Sickening Labour 66

 in Uncategorized by

You expect the Tories to be stupid. It is their nature, as John Stuart Mill pointed out. But the disruption by New Labour of radical reform of the House of Lords is about career advantage and a total absence of genuine political belief. Which is precisely what Blair brought to New Labour. Tomorrow he makes his Labour Party comeback speech at Highbury – to a closed £120 a ticket dinner. Says it all, really.

Allowed HTML - you can use: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>

66 thoughts on “Sickening Labour”

1 2 3
  • Komodo

    Mackay of Ardbrecknish, that’s the one. His ex-pupils at Oban fondly recall his penchant for extracting the matter from his nostrils, and flicking it at them. He was the chair of the finance committee on Oban Town Council, and many deals were done which favoured his fellow-Tories, if not the poor sods who had to live in the resulting buildings. One of my earliest research projects.

  • wendy

    the olympics was always supposed to be blairs nuremburg rally …
    .
    one has to wonder what the game is
    .
    certainly iran and syria ..
    .
    the banks have just about finished stealing from the public directly now its from the central banks
    .
    so economic collapse, authoritarian/military control, and war.
    .
    anything else?

  • wendy

    “What was it Cameron said ?
    We’re all in it !! Together.”
    .
    it was rebekah who said it, and cameron repeated it to re assure his wealthy backers.
    .
    but the media spun it to mean all of us, it was never the intention of course.

  • Mary

    I think little of Andrew Neil, who has been given a monopoly on political comment by the BBC, but he has put the knife into Murdoch here.
    .
    Leveson Inquiry: Murdoch ‘Wapping request to Thatcher’
    Mr Neil has worked for Mr Murdoch in the past at the Sunday Times and Sky
    .
    The Leveson InquiryDecision time approaches for Leveson
    Module three: Live coverage
    Q&A: The Leveson Inquiry
    Key events in hacking scandal
    .
    Rupert Murdoch sought assurances from then-PM Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s about policing of print union strikes, the Leveson Inquiry has been told.
    .
    In a written statement, ex-Sunday Times editor Andrew Neil disputed Mr Murdoch’s claim that he had “never asked a prime minister for anything”.
    .
    Mr Neil also wrote of Tony Blair and Mr Murdoch reaching “an understanding”.
    .
    That “relationship became closer, more extensive and deeper than anything … during the Thatcher years”, he claimed
    .
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-18789738

  • Gadfly

    Sickening indeed! But why is Cameron covering up Blair’s government’s crimes (not only those war-related) with the full knowledge of Her Majesty?

  • guano

    This government was elected to aristocratise post-Thatcher wealth.
    New Labour’s sense of social justice is aroused by the re-aristocratisation of UK politics, but takes no responsibility for its own promotion of the the Thatcher wealth-making roller=coaster. Wouldn’t it have been better for Blair and Brown to have been worried about 7 figure pay packets, and blatant banking bonanza bonusses, than wring their hands now about the destruction of 2 centuries of socialist achievement on their watch.

  • Mary

    Can no one put a stop to this awful woman roaming the planet in the manner of Blair and spreading her poison?
    .
    You would think she would dare not show her face in Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia and Thailand after her country’s annihilation of their peoples and desecration of their lands with with bombs and Agent Orange.
    .
    US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on historic Laos visit
    Mrs Clinton’s landmark visit to Laos is part of a trip signalling growing US interest in Asia
    .
    Laos vows to address dam concerns
    Is Laos damming the Mekong river?
    US to ease deadly Vietnam legacy
    .
    Hillary Clinton has arrived in Laos, the first US secretary of state to visit the country in 57 years.
    .
    She is expected to discuss plans to build a controversial Mekong River dam, which critics say would impact the environment and millions of lives.
    .
    The effects of Agent Orange, a defoliant used during the Vietnam war, are also likely to be on the agenda.
    .
    Mrs Clinton, who arrives in Vientiane from Vietnam, will then head to Cambodia for an Asean meeting.
    .
    The last top US diplomat to visit Laos was John Foster Dulles in 1955.
    ‘
    The $3.8bn (£650m) hydro-electric dam project at Xayaburi has caused tension among Mekong region countries – Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia and Thailand
    ‘
    /..
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-18792282
    .
    Note the ‘growing interest’.

  • Mary

    I have just come indoors (hooray it’s sunny today) and switched on Sky News. There was a strident young woman Julia Manning from the 2020 Foundation being interviewed plus a Nigerian representing the UN talking about this family planning conference. It is white man ordering black man about as usual and the accent was on Africa. You would not know if you only listened to these two that girls as young as 12 get pregnant here too and that rape, prostitution and ‘strange sexual practices’ are also not unknown. What gross hypocrisy. Population control under the Microsoft (Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation) banner. I would not be surprised if Bliar made an appearance too.
    .
    http://www.2020health.org/2020health/about/whoswho/chiefexec.html
    .
    {http://www.2020health.org/2020health/Press/latest-news/Family-Planning-Summit.html}
    .
    I bet there are some fingers in the NHS privatisation pie here if you look around the board, consultant directors, associates and research team on ‘About Us’.

  • Mary

    You can follow tweets on the summit here.
    https://twitter.com/#!/search/%23fpsummit?q=%23fpsummit
    .
    The latest is from that well known hypocrite, La Clinton, known for her expertise is enabling killing of men, women and children by drone.
    .
    Gates Foundation‏@gatesfoundation

    Hillary Clinton in video message to #FPSummit: ‘Reproductive rights are basic human rights’ #nocontroversy in #contraceptives

  • Mary

    Komodo There are 755 members registered so that makes 16% who are available for hire. Shame on them. They should get the Order of the Boot.

  • Suhayl Saadi

    The Tories are not stupid. They – and their New Labour/Lib-Dem mimics – are very clever and successful managers and looters for their real constituency – which of course is not we, the people.

  • Rose

    Komodo – thanks for that list of exquisites at the trough; I was relieved to see that my local grandee was not amongst them.
    You’d think they’d pay a bit of attention to how they sound though – Carter of Coles and Chalker of Wallasey raised a wry smile; not too many hewers of wood and carriers of water amongst though I bet.

  • Mary

    This has just been posted on Medialens ref Kazakhstan.
    .
    Tony Blair’s moral values.
    .
    Posted by Hidari on July 11, 2012, 6:51 pm
    .
    ‘(Fascist dictator) (Nursultan) Nazarbayev is used to getting what he wants and…. in 2010, his whim was to have Blair come to dinner, make a speech in which he said he and the president shared the same philosophy and be photographed together. So my informant rang the Tony Blair Faith Foundation and offered $250,000 for Blair to come and perform. Sorry, he was told: Tony is very busy. Perplexed, but remembering how close Blair and Clinton had been, he rang the Clinton Foundation. What that means, he was told, is he wants more money. He rang Blair back, he says, offered $500,000 and was accepted at once. Blair’s relationship with Kazakhstan is now worth around $13 billion a year, according to the FT.’
    .
    http://www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2012/07/11/hsfbilliafrica-com/mr-blair-goes-to-astana/
    .
    PS Hope he chokes at the Arsenal dinner tonight (if indeed it takes place) and that nobody there knows how to do the Heimlich manoeuvre.

  • Mary

    BBC News is down??? I have never known that to happen.
    .
    This might be because:
    We are experiencing abnormal traffic to our network or
    the service or servers it is on is not currently available.
    Please try the following options instead:
    Try again later once we have solved the problem.
    Use our site index
    .
    The site index is usable where I saw this. Plan B for the Olympics? First the G4S failure and now doubt on the main route to London from Heathrow. That is once the passengers have made it through ‘Border Control’.
    .
    11 July 2012 Last updated at 19:31
    M4 motorway London to Heathrow reopening delayed
    The M4 disruption comes after the five-month closure of the Hammersmith Flyover
    .
    Race to fix M4 before Olympics
    Drivers told to avoid cracked M4
    .
    The main motorway link from London to Heathrow Airport will not now reopen on Thursday as planned.
    .
    The Highways Agency said it had put back reopening junctions two and three.
    .
    The motorway was shut after a crack was found in a “sensitive area” of the road structure. Large vehicles were already banned from the elevated section, known as the Boston Manor Viaduct.
    .
    ++The Highways Agency has said it expects all work to be finished before the start of the Olympic Games.++

    .
    ~~~~~
    Oh well.

    .

  • Mary

    Miliband Jr is finished whatever hopes he had before.
    .
    http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2012/jul/11/labour-adviser-tony-blair
    .
    Meet the new Labour adviser: Tony BlairFormer prime minister to advise on Olympic legacy, reuniting with leftwinger Jon Cruddas
    .

    Email Juliette Jowit, political correspondent
    guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 11 July 2012 20.46 BST

    The former PM is to advise Labour on the Olympic legacy.
    .
    Tony Blair is to be given his first formal role in the Labour party since retiring from frontline politics, when he stepped down as prime minister five years ago, as an adviser to Ed Miliband’s policy review.

    The former prime minister will be giving specific advice on the Olympic legacy and in particular how to “maximise both its economic and its sporting legacies”, Miliband said on Wednesday.

    The role reflects Blair’s part in the successful 2005 bid to host the Games and his sporting foundation, one of his key charitable causes in his retirement.

    Blair will be reunited with leftwinger Jon Cruddas, a former aide, who was brought in by Miliband to head the policy review. Cruddas spoke recently of “reforming the band” – bringing together leading lights of New Labour – in support of Miliband.

    The highly controversial move – perhaps especially within the Labour party – was announced at a fundraising event on Wednesday evening when Miliband and Blair symbolically shared a platform to make speeches.

    Miliband, who was more closely allied to Gordon Brown during the 13 years of Labour government, praised Blair’s role in helping the UK win the right to host the Olympics this summer in London. It was, said Miliband, “one of the many proud achievements of the governments that Tony led: saving the NHS, rebuilding our schools and cutting crime.

    “I want to thank Tony for what he did for our party and for our country. And I know how committed he is to Labour winning next time.”

    Blair told the Labour fundraising dinner at Arsenal’s Emirates stadium: “It’s an honour to be here tonight to support our party, whose values and principles I have always believed in and always will. And to support Ed, support his leadership, support his drive to make our party win.”

    The joint appearance was organised by Alastair Campbell, Blair’s spin doctor, the former Labour general secretary Lady McDonagh, and Richard Caborn, sports minister during the successful Olympic bid. Other guests at the event included the former deputy prime minister Lord Prescott and the Manchester United manager, Sir Alex Ferguson.

    With much of his own party – and the country – still angry about the legacy of Blair’s decision to take Britain into the Iraq war, and Labour’s clear departure from socialism under his reign, Miliband will be aware that his new role will be controversial.

    Aides played down the policy position, saying it should not be “over-interpreted”.

    “It’s something Tony knows a lot about,” said one insider. “He’s got the sports foundation and he was instrumental in bringing the Games to London.”

    In an interview last month with the London Evening Standard to mark five years since he stepped down as PM and Labour leader, Blair was asked if he would return if he were asked to be prime minister again: “Yes, sure, but it’s not likely to happen is it.”

    Otherwise, though, he was coy about what sort of role he could play in public life, adding: “What I can do is contribute to the debate, whether it is Europe or the Arab spring or areas to do with economy and public service reform here.”

    He was less shy, however, about giving controversial views on the current economic and political turmoil, his views potentially at odds with Miliband’s talk of rethinking capitalism and a revolution in banking. “I think the hardest thing for any political party now is to work out what has really changed since the financial crisis and what hasn’t,” Blair said.

    “My view is that you still, in order to win from the Labour perspective, have to have a strong alliance with business as well as the unions. You have got to be very much in the centre ground on things like public sector reform. But I understand that some people think the financial crisis has altered everything. And the mood is against this. Personally I don’t think that’s correct.”

    Cruddas, who became Blair’s link from No 10 to the trade unions between 1997 and 2001, believes the New Labour pioneer started well as an ethical socialist but then came to a “dismal end”. Significantly, friends say he argues that Blairism should not be remembered as it was at the end of the former PM’s tenure, but the early days: “Labour has to get back to what Blair deserted,” says one ally.

    As well as his political legacy, Blair remains controversial in retirement for his globetrotting activities and the vast sums of money he has made, including relationships with Portland Communications, which has advised the government of Russia, and the investment bank JP Morgan Chase.

  • Mary

    Sickening Labour as Craig says.
    .
    Miliband Jr is finished whatever hopes he had before.

    .
    Meet the new Labour adviser: Tony Blair
    Former prime minister to advise on Olympic legacy, reuniting with leftwinger Jon Cruddas
    .
    Juliette Jowit, political correspondent
    guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 11 July 2012 20.46 BST
    .
    The former PM is to advise Labour on the Olympic legacy.
    .
    Tony Blair is to be given his first formal role in the Labour party since retiring from frontline politics, when he stepped down as prime minister five years ago, as an adviser to Ed Miliband’s policy review.
    .
    The former prime minister will be giving specific advice on the Olympic legacy and in particular how to “maximise both its economic and its sporting legacies”, Miliband said on Wednesday.
    .
    /..

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2012/jul/11/labour-adviser-tony-blair

  • guest

    “Hugh Gaitskell”
    .
    “Hugh Gaitskell died at the Middlesex Hospital, London, of the rare disease lupus erythematosus, on 18th January 1963. He was replaced as leader of the Labour Party by his long time enemy, Harold Wilson. Some members of MI5 believed that Wilson was a Soviet agent. Anatoli Golitsyn also told them that Gaitskell had been poisoned by the KGB. A senior figure in MI5, Peter Wright, explained in his biography Spycatcher: “I knew him (Gaitskell) personally and admired him greatly. I had met him and his family at the Blackwater Sailing Club, and I recall about a month before he died he told me that he was going to Russia. After he died his doctor got in touch with MI5 and asked to see somebody from the Service. Arthur Martin, as the head of Russian Counterespionage, went to see him. The doctor explained that he was disturbed by the manner of Gaitskell’s death. He said that Gaitskell had died of a disease called lupus disseminata, which attacks the body’s organs. He said that it was rare in temperate climates and that there was no evidence that Gaitskell had been anywhere recently where he could have contracted the disease.” In 1968 Wright became involved with Cecil King, the publisher of the Daily Mirror, in a plot to bring down Wilson’s government and replace it with a coalition led by Lord Mountbatten.”
    .
    http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/TUgaitskell.htm

  • Conjunction

    Tom Welsh ma kes a good argument about the Lords, until its examined closely. Lord Salisbury once said that it was right that aristocrats should govern, not because they were better than anyone else, but because they were educated and because they had sufficient leisure to reflect. Remeniscent of Plato’s Republic. However that was the nineteenth century. Now the peers are really just like anyone else and however false and self-interested the Commons are, the existence of the Lords is one reason they get away with it because they use the lords to kill reform.

    As for Blair – just when I was thinking Milliband was showing some signs of common sense he kills Lords reform and invites Blair back to the seat of power.

    God help us.

  • Komodo

    The Bureau of Investigative Journalism’s recent report on their lordship’s promotion of (their) businesses using taxpayer-funded facilities is interesting, not least for the three links in the text which were made unavailable. By whom? Time Warner?
    .
    http://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/2012/06/20/sliding-doors-and-toilet-parts-launched-in-lords/
    .
    My thought is that Lords reform should go hand in hand with the extinction of SPADs. If the Commons needs to be backed by expertise (my God, does it…)then the upper chamber – with the facilities of the civil service – should provide that role. The Lords should absolutely be non-party, and should have the ultimate right of veto over the more lunatic decisions of the other place. How democratic this can be made to appear is another matter, but it would be hard to make it less so than the present arrangement.

  • Komodo

    This guy articulates my feelings on the Olympics shambles precisely –
    .
    http://cowanglobal.com/tag/qatar/
    .
    But that was before the lifejacketed turd (thanks, Rosie, nice phrase) Blair rose yet again to the surface of the foaming bowl to look after the “legacy” (prop. Qatari royal family).
    .
    And before the Army was told to cancel leave for 3400 rotated troops from Afghanistan in order to protect the corporate bonanza from, er, you know, them? The guys we’re stirring up by being in Afghanistan? Because G4S were paid by the taxpayer to fuck up?
    .
    My local primary school could run this country better.

1 2 3

Comments are closed.