If one of the Marx brothers had been elected to the Labour leadership, at least we would have been guaranteed a good laugh for the next 5 years or so. Instead, all we get is the B movie act of the Miliband brothers - which is proving to be dull as ditch water.
On the grounds that Ed Miliband got a small majority of the "union vote", the Tory politicians, backed up by the media, have accused him of being a puppet in the hands of trade unionists. If only.
What all these people forget to mention is that little more than 3% of the trade union membership eligible to vote, actually voted for him. The biggest union, Unite, where most members pay the political levy to the Labour Party, had little over 10% turnout! And this was despite the special attempt they made to mobilise the vote.
Besides, Miliband himself immediately rushed to spell out that his loyalties certainly do not lie with trade union members, let alone the working class! So much for "red Ed". He says strikes are a "last resort"? Yet how else do workers prevent cuts in their livelihoods and working conditions?
In fact, besides vague references to the poorest in society, the middle class seems to be the only social category he has ever heard about, or is interested in impressing, judging from his interview with Andrew Marr on Sunday. What did he say he is so worried about? That the middle class is "squeezed"!
A Blair dressed as lamb
The fact is, that for all his claims and the media headlines that "New Labour is Dead", the Labour Party has just got itself another version of the young upstart Blair, with the very same middle class arrogance and the same inability to resist the attraction of the rich and powerful. Because the one thing that the new Labour leader has made very clear, is that he will not challenge the coalition government over any of the things which really matter to the working class majority.
He is prepared and willing to talk the garbled language of economists when it comes to "deficit reduction". But he is not prepared to talk about the hundreds of thousands of job cuts and the dire effect on workers and more so, the elderly and unemployed, as a result of these "deficit reduction" policies. Indeed, for the likes of Ed Miliband, the cuts are not in question, it is just their timing which is at issue.
The only real concern he expresses is that the speediness of the present government's cuts would affect "economic growth" - in a nutshell, the profits of the capitalist class! And despite the fact that numerous Labour MPs have been protesting against such things as the proposed welfare cuts, which are aimed at the most vulnerable sections of the population, Miliband is not even prepared to pledge to reverse such cuts, if and when Labour gets back to power.
On the contrary. In fact in the same Andrew Marr interview, he made a point of stressing that he thought welfare benefit "reform" was needed, just as Blair and Darling had in the past, agreeing that too much money is being spent on the sick and disabled.
"Labour" in name only
Of course, none of this should come as a surprise. The Labour Party has long been making itself responsible, first and foremost, to the City and its interests. If it still keeps the word "Labour" in its title, it is only because it is a way to get the support of working class voters who have nothing else to vote for and, moreover, to provide a justification for union leaders to be handing over a share of our union dues.
If it were not for these "incentives" - votes and money - people like Blair, Brown and Miliband would long have dropped any reference to the working class whatsoever.
This is nothing new. But it takes a situation like the one created by the crisis to make it crystal-clear - a situation in which the capitalist class has embarked on a class war against the rest of us and in which, therefore, its politicians are no longer allowed to resort to their usual populist demagogy.
In such a situation, what also appears crystal-clear, is the fact that the working class is effectively disenfranchised and has no party prepared to stand up for its social and political interests, in the crisis and beyond. Building such a party is not only necessary today, but in order for us to shape a different society, it is vital for tomorrow.