Change we cannot believe in

Norm

If proof were ever needed that politicians live in a different world than the rest of us then this is it. Do they think us all fools? Well, yes actually.

Silent Hunter

Melanie!

Say you nothing of the nearly 500 posts from the public almost universally vilifying the Millipede?

I think that we deserve a little credit for helping to turn his leadership bid into something that resembles 'the shape of a pear'.

jose garcia

from what i can read in the commiguarding he has nothing to apologise and the labour party had made no wrongs in the last 11 years

hail our Cesar!!, we taxpayers salute you!!!!!

Brian O'Connor

Mel wrote:

This is infantilism. The idea that the only thing that's gone wrong is G Brown and that all they need do to win the next election is replace him is absurd. It's the Labour government that's bust, and all who sail in it.

See . . . we 'mericuns have a descriptive phrase for this, courtesy Sen. Obama's, er, actions: it's called "throwing him under the bus."

Bogdan of Australia

Such an absurd spin could be produced only by a graduate from Evening Courses On Marxism-Leninism...
P.S: Wasn't his father a Commie?

Bogdan of Australia

David Milibrain - the Labour's New Great Hope... He, he, he...

Terry Walpole.

Absolutely right Mel; march 'em to the cashpoint, march 'em through the hospital wards, pay the fat not to eat junk food etc etc it just isn't a grown up politics.

tim

Panglossian, Manichean Hegelianism.

It's the best of possible worlds, Tories are wicked and NuLab are the incarnation of the progressive world-historical force.

Juan Kerr

Silent Hunter.

Far from being pear-shaped, Milliband's slither towards power seems quite effective. There looks to be a fair chance that he might soon be the successor.

Not a knocking bet by any means, but a strong contender, possibly due to the fact that The Labour Party is in such a parlous state right now.

You and the 500 have a bit more work to do.

Dave

Mel, do you think of these headlines all by yourself?
Priceless. x

David McAdam

My, my, the insatiable arrogance of a young pretender. Anybody else sense echoes of Jimmy Carter's 1977 'Crisis of Confidence' rhetoric?

Matt

Stupid boy.

Sempronius

All this is true, but Miliband's target audience was the Labour Party, not the country at large. From the Labour point of view the Miliband prospectus is rather more attractive than Gloomy Gordon's. The name of the game is for Labour to avoid a meltdown of 1997 proportions or worse at the next election. What if a new Labour leader halves Cameron's opinion poll lead from 20% to 10% and then call an election? Could be the difference between a Tory landslide and a hung parliament.

Furthermore, Miliband's assessment of Cameron is not wide of the mark. DC doesn't really stand for change - he stands for the Blairite status quo.

A Miliband leadership could be trouble for the Tories.

Miranda Rose Smith

Would someone please remind me how the Labour Party "got rid of Tony Blair in an act of poisonous disloyalty to the most successful election winning politician ever to have led that party?"

Frank Pulley

Sempronius

"A Miliband leadership could be trouble for the Tories."

The only thing that will mean trouble for the Tories is what they will inherit in 2010. Let's hope they can handle it.

Dee Ranged

Blair, Brown and now Bulliband.

Off with their heads!

Frank Pulley

BTW - and to answer Bogdan's query - this will get you started on the Miliband political blood line:

http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/HISmiliband.htm

I suppose you know something about Marxist propaganda, if your Grand-daddy, Sam, was in the Red Army and your pop, Alphonse (aka Ralph) was an LSE Lecturer in Marxism and one of the first to start the 'Long march through the institutions' (after kicking off as a spiv removing furniture from bombed houses in London). Perhaps it gives us a clue as to why D Miliband thinks he could do a good removals job from a premises derelict of ideas and effective policy - No 10 Drowning Street.

Plenty more where that came from if you're really keen on having yet another crypto- Marxist as PM.

The spins of the fathers ...

Perhaps it's time SB spun their drums! Oh! I forgot, the cabinet would have to approve that and as we know Turkey's don't usually vote for ....

Gilbert

But wasn't Miliband dishearteningly correct when he said that Cameron is a different sort of Tory to Thatcher. That he is the sort who is happy to oppose what Labour plans to put in place until it is in place, then he is all for conserving it. And the same for the next thing and the next.

skydog

''Let us not forget -- the Labour party got rid of Tony Blair in an act of poisonous disloyalty to the most successful election-winning politician ever to have led that party''

On the other hand, could it be that Bliar handed over the poisoned chalice before he was forced to drink the hemlock? ;o)

David Crowter

The health service has deteriated dramatically in the last six years. I had a hip replacement operation in 2002 and had nothing but praise for the efficient way all was done. My experience in the last few months in trying to get hospital appointments and examinations for a kidney problem, has proved virtualy impossible. I am still waiting after many phone calls and visits to the hospital reception to get an appointment the Specialist I saw five weeks ago, said was necessary.

Mr H

Does anyone believe the crime statistics?

All my neighbours have been victims of theft, vandalism or petty arson in the last year.

In many cases it has been dificult to get any acknowledgement that the crime has occurred from the police.

I think they have decided that the easiest way to reduce crime figures is only to record crimes they can (or have) solved - often by issuing a "warning"

Grumpy and irritated

Miliband - the little classroom monitor.
Brown may be as dull as ditchwater, but he has a certain gravitas (jowly, overweight etc), whereas the shiny faced boy will always look and act like what he is - a lightweight on the global stage.

JH

Same old story. Miliband sees Obama, thinks "Yes, I also wannabe a big shot, am I not also clever and smart? I deserve this; it's my right." Hello? This is a democracy and we VOTE for our PM. Or we used to, anyway.

Miranda Rose Smith

Dear Mr. H.: Seriously, what's petty arson? Setting somebody's flowers on fire? Arson is never petty. Fires can spread.

Peter

Melanie, you are falling into your own trap.

As you have so often said, whomever leads this shower of shts is by the by. The real power is elsewhere and this is just the theatre. You do us a diservice by wasting your talents on it.

While the real power lies elsewhere, so does the real politics. The most urgent of issue of the day is whether we will still have electricity by 2015 thanks to the EU renewables targets.

If the power goes off, even your blogging days are over.

Kieran

"The British public will not take kindly to having not one but two unelected Prime Ministers foisted upon them."

Melanie? Do you even know your history, or are you merely insisting on perpetuating the myth that the Blair-Brown transition was somehow out of step with the political past?

May I remind you thatTories hardly a have a good record in this area when five of their last seven Prime Ministers took over mid-term, four of whom doing so without even an internal party election.

And half of all post-war PMs have switched hands to another PM without consulting the electorate.

A PM changeover without calling an election is therefore far from unusual. And far from unconstitutional.

Did you know this Melanie?

ag

JH, when have we ever voted for our PM? A cursory glance at post war political history would show that.

zizz

The fact remains, Kieran, that the British public will not take kindly to having not one but two unelected Prime Ministers IN A ROW foisted upon them. Particularly these two. Do you dispute that? Do you? Are you sure you do?

anglicus

Another load of codswallop from mr.millipede

Frank Pulley

Well, after the Milibollix on the Radio Two Whine Show today, Gordon should sack him, then call the bluff of the cabal of backstabbers by asking the Queen to dissolve Parliament, call an election and replace NuLab with NoLab. He could then become the Rectum of St Andrews or something and sit in a corner with his rictus grin and Asperger' awkwardness and enjoy, in his solitary spitefulness, the utter destruction of his camaradian enemies while his Cameroonian adversaries take over. Bwaaahahahahahaa!

As Terry Thomas would have said, "What a Shaaar, what a complete shaaar!"

Ron Todd

Is it just me or did he sound a bit Obamish?

Marin

Labour politicians may be trying to push the idea that the only thing that went wrong is Gordon Brown; this is, of course, because they are trying desperately to pull the wool over our eyes. I looked up the word 'demagogue' in Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionary. A demagogue is 'a leader who makes use of popular prejudices and false claims and promises in order to gain power'

Jack Tomas

I'm with Peter. No electricity, or much reduced, after 2015. Millipede is after a greener Britain, don't forget. So, just to repeat - serious power cuts from 2015 due to EU renewables targets. If we don't wake up until it starts to happen we're probably looking at six or seven years of it - assuming that someone, somewhere, gets their finger out at that point. This won't be like some groovy candlelit evening, nor the three day week - relatively short lived and inflicted on a far less technologically dependant and far more patient and resourceful population.
This will be a devastating blow to our infrastucture - Al Qaeda would be delighted to land such a blow. We need a LOT more "banging on about" power cuts, which can, and should be, pre-empted.

Mr H

Dear Miranda Rose Smith,

Petty arson is the description now coined for burning down your hedge, settling light to fences, bins and other items that are unlikely to be insured.

No real solice for my neighbour who had to have his roof repaired and window replaced due to heat damage after someone lit his fence - the fifth such crime in the area recently.

To add insult to injury the replacement panels were then stolen.

Psychologists recognise that this behavior escalates but it will only get properly investigated and recorded when a car or a house is burnt down.

Archie

Well quite, Miss Phillips, but as brighter minds than mine have pointed out, the keening belief in a certain D. Cameron galloping in to right all the Socialist ills manifest in our troubled land will all end in tears!

Robin

As Peter rightly points out, the big issue is the pending collapse in our power supplies. It's particularly pertinent as we hear today of the collapse of the deal to buy 8 of our ageing nuclear power stations.

I suppose the only saving grace would be a reduction in our power bills. Good job my wife's a terrific knitter.

Paul

It was Ted Heath who said you dont go into politics unless you have something to offer. Guess what? Millipede has nothing to offer because he's never done anything other than the greasy pole of politics. He has no other experience except brown nosing his way around Westminster. So what can he offer us? Brown is the same-a life of Labour politics. No serious productive career beforehand. No real nouse of what makes the world tick. I say give the country to Mr Tesco to run and kick these excuses out. As others have said we'll have no electric soon unless someone starts building nuclear stations just like the French. Politics is not all gay rights and equal opportunities its real hard tough decisions that need to be made NOW. We need common sense.

D Gray

Oh come on Melanie,Miliband is hilarious and good for a laugh.The prat has no chance of saving labour from the monumental kicking which is a mere 16 months away.Let him have his bleat,give him the spade to dig himself into his self absorbed pit.He reminds me of Blair...the smirk,the desperate need to convince us that without him our lives would be meaningless.I loved the look on his face after he gave that speach,the hands outstretched and the look on his face with the the 'who me?' type vibe...'but I wasn't doing anything,I love Gordon {I just want his job]

If Brown had any balls at all he would have sacked this chancer.But he wont...he'll promote him.Nothing can prevent the labour parties destruction.I just hope Dave boy 'down with the yoof' Cameron is not as talentless as Miliband.

abc

There is to be a reshuffle. Brown intend to get rid of his enemies. Millibrand probably guessed this was coming some time ago so he got into revolting mode. He has nothing to lose.

JJS

abc - I think you're right.

Ann

The man is an ignorant, useless asshole. That's all there is to say about him.

Ann

David Crowter, I have had to use the NHS quite a bit in recent months, including today, and I have little but praise for their efficiency and care. Sure, I could quibble about this or that small point, but that's always possible.

However, none of that is thanks to ZanuLabour, which for example has been trying to all but close down an excellent hospital where I had treatment a little while ago, for no sane reason other than to save a little money through the false premise of economies of scale.

Millipede is an ignorant prat.

Byron in Wahroonga

***The Tories say society is broken. By what measure?***

Measured against Titus Oates' administration, David.

Byron in Wahroonga

***my experience in the last few months in trying to get hospital appointments and examinations for a kidney problem, has proved virtualy impossible***

An undoubtedly horrid experience, David. Yet it could be argued your case is relatively minor:

http://www.moonbattery.com/archives/2008/08/30000_left_star.html#comments

Alex Hunter

"This is a democracy and we VOTE for our PM. Or we used to, anyway."

Yeah right! Like we voted for Major, Callahan, Douglas-Home, Macmillan, Asquith and Lloyd George!