Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell has called on “all Labour members and anyone who cares about the future of our country” to join a Momentum demonstration to oppose far-right activist Tommy Robinson, who intends to lead a march in London on Sunday 9 December.
it doesn’t matter whether you voted leave or remain, Tommy Robinson doesn’t represent you
John McDonnell
McDonnell said Robinson and other far right figures “threaten the very fabric of our nation” and called on supporters to “stand firm against the poison Robinson is trying to inject into our politics”, arguing that “it doesn’t matter whether you voted leave or remain, Tommy Robinson doesn’t represent you”.
McDonnell said that “the working class of Britain have a proud history of beating the far right” and that “this history must continue”. He also called on the labour movement to be “front and centre” in opposing the far right.
The march, organised by Momentum and a coalition of partners including London Young Labour, Labour Against Racism and Fascism and the Stop Trump Coalition, is to take place in central London on 9 December. Momentum is also planning a social media campaign comprised of digital communications and a series of videos to mobilise members.
McDonnell said:
This march isn’t about Brexit, it’s about far right extremists dressing up in suits and pretending to be respectable.
They don’t care about communities who voted to leave, the towns that have been ravaged for decades by heartless globalisation and held back by Tory austerity. Only Labour has a plan to rebuild these communities, with more investment and decent jobs in every region across the country. These far right extremists only care about themselves.
The working class of Britain have a proud history of beating the far right. In Lewisham in the 1970s the National Front were outnumbered by nearly ten to one. At Cable Street, the local Jewish community and socialists from across Britain stood firm against Oswald Mosley’s blackshirts.
This history must continue. A newly energised, well funded network of hate is emerging, from Steve Bannon in the US to the former EDL leader Tommy Robinson at home, and it threatens the very fabric of our nation. The labour movement must be front and centre in opposing them, and I’m glad that Momentum are leading the way.
It doesn’t matter whether you voted leave or remain, Tommy Robinson doesn’t represent you. I call on all Labour members and anyone who cares about the future of our country to join the demonstration on 9 December and stand firm against the poison Robinson is trying to inject into our politics.”
Momentum spokesperson Becky Boumelha said:
Tommy Robinson is trying to position himself as the leader of the leave voters by pretending to care about Brexit. This is a lie, and all he seeks to do is legitimise himself and a politics of fear and division which blames refugees, migrants and Muslims for theproblems in our society.
Tommy Robinson doesn’t have the answers, and neither do his friends in the Tory party who have presided over the catastrophic ideological destruction of our country.
We need a future of investment in our communities alongside access to decent healthcare, education and housing. The first step is to stand together against right wing extremists who look to destroy our country.
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McDonnell is absolutely correct in saying that :
“This march isn’t about Brexit, it’s about far right extremists dressing up in suits and pretending to be respectable.”
… but it is a timely reminder of where Brexit originally comes from – the far right in the ‘respectable’ guise of the foreign/non-dom owned media plutocrats.
There are worse things than the EU.
So would you argue that Tony Benn, a consistent critic of the neo-liberal, anti-democratic EU was unaware of the dangers of fascism?
The reality is that the EU is a breeding ground for far right politics.
Absolutely right, bevin.
By ending democracy in favour of the interests of the economic elite, the EU has effectively become the recruiting sergeant for the extreme right.
To support the EU is essentially to support the ascendancy of the extreme right in Europe.
Danny – Could you please justify and evidence your statement that the EU has ended democracy?
It may also be helpful if you could let us all know which state best represents your version of the democratic ideal.
It’s true that the present management of the EU is neoliberal and antidemocratic but so is the present UK management.
Should we leave the UK as well as the EU? To go where exactly?
The whole world is run on neoliberal principles (if you can call the self-centred greed of an infant ‘principle’) for the benefit of the rich.
The neo’s currently hold the EU and everywhere else but from where I stand Brexit is an ignominious retreat from a battle that needs fighting.
The left must recognise and embrace the global nature of the fight because the rich understand it all too well.
If everywhere we erupted as in Paris the rich would fill their panties at the sudden realisation they have nowhere to run and that they exist only by our leave.
One more time and they’d beg us to allow them to finance the building of our new world.
“So would you argue that Tony Benn, a consistent critic of the neo-liberal, anti-democratic EU was unaware of the dangers of fascism?”
No. I’m sitting here with the 9 volumes of Benn’s diaries on the shelves. But he wasn’t an infallible guru – and had some touching sentimental Victorian attitudes to stuff like ‘sovereignty’ and the integrity of the HoC.
Simply – he had a one-eyed view. He’s also dead, and didn’t even convince his son :-).
“The reality is that the EU is a breeding ground for far right politics.”
Sorry – but that sounds like a pretty far-fetched distortion to fit a preconception. There are extreme right movements in Europe, undoubtedly, and our domestic senile versions can seem more cuddly. But wider Europe also has much more knowledge in the genes of what fascism can do compared to the distanced experience of the UK. And our purported ally, the US, is much closer to incipient fascism than most European states.
The simple fact is that a movement against Ayn Rand-type marketisation (‘neoliberal’ has become a bit over-used) won’t be tackled by a mid-Atlantic, impoverished floater (double entendre intended). It needs close alliances.
DavidMcN. You have consistently acknowledged the EU problem – but whilst the rich may fill their panties, it isn’t necessarily the left that those protesters incline to and there’s the rub. Liked your “stroppy” comments on earlier thread and offered you a quick reply BTW.
@SteveH
“Danny – Could you please justify and evidence your statement that the EU has ended democracy?”
Well, for the first time in its history it has rejected the budget of the democratically elected government of one of its members – Italy. Had Syriza in Greece had the balls to present a budget in defiance of the Troika, no doubt it would have done this earlier. It is very difficult indeed to regard the rejection of a sovereign nation’s democratic right to decide its own economic agenda as a hammer blow for democracy, but presumably, that’s exactly how you see it.
Forthestate 08/12/2018 at 4:34
All which may have had some relevance if Italy hadn’t had democratic input into the creation and or acceptance of these rules.
I doubt very much that many Italians had any democratic input into an arrangement that annuls their democratic right to set their own budget, and I doubt anyone looking at the issue in good faith thinks so either.
What the EU is looking to impose on Italy, in order to deal with what is, yet again, a banking crisis (the same banking crisis permeating European banks since the financial collapse), is, of course, increased austerity, in the now familiar move of socialising private losses.
And quite incidentally, I’ve noticed that prior to such a move, public opinion is usually mollified with a few thinly failed racial slurs repeated in the msm which imply that the people do actually bear most of the blame for the situation – hence the Spanish were lazy, the Irish feckless, and the Greeks irresponsible (didn’t pay their taxes); it’ll be interesting to see what the Italians come in for.
Forthestate 08/12/2018 at 10:43 am · ·
I’m sorry but this is self evidently untrue. The Italians elected their MEPs and their elected government appointed their EU Commissioners. Obviously they also elected their own government in the knowledge that they would present an illegal budget.
“Thinly veiled”
“The Italians elected their MEPs and their elected government appointed their EU Commissioners.”
No, the Council of Ministers, itself a legislative body comprised of the finance ministers of member states, appoints the EU commissioners, the main legislative body, whose appointment is then rubber stamped by MEPs. No single commissioner can be removed from their post by the EP, so they are therefore not individually accountable to Parliament, although the Commission can be dismissed in its entirety.
And there you have it. EU Commissioners are not directly elected by the people, the sole source of legitimacy in any liberal democracy. The legislature has no legitimacy. I’m afraid it’s as simple as that, although the well documented ‘democratic deficit’ within the EU defines a great deal more that is problematic with regard to democracy and the EU.
Forthestate 08/12/2018 at 11:22
I refer you to my answer below
SteveH 08/12/2018 at 11:45 am ·
https://skwawkbox.org/2018/12/07/mcdonnell-rallies-labour-supporters-to-oppose-robinson-march/#comment-88803
…….but not many.
In your opinion which state or transnational organisation is better.
@ SteveH
Any liberal democracy. A liberal democracy must include a legislature that is composed of members of parliament who have been directly elected by the people, since that is its only source of legitimacy.
Forthestate 08/12/2018 at 7:15
Come-on, don’t be a wimp. Give a straight answer to a straight question.
Have the courage of your own convictions and be specific. Would you for instance include the UK government in your list of liberal democracies
In comparison with the EU, which was your original question, certainly. Every member of the legislature was directly elected by the people. Hope that’s courageous and specific enough for you.
By the by, can we drop ALL name calling, and have a grown up discussion? One that respects the other person? Had enough of snideness, insult and abuse to last a lifetime. Fine if you can’t manage it. We’ll end it now.
Forthestate 08/12/2018 at 10:51 am · ·
This is also self evidently untrue. The following Ministers of State were not directly elected.
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon
Minister of State for the Commonwealth and the UN at the Foreign & Commonwealth Office
Lord Callanan
Minister of State
Lord Keen of Elie QC
HM Advocate General for Scotland and MoJ spokesperson for the Lords
Lord O’Shaughnessy
Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Health (Lords)
Lord Henley
Parliamentary Under Secretary of State
In theory under our system of ‘democracy’ the PM could be an un-elected member of the House of Lords. No democratic system is perfect and it could be argued that ours is less so than many others due to us using FPTP rather than PR.
My apologies, I hadn’t appreciated that calling you a wimp would have such a profound effect on your sense of well being. In future I will try to bear your sensitivities in mind.
True, there are some relatively minor anomalies. The entire legislature of the EU is comprised of officials who have not been elected by the only source of legitimate power in a liberal democracy – the people. I repeat, in comparison with the EU, the UK is a better liberal democracy, and for more reasons than this.
“I hadn’t appreciated that calling you a wimp would have such a profound effect on your sense of well being.” It really didn’t. That would take something profound. It’s just a very boring way to debate anything, unless you get off on it, of course.
Forthestate 08/12/2018 at 12:02 pm · ·
If you class un-elected PMs or Ministers of State as relatively minor then I suppose everything is hunky-dory
Pot calling kettle etc.
As you may recall I asked a specific question in response to another contributor and you decided to contribute by giving a non-answer this also makes for a very boring way to debate things.
Firstly, I can’t recall calling you any names, so I don’t know what you mean by pot and kettle. Secondly, I decided to respond because I assumed we were all here to comment, and there weren’t any rules about which comments we responded to. I’m sorry to have intruded. It won’t happen again.
Forthestate 08/12/2018 at 12:47 pm
You may recall that I posted – “Come-on, don’t be a wimp. Give a straight answer to a straight question.” that you, for reasons best known to yourself, decided to take as a direct insult. So in the same vain am I not allowed to join you in stretching credibility and take “unless you get off on it” as an insult. Admittedly neither of these really pass muster as an insult but it was you that started off the snowflake routine.
Of course you are just as entitled and welcome as anyone else to make a comment anywhere you like. I’m all for open and transparent discussion. The only reason I mentioned that you had responded with a non-answer to a question that I had asked of another contributor was for the context.
Please feel welcome to butt-in anytime you feel the urge.
ps “If you class un-elected PMs” This shibboleth is often repeated. The last time I looked May was elected as MP for Maidenhead. The fact that she was not elected to the post of PM is a separate issue. Unlike the EU Commissioners, she is an elected MP.
“or Ministers of State as relatively minor then I suppose everything is hunky-dory”. No, it is not hunky dory. It’s just that, with 95% of the legislature in this country directly elected by the people, as opposed to 0% of the Commission, it’s more hunky dory than the EU. Your original question was “In your opinion which state or transnational organisation is better.” I’ve made a genuine attempt to answer it, but I repeat, this won’t happen again, as it appears to have had a profound effect on your sense of well being.
Yes sometimes we find them stuck to our shoes
UKIP originated as the Anti-Federalist League, a single-issue Eurosceptic party established in London by the historian Alan Sked in 1991. It was renamed UKIP in 1993 but its growth remained slow. … In 1997, Sked was ousted by a faction led by Nigel Farage, who became the party’s preeminent figure
So Skwawkbox is messenger for Momentum.
Well thanks for the rather silly one liner. Do you have any evidence for your extraordinary statement or did the thought just pop into your head and for reasons best known to yourself you just felt compelled to share it.
Hadn’t noticed that Skwawkbox was overwhelmingly ‘Remain’ like Momentum.
Huh? Have you read any of the last twelve months of articles that mention Momentum?
Tommy Robinson! Come on now folks, it’s not even the little dickhead’s real name. He is a poorly educated former football thug. In Marxist terms a true member of the under- class.
Yaxley-Lennon is however, manipulated by far darker forces. It is the Steve Bannon’s of this world that are the real danger. They are the ones we need to expose, marginalise and humiliate.
I am sure that the Left will out-number and see off these fascists and their dark neo-liberal outriders.
Am I the only one who feels uncomfortable about naming the individual barbarian here whilst needing to confront this grotesque movement.
As the New Left Review argues (using the US economy as an example) Neo-Liberalism is in a structural crisis and perhaps this is why Far Right US billionaire barbarians are pouring millions into far right groups and individual barbarians around the world (including here) to try to divide diverse working people to rule.
But my concern is we seem to be being reactive and countering their actions when perhaps we need to be proactive and take control and set our agenda and unite diverse working people,
A great thinker once said “Fascism is the emergency committee of capital” (or now Neo-Liberal capital) and the Far Right Barbarians aim to divide and rule plus aid the rich which demonstrates they are political imbeciles!
We need to try to unite diverse working people in every country (we all have to sell our labour to live) with left wing democratic socialist ideas.
Yours in international solidarity!
“Neo-Liberalism is in a structural crisis and perhaps this is why Far Right US billionaire barbarians are pouring millions into far right groups”
The Koch brothers have been pouring billions into far right groups as long as I can remember.
Structural crisis? The same Koch brothers are quaking in their boots. 🙂
I think not! The New Left Review should be booked at the Windmill.
It is somewhat ironic that the apologist for the EU McDonnell is opposing fascism when the EU is turning fascist.
Your comment appears to be somewhat bizarre. Perhaps you could enlighten us all, what were the thought processes that led you to think this.
“the apologist for the EU McDonnell is opposing fascism when the EU is turning fascist.”
Oh dear, Barry – I know it’s possible to see patterns in clouds that express one’s imagination. But I think politics deserves a keener perception than two fantasies in one sentence.
This is a jumbled thread so I’m not even going to try placing this.
Paulo, why would we fear the far right being part of any protest – do you imagine they could match our numbers? Write a manifesto? Get elected?
As for claims I read here, a tiny few of which are “The Euro is doomed” – ‘Neoliberalism is in crisis” – “The EU is a breeding ground for the far right” – “The EU has ended democracy” – “The EU is turning Fascist”
You’ll notice the above all point to an EU in flux – there are hundreds more examples, these were just nearby.
They’re assertions made by some of the same people who claim with certainty that the EU will NEVER change on that one single fucking issue that’s crucial to a supposedly ‘left wing’ argument for Brexit – that the EU will NEVER tolerate a socialist policy.
In 18 months Macron has gone from saviour to pariah but someone linked to a piece with “a socialist transformation … would take decades to implement” FFS.
We shouldn’t assume everyone posting here is necessarily on our side.
BTW I’ve noticed the TellyTories in the last few days pushing hard the idea that “the people are sick to death of Brexit and just want us to get on with it” – the implication being that we should all just chill out and put our trust in May and the good old Tories.
Wearing down the electorate into pissed-off don’t-give-a-fuckedness is a strategy I haven’t seen before, even from the Tories.
Flopping about like fish on a riverbank.
“You’ll notice the above all point to an EU in flux – …”
I don’t see it like that. The countries within the EU and particularly within the Eurozone are in flux and destabilizing mainly due to neoliberal austerity policies inflicted by their governments and under EU rules and directives. The minor EU/Eurozone countries/economies have already suffered great indignities and hardship and now the domestic and EU policies of austerity and privatisation are impacting the bigger economies…I don’t see the EU itself in flux… what policies and directives has EU/EC/ECB changed and issued to relieve the economic suffering and social unrest?
Btw, I am not a believer in the mantra ‘neoliberalism is in crisis’. I believe it is doing exactly what it was designed to do, siphon wealth and power into fewer and fewer hands, most are unaccountable, whether ‘appointed’ or private hands.
Societies and economies under the boot of neoliberalism are in crisis due to neoliberal/neocon policies and reckless, often criminal, banking actions.
Maria, your 12:35/08 – I haven’t seen anyone claim that the EU has changed in a good direction – the point is that it is capable of change – either by persuasion or by having change forced upon it by democratic action or by circumstance.
Your 1:02/08 – agree completely but why blame a global phenomenon started by US/UK on the EU? They simply jumped on board when deregulation looked like a brilliant wheeze.
Your 10:20/09 – I think all but the rich feel anger, frustration, helplessness and fear for our children’s futures when we see society going backwards and we all know global capitalism is to blame – but it can’t be brought under control one nation at a time.
Capital has to be made to feel the same fear for its own and its children’s futures – to do that we absolutely have to give it nowhere to hide.
That means we have to operate globally too.
ps Boris’s hair seems to have tidied itself up for some reason (Marr, this am).
I think it’s decided to make a leadership challenge even if it has to drag him kicking and screaming into No. 10.
David McNIven,
“Maria, your 12:35/08 – I haven’t seen anyone claim that the EU has changed in a good direction – the point is that it is capable of change – either by persuasion or by having change forced upon it by democratic action or by circumstance.”
Time will tell if those that want change get their act together enough to make changes.
“Your 1:02/08 – agree completely but why blame a global phenomenon started by US/UK on the EU? They simply jumped on board when deregulation looked like a brilliant wheeze.”
I don’t agree just UK and US were behind the EU project or neoliberalism. I don’t think it’s as simple as that I’m afraid and Germany and France were important states involved in EU project. Many rich and powerful (effectively stateless or not interested in states except as a powerful tool) vested interests were involved lobbying behind the scenes throughout the processes of EU and neoliberalism becoming hegemonic as an ideology.
Just a reminder of the power of wealthy special interests lobbying for neoliberalism described within this discussion with Michael Hudson.
https://renegadeinc.com/j-is-for-junk-economics/
Maria, the point is that the EU, like all administrations, constantly reacts to internal and external events – its adoption of neoliberalism was in response to Thatcher/Reagan’s Big Bang.
To claim that Brexit is essential to the left because the EU “will never/can never allow state aid (etc.)” is to claim that the EU is incapable of change – one false assertion trying to prove another.
I suspect the EU may even be marginally less wedded to neoliberal dogma than the Tories – whose arses we’re about to hand them in a paper bag.
Not ridding the EU of its neoliberals would be like not finishing a course of antibiotics – you have to kill ALL the parasites.
The claim that “Brexit is essential to the left” simply takes no consideration of power imbalances at the global level.
[I note also in this thread a confusion between the EU and the EMU – which doesn’t help]
Those of us who are firm ‘Remainers’ are not so because of any illusions about the EU as it is. However, as David McNiven has pointed out, the UK has inflicted more extreme marketisation on itself than the the EU has been responsible for.
As I’ve said before, I see no New Jerusalem in the isolation of Brexit, with the UK and it structurally flawed economy subject to much more powerful trading blocks. I’ve never equated socialism with common impoverishment; it will not bring greater equality – probably the reverse.
Forgive my repeating the quotation, but my indubitably working class great aunt (who knew all the early 20th century’s betrayals by
capitalism) would have been quietly scathing about an aspiration that led to greater impoverishment (imagine a Cotswold accent) :
“Poverty : ’tis no disgrace, but ’tis great inconvenience”
I wouldn’t wish such ‘inconvenience’ as a mark of ‘socialism’.
After two major wars, I think someone advocating Brexit as a path to a better future would have been typically dismissed with another gently reproachful – but telling – dismissal :
“Bless ‘un. Ee do mean well, but he do find it hard to catch the bus”
The eU is a cancer you don’t try to repair a cancer you kill it or it kills you.
Believe me – I’d be a happy bunny to exchange the EU ‘cancer’ for the actuality:-). I think it’s Brexit that promises a slow terminal decline.
“Bless ‘un. Ee do mean well, but he do find it hard to catch the bus”
Don’t know who you are quoting but this is why I rarely engage with Remainers and always regret bothering… nothing but derision, superior tone and insult comes from them in the end. Ardent Remainers are the new TINAs… same old same old attitude
“Don’t know who you are quoting”
No you won’t. She’s dead a long time ago,anyway. But with her husband – one of the ‘Old Contemptibles’ – had seen more in her lifetime than either you or I will. Both radical, working class Labour voters from the start of the Party – or rather – the franchise that eventually gave them the vote.
They were the voices on the shoulder whose rooted experience made voting Tory an impossibility. Not the pages of the New Left Review or forgotten sectarian broadsheets.
‘Superior tone’? No – just an ability to tell it as it is, and an impatience with illusion – even that which is well meant.
” I rarely engage with Remainers”
Obviously. An unchallenged echo is a comfort. I notice that you haven’t actually challenged any of my substantive comments about the folly of Brexit, and its foundations in the deeply repulsive recesses of plutocratic interests and propaganda.
Sorry you’re offended, Maria. But this is too important for wounded egos – or a manipulated sense of victimhood – to be the arbiter.
I’m not going to be around to see the full effects of this debacle. But I’m buggered if I’m going to give my consent -let alone support – to a project from the swivel-eyed right that will affect my grandchildren in such a detrimental way.
“Sorry you’re offended, Maria. But this is too important for wounded egos – or a manipulated sense of victimhood – to be the arbiter. ”
I am tired and feel inadequate. I haven’t challenged any arguments on this site because I am tired of it all and there comes a point when someone not capable of writing the same thing in a thousand different ways sees no point. I don’t see many things the way EUrophiles see them but feel I’ve been run over. That is of course my problem for not educating myself better and having or learning the skill to argue my case and allowing frustrations to consume me.
I am feeling somewhat browbeaten because I no longer have any belief UK will leave the EU, it looks very like Parliament will ensure it doesn’t happen and along with that the apparent great majority of Labour party members are no doubt pressurising Corbyn to find a way out, or is that to stay in… I see no avenue for the EURef being respected.
I wont be cheering but I wont be moaning and disrespectful to you or your celebrations either if Brexit is reversed one way or another. Life for most of us goes on if getting harder, I just hope life gets better for millions now suffering terribly and in the end I don’t really care under what supranational entity or government that happens, so long as it happens and soon.
I’m a believer it’s easier to change things in your own country and if national changes can’t be achieved I hold out little hope for changes in truly democratising the EU, a bureaucratic supranational behemoth that has expansion designs.
I wont apologise for being emotional and down about the way things are panning out. For a long time I felt Brexit would never be allowed to happen and was resigned to it. Corbyn gave me some hope but that has now dissipated so I’m back to resignation and moving to acceptance.of the situation and will probably be one of those who self disenfranchises when/if offered a vote between two sides of the same coin in a so called ‘peoples vote’.
Btw.. I don’t categorise myself as a member of the “swivel eyed right”, many drawn to the far right are also suffering, we need to build a consensus and offer a decent vision of a better future with clear steps how to get there, not fight and insult our working class peers. The systems and structures we live under are the problem not other people also suffering under them who see others as offering a better chance of change.
RH you just can’t help yourself can you insulting and lumping all who do not agree with you into one box of ‘deplorables’ of one sort or another. Attitudes like yours are a real turn off for me.
In the past few days there has been quite a taxonomy of the vices that Maria Lundiel refers to. I will confine my comment to just a very small sample:
“come on don’t be a wimp” (to forthestate) is, for me, oppressive as well as an insult in that it challenges a person to prove that they are otherwise. It tends towards characterising a person and their demeanour rather than a flaw in their point of view; worse than that, the respondent is implicitly not in a position to refute the insult without deferring to that view.
And this from the person who called my comment on the “smug” tone of some recent comments “Ad Hominem” because I was somehow losing an argument. There was no argument that I was aware of, just an unpleasant tone and an arrogant failure to check what a person has actually said.
Then, from the same poster there was “you must be a sensitive soul paulo” which, in its context, I found a little too personal from a poster who has never directly engaged with me, or my point of view. I accepted it as a joke but the ensuing comments from that same poster made it clear that the comment wasn’t meant kindly and indeed was intended to patronise.
Perhaps I should also make special mention of the ridiculous comment that paulo must be “miffed” because the Tories Brexit project is falling apart,
or that Maria is an uncritical and ardent fan of Putin.
Comments like these seem to reveal a developing sense of impunity and a breathtaking lack of interest in what people have actually written that amounts to either arrogance, or illiteracy.
Nobody is perfect of course.Tired and wired as I was last week and with my patience running thin at the general tone of comments made by ardent Remainers, I made a rather chippy reference to what felt like a gratuitous comment from the other member of this double act and promptly apologised, though I will admit that in doing so I was probably digging a shallow hole, for which I couldn’t find the lid.
I never find opposing points of view offensive, or upsetting. It is their tone (and perhaps occasionally, therefore, their underpinnings) that myself and others have recently found so objectionable.
“lundiel” – apologies – don’t know how that got there. I’ve just read Maria’s comment above; I wish I could muster that kind of courage, focus and eloquence.
I was about to reply to your longer post which succinctly expresses much of what I have observed and felt but will take the opportunity to thank you for your very kind post regarding my above comment.
“or that Maria is an uncritical and ardent fan of Putin.”
I was well aware that that was where commentators were trying to lead and corral me. It’s a depressing, dangerous and now common tactic to use such categorisations to easily dismiss someone as an apologist for the latest phantom ghoul under the kosh of western exceptionalism and warmongering. Sadly, the ‘left’ is as guilty or perhaps even worse than the right in using this tactic to dismiss someone’s views on a variety of issues they don’t agree with.
The ‘left’ really has to remember tactics used in the run up to the Iraq military assaults and other wars of aggression (sold as humanitarian wars) or the way things are heading we may well be in a major war in Europe sooner rather than later and the EU wont save us or our children and grandchildren from the unspeakable horrors of that.
I for one value the rights, privileges and protections that my current EU citizenship gives me.
When and if we leave the EU who is going to protect us from a Tory government decimating our Human Rights, Employment Rights, Environmental Standards, NHS and Food Standards.
Indeed. Brexit is adolescent Kevin walking out and slamming the door because life isn’t perfect. The bus shelter’s a lot colder.
I think it’s time to draw a line under this particular thread.
However, I would just reassure Maria that I do not classify her as ” a member of the “swivel eyed right”,
My entire point is that the *project* of Brexit is rooted in the ideology of the extreme right. Similarly, it’s not a case of ‘insulting’ people – it’s about sincerely combating *ideas* that don’t make sense and which – worse – promise on-going distraction and damage.
“My entire point is that the *project* of Brexit is rooted in the ideology of the extreme right.”
I will just say I do not agree and leave it like that.