The Brown speech was a retreat to safety. There was nothing about tax which is the electoral touchstone ( See Lib Dem bounce and the electrifying effect of IHT reform by Osbourne ). A few welfare baubles thrown out ,with National debt in the state it is in, looked like inappropriate clowning .The sub-text was yet more tax and borrowing .I am going on the reviews, but academies ,welfare to work , and other mini steps to modernity seem to have been shelved .This was Old Labour .Brown’s attention should have been on the tax payer woo-ed by Blair .In fact did nothing to allay fears that his accession would be their financial death warrant (. He may not be in a position to any more.) Public Sector union bosses smiled like hungry Lions,and wildebeest voters will spring in the opposite direction.
It was a political ‘Princess and The Pea’ moment ...(bear with me )....The story of ‘The Princess and the Pea.”, is a version of Cinderella , a narrative endlessly re-worked from King Lear to Pride and Prejudice . It dramatizes a persistent human dream......“ If you knew who I really was then you would love me”. The heroine reveals her true self and is rewarded by love allowing the reader to indulge child like wishes suppressed in adulthood .
Under stress there is a tendency to indulge vestigial infant. The Conservative Party did it by returning to their deepest prejudices when confronted with rejection. They said ...”No no ....this is me ...surely now you love me ... the real me “. No-one did . The Labour Party are doing the same. They cannot believe that they, the real Labour Party, are unpopular .It must be a matter of ‘presentation’. Brown was played to child-like denial and will shore up his position as IDS did, alienating everyone else along the way
For Political Parties ,and for us all ,the lesson that it is we that must change not the world is a hard one . It is one the Labour Party are ,as yet, unable to face, and by this choice they have doomed themselves to defeat.
8 comments:
His speech started out well I thought, no really. Then around the time he mentioned the NHS it started to get into cloud cuckoo land. And ultimately I zoned out. Did I miss anything? He outlawed child poverty didn't he?
And I don't like IDS. Never did.
Never underestimate a quiet man.
Yeah.
He outlawed child poverty didn't he?
I think being unhappy in anyway is now against the law
I watched it last night and though all I heard was 'Spend Spend Spend' when you analysed it the actual spending commitments were lacking - it was a typical piece of well-crafted Brown bullshit, promising the world and delivering nothing.
And as for enshrining an end to child poverty in law .... no Act is binding on a successor Parliament. No doubt Cameron will quietly absorb a changed 'obligation' in new bit of Tory legislation.
no Act is binding on a successor Parliament
It is unless they change the law surely
cutting CO2 emissions is somehow to be 'enshrined in law' too, and it's meaningless
(except of course that a catastrophic downturn in the economy will achieve it anyway, just as with E.Europe in the 90's)
Yes Nick I am greatly looking forward to my green career as a hunter gathering nomad.
Love the piccy.
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