Greens for TwentyTwenty-A Future Political History Story

[The Bishop]

Jan 8, 2017 15:52:57 GMT carlton43 said:

Jan 8, 2017 6:10:43 GMT john07 said:

The point is that there are next to no 'Blairites', even in the PLP, left to ever seriously be considered to lead the Party. It is about as relevant as talking about 'Gaitkellites'.

How do you feel about Gaitskell John? At this distance and knowing all in between? For me he was an intellectual, very cultivated, well connected, a bit of a ladies man, a bit elitist, a gentleman and even to a young opponent full of rather likeable qualities. I rather saw him as a type of Blair with more depth, more culture, more background but a bit less common touch charisma.

There is little doubt that Gaitskell would have won for Labour in 1964 had he lived, and maybe more comfortably than Wilson did.

In many ways he had the stuff needed to be a very accomplished PM; the big fly in the ointment for me has always been - as a passionate, almost fanatical, Atlanticist would he have done what JHW (to his lasting credit) never did, and taken us into the disaster than was Vietnam??

The s***storm that would have caused - both within Labour and more widely - might have dwarfed even Iraq under Blair.

[john07]

Jan 8, 2017 15:52:57 GMT carlton43 said:

Jan 8, 2017 6:10:43 GMT john07 said:

The point is that there are next to no 'Blairites', even in the PLP, left to ever seriously be considered to lead the Party. It is about as relevant as talking about 'Gaitkellites'.

How do you feel about Gaitskell John? At this distance and knowing all in between? For me he was an intellectual, very cultivated, well connected, a bit of a ladies man, a bit elitist, a gentleman and even to a young opponent full of rather likeable qualities. I rather saw him as a type of Blair with more depth, more culture, more background but a bit less common touch charisma.

There was more substance to Gaitskell than Blair. He was the archetypal Social Democratic Revisionist apart from one area. He was against Britain joining the EEC whereas most of his ideological allies - Crosland, Jenkins, Williams, etc - were very pro-EEC.

He did have a tendency for 'sitting on the fence' in major disputes.

[carlton43]

Thanks chaps. I don't think he would have  permitted us to be sucked into Vietnam but who knows? His predecessors easily got embroiled into Korea and that was hardly different, so you could be right? If so it would have been a considerable disaster unless of course we had won! We had the Malaysian experience and we would have made a real difference.

His anti-EEC stance was of course an attraction to me, as well as his manner, voice and style.

[hedgehog]

greenhert , a huge amount of detail, looking forward to a further installment, some of those seats you mentioned, I can see us potentially winning , the swath of blue that curves through the Marcher counties to the IOW, given the post Brexit collapse that you suggest and potentially harmful countryside policies that the government may bring in.

Some seats you mention are too optimistic even for me though.

Given an absolute majority, for which we may need to see a catastrophe at a French nuclear plant, just as the costs of Hinckley became apparent, a hard line alliance between Theresa May and Donald Trump and mass defections from Labour.

How would you see a Green government trying to pull Britain out of this mess, with a big mandate would you see a far more radical Green agenda likely and how do your think a Green government would go down internationally, many people with vested interests would see a Green Britain as a far more terrifying prospect than a Trump America.

[No Offence Alan]

I don't get this optimism from the Greens.
2 expensive "Green" schemes - Renewable Heat in NI, and Carbon Capture, have been totally discredited recently.

[gwynthegriff]

Jan 22, 2017 22:27:45 GMT hedgehog said:

greenhert , a huge amount of detail, looking forward to a further installment, some of those seats you mentioned, I can see us potentially winning , the swath of blue that curves through the Marcher counties to the IOW, given the post Brexit collapse that you suggest and potentially harmful countryside policies that the government may bring in.

Why would West Mercia and Wessex turn to the Greens rather than the Lib Dems?

[gwynthegriff]

Jan 6, 2017 1:16:15 GMT greenhert said:

The year 2020 AD, in not so Great Britain. These were dark, difficult, and very uncertain times. The economy was in another downward spiral after Britain left the European Union and with it the single market; whatever trade deals they had cobbled together had not gone well. The effects of climate change were becoming more apparent, even in temperate climates like the one Britain was once accustomed to; flooding was frequent rather than exceptional and unseasonal heat waves and air pollution were getting more and more dangerous. The after-effects of unfairly imposed fracking operations were ruining several areas of British countryside, like Sherwood Forest and the Yorkshire Moors.

2020? Don't you mean 2040?

[hedgehog]

Jan 23, 2017 22:11:10 GMT gwynthegriff said:

Jan 22, 2017 22:27:45 GMT hedgehog said:

greenhert , a huge amount of detail, looking forward to a further installment, some of those seats you mentioned, I can see us potentially winning , the swath of blue that curves through the Marcher counties to the IOW, given the post Brexit collapse that you suggest and potentially harmful countryside policies that the government may bring in.

Why would West Mercia and Wessex turn to the Greens rather than the Lib Dems?

Hypothetically both are possible.

[Deleted]

A much more realistic (and in my view much more interesting) fantasy would be to split this over a series of election cycles. Rather than have the Greens miraculously winning in 2020, you could come up with a scenario in which the Greens polled say 10% and, through careful targeting, won a handful of seats. Then the next chapter could focus on council gains in these areas and elsewhere over subsequent years. Then perhaps a handful more parliamentary gains in 2025 in areas that polled well in 2020 and had had council success since. And so on, while considering what kinds of policies and positioning could hypothetically allow this to happen, and who these fantasy future MPs would be, many of whom would likely not be Greens just now.

[greenchristian]

Jan 24, 2017 11:09:15 GMT @benjamin said:

A much more realistic (and in my view much more interesting) fantasy would be to split this over a series of election cycles. Rather than have the Greens miraculously winning in 2020, you could come up with a scenario in which the Greens polled say 10% and, through careful targeting, won a handful of seats. Then the next chapter could focus on council gains in these areas and elsewhere over subsequent years. Then perhaps a handful more parliamentary gains in 2025 in areas that polled well in 2020 and had had council success since. And so on, while considering what kinds of policies and positioning could hypothetically allow this to happen, and who these fantasy future MPs would be, many of whom would likely not be Greens just now.

I've occasionally pondered what kind of historical changes might lead to the Greens being a major political force right now. I suspect the following changes could plausibly have had us be the third party in England by now:

1) Around 1983, a group of Liberals defect to the Ecology party in protest at the Alliance. They teach the party Liberal targeting techniques around two decades earlier than we began learning them in reality.
2) PR is introduced for European Parliament elections two decades early. The Greens win a significant number of seats in 1989, leading to the party being given as much national media attention as the new Liberal Democrat party for the next couple of years.
3) David Icke remains with the party somewhat longer, but doesn't start claiming to be the messiah or start believing in lizard men conspiracy theories. The party therefore has an incredibly talented main spokesperson for that entire period.

The result of these changes would be that the Green 2000 group actually wins the fundi-realo party struggles following the 1989 surge, and is able to use 1989 as a foundation to build on. One very plausible path after that is that there would be a continuing increase in Green councillor numbers for many years, and the party probably wins its first MP in 1997 (after coming a good second in two or three seats in 1992 - though if we were lucky enough to get a sitting MP defect, we might be able to hold their seat in 1992). There is gradual growth through the Blair-Brown years, and when the Lib-Dems collapse in 2010 the Greens, rather than UKIP, become the main beneficiary. And, as we've established a Parliamentary presence, that increased support actually does lead to significant seat gains.

[Deleted]

Jan 24, 2017 17:07:07 GMT greenchristian said:

I've occasionally pondered what kind of historical changes might lead to the Greens being a major political force right now. I suspect the following changes could plausibly have had us be the third party in England by now:

1) Around 1983, a group of Liberals defect to the Ecology party in protest at the Alliance. They teach the party Liberal targeting techniques around two decades earlier than we began learning them in reality.

If this were to become a wider trend, then another effect of this would likely have been to give the Greens a more definite identity as an environmentalist social liberal party. The flip side of this is that it would likely have made the Alliance and then the LibDems smaller and more SDP-heavy, and thus less localist, more top-down and more right-wing. How all this might have influenced subsequent election results is another question.