David
Milliband has praised Keir Starmer’s leadership of the Labour
Party: “I am proud to be Labour again. He's brought back clarity,
pride, principle to the work of opposition and I think it's been
really good to see." He went on to attack Jeremy Corbyn’s
leadership as years of ‘vacillation’ and “betrayal’.
His
father Ralph Milliband would not have agreed and could have been referring to his son when he
wrote “ The Labour Party have always conceived their proposals and
policies as a means, not of eroding— let alone supplanting— the
capitalist system, but of ensuring its greater strength and stability
… Far from seeking to surround themselves with men ardent for
reform and eager for change in radical directions (They) have been
content to be served by men much more likely to exercise a
restraining influence upon their own reforming propensities … Pious
references to the Labour Party being a ‘broad church’ which has
always incorporated many different strands of thought fail to take
account of a crucial fact, namely that the ‘broad church’ of
Labour only functioned effectively in the past because one side –
the Right and Centre – determined the nature of the services that
were to be held, and excluded or threatened with exclusion any clergy
too deviant in its dissent.”
Now
that Jeremy Corbyn has been summarily excluded and put back in the church pews, David has hinted at a return to UK politics (he was Foreign
Sec, pro-war and responsible for collaborating with the US on
renditions) At the moment he is in New York as CEO of the
International Rescue Committee. Mind you with his $1 million salary he will have to take a pay cut.
YOU CAN NOW READ
Every
year I go to Bosnia Herzegovina to stay with my Mostar ‘family’
who I have known since I was there at the time of the Bosnian war in
the 90s.
I
recently wrote to them, “If I was well and 30 years younger I would
be a revolutionary. Now I just wanna come and chill with you all. Did
you ever think we here in the UK would think nostalgically of Mostar
as a place of life and sanctuary. Everything is upside down or, as we
say, topsy-turvy!”
He
was shouting that he was hungry and ‘You’re not fucking getting
me.” A Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) spokesperson said:
“The welfare of customers and staff is paramount.” Of course it is.
My
son receives DWP ‘Personal Independence Payment' (PIP) benefits and
yesterday rang the DWP to enquire about the next payment date. He
waited for half an hour before anyone would talk with him.
His PIP
benefits were withdrawn three years ago and he had to take the DWP to
court to win them back. He only succeeded because he has a cousin who
is a lawyer and took on his case pro bono.
Meanwhile
and on the other side of the tracks, The Guardian reports that, “The
UK is the world’s greatest enabler of corporate tax avoidance and
has done the most to break down the global corporate tax system,
accounting for over a third of the world’s corporate tax
avoidance.”
They
fully intend to keep it that way. Theresa May’s comment to Jeremy
Corbyn in 2017 about his chances of being PM, “We will never let it
happen” now chills my bones.
Meanwhile,
and are you surprised, May’s husband Philip has a reputation for
tax-avoidance
Talking
of fiddles, how much ‘fiddling’ goes on with our voting? I have
already written about the private companies who organise
the postal ballot.
Then
there is the incessant fixing of information carried out by the
tax-avoiding billionaire-owned media.
Part
of their campaign to not let a Corbyn-government ‘happen’ have
been the anti-semitism slurs. Not made against the party with a long
history of racism, but against one led by a man who is proud that his
mother fought fascists in Cable Street.
The
London Economic dealt with this a year ago and
the Morning Star located the ‘charity’ at the heart of
anti-Corbyn propaganda.
As
someone who has depended for my continued life on the NHS, there is
its galloping privatisation to consider while we look at the smiling
face of Richard Branson.
Austerity
is what lies behind the problems so many of us face while the very few
benefit. Noam Chomsky defines it as "Just a fancy word for
class war”.
Back to Liverpool where its mayor has called time on austerity. The Scousers are famous for banning The Sun from their shops and
remaining solidly Labour. There is hope.
Further
south too, in France, there is hope.
But
I am off to Bosnia, but before I go am looking forward to the Dubioza Kolektiv gig at London’s Electric Ballroom next week.
ENEMY
OF THE STATE Boris Johnson warns voters Jeremy Corbyn is a national
security risk who will bow down to Britain’s enemies. THE SUN
BRITONS
FURIOUS at Corbyn’s OAP tax attack. “Stick Your Hikes where the
Sun Don’t Shine.” DAILY EXPRESS
JEREMY
CORBYN FORCED to deny he wants to get rid of MI5 after Boris Johnson
called him a security risk. THE DAILY MAIL
JEREMY
CORBYN IS ASHAMED OF BRITAIN. He’d leave our defences in the hands
of a chaotic committee. THE DAILY TELEGRAPH
All four headlines from one day, 2 December 2019. If
the billionaire Press have persuaded you to believe and act on
these words all our futures will be very bleak. Fortunately we are now
able to communicate with each other on social media and scrape away
the frost from the corporate media window.
I
have met many politicians over my seven decades, but have never
empathised with any of them, never joined their parties or knocked on
doors for them. Until now. In next week’s election we have a
manifesto worth fighting for.
I
have personal reasons for this. First of all the experiences of
my son when faced with cuts to his disability benefits. See here,
here and here
and
my own health crises and direct experience of the need for our free
NHS. See here, here and here
If
Brexit is the most important issue for you, above and beyond child
poverty, foodbanks, the rise in homelessness, zero-hours contracts,
low pay and low pensions, social benefit cuts, climate extinction, the NHS, peace
not war, anti-racism….add your own list here, then read this
Finally
the massive lie that is being used to persuade us that we should not
elect a Corbyn-led Labour government. - that he is a racist and
anti-semite. If he is then so was Albert Einstein. Read here, here, here and here
Six
months ago I wrote that we are on a winning run. Today it seems
the bookies agree with me.No
more Tweedle Dees and Tweedle Dums. On 12 December the choice is
stark and will decide all our futures
None
of us struggle alone or without support. Although I blog on my own website,
I have been published by The London Economic, The Peoples News, Stop
the War, International Times
and
regularly by The
Peoples Campaign for Corbyn; run defiantly and with a commitment few
of us could manage, by banner maker Alice Kilroy.
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| Add caption |
Chris
Williamson (re-suspended from the Labour Party) joins Jackie Walker
and Marc Wadsworth in their suspension from the party. All three are
left-wing, Corbyn-supporting actvists. The former London mayor, Ken
Livingstone remains suspended along with others such as Jewish
activist, Tony Greenstein.
Chris Williamson MP was suspended after
telling a Momentum meeting that Labour’s reaction to anti-semitism
allegations had led to the party being ‘demonised’. He was also
filmed saying he had celebrated the resignation of MP Joan Ryan,
former Chair of Labour Friends of Israel, and who has since quit
Labour because she claimed she was a victim of anti-semitism'.
Jackie
Walker, of mixed Black/Jewish ancestry and former Momentum Vice
Chair, was suspended after she criticised Holocaust Memorial Day for
commemorating only Jewish victims. “In terms of Holocaust day,
wouldn’t it be wonderful if Holocaust day was open to all people
who experienced holocaust?” she said.
Marc Wadsworth, Labour
Party activist and founder member of the Anti-Racist Alliance, set up
after the murder of Stephen Lawrence, was filmed accusing MP, Ruth
Smeeth of working, ‘hand in hand’ with the Telegraph in smearing
the Labour Leader Jeremy Corbyn. She claimed that, as a Jew, his
remarks were 'anti-semitic'.
The target is of course Jeremy
Corbyn, who has become the enemy of the Establishment media,
right-wing labour MPs and the Israeli Embassy. His anti-austerity
platform, support for the Stop the War Coalition, and for Palestine
and the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement ensures his
demonisation.
When former Israeli lobby intern Alex Chalmers
claimed “a large proportion” of the student Labour club “and
the student left in Oxford more generally” had a “problem” with
Jews, his claims were highlighted by the press. No one mentioned that
Chalmers was a member of the far-right Progress faction in the Labour
Party and soon after he defected to the Liberal Democrats.
When, a
few months ago, the Jewish Leadership Council and the Board of
Deputies of British Jews organised a demonstration against Corbyn
outside Parliament, they were happy to use anti-Semitic abuse against
left-wing Jews who were holding a counter-protest in support of
Corbyn.
Ben Southern-Thomas, from Jewish Voice for Labour, said “I
came away crying” after anti-Semitic abuse from two demonstrators.
He was told he was “not a real Jew” and was just “pretending to
be a Jew.” He added that “being Jewish is a really important part
of my identity,”
And so it goes. Recently Jonathan
Goldstein, chair of the Jewish Leadership Council claimed on BBC
Newsnight that Jeremy Corbyn is “the figurehead of an anti-Semitic
political culture.”
We are involved in a struggle which is
way beyond waiting for the next election polls to open. If we want
any possibility of radical change ( no more wars, no more austerity,
defence of the dwindling NHS, action on climate change … the list
is long) we have to realise what is going on and act now. This means
supporting the three W's - Williamson, Walker, and Wadsworth
