll of Labour members which contains relatively good news for Jeremy Corbyn, even if it suggests he's no longer as wildly popular as he was last summer.  It shows that he has a healthy lead in any head-to-head leadership contest against Angela Eagle, Tom Watson or Dan Jarvis.  Perhaps surprisingly, Eagle does best of the three, but still loses by 50% to 40% - and remember that's only among full party members.  Registered supporters also have an equal say in the election, and they're probably even more likely to vote for Corbyn.

By a narrow majority (51% to 44%), members say that Corbyn should not resign.  That's only a qualified endorsement, because roughly one-fifth of the people who say he should stay also think he should step down at some point before the next general election.  But words have meanings, and the simple fact is that a majority of members don't want him to resign now - which is exactly what the coup plotters are demanding he must do.

So you might think it would take a special kind of talent to present this poll as somehow being a disaster for Corbyn, but our old friend Mike "can't be arsed" Smithson is up to the task.  Just as Lucy Powell did on Twitter last night, Smithson cynically ignores the 10% of the sample who want Corbyn to remain in post on a time-limited basis, and claims that there is a 44% to 41% plurality who want him to resign now.  There isn't.  There just isn't.  To repeat : members oppose his resignation by 51% to 44%.  

If Corbyn turns out to be "doomed" as Smithson risibly claims, it'll only be because he's fallen for a gigantic con-trick which Smithson has now made himself an active part of.  As this poll unambiguously shows, it's unlikely the Westminster/Bedford elite will be able to displace Corbyn by democratic means, so their only hope is to use psychological techniques to convince him that his very healthy position somehow looks "increasingly untenable" (never forget the "increasingly", folks).  If his inner circle can help him keep a proper sense of perspective and he successfully stands for re-election, where do the conspirators go from there?  They can't pull this stunt every year, so they'd either have to unite behind him or leave the party.  Either way, Corbyn would have established complete authority over whatever remains of official Labour.  It really all depends on whether he can hold his nerve - and I don't know the answer to that.

33 comments:

  1. I'll make a simple point... a leader who has any hopes of governing effectively should have a negligible number of people who want them to resign, not approaching half of the party's members.

    I'd also point out that in this dynamic climate that the poll started 4 days ago and I'd imagine the resolve of many has since been broken.

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    1. There's no point pretending this is an ordinary situation - this poll was conducted during a destabilisation campaign. What matters is whether the other half of members would broadly accept Corbyn as leader if he is democratically re-elected, and it seems likely that they would. The MPs are another matter, but that's up to them.

      Incidentally, if Corbyn is deposed by undemocratic means, I suspect his successor will have far, far greater difficulty uniting the membership behind them. The bitterness towards that person will be huge (unless a continuity Corbyn candidate can somehow emerge - I suspect John McDonnell might win if he can get enough nominations to make the ballot paper, which he probably can't).

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    2. Blairites of Mass DestructionJuly 1, 2016 at 7:47 PM

      "I'd imagine the resolve of many has since been broken."

      Indeed it has, though sadly for the Blairite ChickenCoup it is self-evidently the resolve of the hilariously inept plotters leadership hopefulls/sacrificial lambs like Eagle.

      I can think of no more damning indictment of their resolve that after day after day after day of their most cretinous cheerleaders promising with ever increasing desparation that today was finally the day when Eagle or whoever else would stand and actually find the balls to challenge Corbyn.

      Eagle hasn't nor has anyone else. So they are reduced to putting some ludicrously out of touch talking heads on SKY/BBC News, as well as some pitifully substanceless attack pieces from various useful idiots, who seem to think increasingly shrill assertion is a compelling reason to ditch Democratic values.

      Even the laughably biased presenters are getting tired of it as I saw an amusing exchange where a clearly bored and irritated SKY presenter rounded on one of the ChickenCoup 'worthies' and just snapped "Yes, why don't you just put up or shut up?" LOL

      This wasn't in the plan, they had been assured (albeit by imbeciles and liars like Dan Hodges, "no-brainer" Mcternan, Hothersall etc.) that no, no, no today was DEFINITELY the day when it would all fall into place and Corbyn would crumble or the Eagle would land.

      Just like last weekend when Corbyn's nemesis and downfall would unquestionably arrive on Monday morning with the Eagle soaring to the Blairites rescue.

      So it's next Monday AGAIN now is it? Yeeeeeah, I think Corbyn and the mass influx of Labour members might just have rumbled you well and truly by now.

      Let's face the facts though, how could they not?


      The Blarite ChickenCoup has been gloriously incompetent and inept at every single stage.

      It has all the subtlety of Murdoch and Dacre shrieking headline combined with the forward planning and substance of a tory Brexit plan.

      Why on earth would Corbyn give it up now?

      Sure, it's very likely there will be yet more jawdroppingly obvious smears and dirty tricks probably already being furiously scribbled by Blairs P.R. firm and his MP lackeys as we speak. To be splashed across whatever 'Newspaper/tabloid' feels it has nothing left to lose by increasing the contempt it will be held in by ordinary labour members.

      But the simple fact of the matter is the Labour party are not going to dump their democratic process to please petulant unprincpled MPs. The resolve from those actually in charge of that process has been amusingly solid in the face of the dirty tricks and hysteria.

      Nor have ANY of those screaming for Corbyns head actually been able to withstand stunningly simple questions like "Show me the facts?" Show me the % and the comparison with other leaders to support your assertions even WITH the somewhat massive handicap of the Blairite plotters having undermined Corbyn since Day 1.

      Let them finally find a challenger. I have no doubt what the result will be after this colosally inept attempt at a coup. That ineptness is also all the proof in the world that those behind and those MPs most gung-ho for it couldn't find their own arse with a flashlight, never mind offer serious opposition to the tories.

      Having a leadership contest or the cowardly MPs still screaming for Corbyn to go in the week of Chilcot would be the absolute epitome of Blairite stupidity, so please let it be so.

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  2. The problem is FPTP. Both wings of the party need to unite to win under the current electoral system. If we had PR they could split like we see in Europe.

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    1. Blairites of Mass DestructionJuly 1, 2016 at 11:27 PM

      I can tell you one person who will definitely be pushing hard for a 'New New Labour Party'* to slink off to.

      ---------------------------------------------------

      Éoin ‏@LabourEoin ·

      If you're wondering why the Labour Plotters have been stunned into total silence it is because this has been exposed


      Angela Eagle's colleagues prepared for leadership challenge two days before she resigned from shadow cabinet

      http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/jeremy-corbyn-angela-eagle-labour-leadership-prepared-for-challenge-two-days-before-she-resigned-a7113071.html

      ---------------------------------------------------

      Oh those crocodile tears! LOL

      Can you imagine just how fast this would have been passed around Labour MPs?

      There are around say 80 or so Labour MPs who turned against Corbyn that unquestionably only did so because of a herd mentality. They didn't look too closely at the details of those behind the ChickenCoup or know the full extent of it's planning.

      Well ye ken noo!

      So they are hardly going to be so gung-ho now, to say the least.

      In fact the evidence is there for all too see. The latest spin from the ChickenCoup Blairites is primarily damage control. Bemoaning the fact the Labour members and a huge amount of Labour voters are absolutely furious with the ChickenCoup plotters. They're actually trying to paint it as 'stop bullying MPs!!' Absurd though that notion clearly is after their shocking bullying behaviour towards Corbyn.

      The sheer volume of traffic Labour MPs will now have from members and voters over this is something they can hardly ignore for much longer.

      They know exactly what it means. Believe it.

      Their only chance for this incompetent idiocy to work was for it to be quick and relatively painless before too many people noticed.

      It's been the precise opposite of that and they are going to have to face their own members and voters long after the Blairites and plotters have scurried off to lucrative jobs elsewhere.

      "I'd imagine the resolve of many has since been broken."

      As I said before, yer not wrong there.

      Éoin ‏@LabourEoin · 5 hours ago

      Latest indication now is all 3 prospective challengers against Corbyn have chickened out. This will forever be remembered as #ChickenCoup


      So all the odious Blairites and plotters have left is to desperately keep shrieking - hope the tory press and the rest of the rabidly hostile media keep up the feeble dirty tricks an incompetent smears - and hope to god the huge bulk of the naïve Labour MPs bounced into opposing Corbyn somehow don't notice they are being led of a cliff by cowardly inept fools.


      Every hour that passes is an hour closer to Chilcot.


      * Some of Blair's Lawyer chums are actually in the midst of legal exploring the possibility of them grabbing the Labour name as a political brand to do as they please. (New party in other words and their lifeboat to fuck off to) NOT a joke! We can scarcely grasp the depth of their power-mad depravity and greed. Though the ChickenCoup and Iraq should really have shown us by now.

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    2. Blairites of Mass DestructionJuly 2, 2016 at 9:21 AM

      The ChickenCoup rolls on/fizzles out with yet more hilarity.

      "Owen Smith, who was shadow work and pensions secretary until his resignation last week, is a more likely challenger to Jeremy Corbyn than Angela Eagle, according to a former senior member of the shadow cabinet."

      More likely you say? Steady on chaps, let's not get too definitive yet before booting the Eagle into the dustbin of history.

      So we must prepare ourselves for the imminent leadership challenge from.. whatshisname?

      Good lord! Then maybe the ChickenCoup isn't totally filled with the kind of spineless, gutless, anti-democratic, caree..

      "Those MPs who oppose Mr Corbyn's leadership say they are in no hurry to give him and his team the contest they want so it can divert attention from "their crisis".

      ROFL!!

      Of course not.

      What a shower of incompetent cowardly twats.

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  3. The labour party are a disgrace. This looks to me to be an attempt to move him before the Chilcot report comes out. I.e. Before they are all found out for being complicit in war crimes.

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    1. Not sure why everyone's suddenly so optimistic about Chilcot. If he says the invasion was a war crime, I'll give you a billion pounds. (Okay, euros - don't want to seem tight.)

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    2. Blairites of Mass DestructionJuly 1, 2016 at 8:12 PM

      It's the fact of Chilcot Keaton, not just what it contains.

      It has taken SO fucking long that any attempts at a Hutton whitewash would rightly be met with utter fury.

      Not least from the relatives of those who died in Blair's catastrophic folly who have been kept waiting so shamefully by the Blairite attempts to frustrate it at every turn.

      It will be a focal point and right now that is all that is needed.

      It will cause the most spineless Blairites to melt way or embark on some suicidal revisionism that will well and truly seal their fate in the eyes of the public.

      History has not proven them right, quite the opposite.
      That cannot be spun away with some expensive PR any more than the facts of no WMD.

      As for War Crimes, again, there's been a great deal of ChickenCoup spin that Corbyn will demand Blair's incarceration which is, to be frank, pretty fanciful stuff.

      People simply do not want another Iraq Catastrophe. Ever. That by itself will ensure that those who are fighting Blair's corner will find next week far more desperate and humiliating than merely shrieking themselves hoarse to try and bully Corbyn out.

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  4. Is that sad racist Smithson not just trying to manipulate the betting markets to his advantage again?

    He does have previous.

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  5. I think the plotters should just leave the Labour Party and join their soul mates in the Tory Party as they are all rabid Tories anyway.

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  6. Yeah let's wait until Chilcott and see how many of the plotters are left standing.

    Good old Prescott came out for Corbyn. Good man!

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    1. Glasgow Working Class 2July 1, 2016 at 9:09 PM

      Prescott joined the Blair project because being a man who wants to be in power he knew it was the right move....He is now a Lord.

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    2. Glasgow Working Class 2July 1, 2016 at 11:25 PM

      The poster above is on release for a while but will get better.

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    3. The poster above is a far-right racist troll from EnglandJuly 1, 2016 at 11:37 PM

      Here is the proof. They wrote this. "Jock land the high dependency unit in the EU"

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    4. Glasgow Working Class 2July 2, 2016 at 12:16 AM

      And you are an inmate in the English dependency unit and visa via the EU subsidy rebate.. No Shame Man. Just a crawling Joke.

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    5. The poster above is a far-right racist troll from EnglandJuly 2, 2016 at 12:25 AM

      ^

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    6. If you are not a Troll then you are a Commie coward at least have the genitalia to publish your name.

      Delete
    7. The troll is no Commie. All his ravings are right-wing and authoritarian. No doubt he'll be voting for Theresa May.

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  7. I assume that for a poll like that, the pollsters contact people they know to be members of the party already. That means that people like the few of my friends who've joined the party this week specifically to back Corbyn won't have been counted. As you pointed out, the £3 registered supporters and the unions aren't factored in either. If Corbyn can hold his nerve for another week or two, he'll stay in post. He's been massively undermined though, and his whips will have a hell of a job trying to get anything like a party line. The Labour Party is very possibly on its last legs now and it's no-one's fault but these idiot plotters. I hope Corbyn's last act as party leader is to get mandatory re-selection in place before the next election. That'll show these imbeciles who's really in charge of the "people's party." Yeah, the people.

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  8. The Blairite Goon ShowJuly 1, 2016 at 10:13 PM

    Labour councillors’ plot to unseat Corbyn backfires spectacularly

    http://www.thecanary.co/2016/07/01/labour-councillors-plot-unseat-corbyn-backfires-spectacularly-video/

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  9. Bumblefuck tories for unityJuly 2, 2016 at 12:17 AM

    While we are on the subject of incompetent fools who fear democracy..

    It would appear that the Cameroons are starting to get a touch wobbly with the more excitable of them pushing hard for a coronation of Hideaway May.

    No doubt it's starting to penetrate even their thick skulls that May's support of Remain might not be going down to well with those who do not and expected Brexit to be carried out fairly soon and not punted forever into the future.

    So far, so Cameroon. For sure, but the touch of absolute Genius that the Cameroons always bring to things was having KEN CLARKE angrily demanding that poor little Gove drop out immediately to ensure a swift coronation of May and no more of this Brexit talk and 'divisiveness'.

    As a measure for ensuring unity and reassuring Brexiters over May's 'trustworthiness' on the issue, that ranks alongside having May don a European Flag while embracing Juncker.


    Well played twits, well played indeed. LOL

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  10. The dining rooms of the Palace of Westminster must be running short of cutlery.

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  11. Bumblefuck tories for unityJuly 2, 2016 at 7:30 AM

    Remember kids, Hideaway May is most definitely not the continuity Cameron candidate.

    Which is why the Cameroons have been the most conspicuous in backing her to the hilt from the off. LOL

    It's hilarious watching the biggest westminster bubble fools trying to deny the blindingly obvious. There's been no shortage of it this week and it's not going to stop for years.

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  12. omnishambles OsborneJuly 2, 2016 at 8:09 AM

    Stewart Wood ‏@StewartWood · 20h

    Osborne's Deficit Plan

    2010: Surplus by 2015
    2011: Surplus by 2017
    2013: Surplus by 2018
    2015: Surplus by 2020
    Today: Surplus plan shelved

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  13. Blairites of Mass DestructionJuly 2, 2016 at 9:54 AM

    Yup. The ChickenCoup certainly looks like it is dying out with a whimper.

    The Blairite plotters are now briefing that there will be nothing till after Chilcot.

    Even then they are being amusingly vague and talking of "possible" moves within Corbyn's new shadow Cabinet to try and persuade him to stand down. Didn't work the first time lads, won't work the second.

    After Chilcot the mad hysterical panic and rush of the ChickenCoup will have died down considerably, to say the least.

    Corbyn will still have to prove himself during Chilcot. However, I think he's on fairly safe ground there tbh

    While most the Blairite plotters will be making themselves very scarce indeed or fending off the avalanche of criticism they can expect for their head in the sand attitudes to the Iraq War and Blair's conduct during it.

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  14. Blairites of Mass DestructionJuly 2, 2016 at 10:01 AM

    Éoin‏@LabourEoin

    I suspect this is a programme that you will not want to miss. Monday, 8pm, Chanel 5. http://www.channel5.com/show/the-blair-rich-project …

    ------------------------------------------------

    I can just imagine some of the ChickenCoup plotters faces when they saw that scheduled.

    You might be on TV lads! Cheer up. :D

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  15. so! who's the alternative, Angela Eagle........do me a favour!

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  16. Glasgow Working Class 2July 2, 2016 at 11:17 AM

    I am an arsehole

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  17. May we all have enemies as competent as Jeremy Corbyn's.

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    1. Or indeed as competent as Jeremy Corbyn.

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  18. As a Left-Labour New Zealander who's trying to keep up with both the on-going Chicken Coup and latest UK polling trends in general, I often look at comments and links from Smithson and Tim Bale (my former Politics lecturer) and Matt Singh on Twitter (all of whom regularly link to each other).

    But I always know that I'll have to wade through all the banal Blairite (Bale) and Lib-Dem (Smithson) partisanship. They couldn't deal objectively with Corbyn if they were paid to. And that's one of the fascinating things about Corbyn's rise - the way it's shone such a harsh light on all the little ruthlessly-ambitious Westminster Courtiers and English Establishment bottom-feeders.

    I'll be setting out all the latest (post-EU Ref) poll data on Corbyn's leadership (polls of both the Labour "Selectorate" and Labour voters) on my blog in a few days time. Just collating it all now.

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