What Britain can teach Democrats about the ultra-left

Neil Kinnock is best known in America as the man whose oratory Joe Biden plagiarised. In 1987 Mr Biden was so taken by the British Labour Party leader’s line about being the first of his family “in a thousand generations” to attend college that he borrowed it. At first, with due credit. Then, on television, without. The ensuing furore helped sink Mr Biden’s first run for the presidency.Andy Burnham, leader of the Labour Party, right, shakes hands with Neil Kinnock, former Labour Party leader, at a speech to party members in central London, UK, on Friday, July 17, 2026. (Bloomberg)Yet Lord Kinnock, as he is now known, is not just the man who condemned Mr Biden to another 21 gruelling years in the Senate. He also helped make Britain’s main centre-left party electable again, by purging hard-l