A sociologist, Labourite and accidental blogger writes...
Image courtesy of Channel 4 and their new interactive web2 type site Who Knows Who which reveals the incestuous nature of life at the top. Related programming begins on Saturday without another airing of faction docu-drama When Boris Met Dave at 8pm.
The nation feels terrible about the situation that’s arisen about Mrs Janes. Losing your own child is the worst nightmare for every parent – her son Jamie was just 20 years old. The PM-penned sloppy-looking letter was not appreciated by her, although by contrast other recipients of similar ones were on the tv news yesterday saying they were touched by the hand-written aspect of theirs. However having just clicked on the Sun website to hear the converstion between Gordon Brown and her I wonder if there is there a danger that the Murdoch rag is using the greiving mum to score points against a PM who it openly declared war on during the week of the Labour party conference. Why else would a transcript of the 13 minute conversation be available on several pages of the paper today? Obviously the Sun rigged the whole thing up, who normally records phone conversations after all? The clickable version is an edited highlights of 4 mins, obviously selectively cut.
Gordon Brown has written a few of these before (229) and sadly Mrs Janes’ one will not be the last. It was sobering to hear her describe exactly what happened to her son: bringing a human dimension to figures that we hear about in an often clinical way. The timing of all this was all the more poignant this poppy season with Rememberance Day having recently happened but let’s hope she is not succumbing to playing out the political agendas of the Sun and the Murdochs.
This was the best pic I could find but following the dribs and drabs coming out, it looks like it’s the Clapperboard signalling CUT for state sponsored property purchase gains/ duck-houses/ moat cleaning/ porn DVDs/ gingernut biccies/ keeping it the family regarding staffing arrangements.
Opening titles for the cinema-themed Granada show of yesteryear are here (1981 version) while a whole episode (from that golden year 1972) is a click away here.
As David Cameron has egg on his face by U-turning on his cast-iron pledge to assure Britons a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty, should a Conservative government be elected, a new debate has launched on the Future of the European left at the website of Social Europe Journal.
According to Labour philospher king Jon Cruddas who is behind the project:
“The poor results in the European elections in June were proof that we need to revive and reinvent our traditions. Since then the elections in Germany have delivered a terrible result for the SPD and in Britain the Labour Party faces a very difficult future. Change is essential. But what kind of change? In April 2009 Andrea Nahles and myself jointly published a document ‘Building the Good Society’ which we launched in London and Berlin. It brought together social democrats from Germany and Britain to discuss a new direction for social democracy in Europe. The next stage is to use this exploratory text to build a pan-European network of social democrats who are looking ahead to build the good society.”
Looks to be an interesting unfolding debate. I was at a meeting at the weekend of folks from the recently-launched Downing Street Project who also thought that “change” was something that the British public are thirsting after right now but I think the general mood is one of “anti-politics” since the whole expenses furore and the unalloyed rage it unleashed. The Czech result however seems to have put Europe back on the UK political radar. The EU is often painted by the right-wing press as something restrictive and interfering whereas the aim of the series of articles in this thread is to use the Obama-esque “another world is possible” narrative in a European context. Am hoping to add my voice at some stage.
Spotted these on the Lower East Side today… making me feel right at home. Proof, if proof were needed, that America really is a nation of immigrants.
Forgot to say I saw Vince Cable speak at Kingston University Student Lib Dem Society the other day.
He was quite donnish, as befitting someone with an economics PhD. For example his talk included a section on the formation of the SDP/Liberal Alliance, which nobody really talks about anymore. Cable is ex-Labour ex-SDP and I think no current Labour person could have really disagreed with his commentary on what is happening now. He did do that annoying Lib Dem “I told you so” thing claiming that he was warning it would go tits up 5 years ago, however when asked on government handling of the crisis he said when the time came they made all the right decisions unlike the Tories whose plans for cuts would worsen things by causing unemployment among other things. When someone asked whose fault it all was the man who along with Robert Peston has been hailed a hero of the recession (at least until mansion tax-gate) answered “Well I don’t think organising a lynchmob to go round Gordon Brown’s house would be very productive”. Right on.
Most memorable quote for me was “In Teddingdon the big issue is parking, even despite the collapse of the world economy crashing down like a pack of cards…”
Talking of suburbia, if anyone’s going to this later see you there.
Was present recently at Harriet Harman speaking at an Ealing Southall dinner then at the Foreign Office’s annual Eid gathering with David Milliband, Alan Johnson and John Denham. Nice to be at the bashes but it did strike me that speeches to ethnic voters are often pretty samey… fantastic contribution to our vibrant society, blah blah blah. Do these politicians speak to each other before giving them?
Longer post at the fabby revamped Labour list here including a pic that some might caption as a future dream ticket.
All over the political spectrum people are recovering from party conference season including the media and corporate exhibitors. The big three are done with the SNP remaining next week however it all got me thinking
1. Isn’t a four day love-in a bit long for any delegates in non-political jobs? Commentators claimed that Labour attendance shrank after Brown’s speech on Tuesday but that’s probably because the delegates had to flee back to work. The Tories were trapped until yesterday.
2. At around an hour, the leader’s speeches are over-long, particularly as they are chopped for tv. Lots of the commentary on Cameron said it looked better on the news-bulletins than in the hall, probably because an hour is an age where everyone feels time-poor. Surely for leaders to distill their argument into a shorter space would be more challenging.
3. Policy-making is almost zilch at all of them nowadays. They are effectively rallies.
Just some thoughts to mull over on a Friday anyway – as seen this morning on BBC Breakfast News in case anyone was watching.
UPDATE: Cif post by me on this here
1. Boris-appointed Conservative deputy mayor Ian Clements found guilty of fraud for claiming £156 of restuarant meals on expenses. He quit in the Summer when it all came to light and now will have to account for his actions with a suspended prison sentence and community service.
2. From the Manchester Evening News, hot on the heels of the revelations of Cameron quaffing bubbly on the sly at Conservative conference when we are meant to be in an age of austerity, another Tory has been arrested for obtaining and downing a £150 bottle of the stuff from swanky conference hotel the Midland without payment.
Food and drink to their opponents, both stories.
Have a post up over at Progress with this title kinda pondering whether the Tories can pull it off in bagging the Asian vote. I think not as people like my parents seem to have long memories about Enoch Powell and all that but then there is a new breed of Tory candidate who don’t have the same hang-ups and like all the private sector personal responsibility messages who are being welcomed with open arms.No section of the electorate should be taken for granted by any party and it’ll be interesting to monitor this one. Of course most people classify themselves as manythings not just their continent of origin so treating “Asians” as a bloc vote becomes less and less relevant with successive generations if indeed it ever was valid.
Was tempted to call this post “currying favour” then realised I’d already used the title earlier – this *is* my 373rd post though in my defence.
