On the performance of the leaders themselves, of the four Nicola Sturgeon got the easiest ride of the night. She faced pointed questions, but not hostile ones. And her performance was as accomplished as you'd expect. Fluent and business-like certainly, but without the personnel management vibes that afflicted too many politicians during the New Labour era. Understandably a great deal of questioning revolved around Scottish independence, what kind of relationship the SNP would seek with a Corbyn-led Labour government, her price for cooperation (she refused to believe Corbyn wouldn't allow a second independence referendum in time), an independent Scotland's position in the EU, and how her government might deal with a deficit. An assured appearance.
As for Corbyn, I thought he initially came across as a bit flat but soon warmed up under a barrage of hostile questions about socialism, about nationalisation, and about Labour's rumbling anti-semitism crisis. But he rallied after supportive audience members intervened, and had the space to discuss Labour's Brexit position at length. Coming out as neutral in any forthcoming referendum will, hopefully, use ambiguity to nullify ambiguity about what Labour plans to do. From then on there was a mix of tough and friendly questions that played to his strength, allowing him to finish on a Labour's green industrial strategy. No nonsense about pressing the nuclear button on this occasion.
When it came to Jo Swinson, oh dear. It wasn't that her performance suffered in terms of fluffed lines and bad delivery, it was what she was selling that bombed with the audience. Having spent the campaign so far at a remove from the public, save her kind of people, she hasn't had to account for her record in power, nor the positions taken since under pain of persistent questioning. Take the move to hard remain, for example. Simply putting the votes of over 17 million people in the bin was always going to be a tough sell, especially for a party pretending to be the most democratic in British politics, and so it proved. One woman said the LibDems had lost her vote thanks to the cynicism of their ludicrous remain alliance lash-up with the Greens and Plaid Cymru. Another took Swinson to task precisely because she was prepared to dismiss leave voters. She didn't have much luck on other matters either, from her commitment to tackling climate change, her (continued) support for austerity policies, and her preparedness to launch a nuclear strike. The more the public see of the LibDem leader the less they like, and it's doubtful the party's cause won many new friends off the back of this.
And lastly there was Boris Johnson, whose questioning wasn't quite as hostile as Swinson's but was pretty rough. Following the formula we saw on Tuesday evening, Johnson kept trying to relate every question back to Brexit so he could comfortably reside in the soundbites of "oven ready deal" and "get Brexit done". On this occasion, Fiona Bruce was having none of it and intervened persistently to steer Johnson back to answering the question. No wonder the Tory commentariat were spitting feathers afterwards - they're used to deference from the BBC, not being held to account. Johnson was taken up on questions of honesty, on delivery, and on the influence of Russia in UK referenda and election campaigns. On this the PM looked shifty, saying there was nothing in the reports and that Russian influence was "Bermuda Triangle stuff". What definitely isn't are the Russian monies pouring into the Tories. He was also asked about racism and made out that in the millions of words he'd written during the last 20 years, a racism was bound to crop up here and there - almost as if bigotry is a slip of the pen. Johnson also refused to apologise. In all, it was an unusual Johnson performance because he wasn't allowed to bluff and bluster out of questions. As it should be.
Question Time gets a lot of stick - rightly - for dodgy guests and inconsistent chairing, but on this occasion it showed the format can work with balanced chairing and balanced audiences. In fact, this was much more enlightening than any head-to-head is likely to be and is more likely to go down better with punters watching from home. One thing those not plugged into detest is the perception of squabbling politicians. This Question Time avoided that, and should be the model for future leader-focused events.
10 comments:
"Question Time gets a lot of stick - rightly - for dodgy guests and inconsistent chairing, but on this occasion it showed the format can work with balanced chairing and balanced audiences."
Ahem. They guy who opened the "debate" attacking Corbyn over the Smeeth thing has been on the show 4 times before. Obvious plant.
"on the influence of Russia in UK referenda"
It beggars belief that at least leftists cannot see what the Russiaphobia amounts to. Russia have been set up as a bogeyman to explain every election defeat. I mean they have a report into Russian influence in elections but not American influence, seriously this is so politicized only someone who endlessly watches the mainstream media wouldn't spot it.
So the election of Trump had nothing to do with the internal problems of the US and the election of Trump was not the fault of the Americans who actually voted for him.
And the Brexit vote had nothing to do with the internal problems of the UK and the Brexit vote was not the fault of the British people who actually voted for Brexit.
No all of the above can be pinned on the Russians. The West is incapable of being self critical and has to project all its problems onto a bogeyman.
Uber economic nationalism (imperialism) does the same, no election victory is legitimate anymore. From Egypt to Bolivia democratically elected governments are falling because the empire demands it. Every election is seen as suspicious.
This play into a thread, namely the dangers of social media and the internet that the mainstream like to play up. It is their worst nightmare that ordinary people can actually engage with each other without their filters getting in the way.
Laughably Sacha Baron Cohen wonders what would have happened if Hitler had used facebook or twitter, as if having those things would have made him do bad things! But the mainstream don't just use Hitler to attack social media, the BBC will endlessly drop into their bulletins how kids are being groomed, how someone is being bullied.
The ruling classes are doing everything to insert their filters into social media, so we can't talk to each other directly. Russophobia is being used to achieve this goal and further their nefarious interests.
And now you pay lip service to all this. It doesn't bode well if you represent Labour!
Corbyn's fake neutrality is laughable. No one believes he is neutral, and even if he were, it would essentially mean giving succour to Brexit. He has come up with this ludicrous position, because he knows that he could not do what he really wants to do which is to follow his Morning Star and Red-Brown backers in calling for a vote for Brexit. He also knows that even fewer people would beleive him if he chose the other ludicrous option of spending months trying to negotiate an unachievable fantasy Brexit, only then to encourage people to vote against it!
If we were to believe his position it represents a criminal abandonment of leadership on an historic class issue, which in itself is an act of betrayal. The argument that has been put, and was summarised by Chakrabarti that modern leadership means listening and then following what the electorate have said is not just an abandonment of leadership, but represents the end of politics.
If that is what politics comes down to, simply tailing the electorate then there is no further point in having political parties or politicians. It would mean just having referenda on every issue, with electronic voting, hustings being carried out by every Tom, Dick and Harry via social media, with the result of the votes being implemented by civil servants.
Utterly ludicrous in a class dominated society.
What Boffy says. This is very much about personalities and the public are voting for a leader, which is why despite knowing Johnson's moral failings they still have more faith in him. They would probably respect Corbyn more if he said what he really thought, but all the Remainers that foolishly voted him into power might get the hump.
Leadership and vision is missing across the world, which is why incredibly people like Putin. This vacuum of democratic leadership leaves the door open to fascists.
«I mean they have a report into Russian influence in elections but not American influence, seriously this is so politicized»
Plus Saudi, Likud, japanese influence, which are pretty big in the USA itself and here. We may be tempted to think that those are given a pass because they are ideologically on the right-wing side.
But I reckon that the big deal why the very modest degree of russian influence is singled out has not to do with ideology:
* During soviet times it was an open secret that the COMINTERN was financing left-wing european arties, just as the CIA and the USA ambassadors were financing (much more generously) right-wing candidates.
* But Russia today is not ideologically committed to the left, it has a centre-right government that is perhaps very faintly one-nationist economically, but socially wight-wing.
So my guess is that Russia is bigged-up by propaganda as a common external enemy to maintain cohesion in western countries, that are subject to many centrifugal forces after the cold-war ended, for example Scotland, Catalunya, the already made Czech-Slovak split. My guess is that what first-world "imperial" thinkers are afraid is that west european countries may be subject to something similar to what happened (or was "facilitated") to Austria-Hungary after WW1, or for Yugoslavia after the Cold War.
«He was also asked about racism and made out that in the millions of words he'd written during the last 20 years, a racism was bound to crop up here and there - almost as if bigotry is a slip of the pen.»
Careful there, that's pretty much the argument used to label the Labour party as institutionally anti-semitic...
"If that is what politics comes down to, simply tailing the electorate"
Seriously this Boffy character is laughable. If there is one thing you cannot accuse Corbyn of doing, it is tailing the fucking electorate.
Boffy is mixing up Corbyn with with the Tory lite Blairites that speedy is so fond of.
In fact Corbyn is the only man in politics not tailing the god-awful electorate.
His Brexit position is perfectly rational. Corbyn and his team, having actually met the EU negotiators on numerous occasions, knows that he can get a deal which commits the UK to EU labour laws and environmental and consumer right, something the Tory deal doesn't do. He would then put Labours deal along with remain to the masses.
If the corporate media brainwashed masses can't get their little brains around this super simple idea then my advice to Corbyn isn't to reduce his politics to their utter idiocy.
Again it was the tory lite Blairites who speedy loves so much who pandered endlessly to the Murdoch’s of this world and other Billionaire fascists who will happily cheerlead fascists in brazil and Bolivia.
It would be a grave mistake for a genuine socialist like Corbyn to do the same.
So in reality that arse Boffy wants Corbyn to tail the electorate and dresses up his own position as not tailing the electorate while he dresses up Corbyns not tailing the electorate as tailing the electorate,.
Boffy as slippery as an eel covered in butter on ice, bit like his far right sock puppet speedy.
«This is very much about personalities and the public are voting for a leader»
That's pure refined identity blairism: the claim that personalities matter a lot because the leader matters a lot, politics, class, are not relevant. Leaders like Attle or Wilson or Blair in 1997 (he was an unknown) evidently won by sheer force of leadership :-).
Most voting studies actually conclude that "leaders" matter quite little, perhaps when they matter they swing 1-2% of voters, who for the most part often don't even know who the "leaders" are (two recent statistics: less than 20% of voters know the name of their MP, and in june 2017 less than 15% knew that the Conservative campaign slogan was "strong and stable").
People first and foremost vote their material interests, in England today whether they extract fast rising rents or house prices, or pay those rents and house prices, and then whether they pay workers or are workers. As Tony Blair said:
http://www.britishpoliticalspeech.org/speech-archive.htm?speech=202
“people judge us on their instincts about what they believe our instincts to be”
as to their material interests. Conservative voters' instinct is that B Johnson, whatever his antics, has solidly extractive instincts, and they are right:
«Boris Johnson's Monday morning praise for George Osborne's dramatic pension fund reforms [...] “I think the vast majority will want to put their pots into the market with the greatest yield over the past 40 years – and that is property”»
«Johnson said: "I don't think it is sensible to say to keep down property values we should keep people out, or investors out, in order to allow property values to decline. That would lead to a fall in the equity of everyone and, for the life of me, I cannot see the logic."»
Blissex,
"Plus Saudi, Likud, japanese influence, which are pretty big in the USA itself and here. We may be tempted to think that those are given a pass because they are ideologically on the right-wing side."
Your impllication here is that Russia is NOT ideologically on the right-wing side! You cannot get much more right-wing than the kleptocratic regime of Putin, which by the way stands in alliance with Erdogan, with Netanyahu et al.! The wife of one of Putin's Ministers paid tens of thousands to play tennis with Johnson, and has again recently given over £100,000 to the Tories. They have funded right-wing Tory groups during the Brexit campaign via payments to Tory groups in NI, where the payments are hidden. They back Farage as well as Le Pen, Wilders et al. They acted to get Trump elected in the US.
How much more right-wing a regime do you want?
"Plus Saudi, Likud, japanese influence, which are pretty big in the USA itself and here."
Forget nation states for a minute, I want an investigation into how the corporate media and the secret services and tax payer funded 'think-tanks' are influencing this election, all in favour of anyone but Corbyn.
We are in totalitarianism right here and right now.
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