An interesting read

[Sheepskin Stu]

Some reaction to Tony Blair's new book and more particularly the Iraq war.


www.newstatesman.com/blogs/mehdi-hasan/2010/08/saddam-iraq-weapons-report

[CusworthRovers]

Oops, another one that was wrongly hung then.

[Boomstick]

So not only did he take us into an illegal war, he handed the labour party over to a person he didnt like and knew was useless. Why?
Will what Tony Bliar thought of Gordo change the minds of the nu-labourites that defended Gordo to the hilt before the election, or will they back-track on their opinions or pretend they didnt say them? OR did they think the same as Bliar but not say in public in the fear of losing votes.

 

[BillyStubbsTears]

Boomstick wrote:

So not only did he take us into an illegal war, he handed the labour party over to a person he didnt like and knew was useless. Why?
Will what Tony Bliar thought of Gordo change the minds of the nu-labourites that defended Gordo to the hilt before the election, or will they back-track on their opinions or pretend they didnt say them? OR did they think the same as Bliar but not say in public in the fear of losing votes.

 

You and Detailed Reasoned Duscussion have never been introduced have you?

I'm waiting for your critique of The Bible.

\"A carpenter made loads of fish sarnies then got grassed up by one of his mates.\"

[The Red Baron]

It will be fascinating to see in years to come whether Blair casts the same kind of shadow over the Labour Party that Thatcher cast over the Tories. After all, his record was very similar to hers: he won three elections and \"retired undefeated\" (at least in electoral terms) after losing the support of his colleagues. In both cases, their successors then lost a subsequent election (although John Major did win one as well.) Will you get people claiming (as some Tories still do re Thatcher) that everything would have been fine if only Blair had been allowed to carry on and to choose the moment of his departure having secured his succession?

FWIW I believe that the Tories would have lost the 1992 General Election with Thatcher at the helm, but paradoxically their defeat then might have saved them years of internal wrangling - as well as being cast into the political wilderness for over a decade. On the other hand, if there was one man who could have won the 2010 GE for Labour, that man was Tony Blair.

[CusworthRovers]

The 92 election was at the time of us coming out of the worst depression for a long time.

I think Maggie's austere no nonsense ways had caused the tories to believe that they would lose the election, as was predicted by many pundits and the media, or at best a hung parliament. The novelty factor of a woman PM and all the extremely well done TV interviews and quotes she laid out (the first party and whore of the media was Maggie IMO) was not working anymore.

Maggie went before she was pushed, which I imagine she was too proud for that. The tories went the opposite way for the next leader in the hope of appeasing the masses and winning the anti Maggie crowd and floating voters over.

Against the odds, and to many surprises the Tories pissed the 92 election.

It's all guesswork/opinions, on would they have won had Maggie been at the helm. I'm of the opinion that they would have lost. I'm also of the opinion that Labour would have won had Blair been in charge this time round, and could never understand why he stood down.

[Boomstick]

BillyStubbsTears wrote:

Boomstick wrote:

So not only did he take us into an illegal war, he handed the labour party over to a person he didnt like and knew was useless. Why?
Will what Tony Bliar thought of Gordo change the minds of the nu-labourites that defended Gordo to the hilt before the election, or will they back-track on their opinions or pretend they didnt say them? OR did they think the same as Bliar but not say in public in the fear of losing votes.

 

You and Detailed Reasoned Duscussion have never been introduced have you?

I'm waiting for your critique of The Bible.

\"A carpenter made loads of fish sarnies then got grassed up by one of his mates.\"

Contradicted yourself there old lad. Where is the 'detailed reasoned discussion' in that birdseye potatoe waffle?

 

[BillyStubbsTears]

The Red Baron wrote:

It will be fascinating to see in years to come whether Blair casts the same kind of shadow over the Labour Party that Thatcher cast over the Tories. After all, his record was very similar to hers: he won three elections and \"retired undefeated\" (at least in electoral terms) after losing the support of his colleagues. In both cases, their successors then lost a subsequent election (although John Major did win one as well.) Will you get people claiming (as some Tories still do re Thatcher) that everything would have been fine if only Blair had been allowed to carry on and to choose the moment of his departure having secured his succession?

FWIW I believe that the Tories would have lost the 1992 General Election with Thatcher at the helm, but paradoxically their defeat then might have saved them years of internal wrangling - as well as being cast into the political wilderness for over a decade. On the other hand, if there was one man who could have won the 2010 GE for Labour, that man was Tony Blair.

An interesting thesis TRB, but I disagree with it.

Blair will not cast a Thatcher-like shadow over Labour, for a very simple reason.

Thatcher told the Tories what they wanted to hear and positioned them where (politically) the mass of Tory activists wanted to be positioned - further to the Right. As a consequence, she was venerated by the Tories.

Blair by contrast moved Labour AWAY from it's heart. As a result he was viewed by Labour activists with something on a scale between toleration and disgust.

As for Blair's saying that Labour lost because they stopped being New Labour, he's doing nothing but engaging in the tedious self-indulgence that ousted leaders always wallow in. As ever, they say, \"Ah yes, the rot only set in when you stopped listening to me. I was the genius and you forgot the message.\"

Which, as ever, ignores the inconvenient facts.

By the time he left power, Blair was hated by a majority in the country. He had come in on a wave of (self-generated) enthusiasm, and had let people down on a number of scores, Iraq being the biggest.

Brown taking over gave Labour a huge boost in the polls. It's easy to forget now, but back in mid-2007, Brown was a big asset to Labour. When he took over from Blair, Labour's poll ratings went up by 1/4-1/3 overnight. Of all the tactical mistakes that Brown made, not calling an Election in Autumn 2007 was the biggest. The polls indicate that he'd have swept to power.

http://ukpollingreport.co.uk/blog/voting-intention

After that, Brown was hammered by the economic hurricane and by the impression that he'd bottled the Election that never was.

But, by early 2009, when it was becoming clear that Brown had given the steer to the entire Western Capitalist world on how to stop the recession becoming a Depression, Labour rapidly started improving its popularity. Look at the poll figures.

By contrast, Blair states that Labour should have adopted a similar economic/fiscal strategy to the one that Osbourne has blathered on about since 2008. And that would have been a God-Almighty disaster. If one thing would have been guaranteed to annihilate Labour's chances in May this year, it would have been doing that.

But then, Blair never was much cop at economics. His great good fortune was to have Brown at the side of him for a decade doing the intellectual spadework.

The fact that Labour damn-near matched the Tories in seats at the Election, despite suffering the worst recession for 80 years is quite astonishing. What the Blairites should consider is how much better Labour might have done if they had kept their f**king gobs shut and supported their own Government instead of having a co-ordinated strategy to undermine Brown in the 2 years running up to the Election. Had Labour been just a fraction more popular at the elction, the current situation would be entirely different. Had Labour won just 10 more seats off the Tories, we would now have a Labour-Liberal coalition Govt. The fact that we haven't is to a great degree down to the actions of the Blairites over the last 2 years.

But then again, the Blairites would probably prefer that outcome anyway - it means that he and they can smugly go off into History saying, \"I told you so...\"

[The Red Baron]

Blair by contrast moved Labour AWAY from it's heart. As a result he was viewed by Labour activists with something on a scale between toleration and disgust.

In that case, the result of the Labour leadership election should be very interesting. One would therefore expect anyone but David Miliband- who is the closest to Blair's \"New Labour\" position than any of the other candidates- to win. On the other hand, DM is the bookie's favourite.

Fact is- everyone likes a winner. And within their respective parties, Thatcher and Blair WERE winners.

I do agree with you that Brown would have won in 2007. However, the accusations that he bottled it were spot on- he did! He should have given his keynote speech to the Labour conference then driven to Buckingham Palace. Instead he allowed the Tories to hold their conference and come out with as many populist policies as they could- then he got spooked when their poll ratings rose as a result.

[BillyStubbsTears]

The Red Baron wrote:

Blair by contrast moved Labour AWAY from it's heart. As a result he was viewed by Labour activists with something on a scale between toleration and disgust.

In that case, the result of the Labour leadership election should be very interesting. One would therefore expect anyone but David Miliband- who is the closest to Blair's \"New Labour\" position than any of the other candidates- to win. On the other hand, DM is the bookie's favourite.

Fact is- everyone likes a winner. And within their respective parties, Thatcher and Blair WERE winners.

I do agree with you that Brown would have won in 2007. However, the accusations that he bottled it were spot on- he did! He should have given his keynote speech to the Labour conference then driven to Buckingham Palace. Instead he allowed the Tories to hold their conference and come out with as many populist policies as they could- then he got spooked when their poll ratings rose as a result.

Fair point about David Miliband and the bookies. (Mind, they also had us at 1/4 on to go down at Xmas 2008...). Personally, I think it would be a big mistake for the Labour Party to elect him. He appears to have all the problems of Blair (far-right of the party, not particularly adept on economics) and all the problems of Brown (thoroughly un-telegenic, easily caricatured, overly-intellectual). And of course, he carries the baggage of being the main figure who plotted to undermine Brown in 2008-09.

It's going to be fascinating, whichever Miliband wins. The obvious Shadow Chancellor is Ed Balls, but taking him on might seem like replaying the Blair-Brown frictions.

I couldn't agree more about Brown's 2007 mistake by the way. Future counter-factual historians will have a field day working out what would have happened if he'd had some balls in Sept 2007.

[The Red Baron]

BillyStubbsTears wrote:

It's going to be fascinating, whichever Miliband wins. The obvious Shadow Chancellor is Ed Balls, but taking him on might seem like replaying the Blair-Brown frictions.

I couldn't agree more about Brown's 2007 mistake by the way. Future counter-factual historians will have a field day working out what would have happened if he'd had some balls in Sept 2007.[/quote]

If Balls isn't offered a job that he can accept, then the risk to the leader is that he'll go to the back-benches and cause trouble. Which is precisely the reason Blair gives for not sacking Brown - or at least moving him out of the Treasury.

Agreed- 2007 and \"the Election that never was\" will go down as one of the great counter-factual moments of recent political history. (The Tory equivalent is what would have happened had Thatcher won a clear majority in the first round of the leadership ballot in 1990.) What a victory in 2007 would have given Brown and the Labour government is until 2012 to see whether their economic policies led to a sustained recovery. In May of this year they were still having to deal with the political fall-out from a deep recession- which was always going to handicap an incumbent government.

[turnbull for england]

its of no importance I know but i feel slightly cleverer for reading this, cheers lads, seem to getting more interested in politics as i get older  any recommendations for some further reading ?

[BobG]

Easily obtainable and reasonably cheapish sources, start with getting reasonably regular copies of the Telegraph and the Guardian. Both are intelligent and both try to illustrate situations and consequences by refernece to facts and trends - rather than the emotional, illiterate, knee jerk claptrap of folk like Boomstick. with these two paperrs on the opposite sides of the political divide, over time you can start to contrast opinion, how selectively used facts distort truths and how differing opionions are perfectly rational.

Cheers

BobG