[Boiler]

Well, perhaps, though Corbyn P isn’t as relevant in Labour Party terms. It’ll be a real step forward if he is finally out of the party for good, though.

You know that.

I know that.

But do they know that?

[Cyclist]

Corbyn, like the Winter of Discontent, will still be with us 50 years after the event. The Tory press will see to that.

[Boiler]

Corbyn, like the Winter of Discontent, will still be with us 50 years after the event. The Tory press will see to that.

Worrying, isn't it? Even when every last soul who lived through 78/79 has departed this Earth it'll still get trotted out.

[Andy McDandy]

I was born in 1977. At the last election I was taken slightly aback by a vox pops in which a woman clearly younger than me said that she remembered it.

I suppose it's a bit like the PIE, or "banning" Baa Baa Black Sheep, or bloody Winterval (thankfully that one seems to have died a death in recent years, but you can never be too sure). Always there for use as ammo.

[Boiler]

You've reminded me of those going on about WW2 - whose sole experience of it was via the pages of Victor.

[Crabcakes]

Yes, one Jeremy Bernard Corbyn. Point is, if he chooses to stand for election as such, he will be standing against the official Labour candidate.

Call me a cynic, but I suspect the astonishing human dynamo who scraped 2 A levels at grade E after a grammar school education and a lovely upbringing in a mansion, went and "volunteered" in the Caribbean for a year (how awful) before an extended jolly in South America, quit a college course after a year for the heinous crime of his tutors deciding to disagree with him on its content, and who then has spent 50-odd years coasting along as first a council member and in 2 years time will have spent 40 years in a rock-solid safe seat might suddenly decide to do *just* enough to get himself readmitted in time to stand.

No doubt he'll spin it as his taking one for the team for the greater good of Labour, and once back in he'll slowly retcon his required apology into meaninglessness, but I suspect it would be more effort to retire and fill in the various bits of paperwork and god knows where he'd find the time and energy to do that.

[davidjay]

Corbyn, like the Winter of Discontent, will still be with us 50 years after the event. The Tory press will see to that.

Worrying, isn't it? Even when every last soul who lived through 78/79 has departed this Earth it'll still get trotted out.

Even though the reality was nothing like the memory and the Dead Went Unburied line was one council for a few days.

[BBN]

TBH Labour are missing a trick in not rehabilitating Ed Balls as one of the few New Labour politicians who actually seems popular (even if it's just as the funny man who did Gangnam Style on Strictly). I get he might not want to be involved but I'd be shocked if nobody had at least asked the question.

[mattomac]

TBH Labour are missing a trick in not rehabilitating Ed Balls as one of the few New Labour politicians who actually seems popular (even if it's just as the funny man who did Gangnam Style on Strictly). I get he might not want to be involved but I'd be shocked if nobody had at least asked the question.

Would be good to involve him in something, potentially the economics of the live entertainment sector perhaps, though he does seem happy away from politics. I think both Balls and Cooper (in her committee role) are a miss.

[Tubby Isaacs]

TBH Labour are missing a trick in not rehabilitating Ed Balls as one of the few New Labour politicians who actually seems popular (even if it's just as the funny man who did Gangnam Style on Strictly). I get he might not want to be involved but I'd be shocked if nobody had at least asked the question.

Nice to see you.

I think Balls is always going to be the Man Who Brought Down The Banks, sadly.

[Boiler]

There's a whole litany of those, sadly:

Blair: illegal war.
Brown: sold all the gold.
Burnham: Mid-Staffs.
Balls: brought down the banks.

Fill in your own...

[Cyclist]

Plus, as I said upthread, Corbyn's skeleton-filled closet will be inextricably linked to the Labour Party for the next 50 years. And they're *still* banging on about their fictionalised version of the Winter of Discontent.

[BBN]

[The Weeping Angel]

I hate to break it you all but if you were to ask people under 35 what the Winter of Discontent was they'd probably say it was a band.

[Boiler]

Or ask if it was in the Game of fucking Thrones.

You can say that TWA, but it's the sort of thing that will get brought up as a lesson from history. Nobody advocates saying "WW2 was 75 years ago so it's irrelevant", now do they?

[Crabcakes]

Or ask if it was in the Game of fucking Thrones.

You can say that TWA, but it's the sort of thing that will get brought up as a lesson from history. Nobody advocates saying "WW2 was 75 years ago so it's irrelevant", now do they?

Yes, but WW2 "content" is still all around us - from museums to films and videogames and even to the rise in neo-Nazis. No one is playing Call of Duty: army bin collection, or trying to make a culture war out of people potentially defacing a statue of Jim Callaghan.

But I think the real reason it could backfire is that we could be in for something of that ilk this year - empty shelves, new lockdowns, high prices. The Tories will drop bringing it up quicker than a lit disposable barbecue if they think it's a label that will soon be attached to them rather than Labour.

[Boiler]

But I think the real reason it could backfire is that we could be in for something of that ilk this year - empty shelves, new lockdowns, high prices. The Tories will drop bringing it up quicker than a lit disposable barbecue if they think it's a label that will soon be attached to them rather than Labour.

The people who'll not bring it up are the Fourth Estate: they'll do what it takes to keep that theme firmly on Labour in perpetuity.

Are shelves really as empty as people are claiming, or is it just that Brexit Remainer hysteria that has served us so badly? I suspect whilst a few items are a bit thin on the ground, we're hardly heading for revolt over a lack of baked beans in Asda. A few missing stock items in the Waitrose delivery are hardly going to set the UK on fire (if anything, that's normal).

That said, when ordering a part for my cranky old car yesterday I was told that if I'm lucky it'd be Saturday when it arrives, but more likely Tuesday; whereas previously I could guarantee next day.

As for lockdowns: I worry that Johnson may just go all Bolsonaro on us and say "it's not that bad" whilst the Mu variant progresses from "of interest" to "of concern".

[Tubby Isaacs]

Not sure the US-UK parallels work really. The US Green party in the US really doesn't amount to much, not in Congress, not in statehouses, not in city halls. But it duly shows up for presidential elections where it can only really take votes off Democrats and attract a tiny amount of people who'd not vote otherwise.

The Green Party of England and Wales has 444 local councillors, and no reason why it shouldn't go after more really. The Tories coming through the middle in South Tyneside by-elections isn't really all that much of a blow. In general elections, it's not usually much of a nuisance. The sort of people who vote Green generally understand tactical voting. They're not really like a set in their ways old Labour supporter who won't consider voting Lib Dem in Cheltenham.

[The Weeping Angel]

How many times have the current times lot mentioned the Winter of discontent? Hardly ever IIRC. Their more likely to mention the crash than they're the Winter of Discontent.

[The Weeping Angel]

Not sure the US-UK parallels work really. The US Green party in the US really doesn't amount to much, not in Congress, not in statehouses, not in city halls. But it duly shows up for presidential elections where it can only really take votes off Democrats and attract a tiny amount of people who'd not vote otherwise.

The Green Party of England and Wales has 444 local councillors, and no reason why it shouldn't go after more really. The Tories coming through the middle in South Tyneside by-elections isn't really all that much of a blow. In general elections, it's not usually much of a nuisance. The sort of people who vote Green generally understand tactical voting. They're not really like a set in their ways old Labour supporter who won't consider voting Lib Dem in Cheltenham.

The US greens really are awful.