Saturday, 12 October 2019

"JESUS WAS A SOCIALIST"

John Ra McDonnell sat down for a cosy chat this week with none other than the epitome of 'Blairite scum' Alastair Campbell.  Campbell, who was expelled from Labour earlier this year, wastes little time in bringing up the Great Satan.  "Say something nice about Tony Blair" he demands of McDonnell.  This was a follow-up question to the direct question:  "Is Tony Blair a war criminal?"  "No" comes the reply, without hesitation, despite the fact three years ago McDonnell refused to rule out trying Blair for war crimes.

A bit later in the interview McDonnell says that Labour isn't interested in forming a coalition government in the event of another hung Parliament and would 'govern' as a minority administration.  This is a daft statement, as we know minority administrations cannot 'govern' effectively, which is why a general election is imminent now that Boris has no majority.  In reality McDonnell and Corbyn would be on the blower to Sturgeon within hours, if not minutes, of a hung Parliament.

In discussing how Labour would reverse the Leave mandate, McDonnell comes out with possibly the most deluded statement of the entire interview:  "I've never seen the Parliamentary Labour Party more united than it is at the moment".  He says this with a straight face.  The PLP is so divided that it's not so much a case of which of the other opposition parties would back Corbyn as a 'caretaker PM', but how many of his own MPs would.  Remember that when it came to a vote of no confidence in him in 2016, they voted overwhelmingly against him 172-40.  However, during this interview McDonnell refuses to countenance a defeat for Corbyn if it came to forming a caretaker government.

There was an awkward question about what McDonnell refers to as the 'armed struggle', as if Campbell was looking for a damaging soundbite.  However, the Ra man dodges the question.  This is a fascinating interview and insight into the mind of a Marxist and somewhat surprising (or unsettling) to see the banter and frivolity between two men who have been at political loggerheads for years.  Just don't mention Tories though...