Your five point guide to Balls's highly political interview

telemachus'

Credible optimism from a chap who is sound on the economy and does not go antagonising all our European friends that we rely on.He is clearly head and shoulders above the revanchist shower in 10 & 11

Rhoda Klapp

Congratulations, Pete, on writing this whole item with no punning refernce to his name. How tempted you must have been, under the circumstances. I bet the commenters cannot do the same.

Kestrel Sprite

Those of us who believe that there are few policy differences between the three major political parties will have that view reinforced today. All believe in big government, high taxes and obeisance to Brussels.

Bob Dixon

I thought Chis Huhne was in prison?If not why not?

Hexhamgeezer

In other words, if Balss regains office, his horizons in the political house will not stretch beyond the cubby hole under the stairs that we are currently locked into.

Tweedle fkg dum.

Colin

telemachus'@

Is your name balls or cooper or both?

You're deluded.

Bob

his optimism is the only credible thing about him

madasafish

I read the Independent's article.

The comments fall roughly75% against Mr Balls. And that's Independent readers...Even Labour supporters think him incredible... as in "in" meaning "not".

IanB

Umm... Your "Independent" link goes to the Telegraph.

andrew

Did my sourceware just identify telemachus' as using a LabourHome server? Well, I believe it did. Same as the late Fat Bloke. And the Independent, does anyone, anywhere still read it? Shurely not milord.

Andy Carpark

While listening to the wireless in the greasy spoon this morning, I was flabbergasted to hear that 'Merry Christmas, Everyone' is not by Bing Crosby at all but by a scruffy Welsh crooner called Shakin' Stevens. Never glad confident morning again.

pete-s

Just how desperate have things got in Labour; when even Balls starts telling the truth!

Russell

Balls has demonstrated his total lack of credibility with his record in government of being incompetent.
His other characteristics of bullying and arrogance will never endear himself to the electorate.
A more repulsive politician would be difficult to find (Prescot is no longer a politician).

Dennis Churchill

As Kestrel Sprite wrote above there is no real difference between our main stream political parties, they all consist of members of a political class that has more in common with each other than the majority of the population.
I don’t think a Lib Lab coalition is likely because it would allow a much more anti-EU faction to gain control of the Conservative party and from there a pact with UKIP.
The ConLib coalition neutralizes the anti-EU stance and avoids a referendum.

David Ossitt

“Balls admits in this interview that voters don't yet trust him or his party on the economy”

Nor will they ever, this financial ignoramus has left his pudgy thumbprints all over the evils that his mentor the sad, mad, bad, evil Gordon (never in the commons) Brown.

“conditionality [for benefit claimants]. If people can work, they should work”

When a politician stoops to using words such as ‘conditionality’ then what follows will be false an untruth a lie.

“If the final job of my political career is Chancellor of the Exchequer”

Let us never forget that this conniving creep has only been in parliament since 2005, it does seem much, much longer but then we have to take into account that he was the evil one’s confidant and bag carrier.

I hope and pray that if; for what ever reason, dopy Ed Miliband stands down, the labour party has the stupidity to select this unprincipled bag of putrescence as their next leader.

Sally Chatterjee

As usual it's all highly politicised. He is trying to signal a change in stance on the deficit but I suspect most people remain ultra-cautious of this destructive man.

David Ossitt

Colin

Hello Colin, these blogs are infested by three or four trolls the most pernicious of these is telemachus.

He requires little if any encouragement to post his Stalinist garbage over the entire site and his presence on The Coffee House Wall often runs to 4,5 or 6 posts one after the other, most of the regulars try to resist the urge to reply to his insane ramblings, lest we, by doing so encourage him/her/it.

michael

Prime Minister Balls, Chancellor Cable, Home Secretary Hune ... Incredible optimism. Could we really be bestowed such boundless fortune?

TimC

More from the eponymous shadow chancellor

Sterling

Bawls is one of the most distrusted politicians in Westminster, perhaps in the UK. Red Ed must certainly be worried about his own position with Bawls just behind him. Who on earth would believe a word from a duplicitous character who encouraged Bliar and then the dysfunctional Brown to borrow recklessly damaging our economy so badly it was unable to withstand external pressures from the 'world financial crisis'.Balls remains in denial and always looks for a scapegoat. His claim of growth and stability was funded with reckless borrowing beyond the means to repay. It exploded in such a manner with Brown falsely claiming he has put an end to "boom and bust".
Balls and his ilk were a disaster and the electorate know it. They threw Labour out losing them over 200 seats going down to one of the biggest electoral defeats in history. Unfortunately, our children and grandchildren are left to repay the mountainous debts for Labour's disastrous 13 years of mismanagement.

David Ossitt

Andy Carpark
December 21st, 2011 10:46am

Andy, Bing Crosby’s was White Christmas, as in ‘I’m dreaming of a’

Chris lancashire

Balls has, belatedly, realised that a majority of the public fully appreciate that the government has overspent for (mostly his) years and huge cuts are needed. Therefore Balls will now spout that whilst secretly believing that more spending is really needed.

As for "benefit conditionality" he still doesn't realise that any member of the government that presided over the exponential growth in disability claimants has zero credibility when it comes to talking about reducing it.

As for Balls for Leader - go for it Ed!

David Sterling

Who would listen to the discredited Bawls after Labour's dysfunctional record left this country with the biggest debts in history? He is still in denial and continuing to blame it on others, the 'world recession'. The fact that, with his support, Bliar and Brown recklessly borrowed and borrowed (they called it growth) putting this country into massive debt before the recession and thereby undermining the ability of the UK to resist recessionary pressures. The public are fully aware of his cretinous attitude and lack of credibility. All these cuts now are unfortunately necessary, a direct result of Labour's 13 years of mismanagement of the economy.

Heartless P.

And would the spouse of Chez Boules, even at this moment, - be murmuring "Oohhh, - my Hero!"

Pete Hoskin

IanB: Apologies, I've fixed that now.

Rhoda: I try my best.

Dennis Churchill

Bob Dixon
December 21st, 2011 10:02am
Because he is a LibDem minister and standard bearer of the Green Fascists.

TrevorsDen

I think it is Mr Osset who uses the right word about Balls - 'creep'.

Its pathetic that balls is now saying he would cut cut and cut whilst at the same time criticising the govt for... cuts.

fergus pickering

Did Bing sing 'All I want for Christmas is a Beatle' or was that Ella Fitzgerald?

poor pensioner

I have heard some comedians in my time, but Bawls takes the biscuit.Tunnel vision, parrot like speech (sorry to all speaking parrots of course) and he still does'nt get it. You Bawls were the instrument amongst the other tools who wrecked this Country financially. Your Government raided my pension, sold half the Nation's gold reserves, built up a massive debt etc.etc. etc. but there has never been one admission of guilt from anyone in the Labour Government for it.
People have now no respect for an outfit which says one thing, does the other, and then blames someone else when they got it frightfully wrong.
Your hopes of becoming a Coalition with the Liberals are pie in the sky. Even Liberals have some sense of decency and honesty, not all, but some.
The papers are desperate obviously for a news story at Christmas time, otherwise this would not have been copy worth reporting. Get back to your rhubarb fields in Pudsey, you are and always have been out of your depth. You are finished. We don't like you or your useless Shadow Cabinet.
Final word about Parrots, a good name for your type; " This Parrot is dead, mort, extinct, gone...."

MrDavies

Unfortunately for Mr Balls, whatever he says is going to play second fiddle to his malicious piggy-eyed Hitleresque physiognomy.

He'd be better off taking up acting.

GUBU

Typical Balls...in both senses.

Axstane

Telemachus

The Balls does not go around irritating European governments by his comments on the economy simply because he is in Opposition and none of them would want to listen to him.

Up to now his only contribution to the erconomic debate has been that the Tory-led Coalition is "cutting too far, too fast". Never at any time has he indicated what he would cut and when. Suddenly he becomes an advocate of cuts - presumably those that are "too shallow, too slow".

Peter Grimes

You miss out the most pertinent part of Ed Bollox' Indy outpourings. That ZaNuLieBor will come out with policies some time next year, ie after they have seen which way the eurozone economic/liquidity crisis is developing and how it has affected the UK economy.

Holly ......

The Grimer Wormtongue of politics.
Sliding on his belly to the sulky members of the Lib Dem party.
Rattling on about a Labour victory just over the horizon?
TEE HEE!!
The trouble with horizons is it is FOREVER just in front of you, yet never reachable.

Does anyone even trust a word this excuse for a man comes out with....Oh yeah....
journo's & news bods, of course.

Hans Beinkrampf

not really worth getting excited about - Balls is totally lacking in both credibilty & ability & anything he says should be dismissed as total claptrap. Certain people have shown support for him on this page but I suspect the postings are satirical.

Occasional Ostrich

fergus pickering 21st, 12:18pm

Nah, it was Dora Bryan.

Rh-

does anyone not see that labour 'policies' are basically to rubbish anything the govt does ... realize that the public like the govts moves ... resulting in political gymnastics as they try to rewrite history to claim it was their idea all along.

Nicholas

telemao, you bolshevik cretin, are you getting this? Are you reading these comments you sad little reptile?

Percy

Even in a photo of him going up an escalator or whatever he's doing, the lovely Ed still looks like a throwback from the Third Reich.

David Bouvier

The great thing about Ball's overwheening ego is that he will probably keep Yvette Cooper from going for the leadership. She would be a far tougher opponent.

Paddy

Balls is "barking"!

Doesn't he realise the government front bench and the country.....are laughing at him.

dorothy wilson

There are some things Balls needs to do before anyone will listen to him. One of those is to admit his culpability for the mess we are in. Another is to make an apology for what he did.

michael

"Ed still looks like a throwback from the Third Reich" ... Herr Flick.

Cynic

"Balls admits in this interview that voters don't yet trust him or his party on the economy ..." I wonder why. Couldn't have anything to do with the fact he was part of the Government that caused this mess, could it?

Cynic

"I expect we'll be hearing the rather managerial phrase ‘credible optimism’ a lot in the next few months."" "Rather managerial"? Meaningless rubbish, I think you mean.

Cynic

Balls said "‘I could serve in a Cabinet with Chris Huhne or Vince Cable tomorrow.’" Why am I not surprised? Those two are a waste of space and no help to the country at all.

duds

If the CEO of a bust bank should be sacked, why not the fools in charge of the treasury when the baloon broke?
If they are not sacked they should certainly shut up.

Ghengis

As a matter of interest I read the comments posted under the article re Balls in the Independent - delightfully, almost without exception all were adverse on the grounds of his proven ineptitude.

Woody

Anyone who saw Balls in the HoC on Monday would not give him a job at the checkout in Tesco. He was all over the place and could barely put a coherent sentence together. The faces of those on the Labour benches said it all.

The thought of this odious bully ever getting his hands on the Treasury books again is too appallying for words.

Isolde

David Ossitt, well done for summing it all up. God forbid the odious pillock ever becomes Chancellor. Just like his hero, he has great delusions of grandeur.

Reed

‘I could serve in a Cabinet with Chris Huhne or Vince Cable tomorrow.’

Balls, Huhne, Cable running the show...

*shudder*

Dimoto

Eighteen months in, and the greedy little fat man, is desperate to get back to the perquisites of "office".

He'll say anything.
It will be amusing to see how far he will go as he gets more and more desperate.

Ed, face it, you blagged a couple of years of troughing at the tail-end of a totally discredited regime, an opportunity that would never fall to one like you, in normal circumstances, (we have your master, the paranoid thug to thank for that), but that's it.
It's over.

If you want to make some money, better resign and try to find a really dumb finance house (plenty of those), to give you a sinecure.

Or, of course, you could become a house-husband - lots of opportunities for crying along with the Antiques Road Show.

Jeremy Poynton

If Balls and co get in, the "net migration" problem will be solved in a flash - millions will emigrate. We sure will. Once bittten, twice shy. Balls is a crazed ideologue.

Jeremy Poynton

This would be the same Ed Balls (economic genius) who complained about the government borrowing more money, and then said again he would cut more slowly - which could only be done by - yes, you got it - borrowing more money. Balls holds the rest of us in contempt, which is why he is such a danger. Like his sugar daddy, Bonkers Brown.

Matt

The Ed Balls defence of what went wrong for Labour:

"Please sir! It wasn't me sir! A big boy did it and then he ran away!"