Guido Fawked - Luciana Berger Hypocrisy

[Update at end of post]

Yesterday evening, there was a meeting of the Liverpool Wavertree Labour Party branch. This included elections for ten positions on the executive committee. Nine of those ten positions went to those associated with Momentum, the group which unswervingly backs party leader Jeremy Corbyn. One of the winners was Roy Bentham, who is also a Spirit of Shankly member, and therefore a ferocious opponent of the Sun newspaper.

Luciana Berger - not under threat

Bentham’s message to Liverpool Wavertree MP Luciana Berger was a little hyperbolic, but nothing more: “She will now have to sit round the table with us the next time she wants to vote for bombing in Syria or to pass a no confidence motion in the leader of the party - she will have to be answerable to us … We would like her to come out publicly like other MPs have done and apologise for not supporting him in the past”.

This has sent many in the right-leaning part of the Fourth Estate into yet another fit of the vapours, notably the perpetually thirsty Paul Staines and his rabble at the Guido Fawkes blog, who have howled dishonestly “Labour MPs Do Nothing As Corbynistas Threaten To Deselect Berger”. There has been no deselection threat. But, dutiful Murdoch grovellers that they are, they predictably smear Bentham as “the ringleader”.

This does not deter The Great Guido: “Luciana Berger’s Liverpool Wavertree CLP has fallen into the hands of Corbynistas, who are now threatening to deselect her unless she does what they say and apologises to Jez”. Two things here. They “want to work with Ms Berger” (the phrase in the Echo’s report) is not “do what they say”, and once more, there has been no deselection threat. Still, details, eh?

Then comes the predictable nudge-nudge: “Labour MPs stood by and watched following the anti-Semitism whitewash, they did nothing about the Ken farce, nothing about Corbyn’s extremism problem”. There is no evidence whatever of anti-Semitism, but the Fawkes mob are going to suggest it anyway. Oh, and deselection again? “Yesterday Corbyn’s spokesman confirmed deselections were a possibility”. And thrice wrong.

Guess who wrote the Fawkes drivel

Moreover, The Great Guido is now standing in an extremely draughty glasshouse, given his antipathy to Ms Berger over the years, a subject where Zelo Street regulars will need no reminders. The Fawkes blog claimed she was in receipt of dodgy donations back in 2012, but that was down to their inability to understand limited companies and accounting periods. Then there was the case of young Councillor Jake Morrison.

They claimed she had had him “booted out”. That was another pack of lies. They accused her of dishonesty over comments on Young Dave’s lack of speeches on climate change - and were, once again, wrong. And while claiming to be hot on anti-Semitism, the Fawkes rabble somehow missed the conviction of sad nobody Joshua Bonehill Paine for racially aggravated harassment against the MP.

Yet there they are now, pretending to be her friend, while lying through their teeth about a deselection that somehow did not even get mentioned in the Echo’s report.

Still, those lies will get picked up by their pals in the press establishment, and become the received wisdom. And that’s what they really want. Another fine mess, once again.

[UPDATE 1800 hours: the executive of Liverpool Wavertree CLP have made a statement about the story put around by the Fawkes rabble.

This is what they have to say: "[We] are looking forward to working with our MP Luciana Berger for our constituency ... We must dissociate ourselves from remarks made by one of our officers who did not speak on behalf of the executive. The views he has expressed do not, in any way, represent the position of the CLP officers".

The full statement is shown here. And no, The Great Guido has not acknowledged this, nor resiled from the pack of lies posted earlier. In fact, the Fawkes blog is now suggesting that there are more deselections of sitting Labour MPs in the pipeline, on the basis of no evidence at all.

Still, when you're in an hole and all that. The Fawkes rabble just keep on digging]