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Mandelson
Posted by Pinmonkey on 14 July 2010 - 10:37am.
It's interesting to read Peter Mandelson's pieces in the Times newspaper. It seems to confirm that most of the Cabinet privately thought that the Labour Party were heading for disastrous defeat with Gordon Brown at the helm. Why on earth then didn't they have the bottle to move against him? I think that Alistair Darling has come out of the past two years with real credibility and gravitas and I'm disappointed not to see him stand as a future leader of the Labour Party. However, he probably was in the best position to bring Gordon down by resigning and moving against him.
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Lack of it
Bottle that is. Invertebrates, the lot of 'em. I agree about Darling BTW, he'd be a good candidate. The current ones are depressingly dismal. More interested in defending their past than thinking about the future. I hadn't seen much of Andy Burnham before but he's no better.
Had Labour got rid of Brown before the election...
... they'd have definately lost as opposed to potentially lost if this makes sense?
Gordon Brown was appointed Labour Leader with no opposition from (spineless) MP's and made Prime Minister with no election. Had he been removed or had Darling successfully challenged him after resigning himself prior to the last election, voters would have been faced with two, unelected Labour Prime Ministers in a row. The party had a minor chance to win under Brown, but all that dithering would have been a definite loss. Would you vote for a government which cant even elect a party leader efficiently?
Still, this is all academic now...
But but
didn't the polls consistently show that Labour had a better chance with a new leader? Had they elected a new leader a year before during one of the numerous almost coup we might well have a Labour government now, given how it turned out. Noone was prepated to stand up and be counted, sadly.
I don't really trust polls I must confess.
Some may well have said that, some won't have done. The only way labour could have won would have been if GB called a general election as soon as he became PM. The economic crisis would have happened anyway, perhaps with an actual mandate he'd have done better.
You know what the opposition approach would have been
"Look, this is the second leader they've foisted upon you with no choice - how is that democratic?"
Not a position I agree with, after all we vote for individual MP's and parties, so whoever is the actual leader is not the real issue in those terms of reference. But that's how the campaign would have gone. Labour wouldn't have been able to go on the attack because they'd be continually having to justify choosing a new leader in an "opportunistic attempt to con the electorate".
Perhaps GB's big mistake was bottling out of calling the election in October 2007. Now we'll never know.
As for the Grand Vizier Mandelson: well, it's hard to warm to him. He's had a career of attempting to manipulate the facts and position himself at the centre of power without seemingly accepting any of the concomitant responsibility that went with it. And now he's flogged the rights to all this to Rupert Murdoch. Seems fitting, really.
October 2007
I have absolutely no doubt that this is true. It was immediately after the election-that-wasn't that the press started going for GB in a major way, seemingly out of pique at not having an election to cover, and also because he'd shown weakness. Remember the "government of all the talents"? All the positivity when Blair went? Nothing substantial changed after 10/07, but the press were suddenly hostile.
I feel reasonably certain that if he hadn't been so weakened in his early days, he'd have been able to carry on and possibly even win a 2011/2012 election as well. A defeat in 2007 for Cameron would have decimated the Tories, and there's no doubt that back then, Cameron would have been defeated. I think a Brown with a (perceived) public mandate would have governed very differently from the Brown we saw: embattled, fighting everyone from his own cabinet on down.
Ah well. Woulda coulda shoulda.
Agree with this
I thought from the moment it had happened that Labour had lost the general election. I remember when Jim Callaghan did the same thing in 1978 and it had the same effect - he lost his credibilty with millions of voters who wouldn't give him credit for anything and blamed him for everything.
Can't say I'm inspired by any of the leadership candidates, but would still take any of them over Etonian Cameron and his fag Clegg.
I think the current race to get their autobiographies out
simply illustrates a few things:
Mandelson may be a charming and fun person in the flesh but in his public life appears to be an appalling, smarmy, power-hungry, careerist political chancer. His grandfather must be spinning in his grave at the sight of someone who had to be parachuted into a safe seat to ever get elected; had to resign twice; was appointed a life peer to become a Government misister. Just what the Labour party fought for, eh? (And yes, I know Mr. Morrison took a peerage, too, but he did so on retiring from politics and went to the British Board of Film Censors.)
The notion of collective responsibilty needs to be re-examined. As does journalism that assumes Joe Public doesn't appreciate full well that it's perfectly OK to agree about most things and disagree on others and still be members of the same club.
And I agree with you about Mr. Darling who, along with Jack Straw, is one of a very small list of people who emerge from the last government with much credit.
I have a bit of a block
when it comes to Jack Straw. When I look at him all I can think is that he looks like a doctor in a concentration camp.
No, no, no...
He's the Demon Headmaster, surely?
It amounts to
much the same vibe, I'd say :)
A friend has suggested to me...
... that a news programme should do some research in their archives and invite Peter Mandelson on. Anything he has denied in the past in interviews, which he has now said in his new book is now true should be played back to him. And he should be made top explain why he felt the need to lie then and not now.
It could be awfully instructive.
Paxman? Humphries? On you go. He's got a book to plug, he wont say no...
It's a good idea
but make sure it's well researched. I listened to an interview with Mandy once and he was confronted with one of his own quotes that totally contradicted his position du jour. Without ever denying it, he claimed to not remember ever saying it. When pressed, he demanded to know when, where, to whom and in what context - in other words, he used up the interview steadily making his new point and avoiding having to explain a complete about face.
He reminds me of barrister who knows full well he's defending a criminal and can do so just as long as the criminal doesn't admit guilt and spins him a consistent lie. We'd like to think barristers are serving justice but they're not: they're hired hands who are paid to win a case. Ditto politicians. Is it any coincidence so many politicians are QC's or from a legal background?
I think it says a lot for the present coalition
when the most reviled Prime Minister in recent history runs them so close. You would think with the media hate campaign that the Tories would have gained a landslide victory as opposed to no clear majority and a cosying up to their natural opponents to form a shambolic coalition. The biggest surprise is their assumption that this pact will last 5 years. Will give it until next summer before the long knives are sharpened in the corridors of power.
My local Newspaper has gleefully reported a drop in the jobless figures. Sorry guys but it is temporary. 600,000 people losing their jobs in the Public sector aint gonna get replacement ones in the Private sector.
No argument
No argument with the main thrust of your point, none at all.
But this interested me "the most reviled Prime Minister in recent history". "Most reviled" compared with whom?
Cameron - give it time...
Blair - agreed he was way more popular than Gordon, even at the war-tainted end.
Major - he may be seen as a "good bloke" these days, but when in office he was widely disliked.
Thatcher - still hated by many to this day.
Surely nothing prior to 1979 counts as "recent history" in these terms?
Darling or Balls for leader?
It's a headline writer's dream.
HIS LORDSHIP
PM has done very well for PM, but not Prime Minister variety. Politicians are not there to leave a legacy like your favourite worn out 45 they are there for themselves.
It is an ego trip built through years of not working to produce anything, but the political answer to a question that never gets answered.
PM has embraced the coffers of the Europaen Parliament in a life of devotion to the fine things that only being adept at playing the game could give.
As Viv Stanshall once remarked " It doesn't matter who you vote for the Government always gets in".