Westministenders: Boris and God Knows what next. (I'm all out of ideas!)

[RedToothBrush]

Still a week until Stoke and Copeland. (Labour Hold/Con Gain unless something strange happens) QT is from Stoke next week.

A50 hits the Lords next week. Melania is being lined up to do something for the women. (God help us all).

Will UKIP survive? Will Nuttall survive? Will Labour survive? Will Trump survive? Will CNN survive? Will the Lords survive? Will Theresa May survive a class room of children?

All these questions and more

Just because Blair is odious, doesn't mean he's wrong.

We can't afford to throw away useful tools because we dislike their design ...

Mistigirl, I think my issue is with the negative language we use to describe pretty much all of our politicians. I actually think that a number of MP are genuinely motivated in large part to do good. Their judgement may be far from perfect, or to be more nuanced may be really good on one subject but frankly ropey on another. They may not be entirely altruistic - who is? But for the most part there will be good people who want to serve and get the best for their country.

Whilst we use such loaded language to cover mistakes - and I am thinking in particular of Nick Clegg and tuition fees - whilst ignoring achievements - and I am thinking of all the money Tony Blair put into the NHS and the introduction of the minimum wage - we can lose sight of the bigger picture. That doesn't mean that we shouldn't call out bad behaviour or errors for what they are, but we should not try to throw out the baby with the bathwater.

If we are so hyper-critical of those who make mistakes, we then only have the same language to use when we encounter truly obnoxious people such as Trump, Bannon, Farage and Nutgall. I would reserve the word "odious" for the latter.

It also affects our beliefs and our expectations if we are constantly calling out public figures, whilst not noticing when they do something good. We become cynical and, beyond a certain point, that is not helpful.

It also does not help to win people over to what might be essentially a good cause (not necessarily just fighting Brexit). Positive language, i.e. focussing on the actually very well-worded message in this case, would be much more helpful.

I always feel angry about Blair and Iraq. If he had not tarnished his reputation with that, then he would have been able to take much of the credit for the Good Friday Agreement, even though others were involved, not least Major. That would have been seen as a very worthwhile legacy.

Sadly we have now got May with her pious words, but actions which will probably throw NI under the bus.

I think Blair has got them rattled:

Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson added: "I urge the British people to rise up and turn off the TV next time Blair comes on with his condescending campaign."

Agree Stripey MPs are just public servants, but the culture round public service is one of attack.

Cynicism is traditional way of disarming opposition.

And if you want to talk about racism, Johnson, May et al has some very recent previous on that one.
I think Blair has got them rattled, agree Peregrina

Meanwhile, back in Brexit land ...

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/f966e8c0-f45f-11e6-b1cf-e834bbdfda95

Researchers in the UK who fear they will lose European Union funding after Brexit are being encouraged to move to France under a plan to establish a British university outpost near Paris.

French officials are offering British universities, including Oxford and Cambridge, an opportunity to retain EU subsidies by exporting academics, students and research projects to a new campus. The proposals could generate concern about a brain drain when Britain officially leaves the EU.

(contd).

Looks like the French have swalllowed Project Fear then ...

Vive la difference !

I hope Blair carries on rattling their cages. It would be great if he could do it on a daily basis to make headlines until people wake up a bit. This government is having it too easy with hardly any opposition. Corbyn is a protestor; I cannot stand him either. He has helped indirectly to create this mess by not arguing properly against all the lies and smugness displayed by IDS, Davis, Fox and co..

This would just be Oxford University returning to its roots - it was an offshoot of the Sorbonne, I believe.

^Bullying'
Iain Duncan Smith, who was a prominent Leave campaigner, said Mr Blair had shown the political elite was completely out of touch with the British people.
He compared Mr Blair returning to the political scene to the British horror comedy "Shaun of the Dead", with "his hands outstretched to tell the British people they were too stupid to be able to understand what they were voting on", adding that this "is both arrogant and a form of bullying^

As Trump accused the media, in similar terms yesterday, I wonder if they really are sharing the same strategists?

They're clever, I'll give them that, but not that clever.

Well, if nothing else, Blair has poked a wasps nest ... the current reaction is almost an internet definition of out of the woodwork. Or in IDS case, waxwork ....

George W Bush was going to have his bloody war for oil in Iraq whatever Blair did - TB was focused on trying to persuade him to get consensus in the UN and elsewhere.
UK armed forces were very small beer - sometimes embarassingly so - compared to the massive US armed forces in that war

So, I don't believe any fewer Iraquis would have died if Blair had followed France, Germany & much of the EU in believing the weapons inspectors.

Blair can definitely be held responsible for all the British casualties though.
If he'd kept the UK out of Iraq, all those Uk service personnel wouldn't have lost their lives. limbs, sight....

It's interesting: I'm catching up after having lunch with my formerly No voting, Remain supporting friend.

She said to me that the behaviour of TM/Brexiteers is akin to bullies: blaming the the bullied for "making" them attack you, manipulating the facts so that the it is "your" fault.

So as far as IDS is concerned..... Pot, kettle, black?

Le Pen will most probably make to the first round but will lose out on second because the other parties will vote against her.

Her father's ghost is difficult to bury; he was a vicious torturer during the Algerian war and many people remember this

www.henri-pouillot.fr/spip.php?article371

Blair seems to exert some supernatural horror effect that terrifies Tories.
Remember the infamous Tory 1997 election poster, with Blair's "Demon Eyes"

supernatural horror effect that terrifies tories
landslide and 3 terms was a bit annoying

I thought Shaun of the Dead was a bit of a cult film? If that is so, IDS has missed his target. This is the Blair who was so out of touch that he won 3 elections, and the hugely successful IDS who won none.

Interesting isn't it BigChoc. And the Tories were pro-Iraq war (and still are) so it's not that which worries them about Blair.

I thought Shaun of the Dead was a bit of a cult film? If that is so, IDS has missed his target

I think it's spot on.

Oh, sorry, cult ....

And the Tories were pro-Iraq war (and still are)

Glass houses ?

Of course, the LDs can hold their heads high on this one.

Strikes are this season's 'must do' or "must don't' :
www.mumsnet.com/bloggers/blog-of-the-day; mums net!
www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/feb/17/day-without-immigrants-protest-restaurants-economy-trump; US immigrants
www.standard.co.uk/lifestyle/london-life/the-womens-march-organisers-are-now-planning-a-general-strike-a3467696.html women's strike
www.southernrailway.com/your-journey/strike; rail workers
www.irr.org.uk/events/one-day-without-us-uk-national-protest/; UK immigrants.

Blair hasn't a hope of any major EU role like the Presidency:

Once A50 is invoked, the rEU do NOT want the Uk back, with all the associated aggro and special case pleading that the UK repeatedly brought within the EU.
Bringing back an unwilling, rebellious UK would earn Blair the booby prize.
The E27 want a smooth, calm - preferably EEA - Brexit not a disorderly one, but A50 for them means get on with Brexit.

The only possibility of revoking is if Brexit looks like total economic disaster for the UK AND if the E27 then manages unanimous consent - which is uncertain.
However, in that disaster scenario they wouldn't be rewarding Blair for landing them with a rescue operation.

Just the point I was about to make, LH. Blair got the motion to invade Iraq through Parliament with the backing of Theresa May, Boris Johnson, Liam Fox, David Davis, IDS, John Redwood etc etc.

Theoretically the EU might not have a choice if UK were to change its mind sheepish - we have yet to find out if A50 is reversible, BCF.

www.politics.co.uk/blogs/2017/02/17/week-in-review-the-second-coming-oif-tony-bl-air

The timetable the prime minister has set for what she is trying to do is impossible. She has promised the world but shown no signs of how she will deliver it. There is now a strong chance that talks in Europe will break down, probably sometime between spring and autumn 2018. If that happens, the cliff edge becomes real. It constitutes one of the biggest threats to British living standards this country has seen since in the modern era. And what happens when that takes place? What story will people be told?

That the dastardly Europeans have tried to punish us. They are already laying the groundwork for that narrative now. Those bloody Germans. They've always resented us since we beat them in the war and now they're taking revenge. It is as stupid a story as anyone has ever told, but it will be the core emotional message of the Brexit press campaign, enthusiastically promoted by Downing Street. And what the press writes becomes part of the political mood music of the broadcasters, as if by osmosis.

Who will be telling a story to counter it? Corbyn, the human vacuum? A man who stopped thinking sometime in the 70s and hasn't noticed yet? A man content to let this process take place in the magical belief that it somehow ends in a socialist utopia? Or one of the centrist Labour figures? The so-called moderates, who seem more concerned with proving to voters that they're tough on immigration than trying to keep in check the suicidal economic policies which stem from that promise. Tim Farron has done what he can for the Lib Dems but he does not have the standing or the infrastructure. The SNP speak only for Scotland. By their own agenda, they cannot represent the country.

There will only be the Brexit message – simple, emotionally compelling and spread by a well-oiled media infrastructure. 'The foreigners screwed us.'