Tony Blair has said some words again. Not just about the appalling situation the economy's going to be in after the Coronavirus outbreak has exhausted itself (talk about stating the obvious), but concerns political strategy. Or, to be exact, what Scottish Labour should do. Apparently, its route to success is Labour becoming more like ... Ruth Davidson. She was able to energise the pro-union case and see off the Scottish National Party. As he puts it, "the only politician in Scotland that broke that SNP grip at all was Ruth Davidson." And she was able to do this because Scottish Labour were wishy-washy on unionism. First of all, let's scotch Blair's myth-making mischief. Whatever one thinks of Davidson's qualities, she did not "break the grip" of the SNP. Under her leadership the Tories turned in a creditable performance at the 2017 general election, but following her departure last summer things went to pot as they fell from 13 seats to six at the general election. If we're playing the centrist game where Jeremy Corbyn's near miss is irrelevant, so is the peak of the Scottish Tory resurgence. Considering the 2016 Holyrood elections, the Tories displaced Labour as Scotland's second party and took 31 seats, but in terms of MSPs and votes the SNP won twice more than "Ruth's team". Perhaps what Tonty meant is how Davidson caught the eye of London-based commentdom, who at times feted her and, if the stories are to be believed, was approached by an all-too-brief trail blazing outfit to lead them. She certainly proved more effective wowing arbiters and gatekeepers of establishment politics than winning voters over from Scottish nationalism. On Labour's are we/aren't we unionist stance, there's some selective memory at play here too. It was never Scottish Labour's policy to back independence or support another referendum. Last Summer John McDonnell said Westminster shouldn't get in the way of another vote, if that's what the Scottish parliament decides to do. A position Jeremy Corbyn also conceded, while Scottish Labour stuck to its unionist line. And still the party got steamrollered, again, by the SNP in December. To suggest the party's salvation is being more explicitly unionist is peculiar to say the least. Speaking on Steve Richards's programme about Labour's futures, Blair (rightly) notes the SNP aren't a far left formation, but goes on to suggest a political space exists for a centre left unionist opposition. But where? The Tories are the hard unionists now, and why would progressively-minded voters be lured away from the SNP when, all told, the SNP are hardly living up to the Tartan Tory caricatures you can still find bandied about among some sections of Scottish Labour. In fairness to Blair, he does recognise the party has to create its own political space by drawing attention to the SNP's record on education, and so on. Which is fair enough, but going after them on economistic grounds concedes the constitutional politics of the nation - the central question in Scotland - to the Tories and SNP. And besides, is Uncle Tone seriously suggesting Scottish Labour doesn't already talk about these things? The truth of the matter is, while Blair is right that in England Labour have to take votes from the Tories to win an election, he cannot bring himself to make serious suggestions about how in Scotland Labour has to win them back from the SNP. And this comes as no surprise, because to understand how Labour lost north of the border it is necessary to think about how class dynamics there have played out. I never shut up talking about the new working class and its relationship to the Labour Party, and how Corbynism was simultaneously its articulation and expression. As far as the 'old' working class were concerned, i.e. the huge numbers of older workers and retirees who abandoned Labour for the Tories in December, their old auto-Labourism were legacies of working class institutions that have long since faded, of common outlooks tied together by work and place, and a much more homogenous culture. As the political economy supporting the integration of organised workers with the Labour Party was eroded and, in the 1980s, smashed up, so their loyalties faded and other politics backfilled the void - mainly the politics of soft nationalism, which has a particular resonance with older people. This is true of Scotland too. Labourist unionism has historically been dominant in Scotland because all across the central belt and in the major towns industry was initially tied to the Empire, and in the post-war period was maintained as successive governments were committed to (haphazard) policies of full employment. The labour movement then, cursed by empire chauvinism across Britain, and doubly distorted by added sectarianism in Scotland, nevertheless formed an assembly of working class institutions that bargained, sometimes forcefully, sometimes militantly for its share of the spoils, and won them. The Scottish working class derived tangible benefits from being part of the United Kingdom. And then the post-war consensus fell apart, and in came the Tories. As per England, Britain's primary industry and manufacturing base was imperilled by competition and was in decline before Thatcher, but her countenancing of mass unemployment to break the labour movement destroyed livelihoods and the political economy that conferred the state legitimacy. With unemployment giving way to call centres, offices, retail parks, the benefits of the union became less tangible. Having a few staff from the DWP transferred out of London and the multiplier effects of Faslane, what is there? And so once the Scottish Parliament was set up, a new mainstream politics opened up relatively autonomous from Westminster and more reflective of the dynamics post-industrialisation were set in train. In other words, Labour's domination became conditional. The 2014 independence referendum saw this conditionality collapse. It wasn't so much that Labour played the leading role in the Better Together campaign, and shipped in activists from England to assist a long hollowed-out party, but rather the manner of the politics adopted. Here Labour were lining up with the very Tory party that had just spent four years overseeing attacks on the poor and driving down living standards while getting into high profile spats with the SNP over spending - a series of set-tos that allowed the SNP to present itself as the best defenders of the Scotland and "Scottish interests". Labour meanwhile was saddled with its pathetic non-opposition to austerity, and were only too happy to go along with Tory threats about how much they were going to screw a post-independence Scotland. What was particularly catastrophic about this blunder was it made sure the rise of the new working class in to political consciousness be channelled into the SNP as opposed to Labour. Scottish Corbynism was only ever a nice idea because what would have been its base was the SNP's new base. Now, Scottish Labour might have the strategic genius of the likes of Ian Murray on its side, but any strategy for returning the party to health that fails to recognise this elementary fact is utterly useless. This is where Tony Blair fits in. The kind of politics he's advocating is no different to the Blue Labour prescriptions for winning England, but in Scotland it's doubly dumb. His preference and that of what remains of the party's establishment is to go after the Tories for the decaying unionist vote. Madness. As England where Tory support remains in long-term decline, despite their bumper Christmas gift, Scottish unionism is decomposing at a faster rate. Scottish Labour and Scottish Conservative support is mostly older, mostly retired, and is not reproducing itself. Sticking here is never going to be a route to political success, and guarantees nothing but diminishing returns for Labour. I don't have a magic bullet, a solution, or even a strategy for Scottish Labour. Only a diagnosis of a problem. The medicine Tony Blair is dispensing, however, is nothing of the sort. Far from a cure, it's not even a palliative. Swigging it induces paralysis, and guarantees decay, defeat, and irrelevance. Image Credit
Is the neoliberal economic and social order on its last legs? Does Coronavirus confront the ruling class as if they are harried by grim reaper decked out in funereal garb? This guest post from Prof Scott Newton considers the contours of the unprecedented crisis gripping global capitalism and how everything, including the the geopolitical relationships underpinning the neoliberal order are shifting. The clock cannot simply be wound back to the time before the outbreak. We will forever live with its consequences, in the time after. A question of timing? The highly infectious COVID-19 coronavirus disease, an acute respiratory syndrome first seen at the end of 2019 in China, is now spreading rapidly across the globe. The World Health Organization (WHO) has declared a pandemic. At the time of writing (8 April), there are 1,453,247 confirmed cases of the illness globally, 83,585 of which have proved fatal. The numbers are rising all the time, with the largest impact of the illness now being felt in Western Europe (including Britain) and the USA. Estimates of the illness's mortality rate currently range from less than one to over three per cent. It is too early in the life of COVID-19 for the medical community to have much certainty about the number of fatalities likely to result from it. When the illness first struck the UK back in January this year (or, to be more accurate, when the first cases were identified: many now assume that it had already been circulating here for some weeks unidentified) it was suggested that up to 80 per cent of the population might contract it. Given a 1 per cent mortality rate, this implied a toll of 500,000 lives in a worst case scenario. The government's initial reaction was to advise plenty of hand-washing and self-isolation for those with symptoms of infection by the virus. Then, in the March Budget, it released £5 billion of extra resources into the NHS along with £7 billion to support business, and called for social distancing to reduce contagion. In Western Europe, many nations had by this time embarked on stringent lockdowns to minimise interaction and contact between people, although even these did not stop a dramatic and distressing rise in fatalities, especially in Italy and Spain. WHO officials were by now making clear the importance of increasing testing to identify who had and who had not been struck by the virus; but the British government's approach to this, and indeed to the need for many more ventilators and Intensive Care beds for the large numbers likely to require hospital treatment, was somewhat sluggish. There were leaks which suggested that senior advisers were prepared to let the disease circulate within the population in order to achieve a level of 'herd immunity', which would minimise its impact until a vaccine could be found. All this changed shortly after the Budget, when rapidly rising number of cases suggested Britain was on a path to the worst case scenario and likely to follow the example of Italy. The NHS, so poorly funded thanks to the austerity regime imposed after 2010 that the normal winter flu regularly sends parts of it into a flat spin, was in no position to handle a crisis on this scale. The government introduced a lockdown, leading to the suspension of activity across large parts of the economy. To mitigate the impact of this it dramatically increased NHS capacity and introduced a series of packages to support business through the crisis. Paradoxically, it is this dramatic extension of the State's role in the economy following from lockdown and from the need for a rapid expansion of the hospital system and its provision of staff, beds, IT facilities and ventilators, as well as of testing, which explains the government's slow response to the COVID-19 crisis. Its initial strategy had been driven by a team of behavioural scientists appointed as advisers by David Cameron in 2010 and known as the 'nudge unit' because it operated on the assumption that social change could be achieved simply by influencing human conduct through a mix of incentives and messaging, delivered through charities and existing government institutions. This idea of reform (usually in the direction of attempting to create the population of rational, self-interested economic actors appropriate to a free market world) was of course designed to avoid large financial commitments, collectivism and State intervention. Applied to COVID-19, it meant that the government's intention was to manage the crisis without sacrificing the neoliberal consensus in place since the Thatcher years. By late March it was very clear that this approach was totally inadequate and likely to result in a human and social catastrophe. In common with other governments throughout the advanced capitalist world, therefore, the British government embraced emergency measures likely to fill the fuglemen of the 1970s and 1980s free market counter-revolution with profound gloom. These included access to large-scale loan finance, grants to pay 80 per cent of the salaries of all workers laid off thanks to firms closing, a commitment extended (after a delay) to the self-employed, and deferrals if VAT and income tax payments. The railways were nationalised (this was said to be a temporary measure), to ensure they kept running throughout the crisis. The Institute for Fiscal Studies estimated that the stimulus would lead to a UK Government budget deficit of more than eight per cent of GDP in the coming financial year (the Budget of March 19 had projected one of between two and three per cent) - and this on the questionable assumption that output in 2020 would fall by just five per cent below. Leaving to one side the loans and tax deferrals, the spending commitments alone amount to 2.3% of GDP in 2020-21. This exceeds the boosts to GDP of 0.6% and 1.5% introduced by the Labour government in 2008 and 2009, at the peak of the financial crisis. Coronavirus, whose rapid transmission across the world is a function of neoliberal globalisation, facilitating free movement of people, goods, capital and viruses, now presents three potentially fatal dangers to the very political and economic environment which allowed it to spread so fast and so widely. First, the era of 'sound finance' appears to be ending. This is because the most serious impact of the virus has been felt in those societies whose health and social services have either been run down thanks to austerity (voluntarily accepted by British governments and a function of Euro group membership in Italy and Spain) or neglected on ideological grounds for over 40 years (as in the USA). Since it has now become clear for everyone to see where a political economy founded on the principle of private affluence for a few and public squalor for the many ends up, future political debate in western democracies may revolve not around balancing budgets and redeeming debt but around which parties can best deliver well-funded health and welfare services, leading to more hospitals, doctors and nurses, more social housing and more generous support for the poor, the elderly and the infirm. There will certainly be calls for cuts, 'to repay the debt' once the crisis is over. But it will not be so easy to panic populations into supporting them as they did after 2010 with lurid warnings about looming national bankruptcy, given that we shall all be able to point to the ease and speed with which governments ramped up spending to beat the virus. If they can do it for that, why not afterwards, to build better, kinder and healthier countries? Moreover, the crisis has highlighted the central role in our society of the 'key workers' - doctors, nurses, administrators, carers, delivery drivers, postal workers, supermarket staff - whose efforts are so vital to our survival right now. As has been pointed out many times in this blog these comprise the new working class whose labour is immaterial and concerned with the reproduction "of relationships, of data and knowledge, of care and socialisation processes." This constituency, radicalised and empowered by the crisis, is capable of leading society away from austerity towards social democracy and possibly beyond, to a system of production for use and not for profit; in short, in the direction of socialism. Secondly, the lockdowns have led to fractures in the circulation process essential to the survival of capitalism. Production has fallen sharply as has the consumption of goods in the market (realisation). Output in the UK in the second quarter of this year has been forecast to fall by 15 per cent, with unemployment likely to double. In the USA second quarter output is estimated to have plummeted by up to 30%, while unemployment grew by 9.95 million in the last two weeks of March. A capitalism short of commodities being produced for profit and with a drastically reduced number of consumers for those that reach the market is facing profound crisis. Barring an early end to the emergency, it is hard, in the absence of government interventions including measures of widespread socialisation unprecedented since World War Two, to see how the economies of the USA and the UK, and in fact of much of the world, can escape a depression as great as or even more severe than the one which started in 1929. Thirdly, there is a distinct possibility that the fall in output and concomitant supply chain disruption caused by the lockdowns will prevent countries throughout the advanced capitalist world from producing the volume of goods and services they need for the trade which sustains populations at their current standard of living. In short, for a time many countries will not be able to afford all the imports they normally consume and even if they can it may be very hard to find them. The result? Either a sharp rise in inflation as governments stimulate demand in societies where goods are scarce, or increasing dependence on Chinese imports to fill the gap. China, now recovering from the damage done by COVID-19, has the capacity to do this and moreover will need the markets. It seems possible in this scenario, therefore, that the Chinese government may well extend credits and grants on a scale large enough to keep the global economy turning over - much as the USA did after 1945. This implies the replacement of the USA by China as the world's hegemonic power, with political and ideological consequences likely to prove fatal to the neoliberal order. The longer the COVID-19 crisis lasts the longer it will be necessary for governments to take up the slack left by a collapsed private enterprise system and the more likely it is that their responses will embed profound changes to the nature of the global economy and the geopolitical system sustaining it. It therefore makes sense for nation states wishing to avoid such an epochal transformation to seek to end the coronavirus emergency as soon as they can. A recent study at Bristol University suggested that if the fall in the UK's economic output exceeded 6.4%, "the benefit of a long-term lockdown in reducing premature deaths could be outweighed by the lost life expectancy from a prolonged economic dip." These findings have been disputed but it would not be surprising if they (and similar research) are even now being used by governments to influence discussions and planning about the 'exit strategy' from the lockdown. This will not be guided solely by the requirements of the war against COVID-19: suitably glossed by 'experts' (no doubt behavioural scientists will loom large) other issues will be invoked. Public discussion is likely to be dominated by the question of whether ending lockdown will save more lives than prolonging it. But for administrations in London, Washington and elsewhere the prime consideration is whether this can be done in time to prevent the death of the neoliberal order. Image Credit
You don't have to "clap for Boris." There is no compulsion to put out earnest tweets or status updates "wishing the Prime Minister well." But going to the other extreme, to actively crow about Boris Johnson's illness or, in some cases, merrily willing him to suffer and die is so self-evidently stupid that it says something about the state of politics how a piece such as this has to be written. I don't need any lectures about what an arsehole Boris Johnson is, his bumbling chucklesome indifference to the hundreds of thousands who've suffered under the Tories, and how his own dithering and complacency has led to hundreds of unnecessary deaths, and is - poetically, one might say - responsible for his own hospitalisation. But before anyone caves into the little voice urging a public display of gloating, perhaps some thoughts should be spared for other people. Yes, a radical suggestion for our narcissistic times. Johnson's family deserve sympathy. Whatever Johnson is responsible for, his kids and relatives are not, and anyone wishing Johnson harm is also wishing distress, misery, and grief on others who aren't accountable for his actions. Hoping his unborn child grows up without a father is many shitty things, but radical and left wing it is not. That the Tories show scant concern for those who suffer at their hands does not matter: socialism is not a game of putting a plus wherever they put a minus and vice versa. We're not their mirror image, nor a revenge fantasy wrapped up in a critique of political economy. Socialism is a class politics, a collective struggle, and a morality too. As my mate Anna Chen has oft noted, Trotsky wrote a pamphlet called Their Morals and Ours, not Their Morals and We Ain't Got Any. Which brings me to the second point. After putting something out last night about Johnson's move into ICU, some dickhead on Twitter replied about not being on Labour doorstep now. Quite. But sure, it's a great idea to go round associating left wing ideas with wishing death on Coronavirus sufferers because of their politics - which is how most people will see it. As well as handing ammunition to our enemies, something cranks and idiots in our own ranks have proven more than happy to do in recent times. We don't know what politics is going to be like post-Coronavirus, but giving the powers that be excuses to snuff out, witch hunt, and delegitimise leftwingers is dumb beyond belief. And yes, there are very good non-political reasons to show a bit of bloody common sense. Right now there are millions of people stuck at home. Millions of people who are frightened of Covid-19 and are terrified of catching it, not least thanks to the unpleasant symptoms and the grim death toll that gets published every day. What do you think they feel about the stricken Prime Minister? Would the daily grind of stress and worry grow lighter if Johnson suffers badly, or dies? Or would this situation become more frightful and more difficult to cope with? And spare a thought for those living with mental health conditions, or need to stay healthy to discharge caring responsibilities, or live with at risk people. Are they going to be cheered up? Or, as folks deeply anxious about the future is it going to make every day more of a grind, more miserable and dreadful? The answer is so obvious it shouldn't need spelling out. If you can't stand Johnson, fine. It's that the world doesn't need to hear about your oh-so principled reasons for wishing him dead right now.
"It's the dregs of the Brown combined with the mediocrity of the Miliband era", so says a "senior Labour MP" finding themselves passed over for preferment in Keir Starmer's first shadow cabinet. That's one way of looking at it. The other is a candidate of the soft left fills his first appointments ... mostly from the soft left. Shocking, I know. In terms of political balance appointing Rachel Reeves the roving brief of the Shadow Chancellor for the Duchy of Westminster is a bone thrown to Labour First, while shuffling Rebecca Long-Bailey to Education is there to placate the left. Not that either wings are going to be satisfied by measly nuggets, but it doesn't matter. The left are strong, but not as strong as it might be, and the right have hitched their wagons to Keir's caravan - not the other way round. What to make of the rest of the new appointments? Slotting Anneliese Dodds into shadow chancellor is a good shout. Upon her election in 2017 she served loyally with John McDonnell, obtaining his endorsement, and helped work up Labour's green industrial programme. She was part of the party's economics road show, for instance. This will at least mollify the left who are happy to take John's recommendation as good coin, even if they don't know her terribly well. And for those who enjoy entertaining counterfactuals, it's likely Anneliese would have got picked for this position had RLB won. Giving Lisa Nandy shadow foreign was probably not much of a surprise, though it will be noted in the scheme of the Westminster pecking order that she was awarded a more senior position than the woman who actually came second. Folks can read into that what they will. But from the standpoint of making an impact, as we saw in the leadership election Lisa easily had the best of Andrew Neil and would therefore prove more than a match for the hapless Dominic Raab in the post-Covid world. Despite an unwelcome propensity to be economical with the actualité, from Starmer's point of view a top drawer media performer with a proven ability to think on her feet will, he thinks, make her an asset to the new leadership. Other appointments? I suppose the return of Ed Miliband is something Keir's core supporters will appreciate. Still popular in the party, politically it reconnects with the pre-Corbyn era and effectively parcels Jeremy's time off as adeparture from the norm. Now liberated from the Blairist constraints said to have saddled him between 2010 and 2015, we'll see whether there is radical mettle in his soul. The moving in of Jonathan Reynolds to shadow social security is interesting. Rare among the centre right of the party his idea of "radical welfare reform" isn't privatising and marketising everything, unlike some. But he is supportive of the basic income, which we hear today is now part of Spain's response to the Coronavirus crisis. Having an advocate for it in this position is encouraging. Scotland was only ever going to be given to Ian Murray, bringing back Charlie Falconer as shadow attorney general was entirely predictable, as was shifting Emily Thornberry to international development and giving David Lammy a prominent role (considering his exemplary work around Grenfell Tower). Who's in and who's out - which is all of Corbyn's top team except for RLB, Jonathan Ashworth, Angela Rayner, and Emily - is jolly good fun, but what about the politics? First, Keir has not gone out of his way to troll the left and appoint some of the party's biggest idiots. Positions for the likes of Wes Streeting, Jess Phillips, Neil Coyle, and Margaret Hodge was sure to severely damage his creds as the unity candidate and, well, undermined the capacity of his team. Having one eye on the brief, while giving under the counter briefings to the lobby hacks wouldn't have done. As regards wider alignments in the party this spells the end of Unite's disproportionate influence over the party leadership. It's certainly true many trade union tops in other unions felt their nose was put out of joint these last few years, both in terms of Unite's out manoeuvring them for influence and the Corbynist pressures coming upwards from their activist wings. Why else, despite the over long contest, did many general secretaries scramble to convene candidate endorsement meetings before pressure could build from lower down the union echelons - a lesson learned from 2015 when the collective apparat were caught on the hop. And so now Unite is more out in the cold and the other union leaders enjoy more pre-eminence - again, a return to how matters were pre-Corbyn. Overall though, folks claiming this is a neoliberal or Blairist restoration are wide of the mark. The left are right to harbour serious concerns about Keir Starmer, and his commitment to a Corbynish platform during the election probably owes more to positioning than genuine enthusiasm, but the politics of what we're seeing is a return to soft left Fabianism. A politics of brainy and socially concerned technocrats dispensing justice through a top down plan here, and tinkering with the state machinery there. This is a step back from Corbynism, which despite the criticisms that can be made of it recognised itself rooted in social struggles and class politics, whereas this - in as much as it tells itself a story of its lineage - is closest to ethical socialism (i.e. a better society is a nice idea as opposed to a material necessity) and therefore is liable to be overly wonky, remote from what's actually happening in the real world and, well, boring. But perhaps after the turbulent time we've had and the Coronavirus crisis, boring might just be what the electorate four years from now wants. Image Credit
Dear Corbyn Supporter, With 275,560 votes (56.2%) vs Rebecca Long-Bailey's 135,218 votes (27.6%) and Lisa Nandy's 79,597 (16.2%) Keir Starmer is the new leader. Sometimes politics is totally, straightforwardly predictable. Also the left candidates for the deputy leadership didn't do fantastically, what with Richard Burgon getting 80,053 votes (17.3%) and Dawn Butler receiving 50,255 (10.9%) in the first round. Alas, the crank right had little to shout about - Ian Murray could only muster 61,179 votes (13.3%), despite my endorsement. Fallow times for the left, then. Or are they? I'm extremely sceptical of Keir Starmer's leadership. His pushing of the second referendum after 2017 either demonstrated conscious complicity with an obvious campaign to undermine Jeremy Corbyn, appalling naivete, or - considering how central Brexit was to the Tory revival - an unseemly tone deafness. These are not qualities that recommended Keir as a serious leadership candidate, but alas. Here we are. We're going to have to live with someone whose first instinct is to praise the government when they're doing well, and keep quiet when they're not - an approach sure to set us up for future election victories. What does the left do now? It's very likely tens of thousands of party members are considering their position. If you're one of them, you should stay. This isn't to say the Labour Party must be the be-all and end-all of your political focus. As a number of comrades have noted, the eruption of Corbynism and the drawing of virtually the entire left into the party has left the field open for other forces to fill the street and community campaigning niches. Most obvious is the rapid growth of Extinction Rebellion and its radical liberal politics of personal responsibility and accountability, with its daft stunts like clambering on top of trains and activists gluing themselves to the front of Labour's battle bus. The end of Corbynism means this sort of organising by the left will no longer get neglected. However, the shift of focus doesn't necessarily entail dumping party membership. Especially when there are plenty of battles coming up. Regardless of my Starmer scepticism, he was elected on a Corbynist-lite programme. And as we're seeing the editorial board of the bosses' house organ, the FTcalling for a new settlement along these lines, the political room for backsliding is blocked by a largely left wing membership and an emerging bourgeois common sense - though I strongly suspect the latter will count for more than the former. But this is no room for complacency. Not only can we expect attempts at rolling back manifesto commitments, but also the limited democratic advances made in the last five years. Prepare for a lot of dishonest hand-wringing over the imminent EHRC conclusions, and the best efforts of the right to try and purge prominent leftists. We're likely to see some trolling too, with the inviting back of horrendous scabs like Ian Austin and John Mann, and finding jobs for backbench phantoms of Labour's recent past. In these circumstances there is no need for a purge if the left can be expected to purge themselves. These initiatives and moves need resisting not just because it weakens the left in the party, but because they weaken the left and, yes, the viability of the Labour Party as a whole. Therefore comrades who've had a bellyful (and seriously, who hasn't?) should approach the matter not as an issue of ideological purity but as pragmatic class politics. Keep the membership and follow your own political priorities outside the party, but support comrades in the party when it comes to crucial votes, meetings, and selections. That's it. And as quid pro quo, for comrades whose focus remains Labour stuff they should seek to use whatever leverage they have in the party to support and publicise activism and struggles taking place outside of it. This isn't particularly difficult, nor is it a big ask. Rather it's maintaining what is already happening in a lot of places, of preserving the relative cohesion of our movement. Consider the position of the left at the moment. Apart from a few irrelevances, for the first time in my political life the left is largely united and pulling in a common direction. Even with the catastrophic defeat and the subsequent arguments about who should stand for the left, what is unique about this moment is how the left hasn't turned in on itself. There's been a dribble of support from the active left over to camp Keir, but it has been clear sighted about how the class interests of our people are best served by Rebecca Long-Bailey's candidacy. I hope this clarity and seriousness continues as we grow accustomed to the new politics of the post-Covid era. For the left in Labour, resistance is the name of the game but, to borrow a phrase, not opposition for opposition's sake. Criticising the new leader when Keir makes his mistakes, continuing to advocate for policies and strategies that keep our coalition together, resist the spurious Coronavirus Union Sacrée and carry on forcefully attacking the Tories and, crucially, defending Starmer from the inevitable Labour right carping so they can get back to their long 90s comfort zone and, crucially for them, their former prominence and power. The left might have very little to no confidence in Starmer, but that doesn't mean we don't want him to succeed. We do, but success is measured by the demands of the moment. Our job is to ensure he and the rest of the party are up to it. And this is where those comrades whose focus outside of the party is crucial. We must resist the tendency to fragmentation and squabbling, but continue to learn from and keep accountable to one another. We need to keep ourselves honest. As someone who was once completely sucked into the party machinery, I know how a total fixation on the party can insulate one from wider politics and distort your perspective. Likewise, total neglect/outright hostility runs the risk of ceding conventional politics entirely to our enemies. The left then must stand with one leg in and one leg outside the party, that is how we stay united. This is our responsibility, no one else's. The future will not be kind if we fail. Best, Phil
Or to give it the full nomenclature, Bubsy the Bobcat in Claws Encounters of the Furred Kind, the dreadful punning should come as something of a warning. As should the heavy dose of 90s hoky. Just check out the blurb: "Don't just watch cartoons, play 'em dude." Really. Obnoxious, baggy t-shirt wearing teens pumped full of irreverent attitude were sure to find this invitation beguiling. But nevertheless, Bubsy was very much of the moment and, indeed, was a player in the great mascot rush that dominated console gaming in the first half of the decade. Unfortunately, Bubsy has a pretty poor reputation and has found the franchise, until its recent PlayStation 4 and Switch reboot, become a bygone word for bad games. Which isn't really fair. While it is true Bubsy 3D for the PS1 is known for broken game design and general awfulness, the first two games were relatively well-received outings on the MegaDrive and the Super Nintendo. It seems the general opprobrium the 16 bit efforts get now are partly framed by its three dimensional disaster, and herd opinion as filtered through video game YouTube. It's a shame because Claws Encounters isn't, well, that bad. Though not bad doesn't necessarily mean worth playing now. Gameplay is pretty standard 16 bit platforming fair. A ridiculous plot (this time, the alien "Woolies" have invaded Earth to steal our supply of yarn) that involves the titular character moving from left to right picking up collectibles - in this case, yarn balls - with a number of extra lives and power ups to be collected along the way. Enemies are dispatched by jumping on them Mario/Sonic stylee, and each zone ends with a boss fight. So far, so unoriginal. But there are a few things Accolade tried out with their mascot that are, well, interesting. First were the production standards. Yeah, whatevs the cartoon stuff but Bubsy is quite a pretty game. Not up there with MegaDrive Sonic but appealing enough, especially the first area. The greens and the blues make for an eye-popping and pleasant initial impression. The second are the water slides, which were clearly inspired by those Sonic segments where you could sprint and spin without worrying some beastie is about to cost you a life. There are intra level warps which, if played around enough with, will ferry you off to a bonus area riding the lava tubes for more yarn collating japes. And on the character of Bubsy himself, a lot of work went into the animations he performs. Sadly, most of these animations were oh so hilarious death animations, almost as if the developers knew their creation was horribly irritating and took pleasure in killing him off as entertainingly as possible. This is where you get to the problems with the game: you'll be seeing these animations a lot, and this comes down to very basic flaws in game design. If your mascot is a Sonic knock off who's all about speed, you need to provide room to stretch the character's abilities. And on first glance, the slides, the long platforms, the plethora of downhill paths and, in world two, a rollercoaster track simply invites sprinting. But you try it and you'll find one of the many one-touch-death enemies breaking your stride. Even worse, get in one of the water slides, where you barely control things, and you'll find baddies situated in them too. And more than one chute will drop you onto a pack of woolies. What can you say, bad enemy placement is a bane. There's also plenty of occasions where precise jumping is required to sort out the enemies, but the emphasis on speed means precision is lacking. Frustrating. Even worse, there are two more innovations that prove annoying. Off the top of a jump Bubsy can glide, and if it's a big jump he can float some way across a level. However, this always ends up being blind (unless you know the lay out well) and typically ends in a cheap death. More annoying is the decision to make falls from a great height fatal. Presumably this was so more death animation hilarity can ensure (this either reduces Bubsy to a puddle, or more commonly a concertina), but it is incredibly tedious. And unnecessary, because lay out wise the levels could have worked without the cheap deaths, and it might have given players a bit more incentive to explore the game (each level is pretty sizeable, after all). A notorious game that, well, doesn't live up to its rancid reputation. But is it worth playing nowadays? For me there was a touch of the dreaded nostalgics because we'd borrowed it from a mate at the time, and my opinion then seemed more forgiving than it is today. If you're interested in it as a curio, why not. Though be warned, it does wear thin and there are better time sinks out there.
A frightful ghoul stalks my nightmares. Boris Johnson makes a complete hash of the Coronavirus crisis, which is what he's presently doing (despite what the polls think), and he then screws up the subsequent peace with austerity 2.0. After all, we have to pay for all those bail outs. Yet, even then, despite a smooth new Labour leader at the helm we still lose. Because with everything else gone to pot, the Tories decide on replaying the 2019 general election. And Labour hasn't drawn a single bloody lesson from December's catastrophe and lose because significant chunks of the party can't stop banging on about Brexit. A portent of siren calls to come hails this time from Rafael Behr, who uses the occasion of unprecedented crisis to moan about Brexit. Padding out his piece, we are pointed to the tomb of Tory orthodoxy, wherein lies the mouldering bones of laissez faire and small statism. If these can be interred in the ossuary in the first throes of the crisis, he muses, then further down the track surely a Brexit delay and an extension to the transition period - lobbied for by the European Union, but so far resisted by Johnson - could be pulled off after a few more weeks of lock down. His second argument is against the very real threat Coronavirus poses, Brexit seems like a petty, trivial, and small-minded affair which this crisis could confirm and then write off as a bad idea. Unfortunately, this sounds very much like Coronavirus-conditioned wishful thinking. Politically, the pandemic has changed a lot. But that doesn't mean we're in Year Zero. A number of leftist writers have argued, including yours truly, how the government have skipped the most expeditious means of addressing employment and welfare problems (i.e. the payment of a flat, relatively generous basic income) in favour of measures designed to protect the wage relation, keep punitive social security arrangements in place, and guard against the principle of income deriving from anything but work. Like duh, capitalist states are going to protect capitalist economies, and that's true of any mainstream party regardless of political colours. In this sense, the Tories are ensuring that, at least where the fundamentals of political economy are concerned, there will be no great reset. Their pre-Corona budget set out a strategy for big spending, and the (intentionally blank) manifesto gives them plenty of room to liberally raid Labour's discarded document and do whatever they see fit. And doing whatever they see fit has the dual project of preserving class relationships, which is to be achieved by their continuing political dominance. And, yes, that means carrying on with Brexit. As Rafael observes, Johnson does have wiggle room here as some two thirds of voters, or thereabouts, are chill with delaying the negotiations and having an extension to the transition period. And it's probable Johnson will take it up in time once the practicalities assert themselves. Yet, seeing as his winning formula of sticking to Brexit made his political fortune, for as long as possible he will stick with the rhetoric of getting it done. The problem then comes with what happens next. One extension is fine, but given this crisis is with us for at least six months and rolling lock downs could be a feature of everyday life for the next year, the danger lies in the number of times the talks are extended and/or its length. The longer this goes on, the politics of old, the angry impatience with delay and Brexit thwarted will find ingress back into political life, and the greater the potential cost to Johnson. This is where the danger to Labour presents itself. Considering who we're about to make our party leader, Keir Starmer's base is, to put it euphemistically, enthusiastically pro-EU. And despite prior promises of Brexit being a settled issue, fools could easily rush in where Rafael happily treads. Coronavirus-induced Brexit delays are going to be seized upon to reopen the arguments we've enjoyed these last four years. I don't think it's going to be particularly helpful for Labour to enter into the politics of reconstruction and recovery with a prominent and vocal strand calling for a reassessment of Brexit, up to and including rejoining the EU as full members. What it would do, however, is throw Johnson and the Tories a life line when they most need it. Don't let them deflect attention from their reckless necropolitics and general incompetence, but this is precisely what reopening the Brexit debate on remain terms will do. It will then be Labour who'll be accused of exploiting a serious crisis to thwart a democratic vote, and Labour who'll be seen to disrespect the memory of those voters who didn't make it through the pandemic. And the result? The same polarisation, and the same outcome. If the new leadership has any sense it will abandon the Coronavirus timidity evidenced by Keir Starmer's candidacy, and ignore the temptation to bang the remain drum as Johnson founders in the Brexit negotiations. If we are to believe the forensically forensic hype, surely we're not about to lose focus as the task as the politics of recovery looms over everything?
Long time readers know I supported Rebecca Long-Bailey for Labour leader. It might therefore come as a surprise that my deputy vote went to ... Ian Murray. This appears a bit incongruous considering everything written here in recent years and, well, my choice for leader. Why have I found Ian's pitch so attractive? In brief, here are my reasons: 1. As a discerning writer of all matters politic, one must move with the times. Stay relevant. A wind is flapping about the Labour Party, and the gale that blew the left wing leadership off course has forced them onto the rocks of marginality. To be taken seriously one simply must ditch the hard left's beached hulk and bail out on the position takings of the last four/five years. And the rewards? There might be retweets from Stella Creasy, an occasional article in Unherd and CapX, and basking in five minutes of fame as a Corbynist-turned-sensiblist. I'm sure in time the smug supremacism and advocating for hospital car parking charges will come. Backing Ian is the best way of having my totally good faith apostasy taken seriously, and would secure my relaunch as an outrider for the New Moderation with a Marxisant turn of phrase. 2. I am a loyal Labour Party member who believes everyone has something to contribute, and Ian has a great record we can draw on. Just look at Ian's successful winning ways. Scottish Labour have fallen to just a single parliamentarian on two occasions, and Ian was just that only man left standing. Never mind Edinburgh South is one of the wealthiest constituencies in the country, and doing what Ian does to ensure victory there is very much not the way to win all the other Scottish seats doesn't matter. He wins where Labour loses, and that confers upon him a special status. He demands the party must learn from him! 3. Principles matter, and there's no higher value than ... winning. It's all about winning. Ian notes in his campaign material, Labour needs to win elections. As he eloquently puts it, "Only by winning can we have a Labour government." No other candidate has offered as sharp an analysis about the party's predicament. We need to win, and by saying we need to win we will be convinced that we need to win. Winningly winning, Ian's emphasis on winning certainly wins my vote. And by banging on about winning, we will win.
The month in which everything changed. But what posts tickled readers' fancies over the course of the last 31 days? 1. Meeting Coronavirus With Complacency 2. Finding Coronavirus Scapegoats 3. Dither and Delay 4. Oh Jeremy Corbyn 5. Criticising the Coronavirus Strategy Hey 'rona, ooooh 'rona. Covid-19's certainly done a job here. Not only when it comes to determining what's hot, but also by relegating the blog to, um, definitely not. Since the start of this crisis audience figures have approximately halved. There could be three reasons for this. Either the great internet-travelling public have grown tired of my jibber-jabber, Google and/or Facebook have messed around with their algorithms again, or people are not going into work and reading it on their phones during the commute, or filling up their lunchtimes with other things now many of them are at home. It may well be a combination of all three or none of them. If you have any further insights, please share in the comments below. What it does mean though is this place is upping its game, so stay tuned. Okay, who's getting the second chance treatment this month? As we can look forward to a new leader of the Labour Party this weekend, in all likelihood Keir Starmer, let's preview some of the super forensic and effectively oppositional effective opposition to come by looking back over his response to Coronavirus.
