Cameron's attack on 'terrorist-sympathising' Corbyn resembles a McCarthyist witch-hunt

[Turborama]

By Harry Leslie Smith

-snip-

When David Cameron said about the leader of the opposition: "We cannot let that man inflict his security-threatening, terrorist-sympathising, Britain-hating ideology on the country we love," he changed the tone and shape of modern British politics and returned it to a darker period in this nation's history.

Cameron wrapped himself up like an evangelical minister in a mourning shroud for the victims of 911 and implied that because Jeremy Corbyn and other legal scholars had concerns over the extra judicial killing of Osama bin Laden, they did not appreciate the horror and devastation that occurred at the Twin Towers on 11 September 2001.

Cameron's attack on Jeremy Corbyn resurrects the politics of the Cold War, when people of good will, politicians, activists, gays, artists and ordinary citizens were deemed enemies of the state because they opposed colonialism, racism and nuclear weapons or embraced their sexual orientation in a time of homophobia.

In those days, whether here or in the United States, when political demagogues attacked their opposition by smearing them as unpatriotic or sympathetic to communism or socialism it was done not through jurisprudence but as a witch-hunt whose only purpose was to diminish the democratic rights of a free people.

Full piece: https://uk.news.yahoo.com/camerons-attack-terrorist-sympathising-corbyn-090128372.html#RILe639

[djean111]

1. Same thing David Brock tried, by linking Bernie to Hugo Chavez and leaving out oil for poor

people part, and the fact that others in Congress did the same thing in order to keep their poor constituents from freezing. he tried to link Bernie to Corbyn, too.

The 1% are really getting pissed off, methinks.

[forest444]

2. Cameron calling others terrorists? The nerve!

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/syria/10279790/Government-allowed-export-of-nerve-gas-chemicals-to-Syria.html

[LeftishBrit]

3. Hardly new. Remember the Daily Fail's vicious attack on Miliband's father...

Last edited Sun Nov 29, 2015, 05:25 AM - Edit history (1)

and calling him 'Red Ed' as though he was far left. And earlier of course 'Red Ken'; I remember someone pointing out that no one ever called Thatcher 'Blue Maggie'

As I said in another post, concerns about Corbyn's 'terrorist' sympathies, being 'anti-British', too 'communist', etc. come ill from a party that sucks up to both China and Saudi Arabia, and includes people who wish to change Britain's long-held values to the ruthless authoritarian agenda of states like China (yes, Jeremy Hunt said that taking away tax credits would create a culture of British people working as hard as the Chinese).

But the culture of negative sound-bites against opponents - sometimes including critical private citizens - is something that has steadily increased, and I think stems in part from American influences more recent than that of McCarthy, e.g. Rove and Atwater. And also of course from the ruthless media empires.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

4. It's kicking a man while he's down.

Cameron knows that a very large fraction of the electorate are already deeply suspicious of Corbyn, and so he can get away with over-the-top attacks like this.

[T_i_B]

5. Let's not forget the PLP

The Corbyn surge was a very nasty shock indeed for the Parliamentary Labour Party, and many Labour MP's are pretty strongly opposed to Jeremy Corbyn and his supporters.

To be honest, Labour at the moment just look like a mess, but who is going to be able to stop all the infighting and give Labour something positive to stand for?

[Donald Ian Rankin]

6. The next Labour leader, or possibly the one after that.

Labour under Corbyn is a writeoff, straightforwardly.

If he goes in 17 or 18, it's conceivable that whoever replaces him may be able to get the party back on its feet in time for 2020, but it would take a lot of doing, especially because if Corbyn goes before the next election some of his supporters will cling to be delusion that he might have won it if he'd stayed, and so there will be a lot of bad blood. His successor will have a struggle, and it will probably have to be their successor who has to put the party back together after 2020.

If, on the other hand, he stays til after the election - which I think is probably more likely, given how the Labour party rules work, but far from certain - then Labour will be decimated, but at least the fragment that's left will be more inclined to unity.

But in the meantime, the Tories will be able to govern essentially unopposed, and to put pretty much whatever they like into their 2020 manifesto and still win and claim a mandate for it. If you're a far-right Tory who's been itching to subcontract the NHS and the education system out to the private sector, 2020 will probably represent the best chance you've had in a generation.

It's going to get worse before it gets better.

[non sociopath skin]

7. And who do you think this mighty saviour might be, O Wise One?

And why didn't they stand this time?

The Skin

[Donald Ian Rankin]

8. Not a clue.

At least two and arguably three perfectly reasonable candidates *did* stand this time; it wouldn't amaze me if the person Labour picks to pick up the pieces after Corbyn were one of them. But I think it's more likely it won't be - having lost once tends to be a stigma, and I wouldn't rate any of them higher than "perfectly reasonable".

[T_i_B]

9. Pffft!

I'm sorry, but the 3 mainstream candidates were very poor. and it's ludicrous to pretend otherwise.

Andy Burnham is a weak flip flopper with baggage from his Blairite past. Liz Kendall is an ultra sectarian Blairite whose pitch was to be as right wing as possible and stick her fingers in her ears whenever anyone voiced concerns from outside the Westminster bubble. And it's difficult to think of a blander, more uninspiring and mealy mouthed politician than Yvette Cooper.

I don't deny that Corbyn has many weaknesses, but compared to the dross that was offered up by the others he became the least worst.

The moderate left in this country is in major crisis. People have grown sick of negative Westminster bubble Blairite politics.