Jeremy Corbyn - Not Not Labour Party(?), not a Communist (BBC)

[sun_tzu]

Would be the wisest move, personally think Thornberry should take on that role for now.

The big issue is Corbyn has no credibility to challenge Boris on anything so staying just lets Boris have a free ride. I expect he'll go next week they're just buying some time for things to form but we'll see.

I believe the nec has power to appoint a temporary leader if Corbyn steps down... But given the momentum infiltration of the nec it would probably be burgon or some other crazy pick

 

[DavidDeSchmikes]

 

[Adisa]

Next PM questions will be brutal for Jeremy. The smug faces on Johnson and the front bench will be painful to see.

 

[Kaos]

Next PM questions will be brutal for Jeremy. The smug faces on Johnson and the front bench will be painful to see.

Can he just not bother turning up? He’s got nothing to lose or gain, and he can always deflect by pointing to Boris’ cowardice with Andrew Neil and the other recent debates/interviews he tucked tail on.

 

[Guy Incognito]

Next PM questions will be brutal for Jeremy. The smug faces on Johnson and the front bench will be painful to see.

No different to John Major in 97, but there was an underlying respect between him and Blair.

 

[sun_tzu]

No different to John Major in 97, but there was an underlying respect between him and Blair.

Not sure there was... Especially after this

I do think Blair thought gloating would make him look bad especially as he was the first labour pm in a long time and wanted to look statesman like... And I'm not sure Johnson cares about that so yeah fully expect Johnson to pile on.

 

[Boycott]

Next PMQs isn't until January. I suspect the poor fellow will be put out of his misery by then.

 

[11101]

I do dislike the man, not least for his dishonesty, but as far as wanting to divide the country goes he doesn't even come close to Thatcher. Corbyn's just a tosser, she was genuine evil.

Thatcher did what had to be done, hard as that was for some sections of the country, and the majority see her as a great PM because of it. She even came ahead of Churchill in a recent Yougov survey of our greatest post-war leaders.

 

[Charlie Foley]

Is this a preview of the scenes in the US election thread after Sanders is beaten by Trump? @Eboue

Sanders is light years ahead of Corbyn though

 

[sun_tzu]

Thatcher did what had to be done, hard as that was for some sections of the country, and the majority see her as a great PM because of it. She even came ahead of Churchill in a recent Yougov survey of our greatest post-war leaders.

well to be fair Churchills post war political career was basically a defeat and then pm from 1951 to 1955 with some "questionable" attitudes

Churchill tried in vain to manoeuvre the cabinet into restricting West Indian immigration. "Keep England White" was a good slogan, he told the cabinet in January 1955.[527] Ian Gilmour records Churchill saying to him, in 1955, about immigration: "I think it is the most important subject facing this country, but I cannot get any of my ministers to take any notice".[528]

but certainly post war was very much a footnote to his pre war and wartime political career

 

[711]

Thatcher did what had to be done, hard as that was for some sections of the country, and the majority see her as a great PM because of it. She even came ahead of Churchill in a recent Yougov survey of our greatest post-war leaders.

There would be absolutely no contest in who would win a most hated survey, you might as well not bother counting anyone else's votes. Thatcher was simply a class warrior who's sole objective was to put the working class back in their place, and she didn't care how much damage she would have to do to the country to achieve that.

 

[11101]

There would be absolutely no contest in who would win a most hated survey, you might as well not bother counting anyone else's votes. Thatcher was simply a class warrior who's sole objective was to put the working class back in their place, and she didn't care how much damage she would have to do to the country to achieve that.

Oh I know the people in the towns she killed off (including my own) will always hate her, but the history books will remember her favourably, they already do. The fact is those towns and industries were already dead, she just dealt the final blow.

 

[sun_tzu]

Oh I know the people in the towns she killed off (including my own) will always hate her, but the history books will remember her favourably, they already do. The fact is those towns and industries were already dead, she just dealt the final blow.

and lets be honest bolsover, ashfield, mansfield... you wouldn't have found many more anti thatcher places ... large ex mining communities with a real hatred of thatcher - but over the 30 years or more since the miners strikes the demographics have changed and whislt you will find plenty of people in those areas who hate thatcher and hate the conservatives (probably in that order) you also now have 3 conservative MP's representing those areas ... labour cant survive simply on thatcher hatred (the demographics wont allow it) ... corbyn certainly wasnt the solution - an absolutly toxic brand up in this part of the world (even more so than thatcher id say)

 

[Virgil]

There would be absolutely no contest in who would win a most hated survey, you might as well not bother counting anyone else's votes. Thatcher was simply a class warrior who's sole objective was to put the working class back in their place, and she didn't care how much damage she would have to do to the country to achieve that.

you really can tell those who actually lived through the Thatcher or Blair years against those who only know them via social media. Firstly the mining industry was already
dying in the UK. The way Thatcher went about dismantling it was shameful but the power of the Unions just had to be broken. Scargill and Co were twice as dangerous as JC.

Secondly she tapped into the aspirations of the working class with the sale of council houses at a serious discount.....fostering home ownership.

 

[sullydnl]

Oh I know the people in the towns she killed off (including my own) will always hate her, but the history books will remember her favourably, they already do. The fact is those towns and industries were already dead, she just dealt the final blow.

We definitely get very different history books in Ireland.

 

[Kag]

Thatcher did what had to be done, hard as that was for some sections of the country, and the majority see her as a great PM because of it. She even came ahead of Churchill in a recent Yougov survey of our greatest post-war leaders.

Decimating all industry in an area and providing nothing (other than disdain) to compensate for the loss of jobs is going over and above doing “what had to be done”.

 

[Virgil]

We definitely get very different history books in Ireland.

Of course you do and no reason why not. Much the same as the history books of the UK look on Ireland unsympathetically. After all Eire as a neutral would have been quite happy for Germany to have been victorious in WW2. That is the trouble with entrenched positions on all sides sadly.

 

[Virgil]

Decimating all industry in an area and providing nothing (other than disdain) to compensate for the loss of jobs is going over and above doing “what had to be done”.

As I said. The way she went about it was shameful .....however necessary. Good post

 

[2cents]

After all Eire as a neutral would have been quite happy for Germany to have been victorious in WW2

No. We were ‘neutral’ in favor of the allies.

 

[Virgil]

No. We were ‘neutral’ in favor of the allies.

Surely the key word is 'neutral' or am I missing something? Mind you with the echo chamber that social media is it would not be surprising if I was missing a key point.

 

[711]

and lets be honest bolsover, ashfield, mansfield... you wouldn't have found many more anti thatcher places ... large ex mining communities with a real hatred of thatcher - but over the 30 years or more since the miners strikes the demographics have changed and whislt you will find plenty of people in those areas who hate thatcher and hate the conservatives (probably in that order) you also now have 3 conservative MP's representing those areas ... labour cant survive simply on thatcher hatred (the demographics wont allow it) ... corbyn certainly wasnt the solution - an absolutly toxic brand up in this part of the world (even more so than thatcher id say)

Well you've moved the conversation on from how evil Thatcher was a considerable time ago, which she was, to whether Labour currently represents the people of today. We got the answer to that on thursday I'd have thought. That won't change until the left activists stop blaming everyone and everything else and develop at least some sense of how others see them.

 

[berbatrick]

Simon Wiesenthal Center disclosed its annual top ten list of the worst outbreaks of antisemitic and anti-Israel incidents, including lethal Jew-hatred in the US and Germany.

Wiesenthal announced that the now-defeated British Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn was ranked number one for mainstream antisemitism in the UK. The Center wrote that it ”released its #1 choice for its Top Ten 2019 list five days before the UK election. Corbyn’s Labour was trounced by PM Boris Johnson’s Conservative Party in the December 12th elections. Some analysts say that antisemitism impacted the voters. Corbyn has resigned as leader of the Labour Party.”


In fact, Corbyn termed the antisemitic jihadi organizations Hezbollah and Hamas his “friends.”

The Center listed the lethal antisemitic attacks in Jersey City and in Halle, Germany as the next worst outbreaks of Jew-hatred. [...] “Anderson had expressed anti-police and antisemitic sentiments. The shooters first killed a police officer, then unleashed a barrage of gunfire killing three innocent people inside the kosher store. Only quick and heroic action taken by police prevented an even greater massacre, as an adjacent yeshiva [school] would have been their next target,” wrote the Center.

Wiesenthal wrote that “some 80 Jews praying in a German Synagogue on Yom Kippur – Judaism’s holiest day – miraculously escaped certain injury or death at the hands of a neo-Nazi when the attacker failed to break down a security door outside a synagogue in Halle, Germany. Balliet admitted that he was motivated by his hatred of Jews.”

The entry also listed the San Diego gunman who “opened fire on Jews at prayer inside a Chabad synagogue in San Diego County, killing 60-year-old Lori Gilbert-Kaye, and wounding the rabbi.” The shooter announced that he was “defending our nation against the Jewish people, who are trying to destroy all white people.”

The third spot went to the antisemitic death threats targeting the “Eighty-nine year-old Auschwitz survivor Liliana Segre, who serves as Senator for Life in the Italian Parliament.” [...]

As number four on the Center’s list, French prosecutors were cited for “dropping murder charges against Kobili Traore, who mercilessly beat Sarah Halimi, a Jewish kindergarten teacher, and then threw her off her balcony. [...]

American Muslim Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib, America’s first Congresswoman of Palestinian descent, and IIhan Omar, a Muslim Congresswoman, earned spot number five for their “slander of Israel and Jews.”

https://www.jpost.com/Diaspora/Wiesenthal-releases-ten-worst-outbreaks-of-antisemiticanti-Israel-cases-6113

 

[berbatrick]

 

[Sweet Square]

 

[esmufc07]

Do these count as smears?

 

[Sweet Square]

Thread of the void

 

[berbatrick]

There's been a lot of talk about a lack of ventilators and of local manufacturing capacity generally in response to the virus - the pitfalls of having so much manufacturing outsourced. I've also seen an article posted here about a 3D printing solution to the ventialtor problem.

Here is an article written by a McDonnell advisor in September 2019.

De-Deindustrialisation
ByJames Meadway
After decades of deindustrialisation, the next Labour government can reboot the areas left behind  - by laying foundations for a digital industrial revolution.

The 1st paragraph:

If you want to see the future, head to New York’s Fordham Road Metro station, right in the heart of the Bronx, and walk round the block to Morris Avenue. There, in the back rooms of a Lutheran church, the Bronx Innovation Factory has community-owned and operated 3D printers, laser engravers, and a robot milling machine. Inside, training programmes are in full-swing and locals with a bright idea can turn it into prototyped and 3D-printed reality.

The Bronx is the poorest county in New York, with nearly a third of its residents living in poverty, and one of the poorest counties in the whole of the US. It’s not the first place you might think of when you hear the term ‘advanced manufacturing,’ but that’s the vision behind the Innovation Factory: that changes in technology can place the means of production back into the hands of places that have too long been treated as bywords for economic decline.

But there is something more subtle, too. We’re all faced with a world that seems dangerously out of our control. Those in charge often do not know what they are doing, as the global financial crisis demonstrated, and care little for the rest of us if they do, as austerity showed. Climate change is already disrupting our lives. Fairbourne, on the North Wales coast, is the first place in the country to be evacuated due to climate change, the local council claiming it can no longer afford to provide protection against rising sea levels. Every year, wildfires spread across peat moors and floods threaten lowland areas.

Decisions are taken about our economy with little reference to how we actually live, from the disappearance of high street chains to the closure of car plants. And then at work itself, with the erosion of trade union rights, the spread of insecure work, and the growth of electronic monitoring, we are subject to the whims the labour market and corporate hierarchies. Alienation is the dominant feature of the society in which we live.

It’s little wonder the demand to ‘take back control’ resonated with so many in the summer of 2016. That’s why economic democracy and decentralisation is the most important part of Labour’s new approach to economic policy. By giving ownership over productive assets back to the people who work with them, and the people who should benefit from them, we are reasserting a fundamental right over the economy and how it operates.

Two developments are opening up this possibility. The first is the growth of what gets called ‘distributed manufacturing.’ Distinct from the older model of manufacturing, where one large factory would churn out standardised goods for consumers a long way off, distributed manufacturing relies on far smaller plants that can churn out customised products, close to their markets.

3D printing is the most obvious technology associated with this. Costs have plummeted, with viable 3 printers available for as little as $49, but at the same time their quality and sophistication has improved. Already, there are companies across the country offering access to the smaller-scale production 3D printing can provide, and future advances could include the personalisation of medicine, including even the 3D printing of replacement human organs. But the rise of the ‘maker’ movement demonstrates another, less sci-fi version of the same process — shared spaces, like Building BloQs in north London, that provide cheap, shared access to machine tools, allowing economically viable production to take place on a far smaller scale than previously seemed possible.

To call this prescient would be an understatement. This one random guy that the disgraced leadership picked as an adviser has done better than the magic of the market, and honestly this article combined with the coronavirus crisis validates my worldview so much I won't be able to resist re-posting it forever.

 

[PedroMendez]

There's been a lot of talk about a lack of ventilators and of local manufacturing capacity generally in response to the virus - the pitfalls of having so much manufacturing outsourced. I've also seen an article posted here about a 3D printing solution to the ventialtor problem.

Here is an article written by a McDonnell advisor in September 2019.

De-Deindustrialisation
ByJames Meadway
After decades of deindustrialisation, the next Labour government can reboot the areas left behind  - by laying foundations for a digital industrial revolution.

The 1st paragraph:








To call this prescient would be an understatement. This one random guy that the disgraced leadership picked as an adviser has done better than the magic of the market, and honestly this article combined with the coronavirus crisis validates my worldview so much I won't be able to resist re-posting it forever.

I don't understand the connection between outsourcing of manufacturing, the current crisis and 3d-printing.

 

[Sweet Square]

 

[berbatrick]

I don't understand the connection between outsourcing of manufacturing, the current crisis and 3d-printing.

Current crisis and 3D: https://www.3dnatives.com/en/3d-printed-respirator-230320205/

Outsourcing and crisis: inability/unwillingnes to quickly ramp up domestic production of ventilators

3D and outsourcing: a form of manufacturing with less capital and labour requirements, it is suited to small work-spaces using a highly educated workforce and would thus (with the correct investment) be viable in the west.

 

[Drifter]

They'll be re-nationalising trains next.

 

[Flying high]

What a tool.

All this AS, anti UK, support for IRA stuff was bullshit cooked up by the right wing media. The same can, and will be done to the next left-leaning Labour leader. That so many of you in here lapped it up is totally shameful.

 

[nickm]

What a tool.

All this AS, anti UK, support for IRA stuff was bullshit cooked up by the right wing media.

There is no way the UK electorate was going to elect Corbyn. You (as in this currently dominant part of labour) were told this again and again, including by your own MPs, ie the people most exposed to the electorate - who you decided to attack and marginalise instead. The whole history of the last few years of labour is a refusal to listen to anyone outside the Corbyn echo chamber. A better candidate and a better operation would have resulted in a better result but you were - and remain - too deaf to hear that. People like you lost this election for Labour.

The same can, and will be done to the next left-leaning Labour leader. That so many of you in here lapped it up is totally shameful.

Maybe. Perhaps Labour will get smart enough to elect a leader who doesn't offer so many easy targets to its enemies, and followers strong enough to have real debates rather than pointless ideological purity contests.

 

[Flying high]

There is no way the UK electorate was going to elect Corbyn. You (as in this currently dominant part of labour) were told this again and again, including by your own MPs, ie the people most exposed to the electorate - who you decided to attack and marginalise instead. The whole history of the last few years of labour is a refusal to listen to anyone outside the Corbyn echo chamber. A better candidate and a better operation would have resulted in a better result but you were - and remain - too deaf to hear that. People like you lost this election for Labour.



Maybe. Perhaps Labour will get smart enough to elect a leader who doesn't offer so many easy targets to its enemies, and followers strong enough to have real debates rather than pointless ideological purity contests.

The attacking and marginalising started immediately from the so called centrists. Stop trying to rewrite history. People like you lost the elections for all of us.

Corbyn is not some crazed idealogue as you seem to want to paint him. He is a considerate, thoughtful man who would have been a huge improvement upon the callous tories.

He is not a great orator. His demeanor, especially toward the legions of the press who kept attacking him, could certainly have been better. But why was he really being attacked? It was purely because he would have, at least in some small measure, done what the majority of people in this country actually want: Disrupt the never ending drain of money/resources and rights from the many to the few. Corbyn kept on talking about the issues which matter to the people of this country, in a mostly calm and extremely determined manner. But was attacked mercilessly, enabled in large part by the fact that half of his own party were briefing against him from the bloody start. If, as some claim, they were merely 'concerned about electability', how do you explain them still causing trouble after seeing Labour becoming the largest party in europe by membership? Or when increasing the vote share from 30 to 40% in 2017? It's almost as though the centrists were the idealogues who were prepared to take the whole ship down rather than cede power within the party. They simply couldn't put aside their personal preferences and help improve the operation(as you put it) or take some pressure from the candidate.

To say we were too deaf to hear it is also clearly bollocks. We know what we are up against. And, speaking personally, I would have prefered him to have stood down before the election to prevent the tories from winning, because by that time, yes he was too damaged. It was never for me 'Corbyn or bust' but the politics which he espouses are exactly what this country needs and must be fought for against the prevailing narrative. Whoever can deliver that will get my support. Another Ed Milliband type(apologetically left wing) will not get my support...even if they might get my vote.

But make no mistake, this has all been a stitch up and you bought it. For every weakness Corbyn and Labour has, Johnson and the tories have more. The difference has been the press and powerful lobby groups. That's it.

 

[Kentonio]

The attacking and marginalising started immediately from the so called centrists. Stop trying to rewrite history. People like you lost the elections for all of us.

Corbyn is not some crazed idealogue as you seem to want to paint him. He is a considerate, thoughtful man who would have been a huge improvement upon the callous tories.

He is not a great orator. His demeanor, especially toward the legions of the press who kept attacking him, could certainly have been better. But why was he really being attacked? It was purely because he would have, at least in some small measure, done what the majority of people in this country actually want: Disrupt the never ending drain of money/resources and rights from the many to the few. Corbyn kept on talking about the issues which matter to the people of this country, in a mostly calm and extremely determined manner. But was attacked mercilessly, enabled in large part by the fact that half of his own party were briefing against him from the bloody start. If, as some claim, they were merely 'concerned about electability', how do you explain them still causing trouble after seeing Labour becoming the largest party in europe by membership? Or when increasing the vote share from 30 to 40% in 2017? It's almost as though the centrists were the idealogues who were prepared to take the whole ship down rather than cede power within the party. They simply couldn't put aside their personal preferences and help improve the operation(as you put it) or take some pressure from the candidate.

To say we were too deaf to hear it is also clearly bollocks. We know what we are up against. And, speaking personally, I would have prefered him to have stood down before the election to prevent the tories from winning, because by that time, yes he was too damaged. It was never for me 'Corbyn or bust' but the politics which he espouses are exactly what this country needs and must be fought for against the prevailing narrative. Whoever can deliver that will get my support. Another Ed Milliband type(apologetically left wing) will not get my support...even if they might get my vote.

But make no mistake, this has all been a stitch up and you bought it. For every weakness Corbyn and Labour has, Johnson and the tories have more. The difference has been the press and powerful lobby groups. That's it.

You remind me of the Democrats with Hillary Clinton. Many of us were pleading with them not to elect someone who offered so many obvious targets, but they insisted that because many of the attacks weren't justified that they should be ignored. That's not how the world works. It doesn't matter that Corbyn didn't support the IRA and middle eastern terrorists, it doesn't matter that no he didn't want to turn Britain into a Marxist state, it doesn't matter that he's a thoughtful and considerate man. What matters is that his past and the fact he's not a great orator made it so those attacks could be thrown at him constantly and they were always going to stick. Even setting aside what a fecking mess he made over anti-semitism and Brexit, he was never going to be elected anyway because politics is a dark act, and he was just carrying too much baggage.

Now you can either accept that and learn from it and maybe win next time, or just shout how unfair it is and repeat the last election.

 

[nickm]

The attacking and marginalising started immediately from the so called centrists. Stop trying to rewrite history. People like you lost the elections for all of us.

The attacks started because the "centrists" (let's instead call them moderates) knew, from bitter experience, what happens to Labour's electability when they swing too far to the left. And they were right.

Corbyn is not some crazed idealogue as you seem to want to paint him. He is a considerate, thoughtful man who would have been a huge improvement upon the callous tories.

He is not a great orator. His demeanor, especially toward the legions of the press who kept attacking him, could certainly have been better. But why was he really being attacked? It was purely because he would have, at least in some small measure, done what the majority of people in this country actually want: Disrupt the never ending drain of money/resources and rights from the many to the few. Corbyn kept on talking about the issues which matter to the people of this country, in a mostly calm and extremely determined manner. But was attacked mercilessly, enabled in large part by the fact that half of his own party were briefing against him from the bloody start.

It may well be that Corbyn was attacked partly because his policies worried some vested interests. But it's also the case he was attacked because he was easy to attack.

If, as some claim, they were merely 'concerned about electability', how do you explain them still causing trouble after seeing Labour becoming the largest party in europe by membership? Or when increasing the vote share from 30 to 40% in 2017? It's almost as though the centrists were the idealogues who were prepared to take the whole ship down rather than cede power within the party. They simply couldn't put aside their personal preferences and help improve the operation(as you put it) or take some pressure from the candidate.

Ah yes, the totemic 'increasing vote share'. You completely took the wrong lessons from that loss. Instead of asking why you fell short, you asked how can we double down. You doubled down on what turned out to be, on a longer timescale, a losing strategy.

But make no mistake, this has all been a stitch up and you bought it. For every weakness Corbyn and Labour has, Johnson and the tories have more. The difference has been the press and powerful lobby groups. That's it.

Which "powerful lobby group" is that then? Go on say what you mean.

Pathetic.

 

[Flying high]

You remind me of the Democrats with Hillary Clinton. Many of us were pleading with them not to elect someone who offered so many obvious targets, but they insisted that because many of the attacks weren't justified that they should be ignored. That's not how the world works. It doesn't matter that Corbyn didn't support the IRA and middle eastern terrorists, it doesn't matter that no he didn't want to turn Britain into a Marxist state, it doesn't matter that he's a thoughtful and considerate man. What matters is that his past and the fact he's not a great orator made it so those attacks could be thrown at him constantly and they were always going to stick. Even setting aside what a fecking mess he made over anti-semitism and Brexit, he was never going to be elected anyway because politics is a dark act, and he was just carrying too much baggage.

Now you can either accept that and learn from it and maybe win next time, or just shout how unfair it is and repeat the last election.

But that's the point though. They can make up all this bullshit and keep ramming it down peoples throats to the point that enough of the electorate can come to the conclusion that he is, as they keep being told, unelectable.

So the right wing press literally get to choose the labour leader and you're fine with that? No point fighting it, just jump on board and embrace the race to the bottom?

 

[Kentonio]

But that's the point though. They can make up all this bullshit and keep ramming it down peoples throats to the point that enough of the electorate can come to the conclusion that he is, as they keep being told, unelectable.

So the right wing press literally get to choose the labour leader and you're fine with that? No point fighting it, just jump on board and embrace the race to the bottom?

It’s not about being ok with it, it’s about accepting that a certain level of ratfecking is definitely going to happen and preparing yourself accordingly. Does that mean letting the right wing press select your leader? No. But it does mean realizing that selecting a guy who comes with a ton of easily twisted baggage and a lack of skills to give his own side probably isn’t the best approach to take. You don’t have to accept the bottom but you might have to also accept you can’t just get your top choice either.

 

[Foxbatt]

It’s not about being ok with it, it’s about accepting that a certain level of ratfecking is definitely going to happen and preparing yourself accordingly. Does that mean letting the right wing press select your leader? No. But it does mean realizing that selecting a guy who comes with a ton of easily twisted baggage and a lack of skills to give his own side probably isn’t the best approach to take. You don’t have to accept the bottom but you might have to also accept you can’t just get your top choice either.

With Corbyn the issue was much bigger. It was not the right wing press that was the obvious problem. But right wing members of his own party undermining him and stabbing him in the back.
To make matters worse he is no orator so he had a difficult time in getting his message across and defending himself. Honest good hearted people have no chance of getting elected to the top post. Look at the USA. The Democrats are electing a corrupt guy who changed the prosecutor of a foreign country because he was investigating a company that his son was on the board. He withheld aid until the prosecutor got sacked.
As for POTUS the less said the better.

 

[ZupZup]

Even setting aside what a fecking mess he made over anti-semitism and Brexit, he was never going to be elected anyway because politics is a dark act, and he was just carrying too much baggage.

I actually don't think he had a lot of baggage for someone who has been in politics as long as he has... the media in large part create the baggage. If he had so much baggage, why are the press twisting old stories and hammering him on things he did twenty or thirty years ago? It's the lack of content and why half of the stuff thrown at him was fairly laughable. They will pick an angle... any they can get to stick really, and attack it relentlessly.

Anybody with similar politics would get exactly the same because they will find angles to go at. It will then be the same excuse again - "they had too much baggage".