For British Members: What Do You Think of Jeremy Corbyn?

[Debater Slayer]

I don't know much about the guy other than that he's a socialist and that he was involved in problems related to antisemitism within the Labour Party. Was he unpopular mainly due to his socialism, or was it a secondary issue compared to other problems he had? Would it have been conceivable for him to be PM if he had managed the other issues more competently?

 

[ChristineM]

Personally i thought the guy was ok as a back bencher with some good labour history behind him.

Not leader material though and his opposition to the EU didn't do much to endear him to me.

Problems in the party that he failed to adequately address that the media played on brough him down.

 

[Altfish]

Personally i thought the guy was ok as a back bencher with some good labour history behind him.

Not leader material though and his opposition to the EU didn't do much to endear him to me.

Problems in the party that he failed to adequately address that the media played on brough him down.

Basically what ChristineM says
He would have been far better than Johnson/May/Sunak in.
I agreed with 95% of his policies.

 

[Mock Turtle]

I don't know much about the guy other than that he's a socialist and that he was involved in problems related to antisemitism within the Labour Party. Was he unpopular mainly due to his socialism, or was it a secondary issue compared to other problems he had? Would it have been conceivable for him to be PM if he had managed the other issues more competently?

I would have agreed with many of his policies (the public might not though), but not as to how he or his group went about taking control over the Labour party. And even if Blair had many issues, he was a far better leader than Corbyn in my view. I think Corbyn just got it wrong as to how much of the public he thought would vote for the policies he advocated - and he probably wasn't that appetizing as a leader.

 

[Debater Slayer]

I would have agreed with many of his policies (the public might not though), but not as to how he or his group went about taking control over the Labour party. And even if Blair had many issues, he was a far better leader than Corbyn in my view. I think Corbyn just got it wrong as to how much of the public he thought would vote for the policies he advocated - and he probably wasn't that appetizing as a leader.

What, in your opinion, made Blair a "far better leader than Corbyn"?

 

[Debater Slayer]

Basically what ChristineM says
He would have been far better than Johnson/May/Sunak in.
I agreed with 95% of his policies.

How much do you think the public would have agreed with his policies?

 

[Eddi]

The media had it in for him

 

[Mock Turtle]

What, in your opinion, made Blair a "far better leader than Corbyn"?

He was in for three terms for a start, and was recognised worldwide as a respected leader. He seemed to manage his crew too. I wasn't that keen when he first came to power but he came across as better than many others. He perhaps never managed to get policies that the more left-wing would have wanted to be enacted, and of course we have Iraq, such that both of these seemed to ensure he became as hated as Thatcher was by many. Not by me though.

 

[Altfish]

How much do you think the public would have agreed with his policies?

If they were explained to the public in a rational way, not by the shrieking Daily Mail and its scaremongering friends that get people to vote against their own interest, then yes the public would have accepted them.
BUT Corbyn was not a leader.

 

[Altfish]

How much do you think the public would have agreed with his policies?

If they were explained to the public in a rational way, not by the shrieking Daily Mail and its scaremongering friends that get people to vote against their own interest, then yes the public would have accepted them.
BUT Corbyn was not a leader.

 

[RestlessSoul]

I've met Jeremy a few times, his constituency is adjacent to the one I live in, and his office is next to where I work. He's very highly thought of as a constituency MP by the people of Islington North, which is probably one of the most culturally and ethnically diverse communities in the UK. He's also without doubt an honourable and principled man, but absolutely no kind of leader at all; in part because the sincerity of his principles won't allow him to 'play the game' and shift position for reasons of pragmatism. He's also anything but charismatic, and while you could argue that shouldn't matter in politics, in reality it does matter, a lot.

For all his qualities and his faults, and for all my distrust of the media, I was appalled by how brutally he was vilified by the entirety of the press, including so called liberal and left leaning titles. They did an absolute hatchet job on the guy, while the morally bankrupt narcissist Boris Johnson got an easy ride (at first anyway).

 

[Rival]

In many respects Corbyn wasn't boring enough. The Brits don't tend to go for the American President type, the celebrity leader; we tend to go for non-descript people who have the 'perfidious Albion' character. This is evident in Churchill, for example; not exactly a looker, had a drinking problem, but knew exactly how to deal with the threat at hand. After that, we needed to vote him out because he made a terrible peace-time leader and wanted to go to war with the Soviets. Churchill was not really a good character and this was known at the time.

Corbyn is a fundamentalist, on the other hand, and led a fundamentalist party within the Labour Party. Brits generally don't like that kind of thing and realise that it doesn't work within real world politics. I don't often like doing things for practical over moral purposes, but most political leaders need to do the practical as well as the moral in order to lead and deal with various nations. Churchill did this by allying with the Soviets against Hitler, but once Hitler was over he wanted to derail the Soviet train as well. Given the absolute state of Europe at this time, that was a death wish - it was Churchill's moralism taking over his more practical ethic. The Soviets would have crushed us. Corbyn strikes as the same; he promised what some people called the 'magic money tree' and to me, a capitalist, this is how it seemed. He was political friends with all the wrong people (he called Hamas and Hezbollah 'our friends' and no matter how hard he tried he couldn't backtrack that one). Hamas has been declared a terrorist organisation by the UK and his comment just went down like a brick.

Corbyn came off as a raggedy wonderworker who seemed to get in with all the wrong people, advanced anti-Semitism in his party and was generally talking fairy tales. He didn't seem to realise what the current political trends are. He would have been a disaster as PM.

 

[England my lionheart]

Corbyn reached out to all the wrong people and had a following all the wrong people,the looney antisemetic left,never a leader but he was more honest than liar Blair.

 

[Secret Chief]

I've met Jeremy a few times, his constituency is adjacent to the one I live in, and his office is next to where I work. He's very highly thought of as a constituency MP by the people of Islington North, which is probably one of the most culturally and ethnically diverse communities in the UK. He's also without doubt an honourable and principled man, but absolutely no kind of leader at all; in part because the sincerity of his principles won't allow him to 'play the game' and shift position for reasons of pragmatism. He's also anything but charismatic, and while you could argue that shouldn't matter in politics, in reality it does matter, a lot.

For all his qualities and his faults, and for all my distrust of the media, I was appalled by how brutally he was vilified by the entirety of the press, including so called liberal and left leaning titles. They did an absolute hatchet job on the guy, while the morally bankrupt narcissist Boris Johnson got an easy ride (at first anyway).

Pretty much this.
Although it looks like Labour could be on for winning the next General Election this is partly cos of the Tories plumbing ever deeper depths (oh good a racist Home Secretary) and partly cos Labour have become more pragmatist and centrist under Starmer. Aside from the loony right media (mail, express, etc) I'm not sure there's enough truly leftwing brits any more that would want a radical leftwing government (eg renationalise utilities and public transport, chuck out private companies from the (supposed) public sector (including the NHS) ). Society has become atomised with the demise of unions, too many people are only concerned with me myself and I.

 

[Augustus]

I don't know much about the guy other than that he's a socialist and that he was involved in problems related to antisemitism within the Labour Party. Was he unpopular mainly due to his socialism, or was it a secondary issue compared to other problems he had? Would it have been conceivable for him to be PM if he had managed the other issues more competently?

He's basically a public school boy from a wealthy family who has been a politician all his life, mostly without having any real responsibilities.

As such he has been free to "talk a good game" without ever having to have his ideas and learned theories tested by reality. Spending 40 years attending protests and meetings with likeminded people who all see things the same way, and criticising others for doing the wrong thing is not a great CV for a national leader, especially if you are almost entirely without charisma and political savvy.

It was quite funny watching his half-***** attempts to be against Brexit, when he quite obviously retained the "Old Labour" style opposition to the EU though. But the fact that he couldn't move past his personal beliefs on Brexit and lead an effective opposition speaks volumes, especially given the fact that he didn't openly state his views which means it wasn't a principled stance.

 

[Yerda]

As a human being, he comes across as geniunely caring about others. Never seems to have wavered.

He put forward a platform that was the first I've ever supported from a mainstream party and for that I give him credit.

As a politician absolutely hopeless. Not a leader and nowhere near savvy or cynical enough to deal with the oceans of **** coming from the press or his political opponents in the right of the Labour party. Would have tackled every crisis we've had since much better than the current shambles though, without a doubt.

 

[Secret Chief]

As a human being, he comes across as geniunely caring about others. Never seems to have wavered.

He put forward a platform that was the first I've ever supported from a mainstream party and for that I give him credit.

As a politician absolutely hopeless. Not a leader and nowhere near savvy or cynical enough to deal with the oceans of **** coming from the press or his political opponents in the right of the Labour party. Would have tackled every crisis we've had since much better than the current shambles though, without a doubt.

I think it's a sad reflection that a person whose heart is in the right place can't get to be PM, yet a conniving manipulative selfish moral vacuum like Liar Johnson can. (I know it helps if you went to Eton).

 

[oldbadger]

Jeremy Corbyn seemed honest and genuine and although I heard many claims against him of anti-Semitism because he did not investigate/act on various claims and complaints, but when these were questioned more closely most claims seemed to have been based upon his and others opinions about Israeli leadership decisions.

There are plenty of those circulating at present.

 

[Secret Chief]

Plus, I've got an old calendar with a photo of him with his cat.

 

[siti]

...it's a sad reflection that a person whose heart is in the right place can't get to be PM

Well you would presumably want someone whose head was in the right place...and that's where poor old Jeremy missed out as often as not...not that there was massive amount wrong policy-wise (although there wasn't much originality there), but he did fail to grasp the political impact of some of his comments and decisions - e.g. imposing a 3 line whip on article 50...anyway, he couldn't get his MPs behind him in opposition so I doubt he'd have made a decisive PM...on the positive side Donald Trump thought he was a "negative force" presumably implying that he recognized (with some dismay) that Corbyn might one day have been an honest Prime Minister - thankfully, the world of politics was spared that ignominy!

My late Mum just thought he was "too scruffy"...mind you, she thought that about me too!