Blair's contempt for the left

Robert Taggart

Bliar has contempt for the left ?
He be not alone !
As for contempt for Bliar... do not get us started !

PayDirt

I have never read politian's memoirs, but perhaps I'll buy his book. I could not stand him as PM, he always made my flesh creep. I had a premonition he would end in disaster, though I did not guess it would be Iraq. Perhaps I was too harsh on him as PM and should have rather vented my anger on his Socialist Party, though of course Iraq is always his alone. His spineless party did not stop him.

Vulture

'What a weirdo'... but slimy Bliar was only the warm-up act. The weirdo preceded a complete raving lunatic.

lola

Gordon Bennett! I'm dumbfounded.

politicsForTheYoung

Let us be clear, do you really think anyone who aspires to be a PM is normal, whatever that means or has ever meant.
It is a job few of us would ever like to have. Those attracted to it know how the story ends, always sad. But still they wish to do it. Such persons have many things wrong with them, as much as is right about them, as does any of us. Funnily enough it is probably the wrong things that can often fuel the right things, and in reverse. Anger can be strength. Ruthless can be decisive. Silence can be combative. etc
The point is, no one has the qualities we want in a PM, except a God. So let us critique those who have the misfortune to be a PM, hold them to account on an intellectual level. Personality flaws and all, some fool has to do the job. Do you want it? Your answer is probably No!

andrew

"the Gordon curse was to make these people co-conspirators"

Did he steal that line from guido fawkes????

Stuart Seacole Smith

Weirdo or no, makes me wonder whether Blair might make a more suitable Spectator journalist than a number of the limp-wristed liberals it's got now!

Yam Yam

I always thought it was a desperate shame that 'Spitting Image' went off air at about the same time New Labour came to power. Then again, the Blair Cabinet was perhaps beyond parody.

Alex

Well you cannot fault Blair's judgment on his colleagues can you.

Labour is a clueless philosophy that is basically about spending successful people's money on your own voters.

John Bracewell

3 articles today on the Speccie blog and all of them about that twat Blair. Change the bloody tune!

tomdaylight

It seems so ironic that by failing to win an election, Cameron has managed to achieve one of Blair's unrealised dreams in bringing Lib Dems into the cabinet. (Although come to think of it, that's far from the only unrealised Blairite dream he's bringing to life...)

Richard of Moscow

A weirdo indeed, but to partly echo PoliticsForTheYoung's point, Blair is a symptom, not the disease.
Can the media not pester the main parties with the big question: why are they all so full of such limp-wristed, namby-pamby, educationally-subnormal, posturing, ignorant little cry-babies? Is it because anyone with brains or balls would be stabbed in the back before they got anywhere near the leadership?

David Morris

His analysis of certain Labour Party members has made me want to by the book even more.

I'm not a Labour supporter and I definitely questioned some of his decisions when he was PM, but winning three elections and modernising an old party are great achievements.

Cuffleyburgers

Some of these extracts are considerably more amusing than most of what we've seen today.

His judgements are so obviously spot on that we realise that he knew exactly what he was, and the harm, and he didn't care because it was his vehicle for playing at being top man for as long as he could.

Make you sympathise with say Benn - the man was loathsome and the rest but he never watered down or lied about his views to achieve power, and I suspect neither did Churchill.

Cameron of course we know has done.

Bad news!

saddleworth

Let's see if I got this right..... TB knows that GB would be a disaster of a PM. Therefore TB does nothing, says nothing and quietly creeps away to make money leaving the rest of us to get poorer.
Oustanding leader.

mark c

truly naked in the emporers new clothes

but as adept as ever at controlling the press, nowt else in the news but what the fool thinks we should know about his journey, though surely no more is as truly spoken now than it was then

normanc

At least his contempt wasn't only for those of us on the right then! Seems no one measures up to his standards.

From reading these excerpts it appears the previous two PM's have a tenuous grip on reality.

This stuff Blair is professing to believe in could come from a New Conservative but when you look at what was actually achieved in the UK under 13 years of New Labour rule the most striking aspects are: massive reduction in individual liberties, growing police state, massive expansion of the public sector (with very very little reform and a falling efficiency for the whole 13 years), complete destruction of our financial base, mortgaging of our childrens future.

And to top it all off he ushered the (self-censored) Brown into Number 10 to finish off the job with hardly a murmur.

Not much of a record to stand for.

Tiberius

Blair is so wrapped up in his own greatness that he fails to see the irony that it was he who appointed Brown and Prescott, and visited a double plague on the country in the process.

Well I suppose the Almighty's representative on earth has the right to do so, as well as possess the power to forsee the death of the man blocking his path to the premiership.

All in all, he just a di*k.

Albert Hall

So Blair has contempt of the left, you can add that to contempt of the electorate then.

EyeSee

Oh, my God. The man even thought he was destined for greatness! These quotes and others I've seen elsewhere certainly confirm Blair's absolute feeling of superiority over everyone he has ever met and his complete lack of care for the job he coveted.

For me though, the biggest problem Blair brought was the free fall plummet of British culture, from legislation to undermine Britain to binge drinking, all things the Blair government encouraged.

Perhaps lthough some scant amusement can be raised by the thought that the socialists believed they had seized power and in a way that would let them run amok over years. But Blair's need to get rich got in the way!

The Laughing Cavalier

What a vile pair Blair and Brown make. Brown destroyed more value than any other chancellor in history and the Blair more values than any previous prime minister. We are all poorer for their works, financially, morally and spiritually.

Paddy

Blair was put there as the 'pretty' face of labour.

They were unelectable with the likes of Prescott and the other lefties.

They 'conned' the public for 13 years.

yank

I believe Tony Blair to have contempt for everybody that isn't him. Probably understandable, because he conflicted with seemingly all, including his ostensible allies.

We could properly edit one of his book's passages, as follows:

"There is only one person who can write an account of what it is like to be the human being at the centre of that history, and that’s me."

Yes, we all have need for true change in our bodies politic, and perhaps figures such as Blair are a necessary part of that process. But let's not put the cart before the horse. The need for change came first, not the transitional figures who were raised up in recognition of that need. Blair was a response, not cause of anything. So are these latest, and they are but transitional as well. Change is coming, make no mistake.

We get the government we want... good and hard. Bush/Blair/Brown/Obama and their ilk prove that point mercilessly. I hope we can all do better, now that we know better.

lescam

"Blair was put there as the 'pretty' face of Labour".

Paddy is right. Because Blair was educated, goodlooking and well-spoken, with an appealing personality, a large section of the middle classes voted for him in 1997.

But if Prescott, with his cloth-cap, workingman's image, or Brown with his leaden features, tombstone voice and facial twitch had won the leadership election in 1994 after John Smith's death, things might have been very different. Labour might have won in 1997 with a much smaller majority, and the Tories might have got in again in 2001.

From Labour's viewpoint, Blair was the best thing that ever happened to the party, so with typical MP ingratitude (a re-run of Thatcher in 1990) he was forced out. Whereas from the Tory point of view, Blair was the nightmare they dreaded, a personable, educated, electable Labour leader, who the party was foolish enough to get rid of. By doing so (and allowing the clunking Brown into power) they played right into the Tories' hands. Even madder, they refused to chuck Brown out even when it was obvious that the man couldn't win an election unless only the voters of Kirkcaldy took part.

Let's hope they get another 18 years in opposition. If they do, it won't matter if MiliD or MiliE wins, they will be ancient history by then.

Peter Grimes

If Blair shows contempt for the Left at least he got one thing right!

Andy

This sounds like it might be a bloody good book, full of juicy bits.

Dimoto

Cruddas and Prescott as "left wing intellectuals" ??
Errr.. no, definitely doesn't compute.

(I thought he would be referring to Aaronovich, Kampfner, Richards, Blanchflower & co. not union bovver boys).

Frank P

Like all other shit, it will pass in due course. It's known as he peristalsis of politics. Now pull the chain, FFS!