The power of immovable integrity

 

 

The reason Ed milliband attracted ridicule was because he tried too hard. He was too malleable to the image makers and not good enough at pulling it off. He dressed in the City Slicker garb that Blair had adopted with far more aplomb than Milliband but is somewhat gauche and clumsy. Too easy to photograph with an idiotic facial expression, he was not the most photogenic candidate for leader. What he did have is an apparent innocence and, presumably, the Labour party felt that this was what was needed. His brother, David is far more photogenic and, one would imagine, far slicker. But David comes across as something of a spiv. People would not trust him. Women might want to bed him but they wouldn't expect any loyalty or commitment in return. Some women might be up for bedding Ed... but one gets the impression that he would then stalk them with love poems forever after. Ed is the archetypal 'Nice-But-Dim'. Also, his willingness to try to appease the image makers left one wondering if he would be equally willing to appease the lobbyists. He was every inch the puppet.

Corbyn, in contrast, makes no attempt to appease the image makers. He doesn't dress like a City Slicker (or a spiv). He does not ridicule or take pot shots at the easy targets and the very characteristics on which Cameron has tried, unsuccessfully, to capitalise as his weaknesses are actually his strengths. He is, in many respects, the image makers' nightmare. He rides a bike in preference to a chauffeur- driven limousine and doesn't seem to mind that his cycle helmet looks a little silly. It's part of his charm. Yet, when he speaks, he is to the point. He shuns the lavish photo-opportunities, banquets and audiences with the High-and-Mighty in preference to spending time with the ordinary people of whom he is seen as very much a part.

More to the point, one definitely gets the impression that he would not give in to lobbyists regardless of promised rewards or threats. What could they threaten him with? There are, it would seem, no skeletons in his closet and the worst that the media's 'dirt archaeologists' have managed to dig up is an affair with Dianne Abbot twenty years ago. Not exactly the Profumo Scandal and pales in comparison with Cameron's pig's head fiasco. Corbyn is as he has always been. He has always ridden a bike and worn off-the-peg clothes from BHS. He doesn't try, he simply is. And he is seen by the general public as incorruptible.

Even the Tories would have to concede, if only privately within their heart of hearts, that, if an election were to be held now, Corbyn would win with a majority that would exceed even Blair's landslide victory in 1997. Labour is once again the 'people's party'.

So why are critics within his own party saying that he could not win the election in 2020? To answer that, we have to look at who his critics are. Many are those who had joined the party during Blair's premiership. No longer the 'belt & braces' socialist party of its origins, it had become effectively a branch of the Tory party. The City-Slicker image and profiteering from wheeling and dealing with lobbyists and corporations was the New Labour way. This was all about capitalising on fear and greed, increasing police powers and introducing new laws that serve only the powerful at the expense of the electorate. Politics had ceased to be about governing for the people and had become the stepping stone to the dizzying world of unimaginable wealth that Thatcher had created.

Prior to Thatcher, leaders from both sides of the House would get their turn at the helm in Number 10 and return to the opposition benches following electoral defeat. Regardless of what one may think of their policies, they were committed politicians. It was in no way unusual for a serving Prime Minister to be facing a former Prime Minister across the Despatch Box. This, they saw as their calling. All that changed with Thatcher. She got in, did the arms deals (brokered by her son, Mark Time-To-Pay-Mumsie Thatcher) and deregulated the banks, opening the financial world to the biggest orgy of greed and corruption since The House of Medici in 15^th Century Italy. On leaving Office, she was never to be seen in the Commons again... and left Westminster several million pounds richer than when she first entered it. The same was true for Blair. The culture of 'get in, make your pile and get out' was born. Cameron, no doubt, has a place on the board of BAE Systems or suchlike when he is eventually spat out of Westminster.

This is the political climate into which the Yuppie Labour faction entered the fray. It didn't matter where one's loyalties lay as the politics of both sides served the same agenda. That is to look after the corporate interests of the biggest companies and eventually reap the rewards waiting for them on the other side of the Revolving Door. To them, a Labour victory in 2020 is a far less attractive (or lucrative) proposition than being instrumental in ensuring that Corbyn's policies do not see the light of day. They are as aware as everyone else that Labour's chances of an election victory are greater now than ever before... but at a cost. Under Corbyn, they see their dreams of profiting from perks of Office and opportunities for corruption with impunity evaporating like ether under the desert sun.

There are many who hold a blade for Corbyn's back and he needs to tread with caution. But he is no stranger to the betrayals and conspiracies that have been a part of politics since Time Immemorial. He's been around for a long time and has learned a thing or two. His greatest weapon against the Tories is the Tories themselves. Like a master of Tai Chi, he allows his opponent to destroy itself. He is the Iceberg to the Tory party's Titanic.