BS: How do you feel about Blair?

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: stevetheORC
Date: 10 Apr 03 - 05:22 AM

I dont like him never have and never will, but I will credit him with been a very effective politician.

De Orc

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Barry Finn
Date: 09 Apr 03 - 11:30 PM

Blair, a squealing pig who's just been forked. Barry

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Rapparee
Date: 09 Apr 03 - 08:52 AM

"How do you feel about Blair?"

I'd use my hands, but I'd rather not, thank you.

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 09 Apr 03 - 04:14 AM

I agree with DougR; Blair is an outstanding statesman. He can convince all his listeners that he has their best interests and wishes at heart, even when confronted with an audience with widely divergant views!

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: DougR
Date: 09 Apr 03 - 02:42 AM

I think Tony Blair is an outstanding statesman. Too bad so many people in GB don't recognize that. Sorry folks, I think Neville Chamberlain is gone by now.

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: GUEST,pdc
Date: 09 Apr 03 - 01:39 AM

Answering the original question of this thread:

I think Tony Blair is a very sad, little man, who longs for the days when Britain was an empire, and being British Prime Minister had international prestige. I think he is holding on to Bush's coattails as hard as he can, hoping desperately that some sort of glory or power will rub off.

Unfortunately, the only thing that is rubbing off on Blair is the stuff that Bush is so full of.

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: GUEST,Gareth
Date: 08 Apr 03 - 10:29 AM

"Edukation, Edukation, Edukation !"

Obviously some parts of Hul9 need it more than others.

Gareth

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: kendall
Date: 08 Apr 03 - 09:00 AM

By the time the Bush gang get through stabbing Blair in the back, he will make Neville Chamberlain look like Attila the Hun.

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: DougR
Date: 08 Apr 03 - 02:44 AM

Gee, John, I can't imagine why you didn't get a reply!

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Rt Revd Sir jOhn from Hull
Date: 08 Apr 03 - 12:33 AM

refreh, 9I stil think hes a lying sack of shit), i told him as well, 9 i sent him an emale =[e-mail], saying tony , you are a sack of shit, and you like making trobble, war etc), he dident anser yet either, ignorant arshole.john

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Ringer
Date: 28 Jun 01 - 11:53 AM

A few questions/points, about private/public partnerships, or PFI, or whatever it's called at the moment (and this post is entirely serious):

Somewhere above, George H muttered about the inappropriateness of PPP given today's buoyant economy & low interest rates. Other things being equal, he may be right (I'm afraid I've never looked at the figures) but, as so often, other things aren't equal. It used to be the case that on average planning a new hospital, awarding the design contract, waiting for the design, going out to tender, evaluating the responses, and finally awarding the contracts took about 12 years; building subsequently took another 9 years typically. PFI reduces the first phase from 12 years to 3 and the second phase from 9 years to 5 (I have in mind the specific instance of the new "Derby Acute" hospital where the 3 years is fact, although the 5 years is, as yet, a promise). So you get a new hospital in 8 years, not 21.

Second, although people fulminate about the private sector profiting from illness, no-one complains about profits (moderate profits, anyway: but I'm talking about normal competition-limited business, not exploitation) made by the suppliers of anaesthetics, scalpels, PCs, bog-paper, canteen cutlery, etc to the hospital service - what's the difference?

Thirdly, in the private sector, monopolies are thought to be a bad thing. But, again, no-one seems to complain about government monopolies. I think that all monopolies are deplorable, but that government monopolies are particularly pernicious.

Lastly, RailTrack: they may not be a shining example of the benefits of privatisation, but are memories so short that the deficiencies of BR are completely forgotten? BR was not a golden age. If I may introduce, taran-tara taran-tara, a musical element, the "apocryphal" verse, "I saw a snail drive a nail faster than by British Rail", of Who's the Fool now? was written long before RailTrack was thought of.

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Gervase
Date: 27 Jun 01 - 10:31 AM

Jon, no hard feelings!
The benefit system is particularly skewed at the moment because of the incredible obsession by politicos of all colours in cracking down on fraud. That means that all claims have to be examined at six-monthly intervals, and yet no extra staff have been taken on by most departments - resulting in horrendous delays.
Yet what rarely gets mentioned is just how much money goes unclaimed in the UK because people can't cope with the system. Last I heard it was estimated at around £2 billion - which would make a heck of a difference to a lot of people.
Sadly, by the sound of them, Blair's plans to bring the private sector in will only make things worse (much as they've done with the prison and courts service. Group 4 is a national joke/disgrace)
I for one would quite like my old Labour Party back. Meanwhile, the current one is the lesser of several evils.

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 27 Jun 01 - 09:10 AM

Gervase, firstly sorry for "smarmy". You just hit one of my many nerve ends...

Re housing benefit, I am well aware of the problems and my parents bailed me out a couple of times when I was renting a flat in N Wales. One of the times was caused by an error on the part of the DSS which resulted in my claim for benifits being stopped. Again an amazing system. The DSS recognised their error and re-instated my claim but the council who had managed to close my housing benifit claim instantly on notification from the DSS could not accept this so I had to go through the full claim procedure again and yes, had to wait a month... Mind you, I think most of it was sheer inefieciency and incompetence on the part of the council - I have gone in to the offices with paperwork, had it agreed as OK by the person on the counter to later receive a letter saying "not OK" - as for letters, their postal system was quite incredible - on more than one occasion, there were changes in the ammount I was paid which I discovered by the payment cheque - the letter explaining why although dated earlier, arrived later - guess they must set a rule, payments are batched and go out on a Monday, explainitory letters are batched and go out on a Friday...

As for better of, I'm not convinced although I think there can be no doubt that we would have been worse off under the Tory's.

What I can't see is why Blair took the party the way he did. It was not because the party was not electable, the party regained popularity under John Smith who I think many people expected to become the next prime minister. The popularity of the Conservative party decreased further during the period between his death and the next election.

Fiolar, what has happened to the NHS now - has there been any real improvement? My mother was a phyisiotherapist for 30+ years and, like yourself, watched with sadness as the service she loved was destroyed by trusts, where bed occupancy became more important than patient welfare to keep the statistics looking good for the (financial) managers... she too was glad to get out.

Jon

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Fiolar
Date: 27 Jun 01 - 06:38 AM

The funny thing about leadership contests is that people don't have to stand as a candidate. If they do stand and get selected and later cannot do the job, then it's no good blaming others and saying "if only this" or "if only that." Regarding Tony Blair how many people really now the man behind the public mask? Much of what is "known" about him is the rabbiting of the gutter press who for years were bed-fellows of the Tories. Now that the boot is on the other foot, they cravenly change tack. Personally I must admit that I have rarely been better off. Having worked in the Health Service for over 37 years, I saw the destruction vented on it by successive Tory governments - cutting bed numbers; closing hospitals; the introduction of the financial markets and introducing managers from industry to run hospitals on a financial basis. Those "managers" had little or no experience of health management and were better prepared to run supermarkets than hospital wards. As a result of this staff left, recruitment dropped and the staff who soldiered on were often scraping the bottom of the barrel to cope. I was glad to be able to get out of a service I loved which was not the one I joined. Anyway - sigh - I guess we'll have to agree to disagree over many points.

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Gervase
Date: 27 Jun 01 - 05:52 AM

Jon,
Need is relative. If you define need as relying on housing benefits, free school meals, free prescriptions and all the other benefits and rebates that were so grudgingly given in the early eighties, then I suppose I do qualify.
Now I'm lucky enough (at the moment) to have a business that pays reasonably well, but I do know what it's like to have bugger all - but let's not get into the Monty Python "we 'ad to live in cardboard box" routine. Mind you, a winter endured without electricity or hot water wasn't a barrel of laughs...
I agree that the current system is far from perfect - the housing benefit system in particular is falling apart at the moment, with delays of up to a month in the payment of benefits; delays which mean that some claimants are literally losing their homes. That is dreadful and needs fixing asap. And the fact that you can't get work under the New Deal because you've been on a training scheme within 12 months is bloody ridiculous - so yes, the system still needs to be changed.
But, smarmy or not, I stand by what I said. On balance, I believe that the country as a whole is better off under "New" Labour than the Tories. Remember Portillo's pre-election pledge to "trim" public spending by £8 billion? I know he wasn't able to say where the money would come from - but it's a fair guess that it would come from those who are most needy and who have the smallest political voice.

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 26 Jun 01 - 08:15 PM

At least rape and pillage doesn't occur anymore.(Well not much anyway). " (Fiolar)

There are some fortunate places where that broad generalisation isn't that far off the truth. But I suspect that overall there's probably been more rape and pillage over the past half century or so than there ever has been before. It's organised more efficiently these days, as a technique of war, rather than just being left to happen on the side.

You'll be saying isn't it a good thing we don't have torture any more next...

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 26 Jun 01 - 07:27 PM

Whatever, Gervase but I'll bet that unlike you, I did need New Deal and in fact had an employer willing to take me on until it emerged that going on a government training course within 12 months of this actually stopped me - great system - make the effort to get trained and not get a job because of it....

Argue for all you want about Blair but please remember when you try to make your smarmy comments about those of us being too well off not to need it or notice what has been done, I have been in need and I doubt you have.

Jon

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Gareth
Date: 26 Jun 01 - 07:16 PM

Gervase

I agree with every word.

Sorry I have not replied earlier but I spent Monday night at the Statistical Post Mortem ( continued at the Pub until shut tap ) Thank the Lord for Exell spreadsheets.

I must confess that in the 1980's I thought that the Labour Party Song The Red Flag, should be replaced with Garryowen - and if you wonder why, think about where and by whom, that was reputed to have been sung.

Gareth

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: GeorgeH
Date: 26 Jun 01 - 02:41 PM

Fiolar . . you actually confirm my view of Major as a decent guy who was destroyed by his party . . that's the problem with "compromise" candidates. The fact that his style of management was more appropriate to a delicate task like running a country is, of course, of no significance . . . You can only govern (be it a nation or a political party) by the consent of the governed (even if in the UK that consent is largly through apathy).

As for withdrawll from the ERM - that was a consequence of our havind entered it at a stupid and unsustainable rate; that wasn't Major's fault.

As for "Thank God for Tony Blair" - as others have pointed out, he's an admirer of Thatcher - and I, for one, see NO clear differnce between the pair of them. Both are more interested in self-seeking than service to the nation. Yes, I realise that's a quaintly old-fashioned notion. As is honesty.

In terms of personal qualities Major is leagues ahead of Thatcher or Blair. He couldn't pull the Tory party together . . neither could Haigh (who was not averse to banging heads together . . ) simply because the party was/is in self-destruct mode. Which since their philosophy values, above all, personal achievement at whatever cost to everyone else, is hardly surprising.

And, Fiolar, with race riots AGAIN, repressive action against refugees, continued destruction of the Education system, worship of "private sector" management skills, ridiculous courts, an increasing rift between rich and poor, areas of the country where the police claim they can't maintain the law, a fundamentally dishonest press and a Government which isn't prepared to do ANYTHING more difficult than follow the line of least resistance . . do you REALLY call this a DECENT society? I'm sorry, but I don't.

Thank heavens for Mudcat!!

G.

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Fiolar
Date: 26 Jun 01 - 02:10 PM

Chin up lad - look back over the past thousand years and take heart from your history. At least rape and pillage doesn't occur anymore (well not much anyway). Think of what happened to the participants who defied William the Conk; The wars of the Roses; The Pilgrimage of Grace; Guy Fawkes and his mates; the Highlands after Culloden. I could go on but I'm sure you the same as I are fairly happy living in a decent society in spite of what the Tories did to destroy it with Thatcher's claim that there was no such thing as society.

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 26 Jun 01 - 01:49 PM

Has he got round to discussing privatising politics yet?

Privateers used to be a sort of pirate. I think the word should be brought back for the 21st century equivalents.

What is really worrying is that, with the way politics is structured, when a left-of-centre party lurches over to take the place of the right-of-centre party, the chances are that the right-of-centre party will spin off into round-the-twist extreme-right politics - but in time that won't stop them getting back into power, if they are seen as the only alternative, according to Buggins' Turn.

Blair is irritating, though significantly better than what he replaced, let alone the present wreckage of a Tory Party - however the real nightmare is that in a few years some nightmare amalgamation of Thatcher and Bush will slip into office. And that will not be at all pleasant.

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Fiolar
Date: 26 Jun 01 - 01:02 PM

" A waste of skin" - The Tories had a choice when Thatcher was booted out between Hesseltine, Major and Hurd and major was chosen as her blue-eyed boy because it was assumed that he had "the common touch." He then went to speak against devolution in Scotland and Wales. His government was forced to withdraw from the European Exchange Rate Mechanism in 1992. He was completely unable to control the mavericks in the party and presided over a government which was besieged by revelations about sleaze or sexual misconduct. One word sums up the sleaze - "Tatton." Because of his wafer thin majority, the Unionists were able to lead him around by the nose. The 1995 leadership crisis need never have happened if he had knocked a few heads together. Thank God for Tony Blair. I have no wish to see another Major or Thatcher in power again ever.

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: GUEST,Jude
Date: 26 Jun 01 - 08:44 AM

Did anyone notice that in all the retoric about public services, not one of the polititians acknowldged that public services are more than teachers and nurses. There is outrage at "dirty" hospitals and yet do they think that the problem might be that they have auctioned cleaning hospitals off to private firms who pay their staff so little that most of them have to claim some type of mean tested benefit just to keep food on the table. There is public outcry at children who are not protected - but no understanding that if you don't fund the service properly, pay them enough and sufficient staff you end up with a few demoralised social workers desperately trying to carry an unworkable caseload - they are being set up to fail - and when they do ... the polititian's answer is to scapegoat the individual. The quality of residential care depends upon the staff - in general supermarket checkout operators get paid more than residental staff and that's before they "transfer us to the private sector". In the private sector, terms and conditions are even worse. TUPE is little protection as it only lasts as long as you are in that exact post, you cannot develop your career without accepting a change to the new firms terms and conditions. So you are effectively trapped & with a downward pressure on your terms and conditions as any new staff do not have to be paid at the same rates. And since the new pay is even less than yours it does not tend to attract high quality professional staff so your job gets even harder.
Sorry for the rant - but polititians annoy me
Jude

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 25 Jun 01 - 06:30 PM

The new law as I have read it states that "Hunting with dogs" will become ilegal. This means that if I take my dog for a walk and he chases a rabbit I am a criminal. (bill/sables)

I think if you substitute "cat" for "rabbit" in that sentence the distinction becomes fairly straightforward. Taking your dog for a walk, in the course of which it pursues a moggy is a very different thing from going out on a cat hunt

Actually of course in many towns your dog might be as likely to come across a fox, since the more sensible foxes have moved into towns. Maybe they do understand the difference between having to leg it from a mutt on is way home from a trip to the pub and being pursued by a mobb of dogs and humans bent on a kill.

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Mrs.Duck
Date: 25 Jun 01 - 06:20 PM

I always feel better after a good Tony Blair. I try to have one at least once a day preferably before breakfast.

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Kim C
Date: 25 Jun 01 - 06:12 PM

Dogs don't kill foxes, foxes kill foxes. No, wait.......... Excuse me. I live in Tennessee. We run raccoons up trees with hound dogs.

I think Mr. Blair's ears stick out a little. ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: GeorgeH
Date: 25 Jun 01 - 02:12 PM

How, precisely, was Major a waste of skin? He was and is a decent and honest guy, treated badly by his own party (the start of the chaos they're still in) . .

But it's precisely BECAUSE the Tories are such a mess that it's deplorable that "New Labour" are so little better . . I don't know about Bush having balls (I'd say that like an enraged bull he's simply to dumb to know better) - but certainly NONE of new Labour do - AND they continue to let the Tories set the agenda - on Taxation, Public/Private partnership, denationalisation, treatment of refugees . .

We still have the Tories in power - just calling themselves by a new name. Yes, they are marginally better than the other option - but it's a depressingly narrow margin, IMO. I'm still waiting for Blair to show a vestage of leadership (as distinct to his control-freak approach to his own party . . )

G.

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Jun 01 - 01:45 PM

Major was and is a waste of skin. How many remember the Black Wednesday fiasco. Scargill was right about the Tories destroying the mining industry but as the bible says "a prophet is not without honour, save in his own country." Thank God the Tories are out for at least another four years and if the present contenders for the leadership of the party are anything to go by, perhaps for ever.

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 25 Jun 01 - 01:41 PM

On the subject of balls: you have a president now who has them, but you don't like him.

But surely Doug, that was one of the big complaints against that last lad you had...

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: GeorgeH
Date: 25 Jun 01 - 12:27 PM

You're right in one respect, Fionn - I failed to distinguish between Thatcherism and Thatcher . . None the less, at that point the Tories were so unpopular anything would have got elected . .

However . . Are you sure about Blair's father being a Conservative? That's not my recollection. Certainly Blair himself has been a member of the Labour party ever since he was at University. (Mind you, my "source" on these matters, who's a Labour activist from those parts, does reckon Blair's constituency labour party is probably the most conservative in the UK). [I have an idea Blair Father was a lecturer at Durham University, and a Liberal.]

I'd also agree with you that Major was the first and last decent person to serve as Prime Minister for a very long while . .

Bill Sables, I disagree with you about Scargill, too, but that's another topic . . (Do you believe the miners are totally stupid when they kept voting for him? He endured longer than Thatcher . . ) And, indeed, my reaction on meeting him is the opposite to yours, too. (Though I agree he was bloody stupid over the management of the strike ..)

Bald Eagle - again, I was in too much haste . . "Totally disagree with you ON THAT PARTICULAR POINT!!"

Firecat - HOW has Blair destroyed this country? (And in any case he's generally continued the policies of "the other lot" including - as someone pointed out - widening the gap between rich and poor . . and destroying manufacturing industry . . .

G.

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Gervase
Date: 25 Jun 01 - 10:37 AM

Bald Eagle,
Which of these views of the Blue Nun is the most reasonable:
Her views on the use of cannabis - one strike and you're out (far more extreme than those of most serving officers in the Met);
Her belief that asylum seekers should be locked up without any semblance of a trial;
That a pregnant prisoner should have to be shackled to a bed while she gives birth;
That an armed man who shoots an aunarmed teenager in the back should be hailed as a hero?
...
Need I go on?

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: KitKat
Date: 25 Jun 01 - 09:24 AM

Dear Firecat

You may think that Blair has messed up the country, but you weren't born when Thatcher came to power - now THERE was someone who really knew how to mess up a country. Remember that the present bloody awful mess we have with transport in this country (amongst other things)is her fault.

As for Scargill, I once heard him described as 'the shite in mining armour'.

Pat

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: English Jon
Date: 25 Jun 01 - 09:04 AM

maybe what I mean is that a non-vote should count as an abstension. Yep, that'd be better.

Chairman EJ

corrrr..... votez four Katz.....corrrr....

EJC

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: English Jon
Date: 25 Jun 01 - 09:01 AM

Cheydi, the point of a compulsory vote would be that no government could be formed until ALL THE VOTES WERE IN.

Hehehehehehehe!

Also, the 40% of the population who didn't vote, could tick the abstension box and then all the politicians would have to bugger off and come up with some better ideas.

Either way, it's no less democratic than the current system.

EJ

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Ringer
Date: 25 Jun 01 - 08:37 AM

If you define "reasonable people" as "people who think like me", then you're probably right.

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Gervase
Date: 25 Jun 01 - 07:39 AM

Well said, Gareth!
I too did my bit of footslogging as a paid-up party member, and the general reaction I found on the doorstep (from those who could be arsed to vote - but don't get me on that one, or you'll get the full rant...) was that Blair as a person may have shortcomings, and certainly isn't the messiah, but what the Labour government has done since 1997 meant it deserved another go.
The minimum wage may not be as much as is needed, but it's better than what didn't exist earlier. Then there's the working families tax credit, the new deal, the winter fuel allowance....but maybe all you Blair-hating cynics out there are just too comfortable to benefit from such things.
And, for most people, the alternatives didn't bear thinking about. Ann Widdecombe may be the stuff taht wet dreams are made of for paid-up Tory party die-hards, but to most reasonable people her views are grotesque.

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Gareth
Date: 23 Jun 01 - 01:45 PM

As a paid up, and active member of the British Labour Party here in Caerphilly perhaps some comments on what we found going from door to door over the last few weeks might be in order.

No, most people, including myself, have our doubts about Blair, but when you look at the alternatives - well what choice was there.

I can remember when the head bangers controlled the Party in the 80's. Unelectable and rightly so.

What we did find on the doorstep was a good deal of goodwill towards the Labour Party, and the realisation that the damage that was done under Thatcher and Major can not be rectified immediatly - You can't go down to Woolworths and buy a packet of instant Doctors or Nurses.

Time will tell - but I would point out that turnout here in the UK was still higher than the turnout in the US of A Presidential election, and the votes were counted quickley and accuratley.

Incidently Scargill did not destroy the mining industry here - but he made it possible for Thatcher to do so !

But then as they saying went "The Yorkshire Miners will fight to the last Welshman !"

Gareth (Sorry if this sounds serious but I'am seriously P****d off with the armchair critics who want utopia but find it actually get involved, and who infest the pages of the Gaurdian Newspaper)

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: bill\sables
Date: 23 Jun 01 - 09:34 AM

Arthur Scargill destroyed the mining industry by calling a mining strike without a vote in the middle of Summer. He knew, along with many miners, that after six weeks closure the pits would be un-workable with floors rising and ceilings falling. He caused hardship in mining villages and scars between friends that will never heal. When the Russian miners sent £6,000,000 to help the strike fund he put the money in his own account, and after a year he paid it back minus interest. This is why he is a rich man today. I met Scargill in the early 70's and could see then that he was a man after fame and fortune at the cost of anyone who got in his way. Blair is very much like him.

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Fiolar
Date: 23 Jun 01 - 09:05 AM

Never mind guys. Just don't vote next time or vote Tory and then moan and grouse about everything. The Tories destroyed the mining industry, the Health Service and God only knows what else and now people are complaining because they haven't got instant improvement after four years. The Tories were in for 18 years for God's sake. It takes seven years to train a doctor, three for a nurse. The biggest shock to the Tory ego is that they think that they are the party who should always be in power and it galls them to see another party who pricked that balloon.

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Firecat
Date: 23 Jun 01 - 06:37 AM

One thing you don't particularly want to hear as soon as you wake up on the day following a General Election is to hear that the person you hate has stayed in power. I couldn't believe it when I heard that Tony "I'm a smarmy git" Blair had got back into power after totally messing up the country. I wanted William Hague to get in, but he's quit now.

Mind you, I'm only 17 and a hlaf so I'm too young to vote anyway, so why am I bothered!!??

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: GUEST,Les Jones, once of Ellesmere Port now of Man
Date: 23 Jun 01 - 03:26 AM

It is worth considering a hidden Blair agenda, the complete distruction of the Tory Party. Things going quite well for Blair and those of us who have spent the last 25 years argiung for tax redistribution, failing and getting Thatcher etal. Most people never understood or wanted socialism, the Labour Party certainly didn't, and as for old Labour, what the hell was that? Municipal Socialism, Militant? Socialst front for the Liberation of Palistine, what did the Romans ever do for me..... oh1 God stop me.

It looks like Blair has almost seen the scum off. Rejoice!

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: DougR
Date: 22 Jun 01 - 06:45 PM

I don't know enough to comment, but it's refreshing to read a discussion about British politics rather than U. S.

On the subject of balls: you have a president now who has them, but you don't like him.

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Shields Folk
Date: 22 Jun 01 - 06:41 PM

I was making the point that if he was that cynical he would support whoever was o top at the time ie Man U. but as far as football goes he is commited true and black and white (not easy for a politician)

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 22 Jun 01 - 06:38 PM

Bald Eagle:

"And, Jon, you can't believe everything Jimmy Reid says: he suggests, for example, that nobody in his right mind would vote for "Hague's lot", but I did...".

No comment! ;-)

Jon

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Lanfranc
Date: 22 Jun 01 - 06:31 PM

Blair is a hypocrite, a self-seeking control freak and an insincere, patronising pseudo-socialist.

All of which makes him just the Prime Minister that Britain deserves.

Bush is a hypocrite, a self-seeking capitalist lackey and an insincere, patronising xenophobe.

All of which makes him just the President that the US deserves.

If I believed in God, as they both profess to do, I would ask Him to help us all!

As I don't, who will? - discuss.

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: bill\sables
Date: 22 Jun 01 - 06:22 PM

Shields Folk, you said earlier he supported The Toon now you say Manchester United. It seems he just suports whoever is winning at the time

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: bill\sables
Date: 22 Jun 01 - 06:20 PM

I fealt I had to mention that when reading through the threads the three threads in order were
Can a believer sing athiest songs
How do you feel about Blair
Is this guy worth a second chance

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Shields Folk
Date: 22 Jun 01 - 06:13 PM

If he was that cynical he would support Man United

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 22 Jun 01 - 05:14 PM

Cardinal Heenan? Well that's only about 50 years wrong.... Make that Cardinal Hume.

Subject: RE: BS: How do you feel about Blair?
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 22 Jun 01 - 05:09 PM

GeorgeH, it is you who is confused I fear. Mrs Thatcher never lost a General Election. Indeed the Tories won again, after she'd gone. And of course, even when so-called Labour finally won, who was the first invited guest at Number Ten?

How heartening it is to see evidence in this thread that Blair is being rumbled. To me, this one-time CND campaigner's choice of the Labour Party as his career vehicle, when it was at rock bottom, was as breathtakingly cynical as Hitler's choice of the the National Socialist party when that too was a pathetic rump. I have no difficulty at all in imagining Blair running off the rails, if not quite on Hitler's scale, then at least on a par with say Mugabe, to mention another self-proclaiming Christian.

Blair leads a party that promised an end to selection in secondary education. Then when it came to his own kids, he chose the Brompton Oratory - leapfrogging several nearer schools, and opting for one that is massively selective (it likes rich Catholics best). Eventually Cardinal Heenan put a stop to Blair partaking of the Holy Eucharist at Catholic Mass, on the reasonable basis that Blair isn't actually a Catholic. At least one of the Catholic schools that Blair bypassed (St Richard of Chichester) closed soon afterwards , and no wonder. Families cottoned on immediately - if it wasn't good enough for Blair's kids, it wasn't good enough for theirs. They flocked away in droves.

Shortly before the last election, Blair was put under repeated pressure in a tv interview, to say what he thought about the gap between rich and poor getting wider under his stewardship. (It has been widening in the UK since 1980, faster than in any developed country on earth except New Zealand.) In the end, he said he thought it was OK. Pure Thatcherism.

No wonder he was returned on the lowest turnout in Britain's democratic history (apart from 1918, when soldiers were demobbed too late to vote). Blair was quick to lambast the Gothenburg protestors for threatening democracy. (Bertie Ahern was a bit more temperate, suggesting that maybe European policymaking needed to be more open and inclusive.) Blair should have remembered that another drop in turnout comparable to the last two, and the voers will be a minority. Legitimacy could well passs to single-issue campaigns that have given up on the futile farce of politics.

Just like Blair himself has given up on parliament. Most policy anouncements are now made elsewhere, free from irritating challenge. All postwar Prime Ministers, from Attlee to Major, attended to vote in 35-50 per cent of divisions. For Blair the figure is less than 12 per cent. What is so amazing about his arrogance is that he actually gets away with it.

On personal qualities - competence, honesty, etc - John Major is streets ahead of Blair. Odd it was that Major, the son of a circus trouper, proud posessor of two 0-levels, and brought up in the inner-city streets of Brixton, came to lead the Tories, while Labour got Blair - the privileged and privately educated son of a well-to-do Tory.

Any American observers who share Jed Marum's fear of the colour pink seeping into Euro-politics, must find it bewildering that leftish France has the world's finest railway (the TGV) while the UK has Railtrack.