You must be watching and listening to a different Corbyn to me - The one l see and listen to is a dithering old Trotskyite who can’t make his mind up about the one single issue where he should be pinning his colours to the mast. I am a lifelong socialist but he in no way shape or form represents socialism and will be responsible all on his own, for getting Johnson ensconced in Downing Street. Rose tinted comes to mind.
By the way it’s nice to have you back - hope everything is well with you.
Corbyn’s problem was, and is, that he is in a position where it is logical to be against Brexit indeed he should be against Brexit but his personal views are that he is a Eurosceptic who wants to leave just as much as Farage does.
He has not handled this tension very well.
I disagree, as you might expect me to, Paul.
The tension is that of a wire suspended over a chasm, anchored at each end to a tall building. One represents the current status within the EU. The other is as yet an unknown and unknowable destination.
Corbyn’s skill has been to move along the line of tension without falling in to the chasm below. His endeavour is to make the crossing without losing his balance, swayed by the calls of those who want to distract him to left or right.
His role as leader is not to decide for others, but to facilitate a new decision about the eventual nature of the destination, one that is seen as a wise and just one, and ‘satisficing’, “good enough” represent a sound foundation for all our future.
As he says often, his is only one opinion on the remain/leave polarity. He will not impose it arbitrarily on the Party nor the nation.
He is a wise leader in the tradition, perhaps, of Solomon before him: “give full attention to the outcome of your decision, now that you have conferred about it in the full light of knowledge of what it may yield”.
Those who characterise him as a ditherer are IMO like impetuous children. Bojo plays on their immature impulses and impatience to be relieved of having to watch, and wait for the full picture to emerge. “Get it done” is a primitive, premature, and perilous slogan, designed to raise tension and dismiss reason.
The “deal” he has negotiated may never ever be examined: should we should trust him with our futures, full of milk and honey and the smell of chestnuts roasting on the open fire? A unscrupulous manufacturer of worthless and unfulfilled promises?
I won’t, and I wager the British people won’t either. They have more sense.
I agree Peter. Corbyn’s refusal to take sides in what is a toxic argument - stuck in 2016 - is the only statesmanlike position of any of the party ‘leaders’.
But whatever you think about him, there is only one route to remain now: Labour government > new referendum > vote for remain.
Thanks Carl, I was just thinking of throwing in the towel, hanging up my gloves, and putting my gumshield back in its little Steradent bath.
I’m getting a bit old for this game, but I can’t resist the roar of the crowd as I climb into the ring and smell the rosin…
Thanks Dan, you’re a pal. I’ve had a very generous reception, which I don’t really believe is merited…
Welcome back Peter 
Now it’s labours turn to implode, as Tom Watson resigns
“Labour implodes, Watson resigns”? @Brian_Wheeler
Like most Party members, I’ve been long resigned to Watson’s implosion. 
But will he slip away quietly, or becoming a thorn in the side critic from the outside?
Who cares ?
Do we want a return to Blairite Labour
Or a real Labour party run by Socialists ?
@Brian_Wheeler asks very reasonably:
“But will he slip away quietly, or becoming a thorn in the side critic from the outside?”
That’s up to Tom, isn’t it?
It won’t make any difference, except perhaps to Tom.
Indeed.
Bollocks
As I have said before - the one person who should have championed the 16.1 million Remain voters was the leader of the opposition - but he could never see beyond his own prejudice and ambition.
I will admit that his vacillation has, at least, papered over the Labour party cracks where Brexit is concerned but from the moment he whipped the Labour Party to vote for triggering A50 he betrayed the sizeable minority in the UK who did not wish to leave the EU.
A “wise leader” would have got his party on board with the idea that they needed to oppose - constructively - the Tory vision of an ultra-hard Brexit, but Corbyn has never done anything constructive, wanted an ultra-hard Brexit himself and was too wedded to the idea that he could get his own wish but attach the blame to the party on the other side of the house. In doing so tacitly admitting that Brexit was something with which one might not want to be too closely associated.
Frankly I hold him in just as much contempt as Johnson, maybe even slightly more.
Re “Bollocks” @anon88169868
That’s the Bulldog spirit, Paul. Your reply was worth waiting for. And I can see your point if view, even if we disagree. You would always be a hugely welcome guest at any Dinner party chez nous, if we ever feel confident enough to get one organised.
I’m still coming to terms with the intricacies of plate-wiping, the many uses of bread, how to see to it that everyone gets their glass topped up, how and when to pick one’s teeth; and (of course) at what point in the meal (pre- or post-fromage) one can start disagreeing vigorously with someone at the other end of the table.
You experience and suggestions, please!
That is a more appropriate term Mat I agree for what took place, because it was an advisory referendum to gain the public’s view at a snap shot in time. It’s been my issue with the whole thing right from the start, it was not a binding public referendum, it was advisory and therefore whilst the public gave its opinion it was the Tory Government that chose to act on it. They had no obligation to do so. They chose to act on that flawed result and continue to do so. The public were too ill informed to make such a massive call on their own futures without much wider debate and understanding of the facts and likely real consequences.
The whole thing was rushed through far too fast without the real facts for each case being laid out in detail and they probably should of spent a good two years, preparing the UK electorate for such a vote. With proper independent financial forecasts, it’s cause and effects on business etc. etc. But what we got were a few slogans on buses, and stirred up hardliners blaming it all on immigration, with little understanding of how our economy works and how much we rely on those migrants for our day to day service delivery in our schools, hospitals, care homes and food sectors etc. Many of whom have now left feeling unwelcome, and huge gaps now sit infilled across many areas of industry and especially the health service.
But the real tragedy is the unwillingness to revisit this with the British public 3 years on, now we know so much more. We have begun to experience and understand the wider consequences now of the decision made. But, the Government don’t want to give us this choice again because I believe every opinion poll since May/June 2017 in which a straight forward leave/remain question has been asked has come out in favour of remain. So they won’t risk it and will push on slavishly to get it done. It will if it ever happens be the ruin of this country, and we will all know who to blame when and if it does.
Genuine question @Brian_Wheeler:
With very nearly all of the opinion polls since 2016 now show that the majority of people want to remain - Why are the Conservatives seeming to only concentrate on “Getting Brexit Done” and thereby appealing to less than half of the electorate?
If you wish to appeal to as many voters as possible wouldnt you try to appeal the the larger group of people who wish to remain?
Are Labour playing a carefully crafted game trying to appeal to both sides (whilst possibly managing to attract neither group of ardent people)?
Also listen out for “once in a lifetime” (promise or threat) now being banded around - seing that this is the 3rd GE is 4 years… It looks likely that there may be another GE coming along shortly!
I think Mat it’s simply about party numbers, bullying and saving face. Brexit was never expected to happen, the conservatives entered this referendum with no expectation what so ever that the country would vote to leave. As a Civil Servant I know that there was no request for us to prepare for a leave result. I actually remember a message coming out from Jeremy Heywood the then head of the Civil Service explicitly inform us not to do any preparations. After Cameron resigned we lost a number of moderate Conservative MP’s to the back benches, they elected May to try and keep the balance and deliver a reasoned Brexit for both sides of the vote. But her catastrophic decision to hold the election changed everything. She lost a number of the moderates in that election and that opened the door to move the hardliners into ever more higher positions of authority. Now they have dropped all pretence of trying to be centralist the hardliners have taken over and that’s what’s pushing them. They’re voters have moved to the right with them, so any back tracking now means they are finished because they have already lost their centralist voters. There’s no going backwards from the mess they have made, I think secretly they would like someone else to stop it as they have no idea how to deliver it, then they can then point the finger!
Corbyn may well be playing the long strategic game but I’m not sure that many voters will see his strategy other than dithering. And that is a big risk for him.
Well I didn’t ever think I would see Jeremy Corbyn and Solomon in the same sentence. I think with all politicians we see what we want to see according to our own biases
Of course, Mary. A hungry baby has a bias toward its mother’s milk. A plant has a bias toward the sunlight. It’s a natural phenomenon. 
As someone posted elsewhere. Who’d have thought that the electorate would have to choose between an incompetent Marxist and a lying poppinjay