As James wrote yesterday, Stephen Carter’s alleged slide down the pecking order at No.10 suggests that his softly-softly approach to tackling Davids Miliband and Cameron has been thrown out the window. The assumption now is that the Brownite attack dogs will be let off the leash, and we’ll start seeing some bare-knuckle politics from Team Brown.
One question doing the rounds, then, is whether that (potential) new approach will help Labour eat into the Tory poll lead. I’m inclined to agree with Political Betting’s Mike Smithson that it will do nothing ot the sort. Two simple, interrelated reasons spring to mind:
1) There’s plenty of evidence to suggest that David Cameron is extremely popular with the general public. Not only does he score well on that front in opinion polls, but he’s also emerged unscathed from from the few “toff”-based attacks that the Government has launched. And a popular person does not make a great target for personal attacks. As Smithson puts it: “You cannot go into full-frontal attack mode unless what you are saying chimes with public opinion.”
2) By contrast, Brown – and the Government more generally – are operating from a position of low popularity. It’ll be extremely difficult for them to land tellling blows on Cameron, when voters are increasingly holding them responsible for many of the country’s woes.
But there’s also the school of thought that Cameron hasn’t yet been tested enough, and that the entire point of a concerted attack by the Brownites would be to negate points 1) and 2) above. What are CoffeeHousers’ views on the matter?
Comments