Didn't the 'charge' him or suspend him a couple of days before the election ended when things were looking pretty close?

Politics as lifestyle option. I see. Oh dear.

Jeremy Corbyn's favourite books are Ulysses and Madame Bovary.

British socialism is quite largely based on Keynes: General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money (1936), Beveridge: Social Insurance and Allied Services (1942) and, culturally, Orwell's essays, including the literary ones, which usually involve politics.

I've had dinner with Joe Stiglitz and he's a very nice man, so you could try him. Never read his stuff -- doesn't seem much point when it was simpler to just ask him what he thought -- but, despite being one of the world's most influential economists, he doesn't seem to have much influence. He was well in with the Obama administration but strongly disapproved of their bank bail-out measures for technical reasons which escape me. The world is going in a direction he doesn't like but despite chairing various talking-shops he can't stop it. Political economy is like the weather -- everyone complains about it but nobody does anything.

Francis Wheen's How Mumbo-Jumbo Conquered the World (2004) is probably not available any more. Wheen's idea is that the modern world was shaped by two swivel-eyed oddballs, Margaret Thatcher and Ayatollah Khomeini. His observation that the Thatcherite economy (copied worldwide) has done rather worse than the post-war mixed economy is of some interest.

My favourite bookshop named after that.

When the cat disappears it's important to remember that you never owned the cat anyway. I've never regretted the money I spent on it either.

All of it's horrible. A very large system failure.

A lad who's in taekwondo class with a friend of mine lived on the 24th floor at Grenfell. He carried his mother all the way down. His father didn't make it and is dead.

Len McCluskey is basically Jimmy Hoffa, except for the part about suddenly disappearing, which unfortunately hasn't happened to him.

Hmmm. Should we shed a tear for Gerard? Just who exactly is Gerard Coyne anyway?

It strikes me as odd that a trade unionist wanting to give the union back to 'the members' would be supporting his campaign by using a media platform so derided by ordinary people it is unanimously detested even here on 2p2:

“He [McCluskey] and his followers will cry foul when they find out that I am writing for The Sun, because Britain’s biggest-selling newspaper does not share their rosy views on Jeremy Corbyn...
“But I respect the hundreds of thousands of Unite members who read The Sun. I want to reach out and represent all Unite members, not just those from a narrow band of the political spectrum.””

Needless to say I wont be linking to that particular article.

Not that anybody should be ruled out of leading Britain's biggest union just because they develop a relationship with a 'newspaper' which attacks trade unionists every day in its pages and is owned by a man who smashed the printing unions. It's odd, but not impossible. But it does expose vividly what Coyne is about, this is a political campaign to undermine Corbyn. There are wider, legitimate questions about trade unions, but Coyne isn't the man to raise those and I certainly won't be entertaining his little s*** parade here.
And there may be question marks over his dismissal, witch hunts happen though it's usually the left on the receiving end. But I'm not taking this man's word for it.

This is freakish.


Life imitates art.

Excellent name drop even though the discussion was about socialist authors not bourgeois economists

Everything appears to be falling apart

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk...-a7799501.html

And even if they were to get propped up by the DUP..

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk...-a7798941.html

This tory lot clearly are pretty much the worst negotiators ever. If they had just stayed quiet for a day or two and actually thought about the ramifications of a deal they might have realised by not doing one the DUP would likely back them anyway and not risk a Corbyn government. They would then also not have created this mess with the NI peace process. Instead they just went lurching straight into public announcements about it.

Does he not realise people change their voting habits as they age? if this were even a thing, the Tories would have been unelectable decades ago.

https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...grenfell-tower

Aditya Chakrabortty joining the dots between Grenfell and the austerity agenda

Does anyone think that May is very close to the edge constitutionally? She can't command a majority it appears, so shouldn't she at least offer the next largest party the opportunity to try?

I know that Labour has no chance but that isn't the point.

Not really. Our constitution is very flexible and isn't being tested. The Queens speech will be voted down or the government will continue until a vote of no confidence succeeds or parliment is disolved.

A minority Labour government would probably be the most balanced politically, and would be my preference at this point.

I don't know what on earth this Tory government hopes to achieve over the next 5 years, and I don't think they do either.

Agree. Their level of terribleness makes Heath and Callaghan look totally in control.

So you think that Brown should have put forward a Queen's speech in 2010?

Which is a springboard to another GE and probable labour majority btw,

11 days the dup have had the tories waiting at the altar.

Lol that is the ****s modus operandi, keep everyone waiting as long as possible then some more, while demanding more and more.

The Tories can submit a Queens Speech that says nothing giving the DUP no reason to vote against while they continue to work on the detail.

Point me to the part of the constitution that says she is on the edge. She is 8 short of a majority (closer than David Cameron was in 2010) and can easily form a minority government.

She can't command a majority because she hasn't got a majority.

Then why offer it to the largest party if they have, quote, "no chance"? That would be highly irresponsible and put the country in complete chaos.


With all due respect, you're posturing a load of nonsense here. I don't think you really know what you're saying.

Spotlight, the local current affairs show had something on Private Finance Initiative (PFI) last night that ties in with this. Local hospital used the scheme to get a car park built (cost around £3m), car park has paid for itself multiple times already but NHS get only £40k per year. Also used to build schools, hospitals and Invest NI new office block (will cost £120m and investor will still own it lol). Scheming bastards are getting paid for the buildings by securing all service contracts for next 30 years - huge cuts in services in one of the newly built hospitals already, only 5 years in.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode...ds-hidden-debt

So the person leading the country into the most important negotiations in a generation can't manage to negotiate a deal to get Irish unionists to support a UK conservative government? Bodes well.

So you see either Tory or DUP MP's voting for a motion of no confidence?

mc1, how would dup voters react if no deal could be done and it resulted in corbyn PM sooner or later

1-10,

1 being oh well the dup negotiated in our interests and its a shame a deal couldn't be done

10 being apoplectic with rage with their party