Corbyn and McDonnell want you to attack their broadband pledge

The Labour plan to nationalise broadband is a good illustration of why the Corbyn-McDonnell team are much better at politics than their Conservative critics realise. It is also more evidence that the allegedly radical socialist Corbyn is actually engaged in an almost Blairite exercise of calculated branding and positioning.

If you read certain newspapers and listen to the mainstream Conservative narrative about Corbyn, you’ll hear that he is an economic radical intent on the biggest extension of state power into the private economy in modern British history. There is a lot in that narrative, but his Tory opponents should ponder the fact that Corbyn and his friends are actually quite happy to be accused of doing this. Generally if your opponent welcomes your attacks, you should stop and ask yourself whether what you’re doing is working.

Why does Corbyn welcome being painted as a dangerous radical? One reason is obvious: his base in the Labour Party supports him precisely because they think he is such a dangerous radical, a scourge of the privileged elite, etc etc.