I shall keep this short because this is yet another negative piece about Jeremy Corbyn. Presumably pushed by his Stalinist spin doctor Seumas Milne, the Labour leader’s relaunch started today and what a mess it was. This man is not a leader: he’s a clown. The only problem with that is the only people laughing at him are the Tories, Ukip, the Lib Dems and the SNP.
For weeks, people like me have been complaining about Corbyn’s complete silence on everything. With Theresa May’s government divided down the middle over Brexit, the NHS in crisis and social care collapsing, Labour’s leader has been absent with or without leave. It has been a pitiful deflection of duty. The only problem is when he actually does start saying things, then things really go wrong.
Now we know where Labour stands. It’s for and against the single market. It’s for and against free movement. It’s for and against controlled immigration. Can you imagine what it’s policies will be tomorrow? Corbyn can’t because he makes things up as he goes along.
Today he comes up with the national maximum wage because there is an unacceptable gap between the richest and poorest in society. The old boy recognises the problem and then comes up with something so completely stupid in response that he gets laughed off stage. In one fell swoop, he wastes a golden opportunity to address a serious subject.
He was everywhere today. Radio Four’s Today programme, on Five Live with Nicky Campbell, on the couch with that idiot Piers Morgan and every time he was asked something, he gave a different reply. His much-trailed speech this afternoon, briefed to the media, included things that he didn’t say, like saying free movement wasn’t a red line in the sand as part of EU negotiations. It was negotiable, until it wasn’t. That’s all right then.
The comrades keep saying that Corbyn doesn’t get a fair deal from the media and when he does get heard, he is the victim of biased coverage. There is a sliver of truth in this statement, but only a sliver. Much of the tabloid media might well be – is – right wing filth, but Corbyn asks for this. He is so utterly incompetent, incoherent, inarticulate, lacking in clarity, bumbling and so clearly out of his depth. These are the main reasons the press have it in for him. The right wing press does not attack Corbyn because they are scared of him because they know they have nothing to be afraid of.
A decent Labour leader – a John Smith, a Tony Blair for example – would have skewered the barely less out of her depth Theresa May, but Corbyn reaches the incompetent parts other leader cannot reach. Corbyn’s relaunch as a populist politician is doomed to failure because you cannot turn a very unpopular leader into a populist.
Doubtless Corbyn’s cult following will come up with the usual excuses for Corbyn’s woeful ineptitude, blaming everyone for Labour’s hopeless position other than the great man himself. It really won’t wash. Corbyn cannot and should not be supported by Labour members and MPs because he is useless and useless is not the best characteristic of a potential PM. A man of principle would see the way the wind was blowing and resign to enable Labour to try to limit the damage in the next general election and build for the one after. That he is not a man of principle and cannot or will not see what everyone else can see, tells you everything about Jeremy Corbyn, the man of unprincipled opposition.
