Shadow Cabinet Anger Over Shock Corbyn Letter

[Ignitionnet]

Originally Posted by Arthurgray50@blu

Only the other day, there were 100 migrants landed in Scotland. How many could be ISIL members.

We simply don't know. As they were just allowed in WITHOUT papers.

They were taken from refugee camps in Lebanon and Iraq as part of the Vulnerable Persons Resettlement Programme, not simply allowed in. They were all vetted. None are men travelling on their own.

Originally Posted by Arthurgray50@blu

I am not saying that all migrants are terrorists, but l was due to take my family out xmas shopping - they wont go on the tube, or on the bus. This is how scared people are.

They must have lived a very frightened existence when the IRA were doing their thing in Great Britain.

I think you'll find that this is how scared they are. 'People' are getting on with their lives because that's what people do, and is the best way for us commoners to respond to Cystisis.

As Hugh said stop reading the Mail, Express and Sun. The first two are full of xenophobic scaremongery and just thinking about the other is harming my ability to think rationally. If your family are being fed on a diet of that bullcrap it's no wonder they are scared.

[TheDaddy]

Originally Posted by Maggy J

And the lessons of 2003? I can see that something has to be done but it seems to me everyone is going off at half cock about it..We really need to be working in unison and at the moment too many countries are bombing too many groups..it's a mess..Joining in just because everyone else is doing so seems like a very poor reason to do it..

Exactly, we are being led by the nose into war based on dodgy intelligence by a spiv in a flash suit with no idea what to do in the aftermath or if things escalate further.

[Ignitionnet]

The disagreements within Labour are certainly escalating.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk...-a6753846.html

[techguyone]

This is a multi faceted issue, with multiple layers of complexity that go well beyond the scope of the thread.

Certainly not helped by an at times disastrous immigration policy, nor by a huge failure of integration. Over successive & different governments. (anytime you get a people that describe themselves by their culture/religion first & Country second you have lost it)

EU's frankly bizarre policy making is also aiding the enemy without to become the enemy within...

Getting back to the topic itself, it's not entirely fair to draw parallels with the 1930's & the Nazi build up. This at least had the benefit of one united & clearly defined 'enemy' & state you could oppose.

Iraq/Syria doesn't have that luxury, it's made up of many factions, whose allegiance probably changes daily, compounded by the fact that even amongst the 'Western forces' we're at odds as to who 'the enemy' is, we should take the lessons learnt from recent history and leave well alone

Air & drone strikes only take us so far...
We never have any real idea what to do after we've rolled in & taken out the military (the easy bit - relatively) we should leave well alone, it's an arabic country - in the middle of other arab countries, perhaps it wouldn't be too much to expect for them to clean House. We wouldn't expect Iran to come in and fix stuff if <Insert Western Country of your choice> started getting uppity.

I don't suppose this will happen as we'll blink first, and we'll end up rolling in as some sort of coalition, thus creating another generation of resentment and so it will continue on and on.

I think on reflection I prefered the Cold War at least we knew who the 'enemy' was, they were there, we were here, and it was scary but known.

The ongoing warm brush conflicts are far worse and seemingly unwinnable unless the West drastically does something new & different on many levels.

Interesting times we live in.

Originally Posted by Ignitionnet

The disagreements within Labour are certainly escalating.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk...-a6753846.html

Something Mr Corbyn said in the Andrew Marr show yesterday

“The membership of the Labour Party must have a voice. Labour MPs need to listen to that voice,”

The MPs may have been selected by the members of the Labour Party, but they were voted in by the electorate, who vastly outnumber the Labour Party members - when will their voices be listened to.

[Osem]

Could the Tories really have wished for a more ineffectual opposition? After seeing off the inept Miliband, they must have thought 'things can only get harder'... Labour were clearly deemed economically inept before the last election, now they're seen to be politically inept as well. I hope there is a split. Labour would do well to get shot of their loony contingent and their policies once and for all. There's plenty of room for sensible middle ground opposition.

You'd have thought they might just have learned a lesson from their utter demise in Scotland but Corbyn seems to have decided to plough on regardless of what the man in the street thinks.

---------- Post added at 10:17 ---------- Previous post was at 09:42 ----------

Having lived through the IRA bombing period like many people here I can confirm that I won't be altering my behaviour due to some unknown terrorist threat or another. I reckon I'm far more likely to get run over whilst my mind is preoccupied with thoughts of gunmen or suicide bombers than be a victim of crazed terrorists. What I will do is be careful just like I am when I use an ATM. I don't shield my PIN because I think everyone else is a threat, I do so because some people are. I lock my front door for the same reason. It's sensible. We don't need to stop doing/using this, that or the other, we just need to be aware, not paranoid. I'd argue that tightening our border controls and screening processes is entirely sensible not because 'all bloody foreigners are lunatics' but because some are. Given that quite a few Brits have shown themselves to have terrorist sympathies I'd happily accept that other countries might want to screen me a bit more carefully than they might previously have done too. I'd expect them to do so and not whine about being picked upon. If I were a genuine refugee who turned up on a border somewhere I'd also expect my prospective hosts to want to screen me for all sorts of reasons. Why wouldn't they do that?

Nothing we can do is going to be a panacea for all our potential terrorist ills but it's still sensible to take more precautions that we currently are. I reckon if we all worried less about being 'offended' and applied proportionate common sense precautions to such matters things would be a whole lot better for everyone.

The really annoying part to all this is that there no no actual discussion in the media about bombing Syria.It's all about the dissent in the Labour party..

Originally Posted by Maggy J

The really annoying part to all this is that there no no actual discussion in the media about bombing Syria.It's all about the dissent in the Labour party..

There's a couple of good articles in today's Times (behind paywall).

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/u...cle4627546.ece

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/p...cle4625275.ece

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/p...cle4625240.ece

I don't take the times..as it's owned by News Corp and ultimately Murdoch and I won't pay..

[mrmistoffelees]

Originally Posted by Maggy J

I don't take the times..as it's owned by News Corp and ultimately Murdoch and I won't pay..

I read this in a Downton Abbey esque voice (well what i think it would sound like )

Interesting article on the Labourlist website.

http://labourlist.org/2015/11/labour...tion-on-syria/

Labour have released the findings of their policy consultation on intervention in Syria with members over the weekend – claiming it shows 75% are opposed to airstrikes against ISIS.

Jeremy Corbyn sent out an email on Friday evening to members and supporters asking for their opinion on how Labour should approach the Government’s proposals for intervention in Syria. The party have today said that 107,875 people responded to the consultation, of which 64,771 were confirmed as full Labour Party members.

Of those 65,000 party members, they analysed a random sampling of 1,900 responses. These responses showed that 75% were opposed to airstrikes in Syria, 13% were in favour, and 11% undecided.

The result was released an hour before the Shadow Cabinet met a 2 o’clock to discuss the party’s position on Syria. In a recent speech, Corbyn asked “Why not give members the chance to take part in indicative online ballots on policy in between annual conferences – and give our grassroots members and supporters a real say?” This indicates that he may start using such consultations more regularly.

The consultation’s process has come in for some criticism though, with professional pollsters saying that a self-selecting process with a leading invitation (in the email Corbyn made clear he was opposed to “the bombing of Syria”) can not be trusted as a representative result.

It is also unclear what methodology was used – how the random responses were selected, and how they were analysed. With no selective options, such as ‘support’ or ‘oppose’, the answers were qualitative, and many could have been difficult to process.

The email was sent out after it had been agreed nothing would happen until the Shadow Cabinet meeting today, and then the results are released an hour before the meeting.

Update - apparently, there will be a free vote for Labour MPs on the issue, and Mr Corbyn has requested a two day debate on the issue, with the vote being taken on Thursday (the day of the Oldham by-election).

Originally Posted by mrmistoffelees

I read this in a Downton Abbey esque voice (well what i think it would sound like )

Not really. I'm as common as muck..

[techguyone]

Oh look as expected.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-34967024

Free vote

So according to Mr Corbyn's policy consultation, 75% opposed air strikes on Syria.

Strange how a YouGov poll a week ago gave these figures.

Public support, now at 59% to 20% in opposition, has been steady throughout 2015, even in the wake of the Paris attacks – suggesting the public have settled on a position, with support unlikely to deteriorate in the near future.

Some differing viewpoints reported in the Telegraph

As Jeremy Corbyn fights with his shadow ministers to decide Labour's view on bombing Isil in Syria, one of his few shadow cabinet allies - Diane Abbott - has been putting his case against intervention in the media.

"I think public opinion is moving towards us in opposing the rush to war," the Shadow International Development secretary boasted on the Today programme this morning.

The only problem with Ms Abbott's claim is that recent polls don't exactly show this. They indicate, as YouGov's Will Dahlgreen wrote, "strong and consistent public support for RAF air strikes within Syria". As he noted: "A clear majority of British people support RAF air strikes."

Polling across the board bears this out. Survation found that 48 per cent backed bombing Isil targets, while YouGov put this figure a bit higher, at 59 per cent. A ComRes survey from earlier this month found that 60 per cent of voters would back air strikes, compared to 24 per cent who were against.

[pip08456]

THIS WILL CLEAR EVERYTHING UP FOR YOU .

​
A highly restricted briefing document on Syria....


President Assad ( who is bad ) is a nasty guy who got so nasty his people rebelled and the Rebels ( who are good ) started winning ( Hurrah!).

But then some of the rebels turned a bit nasty and are now called Islamic State ( who are definitely bad!) and some continued to support democracy ( who are still good.)

So the Americans ( who are good ) started bombing Islamic State ( who are bad ) and giving arms to the Syrian Rebels ( who are good ) so they could fight Assad ( who is still bad ) which was good.

By the way, there is a breakaway state in the north run by the Kurds who want to fight IS ( which is a good thing ) but the Turkish authorities think they are bad, so we have to say they are bad whilst secretly thinking they're good and giving them guns to fight IS (which is good) but that is another matter.

Getting back to Syria.

So President Putin ( who is bad, cos he invaded Crimea and the Ukraine and killed lots of folks including that nice Russian man in London with polonium poisoned sushi ) has decided to back Assad ( who is still bad ) by attacking IS ( who are also bad ) which is sort of a good thing?

But Putin ( still bad ) thinks the Syrian Rebels ( who are good ) are also bad, and so he bombs them too, much to the annoyance of the Americans ( who are good ) who are busy backing and arming the rebels ( who are also good).

Now Iran ( who used to be bad, but now they have agreed not to build any nuclear weapons and bomb Israel are now good ) are going to provide ground troops to support Assad ( still bad ) as are the Russians ( bad ) who now have ground troops and aircraft in Syria.

So a Coalition of Assad ( still bad ) Putin ( extra bad ) and the Iranians ( good, but in a bad sort of way ) are going to attack IS ( who are bad ) which is a good thing, but also the Syrian Rebels ( who are good ) which is bad.

Now the British ( obviously good, except that nice Mr Corbyn in the corduroy jacket, who is probably bad ) and the Americans ( also good ) cannot attack Assad ( still bad ) for fear of upsetting Putin ( bad ) and Iran ( good / bad) and now they have to accept that Assad might not be that bad after all compared to IS ( who are super bad).

So Assad ( bad ) is now probably good, being better than IS ( but let’s face it, drinking your own wee is better than IS so no real choice there ) and since Putin and Iran are also fighting IS that may now make them Good. America ( still Good ) will find it hard to arm a group of rebels being attacked by the Russians for fear of upsetting Mr Putin ( now good ) and that nice mad Ayatollah in Iran ( also Good ) and so they may be forced to say that the Rebels are now Bad, or at the very least abandon them to their fate. This will lead most of them to flee to Turkey and on to Europe or join IS ( still the only constantly bad group).

To Sunni Muslims, an attack by Shia Muslims ( Assad and Iran ) backed by Russians will be seen as something of a Holy War, and the ranks of IS will now be seen by the Sunnis as the only Jihadis fighting in the Holy War and hence many Muslims will now see IS as Good ( Doh!.)

Sunni Muslims will also see the lack of action by Britain and America in support of their Sunni rebel brothers as something of a betrayal ( mmm.might have a point.) and hence we will be seen as Bad.

So now we have America ( now bad ) and Britain ( also bad ) providing limited support to Sunni Rebels ( bad ) many of whom are looking to IS ( Good / bad ) for support against Assad ( now good ) who, along with Iran ( also Good) and Putin ( also, now, unbelievably, Good ) are attempting to retake the country Assad used to run before all this started?

So, now you fully understand everything, all your questions are answered!!!!