baldysblog.co.uk

It got off to a good start in the Times with the Peter Brooks cartoon of Brown firing the starting pistol at his own head: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/cartoon/ Peter Brooks

One of my favourite journalists in John Rentoul was on top form too with a very good article in the Independent: http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/john-rentoul/john-rentoul-ill-put-a-wager-on-a-tory-victory-despite-the-known-unknowns-1937450.html

This Led To…

I’m sorry but I just had to wade in on the “comments section” particularly with some numpty going on about the Conservatives ‘lying’…

Your complaint about the “First Victim of an Election Campaign is Truth” is correct and applies to all parties. Although I am right of centre politically, I always enjoy reading John Rentoul, he is a fine writer who brings balance despite him being left wing. One of his best recent articles which this one mirrors was the following: http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/john-rentoul/john-rentoul-policies-smash-personalities-1912985.html

In this article he is really underlining what he wrote then, the majority of the public want to stick their head in the sand. How many times have we heard people demand that politicians “tell the truth” ? But if they are told it, they will only run away. John Rentoul is making the point here that the Tories have switched their approach to accommodate this.

The Tories Will Win

I think that John is being mean, 16 seats, more like 60 I suspect. I think the Tories will get elected and with that there will be the tacit acceptance by the electorate that they may well act differently once in power. If Osborne stands up and says “I’m sorry but things really are a whole lot worse than we expected…” and then raises VAT, it would be credible, Darling couldn’t say that could he ?

Brown is an electoral liability to Labour and Cameron’s greatest asset but what will finally “do” for Brown and Labour is their track record of total dishonesty. Whilst Alistair Darling has tried to bring some respectability back to the Treasury Benches, we all know them for the liars that they are, even Lord Mandybum, they are all past their sell by dates. The appearance of an orange coloured Blair last week only served to show how “So yesterday” they all are now.

As to corruption, Eccelston onwards…you haven’t been asleep these last 13 years old chap, Labour are totally corrupt, Taxi anyone ?

My favourite bit from the above and considering John is a Labour supporter was: “…and Ed Balls was on television – never a vote-winner, that…” had me in stitches !

A Highly Indignant Reply

In response to the above, I got a diatribe about “Tory Corruption” from a LibDem supporter, hence the following:

I don’t waft anything aside but whilst you may support the LibDems, I certainly wouldn’t. The best leader they had, Charlie, they got rid of and now we have someone in Clegg who looks like a schoolboy, seems generally only half engaged in the real world and has a wife he is totally subservient to and who makes Cherie Blair look positively angelic – no mean achievement that.

He is so important to her that she can’t be bothered to support him on the campaign trail, her job and children come before her husbands ‘little hobby’, it seems.

I do not condemn the LibDems because of a ‘lack of experience in Government’, one should always remember Wellington fought Waterloo with a new Army of raw recruits and they did well enough. No, what I do condemn them for is that they just don’t know their business of politics. Over the past two years they should have replaced Labour in the polls at least as the second party and in contention for Government in their own right, it is they who should be neck and neck with the the Conservatives not Labour.

If they cannot manage this with possibly the most unpopular PM and Government in living memory, when will they ? You might remember a couple of years ago Clegg saying that he was going to target Labour held seats, what happened apart from nothing ?

You are right, corruption does matter from wherever it comes but there is something else too, competence and that is what the LibDems lack at a National Party level, far too many chiefs and not enough Indians. I have written before that being the Leader of the LibDems is a thankless task, it must be like herding cats.

My anger with Bankers is not over the size of the bonuses they got paid, it is the fact that they were totally incompetent to the extent they drove the businesses they were responsible for into the ground. The parallel is quite simple:

The LibDems are too incompetent to even get themselves in ‘contention’ of forming the Government and on that basis, even if they did, could we trust Clegg to negotiate with the EU ? Sadly not, the combination of his MEP pension and Spanish wife would ensure Brussels walked all over him and us too.

You can call the Tories all the names you like but face reality. The Labour Party is tired, mired and out of touch just as Major’s Government was in 1997, the LibDems aren’t even within spitting distance of power, Cameron and the Conservatives are frankly the only game in town right now with the election only 4 weeks away and if Cameron pulls that off, he will have already demonstrated his competence.

You can ‘LibDem’ if you like and hopefully for you, you might get such an MP where you live but nationally, we need a Government with a working majority, a hung Parliament would be an economic disaster as Sterling halved in value which would hit the poorest in society worse of all and overnight. If Clegg and the LibDems haven’t done enough to overtake Labour as the torch bearer of radical British politics, they are incompetent in their chosen ‘trade’, the very last thing we need right now is a Government of well meaning fools and frankly, this is the polite version of what I feel, all our futures hang in the balance over this one but, my guess is that it will be a very low turnout.

Another one…

There was some demented idiot who stated that the problem with Labour and therefore the economic mess we are currently in which includes personal debt, was wholly due to them (Labour), following ‘Tory Policies’ for the past 13 years. Red rag to a Bull on that one…

You obviously like a “Nanny State” , I don’t and see it as my personal responsibility to live within my own means not some dick wad from the Government telling me what to do and when. As for Labour carrying on “Tory Policies” that is rubbish. They stuck to the Tory budget for two years and then Gordon Brown “Let it Rip”, actually Blair did too over the NHS, he announced a massive expansion in spending on TV without even consulting Brown.

The 800,000 additional Public Sector employees was wholly a Labour policy with its pensions time bomb as was PFI which was yet another booby trap for future generations of taxpayers. The NHS computer system and the ID Card fiasco was another Labour policy. As someone from an IT background, I can assure that before a single thing had been done on the NHS system at a projected 6bn Pounds, people who knew what they were talking about on such projects told them that the actual cost would be well over 20bn. As with any Labour Project, Over Promised, Under Delivered and Way Over Budget.

The arrogance of Labour and a man who as Chancellor declared on three occasions in the House that he had “Abolished Boom and Bust in the British Economy” is breathtaking. Brown was warned at the end of 2002 by the IMF that the policies being pursed by the UK Government were highly risky.

No, Brown did not get us into this mess because he followed “Tory Policies”, he got us in this mess because he was not fit for purpose either as Chancellor or Prime Minister and it is high time he and his bunch of useless cronies were gone !