A comforting delusion appears to have afflicted some of those supporting Jeremy Corbyn’s bid to be Labour leader: maybe his far left ideology isn’t electoral liability at all, maybe it’s even as asset. The empirical basis for this are opinion polls indicating broad support for his positions on issues like tuition fees, rent controls and renationalising the railways.
Writing for Left Foot Forward, Robert Priest ably dissects this wishful thinking:
It goes without saying that the same opinion polls persistently overstated Labour’s popularity and suffered deep methodological problems, but this does not entirely discredit them. Individual findings are certainly questionable. Yes, polls showed that the public was opposed to the tuition fee rise and broadly supportedLabour modestly reducing tuition fees to £6,000. (By the way, the same polls showed voters thought this would most benefit the well-off.)
But this is not the same as the electorate supporting Corbyn’s total…
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Utopia, you are standing in it! 
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