To win the election, the Tories must learn to fight dirty

Wednesday, 17th February 2010

James Forsyth reviews the week in politics

The Brownite political culture that now dominates the party’s election machine has always been hard and aggressive. They do not enjoy government, and are not much good at it. The Brown machine is fundamentally an attack machine. By contrast, the skills of the Cameroons are far more suited to government than electioneering.

This testosterone-fuelled politics contains within it the seeds of its own destruction — as embodied by Damian McBride. He revelled in his ability to intimidate. Just days before he was forced to resign for his role in planning a smear campaign against top Tories and their spouses, I remember watching him take great pleasure in standing in front of a bunch of Tories in a Westminster pub to block their view of the football on the television.

In the end, McBride imploded because he detested the Conservatives too much. He had forgotten Michael Corleone’s edict, ‘Never hate your enemies. It clouds your judgment.’

The Cameron campaign machine isn’t driven by such hatred. Many of its key figures have good friends on the other side of the political divide and it is impossible to imagine them spending their time dreaming up McBride-style smears. But at times it can seem that Labour is fighting rough, donning knuckledusters and splashing the vitriol, while David Cameron is fighting according to Queensberry Rules and being repeatedly punched below the belt. The Tories do, though, seem to have toughened up in the last fortnight. Their attacks on Brown’s ‘death tax’ have been delivered with impressive force.

Even so, there remains an aggression mismatch. But one Tory told me that this is not a source of worry, that a campaign driven by anger is bound to overreach. If the Brownites are left to their own devices they are bound to cross the line. Indeed, some Cabinet ministers are already grumbling that Ed Balls’s desire always to go on the attack is hampering Labour. They were annoyed that Balls rushed on to TV to denounce the new Tory policy on co-ops as a gimmick when a more substantive critique was available.

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cityboozer

February 18th, 2010 11:06am Report this comment

I do wish you journo and political types would find a better word than "staffer". It really is very ugly.

Vulture

February 18th, 2010 11:34am Report this comment

The Duke of Wellington famously said that the battle of Waterloo was won on the playing fields of Eton. Well, it may have been, but every subsequent battle has been lost there.

The problem with Cameron and his clique is that they don't do hate. Having never had to fight for anything harder than the corner table at the Ivy, they don't understand the bare-knuckle, broken-bottle tactics of Whelan, Campbell, and the sadly departed Irish bloke.

This comes over clearly on programmes like Question Time or Any Questions. Inevitably the Tory spokesman is a mild-mannered gent like Willets, Gove or Damian Green. And inevitably their tepid, cerebral, fluffy comments are forgettable - and forgotten.

Those that gets the roars and applause are not official Tories at all but the red-meat
popular journos like Littlejohn or Kelvin Mackenzie who are happy to talk abt topics forbidden in polite Tory company such as crime, the EU, and the two 'I' words: Islamification and Immigration.

But Dave and co. won't go there. No wonder they are wobbling in fear of Liebour attacks. They are just too effete, too posh, too gentlemanly, too rich and fastidious to get their hands dirty, - and too arrogant to spot idiotic mistakes.

In other circumstances they would deserve to lose, but Liebour are so unutterably awful that they will probably scrape in despite themselves.

Personally, I don't have a problem hating Bruin and Liebour. My problem is that I hate
Clique Cameron almost - not quite - as much.

Cogito Ergosum

February 18th, 2010 9:22pm Report this comment

I am surprised Labour have not made more of 54% versus 5.4%. The Conservatives claim they will set our economy straight; but they won't if they make blunders like that.

There does seem to be widespread innumeracy at the top of the Party.

Steve Patriarca

March 3rd, 2010 10:23am Report this comment

Is it a matter of learning 'to fight dirty' or learning to fight at all? I cannot bekieve they have let the Labou media - and Dark Horses - make the running over Lord Ashdown. They have not even tried to point to the difference between Domicile and Residency. Most of the reports are a complete muddle.