Thread by @shaunjlawson

I've just spent the most JOYFUL two hours watching my favourite favourite edition of Question Time ever. What happened? Did the Britain First-sharing and 'British Patriotic Front' liking Alison Fuller Pedley forget to vet the audience for this edition? #BBCQuestionTime

Rankings

1. Corbyn - amazing

2. Audience - terrific

3. Sturgeon - very good

4. Johnson - awful

5. Swinson - 😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂

The show was so good, even Fiona Bruce was shockingly OK.

Corbyn's long held conviction that British politics are about more than one issue is being spectacularly vindicated. Because they are.

They're about jobs, healthcare, homes, schools, students, pensions, the environment, climate change, infrastructure, technology, investment: not just into one privileged part of the UK but across THE WHOLE of the UK.

They're about, most of all, the kind of country we want to be

What did we see from him tonight? Ideas, vision, calmness; a holistic, joined-up view of the future under a Labour government.

What did we see from Johnson? Crap jokes, attempts at looking the smartest person in the room which went down like a lead balloon, lies, obfuscation.

Maybe, maybe, the public is tired of this chameleon's act. Maybe it actually wants SUBSTANCE. Detail. Honesty. Compassion.

But if it wants any of those, it ain't getting any from Bottler Boris or Fracking Jo. The latter's segment was one of the funniest things I've ever seen.

The day Swinson announced her revoke Article 50 policy, my staunchly Remain best friend asked me "what does she think she's doing? That's crazy".

On last night's evidence, this is someone who started the election as "a candidate for PM", who might well finish it no longer an MP

This is someone who claims to be in favour of green politics while having taken donations from frackers, voted for fracking, and who even thinks pushing the nuclear button is a virtue.

This is someone who says that Britain isn't working fairly, yet WHO VOTED FOR ALL THE POLICIES WHICH CAUSED THAT.

'Trust me, I'm Jo Swinson'? It's precisely because she's Jo Swinson that nobody would trust her not to turn a life support machine off just to charge her phone.

You know what she reminded me of? A crap Britain's Got Talent or X-factor auditioner who gets voted off early on. All ego, all fakeness; she's a complete phony. And worse: I think her whole strategy is based on thinking it's still 2015. It's not.

In 2015, in a desperate bid to differentiate themselves from the Tories, the Lib Dems campaigned as an equidistant party... and got squeezed from both sides mercilessly, as well as in Scotland. It's gonna happen again.

In 2015, Britain was a country in which the gammon vote (the pro-nuclear button-pressing vote) held a lot more sway than it does now. In 2015, Britain wasn't as poor, as run down, as devastated by Tory cuts as it is now.

She's got it wrong. Completely wrong. But that's what pretenders with no conviction or consistency on anything do. She just swings whichever way she wrongly thinks the wind is blowing.

As for Sturgeon: lots of warmth towards Labour, as well as one curveball which was just her playing games. Because the bottom line is this, Nicola. As you'd never let Johnson in under any circumstances, you're not going to block a Labour government over an independence vote.

Corbyn's strategy is, unlike Ed Miliband's, so perfect on this that I want to hug him. Maybe even kiss him. (Not on the lips, mind).

Why is it perfect?

1. Because it calls the SNP's bluff given the latter cannot back the Tories in any way.

2. Because with Labour weak in Scotland, a Labour government backed by the SNP is effectively a Labour government in any case.

3. Because there were no clarion calls for independence while New Labour were in power. The calls only started once the coalition was making such huge cuts... because this was both democratically illegitimate AND devastating to so many people's lives.

If you invest in Scotland holistically and for the long term, not only does support for independence probably fall, but Labour finally begin to recover there. Sturgeon knows this herself: that's why she's so desperate for a 2020 referendum.

Corbyn's approach - invest first, referendum later - is both morally correct (because what could be more important than urgent investment to help so many people?) and politically shrewd... because it'd make the SNP's task of winning a referendum harder.

And of course, Labour can't afford and as a unionist party, doesn't want to give up Scotland. This is the way it achieves that. Plus, if we Remain, Sturgeon's whole argument for why a 2nd Scottish referendum is so urgent crumbles away from beneath her feet.

And on the subject of Remaining... that was a much much MUCH better exposition from Corbyn on why him staying neutral is the right thing to do. We need more of that on every setpiece occasion between now and December 12.

Massive kudos to the guy in the audience who pointed out that Harold Wilson did the same thing in 1975; and to so many other questioners. Who made such powerful points because they all came from lived experience in Tory austerity Britain.

If that audience was a genuine cross-section of the UK, Labour landslide incoming. But... it's not. It was too young and especially, too political for that - and the applause for Johnson's comments about Brexit right at the end shows there's still a long way to go.

But... it's turning. This thing is turning. I can feel it. Remainers seeing through Swinson's drivel and coming home to Labour. Leavers who don't want to wreck the country realising that Corbyn's the only grown-up in the room. Public servants DESPERATE for a Labour government.

The most politically aware generation in human history - young people - calling Johnson out on his lies. Even Tory voters wondering, just wondering... "maybe we've got it all wrong about Corbyn? Maybe he might just have a point?"

Game well and truly on. Or to put it another way:

IT'S HAPPENING.