Jeremy Corbyn’s gravest foe isn’t Tory, Ukip, the SNP or what remains of the Lib Dems.
No, it's the “enemy within”, those in the Labour Party plotting a coup before a single vote is cast.
The anti-democrats include Blairites who for years demanded total obedience yet now threaten only disloyalty to a potential leader.
Labour can win from the Left on a convincing anti-austerity platform, challenging myths and lies to create an economy operating for working people instead of the interests of a wealthy, powerful few.
Labour cannot win from anywhere on the political spectrum if the party is bitter and divided, battling with itself rather than opponents in Westminster and its corporate foes.
I’ve known and respected Corbyn during the decades he was right on big questions: from regulating greedy banksters to speaking to Sinn Fein in order to create peace in Northern Ireland.
Yet I remain to be convinced the fresh face of Labour is a bearded, honourable 66-year-old – despite the Islington phenomenon gaining the support of 152 constituency parties against 111 for Andy Burnham, Yvette Cooper’s 106 and Liz Kendall’s mere 18.
Corbyn is sitting pretty and a victory once considered impossible or improbable now hovers between possible and probable. But this race has many twists and turns ahead before the result is announced on September 12.
Endorsements from a general council of trade unions and the young flocking to sign for £3 votes will marginalise the impact of a few Trotskyists infiltrators and Tory liars. Nobody, however, can accurately forecast how the bulk of Labour’s 250,000 members will vote.
If Burnham-Cooper-Kendall MPs are out of touch with Corbyn-supporting local parties, constituency activists may be distant from members who never go to meetings.
What is unmistakable is the excitement and energy generated by Corbyn. Win or lose, he has a rare ability to electrify Labour. He has stolen the Left from Burnham, the New from Kendall and Change from Cooper.
Tony Blair couldn’t have been more wrong with his dirty dig, saying if your heart is with Corbyn you should get a transplant.
Corbyn’s heart is much larger than Blair’s; he confronts failed orthodoxies including Blair’s outdated politics of surrender to reckless City speculators and George Bush’s disastrous militarism.
The greatest weakness of Corbyn-the-rebel-who-would-be-leader is authority. He possesses courage by the bucketful. Travelling home in London by night bus after a late meeting wasn’t a Boris Johnson-type stunt but the transport used by Citizen Corbyn.
Should he win, he would have the mandate of a ballot. But the serial rebel would struggle to persuade die-hard opponents to accept his rule, however consensual the style.
Corbyn is kind where Tory axeman Iain Duncan Smith is cruel but the Tory revolter was overwhelmed by disloyalty when he wore the Conservative crown.
Blairites and others vowing mayhem are David Cameron’s useful idiots, doing the Tories’ dirty work.
Labour might splinter rather than split should the most Left of the four party candidates win – it’s the enemy within, not Corbyn, who might render the party unelectable.