The peculiar irony of New Labour's endgame

Marina Hyde writes an interesting article in the Guardian today, which reflects on the fact that

The peculiar irony of New Labour's endgame is that it was all foretold by an accidental prophet named Tony Blair. "My project will be complete," he once declared, "when the Labour party learns to love Peter Mandelson."

Today we saw Lord Mandelson of Foy and Hartlepool installed, in all but name, as the No 2 to Gordon Brown. Unfortunately he is surrounded in the Cabinet and his party by a bunch of Toadies, Has-Beens, Never-Beens, and those who have simply been promoted way beyond their capabilities. Truly a Government of absolutely no talent.

The article also reflects upon the issue that

"We are witnessing the final self-destruction of what those who ­created New Labour were given to calling 'the Project', apparently oblivious to the Orwellian overtones of the phrase. Then again, perhaps they weren't ­oblivious – after all, the Project appeared to be closely modelled on the Party, which, you will recall, 'seeks power entirely for its own sake'"

This is so true of Gordon Brown and his party who cannot see the damage they are doing to our country. They cannot see that they must, instead of trying to save their own skins, save our country from the abyss that it is rapidly descending into. They need to unite together and throw us a lifeline by getting rid of Gordon. As Marina says

The Project is complete. It was never about ideas, as became ­depressingly clear to many of us well before the 1997 election. The Project was the formal expression of the gut instinct for survival in power. Its sole aim was to make Labour ­electable, and the manner in which it realised that ambition has now left it even more ­unelectable than it was before its inception.

The problem is that not only is Labour unelectable, as has been amply demonstrated today, but that they are also not fit to Govern. When they rely on 7 Lord's a Leaping and a plethora of non-entities, all led by someone who has no aim but to further himself as a man of history, it is time to call for the Grim Reaper to dispatch this malfunctioning and self-destroying Government. As Marina Hyde says as the end of her article

Think not of it as a murder, but a fated suicide.

Let us only hope it is not a long-drawn out affair as our country is in need of change.

Misery. It's Gordon Brown as Kathy Bates. And Westminster as Lilliput | Marina Hyde | Comment is free | The Guardian:

Gordon Brown: The endgame nears

Guardian says it is the endgame

"Any prime minister, however powerful, serves as a member of a cabinet. When that cabinet loses faith in him or her, and its members start saying so in public, the leader cannot stay. Gordon Brown must face this reality today, after losing three cabinet ministers in three days, attempting to terminate his chancellor's career in public and reportedly offering a series of posts to people who refused to take them. Tonight's dramatic resignation of James Purnell, the welfare secretary, was a massive blow, a deliberate full-frontal attack. Even a strong leader would struggle to survive it, and Mr Brown is not that."

When will he realise, he is past his sell by date. Three ministers already, Miliband rumoured, Burnham rumoured. More than 50 MP's rumoured to have signed the resignation letter.

Go Now!

Gordon Brown: The endgame nears | Editorial | Comment is free | The Guardian:

Guardian thinks it's all Over

Guardian says

But there is more to it than this. Purnell has long argued it is time to discard the old tropes of Brownite and Blairite.

And if Purnell has been talked about on the right of the party, then Jon Cruddas can be broadly defined as on the left. Cruddas is known to be in a quandary about how to respond to the Hotmail plot. However, in the last year, Cruddas has been very complimentary about Purnell – regarding him to be a Blairite the left could be able to do business with. Purnell's ascension to the backbenches will add to the many meetings Cruddas has been convening in the last few days to figure out what to do.

"This coup has no legs," said one Brown supporter yesterday. Purnell has given it very long legs.

How James Purnell's manoeuvre changes everything for Gordon Brown | Politics | The Guardian

Letter to the Guardian

A letter in the Guardian from a Mr Aitchison of Hove, East Sussex has this to say

Do I notice an increasing amount of anti-Gordon Brown sentiment in the Guardian's editorial content of late? Whatever his faults, Mr Brown strikes me as a man of integrity - something increasingly rare in UK politics nowadays. While we're at it, does anybody seriously believe any of the other political parties would have avoided the credit crunch - or indeed handled it any better now that it's here?
Stuart Aitchison
Hove, East Sussex

Perhaps Mr Aitchison has had his letter answered by the slightly anti-Gordon Brown Guardian editorial in the same issue when they say "Labours Dilemma: Gordon Brown".

Amongst some of the choice quotes are

The public is calling furiously for a better system. People want an honest parliament. They want leaders who are prepared to act. They loathe the old system, and many of the people who are part of it.

and

The truth is that there is no vision from him, no plan, no argument for the future and no support. The public see it. His party sees it. The cabinet must see it too, although they are not yet bold enough to say so.

and finally

But Mr Brown will never do it. The prime minister was absent from the start of the debate and cautious now he has joined it. His instinct is usually to hesitate, and to establish reviews and commissions. Meanwhile, the chance of a generation is being missed.

Mr Aitchison may now just about have got the idea. Hopefully the rest of the country will get the idea and continue to tell Mr Brown to go on Thursday.

Letters: Not the time to drop the chancellor | Politics | The Guardian

Some Light Reading from David Cameron at the Guardian

David Cameron has four articles in the Guardian tonight at A New Politics which is on the Comment is Free site.

The first article is entitled We need a massive radical redistribution of Power and starts out

Adding his voice to the Guardian debate, the Conservative leader argues today that public fury at the MPs' expenses scandal points to deep problems in the British political system, and calls for restoring local control in the spirit of glasnost

In it David Cameron argues that

The anger, the suspicion and the cynicism – yes, with politics and politicians, but with so much else – are the result of people's slow but sure realisation that they have very little control over the world around them, and over much that determines whether or not they'll live happy and fulfilling lives.

The second article is entitled Democratic accountability and starts out

From local to central government, the driving principle of Conservative reform will be from the powerful to the powerless

In this Cameron says

But it's not just by decentralising power and reforming parliament that we can redistribute power away from an over-mighty executive. We need to end the culture of sofa government, where ­unaccountable spin doctors in No 10 – whether it's Alastair Campbell or Damian McBride – toss around ideas and make up policies not to meet the national interest but to hit dividing lines or fit the news cycle.

The third article is entitled The Post-Bureaucratic Age and starts out

Where the information revolution meets progressive Conservatism, people will control the things that matter to them

In the article David says

The lack of power and control people experience from politics was barely tolerable when times were good. But now times are hard and people are on the receiving end of wage cuts, job losses, negative equity, home repossessions and rising crime – and revelations about their rulers' behaviour, which has disgusted them. They are furious and finally demanding big change. Big change and a new politics is exactly what people can expect from a new Conservative government. We'll begin a massive redistribution of power in our country from the powerful to the powerless – from the political elite to the man and woman in the street.

The fourth and last article is entitled Electoral Reform and starts out

We'll consider fixed-term parliaments, but not proportional representation, as many in the Guardian series have demanded.

In it Cameron has a go at the current Government and its, and our, unelected leader

We also need to look seriously at the immense power prime ministers wield through their ability to call an election whenever they want. I know there are strong political and moral arguments against fixed-term parliaments. Political – because there's nothing worse than a lame-duck government with a tiny majority limping on for years. And moral – because when a prime minister has gone into an election and won it promising to serve a full term, but then hands over to an unelected leader halfway through, the people deserve an election as soon as possible. These arguments are of course particularly relevant today

I would recommend that anyone of any political persuasion reads these and has a think about what they mean.

You may agree or disagree with them, you may or may not believe that any party, far less a Conservative party, could be able to put them into being, they may make you angry or happy, they may even get you interested, if so they have achieved their aim and made you think about what is going on in the UK at the moment and make you want to do something about it.

Only when most of us want to do something about the current state of this country will it happen. Politicians themselves don't make anything happen, the truly good politicians though, might just get us pointed in the right direction, and get us back on our feet and believing in this once great nation.

A new politics: blueprint for reforming government | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk

Charlie Brooker on the car crash that is Gordon

Charlie Brooker writing in the Guardian seems to have worked out what a car-crash Gordon really is His final lines suggest a way Gordon might get out of this situation

... Failing that, simply bursting into tears on live TV might be a good move. Pay a visit to This Morning for an ostensibly upbeat chat about how this whole government thing's been working out for you, then suddenly go quiet and well up. Wait till Phillip Schofield puts a hand on your shoulder before letting rip - but when you let rip, really LET RIP. Wail. Howl. Punch the cushions. Quake with sobs. Say you're sorry for all the mistakes and beg for a chance to put it all right. Make stuff up if necessary.

Pretend you've been a heroin addict or something like that. Weep 16 litres right there on the sofa if you have to.

Or tell a joke! A bad one! Anything! Do any-thing! Please - just do something to clear the air. Because the public still has a few pity cells left. Many will forgive you. I'm not sure everyone believes the current mess is entirely your fault. It's just the tragic-comic misery and embarrassment of it all. It's too much for our embattled nation to bear. It's awful. Truly awful.

Sorry Charlie that won't work. It's past time for Gordon he is now the zombie waiting to put out of his misery.

Charlie Brooker on the car crash that is Gordon Brown's premiership Comment is free The Guardian

MP's Expenses - A view from 2000 Years Ago -

Tories, Labour, Lib Dems are all at it, feeding like a pig from the public Trough. Today it is Labour tomorrow it will be the the Tories and Lib Dems turn over the weekend.

Direct from Fraser Nelson in the Spectator.

Plato had it right on MPs' expenses. This from The Republic:

"We also have to make sure the guardians do not become like sheep dogs that turn into wolves and abuse their power to harm their fellow citizens. Therefore the guardians will have no private property, they will live transparently, they will be provided for out of taxes, and they will live together communally.

First, none of them should possess any private property beyond what is wholly necessary.

Second, none of them should have a house or storeroom that isn’t open for all to enter at will.

Third, whatever sustenance moderate and courageous warrior-athletes require in order to have neither shortfall nor surplus in a given year they’ll receive by taxation on the other citizens as a salary for their guardianship.

Fourth, they’ll have common messes and live together like soldiers in a camp.

We’ll tell them that they always have gold and silver of a divine sort in their souls as a gift from the gods and so have no further need of human gold.

Indeed, we’ll tell them it’s impious for them to defile this divine possession by any admixture of such gold… Hence, for them alone … it is unlawful for them to touch or handle gold or silver… In this way they’d save both themselves and the city. But if they acquire private land, houses, and currency themselves, they’ll be household managers and farmers instead of guardians – hostile masters of the other citizens instead of their allies. They’ll spend their whole lives hating and being hated, plotting and being plotted against, more afraid of internal than external enemies, and they’ll hasten both themselves and the whole city to almost immediate ruin."

Thought for the day Coffee House

Doomed?

No not a Swine flu story but a question about whether or not Labour are doomed. For the past couple of weeks the news has been relentlessly bad for Gordon Brown and Labour, but today we have a number of stories about impending doom.

The Evening Standard has this story, with a number of Labour MP's being rather less than Optimistic.

But the Guardian is, as usual, more guarded but none the less not particularly optimistic. It points out

I remember the last three years of John Major's premiership and stories about his party losing faith in him became – rightly – a regular feature of political news coverage. These stories often featured on-the-record comments from the "usual suspects" because the people who mattered did not want to be quoted. The same thing is happening again now. Brown doesn't need to worry about Marshall-Andrews, Livingstone or Clarke. But he does need to worry that they are getting airtime because the media has decided they have got a point.

So this could be a long slow death but we at least know we have a final date next year when Labour must go to the country. Hopefully with Labour now in the betting to get less than 20% in the upcoming Euro elections the Men in Grey suits may do their job and get rid Gordon.

The final line in the Guardian article is particularly relevant

There's another type of story that crops up when a leader is in trouble and, from the Press Association news wire, I see that we're getting one of these this evening. Harriet Harman "will call for party unity in a speech in Scotland tonight". This is confirmation that things really are pretty bad; politicians don't appeal for unity when it already exists.

This hits the nail on the head. If there is no unity (and Unite!) then Labour will be doomed.


Is Labour now doomed? | Politics | guardian.co.uk

The Bully that is Paul Dacre

Agreement with Polly Toynbee is something I seldom have, but her article on Paul Dacre, the Daily Mail editor is something I am in complete agreement with.

This paragraph should give you a flavour

Dacre, the nation's bully-in-chief is, like all bullies, a coward: he refused to go on the Today programme yesterday to argue his case. He never dares face his critics, happy to fry alive all and sundry, never apologising, never explaining. There is a good reason for this: the stance his paper takes on just about everything is so internally contradictory and inconsistent that he could never survive even minimal scrutiny. The Mail's mishmash of lurid scandal, bitching about women and random moralising zigzags all over the place, dishing out pain and praise often according to who it has succeeded in buying with its limitless chequebook, or who has infuriated it by selling their wares to another bidder.

Now I'm sure the Guardian has no liking for Dacre but this is a bit more than the Guardian having a go. It exposes the strange link between the two little bullies Dacre and Brown and their even stranger friendship. Polly has this to say

One reason why it's easy to despair of Gordon Brown is his incomprehensible and grovelling friendship with Dacre, Labour's worst enemy. Where was Brown on the eve of his party's disastrous Glasgow East byelection? He was far away at Stratford-upon-Avon, watching Hamlet with his good friend Dacre. The Mail plays a curious cat and mouse game with Brown, sometimes praising his moral qualities on inside pages while assaulting Labour on its front page. Dacre is said to be very close to the Browns - which makes you wonder about the spinning of the PM's much-vaunted moral compass.

The Guradian also has a potted history of Dacre here. An interesting point is the final paragraph

One of Brown's first acts in office was to abandon proposals for supercasinos, a plan which had been the target of a fierce campaign in the Mail.

This maybe shows how deep the relationship is between the two.

Polly Toynbee: Judge Dacre dispenses little justice from his bully pulpit | Comment is free | The Guardian

Tories at record 20-year high in ICM Poll in Guardian

According to the ICM poll in the Guardian

Gordon Brown faces a damning verdict from voters ahead of his first anniversary in power. It suggests that his prime ministership has been a disappointment: 74% of those questioned say that he has been a change for the worse compared with Tony Blair, and only 24% think Labour has a chance of winning the next election while he remains leader.

Headline figures are Con 45 (+4) Lab 25(-2) Lib 20(-2).

This should put to bed the thoughts that what David Davis is doing will be bad for the Conservatives. The cowardly decision , yet again, by Gordon Brown has backfired on him as usual.

One other quote from the Poll as follows

Voters also think Brown has failed personally as prime minister. Asked to rate his performance on a scale of one to 10, voters give Brown only 3.94 on average. Almost a quarter, 23%, give him a one.

You would laugh but this is a desperate time for our country with this truly inept man in charge. He has become a joke and we must get rid of him to allow this country to get back to be where it belongs in the world.

Desperate reading for Gordon as he comes up to his anniversary, but will he get the message and get the Pickfords van in.


Tories at record 20-year high in new Guardian/ICM poll | Politics | guardian.co.uk: "

Brown's booty

Brown Grasps Invisible woman

Interesting to see that Yvonne Roberts in the Guardian's Comment is Free has a go at women who see Gordon Brown as their Messiah and are apparently rushing to vote for him.

As she says

Women voters are said not to like "confrontational politics" but this kind of cross-party camaraderie, cosying up to very strange bedfellows, makes for a creepy kind of osmosis that seems the opposite of democracy. A brief trip to Bournemouth felt like attending a sales convention for moderately successful piece of kitchen equipment whose chief attraction is that anyone can use it.

Well said. His appeal is based on drivel dressed up as policies, mostly stolen from others and dressed up as new. Indeed many of the items he spoke about in his speech were mere pipe dreams with no policy or money to back them up.

Brown called himself a "conviction" Politician, all I can say he is he should be convicted for complicity in the Iraq War, for stealing our Pension Money and for funding his Publicity Machine from Public Money amongst a raft of other charges.

As a final point Yvonne says

Perhaps, if a general election is called, Brown will produce the miracle cure for all these ills that he's been storing at the back of his Downing Street cupboard for precisely this, his special moment. Somehow I doubt it. He's a man committed to redistribution - but of the timid kind. So what precisely are these "traditional values" to which Mr Brown appeals? And why are some women so easily conned?

Some good questions that need answering and some food for thought for us all.


Brown's booty