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Apparently Cherie Blair is publishing some kind of biography shortly and as a practising “Human Rights” Lawyer who had continued her illustrious legal career whilst her husband was Prime Minister, even if buying a railway ticket was ‘too much’ for her, I would say “why not ?” I have never found the idea of Tony Blair as a lawyer credible but, she does work at it.

To my mind, she must have some interesting insights into subjects such as “Human Rights” but set against the realities of political power and influence. Between loyalty to her ‘man’ and loyalty to her avocation, she should have something interesting to say and be well placed to illuminate the conflicts between ethics and personal interests. The fine line between theory and the reality of “the art of the possible”, it could easily be a “must read” for generations to come.

Alas

Unfortunately, I suspect not and I hope it may be interesting for me to state just why I feel this way but be assured, it is all speculation, interpretation and a degree of “gut feeling” because I have never met the woman and am unlikely ever to do so in the future (hopefully).

However and despite heavy mortgage payments on the Blair property in Connaught Square, I find it difficult to understand just why a book scheduled for publication in the Autumn has suddenly been bought forward to late Spring/early Summer when “Gordon” is clearly in the pooh and is there another purpose in them doing so ?

I Think There Is…

But it has nothing to do with the Blair’s trying to undermine Brown but everything to do with “cashing in” on a brand before it fails totally and any books ending up in the remainders bin. At its heart, publishing is a business and the aim is to make money for both the publishing house and its author. From the perspective of the Marketing people being confronted by the Labour Party heading for a possible meltdown at their Autumn Party Conference and a Mrs Blair who is constrained in her comments, get it out as fast as possible, must seem their only course of action. If nothing else it may pick up some holiday beach reading sales.

It is said that Mrs Blair does not put the knife into Gordon to anything like the degree that she may have wanted to and is that a surprise ? In war, it is the victors who write the history, in domestic politics, there are few victors and indeed, even what looks like a ‘victory today’, in 10 years time, may well be seen as the total disaster it probably always was.

May I Suggest a Lesson for All ?

Many years ago, I read one of the funniest autobiographies I have ever come across by the British Actor David Niven who by all accounts, was as genuine a man in real life as he projected publicly. The book is called “The Moon’s a Balloon” and it covered his life up until and during the Second World War, with great tales of his time in Hollywood prior to the outbreak of war and his return to the Army.

It was a great read and I believe a commercial success, as a consequence, he was prevailed upon to write a sequel called “Bring on the Empty Horses”. This second book was not a success and to a large part it was most likely because being set post war, many of the people were still alive and working in the Entertainment Industry so I suspect that David Niven erred on the side of being kind to people, the consequence of which was that it was nowhere near as funny as his first book.

The current fashion for people to rush out a “book deal” the moment they leave office is frankly foolish, what are you going to say ? What are you going to write about ? Regardless of making fun of John Prescott, the reality is that any of these books written so immediately after the event, can be little better than say a book called “My Life” by Wayne Rooney or the average offering from “Hello” magazine.

In fact although Rooney has only lived a couple of decades, his inability to practise any self control so he gets penalised far too frequently, is more interesting than some old fart either in or associated with the Labour Government. Rooney is uninteresting, ex politicians are just plain boring.

The Odd Legacy of New Labour

Over the past 11 years we have seen an avalanche of “Don’t Do This or That…” legislation by the Labour Government most of which reflects middle class angst and a NIMBY mentality, “my rights to stop you smoking…” the list goes on. However, this has gone hand in glove with a surge of increasing low level disorder by the burgeoning underclass which spills over into increasing levels of violence, youth killings and so on.

For all the “new” labels attached, this Government by not respecting other people’s views and the possibility of alternative courses of action, have made some serious mistakes. They have always been “prescriptive” hectoring, strident, never been embracing and inclusive and it is on this petard they have lanced themselves.

It is therefore quite amusing that that John Prescott, Tony and Cherie Blair should end their public lives scribbling self-justifying nonsense to compete with say a Victoria Beckham biography. They should have recorded the events at the time, their reaction to them and only turned to an experienced writer to put it all together with lots of independent background stuff when they were old and most of their contemporary s had died or also left the stage. I guess the problem is that a pulp fiction politician can only deliver pulp fiction memoires and therefore “immortality” will always elude them !