The limits of going negative for Labour
James Forsyth 7:04pm
Many people in the Westminster Village will tell you that Labour’s last best chance is to personally attack David Cameron. The theory is that if you can take down Cameron, the Tories will fold. But when you ask about what Labour should go negative on you receive pretty weak answers involving the Bullingdon, Eton or White’s. The, predictable, aim would be to paint Cameron as out of touch or a sexist. But neither of these attacks strikes me as likely to be effective.
First, the out of touch line has been tried already and hasn’t hit home, just turning up the volume won’t make it effective. Also, the fact that Cameron has spent more time inside NHS hospitals in the last few years gives him an emotionally powerful response to the charge that he is out of touch. The sexist thing hasn’t yet really been tried but having been a member of men only establishment is hardly proof that you’re a misogynist whatever the Mirror might say. The charge also doesn’t seem credible when you consider that Cameron is married to a career woman who is, probably, the main family bread–winner.
If Labour’s sole aim is to take down Cameron they would have to launch a campaign of the same-level of viciousness, and with the same relationship to the truth, as the one against John McCain in South Carolina in 2000. Now I think that Labour would baulk at launching that kind of assault. But even if they didn’t, there is simply no distribution network for these type of attacks in Britain. As it is, railing against Cameron for having gone to Eton and joined the Bullingdon while the country goes into recession is just going to make Labour look rather pathetic.
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Alex
September 4th, 2008 7:55pm Report this commentMaybe Labour should concentrate on running the country (rather than attacking the opposition)? Afterall, they are the Government, aren't they?
... just a thought
maas101
September 4th, 2008 8:16pm Report this commentAlex,
"...just a thought"
Therein lies your problem with this government. Thought is not high on their list of priorities, keeping their noses in the trough is.
mitch
September 4th, 2008 8:27pm Report this commentsimply put..... no one could be worse than brown.I dont care if cameron eats babies if he will rid us of brown.
Does anyone think that in a few years they might say"I wish gordon was still in charge"?
Verity
September 4th, 2008 8:28pm Report this commentI dunno. Anything that gets rid of David Cameron works for me.
Tom Freeman
September 4th, 2008 9:03pm Report this commentHas attacking a party leader ever worked without the press enthusiastically taking part or even leading the charge? Not that I can recall. Are they likely to weigh in against Cameron all of a sudden? I don't see it happening.
Oscar
September 4th, 2008 9:23pm Report this commentMaybe Brown should appoint Verity to advise him on how to mount effective personal attacks.
Mike, Brighton
September 4th, 2008 9:27pm Report this commentI agree with Mitch. I'd vote for Beelzebub if he was in with a chance and would get rid of Brown. In this case it's Cameron and whatever his flaws they are insignificant compared to to ziggurat of flaws Brown possesses
Nicholas
September 4th, 2008 10:02pm Report this commentMuch as I despair of the Cameron Tories my enemy's enemy is my friend. The priority now is the absolute defeat of Brown and New Labour so that the quasi-East German swine can never again gain power in Britain. Every Labour seat lost is a blow for lost liberty and Britannia. Pulverise them.
John
September 4th, 2008 11:05pm Report this commentGood God. Is Verity still in the land of the living?
Hugh
September 5th, 2008 9:39am Report this commentSurely the point is that Cameron has forged a cabinet in waiting, including two, Hague and Duncan-Smith who are former leaders. They know collectively what a pass the labour party have brought us to again, and they also know what a painful business recovery is going to be.
They also know that we cannot afford the personality politics which Brown and Blair practised, now we no longer have self-sufficiency in hydrocarbons, or most other things for that matter.
The Conservatives have competence and defence in depth again. The electorate is not stupid, they enjoy the good times but they will shoulder the burden again when asked, and will remember who said he had abolished the economic cycle, and then acted so imprudently, and they will punish him for it.
We must not let them forget.
The Wordsmith
September 5th, 2008 11:26am Report this comment"Labour’s last best chance is to personally attack David Cameron."
Tsk,Tsk!
Quite apart from the abhorrent splitting of the infinitive, even in its present form it does not mean what I suspect is intended: 'to personally attack' is the equivalent of '...for one to attack David Cameron".
This is a mess grammatically. It should read: "...to attack David Cameron personally" thus telling the reader clearly who is meant to be the object of the attack and how (in distinction to, say, 'politically') it is to be done.
You have been visited by a Grammar Vigilante
Gordon Musgo-Soon
September 5th, 2008 7:19pm Report this commentThe most negative thing about DC is that he's too like NuLab. Hard to see how they are going to use that. If they think personal attacks on him will work with the uncommitted, no matter how well it goes down with the faithful, well, they really are as stupid as I supposed.
Frank Pulley
September 6th, 2008 5:11pm Report this commentCameron should not go negative on Brown - he should go nuclear! Perhaps when the children go back to school, eh? After all there's no hurry, is there? Slump, property crash, the Russian Bear growling, the Yellow Peril smiling like the cat that stole the cream, the US in dire danger of falling to the black supremicists; the energy companies gouging the punters; old people living on porridge; politicians who should be doing porridge living on the fat of the land - no! No hurry David, just you enjoy your hard-earned rest. We've got two more years of cultural destruction and economic decay; classic scorched earth from a defeated political experiment; self defeated that is; very little of the collapse of NuLab can be attributed to the Snories! Wake up at the back there and live up to your name of HM Opposition, you young pups.
Verity
September 6th, 2008 9:17pm Report this commentA fine call to rally, Frank P, but Cameron isn't the right stuff. Anyone who has a windmill on his roof is not the right stuff. He's a socialist who will fiddle with the curtains and get the political furniture replaced with something more tasteful, but he hasn't got the fire. And he hasn't got the idea. He believes that going into Europe is a good idea.
Have we ever heard a peep out of him on immigration? Probably not. And that would be because he believes that former colonials and the inexplicable Somalis have a "right" to occupy our land.
Is he going to stop taxpayer-funded money for second and third "wives" as long as the "marriage" was contracted in a country where bigamy is legal? That's what we want to know.
Is he going to ge the paedophiles, with all their slavvering interest in introducing children to sex, out of the classroom "sex education" industry? Is he going to get rid of pretend policemen? Is he going to kick out the "politically correct" pandering police chiefs and put real chiefs in? Is he going to allow the voters to choose their own police chiefs?
Dave's all broad strokes. All fur coat and no knickers.
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