Jeremy Corbyn - in the flesh! And in the garden!

Here is the East Cliff at Ramsgate, the area around the bandstand, opposite Wellington Crescent, where Jeremy Corbyn spoke on Saturday 3rd September.  I had long standing other commitments to cooking that day, but I had to leave the house to take N to A&E and decided to make a detour on the way back to see if I could see anything.  I was thrilled as I dawdled along Wellington Crescent, to see so many people there.  It made me feel rather emotional to think that so many local people had come to hear him.   He was actually speaking as I passed, so I heard a few positive sounding phrases.   I was sorry I hadn't been able to be part of the fun.  I was amused to hear later that UKIP had insisted that there were only 1000 and they had all been bussed in by trade unions.  Even the BBC had said that there were 3,000 people there.  No sign of the coaches could be found.   It contrasts famously with Nasty Nigel's "mass rally" at Cliftonville in 2015.  He spoke from the UKIP battle bus - Jez spoke from the back of a fire engine.   UKIP claimed 300 were present at NN's rally, but a careful count of the audience photo showed approx 79 people.     However, that's enough sectarian nonsense.

Later I was at the BBQ, an LP fundraiser, and someone said "Jeremy Corbyn's here!" and he was, in the kitchen.  So I retreated to the garden, and soon he came out to join us, and we and some others began a chat about gardens and allotments.  I can now reveal the following fab facts.
He has a 30 ft garden which is mostly paved because the soil is largely builders' rubble, however he grows vintes and olive trees, because they thrive on lime.  At his allotment he has grown a lot of beans and spinach which he freezes.  It is difficult to grow some things, because they need daily watering.  He has problems when he goes to the AGM because they always want to vote him onto the Allotment Committee.  Mark told him about our old allotment, and Jane H's niece commented that she goes running up there.  He told us that allotments couldn't be developed by councils if there was demand for them, so clearly we need to create demand to stop local ones disappearing.  Someone said Ramsgate houses had huge gardens, but I said that a lot didn't because they were built as holiday lodgings.  Someone else said that gardens were often full of buildings, and the conversation shifted and Jane H wisely nabbed him to talk to him seriously about mental health...

So, there we have Jeremy Corbyn, a nice beardie man, standing in a summer garden chatting about growing veg.  I didn't even dream of trying to talk politics with him.  Is he ready to lead the country?  Why not?  I swear we've had worse people.   Intellectually/socially he's probably roughly equivalent to David Cameron, able to mix affably with people and have normal conversations, although rather lacking in DC's PR skills.  I also noticed that in conversation he didn't try and draw other people out, this is fairly typical of men in general, so I won't hold it against him too much.    He does have courage and integrity and these are rather more important in a leader.,  I doubt whether Churchill was much of a one to draw out people in conversation either, it's not an essential skill, although I suspect it would help if one was trying to get to know one's Shadow Cabinet better.

A short rant about the PLP

This is something I posted on FB, which I rather liked.

Well, they started it. In the aftermath of Brexit what we REALLY, REALLY needed was a united party, a united response from Labour that could have shown people what we were about and how we were going to face the future, instead we get formation posturing from Mrs Hodge and half the Shadow Cabinet... It so was not the time to start this silly game. It WAS the time to let Jeremy shine - and if he couldn't shine then, well they might have given him enough rope to hang himself and he could have gone within the next year and fewer of us would have been so disgusted about it. But hey, why let strategy get in the way of your over-inflated ego and your parliamentary salary?

I do like a good rant.

Corbyn, McDonnell and lefty claptrapping...

I don't know what you call that automatic applause that occurs at socialist meetings whenever certain trigger words (currently "NHS", "Junior Doctors" and "refugees") are mentioned, but it's bloody annoying.   In the last six months I've heard Corbyn speak (in August) at the Winter Gardens, and this week, the Shadow Chancellor, John McDonnell, at the King's Theatre in Ramsgate and I've heard a hell of a lot of this. For some reason I think it's clap trap - but it can't be can it?  Perhaps claptrap is what the politician says to provoke applause and I noticed McD commented on something at the beginning of his speech, saying he hadn't said it to promote applause.

There was an awful lot of "spontaneous" applause on Tuesday night.  Not just for McD - but for every word that issued from the mouth of another speaker, and a tremendous deal of it for the striking junior doctors present. Yes, we want to show our appreciation, and Raushan, our local socialist restaurateur definitely deserved it for her work and her kindness but actually a lot of the claptrap is counter-productive since it slows the flow of the speech and the ideas.  And a great deal of what is being said to provoke it isn't especially new or interesting - usually a re-statement of long-held positions.

Both Corbyn and McDonnell said one, different, interesting thing which I wanted to applaud.   At the Corbyn thing I applauded and people followed (it was an attack on the supremacy of the market - seldom mentioned) and McDonnell said the new mantra for the LP should be "invest, invest, invest!"   This received zero applause.  Was it because it was a new idea and people weren't sure about it?  Is it because a lot of socialists actually are economically illiterate?  Or frightened of investment because it has capitalist overtones?  I don't know, but I found it disconcerting.   It was an enjoyable speech and quite funny, when he dealt with personal anecdotes, but I was much more interested in HOW Labour would implement policies, which McD was trying to explain.  I was glad to hear about all the advice they were taking, they sounded as if they were getting it sorted and using a diverse number of people,  many sensible former civil servants etc. as well as everyone's favourite comedy game theorist, Yannis Varoufakis.   As a former fan of Mr V. I was thrilled to hear that, nevertheless, I feel applying too much game theory to negotiations has not been a success for the Greeks, so God forbid a future Labour government should make too much use of him.

Jeremy Corbyn is a Quaker

This is my conclusion since he will not wear formal or expensive clothes, but enjoys simplicity in dress; he is a pacifist and the child of pacifists; and he will not bend the knee to anyone - not the Queen for example.  This sounds suspiciously like a secret Quaker.

Not that being a "Quaker" in this sense, implies religious belief or anything like that.  It's more a state of mind that certain people adopt.  A non-conformity to the Establishment and its values.  This gets up the Establishment's nose more than anything.  They don't mind satirists sneering at them, because when people are slagging them off, it means they matter. But these "quakers" are just ignoring them, and going their own way.  Establishment values clearly do not matter in the least to JC.

What not to wear to the Cenotaph.

Chris Mullin described him as being "rather saintly".  I think that's going a bit far, probably, what JC is, is unworldly.  The world laughs at the unworldly, and not kindly.  He is in trouble with the media, with the formerly important members of the party, with the terminally stuffy who, sadly, still seem to be in charge of a lot of things.   I would never want him to change his beliefs (unless he was convinced of the truth of another position), but I think for his own sake, it might be best to do some superficial conformity.  We don't want endless media nit-picking about unimportant matters, like what he wears to the Cenotaph.  Let him get a nice dark Crombie style overcoat - nothing flamboyant about that - and a dark suit and a "sensible" tie - not one covered with teddy bears or golf balls - and let him wear that at the Cenotaph.  Perhaps he could wear a red and a white poppy.  I don't think a red poppy means you are an active militarist does it? I hope he's got some good advice somewhere.  I hope he isn't stubborn about small, unecessary things.

What we admire about Quakers is the commitment to speak truth to power.  If he's cut down before he gets a chance, it won't be much good.  I suppose the reason why ordinary people laugh at the beard and sandals simplicity of people like JC is that they are slightly incredulous.  Why does a man who apparently had a private education (only to a prep school, than a state grammar school) and has been to university (for a year!) wander round on a bike, spend time on his allotment and generally appear to have that sort of old hippy lifestyle (in his spare time at least).  Surely a man with his advantages ought to be out running industry or working in a merchant bank or rolling in money.  People who have been brought up unhappily poor find it hard to understand this elective simplicity.  Many people have been taught that only money will make them happy, and what's the point of having money if you aren't flaunting it?   I don't suppose JC has a great deal of money.  If he lives in London his house must be worth a bit, but he's got his MP's salary, and his earnings for the odd bit of speaking and consultancy - that's more than probably your average Sun or Daily Mail reader.  If they had his money they would have a new car, a new kitchen, flash holidays.  Why isn't he like that?  What's wrong with him?  Couldn't he at least get a new bike?

He's a dissenter, a non-conformist (he said that his beard was "a form of dissent" against New Labour) - and there are a lot of us like that, who, for whatever reasons, don't like the idea that we must behave in a certain way.  That's who he represents, he probably isn't going to lure the Daily Mail readers away from their sense of security.  Those of us who want to feel we are doing the "right thing" socially will not really "get" him.  The question is, are the dissenters in the majority?  Or will a combination of the conformists and the apathetic defeat Labour again next time?  Time will tell, but for a while, we dissenters can bask in the happiness of having a quakerish, Ghandian, pacifist with integrity and socialist values leading the Labour party.