THERE MAY YET BE HOPE....

[MrGongGong]

I don't know where you live.

The Gang of 11 are behaving as if they agree with a majority view that there should be same sex marriage while simultaneously blocking the door of the church to physically prevent it.

That isn't my idea of liberalism.

Stopping the UK leaving the EU is the ONLY thing that matters at the moment.

[Lat-Literal]

Stopping the UK leaving the EU is the ONLY thing that matters at the moment.

It's a pity because I thought you might have been noting the retention of Erasmus come what may and exploring the avenues for building on and around that news.

Anyhow, you do, of course, have Green candidates in your area wherever it is.

[MrGongGong]

It's a pity because I thought you might have been noting the retention of Erasmus come what may and exploring the avenues for building on and around that news.

What on earth are you on about?
If we leave the EU we isolate ourselves culturally and remove ourselves from many long term collaborations (not just in music and the arts)
I thought folks who were interested in MUSIC might actually care about it a bit ?

[Lat-Literal]

What on earth are you on about?
If we leave the EU we isolate ourselves culturally and remove ourselves from many long term collaborations (not just in music and the arts)
I thought folks who were interested in MUSIC might actually care about it a bit ?

My position on music is the same as on everything else. Leaving the EU could be worse for it or it could be better for it. No one knows. No one knows if only the EU' economy will be going down the pan, if only Britain's economy will be going down the pan, if both will going down the pan because we are in the EU, if both will going down the pan even if we are not in the EU, if there will be a Corbyn Government, if there will be a Rees-Mogg Government, if there will be a Umunna Government, if the far right will become the main political force on the continent and if freedom of movement will be retained in its current form which is increasingly unlikely. No one knows. I can't rationally respond to Mystic Megs who say they know it all. The one thing I believe I know - this applies to the sunshine brigades on both sides - is that everything is about to get worse and to think one way will be all sweet is childishly naïve.

[Joseph K]

I think Corbyn's success as a politician is shown by the fact that Labour achieved its biggest increase in votes since 1945 and that Labour has massively increased its number of members. Of course, he doesn't have the typical oleaginous politician slickness and I have heard people dismiss him, saying he doesn't want to be prime minister; this is precisely one of the many appealing aspects of having him as prime minister - he'd be doing it as a chore, not someone who relishes the prospect of power.

Neoliberal austerity, as delivered by the Tories, has resulted in over a hundred thousand deaths, and in various parts of the UK has led to a decrease in life expectancy. It is this foul scourge that needs to be opposed. Too many people voted Labour for Corbyn to just be dismissed as a cult.

As for the EU, we have seen how they treat a left-wing government in Greece - though things might be different since we have our own currency. I voted remain but since that lost, think a Norway style deal would be preferable.

[french frank]

I think Corbyn's success as a politician is shown by the fact that Labour achieved its biggest increase in votes since 1945 and that Labour has massively increased its number of members.

I don't think this indicates his success "as a politician" in the sense of "progressing the aims and policies of the Labour party. The "biggest increase in votes'' but still beaten into second place. As a Commons library briefing points out, 'membership' of political parties is hard to estimate because definitions of 'membership' vary: Labour has been by far the biggest party in terms of membership for years (though post-Blair it was historically low, for reasons not hard to find).

Neoliberal austerity, as delivered by the Tories, has resulted in over a hundred thousand deaths, and in various parts of the UK has led to a decrease in life expectancy. It is this foul scourge that needs to be opposed. Too many people voted Labour for Corbyn to just be dismissed as a cult.

Don't forget the relaxation in the rules which allowed non-members to vote on payment of the requisite small sum: my (Labour-leaning) next door neighbours took advantage of this with great amusement; and rumour was that many (right-leaning) members of the public did so too - in order to get Corbyn elected.

As for the EU, we have seen how they treat a left-wing government in Greece - though things might be different since we have our own currency. I voted remain but since that lost, think a Norway style deal would be preferable.

Greece was a more complex situation than some are prepared to admit. It was unable to capitalise on its EU membership in the way that Ireland, Spain and Portugal (to varying degrees and not without struggling!!) were able to do. Let's admit: the EU was not set up in such a way as to be able to deal with that situation.

We have neo-con and neo-liberal: there really ought to be a 'neo-' label for the left (not New Labour). I imagine it would be a system where there were no restraints on borrowing until such time as the debt interest charges dwarfed the amount available to spend on the NHS, and credit became too expensive and/or nor forthcoming (except from the EU with exorbitant conditions attached).

At least a Norway-style deal would allow for continuing Freedom of Movement, though it's hard to see how such a deal would be, all round, better than what we have now - especially since the government is making comforting noises about compensating the various interest groups for their loss of EU grant (and lessening the amount of beneficial funding for the NHS, secured by not having to pay £18bn pa. - and we'd still have to pay for the Norway-style deal).

[Richard Barrett]

I think Corbyn's success as a politician is shown by the fact that Labour achieved its biggest increase in votes since 1945 and that Labour has massively increased its number of members. Of course, he doesn't have the typical oleaginous politician slickness and I have heard people dismiss him, saying he doesn't want to be prime minister; this is precisely one of the many appealing aspects of having him as prime minister - he'd be doing it as a chore, not someone who relishes the prospect of power.

Neoliberal austerity, as delivered by the Tories, has resulted in over a hundred thousand deaths, and in various parts of the UK has led to a decrease in life expectancy. It is this foul scourge that needs to be opposed. Too many people voted Labour for Corbyn to just be dismissed as a cult.

As for the EU, we have seen how they treat a left-wing government in Greece - though things might be different since we have our own currency. I voted remain but since that lost, think a Norway style deal would be preferable.

Right. And, frankly, the "everything else is a distraction" attitude plays exactly into the hands of the Tories, and the NeoTories or whatever they end up calling themselves, whether one wants it to or not.

[Richard Barrett]

rumour was that many (right-leaning) members of the public did so too - in order to get Corbyn elected.

Come on, ff, you don't usually deal in rumours. Let's not forget that JC was elected as party leader twice, the second time with an increased majority - even if the first time was as a joke, it would have worn a bit thin by the second. On the other hand there were and are numbers of people like myself who had waited decades for there to be a mainstream party in the UK that they could actually get behind, without the necessary nose-holding of the Blair/Brown years*, as well as very many young people wondering why the two main parties had basically been peddling the same dogma throughout their lifetimes and wanting an end to the ideology of austerity... and so on and so on.

* This is one thing I mean by entitlement. Socialists had to hold their noses for many years, but the New Labour people aren't prepared to do that and prefer to flounce off into a comfortable club of their own - and I always thought the far left had a monopoly on splintering!

[MrGongGong]

My position on music is the same as on everything else. Leaving the EU could be worse for it or it could be better for it. No one knows.e.

WRONG

Those people (and I don't mean ME !) who know about it are pretty unanimous.
Unless you want to go the whole Nigel Lawson on Climate Change fantasy stylee

But as you seem so certain, let me know where to send the invoice to for lost work and extra administration for the things I'm doing.

[french frank]

Come on, ff, you don't usually deal in rumours.

I thought that as I wrote it ! I do agree that Corbyn was widely seen as, for the first time since for ever, the potential hope of the left for a new direction in politics in the UK. But I think it was a clutching at straws. Changing the system in the UK, on even minor political issues, seems near impossible. And the idea that Corbyn would be the leader to do it on the grounds that that is what he stated as his aim, seems - cynic that I am - a little naive.

But I probably don't see the major political issues nowadays as the class struggle and the overthrow of capitalism (however much I think that would be a good thing, I don't see the weapons necessary to achieve that at the moment). And other issues - like the rise in nationalism and all that ensues - seem to me to be of more immediate importance.

[Richard Barrett]

WRONG

I was just thinking that it was an encouraging sign that we're having a discussion of this particular issue where each of us has a chance to state their position and is respected for it. Maybe try and be a bit less shouty and a bit more facty?

[Richard Barrett]

I think it was a clutching at straws

One of my favourite bons mots, from Edward Bond: "Clutching at straws is the only realistic thing to do."

[MrGongGong]

I was just thinking that it was an encouraging sign that we're having a discussion of this particular issue where each of us has a chance to state their position and is respected for it. Maybe try and be a bit less shouty and a bit more facty?

It's tedious to have to keep repeating the same things over and over again
I'm working with an orchestra at the moment and they tell me that they DO know these things simply by looking at this years diary and comparing it to last years.
Unless, of course, the idea is to have a beard stroking lengthy discourse

It's a real shame that the Labour party has shafted us over it's stance on Europe.

[Lat-Literal]

WRONG

Those people (and I don't mean ME !) who know about it are pretty unanimous.
Unless you want to go the whole Nigel Lawson on Climate Change fantasy stylee

But as you seem so certain, let me know where to send the invoice to for lost work and extra administration for the things I'm doing.

I don't know why you believe in economists when their record is so atrocious. As for the predictions on migration...….worse. I have come to the conclusion after many months of reading your posts that your own personal financial backing from the EU can't be merely useful. It must be absolutely enormous. It is a pity that you have never felt able to describe what it is that it is funding. Then I could consider whether I felt that it was appropriate.

As for the new "party", Anna Soubry was saying in her three hour programme on LBC this morning that she feels Liberal Democrats should either leave their party and join her non party or if not they should work alongside her for now. She does not agree that she or any of the others should join the Lib Dems as they are the old politics which needs to be wiped out by her new politics as she sees it. I thought this might be of interest to Lib Dems.

[MrGongGong]

I don't know why you believe in economists when their record is so atrocious.

As for the predictions on migration...….worse.

I have come to the conclusion after many months of reading your posts that your own personal financial backing from the EU cannot be merely useful but absolutely enormous.

It is a pity that you have never felt able to describe what it is that it is funding.

I don't have anything to do with economists
I do know lots of musicians with international careers who are having serious problems already
My "financial backing" from the EU isn't massive (nor is it personal) and is largely connected to projects like this which many artists and organisations work on all the time

http://www.interfacesnetwork.eu