The crash had little to do with Labour, but they have been all too keen to agree with the Tories that it was their fault, so this is now unquestioned truth.

Blaming New Labour for a worldwide financial implosion that started in America is Daily Mail-level rhetoric.

The fact Corbyn refused to take any form of responsibility for losing the seat is ludicrous.
The party leader will always have an influence on how people vote in elections, always.

That is ignoring his anti nuclear stance in an area that where nuclear is a key issue.

As for the financial crash and Blair's media support or whatever else happened in the past I am concerned now about if Corbyn can lead the Labour party to winning a general election, or at least gaining seats.
I don't see it, all I see is another 10 years of the Tories.

Shami Chakrabarti on C4 is claiming Labour lost the seat because in the past ballots were weighed rather than counted and "cherished".

Fucking hell.

You might get your way if Corbs fights a general election.

Blairites to oppose what the Tories are doing

I have very little confidence they'd do owt of the sort.

It's entirely possible that they wouldn't, but it's abundantly clear that Corbyn can't.

Are you referring to the same welfare bill as this article?

https://diaryofabenefitscrounger.blogspot.co.uk/2011/03/why-did-labour-mps-abstain-on-welfare.html?m=1

Heartless bastards!

No, this:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/these-are-the-184-labour-mps-who-didn-t-vote-against-the-tories-welfare-bill-10404831.html

It was post election, pre-Corbs.

Do the Guardian prep you with handy anti-Corbyn articles?

I didn't read them tbh. I was just being aggressive (apols, etc).

I just fundamentally disagree that Blair and his government were anything we should have been grateful for and a glorious return to the third way is anything we should be aiming towards.

That's how they get you though. 

"We can't expect anymore, this is as good as it gets, you'll have to accept you can't have everything you want, be reasonable..." Etc.

LarryDavid wrote:

because his message never reached the majority of voters, or his message was confused and poorly delivered...

Both, I think, but also the way that he's portrayed by our news. Using my dad's wide social circle as a tiny barometer, Corbyn's unpopular with Labour's old working-class standbys, many of whom have drifted Kipwise, or even migrated to full-blown Torytown.

It's true that they blame migrants and foreign-aid and all the rest of it, so a compassionate Labour sells the idea of furthering those problems, versus Tory talk of crackdowns. A number of these charity-at-home Brecariats claim benefits and just don't see what's happening. Many of them'd vote for May in mind of pensions, the NHS, and national security... Trident; borders; hegemony...

LarryDavid wrote:

Corbyn has never looked like finding a way to reach out to voters or reach through the swampy waters of lies, distortion, idiotcy and bias that is the British media and get his message across.

Besides PMQs, which hardly any bugger watches, where's his platform otherwise? That's the crux of it, I'd say. I have to seek his views, whereas hundreds of others' about him are all over the shop.

He'd get nobbled on all of those but Newsnight, and perhaps even then. Their audiences simply aren't his, nor any lefty's. Question Time in particular's a poisoned twenty. It's also the only one that a lot of old-school Labour-voters watch, and you'd lose more of them by appearing on it.

Some right-winger'd broadside him with left-wing fearmongering, and one of the things about working-class responses to such is that they're often contagious within their communities. Maybe one bloke watches QT and forms an anti-Corbyn view, and that soon becomes a consensus in his social environment. Independent thought's so rare in my experience of my dad's culture; there's a safety-in-numbers thoughtweed to be extremely wary of giving roots to.

Yossarian wrote:

How does Corbyn not have access to the Labour PR machine?

Our Press liked Blair because he was good for business.

monkey wrote:

Labour would have had to predict an event that no one saw coming, convince everyone that it was going to happen in order to build support for taking measures against it

What about Brown's gold?

I agree with that in principle, but as someone who's spent his life mixing with poor people almost exclusively, I'd still caution against his appearing on Question Time until a GE run-up.

That's when a lot of poor voters are most malleable  — most likely to listen to their compassionate voices. Because if they're not in flux then there's a high danger of peer pressure getting to them once they return to their jobs, clubs, pubs...

And since a lot of Brits only talk about politics before a GE, I think it's best to strike as late as possible. It's inevitable that you'll still lose millions to peer pressure, though, which is the best argument for your gaining-ground attempt. My worry is that you'd build up resistance to left-wing ideas over time, as they were digested and rejected, so I'd rather try a slash-n-dash with well-presented policies to ameliorate.