MMofM has been a politics-free zone for too long.
Time to up the ante.
I will state now: I like Tony Blair. I have a lot of criticisms of him. Regarding the war in Iraq, I will never forgive him. Blood on his hands. What is most frustrating is that he still believes it was the 'right' thing to do. And in some stupid way I think he is genuine. I find his idealistic belief of doing the 'right' thing to be worse than cynical stupid arrogant power-crazy Bush willy-waving.
And I'm angry at the way that Tony has squandered such goodwill from the electorate, and has allowed the unconscionable foreign policy to dominate political discourse at the expense of the Domestic Agenda.
I don't subscribe to the pendulum theory of electoral politics. It's too simple a psephology. Most people don't radically change their views, principles or policies. What does change is the emphasis people put on different aspects; turn-out can affect an election result; also the willingness to vote for the third party, rather than one's favoured, to get rid of the 'other' party.
And there is oppositionalism. Some of it positive: in a democracy is it vital that people scrutinise and criticise all those that hold power. It is possible to do that and stay loyal, it is also possible to do that and change allegiance. There is also a negative, nihilist, anti-everything standpoint. "I don't like what The Government is doing so I'll carp from the sidelines but not offer a sensible alternative". Regardless of who 'The Government' is.
In Autumn 1990, I watched the fall of Thatcher. At the time with barely disguised glee. Although I later realised that the toppling of Thatch was crucial to the Tories winning the 1992 election.
To put it simply, Tony has to go. He said years ago he did not want to go on and on like Thatch, living an increasingly surreal existence divorced from the concerns of the population, deluded and illusional, unnaysayable and trapped in a belief in their own insuperability.
There is so much that has been achieved by the Labour Government since 1997, stuff that people take for granted and then say, in the same breath, "What's this government done ?".
Some of it has been inadequate to achieve what was intended. Some of it has brought about unintended consequences. Some has been misguided despite its worthiness. Some has had inevitable consequences, and politics is often about the electorate's view of whether the consequences are worth the remedy (eg healthy economy leads to more economic immigration).
But the Labour Government has not run out of ideas (possibly the criticism remains that there too many ideas), is not bending in the wind to pick up every passing fad, bereft of substance, like the Tories, and isn't a rudderless leaderless irrelevance like the LibDims.
The personality of the Leader shouldn't matter for a political party. But it does. And it's time for a change at the top.
Oh, there's a relevant link here: Minister joins Blair exit demands
Anyone dare go over to Tom Watson's blog and shout "Splitter!"?
