Is Labour heading for "civil war"? Colin Talbot says yes. Simon says no. I'm inclined to agree with Simon. There has always been tension in the party between socialists and social democrats: "Labour is a broad church" is one of the oldest cliches in politics.

I suspect this tension is exacerbated today by the fact that there are two different realities: the reality of electoral politics as shaped by the MSM versus economic reality. For example:

- Political reality regards Osborne as competent on the economy; economic reality sees him as an anti-economist.

- Political reality sees the deficit as the top economic problem; economic reality sees low investment and productivity growth as bigger problems.

- Political reality requires austerity now; the economic reality is that this is failing in its own terms.

- Political reality sees benefit "claimants" as a drain on the economy: economic reality, arguably, focuses more on the possible damage done by the 1%.

- Political reality says immigration is a big problem; economic reality says it isn't.

- Political reality overstates the incomes of middle England; economic reality focuses on the fact that half of full-time workers earn less than £528 per week and 90% earn less than £54,000 a year.

There isn't that much substantive policy difference between John McDonnell's "socialism with an iPad" and Liam Byrne's "entrepreneurial socialism" (pdf). A much bigger difference, I suspect, lies in how to respond to these different realities. Leftists like me emphasize the economic realities, but rightists claim that a strategy of "no compromise with the voters" is electoral suicide.

Now, maybe I'm guilty here of deformation professionelle and am overweighting the importance of economics. Many of Corbyn's fiercest critics - I'm looking at you, Mr Cohen - focus instead upon his attitude to foreign affairs.

Nor must we under-estimate the role of personal loyalties. The division between Blairites and Brownites (which seems so quaint now!) was more about allegiances to individuals than about policy differences. Likewise, the strongest evidence for Corbyn being a hard leftist lies not in his economic policy - which is ho-hum and mainstream - but, as Colin says, in the fact that he has happily associated with some rum coves in (for example) the Stop the War coalition.

These caveats aside, what I'm saying is that in a better world Labour would find itself a new Blair - a leader capable of bridging the chasm between economic reality and electoral reality.

However, as Stephen says, nobody of such quality exists: the fact that Andy Burnham - who ran an utterly uninspiring leadership campaign - should be the most popular (pdf) alternative to Corbyn shows that Labour has not so much a talent pool as a puddle.

If we had a more sensible politics which was more collegial and less infected with the disease of leadershipitis, this wouldn't be so much a problem. In the real world, however, it is.