More on Len v Lewis

Lewis Goodall

Hmm. So where are we now with the Len McCluskey-Lewis Goodall business? 

Well, it looks from what both of them are saying (see the post below) that they both got through to Barry Gardiner in Abu Dhabi last night. Len says Barry Gardiner dismissed the story as fake news while Lewis says Barry only dismissed the part about Len McMluskey encouraging him to stand. Lewis now says, however, that Barry is still making his mind up whether to stand and will decide in the next 24 hours - which isn't what Lewis was tweeting earlier last night:

EXC: I can confirm there is to be a seventh entrant into the Labour leadership contest. 

It’s Barry Gardiner.

Tune into #Newsnight at 2230 for more.
— Lewis Goodall (@lewis_goodall) January 8, 2020

In fairness to both of them, Barry Gardiner is often as clear as Dead Sea mud during TV interviews, so it's perhaps no wonder that his intentions aren't crystal clear now!

It may have been having bigger stories - the Harry and Meghan news and the Trump/Soulemaini story - on the same edition that saw last night's Newsnight shunt poor Lewis to the very end of the programme, or it may be that they lost confidence in his 'exclusive'. He got a little over a minute to do his Barry Gardiner bit, including all the caveats he had to add given Len and Barry's comments.  

It would certainly add to the gaiety of the nation though if Barry Gardiner were to stand for the Labour leadership. I laughed at this tweet from polling expert and politics professor Philip Cowley overnight: 

Woke up. Checked the news, half-asleep. Misread things and thought I'd read that Barry Gardiner was running for Deputy Leader. Thought OK, sure, whatever. 30 mins later: WAIT A GODDAMN COTTON-PICKING MINUTE! It's a bit like the time I dozed through the news bulletins about John Major's affair with Edwina Currie. Several hours later at work, I told someone that I'd had the weirdest f*cking dream...

Red Len v Red Andy (featuring Red Paul Mason)

I'm late in catching up with today's The Andrew Marr Show. 

Andrew's interview with far-left Len McCluskey of the Unite union was particularly gripping viewing.

My favourite bit needs transcribing:

Andrew Marr: Have you ever heard the suggestion around the leader's office that he's going to step down towards the end of this year?
Len McCluskey: Absolutely not. It's fake news. Jeremy is a strong leader and people should stop putting him under pressure. This idea, even from comrades of the Left - Paul Mason. He seems to have lost his marbles -...
Andrew Marr: (interrupting) No, he hasn't lost his marbles!
Len McCluskey: He's wanting...
Andrew Marr: (interrupting) No, that's not fair!
Len McCluskey: ...to sack everyone around Jeremy...

Now I, of course, was mainly laughing there at Red Len's denunciation of Comrade Mason, ex of the BBC's Newsnight (though I shocked myself by finding myself agreeing with Len on quite a few things during the whole interview)...

...and I also laughed at Red Len saying that Jez is "a strong leader" and then saying "and people should stop putting him under pressure". (Who needs satire?) 

I then saw from Twitter that far-left ex-BBC Newsnight economics editor Paul wasn't at all happy with Red Len about that, and that made me laugh even more. 

The endless fallings-out of the present day extreme-Left are grimly comical, in a Monty Pythonish kind of way, but what if they - and their anti-Semitic hordes - got into power via a Jeremy Corbyn premiership? What price laughter then?

Weekend supplement.

That’s why Jeremy Corbyn is such a strong leader!

 Oh Len, on the Marr show, saying such weird things. 

I know!  Someone must have dared him to try and get away with playing ‘opposites’ all the way through the Marr show. 

Like the time when Penny Mordant took on the challenge of seamlessly introducing some outlandish word into her speech.

Wait till tomorrow, when he’ll admit he was playing ‘opposites’ and the joke was on the Beeb.

*******

During a bout of insomnia, I turned on the radio - as you do - it’s a very effective soporific for we inso-maniacs. What I heard was something called A History of Hate 

Not wanting to appear like an apologist for the Serbs, or even worse, like an inverted version of a Nazi enthusiast who insists that “the Jews brought it on themselves” -  heaven forfend  - but I had the distinct impression that this programme was coming at me through a prism of rose-coloured, Islam-washing specs.  The moral of the story was that hatred of Muslims led to the Srebrenica massacre.

I don’t know as much about the Bosnian war as I ought, and I have no business moralising about it. Perhaps it was indeed a straightforward matter of ’good versus evil’ but the programme presented it as virtue in the form of tolerance, diversity and religious freedom versus evil in the shape of Hitler-style, racial purity.  If it was a lecture, the message was a warning not to mess with far-right/alt/right anti-Islam bigotry.  

Admittedly I may have got it all wrong, but in my half-awake state it seemed to me that a good deal of the actual ‘hate’ came from the programme itself, and it was aimed at ‘the far right’, a term that I took to mean ‘critic of Islam’. What’s more, I felt that as a critic of Islam, the hate was being directed at me and the message they were sending was: "you’re a hater and ‘look what hate leads to’ "The Srebrenica massacre. 

This sleep-time paranoia wasn’t ameliorated when the next item included someone eulogising about hijabs and gaily coloured headscarves.

******

See Rod Liddle? What is he like?

I’m not sure what the reproduction rules’n’regs are on stealing huge chunks of content from paywalled articles but I’ve only stolen the section about the Labour party. If you’ve got the  Sunday Times or have online access to it you’ll have read it by now, but if not it’s hidden over t’fold. 

But Rod, I haven’t forgotten - it’s not so long ago that you were still rooting for Labour (long, long, long after things went bad.)

Dealing robustily

Talking of missed opportunities, let’s not forget the antisemitism scandal. (Jonathan Arkush speaks for the Jews and Norman Smith speaks for the Labour party)  Lots of coverage following the “Missed opportunities” verdict from various members of the Jewish delegation following their unsatisfactory meeting with Jeremy Corbyn.

From Today, Norman Smith, Justin Webb and Barry Gardiner.  And  Ian Watson.

The Daily Politics with Andrew Neil. Peter Dowd MP, Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury is in the hot seat. A little sheepish, but still loyal to Dear Leader. Andrew Neil had a long list of examples of Labour’s outrageous conduct, (reputedly lifted from Guido Fawkes) which he read out, item by item. Dowd had no answer, but he did express regret. 

The Today programme featured Kier Starmer who said the party should “deal robustily” with the antisemitism. 

We mustn’t forget Len McCluskey who has written a nasty piece in the New Statesman in which he dismisses it all as a smear. 

Did you know that Jennie Formby is a former partner of Len McCluskey a relationship from which they have a son? She’s the one who has the task of dealing with it, no doubt robustily.

A Gov’ment in waiting

“Let us do more to end the oppression of the Palestinian people. The 60 year occupation - gabble gabble gabble -  two state solution. ...the values we share are not served by building walls.”

Says Jeremessiah  Corbyn.

Or to be more precise, here’s a more accurate transcription from the Spectator:

“And let’s give real support to end the oppression of the Palestinian people, the 50-year occupation and illegal settlement expansion and move to a genuine two-state solution of the Israel-Palestine conflict. Britain’s voice needs to be heard independently in the world. We must be a candid friend to the United States, now more than ever.
The values we share are not served by building walls, banning immigrants on the basis of religion, polluting the planet, or pandering to racism.” 

I knew the way the BBC has been behaving was reminding me of something. Yes, of course! It’s like the Arab Spring all over again. 

“The Labour Party is the gov’ment in waiting!" "Feel the euphoria!" "Jeremy Corbyn is the next PM.”

Recently I’ve held back a bit on the anti-Jew stuff that emanates from the BBC. I’m not sure that everyone is as interested in the topic as I am. The BBC certainly hasn’t featured antisemitism in the Labour Party (there isn’t any, you know) as much as, say, Sky. Sky featured it prominently all day yesterday. 

On the occasions the BBC has mentioned it, presenters like Jo Coburn and Emily Maitlis have been ever so gentle on their interviewees.

I’m not keen on rabidly adversarial interviewing. Repeated interruptions can all too easily make one sympathise with the victim. The aggressive, intrusive interviewing style has become so commonplace that pleas from interviewees are becoming almost routine: ‘Let me make my point’ or ‘if you could just let me finish one sentence’ they say, sometimes preemptively. I mean before an interruption has even occurred.

There much to be said for allowing a speaker enough rope to hang him/herself, which is fine if the interviewer or presenter is capable of making the occasional informed and intelligent interjection. That’s a long way from constantly interrupting and challenging every word.    Meritless (that’s my autocorrect but I’ll leave it in) let Shami Chakrabarti get away with a complete load of bollocks yesterday. As if it isn’t bad enough watching the baroness’s smug little countenance and listening to her pedestrian insights, we were invited to ’read my report’ as if her wretched report into antisemitism in the Labour party (there isn’t any) was some kind of definitive  decree and not a superficial, narcissistic whitewash.

“You have to prepare for the worst” Shami Chakrabarti says senior civil servants stress-test threats to the economy all the time #newsnight pic.twitter.com/B26sZsVsed

— BBC Newsnight (@BBCNewsnight) September 26, 2017

 Take Len McCluskey. He was allowed to state that he hadn’t seen any antisemitism (ever) in the Labour Party. 

Len McCluskey tells @maitlis that Labour’s anti-Semitism row was “mood music” created by people trying to undermine Jeremy Corbyn #newsnight pic.twitter.com/38Ri6Nc41v

— BBC Newsnight (@BBCNewsnight) September 26, 2017

(Yet it transpires (allegedly) that he actually attended the controversial ‘fringe’ event that everyone but him acknowledges was unspeakably offensive.) 

More of the BBC’s favourite socialist filmmaker here:

Possibly fearing a reputation of last year’s embarrassment, Corbyn didn’t attend Labour Friends of Israel’s ‘final night’ event. He sent Emily Thornberry along instead.  She apologised, and lied, stating that Jeremessiah was too busy preparing for the Big Speech next day. Only he wasn’t.

Here is Karen Pollock in the Times (£) 

“We have elected Labour politicians suggesting that antisemitism has been “weaponised” – a suggestion that it is being used to promote some other agenda. 

And we even have activists handing out material at the Labour party conference quoting Reinhard Heydrich, one of the leading architects of the Final Solution. 

How many times do we need to explain the hurt and offence that it causes when people question the truth of the Holocaust? How many times do we need to explain that there are survivors – who lost their homes, communities and entire families - still among us, who register these comments with disbelief? 

How many times do we have to defend basic truths that should be considered sacrosanct?”

Some people do recognise what is going on. 

Labour council leader Warren Morgan for one. He wrote to the Labour Party general secretary:

Dear Iain,
I hope that you and the entire Labour team here in Brighton and Hove are enjoying your stay and that the facilities offered by the Brighton Centre are everything that you would expect from us. As a city we very much appreciate the business that Conference brings to our hotels, restaurants and shops. 

I am however very concerned at the anti-semitism being aired publicly in fringe meetings and on the floor of Conference. We have a significant Jewish community in Brighton and Hove, and I met with them only last week to discuss the anti-semitism already on our streets, causing them fear and alarm. We have the prominent activist and suspended Labour Party member Tony Greenstein here, who indeed was present at the fringe meeting where it was suggested that Holocaust denial should be allowed. His expulsion, in my view, is long overdue. 

As the Labour leader of Brighton and Hove City Council I will undoubtedly face questions as to why we allow any event where anti-semitic views are freely expressed to happen in the city, particularly on council premises. As a Labour Party member I expect the enquiry announced today to take firm action; as Leader I will need reassurances that there will be no repeat of the behaviour and actions we have seen this week before any further bookings from the Party are taken. 

I must apply the same standards to Labour as I would to any other Party Conference or political event; whilst none of us can control what is said at meetings we do not run, I have to make the strongest possible representation on behalf of the residents of the city who are Jewish. We are a City of Sanctuary and I have to speak up against any form of racism as and when it is given a platform in the city.
Best wishes,

Finally, here is (Jewish vice president of the NUS) Izzy Lenga’s Tweet:

I didnt think it was possible, but I feel a whole lot more unsafe, uncomfortable & upset as a Jew on #lab17 floor right now than I do at NUS

— Izzy Lenga (@izzyjengalenga) September 26, 2017