Why can’t Gordon do the “sincerity thing”?
September 26th, 2006-
How damaging were Cherie’s alleged remarks?
After watching and re-watching the vast amount of material coming out of Manchester I’ve come to the conclusion that the real problem with Gordon is that he cannot “do” sincerity.
The world “knows” that he was behind the “rolling resignation” plan to oust Tony earlier in the month that it is stretching credulity to it absolute limits for him to be going on the platform talking about the “great privilege” of working for all that time with the Prime Minister.
You cannot but help thinking that if it was such a privilege then why has he gone to such lengths to force Blair out?
For much of the time, of course, politics is about organised hypocrisy that a key quality in a leader is to be able to deliver the “sincerity” thing. You’ve got to be able to say things that at least sound plausible and that is where Gordon falls down badly.
The reason that Cherie Blair’s alleged remarks carry so much force and dominate the headlines this morning is that they ring true.
If there is widespread disbelief over what he says on this matter then surely that is going to spill over to other areas? That’s been a theme of much of the recent opinion polling and last night’s Frank Luntz focus group on Newsnight.
Where does this leave Labour leadership punters? Is there an alternative to Gordon at price that make an investment attractive. This is where it starts to get hard. For although John Reid came out of the Luntz session well he has a huge amount of baggage that will be crawled over if he does decide to put his hat into the ring when the time comes.
The Brown biographer, Tom Bower, had a long feature on Reid’s background in the Guardian at the weekend and, clearly, the Home Secretary could be very vulnerable in a leadership campaign.
Apart from that there appears to be nobody else. As the Luntz film suggested voters like Alan Johnson’s life-story but he has yet to find out how to inspire. A critical factor is his voice doesn’t sound right - it is not easy on the ear. I think any Johnson challenge is now dead.
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Meanwhile today it is Tony’s turn on the platform and one thing’s for sure - he will at least sound sincere.
Latest leadership betting is here.
Mike Smithson
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Brown has clearly been told lately he needs to smile more, become more human and approachable etc. Doesn’t work for me i’m afraid, he seems quite incapable of seeming a nice bloke, even if he is. It’s important in a politician, especially these days, and will put a lot of people off i suspect.
Of the other possible contenders, Johnson is quite slimy, Reid wholly unpleasant. Brown will surely still win, if only because there’s no-one as impressive as a Cameron in the labour ranks.
test
Mike, I really think that you are Brown’s worst nightmare. Your relentless pursuit of him - I (almost) feel sorry for the man. PB like Newsnight is an ‘influence the influencers’ source. And you keep filleting him…
If he fails to be PM I will consider your blog to be a significant contributing cause. Many thanks from most of us (presumably not the esteemed Roger, sorry Roger).
If Blair sounds sincere to you I feel you need to seek treatment.
4.
That’s not what Mike wrote. He wrote about Brown and his limitations, not about Blair. Sincerity isn’t a zero-sum game.
Blair can “do” sincerity incredibly well. Just because hardened political cynics can see through him every time it doesn’t diminish his ability. Admittedly since Iraq there are a lot of cynics around. But that his more an indication of his past catching up with him. By contrast Brown barely has a “past” as an excuse.
re 3. Notwithstanding my betting I should say that on a personal basis I much prefer Brown to Reid or Johnson and I think that he has done a lot of remarkably good things as Chancellor. His encouragement of enterprise through capital gains relief has been a real boost to job creation - sadly my party, the Lib Dems, want to abolish this.
I think a leader has to be a lot more than a superb strategic manager. He/she needs to be able to elucidate a compelling vision for the party which resonates with the voters. It is this element that I think he lacks.
Who was it who said “if you can fake sincerity, you’ve got it made”…?
We all know that Blair does actually believe in his own “Ess Aitch One Tea” (as my mother used to call it) and this Chérie story is exactly like poor old Jim Callaghan’s “crisis? what crisi?” - neither of them said it, but everyone thinks they should have said it, it fits the script (whilst the truth doesn’t)… it’s this aspect of mass psychology that Brown doesn’t get, because he doesn’t want to get it. Son of the manse, you see, and what’s bred in the bone and all that…
7 - Personally my major worry about Brown is his alleged indecisiveness. Being PM requires a bit more than having 6 months to prepare a budget.
I just heard a female on ‘Today’ from NOP who has been carrying out focus groups for Labour for some time saying that Luntz findings don’t match hers. She found that in matters that concern people Brown scores very well (though his ratings have dipped a little lately) and would be more than a match for Cameron whose satisfaction rating has dropped 12 points since March.
Basically Brown is a strategist to Blair’s tactician. Strategists are fine when everything is calm, but the moment a storm begins to brew a strategist will not respond until it’s too late. What we need is a couple of years of Brownite led calm, and then a quick handover before the waves get too big.
Rather unfortunate that Cherie couldn’t sit quietly and enjoy Gordon’s speech like everyone else. The sooner Tony removes himself and the entire cast from Little Miss Sunshine the better. I always wondered why Cherie allowed Tony to do his Dr Strangelove impersonation during the Lebanese affair. Now I’m beginning to wonder whether she was his inspiration.
10 - Certainly “trust” has always been something Brown has scored highly on.
re 10. clearly she wants to retain her client.
As she has now gone public with the findings and as NOP is a member of the BPC then there under the transparency rules the information has to be made available to those who request it. I bet that that it isn’t.
8. To be fair, we only have a lawyer’s word that she didn’t say it.
I’ve just had a look at the market for Blair leaving and April-June is now out to c2.5 on Betfair, which to me looks like remarkably good value (although I’d put my usual rider about their unclear definition of the exact bet). There’s also £31 available for anyone who can tie up somewhat over three thousand (rules me out) until the end of the month for the July-Sept 2006 period.
Re the Labour leadership, Labour is beginning to look distinctly short of star players. Perhaps this happens to all governments after a while. It’s easier to be maverick or charismatic in opposition, whereas government turns you into another senior manager. Brown’s speech showed his severe limitations on the skills needed to play and act the role of the leader, which is just as important as the ability to actually do the job.
It is not a good morning for the Liberal Democrats either.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-2374847,00.html
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-2374680,00.html
10 Good to hear that last bit. Perhaps the world is taking notice of my campaign to save the world from this monster. Virtually any other politician from any other party would be a better pm than Dave, because he doesn’t really know why he wants the job. Probably thinks it’ll be jolly good on his cv.
I expect that lots of people will believe in Cherie’s alleged remark even though she probably didn’t make it, but they’ll ascribe it to loyalty to her husband. Most people don’t seem to me to find Brown insincere - they might not warm to him especially, but they respect him for the ’solid’ virtues like competence, and integrity is another of them.
If we’re honest we should all accept that we don’t really know how people will feel about GB when (and it really is ‘when’) he’s been PM for a bit. With the Tory policies still shrouded in mystery, and any changes that GB makes also hard to anticipate, politics is very unpredictable at the moment.
As for TB, jon, it misreads him to think he’s insincere. The issue has always been that he is extremely unwilling to do anything he doesn’t believe in (merely because, for instance, it’s popular or colleagues disagree). Most politicians bend with the wind much more readily: TB’s experience has been that you can turn the direction of the wind if you stand up to it.
Mike you are losing me, you seem so sold on Luntz, despite all its obvious set up techniques.
Johnson is very popular in Labour circles, and has a good Union base.
Not sure you are thinking as a Labour activist, you are thinking as Mike.
In the event of some sort of deadlock the dark horse may be Harriet Harman, suspect the Conservatives may find her har to combat.
16 The tape-loop on the PA system is set for today’s speech in Manchester.
‘Everbody-except-Cherie’ are recorded in chorus:
“That’s a lie…..That’s a lie….That’s a lie….”
As for poor Camulodunum, your straw-clutching is of almost Rik-like proportions. The daily Mail, that great lover of lib dems has recognised the true significance of this story and buried on page 16.
Unfortunately I rather suspect that Cherie did make that comment. The fact that she was sufficiently disrespectful that she chose to be walking around when he was making the speech really gives the game away.
I don’t any longer know whether Blair is or isn’t sincere. His decision to side with Bush against the UN in something as simple as asking the Israelis to stop bombing Lebanon showed him to be feeble. Following his leader whatever doesn’t strike me as showing leadership.
18. “As for TB, jon, it misreads him to think he’s insincere. The issue has always been that he is extremely unwilling to do anything he doesn’t believe in”. That’s probably true, but he has a great ability to convince himself of the truth or rightousness of a course of action. His change of espoused policies between 1983 and 1994 is one example - perhaps that was genuine: the world did change a lot in that time. Iraq is another, when the circumstances are a good deal murkier. Brown, to his credit as a man doesn’t seem to have the same lawyer’s flexibility in believing the case (which, though it makes him a less effective tactician, is probably beneficial in the longer term).
The problem though is that that becomes very clear when he does try to do it - as in yesterday’s speech. If Cherie hadn’t made the point (if she did make the point), then someone else would because it was transparently obvious.
10 Roger, there is no ‘clash’ - you are not comparing like with like. The NOP stuff is of ‘overall impression’ to date (ie ‘history’). The Luntz stuff is about ‘immediate impression’ - the sort of thing you’d get in an election campaign and (to a lesser extent) in the media week in week out (ie ‘future’). it seems that Geebee comes off rather worse in the latter, where the populist histrionic Reid (heaven help us) does better.
Mike at 14. I’m trying to find the clip on ‘Today’ which was on between 7 and 7.30. I really need Andrea! Anyway if you can get the figures they would be very interesting particularly for Brown’s supporters. It comprehensively rubbished Luntz.
Nick 18. You are in a difficult position posting under you real name and that is understandable. But the public perception of Gordon, as shown in the polls is that he is not to be trusted. YouGov only this weekend recorded a 45-26 split against the Chancellor on this issue.
http://www.yougov.com/archives/pdf/TEL060101017_1.pdf
As someone who sits for a marginal seat do you think that your chances of holding on next time will be enhanced if Gordon becomes leader?
re 24. One of the endearing characteristics of pollsters is that almost to a man, and they all seem to be male, they rubbish each other in private.
22 “he has a great ability to convince himself of the truth or rightousness of a course of action.”
Almost the classic diagnostic statement in the definition of a Narcissist. And of course the most important first step in the con-man’s mass-delusion persuasion of many others of palpably false things (Emperor’s New Clothes syndrome)
[25] How relevant is what people think about GB as Chancellor when presumably he’ll have been PM for perhaps a couple of years before the next General Election?
It’s an interesting thought experiment to suppose Luntz had been around in 1990 - who’d have got the nod then, out of Heseltine, Major or Hurd? (Well not Hurd, I daresay - he admitted he only stood because he’d've spent the rest of his life kicking himself if he hadn’t.)
I hadn’t thought of Blair vs Brown as tactics vs strategy before this morning’s discussion - it makes a lot of sense, and if Cameron is a Tory Blair it also makes sense for Labour to go for the least Blairite (in this sense) candidate they can find.
25 Mike Interesting poll. Don’t you think it’s significant that only 27% of voters think David Cameron would make the best Prime Minister when 38% support the Tories. We’re not missing the elephant in the room are we?
[20] Probably not, Roger - it’s at least arguable that the Tories won in 1979 in spite of, rather than because of Mrs Thatcher.
29. Not really. Once the ‘don’t know’s’ are stripped out, the figures for who would make the best PM are:
Choice of Blair / Cameron / Campbell
Blair 44%
Cameron 46%
Campbell 10%
Choice of Brown / Cameron / Campbell
Brown 40%
Cameron 48%
Campbell 12%
It’s not a good sign when you start hallucinating elephants!
…before nine in the morning
re 29. Interesting - the 27% was against Blair on 26% and Campbell on 6%. A total 44% said they didn’t know.
Interestingly when Gordon Brown was brought into the equation - same question - Cameron went to 30%, Campbell to 7% and Brown was at 25%. Only two thirds (68%) of the Labour voters in the sample said Brown.
When the question had Blair in it the Prime minster got 81% of Labour voters.
Mike at 26. It was a female pollster Deborah Mattison who said it’s not true that Labour are likely to lose to a Cameron led Tory Party.Cameron she said has lost 12% of his support among women voters since March and on issues that matter…..
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/today/listenagain/
(Press 7.30)
30 And quite likely that, given the Lib Lab pact that had been sustaining Labour in power in 1979, that the Liberals had put themselves out of the game. Tories - as they always do - painted the Liberals as fellow travellers with “the socialists”. And with a desperately unpopular Govt and a country (apparently) riven with public sector strikes - the message got through, with the result that the Liberals were decimated compared to their strong performances in 1974.
Good article as usual Mike. It is the fact that every one believes she could and perhaps should have said that, that keeps that story alive.
It is a bit like the aleged Richard Armatage quote to Musharaf, that if Pakistan did not help they would be bombed back to the stone age. It rings true, regardless of whether it is or not.
Roger @ 29: Voting intention is repercentaged to exclude don’t knows and won’t votes. Prior to that about 29% of people said they would vote Conservative.
The cross breaks of best PM by voting intention are on the tables anyway. Amongst Tory voters 72% think Cameron would make the best PM, 3% Blair and 2% Campbell (the rest don’t know). Amongst Labour voters 81% think Blair would make the best PM, 3% Cameron, 1% Campbell. Amongst Lib Dem voters 30% think Campbell would make the best PM, 10% Blair and 11% Cameron.
Same question but with Brown instead of Blair, amongst Tory voters 76% think Cameron is best (3% Brown, 3% Campbell), Labour voters 68% prefer Brown (6% Cameron, 3% Campbell), Lib Dem voters 30% prefer Campbell (18% Brown, 13% Cameron).
16 - Zebidee - we know you inhabit a parallel universe where Lib Dems can do no wrong but why dont you try reading the stories before you dismiss them.
The Times, no friend of the Conservatives suggests that this will increase pressure on the Lib Dems to repay the donation. Or are you happy to have live off the donation of a proven criminal?
GB’s unspoken problem is his supporters, rather than his enemies.
His critics recognise both his positive and his negative contributions. They’ll detail his various mistakes from their own standpoint (they are his opponents, after all).
But backers of GB can only see his plus points. As far as seeing a weakness, it is never more than in ‘presentation’. And that accords precisely with how GB sees it. A man who’s convinced he’s always right before he has ultimate power. A man with coterie of uncritical admirers, with nobody to tell him when he’s wrong. Where’s the width and breadth?
GB makes a surprisingly high proportion of the cabinet uncomfortable, and not just his competitors for the top job. Much of the public feels the same.
The question of TB’s “sincerity”. Surely the whole New Labour thesis is built on pragmatism - “what works” has been the mantra. A less kind way of putting this is that it is therefore founded on opportunism. And if you listen between the lines of political speeches you can hear the undertones - IMO TB has never “sounded sincere”. I would suggest that GB as a person is a lot more ideologically driven and based, so the “sincere strategy” comes through when he speaks. But he cannot get away from his total and central involvement in the New Lab project.
The Luntz thing last night was fatally flawed because he left out Tony Blair.
I bet if TB had been included the audience would have voted him no 1 by a country mile.
Virtually every leadership giant in recent times has been followed by a pygmy - Churchill - Eden; Macmillan - Douglas Home; Wilson - Callaghan; Thatcher - Major.
Leading the Labour party now is a poison chalice, no wonder it’s such a small field.
Marcus - it’s isn’t really a fatal flaw since Blair isn’t a candidate to succeed himself
Roger/Mike- I’ve listened again, Deborah Mattison worked for Opinion Leader Research, not for NOP.
38 Rik W. Azil Nadir ????????
Step into the Headmasters study again Willis
Bend over … Whack !!!!!!!
35. ‘Tories - as they always do - painted the Liberals as fellow travellers with “the socialists”.
True - but the Liberals did rather leave themselves open to that charge in the late 1970s, didn’t they? and they continue to do so, propping up Labour in Scotland for example. Not to mention accepting refuseniks like Brian Sedgemore.
43 - Jack W - Nadir = not convicted of anything!!!!
Book down trousers!!
37 and 42. Thanks Anthony. Have you come across Deborah Mattison before? She seems to know what she’s talking about don’t you think?
OT but on Cameron’s ratings. This story in the torygraph on cameron’s fellow old etonian facing murder charges and potential death penalty seems to me one of those stories to bubble up and create ripples in the political sphere and places well beyond. If he does go down - widespread sympathy and it softens the accusations of privilige; if he gets off, then just the reverse.
Torygraph
45 Rik W. “Book down trousers!!”
Typical of you Willis! …. trying to avoid punishment. Add to that not carrying out your fagging duties to Heath Senior and avoidance of cold showers over your little majority.
Take a hundred lines :
I luv Lib Dem bar charts and Ming is my poster boy !!
And you boy in the background … Marcus Wood Junior .. stop sniggering in the background about the monarchy !!
46. Nice to think that someone might
40. I don’t think Blair can be criticised for being overly pragmatic in his foreign policy.
In fact if anyone is being pragmatic it has to be Cameron who, in search of votes, has distanced the Conservatives from much that they were formerly identified with. Indeed he appears not to have policies of his own but has devolved the task of developing a programme to the various Commissions. Not necessarily a bad thing AFAIAC - I’ve totally had it with misplaced conviction.
Labour conference….
it seems that yesterday a group of around 20 Blairites Labour members staged a demonstrations in front of NEC members room to ask them to support Tony
At the NEC meetings, they discussed the NEC statements about Pension, Health, Rights to Work and Corporate Liability…the leadership wanted them approved, but some members complained that they popped out of the blue. In the end it was voted (18 vs 13 with Dennis Skinner absents because he’s ill) that a process of consulation with CLPs and unions should take place before agreeing on the final statements.
re 46. Her company does not appear to be listed as a member of the British Polling council but I have made a request for data.
42/46/52. It’s this woman:
http://www.opinionleader.co.uk/contact.php?contactID=8
All this stuff about sincerity and acting strikes me as a bit odd.
Surely it’s in the nature of the job that politicians have to be able to act? TB has never struck me as being a particularly good actor. I cringe when he goes into his ‘Trust Me’ routine. Nor is Brown any better. Watch Rory Bremner and the way he picks up on that tongue into the bottom lip thing. ‘By little things shall I know thee’.
It all rather reminds me of a remark Roosevelt is said to have made to Orson Welles when they met after the President watched the actor at work:
“I always thought I was the best actor in the world, until I saw you perform”.
Roosevelt was such a consummate actor that few members of the public even realised he was disabled. Did it make him any less of a President? Did it heck.
46 I’ve heard of her before, but can’t remember where.
Roger/Mike - I have a suspicion that she was talking generally, rather than from her own research, the figures she mentioned seem to be in line with MORI’s crossbreaks.
52. So she’s not from NOP as claimed - Cherie will be on “liar watch” - roger beware.
Luntz opened his little experiment by saying, all the people involved were, ‘From the London area’ So much for the empirical standard. I was amazed by some of the answers, Brown was not chosen because he was a Scot, Reid was chosen because he was a Scot. Is there an agency called ‘Rent-A-Cretin’ obviously Luntz has an account there.
54.”TB has never struck me as being a particularly good actor.”
He looks like a soap actor (all the pauses whilst talking, the look, the voice…)…which I suppose it’s good to reach a certain type of audience
Meanwhile … a little straw in the political wind is the almost cringeworthy praise of Gordon in the leader comment of the “Daily Mail”
Now, it’s no secret that Dacre is decidedly luke warm on Cameron, but the prospect of the “Daily Mail” going all ga ga over the Baldwinesque figure of Gordon will set alarm bells ringing in the Blue corner.
54. Peter - yes Blair is no Larry Olivier. But to a public brought up on the kind of ham acting seen in soaps, he probably appears quite passable. Brown, by contrast, cannot even aspire to that debased standard.
To me, Cherie’s remarks damage Cherie rather than Brown, it just reminds me of her previous. Watching the conference coverage on TV yesterday, as far as I could see everyone else was behaving themselves. I agree with Nick Palmer that we don’t know how people will feel about GB until he’s been PM for a bit.
Mike,
Your suggestion that the Johnson challenge is now `dead’ because Luntz found that 30 people in a room - who spent a lot of time hearing Reid be tough on crime - do not like his voice is ludicrous. The key problems for Johnson are that he is not known and lacks substance. With the right campaign both can change. If the only two options were Brown and Johnson what would they have said?
re 60. It’s an intriguing thought but could we see that almost all the national papers at the next election doing the opposite of what they did last time. The Guardian and Indy have been pretty pro-Cameron of late while the biggest nest of Cameron-haters is at the Telegraph.
“Now, it’s no secret that Dacre is decidedly luke warm on Cameron, but the prospect of the “Daily Mail” going all ga ga over the Baldwinesque figure of Gordon will set alarm bells ringing in the Blue corner”
Yes Jack, but it will be good fun nevertheless watching the mental gymnastics of the centre-left trying to justify why the Mail is a good thing all of a sudden. Likewise the Tories coming to love Monbiot and co as suggested by Mike.
Oops, b*ggered up the italics a bit in the last one. Sorry
59. Yes Andrea. I don’t like soaps but obviously many people do.
61. PM - As I said, Brown doesn’t strike me as a particular good actor either.
64 Mike S. I doubt it. Both the Gruntfutock and the Indy have overwhelmingly anti Tory readership. More likely I think that their coverage and perhaps that of the “Mail” will be more balanced and less aggresively anti than in the past.
As for the “Torygraph” …. well it’s the birthright of every reader to vote Conservative, but perhaps a little lukewarm in 2009 ?!?!
The situation with newsapers is amazing! As ideology dies as a reason for voting, we are moving into personality politics. Newpapers are looking at types and lifestyles as a reason to vote for someone. The Independent and Guardian like Cameron because he’s their sort of person. The Mail and Telegraph hate him because he is not their sort of person. The anti-Cameron brigade are now led by Heffer/Phillips/Hitchens they hate Cameron, no one on the left hates Cameron like they do, most people on the Liberal/Left are either supportive or indifferent they don’t hate him with the sort of fervour Heffer/Phillips/Hitchens do.
Incidentally, did all you Newsnight watchers last night stay with it through the Paxman discussion following Luntz? I thought Kavanagh’s attitude was interesting. It seemed to me he was signalling the Sun is likely to be much more hostile to Brown (and presumably a Brown-led Party) than it was to Blair. That would seem to me perfectly consistent with the paper’s previous form.
65 Stephen B. Please replace that paddle like wooden spoon in the kitchen !
BTW …. how are things Inverness way ??
re 63. The Luntz conclusion on Johnson was backed up by the report of ICM online focus group that was published yesterday.
It may sound ludicrous to you but my view is that the sound of a politician’s voice is critical to their electability. In my judgement Blair, Reid, Cameron and Ming have good ones and that has helped them enormously. I can hear what these four say and it is easy on the ear. Johnson and Gordon are not in that class.
70. Yes I spotted that from Kavanagh too - a definite sense that the Sun will not be enthusiastic at all about Brown. I think they might well like Reid though…
67. Blair will apparently say this line this afternoon:
“The core vote of this party is not the heartlands or the inner city or any sectional interest or lobby. Our core vote is the country.”
I can already picture him saying the last part with a “I can almost cry for the depth of my thinking and my attention for the country” look….it’s better I just read his speech and listen to it. I’m probably the only person who finds his speeches better when I read it (for ex that sentence is good) instead of listening them
72.”I can hear what these four say and it is easy on the ear. Johnson and Gordon are not in that class. ”
I usually have problems to understand Scottish politicians speaking. I can quite understand Brown compared to Salmond or Nicola Sturgeon (yesterday after Brown’s speech Sky interviewed Alexander and I had more problems to understand it than Brown).
Actually the easiest politician to understand IMO is Patricia Hewitt…… not sure if it’ll help her electability though….
The decision as to whether the Sun supports Brown or not, wil not be taken by Trevor Kavanagh,I think we all know who will make that decision. If Brown continues to support the US in the war-on-terror etc, the Sun will give him wholehearted support. Cameron has been a little wobbly in that direction, Rupert the Sun King will not like that.
Brown was much better with Marr last week.
Worth noting that Thatcher had a bad reputation initially in front of the camera. She did alot of work once PM and turned out to do OK in the media.
Media presentaion can be worked on. Politcal substance, intellect and integrity cannot. As a result Brown edges it for me.
** O/T Is it just sinking in to others that Blair is really going? His leaving is going to change everything in politics **
70. I can’t see the Sun being too keen on a Cameron lead Conservative party either, and they are certainly not going to go pro LD any time soon! I wonder which way the paper will end up facing?
78. They’ll back who is more likely to win…if it’s neck and neck, I don’t know.
60 - Jack, Gordon Brown may be many things to many people
but being a modern day Stanley Baldwin ain’t one of ‘em.
79. No, Andrea, I cannot agree with that. The Sun will want to see a continuation of this country’s Altanticist policies. It will also oppose increases in taxes and public spending. I am sure the latter will cause it to oppose Brown. I am also sure an astute jounalist like Kavanagh will have worked that out for himself. It would hardly be necessary for his boss to point it out to him.
I’m still stuck in the deserts of Anatolia. Feeling quite melancholy and homesick, and bored of Ramadan already.
And then I read about Cherie’s remarks.
Ha. Ha ha haha haahahahaha HAH. HAHhahahaha. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!
Thankyou Mrs Blair, thankyou.
81.”It will also oppose increases in taxes and public spending.”
but Brown has more or less been the decision making of those things as Chancellor in those years. And The Sun continued to back Labour.
If Labourn is 10% ahead, I doubt that the Sun will back the tories in the end…unless they elect McDonnell* as leader, but it’s unlikely (both that they elect him or that they’re 10% ahead with him)
* McDonnell will probably dislike Mandelson even more:
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/labourleadership/story/0,,1881113,00.html
First defeat on the conference floor. Delegates backed a motion criticizing of key planks of the government’s pensions policy (the raise of state pensions age to 68 and delay restoring the link between pensions and earnings). It was tabled by GMB (it welcomed some parts of the White Paper though, so it wasn’t an all negative motion)
Jack - all is well in the North - we continue to enjoy the sight of our Lib Dem MP arguing that fuel should be cheaper while suporting his party’s policy to make it more expensive to drive…
Off to Saxa Vord in the fair County of Zetland (or ‘Island of the Cat People’as it was apparently known to the Gaels)this weekend - it seems like the kind of place one could bump into SeanT but I notice that he is detained elsewhere.
Stephen B, ave!
Yes I am in Turkish Kurdistan, which, despite being the scene of a secessionist terrorist campaign for the last forty years, seems a lot less savage than the Labour Party Conference.
I’m here looking for the Garden of Eden. Apparently its a minibus ride out of town.
In fact - hush hush - I went there yesterday and saw remarkable things. The stuff they are digging up here - in front of my very eyes! - makes the opening of Tutankhamun’s tomb look drearily predictable.
All will be revealed, I hope, in the Sunday Telegraph, around 8th October. Or maybe 15th, depending on media embargoes.
But now I just want to come home. Enough kebabs already.
I’ve now tracked down the polling that was referred to on the Today programme and which was discussed earlier in the thread. It was by Mori for the Fawcett Society.
The main other pollsters, including YouGov and ICM, are finding that there is more support from women for the Tories than from men.
In the latest YouGov poll women went C41-L29-LD18 . Men went C36-L33-LD18. so there’s a 12 point gap with women but only a three point gap with men.
On “who do you think would make the best PM?” men went Cameron 29, Brown 33, Campbell 9. With women it was Cameron 27, Brown 21, Campbell 6.
Mike, as a Lib Dem are you disturbed with the amount of ridicule voters have for your leader?? People hold Campbell in such low regard it is untrue
80 John O. Well, Gordon is hardly Lloyd George either !
85 Stephen B. Saxa Vord eh !! …. the very tip of Rule Britania. I visited the veritable bird colony and RAF base a few times. Not exactly the Big Apple.
re 88. If you can survive having Jeremy Thorpe as leader you can survive anything.
Mike Smithson 7.
Taper relief does not boost job creation, or if it does, then only marginally.
On the other hand, increasing Employer’s National Insurance from 10% to 12.8% since 1997 (as Gordon Brown has done) has increased the cost of labour, so all things being equal, destroys jobs.
91 - Love the line ‘increases the cost of labour’. How true
88. Which people, Antony? You including me in that?
Jack W - I submit the following from Iain Dale’s blog in my defence m’lud:
“The Times questions this morning whether the 2.4 million pound donation to the LibDems by convicted perjurer Michael Brown was permissable under Electoral Commission rules. Three of the four investors in 5th Avenue Partners were foreign, which raises the possibilty that the LibDems were in effect given a foreign donation. This is The Times’s speculation, not mine.
These four investors, who include former Man United chairman Martin Edwards, believe it was their money which Brown donated and they want it back. However, the LibDems have spent the money and couldn’t pay it back even if they felt morally obliged to - which they don’t.
The next stage is for the four investors to launch a court action against the LibDems. Watch this space.”
88. I don’t think people hold Ming in ridicule. It’s just that he’s sometimes ignored. If people maybe don’t like him, I think they don’t dislike him either. If other leaders create strong emotions (in one sense or the other), Ming probably doesn’t.
95 - I agree with that Andrea. I’m sure many people think he is a fine politician - just not a particularly good leader.
Rik don’t get excited. If the worse comes to the worse the membership will be asked to meet the debt, people paying as they felt fit, some might contribute the odd bob or two, others hundreds, maybe thousands.
This was all in the press, public and contained in official part statements.
The Times have a thing about this issue and keep suggesting a terrible problem for the Lib Dems, when in fact it is not.
O/T but at the NEC meeting on 21st Sept the Labour General Secretary said that the Leadership election was budgeted for 2007 calendar year and not 2006.
Looks like I lose my 2006 bet…..
Marcus 14.
You are right, Luntz would have been much more fun had he included Tony Blair. Perhaps that is the elephant in the room, why on earth is he standing down?
John Major & cabinet were not pygmies. They were quiet unassuming chaps who did a pretty good job without too much fanfare and under awful pressure from “b*stards”.
Would TB have the nerve to “do a Major” and just resign as leader of his party and put himself up for re-election (while holding on to office of PM?). Major’s finest hour!
Local elections last week were, I thought, very good for Labour.
Took on the Lib Dems at Oxford and the Conservatives at Hyndburn, good wins both.
Couple of interesting ones in the North West again this week, especially the Lib Dem seat at Rossendale. I sense Labour coming back after their poor time through August and early September.
94 Rik W. I notice you failed to do your lines Willis.
Tuck your shirt in boy …. and the book goes down the back of your trousers, not the front.
Now, you’re compounding your offences by sicking up the gossip of Dale Senior from the 6th Form Common Room.
What we’re really looking for Willis is for you to snitch on that Nadir boy, who seems to have left the School grounds 13 years ago !!
97 - david(s) - it takes a lot more than that to get me excited!
101 -
100 the Oxford result was certainly good for Labour. But the Hyndburn result showed a further swing from Labour compared to May.
99 - Absolutely right. I have and always will hold JM in the highest regard.
The world doesn’t “know” that Brown was behind the coup against Blair - the instigator Bryant is a Blairite and has denied any collusion with Brown people. If the coup wasn’t very broadly based, there is no way Blair would have capitulated and announced a departure deadline.
As to the question “why remove Blair then” - for the same reason Kennedy was removed: because Blair has been cocking up. We’re at 31/32 in the polls because of Blair’s mistakes all summer. The rest of the govt (bar Charles Clarke before he was removed) has pretty much done their jobs properly. Despite Blair’s “good communication skills”, the public arn’t listening to him any more, they are tuning him out - because they don’t believe he is sincere.
Gordon Brown comes across much better in the sincerity stakes. To us women, he’s the more dependable character and less likely to do wild things a la Blair.
70, 76, maybe he’s just a good actor, but Trevor Kavanagh seemed to be much more switched on than Steve Richards or Paxo.
Maybe TK is buoyed by the knowledge that he alone can actually do something to affect the result of the next General Election, and for the time being he’ll play off DC against GB.
[105] Snowflake alleges the rest of the govt (bar Charles Clarke before he was removed) has pretty much done their jobs properly - does this include the inadequate kit provided to our forces in Afghanistan and the decision to impose censorship on what they’re doing there..?
105-snowflakes
‘Gordon Brown comes across much better in the sincerity stakes’
Are you being serious,why is it that not many people seem to share your view?
Surely its just a case of things can only get bitter.
x07. New kit has been ordered for the men in Afghanistan.
x09 - Shouldn’t they have had the kit.. you know.. when the war was actually being fought?!?!
BTW, this is what the New York Times Editorial for Friday 22th Sept had to say:
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/22/opinion/22fri3.html?n=Top%2fOpinion%2fEditorials%20and%20Op%2dEd%2fEditorials
But those words no longer describe the prime minister himself. His luster has faded, a victim of too many years in the spotlight and too many egregious misrepresentations over Iraq. His hold over the electorate, the Labor Party and even his own cabinet colleagues is slipping fast. It is time for Mr. Blair to move on, preferably before the end of this year.
I know Blair is hanging on because he thinks he has lots of work to do - but he hasn’t the political capital to achieve it, everyone can see that, even people across the Atlantic.
105 “To us women, he’s the more dependable character and less likely to do wild things a la Blair.”
Wasn’t Blair the key factor in swinging the female vote to Labour in 1997? And could Cameron not be a key factor in swinging the female vote back to the Tories?
Cameron is well ahead among female voters in the polls, I don’t see that changing if Brown is elected Labour leader.
100. Might that Oxford result also have been affected by the contest taking place outside term time?
x10. They went in as peace-keepers. Peace-keepers require different kit to soldiers in combat situations. It’s only now that the NATO high command have changed the rules of engagement and changed the nature of the mission. I might remind you that this is a NATO operation, not a British operation. The NATO generals decide the mission, and defence ministers (British, Canadian, Dutch etc) stay out of the operational decisions. Can you imagine the chaos if all the defence ministers in NATO were micro-managing?
111. Snowflake, so you too accept that Blair is guilty of ‘egregious misrepresentations’ (translation: lies) over Iraq?
If so, this is good and exciting news. If even the most hysterical cheerleaders for NuLabour (translation: you) are now admitting that New Labour lied over Iraq, perhaps we are getting somewhere.
x14 Since the war fist started there were complaints of equipment failures, this is not something new and no matter what you say they are in a combat zone and deserve to have kit that is going to protect them.
109 - what kit snowflake??? They have been out there fighting for months already?
There is insufficient and inadequate body armour, too few helicopters, too few armoured LandRovers (most of them are in Iraq) and too few men. If the govt is going to address all of these shortfalls I look forward to a major increase in the Defence budget!
I wonder if the ’scum’ Sun’s market share will decline if it continually supports Labour? It is the most Anglophobic and deceptive hypocritical paper I have ever come across - pretending to be right wing and patriotic, however the exact opposite is true pro USA, pro Israel, pro Freemason ,etc.
112. Labour did get a lot of female votes in 1997 - whether this was specifically to do with Blair is a moot point. Women give very high priority to jobs, housing etc - things the Tories had failed on, and this is as likely as anything else to have swung the female vote.
There are lots of men pontificating about what they believe women vote for, and whom they they think women find attractive. eg a few days ago you were all convinced that women found Alan Johnson attractive, and wouldn’t believe this woman when she said she thought he was too gray and 1960’s. Ditto Blair and Cameron - they are too slick for women’s tastes. Mr Brown is dependable, Mr Campbell is dependable. Mr Cameron and Mr Blair are not.
118 francis. You forget “Sun” readers don’t care who runs the country, as long as she’s got big knockers !!
118. Time for today’s comedy turn I see.
119 - So why does Cameron poll better amongst women than men. You seem to be in complete denial of all the polling evidence.
Very few British politicians can do sincerity. But then, very few Brits can do sincerity. We sneer that the Americans can’t do irony, but irony is so firmly embedded in the British language (as opposed to the English language - i.e. the way the British talk to one another) that we find it very difficult to say things and sound like we mean them. And it’s so firmly embedded in the British language that our ears hear irony when it isn’t there. I was on a course once that an American was taking, and I came in one morning full of cold. This American’s comment on the matter was “I feel bad for you because you got sick”; a straight, sincere comment such as this isn’t something you’d expect to hear from a Brit, and I was mentally searching for a moment for the barb.
This is why we mock Tony Blair when he tries to over-egg the pudding with his dramatic pauses. If a British politician wants to sound sincere, the best he can hope for is angry or boring.
118 - pro-Freemason? I’ve missed the Sun’s detailed take on the merits of freemasonry. Fascinating.
x15 SeanT - I voted LibDem as a protest in 2005 - I thought everyone on here knew that.
I’m a Gordon brown fan - on the economics, Labour has been well-nigh perfect, better than any other British govt in decades. Tories don’t get this, because their brains are too small, a flaw which also contributed to them causing the severe recession of 1992, and which will likely contribute to them causing recessions in the future, which is why they must never be allowed back into govt. Of course if they purge all the writers and PR guys and get in some scientists and economists, they might have a chance
38/94:
Rik’s at it again (what a surprise). Rik, what about your former colleague and Reading East Tory MP’s agent who’s just been convicted of driving while three times over the limit, crashing his car then fleeing the scene?
(And you did say that one of them was an ex chairman of ManYoo PLC. I rest my case)
122. Max, polling evidence means nothing when set against a narcissistic belief that all reasonable people must by definition have similar views to oneself. Surely you have been reading this site long enough to have worked this out - there are plenty of other examples of this syndrome every day.
122. Agreed. Blair circa 1997 and Cameron now are more attractive than Major, Blair now, or Brown (or Campbell for that matter!) to female voters.
Brown has is boring, not personable, isn’t media friendly and doesn’t do the family-man thing well
Cameron, much as I hate to say it, is interesting, is personable, is a skilled media performer, is interested in issues which go down well with female voters (such as the environment) and does the family-man thing very well.
125. Well well. I didn’t know that. It’s good to have it on record. You, with your New Labour pompoms and your Gordon Brown ra ra skirt, agree that New Labour lied to take us to war.
Quite frankly, compared to this - lying to take a country to war, a war which has led to 7000 deaths in Iraq in the last eight weeks - everything else is pretty small beer. Even Brown’s, ahem, ‘near perfect’ economic record. LOL.
Iraq is why Blair is having to resign prematurely. Blair resigning prematurely is why Labour is lost in bloody civil war. This civil war will lead to Labour’s certain defeat at the next G/E.
Ergo, Iraq will give the Tories victory at the next G/E. A rich irony.
I see that Marcus has now changed his line on the question of republicanism - obviously got at by the Tory big-wigs.
That is the problem with the Tories They do need to be told constantly what the latest Tory line is. And with their policy of Chameronism - thinking two contradictory things simultaneously - there is always the risk of leaning too far in one direction.
So now Marcus has re-invented himself as a republican-monarchist. That makes sense, in Chameronian Tory terms.
But the upside is that presumably Marcus can now safely ignore the letter from the Chairman of the Torbay Tories.
118. Francis, you should try Bildzeitung! OK, it’s German but you don’t have to know German to read it.
In fact, you don’t have to be able to read to ‘read’ it.
113. Yes.
131. The reference to freemasons suggests ‘Volkischer Beobachter’ might be more appropriate German reading material.
129 Iraq yet again.
Honestly, not sure that they did lie. I reckon that Blair genuinely thought there were weapons. At worst naive and incompetant. Not a liar.
I also question the people who did nothing after the 1988 massacre, created a strong Iraq to balance Iran and okayed the selling of arms that are being used today.
They sowed the seeds of today’s mess, not Blair.
Right war, wrong time, wrong reason, wrong coloured helmet.
120. ““Sun” readers don’t care who runs the country, as long as she’s got big knockers !! ”
Jack, http://www.political.co.uk/annwiddecombe/images/out60.jpg
133 - I expect Francis devours the Protocols of the Elders avidly.
x26 - readingliberal - you are a crashing bore of the highest order. Everybody on this board is able to provie dozens of links that show councillors and activists of all parties doing stupid and illegal things (and being caught). It isn’t confined to the Tories. Perhaps you’d like to comment on the LibDems up in court for producing dodgy proxy vote forms? No? Thought not.
122. It’s been known to take a woman a while to realise that a man’s stringing her along…
134. Yes, tsk tsk, bad old me for bringing up Iraq again. I mean, only 7000 people died in the last two months, not like it’s important, can’t we get on to serious stuff, like whether Tony hates Gordon’s new curtains, or whether Gordon ate Cherie’s polenta back in 1998..
Iraq is the subtext to almost everything unfolding on the British political scene today. Blair’s resignation is a long-delayed blowback from Shock and Awe and the aftermath.
And yes, of course Blair lied, he lied he lied he lied. The only way you can claim he didn’t lie is to claim that he believed his own lies, like a snake-oil salesman so puffed up with sincerity he really thinks his snake-oil really does cure cancer.
The fact remains, the snake oil doesn’t cure cancer. It’s a lie to say it does.
Blair lied about Iraq.
Rik W 117, to be fair it’s an equation with two unknowns.
One view is there is not enough kit in Afghanistan. The other is that there is enough kit but too many soldiers.
Snowflake5 119, how about Alan Milburn? My wife says they all make her sick and refuses to be drawn into respective sex-appeal of various frontrunners.
Snowflake5 125.
Gordon Brown’s record on the economy has been absolutely disastrous. Any objective research will tell you that. It amazes me that people fall for this “good substance, poor image” routine; it is in itself just an image!
It is the finest scam ever pulled, this routine of “Yes, people hate me, but that’s only because I’m about substance not personality”. Wrong, Gordon! We hate you because your policies are rubbish, you are a deceitful, lying, bullying hyocrite who couldn’t care less about enybody but himself.
That said, I quite liked what he was doing up to 2001 and voted for Labour quite happily that year. It was only in 2001 that he performed a 180 degree volte face full on vaulting U-turn.
29,
Dream on, foreign policy gives you election win, should have done in 05 if you were correct.
Conservatives will win because of Cameron becoming all Liberal, which you will eventualy despise, and probably do now.
However you are so desperatley partisan at the moment your past caring.
141. Clearly, it’s not Iraq that will directly hand victory to the Tories - it’s the blowback. Labour are, in effect, sacking their most successful leader ever - and replacing him with a notably inferior, greyer, sadder accomplice - and why? Iraq.
And Cameron will beat Brown, as I think we all know.
So you see: it’s indirect.
Not sure if I am ‘desperately partisan’ at the moment. I will confess I am hugely enjoying the sheer spectacle of Labour’s implosion. Now I see why lefties wet themselves when Thatcher fell.
142. “Labour are, in effect, sacking their most successful leader ever - and replacing him with a notably inferior, greyer, sadder accomplice - and why? Iraq.”
That’s very true - as the latest polls on Blair seem to emphasise.
38 - Rik - the fact that the Times ASSERTS that the Lib Dems may come under pressure to repay this money doesn’t alter the FACT that the Electoral Commission already accepted that the party acted in good faith when it accepted the money.
The real contrast is between the Lib Dems who properly reported these donations and interest on the realtively small number of non-commercial loans they have recieved, and your lot who are still refusing to disclose details of who laoned them massive wads of cash.
100 - Labour deliberatly fought the Oxford campaign on purely local issues and the record of their local candidate, who was also involved in the local residents and tenenats association.
They (sensibly) avoided any mention of national issues.
Guido is reporting there is another source for the Cherie ‘comment’…
Seant,
I agree Cameron will beat Brown.
However can`t get my head around that Conservatives agree with his positioning at the moment.
As I said, think most are in desperation mode , like Labour were in 94, and will put up with about anything as long as he supplies victory.
Once that victory has been achieved, I expect a lot less Liberal, and more blue water.
This is what most on the right are secretley hoping, however I hope he is true to his word, but have my doubts, as many do.
I wonder why there’s so much bad blood towards that nice Mr Luntz chap amongst Labour supporters on here? Is it because they “blame” him for starting the Cameron bandwagon rolling when they were hoping they’d get someone unelectable like Davis? Or because he’s now telling them the truth that none of them want to believe - ie, what every other pollster is finding, namely that Labour is on a loser if they pick Brown as Leader?
Or is it the beard that does it? (I thought he looked like a Lib Dem to be honest)
I thought his experiment last night on Newsnight seemed perfectly reasonable, non-leading, and clearly set out