Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 1959 Location: South London
Posted: Thu May 10, 2007 10:42 am Post subject: Re: Blair To Quit
David WJ Sherlock wrote:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/
The temptation is to go dancing in the streets - but no! Will his long-awaited departure make much difference?
The Indian-born Rudyard Kipling wrote:
"If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same..." which seems to me to encapsulate the message of the Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad Gita. This seems a wise counsel in this situation.
We don't know what the next PM is going to be like, whether he/she will be better or even worse, so there's not much point in getting elated now to be disappointed later. We need to keep our heads and remember that a rather luke-warm LIHOPpy 9/11 truther is standing for Labour Party leader. He won't win. He's too green and too left-wing for that and does not appear to do enough bum-licking of the PTB, nevertheless, his fighting the election gives us an opportunity for publicity.
Posted: Thu May 10, 2007 10:46 am Post subject: Re: Blair To Quit
xmasdale wrote:
David WJ Sherlock wrote:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/
The temptation is to go dancing in the streets - but no! Will his long-awaited departure make much difference?
The Indian-born Rudyard Kipling wrote:
"If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same..." which seems to me to encapsulate the message of the Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad Gita. This seems a wise counsel in this situation.
We don't know what the next PM is going to be like, whether he/she will be better or even worse, so there's not much point in getting elated now to be disappointed later. We need to keep our heads and remember that a rather luke-warm LIHOPpy 9/11 truther is standing for Labour Party leader. He won't win. He's too green and too left-wing for that and does not appear to do enough bum-licking of the PTB, nevertheless, his fighting the election gives us an opportunity for publicity.
How should we play it?
Noel
If Brown is going to take over. I would say D-Ream should write another song. Things Can Only Get Dangerous.
Political control of the judiciary via Ministry of Justice
Extraordinary rendition via UK airports
The broken promise on introducing University tuition fees
Asymmetric extradition to the US
Record trade deficit
Record prison population
Tanks at Heathrow.
Tax Freedom Day is now 9 days later than when Neo-con Lab came to power.
Gordon "Goldfinger" Brown's massive bullion reserve sell off costing us £2 billion
NHS Trusts going broke
MRSA
700,000 additional public sector, tax funded "jobs"
Increase in retirement age
The politicisation of the police service.
Imprisonment of pensioners for refusing to pay unaffordable Council Tax increases.
ID Card Bill - no passport for refuseniks
Further decimation of UK farming, fisheries and the countryside.
Detention of up to 28 days without being charged
Powers of arrest extended.
Downing Street Memo, 45 minute WMD claim etc.
Iris scanning and finger printing of school children
Walter Wolfgang et al.
False flag terrorism, hoaxes and scare mongering
Bliar inherited an optimistic and hopeful nation who gave his oh so phony New Labour project a massive landslide.
Bliar's historic 3rd Labour term was secured with the smallest vote ever in British electoral history.
Bliar leaves a society ruled by fear, ever more divided and with less hope and faith in any political solution, with the gap between the haves and the have nots wider than ever.
Take a rest from finding a way to pay your latest mortgage increase, bank loan, worrying about your job, your pension, your children, your loved ones languishing in Bliar's gulags, Council Tax, your health, MRSA, if you're going to be blown to bits today, Bird Flu and your carbon footprint by watching the Blair Rich Project tonight at 7.00pm on BBC2.
Your legacy ?
Bliar's five 'wars'.
Air strikes in Iraq (1998)
Kosovo war (1999)
Sierra Leone (2000)
Afghanistan (2001)
Iraq (2003)
Oh and Bliar's 6th War.
The war of terror on the hearts and minds of the British people.
And this.
Your post 9/11 messianic marionette message to the NWO.
The kaleidoscope has been shaken.
The pieces are in flux.
Soon they will settle again.
Before they do.
Let us re-order this world around us.
That's what I will remember you for.
You did mess with my mind, I admit.
There were times during your "reign" when you made me almost reminisce about Thatcher.
That feeling, I never, ever expected for as long as I live and is one I will never, ever forget.
Lesson learned.
June 27th 2007. Good riddance Princess Bliar.
See you at the ICC in The Hague one day being prosecuted for War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity. _________________ The Medium is the Massage - Marshall McLuhan.
Posted: Fri May 11, 2007 8:22 am Post subject: Thanks for that Mark!!
We forgot the murder of Dr. David Kelly, Robin Cook?
Although a left gatekeeper like Chomsky, Galloway et al on the issue of 9/11 illuminating is the quote in bold from a former Blair advisor.
Quote:
Famed as a favourite attack dog in the imperial kennel
Blair's first loyalty was to the White House. The result has been a legacy of hatred that ultimately ended his premiership
Tariq Ali
Friday May 11, 2007
The Guardian
The departure, too, was spun in classic New Labour, Dear Leader fashion. A carefully selected audience, a self-serving speech, the quivering lip and soon the dramaturgy was over. He had arrived at No 10 with a carefully orchestrated display of union flags. Patriotic fervour was also on show yesterday, with references to "this blessed country ... the greatest country in the world" - no mention of the McDonald's, Starbucks, Benetton that adorn every high street - nor of how Britain under his watch came to be seen in the rest of the world: a favourite attack dog in the imperial kennel.
Tony Blair's principal success was in winning three general elections in a row. A second-rate actor, he turned out to be a crafty and avaricious politician. Bereft of ideas, he eagerly grasped and tried to improve on Margaret Thatcher's legacy. But though in many ways Blair's programme has been a euphemistic, if bloodier, version of Thatcher's, the style of their departures is very different. Thatcher's overthrow by her fellow Conservatives was a matter of high drama. Blair makes his unwilling exit against a backdrop of car bombs and carnage in Iraq, with hundreds of thousands left dead or maimed from his policies, and London a prime target for terrorist attack. Thatcher's supporters described themselves afterwards as horror-struck by what they had done. Even some of Blair's greatest sycophants in the media confess to a sense of relief as he finally quits.
Blair was always loyal to the occupants of the White House. In Europe he preferred Aznar to Zapatero, Merkel to Schröder, was seriously impressed by Berlusconi and, most recently, made no secret of his support for Sarkozy. He understood that privatisation and deregulation at home were part of the same mechanism as wars abroad.
If this judgment seems unduly harsh, let me quote Rodric Braithwaite, a former senior adviser to Blair, writing in the Financial Times on August 2 2006: "A spectre is stalking British television, a frayed and waxy zombie straight from Madame Tussaud's. This one, unusually, seems to live and breathe. Perhaps it comes from the CIA's box of technical tricks, programmed to spout the language of the White House in an artificial English accent ... Mr Blair has done more damage to British interests in the Middle East than Anthony Eden, who led the UK to disaster in Suez 50 years ago. In the past 100 years we have bombed and occupied Egypt and Iraq, put down an Arab uprising in Palestine and overthrown governments in Iran, Iraq and the Gulf. We can no longer do these things on our own, so we do them with the Americans. Mr Blair's total identification with the White House has destroyed his influence in Washington, Europe and the Middle East itself: who bothers with the monkey if he can go straight to the organ-grinder?"
This, too, is mild compared to what is privately said in the Foreign Office and MoD. Senior diplomats have told me it would not upset them too much if Blair were tried as a war criminal. But while neither Blair nor any of those who launched a war of aggression and occupation in Iraq have been held to account, a civil servant and MP's researcher were yesterday shamefully jailed for exposing some of the dealings between Bush and Blair that lay behind the war.
What this reveals is anger and impotence. There is no mechanism to get rid of a prime minister unless their party loses confidence. The Conservative leadership decided Thatcher had to go because of her negative attitude to Europe. Labour tends to be more sentimental towards its leaders, and in this case they owed so much to Blair that nobody wanted to be cast in the role of Brutus. In the end he decided to go himself. The disaster in Iraq had made him hated and support began to ebb. One reason for the slowness was that the country is without a serious opposition. In parliament, the Conservatives simply followed Blair. The Lib Dems were ineffective. Blair had summed up Britain's attitude to Europe at Nice in 2000: "It is possible, in our judgment, to fight Britain's corner, get the best out of Europe for Britain, and exercise real authority and influence in Europe. That is as it should be. Britain is a world power."
This grotesque fantasy that "Britain is a world power" is meant to justify that it will always be EU-UK. The real union is with Washington. France and Germany are seen as rivals for Washington's affections, not potential allies in an independent EU. The French decision to reintegrate themselves into Nato and pose as the most vigorous US ally was a structural shift which weakened Europe. Britain responded by encouraging a fragmented political order in Europe through expansion, and insisted on a permanent US presence there.
Blair's half-anointed successor, Gordon Brown, is more intelligent but politically no different. It is a grim prospect: an alternative politics - anti-war, anti-Trident, pro public services - is confined to the nationalist parties in Scotland and Wales. Its absence nationally fuels the anger felt by substantial sections of the population, reflected in voting against those in power, or not voting at all.
· Tariq Ali is the author of Rough Music: Blair, Bombs, Baghdad, Terror, London
tariqali3@btinternet.com
Joined: 25 Jul 2005 Posts: 18335 Location: St. Pauls, Bristol, England
Posted: Fri May 11, 2007 9:30 am Post subject:
The past decade has seen many portrayals of outgoing Prime Minister Tony Blair on film and TV. Comic Rory Bremner was among the first to play him in his Channel 4 satire shows. I especially remember the brilliant scenes with Cherie perched on Alistair Campbell's knee.
Posted: Fri May 11, 2007 9:35 am Post subject: Another one...
Quote:
Blair’s legacy: Militarism abroad, social devastation at home
11 May 2007
On Thursday, Tony Blair announced the timetable for his departure as leader of the Labour Party and therefore as prime minister. He will not formally leave office until the end of June so as to enable the party to select his successor, which will almost certainly be Chancellor Gordon Brown.
Blair’s announcement is probably the most long-awaited resignation in living memory. Ever since the 2005 general election there has been much talk that Blair’s departure was imminent.
For a man who has made so much of the “hand of history” being on his shoulder and of his “legacy”—a word now being bandied about by Downing Street and the media—there was no good time to announce he would stand aside.
Even more detested in Britain than his mentor Margaret Thatcher—officially the most hated prime minister in recent history—opinion polls record that his legacy is one soaked in the blood of the preemptive war and occupation of Iraq. Some 50 percent of the population believe it is for this ignominious reason that Blair will find his place in the history books. The next highest numbers believe it will be due to his alliance with President George W. Bush.
Blair leaves office as an unindicted war criminal and the first sitting prime minister in history to be interviewed as part of a police investigation (the “cash for honours” scandal). It is no coincidence that Lord Levy had earlier announced that he would stand down as the prime minister’s special Middle East envoy. In his capacity as Blair’s chief fundraiser, Levy has been arrested and questioned under caution by police investigating the alleged sale of peerages in return for party loans.
The prime minister has reportedly been planning his retirement for some time in discussions with the likes of Rupert Murdoch and the then-chief executive of British Petroleum, Lord Browne. It has been suggested that out of concern that he not be seen to be cashing in too quickly, his first project will be to establish a global foundation to foster “greater understanding” between the three “Abrahamic faiths” of Christianity, Judaism and Islam.
This is an obscene conceit in itself, considering his role in the Middle East. But no doubt Blair will once again be able to utilise his skills in soliciting donations from rich benefactors. His real money-making venture is expected to be speaking tours of the United States. Estimates as to what he can expect to earn in his first year out of office range between a conservative £5 million and £10 million, and a book deal is estimated to be worth between £5 million and £8 million.
There is no question that Blair will be feted in right-wing circles, especially in the US. This is first of all for his record of unbridled militarism in alliance with Washington. He is also valued in these circles because, just as in the US, his “war on terror” rhetoric has been used to justify the most antidemocratic and authoritarian measures.
Just as importantly, his reputation has been built on the huge transfer of wealth from working people to the global financial corporations and the super-rich that he helped engineer in the UK.
Last month’s Sunday Times Rich List recorded that the richest 1,000 people in Britain more than trebled their wealth under Blair. Their fortunes grew by 20 percent last year alone, to a combined £360 billion.
London has been described as a “magnet for billionaires,” attracted by the UK’s reputation as an “on-shore tax-haven” in which the wealthy—many of whom earned their fortunes through asset-stripping, privatization and financial speculation—pay next to nothing on their incomes.
In contrast, the number of people living in poverty in Britain last year rose from 12.1 million to 12.7 million, a rise of 600,000 people, whilst the number of poor children increased by 200,000 to 3.8 million between 2005 and 2006.
It is his role in enriching a small minority of the population that has also earned him kudos from Britain’s media, including the nominally liberal press. The Observer editorialised April 29, “Britain is better off after a decade with Tony Blair in charge. Wealth has been created, and wealth has been redistributed. That is what Labour governments have always hoped to do. It has happened without a brake on global competitiveness.”
To the extent that commentators have been forced to acknowledge Blair’s role in Iraq, it is portrayed as a tragic and isolated mistake that mars an otherwise enviable record. This conceals the fact that Iraq is part of a resurgence of imperialist militarism that has included sending Britain to war in Kosovo, Sierra Leone and Afghanistan, and which continues with the current provocations against Iran.
That the media should reduce Iraq to a mere detail is bad enough. That it does so in the aftermath of the devastating losses suffered by Labour in the elections on May 3—in which the war played a key role—is testament to the gulf between the ruling elite and their political apologists and the mass of working people.
The elections saw Labour lose control in Scotland for the first time in 50 years, and delivered the party its worst result in Wales since 1918. In England, where Labour was already at an unprecedented low, it was wiped out in 90 local authorities and lost almost 500 councillors. Overall, its share of the vote stands at just 27 percent, under conditions in which turnout never went much beyond 50 percent.
There has been much discussion on the elections revealing the extent to which the coalition that brought Blair to power in 1997—between Labour’s traditional support in the major cities and towns and a layer of former Conservative voters in marginal constituencies—has broken down.
Andrew Rawnsley in the Observer May 6 noted that “to non-tribal voters, his detachment from his party was always central to his electoral appeal. It was his ability to reach out to parts of the country not touched by previous Labour leaders that has kept him in Number 10 for such a remarkably long span.... Tony Blair has proved that an UnLabour prime minister leading a Labour government can be electorally very potent.”
Like Margaret Thatcher, Rawnsley continued, “he won by creating a coalition that gathered support from beyond his party’s core vote. Like her, his electoral triumphs at Westminster were accompanied by a hollowing-out of the party beyond it. And as with her, his coalition has eventually fractured.”
Rawnsley’s reference to the “hollowing-out” of Labour is telling, but it is one that he skips over and other commentators completely ignore. This is because, like much of the pro-Labour media, the Observer is involved in a concerted effort to rescue New Labour from oblivion under a Brown leadership. The lesson, Rawnsley continues, is that “the chancellor must remember that New Labour won power in the first place by appealing to affluent and aspirational middle-class voters.”
The excited chatter about New Labour’s “coalition” is bogus. In the final analysis, all parliamentary majorities depend on such combinations, including Labour’s landslide victory in 1945 that was secured on the basis of a programme of significant social reforms. In New Labour’s case, however, its electoral victory was built on the monumental fiction that it was possible to marry the concerns of working people with an unbridled big business agenda.
No amount of repackaging can conceal the fact that this perspective has been proven to be little more than a smokescreen behind which the rich have become even richer while the vast majority have been reduced to a precarious and debt-ridden existence.
The real pro-Blair coalition—the one that dare not speak its name—was between big business and the super-rich and the Labour and trade union bureaucracy.
It was because of its past association with the working class that Labour was able to complete Thatcher’s abandonment of the welfare state model—the “mixed economy” of nationalised industries and public service provision—and, with it, all the gradualist notions that were essential to securing social peace in the postwar period.
The trade unions not only played an essential political role in fashioning New Labour’s right-wing agenda, but also in preventing any resistance to it, whilst the government cut public spending, held down wages and privatised health and educational provision.
Nothing epitomises the invidious character of the trade union bureaucracy more than its refusal to back the mass protests against the Iraq war, on the grounds that to do so would jeopardise a Labour government. Indeed, the fact that Blair can expect to make a graceful exit from Downing Street at a time of his own choosing, rather than being forced out of office as he deserves, is primarily the responsibility of the Trades Union Congress.
At the same time, the manner of Blair’s departure is eloquent testimony to the absence of any principled opposition to Blair within the Labour Party itself. He never faced a serious challenge on the left. Rather the party’s official left wing dwindled to a rump, while Blair’s inner coterie was staffed by a host of former “lefts”—many with a Stalinist pedigree.
Big business and the trade unions are now attempting to build support for a continuation of this alliance under Brown. In an effort to salvage Labour, even the bitter hostilities between the Blair and Brown factions of the party have been temporarily set aside, with the chancellor’s succession to leadership more of a coronation than a contest.
The fundamental problem they face, however, is that Blair’s “success” was built on the corpse of the Labour Party. With big business having monopolised all the official parties, in the process transforming Labour into a neo-conservative rump, any possibility of social tensions finding safe release has also been eliminated.
Brown—the joint architect of New Labour—can no more turn back the clock than he can jump out of his own skin. Much of Brown’s claims to be setting out a different agenda to Blair’s are about presentation and securing the support of Parliament—something made necessary by Labour’s dwindling majority and the widespread belief that parliamentary democracy has been eviscerated by a sleazy, corrupt and unaccountable clique. Of the agenda of militarism and war, he has nothing to say other than an indication that he will allow Parliament a vote when a future war is declared.
There can be no return to the old political setup, when millions of workers looked to Labour as “their party.” It is a party of the financial oligarchy, bitterly hostile to any measures that encroach on the interests of capital and the rich—a fact made plain by the derision within its ranks at the prospect of a “left” leadership bid by Michael Meacher or John McDonnell. So antithetical is the Labour Party to even the tamest support for social reforms that it is questionable if the chosen “left” candidate will be able to muster the backing of 45 members of Parliament necessary to make such a bid.
The disenfranchising of the working class is a European and international phenomenon. Across the continent, the former social democratic parties have adopted the policies of the right. Their names are the only remaining vestiges of their origins as mass organisations of the working class, retained only in order to sow political confusion in an attempt to impose their deeply unpopular policies on a hostile electorate.
This presages enormous class and political conflicts. But, as recent elections here and in France and Germany have shown, if right-wing social democrats are not to be simply replaced by right-wing Conservatives, and social inequality and the dangers of new wars are to be overcome, workers and youth must establish their political independence from the bourgeoisie and its “left” appendages through the building of a genuine international socialist party.
.................
"At that point, the shareholders would be at least as concerned as would the banks." Metronet has been criticised for doling out maintenance, repair and enhancement work to a closed shop of its five shareholders, but the company announced recently that it will open up some station overhauls to outside bidders.
The PPP was implemented in 2003 following a bitter war of words between the London mayor, Ken Livingstone, and the government <Gordon Brown>* - culminating in a high court case which the mayor lost. However, the capital's pre-eminent politician fared better in the PR battle.
Mr Livingstone said the arrangement was "fatally flawed" because it would compromise safety standards, while his transport commissioner at the time, Bob Kiley, accused Gordon Brown of being a "wizard of Oz" figure forcing through the partial privatisation. Ministers said London Underground could not be trusted to deliver the work on time and on budget following the troubled extension of the Jubilee Line.
Under the terms of the PPP, Metronet receives monthly instalments of taxpayers' money - £660m in 2005 – which are boosted by bonuses if targets are met but are whittled away by fines if there are delays and mishaps, such as the notorious failure to prepare stretches of track for a heatwave two years ago.
The New Nazi labour party will be busily scouring the country for labour shills to round up and bus to his farewell leaving parade. All there with fake smiles, waving and cheering while the TV's zoom in to create the illusion of a great,honest statesman being roundly applauded for a job well done, while joe public are all wondering, what does one have to do to be tried as a war criminal?. Now where did i put my sick bag?
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