The big media portals like The Guardian, The BBC, The Daily Mail & The Sun all tried to destroy Corbyn and his platform of moderate social democracy – they failed. Their new mission is to bury the electoral success of socialism as though it never happened. We must not let them get away it.
Understand one thing about the mainstream media in the UK: they do not report news. Their function is to restrict the range of permissible views and political outcomes via propaganda. This is why they have pumped sewage all over Corbyn and his supporters. Social democratic views lie outside the neoliberal consensus and that cannot be permitted.
The media establishment bellowed with venomous fury that Corbyn would lead Labour to electoral disaster, but their attempts to shape the outcome have been confounded. Social democracy is the middle ground of the British political landscape and it remains popular at the ballot box, delivering the biggest swing to Labour since 1945.
Now the media are engaged in a damage limitation exercise – desperate to deflect attention away from the manifesto that Corbyn campaigned on. The most illuminating example of this mind-set actually came from the Tory MP Crispin Blunt, who said that “the electorate plainly have got it wrong” in not attending the coronation of Princess May on bended knees. The media wholeheartedly agree with this assessment and have all kinds of explanations for the malfunctioning UK electorate not voting as instructed.
After we were endlessly told that Corbyn was a liability, a buffoon, a disaster, unelectable, implausible, unviable and old fashioned – suddenly he has been reinvented as a master hypnotist, a seducer of the young, a tactical genius and a master campaigner. Conversely, the woman we were told was a safe pair of hands – strong, stable, capable and splendidly electable – has been abruptly abandoned. Now she is toxic, robotic, useless, hopeless and a campaigner with less talent than Lord Buckethead.
Why has this happened? The answer is simple. We have been fed the lie by all branches of the media that social democracy is unelectable since the Blair victory in 1997. This lie has been utterly exposed and the usual suspects are in full damage limitation mode.
Four unthinkable things have happened that have left the media and the people that own it aghast (not for nothing did Rupert Murdoch storm out of Tory HQ as the exit poll was announced). Firstly, Labour elected a socialist leader (twice), then they published a manifesto of moderate social democracy, then both platform and campaigner proved very popular and worst of all…
… Corbyn never went crawling to the Murdoch press or the corporate lobbying industry.
Corbyn backed his own principles, respected the mandate given to him by the Labour membership and stood by the history and convictions of the real Labour Party. No wonder The Guardian and the BBC hate him so much – he embodies everything they lack.
Let us not forget that after the miserably limp campaign of neoliberal robot Ed Milliband put the very future of the Labour movement in doubt – Corbyn came within 2,227 votes of being prime minister. An EXTRAORDINARY turn around.
The salaried media is awash with explanations for Corbyn’s success that are nothing to do with his principles and absolutely nothing to do with the Labour manifesto. Let’s list a few memes:
* It’s ALL Theresa May’s fault
* It’s ALL the fault of Theresa May’s team
* It’s because Corbyn looked comfortable during the campaign
* It’s all because Corbyn was somehow better than we expected
* It’s because of the young people (with unsubtle slurs against their judgment)
and many other variations on this theme. But don’t mention the policies!
You need to do more than ‘look comfortable’ and be seen to be ‘enjoying the campaign’ to do well in elections. You need principles that people can understand and identify with. For the moment the Labour Party has that and they must fight the next election on those principles – not spin.
The bottom line is this: the bullshit spun by the billionaire press and the Blairite rump within the Parliamentary Labour Party is busted. Labour now has a clear and coherent formula for electoral success that is based on an ever growing membership in support of moderate socialist values in government.
It was illuminating to see Blair’s chief spin doctor Alistair Campbell all over the media following the result. He is there to assist the media in airbrushing the success of socialism at the ballot box out of history. Don’t let them get away with it.
Excellent article! I’m sharing the hell out of it, thank you.
You are very kind. Many thanks.
Hats off! You are a breath of fresh air.
Thank you kind Sir – these are interesting times!