Post
by Twiglet » Sun Apr 11, 2010 4:37 am
I don't see substantial policy differences between Labour & the Tories since labour abandoned the social contract and the union bloc votes in candidate selection around Neil Kinnocks time. The rationale at the time was to present a cleaner face to the Murdoch press, and over a further decade, the ideological base bacme so undermined in the quest for power that the change became entrenched.
John Smith, who died under somewhat mysterious circumstances hiking in Scotland, was a fairly traditional centre-left leader and was widely predicted to win the election which swept Blair to power. During Blairs first term, labour passed some good socially progressive legislation like instituting the minumum wage, and IMO, despite the divorce from the TUC, had a pretty good first term in office, but a lot changed when Clintons presidency ended.
British politicians have always had a level of servility to America since ww2. The degree of it has varied, but the fact of it remains constant. I think at some level, Blair believed that by hand-holding Bushs adventurism, he might also come to influence it, but that belief appears cosmetic in hindsight, and perhaps overly generous to Blairs now apparant mendacity.
The sitting MPs of the labour party are equally to blame for the capitulation into "New Labour". The could have chosen to oust Blair and follow the will of the people on the Iraq war, but few did so. The constituency Labour parties could have threatened to de-select MPs and ignored the edicts of Wallworth Road, but they chose not to do so. Other power-grabs took place. Blair used the selection of women candidates to promote women candidate (under the guise of equal opportunities) who were in lockstep with his own cult of personality, and so his rule became one of fiefdom in his second term. His cronies, like Brown, are too complicit in his deceptions to altogether betray them, and I suspect, over time, they have bought into their own bullshit.
I'm talking specifically about the choice to go to war in Iraq, but I could equally apply the same arguments to the wholesale capitulation to the interests of big business, tax breaks and general subservience to corporate power.
The labour party originated from the Union movement. By divorcing itself from the Unions, it has become very much like the US democrat party.
The Liberal democrats are an interesting case. In the 70s and 80s they were viewed as the centreist political party, and evolved into the Social Democrats with mostly right-of-centre Labour Party defections. Their political stance has stayed much the same since that time, it is the Labour party who have slid to the right over the same period. It has been said that it is eay to have principled politics when you have no real chance of being elected to power. If a hung parliament happens, I will be curious to see how much the Liberals capitulate. I think the tories will win though.
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He had a heart attack at his flat.