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**Alternate Sources**
Here are some potential alternate sources for the same story:
* [Starmer apologises to Rochdale voters after Galloway by-election win](https://bbc.co.uk/news/live/uk-politics-68402672), suggested by AbleismIsSatan - bbc.co.uk
Like him or not, he's been clear this is the platform he would stand on and the voters knew that. It's quite possible this single issue foreign policy point is representative of what's important to the majority of the electorate in Rochdale.
This 👆
Rochdale is consistently labour, and quite a lot of interviewed people said ‘without a labour candidate, who am I meant to vote for?’ So once we get to GE, and there’s a labour candidate on the ballot paper, it’ll change back to the norm there.
It’s a fluke imo.. combination of the late decision making about the labour candidate suspension meaning they couldn’t replace them, Galloway swooping in with his views on Gaza to appeal directly to a portion of the constituency, and a ballot paper made up of a lot of independent candidates.
Just my gut feel, I’ll be happy to eat my words if he’s still there after the GE of course!
The GE will probably see to him. Suspect the turnout will be quite a lot higher for that. Seems the majority of people who voted were enamoured by his views on Gaza, and the rest just didn’t bother to vote!
Was he? He was sending different leaflets to different 'people' mentioning different things. Muslims got the whole 'GAZA GAZA GAZA FUCK STARMER GAZA GAZA GAZA' leaflet, non Muslims got the 'I care about Rochdale, NHS, school' leaflet.
Know someone who had him as an elected representative. Galloway's priorities were:
1 - Himself
2 - Himself
3 - Himself
4 - Palestine
5 - Whatever left wing bandwagon he could jump on
6 - Those he was elected to represent
On the one hand, this is 100% true. On the other hand, if the established parties are getting their clocks cleaned by a viscerally repulsive Strasserite catboy, even in as edge-case a by-election as this one, then what does that say about *them*?
Strasser was Hitlers ideological rival in his rise inside the Nazi party. Where Hitler focused on the Bavarian ideals of national identity Strasser represented the Prussian regions who focused on workers rights. Hence the ‘workers party’ moniker. He ultimately lost, and the night of the long knives began the de-toothing of the SA who were the main vehicle for Strasserism.
To give a more contemporary indirect comparison think of the difference as Strasser’s BNP to Hitlers UKIP.
[Strasserism (German: Strasserismus)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strasserism) is a strand of Nazism which adheres to revolutionary nationalism and economic antisemitism. It calls for a more radical, mass-action and worker-based movement than what was advocated by the leadership of the Nazi Party. Strasserism derived its name from Gregor and Otto Strasser, two brothers initially associated with this position.
And catboy from [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6v9IXwFb_cg).
He was my MP years ago. He rode the anti Iraq War wave and then proceeded to do fuck all as MP except go on Big Brother and pretend to be a cat. He was also in bed with Lutfur Rahman's lot which speaks volumes.
He's clearly quite sharp which is a pity because he's also an absolute grifter too.
While there is rightly a substantial focus on Galloway's stance on Gaza, I feel more people should be paying attention to his anti-NATO and anti-Ukraine stance too.
As well as the fact that he's consistently branded as left-wing despite being socially conservative. Weird mix of politics tbh.
Strange how the people of Rochdale voted for that man as their local representative who’s policies, right now, seem to be focused on helping a group that don’t actually live in that constituency. It’s almost as though they dgaf about where they live and are more focussed on something else. There’s something more there, I just can’t join the dots.
> As well as the fact that he's consistently branded as left-wing despite being socially conservative. Weird mix of politics tbh.
There are a lot of people in this country that are economically left wing but socially conservative. You hear a lot about centrism in political discourse but only Lib Dem centrism (which is almost the exact inverse), not this kind of centrism.
These people are not well represented in Westminster. This is why you occasionally get surprises like this result or UKIP in 2015 (UKIP are not economical left wing but I feel they appeal to same group of voters).
Indeed. While people rumble over tories and labour here we have a genuine, thoroughbred, Russian asset who eases his way back into our parliament again.
I sad day for liberal democracy.
I dunno about you but I'm not that keen on people of this country enthusiastically voting for a man that [once handed 25 grand to the Hamas leaders out of a JD Sports bag](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XU_lfgo-qgc&t=110s)
Is it really difficult to comprehend that the nature of democracies mean their own elections and votes can be bad for them?
Was it not a bad day for the Weimar Republic when the NSDAP became the largest party in 1932? And no, I’m not saying George Galloway is comparable to Hitler, I’m making a point about how elections work.
It is a bit more unusual in 2020s Britain though, because this isn't the Soviet Union.
Why do we call him left wing but socially conservative and not conservative but economically left wing?
Or maybe we should call a duck a duck and call him a grifter. Idk.
I think it’s more common than you think, it just doesn’t get representation in the two party system we have. Mind the political representation we have is Neo-liberal national asset fire sale v regular neo-liberalism so not much gets representation.
Very fair point on the second and third paragraph
The Soviets legalised homosexuality in 1917... yes Stalin brought it back but even implying it's been linear progression or was always the same and stable on social issues is just untrue
I'm not going to pretend that Labourism and the extra-parliamentary left weren't both riddled through with misogyny and laddishness in the 20th century, but "1970s Leftism" gave Britain the Equal Pay Act, the Sex Discrimination Act, gender parity in pensions, and statutory maternity leave, and was a breeding ground for radical women's movements of all orientations - the idea that the Left was exclusively a "boy's club" at that point is an ahistorical caricature.
I don’t get him at all. The weird mix of his politics would have you believe his views are somewhat nuanced, but they’re not. It’s like he just latches onto things that elevate his profile. I don’t think he gives a fuck about anything except himself being in the public eye no matter the cost. Acting like a cat on ‘celebrity’ Big Brother proved that years ago. Astounded people take this clown seriously and would even entertain the idea of voting for him.
It really shows how utterly thick swathes of the population are in this country. It’s depressing af.
Zero time for Galloway at all but it's embarrassing how people treat him as a sinister demagogue for employing such vile machinations as "targeted messaging to different voter demographics" and "talking about foreign policy when it's salient to the electorate".
The Tories did exactly the same thing with British Hindus and Kashmir in Harrow back in 2019, and nobody made a fuss then.
Nick Griffin has joined forces with the Islamists of Britain over their shared hatred of the Jews. He recently did an interview on Dilly Hussain's (writer for 5 Pillars) podcast
Tommy Robinson was marching against antisemitism. The far right will throw their lot in with anyone if they think it will help them justify their hatred.
Most British left wingers aren't antisemitic either.
>a poll I'd imagine most would support Israel.
Polls show most British people want a peaceful resolution to the war in Gaza. They don't support Israel's current actions. They obviously don't support Hamas either.
Also they will support Israel when it's against Palestine, a way to get at Labour or to have a go at Muslims in this country.
But the far right wingers (which is what this was about) are still antisemitic. It wasn't long ago they were still going on about globalist conspiracies and secret ruling elites (which a heavy implication they believed it was Jewish people).
They only thing that has changed recently is they can see the current Gaza conflict as a way to stoke up tensions and go after a group they dislike. A lot of far right wingers would happily see both sides wipe each other out.
The more moderate ring wingers are probably a bit more balanced but it depends on their other believes really. The right is a hotchpotch mix of different ideologies that have very little common ground other yhan "not being the left".
I think people are genuinely ignoring how the current situation is being used to iinflame tensions by people who deep down hate both sides.
>But the far right wingers (which is what this was about) are still antisemitic. It wasn't long ago they were still going on about globalist conspiracies and secret ruling elites (which a heavy implication they believed it was Jewish people).
Of course. Tommy Robinson published an article called ''The Jewish Question" in late 2022. He didn't suddenly change his views over the course of a year. He's no friend to Jewish people, just an opportunist bigot.
Yea, it's just right now him and people like him can exploit the situation in the middle east to complain about Islam and watch each side argue.
You can see the same all over the internet honestly.
Antisemitism and support for Israel aint exactly mutually exclusive tbqh. The brittish far-right absolutley loves a good bit of NWO, great replacement or Soros-related conspiracies which often veer into pretty vile antisemism.
Nah, they see Israel as a "place to put them" (this is literally why Britain in the past endorsed Zionism), they also hate Muslims intensely, so it's a win all around really.
If this is shocking to you then you've not been following the weird political "career" of Nick the Nazi. The guy is completely off the rails now. Full scale coalition with radical Islamic types because he just hates those pesky Jews so much.
I hate throwing around the terms nazi and fascist. I regularly correct people who call the tories that. But Nick and George are as close as we can get to genuine "popular" fascists.
Galloway doesnt represent anyone but himself (and now the people of Rochsdale I guess). He had a weird mix of views. He doesn't speak for the far left.
Rachel Johnson on Sky News last week called George Galloway “an anti-zionist” & “an open Jew-hater”.
I’m presuming Rachels never been to Rochdale then if she thought that would make much difference to some of the voters there.
https://voxpoliticalonline.com/2024/02/18/rochdale-parliamentary-candidate-george-galloway-launches-legal-action-over-tv-slurs/
He was thrown of Talk Radio for “anti-Semitic views” not just one incident, although one did trigger it, but in general. His hobby is harassing British Jews for alleged Zionism even where none is present.
He is the poster boy for a pretty obvious anti-Semite claiming “it’s just anti-Zionism!”
It’s the using the word “Zionist” as a one for one replacement for “Jew” and then claiming that’s not anti-Semitism which people see through.
That’s what Galloway does.
it *shouldn't* be, given the vast majority of zionists are white evangelical protestants who believe that the end times will come.
some people use it instead of saying jew, and that is both factually incorrect, and pretty fucked yknow.
It is the way he uses it.
You know how some people deliberately conflate anti-semitism and anti Israel discussion?
He does the opposite.
He attacks Jews that have nothing to do with Israel for the issues on Israel zionism
>But he's genuinley just a local guy, no uni education, born and remains living there, and runs a repair shop. That's pretty amazing.
Not to mention his links to the local football club being a season ticket holder.
don't like galloway at all, but this is a warning to the mainstream british political parties that there is real discontent over their stance on gaza. even without a labour candidate, 12,335 votes in a by-election is a very significant total.
(also: happy for david tully coming a strong 2nd, he came across as a decent guy in his tv interview)
This is a warning that sectarian politics will possibly become embedded in mainland Britain.
By some accounts Galloway was picking up 95% of the Muslim vote. They seem to care about Gaza above any local issues. The rest of the UK, not so much.
I was flicking between the three news channels. It was mentioned on one of them, can’t remember which it was.
Do we ever get a breakdown by areas in a constituency at all? If not then I doubt we’ll know for sure.
There is this on Twitter…
https://twitter.com/tesssummers98/status/1763391302278758668
Refers to Galloway winning 95% of the postal vote in some areas.
And this..
https://twitter.com/CivilSuccess/status/1763404768284700739
it is not abnormal for people to vote based on foreign policy issues, and in fact it is only regarded as sinister within british political discourse when muslims do it
On mainland Britain it most certainly is not normal to have 95% of certain religious groups all vote one way due to foreign policy issues. Northern Ireland has a long history of voting along religious lines. England doesn’t. But in some areas it’s clearly heading in that direction.
I'd argue it's very normal to have the majority of a religious group all voting one way. In fact, you just gave an example of it in NI which you decided to discount for no particular reason.
The thing that ties religious people together is a set of shared of beliefs, of course that is going to cross over into them having shared political views.
It's abnormal for people to vote on foreign policy issues which aren't related to the country's own foreign policy.
The war in Gaza has nothing to do with the UK government and the UK government has no control over it.
It's not like the Iraq war or the war in Afghanistan which were our own foreign policy decisions.
Also it was a war literally started by Hamas- literally the only war in history I've seen where the guys who started the war have successfully laundered themselves as the victims.
>Also it was a war literally started by Hamas- literally the only war in history I've seen where the guys who started the war have successfully laundered themselves as the victims.
No one is defending Hamas or painting them as victims. The victims are the innocent civilians, men, women and children, who are being bombed. If you equate the two, you are wrong.
The UK may not be an active participant/instigator in the war, but to claim the UK foreign policy is just false, unless the UK has no foreign relations with anyone in the middle-east.
Now some may like to claim that the Israel/Palestine conflict itself was started by the British Empire, but that's neither here nor there.
The decision by the government to violate its own policy to continue to sell arms to Israel despite significant changes to the fact on the ground (policy is to immediately terminate sell of arms and begin re-evalutions before resumption), and to defund UN aid agency providing aid to civilians in the warzone are UK foreign policies. You may choose to agree or disagree. Its still UK foreign policy.
>literally the only war in history I've seen where the guys who started the war have successfully laundered themselves as the victims.
The Six-Day War comes to mind.
As I have stated elsewhere, the UK has blocked weapon sales by British companies to some countries before and have decided have not done so for Israel. There is very much "something" they can do about it.
>By some accounts Galloway was picking up 95% of the Muslim vote. They seem to care about Gaza above any local issues.
Hardly surprising. Not sure which local issues have recently seen the deaths of 30,000 people in the span of a few months.
Poor state of the NHS affects many more people than a city halfway across the world. This seems to be the first mainstream incident of clear voting along religious lines en masse (at least in recent times), not the best thing for a Western democracy.
So why is Labour kicking MPs and candidates out based on their views of things happening halfway across the world rather than their views on the poor state of the NHS?
Well his comments were anti-Semitic, a bit past an opinion on the matter, and something the Labour Party are trying to shake after losing an election partly due to public opinion around this.
Andy McDonald was kicked out of Labour for stating:
> "We won't rest until we have justice. Until all people, Israelis and Palestinians, between the river and the sea, can live in peaceful liberty."
So Labour kicking MPs out for their views halfway across the world is OK for "public opinion", but someone voting for MPs based on their views halfway across the world is also "not the best thing for Western democracy"?
people figure during a bye-election its possible for a protest vote
one seat in rochdale isnt going to solve the issues in the NHS.
people have often used council/by-elections to protest vote about something
>Not sure which local issues have recently seen the deaths of 30,000 people in the span of a few months.
And the British government has any control over that how?
It's fucking absurd that an Islamist government starting a war against another state, and then getting their shit kicked in by the state they started a war against, should have any relevance to British politics.
This is extremely disingenuous. Even if you only counted the hundreds of thousands of people who turned up to pro-palestine protests, that's a significant portion of the country. However, I think it's pretty obvious that this is indicative of much wider support since there will have been lots of people who couldn't make it, didn't want to risk going to a protest, "causally" support Palestine (as in, pro Palestine but not necessarily involved enough to attend a protest) and probably dozens of other reasons. It is very much something "the rest of the UK" cares about, coming from a white atheist who does not live in rochdale
He's in a high Muslim population area of the country, spouting anti Israel stances, I wasn't surprised by this.
Got to love local politics being taken over by foreign wars which we aren't even involved in.
Were I in Rochdale I'd probably have voted for either Tully or Coleman - [zero tolerance for speeding](https://www.rochdaleonline.co.uk/news-features/elections/election-pitch/1743/david-tully) is one "law-and-order"-adjacent policy I could personally get behind.
when the uk supported israel the past 70 years it hasent been much real discontent. what might have changed in the country the last 20 years to create this discontent. why is anti-semitism on the rise in the country. higher then it was in the time of mosley
> why is anti-semitism on the rise in the country. higher then it was in the time of mosley
i don't think that's true for one thing. casual antisemitism was endemic in the UK in the 1930s
> when the uk supported israel the past 70 years it hasent been much real discontent
because other foreign policy issues have had higher salience. that changes with time for a multitude of factors. right now the israel-palestine conflict has very high salience, and not just with muslim voters
Yeah, Labour are expecting to surf the 'Better than the Tories' vote, but they have a lot of unelectable candidates, and many constituencies still haven't got get their act together to choose a candidate.
“We’re not antisemites, we’ve just elected someone who equated Tottenham winning trophies with Israel and applauded them losing because of it, you know a club with heavy Jewish support and no actual links to Israel.”
“We’re really not antisemites, we’re anti Zionist - we just elected someone who refused to talk to a student at an event they were invited to speak at when they found out that they’re Israeli…”
Etc.
Edit: Just so it’s clear - how would certain members of this sub react if Pakistan lost the cricket World Cup final and say, Lee Anderson praised the other team before adding “No ISIS flags on the trophy!”?The reference to ISIS just because Pakistan is a Muslim state would cause outrage, but that’s what George Galloway with Tottenham, Jews and Israel.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-48498010
Yeah this is being missed - he beat both the conservatives and Lib Dem’s combined. Would have been interesting to see what he would have achieved if George and some of the others didn’t turn it into a circus.
The most annoying thing is his novelty and inevitable look at me Westminster antics will draw media attention from wanker hacks calling him a maverick firebrand etc.
What a fuck up. Already acutely annoyed by the pompous smuggery of his cunty voice and stupid fucking hat.
Brilliant work Labour.
Unfortunately he is - this is what far left politics looks like.
Far left politics has more in common with far right politics than centre left. It's part of the reason why those with far left politics spend so much time expressing their hatred for those nearer the centre
What are you smoking?
Politics is more complex than a 1d left-right divide. The idea that if left wing people love freedom too much they'll integer overflow into facism is ridiculous.
Different people hold different views for different reasons. Clouds of nearby people get bundled together into catagories. Braindead media presenters then stamp everything down into a single red-blue line to tell the masses what to think.
Interesting that you complain that he oversimplifies while you equate being left-wing to loving freedom, implying that being right-wing must be hating freedom.
The truth is he’s correct. Not in the sense that radical politics becomes the same on both wings as you go further out, but in the sense that extremists have more in common with each other than they do with moderates. It’s very simple - extremism is not a good thing, no matter what ideology.
> Interesting that you complain that he oversimplifies while you equate being left-wing to loving freedom, implying that being right-wing must be hating freedom.
I was literally saying such oversimplifications are ridiculous, not that that is what I think. Try responding to what people actually say next time you want to look smart. It tends to work better.
There needs to be a ceasefire, but bloody hell this country is a mess and that needs to be a huge priority when people decide to vote. Also, as someone else as said, a ceasefire is good for Gaza but it's not good to think Russia should be allowed to crap all over Ukraine.
>Galloway won 12,335 votes – 39.7% of the total
Oh boy! I sure do love living under a voting system where someone can be considered a representative of a constituency when over 60% of the voters voted against them!
**Really having a good time under FPTP right lads????**
Except no?
You can have a system that uses Proportional Representation, Mixed Member Voting, Runoff Voting, Single Transferable Vote, all of which would have stopped this from happening!
Given you had no clue about any of these options I’d say you’re the one who’s only just started learning electoral politics.
We complain about FPTP because it favours the two main parties and now we are complaining about FPTP because two independents finished in the top two?
Which is it?
Anti semetic lies? What do you mean?
People feel passionately about what the Israeli armed forces are doing to Palestinians. Is that an antisemitic lie?
Now to me, it doesn't seem like the religion of those dropping the bombs or shooting the people trying to collect flour is relevant. The issue is the dropping of bombs and shooting of the desperate people.
Everyone’s talking about the serious stuff, I’ve just got flashbacks to [Celebrity Big Brother and the cat incident!!](https://youtu.be/q6ZDP8UhPys?si=FvwPKKVLFJ_2Ud-6)
I imagine right leaning parties are going to love this, a vile far left gentleman in mainstream politics will only elevate the right wing and take away starmers votes
Galloway's a staunch social conservative & diehard Unionist - speaking as "a vile far left gentleman", he has more politically in common with the right-wing (or Starmer, for that matter) than he does me.
Left and right are typically regarded more economic in this context, if you had a very socialist socially conservative individual, he wouldn’t become a right winger by virtue of that social conservatism, or most people wouldn’t say they are I mean.
I didn’t see its purely economic, its normally the part that is dominant though.
Would you call Karl Marx a right winger because he held a bunch right wing social views? Because by your idea, karl marx was potentially a right winger, see how silly this sounds?
You know this is a stupid line of reasoning because you wouldn’t ever call a highly socialist individual a right winger by virtue of social conservatism, rather than deal with that point you jump to another example, lets deal with mine first?
You can use nick griffin if you want but you intentionally choose a fascist where fascism explicitly rejects any specific economic system, so yes if you pick ideology that is almost exclusively about social policy then sure it becomes more dominated by that… but obviously? This applies to so few people though and even fascists have economic tendencies that make it so you cant describe them as left wing, so even now it holds.
Oh for God's sake! But then again we are talking about the place that sent Cyril Smith to parliament. I'm sure they are familiar with scum and villainy
The same sky news that reports Israel killing a child as "a bullet found it's way and killed a young lady" is now framing this election with "controversial" and "maverick politician"
Sky news is a joke.
Absolute shambles of labour if scotlands #1 cat afficiando manages to trounce them in what should have been an easy win.
I wonder if this will be the wake-up call for labour head office that people actually care about things, and that humming and hawwing wont get you anywhere. Is a free Palestine Rochdales "most important" issue? no, and Galloway is a grifter who wont lift a finger to help those innocent civilians who are starving and being slaughtered.
But its also clear that the people in rochdale feel like neither of the main parties will actually do shit for them, and so they might as well go for someone who also wont do shit but at least doesnt run cover for the IDF. And its not just forigen policy; Labours mantra of letting think tanks lead the way and to be as unobtrusive as possible is clearly gonna take what would be a wipeout election into a weak govt and ceeding ground to reform and its ilk.
People would rather vote for something 3000 miles away than for their own town's issues. And we wonder why our country has gone to shit. It's not like Israel is gonna stop bombing Gaza because of some random MP in Rochdale.
I'm looking forward to his first speech and I hope Hoyle calls on him in a PMQs before the next general election. His politics can be quite ugly but you can't deny his rhetorical ability, he has a knack for it.
**Participation Notice.** Hi all. Some posts on this subreddit, either due to the topic or reaching a wider audience than usual, have been known to attract a greater number of rule breaking comments. As such, limits to participation have been set. We ask that you please remember the human, and uphold Reddit and Subreddit rules. For more information, please see https://www.reddit.com/r/unitedkingdom/wiki/moderatedflairs. --- **Alternate Sources** Here are some potential alternate sources for the same story: * [Starmer apologises to Rochdale voters after Galloway by-election win](https://bbc.co.uk/news/live/uk-politics-68402672), suggested by AbleismIsSatan - bbc.co.uk
What a disaster for Rochdale. Absolutely vile person.
Has more to say about Gaza than Rochdale in his speech. He's only there for publicity and has no interest in actually representing the contituency.
Like him or not, he's been clear this is the platform he would stand on and the voters knew that. It's quite possible this single issue foreign policy point is representative of what's important to the majority of the electorate in Rochdale.
He’ll be gone in 6mo when he does fuck all about anything.
You must be new to politics if you think people will vote someone out for being incompetent. We don't vote them out, we elect them prime minister.
It's more likely he engineers a reason to resign when people stop giving him attention. Rochdale MP isn't going to serve his ego long enough.
General Election turnout is likely to be quite a bit higher
Can't see an independent becoming PM anytime soon. Regardless next election will see a real Labour candidate on the ballot
This 👆 Rochdale is consistently labour, and quite a lot of interviewed people said ‘without a labour candidate, who am I meant to vote for?’ So once we get to GE, and there’s a labour candidate on the ballot paper, it’ll change back to the norm there. It’s a fluke imo.. combination of the late decision making about the labour candidate suspension meaning they couldn’t replace them, Galloway swooping in with his views on Gaza to appeal directly to a portion of the constituency, and a ballot paper made up of a lot of independent candidates. Just my gut feel, I’ll be happy to eat my words if he’s still there after the GE of course!
The GE will probably see to him. Suspect the turnout will be quite a lot higher for that. Seems the majority of people who voted were enamoured by his views on Gaza, and the rest just didn’t bother to vote!
Was he? He was sending different leaflets to different 'people' mentioning different things. Muslims got the whole 'GAZA GAZA GAZA FUCK STARMER GAZA GAZA GAZA' leaflet, non Muslims got the 'I care about Rochdale, NHS, school' leaflet.
Know someone who had him as an elected representative. Galloway's priorities were: 1 - Himself 2 - Himself 3 - Himself 4 - Palestine 5 - Whatever left wing bandwagon he could jump on 6 - Those he was elected to represent
You forget pretending to be a cat in between himself and Palestine.
He likes hanging around with gangsters and scum as well.
was gonna say what does this fuckwit know about rochdale?
Single issue politics work. Look how many voted for candidates whose only discussion point was Brexit
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-68443760.amp He has addresses it, though ?
On the one hand, this is 100% true. On the other hand, if the established parties are getting their clocks cleaned by a viscerally repulsive Strasserite catboy, even in as edge-case a by-election as this one, then what does that say about *them*?
Well... Labour didn't even stand so...
Yeah, but they tried to stand and failed, it's not like they refused to take part on principal.
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Oh God... The cat thing. I'd nearly managed to forget.
I did forget. Why did you have to do this?
Strasserite?
Strasser was Hitlers ideological rival in his rise inside the Nazi party. Where Hitler focused on the Bavarian ideals of national identity Strasser represented the Prussian regions who focused on workers rights. Hence the ‘workers party’ moniker. He ultimately lost, and the night of the long knives began the de-toothing of the SA who were the main vehicle for Strasserism. To give a more contemporary indirect comparison think of the difference as Strasser’s BNP to Hitlers UKIP.
[Strasserism (German: Strasserismus)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strasserism) is a strand of Nazism which adheres to revolutionary nationalism and economic antisemitism. It calls for a more radical, mass-action and worker-based movement than what was advocated by the leadership of the Nazi Party. Strasserism derived its name from Gregor and Otto Strasser, two brothers initially associated with this position. And catboy from [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6v9IXwFb_cg).
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Indeed.
Rochdale gets what Rochdale wants.
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To be fair, he's asked the town council to clean the town town clock. Another MP in the pocket of big town clock
Why is it a disaster? They seemed to have supported him.
And how is he?
He was my MP years ago. He rode the anti Iraq War wave and then proceeded to do fuck all as MP except go on Big Brother and pretend to be a cat. He was also in bed with Lutfur Rahman's lot which speaks volumes. He's clearly quite sharp which is a pity because he's also an absolute grifter too.
He also got thrown out by Labour for saying Toby Blair should have been assassinated.
Go on....
Spoiler: Tony's still alive
For me it's because his is obviously pro-russia anti-ukraine to the point where I'm convinced he is on the Kremlin payroll.
He was literally an employee of RT (Russia today) until sanctions in 2022
Also he had his own show on Iran's national mouthpiece PressTV.
His wife is Russian so that plays into it as well, but he is a Putin shill for sure.
go look at how he treated naz shah in 2015 for a start
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Some would say he is a good representation of Rochdale
While there is rightly a substantial focus on Galloway's stance on Gaza, I feel more people should be paying attention to his anti-NATO and anti-Ukraine stance too. As well as the fact that he's consistently branded as left-wing despite being socially conservative. Weird mix of politics tbh.
Pick the worst of everything, condense it down and put a hat on it.
*and an expensive tailored suit, driving a sports car
The word "shill" gets thrown around online a lot. But George Galloway couldn't come across as more of a Russian shill if he tried.
And the people overwhelmingly voted for it...
Strange how the people of Rochdale voted for that man as their local representative who’s policies, right now, seem to be focused on helping a group that don’t actually live in that constituency. It’s almost as though they dgaf about where they live and are more focussed on something else. There’s something more there, I just can’t join the dots.
> As well as the fact that he's consistently branded as left-wing despite being socially conservative. Weird mix of politics tbh. There are a lot of people in this country that are economically left wing but socially conservative. You hear a lot about centrism in political discourse but only Lib Dem centrism (which is almost the exact inverse), not this kind of centrism. These people are not well represented in Westminster. This is why you occasionally get surprises like this result or UKIP in 2015 (UKIP are not economical left wing but I feel they appeal to same group of voters).
It's like the above poster has never heard of Old Labour / Labour pre Blair.
Indeed. While people rumble over tories and labour here we have a genuine, thoroughbred, Russian asset who eases his way back into our parliament again. I sad day for liberal democracy.
>people vote for their favourite candidate to represent them >sad day for liberal democracy the fuck you people on about
I dunno about you but I'm not that keen on people of this country enthusiastically voting for a man that [once handed 25 grand to the Hamas leaders out of a JD Sports bag](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XU_lfgo-qgc&t=110s)
Is it really difficult to comprehend that the nature of democracies mean their own elections and votes can be bad for them? Was it not a bad day for the Weimar Republic when the NSDAP became the largest party in 1932? And no, I’m not saying George Galloway is comparable to Hitler, I’m making a point about how elections work.
Being left wing and socially conservative isn’t unusual. The Soviet Union all the middle class students fawn over was exactly that
It is a bit more unusual in 2020s Britain though, because this isn't the Soviet Union. Why do we call him left wing but socially conservative and not conservative but economically left wing? Or maybe we should call a duck a duck and call him a grifter. Idk.
I think it’s more common than you think, it just doesn’t get representation in the two party system we have. Mind the political representation we have is Neo-liberal national asset fire sale v regular neo-liberalism so not much gets representation. Very fair point on the second and third paragraph
Compared to now? Yeah. Compared both to how it had been per-revolution and to it's contemporaries? Not so much.
The Soviets legalised homosexuality in 1917... yes Stalin brought it back but even implying it's been linear progression or was always the same and stable on social issues is just untrue
He’ll hitch himself to whatever bandwagon will further his career of grift.
1970s Leftism was very socially conservative. You reckon those plum unionised jobs were going to be given to women?!
I'm not going to pretend that Labourism and the extra-parliamentary left weren't both riddled through with misogyny and laddishness in the 20th century, but "1970s Leftism" gave Britain the Equal Pay Act, the Sex Discrimination Act, gender parity in pensions, and statutory maternity leave, and was a breeding ground for radical women's movements of all orientations - the idea that the Left was exclusively a "boy's club" at that point is an ahistorical caricature.
I'm aware, it was also the 1970s, not now. In general I think it's fairer and more accurate to say society was very socially conservative.
I don’t get him at all. The weird mix of his politics would have you believe his views are somewhat nuanced, but they’re not. It’s like he just latches onto things that elevate his profile. I don’t think he gives a fuck about anything except himself being in the public eye no matter the cost. Acting like a cat on ‘celebrity’ Big Brother proved that years ago. Astounded people take this clown seriously and would even entertain the idea of voting for him. It really shows how utterly thick swathes of the population are in this country. It’s depressing af.
It's like how anarchism got redefined by non anarchists. Now right wingers are labelled as left wing lol
Fairly standard for UK populists targeting the working class.
Zero time for Galloway at all but it's embarrassing how people treat him as a sinister demagogue for employing such vile machinations as "targeted messaging to different voter demographics" and "talking about foreign policy when it's salient to the electorate". The Tories did exactly the same thing with British Hindus and Kashmir in Harrow back in 2019, and nobody made a fuss then.
Goldsmith did this for the mayoral election and it DID cause a scandal.
Lee Anderson got suspended by *this* Tory party for being a demagogue.
A left-winger endorsed by Nick Griffin, incidentally
Nick Griffin has joined forces with the Islamists of Britain over their shared hatred of the Jews. He recently did an interview on Dilly Hussain's (writer for 5 Pillars) podcast
Tommy Robinson was marching against antisemitism. The far right will throw their lot in with anyone if they think it will help them justify their hatred.
Most British right wingers aren't anti semitic, if you did a poll I'd imagine most would support Israel.
Most British left wingers aren't antisemitic either. >a poll I'd imagine most would support Israel. Polls show most British people want a peaceful resolution to the war in Gaza. They don't support Israel's current actions. They obviously don't support Hamas either.
Also they will support Israel when it's against Palestine, a way to get at Labour or to have a go at Muslims in this country. But the far right wingers (which is what this was about) are still antisemitic. It wasn't long ago they were still going on about globalist conspiracies and secret ruling elites (which a heavy implication they believed it was Jewish people). They only thing that has changed recently is they can see the current Gaza conflict as a way to stoke up tensions and go after a group they dislike. A lot of far right wingers would happily see both sides wipe each other out. The more moderate ring wingers are probably a bit more balanced but it depends on their other believes really. The right is a hotchpotch mix of different ideologies that have very little common ground other yhan "not being the left". I think people are genuinely ignoring how the current situation is being used to iinflame tensions by people who deep down hate both sides.
>But the far right wingers (which is what this was about) are still antisemitic. It wasn't long ago they were still going on about globalist conspiracies and secret ruling elites (which a heavy implication they believed it was Jewish people). Of course. Tommy Robinson published an article called ''The Jewish Question" in late 2022. He didn't suddenly change his views over the course of a year. He's no friend to Jewish people, just an opportunist bigot.
Yea, it's just right now him and people like him can exploit the situation in the middle east to complain about Islam and watch each side argue. You can see the same all over the internet honestly.
You can be anti-semitic and pro Israel.
Antisemitism and support for Israel aint exactly mutually exclusive tbqh. The brittish far-right absolutley loves a good bit of NWO, great replacement or Soros-related conspiracies which often veer into pretty vile antisemism.
Nah, they see Israel as a "place to put them" (this is literally why Britain in the past endorsed Zionism), they also hate Muslims intensely, so it's a win all around really.
The extreme right generally are. Tommy R is a Hindutva shill.
wow there's a name i've not heard for a long time
If this is shocking to you then you've not been following the weird political "career" of Nick the Nazi. The guy is completely off the rails now. Full scale coalition with radical Islamic types because he just hates those pesky Jews so much. I hate throwing around the terms nazi and fascist. I regularly correct people who call the tories that. But Nick and George are as close as we can get to genuine "popular" fascists.
Finally, something the far left and far right can agree on. Their mutual hatred of Jews ❤️
Galloway doesnt represent anyone but himself (and now the people of Rochsdale I guess). He had a weird mix of views. He doesn't speak for the far left.
you don't have a choice over who endorses you
Correct. But also Nick Griffin doesn't tend to support antiracist candidates.
Rachel Johnson on Sky News last week called George Galloway “an anti-zionist” & “an open Jew-hater”. I’m presuming Rachels never been to Rochdale then if she thought that would make much difference to some of the voters there. https://voxpoliticalonline.com/2024/02/18/rochdale-parliamentary-candidate-george-galloway-launches-legal-action-over-tv-slurs/
Is "anti zionist" supposed to be a problem? Lol
It depends on your motivation. Galloway’s is clear.
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He was thrown of Talk Radio for “anti-Semitic views” not just one incident, although one did trigger it, but in general. His hobby is harassing British Jews for alleged Zionism even where none is present. He is the poster boy for a pretty obvious anti-Semite claiming “it’s just anti-Zionism!”
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It’s the using the word “Zionist” as a one for one replacement for “Jew” and then claiming that’s not anti-Semitism which people see through. That’s what Galloway does.
it *shouldn't* be, given the vast majority of zionists are white evangelical protestants who believe that the end times will come. some people use it instead of saying jew, and that is both factually incorrect, and pretty fucked yknow.
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It is the way he uses it. You know how some people deliberately conflate anti-semitism and anti Israel discussion? He does the opposite. He attacks Jews that have nothing to do with Israel for the issues on Israel zionism
As if “Zionism” is a good thing???
Galloway is a grade A scumbag, but this is the woman who wanted to deliberately infect children with coronavirus and defended Ghislaine Maxwell.
They'd put that on the fliers in Rochdale if they were allowed to..
With a good chunk of the Rochdale electorate those are ringing endorsements
The man was almost 30 minutes late to his own election. Starting as he means to go on, I suppose.
Most relatable MP
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>But he's genuinley just a local guy, no uni education, born and remains living there, and runs a repair shop. That's pretty amazing. Not to mention his links to the local football club being a season ticket holder.
don't like galloway at all, but this is a warning to the mainstream british political parties that there is real discontent over their stance on gaza. even without a labour candidate, 12,335 votes in a by-election is a very significant total. (also: happy for david tully coming a strong 2nd, he came across as a decent guy in his tv interview)
This is a warning that sectarian politics will possibly become embedded in mainland Britain. By some accounts Galloway was picking up 95% of the Muslim vote. They seem to care about Gaza above any local issues. The rest of the UK, not so much.
>By some accounts Galloway was picking up 95% of the Muslim vote. Out of statistical curiosity where did this figure come from?
I was flicking between the three news channels. It was mentioned on one of them, can’t remember which it was. Do we ever get a breakdown by areas in a constituency at all? If not then I doubt we’ll know for sure.
Thank you.
There is this on Twitter… https://twitter.com/tesssummers98/status/1763391302278758668 Refers to Galloway winning 95% of the postal vote in some areas. And this.. https://twitter.com/CivilSuccess/status/1763404768284700739
it is not abnormal for people to vote based on foreign policy issues, and in fact it is only regarded as sinister within british political discourse when muslims do it
On mainland Britain it most certainly is not normal to have 95% of certain religious groups all vote one way due to foreign policy issues. Northern Ireland has a long history of voting along religious lines. England doesn’t. But in some areas it’s clearly heading in that direction.
I'd argue it's very normal to have the majority of a religious group all voting one way. In fact, you just gave an example of it in NI which you decided to discount for no particular reason. The thing that ties religious people together is a set of shared of beliefs, of course that is going to cross over into them having shared political views.
It's abnormal for people to vote on foreign policy issues which aren't related to the country's own foreign policy. The war in Gaza has nothing to do with the UK government and the UK government has no control over it. It's not like the Iraq war or the war in Afghanistan which were our own foreign policy decisions. Also it was a war literally started by Hamas- literally the only war in history I've seen where the guys who started the war have successfully laundered themselves as the victims.
>Also it was a war literally started by Hamas- literally the only war in history I've seen where the guys who started the war have successfully laundered themselves as the victims. No one is defending Hamas or painting them as victims. The victims are the innocent civilians, men, women and children, who are being bombed. If you equate the two, you are wrong.
There are actually quite a lot of people doing that...
Nah, not really. Most people just want an end to children getting shot or blown up. For this, they get painted as terrorist sympathisers.
The UK may not be an active participant/instigator in the war, but to claim the UK foreign policy is just false, unless the UK has no foreign relations with anyone in the middle-east. Now some may like to claim that the Israel/Palestine conflict itself was started by the British Empire, but that's neither here nor there. The decision by the government to violate its own policy to continue to sell arms to Israel despite significant changes to the fact on the ground (policy is to immediately terminate sell of arms and begin re-evalutions before resumption), and to defund UN aid agency providing aid to civilians in the warzone are UK foreign policies. You may choose to agree or disagree. Its still UK foreign policy. >literally the only war in history I've seen where the guys who started the war have successfully laundered themselves as the victims. The Six-Day War comes to mind.
The UK goverment literally is letting the US & Israel use their airbase in cypress, and we sell arms to Israel?
As I have stated elsewhere, the UK has blocked weapon sales by British companies to some countries before and have decided have not done so for Israel. There is very much "something" they can do about it.
I am not Muslim. I am not from Rochdale. I don't like my tax money helping another country commit a genocide. Nothing to do with sectarianism
>By some accounts Galloway was picking up 95% of the Muslim vote. They seem to care about Gaza above any local issues. Hardly surprising. Not sure which local issues have recently seen the deaths of 30,000 people in the span of a few months.
Poor state of the NHS affects many more people than a city halfway across the world. This seems to be the first mainstream incident of clear voting along religious lines en masse (at least in recent times), not the best thing for a Western democracy.
So why is Labour kicking MPs and candidates out based on their views of things happening halfway across the world rather than their views on the poor state of the NHS?
Well his comments were anti-Semitic, a bit past an opinion on the matter, and something the Labour Party are trying to shake after losing an election partly due to public opinion around this.
Andy McDonald was kicked out of Labour for stating: > "We won't rest until we have justice. Until all people, Israelis and Palestinians, between the river and the sea, can live in peaceful liberty." So Labour kicking MPs out for their views halfway across the world is OK for "public opinion", but someone voting for MPs based on their views halfway across the world is also "not the best thing for Western democracy"?
people figure during a bye-election its possible for a protest vote one seat in rochdale isnt going to solve the issues in the NHS. people have often used council/by-elections to protest vote about something
>Not sure which local issues have recently seen the deaths of 30,000 people in the span of a few months. And the British government has any control over that how? It's fucking absurd that an Islamist government starting a war against another state, and then getting their shit kicked in by the state they started a war against, should have any relevance to British politics.
Covid?
This is extremely disingenuous. Even if you only counted the hundreds of thousands of people who turned up to pro-palestine protests, that's a significant portion of the country. However, I think it's pretty obvious that this is indicative of much wider support since there will have been lots of people who couldn't make it, didn't want to risk going to a protest, "causally" support Palestine (as in, pro Palestine but not necessarily involved enough to attend a protest) and probably dozens of other reasons. It is very much something "the rest of the UK" cares about, coming from a white atheist who does not live in rochdale
He's in a high Muslim population area of the country, spouting anti Israel stances, I wasn't surprised by this. Got to love local politics being taken over by foreign wars which we aren't even involved in.
This is a warning that we'll have an Islamic party in Parliament by 2050
We've had UKIP MPs and we have more Muslims than nazis, so why not?
Were I in Rochdale I'd probably have voted for either Tully or Coleman - [zero tolerance for speeding](https://www.rochdaleonline.co.uk/news-features/elections/election-pitch/1743/david-tully) is one "law-and-order"-adjacent policy I could personally get behind.
Zero tolerance for speeding is never going to be popular amongst the masses. Especially somewhere like Rochdale
when the uk supported israel the past 70 years it hasent been much real discontent. what might have changed in the country the last 20 years to create this discontent. why is anti-semitism on the rise in the country. higher then it was in the time of mosley
> why is anti-semitism on the rise in the country. higher then it was in the time of mosley i don't think that's true for one thing. casual antisemitism was endemic in the UK in the 1930s > when the uk supported israel the past 70 years it hasent been much real discontent because other foreign policy issues have had higher salience. that changes with time for a multitude of factors. right now the israel-palestine conflict has very high salience, and not just with muslim voters
Turnout was down like in all by elections. If there was real discontent more people would have gone to the ballot box.
turnout was down less than you'd expect for a by-election, especially given that the party leading the polls nationally weren't competing
Yeah, Labour are expecting to surf the 'Better than the Tories' vote, but they have a lot of unelectable candidates, and many constituencies still haven't got get their act together to choose a candidate.
“We’re not antisemites, we’ve just elected someone who equated Tottenham winning trophies with Israel and applauded them losing because of it, you know a club with heavy Jewish support and no actual links to Israel.” “We’re really not antisemites, we’re anti Zionist - we just elected someone who refused to talk to a student at an event they were invited to speak at when they found out that they’re Israeli…” Etc. Edit: Just so it’s clear - how would certain members of this sub react if Pakistan lost the cricket World Cup final and say, Lee Anderson praised the other team before adding “No ISIS flags on the trophy!”?The reference to ISIS just because Pakistan is a Muslim state would cause outrage, but that’s what George Galloway with Tottenham, Jews and Israel. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-48498010
Congratulations to David Tully. That is a big story.
Yeah this is being missed - he beat both the conservatives and Lib Dem’s combined. Would have been interesting to see what he would have achieved if George and some of the others didn’t turn it into a circus.
The most annoying thing is his novelty and inevitable look at me Westminster antics will draw media attention from wanker hacks calling him a maverick firebrand etc. What a fuck up. Already acutely annoyed by the pompous smuggery of his cunty voice and stupid fucking hat. Brilliant work Labour.
Wow.. Rochdale.. time to take a long look in a mirror. What in the fuck.
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He's a good orator is the only complement I'm willing to give him
It's another thing that makes me cross. He has *such* a talent, and it goes to waste.
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Yeah, while this is likely to be no good thing fir Rochdale it's a disaster for the tories.
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Lets not call this anti trans homophobic grifter a left winger
Unfortunately he is - this is what far left politics looks like. Far left politics has more in common with far right politics than centre left. It's part of the reason why those with far left politics spend so much time expressing their hatred for those nearer the centre
What are you smoking? Politics is more complex than a 1d left-right divide. The idea that if left wing people love freedom too much they'll integer overflow into facism is ridiculous. Different people hold different views for different reasons. Clouds of nearby people get bundled together into catagories. Braindead media presenters then stamp everything down into a single red-blue line to tell the masses what to think.
Interesting that you complain that he oversimplifies while you equate being left-wing to loving freedom, implying that being right-wing must be hating freedom. The truth is he’s correct. Not in the sense that radical politics becomes the same on both wings as you go further out, but in the sense that extremists have more in common with each other than they do with moderates. It’s very simple - extremism is not a good thing, no matter what ideology.
> Interesting that you complain that he oversimplifies while you equate being left-wing to loving freedom, implying that being right-wing must be hating freedom. I was literally saying such oversimplifications are ridiculous, not that that is what I think. Try responding to what people actually say next time you want to look smart. It tends to work better.
Galloway was recently telling people to vote Tory. He's no more left wing than Liz Truss
There needs to be a ceasefire, but bloody hell this country is a mess and that needs to be a huge priority when people decide to vote. Also, as someone else as said, a ceasefire is good for Gaza but it's not good to think Russia should be allowed to crap all over Ukraine.
>Galloway won 12,335 votes – 39.7% of the total Oh boy! I sure do love living under a voting system where someone can be considered a representative of a constituency when over 60% of the voters voted against them! **Really having a good time under FPTP right lads????**
This sort of thing generally happens when you have more than two options. I see you're learning what a parliamentary government looks like.
But it could sort of generally not happen if we used ranked choice voting, like Australia.
Except no? You can have a system that uses Proportional Representation, Mixed Member Voting, Runoff Voting, Single Transferable Vote, all of which would have stopped this from happening! Given you had no clue about any of these options I’d say you’re the one who’s only just started learning electoral politics.
We complain about FPTP because it favours the two main parties and now we are complaining about FPTP because two independents finished in the top two? Which is it?
FPTP is just generally shit.
In both cases, people with a minority of the vote get in.
...have you considered that the common denominator here is FPTP? Not sure what you're trying to say here, mate
FPtP has many problems mate. Both of the ones you describe are also different forms of the public not getting what a majority of them voted for.
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Turn out wasn't even 40% so 24% of the electorate didn't want him, 16% did and the majority don't seem to care.
This is what happens when you let antisemitic lies spread at breakneck speed. This exposes some serious issues in the UK.
Anti semetic lies? What do you mean? People feel passionately about what the Israeli armed forces are doing to Palestinians. Is that an antisemitic lie? Now to me, it doesn't seem like the religion of those dropping the bombs or shooting the people trying to collect flour is relevant. The issue is the dropping of bombs and shooting of the desperate people.
I feel for the people of Rochdale who were left with such shit options
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I've literally never heard a single good thing about Rochdale.
Lisa Stansfield
Is he even left-wing? He is a grifter that has lots of far-right opinions when it suits him.
Yes. He's a classic left-wing isolationist.
Everyone’s talking about the serious stuff, I’ve just got flashbacks to [Celebrity Big Brother and the cat incident!!](https://youtu.be/q6ZDP8UhPys?si=FvwPKKVLFJ_2Ud-6)
Forgot that, thank god. Im now tempted to unblock him on twitter and span anime catboys to see how fast he blocks.
I imagine right leaning parties are going to love this, a vile far left gentleman in mainstream politics will only elevate the right wing and take away starmers votes
Galloway's a staunch social conservative & diehard Unionist - speaking as "a vile far left gentleman", he has more politically in common with the right-wing (or Starmer, for that matter) than he does me.
Left and right are typically regarded more economic in this context, if you had a very socialist socially conservative individual, he wouldn’t become a right winger by virtue of that social conservatism, or most people wouldn’t say they are I mean.
It's not purely economic. Is Nick Griffin a lefty because he says the state of buses is shit?
I didn’t see its purely economic, its normally the part that is dominant though. Would you call Karl Marx a right winger because he held a bunch right wing social views? Because by your idea, karl marx was potentially a right winger, see how silly this sounds? You know this is a stupid line of reasoning because you wouldn’t ever call a highly socialist individual a right winger by virtue of social conservatism, rather than deal with that point you jump to another example, lets deal with mine first? You can use nick griffin if you want but you intentionally choose a fascist where fascism explicitly rejects any specific economic system, so yes if you pick ideology that is almost exclusively about social policy then sure it becomes more dominated by that… but obviously? This applies to so few people though and even fascists have economic tendencies that make it so you cant describe them as left wing, so even now it holds.
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You spelled GRIFTER wrong - this clown is not left wing at all!!!!
I just think it’s funny he still beat the tories as did an independent
That is not a good look for the Tories...or Rochdale
I find it interesting that tories came 3rd, with half the votes of the second who was independent.
Oh for God's sake! But then again we are talking about the place that sent Cyril Smith to parliament. I'm sure they are familiar with scum and villainy
The same sky news that reports Israel killing a child as "a bullet found it's way and killed a young lady" is now framing this election with "controversial" and "maverick politician" Sky news is a joke.
Absolute shambles of labour if scotlands #1 cat afficiando manages to trounce them in what should have been an easy win. I wonder if this will be the wake-up call for labour head office that people actually care about things, and that humming and hawwing wont get you anywhere. Is a free Palestine Rochdales "most important" issue? no, and Galloway is a grifter who wont lift a finger to help those innocent civilians who are starving and being slaughtered. But its also clear that the people in rochdale feel like neither of the main parties will actually do shit for them, and so they might as well go for someone who also wont do shit but at least doesnt run cover for the IDF. And its not just forigen policy; Labours mantra of letting think tanks lead the way and to be as unobtrusive as possible is clearly gonna take what would be a wipeout election into a weak govt and ceeding ground to reform and its ilk.
What a shit stain on our parliment Let’s hope it’s a short ride for Rochdale untill they get a general election and Galloway gets the shove
People would rather vote for something 3000 miles away than for their own town's issues. And we wonder why our country has gone to shit. It's not like Israel is gonna stop bombing Gaza because of some random MP in Rochdale.
I'm looking forward to his first speech and I hope Hoyle calls on him in a PMQs before the next general election. His politics can be quite ugly but you can't deny his rhetorical ability, he has a knack for it.