Croz dressers?
In Australia, Andrew Bolt is aghast that, in the wake of the rout of John Howard’s Liberals at the hands of Kevin Rudd’s Labour party, the Liberals seem to be about to elect a new leader, Malcolm Turnbull, who is to the left of Rudd. Expostulates Bolt:
Memo Liberals: What on earth makes you think the result was an endorsement of the cultural Left? Why do you think Rudd felt it necessary to badge himself as a Christian, a conservative and a me-too Howard?This provokes an overwhelming sense of déjâ-vu here in the old country. Australian politics seems to be tripping down precisely the same path as Britain into triangulated turmoil.
First there was an apparently impregnable conservative Prime Minister: Thatcher/ Howard. Then there was a series of Labour duffers in charge of a left-wing rabble: Foot, Kinnock/ Latham, Beazley. Then Labour finally scored a knockout with a leader who presented himself as a conservative ‘New Labour’ heir to Thatcher /Howard: Blair /Rudd, and who trounced the real conservative. Then, even though Labour’s victory was due to the fact that it had presented itself as conservative and therefore safe, the Conservative party perversely decided instead that they had to become more left-wing in order to regain power: Cameron/Turnbull.
Update for our Aussie friends: New Labour has turned into a slow motion car crash; and Cameron’s Tories have discovered that it is only when they say conservative things that their poll ratings go up.
Moral: political cross-dressing is a seriously over-rated pastime.
Update: In the last few hours, Turnbull was defeated for the leadership by three votes which gave the post to Brendan Nelson. Did the party see sense at the last minute? Let's see how Nelson will position the Liberals now.