Russell Brand summed up nicely.....

[Loz]

Surely the obvious reasoning is that since immigrants are less likely to vote UKIP, areas with higher immigrant percentages are also less likely to vote UKIP?

[Blah Blah]

That's a very good point too Loz.

[JohnL]

I think if you focus on inequality these days you are seen as someone focusing

on an argument lost in the 1970s, unfortunately.

The big arguments have all passed by - and won't come back for a while yet - until

then every politician is more or less the same.

Blah Blah Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> I think Brand did ok on Question Time Holloway. He

> tried to keep the focus on the inequality of the

> ecomony (and rightly so), whilst others wanted to

> distract with immigration draining resources being

> the reason there's no money to go around ordinary

> people. He is a lone voice though in that repsect.

> No major party is giving any policy designed to

> get employment and wages up. They may flirt with

> it, as Miliband has done in recent days, but

> there's no mention of how it's going to be

> achieved.

[david_carnell]

Loz Wrote:

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> Surely the obvious reasoning is that since

> immigrants are less likely to vote UKIP, areas

> with higher immigrant percentages are also less

> likely to vote UKIP?

I had wondered that but the numbers of actual migrants is still so small as to not affect voting patterns that highly I would have thought.

Also, I wonder what "immigrant" is qualified as. For instance, Peckham might be home to a majority non-white population but they might not be counted as immigrants if they are second or third generation.

[adonirum]

david_carnell Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Fear of the unknown too? Whereas those areas who

> live among high levels of immigrants realise

> there's nothing to worry about?

>

> That and people in Norfolk and Lincolnshire are

> inbred half-wits.

Have you been to Norfolk and Lincolnshire recently,DC,cos your statement is entirely aposite!!!!

Don't forget the webbed feet as well!!!!

[miga]

.

[miga]

.

[Otta]

I thought RB had a real opportunity to argue Farrage down last night, and he threw it away with his over simplified preachy shite. Even if he did make some good points.

[miga]

.

[Jah Lush]

I thought he was out of his depth and once things got under way he knew it too. All he could offer was a couple of popularist platitudes and that was it. I thought the two woman sat either side of Brand came over best.

[????]

Yup. Because he hasn't any depth and there is no substance. It's all very adolescent no solution "Occupy" type crap...

[miga]

.

[Jeremy]

JL/?? - absolutely, he was out of his depth. Farage is a politician, an accomplished debater. Brand is a comedian. Wrong man for the job.

[right-clicking]

I suspect RB sources his material from the opinions, thoughts and beliefs of others, cherry-picking and indulging in plagiarism. Personally I do not have much time for the man and frankly he gets up my nose, His 2nd hand views are pertinent, and need however obnoxious, a character to appeal to an audience that would have not been otherwise exposed to the ideology and and facts that surround the multitude of "HIS" concerns.

I rather enjoyed when the large man in the audience berated him on his lack of gumption to stand for election!

His weak response was par for the course and exposed his lack of contents in both his thought processes and contents of his man sacks!!

[????]

I admire him for creating that " I am the altenative voice" platform to some degree (even though I think it largely driven by his own narcissm) but now he's there he's being found out. I think that huge numbers of 'the left' are crying out for some strong narrative but no-one seems really able to articulate anything. If Russel Brandis the best they've got, gawd help them.

An old, disiilusioned cynic like me just think there's isn't really a strong non-issue based narrative for the left anyway, so people grab at anything in hope, at the moments it's RB, although I sense from Social Media that this has peaked now!

[El Pibe]

until we all left for surrey/devon/sussex/ireland, east dulwich was full of immigrants ;)

[steveo]

With a bit of light bumping you could get the top four threads Quids

[El Pibe]

to be fair, pretty much every narrative available amounts to fiddling while climatic rome burns ;)

[Loz]

david_carnell Wrote:

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> Also, I wonder what "immigrant" is qualified as. For instance, Peckham might be home to a majority

> non-white population but they might not be counted as immigrants if they are second or third generation.

'Immigrant' should be just that - on who has immigrated. Second or third generation are not immigrants, they are Brits.

'Immigrant' is not analogous to 'non-white' anyway. Although I am mixed-race, I look (and mostly identify as) white and I'm an immigrant. And where I live there are quite a few immigrant Poles.

[Blah Blah]

Owen Jones is the person to do that ????. But at a People's Assembly rally in the summer in Paliament Square, it was Russell Brand, who said nothing of any use on the stage, who made the press coverage (what little there was of it), not the brilliant speech by Owen Jones and others. That's for me where RB does more harm than good.

To say there isn't an issue based narrative for the left isn't true. Corporations make increased porfits year on year while the value of wages they pay goes down. Ken Loach gave a great speech recently in which he said that most ordinary people just want an education, a job, healthcare and a pension. He is right, that hasn't changed at all. But corporations, banks etc don't care if you have any of that. That's a huge problem. And where government has failed is in safeguarding a balance in the economy that can deliver those things.

The left would argue for public ownership, where workers are invested in the company they work for. The right argue for unregulated free markets where profit supposedly trickles down to take care of everything. We know that neither models do what they promise. Somewhere in the middle is where we should be (failing a complete change of system and the things we value within it). So there is a role for the left, in reining in the onward march of free market capitalism, just as there always has been.

[david_carnell]

Loz Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> david_carnell Wrote:

> --------------------------------------------------

> -----

>

> > Also, I wonder what "immigrant" is qualified as.

> For instance, Peckham might be home to a majority

> > non-white population but they might not be

> counted as immigrants if they are second or third

> generation.

>

> 'Immigrant' should be just that - on who has

> immigrated. Second or third generation are not

> immigrants, they are Brits.

>

> 'Immigrant' is not analogous to 'non-white'

> anyway. Although I am mixed-race, I look (and

> mostly identify as) white and I'm an immigrant.

> And where I live there are quite a few immigrant

> Poles.

I wasn't really asking - more just wondering what the Telegraph had used for their stats. And also pointing out that "who do immigrants vote for?" is much more complex than "not UKIP".

[El Pibe]

The funny thing is that libdem as aprotest vote may have been undermined by their behaviour in power.

UKIP in power is basically tory max.

If the little folk think westminster doesn't care about them, just wait until that happens.

And watch as each piece of EU legislation protecting the rights of all of us is repealed in favour of big business and screwing the little guy.

Today 0 contract hours, after ukip Workhouses fed by monsanto gruel!!!

As long as farage can keep the debate focussed on the straw man of racism noone will debate what he really wants to do. media campaign is playing into his hands, and as he demonstrated he's nothing if not a shrewd politician.

[????]

Yup Blah - Owen Jones is a good shout, and without the issues which the previous equivalent poster boy, Hariii, had/has.

I still don't agree with much he says/writes though :)

[Otta]

Jah Lush Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> I thought he was out of his depth and once things

> got under way he knew it too. All he could offer

> was a couple of popularist platitudes and that was

> it. I thought the two woman sat either side of

> Brand came over best.

I liked it quite early on when RB started talking over the Tory woman, only for the Labour woman to put him down saying something along the lines of "a lot of women don't like to be shouted down". He was silent for quite a bit after that.

Camilla Cavendish did very well because she times her bits well and came across as the grown up voice of reason. Well played.

[Blah Blah]

I don't always agree with him either ????, but that's not really the point. He raises debate around important issues, that HAVE been swept under the carpet in the leaning towards the economic right. And it's refreshing that he's a relatively young left winger.

Totally agree El Pibe. Farage is not a scoialist in any form. He may pertain to speak for the common man, but he is free market capitalist Tory through and through and cares even less for hard won rights and protections. That he manages to mask all of that either makes him extremely clever (and dangerously so) or those who support him a bit stupid. Careful what you wish for comes to mind on that one.