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Edmund Griffiths Profile picture
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11 Jan, 4 tweets, 1 min read
Are you though
Can't you though
Will they though
Can't we though

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More from @EdmundGriffiths

Edmund Griffiths Profile picture
10 Jan
Not sure; but the conditions in the 2000s were ok in fact. At the 2005 GE Respect won one seat & got one reasonably close second place (3300 votes behind the winner), plus two distant seconds; that's better than the Greens in 2019 (one win & two even more distant second places)
Obviously the overall vote share was much much smaller, but that's bc there were only a fraction as many candidates in places where they were never going to win
It isn't self-evident that when left electoral challenges falter it's purely because of objective conditions that mean they _couldn't_ succeed. The objective conditions aren't too easy (as though they are for any other approach); but there are political & strategic issues too
Read 5 tweets
Edmund Griffiths Profile picture
31 Dec 21
This is true—but there's a further point, which is that deciding to support & campaign for Labour on the basis that it would be a bit better than the Conservatives (even assuming it would be) just means we'll be facing the same miserable choice next time & forever
If you want better options, you need to support & create them—even if that means not prioritizing getting the govt you'd (arguably) hate marginally less in the interim
The founders of the Labour Party understood that perfectly well. They didn't just say "any Liberal government is better than any Conservative government"; sometimes they did deals with the Lib Party, but also they aimed to replace it
Read 5 tweets
Edmund Griffiths Profile picture
1 Nov 21
Suppose you could argue given it's the PM that he'd be doing it fatuously whatever he did; but this way of posing the question is itself more than a little, y'know
One of the biggest obstacles stopping the general public taking the climate situation fully seriously—I suspect, the biggest obstacle—is politicians who _talk_ as though it's an existential global crisis but _act_ as though it's nothing to worry about
I think most people just take it for granted that political rhetoric is mostly exaggerated (that's why they prob don't think e.g. the Tories will really privatize the NHS—they think people who say so are overegging things as always)
Read 6 tweets
Edmund Griffiths Profile picture
28 Sep 21
I'm not talking abt Big Names With Platforms, who can be assumed to have known what they were doing re Sir Keir; but the fact large numbers of left-leaning members got duped does I'm afraid say something abt what the organized left had been explaining to people & what it hadn't
To many people on the left, inside Labour & out, it was transparently clear that Sir K was the candidate of anti-Corbynist revenge & authoritarian Blairism; but many other people, also more or less on the left, couldn't see it at all
So you have to ask: did the first set of people do everything they could have, in 2015-19, to help the second set become sufficiently politically aware that they wouldn't be taken for a ride like that?
Read 5 tweets
Edmund Griffiths Profile picture
27 Sep 21
What has to happen before we admit we now know what the strategic & tactical answer is
Really doesn't seem as though everyone's quite taking seriously the fact that the best-case-scenario ideal daydream of the pro-Labour left actually happened & we can see what it achieved & what it didn't
The Labour Party was led for several years by arguably its most left-wing MP, a lifelong campaigner with close links to the left outside parliament; he was supported by a clear majority of the members & by a good chunk of the union leaderships
Read 5 tweets
Edmund Griffiths Profile picture
16 Apr 20
Anger needs to lead through to clarity. The Blairites _hate you_, far more viciously than they hate the Tories, far more viciously than you hate them, & the only terms on which they will cooperate with you are your total submission. They'll let you pay your subs & do the leg work
The Lab left hasn't tended to act as though it gets that. Corbyn always behaved as though it was possible to reach an amicable working relationship with the Blairites. "We're all Labour." Nope: they would much prefer the Tories to win than a Labour Party they don't control 100%
During the leadership election Burgon was talking about how a bird needs a left & a right wing to fly. Nope. _They hate you_
Read 7 tweets

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