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Nurenburg - Halcyon Days for one[?] Labour activist

Posted August 4th, 2006 by ringverse
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The election of Walter Wolfgang to Labour's NEC will not please Labour aparachiks, as he will get the chance to speak from the platform, rather than having to heckle it.

Walter Wolfgang, the heckler ejected from last year's Labour conference, has been elected to the party's ruling National Executive Committee (NEC).

The 83-year-old, from south-west London, was fourth in a poll of ordinary party members - which guarantees him a seat on the body. He said his heavy-handed treatment in Brighton had "woken people up" to Labour's "control freakery". And the NEC result was "partially a result of that", he added.

The veteran peace campaigner said he would use the platform to speak out against Tony Blair's policy in Lebanon and Iraq and against nuclear weapons. He also called on the prime minister to quit immediately and said Chancellor Gordon Brown was not the right man to replace him.

But he can rest assured, that at least one Labour councillor activist will not be heckling him:)

The idea that the likes of Walter Wolfgang can be elected to the NEC fills me with dread. I might not agree with Ann Black but I do respect her. Having heard Walter's interview on Radio 4 tonight it is obvious he doesn't have a clue what the NEC does and that he just wants to use it as his own private pulpit.

Hecklers don't deserve respect. When Walter uses his new position to speak at this year's conference I will either choose to listen to him or not. If I do listen I very much doubt I will agree with him, but I will accord him the common courtesy of listening. I will not be so ignorant as to heckle.

The cheek of it, heckling at a party conference! Where will it end? It's the start of a slippery slope that could lead to debate, or even an exchange of views, or even an outbreak of some sort of Democracy in the party!

For the record, it is worth reminding ourselves of Jack Straw's speech from last years conference. The astonishing thing isn't that one man was sufficiently incensed to shout 'Rubbish', but that the other 1000 delegates in the hall managed to keep their mouths shut!

It appears that with a few notable exceptions, there appear to be enough people in the party like Stuart Bruce who are loyal enough to keep the Blairite ship steady... Which is why I disagree with Vervet's comment of yesterday:

"To all intents and purposes, the Labour Party is a dead parrot. Unable to defend itself, unable to stand up for itself and undeserving of support."

I do thnk that we have to be more specific here .... it is 'NuLabor' that is dead as a parrot. I honestly believe that the 'grass-roots' labour membership is still there, but keeping their heads down, embarrassed at the messianic pronouncements and fascistic policies of their dictatorial leader. They secretly yearn for a return to honest, democratic government, as most of us do.

I'm sorry, but IMHO the private mutterings and closet outrage that apparently many in the Labour party feel about the 'direction of travel' mean nothing.
Silent complicity is as much a problem as the Nu Labour zealots who loyally line up to back the leadership. This is not a 'Blair' government, it is a Labour Government. If you remain a member of the Labour Party, then Iraq is your policy, as is giving Israel a green light to bomb Lebanon back to the stone age, as are tuition fees, PFI, Loans for Lordships, privatisation of the NHS, Extraordinary Rendition etc etc etc

I have quoted this from Craig Murray before, but it is worth quoting again:

Whenever you think Blair can bring us no lower in international morality, he does it. It is no longer possible for anyone to justify continued membership of the Labour Party. This government is responsible for the deaths of tens of thousands of innocents through its support for Bush's imperialist wars. Anyone who stays in the Labour Party should be shunned as a moral pariah.

When Blair, Brown, Straw

On August 4th, 2006 barnacle_bill (not verified) says:

When Blair, Brown, Straw and, the rest of the rabble are arrayed in the dock at the Hague facing war crimes charges then I will know there is life left in the Labour Party.

I can understand your

On August 4th, 2006 vervet says:

I can understand your perspective ringverse, and I agree that lack of public outrage by the 'grass-roots' labour members suggests acquiescence by default. For this reason I agree that they are equally as responsible as the blairites and, "... undeserving of support."

Their problem is that they remember the 18-years of opposition and that still hurts more than the current discomforting, hypocritical position they have: in power without principle.