Rumours of the death of the political left have been exaggerated. [Newly elected Labour Party leader Jeremy] Corbyn, like Syriza in Greece, Podemos in Spain and the Scottish National Party, is an immune response from a sick and suffering body politic trying to fight off a chronic infection that threatens to swallow hope for ever. There is a crisis in representative democracy in the west and it was established well before the stock-market collapse of 2008. The old centre left is at odds with its electorate because it decided for itself the limits of what was politically possible a decade ago.
[…]
Corbyn bucks that trend, terrifying a political class that chose power over principles long ago without once asking itself whether power without principles is worth having.
[…]
Across Europe and the United States, [...] professional politicians of the centre left have one idea about what politics should look like and the people they claim to represent increasingly have another. Certain politicians have not properly understood the definition of “representative” democracy.
New Statesman
I think one of the most telling indicators that all major [Western] political parties are the same has been the fact that Tony Blair ever headed the Labour Party in the first place.
We shall see what becomes of Jeremy Corbyn.
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