Ex-Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn said Tuesday he has been reinstated to the U.K. opposition party after a three-week suspension — a decision that touched off fury from Jewish leaders angry about anti-Semitism in Labour that flourished during his tenure.
Corbyn was suspended after he said the problem of anti-Semitism in the party had been “dramatically overstated” for political reasons. His comment followed a scathing report from the U.K. equalities watchdog, which found “significant failings” and a “lack of leadership” in how the left-of-center party handled allegations of anti-Semitism among its members.
A three-week vacation after Corbyn basically spent years either closing his eyes to anti-Semitism (best case) or egging it on (worst case)? That's a slap on the wrist, if even that severe.
Basicaly, Corbyn has retracted nothing, apologized for nothing. He's only saying that he was misunderstood, the poor baby.
Between Corbyn and Mini-Trump, there's not very much to like about UK politics.
I would disagree on the not much to like. A viable, truly multiparty system, featuring a need to often genuinely grow consensus to pass legislation, and to govern, would be a huge improvement over our current system, which effectively works like railway tracks. Granted, Boris is a clown and Jeremy is an antisemite, but you also have interesting bit players like Nicola Sturgeon (Scottish Nationalist Party), who has to navigate keeping the independence minded supporters in line to support a party who effectively is not totally sold on independence. Then you get the bonus of bit players like the DUP (Democratic Unionist Party), run by Arlene Foster (who held the Conservatives hostage for a while) and their buddies, Sinn Féin.
ReplyDeleteThe inherent problem in the U.K. is, like in the U.S., a first past the poll voting system. In areas where proportional voting has been introduced for lower level legislative bodies, there is a developing, vibrant fully multiparty ecosystem. Hopefully, Maine’s use of ranked voting will expand across the U.S., and this allow a more nuanced selection of parties and coalitions to take hold...hopefully without full-scale Italian theatrics!
P.S. We could do a lot worse than adopting the neutral Speaker role too...especially if it would generate characters like John Bercow, who make politics much more tolerable and, perhaps, pick the overinflated egos of some of the elected idiots.